She was carrying a few boxes out of her room. Soul didn't know why, but he saw a book fall out of one them.

Oh God, the apocalypse was starting, if Maka was willingly getting rid of books. He walked over and picked the book off the floor. It was a thin thing. The cover had a young anime girl with auburn hair and a frilly outfit on. A small, winged lion smiled next to the girl. She held some sort of scepter with a strange bird head ornament on it.

"The hell is this?" he muttered.

"Oh…just some manga I'm getting rid of," his meister answered, taking the book from him and throwing it into one of the boxes.

"Mah…what?"

"Japanese comics," she explained, "Tsugumi told me about this one author, and I started reading a bunch of them."

Soul dug through one of the boxes, and sure enough, they were all by the same person. Someone called CLAMP.

"Clamp?"

"There's a group of women that write and draw manga," she went on, "They've been at it a while. I've just gotten tired of them. Despite the all-women team here, they're stories are really weird. Some of them are kinda sexist, if you look at them a bit."

"Really? I would think an all female team would be a bit better about that."

"Yeah. You'd think. Dunno what I'm gonna do with 'em. Need to make more room for my regular hardcovers."

"I can find something to do with 'em."

"You sure? I was gonna give them to Tsugumi or something."

"I got an eBay account. I can sell 'em."

"Well, alright! Thanks, Soul."

She gave his arm a playful bump with her fist and walked back to her room. With that, Soul took the books to his room.

Once they were all there, he decided to look through the collection. If the books were as sexist as Maka claimed they were, he wanted to confirm that for himself. The first one he grabbed was titled Chobits.

Only a few pages in, and there was a naked girl. Yup, he saw why Maka had a problem with this. He snickered to himself.

He put it down and grabbed a different one. The art was slightly different. The title read RG Veda. It looked kinda dated to him, so he set that one back in the box as well.

Then, he saw one with a boy and a girl on the cover in a different art style. The title was a mouthful.

"Too-soo…buh…Reservoir Chronicle?"

He opened it, and it seemed to start with the boy and girl unable to reach each other through a wall of glass. Oh boy, a romance. He rolled his eyes.

However, as he read it, the two turned out to be just friends that were secretly in love with each other.

Somehow, this caught his interest.

He sat on the bed and continued reading.

He had gotten to volume fifteen in the box before Maka knocked on the door.

"Yo Soul! Dinner's up!"

"Can you set it outside? Kinda busy!"

Maka frowned.

"What are you doing in there?"

"Reading…"

Now, she knew he was fucking with her.

"No, seriously, what are you doing?"

"I'm seriously reading something. Can you please just leave it outside?"

She groaned in annoyance, but obliged, putting his food on a tray. She knocked again, and he grabbed the tray quickly before shutting the door again.

He opened the sixteenth volume as he took a bite of his meal.

Sunday struck, and Maka slept in, but awoke to a loud yell. She lept out of bed and ran out. Soul wasn't up. Must've been in his room.

She burst open the door.

Soul had his face in his hands, sitting on the edge of the bed, the twenty-eighth book lying on the floor.

"Soul, what the hell happened?!" she cried.

"It was a title drop…"

"Excuse me?"

"THEIR NAMES WERE A FUCKING TITLE DROP!"

Maka looked bewildered until she saw what the book was on the floor.

"So you were reading Tsubasa…"

He didn't reply, but she sat next to him, placing the book on the bed.

"You read it?"

"Yep…"

"All twenty-eight books?"

"All of them."

"The ending sucks, doesn't it?"

"YEEEESSSSSS…oh my God, why do Syaoran and Sakura NEED real names, and WHY do they have the same name? And WHY IS THERE NAME THE TITLE OF THE FLIPPING BOOK?"

"OH MY GOD I KNOW! That was so dumb! I totally makes you forget that whole speech Mokona made about their past lives not mattering totally pointless!"

"YEAH! And they were never called those name in their pasts! UGH! … Still…at least they ended up sort of together in the end I guess…"

"Heh heh, yeah…"

"Also, gotta ask…are Kurogane and Fai…"

"Gay? I dunno. I don't think CLAMP ever confirmed it, but I mean…a lot of their other works are kinda homoerotic. I wouldn't put it past them."

"Yeah. The bromance was strong with them. I mean, Jesus…KUROGANE CUTTING OFF HIS ARM!"

"YEEEESSS! HOLY SHIT, THE SCENE WAS SICK!"

And they started laughing.

"You're such a nerd, Maka," Soul laughed.

"Hey, you're no better," she pouted, "Mr. I-Read-A-Manga-Series-In-A-Whole-Night."

As he let out a sigh, Maka got up.

"You know what? I heard their making a sequel."

"GET OUT."

"YUP! I think there's some chapters out right now! … Wanna read them after we have breakfast?"

"…maybe…"

Maka smirked at him and held out her hand. He grabbed it and got off the bed. He wobbled a little.

"Maybe after a nap…" he admitted.

"You didn't sleep, did you?"

"…mmm-mmm…"

"C'mon," Maka chuckled, "I'll make pancakes."

After eating, Soul wrapped up in a blanket on the couch. As he slept, Maka hunted online for a way to turn the boxes they had into a bookshelf. Guess she was going to keep some of those books for a bit longer.