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Night. Or rather, whatever passed for night on the meatship. With the threat of the Melting Clock gone, the ship's crew was free to return to their normal schedules. Unbeknownst to anyone on the ship, Stacy was hiding something. Not that this is anything new, but this is a fairly recent something. Something that wasn't on the ship before the last podpop.

So in the dead of 'night' when the majority of the ship was asleep, or working, or otherwise holed up somewhere, a shadow suddenly appears in an empty sensorium. The Shadow darted about, running up the walls, on the ceiling, looking for any means of escape. After a few more minutes of scrambling around the room, the Shadow found the door, and immediately darted out and down the nearest corridor.

Mami Tomoe wasn't normally a night owl. Before she was taken on board Stacy, she was never up at the wee hours of the morning; she needed all the rest she could get, after all, having to keep up with schoolwork and witch hunting. Even now, when she had nothing to occupy her time other than staying by her injured friend's bedside, one would think she would keep up that habit.

But that was far from the truth. Between her restlessness over Madoka's current condition and her frequent nightmares, Mami hasn't been sleeping well the past few days. So here she was, in the nearly vacant Obs Deck, staring at her nearly-dim Soul Gem. The sight greatly unsettled her, even though she didn't know what would happen when it went completely dark.

And then, as if in response to her thoughts, the gem flared to life. Not the healthy golden glow of a fully restored Soul Gem, no, but a dim, sickly glow. The only reason it would glow like this was if...

Damn.

In one fluid motion, Mami jumped off her chair, pulled out her comm, and punched in seven words:

Witch. Meet me in the Obs Deck.

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Sayaka smiled as she heard that from Mami, flying out of the way of fire as she watched Mami form that massive gun of hers. Hopefully this was going to work, but in case it didn't, Sayaka was ready with her blades to start attacking the witch again.

With the other girl safely out of the line of fire, Mami set the cannon's sights on the witch just as the fuse burned down to nothing.

"Tiro Finale!"

A massive burst of energy tore through the witch, effectively incinerating it. The attack was a classic finishing move, so there was no fear of the witch reforming.

The dimension around them flickered and faded, and they were once again in one of the many halls of the ship. sticking straight up in the floor in front of them was their prize: a single Grief Seed. Taking a shaky step forward, Mami picked it up, and held it out to Sayaka.

"You first?"

Sayaka landed on the floor of the ship, changing back to normal and taking a few deep breaths as she looked up at Mami. "... yeah, thanks."

She held out her gem to the grief seed, watching as the black darkness from the gem moved over into the seed.

When she was finished, she pulled her Soul Gem away, looking over at Mami.

"We need to find a better way of practicing, hopefully one that won't use our Soul Gem's energy."

"The Sensoriums would be a good place to practice, don't you think?" Mami said as she summoned her own Soul Gem, holding it close as the Grief Seed drained the darkness out of it. "We could recreate our weapons and various enemies, and we'll be safe from serious injury."

Sayaka nodded. "Yeah, that's a good idea. We should've thought of it sooner, really."

Mami laughed. "Yes, we should've. I've been so preoccupied with getting used to how things work here, it completely slipped my mind."

Which wasn't entirely true. There was that incident in the Sensoriums with Charlotte, but that... was more of a way to put her mind at ease. She wanted to defeat that witch with her own power, to get rid of the horrid nightmares that had bee plaguing her, not train.

And speaking of witch...

"I suppose we should inform those in charge about this little incident."

Sayaka blinked, before realizing what that meant. "That's right. The people here will actually believe us, won't they?"

"I'm sure they will." Mami said with a nod. She pulled out her omnicomm, typing up a quick message and sending it off. "It's... strange, not having to hide any of this."

"Yeah, it is," Sayaka said. "It's going to be kinda strange to talk to anyone else from our world if they wake up though. Unless they were involved in this too, anyway."

Any hint of a smile on Mami's face disappeared at that. "... I don't mean to sound cruel, Miki-san, but it's hard to believe anyone from our world who isn't a Puella Magi is down in those caves."

She may not have meant to sound cruel, but it was still pretty harsh. "The whole reason this ship saved us is because we're fighters. We're useful pawns for our saviors to throw at their enemy. I doubt they're going to be saving normal, mundane people that have no place in an interdimensional war."

Sayaka frowned. "I guess. But not everyone here has powers or anything like that. There might still be a chance that someone who isn't a Puella Magi is down there."

"Maybe not, but those people still have some use." She didn't mention it, but the first person Mami thought of was, of course, Madoka. She didn't make her contract, but Kyuubey had said that she had the potential to become a great Puella Magi. So while she was a normal human, there was probably a possibility to harness that potential.

"But people like our teachers, acquaintances..." Friends, family. Mami, while having no friends outside of Madoka and Sayaka to speak of, and no living parents, was kind enough not to say that bit out loud. "I doubt they were saved."

Sayaka sighed, looking away from Mami. "Well, I'm just going to hope that they are there. It's all we can really do..."

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