Thanks for all the reviews, everyone! They encourage me. Yet again, I disclaim, I do not own Soul Eater or any other fandoms that appear, but I'm pretty sure you've realized that by now. Although I shall warn you: I'm gonna incorporate another pairing into this chapter.
Define "Normal", Chapter 4
My Lab Partner's A Snake
As you probably know, clothes come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors. Some clothes are better fit for boys and men, and some are better fit for girls and women. And even in the different categories, there are different sizes for how large or tall a person might be. Because of this, when guys decide to try on girl's clothes that are five sizes too small for them, the result can be uncomfortable.
RIIIIIP
"Oops." Soul mumbled, examining the large hole in the back seam of Maka's V-neck sweater that he had attempted to put upon himself.
Crona looked himself over in the mirror on the wall of the closet. He had fit perfectly in one of Maka's entire ensembles, but the pink-haired meister was finding the tiny pleated skirt hard to deal with. Soul glanced over at the boy and laughed.
"Man, that thing doesn't even come down over your boxers!" He exclaimed. The child turned beet red and quickly wrapped the black coat around his thin legs.
"What are you two doing?" Ragnarok interjected, emerging from his meister's back and examining the scene. "Wanna explain to me why you're both dressed up like girls?"
"Soul said it would be fun." Crona replied, still embarrassed.
"You know what's weird?" Soul mumbled, not paying any attention to the Demon Sword. "I fit in Blair's clothes better than I do my own meister's." He held up the feline's purple dress with one hand and positioned her witch's hat with the other.
Ragnarok guffawed loudly. "You two are total nut jobs! If this is the best thing you can come up with to do while you're locked in a closet, then you need serious help!" His laugher continued to echo in the small room as he dissipated back into his meister's blood.
Crona sighed. "Soul, can I please get- AH!" He yelled, turning to Soul and seeing him in Blair's dress.
"It fits." Soul grinned. "We should stay like this and freak the girls out when they come home!"
"They might get mad that we're wearing their clothes." Crona muttered, slipping off the coat. "I'm changing back; I don't know how to deal with wearing Maka's clothes." He added.
"You're no fun." Soul chuckled, badly imitating Blair's voice. He looked over the clothes on the racks once again, his gaze resting on a sky blue dress decorated with rhinestones and a decorative bow on the side.
"What's that?" Crona asked, watching Soul as the young Gorgon pulled a black t-shirt and jeans from his dresser.
"Maka's prom dress." Soul replied.
"Oh." Crona murmured. "Has Maka ever been to a prom?"
"No." The scythe sighed. "I've never had the courage to ask her to the school's dance. Plus she's more interested in studying, anyway." He said.
"So… Why does she have a prom dress?"
"Her Dad got it for her."
"Why would he get her a prom dress if she's never been to a prom?"
"I dunno. Probably to encourage her to go to one."
"Oh." Crona said quietly. As he glanced up at Soul once again, he saw the scythe appear to be deep in thought.
Soul could just see it; Maka and he would be the best ballroom dancers in the entire room. Then Maka would notice the empty grand piano in the corner and beg her partner to play. He would play for her; no one else in the room would matter as he composed their song right then and there. After which, he would lead his meister out to the terrace, where he'd sweep her close to him, and the couple would have their first kiss under the moonlight.
Soul nodded to himself as he decided at that moment that he'd summon the bravery to ask Maka Albarn to the prom this year.
"All right." Soul said, slipping out of Blair's dress and back into his own clothes. "That's enough of that."
Crona sighed with relief. "Good." He smiled as Soul resumed his spot next to the Demon Swordsman on the latter's air mattress. Soul pressed his hand down on it.
"You're right. This does need more air…"
CLANG
Crona's head shot up. "What was that? Is Maka home? What…" The boy was cut off as Soul slammed his hand over the meister's mouth.
"Quiet." He whispered. "Maka wouldn't have had to throw the air vent out of place to get in. Someone's breaking in." He snapped quietly. Crona stiffened with fear and nodded to Soul's words as the scythe removed his hand from the child's mouth. They couldn't hear anything for a minute, but the faintest of noises caused Crona's eyes to grow wide and blow their cover.
"IT'S A SNAKE! I HEARD A SNAKE'S HISS! IT'S MEDUSA!" He cried loudly. Soul quickly attempted to silence the child, but his efforts were futile. The scythe whipped around as the latch clicked and the door swung open, revealing a black snake wrapped around the knob with its tail in the lock as if it had been picking it.
Soul stiffened with fear as well; there was no mistaking those yellow arrows across its body. "What do you want?" He growled, trying not to seem afraid. The snake bared its fangs in a grin.
"Revenge." Medusa's voice echoed in their minds. Soul scooted backwards as the reptile slid off the door and slithered closer.
"But you're dead. I saw you. I split you in pieces. Your soul dissolved into nothing." The scythe continued.
"My sister could disperse her soul into the forms of spiders. Why can't I do the same with snakes?" Medusa replied. Suddenly she quickly lunged forward and wrapped herself around her son's arm, the child staring at her with fear reflected in his pale eyes. "So I'm out to eliminate any threats to me. Starting with you, my dear child. Naughty boy; you tried to kill your own mother and survived when I tried to kill you."
Soul's lower arm became a scythe's blade as he brought it down on the snake, but she dodged and instead bit his upper arm. Soul gasped in pain and pulled back, causing Crona to scream and giving his mother just the opportunity she needed.
Soul stared in horror as Medusa leaped into Crona's mouth in an attempt to possess him. The child gagged for a minute, then his eyes rolled back into his head and he fell to the ground. The scythe kept his distance and the body stirred before rising once again. The boy's eyes were now a pale gold as this frightening gaze turned to face Soul.
"I'd suggest running. I plan to kill you too, you know." He smirked, but it was Medusa's voice that came from his lips. Soul stared at the boy a minute longer, feeling helpless. Medusa chuckled. "Fine, then. Ragnarok." She smirked as the Demon Sword emerged from Crona's back and into his hand. His arm raised, ready to bring the black-and-white blade down upon the scythe. Soul, feeling cowardly, quickly got up and ran as the Snake Witch's laughter echoed throughout the apartment.
"I can't hurt Crona." Soul thought, racing to the bike rack at the front of the building. "And I'm near useless on my own." He pulled keys from his pocket, first unlocking the chain holding the wheel in place and then inserting another one into the ignition. "I need to find Maka." Tires screeched as the living scythe drove as fast as he could on his motorcycle to the mall.
It had been a long day. And night. And week. Franken Stein was growing restless; there was nothing to dissect or experiment on, and the current term he was teaching in class was terribly boring. In addition, Marie had been called off to monitor Oceania again for a little while, so everything was quiet. Nothing was new and all was boring, save the doctor's dreams.
Recently, every time he drifted off he could hear her voice; the enchanting voice of the Snake Witch he had seen die, begging him to find her, to rescue her. There were times where he would wake up suddenly, finding himself sleepwalking towards the door to look for her. The silver-haired meister would quickly go back to bed, resisting her pleas as best he could. But yet her words remained, haunting him.
It was that Saturday afternoon that he heard her voice once again. Stein had been falling asleep at the computer, his head pressed into the keyboard, causing the screen to show the half-hour's work of a constantly held down letter 'h'.
"Stein?"
The man's head shot up. Was this another dream that his mind had conjured?
"Please let me in, Doctor. It's cold out here."
Stein's wheeled lab chair flew backwards in the force the professor used to get up and rush down the stairs. He threw open the door upon reaching it, but the child before him caused him to believe he had been imagining the voice. However, Crona quickly spoke and caused the senior meister's confusion to return.
"Yes, it's me, Stein." Medusa's voice rang out to him through the boy's mouth. Stein shook his head in confusion.
"This is a dream… Right?" He murmured, causing Crona to smirk. The witch within him quickly realized that she could use this scenario to her advantage.
"Yes, Stein." She purred. "This is a dream. A dream that you never have to wake up from." She told him. She concluded that she could persuade him to do anything, and the madness produced by her snakes would do the rest.
"Can I come in now? It's cold." Crona shivered. Stein nodded, letting the child in. He doubted, however slightly, that perhaps this wasn't a dream, but the miniature madness wavelength produced by the witch soon extinguished the thought.
"Since this is a dream, Stein," Medusa began as Crona sat upon the leather of the stitched-up couch, "You can do anything you want. Experiment on anything you want. Dissect anything you want. And do you know what would be fun to dissect?"
Stein raised an eyebrow, watching the boy with curiosity as the former shook his head and the latter grinned.
"I bet you've never dissected a Reaper before."
"Patty, I really don't think this was the best of ideas." Liz groaned.
Patty tilted her head to the side in confusion. "What do you mean?" She asked. At that moment, two Kids proceeded to pick the young gun up from her seat on the couch while another dusted under her. "Kid's enjoying it." She continued as she was put down.
"That's exactly what I mean." The elder Thompson muttered, slapping one of the Kids that attempted to lift her out of the way of their cleaning. "I think they're enjoying it too much. They're cleaning the house from top to bottom, and I think they're going overboard."
Patty shrugged as yet another Kid appeared and spent the next five minutes trying to straighten her hat. "I don't see it."
Liz rolled her eyes and stood. "Fine. I'm going to go guard my room from Hurricane Symmetry." She said tromping up the stairs soon before the doorbell rang.
"I'll get it!" One of the Shinigamis proclaimed, going over to the door and opening it. "Oh hello, Crona! We're currently in the middle of fall cleaning, would you like to join…"
THUD
The Kid collapsed to the ground after Crona hit the Reaper's head with the blunt end of Ragnarok. After making sure that he was out cold, the witch's son threw the OCD teen into a mill sack, carrying him across town and back to Stein's lab as discreetly as possible. "A perfect ransom." The witch within the child grinned. "The Reaper would give up anything for his beloved son."
"Time for reports!" One Kid called after checking the clock. The group of clones had gotten in the habit of reporting their cleaning progress every hour.
"Our bedroom is absolutely perfect!"
"Nothing is amiss in the hallway!"
"All the toilet paper is properly folded!"
"There is not a speck of dust to be seen on either television!"
"The couches are free of dust as well!"
"Everything within the dining room is in its correct place!"
"Same as the kitchen!"
Silence.
"Wait…" One of the Kids froze. "Where is number eight?"
This statement caused the others to stiffen with shock. "We're no longer… Symmetrical?!" They exclaimed.
"Emergency meeting! Assemble in the living room!" One called, and the others quickly congregated to the aforementioned spot. It took the Kids a few minutes, and a lot of clamoring to sit on three cushions, to realize that they would not all fit on the couch, so they simply stood in a circle.
"One of our own is missing," Began a Kid, "Making our band horrifyingly asymmetrical. Do we have any reason that he might have wandered off?" He asked.
"Perhaps he was defective." Said one.
"Maybe since he thought the house was clean, he'd continue on and try to position the entire city symmetrically!"
"A good plan, but Dad would never allow it."
"Which leads us back to the possibility that he was a defective clone."
"What if he was the original?"
"Then possibly the situation was getting to him. I mean, if there was suddenly eight of you, how would you cope?"
"We'd bask in the symmetry and then clean the house from top to bottom, which is what we did. I doubt one of us would run off because the symmetry was too much for him."
"True…"
"Maybe he was kidnapped!" Patty beamed. The younger Thompson had evidently been seated on opposite couch the whole time. This assumption silenced the Reapers as they thought of the possibilities.
"Well… If he truly was kidnapped…" One spoke up, "Then I propose that we pursue the missing Kid and scour the city for him!" He exclaimed. The others were quiet for a few seconds, and then cheered as all seven ran out the door.
"Leave no stone unturned!"
"Search high and low!"
"Low and high!"
"No clone left behind!"
Their determined voices faded into the distance as Liz emerged from upstairs. "What was that all about?" She asked. Patty grinned.
"I got them all out of the house for you!"
"So… How long have we been in here?"
"I dunno. I thought you had a watch."
"I don't. I thought you had a phone."
"I dunno."
Maka crossed her arms in frustration. She was sure that the security guard had left hours ago, and she had no company other than a ditz of a cat who likely retained some catnip in her system. "So how are we going to get out of here? I have no idea what happened to that guard."
Blair was snapping her fingers in a bored manner. "I dunno." She replied once more. After snapping them a few times more, her cell phone appeared in her other hand. "Oh yeah." She smiled. "I can summon the phone with my magic." She purred, beginning to text her waitress friends at Chupa Cabra's, but Maka quickly snatched up the purple Droid.
"I need that." She muttered, quickly dialing Soul's number. "I sure hope he can bust us out of here." She sighed, putting the phone to her ear.
Insanely loud piano music began blasting from the cellular phone on Soul's dresser, but the scythe lad forgotten the device in his haste to escape.
Maka rolled her eyes. "Figures. He probably left Crona to move his own stuff and went off biking somewhere." She mumbled, wondering who she could call that would be able to get her out, by means legal or otherwise. She paused, knowing the only solution as she began to dial her father's number. However, she hesitated when she remembered there was no cell phone service in the Death Room, oddly enough, but he could receive texts. Also odd. She went on to text him, saying
We r stuck n mall basement. Blair got us arrested. –Maka
After hitting the "Send" button, the blonde handed the phone back to her cat, who gratefully took back her precious Droid. But Maka had forgotten if Spirit's phone was a newer model or not, and how quickly it received texts.
Maka sat down on the floor, sighing. "I just wish I had other company." She mumbled. Be careful what you wish for. She picked her head up as the basement door was thrown open.
"THE BIG MAN HAS ARRIVED!"
You know he had to come in at some point XD By the way, that thing about getting texts where you don't have cellphone service? I have experience with that, and it's true. So are you liking? Tell me pwease. I give you digital cookies if you review.