Yep, you guessed it. I'm working on the magical girl story again.
This time, I figured out a few things about Whitney, the seventh magical girl to join and the ice girl. In this case, I decided that said girl is actually a young woman: she's 21, compared to the others who're 16-17 at the time of her introduction. I decided she likes beer, she lives in the area, but had been operating for the last few years nearby out of sight. She gets assigned to the team professionally after the fallout from the traitor arc, for two reasons: the traitor magical girl, while having undergone a HeelFaceTurn from TheMole into a ReverseMole mid-battle, still required a technical reclassification on her registry file (making the details of registered superheroes not entirely irrelevant), warranting an official 'guard': Whitney, the Sky Shinobi. She's mainly there for the protection of the traitor, from former allies (that is, supervillains now ticked off) and any current ones with lingering doubts (that is, civilians distrustful of her--a legitimate concern, but totally irrelevant in this setting because nobody holds ill will towards her), along with any theoretical chance of her turning back (also a legitimate concern in any other setting, but not this one, and everyone knows it, but it's a technical precaution to have as a just-in-case).
The second reason is because this being after Ruby's other half is first shown, Whitney is sent in to make sure that Ruby's correctly classified as she has been filed. So it's a win-win: the riders get their team to what they think is completion (Amy joins ~2 years later), and Whitney goes from being a solo to being part of a team. The magical girls get exposure to what life can be like when they mature (particularly, the joys of going professional), while Whitney gets to slack off on the professional duties she'd normally be obligated to attend to and focus more on the professional duties she prefers.
For her part, Whitney spends her free time in her family-owned bar-and-grill: it is a nice little place, with a stage for everything from bands to karaoke, tables for groups to sit down at, and a barstand. It's a bit of a hybrid between a restaurant, in that it serves drinks (non-alcoholic to those that're below 21 are available a plenty: basically, you name the drink, and they have it), and cooked finger-food: things like french fries, cheese sticks, onion rings, chicken, and the like. Her favorite drink is a particular brand of beer.
I also more or less decided that unlike the other heroes, she's actually a natural blonde, and has it midway between waist and shoulder-length: decently long, but not extremely long. I also decided that she's fairly large, being 5'9.5" and not a stick: she's not wide, but she's decently muscular. (I also decided her weapons would be dual pistols, for what it's worth, and a cell phone when in her untransformed state.)
I did more than that, though. I also thought of the origin story behind Hannah, the fourth Rider. I basically thought up a bit of a story arc, where there is a mystical villain behind-the-scenes, whose general is one of the villains in our cast's Rouges Gallery. Basically, during this period in the story, the heroes and the villains by now have deduced there are more magical girls to be found/created, and that they are all gathering in this area for whoever knows what purpose. (It does not go without lampshading, if you couldn't tell. This cast is quite aware of the type of world they live in, and lampshade how stupid people that don't realize it are.)
And around this time, Sally has already become an ally of Ruby. During some point when she's solo (because she still operates independently from Ruby), though, she fights a foe who manages to overwhelm her. So we as the audience know she's been captured, but the characters don't, because a "Sally" comes back. On all attributes, 'she' passes: she has the memories and powers and basic personality of Sally, and has the appearance nailed down.
When she goes home, though, her other friend, a blind girl named Ana, immediately calls 'her' out. Ana lists the above facts, with explanations, and also goes on about smell, because if there was something off about the smell, the local dog at the homeless shelter would alert them so 'she' must smell like Sally.
Ana, the blind girl who we as the audience are meant to think is special, deduces (because both she and Hannah are Sally's closest friends, with Hannah as a shy airhead and Ana a cool, calculated yet not extremely outgoing intellect) that while the disguise is good, 'Sally' had to sacrifice perfection in personality for the sake of the disguise working: if it was too good, 'Sally' would forget she wasn't the real Sally and become Sally so much that the mission would fail; if not, then Sally's natural guilt would seep in and make the imposter fess up and admit to their sins. 'Sally' asks what's wrong with Ana, and Ana latches onto that, pointing out that the real Sally--who is both outgoing and extroverted--would, instead of questioning her friends, question herself, because Sally's a human being and she has issues, issues that shine through mainly in her partially-false bravado. When around her friends, she's more vulnerable, and shows it off.
This rallies the rest of the residents in the homeless shelter to try and subdue 'Sally', and they actually manage to succeed, until 'Sally' reveals that, yes, they are right: they know Sally so well that they were able to tell 'she' was a fake, and even manage to subdue her powers in spite of their strength...but 'she' isn't actually Sally, and 'she' transforms into her true form, that of a shapeshifting black shade, and he is able to knock them back.
He focuses on Ana, fully expecting her to be the fourth magical girl, who he has been sent to take care of, eliminating her before she becomes a threat or failing that, corrupting her...however, just as it looks as if he's going to win, he gets knocked back by Hannah, her powers having awakened. Ana is just a normal girl, albeit a blind one friends with one (now two) magical girls. Hannah, however, is a magical girl to be reckoned with.
The black shade tries to attack her, but his attacks pass harmlessly through. He realizes the nature of her power, and then tries to attack the others, but Hannah's power can extend to others, and she does so, reemphasizing that her power is first and foremost, a shield. She blasts him time and time again with her divine blast, asking where the real Sally is, but he continues to recover. The shade then tries to attack with a shifting attack, something he knows should be able to affect a person even when intangible, and sees his attack hit her arm with her arm stopping it dead, her using her impenetrable powers now.
He mentions that when facing an immovable object, all it takes is an unstoppable force to pierce through it, now readying an attack to do exactly that. As the blade makes contact, though, Hannah tells the shade that she's not an immovable object: she's an impenetrable force, and when an unstoppable force meets an impenetrable force, it surrenders. She then uses her sacred slash to destroy the shade's weapons, and manifesting her staff, she points it at his throat, asking once again. Him having missed being cut to ribbons merely by her will, he doesn't exactly have a choice, and Sally is found and freed with Ruby's assistance.
In the shadows, though, the dark villain mentions that while the awakening of the fourth has been a...setback...that the undoing of the riders is near, for he knows that a magical girl has already been corrupted.
Cue foreshadowing to the arc where it's shown that Ruby has figured out there's a traitor. Of course, there's a couple of introductory arcs at minimum before that, to give us our Pink Power Princess and Violet Ranger riders, but I really, really love the way that this is progressing, here. I even think that people who've read the entirety of my blog will still find the story entertaining, because while you know the basics, I've kept a lot of info hidden from you in how it's executed.
There's a reason I love this project so much.
This time, I figured out a few things about Whitney, the seventh magical girl to join and the ice girl. In this case, I decided that said girl is actually a young woman: she's 21, compared to the others who're 16-17 at the time of her introduction. I decided she likes beer, she lives in the area, but had been operating for the last few years nearby out of sight. She gets assigned to the team professionally after the fallout from the traitor arc, for two reasons: the traitor magical girl, while having undergone a HeelFaceTurn from TheMole into a ReverseMole mid-battle, still required a technical reclassification on her registry file (making the details of registered superheroes not entirely irrelevant), warranting an official 'guard': Whitney, the Sky Shinobi. She's mainly there for the protection of the traitor, from former allies (that is, supervillains now ticked off) and any current ones with lingering doubts (that is, civilians distrustful of her--a legitimate concern, but totally irrelevant in this setting because nobody holds ill will towards her), along with any theoretical chance of her turning back (also a legitimate concern in any other setting, but not this one, and everyone knows it, but it's a technical precaution to have as a just-in-case).
The second reason is because this being after Ruby's other half is first shown, Whitney is sent in to make sure that Ruby's correctly classified as she has been filed. So it's a win-win: the riders get their team to what they think is completion (Amy joins ~2 years later), and Whitney goes from being a solo to being part of a team. The magical girls get exposure to what life can be like when they mature (particularly, the joys of going professional), while Whitney gets to slack off on the professional duties she'd normally be obligated to attend to and focus more on the professional duties she prefers.
For her part, Whitney spends her free time in her family-owned bar-and-grill: it is a nice little place, with a stage for everything from bands to karaoke, tables for groups to sit down at, and a barstand. It's a bit of a hybrid between a restaurant, in that it serves drinks (non-alcoholic to those that're below 21 are available a plenty: basically, you name the drink, and they have it), and cooked finger-food: things like french fries, cheese sticks, onion rings, chicken, and the like. Her favorite drink is a particular brand of beer.
I also more or less decided that unlike the other heroes, she's actually a natural blonde, and has it midway between waist and shoulder-length: decently long, but not extremely long. I also decided that she's fairly large, being 5'9.5" and not a stick: she's not wide, but she's decently muscular. (I also decided her weapons would be dual pistols, for what it's worth, and a cell phone when in her untransformed state.)
I did more than that, though. I also thought of the origin story behind Hannah, the fourth Rider. I basically thought up a bit of a story arc, where there is a mystical villain behind-the-scenes, whose general is one of the villains in our cast's Rouges Gallery. Basically, during this period in the story, the heroes and the villains by now have deduced there are more magical girls to be found/created, and that they are all gathering in this area for whoever knows what purpose. (It does not go without lampshading, if you couldn't tell. This cast is quite aware of the type of world they live in, and lampshade how stupid people that don't realize it are.)
And around this time, Sally has already become an ally of Ruby. During some point when she's solo (because she still operates independently from Ruby), though, she fights a foe who manages to overwhelm her. So we as the audience know she's been captured, but the characters don't, because a "Sally" comes back. On all attributes, 'she' passes: she has the memories and powers and basic personality of Sally, and has the appearance nailed down.
When she goes home, though, her other friend, a blind girl named Ana, immediately calls 'her' out. Ana lists the above facts, with explanations, and also goes on about smell, because if there was something off about the smell, the local dog at the homeless shelter would alert them so 'she' must smell like Sally.
Ana, the blind girl who we as the audience are meant to think is special, deduces (because both she and Hannah are Sally's closest friends, with Hannah as a shy airhead and Ana a cool, calculated yet not extremely outgoing intellect) that while the disguise is good, 'Sally' had to sacrifice perfection in personality for the sake of the disguise working: if it was too good, 'Sally' would forget she wasn't the real Sally and become Sally so much that the mission would fail; if not, then Sally's natural guilt would seep in and make the imposter fess up and admit to their sins. 'Sally' asks what's wrong with Ana, and Ana latches onto that, pointing out that the real Sally--who is both outgoing and extroverted--would, instead of questioning her friends, question herself, because Sally's a human being and she has issues, issues that shine through mainly in her partially-false bravado. When around her friends, she's more vulnerable, and shows it off.
This rallies the rest of the residents in the homeless shelter to try and subdue 'Sally', and they actually manage to succeed, until 'Sally' reveals that, yes, they are right: they know Sally so well that they were able to tell 'she' was a fake, and even manage to subdue her powers in spite of their strength...but 'she' isn't actually Sally, and 'she' transforms into her true form, that of a shapeshifting black shade, and he is able to knock them back.
He focuses on Ana, fully expecting her to be the fourth magical girl, who he has been sent to take care of, eliminating her before she becomes a threat or failing that, corrupting her...however, just as it looks as if he's going to win, he gets knocked back by Hannah, her powers having awakened. Ana is just a normal girl, albeit a blind one friends with one (now two) magical girls. Hannah, however, is a magical girl to be reckoned with.
The black shade tries to attack her, but his attacks pass harmlessly through. He realizes the nature of her power, and then tries to attack the others, but Hannah's power can extend to others, and she does so, reemphasizing that her power is first and foremost, a shield. She blasts him time and time again with her divine blast, asking where the real Sally is, but he continues to recover. The shade then tries to attack with a shifting attack, something he knows should be able to affect a person even when intangible, and sees his attack hit her arm with her arm stopping it dead, her using her impenetrable powers now.
He mentions that when facing an immovable object, all it takes is an unstoppable force to pierce through it, now readying an attack to do exactly that. As the blade makes contact, though, Hannah tells the shade that she's not an immovable object: she's an impenetrable force, and when an unstoppable force meets an impenetrable force, it surrenders. She then uses her sacred slash to destroy the shade's weapons, and manifesting her staff, she points it at his throat, asking once again. Him having missed being cut to ribbons merely by her will, he doesn't exactly have a choice, and Sally is found and freed with Ruby's assistance.
In the shadows, though, the dark villain mentions that while the awakening of the fourth has been a...setback...that the undoing of the riders is near, for he knows that a magical girl has already been corrupted.
Cue foreshadowing to the arc where it's shown that Ruby has figured out there's a traitor. Of course, there's a couple of introductory arcs at minimum before that, to give us our Pink Power Princess and Violet Ranger riders, but I really, really love the way that this is progressing, here. I even think that people who've read the entirety of my blog will still find the story entertaining, because while you know the basics, I've kept a lot of info hidden from you in how it's executed.
There's a reason I love this project so much.
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