Author's Notes- A little bit late, but hopefully that's alright. Going through O'Hare was a nightmare, and then I had to do some major revisions to this chapter once I (finally) got home because I had a stroke of genius yesterday and knew I needed to fix/improve this chapter before I could happily publish it.
❅ Chapter 4 ❅
The next day was overcast and sleet or snow was predicted in the afternoon. Most of the group was reluctant to drive up the mountain with the promise of miserable weather looming over them. It didn't stop Harvar or Jackie, the two most devoted ski enthusiasts in the group, from hopping in his van and going up anyway, but the rest of them chose to stay down at safer elevations. Even Black*Star, much to everyone's surprise, decided to stay with Tsubaki rather than get in more time on his snowboard.
The group lazed around in the common room on the second floor of the A-frame, talking idly and enjoying each others' company. Ox and Maka played a game of Scrabble that almost ended in a fistfight, prevented only by Kilik's repeated cautions not to swear in front of Fire and Thunder and an eventual physical intervention by Tsubaki, who threatened to put them both in a corner if they couldn't behave.
As late morning faded into early afternoon, sandwiches were made and distributed and the Evans's enormous flat screen was flipped on so that Kilik, Soul, Black*Star, and Liz could watch the basketball game. The instant the score flashed on the bottom of the screen, however, they discovered that the Death City Devils were losing by an absolutely ridiculous margin. A round of loud groans went up and they quickly gave in to the demands of the others to turn off the television because, in Maka's words "basketball was boring."
Not long after giving up on basketball in disgust, it started to become apparent that they were getting restless. This manifested itself in the form of Patti chasing random targets around the room with a sprig of mistletoe she had gotten from god-only-knew-where, attempting to corner them under it in company with the most awkward match imaginable.
After a solid twenty minutes of this, during which time Soul had only narrowly escaped being forced to french Black*Star, Liz apparently decided she'd had enough of her sister's antics. Looking up from filing her nails, she said, "Patti, why don't you get out your craft stuff?"
Patti, distracted momentarily from stalking her latest prey, looked up at her sister and pouted. "But I can draw anywhere!" she protested. "We're on vacation, we should be doing something special!"
Tsubaki spoke up. "You know, she has a point. We can sit around talking anywhere. We should do something we can only do here, and take advantage of it."
Soul snorted and mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like "tell that to my parents."
"Why don't we go for a walk?" Patti suggested cheerily.
"You know, that's not a bad idea," Liz agreed. "Growing up in Brooklyn, Patti and I didn't really get to walk in the woods much."
"Yeah!" Kilik piped up. "Are there any good hiking trails around here, Soul?"
Black*Star stared at Kilik, who was next to him on the sofa. "Dude, weren't you saying like five minutes ago how you never want to leave this couch again because it's so comf-"
The rest of what he was saying was lost as Kilik slammed his hand over Black*Star's mouth. When the utility meister noticed he was being stared at, he attempted (badly) to turn it into a fraternal hug/wrestling move combo.
"Oh-kay then," Liz said, after giving him a skeptical look. Turning her azure gaze back to Soul, she repeated Kilik's question.
Soul shrugged. "Yeah, there's a couple. Most of 'em are the starts of high-country hiking trails, not something you wanna tackle in the winter at all, let alone with bad weather coming, but there's a few easy walking trails just upslope."
The trail head was very nearby the Evans's, only a half mile or so from the cabin and not very far beyond the boundary between their privately-owned land and the state-owned parkland. Since it was so close, they elected to walk rather than take one of the cars. The entire group ended up going, with the exception of the two who were off skiing. Even Ox was coaxed into coming despite his still sensitive ankle, but he insisted that he would be taking frequent steps if he got too sore.
"Aggravating even a minor injury can significantly impact one's physical health and agility down the line," he preached unnecessarily so, for every meister present knew far too well how past injuries could affect their performance on the battle field.
The trail was lovely despite the ominously grey sky, quiet and surrounded by thick Engelmann spruce and white pines. The snow on the trail was pristine and untouched, which was beautiful but caused them more than a bit of difficulty. Sheltered by the dense forest, it wasn't quite as heavy on the ground as the snow in more open areas, but it was still over two feet deep. Wading through it was a challenge, especially for Fire and Thunder, who were the smallest of the group, although no one had a particularly easy time.
After five or ten minutes of wading along in snow up to their knees at the least, Soul grumbled, "Fuck this, we should've brought some snow shoes."
Black*Star let out a cackle. "What? Snow shoes? Dorky shit like that's for pussies who can't keep up with a big guy like me!"
Soul glowered in his direction, but before he could say a word, a slender arm hooked through his elbow. Soul felt his heart flutter happily in his chest, expecting it to be MAka. When he glanced sideways and caught an eyeful of Pepto-Bismol colored hair and heard Kim say, "I think snow shoes would be a good idea, Soul!" he felt sinking disappointment.
He didn't reply, both because he had nothing to say and because he kind of hoped if he ignored her she'd go away.
No such luck.
"Maybe I could make some snow shoes," Kim announced. "If you really wanted some."
Soul had thought he'd made it clear that he wasn't interested after their conversation yesterday, but it appeared he hadn't gotten his message across. "Sure," he said with a sigh.
Kim smiled happily. "Alright, I just need some sticks! Do you guys think you could find me some branches to work with?" she asked, letting her grip on Soul's elbow loosen as she turned to face the rest of the group behind them.
Soul took the opportunity to pull free and put some distance between them.
"Does it mean I can stop floundering around in this crap?" Kilik asked.
Kim nodded.
"Then hell yes!"
"Couldn't have said it better myself!" Liz agreed enthusiastically.
The group scattered off the path, poking around beneath the trees for fallen branches. Only Kim and Maka remained behind. Kim set about tracing a series of interlocking circles and lines in the untouched snow ahead of them on the trail.
"What are you doing?" Maka asked abruptly.
"Well, this kind of magic is pretty far off my specialty, so I need to set up a matrix to support my spell work and-"
"No," Maka interrupted, "I mean what are you doing with Soul?"
It was fascinating to watch Kim's entire body visibly stiffen, locking in place. She stood frozen for a moment before straightening up and turning to face Maka. "I don't know what you mean!" she said, voice strained and shrill, much too shrill to be believable.
Maka scoffed. "Oh come on, Kim," she shot back. "You and I both know you've been hanging around him like a bad smell since you got here, so what gives?"
It was a sign of how deeply the young witch was entrenched in the lifestyle of a Shibusen meister that she unconsciously shifted her feet into a defensive stance when she felt threatened. "What's it to you?" she asked.
"Soul's my partner," Maka said fiercely.
Kim snorted. "Yeah, and he's also hot, rich, and single. It's not like being his partner gives you property rights!"
It took every ounce of Maka's questionable self-control to keep herself from leaping across the space between them and smacking the predatory smirk from Kim's pretty lips. "And it's not like he even wants you!" she snapped.
Kim's expression wavered oddly, but she retorted, "Are you sure? Maybe you're just jealous, hm, Maka?"
It hit too close to home, and Maka's smart reply withered on her tongue. "I-I just want him to be happy," she choked out.
The air immediately went out of Kim's sails. A visible slump went into her shoulders. "Oh death, you love him," she mumbled. Stumbling from the middle of the trail, she sank down onto a snow-covered boulder and hid her face in her hands. "I knew it was safe to flirt with him because he's so obviously infatuated with you, so it wasn't like he'd actually go fo it, but I didn't think you actually felt the same way!" Her tone was absolutely miserable. "I'm so sorry, Maka."
Maka wasn't sure whether she should be confused by her statement or elated by the assertion that her weapon shared her feelings. Deciding to deal with her relationship with Soul later, she sat gingerly on the boulder next to the young witch. "Kim, if you don't actually want Soul, why have you been... well...?"
"Shamelessly hitting on him?" Kim supplied in a wry but wavering voice.
Maka nodded even though Kim couldn't see her with her face buried in her hands; she couldn't respond verbally because she couldn't think of anything to say without being unnecessarily rude.
"I just... I just wanted to not look like such a fool!" Kim wailed.
"What?" Why would you look like a fool?"
Kim sniffled loudly, and it occurred to Maka that she was crying. "E-everybody thinks that I broke up with Ox, but that's not what happened," she stuttered out. "H-he b-broke up with me."
Maka's jaw dropped and she instinctively put a comforting arm around the distraught girl's shoulders. "But Ox adores you," she said blankly, completely baffled.
At her statement, Kim let out a wail and began crying harder. "B-but not e-enough t-t-to put up with th-the way I-I've been treating him!" she sobbed. "He s-said he was tired o-of m-me putting him d-down and not wanting t-to be seen in p-public with him! H-he said he deserves b-better than that and I h-hate it so much because he's right!"
There were many things in this world Maka could have expected, even predicted, but Ox Ford breaking up with Kim Diehl was not one of them. He had been utterly, faithfully devoted to the girl for years before Kim had ever given him the time of day. He had braved her verbal abuse and her mercurial responses toward him throughout their courtship and had finally gotten her to agree to be his girlfriend. Kim had been a hard-won love for Ox, and for him to reject her now... he had to really mean it. This wasn't like the many temporary interruptions their relationship had suffered when Kim changed her mind for a few days or a few weeks. This was serious.
"I'm so sorry, Kim," Maka said, hugging her friend tighter.
Kim leaned into the comfort she offered, burying her face in Maka's shoulder. "I miss him so much, but I'm so confused," she mumbled between small, hiccuping sobs. "I don't want to be with him, but I do."
"I don't understand."
Kim gulped in a few deep breaths, calming herself, although she kept her face hidden against Maka's parka. Once she was moderately calmer, she said, "Ox wasn't in the Plan."
"What plan?"
"See, when I came to Shibusen, I had a plan. I couldn't fit into witch society, but I thought maybe... I'd come to school, and I'd find a rich, handsome boy and make him fall in love with me. And I would... I would fit in with him. I wouldn't ever have to tell him I wasn't normal, we could just live out our days together and if I had to I'd age myself with magic so he wouldn't notice I wasn't getting older at the same speed. It would have been perfect, see?"
Maka didn't see, not really. How could you love someone and lie to them like that? The only secret she kept from Soul was, in fact, how much she loved him.
Kim sighed and sat back at last, wiping at her eyes embarrassedly. "I had the Plan and I pretty much stuck to it until Ox. He... he offered me a place to belong, you know? He offered me e-exactly what I was looking for, and he's not rich or very handsome, but he's cute enough and I thought maybe... maybe I could give it a shot. If nothing else, it might be good practice, at least..." She trailed off with a sniffle. "I just couldn't let go of the Plan and I guess I finally pushed him too far. And I guess I just thought, if I have to get dumped, at least I could not... look pathetic about it. "
Maka rubbed gentle circles on Kim's shoulder through her coat. "You were trying to prove to Ox that he hadn't hurt you."
"Yes, exactly."
"You know, it's okay to hurt. Trying to find the right person to love you is hard, and sometimes you get hurt in the process," Maka said, electing to ignore the hypocrisy in her words for the moment. "Maybe you should forget the plan. I mean, you may not have found some rich, handsome, knight in shining armor type to sweep you off your feet, but you still have Spartoi. You have all of us, Kim, all of your friends. We're your place to belong. And you have Jackie, too. She'd follow you anywhere, you know, just like Soul would for me."
"Maybe not just like Soul would," Kim mumbled, but her expression brightened enormously. She threw her arms around the scythe meister in a fierce hug. "Thank you, Maka. I feel so much better now. And I really am sorry for flirting with your boy."
Maka spluttered in protest as Kim released her. "Soul's- he's not-! I- Soul's not my boy! Dating your weapon is always a bad idea!"
Kim grinned like a fox. "Sounds like maybe someone has a Plan of her own that needs some reevaluating."
Ignoring Maka's stunned expression, she bounced to her feet, wiping at her cheeks to erase the last evidence of her crying jag. She returned to tracing out her patterns in the snow, now with a small smile on her face in place of the
It was only a few moments later that the rest of the group began to trail out of the woods, carrying armfuls of sticks or small downed branches. At Kim's instruction, they laid their burdens in the center of her etchings, careful not to smudge the lines. Once the whole group had deposited a sizable amount of wood in the places she directed, Kim shooed them all back from the edges of her drawings.
Kim stripped off her gloves and extended her arms out over the pile of wood, palms down and fingers splayed wide. "Raccoon-coon pon pon pon coon raccoon," she chanted.
Dim silvered-green light flickered in the outlines Kim had traced in the snow. They all stared in curious fascination, for Kim rarely did magic in front of anyone but Jackie. The lights flared up abruptly. When they faded, where the sticks they had gathered had been was a tidy little pile of ten pairs of snow shoes. Upon a closer inspection, they were all sized according the height and weight of the group members. There were even two smaller pairs designed for Fire and Thunder.
Immediately, they set about strapping the homemade snowshoes onto their feet, only to discover, during the distribution process, that Tsubaki and Black*Star were no longer among them.
"Where'd they go?" Kilik asked, looking over the group in confusion, as if he expected to suddenly spot them hiding behind Maka.
Soul shrugged. "They probably went to make out or somethin'. Better not go looking unless you wanna see Black*Star's tongue down her throat. Trust me, I've walked in on that before... it's not something you wanna witness if you can help it."
The rest of them visibly shuddered, and Fire made gagging noises and aggressively mimed vomiting into the snow, which resulted in a smack upside the head from his sister.
Jackie took the curve of a berm sharply, nearly skewing sideways as she cut around the snowbank at dangerous speeds. A patch of ice crusted on top of the snow caught her off guard and she shot across the slope at an unplanned angle. She attempted to crouch down to lower her center of gravity and regain control, but too much of her weight had been shifted off-balance and she tumbled backwards, rolling five or six feet with her momentum as her ski bindings detached.
She flopped over onto her back, pushing her goggles up off her face to breathe better.
The hissing crunch of a skier coming to a sharp halt caught her attention, and she tilted her head to see Harvar sliding to a stop next to her. He pulled off his balaclava and looked at her, silently offering her a hand to help her up. She blushed, mortified at her fall on such an easy slope (relatively speaking), but took his hand and let him pull her to her feet.
"Guess it's been longer than I thought since I last did freestyle," she mumbled by way of explanation.
Harvar shrugged. "Happens when you've been out of the game for awhile," he said, expressionless.
Jackie was in the process of dusting snow off the back of her jacket and out of her hair when he suddenly asked, "Are you alright?"
"What?" She laughed. "Yeah, I used to have worse falls on the bunny slope!"
"No, I know. I saw you go down, there's no way you'd have actually hurt anything like that. I meant... are you alright?"
Harvar had two emotions: boredom and sarcasm. You had to know him pretty well to be able to pick up on anything more nuanced than that. Jackie, for her part, did know Harvar pretty well, and she was able to read the subtle traces of concern in his expression.
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, you know, watching Kim all over Eater these last few days... it can't have been fun for you."
Jackie felt herself coloring again. Did everybody know about her unrequited crush? Was her disappointment that obvious?
"You're not obvious, if that's what you're wondering," Harvar said drolly. "It's just that once you've had a broken heart, you tend to get better at seeing it in other people."
She looked at him curiously. "Are you saying you've had your heart broken?" It was hard to picture.
He rolled his shoulders apathetically. "I wouldn't go that far, but I have cared for somebody who didn't care for me. It sucks."
"You got that right."
"But you're tough, you'll be fine."
A pleased smile crept onto Jackie's face despite the unhappy topic of conversation. Yeah, she was tough. She would keep hoping that maybe someday Kim would look at her and see her, not just as a weapon, friend, and confidante, but as a potential lover. She wanted that, and she wasn't ready to give up hope that it might someday happen. But she wasn't going to let it get her down the longer it went without that happening. She wasn't going to let it break her, because Harvar was right. She was stronger than that.
Harvar glanced away, shading his eyes against the diffuse, bright winter light that was filtering down through the cloud cover. "I'm thinking after we finish this run we might want to head back down to the cabin."
Jackie nodded. "Yeah, there's too much chatter as it is, if it starts sleeting like it was supposed to it'll be an absolute nightmare."
She set about strapping her skis back on, Harvar holding helpfully onto her shoulder to keep her steady despite the steep pitch of the slope they were on. Once she was successfully re-equipped, she shot a grin at her ski buddy.
"Last one to the bottom's a kishin egg?" she shouted, and took off, not daring to look back because she knew the other weapon would be right behind her.
Kilik fidgeted nervously with his hands in the pockets of his cargo pants as he approached Liz. This thing that had caught fire between them the last few days had him on edge. He and Liz had always been a little flirtatious together, and in the last few months it had gotten more... intense, he supposed. But multiple occasions of making out with no explanation given was a whole other level, and he didn't know what to make of it. He was going to get some answers.
He plopped down on the couch next to her, clearing his throat to get her to look up from her cell phone.
"Huh? Oh, hi Kilik," she said distractedly.
"Hey, Liz," he said. "You got a minute?"
"Uh, I guess?"
She looked wary, and that wasn't a great sign. He had a feeling she was going to bolt. Which, admittedly, wouldn't be the biggest tragedy in the world. Kilik was a big believer in the "you win some, you lose some" approach to dating, and if Liz wanted to split on him and never speak of this week of random tonsil hockey again once they returned to Death City, he could live with that. But he wasn't so sure he wanted to just let it be. Liz Thompson was definitely one of a kind, and he wanted to see if this could go anywhere. Death knew they had the chemistry!
"Listen, I wanted to talk about what happened yesterday-"
"Hey Sissy?" Patti interrupted him, popping up from behind the couch... what even had she been doing back there, anyway?
Liz looked relieved by the interruption, which made Kilik all the more certain that she wasn't all that interested in talking. "What, Patti?"
"Where are Tsubaki and Black*Star, anyway? They never came back."
Liz glanced at her cell phone again, and stared for several moments at the clock face, as if to make sure she hadn't read it wrong. "Shit, you're right," she said. "We've been back for like three hours... even Harvar and Jackie are back!" She shot him a glance that was half apologetic, half incredibly grateful for the distraction. "Listen, we'll talk later, okay?"
"Uh, okay?"
"Hey, guys, has anybody seen Tsubaki and Black*Star?" Liz called, getting up out of her seat.
A brief conference with the rest of the group revealed that none of the other members of Spartoi present had seen the shadow weapon or her meister since they had wandered off during their walk earlier.
"I don't like this," Maka said worriedly. "It's getting dark out already, and the weather's getting bad."
"We should go search!" Patti exclaimed.
Harvar nodded. "We can split up to cover more ground.
"But we'd better go in pairs," Kilik said. "It's not safe to be out alone in these kinds of conditions." That much was true, although maybe he had a bit of an ulterior motive in being the one to say it. Maybe he'd be able to have his little chat with Liz after all.
"I'm going with Patti!" Liz cried, clinging to her baby sister's arm.
Or not.
In the end, they split into four groups. Kilik stayed behind at the cabin with his weapons, so that someone would still be there if Tsubaki and Black*Star showed up there, while the rest of them divided into teams to spread out in different directions. Liz and Patti went to search the avalanche chute that was just over the next ridge from the Evans family cabin; Kim, Jackie, and Harvar headed into the woods downslope, in the event that the two of them had headed towards town; Soul and Maka hiked back up the hill in the direction of the trail they'd been walking on earlier that afternoon.
They were mostly silent except for occasional shouts of their friends' names, but once they'd reached the trail head, Maka said aloud, "If we don't find them in the next five minutes, I'm gonna just use my soul perception to find them."
"Good plan. I don't wanna be out here any longer than I have to, 'cause it's cold as balls," Soul grumbled.
"Y'know, you could have stayed back in the cabin with Kilik," Maka pointed out.
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye and snorted. "What, and let you go wandering around the mountains all by yourself? I don't think so, Little Miss Desert Queen. You'd freeze solid and then we'd have to send out a search party for you!"
She stuck her tongue out at him. "Says the boy bitching about how cold it is. Besides, we had even numbers without you. I wouldn't have been alone."
"Yeah... well... I just... um..."
"What?"
It was getting very dark, so Maka couldn't be sure, but she thought Soul might be blushing. "I maybe wanted to keep hanging out with you. It's just, we haven't really gotten a chance to spend much time together on this trip."
Maka's fingers tingled. She recognized this as one of those Moments they had, when one of them (usually Soul, who was far more of a sap than most gave him credit for) would say something a little too close to the heart and she was made sharply aware of how profoundly she loved this boy. Always in the past, if there wasn't some immediate crisis to be dealt with, Maka would find a way to brush it off, to move past it while keeping their relationship in the Strictly Platonic zone. Because that was what she had to do, right? She was going to spend the rest of her life smothering her feelings for the sake of their partnership.
This was the part where she made some smart remark about we live together, we spend time together every day. This was the part where she pretended there wasn't an undercurrent of something in Soul's words that made her hope that this really wasn't as one-sided as she liked to tell herself.
And yet...
She didn't want to. If she really thought about it, thought about the way her heart had pulled painfully in her chest each and every time she dismissed it when he said something sweet, she never had. She'd always done so in the past because that was what she was supposed to do. That was, as Kim had put it, The Plan.
Maka was a planner by nature. She loved to be three steps ahead in her schoolwork so that she was always ready for anything. She scheduled cleaning days in the apartment and marked the most efficient routes through various exhibits when she was planning a trip to the museum. She loved having a plan.
Except... Kim had followed her plan and it hadn't brought her much of anything except a broken heart. In this case, Maka had a funny suspicion that she was headed for the same sort of disaster. Soul was a strangely patient boy, but even the most patient person had their limits. She felt suddenly afraid that, if he really did share her feelings, she might push him to give up on her if she didn't ditch the plan, and fast.
Fortunately, she'd always been good at improvisation.
"Soul..." she started slowly, thoughtfully.
"What?" He stopped walking and turned to face her, seeming to sense something in her tone.
"I have something I want to-"
Before she could finish, Black*Star himself came crashing out of the undergrowth with a loud yell, landing between them and hooking an elbow around each of their necks, nearly strangling them in his enthusiasm. "Hello, minions!" he yelled, half-deafening them. "How are you this magnificent evening?"
"Looking for you, ya shriveled nutsack!" Soul said, pushing Black*Star's arm off irritably. Maka followed suit, because if he didn't stop touching her right this very second he wasn't going to have a nutsack! He'd interrupted her right when she had finally gotten up the nerve to confess!
Soul continued: "Nobody's seen you or Tsubaki for hours. Where is she, anyway?"
"Right here," Tsubaki said, emerging from the forest more serenely than her boyfriend. Her coat was a little askew, scarf hanging lazily over one shoulder, and there were twigs in her hair. Maka spotted what looked suspiciously like a large hickey on her neck, and suddenly had some very strong suspicions about what, exactly, Black*Star and Tsubaki had been doing for the last couple of hours.
"Outside?" she asked her friend in a mildly disgusted tone. "Really? Wasn't that uncomfortable in this weather?"
"Oh, no," Tsubaki said mildly. "We kept plenty warm."
Maka groaned.
Soul looked between them for a moment before comprehension dawned in his eyes and his expression morphed from confusion to pure disgust. "Aw man, in the woods? Seriously? We were actually worried about you guys, and all this time you were just... just...?"
"Fucking like rabbits?" Black*Star suggested. "Guilty as charged!"
"I hate you so much," Soul grumbled.
"Hey," Black*Star rejoined with a jaunty grin, "don't take your frustration out on me just 'cause Tiny Tits here won't put ou-"
The ninja suddenly found himself in a twitching heap on the ground, as Maka stood over him with a book in her hand and a positively murderous expression on her face.
She glanced over at Soul. "Come on, let's go back to the cabin. Tsubaki, can you manage your jerk-idiot boyfriend?"
"Yes, he always comes around after a minute or two," she replied.
Maka set off at a quick gait through the snow, stomping angrily. It took Soul a few strides to catch up with her at the pace she was setting. Once he was at her side, he nudged her gently with his elbow.
She glanced up questioningly.
"Jerk-idiot?" he asked, raising a sardonic eyebrow.
Maka poked him in the side, trying to glare at him but failing because she kept smiling instead.
