The first thing Kyoko's slowly waking mind noticed was the annoying high-pitched begging forcibly dragging her from her sweet, sweet slumber. The second was the rough shaking from soft hands pushing her to wake up. The third was the slap she received to her cheek.
"Sayaka, I swear to god if you don't let me sleep in…" Kyoko mumbled, still half-asleep.
"It's um… me, actually," Nagisa replied.
Kyoko's eyes shot open. The redhead sat up, realizing that jagged rocks weren't the best sleeping material.
Wait. Why was she sleeping on jagged rocks? And for that matter, why were they out in… oh. Hm. Well, this was certainly nightmare material.
All around them lay a burned out, blasted forest. Dead trees lay scattered about and covered in what she'd originally thought was snow, but as she dug her hand into it realized it was ash. It WAS cold though, bitterly so, and in her thin hoodie and jean shorts, she was freezing. In the far distance, across a narrow sea stood a truly gigantic volcano bigger than anything she could have imagined existing on Earth spewing into the cloudy sky. The weirdest thing though, had to be the occasional giant mushroom sprouting from the ground, easily twice her height, if not more. They themselves were within a strategically placed alcove of rocks.
"…Where the hell are we?" she asked Nagisa.
"I'm not sure," Nagisa sighed, "What's the last thing you remember?"
… Oh. OH. "… Pretty sure the world ended," Kyoko muttered as she rubbed her eyes, "Great. So that's a thing," she looked around, "… Where's Sayaka?"
Nagisa shrugged helplessly, "You're the only one I've found. I was worried, you weren't responding. You've been out for hours".
Kyoko sighed. Her mind was quickly coming to a number of conclusions that while they made sense, weren't ones she was happy with, "… I doubt we'll see any of them, except Homura maybe. They're too good for this place".
Nagisa frowned in confusion, "… You know where we are?"
Kyoko closed her eyes as she let off a mirthless laugh, repressing an involuntary shiver that was only partially the fault of the cold, "Isn't it obvious? We're in Hell." They were damned, and as far as Kyoko was concerned, she deserved every last bit of it.
Madoka stared at the pink soul gem in her hands. Her soul gem. Which… wasn't supposed to exist anymore, but this was hardly the weirdest thing she'd experienced today. She'd checked a mirror; pink eyes and short hair. She was mortal again, stripped of divinity for the second time in the span of a month.
Wow, she was really bad at this.
The former goddess had cried her eyes out until she literally couldn't anymore, and now mostly existed in a state of "wanting to curl up into oblivion." At some point Bren's wife (Aia, was it?) had come by with some bread, and despite her protestations that she wasn't hungry, one bite had confirmed the exact opposite.
Mami hadn't left her side for a moment, doing her best to keep her spirits up and generally fill her in on what had happened in the solid day(!) she'd been out cold, and Madoka was so very glad she was around because she wasn't sure what she'd do if she was alone right now.
Madoka banished that particular train of thought.
The bigger issue right now was Sayaka. The other girl hadn't woken up at all, and her soul gem currently resting on the end table was filled with indescribable colors courtesy of Homura. Fears of witch-hood quickly abated when it was clear nothing was going to happen, and Madoka wasn't even sure if it was possible to become a witch a second time. Or rather… if it was possible to become a witch after she would-have-been-but-didn't-because-she-was-added-to-The Law of Cycles. Or…
Eugh, Madoka's head hurt, and the nature of Homura's ascension only made the question even more confusing. Homura had somehow done something Madoka hadn't even been aware was possible, and she hadn't really had any time to puzzle it out, considering she'd "known" devil(?) Homura for a grand total of about five minutes, and most of that had been spent locked in combat.
… Devil Homura? Eh. She'd leave the clever nicknames to someone more capable than herself. Besides, thinking about her that way pained Madoka. Homura wasn't evil, despite what she'd said. Or done…ish. Mostly. She glanced back at Sayaka.
… Crud.
Madoka felt dumb. She'd once been a timeless infinite being, able to reach her consciousness across the cosmos at will. Now everything felt restricted and fuzzy. Even her memories of the experience felt distant and disjointed, like a half-remembered dream, as if she was trying to grasp something beyond her comprehension.
"… Do you think she's going to be alright?" Madoka asked Mami mournfully, looking over at Sayaka's sleeping form. She certainly didn't look well; her eye bags and gaunt appearance revealing the other girl's suffering in a way her otherwise peaceful sleep did not.
Mami shook her head, "I don't know. I want to say her gem looks a little less dark than it did yesterday, but I can't be sure. I wish I had some grief cubes to give her." Nothing the apothecary had on hand had worked, not that either of them had expected it to. Sayaka wasn't suffering a physical ailment; whatever Homura had done to her had been directed at her soul. Madoka had tried to take the burden off Sayaka of course, but it seemed she didn't possess any of her old powers. She just… wasn't the Law of Cycles anymore. At all.
Madoka sighed with bewilderment and abject sorrow as she brushed a lock of Sayaka's hair out of the girl's face with her hand, "… Homura, what have you done?"
Holding her own soul gem, Mami again attempted a simple spell.
Nothing.
"Still can't cast anything?" Madoka asked her.
"No. I don't know if it's going to come back." The situation reminded Mami of a conversation she'd once had with Kyoko when the latter had been reflecting on her lost illusion magic, and Mami wondered if this felt anything like that or if she was just completely off-base. Certainly, she hadn't rejected her wish, and even then it had only cost Kyoko part of her abilities.
Neither Mami or Madoka had been able to do so much as transform or do anything beyond switch their gems between ring and gem form, which only furthered Madoka's endless questions; why bother giving her back a soul gem if her magic was going to be useless? Why was her magic useless? None of this added up.
Needless to say, none of this was doing any favors for Madoka's already terrible mental state.
"… This is all my fault," she whispered to herself, staring at the floor.