Hello again, gentle reader, and welcome as I touch on canon for the last time! Yup, after this chapter I will no longer have any canon to actually follow, so it'll be interesting to see how this develops without a rule to guide it. (I think it might be easier, frankly - tying into canon is hard.) I think I'm going to have to find ways to fit Excalibur in more often, as he's way too much fun, even (and especially) when it's not appropriate. Silly Excalibur. Apocalypse is not playtime. Thanks and love to rebecca taylor, Kara Black, Jeice Lover, L, Numbah 12 (thanks for the encouragement at the end, BTW!), ImJustThatAnimeFan, Tree Wood, xStarxWolfx, abesgoldenfriend, and secretyaoiadmirer for their reviews! I am so lucky to know such supportive and awesome people. :3

If you haven't, feel free to follow me on Tumblr (link on my profile), where I can be found rambling about Soul Eater or liveblogging as I try to write. Do let me know what you think, and please, enjoy!

Chapter 11: Walls Come Tumbling Down

For a time, there is just darkness.

Thump . . . thump.

Pain is a distant thing, felt through the filter of time. The only thing he can taste, smell, feel is the color red, red, the color of life, coppery and bitter; the red slides away from him, pools underneath him, pulls the warmth from the furnace of his body. There's a faint drumbeat in his ears, thump thump-thump thump-thump ra-ta-ta-tat thump – the echo of a heart struggling to beat in a credible rhythm. Even fainter in the background is a thread, a light shimmer – the soul wavelength of the Reaper, still hanging onto him.

Thump . . . . . . . th-thump.

Voices crackle through the darkness. Rising panic, terror, grief, and he wants to reach up and tell them, It's OK, I'm only dying, but he cannot feel his body.

Th-thump.

And part of him is okay with that. He has failed for the final time, and cost them all the world. Cost his Meister everything. Deprived his daughter of a future. But he is so tired, and he has been fighting for so very long, and he is tired of the nightmares, tired of the scars that itch and ache and remind him every moment of the day what he is and what lows he's sunk down to. Tired of jumping at shadows, of being afraid of the dark and what monsters it might bring. Tired of being weak. Tired of hating himself.

ra-ta-ta-ta-

Tired of seeing no way out.

Th . . . . u . . . . mp.

Lightning crackles across the darkness, blue-white; his heart gives a sideways jerk and the lightning crashes again, blasting through him and bringing the distant pain up front and center.

Th . . . thump.

But the other part of him . . . that damned stubborn fool that still clings desperately to the distant thrum of the Reaper's soul wavelength . . . .

Th-thump.

(Resonance. Shinigami's hands cradling his soul. Emotion so strong, so open and warm, what did he mean he needed me I don't understand – )

Thump-thump.

Thump-thump.

Thump-thump.

That other part just won't give up.

Sound was the first sense to come back to him. Hushed voices echoed throughout the room, as if in fear of speaking too loudly.

"Have the other teams reported in yet?"

"Not since Australia contacted us. We're still awaiting word from Europe and Africa." A grunt – male, deep-voiced. "China took a lot of casualties, but not nearly as many as we did here . . . ."

Australia. Why was that so familiar, and why did it seem so important? His mind was in a fog, memory muzzy and scattered; he cracked his eyes open a fraction and immediately squinched them shut against the bright light.

". . . not as many fatalities as we'd feared, thank God." Female voice . . . Azusa? Azusa. Petite, annoying Azusa; he could imagine the light glinting off her glasses as she spoke.

"Where's Justin? Shouldn't he be up here?" And that was Sid? He opened one eyelid just a sliver to see a blue-skinned man cross his arms over his chest. Yes. Sid. And next to him was Joe, fidgeting with the pockets on his cargo shorts.

"He's gathering the wounded and bringing them back here. We're running out of room to keep them all, though." Azusa sighed, her voice low. "Brazil's giving us some help, but the neighboring countries are refusing to provide assistance."

Sid snorted a laugh devoid of humor. "There's a Kishin sitting right there on their border. Can you blame them for not wanting to get too close?"

". . . Papa?"

Spirit opened his eyes as a shadow fell over him; Blair was hovering above him, her catlike pupils narrowed in concern. "You're awake," she murmured.

His whispered reply was muffled by the oxygen mask strapped to his nose and mouth. "Shh, don't try to talk. Just nod or shake your head, OK? You're-" She bit her lower lip to keep it from trembling. "You're really hurt."

He nodded ever-so-slightly, eyes roaming about as his memory began to swim back up to the surface through the fog of what had to be heavy medications. The fight with Ashura. The Kishin trying to take out Kid and Azusa. Shinigami-sama's idiotic stunt-

Shinigami-sama!

Eyes wide, he struggled to move and couldn't- his left shoulder bloomed in agony as he shifted weight onto it, and no matter how he tried his arms weren't strong enough to even lift himself up. The only one he could even move was his right hand, scratching uselessly at the floor. "Stop!" Blair hissed, hands on his bandaged chest to hold him down flat. "You're making your wounds worse!"

Panting, he let his head fall back against the floor. His eyes darted around; multicolored wires traced up from under her hands to a hard shell case on the floor to his left. Two paddles rested in cradles below a steadily moving monitor – a cardiac monitor, silenced, tracing the slow, slightly irregular beat of someone's heart.

A defibrillator. Used. Monitoring him.

Spirit closed his eyes and turned his head away from the rhythmic green light. "Shi-"

"Papa?"

He tried again, forcing his voice out despite the knifelike jab that cut through his chest. "Shi- gami?" Faded blue stared at her from under long red eyelashes.

Blair blinked. ". . . Shinigami? Oh!" She smiled, shaking her head. "He took a big hit, but they think he'll be okay."

'A big hit' was an understatement; DeathScythe turned his head and stared past the defibrillator to the tattered inky mass stretched out on the ground. Shinigami's body was a wreck, torn apart; half his mask had been vaporized in the blast. An IV was pumping fluids into him (next to that was one pumping blood into his own body); the Reaper even had his own retinue of nurses, Risa and Arisa, though neither seemed to have any idea of what else to do for him. "The funny little guy with the big nose said it wasn't as bad as it looked," Blair offered. "Excaliper, I think? He just said to give him rest until he regains consciousness."

Spirit stretched his soul wavelength out and felt Shinigami's faint one, the junction of their souls still humming in Resonance. Tired, depleted of energy, wounded, yes . . . but he would live.

His Meister would live.

"Blair – I-"

Shinigami's mask cracked.

The Resonance that had seen them through the battle of their lives snapped in two.

And for just a second, Spirit's heart stopped beating.

"We don't know what's going on down there! They could be-"

"Don't say it, Azusa."

"What? That they could be dead? You know it's possible! Wishing it weren't won't make it so, Sid!"

"H-hey, you two, shouldn't we calm down? We can't even see what's going on down there. There's no sense speculating if we don't know!"

Azusa crossed her arms over her chest, scowling; Sid turned his head away from her and the placating Joe to look out the enormous hole Ashura had blasted in the wall of the Death Room. A seething black sphere of Madness surged and spun atop the remains of Baba Yaga castle, thick and impenetrable, its red aura lighting up the stormy sky. "As far as we know, nothing's happening," the female deathscythe muttered. "They could be having a damned tea party for-"

". . . S-something's happened."

All three heads shot up at the sound of the weak, rasping voice. Spirit sat up behind them – or, rather, he was being propped up by a worried Blair. His right hand was weakly grasping at his oxygen mask, pulling it away enough that his voice could be heard. Crimson stained the bandages encasing his ruined shoulder, the sides of his torso, and yet his eyes were bright and feverish. "Spirit!" Azusa exclaimed, a hand covering her lips. Her jaw worked for a moment, as if trying to find her voice. "You – oh, Spirit. You should be-"

He wriggled his left shoulder as if to raise that hand, grunting in irritation when nothing responded other than a bright hot flare of pain. "Something happened," he repeated, letting the oxygen mask cover his mouth and breathing in before speaking again. "Shinigami-sama's mask . . . cracked. Just now."

Sid shook his head. "That doesn't mean anything happened, DeathScythe. He's injured." The zombie looked almost ill as Spirit tried again to move his shoulder, a frown crossing his features for a moment. "So are you. Haven't you noticed-"

"Fool!"

Excalibur swung his cane hard – Sid had to bite back a curse as it whacked him in the shins. The creature glared hard at him before turning back to the group. "It means something very important happened. Did you not feel it?"

Spirit nodded once, slowly. "Broke our Resonance."

Joe's eyes narrowed further; he tilted his head at one of the cabaret girls, who began adding another medication to Spirit's IV line. Excalibur leaned forward on his cane. "I thought you might. Have any of you heard of the Lines of Sanzu?"

"They're what mark a shinigami, aren't they?" Azusa glared down at the little Weapon. "What does that have to do with our current situation?"

He turned and glanced at Spirit, who was clutching his oxygen mask with his right hand and trembling. ". . . before I deign to answer any more questions, I require tea!" Excalibur sat back in the only chair still remaining in the room, stubby hands behind his head. "It must be a mix of oolong and jasmine, and all the tea leaves must have been hand-picked by a colorblind macaque named Rodriguez!"

A collective set of groans rose up from the room. "Are you sure some coffee wouldn't work?" Joe asked. "I finally got some Mandheling coffee beans-"

Excalibur lifted a surprisingly intact mandolin out of the rubble of the Death Room and pitched it at Joe. "Fool! I said tea-"

". . . enough!"

The harsh reprimand dissolved into labored coughing; Azusa knelt by Spirit's side even as Blair began to gently rub his back. "Spirit, calm down. You're not in any condition to be exerting yourself!"

He shook his head almost violently. Shaking fingers lifted the oxygen mask enough for him to spit out a mouthful of dark blood. "Where . . . where's Kid?" he managed when he had caught his breath. "The Kishin? Where . . . ?"

Sid glanced over his shoulder. "DeathScythe, you need to rest. Let us take care of-"

"The bylaws of the DWMA state that if Shinigami is ever incapacitated," Excalibur interrupted, "then the lead DeathScythe is in command until such time as he recovers." Beady eyes fixated on the Meister's blank face. "Am I wrong?"

He turned enough to give the little Weapon a stony glare. "Even when he's half-dead himself?"

"Sid." The female deathscythe's voice was unusually soft. "He deserves to know."

". . . fine." Azusa placed a soothing hand on her colleague's uninjured shoulder. ". . . after you failed to stop him, DeathScythe, Ashura blew a hole in the wall of the Death Room and escaped." Sid's voice, flat and emotionless, echoed in the ruins. "We think he ate the witch Arachne's soul. After that, he erected a barrier on top of the castle, and he's been sitting in there ever since. We don't know what's going on in there."

Spirit slumped back against Blair; she combed a hand through his hair, holding the oxygen mask up for him. "Kid?" he asked after a moment.

"Kid took Liz and Patty and went after the Kishin. He's in the barrier." The zombie relented, unfolding his arms and turning around. "He's not alone. Two other Meisters went in with him."

"Who?"

"Black*Star went in with Tsubaki. And . . . ."

Spirit's face turned paper-white under the mask. "Maka?"

Sid nodded. "Right after Kid and Black*Star got in. It's sealed now – we've tried to send people in there but nothing's worked."

Faded blue eyes darted over the group and their avoidant gazes before looking pleadingly at Excalibur. "I cannot tell you the outcome of the fight," the little creature said, bowing his head respectfully. "Only time can do that."

He closed his eyes tight, trembling. "Spirit, they're the strongest students at the Academy," Azusa said, a hand rubbing his good shoulder. "With Maka's anti-magic wavelength-"

"Contact the . . . Brazilian military. NATO forces," Spirit rasped. "Any wounded that can be moved . . . evacuate. Emergency protocol Delta-Three-Zulu."

They stood there in surprise for a moment before Azusa jerked her head at Joe; the engineer nodded and jogged towards the doors. "Joe's going to make the call," she said. "Is there anything else? You really need to rest-"

"Will you . . . fight?"

Spirit's exhausted gaze fixed on them, on the deathscythe and the zombie Meister; they glanced at each other and nodded their heads. "You know we will, DeathScythe," Sid said.

"You don't even have to ask," Azusa said with a determined nod.

"I'll help too, Papa," Blair added. "We can still win. You'll see."

Excalibur watched them from his seat, unnaturally quiet. "Fools," he murmured, turning away to stare out at the horizon. Below them all, Ashura's barrier rippled, crackling with Madness; above them, the first faint booms of thunder rolled.

"What happened h- hey, I'm talking to you! What happened here?!"

Men and women in military uniforms streamed in pairs from the towering mountain that was Death City, each carrying one of the wounded away on a stretcher. Helicopters from various military organizations – Brazil's army, the United States, even NATO – took off from the clearing once they were full, only for others to soon land and take their place. The medic Marie had grabbed halted for a brief second, eyes narrowed and a hand above his firearm. "Who are you?" he asked in heavily accented English.

Stein, behind her, had gone almost slack-jawed as he stared up; he cranked the screw in his head twice, three times with his free hand, before shutting his jaw with a click. Crona, hanging limp over his shoulders piggyback, looked up at him in confusion. Marie pulled a thin wallet from the bosom of her dress and flipped it open to show the medic. "... ah, you are DWMA. My apologies." The man saluted her briefly before moving to return to work.

"W-wait! What's going on?"

"You do not know? DeathScythe called for an evacuation. All the wounded are to be removed from the area."

Stein stepped forward. "Something's wrong, Marie. Sempai's wavelength – it's too weak. I almost can't feel it."

Her brow furrowed in concern. "Why are they evacuating? Shinigami-sama and Spirit should have-"

The man frowned and pointed at the giant mass of black swirling in front of what was once the mobile Death City. "The Kishin is in there, miss. Your Shinigami wasn't able to stop him." He shook his head. "I'm sorry - I have to return to work."

None of them paid any attention to his leaving; Marie turned to Stein, her good eye brimming with tears. "Stein? They couldn't really have failed, could they?"

For a fleeting moment she thought she saw emotion cloud his eyes. As soon as it came it vanished, and the mad scientist pursed his lips in a scowl before sprinting towards the city, Crona still clinging to his back. "Wait! Stein!" Marie tore through the dense jungle brush after him. "Stein, you have to wait for me!"

As if by a miracle, he stopped, Crona hanging on to him by the throat. "Sempai . . . you can't feel it, Marie, but I can," he ground out. His eyes began to pulse in time with the waves of Madness pouring off the Kishin's dark cocoon. "He's dying up there, and it's-"

The darkness exploded.

Shreds of Madness floated away through the air like bits of ash and soot; the stormy clouds above swirled and burst open to cerulean skies. Thousands of tiny twinkling blue lights scattered across the heavens, pulsing – souls entrapped for hundreds of years, finally, finally set free, dancing through rays of warm sunlight. Marie and Crona, all the aid workers, everyone stared up in wonder as the oppressive weight of the Kishin's Madness dissipated, leaving behind air sweet and uplifting. "Oh, Stein," she whispered, slipping her hand in his. "How – how did-"

"They did it," he murmured. Even he, ever the scientific one, was transfixed by the display; he squeezed her hand gently. "Kid and Black*Star and Maka . . . they're up there. I can sense their soul wavelengths. They must have been the ones to defeat him." His peaceful look faded. "I have to get to the Death Room. You should take Crona to the Dispensary-"

"I go where you go, Stein." Her hand held his with an iron grip. Crona nodded behind him.

He turned. "Your choice," he said, taking off at a sprint, Marie right behind him – but if he held onto her a bit tighter, or if he kept his pace down enough that she could stay at his side, she didn't say a word.

The skies were a dizzying blue, souls sparkling in the sunlight – Excalibur sat back in his chair and sipped reluctantly at his coffee as Sid and Joe peered out from the hole in the wall over the landscape.

". . . they're alive," Sid said, and there was unmistakeable relief in his voice. "They're all alive. Ashura's gone, DeathScythe, Maka's fine . . . it's over."

Spirit stared up, pale and trembling. "Over?"

"And thank goodness for that," said a cheerfully nasal voice behind them all. "I was a little worried for a moment there!"

The entire group spun around in shock; Shinigami stood behind them, his body still in tatters and his mask still shattered, but very much alive. Even Spirit, who was still being supported by Blair and Azusa, tried to turn around. "Sh-Shinigami-sama?" he rasped.

The Reaper swiveled around, his expression never changing as he looked down at his wounded Weapon partner. One oversized hand reached out and ever-so-gently pushed bloodstained red hair out of his face. "Spirit," he whispered, his voice dropping low with grief. Something almost electric pulsed between them, the resonance of old companions relinking. "You idiot."

The faintest of smiles played over his lips, barely visible under the oxygen mask, before his eyes slid closed. "Papa?" Blair cried as his body went limp in her arms. "What did you do?!"

"Blood loss. He's unconscious." Shinigami knelt and lifted his Weapon partner up into his arms, wobbling slightly under the weight. "It's better if he is, for what's coming next." His voice gained a flinty edge. "Or were you hoping to see his reaction to you, Stein?"

The mad scientist stood at the threshold of the Death Room, staring at the bloodied figure in the Reaper's arms; he didn't even seem to notice the blank stares, or the confused looks Azusa and Joe were giving each other. Crona hid his head behind him. "Shinigami-sama," he began in a tremulous voice.

"Marie." The Reaper turned his ruined half-mask to stare at her as she came up along side Stein. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't kill him right now."

"Shinigami-sama!" Azusa gripped him by the arm. "That's going too far! Over a fight?"

Stein glanced at her in confusion. Shinigami glared at the two of them before turning back to Marie, who had placed herself protectively in front of her Meister. "Well?"

"Marie." Stein placed a hand on her shoulder.

"No." She raised her chin up in defiance. "We did not get rid of Medusa just to have it end like this." She met the Reaper's gaze head-on. "Do you think Spirit would thank you for killing him? Really? If you honestly think that's what he would want, then go ahead and try."

Shinigami glared her down for a moment before turning his head. "Sid, take Stein into custody. I want him secured." He refocused on the unconscious figure in his arms, giant gloved hands shielding him from Stein's eyes. "Is there anyone in the Dispensary who can treat the wounded?"

"NATO has dispatched three teams of field surgeons." Joe backed away as Sid stepped forward, gently helping Crona down onto Marie's back. "First team's ETA is in thirteen minutes. They'll be setting up there. I've already informed them about DeathScythe's . . . condition; they're sending specialists-"

"Let me help."

Stein was still staring at the bloodied mass of bandages that was Spirit's chest and shoulder. "I know him better than any specialist. If you let me-"

"You will never touch him again."

". . . come on, Stein," Sid said almost gently, tugging at his arm. "Orders are orders."

He stared at the tall, imposing figure of Death holding the man he once called brother, at the woman he loved, then took a deep breath and followed as he was pulled away.

"Spirit."

A concrete ruin, walls falling apart. Arctic winds, stars barely visible in the void, trees whispering secrets in the dark. A lupine figure atop the rubble, mismatched gold and silver eyes, lit up by the rolling projector.

Ghostly figures, out of focus, as the reel plays.

"You have to be brave now, Spirit. Your true enemy is here."

The gleam of a surgeon's blade.

"And I name thy enemy FEAR."