Disclaimer: All rights to Soul eater belong to Atsushi Ohkubo and studio Bones. This is purely for entertainment and no money is being made from this.
Author: Maggisakura
Pairing: Asura/Maka
Rating: T
Genre: Romance/Horror
Word count: 4,062
Alphamegamia.*
Maka Albarn was a 14 year old girl who was very, very sick.
She had been stillborn and almost didn't come back to live but somehow the doctors had managed to save her. She resided in a hospital, mainly because of her poor health and the conditions in her own home weren't good enough for the doctors to let her live on her own. They said she couldn't make one day on her own and that she needed clean air and cleaned environment.
Maka didn't actually have any friends since who would visit the gloomy hospital when they could be outside, playing and running and bath in the sunshine.
The only persons who ever visited her were her father (obviously since he was worrying over her and loving her too much) and Tsubaki, a nice girl who from time to time visited her blue haired boyfriend because he just had the knack to get into big trouble. Last time it was because some gang and surprisingly he had defeated them all but gotten himself injured too. Tsubaki was Maka's only friend literally and the younger girl was grateful for that fact. She didn't really need these so called friends anyway since they only visited and left and sometimes bought souvenirs. Tsubaki had been quick to correct her thoughts about the importance of friends but Maka just as quickly denied them all.
Maka also liked books very much and asked her father to bring her some but when he absolutely couldn't grasp his daughter's likes and dislikes, Maka had entrusted the task to Tsubaki. The girl had bought and brought her scientific books, math books, college books, fantasy books and fairy tales and what-not. Maka's favorite ones were the big dictionary and Grimm stories.
Tsubaki had offered that she could also bring some new clothes for the poor girl but Maka had once again declined politely. She had been wearing the hospital gown for her entire life (of course she washed it every other day) and she really couldn't grasp why people even changed their clothing to different ones everyday. Hospital gowns were not too hot on summers and not too cold on winters either. It was easy to put on and it wasn't nearly as time consuming to wash a hospital gown than it was for regular clothes.
Today Maka was feeling quite well in fact and Tsubaki had once again decided to pay her a visit.
"How are you feeling today Maka-chan?" The older girl asked nicely and laid a few books at the end of the hospital bed.
"Alright I think. At least I'm not spitting blood like a few days ago." Maka answered with apathy for the last part and Tsubaki laughed a little for the obvious sarcasm in the sentence. She started peeling a green apple for Maka while the other girl just stared.
"Tsubaki have you bedded another man lately?" Maka asked bluntly, making Tsubaki cut her finger deep.
"WHAT!" She shouted, being very perplexed and surprised. "Wh-Where did that come from?"
"You smell disgusting. In fact you're making the air in this room worse than it already is. Answer my question." Maka went on and hugged her knees despite the two infusions attached to her right arm. In fact the infusions hardly bothered her at all but the awful smell did. Tsubaki was coated with heavy black smoke and Maka knew what it meant since his father carried it around himself all the time.
"N-no I..you know maybe we should get you to sleep Maka-chan." Tsubaki said sweetly and smiled but sweat was creeping down her face. If Maka could have had a word to say, she would've guessed that the Japanese girl was terrified by the expression on her face.
"Oops, looks like someone got caught." Maka smirked yet again and didn't settle down. Guess when your boyfriend's almost all the time in the hospital, you can't really do birds and bees with him. Especially with this so called Black Star who she heard was more of an idiot than a boyfriend. Tsubaki offered the ash blond haired girl a small smile and walked out from Maka's little sanctuary. Maka smiled quite ironically and started eating the half peeled apple.
"Oops, looks like I might have lost a friend."
I
One thing was unmentioned about this poor little and sick girl. Maka had seen death stand right in front of her right when she had broken her way through her poor mother's womb. The woman had died there on the surgeon table but Maka wasn't nearly as intrigued with her death as she was with the black deity standing in front of her small form.
When she was old enough to remember things correctly, Maka had always been able to see the lingering dead spirits and mythical creatures such things that smoke. In time it'll consume poor Tsubaki if she doesn't stop the affair, just like the smoke has done to many others. Maka even saw how one drug addict got throttled by a small ugly looking creature sitting on his shoulder. Guess that was karma or something...
Maka had read about them quite a lot and one day a doctor came to her telling that her sickness was getting worse.
Well no wonder she had been bleeding from her ears then.
One thing that Maka, the sarcastic little devil of the hospital, loved were marriages. She used to watch them on TV and her father would show her photos about her mother and his wedding.
The first thing that came to little girl's head had been: How sugar coated can these things be? But it was also very interesting. Something as vain and useless as a husband dancing together with his wife who was in white (probably very expensive too) dress and the guests and the food etc. It was very, very vain in Maka's opinion.
"Papa why do people marry if they could just live together?"
Spirit laughed and looked his daughter with beautiful blue eyes as some might have called them, "Because they love each other more than anything and they want to make sure the whole city gets to know about it. Preferred if the whole world would but yes. They love each other very much."
Maka hadn't understood what love was at that point.
II
Maka had made death her companion and they talked a lot.
"Are there other gods too?"
"Many others. Many are already dying and new ones are born but there are only few of the old gods left." death answered and sat down to her sick bed.
"Do you have friends among them?"
"...Maybe one only..." death said with slight hesitation.
"Who?" Maka had asked.
"Perchance you know the insanity god? We're friends just as much as we're enemies."
Maka listened well and didn't ask about the other gods any longer but when the girl had asked for the older god to remove his mask, he declined politely. Said something about, only dead may see the face behind this mask and are you dead dear child?
Maka thought about that a lot. She seemed to be on the verge of living yet it didn't feel like it at all.
"Well guess it's fine since I'm already dead." Maka said and put both of her hands to the sides of death's face and pulled.
Instead of a face, she had a cardiac arrest.
The doctors were very confused of how she could have such a thing when first she was okay and there wasn't anything that could have caused it. The girl laid in coma for about a week and didn't notice the change in the hospital's atmosphere. Someone had nicely laid white lilies at the end of her bed and Maka's hospital gown was stained red.
"What's happening to me...?" Maka spit the words with venom as she glared the doctors who came closer and tried to stabilize her. Maka squirmed and struggled as it hurt and tried to reach for her bouquet. Who would give her a bouquet? She reached out but the man doctor quickly dragged her down and gave her sedatives as Maka had began to claw herself.
Oh the pain she was in when the white man came in.
"W..Who are you..?" Maka asked the words with slight fear. Even death's presence didn't scare her this much. The doctors thought she was going to lose consciousness soon and didn't comment her incoherent babbling.
"You can see us?" the man was coated with black coat and Maka didn't know what to call it. The sleeves ended at the wrist but the cloth continued over his feet so Maka didn't see them but the cloth seemed to be so alive. Like a move from a paintbrush had hastily painted it but it fit so well for this stranger and the skin, the white skin and the black hair and from there, the red rubies of insanity.
"Yo..you're the..." Maka didn't get to finish her sentence since the man raised his palm and put it on top of her eyes and Maka fell asleep.
III
The white man stared her. The complete opposite of death stared her.
"We gave you the flowers." The man said with casualty and stared her. By some point there were scarves growing out of his back and they didn't leave or disappear. They simply moved like cat's tail under the man's emotions. Maka felt slightly vexed that she had been scared of someone like this. The nurses and her father came and went and didn't probably see the man because, hell anyone would've been scared of this guy. He just didn't suit in the loop.
"We would be considerably grateful if you didn't compare us to humans. We're a god and we would like to be treated as such." the man said and it threw Maka off the edge. Alright so he could read minds.
´Best if I'll just ignore him then.' Maka thought and hopped off from the bed and took her dropper with her and started strolling down the halls. The sunlight came in from the windows even though they had Venetian blinds controlling it.
"We would also be very grateful if the little girl didn't ignore us..." the deity muttered mostly to himself probably but Maka heard him anyway. She didn't show any signs of hearing it though and continued her morning walk to the lower wards and floors.
Fractured ward, polyclinic, the ICU-ward and so on. Everything was familiar and everyone knew her, most of the people as a cranky and creepy kid, the elders just as a cute girl. Maka tried to ignore the obvious stares that the deity was sending her and kept going, well until he grabbed her shoulder and suddenly Maka felt like she was being transported and she guessed it right! The next moment they were at the hospital's roof. Maka no longer tried to ignore the god after that stunt.
"What are you here for? Seriously. Pitying me? Don't you gods have your god-like business to do?" Maka asked, being more than annoyed.
"You called us with your insanity. You would've probably lost your mind if we hadn't came yesterday."
Maka was quiet for a while. Well that changed things a lot, if the man was trying to protect her, then she'd probably have to let him stay.
"What's your name?"
"It would be notably very complimenting if you called us Asura. All call us the god of insanity but that is not our name. It is a shame that most of the gods have forgotten our name." Asura rambled on. Clearly the man liked to talk. "And you fear us only a little. That is good so that's why we will grant you the permission to use our name 'Asura'."
"Does death know of you're here?" Maka asked and bend her neck so that she could clearly see the face of the tall man who clearly stood somewhere around 6'9 feet while Maka herself was only somewhere around 5'3 feet tall.
"How do you know about him?" Asura asked, his eyes widened a bit in recognition.
"We're friends of course. Just like you and him are so I was just wondering." Maka said pretty bluntly and touched the solid chest hidden by the black cloth. "Say...Do you know anything about love?"
"We do know that it's an emotion and humans like to use it as an excuse and they 'love' each other. We also happen to know that humans are usually driven insane if they do not love something. They are also sometimes driven insane by love." Asura answered truthfully and stated the facts.
"Then.." Maka was a bit unsure how to ask, "Then can you marry me?"
"Why would we marry you?" The insanity god looked very surprised by the girl's declaration. This was the first time it had been proposed but it had seen humans propose to each others many, many times and after each break up, fall into madness.
"I-I can't love and I can't care like other people do and I'm sick so normal people won't have me either way so...Will you?" Maka asked and for the first time in a while, her eyes looked slightly vulnerable. She wanted to know love, taste love, feel love. Even if it meant she would have to spill her guts out and bleed to death.
"Ah, fear and jealousy. We're quite familiar with your feelings but love isn't about them unfortunately and you do not have much time left so yes, we can try to show you some love." Asura answered with his ruby eyes and the clouds above them seemed to move just slightly as the wind picked up and went through the airy fence of bars that surrounded the roof and blew Maka's ash blond hair up. The girl was still holding to her drip stand when the man raised her chin up and kissed her.
That was her first kiss on top of the roof.
IV
Maka had never really cared much about the myths and stories of hell or even the low deities. She had always been interested in those who had power within their grasp and could use it.
Since Asura is a lowest Hinduism god, 'demigod', of wrath, it never has the power all the other deities have and for that it envies them and continues to go lower and is only few ranks above humans.
Her Asura however was nothing like that. He was powerful and he ranked as high as to be equal to death. He also seemed to be a god of insanity which led Maka to think that maybe he wasn't the low-life the books spoke of.
"We promised to love you so here." The deity threw a black dress onto the hospital bed and Maka stared it. She touched it with her fingertips and the material was heavenly silky. She grabbed it to get more from it but the dress absorbed into her bloodstream and then it vanished her dirty hospital gown and now, Maka Albarn was wearing the very first dress of her whole life. Her hair went freely to her waist and she stared herself.
"That'll keep you stabilized so that you do not die, for where I am about to take you, you need your body." Asura said and offered the girl sitting in the hospital bed a hand. He himself was sitting in front of the bed, right in front of her. Maka took her hand and let him pull her into a kiss and then they were gone again.
To appear into the so blue sky just above the city.
"You humans have very funny reactions to something as normal as this." Asura mused slightly and sat down, well more correctly started hovering, with Maka on his lap and his hands around her waist and the man's head, it was so light that Maka wondered if her lover was heavy at all, was resting on her shoulder.
"Not many humans can fly." Maka said and she saw how an airplane flew hundred meters over her head and how the wind picked them up and trashed them around. Maka seemed to have fun since she clutched Asura's chest and laughed her real laugh for the first time in her whole life.
She wasn't so sick any longer.
V
"Here's a gift for the sick poor you." Asura teased as he leaned in to take a closer view of Maka's face. He was standing right next to her bed and there was a doctor right next to him. He looked so tiny in comparison to the god that Maka almost laughed.
"Where is it?" Maka asked and eyed around while grinning.
"Here." Asura moved her forelock away to see the girl's eyes. "As long as I am here you do not go mad and this is a great gift for you have been condemned to die from madness. Not this sickness of yours."
"Hm...I guess that's acceptable." Maka smiled and traced the deity's cheek with her so pale hand.
That night Maka got Lilacs instead of white lilies.
VI
The telltale figure was so easy to spot among other people that Maka didn't even have to try. The visits from Tsubaki had ceased and from what Maka had smelled, she had stopped the affair. That was good. Black Star wouldn't have been able to realize it anyway.
The power the deity wielded was something worth envying. Maka saw from her small window how he turned little children into his puppets, most finest men into waste and the most beautiful women to witches that were very ugly. The girl smugly thought about the things death would do to her once he would be enlightened about insanity god's little visits to her. A lot of people died in this hospital anyway and Maka, even though she caught his red ruby eyes down below, on the streets and he stared right into her soul, she had to close the window and go to the sink because her eyes started to bleed. Now they were bloodshot.
When Asura was near her mind was clean but her body trashed around, convulsed and the god patted her back when Maka was over the sink, vomiting blood from her already corrupted lungs and the girl was so grateful when this didn't bother the man at all. Instead of being repulsed he just joined their mouths and started exploring her mouth with his agile tongue, tasting the copper and giving in to the bloody taste. Because everyone was treated equal among Asura and Death because it didn't matter to them who their victims were.
The flowers Asura gave her that week were Irises. They glowed in the vase where she had put them along with the other flowers. Only one of each. The others had wilted.
"I see you've made a friend." Death commented and eyed the flowers.
"Try not to harm them. They're fragile and actually they're from my lover." Maka smiled as she jagged the petals of the rose she had on her lap.
'Loves, doesn't love. Loves, doesn't love. Loves, doesn't love...'
"Do you know what love is yet?" death asked and he added a black jasmine into the vase.
"No. Not yet but I'm sure I'll come to know it soon." Maka threw the rose at death who caught it and it withered almost immediately. "I could try to love you, you know." Maka rested on her elbows in her hospital bed and watched death with curious eyes and a grin that spread from ear to ear.
"I wouldn't advise you to do that. It is a bad thing to love death. Alphamegamia between god and a man is not really popular these days." Death answered and took his leave.
Maka slept through the night and saw dreams about how mini devas continued to climb on top of her and showered her with their gifts. There were thousand of little lotuses in her dream and she rebirthed as many times as there were flowers and every time, her little god plucked all the life out of them as if telling, only in death you truly feel loved.
VII
Maka woke from her dream, only to realize she was being snuggled against. The girl moved her head to look beside her and saw the man sleeping right next to her. Little three eyed bugs kept trying to climb on top of him, maybe to sleep too but couldn't. Maka pitied them and tried to collect as many as possible and soon they were in her hands, forming a sunflower.
The flower of foolish passion.
Maka blinked and stared the bug flower. She felt the sarcasm drip from it and laid down. The man's breath continued to wash over her face and Maka lulled herself to sleep again. Asura's black cloak emerged into Maka's hair and body and soon she had the black dress, only much more lace and decorations added and a veil, all black, all from blood she had vomited, all from him. Maka looked like a black widow that grieved for the loss of her lover more than a bride but you couldn't always get what you wanted. This time it was the colors. A little rings rested on her ring finger.
"Maybe you learned to love after all." Asura smiled as a small smile crept on Maka's face too and her heart stopped but when the doctors came to revive her again, they were stunned to find no one there and just a little lily of the valley along with a note:
'Thee achieves ladder to heaven and knowing true happiness of love. We deem you worthy of our love.'
-Asura.
Alphamegamia*= means a marriage between a younger woman and an older man.