Seven: One jump ahead of the slowpokes, one skip ahead of my doom
.
"... That fucking bird."
Soul gazes down at his empty hands and then up at Blair, who's staring at him with sympathetic eyes.
"He must have snatched it," Soul says dully, answering her unspoken question. '"Before we disappeared."
Distracted as he is by his despair, it takes him a moment to notice the very bewildered silhouette of his meister, sitting stiffly on her bed with her arms crossed.
To be fair, he hadn't expected to see Maka again so soon. He certainly hadn't expected to see her so soon sitting in her bedroom, in almost the exact same state he'd left her, irritated and ready for a fight – though he sort of wonders if both of those have actually intensified a little since he'd left. It's amazing what can happen in ten minutes.
"What—how—where did you come from? How did you get in here?!" she demands, while not really waiting for an answer as she lunges to her bookshelf, takes a book and throws it at his head. "It's one thing to be on the balcony, but now you're push-"
"This wasn't my idea!" he yelps, throwing himself to the side to avoid the book barrage, immediately regretting not being more specific in his very vague request to get the hell out of there. "It was—"
He almost says 'Black*Star,' and then realizes that he hasn't explained any of this to her, yet, and meditates for another moment on his piss poor timing and total lack of tact.
"Okay," he says, "I have something more to tell you, but I need to do it fast. And it's all gonna sound really crazy, but it'd be… really great if you'd believe me."
She glares at him, crossing her arms. "… I'm listening."
And right on cue, the sound of jets meets their ears as the skateboard bursts into the room, lowering to the ground.
"Glad you're okay, kiddo," Blair says, running over to rub up against the skateboard. Maka freezes, and Soul realizes that this is the first time she's ever heard Blair speak.
Despite the fact that they are clearly in crisis mode, he manages to laugh at the shocked expression on her face.
"Trust me," he says. "The cat and the skateboard aren't even the weirdest... pa… agh!"
He doubles over, all good humor promptly forgotten as a sudden lurch echoes through the back of his brain, making everything blur.
"What the…" Slightly queasy, he lifts his head, trying to find something to look at, to hang on to. As he looks up, however, gaze slipping in and out of focus, the room has… transformed.
He thinks he might be dreaming. The smooth, white marble of the Academy floors has been replaced by red and black checkered tile, accentuated by that same black chandelier that hangs in Soul's bedroom. When Soul blinks, the room is gone, replaced by Maka's bedroom, but as he blinks again, something that sounds like the low tinkle of a jazz song echoes in his ears.
The three of them are staring at him in concern, Maka crossing the room to stand slightly closer to him.
"…What was that?" she asks.
He blinks at her. "You… you didn't see that?"
Maka shakes her head.
"None of you saw that?"
They all shake their heads.
He stares at the ground, unable to shake the feeling at the back of his brain, the unease slinking through his skin.
"Something's happening, I think," he says. "But I don't know what." As he says it, the skateboard jumps up again, zooming outside, and then comes blasting back into the room faster than Soul's ever seen, popping primly back into longboard mode.
They both hop on, electing to sit again while Blair claws her way into Soul's lap, and the skateboard brings them to the roof of the Academy. As they stare at the horizon, something is stirring in the distance, and it's pulling at him.
It's too far away to tell what exactly it is, but something about it feels… tempting, in a too-familiar way.
It feels... like turning left in an underground cave.
"I know where it's coming from," he says suddenly, and he starts to laugh a little as another bout of mental queasiness infects him, pulling, pulling him forward towards the strange red mass. "Agh! Why-"
"I… think it's the peanut, kitten," he hears Blair say sadly through the fog, and it brings him back to the roof, away from the desert.
"The peanut?" Maka looks down at them both.
"… Something else to tell you," he hedges, and she frowns.
"Tell me on the way," she says, eyes on the sky. "We need to warn Papa."
As they run to find Spirit, he fills her in on most of it - on the flower, on Black*Star, on the peanut, and on Medusa's role in all of this. There's only one thing he won't say, and he holds on to it, saving it for when things have calmed down. He's putting it off, he knows it, but there's no right time.
At the very least, finding Spirit proves to be easier than they'd expected.
"Papa!" Maka shouts after she and the skateboard have essentially decimated the door - a successfully exacted revenge, after his unsuccessful attempt at bringing down the other one - and they catch a glimpse of him between the shattered pieces of the doorframe, tied up and slumped into a chair.
Spirit tries to slink up some more in his seat, but Maka's already sprinting her way over to him before he can make much headway, untying him and getting him seated as Blair jumps up into his lap.
"... Medusa?" Maka asks, settling back against the desk.
"...Yes," Spirit replies, brow furrowed as he strokes Blair's back.
"Some advisor," Maka spits.
"Yes... well," Spirit says, clearing his throat. "When she tied me up I thought it was going in a... very different direction." Soul and Maka shoot each other a disgusted look.
"Uh huh," Maka says, gritting her teeth and making every effort not to touch that with a ten-foot pole. "Soul thinks he knows where she is, so we're going to stop her."
"Go through the city on the way," Spirit says. "Gather up whoever you can find."
Maka looks at him for a moment, and then nods.
"You stay with the old man, okay?" Soul says, looking down at Blair with a chuckle. "Since it seems like he needs some female compan-"
"LET'S GO," Maka hisses, dragging Soul and the skateboard out of the room as Blair sends them a little salute.
The city is in chaos.
Overhead the sky is beginning to deepen to an angrier red, little black eyes stretching across the horizon, massive pupils dilating and gazing towards the city. The streets are alive with activity, all of it hazy and unpredictable as people begin to feel the effects of whatever is happening, Death City descending into a maze of screams and cackles and nervous energy.
Soul is feeling effects of his own - much more so than Maka, he notices. He stumbles every few blocks, putting his head between his legs as the strange room in his head becomes more tangible, frantic jazz music playing on a loop in his brain. He tries to mask his panic as they race through the streets, but the worried glances Maka keeps sending his way do nothing to abate his anxiety. As they reach downtown, things are even more worrisome, food trucks overturned - something he would have considered a golden opportunity before - as well as doors to stores left wide open and abandoned.
When they turn the corner to race down another side road, they reach another obstacle.
"Eruka!" comes a loud, angry shout from a loud, angry source, followed by a spray of ice that Maka and Soul have to drop to the ground to dodge, skateboard bumping into their feet.
"Holy-"
"Oh." The spray stops and the two of them look up to see Free frozen in the middle of the road with a leg in the air, foot enclosed in an ice-shoe. Despite his very obvious anger mere moments ago, his face splits into an almost-smile - though the suppressed anger radiating off of him is still palpable. He walks over to them, slipping slightly each time he puts weight on his icy foot.
"Lookie here, it's my two favorite delinquents," Free says, hands on his hips as he looms over them. "What brings you to the city on this fine day? Where's the cat?"
Soul can't tell if he's kidding, very aware of the sounds of cackling and screaming building in the streets around them. He also can't tell if Free's being affected by the eyes in the sky or not, because he isn't acting like everyone else, all unpredictable and wobbly. Based on all of their previous encounters, Soul knows that shooting ice out of his foot and yelling are not explicitly strange behaviours for him.
Maka pulls them both up to stand, hands clenched at her sides.
"We're going after Medusa," she says, and when she looks at Soul, he sees what she wants and transforms immediately, red eye glinting in the strange, hazy light. She sinks down into fighting stance, glaring at Free. "Don't try to hold us up."
Free's eyes widen and then narrow, and his fists clench, too. "Medusa," he growls. A pause, then: "I'm going with you," he adds, voice low.
Soul and Maka exchange a surprised glance. He transforms back into human form, gazing at Free.
"...You are?" Soul asks.
"She owes me an explanation," he says angrily. "And if I don't like her explanation… I'll help you take her down."
This doesn't explain what will happen if he does like the explanation, Soul thinks. Maka also looks dubious, but she gives Soul a little shrug.
"We need all the help we can get," she mutters.
"Let's go, then!" Free says, still slipping on one foot as he strolls past them.
"...We need to get there fast," Maka says. "Running won't be good enough."
Soul looks at Maka, then at Free, and then turns to the skateboard, face blank.
"...You don't have a longer-than-longboard setting, do you?" he asks.
The skateboard rests immobile, clearly unimpressed.
"Yeah, I figured not."
Soul and Maka stand this time, Soul clutching his head as they edge closer and closer to the cave. His vision is blurring more frequently now, red and black floors casting checkerboards across his eyelids.
The cave isn't hard to find, since red and black eye-wavelengths are stretching from it like a wavy, deranged Bat Signal. Beneath them, they can see Free crossing the desert on a magic skateboard ride of his own, having managed to finagle his ice-powers into a board.
The closer the cave becomes, the stronger Soul's unease, and as the skateboard starts to descend, making its way closer to the desert sands, he speaks.
"How are we gonna fight her?" Soul asks, staring at the rounded form that he knows to be the cave.
"... I don't know," Maka admits, squeezing his hand. "But we'll do what we usually do, right?"
"What's that?" he asks warily.
"We trust each other," she says simply. And with a jolt, he remembers the one thing he hasn't told her.
"Um… Maka..." he says.
"I know," she says, reading into his restlessness. "I know there's something else you have to tell me. But I don't care what it is." She trains her gaze on him, and his chest is suddenly very tight. "We'll deal with it after. In the meantime, we do what we always do. We trust each other. No matter what. Okay?"
When he manages to speak again, his voice is very small. "Okay."
"And just remember-" She grabs his hand as Medusa's form comes fully into view. "When there's nothing else to do… we jump!"
Landing on sand is, ultimately, more comfortable than landing on metal. Soul also manages not to hit the sand face first this time... so really, he's making progress all around.
He only has a moment to feel good about this, however, as he looks up to see Medusa in front of them, wearing a victorious smile and, as usual, her favorite accessory - that stupid bird. Only now, the bird is bigger, one leg perched on each of Medusa's shoulders so that it looks like a screechy, ugly, peanut-venerating hat. Behind her lies the cave, its normally cheerful face lying dormant as the red waves spill out of every crevice, radiating into the sky.
"You're just in time," Medusa says, tossing a peanut straight up. Ragnarok catches it deftly in his mouth, cackling as he does so. "I was just about to make my second wish."
"Why are you doing this?!" Maka asks - without, Soul knows, fully understanding what this is.
"Silly girl," Medusa says. "Always looking for a reason, when reason is precisely what I'm trying to stamp out." She turns to Soul, simpering. "How are you feeling, you poor dear?"
Soul scowls at her. "What was in that peanut?"
"Ah, yes," Medusa says, as if she's just remembering. "I owe all of you some explanations, don't I?" She sighs. "But first…" Drawing a familiar flower out of her pocket, she leans forward and sniffs it, and it gives Soul more than a little satisfaction to see her cough in disgust as she sniffs it the second time.
Black*Star spills out of the flower with a grimace on his face. "What do you want now, you filthy- hey! Soul! Soul, it's me! How ya been, buddy! Could you get me away from this fuckin' witch?"
Medusa clamps her hand over his mouth with a clawed hand and his insults turn into incoherent grumbling.
"Enough of this," she says, glaring at Black*Star. "Time for my second wish. Genie, I want you to make my magic the most powerful magic in the world."
"Hoo dun han hee beenie?" Black*Star mumbles into her hand, and she tentatively removes it.
"What?" she says.
"You don't wanna be a genie?" he says hopefully.
"As if I'd fall for that," she says, rolling her eyes.
"...Worth a try." He shrugs as he tentatively lifts up his fingers and gets ready to snap them. "Well, uh." He shoots an apologetic glance at Soul. "Here goes."
With a snap of his fingers, the aura of power surrounding Medusa noticeably changes, lightning crackling in her eyes as she lifts her hands out, cackling. Ragnarok grows, too, flapping his gigantic black wings in mirth as he screeches towards the sky.
"Oh no," Maka says, voice trembling and gaze distant. "Her… her soul is huge."
"... What?" Soul says, and she blinks, glancing at him with wide eyes.
"Oh," she says, and despite the situation, she laughs in surprise. "I… guess we both have some more things to tell each other. I can… see souls."
An ancient comment on a rooftop - you have a good soul, I can tell - hits him, and with it comes a warmth that fills him up, lending him courage.
"Well. Guess we'll have to stop her anyway," he says, squeezing her hand, and she smiles at him, though it's strained as Medusa turns her gaze back on them.
"Now," Medusa says, and as Soul watches her, something in the back of his mind twists again, a blackness that feels like it's dripping through his brain. "On to your explanations. I do value the truth, after all." Her eyes glint. "When it suits me."
"Welcome to my masterpiece," she says, gesturing at the cave behind her. "Hidden in this cave for millenia, a perfectly cultivated madness. I didn't quite know what it would do if we released it, but… I do love to experiment."
Her eyes fall onto Soul, surveying him with a perverse curiosity. "It's affecting you more than them. Isn't it?"
"What did you do to me?" he asks, clutching his head again.
"I just gave you a little snack," she says. "Of my own design." She tosses another peanut up to the bird and regards Soul impatiently. "Oh, please. Don't look so upset. Ragnarok's got black blood and he does just fine."
"Black… blood?"
"Yes," she says, feigning boredom, as if she's explained this to him many times. "I've always wanted a weapon with black blood. And I couldn't turn Ragnarok into one." She chuckles maniacally. "He's a bird, after all. That would be ridiculous."
And he is a lot of bird. His wingspan now extends far beyond Medusa's shoulders, growing larger with each peanut he consumes.
"Eating peanuts and not having to fight is great," Ragnarok affirms, a crazed smile stretching across his face.
"It's all thanks to Free, here," Medusa says, "that I got you to the castle in the first place." Free stills, glancing over at Soul. "And it's thanks to you," she says, pointing back at Soul, "that I got my little guinea pig."
Free's eyes latch back on to Medusa, and when he speaks, his voice is deadly. "What do you mean?"
"Well, I needed someone to test out the cave for me. I couldn't go in myself," Medusa says with another airy laugh. "You remember our deal. You got your eye, and I got to send Eruka on a trip… from which she, sadly, has not returned."
There is zero sadness in her voice, and with a burst of clarity, Soul realizes that, holy shit, she really was trying to turn him into a human sacrifice.
Free points an accusatory finger at her. "You broke the deal, then. You said she'd return safely."
"Ah ah ah," Medusa says, shaking a finger. "I never break a deal. When we made the deal, I asked if I could borrow her for a trip. I didn't say anything about bringing her back."
"You-" Free's shaking, now, rage filling him up. "You bitch. You bring her back."
Her eyes narrow, though amusement still graces her features. "Obviously I can't do that. I'm sorry that our deal no longer pleases you. And if that is how you feel..." She slowly raises her hands in front of her and smiles wider. "...I'll be taking back that eye."
There's a millisecond of pure silence where everyone realizes what is happening… and then everything happens at once. As black arrows snake their way out of Medusa's fingertips, the three of them scramble out of the way, throwing themselves sideways into the sand. Soul is transformed and in Maka's hands in an instant, and Maka takes a swing at another arrow as it comes for them, the metallic clang of the contact doing strange things to his already pounding skull.
"Maka, I don't know if I can fight for that long-" he grits out.
"I have an idea," she murmurs. "It shouldn't take too long, but-" She takes another swing at an arrow, skidding backwards in the sand. "I need to talk to Free."
"I uh- don't know how easy that'll be-" Soul says as she dashes forward to clash with another arrow.
"We need a distraction," she says, and Soul starts to look around wildly, searching for something distracting… and his eyes land on Black*Star.
"I know what to do," Soul says with a jolt. "When?"
"Now is good," Maka gasps as she swivels and blocks an arrow coming at them from behind.
"All right…" In between arrow attacks, he pokes his head out of weapon form and shouts the only thing that comes to mind.
"Hey, Black*Star! I heard the bird say that your flower smells terrible!"
The effect is instantaneous.
"You WHAT?" Black*Star howls as he rises up to mirror the bird's height and raises his fists.
"I did not!" Ragnarok says, and Black*Star pauses for a minute, regarding him curiously.
"...But it does," Ragnarok adds, grinning.
"You little-"
And directly above Medusa's head, a full on fist-slash-wing fight breaks out, causing her to topple backwards into the sand. The three of them start to bicker as Maka runs over to Free, turning her back on Medusa with Soul watching over her shoulder.
"I have an idea," Maka murmurs. "If Medusa's the one that gave you the eye, you still have her magic. That's probably why she wants it back." Free's eyes widen and he nods, listening carefully.
"I think if we get her back into the cave, we can trap her in there," Maka continues. "Is there anything you can do that will push her in really fast, or keep her there? There's no way anything we do will be enough."
In the distance, Black*Star's even-larger-than-usual abs are still blocking Medusa's view as he lands a punch on Ragnarok's face.
"There's... something I can try," Free says. "But I can't really control it-"
"It'll have to work," Maka says. As Medusa manages to separate the bickerers - via the very effective tactic of pointing black arrows at their throats - Maka adds, "Can you buy us a few more seconds?"
"You got it."
Maka darts away from Free and curves around, making a beeline for Medusa from the side as Ragnarok preens his feathers and Black*Star sinks back into his flower to pout.
"Oh no! The madness! It's overtaking me!" Free declares with a swoon, followed by a spray of ice as he does a little jig, hopping between each of his feet and sending layer upon layer of ice at Medusa.
Taking advantage of the arrow-free moment, Maka darts in and snatches Black*Star's flower from where it lies on the ground, blocking a couple of Free's ice bombs in the process. By the time Medusa realizes what is happening, Maka is already halfway to the mouth of the cave, tucking the flower into her breast pocket. In retaliation, Medusa sends double the firepower in Maka's direction - all of the arrows, plus a sea of snakes rising up from the sand to snap at her ankles. But they're an effective team, and as Soul and Maka swipe at the snakes, Free puts the arrows to rest with his ice dancing.
Finally, Maka leaps through the mouth of the cave, and as she does, the madness spilling out of the cave stutters to a stop, the cave's eyes re-animating as someone who's not supposed to be there awakens its obsessive need to keep everyone out.
"Oh… oh dear," the cave says sadly. "One of you can be here, but the other can't! What a predicament! Ah, well. Time to bring it all back in, I guess!"
And as the cave's mouth starts to slowly close, the madness switches direction as the cave summons it back into the cavern. Maka frantically slams Soul's blade into the cave wall, holding tight as the cave forms a vacuum, pulling the madness in and leaving them clinging to the wall.
Against the sea of madness, Medusa's silhouette comes ever closer, Ragnarok perched back onto only one shoulder as the madness begins to recede.
"Well then," Medusa says as she comes to stand at the mouth of the cave, her anger thinly veiled behind her expression. "Not necessarily what I expected… but if I can't have the madness, at least you'll be trapped here."
"What about the genie?!" Soul yells, trying to bring her in closer. "Come and get him!"
"Keep your genie," she says, and Soul swallows hard as she turns from them with a final malicious grin. "I have all the power I need. You could've been a great weapon... but instead, you've chosen this."
"Any time now, Free," Maka mutters, hands sweaty and slipping along his handle. But Free's magic solution isn't coming, and the cave is closing, and as the last of the madness is pulled back into the cave-
"Go!" Free screams. Soul looks up to see a strange, translucent green box, with a lock and key, hovering in front of them, which then lurches forward and traps Medusa inside. They watch as Medusa's face morphs from smug to enraged in an instant, Ragnarok flapping his wings angrily on her shoulder.
Maka wastes no time in wrenching them free, sprinting to the entrance and sliding out through the cave opening. From the sand in front of the cave, the three of them watch as, enclosed in Free's magical green box, Medusa and Ragnarok sink into the earth, victims of the cave's very exclusive guest list.
As always, the last things to disappear are the cave's eyes, and Soul swears that it winks at them before settling back into its slumber.
