[Brainwashing, Identity Theft]

“Nanoha, Fate, please be safe...”

The voice of Yagami Hayate echoed through the night sky, the girl walking down the street with a book carefully held under her arm. A book that looked not unlike the one that had caused her so much grief, the same that had housed the girl that wanted to protect her all this time.

After everything that had happened during the Book of Darkness incident, the same incident that fixed the girl’s legs and gave her many friends, things seemed to wind down. She could enjoy normal life with the girls that she had befriended, as well as the family she had made through their service to the book. And yet…

Things never last. Hayate wanted to train to become a Mage, just like the two girls that had aided her during the incident. Takamachi Nanoha and Fate Testarossa. Those two girls had given their all to save her from the book, and quickly struck up a friendship after everything had been said and done. To suddenly see the two girls vanish into nothing, after they had done so much? It was mysterious beyond all compare. Especially since they had promised they’d try and help her figure out the ins and outs of magic...

What surprised her more than their disappearance, however, was what happened some nights later. Her knights, or rather the family she had made, started to disappear just the same. All leaving behind a letter from two… Phantom Thieves? At least, that’s what it said in the letters. She would’ve been distraught, but her knights reassured her. They’d keep her safe.

Then they disappeared. Leaving her all alone. And finally, the last letter arrived. Addressed specifically to her, in the same place where the Book of Darkness had once been resting on her shelf.

“We’ve taken your most precious things, but now, the time has come for you to be taken just as well! Guard that which is most precious with your life, if you wish to avoid us taking it!” -Phantom Thieves N and F”

She didn’t know what she owned that could even be considered precious, not compared to the lives of the ones that she had taken care of. So she took the only thing that had even a lasting connection to one of them… The Tome of the Night Sky. The recreation of the same tome that served as the base of the Book of Darkness. And without looking back, she ran.

This was why she was out so late at night. This was why she hoped both of them were safe. She hoped that her knights were safe as well, but her thoughts were more focused on the two mages that had saved her. Because if they were literally stolen by those thieves, then she didn’t know what she’d do to stop them. Sure, she had magic that was innately powerful, but that didn’t mean she had the aptitude to properly use it. At least not against somebody that seemed to be more powerful than her friends.

Hayate, not knowing where to even start her search for her friends, or how long she could keep running before she’d find a place where she’d be safe, did what any young girl would do. She ran for one of the parks, hoping that the night lights would give the sight she needed.

Just as she stepped underneath one of those light bulbs, she heard it shatter and burst apart. The shards rained down around her as she gaped in shock, prompting her to try and look up… Only to see nothing. Only darkness peering back at her.

“She thinks that she can hide from us!” A laugh echoed from somewhere around her, a laugh that sounded strangely familiar. A laugh that caused her to run, without even dwelling on that familiar sensation.

The more she ran, the more those lights above started shattering. Leading her towards the only lights left inside the park, the ones circling around the fountain in the middle.

“A powerful mage like her, listening to the emotions in her heart. Such an adorable sight, yet it makes her so predictable!” Another voice, equally familiar, cried out as the lights shut off. This time, they weren’t broken. They were shifting, pointing towards the fountain as they remained shut off.

Hayate didn’t understand what was going on, keeping her arms firmly wrapped around her book as hard as she could. “Who are you!? Show yourself! Please!” The gentle-hearted girl cried out, hoping to get an answer. Or a face, anything that could show her who she was dealing with.

As if they were acting in response to her pleas, the lights started shining on the fountain. The very tip of it, illuminating the night as the familiar voices laughed in unison, their positions revealed to the young brunette.

Right as she laid her pretty little eyes on them, they widened and realized exactly who they were. Those colors, the white with the blue and the yellow with the black… They were the girls that she had been looking for. Nanoha and Fate, wearing their usual barrier jackets…

“Nanoha! Fate! Where’ve you been?!” Hayate rightfully shouted at the two girls, not knowing what to think of them. Why would they just have hidden themselves away like this? And beyond that… Where were their devices? Raising Heart and Bardiche were always close to them, and yet neither girl were wielding them.

The two girls that seemed to be her friends giggled, both of them bringing a hand up to their collars. “She thinks she knows us, isn’t that cute?” ‘Nanoha’ chimed, looking at her partner with a wicked grin on her face.

“It’s adorable. She should’ve heeded our warnings, now we’ll be stealing her.” ‘Fate’ replied, before both of them yanked hard on their outfits, tossing them aside like they were a mere disguise. Rather than an extension of themselves.

When their jackets fell to the ground, two girls wearing eye-covering masks stood in their place. Two elegant girls with their cheeks tattooed showing off their old devices, a mockery of what they had once been. Two charming girls wearing matching suits, with black and white ribbons keeping their hair in identical twintails. Their true identity… and the true identity of the phantom thieves that had been sending their friend letters.

“No way…” Hayate muttered, falling onto her knees. She thought that Fate and Nanoha were her friends, but to see them acting like this, like criminals that would take away her family… It was enough to make her emotions overflow. “Why?” Was all that she could ask.

Phantom Thief N giggled, brushing a hand across her black ribbon. “To be a phantom thief means to steal anything and everything, especially that which can’t be valued. An emotion? A life? That is what we seek!”

“Even your hope, so precious, has been stolen away.” Phantom Thief F declared, adjusting her white ribbon slightly. “Even our own identities, stolen away so we could realize what we were both meant for. And now, Hayate… You’ll join us!” The blonde thief declared, giggling as she revealed a piece of the puzzle.

Hayate wasn’t stupid. Even with her emotions in turmoil, she picked up on the hint, her eyes gravitating towards the masks that they both wore. They were made to hide part of their identities, but at the same time the ornate yet cybernetic nature of both made it clear that they were some form of Lost Logia. If what the thief that was supposed to be Fate was saying was true…

“Please, Fate! Nanoha! Throw away those masks! They’re controlling you!” She had to try and get through to them. Somehow! “Didn’t they try to stop you? Make you see reason? What they did can’t all have been for nothing!”

Both of them seemed to react to this, each flinching ever slightly. In fact, the blonde jumped into the darkness, while the brown-haired thief staggered back and forth after hearing those words. “What they did…” She muttered, almost like she was in pain.

“Vita always enjoyed being with you, Nanoha! Please, show me she did something! Anything!” Hayate shouted, her arms clenching tighter around the book…

Only for her frantic shouting to be cut off by a rather chilling laugh from the suited thief, who reached into her outfit to pull out a little something. A single pendant… Easily identified as the Device belonging to one of the girl’s knights.

“All that little Vita could manage to do to a thief like me was give her treasures away. And she did it with a smile, when I stole your love straight off her lips.” Phantom Thief N giggled, stashing the pendant away. “Signum too, she fell into our arms when we broke her defenses down and stole her sense of duty from her. Such a cute treasure she’s become.”

While the young girl was once again stuck being shocked, the other thief had snuck up behind her in the darkness. Something she became deadly aware of as a pair of arms wrapped around her waist, pulling her into an embrace. “And now, more than ever, it’s time to steal you away, Hayate.” The masked thief that had been Fate whispered into her friend’s ear, that infernal giggle reaching all the way into her mind.

Hayate struggled. She thrashed. She did anything she could do to try and free herself from these bonds. But her attempts were nothing in the face of an experienced thief, one who lived on trickery and trickery alone. All of that struggling was able to free her…

Only for her face to fly straight into a mask, one held by the thief that had been Nanoha. By bouncing the girl’s attention between the two, they had subdued her. And now, with the mask-shaped Lost Logia on her face, it was time for her to join them.

A single name slipped into her mind as it sunk onto her face. ‘Mask of the Phantom.’ Knowledge about the role of the Phantom flooded in, including everything pertaining to the mask itself… Something she couldn’t remove, whether or not she wanted to. Magic was keeping her from taking it off, permanently keeping it stuck to her face.

The purpose of the Mask was to eternally record the Phantom’s life and allow them to live forever. The way it did this? It absorbed everything about its wearers, imprinting the original personality of the Phantom onto them in their place. Which meant that Nanoha and Fate had already been absorbed into their copies of the Mask, and now it was her turn.

Hayate’s hands were trying to grasp at the Mask. Trying to pry it off. But it just stuck on there, idly draining her memories, her sense of self, and her sense of morality. The last theft she’d ever be a victim of.

She could see the images of her friends and ‘family’ burning away, a soft giggle leaving her lips. Gentle thoughts, happy thoughts, all being sucked into the Lost Logia, never to be released ever again. Even the girl that had saved her from the Book of Darkness disappeared, leaving an empty spot for the Mask’s influence to fill her.

Her body grew limp as it sucked out the last few remnants belonging to her. Like the life itself had been stolen from her. But as soon as it left, no sooner did it come back. All highlighted by the alluring giggle that both thieves had been slipping from their lips.

A light covered Hayate’s body. A dark light, like the Phantom that had once been stealing trinkets from all over spacetime. The light tightened as it turned into the same sort of suit that the other two girls wore, while her hair grew just a little longer to allow for two ribbons to wrap it all into identical twintails, just like the ones her new partners had.

The last piece of it all was the book-shaped tattoo that appeared on her cheek, the last remnant of her own self. It took after the book that she had held in her arms, now fallen to the ground as she giggled alongside her partners.

Phantom Thief H had been born. And together with N and F, they’d steal it all. Even the world!