#barely though

Maybe it was hyperbolic to say that both persons crying inflicted her with the same feelings.

For that person emotions can't and shouldn't be contained. It's still hard to watch, expecially when Homura knows it's not her place to comfort her anymore. It's ugly and it's beautiful because it's her. It's so much of her coalescing into a single action, every tear something to be treasured, something only her heart was capable of.

But for Sayaka, it was something truly disgusting. It made the raven shake with barely contained rage how out of place that heartbreak really is on the girl who was supposed to be so normal. She was supposed to joke and have fun with her little cadre of close friends and acquaintances. She was supposed to swear to bring those who defiled Mami's memory to justice, rightous anger pulsing through every inch of her. The radiance of her uncontracted soul was supposed to light up every meeting, every hangout, every sleepover, every-

Homura clenched her hands tightly. The girl was long gone, and still her thoughts swirled darkly.

Once, that girl had been a shining hope for her when she was alone, unloved, scared, hopeless. When she came out of the hospital her Madoka had saved her. Had given her a life worth living. Had given her friends. Love. Connection. Everything.

Madoka had meant the world for Homura, and it had stayed that way, even though the same could not be said the other way around, no memory of their bond persisting the rewinding of time. From that point on, the raven had done a lot to make the kind girl cry.

She had killed, she had lied, she had destroyed.

But it was all for her, in the end.

And still, Homura wouldn't forgive herself for those times either. The times she made the girl cry. She wouldn't let the pain she inflicted mean nothing, unable to accept that hurting the person she loved so deeply was just another tool for her crusade to save her. She was unable to fully seperate the harm her actions caused from Madoka's fate.

The raven was unworthy of the person who took care of her, who gave her life.

And still, she carried on.

Her hands pressed the button that open the doors of the elevator. They were perfectly functional, and soon a normal highschool girl was riding up the building from inside fluorescently shining metal confines.

She walked as her thoughts drifted towards her destination faster than the deceptively slow gait of the magical girl could.

Kyousuke Kamijo was a hospital patient. Someone who had suffered a crippling injury in the past, someone who was alone, though, unlike Homura, largely by choice. His best friends are Sayaka Miki and Hitomi Shizuki, two girls he had known and taken for granted for most of his childhood. He was admired in the musical world for his skills with the violin, which he had been his life's work until the day of accident, and then never again.

Until he betrayed Sayaka. Until he crushed her ruthlessly with his anger which he should have directed at the world.

Until he decided her heart was nothing but an obstacle for him to take it all out on.

The raven's claw fell towards the door to his room.

She just stared at it for a second, her amethyst eyes drilling a hole into the wood.

A mix of pink and blue swirled inside her mind, but normally happy images of the two girls weren't alleviating her hatred but deepening it. Like life-giving water that made the flower bloom and the roots stretch even deeper into the earth.

There are few things Homura was capable of truly hating.

There were the obvious ones,

Kyubey

Walpurgisnacht

Oriko

Herself

And then, there was Kyosuke. Someone who had never threathened Madoka, someone who had never lied to anyone, someone who had never misled anyone, someone who has nothing to do with magical girls and the contracts that bind them to their fate.

But his crime isn't dramatic and neither is it big.

He just sends an innocent, sweet girl to suffer in his stead.

As Homura opens the door she wonders if a shard of broken mirror would be fitting for what she had planned.

Kyousuke doesn't look towards the raven as she enters.

"Forgot anything?" He snears pathetically while sitting on his pristine white hospital bed.

Homura doesn't speak. No accusation could ever be enough. No smalltalk could ever disguise the cry in the back of her throat.

'Murderer'

He finally looks towards her, tear tracks that long since dried framing his expression that morphed from silent anger to confusion.

"Who are you?"

The raven doesn't smile.

Maybe she'd use the shard... or maybe she should just keep it clean and simple.

Should she be smiling? She rarely does, and certainly not for killing a defenseless boy, regardless of the murderer he is, regardless of how much she loathes and spites him deep inside.

Regardless of how much she loathes and spites herself for being just as bad as he is.

She shard will stay there, in her shield, as a reminder of what a hypocrite she is.

And she won't make Sayaka live with the knowledge that he suffered.

Tonight, she'll cry again, but now because of someone she doesn't love.

Homura glares at the boy as their eyes meet.

Nothing happens for a long, long moment where Kyosuke seemed to wither before her eyes.

And... it doesn't make it better. Seeing him there doesn't alleviate even a little of the suffering she wants to let out.

She steps out and shuts the door.

Vertigo rises up from deep inside of her.

She curses her weakness, her frailty, her worthlessness.

Sometime later she makes it out of the hospital.

"I'm sorry."

A griefseed in her hand, she lightens the colour of the amethyst soul.

"I'm sorry."

Maybe next time.

"I'm sorry, Sayaka."

××××

This went through quite a few reworks after posting. This originally ended cruelly, then it ended coldly, and then... like this. I'm not a great writer, but I still hope you enjoyed the version I decided sticking with. I originally wanted to explore the idea of Homura's dynamic with Madoka overlapping with Kyosuke's with Sayaka. I wanted it to be sweet, like "She kills for her too, you see?" But in the end nothing felt right until I... stopped being self-indulgent, I guess. A crime of passion is unlike Homura in most cases, is what I learned.