The ripples of gunfire in the air zipped past, cracking the walls and fragmenting into miniscule pieces against stone. The shrapnel bounced against the Soldier's fatigues, as she leaned against the wall, waiting, preparing.

The fire kept coming. The desert sun peeked through the small holes, illuminating the dust like a spotlight on a stage. The wooden wall creaked as she leaned against it.

She took a deep breath. Rounding the corner, she saw three targets.

Three bullets.

Two down, the bloody stream from their heads imprinting themselves in her mind, despite only being in vision for less than a millisecond. The last bullet flew wide. She couldn't tell where, she didn't have the time to know or care.

Nondescript shouting on the other side of the wall, followed by more bullets. Rate of fire suggested two remaining enemies.

One must have come out from hiding.

She coughed. The dusty air had been getting in her lungs. She glanced down at the broken gas mask to her right, cursing under her breath. Gripping her rifle tight, the soldier rounded the corner.

Three bullets, two targets, two shots hitting her mark.

Slamming her back against the wall, peeking her head towards the exit, she waited.

No more voices.

She sighed, reaching up to her earpiece.

"LZ secured." she said.

"Roger that. Sierra-four-one-seven on the way. ETA five minutes." the radio crackled in her ear.

She rounded the corner. Walking out into the plaza, hit from above by the harsh sun. Back in the shade the light had only hit her through small bullet holes, now it hit her full force, and she immediately started sweating.

The smell of lead and gunpowder lingered in the air. Joined by the smell of dust and broken stone.

Followed by the smell of iron, and corpses.

The smell of war.

She sat on a bench, slipping the sling over her head and laying back, her helmet pushing forward and shading her face from the sun.

This was the most relaxing war could get.

But for now at least, she could enjoy it.

"Heads up! Something's coming your way! Just jumped up- holy shi- I think it's a cruise missile! Find cover now!"

She reacted before she could process her CO's confusion, or her own. She didn't hear a missile, She didn't hear anything. Only the rumbling of tanks in the distance, and the sound of far away gunfire. She stood up, unholstering her rifle and rapidly looking around for the target, but finding nothing.

"Uh…" Her commander staggered. "Lieutenant? You still there?" There was mild panic in his voice, but seemingly not directed at her.

"Affirmative." She answered. "Status?"

"It just- it just stopped! Full deceleration from mach one-point-four and we didn't pick up anything. From the fact that you can still hear me, all that momentum just… disappeared, what the hell is happening over there? Give me a description!"

She looked down at the display on her wrist, showing the radar ping-

Right above her?

The stone ceiling adjacent to her broke apart like a hammer against styrofoam. She dodged out of the way of the rubble and torrent of dust, examining what could cause such damage. No sonic boom meant no explosive, and the building practically exploded, meaning it wasn't structural failure.

Unfortunately, seeing the source of the damage only gave her more questions than answers

"A girl?" she said, under her breath.

"Sorry Lieutenant, did you just say 'a girl'?"

"I-"

Her brain couldn't process the next few milliseconds, as the child kneeling in front of her, clad in a multicolored, brilliant robe, went from a complete standstill and moved instantaneously where the soldier was currently standing, with her fist extended. As if the universe itself couldn't compensate for how fast she was, the pain didn't hit her until what seemed like milliseconds after she moved, followed by physics finally reacting to this. The soldier flew backwards through the courtyard with tremendous force, impacting the wall and shaking the building behind her.

She coughed up a mixture of spit and blood, feeling across her chest and reeling back in pain. She suppressed it, using the wall as leverage to stand back up, leveling the rifle towards the girl.

"Idiot!" shouted the little girl. "More Americans have come to kill my people!" She reached out an open palm, slowly closing it into a fist and raising it upward. The Lieutenant tried to regain her bearings as the rubble cleared from off of her, and she rose into the air, enveloped in a black sphere. "You come into my country so you can, what, get more oil? Is that why you killed my family?! Oil?!" Her foriegn accent only served to amplify her accusations.

She clenched her first harder, and the bubble started closing inwards. The Lieutenant tried to push her way out, but was stopped by an unbreakable force.

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't crush you into sinew! Oh! Maybe I'll get more creative! You Americans love your moon landing so much, why don't I teleport you there?!"

Her radio crackled to life. "Lieutenant, are you there? Lieutenant?! Sarah! Come in!"

She turned her radio permanently on as she struggled to formulate a response, or even address what was happening. Was this some sort of new combat technology? A hallucination? A dream? Any excuse to get out of the reality of this situation. A little girl flew here at the speed of sound, punched her into a building, and was now holding her up in some remote controlled back orb.

"I…"

Suddenly, a voice in her mind. Not from her radio. It came from all directions, as if it were being broadcast from inside her head.

The barrier holding you in place is about to fall. Be prepared to shoot her.

A simple order, and one that sounded like it was coming from… another little girl? This one sounded calmer than the other one, at least. Right on cue, the barrier crumpled away like a ripped sheet of tin foil, dropping Sarah on her back. She slowly stood up, a sharp pain emanating from her chest, unholstering her rifle. She looked down the sights, lining up a shot on the girl…

And not firing.

Suddenly it was as if reality had crashed back onto her. Despite nearly dying at her hands, Sarah couldn't find it in her heart to shoot a kid.

The girl, meanwhile, visibly recoiled from something on her right, raising her hand and extending a translucent black shield to block a stream of incredibly fast, blue iridescent projectiles, glimmering in the desert sun for the milliseconds that they were visible.

"Hah! Looks like you have backup from a Magical Girl, American! It's rare for them to help adults, you should consider yourself lucky!"

Sarah looked to the girl's right, seeing the barrier push forward rapidly, curving outwards and then inwards to form a sphere around a point of air. Inside the sphere, another little girl appeared within, her skin and clothes shifting back to their original colors, like advanced stealth technology being shut off. She wore a short, frilly dress that shined various colors, as she glared daggers at Sarah.

What the hell is your problem?! You had one job! Shoot her!

A torrent of thoughts ran through Sarah's head. Questioning on if she should have followed through, but mostly still on the question of "What the hell is happening?" Her train of thought was interrupted by the same telepathic voice from earlier.

Oh fucking- adults! Always having qualms with attacking Magical Girls! Listen, she's going to kill us both if you don't kill her first!

I can't shoot a kid! She replied almost subconsciously, still frozen with confusion and fear.

You can at least try! The voice practically shouted into her head.

The bubble containing the other Magical Girl floated closer and closer to the enemy. "Look at your soldier!" She said, staring at the allied Magical Girl and gesturing towards Sarah. "Even after I've murdered her platoon she still can't bear to shoot a 'poor little girl!'" she put on a mocking voice as she said that last part.

"You… what?"

The girl looked at Sarah. "You heard me, American. I killed them…" she looked up and to the side. It's obvious she didn't care as she described the various fates of Sarah's comrades. "Let's see… I teleported three of them into Jupiter, two of them into a cave ten kilometers underground, a few more into the Mariana Trench, and what about the last one… oh, I think I just crushed into a ball of flesh! How deligh-"

Interrupting her speech, Sarah unleashed a full barrage of bullets from her rifle, keeping her aim centralized onto the center of mass of the child, as a stream of yellow tracers pierced through her like she wasn't even there, exiting out the other side of the body and impacting the stone wall and floor behind.

All moral qualms went out the window: this child had murdered her allies in disturbingly brutal ways.

She deserves no mercy.

Sarah heard a click, ejecting the mag out of her rifle and shoving a new one in, pulling back the lever as she kept her aim on the target, now a holey, bloody mess…

But still standing.

Smiling.

"Hah! Just like the rest! You don't know how to kill a Magical Girl!" The girl spoke like the bullets didn't even hit her, despite clear evidence to the contrary. Whoever… whatever, this was, it wasn't human.

Yeah this asshole has a point actually what the fuck was that?! Aim for the soul gem dumbass!

"Oh, I see now." The enemy girl looked between the two. "You're telepathically communicating! Which means you probably just told her to aim at my soul gem…" The girl turned to stand completely exposed to Sarah. "Well… go ahead, it's the little jewel on my neck. Give it a shot! I'll even stand still!"

Wait, this doesn't seem right-

Sarah didn't hesitate, lining up the shot and firing directly into her neck. The similar translucent black bubble bounced the bullet away, causing it to harmlessly ricochet into her neck. She maniacally in response as the bubble pulsed, showing it completely covered her gem. "Truly as dumb as the rest of the humans, you can't kill Magical Girls! We surpass you in every way!" She looked at the girl she still had contained. "Tell me, why do you see fit to risk your own life helping this weakling? You should be using her to your advantage! Or for target practice, that's what I'm doing."

"Humans aren't our cattle, monster! What right do we have to exploit them like this!"

"The few humans I've loved were taken away from me by other humans. They are a race wrought with nothing but violence! And because I have the power to do so, I shall cleanse them of this world! Started with that dreaded America! So keen to exploit its influence in places that don't care for it! But…" She looked away. "I'm not that comfortable killing Magical Girls, I'm sure that once the humans have wronged you like they have me, you'll see the light, so…"

The girl held her hands outwards, slowly bringing them above her head. Sarah looked around as the reality itself seemed to bend and contort, and in a panic, raised her rifle to fire off a few more shots towards her neck. The bullets bounced harmlessly off the barrier, while the other girl continued to scream profanities.

A sound louder than anything Sarah had heard pierced her ears, as she fell forward…

Into snow.

The cold stung her face, while the distant sounds of war were replaced by the low reverberation of strong wind, as the cold air hit her sunburnt back like a truck.

She lifted herself up, letting the freshly fallen snow fall off her helmet, as she tried to wipe the cold water off her face with her wet gloves.

"Oh that's just perfect! She got away again, and now who the fuck knows where I am now?!"

Sarah dug her gloves into the deep snow, falling over as she tried to stand up. She was grateful that the snow cushioned her fall, but cursed quietly as her face went under once again.

"I had her! She was right there, vulnerable to me! But no! Another worthless soldier has to go and ruin everything! And now-" The little girl continued ranting, not paying any mind to the environment around her as she pulled Sarah up by her shoulders with unnatural strength. "We've been teleported away to… to- to- where the hell even are we?!"

"What…" Said Sarah, with Raspy breath. She was barely audible amidst the blowing snow around them, and she couldn't even see a few meters in front of her. And despite shivering in her gear, the little girl, in an open shouldered, short dress, didn't seem to care in the slightest for the cold. Her dress moved frantically in various directions, but she herself gave no mind to the snow and heavy wind.

"Worthless! You've ruined everything! Typical!" She dropped Sarah, who extended her arms to catch herself, and finally stood up, ankle deep in snow while she gripped herself, trying to stay warm as she watched the little girl stomp her feet in the snow. "Typical! Typical! Typical!"

Sarah finally sobered up to this situation, putting her survival above figuring out what the hell was going on, and turned away, wading her way through the active snowstorm and in a random direction away from the girl.

"Where the hell do you think you're going!" Yelled the girl.

Sarah continued walking as she talked, turning her head away from the wind so her mouth didn't fill with snow. She continually stuttered over her words and stopped and started talking, as the shivers took over her voice. "If I stay out here… I'm going to die… I need… to find cover…"

The girl let out a sarcastic laugh, walking backwards through the snow like it wasn't even there, while she put her hands in the pockets of her dress… a dress with pockets, now Sarah was envious and freezing to death. "So… what makes you think this direction is better than any other?" She turned back around, looking in front. "I can't see shit out here."

Sarah didn't respond, her confusion slowly being replaced by anger as this apparently invincible child continued talking.

The little girl looked down. "Alright, fine. I'll scout forward and come back if I see anything." She curled her knees, and propelled herself upward and forward at immense speed, leaving vision as soon as she jumped. Sarah tracked her as she disappeared, and filed this feat under "weird shit that little girls can do now, apparently." She continued trudging through the snow, slower and slower, barely able to operate in the sub-zero temperatures she was exceedingly unprepared for.

"Holy shit a cave!" Sarah heard shouted from the distance, barely audible over the wind. "Get over here!" She slightly shifted the direction she was stumbling in. The harsh snow continued to batter at her helmet, as she moved one of her arms from her chest to block the snow from falling into her eyes, squinting as she tried to look past the snowstorm. She could make out the vague silhouette of a slightly raised structure.

The cave ceiling gave temporary respite from the storm outside, as the wind grew quieter and quieter, and the sound was replaced with the dripping of water, echoing from deeper in the cave. Sarah slowly walked over, shivering hard as she leaned against one of the smoother walls, slowly falling down, until she was sitting. She took a deep breath.

"Hey you wouldn't happen to have anything flammable on you?" Sarah turned her head up to the girl as she asked her question. She was looking around the small entrance of the cave, ignoring the small crevice that seemed to lead somewhere deeper, using some sort of glowing gem as a light source. "I probably don't need a fire as much as you do, but… I wouldn't say no to one."

Sarah reached over her shoulder, still shivering as she struggled to lean forward away from the wall enough to slide the sling of her rifle over her head. It took her helmet with her as it fell to the ground, showing her short, black hair. "There's still some bullets left…"

The girl walked over, picking up the gun and ejecting the mag. She dropped the gun to the side, making a slight echo as it clanked against the ground three times, before ceasing movement. "Well, I can't say I've ever used gunpowder as tinder, but maybe I can make something work." She ejected each bullet out of the mag, breaking open the primer and pulling out the powder of each one, pouring it into a pile, which after a few minutes began to amass to… barely any size at all. Turns out fifteen bullets worth of gunpowder was barely anything.

Sarah grew increasingly conscious and anxious, staring at the pile of gunpowder in front of her, apprehensive of what this girl was trying to do. "This can only go well…"

"Anytime you want to help, feel free! Or you can keep moping in that corner!" The girl snapped back, standing up and holding her hands in the air as she walked out into the snowstorm. "Oh look at me! I'm a stupid idiot who can't do anything because I have some internal bleeding and mild frostbite, I think I'll just sit here and die while I make a literal child do things for me! Oh woe is me! Woe is me-!" she shouted sarcastically, her voice growing more and more muffled as she moved into the blowing winds, her silhouette disappearing among the sea of white.

Sarah stared at the cave entrance for a few seconds, then shifted her vision to the pile of gunpowder, surrounded by rough gray rocks, barely visible amidst the lack of light. She took a deep breath, propping herself up against the wall as she stood, a sharp pain shooting from her chest and fingertips. She slipped off most of her combat uniform, throwing her soaking wet clothes into a pile, ironically heating herself up slightly. Now wearing nothing but her pants and white tank top. She grabbed a pinch of gunpowder, spreading it onto the pile, before reaching for her gun, twisting it apart, and trying to rip off the firing mechanism from near the trigger. She tried as much as she could, but the frostbite had already progressed to the point where she couldn't feel her fingers.

The damage would be permanent soon, but that was the least of her concerns.

"What the hell?" Said the little girl, finally returning. "What are you doing, and where did your clothes go?"

"Not letting a literal child do everything for me…"

The two stood in silence for a second, Sarah leaning against a wall as she desperately tried to pull the firing mechanism out, while the little girl stood at the cave entrance, her short dress blowing with the wind.

She reached out her hand, firing a fast blue projectile, igniting the gunpowder and lighting the fire with a loud fwoosh.

Sarah stopped, staring at the fire as she dropped the broken-apart gun. "Thanks…" She sat back down, holding her hands to the flames, finally being able to embrace stave off the cold. But she kept shivering. There wasn't enough fire to warm her up completely, and there would less and less as more of her clothes burned. "What were you out there doing?"

The girl walked further into the cave, holding out that same gem for light. "Trying to see if that bastard teleported anything flammable with us, but nope. She's skilled, and really didn't want us to have anything." The girl walked a bit further, before turning back to Sarah. "How does someone end up like that? Hating humanity with such fervor? America is what, several-hundred-million people? Out of thirteen billion?" She scratched the back of her head, looking slightly away. "Although I suspect she's using her hatred of America as an excuse to kill anyone she wants, that girl's got some issues. I wonder if-"

"What are you?" Asked Sarah, cutting off the girl.

"What, like who I am? My name's Lucy. I'm from America as well but-"

"No!" Sarah shouted in her raspy breath, coughing. "I meant what the hell- that other little girl shows up and projects force fields from her hands, you show up and start shooting projectiles from nothing while invisible, then we're teleported to some icy wasteland, where you're impervious to the cold and can jump and-" she cut herself off, looking down and sighing. Her vision turned back to the girl. "How are you able to do these things? What's a magical girl? Are there more of you? I just want to know…"

"I'll look into it later, shut up!" Said Lucy, looking to her right. "Sorry that wasn't directed at you, that was directed at- wait, you don't even know what a Kyubey is! Alright, I'll start from the beginning."

As Lucy sat down, the name 'Kyubey' hung in Sarah's mind. Why did that name sound familiar? Why did the image of a deformed white cat immediately pop into her mind? But no matter how hard she tried to dig into her own mind, it's as if something was physically blocking the memories from interacting with her train of thought.

"So, this little cat thing, Kyubey. Has two sets of ears, talks telepathically- whatever, he's not important, but what he offers is! He goes to people who need it, and bestows upon them a wish, in exchange for becoming a Magical Girl! Now, if you ask me, this is a bit of a one-sided offer. I get a wish of my choice and I gain power beyond my dreams? Seems like a win-win. And while I don't know of Kyubey's motives, I assume I won't care."

"Get to the point…"

"How impatient. Anyway, being a Magical Girl is a lot like those japanese cartoons: transformation sequence, superpowers, locked into the body of a little girl, you know, the usual. I'm seventeen you know."

Sarah… tried, to absorb this information, but none of it made sense. The questions flowed out from her mind rapidly, but she could only choose one at a time to come out of her mouth.

"Are magical girls usually this violent…?" Asked Sarah.

Lucy sighed. "Well… turns out if you give a bunch of hormone-driven little girls the ability to enact their will on anyone they see fit to, it spirals out of control." She looked away from Sarah. "Sure, most sign on under the prospect of helping those around them but… for the few that don't it gets… bloody."

"Bloody?"

She turns back to Sarah. "Magical Girls can't use their powers wildly. It builds something called 'grief' in their soul gems." She held out the egg shaped jewel encrusted in a gold net. Black specks seemed to float around the red iridescent gem sitting inside. "That's what these are. It's the source of power and wellbeing in a Magical Girl. To stave off this grief, we have to use things called Grief Seeds, which we get from killing Witches, which are the manifestations of negative emotions given physical form."

"How-"

"So let's say two Magical Girls who happen to be close to each other find a Witch. It's a sort of 'enemy of my enemy is my friend' situation. They work together to kill the Witch, but just due to experience, Magical Girls naturally distrust each other, so there's a standoff to see who gets the Grief Seed afterwards. Normally the weaker or less experienced one either walks away, or begs to no avail, before leaving. But sometimes when the weaker one is overconfident, or when two experienced Magical Girls meet like this, it gets…"

Lucy waits a moment before continuing. She sighs.

"Well, one of them kills the other."

The two stared at each other for a few moments, Sarah taking in what Lucy just said.

"Kill? As in… murder?"

"Yup. It's… horrible, and shouldn't be how it is. But it's the price we pay for being a Magical Girl. There's simply not enough Grief Seeds to go around, and the weak Magical Girls who can't keep up with the seniors simply fade away, consumed by grief and killed. Maybe the weaker ones can find a mentor, but it will undoubtedly always be a one-sided relationship. Compassion among senior Magical Girls is exceedingly rare, and should never be assumed, and thus the safest way to engage with another Magical Girl is to weaken them first, and then talk later."

More silence. The cave wind blew in the distance while the fire crackled, and feeling was slowly returning to Sarah's fingers, while the pain in her chest continued unhindered.

"That's… I…" Staggered Sarah, who as an emotionally detached soldier, couldn't react in a normal human way to this. She simply acknowledged it as yet another atrocity of this world, that's the only way she could compute this.

"And then we get Magical Girls like the one I was fighting, who have completely forgotten their humanity and kill humans on sight. They see Magical Girls as a kind of evolution, the next step for humanity. But she doesn't realize how short sighted that goal is. More Magical girls and less humans means less Witches, less Grief Seeds… She's an idiot, simple as that. But a powerful idiot, and powerful idiots are common among Magical Girls. The smart ones die too quickly, trying to fix a broken system that's cemented itself for centuries."

"What about you?" Asked Sarah. Lucy turned to her. "You're… you seem smart… how have you gotten by if the smart ones die quick?"

"I don't get to be dumb, my powers are too weak for that. Instead I have to be smart. I don't kill witches, I don't help or interact with other Magical Girls, I stay invisible while they fight the Witches, and then I just steal the Grief Seed." She pats the ornate sachel laced around her shoulder, the sound of multiple metallic somethings inside clanking. "I try not to think about what happens to the Girls who I steal them from… makes sleeping easier."

"If you don't attack magical girls… Why did you help me?"

"Like I said back there, I had been tracking that one for a while. Mostly because she was ruthlessly efficient at killing witches, and commonly just… left the Grief Seed, for some reason. Which is horrifying. I've never seen her gain any buildup of grief, which means she has to be holding back hard whenever she fights, to the point where her powers don't even cause her grief to rise."

"So-"

"So we should be happy we aren't red mist, that I get to live on to escape this island, and you…"

Lucy seemed to struggle words out, it was if she was unclear whether or not Sarah would even survive this. "... Will make it. We'll, make it out of this. I hope…"

The torrent of curiosity in Sarah's mind had slowly faded away as she explained the intricacies of Magical Girl culture.

But one question remained.

"What did you wish for?"

Lucy stared at her blankly, like she had just thrown out a grave and serious insult, but the face went away as quickly as it appeared. "Right… you don't know." She stood up. "Just for the record, that kind of question is absolutely not something you should ask a Magical Girl you just met." She turned around. "Each girl's wish is the reason they took on this burden. That they accepted this life fraught with violence and death. Maybe it's something as innocuous as 'I wish I could help people,' or maybe it's something as serious as the revival of a loved one. Regardless, Magical Girls never tell anyone unless they're close."

Lucy walked deeper into the cave, sliding into the crevice with her small form, her soul gem casting light on the uneven surface of jagged rocks. "I'm gonna explore deeper in here, it seems to go on for a while. Just try to warm up."

Sarah did as told, and sat in front of the fire, trying to analyze the absolute torrent of information in her mind. To think that beneath her, there was this entire subculture of murder and depravity being subjected to little girls. Was it the fault of this Kyubey? Kyueby was, apparently, the source of these powers, but Lucy didn't seem to care about him in the slightest.

But that didn't stop the memories. She knew it for sure, she had heard of Kyubey before, somewhere, some place in the past. But how?

Sarah gritted her teeth, unable to break past the mental block placed in her mind that blocked any information on this creature.

This anger didn't last long in her mind, as she was interrupted by Lucy calling out from the crevice. "Hey soldier-lady! You gotta check this out! There's something weird over here!"

Sarah slowly stood up, stretching her arms only to realize that exacerbated the pain she was in. A small 'ow' came out as she started walking over.

The path wasn't easy. Obviously for someone superhuman like a Magical Girl this must have been a cakewalk, but the jagged, invisible rocks she had no lightsource to see made walking here painful and arduous, and multiple times she gained small cuts on her hand from touching the wrong rock. At the end of the tunnel, she saw a light source, the Soul Gem of Lucy.

And a door.

The door was metal, ornate, but in an obvious state of disrepair. It contrasted the black rocks surrounding it, and the jaggedness seemed to calm down as it met the metal.

Sarah approached, putting her hand on a smoother piece of rock and catching her breath.

"What do you suppose it is?" Asked Lucy.

"A door…" answered Sarah, deadpan.

"No I- shut up!" Lucy turned to the door. "I meant more metaphysically, like what's its purpose here."

While Lucy crouched, then stood tall, trying to examine a door which had no handle from every angle, Sarah's hand slipped a bit, and removed a layer of dirt from the wall. As her hand moved, she felt even, patterned bumps, and turned to look. Embedded in the wall were several raised letters, English, making a sentence. She brushed the rest off and crouched down to read it, as the text seemed high enough to be read comfortably by someone of childlike height.

"'Present a clean Soul Gem and await judgment.'"

Lucy raised an eyebrow, reaching out and pulling back her soul gem repeatedly, to now reaction from the door. "I think it's broken."

Sarah stared at the Soul Gem as it moved, noting the floating black bits. "You said gems build up grief, right? Maybe try purifying yours? You said something about Grief Seeds being able to do that."

Lucy stopped, looking down and putting her other hand to her chin. She shrugged. "Couldn't hurt." With that, she opened the satchel across her side, pulling out a small black gem, covered in a metallic net, and balancing on a needle. She held the Soul Gem to it, and floating black bits traveled through the air into the black gem, leaving the Soul Gem an iridescent, clean red. "Needed to purify anyway, but this Grief Seed-"

The area around them shook, almost like an earthquake, the shaking ending as soon as it started. A mechanism clicked beneath them, both looking down to the floor, as something whirred in front, directing their vision there. The sound of interlocking mechanisms unfurling, seemingly after an extremely long time being locked, filled the air. As the final mechanism stopped moving, the door creaked open on its own, Sarah moving next to Lucy, and out of the way of the opening door.

The inside was long, dark, and soon after illuminated by a chain of lanterns placed along the ceiling. They flickered on after a few moments, brightening a deep, deep staircase down further into the earth, the walls covered in patterned stone, completely different from the jagged rocks in the cave outside.

"-is… depleted…?" Lucy said, finishing the sentence but showing her confusion. The grief seed dropped to the ground, twirling around as it maintained its balance on the metal spike attached to it.

"What the hell?" Was all Sarah got out, still trying to process Lucy's exposition dump, and now having to accept the fact that in this random cave, a piece of ancient machinery had laid dormant for who knows how many years. And judging from the inscription on the wall, it had something to do with Magical Girls.

"Well, nowhere else to go." Lucy put her hands into the pockets of her dress as she started descending into the deep. Sarah sighed, following in soon after behind her.

To their surprise, they both heard a voice.

"Welcome! To Utopia!" An american accented child, speaking from some sort of speaker, however it sounded like a recording. As Sarah looked around, no obvious broadcast point was visible. Meanwhile Lucy was immediately on guard, stopping and going into a battle stance.

"What- where are you?! Show yourself!"

The voice continued, not acknowledging her question.

"For so long, Magical Girls like yourself have toiled away at a society of oppression. If you chose to maintain your civilian life, you were forced to attend school, maintain relationships, and pretend to care about those around you, while hiding the trauma from your secret life."

"Oh… just a recording." Lucy blushed embarrassingly as she calmed down, and continued walking down, Sarah pretending she didn't see her lapse in judgment.

"You could not tell other Magical Girls what you were going through, because they would exploit your weakness to remove a competitor from the Grief Seed pool."

"Maybe this chick is onto something." Said Lucy.

"And if you chose to forgo your human life, you lived at the mercy of those around you. Fending for yourself on the streets like an urchin, chased by police, concerned citizens, and other Magical Girls, seeing you as an easy mark. I say… no longer! I, Queen Olivia Kain, have vowed to fix the problems with Magical Girl society! And that all starts here: in Utopia!"

Lucy refrained from commenting. Perhaps she knew that this Olivia character had more apt things to say.

"Utopia is where all Magical Girls truly deserve to live, a land with the human element removed. A land deep within Antarctica-"

"Yeah that checks out." Said Lucy.

"-that prides itself as the place, where Magical Girls can go to live long, fulfilling lives. Away from the petty dramas of the mainland. Constructed out of the remains of an old German research station, this once-small outpost has branched out into an entire city of thousands. Thousands of Magical Girls, much like yourself, who seek a change to the constant fear they live in."

"This place is sounding better and better by the minute, how haven't I heard of it before?"

"A powerful guard that maintains peace, and a like-minded goal shared by all citizens, a need for order, and non-violence. You have arrived in the one location on this planet that is free from oppression, and fear."

The two finally arrived at the bottom. Another door waited for them, two torches lighting autonomously as soon as they made it past the last step.

"Welcome… to Utopia!"

The doors opened, and a chain of street lamps illuminated the city streets and buildings in front of them.

Lucy's smile dissipated immediately as she saw the interior.

The city was dilapidated, destroyed. Various broken buildings, ones both attached to the ground and others that once hung from the ceilings, were in pieces, broken down by what Sarah assumed to be explosives. Several streetlamps, still casting light across the massive cave system, were broken in half, as if snapped like a twig. Craters littered the streets and sidewalks, and what was mud on the outside, now was dust, layering everything in sight.

Whatever this place was, it was destroyed a long, long time ago.

Lucy looked down, sighing. "It was my fault… really." She turned up to Sarah. "For a second there, I actually thought there was hope for Magical Girls to live in peace. I actually believed that Olivia!" She laughed, but the laugh seemed… distressed.

"Lucy…?"

"I mean, we don't deserve that, do we? I don't deserve to be happy, do I?! I lost my fucking right to happiness the moment I made that contract with that stupid cat! Why? WHY?!" She brought her hands to her eyes, while liquid, tears, seemed to seep past. "Why do I deserve this?!"

Sarah walked over, putting her hand on Lucy's shoulder, but struggled to think of anything to say. She had learned not ten minutes ago of her struggles, and now had to somehow conceptualize a way to connect with Lucy.

When the two had zero in common.

Lucy leaned into Sarah as she cried.

Perhaps human contact was enough.

The tears intensified as Sarah embraced Lucy.

How long had she gone without a hug?