Armaggedon Part 2: Purge
Goddess, almighty Goddess.
I love you.
I love you so deeply.
All my thoughts are about you.
Everything I do is for you.
Can you see it?
Can you feel it?
My undying eternal love for you?
Yes.
I know you can.
The night is not yet over, Madoka Kaname.
Let's continue.
Let's continue our dance underneath the broken moon.
Fourteen eggs clad in shadowed darkness twitched against the unforgiving cold. They rocked back and forth, the shells slowly breaking through.
Nails pinched through, tearing apart the thin membrane between reality and the innards of the eldritch eggs.
"SCREEE!" Hideous screeches echoed through the shells, completely shattering them like glass.
Fourteen humanoid dolls stood upright like puppets with newly-attached puppet strings, and held dark spears in their hands. They laughed, giggled, and scoffed
It was time to play.
[]
"Madoka, run!"
Pieces of glass that once emanated a beautiful ocean started to crack and fall apart. Darkness wormed its way through its cracks, spilling out faster and faster by the second. A foul energy threatened to consume existence itself.
"She's not going anywhere," A distorted voice overpowered the tsunami of shadows. The dark torrents slowly merged into one single point which slowly took shape into that of a fallen angel. Her wings descended next to Kyouko, who appeared sullen and disgusted with herself. Yuma's footsteps dragged her to the eldritch deity's side, her eyes devoid of emotion and self-awareness.
The Temptress of Desire waved her hand to the panicked Madoka, who returned her greeting albeit awkwardly and frightened. "Hi, Madoka."
"Another...Homura-chan?"
"So she still doesn't remember," The Demon flipped her hair proudly, "Good."
Her violet-red eyes gazed through the group of magical girls, and noticed she forgot Tomoe Mami. In that instance, she forced her hand through a summoned portal, and dragged out a blonde-haired girl by the hair.
Mami's drill-haired hair had now fallen down to her shoulders, and her once-vibrant eyes were now in a deep sleep. Cuts and bruises were evident over her body. "Let's see," The Demon looked over her enemies, and counted Sayaka, Nagisa, and her human self.
Immediately, without warning, Nagisa screamed, her eyes filled with a deep anger as she summoned her trumpet. "LET GO OF MAMI!"
She fired a dozen high-speed bubbles towards The Demon, but with one swift motion, the eldritch creature blocked the explosive bubbles with a purple-hued energy shield. The Demon yawned. "Sigh...spare me."
The opponent opened her jaw, and her teeth formed into spikes in a demonic fashion, and ate the rest of the projectiles. In one big gulp, they disappeared into The Demon's pit of a stomach.
She breathed in, and fired those same projectiles from her mouth. They were dyed in purple, and much faster than Nagisa's own trumpet attack.
"Ah crap! Nagisa,dodge-" Sayaka yelled too late.
The energy projectiles hit Nagisa head-on, exploding and tearing apart her magical girl attire. Her uniform dissipated, and was knocked out. Sayaka grit her teeth. Her antipathy for The Demon grew exponentially with each passing second. The knight held the battered Nagisa close, and set her next to Madoka. "Take care of her, please?"
An angered Sayaka turned her attention back to the demonized deity. "You freak."
"I don't like to do this, y'know?" The creature shrugged.
She took a step forward, leaving behind a footprint meddled in miasma.
She smiled a grin far too large for her delicate face. It twisted the corners of her lips, and gave her a look of pure insanity.
"You...are Homura-chan, right?" The sheer miasma that emanated from The Demon made Madoka sick to her stomach. For the first time ever in her life, she felt repulsed by the creature in front of her.
How could she not have noticed? Why didn't she notice how thick the stench was?
"After becoming a demon, I realized why you rarely came down to Earth in human form," The Demon spoke, her voice sent chills to Sayaka, Madoka, and the other Homura, and kept them in place, "The more I stay in my true form, the more twisted the world becomes. Even now with each step I take, more and more wraiths are created right beneath my feet."
"If you had constantly come down to Earth, there was a chance you would have brought unrealized disaster to the planet. It's understandable but but but but but but but but…." She clenched her first as The Demon talked to herself, without giving a single bit of attention to anyone. The more the eldritch creature rambled on, the more Madoka found herself lost in confusion. "I just couldn't accept that!"
Homura silently summoned a beretta handgun from her nearly-broken shield, and took aim directly at The Demon's temple.
A wide grin crossed the eldritch monster's face as Kyouko charged down her spear against Homura, but Sayaka parried the redhead's spear with her trusted sword. The blue knight pushed her feet down into the shivering unnaturally opaque ground, and cracked it like glass.
"Kyouko! Get a grip of yourself! Why the hell are you working for a monster like her?!"
"You don't get it! You don't understand!" Kyouko Sakura spat out, "None of you Law of Cycle chumps could ever understand! I lost my entire family! And what did the Law of Cycles do?!"
Sayaka wavered, and Kyouko took advantage of the opening, and wrapped her chains around her enemy, and pinned her straight to the ground. "NOTHING! She did NOTHING!" The redhead screamed to the top of her lungs. "She promised me to revive my family if I worked for her! She promised me!"
"What makes you think she would do that!" A trapped Sayaka screamed.
"Because she brought you back!"
That sudden declaration shut the blue knight's mouth shut. She caught a glimpse of the redhead, and saw tears flowing down her cheek.
The time traveler Homura summoned a knife and charged at Kyouko but Yuma pummeled the raven-haired magical girl with her staff and knocked the wind out of her lungs.
"Madoka! You must remember!" A very familiar rat appeared on Madoka's shoulder, its eyes glaring deep into her pupils and into her soul. Kyubey called out to her in telepathy, "You have the power to stop this! To sto-"
"Bang," The Demon cracked her fingers, and Kyubey's body rapidly swelled up, and bursted into tiny pieces of meat right next to Madoka's face.
"Ahhhh….AHHH!" She panicked. She lost all reason. Madoka watched as Kyubey, the strange little critter, exploded. She remembered how its eyes bulged upward, its cheeks and tail puffed up painfully.
But most of all - she remembered the smell. The burnt flesh permeated her nostrils that stunk of rotten eggs. It made her stomach churn in on itself, and she felt a sudden surge of vomit wormed up her throat.
"I guess it's time to put you to sleep," The Demon raised her hand, and nearly pointed at the screaming mess of a Madoka when the eldritch deity felt something tug at her leg. A familiar gold ribbon firmly grasped itself around her, halting her movements. She looked down, and noticed a barely-conscious Mami Tomoe who glared straight into her crimson-violet pupils.
Another ribbon wrapped around her right arm, pulling her back. A sudden web of ribbons strung themselves against the monster's limbs, paralyzing her, for just a moment.
Her neck twisted itself backwards, the flesh and bone in it cracked and shattered as the eldritch deity's eyes glared directly at Mami Tomoe. The Demon's neck had turned a complete one-eighty. The sight was something out of a horror movie. She brought her neck down even further, destroying her body's proportions.
Mami's body flinched in fear.
"No matter how much the world changes, you and I could NEVER get along now, can we?"
"Y-you monster…What the hell are you?"
"I've been asked that so many times," She curled her hair with her right arm with her neck still in a twisted position, "Please get a little more original."
"We will defeat you..I swear it!"
"I'm inevitable." In one swift motion, her neck stuttered back in place, with her bones cracking audibly. It made everyone cringe in discomfort.
Her wings sprouted downward and pushed the air beneath her feet, but she was held firmly by Mami's ribbons. "I won't let you go that easily," The blonde veteran snarled, as she concentrated her magic on her ribbons, not just enforcing it, but setting them on fire. "Tiro Finale."
"What are you-" The Demon's words were engulfed by flames. If she cried, if she screamed, no one could hear it. Her body twitched and shuddered against the heat, unable to escape Mami's grasp.
"Tiro Finale."
The flames grew.
"Tiro Finale."
The intensity shined brighter.
"Tiro Finale."
The Demon's screams penetrated through the flame's roars.
"Now! While she's detained! Attack her with all you got!"
In that instant, Sayaka tore through Kyouko's shackles, and kicked her straight in the gut. The redhead didn't register that she was sent flying in the air. Drops of blood splattered across her face, her senses dulled from the knight's fierce attack.
In response, Homura spawned a sleep dart from her cracked shield, and stabbed it straight in Yuma's neck, knocking her out immediately.
Homura and Sayaka both looked at each other, and nodded. They charged straight to the flames that imprisoned a dark silhouette. The blue knight spawned two new swords, and stabbed the silhouette in the stomach in rapid succession, then flipped back as the time traveler pumped her shotgun, and fired three consecutive bullets straight in the chest.
"S-stop! Just stop it!" A soft voice the color of pink screamed at the top of her lungs as she witnessed true cruelty.
"Madoka said to stop," The flames dispersed, and a gloved hand gripped Homura's hair, and wrenched her upward, while another seized Sayaka's right arm, and twisted it in a one-eighty degree angle. The bones cracked and shattered loudly.
"AGH!"
"FUCK!"
With overwhelming strength, the eldritch deity pummeled both of their faces into the opaque glass-like floor, nearly shattering it completely.
With the heel of her boot, she scrunched the meat of Sayaka's stomach while she continued to tear at Homura's once-beautiful shiny-black hair. "You heard Madoka. It's time for you two to-"
"You TOO!"
The harshness of the pinkette's voice caught the demon off-guard, and her eyes flung wide as she saw a very familiar pinkish-white bow in the corner of her eye. It had a blazing rosey fire.
Without warning, she fired.
Beautiful….
Several dozen circular symbols all connected to one another appeared right in front of The Demon.
For the first time since she's become a demon, the eldritch deity felt a drop of cold sweat fall from her neck.
Gulp…
A burning flash of light brighter than a thousand suns burned through the monster's skin. Pure light chipped away at her dark figure, quickly destroying the shadows that surrounded her. "G-gahhh!"
It continued to chip at her, and the pain paralyzed her. Everything, all of Madoka's fury focused in on The Demon, and not a single speck of it hurt or blinded any other girl.
Fourteen shadows spawned from The Demon's barely-visible shadow. They readied their spears, and pushed their mistress out of harm's way.
Without any orders, the Clara Dolls dutifully stood in the way of the blast. The sisters burned much faster than The Demon.
Five had already disappeared.
The unforgiving light kept burning.
Three more.
Their defenses weakened against the almighty judgement of the light.
Only six were left.
Those final six turned their puppet-heads to their good-for-nothing mistress. The only expression they could do was smile, and yet tears escaped their nonexistent tear glands. They wept as they noticed the look on their mother's face.
"M-...other…." The Clara Dolls whimpered.
Wide eyes covered the demonized deity's face, one of surprise, agony, and despair. One single tear fell from her eye.
A floating dark orb independent from The Demon fell on her lap. There, right in the middle of its crowned core was a very small blight - a curse.
The winged creature couldn't remember a time when her dark orb had lost even a portion of its purity - until now. That overwhelming power pushed her to a corner. Sweat from exhaustion and fear dropped from her cheek down to her collarbone. She breathed heavily, exhausted.
Her daughters were gone.
Madoka damaged and nearly forsaken her.
Her power had started to dwindle slightly.
She was losing control.
Multiple thoughts ran through her mind.
How was she going to deal against a fully-powered Law of Cycles?
How was she going to deal with the band of magical girls that gathered together to defeat her?
How was she going to escape?
How was she going to depower the Law of Cycles?
How was she going to repair the souls of her beloved children?
So many thoughts ran through her burnt skull. The stench of burnt flesh started to wear off as her body repaired itself at an astonishing rate, far quicker than Sayaka's regeneration.
She looked down at the place of attack. There was not even a single speck of them left. The Clara Dolls were thoroughly wiped away.
The Demon pushed herself upward. She faintly heard a sizzling sound. For a moment, the eldritch creature wondered where it came from, until she looked down on her arms. They were still burning, sizzling from the Goddess's attack.
She slowly turned to look at Madoka. There was a small tinge of fear in those violet-red eyes.
"U-ugh…" A familiar pink voice collapsed in on itself. Madoka's legs wobbled, then fell flat on the opaque ground like a puppet whose strings had been cut. Her new magical outfit that composed of a reddish-pink outfit with an oversized bow on her chest disappeared in a flash of light, reverting back to her white swan ballet outfit.
Madoka exhausted all of the power she could muster and fell into a deep sleep. Seeing this, The Demon couldn't help but laugh.
It wasn't a victorious laugh, but a laugh filled with anxiety, nervousness, and ultimately, relief.
Her eyes gazed through the scorched battlefield. Not a single enemy was left standing. It was The Demon's victory.
She stretched out her burnt and nearly-plucked wings, and pushed her feet toward her grand prize - Madoka Kaname.
"Don't…." Her nonexistent lungs collapsed in on themselves, "...worry. I'll make things right, Madoka. You won't remember any of this-"
Something grazed her left cheek.
Instead of blood, shadows leaked through her damaged skin. She turned around, and saw the culprit.
It was an exasperated Homura Akemi holding a Smith and Wesson M500.
"What more can you do?" The Demon donned a smug smile, "Your time has run out."
"That's where you are wrong," The time traveler dropped her magnum, and clenched at her shattered shield, "I have time. I'm filled with it."
"No! If you do that, the witch-" There was no time. "SHIT-" Panic overflowed The Demon. Her wings pushed her with intense speed toward her human counterpart. She reached out to the shield.
She knew that movement all too well. It wasn't Homura's time stop power. No, Homura was turning her shield completely upside down.
The time traveler was turning back time itself.
A familiar black, grey, and white road presented itself amongst the two raven-haired girls. The shield pushed itself to the end of the time-traveling road, before suddenly spiraling out of control.
The black glass from the road imploded on itself. Shadows from a witch-like origin escaped and thickened the air with miasma. A wretched roar penetrated reality itself.
Homura's time-traveling road was destroyed, and within it, emerged a monster all-too familiar to both raven-haired girls.
Its figure completely engulfed and consumed The Demon's surroundings. The scream permeated through her ears.
"I will KILL YOUUUUU!" A vortex pushed and nearly tore apart the eldritch deity as she screamed this to the top of her lungs.
She nearly cursed her fate as she saw her human half pick up the other magical girls. She cursed herself for falling into Homura's trap.
Was this...Her trump card?!
Terror paralyzed The Demon's heart. She clenched at her chest as her wings shook in fear. The shadow figure grew exponentially in size with each second that passed by.
She couldn't believe it.
She didn't want to believe it.
But it was happening right in front of her.
"H-how…."
Beginning of the End. End of the beginning. It was…
Armageddon.
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Chapter End
Author Notes
I actually forgot about Nagisa when I was 95% finished with the chapter….I suck at large character interactions involving more than four characters. Seriously…
Anyways, here we go. Sorry for the wait. I decided to go all out cause screw it. It's almost the end of the story anyways. I want to give you guys one heck of a ride.
Also, since Pilgrimage is more of a series designed to feel like a one-shot, I won't write for that one too often, but I do plan to write on it for holidays. Still debating what to do for a Valentine's special.
Since Rejection is coming to an end, what premise for Madoka Magica would you guys like to see? I've seen all kinds of interesting ones, from Homulilly having a normal body to Kriemheld possessing Madoka to Homura being trapped in a laboratory.
Leave your ideas in the review section since I'm going around scratching my brain for ideas already.
Other than that, enjoy the latest chapter!