''How does one answer a question like 'how was school'. There are so many unpleasant interactions that get filed directly into the waste bin, promptly forgotten to make room for the next onslaught of information. Random dirty looks in the hallways turned into wallpaper. The classmates that talk to their own friends are background noise. Angela would ghost through class after class of dry information that had nothing to do with why she came to the magical world. She had no doubt that if it bored her, it wasn't worth sharing.

The pictures she had received from Black Star's last mission were far more entertaining. Creepy houses, spiral paths with lion statues in the center, some local dish that didn't look safe to eat. His attempts to get her to change her mind about becoming a meister were not subtle.

"Before the magical world was cut off from the mortal realm, the Fates had more control over the world order." Her teacher flipped through slides on a projector of ancient pottery. "Like cogs in a machine; the Spinner would mold the nature of a soul, the Allotter would watch it's destiny play out, and the Inevitable would call for the spirit's return. After the portals closed, the ferryman shouldered the burden of guiding the dead to the underworld." The slide switched to a lion receiving a soul in it's jaws from someone with a star on their skin.

"Ms. Bruixa, that's not a ferryman." Angela said. "That's a member of the Star Clan."

"They're the same thing Ms. Leon." Her teacher said tersely. "Don't speak without raising your hand."

"Now, as I was saying," the slide switched to a domineering black figure, "these days souls are attracted to the underworld by actual machines. We've found recently, that magical individuals caught in the current, do return to the entropic void. In case any of you planned on visiting the mortal realm." A chorus of polite laughter from the students gave her teacher a chance to check who was paying attention. "Ms Leon, phone, now."

A lock box soared toward her and snapped the phone from out her hands. Just when she finally had something of interest to send back. She flipped her note sheet over and started doodling on the back. Stupid boring classes, stupid boring teachers, magical school was supposed to be fun.

The incense Maka had brought to the training hall was supposed to help improve their resonance link. Something she had done with Soul under the guidance of Dr. Stein. Like most of his methods, it was hard to tell if it had really helped that much, or if Maka's stubborn determination had pulled her through freshman year. Black Star lit two more sticks for good measure. He'd barely been able to smell the first one permeate the room.

"This is already a difficult exercise," Maka scolded, "you don't need to make it more challenging."

"I'm just making sure it works." He said. "If one works a little, three should work a lot. It's basic math." The saccharine scent burned the inside of his nose. "So, what's next?" She had taken a seat on the floor a motioned for him to do the same.

"We point out each other's faults." Maka said. To her, it was kind of like a trust fall. It was easier to enter a high-stakes mission when everything was already out on the table. Black Star rolled his eyes and took a seat. He'd gotten his good training sweats on for nothing. "What?"

"Stein gave you the stupidest shit to do." He shook his head.

"Yeah, well sometimes it works." They were already getting off topic. "You're not supposed to point out his faults, you're supposed to point out mine." He leaned back and looked up at the ceiling. "Black Star."

"I'm thinking!" God, she could be so impatient sometimes. Wait, that was it. "You're not always right you know."

"Yeah, and?" That wasn't really a fault.

"...nope, I lost it." He sighed. "Give me a second, I'll think of something else." He waved for her to continue on ahead. Next time he thought of something, he just needed to repeat it in his head over and over until it was his turn to talk.

"Part of why it takes you so long to do things, is you refuse to listen other people." She said. "I might not always be right, but neither are you."

"What the hell do you think we're doing right now!?" Black Star said. "You like these mind-numbing training things, that's why I'm trying to do them." He cursed under his breath. "Now I forgot the thing, I almost had one."

"I don't like doing training like this!" She said. "I do it, because it works. Or at least it usually does." They were definitely bickering, but no more than usual. Maybe it was because these were things they'd already told each other before the exercise. "Why is it taking you so long to come up with something?"

"Jesus Maka, it's not like I have a list of reasons you suck on file." He gave up, laying on the cold wooden floor. "Now the room's just stuffy and hot. The fuck is wrong with you screw-head!?" Maka scrunched up her face, because that had never been an issue before. The people she worked with in the past always had an endless list of things to pull from. "Reasons you suck..." Black Star muttered to himself like mantra, until something broke through his foggy memory. He was used to people pretending he wasn't there, but nothing quite stung like looking down from the roof the first day of school and only finding Tsubaki applauding from the entry way. He was quiet for a bit as he tried to formulate it into a proper 'fault'. "You worry too much about what people think about you." He popped up onto his forearms to look at her, she hadn't said anything yet.

"I wish I didn't." She sighed. "I can't turn it off, it fucking sucks." She usually wasn't weepy during this exercise. What was wrong with her?

"Shit." He sat all the way up. "See this is why I thought it was stupid, I don't want to hurt your feelings." He fretted when she cried more. "Come on you masochist, say something back."

"I'm not a masochist." She punched him in the shoulder, hard. "You're an asshole."

"Generic."

"A megalomaniac."

"Old news."

"Ugh!" Nothing ever bothered him. The point was to point out faults, not devolve into pointless name calling. Though really, he should consider having a shred of humility. At least she was back to being irritated, instead of embarrassingly weepy.

"Not so easy, is it?" She was going to kill him one of these days. He kept looking at her with that stupid smug grin, like he won some game they were playing. Only, he had problems maintaining eye-contact. "Hey Maka, what does that incense do exactly?"

"It's supposed to heighten emotions." She said. His smile dropped. He got up an opened the closest window. "What are you doing?" She'd never seen him bail on a training exercise like that before.

"It clearly isn't working." At least, not the way it was supposed to. She had been this close to laughing at the bullshit he'd been throwing out. All it took was that look, that she was trying to be above it all and had been carried away anyway, for him to feel like a teenager again in all the wrong ways. The heat in the room was stifling and the last thing he needed was more probing questions. "You were right, I shouldn't have burned that many." He closed his eyes, the fresh air clearing his head just enough for him to realize what a mistake that was.

"What do you mean I'm right?" She got way too into his personal space and grabbed his shoulder. "What's gotten into you?"

"Maka." He turned to her, his pupils blown wide and dark. "We've known each other since first grade, we can skip all the beginner crap. We really can." She was three inches away from him. The flush from her cheeks sparking far more hope than it should. "I know you pride yourself on being perfect all the time, but there's nothing wrong messing up every now and then." Her standards for what being a good weapon were had gotten so unreasonably high after years of working with Death Scythes and three-star meisters. He had no doubt she'd surpass them if she just allowed herself to learn through experience instead of forcing herself into some idealized mold. "It'll be fine."

"That's funny." Her expression softened into something more inviting. "I told you something similar earlier."

Earlier? Earlier when? The wind ruffled her hair, and she seemed to catch herself from stepping forward. She tucked her hair behind her ear and pulled back. More disappointed in herself than anything.

"Definitely too much incense." She muttered under her breath. "Well, if you have any bright ideas other than running into combat blind I'm all ears." First she needed a break from this, a break from him.

He watched her leave, still chewing on the puzzle she left behind. The missions had mostly been them fumbling for control. She'd told a number of people to stop questioning why she was serving as a temp weapon, but that couldn't be it. The only other thing that would come close was her slurring those words in his ear.

Oh.

They hadn't really stopped to talk about what happened, he just assumed most of those memories had been eaten up in a haze of alcohol, but she remembered. Then stubbornly insisted they take on this mission together for personal reasons. It almost seemed like an invitation, but Maka wouldn't cross professional lines at this point. There was no way.

It was all in his head.

Group projects were the worst. Everyone had their own little friend groups and Angela was stuck waiting from someone to put up with getting separated. At least by the end of this she'd get to learn some new spells.

"Spindle, Crystal, Sheers, shoot!" Two girls cheered as one dressed all in yellow and black hung her head in defeat.

"Not fair! The crystal should break the sheers and the spindle."

"Suck it up Penelope." One of the other girls said. "It's past beats present, present beats future, future beats past. Not present beats everything." Penelope came over to Angela sulking. Leopard spots decorated her buzzed hair, a strange choice for someone so outwardly timid. Everything about this place was backwards. Witches here had familiars that were large and powerful like bulls or horses, even wild cats apparently.

"What are you doing?" Penelope tilted her head. Angela had taken her starting position for combat practice.

"...sparring?"

"That's not what we're doing!" Penelope leaned back and let out a frustrated sigh. "This is AD Combat, as in 'avoiding deadly combat'." Angela's arms drooped to her sides.

"Then why am I here!?" Angela had just about enough of this. "I already know how to hide in the shadows and all that junk without magic. That's literally all I do at home." She'd spent decades learning how to hide from fights, she wanted to be able to overpower them. "I can't protect anyone that way. How am I supposed to prove my magic is good, if all I use it for is myself?" She couldn't disguise other people, or project soul protection charms onto them. The best she could do is make things conveniently float for people.

"Magic's not good or bad." Penelope raised an eyebrow. "It's just recycled energy that has to get out." DWMA kids were so weird, they got hung up on morality and rules that didn't really exist. No wonder the mortal realm was a mess. "You'd know that if you paid attention in class." Angela vanished, then popped up behind Penelope. It was just a gentle tap, but it was enough to scare the girl right out of her shoes.

"History and ancient tongues don't mean shit when people want to take advantage of you." She stalked toward the girl. "I've seen witches melt peoples memories into ash, make artificial blood that saved people's lives, bring entire sentient beings into existence just to lock them in cages; and all I can do is stupid shit like this!" She morphed into a mirror reflection of the other girl. The angle of her face just as doughy, and her clothes a mockery of how bright the yellow was. "Not looking like a threat, isn't enough to 'avoid' deadly combat."

"What the hell happened to you?" Penelope asked. The casting teacher was marching towards them, but Angela was too shaken by the genuine concern to maintain her spell. It's all noise, it's all wallpaper; the bodies, the loss, the young boy pointing a sword at her just to change his mind at the last second. Be calm, be sweet, be good.

"Nothing happened." Another trip to the office, another disappointment waiting to spiral into something more. "Everything's fine."

Condensation formed small, light clouds in front of Black Star's face as Stein welcomed them into the morgue. Rows of empty silver boxes sat pre-chilled in the event another victim showed up. Their old teacher giddily recounted his first dissection of a deceased body in graphic detail. Maka didn't bother to hide her disgust at the topic. Stein opened up the first antique door and rolled out the bed.

"Well, I'll be damned, it's gone." He said. "Pity, I was just making headway comparing the two. It's amazing how many things in the human body can be abnormal and go completely unnoticed." Maka had really hoped they'd have evidence of a copy-cat, it would have made Kid's addresses to the public so much easier. The number of angry phone calls to the school would only increase from here.

"Why's his heart the only thing left behind?" Black Star asked, the wicked grin Stein gave far more unnerving than anything they'd seen the last two weeks. "Who's heart is that?"

"Ah, the other one." Stein said. "Turns out transplants are only accepted while the brain is active. Fascinating, isn't it?"

"Did he..." Maka tried not to gag at the thought. "Did either of them rot at all? We ran into an incident in Shakashita." She described the crime scene as tactfully as she could.

"It takes at least five days of a soul lingering around to do that." Stein shook his head. "You should have seen Sid's body before I got to him, it was a mess." His ex-students vehemently objected to any further details. There was a reason, after meeting with his advisors, that zombification had been expressly outlawed by Kid. It was easy to get lost in that town, perhaps his soul had taken a while to find a fault line.

Overhead a red light flashed. An intruder had come to the school. Black Star and Maka ran up the steps. In organized lines, students were escorted to the nearest classroom. Windows were darkened and doors were locked.

One the steps of the school, a young man with plugs in his ears held three monstrous creatures on leashes. His two-toned hair an affront to the curated order of the new DWMA. He unclipped two of the leashes and removed their blind folds.

"Find it, and you'll get your reward." The two kishen-eggs ran like rabid dogs toward the school. They hooped and hollered to give themselves courage as they scaled the walls of the school. The first, a gangly creature with curly hair peered through each window in search of the shiny object his boss wanted. The second, a bowl-headed thing with a tongue dragging underneath him launched himself like a frog toward the nearest entrance. It rammed its head against the door like a battering ram, until Black Star kicked the doors open from the inside, with Maka in hand.

"Pl~please." It held up it's hands. "I need~ in." Each breath was a haggard effort to form human words. "Want to go back~" From the tallest tower, his accomplice let go. "Curl, don't. " From free-falling, the other Kishen Egg turned around and formed a giant stinger with his legs. Black Star slide out of the way and dodged the strike. He blocked multiple strikes overhead. Then, with all his upper body, launched Maka's blade into the tail and severed the stinger.

The Kishen Eggs' master held the one leash tight in his hands and blew on a whistle in a tone none of the meisters could hear. They had a mission to fulfill, instead, his assistants were bumbling around like idiots. The two that were loose tried to flee, but with Black Star hot on their trail, the furthest they could get was the tower roof, before getting cornered again.

The bowl-head one lashed out with his elastic tongue. Forward, forward, over; a pattern Black Star quickly picked up on as he tilted Maka's blade toward the ground and got it under the shoulder. It was thrown up onto its hind legs. Black Star kicked it in the left knee, then jumped. With a wide overhead strike, he sliced it clean through.

"Who'd be stupid enough to bring Kishen Eggs here?" Black Star joked. An ear-splitting scream from the roof reminded them of the other foe. It slithered at an alarming speed along the roof only to get cut through the middle by a soul-less scythe. "What the hell?" The other meister landed on the walkway with practiced grace. A glossy silver blade reflected her own flaxen hair and stern gaze back at them.

"Maka?" The woman held her tongue as Maka transformed back like her life depended on her. The once stable resonance like fell apart like pop rocks in a puddle, leaving Black Star's hands itchy.

"Mom!" Maka straightened her hair, slightly mortified she'd been caught in action by the last person she expected to see. "What are you doing here? I thought you were on a mission in the gulf."

"I heard something strange had been going on in Death City, and had to check in on it." Kami stiffened when Maka hugged her. "Clearly things are dire if students are being ushered away from one-star level targets." She squinted down at the entry way, the other target was no longer on school grounds. He'd gotten away. She held her daughter at arm's distance, more concerned now that the immediate threat had gone away. "You look puffy. You shouldn't be exerting yourself in this state, especially when you're a perfectly capable meister." Maka brushed her mother's hands away from her face.

"I've done everything there is to do as a three-star meister." Maka said.

"Yes, well, Justin Law was able to be his own meister, there's no need to go partnering with some inexperienced-" She stopped herself, her eyes immediately drawn to the flare of violent emotions one offhanded comment brought out. "I see." Kami stood up a little straighter and adjusted her glove. "When I was a student, staff members weren't allowed to have tattoos." She narrowed her eyes. Maka held out a hand, a simple gesture to keep the two from butting heads.

"Mom, please." She shook her head. "What are you doing here?"

"I told you, I'm investigating the murders in Death City." She made her way to the stairwell. "Given the nature of the perpetrator, it falls under my jurisdiction. I'll handle things from here. You should get some rest."

"Is she always like that?" Black Star asked once the door to the stairwell closed.

"Like what?" Way of the assassin rule number one, blend into the shadows.

"Nothing, forget I said anything." He may love a good challenge, but he was not going to run straight into that hornets' nest. He long learned with Soul, when it game to parental junk, it was best to leave things alone. "She took the soul you reaped."

"It's fine," Maka said, "I was just going to give it to Kid anyway." They slid down the side of the building to the ground floor. No point in loitering on the roof when there's nothing left to gain. It was a wrap on another day. Another night in an empty house waited for him.

"Hey," Black Star asked, "do you want to come over?"

"What, like, now?" She hadn't had dinner yet. The prospect of another take out meal was hardly appealing, but she wouldn't be able to hide behind the vernier of professionalism again. They'd just be hanging out, alone. Which, they used to do all the time in school, but that was before.

"You don't have to." He said.

"No, it's cool." She felt feverish. "I'd love to."

Dinner was a quiet affair. It was still take-out, both of them too tired to want to cook anything, but it came from the shop next to Black Star's apartment. Warm salty broth and noodles did her body good. It felt like she hadn't had anything descent to eat all week. There was something cozy about sitting on a couch trying to decide what to watch. The last few months her nights had been episodes of the same podcast in an uncanny replica of a home while eating out of a plastic tub.

"You don't have to go back to the hotel." He said, the minute she let one comment slip about her room having wall hooks instead of shelves. When was the last time she felt comfort with closeness? The idea of sharing a space now less of a daunting task, and more of a welcome offer. He'd been sitting in the dip of the cushions with his feet up on the coffee table, like he was the most relaxed person in the world. Even though his eyes were trained on a movie he had memorized by heart. "I wasn't that against the idea, I just didn't want to make Angela uncomfortable." He felt her lean back against couch, her shoulders square against his outstretched arm. "It makes sense, kinda stupid to have you going back and forth all the time."

"I don't mind." The apartment was barely any bigger than the one he'd had in school. The living room and dinning room was the size of Maka's hotel with the kitchen in the eye line of everything. A small office of sorts had been converted into Angela's room, and the only other space was the master and a narrow alcove of a patio. "Where would I be sleeping though?"

"I've got an extra futon." He brushed a lock of hair out her face, still pretending like he was watching the movie. "The good kind, not those weird fake couches." He kept his fingers in her hair, absently twisting it around and messing with it. She hummed softly in agreement, whatever tension remained in her body relaxed against him. His heart hammered a mile a minute. "Why'd you take on the mission?" There was a million things she could say, but he needed her to say something that clue him in on how platonic she saw this situation as.

"I guess, I'm just putting off going back." Maka said. "I don't hate my job, but I feel like that's all I've done. I know me, if I go back to doing routine management stuff, I'm going to blink and another ten years will have gone by. I just... I don't know what else to do." She laughed. "God, and finding out Soul was getting engaged was just kinda made me feel like I missed all this stuff, and what do I have to show for it?"

"Soul's dating someone?" Black Star tried to think who it could be.

"He didn't tell you either?" Well now she really felt like an idiot. This whole time, she'd carried this bruise that he'd personally cut her out of something.

"Maka, I obtained one kid and instantly became invisible." He leaned toward her. "But, wait, who is it?"

"Patty."

"Hunh," his mind started to wander, "they did go on a lot of missions together after graduation. I just assumed Kid was playing favorites." That still didn't answer his initial question. "Who said you had to go anywhere? You could stay here." She should stay here, that would make all of the half-formed thoughts solidify into something more actionable. "You could actually give weapon training a try." Stay. "You said yourself, you're bored with the meister side of things." Please, for the love of god, stay. "I have more than enough time."

"I'd like that." Then she noticed how much she was leaning into him, and how long he'd been tracing idle patterns along her shoulder."It's just," she winced, "I know it's a silly hang up, but I try to avoid getting romantically involved with the people I pair with." His hand froze. She looked up at him, his arm still around her shoulders. He squeezed her arm, because he could do both. He knew he could, not that he ever tried in the past, but he knew why she'd think that was an issue. It wasn't a silly hang up, just one that put him in a very difficult position. Especially with them already playing jump-rope with that line.

"What about after?" He was an open book. There was no way he would lie about what was going on in his head. Right now, the torch he'd carried for his friend was in a vicious battle with the stupid little kid that thought they would have been weapon and meister during freshman year. "You know, training takes a year or two for you, because you're nuts like that. What about after you're done?"

"I don't know," she said, "no ones ever stuck around after." It's not like they ever ended on bad terms. They all had just moved on with there lives. "But I don't see why that'd be a problem." A lot could happen in that span of time. Her hand ghosted along the back of his. Perfectly innocent, and also, surely the death of him. Because Maka may have been able to train weapons like they were going out of style, but it'd taken him fifteen years to get Tsubaki to the status of a Death Scythe.