Novelization of the doujinshi, Upright.

Just like Rendezvous Pitch Maneuver, this is on a hentai site even though there is no sex in it. It can be found here: http: /www. fakku. net/viewmanga. php?id=3198 If you decide to read, enter without whining or otherwise complaining at your own risk.

Look at me! I'm back from the dead! I am in Tennessee using hotel Wi-Fi so I'm not sure when I'll be back, but I'm alive and I'm okay. I'm updating! I'm on my way to Arizona with my Dad and my mom is rotten still, but I'm hanging in there. Thank you all for your wonderful support! Here is your reward!

X X X

It had been a long hard day of training. Professor Stein had worked both Maka Albarn and her weapon-partner, Soul Eater Evans, to the bone. But, in a sense, it had also been easy training because Stein had only insisted they practice resonating with each other over and over while doing a few easy sets that Maka could already do in her sleep. But resonating with Soul had been taking a lot out of her lately and she knew Stein could tell—hence the endless practice.

She didn't know why they were having trouble either.

Normally, she and Soul were incredibly compatible despite their different personalities and normal teenage squabbles. Lately when she tried to resonate with Soul, he overpowered her. It was almost as if his soul was trying to devour her and draw her into himself. She wasn't frightened that Soul would ever hurt her, but it was exhausting to push back the waves of his soul as they washed over her own like a strong ocean current.

Exhausted, the meister and weapon left the training grounds while Stein smoked a few more cigarettes, puffing out skull-shaped clouds of smoke.

It was a hot summer day and Maka had even left her black overcoat at home, but Soul had his favorite yellow and red leather jacket zipped up to his throat. She had no idea how he wasn't dying of heat stroke, but he looked comfortable even in the piping sun. Maka fed some quarters into the vending machine back at the Academy and removed two cold drinks from the mouth of the machine.

She smiled slightly to herself as she recalled all the things that had happened at this soda machine. Kid had to be kept away from the machine because the fact that there were always different amounts of each drink on each side and that wasn't symmetrical in the least. He had had many a mental breakdown right here in front of it, spitting up blood and passing out like clockwork. There were dents in the front and side where BlackStar had beaten the crap out of it for not giving him a soda after he had given it money. On occasion, Patty had beaten the machine for the same thing, but Maka never had trouble with it. The machine was good to her and it was nice to Soul, too.

Maka leaned against the wall in the shadow of the machine and Soul plopped down on the cool concrete a few feet away from her. Even with that space between them, Maka still felt the wavelength of his soul washing over her shoulders and pulling at her.

Why was his soul so overpowering and strong lately? Why did he seem to be trying to absorb her into himself? Why was he so protective lately?

Maka decided to play with him a little and sipped her soda as she watched her partner do the same from the corner of her eye. She licked her lips and lowered the can. "Hey, Soul," she began. "I got an offer today. Someone asked me if I wanted to be their partner."

Soul didn't respond to her for a long moment and his crimson eyes slid to the side. The waves of his soul smashed into her sidelong, sucking at her skin and hair like some manner of breeze. For a moment, she thought he was worried about the thought of losing her to someone else, but he still didn't say anything. Only the waves of his soul gave away that he cared at all. He took a drink and Maka saw his pink tongue snake out to lick his lower lip.

"What should I do?" Maka asked him.

Soul's soul slithered against her side and abruptly pulled back as if burned by her.

'What does she mean 'What should I do?'?' Soul demanded inwardly. Was she tired of being his partner? Or was it something else? Inside, Soul had always known that a part of Maka wanted to be with him because he was a scythe just like her father and that he was a convenient replacement for her father in her life. After all, she told him enough that Soul was the only man she trusted and she was obsessed with turning him into a weapon stronger than her father. She was using Soul to replace Spirit Albarn in everyone's lives.

But Soul wasn't Spirit…

"Why don't you just do whatever?" Soul forced out. Even though it would kill him to have to let her go, to watch her soul joining with someone else's and to take a different partner himself, he wasn't going to hold her back if she wanted to go.

Maka stared at him with her jade-green eyes wide. With the way his soul had been acting, that was the last thing she had been expecting to hear come out of his mouth. Her heartbeat began to race. Was he calling her out, catching her in a lie about her partner offer? Maybe he was mimicking how she got whenever she saw him get offers for new partners. Maka acted the same way Soul was acting now—indifferent and cool as a cucumber.

"Huh," she snapped flatly. "Maybe I'll take him up on his offer." She reclined against the wall, feeling the chill seeping into her skin and enjoying it after the heat and sweat of training. Man, was it ever hot. Maka embellished her fake-partner-offer with the traits she loved in all her friends. "He's smart and tall," she said because she loved that about Kid. "He's always smiling," she said because she loved that about BlackStar even if his flamboyant and ebullient attitude got on her nerves. "And he's pretty cool!" Damn, that wasn't supposed to get in there. That was Soul's trait. Scrambling, she covered her Freudian slip with the first thing that popped into her head. "Oh, and did I mention he's rich?" She leaned down to look into Soul's face but his expression gave nothing away.

"Uh-huh, good for you," Soul said with equal flatness. He took another drink and Maka watched his thin throat flash as he swallowed.

Disgruntled, she stared at him. There was no way he had figured out that she was bluffing. She could still feel his soul lashing around inside him, pulling at her occasionally. But why was he acting so cool then? What was up with him lately?

Maka threw her empty can into the trash with a clatter that was a little too loud in the silence of a summer afternoon. "Just kidding!" she said in a sing-song cheery voice.

"Huh?" Soul's eyes flit up to her face and he looked genuinely surprised by this admission. Had she really been playing with him? Just to see if she could hurt him, maybe? But why? Why would she do that to him? Soul didn't understand Maka, lately. She had been acting so weird.

"I was just kidding," Maka continued. "None of that was true. But you know, you could have said something to stop me. I mean, I was talking about finding a new partner." She was leaned down to look into his face. The shadows from the vending machine played across her cheeks and in her eyes.

"What's the point?" Soul asked her, voice rising. His soul was reaching out again. "You never listen to me once you've made up your mind."

"So what?" Maka shouted. "You should at least try!"

Soul turned his face away, eyes narrowing.

Her voice lowered. "You just don't get it, Soul." There was something strange in her soft voice. "And while we're on the subject, I don't want you throwing yourself in the way the next time someone attacks me—"

Soul turned his face back to her, eyes lifting up to her face. Her expression was strange, eyes closed and mouth set in a grim line.

"—though I guess you probably wouldn't listen, either, even if I asked you."

His silver brows drew together sharply. "Why the hell shouldn't I protect you?" he demanded.

"Because you'll die." Her gaze was farseeing, eyes glassy with something Soul thought was long put behind them.

Chrona. It all came back to the fight with Chrona, to the black blood in Soul's veins, to the horrible old wound bisecting his chest. It came back to Maka's guilt for bringing him into that stupid chapel in Italy where he almost died, back to his willingness to sacrifice himself for her, back to his bright red blood splattered all over the white marble floor and the new black blood in his veins. It always came back to this. Soul couldn't count on all his fingers and toes the number of times they had talked about this.

"A meister can't do anything without their weapon-partner. Even if you were to…" she hesitated, "take the blow for me, the moment you were down it would mean the end for both of us."

Soul tightened his grip on the cold can.

"It's better that you run and save yourself than to die needlessly," Maka said coldly. Why did her voice sound so ugly?

"You know," Soul began and couldn't keep the biting tone out of his own voice. He was hurt and he was almost angry. "The way I see it, you've been throwing the word 'partner' around." He set the can on the ground in front of him to disguise the fact that his hands were shaking.

Maka's green eyes were on him, drawn by the strangeness in his voice and by the way his soul was behaving. It felt almost barbed, prickly and unhappy. He was hurting and she had hurt him by playing this game with him.

"But from where I'm standing, it sounds like I'm nothing more than a tool to you."

His words stabbed into her chest like shards of glass.

X X X

I love how this was only the first seven pages. Could I have made it any longer, honestly?

Questions, comments, concerns?