Crystal Diaper Magic

[lily-celeste]

Hello! This will be my first post on this board! A friend of mine who is a regular suggested that an on-going story I have been working on might be a good fit for here, so I figured I would post the parts that I have so far. I hope you like it!

Lily didn’t see the point of Math class. Well, not all Math classes universally, she didn’t feel remotely qualified to make such a sweeping claim. Somewhere out there could be a future Robert Oppenheimer or Mileva Maric who is seeing their first isosceles triangle and furiously scribbling in their notebook the first figures in a formula that will completely change the way humanity views the laws of reality, and that will ultimately carry us to the stars and all of the wonders contained therein—but that person was not Lily. And that class was not Mister Shigeki’s Intro to Differential Equations. Oh well. At least he was nice to look at, even if his accent was unexpected. She had always thought Scottish brogues were supposed to be sexy, but his just felt frustrating. Then again, the gods don’t give with both hands.

As she began dissecting why that idiom doesn’t translate to polytheistic beliefs, a nub of pink chalk bounced off her forehead. Mister Shigeki had hit her right between the eyes from across the room, and now stood leaning against Marissa Adam’s desk in the front row. His beard was perfectly manicured to compliment his jawline, and the smirk on his face betrayed his frustration.

“Miss Celeste. I don’t suppose you can tell me the answer to the question on the board?”
 

Lily blinked several times as she processed his request. Her eyes darted to the question on the board and she sighed. There weren’t even any numbers in it, just random letters representing imaginary ones. “You know what Mister Shigeki? I really can’t. But it’s my fault, I thought this was going to be a Math class. If I realized this was linguistics I would have brought my other notebook.” She punctuated the last word by picking up the little red notebook and tapping it on her desk for affect.
 

A murmur of exasperated snickers rustled amongst her classmates and Mister Shigeki rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. “If you don’t plan on paying attention, why don’t you just go home early?”

Lily raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t you supposed to teach me?”

“You can’t teach someone who doesn’t want to be taught. I have fifty minutes three times a week to teach a first year Math class to a room of students, the majority of whom do not care. If you decide that you want to get caught up, my office hours are always open. But I don’t need you setting precedent for people day-dreaming and getting away with it.” He paused. “Although I suppose half of the room only shows up to ogle you while you’re staring off into the void. 

Blood flushed to Lily’s cheeks, but the rest of the class was busy either grumbling indignantly of stifling laughter. She blacked out for a moment, and the next thing she knew she was standing outside the door to the Math room with her backpack slung over one shoulder. She started down the hallway to the stairs, feeling extremely self-conscious about how short her skirt was. She threw the front door of the STEM building open with both hands and galloped out into the sun, her ballet flats clicking on the pavement as she did. Lily hated everything about the STEM building, how stiflingly warm it was, how the third and fourth years seemed to linger everywhere like Gollum looking for a fish—she prided herself on how quickly she could get out of it. After such a mildly embarrassing experience she needed to not be around anyone, let alone leering engineering students. Thankfully the University campus was built alongside a dense greenbelt, and she made for the trees. While the edge of the trees was a popular hang-out spot for students, walking just ten minutes into the scratchy underbrush and decomposing autumn leaves virtually guaranteed her solitude. To her, the smell damp detritus was comforting.

She kept walking until she couldn’t see any sign of the campus through the woods before finally leaning against a tree. Lily carefully lowered herself down onto one of its roots and took a deep breath. She thought back to what Mister Shigeki said. She didn’t want to be there. That was about all she did know. Halfway into her first semester of University and she still had no idea what she wanted to study, as well as having befriended a paltry two people: Marissa Adams from the Math class after she lent the other girl a pencil on the first day prior to moving to the back of the classroom; and Lily’s assigned roommate, Annie.

Realistically, Annie was the only reason she had not dropped out yet. She actually felt like she could trust the other girl. Annie was in her second year and she had the confidence to show it. She had her whole daily schedule planned out, which fit into a weekly schedule, which fit into a monthly schedule, which fit into her five year plan. She colour-coded everything too, and prepared her meals in advance. She prepared her meals in advance! Lily didn’t even feel like an adult most days, and next to Annie she felt like a gods damned toddler.

A noise nearby drew Lily’s attention. It sounded like a rabid housecat, then a desperate squeaking. She got to her feet and slowly slunk towards it, holding her bag in front of her as a shield. She peered around a tree into a clearly. A white rabbit with little purple wings was slowly backing up into a tree trunk, having been cornered by some kind of black lynx. The winged rabbit looked injured and terrified. The wildcat coiled as if it was about to pounce, and before she could so much as think Lily broke from cover and hurled her bag at it and prayed the weight of her Math book would be enough to scare the creature off. 

The bag struck with a heavy thud that knocked the cat off its paws and Lily shouted at it as she moved towards the rabbit. She still didn’t know what prompted her to act. She had never heard of a winged rabbit, so it was probably an endangered species and she couldn’t have extinction on her conscience. Her eyes went from the rabbit to the lynx and she froze. It had three eyes. Three red, angry eyes. And maybe it was because she was closer to it, but it seemed a lot bigger now. Panther big. Lily imposed herself between the ever-growing cat and the injured rabbit, wishing she still had her shield-backpack to maybe buy her thirty seconds more of life.

“You are the one I’ve been looking for.”

“Wha—“

The voice was coming from inside her head, and despite the danger of her present situation it filled her with courage. A brilliant light erupted from the rabbit and she turned her head just in time to see it leap towards her. At the same time the enormous wildcat pounced at her. As the rabbit made contact she was enveloped by light and an invisible force erupted forth from her body and the wildcat was blasted away from her like a shot from a cannon.

In her mind Lily saw a pink crystal star encapsulated by a green gem. She saw the star inside her own chest, in her heart, and felt power flow out from it and into her, transforming her. The light faded and Lily was left in the clearing. Her skirt and blouse had been transformed into low-cut tutu-like uniform with a bright purple blow emblazoned on her chest, with matching bows now tied into her hair. Her ballet flats had similarly been changed into knee-high boots, her knee socks had become pale pink thigh highs, and elbow-length frilly gloves had manifested on her arms. A weighty scepter with a pink star atop it was in her hand. But in all of this, the part of her outfit Lily noticed first was what had appeared between her legs: an impossibly large pink diaper, complete with bows and frills that matched the rest of her outfit. The padding was so thick that it descended to halfway down her thighs, and the frills of her new skirt did nothing to hide it. But she had no time to question the ensemble as an enraged yowl from across the clearing reminded her of her predicament. The wildcat pounced again, but this time she reacted faster—faster than she ever thought possible. Lily hopped aside and the three-eyed beast buried its claws into the tree roots in the spot she had stood a moment before. Moving on instinct more than anything else, she thrust her star scepter towards the beast and pink and green light erupted from it. The cat yowled again, but this time in pain as it was thrown into a tree trunk. It hit with a crack and it slumped to the forest floor.

Lily stood her ground, not dropping her guard for a moment as she watched the cat’s furious red eyes. It blinked at her as it breathed slowly. Then its form began to change, the heavy black fur seeming to fade away into smoke. All that was left were the three glowing eyes, and then they were gone too.

Lily sighed. Then she re-examined her new outfit. What the Hell was going on? And how was she supposed to get back to residence?

***

 

Lily pinched the baby fat of her bicep. 

Ow. 

She pressed the bramble of a bush of fuchsia flowers against the inside of her thigh.
Ow.

She bit down on her tongue until tears welled in her eyes.

Oooooooow.

Okay. She was now reasonably certain she was not dreaming. Though the only other possibility was that she had lost her mind. Maybe the cat had pounced on her and was actually in the process of disemboweling her as it snapped her tiny neck and everything after the point of impact was an elaborate fantasy her mind had created to cope with the agony. Maybe she stepped on a hidden pressure plate on the forest floor that released a hallucinogenic gas that was developed by the government and she was actually rolling around on the forest floor tripping out like those kids in the DARE not to do drugs after school specials. Drugs seemed like the more likely option, because despite nearly dying a handful of minutes ago and being stuck in the most embarrassing outfit she could possibly imagine, she could not remember ever feeling better in her life.

And oh yes, she was stuck. Once the shock of fighting (killing?) a wildcat the size of a small car faded, that was the first thing she tried. Everything was stuck in place, from the headband and ribbons, to the gloves and stockings, to the impossibly skimpy dress, to the diaper that hung almost to her knees. It wasn’t like any of it restricted her at all, beyond needing to waddle whenever she took a step. But the especially weird part of it was that even though she had next to no desire to go anywhere dressed this way. . . She also didn’t exactly have any desire to take it off. These clothes felt good. Safe. Like she was powerful.

No amount of powerful-feeling ridiculous outfits were enough to give her any desire to stay in the woods once it got dark out. At night the University’s heavy metal club were known to go out into the forest to drink and blast music and those were the last group of people she wanted to run into. She squeezed her star scepter in both hands as if praying for courage and started in the direction of the campus. At least if she peed herself in fear she was properly equipped for it.

Lily’s heart skipped a beat at the thought and she pushed it from her mind. There would be time to figure out whatever she was feeling once she was back in her room. Then maybe she could figure out how to change. Her first problem was making it to the safety of residence, which was located at roughly the opposite side of the campus.

The walk to the edge of the forest was surprisingly quick. She had expected her padded predicament to slow her considerably, but the exaggerated sway of her hips didn’t appear to have any such effect. She even found herself smiling, and skipping once the underbrush thinned. The air had an enticingly sweet scent to it, probably from the fuchsia flower bushes coiled amongst the trees. Were they always there? For all of the time Lily had spent in the forest, she could not recall ever seeing them before. She considered stopping to examine them for a moment. . . Then glanced down at her frilly dress and bulging pink diaper and decided it was better to come back later. 

She was close enough to the edge of the forest that she had to be conscious of running into students sunning themselves between classes. She could make out the concrete of the STEM building through thinning trunks, and the forms of people moving. Classes must have just let out, which meant in a few minutes people would either be off to their next class or in the cafeteria for dinner. This was perfect. If she just waited for that to quiet down she could stealth her way clear across the quad and slip inside before anyone noticed her brightly-coloured ensemble. Just watch and wait. 

Watch and wait.

Watch and wait.

She blinked. As her eyes opened she realized how heavy her lids felt. Maybe waiting for a few more hours was a good thing. People less likely to see her in the dark. She could take a nap. The adrenaline was probably wearing off. Her body needed to rest and recover. Lily felt her body begin to sway gently. She could sit down. Just had to keep watching and waiting. 
Watching and waiting.

Keeping her eyes forwards, she squatted down and let her padded rear touch down on a fallen log. She blinked again. Her head nodded forward once, twice, three times. One of the fuchsia flowers was between her boots. She hadn’t noticed it before just now, but it must have been there. Flowers don’t move on their own. Their vines don’t coil around your ankles and travel up your legs and—
Lily leapt up from the log and to her amazement flew twenty feet vertically. She flailed her arms and legs in her surprise and managed to snag the branch of a yellow spruce. Lily hung there, one hand on the tree and the other gripping her scepter so hard it trembled. She looked below. The flower was still there, its vines coiled around the log and immobile.

No waiting. She wanted out of these woods. Lily swayed her legs back and forth and on an upswing released the branch, sailing forward. She stuck the landing with only a slight stumble and transitioned into a nervous jog towards the edge of the woods. The moving forms through the trees had tapered off. Now was her best shot. As she approached the edge she picked up speed as much as she was willing with her waddle and bolted out onto campus. She made for the shadow of the STEM building and crouched low the way she did when she was playing hide-and-seek tag as a child. If someone looked out the window of one of the nearby buildings for more than a moment they would certainly see her, so she kept moving. She hugged the corner as she rounded it and the campus quad lay before her. It was empty, which is better than she possibly could have hoped. Taking a deep breath she broke out in a sprint diagonally across the field, aiming her trajectory so that the fountain in the centre could shield her from the greatest possible number of windows. As long as no one saw her face, no one would have any reason to suspect her. 

She passed the fountain, and the glass library, and the English and the art buildings. She crossed the road separating them from the residence and used the enormous and ancient trees that dotted the grass as cover as she skirted past the cafeteria. She could hear people nearby, possibly arriving late or finishing early or just wandering amongst the maze-like grey residence buildings, but it didn’t matter because she was almost home-free. She could see the door to her building, and she forced herself to contain a squeal of delight. She reached out to pull the door open and—

She didn’t have her key. She froze on the spot, petrified by the realization. Her key had been in her backpack. Her backpack was still in the clearing, if it was intact at all. Lily had made it all this way only to be locked out. The voices were getting closer. Her legs trembled. Her throat felt tight, like she was on the verge of tears. Her reputation on campus was about to go from lazy smartass to diaper girl.

The front door opened under someone else’s power. Annie stood in the threshold, one arm leaning against the metal from and the other propping the door open. She looked Lily up and down and raised an eyebrow.

“So I see you finally found your Catalyst. Come on, get in here before anyone sees you.” She stepped back to allow Lily in.

What?

***

 

Lily had never been so happy to see her shitty cramped residence room. The hallways and stairwells leading up to their room had been mercifully empty, and Annie had not so much as snickered at her predicament before whisking her in.

Lily dove straight for the covers of her bed and rolled herself into a comfortable little burrito. For a moment she hoped that she could forget that she was trapped in an enormous pink diaper, though that did not end up being the case. 

Annie locked their door and then went to sit next to Lily. She placed a comforting arm around her friend and began to stroke Lily’s cheek. Lily flinched, but then allowed it to happen. She realized that she had been running on adrenaline and not much else since the fight in the woods, and now she was too exhausted to even stand. She opened her mouth to speak but the words felt like mush.
“Hush now, baby. Er, sorry,” Annie said, then shook her head with a chuckle. “I can only answer a few of your questions, but I will help however I can.”

Confusion prodded at Lily’s mind, but she nodded and waited for Annie to continue.

“Okay. The short version is that you are a magical girl.”

“What. You mean like Sailor Moon?”
 

“Yes! Sort of. These powers work differently, and there isn’t some team uniform.”
 

“How do you know any of this?”

“Well, because I’m one too.” Annie half-smiled and tilted her head to one side.

Lily’s brow furrowed and she looked from Annie’s face to her waist.

“Wah— No, I don’t have a diaper when I transform. That’s just you, at least I think it is.”

“Well why do I look like an enormous child then!” Frustration tinged Lily’s voice.

“Calm down, it’s okay,” Annie stroked Lily’s cheek. Lily’s eyes were still wet with tears on the verge of falling. “Okay. There are a few of us all over the world, at least as far as we can tell. We all have different powers and costumes, and generally we’re pretty spread out but occasionally we team up. As near as we have figured out, all of our powers were awakened when we came in contact with an unnatural animal.”

“Unnatural like a dragon?”

“For one of us, yeah. Mine was a snake with ram horns.” Annie used her hands to mimic curled horns on the side of her head for descriptive effect. “What was yours?”

“A—A bunny. With wings.”

“I’ll add that to our google doc.”

“There’s a google doc? You started all of this organization stuff, didn’t you.”

Annie suppressed a blush. “Maybe. We needed to organize to maximize our effectiveness! None of us even know what we’re fighting, just monsters that seem to prey on humans. Someone needs to start piecing it together so we can start to win.”

“Alright, alright fine. But why can’t I change back? And, not to sound like a broken record, why am I wearing a diaper?”

Annie sighed and took Lily’s hands in hers. “You can't change back because you didn't kill whatever you were fighting.”

“The Hell I didn’t! I knocked that giant pussycat against a tree and it didn’t get up!”

“Did it fade away like smoke?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah. You didn’t kill it. You have to deliver a finishing blow. It’s still in the area, and it’s going to prey on the vulnerable to regain its power.”

A cold shiver ran down Lily’s spine. It was still out there. “I have to go stop it.”

Now Annie laughed. “No, you need to stay here and rest. You’re weak from your transformation and you don’t know how to use your power yet. I’m going to go finish it off.”

Lily opened her mouth to argue, then closed it. Annie made sense. She knew how this stuff worked, so it was better to leave it to her.

“Good. As for why you’re wearing a diaper: when we all came into contact with our animal, our Catalyst, they didn’t give us these powers. They just unlocked our potential. As near as we can figure, that’s why we all look different.”

“So that means—“

“—that your potential is related to your youth or innocence or—“

“—or I’m a giant baby.”

The girls let silence hang over them. Annie hugged her friend in what she hoped was comforting. For Lily it was impossible for it not to come off as being babied.

Annie stood up. “Look, I’m going to go track down the monster. We’re going to get you turned back, and then we’re going to figure this out. Whatever is going on here, you aren’t alone, Lily. You’re part of a team now.” She offered a smile, then folded her hands over her breasts and closed her eyes. Green light enveloped her in a flash. When it cleared her tank top and short shorts had been replaced by a green bodysuit that looked like it had the same texture as a lizard’s scales. The suit completely covered her chest and neck, and formed a cowl with a set of horns that pushed back her red hair. She had thigh-high heeled boots, elbow-length gloves, and a domino mask. On her hip were a set of twin curved short swords.

Lily was simultaneously in awe and painfully jealous. Annie looked like she had stepped straight out of a comic book. She was right, Lily would be no help in hunting down that monster. 

Annie shot her a wink and skipped to their window, pushing it open with one hand. “We’ll get you fixed up in no time, sweetie. Get some rest, I’ll grab you something to eat on my way back.” And with that she slid out into the night.

Lily curled up on her mattress, still cocooned in her sheets. Sleep was a good idea. Just stay here and rest until Annie gets back. Just rest. Just rest. Just rest. 

On some level Lily became aware that the voice telling her to rest was not her own. In fact, it was the same one she had heard at the edge of the forest. She made to sit up but couldn’t. She couldn’t move anything. Panic began to set in and she tried to struggle, but something had coiled around her body and restricted her movements. She could feel it writhing around her arms and legs, beneath her dress and in her diaper.

“Wha—“

One of the magenta flowers from the woods came into view in front of her. How had it followed her? Did it stow away? The flower took up her entire field of vision, and the centre of it began to ripple like a mirage. Lily tried to turn away but it followed her every move, and the longer she looked at it the less she wanted to fight it. Everything was fine. No need to scream. This was fine. Just sleep.

***

 

Despite the situation, Annie couldn’t stop herself from smiling. The evening air was growing colder and bit softly at her exposed cheeks as she descended from their shared window. She landed on one knee, then leapt with extraordinary power and grace back into the air. She had orchestrated being Lily’s roommate when her serpent eyes identified the magical potential she held. Annie had been piecing together documents on these Magical Girls since her own awakening and had done her best to establish a support network. She also took it upon herself to ensure potential candidates had a guardian until they found their Catalyst, and these measures had both helped their numbers to swell and kept young girls safe from the corruptive power of their enemies (whoever they were).

Annie made contact with the side of one of the residence buildings and immediately bounced off, then ricocheted again and again from building to building. It was still light enough that she had to be quick and quiet, and stick to the periphery of people’s vision as she hunted to the creature. Lily’s reaction, to go with her and help hunt, was an admirable one. But she was tired, exhausted, and had only just acquired her new powers, to say nothing of her unorthodox outfit. Annie didn’t have time to babysit tonight.

She gripped the edge of the campus observatory’s domed roof and vaulted onto it; it was the highest point that gave her a clear view of the surrounding area, and a clear view was what she needed to hunt. Annie closed her eyes and focused on the power deep within her. It was coiled around her heart, binding her while protecting her. It was a snake constricting her so tightly that it was impossible to discern where one began and the other ended. The snake opened its eyes and so did Annie, and now they saw the world as one predator. Colours of mundane objects, of buildings and students, were a muted grey. The tainted trail of the creature that Lily had fought was magnified to an unnatural vibrancy. Annie looked towards the woods, to where the cat had entered the campus and to the clearing where Lily had fought it. The trail had a brilliant green aura to it that shone through the trees. There was another glowing colour too, but this one seemed to be spread at random throughout the forest; pink lines woven throughout the underbrush like a hastily-woven web. Annie squinted and her view magnified and zoomed in on one of the neon pink strands. They looked like . . . Vines? With bulbs or flowers. Were they a new weapon? Annie had never seen them before. She would have to examine them more closely after the hunt, and inform the others to beware of strange plant life. 

A flash of green at the far end of the woods caught her eye. The creature must have reformed, and it was moving fast around the outer edge of campus. Annie took a running leap off the rooftop and aimed to intercept the beast if it stayed on its current trajectory. It was dark enough now that she didn’t need to do this quiet anymore, but the beasts were more powerful at night. She had to stop this now, before it found a staff member or student to feed on.

She landed on the ground a dozen stories below in a forward roll and immediately transitioned into sprinting, her heels clicking on the pavement in such rapid succession that any casual observer would see a blur of green and red and hear a constant, steady noise. In the span of a blink she was in the woods, and in the span of another she had closed in on the panther-like creature. Annie drew her blades and wove through the trees to come in low from its flank. With one blade in a fore grip, she jabbed it between the beast’s ribs with enough force to take its paws off the forest floor. Then in a smooth spin she flipped the other blade into a reverse grip and aimed a vertical cut at its meaty neck. The speed of her attack, combined with the speed she had been travelling, was more than enough to part the beast’s head from its shoulders. There were a pair of thuds, one light and the other much heavier as its now two parts landed several yards away, in the direction it had been running. 

Annie alternated spinning her knives in each hand as she strode over to the beast’s three-eyed head. It still snarled at her despite what would have been a lethal wound to any normal animal. With clinical precision, Annie sunk the tip of her knife into its third eye. It shrieked as rays of light erupted from every orifice and it imploded in the spot. Annie checked over her shoulder just in time to see the beast’s body fade out as if it were sketch being erased by a frustrated artist. That was easier than she had expected. 

She turned and walked in the direction of vines she had seen before. At this rate she would be finished here before Lily even woke up.

***

Lily felt like she was floating. Everything was heavy, as if her perceptions were moving through water. Warm fluid swaddled her, filled her nostrils and covered her eyes. It embraced her inside and out. She didn’t know how she got here, or even where “here” was for that matter. She could see, but she could only see nothingness. Deep down part of her knew this wasn’t real, or it was but that she was really still in her dorm room. Whatever this place was, it was very real, just not in the way her bed or the campus or the trees or Annie were. Annie had gone somewhere. Would she be able to find Lily? Was Lily findable? 

She became aware of a ripple passing through the fluid that suspended her. The fluid reoriented her in the direction of the source. Something formless, like the void that surrounded her while simultaneously being much deeper. The formlessness shifted almost imperceptibly, then it began to move. It accelerated faster and faster; Lily could feel the velocity tearing at her, and yet she also didn’t move. She screamed but there was no sound, or maybe there was a cacophony all around her and it all became the same thing as the pressure grew to be unbearable—

Light burst forth from her chest and formed a field around her. Lily could see colour, and the weight all around her receded. The void rumbled again like angry thunder and then it too was gone and Lily was lying in her bed.

The vines of the magenta flower still bound her tightly, and its petals formed a tight mask around her face. She screamed and an omni-direction energy blast burst forth from her, forcibly stretching the vines and the flower squealed like a wounded animal. It released her and slithered away from the bed like a cephalopod on the ocean floor. Lily threw back her blanket. Her Star Scepter appeared in her hand and she fired a series of blasts, but the flower skittered them. It seemed to flatten itself out and slip through an air vent.

Lily sat on the edge of her bed, stock-still and arm still outstretched. Slowly, she forced herself to take deep breaths. Her heartrate slowed. It was gone. Maybe she wasn’t safe (she was still transformed afterall), but she was safe-er. It was dark out her window. How long had that thing had her trapped? Annie should have been back by now, right?

Annie had gone out to hunt the creature she had failed to kill. The last time Lily had seen the creature was in the woods. The woods were full of those flowers. Annie might not know about them, or if she did she didn’t mention. If they trapped her out there then she could be in serious trouble.

Lily gripped her knee until her knuckles trembled, then stood up. She examined her outfit: elbow length gloves and stockings, uncomfortably short and low-cut baby-dress, ribbons and ruffles all over, and a comically large diaper that she could not hope to conceal. 

Annie carried herself like someone who knew what she was doing—heck, apparently she was the most organized Magical Girl on the planet! She probably knew all about the flowers. And if she already knew about them then Lily would being risking social suicide for nothing. 

She closed her eyes, then walked out into the hallway. Her best bet was to start where she had last seen the creature.

***

With the exception of a handful of late-night study groups and some intoxicated individuals near the campus pub, the campus was relatively deserted. Lily considered that one of her first real turns of good fortune all day. Though, she supposed the ease with which she was able to move in her transformed state could also be counted as lucky. If you had told her yesterday that she would be faster and more poised than ever before while wearing high heels and an impossibly thick diaper she probably would have laughed politely, then backed away slowly and made a note to avoid you in the future. Then again, she wouldn’t have believed very much about what had happened to her today. In fact the only thing that made a strange amount of sense was that Anna was a superhero. 

Something about the way she had carried herself in the brief time that Lily knew her just had a certain nobility, righteousness even in the mundane. Anna’s fastidiousness and reliability was such that Lily was already second guessing going after her roommate at all. She had not even left the shadow of her residence building, and truthfully was huddled behind one of the exterior bushes. Even if Anna didn’t know about the flower, surely she could handle it. She seemed beyond ready to handle the beast that had nearly killed Lily in a straight fight, and while the flower had posed a threat when Lily was asleep it didn’t seem particularly dangerous once she awoke. Though, the feeling of the vines crawling all over her, of the flower’s hypnotic stare—

Lily shivered and shifted her weight from foot to foot. No, she couldn’t let her fear control her, whether it was fear of being attacked or fear of being seen. Anna wasn’t the only superhero now, and it was time for Lily to do her part. She inhaled deeply, held her breath, and exhaled. Then she tensed her legs and leapt forward with all her strength, flying several stories up and into the air. Her breath caught in her lungs for a moment in surprise at her own strength, but there was no time for that now, since she still had to stick the landing. 

Her toe set down ever so lightly on the lawn and she kicked off again, into the air and covering ground faster than she could have ever imagined. She held her breath for an instant as she saw she would land within eyesight of a group of drunk college bros out for air and she fought to keep the redness from her face. She leapt again, and if any of them had seen her she was gone before she heard the reaction.

In a fraction of the time that her absolutely terrifying run home in the afternoon had taken she reached the edge of the woods and was barely even winded, though the next problem quickly became apparent: she could not see in the dark. But she wasn’t worried now, as if something brave and sure deep within her knew what to do. Not really knowing what she was doing, Lily raised her wand up like a torch and a soft pink light emanated forth from its star and as the light washed over her she became absolutely sure that she had chosen correctly. She started off in the direction that she had seen the flowers in earlier that day, trusting the light of her scepter to guide her. And it wasn’t long before she found exactly what she had been worried of: a tightly wound mass of green vines and pink flower, approximately the size of a person. The curved knives Anna had carried lay nearby in the underbrush, forgotten and evidently useless.

“Anna—“ Lily cried out and started forward, but her voice and momentum died as quickly as they began as she found those same vines tangle her ankles and wrap around her mouth. One of the flower slithered over her shoulder, and trembled as if in satisfaction. Had the one from the residence building hitched a ride on her? Her cry was muffled, and she struggled in vain as it reasserted it’s earlier control over her, it’s hypnotic center taking up her entire field of view. She felt the inky void calling out for her, comforting. It missed her and wanted her back. Someone in it wanted her back.

She wouldn’t go so easily. An omni-directional wave of magical energy burst forth from her chest and ripped the flower away with a piteous squeal. Lily scrambled upright leveled her scepter at the flower nearest where Anna’s face would be and fired. The kinetic blast ripped it away from the mass of vines and revealed Anna’s still-dazed face. 

Momentarily surprised at the effectiveness of own attack, Lily continued with a flurry of at the heads of the various flowers trapping her friend.

“Anna!”

Lily’s roommate blinked at the sound of her own name and seemed to come to, quickly tearing the weakened vines away before retrieving her blades. She dashed towards Lily and the two stood back to back.

“I told you to wait in the room.”

“Bet you’re glad that I didn’t.”

“My ass and I are both very grateful for your poor listening skills, but perhaps we can continue this later.” The flowers, though still injured form Lily’s assault, had abandoned any semblance of camouflage and now moved like enormous knotted spiders to surround the two. “I’m not in great shape right now, so I don’t suppose you have a plan?”

“More of a hunch.” Lily seized Anna around the hips with one arm, aimed her scepter towards the ground, and fired. The blast lifted both women into the air like a rocket, launching them clear of the trees just as the flowers were about to close in. She angled the stream of energy to carry them away from the forest and back to the relative safety of the campus. They landed in a twisted heap of limbs, sore but safe.

As the two extricated themselves from around each other, Lily helped Anna to her feet. “So I think I need to know a little more about this whole magical girl thing.”

***

The two exhausted magical girls made their way back across campus, hopefully for the final time that day. Lily still carried a fragment of her earlier anxiety at being seen, but it was much diminished. Perhaps it was because of the terrifying battles with an eldritch blackness on another plane of existence she had experienced twice now today, but she suspected that having her arm around Annie was also a big factor. Something about her friend being there was comforting. Even if her friend seemed the worse for wear.

Annie’s eyes were distant, unfocused. The speed and power with which she had moved earlier that night was also diminished. She barely focused on where they were going, instead letting Lily lead her. How could she have let herself be captured so easily? She knew how to fight these monsters and how to smell a trap. How did flowers get the drop on her? And why could she not shake this feeling; it was like the vines were still present, still tangled around her limbs. She felt some weighty darkness pulling at her, something that she had never known before and yet that felt uncomfortably familiar. The night air gave her a sense of unease that she simply could not shake.

Despite their physical state, they made it home together without incident. This time Lily was especially cautious of being followed, as she was not about to let the same flower trap her as easily again. Back in the safety of their room, they slumped to the floor, leaning against each other for support in the process. Lily still gripped her scepter so tightly that her knuckles trembled, but the fight was over. At least for now.

“Annie. Annie,” Lily stroked her roommate’s hand gently.

“Mmm.”

“Annie.”

“I’m okay, I’m here.”

“What is going on?” Lily placed special emphasis on each word, letting their significance impress itself.

“We’re magical girls—“

“Not that part, I got that.” She gestured at the way the two of them were dressed, from Annie’s latex-like catsuit and horned cowl, to Lily’s enormous pink diaper and uncomfortably short dress. “What were those things? Where did they take us?”

Annie blinked slowly as if she did not understand the question.

“Annie. . . You felt it, right? When the flower trapped me it. . . Brought me somewhere. I felt something.”

Annie said nothing.

“I’m not crazy, right? That happened, right?” The agitation in her voice was audible.

Annie still said nothing.

Lily put her hands on her friend’s shoulders and turned her so that their eyes met. “Annie!”

Annie gripped Lily’s wrists firmly. “I’m here.”

Lily recoiled slightly, but allowed herself a slight smirk as she felt her friend returning."So?”

“I don’t know what that was. I don’t remember.” She shifted into a more comfortable sitting position. “Each one of us have different strengths and weaknesses. If whatever those things did was magical— I’m highly vulnerable to magic attacks. I think if you were able to break out it means that—“

“—It means that I’m not.”

“Right. Which means you could be the best person for fighting whatever that thing you sensed was.”
The bottom of Lily’s stomach fell out and the emptiness in her gut chilled her. How could she possibly face that thing again? 

Annie stroked her friend’s cheek as she had earlier that night. “Don’t worry, hun. That doesn’t mean you have to do it alone. You’re part of a team now.”

Lily could feel her friend’s words. They warmed her heart, and the complicated font of emotions within her caused her to tear up. “Okay. One more question?”

Annie wiped the tears from Lily’s face with her finger. “Yeah?”

“How do we change back?”

***

Lily yawned and stretched her arms above her. She blinked groggily and grunted as she felt the stiffness in her neck. Why was she sitting up? She had fallen asleep in front of their bedroom door, in the same place that she and Annie had slumped over yesterday when—

Holy shit was it real?

“Annie!” Her voice came out in a sleepy rasp. She sprung to her feet and immediately regretted it as the stiffness in her neck blossomed into a cramp.

“Good morning, sleepyhead.” Annie called over from the far side of the room. She was seated at her desk across the room with her computer open. Two mugs, one shaped as Winnie the Pooh and the other with a My Little Pony logo on it sat next her, steam coiling off of them. “Coffee?” 

Lily took one of the two mugs and sipped from it—strong black coffee—and let her eyes linger on Annie for a moment longer than usual. The green catsuit was gone. She was dressed in her pajama pants and a white t-shirt, the set she wore every Thursday night. She checked herself too. She was wearing the enormous pink sweatshirt that she slept in every night. Most importantly was what she was not wearing: a diaper. She opened her mouth to vocalize the thought perched on her tongue.

“So—“

“Yes. Yes it’s real. Everything. The monster, the flowers, the bunny, the magic. . .”

“The costume?”

“The costume.”

Lily sighed and leaned against the desk as she gripped the mug in both hands to leach off its warmth. She felt Annie grasp her thigh reassuringly.

“I know this seems like a lot right now. I mean, it is a lot.” Annie jiggled the high-end mouse hooked up to her computer to bring the screen to life and opened a file titled ‘Crystal Magic.’ “I’ve seen several first transformations, and it’s never easy. Lord knows mine wasn’t.”

“What, did you used to have a giant diaper too?” Lily spat the words. She knew she would regret the venom behind them later. But while she was glad to have her friend here for this, there was a very small, very nasty part of her that resented her roommate.

Annie tilted her head in recognition of Lily’s point. “No, that was a first for me.”
“Oh good, I’m special.”

“But you are special,” she said as she grasped Lily’s hand. “Each of us is. We all went through our own struggle when we met our Catalyst. You remember how fast I can more, right?”

Lily paused. “Yeah,” she said sulkily.

“The first time I changed, I couldn’t control it. I was completely disjointed from space and time as you recognize it. It was—Invigorating, to say the least.” Annie’s eyes took on a far-off look, one that equally reflected fascination and pain.

“Oh. . . How long did that last?”

“Three days.” She put special emphasis on each syllable. The two girls let the weight of the words fill the room for a time. Lily tried to imagine her own experience lasting that long. The terror at every new predicament, but also at the power that filled her up unlike anything else she had ever known. 

“I’m sorry.” Lily looked Annie in the eye for the first time since the night before. “I didn’t know. I’m just—“

“Scared?”

Lily sighed. “Yeah. I’m scared. Not even just the monsters and the plants and whatever that. . . Blackness was. I’m scared about what this means for me. What does this say about me?”

Annie smirked. “It means you’re a hero. Anything else is just a side dish.” She then opened a blank document with shocking speed and formatted its margins with minute precision. She titled it ‘Lily Celeste,” and her fingers flashed across the keyboard as she filled it in. “We’ll have to think of codename for you soon. Hey, you don’t have any classes today, right?”

“Yeeeah, why?”

“Because you have class now.” Annie drained her still-hot coffee in a series of gulps, wiped her mouth, and got to her feet. “Get dressed.” She paused. “And don’t wear anything you like.”

***

Lily shivered in the dawn chill. She wrapped her hoody more tightly around herself and leaned against the wall next to the front door of their building, just on the edge of where the light fell. The hoody was two sizes too big, a “boyfriend hoody” according to some, but she didn’t feel right calling it that as she had never actually had one (a boyfriend, that is), not unless you counted high school mistakes that ended before they even began. She hoped that it and the two pairs of leggings she had layered would be enough. Training meant physical activity after all, and that meant they would be moving around. Probably. 

The expired packet of instant oatmeal she had foraged from the common room sat like a brick in her stomach. Maybe the sad, grey paste could have been appetizing if she had more than a shoddy microwave and tap water available to prepare it, but she did not and thus it was quite bad. Lily already regretted eating it at all. But the cafeteria wasn’t open this early, and neither she nor Annie had been to get groceries for the past few days. She had meant to after Math class, on the day when her whole world went crazy and she fought hypno hydrangeas and a fairytale monster while wearing a giant pink diaper. Ever since all that she hadn’t felt much like going outside. Not alone at the very least.

Lily examined her own body. She ran a hand across her thigh. It was the same thigh it had been last week, the same as it had been for as long as she could remember. And yet not the same. It felt different. Her whole body felt did.

At that moment Annie bounced down the stairs, a duffle bag slung over one shoulder.
“Ready to go?”

Lily dropped her hand with a start and did her best to make it look like she had not just been feeling herself up. “Yup, so ready. Just lead the way. I am very, very ready.”

Annie gave her a look somewhere between maternal care and condescension. She held out her hand as if she wanted Lily to take it, which she did. Then with a flourish of her other hand Annie summoned one of the two curved blades Lily had seen her use before. There was a blur of motion and light and the air itself opened into a narrow slit, like Annie had made a gash in space itself and the guts of the universe were about to be laid bare. Annie winked at Lily then stepped through, pulling Lily with her.

Lily was a petrified by panic and wonder and she was certain that for a moment her heart stopped and the breath froze in her lungs and then the apartment was gone and Lily was standing next to Annie, still clutching her roommate’s hand and standing in a meadow that she had never seen before.
Annie tossed the blade and it did a neat spin in the air before vanishing. She coughed once and glanced at their still-clasped hands.

“Do you mind?”

Lily released her death-grip and the motion broke her form her stupor. “What just happened!”

“We warped,” Annie said as she set about unpacking her duffle bag. She extracted a stack of clay disks and a small pneumatic device with a slit on one side and a plastic cylinder on top that looked roughly the same diameter as the discs. “Well warp, teleport, instant transmission, whatever term you like really. Most of us have some ability that serves a similar purpose, but it kind of varies depending on the specific powers.”

Through the haze of the day of her first transformation Lily remembered Annie mentioning others. She wondered for a moment where they were and when she would meet any them.

“But we can talk about my powers later. Right now we’re going to focus on yours.” Annie loaded the disks into the cylinder and clicked a switch on its side. The device breathed to life. “Let’s see how your aim is.” She pulled a remote control from her pocket and clicked a button on it. The device revved and one of the clay disks shot out up into the air—

And kept going off into the horizon.

Annie glanced at Lily from the corner of her eye. “You were supposed to shoot it.”

“Shoot it with what? I don’t even know how to transform.”

“Ah! That’s an excellent point. Okay. We should go over some basics.” Annie pulled out a well-loved notebook with the words ‘CM BASICS’ written on it in careful calligraphy. She opened it to a page and held the book up to Lily. There were a series of graphs and numbers, some of which she could recognize from sight but others so complicated that even trying to process them made her head hurt. “Don’t worry, we’re gonna go slowly,” Annie said. She pointed to the first graph, one that Lily could understand. It was a scatterplot. “This graph represents a hypothetical two dimensional reality. Those two dimensions are the two axes of the graph,” Annie said, indicating it with her finger. She pointed to the one next to it. “And this one represents our three dimensional reality. It has a third axis, so the same data we had represented on the previous graph is going to look different by virtue of adding that in.” Sure enough, upon closer inspection the two graphs did contain the same information. The new metric of measurement took the handful of datapoints and cast them adrift from what had been their point of origin.

Annie pointed at the final graph, the one that made Lily’s brain hurt to look at. “And this graph represents a reality that has four dimensions. It changes that same data even more, so that it is virtually unrecognizable from before.” Lily tried yet again just to process the thing she was looking at, but looking at it longer brought the graph from merely painful to totally confounding. She couldn’t even imagine a way to sensibly present it in three dimensional space.

Lily closed her eyes and rubbed at her temples. “Okay, I guess I’m following you. But I don’t see what this has to do with me.”

“Well, you remember how I called that animal you touched your Catalyst? It created a reaction in you with components that already existed, and it was specific to you. As far as I know, the catalyst of one magical girl could not activate another. The one thing that we all have in common, though, is that we all appear to be pieces of a fourth dimensional reality.” Annie paused to let her words sink in. “Your Catalyst reintroduced your fourth axis. From the moment you touched it you have been transformed, changed into your true form. Even right now you are transformed.”

Lily blinked several times, then looked down at her body in confusion. Same hoody and leggings she remembered putting on this morning.

Annie rubbed her chin with one hand. “I’ll try to break this down even more. You know those shows like Power Rangers or Sailor Moon where they have a transformation sequence every episode?”

Lily nodded.

“We don’t have that. Our physical form just changes when we use our powers. And when we don’t use them we appear, at least to most people, as we would in this three dimensional reality. We appear the same way we did before we changed.”

“I still don’t really get it,” Lily said deliberately. “But I think I get the important part? There’s no ‘Morphin Time.’”

“Yes.”

“But how do we turn back?” Lily paused for a beat. “Well not turn back but you know.” She gestured around her hips.

“The short and horribly unhelpful answer is practice,” Annie said with a shrug. “You just have to figure out what works for you.”

Lily sighed in frustration. “Alright, fine. But this all seems pretty. . . High-concept for basics.”

“Ah,” Annie stammered. She blushed and looked intently at a spot on the ground. “I don’t get many chances to share my theories with anyone. I guess I just got excited.”

Lily stared at her for a long, unbroken second. Then she burst out laughing, so hard that tears formed in her eyes and her abs ached, so hard that she felt like she might pee, which honestly would be the perfect thing to happen since apparently she was a big old magical baby at heart. This was the first moment in the entire time she had known Annie that the veneer of fastidious perfection slipped. Annie was just as confused and alone as Lily was. And at some point Annie started laughing too, until the two girls were exhausted, sweating, and slumped against each other on the dry grass. The two sat in silence, enjoying the emotional release of everything they had both been through over the past few days. Lily looked out into the sky, and the smile that lingered on her lips began to fade slightly.

“So if I’m understanding your theory,” Lily said. “I’m always transformed. But when I use my powers that becomes, uh, apparent.”

Annie nodded vigorously, pleased that Lily had followed her explanation.
“So I’m actually always wearing a diaper.”

Annie stopped nodding and squeezed her eyes shut as if Lily had just hit on something she hoped would go unnoticed. “Yeah. According to my theory, at least. That is your true form, or at least as close to your true for as can be conveyed in three dimensional space.”

Lily felt around her hips again, searching for any sign of the padding.

“Are you okay?” Annie asked hesitantly.

“Yeah. Honestly the part that scares me is how okay with it I am. It’s like, I never would have described myself as being uncomfortable in my skin before. But then I experienced that change and I can’t imagine wanting to go back to how I was.”

Annie’s eyes sparkled. “I felt the same way about my change.”

“I mean obviously it’s still going to take some getting used to but. . . I think I can do this.”

“Yeah,” Annie said, squeezing Lily’s hand in her own. “I’m pretty sure you can.”

Pieces of another reality. Lily had always felt like she didn’t really fit in, like she was one small fragment of a mosaic that was not meant to be, a piece of coloured glass whose hue and texture clashed with those that surrounded it. But she had decided long ago everyone probably felt that way, that disillusionment was standard. It was the only way she had found to survive. But now, apparently, there really was more to that feeling. She belonged to a space and a time and an existence beyond the one she had always known and that thought filled her with equal parts warmth and sheer terror. And that terror caused a thought to percolate in her.

“So those monsters from before,” she said. “They must be from the same reality as we are.”

Bewilderment crossed Annie’s face. “I suppose it’s possible. I haven’t had the chance to study them.”

“Wait, you mean you didn’t immediately catch one and dissect it?” Lily nudged her in the ribs.
“I guess I got caught up in the whole ‘fight evil’ thing. I mean it’s not every day you find out you’re a superhero.”

“Okay, well. When I started walking through the woods, I didn’t see any of those flowers. Maybe I’m just kinda dumb—don’t say anything—but if we go by your theory—“

“—Then you only started seeing them when they became apparent in this reality,” Annie’s eyes lit up. “Lily you’re brilliant. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. If we’re pieces of another reality then it stands to reason that there could be other pieces too.”

“If we can figure out what they’re doing and why they’re here—“

“—then we can figure out where all of this is coming from. Including us.” Annie looked ready to explode from pure elation. She sprung to her feet and offered a hand to help Lily up. “But first we’re going to get some use out of this launcher. Do you have any idea how upset the phys. Ed. Department gets when I take this thing?”

“Annie—you stole it?” Lily’s brow knit together and her mouth gaped, the face of someone who had never stolen anything since she had been punished in elementary school for taking Macey Johnson’s eraser because it was shaped like an ice cream cone. Annie raised an eyebrow at her.

“What? Did you think they were going to let me sign it out for magical girl practice?”

***

[Wannatripbaby]

Ah, finally uploaded it here, eh? Good for you!

I still think I'm gonna read it on DA so that I can comment on each chaptet individually, but I'm glad you came here and it is my honor to give you your first Like. ?

[GeraldRoss]

When it just started, I thought I knew what's coming. Nope, wrong.
It's actually pretty good. A plausible explanation, the story... The only thing I didn't entirely like is how long it is. I'm sure it could be told in a less lengthy way. But it's one of those stories, that you can actually enjoy even if the diaper part wasn't present. I like that.

[lily-celeste]

18 hours ago, Wannatripbaby said:

Ah, finally uploaded it here, eh? Good for you!

I still think I'm gonna read it on DA so that I can comment on each chaptet individually, but I'm glad you came here and it is my honor to give you your first Like. ?

Thank you so much for that  I'm always happy to get feedback.

15 hours ago, GeraldRoss said:

When it just started, I thought I knew what's coming. Nope, wrong.
It's actually pretty good. A plausible explanation, the story... The only thing I didn't entirely like is how long it is. I'm sure it could be told in a less lengthy way. But it's one of those stories, that you can actually enjoy even if the diaper part wasn't present. I like that.

Yeah, when I looked back over the stuff I wrote last year compared to the most recent chapter I was definitely more focused on the kink stuff before. There is a lot of stuff that, if this was a completed story, I would go back and cut out. But it's not, it's just a fun little story to keep me fresh. Thanks for the feedback

[CDfm]

I really enjoyed this. Flying bunnies and snakes with horns is different for sure but at the same time pretty funny. I don’t have any more likes for the day or I would have gladly given it one. I am interested in reading more. 

[YourFNF]

This is fun curious to see where it goes.. sadly out of likes for the day ?

[Ishigreensa]

Interesting beginning.  You say yo uhave more and have been working on this a while?  Cool.  I'm sure people want to read lots more about this world you've created.

[Sarah Penguin]

Hoping for more when you can

[VoxyRox]

Omg I hate when I get into unfinished stuff lol. 

[Wannatripbaby]

10 hours ago, VoxyRox said:

Omg I hate when I get into unfinished stuff lol. 

That's why there's a "Completed Stories" section lol. ?

[lily-celeste]

On 9/25/2019 at 4:49 AM, Wannatripbaby said:

That's why there's a "Completed Stories" section lol. ?

Sorry to be AWOL for so long. I have needed to focus on my mental and physical health recently while starting at a new job, so I haven't been writing longer pieces very much.

[Sparkle Dust]

1 hour ago, lily-celeste said:

Sorry to be AWOL for so long. I have needed to focus on my mental and physical health recently while starting at a new job, so I haven't been writing longer pieces very much.

That is okay!  

[Sarah Penguin]

16 hours ago, lily-celeste said:

Sorry to be AWOL for so long. I have needed to focus on my mental and physical health recently while starting at a new job, so I haven't been writing longer pieces very much.

Yups is okies happy healthy writers write mores!

[PinkTheDinosaur]

still love this story. ^.^