A/N: Yes, I know many of you may or may not loathe lyrics in fanfiction. Doesn't it get you so annoyed to see either:

1) blocks and blocks of lyrics and virtually no 'fic

2) lyrics that make no sense and/or aren't part of the story at all (as in, the song isn't playing during the action)

3) just plain old lyrics

Sorry if you hate lyrics period, (though I've been told that I am good at using them) but I had to.

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In every Heart...awaits Your Angel. ~Michael, Where Angels Come

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Chapter Two: An explanation?

A splash echoed in the lunchroom, even though the place was bursting with the noise of students.

Why?

Sugary lemonade trickled over soft peach skin and left a sticky film, soaking her hair to the roots. The girl could only stand there, in shock, as the lemon juice from the drink made her eyes water. But then the pain started to kick in, not only from the acidic beverage but the disbelief at such prejudice. Her body shook, more from feelings of worthlessness than anger and stared at the floor. At her feet an overturned plastic cup sat on its side.

Why can't I just fit in?

As fast as she could, she ran, without caring who saw the tears spilling over her face. Nothing ever went right, even if she was trying her best. The family she grew up with rejected her, so she had sought refuge at the DWMA. At least being a Meister was something she was good at, other than her failed attempts to fit in with the other Witches.

But even though she was part of one of the most elite squads at the Academy, Spartoi, they still judged her by her wavelength. Like a terrible metronome she could feel the despicable magic pulsing from it steadily as she ran through the cafeteria double doors—a badge of dishonor that was pinned to her heart and left it beating in agony. She knew just what they thought of her, but it wasn't hard to tell.

'Witch. Witch. Filthy, stinking Witch—you should just die, you're such a bitch.'

Why couldn't they accept she wasn't evil? She was different from the others.

"Kim!"

Her name meant nothing. She was nothing. Slowly, something inside was breaking, like she was walking on thin ice and the floor was about to give way into a dark pit. It was part of the reason she and Jackie had left Shibusen before they had figured out she was far from human.

"Kim, wait!"

Despite Ox's pleading she wouldn't stop running. Kim knew he meant well but there was only so much he could do for her. Even if he was now her boyfriend, Ox couldn't fight away the entire human race, could he?

Stupid Ox probably thinks he can…

"Can't you see it's impossible to accept me!" Kim yelled, gaining more speed and sprinting away from the chaos. Away from the humans, from the pain of being different. She wanted to be normal, to be human, but it was an impossible wish. Nothing could miraculously change the fact that everyone hated her guts. Still sobbing, Kim rounded a corner, slumped to the floor and leaned on the wall, looking upwards to the sky. From out of nowhere, a voice floated to her ears just as Ox caught up with her. A sudden jolt went through her chest, as if her soul were being ripped out.

"Oh! I can't take no more," said the voice, wrapping itself around Kim's heart.

"Her tears are diamonds on the floor…"

It bonded the lyrics to her sorrow, exploiting her weakness. Something was so familiar about the voice too, as if she had heard it before from someone she knew. It was futile, however, to pinpoint who exactly it was, because her mind was filling with darkness.

"And her diamonds bring me down," it sang, reflecting Ox's side of the problem. "'Cause I can't help her now…"

Standing on the roof of the school was a one small girl. She mouthed the words to her spell carefully as she surveyed the deterioration of her victim and continued the malicious attack on Kim's heart. She snapped her fingers only once before smiling sadly to herself, wishing that she didn't have to do such a deed.

"Kim, are you okay?" asked Ox. He had seen the blank look in her eye and started to worry. "About them back there, I'll report them to Lord Death, don't worry." When she didn't respond he walked over to the pink haired Meister and knelt down. "Kim?"

"Oh, She's down in it," sung the voice soothingly, unraveling a dark lullaby.

"She tried her best and now she can't win it"

A fuzzy blackness clouded her eyes as her consciousness was obscured by the haze of a damaged dream. It was too late for anyone to stop the process while it was happening.

"KIM!" yelled Ox, shaking her shoulders, but her face was expressionless. Somehow he knew he couldn't save her from going under.

"It's hard, to see them falling down," whispered the voice, regret in its tone."Her diamonds on the ground…"

"Soul's P.O.V"

So there Maka was, staring at me concerned, and it made me feel terrible. Of course, I already felt horrible because of so much unwilling exercise and the broken clock, but the worry on her face made it feel even worse. It wasn't long before I saw Amu's face appear next to Maka's as well.

Oh no, the weird girl again, I thought. Somebody pick me up and wheel me away before she has another breakdown. Speaking of which, I really felt like I needed to rest in the Infermary instead of on the dusty, hard ground.

"Soru-kun," said Amu. "I have something to ask." I automatically turned to the sound of my name and looked up to the new girl. I wasn't expecting what happened next.

My brain went nuts then.

Maka also gaped at her, mirroring my feelings of confusion.

"Huh?" said my Meister before I could.

"Who, wh-what are those things?" I yelled spastically, jumping to my feet. My legs wobbled like wet noodles but at least they held me steady.

"Huh?" said Amu, since I was pointing in her direction. Three things that looked like little girls or dolls or something floated near her head. One was pink, wore a tennis outfit, and held pom poms for crying out loud. (Which, at this point I wanted to do from such a weird day.) Another was blue; she was dressed in shorts, long-sleeves, and a vest and held a small satchel. The last was green, had a short puffy green dress with an apron, and all three had hats to match their respective outfits.

"He can see us!" said the pink one, shaking her pom poms kind of excited.

Maka perked up when she did. "Did you see that?" she asked. "So cute!" She made an attempt to grab one, but they merely floated away from her grasp.

Amu followed my wild stare. "You can see my charas?"

"Y-yes?" I said, unsure if I should be locked into an asylum or not.

She gave me an embarrassed smile and blushed. Amu scratched her cheek with one finger and looked down. "Then I guess it answers my question, aheh…"

"Which was…?" I was completely lost. I don't know jack. Maybe I was somewhere in the Death City Mental Health Facility rocking in a corner. Or worse: I was in a daze of insanity working Customer Service at The Gap. The second was less appealing than the first.

"Are you talking about the eggs?"

"Yeah! Exactly! Do you still have them?"

I nodded. Earlier, before class I had left them all in my duffle bag that I used for gym. We all went behind the bleachers to collect the darned things. I reached inside and pulled out anything egg-shaped; making sure Maka wouldn't see the unholy remains of my deceased clock. Three eggs and two open eggshells are not a good sign I take it. Mine that had the fireball on it, and Maka's with the music note—they were cracked open and there was no knowing what would happen. What the frick was in those shells anyway?

The Blue doll gave Amu a concerned look as she hovered over the duffle. "Looks like two of them have hatched already, Amu-chan."

"We've got to find them soon, desu," said the Green doll in a soft voice.

"Really?" said Maka. She threw me a quick glance—I knew just what she was thinking:

"What the hell is going on here?"

"Yes, really," said Amu. The urgency in her voice was causing her to sound squeaky. "There's no knowing what those little guys are up to unattended."

Amu tried to explain the whole 'chara' concept to us both—it wasn't getting quite through to my brain.

But then I felt something. A small little pinging sensation came from the middle of my chest, right where my soul was.

Apparently I wasn't the only one who noticed. Another look from Maka told me she had felt the same thing. It was then Amu's demeanor suddenly changed from fragile and naiive to crazy composed and somewhat battle-hardened. This surely wasn't a good sign either. Maybe I should sneak away? Cool guys don't always have to look for trouble, right? RIGHT?

Wrong.

"Amu, do you sense that?" said the Blue Doll to Amu.

But then I head a terrible screeching noise, and above us a small black object zoomed from behind, coming to a stop right in front of Maka, Amu and myself. It was shaped like an egg from what I could tell, and a large white X was on the front of it.

"An X egg!" shouted Amu and her dolls.

"X egg" what an accurate description. I would have never thought of that to name the object floating before us. Oh, look, the sarcasm detectors are broken.

"Impos-impossi-imossible," said the little egg in a warbly tone.

Maka held her hand out to me, staring at the strange sight before us. "Soul," she commanded, "transform!" Usually we only saw souls floating, if that at all, so it was even more shocking considering the Mind Screw of a morning that we had had.

Amu jumped in front of us instead, before I could change. "Wait, wait! I'll handle this." She tured to look at the dolls. "Miki!" she called, to which the Blue Doll perked up and said:

"Right, Amu-chan!"

And then there was a small glow of light from that necklace around Amu's neck that I hadn't really paid attention to much before.

"Atashi no kokoro…unlock!" yelled the new student.

And promptly the Blue Doll, ('Miki' was her name, right?) disappeared.

Amu was suddenly dressed in a pretty se—I mean…interesting outfit that made her look like one of those Parisian Artists. Sort of. Not exactly. It was what Maka would call… "kawaii".

"Amulet Spade!" Amu struck a ridiculous pose before facing the X egg with that same serious look as before.

"Woah," I heard myself mutter. "That was sorta cool."

And then there was an explosion of darkness. It streaked past Amu and it nearly hit Maka. Luckily I shoved her out of the way and ducked before it could blast me to bits. Meanwhile, Amu had somehow conjured this giant blue paintbrush and was swinging it around. Giant globs of rainbow were flying everywhere, missing the X egg because it was too quick for her attacks. The egg would pause in the air at times to throw a few dark blasts our way, but for the most part Maka and I hid behind some columns.

"We've got to help," Maka told me, and she was right. What kind of people would we be if we didn't? Even if Amu seemed accustomed to fighting whatever weird opponent she was up against now. I transformed, (like I should have done earlier) and Maka charged into the battle, swinging me all over the place.

Unfortunately, the egg was still too fast.

Also, Amu wasn't amused at our efforts to help. "No," she cried, "don't destroy the X egg!"

"What?" I said. From where I sat in the Black Room, I couldn't help but frown. This chick was crazy. It looked evil, it attacked us, and she didn't want to destroy it?

Un-freaking-believable.

As if my day made no sense already.

"Just keep it busy until I can purify it," she explained. Holding the paintbrush and panting, Amu looked like she had been through Boot Camp. Sweat was pouring down her face, and I wasn't sure how long she would last without our help.

Maka (rudely I might add) used me to point to the subject of our conversation. "But how do you propose we do that?" she screeched. Good thing I don't have ears in my Weapon-Form or else I'd be in pain right now. But still, Maka had been pretty damn loud.

"Don't worry. I'll—," a blast had connected with Amu's stomach. She yelled out in surprise, but the attack also looked pretty painful. It was the longest I'd seen her stand still since her sudden 'transformation' and I wasn't surprised. She looked like she couldn't quite stand. I told Maka to move her ass before we got hit as well, but it didn't stop her from calling out Amu's name in concern.

"If I get hit like that again…" I heard the girl mutter. She was still on the ground, so the shock of the attack most likely had paralyzed her for a moment. I was about to tell Maka to go back and slice that egg to shreds before it hurt Amu anymore.

However, another flash of light blinded us just as another blast of darkness was headed toward Amu's defenseless state.

"Holy Crown!" I heard a high voice say.

It was so strange I couldn't even comprehend what had happened. There was this blonde kid standing in front of Amu that wasn't there moments ago.

"Tadase-kun?" Amu yelled. She had risen to her feet, but the shock in her voice was clear. She definitely knew who this mysterious person was.

"Sorry we're a little late," said the kid quickly, "ready for this?"

And then there was another little doll, chara, whatever.

"Hi Maka!" Before my Meister was a little girl in a leather jacket, blue shorts, and headphones. She had short brown hair and red eyes.

Maka stared at her in a daze. Sometimes she couldn't resist cute things, but this was ridiculous! In the middle of a battle no less…I wanted to slap my palm into my face, but no one could see it so there was no point.

"Are you…my chara?" she asked the little flying girl.

She nodded and winked. "Yup. Now Let's rock this party!"

"Tadase, you ready for this?" Amu seemed to have recovered a bit after being protected by this…was it a guy? I'm sorry, but for me it was hard to tell.

Well 'Tadase' seemed all too happy to nod back and turned to his own chara, which looked like a little prince-thing. "Let's go Kiseki." He made the same strange hand movements as Amu had minutes ago and yelled with authority: "Boku no kokoro, unlock!"

A second later he was wearing a frilly prince outfit. It could have at least had a manly color, but instead it was a creamish-yellow.

Huh, I thought, very campy.

Maka seemed to buy into the odd phenomenon that was happening this morning. She copied Tadase and whispered to herself "Atai no kokoro, unlock!" probably hoping she could do the same thing.

After a few blinding sparkles she was wearing her own outfit.

"Rebel Spirit!" echoed her voice, thought it probably was just my imagination.

"What— hey!" she yelled at full volume. My guess: she was probably surprised that it had worked at all.

Just to be funny I pointed out the obvious.

"Dude," I teased, "it happened to you too!"

Maka gave her usual huff of anger.

"I know Soul. "

I examined the outfit some more, looking her up and down through the blade in my scythe form. Not bad.

"Wow. Short shorts."

"Ha ha, laugh all you want."

I didn't want to laugh, actually. It looked really…uh…nice. Extra short shorts in black, a hooded jacket of the same color with one white stripe on the hood, and a shirt that showed most of her belly. Her hair wasn't in pigtails, but it was out and sort of ruffled looking, and she had one of those pop-star mouth-mics near her face. Not to mention this amazing red Alvarez guitar hanging from her shoulders from a guitar strap.

At this point I changed back into a human. Obviously the power-up faerie wasn't visiting me soon.

"What do I do?" she looked to where Amu and Tadase were keeping the thing busy.

"Call out the first thing that comes to mind," said Amu, "and attack with it!"

Bookworm takes too long to overthink things sometimes.

"Call out the first thing?" she said inquisitively, looking at her guitar.

In the corner of my eye I saw the egg change direction. My heart leapt into my mouth.

"Maka, it's coming this way!" a blast of darkness was barreling towards us and we didn't have time to run to somewhere safe.

We didn't have to. Maka calmed herself down and stepped in front of me. Her voice was deathly cold as she gave the guitar one violent strum.

"Defiant Chord."

. . .

Dark red streaks of lightning seemed to jump out of the guitar. They collided with the darkness and shattered the attack into little black splinters. Amu and Tadase looked on with a strange, frightened awe as they saw as the X egg seemed to leap back in surprise.

"Impossible~" it chimed sullenly, recoiling in fear.

A disembodied voice seemed to echo from the egg, other than the incessant chant of 'impossible.' A small, distressed voice that belonged to a certain Witch.

"No matter what, I get shunned!"

Soul seemed to pale at the thought. "Kim?" he said quietly. Was this whole episode Kim's doing? He looked to Maka to confirm his suspicion.

"That's Kim's voice alright."

For some reason Tadase narrowed his eyes at Soul and Maka. "She's your friend?"

"Yeah," said Maka. "She also happens to be a Witch too."

Horror and confusion flew across Amu's face. "I thought you guys hunted Witches here!"

"We do," Soul explained, "but Kim's an exception, her magic only heals things."

"Every time I try to fit in," continued Kim, "I never can! I can't do destructive magic, so Witches hate me. And humans hate me for being a Witch!"

Soul scoffed. She was going on about this? It had been an issue before, but why did it present itself now? Hadn't she and Ox resolved this at Baba Yaga's caslte?

"Come on Kim," said the scythe, "you know we care about you."

Maka merely stared at her partner for a bit. He sounded really assuring. This was rare.

"It's impossible! No one likes me." The egg seemed to have a tantrum in the air as Kim struggled with the concept of kindness. In this fractured state she could remember…something faint. It wasn't strong, but a small feeling had shone through her hypnosis.

At the statement Kim made, Maka frowned. Very unlike the Kim she knew to cast off everyone that was her friend. "You're wrong!" shouted Maka, her righteous anger fueling her voice to be able to reach Kim. "Ox loves you more than anything!"

Again the egg jumped back in surprise mid-air.

"Huh? But…" Kim trailed off guiltily and looked around. Where was she?

Nevertheless, Maka continued to scold her friend. "You're letting other people's thoughts hurt you. It's not like you, Kim."

Soul nodded in agreement and looked at the X-egg straight on. "Besides," said Soul in his best 'cool-guy is here to save you' voice. "It's their problem that they hate you, not yours. Show them you demand respect."

Now, while they were distracting the X-egg, Tadase nudged Amu just when Soul had finished off the speech nicely. "Amu, here's our chance!"

She grinned. "Right." Amu pointed to the X-egg floating above Maka and Soul, glittery magic flooding the area all around her. "Negative Heart, Lock on!" Her hands formed a heart-shape and pointed at the X-egg. "Open Heart!"

Nearly everyone in the Academy could feel the surge of power that overwhelmed the campus. Especially Lord Death. In fact, he had been watching the entire ordeal from one of his mirrors the second he had sensed the slightest bit of magic. He watched with interest as the beam coming from Amu showered the X-egg in a brilliant light, cleansing off the darkness and causing it to return to its owner, Kim Diehl.

Lord Death smiled to himself behind his mask. That girl was invaluable.

"Who would've thought," he mused to himself. "Another practitioner of the Cleansing Wavelength."

Meanwhile, everyone had changed back into their original forms after the X-egg had left. Maka herself was blinking at Amu, who merely blushed at being stared at. What everyone had felt, that was certainly different. But Maka was now sure this girl had an exceptionally strong soul.

"So, what now?" asked Soul.

"I think we should check on Kim," said Maka. She ran off in search of the Meister, going in the same direction she had felt that the egg had left.

. . .

I am so sorry that I haven't updated in so long. Hopefully I can give you more chapters soon.

Next time, Amu goes on her first mission. Alone. Lord Death orders it, which is really odd for him to send a new student by herself. But, she does have a Weapon by next chapter, thanks to Tadase's arrival. (It'll be a surprise)