Uluru
Amid the multitude of “appropriate” merch—paper garlands, stuffed animals, shelves lined with figurines, a poster for an anime currently on air, posters from decade-old and two-decade-old anime—sat several girls dressed up as characters Uluru didn’t know. They were having a tea party.
This was Magi-magi Cal-cal, the café where transformed magical girls met up pretending to cosplay. This place famously served tea to magical girls while not in their civilian forms. Uluru could eat cake in magical-girl form there, and nobody would get angry at her. And the magical girl sitting in front of Uluru blended in even more than she did. Magical girls and humans alike kept asking, “Can I take a picture with you?” roughly every five minutes, which was annoying.
“So.” Uluru waited until a fifth person finished asking for a photo, then placed her fork on her plate. She found the resulting clink irritating. “Why were you stalking Snow White?”
Dark Cutie, the magical girl who had just taken a photo with that fifth person, looked offended. “I wasn’t stalking her.”
“Then what were you doing?”
“Gathering intelligence.”
“What?”
“I’d figured that the final battle with Snow White was nigh. I sensed it in my blood. That feeling never leads me astray. So then I had to prepare for this battle. It’s the proper thing to do for a protagonist.”
Uluru had regrets—calling Dark Cutie here, asking her that question, inviting her to tea (though Uluru wasn’t footing the bill). Ask a magical girl who lived in a world outside of common sense a question, and she was going to give you an answer from a world outside common sense. Uluru had been wasting her time on something pointless.
“Now for my question,” said Dark Cutie.
“Huh? What?”
“Why are you helping Snow White?”
“She would have a tough time on her own. Uluru isn’t so irresponsible that she would give this her all and then call it quits.”
Uluru didn’t want any more magical girls winding up like her sisters, sacrificed for others. Uluru was helping Snow White because she thought that she might make a world where magical girls wouldn’t be used up and thrown away. But she hadn’t been able to say something so embarrassing to Snow White herself—even if Snow White would hear her thoughts with her magic—and she really didn’t want to talk about that with some crazy magical girl.
“One more thing,” said Dark Cutie.
“What the heck? Uluru only asked one question, and she didn’t even get a decent answer. Some deal this is. You’re not being fair.”
“I killed your sister.”
The mess of thoughts in Uluru’s head was all cleaned up without a sound. It was simple inside now. Dark Cutie had killed Sorami. Uluru knew this. She had seen it.
“…So?” she said.
“You don’t want to get revenge?”
“Uluru does want revenge. But not right now.”
“I see. I don’t know when that will be, but I’ll look forward to it nonetheless.”
Uluru stood up and raised her hand. “Another chocolate cake!” she called to the staff before sitting back down.
Dark Cutie recrossed her legs and pointed to the menu. “They don’t have chocolate cake.”
“Yeah they do. Uluru was just eating some.”
“That’s Princess Chocolat of the Cream Kingdom. The name is important. Use the right one.”
“Agh, so annoying! You’re just talking nonsense! Oh yeah—Uluru told you two things, but you only told Uluru one. So Uluru’s gonna add one more.”
“Yes?”
“Letting you go unchecked would be dangerous, so we’re gonna share information. Tell me your MINE username.”
Dark Cutie looked back at Uluru, then averted her gaze. Uluru wondered what she was staring at—it was the Cutie Healer poster on the wall.