Freefall
by. Poisoned Scarlet
15a
"Nothing is wrong, Maka-chan." Tsubaki smiled prettily, hiding her discomfort by taking a drink of her tea. Maka fingered the rim of her cup while Tsubaki distracted herself by watching ripples spread through the hot drink with every jerky move. "Professor Stein's workload is just getting the best of me, that's all."
"Yeah, he has been hard on us this whole year." Maka offered a sympathetic smile. "Even I've been struggling to finish the work he's assigned us. He isn't going to stop just because the end of the semester is near, though – I heard he's going to double it soon."
Tsubaki groaned, shoulders slumping. "Is he, really? Oh, I hope he doesn't! I'm already very behind on the work!"
"How far behind are you?"
"Two assignments." She meekly admitted.
"I can help you if you want." She offered, helpfully. "I'm ahead by one assignment."
"You're ahead?" Tsubaki gawked although she quickly shook off her surprise. It should not come as a surprise: Maka would always be a scholar at heart, no matter if Soul had managed to loosen up a bit and broadened her views on how to entertain oneself without the need of a book or studying. "Would it be too much trouble if you helped me out?"
"It wouldn't be a problem at all, Tsubaki!" Maka beamed, knowing that this may be her only chance to discover what had been eating at her friend for the past two weeks. Tsubaki's smile had been dim, forced, and her usually calm temperament had been replaced with a nervous, restless, air. Even Black Star had managed to pick up on it although Maka was convinced Tsubaki's restlessness had something to do with him.
"Then we better get started today." Tsubaki smiled, a little more genuine. "B...Black Star won't be joining us, too. He said he had an engagement elsewhere..."
"Where else does that idiot have to be?" Maka snorted, swirling around what was left of her soft drink. "The gym or something?"
Tsubaki merely pasted on a smile to hide her trepidation.
15b
"Aye! Being me another round, yeah?" A raucous voice hollered from somewhere down the bar table, a crowd of rugged and built men surrounding him and paying rapt attention to the television screen. Their eyes hardly left the screen, engrossed in the football game that may very well earn them an extra fifty bucks if luck was on their side.
"How do you deal with that all the time?" Soul asked bluntly, sparing a glance at the crowd of men when they burst into cheers as their team scored a point. Nygus merely smiled and continued to pour another round of beers for the men.
"You just take it, Soul, there ain't much else you can do." Nygus dismissed, tapping a passing employee on the shoulder and gesturing for him to bring the group of men their drinks. "Business is business."
"Sounds lame." Black Star commented from beside Soul, tapping his shot glass on the table impatiently. "Refill!"
Nygus rose a sharp brow. "That's your fourth one."
"Your point?"
Nygus refilled his glass with a shrug of the shoulders and exchanged a look with Soul, who let nothing but a simple shrug answer his friends silent question. Nygus watched Black Star down that drink as well, nose wrinkled against the bitter, burning, taste of tequila. He waited for a few seconds before sliding the shot glass back to her, demanding another shot.
"Just do it." Soul muttered when Nygus protested. "The faster he gets drunk, the easier it is to make him talk."
"Ha! As if six shots can get me drunk!" Black Star haughtily sniffed, downing this shot as well. Soul rolled his eyes when Black Star exhaled loudly, grinning out: "See? It's gonna' take a helluva lot more than that to get the great me to start talking! Gimmie another one, mummy face!"
"Whiskey alright?"
Soul smirked at his friends sneaky tactics.
"Bring it on!" Black Star slapped a hand on the table, challenge flaming in his eyes.
As it turned out, two shots of whiskey seemed to be his limit.
"...She hates me...she totally hates me, man, it's not even funny..." Black Star mumbled depressingly, slumped over the bar table lifelessly. He stared glumly at the polished onyx tabletop, gripping his half-empty shot glass in his hand as he recalled the fear in her eyes. "I screwed up big time. Fuck, if your dumbass girlfriend hadn't said anything to her, this wouldn't be happenin'! This is all that flat-chests fault!"
"Hey, who you callin' a dumbass?" Soul snapped. "That's Maka you're talking about. Watch it."
Black Star scoffed and waved him off, stewing in his melancholic thoughts. He finished his drink, halfheartedly sliding the shot glass to Nygus once more. The woman filled this glass with water instead of more alcohol and Black Star drank it all, seemingly not noticing the change in drinks.
"Alright, so she found out about your past job, too." Nygus began, after he let his head thump on the tabletop. "I'll tell you what I told Soul: let her cool down—!"
"She's not pissed!" Black Star snapped, sending her a dark glare. "She's...she's scared." He frowned deeply and slumped further into his seat. He flicked the shot glass with his finger grimly. "She's scared of me. Of what I did before..."
Nygus and Soul exchanged uneasy looks but it was Soul who spoke up next:
"Look, man, although Tsubaki looks like a rabbit could scare her into hiding, she's stronger than she looks. Maka called me an hour ago to tell me that she was gonna' help her out with some schoolwork. Maybe she'll be able to get her to open up and they can talk it out – do what girls do when they're alone – and she'll get over it." Soul finished his soda as Black Star pondered this new outcome. "Maka's good at giving pep talks. She'll get Tsubaki back on track in no time."
"Yeah...yeah! You're right!" Black Star brightened, and pointed a finger at Nygus. "Gimmie another shot, you hag—OUCH!"
"Who you callin' a hag, boy?"
"Well, I dunno', why don't you look in a mirror and tell me—UGH!"
"'Star, just shut up before she brings out her knives..." Soul hissed, Black Star face down on the tabletop holding his possibly cracked skull, a string of curses answering Soul.
Nygus merely cracked her knuckles with a satisfied huff. "Listen to Soul, you midget, and maybe you'll leave with your head intact!"
"Who you callin' a midget, you old bit—!"
Soul cringed when Black Star was body slammed on the tabletop by one furious Nygus, the crowd of rugged men cheering when their team made another score, and the others in the bar not at all surprised by the outcome of Black Star's drunken boldness.