Who Da Boss Lady? 12 (Patreon)

Commissioned by InfiniteChaosRai

Who Da Boss Lady?

Chapter 12

-VB-

Yoruichi hummed as she inspected the site. 

It was closed off to the public via caution tapes and even further made so with barriers that directed “normals” away from this place. 

And that was a good thing because this place was stinky with all sorts of energies clashing and fighting for dominance. It wasn’t an overt battle, but one that happened subtly and constantly. 

‘Any normal human who stands around here for too long is going to end up sick at best,’ she thought as she tasted the energy-laced air. Then she spat and huffed. “Oi, Kisuke! What’s taking you so long?!” 

It’s been three days since they arrived here to investigate this “black doll.”

And Yoruichi did not like it one bit. 

One, she didn’t feel anything. Not a single iota of energy of any kind that stood out of place. 

Two, nothing happened in the three days that she and Kisuke were here. 

And lastly, Kisuke hadn’t found anything in the past hour. 

That alone told her a lot.

Urahara Kisuke, the former Captain of the 12th Company, not being able to find spiritual or magical trace for someone who’s been in the area in the past week, never mind the past month? When he’d done so much more with traces that had been centuries old?

It wasn’t fishy anymore.

It was downright concerning. 

If someone like that existed, then who was to say that such a person couldn’t visit Karakura Town or Soul Society? 

This was dangerous enough of a territory that she wasn’t letting her guard down. 

“Where’s the brat when you need him to stumble into some random clue,” she muttered to herself while thinking about a certain orange haired teenager. 

“Almost there!” Kisuke shouted from wherever he was. 

She looked around, looking out for trouble. 

Of course, there was another reason why she wasn’t letting her guard down. She was in Kuoh Town, the official unofficial territory of the Devilkind, those aligned with the Four New Satans. She had to be aware of tricks that devils might pull. Not Levy-chan, of course! 

But others? The “Old” Satan Faction, independent devils, and other denizens of their underworld? 

They can and will if they think (correctly or not) that they had a chance. Chance at what? Chance at whatever they thought was good for them.

After all, she’s had more than a few past Satans come to her and Kisuke to try to convince them to join their retinue. Levy-chan had been one of the latest to try, but instead of getting them as retinue, the girl left with new friends and allies. That girl knew right and proper diplomacy: brutally cunning and cunningly brutal.

And if it wasn’t the devils, then it would be the Yokai and the “proper” Shinto factions. In their eyes, Soul Society and its Soul King was an aberration. Insults to the deities of Takamagahara. An insult to Amaterasu Opomikami. Younger and weaker Shinigamis often got attacked by the onmyouji in particular if they strayed too far from Soul Society’s “territory.”

The mortals didn’t even understand that their own gods didn’t care about them.

Not that they understood the dynamic between Soul Society and Takamagahara. Their priests  - their histories - didn’t record it because it happened before their time. 

Of the titanic War of the Two Suns.

Of the day that Takamagayo became Takamagahara.

It was the day her ancestor became one of the Six Great Nobles, after all. 

“Found it.”

She jerked up. “You did?” she asked as she stalked along the edge of the flat rooftop. Once she was by his side, she sat down and waited for his gadgets to tell her… something. She couldn’t tell what was heads or tails with all of those symbols present on the screen.

“Well, we can start by calling your friend,” he hummed. “Whatever it was, it hasn’t come back to Kuoh Town since it left.”

“Really?”

“Yuppers,” he hummed. “But I am more concerned about what it was.”

“What about it?” 

“It has traces of the Deep Void.”

Her eyes widened. The Deep Void was what the Shinigamis called the Dimensional Gap. A place that, as Kisuke once explained to her, surrounded the local “pancake layers” of the universe and both kept those inside of it inside and those outside of it outside due to its highly entropic nature. 

“And what is it?” she asked. 

She still remembered the harmless looking doll that had appeared in Sona's memories. 

He gulped as he looked up. “That’s the troublesome part, I think!” he chuckled.

“... Kisuke?” she asked cautiously at how unnerved he was. 

“We… might have a Puppet Scenario on our hands.”

Her eyes flew open.

“Whose?!” she hissed. 

If Kuoh Town was the center of a Puppet Scenario, then they needed to warn everyone!

“No idea,” he shook his head while his fingers continued to fly across the keyboard that he wasn’t looking at. “But let’s not warn people right now.”

“What do you mean not warn people?” she demanded while grabbing him by his haori and shook him. 

“I-I don’t have enough … data!” he said through her shakes. “Could be a small timer for … all we know!” 

She let him go and let out a frustrated growl. 

Shit. 

A Puppet Scenario, an event where beings outside sent an avatar onto Earth for whatever reason. 

The last one was over in Egypt thousands of years ago with the Black Pharoah. 

-VB-

I sneezed. 

Mari stared at me while her dad drove his family and me back to their home. 

Yes, I was being allowed in.

No, I could not hide anymore. I was now under “strict supervision” and “play time allotment.”

I wasn’t a kid, goddamnit! 

“So you don’t remember anything?” Mari’s mom asked, slightly aghast at what had happened to me.

“Nope,” I replied with a sniffle. “One day, I was fantasizing about womanly things, and then the next instance, I was falling out of the sky with this doll as my body.”

I could see that Mari’s dad was paying attention, though his eyes were on the road. He’d done something to the car to change its color and the driver’s license, which meant that the police wouldn’t be looking for it. 

“Are you sure you don’t remember anything?” Mari asked with a skeptical half-lidded gaze. “I mean… for all you know, you could be like a contractor or something. You made a deal with the devil or a god or whatever, and that included your memories of the deal.”

“If that is the deal, then it’s shi-”

Mari’s mom glared. 

I sighed. 

“-zzing deal,” I grumbled. “I mean I can’t follow through with the deal if I don’t know what the deal is, right?”

Mari stared at me. “Vena. The first thing you said after meeting me was that you were here to make magical girls.”

I raised a finger to retort. “What are you talking about? I’m just going through with what a good magical mascot should be doing!” 

Mari looked concerned and worried.

Mari’s mom looked concerned and a little confused.

Mari’s dad looked concerned and resigned. 

“What?”

Mari spoke up. “Vena… if you were a human woman right before you became … you, then why do you think it’s a good thing for you to be … a magical mascot instead of trying to find your human body again?”

I stared at her. 

I… didn’t have an answer for that. 

I really didn’t. 

Shouldn’t I just be focusing on getting more magical girls-.

Oh.

… Oh shit.