A/N - Oh, crap, I'm so sorry it took me so long to get this chapter out (I say, posting about 5000 words after a three-day gap). Christmastime is rolling around and everything's been really hectic because of it, so I didn't have as much writing time over the weekend. Carols, cookies, Christmas trees, fun times! Speaking of fun times, you know what's fun? Reviews! Leave me a review to tell me how I did with this chapter!
Speaking of reviews, thank you to turtledove237 and for favoriting, and I thank turtledove237, SandStromAlchemist, and Carolinefdq for reviewing! To SandStromAlchemist, I say that I sure am glad that you like Alecto's latent crush on one Miss Nakatsukasa, because there's gonna be quite a bit of that in this arc! I must say, I've never seen much F!OC fanfiction where said F!OC had a positive, significant relationship with a canon female character. Not that such fics don't exact, but I'd like to see more of it. We need more lady-lady bonds and fanfiction that passes the Bechdel test up in here.
To Carolinefdq, I say thank you for the review and if the review weren't two days old I'd totally be telling you "Go to bed, silly goose." :P
To turtledove237, I say thank you for the review and it's wonderful to know that people enjoy my fanfiction!
Oh, and another thing: I made a cover for this fanfiction! I was tired of seeing purple space stuff beside the fic as if purple space stuff was in any way relevant to Tempus Fugit, so I cobbled together a relatively decent-looking cover instead. I may be a terrible artist, but I am damn good at using photo manipulation software to create decent-looking manips!
Notes and translations of the Latin will be at the end of the chapter.
DISCLAIMER: Soul Eater is the intellectual property of Atsushi Ōkubo. I have no intention of monetizing my fanwork, and this is merely an enjoyable passer of time.
Chapter Thirteen - A Boy to Remember - The Son of Death's First Day at the Academy, Part 1
When all the facts were laid out, there was no reason for Alecto to be as upbeat as she was that morning.
Through some terrible miracle of some sort, Dr. Stein had been assigned as the new teacher of Class Crescent Moon, and they had spent every day since that development dissecting creature after creature. If Alecto had to identify the dorsal aorta of one more bullfrog, she was going to flip Dr. Stein out of his office chair.
She hadn't taken on any new missions in quite a while, and the last time she had done this the lack of activity had nearly driven her insane, and that had only been a few days. By all rights, she should be completely off the walls by this point.
Also, Black Star still existed. Yes, she had gained a bit of respect for his combat skills during their fight with Sid, but there was still the matter of him being an arrogant, largely incompetent snot with a partner who was way too good for him.
So what was making Alecto so happy? Was it the weather? She doubted it. The day was beautiful, to be sure, with the clear azure of the sky completely free of clouds and the large, warm sun guffawing overhead, but in the end it really was not different from most days. Death city was located in the middle of the Nevada desert, after all; it wasn't like there was an abundance of rainy days to be had.
No, Alecto was sure that the thing that had gotten her spirits so high was tea.
She couldn't believe that she had never thought of brewing the tea inside the thermos before. She supposed that she always subconsciously assumed that because the tea wasn't freshly brewed when she got around to drinking it, it wouldn't be as good.
But she was dead wrong. The thermos has perfectly preserved the flavor inside its impermeable casing, and had actually probably strengthened the flavor of the liquid inside it. It was the best idea ever, and the moment she had realized that she had sworn to herself that she would never go anywhere without a thermos full of tea.
As such, Alecto figured that there wasn't much that could quell the spring in her step that morning as she jogged down the street, a thermos of tea in each hand. Tempus had noticed her unusually good mood, too, and he remarked, "You look like you're about to spontaneously break into song. Did you have a really good dream or something?" He had his jacket slung over his shoulder and his sleeves rolled up to his
"No," Alecto said. "Just tea."
"Ah, I should have guessed," Tempus said, quickening his pace to keep up with the young meister. He was quiet for a few seconds before speaking again. "Do you know what really bugs me? Like, a lot?"
"Non-sequiturs?"
"Oh, hah, hah." Tempus shook his head. "No, see, here's the thing. Sid's technically not really dead anymore, right? I mean, he's dead, but he's still all active and the like. So why can't he go back to teaching class Crescent Moon? Why'd we end up with Stein as a replacement for a guy who's still perfectly eligible for teaching?"
Alecto shrugged. "Maybe Lord Death needs Sid for specialized missions. I imagine there are some aspects of life, so to speak, in which being undead would be have its benefits."
Tempus didn't look quite so sure about that. "Or maybe Lord Death's just got a twisted sense of humor," he grumbled. Then a grin crossed his features. "Oh! Speaking of the Grim Reaper, have you heard the rumors? I know you're not really interested in rumors and the like, being the… whatever the opposite of a social butterfly is… that you are, but everyone's been talking about. It's been sort of hard to miss."
"Uh, well, nōn. I can't actually say that I've heard anything." Alecto had never really been one for gossip, and she wasn't nearly enough of a people person to pick up any of that sort of thing in idle conversation. Most of what she heard, she heard from Tempus.
Of course, with Tempus being the eavesdropper that he was, she heard a lot of things from him. Alecto glanced up at him to see that he had a very eager expression on his face. "Oh, go on, I can tell you want to tell me. What rumors have you heard?"
Tempus's smile widened "There's a new meister joining the DWMA today."
"And?"
"And what?"
"You wouldn't be this excited over someone who was just a new student. Who are they?"
"Well," Tempus said, steepling his fingers together, "I can't say that that I am a hundred percent certain on this front, I mean, rumors are rumors after all. But these particular rumors say that this student isn't like the others. People are saying that he's Lord Death's son."
Alecto stopped in her tracks, dark brow furrowing incredulously. "Wait, seriously? That Death the Kid guy, the one who took on the Pharaoh mission?"
"That's the one."
"Non credo tū."
"Now, my Latin is a little rusty, but I think you just told me that I'm full of bullshit."
"Not in so many words. But yeah, I don't think those rumors are true at all. Lord Death's son is supposed to be a Grim Reaper like he is, right? Why would a Grim Reaper need to attend the Academy?" It wasn't as if a Grim Reaper would need to make his own Death Scythes, and she couldn't imagine that he'd learn anything that he didn't already know by way of being the son of Death. "I just can't see that happening. I'm not going to rule out the idea of us getting a new student, but Lord Death's kid? Doubt it."
Tempus shrugged. "Hey, that's what I heard. I dont know where the rumors started, or how true they are, but I do know that everyone seems pretty sure that it's all true. And besides, everyone was right about Sid coming back to life, right? There's no reason that they wouldn't be right about this one."
"Tempus," Alecto said, "I think that rumor about Sid was started for the sake of those extra lessons."
"Oh." Tempus was silent. "Well, it could be true. We just don't know."
"I still doubt it," Alecto said. "Come on. I wanna find Tsubaki before classes start."
Tsubaki and Maka were both standing in front of the mission board, making idle conversation as they waited for the bell to ring. To Alecto's surprise, neither Soul Eater nor Black Star were with the two girls, though in the case of the latter she considered the absence to be a blessing. "Tsubaki! Maka!" she called out as she and Tempus approached, her boots clacking against the hard tiles of the hall floor.
"Hello, Alecto, Tempus!" Tsubaki said, turning to face the two of them as they drew near. Despite the smile she gave them, the expression on her face bore a hint of sadness. Alecto was about to ask what was wrong when Maka spoke.
"Have you two heard about what people have been saying?"
"The rumors about the new student?" Alecto replied. "I've heard enough. There's a few details I don't really belie-we though. Uh, believe." She turned a little red when she realized that her accent had slipped again. Vae. She thought she was getting better at reining that in. "Why do you ask?"
"Oh," Maka said, "well, it's just that we've been hearing about it all around school. When Black Star and Soul heard about it, they ran off. Did you two run into those two idiots?"
Tempus shrugged. "No idiots on our way up. Granted, we might have missed them in the halls or something along those lines. It's a big school, after all."
Alecto noticed that Tsubaki looked somewhat crestfallen at the mention of her meister, so she decided to divert the train of conversation to another track. "Tsubaki," she said, her cheeks further reddening as she held out one of the thermoses, "I made you some tea! I brewed it just before we left for school, so it should still be good! I-it's orange blossom."
Tsubaki looked equal parts surprised and grateful as she accepted the thermos. "Oh, thank you, Alecto!" She took a sip, and an expression of confusion flitted across her gentle features. "Huh. This doesn't taste like orange blossom…"
"Wh…? Oh!" Alecto exclaimed as she realized what she meant. "Oh, g-gosh, I think I gave you my vanilla tea by accident! Oh, gosh, m-mē miseret, mē miseret!" she stammered as she took the termos in Tsubaki's hand and replaced it with the one she'd intended to give her. "I knew I should have labeled these. Or bought thermoses that were different colors…"
"It's fine," Tsubaki said reassuringly, taking a sip of the orange blossom. She smiled. "This is good!" She still sounded a little sad, but less so than before, and that made Alecto happy. Tsubaki was a good person. She didn't deserve to be sad.
Above the four of them rang the familiar ding dong dong ding of the bell that alerted students that it was time to head to their respective classes. Alecto winced. Ever since their fight with Sid, she'd always been a bit set on edge by the noise. Even knowing that it had all been a set up, she still couldn't shake the memories of Sid's singsong mockery of the bell as he knocked them about with a gravestone.
The four of them headed to class alongside the other students of Crescent Moon, and Alecto decided to try and listen in on the hushed conversations around her. Sure enough, Tempus and Maka had been right in that the new student was pretty much the biggest topic of conversation. She didn't get it. Wasn't there anything else for them to talk about?
Tuning out the buzz of words around her, Alecto took a sip of her tea, the taste of vanilla tickling her tongue and the heat warming her throat. As she drank her tea, she had to admit that curiosity was biting at her a little. She almost considered going to try and track down the source of these rumors, but then she remembered the last time she had skipped class to get to the bottom of some mystery everyone was talking about, she had ended up exhausted and with extra laps to complete in P.E.
She didn't want any more extra laps. She didn't want any laps, period.
So she shoved that curiosity into a little box at the back of her mind and shoved it away, heading to class and trying to ignore it as best she could.
"Tempus, you've been doing that for a week. I don't think Dr. Stein is going to be fooled."
"It's not about him being fooled. I'm not trying to hide from him, I just don't want to see his stupid jerk face. Ugh, I still can't believe they let him teach here," Tempus grumbled from his place underneath his desk.
Alecto sighed. "You know, I don't think Lord Death would let him teach here if he didn't trust him," she pointed out. While she hated Dr. Stein with a furious passion, she knew that she wasn't in any position to question the judgement of the Grim Reaper himself. If he thought that Stein would make a good teacher
"Wait, since when did you become a supporter of Dr. Stein? I thought you hated him since he, you know, used your biggest fear and insecurity against you and threw you against a wall."
"I do hate him. Given the opportunity, I'd gladly toss him off the nearest balcony," Alecto said. "But I'm not going to hide from him. I'm going to look him in the eye and think 'te odi, 'te odi' as loudly as I can and hope the pure strength of my resentment reaches him and hopefully makes his screw fly right out of his head."
"Yeah, that's not going to work, Ally."
"Yeah, I know."
As if talking about the man had inadvertently summoned him, the classroom door opened, and Dr. Stein rolled in on his office chair. Behind him, he dragged something large and square and covered by a large cloth. Whatever it was, something was moving in it, and Alecto couldn't help but feel a bit of hope. Maybe they were actually going to learn about fighting instead of the internal anatomy of the average amphibian?
Around her, there was a low murmured of confusion as Dr. Stein rolled to a stop behind his desk. "What should our lesson be today, class?" he said in a clearly rhetorical manner. At least, Alecto assumed it was rhetorical. He looked like he had something already planned out, so what was the point of asking? Trying to be as unnoticeable as possible (she technically wasn't supposed to eat or drink in the classroom), she took a small sip of her tea, watching the scene unfold in front of her with a confused gaze.
"I've got it," Stein said without waiting for an answer from the students, "why don't we do another dissection lab?"
The response was an almost unanimous groan, and Alecto immediately began calculating whether it was possible to use a desynchronization to give Stein a good beating with that office chair had not have anyone notice it was her. "Yeah, uh, Dr. Stein, if I could point something out?" Maka said, raising her hand somewhat. "Ever since you became our teacher, all we've done is dissect animals. Every day."
"Oh, but you see, Maka," Stein said, his glasses glinting ominously despite the lack of any sort of bright, contrasting light. Alecto was starting to think that his glasses just produced their own luminescence. "Today will be different. This time our specimen is infinitely more interesting than a mouse or frog."
Quid? Alecto thought. She figured that frogs and mice were sort of the standard for dissections, and what could possibly make the now-dull procedure any less so.
"Are you ready for it?" Despite the flat tone of his voice, there was a definite flourish in the way Dr. Stein yanked the cloth off the rectangular shape. Said shape turned out to be a cage, and inside stood a very nervous-looking white bird with a red face, a long neck, and a droopy-looking black beak. Whatever species of bird it was, it certainly didn't look like your average pigeon or sparrow. "Today we'll be poking around the insides of this little guy here," Stein said, gesturing to the bird. "A rare species of cuckoo. Endangered, I believe."
If Alecto had been drinking her tea as he'd spoken those last three words, she'd have surely spit her drink over her desk. She was no expert on the ethics surrounding endangered animals and the treatment of them, but she was certain that there was some sort of rule against dissecting one for class.
And what the hell did this cuckoo bird have to do with hunting Kishin and witches?
The rest of the class seemed to be just as shocked at this development as she did. "Um, Dr. Stein, I don't think we can dissect that," Maka said. "It's really rare, nearly extinct!"
The borderline maniacal grin on Stein's face merely widened as he turned to face the feathered creature. "All the more reason to dissect one before the entire species dies out."
The bird liked it was about to drop dead from sheer terror.
"He's seriously crazy," Alecto heard Maka say quietly. "He must be insane." Alecto found herself agreeing.
Dr. Stein's pale gaze swept over the row that Tsubaki and Maka were sitting in, his focus lingering on the two empty chairs. "Tsubaki, Maka, why don't I see Soul and Black Star up there with you? Are they planning to come to class?" Alecto noticed Tsubaki sigh despondently at the mention of her meister.
"They're probably skipping," Maka replied. "Again. Those two idiots are hopeless," she muttered under her breath.
Again, Alecto found herself agreeing. Not because the two were skipping class; hell, at this point she wanted to start skipping class too, it wasn't like they were learning anything useful from cutting apart an endangered bird. It wasn't even that she thought that Soul was hopeless. She actually didn't mind Soul. No, she just thought that Black Star was hopeless enough for the both of them and then some.
"Jeez," Maka continued, "if they wanna be together so much, maybe they should be partners. What do you think, Tsubaki?"
Alecto was sitting behind Tsubaki and Maka as usual, so she wasn't able to see the statuesque girl's face and pinpoint when exactly her demeanor did a complete one-eighty, but suddenly she had grabbed Maka by the front of her shirt and was shaking her back and forth like a maraca. "No, that could never happen!" Tsubaki shouted. "Do you hear me?! Never never never!"
"I'm not sure what you're so worried about, Tsubaki," Alecto said, her mouth forming words before her brain could judge their wisdom as she leaned forward, practically sprawled across the desk. Tsubaki stopped shaking Maka and looked up at the pink haired meister, who kept speaking. "You're pretty much amazing in every way. Anyone who would choose Soul over you is a complete fool in my book."
Tsubaki's cheeks turned a little pink at Alecto's words, but apart from that her expression didn't change. She still looked sad. Alecto wasn't sure what had happened to make the chain scythe feel the way she felt, but she suspected a certain blue-haired meister was behind it. Subsequently, she also suspected she would have to be delivering a few temporally desynchronized fists to the face in the near future.
From the front of the class, Stein spoke, apathetic to Tsubaki's blatant distress. "I guess they'll miss out on the excitement," he said. "I'm sure that you are all aware by now, but a very interesting new student will be joining our class today."
From his spot under the desk, Tempus hissed, "Hah! Told you!"
"Tace," Alecto replied.
"Well, with that out of the way, let's get on with the lesson," Stein said. "Oh, and Tempus, hiding won't do you any good. I still know you're there."
There was a loud thump as the golden-haired boy jumped, his head banging against the underside of the desk. "Ow! I mean, uh, y-yes, sir!" He crawled out of his hiding spot and sat down in his chair, glowering at the students who were giving him odd looks before turning to Alecto with a smug I-told-you-so-did-I-not-tell-you-about-the-rumors-I-believe-I-did grin.
"Tace," she repeated.
"I didn't say anything."
"You were thinking it."
The lesson began, with Stein spending a good hour or more lecturing the process of immobilizing the cuckoo and plucking its feathers, exposing the bare skin underneath. The cuckoo, Alecto noted, was still alive and conscious during all of this, paralyzed with fear the whole time. Alecto wondered if Stein had truly earned the title of "doctor," or if the truth was that he'd never spent a single day at medical school.
She also wondered if he knew the difference between a dissection and a vivisection.
Regardless, Alecto found herself unable to focus on the lesson anyway. Her thoughts kept drifting to other matters. Namely, this transfer student.
So, the rumors about there being a new student were correct, and if the way Stein had phrased his announcement was and clue, the other half of the rumor was true. The son of Lord Death really had enrolled in the DWMA. Alecto mentally combed through the reasons that a Grim Reaper could possibly have for joining the Academy, but each of them was just as implausible as the last. She didn't actually know anything about this Death the Kid fellow, and thus couldn't really determine why he'd done what he'd done.
Well, she would get to know him soon enough, she supposed. She did wonder why he wasn't in class now, though. Unless his schedule was somehow different than theirs, he should have been there when the bell rang like everyone else. Unless he was running late? Did Grim Reapers run late? She'd only met one, but she'd always figured that Lord Death was never early or late, and simply just arrived precisely when he meant to.
Her wayward wonders were interrupted by a strange sound coming from outside, echoing into the classroom through the round windows lined up along the classroom hall. The sound was a little bit familiar. Almost like…
"Are those gunshots?" Tempus echoed her thoughts, leaning his chair back on its hind legs and looking over his shoulder, eying the windows with a bemused gaze.
A couple of the back row kids stood up and moved to the windows to see what was going on. "Dr. Stein!" one of the kids, a boy with chin-length hair and a beret, said. "It's Soul and Black Star! They're fighting someone outside."
"Raise your hand if you're surprised," Tempus muttered. Alecto promptly pulled her hands off her desk at let them hang limply at her sides.
Maka stood up. "Excuse me, Dr. Stein?" she called out. "There's a rule about two meisters dueling on school grounds. It states that in order for the duel to continue there must be a professor there to witness it."
Stein, who held a scalpel in each hand and was about to cut into the strapped-down and batshit terrified cuckoo on his desk, looked a little inconvenienced about the statement implicit in Maka's words. "I hate to stop her, but it can't be help," he said, stabbing the scalpels in the wood of the curved desk. "We'll have to postpone the dissection."
For reasons that Alecto couldn't possibly place, no one seemed particularly torn up over that little announcement.
"As Soul and Black Star's partners, Maka and Tsubaki, please come along with me." He sat back down in his chair… why he insisted on always sitting in it backwards was a mystery for the ages… and rolled off. "Everyone else, study something."
Maka and Tsubaki followed Stein out of the classroom. As soon as the door closed behind them, half a dozen students rush forward to free the poor bird from its restraints while the rest of them crowded around the windows to try and see what was going on. The only two students who didn't get up were Alecto and Tempus, who exchanged a glance with one another. It was a glance of an unspoken agreement, a glance of mutual curiosity and disinterest in following Dr. Stein's command to study. Without speaking a word, the two of them reach out towards each other and locked hands, and with a familiar noise, time shifted.
Tick.
Tock. "So, what do you think he's like?"
Tick. "Who?"
Tock. "The cabbage man. Who do you think I'm talking about, Ally? Death the Kid!"
Tick. "Oh." Alecto thought for a second. "I don't know, not reall. I imagine he's tall. Thin. Older than us, maybe? Probably resembles his father a bit."
Tock. "You think he has a skull face?" Tempus asked
Tick. "Oh, for Pete's sake, Tempus, I don't know!" Alecto snapped. "And what makes you think that it's Death's son that Soul and black Star are fighting, anyways?"
Tock. "Well, it's obvious, isn't it? Black Star's always talking about how he'll conquer the gods, and now here's a fresh young god, ripe for the picking!" Tick. Tempus paused, brow furrowing. "That came out wrong. The point is, there've been rumors about this guy going about the school for a couple days now. Black Star's ego probably couldn't handle that and he went off to go challenge the guy to the duel." Tock. "You have to agree, that is something that Black Star would do."
Tick. "That does sound like Black Star," Alecto agreed.
Tock. Tick. "Crap, that was Stein and the others. I'm positive they noticed us. I told you we should have gone to a balcony to watch instead."
Tock. "And I told you, I'm not interested in being sneaky about all of this. I want to see what's going on, and I don't want a bird's eye view of it, either. I don't really care if Stein saw us. He probably figured out what we were going to do the moment he left."
Tick. "Speak for yourself," Tempus said." I'm not exactly eager to end up on the bad side of a guy whose entire existence practically screams 'look at me, I'm a mad scientist.'"
Tock. "Hush, we're almost outside." In fact, the massive front doors leading to the outside of the school were just in front of them. Going from a jog to a run, Alecto bolted forward, throwing herself forward and slamming her entire weight against the door, because that was what it was going to take to get the damn thing open. Even so, it only opened slowly and just enough for her and Tempus to slip outside. The two of them moved forward to get a better look at the scene that was unfolding in front of the school.
That's when she saw him.
A/N - Do you hear that? That's me laughing evilly. Enjoy it. :) And people wonder why authors use cliffhangers so much. The answer? It's fun as hell.
I've always wanted a reason to impart my knowledge on the difference between dissection and vivisection to some unsuspecting soul. A dissection is the cutting up of a dead body for scientific observation and education. A vivisection is basically the same thing, but the subject in question is very much alive, which is what the lab regarding the cuckoo would have been if not for divine intervention (that phrase is surprisingly fitting in this scenario).
Now that I've thoroughly disturbed you all, can I just say that the bird in the episode looks nothing like a member of the cuckoo family? The cuckoo family are a family of tree-dwelling birds, and I don't think the bird in the episode can even fly, much less nest in a tree.
Science aside, on to the Latin!
Nōn: Means "No." I'm not sure why I included this, I feel like it should speak for itself.
Non credo tū: Means "I do not believe you." So, yeah, Alecto's pretty much just saying that she thinks Tempus is full of shit. Oh, Alecto. If only you knew. :3
Mē miseret: Literally means "I'm sorry," it's an apology for a mistake made. Like a tea mix-up. The most heinous of crimes.
Te odi: Means "I hate you."
Tace: Means "Shut up."
Chapter 14 should be up soon, if Holiday madness doesn't get in the way of everything. In the mean time, feel free to leave a review telling me what you think!
- Diana "Nocte"
