Oriko is on the loose and I have replenished my magic power. Now lets kill Gertrud again and be done with this stupid place. I start my search for the remaining witch.

I can't stop grinning while imagining the stories I am going to tell Mami, or should I call them my heroic achievements? Would she praise me? Would she pat my head while telling me how great I am? Would she let me hug her while we are sleeping?

I can't wait to get out of this place and see Mami. My love for her is increasing each and every second. Its strange though, I didn't love her THAT much before. Mami... I can't wait for our reunion...

My smile slowly faded away. How could I have exposed her to danger like that? How could I let her get hurt? Will she ever forgive me? Will I ever forgive myself?

I look at my soul gem which is shining as bright as possible. What am I talking about? Of course she will forgive me. Even my soul is happy and I won't let it get tainted by such pointless concerns.

Madoka? I will also tell Madoka all about my accomplishments. That cute pink ball looking at me with eyes of admiration... I would squeeze her cheeks and tickle her until she gave in. Lay her down the ground and stare deep into her eyes before kissing her soft lips again... Why did they feel so good? Why did kissing feel that good? Its better than I expected and I want to do it again and again and again...

Sigh What am I thinking about. Do I even have the right for any of these? DO I? How can I love Mami? How can I kiss Madoka without Homura's permission? How can I act as I want in her body? Why am I after the warmth of a body, feeling of life so much?

My eyes started watering. My chest got tighter as my facial expression got out of control.

Why am I crying so hard? I never intended to love anybody else but you Homura. Why is everything so different than I expected? Why am I so different? I didn't know I had such feelings lying dormant.

I close my eyes while walking straight and imagine that Homura is in front of me. She is standing completely still, looking at me. I hug her, expecting some praise for all my work until now. But she doesn't react, she can't react. I just can't make her move with my imagination. Just like how I am in control of her body and she can't move in real life. Is this what I have been thinking the whole time? Am I just feeling guilt? I have already robbed Homura's body from her and I feel guilty for acting in a way she won't accept.

I open my eyes and clench my fists.

But you know what, Homura? I won't be some miserable girl who is trying to live a life worse than a slave's, going against her own interests. No, the path to victory is only for the greatest. I won't hide, I won't run away from my own personality. I will acknowledge myself. I love you a lot but I can't grasp the happy future for you if I am shackled by guilt.

Yes I do love Mami. She is perfect and perfectly lovable. She is smarter and stronger than me and the idea of being able to protect her makes me unbelievably happy. She has always been my scale for perfection. And perfection I shall embrace on my path to ultimate victory.

And yes I also love Madoka. I understand why you love her so much. I also share your feelings after all and she also amazes me. She is much better than others around me. She is so bright, so pure, so... So divine. If she isn't a blessing to our life then I know nothing. She is a treasure that I must protect from everyone else. Especially from misguided pseudo heroes...

And yes I stole her first kiss and I loved every second of it. You can hate me for it and I will accept it all. But you can't dim sun's light. She will shine ever bright, forever. That dazzling light will one day wake you up as well, at least that's my plan.

I am glad we had this " talk ". Now I can go on and live as I want. I can have dreams and realize them. And first step is getting rid of this stupid witch.

After walking for 5-10 minutes I finally find the final door. No need to waste time let's enter inside. The room is some sort of a garden with revolving " walls ".

Gertrud is " sitting " inside. Same old Gertrud, never change. She has spawned lots of small familiars in such a short time as well.

I won't stop time, I don't need to. I have done pretty well without that magic. I pull out some rocket launchers and place them on the ground except for the one I am pulling out last.

She starts moving. She noticed my presence, she is more alert than last time. This will be a bit tricky, I can't just shoot a rocket and be done with it.

Sigh I guess a little bit of magic is indeed necessary. Let's see if I can do this without stopping time.

' Come at me all you want, results will be same as last time. '

I place the rocket launcher I am holding next to the others and pull out Skorpion from my shield. This is only for familiars around me. I wish I had thought of pulling out a flamethrower instead but I can't just equip it in the heat of moment. I expected this to be easy but I guess I have started losing. Can't blame my luck after all that good events after all. But me, losing to the likes of Gertrud? I won't allow it.

Familiars make their move and rush towards me, forcing me to jump back.

Ah, if I needed fire I could have just used a molotov cocktail instead! Why didn't I think of it? I must be losing my edge. Trying to shoot down all these miniscule familiars is way too inefficient. Rocket launchers are in front of me, wish I could just fire them and be done with it but Gertrud is way too agile for its size. I am doing really bad right now, losing the control of battle.

I empty my magazine on familiars and throw away the weapon. I pull out M320 grenade launcher and stay put. Gertrud and rockets are in front of me. My plan is luring Gertrud closer and firing at rockets, killing Gertrud with the explosion.

How can I lure Gertrud though? I don't have any idea. Familiars are approaching. Should I get myself into a pinch, allowing Gertrud to make its move? No, it is too dangerous. As far as I know I am on losing streak. I can't do something that risky. How can I win? What would Mami do?

If only I was as smart as her, I could have a good plan. Maybe I really should freeze time. But I can't face Mami if I just cheat my way through. I already have all the weapons in humanity's arsenal. It would be ridiculous if I can't win now. It will be impossible to stop time after Walpurgis Night anyways.

I close my eyes. What am I missing? What more do I need? What would Mami do if she were in my place?

Heh, I smirked. She would do things in a flashy way. She wouldn't shy away from using magic, yet never waste more than enough. If she were in my stead though... She would probably use environment to her advantage!

Who cares about luring Gertrud! I will destroy walls and she will have to dodge falling pieces. All I have to watch out for are familiars.

I start running towards rocket launchers I have left. I only need to distract Gertrud for a little while. I will fire at her. She will then be forced to dodge towards two directions I will be aiming at. If I shoot at her plus either left or right of her she will be forced to either run towards one of those two directions according to my choice or come towards me. I need to fire four rockets in total, I can not mess this up. I need to be incredibly fast, I shouldn't even check whether or not if my aim was off.

With M320 I keep running towards Gertrud and rockets. For her to not attack me I will shoot once with it.

All of a sudden familiars line up in front of me, uniting into some sort of a rope floating on air. That won't be enough stop or catch me when I am determined though!

I slide under this emergent barricade while firing at Gertrud, immediately rolling towards rockets afterwards.

Gertrud dodged towards right. I picked up two rocket launchers, holding each with one hand. Please, my hands, don't shake!

I change my mind after seeing that Gertrud is still running. I can do this with two rockets. If I shoot at the wall on the direction she is going towards, she won't be able to react by going back. After taking the radius of explosion into consideration she should change her direction 30-40 degrees towards her right. I will fire the second rocket directly towards her path one second after firing the first rocket.

State of art wall crumbles after the damage I have inflicted. Trajectory of pieces were a bit different than I have expected though. Must be because wall had its own velocity. Thankfully I wasn't the only one whou couldn't calculate their trajectory because Gertrud also turned as I expected. The second rocket finally hits her. Letting out one final cry of pain, Gertrud disappears without leaving any griefseed. I should be able to return back to reality now as there isn't any witch left.

Barrier disappears and I am facing the doors of hospital. The scenery in front of me though, was much more than them.

Kyoko and another magical girl is writhing in pain. That girl... I don't even know how to react. Her hand... it is melting. What the hell is that! Even I can't stomache this. And Kyoko... She is also on the ground bleeding out while holding her abdomen. What do I do, facing this grotesque scenery? Who is that other girl? What exactly happened to them? So much for happy fun time after returning to Mami and Madoka. Do I heal them, wasting my magic that I tried so hard not to spend? Even if I try to heal them I still won't be able to. They are beyond the help of normal magic. If Sayaka was here as her healer type magical girl self like in other timelines though...

Sayaka: " Ho-Homura? W-what are you doing? " from behind

Her voice almost startled me. I haven't expected to hear from her after thinking of her.

I turn around to face her, putting on a smile:

' Nice timing! I have just finished off the witch haunting this hospital. '

Sayaka: " A- Are for real?! Can't you see those girls on the ground! What have you done to them? "

' Hey! I am as clueless as you are. I don't know what happened to them and I wouldn't be doing such things. '

" It was Oriko Mikuni and Kirika Kure's doing " said a familiar voice.

' Incubator? '

Kyubey: " Even I haven't expected this turn of events, meeting you here this way, Homura Akemi. "

' Spare the pleasantries, what happened here? Tell us quickly. '

Kyubey: " These two were attacked by Oriko Mikuni and Kirika Kure. Had barrier disappeared a few seconds later these two would have been killed off. "

It is my fault these two are in such a shape then. Because I have let Oriko run away... Oh Oriko, this girl with her hand melted got it easy compared to what I am going to do to you.

' It's a shame. These two are beyond saving. From what it looks like Kyoko is only holding onto the " life " thanks to magic while the other one's situation is beyond painful. She can still live but never ever be able to use her hand again. '

Sayaka: " Can't you heal her hand, just like how you healed Kyosuke's? "

' No, it only required some tinkering with nerves. This one requires creating the whole hand. I can't do it. Same with the redhead, Kyoko. I can't heal her either. They are beyond saving now. Even if we are in front of a hospital, Kyoko won't make it to the operation room while the other won't have any use for hospitals besides amputation. '

Kyubey: " They are not beyond saving though. There is a girl here who can make a contract with me in order to heal them. "

Sayaka: " Eh! Homura is already a magical girl so you are talking about me? "

' Exactly. ' I faced away from them to hide my grin. I don't want Madoka to become a magical girl but Sayaka becoming one is not that bad. I took away her reason for being one, changing her and Madoka's opinion of me in a positive way. If I haven't done it then she would have turned into some stupid magical girl trying to hinder my progress. If she becomes one now though it won't be that way. Strategically speaking if she doesn't heal these two I will lose two magical girls that can be of use to me. If she heals them, I will be having three magical girls at my disposal.

Kyubey: " Yes, you have the potential to become a magical girl. Only you can save these two. "

Sayaka: " How can you ask me that! You are asking me to give you my soul and turn me into a monster! Isn't that right, Homura? "

Was that what I told them? Oh well, gotta push her a little bit.

' Mami is a magical girl and I won't let anything like that happen to her. It only happens when you spend too much magic or lose your mental health as I have explained to you. To be honest with you, I would rather have you save these two here. Otherwise, it would be quite a tragedy... '

Sayaka: " But!... You can't just tell me that. "

' Oh? You don't want to become a magical girl just to save two strangers? I can understand that, but I wont empathize with you. I don't want to sound manipulative but I would have taken him up on his offer. And if you actually do it, know that I won't let such a thing happen. '

Sayaka: " I thought you were against him turning others into magical girls! That he was your enemy! "

' *Sigh* Just make up your mind quickly. If you don't want to become a magical girl then I don't want to waste any more time putting them out of their misery. '

Sayaka: " You will what? You can't be serious. "

' At least one of them will die. By the way, the girl I told you that you were going to look after... It is the redhead. Don't know if it matters at all for you but thought I should just say it. She was supposed to kill witches during our absence. Now, this city won't have any magical girls. It will be either left empty or turned into some battlefield for other magical girls eyeing the territory. "

Sayaka was struggling, thinking of any comeback. She finally gave up:

Sayaka: " Fine... "

Kyubey: " Will you make a contract with me, in return of anything you want? "

Sayaka: " Yes, I will. I will become a magical girl..." silently

Kyubey: " Then state your wish and become a magical girl! "

Sayaka: " I want these two to be healed completely! "

Kyubey then touched Sayaka with her ear, feeler, antenna or some completely different body part. A soulgem glowing blue came out of Sayaka's body as those girls stopped feeling pain. I don't know if her being a magical girl is a good or bad thing but at least they will be grateful for pain's disappearance. It was Sayaka's turn to scream in pain now. Her soul getting taken out of her body was painful enough for her.