Soul is 7 years old when he finally realizes what a freak he is.
He doesn't have any friends. He can't go outside. It's not suited for an Evans to mingle with mere peasants. But even if he was allowed he knows that nobody would want to play with him anyways.
The strange Solomon with the distorted pointy teeth, the eerie red eyes, and the freaky white hair.
No talent, no manners, no patience, no empathy, no allurement.
Not fitting in the high society.
Not fitting in the lower classes.
Not fitting anywhere.
A freak.
Soul is 9 years old when he finally accepts that he isn't enough. That he'll never be enough.
He is in the music room, Ala the only one keeping him company. The little bird flies around in her little cage. He doesn't know how long he's been here. Playing the same song again. And again. And again. He isn't paying attention anymore, playing solely on muscle memory. Music is supposed to be freedom. A way to convey emotions words aren't able to. This isn't freedom. This isn't art. This isn't music. This is torture.
This isn't enough.
He lets himself take a break. Only for a minute. He looks over at his little bird, his hands laying unmoving on the keys.
Ala looks lonely. Desperate.
Let me out.
He looks longingly at the door.
His fingers are hurting. His back is aching from the uncomfortable piano seat. He can't listen to these bloody tones anymore.
Sometimes he wishes he had wings. He imagines how it would be. The wind blowing in his face. Nothing holding him back. No duties. No parents. No Wes. No piano. Not even gravity.
Just him and his wings and the sky and the clouds so close he could touch them if he tried. Just freedom.
But he knows that he doesn't have wings. That he can't fly away. That he will never be free, not while he lives in this family. Not while he carries this name.
So he turns back to the piano and plays the same song again.
And again.
Sometimes he feels like his little bird. Trapped in a golden cage.
Ala. Wing.
He laughs bitterly. The irony isn't lost on him. It is the reason he chose the name after all.
His sarcasm is just another of his many qualities condemned by his parents.
They play the song for their parents the next day. He and Wes.
His parents praise Wes. The sounds he can tear out of the instrument are breathtaking. He's a musical prodigy. He's enough. He's more than that. He's perfect.
They send Soul back to the music room.
He is not enough.
Soul is 10 years old when he understands that he'll never be Wes.
His brother was ten when he composed his first song. It was beautiful. A sweet melody that caressed your ears and made you feel pure content.
At the end of the performance, his parents asked what Wes's inspiration was. Who was his muse?
His emotions, Wes said. He turned his emotions, his soul, his essence into music. He morphed him into a beautiful piece on the violin.
He played his song on his first private concert two months later.
Ala's chirp brings him back to the present.
For once, the music room doesn't feel like a cage. Music is freedom and the piano is his wings.
He's not here to practice the same piece again and again. He's not here for tedious exercises or under the severe watch of his private tutor.
He's here to compose. To create music. Art. Freedom.
He loses himself in the keys. He pours everything into the music. His music. His anger, his jealousy, his frustration. His emotions. His essence. His soul. Him. Everything captured in a few tones.
And he plays. He doesn't feel the time passing by. His body is stiff and his hands are aching but he keeps going. Keeps writing and keeps playing and keeps flooding the room with his melody.
This must be what flying feels like. No time. No responsibilities. Just him.
Just him and his piano. Just him and his wings and the endless sky. Just freedom. Just him.
The next day he presents it to his parents.
The melody is dark and bitter and macabre. The melody is different. A freak, just like him. It doesn't calm you down. It invades your ears and makes you feel a turmoil of uneasiness and disquietedness.
Then he finishes it.
His parents don't say anything. His mother at least attempts a forced smile.
His father doesn't even look at him.
Freak.
They don't say anything, but they don't have to. It's all written on their faces.
It feels like a slap to his.
Soul is 10 years old when he plays for an audience for the first time.
It's Wes's concert. Of course.
Their piece is the last one.
There is an ugly feeling in his chest. It grows with every difficult song Wes manages to play perfectly. It grows with every clap from the audience. It grows and grows and grows.
When it is finally their turn, he is almost drowning in it.
For a moment he feels tempted to play his own song. To leave Wes standing there like an idiot with the wrong notes. To show the audience exactly what a freak he is.
Yes, I'm also part of the Evans family. The shameful black sheep. Always in his brother's shadow.
But he doesn't. He plays the tones written on the music sheet.
When they finish, the audience applauses. And suddenly he isn't so angry anymore. Suddenly this black feeling in his chest almost vanishes. This. This is how flying must feel like. Just him and the deafening applause. Just him and the sky.
But he can't completely erase the little ugly voice in his head telling him what he already knows. They are applauding Wes. Not him. There wouldn't be any applause if only he played.
He doesn't get a private concert. Not in two months. Not in two years. Not ever.
Soul is 11 years old when his jealousy has turned into resentment.
His brother plays a piece for the first time? His parents applaud.
His brother composes his own songs? His parents almost cry in happiness.
His brother shits on his stupid violin? His parents would probably organize a procession.
Concerts. Acceptance – no, more than that. Appreciation. Support. Affection. Belonging.
Wes takes it all for granted.
He gets more and more and doesn't even appreciate it.
But what Soul really hates is that – deep down – he knows that it's his own fault.
If he was just a little more patient.
If he trained just a little longer.
If he looked just a bit more like an Evans.
And what he hates even more than that is that he still wants to be a part of their family. He wants to be an Evans. He cares about his parent's opinion. He cares about Wes's opinion. He wants their approval. He wants to belong.
Why would he still call himself 'Soul' otherwise? The nickname his brother gave him?
But loneliness turns into hatred and hatred turns into resentment and anger.
So he is impolite and rude. He criticizes Wes's music. He laughs at him. He ignores him sometimes, too.
And why wouldn't he? He doesn't belong anyways.
His desire to fly away grows every day.
But he doesn't.
What would he do outside anyways? All he can is play bad music on the piano.
If Ala can survive in a cage of gold, so can he.
Soul is 12 years old when Ala dies.
She never left her cage. She never used her wings. She never flew.
She never experienced freedom.
He buries her in the garden with Wes the next day. Right under the angel statue on the entrance.
Soul is 12 years old when he discovers that he is a weapon.
He stares at the blade that was once his arm, glistening dangerously in the sun.
He knows what his parents feel.
Shock. Dread. Proved.
So that's why he's different. The black sheep of the family. So That's why he's a freak.
While they see an anomaly. A weirdo. A monster. A freak.
All he can see is his wings. His ticket to freedom.
He can't hold back his laugh of pure delight. Gravity has never seemed so far away.
Soul is 13 years old when he meets his partner for the first time.
It is in a ball. A party host by the DWMA for the new students to form partnerships.
The clock is ticking. He needs a partner.
He hates parties.
He is at the balcony eating raw salmon – the only good thing in this whole godforsaken event. He almost jumps when someone actually notices him.
"Hi."
He turns around. She is small and slim, but her muscles are strong and her eyes are fierce. Her eyes. The deepest green he's ever seen before.
"Hey."
"Soul, right?"
He nods.
He had already changed his surname, he couldn't imagine changing his first one, too. And he's never been a big fan of Solomon.
Soul. It reminds him of Wes.
"I'm Maka Albarn. A scythe-meister. And you are a scythe, right? So, do you want to be my weapon? Do you want to be my partner?"
He stills for a second. Is she… serious? Just like this? No small talk? No getting to know each other?
But her look is just as fierce as before, without an ounce of deceiving.
He wants to agree because why the hell not? He needs a partner. She's offering. He hates small talk. She doesn't try to start any awkward conversation. He is a scythe. She is a scythe-meister.
But something stops him before he can say yes.
As much as he despises pleasantries, he can't rush this. Everything depends on this partnership. He won't go back to his parents – not now that he knows how it feels to fly.
Partners are supposed to know each other, right? To know their soul. Their essence. Their being.
He can arrange that.
"Meet me tomorrow in front of the school café"
Soul is 13 years old when he plays the song again. His song. For the second and last time.
He knows exactly which keys to hit. It feels as if he composed it only yesterday, with Ala in her small cage and his dreams of acceptance and freedom.
The melody is just as he remembers. Dark and bitter and macabre.
He loses any sense of time. He even forgets about his audience for a while. All that exists is him and the piano and him. He's like Ala, flying in the skies with his wings. Nothing but the wind and the endless blue of the sky.
When he finishes, he is almost panting.
He forgot how freeing it can be to sit down and just play.
But, with a calm sureness, he suddenly knows he won't be playing the piano again. He's left this life behind. He chose the blade over the keys.
It's in the past.
He lets the last tones fade in the silence.
"What do you think?"
He's too scared to turn around. To be rejected. Again.
"It's beautiful."
He faces her, surprised.
He wants her to say it again. To compliment his music. To compliment him.
He offers her his hand instead.
"Partners?"
She smiles.
"Partners."
Soul is 13 years old when he kills his first kishin.
The thrill of the battle is unlike anything he's ever felt before. The excitement of tearing the enemy's flesh. The feeling of blood trickling down his blade. The satisfaction knowing that you freed the world from evil. That you may have saved lives. The exhilarating feeling of power after a won battle. The feeling of his victim's soul sliding down his throat. More heavenly than any sound Wes could produce with his violin. His old life has never seemed so far away.
Music is nothing in comparison. The applause of an audience is a joke when compared to the slowly fading adrenaline rush post-battle.
Fighting is real freedom. Only him and Maka and the enemy and the blood. Only he and the endless sky and the wind blowing in his hair and his wings.
And if the fight is the flying and the soul leaving a kishin's body is the wind blowing in the wind, that means that Maka is his wings.
She twirls him around and fights with a ferocity, unlike anything he's seen before.
He couldn't have chosen a better partner.
Soul is 15 years old when he plays the piano again.
He swore himself not to. This life was gone. Far away. In the past to never be visited again.
But the mosquito guy isn't someone they can defeat alone. They have to resonate. All of them together.
"You know how you can convey them."
The devil. He hates it with his whole soul.
But he knows that it is right.
Music can unite.
Just like the days he and Wes would sit together in the music room, composing and talking. Suddenly the gap between them disappeared. He didn't see his parents disappointed faces every time he looked at him. His jealousy and resentment didn't exist anymore. Just him and Wes and the music. Just him and Wes. Together. United.
"Come… enter the black room… Change the connection between each of you to one of sound… The black blood will empower you…"
He enters the pure blackness in his mind. As soon as he gets in, he can feel the insanity. Calling for him. Pulling him. Wanting him.
He glares at the demon before testing a few keys. The piano is perfectly in tune.
He swore to himself to never play again.
"I understand."
He hasn't touched a piano ever since.
"Everyone, listen."
But he has no choice. All he can do is play. Play and hope that it'll work.
He sits in front of the piano, the keys glistening ominously in the darkness.
All he has to do is to play.
He doesn't move.
Play… C'mon…
All he can see are his parents. The disappointment. The sneers.
Nobody's looking down on you, waiting to judge you…
I'm certain to it, idiot.
His fingers barely twitch.
Your Soul's gonna rot!
All he can do is stare.
Look at it! Your soul ain't moving!
He clenches his teeth. Why is it so damn hard to play a simple song? Why can't he move his damn hand?
C'mon
Your soul is crying…
Play.
Play.
PLAY
PLAY!
He smashes his hands on the keys.
He should play? They wanted him to play?
PLAYPLAYPLAYPLAYPLAY
Then he would fucking play.
It almost feels as if the piano is playing him and not the other way around.
His fingers press the right keys almost instinctively.
He is playing it again. Dark and cynical and macabre. But… it's not the same. It feels somehow… lighter. Less bitter.
He feels the insanity clawing at him. Tearing him apart. But he won't stop. Can't stop.
He can feel his partner's soul, warm and familiar. But, for the first time, he can sense others, too.
He plays and plays and realizes that music can be just as freeing as fighting.
When he finally stops, he almost misses it.
Soul is 16 years old when he flies for the first time
He thinks about Ala as Marie explains how to do it. How to control their wavelength and finally, finally fly.
He has to suppress a smirk. Seems like Maka literally was his wings all along.
He'll fly for Ala. His little childhood pet that never flew. Never knew freedom. He'll fly for her and for him, too.
He sees Jackie and Kim in front of him. Shooting through the sky as if gravity didn't exist. He pictures wings. Big wings to dash across the infinite sky. He thinks of Ala and freedom.
And for a second he flies. It feels like he imagined it. The wind whipping against his blade. No ground, no gravity, just the endless blue. It's a bit shaky in the beginning and they aren't very high up but his feet aren't touching the ground and this alone feels almost as liberating as fighting.
But it's only for a split second. And he feels that Maka is distressed about something and now Spirit is screaming at them from the ground and he knows he won't be able to hold him and Maka on the sky for much longer.
And then they fall.
He cushions her fall and he's never been so glad that she is so small for her age.
She is screaming at him. She wants to be an angel. Wants to have angel wings.
He doesn't understand her. What is it with her sudden obsession with angels? Isn't it enough that they are able to fly? Fly away, free from gravity and into the endless blue of the sky?
Not for her, apparently.
She gets her way in the end. She always gets her way.
He feels stupid with the tiny angel wings on his back. They are incredibly slow. This is not how freedom feels. This is not how flying is supposed to feel.
He finds it very ironic that the reason he can't fly properly is his wings.
Of course it takes an enemy for her to snap out of it.
And then they fight. They soar through the sky, real wings on his back.
Just him and Maka and the enemy and the wind and his wings and the endless, endless blue sky.
And he knows, this is what freedom feels like.
And he flies.
A/N
And that was Day 6! It is a bit different than my other stuff (less fluff and less Maka), but I hope you enjoyed it anyways! (it was kinda an experiment from my part, so some feedback would be great)
This was actually my attempt at angst (in the beginning, at least. I gave up bc apparently I just can't), but I didn't think that it deserved the angst tag. I hope it wasn't too dramatic...
Reviews and faves are (as always) super appreciated and needed!
Have a great day and (hopefully) until tomorrow!