#sayaka.

[tsuiito]

"Was it...no, that was her. Oh, maybe--n...no, that was..." She is still trying to pick her own memories of living apart from the other Sayakas. She is going to give herself a migraine somehow.

"Uuuuggh--"

[tsuiito]

NULL @ Sayaka

Painted eyes manifest upon a surface, focusing on the seraph.

"HOW STRANGE. YOU ARE NOT THAT ONE. THE ONE WHO EFFECTIVELY DISSOLVED. YOU PLAY ANOTHER ROLE, ONE OF BIBLICAL SCALE. TO WHAT END DO YOU SERVE YOUR GOD?"

"Have you ever considered nice and polite introduction and conversation before jumping right to the intrusive questioning?" Sayaka raised an eyebrow, staring back at the weird....eyes. This is a new one, not just to her but to all of the memories in her head.

"I don't know. I'm sure there's a Sayaka who dissolved in here somewhere." She tapped the side of her head, frowning. "I serve whatever ends there is to serve. I'm not sure how this is the business of a presence I don't recognize though."

[tsuiito]

The headaches were horrible today. So were the dreams and the voices.

It's the same routine, almost every other day. It isn't like she needs to sleep. But sometimes she does it anyway. Through no fault of her own, something makes her drift off. It makes her visit the memories of the many she took upon herself.

They ranged from surprisingly pleasant to abruptly horrific. Sometimes she felt their pain. She felt their joy and love. She felt their anguish and their wounds as if they were branded on her own body. Glimpses of different versions of the same faces she knew and loved herself. Sometimes she watched them die. Sometimes she watched them scorn her and sometimes they laughed.

Even when she woke, those memories still played. It was like a curse she had agreed to without realizing the extent. But would she take it back? No...she wouldn't. They didn't deserve that. They deserved so much better than all the ways each of them perished. It wasn't fair. It took so long for her to accept her own death, and she couldn't imagine how cheated they felt.

She didn't have to. She felt it, whenever she had to feel the phantom sensations of their last moments. Feel the emotions that wracked their heads in their last breaths, and the pain of whatever their body had to go through.

She didn't let the sentient witch companion she'd come to be so familiar with be burdened with these unusual problems. She didn't like the idea of allowing her temporary host, the strange and quiet shinigami that had watched over her since her re-awakening after what she had done, to deal with her weight. Maybe she never learned. Or maybe her ways mingled with the mindsets of so many other Sayaka Mikis in a way that made her make those same foolhardy decisions she would make before when she was still among the living. But regardless of the reason, she was always trying to trudge through it alone. Grit her teeth. Tremble through it. Steel herself. She could remember who she was. Among the sea of memories and emotions that weren't her own, she could still pick herself out.

Right?

She could, couldn't she?

No, no that's not really right. That's hard to do. Sometimes, she looked at herself and doubted what she saw. She looked at her hands and wondered why they looked like that. She could see her face in a mirror and in the instant she felt unfamiliar with the tired eyes staring back, feel a horror that she wasn't meant to feel.

She wouldn't wish this on anyone. She wasn't sure what the goddesses had to put themselves through, but this? She wasn't meant to do this. Her feeble mind and her body wasn't supposed to wade through the souls of so many others. They were not supposed to be here. But where else would they go? They didn't want to move on. They would be stuck in place otherwise. Damned in a purgatory of their own making because they didn't know what to do. They were never granted the freedom to figure that out. The right.

It's not fair.

Hands rise to her head, fingers slipping through blue hair as she squeezed her eyes shut, breathing out a soft but forced breath. Her name is Sayaka Miki.

Which one is she?

She needed to be able to do this.

She doesn't know how to do this.

She isn't sure she can.

Her head hurts so much.

It's just too loud.

[tsuiito]

@amermaidslily replied to your post “The journal's pages move by their own volition. On...”:

The presence remains quiet, yet it lingers ; contemplating the troubles of this lost angel, drowning in her loneliness and forgetting important pieces of who she was meant to be. The salt water permeates, indicating no intention of leaving. With the sound of waves crashing against the rocks, a voice rings out within Sayaka's head. Her own. “It doesn't have to always be like this. Unless you wish for it to be, but I know that is not what you want.” The low keys of a piano accompany an orchestra composing a melody to soothe a lost soul. A white thread is tied around Sayaka's finger, glowing beyond the scopes of reality ; a trace of the Law of Cycles that she belonged to, signaling its presence—or something close enough to it, to the home she longed for. “I am everywhere,” Multiple voices echo, entangled within the sound of the music. “and nowhere at all. I do not need to go where I am needed, for I am already here.”

​Sliding her arms back onto the desk, Sayaka picks her head up a little bit, regarding the white thread quietly before looking at the journal, then up towards the ceiling with a sigh.

"...you're different. I don't know how though. It's like if I think too hard about why Kanade doesn't feel quite like a god, despite being like one," She quietly muses about it, feeling a little strange, talking to the air. Talking to...a voice in her head. It makes her feel a little...well, she's definitely not well. She already knew that. But she supposed she could take a little comfort in this voice not exactly coming from herself.

Still...maybe it's sad of her to admit, but hearing a voice that wasn't her own voice was a welcome change, even if it was strange. Even if it was unusually layered and unusual.

A Sayaka, maybe? Or maybe an Oktavia. She was too exhausted to tell. Or to linger on why it sounded like that.

"It's still pretty selfish of me to go pulling someone's attention like that, I'm sure. These feelings will go away. They always do, for a while. It's just...a lot. But I guess that's on me for trying to give a damn about those specific versions of me. I...asked for this. I probably should have thought it through more, but...that's never been a very me way of handling things, has it?"

She huffs, looking at the desk. "Sorry if I'm worrying you. Here I was hoping I'd finally left that habit behind."

[tsuiito]

|| In Memoriam [Broken But Loved]

[In reference to @viitiosus]

A small sigh was the only sound in the room before a journal was gently placed back on the desk, and the chair pulled out to sit in. It was a simple little book. The first half had already been heavily used with various inconsistently timed entries. It was a clean white color with gold trim and decorations.

Gently, fingers pull the journal open to the page marked by one of the attached silk ribbons, opening to a page that had been carefully doodled and decorated on. In the center of the paper was carefully drawn lettering, words crafted into a time-consuming but surprisingly artistic title.

"In Memoriam"

"Good job, Sayaka. You've made the atmosphere of this little pet project completely impossible to work out." She frowned, but moved past it already. She had done it while she was bored anyway, still deliberating if she wanted to do this or not.

The next page was blank, save the very first few lines of the page. Scribbled down information on a specific person. Very much like the details of her own living life, but there were enough differences to still ensure she was talking about a different timeline's very own Sayaka Miki.

Residence: Lives with Mami Tomoe Family, estranged. By all accounts they believe she is dead. Notably more mentally unstable. More violent and aggressive. Grew much taller. Good for her. I've seen alternate timelines of her. They all share a peculiar taste in people. They were all fortunate enough to be cared for nonetheless. Died at 19. Cause of Death: Overuse of magic and fatal blow taken protecting Tomoe.

Sayaka's pen rested against the paper, reviewing those notes. She felt particularly attached to her time watching the actions of that one. She wasn't sure why. Maybe she was trying to root for the underdog, or something. No one would look at her and think she was going to make it that long, much less die of anything but succumbing to the corruption of her soul gem. Nothing kept that young woman going except the intensity of the bonds that she had developed with everyone she met and that she realized care for her more than she could ask for.

She began to write. She couldn't help but feel like she was writing some kind of eulogy, even if that wasn't what she was doing. She was just...writing. Her thoughts on them. What she knew of their deaths. How did they feel? Why did this matter at all?

Another sigh as her eyes shut for a moment. Opening them up again, her tired blue eyes scanned the page before she simply began to write again.

That Sayaka's life was an unfortunate wreck. Everything got under her skin more than it should have. Things hit her harder than it should have. She suffered more than she deserved to. Her mind snapped where it needed to stay together, and once that happened, she had to live with it. She had to live as a magical girl, with that. Nobody in that state should have been exploited for the incubators.

She spent so much of her life accepting that it was safer if she stayed away from friendships and family and love that when she started to obtain those things, it was a struggle to convince her to hang on to them. The only people capable of breaking through that kind of shell were the types to stay by her side even when she began to act at her worst. When she started shoving back and started acting like a monster for the sake of scaring people she was afraid of hurting away. She needed people who would see who she was behind her actions of fear and paranoia.

And, she had them. The special case of Mami Tomoe wasn't one to be forgotten on her. That instance of Mami had become precious to this Sayaka. She was someone that this Sayaka would give anything for, and someone that she even began to change for. It didn't wipe every problem she had away like magic, but she became a supportive bond that this Sayaka could never have made it that far without.

Without even meaning to, perhaps, that relationship reaffirmed a long-dead notion in Sayaka's mind that maybe she didn't have to accept being lonely or sad. Maybe she could love people again and maybe she could keep them close like she used to. Sometimes she felt like maybe the old Sayaka Miki inside of her wasn't dead after all.

What took her life was surprisingly sacrificial, but it wasn't a wasteful action or unnecessary. They'd done everything they could. The only other option at that point was both of them dying. Or Sayaka trying to finish the fight only to transform immediately after. She was on the verge of her last breath, after all. Her soul gem was at its limit. Even if she lived, she would force Mami to end her life when she knew that the rifle-user would sooner choose to die with her.

Her last thought was to spare of her of that pain. She poured all of the energy she had left into a last, strong attack. Every single ounce of herself she had left, she scraped from the very corners of her artificially housed soul, and she poured into one last blow, throwing herself directly at what would be that witch's very final blow as well.

Curious. As horrible as that iteration's life had been, her last thoughts and feelings were surprisingly...at peace. Even if she wasn't exactly at rest. She figured, if there was any good way she would like to go, it was like this. Her attack, killing the witch threatening the person she loved. Her soul gem, shattering under pressure and direct attack, not even given the chance to commit to the transformation it was preparing to take.

Her soul, inevitably finding its way among the odd mass that the angel took under her care.

She wouldn't be here with Sayaka if there wasn't some kind of unrest. Of course she didn't want to die. She didn't want to pass on, either. She didn't feel like she deserved to. She felt guilty and and sad. No matter what kind of redeeming she had done for herself in loving Mami and doing what she did, she could never feel like she belonged with everyone else in their little heaven.

She couldn't linger, either. She couldn't bear to see Mami process the loss. She didn't want to see her sad. She was scared to. She didn't belong anywhere. She didn't belong in...whatever hell existed for her if she hadn't changed.

So instead...the angel ended up giving her somewhere that she could feel she belonged, until they could figure it out together, somehow. If she didn't feel like she could belong anywhere else, even if death, then she could belong here. She didn't have to spend any more time alone and lost and confused. She didn't have to feel like that anymore.

Putting the pen down, Sayaka momentarily lifted her hands to the sides of her temples and squeezed a little bit, trying to ignore the slight warnings of another one of those unusual headaches. She sniffed. Shaking her head, she moved a hand to instead stubbornly wipe at her eyes. She can't tell if those were her own tears or if they belonged to the Sayaka she thought so hard about right now. Her feelings or someone else's? What a daunting feeling.

Gently, she finished the entry and shut the journal for now, leaning forward and resting her head on the cool desk before folding her arms over her head. Tried to find the file of her OWN memories among the many, many others she now had that weren't her own. It was harder every time she tried to do it. Harder to remind herself. To differentiate herself.

"I'm still me. I still know who that is. Right? I know I do. Please don't forget that..."

It surprises her, just how scared she is of the idea of losing herself among this mess. Then who would be there for the ones lost in here?

Who would be there for her?

[tsuiito]

@betweenmanyworlds replied to your post “"Oh the woes of being a Sayaka Miki."”:

the cosmic chewtoy of mitakihara at times

"At times?" That implies it stops.

[tsuiito]

"Oh the woes of being a Sayaka Miki."

[tsuiito]

What the hell is even happening around here.