I own nothing.
The reason the bow became obsolete in favor of the gun, despite all of the early gun's disadvantages, is because it's much easier to teach someone to fire a gun than it is to teach them to fire a bow and arrow. Homura had already known that, but it's just really starting to sink in now, on this unseasonably hot spring day, as sweat pools in the collar of her jacket.
Her aim is abominable when she fights Demons. The bow in her hands as a Puella Magi may be a construct, but it's every bit as real as the bow she has now, a recent buy from a local sports equipment store, and she can't aim to save her life. Her arms and shoulders ache, and she can't hit the broad side of a barn.
Why is it so much different than shooting a gun?
Why is it so hard?
You would think… Homura swallows hard on the knot in her throat, on the still so keen, the still so fresh wound. You would think that I had seen Madoka do this often enough to have a better idea of how to do it myself.
There it is. She doesn't know why she emerged in this world without Madoka bereft of her time-stop device, and a bow in its place. This was the weapon Madoka wielded, not hers, and she feels inadequate in comparison. I will never be what she was, Homura reflects bitterly, not so kind, nor so brave. Why should I have her weapon? Why should I have been thrown into this world with her weapon in my hand?
But as it is, Homura has no choice. It is an archer's bow she fights with now, instead of the cold steel guns she'd used in other worlds. She still needs to fight to live, and Homura has never been anything if not practical. There is nothing to do but make the best of this situation, and try to find some good in it. Even if Homura can't see anything good in this now, even if she feels utterly unworthy of what she was left to fight with, Homura has no other choice than to fight.
She had also bought a hanging target at the sports equipment store, and has long since expended all of her arrows. Homura crosses the clearing—she chose a secluded place off the side of a park, where she would have plenty of space and it wouldn't be likely that she'd be disturbed or accidentally hit someone—to retrieve all of her arrows, glare at the target swinging gently in the breeze on its tree branch, and starts again.
And once again, Homura's arrows don't even hit the target, let alone strike the bull's eye. Homura resists the urge to break something out of sheer frustration.
"Excuse me."
She whirls around at the sudden sounding of a quiet voice, every muscle tense, the result of untold months and years fighting Witches (and Homura almost welcomes Demons as a replacement), cursing her own inattention. However, it's just a boy, some years older than herself if the high school uniform he's wearing is any indication, and Homura relaxes, adopting that carefully neutral expression that's been such a help to her in her time as a Puella Magi. "What are you doing?" the boy asks, eyes narrowed behind his glasses, wearing a neutral expression that's practically the mirror of her own.
Homura hesitates, wondering if she should be open, or just brush him off and do this on her own; she's gone so long without the help of others that it doesn't feel right to even talk about her problems. However, after a long moment that she and the boy spend staring awkwardly at one another, Homura decides to swallow her pride and own up to her problems. "I'm trying to learn how to shoot," she says flatly, holding up the bow clutched in her left hand for emphasis.
The boy nods, his eyes flickering from her bow to her face, and down to the grass. He draws a deep breath, as though steeling himself for something, though she has no idea what. His shoulders draw up tensely. "Do you… Do you need help?"
Floored by the question, Homura stares at him, her light purple eyes open wide. Though a boy's school jacket usually conceals his build to some extent, Homura can see that this boy is pretty scrawny; he doesn't look remotely athletic. Moreover, it's been so long since she received a genuine offer of practical help that she's forgotten how to respond to it. She's forgotten how to feel when someone says "Do you need help?" As it is now, Homura just feels numb, like her heart's a lump of ice instead of an organ.
Slowly, she nods. The boy discards his school bag on the grass, letting it slide fluidly from his shoulder. He walks over to her without a sound—Homura marvels at how quietly he can walk—and shoots another glance at the bow in her hand, lips pressed tightly together. "How long have you been doing this?"
"Not long," Homura admits, intentionally vague. She doubts highly that she could explain why she needs to learn archery so badly to this boy without being written off as insane.
"How's your hand-eye coordination?" the boy asks clinically.
"Alright, I guess," she answers him, frowning and unsure of why he needs to know that at all.
But apparently, it was something useful, because he gives a slight nod and motions for her to hand over the bow she's holding. Plucking an arrow up off the ground, he looks at her target, fluttering slightly in the wind as it is, and frowns. "If you have the money, you should buy a stationary target. That would be better for you to start off with." The wind blows Homura's long dark hair into his face and he splutters, brushing it away with a sharp, distracted wave of his free hand. "And in future," he says, cheeks flushed red, not meeting her gaze, equanimity gone, "you should definitely tie your hair back. It's going to get in the way."
Homura, who left the days of wearing her hair back long ago, personally disagrees with this statement in the strongest terms imaginable, but does not respond except to raise her eyebrows and purse her lips.
Alright, let's see if you know what you're talking about at all.
As the boy nocks the arrow on the bow and lifts it, Homura looks at him and frowns. "Wait, was I supposed to have my left hand on the bowstring?" she blurts out, looking at his hands. Sure enough, the boy holds the bow in his right hand, and pulls the bowstring back with his left. But Madoka always had her right hand on the bowstring. For a moment, Homura has what feels remarkably like an intense moment of crisis. Wasn't I supposed to do it like that?
"Are you left-handed?"
"No."
"Then no, you weren't."
He looks a lot like her, Homura's noticing. Come to think of it, the resemblance is startling, and she narrows her eyes. Ink-black hair, ashen pale, almost sallow skin, and very thin. Looking at him is like looking at what she'd look like if she was a boy, had blue eyes and still wore glasses. Okay, this is weird. Even for what I'm used to.
"Pay attention to how I'm standing." There's a curious gleam in his blue eyes, feverishly bright. "Keep your back straight and your shoulders out. Stand perpendicular to your target. Balance your weight on the balls of your feet." That feverish look has spread all over his face, pale cheeks flushed again, absorbed in his craft. Homura stares at him, stunned by the sudden enthusiasm present on what had been up to now a deliberately impassive, almost hesitant face. "Hold the bow high enough that your drawing hand—the hand I have on the bowstring—comes to rest against your cheek. Aim…" the bow creaks as he draws the string back until it's completely taut "…and release."
The arrow practically sings as it zips through the air, and hits the gently blowing target dead center.
Homura gapes (I guess he does know what he's talking about), and the boy actually smiles for a moment in a brief flash of teeth. "There, see?" That feverish glow lingers in his eyes, until suddenly he seems to realize how he's acting and how he looks, like he can see his face reflected in her eyes. The smile dies off of his face, the red flush a little more slowly, but eventually his skin takes back that sickly pale coloring, and he hands the bow back to her. He licks his cracked lips. "Go on." There's a distinctly hesitant note in his voice. "Try," the boy says softly, his eyes brimming with some strange, heavy emotion.
Frowning intently, Homura does so. I can do it. I can do it. I know I can do it.
This time, the arrow actually hits the target, though it only does so at the outermost circle. Homura scowls, and the boy shoots her a look that might actually be that of sympathy—she's not entirely sure how to identify sympathy anymore, unless it's utterly blatant. "Your aim will get better with practice. And your muscles will stop being so sore with practice too," he remarks, only slightly more lightly when he sees how stiffly she moves her arms.
Under the boy's direction, Homura shoots off a few more arrows. Two of them hit the target; the rest fall short or miss, and land with dull thuds on the grass. Finally, when Homura has shot her last arrow again, she hears the boy, standing off to her left, sigh softly. He has an abstracted, far-away expression on his face, the look of someone living in the past—a feeling she knows well. "How… If I may ask, why are you interested in learning archery?"
That's not the sort of question Homura expected to hear from anyone, and it's a long moment before she can find it in her to respond. The bare truth isn't an answer she can just give him; who would believe the reality of her life. "I had a friend who was interested in archery," she tells him flatly, staring straight ahead and not seeing the trees, or the target, or the arrows lying in the grass and sunken into the target. "But she's dead now."
"Oh." He swallows so thickly that she can hear it clearly, and her eyes snap to his face, twisted in a momentary expression of pain that he stows away the moment he realizes that she's looking at him. "I'm sorry."
"Thank you." It's such a relief to be able to say it, even if she says so to a stranger, has revealed a bit of her pain to a stranger, and seen her pain reflected in the face of someone she doesn't know and may well never see nor speak to again. It's a relief, and Homura can feel a bit of the weight that's been sitting on her chest ever since she got here lift and float away. She hadn't realized how heavy she felt until that sliver of leaden pain broke away and left her.
They lock eyes for a long moment, silent. Homura suddenly feels a strong sense of kinship with this boy, and suspects that, though she has no proof, he feels the same way. She gets the strong impression that they have more in common than archery, but doesn't ask.
To anyone who has ever read my Bleach works, I am not trying to fake you out, I swear. I have not picked Bleach back up and have no intention of doing so (And as such, I fear that my characterization of Uryuu has suffered). But really, am I the only one who's noticed the similarities between Homura and Uryuu? I mean, they look a lot alike, they act a bit alike, and they have similar color schemes with their costumes; if Homura started wearing glasses again the resemblance would be terrifying. They both practice archery (well, Homura does in the final world), and they carry a great deal of grief and trauma with that.
So I got to thinking, how did Homura figure out how to use a bow? So, this happened, and Uryuu and Homura discovered their long-lost little sister/big brother. For the record, I don't think this is actually plausibly canon; there's no way PMMM and Bleach exist in the same universe, and I don't think Karakura Town and Mitakihara Town are actually anywhere near each other (I don't think Mitakihara Town is even in the Tokyo area). But I had the image in my head.
Lastly, the timeline is the final world for PMMM, and during the time skip for Bleach. Thank you for reading.