Coda: The Color of Sky and Rain

The forest of Fear arches wide about him, evergreen trees coated with bloodstained snow, dead pine needles to crunch under his bare feet as he runs, silence to haunt him and stars flickering in the sky to provide tantalizing glimpses of light.

And behind him, always chasing, always hunting, mismatched eyes of crimson and sapphire... the Wolf is never far, waiting for him to make a misstep in his endless run. And he is always running, desperate to escape the memories the Wolf carries with it.

The Wolf is Spirit Albarn's Fear, and he can never escape it.

He can hear it behind him, because he can hear memories chanting behind him, the memories he has been haunted by for over a year now, what he is always trying to escape-

(ohGodohGodplease stop pleasejustSTOP)

He nearly trips on a broken tree root and scrambles to keep his balance. He can almost feel it, hot breath on the back of his neck-

Echoes of mad laughter. Hands press his thighs apart, fingernails digging in until they split the skin.

(NO notagainPLEASE not again burnmebeatmekillme doanythingjust NOT THAT)

Many times he has the strength to fight, can summon his scythe blades to defend himself, but tonight everything has deserted him, just like it did that night-

Weight atop him, splitting pain. Shame so deep he cannot breathe.

(ohGodsomeone please-)

"STOP!"

The Wolf looks over him, paws heavy on his shoulders, and licks its chops. Oh? Giving up so soon? How boring.

Spirit pushes at it, his hands sinking into its bright red fur. "Get- get off- I'm so fucking tired of remembering-"

Would you rather remember something else?

A long tongue drags itself up the side of his face. He flinches, blue eyes narrowing. We have so much to explore, after all, sempai. It lifts a paw, amused. So much repression to choose from, where do I even begin?

Lifting its paw is a dangerous mistake. As soon as it lets go, Spirit kicks it in the soft underbelly and makes a run for it, tearing through the rough forest with renewed purpose. The Wolf behind him snarls, winded. You can't outrun me, sempai! This is your mind! I am your Fear! You can't escape!

Spirit doesn't answer. He runs until his feet bleed, clothing ripped by branches, runs without purpose other than get away. He runs, and runs, and runs-

-until he enters the Clearing.

The shambles of the concrete bunker lay all about the area, the vault where he had imprisoned his soul after being assaulted by Stein. Now it is rubble, just a thick concrete floor scarred by claw marks and surrounded by broken old cardboard boxes – the memories he keeps trying to repress, slowly coming to the surface. One box, continually rewrapped with biohazard tape, is about to crack open again.

The Wolf paces forward behind him, its paw crushing bits of concrete. Shall we end this little game, sempai? I tire of toying with you.

There is nothing nearby to defend himself with – he is not strong enough to lift giant chunks of rubble, and throwing pebbles will do no good – so he grabs the nearest thing he can find and hurls it at the Wolf.

The biohazard box.

Mismatched eyes light up in delight as it breaks open against it; it snaps up an ancient movie reel in its jaws. Spirit steps back, going pale – but before he can try to run the Wolf has thrown the reel into the air, the film spilling out into the starlight, the memory unfurling in his mind, instant replay, and he feels-

-a tug of pain. The tang of blood in the air. Something crawls under his skin, under muscle down to bone, searching, questing.

Nerves are touched. Muscles contract and relax.

Blood flows.

The tugging pain creeps lower. The something – or somethings – slip over his jutting pelvic bone, under tendons, teasing apart slick muscle sheaths.

The darkness is alive; it whispers in Latin, prayers to the gods of pain.

It slips inside, below muscle into his abdomen, and suddenly the darkness has fangs; it bites down into his gut and tears.

He cries out. Sleep flies away; dreams escape; reality comes crashing in.

He is tied down, wrists and ankles, to a cold table. He has been stripped nude except for a cloth covering his genitals. His torso is spattered with blood.

His Meister is standing there, beside the gash that has laid his lower stomach open, a scalpel in his hand.

"Please," he begins to whisper, to beg for help, and then his Meister moves.

It's his Meister's hand that is inside him. His hand that he feels right now, crawling around against his intestines and slipping against his muscles. His hand that he can see deforming the flesh above it as it moves, and he can't even draw in a breath to scream for help, he is so horrified.

The hand comes out through the surgical site with a sickening wet pop. Blood splatters everywhere.

The world begins to turn grey.

"Go back to sleep," a young voice says. A heavy wet cloth covers his nose, ether fumes, and he draws in breath to scream-

A familiar soul brushes against his own, and he is awake.

Shinigami sits beside him on the bed – Spirit knows this without even looking over, knows it just by how far the bed dips down beside him and how close the person beside him is and how cold the air around him is (Reapers have a low body temperature, which makes them miserable companions on cold nights, but the difference in body temperature is a perfect way to gauge if the person touching him is safe or not) – and while he is not touching his Deathscythe, not just yet, he has a hand hovering right above his forehead. "Another nightmare," he says, and from the tone of his voice Spirit knows it is not a question.

"Mm," he replies.

"Which one?" the Reaper asks, and this time he actually does touch him, the feather-light touch of cool fingers against his forehead, a dry cloth – dabbing the sweat from his brow. There's a fresh glass of ice water beside the bed, a lined wastebasket at his feet in case Spirit has to vomit, fresh sheets in case he doesn't make it to the basket in time. It's become a routine over the past year, this, Spirit waking up from nightmares to the calm presence of his Meister.

If there is one upside to the nightmares, it is this – he is never alone after. He always awakens to someone who understands.

Spirit licks his lips and imagines the taste of ether there; when he grimaces Shinigami wordlessly hands him the glass of water. "New one," he says slowly after taking a few sips.

The Reaper is silent for a second, studying him. Those golden eyes never miss anything, which is both heartening and frustrating at the same time. "You remembered something, then," he says, and again it is not a question.

". . . I woke up once while . . . while S- St-" He grits his teeth and Shinigami takes his hand and squeezes. (His touch is such a comfort, the cold embrace of Death not feared, but craved.) "While Stein was dissecting me. Playing with my guts like I was a rat. H-he had me tied down-"

Shivering again. Shinigami gathers up the blankets and wraps them around Spirit's shoulders before sitting up closer to him on the bed. He still holds his weapon partner's hand, a quiet bastion of strength. "Shhh. It's over now. You're safe, I promise."

Spirit sighs before thumping his head against the other man's shoulder. "Sorry," he says, but the Reaper brushes it off.

"Why? There's nothing to be sorry for, Spirit. You had a nightmare. Everyone has nightmares. Even I do."

They sit in silence for a few minutes, Spirit calming his breathing and Shinigami supporting him, before the younger man speaks again. ". . . what could possibly scare the Grim Reaper?"

The Reaper pauses. His hand clenches Spirit's lone one almost painfully tight; the muscles in his jaw ripple as he tries to unclench it. "Are you sure you want an answer to that?" he asks lowly.

He's quiet for a moment. He is actually curious, now that the worst of his fright is gone. "It's only fair," he ventures, and Shinigami snorts a humorless laugh before looking to him.

"In my nightmares . . . I watch you die. I watch you all die. Sometimes it's Asura, he strips out your souls and devours them and I can do nothing but watch." The god's large, calloused hand curves over Spirit's high cheekbone. The deathscythe swallows as he is forced to look up into his meister's face. "Sometimes it's you, alone, dying. I can hear the cardiac monitors flatlining all over again . . . but your heart never starts back up."

Both of them nightmares that had nearly come true. Spirit takes his hand back and nervously rubs the stump of his missing left arm, the phantom limb aching. "But – but that didn't happen. We're OK. We're all-"

"You're not all right."

Spirit's eyes go wide as Shinigami looks down. "The worst ones . . . do you know what happens when a soul dies, Spirit? When despair and fear swallow a soul? You came so close to that, and sometimes . . . sometimes I dream you give up. That I come in here and you've-" His free hand comes up, makes a desperate clenching motion in the air as if trying to grasp the words out of the air, then falls back to the air.

What he wants to say goes unspoken. He'd considered it, a few times, overwhelmed by the loss of his arm and his dignity, when the healing seemed to heavy to bear.

"I've failed you twice, Spirit." His voice is choked; the younger man hesitates before gently retaking that huge hand in his own. "I couldn't prevent Stein from . . . I couldn't stop Asura . . . I'm so afraid I'll fail you again." Spirit reaches for Resonance – it is usually so easy between them, just a touch of souls away – but tonight the Reaper is keeping himself guarded, tightly controlled. Even so, there is emotion coloring that giant soul, an electric living emotion he has not felt in so long he doesn't quite recognize it.

(It both scares him and makes him feel so very, very alive.)

Those huge shoulders fall. There are dark circles under those red-rimmed gold eyes, the faint track of tears dried on pale cheeks; Spirit wonders if, perhaps, he's not the only one who woke up to a nightmare tonight.

"Shinigami-sama," he whispers.

He shudders at the sound of his name. "Please . . . ." Shinigami rests his forehead against Spirit's own, cool breath against his skin and that hand still so gently caressing his cheek. This should be terrifying. This should be uncomfortable. Spirit still has issues with touch like this, but oh, it is somehow so very welcome right now. "Please . . . don't make me take your soul."

In the very back of Spirit's mind there is a faint echo, the whisper of the Wolf, words it said long, long ago – Do you really think you have nothing left to lose but your daughter? Do you truly think she is the only person you have left in this world?

His head tilts as he reconsiders his Meister, faded blue eyes meeting tarnished gold. The one person who believed him from the start, the one person who had never left his side through the hell he lived through. That cold hand feels so good against his cheek, so safe – it is a touch he has nuzzled into many a night, taken refuge in, but never considered the meaning of until now.

The meaning of it, the emotion in the huge guarded soul – Spirit realizes he has known what it was for a long time now.

(What he is still afraid to fully admit to himself – in the parts of his mind still ruled by Fear, the ones that say he deserved it, that he is still tainted and filthy – is that the same electric emotion swells within his own soul as well.)

Spirit lets go of Shinigami's hand to mirror the same pose, his warm hand hesitantly laying against the other's jawline. "I won't," he says, and for a brief moment a smile – small, shaky, but achingly honest – crosses his lips. That smile alone is enough to drop the Reaper's guard on his soul, and they link in easy Resonance. The ripple of their souls connecting glows with the colors of sky and rain, singing of heart and home and healing.

Spirit knows, and Shinigami knows that he knows.

The Grim Reaper sighs a laugh through his broad smile, those golden eyes practically glowing, and his lips ghost over the younger man's forehead before he pulls away. "You should try to get some more sleep," he says gently.

"Mhm." He curls up against him and lays his head back against his broad shoulder, still watching his Meister through hooded eyes. ". . . will you stay?" he asks. "Just for a while longer?"

"Of course," Shinigami says, his deep voice husky and warm. His arm curls protectively around his shoulders, a gentle hand brushing cherry-red hair back from his face. "I'll stay with you as long as you want me to, Spirit. Always."

End.

I started this fic back in 2013 when I was first getting entrenched in the Soul Eater fandom. The song "Roses" by Poets of the Fall was the main inspiration for it, and I admit that I listened to a fuckton of that band while writing it. Even now, finishing the fic, I went back to their older discography to get into the groove.

This fic is dear to me for a number of reasons, and while the style I wrote it in isn't what I've evolved into now, I'm still pretty proud of it. I know it's meant a lot to a lot of people, and I'm even more proud of that - that I can share something like this with you, the readers. I finished this dusty old thing for your guys, after all.

Be kind to each other. Take care. And remember that no matter how insurmountable the odds or how hard it seems, you can survive anything. I'll always be cheering for you.

Much love,
Tiger 3