Dear Diary,

It's so weird being able to see Mana. It's hard to describe what it's like seeing it, although by now I've got three, maybe four different ways of seeing it, and each of them is different. So maybe it's not just my ability to describe shit failing, but Mana being weird in and of itself.

The first way I saw it was by Shaping it, of course. A brilliant line of scintillating energy in the air, at an intensity that ought to be blinding but somehow wasn't. Like, arc welder intensity. In case you're wondering, Eastside used to have a shop class, and one day I cut class and snuck in, and it turns out the class was cut so quickly that nobody ever cleared the place out. That meant there was an arc welding machine just sitting there, mostly ready to use. They even had those stick things to go in it. Amazing what you can find how to videos for online. But that's what my Shaping reminds me of; that brilliant scintillating light that somehow doesn't blind anybody or cast any shadows. Well, it doesn't blind me, and doesn't cast shadows that I can see. Or remember.

That's one of the weirdest things about Mana, I think. Most of the people who describe it describe it as light. Even Saffron, when she's talking about dark Mana, isn't talking about not-light, but about some kind of dark light. Heh. Kinda would be funny if she popped out a Mana Blade of Dark mana and Murder Mittens and Ice Pop started glowing like white tee shirts do under a blacklight. But there are no shadows, no squinting when I look at it. That's weird, right?

Although really I'm not sure if that's true for everybody or just me. I recall when I first saw the ley lines above the school, they looked like kinda heat haze wavery things. Almost like a trick of the light, except they were stable and steady, at least as much as anything that's flowing. Because they do, they look like they're flowing. From what I remember of shoving my arm in, they are flowing. Flowing Mana, running through the sky. But everybody else who saw me looking definitely thought I had some kinda issue, because as Saffron described it, looking at ley lines is like staring at the sun. Thing is, when we're out there standing on the roof, everybody's got just the one shadow, the one cast by sunlight. So there's still no shadows from it. Like, there are shadows from the Mana Lamps, but those produce normal light, or I wouldn't be able to see them, right?

Y'know, I haven't actually tried to look at the ley lines while I'm high on Fae Grain. I really ought to do that at some point. Because that's the third way I've been able to see Mana, of course. If I'm dosed up with Fae Grain or anything made out of it, I can see Mana. From what I can tell, I can see it almost like Saffron or Doc Roberts or anybody else who can see it normally. So I'm wondering if I look at a ley line or even my own Mana Blade while I'm high on Fae Grain, or if I'll wind up blinding myself. That would kinda suck. The Mana Blade thing. Ley lines aren't exactly common, from what I've seen.

Yesterday I leaned a new way to see mana. Doc Roberts' new Mana Analysis Shape not only amplifies the details of Mana Shapes and does that weird slowing thing where I can see them forming, see how the Mana twists around itself to rearrange reality into the configuration the Shaper wants it, it also does this weird... I don't want to call it 'color coding', because none of the colors are ones I'd normally be able to name or see. Maybe I'm seeing stuff outside the normal visual spectrum, or maybe the colors are just too weirdly presented for my brain to make sense of them. But they're visible and color coded. Even when I felt my Fae Grain high fading, I could still see them.

I pulled Doc Roberts aside at the end of class. "Hey, Doc? One last question. If you don't mind waiting for a little privacy?" They looked really uncomfortable, but nodded. When everybody'd gone, including Doc DeLeon, who gave Doc Roberts one last look to be sure he wasn't gonna fall apart, I turned to them and asked. "That new Shape of yours. Did you..."

I paused for long enough that they said, "did I what?"

"Did you make that for me? So I could see what everybody else could?"

They smiled and nodded, but said, "not entirely. The initial inspiration was your disability, of course, but once I figured out how to make a real time vision of Mana being Shaped, I added in all the additional effects that make it easier to see how the Mana is interacting. I'd like to think our Advanced Mana Shaping classes may have vastly improved results going forward. But that just might be hubris on my part."

I'd been standing there, trying to keep myself under control, but something about their self-effacing hopes that their work would not just help others, but help others who would use that to help still more broke something in me. I leapt forward, my arms going around him, tears running from my eyes. "Thank you!"

Their arms went around me gently, tentatively. "You're quite welcome, of course. Not that you wound up needing it."

I pulled back just far enough to stare at him incredulously. "Are you kidding? Yeah, I've found ways to work around it. Looking through Saffron's eyes. That trick you taught her to light up her Mana so I can see the Shapes as she makes them, sort of. Hell, I think I can see them sort of normally when I'm lit on Fae Grain. But this... Look, it doesn't matter whether I found some other way. It really, really doesn't. You did this for me." I might have blubbered a little bit. "For me. Shit, yeah, I get it, lots of people do things for me now, but then? Back when i was the fuckup nobody thought was worth anything? You... Shit, I don't know if you believed in me, or just did it out of kindness. But... for me."

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I trailed off, and their arms settled around me. "I always believed in you, Tabitha. I had no illusions, or I didn't think I did. I knew you weren't an intellectual like me. But you... your unflinching courage, your unthinking willingness to sacrifice yourself for your friends? I knew that someday you would be a Hero."

I sniffled a little. "Still not one, y'know."

They leaned into the hug. "I still have faith, Tabitha. Someday, before the end of whatever road life leads you on, you will be in name, as well as in truth. Because truly, whether you have the Title or not, you are one."

"Thanks, Doc."

When I got home, I couldn't wait. I pulled Saffron into my lap at dinner and said, "Kitten, you gotta see what Doc Roberts made for me!"

She settled in with a soft smile. "What is it? The chair? The table?" When I looked my confusion at her, she said, "I remember the chair he made you when you Soul Burned your arm, and the detector to prove you weren't dangerous to be around when Shaping." As patently untrue as that is.

I paused mid-Shape, holding it there. The fuck?

Not only are you a mistress of any shape likely to cause harm, you're also... Anyone who's been around you while you Shaped for any length of time has become far more than they were, you realize?

I snorted. "Yeah, like that's me. Look at this though." I finished the Shape, and felt her looking through my eyes.

"What does it do? Also, I'm impressed you memorized that whole Shape; it's a genuine Shape, not a call for a Global Spell."

"Yeah, it's something new Doc Roberts came up with. Shape something!"

She waved her hands through the motions for a simple Status, and I heard her gasp when I saw that dark glow following her fingers, taking shape before turning into a Status window hovering there before her face. "That's... fantastic!"

"I know, right?"

Of course, the two of us getting excited brought the kids around, who insisted I show them my new trick. Then insisted we let them try it. After some intense negotiations between Kitten and Menace, I suggested since I had the day off tomorrow we could have another set of lessons.

So today we all went to Mom and Dad's place and had another 'teach the horde hoard how to Shape' day. They practiced what they'd learned before, and each of them took at least one try at the new shape. Most of them didn't manage it, but none of them hurt themselves.

Of course, with the Shape in place, I managed to actually catch Menace cheating. Like, Ria managed the Shape with next to no problems. Maze took most of the day, but with some one on one tutoring by Ria, managed it before we were done, which had both of them squealing and hopping around hugging each other. The rest of the girls wound up failing, but all of them actually managed to output some Mana, which Saffron told me hadn't happened the time before.

Then, of course, Menace. She wove her hands through the motions, not unlike Ria, and she definitely had the Mana output going on just fine. In spades, really. But she was sloppy, and the whole thing started to fall apart before she squinted at it, frowned, and poured Mana around the whole fuckin' Shape until it turned into something identical to Ria's Shape.

"Dah Da!!"

I might have let it slide, but then I saw the look on her sister's faces. "Menace. Do it right."

She looked a little blubbery at me. "Bud... I god id!"

I sighed and said, "we'll be right back," before pulling her along with me to my office. "Not mad at you, Isnomi, but we need to talk."

"Why?"

"Because you made your sisters feel bad when they hadn't done anything wrong."

She pouted. "I did id."

I nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, you did, but you still want to learn to do it right, and you don't want to shove in your sisters' faces that you've got that Divine Goddess magic going on."

"Why?"

"Why don't you want to shove their noses in it, or why do you wanna learn to do it right?"

She thought about that for a second. "Bowf?"

I smiled. "Okay then. You don't want to hurt your sisters' feelings, right?" She shook her head. "Now, you're allowed to be you. That's fine. Your sisters love you for who you are. You make some of them feel safe, because they know you wouldn't let anybody hurt them. But when you hurt them, it makes it that much worse."

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh. Now, you doing it like that? That's just you being you. But you bragging about it makes them feel like maybe something's wrong with them. Like maybe they're not good enough to be your sisters."

Her face scrunched up. "Dath thilly."

"Yeah. Maybe it is. It's also how people are. So... be careful not to hurt their feelings, and more importantly maybe, apologize when you do."

"Ah Tay!"

"Now, the reason you want to do it right?" She nodded. "We're Goddesses. We can just will things to happen, right?" She nodded again. "You've seen D's Avatars, right?" Another nod. "That took him a huge amount of power, of Glory, right?"

I waited until she said, "Yeth?"

"Does Marie use that much power?" She shook her head. "Does Grandpa Loki?" Another head shake. "Do I?"

"No?"

"Nope, I don't. So... which of us do you think can make more copies of themselves?"

Her little face lit up. "Do id ride maketh me throngew!"

"Yep. Which means you're even more of a Menace, even better at keeping your sisters and everyone else you love safer."

She looked at me and solemnly said, "I ged id. I do id ride fom now on."

I ruffled her hair. "I know you'll try. I know, just like me, you'll mess up some times. Just remember that whole 'apologizing and making it right' part too, okay?"

"Ah Tay!"

I stepped us back to the cave, and she immediately went to join her less magically talented her sisters, quietly pulling them aside one by one and apologizing to them. By the end of the day, they were all worn out, but in the best of ways, and all of them were one big happy pack again.

Her volunteering to be their Stabilize target might have helped some, too.