Interlude Part Three
Homura
Homura paused time at the moment the explosion began. The little kusarigama wielding magical girl froze halfway to collapsing onto the blooming ball of flames and shrapnel, and Homura couldn't help feeling the slightest twinge of respect for her. She had thrown herself on that bomb without a second's hesitation.
Had the girl's selflessness alone been enough to ensure Madoka's survival, Homura would have allowed her sacrifice to stand as a testament to her character and morals.
But Madoka was too close to the blast. Close enough not to risk it.
Sighing, Homura slid her 9mm back into her shield and withdrew in its place a black safe. It was large enough to be unwieldy, and had she been anything other than a magical girl, it would have been much too heavy to carry, but Homura had years' of years' of years' of years' worth of experience in handling such things.
Opening the safe, Homura maneuvered it beneath the little magical girl to scoop up the bulk of the explosion. She was very careful not to touch the girl because as soon as she did, the time bubble would burst and everything would go back to real-time. It was the most inconvenient weakness of her control over time: she couldn't take anything living with her into sub-space.
She had a lot of theories as to why that was the case, but the one that made the most sense was the crossing of time-streams. The only time Homura had control over was her own, so when she came in contact with another person's time, they immediately canceled each other out and defaulted back to real-time.
Or so Homura guessed. She never had much time to run thorough tests.
With the explosion contained, Homura eyed the lazily hung shrapnel. She picked out the pieces that could potentially do damage to Madoka and placed them inside the safe with the ball of fire before stepping away from the little magical girl to close and lock the safe well out of accidental touching range.
Getting rid of the safe was a bit more of a challenge because the moment she released something, it began existing in real-time, and while she could maneuver objects after they had been placed, it always worked best if she placed them properly from the start.
Honestly, the only real issue Homura faced was making sure the safe was well out of Madoka's range when real-time returned. It was a bomb safe, so it was unlikely that it would explode or even sustain much damage, but there was always the chance of error. And when it came to Madoka's safety, there was no room for errors.
"This will work just fine," Homura said, placing the black safe on a cleared patch of ground in the midst of a particularly dense skirmish. That way, if it did explode, it would do damage to Homura's enemies. And if her own allies became caught up? Well, casualties were expected in war.
Stepping back into the splintered hallway, Homura released her hold on time, and the frozen tableau before her exploded into motion. Small fragments of metal shavings lodged into the chest of the little magical girl like bullets. She gasped, and a line of blood escaped from her open mouth as she collapsed. Most likely, a bit of shrapnel had lodged in her lungs. It would hurt terribly, but it wouldn't kill the girl.
Only one thing could kill her anymore.
"Wh-what happened?" The little magical girl pushed onto her elbows and raised her head. Her eyes went wide at the sight of Homura looming over her. "Y-you!"
She coughed, and a glob of blood puddled on the ruined floor beneath her. "H-how did you…?"
"Your name," Homura said, unmoved by the expectoration of even more blood.
"W-what…?"
"Your name," Homura said again. "I will allow you to tell it to me."
For a long moment, it seemed like the girl wouldn't say anything until, finally: "Ch-Chiyo. Yumeh-hara Ch-iyo."
"Chiyo." Homura nodded. "I accept your valor and determination, Chiyo. Would that other magical girls had even half your level of courage and loyalty."
"D-don't think you've w-w-won," Chiyo said, struggling to get one knee beneath her as she lay sprawled on her stomach. "I…I won't let you h-hurt anyone else…"
"You are clearly very new to being a magical girl," Homura said. "It seems you have yet to learn how to heal yourself."
Homura crouched in front of Chiyo with an inquisitive tilt of her head. "Well. I suppose that is all the better for me."
Reaching out, Homura grabbed hold of Chiyo's hair and tilted her head back to expose her throat. As expected, the red ribbon she wore like a tie beneath her black collar had a bright yellow crystal at its center: Chiyo's soul gem.
"Had I the time, I would very much like to know you better Yumehara Chiyo. I am certain I could make you see things my way, and I am equally certain that you would make an excellent ally." Homura reached into her shield with the hand not gripping Chiyo's hair and pulled out her favorite 9mm. "Unfortunately, time is never on my side."
"N-no! Please!" It was the other girl who begged, not Chiyo. The girl who was wrapped around Madoka in a disgusting display of intimacy. Homura turned her head to glare at the blue-haired girl.
"Do not interfere," Homura warned. "Your time is coming."
"Don't you h-hurt her!" Chiyo said, glaring at Homura as best she could with her head tilted so far back. "And don't you hurt Y-Yuuta-k-kun!"
A rare, please smile turned up the edges of Homura's lips as she looked into Chiyo's defiant amber eyes.
"Yes," Homura said. "If only I had more time."
She pressed the barrel of her gun to the center of Chiyo's soul gem and squeezed the trigger.
"CHIYO!"
A territory opened, sending a violent shock through Homura's brain as, all around her, time seemed to stop while colors inverted. The sensation passed as quickly as it had started, but the results lingered.
A transparent blue barrier shimmered to life between Chiyo and the bullet, nearly jamming Homura's weapon. She stopped time in an instant, releasing her grip on Chiyo's hair and leaving the girl to hang suspended. Homura danced away, her eyes scanning the fray for the origin of the glittery spirit shield protecting Chiyo from the bullet still pressed intimately against the magical girl's amber soul gem.
While searching, Homura noticed that the same type of barrier stood between every combatant, both ally and enemy alike. Scowling, she knew her time was up, and oh, how that thought rankled.
Hissing between her teeth, Homura turned back to Chiyo, the blue-haired woman, and the cluster of children. A spark of delight raced through her from head-to-foot when Homura realized that the blue-haired woman was half-way across the engawa with her hand stretched out toward Chiyo. Madoka was behind her, holding the hand of a small teal-haired boy while the two identical girls stood in front of them with their little pointer fingers raised and glowing.
"How perfect," Homura said, her voice taking on that familiar flat tone it always did in frozen time.
Scanning the battlefield once again, Homura took careful note of where the forcefields did and did not appear. It seemed only violence was stopped while careful or friendly touches—such as the boy holding Madoka's hand—were left alone.
"No violence in this territory, it seems." Her lips twitched upward as she continued to scan the yard. The attacks of her enemies were blocked just as soundly as those of her allies. "How convenient."
Stepping onto the engawa, Homura maneuvered carefully around the gaggle of children, placing herself at Madoka's back. She could not enact violence, but she had no intention of ever hurting Madoka or of allowing her to be hurt.
Releasing her hold on time, everything snapped back into motion at the same moment Homura reached forward and gently lifted Madoka off the floor by her armpits. Madoka shrieked, no doubt surprised, but Homura cradled her small body to her chest and smiled at her.
"It's all right, Madoka," she said. "I have you now."
"No!" Madoka flailed, her tiny fists slamming against the shimmery barrier that appeared on Homura's body to protect her from the attacks. "No, no, no, no, no! Put me down! Put me down right now! Ane-chan!"
"D-don't touch him!" Chiyo shouted, climbing tremulously to her feet. The barrier that had stopped the bullet millimeters from her soul gem had vanished and the bullet lay in splinters all around her. She didn't seem to notice as she hefted her kusarigama and glared.
"Chiyo!" the blue-haired girl yelled, racing to Chiyo's side. She wrapped Chiyo's arm around her shoulders as a crutch before looking up. She saw Homura holding Madoka and the blood drained from her face. How pathetic that the girl had only just noticed Madoka in the arms of another. Clearly, Homura was right to secure Madoka from them; this girl had no right to protect someone so precious. It was a miracle poor Madoka had survived in her care for so long.
"Let him go, right now," Chiyo said, looking remarkably recovered from her shrapnel wounds, though blood still beaded her lips and dribbled down her chin. Her body must have begun healing itself on instinct. Fascinating.
"I will not," Homura said, cradling Madoka's face against her neck. "She is not yours to protect."
"You don't want to protect him!" the blue-haired girl shouted, tears swelling in her indigo eyes. "You're going to kill him!"
"Souls cannot die," Homura explained. "They are eternal."
The girl sobbed. "But the body isn't! If you pull Madoka's soul from Yuuta's body, he'll die!"
"Flesh is weak. I intend to insure that Madoka never faces such weakness again."
"Please," the girl begged, stepping forward with one hand outstretched before realizing that she was dragging Chiyo unsteadily along. The girl froze, clearly torn between helping Chiyo and 'saving' Madoka. "Please, don't take Yuu-chan from me. I…I couldn't bear it. Please."
Glittering tears slid down the girl's porcelain cheeks, and Homura frowned at the unexpected stirring the sight caused in her chest. Was that…sympathy? Affection?
Homura scowled and stepped back. "Don't use your territory on me."
The girl's eyes widened, then the intensity pressing on Homura's heart tripled.
Hissing through her teeth, Homura scrambled backward to escape. Chiyo slumped to her knees as the blue-haired girl released her and stepped forward with a determined glint in her teary eyes.
"Please let him go," the girl begged. "Please. I promise to protect him. I'll protect him forever. Please."
In Homura's arms, Madoka sniffled miserably and reached for the girl with her little arms. "Ane-chan…"
Homura's heart faltered.
"No!" Homura steeled herself against the girl's terrifying territory and tightened her grip on Madoka. "I won't let you have her!"
A smear of black streaked through the air, sweeping past Homura's ear. She jerked around to see what it was just as the red-edged blade of Chiyo's black kusarigama gleamed in the dim light on its way to Homura's throat. Homura didn't move, with the violence cancelling territory still open, the blade couldn't strike her anyway.
The blade sliced right through Homura's neck from front to back. Power exploded benignly around her as Homura cried out, almost dropping Madoka as the inertia from her sliced neck dragged her backward. She slapped a hand to her throat as she spun around, reaching for magic to heal herself. Except her head stayed attached to her body.
And her magic was gone.
Crying out in horrified anger, Homura pinned Chiyo with her frantic glare. "What did you do?!"
"I c-cut your magic." Chiyo lurched onto her hands and knees, vomiting blood while more dripped from the shrapnel wounds in her torso. Her chest heaved with short, sharp breaths as she glared up at Homura. "Y-you're not going anyw-where."
The territory that had opened—the one stopping all the violence—vanished. The identical girls raised their glowing fingers at Homura's head and yelled: "Spirit gun!"
Growling, Homura leapt from the engawa and into the stopped battle. She sprinted using pure physical strength and shouted a retreat for her allies. They peeled away from their opponents to fall in behind her, fielding attacks and firing back to keep the pursuers off their trail. They only needed to get beyond the gate, and they were home-free…
A sharp golden light-streaked past Homura and lodged in Subaru Kazumi's back. Subaru shouted, more annoyed than pained. She grasped the head of the arrow sticking through the front of her shoulder and ripped the whole thing out. The fletchings emerged bloody, but she only grinned as she tossed the arrow aside.
"Well damn, Homura." Kazumi grinned, tipping her enormous witch's hat in Homura's direction, "Looks like these kids mean business!"
"You had better stop right now!" the blue-haired annoyance shouted from below. The bow she held glowed gold with the same vibrant spirit energy that coated her whole body from head to foot. Her inky blue hair and temple uniform fluttered with her fluctuating aura, but Homura could tell that she had little to no control over her abilities.
"Take her and go," Mikuni Oriko said, skidding to stop just ahead of the compound's enormous gate with her best friend Kure Kirika landing beside her. "Madoka-san is important to the future; we will handle things here."
Homura nodded, her only acknowledgement before sprinting for the gate. "Subaru, take us up."
"You got it, boss!" Kazumi looped an arm around Homura and propelled herself up the sheer front of the gate.
"NO!" It was the blue-haired girl's voice.
"Enough!" Kirika said, and Homura dared a glance at the black-clad magical girl, who snatched another energy-laced golden arrow out of the sky. "I will not allow you to destroy Oriko's future!"
"Hup!" Kazumi said as she landed atop the gate on her toes with Homura held against her right side while Homura still clutched Madoka's tiny, trembling frame to her breast.
"I w-want Ane-ch-chan…" Madoka begged, staring up at Homura with teary green eyes. "Please let me go home."
"Don't worry, Madoka." Homura smiled and stroked the tears from Madoka's cheek with her thumb. "You'll be home soon."
Kaliea: So here ends the interludes; next we have the start of part four and the aftermath of the battle. Some things will need to happen off-screen because we're back in Kusuo's POV, but I will do my best to quell any confusion. Let me know if you have questions!
