Since L&O has turned into a love fest, I obviously had to direct my angst energy somewhere, so here you go. This is actually one of four new fics I have in the works right now, so be prepared for the onslaught.
"She should forget everything after the moment she first saw him."
"You ever read The Monkey's Paw?"
"This isn't English class - I'm not asking for reading recommendations. I'm saying that girl doesn't deserve to have memories of him."
"Wouldn't it be easier to make the guy forget?"
"I'd never do anything to hurt Soul, it's just - Albarn. She's the problem. She's the one who deserves this."
"Suit yourself."
"So?"
"So."
"When?"
"Lunchtime tomorrow."
Soul was focused on her smile, Maka's face turned back to him in the stairwell as they descended from the roof. For a second he was sure he was about to get one of those world-famous Maka eye-rolls - for what he wasn't sure since nothing ludicrous had come from his mouth yet - but those green orbs only started the rotation and her eyelids suddenly stole the show, batting shut. He watched her knees buckle and his arm jutted out just in time, grabbing her wrist to yank her like a ragdoll towards his chest. Maka was deadweight, simply taking the momentum of his pull and smashing into him, throwing Soul back against the stairs to take a hard seat with cement digging into his spine.
All he allowed was a grunt before the panic saturated into his voice, "Maka?" He fumbled the unresponsive body in his lap, grasping her throat to stop her head from lolling away from him. "Maka?" Without much thought or hesitation, he slid his hand back into her hair, cradling her neck and keeping her face on his. "Hey, Maka, come on," a frantic octave was squealing from his throat. This wasn't a battlefield. They weren't surrounded by enemies. They were at DMWA, safe, sound, and she was somehow not.
A withering groan finally escaped from her lips.
"Maka?" It was the final shot he was going to take before he was going to have to ignore the ache of his back and bring them to standing. He was just sliding his hands under her legs when the flutter of her eyelids caught in the corner of his eye. "Maka!"
There they were, jade starting a slow blink up at him.
"Fucking shit," he muttered. "Next time you gotta listen to me when I say you didn't eat enough, you hear me? Practically broke my fucking back trying to catch you."
Maka's eyebrows furrowed and while he expected some biting comment back her hands shot out into his chest.
"Hey," Soul struggled against her arms, trying to keep her steady. "What the hell are you trying to do? I'm gonna drop you-"
"Let me go!" Her eyes widened in terror, expansive white shining as her fists dug into his chest while her legs kicked.
"Maka-" The desperate wriggling left him with no choice but Soul at least tried to control the slide, grabbing her leg to slow the thud of her ass down to the bottom of the steps. Even with the help, Maka was still kicking out of his grip, forcing herself back onto the landing. "Maka, come on-"
"Who are you?" Her voice was a tight, panic shriek, the one he thought was reserved for those moments when Death was knocking on their door.
"What?" A hesitant, shaky laugh left his lips. "You - you hit your head or somethin'?"
"No," she shook it firmly as if to prove its constitution. "Who are you and why were you touching me?"
"Maka-"
"That's my name but I don't know you."
"I caught you," the words were barely alive on his lips, another dumb, pained laugh bubbling from the ache in his gut. "You fainted, Maka - we finished lunch, came down, and you fainted."
"But who the hell are you?" she charged again with such a fury that all of Soul's muscles clenched.
For a delirious moment, Soul Evans almost had to ask himself that question, the logic of it completely lost on him because the only answer that could come to his mind was: If Maka Albarn doesn't know the answer to that how the hell am I supposed to? "I'm… Soul, Soul Evans, your partner."
"I don't have a partner," Maka let her lip tremble for a moment before stuffing it between her teeth.
His fingers turned white as he clenched them tightly into the unrelenting stone of the stairs. He saw the futility of it sitting on her face but he couldn't stop the frantic plea from his lips, "We've been partners for - for fucking forever, Maka."
"I don't know you," came as a shuddering repeat.
No, no, no, pattered along with the wild sputter of his heart. No, Maka, you know me, stop joking around, stop looking at me like that, stop, stop, stop, stop-
"What's all the noise?" Black Star's face popped over the side of the stairs, eyes lingering between Soul and Maka.
"Black Star!" Maka was frantically on her feet, getting to his side to almost hide behind his shoulder.
"Huh?" Black Star grimaced at her before sending a questioning look back at Soul. "What'd you do?"
Soul's lips fell open but nothing came out, the horror still clutching firmly to his throat.
After finding Soul useless, Black Star fielded the question back towards Maka. "What'd he do?"
"He grabbed me! He said that he was my partner, but- I don't have a partner," she hissed at Black Star.
Soul watched the same confusion wash over Black Star's face, just without the utter abject horror. "Maka, what are you talking about?"
"She remembers you," Soul muttered weakly. "Somehow she remembers you, but not me?"
Black Star was in the midst of rolling his eyes. "That's-"
"I grew up with Black Star," Maka seemed to defend as she narrowed her eyes at Soul.
"Well, yeah," Black Star blinked a look between the two of them again. "Maka, seriously, Soul-" He shot a hand out at the withering boy on the stairs. "Your partner, you don't know him?"
"I don't have a partner," Maka pressed out between her teeth in another desperate rush.
I don't have a partner. I don't have a partner. I don't have a partner! Each one became a louder scream in Soul's mind as he stared at green eyes that read nothing of their years together. "She- we need to get her to Stein," he croaked.
"Hell yeah," but Black Star's tone was nowhere near his usual bark, just a drifting quizzical addition. "Come on, Maks, let's go see Stein…"
It's like being in a waiting room but instead of that bad elevator music I'm trapped listening to my own voice saying things I wouldn't say - shouldn't say - and slowly tearing away at the things I've built. I can only watch her - me! - pluck little bits of his heart out and be powerless to stop it. I can stand here in this gray room and shout his name until I'm hoarse but she still just keeps ripping through the mire, making each moment another of helpless agony for me.
I watched Soul break as she, that other terrible me driving my body, said that she didn't have a partner. I watched him scared, hurt, panicked and I've never been so utterly powerless. All I could do was beg, plead not to do this to him, not to abandon that person who'd only been left behind - not to ignore the boy who'd spent his youth being ignored. Whose worst nightmare was this? His or mine?
Chaos was the closest comparison Stein could make and while he thrived in that kind of madness this moment wasn't exactly his forte especially as the girl he was so used to seeing courageously striding into his office was now nothing more than a cornered animal. "Maka, Black Star," Stein started but didn't have to get much further with Black Star in the lead.
"Something's wrong with her," he piped as he tossed a thumb in her direction.
"Nothing's wrong with me," Maka hissed back.
Black Star scoffed before shaking his head, "She forgot Soul."
That short sentence hit each one in the room differently but none harder than the scarlet eyed boy who was barely squeezing through the door behind them. It was obvious Soul was trying to stay off the radar but the wince, the physical wave that Stein saw ripple, or more so tear through his spiky soul made Stein's eyes latch instantly to him. "Soul, what happened?"
His throat cleared with a gravely rumble. "She just… passed out and when she woke up." A lifeless hand barely wafted in Maka's directions as his empty stare fell to the floor.
Stein breathed out slowly, an even set to his jaw as he transferred eyes between the two. "Black Star, go get Spirit and Marie."
Black Star sucked in a breath to air complaint but one glance at the miserable mass that was Soul silenced it, instead his feet stomping back the way they came.
"Maka," Stein started methodically, "what do you remember?"
"Um…" Maka paused for inspiration.
I remember hurting him, the Maka trapped behind her eyes groaned. I remember having lunch, just like always, teasing, smirking, but still doting in that quiet way of his. And now-
"I remember coming to school - Papa dropped me off - and I was supposed to be going to orientation, but he-" Maka cut herself off as her eyes started towards Soul but stopped, ticking back instantly to Stein.
"Orientation for what?" Stein leaned closer, his eyebrows starting to slightly lift.
"Orientation," Maka shook her head in disbelief, "I'm just starting as a meister."
Soul's head popped to attention. "Starting?"
"That's why I said I don't have a partner," Maka intoned sharply, "because I don't."
Please, stop saying that to him! Maka cried from that grey room. Please, look at him! See that it's hurting him and stop! Each cry thudded uselessly between them.
Stein's head only tilted before he continued, "You said you came in with Spirit - you're living with him?"
Maka let out a twittering laugh, "Of course, where else would I be living?"
The muscles in Soul's hand popped into a fist. "Your mom - does she live with you?"
The chill in his voice froze her, Maka's eyes darting to Stein who simply nodded reassurance. "Well… yes, Mama and Papa both…" But her lip worked between her teeth to finish.
"She's known Black Star since she was a child," Stein locked eyes on Soul who was still shouldering more towards the wall than the two of them. "So it would make sense that she knows him but it seems as if Maka may have forgotten everything since, well, I would say since the morning of the day you were supposed to meet."
"What?" Maka snapped. "Professor Stein, I-"
"Maka, listen, please." While there was no imploring there, just a cold, steady tone, Maka was shocked into silence by the word alone. "That boy behind you, Soul Evans, is your partner, has been your partner for a number of years. You've made him into a death scythe."
Maka let out a delirious little laugh, "Me? I haven't even-"
"Please," dropped helplessly from Soul's lips and while Maka barely heard it the word seemed to strike her just as much from his lips as Stein's.
"Here…" Stein turned slowly back to the desk and rummaged. It took a few tightly wound moments before he turned back to Maka, a small mirror in his hand.
Maka's eyes focused on the reflection. "I, that's not me, is it…?" Suddenly her head was reeling again, and in a heavy moment of deja vu Soul was rushing to grasp her, to keep that ragdoll from hitting the floor again.
"Ah, too much," Stein sighed.
Soul eased down to his knees, cradling a Maka that seemed so far away from him. "Stein…"
"Curse, that's my guess." Stein stood and walked towards the two so he could place a soft hand on his shoulder. "Something's off in her wavelength, can you feel it?"
"Yeah," he croaked.
There were a few beats of icy silence before, "It's going to be hard, Soul."
"Yeah," he echoed lifelessly before upturning a blank face to Stein. "Take her. She'll get scared if she wakes up to me."
Stein nodded slowly as he knelt next to Soul and gathered Maka from his arms.
The absence of her left enough of a weight for him to carry so Soul sat lifeless, watching Maka suck in sleepy breaths as Stein waited.
The door creaked before her eyes opened, Spirit and Marie rushing in a whirlwind of parental protection that made Soul shrink. It was the same explanation once again pounding in his ears. I'm cut out of her memory. All of it, all of me is gone. His mind tried to force the addition gone from her mind but his heart wouldn't let it.
"Soul?" Black Star was crouching next to him, almost nose to cheek, and Soul had barely registered it, not even jumping when the reality hit him.
"Yeah…" but it was half-hearted because Soul was channeling most of his energy to stand just in time to view those green eyes blinking open over Spirit's shoulder.
"Maka?" Spirit had taken her from Stein's arms.
"Papa, I don't… I'm confused…" Maka murmured.
"I know, honey, I'm going to take you home…"
"Hey, Soul," Black Star started again.
Take her home… Soul took a shaking step forward. "What home?"
Spirit only offered half a glance, his eyes barely lingering over his shoulder. "I'm going to take her for now."
"Hey-" Black Star started to bark but Soul's hand shot out, a tight fist just stopping momentum before lightly tapping into Black Star's chest.
"S'fine."
"Like hell, it's-"
"Star," Soul tapped that fist to his sternum again before dropping it weakly to his side. He turned, barely enough momentum to get through the door. Even after his warning, he could hear Black Star's voice buzzing away in the room behind him but Soul couldn't suss it out because everything in his mind was in pieces. Go back in there, fight for her, take her home, her real home - where she can be scared of you, frightened when you even touch her, can't even look you in the eyes.
Splintery fragments of pain blossomed in his chest and he teetered towards the wall.
"Soul?"
Soft hands came to his arm and for a moment, Soul thought it was all over, that Maka was there and she was holding on to him, keeping him steady, because all she ever did was keep him steady, but as soon as he turned his head it was a higher set of pigtails, eyes he couldn't recognize blinking up at him expectantly. "Sorry, who-"
"Clara," she interrupted with a smile. "Remember, from Maka's meister class?"
Soul slipped from her fingers, sinking his back into the wall. "Don't touch me."
"Sorry, you looked sick, I was just-"
He shook his head with a sigh, "Yeah, no, nevermind." Not cool, Soul, not cool. "I just need-"
"Soul!" Black Star was charging out of the room, setting a crash-course between Soul and Clara. "What the hell was that, you dumbass!"
"Sorry," Soul tossed over Black Star's shoulder towards the girl as he was dragged away. The half-assed apology didn't seem to bother her much because Soul could swear he saw a smile as Black Star forced him on their way.