Sofia pressed her face on the car's window, watching the forest blur by with mild disinterest. In no time at all, the trees started to grow sparser. When the first left turn came into view, Arnie took it.

Finally, civilization.

Houses. These were not mansions anymore. Uninteresting blocky slums with uninteresting triangular roofs, the occasional beat up minivan parked in the concrete driveways. The sidewalks ran deserted; the people who were supposed to populate them were trapped in their homes under the oppressive heat. Long ago, in a town far, far, away, Sofia had lived in a house like that.

Was a good thing she got out.

Suddenly, Arnie's phone started to ring. He picked it up and declined the call before Sofia could read the caller's name.

"Who was that," Sofia asked.

"My– my girlfriend."

"Girlfriend?"

"Well– actually– she's not… not exactly my girlfriend," Arnie squeaked. "Uh. I. I sleep around. I just… she's just a random person. She's no one important."

"Uh… okay?"

"In–in fact… I'm never going to see her again. After this." Arnie said. "So… so yeah. She's definitely not my girlfriend. I– I don't even know her name!"

Why was Arnie telling her this? Was this some weird way of coming on to her or something? Sofia was not in the mood for this.

And so the car rumbled on.

Los Angeles had a lot less skyscrapers than Sofia had expected. In fact, it looked like just any other city. Arnie's car drove through neighborhoods of worn-down houses not dissimilar to Malibu's . Unlike Malibu, however, a fine layer of dust lingered in the sky. They were individually invisible, but together, they tinted the world in the slightest hint of yellow.

The Los Angeles citizens were much more used to the heat than the ones in Malibu. People shuffled on the sidewalk. The tint of perspiration on their shirt collars did not stop purpose from oozing out of every step they took.

Finding a magical girl among this crowd would be impossible.

Arnie was approaching downtown now. The apartments were turning into office buildings and storefronts. Cars became more and more common. Human faces blended into each other, and Sofia was beginning to lose track of them.

What was she supposed to do now?

There was a plaza up ahead. A billboard advertised a variety of logos of Chinese and Mexican food joints that Sofia had never heard of– but there was one logo, up upon the very top, that Sofia did recognize.

Home Depot.

"Um. Arnie. That plaza over there. Can you drive into it?"

Arnie looked. "Is that where I'm dropping you off?"

"No. I need to buy something. From the Home Depot."

"Buy… buy something? What are you going to buy?"

"I need to print two posters. And, some glue too." said Sofia.

"And," Arnie said cautiously. "What are you going to do with… with these things? I'm sorry if I'm… uh… prying, but I just…"

"Listen… I know this sounds kind of crazy… and if, uh, this stunt, stunt of mine leads to any, uh. unnecessary expenditures, on your part, you can bill me… I mean, Sofia, all the damages, and she'll pay them all back twice fold–"

Arnie stared at Sofia with an expression that was an incredible mixture between incredulity, fear, and disgust.

"I'm… I…" Sofia stuttered. God damn it, she shouldn't be freaking out like this. She was paying Arnie thousands of dollars for this car ride. It was the least he could do. "I would like to… uh, get a poster printed," her voice was starting to trail off. "And then, I'd like to glue them on the sides of your car."

Arnie sat, frozen in stunned silence. In the front, the traffic light turned green, but he paid it no heed until the driver behind him honked.

Wordlessly, he turned back around, and stepped on the gas pedal.

And Sofia's heart rate increased. Arnie was ignoring her. What was this supposed to mean? Sofia was his employer! He shouldn't be ignoring her, right?

"Twice." Sofia blurted out. "I'll tell my boss to double your fee. Twenty grand. Plus any damages that come up. I'll tell her to pay for it all."

"Yeah. Just. Give me a second to process this."

But thankfully, when the turn to the plaza came up, Arnie went in, and parked in a random open spot.

"No need to increase the price," Arnie said. His eyes darted around. "I'll do it. I'll just need your word. I need Sofia's word, on something."

"Uh… sure."

"If you want me to… go along," Arnie's bravado was fading. "Your friend, uh, Sofia, she's going to leave Malibu after this, right?"

"Yeah." Sofia nodded, psychologically preparing for Arnie to ask for her hand in marriage.

"After she leaves…" Arnie said. "I just need her to promise, swear, whatever… that she will never interfere with the lives of anyone I know. My girlfriend, my parents, my friends, my professors, and anyone else I'm forgetting."

Oh.

Arnie's eyes bored through her through his spectacles, intently analyzing Sofia's body language. It was making her more nervous than she already was.

"I… I thought you didn't have a girlfriend."

That sent a visible shiver down Arnie's spine. He leaned backwards into his door. "I, uhh… yeah. My bad. I misspoke. I don't have a girlfriend."

Sofia stared at him.

"Okay, okay, okay." Arnie waved his hands in the air desperately. "I lied. Okay? I lied. I do have a girlfriend. I love her very much. Screw the, screw the twenty grand, you don't have to pay me at all. I just need Sofia to promise, alright? She'll never touch me or my friends or my family after this. That's it. Okay? Please?"

Oh.

Did Arnie think that Sofia was a gang leader or something? Sofia supposed that was understandable. She looked like a teenager who lived in a massive mansion and had an endless stream of dollars to throw around. Sofia wondered how many nights Arnie had spent awake at night, contemplating whether the thousand per week that he got was in part paying for his initiation into the teenage girl crime family of Southern California.

'No, no," Sofia said. "I… uh… Sofia means you no harm. That I can say for certain. After this, you'll never see her again– or me. Nor any of your families." Arnie's expression morphed into one of panic, and Sofia quickly corrected herself. "No– I mean, I mean, your family will never see us. You understand?"

"You're… you're sure?"

"Yeah. I'm sorry… sorry that she made you feel, uh, threatened."

An awkward pause ensued. Arnie adjusted his glasses.

"Um…" Sofia changed the subject. "I don't have, uh, any money. I think you'll need to lend me some money. So I can actually, uh, buy things."

"Yeah, yeah. Sure." Arnie opened his glove compartment and gave Sofia a crisp hundred dollar bill.

"I'll send the bill to Sofia so she knows what to pay you," Sofia said. And left.

DEAR LOS ANGELES PUELLA MAGI:

MUST DISCUSS URGENT BUSINESS.

WILLING TO PAY GRIEF SEEDS.

CALL ME: 310-525-7799

To really really make sure the whole thing would stand out, Sofia printed the thing on purple paper and typed the letter in bold yellow Comic Sans.

The phone number was Arnie's. He'd agreed to put it up without much protest. But he'd probably grumble about it for the rest of the trip.

After twenty minutes of driving, Arnie's phone finally rang.

Sofia did have high hopes for her plan, but she didn't expect it to work this well. She was expecting to drive on for at least another hour.

Sofia picked it up. "Hello?"

Loud background noise came through the reciever. It sounded like the person on the other end was speaking in the middle of a busy street and dodging cars while talking to her.

"Toes," he said.

What was that supposed to mean? Some Los Angeles slang Sofia didn't recognize? Was she mishearing the word because of the bad signal? Just to be safe, Sofia said nothing.

The person on the other end continued.

"Will you suck upon my toes?"

Sofia froze, trying to figure out if that, too, was some kind of coded message– until she realized that she had probably been prank called.

Parading your phone number around the one of the densest population centers in America wasn't much of a good idea after all.

Sofia got a call like that every single ten minutes or so. One guy thought Sofia needed somewhere to live, and Sofia had a one minute ad spiel of his AirBnB shoved down her throat. Another told her it was illegal to glue advertisements on cars, which had Sofia panicking for a moment until she saw a Safeway truck pass by right in front of her.

An hour and a full tour around the business district later, none of the magi in LA got in touch with her.

Sofia was really getting worried now. She hadn't eaten breakfast yet, and the candy that she'd bought herself was not the most satiating thing that she'd had in her life. Her gem was not doing any better, either.

Up in front, Sofia saw a burger joint. Dark green concrete standing out amongst the rest of the monochromatic storefronts.

As Kyubey had said, her gem will only get worse if she had to run around with an empty stomach. It was better to take care of sustenance first.

—Besides Sofia really wanted a burger holy shit, she'd been eating stale barbecue chips for three months—

"Arnie." Sofia said. "Can we stop at the, uh, the place up ahead?"

"The… the place up ahead?" Arnie's eyes went wide as saucers. "You mean… you mean the burger place?"

"Yeah," Sofia said. "I haven't had breakfast today. Or lunch. I'll be right back."

Arnie looked like he wanted to protest. And he almost did, before he had an epiphany and sighed in resignation. "Fine. You– don't need me to come with you, right?"

"No," Sofia said.

So that was that.

* MIMI *

The sun was starting to get hot again.

Mimi did try her best to wake up early so she could make the walk all the way back to Los Angeles without having to have the sun get hot. Which didn't work. And according to the highway sign she walked past twenty minutes ago, she still had a looong way to go.

How did she even know it was twenty minutes? Mimi had no clocks on her person, and her parents wouldn't get her a phone even though she was thirteen now and literally everyone else had one, come on.

No. She knew because she was counting.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

Mimi was on one thousand, three hundred and four seven now.

With each passing number, the sun got higher, the sores on her feet got bigger, and her soul got darker.

But there was one constant in her situation. No matter how many steps she walked. No matter how many numbers she counted. If she told her brain to activate its witch radar, it would always point towards one particular direction: back the way she came, towards the city of Pasadena, California. The city where witches parade around in the streets, where labyrinth entrances line along roads like the restaurants in a food court, screaming kill me, kill me! at any magical girls that passed by.

The city that was run by that Cheburg girl.

Magical girls aren't very good for sharing. When you have too many girls crammed in a six by six miles square, you gotta have a leader. And Maia Cheburg was the perfect candidate. She was ruthless, cunning, and nothing got her off more than watching innocent girls like Mimi shamble to their demise. Mimi hated her with all her might, yet she still needed to kiss her boots every day.

You see, Pasadena didn't get its extra witches from nowhere. Witches migrate there in droves like birds flying south in the fall. So, while Pasadena had too many witches for any amount of magical girls to feasibly fight, its surrounding cities– Calabasas, Malibu, Thousand Oaks, and even Los Angeles– were left with scraps.

Even less than scraps.

Mimi knew for a fact that Maia Cheburg had something to do with it, but the incubator never listened to her. The incubator was always so stupid when it came to things that actually mattered.

But on one of these days, he'll wise up. And Mimi's territories will escape from Maia Cheburg's evil clutches.

The thought comforted her. Encouraged her to keep walking. Encouraged her to keep checking her witch radar, despite already knowing that it would prove useless.

So Mimi kept walking.

Mimi did not actually need to keep walking. A nice woman saw her on the side of the highway and gave her a ride all the way to downtown Los Angeles. Her car smelled like herbs and multicolored rocks hung from her rearview mirror in ropes. Mimi didn't believe in all that crystal stuff, but she decided that the woman was alright.

The whole experience reminded Mimi of a movie she once watched, where Chris Evans had done something similar. He'd held out a thumb and stopped cars along the road with his sheer, muscular charisma. Mimi wished she'd thought of that before she walked for hours to Pasadena the day under the scalding rays of the sun the day before.

After Mimi assured the woman that she was not being abused, that she knew how to get back home, and that there was no need for anything unusual to be done, she was finally sent off with a crisp ten dollar bill that the woman shoved into her hand.

Mimi checked her witch radar.

The closest witch was fifteen miles west of her. Still Pasadena.

Mimi sighed.

She conjured her soul gem and watched gusts of inky blackness distort the amber into a variety of colors not like any seen on Earth. Two days of wandering had sure done a quite number on it. It was dark enough that she was half sure she could blink and wake up in Pasadena, drawn to its allure like all the other witches, waiting to be butchered by Maia Cheburg and her evil lackeys.

The sense of victory for her triumphant return to Los Angeles was fading. Her quest to Pasadena had earned her nothing but a stern talking-to from Maia Cheburg and shaved another day off her life.

Mimi decided to check her otherradar.

This was a special radar– one that not every magical girl had. It was Mimi's own magic, the thing that the incubator said made her special. And, instead of tracking anything useful like pizza or ice cream or dollar bills, it tracked other magical girls. And, given that she lived alone in the biggest territory in the entire west coast, it was more useless than an epi pen to a person that wasn't allergic to anything.

As usual, she saw a cluster of multicolored dots somewhere west, representing the soul gem of each member of the Pasadena Eight– or, the Pasadena Seven, now. One girl had been missing since the day before. Which was weird, since hadn't seen any obituaries on Magicord when she checked it the day before. Mimi liked to think that the one girl got tired of Maia Cheburg's tyranny and left in the middle of the night in pursuit of freedom!

Anyways.

Mimi looked to the south, expecting to see the same old barren wasteland that she'd seen for millions of times–

But there was something.

To the west, in the very border of her range, there was one dot, red as the color of blood– a shade that Mimi had never seen before. She watched, transfixed, as it squirmed across the intersecting squiggles that were the Los Angeles commute map.

One of her "friends" had almost witched out, once. Before Mimi snapped her out of it, she said that she had been cursed by whatever sorcery that turned her into a magical girl.

But Mimi had realized that on her own, even without a darkened gem to boost her perception.

Before she had contracted, she had one friend. Their friendship was so great that Mimi didn't need any other friends. When Mimi and her mom had come to Malibu from Sapporo twelve years ago, Kate and her mom were the only other Japanese Americans in their neighborhood. They were so close that Mimi asked Kate's mom for pocket money and Mimi's mom had photo albums of Mimi and Kate sucking each others' thumbs as babies. And they stayed that close, until one day two years ago, when Mimi's mom announced that she and Mimi were moving into Silicon Valley for a job.

Mimi assumed that moving meant she was never going to see Kate again and became inconsolable. She screamed, refused to listen to anything else that her mom said, and ran away from home. The incubator approached her then, and the rest was history.

Mimi went home that day to her mom unpacking a suitcase and wondering why she had ever thought moving Mimi was a good idea. And everyone was happy.

Until the next day.

Mimi had come home to her and Kate's mom arguing. They were shouting at each other in rapid-fire Japanese that was way too fast for Mimi to understand. After Kate's mom left, Mimi's mom barged into Mimi's room, her breathing heavy with exertion.

"Mimi, I have bad news." she said in Japanese. "You won't be seeing Kate for a while."

Mimi looked up from her homework. Her mom had bloodshot eyes, rumpled clothes, and dried sweat and tears all over her face. It was obvious that something really bad had happened.

"What are you talking about?" Mimi said.

"Well… remembered how I talked about us moving yesterday? Before I changed my mind?" After seeing Mimi nod, she continued. "Well, me and Auntie Vivian have had it planned out for a while. We were going to move to Silicon Valley together."

Mimi froze.

"Auntie Vivian had bought a house in San Jose already." Mimi's mom continued. "I tried to convince her to stay since I wasn't going to move, but she won't budge. That stubborn woman! What's going to happen to Kate now, moving around so young like this?"

"You– you mean," Mimi said shakily. "We were never moving there alone? Kate was going to come with us?"

"I thought I had told you yesterday," Mimi's mom said. "But anyways, that was a terrible idea. I've made a terrible mistake. I understand why you were so scared yesterday." Mimi's mom enveloped Mimi in a hug, dripping her sweat all over Mimi's hair. "We're staying right here, okay?"

Mimi's heart detached from her circulatory system and fell into an abyss in the fourth dimension. "And Kate's still going to move there?," she said.

"Don't worry," Mimi's mom smiled. "I'll try my best to convince Aunt Vivian before she decides to leave, yeah? She loves Kate very much. She'll see reason."

Mimi's mom droned on, but Mimi no longer heard anything else. Her mom's hands held onto hers, but Mimi didn't feel them. Everything was suddenly moving farther and farther away, being repelled by Mimi's existence, until Mimi was left, alone, the place that her room had been.

That night, Mimi had shouted and cried at the incubator, begging for him to reverse the wish she had made. But he didn't believe in second chances.

Kate left one week later.

And soon, Mimi was thrown headfirst into the magical girl geopolitics of Los Angeles, the largest city in the entirety of the American midwest. Eventually, Mimi managed to adjust. Her radar had been useful; she could avoid the girls who picked fights. Soon, she had a clique following her.

And then Maia Cheburg took over. And Pasadena happened.

Soon, it was apparent that Los Angeles County was not going to be able to support as many girls as it used to. So, like birds migrating south for winter, magical girls began to leave. And eventually, Mimi's clique started to leave, too. It didn't matter how many meals Mimi had her mom cooked for them. It didn't matter how many witches they'd fought together. Most of them didn't even say goodbye when they left.

And now Mimi was left completely alone, the sole proprietor of acres upon acres of barren, useless territory that only got more barren and useless as time got on as Pasadena slowly amped up whatever evil witchery that was sucking all the witches in.

But that was the end.

Mimi knew that it was impossible to sink any lower– She saw her salvation approach on her radar. Shrouded in a procession of holy light, the crimson dot on the other side of the city inched its way towards her, each movement filled with glorious purpose.

This wasn't a coincidence. The dot had appeared in Mimi's lowest moment, while she stumbled aimlessly in the unfamiliar streets of Los Angeles with death closing in around her. It was here for Mimi. It was a sign that her luck would finally change.

Despite her steadily blackening gem, Mimi decided to keep her radar up anyway. As if the dot would suddenly disappear if she stopped keeping her eyes on it.

As she and the dot closer and closer, a new fear crept into Mimi's thoughts. What if the dot just whizzes past her like she wasn't there? Mimi wasn't going to outrun a car–

And, as if the dot had somehow heard her thoughts from all the way across the radar, it suddenly stopped moving.

Reflexively, Mimi stopped too. The dot had stopped in the middle of the road, so it didn't look like a traffic light. Why? They didn't get into a car accident, right? Oh god, was she jinxing them by thinking about it?

Mimi ran. It took her another three minutes to make it to the dot. When she got there, she saw no blaring alarms or angry crowds gathered around destroyed cars. But something caught her eyes anyways.

On the flanks of one of the cars, there was a purple poster taped on the left passenger door. There were words on it written in bold yellow colors in comic sans, no less. Apparently, it was addressed to the "Los Angeles Puella Magi". Which Mimi technically wasn't, but she read it anyway.

"Mmmm… Los Angeles Puella Magi… Urgent business… G–"

Crimson dot girl was willing to pay grief seeds?

Mimi was right. She was right. The crimson dot girl was there for her. An act of mercy from the uncaring universe.

Joy and relief filled every vein in her body. If there were vampires there to suck her blood, they would probably get high with just one slurp. It was all Mimi could do to stop herself from inflating like a balloon and floating up and becoming a smiley-face shaped constellation in the sky.

This was some kind of divine intervention. Had to be. Maybe the crystals in the cars that Mimi rode actually worked. Not only did the mysterious crimson dot girl just happen to stop half a city block her, the girl inside was offering to pay for some kind of urgent business in grief seeds. There was no way the odds of that weren't one in a million. Mimi's theory had to be right. The universe had orchestrated this.

With the first genuine grin that she had since a month on her face, Mimi proceeded on. Her radar said the girl wasn't in the car, though– She was in the burger joint that it was parked in front of. Mimi took a deep breath and went in.

The lunch rush was long since over, and the restaurant was almost empty. And then Mimi saw her. The only girl in the store. A quick check on her radar confirmed it.

Crimson dot girl was definitely not what Mimi imagined the breaker of her curse would look like. She was wearing cotton pajamas that had random patches of wetness on them and a heavy-looking necklace made of chain links. Her blonde hair was oily and straight, with individual strands breaking apart from the whole, like she forgot to comb her hair that morning.

And she was absolutely destroying the burger in front of her, taking bites that would put pythons to shame. Sauces and burger fillings were leaking from her mouth onto her pajamas. Mimi imagined if she ate like that in front of her mom, she would probably get grounded for the rest of her life.

Mimi decided to invite herself to the table.

Crimson dot girl heard the chair rumble in front of her and looked up from her burger. And, when she saw Mimi spontaneously appear in front of her, she froze, dead, in her tracks, food half-chewed in her mouth. A small flake of lettuce on her top lip fell onto her lap.

"Hello," Mimi said, and grinned. "You wanted to discuss urgent business?"

With some difficulty, crimson dot girl swallowed the food in her mouth and wiped her mouth with her sleeve. "You– you're a–"

"I am a magical girl. I saw that you were willing to offer grief seeds. I really need some grief seeds."

Crimson girl sighed in relief. Her breath smelled like wet patties. She closed her eyes and smiled, basking in the moment, seeming to forget that Mimi was there. "Man." Crimson dot girl said. "I've been running around the city for– for an hour, with my poster, trying to find someone. Thank God you're here."

"Why didn't you just call me on Magicord?"

"Magicord?" Crimson dot girl had to think for a moment. "Oh… you mean, uh, that forum? I thought it was under development."

Mimi was puzzled. "But… but Magicord launched a year ago. Why?"

"Oh." Crimson dot girl said. "I guess that I'm not very involved in the, the community."

That was weird. The incubator nagged at every magical girl to sign up for Magicord after they contracted. How did Crimson dot girl go a year without him drilling her about it? Was that a "red flag", as they say?

"Well–." Mimi waved away all those thoughts. Crimson dot girl was sent by fate to save her and set her on the path to greatness, after all. "Why did you come here to wave the poster around anyway? You're lucky I decided to stop here."

"LA's a big city, so I just thought more people would see the poster. And it worked, didn't it?" Then, Crimson dot girl stared at Mimi and seemed to realize something. "Oh… I guess it didn't…"

"Yeah," Mimi had no idea what she was talking about, but was more concerned about the fact that she somehow didn't know about Pasadena either. Maybe that made sense. Pasa made their fame through Magicord, after all. "Yeah. But now that you found me– I'll do your favor for you. Don't bother going to Pasadena."

Crimson dot girl narrowed her eyes. Despite not having known about Pasadena's shenanigans, the city still seemed to mean something to her. "Why?"

"Maia Cheburg– that's the city's leader– total bitch. I tried to ask for grief seeds– my gem was pretty much dead– and she kicked me out anyway."

Maybe she oughtn't be talking about the state of her gem to a total stranger. But it should be fine to let her savior know. She refused to believe that Crimson dot girl could hurt herZ Mimi cleared her throat and continued. "Anyways– about the urgent business. Uh… Whatever it is– I'm willing to do it. Would it be possible for me to get the grief seeds up front, though? My gem's in dire straits."

"No." Crimson dot girl said.

"I– my gem's super duper busted. I can't do much if I can't purify first–"

"Don't worry about it. You won't need any magic. And, even if you could– uh, I don't have seeds on hand now. After you do the thing, we'll get the seeds."

That sounded super sketchy. Mimi took a deep breath– reassured herself. She was talking to the walking proof that everything would work out for her.

"I trust you," she said. "What do you need me to do?"

"Nothing much,"Crimson dot girl said. "You just– well. You just need to call Kyubey over."

Call Kyubey over.

Mimi blinked.

"That's it?"

"Yeah. Do it, and we'll have seeds for days."

Mimi was prepared for much, much worse. One last trial to prove that she was worthy, or something.

But even now, Mimi had the audacity to be suspicious. The feeling that something wasn't going to work out lingered at the back of her head.

Mimi finally realized what was happening.

She was falling victim to stereotypes.

Mimi ought to reexamine her biases. Just because crimson dot girl was dirty didn't mean she was untrustworthy. The stars had literally aligned to allow them to have this conversation. She was here to break Pasadena's bind on Mimi's life and allow her to finally be a real person with friends, again. That was definitely enough to overwrite all the burger grease and god know what else on her pajamas. It wasn't as if sending a telepathing the incubator was going to do Mimi any harm anyways.

Mimi took a deep breath.

Incubator. You need to come over here. Someone here wants to have a word with you.

And that was that. Mimi felt no disturbances in her message. There were no traps or whatever placed on her.

"I could hear you," Crimson dot girl said. "Your telepathy was working. That's a good start."

"Now we wait?"

"Now we wait."

So they waited. Crimson dot girl dug into her burgers again, while Mimi watched politely. It was odd. Even though she hadn't eaten the whole morning, she didn't feel hungry at all.

It seemed like Crimson dot girl shared the sentiment. Her bites became slightly more civilized. When she finished the burger, she didn't touch the second box on her tray.

"Why isn't Kyubey here yet,"

"Mmm?" Mimi looked up. "I mean. It's only been a minute. Maybe we should give him some time."

"No." Crimson dot girl tapped at the desk with her knuckles. "It shouldn't be taking this long. He should have heard us instantly."

"Maybe– maybe he's just busy?"

"He's always busy. There's clones in reserve for emergencies. They should've been here by now."

"Well– well," Mimi said. "Kyubey stopped talking to me yesterday. Probably because he thought I was toast for sure. Maybe that's why he's not listening to me."

Crimson dot's girls lit up at that. "Yeah." She had probably been looking for any excuse for her idea to not work. " Yeah. That's definitely what's happening. You should mention me. Mention that Sofia Robinson is there with you. He'll definitely respond."

Mimi repeated her message. Then, she added, I've a Sofia Robinson with me. She, she wants me to be the one to call you, for whatever reason–

"My telepathy is blocked," Crimson dot girl, whose name was apparently Sofia, corrected her.

Right. Her uh, her telepathy is blocked.

Sofia nodded. All the previous excitement had melted off her face. She probably didn't believe that mentioning her name would help.

Seconds passed by, each one more excruciating than the last. The incubator did not show up.

"I want to try something." Sofia said suddenly. " Then she switched to telepathy. Bananas, she said.

The word echoed throughout the room, each syllable bouncing off the walls and into Mimi's brain from all sides. There was something desperate and hollow about the word that was uncharacteristic of the yellow fruit it represented.

"Did you hear me?"

Mimi nodded.

"No. You couldn't have. What did I say?"

Mimi told her.

"So my telepathy works," Sofia said. "It wasn't being blocked. All this time. Kyubey's just… he's– he's just been–"

"The incubator hasn't talked to me since yesterday," Mimi said. "He doesn't think it's worth it to talk to magical girls who are going to die."

"No." Sofia said. "That's not it. He couldn't have– couldn't have abandoned me. He has something more important. To be doing. That's why he's not here right now. We can wait– and he'll be done with it eventually–"

"That's your only plan?" Mimi interrupted her. "You were out of seeds, and you thought the incubator would take pity on you?"

"No!" Sofia shook her head. "No. He– he's my friend. There's just something more important he needs to be doing–"

The incubator. Sofia thought the incubator was her friend.

The full gravity of the situation had dawned on Mimi. Crimson dot girl wasn't a destined savior. Her arrival wasn't Mimi's prophesied reversal of fortune. It wasn't an olive branch from fate. It was just another deathtrap, in the variety of deathtraps that had composed Mimi's magical girl career.

She was no different from Pasadena. From Maia Cheburg. Or the incubator.

The coincidences? The fact that Sofia chose this specific burger shop to get her lunch break? It was fate laughing at her. God must've found it hilarious, watching her trying to talk a homeless person into saving her life.

Was Sofia even real, breathing human? If Mimi cut her open, would she really find blood and organs? Or will she find an empty husk powered by wisps of wind, controlled by some psychopathic deity, deriving some sick amusement at seeing Mimi dance? What about Maia Cheburg? The clique Mimi had before Pasadena? The incubator?

Kate?

"Hey." Sofia's voice came somewhere far away."We'll… we'll be spending a while together, right? Until Kyubey finishes whatever he's doing, right? We can still survive–"

Mimi couldn't hear her anymore over the sound of her demons pulsing behind her ears. It was time to leave. Do what she originally wanted to do. Get herself as far from Pasa as she could, and try her best to find some witches in a place that Pasa wouldn't touch for a while.

Mimi stood up from her seat.

But what was the point?

Even if she leaves her mother, even if she found somewhere new to start a new life, Mimi's curse will follow her. There will be another Kate, another Maia Cheburg, another Pasadena, another story written specifically to make her suffer.

So why should Mimi even try? What were you supposed to do when fate itself was against her?

Mimi stared at Sofia. Or the thing that said her name was Sofia. Her eyes were seeing funny, like pixels were falling out of the picture and revealing the empty blackness behind it. She couldn't even see Sofia's face anymore. Patches of her cheeks had crumbled into blackness, distorting the facial features surrounding it, like a black hole bending light.

"Hey," Mimi said to Sofia-thing. "Sofia. Look."

Mimi conjured her gem. It was more corrupt than Mimi had ever seen it. But it wasn't entirely black. Spots dotted the surface of the gem, cycling through the colors of the rainbow and squirming along the surface like little worms.

"This is what you did to me," she said. "This is what you did to me."

Sofia's eyes widened as she processed Mimi's gem. But she didn't lose her composure. "What are you talking about?" she said.

"You're just like– you're with Maia Cheburg." Mimi said, more to herself than to Sofia. "You're all behind this. Every last one of you."

"I don't even know who Maia Cheburg is. I don't even know who you are– you're listening to your gem." the Sofia-shaped thing in front of her said. "Hey– listen. Listen. Let's get out of here. You can uh, find some other magical girls around here. We'll see if they're nice enough to give us some seeds. Right? Mimi?"

"You said my name," Mimi said. "I thought you didn't know who I was."

"No– I–"

Mimi interrupted her. "I knew it. I knew it, I knew it. I was right. I'm going to turn into a witch, Sofia, and I'm going to kill you. And after I kill you, I'm going to go to Pasadena, and I'm going to kill every single girl in there, and then I'll kill the incubator, and all of you will pay for ruining my life–"

"Listen– listen," the Sofia-shaped thing in front of her said. "This is downtown Los Angeles. Pasadena also has innocent people. Do you know how many people you'll traumatize if you witch out here?"

"I don't care," Mimi said. "I don't care."

Sofia sighed in defeat. She ran her hands through her half-deformed face.

In one smooth motion, the Sofia-thing leaned forwards and snatched Mimi's gem from her hands. Then, Sofia-thing pushed itself onto the table, sending food flying everywhere, and launched itself towards the front door–

Oh no you don't.

Mimi transformed into her fur coat getup and conjured her magical weapon– a grenade launcher. She fired it, and with a deafening crack, a golden shell landed next to Sofia-thing and exploded in a shower of fake dollar bills. The Sofia-thing yelped and fell to the ground with cuts all over.

Mimi fired another shot. This one hit Sofia-thing in its back, and gashes spiderwebbed through her skin.

Sofia-thing must have deliberately avoided crushing her gem so she could keep Mimi alive and make her suffer more. Terrible mistake.

Mimi walked towards Sofia-thing's prone self. She crawled towards Mimi's gem, which had fallen a couple of feet away.

Seeing one of the people who had caused Mimi's life to go to hell lying defeated in front of her– A surge of sadistic glee welled up inside of Mimi.

She was finally going to get her revenge.

Then, Mimi's gem collapsed in on itself, and reality deteriorated into blackness.