1119/Time to go home

Time to go home
Date of Scene:	14 February 2024
Location:	Train Station
Synopsis:	Klarissa has become the Witch Oktavia, and despite the chances being against them, this isn't a battle to eradicate the threat she represents, even as Kyubey pushes them towards that choice, but to rescue her.
Cast of Characters:	Sayaka Miki, Madoka Kaname, Melona Mizu, Norie Okana, Usagi Tsukino, Mamoru Chiba, Amanda Faust, 6, 21

---

Sayaka Miki has posed:
Ula goes pallid in the face when she sees the dark Soul Gem. She knew for a fact it wasn't that dark when they went to give Hinoiri her present, she checked. Maybe it wasn't within normal levels, and they should have procured a Grief Seed soon, but they still had time.

Or they supposedly did.

"Klarissa, you..." Sayaka says in reaction to the same sight, the shock and horror in her voice as clear as pure water. Yet, the bluenette isn't able to finish the sentence as the Soul Gem cracks and the wind lifts and pushes them back.

Just like Madoka, Sayaka has to make a grab for Ula before she too is lifted and has to hold herself to the station's railing, shielding the small mermaid with her body from the powerful wind currents.

"Klarissa!", Sayaka calls out too, too confused by the sudden turn of events to properly elaborate them. "What are you doing!?"

But instead of a reply, she only gets weird symbols appearing in the air, unnervingly similar to a stylized Grief Seed. Not that she has the time to reflect on it with how the wind is threatening to rip her off the railing.

And then nothing. The wind stops howling and Sayaka is now standing, still hugging Ula close to herself, looking up with her mouth agape, struggling to believe what her eyes are showing her. They are not in the train station anymore.

Oktavia is sitting up high, overlooking the eldritch concert hall that makes up this part of her Labyrinth. There is one thing both her and Sayaka are facing. The body of a bluenette floating down in front of the Witch.

And then a scream. An eerie, unsettingly human scream that has its origin in the mermaid Witch, almost as if she too realised just now what happened.

"That's Klarissa", Sayaka says, her voice shaking incredulous. "That's Klarissa, isn't she? She just... became a Witch." How? Why? Since when do Puellae become Witches? A frustatingly simple answer comes to Sayaka's lips as the bluenette grits her teeth. "Kyubey. Kyubey knows, doesn't he?"

Ula silently nods. That has to be right, this must be Kyubey's final secret, the one Gretchen was tormented with keeping. How could she keep going so well like that? The small mermaid's sympathy for the X-Chara grows as she gets that piece of the puzzle to the dark mini Madoka's behaviour.

"It's ok", Sayaka says. "We can do something, we will get her back. Moon and Red are coming, I sent them a message while on the chase earlier." Even if she thought they would come to help calm Klarissa down, not face her as a Witch.

"In the meantime, Madoka and I will hold her back", Sayaka says, getting her ring to its oval form as it releases the blue flash of her henshin. And yet...

"I can't transform", Sayaka says, still in her civilian form, a bead of sweat travelling down her forehead as she realises the gravity of what she just said.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
[From Scene 1112]

    "Klarissa-chan!" calls out Madoka. "What's happening?!"

    Gretchen can't handle this anymore. She starts to cry, and immediately pulls her mask down over her face to hide it. Sio, with gritted angry teeth, glares daggers at Gretchen. "I want you to tell us what's happening."

    The wind dies down, and Madoka finds herself inside the Labyrinth. Both of her fairies are still in her arms. None of the trio question it when Hinoiri flees, because as far as they know Hinoiri still has no powers.

    Gretchen is shaking. The mask only covers her face, but it doesn't hide her body language at all. She breaks away from Madoka's embrace and turns her back on the other two, looking up at Oktavia.

    There's no running away for her. There was only ever a single, inevitable fate that she was always marching towards. The truth has come out, and now everything is going to fall apart.

    "Klarissa... has become a Witch."

[Now]
    Madoka stares up at the Mermaid Witch in wide-mouthed disbelief. What Gretchen has just told her sounds impossible. She wants to demand answers, but the words die in her throat when she sees how much Gretchen is suffering.

    Sio feels differently. The minidoka flies up to Gretchen and slaps her across the cheek, knocking off her mask and revealing the Witch Chara's teary, puffy eyes. "What the hell, Gretchen! Why did you hide this from us? From Madoka-chan?!"

    "Sio-chan, stop!" protests Madoka. "Can't you see she's already hurting?"

    "Don't just let her off the hook!" bites back Sio. "Chara Change! Become someone who will call out her bullshit!"

    Suddenly, all at once, Madoka's hair goes from pink fluffy twintails to a chin-length bobcut; as if Junko Kaname was somehow shorter, younger and pinker. Madoka glances towards the looming Oktavia and gets a lot more serious. "We don't have time for this." Aiming her angry gaze at Gretchen, she sharply commands, "Gondola. Now."

    The world shifts around them a second time, as Gretchen obediently draws both Sio and Madoka into her own personal Labyrinth. There's no telling how long this hideaway will last if Oktavia tries to pull them out, but it grants them a moment of respite. Her relatively tiny space manifests as the inside of a gondola floating high over city skyline within a starry night.

    Madoka takes a seat, crossing both her arms and legs. Her sharp gaze tracks Gretchen as the Witch Chara rubs her eyes. "We don't have time to waste. Right now, Klarissa needs our help, and Sayaka can't transform. You are the only one who really understands how Witches work. So. What do we do, Gretchen?"

    "You grieve, Madoka!" bites back the X-Chara. "You kill the Witch, you bury Klarissa, and you grieve. That's it. There's no saving her. Not once she's turned."

    The pink Chara Bearer shakes her head. "You can't expect me to give up that easily. There has to be a way. There has to be hope."

    Now it's Gretchen's turn to be angry. "You think I haven't been searching? You think I haven't been doing everything I can to defy this fate? From the moment I hatched, this was one of my top priorities. Stubborn naivety may work for other magical girls, but against a Witch it will just get you killed!" The dark fairy gestures towards herself. "Don't assume that the Dark Energy of Obsidian and the Despair of a Witch are the same! Klarissa didn't fall because some evil magic drew out the worst from her or blinded her with dark delusions. She fell because of her own feelings and the curses born out of her own heart. Purification can only burn Witches, not fix them."

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Closing her eyes and tilting her head down, the Witch Chara goes on, "There's nothing to hope in. There's no karmic force or divine entity that will save Klarissa, because it's karma that has done this to her! From the moment she formed a contract, it was over! Be happy you have a spare Sayaka."

    Madoka's face, even under Sio's influence, begins to soften. "If there's no god who will hear the prayers of Puella Magi, then maybe there should be."

    Gretchen squints her eyes at Madoka. "Who, you? You might have the karmic potential to pull that off, but you lack conviction. Someone who's highest desire is to 'be her best' simply isn't good enough. With a mindset like that, you'll always be a victim to your own limits, never able to break them."

    Hearing these criticisms gives Madoka pause. "Maybe so. Maybe as I am now, I'm not good enough, but I disagree on one point. If you can break your limits, then they aren't your limits." She leans forward in her seat, and then stands up with in the confined space of the gondola. "... If I think about why I wanted to be a magical girl, or why I volunteer at the hospital, there's more to it than just being my best. I've always wanted to be the kind of person who can make things right."

    The gondola shakes, and Gretchen looks around nervously. Is it something from outside? No... the Labyrinth, itself, is changing. Madoka's words pour forth as Gretchen's confusion rises. "It's not just about being a good girl or making others happy. What I want, what I've always wanted, was to be someone who can make things better." The pinkette gestures towards her heart, "That's why I can't give up, even if you tell me it's too late. Even if you're right. I can't accept a hopeless universe." Extending out her hand, she cups the floating Gretchen in her palm. "You're the only one I can turn to. Please, Gretchen-chan... even if there's no chance at all... help me."

    Gretchen crosses her arms. She refuses to meet her Bearer's gaze. "Last time, Brai and Medo paid the cost for you. This time, you will have to bear it yourself. If you call upon my power, you will know the deepest, most horrible darkness. I'm not just talking about the sorrow of one frustrated X-Chara, nor the hopelessness of the magical girl Madoka Kaname." Looking Madoka dead in the eyes, pointing her tiny finger at her Bearer's face, she finishes, "You will know the full Despair of my very own namesake: the Unborn Witch, Kriehmhild Gretchen!"

    Several loose pieces fall into place in Madoka's mind. Softly, she says, "That's me, isn't it? That was my fate..." The Chara Bearer trails off and closes her eyes. Then, shaking her head, she opens them again. "God or Witch, I don't care what I become, and I'm not going to stop trying just because it hurts. My Heart, Unlock!"

    Moments later, Hope Witch and Sio step out of Gretchen's Labyrinth and into Oktavia's, and the black-clad Madoka looks up at the Witch of her childhood best friend. "Sio," she commands, "Go find Brai and the others. Go get help. I'll keep her here."

    Sio protests, "I can't leave you here all alone!"

    Two eldritch horrors appear at either of Madoka's side, larger versions of Gretchen's own many-eyed winged Familiars just barely taller than Madoka herself. "I'm not alone," responds Hope Witch. "Don't waste any more time, and tell Brai and Medo... that I understand now."

    Taking one last look at her transformed Bearer, and hoping it wont be the last, Sio turns towards the exit and flees Oktavia's Labyrinth, desperate to find who can help.

    One of the strange Familiars places itself between Sayaka and Oktavia, providing a protective shield for the bluenette and her mermaid companion. "Sayaka-chan," calls out Hope. "I'm sorry. I know I said I wouldn't use Gretchen anymore, but this is an emergency. I'll keep you and Ula safe. We'll figure this out, I promise!"

Melona Mizu has posed:
     Melona hadn't actively been out on a hunt tonight. She hadn't been looking for a fight. But. She heard... a scream. A scream that drew her attention. "..." Did she care? Should she care?

Something told her she should. Shortly, she was transformed into her Puella Magi form. "...Stupid bleeding heart." She mutters to herself, as she grabbed her flail and started running towards the area where she'd heard that scream. And then... something she recognized. A labyrinth. Some girl had probably wandered into it by accident. What she saw when she entered, though. That was... certainly a strange scene by comparison to what she expected. Someone else had already arrived, but instead it was like... ... three witches maybe? "Uhhh... this..." Is she over her head? Because she feels like she's in over her head with the sight in front of her. But at the same time.

She walks closer to the three who looked like people...ish... kinda. One of them gave her bad vibes but you know what it's probably fine. Probably.

She started to take stock of the situation, of what was going on, and trying to make heads or tails of what specifically would be her enemy here. Aaaaand frankly quickly going to interpose herself between Sayaka and whatever that was, because she was not in henshin, so clearly a civilian. "I would recommend running, Blaue Dame." Even as she said this, she was starting to reach for chunks of train concert hall, chunks of it coming off as if it were clay for her to mold.

She wasn't attacking yet. She wasn't ready and did not have enough information.

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima is dressed today in her labcoat and has the big sensor box with that little scanning gun thingy on it and her safety googles. Still, she hovered through the air towards the sensing of a Labyrinth. It was time to get information and study a witch.

And thusly, she entered into the moray of train tracks and a concert hall as she followed after the faint images of others disappearing into it.

"Oh. Heh." she goes as she raises the little scanning gun.

"Don't mind me." she says in monotone, straight faced.

"I'm here to study."

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
It's Valentine's Day - naturally, then, Usagi is with the person she most romantically loves, her handsome prince charming, her best boy, her silly rabbit, if you would. Dressed in in a pretty pink dress with her favorite horrible purple jacket, she's walking hand in hand with Mamoru, and pleased with herself.

Earlier in the day she had offered him the treasure trove of her heart, her heap of accomplishments for her very first Valentine's Day with a boyfriend to celebnrate with - mediocre handmaid chocolates, higher quality store bought chocolates, and a teddy bear in a black tuxedo, and he had accepted them, naturally. They ought to be having a having a picnic in the park in Juuban, but it's mid-February and freezing, so instead they're just exiting a movie - it had been something a little dumb, but with a lot of action and comedy, and they'd held hands through most of it, just like every other couple seeing a slightly dumb and fun action movie on Valentine's Day.

There are plans to sit down and have a late lunch-early dinner situation together, and Usagi is about to ask if Mamoru has a preference on eateries when her phone chimes.

"Oh, hold on Mamochan, I'm gonna get this and -" she checks the message. Her face pales and she grimaces - "Something's gone wrong with Sayaka and her twin, they need help, like, chase down help. Raincheck?"

Soon after, Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask will arrive at the train station, Sailor Moon skidding to a halt at the entrance of the Labyrinth - "Oh, this is not good."

Sayaka hadn't said anything about a Witch! But what's she going to do, turn back and go out for lunch after all? There's nothing to do but move forward, right. She offers Tuxedo Mask her hand. "Want to go in together?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
There's nothing like it! There was chocolate, and there was movie, and there was going to be food, and now there is Witch.

Tuxedo Mask takes Sailor Moon's hand and nods decisively, blue eyes steady behind his mask despite how much he absolutely loathes labyrinths. He lets out a little puff of breath that would be a laugh if there were anything funny, and says, "Maybe this time the floor will stay the floor. And Sayaka and Klarissa are probably in there somewhere, just, what rotten luck."

Another breath, and they go in, Moon and Mask together, hand and hand.

"It... doesn't seem very different," he murmurs, and then they get past the train tracks and he can really tell they're not on Earth anymore, and then it's the concert hall and he looks up and up, then over at Sayaka and ... a pink-haired unfamiliar magical girl, and more familiar faces-- he scowls when he sees that Neph-stabber, LaCrima, but there's no time for that.

"How can we help?" he calls over to Sayaka, his hand briefly tightening on Sailor Moon's. Squeeze! "Can we get her down?" he's looking at the floating Klarissa now.

Amanda Faust has posed:
[Minutes Ago]
    Amy is riding back to the Academy on the train. As usual she's sitting, reading, and has done her best to find a mostly-empty car. The darkness and filth she's stared into has a lot to say about what could happen on crowded train cars. She tries not to think about that while on the train. Maybe, subconsciously, that's part of why she likes to ride on the top like Rockman. Or maybe that's just so cool.

    She hears the most vile discussion, and attempts to lecture two adults who must be at least several years her junior, all the while inwardly wishing terrible fates from humanity's dark dreams upon them, but the train pulling into the station lets them leave, and she does not follow. She needs to take care of something else real quick.

    By a quirk of fate, she misses the others by moments.

[Now]
    A text came in that Klarissa's in trouble, so... looks like that's how she'll be spending Valentine's Night. She doesn't know what she can do, but she can't leave a friend in need. But first, Amy walks up to the sink and washes her hands. When she looks up from her hands, Kyubey is sitting by the next sink over. <<Amanda, a new Witch has revealed itself! If you don't kill it and claim the grief seed, you don't know when you'll get another chance!>>

    Amy's eyes widen. She hurriedly wipes her hands off on her shirt. "Where?!" She transforms and starts to run. "You know it's not some sort of contest. Besides, I know better than to enter a Labyrinth--"

    In her hurry, she rushes out of the restrooms and into the corridors of a papercraft theaterhouse or concert hall, or perhaps something weirder.

    "--alone."

Mochi (6) has posed:
Kyubey arrives perched on Amy's shoulder. Upon seeing Sayaka standing, he tilts his head like he's trying to get a different angle on her. Then his head swivels from left to right, looking from Sayaka to the Witch and back. But when he finally speaks, it's to Amy and Melona, more than Sayaka.

    "This is a very busy train station. The witch should be eliminated before more civilians are endangered."

Macaron (21) has posed:
Oktavia Von Seckendorff towered over all. Her despair was unending. Her suffering... immeasurable.

Her sword lifted into the heavens... and the orchestra began.

Besides her, a great piana rose from the ground, a strange familiar with short blue, cutout hair took a seat... and began to play. Every so often it would turn its head and a speech bubble would come from its mouth, filled with sharp, jagged symbols and letters... Which then erupted out, forming little blades that shot through the air, straight at the Hope Witch!

On Oktavia's shoulder a new existence appeared. A bright, cheerful figure, with soft red and yellow hair, they seemed almost see-through. They whispered something into Oktavia's ear and then held out something, like a pearl... However...

When Oktavia reached up a hand to take the pearl, both the familiar and the pearl vanished with an impish little smile. Oktavia let out a pained, furious roar, before bringing its arms down.

Steel wheels, massive ones many times the size of a person, began to rain across the battlefield. Spinning and bouncing and flying in all directions. Amongst them, another familiar appeared. One with violent red and yellow hair. Riding on one of the wheels, fire erupted from her hands and enveloped two of the wheels, spinning wildly across the battlefield as the flaming familiar flew into the heavens.

The first of the arrivals to be hit by and knocked down by one of the wheels would look up to see the familiar who had been on Oktavia's shoulder... kneeling down and offering a pearl to them. To help?

... And if they took it, if they were so foolish, they would momentarily be unable to move... as flaming wheels would crash into them from all directions, the phantom familiar fading away with a playful giggle and the flaming familiar cackled from above with cruel delight.

Klarissa, or rather her body... fell from above, unmoving... unbreathing... now a husk, bereft of what little humanity it once held... And when it hit the ground, Oktavia's head would look to it... and then it would lift its arms high and the music would only get louder, but nowhere near enough to drown out the pained, despair filled screams of the Mermaid Witch.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "It's dangerous to hesitate. Clearly, the witch has already caused the end of Klarissa." Kyubey adds, his strange unmoving mouth sending that telepathic speech to everyone except Sayaka Miki.

Sayaka Miki has posed:
Sayaka looks a bit unnerved at the familiar shielding her, even if this one is here to help. That does nothing to change the inherent creepiness these familiars have.

And then there is Madoka's transformation in the Hope Witch. Once more, her instinct is to block her childhood friend, get her out of that heinous transformation and make sure she is safe.

But how can she do any of that, she is powerless and she is the one being defended, even, by the power of Gretchen. She still doesn't understand why Madoka would do that. Witches are their enemies, after all.

Their enemies? What does that mean about Klarissa? No, she doesn't count, she just needs to be dragged out of that transformation and everything will be back to normal.

Transformation? Sayaka thinks as she thinks she gets why she can't transform. It's because whatever turned Klarissa into that is strong enough to overpower her, right?

And if it wasn't the worst, then she is even mistaken for a civilian by a random Puella, which... she is pretty sure she met once or twice? This is not the first time, for sure. "I am not going out, that Witch is my twin!" she shouts to Melon. "We need to get her back!"

A similar frantic explanation is provided to Moon, Tuxedo and Amy when they enter. "That's Klarissa! Her Soul Gem went completely dark and broke, then she became that thing! Don't kill her, we need to save her!"

We? What is she even accomplishing right now? Everyone is doing their thing, and her nothing. Is this how she wants to get Klarissa back?

That doesn't matter, there is La Crima who dares study Klarissa! "Leave her alone, she doesn't need to be studied like a lab rat, we need to save her!"

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope Witch gives Misery a side-eyed glance as she comes in. A Puella Magi, to be sure, but above all else Madoka isn't looking to allow Klarissa to be anyone's prey. Not if she can avoid it. How to explain this?

    "This isn't going to be your usual Witch fight. Normally I don't interfere in the collection of Grief Seeds, but this one is special," says the Witch Chara Bearer.

    'Oh? You're not going to spill the secret, either?' teases Gretchen from the back of Madoka's mind. Well, no of course not. They have to feel things out first. 'And what if Sayaka or Ula spills the tea?' That's their choice to make. 'What about Amy? You going to hide things from her, too? She deserves to know what kind of creature Kyubey really is.'

    Hope Witch's faint smile becomes a thin, flat line. She doesn't like where this is going. How are people going to react to the truth? Is someone going to decide that all Puella need to die now? Maybe if she knew what crowd she was working with...

    Oh, Kyubey is here, and he's saying...

    Oh you little---

    A black bow appears in her hands, and she draws back a pink magic arrow. She hesitates, knowing that Kyubey is sitting on Amy's shoulder. She can't fire upon him like this, no matter how much she really wants to.

    "Kyubey, you dirty liar! You know that Witch was Klarissa! You've known this whole time what happens to a darkened Soul Gem, didn't you?!"

    Suddenly, she has no time to argue. Sharp Words are coming at her, and strange familiars are offering pearls. Gretchen's name means pearl, she remembers. "Gretel, cover me!" she commands, and one of her angelic Familiars moves to block the incoming shots with its body. The swords tear through her, wings and feathers. It's all fun and games until someone loses like 20 eyes.

    The arrow, once intended for Kyubey, gets fired into the air where it splits and starts to rain all over the battlefield, targeting the dangerous wheels and trying to knock them off course.

    In any timeline that Madoka remembers, Oktavia never did hold back at all did she?

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima is staying out of the way, with her scanning, taking readings. She's avoiding attacks and not attacking back, choosing the >dodge< option any chance she can as she huffs and then thud. Klarissa falls from the sky and wait. Is....

Is there two Sayaka Mikis?

What!?

La Crima takes in all the information as she tries to sneakily scan the body. Well. Not so sneakily. She's out in the open after all.

"Fascinating." she says. "Are you saying this witch is newly born?" she asks as she continues to scan. She'll have to fight... but. Eventually. For now. She wants her readings. Delicious witch data.

Melona Mizu has posed:
     This is what she gets for showing up to help others. An arrival marked almost immediately by being struck by a rolling steel wheel. It wasn't direct. She wasn't blind, but she, for whatever reason, seemed unwilling to stop being superimposed between the Witches and Sayaka Miki, a fact which meant she was now being presented with a pearl.

"..." Melona's distrust in others would save her there, lifting the materials she'd been grabbing, which had taken on the shape of a crossbow to shoot at the familiar, attempting to simply shoot it through the head with a crossbow bolt as she pushed herself up to stand once more. It was a half-hearted attempt to shoot the familiar, though, as she figured it would simply disappear as it had against Oktavia.

"It is suffering." She murmurs. It has caused the end of someone apparent...ly. "Your... twin..." She looks towards Sayaka, a deep frown creasing Melona's lips. "..." She mutters under her breath, "Curse the bleeding heart."

Why does she care?

Why does she care???

WHY DOES SHE CARE????

They're not her friends.

And yet.

In spite of those thoughts, she was immediately leaping into action, lifting her flail. "I do not know what saving can be done, but clearly, for now, she needs to be stopped." Melona replies to the Hope Witch. Drei Spitzen, her flail, is moved up and over her shoulder as she leaps towards Oktavia, taking advantage of some of those rolling wheels to push herself off of now and then as she works to get above Oktavia. Once she has gotten to that position, the head of her flail glows, doing two things: Changing sizes to grow to a massive size, and flattening one side of it while removing the spikes. She has a simple intent: To crush Oktavia. Not with lethal force, but instead to attempt to hold it in place. "...This is going to get us all killed."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"Whoops, unarmed Sayaka," Mamoru says to Usagi, "and super unarmed Klarissa; I'll help her get out of the line of fire--"

--and then he takes a running leap, bounces off the top of one of the approaching wheels, and lands right by Klarissa and LaCrima. He says very flatly, "You'll have to do your studying elsewhere," and bends to pick up Klarissa. Then he yells, "Sayaka-san! I'm moving Klarissa's normal body--" (so he did catch that) "--out of the way. If you come with me I'll give you a sword!"

He leaps away with Klarissa in his arms, going further back with her toward the corridors and train tracks of the labyrinth, though he doesn't actually try to stop LaCrima from coming with or anything -- he's just pretty fast.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Stepping into the labyrinth is as disconcerting as ever, Sailor Moon shivering uncomfortably and grateful for Mamoru's hand as they walk through together. Their surroundings, bizarre mix of concert hall and train tracks, aren't nearly as strange and foreboding as the last two labyrinths she entered - but the cost of that is obvious, with the Witch herself standing tall and fierce, screaming at the invaders.

Sayaka is there, behind a shield of some sort, defended by a magical girl that Sailor Moon doesn't recognize, and Red bursts onto the scene just as Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask have stepped away, that awful creature Kyubey on her shoulder, and well, they should fight the Witch, shouldn't they? But where's -

There's a body before the Witch, blue-haired, and Sailor Moon's heart clenches when she sees her, sure this is either Klarissa or Sayaka, and when the girl falls - just as Kyubey says this Witch has been the end of her - Sailor Moon cries out.

"Klarissa!"

No, no, it can't be - Usagi was going to talk to her, she was going to help, she was - Hinoiri had been so worried and Usagi hadn't been able to make time and now -

Sayaka's voice, her frantic explanation, makes things both more confusing, more horrifying, and much, much simpler.

Klarissa is the body on the floor. Klarissa is the Witch attacking them. Her soul gem broke and she became a witch. The Witch attacking them now, with sharp words and spinning wheels and strange, fiery girl-like creatures with - with red and yellow hair, like Hinoiri-chan's -

It is Klarissa. It really is.

Sailor Moon glares daggers at La Crima as she moves closer to said body, clutching some strange machine, saying this is fascinating -

Is she serious?

She loses track of things as the wheels start spinning wildly, coming after them all, and the Moon Stick is clutched in her hand tight, the points of the golden crescent moon looking especially sharp, light refracting off the facets of the inset Silver Crystal.

One of the other girls has gone for Klarissa's Witch. Another has launched an attack at the familiars. And Mamochan has gone for the body - good!

"Moon Tiara Action!"

And Sailor Moon's tiara is going for the wheels, careening around the labyrinth to smash through one and then another - this one ridden by the flaming familiar."

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Amy barely gets a second in some hallway before she's called to the Witch's Lair, the unreal space of the Labyrinth contorting around her and moving her through a door to confront a Witch battle already in progress.

    And this time

    This time, one of the characters in what Amanda thinks of as the 'Boss Titles' are familiar.

    Amy turns her hand over, her soul gem briefly changing to ring form as she looks at the underside. That sort of D-shaped one with a tail curled around the bottom... That's where the 'A's would appear in 'Amanda' and 'Sayaka' on their respective rings...

    Her eyes widen. But before she can think more, Klarissa's body falls. Amy runs to it as Kyubey yells, casually, that it already got her. A glance at the body sees no soul gem.

    "No... she's not here! She must've been at the edge of her range! We need to find-- Sayaka?!" she shouts, as wheels crash around and she dives to barely avoid them.

    "Her Soul Gem..." Amy echoes, staring wide-eyed at Sayaka and then up at the Witch.

    She holds up her left hand for Sayaka to see, shouting over the noise of battle. "They're Witch letters! I saw the one that means 'A' just now! But it didn't say 'Sayaka'... maybe 'Klarissa'?"

    They need to save her.

    Amy looks up at the towering armored mermaid.

    "How?!"

    She looks around. "Is Gretchen here? She knows about Witch stuff, somehow... can she talk to them?!"

Macaron (21) has posed:
Oktavia Von Seckendorff turned her eyes towards Sayaka. The other one. The part of her who had done nothing but judge her. But scold her. But ignore all of their duties. Both swords were lifted high into the air... Before both came crashing down. One of them came flying down at Hope Witch. Her friend who had been spared this fate thanks to her dreams...

And the other coming down on Sayaka, the girl who had, repeatedly, dragged her off to waste her time...

Fortunately for Hope Witch, she managed to blow the flaming wheels aside, causing them to crash into each other... And while the familiar lighting them up had gone to another, intending to light it up... a moon tiara came out of nowhere and blasted it, putting an end to the flaming wheel problem once and for all! Well, for a few minutes. Unfortunately, Hope Witch now had a much bigger problem coming down at her.

Melona's guess was right. The gift giving familiar disappeared when she shot at it. Always abandoning others... Only to appear in front of Sayaka the moment Melona runs away. Holding out a... ring. A puella ring. One made of... witch... paper? Maybe? If she took it, though... could she transform? No. It was another trick. Another trap. If she took it... it would burn her hands.

As Melona approaches the witch, however... the flame spewing familiar appears in front of her, yelling... something? But it wasn't 'words' so much as the witch's weird idea of words. The familiar puts both hands together and fire erupts out, aimed at Melona! However, the familiar got too close... and before the familiar can go too far, it is cut down by Oktavia, the great witch letting out another furious, agonized roar of misery.

The body Tuxedo Kamen grabs... is oddly cold. Hollow. Lifeless. A body, but one without a soul, a pulse... any sign of life.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "The fraction of an individual you referred to as Klarissa Miki is no longer alive, by any measure. It is as I have warned you all at every opprotunity - when a Puella Magi's soul gem grows completely dark, they die." he says. He's keeping his perch on Amy's shoulder (as long as she lets him) and no longer preventing anyone there from 'hearing' his words.

    "However, an intense despair has given rise to an intense witch. A witch, unslain, will release familiars from their labrynth, will draw in those blind to the veil and harm them for its own power. As you hesitate you increase the chances a familiar will escape and do harm. And were you to discover your delay caused harm to another, that might have adverse effects on your own emotional state."

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope Witch hears Melona's words and feels a bit of a sting. Yeah, actually, holding back here can get them all killed. So will wasting her time fighting Kyubey, she realizes. As much as he deserves it, she'll have to reserve her attacks to purely verbal ones.

    Fortunately, she is Hope Witch, and she has a few extra powers.

    <<Oh no, Kyubey! You seem to have left some people out of the telepathy link! Don't worry, I'll fix it.>> Tiny stickers appear everywhere and rain from the sky, trying to land on and stick to people. They look not unlike a Witch's mark, but instead of giving you horrifying murderous or suicidal thoughts they just let you talk to your friends.

    <<Hi! My name is Hope Witch. You also know me as Hope Blossom. I'm merged with Gretchen right now, which means that her power, knowledge and crankiness are now mine. To Amy: the Witch introduced herself as Oktavia von Seckendorf. Yes, I'm pretty sure it's a reference to something. No, I don't know what it is. Honestly, most things that Witches say are pure nonsense, even if you do understand them, so don't worry too much about it.>>

    In the time she has to explain that, she's already seeing a giant sword descend upon her. Hope Blossom would be able to narrowly avoid this, but Hope Witch isn't sure she's as nimble. She hasn't practiced using this henshin at all. Crap.

    Her Twin Familiars, guarding both herself and Sayaka, move in to tank the hit. They are expendable, and they know this, and so they're at peace with what happens next. Which is good, because 'what happens next' is that they each get sliced in half and dissolve into black mist. Their bodies slow the descent of the blades long enough for Hope to jump to Sayaka and get closer to her.

    <<Sayaka-chan, it's not safe here! If you can't henshin, then you need to hide!>>

    Even though she says that, Sayaka's presence might be necessary.

    <<We won't be able to talk a Witch down, or reach her with words, but in your case it might be different. Are you still linked to her in some way? Do you think we can reach Klarissa through you?>>

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
The Tiara returns to Sailor Moon's hand, and Kyubey's calm voice sets her teeth to grinding. There's no time to waste on him though - not with swords coming down!

Sailor Moon runs towards Sayaka, trusting Hope Witch to protect herself for this moment. "So he's not going to be any help in finding a way to reverse this, but maybe if we try purifying her?"

Clearly she was right to let Hope Witch handle herself - two familiars take the brunt of the sword blows, disintegrating. Sailor Moon's question is a genuine one, but it's also one that she's ready to find an answer for right away, the Silver Crystal glowing faintly as Sailor Moon leaps in front of Sayaka, ready to tank any blows that come from the front. She moves quickly, carving forth the circle of light necessary for - "Moon Healing Escalation!"

Silver beams of light and gentle mists flood from the apex of the golden circle, carrying with it the purifying power of the Silver Crystal. This much won't be enough to save the day, she's sure of it, but will it have some visible effect? Will there be any sign that this could be part of the key to saving Klarissa?

Melona Mizu has posed:
     More people were there. What would be the best way to get through this? Did she even want this Witch's Grief Seed? Her own gem was about half darkened, she could really use one.

This fight is stupid.

She shouldn't be here.

And as she was leaping to get to Oktavia...

There was suddenly a familiar in front of her.

"Tch. Of course." The flail that had been originally intended to be an attack now needing to be used as a defense against the fire being shot at her -- even if it was cut short.

Of course, fire moved around things. She didn't escape unscathed... but luckily for her, neither did the familiar.

"You... foolish thing. It was protecting you." She mutters.

Would she be able to get close in another situation, or maybe it was better for her to take a different approach? Yes. Probably better not to get into close combat with the sword-wielding Witch.

She drops to the ground, no longer trying to leap towards Oktavia anymore, instead opting to back off and start gathering materials, adding them to the crossbow that she had been holding before. Pulling more and more things from the environment, molding it together, putting in a reasonable amount of time into its creation to increase its quality.

"Despair..."

"..."

She was in danger, wasn't she?

She glanced at her soul gem.

And then shook those thoughts away as she focuses on what was now obviously a ballista, loaded with a massive bolt. This was the best she could think of. She'd still need to get a good angle on SOMETHING solid for her plan.

So once again she's moving, now holding a large ballista to a higher purchase as best as she can.

The top of the seating area would do, probably. So that she can attempt to shoot that ballista at Oktavia. Aiming for one of her shoulders with the intentionally widened bolt bottom; she's trying to nail it to the stage. "...I'm sorry."

And then she pulls the trigger to launch said ballista bolt.

A sticker lands on her shoulder. And Melona listens, though doesn't respond... at least not yet.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Oktavia von something? Amy glances at the ring, trying to recall if she also saw the two crescents-with-circles that make an 'N' in the boss titles.

    "You didn't though!" Amy protests, her innate Technical Correctness able to act on reflex while her brain is overwhelmed. "You didn't tell us we die from that when this all--ACK!!!" She's hit by a wheel and ground against the floor, whimpering in pain before she remembers how to shut that off and blows the wheel away with a point-blank rocket.

    She gets to her feet, agreeing with Sailor Moon. "The others were right. He was lying from the start! He won't help--" Where is he, anyway? He was on her shoulder until a moment ago when--

    She got hit by the wheel.

    Amy looks at where she fell, at the... smushed Kyubey. Huh. Magical creatures are made of stuffing, or chunks of marshmallow, or something? She's not sure what she's looking at. "...At least he won't trick anyone else ever again..."

    And then a wheel clips her, sending her spinning! Right, she has to fight! But she can't just kill the Witch... Amy tries to get the hang of timing rockets to hit wheels with the lag of shutting pain off. She's kind of off her game right now and most of the rockets just hit the walls of the concert hall...

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima scowls when Tuxedo Mask takes away her scanning target. "GET BACK HERE. THIS IS IMPORTANT." she says as she tries to chase after Tuexdo Mas, spouting her logical garbage. "IF SHE'S A NEW WITCH I NEED THE READINGS WHILE THEY'RE FRESH, NOW!" she says angrily as she hovers through the air after Tuxedo Mask.

"JUST STOP ALREADY!" she cries as she catches up and runs the strange scanning gun to the machine that's tucked up under her arm on a strap and hanging down to her side.

"IT'S NOT LIKE I'M GONNA EAT IT IF YOU'RE NOT LOOKING!" she screams. "NOT THAT KIND OF VAMPIRE." pant pant pant pant.

Sayaka Miki has posed:
When Madoka brings attention to Kyubey, Sayaka turns around trying to locate the annoying form of the white critter. There it is, on Amy's shoulder. Great, he really couldn't stay out of this?

"You really dare to show yourself here? It's your fault Klarissa turned into that. Have you no remorse for making her a Witch?" Sayaka scowls at him, even if she can guess at the critter being bound to answer with a yes. He has had no qualms about tricking them in the past, of course he is responsible for this.

And if it didn't matter, there is also La Crima happily calling her fascinating. "How can you say something like that? What if it were you there?" But ineffectual words are all she has to offer in the defense of Klarissa.

And then a sword comes crashing down towards her, and the familiar that Hope Witch was using to protect her gets in the way of the strike, to let her get away from the animosity of the Witch.

Animosity that can still cut her in a metaphorical even if the blade doesn't reach her, because that blade certainly felt backed by an intent that wants to break her personally. Why is that? She has only done her best to her. That must be just Klarissa being corrupted thanks to Kyubey. Nonetheless, she tries to run away from the strike, and then Moon jumps in to defend her! "T-thanks", Sayaka says, noting how provvidential it was. "Please try it, maybe it will work!" the bluenette answers to the soldier of the moon.
Shehe has more important matters than trying to understand Witch letters now, she has to take the sword Tuxedo has offered her, as she too moves after him, albeit without the favour of a henshin.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Well, if Klarissa is literally cold, hollow, and lifeless... Tuxedo Kamen cannot bring her back. It's magic he doesn't understand, though, so if the Witch is also her, maybe-- no, he doesn't even know enough to speculate. He gently lays her on the floor as far away from Oktavia as he can get her, then turns back and hears Kyubey -- he hears the words and wow, wow, wow, that is NOT HELPING. He almost roses the foul little thing, then remembers Fuyuko-- but he's not Fuyuko, and he's not full of dark energy anymore, and he can't. What if he does kill the thing?

But Hope Witch is Hope Blossom-- Madoka~! And SHE almost shot Kyubey! It's on the back burner for now. At the moment he's watching and standing up, listening, and then Kyubey gets smushed and makes the whole thing elemental. He looks at the screaming Lacrima, blinking. "Then do it here where her body's not going to get squished into hamburger like Kyubey," he says absolutely and perfectly reasonably. "There's a lot going on, you may have missed it."

Then he smiles -- smiles -- and takes out a rose, twirling it between gloved fingers, and whips it like a dart at a wheel that looks like it's approaching the running Sayaka. He's confident enough in it that he leaps to meet her on the field, then draws a sword from nowhere, handing it over to Sayaka. It's bigger than a saber, but she should definitely be able to wield it, even if she can't transform. He'd lend her his cape too but he's tall, she might end up tripping on it. "It doesn't do anything magic like yours!" he warns her.

Macaron (21) has posed:
Oktavia Von Seckendorff was, annoyingly, deflected. Her blades cleaving into the ground. Failure. Another failure. For a moment, the witch seemed to just... stop. Exhausted. Arms limp...

At her side, the one on the piano looked up, and one more sharp letters appeared from its mouth. However, instead of striking the fighters, they struck the witch in the back.

She let out another roar and, from behind her, more of the wheels flew out, spewing out on the battlefield in a flurry of pain and rage!

Unfortunately for Moon, the light washes over the witch... and it had no effect. There was no burning. No sign of purification. No dark energy to wash away... no pain this could heal. Instead, the great witch lifted a sword and, this time, it swung down on the moon princess! Intending to cleave HER in twain! Except, before it fully can, a ballista bolt came out, slamming into her shoulder, pinning that shoulder to the wall, throwing off the blade entirely!

And a moment later... The gift offering familiar was there. Holding out... a cupcake? To Sailor Moon? Take it... please. But if she bit into it... it would be POISONOUS! And like biting an angry porcupine!

Missiles from Amy, the flurry of wheels filling the battlefield, turning the chaos even worse! As if that wasn't enough, one of Amy's rockets is suddenly knocked off track, and sent into the ballista! The flaming familiar, no longer cut in two (instead having some crude tape holding it together) flew down at Melona! Spewing fire at her and trying to incinerate her!

The piano player once again started talking, yelling... and more of the words jammed at Oktavia's back, making more despairing yells fill the air. She reached up with her good arm and ripped the ballista out... before throwing it at her own body! While her wheels are easy to distract... well... the bolt might be a bit harder. As it flew at La Crima and Klarrisa's body.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "You should know..." begins the little fuzzy white creature, as it walks up from the direction most of the group had entered previously. "... you're probably wasting a lot of energy. The only situation I am aware of where Klarissa could be returned to her previous form has passed, when someone who had the power to change... even the very laws of magic itself... elected to delay until her potential manifested in another form." The 'new Kyubey' gently pads across the 'floor', such as it is, stopping near what's left of the Kyubey that came in with Amy.

    It's more out of not wishing to cause further him-related-distress that might complicate matters than any nebulous concept of politeness that he sits next to it, and only rapidly consumes it when everyone's busy trying to not be slain by the witch's next volley.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
The towering Witch standing directly in front of her is probably one of the scariest things Usagi Tsukino has ever scene, on sheer virtue of the fact that this used to be her friend's girlfriend. It's not like she keeps a running list, but this is probably top fifteen for sure.

Which is why it's saying something that La Crima's shrieking cries are enough to drag her attention away from the towering figure.

"Can you stop chasing my boyfriend?! We're trying to save a life here! Did you ever think that maybe there's more important things here than whatever it is you want?!"

Sayaks's anguish only makes her more upset, and it's only remembering how loudly La Crima had screamed the last time that keeps her from launching the next Moon Healing Escalation at her instead of the Witch.

Taking her attention away is a mistake. By the time she looks back up the Witch is bringing a sword down on - never mind. A bolt that throws the attack off course -

"Thanks!" She cries out to the launcher of that attack, hopping back now that Sayaka is running towards Tuxedo Mask, hoping that between she and Hope Witch, they can keep it distracted -

Nope, nope, there was that bolt being launched towards her boyfriend and the approaching Sayaka both! It's a good thing that impish little familiar offered Sailor Moon the cupcake - because in an instant, she's shifting into a perfect throwing stance, honed by way too much afternoons in Mahou Fite Club. The cupcake glows, sparkling with cosmic energy as the Witch energy is entrapped by Sailor Moon's own brand of the stuff.

"Moon Return-Fire Action!"

The cupcake-shaped bolt of cosmic energy goes flying right for the ballista bolt to knock it off target!

Only then does she turn to Hope Witch. "That didn't seem to do anything - and I can use more power, I can, but if it's not a problem that purification can fix, I don't want to waste the energy we might need to help hold her still for something else to work."

She's resolved to ignore Kyubey.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Amy startles as she hears a voice she thought, seconds ago, she would never hear again! She turns-- only to be smacked by a wheel, although she immediately blasts herself away from it this time, that can't have been good for her!

    She stares at Twobey for a second (or if he wasn't the first, is it Juu-bey?)

    "...Of course. He's got a soul gem too." She hops to the side as a wheel smashes into the floor where she just was. "Those bodies... must be designed to be made cheaply with magic. So what do you really look like? I mean, originally?"

    Wait, more pressing issues!

    There's still no clear answer of how to get through to Klarissa-the-Witch. But she can stall for time.

    Puella Magi are tough, and she's got a nearly full soul gem and a half-full grief seed. She can push things pretty far if she has to.

    ...No time to wonder who died to make that seed, either...

    "HEY!" the red Puella fires a rocket at Oktavia's center of mass. "I know you're a big monster raging at all of us now, but... I don't actually know what to say!" She fires again. "You can't understand me anyway, right? Come and get me!"

Melona Mizu has posed:
     Okay, the bolt hit, did what it was supposed to do. It pinned the arm.

Now she just needed to pin her other ar-- is that a MISSILE?

Melona is forced to leave the ballista behind as that rocket flew towards her, destroying it and returning it to fragments of steel track and seating as Melona's energy leaves it.

And once again that flaming familiar was right back in front of her, trying to incinerate her. While mid getting away from another attack. "..."

Why was she still here.

None of these people were close to her.

She was trying not to kill a witch.

That didn't make sense. None of this made sense.

'Thanks!'

...Okay that felt a little good.

What doesn't feel good? She was currently being consumed in flame that she couldn't really get away from easily, the only saving grace for her being that she'd already been in the air so she was on an arc downward into a roll to put out the worst of the fire.

A roll that at the end of she uses the momentum of to get back to her feet, shifting into a spin while holding her flail in both hands, the head of it reshaping to a spiked ball, using the spin and momentum along with a leap to LAUNCH herself at that familiar, attempting to smash it with her flail. Her breathing growing heavy.

It hurts.

And she was going to make sure that familiar hurt just as much.

...Nevermind that familiars can't really feel pain probably.

<<Do you have an actual plan???>> She asks over that sticker-network.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Of course purification wont work, thinks Hope Witch, but she silently watches anyways. She was told from the start of this fight that her chances for success were exactly zero, but now that she's in henshin she can feel that even Gretchen is holding onto a little bit of hope here.

    'Only a little,' reminds the X-Chara.

    Having already dismissed the many things that didn't work in previous timelines, Madoka can only focus on the new changes to the situation and the things she hasn't tried.

    <<I wouldn't bet on that, Amy,>> she says, regarding Kyubey's squished corpse.

    This isn't good. Madoka's on the defensive, and she can't really do anything other than focus on improvising defenses via weird pseudo-Witch nonsense.

    'I mean... you can have more than two familiars,' says Gretchen's ever-helpful voice. 'You're not limited like I am'.

    "Um... but if I do that, then..." Hope Witch hesitates. Her Familiars are pretty weird, even for her. Then again, she probably shouldn't be afraid of them at this point. "Okay, here goes!"

    The entrance to her own Labyrinth ripples into existence in front of her, and a flood of bizarre eldritch things start pouring out. Masses of feathery wings, golden wheels, weighing scales and bows. Ranging in size from a small dog to a horse. Each covered in eyes in random, nonsensical places. The flood of monstrous minions fills the battlefield, each of them fragile yet determined. Giant wheels flatten several at a time, only for their companions to rise in their place. Each of them charging directly at Oktavia, not really attacking her but maybe hoping to dogpile her.

    "You know..." Hope Blossom gives the gift-giving Familiar the side eye. "... No offense to Sayaka-chan, but I don't think I like what I think you represent." Arrow nocked, arrow fired, directly at the false gift-giving Familiar.

    To Kyubey, she adds, <<Maybe I could've done something like that. Maybe I still can. I'm not going to give up just because it's inconvenient for your schemes!>>

    To Sailor Moon, she shakes her head. "I'm sorry, but that was never going to work. I had hoped it'd be different, because it was you, and it's an unusual situation. I'm not going to ask you to waste your time and energy when we could be doing something else."

    She watches Oktavia for a moment. Purifying the Witch wouldn't do anything, but purifying an X-Chara... No, that's reckless. Gretchen might not survive it, she suspects. 'Well, it's not like I'd die. I just wouldn't be able to hatch for a while. Not until you had a complete dream for me.' How long would that take, exactly? '... You might be closer than you think, but... if it messed up even a little, I might go to sleep before you were able to tap into the result.'

    Hope Witch files that thought away as a last resort. "I'm honestly not sure what to do," she admits to Sailor Moon. "If it's what I suspect, Klarissa's soul can't be reached from the outside. Not through the Witch. Her real self might only be barely aware of what's happening. However, there's a chance that there is Klarissa's real soul somewhere, in some kind of dream state, but I don't know where that is. I suspect the only reason Sayaka's still here is because of that Lost Logia she used. That might be our best chance here."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
KYUBEY WAS HAMBURGER. And now KYUBEY IS THERE. Okay, that just means that while Tuxedo Kamen is flicking his cape up to deflect-- like a shield-- anything splatters of poisonous exploding cupcakedon't sort out, he's underhanding another rose dart, this time directly at Kyubey.

"Thanks, Sailor Moon!" he calls out, then sticks close to Sayaka since she's armed but not armored. He sees the wheel smack Amy and winces, then sees Melona get set on fire, and he sends through the magic Hope Witch network, <<Hey Puellas! See me after class for those injuries and I'll see what I can do, okay? I'm a healer-->>

Another magic-breaking rose gets flung at a familiar that's getting too close to them for comfort, and he sees Hope Witch flood the place with biblically accurate angels and assorted associates, and this is way above his pay grade but that's fine! That is fine. <<Can the big Witch just keep creating more Familiars? Also, if anyone thinks of something good, let's do a combo attack!>>

Sayaka Miki has posed:
"Thank you", Sayaka says, as she grabs the sword given to her by Tuxedo, struggling a fair bit to hold it up without the strength given by magic. Still she now has something to fight with, even if it's not enchanted, as Tuxedo Mask points out.

She watches as Sailor Moon's purification attack fails to do anything against the Witch. Is there really no way to rescue Klarissa from within the Witch? Even with all these people trying? There has to be something they can do. All the appeals they have given to her, all the efforts they have undertaken to make sure the whole Sayaka and Klarissa understood she had their comprehension, is it really all for naught?

No, they are halves of the same person, surely she knows her better than everybody, so there has to be something to rip her away from that dreadful power. All she did can't have been in vain.

"Kyubey, why don't you stop talking for once? You are just being a pain, and there is no way we won't rescue Klarissa from that thing", Sayaka grits her teeth at him.

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima screams back at Usagi. "THIS IS IMPORTANT YOU KNOW, THIS INFORMATION IS IMPORTANT. If I can figure out more about this now..." she says as she scans and scans and--- there's a huge ballista bolt suddenly being thrown at her and Klarissa.

"REALLY!?" she calls out as she throws her hand out and fires off a series of quick, nameless dark energy blasts towards it, trying to throw it off balance and target, and all she does it force it into a spin she has to throw herself down over Klarissa's body to avoid being thrown around.

Macaron (21) has posed:
The ballista bolt was hit by the mooncake and La Crima's dark blasts, exploding and spinning wildly. It crashed into the ground... a few feet from La Crima, before tipping over and... away from her. Safe!

Oktavia didn't get to focus on this, however. As a flurry of rockets started striking her chest! Forcing her back.

Melona launched the flaming familiar away with her flail, sending it toppling back... into the rockets. Fire erupted around it, however before it could be fully incinerated, Oktavia cut into it with her blade.

Only for more familiars to suddenly wash up and onto Oktavia. With a single swipe of its blade, dozens of them were cleaved. And it became a meat grinder, slashing through them, again and again and again, tearing the ground apart and sending splinters of the stage flying at the magical girls, familiar pieces raining down on them.

The flaming familiar, however, seemed to appear above Hope Witch. And then...

Did nothing.

Because it was then that the gift giving familiar was by Hope Witch. And gave her the gift of a hand. Across her cheek. In a *oddly familiar manner*.

It was then that the flaming familiar held out both hands and rained fire down on both Red AND Sailor Moon! Gahhhh!

Meanwhile, the music was getting louder and louder... and it was now that the long, sorrowful sound of the piano was beginning to wash over them... and they'd feel themselves slowly, subtly, drawn towards the stage...

Mochi (6) has posed:
    Kyubey tilts his head at Amy now, much the same way he did at Sayaka's presence in front of Oktavia. "Soul Gem? I don't have a soul -" the rest is cut off, leaving it unclear as if he had no soul gem, or even no soul, since the rose cuts through the air and impacts Kyubey seriously enough to silence it. His body certainly isn't as tough as the concrete such thrown roses regularly embed themselves in.

    Of course it's not too long before the commentary from the creepy peanut gallery begins again due to the presence of another Kyubey. Or the same Kyubey, again. "My nature isn't akin to yours." He says. "And really you shouldn't waste energy attacking my spares. While you're not a Puella Magi yourself, I'm sure that you're spending more energy on attacking me than I am returning."

Melona Mizu has posed:
     There was no plan.

They didn't know what they were doing.

'Maybe'.

'Her soul can't be reached from the outside.'

Great. All things Melona couldn't really... do anything about, realistically. On the upside, having flailed at the familiar, she had some room to breathe again. And then... that music.

Was that music important?

Clearly it must be.

She should go and destroy it.

Melona turns towards the stage, beginning to move towards it. At first it's a walk, but then she began to sprint, spinning her flail next to her and then throwing it skyward to launch herself into the air.

Magic begins to gather into her flail. The spikes on the semi truck sized flail glowing brilliantly as she draws energy from herself; and from the area around her. Remnant's of Moon's attacks. Energy from the witch's labyrinth. Things that, really, a Puella Magi should probably not be doing.

And the flail, along with Melona, plummets from the sky straight down towards that piano and the piano familiar. "Spitzen..."

Impact.

"BLAST."

And then Misery Melon, her flail, and likely much of the stage itself was consumed in an explosion of built up energy. Assuming, of course, she wasn't... deflected or something.

On the upside, the music was successful! It drew her in, right???

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope Witch uses her small army of horrors to help buy herself a little bit of time, and she uses that time to think. Purification alone isn't enough, Sayaka doesn't seem to have any specific ideas yet, and her own Witch magic doesn't really help her prevent or rescue Witches. No, if she wanted to fix this on her own power, she really would need a miracle. If only...

    All of a sudden a certain Familiar, which she already didn't like, decides to pay her a visit. "Whatever you're selling, I'm not buy--"

    SLAP!

    Hope Witch's whole head turns from the impact. When she turns back, she stares wide-eyed at the Familiar. She lifts up her black bow and holds it in two hands like a bat. Witch runes and opalescent energy gather around the tip as Hope takes a swing at the Familiar's cheek, releasing in a burst of magic upon impact. One good smack deserves another. "I've had about enough of you."

    Seeing her Familiars get turned to mulch makes Madoka a little sick to her stomach, but it was better them than anyone else here. With hesitance, she draws back another arrow. As she charges it, the flame ignites at the peak of her bow. There's no question that her otherwise bright pink magic gives off a faint sense of wrongness. "I'm not shooting to kill... but that's still a Puella Magi. It's probably okay to maim her a little bit. Worst case, maybe we can figure out something to do with the Grief Seed." She winces, and glances towards Sayaka. "Sorry... I hope this doesn't hurt you."

    More and more magic gathers around her bow. Bits and pieces from her fallen Familiars turn into black mist, and gather around the tip of the arrow. The music plays, and Madoka resists its pull long enough for Melona to deal with the source. Now that the other pinkette is this far out of position, Hope Witch can't really afford to leave her hanging.

    "If we combine our power into one attack, we can take her out. I just... wish there was a better way to resolve it than this."

    After a moment of charging, after having given people plenty of time to buff her charging arrow or add their own attack to the pile, and when she can no longer afford to wait... Hope Witch releases the bolt. It splits, surrounds Oktavia and converges upon her from all sides. Each arrow explodes with despair-flavored energy, or at least the nearest Chara equivalent.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    The giant armored mermaid cleaves through the familiars!

    "No, I don't think so." Amy abruptly isn't holding her rocket launcher anymore.

    Additional armor parts have appeared on her arms and legs, to brace missile racks that appear on each, as well as a pair behind her shoulders. Amy glances around the battlefield, preparing to--

                      Destruction rains from the heavens!                      
                                                                                
                        ...But Tuxedo Mask covered you!                         )]

    --fire dozens of miniature missiles at once, which split away to home in on Oktavia's sword arm, on the wheels, and on the flaming familiar! "I told you, fight me!"

    She does glance over to the other bluette, since it's not like talking to Oktavia will do anything. "Sayaka... she was a part of you! I don't know how this works, but... can you... I dunno... try to... resolve that part's issues? Like in yourself? I'm sorry I'm bad at battle psychology, I can't words!"

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Purification won't help. There's nothing - there's nothing to purify Klarissa of, if Hope Witch and Sayaka are right. Her Silver Crystal wouldn't let her change people's minds and hearts, and Klarissa's heart is full of - of, whatever it was that made a Witch.

But Hope Witch has a point - and it's given Sailor Moon an idea, because it's reminded her that -

"Klarissa is part of Sayaka-chan," she says slowly, obviously, "She's not really her sister, she's her - and she was made because they couldn't agree, right? Because Sayaka found out about the Soul Gems and she was so upset, and isn't that the main thing they keep fighting about?"

A battle isn't the time for a long conversation, but and idea has hit her and she thinks it might be key - if she can get to Sayaka to share it. There's a familiar there, between them, before she can finish sharing her thoughts and Sailor Moon growls in frustration and then horror as the SLAP echoes. But Hope Witch can handle it.

Meanwhile, Fire is raining down on her, and Sailor Moon runs around a little, trying to dodge, shouting as she shares her thoughts, trying to see if they'll be of any use, hoping Sayaka-chan will hear her -

"Klarissa wasn't ever supposed to exist in her own body, because she's you, Sayaka-chan! She's supposed to be with you - so maybe you, Sayaka, the only Sayaka still here, can reach her if you remembers that it's you that you're trying to reach!! Klarissa isn't someone else! This isn't happening to someone else! It's you - her despair and her anger and her frustration, this is all yours too! You've got to embrace her!"

It may be that she's projecting. Thinking too much of her own trouble, her own problem - not the nightmares, though they were part of it, but the truth of herself as she'd had to grapple with, that she was Serenity and Serenity was her and Serenity had -

Since regaining her memories and her Silver Crystal, Serenity's final act had been the hardest thing to reckon with. The selfishness of it and the hurt of it and the utter despair she'd embraced and left so many people to deal with in their final moments. Accepting that that too was a part of her... that that too was within her...

It was hard.

Is it hard for Sayaka, too? To be the girl who felt so deeply that she was a monster, that she was nothing, because of what had been done with her? To be the girl who also still wanted to cling to hope?

Of course, talking is Not a free action in a labyrinth. Fire has rained down and a lot of it has hit her - and the next attack the Witch launches her way can be guaranteed to hit!

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima relishes in the misery of it all. It's just what dark energy things do and she laughs at Hope Witch as she snorts and has to catch herself in her odd, ugly start of an oujo laughing tirade before she scoffs into her arm.

"She's a witch. Kill it." she says. "Do it!"

Before she throws out both her hands, dropping the scanner's reader and and just lancing out with a dark energy barrage to protect both herself, and trying to finally 'help' by feeding damage into the witch itself;

"Ugh fine I have enough readings, kill it already." she says settling into montone again.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Tuxedo Kamen spends a little more energy making a rude gesture at the newest Kyubey on the block, and then he and Sayaka are close enough to Moon and Red that he can jump up and hopefully intercept the flamethrower curtain with his cape; he looks toward the stage and starts edging towards it, then covers his ears-- and then legitimately cringes when Misery Melon jangle-crash-explodes into the piano. And the stage. And a lot.

THAT'S A LOT.

As soon as Hope Witch looks like she's readying a big old attack, Tuxedo Mask darts over and puts a hand on her shoulder, and floods focused energy through the light touch: it's warm and golden, it's blue skies on a summer day in a gently buzzing meadow, it's the light in the window in the cold and dark, it's the hum of a living city and the deep sounds of a borehole, it's--

--it's help, and a sense of 'there is a safe place somewhere, even if it's not here'. It's bedrock solid help to make a difference.

"SAILOR MOON!" he cries out, and he's not going to get to her in time, he's not, and he shoves the last of that energy at Madoka as she looses her attack and bolts toward Moon, he's not going to make it he's not going to make it even if he's just trying to crash into her sidelong he's not going to make it--

Sayaka Miki has posed:
What she is actually doing, though? Her contribution has been running around and thinking of nothing. Has she ever really understood Klarissa?

All her efforts have been good, right? Right? she thinks as she shakes her head, but then what about the fact that she is staring at Klarissa's Witch form?

And those familiars... Aren't they representations of the pain she inflicted on Klarissa? They stayed together all the time, so she had the most occasions, and despite that, she is the one immortalised as that painful familiar, not Moon, not Daifuku, not Red, not anyone else.

And despite everything, they never abandoned Klarissa, they never ceased to be understanding, certainly more understanding than her. This despite that Sayaka was the one that was actually enjoying her life still, and Klarissa even at her most despondent had never wished that their places be traded.

She may have been blind towards her twin. Has she ever tried to actually talk with Klarissa? Amy's suggestion would have been good then, but now the Soul Gem is broken. But can her words reach Klarissa when her gestures have failed, even now?

They are not two different beings, Usagi is right too, she too is Klarissa, and the help they have been giving her isn't some external thing they have been giving to someone else. That's all been for her, and it's time, she actually just reached out to that part of herself, for real.

Macaron (21) has posed:
Explosions. Explosions EVERYWHERE! Madoka manages to slap the familiar that, well, grieved her... slapping it back to sender.

Melona's assault, however, erupted the stage. Magical blasts erupted, silencing the music and sending dust flying into the air. Before the dust even had a chance to clear, arrows of despair and help rained down on it, explosions of missiles erupted.

And then...

The blades rose up. In a burst, the dust cleared...

They could see them. The orchestra... was in shambles. The stage destroyed. The witch... hurt. But swords up. And... again... the one on the piano began to play...

Oktavia lowered one sword, vertically... towards the ground.

Attesa, she who played the piano, started to say something. Nagging Oktavia ever onward. Oktavia's blade slashed out, cutting a single gash deep into the ground and cutting both familiar and piano in half.

Tramonto, the flaming mayhem creator. She rode a wheel, flames rising overhead, but once more... she came too close. Attempting to incinerate and bring gifts to Oktavia. And a second gash was cut into the ground, cleaving the familiar in half...

Brillio, the inspirational 'gift' giver, who gave gifts... that only caused suffering and who could not be trusting. She came to Oktavia, offering a pearl... And she, too, met a fate. The blade cutting through the familiar and leaving a third deep gash in the ground itself.

Oktavia stood tall and... her swords fell from her hands as she began to fall.

Sayaka Miki has posed:
Oktavia crashes down to the ground, tired, the wheels now completely unmoving. Glacial silence reigns, the chaos of battle completely over.

The fight essentially over, a final strike would be all that's needed to estinguish it, its gloved hands having let go of the swords. Yet, before a single move could be made, a word rings out, clear like bells of hope and transparent like ripples across a pure pond of water.

"Sayaka." It's a plea and a recognition of identity at once, uttered from her other half, a name the titan hadn't used for herself in a long while back when she was still human. As a concentration of curses, the three-eyed being focuses with animosity on the small thing that is approaching her, but it no longer has the strength to threaten anyone.

"I am sorry we couldn't actually help you, and I am sorry that my behaviour pushed you away even after a long time had passed from when we discovered what happened to our soul", the bluenette says, still walking towards the monster. "That Lost Logia was much too cruel with you, making you the shield of my emotional state like that."

"I am guilty of never really stopping to talk and listen, instead just proposing activity after activity because I wanted you to act like how I imagined you", She approaches the giant hand laying on the ground and starts climbing it, walking up the layered curses that make up the Witch's mass.

"I know that you actually wanted to reach out to everyone, and that you felt guilty both for pushing everyone's kindness back and feeling like you really had to, yet I couldn't understand that you had taken the weight of those feelings we shared and were determined to take them with you despite everything."

She stumbles a bit when the path starts becoming much more vertical, but otherwise she keeps going. "And I really didn't help matters when you became like this: I was afraid of you, not because of our powers suddenly turned to evil, but because you stood there to declare everything we failed at."

She is by now on the monster's shoulder, closely approaching its face with a smile. "We wanted to do good, to be the perfect paladin of justice for everyone who required one, and yet we attacked those that didn't deserve it, fled from those that genuinely believed in us, and wanted to help us onto that path."

The girl leans back against the giant's face, looking up at the ceiling of the Labyrinth, encrusted with jewels like many twinkling stars. "You paid that price, and saved me from ourself. But now it's time to lay down that burden, we are ready to accept every facet of ourself, and you know we aren't alone. Sleep now, Sayaka, it's time to go home."

A purple mist surrounds the two figures, and just as it spoke many months back, the voice of the Scroll talks again, running the countdown to the restoration.

When the purple mist disappears, the Witch is no more, and clad in the knightly clothes of her henshin, Sayaka smiles in its place. She looks at the people that have been there through thick and thin, the efforts they have put both into putting up with her as well as dealing with the Witch.

"Thank you, everyone, for sticking with me despite everything. You have given me a lot, and I won't forget that anytime soon", she smiles.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    Kyubey sits down and watches, wide eyed, at the events that unfold before them. Red eyes unblinking. Face unchanging. But, mercifully silent. No more intrusive mental speaking for a while. Just silence and observation. After all that happens and all that Kyubey has said, as the labyrnth vanishes around everyone, the most malicious mascot moves from sitting to standing and simply starts to pad away, saying nothing more to anyone unless stopped.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope watches in somber silence as Oktavia starts to destroy even her own Familiars. Is this just an imitation of her tragedy? A culmination of her self-destructive tendencies? All of that self-directed anger. It only makes sense that they would reach this point, though the thought of that makes Madoka sad.

    Yet, when Sayaka moves forward and speaks, Madoka watches with rapt attention. The words, while sad, bring a smile to the pinkette's face. Even if it would be too late for anyone else in Sayaka's shoes, the bluenette has come to accept herself, to truly listen.

    Kyubey's departure isn't unnoticed by her. She just doesn't want to ruin the mood. As much as she wants to send a thousand arrows after a thousand Kyubeys, Madoka would rather focus on the mental health of her friend.

    "Go for it, Sayaka-chan! You can do it!"

    When the smoke rises and clears, Hope Witch blinks. The reality of the moment hits her. Out of all the timelines she's been in, and everything she remembers. Her scattered memories of trying, over and over, to save Sayaka. For once in her life, in this one lucky timeline, it actually worked. A tear forms at the corner of her eye.

    'Are those your tears... or mine?' asks Gretchen. A silly question. There's no difference.

    Wiping the tears away, Hope races to the side of her friend. "Is... is it really over? Are you really okay?"

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Sayaka steps forward, and Sailor Moon's heart is in her throat for the entirety of that speech, with every step she takes. Her hands bat at the few remaining flames, and she's not too badly hurt by the fiery projectiles. It's just she needs something to do with her hands.

Those familiars, each of them slaughtered - they make her breath catch yet still more. Has she sent Sayaka to her death?!

But the Witch doesn't attack. Sayaka steps closer.

Mist rises and covers the two figures - and then there is only one, the knightly girl Sailor Moon once fought beside in the mall. As the labyrinth collapses around them, an obnoxious noise cuts through the din - Sailor Moon's phone beeping, beeping, beeping, as text messages resume.

Flushing, she reaches down to see who it is - and goes still as Hinoiri's name flashes over her screen.

     TXT from Hinoiri: Usagi, grab who you can, XXX train station.
     TXT from Hinoiri: It's Klarissa, help her. Please. Get moon and her miracle rock. She needs one.
     TXT from Hinoiri: Please. Please help her. I can't.
     TXT from Hinoiri: Please, just please help her. Please.
     TXT from Hinoiri: She doesn't deserve this.

"Oh, Hinoiri-chan," she whispers. Her fingers move over the screen.


TXT to Hinoiri: Sayaka is all in one piece again.

TXT to Hinoiri: She's okay.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    That's right. Klarissa isn't dead, she's part of Sayaka! And when the Lost Logia's effect is reversed, there is... one Sayaka, not one Witch, or some sort of half-Sayaka half-Witch.

    Amy lets out a breath she didn't realize she was holding. "...I'm just glad you're okay. And we're friends. Comrades. Of course we'd stick by you in this mess."

    "But speaking of this mess..." she turns around. "No, it's not over. Why are you doing this? Kyubey!" She dismisses her missile racks as she stamps a foot and leans forward, attempting to Loom Intimidatingly in this 4'11" body, which, do be fair, does tower over the Incubator. "Why are you doing this? Making Witches? Because that's the end result, if this is what happens when we die. Sooner or later, we'll..." Okay, don't think about that personally just yet, stay on topic. Amy shakes her head.

    "If you hadn't gone around recruiting us, there wouldn't be any Witches at all! So why?! Why are you making Witches?"

    She glares at him, sternly, for a few seconds before a thought crosses her mind, and her intimidating posture deflates, and she facepalms and mutters to herself.

    'Oh my god. He was the manipulative evil mascot the whole time. I did get hoodwinked by Fav... stories tried to warn me the whole time...'

Melona Mizu has posed:
     CRASH. ... ... ... And the Piano was still there.

Somehow, it was still playing.

Melon looks towards the piano-playing familiar again, ready to attack it --

Only to be pre-empted by the witch itself, forcing Misery Melon to jump out of the way of the gash of sword slicing familiar and ground alike.

And then Sayaka started to walk up the witch.

Melon watched silently.

She's tired.

But it seemed... things were... okayish? Probably?

Well okay she was in a lot of pain but like. They won?

...There's no grief seed though.

Melon glances towards her own soul gem, clicking her tongue. "Cursed bleeding heart." She mutters under her breath. Again.

She didn't really seem intent on waiting though. Instead, much like Kyubey, falling silent and starting to walk... vaguely after Kyubey.

They weren't her friends.

She had just come to hunt a witch. No debts incurred here.

"...Kyubey, I'm going to need to hunt again soon. Let me know when you sense the next witch, please."

She didn't seem to be processing the information yet. Either incapable of, or unwilling to.

At least, for the moment, having just enough tact to not ruin everyone else's happy feelings.

"Guten abend." She says, dipping into a curtsy towards those gathered, before starting to leave properly.

They're not her friends.

This is not her moment.

Let them be happy.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
--and Tuxedo Kamen skids to a halt, because-- there is no next attack, there's nothing coming to get Sailor Moon; he straightens his jacket and adjusts his mask and pretends he never panicked. There's...

...he doesn't quite understand. He thinks he might understand what was going to happen, what was happening, what would have happened, but... Sayaka's speaking, Sayaka's climbing. He watches silently, and then there's mist... and there's only the one girl, the one who fought him and yelled at him when he was Hematite, the one who was so protective of her girlfriend, the one who always tried to stand up for justice even when it made her mad.

He collects his sword, then sheathes it in the air at his side, as practiced as if he were used to doing it.

A glance over at all the beeping, and he smiles a little-- and then Misery Melon is leaving after all that crashing she did. He jogs after the girl and calls out when he's close enough that he doesn't have to yell, "Hey, are you all right? That was a phenomenal crash, well done! But it looked like it really hurt."

Mochi (6) has posed:
    Kyubey stops and turns to face the Red Puella. "I don't make witches. I allow you to make wishes. The fact that you eventually fall to despair is simply the form that the curses of humanity take now, due to the existence of the Puella Magi." he says.

    "However, the reason is simple - at the moment that your Soul Gems flare out and become a grief seeds, a tremendous amount of energy is released. In that way, each Puella Magi pushes the death of the universe to Entropy further away - the loss of energy that would mean the end of all living things." he says.

    He stretches out, flexing the toes at the end of his paws and arching his back. "It is a quirk of the situation that allows your hope and despair to overcome entropy, as your wish overcomes the laws of reality, and then your Labrynths turn reality on its head."

    "That is the answer to your question, Puella Magi. Without witches, the curses of humanity would still take some form, but Puella Magi would get no wish, and entropy would not be stalled."

Norie Okana has posed:
And the Labyrinth vanishes and La Crima tries to scramble for last minute scans and it's just s smidge for her too late for her readings to go from 'something' to 'nothing interesting' all too fast and she sighs and 'awwwwwwwws'.

That's when Amy nabs Kyubey before he can run away and she wants to hear these answers. She's curious.

She also expects someone to off him again soon so she's scampering fast over there.

"Hold. Lemme get my notepad." she says. scrambling.

"Okay. Proceed."

Melona Mizu has posed:
     Melon did pause when Tuxedo Kamen came jogging up towards her, looking towards him. "Ja. I am fine, my own magic does not overmuch harm me. ... Rolling steel gears and fire, much less benign, though." That last bit had a slight joking edge to it.

She shifts her flail over her shoulder, the 12 year old looking uuuuuuup towards the much taller Tuxedo Kamen to more or less make eye contact. That's only polite, after all. "...That was a smaller blast. I could not gather magic as effectively, the music was ... distracting."

She vaguely listens to Kyubey. His explanation is ... interesting. Also vaguely seems to be, well, maybe like not a terrible trade to her?

"...The price of a second life, to eventually become sustenance for someone else's..."

"...Does not seem unfair."

She might be assuming that everyone dies before coming a Puella Magi though.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope sees Amy walk up to confront Kyubey, and it's at this point that Gretchen decides it's time to dehenshin. Here. In front of Godoka and everyone. "H-hey!" protests Madoka. "Don't just do that in public!"

    The tiny Witch fairy Gretchen ignores her bearer to go hover close to Amy and Kyubey. She crosses her arms and smirks down at the white fae. "Yeah, Kyubey. Why is that? What was it you said to Homura that one time? 'To offset the continued increase in universal entropy'?" Her smirk turns into a frown as the white rat just admits what she was about to reveal anyways. "I never liked the way you said that. Acting like my Bearer and all of her friends are just fuel for your stupid energy schemes!"

    Turning to Melona, Gretchen is distracted from her anger at Koobs in order to say, "Thanks... I know it's not really your fight. If I sense another Witch, I'll let you know, okay? I'm sorry you had to find out like this, but I gotta warn you: Not everyone is going to take this news well. Be very careful who you tell."

    Madoka, meanwhile, is staying by Sayaka's side.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Hinoiri doesn't text back, but that's okay. She'll see it, and then she'll know that everything is alright! And -

And then Amy is talking - yelling - at Kyubey, and he's offering an explanation and La Crima is coming back.

Sailor Moon's relieved smile drops into a scowl, and she stalks over to the rest of the group. There's a small fairy, like Tadase-kun's, getting in on the yelling-at-Kyubey, but this little jerk - and that much bigger jerk - have seriously ticked her off.

So before Kyubey can stop her, Sailor Moon has reached out and grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, shaking him roughly the way she's often wanted to do to Luna but never dared. She actually likes Luna, after all.

"How dare you. How dare you! You hide all these secrets and you offer your contract without ever telling people the consequences, the cost of what you're selling - and then you act like it's for the good of the universe?!"

Another shake, for good measure, before she wheels around to face La Crima, Kyubey still dangling in her hand.

"And you! What kind of person studies someone's corpse right in front of their family?! What kind of person wastes time in a battle to handle their own selfish interests?! What is WRONG with all you Obsidian JERKS?!"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"...it costs you magic to heal yourself, though, right? Let me help if it's bad, I'm a healer," says the too-tall sixteen-year-old in the mask, concerned. "I'll ask Red after, it just... you were leaving--"

And then not only is Kyubey answering questions, Usagi is losing her *shit* and you can tell they're dating because the hearts-in-eyes over her temper is very, very, very appropriate for Valentine's day. "Listen to that," he murmurs, starting to grin. "That's my girlfriend."

Amanda Faust has posed:
    After removing her hand from her face, Amy just stares. What.

    That is entirely the wrong genre. This is like, some story where it looks Magical Girl on the surface, but then it's actually some transhumanist sci-fi. But this isn't a story, or at least, if it is... it's out of place, with all the other types of magical girls around. "Really? You're buying the universe more time because-- Hey, hold up."

    Amy calls out to Misery, taking a few steps after her. "I still have a grief seed, if you need a recharge. I... I guess keeping ourselves alive has to come before worrying about who it was, right now."

    After that's handled, she pulls out her phone, searches something, taps, swipes, taps, swipes, taps, swipes, taps, and looks to Kyubey. "You're causing all this grief because of something that won't be an issue for like a hundred trillion years. Longer if whatever Humanity and any aliens become have uploaded to matryoshka brains built around something that harvests energy from black holes. Really? I figured that literal trillions of years is plenty of time for us to figure out how to escape to another universe or, I dunno, figure out how to upload society into a Tipler oracle or something. But you think that's not enough? You think even by then, we won't solve this problem?"

    Amy cocks her head to one side and holds her hand out, conversationally. "So just how much more time does this buy us? If we can even believe you're telling the truth."

    She reaches back into her pouch and pulls out the grief seed she just recharged Misery and herself and maybe Sayaka with, holding it out towards Kyubey between her fingers, and repeats, firmly: "How much time did this girl's death buy us, Kyubey?"

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "Your 'bearer' could have aleviateed the need for the process to continue for quite some time; her wish would have met my quota. However, she delayed until another path to power opened for her and closed her ability to make a wish, so I must continue my work." Kyubey says to Gretchen.

    If he was going to say anything more to Gretchen it's arrested by Usagi shaking him. Usagi can feel that, despite being soft and fuzzy, it doesn't feel like she's shaking say, a regular creature with bones and organs. Something feels off about it. "Why is it when humans regret a decision based on a misunderstanding, they feel resentment towards the other party?" Kyubey asks as Usagi jostles it. "I don't understand this reaction, though I am somewhat familiar with it."

    "All of the time that you have to judge on Entropy is based on equations from a society which has never known a universe without us harvesting energy from human souls. That math only assumes the current, constant rate of energy usage, and the current, constant rate of energy harvesting." He turns to look at Amy with beady red eyes. "Think about all of the things you didn't know about yourself before you made your wish? Think about all of the things about the world you didn't know. Your math doesn't even accept the existence of the magic you use every day. Don't presume its right."

Sayaka Miki has posed:
When Hope approaches Sayaka, the bluenette replies to her one and only childhood friend with a big smile. "Yes, Hope Blossom, I am ok, thank you", she says as she elaborates the overlapping memories of everything that happened while she was split.

"That Lost Logia really did a number on me", Sayaka says, picking up the scroll from the ground next to her. "Must have been really worrying, but it's actually good to be back."

And after the pinkette undoes her transformation, Sayaka looks at Gretchen. "I didn't make things easy for you, and even then you still had your burden to shoulder, with the knowledge about the risk we Puellae go through. So, you have my apologies, and I guess I could treat you to something like taiyaki, or maybe ice cream", she offers to the X-Chara as a small gesture of the reparations she intends to give her.

And then there is Kyubey, the cat that really should is a frustrating mystery even when he gives all those reasons. What exactly runs through his mind to accept those sacrifices? *Kyubey, you are just as much of a jerk as you always seemed, but this is still a new low. How can you consider this saving the universe when your saving is built on a untold amount of sacrifices? It's not your prerogative to rob people of information and their consent like that. Do you ever think of the people that are suffering as Witches due to you?"

Melona Mizu has posed:
Melon responds to Hope, "You are welcome. ...I do not know why you are apologizing to me. ...I will be careful, though. I do not really talk with many people, so you should not have to worry about who I tell." Except Mami.
     Various responses from everyone else. Everyone seemed unhappy at Kyubey's answers. Misery Melon was honestly looking at them in confusion at this point. Sure, she could kind of understand not being told the full details but like she hadn't had TIME to be told the full details.

"...Did he even have time to tell you? I mean... d...don't you tend to, y'know, fade out pretty quickly when you're dying?" She asks, her tone honestly curious.

To Tuxedo Kamen she looks towards him, lowering her head down. "...I do not have anything to give in reasonable trade, but if you wish to, I will let you. I took a few bad hits from the fire and the rolling gears."

Amy offers a grief seed. Melon has mostly stopped walking away at this point. "...You hunted that seed fair and square. You should save it for when there is a dry spell. Witches happen often, but rarely enough... you should not waste it on a stranger."

Kyubey is listened to again, but this time Melon does not comment on it. She isn't there to argue against them, more she was just asking some curious questions of her own, though more aimed at the others.

...She might have been throwing fuel on the fire, accidentally.

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima scoffs a Usagi as she throws a fit. "You wouldn't understand. You're not rational right now so I'm refusing to engage with you." she says bluntly towards Sailor Moon. She looks back at Kyubey and takes down notes.

"This is important if I wanna know more about these Witches." she says.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Gretchen watches Moon yell at La Crima and says, "So like... do you want a list? A spreadsheet?"

    Then she overhears Tuxedo Kamen being over the moon for his girl and she snort laughs, because that is just too cute.

    Amy starts asking real questions and Gretchen can think of one or two answers, but there's no way she's going to say anything to actually help Kyubey's case in any way, shape or form. Nah, this is his aggro, and he can tank it on his own.

    "I don't buy that, either. The whole 'you not getting it' thing. I think it's funny that you've been hanging around us since basically forever and yet you still don't understand something so basic."

    Sayaka's words to Gretchen make her blink. The dark fairy crosses her arms and look away. "I mean... I wasn't being forthcoming either. I can see why you'd think the way you did. It's just... this isn't easy to talk about. Of all the ways that this could have gone, this is actually one of the best." The Witch fairy floats closer to Sayaka with a smile, an actually genuinely happy one, and says, "Sure... I'll take you up on that sometime. Now that you know, we can talk a bit more freely."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Tuxedo Kamen takes off his gloves and disappears them, then holds out his hands. "You don't need to trade. If you need to think of it as transactional, you didn't need to help us, either, right?" he says with a crooked little smile. And if she takes his hands, the pain is significantly less immediately -- there's warmth, a respite, as blunt force trauma is healed, as abrasions and burns fade away in a golden glow.

For the record, the boy in the tuxedo will never get over the Moon. <3 <3

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Sailor Moon looks at La Crima and says - "Do you think you're special because you're suffering? Do you think it makes you special? You laughed when Sayaka was suffering - but you think you're rational?"

She scoffs right back.

And then Melona says -

"Fade out quickly when you're..."

She had been dying?

Maybe that's why she's taking this - is it easier? Is it? Kyubey had saved her life when no one else was around too, and that's the only reason Usagi doesn't launch him to the floor.

"How long have you been on my boyfriend's planet?" She asks Kyubey, shaking him roughly. She can feel how off he is - how it doesn't feel like bones and organs are in there, but something else. And her question makes her sound like an alien, but she means it in the possessive - it's Mamoru's planet, and she doesn't think he was here, before.

Maybe she's wrong. But magic wasn't hidden, Before. There wouldn't have been a veil to keep people from noticing Puella Magi.

"It's called a lie of omission! You keep information out that might make people less likely to take your deal, and then you mock them for getting upset. You're such a creepy, it's like you're getting your playbook from 4chan."

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Melona rejects the offer of help. Amy insists. "Despite all this, I became a Magical Girl to help people. You're people, and right now... I'm not letting you get closer to becoming a Witch, for my own selfishness." She taps the grief seed against her ring, refilling all but a sliver of darkness, and holds the now half-full grief seed out for Melona to use.

    And then Kyubey drops another bombshell.

    A long time ago, in another life, Amy read other stories.

                           WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD                            

MORPHEUS: For the longest time, I wouldn't believe it. But then I saw the fields with my own eyes, watched them liquefy the dead so they could be fed intravenously to the living--

NEO: Uh. Excuse me. I tried not to question all this until now, but the human body is the most inefficient source of energy you could possibly imagine. If you had any sort of food humans could eat, it would be more efficient to burn it in a furnace than feed it to humans. And now you're telling me that their food is the bodies of the dead, fed to the living? Haven't you ever heard of the laws of thermodynamics?

MORPHEUS: Where did you hear about the laws of thermodynamics, Neo?

NEO: Anyone who's made it past one science class in high school ought to know about the laws of thermodynamics!

MORPHEUS: Where did you go to high school, Neo?

NEO: ...

NEO: ...In the Matrix.

MORPHEUS: The machines tell elegant lies.

NEO: ...

NEO: ...Could I please have a real physics textbook?

MORPHEUS: There is no such thing, Neo. The universe doesn't run on math.

                           -------------------------                            

    So yeah that's about how Amy feels right now. She visibly deflates. She can't prove that all of this isn't necessary if everything she'd use to prove it is suspect, and she knows it, and Kyubey knows it.

    "So we're all in Omelas the whole time, and Puella Magi are the orphan in the box? And no one can even walk away, because there's no one to walk away to?"

    She looks around at the others. Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Kamen... "Come on. We're magical girls! And boy. That can't be how it goes, right?"

    She straightens up and turns towards Kyubey, pointing accusingly again. "Hey, that's right! What about other kinds of magic? That's not limited! That speech you gave before about all power coming with a price... that was based on human knowledge, and if we got it so wrong, that doesn't prove anything! How do we know you have it right?!"

Melona Mizu has posed:
     Everyone seemed curious about everything. Upset about all of this. Melon just felt confused at their reactions. The trade was a /great/ one. She got to live. She got powers. Everyone got powers and/or got to live. Sure, they would die eventually and maybe become monsters but...

She had been about to die anyway.

"I am a Puella Magi. It was a witch. It is my job." She says simply in response to Tuxedo Kamen with response to him saying she didn't have to help them. "Part of the Contract, fighting witches to protect the world." She says softly.

The hands are offered, and she looks at them silently for a while.

There is clear hesitation there, as Sailor Moon clearly gets angry at the rabbitcatalienthing in the background.

As if taking those hands would be dangerous somehow.

She eventually lifts her hands, pulling off her own gloves to take Tuxdeo Kamen's hands.

And then that healing begins.

Those feelings start to overtake her.

The look of shock on her face.

Panic even.

Tears welling up in her eyes.

No. Nonono.

This is wrong.

This is WRONG.

She wasn't allowed to feel like this.

Not anymore.

The moment of panic leads to her not even reacting as Amy taps the grief seed against her soul gem, purifying it. She doesn't take the offered half-full grief seed.

Just that stare at Tuxedo Kamen's eyes.

Guilt. There is so much guilt in Misery Melon's eyes in that moment.

And that moment ends. And she immediately breaks contact, starting to absolutely sprint away as fast as her little legs could carry her.

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima scoffs. "I can't laugh! Why are you lying!?" she says. She did laugh, though not for long. Maybe she doesn't remember. Maybe she doesn't want to.

"I'm trying to stop these... these things and all you people do is call out and name call and try to instigate life or death showdowns over scans and readings." she says angrily.

She takes notes angrily, now, pressing her pen harder into the paper.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "If there was something that someone wanted to know, and they didn't ask it, I really don't understand how that's my fault." Kyubey responds to the twintailed blonde, his voice not rising and falling as he's shaken since it's telepathy. "Your value system makes very little sense to me, though. Wouldn't anyone interested in making a deal only volunteer information that benefits the deal happening? You humans do this all the time, regularly, throughout your history - obscuring data or not volunteering all of it... Simply watching any of your broadcasts could tell us that." he notes.

    "Of all the people here, only the Melon girl makes any sense to me." Then she bolts and the confusion returns to his mental 'voice'. "Well, for a moment, anyways."

    "Other forms of magic don't defeat entropy in the same way as Puella Magi. Haven't you noticed that in order to get a wish, everyone else has to put in their work over time? Or that they do not have to risk the darkening of their souls? Different systems provide different benefits. When that girl decided to put her power in the egg of her heart over making a contract with me, that potential energy to affect entropy vanished - it may have gone into her powers now, but it didn't offset entropy."

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
"You did laugh," Sailor Moon says, and quirks an eyebrow. "You don't remember? Really doubting that rationality of yours."

She doesn't know what it is about Obsidian people and trying to Uno Reverse things back on her, but it's kind of tiring. First they call her a murderer, then a liar.

"You came into a life or death situation to do scans and take readings of someone's dead twin," Usagi adds, sharp, "If you can't understand why that's just - really fucked up, you're even more messed up than I thought. No even tried to fight you; you chased my boyfriend around and he didn't even throw a rose at you!"

And to think she'd once offered to feed this girl!

Meanwhile, said boyfriend has offerd to help someone, and the girl is running away, which is not usually the reaction people get. Her eyes stray worriedly to Mamoru, but then Kyubey is talking and -

"The fact that you use the same tactics as scumbag politicians and newscastors is not helping your case. People lie and cheat and steal and murder and those things are wrong! The fact that people do them doesn't make them okay. The fact that you do them, doesn't make it okay. You're so... ugh," she grimaces, "And don't think I missed that you didn't even answer any questions, not really. I asked you when you came to this planet. And you were asked how you know all this stuff is true, and you were asked how much entropy was pushed back by the loss of the girl who was that grief seed. You didn't answer any of those questions."

Why did villains always think taking people's energy was totally good and right and virtuous when it was their crazy, evil plan?

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
That was... unexpected, unintended, and kind of horrible. Tuxedo Kamen stares after the rapidly retreating Melon with his own (much less intense) guilty look for a moment, then turns to Amy. "If you know her outside of this, please tell her I'm sorry, I didn't mean to distress her. Maybe I shouldn't..." Heal anyone? Yeah right like he'd stop.

He's silent for a moment, watching, and then he just... goes over to Usagi, puts his hands on her shoulders, leans down, and murmurs something very quietly before kissing her on the cheek, then starting to leave. The station is still somehow a liminal space that feels out of time, and he'll probably jump the turnstile like a rebel, unless he's stopped.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Damn. Kyubey always has answers! What can Amy even say to that? Moon's saying it better, anyway.

    And then Tuxedo Mask asks if Amy knows the other puella magi, and Amy shakes her head, and then her eyes widen as she remembers. And then sees him leaving. "Wait, wait!" She runs after him, slipping the grief seed back in her pouch. "I'm surpressing pain right now, but one of those wheels got me pretty good. I dunno how bad it is." She thinks for a moment. "...I'm still breathing, so that's working." She tries to put a hand on her chest to feel her heart but the armored part of her costume is in the way, so she places her fingers on her opposite wrist, then on her neck. "Gah, I never did get the hang of doing this properly... do I still have a pulse...?" She's so distracted with self-diagnostics she doesn't actually get around to asking to be healed, but it's hopefully implicit.

Mochi (6) has posed:
    "If someone was holding one of your bodies by the back of the neck and shaking it around in a clearly irrational manner, I know enough about human nature to at least presume you wouldn't be forthcoming with information they wanted, either." he says. "In any case you aren't a Puella Magi, so I don't owe you anything at all. You are an interloper... with an odd soul. You should have that looked at. It seems defective in some way. Moreso than a regular human's."

    "...But I will also say, I am aware of the situation with the one in the formal attire. I am simply not allowed to speak about things that are outside of my sphere of responsibility. I probably know more than you or he does. However... The desires of any human, even one who claims descent from long-dead monarchs, do not outweigh the needs of the universe as a whole."

Norie Okana has posed:
La Crima scoffs. "I. can't. Laugh. If you can make me laugh. I will.... I will.... well I don't know, but I'd be pretty grateful." she says bluntly.

She then frowns. "You still don't understand and it's making me angry so I'm leaving." she says with a huff as she closes her notebook.

"I'll find Kyubey on my own time." she says as she starts low-hovering away.

She mutters unintelligible things on her way out. Probably 'I hate yous' and 'Always problem makers!'

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It's definitely implicit.

Tuxedo Mask gets stopped, and turns, and looks -- hesitant. "That girl really didn't react well to it. I guess it carried an emotional load for her? It's-- it's Earth energy, the same way Sailor Moon uses Moon magic, I just-- if it hurts your feelings somehow, I'm really sorry..."

...but he holds out his hands again, tentative. This time, he looks like he's standing a little less upright than he was for Melona, but not by a whole lot. He takes a deep breath and -- when she takes his hands -- gives her the same careful warmth, erasure of pain instead of suppression; gives her the same sense of 'this is your planet too, this is home, you belong', the same sense of a refuge and a rest, even as he's restoring flesh and hairline fractures, abrasions and burns.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
"Totally rational," Sailor Moon grumbles at La Crima's retreating back, and then Tuxedo Kamen is at her side, whispering, and she wants to reach out to him and catch his hands, but that seemed really upsetting, so for the moment, she leans back into his hands, and whispers back -

And then lets him go. Sometimes you do have to let them g-

Oh right, Amy got hit with so many wheels! Thank goodness she caught up to him!

Looking down at Kyubey, still dangling in her hand, she, well - "It's actually pretty rational to shake you around like this. But I also wouldn't be very forthcoming with someone shaking me. Good thing I don't make a habit of lying to people so much they have to grab me by the scruff if they want to get a single answer."

No shame in her game! None at all -

"My soul is not weird," she squawks and then wonders if humans and Lunarians have different souls and then - "If human souls are so defective, why do you use them for your stupid energy projects?"

She's just ignoring what he said about her not having a right to this information.

"And they're not long-dead so long as he still lives. And if you're so sure the universe needs this, why can't you offer any proof stronger than your word?"

However, despite her henshin... the simple truth is... her arm is getting tired.

So Kyubey is allowed to go free.

She wants to get takeout with her boyfriend more than she wants to interrogate a jerk. As soon as Tuxedo Kamen is done with Amy, Sailor Moon is cuddling up next to him -

Then she turns back to Sayaka and Madoka, and says - "I'm so glad you're okay now, Sayaka-chan!"

Moon and Kamen - OUT!

Mochi (6) has posed:
    Kyubey shakes his body out, a bit like a dog shaking water off, fluffing from back to front - and looks back. "I will speak to the Puella Magi later. I am sure they have more questions. Then they can share the information with others as they wish." He says, starting to step away again. "It seems as though you have a lot to think about anyways."

Melona Mizu has posed:
     An undisclosed amount of time later, regardless of if she answers or not, Melona Mizu knocks on Mami Tomoe's door, holding Kyubey in a tight hug in her arms. He might be trying to escape.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Amy just nods, suitably warned, and places her hands in his.

    Her hands are so tiny, and his are so big.

    It's internal damage. (Beyond general mahou toughness, Amy's magic strongly resists surface injuries.)

    But...

    This is home.

    Right now, in this moment, she belongs.

    She can rest at last, in a way she normally can't except around Hannah, who makes her feel safe without magic.

    She wishes the moment would last. It's nice.

    ...But it does end. As he starts to pull his hands away she reflexively grabs them, then realizes what she's doing, and lets go, pulling her hands away. "Ah, s-sorry..."

    She feels awkward looking him directly in the eye right now, so she doesn't quite meet his gaze, but she can explain. "It didn't hurt her feelings. But she might not have been shown kindness before. Might have never... that power you have, it makes you feel safe. Accepted. Home. 'At last, I can rest, and things will be okay.'"

    She turns her head aside more, looking away, embarassed, but he deserves to know what effect he has on people before he gets drawn into Shenanigans. A little more quietly, she continues, "...If I didn't have Hannah -- I mean, if I hadn't met her and known it was possible to feel that way before now -- I might've just fallen for you. So, be careful with that power."

    "I don't know a lot about hearts, but I see it a lot in stories. The childhood friend or former rival who makes the protagonist feel that way... They wouldn't keep writing it if there weren't some real feelings behind it, right?" Amy scratches the back of her head. "So be careful, that power must have an effect on girls' hearts. ...And maybe guys' too, I dunno if there's anyone who doesn't want that feeling."

    Well THAT WAS AWKWARD, so she turns to walk back to the others, but stops long enough to half-turn back and call out, "Oh and uh, thank you! You saved me magic and kept me a little further from turning into a Witch, so... yeah."