I'm back!

I started this maybe a week ago, and I'm proud of myself for finishing it so quickly—I'm awful at finishing stories. While I wasn't so sure about certain parts of this, my friends said it was good, so here it is.

Take note that this is on the more mature side of T. There isn't outright smut, but it gets steamy, so be careful about that. Oh, and minor cussing and major manga spoilers.

Enjoy! And expect to see more Soul Eater fanfictions coming soon. I'm doing ResBang and have an AU one-shot planned for this series.

She came home to the sound of typing and the smell of freshly brewed coffee, as usual.

Honestly, Marie couldn't remember when she'd started referring to that dreadfully creepy, shabby labratory as home—it had happened as naturally as everything else, like her placing of proper teacups and odd "feminine touches" here and there, her supply of tea, her claiming the couch as where she graded her papers.

She dropped the keys on the table and hung her coat on the rack, taking out a quaint little cup and spoon. Reaching into a nearby cupboard and taking out some honey, she started boiling water on the stove, glancing around at the haphazard metal stitches on the walls. When had that become normal again?

"Marie? Could you get me something to drink?"

Or her heart's jump as she heard his voice.

"Of course!" She called back and grabbed another mug. She'd never minded making tea for two, especially if he was the second party. Really, the thought of doing anything for Stein made her feel happy (as long as it wasn't assisting in dissections or giving him more cigarettes.) Marie guessed that it was because he was getting more unstable lately, on the verge of going insane because of the Kishin's wavelength. It started to give her headaches lately, though barely noticeable with her calming wavelength; she could only imagine how someone like Stein felt, already with a strong sense of madness in his soul. After coming back from the search for Joe's murderer with bad news about Justin, they'd all been shellshocked, and with this whole moon mission by the end of the month on top of the infectious madness...

Well, everyone was going a little crazy.

As the tea brewed, she sat down and began going over the short quizzes she'd given her pupils, surprised at how well they'd been doing. It seemed that kids really did pay attention more in a life or death situation like this, where their education was their only savior from fatality. She hoped the madness had not largely affected any of them yet, although she was sure Soul was an exception. With the black blood in his system, he was bound to have worse side effects than anyone else at the DWMA at that moment, though probably not as bad as someone like Stein.

But Soul had Maka, and Stein had her. She just wished both of them would open up about their problems more.

After grading several quizes, she checked on the tea and declared it properly prepared, pouring it into their teacups. She absentmindedly wondered what Stein was working on. Maybe another experiment? A thesis over some sort of research he'd been conducting? A report to Lord Death about Justin Law?

Her worst fear was walking in and discovering nothing. She'd rather have a slightly-more-crazy-than-normal, functioning Stein, not a deliberately insane, incoherent one. If he wasn't accomplishing anything, she'd know that something wasn't right.

She kicked open the door. "Stein?"

The scientist waved his hand beside his computer. "Here."

Marie carefully tip-toed to his desk and, glancing cautiously at the screen, set down his cup. There was one word typed.

She bit her lip.

"Anything else you need?" she asked. He most likely wouldn't need her help for anything, and maybe she could go get some sleep and ignore the unusually fast pace at which her heart was pumping yet again, even if to no avail.

To her surprise, he looked her way. "Actually, yes. Could you, ah, how do I put this... Stay in here for a little bit? You can sit on the bed if you want. You're helping me calm down and keep my thoughts together."

One glance at his shaking hand on his mouse and the used cigarettes in the garbage bin and she knew she couldn't refuse even if she wanted to. She nodded silently and took her place on his bed, drinking her tea to calm her stomach and fill it with something to hide the airiness of it.

Why did she have to act like a little schoolgirl around him? It was like their days back at Shibusen so long ago, when she left him notes in his locker and he, in return, left her gory (but fascinatingly well-done) doodles in hers. It had made her feel so giddy, and she still felt that way, had after only the first month of seeing him again. She'd adored BJ and genuinely wanted to try to rekindle things between them, but as she sat on Stein's bed and felt how at peace she was there, she thought that she wouldn't have been able to go through with it.

But that never changed the fact that BJ was still in her memories and heart. She had taken his loss just as badly as everyone else. Losing your technician, especially the one that made you into a sacred weapon, was something that words couldn't fully describe. Even if they abandoned you for decades for your own sake, you just didn't forget your first meister. You never mentioned the probability of them being killed in battle, because not only was it a taboo subject, it was dreadful to think that you should have protected them better. It was the job given to you from that first resonance.

If only she hadn't been waiting at that restaurant for him, then maybe...

She shook her head, because she knew it wasn't her fault. The only one who could have saved him was Stein, due to how used he was to madness. Marie would have crumbled either way, possibly have even been murdered herself. But it still stung to think that she had no chance of helping Joe, that it ultimately would have ended in his death either way.

And here she was, desperately pining for her current technician, a mad scientist obsessed with tearing people apart and examining their insides—what a weapon she was. Hell, Stein had been the one man who had never fully left her heart—she'd even gotten over Joe some years after that heartbreaking ordeal, but Stein was always there, even if he was just at the back of her mind. She'd never known why. She learned to stop questioning it long ago, because nothing made sense except that stupid fantasy-obsessed part of her that called them fated soul mates and talked about their connection of true love. But he would never believe such hullabaloo, and she doubted anything would spark between them.

A few minutes passed before one of them spoke aloud, filled only by the clicking of a keyboard and the sound of swallowing. Marie could see that Stein was finally getting work done–he'd typed about a paragraph and a half before saving and turning off the monitor. Feeling that he was done for the night, she stood to leave, only to see him hold up a hand for her to stop.

"Hold on. I've got some things to ask you, Marie."

She paused and slowly sat back down on the bed, wringing her hands. "Yes?" Her voice faltered, but she covered it by clearing her throat. She noted the number of empty cups she saw by his old computer, previously filled with caffeine and sugar.

"Something seems off in your wavelength. I know it's partially because of BJ—we've all felt upset about that lately—but I can tell there's something else that you aren't telling me." He spun around in his patchwork chair, pushing his glasses further on his nose and cranking his head screw a few notches. "Mind enlightening me?"

She started fidgeting. Stein never liked small talk, and he'd always just been one to cut to the chase when given the option and appropriate time to do so. However, this situation was not the most appropriate of times—at least not for her, she noted as she grew even more anxious. "I... I would, but I'm afraid that's an impossible question."

"No question is impossible, Marie. I can see your nervousness growing." He ran his fingers though his hair. "I understand if you need some time to get it out, but..." A sigh escaped his lips, as if he didn't want to admit weakness. "I need to know someone trusts me right now. Please?"

He gazed up at her, and she couldn't refuse it when he seemed so momentarily vulnerable and frightened of himself, what he could become and was already well on the way of becoming. She had forgotten that he himself was human, with fears and desires like herself, and he just needed something solid to grasp onto, something that he'd know was right. And she supposed that it was this hidden side of him that had touched her soul at such a young age, being reminded that even someone so logical and stoic could carry emotional baggage, that had made her really fall in love with him. There wasn't anything she could do about it at this point.

She thought of the men who'd approached her when she arrived at Death City yet again, asking for her number or a date. She'd accepted one or two requests, but after realizing who she truly wanted, she'd turned them down, one after one, good man after good man. And yet here she was, with the one man who was going mad, with not much sanity left, and she was left to obey him because of that lack of sanity.

But that didn't mean he wasn't necessarily a good man. He was just a bit... strange was all.

It must have been half a minute before she bravely spoke her mind, not sputtering once in the slightest. "I love you and you don't love me," she began. "I... I have for a long while now, and I realize that you don't reciprocate those feelings, but that doesn't change the fact that they're there. Just give me some time to get over it, and I swear everything will be back to normal soon enough—well, as normal as it can be right now." After the words had been thrown out, she once again stood up and faced away from him.

She really didn't know how long it could take for her to forget him; she had lied, mostly to take his attention away from her enough for her to hide her face from him. She was surprised at how much of a strong facade she'd put up over an issue that had been digging away at her from the beginning. She could barely suppress her tears and sniffles as she walked away, hidden only by a balled-up fist as the impact of what she'd just done sank in.

Go and confess your undying love to your second meister that you've only kissed twice before, once as a child and once when very drunk, Marie. Sounds like a great idea.

There was total silence as she approached the door, broken by his footsteps as he jumped in front of her and blocked the door she was planning to open

"Stein..." Afraid to glance up at him in the dim room, she resorted to pouting and staring at the floor. "Could you move out of the way, please? I want to entertain myself on my night off."

However, it appeared that Stein wasn't listening, staring at something in the room and mumbling to himself. "don't reciprocate... those feelings..."

She took in a shaky breath. "Please, I'd really like to—"

"I'm not letting you go anywhere right now," he stated sternly, massaging his temples and setting his glasses on a nearby coffee table to rub his eyes. She was about to protest when he started speaking.

"So, you don't think I love you?"

"Just let me go, Stein. I—"

Wait. What?

She shook her head, wondering if she had misheard him, but sure enough, they were in the same situation. She wasn't sure how to respond to him; after all, there was no polite way of telling someone that they would avoid love, a perfectly natural human emotion, just because it seemed unnecessary or viewed as primitive in their eyes.

"I... Don't know. You always just seemed too preoccupied as it was, and I always assumed you'd fall for another scientist," she admitted. Both statements were honest. Marie always suspected that had Medusa not been a devious witch, she and Stein surely would have acted on attraction towards each other. "Not someone like me." She awkwardly faked a laugh, only to hiccup and make her cringe in embarrassment.

She didn't dare look up at him until she felt him take her chin between his thumb and index finger and pull it up himself, forcing her to see his face. It was a mess of misconstrued, unclear emotions, and she wasn't sure how to feel about that. He could certainly see her watery eyes now, and at the angle her head was tilted, she was positive the waterworks would flow even more.

He let go of her and shook his own head. "I... I can't believe you. I thought you were smarter than this." Stein put his face to his palm and shook it.

He was... Disappointed? Of course he was. She shouldn't have gotten her hopes up when he'd asked her if she thought he didn't love her. He was mad at how illogical she was, at how much she based her actions on emotions rather than strategy, and she couldn't blame him, because she always got mad at herself for it. Why had she uselessly tried to sacrifice herself to try and prevent her students from being harmed? Why did she want to be a housewife so badly? Why was she so desperate that she had fallen for someone like him? Why did she feel that she hadn't fallen for him over desperateness?

Why had she felt an attraction to him from day one so long ago?

It wasn't logical. She should have gotten over him twenty years before, but no, she just had to be curious about the abnormal child obsessed with dissections and anatomy and climb down a spiral staircase, deeper into a chasm. There was no bottom with Stein. It never ended, just like his odd ways and his madness.

And that was Marie's madness. She'd never escape Stein's insanity, no matter how hard she tried. She was stuck as a prisoner at the basement of the castle. Stein was at the top, and she'd only ever been there once, during the retrieve of Brew, and that hadn't been his actual will in madness. She would never willingly be let inside.

As soon as that thought crossed her mind, though, she saw Stein's expression change from vaguely calculating to desperate, which was unexpected. He put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed it, and she watched as he nearly crumbled down, like a tower that had stood far past its time.

"Marie..." He wiped a tear from her cheek and rested his hand on the side of her neck, dwarfing her. "Don't cry over someone like me. Save your tears for your students."

She blinked, smiling and laughing as another tear showed itself. "I cry over you because you're worth it to me," she said simply, as if it was completely natural, because it was. "You need someone to love you for once."

She looked into his eyes—when had he bent down to her height?—and only saw joy and guilt and a small, sad smile. "And because you showed me love, I fell in love with you."

He tilted his neck and leaned in, his lips pressing against hers. Their eyes fluttered shut as the contact was made, and it was sweet and chaste, and Marie ended up standing on the tips of her toes to make things easier on Stein. Their height difference wasn't too big, but he still struggled with crouching to her level.

Franken Stein, the man who'd claimed he never knew what love was, just told her that what she felt was mutual, and now they were kissing. Today just got better and better.

As they parted to catch a breath, something shifted—maybe it was the subtle smoke in the room or the tension that had been between them for so long, or maybe even Asura's madness wavelength, but she suddenly felt more confident and passionate and pulled herself back to him again. After a second of confusion, he seemed to pick up on whatever it was that was happening, and he jumped right in, their touches becoming more pressured and frantic. She ran her tongue along his lips and he responded eagerly as the fight for control ensued. Being so used to taking charge, Stein eventually won, but Marie had given him a damn good fight. She'd get him someday, but not that particular night.

They broke apart at random intervals for a short breath before plunging back in again, and with the light being absent from everything except the streetlights outside, they weren't anywhere close to stopping. She was tackled onto his bed by him, pinned down at the shoulders, but she flipped the tables on him and shifted spots with him as quickly as it had happened, straddling him, hastily grabbing his shirt and removing it—his lab coat had long since been disposed of.

As her own shirt was hurled on the floor and she realized that he probably didn't take note of or care about her little amount of baby fat that had never gone away in her stomach area, she noticed a look on his face that excited her in ways she couldn't understand; a look of passion, smugness, and madness all rolled into one. It was so incredibly like him and yet not like him in the perfect way and it made her want to see what else she could make him do, feel whatever he had planned for her. She had an idea of what Stein might be like in the bedroom, and something told her that it wasn't all innocent. Marie had been scared to think about it, but at the moment, she was thrilled.

After she'd run her fingers across his scars and stitches and kissed them, more out of love than lust, he impatiently scooted himself up and caused her to fall on her stomach with an "oof!" Flipping her over (she was glad that they were both strong and fairly fit, especially him because his body was sinfully muscular), he waggled an eyebrow, making her chuckle despite the circumstances.

The expression on his face told her that he knew he could make her moan and even more, and before she could protest (not that she wanted to), he'd begun his work on her neck and collarbones. She was sure he'd had to have read up on this and studied it at some point, because what he was doing to her already was much too skilled for his own good and few one-night stand experiences.

She dug her fingers into his hair and breathed heavily as he sucked away at her jaw.

Maybe she was going to end up entertaining herself that night.

She woke the next morning in a foreign bed, but it still felt like home. Marie guessed she'd went ahead and fallen asleep and forgotten to return to her room afterwards. She faced the wall, and she and Stein had only cuddled a little after the night's activities before they rested. He wasn't very touchy-feely. She turned and, surprisingly, still found him on the other side, and she smiled at how peaceful he looked.

Stein hadn't gotten a good night's sleep for a long time, but it had been been especially more difficult after Asura's revival. But she'd remembered sex ed, and the effects must have been enough to relax him and wind him down to feel tired and want to sleep. And damn, she was glad that he had such an obsession with human anatomy doubled with his soul perception ability, because he'd known exactly what buttons to push to make her feel good. Marie would have to do that again soon.

She scooted closer to him, slowly dragging her hand up and running her fingers through his silver locks. Looking at him now, you wouldn't be able to guess how stressed he'd been lately or how crazy he actually was. He looked like a kid taking a well-deserved nap, which made her chuckle. Stein would never cease to baffle or amaze her, but that was one of the reasons why she loved him.

As he started to stir and opened his hazel eyes, she smiled at him and landed a quick peck on his nose, tenderly brushing her finger along the stitches in his face. "I love you," she said and smiled.

He either didn't smell her morning breath or didn't care, because he immediately pulled her in for a small kiss on the lips and buried her head in his neck. "Love you too," he mumbled, but she could hear a sense of pride shining through. She couldn't blame him; Marie felt the same way, but he smelled a bit weird, so she had to come up for air and with a remark of "you smell like sweat" for him to laugh and let her back up.

"But you love my body odor, don't you?" he teased.

"If it comes with the package, I suppose I'll have to," she joked, chuckling. Stein smiled and stroked her cheek gently, and for the hundredth time, she wondered how he could be so sensitive when it came to her in their situation. They would eventually have to get out of bed, get ready for another day of teaching at Shibusen, and deal with the constantly progressing madness yet again, which was already starting to gradually affect Stein. At least she'd been able to help him get his mind off of it and keep him sane to an extent.

But it was in this moment, where she knew that Stein didn't care that she hadn't worn makeup the previous day because he liked authenticity or that he ignored her bad breath and dealt with her teasing, that she realized she wanted to be with him for the rest of her life, have children with him and marry him. She wouldn't be a typical housewife, but she'd never been a "typical" lady, as she'd always been perceived as far too strong to be the pristine picture of femininity. She finally stopped caring, because Stein never made her feel that something was wrong with her not quite fitting within her gender roles, but it showed more in his snarky comments that he made to everyone. He made her feel like the little bit of pure gold in the Californian mines, and he would be the miner who'd struck it rich. And she loved that.

She decided that it wasn't such an outlandish thing that she had started referring to this place as home, because she had finally found where she belonged.

AndthustheSteinxMariebabywasborn. Stay safe, kids.