A/N: Well, here we are. The last chapter of the main story. Hope you guys enjoy this, and please don't take this off of your alert list just yet. We still have an epilogue to go!
This chapter is dedicated to all of you, since I wouldn't have gotten this far without your support.
Review Responses:
cherrishish, he definitely is. Thanks for reading and reviewing!
Wisteria, nice catch with the Little House on the Prairie reference! I'm very glad that you enjoyed the chapter and the fight scenes, and thank you so much for your kind words. I do want to publish a novel someday, so it's great to hear that you think I can do it. As always, thanks for your support, and hope that you like where this is going.
Diana Raven, I'll miss it too. Thanks for reviewing and reading!
Arcane Student, my favorite parts to write have definitely been the more emotional scenes. I love exploring characters and making them grow. I don't actually enjoy writing fight scenes all that much, although I like the effect they have on the story when they're done. Favorite characters…well, I like them all. But I'd be remiss if I didn't say that I enjoyed writing Rei, which I do, and Ayame. I also have a soft spot for Vayne. Out of the original cast, Maka and Soul are the easiest for me to write. Kid and Black Star are hard. Thanks for reading and reviewing!
pokelover01, as always thanks so much for all of your reviews. I'm glad you enjoyed those scenes and yes, the black blood definitely gave Rei and Ayame a bit of an unexpected edge back there. Hopefully you enjoy this chapter. As requested, I'm not going to tell you anything, and will reserve my comments until the end.
Karma88, if you thought that chapter was long, wait until you see this one. And yes, Asura would be too much for Annie, but they weren't hoping to use her body for that long. Other questions will be answered later, so thanks again for the review and hope you enjoy the chapter.
Xenoprime1337, thank you very much for your comments and I'm glad you enjoyed the chapter. Hope that you enjoy this one as well, and that you like the ending. Thanks for reviewing!
Disclaimer: I don't own Soul Eater.
CHAPTER FIFTY
Soul Eater ZERO; The World's Courage
Sunlight streamed in through an open window in the Patchwork Lab, shining onto a living room in a constant state of disarray. It slanted onto beakers filled with coffee, onto a stack of papers haphazardly deposited onto a desk, and over the scientist that sat hunched over at the desk, straddling a green, stitched chair and staring at the radio in front of him, the one that had been silent for the past hour. He reached out with one hand to poke at the radio, frowning as the device fell backwards onto the tabletop.
He supposed he could be doing worse things. He could be outside with Marie, staring up at the sky, getting blinded by the sun.
It really was bright in here. The sunlight was getting into his eyes. Stein blinked slowly, lifting his head as he turned towards the window Marie had opened. He contemplated whether or not it was worth going all the way over there to close it and decided against it, lowering his head back onto his folded arms.
Too much effort. He stared at the radio again.
"Anything?" a voice asked from behind him, sometime later. How much later, Stein wasn't sure. The desk in front of him had precisely one clock, and he'd already pushed it facedown so that he wouldn't be able to see it. There wasn't much point in keeping time. He straightened up and whirled around in his chair, fingers drumming out an erratic rhythm on the backrest as he turned to face Marie.
She was sitting on the couch, a white stuffed bear in her lap. The bear's limbs were laced with stitches, the result of a childhood accident nearly fifteen years ago. His eyes drifted from the bear to the woman who was holding it. Marie pursed her lips and narrowed her eye at him, as if daring him to say anything about it. He didn't, keeping up the erratic movement of his fingers.
They all had their coping mechanisms.
"Nothing," he said. "You?"
Marie shook her head. "You can't see the moon from here yet," she said, her lower lip trembling as she looked away. Her back was stiff, ramrod straight. "I texted Asuza, since it's nighttime over there, but she hasn't answered yet." Her fingers moved, nervously smoothing out the bear's fur. The motions said what her words didn't. Asuza was probably busy.
Not for the first time, Stein wondered at the irony of it all. There had been a moment more than twenty years ago when he and Marie had been essential. He might have been so affected by Asura and Medusa and all of that insanity that he nearly forgot his own name, and Marie might have been pregnant, but they still went up to the moon to fight the Kishin because nobody else could. Now, it seemed, they weren't essential anymore. Now they were the ones left behind, told to do things like 'protect the school in case the worst happens' and 'standby for orders'.
It wasn't like it was an unimportant job. If the worst happened, those who had been left behind would find themselves responsible for hundreds of students, only a tenth of which had actually been trained to fight. It made sense to leave capable, experienced agents behind.
It definitely wasn't because they were getting old.
And they definitely weren't any less suited for the job just because he couldn't stop fidgeting and wouldn't look at the time and Marie had dug up an old bear that hadn't even been touched by its owner in years.
It's owner. Right. Shelley. He had a daughter, and her name was Shelley, and she was on the moon. He had definitely only just remembered that. He was definitely not worried about her. She was definitely not the reason why he refused to look at the clock, why he had gotten up three times to fill beakers with coffee that he didn't even drink.
He drummed his fingers faster on the chair, wishing for a cigarette.
As if reading his mind, Marie turned towards him, tightening her grip on the bear. "Well, we'll know soon enough," she said.
"Yes," Stein said, keeping up his drumming. "We will."
The warning signal came sooner than Rei expected, a siren that moved through the airship. Time to attack. He straightened up from where he was leaning against the wall below deck, glancing at his partner. Ayame rose from her seat on the slender steps that led up to the bridge, standing up with an ease that belied her own nervousness. She raised her arms over her head in a stretch, almost making it look like she was doing nothing more than stepping onto the mat for Naigus's Unarmed Combat class. But Rei knew better. He'd seen the tension in her when the alarm rang out, knew that she was scared too.
She was just better at hiding it than he was.
"Ready to go?" he asked, inclining his head towards the stairs above.
She gave him a tight smile in response. "Ready when you are."
He took a step forward, placing one hand on the railing as he moved past her, climbing up the stairs. He'd taken one step forward before he changed his mind, and he spun around quickly, looping an arm around Ayame's waist before he could lose his nerve and pressing his lips to hers.
The kiss was breathless, desperate, and over entirely too soon. Rei released her and stepped away from her, his heart racing as he met her eyes, looking into her stunned expression.
"In case we die," he said.
Ayame raised her hand to her mouth, still looking stunned as her fingers traced the outline of her lips. Rei turned away quickly, his face flushed as he started climbing the stairs.
"You weren't, I don't know, scared we'd die before this?" Ayame asked from behind him. "Like, uh, last night, maybe?"
"Ayame—," Rei began, his flush deepening.
"Right, right," said Ayame, beginning to climb. "I know. End of the world. Apocalypse. I get it. Let's get this over with."
By the time he made it out on deck with the others, his heart rate had gone back to normal, but it was close. He and Ayame stepped out of the way of the door, letting others move past them as he looked around. Everyone who could be spared was standing on the upper deck, arrayed around Shinigami and his weapons. He spotted his and Ayame's parents standing next to him, Maka and Tsubaki still scolding Cori and Bright Star respectively. The rest of their team—Vayne, Clark, Morgan and Cassie—waited a respectable distance away.
Rei walked over to them slowly, trying not to feel like he was walking to his own execution. The crushing weight of Asura's presence still hung in the air around him, muted thanks to the witches' Soul Protect, but still strong enough to terrify him. He was afraid, more than he would ever admit, but he buried that fear deep down, somewhere deep inside of himself.
If he survived the day, he would allow himself to feel scared. But right now, he had work to do.
"Ready to go?" Soul asked as he approached, looking away from Maka and Cori. Even over the hustle and bustle on the deck, he could still hear his mother's words, and winced in sympathy for his sister.
The truth wasn't flattering, but he did his best to answer his father's question anyway. "Is anyone?" he asked.
Soul flashed him a sharp-toothed grin. "Probably not," he said, "But we'll do the best that we can anyway."
He nodded at Rei as Maka finally broke away from Cori and started walking over to them, with one last parting 'and don't you even think about coming out on deck while the battle is going on, young lady', stepping aside to join her. Maka's expression softened as she caught sight of Rei, and she gave him a tired nod, turning towards Shinigami.
"Time to go, Kid?" she asked.
"Just about," Shinigami said, not looking back at her. On his other side, Tsubaki rejoined Black Star, and Bright Star and Cori slunk back down the stairs, exiled below decks until the battle was over. Shinigami turned his head towards the small figure that stood near him, still wearing the body of Rei's sister. His brows arched. "Ready?"
Crona-in-Annie didn't answer, her eyes still fixed on the sphere of black blood that was Asura's power. But Rei saw her head dip forward in a nod, a black sword forming in her hand. Shinigami looked up, at the witches that hovered in the air over their heads.
"We're ready," he said.
A signal moved through the circle of witches that hovered around the moon. As one, their hands came up, power flooding them as the Soul Protect around the moon changed shape, a sharp blade of power cutting straight through the black blood's center. Rei caught a glimpse of a storm inside the sphere, blood and power raging beneath a black sky. In front of him, Shinigami reached for his weapons, Liz and Patty's pistol forms settling comfortably into his hands. Tsubaki transformed for Black Star without a word as beside him, Maka extended her hand towards Soul.
Soul's arm shifted as he reached for Maka's hand, becoming the shaft of his scythe form, but he paused before the transformation took hold of him entirely, looking out over Rei and Ayame. "You might wanna give us a minute before you follow," he said, and there was a smirk on his face that Rei couldn't read.
The light consumed him as he transformed, the gleaming steel of his scythe form settling into Maka's hands. Wings sprouted from the scythe blade as Maka quickly leaped up onto the handle, taking Crona by the hand and pulling her on behind her.
"Maka, Black Star, with me," Shinigami said, leaping off the deck. Maka followed, the wind whipping behind her as Soul's wings beat once, launching her into the air. Black Star crouched on the deck behind them, a grin on his face as he looked back at Rei and Ayame. He raised his hand towards Ayame once, a gesture of farewell, and then he was in the air too, catching up to Maka and Shinigami quickly.
Rei stared at them, wondering what they were planning. He had half a second to see their souls flare up inside their chests, reaching for each other.
Their Resonance was almost blinding.
"Whoa," Ayame said from beside him as Rei blinked the light out of his eyes. Beside him, he heard Cassie and Vayne make similar statements, their eyes on the battle in front of them. The three of them plowed into the sphere of black blood with all the force of a cannon ball.
Rei couldn't look directly at their souls—the light was too bright—but he had a moment to admire the fluidity and power with which they moved, to watch, entranced, as Black Star and Shinigami moved ahead of Maka and Crona, each of them cutting down several monsters one after another and opening a path straight towards the heart of Asura. His mother couldn't fight as well as she normally could with Crona riding with her, but she still managed to hold her own regardless, slipping through the barrage that greeted them like the wind itself.
The path blazed open behind them, a trail of light, beckoning the others to join them. The only place the light dimmed was around Crona, who had summoned up a halo of black blood around Annie's body, blood plastering itself to her skin like armor as the few creatures that managed to squeeze through Black Star and Shinigami's onslaught dashed themselves to pieces against that halo.
From his other side, he heard Morgan take in a sharp breath.
"He's not human," she said, watching as Black Star sliced cleanly through two giants several times larger than him, darting back up to slice through a spear of black blood that had been angled towards Maka and Crona.
"He is," Ayame said, awe in her voice as well. "That's the best part."
He could have stayed and watched the battle unfold forever, but an explosion of movement across the deck reminded him of his task, reminded him that he couldn't. He shook his head fiercely, shaking off his stupor, and nodded at Clark and Morgan.
"Come on," he said. "Time to earn our keep."
Clark held a hand out towards Vayne, who transformed in a flash of light, the pendulum settling into his meister's hand. From beside Rei, Morgan extended her hand out towards Cassie. After half a moment, she held a hand out towards Excalibur as well, a look of disgust and reluctance crossing over her features, but the strange creature only sighed and transformed, the white sword settling into her hand.
While his friends readied themselves, Rei reached for Ayame.
She transformed, shifting into Nocturne. He spread his wings, feeling the air currents shift and sway around him, his eyes fixed on the battle in front of them.
Then he kicked off of the deck, leading them all into the storm.
It was complete and utter chaos.
Not long after flying into the sphere, Rei quickly lost all sense of direction. It was a cacophony of wavelengths and power, playing havoc with both his Soul Perception and his hearing, so that when the full force of it hit him he felt as though he had gone both deaf and blind. It was all he could do to launch himself from attacker to attacker, to cut down the grasping hands reaching for them and keep the path open while his parents and the rest of their team made their way to the heart of Asura.
It was a good thing he and Ayame had learned to communicate without him having to speak, because he wasn't sure he could have gotten the words out anyway.
Ayame's feathered blades soared through the air as he flapped his wings, thin, rounded kunai that peppered the barriers beneath them. It was an effective attack, but an indiscriminate one, and that just wasn't good enough. There was a patch of stone beneath them, solid enough to stand on. He drew his fingers across the ragged patch of cloak in front of him, making a hand gesture.
The wings across his back dissolved into light, and his stomach lurched as he started to fall. He landed on the ground, a thin black European style dagger in his hand, small enough to conceal in his palm if he kept the handle tucked into his sleeve.
Zero Star Third Form: Lament. Ayame's power compressed into a small, nearly invisible blade. He kicked off the ground as he landed, the residual power propelling him forward faster than he expected, and lashed out at the writhing creatures that rose up to surround him, stabbing at vital points beneath necks and between vertebrae and into hearts. Two went down, and at the third he made another hand gesture, Ayame's form shifting into the more recognizable shape of her katana form. Zero Star Second Form: Elegy. Elegy whirred through the air as he beheaded another creature, the downward slash transitioning quickly into a horizontal cut that bisected a leaping enemy at the waist. They all went down as he sliced into them, their bodies sinking back into the pool of black blood that they had emerged from. He blocked another blow with Elegy's flat, slipping beneath the sword and letting it transform into Requiem, which took two enemies out in one slash as it caught them in the curve of its scythe blade.
The problem, Rei considered, as he stood underneath the veil of steel that was Ayame, feeling her fire burn solidly inside of his soul, wasn't that each individual enemy was difficult to defeat. If he was fighting a finite quantity of them, he might have even said that this was easy. But it wasn't. Because every time one enemy fell, two seemed to replace it. Every time he killed one, it simply dissolved into black blood. It didn't go away. The witches could keep the black blood from regenerating some of the larger opponents, but their attention was focused on keeping Asura's madness at bay. They didn't have much thought to spare for Rei and some of the other DWMA operatives who were just trying to keep the way open, to keep Asura distracted enough that Shinigami and the others would have an easier time taking him down. The only person who seemed to be doing anything to negatively impact the black blood was Morgan. Excalibur was like a brand of white fire, leaving destruction everywhere she cut through, and the enemies cut down by that sword did not regenerate. They lay on the earth, ragged wounds smoking as Morgan continued to cut, pressing forward with single-minded intensity.
But Morgan was only one person. Excalibur, however powerful, was only one sword. If the battle was allowed to go on infinitely long, they would tire, and they would lose. But that was what they were hoping to avoid.
He heard a shout from somewhere off to his left, a low, ragged cry of despair. Against his better judgment, Rei looked, and the lapse of concentration cost him. A tendril of black blood slammed into the side of his face, throwing him off to the side. He grit his teeth as he landed, Ayame shifting into her new shuriken form—sleeker and thinner, but still recognizably a shuriken. He blocked the next attack with the flat of the blade as he leaped back to his feet, slicing cleanly through the tendril. Only when it was gone did he look over his shoulder, did he take in the sight in front of him.
They had made it to the hollow they had been standing in earlier, just beneath the crest of the moon. Clark was kneeling on the ground, his arms around a prone figure. Rei looked and saw a head of blond hair, a pale face, eyes closed and mouth hanging open slightly. He felt out with his Soul Perception, but he already knew what he would find.
There was no soul, nothing but the last lingering traces of a wavelength. The woman Clark was holding was gone.
"Clark—," Vayne began, from beside him.
Clark didn't answer. Something snapped inside of him, some madness that finally broke beneath his eyes. Lightning snaked its way up his arm as he reached for Vayne, as he charged at the monsters that surrounded them. He let out a cry of rage as he plowed into the group of monsters, Vayne's blade slicing left and right as he cut and cut.
Rei muttered a curse under his breath.
"He's going to hurt himself," Ayame said, watching the scene with growing horror.
"I know," Rei said, but he couldn't deal with Clark just then. Something else was happening overhead, something that drew his attention. His parents and their team were far above them, striking at the heart of Asura's power.
He could hear them fighting, could see Shinigami and Black Star cutting down resistance left and right, could hear the sounds of his father's piano slicing down attackers before they could even reach them. He could hear one dissonant note, the only signal that something was wrong, a missed attack or a misjudged dodge or block, and it was because he could hear it that he looked up, that he saw a whip of black blood slam into Crona in his sister's body, knocking her off of her perch behind his mother. He saw Maka's eyes widen, saw her move to catch her, but Crona was falling too fast. Maka wouldn't make it in time.
Ayame transformed before he was even fully sure of what he was going to do, and he launched himself into the air, wings spread as he soared towards the small figure. As he flew, he looked down, at Clark still cutting his way through the monsters with single-minded intensity, at Morgan not too far from him.
"Morgan!" Rei shouted, pitching his voice to carry. "Take care of Clark!"
He caught Crona.
Somehow—maybe it was the armor—Rei expected the slight figure he caught to be heavier than she was, but she was almost frighteningly light, the same weight as Annie. The girl in his arms groaned, head lolling forward as if she was shaking off the blow. She had a sword in her hand, and that sword was screaming at her.
"Hey, wake up!" the sword shouted. "Wake up, you useless idiot, wake up!"
Her eyes snapped open, confused and scared for half a second before her focus sharpened, her eyes fixing on Rei's. She started to sit up in his arms, propping herself up with her free hand as she looked up at the battle.
"This is bad," she said, her focus wavering as if she was in two places at once, trying to focus on something impossibly far away. "I can't hold him."
I can't hold him. Which meant that Asura was about to break free. And if he did, if he broke free fully, Rei doubted that even the prison the witches had constructed would be able to hold him.
"What can I do?" he asked. "How can I help?"
Crona looked back at him, eyes widening as if seeing him for the first time. "I know you," he said. "You're—Rei, aren't you? You're Maka's son."
"Yeah," Rei said, feeling absurd. Here they were, flying through the air inches from the end of the world, and he was chatting about his mother. "Yeah, I am."
Crona nodded, frowning as if coming to a decision. She shifted in Rei's grip, looking back at Asura. Annie's face pulled into a frown that quickly turned into a look of determination, edged with fear. "I'm going to go back to my body," she said. "I'm going to try and take it back. It's the only thing I can do. When I go, you need to take care of Annie-chan. She's going to be scared, so you need to get her back to the airship where it's safe. Okay?"
"Okay," Rei said, his arms tightening their grip around the body.
Take care of Annie, fly her out of harm's way. He could do that. He hoped he could do that.
"Okay…" Crona repeated, taking in a deep breath. Her eyes fixed on Asura again, and Rei could see her hesitate, her fingers curling into tight fists as she looked up at the creature. A shudder ran through her. "I'm going to do it now."
"Sure," said Rei.
"This might be goodbye..."
"Just do it already, before you chicken out again!" the sword shouted.
Another shudder passed through Crona and she winced, but she nodded and closed her eyes. "Goodbye," she said, tightening her grip on the sword.
"Good luck," Rei said, not really sure what else to say.
A light shot out of Annie, a pair of souls so deeply intertwined that it was hard to distinguish them. They moved almost too quick to see, the bright pink color bleeding out of Annie's hair as they left and leaving snow white in its place. The black blood armor lifted itself up off of his sister's body, both the armor and the sword streaming back into her through the small cut at her wrist. She gasped for breath but didn't open her eyes, her chest rising and falling slowly.
Rei held her close to him and shot one last look at the battle around the Kishin, at the path the two souls had taken. Then he turned, gritting his teeth as he left the battle behind and flew for the patch of open sky that led towards the airship.
Pulling away from Annie's body was a severance, a breaking. One second there was form and function, sight, sound, smell, sensation. There was blood, breath, and bone. In the next second, there was nothing, only consciousness and void. Only thought, and the overwhelming pressure of Asura's presence.
Crona could feel it tugging at them even now, as they rushed towards Asura, his soul and Ragnarok's bound so deeply with each other that there was no way to separate the two. He could feel the edges of his thoughts growing fuzzy again, like they did in the darkness, could feel Asura digging his fingernails into what was left of his mind, trying to pry it apart.
It almost worked. The darkness was so sweet, so tempting. There wasn't any fear in the darkness. There wasn't anything. It would be so easy to sink into it again.
There certainly wasn't death waiting there. Erasure. A test of wills against an overwhelming foe that he couldn't possibly hope to defeat. He had a feeling that what they were doing was the definition of insanity, and he didn't know how to deal with it.
What he told Rei hadn't been a lie. This might very well be the end. For both of them.
"Hey, brat," Ragnarok said, and was it Crona's imagination, or was there a hint of fondness in that remark? It was a reluctant fondness, but it was still there. "Don't tell me you're getting second thoughts. We're already here. There's no turning back."
There wasn't. He couldn't go back to Annie now. Annie's soul was a small pinprick of light, being carried farther and farther away. And they wouldn't last long in the void, couldn't hold back against the maelstrom of Asura's power for much longer than this. There was only one thing to do.
He looked down, as much as an abstract consciousness could have an idea of down, at the combatants arrayed below him. At one in particular, blond hair streaming, green eyes blazing with inner fire as she launched herself at the manifestations of Asura's power. She was older now, different in a lot of ways, but she was the same in every way that counted.
She was his friend.
He fixed that in his mind, holding onto it, holding onto his identity as their small, conjoined soul looked up to face the vastness of Asura's presence.
Ragnarok was right. There wasn't any turning back.
Their souls sharpened themselves into a needle, an arrow that shot across the sky, straight towards the heart of that power.
Shelley Stein had always been alone.
It wasn't that she didn't have family that loved her, because she did, and it wasn't that she didn't have a partner who cherished her, because she did, but there had always been a distance, a separation between her and everyone else around her. All through her childhood, people watched her, looking for any signs of madness. They found none, but that meant nothing. Sanity meant nothing. All of her adult life, Shelley had understood a simple truth—that it was fully possible to be both completely sane and on a different frequency from anyone else.
In fact, the sanity made it worse. Because she didn't have the comfort of madness to run to, didn't have a screw she could turn to make the voices in her head speak clearly every now and then. Instead, it felt like she was looking at the world through a permanent haze of static, like she was a radio that was tuned permanently, perfectly off-key. And she'd hated it. She'd tried so hard to be just like everyone else, to think just like anyone else. But in a world of outcasts, she was the only one who wasn't able to fit in. Because she wanted nothing more than to be like her mother, to be like Luna, to be warm and welcoming and liked, to instinctively understand people when they came to her, to be able to soothe all their hurts and worries.
And she wasn't.
She had her father's versatile soul, could alter her wavelength to match any meister, but that didn't mean she understood them. It just meant that she was a very good actor.
She'd wanted nothing more than to be normal. And she wasn't. Every day she lived, she felt like she was putting on a show. A performance, a face that she wore so that she fit in with the rest of humanity. It was only the people she loved the most that made her feel like she was understood, and each of those connections had been hard won, born out of years of trying.
And out of all of those, Micah had been the one she valued the most. Because outside of her family, he was the only one that she hadn't had to try to understand, hadn't had to tune in to.
He had reached out to her, and for a time, he had made her feel normal.
That time shattered when Luna died.
She ducked beneath his blow, seeing the madness shining in his red eyes as he edged closer to her. Her scalpel hand flicked out, a rapid movement across his chest, and she felt the tips of the blades meet skin, felt them draw blood. At the same time, his fingers brushed across the side of her face, ice flooding her veins. They drew away from each other just in time, Micah bleeding from an array of thin cuts across his chest, Shelley feeling as if the side of her face had turned to ice. He lunged in towards her and she twisted out of another blow to the head, his fingers tugging her hair free of its bindings. A blast of wind knocked him back and he stumbled, one wrong step away from falling into the whirlwind that she had put up around them.
She sucked in a breath as he regained his footing, feeling her chest burn from the exhaustion. The battle had gone on long enough that she could no longer see any trace of sunlight, could see nothing but the black blood that swirled around them, kept back by the whirlwind that she had created. The fingers of her left hand had gone completely numb, as had the skin on her wrist, and the side of her face. Across from her, Micah was bleeding from several thin cuts, his elaborate coat disheveled and hair plastered to the side of his face. The ground around them was littered with slashed cards. He had thrown them at her face a while ago, a distraction while he set up another attack, and she had slashed them out of the air. They were evenly matched, occasionally scoring blows, occasionally driving each other back, but unable to get the upper hand over the other. They knew each other too well for that, and so the battle continued, an endless back and forth while the world ended around them.
And it was wrong. It was so wrong.
She blinked rapidly to clear the tears out of her eyes as he charged at her, angry at herself for the emotions and angry at him for bringing them out in her. It would be so easy if she were mad, she thought. If she didn't care. If she could be nothing more than a blade, an instrument of destruction.
It would be so easy to be mad.
Instead she was fully aware as she lowered her center of gravity, as she widened her stance and slid forward, scalpel hand slicing across his chest. And she was also fully aware when Micah grabbed her by the back of her hair, yanking on it and pulling her onto the ground.
Her head struck the stone hard, momentarily disorienting her, but instinct kept her fighting, let her grab at his wrists with both her hands so that she could drag him down on top of her.
He landed with a grunt of pain, his free hand still gripping her hair tightly. His other hand, the one wreathed in the unearthly light brought on by the Death card, was inching closer to her skin, held back only by her now-human hand. Hot blood dripped from his wounds, staining the fabric of her blouse as she grit her teeth and shoved against him, trying to push him off of her. Ice spread through the skin of her hand as she held back his arm, as all the while, Micah inched closer towards her neck.
It was a losing battle. And because her mind couldn't stop calculating the odds, couldn't take a moment to just appreciate the immensity of the emotional distress that she was in, she knew it. She knew very clearly that she would soon lose all function in her hand, that there would be nothing stopping him from killing her. She grit her teeth, pushing harder, but it wasn't working. It wouldn't work. There wasn't anything else she could do.
"You'll die," she gasped out, meeting his eyes as he inched closer to her, his weight suffocating her. "Asura won't let you live. You'll kill me, and the barrier will fall, and you'll die."
"We'll die together," Micah said, his eyes crazed. There was a grin on his face, his teeth stark white in the half-light. "That's how it should have been, Shell. How it was always supposed to be. We should have died together."
She shoved at him uselessly. He didn't move. Her hand was so cold. She was already beginning to go numb.
"You're insane," she said. "The Kishin's getting to you. The Micah I know wouldn't—." Wouldn't what? She broke off abruptly, staring at him. The Micah she knew was gone. There was very little that this new Micah wouldn't do.
"Am I?" Micah asked, leering at her. "Or do I finally see the truth for the first time? It's everything I ever wanted, Shell. It's true freedom. It's so, so beautiful. If only you could see…"
He trailed off, sitting up so that he was straddling her. Shelley gasped out a breath as the pressure on her chest eased. His eyes were glazed over as he stared at the whirlwind that surrounded them, the vortex of black blood.
It was only when she caught her breath, when she was able to tilt her head back to look at the maelstrom, that she realized what he was looking at.
The tornado was weakening. Asura's madness was leaking through. She had only a moment to process that before twin tendrils of black blood reached through the gap, grabbing at her arms and yanking her out from under him.
Shelley screamed, thrashing in the black blood's hold, but unlike Micah, who had been made of flesh and blood, Asura's tendrils were relentless. She felt her glasses slip down her face as she fought and thrashed, but they grabbed at her, holding her fast as the shadows rose up around her, blades pointed directly at her chest.
At her soul. Asura was going to take her soul.
"No!" she shrieked, kicking out at the mass that held her. "NO! Don't—! Mic—."
Her plea broke off mid-word as she looked down, her eyes fixing on him. Why had she done that? Why had she called out for him? The boy she knew wasn't there anymore. He was dead. He had died long ago, and this thing that had been left in his place wasn't going to help her. Even now, he was staring at her, standing on the bare earth untouched by the shadow. Even now, there was nothing but confusion in his red eyes as he stared up at her, nothing but the slightest hint of dismay that he hadn't been able to finish her off himself. Her eyes met his, wide with horror and desperation.
Something broke behind his eyes, some flash of recognition appearing in them.
And then the darkness took her, drawing her in.
Annie started to stir just as Rei cleared the border of black blood around the moon, wings spread to catch the air currents as he angled himself towards the airship. She shifted in his arms and groaned, eyelids fluttering. He tightened his grip as she opened her eyes, blinking wide green eyes up at him.
"Rei…?" she asked, her voice soft.
"It's me," Rei said. "You're okay now, Annie. I'm taking you back to the airship."
"The…airship…?" Annie's brow furrowed as she pushed herself up, looking past Rei. Her eyes widened as she caught sight of the moon behind them, and Rei felt her go rigid. "We're on the moon?!" she asked. "Rei—!"
He tried to soften his voice, but it still came out harsher than he had intended. "I know," he said, cutting her off. "I know you're scared. Don't worry, I'll take care of you."
"But what about Crona?" Annie asked, drawing back sharply and looking into Rei's eyes. "What—what happened to Crona?"
"Crona left to help Mom and Dad with Asura," Rei said. "He—he said it was something only he could do." He refrained from saying that Asura was waking up. The explanation would only worry Annie, and it wouldn't help anyone. From the way her eyes widened in distress, though, she was worried enough anyway.
"No," Annie said, shaking her head. "No, no, no, no. Crona left? He went back there by himself?!" She looked out over Rei's shoulder, her hands gripping his uniform jacket tightly as she stared at the chaos around the moon. Rei winced.
"It's going to be okay—," he began, feeling like a broken record.
"No, Rei, it's not! Listen to me!"
He jerked back in surprise as Annie grabbed his face, pulling it down sharply so that he was looking at her. Her eyes were narrowed in determination, and there was a surprising amount of fire in there. He hadn't seen that in Annie before. The change caught him off-guard enough that he had no choice but to listen to her, couldn't think of anything to say.
"Crona can't beat Asura," she said. "He's not strong enough! If he was, he would have done it already!"
"How do you know that?" Rei asked, gaping at her.
"I—." Annie's brow furrowed in confusion, her head turning from left to right as if she was searching for the answer in the sky. "I—sensed it. I don't know. I don't understand. I—oh."
Black blood streamed from the small cut in Annie's arm, floating gently towards the mass of black blood around the moon as if attracted by it. Rei grit his teeth and stopped it with a gloved hand, pushing it back towards Annie. She stared at it, eyes wide, then reached out with both hands for it. The blood streamed back through her fingers and into her body, the hole quickly sealing itself as she asserted control over it again.
"I need to go back," she said, looking up at Rei. "I need to help him."
"I'm not taking you back there," Rei said. "Are you crazy?"
Annie shook her head, and while her face was white with fear and her hands were cold as she gripped his uniform jacket, there was nothing crazy in her gaze. "I can—I can feel Asura," she said. "He's getting weaker, but he's not weak enough. And Crona can't even get back to his body. He doesn't have any black blood to use to control Asura. He's going to die if we don't help him."
"First of all, if I take you back into that, Mom's going to kill me," Rei said. "And second of all, you're eight. If you get any closer to Asura, he's going to bleed you dry. Or take you over."
Annie paused, blinking at him thoughtfully. She pressed her lips tightly together, studying the moon behind them as they flew farther and farther away. Then, as if coming to a decision, she nodded to herself, looking back up at him. "Not if we have the Anti-Magic Wavelength," she said. "I think I can control myself if we have that."
"Yeah, but I don't have that wavelength, remember?" Rei asked. "And it's not like we can get to Mom."
"We don't need to," Annie said. Her voice was soft, hesitant, as if even she couldn't believe what she was suggesting. Her arms wrapped tight around her middle. "Mom's not the only one with an Anti-Magic Wavelength."
Rei followed her gaze as Annie turned her head, her eyes landing on the airship. Then he understood.
"No," he said. "No way. Absolutely not."
Annie looked up at him, eyes wide. Rei stared down at her for a few long moments, before swearing loudly, pulling her close to him. He put on a burst of speed, shooting for the airship.
"I can't believe you talked me into this!" Rei shouted a few moments later, as Cori let out a whoop of exultation, her scythe form extended to catch the breeze. From inside her own soul space, Annie was surprisingly calm, watching the moon grow closer with a solemn, serene expression on her face.
"Oh, come on Rei, don't be such a spoilsport!" Ayame shouted as the four of them dove through the air, the wings of her Nocturne form pressed tight against Rei's back. "We're going to make one hell of an entrance!"
"We're going to die!" Rei said. "And if Asura doesn't kill us, our parents will!"
He bowed his head as they flew into the wind, his protests drowned out by Ayame's shout of excitement. A stray gust of wind threatened to blow them all off the path and he quickly spread out a wing to steady themselves, launching themselves faster and faster towards their goal.
He held Annie's scythe form in his left hand and Cori's in his right, and already, a haze of black blood was lifting off of the scythe in his left hand, negated only by the aura of light rising from the scythe in his right. And all of that was brought together by the heat rising up inside of his soul, the warmth of Ayame's wavelength seeping into his.
"Okay," Cori said as they drew closer, her voice sharp in Rei's ear. "This is what we're going to do. Annie, remember that attack we were practicing? The one where we attack at the same time?"
"I remember," said Annie, from Rei's other side.
Rei frowned. "This isn't the same attack that blew a hole through the roof last Thanksgiving, is it?" he asked.
"Um…" said Cori. "We're a little bit better at it now."
"Are you?" Rei asked. "Are you really? Because you know, that was a few months ago, and I don't remember Death City Elementary teaching any combat lessons—."
"Well we're going to have to be better at it now, or we're all going to die," said Cori, "Sheesh, Rei. Is that what you want to hear?"
"I just want to know that I'm not flying my little sisters into a suicide mission," said Rei. "Is that so bad?"
"We'll be fine," said Cori, resting her hands on her hips. "We've got this. We just—you know, could use a little more power."
"I can help with that," Ayame said. "Rei, you remember what Maka-sensei was trying to tell us? Before we arrived at the moon?"
"Your amplification ability?" Rei asked, frowning in thought. "I remember."
"Time to use it," Ayame said.
"I still don't think we should be doing this," said Rei, his eyes narrowing as he dodged a stray tendril of black blood, banking sharply and drifting around it.
"We can do this, Rei."
Annie's voice was soft when she spoke, but there was a quiet resolution to her words that made Rei stop and listen. She stood solemnly in her corner of the soul space she shared with Cori, one hand clenched tightly over her chest as she stared out at the world. Rei drew in a deep breath, slowing to a stop in the air just over the Kishin.
He nodded.
"Let's get this over with, then," he said, holding the scythes out to either side of him.
He reached for Ayame's soul. Her wavelength responded, their resonance building up, brighter and brighter as their shared soul expanded to fill the space around them. He could feel power flooding through him as Ayame began to glow, floating off of the ground in her soul space. Black lines traced themselves across her skin and then flared a bright white as the power between them continued to build, a heat bubbling up inside of him that was almost unbearable. He grit his teeth and tightened his hold on the scythes, feeling the power grow, feeling his own soul ripple and expand to meet it.
Holding it in was agony. He breathed deep, trying to control it. The black of the cloak that rested on his shoulders flared into a rippling white, white light threading through the feathers of his wings.
At the last second, just when Rei thought his soul was about to be torn apart, Ayame opened her eyes.
"Ready," she said.
Before he could think better of it, before he could even stop to consider what he was doing, he reached for his sisters' souls. Annie and Cori's wavelengths threaded into his, melding with his own soul.
And the power that Ayame had built up pulsed back into them.
The haze of black blood around Annie's blade rose up into a storm, the faint aura of light around Cori's into a golden river. Rei twitched his wings and shot forward like a bullet, racing towards Asura. He had just a second to catch sight of his parents, to see Shinigami and Black Star in his periphery as they rushed past them, light and shadow trailing behind them like dust. His mother's face was fearful, Shinigami's was surprised, Black Star was grinning.
He activated his Soul Perception and the world around him burst into a sudden riot of light and color, sensation flooding through him like he had never felt it before. He could feel the unsteady hum of Crona's wavelength, could feel Crona's struggle as Asura pushed him down again and again. Annie was right. Crona would never beat Asura on his own, but the battle hadn't left the Kishin unscathed. He could feel the weaknesses in Asura, the places where Shinigami, Maka and Black Star had been hammering at for the entirety of this battle, the cracks that were starting to show in the armor. That armor was about to break, and if it did break, Crona would have a chance.
The battle was so close to a tipping point. It just needed that last extra push.
He drew up in front of Asura's presence, mouth open and throat hoarse. It took him a second to realize that he was screaming. Annie and Cori were screaming too, eyes narrowed in determination, voices rising in time with his. As he stopped, the twins linked hands, bodies glowing inside their shared soul space. The glow spread across the surface of their weapon forms, the black blood and the light intermingling.
Rei moved his arms like the hands of a clock, Cori's scythe moving up, Annie's scythe moving down. Black blood and light followed the movements, forming a circle of light and shadow in the air around him. The circle connected, momentarily frozen in perfect symmetry.
Then Ayame released her grip on the power she had been holding, and all of that power broke free.
A wave of light and darkness crashed into the Kishin, slamming straight into that weak point that their parents and Shinigami had created.
And through his Soul Perception, Rei felt something breaking.
Asura's presence was strong, overwhelming. He could feel it pressing in on him, crushing him from all sides, sapping what was left of his strength.
Brew's faltering power flickered around him, the last vestiges of its power clinging to what was left of his body. He could feel Asura's presence digging its tendrils into his soul, could feel Asura's mad glee as the Kishin grabbed at him, tearing off small portions of his power and consuming them whole.
Consciousness flickered.
He could feel Maka attacking Asura, could feel Kid and Black Star doing the same. He could hear the faint traces of Soul's music, could feel the energies of the world around him, of everyone that was attacking Asura, fighting for their right to live.
It wouldn't be enough. It was never going to be enough.
There wasn't any hope. There was nothing. There was only fear. Overwhelming, crushing fear. It would be so easy to give into it.
There was nothing more he could do. There was nothing—
A light shone through the darkness, a bolt slamming into the center of Asura's power and loosening Asura's grip on him, if only for a moment. Consciousness returned, sweet and sharp, and if he'd had a body, he would have gasped for air. He thought he heard a voice in that attack, thought he heard someone's soul, calling to him.
"Crona-san!"
Annie.
Crona twisted away from Asura in one sudden movement, sliding through the gaps in Asura's hold. Power flooded outwards from him as Asura's soul began to falter, pinkish-violet light slithering into the cracks of Asura's consciousness. He felt the Kishin recoil as he pushed harder, felt Asura's surprise as Crona's power grew, felt that surprise turn into fear.
"Use me!" Ragnarok shouted, his voice loud in Crona's non-existent ear. "Don't hesitate, you idiot. Use me!"
"Are you sure?" Crona asked, hesitating in spite of the sword's instructions not to. "If I use you, you might not come back."
"Do you have any choice, brat?" Ragnarok asked. "Sheesh, this is why I hate working with stupid kids!"
He felt Ragnarok's determination well up inside of him, felt it almost as if it were his own. Crona drew his soul around himself like a breath, holding it before letting it out. Then he reached for Ragnarok's power. Something in his soul broke as Ragnarok's consciousness tore itself away from his own. It was agony, but Asura's presence had been enough agony. He barely even noticed.
The Demon Sword's soul shot towards Asura's like a missile, the point forming into a spearhead as it stabbed straight through the center of Asura's power. Asura's soul shone in response, his own wavelength a blistering red compared to Crona's violet light. Those two souls crashed over each other, light flaring up in the spaces they met in, a white light that filled up the whole of Crona's vision.
"You can't,"Crona heard Asura say, and suddenly the Kishin was crouched before him, kneeling on a void of white, propped up on his elbows, hands threaded through the black and white of his hair. The void was cracked around his elbows and feet, darkness showing through the gaps, and Ragnarok's black blade was stabbed straight through his chest, dark energy crackling throughout the sword as it pinned Asura to the ground. "You can't, you can't, you can't—. It's not your power. It was never yours. The fear of the world is mine."
Fear washed over him, bright and terrible, coming off of Asura in waves. It made Crona want to falter, and for a second he did. For a second, he did allow himself to take a step back, to hesitate, to be driven back by the force of Asura's fear. But the second passed and he stepped forward again, eyes narrowed in determination. The violet light around him parted, peeling away from his form.
And then he was standing in front of Asura, feet resting on the smooth white expanse of the void around them.
"I think…" he said, his voice soft because a part of him still couldn't believe that he was really doing this, really standing in front of his captor and prisoner of twenty years and talking to him like this, "…I think that the world's had enough of fear."
Asura braced his hands on the ground, the white floor cracking beneath his palms as he turned his head towards Crona. Red eyes sought out Crona's own. "What would you know of fear?" he asked. "Of suffering? You think you can take this power from me, child? You'll be no different from me." He grinned, white teeth flashing even through his pained breaths. "Can you feel it? Can you feel their fear around us? Everyone is afraid. You'll take their fear, and you'll plunge this world into pain and darkness, just as I did."
"You're wrong," Crona said.
He didn't know where the words were coming from, only that they were true. And that they were right.
Asura's brow furrowed in confusion, as if he hadn't expected that from Crona. Which was fair, Crona thought. He hadn't expected that from himself either.
But he kept on talking anyway.
"You're wrong," he said, firmer this time. "I'm not going to be like you."
Maka's face flashed into his mind, the smile she had worn when befriending him for the first time, her hand extended to him. He saw her face again, saw her as she appeared now, green eyes narrowed in determination and blond hair streaming out behind her. The picture filled itself in around her, Soul and Black Star coming into hazy focus. Tsubaki. Liz and Patty. Kid. He saw Rei appear as a shadow in his mind, red eyes shining as he fought back the darkness around him. Saw Annie as he had seen her in that broken room of hers, saw her blinking the tears out of his eyes as she reached for his hand.
"Everyone's afraid," he said, his voice soft as he looked away from Asura. "But they're still fighting. Even though they're afraid, they're still here. They're still fighting you. They refuse to give into fear. Why do you think that is?"
"Because they're deluded," said Asura. "They think the fear doesn't affect them. That it doesn't control them. But we know better, don't we, Crona? We know what fear is, what it does. Don't we?" His features seemed to blur and morph in front of Crona's eyes, becoming something different. Something more feminine, all blond hair and gold eyes and darkness like writhing snakes around him.
"Don't we?" Asura asked, but the voice that spoke was Medusa's.
Crona shuddered and clenched his fists, gritting his teeth. He looked away, squeezing his eyes shut, then slowly, deliberately, forced his eyes open again, forced himself to look back.
Medusa couldn't hurt him, he told himself.
It was just Asura. Nothing more.
"They aren't deluded," he said. "They're brave. They understand their fear, accept their fear, and because of that, they have courage."
"That's madness," Asura said, mouth splitting open in a good approximation of Medusa's grin. "Nothing but madness."
"Maybe…" said Crona. Light spread outwards from him, chasing away the last vestiges of Medusa's image and revealing Asura's form again, revealing the Kishin crouching on the ground in front of him, pinned there by Ragnarok's power. "But if you think about it, if courage is madness, then it really is another type of Madness of Fear. If you can't have courage without fear, then I won't become like you. I won't take all the world's fear."
Their faces flashed through his mind again. Maka and Soul, Black Star and Tsubaki. Kid, Liz and Patty. Rei. Annie. Ragnarok. The light around him grew brighter with each thought, with each name, washing over himself and Asura.
"I'll take all the world's courage."
The light flared, consuming both of them with its brilliance.
Shelley woke up.
That had been unexpected. She hadn't thought that she would wake again, that she would know anything but blackness. But she did wake up, did get to open her eyes and feel the warmth of the sun on her face, to see the black blood fading around her. She blinked in confusion, staring up at the blue sky above her, feeling the sunlight seep into the stones at her feet.
Something significant had just happened, and she didn't know what. The world had changed, and she didn't know why.
She wasn't alone.
She gasped as she felt the presence of the soul beside her, sitting up. Micah groaned from where he lay face down on the earth beside her, but he didn't stir. His face was pale, his cloak in tatters, his breathing labored. There were bruises on his body that hadn't been there before, blunt force injuries that she hadn't caused. They stood out starkly against his skin. The jewel at his neck was shattered and spent, the last remnants of his cards scattered around him.
His fingers were bruised and bloody. She saw that, the detail trickling in through the haze of her mind as she reached for his hand, running her fingers gently over the wounds. They almost looked like…defensive wounds. Like he had been clawing at Asura's black blood, trying to break himself free.
Or to break her free.
An image passed through her mind in that instant, the last image she saw before the darkness swallowed her. Micah surging forward, hand outstretched towards her, eyes wide in desperation. He had screamed her name.
Her fingers brushed the hair out of his face, a tender motion that came almost instinctively. And his eyes slowly opened.
She pulled her hand back. She hadn't been expecting him to wake. The red of his eyes was solemn, sunken, but the spark of intelligence was still in them as he looked up at her.
"You tried to save me," Shelley said, her voice shaking. "Why?"
Micah stared at her, drawing in a rattling breath. In some corner of her mind, she registered that she didn't like the sound of that. That it likely meant some sort of fluid in the lungs. He exhaled all at once and lowered his gaze, corner of his lip quirking upwards.
"Old habit," he said. "Are you—alright?"
"I—I think so—," Shelley said, giving herself a cursory inspection anyway. She felt sore, wounded and slightly concussed, but she didn't think she had any lasting injuries. At the very least, she wasn't bleeding out, and all of her fingers and toes still worked. But—
Her eyes landed on him again. "You're not."
"No," he agreed, closing his eyes. "I'm not. But I'm glad—that you're alright. For some reason, that makes me really happy."
Her throat closed up, tears pricking at her eyes. Her medic's mind was already working, her fingers reaching for the kit strapped to her waist. "I can—maybe—."
He caught her by the wrist, his grip surprisingly strong as his eyes opened again. "Don't," he said, brow furrowing as if the words were hard. "Just—stay. Until the end. Can you do that—for me…?"
"I—." Her voice was thick. It was hard to speak, hard to breathe, but she allowed him to pull her hand away from the medical kit. "I—can do that, Micah."
"Good," he said. His fingers fell away from her wrist as he slumped forward again, closing his eyes. "I'm glad. If someone has to take my soul, I'm glad it's you, Shelley…"
She didn't know what to stay to that, didn't know what she could say. So instead, she placed a hand on his back, hesitantly at first, and then firmer. The crease on his brow faded as he felt her touch, his features relaxing. Beneath her fingertips, she could feel his heartbeat, slow and steady, could feel his breathing.
She saw him smile. It was a faint smile, as if even smiling was taking too much effort.
She sat with him until his breathing slowed, until his heartbeat began to weaken, the space between his breaths getting longer and longer. When he spoke, it startled her. She hadn't expected him to ever speak again.
"Do you think…" he asked, his voice coming out in a whisper. "Do you think Luna will ever forgive me…?"
Shelley sucked in a ragged breath, feeling something stabbing at her heart. And yet, she smiled. She didn't understand why she smiled, even through the tears and the pain and the anger, but she did. Her hand moved up, threading through his hair.
"Ask her yourself," she said.
He smiled, pushing back against her hand just slightly.
And then he sagged back onto the earth and was gone.
It was surprisingly quiet in the aftermath of the battle.
Morgan would have thought that with so much happening, with so many main players, that it would have been loud, but it was almost startlingly silent. It was as if a hush had settled over the whole world in the aftermath, like all creation was holding its breath, waiting to see that the threat was truly gone and that life could actually continue. There were only two main hubs of activity, the space around the DWMA's airship and the group of people surrounding the newly-minted shinigami.
It was interesting. Her grandmother had wanted to create a new bearer of the Fragment of Fear, and in many ways, she had succeeded. Just not the way she had wanted to.
In the silence, it was easy to slip away. No one noticed that she had broken away from the main group, no one except for Cassie, who had understood with a glance that this was something Morgan needed to do alone.
She landed softly on the surface of the island, walking towards the figure that lay prone on the ground, staring up at the sky. The sword in her hand was heavy as she loomed over her grandmother, looking down on this woman that had caused her so much pain, that had made her childhood such a torrent of misery. She looked down at the woman that had had her uncle killed, her mother killed, that had driven her other uncle into killing himself.
The Morrigan looked up at her, beautiful even in her weakness, and smiled. Morgan debated the merits of putting Excalibur's point straight through her teeth.
"Are you here to kill me, granddaughter?" the Morrigan asked.
The sword point wavered, her right hand tightening its grip on the hilt. She could feel Excalibur's eagerness in the blade and had no doubt that the sword would follow through, if that was what she wished. She could still feel the thin strip of cord tied around her wrist, blocking out the Pull of Magic. This feeling had nothing to do with the Pull.
A part of her, a part that had nothing to do with being a witch and everything to do with being a human, wanted to do it.
But only a part.
The rest of her had better things to do with her time.
"Unlike you," Morgan said, narrowing her eyes at her grandmother. "I don't kill family. But there is someone here who would like to speak with you."
She stabbed Excalibur point down through the ground, removing her hand from the hilt and letting it fall back to her side. As she turned away from her grandmother, she glanced at the sword, pausing in place.
"Our bargain is fulfilled," she said.
She could feel Excalibur's agreement as she turned her back, walking away.
"I surrender!" the Morrigan cried less than half an hour later, practically throwing herself at the Old Witch and the witches arrayed around her. Her hair was frazzled and standing on end, her appearance disheveled as she grabbed onto the witch's cloaks. "I surrender!" she yelled, pointing at Excalibur with one finger. "Now get me away from this thing!"
The witches grabbed the Morrigan by the arms, peeling her off of the Old Witch and leading her away. Maka watched the scene unfold from her position on the airship, a small smile on her face as she looked around at the people standing with her. On the other side of the airship's deck, near the prow, Liz and Patty were standing around Crona, who had regained control of his own body and now looked no different than he had twenty years ago. She watched out of the corner of her eye as Liz and Patty leaned in to examine him, Patty occasionally poking him in the cheek.
"So Asura went in here?" Patty asked, poking Crona harder. Crona looked away, lowering his eyes to the ground, one of his hands gripping the other.
"Um—well—," Crona began.
"So what, are you a shinigami now too or something?" Liz asked, her hands on her hips as she leaned closer. Crona stepped back nervously, avoiding her gaze.
"Uh, well that's—."
"You don't look like a shinigami!" said Patty, reaching forward and grabbing Crona by the face.
Crona let out a squeak of surprise, and the air around him rippled for a second, his image distorting as if a second image had been overlaid on top of the world. In that second image, Crona's pink hair had changed into a deep black laced with white stripes shaped like eyes, and his dark eyes flashed a bright red. The sky flashed red with black clouds before returning back to its original form, Crona's normal coloring asserting itself. Liz shrieked in panic and leaped away from him as Patty let out a whoop of delight, clapping her hands.
"Awesome!" Patty said, even as Crona shrank back away from her, wrapping his arms tight around his middle. "Do that again!"
"Whoa, cool…" said Bright Star with wide eyes, standing next to Crona for a second before being ushered away by a frazzled-looking Tsubaki.
"Hey!" Kid barked from where he was standing with the witches, overseeing the capture of the Morrigan. "Don't mess around with that!"
Patty grinned and skipped over to Kid, her hands clasped behind her back. "So, is Crona going to live with us now?" she asked.
Kid looked uncomfortable. "Um—well—," he began.
"Because you know, if he's like you now, he should probably live with us, right?" Patty asked.
"Well—uh—we can decide that when we land—," Kid began, but Patty was already running back over to Crona, grabbing him by both hands and spinning him around.
"You're going to live with us~" she said. "You can have the attic. The kids are too scared to go up there."
Crona stared at her with wide eyes as she manhandled him, looking flustered and confused.
"We're not putting him in the attic!" Kid shouted. He thrust the clipboard he was holding into the hands of a confused-looking Soul, marching over to her. "Patty—!"
Soul blinked over at Maka, holding up the clipboard with one hand. He pointed at it with the other, as if asking her what the hell he was supposed to be doing with it. Maka raised her hand to her mouth to hide her giggle and looked away, waving him off with her free hand. She looked back at the activity around her as more people arrived from the surface of the moon, landing on the deck.
"YES!" Ayame shouted as she transformed back into her human form, leaping on Rei and wrapping her arms around his neck. "Yes! We're alive! We made it! We're awesome!" Rei stared at her, a little bemused as she pried herself off of him, jumping twice on the deck before spinning around, her eyes landing on Vayne. "Vayne—get over here, you big dope! We made it! Clark—."
She froze as she saw Clark, who was leaning against the ship's railing, his head bowed. One of his arms was wounded and being tended to by a medic, but his free hand was covering his eyes, his glasses pushed up over the hand. Maka took a step towards him at the same time as Rei did, and the two of them froze, glancing at each other in surprise.
She smiled first. Rei looked away, his expression hesitant, before he returned it.
"I'm proud of you," she said, and she was. Seeing him charge in had almost given her a heart attack, but she couldn't deny that she was proud of him. "All of you," she added, inclining her head to the two girls standing with him.
A small voice spoke up from somewhere around the vicinity of Rei's left hip. "So—uh—does this mean we aren't in trouble?"
"Oh, you're grounded until graduation, Cori," said Maka without missing a beat. "But we can talk about that later." She raised her eyes back to Rei's, smiling at him again. "You should go to your friends."
Rei nodded, still looking slightly awkward as he released his hold on the twins, walking over to the small huddle that had formed around Clark. Maka watched as Morgan, who had just landed, stepped away from her spot beside Ayame, giving Rei room to stand between them. The two of them exchanged a smile, and Rei put a hand on Ayame's shoulder as he turned to speak to Clark.
She felt Soul approaching her before she saw him, felt him place an arm around her shoulder as he looked down at the twins. Annie immediately threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his waist, and he blinked in surprise before smiling, placing a hand on her head of white hair.
"You're okay, kiddo," he said, and Maka got the sense that he was saying it as much for himself as for Annie. "You're alright."
"What about me?" Cori asked, frowning at Soul. "Do I get a hug?"
"You get grounded," Soul said, frowning at her. He glanced at Maka. "Did you already ground her?" At Maka's nod, he turned back towards Cori. "You're grounded twice."
Cori pouted at him, lip quivering. Soul let out a long-suffering sigh, holding out his other arm. "Come on, then."
Cori grinned, launching herself at him. Soul let out an 'oof' as she made contact, nearly throwing him to the ground. He caught her midair, managing to get his arm underneath her legs so that she was sitting down as she threw her arms around his neck.
"Ouch, careful—," Soul said. "You're getting too big for that."
Maka smiled, shaking her head. While Soul was busy with Cori, she crouched down, gently touching Annie's shoulder.
"We're going home, Annie," she said.
To Maka's surprise, when Annie peeled herself away from Soul to look at her, she wasn't scared. Her face didn't have her usual, shy, uncertain expression.
Instead, she was grinning. A bright smile that went from ear to ear, reaching her eyes. It didn't have the same fire as Cori's smile, but it was there. While she was still puzzling this out, Annie drew back from Soul and threw her arms around Maka, who caught her automatically.
"I'm so glad you guys are okay," Annie said.
"Yeah," said Maka, tightening her grip around Annie. "I'm glad you're okay too."
The trip home was uneventful, especially when compared to the trip out, and the airship, battered, bruised, but still functional, landed in Death City just as the sun was beginning to set for the day. Maka said goodbye to Rei—who had been dragged away by his friends for a hug and group photo—and walked home with Soul, Cori and Annie. She held on to Cori's hand as they walked, and Annie rode on Soul's shoulders, her arms resting on the top of his head as he held onto her by the ankles. Maka smiled as Annie raised her hand, waving a cheerful goodbye to 'Crona-san' as they left the airship landing.
She was asleep by the time they rounded the next corner, and Cori was nodding off on her feet. Maka eventually gave in and let Cori ride on her back, and within seconds the child's head was pillowed on her shoulder, Cori snoring so softly that there was no doubt in Maka's mind that she was really asleep this time. She looked over at Soul as the two of them walked, the shadows gathering as the sun sank beneath the western horizon, the yellow moon rising up and gleaming for the first time in decades. She didn't realize until then how much she'd missed this—walking home in the moonlight.
"They're good kids," Soul said, his eyes moving over Cori. "Even when they pull off stunts like that."
"We did alright," said Maka with a smile, nodding. The smile faded from her face as she remembered something, something that had been nagging at her since she first found Cori and Bright Star in that barrel on the moon. "Still…there's something weird about all of this."
"Besides everything?" Soul asked, brows arching.
Maka shook her head. "Earlier," she said, "Back when I sensed Cori…I should have been able to sense her much earlier than that."
"You were distracted with other things," Soul said. "You weren't expecting Cori and Bright Star to turn up, so you weren't looking for them."
"That's just the thing, Soul," Maka said, looking at him. "I didn't sense Bright Star. Even when I felt something was off, I still only felt Cori. I didn't start feeling Bright Star's wavelength until after we had already found him."
Soul stared at her, and she saw the moment the implications of what she was saying sank in, saw his eyes widen as he understood.
"Damn," he said.
"Yeah," said Maka, looking back at the road. "He's going to be scary someday."
"Well, he's Black Star's kid," said Soul, letting out a breath. "It would be weird if he wasn't."
"True," said Maka. "It'll be interesting to see how they all turn out."
The two of them turned onto their street and stopped suddenly, staring. Their house had become the center of activity, several police cars arrayed around it with lights flashing. As they watched, a harried-looking Spirit ran out from the knot of policemen, running over to her.
"Maka, I'm so sorry!" Spirit said, collapsing onto his knees on the cobblestones in front of her. "I don't know what happened. I turned around and she—and she—she was gone! And I've been looking all day, and I—."
"Calm down, old man," Soul said, inclining his head towards the girl sleeping on Maka's back. "We've got her."
Spirit's eyes widened, and he looked from Cori to Soul to Maka to Annie and back to Cori again.
Then he let out a sigh of relief, his eyes rolling into the back of his head as he collapsed face-first onto the street.
A/N: The end of the Crona scene is brought to you by Psychadelic Souljam (from this anime's soundtrack). It's been fun, all! See you at the epilogue!
