The final two chapters should hopefully be posted tomorrow as I want them to be revised and edited by someone other than me (parts of this chapter might not have been betaed, either); the epilogue should come along a bit after.
Enjoy!
Maka likes to keep all her blades sharp, both those who belong to her partner and the ones that adorn the apartment's kitchen. She takes care of them every few weeks, and today is that day.
The oil, the whetstone, and the extensive collection of knives are ready for their scheduled preening, so are the rags placed neatly on the countertop. She couldn't bring herself to change out of her nightwear - one of Soul's shirts and a pair of sleep shorts. Maka has the habit of stealing them after he's worn them once or twice; long enough for his scent to soak in them and make her relax even when he's not around. His scent is nearly gone, though, but she can't bring herself to replace this one - not when the scent of the shirts he's been wearing recently is the tiniest bit off.
She takes her time sharpening the knives, starting with the smallest. Her weapon enters the kitchen as she reaches the bigger ones, opening the fridge and drinking directly from the carton like she scolded him a thousand times for doing. It's almost enough to make her question what she's about to do.
The sounds of the whetstone sliding across the metal stop, and it's put aside. Her hands are relaxed over the hilt of the blade when she asks, "For how long have you been pretending to be Soul?"
Maka narrows her eyes. He looks back, eyes unblinking even in the harsh light, and she knows her suspicions are right.
"You're not Soul," she accuses, and her hand firmly grips the freshly-sharpened meat cleaver resting on the kitchen table. "I knew it. Who the hell are you?"
The impostor looks a bit too relaxed given that they'd just been found out - and that an angry meister was pointing the sharpest knife in the household at them.
"Took you long enough, given that you 'knew it'," they mock, and it doesn't do shit to calm her down. In fact, it does the exact opposite.
"I only had a feeling," she growls. "And given that sometimes either Soul or I go through something that makes us act weird for a while, I didn't want to jump to conclusions. I guess I should have, though."
"Probably, yes," the imposter says with a smirk. It looks wrong, wrong, wrong, to see that kind of familiar expression on her partner's face while knowing that it isn't him. It's just the slightest bit off, but it's enough for her to grit her teeth at the familiarity of it.
"You have his memories, like Oni did," she deduces. "That's how you've been able to hold character for so long. But we got rid of that guy a while ago, so I ask again, who the hell are you?"
"Oooh," they croon. "Scary. Are we playing good cop, bad cop now? Because I think someone is missing from the equation."
"Yes," Maka hisses. "Someone is. Where is Soul?"
This new smirk is slow, unfurling cruelly over her partner's lips. "What if I told you he's dead?"
And then she lunges at him.
Maka Albarn is and has always been a scythe meister, but it doesn't mean that she doesn't know how to wield a knife. She flies at him, both hands gripping it, ready to cut into its skin with all the force of someone who wields a human-weighted scythe for a living, but her mind quickly registers that something is wrong; she stops herself just in time. The fake hasn't moved, allowing her knife to graze the skin of its chest before grabbing her wrist roughly, not allowing her to move.
"Tsk, tsk," they taunt, brushing her partner's lips against her ear, and though she knows that it isn't him, she can't suppress a shiver. "Well, angel - what if I told you that if you kill me like this, your dearest partner also goes down with me?"
Maka freezes. "What happened in that cave? What did you do to Soul?"
It's her partner's eyes gazing back at hers, only not. She can sense it in their coldness, in the lack of calculated laziness that is customary in her partner, in how they fail to bring comfort to her soul.
It's her partner's voice rumbling out of her partner's chest; she can see the tiniest sliver of the scar that means so much to them peeking out of his shirt's collar. This isn't her partner, her soulmate. This isn't her Soul.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" he - it, she corrects, and scolds herself for even having to remember herself to do it in the first place - purrs at her, caressing her cheek thoughtfully, almost affectionately. "You were quick enough to deduce when the change occurred, I'll give you that. For how long have you felt guilty about thinking badly of your partner before you realized I'm not him?"
Maka flushes red when his lips touch the corner of her mouth, frantically reminding herself that this isn't Soul, don't fall for this crap! while his hand still firmly holds hers in place; the pressure of the knife in her partner's chest makes a few more droplets of blood spill out.
"Don't do that," she snaps. Her eyes are burning. How could she have taken this long to notice the absence of her partner?
"Why not?" he whispers. His breath is warm, and she can't help but feel disgusted at both herself and him. "Is the relationship between you and your partner that weak, for you not to have suspected it right away? Was the relief of seeing his body alive enough to fool you? Silly girl. How you even noticed anything was wrong at all is beyond me."
The phoenix, she realizes in the midst of her anger. It's the only thing back then that was off. It's how it even knows what happened back then.
"Soul is nothing like you," she grinds out, turning her face away from his smirk. Now was not the time to let that thing know that she had caught on. "He's selfless, and he loves music, and he eats like he hasn't seen food in days, and he's an amazing person, unlike you!"
He snickers. "More like he always puts you first, and it set you off when I didn't do the same."
The pigtailed meister growls at him, eyes blazing fiercely. "I'll get him back, you'll see."
"One word about this to anyone else and your partner is dead." The fake offers her what could almost pass for a honest smile. "I really want to see you try."
It hurts. It hurts, it fucking hurts, and he can't do anything to stop it.
He trusts his partner, he seriously does. But he can't pretend that it doesn't make him ache down to the deepest recesses of his soul, to see Maka act around the fake walking around in his body as if it's him - not after he fought through darkness and its grasping cold hands to make it out of the tunnels, latching onto her soul even if she couldn't feel it in order not to become one of the souls in the endless pit they had escaped. Even though he knows that the phoenix's infernal screeches temporarily mess up the weapon and meister genes, disabling her Soul Perception, he'd like to think that his meister knows him better than that.
And then, she doesn't even seem to notice.
It makes him tremble whenever the maleficent bird in his body brushes against her, making her shiver. He hates it when the imposter compliments her cooking, or when it makes a grab for her wrist - the one comfort he has is that she doesn't seem to reciprocate, not like when it's with him there instead. He feels somewhat ecstatic at the knowledge that, at least, Maka isn't unaffected by the closeness of his body - he can see her every reaction from his non-corporeal vantage point, from the goosebumps rising in her skin to her dilated pupils - and then promptly wants to vomit his guts out on the nearest trash can or toilet, because it's his meister and someone who isn't him.
He hates it, he hates it, he hates it.
Soul knows that he has to do something, but his hands pass through all things physical and his shouts go unheard. He has taken to nearly glueing himself to his meister in an attempt to at least bring some comfort to the both of them - the one thing that gives him hope is the way Maka's eyebrows furrow in concentration when the usurper in his body turns away, as if to check that it really is him. It's useless for now, but just the fact that she knows that something isn't quite right is reassuring; that warm feeling keeps him grounded even as the wriggling, translucent mass of Other threatens to sweep him away in its tide.
The bastard knows what he's going through, and smirks whenever his phantom body starts to feel a little too much like it's shattering into a thousand pieces of his soul. It makes a point of getting particularly touchy with his meister at such times, to the point where even his new kind of fractured, kaleidoscopic vision becomes uncomfortably foggy. On these times, Soul is sure that he's so close to fading away he can almost taste the nothingness of death - if death is even a possibility for him now.
Maybe Kid could have helped him if he'd been around. Yet, issues with the witches' world have become complicated, according to Maka's daily ramblings; it's the kind of thing he wouldn't have paid any attention to in their daily life, but now he needs his meister's presence, his meister's voice, his meister's scent - it has become his oxygen and water and life.
His world revolves around her, now more than ever. Soul has always been accused of being a little too overzealous about his meister, a little too protective, too ready to lay down his life for hers if the situation called for it - it's what got him in this new dilemma in first place. A world without Maka is something he can't - won't - even imagine; not for him, not for anyone else.
Soul drifts a little too close to her, like he has the tendency to do nowadays. If he gets close enough, he can nearly use the senses that his human body kept. So what if it's more images and flashes of colour and temperature than scents or tastes? So what if Maka's presence tastes of starry nights and adrenaline and crushed pine needles? His mouth waters, though he isn't sure if he even has one anymore; his fingers reach out for her, only to be reminded that he shouldn't set himself up for disappointment. He is becoming a little too much Other; he wonders if all the kishins they battled went through something like this.
If they did, Soul thinks he can understand them a bit better now.
And then, something shifts. In the middle of the thick Other water that keeps trying to drag him under, there is a change.
"Who the hell are you?"
He breathes in her voice, a limpid, crystalline bell sounding clear between the dark undercurrents, and now there's a safe place to hold on, tiny and feeble as it might be.
"What did you do to Soul?"
Maka, no, he wants to say, but also, Maka, yes, please.
Get away from him.
Stay away!
You need to stay safe!
Get me out of here!
It drives him mad. Soul is halfway to madness, he's sure, because he can't even keep his own thoughts from battling each other; he's trapped in a void, a vortex of selfishness and desire to keep his meister safe. This is what it's always been about, after all.
But now there is light shining through the Other veil that clouds his eyes, his soul. Something is breaking through the barrier that keeps their Resonance from flaring up, maybe just the very recognition from his soulmate that he is still around, even though his body is occupied by someone who's not him; he can feel the tiny tendrils of her soul still holding on to his coming back to life, enveloping him, pulling him in. He's the most corporeal he's been in what feels like forever - the dizzying, twirling lights on the edge of his vision are nearly gone; he can almost taste the soft cotton of his meister's shirt as she looks up at him, mouth open invitingly in a gasp as her eyes overflow with tears.
"Soul?" she asks, and her voice melts and swirls around him like warm honey.
He could never really leave her in the first place.
Soul Eater Evans, the Last Death Scythe - or at least something that appears to be him - strides into yet another meeting with the Witch Council with a satisfied smirk playing around the edges of his mouth.
He's got a truce to wreck, and nothing can get on his way right now.