Author's Note: Wow, 2 updates in 2 days! This story is just getting too fun to write. This chapter focuses on Maka and Soul once more, and how the mysteries between them deepen.
I want to thank bluenian98, Elayna19, Vi3009, and Midlina for your wonderful reviews. You guys really make my day.
A special thanks to my editor, who is probably sipping a cup of coffee and eating a donaught, patting himself on the shoulder and saying 'job well done'!.
Anyway, it would be awesome if you left a review, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask and I'll answer as best I can.
Until next time – gone-phishing
Medusa smiled with a torn expression as she watched the two Shibusen students vault down the hall and out of the building. Every time she saw children like that, it made her heart ache.
Sighing to herself, she too collected her coat before turning out the light and swinging the door shut behind her.
She had somewhere to be tonight.
Soul allowed Maka to drag him down the hall, before she stopped before they completely left the building.
"The jumper is uncomfortable on my cuts." She explained, while removing the scrap of clothing. Soul tilted his head slightly, before continuing to walk towards the exit. He didn't need to see her remove any clothing – because that always sent his thoughts rolling around in the gutter, no matter how much he attempted to reel them in.
Maka peeled the sweater off her skin, before pulling it inside out and wrapping it around her waist so that it looked like the arms were hugging her hips. Jogging, she caught up to Soul in no time, who had held the door open to the outside open for her.
"Thanks"
He merely shrugged at her words before following in her footsteps.
He glanced around at the evening air, the usual bright green trees of Shibusen that shone in the sunlight, forming dark silhouettes against the flickering lamplight. Clouds dotted the midnight blue horizon, and the crescent moon sat amongst the pinnacles of light that veiled the sky like a blanket.
He soon realized just how low the temperature of the night was, as when he went to exhale, his breath would come out in smoky puffs and a cloud of white mist would form, before disappearing a moment later. Hearing the chattering of teeth beside him, he glanced over to his companion, watching as her lips slowly turned blue and the noisy chattering of her teeth continued.
"Soul, I'm cold!" She moaned, rubbing her arms to exaggerate her statement. He snickered at her, as she stood, waiting for his offer of his own jacket to help keep her warm. Well, screw her! He thought to himself, he needed his jacket to keep himself warm.
He leaned forward, as if to slowly slip his jacket off, before veering off and flicking her gently in the forehead instead. He turned and began to walk off, her following closely in his footsteps.
"If you weren't using your jumper as an ass warmer, you might feel a bit better." He explained, her face turning varying shades of red at his words.
"Idiot!" she scolded, bonking him lightly on the head. Thank god she didn't seem to be armed with any dictionaries, or heavy reading material. "You're meant to offer the lady your jacket when she says she is cold! That's what a proper gentleman is meant to do."
He barked out short laughter at her teasing words.
"Yeah, but there's two problems with that. One, I'm no gentleman, and two, with a chest like that, you're no lady either-"
Once more, he never saw the book flying at his face before it smacked him on his left cheek. Oddly, this time it didn't seem to render him unconscious for a few seconds. In fact, the actual hit wasn't as painful as usual. He glanced down at the tiny notebook clutched tightly in her hand.
She was able to do that much damage with a notebook the size of her fist? What the heck was she?
Maka was still fuming, steam flying out of ears in rage as a bright idea came to him. She was obviously too annoyed to take whatever he said seriously, as well as she was cold and not armed with that deadly reading material. This was the perfect time to ask about the… thing, on her back.
"Oi, Maka." He called to her, coming to a standstill as she did the same. She peered in wonder at the somber expression on his face, especially in contrast to his previous joking front.
"There's this… thing on your back." He started uneasily, watching her facial expression fall at his words. "I was just wondering… how exactly you got it?" He finished meekly, studying her carefully controlled reaction.
Maka immediately turned her head away from him, hanging it in an emotion akin to shame.
"The burn?" she asked in an almost whisper as Soul nodded.
For a minute she remained quiet, and for a moment he began to think she wasn't going to answer his question. All the shame, sadness and depressing thoughts seemed to drain from her body, being replaced rapidly by a fierce and defensiveness.
"You can't just ask me something like that." She snapped, a fire had ignighted in her gleaming eyes, and they seemed to almost glow and strong emerald in the darkness. "Everyone in the dorm does it too! They all want to know all this stuff about me, and I still don't know anything about them!" She ranted, arms waving in dramatic movements to her words.
Soul couldn't help but agree with her, and though he was reluctant to admit it, he too had done the exact same thing.
"It's not fair to me, and I thi-"
"Fine" He interrupted, a bright idea forming in the darkness of his mind. She looked like a bomb that had just had its fuse lit as soon as he interrupted her words, but as what he had said sunk in she only looked at him with mild curiosity.
"Fine?"
"Fine. How about this? For every question I ask you, you can ask me one in return?" He asked, starting to move off towards his dorm. The chilly breeze and the frigid temperature was getting to him. Maka followed dumbly after him, his words echoing through her mind. It was perfect! His idea was everything that she was looking for!
"It'll be like a game of 20 questions." He nodded as they fast approached the enterance to their dorm. Soul dug through his pockets, rummaging through a mixture of coins, wrappers and crumpled notes until he found what he was looking for. Pulling out his set of keys, he unlocked the door with ease, before holding it open for Maka.
"You say you're not a gentleman, yet you hold doors open for me?" she said in a teasing voice, his eyes narrowing slightly in her direction.
"You're injured, otherwise I would never do this for you, Tiny-tits."
She responded by leaping inside and slamming the door – that he was holding open, mind you – in his face and onto his toe. Bitch!
Grappling with the lock once more, he tore the door open to find Maka giggling and already making herself comfortable on the couch. None of the others were in the main room, as Soul assumed they were either out, or asleep.
He sighed, closing the door lightly behind him and making his way over to join Maka on the couch. Soul plopped down beside her, grabbing the remote and flicking through random channels to find something at least vaguely interesting to watch. He skipped over the channel that constantly played western cowboy movie reruns – with horribly dubbed voices- before Maka fought for the controller. Well, more or less just ripped it from his grasp. She changed it back to the old western movies, smiling when she found the right one.
A little nagging voice in the back of Soul's mind continued to echo that he had forgotten something. Something important. He ignored it, in favor of the old, low quality movie playing on the big screen.
He didn't realize that she had never answered his question.
An hour later and Soul was bored out of his mind. Like, seriously. Old western movies were alright, he supposed, if taken in small doses with very large gaps in between. This was just too much, all at once, because suddenly, staring at Maka while she paid attention to the boring movie was more interesting than the gunshots and curses on screen. Prying the controller out of Maka's vice-like grip, he turned the volume down much lower, so that it was now as distracting as a fly buzzing in the opposite corner.
When she realized exactly what he had done, she turned to glare but was caught by his gaze midway.
"Let's play that game now." He purred, as she began to slink back into the pillows on the couch, but nodded none the less.
"You go first." She said, fiddling with the hem of her jumper, her eyes downcast.
"Alright." He affirmed, watching every move she made. "What's your name?"
Her head snapped to attention. There was no way in hell he could not know her name. They had been living together for the past week! Wait a minute… she supposed he only ever really called her 'Tiny-tits'. Was it really possible he didn't even remember her name? That son of a…
Her hand inched towards the Math text book she stashed under the couch, when Soul noticed her deadly gaze and quickly corrected his question.
"I-I mean, your full name, Maka." He elongated each syllable of her name purposely, trying to make her left hand stop crawling towards something that would probably leave him unconscious. Understanding filtered through her mind, as her hand retreated to her jumper and she answered.
"Maka Albarn." Soul nodded in response, not quite sure what to say. Albarn just sounded so…ordinary. Secretly, he was hoping she had some amazing, cool last name, or one that was hilariously bad. Albarn just sounded too… average for a girl like her.
"And you?" She asked, a devilish smile playing across her lips.
"Hey! You can't just repeat my questions." He grumbled.
"Fine, I won't. But I really do want to know your full name." Maka repeated, determined to get an honest answer out of the boy.
"Soul Eater."
Maka frowned in disappointment. She had thought that over the past week they had grown… relatively close to each other. He still doesn't trust her, huh?
"Don't lie to me…" Maka whispered, the quiet words barely audible over the low gunshots coming from the TV. Soul was dumbstruck, how did she?
"What? I'm no-"
"I heard Kid talking to his father… You're an Evans, aren't you?" She said quietly, watching as his temper rose and he slowly got riled up. His eyebrows were furrowed and eyes narrowed, as he stood at her accusation.
"So what?" he spat, waiting for her to start treating him differently because of his last name. That was the sole reason why he didn't tell anybody! This was meant to be a fresh start. He didn't want to be Soul Evans anymore! He… he didn't want her to see him as Soul Evans… "That doesn't mean anything! I'm still Soul-"
"I know…" She interrupted, smiling faintly up at him.
"What?"
"I don't care that you're an Evans… Just please. Don't lie to my face…" She pleaded, her eyes silently begging him to say he wouldn't. He could call her tiny tits, insult her chest and be a plain old jerk all he wanted, but lying… she wouldn't - no - couldn't stand that. Not after Papa.
Guilt and shame immediately pooled into the snowy-haired boy's stomach. Though he had a reason, the straight fact that he lied straight to her face when this was meant to be when they gained trust, not lost it, was just disappointing. He felt horrible, and it showed on his face.
"I'm… I'm sorry Maka." Soul apologized meekly, truly and completely remorseful about his actions.
"It's alright, just don't do it again." She replied good-naturedly, the TV in the background completely forgotten, 100% of her focus on the boy before her. "Your turn." She added as an afterthought, seeing as he made no indication of asking another question.
Soul decided to start with a simple question, one that couldn't dredge up murky pasts or complicated feelings. Heck, they couldn't even get past knowing each other's names without some kind of ill feeling being wrung to the surface.
"What do you like more, summer or winter?"
She didn't even pause and responded confidently without hesitation.
"I love the summer, hate the cold."
"Really?" he exclaimed, finding difficult to believe that someone legitimately enjoying being hot and sticky. "I hate the heat, much prefer to be freezing my toes off than sweating like a pig."
She snickered slightly before nodding in agreement. "Fair enough."
"What's yo-"
"Hey, it's my turn!"
"I just said I liked winter, so you already had your turn" he argued, seeing no flaws in his logic what so ever.
"Nah, that doesn't count, 'cus I didn't ask, stupid." She retorted childishly, poking her tongue out at him.
"Fine, fine." He conceded "Go ahead."
"What's your favorite food?"
"Brownies." He replied evenly with a smile of reminiscence "Definitely brownies. My brother used to make these amazing brownies after we finished tutoring. I would always take them before they cooled then burn myself and he would scold me while fussing over the tiny marks." He laughed at the end of his little recount, the memories of the countless burns and tears spilled over the marks surfacing.
"Your brother sounds like a nice guy" Maka offered with a lop-sided grin. Soul had an odd expression on when he spoke of his brother. It was joy, mixed with love and a whole lot of remembrance. To Maka, it didn't make any sense.
"Yeah.. He was a pretty amazing brother…"
"Was?" she questioned, picking up on the way he referred to his brother. Had something happened between them? "What changed?"
"H-he's dead." Soul replied somberly, eyes dull and vacant, making him look almost lifeless for a moment. The expression scared Maka out of her shock at his words, as she laughed uneasily and scratched the back of her neck.
"…I just stepped on a landmine, didn't I?"
"Heh, pretty much…"
An anxious silence descended upon the two, as only the sounds of the TV, and snores from nearby echoed in the room. Both Soul and Maka were trying to think of a way to lighten the conversation, even if just a little.
Soul decided that it was technically his turn, so he ought to keep playing at the very least.
"What's your favorite food?"
She cracked a grin at his question, as he simply raised an eyebrow at her peculiar reaction.
"Cucumber. Definitely cucumber."
Maka giggled girlishly as Soul choked on air.
"Cucumber?" He repeated in disbelief "Man, you're weird. What kind of kid has cucumber as their favorite food?"
"I do, I suppose."
Maka allowed herself to slump back into the soft couch, tension from her body slowly draining away. She was able to forget about the wounds on her back, and lying like she was at that moment, she couldn't feel them in the slightest.
She began to brainstorm another question, as she felt the need to yawn. Exhaustion was beginning to overcome her willpower, but she wouldn't submit just yet.
"Hey Soul…" she said, midway through a yawn "What was your favorite childhood memory?"
He looked in her direction curiously, before leaning his head over the top of the couch, so he was staring listlessly at the white painted ceiling.
"Favorite childhood memory?..." he echoed, before pausing then thinking for a moment.
"This one time, Wes and I were allowed out of the house for a full day. I was about 6 at the time and he was 12. I wanted to see this pond in the corner of our estate desperately, so he took me down, holding my hand all the way. When we got there, he refused to let go and he kept saying that I would fall in if he let go. I remember staring into the pond, and seeing all these tiny tadpoles. I had never seen a tadpole before at that time, and had no idea what they were. I started crying, and Wes got worried, and he asked what was wrong. I kept wailing and saying that the worms could somehow swim and were going to hurt him. I remembered his laughter, before he showed me one of the tiny frogs that had just evolved from the tadpoles. I spent hours trying to catch other tiny frogs like that afterwards, Wes watching me the whole time. "
Soul was grinning childishly by the end of his small story, as Maka too began to grin in response.
"That sounds pretty fun…" she said, her tone light and her words airy.
"What about you, Maka?"
"Me?" she paused, searching desperately for any memories that she could recount, or even recall at all. "I can't really think of any… ah, wait, I remember one. It was way back, before papa lost his job, before Mama was always sick. I could barely walk at the time, but one day in the middle of summer, it was during a heat wave, I think, but my parents wanted to take me out. I didn't like going out when I was a kid, because my neighborhood smelt bad, and I always thought there were monsters outside. My parents said they had to show me, so they picked me up and dragged me out of the house. I kicked and screamed all the way, but when I opened my eyes, I was in this beautiful place. Never before had I seen anything so green and full of life. Back then it was a park that was built by one of the richer families. In the middle was this big swing set. It was bright blue and red, and I remember swinging on it for hours, before Papa had to come and drag me away again. "
She finished as Soul's mind was sent reeling from her words. Swing set? Could it have been-
"Was that-"
"Yeah. That was the park we first met in."
Maka yawned once more, stretching her limbs like a cat, before curling up into a ball of sorts, allowing her head to lean against Soul's shoulders.
"Why are your teeth so sharp?" she asked in a mild daze, slowly but surely falling into slumber. She was staring curiously at his teeth, as he gnashed them together in response.
"All the better to eat you with, my dear." He drawled, quoting one of the only nursery rhymes he was ever exposed to as a child.
Maka snorted with laugher at his response, as he too laughed lightly at the sound she made.
"Why do you read so much?" He questioned, determined to figure out as much as he could about her, when she was in this state. She seemed to be half way between sleep and consciousness, so that she was awake enough to answer questions, but not awake to hold any of the defenses she constantly had up during the day.
"I don't know… It's always been a way for me to escape, I guess."
"From what?"
"Everything. Just everything"
She was staring at him again, and it was making him slightly uncomfortable. This time, her eyes were fixed squarely on his locks of white-silver hair.
"Why is your hair white?" she asked, eyes slowly closing.
Soul grimaced. She wouldn't be awake enough to question his excuse anyway, so he supposed it was alright if he…didn't tell the whole truth.
"I had an accident when I was a kid… that accident is also the reason why my teeth are so sharp.."
"Sounds painful…" she mumbled into his chest, as he simply nodded in response.
"Yeah… what about you?"
"What about me?"
"That burn on your back." He said in an almost whisper. "What happened?"
"Let's just say it was an accident too, alright?"
"Ok." Soul wasn't sure if the entity that was Maka Albarn was growing clearer or slowly getting more complicated.
"Your turn" he said, watching as she nuzzled deeper into his chest.
"What happened with your parents?"
"Ever since Wes died, they can't look at me, and I can't look at them. I don't consider them my parents anymore."
"Th – " she yawned loudly, half way through her sentence, before continuing once more as if nothing had happened. "– that's really sad."
Soul grimaced, he didn't enjoy talking about his personal family life. He quickly moved on to say his question.
"How about your parents, Maka?"
"Papa's… he's - I don't even know anymore. Mama's dead."
Soul could still hardly believe the ease with which she could talk about her parents, who had obviously caused her so much pain. He didn't like delving deeper into the abyss, but he would probably never get another chance to ask her questions like these.
"You said she was murdered… was her murderer connected with the fire that caused the burn on your back?"
"No…"
"Wha-"
Soul was cut off by Maka before he could question her response.
"No… the person who killed my mother…"
"Was me."
"13!"
There was no response, as the number was barked out once more by a gruff voice. Footsteps clacked against cobblestone as they slowly grew louder and louder.
"Prisoner number 13! You have a visitor!" shouted the voice once more, as the grating of metal bars sliding against concrete filled the otherwise, deadly silent air.
A dark figure sat motionless on a bed, shrouded by shadows and cloaked in darkness, it sat gazing emptily at the visitor approaching the entrance of the cell. The way its eyes shone in the pitch blackness of the cell, made them almost glow crimson. It all, it looked like a figure of nightmares, a bringer of terror…a monster.
The visitor spoke.
The monster smiled.