Madoka Magica One Shot

I am the last witch. The goddess of hope has stopped all of them from being born. Except me. I understood why. My “birth” was highly unusual. Oh, I went through a rather standard start. Met some other Puella Magis in the area, saw the Kyubey. For some reason, however, I didn’t see the witches as something completely different. All I saw was a source of power. I was naive then, and thought that the witches had unlimited power. On the other hand, the Girls needed to kill witches in order to recharge. By that logic, I believed that if I could be a witch, but not go crazy, maybe I can help out in a different way.

Of course, this was all before I knew what those aliens were using us for.

So that was my wish. I wished to retain my faculties and become a witch, and completely skipped the whole despair, running out of magic, etc. phase. There wasn’t a flashy effect. No Soul Gem was created immediately, though there was a brief poof of darkness. I recall the Kyubey leaving without a word. I think it was pissed.

In the beginning, I was a bit pissed too. All the other girls got a battle uniform and a weapon. I got a brief cloud of smoke and a tingly feeling. I heard that you get tingly feelings from passing by large amounts of radiation. Maybe the cloud was somewhat radioactive.

I apologized to my friends, and went back to my life. I wasn’t a clumsy person, so any changes were unnoticed by me. A few weeks later, I got a paper cut. There was ... some sort of bodily fluid, but it sure as heck wasn’t blood.

No, I’m not emo, but I got a knife and cut myself. No, it wasn’t my wrist. I just cut my finger again. It was like I was filled with that smoky material for the beginning. I thought I got some cool gas summoning abilities, and tried to make it do ... something. There weren’t manuals for these things, you know. Instead, I summoned something else. A piece of metal, some sort of egg cradle, fell out. It was what would have been my Soul Gem. There was no glass, no inner light. In fact, it looked half formed, with little wisps of smog dribbling out like some dirty dry ice.
Later on, I figured out what these things were, and what the aliens were using them for. It was supposed to have become a Soul Gem, then create a large amount of energy when it gets converted into a Grief Seed.

But me? It became a Grief Seed without the whole energy overload thing. Before I knew that, I was just overcome with a desire to experiment. This was going to be interesting, a witch fighting other witches.

I casually looked for my friends again, though this time I realized I had to be extremely cautious. More smoke seemed to be bubbling out of my Grief Seed. I believe it was an indicator that I was slowly gaining in power, and it just might be enough to make them think I was a witch. I never told them what my wish was right away from the beginning; probably would’ve been interesting to see their faces and avoid this round of deception in the first place.

I went with them to where another witch was located, to make them think that the witch aura they felt was the other one. Regrettably, it appeared that they had already lost one member to the claws of another witch, and were a bit antsy when talked about these things. I asked them how they summoned their weapons, since I was a “non-magical” person apparently, and managed to get some answer before they shooed me away.

It didn’t really make sense; all I got that it was slightly different for each individual. I decided to try out cutting myself and letting that smoke billow out again, this time with my Grief Seed already outside. Instead, a pillar of energy blasted out of the metal egg cradle. After its stopped shooting smog like a fire hose, it cleared away to show a 1.5 meter long scalpel. I admit, I squee’d when I saw it. It was pretty badass, in my opinion. The not-badass part? The hand holding it became skeletal, numb, and weakened. The thing felt heavier than it should be by thirty kilograms, and my fingers became stiff, like they were dipped in ice water. Plus, it appeared to be slowly spreading. I threw it away from me once I realized it, and it dispelled.

This was when I found out that even witches need to get energy. It just that they had less morals to obstruct them from getting it. Its an interesting food chain. Witches gain energy from the despair from others. Some create familiars, who also might gather enough of their own energy to grow their own Grief Seed and be considered a full fledged witch. The Puella Magis who fight them replenish their own energy levels from killing the witches and consuming the energy in the Grief Seeds. Really, they are still eating from the same food source. And now that I skipped the whole Soul Gem process.

It took a bit to get used to. I didn’t really want to hurt others for energy. I managed to get around it for a while, lurking beside hospitals and moody teenage gangs. It was enough to restore my hands skin color, though just in case, I’ve taken to wearing a full body black cloak, elbow length grey gloves, loose jeans, and boots. I sometimes carry a face mask that covers my lower face, just in case. Once I got enough energy, I went around and killed a few witches and familiars. Its not easy when you have a limited supply of magic to use, you know. Most of the time, I’ve managed to ambush them. I have a drastically different aura compared to their normal targets. Its sometimes funny to see some girls run up to a barrier and see the witch already defeated, a half-used Grief Seed left on its metaphorical door step.

Over time, I managed to master my new abilities, and discover a few new ones. My skills apparently lies in illusions, necromancy, and familiar summoning. The last two are sometimes interchangeable. When you think about it, its pretty much the default ability set all witches have. The difference is that I have a brain that can utilize them far better than they ever could. The oversized scalpel probably was what my weapon would be if I actually became a Puella Magi if my wish didn’t completely screw with the process.

It was somewhat more comforting that I could go around without having to worry about my Soul Gem being corrupted, though I still had to deal with my skin becoming transparent at times. Hospitals, especially the sections where the victim had either no hope or was currently in the pit of despair helped a lot. Some of them were already going to die within the hour anyways. Sometimes, I shed the let the skin on my face temporarily recede and played Reaper. Had to work on being cold and heartless, though. I gave up on that when the people are about to take their final breath.

I still did so for those about to be on Death Row, though. Its pretty satisfying.

This arrangement lasted for nearly a decade. I altered my appearance ever so slightly to portray aging, and graduated high school without sacrificing too much of my grades. I was still pretending to be normal, you know. I nearly would’ve finished college too, if she didn’t make a certain wish. I don’t know how many times she did it, but when I got to the other side of the time loop, I was the only one left.

The Goddess of Hope went through time, and stopped every single Puella Magi from ever becoming a witch. Except me. I never was a Puella Magi. Barely any energy marked the time when I transformed. There wasn’t anything she could do to me that wouldn’t involve killing me either. I felt her passing by, but she never stopped for me.

At first, I wondered: why? How could I have continued to exist in a world that ostensibly shouldn’t have witches? The next day, when I went back to my room, I saw her. Or actually, I saw me. The me from the timeline the Goddess created. Here, I never made that wish. The wraiths are freaking ugly, besides. I then realized what happened. I was a paradox, existing from a time that was all but destroyed.

So I ran. Staying would create too many questions, and I dared not to stay near the one Puella Magi left in the world who knew what a witch’s aura felt like. I still had my housekey, strangely. I destroyed it once I was done with it. I took a few personal items, stuffed them into a suitcase, and ran for the coast. I killed a few wraiths along the way, though I eventually gave up on actively pursuing them since the energy efficiency rate was so bad.

Once I reached the coast, I summoned a large whale familiar, hopped into its mouth, and set off through the ocean. I opened my phone. I stole this along the way, since I smashed my old phone into pieces. I used a bit of my magic to force a connection with the satellites above. I reassured myself that magic based internet connections probably didn’t have IP addresses.

With my fears calmed, I scrutinized a world map. The Bermuda seems to be an interesting place to camp out.

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Something I thought about a while ago. At a first glance, witches appear to have more power, but less control/strategy. What if someone thought if she could become one, and all the the pesky corruption troubles could be avoided? Not always. And, there's also the Goddess of Hope fixing everything....