Madoka was scared.
One day things were normal. She came home from school to spend time with her family. They ate, played a board game, then had story time before bed. Madoka has gone to sleep wondering on the exchange student the teacher had teased about that day.
The next? She woke to a place that wasn't her bedroom. It was entirely unfamiliar.
It was a bedroom to be sure. The bed was soft and comfortable, made of the highest-quality materials. There was an armoire full of the clothes that had been in her dresser at home plus a few different outfits. A vanity dresser also sat opposite in the round room, everything somehow specifically made to fit into the space. In it was lavish jewelry and ribbons that were somehow things that Madoka had always wanted.
Yet there was something...off. The walls, floor, and ceiling had a strange, ethereal edge to them. The entire room came together at the top like a circus tent yet seemed to have no depth. Like they were somehow flat. She could swear the splattered rainbow of colors shifted when she wasn't looking. And there was the creeping feeling that someone, something was watching her.
There was one door to the room. It was a strange affair with intricate bars that were connected by the same material as the walls. It had no handle; only the empty slot for one.
Madoka circled around the room once more, trying to find some incongruity she could use to unravel the strange mystery of where she was. Again, she found nothing.
Her stomach suddenly growled loudly. She realized that she hadn't had her regular morning meal. There was no indication of time save for the hunger, now that she thought of it.
Her head snapped up as the door slowly opened with a soft squeal. She rushed over to the door, hoping it led to the outside where she could gather some semblance of understanding.
Madoka blinked.
It was her house. But it wasn't her house. Everything—furniture, fixtures, walls—had the same texture as the walls in the room. There was nothing outside the windows but a dark emptiness. And at the table...
Puppets. Strangely well-made puppets with drawn-on empty eyes and smiles of her mother, father, and brother were propped up at the table. In front of them were empty plates and empty glasses. Set up in Madoka's spot was what looked like a real meal of rice, grilled fish, and miso soup.
As strange as the scene was, Madoka felt her hunger overcoming her fear. Still, she cautiously made her way to her spot. Carefully sitting down, she brushed up against the puppet of her brother. He didn't move, like he had been glued into place.
Madoka sniffed at the food cautiously before taking a sip of the soup. Her eyes opened wide at how delicious it was! It was exactly how she liked it!
It didn't take long until she finished up the meal. It was fantastic! Pure deliciousness! Everything Madoka loved in a breakfast!
Madoka licked her lips as she looked around the not-house. It all looked drawn on save for the open door to the bedroom. She got up to go to the porch doors. Her fingers traced along the picture of a glass door.
She sighed, closing her eyes as she did so.
Her eyes opened to find she was now standing back in the bedroom, the door closed once more.
—
Madoka rested her head against the wall, sweat pouring down her forehead. It was all impossible. Entirely impossible. Yet here it was.
She wasn't sure exactly how long she had been in the bedroom. Another meal had passed with the same not-house with the same puppet family.
What was all this? What had she done to be trapped like this? Separated from her family, friends, other people. She was alone.
Still, she kicked at the door and scrabbled her fingers at the edges.
There was no give.
Then Madoka jumped as something hit the wall hard from the other side. The walls shattered like porcelain, falling down into nowhere. In their place were golden wires that were too close together for Madoka to do anything but reach through.
She looked out. And wished she hadn't.
She recognized some of the people below her. Classmates, teachers, staff from the school. They were in an assembly line forcibly held by puppets and were being dragged down the line.
Madoka gasped and reached out as she recognized one person in particular.
Sayaka! She was at the start of the line.
"No!" Madoka reached her hand out desperately for her best friend, tears dripping down her cheeks.
Sayaka's gaze shot up to Madoka, fear shining in her eyes.
The first scalpel sliced neatly through Sayaka's torso. Her body flailed, eyes widened in pain as she failed to scream through the pain. Her insides were neatly scooped out and fell to the empty abyss. Sayaka's eyes grew dim and unfocused. Madoka desperately hoped her friend was dead as her head was cracked open and her brain was scooped out. Sayaka was then sewn back up before being tossed into a tub of some kind of viscous liquid.
Then Sayaka popped out, limbs flopping like she was on strings from a new puppeteer. Her clothes had vanished, leaving her naked. It took a moment before Madoka realized Sayaka had been modified in the liquid. All her orifices were gone as if they had simply been wiped away, as were the details of her body such as the mole she hated on her shoulder and her nipples. She flopped over to the last puppet in the line that proceeded to draw a happy expression on Sayaka's face.
Madoka was close to throwing up already. The sheer carnage in front of her was too much. So many people she knew and cared about were dying right under her and she was helpless to stop it.
Another explosion caught her attention. Madoka gratefully took the distraction and ran to it on the other side of the cage.
There was a girl standing on the rubble of what looked like Mitakihara Middle School's entrance gate. A blonde with dramatic curls dressed in a stylish brown and yellow outfit. The flower ornament in her hair was lovely.
There were muskets one her hands, aimed up to the sky. Curious, Madoka looked where she was aiming.
Her eyes widened as she took in a woman. As flat as the walls that caged Madoka, she was wearing a gothic dress. Her skeletal arms were locked by an old-style wooden handcuff. Her face...there was no face. Where there should have been one was instead overfilled with a red flower of some kind. Around her danced a variety of puppets, some flat like herself while others were more of the fleshy variant.
As what looked like Ms. Saotome had her head messily blown apart by a musket shot, Madoka froze. If these puppets had been real people...her family—
Madoka shot straight up in the bed. Her head shot around, trying to figure out what had happened, what was going on, what was that thing? So many questions with no answers. And the few answers she did have she didn't want.
She looked around at the sides of the round room. Again the messy rainbow walls were back, obstructing her view of everything outside of there.
Madoka was almost relieved. The nightmares beyond the walls were too much for her to truly fathom. What anything was was beyond what she understood.
The door creaked open again as she looked over to it. Her stomach twisted at the idea of having to face her family. Her mother, father, brother...all gone. Sacrificed to whatever that monster was and used as playthings.
Madoka couldn't make herself move. She couldn't face them. She would prefer to starve than go.
Hours passed like that. Madoka simply stared at the open door from where she was in the bed. There was nothing she wanted in that room.
A blink was all it took. Suddenly the door was open in the other direction. Madoka could see even from where she was that the location was different. The smell of tea wafted from the room.
It...might be safe. At least her family shouldn't be there. Hopefully. Madoka was getting hungry, and it didn't seem to go to her house. And even if it wasn't safe, was it really that much better than where she was?
Madoka carefully walked towards the door and peeked in.
It seemed normal enough. A finely decorated apartment, though still the flat dimensions, struck Madoka. She felt like she should know this place. In the middle was a table set out with a teatime meal. A nice set of porcelain kettles and dishes were laid out, food such as cakes and pies set out and sliced into perfectly even portions. On one side of the square table sat a puppet of the girl with the yellow curls wearing the same outfit as before. Another side had a puppet with long black hair and a practical purple outfit, the face left blank. On the third side—
Madoka resisted running. Instead, she stumbled in half-disbelief towards the third puppet.
Sayaka. Her short blue hair was distinctive, though the outfit was unfamiliar. It was a strange affair with a corset and a cape, all blue and black, while a musical note hairpiece laid in her hair.
Madoka collapsed next to her best friend. Then she gave the puppet a rough, desperate hug. Its skin was smooth and cold like wood under her hands. The puppet didn't move from its sitting position, hands set peacefully on the table.
Finally, Madoka began to cry. The tears before had been desperate. Now they were grief.
Her family was dead. Her friends were dead. Everyone she knew was dead.
Why? Why had this happened? Why was Madoka spared? What was with these elaborate mock-ups of places set like they were everyday scenes for Madoka's benefit?
She doubled over, head hitting hard against the table as she simply let herself feel. No thoughts. Just despair.
Madoka jumped as something patted her on the shoulder. She shot up to find the black-haired puppet was rubbing her shoulder soothingly.
This person, Madoka didn't know. Why was she the only one to move?
"Who...are you?" she dared to ask.
The dark windows began to show a scene like a television. Suddenly, as if looking through someone's eyes, Madoka saw a disastrous scene. Desolation everywhere. A battleground where everything was destroyed. On one slab of concrete Madoka stood, saying things inaudible to her. The person looked down at her dress—the girl's dress—before messing with the shield on her arm. A black gem on her hand glowed ever-so-slightly.
The scene changed. It was now third-person, looking down at the girl as she laid in a hospital bed. A black egg-shaped jewel sat in her hands. It cracked once, twice, before exploding in a blast of black. A swirling vortex flowed from it, a gothic dress forming—
Everything was black once more.
Madoka looked back at the puppet of the girl. "I...I don't understand."
The puppet shuddered before it leaned forward and brushed her face against Madoka's. If the puppet had lips they would have kissed.
An alarm from somewhere blared. The girl puppet shot up into the air. Madoka followed it to find there was no ceiling and her strings as they were manipulated by the monstrous woman in the gothic dress. Madoka now noticed chains on the woman as they were being pulled.
"No! Please! Don't go!" Madoka shouted at them. "Don't leave me alone!"
The woman and puppet vanished into the blackness around the room.
Madoka stood, shocked. She hesitantly wiped her eyes with the sleeves of her shirt.
When she opened her eyes, she was once again in the bedroom. But now, in the middle, was a table. All around it the puppets of her family, her friends, her teachers all sat at attention as if they were waiting for her.
Madoka stared. Then she laughed. Once. A couple of times. Then it was a torrent of gut-wrenching laughing.
It never stopped.