This piece is for Reverb 2015. My amazing partner is tilliquoi, whose art was incredibly inspiring and whose feedback was invaluable. Many thanks to my betas chaoticlivi, professormaka, and zxanthe.
The slowly sinking sun could barely penetrate the thick forest canopy with its fading light. The forest floor was dappled with pale sunlight, casting everything into dark, twisted shadows. The leaves rustled as the breeze passed through them, causing them to shiver and shake.
Maka's boots against the ground made crunching noises that seemed amplified against the quiet of the woods. The air smelled loamy and rich, but oppressive, hanging thickly around her and eddying in her wake.
As she walked, everything seemed unusually still, but Maka kept catching flashes of movement out of the corner of her eye. The skin at the back of her neck prickled uncomfortably. Turning her head this way and that, she saw nothing, and her Soul Perception revealed nothing either, but she still felt uneasy.
"Hey, Soul…"
"Hm?"
"You get the feeling we're being watched?"
His voice was tinny as he answered, as he was in his scythe form, slung casually over her shoulder. "I don't think so… do you?"
She didn't respond right away. Maka flicked her eyes to the trees, peering through the gloom. A flash of something caught her attention. The pale light glimmered off of the glossy black feathers of an old crow sitting above her head. It cocked a beady eye at her, almost as if it were sizing her up. Maka opened her mouth, words on the tip of her tongue, when the creature gave a hoarse caw and took flight, leaving a few ragged feathers and a sense of unease behind it.
"Finally," said Soul in her ear.
Maka smiled. The motel had come into sight at last. Darkness had fallen, but the flickering neon sign indicated that the Shady Hollow Motel was open for business. Or at least, the "S ady Holl w otel" was.
She stepped onto the cracked pavement of the parking lot and a feeling of relief swept over her. They had been walking through the woods for almost two hours, and the sense of being watched had not left her until she was under the buzzing lights of the motel.
Of course, that might have had something to do with the reason they were here in the first place.
There was only one reason that could have caused them to travel all the way from Death City to a tiny Appalachian mountain town, and it wasn't pretty. A prekishin had been terrorizing the (admittedly, very few) locals, and Maka and Soul had been put on the case by the newly appointed Lord of Death, who now, based on the look of the motel, officially owed them a favor.
There was no other word for it: the motel was seedy. The windows were dirty, the gravel path was uneven and disused, and the lights leading up to the front door were only half working. Maka tightened her grip on the small pack in her hand as she approached. The shaft of her scythe grew suddenly hot under her glove, and in a flash of light, Soul was standing next to her.
"Not sure how they might react to a talking scythe," he said, slipping his hands into his pockets. Maka grinned as he settled into a slouch, and they swung open the front door.
A bell tinkled overhead as they entered. The carpet leading to the front desk was faded and stained, and it muffled the sounds of their footsteps. No one was behind the desk, but Maka's Soul Perception revealed a single person moving from below, ascending slowly; the owner must have been in the basement.
Soul leaned against the counter and looked around the room. "Please tell me we're not getting breakfast from this place," he muttered. Maka elbowed him.
"We might not have much choice," she said, looking over her shoulder. With a sinking stomach, she could see the source of apprehension: the continental breakfast from that morning was still spread across a sagging card table. The flies had found it, circling the stale bagels and oversized muffins.
"Welcome," came a raspy voice, and Maka turned back to the desk.
An old stooped woman stood there, barely visible above the counter. Her thinning gray hair was swept back over her shoulder in a long braid, and when she smiled at them, she revealed a few missing teeth.
A quick scan of her soul revealed her to be about 87 years old. It was a little slow and droopy, a sign of her advanced age, and it seemed to have developed an odd sheen to it, but she seemed healthy enough.
"Hi!" Maka chirped. "I'm Maka Albarn. We made a reservation?"
"Let me see." The women bent over and ran a gnarled finger down the pages of the yellowed ledger. "Yes, here you are." She glanced up at the two of them. "I didn't realize you would need two beds."
"Ah-" Maka felt a blush tinge the top of her ears. She and Soul had been sharing a bed for a while now, but she hadn't even thought that someone might find it a bit scandalous.
"As long as you have a trundle, we should be fine," Soul said quickly.
"You didn't bring much either," the woman observed.
Maka exchanged a glance with Soul. They hadn't made the reservation under the DWMA's official code; the place was so off the beaten path, they hadn't been entirely sure how much was known about their occupation in this neck of the woods, so they were traveling only as civilians.
The woman grinned again, a knowing twinkle in her eye. "You're not the only people to come to this motel looking for a little privacy. This isn't exactly a tourist destination. As long as you cause no trouble, we shouldn't have any problems."
"No trouble here!" Maka said.
"Wonderful." The woman turned around to reach for a set of keys hanging off of the many hooks behind her. "I'll show you to your room. My name is Helen, and if you need anything, please feel free to ask. Breakfast is served from 6:30 to 10:30 in the morning, and the pool opens at 11am."
They followed her frail frame out the door and around the corner down the long line of rooms. The pool filter droned to their right, obscured from view by a ring of scraggly bushes. Once they reached a peeling red door labeled 34B, Helen shuffled to a stop and slipped the key into the lock. With a few tries, she wrenched it open and stepped inside, Maka and Soul on her heels.
The room smelled musty and stale, but it looked clean enough; Maka tossed the small bag onto the comforter. Helen tried to stoop down, fumbling with something under the bed, but Soul grunted, "Here, let me," and dropped to the floor to roll the trundle bed out.
"Well, I'll let you get settled," she said, waving a knobbled hand as she made towards the door. "I'll see you at breakfast."
"I don't wanna get up that early," said Soul as he threw himself onto the trundle bed. Maka kicked at it and he groaned.
"Stop it. We're getting up early regardless. The woods are so thick here that we need to take full advantage of the sunlight to see." She didn't mention the feeling of being watched earlier, and Soul didn't bring it up, but it still nagged at the back of her mind. "We'll have breakfast here, then start investigating by walking towards town so that by the time lunch hits, we can stop there."
The bed creaked as she let her weight sink into the faded comforter. Rubbing her neck, Maka glanced around the room. It was pretty sparse: a side table with a single lamp, a low set of drawers with a dirty mirror propped on top, and a small bathroom off to the side of the room. She kicked off her boots and flopped backwards onto the bed.
After a moment, Maka felt a light tap on her arm. "You asleep?"
She opened an eye to look up at Soul. "Not yet."
"So… should we use the trundle or-?"
Maka smiled, then rolled onto her side so she could see him better. "I won't tell if you don't."
He flashed her a toothy grin, then clambered up, falling with a thwump onto the mattress. It protested under the added weight, and for a moment Maka imagined having to explain a bill for a broken bedspring to Kid and her father, but luckily it seemed to hold. Soul wriggled out of his jeans and kicked them off the bed. As he crawled towards the head of the bed, Maka pulled her sweater over her head. She tossed it towards Soul's clothes and began to work at her buttons.
They'd been sleeping shirtless together for a while now, but hadn't yet gotten to sleeping totally nude, so she slipped under the covers with her underwear still on; Soul yanked his shirt over his head and did the same. As they settled in together, Maka wondered for about the thousandth time if she should suggest they lose their bottoms too (and suggest all the implications along with it) but it only took a few moments for sleep to claim her, and she slept dreamlessly.
A far too short time later, Maka felt the sun beating down on her face; they had clearly forgotten to draw the curtains. She lifted her hand to shade her eyes, groaning blearily. Soul had buried his face into her bare back and as she began to stir, he burrowed deeper under the covers.
"Time to get up," she yawned.
Soul muttered something unintelligible as Maka wormed her way out of his grasp. With a stretch, her muscles all popped into place, and she padded across the room. She gazed out the window, but the only things she could see in her line of sight were the scraggly bushes that lined the walkway. Now that it was light out, she could see through some of the more ragged branches to the pool, which was currently still, the jets not yet on for the day. The water was a sickly blue and more than a few leaves floated on the top.
Feeling more awake, she turned back to the lump on the bed. "C'mon, get up," Maka said.
It moaned a little and she giggled. She slid back onto the comforter and began to prod at it gently.
"We're gonna get breakfast and then be out in the sunshine, I promise it'll be worth it."
"Better be good breakfast," said Soul, emerging from under the blankets with outrageous bedhead. He rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand, then stretched to crack his back.
After a few minutes, the pair emerged from the room, fully dressed and blinking back the sunlight. Maka used a quick Soul Perception scan to determine that there were three other guests in the rooms that they passed on their way towards the front room. Two were still in their rooms and Helen's soul was downstairs again, so when they approached the front office all they could see was the stooping back of the last guest.
As they entered, the man turned to shoot them a toothless grin. He wore a trucker hat, and below that his skin was tanned and leathery. His windbreaker seemed to swallow him up, his chest caved in and his arms like baby bird wings, but his smile was genuine.
"Help y'selves," he said with a lisp. "Helen be up soon."
"Thanks, but we're eating and running," said Maka, squeezing past him and grabbing a plate. She loaded it with burned toast and some questionable eggs, passing over the very browned fruit.
"Ah," was all the man said, touching the brim of his hat lightly.
"Are the eggs any good?" asked Soul, shoveling them onto his plate.
"Helen makes a mean egg." The man lifted his plate to show them. "S'why I stay here when I'm in the area. Name's Paul."
"Good morning Paul, I'm Maka and this is Soul." The three of them sat down at an empty card table. Maka eyed the coffee maker, and after tasting the toast, decided she could use a cup.
"Unusual," said Paul, tapping his nose with a crooked forefinger. "Unusual."
Soul paused from stuffing his face. "Paul, you wouldn't have happened to notice anything else unusual around here, would you?"
Throwing Soul a sharp look over her shoulder, Maka tightened her grip on the handle of the coffee pot. But Soul shrugged, as if to say Well, that's why we're here, and Paul only smiled his gap-toothed smile again. Maka turned back to the coffee as Paul began to speak.
"I suspect you're talking about the disappearances." Maka chose the least dirty mug and poured. The coffee was sludgy and rank, and she wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Surely, I've seen things. Strange lights in the woods, people possessed. There's something afoot, surely."
Soul tapped his fork against the chipped plate. "That does sound strange."
"Do you know any of the people who have disappeared?" asked Maka, discreetly dumping the contents of the mug into the trashcan.
"Not me, but there may be some folks in town who might."
"Excellent," said Maka, sitting down to finish her breakfast. "Eat fast, Soul."
After disposing of their plates, they stepped into the morning air. The fog had not yet burned away from the parking lot and gave everything a slightly ethereal feeling. Instinctively, they reached for each other's hands, entering the woods united.
"Should I transform?" asked Soul once they had moved far enough away from the motel.
Reluctant to let go of his human hand, Maka nodded slowly; it did make a lot of sense, especially since they still didn't know exactly what they looking for or when they might encounter it. With a flash of light and a rushing sound, Soul was no longer a slouchy white-haired young man but a thick blade of demonsteel, shining even in the watery light of the forest.
"So let's go over what we know." Maka shouldered her weapon like she had the day before, and Soul began to recite.
"Well, we know that there have been several disappearances of people in this general vicinity. These woods are large and old, though, so it's possible they're just getting lost, but it seems pretty unlikely, seeing as how it's been happening so frequently. But no one has actually seen any prekishin, and no one has reported any witch-like activity. It's weird."
"Mmm," said Maka, stepping carefully over a root. "There's not a lot of evidence to base anything on, so we're kind of going in blind."
"Basically. But it definitely seems like something sinister."
"I agree, but I'm not really sure where to start."
"Have you used Soul Perception yet?"
Maka frowned. "I don't think my range would be large enough to find it if I don't know where it is… I'm hoping for physical evidence, like those lights Paul mentioned or claw marks or something."
"Worth a shot."
Maka breathed in through her nose, a little annoyed she hadn't thought of that herself. But he had a point. Taking a deep breath, she focused on expanding her Soul Perception as far as she could, reaching out tendrils of her power and letting it wash like waves over the forest.
She could sense the soul of her partner almost too powerfully, so sensitive was her Perception and so close was he to her. She averted her gaze from him, eyes almost blinded by the light of his soul, and moved it out into the field. There were tiny sparks of light, like the stars across the sky, and she knew she was looking at the thousands of animals in the forest. Their souls were smaller, less defined, and she could read no personality in them - animal souls were just too different - but it was a beautiful sight.
Turning her attention to the farthest edges of her ability, Maka strained to push past her boundaries. There were no other souls she could sense, human or otherwise.
"I don't see anything," she said, opening her eyes and returning to the present. For a moment, she was disoriented by all the colors and the bright sunlight, but soon righted herself.
"Well, we tried."
They walked further into the woods, stopping occasionally for Maka to send out her Soul Perception every so often. Once she sensed the souls of a man and two young boys, so they moved stealthily through the trees until they found them. It was obviously a father and his sons on a camping trip, and Maka and Soul moved on without disturbing them, amused at the antics of the boys as their father gutted a fish for their lunch over the fire.
Their journey through the forest was actually a pleasant one. Gone was the feeling of being watched, replaced only by a sense of calm, punctuated by birdsong and the occasional gurgle of a brook. It was peaceful. The weapon and meister chatted lightly as they made their way, heading northeast through the woods. Maka was still on the alert for anything unusual, but she noticed nothing, and they finally spilled out onto the edge of the small town.
Soul transformed back into a human and they meandered towards the center of town, bellies grumbling. They had flown over the place on their way to the motel, but hadn't had the chance to stop; now they were starving.
The DWMA had paid for their flight out, but as neither Maka nor Soul were old enough to rent a car, they were on their own in terms of getting to and from the place. As they could fly using Soul, there wasn't a big problem (though it did make bringing suitcases difficult), but it was a little awkward to mount her weapon when not in the presence of other meisters and weapons. It was hard to know how the locals might react to a human weapon, even the Last Death Scythe. Weapon prejudice still existed to varying degrees, and Maka liked to avoid that sort of confrontation as much as possible - it was very hard to control her temper, and filling out the paperwork for punching a civilian took forever. So they played it safe and skirted the edges of civilization when utilizing Soul's weapon form. Now, however, they were in need of a substantial lunch; a barely edible breakfast was not enough to fight monsters.
Soul pointed out a small diner up the street, and Maka nodded. There was a blast of cold air as they stepped into the building, causing goosebumps to erupt across Maka's shins. A woman in a black apron bustled over, smoothing out the wrinkles as she came. "Table for two?" she asked, though there was really no need. There were only four other people in the place, and all of them were sitting at the counter; all the tables were vacant.
"Yeah, thanks," said Soul.
The two were seated, sliding into the peeling booth, and the woman lay two menus in front of them and disappeared into the kitchen. Soul picked his up menu, but put it down almost immediately.
"Waffles," was all he said. Maka smiled.
The menu was a little greasy, but otherwise sported the usual fare, so Maka decided on an omelet - apparently it was a day for eggs. The waitress smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling, then bustled away.
They made small talk as they waited for their meals. The food came out relatively quickly (which made sense, as the kitchen was only handling their orders). Maka finally had a cup of coffee as Soul began to devour his waffles.
"So," she said, delicately cutting into her omelet. "There haven't been any reports of anything strange happening in the areas surrounding the town. That means the prekishin must be limited to this forest. At least that's something."
"Unless it hasn't started hunting elsewhere yet," Soul said between mouthfuls of waffle.
Maka pursed her lips. "I doubt that. There would be far more prey in some of the more populated cities not that far north of here. This location must be important."
"Sorry to interrupt-" The waitress had come back over, knuckles white around the menus in her hands. "-but I couldn't help but overhear. Are ya'll from that school out in Nevada?"
Soul burped behind his fist and Maka kicked him under the table. "We are," she said, keeping her tone carefully neutral.
"Ain't that something," she said in wonderment, and Maka relaxed. "We haven't had anyone from the place in, oh I don't know-"
"Twenty years," supplied one of the men at the bar. He had turned around, his watery eyes trained on their table. He wore a plaid shirt under his denim vest, and his hat was old and faded. "The school sent a pair of greenhorns, right Sally?"
"That's right," said the waitress over her shoulder. She turned back to Maka and Soul, who were now listening intently. "There was a weapon and a - what do you call the people who fight? - anyway, they came looking for a witch, apparently. There were disappearances, sort of like what's happening now, only much more, much more. Anyway, this pair came down and went looking for trouble… and they found it."
"What do you mean?" asked Soul.
The man at the bar was practically hanging off of his stool to be involved in the conversation. Maka waved him over, and he hopped down to stomp over to them.
"Trouble, that's an understatement. They barely survived." The man scratched at his stubble, looking serious. "I think the girl was from Germany, didn't speak much English, but the boy was almost local, from South Carolina. He dragged her unconscious back to town, eyes wild like something was on his heels."
"Something was, Dale," said the waitress. "That night there were three more disappearances."
"Did the DWMA evacuate them?"
Dale nodded. "Big to do. They flew a helicopter in and everything. And in that helicopter they dropped off a new pair, a more seasoned pair. They were still just kids, but you could tell: they knew what they were doing."
"I remember them. Another girl and boy, but something in the eyes… they had already seen it. Seen the kind of horror in the woods and they were not afraid."
"So what happened?"
"They defeated the witch, and they came back to town to get picked up by the helicopter," said Dale. "It was something. I saw them holding that glowing thing, all pulsing and orange…"
"Well, it's not possible that it's another witch," said Maka, wrapping her hands around her coffee mug. "There's a treaty now between the DWMA and the witches. We're still working out the kinks, but they would have known if this was a witch disobeying those orders."
Sally looked fascinated. Dale stared.
"The other possibility," said Soul, swallowing his bite of food with some difficulty, "is that it's a prekishin, a tainted soul gone rogue. Those are less powerful than witches, but they can still be dangerous. Which is why we're here."
"Yes," Maka said hastily. "We'll have it under control as soon as possible. We're like the second pair that was sent here; we're very seasoned veterans." She paused, stirring the spoon in her cup pensively. "Actually, do you happen to know anything about them? The ones who came here before, I mean. Perhaps we can get in touch with them and ask them about what they saw here."
"Do you remember their names?" asked Sally, looking thoughtful. "I think they were something odd…"
"Sure do," said Dale. "Or at least I remember the young man's name, as it was so unusual and he shouted it loudly at my niece. Spirit. Spirit Albarn."
There was a loud KRACK-KOOM just as Maka and Soul stepped outside of the diner. The smell of rain assaulted Maka's senses, and she sighed as the heavens opened and big, fat raindrops began to pepper the concrete with dark spots. Soul slid his hands into his pockets and sent Maka a sideways look. She clenched her teeth.
The bell above the door tinkled again as Dale stepped out under the tiny awning with them. "Where ya headed?" he asked. "I can give you a ride in the pick up, if you'd like. Not a lot of room in the cab, but it'll keep you dry."
Maka did a quick scan of his soul. It was weathered and tough, like leather stretched almost to the breaking point, but it was honest, so she smiled. "Thanks, we'd love that. We're staying at the Shady Hollow Motel, do you know where that is?"
The man touched the brim of his hat and pulled it down more snugly onto his forehead. "Yes, I do. Helen's been running that place for years. I can get you there, no problem."
He began to walk heavily around the back of the diner, so Maka and Soul followed. The rain splattered onto her coat, soaking the fabric, but right around the corner of the building was an old, rusty pickup truck. The blue paint was peeling and faded, but the roof was intact, which was all Maka cared about at the moment.
Dale opened the truck with his key, then gestured to the meister and weapon pair. "Go on, the other door's a bit busted. Just slide in."
Soul quickly hopped into the cab. Maka followed. The interior of the truck was worn but well cared for: the seats were clean, the dashboard was sun-bleached, the floor was impeccable. There was no seatbelt for the passenger seat, but they were squeezed together tightly, so Maka wasn't worried. Besides, they'd lived through a lot worse.
Crammed into the seat, Maka idly watched as Dale turned the key in the ignition and started the windshield wipers. The windows began to fog with their combined breaths, so he fiddled with the dashboard.
"Shouldn't take too long to get you back," said Dale as they pulled out of the parking lot, "but we'll have to be careful because of the rain. Might take a tree down."
"Thanks," said Soul. Maka smiled again, then turned away.
Inside, she was seething. How could they have been sent on this mission without being told her father and mother had been in this very town twenty years earlier? She couldn't believe that had not occurred to Spirit as he had waved her off tearfully at the airport. Maka wasn't sure whether she should be angry with her father, or with Kid, who had assigned them this mission, or with Stein, who had debriefed them before they left.
It didn't seem possible that the witch her parents had hunted two decades ago could have resurfaced, but something strange was going on. She watched the tiny rivulets of rain run down the windshield, rolling down in thin streams until the wiper came to force them down to the bottom.
Soul seemed to be trying to catch her eye, but she didn't want to admit in front of Dale that it had been her parents here all those years ago. She stared determinedly out the window.
After a few moments, Soul seemed to give up, and addressed Dale. "So one of the people staying at the motel with us said there had been some weird lights associated with the disappearances. Have you seen anything like that?"
"Can't say I have," said Dale. "But I haven't seen anything like I did twenty years ago. People then were afraid to walk down the streets. You'd be behind someone, and they'd turn a corner, then you did, and they were gone. Just vanished."
"Did you know any of them?"
Dale nodded gravely. "A fair few. Big loss to this town."
"Did you know any of the people who have disappeared this time around?"
"Not particularly well. Many were out of towners. There's a path that runs through the woods that eventually meets up with the Appalachian Trail, so people looking to camp will sometimes take it to start hiking the big trail. Easier when you're coming from northwest of here than going all the way to Georgia. You'd have to be from out of town to want to be up in those woods, though. No one who lived here twenty years ago goes into the woods without a damn good reason."
"Except Helen?"
Snorting, Dale flicked his eyes across to his passengers. "Helen's always been a bit batty. Her motel sees mostly hunters or campers who want one last bit of civilization before heading off towards Maine. She's as much a part of those woods as anything. But her business certainly suffered right after those incidents, so I'm not surprised she's been a bit quiet about these ones. Doesn't wanna scare people off again."
"Makes sense," said Soul, and they lapsed into silence once more. Maka chewed the inside of her lip, feeling agitated. To distract herself, she used her Soul Perception to study Dale's soul again. She concentrated on sorting through his feelings and his power level - normally largely uninteresting for a meister, but it helped to pass the time.
The rain had not abated in the slightest by the time the truck pulled into the parking lot in front of the motel. After thanking Dale profusely, Maka and Soul dashed towards the entrance of the building. Water was cascading down off the roof to splatter against the walkway - clearly the gutters weren't very well made - but they hugged the wall as they made their way along the row of doors until they reached 34B.
Soul fumbled with the key until they heard the lock slide clumsily out of place, and the door swung forward with more momentum than he'd meant. It slammed against the wall and bounced forward again as Soul scrabbled to grab it. Maka rolled her eyes good-naturedly as they stepped over the threshold into the muggy room. They shed their heavy, wet outer layers.. Maka rubbed her shoulders through the thin shirt she wore under her uniform. "I think I'm going to shower," she said, not meeting Soul's eye. "I feel gross." It was true, but for more reasons than one.
She stepped into the bathroom. The light turned on, dim and flickering, and a groan started up as the old fan began to spin. Stripping down, Maka tried to concentrate on peeling away the feelings of frustration, anger, sadness, and let out a sigh.
After playing with the water temperature for a while, she stepped into the discolored tub. Trying not to think about foot fungus, Maka let the hot water pour over her shoulders, easing her aching muscles. She took another deep breath. She felt wrong-footed and off, and she hated feeling that way.
The motel only provided a small bottle of unlabeled substance that turned out to be shampoo, so Maka lathered it into her hair and washed it across her arms and legs as well. There was at least some satisfaction in scrubbing away the anger, but her skin was raw and pink afterwards. Maka watched dully as the streams of water flowed down her arms, spreading apart as she opened her fists and coming back together as she closed them. So lost in thought was she that she lost track of time, and only snapped to when a rap on the door shook her out of her thoughts.
"Did you drown?" asked Soul through the door.
"Coming!" Maka called, feeling sheepish. She hoped there would be enough hot water left for his shower.
She turned the water off and reached for the starchy towel as she stepped out of the tub. Maka opened the door and watched the steam billow out into the cooler room. A faint blush traveled down her neck and across her chest as she stepped out with only the towel around her body. She did catch Soul running his gaze up and down her form before he moved around her into the bathroom, but the momentary happiness she felt quickly dissipated as she remembered why she was upset. She slipped on a fresh pair of underwear as she heard the shower turn on again behind her.
Maka got dressed, struggling a bit to get her shirt over her still-wet shoulders, and used the towel to dry her hair. The storm raged outside, the noise of the rain melding with the noise from the shower. Maka threw herself onto the bed and picked up her phone. She had no service, so she played a few rounds of Candy Crush before getting bored and rolling onto her back to stare at the ceiling. The pipes squeaked within the walls as the shower turned off, and a few moments later, Soul emerged from the bathroom too, similarly wrapped in a towel. She didn't look at him as he searched for his clothes.
There was a large spot of water damage on the ceiling. Maka frowned as she stared at it, trying to determine what it looked like.
"Maka," said her partner, and she turned her head to look at him. He still wasn't dressed, though his clothes were clutched in his hand, but he was gazing at her with a stern expression. "Clearly you're pissed. Do something about it."
"Like what?"
"I dunno, call the school. Ask why you weren't told about your parents. Just do something besides stewing."
Maka sighed audibly, rolling onto her side to face him. Her eyes were level his stomach, and she watched the muscles contract and expand lightly as he breathed. "I don't want to talk to them though."
"So what are you gonna do? Just sit here and be annoyed? You know that could mess with our resonance if you're in such a bad mood, and they might have insight into what we're facing here anyway. Just swallow your pride and call."
Her lips pursed as she stared up at her partner, but he didn't look away. Finally, she acquiesced with a huff and swung her legs off the side of the bed. "Fine. But I will not be held responsible if I lose my temper."
"When are you ever?" Soul muttered under his breath, and she threw her knuckles into his abs as she passed him. She left him groaning in the bedroom as she stepped into the bathroom, the mirror still steamy from Soul's shower. With an extended index finger, Maka wrote the well-practiced numbers on the surface of the mirror: 42-42-564.
The mirror rippled, and the surface was no longer reflecting the dingy bathroom but the pale blue sky of the Death Room. Maka could see the back of a long gray lab coat, so she cleared her throat and said, "Professor Stein?"
The man whirled around to look back at her. Stein was sitting at a low table, tea cup in hand and eyes obscured by his opaque glasses, but when he recognized Maka, he grinned a little madly.
"Good evening, Maka."
She ran a hand through her hair, suddenly acutely aware of the tangles, but steeled herself and squared her shoulders. "I'm upset, Professor Stein."
"Oh?" he said, turning the screw in his head with a click click click.
"You debriefed me and Soul before we left for this mission, right?"
"I did indeed."
"Did it not occur to you to tell me that my parents had been here twenty years ago? And that the townsfolk would still remember that?"
Stein cocked his head to the side. "It didn't occur to me that that would be relevant."
Maka balled her fists. "How could that not be relevant?"
"We have no indication that the witch they defeated there was anything but dead. It just seemed like a strange coincidence, nothing more. Do you have reason to believe this is not a prekishin, but a witch?"
"No," she said sourly. "But it still would have been nice to know."
Stein adjusted his glasses, gazing steadily at her. "Your mission has not been going well?"
"It hasn't been going at all. I've been using my Soul Perception and I haven't found anything. None of the locals have seen anything except some strange lights, which doesn't tell me much. It's so strange. The woods feel… creepy, but there aren't any clues, at least as far as I can see."
"That is odd," said Stein. "Prekishin tend not to be so careful once the bloodlust takes hold of them. They grow more and more erratic the more souls they absorb."
"You don't have to tell me that," she said waspishly.
"No, my best student would surely be aware of that. I'm only agreeing with your astute observation of nothing at all." Maka narrowed her eyes, not sure if she was being made fun of or not. "I'll pull up the files on the witch your parents defeated there. It might take me a while to find them, as that was before we started digitizing them, but if there's anything in there that can elucidate what's happening, I'll find it."
Maka nodded, feeling somewhat satisfied, but something was still niggling in the back of her mind. Stein shifted slightly in the mirror and she looked up again.
"I won't tell anyone what I'm looking for," he said without expression. "I'll just report back once I find something."
A smile tugged her lips upwards; somehow he always knew. "Thanks," she said softly. "I appreciate it."
"Stay out of trouble," said the professor, and suddenly Maka was looking at her own reflection again, eyes creased with happiness.
"We probably shouldn't be here."
Maka nibbled on his earlobe and listened to Soul groan under her ministrations. "Are you sure?" she asked coyly.
"I mean, yes," he said breathily. "But I guess I'm not really complaining."
She laughed as she shifted, hearing the water ripple around her. The pool was lit only by one underwater light, so Soul's skin was glowing a strange, unearthly blue. She placed her lips on his neck again, tasting the chlorine.
"We'll have to shower again," he reminded her. She bit down lightly.
"I don't care."
He chuckled, and she felt the reverberations under her hands as she ran them along his bare chest. She wrapped her legs a little tighter around his waist and he stumbled backwards into the wall of the pool. His hands gripped her thighs, and she felt the heat rush between her legs.
Their lips met again. Maka could feel that his were hot and slightly swollen, and her stomach did a backflip. Everything about the evening felt surreal and otherworldly, and she wondered if tonight was the night. The idea both thrilled and terrified her.
After talking to Stein, she and Soul had gone to the vending machines for a dinner of snacks and soda. It wasn't ideal, but they doubted anyone would deliver pizza to such a remote location. Boredom and humidity had outweighed the possibility of getting caught in the pool after hours, and so here they were. Both were stripped down to their underwear; at this rate, they'd have to start washing them in the sink before they ran out of fresh ones.
Maka felt a heady rush and a tingling up her spine as Soul's fingers traced over her vertebrae. She tugged gently at his lip with her teeth, watching from between her eyelashes as he shivered.
The night was silent save for the slight ripple of the water against the edge of the pool. The wind was still and the sky was clear, the storm from earlier having left a calm wake in its path.
Maka's pulse was pounding in her ears and her fingers were entangled in Soul's hair. So focused was she on her partner and his lips and his chest and his erection pressing against her leg that she missed the sensation of being watched.
Maka woke up the next morning with a start. She was in her underwear, a new pair this time, and Soul was breathing against the back of her neck, but she remembered immediately that nothing else had happened last night except more making out. At the time, she had felt like she wanted it to happen, but in the cold light of morning, she knew it was best that their first time didn't occur in the seediest motel known to man. Prodding her partner awake, she slipped out of bed into the chilly morning air.
After another unsatisfying breakfast, they took to the woods again. "I don't think we're going to find anything new," said Maka to the scythe over her shoulder, "but we can at least evacuate that family camping, and maybe approach this from a different angle."
They started again towards the northeast, the same direction they had walked in the day before, but there was something odd about the trees that morning. It was as if the night clung to the branches still. Maka felt a shiver drop down her spine and tightened her grip on the shaft of her weapon.
But after almost two hours, the oppressive feeling of being watched was overshadowed by the frustration of getting lost.
"I swear, we just had to go over this ridge," Soul said for what had to be the thousandth time.
"Clearly not," said Maka through gritted teeth.
"Maybe if we just-"
"Augh!" she cried, slamming her fist against a nearby tree. A flock of crows was startled into the air, loud caws echoing through the branches. Maka watched their wings block out the sun and felt a tightening in her chest. "We need to find them."
Soul was quiet for a moment. "Okay. Realistically, if they're spending the night, they need to be by the river to access water. We find it and follow it."
Maka closed her eyes and extended her Soul Perception as far as she could. Once again, the forest lit up like a midnight sky dappled with the small souls of all the animals. They were foreign to her, like trying to read a text in another language, but she carefully studied the shapes and movements. The light, airy ones hopped above her head, clearly belonging to various birds. Two nimble ones glided through the trees like ghosts, and she suspected they were deer. Finally, she noticed some thin, silvery souls undulating together. "Fish," she said aloud, opening her eyes. "The river is to the west, a few hundred feet."
They crashed through the underbrush until they could finally hear the gurgle of the brook. Maka kept the river to her left and followed it upstream. It curved east again, and she knew they were heading in the right direction.
"What should we tell them when we find them?" asked Soul. "I don't want to freak out the kids."
"I agree," Maka said. "I guess we'll just tell them there's been an emergency and they need to leave the forest."
"Yeah, maybe some sort of… weather thing? Another storm?"
"Yeah, at the very least, we can-"
For a moment, her eyes could barely register the scene in front of her. Maka felt the breath leave her lungs and her hands go cold as her brain struggled to keep up, and finally it clicked into place.
The tent they had seen the day before was in shreds. The main pole that had held the tent up stuck out of the ground like an accusatory finger, pointing directly at Maka's chest. The fire pit was scattered, rocks overturned and logs askew. Pieces of cloth were strewn about the campground, and each of them was tinged with red.
"No…"
They flew through the forest. Maka saw movement out of the corner of her eyes: a flutter of wings, a hulking figure, dancing shadows. Her hands gripped the shaft of her weapon as they wove in and out of the trees. Despite the thick undergrowth, they were flying with his weapon form: the ruined campsite haunted their steps.
The sky occasionally flashed between the trees, dark and gloomy. Another storm was rolling in. The air was thick and charged with electricity, and the distant rumbles portended thunder.
As they drew closer to the motel, the wind picked up, and Maka was almost knocked off of Soul. He sensed her loss of balance immediately and stopped. She slid off of him and shouldered him once again. "We're almost there," she said breathlessly.
"Hurry," said Soul.
Finally the woods opened up into the gravel parking lot, and Maka skidded to a stop. She did a quick scan of the area with her Soul Perception and saw that the other three guests of the motel were all still in their rooms, safe and sound. Helen, on the other hand, was nowhere to be found, and Maka felt her stomach drop.
"I can't find the landlord," she told her partner. "We have to-"
Something vibrated against her leg. Maka reached into her pocket and pulled out her cell phone. A quick glance told her that Stein was calling her and that she had very little service.
"Hello?"
"Ma-. I have- for you."
"Stein, I can't hear you well."
"Get- you can hea- it's important."
She paced around the parking lot, slowly moving as she gazed up at the roiling clouds. Stein kept coming in and out, but finally in the corner near a peeling sign she was able to hear him.
"-witch your parents destroyed. She-"
"Stein, you're gonna have to start over."
"Fine. The witch they defeated was a possum witch, and while she wasn't necessarily incredibly powerful, she was incredibly nasty. Lord Death thought she was an appropriate target for the original weapon/meister pair to earn their witch soul, but she turned out to be too much for them. They reported that she was in multiple places at once, and by the time your parents arrived, they were able to distinguish what that meant."
"What was it?"
"She had a familiar. Most witches don't take them on, especially nowadays, because they can be a drain on their power even when they augment certain spells, but this witch had one. It copied her form and attacked them at the same time, giving the appearance of two fully-fledged witches attacking."
"But it's not actually a witch?"
"It's a facsimile, a facade, but not a real thing. A familiar is a collection of power but with no soul to drive it. It's impish in nature, fickle things, but that power can be channeled into a witch's spell to make it stronger. But once a witch accepts that power, they need to fuel it after that; it becomes tied to them." His voice was scratchy over the poor connection.
"So what happened to this familiar?"
"True to your father's form, they let the thing escape. Granted, their mission was the witch, and without a soul, your mother couldn't track the thing with her Soul Perception, but still, it was never a confirmed kill."
Maka shifted from foot to foot. "Could a familiar survive after its bonded witch dies?"
"It seems that they need to draw power from souls, and even human souls will do. They can survive like a leech for a long time, often without notice, but it will drain the soul of life faster."
"And then they'll need a new one." Maka felt her stomach sink.
"Then they'll need a new one," confirmed Stein.
Her palms were clammy. She could feel the comforting hum of Soul's presence next to her, but her veins were ice. "Thanks, Stein," she said, surprised to hear how calm her voice was.
"Good luck, Maka." He sounded more serious than she had heard him in a long time.
"You heard all that?" she asked Soul.
"Yeah."
"You ready?"
"As ready as I'll ever be."
"Let's evacuate the guests first, then find… find it."
Maka ran along the edge of the building. Her Soul Perception told her that Paul was in the room closest to theirs, and she skidded to a stop in front of the door.
"Paul!" she called, pounding on the wood. "Come out. There's an emergency, and we need you to leave the premises."
There was no answer. "We need to move," said Soul. "That storm is coming in fast."
Maka backed up a step, then kicked the door as hard as she could. It slammed open and she rushed into the room. The words died on her tongue as she looked at the decrepit desk and felt her heart clench.
On the desk was nothing but a jar with a single soul.
Her panting was loud in her own ears.
"It's clearly using the souls to fuel itself," said Soul, sounding tinny and distant and tense. "It must rotate between them as need be."
Her boots hit the forest floor, sending shockwave after shockwave up her legs. A sweat had broken out along her spine, dripping slowly as she ran. The storm clouds rumbled and swirled overhead, ominous and foreboding.
"Paul, the other guests… it was hoarding them and leeching off of them as necessary. It's been attacking campers and draining their souls of energy to subsist on."
Her hands clenched around the shaft of her scythe. Her pigtails bounced off her back as she ran.
"It must have been possessing Helen until her body died. That's why it started hunting. It needed fresh meat. But I think it's struggling to find a good permanent host, which is why it keeps killing. Or maybe it just likes it now, I don't know. But it's hungry."
Maka felt her eyes sting with tears.
"I can't believe it fooled us."
There were wingbeats in her ears, shadows in her sight. Her heart was pounding in her ears - ba-bump ba-bump ba-bump - and she could feel her panic rising.
"Soul-" she tried to gasp, but her voice was stolen by the howling wind that whipped through the trees. Gritting her teeth, Maka cast out her Soul Perception. She was immediately reeling, because she needed to keep her eyes open to keep running. The result was like looking through a telescope with one eye: everything was overlaid on the other, real leaves with glowing dots of the souls of small insects, shadowy shapes of squirrels behind the sharp, detailed ones. Maka dodged around a tree as Soul shouted for her to be careful, but she finally spotted what she wanted.
"The campers!" she gasped, her lungs burning. Soul didn't have to ask; he knew what she meant.
The large soul of the father and the two small ones of the sons were clustered together on the ground. A large bolt of lightning pierced the air above as Maka turned her barreling run towards them, illuminating the branches of the trees like claws outstretched.
She dropped her Soul Perception, and the forest came into sharper focus while simultaneously growing darker. But as she kept running, a small glow flickered in and out of sight between the trees.
"Up ahead!"
Maka burst into a small clearing. The souls hovered just an inch above the ground, almost as if they were huddling together for warmth. She skidded to a stop just as a clap of thunder crashed overhead.
"We have to get these out of here," she said between gulps of air. She reached down and scooped them towards her chest; they floated closer to her, seeking her pure soul.
She turned, but a vicelike grip wound around her ankle. Maka fell hard, losing her grip on her weapon. Twisting, she kicked out and let out a gasp of horror.
Helen the motel owner lay on the ground, long thin fingers wrapped around Maka's foot. Her nails were dirty and clawlike digging into her skin. She tried desperately to free herself, but the old woman's strength was inhuman.
"Going somewhere?" she growled, her voice a low rumble that didn't match her wrinkled exterior. "If you're going to take my souls away from me, I'll just have to take yours." Long, dark antlers sprouted from the top of the head, curving towards her, and the old woman stared up at her, sharp-toothed smile mad.
Her mouth began to stretch wider and wider, a gaping maw that seemed to swallow the light around her. Her teeth shot forward and hardened into a beak, snapping and dripping. The head expanded, the shoulders grew broader, and another set of limbs erupted from its side.
"MAKA!"
As the familiar transformed, its grip on Maka's ankle loosened, and she managed to break free. Clawing her way through the dirt, she finally felt her hand close around the warm handle of her weapon. With a roll, Maka was wielding her scythe and hopping onto her feet, teeth clenched as she stared up at the twitching monster.
It roared and charged them on its six legs. Maka dodged out of the way as it crashed into the trees behind her. Something pierced her side, and Maka screamed. One of its limbs had shot out as it passed her and stabbed her in the side.
"Maka!"
"I'm okay," she panted. Lightning forked through the sky.
The familiar screeched, inhuman and eerie, as it turned to attack them again. As it barreled towards them, Maka held her ground until the last moment. She sidestepped quickly and held the scythe parallel to the ground. She carved into the monster's flesh as it flew past. With a shriek, its form began to spasm, inky black tendrils spurting forth.
But their victory was short-lived. Its jaws were suddenly snapping at her waist, and it was all she could do to dodge them.
"Your left! Other left! Watch out!"
Maka used the blade of her weapon to crash against the creature's teeth, the echoes of the attacks blending into the sounds of thunder reverberating through the trees. With a gasp, Maka felt her back hit the trunk of a gnarled oak. Her eyes grew wide as the familiar reared up over her, jaws opening wide.
A desperate play came to mind, and Soul read her thoughts just after it came to her, and he begged, "Maka, don't!" but she was already changing her grip on the scythe, centering it in the middle of her body. The monster dove at her and she aimed the blade of the weapon straight into its maw. She screamed in pain as its teeth dug into her arms and shoulders, but through the haze of pain, she felt triumph: Soul's blade had pierced the creature's skull. Her vision grew dark, Soul's voice fading from her ears, but she felt the familiar's death throes shiver up the shaft of the weapon, and smiled. The creature twitched once, twice - then exploded in a shower of jet black crow feathers.
The rain began to pour.
The helicopter whirred overhead, descending through the thick clouds. The smell of petrichor was strong, mist rising from the heated pavement as the rain was burned away.
Maka didn't move as the helicopter landed on the street. The bandages around her arms were tight, and Soul's grip on her shoulders even tighter, and she knew he wouldn't let her up anyway. The regulars at the diner watched out the windows with naked amazement as the blades of the helicopter slowed and a man in a long white lab coat dropped from the open door. He approached the weapon and meister pair, adjusting his glasses as they fogged up from the humidity.
"All right there?" he called over the waning drone of the rotors.
Maka nodded, feeling stiff with fatigue and dried blood.
"Let's get you home." Stein offered her an arm, and between Soul and the professor, Maka was on her feet, the souls of the man and his sons clutched tightly to her chest.
"You're gonna be okay," Soul whispered fiercely in her ear.
"I know," Maka said, tired but comforted.
"Nice work," Stein said in her other ear. "I daresay you two were the most effective pair of DWMA students to come to this sleepy town yet."
Maka smiled up at him, and a weight lifted off her chest that she hadn't even known was there.