Love.

A sadistic smile spread across Professor Franken Stein's face.

He was doing this for love.

Marie would love him for it. She would see how much he did love her. What he couldn't say in words. And she would thank him for it.

He doubted that the mangled man on the operating table in front of him would be able to see the simple beauty of it, but he really didn't care.

She would know.

The reports came in slowly. Men were missing, but it took Marie nearly a month to start putting it together. She recognized all the names on the list. They were all her ex-boyfriends. The men who had let her down. She searched desperately for some other link, some person missing that wasn't someone she knew personally, and couldn't find one.

So she followed him. And what she saw terrified her. Stein was strong, she knew that. But she watched as with one hit he incapacitated one of her ex-boyfriends and casually threw him over his shoulder. She followed him back to the lab, hoping she was wrong. But when the screaming started, she knew she wasn't.

"Stein! What are you doing! You have to let him go!" Marie stormed into the room, her arm already transformed into a hammer.

Stein looked up, his face twisted into a sadistic smile. "Marie, you're early. Come back later. I'll have another present for you then." The scalpel in his hand glimmered in the light above the operating table as he made another cut in the screaming man's chest.

Fighting tears, Marie rushed at Stein, her arm glowing golden with her healing wavelength.

Stein looked down calmly at his patient. "One moment, if you don't mind." He said calmly as he moved out of the way of Marie's attack.

"I don't understand why you're so upset, Marie. These men hurt you." She could see the madness in his eyes, feel it radiating from him. But she could also see something else in Stein's eyes. Love? Impossible.

"Because they're human beings, Franken!" She swung again. "They can make their own choices!" The tears were streaming down freely now.

"The choice to hurt you was the wrong one." Stein's voice was low, menacing. "I won't allow that to happen." He lunged at her, catching her in the stomach with his soul menace and knocking her up to the ceiling.

"Sutures."

"Stein..."

"Marie. I'll show you as soon as I'm done here. He'll never hurt you again. None of them will."

"Stein, no..."

Marie cried as she watched the man she had started to fall in love with cut open her ex, carefully removing his organs, weighing them, dissecting him. She watched in horror as he removed the heart oh so carefully, cleaning it and opened a box which he set it in. He smiled up at her as he did.

"Marie."

"Stein, no more... no more... " She sobbed.

"Have I hurt you Marie? I couldn't stand that." The madness was in his eyes, but there was also... concern? Marie couldn't bear to look at his eyes again.

"Marie, I have a present for you. I hope you understand." That sadistic smile again.

Walking over to the box he had placed the previous heart in he picked it up and brought it over to show her where she was affixed to the ceiling. Opening it up, he showed her his collection. Eight perfectly preserved hearts.

"I want to give you mine, too. I just haven't figured that out yet, Marie."

Her screams echoed through the lab, and she lost consciousness.

"Good morning, Marie. Did you sleep well?" Marie opened her eyes to Stein's own green ones.

"Stein?"

"How are you feeling?"

"I... I don't know. Alright, I guess. I feel like Spirit must have gotten me totally sloshed though... last night just seems to be a fuzzy blur..."

Stein smiled. "That's good."

Stein reached out, and to Marie's surprised, ruffled her hair. His fingers traced the stitches that followed her part line perfectly, and he was satisfied.

The things he would do for love.

A/N: I don't own Soul Eater. Sadly. I hope you enjoyed this, just a short one shot I did at 7am before crashing lol.