Puella Magi Madoka Magica: After The Tragedy

Chapter 22: I apologize for not being there

Nagisa

It's really fun on the playground.
She has already found a friend there, which she didn't expect at all to happen.

They even ate ice cream together.
It's such a nice day, she too thinks to herself.
She feels like a normal child for once, like the ones she had seen in her school, or here on the playground.
Not like a lonely child, neglected by her parents, or a magical girl fighting against the supernatural.
She just feels normal today.
And it's comforting.

They continue playing together.

"Hm...", Kaito goes.
"What else could we play before you have to go again?"

"Hm...", Nagisa repeats.
"What about... catch?"

"Great idea! And the person who is it at the end has to do a dare next time we meet!"

Doing dares, she has been comfortable at that. It sounds scary to her, since they could ask you to do anything, even things that would horrify one.
Though, she can't just back away.
She has faced more scary things than a simple dare, especially as a magical girl.
So instead, she accepts the offer.
"Alright, let's do that!", she replies in a motivated tone.

"So..., who is going to be It first?", Kaito asks.

"I haven't thought about that...", Nagisa answers.

She thinks about doing a coin flip, but that is interrupted as Kaito suggests something different.
"Then I'll be It first!", he almost shouts.

He starts running and quickly touches Nagisas shoulder before she could even react to it.
"Got you!", he shouts.

She gets angered by the surprise and retaliates by touching his shoulder too.
"Now I got you!", she shouts back.

Kaito tries to catch her again, but she reacts quick enough and swiftly dodges back.
And then, the hunt begins.
Nagisa runs across the playground, while Kaito chases her.

Eventually, he does catch up and succeeds in catching her.
He too runs away while she goes after him.
She too catches him at some point, and the roles are reversed again, and so on.
In their childlike eyes, it seemed like a struggle of epic proportions.

She considers using her magical girl powers to win this struggle, it would be just unfair. It would feel like she would be cheating.
But she cannot lose to him, can she?
So she decides to use it only in absolute emergencies, whatever that may be in a match of catch.

She sometimes looks over to Mami, so seems to sometimes look over to them playing catch, and smiles while doing so.
It motivates her even more to win, she must make her proud, after all.

As time goes on, the simple children's game becomes more and more intense and exhausting.
Sometimes the chases are long, and sometimes they are short.
But they do not give up, it seems.
Both the girl and boy are determined to win.

Though, eventually, Kaito becomes completely exhausted, and Nagisa too has less energy than before.

After 15 minutes of chasing and running, he stands still as he gets caught by Nagisa on the back one last time.

Kaito grunts as he grabs his hip, and speaks in defeat.
"I'm com-pletely exhausted. I surrender! You win!"
"You were pretty good, I'm exhausted too.", Nagisa answers.

She has claimed victory in the struggle.
Wondering if Mami saw that, she looks to the bench where she would normally sit.

To her surprise and shock however, she is gone. The bench is empty. It's saddening.
Only her bag, and a yellow piece of golden-glowing ribbon remains.

Whilst Kaito regains his breath, Nagisa walks to the empty bench.
As she comes closer, she notices engravings on the ribbon piece.

She picks it up and reads it.

"I apologize for not being there. There's a witch nearby that I have to take care of. I'll be right back!

Love
Mami."

While she is impressed by the fact Mami can engrave writing on her ribbons, she is also saddened by the reminder of their duty.

As she looks at her ring, she realizes it's blinking.
How long has it been already blinking?
She drags the soul gem out of her own ring. It's clearly blinking.

She cannot just leave her alone to hunt the witches, can she?
She cannot.

Without saying goodbye to her newfound friend Kaito, she goes after Mami with the help of her own soul gem.