019 : Gray

Maka realized through battles and the years and the surmounting scars that everything began to smudge around the corners. She would be lying if she said she didn't think the world looked a little brighter when the edges were blurred a little, the axis tilting a little. It looked pretty, the way the colors would meld and the way her thoughts would just run on autopilot, relying just on muscle memory to provide the swings and kicks.

Her paperwork drawer began to fill with success, and her head seemed to empty. Even in the peace time there were missions and killings, evil never seemed to sleep. For the most part her senses were alert and her hands fidgety, but she just didn't truly feel alert anymore. She was barely eighteen, she shouldn't be feeling so old and aged, even if she had seen more than almost any other meister twice her age. If they made it to that age, that was.

She didn't really have to go to the classes and school anymore, but sometime she found herself going anyway. She sat and listened, looking to her right and left and wondering why her friends wouldn't come either.

Unlike her, everyone, even Kid (who seemed to be getting a slight handle on his OCD), seemed to be enjoying the peace like any normal person. They would laugh and host parties that she would go to and refuse drinks while watching Black*Star try and kiss Tsubaki; they were having fun.

They weren't just floating through life, looking at the colors blankly and thinking that sunsets were depressing. She knew something was wrong when she stared one day out to the raining sky and all she saw was gray, when she had always loved rain. Had always thought it nurturing and found appreciation in it for how it brought life to the dried and cracking land below it.

She tried to just read more, but for some reason that began to feel taxing. Maka knew that Soul was becoming worried for her at this point, as he would watch her cook just staring at the stove. She would usually be dancing or twirling around it by now. The music was on, but her desire to leap around wasn't.

The silver-haired teenager thought at first it was how Blair had moved out, or even how her Father was now busier than her. But neither seemed right, as she seemed to just be annoyed at Blaire and her lingerie when she visited and when he'd made a lunch meeting with her Dad, she had blinked and grimaced before walking away. He got a hard Maka Chop for punishment, too.

Soul knew that he had to do something, and so asked her one night while they were watching TV.

"Maka?" he asked her name tentatively.

"What? This part of the movie is exciting," she said as she moved her arm to grab more popcorn from the bowl in his arms.

He took a breath before saying, "Are you depressed?"

She turned her head slowly from the screen to him and asked, "What?"

"You don't seem to be so lively anymore," Soul said as he scratched his head, before looking back to her to say, "You alright?"

"I'm fine," Maka said with conviction, and Soul wondered if she was trying to convince him or herself.

There was just the sound of the movie for a moment or two before Soul said, "We can fix it, you know; get some pills from Dr. Stein or something."

The teenager groaned and resisted the urge to hit her palm against her face. "Look Soul, while I appreciate the concern, I'm fine."

"You're having, like, post traumatic stress disorder or something!" he shot out in worry.

"Soul," she sighed, "I'm really fine. If anything, I'm just a little bored."

"You're bored."

"Bored."

"You've been moping around for the last few months, being lackadaisical on most of missions, because you're simply bored. Well, that just solves everything, doesn't it?"

Not finding amusement in his facetious tone, Maka snapped, "Look, peace is just so domestic and sane and..."

"Different from what you've grown up with and become accustomed to, I get it," Soul finished for her with a sigh. "You don't have to explain it to me, I know plenty about it."

"Then how do you deal with it? It's just so... consuming!" Maka yelled out, hands raised before letting them fall in seemingly defeat.

"Well," Soul said in thought as he tilted his head towards her, "I just find something intricate, something hard to understand or get and just spend all my energy on that."

"Does it help?" Maka asked with slumped shoulders.

"When I was stuck in that mansion, before I met you," Soul began, "I was bored out of my freaking mind! I had already mastered the piano and there weren't any lessons for me, and I had no inspiration to write any pieces. So I just hit notes without cause. But then I picked up the guitar, and that really helped me. It was so different, but equally entrancing, as the piano I just forgot I had been bored. And then when I mastered it-" he cut himself short and closed his mouth, as if he was just about to revel something he didn't want her to hear.

"Then what?" Maka nudged, both in her words and an elbow to his side.

"Then you came along," he shrugged, "And I haven't been bored yet."

Maka sighed as she leaned back into the cushion. "Great, so I just have to find another me."

"Or something equally interesting and hard to figure out," Soul piped in.

"I suck at guitar, I'm not even going to try again," Maka groaned, remembering the one time she had picked up the instrument she had almost flung it at the nearest wall five minutes later out of pure frustration.

They sat in silence, not watching the still moving pictures and movie on the screen. But then Maka got an idea, and twisted her body to look at Soul. He jumped a little as her face was suddenly in his as she asked, "What's so interesting about your life now to what it was before?"

"Uh," Soul said intelligently.

"I mean," she continued as she leaned more forward, a hand sticking out to push against the cushion below her for stability, "What do you like about being a weapon? About working with me?"

"Maka," Soul squeaked.

"Yeah? What is it?" she asked in interest, head further craning down to his level.

"You're kind of squishing me," he said as he looked up at her.

Maka blinked before reassessing her position, and realized in horror that she was, quite simply, flattening him against the couch. She had crawled over him and pinned him down in interest and haste to what she'd been asking about; she hadn't even noticed her body moving.

"Oh, uh," Maka said, it was her time to be smart, before she slowly retracted her body away from his.

Soul sat back up and dusted off his shirt to distract himself for a moment before looking back over to a still-close Maka, whose green eyes were still wide and expectant. Oh, right, he remembered, she wanted him to tell her why he thought his life was interesting.

"I like working with you, you know how to do everything neat and concise, which is reassuring," he began, "And then I've always been laid-back, carefree so this peace is nice in that."

Maka's eyebrows lowered a little as she said, "So you just like fighting and being lazy. Great, that helps a lot."

"I mean, that's not all," Soul said with a slight huff, "You're pretty interesting yourself."

"Interesting, as in how educated I am?"

"More like, interesting in how you can knock a man out with a kick and not understand the rules to simple basketball."

Her face dropped and blanked; Soul couldn't help but chuckle.

"I don't know how to explain it," he shrugged, "I just find amusement in the little things. If you focus on those, your life doesn't seem so boring and orthodox anymore."

"The little things?" Maka asked for reaffirmation.

Soul nodded, and she turned away to think.

Maka followed his instruction, if a little skewed. Rather then focusing on little things in her life, she focused on one thing and the little things it brought. And that one thing was Soul in her life, and their interactions.

She had known about his habits and tendencies for years now, having been partners for years, but she had never really given very much thought into why he acted the way he did. He had grown out of trying to be popular and someone he wasn't, which coincidental made him infinity popular, a long time ago and she had nodded at the change. Now she found herself trying to figure out what he was thinking or why he said or do the things he did. It was easier when he was stupid and predictable in his youth, but now that he was older like her, he had grown character and (amazingly) some wisdom and insight.

He wasn't a simpleton (coughBlack*Starcough) or overly complicated (coughKidcough) except when it came to, oddly, her. Then he turned unexpected and sometimes, to her vast enjoyment, quirky.

Like the way he would look at her when she was just reading. Like the way he seemed to hover over her when she had just come out of the shower, as if he liked the smell of her shampoo or something of the like. (She thought it was ridiculous, seeing as they shared the shower and he could just smell it himself.) Like the way he always smirked when they walked arm-in-arm on occasion, just for fun. Like how he seemed to drive faster on his motorcycle, so she would grab onto his torso tighter for support.

His odd behavior towards her, different from his usual uncaring attitude to the world around him, made her grin and for her back to straighten. She felt pride in how he was so careful, so content to simply be in her presence.

While her world had mushed almost to an inseparably and confusing level, Maka now felt the lines sharpen and for things to straighten and splay out the way they were supposed to.

On that first day they'd met, Maka had known this silver-headed boy would aid her. She just never realized that she would have helped him in the first place, or how Soul would bring her back from a dreary outlook and bland colors.


AN: I hadn't realized I haven't updated this in so long until I looked at the last update date and was like SHIT! OVER HALF A YEAR? I think I haven't been updating because there's barely been updates in the manga, but I know that's no excuse for this unintentional hiatus. But, regardless, I just literally forced myself to think and write something, anything. Truthfully, I kind of detest what came out, but that's what happens when you peer pressure yourself *Insert mandatory drug and alcohol message here* But, anyway, I hope you guys at least remotely liked it. On a better note, thanks for all the support and reviews guys; how have you all been? Having a good summer I hope~!