A chill wind blows into the broken window of the gym, sending a few tiny shards of glass skittering across the floor. Yuzuki and Kohaku are boarding up the window, Yuzuki bracing the wood and nails against the frame while Kohaku hammers. 

Kohaku: Good. Just a couple more boards should do it and then we can cover this up. 

Yuzuki: There’s still a little glass on the floor…

Kohaku: I guess Aoi was too busy seeing to Kiwako. It’ll fall to us to sweep the rest up. Okay, hold the board still there.

Yuzuki holds the board in position while Kohaku pounds in the nails. The battered window frame gives way on the other side, and the board they’re holding drops suddenly. The hammer strikes Yuzuki squarely in the finger, but she doesn’t flinch.

Yuzuki: Whoops… I guess there was some damage on the other side. You okay?

Kohaku: Uh, yeah. I thought I hit you for a second.

Yuzuki: (With a sad smile, she shows her finger, seemingly unharmed) You did, I just… since I made my contract, it’s been really hard for me to get hurt, so… 

Kohaku: (She hefts the board back into place, eyeing the other side where they’ll have to redo some of the work) Huh. That’s a useful power. 

Yuzuki: N-not really, no… 

Kohaku: (She gives Yuzuki a questioning look) Well, c’mon. Let’s finish this up. It’ll be freezing down in the basement until we do. 

Down in the basement, the temperature has indeed dropped below a point anyone is comfortable with, Niko wearing her school uniform duffel coat as she pours two bowls of porridge for the girls wrapped up in blankets on the couch.

Niko: Well… I-I followed the package instructions. Don’t wanna hear anyone complain, okay?

Kiwako: Owowowowow! (Kiwako hisses, flinching from Aoi’s healing efforts)

Aoi: I’m sorry. Just a little longer. (Aoi has both her wings and medical supplies out, trying to suture a cut) 

Kiwako: Stupid soul-brain-egg-thingy making me think this pain is real… (she sniffles)

Yui: S’wouldn’t be a goddamn problem if you knew how to fuckin’ heal yourself, kid. Just sayin’.

Kiwako: …K-Kiwa-chan.

Alice: (she puts a hand on Yui’s shoulder) Maybe we oughta cut the kid some slack, Yui. Let’s head upstairs, I’m sure Segawa’s already providing Aoi with all the help she needs.

Yui: (She considers her reply for a bit, as if she really wants to say something, but simply sighs and turns towards the stairs) …Yeah. Guess so. Probably can’t break any more hammers tryin’ to board the place up at this point. …Probably.

Aoi: Sorry. We don’t have much lidocaine or I’d put more on for the pain. 

Kiwako: I-It’s fine, Aoi-chan. I’m not sure medicine would work on me, anyway. You’re doing your best. …Can I see the dancing little thingies again though? That coooould help with the pain~

Aoi: (She furrows her brow, trying to figure out what Kiwako means before asking) … What dancing little thingies? 

Kiwako: You know! The dancing little Witch thingies! Mei-chan told me about them while we were training. …Oh. (Kiwako frowns and looks down)

Yui: …(she says nothing, walking swiftly towards the stairs)

Aoi: (A short pause, her eyes following Yui, before she decides to continue as if it hadn’t happened) Oh, the Walpurgis Night’s chorus. I guess they’re here with me, yeah. 

Kiwako: …I hope Yui-chan doesn’t hate me now… 

Aoi: She wouldn’t hate you over just mentioning her name. Come on. Here. (With a reluctant sigh, she points off to the side. The chorus bounds in, from behind a partition as if they were always hiding there and not just beckoned into existence. They caper in a circle around Aoi and Kiwako, giggling and whispering to each other) 

Kiwako: (a soft, almost uncharacteristically innocent smile lights Kiwako’s face as she watches the dancing chorus)

Upstairs, Alice quietly heads towards the safe, opens it up to check on the Baton, then closes and locks it again.

Alice: I… forgot to thank Aoi for what she did.

Yui: …Yeah. Aoi kinda saved our asses. Kept bad from becoming worse. (Yui is leaning against the back wall, right next to the door) …Could’ve been so much worse.

Alice: I shouldn’t have insisted on coming with you.

Yui: Are you fucking kidding me?! You think I wanted to come back to find you dead instead?!

Alice: No! That’s not… w-what I mean, I mean… (she stammers, shaking her head) Sorry, I’m just… It’s natural to blame yourself when things like this happen. B-But I trusted Aoi, and she came through, and… Sorry. This isn’t about me.

Yui: (she leans her forehead against the wall of the office) …I should’ve been here. I should’ve… fucking been here, Alice. I could’ve gone off script and sent Kohaku out to get our shit on her own… (she shakes her head) …Mei really was the only one who could have chased Shiori off. I remember… I still remember everything that Sabrina did when they fought. I can feel her punches on Shiori’s dumb bitch face… I can feel every hit Shiori gave in return… I can still see the sparks comin’ off of her when Sabrina tapped into my magic. …Even my fucking Witch grieved enough to make Shiori hurt. But… it was Mei, with that power she had, that really saved this fucking place. (Yui brings her fist against the wall) …She was just a fucking kid, Alice! I don’t give a shit if she was as bad a chick as I am. …She was a kid, and I fought like fucking hell to keep her stupid ass alive from day fucking one. 

Alice: … But she did what you would have done, Yui. She… She took responsibility and fought to protect the people here who couldn’t protect themselves. I… I know we shouldn’t… expect that of a kid, but… This wasn’t your fault. If anything, it’s because of Mei… because of you… that we’re all still here.

Yui: (Yui lets a single tear hit the floor before she wipes her eyes, turning back to face Alice) …And those fucking Balancers, because of them, that Mei’s gone. …I can grieve for her later. I can fuck them all up now. (she looks down at her closed left fist) …What’s falling off the pacifist wagon one more time gonna mean anyway, when I’m up against monsters like this?

Alice: Th—(she fidgets, closing her eyes) They’re… There’s only… one monster. And its name… is Kyubey. Yui, I don’t… really know Shiori, but I know… I know people. I think. And people… P-People don’t act like that. People… People aren’t that cruel. K-Kyubey… did something to her. Eradicated her humanity. Like… Like it did with Anisa… Like my father lost himself. Magic… corrupting people into pawns of… forces so powerful they don’t care about… anything. We… We have to stop the cycle. Or before you know it… we’ll be the next Balancers.

Yui: (her eyes swirl with silent streaks of violet lightning for a moment, before she blinks, returning to normal) …I’m still gonna beat the shit out of them though. All of them.

Alice: I-If we play their game, we have to follow their rules!

Yui: Her rules are do whatever the fuck you want—

Niko: (she appears at the top of the stairs, holding up a ringing phone) Ehm, s-sorry to interrupt. Your phone.

Yui: (she makes a quick, half-assed effort to wipe her face on her sleeve before turning to face Niko, taking the phone) Jeez… th-thanks. (looking at the “Unknown Caller” message, she answers) …I sure as hell hope you have good news for me, Kotori.

Riko: …Kotori is gone, Forte. (a muffled, stifled sob could be heard from behind Riko) I am her cousin, Riko Sato. My twin sister Rio is with me. …We are also fledgling Birds of Fujiwara. …I have news.

Yui: (her eyes widen in absolute shock) …No fuckin’ way.

Alice: (she gets up close to Yui, gesturing at her to put it on speaker, which Yui does)

Riko: Listen to me, Yui. (Riko takes a deep breath, as if to compose herself) …Chiemi Takahata staged an ambush on the Bends. That would be that explosion you heard or saw the other day. My cousin, my sister and I all assisted in the ambush. But… we were unaware that Satomi Yasuda somehow obtained a replica of her grandfather’s baton.

Yui and Alice listen to this with completely stunned expressions on their faces.

Riko: We were led into a trap. Punisher got the drop on Chiemi, and we essentially had to fight for our lives in order for us to escape. Chiemi… detonated the bombs she set up to take the Balancers out, while she was still inside. Kotori burned her soul to fuel one last fight with Punisher. …My sister and I are the only survivors. 

Yui: (Yui, who had been pacing back and forth, brings her fist against the back wall of the gym’s ground floor) God… FUCKING DAMN IT!

Alice: (she jumps, slightly startled, but doesn’t say anything, covering her mouth with her hand)

Niko: (her eyes widen as she stares at the floor) C-Chie…

Rio: (Both twins flinch inside the huddled phone booth, with Riko dropping the phone. Rio scrambles to pick it up, hesitant in holding it to her ear) …I-I’m sorry, Yui. We’re just… carrying out Kotori’s final orders for us. She told us to relay this information to you. That, and the circumstances of the battle. …Fujiwara no Karasu bade us to relay the secrets of Magia to you. You see… during the encounter with Punisher, Kotori… her Soul Gem cracked. It broke, yet… she endured for a while yet. I saw a light envelope her, one I’ve never seen before. She… was burning through the last ounces of her life force, but… the power she wielded, it was incredible. But more than that… she stood on even ground with Punisher. It… the battle, it did something to her, Yui. She’s normally quite composed, Punisher, but…

Yui: (Yui is doing her best to calm her breathing, her fist still partially embedded in the wall) …She just… unlocked Magia? Right there, on the spot?

Rio: Y…Yes. It seems that way. What self-actualization meant for Kotori… it must have been accepting the end of her life. You knew she was sick, Yui… you probably felt it in her soul, the few times you two met. …You probably also knew that she tried to wish it away, but even the Incubator’s magic wasn’t enough to cure it, simply to numb it. Such cases… incurable diseases and ailments, even to magic, they are becoming frighteningly common…

Yui: …So she just… accepted it, and that was what did it for her?

Rio: …I’ll never know for sure, Yui. But it seems that way. She fought on even ground with Punisher, up until… her soul burned out completely. She said something… something to Chiemi, and that seemed to help her shift what self-actualization meant to her. 

Yui: W… Wait, so… Takahata got it back after all?

Rio: …Yes. She used that power to let my sister and I escape. She teleported us out of the Bends, and the next thing we knew… it was gone. Kotori spent… th-the last of her energy to give me this order, and now we’re relaying it to you… (Another stifled sob, Rio pulling the phone away from her face to try and conceal it)

Yui: …Moot point though, telling me all this. Self-actualization doesn’t mean shit to me. The one lead I had was pacifism. But when I got back to the gym, it was fucked up. Firestarter decided to pay us a visit. ‘Least now I know how it all went down, more or less… but I found Mei in more or less the same shape Kotori was in. …I wasn’t gonna let Mei suffer, s-so…

Alice: (she puts her hand on Yui’s shoulder)

Riko: (taking the phone back from Rio before she can start crying again, Riko sighs) Did you not hear my sister, Forte? Chiemi shifted what it meant for her. You can do the same— this is why Kotori told us to tell you, I’m sure. These Balancers… they’re not the type of enemy you can merely defeat and lock up somewhere. They have to be eliminated, Forte. Or was your pacifism the type that would have someone else kill them, so you can sleep at night?

Rio: R… Riko!

Yui: (Yui is silent for about a minute before she finally pulls her fist out of the cracked wall) …That’s the kinda shit Kotori would’ve said to me. …I wouldn’t even put it past the Oracle.

Riko: But I’m not wrong, am I? You might think it harsh of me to say it like this, but we’re running out of time. In the span of about an hour, three of our number have fallen, and the Bends has exploded. Mitakihara does not have the time to wait on a half-assed answer from one of its most powerful combatants. …If you cannot come to an answer, then relay this information to someone who can.

Yui: …Nah, I’ll find it. What you just told me is, Magia really is the better option. If Kotori stood even with the only one of them with a head on their shoulders… that’s the work I gotta do.

Rio: U-Um… (Rio takes the phone back) …Th-that other option… you don’t mean… Kiwa-chan’s method, do you? (Rio flinches again as she hears another thud on the other end of the line) …L-Listen… she’s still our friend, Yui. Can you at least… tell us if she’s okay? And if so, tell her we’re okay, too?

Yui: (Yui sighs heavily, looking at the second, smaller crack in the wall) …Yeah, that’s fair, I guess. She’s fine, just being a pain in the ass. …But she deserves to know her friends are okay. …Anything else, Birds?

Riko: …That will be all for now, Forte. I… for what it’s worth, we are sorry for all this.

Yui: Don’t be. Not yet, anyway. Once all’s said and done, we can tally the score and see about how we all feel, or whatever. But this ain’t the time. …We all got work to do. (Yui ends the call, pocketing her phone)

Alice: …

Niko: Why… Why’d you go and do something like that, Chie… I-I know Akari is… but I’m still here… we… We were still friends, weren’t we? Why… Why do you always have to sacrifice yourself? Why do you never get… to be… (Niko chokes on her words as she breaks down into tears)

Alice: Segawa… (she slowly walks up to Niko, pulling her into a firm hug) … Don’t pity her for what she did. What she did was brave… Be… Be proud of her.

Niko: What, like how I’m gonna have to be proud when they kill Shinju, too? If they haven’t already? Do I have to be glad all these people sacrifice themselves for me? For my happiness? How am I gonna be happy when everyone I love is DEAD?

Alice: But they’re not. You can keep them with you. That is your power.

Niko: She’s gone, Rinju! She’s gone… I… I don’t sense her anymore. I know she’s gone. I know that fucking asshole got to her before I even had the chance. J-Just like with Akari. It’s all pointless! All completely pointless!

Yui: … Shinju’s alive, Segawa.

Niko: How’d you know that?

Alice: You can take Yui’s word for it—

Niko: She’s my girlfriend, though? W-What gives you the right to know things about her that I can’t know? You knew how she was doing all along? And you didn’t tell me? Why not?

Alice: Segawa, calm down—

Niko: And Chie? What about her? Seeing as everyone and their mom seems to know more about what’s going on in the Dreamscape than I do… Are you gonna tell me she’s secretly alive, too?

Alice: Niko. I-I mean, Segawa. It’s… We’re all upset. Please. The last thing we need right now is people throwing accusations at each other. Yui, I understand what you’re going through, but please… I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.

Yui: …We don’t have time for this. Segawa, I’ll give you three fuckin’ guesses to my source. I hate her fuckin’ scripts as much as anyone else. But I went off the path, and we saw what happened. For now, we gotta figure out how we strike back.

Niko: Well excuse me for needing some time to… be messy about this! Ugh! (she brusquely wriggles out of Alice’s embrace) And by the way… (she sniffles) I’d be glad to hear your explanation for why just telling me my girlfriend is still alive out there would somehow mess up the Oracle’s big plan… or whatever! (she storms off in frustration)

Alice: Niko, we—(she sighs) Better cut her some slack. (she turns to Yui, with a concerned look) You okay? I mean, I know you’re not, but… can you… carry on?

Yui: Oh yeah, right as rain. …Good enough to function. Soon as it’s all done, though, these wheels are gonna fall off. …Sorry in advance.

Alice: … (she utters little more than a worried “hmm”)