Chapter 1 – Reconstituted

“…Millicent…”

“…Millicent…?”

“Yes…“

“Are you ready to go?”

The concourse connecting Masterpiece Stadium to the parking structure was icy cool and empty aside from two girls, one who felt as though she’d just opened her eyes, though she was standing comfortably, and another with an expert smile so balanced and perfectly practiced that it appeared she could perform it in her sleep.

“Yes.” Hard shell travel bags snapped against her grip as she juggled a white box with her phone laid inside. Nimbly, she managed to hold what really should’ve taken four arms.

The other girl released a polite, faint laugh and inquired, “May I help you with those?”

“Got them. Car?“

“Are you sure? It’s no trouble.”

“Let’s just go.”

Aches and discomfort soon clawed at her as she hustled towards the washed-out, sharp field of sunlight bleeding through the open door at the end of the concourse. Again, the other girl made sure she didn’t need any help. No answer this time, but she picked up her awkward steps.

With the beep of a fob, the trunk parted on a large, black crossover to reveal an overwhelmingly fresh-smelling interior. Taking a breath first, she set her bags down in a neat row. Unfortunately, the boxed phone tumbled out as she laid down the last. Flashing her hands out, she wielded the cover, as it tipped back into her palm.

“Nice catch,” the other girl commented lightly, before asking, “Is that the newest one?” The trunk slowly shut itself.

“Last year’s.”

With another press of the fob, the driver’s side door opened along with the back passenger’s. The girl cleared her throat and noted, “I’d prefer to sit up front.”

Two more presses. The rear passenger door closed and the front one opened. Clinging to the door, the girl hoisted herself up into the seat. Automatically, she reached for the bar under her cushion to adjust it but soon discovered that it was already positioned comfortably for her size.

The other girl took the steps up slowly and beamed over a smile as she inquired, “Comfortable? Would you like some water? Or anything else?”

She shook her head at first, but soon responded, “Maybe a water bottle.”

From an icy, built-in cooler, the other girl retrieved and passed her a full, one-liter bottle. A sharply detailed logo bent around the midsection. She’d seen it before.

“Oh! Before I totally forget…”

Searching behind her, the other girl retrieved a baseball cap that looked like it just came from the package. She stretched it out and passed this over too. The girl accepted it in her lap since her hands were full. It prominently featured the same logo.

Smiling in that well-practiced way, she announced, “Welcome to the team, Miss Millicent.”

Millicent. Yes, Millicent. The only name she knew. She was Millicent. For now.

The other girl stated her name was Jolene, accented by a smirk, as though anticipating all the responses it invited. Millicent pulled a quick frown to her brow but soon released it.

Jolene filled the following silence by explaining, “I’m Miss Arjen’s assistant and I’ll be driving you to Brookville so you can have a look around the stadium, meet your teammates a bit, and hopefully get yourself situated. Oh, and don’t worry about your personal vehicle, I have everything arranged so it will be delivered this evening to the team garage. And that should be everything. Right?” Her finishing question pitched up a curious octave.

“Right, yeah”, Millicent responded. She uncapped the bottle and took a steady drink to drown her own voice before she could reflect on how it compared to Jolene’s. Still, as the briskly chill water lanced her throat, she knew her words had a taste like something sticky wedged deep inside that not even a perfect cough could dislodge.

After making sure that Millicent didn’t have any trouble with the seatbelt, Jolene buckled herself in and tapped a few touch displays on the vehicle before explaining, “The drive here took a little over three hours. So, let’s hope we’re as lucky with traffic on the way back.”

Millicent gave the smallest of nods to that, as she fished her phone out of the box. Glancing over, Jolene added, “The car has a hotspot. You should be able to join on by selecting CAR with a bunch of numbers after it. The password is GOTEAM, one word all capital letters.”

Millicent reached into the little rectangular compartment behind her phone case and fished out a wrapped pair of earbuds. She twisted her mouth in a few shapes before finally coming up with the words, “I’m going to listen to some music…for now."

Jolene responded with a quick chuckle and another practiced smile. “Of course! If you need to charge your device, there’s a little pull out cord you can use next to the glove compartment. Once I have this bad boy headed in the right direction, it will take care of itself. I’m just here for insurance. Crazy, huh?”

Millicent soon slipped away into whatever song she’d been listening to last. It didn’t matter. She pushed one bud deep in an ear and raised the volume as high as it would let her. Jolene stopped talking at some point and eased the vehicle over to the ramp that led out of the parking structure.

Glancing at the window without actually seeing the mottled landscape of the city, Millicent caught her ghostly reflection in the turbulence.

Its outline occupied barely a sliver of the glass. From this angle. the jot of her meager nose receded to a childish trace. A fair crease marked her mere flap of a mouth. But her eyes loomed with distorted whiteness, a stark, ashen ring at their center. Flaxen, straw-like stretches of hair branched out to frame her lean cheeks, pool against her chest, and spill past her shoulders. Against all the things she could never be fully certain of, she had one, clear totem: This is not my face.

She cleared some space on her narrow lap by picking up the pristine cap Jolene gave her. Stretching it out even more, Millicent guided her abundant hair away from her eyes to spill through every eyelet and crack of fabric and plastic. She regarded herself again quietly.

“Looks good on you”, Jolene remarked with measured excitement while loud enough to be understood. Millicent fiddled with the visor. Aside from the color, it was just like the one she wore for her last game. That one, she figured, was somewhere in her bags or she left it in her locker. Or she threw it away.

She had on the usual sort of thing she wore when she didn’t have a game: loose, polyester shorts with plain, snug knee-high athletic socks, and an oversized, long-sleeved sweatshirt. Her blank sneakers barely reached the footrest.

In the driver seat, Jolene guided more than controlled the wheel of the car as it merged from the main street they were on to I-5. Almost everything about her was a clear, vibrant shade of blue. Long, carefully-managed blue hair settled on her shoulders with gentle ebbs and flows. A navy, button-up blouse with a narrow collar immaculately slipped beneath her matching, polyester jacket. A sapphire, pleated skirt with golden bands at the bottom spread like an ornate, open fan to the tips of her knees, which rested together.

The last time she checked, Millicent turned 21. Jolene clearly had several years on her, but she wore them like a charming decoration.

Meanwhile, some pop song in a foreign language with a steady beat filled Millicent’s ear. She shut her eyes for a time but didn’t feel like she slept. Eventually, the haze and soft light of morning gave way to the impression of noon. Casually, Millicent glanced out the window.

The sandy bricks that isolated the freeway from the city weren’t there. Beyond a simple lane barrier, she could see long channels etched into the ground with walls of black granite. Sparse, well-watered grass and stone benches interspaced each channel with tightly packed, simple plaques that stretched to the horizon. Larger gravestones and mausoleums occasionally broke up the pattern. Millicent glanced over at the digital odometer on the main display. They were traveling 63 mph. Her eyes flicked to the time at the top of her phone screen.

Sometimes, the wall rose up after a spiraling on or off-ramp. But the sight of stone, grass, and monuments returned, every single time. Millicent plucked her pod out and swiped closed the music app.

“Ever been to the Los Angeles area?” Jolene had a tablet out she was working on but flipped a cover up to hide the screen as she spoke. The wheel made small adjustments on its own.

Millicent, watching a seemingly endless expanse of grave markers only interrupted by even, deep cuts in the ground spilling out names on stone, took a deep breath and answered quietly, “No.”

“There are some great places. I’m partial to the Santa Monica pier. My sister, who teaches art, loves LACMA and has been trying to get me to go forever. The Getty is spectacular, as well as the Villa, but you need to plan that out. Since you competed against the Los Angeles Fireflies, you’ve probably seen Lumen Stadium. I’ve always thought that was gorgeous against the foothills. Such a shame about most of the coast though. Even though we’re opponents, I’m glad the Fireflies at least got that one Cup win. It’s really made a difference in the area. And they’ve always been competitive with packed crowds. Now, when it comes to food… Ronan. That’s on Melrose. Amazing pizza. And, if you’re up for sushi, everyone I talk to loves Sugarfish. Although, I hear they’ve spread out beyond LA. I’ve also heard great things about Porto’s. I’ll make sure to send you a list of recommendations, if you’re interested. And I promise to include some favorites from around Brookville especially. Sound good?“

“Okay…” Millicent dipped her head in place of nodding. The grave markers and monuments out the window continued, relentlessly, all through Jolene‘s words.

Eventually, she witnessed heavy, cordoned-off cranes posed before creases destined to become new gouges cut into the ground. It took twenty minutes, according to her phone, for that stretch to finally give way to normal industry, apartments, and strip malls. Millicent fumbled with the pieces of her box until she was able to slide them back together.

“So, is that… You said last year‘s. So, that’s an iPhone 24 Pro?”

Millicent glanced down at her phone and then over at Jolene before correcting, “Mini.”

“Cool. Did you just get it? Or do you like the box?”

Squeezing the pieces together,  Millicent answered, “I’ve had it for a bit. I don’t have a travel case, but this box works fine, for now.”

With a restrained laugh, Jolene answered, “Oh, that’s clever. Waste not want not, or however that goes. But quite clever. That’s something my mom would do. Find a new use for something good instead of just throwing it away.”

Millicent tipped her head up. “It works.”

After that, Jolene left Millicent alone to peer out the window at the anonymous City of Angels while she sifted for something else to listen to on her phone. For a little while.

“Miss Arjen expressed to me you both were in agreement about skipping teleportation. I was a little surprised. I can understand though.  Standing on a glowing platform as some lady waves her hands and sends you hundreds or thousands of miles away. Now, they say it’s the safest way to travel, and for some places, it’s the only way around certain obstacles. But I’d probably trust some machine from a space story to rip up my molecules and reconstitute them somewhere else than some person with magic who, by no fault of their own, might happen to be thinking of the depths of space. And, all of a sudden, I’m staring down the Earth from too far away. Not saying it has happened or it would happen, but no one‘s told me it can’t happen, so it’s still there inside my head. That’s why I’m always keen to do some normal travel, when I get the chance.”

The burgeoning traffic slowed their car down slightly as it wove between the lines. Jolene stretched her hands towards the wheel without taking over from the onboard control.

When the vehicle soon funneled itself into a quieter carpool lane, Millicent asked, “Did you have a question?”

With a smirk, Jolene clarified, “Just a touch of curiosity. Did you ask for a driver?"

“I left it up to the team. I’m starting to regret that…” She didn’t meet Jolene‘s eyes and she didn’t want to look out the window. So, she looked down and ran her nails between the raised grip lines on the back of the plastic phone cover that her teammate… former teammate, Juley, got for her a few months ago.

With a practiced, polite clearing of her throat, Jolene responded, “My sincere apologies. If there’s anything else you need, please feel free to communicate it to me at any time. Enjoy the rest of the trip, as you wish.”

Millicent returned to the music, both buds in, even though autoplay had shifted to genres she didn’t care about. She just needed it to fill the void. Eventually, she checked on Jolene and saw the young woman working contently on her tablet.

Even though the cap on her head felt too warm with the bundled nest of her hair, Millicent pulled it more securely. She drew her legs up and in the air, closely together but not as high as when she threw a pitch. Setting the phone down and awkwardly cupping it between the two halves of the box, she curled her middle and pointer fingers on her right hand. With a private whisper, a faint electrical arc passed between them like prongs on a taser.

Before the subtle snap and crack through the air might alert Jolene, Millicent pressed her fingers into her side. It hurt and she wanted it to hurt, like a sharp jolt from carpet static. She kept it far away from her phone and any of the onboard electronics. And she kept doing it. Zap zap zap zap… until it reached a threshold of pain where she feared Jolene might see or hear.

After that, she rubbed those two fingers together until smokeless warmth bled through, like a flashlight held behind. Only when the pain of this subtle spellcasting became too much to bear privately did she let her pitching hand rest as music she couldn’t understand surrounded her thoughts like bobbing on the sea.

Out the windows, the tan walls were almost constant. Above them appeared colorful signs, gray factories, puffing refineries, crystalline skyscrapers, old houses flanked by older trees, towering electrical columns, and mountains tracing a ghostly profile through the haze. Reservoirs, highway cloverleaves, boarded-up churches, and giant tires spinning in place gave way to protected truck stops, frozen quarries, and shopping malls looking down on canyons.

This section of the journey felt absurdly normal. Reddish, ceramic Spanish tile filled a sea of two-story houses packed together in tracts with slim yards and high fences. When she ventured out, this was a common sight. The surprise was continuing into the shrublands dotted by expansive farms and handsome ranches. Craggy, crunched spires and buttes existed alongside a steady stream of other travelers. It wasn’t long before they finally crested a steady rise and made it into Brookville Valley.

Despite the pristine sharpness and subtle tint of the glass around her, overwhelming brightness flooded her vision. It was as though what she knew as noonday before was actually just subdued late afternoon settling into dusk. Only now was she seeing what daylight really looked like. It immediately hurt more than any self-inflicted discomfort because even shielding her eyes still brought a blinding glow, as though unrelenting flashes burned images of the land into her.

All stretches of the sky not only had the clearest blue tint but it was also awash in glow, as though an old shirt bleached through a hotel washing machine countless times. Millicent did her best to restrain any audible or noticeable reaction, but she had her limits.

“Give it a sec”, lightly commented Jolene. “New players especially see the Valley for what it is. You’ll get used to it quickly. Unfortunately, shades, or anything like that, don’t help much. Just give it time.”

Overpowering iridescence blasted Millicent’s eyes to the point they started twitching and watering. All she could think of doing was remind herself that she had a practically full bottle of water beside her, which was still cool but approaching interior temperature. She drained as much as possible until it hurt to take anymore. By that point, the images through the window had dwindled to something like backlit, church stained-glass from a movie she couldn’t quite recall. It would take until they dipped down from the foothills for the discomfort to finally wane to a dull ache that threatened to settle beneath Millicent’s eyes and into her head.

“It’s all a bit wild west. If you don’t mind me saying. Now, I’m not a historian but the stadium features a lovely display from local artists about the colorful poppies, which should be blooming soon, along with old photos of wagon trains and miners. So much history in this place and the Brookville Patriotin are very happy to share in it.”

They passed through a road cut after a tree-fringed lake and a series of custom homes flanking the freeway. Millicent noticed the angled, jagged lines of the rock creased one way and then sharply divided and arched off the other, like heavy paper twisted two directions at once. The stone between almost appeared as crystal, densely packed and faintly shiny.

“They used to joke about California falling into the ocean. Well, we’ve made it over to the right side to be on.”

Past the cut, it was more of what she expected as soccer fields spread casually across the flowing hills. Patches of unused, uncleared land with semi-arid shrub interspaced gas stations, schools, and old hotels. Swarms of businesses surrounded a boxy mall before they dipped into a lower stretch bound by regular overpasses. At the edges, like curious stationary onlookers, Millicent noticed trees that appeared more like desiccated broccoli. They kept watch.

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After a curve in the highway and another smattering of boxy buildings, they came to the end of the road, which fed into a series of off-ramps. She could already see the stadium as the car merged onto Kat Taylor Memorial Avenue, which it stayed on for just a short while before turning onto a side service road. Jolene took back full control of the wheel to guide the vehicle over to a security box.

Out of it stepped a woman who seemed a little bit older than Jolene to Millicent, maybe around Juley’s age. Instead of a straight black uniform, her outfit had the team colors. Yellow shoulder patches and a golden badge matched Millicent‘s expectations of a security guard. The raised tail of a walkie-talkie showed through one side pocket, while a taser poked out of the other. Simple, silver ring loops dangled from her earlobes and her blonde-streaked, grayish-brown hair was pulled taut in an efficient bun.

“Hey Rae, how’s your day?” Jolene asked in an energetic tone that almost sounded musical.

Despite the height of the vehicle, the security guard had to crouch to look through their window. Rae responded, “Can’t complain. All quiet on the northern frontier at least. Who’s your…?”

Her casual glance in Millicent‘s direction led to a double take and a lingering look, before asking towards Jolene, “…is that…?”

Jolene‘s answer was to run a finger across her sealed lips followed by a quick wink. Rae obediently nodded but couldn’t resist saying, “Welcome aboard, miss. Pleasure to have you on the team. You really pitch some gems. Just head on back. They were repainting some lane markers, but you should be clear.”

After circling around the edge of a mostly empty parking lot, Jolene guided the vehicle into an underground section with some corridors leading off nearby. The spot was labeled “for staff only”.

Millicent brushed at some unreachable grit in her eyes as she stretched soundlessly in her seat. She’d put her phone and earbuds away and worked her water bottle down to about half. Before they started exiting, Millicent chirped up, “Thank you. For the company and picking me up and everything."

Jolene released her measured chuckle with a slim smile. “Why it’s my pleasure. I hope you had a nice trip. Do you need me to help you with anything you got there? I can make sure your bags are delivered wherever you need them. I’ve arranged accommodations for you at the adjacent three-star hotel.”

Millicent shook her head and slipped to the pavement, as she assured her, “I’m fine. I just need one thing.”

With the trunk unfurling once again, Millicent retrieved the smallest bag. Her boxed phone went securely into a side compartment and the bottle fit neatly in some nylon webbing before she slung it over her shoulder. Jolene grabbed the others before she could help out. Beaming, the assistant relayed, “Miss Arjen is waiting upstairs to greet you but no need to rush. The pathway to your left will take you back out to the parking lot. The one to the right heads to the main concourse for visitors. Here, you should have a team day pass.”

Reaching into a bag, Jolene came up with a laminated card clipped to a lanyard. Stretching the fabric band around the awkward shape of the hat, Millicent wore the card around her neck.

“Perfect! Now, if you go straight from here to the middle opening, that should give you a few options. The first left will take you to the inner area past concessions and a right will take you into the underbelly. You can find the health and medical assessment offices down there. They’ll want you checked out eventually. If you want to see the field, take that original left and then just follow the plaques until you see a gate. That’s usually for groundskeeping, but they should be done for the day. From there, it should be easy peasy to find the dugouts and the clubhouse.”

Out of all that, Millicent pruned it down to surmise that she needed to go straight ahead, then left and through a gate. She hoisted her bag a little higher on her shoulder to make sure it was secure and then slowly set off. By the time she checked behind her, to see what Jolene was doing, she had already left. With a deep breath through her nose, Millicent trudged forward up a slight incline.

As promised, the corridor soon branched off. However, Millicent discovered there were actually three branches compared to the two Jolene outlined for her. With the puff of a sigh carried across her lower lip, Millicent regarded each of the pathways and then followed the one on the left, just as Jolene had suggested. But Millicent gave a long look down the unexpected path, as far as her eyes could squint. Compared to its neighbors, it looked exactly like the rest. With another sigh, crunched up like a groan, Millicent continued down the pathway she’d begun.

It eventually terminated in a heavy security door with a myriad of warnings about authorized personnel and alarms and all that. Placing a slender hand with narrow fingers to her forehead, Millicent scratched the edge of a hangnail on her catching hand. The smart idea would be to just go back, return to the branch, and either hunt down Jolene or retrace her steps until she found someone who could help her. Millicent pushed through the heavy door and just cleared it, with her bag scuffing the edge and her water bottle crunching.

Of course, a harsh, accusing alarm screamed from the other side of the door, with a red light flashing at the top. Crimson shades and shadows burned against the walls. Looking down the curve of the new corridor she was in, Millicent scrunched her forehead, folded her arms, and glanced in each direction, waiting for security guards to come investigate her. When that didn’t happen, she started pressing buttons on the keypad next to the door.

She tried all zeros, then a counting sequence up and down, and then primes before just randomly mashing buttons. At least each attempt bought her a few moments of silence before the alarm resumed. Tightening her left hand into a fist, she took her right palm and clutched the security pad. With a stern, fast incantation, a bright arc of electricity lanced through like the strike of a thunderbolt. After a billowing puff of smoke, the alarm finally went silent. As the acrid smoke lingered but didn’t increase, Millicent remembered the card around her neck and soon discovered a now-scorched slot where it could be inserted. She slapped her thigh and followed the clockwise turn of the corridor away.

Eventually, a golden placard announced she was in “The Elysian Field / Where Our Heroines Are Immortal”. She tightened her grip around the straps of her bag. She tried not to think about the equivalent place on her first team. Still, she knew some of the girls by heart.

Rochelle “Thunderforce”. 170 saves in 172 chances. Over 1000 strikeouts and a career ERA just over two.

Dionyza “Hawk”. 240 wins in 300 starts and a 1.604 ERA for her career.

Sienna “Regal”. Whose career numbers didn’t have quite the same ‘wow’ factor, but she pitched five no-hitters, two perfect games, and held the strikeout title for nine of twenty-three years.

Comparatively, the San Diego Artists team she’d just been traded from had a cozy, fun shrine with experimental statues donated by local sculptors. Here, it felt like being looked down on and scrutinized by goddesses. Amira “the Legend”. Youngme “Sun”. Lyndsie “Starlight” Rosabelle “Viper”. THE Alyssa… on and on and on…

And somehow, for some reason, owner/manager Arjen wanted her. Her stats were ranked in the league between 17th and 28th place. She had one Princess Pitcher of the Month and some other, middling achievements. Millicent looked away and watched her feet as she hustled down the corridor.

At least the eventual gate she found wasn’t barred or chained. Slipping past an immense tarp, pungent bags of fertilizer, and full, darkened shelves, Millicent climbed a small ramp and around the bullpen onto the field.

She’d been here about six times before, as a visitor. Just one start. 1-12 loss where she got pulled after 4 1/3 innings. She scowled at the little notch in left field, where several of her almost-perfect throws landed. Several ads spanned the section above the wall padding. The scoreboard, currently off, looked like a blue slab of ornate, rectangular crystal. When on, she recalled that it looked as clear as her phone or some fancy television, from hundreds of feet away. Straight back in centerfield was an unhitched wagon, frozen in place as it was about to tumble over a series of fake rocks streaming with foaming white water. Its front wheels were intentionally broken.

Avoiding the chalk lines, Millicent made her way to the home dugout, where a basket of balls, filled to the top, rested beside the benches.  A tunnel, which surely led to the clubhouse, stretched out of sight. Setting her bag down on the bench, Millicent picked up the ball at the top of the pile.

She gripped it a few times and turned it around as bands of electricity hopped between her knuckles. Her eyes lingered on the mound as she took a deep breath. Stepping over the chalk lines was easy, the hard part was avoiding the patches of grass still soggy from recent watering.

Standing on the mound, her shoulders settled. The tightness of her cap seemed to loosen. And she took her place on the rubber. Without the spellcasting reservoir of a magical girl glove, it took her a moment to find her focus.

Millicent crossed her hands, re-gripped the ball, and shut her eyes calmly. Drawing back, shimmering sparks crackled against her fingers as she kicked her leg high up and opened her eyes. With a balletic twist and turn, the ball flashed through the air with a glow and thunder crack, slammed against the backstop, and sailed across the netting. With her head down, Millicent cracked her biggest smile of the day.

When she retrieved the ball from where it had settled towards the third-base line, she juggled it in the air to herself a few times before glancing back at the mound. Her fingers rippled with red heat that yearned to burst into a full, plasma of flame. But she puffed out a breath and they cooled.

Returning the ball to the top of the heap, she retrieved her bag and peered through the tunnel. The walls held the glow of the overhead lights with a brilliance like arriving in the area. This time, fortunately, it didn’t hurt her eyes.

The bricks appeared unnaturally pristine, as though they’d just been scrubbed or recently repainted. Masterpiece Stadium wasn’t brand new, but Millicent didn’t think it was much more than 30 years old, dating back to the early 2000s. This stadium already had history and a sense of place. Some of the bricks should’ve been scuffed up or worn, but everything looked as though it had just been placed a day or two before. Hitching up her bag a little higher, Millicent looked towards a vibrant, blue door with the same team logo expressed on her cap, leading forward, and lingering at her back in the nylon webbing of her bag on the water bottle.

It was a blue disk encircled by white stars. At the center, it reminded her of money bills with an old-time face. A vibrant woman held a fluttering flag and expressed a look of determination. In her free hand, she held onto a band of light that stretched out like a scarf. Millicent knew it was inspired by a painting that used to exist in a big, famous museum that wasn’t around anymore. “Liberty” was in the title. Millicent scrutinized it before reaching to turn the doorknob.

The burst of yells, laughter, and scrambled words that slipped through made her pause just a moment before tightening her grip and wedging the door the rest of the way open. Inside, it looked exactly as she expected for a team clubhouse. Lockers and partitions along with booths and benches. Carpet in the team colors, steam billowing from a nearby hallway to catch rays of light, and an assortment of young women who hadn’t noticed her yet.

One of them whipped a tan sports bra above her head like a lasso while screaming, “Get on, cowpokes!”

Before the chaos of the room could resolve into hair, faces, and people, Millicent promptly turned around and reached for the door behind her. She passed through and started to reseal it, when a swift, slender arm stretched out.

“Oh, wait wait, please wait! Sorry, please wait!”

Before their fingers were crushed, Millicent used her sneaker to keep it open. With a nervous squeak, the hand flailed. Stretching open the door, Millicent let the girl through.

“Thank you! Oof. Hi! Welcome! How are you?”

The girl who joined Millicent in the hallway appeared just under five feet, noticeably shorter than herself. Her eyes twinkled a bright, vivid purple, like precious stones. They shared Millicent‘s immense swath. With a futile gesture, she pushed away a small lock of hair that settled near her nose. Tumbles twisted and spilled over her eyes as she used both hands to brush them away. It was hopeless.

Shards of vast, consuming hair enveloped her cheeks, pooled and zigzagged over her shoulders and erupted down her back, stretching as far as her thighs. She seemed at least half hair.

In color, it was closest to snowy white. Not the kind that a grandparent would have, but like trying to stare down pristine snow on a clear day. Millicent could remember snow back in Boston and some road trips. The shadowy sections of her hair almost gave an illusory look like desperately faded lavender. Between the two, Millicent noticed gray currents like ghost dolphins stretched thin.

She wore the same baseball cap as her, but it made no effort to contain her massive hair. Instead, it settled more like a pretend tiara that a child might make in a class, but without knowing what it was supposed to look like. Her eyebrows looked like soft, single swipes by a pencil. Instead of the casual, vaguely sports-related clothes Millicent wore loosely, this girl had on what looked like the official team jersey. The sleeves had little puffs, like cerulean rolls inflated by baking. Lacy cuffs from a long sleeve top underneath swarmed at her wrists. The ornate fringe at the waist, topped by a golden band, distinguished itself from merely physical sports jerseys Millicent had seen. While skorts or long, lean pants were used in competition, she had on her dress skirt dangling against her pale, soft knees. Knee-high, navy stockings nearly met them. To Millicent, the girl was dressed as though she wasn’t certain whether to get ready for one of the far too numerous figurine photo shoots or a regular day game.

And, of course, even though Millicent did her best to be self-conscious of where her eyes led her, she eventually judged the  generous rise of the young woman’s chest through her sports jersey. Millicent resisted shifting her top to better express or hide her own figure. Either way, it would be overshadowed by the one before her.

This girl had an undeniable presence, which Millicent innately knew, from what manager/owner words she’d been allowed to keep through the years, would be immensely marketable for the team. Fan service was part of the game, and she seemed like an exotic princess from some far-off, forgotten land.

How virile and muscular did this petite princess have to be originally, for her draft sorceress to wind up with this, Millicent pondered, but did her best not to dwell on it. She started the same way, even though all signs of that path behind her had been erased, as though by invisible grounds keepers grooming away the steps, spells, and plays of every past game.

All she really had was now. Settling on the friendliest blank expression she could offer, Millicent reached out her hand and started simply, “Hello. Millicent, formerly of…”

The girl flashed forward, like the finish of a pitch, and squeezed Millicent into the biggest hug that her little body could provide. “You’re Millicent! They told me you were coming! Happy happy greetings and welcome to the team!”

Millicent could feel so many intimate details of the young girl’s body against hers. She tried to find her shoulders to brace the embrace but had to settle for slick but luxurious hair. “Hi. Yeah. Nice to meet you.”

Swooping back, the girl squeezed Millicent‘s hands in her own. “I’m Izabelle! This is my very first year. Please forgive my surely many mistakes I'll make. I heard you’re a third-year magical girl, and I would be honored by whatever experience you can share. It’s also an honor to have you as a teammate and I hope we can be friends too! Let’s save the world together!”

Millicent marveled at her own hands swaddled by Izabelle‘s. She felt warm in unexpected ways and places that her magic didn’t cause. Intangible electricity traced down her spine, as she fought to respond without nerves or hesitation, “Sure. Yeah.”

As Izabelle led her back towards the door, Millicent felt more like she was being guided forth in a dream. A dream that surely she would wake from to find herself in another cold, empty hotel room with a blank, anonymous day set before her. At least, it would be better than relentless nightmares she couldn’t recall.

“…Millicent?…Ready to meet everyone else?”

Gazing at Izabelle‘s brilliant, unnatural eyes, she answered with deep, trembling sincerity, “No…”

No way was she ready, for any of this. However…

“…But let’s go.”