Homura ran.
Against all odds, against fate itself, they prevailed. The Night of the Witches came and went, the Queen of Curses toppled from her throne atop the flying city of gears and puppets.
Homura thought her troubles were over then. Oh, sure, she still had to fight for the rest of her life, yet compared to the hell she'd been living for five? -ten years, the everyday existence of Mahou Shoujo was nothing.
And so she dared to hope. How foolish of her. She should've known better. This uncaring universe doesn't like people to hope. All in all, Homura considered, even as she tried to pull ahead of her pursuers, she was the only one to blame.
And yet. She couldn't help but cling to foolish hope. That all was not lost. That she could fix this. Despite her fears, the shield was still working. So she had to try. One. Last. Time.
There it was. An opening. Homura jumped, twisting in the air with unearthly grace and pushing off the wall for that extra little boost even as her hand reached for the mechanism in the center of her shield-
Only to be tacklehugged in the air.
"Caught you!" Yuma exclaimed, her hands squeezing Homura's ribs with strength no eight year old kid had business having. "Told you're gonna get hugged. Hope it will be a lesson to never doubt Yuma again!"
"Good girl, Yuma!" Kyouko shouted from a ways back. "Never doubted you, you little Hug Monster!" She snickered.
"Unlike someone else..."
"Yeah, yeah," Sayaka grumbled. "Guess I lost the bet. Who knew Yuma likes hugs so much she can outrun the transfer student."
Kyouko looked at her, unimpressed.
"Okay, I'll know better next time!" Sayaka said, throwing her hands in the air. "'Ain't nothin' gotta stop me from Hugs' is a true and sacred right of Yuma, Apostle of Hugs! There, I said it. Can we go back to the mall?"
"... why... is... everyone so fast..." Madoka wheezed, only now catching up with the rest of the girls.
A small crowd was already gathering around them.
Homura moaned pitifully.
Let's look a little into the past, before Homura got to become so scared of Yumahugs.
She didn't stop.
Another day, another hug.
The little green tick didn't know when to stop.
It was as if she enjoyed intruding into Homura's personal space and making her uncomforatable. Well, not 'as if'. She did.
But that was besides the point.
The point being, Homura thought as she stared down at the grinning green haired girl -though somehow it felt
her big blue eyes were staring down at
Homura, despite the height difference- the point being that enough was
enough.
She saw it instantly. Yuma's feet
shifted.
Homura's hand was already cranking her Shield before the little girl could leap.
The time traveller allowed herself a ghost of a grin as all colour was leeched off the world, trapping Yuma mid-tacklehug, arms extended and approaching at speed-!
Homura grunted in surprise as the little girl crashed into her -regaining colour on contact- and held onto her thin frame for dear life, obviously confused by her sudden change in position.
Without warning, the Shield cranked back into place.
The sounds of the city assaulted Homura's -and Yuma's- ears once more, and the black haired girl had a moment to realize she had fallen on her butt -hadn't even realized it, being so surprised- before a snort and a laugh irrupted in, courtesy of Sayaka.
"If you would share what is so funny, Miki," droned Homura, calmly but frantically trying to pry Yuma's hands off her, finger by finger and trying to not blush at the sheer indignity of the situation, "perhaps we could all laugh together."
Her tone made it clear, she believed, she wouldn't actually laugh. Not that she expected Sayaka to be smart enough to notice, but at any rate, Homura put more effort into getting rid of Yuma, who totally cheated! As soon as Homura pried off one of her tiny fingers and started working on the next one, the little girl grabbed on with the previous finger again!
Get off, little hugging girl! Madoka was watching!
"
Tsk," Sayaka shook her head, grinning
evilly, "Transfer Student, Transfer Student, Transfer Student... you should've paid more attention in metaphysics class."
Fucking amazing. The suicidal blueberry though herself smart enough to lecture other people.
No wait, that wasn't amazing at all, that was just one of Miki Sayaka's intellectual failings, not being able to recognize her own intellectual failings.
"You see," explained Sayaka, unaware of Homura's mental musings. She recited: "In a hugging frame of reference, a tacklehugging Yuma continues to move at a constant velocity until she meets her tacklehug target, at which point the tacklehuging Yuma exerts a hugging force on the tacklehug target, the tacklehug target simultaneously exerting a hugged force equal in magnitude and opposite in metaphysical direction on the tacklehugging Yuma."
Homura's brain screeched to a halt.
"What the devil did just spew out of your mouth?"
"Simple," Sayaka waved a finger ominously in Homura's general direction. "Nothing can stop a Yuma tacklehug once it starts. Not even your magic.
Nothing."
"..." Homura opened her mouth to answer, but stopped, a cold fear, dread building at the back of her mind. It was true, wasn't it? Yuma had completely ignored her timestop, something nobody had ever managed before. "... You are certainly full of... poopie," Homura caught herself before swearing in front of the little girl, "they do not teach that in school. Do they?" she added, suddenly uncertian.
It's not like she would actually
know, she had had all of thirty two days of public schooling after being discharged and before Walpurgisnacht screwed it all up.
Madoka opened her mouth.
"Yes," nodded Sayaka.
Madoka closed her mouth.
"Oh," blinked Homura. Then she looked down at Yuma. "... Will you let go already?"
"No," the green tick shook her head.
"Fiddlesticks."
