A/N: I may or may not be setting up totally skewed expectations as far as my ability to churn out fiction. I may crash and burn soon, fair warning. Even so, this story is (mostly) planned out, so. And yes, I am naming my chapters after the songs I listen to while I write them SURPRISE. I own nothing except the ability to put words together cohesively. P.S. thank you thank you thank you to all the folks both here and on Tumblr who are giving me such wonderful feedback! Makes my freakin' day.
It was a good thing Pele's secondary home was made mostly of stone and constantly soaked with rain, because she was fuming.
Literally.
"He dares?" the goddess bellowed, flames licking up and down her arms. Her eyes glowed like coals. "A fool seeking power dares use an instrument of volcanic glass to kill my people?"
After they'd found the body, Soul, Maka, Tsubaki and Black Star had all called ahead to contact Pele's attendant, who informed them the goddess demanded an audience. Now they stood before her, heads bowed, waiting out her rage. When they'd described the man's injuries, she'd known the cause immediately, and her anger flowed.
Liquid fire dripped down her fingers, scalding and crackling wherever it hit the ground. "Death is too good for a demon such as this."
Nāmaka glided forward, placing a hand fearlessly on Pele's wrist. Steam rose with an explosive hiss where they touched, but Pele seemed to slowly calm, the fire receding.
"Peace, little sister," Nāmaka said. "They have done right to inform us."
"Yes," Pele agreed, her eyes fading back to black as she turned them on the group. "You are tireless in your service, and I am glad for it."
Maka stepped forward, her sarong now tied into a makeshift dress to cover her body. "We'll set out immediately, my Lady."
"You are tired," Pele said, waving her hand. "I would see this creature torn to pieces, but I will not send warriors into battle unrested. You may stay the night in my guest wing."
Maka bowed. "You honor us, but it's no trouble. Our motel isn't far."
"It is late and you will stay." There was no room for argument in the goddess' words. "I wish it."
"Yes, Lady Pele."
The goddesses walked off together, heads bowed in low conversation. Pele's attendant offered a smile and held out his hand.
"If you will follow me," he said.
Tsubaki and Black Star took up the rear, taking everything in and vocalizing how impressed they were. Soul mostly felt beat as hell. His bones ached from their earlier cliff-diving adventures, and unexpectedly finding a body hadn't helped. All in all, it had been a bizarre night. Falling face-first into a bed sounded like an excellent plan.
They turned into one of the few covered hallways and the attendant stopped before a series of four doors. He bowed, invited them to make themselves comfortable, and bid them goodnight.
Black Star bounded to each door in turn. "All right, we all get our own... oh, no, wait, this is a bathroom. I call the king bed unless someone wants to fight me for it!" He cut to the left and ducked into a room.
"I don't have the energy for musical beds," Maka groaned.
Tsubaki laughed as she leaned into another one of the rooms. "I'll make it easy and take this one, then. It's a single."
Soul peered into the last room to find one double bed. "Tsu, are you sure you and Maka don't want to -" But she'd already closed her door on him. "... Right."
Maka pushed past him. "You can go share with Black Star if you want, but I'm taking this one. Stay or go?"
"Stay, I guess." He shut the door behind them. They'd shared beds before when they absolutely had to, but he didn't especially like doing it. She was a cover hog, and she kicked in her sleep.
He pulled his shirt off by the collar and turned to find her unwrapping her sarong and letting it fall to the floor. Her bikini bottoms tied at either side of her hips and, for some reason, it made his fingers itch. She went to the wall and reached up to a nearby shelf, trying to grab the long sleep dresses folded there.
"Help?" she asked.
With a sigh, he walked over and pulled one down with ease. "When did you get so short?"
"No energy for banter. Need rest." She pulled the sleep dress over her shoulders before reaching behind her back to untie her bikini string.
He coughed and turned around, feeling heat creep up his neck again. "You must be tired. You didn't even tell me not to look."
"I know you don't look," she answered, and he heard the soft whuff of fabric falling over her body. He glanced over his shoulder in time to see her pull the bikini top out of the top of the dress, which made a weird thing happen in his gut.
He walked over to the far side of the bed and fell on top of it with a grunt, facing outward and drawing the thin blanket up over himself. She blew out the lantern that lit the room and crawled in beside him so they were back to back. The bed was just big enough for two, but not big enough to give them ample free space. He felt her arch her spine as she stretched and settled. Her breathing turned rhythmic in minutes.
Sleep took longer to come to him. It wasn't like he wasn't exhausted, it was just that he could feel her heartbeat against his back. Beat, beat, beat. Slightly off from his own, enough to be distracting. It pulsed into him, spreading through the back of his ribcage around to the front. Blearily, he felt Keon's fingers hitting his sternum. Tap, tap.
When unconsciousness finally settled over him, it was light and restless. He dreamed of a red door in the middle of a white wall.
The room stood on the surface of a black sea, far away from anything else inside him, like a box forgotten in the attic. He approached it, trying to remember how long it'd been. That red door was still fresh as the day he'd painted it, still locked tight from when he'd thrown away the key. He didn't like being in front of it again. It made him anxious.
A glow to his right caught his attention and he frowned, turning. In the distance, he saw a shimmer like the sun beginning to lick at the horizon.
There was a sharp crack and he spun back around. At the top right corner of the door, a thin, jagged line split the frame and the plaster beyond it. Dust floated down from it and bile rose in his throat.
He jolted awake, Maka's hand on his shoulder. Thin morning light peeked through the drawn blinds.
"Hey," she said. "We've got a pre-kishin to hunt."
When she stood, he pushed himself to sitting, shaking the cobwebs from his head. It felt like he'd barely slept at all. Maka flicked his ear and he swatted at her.
"M'up, m'up," he grumbled.
She was back in her bikini-and-sarong getup. "Pele insisted on feeding us before we head out."
He grunted at her and she left him alone to pull his shirt back over his head. His mouth tasted like a bag of asses, and there was definitely a crick in his shoulder. Stretches didn't help much, so he gave up, slouching sullenly to meet the others.
The goddesses weren't present, but there was a fantastic spread. Or it would have been, if everything didn't taste like salt and ash to him. He knew it should taste good - it smelled wonderful - but his tongue was apparently on strike. He set his fork down after a few bites.
Maka swallowed and looked him over. "Are you feeling all right?"
"M'fine."
"You should tell me if you're not -"
"I said I'm fine, Maka. Stop being such a fucking mother hen." His chair screeched across the flagstones as he pushed back and stormed off, ignoring Tsubaki's startled look.
When he reached the front of the manor, he paced back and forth, flexing and unflexing his fingers, waiting. He wouldn't be alone for long. He never was.
He almost had himself under control when she stomped outside with murder in her eyes.
"Soul," she said, voice dangerous and deadly. "What is your damage? You've been acting weird since last night."
"I'm tired. I slept like shit." He ran his fingers through his hair, looking anywhere but at her.
"You need to get it together. We're guests here. Emissaries. You understand how important this is, don't you?"
"Yeah, I do, because you won't stop nagging me about it." He yelled the last bit at her with enough force to move her hair with his breath.
Her hands balled into fists and he braced for impact. He kind of wanted it. It would be familiar, at least. Not like the foreign thoughts that had been creeping up on him ever since they'd arrived.
Instead, she gripped his arm and pulled him to her.
"I don't know what's going on in that stupid fluffy head of yours, but snap out of it," she said. "We have work to do."
He wanted to keep being angry, but the heat drained out of him. Picking a fight with her over a bad night's sleep was ridiculous. He knew it was. They'd been above this for months. Why was he doing it?
"Yeah," he said. "I'm just... off. I'll handle it."
"Good," she said, releasing him. "Go wait in the car or something."
He did, nodding to the driver who held the door for him. The minutes passed and he spent them smoothing the tightness in his frown, rebuilding his favorite unaffected mask. When the others came outside and Maka slipped into the seat beside him, he didn't turn to look.
Not until she tossed a bundle in his lap and hunkered down, staring straight ahead with her arms crossed. He glanced down and saw something wrapped in a napkin. When he opened it, he found a few pieces of musubi with egg and felt his face soften. He brushed his fingers over her knee, his thanks unspoken. She shrugged.
After a brief stop at the motel to change and refresh for the day ahead, they gathered outside for Maka's game plan. She spread a map over the hood of a nearby car.
"We should start our search near Kīlauea," she said, pointing to an area in the south. "The pre-kishin has to be getting their volcanic glass from somewhere, and that's the most likely supply. Soul and I can scout ahead from the air. Black Star, Tsubaki, think you can start heading that way?"
"On it," Tsubaki said with a nod.
A voice sounded to their right. "Just got the call. Got room for two more?"
Soul looked and found Keon and Jinah strolling toward them. Jinah threw Tsubaki a wink and the shadow weapon smiled and lowered her eyes. When Keon smiled at Maka, Soul put a hand on either side of his meister's on the hood of the car, curving his body around hers.
"I won't say no to the extra help," Maka said. "This pre-kishin is fearless. How fast can you move?"
"Faster than a trade wind," Jinah said, her labret piercing flashing under her grin.
Maka's hair smelled good. Did her hair always smell this good? Everybody was still talking and all he could think about was whether her hair smelled more like mango or papaya. He should have slept more.
She shoved her shoulders into his chest, forcing him to back up so she could move.
"We good?" she said.
"Good," the others echoed.
"See you all in a bit." She folded up her map and walked off. Soul followed while the rest of their group split off. As he caught up to her, she reached out, her fingernails grazing along the inside of his forearm before she found his hand. She'd forgone her usual gloves in this environment.
He felt less tired now that he was out in the sunshine.
"Ready to fly?" she said, looking up at him.
"Born ready."
In a flash, he was hard steel in her hand, their souls falling into a familiar hum. Their flight was easy - she guided the way with a nudge of her hand or a squeeze of her thigh. Which was a good thing, considering he'd been paying approximately 0% attention to her directions. The island below them shifted, going from bright greens to blackened earth in the space of a heartbeat. In the distance, gray-blue smoke billowed out of a vent. That's what Maka aimed for.
The air grew steadily hotter as she guided them closer to the lava layers, her keen eyes peeled for movement. Every once in a while, there was a glimpse of streaky orange as they passed over a skylight in a lava tube and witnessed liquefied rock making its way toward the sea.
As they came up closer to the basin, Maka banked sharply to the left, bringing them around and halting in midair. She leaned forward, squinting through the escaping volcanic gasses. Soul searched and saw movement.
"There," she said. "His soul is burning up."
The man was hunched midway down the basin, situated precariously between several open lava tubes and vents. His pale skin glistened with sweat where it wasn't streaked with black ash and scarlet burns. He was prying something up off the ground, the muscles in his back rolling and straining.
Maka was about to turn back to find the others when they both noticed another flash of color nearby.
A child in a lime green shirt made a break for it, running several yards before stumbling. The pre-kishin was on him in an instant.
He could feel Maka's heart leap to her throat through her soul wavelength. He gave her a mental push and they were speeding toward the earth. Without missing a beat, he found the black piano he kept inside and played a series of chaotic, powerful notes, passing them through Maka, who infused them with two words - Black Star - before he sent them out on a glowing mental thread that would lead Star straight to them. They couldn't wait. They just had to hope the others would find them quickly.
She swung her leg to the side and twirled him in the air before landing hard in a crouch in front of the pre-kishin and the struggling boy. Soul's blade slicked into position, ready for the fight.
The damaged soul grinned at them, saliva stringing from between his broken teeth. His fingernails were shredded and red as he raised a sharp slice of volcanic glass above his head. It cut into him, blood twining down his arm in rivulets even as the glass seared the cut closed. He didn't seem to mind.
"Pretty souls," he said. "So very pretty. I'll take them."
"Come get them," Soul sneered.
The pre-kishin leapt forward, but Maka was too quick. She blocked and swept his legs out from under him in a single fluid motion, bringing Soul's blade down hard into the thing's chest.
Unfortunately, the thing was pretty fast, too. He shifted enough to take the scythe in the shoulder and swiped with his own blade, a move that would have severed Maka's feet at the ankles if she hadn't used Soul to vault over him, her legs arcing smoothly through the air. When she landed, the monster's foot caught her hard in the solar plexus and she flew back.
The pre-kishin realized he'd underestimated them and snatched up the screaming child before launching straight into the air, bounding up the face of the basin like a mountain goat. Maka let fury flash across her face before she followed suit, using Soul for balance and leverage when necessary.
Dark rock shattered into splinters beneath her boots as she landed at the summit, approaching the pre-kishin as he stood at the brim with the kid. His eyes were crazed, but calculating.
"Careful," Soul said. "Don't make any stupid moves."
The basin scooped down into a bowl. The inside was mostly crusted over, but there were a few places where lava bubbled through, boiling and leaping for the open air amidst the escaping gasses. Maka paced back and forth, drawing the creature's gaze. His skin split at the seams with the heat and evil inside him.
Soul felt her attack the second before she made it. They bolted to the edge, forcing the pre-kishin away from the open air so they'd have more room to maneuver. She was driving him down so she could have the upper ground. They whirled and spun, his body moving around hers in a dance they'd been perfecting since the moment they partnered. He blocked the glass blade again, again, again, its heat barely a blip on his radar.
It was all so natural that they let their guard down. The monster threw the child, and Maka couldn't help but reach an arm to catch him. In that moment, the demon struck, getting through her defenses and laying her thigh open with his blade.
She yelled as the wound split and cauterized in the same instant, driving her down to a knee with the pain. Soul felt it with her, shared her seething rage at the insult. The child shivered into her, and it was another distraction. The pre-kishin pinned her with its knees heavy on her chest.
Soul was about to do whatever he had to do to protect his meister when a wild battle cry sounded from above and the pre-kishen was thrown by a solid double kick to the face. Black Star skidded to a stop in front of them, Tsubaki in her short blade form along his arm.
"I don't remember telling you two you could start the party without me," he called over his shoulder. "Uncool."
"Or me," Keon said from behind. He whirled a spear over his head, feathers and shark teeth sticking out along the shaft. He grasped Jinah in both hands, cracking her base into the ground. When he brought her back up, a second spearhead had formed at her other end, and both sides burst into flame.
Soul grinned, his own sharp teeth reflected in his blade. Maka pushed herself up, settling the child behind an outcropping.
The six of them formed a half-moon around the pre-kishin, whose eyes darted between them all, sizing them up. His tongue flitted from between his lips, sampling the blood leaking from his nose.
"So many strong souls," he said. "Such power."
Maka gave Soul a mental nudge and he complied, his music reaching out to touch the others and bring them into sync. There were the familiar flickers of Black Star and Tsubaki, and the less familiar impulsiveness of Jinah and level-headedness of Keon.
"Go," Maka said.
They convened on the pre-kishin, and to his credit, he gave them a run for their money. The volcanic glass blade whirled and sliced, occasionally nicking skin but causing no major injury. Still, it was enough for the monster to keep his own body protected, guiding them all closer to the edge. Keon slashed him hard across the chest, leaving his own seared scar.
In the end, before Black Star severed the thing in two, the creature managed to land a kick that stunned Maka so badly that she released Soul and flew ass-over-teakettle backward until she rested at the edge of the basin. His scythe form clattered to the earth and he shifted to flesh immediately, trying to get his feet under him, scrambling for her like clockwork.
The child had rushed to her side and was lifting her to her knees as the pre-kishin started to fade and unravel. Before he did, he screeched and threw his blade.
Soul watched in slow motion as Maka shoved the kid out of the way and took the piece of volcanic glass to the torso. It shattered and she lost her balance, falling, falling.
It was no problem. He was almost there. He'd never missed her before.
He reached the edge and stretched for her, ready to grasp her skirt or her ankle or anything he could grip.
His hand closed on empty air.
Blink. Blink.
She was falling, and this wasn't possible.
He grabbed again and met nothing.
Her body tumbled into steam and orange and emptiness and she wasn't there. His mouth formed her name, his lips pressing into a word he'd yelled a thousand times, and his voice wouldn't follow. His legs bent, his feet on the ground, and he made to jump after her. It was the only choice.
A hand yanked him hard by the collar, throwing him to his back on the hard stone.
"Don't be an idiot," Black Star said. Tsubaki shifted to dark katana form and he threw her into the earth. She sank into it like a hot knife into butter.
"Tsu," Star said.
"On it," she complied, ropes of shadow bursting from her to twine up Black Star's arm. He gripped them tight and leapt over the side.
Soul pushed himself back over, staring into the abyss, sweat dripping from his face like tears. They were still resonating; he could feel her. The thread was thin, stretched taut with distance, but she was there, gripping the side, fighting to live. Pain seared into her and he felt a ragged cry force its way out of him.
The moment stretched on, agonizing and infinite. It should be him. He smashed his palms into the jagged rock. Why was he so useless?
After a century, or maybe a minute, Tsubaki said, "I've got them."
The black shadow threads pulled, drawing something back up, and Black Star's bright blue hair came into view, his arms wrapped around Maka's body as they flew over the rim and crashed back to earth.
Tsubaki released her shadow form, returning to flesh.
"Maka," Soul croaked.
"Good thing you have fast reflexes, Short Stack," Black Star wheezed. "Else I never would have-"
He didn't finish because Soul shoved him out of the way, desperate to get to his meister. An angry red burn painted her lower leg and he hovered his hand over it, then searched all over, looking for injuries, pain, anything.
"You never let me go," he yelled at her as she blinked up at him. "You know better."
He prodded her body, touching everywhere, not caring or hearing as she jabbered at him.
"You stupid jackass martyr," he said. "Never leave me behind where I can't guard you."
In an instant, his hand was on the back of her skull and his face smashed into hers, teeth cutting into the inside of his lips as their mouths crushed together.
Then his brain caught up with him and his eyes snapped open. He let her go and stared down at her, completely dumbfounded. A familiar flash lit her eyes and he waited for a fist to the jaw.
Instead, she shoved him in the chest, sending him flying flat on his ass. She pulled herself to standing, leaning on Black Star for support due to her stiff leg. Soul reached for her and she shifted away.
"I can walk," she said, releasing Star and limping until she could gather up the child, who clung to her for dear life. She stumbled a little as she passed Keon, and Jinah caught her under the arm, holding her as she walked. The weapon cast a confused, apologetic look over her shoulder, but dutifully supported her comrade.
Soul's breath caught in his throat. That was his job. If his meister was wounded, he carried her home. He stood, teetering, and Black Star caught his shoulder, looking up at him with something Soul couldn't decipher.
He bared his teeth, resisting the urge to deck the smirk off his friend's face.