Shape of a Miracle EP 2 - FreezeFrame

Prologue

"Plagg, claws out!"

In only three little words, the blistering winter air around her fizzles away in a flash of green light. Her civilian attire is replaced by a black cat-like costume, transforming Shoko Nishimiya into a superhero.

Having jumped off her apartment balcony, she now falls through a seemingly endless clear night sky. Thousands of glimmering stars and a beautiful waxing moon watch her from above. Below her, she sees the same bright constellations, a reflection of the night sky on the river beneath her. With a click of a button, the illusion shatters. Her magical baton extends and crashes right through the icy surface of the river below, launching her back up into the starry night sky. Yet no matter how high she rises, the stars seem no closer than before.

Eventually, the bottom of the baton begins to slip, and she descends back down. With a loud crash, The top end of her staff lands on the roof of a small white painted house facing the river. Lights flicker on in the windows as she swings herself onto the roof of the building, de-extending her staff. Seeing the carnage her landing took on this roof, she tries to slot the cracked tiles back in their place, then peers over the edge of it, seeing a pair of sleepy eyes peek out of one of the windows. She bows her head in apology before vaulting to the neighbouring rooftops. She hates to leave things like this, but time is of the essence.

She vaults, jumps, skips, sprints and trips her way through the rooftops of Ogaki. Quite a sight to see for all that are up at this hour. A part of her wants to indulge in the attention her current identity gives her, a selfish part. But she can't stop now. She has to reach her destination.

And there it is. Chuku middle school. Her middle school. Finally within reach.

She lands on its rooftop, it's looking the same as always. From the outside no one would even have guessed the magical circumstances that it endured just a few months ago. She walks over to the railing and slides down her staff to one of the building's windows. It has a flat piece of wood instead of a glass pane, so she's just about able to push a little gap in it and slip inside.

Jumping into the hallways of her school, she stands up tall. She made it. But there's no time for victory poses. Jolting herself to the nearest closet she grabs her most important weapon. With it in hand, she sweeps the floor of the hallway.

A few months ago, an akumatized villain caused havoc in this school, and although she was able to defeat him, he had caused so much damage that her school had to be temporarily shut down for repairs. Since then, she's been visiting the school every night when no one is around, just to help clean it up.

So she walks around the pitch black hallways, mopping the floorboards, taking out the bins, tidying the classroom shelves and generally cleaning up whatever mess was left in her closed-down school. When she first started, it was almost impossible to sweep the floors without tripping over the mess that the Pied Player left in these halls. But now it's only taken a couple of hours to finish up. And it's all thanks to the diligent work of all the construction workers who've helped fix up her school during the day.

Finishing up her work for the night, she stands back and lets herself smile. Soon these empty classrooms will be full of students. Soon, these darkened halls will light up with smiling faces. Soon she'll be surrounded by all the sparkling friendships she'll never be a part of.

She walks down the hall and sees a big glass pane leaning against the wall. Beside it, is the very same window she came in through and the very same window she broke when she had first transformed into her superhero form. It was the first thing to break, yet here it is, seemingly the last to get fixed.

She carefully removes the flat piece of wood on the window and slots the glass pane in its place. She stands back, breathing in the dusty frozen air. In the window, her own monstrous reflection looks back at her. Against the deep dark hallway, her pitch black attire makes her almost invisible. Almost a part of the darkness around her. But that image falls away, as the glass pane comfortably slides off its frame and falls into the courtyard outside.

She Reluctantly peers through the now paneless window, and searches for the glass pane of the ground. Eventually, she is met once again with her monstrous reflection, this time, through dozens of shattered glass lying on the grass.

She leans back into the dark hallways. An icy breeze runs in through the window. By the time she finishes sweeping up all the pieces in the courtyard, the sun is already rising. It's time to leave. Launching herself into the air with her staff, she watches the blinding speck of light that is the sun slowly grow out from the horizon, giving colour to the once dark city of Ogaki.

But as she lands herself back onto the edge of the roof of her school, right outside the school gates, she sees a familiar figure. Draped in red, with shaggy black hair, it stares up at her with its one big shining eye.

Then everything goes white.