El Guante led an army of countless magical girl trainees up the hill and towards Mexico City. The rain was pouring down in a fierce storm, but none of them were daunted. El Guante himself was covered in mud and grime already, but he didn’t care. He had to be the rock, the fixed point around which his trainees would be focused so that they themselves could perform their duties and save Mexico from whatever evils were causing this.

He knew how evil operated. It wasn’t long ago that El Guante was the one that the magical girls were trying to protect Mexico from, after all. He wasn’t sure why he turned the new leaf that he did, but he didn’t regret it at all. Good was only a point-of-view, but it was the point-of-view that he now accepted.

In the sky, a massive witch floated there, laughing maniacally. She was too big for anyone to fight alone, and even a small group of trained warriors couldn’t do it. But El Guante wasn’t afraid. He had an army.

Behind him, El Guante could feel that the trainees were ready to fight.

“This will be the most important day of your lives,” he told them. “Give it your all! If you succeed, you will have passed your final test!”

He raised his machine-gun arms into the air and fire them. “CHARGE!”

They leapt towards the darkened sky and towards the final battle…

***

Reporter Ana Garcia was there when it hit. Not the storm, but the giant monstrous being floating in the sky.

Dozens of civilians were staring up at it, phones raised and recording it as it picked up a tall building and launched it hundreds of feet away. Ana wanted nothing more than to leave this place, to go back home and hug her husband and her dog. But she had an obligation to report the news, and this was most certainly news.

“Hello,” she said to the camera in front of her. In Spanish, obviously, but it’s not like I’m going to narrate everything happening in this story in the correct languages or else the last character to have spoken English would have been like… Kyubey in the court battle where they were all trying to convict Sayaka. Remember that? Good times.

Ana was not having a good time.

“There is a major disaster happening right now and we need everyone to stay indoors. The Magical Girl Saviors of Mexico Squad are en route and are going to be dealing with this as soon as possible. Please find safety and do not go into any large buildings. Please.”

She knew that her pleas would never work because disaster movie scenarios always attracted people to be dumbasses and go out to try to see the pivotal moments of history. Though she didn’t think this was actually going to be a pivotal moment in history because everyone was about to be dead.

Man, she really needed something to lighten the mood away from gigantic battles full of death and destruction. And by that she meant the author.

Ana’s wish was granted almost as if some divine voice had heard her and granted her wish; in the middle of this massive rainstorm, a calm aura of shining light emerged in a circle around the center of Mexico City, right over where she stood.

She looked up and a small figure emerged from the gap in the clouds and floated down towards the ground. She studied it closer and it seemed to be… a young girl? Was this a new magical girl, ready to save the day from this massive beast in the sky?

The girl floated all the way down to Ana and let her feet touch the ground. She seemed unaware of her general surroundings, the way she stared off into the distance, but as soon as she reached the ground, several magical girls charged at her, and she lifted her hand. Small girders and pieces of the street slammed into them, knocking them away.

This girl looked at Ana. “I want to broadcast something to the world,” she said.

Ana looked at the camera. “Uh, go ahead.” She gave the microphone to the girl.

“My name is Kiiko Kawakami,” the girl said. “I have transported myself to this universe using my powers after destroying a suspiciously similar universe in the span of a few years. I do not merely wish to sow the seeds of total destruction in this one, however. I merely wish to hone my powers and figure out exactly what my limits are. This may result in the eradication of the human race and the elimination of everything you know and love, but please do not take it personally. Thank you very much for your cooperation.”

Kiiko Kawakami handed back the microphone to Ana and floated back into the sky, over towards the large monster. The ray of light moved with her and rain began pouring back onto Ana’s head.

“Well, this is Channel 15 News,” Ana said. “You heard it here first. We’re all going to die sometime in the very near future.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it!” Sheriff Madoka Kaname dropped into view of the camera, snatched the microphone, and pointed. “And I do have something to say about it! That witch Walpurgisnacht and that bitch Kiiko are going down, because they threatened the wrong universe!”

She hopped away and began firing pink magical bullets at the two villains. Ana clapped her hands. The Sheriff of Mexico was going to save the day, and she knew it. She had the hope of a thousand suns in her. Whatever the hell that meant.

***

Neoakemi summoned two holographic pistols (Holo-Pistols?) and began firing at Walpurgisnacht’s familiars. She and Shinigamidoka had done this pretty much every day back in the old universe. It had become so routine that by the time Walpurgisnacht lost the energy to summon new familiars, they actually felt somewhat sad about the loss.

Shinigamidoka…

She had to save this universe, for her sake.

A few civilians accidentally ran into the path of one of those cotton balls with mustaches, but Neoakemi plugged a cyber-bullet into the back of its head, causing it to explode into fluff and weird art styles. She threw a light-disc into the air to dispatch a flying beast-familiar.

If this battle didn’t hurry, these familiars were going to very quickly turn into witches, and that was not going to go over very well at all.

The flying beast did not go down, but instead turned around and swooped at Neoakemi. She braced for impact, drawing a holo-grenade and readying herself--

But a sword slashed the familiar in half, destroying it almost immediately.

“I can’t let a fellow universe companion fall so easily,” Negasayaka said, tipping her sword on the ground and spinning like a breakdancer in midair. “Be more careful.”

“Thank you…”

But Negasayaka had already hopped away in a gigantic lumbering leap towards Walpurgisnacht.

Was she finally turning out to be an ally after all? This was certainly not what Neoakemi was expecting originally. She wished that the girl had come to her senses in the last universe when it actually mattered…