"I've got the strangest urge to sing Let it Snow right now."

"Is t-that so?"

"Well, the weather is quite frightful. And a fire would be very delightful right now, wouldn't you agree?"

"Care to explain why y-you're not f-freezing to death?"

"I imagine the harmonious symmetry of my attire warms my core."

"M-mine's symmetrical too. M-most outfits are."

"I suppose it's the reaper blood, then."

"D-damn y-you."

Kidd made a noncommittal noise. "I could turn the stove on. I think we've still got gas."

"No," Maka protested. "S-save it for nighttime. When it gets c-colder."

"It could be nighttime right now, you know. We've got no way of telling."

"You c-could go upstairs and look out the w-window, you know. M-my internal clock s-says it's s-still afternoon."

"As expected, you've got some unusual tricks up your sleeve."

"What's t-that supposed to mean?"

She shook a fist in his general direction, from underneath her fortress (read: mountain) of blankets. The weekend before winter break- midterms were rapidly approaching, and Maka had joined Kidd for study sessions (at his nice big mansion, of course). The weather forecast that particular morning hadn't been anything out of the ordinary, so she hadn't thought to wear anything special. She'd be inside, too, after all.

The weatherman was currently feeling the wrath of everyone in Death City, because somehow, the entire city had been snowed on. And everyone had been snowed in. Power had cut out after a few hours, and soon all the windows and doors had been blocked. No heaters, and no contact with the outside world.

Maka secretly thanked whatever gods were out there that this house had a seemingly unlimited supply of blankets.

"At what point should I relinquish my furniture to you for firewood?"

"T-the storm won't last t-that long." She paused, her face contorting, and her head whipped to face Kidd. "Right?"

"I dunno."

"You dunno?!"

"I dunno. Relax. We've got enough here to last until winter's over."

"Does anyone else in the ent-t-tire city? Are our friends going to have to become cannibals to survive?"

"Aren't most of them cannibals already? I mean, souls and...you know."

"It doesn't count if they don't eat the f-flesh." Silence. "I t-think."

"Hm."

"B-back me up here. You've gotta know a ton about this."

"I could say the same for you. Are you sure you're warm-blooded, by the way? There's no way you're still cold."

"A-am too." A solitary arm emerged from the blanket fortress. "Feel my hand."

He felt her hand. "Huh. Maka the lizard."

"Your hand is really warm." Her face emerged. "Are you telling me reapers are space heaters?"

"...That's really not our intended purpose."

"Added bonus. Come here."

She spent several seconds untangling the mess of fleece and cotton, yanked Kidd inside the stronghold, and tossed the loose ends over his head.

Maka frowned. "You're too tall."

He slouched, a bemused smile on his face. "Better?"

"No. This design is flawed. I need to rework it."

"If I may-"

"You may not."

"Food?"

"...You may."

Kidd dismissed himself to the kitchen, and when he returned to the living room he found that Maka was halfway through constructing a frame for an actual blanket fort.

"How many blankets are in this house, exactly?" She stopped her work to look at him, and he noticed first and foremost that her gaze was unshakeable. He let himself stay quiet for a few moments, and then shrugged.

"Fix your hair, then we'll go hunting."

She perked up, hands combing through her bangs, sorting them back into place. "Are my pigtails still even?"

"Yes."

Maka stepped back from the frame, arms half raised to steady it in case it wobbled without her next to it. After deeming it sturdy enough to leave by itself, she approached Kidd. "What's our battle plan?"

"We could split up and figure out how many are everywhere, and go from there, or go together and get them all in one go-"

"Or," she said, "and hear me out on this."

He complied, eyebrows raised ever-so-slightly.

"Or, we could see who can get the most blankets before my awful construction piece falls apart."

"I'll take the right wing."

"See you at my winner's party."

Kidd ended up with seven more blankets than Maka (and he was rather dismayed that he couldn't have found just one more), who begrudgingly agreed to buy him dinner for his own winner's party.

The fort frame did not, to the surprise of both of them, collapse. Kidd immediately went to work on it, keeping everything straight and even, and making sure it retained a harmonious symmetrical look. He fetched safety pins when they were needed, to pin the blankets around the outside- and they had a brief argument before deciding there would be two doors and they would open vertically instead of diagonally. Maka, at one point, wondered aloud if they could fit bean bag chairs inside, for comfort, and they scrapped the entire front and back walls to include them. Kidd insisted they have four (one for each corner), and Maka shot back with a "Why do they even need to go in the corners? We could just have them against the wall". This was the one thing they just couldn't come to a consensus on, and they vehemently agreed to just toss four in there and figure out the layout later. After all, they shouldn't be thinking about the furniture before they have a ceiling.

It actually took several hours before the project was declared finished. If it hadn't been night time already, it certainly was now, Maka pointed out, and punctuated her statement with a yawn.

Kidd said that they at least had to try it out before going to bed.

They did end up putting the bean bags in each corner, and there was a large pile of blankets in the center of the small room.

"It's dark in here," Maka finally said. "It's warm, but it's dark."

"Candles might burn the place down."

"And your weird glowy eyes aren't bright enough." She frowned. "Do you have any flashlights?"

"Probably," he said, but neither of them moved.

"I'm too comfortable to move," she admitted. "Even if it was brighter, I'm probably gonna fall asleep any minute."

"Want me to make you up a bed in a guest room?"

"Nah." She stretched- "It seems like a waste to not sleep in here"-and nudged a nearby bean bag with her foot to bring it closer. When she deemed it near enough, she let herself spill out of hers and use both as a bed.

"I suppose I'll be joining you then. Slumber parties are fun, right?"

Maka snorted. "Yeah. Loads. When do you wanna take our shirts off and have a pillow fight?"

"...Is that on our itinerary?"

She fell into a fit of giggles, and chucked a blanket in his direction. "Shut up. Go to sleep."

"As you wish." The faint glow of his eyes disappeared as his eyes slid shut. "I hope you don't snore."

"I hope so too. G'night."

He hummed a reciprocation.

Three hours later, at 10AM, Liz, Patti, Soul, Black*Star, and Tsubaki came over to check on them and let them know the storm had passed- in case they didn't notice.

What they found was a crudely-constructed pillow fort, and inside, four bean bags shoved up against the walls of said pillow fort, a mess of blankets, and Kidd and Maka twisted into inhumane positions-were they cuddling? it was hard to tell-on the floor, snoring away.

a/n: yeah i have no excuse for this taking so long besides writer's block

the ghost au is coming along swimmingly though, expect that soon uwu