This was previously posted on my tumblr, but it was long enough it deserved its own upload. I apologize for the long time between updates here. I tend to write a lot of short drabbles on my tumblr (fabulousanima) and while I'd like to eventually collect them and post them on ff.n, I definitely recommend following me on tumblr for more consistent posting! And I hope you enjoy this one!
The sound of her heels clacking against the cold tiles of the hallway echoed among the empty rooms. She was here after hours again, long after her colleagues had gotten into their cars and driven off to enjoy a meal at home with their spouses, long after the lone old janitor had swept through with his buzzing floor buffer, but none of that mattered right now because she was right.
Not that she, Maka Albarn, almost-PhD, wasn't right almost all the time; she was usually right, because she studied and read and researched everything she needed to in order to be right. But a certain colleague of hers, a certain lazy, sluggish colleague who barely remembered to show up on time, had recently shown her up, proven her wrong — except he hadn't and she was going to make sure he knew about it.
There was a warm glow of light from under his office door, which meant that he was still here this late too, and she didn't even bother knocking, just pushed open the door to reveal Soul "Eater" Evans, feet propped on his disaster of a desk as he read an academic journal. He lifted a snowy eyebrow as Maka strode around the table and slammed the stack of papers down next to his feet.
"What's this?"
"Proof that you're wrong about the tribe's religious traditions," she answered smugly.
Soul grinned slowly. "You're here this late on a Friday night to prove me wrong about Shibusen's religion? Dang, Albarn, you need to get laid."
Maka bit the inside of her cheek to prevent herself from saying something nasty. She needed to be professional. Smiling sweetly, she tapped a finger on top of her papers. "I've been studying this tribe for my entire graduate career. I take it seriously, unlike some people." She gave him a pointed look.
His grin grew wider. "Fine," he said, "show me what you got."
"You claim that the people rejected their more ancient god Shinigami in favor of a worship of a god you call 'Kishin'—"
"Yeah."
"Well, you're wrong. Or at least, they didn't keep that religion for long. I was rereading the manuscripts you found," Maka said, sliding onto the desk to settle in for a long explanation, "and they speak of the lack of morality surrounding the worship of Kishin. It may not even have been a god at all, but more the symbol of an amoral tendency that the tribe adopted for a few generations; it may have simply been a construct." Maka gave her head a small shake; not the point right now, focus. "Regardless, it wasn't the religion they stayed with. Look, here: it speaks of an invasion of the Mabaabians."
Soul crossed his arms over his chest. "Right."
"Not right," she snapped. "I think this is a mistranslation of the word. It wasn't an invasion at all, but a cultural meeting. I believe this was the beginning of an exchange between the two tribes, opening new trade routes. And," she said, triumph evident in her voice, "this also marked a return to a similar religion to the one before the time of the Kishin worship."
"How d'you figure?"
"That pottery I discovered last summer, the one with the odd white markings," Maka said, crossing her arms across her ribcage.
"What about it?"
"Carbon dating came back. Half life suggests it was painted 8000 years ago, at least a thousand years after the last evidence of Kishin deification that you found."
"Is that right?" Soul said, dropping his feet back to the ground and finally picking up Maka's papers.
"See for yourself." She couldn't help but sound a bit smug.
Soul stood, shuffling through her research, a slight furrow between his brows. Maka tried to sit still, but ended up throwing her hair over her shoulders a few more times than necessary.
"You're really enjoying yourself, aren't you?" Soul asked suddenly.
"Excuse me?"
"You can't keep the smirk off your face."
Maka tried to surreptitiously lick her lips to smooth them into a neutral position. "No."
"No, you totally are," he said, leaning down slightly to look her in the eyes. "You are absolutely getting off on this." His face was a mix of amusement and incredulity.
"I am just enjoying the fact that I was right about the overarching influence of the Shinigami religion on Shibusen's cultural history," Maka said, matching his movements and drawing slightly closer. "I will admit, it seems that the theology was altered after the Kishin influence, and their idols started to depict a younger god, but still, for the majority of their history, the tribe of Shibusen worshipped the Shinigami, not the Kishin."
"Maybe I was wrong," Soul said.
"About Shibusen?"
"No, of course not. I'm sure there's a flaw in your research somewhere, I just have to find it, and I am absolutely looking over the lab tech's findings because they only just hired Ford and I don't trust his work at all." Maka opened her mouth angrily to speak, but he continued. "No, maybe I was wrong about you needing to get laid. You're obviously enjoying yourself immensely right now, you can barely sit still."
Maka huffed and planted her hands to her sides in an effort to suppress the urge to gloat. "For your information, I do date. Just… not in a while, but that's beside the point. Yes, I like being right. Because I am. Go ahead, read my whole paper, and I will sit here and wait so I can prove it all over again."
"Is that a promise?" he asked.
"Is what?"
"That you'll sit here on my desk in your little pencil skirt for as long as it takes me to finish reading your paper?" Soul's unusually sharp teeth were on full display.
And she, Maka Albarn, almost-PhD, never backed down from a challenge. She straightened her spine and lifted her chin.
"Yes," was all she said.
"I guess I know your type," he teased, waving her stack of papers in front of her face. "Smooth, crisp research that takes up half your weekend."
"I can certainly tell you what's not my type," Maka snarled. "Smarmy, smug bastards with stupidly spiked hair who think they know it all when they are in fact slackers who wouldn't know a significant archeological finding if it flew out of the sand right up their ass."
"No?" he asked lightly, cocking his head and staring at her lips. His attention seemed to dry them out, because she found herself unable to stop herself from licking them, tasting the slightly powdery tang of her lipstick.
"No," she said firmly, but her eyes traveled across his jawline and she was painfully aware that the position she had struck was making her breasts jut towards his stupid smug face, and that his stupid smug face was currently not very stupid nor smug, but in fact dark and unreadable and far, far too close.
"Not even when those bastards wait after hours to make sure you make it to your car safely because you're too stubborn to leave with everyone else?"
"No," she said, but her mind had jumped to the lecture Soul gave recently on the influence of the legend of Arachne, a historical figure within Shibusen's murky history, and how he looked up there behind the podium under the glaring lights of the auditorium, and how the burning heat of them had caused him to roll his sleeves up his arms, and how he hadn't even stopped lecturing, just rebuttoned the sleeves once they were higher up, his wrist and forearm twisting in the yellowed lights, muscles jumping in the exaggerated shadows.
"Not even when those bastards read all your research before transferring to your university so they wouldn't sound stupid in front of a well-respected colleague?"
"No," she whispered, but she was remembering after the symposium when the entire department had gone out for drinks at the local dive bar frequented by the professors, and how he had chatted good-naturedly with the bartender Blair (who somehow handed Maka a beer she hadn't paid for), and how he had seemed to grow more reserved with each bottle while she grew more outgoing, and how he only seemed to come back out of his shell when she had started an argument about the proper methodologies of preserving papyrus.
"Not even when those bastards are willing to spend even more of their Friday nights reading your thesis?"
Their noses were almost brushing. "That," she croaked, "would certainly be a start."
There was a sudden clatter from outside his office followed by cursing, and they startled out of their reverie. Apparently not every one of the janitors had gone home for the evening, because Maka heard the sound of groaning coveralls as the man bent over to pick his fallen mop.
Maka slid off the desk. Her face was burning and she avoided Soul's gaze. "Read that when you have a chance," she said tersely, and all but fled from his office.
Again her heels echoed as she walked down the hallway, but they were none of the triumphant clacks of a half hour ago; instead, they were hurried and skittish, and she dragged a hand down her face, feeling the heat from her cheeks as she did so. She burst into her own office and shut the door firmly behind her.
What on earth had gotten into her? She was a professional, and Soul had clearly also dedicated his life to the same study she had; if anything had… happened, they'd still have to see each other for the rest of their working lives. Groaning, Maka pinched the bridge of her nose. She was in desperate need of a distraction.
She settled herself behind her desk, but its smooth, clear surface, normally something that relaxed her and made it easier to focus, now made her feel jumpy and on edge. Maka grabbed a journal at random from the neat stack in the corner, determining she would get ahead on some of her reading until she calmed down.
She flipped it open to the middle of the journal, but found the words to be almost as foreign to her as the language of Shibusen still was to scholars. There was a pounding heat between her legs, and the furtive rubbing of her thighs was doing nothing to dispel it. She jiggled her foot as she stared at the same word on the page for a few more minutes.
There was a knock at the door. Maka stood up, accidentally rolling her chair into the table situated only a few feet behind her desk. She straightened the chair as she called out in what she hoped was a steady voice, "Come in!"
The door cracked open to reveal Soul. "Hey," he said, somewhat awkwardly, "uh, can I come in?"
"Sure!" she said too cheerfully.
Soul flapped a stack of papers at her again. "I finished reading your research."
"All of it?"
"Yeah."
"Really? There were a lot of pages, and the print is awfully—"
"All right, fine, I skimmed it," he said waspishly. "The point is, I wanted to look at it before you left for the night." He put it on the desk between them. "Anyway, yeah. I think you're right. This is pretty solid evidence."
"Yeah?" she asked, all pretenses dropped from her voice. "You think?"
"Sounds absolutely reasonable. I liked the bit about the balance of madness and order, that whole thing."
"It needs more fleshing out, but I think I'm on the right track," she said.
"Yeah." Soul glanced sideways, then asked, "So can I see the piece of pottery?"
"Of course!" she said. Maka turned to the table behind her and opened one of the small drawers. When she turned back around, she was slightly surprised to see Soul standing right behind her, but she gently unwrapped the piece of cloth from around the pottery. Soul took it carefully, holding it through the cloth.
"Fascinating," he said, voice filled with awe. "It's in impeccable condition."
"I know," she said excitedly. "And look at the luster of the paint."
"These white lines really just stop here? The rest of it didn't just fade away?"
"No, it seems very deliberate," Maka continued. "It's an interesting discovery. The few texts about the Shinigami revival we can find all focus on the idea of balance and symmetry, yet this piece appears to have been painted deliberately asymmetrically. I really want to find out why."
"Absolutely," Soul said, handing the piece back. Maka took it cautiously, wrapping it back up with care. "Ah, look. Sorry about earlier."
"What?" she said, closing the drawer again.
"The comment about you needing to get laid. That was outta line."
"Mmm," she said, "well, I'm sorry about calling you a know-it-all. Especially because you're not."
"Really?"
"Yeah. You're definitely wrong about the interpretation of that myth surrounding that Crona figure and the moon. I just need more evidence to prove it." She smiled as Soul let out a bark of laughter, shaking his head and running his tongue slowly over his teeth.
"All right," he said, "all right. Fine. And when you find no evidence and my theory gets published as an award-winning paper, you can buy me a beer."
"I will happily accept any number of beers you buy me for writing an even better paper debunking every point in your article," she said, tossing her hair again. She met his eyes, and the air seemed to thicken. Her heart was pounding in her ears again, but a smile played at her lips.
"Trying to get drunk off my dime?"
"Well, I'd say if I'm right, I've earned it."
"You really have a thing about being right, don't you?" he asked, placing his hands on either side of her on the table. She was caged in by his arms, but she didn't feel trapped; the touch of his hands on the desk was light and he was leaning down, looking up into her face with that same dark smile. Maka felt a thrill run through her navel and felt the last nagging doubt in her mind disappear.
"I really do," she said, and her lips were on his and her arms were wrapping around his neck, dragging him closer. She sucked hard on his lip, which a drew a small moan from him before he was kissing her just as fiercely.
So, admittedly, it had been a while. She hadn't kissed anyone in over a year at this point, and she was worried she was a little rusty. But Soul seemed to find a rhythm pretty quickly, and he was apparently talented with that tongue of his, so Maka relaxed into his chest, allowing him entrance to explore her mouth with his tongue.
He wrapped an arm around her waist, trying to hold them steady, but she let her weight do the work and pulled them stumbling backwards into the table. A small voice in her head called out to beware the artifacts, but Soul's voice rumbled louder in her ear, and so she attacked his neck with her teeth.
His skin tasted a little salty. She realized suddenly that she was almost hanging off of him like a koala, which was decidedly not sexy and definitely not what she was going for, so she shimmied onto the table behind her. This raised her a little higher and Soul's teeth were suddenly on her collarbone as he sucked harshly at her skin. Maka let out a gasp.
His fingers fumbled with the buttons of her blouse. "Why are these goddamn buttons always so small," he growled against her chest. She shivered unexpectedly.
"Clearly they were not made with your Neanderthal fingers in mind."
"You're not even gonna stop insulting me now?"
"No," she said, which earned her a languid lick from her collarbone to behind her ear. "Ah!" she gasped as he sucked at the sensitive skin. He released her with a wet pop. "You're an ass, that's gonna leave a mark."
"Serves you right," he said, finally successfully undoing the top button. He moved to reach the next one, but Maka batted his hands away.
"You take too long."
"You're so impatient," he complained, but Maka noticed that his eyes were riveted to where her skin was slowly coming into view. When she finally reached the last button and dragged her blouse away from her body, he leapt into action, licking a path between her breasts. Maka fumbled with her bra clasp as Soul charted her flushed skin with his tongue. Apparently it really had been a while if she was this hot and bothered and he'd barely touched her.
But she managed to get her bra undone and flung it away. Soul stilled, carefully surveying the rise and fall of her chest like a good field observer. He turned his mahogany eyes to hers as she breathed hard. Without breaking eye contact, he took a pert nipple gently between his teeth. Maka tensed with anticipation. He rolled his teeth carefully, carefully, and Maka felt a knot tighten in her stomach as she breathed out.
Well, even if he had gotten the nickname "Eater" from his prowess in the cafeteria, it was clear that that tongue and those teeth had other applications. She moaned as both traveled between both her breasts, leaving a trail of goosebumps wherever they went. His hands, warm and rough, traveled up her skirt and clutched at her thighs.
He pulled lightly at her breast with his teeth and Maka gasped again, writhing against him. Soul lowered her slowly so that she was lying against the table and his body was draped over hers. He moved his mouth back up her chest as his hands roved closer to the heat between her legs. His fingers played with the edges of her (disappointingly dull today) underwear. "Mmm?" he murmured between licks of her skin.
"Ma-ah," was her response.
He pushed aside the cotton and teased each lip with a dexterous finger. Maka bucked slightly at his touch. His lips had made their way back to her ear.
"You're always wound so tight," he panted in her ear as a single digit slipped past her folds to her wet core. "I wanna watch you unravel." Soul added another and Maka bucked again.
She felt that familiar ache in her abdomen as he started to move his fingers in and out, occasionally getting snagged on her panties as he teased her neck with his tongue. Wrapping her legs around his waist, Maka dragged him in closer and let out a long, drawn-out moan; the change in angles allowed him to reach deeper. He crooked his fingers and she had to bite her lip to prevent herself from calling out.
Maka moved her hips against his hand as he worked her clit with his thumb. He was breathing hard in her ear, letting out little grunts to match her moans. "So fucking sexy," he groaned against her skin, and she wasn't entirely sure she was supposed to have heard it, but it was accompanied by a twisting motion of his hand that made her clutch at his back and throw her head back with a silent scream.
The pressure in her lower belly was building, a hot, tight coil begging for release, and so she tried to ride his hand as he slid another finger in to join the others. Maka threaded her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck, and somewhere in the back of her mind, she was surprised by how soft it was. Soul's mouth moved back to hers and she allowed herself to moan loudly as his tongue joined hers again.
She knew she was close, so she moved desperately against his hand. The pad of his fingertip hit the sensitive spot within her sex just as his thumb swiped over her clit again and she let out a "Mmph!" of pleasure, muffled by his lips. Soul seemed to understand exactly what she needed, because he repeated the motion, again and again, and Maka saw the light gathering at the edges of her vision and she tumbled over the edge, her loud moan of pleasure swallowed by Soul's kiss.
She felt her orgasm drag at Soul's fingers inside her. As she relaxed around his hand, he slowed his movements to a leisurely pace, allowing her to ride out her pleasure for as long as she could. A foggy part of her mind was extremely appreciative of that, and was curious what other tricks he might know.
But something more insistent echoed in her head, and she slid off the table, a sudden rush of adrenaline pounding through her veins. Maka pushed Soul by the shoulders across the gap and against her desk, hurriedly encouraging him to get on top of it, glad for the millionth time that her desk was cleared because it was the first time she was going to use it for this purpose.
Soul stumbled onto the desk none too gracefully. His eyes grew as wide as saucers as Maka clambered up to crouch over him, her spine curved as she stared down into his face. Her skirt was too restrictive to spread her legs, so she slid it up her thighs to give herself more room. She watched as Soul's eyes snapped to her movement, as he watched her reveal more and more creamy skin. His hands attached themselves to the back of her thighs.
Something very close to pride surged through her as she watched his dark eyes rove over her, his arousal evident in his feverish skin and heavy breathing. Maka lowered herself against his crotch and felt the hard evidence of his feelings.
Maka planted her hands on either side of her body again, but instead of stilling her movements, she used the position to accelerate them. She ground down against his erection, moving her slightly damp panties against him, soothing the pounding ache of the aftereffects of her orgasm. Soul hissed through his teeth, hands clamped to her legs as he guided her over him.
The friction between them felt pretty great to her, but it was apparently feeling really great to Soul, because his breathing hitched and he kept letting slip "ah-ha!"s. Maka slowed her motions, more purposeful and rough against him, and he threw his head back on the desk.
"Fuck," he growled.
She couldn't help the small smirk spread across her features as she watched him writhe under her. Mr. Cool certainly wasn't acting particularly cool right now, though admittedly he was still aggravatingly attractive. Maka allowed herself to fall forward, wrapping her arms around the halo of pale hair against the desk. She ran her fingers through it once again as she ground against him, kissing him lightly with each twist of her hips. Soul responded to each one enthusiastically.
At a particularly needy groan from him, Maka lifted her hips and slid her hand down his chest (disappointingly still hidden behind a shirt; she should have done something about that before) to undo his belt. She fumbled slightly, but managed to get it undone, and pushed past the elastic of his underwear (boxers - mystery solved). Her fingers found his smooth, hard length, and she took him in her hand. He wriggled against the desk, sliding his boxers and slacks down a little to alleviate the pressure on his erection.
She pumped him slowly, his skin a tiny bit sweaty from having been in clothes all day, watching him bite his lip and twist his head. She observed with something like wonder that his teeth didn't hurt his mouth, but she supposed he must have a lot of practice with them. Then she remembered that he did indeed have good control over them, if the hickeys all over her shoulders were any indication. At the memory, Maka moved her hand faster.
She leaned over him again, pressing her lips to his jawline as he panted hard in her ear. His face was rough; he was in need of a shave. She felt the heat in her stomach again, but she pulled gently at his skin with her lips, each kiss a slight tug to match the tugging of her hands.
"Nnph!" he said, and she could sense his urgency, so she sped up her movements, feeling him twitch in her fingers. She kept going, despite the awkward angle, when suddenly he left out a strangled groan and she felt him pulse and something warm and wet hit the inside of her thigh. Soul slumped bonelessly against the desk, letting out a low moan as his erection pumped a few more times, slower and slower, and she felt the stickiness slide slowly down her skin.
Maka seemed to come back to herself as Soul came back to earth. She was straddling her colleague on her desk after hours, her juices drying on his fingers and his semen dripping down her leg. They had to work together, they had a paper they were cowriting, they played on the same pub trivia team! She bit her lip, at a loss for what to do.
Soul seemed to decide for her, and kissed her again gently.