780/A Time For Peace And A Time For War

A Time For Peace And A Time For War
Date of Scene:	01 January 2016
Location:	Plot Room #1
Synopsis:	Mami has Homura over for tea. No shots are fired. Walpurgisnacht is discussed. Cake is eaten.
Cast of Characters:	Mami Tomoe, Homura Akemi

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Mami Tomoe has posed:
After the fight against the Retail Witch, during which there was a lot of accusatory shouting, discussions were had in small about the fact that Mami and Homura needed to have a meeting. So, the next day, Mami resolves to do just that. She sends Homura a text message. "We should talk. Get it out before Walpurgisnacht arrives. Make plans too. Would you please consdier accepting an invitation to tea at my apartment? This evening?" the question followed, with an addres. (Not that Homura needed the address, but Mami doesn't know that!)

When Homura does accept the invitation, Mami explodes into a whirlwind of domestic activity. By the time Homura arrives, Mami has cleaned every inch of the tiniest speck of dust, made three different cakes, and the tea is waiting to be served.

Even for someone who seems to have very different thoughts and ideals, Mami refuses to let them see to the inner chaos that she hides with aggressive attempts at visible outer 'perfection'.

It's too bad for Mami that Homura's already seen her at her worst, in ways Mami can't even begin to comprehend.

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura Akemi's responding text is not long in the coming. "Alright. We do have a lot to talk about. Especially if we both plan to tackle Walpurgisnacht. We've been meaning to have this talk for a while, haven't we?"

    Homura shows up, in the evening. She doesn't make Mami wait very long. When she walks up to Mami's door, she shows up alone. It wouldn't be fair to outnumber Mami in her own home, after all. It's not the kind of thing Homura would do after Madoka has been asking her to be more considerate to others.

    Homura reaches up to the door, hesitates for a moment and knocks. She's here, not in henshin, but in a thick purple winter coat, complete with a fuzzy hat. It's really cold in the middle of January!

    While waiting for Mami to open the door, Homura hugs her body and looks both ways down the hallway. Whatever she's looking for, she doesn't know, she's just a little habitually paranoid. Meeting Mami in her lair isn't helping that at all.

Mami Tomoe has posed:
The Mami Tomoe that meets Homura Akemi at the door is almost nothing like the one that was yelling at her in the the fight with the witch - at least in attitude or looks. Mami's in a little dress with a bow motif and actual bows on it, and a little red hemline at the bottom. She smiles wide when she opens the door, and steps back to let Homura in.

"Akemi-san, I am really quite glad you were able to make it today. We do have a lot to talk about, you are right." Then she drops a little bit of her overly sweet demeanor and looks down a bit. "I am...sorry for my part in the hostility between us. It's not something I want to continue. We have so many more problems right now than what's happened in the past. So..." then she perks up.

"I have tea, and cakes, and I got out some of my notes on Walpurgisnacht, too."

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura looks at Mami in her dress. She isn't surprised that she has such a dress, but she is a little surprised that Mami is greeting her with it. Homura was expecting this conversation to have a bit more... intimidation, to say the least. Maybe it's just been too long since she actually sat down and talked with Mami.

    "Thanks for having me over, Tomoe-san. I'm glad we have a chance to discuss things."

    Homura glances away and down, she actually looks embarassed. "I'm also sorry for the part that I played, both against you and Kyouko. It's true that I was trying to make things better, but I trusted the wrong people and that led to a lot of bad things."

    Homura walks through the door, past Mami, turning around to face her. "I've got notes of my own I'd like to share with you... but... I'm not sure how to explain how I got them."

    Homura glances inside of Mami's apartment, at the promised cakes and tea. There's something distantly nostalgic about it. "It smells nice, Tomoe-san."

Mami Tomoe has posed:
Mami bows a little bit as Homura enters and then she closes the door. "Well, you're still a guest, Akemi-san. And it's only polite." she says, an open hand gesturing to the glass table where one of the cakes sits, already with two slices on plates.

"I... understand that you have some secrets you need to keep, Akemi-san. I hope one day you'll trust me enough to share them, but right now I just want to focus on Walpurgisnacht." she says.

As they walk to the table, Mami begins with what she knows. "So... the signs are showing that it will manifest. It's manifested before. There are records, I found some. It's almost always incredibly destructive. Either to civilians... or to Puella Magi. Because it's very powerful. I'm... not sure if that means it was defeated, or just driven off. I'm not sure of any witch that can come back from being destroyed. You'd think it'd just drop... a grief seed, and Kyubey would dispose of it... and that'd be the end of it." she says, softly. "Do you know, Akemi-san?"

Homura Akemi has posed:
    "Perhaps one day I will share those secrets with you, but I don't think you have time to hear my entire life story right now," says Homura, as she walks towards the familiar glass table and takes a seat in front of one of the cakes.

    The purple-eyed Puella listens to Mami as she discusses what she knows, and Homura looks down at the offered cake. It's more like she's staring past it. "I don't know about the trends that Walpurgisnacht has shown in the past. What I do know is that Walpurgisnacht doesn't drop a Grief Seed. I know this... because I've defeated it before, but I didn't do it alone. A creature like that isn't something that any one of us could take on by themselves. I know that for a fact. I've tried it."

    Homura clears her throat, saying, "Sorry, but I don't think this conversation will get very far unless I explain at least one thing. My Wish involved time travel. As a result I was stuck in a timeloop where I faced Walpurgisnacht over and over, nearly a hundred times. It didn't always get defeated, and even when someone did defeat it the cost was too high to accept."

    "I don't know if this Walpurgisnacht is even the same one I lost to over and over, because the timing is way off. If it's even a fraction as powerful as that one, we'll need as much help as we can. I would prefer to face it with an army, but we'll see."

Mami Tomoe has posed:
Mami nods a bit. "No, I do think we're a bit limited on time. The signs are increasing." she puts a finger on a stack of paper. "The feeling. It's probably very close."

"No grief seed... then how does it return?" she asks. "And how do yo-"...

And then Homura answers Mami. And Mami... takes it perhaps more calmly than someone else might. "If that's true... well... you're not the first to wish to re-do a moment in time." she says quietly, before sipping her tea. "I don't really have any reason to doubt what you say." In fact, it makes some sense. Though Mami is assuming Walpurgisnacht is the reason Homura went back in time. "If it is, that's all the more reason to make sure we defeat it then."

Mami decides somewhat quickly to make an active effort NOT to pry into alternate timelines. It seems complicated, and... she wants to focus on what she can do here and now.

"The timing is off?" she asks, though. That's perhaps relevant. "You mean it's showing up differently here than it did last time? Or all the other times?" she asks, before taking a bite of cake.

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura thinks about the timing. Some dates she has memorized. Other dates are a bit of an oddity and harder to remember. "It usually shows up on April 30th. My timeloop usually begins on March 16th. For some reason this time loop has a number of anomalies that I won't waste our time on. I woke up some time in May, at least two months late. I assumed Walpurgis would also be two months late, but it was nowhere to be found... until recently."

    "Which, if it shows up in the window that I expect it to, puts it... 9 months late."

    Homura decides not to get into what she saw in other timelines either, except when it is necessary. There's no reason why Homura has to recount Mami's flipout, and there's no way she'd ever detail the reasons behind that flipout. It'd be best if Mami lives her whole life without knowing.

    "Walpurgisnacht has always been very punctual. It's odd that things have ended up like they have, but once in a while I encounter a timeline with strange anomalies. This is just another one of those times."

    Finally, Homura remembers that there is a cake in front of her, that she's been staring at blankly this whole time. She reaches for it and takes a bite.

Mami Tomoe has posed:
Mami nods a bit. She's filing this away, mentally, somewhere. "Nine months late... I hope the thing didn't have a baby." She says this as a joke, but this really isn't a joking moment, so it likely falls a little flat. She sighs.

"So you have a lot of experience fighting it, still. Which is more than I have in all of this..." she gestures to the notes. "So I'm glad you agreed to talk with me. It's still important we stop this. There's a lot of lives at stake. And protecting people... that's a thing I think we both want to do, for different reasons."

She stops as Homura eats her cake and asks. "Do you know what it is. Is it a witch? If it is... why doesn't it drop a grief seed? Why is it so powerful? Why doesn't it use a barrier or labrynth - the research I did says it doesn't, that's right, isn't it?" Mami is driven forward by a combination of a need for information and a desperate and true desire to protect people - with every life lost in front of her weighing so heavily on her spirit, she can ill afford the sort of loss of life that seems to come along with Walpurgisnacht.

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura cracks a smile as the baby comment is brought up. It had crossed her mind, too. She just didn't want to admit it. The smile fades quickly, only having been there for a moment.

    Homura pauses at the comment about protecting people. After a moment, she nods. "I think anyone who lives in this city has a reason to stop Walpurgis. I would also like to prevent that loss of life, and I know you do as well. That's a tragedy that should never be allowed to happen."

    Homura sets down her cake after having bitten it, and looks up at Mami. "To that, I have only theories. I have reason to believe that Walpurgisnacht is not actually a normal Witch as we understand them, but rather a fusion of several Witches together. It's even in the name. Walpurgis Nacht refers to a holiday that is associated with the gathering of Witches. However, that's only a theory."

    Homura takes out a smartphone, messes with it until she finds the picture of Walpurgisnacht. She turns the phone so that Mami can see it. "However, regardless of what Witches I killed before Walpurgisnacht arrived, it always had this same shape. So I'm not sure how true that is."

    "What is true is that it has never before used a labyrinth when I've seen it. As far as I can tell it's because it doesn't feel any need to hide. It's also possible that it simply cannot generate one."

    Homura places the phone on the table, and says, "That phone has a lot of pictures... both of Walpurgis, and its familiars. The familiars themselves are strong enough to threaten a Puella Magi."

Mami Tomoe has posed:
Mami nods. "The good news is, I think you're right. And there are a lot of magical people living in this city." she says, with a smile. "More than anywhere else in the world, as far as I can tell." Mami has, in fact, been doing a little traveling. Another timeline hiccup. "There are more Puella Magi here, and then there's all the other kinds of magical people which I don't even think exist outside of this city."

She leans in to look at the strange picture of the Witch. "It's... still like nothing else I've ever seen." she says. "And... that seems to match some of the notes." she adds. And then a long pause. "Akemi-san... some of the notes that I was able to find..." she stops, and corrects herself. "That Virtue was able to help me find... they're ancient, Akemi-san. And I can see elements of the description in this picture. So it doesn't seem to change."

"I don't think it needs a labrynth because nobody without magical powers survives long enough." she says, absolutly and completly coldly. "And then if what you say about the familiars is true..." she sighs.

"It is a very good thing Virtue owes me a lot of favors. It seems like we'll be calling them in - calling everyone we know in. I don't think anyone can really sit on the sidelines for this one. Especially not if those familiars run free and cause damage on their own."

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura nods solemnly. "The increased magical population is one of the irregularities of this timeline. One thing I can say, and this gives me a lot more optimism than I'd normally have, is that the increased population is going to work a lot in our favor. Normally, I'd have maybe 3 Puella to work with, myself included, at best. Two is barely enough, but one or both of them will probably die. Taking it by myself has never been enough."

    Homura shrugs and says, "I think... this time around, if we spread the word, we can get enough help. I can probably get WPS and a few others on board, but it would be easier if Kyouko and Sayaka were approached by you. On that note, any help that Virtue can offer would help immensely."

    Homura picks up the cellphone, and swipes past a few pictures where Mami can see them. A couple of them are images of multicolored elephants, or some kind of parade. There are some pictures of floating girls made out of some dark blue or purple energy filled with sparkles, almost as if their outline were a window into a starry night sky. The picture that Homura rests on is a picture of a ruined wasteland where there are only a few scattered remains of what used to be buildings. "This is what failure looks like. The parade familiars are mostly harmless. It's the girl familiars you have to watch out for, they have a ranged beam attack and they have enough speed to keep up with you. However, most of the destruction comes from Walpurgisnacht itself."

    Homura swipes again, showing an image of a floating half of a skyscraper. "The Witch literally lifts buildings up with its magic and throws them around. Those buildings really hurt when they hit you. More than once I've been taken out of the fight by that alone. It also has fire breath."

Mami Tomoe has posed:
"I'll just have to take your word for it, Akemi-san. I only know this one timeline." she says with a half-smirk, even as they talk about this very serious issue. She refills both of their teacups - even though it doesn't need much of a refilling. It's more of a habit, more of a soothing action while talking about such troubling things.

"I have a feeling Sakura-san will be more willing to listen to me than you, yes. Besides, she keeps crashing here - she owes me, too. And I think Miki-san will come along if Sakura-san does." she says, agreeing to Homura's comments there. "Virtue... I'd have to shoot them all dead in order to get them to not help. That's the kind of people they are. That's why I work with them."

"It hit you with a building?" Mami says, picking that out of all the talk about familiars... though a closer look at the familiars themselves is warranted, suddenly, and she pulls Homura's phone closer. "They don't look like normal familiars, Akemi-san." she says, though she doesn't go into specifics.

Then she stops. "Akemi-san... I think the combat breifing, like this... since you have this knowledge. We should have more people here for it." she says, intentionally not looking at the phone right now. It's obvious she's averting her gaze.

"We should get as many people as we can together so you can tell us all about this at once. So we can make plans based on the people we have."

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura sees her teacup filled, and takes a sip of it. "I've met a few members of Virtue. I find them rather likeable as a whole. Easy to work with, too. Especially when it comes to matters of saving people." When she places her teacup down, she adds, "Runealy and Hinote... well, you met them already, but I should mention... She knows about our situation and has actively demonstrated a willingness to help. Despite her checkered past, I think she means well and can be trusted."

    Another sip of tea, before she adds, "Though, you could probably tell that just by the way they were willing to help earlier."

    Homura instinctively rubs her arm after being asked about the building. It's a little silly, because those wounds healed a long time ago, but Homura still remembers...

    "Yeah... a few times. As for those familiars, well... I wouldn't worry too much about the shape. These aren't the only near-humanoid familiars I've seen."

    Homura notices that Mami isn't looking too close at the smartphone, and she, for a moment, squints. Did she show her too much? Homura picks up the phone, shutting it off and putting it back in her pocket while trying to convince herself that she hasn't just ruined everything.

    "Yeah, I think so. I think your notes will be helpful, too. Since this timeline is different, and since the timing of Walpurgisnacht is so off, there's a good chance that there might be something in them that I don't know about."

Mami Tomoe has posed:
"I'm glad you think so. They've been very kind to me. In exchange I've been helping them deal with some particularly troublesome witches." she says, of Virtue.

"I still need to talk with that Princess directly, anyways. Even if she comes to our big meeting... I need to ask her some questions."

"Yeah, familiars come in all shapes and sizes." Mami says. It almost sounds like she's trying to convince herself.

When it comes to her notes being helpful, Mami nods a bit. "Hopefully between your experience and my notes... and all of the help we can both bring to bear... there won't be..." she even now stops to take a bite of cake, to center herself. "...any tragedies."

"I know we won't always see eye to eye on everything. I was naive and I used to think I could make everyone see things my way." she admits, after a very long pause. "But I learned that lesson. And it doesn't mean that we can't work together where we can, even if sometimes we do work against each other. This monster... this tragedy in waiting... this is one place where I'm very glad to have your help, Akemi-san."

Homura Akemi has posed:
    Homura glances down at what's left of her cake. She picks it up and eats the rest of it. After she's done, she snorts, for no apparent reason, but it's the kind of snort that has a bit of sadness to it.

    Homura stands up from the table, hand on her phone. "It might be easier to host the meeting at my place. I have a large display screen, and also I have a lot of empty space and sitting room. I don't think you have my address... here." Homura pulls out a card. It's a WPS business card, but on the back is written Homura's address and phone number.

    Homura glances at Mami, then looks down and away. She's clearly disturbed. Well, Mami was always one who took the truth hard. It's something that Homura will have to watch out for, and maybe even deal with.

    "Maybe we wont always agree, but when it's really important it's nice that we can talk like this. I also appreciate your help. This is something I know that I cannot do alone."

    She pulls out her phone again, and looks at the time. "I should probably head out. Thanks for having me over, Tomoe-san."