We'll see if either of us can have more reasonable sleeping schedules in the next fic, WriterGreenReads.

Hoo, man, this has been a trip. Aside from my disgraceful two-year hiatus, this fic still took three years to complete. I started this when I was in HIGH SCHOOL –and now I'm three years deep in college, with an Associates degree (two, actually, since my credits covered two somehow) and working on a Bachelor's. Since I was actually working on material on and off all this time, that's five years that I've been slaving over this. Like goddamn.

But it's finally done! You guys have been an amazing audience (crowd? readership?), even if I couldn't take some of the feedback on my unpublished chunk into account, since, y'know, I'd spent two years working on that shit and the only way I was ever touching it again was to throw it out into the cold light of day. I hope that my shameless plugging will be effective and you'll go read the Soul Eater sequel to this, the first chapter of which has already been published on my account.

We lost some good men on the wandering way of this fic. TheKatanaMistress, Singular Poisonous Ashes, FallenwaterTheFallen, HawthornShadow…you guys were there since the beginning, but after my two-year dropout, I lost you. I value each and every one of my reviewers, of course, even the ones that just send in "hey this is good," but these guys were like the core. I've got other regulars who did manage to stick around, and I lost some other regulars that didn't contribute quite as much, but these guys really did mean a lot, and they make me sad, 'cause like –do they even know I finished? Life makes us change and evolve, and especially for TheKatanaMistress who's been a fan of my works since like 2013, I can certainly understand why those folks might have moved on from checking the site, but like many of you regulars now, they were HUGE fans. Imagine having been there since the beginning of The Trekker before this and then losing the series after Chapter 21 of this fic. Never finishing, never knowing what happened. The idea just ties my soul up in cramps.

Here's to them –and all the other people who dropped out during my two-year hiatus– if they ever hunt me down again like a mad dog (as WriterGreenReads did, hehe) and finish reading. What took you guys so long? I missed you~!

June 19th, 2020

Arya's POV:

Two days and a plethora of frustrated tears and incoherent screaming later (from me), we'd finally managed to work out a set of runes that worked as functional batteries to the Black Butler rune, but as I'd reluctantly expected, the entire array itself still didn't have the amount of power I needed.

We didn't stop, though. I was there nearly all of every day, painting and cleaning up my failed attempts as Wolfram bought can after can to replenish my dwindling supplies. Caught up, perhaps, in the thrill of discovery and how tantalizingly close we were to getting it right, Sieglinde had begun slipping in attending to her other activities, digging up more and more ways we could combine and recombine the various sigils and runes and power flows in a way that wouldn't blow up in my face or rip me apart.

And then at last, the day came.

As I painted and chanted, the array and every part of it remained a whole, unbroken glow as power thrummed loudly throughout the room, and Sieglinde gasped loudly in excitement, clasping her hands to her chest as her eyes shone, bouncing excitedly in place atop her much-comfier padded stool, which Wolfram had dragged up here wordlessly a few days back. It was working, it was actually working, and the threat of my own human error messing it up made sweat trickle down my back as I painstakingly continued, chanting hoarsely around the less-familiar words as I slowly worked towards the very, very end of my array. If I moved my tongue wrong, if I misspoke, if my fingers twitched at the wrong time and I smeared a line, or if I moved my foot over some part of the paint that hadn't dried…I would fuck up everything I'd been working for over these past few months.

No pressure.

I finished. Nothing was faltering or making bad noises.

Straightening up quickly, I made my careful, ginger path out of the circle, stepping as fast as I dared as the glow started to diminish, the bright light dimming.

"Arya?" Sieglinde asked in confusion as I cleared the outside circle of the pentagram and hastily joined her in the doorway. "Did something go wrong? Should-"

FWOOM.

The room exploded in light and a rush of air as Sieglinde and I both winced, raising our hands to block out the sudden bright, harsh glare, Sieglinde yelping in shock as the pressure wave nearly toppled her out of her seat and made our clothes flap wildly for a moment, like we were caught in a March gale.

"There's a time delay before the array itself activates." I explained to her, squinting as the light dimmed a little. "So you don't get immediately teleported the second you finish it. I'd be okay if you were in there, this sigil's keyed to me specifically, but obviously I didn't want to get kicked out without my stuff."

In the middle of Sieglinde's magic workroom, the array was glowing a vibrant sequence of rapidly-shifting colors that defied concrete explanation, mostly because they were blending together so fast. That light itself was radiating upwards like a reverse spotlight, though it was dimming slowly, and that light, at least, was mostly a healthy, encouraging green.

"Is it supposed to look like that?" Sieglinde asked, and I nodded, then realized she might be light-blind and spoke.

"Looks just like the one my Britain used, or near enough."

"Shouldn't it look exactly like it?" Sieglinde asked nervously, and I deadpanned.

"What, the one that sent me here instead of home?"

"…an excellent point."

"Right!" I clapped my hands together. "Now that we've established its authenticity,"

I punched both arms in the air, whooping.

"WHOO-FREAKEDY-HOO! I FINALLY GET TO GO HOME!"

"Yay!" Sieglinde cheered beside me, punching her own arm in the air with just as much enthusiasm. "You'll contact Britain to create a way to maintain contact with me, won't you?" she asked as she lowered it, and I scoffed.

"Dude, what do you take me for? Of course I'm going to find a way to keep in contact with you!"

Sieglinde beamed, and we both went downstairs to the workroom to pick up Britain's mirror and aim it at the pentagram.

"Everything seems to check out." he said as Sieglinde slowly swept the mirror in an arc, showing him every individual word of it. "Excellent work, the both of you."

"Uh, not right now, because obviously I have to get through and make sure I don't end up in the Twilight Zone or something, but is there a way I could like…invite Sieglinde to my place?" I asked as delicately as I could, making her whip around to face me, eyes wide with incredulous joy.

"You would be comfortable with inviting individuals from other parts of space-time comingling with your dimension?"

"Uh, yeah, if its Sieglinde. Maybe you guys too, if you want to come." I said, and he muttered something darkly under his breath.

"You'd have to get home first, since you yourself do not constitute nearly enough of a sample size for even me to feel comfortable creating a transportation spell to your dimension…which is somewhat why you're in this mess." Britain said reluctantly. "Since you and I can exchange messages through your phone, I'm sure we could thrash something out."

"Sweet!" I chimed, and blinked a little as there was a stumbling sort of run before Sieglinde then cannoned into my middle, hugging me tightly.

"Thank you so much! I'll never forget what you've done for me, and I can't wait to see you in your world!" she gushed rapidly, reverting to German as I felt something suspiciously wet soak into the fabric over my belly.

Aw…

I patted her head gently as she continued to fiercely hug me around the waist and probably-cry into my stomach, telling me how wonderful it was to be learning in the real world and how she had me and Ciel to thank for probably saving her life and teaching her to grow like this, and praising me so enthusiastically for how I had saved her perspective of magic and given her something to hope for that I felt myself blush awkwardly. It was a weird feeling to have someone express this much…emotion at you, even when it was wholehearted affection and appreciation. Especially then, actually, because expressing the fact you felt awkward when someone was telling you that you basically hung their moon and stars just made you feel like an asshole.

"There, there…" I tried, wincing at how ineffectual that was. But since I didn't have any better ideas… "There, there…"

When I finally could pry Sieglinde off of me, we went downstairs to gather my things and say goodbye to Wolfram. I was especially careful with checking over my room, since I couldn't very well send for whatever I lost or forgot here for what might be a very long time indeed. Aside from packing my day-to-day essentials that were still out, my toothbrush and shampoo and hairbrush and the like, I also got changed, since the last two times the spell had been used to switch worlds, I'd gotten dumped in water, putting on some boy's swimshorts and a plain brown tankini in lieu of undergarments, and pulling on a T-shirt on top of the tankini. I didn't have any water shoes, something I should probably remedy when I got home, but I compromised by only putting on my long-unused sneakers, since if there was any feeling more miserable than soaking wet socks, I didn't want to learn of it.

Suited up, as it were, I did one last sweep of my room, even going so far as to prowl throughout the house in search for the smallest thing I could've missed.

There was nothing, and I snagged an apple from the kitchen before going out to the stable, where Wolfram was carefully brushing Dämon.

"Hey." I said, alerting both large human and even-larger horse to my presence. "The spell worked."

"I see." Wolfram said gruffly, turning around, and we clasped hands.

"You take care of Sieglinde now, y'hear?" I told him, smacking the side of his shoulder bracingly as we let go, and he smirked a little at such a facetious statement.

"Of course, I certainly will."

"And you," I said fondly, stepping past him. "You evil, piece of shit, demon horse."

I swear Dämon raised an eyebrow at me.

"Yeah, you. You're going to go back to the Phantomhive estate and never have to deal with an inexperienced jockey like me again." I told him, reaching up to gently scratch between his ears. Dämon whickered and lowered his head to grab the apple I offered him, for once not ruining the moment by enacting any one of his evil, clever horsey tricks. "Bet you won't miss me one little bit. I think I'll miss you though…but only a little."

He snorted, and I took that opportunity to back out of the stable, waving cheerfully to Wolfram as he waved back.

"I'm going to miss you very, very much." Sieglinde said from her place sitting on the stairs when I came back in, and I smiled sadly, bending down to ruffle her hair.

"Hey, I won't be gone forever. And you'll have Britain to talk to, and Ciel, and Wolfram, and anyone else you want once you fix those legs of yours."

She giggled a little, flashing me a bright smile.

"I know. Promise to show me your world and all its wonders soon, okay!" she told me, and I smiled fondly.

"Hell yeah!"

Sieglinde used the excuse of me carrying her up the stairs to squeeze in one last hug, which I certainly didn't begrudge her, adorable little teddy bear of a doll that she was, and sighed reluctantly when I let go, setting her down on the padded stool Wolfram had left.

"Okay, so once I step onto this, I should get transported like, immediately." I told her, my serious face hovering above hers. "And the array should stop glowing, which means it's become inert with the fulfillment of its purpose. Understand?"

She nodded rapidly.

"Great. You wait until Britain calls you and says I made it through, and then you can wash away the diagram with soapy water just like normal. It won't do anything to me, I promise."

I let my apocalypse bag thud to the ground, and opened my arms with a smile.

"Goodbye hug?"

She lunged forward and wrapped her arms around my neck, and I smiled and returned the hug, rubbing her back a little as she clung to me tightly. We held the hug for long enough for Sieglinde to squeeze out whatever emotional closure she needed, and I let her go when she started to pull away.

"I'll see you soon." I promised, and slung my apocalypse bag over one shoulder again, stepping cautiously into the room.

My heart began to beat a little rapidly as I looked at the sigil on the ground, shining and humming with power, and flashes of everything that could go horribly wrong kept intruding upon my brain as my grip on the strap tightened. This would be fine. This would totally be fine. I had okayed the array, Sieglinde (a child genius!) had okayed the array, and Britain had okayed the array. Three different people who knew what they were doing had said that this would work.

It would work. It would totally work.

Taking a deep breath and holding it, I took a step forward into the shining ray of light.

FWOOM.

The familiar jolt of tumbling vertigo hit me, and even as my heart jumped into my mouth I still felt mildly reassured that the terrifying sensation of being whirled around in what felt like a million different directions at once was still the same as the other times this spell had worked, meaning that whatever else would happen, I had still gotten the actual action of transportation right.

This was working.

It was fine. It was fine.

It was also vaguely dizzying, feeling myself tumbling head over barely-existent heels as reality stretched and altered around me in ways I didn't have the diploma to explain, everything going faster, harder, more, and more and more until-

SPLASH

CRACK

I felt the cool embrace of water close over my body, and abruptly let out my breath in shock and no small amount of pain as the back of my head cracked against what felt like stone not a second later, followed by the rest of my back a nanosecond afterwards. Luckily, whatever water I was in was shallow, so as I thrashed and sat up, coughing, gasping, and choking all at once (if that makes any sense), and losing my grip on the straps of my apocalypse bag into the bargain, I was able to do so without also continuing my drowning experience.

The second I could breathe without feeling water in my throat I groaned and clutched the back of my head, feeling it throb painfully. Thankfully, as I gingerly felt around, no blood was drawn and my skull remained un-dented. I would probably just have a monster of a bruise for the next few days/weeks.

Then I opened my watering eyes and looked around for my apocalypse bag, seeing it floating in the foot-deep water a few inches away. With a sigh of relief, I grabbed it and slung it over my shoulder again, taking the time to look around my landing site.

It appeared as if I was sitting in a decorative fountain in a city square or something, and my heart sank, because number one I knew there was no such thing in the town near my house, or any towns anywhere near my house, and number two I had no idea where I actually was, given that the architecture was…suspiciously funky for a real-life location. Skull motifs and wacky weathervanes were alarmingly common, and the roofs of the houses and the houses themselves were…skewed, in a way that didn't feel architecturally sound.

Perhaps it was just an artsy part of town. Perhaps I had landed in a very odd sort of festival. Perhaps this was an amusement park.

Perhaps I was desperately in denial.

At the moment, though, all I did know for fact was that it was a very bright, very hot, and probably middle-of-summer day, and for once I was actually mildly glad about being dumped in water. This particular occasion certainly beat being dumped in an ice-cold river in the middle of winter –an image and situation I couldn't help but long for, just for a second, as I squinted hatefully up at the sun.

At which point I froze, my eyes going wide, before I winced and closed them again, forcibly reminded that staring into the sun, no matter how cartoony and anime the world, hurt like a bitch.

What. The. Fuck.

Everyone remembers when they were little and in kindergarten, and you drew a landscape for whatever childish reason, and you always drew the sun with one of two things: a happy lil' smiley face and/or sun rays, when you had never in your grubby crayon-grabbing life seen the actual sun with anything like that? Hell, I remember that some of us would put shades on the damn thing, because there's nothing that four-and-five-year-olds like better than poetic irony.

Well the toddlers and kindergarteners of my world had a sudden basis in fact, because the sun I looked up at just now, while still throwing off as much light and heat as my native, beloved hydrogen-and-helium star, had everything except the ironic shades: flaring, conical rays that circled its entire –...body? Head? Self?– and a billion-watt smile that could put any comic book hero's to shame, gaping wide in amusement as faint laughter drifted down from the heavens. The sun had a face. A face that was laughing, something intrinsically impossible in my home dimension.

Well fuck.

To be continued, in Soul Eater…