When Kid left his father's study, he was surprised to find Black Star waiting for him. He was leaning up against the wall, picking at his bandages when Kid had exited. After the initial shock, he resumed his visual analysis of the floor.
"Umm...hey." Blackstar mumbled.
"Hey." Kid awkwardly gestured to the door. "Are you here to talk to my father too?"
"Hunh? No." Black Star looked up and then away. "I got my mission a bit ago..." Ordinarily it would be easy to slip into small talk about school, but knowing he'd caused his friend's injuries made it hard. It didn't help that Black Star seemed almost reluctant to go on another mission so soon after getting back. "...some string of murders."
"Oh, O.K. then." Kid said. The two stood in silence.
"So," Black Star began, a tad louder than he expected. "Uhh... Maka wanted me to apologize to you, for; you know... yeah." He coughed.
"It's O.K." Kid held up his hands. "I wouldn't have left there otherwise. Besides, we both weren't exactly thinking properly." He was surprised Maka of all people hadn't noticed Black Star took longer to shake Khonsu's thrall. Perhaps it was because it had just enhanced desires Black Star had already made plenty clear. The ninja had nothing to hide as opposed to himself. There was another odd silence. "That Nova Barrage was pretty cool though."
"Yeah, I haven' been able to use it since." He opened and closed his hands, trying to feel an ounce of the power that had once been there. "It must have been a heat of the moment thing. I was pretty shaken up by that illusion. I didn't know shinigami could produce images of the dead before." Kid's brow furrowed; his memory of the fight must have been hazier than he thought.
"Shinigami can't do that." He frowned. Sure, Shinigami had a range of abilities related to the soul, but they weren't inherently magical. At least, that was what he'd always been told.
"Then how-" Black Star was cut off.
"There you are!" Tsubaki called from down the hall. She hurried as best she could without running in the halls. "We were supposed to leave an hour ago. What are you doing here?"
"Just apologizing to Kid for earlier." Black Star gestured to Kid, but he couldn't put on a convincing poker face. Still, he let the subject drop, not wanting to drag anyone else into such a sensitive topic.
"That's fair, but we really have to get going." Tsubaki said. Black Star nodded and followed his partner. But not before looking back at Kid suspiciously.
One of the only benefits that came from taking missions in cities, was they didn't have to hide. Black Star stalked down the streets of New Orleans, kicking loose trash and grumbling to himself.
"We took care of Noah and now we're right back where we started." He shook his head. "Wandering around hoping we find someone. Seriously, why didn't they send a human radar like Maka instead?" Too many people they trusted had withheld information from him. Sure, they trusted higher level meisters with secrets, but having a low collection of souls didn't keep him from noticing people were acting strange. He'd been on more than enough missions to shake his remedial status. A good assassin didn't need soul sight to tell when people were lying.
"Well Medusa uses Soul Protection, so someone who could track her without the use of Soul Perception would be preferable." Tsubaki explained. Her partner ignored her in favor of his own rant.
"I mean; I was in the middle of something important when this came up." He was at war as to whether he would tell his partner his suspicion. If anyone were to take him seriously it was her, but that fight with Kid had left a bad taste in his mouth. Either way he needed her advice. "Tsubaki..." He stopped short.
"What, what is it?" She asked.
"Those footsteps... Chrona's here." He turned to the steps of a crumbling city ruin. The pink haired miester slowly shuffled toward the ninja.
"Look Ragnarok," she said, "there's a ninja here. I didn't know they had ninjas in New Orleans." Her weapon chuckled mechanically. "What, what's so funny?" She paused. "O.K. Medusa, I'll use it." From below her feet a red liquid burbled, for a brief moment there was a Cheshire grin on the liquid's surface. It coiled around her and solidified into a twisted armor. She looked up at Black Star, an equally twisted smile on her face with a dead look in her eyes.
"Hey, what's with that look?" He shouted. Ragnarok's arms pealed out of her back, each hand held a sword. In Chrona's hand, a long-serrated blade gleamed menacingly. "Oh, so that's it? Three swords? I have three blades of my own." His opponent didn't flinch. Something really must be wrong if Chrona couldn't even find the strength to be flustered.
"Black Star, what are you talking about?" Tsubaki asked.
"You, my Soul Menance, and the once weapon that every man holds dearest." With this he posed with his pelvis thrust.
"Black Star, how can you wonder why people don't take you seriously when you do things like this?" Tsubaki sighed. Their opponent stared at them blankly.
"Scream Resonance." Chrona uttered. An all too familiar scream echoed through the ruins as Chrona advanced. All three swords were drawn and at full swing. But Black Star didn't move. "Screech Beta!" She sliced the air before her. It sent a torrent of Black Blood particle into a huge blade that raged forward toward the assassin. Black Star quietly stepped aside.
"That's the best you can do? Please." Black Star rolled his eyes. He began to shout over the demon sword and threw Chrona off guard with a punch in the face. Hurtling backwards, Chrona hit the far wall. "Why are you attacking us? Do you know what Maka would say if she found out you were acting like this? She cried so much because you left." Chrona's brow furrowed as Black Star searched for some kind of reaction. It was as if Chrona's body was here, but she was somewhere else.
"Whose Maka?"
Kid once again found himself drawn into the back of the library. He attributed the whole thing to habit, as he was a creature of repetition. But that didn't stop the bittersweet deja vu that washed over him. It was here Chrona had divulged what little information she knew, a bedtime story. He chuckled at the memory; how did it go? "Once upon a time there were two young witches who were very curious about the world around them. So they took a book and filled it with the knowledge they had gathered."A book of knowledge, sort of like the Book of Eibon. He froze. The book was called Eibon! When she told him the story, he had blown it off as nonsense. But if what Maka said was true, it could be that the legend was real. He struggled to remember the description of the witches. "The older witch gathered knowledge about enchantments, familiars, and pure witch craft." Like the magic tools. So if Eibon was the older witch, then the second might have had a hand in making the clowns. He stopped.
He knew nothing of Claudia. For all he knew, she could have been a nut like Noah. And none of the books he read mentioned her at all. Unless he missed something. A light knock on the bookshelf pulled him from his thoughts.
"Kid, is that you?"
"What are you talking about?" Chrona grimaced. "I don't know how you know me, or why you care." She tried to back away from him, but Medusa wouldn't like it if she ran from a fight. "Why do you care? When I left, no one cared, they were angry." The words fell out reflexively, but she knew them to be true. Even if she couldn't fully remember who 'they' were. "Angry at me, at what I had done." She must have done something, something that had her mother wanting anyone wearing death's crest to die. Not a single person could tell her what that was. "I had to do it, I just had to." He knew her, she could see it in his eyes, and he wasn't afraid. He was full of something else, something that filled her with an inexplicable dread. "Because I wasn't important." She clenched her sword. "Don't you get it! I'm not important, that's why no one is waiting for me! So who's this Maka anyway!" The miester's soul swelled; or more accurately, Ragnarok's soul swelled, feasting on her anger. All of these stupid humans needed to stop running heart first toward her sword; they'd only end up hurt in the end. If this person knew her so well, he should know that too.
"Great; first Kid now you." Black Star groaned. He was surprised at how violently she reacted to his comment.
"Screech Alpha!" She screamed. Her attack was meant to be a finishing blow. "Shut up! Stop lying to my face like that! The one thing I hate more than fear is lies." Black Star took this as an opportunity to rebuttal.
"Tsubaki; Shadow Star." He shouted. The weapon obliged and formed a giant shuriken. He used the new form to slice through Chrona's attack. He then used the star to amplify his Soul Menace. Chrona once again was sent backwards by his attack.
"Chrona, you're wrong." Tsubaki professed. "Everyone's been worried about you. You don't have to fight us."
"I thought I told you to shut up!" How dare they mock her. These ideas that someone was out there, that someone cared had been haunting her like a lost dream. Real, yet intangible, and she couldn't remember why she felt the way she did. Now here were two people who claimed to be that someone; it was too good to be true. It couldn't be as easy as dropping her weapon and follow them. It had to be a trick of some kind. The fact that they were fighting her, had tried to hurt her, Medusa was right; she couldn't trust these people. "I don't know who told you about me, but they were wrong. I know who I am and that's all that matters." Chrona went to advance, but froze. Bits of her armor had fractured where the Soul Menace had hit. The clown, who had blissfully drowned out Ragnarok's screams was falling to pieces. "How?" Ragnarok was screaming such a sad scream. The thrill of the hunt wasn't enough to make up for the pain he felt when she tried to wield him. He didn't want to be here, he didn't want to eat these people.
Something was wrong and she couldn't make him stop screaming.
"Maka's probably gonna' slap me for this," Black Star said, "but I can't leave Chrona here." He was about to strike her when something hit his arm. "What the-" A girl, about five, in a mouse costume soared overhead like a gunner plane.
"I missed." She clicked. Two others honed in from his right.
"We got this Chrona!" One squeaked. "Leave!"
"You need to go see Lady Medusa!" The other said. Spreading her wings, Chrona weakly nodded and took off while Black Star was distracted. After Medusa placated Ragnarok, she was sure to be in for a long lecture.
Kid jolted at the sudden intrusion. Hardly anyone came this far back into the library due to the poor lighting. It took him a moment to recognize the voice.
"Maka, you startled me."
"I startled you?" She chuckled. "I'm not the one hunkered down in the darkest corner of the library." Her face fell. "Is everything alright?" Kid let out a frustrated sigh.
"I already told you Maka, this has nothing-"
"No, I know. I wasn't talking about that." She recoiled. "I meant is everything O.K. between you and your dad?" Kid felt like a deer in headlights.
"Hunh?"
"He didn't say anything strange to you?" Maka pressed. "Maybe acted a little out of the ordinary?" She was gnawing on her lip, trying to hide the fact behind her hands. Maka usually wasn't the nervous type.
"Maka, my father is far from ordinary." Kid sighed. "Why, what made you think that?" Maka thought back to the bizarre conversation she had with her father earlier. She had just finished up with Nygus in the infirmary to treat her wounds when he approached.
"Maka, do you have a moment?" Spirit asked. Maka looked down the hall for an escape. But there wasn't anyone who could have helped her.
"Sure." Her shoulders slumped. It was hard to muster the anger to reject him when he was acting normal. The two walked down the hall in a tense silence.
"You aren't seriously injured are you?" Spirit asked.
"No, I'm fine."
"Oh good; I'm sure your boyfriend will be relieved." He said.
"I told you papa, Soul isn't my boyfriend." Maka crossed her arms. Perhaps it wasn't too late to bolt for the nearest window.
"No, I know that." Spirit amended, "I didn't mean him specifically."
"Papa, what are you getting at?" Maka didn't need any 'talk' from her father. Her mother had made it plenty clear she wasn't allowed to date until after graduation. Besides, she was more worried about the impending end of the world than her love life at the moment. The farther she could keep her dad from that the better.
"Nothing, nothing." Spirit said. "I just don't get to talk to you much now because of work and I wanted to make sure you didn't get you heart broken or anything like that."
"Well you don't have to worry about that, papa. I don't have one." She paused. "A boyfriend, that is."
"Oh." Spirit smile slowly morphed into a sad one. "Good, good." His gaze fell to the ground.
"Papa-" Maka began.
"And everything's been going fine between you and your friends?" He stuffed his hands in his pockets and tried to stand tall.
"Yeah?" Maka eyed her father suspiciously. "Well, that is, no one is currently fighting each other. But back in the book, Black Star totally lost it, he nearly killed Kid!" She paused, realizing how silly it was to hold a grudge. He had been the one to rescue Kid in the end. "He's acting perfectly normal now." Maybe she had been too hard on him considering the circumstance. She just never thought that Black Star could fall prey to madness, he always seemed so strong.
"Do you like him?" Spirit asked. Maka jolted, a blush painted on her cheeks.
"Who? What!" Maka stuttered.
"I'm sorry, I didn't phrase that right." Spirit apologized. "I mean are you getting along well with Kid." He turned away as she narrowed her eyes.
"Yeah, I guess so." She studied him for a reaction. There was the slightest look of relief on his face. "...why?"
"Oh, I just know that he had trouble when he first came here." He chuckled nervously. "And then you had your own group of friends, so didn't know if he got along well with all of you. But it's good to hear that you not having any problems! Yes...good to hear." What had he done this time? Had he tried to rope Kid into something stupid to try and cheer him up or something equally ridiculous? Whatever it was, it couldn't be good.
"Papa, what is this really about?" Maka asked.
"My look at the time, I have to go!" He kissed her on the cheek. "Sorry we couldn't chat longer dear, but daddy has work to do. GOOD BYE!" In an instant he was half way down the hall.
"Papa!" Maka shouted, but he was gone.
"Oh, it's nothing." She dismissed. "Sorry I bothered you. I'll see you tomorrow, O.K.?"
"Alright." Kid said, though he wasn't sure why Maka thought something was up. Maka, however, did hold an innate suspicion that something was up. But if Shinigami-sama hadn't said anything, then she was probably just imagining things. After all, her father wanted her to stay his little girl forever... didn't he?