Restless, Part 4
Mami Tomoe just loved her job!
She was the day manager over at name redacted, located on the corner of street name redacted and street name redacted, which was quite simply the loveliest little café one could ever hope to find. With its cozy dining room description redacted, its bookshelves full of titles redacted, and welcoming atmosphere, it was the most comfortable home away from home to be found. And the cupcakes were to die for!
But most of all, she loved her girls.
There was always plenty of young girls looking to get hired on as baristas. The café was so close to the school that it only made sense, and as the day manager and most senior employee not to yet get called downstairs, Mami was often the one to take them under her wing and teach them everything they needed to know, from how to properly wear their uniform to how to bow and greet the guests to how to carry several plates without dropping them to tricks on how to remember the orders from several tables without getting them confused.
It was the best part of the job, getting to work with all those bright, cute things and shepherding them along and knowing that they all looked up to her. And when the time was right, she would send them downstairs to work at their sister location in the basement, which was considered a big promotion! She missed seeing them after that happened, but she knew how happy they were working for the basement location, and the basement always sent up a big bag of frosting as thanks.
Unfortunately, despite her seniority, Mami had yet to be sent downstairs herself. She would very much like to, as it meant an upgrade in position and pay, and she would be able to work with her beloved kouhais once again.
It was the price she paid at being too good at her job. She was the best at readying the girls to go downstairs, and they had yet to find anyone to replace her, so she was stuck upstairs, watching the faces of her coworkers constantly change. She loved each new group as much as the last, but it would be nice to see those who had left again.
At the moment, she was training two new hires, a couple of middle-schoolers named Madoka Kaname and Sayaka Miki. They were a real pair of cuties, one a sweet, shy thing and the other a cheerful tomboy. They watched in fascination as Mami demonstrated how to make latte art by manipulating white foam into the shape of a flower.
"Oooh!" they said in unison.
Mami smiled as she put in the finishing touches. "And there we are! See? It's not so hard once you get the hang of it."
"That is so cool!" Sayaka gushed.
"Mami-sempai, you're amazing!" Madoka added.
"Well, keep practicing, and soon you'll be just as good as me," Mami said as she served the customer their drink. "You'll be down in the basement in no time!"
Over by the cash register, Kyoko Sakura lounged in her stool and smirked. "Damn, Mami. You just can't keep from adding to your harem, can yah?" Kyoko was one of the longer term employees, having worked with Mami in the upstairs location longer than most.
"Well, I suppose that would make you the eunuch in charge of the harem!" Sayaka shot back.
Kyoko stared at her blankly. "A eunuch? The hell is a eunuch?"
"Uh…" Sayaka shot a pleading look at Mami.
"All right, now let's learn how to frost the cupcakes!" Mami said hastily. She lifted up a big bag. "The basement just sent us a lot of it, so we'll be able to make many cupcakes!"
At that moment, the bell over the door jangled, and the owner walked in. Kyoko immediately stopped slouching as Madoka and Sayaka snapped to attention.
"Good day, ladies," the owner said as he approached the counter. "Working hard or hardly working?"
Madoka and Sayaka both giggled respectfully while Kyoko, who was much more used to the owner's corny sense of humor, merely rolled her eyes and sighed dramatically.
Mami, who had his favorite drink already waiting for him, brought it up to the counter. "Good afternoon, sir," she said. "I hope everything is well."
"It is! It is! In fact, I came to deliver some good news." Sipping from his cup, the owner turned to focus on the redhead manning the cash register. "Now, Kyoko, I do believe the time has come for you to move on."
Kyoko's eyes just about popped out of their sockets. "You mean it?" she said eagerly. "I get to go down to the basement?"
"Congratulations," the owner said. "You've earned it."
"Wow, um." Kyoko looked around at her coworkers. "Well, nice meeting y'all, but I'm moving on to lower and better things!"
"Yeah, yeah, get out of here, you big shot," Sayaka said with a dismissive wave of her hand.
"Bye-bye, Kyoko-chan!" Madoka said waving. "It was nice knowing you!"
"Oh, and thanks, Mami," Kyoko said, momentarily dropping her usual nonchalant attitude. "For everything."
Mami gave her a big hug. "Take care down there."
"Don't I always?" With one last wave, Kyoko headed to the back door that led down to the basement. She opened it, revealing the nearly pitch-black passageway beyond. "Smell you all later!"
And with that, she was gone.
Mami sighed. She was happy for Kyoko, just as she was happy for all the girls that got sent to the basement, but she really was going to miss her. And though she understood the reasons for being held back, she really wished she could join them.
It was then that she noticed that the owner was giving her a thoughtful look. "Mami," he said. "I think that it might be time for you to go down as well."
Mami gasped. "You mean it?"
"We kept you up here because we needed you. however, That was unfair. You've more than earned it."
"Wow, congratulations, Mami-sempai!" Madoka said.
"Man, we just got here, and already you're ditching us," Sayaka said. "Cold, Mami. Real cold."
Mami didn't know what to say. "But…the café! Who's going to-"
"I've just hired a whole bunch of girls," the owner told her. "I'll be looking after things until we can get a new day manager hired. Go on. You deserve it."
Overwhelmed with emotion, Mami hurried around the counter to give him a grateful hug.
The door slammed shut behind her, leaving Mami by herself. Then she ran back to hug her trainees.
"Thank you for everything," she said. "I'm sorry our time together was so brief."
"Aw, you'll see us again!" Sayaka said. "We'll be down there before you know it."
"You better be!" Mami then straightened, composed herself, and took a deep breath. "All right. Off I go!"
And with that, she headed to the back door, opened it, gave everyone one last wave, and stepped through, letting the door close behind her.
She stood at the top of a long, winding staircase. All around her was a wide open space, one with no bottom, no walls, and no ceiling, just a vast expanse in all directions. It was lit by enormous wax candles that rose up out of the abyss, some of them as skinny as a birthday cake candle, some of them as thick as a building, all of them of varying heights but still taller than skyscrapers.
The stairs descended into the forest of wax and fire, winding their way between the candles.
Mami took a deep breath. And then she set off.
She walked for a long time, following the stairs this way and that, all by herself in a labyrinth of candles. She wondered if she could catch up to Kyoko. Probably not. The younger girl had probably started sprinting the second she was beyond the door.
Well, Mami would find her sooner or later, if not on the way down then when she got there.
In fact, she soon would be seeing everyone she had ever trained, from Kyoko to Michiru to Brooke to Melody to Asami to the rest. They were all at the basement location, waiting for her.
Cheered by the thought, Mami started walking faster. It would be good to see their faces again.
Then she paused, and she frowned. Wait, were they all still there? She had sent literal dozens to the basement, which was quite a lot to staff a single café. Had the franchise expanded?
As she mused on that, she heard the sound of feet rapidly striking the metal steps behind her. Someone was running toward her.
"Mami-sempai!" Madoka called as she and Sayaka ran up to her. "There you are!"
Mami blinked. "Wait, why are you two here?"
Sayaka beamed. "We got sent down too!" she said. "The owner decided it was better to just send us all at once!"
"Really?" Wow, that had been quick! "Well, congratulations!"
"Come on, let's catch up to Kyoko!" Sayaka said as she ran off, Madoka struggling to keep up.
"Slow down!" Mami said as she hurried after them. "I'm not as fast as you…"
She slowed and stopped. The stairs were curving around a huge, fat-bodied candle, and there was something sticking out of the wax.
Frowning, Mami leaned in to get a closer look. It looked they the tips of a pair of curving blades, ones with serrated backs. Now, why were those there? It seemed a bit dangerous if you asked her. Someone could accidentally put their hand on the candled and stab-
The wax exploded outward, and Mami was driven backward into the stairs' railing by a flying body. Before she knew what was happened, she had a long-fingered hand shoving back on her chin, bending her backwards over the railing, trying to push her over.
Gasping, Mami saw that it was Annabelle Lee, the deranged and emaciated disgraced Void Walker that had been a thorn in her and her family's side for far too long. Annabelle Lee was grinning savagely as she continued the pressure against Mami's chin with one hand, pushing Mami further and further over the railing.
"Now where are you going?" Annabelle Lee sneered. "Off to receive your reward? Get what you deserve?" She spat into Mami's face. "Hypocrite! You still think that you're the good guy?"
She then drew her other arm back, blades bared and gleaming, ready to plunge into Mami's flesh.
But as she stabbed forward, both of Mami's hands shot up, clapping around Annabelle Lee's wrist and redirecting the momentum. Instead of slicing into Mami's face, the blades were instead jammed into the side of a nearby candle.
Taking advantage of her assailant's momentary surprise, Mami seized the railing with both hands and drove her knees up into Annabelle Lee's sternum, causing her to gasp in pain. Mami then twisted out of her grip and ducked down beneath her to roll out of the way, making sure to drive the point of her elbow into the small of Annabelle Lee's back as she went.
Annabelle Lee hastily yanked her blade free and spun to face Mami, her eyes burning with fury, but Mami was just one step ahead of her. She seized the railing with both hands and used it to leap up and kick the toe of her shoe into Annabelle Lee's nose.
The cartilage crunched beneath the blow, and Annabelle Lee's eyes rolled back. Unwilling to give her space to breath, Mami rushed to the opposite end of the stairs, jumped up to balance on the railing, and leapt forward to nail the stunned Annabelle Lee with a flying dropkick.
Annabelle Lee flipped backward over the railing, striking her head against the side of the candle as she went. She fell into the abyss.
Mami rushed to the railing and looked over. When Annabelle Lee's body had fully disappeared and didn't look like it was coming back, she sighed, took a moment to compose herself, brushed off her uniform, and continued on her way.
By then, Madoka and Sayaka had gotten too much of a head start for her to catch up, but she could at least get there as quickly as she could. Mami hurried along through the forest of candles until she finally reached the end of the stairs. They came to an end at a green door set in the side of nothing. Floating in the air on one side was a sign that said BREAK ROOM. On the other side was a glowing neon OPEN sign.
Well, she was one step closer to the basement. Mami laid her hand on the doorknob.
"That's a bad idea."
Mami paused, and then looked over her shoulder.
Behind her stood a girl with pale skin and long, dark hair. She was wearing a large patchwork overcoat and had leaflike protrusions growing from her hair. In her arms was a trio of raggedy stuffed animals: a wolf, a hare, and a snake.
Mami gazed at her in puzzlement. "Do I know you?"
"Not yet. But you will." The girl looked over to the door. "What is beyond is safe, but doesn't have what you're looking for. But you shouldn't keep looking. You will not like what you find."
Mami shook her head. "No, I have to. I have to go down to basement. I was sent for."
"Sent for by whom?" Then the girl sighed. "It is your choice, but you are making the wrong one."
"That's for me to decide, not you," Mami retorted. "Besides, I'm still on the clock." She then opened the door and stepped inside.
Beyond was a restaurant. It was very high-end, with a rich scarlet velvet rug to a elaborately decorated bar running through the middle to a small string section playing on a stage to several exceptionally well-dressed diners at the tables.
Directly in front of her was the hostess's booth. In contrast to the professionally dressed waitresses and bartenders Mami saw, the hostess was anything but. Her hair was gathered into dreadlocks, each one dyed a different color, multiple piercings were stuck into her face and ears, and she was wearing an artfully torn outfit of denim and black cotton, with several patches bearing band logos and vulgar phrases sewn into her jacket.
Despite being the one in charge of greeting guests, she was slouching in her seat, her legs propped up on the booth as she dourly played with her phone. Her jaws kept chewing, chewing, chewing, masticating what looked to be a wad of gum.
Mami approached the booth. "Hello," she said. "I was sent for."
The punk girl didn't straighten up, but she did shoot her an irritated look. "Reservation?" she said.
Mami was confused. Reservation? She hadn't heard anything about a reservation. "I was sent for," she repeated.
The punk girl looked less than impressed. She blew out a large silver bubble sprinkled with multicolored glitter, popped it, and resumed chewing. "Do I look like I give a shit? I asked you about a reservation!"
Confused, Mami just stared at her.
Sighing, the punk girl withdrew her legs and leaned forward. "Fine. Name?"
"Uh, It's Mami. Mami Tomoe."
The punk girl scanned some kind of list. "Well, we ain't got no Mamimami Tomoe, but we do got something for a Mami Tomoe. That be you then?"
Mami nodded.
"Kewl." The punk girl stuck a thumb back over her shoulder. "Over in the corner there. Enjoy your night or whatever."
"Thank you," Mami said. "And, um, since I've been summoned, where do I go to take care of that?"
The punk girl went back to playing with her phone. "Back door next to your party."
"Thank you," Mami said again, and went over to the indicated corner.
Her family was there, gathered together at a large booth. Her former mentors and close friends Shizuku Sango and Natsuru Senou were seated on a pair of chairs pulled up to the table. Kyoko was behind the booth, and she actually looked surprisingly presentable, having traded in her ratty outfit for a sharp red suit, her long red hair combed out and shining. Oktavia was seated next to her, wearing a striking white foam blouse, with a glittering gem-studded clip in her hair.
And at the head of the table was Charlotte, looking gorgeous in a green cocktail dress. Mami recognized it. It was her favorite dress, the one she liked to bring out for parties.
And evidently a party was exactly what was happening. Everyone was talking and laughing over plates of sushi and expensive looking drinks. Kyoko had just finished telling a story that sent the whole table into hysterics.
As Mami approached, Kyoko looked up and saw her. "And hey, speak of the devil! There she is!"
Everyone turned to Mami with happy smiles of welcome. Charlotte got up and ran over to her.
"There you are!" she said, grabbing Mami in a tight hug and kissing the side of her mouth. "What took you so long?"
"I…" Mami gazed longingly at the back door, which is where she was supposed to go.
"Well, you're here now. C'mon!"
Charlotte took her hand and led her back to the party. Confused, Mami sat down next to her.
"About time you got here," Shizuku said. "Kyoko here was just telling us how much business has picked up ever since you hired a real mermaid."
"I know, right?" Kyoko said, giving Oktavia a hearty slap on the back. "She's laying so many eggs that we're having trouble keeping up!"
Oktavia beamed.
"Well, it's good to hear you're taking care of the old business," Shizuku said. She looked right into Mami's eyes, and her customary smug smirk disappeared. "I knew I was leaving it in good hands."
Mami looked away.
"Because I just knew it would only continue to expand and grow under your ownership, that you wouldn't just throw it all away in pursuit of a madcap scheme that would get you all in considerable trouble."
"I…" Mami licked her lips. "I, uh…"
"The sort of trouble that would inevitably wrangle others into it, that might endanger Natsuru and I just for having associated with you, that would destabilize a delicate political balance and put the lives of thousands at risk, that would-"
Mami abruptly stood up. "I'm very sorry," she said. "I can't stay. I'm still on the clock."
Her head bowed, she hurried from the table and headed for the back door. She could feel the eyes of her loved ones boring into her back.
Only Charlotte ran after her. "Mami, wait!" she said as she grabbed Mami and spun her around. "Mami, do you really have to go?"
"I do," Mami said. "I'm sorry. I'm on the clock."
"Please stay," Charlotte pleaded. "Everyone's here! Your whole family, we're all here! There's no need to go anywhere else."
Mami shook her head. "No, you don't understand. It's my responsibility. I have to look after Madoka and Kyoko and Sayaka-"
Then she blinked in confusion. Wait, Kyoko and Sayaka? But Kyoko was right over there, and Sayaka was with her, or at least a version of her was!
But as she looked past Charlotte's shoulder, she saw that such was not the case. The table was empty, with no one in the chairs or at the booth.
Mami slowly looked around. Everyone was gone, from the diners to the waitresses to the bartenders to the cooks. The whole of the restaurant was abandoned.
All except for her and Charlotte.
"Mami," Charlotte said, drawing Mami's attention back to her. "Please don't go. If you do, there'll be nothing to come back to."
Mami felt her throat constrict. Oh Charlotte, why did she have to make this so hard. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I have to. It's my job. I'm on the clock."
With that, she turned from her wife and walked toward the back door.
The restaurant wasn't completely empty, as it turned out. The punk girl that had been working as hostess was leaning against the wall next to the back door, still chewing her gum and playing with her phone. As Mami approached she looked up, smirked, and blew another glittering bubble.
Then she casually kicked the back of her heel into the door, knocking it open.
Darkness yawned on the other side.
"Hope you enjoyed your evening," the punk girl remarked as Mami passed through.
The door slammed shut behind her, leaving her alone in the dark.
Mami peered down. She was standing at the top of another metal staircase, one that descended diagonally down into a black void. The way was lit by domed lamps hanging from wires from far above, and there was a tiny bright light at the end of the staircase, but other than that there was nothing to be seen above, below, or to either side.
She was standing in an empty void. All alone.
Shivering, Mami started to descend. The old, rusting stairs creaked worryingly beneath her feet. She reached out to grab onto the handrail, only to withdraw when she saw that it was slick with some kind of fluid, one that didn't look like water.
Mami hugged herself and quickened the pace. Now the groaning of the steps was getting really bad. When was the last time these things had been inspected? It could not be up to standards?
"It's a shame, really," said Mr. Hagane, her father's boss and close family friend from back when Mami had been alive, back when her parents had been alive. He was riding by on an electric cherry-picker, one hand on the railing, the other on the controls, the mechanical neck stretching all the way down into the dark. "You should have come to live with us, after the accident. It could have been different. You might have had a chance."
Mami shook her head. "No, I couldn't. I couldn't risk it. You would have been in danger."
Mr. Hagane shook his head and sighed. "Ryu really liked you, you know. You would have been good for him."
With that, he navigated the cherry picker down and away, leaving her alone.
She walked for a time, with nothing but the humming of the cheap lightbulbs overhead and her own conflicted thoughts to keep her company. Should she have stayed in the restaurant, with Charlotte and Kyoko and Oktavia and the rest? They were her family, after all!
But she had a job to do! She had responsibilities! She was on the clock, after all. And she really did want to see her girls again, like Madoka and Sayaka and Kyoko-
Mami paused as a wave of confusion washed through her. Wait, she had just seen Kyoko! And Oktavia was…
She shook her head. Everything was so strange. Why was it so strange?
Then, as she stood there on a stairway over oblivion, there was a sudden hiss of static, and the whole world lit up.
The nothingness to her left suddenly turned on, revealing an absolutely massive screen, one that dwarfed anything in a theater, bigger than most skyscrapers, bigger than most canyons. The entire open space was filled with white television static.
And then the static cleared, and Mami found herself staring at her own living room.
It was the living room from back on the Nautilus Platform, her home. The camera was facing directly toward the couch, and on that couch sat Charlotte.
Mami blinked. Not that she was unhappy to see her wife, but she had never expected to see her like this, and especially not to see such a huge version of her.
The giant Charlotte looked up at the camera and smiled. She reached behind her to grab something.
"Mami!" she said, her voice booming from all around. "Look what I found!"
She lifted up a rather odd doll, one with a clownish face and long sleeves.
"Remember her?" Charlotte said. "I thought we'd lost her!"
She turned the doll around to show Mami a large hole in its stuffed head. "See? This is where you shot me in the head!"
She then pulled apart its belly, exposing another hole, this one going right through its body. "And this is where you sent a Tiro Finale right through my heart!"
Then she started squeezing the doll, crushing its body between her fingers. "And this is how you squished me!" The doll's face started to bulge as all of its stuffing was pushed into its head. "Just tied me up in ribbons and clenched them harder and harder and harder." Its mouth started to puff up, like something was trying to escape. "Right until…"
The doll's stitched mouth tore open, and a cascade of earthworms were vomited up. They spilled over Charlotte's fingers and knees to drip onto the floor, where they lay wriggling.
The ruined doll was still in her hands and a mess of worms at her feet, Charlotte looked up at Mami. "Of course I don't remember," she said. "I never will. My memories start with you chasing me through those concrete halls, over those smashed cars, trying to shoot me to bits. But you remember, don't you? You remember the whole thing."
Mami back away from the screen, stopping only when her back hit the slick railing. "I…I didn't know. I didn't know who you were."
"And yet you still thought you were the good guy," Charlotte said. "Just like you did when you slaughtered all those other witches. Just like when you convinced all those girls to make contracts. Just like when you agreed to go with Kyoko and endanger everyone." She paused, and then reached over to grab something off the tea table, something Mami hadn't noticed before.
It was a green military helmet, one intended to go with a set of powered armor.
"Just like you did in Etherdale," Charlotte said. Then screen then flickered and distorted, and for a brief moment a green octagon enclosing six green pomegranate seeds that surrounded a large Roman numeral P appeared, the symbol of the Persephone Protectorate.
The screen flickered again, and Charlotte was back. "You're doing it still," she said. "You still think you're the good guy."
Mami shivered. "I'm sorry," she said. "I can't stay. I'm on the clock."
Charlotte smiled a grim smile. "You haven't been taking your medicine, Mami. You're not supposed to quit cold turkey!"
With that, the picture then distorted again, losing color and detail. It flipped up like a jammed film reel, and when it righted itself, Mami was no longer looking at a clean picture of her wife sitting in their living room, but a rough sketchwork, an animation test, one composed of a few loose lines in the shape of a woman sitting on a rectangle on a plain background, with only a few frames per movement.
The sketchwork Charlotte stood up. She looked at her stick-figure arms, down at her undefined body, and then directly at Mami. She tilted her head to one side.
Then, as Mami watched in confusion, the sketchwork Charlotte's legs lost shape, becoming squiggly lines that reconvened into a triangular shape, forming a long skirt, one with no legs coming out the bottom.
Then the shape of her hair changed, the curving lines that denoted her pigtails vanishing, and several lines appearing above her head, giving the impression of a wild, punk-rock style.
The sketchwork girl spread her arms, and two lines appeared over her wrists, ones with sharp edges.
And a pair of bright amethyst eyes opened in the stick-figure head.
Mami inhaled sharply. Oh.
Annabelle Lee burst through the giant screen, sending glittering glass shards falling into the emptiness below while dissolving the picture into hot static yet again. She flew across the expanse, zeroing in on Mami, blades pointed straight at her chest.
Mami threw herself out of the way, pivoting on her shoulder and came back onto her feet. Annabelle Lee shot right past, missing her by less than a meter. As Mami rose up, she saw that Annabelle Lee had severed the railings on both sides with her passing.
Her assailant flew high and swooped back around. Mami readied herself for another pass, but as it turned out Annabelle Lee wasn't after her this time. She instead went for the rest of the rickety staircase, slashing at it as she shot past. One pass, two passes, three, and four, and the whole thing was severed and sent tumbling into the darkness below.
Mami stood a few steps before the drop, watching as Annabelle Lee flew up high until she vanished from sight. Moments later, the dome lamps that were hanging from the recently detached piece of stairwell suddenly started to fall one-by-one, starting with the ones furthest away and swiftly coming closer. Annabelle Lee was up there, cutting them all away.
In response, Mami summoned up a musket and took aim. Though she couldn't see Annabelle Lee, she could make a pretty good judgement on where she was.
As the falling lamps grew nearer, Mami fired.
The lamps stopped falling, and Annabelle Lee started shrieking. She fell into view, spiraling madly out of control, screaming the whole way.
Mami thrust a hand forward. A ribbon shot out and snapped around Annabelle Lee's waist. Mami tugged and spun her around, redirecting Annabelle Lee's fall and sending her tumbling off in a different direction.
To be specific, right at the still static-filled screen.
Annabelle Lee smashed into the screen with a hail of sparks. The entire thing shattered, the pieces all fell into the black, once again bathing the whole area in darkness.
There were no more attacks after that.
After taking a moment to compose herself, Mami walked down to the final remaining stair looked down at the gap. She could probably leap the distance, but it was pretty far, and if she misjudged then she would never get to the bottom, at least not in the way she was supposed to.
Time was running out, and she was on the clock.
Then she got an idea. Mami waved her hand, and several golden ribbons materialized, binding themselves between the two halves of the staircase and forming a sort of ramp.
Mami continued her descent. She took it slow, careful to hold onto the ribbons that connected the railings, watching her footwork the whole way. The ribbons sagged under her weight, but they held.
She reached the other half of the stairs, which was very near to the light. The light turned out to be a door floating in the dark, with a single lamp shining above it. Written on a grimy plaque attached to the door were the words ORIENTATION ROOM. There was no knob, handle, or bar.
The punk girl was there as well, standing on the catwalk and slouching against the dark next to the door, still playing with her phone, still chewing her gum. She glanced up at Mami.
"Hey," she said. "You know you're late, right?"
"I was held up," Mami said crossly.
"Well, get yourself put back down, then. Everyone's waiting for you, and you are on the clock."
"Okay," Mami said. "I'm sorry."
The punk girl shrugged. "Not as sorry as you're gonna be if you make the orientation wait much longer."
She lifted her hand and rapped her knuckles against the door. There was a click and it opened just a crack.
Mami pushed it open and stepped over the threshold. As she did, the creaking from the rusty old stairs suddenly increased into a loud groan.
She turned just in time to see the catwalk and the stairs snap off from the door, just like the part Annabelle Lee had severed. They fell, and since her ribbons still connected them to the top half, those two were torn off and dragged down, leaving nothing connecting the two doors in the dark.
There was no going back now.
Mami entered the room fully and let the door swing shut behind her.
In front of her was a classroom, one she had not seen in years but still knew all too well. It was from her old school in Mitakihara, with the glass walls, the retractable desks, and the holographic white board.
Most of the desks had been retracted, but three had been activated and had someone sitting in them. In them, Kyoko Sakura, Sayaka Miki, and Madoka Kaname were sitting and chatting amongst themselves.
Mami sighed. Well, it had been a rough trip, but she had caught up. She had made it.
As Mami approached, they all turned and smiled at her. "Hey, there she is!" Kyoko said. "Team Mom, in the house!"
Mami sighed in relief. She had finally caught up.
"I'm sorry for making you wait," she said. A desk slid up out of the floor and unfolded for her. She gratefully sat down. "I was-" Then she frowned. "Wait, didn't I see you two in the restaurant?"
"What restaurant?" Madoka asked.
"Upstairs! In the break room! They were there." She looked over to Sayaka Miki. "Except you were…"
Sayaka looked away.
"I'd drop it if I were you," Kyoko said, all warmth gone from her voice. Now she sounded cold and dangerous.
Mami blinked in surprise, but before she could inquire further, the door opened, and the instructor entered.
Oddly enough, it was Kazuko Saotome, who had been Mami's English teacher back when she had been a first year. Miss Saotome seemed to be in a huff about something, which was always a sign that they were in for quite the interesting lecture.
Miss Saotome marched to the front of the class, grasped her pointer with both hands, inhaled sharply, and said, "Class! Today we are going to talk about the dangers of a man's sympathy!"
"Well, another one bites the dust," Sayaka murmured.
"A man's sympathy is not to be trusted, because no matter how selfless his behavior might be, no matter how empathetic his demeanor is, men are only after one thing, and it's completely disgusting!"
"You'd think she'd learn after a while," Kyoko remarked.
"It doesn't matter your need, he will only use it against you!" Suddenly Miss Saotome swung her pointer around so that it was pointing straight at Madoka's face. "Whether you wish to rise above your mediocrity!" Then she jerked it over to Sayaka. "Or help your close friend achieve his dreams!" Then over to Kyoko. "Or assist a struggling parent!" And finally, over to Mami. "Or even something so simple as cling to life! No matter the desire, it will be used against you! You simply cannot trust them!"
Was it Mami's imagination, or was there something…off about how Miss Saotome was moving? While she was as animated as Mami remembered, there was a stiffness to her movements, as if her joints weren't working properly.
"Oh, they will say pretty words and give you small tokens of support, but do not be fooled! It is all a ruse! They will use you and discard you and then go after the next poor girl in need of companionship!"
Was she sick? Miss Saotome did seem to be ill. Her skin was looking a lot more grey than was healthy, and it did seem to be in need of a moisturizer. Also, her eyes were looking really sunken behind her glasses.
"So if you don't want to spend the rest of your now very much shortened life alone, do not trust anything a man tells you!"
Mami cleared her throat and raised her hand. "Um, Miss Saotome? I'm sorry, but is this the orientation? Weren't we sent to the basement?"
"Yes, you were!" Miss Saotome stopped her pacing and rotated in place to face Mami. Her joints were now audibly cracking as she swung her pointed back and forth. "You sent them down! The ones you were supposed to look after and protect! You sent them down and then went down yourself, like a good little soldier."
Mami saw that Miss Saotome had been leaving drops of red on the floor wherever she went. It was dripping out of her skirt and crawling down her legs. "Miss Saotome, I don't understand. Isn't that my job?"
"No, not like a soldier!" Mami finally saw the strings attached to the backs of Miss Saotome's wrists, to her neck, to her head, to her back, and to her feet, strings that extended up to a dark hole in the ceiling. "Like a sheep! A sheep, so trusting of the shepherd, that you calmly walk in line and let them place the blade to your throat! One by one you sent them off, until it was your turn to make that final march! And at the end, you are alone!"
With that, Miss Saotome fell apart, her arms ripping off her shoulders, her head separating from her neck, and her legs falling from her waist. The various pieces hung on their strings, rotating around and around in place, blood still dripping from the tears, until the strings were retracted, pulling the pieces up into the hole, which then closed up.
Disturbed, Mami looked to the others to see their reaction, but they had already left. She had just enough time to see Madoka's back as she hurried from the room, shutting the door behind her and leaving Mami all alone.
Mami stood up from her desk and slowly headed for the door, doubts and fears whirling through her head. What had she just seen? What had Miss Saotome been trying to tell her? She had always done what she could to look after the other girls, to help them succeed, hadn't she?
"I tried to tell you."
Mami looked up. The mysterious Puella Magi, the anomaly, Homura Akemi, was standing just outside of the classroom, glowering at her through the glass.
"I tried to tell you so many times, but you wouldn't listen," Homura said. "You only ever disregarded me or threatened me. And when you were confronted with the truth, you broke down. Every time."
"Tell me what?" Mami said. "What's in the basement? What did I send them to?"
Homura shook her head in disgust. "What's the point of telling you? You never listened before, so why should you now?"
"Because I need to know!" Mami grabbed the door and hurried out into the hall to confront Homura directly. "Tell me! What's in-"
There was nobody there. The hall was empty.
Mami looked around at all the empty classrooms, at the abandoned hallways. She was all by herself in the school. Nobody was there to tell her what to do.
Dejected, she walked through the abandoned school alone, hoping to find someone, hoping to learn the truth. Was she still expected in the basement? How did she get there from where she was? Was she still even on the clock? She had gone where she was told to go, but now she was here. It wasn't her fault, was it?
"Madoka!" she called. "Kyoko! Sayaka? Where are you?"
Her voice echoed back at her, but other than that, there was no response.
So she tried something else. "Oktavia! Charlotte! Can you hear me? Akemi? Kyubey! Anybody!"
And then she heard the sound of scornful laughter, coming from behind.
Mami whirled around, but there was nobody there.
But the laughter didn't stop. It was coming from all around, mocking her.
She knew that laughter. And she knew that she was once again in trouble.
"Did you really think they would answer?" Annabelle Lee's voice said. "Did you really think they would come to save you? You led them to their deaths, and now there's nobody out there."
Mami slowly inhaled and breathed out. She summoned up a musket.
"You're all alone, and you have nobody to blame but yourself."
Where was she? Where was the voice coming from?
"You always were a sap, weren't you? You listened to Kyubey, you listened to Kyoko, and you listened to Lily. And in return, you lost your soul, the souls of everyone you ever mentored, your home, your neighbors' homes, and the right to call yourself a good person. You've done nothing but cause death and suffering."
Mami paused. She swallowed back the lump in her throat, wiped away the tears prickling at her eyes, and called out, "If you're going to taunt me, then please do it to my-"
Her voice cracked, cutting off the rest of the sentence.
There was a long pause, and Mami started to wonder if Annabelle Lee had left.
And then the lights went out.
Mami whirled around just in time to see Annabelle Lee appear in the hall behind her, hovering with her arms outstretched, wild hair blowing from an unfelt wind, emaciated face twisted into a look of bloodthirsty delight. The blades on both arms were extended, ready to plunge.
With an unearthly howl, Annabelle Lee flew right at her.
Mami lifted her musket to fire, but she was a fraction of a second too slow. Annabelle Lee hit her in the stomach, lifting her off her feet and driving her into the glass wall of one of the classrooms. The glass shattered on impact, and Mami fell through in a shower of twinkling shards-
-and she was in the Etherdale swamp, falling back into the thick muck, surrounded by gnarled trees, black vines, and humming insects.
Before she had the chance to respond, the wild girl was once again on her, perched on her armor's breastplate, a filthy, naked savage with crazed eyes and two bared swords in hand. She started chopping at Mami with no finesse, no strategy, nothing other than the desire to rip and tear.
Mami backhanded the wild girl across the face and heaved herself up. The wild girl fell sprawling into the muck.
Before her assailant could recover, Mami had her rifle cocked and ready, the targeting grid in her helmet's visor running calculations and working in tandem with the built-in reflexes of her armor, ensuring that she could not miss.
But then, just before she pulled the trigger, she realized that the girl she was about to shoot was Sayaka Miki, her friend and kouhai, once a spunky go-getter, now a mindless engine of rage and violence.
Mami hesitated. It was only for a moment, but it was enough. Sayaka was on her again, teeth gnashing and blades swinging for her neck, and-
-she was knocked off her feet over the edge of the platform she had been standing on, out into the open air of Cloudbreak.
All around her, the ai'jurrik'kai glass rails twisted around and around in a dazzling webwork, but none were close enough to break her fall. Mami reached for something to grab onto, but gravity already had her.
As she fell, she heard cackling laughter. Above her, Nie Blühen Herze was leaping from the platform she had just shoved Mami off of, both pistols in hand, ready to fire.
Mami pulled out a musket, but Nie had already reached her, and the two plummeted together, each firing at far too close a range, each only barely managing to deflect the other's shots.
Mami managed to elbow Nie in the jaw, causing her head to snap back. She pulled out another musket and took aim, ready to end the fight with a shot between the eyes.
But then she saw not the long golden pigtails she had been expecting, but pigtails that were shorter and pink. She was fighting Madoka Kaname.
What?
Before Mami could process this, Madoka shoved her away and took aim with her bow, her magical arrow glowing and ready to fly. She released the string, and-
-Mami rolled this way and that as she batted the Dessert Witch around, its tiny, doll-like body helpless to stop her. She was pleased with how easy the fight was. Not only did she not have to worry about her two little kouhais, but she could give them a show as well.
But though the little witch wasn't fighting back, it was taking a great deal of punishment. Mami had already shot it several times at point-blank range and it still wasn't dying.
No matter. The end was coming soon, both the end of the fight and the end of her loneliness. Kaname had just agreed to become a Puella Magi as well, and it wouldn't be long before Miki did so as well! She had friends again, ones fighting by her side! She didn't have to do it by herself anymore, like she had ever since-
No. She couldn't afford to think about Sakura now. This was a happy day.
Mami clenched her hand, and the witch's body was lifted up by a web of ribbons. They wrapped around it tightly holding it in place, and Mami brought out the big guns, summoning up a massive cannon.
"Tiro!" she cried as she took aim. "Fi-"
Her customary battle-cry choked off. There, tied up in her ribbons, wasn't the little doll witch that she had been about to destroy. It was a girl, one about her age, one with a slender body and long limbs, one with short, dark-pink hair and bright blue eyes.
"Charlotte?" she whispered. "Charlotte, what-"
Then Charlotte's mouth bulged open, and a monster emerged, a huge worm with a black, polka-dotted body and a white face, one with huge, ringed eyes and an almost cartoonish smile. It reared over her and opened its mouth, revealing several triangular teeth.
And as it bit down, Mami stood frozen in horror, unable to move as-
-Kyoko came at her, her face red with grief and rage as furious tears streamed from her eyes. She wasn't even using her spear nor any of her well-rehearsed battle tactics. This was pure emotion.
"Sakura-san, wait!" Mami cried as she dodged again and again. "Stop! I am not your enemy!"
But Kyoko didn't listen. Her family's loss was an open wound bleeding rage, and she was lashing out. Reason would not reach her.
Kyoko kept striking at her, and things were getting serious. Once she recovered enough of her mind then the blades would come out.
Mami still had a musket in her hands, but how could she use it? How could she fire upon her own trainee, her only friend, whom had only so recently lost everything? She couldn't do that, not even to defend herself.
Kyoko's fists continued to rain down, and one struck Mami in the cheek, knocking her down. Her hands tightened on her musket as her instincts to her to fight back, to take-
-aim at Kyoko's soul gem. A single shot would do it. She was still distracted by Sayaka Miki's death. She wouldn't see it coming.
None of them would. Though it tore out Mami's heart to have to do this, she had no choice. They had just learned the truth. Sayaka Miki had succumbed to despair and become a witch. That's what witches were. They had been killing their own, and sooner or later all four of them would also become witches.
It was Mami's fault. She had been the one to lead them into this. She had been the one to doom them all.
She couldn't take it back. She couldn't liberate them from their terrible fate.
But she could make their inevitable end a more merciful one.
Before anyone knew what was happening, she moved into action. Homura Akemi, whose power over time was the immediate threat, was swiftly tied up in ribbons, her hands prevented from activating her shield. As that happened, Mami zeroed in on Kyoko's soul gem. Her trigger finger squeezed, and-
-the shot flew straight and true, the golden musket ball hitting Annabelle Lee in her temple, cutting through her head, and sailing out the other end. She fell lifelessly to the floor.
Mami stood panting, her hands still holding onto the now-useless musket in a death grip, eyes staring unblinking at her enemy.
Annabelle Lee was lying on her side in the middle of the school hallway, completely still. Mami's shot had killed her in an instant.
Still, Mami didn't relax. Annabelle Lee would heal in moments, and then the fight would begin anew. She had to be ready.
And then she saw the pool of red starting to seep out from under Annabelle Lee's head.
Aghast, Mami stared, her mouth hanging open. Dead? How could she be dead? They weren't supposed to die! All wounds healed, even fatal ones! Puella Magi were different that way! Annabelle Lee couldn't possibly be dead!
But she was, and the blood was spreading further.
The musket slipped from Mami's nerveless hands and she turned and fled through the darkened halls.
She had to get out. She had to escape. There had to be a way out of here, had to be a way to the outside.
But she couldn't find it! The halls didn't seem to follow any logical layout! There was just endless paths that went on and on and on, endless classrooms with nobody inside, not even a window she could dive through!
What was more, she was felt certain that she was being followed. It wasn't anything she heard or saw, just a growing sense of panic, of surety that there was something chasing her with malicious intentions.
Mami ran harder and faster. Now she was in a narrow concrete corridor, and ahead were steps that led down into an unlit passageway.
She stopped. No, she couldn't go down there! There was something terrible waiting for her there, there had to be!
And then she heard the scream.
Mami whirled around, and her body went cold. Annabelle Lee was there, up and moving but not alive. Blood still poured from twin wounds in her temples, and her eyes were glassy and unseeing. But she was moving, clawing her way across the floor by her fingernails, her mouth hanging open as she let out an unceasing shriek.
And she wasn't alone. Right behind her was the Worm, the Worm that had been Charlotte. The hall was too narrow for it, but it was forcing itself forward, the concrete cracking as its blood form shoved closer and closer, teeth gnashing and tongue slobbering. And behind that she saw the lithe and grimy forms of the wild girls of Etherdale, their eyes glowing with a fey light.
Mami turned to flee, only to run right into a metal breastplate.
Lily was there, still dressed in her powered armor. But her head was still gone and her wings shredded, she was standing over Mami, somehow looking down at her. In one hand she held her sword, its ornate handle crusted with scum, dried ichor all over its blade.
Lily's corpse lifted the sword overhead. Mami dove out of the way and darted right past her. And with nowhere else to go, she bolted for the stairs.
For a time, she could see nothing. There was only the sound of her feet hitting metal as she descended, the death-shriek of Annabelle Lee, the gibbering of the wild girls, and the moaning of the Worm as the pursued her. She ran and ran and ran and ran.
Then something appeared, a faint rectangle up ahead, a doorway with light on the other end. Mami focused on that and threw every last bit of energy she had into her speed.
She hit the door with her shoulder and it burst open, and she was out! Mami exploded out into the sunlight. Without pausing for breath, she whirled around and slammed the door shut.
All sounds of pursuit ceased immediately.
Panting, Mami leaned back against the wall next to the door and slid down to the ground. That had been close. That had been too close.
Then she looked around.
She was on the roof of the school (wait, the roof? But she had been going down!). She remembered coming up here often back when she had been in school to eat lunch and hang out with her friends. And later, just to eat lunch.
It looked much the same as she remembered, a wide open space surrounded by high, ornate walls set with stained-glass windows and a line of concrete benches down the center. Mami walked out onto the plaza, her footsteps echoing as they struck the hard stone.
"Hey."
Mami leapt to her feet, a musket in hand.
The punk girl was there, slouching against the wall, hands clasped behind her head as she stared lazily up at the sky.
"You're late again. You really like to hold people up, don't you?"
Mami blinked. "Excuse me?"
The punk girl blew a glittering bubble and popped it. "Well, at least you're here. You made it. You're in the basement."
"The basement…What? I don't understand. This is the roof!"
The punk girl waggled her pierced eyebrows and then tilted her head to the other end of the school roof.
The redacted café was there, its OPEN sign glowing, its front door wide open. Beyond she could see the dining area.
"What?" she said. "What's the café doing all the way up here?"
"One part's the same as the other. In the end, it all comes out to the same."
"You mean…I was in the basement all along?"
"Basement? Kitchen? Dining area?" The punk girl shrugged. "It's all the same gig. Beginning to end, it's all the same."
Mami stared at her.
"Well, you'd better hurry along. After all, you're still on the clock."
Bewildered, Mami walked past her and toward the café's front door. It looked the same as it always did.
But why was it there, and not on the corner of redacted and redacted like it was supposed to be?
She walked in. The bell rang overhead. She looked around. The dining area looked like it ought to, with the tables and chairs all set out, the coffee bar stocked and waiting.
Up ahead was the front counter, and the young girls that she didn't recognize, the ones that had just been hired, were there, working.
And standing with them was the owner.
Mami approached the counter. As she did, the owner looked over to her and smiled.
"Ah, there you are!" he said. "Get a little sidetracked?"
"I-"
"Well, it's of no matter. You're here now. And you're just in time!"
Mami blinked. "Just in time for what? Where's the others? Where's Kyoko, Sayaka, and Madoka?"
"Oh, they've already been through here, just like you sent them!" He produced a tray of cupcakes. "And they did their jobs well."
Mami stared at the cupcakes, all of them topped with frosting of red, blue, or pink. "What?"
Then she looked up, at the baristas she had recently been working with. One of them was carrying a garbage can to the incinerator. Humming to herself, she tilted it over and dumped it in.
Mami saw the charred remains of Mitakihara school uniforms, a natty green jacket, burnt and broken bones, and clumps of hair, hair the same color as the cupcake frosting.
"What did you do?" she whispered.
"What we always do," the owner said. "What we have to do to keep things running."
"But…But they trusted you! They trusted me! I trusted you!"
"You did, and you've been a great help. Couldn't be prouder of you. But the time has come for your final service. After all, we are running low on yellowing frosting."
Mami turned to run, but the dining room was gone. So was the counter, the kitchen, and the baristas. Now she was in the basement, an ugly room of red brick and metal apparatuses and a huge furnace taking up one wall.
"Goodbye, Mami."
The floor gave way beneath her, and Mami found herself slipping forward. To her shock, she saw that the furnace was painted like the clownlike face of the Worm, its mouth filled with flame, its teeth constantly gnashing open and closed.
She screamed and tried to hold on, to climb out again. She shot out two ribbons from her palms, hoping to grab onto something.
Two blades came down, slicing her arms neatly from her shoulders. Blood spurted out from the stumps, but the ribbons somehow remained, sticking out of the ends of the protruding bones.
Gawking, Mami looked up to see Annabelle Lee's decaying face leering down at her, next to the owner's. And now that she was looking, truly looking, she saw that the owner wasn't human at all, but a catlike creature with a fixed smile and two beady red eyes.
"KYUBEY!" she screamed as she slid down the slope, leaving two trails of blood.
The Worm's mouth yawned open. Mami screamed again in terror as her body tumbled in.
But when she did, she felt no heat, no fire. There was only the dark of a long tunnel, and two headlights of a truck rushing right toward her, and the sound of its blaring horn, mixing in with her screams.
…
"I don't know how she survived."
The world was so hazy and dark. People were talking around her, but she couldn't find the strength to focus.
"It was such a terrible wreck. Her parents were killed instantly. It's a miracle she's alive at all, but unharmed? That's unthinkable!"
They were talking about her. But why? What wreck? What had happened?
"I'll tell you what! She sold her soul, is what she did! Look at her! Look at what she's become! She chose to be that just to live!"
Wait, what? What were they talking about? What had happened to her? What was she?
"Are those ribbons…part of her? Are they like her arms now?"
"They are, and she's a monster. A monster that must be removed."
Wait.
What?
NO!
Though everything felt so heavy, and though her eyelids felt like they had been glued together, she managed to force them open just a crack, enough to get a look at her surroundings.
She was lying flat on some kind of table, with a bright light shining down on her from overhead. Silhouetted against the light were four fuzzy-looking heads, all wearing surgical masks.
"Wha-" she mumbled.
"And she wakes up!" one of them cried.
"Not like it'll do her any good."
She blinked and groggily shook her head. "Who…who are…"
"Prop her up! Let her see what she's become."
The light was moved, and she felt the table she was lying on start to tilt, to move her into a diagonal position. As it did, her vision began to clear a little more.
She was in the surgery room of a hospital, strapped to an operating table that had been levered up, positioning her in front of a mirror.
Though most of her body was covered with a tightly tucked sheet, she still recognized most of what she saw. The face was the same. The hair was the same. The eyes were the same. And the shape of her figure…seemed to be the same.
But her arms. They weren't there anymore. Instead there were two golden ribbons, each extending down from her shoulders, lying flat on the table. What was more, a name popped into her head, a name she had never heard before but knew belonged to her and her alone.
Candeloro.
She stared in horror at her reflection. Was that her? Why? What had she become?
"Now you see," the lead surgeon said as he lifted a scalpel, its edge gleaming. And behind his surgical mask and hood his eyes were like two red beads. "You have become the abomination you were always meant to be, and now-"
He might have said more, but his head was swiftly and suddenly removed. Blood spurted out of his emancipated neck, and his body slumped to the floor.
"Intruders!" yelled another surgeon as she rushed forward, only to suddenly fall to her knees with a gurgle, red foam staining her mask as she stared numbly down at the silver blade now shoving itself out of her chest.
Another surgeon tried to run, but he found himself impaled by a long pole, one with a triangular blade on one end and a weighted ball on the other. He went down.
The final surgeon rushed forward, brandishing two scalpels as he screamed like a maniac.
A torrent of flame rushed past Candeloro's vision, enveloping the final surgeon. He screamed as he burned, and then he burned without screaming.
It all happened so fast and so violently that Candeloro had no idea how to react. One moment she was about to be vivisected, and the next her captors had all been horrifically killed.
But why? And by whom?
She then became aware of two new figures walking toward her, both of them immediately familiar, and yet so different from what she expected.
Sayaka Miki was there: not the brash schoolgirl she had known briefly, nor the mermaid known as Oktavia von Seckendorff. No, this was definitely Sayaka, except she was now dressed as a princess, with a dazzling seafoam-blue gown, elbow-length white gloves, and a necklace and a tiara of spun silver and glittering sapphires. In sharp contrast to her royal appearance, she was holding a silver sword in one hand, its blade dripping with blood.
The other figure was Kyoko Sakura, but not the aggressive Puella Magi she had trained, not the mangy vagabond she had become, or even the decaying warrior she had been slowly turning into. This Kyoko was attired with a stunning robe of red and yellow, her black-and-red necklace hanging around her neck. In one hand she held her spear, its blade as bloodied as Sayaka's, and her teeth were bared in a violent grin.
Also, there was the small detail of how she now had a blazing fire instead of hair, burning merrily on the top of her head without seeming to cause her any worry.
Shouldering her spear over one shoulder, Kyoko reached out with her other hand. "Wake the fuck up, Sempai," she said. "We have a dream to burn."
…
Quick note: Mami's father's boss and his son Ryu were briefly mentioned waaaaaaaaaaay back in First Time, when she was discussing people she had a crush on before making her contract.
Continuity!
And of all the dreams, this was the one I had the least amount of preplanned material but ended up being the most fun to write. Eh.
Until next time, everyone.