A/N: Thanks a lot for the patience and thank you, Kumakku, for the comments! Hope you enjoy this next chapter, too!
And I added Rins character profile to the introduction (if anyone did not notice yet), hope that helps you getting used to her. ;)

Chapter Two

Jona grinned madly. "He was so pathetic."

Maka felt anger dwell within her. These creatures.. these kishin eggs that killed only for pleasure. She hated them. From the bottom of her heart, she despised them. For all the fear they raised among humanity, for all the innocent lives they took, for all the injuries they caused to herself and to fellow meisters and weapons, but most of all.. most of all she hated them for all the lost souls within them, the shattered dreams that were forever lost.

She clenched her fists. In her eyes, a grim appeared that she had experienced before, during her fight against Prof Stein and Medusa.

"Don't, Maka," Soul said calmly, suppressing the same anger she struggled with. "Don't let him get to you." It almost got you killed last time, he added in his thoughts, and he knew she implied that thought to his sentence all by herself.

"Don't give me that, Soul." She could not... She could not just let this be. "Let's just get this over with."

"Tsh." She'll never change. He chuckled, then transformed into his scythe form.

Maka took her stance, the anger still in her eyes.

"Na, did I piss you off?" Jona giggled again. "Ah, and I'm not even done yet. You're still missin' the good part, you know? C'mon, you wanna know, don't ya?"

"Shut up!" Maka yelled and wanted to charge at him.

Rin appeared in her way, stopping her mid-step. "If you fight like this, you're dead meat in no time. You better calm yourself down. If you want to survive, that is. Besides," she looked over her shoulder into the girl's olive eyes, "I'm going in first." She was gone in a flash. Her clothes ripped where the claws shot out her forearms and the axe blades exited front and rear of her lower legs.

As Jona knew her speed, he was not too surprised when she suddenly appeared within his reach, slicing off two of his arms with her very first strike. However, the wounds immediately started to regenerate. He had fed on many souls to obtain enough energy to hold within himself because he knew he would face Shibusen again, sooner or later. "Oh, don't be so harsh! I really want to end my story, you know?"

What speed... Maka and Soul needed a moment to adjust to the fast battle movements. Their anger had vanished due to their surprise. "Alright," Maka grinned, "Let's help her out." She charged.

Jona dodged Maka's first attack without any struggles. What's she thinking? She'll never cut me with some ordinary scythe. He hardened his bandages so that Rin's next attack did not cost him another limp as her blade went only halfway into his flesh. At the same time, he countered with his remaining arms.

Rin dodged and carved her claws into the arm that aimed for her. Blood splattered onto her face, its metallic smell itching in her nose.

Maka's next strike hit. The sound of metal crashing on metal jangled in the air. She did not even leave a scratch on Jona. Damn, what's with this guy?

"He, Maka," Soul called out to her, "Guess this guy is as strong as she said."

"Yeah," she answered, only half listening while she tried to work out some plan to counter this kishin egg.

"I doubt we'll be getting anywhere without using your wavelength." He meant her specialty, the power she had inherited from her mother – the anti-demonic wavelength. Even her Witch Hunter -an weaker version of her wavelength- more than doubled the power of a regular strike.

"Right." She backed up, leaving Jona to Rin while she focused on herself and Soul. "Soul Resonance." Their souls connected, their wavelengths and heartbeats becoming one. "Traditional Scythe Master Craft: Witch Hunter," she said calmly and the scythe spread a second blade and lit up with the wavelength. Then she charged at Jona again.

Rin had kept Jona busy so he did not notice the rise in power of his second opponent. Now she jumped back, out of Maka's way, so the girl could strike full force. And she did.

The Witch Hunter sliced Jona neatly in half, but he simply used two of his hands as feet while his lower body started to regenerate itself. Seeing the shock on the meisters face, he burst into laughter. He did not feel any pain which was a mayor advantage concerning his regenerating ability. If he would have suffered pain from every cut and every regeneration, it would wear out his mind and soul, drawing the energy he had obtained a lot faster, making him more vulnerable.

Maka bit her lower lip. She knew that Jona was able to regenerate as long as the souls he had eaten supplied him with their energy, but she had not anticipated that he would net even flinch at wounds as large as this. Damn, Rin warned us that this would take its time. This jobs is more suited to Black*Star. Why is this moron sick in bed now?

"Maka!"

As Soul called out to her, she noticed Jona's attack just in time to dodge.

"What the hell are you dozing off for? Do you wanna get yourself killed?"

"My bad, Soul." She focused her wavelength into a Witch Hunter again. All they could do for now was cutting him up so that he had to use up his energy for regeneration.

/Later on.../

They stroke by turns, then changed their pattern to two strikes by Rin and one by Maka and Soul since the Witch Hunter did cost her a lot of energy and already started to tire her out. They had been doing this for almost an hour now, and Jona seemed as lively and healthy as he had been at the beginning of their fight. Maka was sweating and panting hard. She was not used to her fights to last that long, and she felt her concentration crumble.

Maka's mind went blank only for a second, and that's when she was hit by a deflected strike. She did not take any damage, but she was lifted off her feet and sent flying, the scythe sliding out of her hands. Maka hit a wall, a yelp escaping her lips.

Soul transformed back, calling out for his meister as he was mid-air off into another direction, not paying attention to himself and his surroundings. Seconds later, he hit the ground, his head smacking a cobblestone that were lying around everywhere because their fight had destructed the street in several places. He instantly lost consciousness.

Jona saw his chance and aimed for the white-haired boy with three of his arms at once.

Maka coughed and struggled to her feet when she saw the attack. "Soul!" She took a step forward, but she would never make it in time. She would lose him. There was no way he would survive a direct hit to a vital part. Maka wanted to close her eyes shut, but she just stared over to her partner in horror for what was to come. She had totally forgotten that there was one more person to the calculation – Rin.

The weapon girl suddenly appeared in front of Soul, using her incredible speed to get ahead of Jona's arms. She spread her right wing, causing two of the bandages to bound and change directions, each hitting the wall close by. The last one, which came straight towards her, she tried to block with her claws. Yet, it went through, grazing the left side of her neck and the top of her left shoulder. Her blood ran down the hardened bandage while she still used her claws to prevent the strike from reaching the unconscious companion. Luckily, she was successful. The tip of the bandage stopped right before it could pierce the boy's throat. She focused her strength and worked her claws exerted through the steeled flesh, finally tossing the limp aside.

Maka's mind snapped back into her body. She hurried over to her comrades, knelt by Soul's side and shook him, trying to have him regain consciousness.

Jona grinned. "You can't save him, Sōma-san, you know that. I will have his soul, and hers too, it's just a matter of time."

Rin spit some blood to the ground in front of her and shifted her weight, taking a stance. "Over my dead body."

His eyes hardened and lit with blood thirst. "That can be arranged."

She was unable to dodge, she was unable to block. She did not even see it! The next thing she knew was that she felt almost unbearable pain in her left arm, and her scream echoed through the street. One of Jona's bandages had pierced her left upper arm, close to her shoulder, shattering the bone in this area completely. As Jona pulled it back out, the girl's limp only swung useless at her side. She bit her lower lip until it bled and her right hand instinctively clenched over the wound. She was barely able to stand and the pain seemed to fill her head entirely.

"Rin." Maka gasped the girl's name and flinched as she remembered the moment when Asura wounded her severely on her side.

The weapon panted. Her sight was blurry and she felt weakness shivering inside of her, struggling to take over the exhausted body and put it to sleep. "Focus, Maka-san. You need to wake your partner. We won't make it without him, so you'd better hurry."

/At the same time at Shibusen.../

The Grim Reaper frowned. Could they make it? He knew Rin had not shown her true powers yet, since she was not actually a weapon but more of a supportive tool. Just as a weapon amplified a meisters power, she was able to amplify a weapons power instead. Using this unique ability, she is capable to more than quadruplicate the partners' usual power. In addition, even though the girl had a strong character, her soul was highly adaptive. But will she be able to use her ability now, injured like this?

The headmaster of Shibusen pushed the thought aside. If he did not think they were strong enough together, he would have never let them go by themselves, or even let them go in the first place. However, as things were now, they would need medical attendance once this fight was over.

He called for Nygus and told her to get ready with everything she might need. By the time she and her team were ready for departure, the fight would probably be over. It's either that or they're dead.

A/N: In the next chapter you'll get the rest of "Jona's story" and Rins memories in some way, too.