"Okay, okay. My turn!" Patty clasps her hands together and squeals. "My question is for Maka, this time." She grins, and Maka's stomach sinks in anticipation. "Tell me… fuck, marry, kill: Tom Cruise, Keanu Reeves, George Clooney."

Maka rolls her eyes. "Really, Patty?"

"Yup!" Patty laughs. "I thought the rules were that we could ask any question to anyone?"

Maka sighs. Patty does have a point. She had thought up this dumb game as a way to keep Soul occupied, and also kill some time while they got to know each other better. She hadn't expected so many questions about having sex with guys, but then… well, it had worked. In a way. She feels like she knows Liz a lot better, now, at least…

"Probably… I'd marry Keanu Reeves. Fuck George Clooney. Kill Tom Cruise."

Patty blinks. "What's your reasoning?"

"You only get one question!" Maka exclaims and Patty shakes her head.

"No, the reasoning is implied with fuck, marry, kill. You know that!"

Maka rolls her eyes. "Keanu Reeves seems like a cool dude, George Clooney is super hot in that sexy older man kind of way-"

"Preach it, sister," Liz chants in the background. Maka ignores her.

"-And Tom Cruise is a scientologist, so…" she trails off. "Hey, I wonder if that's still a thing," she ponders to herself. "Anyway. My question is to Liz."

"Hit me!"

"What's your favorite movie?" she smiles, going for the kosher questions as ever.

"When Harry Met Sally."

"How uncool," Soul grins at her, still cradling the bottle of whiskey Liz had procured earlier. He's soundly drunk, which Maka would find amusing, were it not for the fact that she'd worried that he'll pop his stitches. "Out of all the incredible movies ever made, you would seriously pick a rom-com?" he asks her, teasingly.

Liz opens her mouth, outraged. "Yes, actually. It's a fantastic and nuanced expression of romance between two people who love each other not only as friends, but as…" she trails off, and scowls. "Don't roll your eyes, Soul! Have you even watched it?"

"Don't need to, all rom-coms are the same,"

"Well, usually I'd agree with you but When Harry Met Sally is different. It was the rom-com. It's the movie that all rom-coms aspire to be." She informs him snootishly, sticking her nose in the air. "You're clearly just emotionally stunted, like all men.

He grins. "Except Harry, from the movie, presumably?"

"Actually," Liz corrects. "He's pretty useless too." She laughs. "Tell me, Soul, as it's my question: when's the last time you cried?"

"Hah! Just now, when Maka did my stitches." He puts the bottle to his lips and takes another swig, as if just talking about the mere experience was enough to make him want to drink. "You lose."

It's Liz's turn to roll her eyes. "Gimme that, I want some." She steals the whiskey bottle from him and takes a glug, wincing afterwards. "Jesus." She coughs. "I meant when's the last time you cried from emotion?"

"Too late. No do-overs. We established that," Soul grins, triumphant. "And… my question is to Patty." He sends Liz a side-eye and grabs the bottle back. "What's the most embarrassing thing Liz has done while she's drunk?"

Patty giggles. "Probably that bartender from Eggplant who turned out to be thirty and live with his mom!" she says in a sing-song as Liz splutters, squeezing the bridge of her nose with her forefinger and thumb.

"Jesus, Patty."

"Well, we are playing truth!" she protests. "Anyway, what happened to the dare part of the game?"

Maka interrupts. "We, uh, realised that it would be too dangerous to play dares. Especially as our lives are already in danger enough as it is?"

Patty sniffs. "Fair point. Still, though…" she hesitates. "Soul!" she yells out suddenly, in her playful voice, pointing to the spiky-white-haired invalid. "Screw! Marry! Kill!" she punches her fists in the air with each word. "Me, Liz, Maka!"

Soul groans. "Really? I have to piss at least one of you off, if not all three…" he grumbles. "I'd kill… I'll kill Patty, screw… Liz," he eventually settles on. "Sorry, Patty," he sniggers and Patty shrugs as if she couldn't possibly care.

"Why?"

"No follow-up questions!" he barks, Patty dissolving into giggles.

Maka can't help but notice the way that Liz has been looking at Soul all night.


They do eventually get tired. Soul makes some excuse and then limps away to some bedroom on the ground floor where he all-but-collapses onto the bed, still clutching his stomach.

Maka follows, finding her own room and Liz and Patty do the same not shortly after.

Being in a motel, there's no shortage of spare rooms, at least, after they've found the master key from inside the hotel reception. Liz had to bust it open with her gun, but they managed eventually.

Soul, for all his trauma, can't manage to get to sleep. His eyes are tired but he stares listlessly up at the ceiling from his double bed. His feet dangle off the end and he briefly wonders if he's too tired and drunk to take his socks off.

Turning his head to the side, he wonders if Maka's asleep, yet.

He thinks about today, realises that it's the first time he's had to fight off an attack like that since… well, since the outbreak. Since his academy days, at least.

It begs the question – is he safer travelling alone? Was Maka safe under his protection?

Come of think of it, she'd saved his life today. Was Maka even under his protection at all?

He groans and rolls over, but not before he hears a light knock on his door.

He cautiously stands up, still holding onto his stitches, and pads over to the door.

"Hello?" he says on the other side. "Come in,"

"Just me," Liz's confident Brooklyn drawl comes back to him. He feels a pang of something, disappointment, perhaps?

He opens the door anyway, and she all but struts into his room. "Can I sit down?" she asks, not waiting for an answer either way before she plonks herself freely down on his bed. "I couldn't sleep. And I'm a little drunk."

"Ah… ditto. On both accounts."

"Wondered if you fancied a nightcap with me?" she asks, procuring a bottle of blue liquid from behind her back with a flirty smile. "Patty doesn't drink and Maka didn't really strike me as the sort…" she trails off, shrugging.

He eyes the bottle suspiciously, raising a brow. "Is that Gatorade?"

"It's blue curacao…" she explains. "Don't look at me like that! There's practically no other alcohol left."

He laughs and takes the bottle, twisting off the cap and taking a swig of its contents. "Hah. Better than some of the prison hooch I've had to resort to before."

Liz laughs and touches him on the forearm as he sits down on the bed next to her. "Give me some," she reaches for the bottle and follows his lead, wrinkling her nose up after she's poured some of the liquid down her throat. "Jeez. That really is bad," she passes it back to him.

"Lightweight," he laughs and then winces, touching his sides. "Ow," he says, and then continues to chuckle. "I'm kind of drunk. Ssh. Don't tell Maka, okay?" he sloppily puts a finger over his lips and then stumbles, half-falling off the bed.

Liz yelps and grabs him before the arm before he goes tumbling on his side, just about managing to save him. "Christ, Soul. I didn't see you drink that much of the whiskey…"

"I, uh, had about half the bottle. Not to mention the rubbing alcohol," he scratches his head. "I also think I'm about a quart low of blood right now, so don't question my drinking skills," he points a finger at Liz, teasing her.

"Yikes. Maybe I shouldn't be bringing you more booze!"

"Yeah, you're like some kind of…" he trails off, deep in thought.

She leans a little closer to him. "Kind of what?"

"…booze concubine."

Liz laughs and takes another quick swig, wiping her mouth on her sleeve. "Better than a regular concubine, I guess."

Soul doesn't lean back and smiles, his expression a little faraway. "I don't know. I get pretty lonely these days. Might be nice to have a concubine or two," he jokes.

There's a ringing silence that follows that sentence, and both Liz and Soul simultaneously realise what they've just said.

In the next second, or maybe the one after, she leans into him. Melds her mouth to his.

She's soft and tentative, at first, but his hand snaking around her waist is the confirmation that she needs to deepen their kiss, tangling her fingers in his hair and letting her alcoholic, blue-tinged lips move against his.

She's practiced at this. So is he, but Liz has him beat. Her hand drops down to his waist and her fingers deftly begin to unbuckle his belt.

He finds himself leaning into it – until Liz parts from his mouth to focus on undressing him, and his head falls back against the pillow. "Liz," he takes his chance to stop her. Before this becomes something else. Before he doesn't want to stop her.

"What?" she pauses her fingers movements and her big brown eyes flicker to his dark crimson ones. "You a eunuch or something?"

He sighs. "I wish."

"So… what's wrong, Casanova?"

"I don't want…" He bites his tongue, a frustrated sigh escaping him. "Obviously, I want to. I just… I don't think now is…" he trails off, unsure of exactly what excuse he's trying to conjure up.

Liz eyes him. "Are you gay?" she asks, but then cuts him off. "No, no. That kiss wasn't exactly gay." She cocks her head to the side. "Oh," she says suddenly, reading his inscrutable expression. "Maka?" she suddenly announces. "It's Maka, isn't it?"

Apparently, Soul is a second too late in spluttering his indignant 'no' because Liz pounces on him like a pussycat. She's struck gold, if her expression is anything to go by. "I'm right, aren't I?" she hesitates. "Well, she's certainly pretty. A little skinny but, if that's your type, I guess…" she wrinkles up her nose.

Soul groans and his head smacks down against the pillow once more. "Shit, Liz." He makes a noise of frustration into the pillow, and then, quieter: "Just don't say anything to her, please."

"Hah!" Liz grins like the Cheshire cat as her suspicions are confirmed. "I won't. Don't worry."

There's a silence. "Sorry," he mutters, a little embarrassed. "I mean, you're… you're like super hot. I totally would, in any other circumstance."

She laughs. "High praise! You must be drunk." She leans forward as he sits up. "Still, it's a shame. You're cute, and I'm bored. Just one more, okay? For me?"

He blinks, not sure what she's talking about until she leans forward and plants another kiss on his lips. This one isn't quite chaste but it's not quite the same as the others, either. It's something in-between, something that lacks definition.

Then, as quickly as she had come in and tipped his world on its side, she exits quietly, taking her blue bottle of Dutch courage with her.

"Night, Soul,"

"G'night."

The door clicks shut almost silently behind her, and he ponders whether that last kiss had been because Liz was lonely, too.

He drifts off after the minutes tick by quietly.

His head swirls with errant thoughts because in his dreams, he's kissing Liz again. It's almost pleasant, except she morphs into Maka after a few seconds which catches him off guard. He enjoys the feel of kissing her, instead, for a couple of seconds, before Maka's mouth suddenly morphs into a decaying one as her lips fall off right in front of him.

He recoils away too late, sees the zombie head that was Maka a few seconds ago, was Liz a few seconds before that – sees the sharp, pointed fangs; not unlike his own; open wide and sink down deep into his neck flesh.

He wakes with a jolt. "Yikes," he says to nobody but himself, running a hand through his floppy head. It comes away drenched in his own sweat.

Thoughts buzz around in his head for a few minutes and he groans, massages his head to try and somehow get them out. "What the hell is in curacao?" he wonders absently, stretching up and getting onto his feet at the side of the bed.

He pads over to the door and out into the hallway, his eyes shifting from door to door.

Which room did Maka go into?

He tries one, a dark brown door with the door number 2 etched into it.

He immediately spies a large mass of very blonde hair, so he quickly backtracks, closing the door quietly. Then, after carefully pushing open door 3, he's surprised when he sees Maka – sitting bolt upright and awake in bed with her nose in a book.

She looks equally as surprised to see him but puts her book down and places a hand over her lips.

He shuts the door behind him and sneaks towards her bed as she beckons him to sit on the edge. "Are you okay?" she whispers.

"Yeah. I just… I wondered if you were asleep."

"I couldn't sleep, honestly," she admits, gesticulating to her book.

"Seems like there's a lot of that going around," he nods. "What-cha reading?"

"Oh, uh. Ulysses. James Joyce. I'm having a hell of time with it, actually…" she says quickly, clamping it shut and reading his expression. "I know, I know. I'm a nerd. But… it helps me relax." She pauses, taking a closer look at Soul as her eyes adjust. "Are you drunk?"

"As a skunk," he laughs, with a contradictory frown plastered on his features. "Liz came in my room earlier," he says with a sigh, taking the liberty of shuffling around and lying himself down on the opposite side of the bed to Maka.

She follows him with her eyes; stares at him like he's grown four heads. "I've never seen you this friendly. Ever."

He shrugs. "Well, I am wasted."

"Why?" she presses on.

"Why not? Why do anything?" he questions, throwing his arms up in the air, then answers his own question. "Because. Today sucked ass, and my stomach fucking hurts." He cracks one eye open to look at her. "Thanks for the stitches, by the way. You're awesome."

Maka smiles and places her book on the side table. "Well, thanks for saying it. I was just repaying my debt of honor, honestly." She grins, before a big yawn overcomes her features. "Come on. We should get some sleep."

"Maka, can I sleep in here?" he murmurs, suddenly feeling very tired. "I just… I kept having weird dreams before."

She hides the fact that she finds him oddly endearing, all drunk and vulnerable like this, and pretends to be grudging as she nods. "Fine, Soul." She pauses. "But… I'm just wearing this shirt, and my underwear. So…"

"It's fine," he mumbles, barely registering her words. As if to prove something, he toes off his shoes and wriggles drunkenly out of his pants, kicking them to the floor when they reach his ankles. "Now I am, too."

She stifles a giggle. "What's gotten into you?"

"Blue curacao," he answers cryptically, almost in a whisper.

"Oh?" she does a double take.

"Liz brought some to my room, earlier," he trails off, whispering something quietly to himself. "…ooze concubine…"

Maka blinks, confused. She shuffles down further in the bed and continues to listen to Soul's strange monologue, even going so far as to rest her head on his chest. She feels it vibrate with a pleasant hum as he speaks. Or rather, mumbles sweet nothings.

"We were drinking the blue shit. Apparently, it was the only thing left over. And then, uh, we kissed. Which was weird as hell, because I thought she didn't like me. But, then, I always think that."

Maka's heart beats a little faster. "You kissed… Liz?" she asks, her voice coming out a little higher than she had intended.

"Well, kinda. She sorta kissed me. I guess. I didn't really want to."

"You didn't?" Maka asks, her eyes raising with apparent surprise.

"Well, don't get me wrong. Liz is hot," he drawls.

"So…?"

"Eh," he shrugs. "She's not you, though."

She opens her mouth to reply, and then closes it again, thoughtfully. There's a silence as Maka digests that information.

She's not you? What on earth did that mean?

Did that mean that Soul had feelings for her? Hadn't that been exactly what they'd wanted to avoid before?

And if he did, why did he act so indifferent to her all the time?

She blushes, gathering up the guts to ask more.

However, she's foiled by the familiar faint sound of his snoring emanating from his side of the bed.

She sighs, supposing that it will have to wait for tomorrow, or more realistically probably never.

In the meantime, in the off chance that she never gets to do this again, she snuggles further into the apex of his neck, disproportionately enjoying the feeling of his arm snaked around her waist.