That one was hypothetical anyway so that's fine.

"Mom and Dad called while you were out," Edie says. "I explained everything. I'm not sure if they fully believed me but they're glad I'm okay."

"Yeah, me too," she says, hugging her sister again. To the fluff: "I killed two witches."

Congratulations!

"Are there any other magical girls in this city?"

Sometimes. Magical girls often move around a lot, chasing witches.

"But right now I'm the only one in residence?"

They don't all tell me where they live when they're at home.

"Okay, but am I the only one who regularly hunts witches here?"

No.

"Okay, see, that is the information I wanted to have. Are you bad at guessing what people actually want to know, or does it just amuse you to make getting answers akin to pulling teeth?"

There are a lot of things I don't understand about humans.

"Okay. Fluffy xenosapient. Not the worst thing ever."

So fluffy.

Pet pet. "I guess there's not much to do until they get around to discharging you."

"Pretty much. Hopefully killing those witches should help a little."

Eventually Edie is checked and shooed.

And then they go home and prove magic is real to their parents and Edie continues quizzing the fluff on mostly wish-related topics for a few days and Emily doesn't run out of room on the grief seeds she has and doesn't go out to kill another witch and then--

between one moment and the next, everything changes.

"What the fuck."

"Hm?"

It is January 25, in the early afternoon.

"We were just at school!"

"Uh, no we weren't."

"Am I losing time? What time is it?" She gets out her phone and checks the time.

She sees the date.

"What the actual fuck."

"Edie you're starting to worry me."

"My phone says it's January 25!"

"Because it...is?"