When the first episode of Ready, Steady, Go! aired later that week, Adah was surprised by how similar the episode’s plot stayed to what had actually occurred on set. Perhaps that was a benefit of the crew’s strict filming schedule. Ready, Steady, Go!’s main conceit was relatively tame compared to those shows where the contestants had to survive on a deserted island or share a house with strangers for a couple of months. Other than the challenge, that first day on set had felt like filming an unscripted sitcom.
The most artificial aspects of the episode to Adah’s eyes were the cutaway confessional segments. Adah and a few of the other cast members had stayed after the Penalty phase to answer some scripted questions from Arthur in a one-on-one with the camera. For Adah, this mostly involved explaining her thought process during the challenge so that the viewer could better understand the trick she’d uncovered with the goal book. Arthur wanted her to say some specific lines during the confessional, so those became the most scripted moments of the show.
That said, it wasn’t as though Adah’s segments became the episode’s focus. Her solution to the challenge acted as a subplot at best. Ciel was the clear main character at this point, depicted as a unifying leader rather than a self-serving empress. She must have even given Felt and Pirouette directions for how to speak during their confessionals, since they had nothing but positive things to say about Ciel. They talked to the camera as if they hadn’t been in on the girl’s plans from the start, and were so glad that someone like Ciel had stepped up to help them solve the challenge.
Being excluded from Ciel’s group didn’t make Adah look like a renegade, but rather a loner.
Adah wasn’t the only one who noticed her minor role in the episode either.
The show had a strict weekly turnaround, with filming on Monday and the airing of that week’s episode on Saturday. So, when the first episode aired that Saturday night, all the magical girls and staff of the Last Light gathered at the agency office to watch their captain’s television debut.
With the addition of Seliah to their roster, the office’s lobby felt thoroughly cramped for an all-hands gathering like this. Seeing half her teammates sitting on the floor was beginning to convince Adah that she may need to compromise on her hopes of simply expanding their current home. The transfer of Seliah’s contract to the Last Light was officially complete, and although the deal had included the company’s purchase of the Orbit Promo brand, it hadn’t included any extension of the lease on the building Seliah lived in. Adah could take her time announcing Seliah’s addition, but the witch would need a new home within a month.
And the current Last Light office would not do. Seliah had started a routine of commuting to the agency office each morning and leaving in the evening, so that she train with the team and join them on any missions, but that arrangement wasn’t sustainable. What if the team needed her help on an early morning or late night mission? She’d also had to commandeer the back office as a place to study or get some privacy during downtime, which was yet another short-term solution to a long-term problem.
Despite the lack of accommodations, Seliah had settled into the team even easier than Adah had expected. Of course she and Ami already acted like old chums, but Seliah even hit it off with Seb and Michel. In the past week alone, Seb had spent hours with the witch interviewing her, learning about her spells, and doing all of the research he needed to help Adah with Seliah’s official introduction.
As for Grace, she was thrilled for the agency to have someone else who could cook and clean to her standards. Seliah was, as their manager put it, the only other adult at the agency. When Adah had asked if negotiating with politicians wasn’t proof of her own adulthood, Grace had just laughed at her. What the hell?
For today, the five magical girls of the Last Light and their supporting staff all found a spot to sit and made do. Adah turned to watch the reactions of her teammates as the first episode of Ready, Steady, Go! came to a close. She wasn’t sure what kind of expressions she expected to see—especially since the final edit of the episode was new to her as well—but the looks that twisted their faces came as a surprise. They were contemplative, almost scrutinizing.
“Did they cut you out of a lot of scenes?” Ami was the first to speak.
“Not that I remember,” Adah said. “I tried to fly under the radar for the most part. I mentioned the Cruelties once—they cut that, but they showed a lot of me during the challenge.”
“That’s what I’m saying,” Ami said. “I almost forgot you were in this until the end.”
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“I wouldn’t go that far,” Rika quickly added, “but I was surprised. You usually have such a strong presence on camera.”
“Well, this was intentional,” Adah said. “These girls aren’t exactly my friends. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself early on.”
Was that even true? All she could remember about the Social phase was how nervous she’d been. But it had to be true—if she’d wanted to make an impact, then she would have. Right?
As if to disagree, Emi shook her head. “That wasn’t you,” she said.
Adah looked to the only magical girl who hadn’t spoken up yet—the newest member of their team, the witch who’d had such a clear read of Adah the last time they’d talked in private. Seliah glanced at the credits rolling down the television screen, then made eye contact with Adah.
“With a show like this, it’s hard to know how much of the problem comes down to how they filmed it,” Seliah said.
“Was I seriously that bad?” Adah asked, though she wasn’t sure she wanted an answer.
Everyone else kept their lips sealed. Now that she’d spoken that word into existence—“bad”—no one wanted to speak their minds. No one except for Seb.
“I wouldn’t call it ‘bad,’” he said, “just not up to your potential. You came across as a background character, but you’re usually making a scene even when you shouldn’t be. I mean, even when you gave me your shoe, you were making a memorable moment out of a lame situation. That’s the kind of magical girl I expect when I think of you.”
Although she didn’t agree with his choice of words—making a scene, really?—Adah had to trust Seb’s view of her performance. This guy was obsessed with magical girls, most of all the members of the Last Light. He spent all day, every day writing about Adah and her teammates, taking pictures and videos of them, helping with their social media, and anything else he could think to do to tell their stories. If there was any opinion she should take to heart, it was his.
And now that she’d heard his take, she recognized it in her own assessment of her role in this week’s episode, too. She hadn’t realized during filming, but she’d been paralyzed. Rather than playing it safe or waiting for her moment to strike, she’d been too scared to take any action at all. That’s why she’d let Felt’s comments bounce off her, why she’d allowed Ciel to fool Zoe, and why she hadn’t reached out to Ren until her back was against the wall during the challenge.
She’d been afraid of the consequences of making the wrong move, so she made no moves at all.
Adah stared at the commercials that had taken over the TV broadcast, nearly chewing a hole through her lip while she thought of how her time on screen had already faded away into nothing.
“Are you mad?” Seb asked her.
“At myself, yeah,” Adah said.
“If you want my opinion,” he said, “it seems like you’ve been so busy trying to be a soldier that you’ve forgotten how to be an idol.”
“One of those jobs is more important than the other.”
“Is it?” he asked. “Is that what made me want to help you out? Is that where all your fans came from? Remember what got all of those people to support you against Secretary Thibault. Sure, you were fighting hard for them all along, but that’s not why that crowd was cheering for you that night. You lit something inside of them. When it comes to idols, you’re not a genius like Iris or a natural like Emi, but what you’re good at is giving it your all. The Heartbreak I know believes in her feelings so strongly that they become reality. When you’re at you’re best, whatever emotions are burning you up start swelling up inside me, too. That’s what you do better than anyone else!”
The rest of the room watched Seb in silence, but he didn’t pay them any mind. He looked at Adah straight-faced, with a steadiness that told her he wouldn’t back down. She could understand that part of him—it had been that passion for magical girls that had helped them connect to each other so quickly when they first met. Adah had spent her schooldays living the same way he did now, always writing about magical girls, watching them rise and fall in popularity, thinking about what it would take for her favorites to reach the peaks of their careers.
When you were that invested in a magical girl, what you wanted more than anything was to watch her trying her best.
“You’re not going to make a dramatic speech every episode,” Seb said, “but you have to let us see what’s inside of you. Chase after the spotlight every week and force those girls to tear you limb from limb if they want to stop you. If you can do that, I know everyone watching will want to root for you. Just like they did at the concert.”
That concert already felt like a lifetime ago, and the girl who had stood at the front of the stage that night seemed like a stranger to Adah. The battle-ready humanoids had yet to arrive; Adah had yet to cross paths with Secretary Sirk; the coalition was nothing more than a loose association of magical girls from the same region. Despite all she’d learned since that night, and all the new fans and power she’d gained along the way, that concert remained Adah’s peak as a magical girl.
The surge of energy that coursed through her when she claimed a powerful Cruelty’s core was nothing more than a shiver when compared to the flood of endorphins that had shook her from head to toe when the crowd roared in response to her calls.
And why had they answered her with so much fervor? Not because she’d fought Cruelties for them—at the time, her team had barely taken down a B-Rank. No, Seb was right. She, and every one of her teammates, had emptied their hearts out on that stage. The crowd cheered for the girls not because they were getting what they wanted as fans, but because they wanted to see Adah and her team get what they wanted as magical girls. That had been the overwhelming force that had shook her so.
That was the will of humanity, and she owed it to those fans to not waste their passion.
The only way she could live up to her own expectations, and thus those of all her fans, was to end each episode of this show with nothing left in the tank.
What was television without a little drama, after all?