Was there anything quite as thrilling as a plan coming together? If there was, Asmodeus couldn't think of it. Strolling through this hallways he could barely restrain from the strut in his step. His new up and coming channel was doing great, baby! Broadcasting nothing but magical girl channels, 24/7, with genres fitting the time of the day. You want some hardcore smut? Midnight to 4AM. Something a little more family friendly? Daytime hours, baby. Something more adult? Late at night, but not quite midnight yet.
All kinds of genres to cover, with so many magical toys and magical collectibles, they'd soon be drowning in the best magic of all: Money.
"Baphomet!" Asmodeus said, catching the eye of a petite glasses wearing girl holding a notebook. "How you feeling today, babe?"
Baphomet tilted her head, her hand blurred across the notebook, and then she flipped it over to reveal a smiling sun over a field full of frollicking magical girls. This was the way that she communicated, you understand. He'd never once heard a sound cross her lips. Not a word, not a grunt, not a single solitary noise.
There were all sorts of rumour about that. That her voice was a horrible thing that rips the souls right out of people. That it sounded so wonderful that it would make you fall in love with her. That she had sold it to an elder thing from beyond the stars in exchange for power, beauty and eternal youth.
Personally, he just thought she was really shy.
Ah, now she was holding up a page with a big question mark and an arrow pointing at her face, off page. Right! Down to business.
"Sorry for pulling you away from your desk like this," Asmodeus said, putting his arm on her shoulder and gently guiding her down the corridor. "We all appreciate the work that you do, designing the uniforms, monster, et al for our many, many shows - But despite your hard work there are still some out there who have not yet caught the Magical Girl Fever, and we aim to do something about it."
Ah, now Baphomet was holding up a picture of Asmodeus himself, sitting in a cloud, tossing out fireballs onto a population begging for mercy yet finding none.
"No, no, we don't do that anymore," Asmodeus said. “It’s bad for publicity.” Instead, we;ll be having ourselves a focus group, a paid group of anti-fans who we will promptly <s>brainwash</s> make them see the error of their ways, and embrace Magical Girl Fever, helping us reach 100% market saturation."
Baphomet held up a drawing of a big smiley devil face. Yes, yes, yes. All according to their evil sinister secret plan. Time to move on with that rather than monologue about it, that's how eavesdroppers found out the salient details. No need to explain the finer details that they were both already fully aware of.
By the way, he hated that in television shows. 'As you know'. If you're writing something that starts with that dialogue, step back and ask what fucking universe you live in where people tell each other things they damned well already know that each other already know.
Ahem. Anyway. Asmodeus led Baphomet into the room, where five adorable young women were sitting around a table. All in the perfect demographic, all five anti-fans of the Magical Girl genre. All for different reasons.
"Hello, there everyone!" Asmodeus said. Baphomet drew a picture of a hand and waved it around. "I am Mister Deus, an executive here at the Magical Girl Channel, and this is Baphy our lead designer/artist. We are here today to figure out how to expand our market share. It is my understanding that all five of you strongly dislike our specialty genre, and we want to get to the bottom of why that -"
"Stop right there!" said a new figure, storming into the room right behind them.
It was a young woman with short green hair and a smirk on her lips that promised mischief and trouble. She was wearing what could perhaps be called a military uniform.. If you were veeery generous. And concluded that the military had been infiltrated by a bunch of perverts with infinite budget. Short pants that very much emphasized her curves, a cap with some kind of insignia and gemstone on it. And a <i>uniform</i> that quickly morphed into.. Well a bikini was perhaps the right name? There was a collar, and a bowtie, and also sleeves!
Just you know, everything below that became fetish wear.
But hey, she was wearing leather gloves.. that had to help, right?
"I can't let you go any further in brainwashing these young women," the obvious magical girl declared in typical over the top fashion. "I, General Justice, will bombard your plan to smithereens, just like I do every villain's plan! Only on The Magical Girl Channel, 8:30 PM!"
The five girls rolled their eyes, and then General Justice handed Asmodeus a cup of coffee. Ah yes, his old secretary. A real stick in the mud, until they'd run a few... tests on her. Now she was an expert cosplayer who adored little more than dressing up in their various magical girls, even made the costumes herself. The resemblance really was uncanny as well.
"My secretary, ladies," he said. Prompting her to curtsey. "Do forgive her, she's rather - ah, taken with some of our shows and likes to put on a performance." That wasn't even a lie. "Thank you for the coffee, tell anyone that calls that I'm busy for the next hour and take a message."
She turned and left, and he took the opportunity to give her a discreet grope while using his own body to completely block sight of it from the five girls.
“Ahh.. It's always a <i>pleasure</i> sir.” She said before slipping out of the room, a odd spring to her steps.
"That's fine, that's fine. Now, how about you young women introduce yourselves? First names only, no need to be formal here."
The first to speak up was decked out in goth gear. You know the sort, face covered with white makeup, blood red lipstick, hair darker than the night's sky (though not as black as this coffee. It had negative amounts of milk in it in defiance of common sense and mathematics. Just the way he liked it!) There was a white collar sticking up from under her black shirt, which had a picture of vampire fangs dripping blood while resting atop a pentagram. She did have a cross hanging from her neck though. Her boots looked like they could accidentally stomp a hole in the floor if she jumped, and they were so big that the skirt she wore was actually covering the very top of them. Which said something because that skirt barely covered her thighs.
"Dani," the goth chick said, voice dripping with derision. It's the kind of person that's just there for the cheque, and doesn't want to bother with niceties about it.
"And why don't you like the Magical Girl channel, Dani?" Asmodeus asked.
"Like you need to ask?" Dani snorted. "It's cartoonish. No real consequences. The power of friendship saves all bullcrap? Nobody in the real world believes that, save corporate suits looking to sell something, and the idiots that buy from them. No offence."
"None taken."
Huh, how amusing, Dani had lied when she said 'no offence' but he'd told the complete unvarnished truth. It didn't offend him, not in the least. If anyone knows how much corporate suits suck it's corporate suits. Go ahead and ask a lawyer sometime where the bulk of lawyer jokes come from, then you'll maybe get it. Asmodeus smiled politely and nodded to the girl next to her.
"Eden," the next girl said, tugging on her baseball cap. She sat there all cool, laid back, wearing a shirt bought from some local sports team that apparently had an owl for a mascot, and a snug pair of shorts. The jogging shoes made her look like quite the tomboy. "Before ya ask, I don't like all that girly bs. What kinda idiot runs around doing big jumps in tiny skirts? It's like they're trying to show off or something!"
"Pardon me for asking, but don't women tennis players usually wear fairly brief skirts?" Asmodeus asked.
"Oh hey girls, he's pegged it!" Eden sarcastically replied. "Damn, now I gotta go home and binge watch Sparkly Flowerbitch saving the Earth with her pretty pink magic."
"Ahahaha, no, no, not at all," Asmodeus chuckled. "I'm merely trying to understand your thinking a bit better." before they wrote it. He nodded towards the next girl in the group. Who was nose deep in a book."Hello, young miss? Would you please introduce yourself?"
"Beth," the girl said. Look at her, she's so confident and aloof, completely uninterested in anything except the contents of that book. "If you must know why I do not enjoy your television programmes, it is simply because they are trite, predictable, rote, and ridden with tropes from credit to credit."
Oh, take Cupid's quiver and shove all the bows into his heart, why don't you? Such a picture perfect representation of the snobbish bookworm. No doubt she over analyzes everything to the point of absurdity, breaking everything down to its components, perceives every aspect of fiction from the Watsonian and Doylist viewpoint, and grades each miniscule minutiae on its worth in both.
"Everyone's a critic," Asmodeus replied, absolutely smitten with this girl, and deeply looking forward to seeing what kind of magical girl she'd cosplay as when the time finally came. "Next?"
Now, this girl had really short hair. Neatly trimmed, was sitting smartly on her seat. She was wearing a camo jacket, and camo trousers. Clearly not actually military, but more like she was pretending to be.
"Sir, Cari, sir!" the girl saluted. "I find this genre disrespects the military by its very nature, sir! In order to make these monsters look like threats, any military presence has to be easily contained and dealt with to give them a boost. Thus, making them seem incompetent when put up against skinny girls with no combat training, no experience, no sense of tactics. Just a magic stick they aim and point."
Okay, this was probably going to be the hardest of them to deal with, because she was completely in the right here. An actual military presence in a magical girl show was always doomed to failure because you... just... can't have the monster of the week steamrolled by a tank. It's not good drama. It's not good buildup.
Still! Asmodeus liked a challenge! Good old Baphy would think of something. A military themed team? Some girl who could become a tank, or something like that?
"Perhaps if we drew some ideas from super robot shows, you would be happier...?" Asmodeus mused. Although, you do have to be careful. I mean, the fetish aspect of this was a vital component. Absolutely vital! "We'll be sure to figure something out, have no fear! Now, last but by no means least, Miss...?"
“Francis," said that last girl, who was wearing a baggy jumper, but her clothes were the least distinctive part about her. For one thing, she'd said her name in between yawns, had her head against the desk, a pencil behind both ears, rings around her eyes, messy hair and easily the biggest breasts out of the lot of them. "I'm a writer... My first manuscript was passed over 'cause of some crummy magical girl show. Oh, you're not hitting the same demo we're looking for. Oh, not nearly enough broad appeal."
Huh! He'd never seen an angry yawn before.
"Magical girls suuuuuck," Francis said. "Why does anyone even like them? Those empty suits went for the safe route, but I'll show 'em... I'll show 'em when I finish writing Heart of the Matter."
"H-Heart of the Matter?!" Beth jumped to her feet. "You - That's the upcoming sequel to No Stomach For It! The best horror story I've read in years! You're <i>that</i> Francis D-?!"
Baphomet held her pen in front of Beth's pretty mouth before she said the second name. For the best really, it kept things nice and simple.
"Alright, now that introductions are finished, let's get down to business!" Asmodeus said, clapping his hands and pulling up a chair. "You all say you hate the Magical Girl Genre, but I'm feeling confident. By the end of today, every member of this focus group will be a great big fan."
Even if he has to break your brains to do it. Now for step one...
- Get them to dress up as Magical Girls.
- Watch their new show and write comments. Ignore the subliminal messaging.
- One of the girls actually notices something strange going on!
- An outsider is sneaking into the building, suspicious of this weird channel.
- Something else
No comments:
Post a Comment