2.x For Yuri, I Build a Better Monster

“I can’t wear that!” I protest, beet-red, at yet another skirt that looks like it would barely cover my ass. This is the fourth item in this store alone that I’ve turned down on scandal factor, so clearly I’m not protesting loud enough.

Bombshell—civvie name Hannah Thompson—pouts at me with eyes like saucers. “C’mon, it’s only a little more revealing than your other outfit, and you’re fine with that one, right? So this is just a tiny hop out of your comfort zone!”

“Because no one who sees me in that one knows it’s me!” I hiss. I hug myself self-consciously and glower at the pushy witch, though I don’t want to make too much of a scene in public. No amount of skimpy clothing can compare to the mortifying ordeal of being banned from the mall—though technically we’re in one of the bigger clothing stores that’s part of the mall complex but not inside the main building, so, maybe not? Beside the point. “It’s easy for you to wear something like that, but I haven’t exactly taken care of my appearance. I’m flabby, I’m plain, and god, I can’t remember the last time I applied real makeup. I’d look like a clown if I tried to dress like you.”

It’s really not fair how good Bombshell looks out of costume. The pink and glittery villainess still sparkles like a star in her plainclothes outfit, a riot of sequins that she somehow pulls off. She’s tried to force me into a crop top and shorts combo just like she’s wearing, but I steadfastly refused.

By contrast, I’m in jeans and a graphic tee and frankly I’m missing my hoodie. I feel so exposed being my rat self next to a model like her. But I did agree to go shopping in the first place, so I can’t say I’m entirely satisfied with my pitiful wardrobe. I want to dress nicer! Hannah and I just disagree on what that looks like. Even this location—a fairly middle-of-the-pack shop on the outskirts of the Nessie—was a compromise between her desire for a “proper boutique” and my desire for the cheapest clothing available.

“Sweetie. Are you telling me you’ve never looked at a scrungly nerd girl and thought, ‘damn, I want to see her in less?’ ‘Cause if you are, I don’t believe you. Think of all the cute weirdos you’re insulting with that attitude! Your dating pool is shrinking rapidly, honey.”

“Hey,” I try to defend myself, “I never told you I’m gay. That’s a baseless assumption.”

Hannah stares at me. “Girl. I’ve seen the way you look at ‘teacher.’ And at me, not that I mind the attention.”

I crack immediately and turn away, blushing. “Okay, okay,” I grumble, “fine, yes, I know it’s obvious, shut up! That doesn’t mean I’m willing to apply the same standards to myself that I apply to others.”

“Girl.”

“It’s not hypocrisy if I admit it,” I say smugly.

“Yes, it is!” Hannah retorts with a roll of her eyes. She shoves a bundle of tops and skirts into my arms and says, “Look, you don’t even have to show me, just try them on in the privacy of the changing room. Give yourself a chance.”

I grimace, but am I really in a position to refuse? “Fine, fine. But I’m not looking at the pink ones, that is not even remotely my color.”

“Pink is everyone’s color,” she preens.

I don’t believe her, but I let her shove me into a changing room with more pink items than I’d like. And then, once the door is locked and I’m certain she’s not hovering outside listening in, I drop the pile in a corner and pull out my phone.

Alexandria: @everyone help how do i clothes good this is a FASHION EMERGENCY!!!

a single femur: Why are you asking us

a single femur: No one here wears women’s fashion

Mordacity: that’s true but i love giving unqualified absolutes

Mordacity: bitch you’re an autumn and you should wear more leather

Mordacity: get ur tits out for the girls

a single femur: Do you actually get off on being muted

Mordacity: you cant prove that I dont

Alexandria: fashion!!!!

Alexandria: emergency!!!!

Mordacity: if u add those exclamation marks together u get the vriska number ::::)

a single femur: I can excuse sexual harassment but I draw the line at homestuck

Mike Trout: Hi, Mike Trout here from hit AMC crime drama Being a He/Him Lesbian

Mike Trout: I have detailed opinions about women’s fashion

Alexandria: i am in need of detailed opinions about women’s fashion

Alexandria: or i will be trapped in this store forever

Mike Trout: So what’s the context here? Are you just trying to freshen up your wardrobe, or do you have an event you’re going to? What are you trying to accomplish?

Alexandria: oh im going to the ossuary

Visiting the Ossuary has been a dream of mine since I first learned of its existence. An extradimensional nightclub run by the strongest witch on the continent this side of the Catastrophes? Yeah, of course I want to see that. But the portals that lead into it change daily, and the mortals who frequent the club are a mix of groupie-adjacent superfans like me and prospective henchmen or business partners, so there’s always been enough of a barrier that I never tried tracking down an entrance. The odds of a witch picking any one person out of the crowd are so low as to be nonexistent.

But now I won’t just be going as a fan; I’ll be going as a witch, to be adored and sought after by all the poor, powerless humans who crave a taste of the glory and grandeur only afforded to the Jovians’ blessed.

…Though, maybe I shouldn’t be so excited to wear that label, given everything that Ferromancer and I talked about.

a single femur: Actually?

Alexandria: ye

Mike Trout: siiiick

Mike Trout: now why the fuck is this the first I’m hearing about it

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Mike Trout: “Oh yeah I’m going to the Ossuary no big deal”

Mike Trout: you cannot just drop that shit out of nowhere

Mike Trout: When and how and why

Mordacity: siiiiiiiick

Mordacity: it’s time for new political forces to enter the fray

a single femur: You realize we have to talk about this right

Alexandria: later!!! everything later!! fashion advice now!

a single femur: Fine

Mordacity: you should really reverse the order of exclamations there so it has a sense of escalation instead of deescalation

Alexandria: DEESCALATE THESE NUTS

Alexandria: gottem

Alexandria: mike please you are literally my only hope, im the most princess-coded leia-pilled ive ever been

a single femur: That’s tortured even for you

Mordacity: you dont even like star wars

Alexandria: i have withc powers now i can find where you all live!!!

Mordacity: withc

a single femur: withc

Mike Trout: withc

Alexandria: oh my god

Mike Trout: But seriously I’ll do my best

Alexandria: thank you

Mike Trout: So my question from before is still relevant here. What exactly are you trying to accomplish? Is this about getting a disguise, or do you just want to look nice for the club? Are you planning to flirt with people while you’re there?

a single femur: Wait why do you need new clothes for that? Are you not going transformed or what?

Alexandria: not initially, apparently there are private spaces to shift in

Alexandria: which for the record was not my idea

Alexandria: anyway, right, uh, goals. i dont think im going to flirt with anyone there? but i mean. i do kinda want girls to look at me.

Alexandria: i guess dudes will also look at me but it’s a witch club there’s gotta be a bunch of lesbians

Mordacity: yeah i usually see a good few

Alexandria: wait YOUVE BEEN?

Mordacity: dont you have clothes to focus on

Alexandria: fuck you, yes, we’ll talk about this later

Mike Trout: so my experiences are going to be a little skewed here but I think Portland and Seattle are close enough in culture that the same will apply to Forks.

Mike Trout: there’s a fair few “types” of signaling that I see when I go out clubbing

Mike Trout: Flannels and hair dye are the cliche examples but also completely true

Mike Trout: If you see a goth girl with a sanrio character dangling from her mini backpack, she’s gay and also probably has BPD

Alexandria: my sweet borderline bitches. my kindred souls

Mike Trout: a lot of people will just straight up have a pride flag on a pin or bracelet. bitches love buttons in portland

Alexandria: fascinating

Alexandria: iiiii will think about that and get back to you, ive been in this changing room too long

a single femur: Don’t forget fighting games tomorrow

Alexandria: yeah yeah ill be there

I do, in the end, reluctantly try on a few choice items from Hannah’s absurd pile. The less said about that, the better.

I leave the changing room behind and toss the lot—except for a single skirt that I probably won’t wear but it had really nice ruffles sue me you bastard—into the unwanteds bin. “Alright,” I tell the eagerly waiting witch, “I’ll get the one, but then I have some ideas of my own.”

The rest of our shopping passes in a blur, and by the time we sit down in the food court for a late lunch—no sign of my intrusion weeks prior, as is typical for Forks—I think I’ve seen the inside of nearly every shop in the entire Nessie. I spent a dizzying sum on new clothes, but I guess that’s just something I can do now.

Thanks to Ferromancer’s work, the money I stole from the bank was successfully laundered and put in a secure checking account. She then went the extra mile and got me a fancy credit card that gets automatically paid off on a fixed schedule from said checking account, so that I never have to think about the money except for really big purchases.

Financial independence is… it’s weird. It’s new. I went from going to college on my parents’ dime to crashing with Sophie and largely living off her generosity. For years I’ve watched my spending money shrink and shrink as gigs fell through and I lost the will to keep up the grind. I didn’t see a world where I could just have the things I want.

Makes a girl think.

“So, like, oh my god where do I even start? You get the basics of wrestling, right?” Bombshell asks me, pointing her sandwich vaguely in my direction. We picked out a cheesesteak place and Hannah immediately went for the spiciest sandwich she could concoct: a buffalo chicken sandwich with banana peppers, plus a drizzle of ranch because it “makes the perfect sauce with buffalo.”

My own humble treat is a kimchi cheesesteak with extra cheese, because it was new and I like trying new things. The flavor profile’s pretty unique, which I appreciate. “I think I do,” I answer Hannah. “Throw two-to-four people in a ring and make them pretend to beat each other up over soap opera drama plotlines.”

“Basically, yeah. It can be more than four but that’s not important. Soap opera’s good! The thing that always grinds me gears is when people say ‘wrestling is fake.’ Do you watch Star Trek, adjust your nerd glasses, and smugly brag about how you could tell all the aliens were just human actors in heavy makeup? No! Wrestling is TV where you get to watch criminally undersupported athletes risk real injury while babbling about zombies and cults because that’s what gets ratings this month.”

“And that’s an upside?” I raise an eyebrow skeptically.

“Yes!” the witch says earnestly. “You have no idea how funny it is to watch grown men talk about wrestling bloodlines and the honor of their forefathers as a preamble to sitting on each other’s faces. The ancient Greeks were onto something, I’m telling you.”

I snort. “Okay, sure, I buy it.” I take another bite of this admittedly quite good sandwich. I should find more foods with kimchi.

“The thing that makes wrestling interesting for our context,” Hannah stresses, reminding me that all of this was meant to go somewhere, “is a pair of terms useful enough to have seen use outside of wrestling itself: face and heel.”

“Oh yeah,” I comment through a mouthful of kimchi, cheese, and bread, “I’ve seen those on TV Tropes.”

“I’m going to ignore that,” she announces graciously. “To put it succinctly, faces make the crowd wanna see ‘em win and heels make the crowd wanna see ‘em lose. When management tries to push a heel in the role of a face, you get a Roman Reigns and people boo your ‘hero’ worse than they boo any villain. And this is the framework that Visage uses.”

My interest sharpens. “I thought they imported a bunch of idol stuff from Japan?”

“Oh, they do that,” Hannah waves, “but Japan has wrestling, too, and you can’t get by just on the idol racket when your idols are regularly getting into property-destroying deathmatches. If you want to control—and profit from—the whole game, you need to account for that back-and-forth between magical girls and witches and sell it as a narrative.”

Bombshell’s insightful commentary on the inner workings of Visage only lasts so long before devolving into excited rambling about her favorite wrestling matches, which I only half manage to pay attention to. We finish our food, grab the bags, and make our way back to Ferromancer’s hideout.

I’m looking into getting a private apartment to store any purchases I can’t quite justify to Sophie, but that’s a problem for future Rachel. I want someplace nice that I can call mine, and paying rent twice demands a certain stability of income that doesn’t quite reflect my current situation. Bombshell has a few ideas on that front.

For now, I’m keeping my luxuries in Ferromancer’s workshop. When I officially accepted the apprenticeship, she set me up with a side room to serve as a study. It has a nice storage closet and dedicated space to do private experiments with my magic.

“We’re back!” I call to Erica as we bring our haul inside.

The other witch is hunched over a table fiddling with some gadget, but she looks up at our entrance and waves. “Ah, perfect timing. I’ve just finalized arrangements with the Morrigan. I have the date and time for our trip to the Ossuary.”

I rush over in excitement. “Ooooo, when is it?”

“Halloween night.”