The nightmares never seem to go away anymore. Every time I close my eyes and will for sleep I am plagued with visions of my dead friends, the ones I care about most being taken from me in the most brutal of ways. Things I cannot even begin to comprehend flash in my vision. I cannot stop these thoughts, and every time I wake screaming. I feel as if I am going mad, this all-consuming terror upon waking leaves me with little energy and I can't get the rest I need. Every night Soul barges into my room and holds me until I stop screaming, until the terror subsides and I can breathe. He is suffering too; he can't rest either with me here. All the extra training we have been doing in lieu of the Kishin Asura's return has been wearing us out every day. We can't even sleep with my thoughts and nightmares lately. We haven't even told our friends; I imagine we look way worse for the wear. Am I betraying them? Their trust, by keeping this from them? Soul doesn't know everything just that the nightmares are progressively getting worse. I've been tempted to talk to Stein about them, but I fear what he will say or think. Will I be kicked from the group? Am I too far gone? Stein, I know, is battling with the madness as well, I can see it miss Marie is trying to help him, but because of Medusa I fear he is getting worse. Is that my fate? I can't help but think this is my fault. I let the madness consume me, I let the black blood take control when I fought Crona, perhaps I have become more susceptible to the madness from the Kishin. Any day now the order to go after Arachnophobia and the Kishin will be heard, I can't help but think that many lives are going to be lost. My hope is that Asura can be defeated without Genie hunter. I fear that my time may be close, the dreams are starting to happen while I am awake, I find myself giggling at things that aren't funny in the slightest. Pain, death, sadness, and anger. I can feel the stares my friends give me, soul too. They are worried about me, yet I haven't said a word. Does this make me a bad person? Maybe I will finally talk about it, let them know just what I am going through. Maybe I will be able to without having a psychotic breakdown. My mind is made up; I will do it today.
~~~~The lunch bell has rung~~~~
Narrators P.O.V
The group of friends walked the halls of the DWMA towards their daily destination, the roof. Maka and Soul leading the way followed by Liz and Patti, Kid and Tsubaki behind them and Black Star bringing up the rear and carrying a few baskets of food. Everyone but Soul were watching Maka with worried glances, she had been softly giggling to herself for the last 10 minutes of class and still hadn't stopped. "Uhh…Maka" Liz asked, "Are you…. okay?" The giggles stopped and Makas head slowly turned toward Liz her face was a little creepy the shadows from her bangs caused only half of her face to be visible and she had an odd looking smile on her face. "Of course I'm okay Liz insert giggle here, we all just have some stuff to talk about another giggle that's all." Everyone's eyes were trained on Maka and Patti deemed the situation funny enough to crack up laughing; Liz took the opportunity to back away a few steps. Kid narrowed his eyes and decided that whatever was happening to the scythe meister was most definitely not good. "GUYS LETS KEEP MOVING! YOUR GOD IS HUNGRY AND DEMANDS TO EAT!" Black Stars outburst brought everyone from their thoughts and Patti decided to stop laughing and so they once again began their walk to the roof. Once there Tsubaki laid down a cloth and placed the lunch she had made on it, not long after giving to go ahead to dig in it was all gone. With everyone relaxed and with full bellies it was time to come clean. Maka had been trying to get a rein back on her sanity so she could warn the others about her current state. "Ahem! giggle" she cleared her throat to get everyone's attention. Immediately all eyes were on her. "giggle there is something serious we need to talk about. I…giggle I am losing my sanity…I am losing myself to the madness." At this she let out a full laugh and her face screwed up into an insane grin but it vanished quickly as she regained herself. The shock on everyone's faces almost made her laugh again but she controlled the urge. Kid was the first to speak up; "Have you talked to professor Stein about this?" Her reply was a shake of her head afraid that if she tried to speak the laughter she was trying to hold back would come through instead. "She has been having nightmares, really bad ones" Soul spoke up with a serious look on his normally calm face "She wakes up screaming most nights, sometimes though she laughs hysterically and tells me that she killed everyone." "Why haven't you told any of us about it?" Tsubaki asked "We are your friends and we care about you." Liz, Patti, Kid and Black Star murmured their agreements with Tsubaki's statement. "idiot probably thought she could handle it on her own. Isn't that right Maka?" That was it, she couldn't contain the laughter anymore, Souls statement had brought it forth. She laughed as tears welled up in her eyes and started to trek down her face, the accuracy of her partner's statement had shocked her enough to lose her foothold on her sanity and she was struggling to grasp it again. "Always so weak" she laughed "I just wanted to be strong, now I don't know how long I can hold on, even now I can feel it consuming me." "We need to get her to stein and miss Marie guys, she is getting worse." Liz had been watching her closely, the change is obvious, even from five minutes ago. Maka was losing herself. Kid leapt up from his seated position and picked her up "I'll fly her there with Beelzebub, you guys meet us at Steins lab, get there as fast as you can." A chorus of "Right" was heard among the group and with that they all took off to find Maka's only hope, even though he too was suffering from the madness.
~~~~At the lab~~~~
Stein was sitting in the corner on the floor, the lights were off and his mind was playing tricks on him as it often was. He was muttering to himself about miss Marie. The door to the lab burst open when Kid had kicked it in, the darkness that greeted him was unexpected and his eyes tried to adjust to the low lighting. Switching the giggling Maka's weight he felt along the wall for a light switch and when he found it he flicked the lights on. "Professor!" he called "Professor Stein, I need your help!" Stein had brought himself back and looked up at kid, he was holding a giggling Maka and looked rather worried. "What do you need Kid?" "It's Maka, she is losing herself to the madness and it is happening at an alarming rate." "Oh?" Stein lifted himself off the floor and walked over to inspect the girl in Kid's arms. Kid decided to set Maka down on her feet. She staggered a bit but finally stood in a slightly hunched over position with her head slightly cocked to the right. Stein used his soul perception to see her soul, it wasn't completely dark but it was definitely being consumed by madness. There wasn't much of it that wasn't tainted and it was struggling to stay that way. "Can you see her soul, Kid?" The seriousness in Stein's voice prompted Kid to use his soul perception as well, what he saw made him suck in a breath. At the serious faces the two were making Maka started laughing, her face contorting into an insane smile and as she laughed the taint of madness in her soul grew darker. "What does this mean professor?" The others had finally made it and cringed at the maniacally laughing Maka but surrounded Kid in order to hear what the professor was about to say. "It means, the Maka you knew, your scythe meister friend, is gone. There isn't a way that we know of that can bring a soul back from the madness once it has been completely consumed." "She hasn't been consumed completely though right?" The urgency in Soul's tone made the rest look at him with sorrow, his meister, his partner, and best friend was practically dying. Once a soul was lost to the madness they needed to be destroyed, they were unstable, unpredictable. They killed for the laughs, brought pain because it was fun. "Not completely, no, but soon she will be. The chances of her regaining her sanity is slim to none. She needs to be kept safe and away from others, I will take her to Lord Death and he will decide." The professor's words shocked everyone, their resonance team leader, the bravest one of them all was essentially gone. "How could this have happened?" Tsubaki asked, it looked like everyone else wanted to know that as well, and for whatever reason Black Star had been unusually quiet since they had eaten lunch. "Some souls are weaker than others and cannot fight off the madness as well as some can. Not to say that Maka has a weak soul it just seems that she is more susceptible to the call of madness, kind of like me." "Is it possible that those souls who have touched madness before have a higher chance of losing themselves?" All eyes trained to Soul, and he winced slightly at his own words. Too late to go back now. "That's a weird question Soul, how did Maka touch madness before now? There hasn't been a trace of madness in her soul before recently." Kid looked a little irritated, what exactly had his friends been hiding from him? The laughter in the background was starting to stop, only small giggles could be heard, she had gained some of herself back, if only a small bit. "The black blood. I let it consume me so that I could get to Crona, Soul had pulled me back that time." "So why can't he do it this time? Are you so weak Soul that you can't save your own meister from something as dumb as madness?" Black Star had decided to stop being quiet. "I have black blood within me too, In the state she is in if we were to resonate enough for me to get in, the madness would consume us both." "So you both have been keeping secrets huh? SINCE WHEN DO FRIENDS KEEP SECRETS!?" Black Star had his fists clenched tightly at his side, his emotions were getting the better of him. Having known Maka since they were kids and considering her a little sister of sorts, watching her go mad and knowing she will never come back to them was killing him. "FOR ALL YOU KNOW WE COULD HAVE PREVENTED THIS! ALL YOU HAD TO DO WAS TALK TO US ABOUT IT! TRUST YOUR FRIENDS TO HELP YOU!" "Black star is right, in a way." Soul looked to the professor "Had we known about this earlier we could have helped her with miss Marie's healing wavelength, now though, I don't think it will be enough."
~~~Maka's P.O.V~~~
I can't stop this; I can't even stop the laughter from bubbling out. I won't be able to kill the Kishin, I'll be killed for the danger I pose to this world. I can't gain enough of my soul back from the madness to keep my sanity. My friends are going to suffer watching me go insane and be executed. They will have to defeat the kishin on their own. My thoughts continue to take dark turns; I know what I must do. With all of the strength I can muster I push the madness back and grasp tightly on my sanity. While everyone is distracted in their conversation I slip away unnoticed and head to the home I share with Soul. I open the door, but I don't bother to turn on the lights. I am looking for one thing only; the only weapon I have ever had that wasn't human. A small 9mm pistol, pretty plain with its black colored metal. It was a gift from mama. I go into my room and into my closet, the gun is sitting in a silver code locked box on the top shelf. I take it, perhaps I should write a note? I sigh but decide to write something for the ones I care about. Simple and meaningful. "I'm sorry, I needed to do this, for my sanity and for yours dear friends. I love you all. -Maka" perfect. I shut the door to the apartment and began walking away from the only home I have ever known. I walked on and on, I don't know how long I walked or how far I had gotten before I couldn't go any further and collapsed onto the ground. "I am surrounded by trees, I must have gone pretty far." I laid there on the ground for a while, until the sun had gone down and nothing but the sound of crickets met my ears. I could feel the madness consuming my soul again, it was so hard to fight it. "I guess this is it then, but I wish it wasn't. I could have done so many things, but I will do this for them, I won't make those I care about watch me waste away. I will be brave!" With that last sentence I gripped the pistol tightly, my finger on the trigger and the end of the chamber pressed firmly against my temple. "Good-bye Death City. Good-bye Liz, Good-bye Patti, Good-bye Tsubaki, Good-bye papa, Good-bye mama, Good-bye Black star…. Good-bye…. Soul."
~~~Back at the lab~~~
After the arguments between the professor and the group of friends was over, they noticed Maka was nowhere to be found. They decided to look for her, who knows what she could be getting herself into. She was extremely unstable. The first place they checked was the school, she wasn't there. Then they ran all over Death City trying to find her only to turn up with nothing. The sun was setting and an exhausted group decided to head to Maka and Soul's shared apartment to check there, it was their last place to check and they hoped they would find her. They arrived just as the last of the sun's rays had disappeared and replaced by darkness. Soul unlocked the door and walked in to pitch black, he reached over and flicked on the lights and motioned for everyone to enter. He knew she wasn't here; he couldn't feel her. The pain hit him so suddenly, his hand gripped his chest and he lost his balance. He didn't know he was screaming until his friends circled him with hands over their ears. He couldn't feel her, her soul, it wasn't…. she wasn't. He couldn't finish his thoughts; it was excruciating to feel what he was feeling…he didn't want to think about the reason. His eyes filled with tears and as uncool as it was he couldn't hold himself back from letting them fall. His screams stopped, now choked sobs that he was trying to contain wracked his entire being. He looked up and his eyes met with Tsubaki's she looked like she was holding something, a piece of paper? Tsu handed it to him, that's when he noticed the tears she was letting go. The room was filled with questions of what was on the paper, what it was, why Tsubaki was crying and where Maka was and asking Soul what happened. Terror that was the feeling he felt at seeing Tsubaki's face and being handed that piece of paper, whatever was on that paper was going to kill him. Carefully he turned it and read the sloppy handwriting that was obviously written by someone who couldn't hold the pen straight. The words were very big and were hard to read, but he understood what it was, what she had done. "She's…. Dead."