You sigh, and nod in acceptance. You're not sure that there's anything you can do that won't make things worse, if you're honest with yourself. And some part of you thinks that it's... fitting, in a way, that Akiko's reduced to this. You force
that thought aside, too.
You look up at Rin. "
Let me know if anything changes?"
The healer nods.
"Alright," you say out loud, voice low. "Alright. We're going home, then." You push yourself to your feet, and Mami looks up at you, tentatively holding her hands out. You smile, and easily pull her to her feet.
"The ribbons will dissolve in about half an hour after we leave," Mami notes, gesturing at the awning.
Rin nods again, looking between you and Mami. Finally, she bows deeply to you. When she straightens again, she says softly, "I'm grateful for what you've done. But... I don't think I can thank you. Not now."
"I understand," you say.
And you suppose you do. For all that you'd done a lot of good, it's still a bitter pill to swallow. Even for yourself. And you can only hope that that bitterness isn't bitter almond, that you
did do good, and that it isn't going to come back and bite you in the ass at some later point.
You bring in some Grief, enough to shape a platform big enough for yourself, Mami, and Kirika. "Mami, do you think you could..." you gesture at Kirika's sleeping form.
Mami blinks in confusion, before it clicks. "Um... OK," she says. She flicks a hand, a ribbon spooling out from nowhere to snake under Kirika's body, gently bearing her up. The blackhaired girl grumbles something, flailing a bit, and her eyes blink muzzily open.
"Huh? Wuzza?" Kirika mumbles. She rolls over to squint at you.
Oh well. "We're going home," you say. "We'll drop you off at Oriko's."
Kirika brightens sleepily. "Yay!" she says, rubbing at an eye with the back of her fist. "Wake me up when I'm home?"
"Nah, we'll just dump you into Oriko's bed," you say, grinning.
"Mmmkay, sounds good," Kirika says, letting her head slump back to the ribbons and eyes sliding closed.
You glance at Mami. A furious blush stains her cheeks. "Uh-" she stammers. "Are we actually going to..."
You smile. "Oriko will probably be waiting for us," you say as you walk to the platform. You frown for a moment, and add a roof to it, since the storm hasn't abated in the slightest.
"Oh," Mami says, considering that as she follows you. "That's true."
Rin stands, watching from the roof as you slowly lift the platform into the air. You lift your hand in a wave, and she returns it.
"
Miss Tsubaki?" you reach out for telepathy as you settle into a seated position, Mami immediately cuddling into your side. Kirika's settled behind you, snoozing happily again.
"
Yes, Miss Sabrina?" Chouko replies.
"
Hamasaki's... she's basically catatonic," you say. "
She's no harm to you, now. We're headed home."
"
I see," Chouko says. "
Then... thank you again, Miss Sabrina."
You sigh. "
You're welcome," you reply. "
I'll be seeing you sometime soon for cleansing, I guess."
"
Yes. Goodbye for now, Miss Sabrina," Chouko says.
You slowly accelerate away from the roof, heading into the stormy night, pulling the enormous masses excess of Grief along with you. Eventually, transform, and raise a clear windshield, the glassy material resonating in your senses, and making Kirika snort and roll over.
Mami's only reaction is to peek up at you, before resettling herself to cuddle into your side despite your coat being in the way.
A twist of will brings up a wall separating Kirika from you and Mami, and you slowly reshape the entire structure, shifting it into a more aerodynamic shape as you will it to go faster, faint lights below whizzing past in a blur. You're fairly certain Kirika's sound asleep now, and that the wall will cut off sound effectively, and... you're stalling. You put Kirika out of your mind.
You take a deep breath.
"I'm sorry, Mami," you say softly.
"What for, Sabrina?" Mami asks, equally softly. She sounds puzzled.
"For..." you swallow. "Mami, I haven't been very considerate to you at all. I haven't... I've been an awful person, Mami, to you. To everyone around me, but you the most of all. I'm sorry."
"What?" Mami asks, face dimly lit by the faint light glowing from the suburbs below. "I don't... you're not an awful person, Sabrina!"
"No, I-" you squeeze your eyes shut in pain. "I run roughshod over everyone's opinions. I assume that my way is better, and I force everyone to follow along because... because I have the
power to."
"Sabrina, I-"
You shake your head, and Mami falls silent. "Mami, you didn't want to get involved in the war. You thought Oriko might be lying. And here we are
anyway. I, I. I tell you I'll be safe. That I'll be careful. Then I immediately run out into
danger, and I get
hurt and I."
"Sabrina..." Mami says, trailing off. "Sabrina, you're being silly."
"Mami, I. Every time you tell me not to do something. You, I. I ignore it, and I can't imagine it's
easy to see me go into all these, these
messes," you say. You look down at your hands, fisted in your lap, tears beginning to slide down your face as if to replace the rain you're leaving behind.
A pale hand reaches across your blurred vision, and gently takes one of your hands. Mami smooths your hand out, and holds it between both of hers.
"Sabrina," she says gently. "You wouldn't be
you if you didn't do what you thought was the right thing.
I'm sorry for asking that you stop. Because you
care, Sabrina, and that's
nothing to be ashamed of."
Even if it hurts me, you fill in the words.
You swallow. "I'm sorry, Mami," you mutter thickly. "I'm... I'm sorry."
"Don't be," she says.
But you are.
The rest of the trip is spent in silence, Mami holding your hand in hers the whole way. Her other hand strokes soothingly across the back of your hand, her fingertips ghosting across your hand in slow, gliding circles as if she's trying to memorize every contour, every skein of muscle, every vein.
When you arrive at Oriko's house, descending towards her rear garden, you find the seer standing at the glass door, her one hand already pushing it open. She looks haggard, white hair dishevelled and faint black bags starting to form under her eyes.
"Welcome back," she says tonelessly, looking up at you as you melt away your windshield so that you can talk to her unimpeded.
You stay on your platform, Mami still holding your hand and leaning her head against your shoulder. "Good to be back," you say, detaching and lowering the portion of your platform Kirika's lying on. "It's late, so I'm just dropping off Kirika. She did amazingly out there, though - we can talk about that another time."
Oriko nods, a gentle smile on her face as she looks at the sleeping Kirika. She reaches out with her hand, gently stroking Kirika's cheek.
Kirika wakes.
Citrine eyes meet and hold sea green ones, the same smile spreading across Kirika's face.
One smile, spread across two faces.
You turn away, abruptly feeling like you're intruding on something intensely private. Instead, you find golden eyes regarding
you closely. Mami gives you a warm smile.
Your stomach squirms uncomfortably. She believes in you. She believes in you with a purity that almost... it
shines, just as much as she said
you do.
But you return the smile. Because you don't want to see
hers dim.
"Good bye," you murmur in Oriko and Kirika's general direction. You don't know if they hear, or really, if they
should. Your platform lifts off into the air again, homeward bound.
"
Is that you, Sabrina?" Homura's voice.
"
Yeah," you reply. "
We're home. Talk to you tomorrow?" You peer out of the restored windshield, and maybe it's just your imagination, but you fancy you see the faintest gleam of a scope, far below in the cityscape. Almost certainly just your imagination, of course. You're too far up.
"
OK," Homura says simply. "
It's... good that you made it back."
It doesn't take too long to get home, and you shamble in, calling out a tired, "I'm home," Mami responding with a "Welcome home." You'd left the vast bulk of your Grief on the rooftop - there's probably enough to pack the living room full, if you brought it indoors.
"I'll make some tea," you suggest. "You can shower in the meantime?"
Mami hesitates, before nodding her agreement, and heading to the shower.
You allow the tiredness to wash over you as you busy yourself in the kitchen, the familiar surroundings comforting in that familiarity. This
is home, isn't it? For all that it's been a week. A hectic week that feels like it lasted months, but just a weeks nevertheless.
Mami returns quickly, damp and clean, just as you bear two cups of tea and a plate of sandwiches out. Her stomach growls at the sight, and she blushes, before smiling at you gratefully. You return the smile, before heading off to take a shower yourself.
Her face lights up when she sees you again, her cup of tea untouched as you join her at the table. You shake your head slightly at her. She just smiles back in response.
You shouldn't have.
I did anyway.
Your tea's still warm, and you sip gratefully at it, picking up a sandwich.
A clink of ceramic on the glass tabletop, Mami's presence settling comfortably at your side.
She picks up a sandwich too.
Between the two of you, the sandwiches are gone all too quickly.
Warm and full and sleepy. Mami cuddling against you.
You sigh. "We need to talk tomorrow morning," you say.
"OK," Mami agrees.
You stand, Mami standing with you, and between the two of you, you make short work of the dishes, before headed to bed. Mami pauses at the door to her bedroom, her touch feather light on your elbow, and you pause.
You smile, and head in with Mami, collapsing into your mattress, Mami hestitating before dropping into her bed.
You lie awake for a while, with your eyes closed, as you think things over. Mami, yourself. Mami
and yourself. Yourself. Who
are you?
What are you? Something Madoka did?
Either Madoka? An abberation in the timelines? Something else?
Somewhere along the way, you hear Mami sit up, and ease onto the mattress beside you, worming under your blanket. An arm wraps around your waist from behind, and you hear Mami sigh contentedly. Her breath slowly evens out into slumber.
Well.
You
really can't say you didn't expect that, you muse as you finally drift off to sleep yourself.
[] When do you want to wake up?
[] Write-in
=====
And with that, we draw both the chapter and the book to a close. The next update begins the new chapter, "Under the Radar".
