This just popped into my head one day as I was watching Soul Eater. I decided that since I put in an application for a job, even though I've already got the job, and I start work as soon as my boss calls me back, I would be super nice and give all of you a brand new story!

How nice am I? ;)

I don't own the characters. I attach strings to them and shout, "Dance marionettes! Dance for my pleasure!"

He can't believe he would end up here of all places. He's not the type to drown his sorrows in alcohol, but tonight that changes. Walking into the bar with his usual pin-striped suit and red dress shirt, he attracts a lot of attention, especially from the ladies. He wasn't looking for that tonight.

He just wanted to drink myself to death.

He sat down on a stool in front of the current bartender; a young black man with cornrows.

"How's it going?" The guy asks cheerily. "The name is Kilik." Soul nods but doesn't speak. Before he can even order his drink Kilik pulls out a bottle of amber liquid and pours it into a glass before handing it to him. He raises an eyebrow and Kilik laughs. "Your expression said 'give me your strongest 'cause I'm going to need it.' "

He smiles a little and holds it up to Kilik in a toast before downing the glass. Liquid fire runs down his throat. Painful, yet satisfying. He takes another sip before he notices a laugh from his stool-mate.

"I wouldn't scare the newcomers." She giggles. "He may never come back. Then where would you get your customers?"

Kilik rolls his eyes. "Yeah yeah. We both know you scare more customers than I do."

It was her turn to roll her eyes. "If they can't stomach my drinking then they shouldn't drink at all."

"You drink more than anybody here all day! It's a wonder you can still function properly!"

She rolls her eyes again and takes a sip of what he can see is a cup of sake. She puts her drink down and turns to him. "So, first time drinking?" He blanches. How the heck did she know? She smirks and takes another sip of her sake. "It's easy to tell a heavy drinker from a newcomer. I've been coming here for ten years. You begin to tell the difference after a year."

He raises an eyebrow as a sort of challenge. "Then pray tell, what is the difference?"

Her smile is sly as she takes another sip from her cup and proceeds to pour more from the huge jar next to her. "The newcomers drinking for the first time are always the ones to get a strong drink because they think they can handle it. Old-timers get more of the strong-but-not-too-strong drinks because they know their limits. The in-betweeners get more fruity drinks because they like the taste and they're not too big on the flavor of alcohol."

He blinked. Did she have every kind of drinker categorized?

She started to laugh at his expression and he quickly covered it up by taking a sip of his drink. He almost spat it back out. He really wasn't accustomed to such strong drinks and he had only ever had one form of alcohol in his entire life, which was years ago.

She suddenly grinned. "So what brought you here?"

He twitched but tried to shrug it off. "I don't know what you mean." She rolled her eyes again. "Do you have a habit of rolling your eyes?"

"Only when I hear a stupid answer." She laughed when she saw his angry expression. "Everybody who comes here is down from something. I just have yet to find out what your problem is. Lost your job?"

"Just found out my girlfriend of fifteen years was cheating on me."

She snorted. "You just found out?"

He raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

She shook her head and turned to Kilik. "Hey Kilik! Can you get me a May 2005 copy of Death Magazine?"

"Sure." He disappeared into the back room.

The weird girl turned to the confused man. "Just watch." No sooner had she spoken those words did the young bartender come back out with an old magazine. He plucked it in front of the strange girl and she handed him a fifty. "Don't argue with me." She said firmly, before the man could protest. "We both know you need the extra money."

"Why do you think I-"

"Have a job? To earn money to pay for school. Think of this as a tip. Now take it before I call your boss and tell him you just volunteered for garbage duty." She winked. "You know he likes me."

The young man could have sworn he saw the bartender pale. He quickly stuffed the fifty into his jeans and shuffled off to mix more drinks. She tossed the magazine over to where the young man was sitting. "Read the headlines."

He did and almost fell out of his seat.

The caption read, "Cat Witch Blair Catina Five-Timing On Platinum Album Winner Soul Evans? Eight Year Relationship A Lie!" The picture under it was his girlfriend with her arms wrapped around a well-known supermodel.

His jaw dropped. "I can't believe it..."

The young woman next to him chuckled. "You never did believe it was true until you found tangible proof."

"How in the world did you know who I am?"

She shrugged and took a long sip of her Sake. "When your name is all over the radio, it kind of makes you remember it."

"You care why?"

She shrugged again. "Maybe it's because I'm a nice woman. Or maybe its because I feel sorry for a guy who makes a living composing music he doesn't even like."

He almost spat out the amber liquid he was going to drink. This woman was unbelievable. "How did you-"

"Unlike most people I'm very sensitive to people's emotions. I can tell from listening to your songs that you only wrote them so the record label would accept them. It makes you big bucks, but it's not really what you want to express. Your real music is more dark than the Jazz crap the company tells you to write."

By now, his jaw had hit the table. "How can you decipher so much from just a few songs?" He quickly backtracked that question. "Wait! Never mind. I don't want to know."

She laughed. "It got me my job, but I can see why somebody not used to it would be freaked out."

The pianist raised an eyebrow. "What is your job?"

He sly grin was so terrifying he almost regretted asking. "I'm the founder and head editor of Death Magazine."

Once again, he nearly dropped out of his seat. "You're Maka Albarn?"

She smiled and held up her Sake cup in a toast. "In the flesh kid."

Soul was dumbstruck. He had heard about her. It was actually pretty hard not to. Maka Albarn was a genius in the world of fame. Her magazine hit number one on the charts in only a few weeks and it was rumored she was only sixteen back then. It's branches ranged from L.A. to Tokyo, and he had heard rumors of another one going to Moscow. The founder, however, had never appeared in public. Nobody knew who she was no matter how hard others tried to find out. She had nine secretaries in one building to answer questions from the media. It was also rumored that she had a secret room in one of her office buildings and that's how she controlled her empire from the inside. Her skills in gossip made her legendary, yet her kindness and respect for privacy to the famous made her well-loved and anybody who was anybody had been featured in her magazine at least twice. Soul was one of those people.

He could not believe he was meeting the person who had been a living legend in the world of stardom for nine years.

While she was distracted by sake, Soul took this opportunity to get a better look at the woman in front of him. Her petite frame was covered by a white chiffon blouse and a black pencil skirt. She had long legs and black ankle-breaking heels, making it seem like her legs stretched out for miles. Her dark blonde hair was straight, almost to her waist, and held back by a black scrunchie in a low ponytail. Her eyes were a captivating olive color. No trace of makeup except for a sheer lip gloss coating her pink lips.

She looked younger than twenty. It was hard to believe that the woman standing in front of him was the head of a multi-million dollar company.

Maka noticed him staring and grinned. "Keep your mouth open any longer and flies will go in. We wouldn't want our pretty-boy musician's breath to smell like crap now would we?" She burst out laughing.

Despite the bruise to his pride he brushed off her comment. "Why would you tell me who you are if you've kept it a secret for years?"

She snorted. "We're the same aren't we? We both run from the press and we're famous. You can keep a secret so I trust you. If you couldn't keep a secret you wouldn't be famous."

"Because the media would eat me?"

She clapped like she was in a classroom. "Very good. You get a gold star."

He huffed. "I already have a platinum label."

They were quiet for a minute before they started laughing. It was surprising to Soul how well they got along. He mostly spent his time in his home composing and recording music and hardly ever spent time out unless he was required to. He almost never went to parties and he barely ever saw his own girlfriend.

Thinking about her brought him down a notch. He had decided to step out of his home for a rare shopping trip when he saw his girlfriend sucking the face of another man.

He went straight up to her and demanded to know what the heck was going on.

"Isn't it obvious?" She purred while holding on to the other man's arm. "You've always been so busy with work that you never pay any attention to me. Blair doesn't like that. So now I'm going out with Hiroshi." Dhe dragged him away leaving Soul standing in the street, dumbfounded.

Maka rolled her eyes and took another sip of her sake. Wait, another? "Get over the Witch Bitch. She's been cheating on you for years."

"Its not that simple." He murmured.

She shook her head. "Actually, you'd be surprised at how many hearts I've healed. It's simple really." She finally turned to him. "It's not your fault that she was cheating on you. You were just trying to do your job and if she couldn't handle that, why didn't she break up with you when you started working?"

That took him a moment. Why was she... "She was only using me? For my money?"

The mystery editor clapped approvingly. "Very good. You finally figured it out." She turned her attention back to her Sake cup. "Anyway, there's a reason why the music world calls her the Cat Witch. Or as I like to call her, the Bitch Witch. She's a gold digger and has been for years. I heard her mom and grandma were as well. They both got pregnant off of one-night stands."

She never ceased to amaze him. "How do you know all of this?"

Her smile was so sly it sent shivers up his back. "I research. Nobody knows who I am so it's easy to pass myself off as a simple member of the paparazzi."

Smart, cunning, and able to drink more than she weighs. Is there anything about her that won't surprise him? He figured not. He suddenly remembered something she had said before. "Why are you here?"

She took a break from drowning herself in sake to look at him. "What do you mean?"

"You said that everybody who comes here is down from something. You said you've been coming here for ten years. And you're...what, twenty? Twenty one?"

She blushed and muttered, "Twenty five."

His eyebrows shot up to his hairline. "No way. You can't be one year younger than me! You barely look twenty!"

"If you keep talking like that," She growled. "I'll punch you."

The pianist barely batted an eye at the threat. "So what is your reason for coming here to drink your sorrows away?"

She sighed and moved a piece of hair out of her eyes. "My mom died when I was ten-"

"Ouch." Soul interrupted. "My apologies."

She shrugged. "I barely remember her now. Besides, the only memories I have of her are her and Dad fighting. Anyway, they say she committed suicide because she couldn't take Dad's constant cheating. After she died he went out every night and either returned home with some tramp or came home in the wee hours of the morning. He kept up a steady job but just barely." She winced. "When he came home he would touch me. Not like full out molesting but just simple touches that made my flesh crawl. Eventually I just couldn't take it anymore and ran away from home. I was fourteen." She added and sighed. "I had stolen the savings Mama had kept hidden from Dad. I didn't have any close friends back then so I had no one to turn to. I was living behind a hotel, sleeping in a dumpster, and hosing myself off with pipe water when nobody was watching." She shivered. "Nobody ever came looking for me. I remember wearing the same clothes for days. Sometimes I just sat on the streets and without even asking people gave me money." She chuckled. Her expression suddenly turned melancholy. "It was then that I met Liz Thompson."

"The main secretary on your main office building in Death City?"

She laughed and took another swig of her sake. Okay, how much had that woman drunk? "Yep, the one and only. Liz was a gang member with her sister Patti. They both turned good when Liz met her boyfriend Kid. He straightened them out and got them both jobs at his magazine company. I reminded Liz of when she was my age so she took me to her apartment and gave me clothes and food." She suddenly grinned. "As well as some Vodka. She slipped it into my drink when wasn't looking. She said I looked like I could use some but I knew it was for interrogation purposes." She laughed. "Liz has always been like that. Anyway, I told her my sob story and she felt so bad for me she offered her apartment to me until I could afford my own. She also got me a job at Kid's magazine company. It's where I got my experience. As soon as I could afford it I went back to school, got my high school degree, as well as an internet degree in Business Managing, and here we are now."

Wow, talk about deep. Even Soul's life wasn't as bad as this and he had a pretty sucky childhood.

"That still doesn't answer my question." He realized. "Now that you have a great life, why are you still here?"

She shrugged and took another big gulp of Sake. "Dad calls me everyday to try and talk to me. I used to go by Maka Scythe which is Dad's last name. Albarn is Mama's so only he would recognize it. When I became rich and famous he wanted to try and contact me. At first I thought he was trying to repent for what he had done but as soon as he saw me he asked, 'What? No limo? Oh well. At least you can still help me with my financial problems by getting me a car.' I realized he was drunk and just got in a taxi and left. I haven't seen him since."

Soul suddenly clutched the glass he was holding so hard it broke. "That's what he said to you after he hadn't seen you in how many years?"

"Four." She answered nonchalantly. She grabbed a few napkins by the counter and dabbed at the mess the broken glass had made. Kilik came over with some extra napkins and gathered the glass pieces.

"How can you say that so easily?" He almost yelled. "He's your father!"

"Actually he isn't." The same nonchalant tone she said it with made his blood boil until he realized what she said.

"Wait...what?"

She sighed and moved back to her original place. "He's not my father. I found out in my mother's will that I stole," Soul rolled his eyes. "I was ten!" She huffed. "Anyway, before she married my step-father she had another husband and he died. It was decided that my father," She put on finger quotes. "would tell me when I was sixteen."

He shook his head. "That's still...unbelievable. You should write a book or something about this crap."

She barked out a laugh and took yet another sip of her sake. "I am. I've already arranged for it to be published when I die."

"Why when you die?"

She shrugged (Jesus that was getting annoying) and took a sip of her drink (how much more can she STAND?). "I've been donating photos of myself to the publisher of the book. Her name is Tsubaki and she's a really good friend of mine. We met at a conference and I when I told her my story she asked to write it. I only accepted her plan because it was brilliant! I meet with her for half an hour to two hours every day, depending on what happened that day. She'll write it all down and then we'll do it over again the next day."

Soul was impressed. "That's a really well thought-out plan."

She grinned. "I know. Tsubaki is a genius." She sipped her drink and sighed. "Sometimes I feel like if I go away forever everyone will be so much happier."

The pianist grinned. "I actually used to think that to!"

An incredulous look settled on Maka's face. "Than why do you say that with such a cheery tone?"

If possible, his grin widened. "When I was a kid my parents used to never be around. When they were, they were always arguing about something. It was always about me. Me, my talents, my studies. It just got so bad that I told my brother Wes one day that I never should have been born." He started laughing. "You know what he said? He said that even if I wasn't born, someone else would be and they would replace me! I thought about how I wouldn't wish my parents on anyone!" He started to calm down. "He always helped me out even though our parents set us against each other."

Maka's paparazzi instinct instantly tapped into her system. "Set you against each other? Do tell."

Soul suddenly realized who he was talking to and instantly became more careful with his words. "My Mom had a...former relationship and Wes is the child from that...marriage. My Dad never exactly liked Wes and when I was born, our grandfather put us in a little competition to see who could win his inheritance."

"Ugh." She moaned. "You forget about my little abilities. I know what you mean even when you say something else. So your story goes like this: Your mom had an affair and Wes is the child of that affair. Your dad didn't like Wes because he wasn't his kid. Your grandfather is a millionaire and he couldn't have two heirs to his fortune, so your parents pitted you against each other in an effort to win the inheritance."

Soul decided to be more careful with his words around the paparazzi queen from then on. They chatted for a little bit before Maka suddenly became silent.

"I've wanted to die ever since my mom died." She said suddenly. "I actually used to hate her for a while. For leaving us. When I got older, I hated myself for thinking like that. Papa acting like that just made it worse." She smiled. "When I met my friends they made me feel like even though I hate my life, they value it so I have to live for them." She took a big gulp of her Sake. "I probably wouldn't be here now if it wasn't for them. If everybody had no friends, I think half of us wouldn't even be here now."

"Then you're lucky." Soul replied. "I haven't had any friends since high school. This guy named Black*Star," She snorted. "Yeah, I know. Weird name, but he's cool. He's my only friend that really understands me. Actually, he's my only friend period. We've helped each other through thick and thin. Now that I think about it I've always taken him for granted. The only reason why he isn't here right now is because he's at a meeting at work. Otherwise he'd be right here, probably laughing at you or staring at you in amazement."

"Probably both." She laughed with him. Soul suddenly stopped and inhaled his drink, the amber liquid burning his throat in a dizzy way like the last time.

"Are you really gonna drink all that just because of her?"

The young musician stopped for a minute and nodded. "Yep. What about you?"

"You know that if I could, I'd drink about three times as much as I weigh."

He grinned. "Even then it still wouldn't be much. But seriously, why don't you?"

"Because although I don't value my life, others do. I figure, if I don't want my life I'll use it for someone else. It's the only thing I can give them in return for my friendship."

"...Would you be willing to pass some of that friendship on to me? I could use it."

She smiled and held up her Sake glass in a toast. "Sure thing Soul. Sure thing."

That night, Soul Evans walked out of a bar mainly sober, unlike what he planned. Instead of walking out of there alone, he walked out of there with a friend.

A friend he knew he had for life.

Wow, talk about a sappy ending. Anyway, you know the deal people. Read and review and you get more!