Chapter Two: Maka
Maka wakes up to the blaring of her alarm clock and the smell of burning coffee. She cracks an eye open, blearily reading the angry little red numbers before smacking the snooze. Five in the morning. She watches as the zero on the end flickers to a one. Her hair, still damp from the night before, clinging to the back of her neck uncomfortably. She toys with the idea of staying in bed, of canceling today and simply relaxing, but the unmistakable sound of someone being body-checked into the wall outside her door promptly banished the thought.
She closes her eyes, not to sleep, but to brace herself against the hallway light that comes pouring in through her open door as Thunder and Fire come crashing in. The former vaulting over the footboard, her knee colliding sharply with Maka's hip. She groans into her pillow, recoiling away from the painful knees of one twin and into the too-awake gaze of the other. "Maka, get up we gotta get ready for school and Dad worked late last night so he's sleeping, do you know where my sneakers are? The red ones with the black laces, not the maroon ones, they don't go with my outfit today–Oh! Also Thunder wants to know if you'll make us pancakes because Blake only made us eggs for like the past week 'cause that's all he knows how to make and–"
Maka claps her hand over his motormouth, squinting at him through the sleepy grit in her eyes. "Fire, I love you with my entire heart, but if you don't stop talking I swear to god you will walk to school in what you're wearing right now." It's worth noting that he was only wearing a pair of racecar boxers, an oversized Tweety-Bird shirt, and a single sock. She gives him The Look, silently asking if he promises to keep the word-vomit to a minimum, and she takes away her hand at his frantic nod. "Okay," she groans as she sits up, swinging her legs over the edge of the bed and cracking her back with a series of loud pops. "Your red shoes, not the maroon ones, should be by the door but they're under the coffee table. And yes, I'll make pancakes." Fire beams and streaks off out into the hall, presumably to get dressed but most likely to watch cartoons. Maka glances over her shoulder to find Thunder burrowed under the covers, mussy tufts of blonde hair poking up out of her blanket burrito.
She smiles and rolls back onto the bed to bear hug the wrapped up log of preteen. Thunder promptly groans somewhere beneath the layers of cotton and down, wriggling under Maka's weight until her head pops out of the blankets with a whiney, "Makaaaaaaaaaaa." To make matters worse, Maka smooshes her cheek against Thunder's, cooing some nonsense about her precious swaddled baby, until the girl finally gathers her strength to throw her off and make a beeline for the door—Maka's comforter still wrapped around her shoulders like a cape.
Half-an-hour later and she's finally woken herself up enough to get dressed and make her way downstairs. She finds the twins on the couch, watching old Full House reruns until the cartoons come on, and in the kitchen, Jackie's slumped over the dinner table with her hands firmly wrapped around a mug of coffee. Turns out, she didn't turn off the pot, thus the source of the smell, and the only thing left is some blackened sludge stuck to the bottom of the faded glass. Maka turns off the maker and dumps the pot in the sink before slinking over to a softly snoring Jackie, peeking in her cup and giving an experimental sniff. There's something sweet and suspiciously chocolatey in there somewhere, but between whatever monstrosity Jackie made and no caffeine at all, her back was against the wall. She carefully pries the mug out of her hands, a couple drops sloshing over the side, and takes a sip, nose wrinkling. Okay, gross, but it could be worse.
Maka shakes her head against the weird taste, but ultimately moves on to getting the pancakes started. Pulling the mix down from the cabinet and turning on the stove. Or, at least, trying to. The pilot light was out. Again. "Fuck," she glances around for a lighter, but settles for the next best thing. "Jackie." She shakes the woman's shoulder, expertly dodging out of the way as she jerks upright with a startled 'whuh'. Maka gives her a moment to get her bearings, to scrub the sleep out of her eyes and swipe the trail of drool on her chin. "Jackie, the pilot light is out again."
Jackie blinks owlishly, staring through Maka for a few seconds before her eyes focus. She nods and snaps her fingers, flicking her pointer finger at the stove, sending a tiny flame flying at the stovetop and igniting the burner. Maka smiles and ruffles Jackie's already messy hair. "Thanks. Go on ahead upstairs and get some sleep." She grunts noncommittally and wanders away, feet shuffling against the worn wood. While Maka dutifully sets to work on the pancakes, she glances at her watch, then to the handwritten schedule on the fridge. "Thunder, Fire," she calls, "go get dressed. And while you're up there, go ahead and get up," she pauses, making sure she's got the names right, "Blake, Stein, Marie, Harvar, Nygus and Sid." The kids groan and slump to the floor, but with vague threats of no breakfast and extra chores, they scramble up the stairs. "And make sure they're awake before you come back down!" She calls after them, doing her best to stretch away from the stove to yell up the stairs but stay within arms reach.
Some indiscernible amount of time later, the pancakes are finished alongside a healthy array of eggs, toast, bacon, sausage, bagels, and three boxes of cereal. Thunder and Fire come thumping down the stairs, dressed for the day, followed by a very tired Blake. The kids practically crash into their seats, tearing into the spread like they haven't eaten in weeks. Maka sits perched on the counter, a fresh mug of coffee held in one hand and her phone in the other. As Blake slumps into the seat closest to Maka, she silently offers her cup, smiling a little when he takes it with a grateful groan, his eyes still crusted shut with sleep. She reaches behind her and produces another full cup, takes a sip, checks her email. From the living room, the theme song of some cartoon blares, and she shoots the twins a glare as they try to sneak their food in to watch. Reprimanded, they duck their heads and slink back down in their chairs, eating their food with less enthusiasm, as if to protest her strict rules of trying to keep the goddamn house clean.
Next down the stairs comes Stein and Marie, the latter dressed in pale pink scrubs and looking much too chipper for the early hour, the former looking like he'd just rolled out of bed. Maka hands off a mug to each of them, raising a brow as Stein leans against the counter and ignores the bounty laid before him. "You gotta eat something." The look he gives her in unamused. "C'mon. Breakfast is–"
"–the most important meal of the day. I'm aware." He sips his coffee, pushes his glasses up his nose. Despite his apparent aversion to the meal Maka so lovingly slaved over, his wife happily digs in, her plate piled high with eggs and toast, a bagel in her hand. Stein shoots Maka a look. "I'm perfectly capable of starting my day without artificial sugar and animal fat."
She rolls her eyes, points behind him. "There are blueberry muffins in the microwave." He doesn't hesitate in yanking open the door and snatching one, happily taking a bite before dropping into the seat beside Marie. Maka shakes her head, far too used to the antics of her household, and hops off the counter. Sid and Nygus make their way down the stairs next, Sid scooping up a couple strips of bacon and making a beeline for the door, Nygus pinching off a piece of Stein's muffin as she slips into the seat beside him. "Hey, hey, hey," Maka calls after Sid, catching him as he balances on one foot to pull on his boot, mouth stuffed full of bacon. She throws her hands up. "Where're you going?"
He fumbles with the meat in his mouth, trying to swallow enough to talk. It's not until he nearly chokes that he shoves his boot on the rest of the way and reaches up to grab the excess. "Gonna go start the cars, check the garden, and run perimeter." Maka blinks, a little taken aback, but nods nonetheless and sends him on his way. Sid wasn't usually one to pass up on breakfast, but she wasn't about to complain if he was in the mood to do chores.
"He woke up with a bad feelin'," Nygus supplies, pouring herself a glass of orange juice. Ah. That explained it. Whenever Sid 'had a feeling', he had to act on it—and he usually turned out to be right, in some capacity. Maka screws her mouth to the side, feels a seed of worry plant itself in her stomach. A shiver runs itself down her spine, she shakes out her shoulders, and tries to swallow her own bad feeling. Instead, she turns back to her family; watches as the twins polish off their plates, dump them in the sink, and bolt to the living room to wrap themselves up in Maka's comforter and watch tv; finds Blake finally coherent, shoveling food into his mouth at a nauseating pace, a chunk of blue hair stuck to the syrup smeared across his cheek; Marie waving her fork through the air as she talks, an animation usually reserved for particularly difficult patients; Stein sipping his coffee, occasionally dipping pieces of his muffin in it, watching his wife rant, pretending to be oblivious when Nygus snags a blueberry poking out of his muffin.
Someone's missing. She leans over the back of the couch, next to the twins. "Where's Harvar?" They both shrug helpfully, never looking away from the television. Maka sighs, turns on her heel and strides up the stairs. Stein sneaks a fork full of eggs off Maire's plate, and Maka calls back down the stairs, "I saw that!"
Maka's fist bangs against the door, but her eyes remain on her watch. If he didn't hurry his ass up, he was going to make everyone late. "Harvar! Get a move on or you're walking to work!" She bangs at the door a little harder, hears the shift and shuffle of clothes, and stops banging just in time for him to swing open the door.
"I'm up." He says by way of greeting, squinting against the hallway light, hair thrown in a haphazard ponytail.
"I see that." She huffs, hands on her hips. "We gotta get movin' here in a couple minutes, so you need to get a move on." She keeps an ear out, listens as someone goes out the front door, as someone else starts up the dishwasher. Harvar rubs his eyes, turns back to his darkened room to snatch up a plain black t-shirt and tug it over his head. Maka leans against the doorframe as he moves deeper into his room, swiping his belt off the back of his desk chair, looping it around his waist as he turns a slow circle, searching for something.
She raises a silent brow, and without looking up, he says, "Shoes."
"Under your bed." Harvar stops, looks her way, and after a pointed second of just staring, he drops to his knees and peers under his bed. She smiles at the way his spine stiffens in surprise just before he reaches under and drags out his boots. "Told you." The look he gives her is entirely unamused; even more so when she flicks on the lights. Maka leans forward and yanks open his dresser drawer, grabbing a pair of socks and tossing them to him. She studies him for a moment as he tugs his shoes on, wrapping the laces around the shaft and pulling tight before tying them off. "I don't understand why Papa has you openin' up the restaurant so early," she muses aloud, answered only by the glance Harvar spares her way. "I mean, the cooks don't even get there until nine."
"Where else would the day-drinkers go?" He asks, humor lacing his tone. "Heaven forbid they go to Greg's and buy a six-pack to tide them over."
Maka gasps, hand over her heart. "Blasphemy!" A beat. "Better not let Papa hear you say that." They both laugh, and Maka backs out of the doorway as Harvar stuffs his wallet in his pocket and follows her out. He tugs his door shut behind him and they both glance at their watches as they wander down the hall. She cuts him a look from the corner of her eye, "You're really pushin' it this morning, huh?"
He nudges her as they tromp down the stairs. "Blame your old man. He had me close up last night."
"Seriously?" She sighs, hooks her hand around the banister as she hops off the last step. "He's gotta find someone else to do it if he's gonna have you opening, too." Harvar shrugs noncommittally, sliding into Blake's vacated seat to shovel as much food in his mouth as he can before leaving. Maka merely clicks her tongue at him, making a mental note to chew her father out later. She couldn't have him running poor Harvar ragged; especially not when he has plenty of other employees to keep the place in working order.
Shaking her head, she dismisses the thought for another time, scooping up her work bag and slinging it over her shoulder. By the door, she slips on her shoes and grabs the twins' bookbags, heading outside to toss them in the cab of her truck–now warm, thanks to Sid.
At the thought of him, she shuts the door and looks out to the woods surrounding her home, hands on her hips. That seed of worry that had planted itself in her stomach now began to bloom, twining around her ribcage, thorns poking into her lungs and making it hard to breath. Sid usually wasn't wrong, when he suspected something amiss, and that made her nervous. Fog hovers over the lake in the middle of the property, it's surface rippling in the early morning breeze, and she shivers; from the wind or from the skittish energy crackling under her skin, she isn't sure. She purses her lips, body leaning toward the treeline, half-tempted to shift into that wolf prowling beneath her skin and go see for herself that everything was alright–work be damned–but the boards of the porch creak, and she turns to find Stein, who says, "Blackstar already went to help Sid, if he needs it."
Something loosens in her chest, if only a little. "Okay." She nods once, maybe reassuring herself. "Okay." Stein simply watches, waiting. She knows he wouldn't say anything if she wanted to take off after Blake and Sid, would take the kids to school without a word. Maka shakes out her shoulders, trying to recenter herself enough to trust in her family, to leave them behind long enough to go to work, but there's just that feeling that something very bad is about to happen. "You'll tell me if anything happens?" She doesn't need to ask. Blake, as her second in command, would tell her, but she needs the verbal reminder.
"You'll be the first to know." He confirms with a dip of his head, eyes sharp with understanding. She swallows thickly, jerks her head toward the house and watches as he disappears inside to round everyone up and send them out.
Maka tosses one last glance to the woods, as if Blake and Sid would come running and give her the all clear just like that, but the trees remain still, undisturbed. As if sensing her dour mood and the too-still morning, the twins come barreling out of the house, breath turning to fog that quickly dissipates as they sprint through it, racing for her truck. Thunder's hand thumps against it's faded blue body as she crows with victory, voice echoing in the clearing, yanking open the passenger-side door and bowing with a flourish as Fire slides to the middle with a disgruntled grumble. She flashes Maka an innocent grin before climbing in beside her brother, pulling the door shut behind her and immediately moving to fiddle with Maka's precious radio. Marie, Nygus, and Harvar stream from the house and make a line for Nygus' jeep. They each send her a comforting smile, or something close to it; sensing her unease.
It's probably nothing, she knows, but it doesn't stop her from worrying.
"I've got them." Stein intones from the porch, now sitting on the steps, socked feet resting on the bottom stair and his mug of coffee cradled between his palms. He gives her a nod, sure and steady. Knowing she trusts him to keep their pack, their family, safe. She nods again, and hops in her truck, peeling out of the dusty driveway behind the others; leaving Blake's car idling in it's spot.
The whole way down their winding lane, she keeps her eyes peeled for any sign of Blake or Sid. Any movement, any sound that she picks up over the rumble of her engine and the early morning talk show on the radio, but she doesn't see anything. The kids, rowdy at the house, were now quiet and tense beside her, both looking out their own window.
Say what you will about them, but those kids know how to read a room.
They spend a long few minutes in terse silence, until the wards protecting their property shimmer and sift over their skin, a waterfall of blue sparks raining over the windshield. All three of them let out a breath–relieved or not, they're not sure–and Maka does her best to break the silence by asking Thunder about her upcoming soccer game. Luckily, she launches into an animated rant, almost hitting Fire with all her gesturing, and she's thankful for the distraction. The blooming worry in her chest begins to wilt, if only a little, and she relaxes into her seat as Thunder talks about the girl on the opposing team whose way too old to be in their league.
It isn't until they're halfway to the main road that she feels that odd sort of something wind around her bones and squeeze, a cold finger scrape down her spine and send her hair standing on end. Something was wrong, something with her pack. She slams on the breaks, arm flung out to keep the kids from smashing into the dashboard, pulling her phone out of her back pocket just as it begins to ring. She answers before it makes it through it's first tone, punching the ancient horn and watching Nygus slam on her own breaks as Stein says, "We need you. Now."
Maka's throat closes around that tone. "I'm on my way." She tosses her phone beside her and leans across the twins to throw open their door. "Go get in with the others," She says, nudging them out and practically throwing their bags at them.
"What's going on?" Fire asks, just as Thunder says, "Are they okay?"
"I don't know. I'll tell y'all as soon as I do." A final shove and they both hop out, slamming the door behind them. "Go! Before you're late!" She barely has the mind to wait long enough to watch them actually get in the car, but once they're safely out of the way, she whips around with a spray of dirt and rock, speeding back the way she came.
Maka pulls up to the house with a wild look in her eye, launching herself out of the truck without turning it off and sprinting for the house. Stein meets her on the porch, screen door slamming behind him, his face drawn and somehow more serious than usual. She notices the rolled up sleeves, the hair pinned out of his face. "What happened?"
The words had barely left her mouth before the smell of blood hit her; sharp, coppery, enough to make her stomach twist itself into knots. Not coming from the house, though, but from behind. The woods. Sid and Blake emerge from the treeline and she takes off on a dead sprint, leaving Stein motionless on the porch, grim determination on his face. She breathless when she reaches them, looks them both over for injury before allowing her gaze to settle on the thing cradled between them.
Oh. Oh.
Not a thing, but a person–hanging limply between the two of them, crusted in dirt and dried blood, pale and damp with the morning dew. She sucks in a breath through her teeth, reaches forward to press her hand to his chest, not wanting to touch the gorey mess of his neck but still wanting to see if he had a pulse. There's nothing, not even a flutter, but his chest still rises and falls in short, tiny breaths. She pulls her hand away, clenching it into a fist against the slight tremor in her fingers. She shares a look with Sid, with Blake, the same dread curdling in her stomach reflecting in their eyes. They're all silent for one long minute, standing still in that wide open field around their home, as Maka thinks. She's the alpha, she's the boss; whatever she wants to do, they'll do it. She considers the risks, the consequences of taking him in, of letting the venom in his veins finish it's job.
She jerks her head toward the house, turning on her heel. "Take him to the attic." Maka doesn't stop to check if they followed her orders, trusting that they will, as she takes off back to intercept Stein as he meets her in the yard. She relays her order, tells him to get the spare bed up there prepped, and she leaves him to carry it out. Her throat is tight, her jaw aching with how she grinds her teeth, but her stride doesn't falter as she enters the tool shed half-hidden behind the house. Yanking open the heavy wooden door, the smell of old oil and gasoline hits her like a punch to the gut, but it steadies her, somehow. Maybe the familiarity of it, or maybe the way it washes away the lingering stench of blood that clings to the air like static to a balloon. She rubs her nose, as if she could banish the smell of carrion and rot that clung to that poor boy, and reaches for the heavy leather gloves hanging out of one of the many tool boxes littering the space. She pulls them on, flexing her fingers experimentally before kneeling and dragging out a heavy metal box, the lid covered with a healthy layer of dust and grime.
Maka swallows, almost apprehensively, and pries off the lid. Inside, a tangle of thick, gleaming silver chains lay innocently. Despite the way her very blood recoils, she reaches in and gathers up the chains, draping them over her arm–careful to keep them on the glove, from touching her skin. Of all the rumors and superstitions, the ones about silver are the most true. Vampires don't flinch at garlic, a stake to the heart would kill anyone, and no, crucifixes and other religious artifacts have little to no sway over most supernatural beings. Silver, however, is a fickle bitch. Blessed or not, it doesn't matter, something about it burns, excruciatingly so. On any supernatural. No one knows why, but the general consensus is that it's a small price to pay for the slew of perks that come with being a creature of myth and legend.
Chains in hand, Maka heads back into the house. There's a trail of dirt and blood leading up the stairs, totally at odds with the cartoons still on the television and the smell of maple syrup lingering from breakfast, but she doesn't allow herself to dwell on it. Doesn't allow herself to dwell on what hell she might be bringing down on her pack, her family. Up the stairs she thumps, down the hall, and through the door at the end, climbing up the creaky steps into the humidity of the attic. Blake and Sid have the kid laid out on the old bed, Stein kneeling at his bedside as he tries to clean up his neck enough to see the extent of the damage. The former two look to Maka for further instruction, arms crossed over bare chests, fingers still unnaturally elongated, tipped in wicked claws with teeth to match. As if they expected the boy to leap from the bed and tear into them all.
She ignores them as she passes, still mulling over what they should do next, and instead sets to work binding their new guest. Stein pays her little mind, only glancing up briefly before setting back to work. Maka pulls the boy's arm to the bedpost, carefully wrapping the chain around the steel before finally binding his arm by the wrist. Despite whatever stage of transformation he's in, his arm still violently jerks against the silver, the metal burning and melting into his skin. After a moment, he stills once again. She shares a look with Stein; whatever hope they had before that it wasn't a vampire attack was officially out the window. She sighs through her nose, proceeding to bind the rest of his limbs, each of them jerking and fighting against the sear of the silver.
Once he's sufficiently bound, she steps back, hands on her hips–smearing bloody fingerprints on the pure white of her scrubs. "Blake, run down to the basement and grab three bags of A-positive." Wordlessly, he turns to leave, but she throws out a hand to stop him–breathing deeply through her nose. "Scratch that. A-negative." Blake disappears down the stairs, and she turns toward Sid. "Get ahold of the others. Give them an update–the bare minimum, I don't want them to panic–and tell them to stay at Kim's for now, until I say otherwise." He nods, pulling his phone out of his pocket as he heads down the stairs; leaving Stein and Maka alone with their new pet project.
She and Stein sit in silence for a moment; the former staring at the face of their guest, the latter rocking back on his heels as he drops a bloodied rag to the dusty floor. Stein looks at her over his shoulder, face carefully blank. "What're we going to do?"
Something in her loosens at that. What're we going to do. Together. She has to remember that they're in this together. She sighs, shoulders sagging, scrubs a hand across her forehead. "I'm not sure. Either we give him the blood and help the process along, or…" She trails off, watches as a bolt of understanding flashes in Stein's eyes. "I doubt this happened to him willingly and who knows how he could react if he Changes. But at the same time...it feels wrong to just let him die."
"Well, out of all of us, you'd know best what it means to be Changed against your will." Maka stiffens, pursing her lips, but if he notices, he doesn't show it. He stands, knees popping loudly, and he claps a hand on her shoulder as he says, "Whatever you think is best, we'll do it, but you'd better think fast before it's too late." She nods absently, eyes locked the mess of the boy's throat. Stein huffs something that could be a laugh or a sigh, and disappears down the stairs, fishing a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket as he goes.
She waits a moment, hesitating, before finally crossing that space and perching on the edge of the mattress. She studies his face; clear skin, clean shaven, his eyelashes and eyebrows the same snowy white as his hair. Maka swallows thickly, turns away from his face and instead rummages through his pockets; finds a phone, it's screen cracked and crusted with blood, a keyring with a single key dangling from it, and a wallet. She tries the power button on the phone, but an empty battery simply blinks up at her, so she tucks it into her pocket–sure they had a charger to fit it laying around somewhere. She disregards the key entirely, putting it away beside the phone, and instead flips open the wallet. Nice, supple leather. The letters "S.E.E" monogrammed in swirling cursive on the inside pocket. Maka runs the pad of her thumb over them thoughtfully, glancing between the initials and their owner.
The sound of the door opening shakes her out of her reverie, and she quickly flips through the cards lining the inside, finds the one she was looking for. Blake stops behind her, peering over her shoulder. "Solomon Evans? Who the hell is that?"
"Him, apparently." She says, waving the card at Solomon's face. "What someone from Maine would be doing all the way down here, I have no idea." Blake merely grunts in agreement, and snatches the card and wallet out of her hand, only to replace them with the blood she'd asked for. She weighs the bags in her hand, chews on her lip, tries to ignore Solomon's weight on the bed next to her; torn between making this call as one person to another, as saving his life versus letting him die right here in her home, and making this call as an alpha, as someone with a responsibility, not only to her pack, but to the rest of the supernatural world as well.
Blake notices her hesitation, the look on her face that he knows all too well. "Hey," he nudges her shoulder with his hip. "You already know what to do." When she looks to him, he simply nods, and something like pride swells just beneath his ribs as her resolve turns the green of her eyes into something harder than steel. He'd follow her to hell and back, and as he watches her tear open the corner of one of the blood bags with her teeth, as he helps her tilt back Solomon's head and pour that blood in his mouth, watching the open wounds on his throat seal themselves up, he knows that he very well may have to before this is all over.