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Kazamino was a land of industry; if Mitakihara was a world of innovation and futurism then Kazamino was a world of untapped potential, industrialisation and, of course, revolution of the creative kind.
Every fifth corner housed an arcade, every seventh building was a shop of some sort, every second street had an advertisement for the newest product. The roads were paved to perfection, the streetlights never flickered even once, neon lights lit up back-alley brawls between groups of men that, hours later, would be laughing and singing as though they hadn’t been trying to kill each other.
Everywhere Homura looked she saw downtrodden people lifting their spirits in bars, rundown hotels staffed by cheer go-getters, businessmen in suits looking either happier than thought possible or grimmer than the dead.
Smoke and the scent of industry filled the air, grey clouds of smog filling her nostrils with every breath – it’s a very good job, then, that Homura doesn’t need to breathe. The water, however paradoxical it may seem, is the cleanest she’s ever tasted. The food here is delicious in that ‘street vendor’ way. The people here are hardened and tough, used to life keeping them down and finding ways to live to fullest regardless.
The homeless were wise beyond their years and educated men and women from all backgrounds and classes; around the corner from her new home, the church, was a woman in her fifties that used to be a high-ranking politician. Across from the arcade Kyouko used to frequent was a man in his thirties that taught piano to anyone curious for a modest fee – modest enough to still render him homeless, that’s for sure.
Even the Wraiths here are different; brutal in a way that those in Mitakihara could only hope to come close to, horrifying and hideous in a way that brought true terror to those that saw them. The Wraiths here were strong, unkind things with apathetic hatred pouring from every inch of their malformed, twisted bodies. They were strong, tough, stuck together in clusters more often than not, and they dropped multiple Grief Cubes just for killing one of them. Homura would never worry for her Soul Gem darkening again as long as she hunted every few months.
It was a society that remained unchanged and thrived for it, and Homura found herself enamoured with Kazamino as soon as she stepped off the train.
This was her territory now, all hers and no one else’s; no one to share with, no one to compete with. No one but her, her thoughts, her guns and, whenever it dared show up, Kyubey. Kazamino was hers, now; Mitakihara could never be her own place because Madoka owned it, and Homura would never take that away from her. But Kazamino was hers.
She would keep it safe, not for anyone else, not for the civilians unknowing beneath her, nor the young girls that may get Contracted. Not even for Kyouko should she ever return for a visit.
This was her territory. She will be keeping it safe for herself and no one else. She owed no one and did nothing on behalf of anyone else. She lived for herself, here. This land was hers, she would never share it.
Even if she kept seeing Madoka out the corner of her eye, or heard her voice on the wind, or felt her touch in the sunlight…Homura felt freedom like she’d never felt it before. She was Homura Akemi, this was Kazamino and wasn’t Mitakihara; in fact, in the thousands of timelines Homura existed she’d not once known Madoka to step foot in Kazamino for more than a single day.
This place had no memories associated with it, no people she knew or places she’s seen for the billionth time. No landmarks she recognised or streets she knew the names of. This was a jungle unlike the forest of Mitakihara.
This was her jungle. She had willingly shackled herself here out of want instead of obligation.
The thought was paradoxically liberating.
Her first week here was spent fixing up the old church to some semi-respectable living condition. The ceilings were still charred and missing planks of wood, allowing nature’s elements access to the insides. The windows were cracked, shattered, and in some cases completely missing. The walls were chipped and scarred but, thankfully, remained sturdy and whole. The flooring was rotted through to the foundations.
The basement, on the contrary, was perfect; four stone walls polished to a shine, the wood above acting as a ceiling to it clearly replaced and cared-for. The flooring was of similar shape, if worn-down by constant use. There was even electricity here, plug sockets that should have been reported as some sort of major fire hazard were haphazardly screwed into the walls – the wires were exposed, the socket itself was old and worn, and the electricity was tapped directly into the street’s nearby power box. Her forearm itches whenever she goes near the light switches.
The lights exploded four times in the past week alone, and it took forever to figure out the perfect voltage so they didn’t either combust or fizzle into uselessness. The plugs had to be replaced after they’d fried her phone’s charger, and the only saving grace was that electricity hardly bothered her anymore if she just channelled magic through her hands to act as a buffer. The floor on the main level had to be nailed down and hammer properly after she’d caught her foot on an upright nail and a loose floorboard.
Whenever the wind blew through Homura found herself boarding up the broken windows and setting up some sort of rudimentary fireplace on the ground floor, bookshelves lining the walls of previous confessionary booth and what little carpet than remained was nailed to the giant front doors of the church. Thankfully they were in perfect condition, if rotted slightly.
It was perfect.
She catches sight of herself in a shard of glass she hadn’t swept up yet, and comes undone.
She used to be Homura Akemi.
Used to be a young girl with dreams in her eyes and ideas in her head, but no friends to share them with. She used to be a soft, gentle creature that wished no harm on even the smallest of insects of the meanest of people. She wished everything could be good, and kind, and soft like her, or that she could grow to be not-so-soft. She used to be a turtle in a shell, lonely and isolated in her self-contained prison of heart issues and weakness.
Pathetic, total weakness.
She used to be Homura, two hundred timelines in and nothing to show for it. used to grasp the world by its neck and throttle it until it bent over backwards for her. It would bow and scrape and beg her not to tear time apart like thin paper, but she’d do it anyway. The world around her reacted by making things harder for her but she accommodated and thrived, and, soon, she learned the tells. She knew the secrets. She understood just what she was to do to earn her happy ending.
She would never earn her happy ending, and she knows that now. Whoever she is.
A thousand timelines in, Homura forgot her name. briefly, of course, it came back to her a second after she woke up; but there was a sense, fleeting as it was, of ‘who am I?’ and nothing has terrified her more. She remembers that timeline well, if only because it’s the first and only time she contemplated giving up. Surrendering to the whims of the world and buckling her knee.
She did not fall. She did not bend. She wishes she did.
She can’t remember what timeline it was, but she completely forgot who she even was, and what she was, beyond a vessel for Madoka’s salvation. There was a point in that timeline in which someone said her name – the teacher Saotome – and she actually startled as though soaked with freezing water. She played it off as her heart acting up and the rets of the timeline proceeded as they usually do.
It was terrifying, forgetting her own name for a full timeline. She wrote it down, just in case she ever forgot again.
I am Homura Akemi
She doesn’t remember which timeline came after that, but she carved those words into her forearm and concealed it with bandages; stupidly she’d cauterised the wound using magic instead of just healing it, so it followed her every timeline since. It’s always a bother whenever she’s asked why she’s wearing them. Homura just shrugs it off as a wound that never truly healed in the hospital.
She remembers, though, carving words below that in a different timeline.
Am I really?
And in her journal after the four-thousandth timeline?
Who am I?
And in the five-thousandth she writes an entry into her blank journal; a reminder of what she is, who she is, what she does and why she does it. for both her and anyone who might find it, because some small part of her is hoping, praying, that someone will find it and read it and just understand her. Understand the girl who used to be Homura Akemi that just wants to save her best friend from a fate worse than death.
I am Homura Akemi, and I forget that a lot. This page is necessary.
I exist. I don’t want to but I have to, for her sake if no one else’s.
I can’t stop until Madoka is safe. I physically can’t. I don’t know anything else anymore.
Beneath is written a brief synopsis of her time-looping, of her trials and everything she’s seen and done. The memories are foggy and clouded, of course they are, but she can call on them whenever she truly needs them. She dredged up everything she remembered to write in that diary, and it filled the entire book front to back.
She left it lying about in obvious places, practically daring a snooping Sayaka or a concerned Madoka to read and see why she is the way she is; why she’s so dead to everything.
Madoka did, eventually, find out.
Madoka still went through with her wish.
Madoka destroyed the world as Homura knew it and rebuilt it, leaving Homura the only one to remember. She spat on Homura’s suffering like it was nothing, like it was a mere footnote to Madoka’s own life.
The girl who used to be Homura hated Madoka. But she loved her, too. Loved her too much to hate her like she wanted to hate her. Loved her more than she’s loved anything else, and hated her even more because of that, but loved her even more. It was a sick spiral that she couldn’t escape, until she left Mitakihara. She was stupid for thinking just leaving would fix her. She was stuck in that loop still.
Her hands were covered in blood, have been since her first timeline, maybe even before that – she can’t remember her life outside the loops, she honestly doesn’t remember what kind of person she was, and she has to refresh her memory reading her journal almost daily.
Her hands took Madoka’s life, bled her dry with the shot of a gun and the shattering of a Soul Gem and the laughter of Walpurgisnacht in the background. Like some sick, twisted soundtrack to the death of everything Homura knew.
The only reason she knows she is Homura Akemi is the journal in her hand, cradled to her chest like a lifeline. The carving in her arm is gone, probably Madoka’s doing, but even years after it vanished Homura found herself missing it. it was a reminder, after all, like her journal is. Like her shield is. Like her wings are. Like the visions of pink hair, golden eyes and a wide smile are.
She clutches the book tighter and forgets how to cry, even if she wants to.
Who is she again?
She looks down to the cover of the journal, her name in chicken-scratch and pocked deep.
Homura Akemi. I am Homura Akemi, but I do not loop time anymore.
Don’t look at the hands.
She looks at her hands.
She unravelled like thread, came apart at the seams, and her fall from composure was swift and merciless. She couldn’t stop it even if she wanted to.
Homura Akemi looped time. Homura Akemi tried and failed to save Madoka. Homura Akemi did so much with time, time and magic and guns. I still have time and magic and guns, but I cannot loop time anymore. I cannot try and save Madoka anymore.
She sees pink hair, golden eyes and a wide smile in the corner of her vision.
Homura Akemi deserved to die for what she did. Do I deserve to die?
She eyes the glass from broken stained windows on the floor and shakes her hand when her hands strays to it.
No, no Madoka would not want that. No. Madoka would not want that.
She eyes the glass again and regrets leaving Mitakihara. Kyouko and Mami kept her connected, sane, even if they were just constant reminders. She hasn’t even lasted two weeks away form them. But she can’t go back now. Homura Akemi would never go back. Homura Akemi would move forward.
She sees pink hair. Golden eyes. A wide smile.
“GO AWAY!” she punches the ground in front of her with so much force it cracks and the bones in her left hand shift and fracture. She punches again for good measure, laughing hysterically between words. “I hate you! I love you! Come back, please!”
There’s no answer from the wide smile. No recognition from the golden eyes. No difference in the swaying of the pink hair.
“Come back…”
She’s still laughing, tears dribbling down her cheeks but she can’t feel them.
The-girl-who-thinks-she-might-be-Homura is clutching the journal to her chest, broken hand limp and she’s staring at it like she knows she shouldn’t but she just can’t stop like she couldn’t with the time loops and she’s suffocating something’s wrong what’s wrong-
“Come back, Madoka. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this.”
Please, I’m sorry for whatever I did. I can’t take this anymore. Who am I? come back, please. Take me with you, please. Madoka, please Madoka, don’t leave me alone like this. Come back…
She’s. still. Laughing.
This is how Kyouko and Mami find her.