Sabrina sits back in her chair, sipping her root beer as she waits for her guest to arrive at the cafe. They were from Tokyo, and had said that they were only coming to check out the girl who had made so many waves, but Sabrina was pretty sure that whoever this girl was, she'd be at the Mami Hotel by the end of the day.
Seeing a mess of black hair approaching her table, Sabrina turned her eyes to her New Friend.
"Are you miss Kazegami?" she asks. "I'm Sabrina, the-"
"The grief-controller," says the girl. "I've heard quite a lot about you. Mind if I sit down?"
At Sabrina's nod, the girl sits down in the empty chair. Her black hair is short, boyishly so, and her rumpled hoodie and jeans suggest that she isn't very concerned with her appearance.
Sabrina does a quick look-over to make sure this isn't a certain drunken Warmaster stuck in the wrong timeline, but her nose's continued will to live suggests that this girl may simply bear an unfortunate resemblance.
"As you know, I'm Kazegami," says the girl. "To cut to the chase, what exactly are you trying to accomplish? Your types usually have some big goal, so I hope you're at least interesting."
Sabrina's smile becomes somewhat strained, but remains firmly attached to her face.
"I want to save everyone," she says. "I want to resurrect people, let megucas live without having to hunt witches or farm familiars, and de- so, how much do you know about-"
"You want to reverse the witching process," finishes Kazegami. "Yeah, of course I know. And how do you plan to accomplish this?"
"SCIENCE!!!" shouts Sabrina, suddenly standing up on the table and raising a fist to the sky. Kazegami shoots her a confused look, and Sabrina sits back down in her seat, laughing nervously. "Sorry, reflex. Anyway, I keep on finding more things my grief-bending can do, I have a friend, prisoner, comrade, whatever you want to call it who can see the future, and another friend, not the prisoner kind, just the regular kind, who can copy powers. So all together, I'm rather hopeful for the future!"
Kazegami remains unmoved by the speech, pulling out a menu and ordering a coffee. She stares at Sabrina, silent and unmoving until the moment she has a sip of her pitch-black coffee.
"Your power-copying friend, are they in the city?" she finally asks.
"She is," Sabrina says. "I can call her, if you want."
"That'd be nice of you," says Kazegami. "Once she's copied my power, I think I'll head back to Tokyo. I wonder if I can sleep on the train…"
"You're heading back?" says Sabrina, eyes wide. "But, but why? I can cleanse you, and offer protection, so why would you just abandon that?"
"It's nothing I haven't seen before," says Kazegami, eyes fixed on her drink. Sabrina would think she was lying, maybe as part of some deluded game, but the look of sheer boredom on her face was a convincing argument in itself.
"Nothing you haven't seen before?" says Sabina, incredulous. "But I can control grief! It's a total game-changer!"
Sighing, Kazegami sets down her coffee and turns her gaze towards Sabrina.
"Sabrina, how many people live in this world?"
Sabrina tilts her head, thinking.
"Well, I think about seven billion?"
Kazegami shakes her head, a wry smile on her lips.
"Actually, it's a bit closer to ten billion. And of those ten billion, how many do you think make contracts?"
Maybe….. One or two thousand?"
"Think about it like this. Mitakihara city has a population of about one million. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm going to say there are about seven to eight magical girls in this here city."
Sabrina starts counting on her fingers, eyes narrowed and brow furrowed.
"Mami, Sayaka, Homura, Oriko, Kirika, Ono, Masami, Hiroko, Madoka's a potential and I just arrived. But Oriko's from Shirome, and I don't count, so we have about seven magical girls and one potential."
"You know, those statistics are actually rather average. Around eight magical girls per one million normal humans. Now, a billion is just a million million, so multiply the population of this city, magical girls and humans, by ten thousand and you get the guesstimate of magical girls in the world."
"Eighty thousand magical girls…" Sabrina says, almost reverently. "Yeah, that's a lot, but what does it have to do with my powers being unimpressive?"
Kazegami shrugs, taking another sip of her coffee. "Eighty thousand magical girls, Sabrina. That means Eighty thousand wishes, and given the turnover rate for magical girls, a lot of girls are making contracts every single day. To put it simply, you may be the biggest deal here, in this country, but in the goddamn ginormous world outside Japan, you're just a giant Kraken in one of the many oceans."
"But even if there are magical girls at or above my level of power, and I doubt there are any who can take Homura and I working together, just my cleansing is a total game-changer!"
"Sure. Infinite cleansing, that completely changes the game, I'll admit. But what you don't seem to understand is that the game changes all the time."
"What do you mean? Girls won't have to worry about grief anymore, how can you brush that off?"
Kazegami puts a hand on Sabrina's shoulder, gaze unusually warm.
"Sabrina, how long do you think grief has been a thing?"
"Forever, duh. Wait a second, are you saying-"
"Grief has been a thing for about, oh, six years now."
Sabrina stares at Kazegami in a mix of shock and wonder, with horror creeping in at the edge. "Six years?" she whispers. "But how? What happened when megucas used magic? What came before grief?"
"It was a Bad-Time Bar for about five years," says Kazegami. "Before that, a Trouble Timer. Then a Murder Meter, then an Oh Shit oscilloscope, then a Witch Watch, then a Shittiness Scale, and so on and so forth."
Sabrina remains rooted to her seat, staring at Kazegami in horror.
"What about witches?" she says, voice wavering. "Are they new too?"
"Cosmically, yeah. They've been around for the past century or so, though they were around for a bit back in the 1700's. Right between demons and then… wait, no, it was back to demons again."
"What do you mean, around in the 1700's?"
"Well, every once in a while, some strapping lass will get the bright idea to wish away whatever evil is ailing the world this century, and sacrifice themselves for the good of the world. But humanity's darkness needs to go somewhere, blah blah blah, and the end result is that some new type of monster rolls into the timeline, sometimes even worse than the thing before it."
Sabrina stares at her guest, mind struggling to comprehend yet another horrible truth.
"So witches… they weren't always there? This is…" her expression goes blank as she stares at the ceiling.
"Uh, Sab-"
"This is great!" says Sabrina. "Even if I fail, things will keep getting better!"
"Less better, more different," says Kazegami. "But on the bright side, your job will probably be done for you by the time you're in any position to seriously help people. On the less bright side, it'll probably be done really shittily, but that's how most things get done these days."
Enthusiasm ruthlessly crushed, Sabrina tries her best to maintain her cheery attitude.
"Well, even if someone wishes away witches, I can help the world fight whatever comes next! Megucas still won't have to fight wraiths or whatever it is if they don't need to cleanse!"
Kazegami grimaces, looking away from Sabrina.
"Well, the thing about that… See, I give it about three months before someone wishes grief away."
Sabrina… smiles, fully and honestly. Kazegami, for her part, merely lifts an eyebrow at the oddly timed display of resolution.
"I can do it," Sabrina says. "I can fix everything, kill Walpurgisnacht, and untie magical girls before anyone wishes grief away. And hell, with all the magical girls out there, I'm pretty sure I can find a few who have communication magic; from there, I just make sure no potentials wish grief away. I can still fix everything!"
Kazegami stares at Sabrina, awed by either her unflinching resolve or her brainless optimism.
"You know, a lot of girls would have given up when I told them that, and they'd have been right to. You're very… let's say interesting."
Sabrina smiles at her guest, and Kazegami surprises her by smiling back. She can do that?
"So, Kazegami," says Sabrina. "How do you know about the stuff that came before witches and grief? Was it your wish?"
Kazegami shakes her head and begins to explain, smiling fondly.
"Actually, it was wish magic. See, I was a history buff with a shit-ton of potential, so when Kyubey offered me a wish I knew exactly what I wanted. I wished to know what the fuck made the Bronze Age collapse."
"Was it a complex mix of factors including soil degradation, natural disasters, and population growth?"
Kazegami smiles. Or does she grimace? She… Griles, let's say, and shakes her head.
"No, no. See, it was actually Sea People."
"Sea people?"
"Well, once upon a time there was a Hittite princess who was really into the whole 'teenage rebellion' thing, but didn't have the military influence to do an actual rebellion. Additionally, she was rather unattractive and was a total bitch, so none of the 'worthy' boys liked her. As the final nail in the coffin, she had a bit of a… fixation on legends of mermen, so…"
"No," says Sabrina, eyes wide. "No, she didn't!"
"After a bad fight with her father, she wished that some attractive mermen would come and rescue her," continues Kazegami. "Now, she had a bunch of karmic potential, being a Hittite princess and everything, so her wish was granted. The army of the Sea People came, 'rescued' her by burning down the coastal city she lived in, and then kept on killing everyone."
"Oh Madokami above," whispers Sabrina. Kazegami stares at her, but Sabrina continues on, horror evident in her voice. "The bronze age collapsed because of a teenager with a merman fetish."
"You know, that's not even the worst example," says Kazegami, leaning back in her chair and taking another sip of her coffee. "The crusades? A Byzantine girl wished that the European christians would help her, and it just got worse from there. Jesus? Some girl wished that people would love her brother, forever and ever. About fifty percent of world events happened because of wishes, and most of them were disappointing."
Kazegami sets her coffee back on the table, looking up at the sky.
"I may have Wished to know what happened, but the intent was all about experiencing history. So now I'm immortal, it seems, with the condition that I do nothing but observe."
"You're immortal?" says Sabrina. "That seems like one hell of a side-effect!"
"I guess it is," says Kazegami, wistfully. "Now that I think about it, you may want to reconsider having your friend copy my powers, depending on how good she is with horrifying revelations. Anyway, I think I might stay here for a while. After everything, I still want to experience history, and if any of us are going into the books it'll be you." She tilts her head, brow furrowed. "Or the Black Queen, if she ever sobers up and leaves Antarctica. But that's a fool's bet if I've ever seen one, so I'll be staying here with you."
Sabrina narrows her eyes at the mention of the Queen, but her smile returns in full force once Kazegami finishes.
"Well, we'd be happy to have you in Mitakihara," she says. "Maybe we can talk later, about all the systems before the one we have now?"
"Sounds good to me," says Kazegami. "Cosmic-level post-cog is good for knowledge, so if you ever need info you know who to call."
She gets up, setting a few coins down on the table.
"Hey, Sabrina!" she says as she leaves. "Don't forget; Always, somewhere, someone is fighting for you. As long as you remember that, you'll never be alone."
And with that, she leaves.
