CHAPTER 6 ~ Marie's Story.
Marie, trapped in her cell, repeated the words of her captor. "M-Medusa?" She was almost scared, although she could not find the reason why. Medusa was dead...she knew it, her team had defeated her, years ago...
"H-how do you know my mistress's name?" The captor spoke, addressing Marie's outburst. Marie, frightened, did not reply. She was too afraid of what might happen if she did. A slow, scraping noise could be heard that Marie identified as her captor standing up. She shivered.
"What's going to happen to me? Will they kill me now that I know who they work for?" She thought to herself, imagining the possibilities.
Her captor stood over her and said, "What do you know of Medusa-sama?"
Marie, surprised by this sudden change in movement, tilted her blinded face in the direction of her kidnapper. "I know...when she was younger...my team...defeated her." She dropped her head, almost shy toward the person asking her about her past.
"Tell me...more?" the captor asked.
Marie, surprised, lifted her head and said, "Sit down. It's a long story."
Stein was a little boy. He was walking down the corridors of Shibusen, looking for a door to his class. Even though he was top of his class, his mind sometimes went off onto strange tangents. Once or twice, his mind would settle on a weird kind of idea, like taking apart his teacher limb by limb until he was just a body and a head. Stein chuckled whenever he thought of these things, but it only made him seem more sadistic. Stein was pretty self-conscious, and he refused to allow himself to look too "crazed." Suddenly, a strange girl came running from a corridor, turned, and hit Stein full in the chest. Stein looked down, wondering how such a small girl could be in Shibusen.
"Are you lost little girl? Do you need help finding the K-12 part of Shibusen?" He asked politely.
"Psh! Why would I ask help from some Freshman, like yourself." She replied, with a smart-ass tilt of her head.
Stein gave her a sneer. "What grade are you in?" he asked, wondering how such a young girl could be making him seem immature for simply being there.
"Psh! I'm a Junior, you pathetic moron. Now get of my way, you're ruining my perfect attendance record."
Stein, bewildered, put his hand on her head. "No. Apologize to me." Suddenly, something came over Stein. Madness rushed through him, and, without meaning too, he blurted out: "Mistress."
Medusa just smiled, almost viciously, and walked around Stein, cackling as she turned the corner.
"Medusa," Marie began, "was always a troublemaker, even as a little girl."
The person who had locked her away sighed, sounding almost depressed by the mention of Medusa.
"She knew Stein pretty well, even though they only met once or twice. I used to hang out with her, but only during lunch hours." Marie began getting uncomfortable explaining her past to this stranger, as normally she wouldn't even tell her best friends about this. "At some point...and I don't think she'd planned it...Medusa...I guess...developed feelings for Stein..." Marie almost blushed at this, getting flustered. She didn't like that topic. "Medusa...and I...were rivals from that point on." She turned red. She didn't need eyes to know she looked like a tomato at that point.
The stranger only sighed again, sounding nervous now.
"We had a mission, which was to capture and defeat a Witch. Basically, it was our last soul, after collecting 99 souls, and I was finally going to become a Death Scythe for Stein to use in battles."
"So...what happened?" The stranger suddenly spoke. He sounded impatient, and Marie felt the urge to speed up.
"Well, in our original team, it was Spirit-kun, Stein, and I...but...Medusa wanted to come along. We couldn't refuse. She was a favorite of the death god, Shinigami-sensei."
"What did you do in that...kind of situation? I would not be able to handle such a task, I don't think..." The stranger began, sounding more nervous.
Marie kind of felt bad for her captor. She didn't know who it was, but she could tell whomever it was had a lot of problems.
"Well...this is how it went down..." Marie began telling the story, explaining in detail just how the events happened. "Our mission was simple." she said. "All we had to do was enter the Witch's lair. A small village nearby had let us in on information about a Witch that liked to play near the pond. Supposedly, at the bottom of the pond, we would find her." Marie scratched her head, trying to remember the details. "When we got to the pond, the only sign that something was different was the smell. It smelled of burnt animal. Stein was studying the water by dipping his hand in it, and Spirit was walking around sniffing the flowers, almost in a daze." Marie got red, as she explained what happened next, "I really don't like mentioning this part, but Medusa had the nerve to walk up to Stein and begin some kind of conversation with him. I'm not sure what they were talking about, but somehow he ended up kissing her on the lips!" Marie was clenching her fists, blushing bright red now, pissed off by the memory. "Then, Medusa dove into the pond and started swimming out to the middle." Marie said, remembering the events. "Eventually, Stein jumped into the pond and swam after her, but for some reason both of them disappeared, as if they were dragged underwater. Spirit and I, freaked out by having our friends missing, immediately dove in after them." Marie was now quite flustered now, the story agitating her and making her wish for a break.
"You can t-take a breather...I'm just trying to go over your p-problems in my h-head..." The stranger said.
Marie complied.
Stein dipped his hand in the murky waters of the pond, feeling it run through his fingers. He imagined it was blood, dripping from his enemies, and that made him smile. Medusa, now older, but still quite a young girl, came up to him and tried to get his attention.
"Hey dumb-fuck, stop feeling up the piss in this pond and look at me!" She yelled at him.
Stein looked up, annoyed at this brat's attitude towards his studies. "What do you want? Do you want me to dissect you on the spot for such demeaning language?"
Medusa just glared at him and said, "No. I want you to look at me, that's all."
She almost looked mad, but Stein knew better. This was just her way of communicating. He had learned that the hard way when, one time at lunch, Medusa was working part time as a server in the Cafeteria. When Stein asked for the usual lunchmeat, he was greeted with insults and crude humor, mixed in with a few sex jokes.
Stein, looking up, asked, "What would the shit-machine want with me?"
Medusa sneered, almost laughing at his pathetic attempt to insult her, and then followed up with, "...Kiss me."
Stein broke into laughter. "KISS YOU? WHAT?" Stein couldn't contain his laughter. It was just too funny that Medusa, one of the biggest assholes he'd ever encountered, would want him to kiss her.
"I ...I'm serious dammit..." Stein stopped laughing as a single tear ran down Medusa's blushing face.
"Okay. I'll kiss you, but only if it'll make you stop looking like a pathetic wuss."
Medusa, happy by this sudden compliance, leaned in, her lips forming into a pursed shape. Stein, not enjoying this, leaned in as well. Their lips bumped and they both recoiled. Quickly recovering, they tried again, but Stein saw out of the corner of his eye, Marie, glaring in his direction. He broke away, trying to gather himself as Medusa leered at him for a good solid minute, then jumped in the pond and swam away.
Stein, still in a slight daze, looked out at the pond and began to daydream. He thought, "Medusa's lips felt nice. I wonder, if I take a knife, could I possibly remove them for later studies?" He pondered on this for a while, but then Medusa was suddenly pulled underwater. Snapped out of his thoughts, Stein was quick to act. He jumped in the water, diving down to try and rescue Medusa.
Meanwhile, above the water, Marie was trying to wrap her mind around what she had just witnessed when a sudden yell from Spirit snapped her out of the daze. She jumped up and dove in with Spirit, ready to rescue the love of her life.