Terminus [tur-muh-nuh s], noun. 1: The end or extremity of anything. 2: The end of a railroad line. 3: Goal or end.

The summer hours sped by like molten gold. Maka sat atop the dogs' train car and tracked the sun westward across the sky through slitted, watering eyes, one hand resting atop her scythe. The dogs were gone from the car, of course, long ago put safely within the big top along with the rest of the animals, in the very center of the circle of wagons.

"Safe," she whispered to the sun. It ignored her and kept slipping on in the sky, downwards and heavy like her sluggish heart, and she closed her eyes and lay flat on her back, feeling the anxious prickling heat of her own scorched skin like a purification. There were no birds singing, she noticed, and even all the warmth she'd stored up keeping watch couldn't combat the chill that shook her.

When she opened her eyes again, her mouth dry and tasting of dust, the sun was a hair's breadth from the top of the tallest mountain on the horizon, painting purple and orange onto the thick clouds roiling up over peaks in a slow-motion tsunami, and the shadows on the ground were long and dark, stretched into strange dangerous shapes. She climbed shakily down from the train car and headed to Soul's wagon, very aware of her own parched mouth and the tiny clever holes Black Star had drilled in her scythe's shaft, the ones that couldn't really be seen but which felt like they might swallow her up as she slid her thumb over them. When she stopped in front of Soul's door, she turned to the side to stare at her own elongated shadow, clawing far across the parched yellow grass, very black, and the scythe curving in her hand was like a terrible tooth, the fang of a carnivore-

She rubbed her aching eyes and opened the door. Soul, seated on his bed, turned to look at her very slowly.

"What's this?" he said, dangling the vial of clear liquid between two fingers. "I was cleaning in here, so you didn't have to, after… to deal with it tomorrow, and it fell out of one of your horse things."

She froze. For a long moment, all she could focus on, stupidly, was the way his throat worked when he swallowed. If she concentrated, if she looked hard enough at him and the bright sunset light that spilled pink across him, she thought could almost see the blood rushing beneath the skin. "It's part of my plan," she said hazily. "It's… I need it." This isn't supposed to happen, she thought, and then, with increasing panic, Black Star's going to say 'I told you so' for years.

He tilted his head, sheets rasping as he shifted, and the vial disappeared into his clenched fist. "Why?"

"I-" She had to think of something, she had to get her hands on that vial- she had to drink it now, to get it into her bloodstream and give it time to work before evening turned to night. She should have hidden it better, too, but she hadn't trusted Black Star not to 'lose' it, she'd been afraid it would break in her pocket, and Soul never messed with her tack; she'd thought it was safe. "Soul, I need that. Please." She tried to put all the things she felt for him into her voice, but it came out only a dry rasp, and she stepped closer slowly. "Please."

He finally looked her in the eyes, and his own were monstrous, wide and ravenous. This close, she could see his nostrils flaring and the thin slick of sweat on his brow. "All right, but can you tell me what it is? Because I'm worried enough about tonight, you know." His laugh was high and wild, like an animal hunting at night.

She shut her eyes and swayed, relief rising heady in her blood. "Oh, thank goodness. Soul, I'm sorry I haven't been with you, I just- I needed time." Time to think about the thing she'd confessed earlier, time to wonder if she'd lost her mind, or even if she'd ever had it, time to think about his hands on her hips and how very sharp she'd made her scythe.

He made an effort to smile in the way she liked, but the shaking of his hands ruined it. Her heart twanged so ferociously that she leaned backwards onto her heels and half-raised her hands to her chest, which was slowly collapsing into a black, choking void. "I know. It's fine," he said.

The way he was looking at her just then, she didn't think she could have moved if she'd had a gun to her head. He looked at her like she had her hand around his throat, like she'd pulled his heart still-beating from his chest to press a kiss to it, like she was the culmination of every dream he'd ever had, like she was wonderful, and he managed to make her believe it. She thought of the bonfire, the one they'd all sat and drank around after washing the blood away in the river, and seeing him look back at her now was like staring into the flames.

"I love you." The words fell from Maka's lips without thought, faster, if no lighter, the second time around, and she waited silently for them to detonate in her face.

Soul's smile stayed, and he held the vial out to her. "So you, uh, said."

That was enough to make her choke out a laugh, even now, even as she sat numbly inside her own shuddering body and prepared to fight for her life while carrying someone else's in her fragile chest. "You're so rude." She stretched a hand to the poison, eyes straying again to the bright strange light painting his bleached-bone hair and his thin cheeks and his starving eyes-

Somebody screamed outside, and they both jerked. The vial fell and shattered without a sound.

"That's Marie," Soul grunted, diving out the door and snagging her by the elbow as they went, his other arm shining and sharp with his impossible blade.

She heard the vial's splinters crunch beneath her foot, tried for one awful moment to stay, to- what, lick it off the floor? She didn't know, but all of a sudden she couldn't breathe, and she was afraid to lean on her altered scythe, but Soul was dragging her impatiently along towards the big top, and then Marie yelled again from somewhere.

"Horsefeathers," Maka said, meaning to whisper, but it came out as a ridiculous shriek, and Soul was forced to stop when she couldn't lift her feet of clay anymore.

"Maka," he said, wheeling on her and cupping her face in his hands, and the last ragged fringes of glorious sunset behind him were dim compared to that burning look. "Maka. Bearcat. My bearcat. You can do this, and you- you'll make it out of tonight alive even if I have to burn the whole world down, do you understand? You'll be all right. But we have to go, now, and help. Oh, christ, I thought I'd be the one- come on, okay?"

She wanted to weep, desperately, because maybe it would loosen the invisible chains tightening around her hitching lungs, but her eyes weren't working right; she could barely see beyond Soul's blurred face. There were voices in the distance, shouts from the big top, and she heard a gunshot that nearly sent her to her knees. "I- I can't-"

"Dammit," he snarled, and she finally noticed that he was afraid too. Dark clockwork clicked into motion inside her skull. "People need you, Maka, Marie needs you!"

Her friends- "Okay," she said, and then she gulped sweet air and they were running again, through the reaching shadows towards the striped canvas of the big top and the massive gleaming skull keeping watch.

Another gunshot; they skidded, turned, and there was the first monster, just as the very last glint of sun disappeared behind the mountains, dipping everything in cold grey.

The monster was a spidery, spiky thing, shredded night terrors wrapped around a bloodthirsty briar bush, nothing human left in it at all as it perched atop one of their protective train cars, hissing and growling, so low that it shook Maka's. It dodged the shovels Marie was wielding easily enough, but it seemed reluctant to advance any further, and with good reason. Pattie and Liz were both there, guns at the ready. Liz's was smoking.

"Hold it still!" Pattie screeched; Marie responded with a few choice profanities that sizzled in the air just like gunpowder and then resorted to lobbing one shovel directly at the monster's head. Finally Pattie rolled her eyes, snarled, and fired three times in quick succession; there was an audible clang of metal as one or two shots ricocheted off the train car, but at least one hit. The monster gave another throbbing moan and fell back away into the darkness.

Marie pushed a sweaty lock of darkened golden hair off her face and thunked her remaining deadly shovel into the soil, stretching her arms out; her hands were shaking fists. "First one of the night," she said, in a terrible high pitched voice that was probably supposed to be jovial. "Early, too. Come on, everyone. Back with us, we've got to stick together."

They hurried after her, joining everyone else in the open space in front of the big top, where they could see nearly two-thirds of their defensive train-car ring arching around them. The horses, tied securely a little inside the big top and hobbled for good measure, were shifting nervously, the whites of their eyes showing, and Aka's red flanks in particular showed the dark sweat of fear. The lions and the dogs, just inside the tent's entrance, were equally as restless. Blair was crouching beside her oldest tigress's cage, perfectly still, staring with wild gleaming eyes out into the darkness, one hand pushed through the bars and into striped fur. She did not look like anything that had ever been human, just then, despite all the true monsters Maka had seen before. Harvar and Black Star were just finished stoking the massive fire they'd all chopped wood for yesterday, and Maka closed her eyes against the heat, rubbing one thumb across the thick callouses on her palm.

She opened them immediately as something too near gave a yowl that was awfully close to human.

Soul whined from between bared teeth, and Maka's breath caught in panic. Blair's tigress gave a hideous moan, and then suddenly all the animals were giving voice, the mournful howls of the dogs lifting above the horses' snorting and stomping. A hot wind rose around them, jarringly strange, like the breath of a dead god on her skin. "Soul," she said, edging closer to him after glancing around quickly in the dim light; she caught Black Star eyeing them, and Tsubaki was conveniently nearby with her bared sword glinting orange from the fire, but everyone else was simply waiting and watching for the next assault, including Lord Death himself, who was a scarecrow silhouette in front of the flames. "Soul. All right?" she said.

He quivered, his cheek spasmed, and for a moment she was afraid, but then he grunted and looked at her. "Yeah. Keep asking, though."

"Okay," she said quietly, aware that her head was swiveling in every possible direction like a drunk owl, but she couldn't seem to stop herself from looking, even though the whole circus was grouped around them. Soul was just as jumpy. "At least we're not running," she said wildly.

He snorted harshly. "Heh. Yeah, that's something."

Mira, pacing aggressive circles to their right with six-inch daggers slung on each hip, a rusted pistol holstered under her arm, and holding a sword that Maka vaguely recognized as one of Black Star's, cast them a measured glance before giving a slow nod.

Maka, still watching Soul- he seemed passably controlled, for now at least- stepped over to Mira and said in a low voice that she didn't recognize, "Are you afraid?"

Mira smiled toothily, bandages rasping as she rubbed her free hand up her sword arm. Her nails were glossy scarlet, appropriately enough. "Yes, I'm terrified. I upchucked twice earlier. Did that make you feel better?"

"No," Maka admitted, disgruntled, pressing her fists to her temples and squeezing. "I thought it might, but… no."

"Fear's a private thing, and it's different for every woman," Mira said quietly, her wide dark eyes reflecting all the flames' violent colors. "Comes at you at different speeds, doll, and you can run, but you've got some of the fastest demons I've ever seen."

Maka looked at Soul, whose demons came on like a train thundering down the tracks, and said, "Not the fastest, though."

"No," Mira said, and they nodded to each other nervously before sidling away again.

Soul took Maka's hand for a moment when she stood by him again, held it for a brief second, then let it drop, and she watched in slow-motion terror as his pupils blew wide, as his lips peeled back from his teeth.

"Get ready! They're coming!" he shouted suddenly, angling his head as if he were trying to hear something far away, and now she heard it too, the nightmarish yipping and gibbering of the things outside the circle of train cars. What were they saying? She stole a glance at Soul's face and was thankful she didn't know.

Sid, hefting his double-barreled rifle, growled low and deep, and Kid, wielding a massive bronze gun she'd never seen before, sank into a boneless stance that made him resemble a snake about to strike. Harvar lit up all over with dancing deadly sparks like a rabid Christmas tree, and Lord Death started to laugh suddenly, a throaty airless dead-man rattle.

"Let's give them hell," he said loudly, and for a moment Maka thought he was about to push back his mask, but instead he only lifted pristinely gloved hands that were crackling with power. The same screaming wind that had torn the monsters apart before rose up again, slipping invisibly along the ground and tearing at the laces of Maka's boots, biting at her knocking knees.

She wanted to say something dramatic and fitting, or maybe just turn around and run, but suddenly unspeakable things were swarming over the barricade and all she could think was oh no, oh no, oh no. Soul stood abreast of her, waiting, and as something big and scaly and feline leapt at them, he sank to his knees and braced his arm almost straight up. The monster gave a terrible scream as it impaled itself on his bladed arm, and as it fell it trapped his arm beneath it, taking a final futile swipe at his face with a clawed hand before shuddering and dying.

Maka bit her scream off at its birth and dove forward, digging her toes into the dirt for traction to roll the thing off Soul's arm, which slid free with a reluctant squelch that put her already upset stomach into hysterical somersaults.

She felt numb, as if she were walking somewhere with her eyes closed, fumbling blindly, and when Soul, shaking off his gory arm, gave the dead cat-thing a vicious kick, his teeth gritted, she felt only distant disgust, a dilute echo of the terror that had been raging through her blood only seconds before. She simply didn't have time to let it run free, so she ignored it. There was no other option; it was that or die. "All right," she said, resolute, even as a distant voice in her head tried to remember the name of what she was feeling, or rather, wasn't. "Let's do this. Come on. Stay by me."

Soul blinked up at her, then stood, flexing a hand that was reddened completely up to the elbow before letting his blade flicker into being again. "To your left."

"Huh?" She wheeled around with a gasp, stumbling over her own feet, but Soul had a firm grip on her arm and was steady at her side as they charged. She held her scythe awkwardly, above the sabotaged area, close to the blade, but it worked nonetheless, though she had to get a little closer than she would have liked, closer to horrible things that she was sure would show up behind her eyelids for the rest of her natural life.

First she and Soul killed an almost man-shaped thing studded with scabs, yellow pus dripping from flesh that was torn away clear to the warped, scarlet bones. Then they herded a crawling, whining monster back into Stein and Marie, who tore it apart with merciless efficiency.

Nothing slowed down, and nothing sped up. There was no magic moment when Maka actually stopped being afraid; instead she fell into autopilot out of sheer necessity, slashing and chopping and running until her lungs were melting inside her heaving chest. There was only heavy breathing broken by the occasional shout or bestial shriek, the musical clink of blades mixing with steady pops of gunfire.

Lord Death's magic tore apart the bulk of each wave as it came, until the grass was slick and the each breath tasted metallic. Everyone else, long ago forced apart from the single tight group they'd started as, worked in smaller bunches to kill the survivors, and when those brief moments of respite came they all grabbed a limb and hauled the bodies off out of the way, or threw wood on the precious fire. Nobody was dead, not yet, but Sid was barely conscious in the big tent, lying beside Blair's cats with Mira stalking back and forth protectively. Everyone else was bleeding noticeably in various spots; it shone black on their skin when they came into the edges of the firelight.

There were so many of the monsters, they just kept coming, and it was dark now, inky night lit only by the hot flames and the merciless moon above. Maka was bleeding from somewhere on her scalp, though she didn't know what had hit her; a fat trickle of heat wound down the side of her face to drip gently off her chin. There was redness on her knee, too, and on her side, seeping out over her mint-green blouse, but she didn't have time to investigate. Her lips felt bruised and swollen and her bones were dry and brittle, old, ready to snap at any second, but the monsters kept coming.

She was so involved in the desperate endless scramble, in the ducking and diving and killing, that it took her too long to notice that Soul wasn't by her side any more.

She spun around, boots slipping in the sodden grass, hunting for pale hair in the darkness, crying his name. "Soul? Soul? Soul!"

Then she glimpsed him, across the clearing and up against the other half of the train-car circle, his blade glowing faintly red against the throat of a thin, white-faced boy.

She was running before she even knew it, though she had to stop halfway to Soul to help Stein, heaving her scythe into the guts of an armored centipede-monster taller than she was. Stein, his lab coat spattered artistically with terrible things, gave her a little wave and trotted off afterwards, before she could catch her breath to say anything.

When she looked up, Soul and the boy were gone.

She sprinted to where they'd been, looked around with her heart in her mouth, and she saw nothing, but she heard a voice coming from the deeper darkness behind the big top.

It was a woman's voice, silky and beautiful enough to make her ears bleed. "Dear, they never understood you, no matter how hard they tried, but I do. Chrona and I understand you. We're the same, after all. You could even say we're family."

And then, Soul's voice; Maka cringed against the train car and clamped her hands over her mouth, glancing quickly behind her and then peering into the darkness again. "I… I don't understand." He sounded drugged, or hungry, and both possibilities made Maka's head swim. This wasn't according to plan, and who the hell was talking to him? Who was that skinny boy?

She took a deep breath and followed Soul's voice into the black.

It wasn't a boy. They were human, certainly, but she couldn't tell much of anything beyond that. The person standing beside the woman with the spider-silk voice had strange, limp, pale hair, so light it was nearly lavender, and wide, tortured eyes set in a face far too thin. The woman was holding something like a glowing golden rope, letting it wrap around and around her arm and give off faint light as she stood before Soul; only when Maka crept closer did she realize it was moving, and then a moment later that it was a snake.

"Dear, my dear boy," said the woman to Soul. The purple-haired person closed their eyes and swayed, licking cracked lips. "Don't you want to be with those who understand you? You're one of the lucky ones. You won't turn into a mindless beast like the rest of them. You can become like me, and Chrona. You'll be whole and strong and invincible, and you won't have to shut your ears to the whispers any more. You can join us, and be with us." She laughed, and it was like a hundred tiny bells. "You can't be stupid enough to think you deserve anything else, after all. I can see all the blood you've spilled, and I know exactly what you're worth."

Soul's arm was still red and gleaming, but his eyes looked lost. Suddenly an image flashed into Maka's mind- a card, with writhing vines reaching to trip the Fool, but maybe they hadn't been vines at all, maybe they'd been scaled and fanged, maybe they'd been snakes too. Slippery and poisonous, and this woman- this thing, because with a sixth sense Maka hadn't known she possessed until now, she knew the woman wasn't fully human- knew every thing that Soul wanted, that he craved, deep down in his heart, and she was leading him to his doom with a collar of sweet lies.

Maka said his name then, too loud, a scream, and he didn't even twitch. Something snapped inside her and all the fear she'd been trying to suppress came rushing out.

The snake woman's eyes, clear and sun-gold and happy, cut to Maka, seemingly unsurprised to see an interloper. There was blood on her cheek, a delicate spray that almost looked like freckles. "Chrona," she ordered, and then the dead-eyed person was right in front of Maka, nose nearly touching hers as they peered into her face, hot breath puffing on her chin.

"I've got to kill you now," they informed her sadly, and then everything was burning and black and sharp. Something nightmarish was rising out of them, whipping and tearing at her, and she was stumbling backward and baring her teeth and raising her scythe.

The wooden shaft snapped, surprisingly loudly, and she fell.

The dark many-armed thing roaring its way out of the purple-haired person's skin dove at her, and she flung her arms up to shield her face, kicking and scrambling, trying to get out of range, but the person was fast and they didn't seem to feel her blows. She snatched up the broken shaft of her scythe and waved the splintered end threateningly, but no matter how she beat on the black sharpness it only came back for more.

Then she realized that the black tentacle-blades were laughing, cackling and shrieking like a child having the time of their life, and yet the purple-haired person's pale mouth was firmly shut as they stared at her.

"Please," she said, very calmly now, even as the blows came faster and harder. She covered her face and her head, turned her shoulders into the blows the way Black Star had taught her, tried to watch for an opening, hit when she could and tried to edge closer to where she thought she'd left the sharp part of her scythe. All the while the snake-woman's gorgeous voice kept going, weaving a spell over Soul that Maka could practically see, and his shoulders were hunched and his hands fists at his side. "Please, please, please don't kill me. Don't kill him, please, please, please."

It was a chant, a prayer, a plea, a waste of precious breath; it was nothing but nonsense, automatic fear-driven mumblings that she barely even realized were coming from her, until the purple-haired person faltered and froze, reaching a hand up into the blackness tearing from their shoulderblades.

"The darkness really does have a mind of its own," they said softly, in what was really a rather pretty voice; Maka, gasping for air even as her injured ribs screamed pain and stumbling backwards on numb feet, had to fight back hysterical laughter at the thought. "It does what it wants. I can't handle it. I can't fight it. I'm sorry, but you have to die."

"No," Maka screamed, infuriated, clutching her pathetic, useless piece of wood. "I won't! I'm not ready! You don't have to do this! You can fight it!"

The black tentacles were still laughing, still reaching for her, but there was a look on the purple-haired person's gaunt face, a sort of concentrated, confused wonder, and it was horribly familiar, it itched to look at-

It was Soul's face, when they'd kissed for the first time, and when he'd asked if they were friends. It was hope like a sunrise, and bewilderment, and it would be her salvation, because the words she still had weren't many, but they would be enough.

"He fights it," she said, jerking her chin at Soul, who was swaying in a sort of trance, twitching now and then, frowning as the snake woman kept up her vicious persuasion. "Soul does. He fights it." Was he fighting now? She couldn't tell, but she told herself fiercely to have faith in him.

"You can't fight it," said the purple-haired person, closing their haunted eyes; it was a relief. "I can't, anyway."

They spoke with broken, old, not-yet-healed sorrow; Maka cut her eyes to Soul again, wincing as she saw his blades reappear, saw the familiar frenzied bloodlust pull his face into something she never wanted to see again. "How do you know?" she whispered. "How do you know you can't fight it? Have you ever tried? Has anyone ever helped you?" Maka had a golden voice too, she was purer and stronger besides, and now, suddenly, she had an idea, and with it clarity that cut momentarily through the fog of bitter fear. "Has anyone believed in you, been your friend?"

Her opponent opened their eyes, and it was like staring into a grave. "W-what? What- what?"

Maka edged closer, just a little. "I could help you. I helped him. He's been fighting all night, fighting to keep his friends alive. He's been fighting all his life and he's winning." Or he had been, but now she didn't even recognize him.

"He… he has friends?" the person said softly, white hands lifting into the air as if hunting for something. "Really?"

"Yes," Maka said frantically. "Yes, I'm his friend. I love him."

"It's not that I enjoy all the killing," they said forlornly, drooping. "I hate it. It's just what I was born to do. It's all I'm good for. Some people are just bad from birth."

"Chrona," said the woman, and now her voice was the opposite of beautiful. "What do you think you're doing? Aren't you hungry?"

Soul licked his lips at the last word, and his head turned back towards the fire; Maka dug her fingernails into her palm to keep from shrieking at his dilated, monstrous, gleaming scarlet eyes. "Chrona," she said desperately. "Is that your name? That's nice. I'm Maka. It's nice to meet-"

"Shut your fool mouth," the woman hissed, suddenly right behind Chrona. Her hair was lifting around her head like a halo now from some invisible force, and her hands were twisted into brutal claws. "Chrona. Kill her. This is your last chance."

"Yes. Okay," said Chrona compliantly, and the blackness on their shoulders began to writhe and laugh and scream, but Chrona didn't move.

"I could be your friend," said Maka, lightheaded, suddenly aware of every ache and pain and piece of shredded flesh on her body. Panic was sour on her tongue as Soul lurched into a predatory stalk towards them, blades flickering rapidly, red as flayed flesh. "I could. If you don't want to be like this you don't have to."

Chrona began to shake, and the black tentacle-blades wound themselves around their throat, lashing about madly. "I- I- I- a friend? I don't- I don't know, I'm not- I don't-"

They were tragic, confused, hurting, very clearly terrified as they looked at the snake woman's furious, contorted face, and suddenly Maka's words were nothing but true, and a golden warmth suffused her chest as she stepped forward again towards Chrona. She only realized she was crying when her vision began to blur. "I can. I can be your friend. You can stay with us if you like, maybe, and I can help you. You can change back. There's- forgiveness, for people like you, for monsters, they can be human, like Soul, and if you have friends-"

The woman growled, and then Maka felt a sharp, brief pain in the hand she had lifted to Chrona. It hurt, but not nearly as badly as most other things had hurt tonight, and she had to tear her eyes away from Soul's to look at the wound- two wounds, right beside each other, in the fleshy part of her palm below her thumb.

Her vision was blurring again. The woman stepped forward and tenderly lifted her shining snake with the bloody mouth off the ground in front of Maka, stroking it; Chrona began to whimper, wrapping their arms tightly around their self, cringing backwards. The bite was red, and then almost purple, and Maka felt absurdly mirthful as she looked at it. Probably she was hysterical now, at last, she recognized distantly; deeper than that was fury that she'd been taken out by a stupid glorified earthworm, of all things, and deeper still was an aching, mournful regret that felt like it could kill her all by itself, if she weren't already dying.

Soul made a sound, something brief and short and agonized, like a wounded animal, and she lifted her eyes back to his with astonishing effort. They were clear and bright. "Oh, Soul," she managed, heart swelling, and then she spent the last of her energy trying to reach for Chrona's shaking hand. It hurt when she fell, but she was oddly numb all over, so it wasn't too bad, and finally closing her weary eyes was a gentle release.

Tsubaki currently had her quarterstaff wedged crosswise into the gaping maw of a monster to hold it open as she drove her sword repeatedly up through the roof of its mouth, all extremely flashy but putting her far too close to too many teeth for Black Star's taste, so he dispatched the thing he was currently killing with extra speed and trotted over, keeping his eyes slit every time he glanced at the fire to make sure his eyes would stay adjusted to the dark.

Tsubaki finished her monster off before he could get there and was wiping her sword on the grass when he arrived. "All right?" she said breathlessly, already looking around for her next target, but it seemed this wave was finished, though they could still hear growling from the darkness.

Black Star sighed and rolled his twanging shoulders before answering, wincing as he felt a barely-clotted slash tear open again along his back. Somewhere by the tent, Blair gave a wild victory holler, quickly followed by a war whoop from Patti and a really profane curse from Mira; he grinned in spite of everything. "Mm. Better'n Sid, anyway, he's out cold. I'm hoping it's over… Have you seen Soul?"

She blinked, and then went pale. "Not in a while, and I don't-" She spun around, raising a hand to her mouth as if it weren't covered in red. "Oh, no, Black Star- I don't see either of them!"

"Fucking hell! Where'd they go?"

"They're not in the big top, I don't see them, I don't see them- oh no!" she moaned, gripping the end of her ponytail desperately with the hand that wasn't holding her sword. "Oh no oh no!"

Black Star snagged her elbow and dragged her back towards the dying coals of the fire, spitting profanities all the while. Of course right when they'd won, when they'd managed to survive this cursed fucking night, things would go bottoms up. If he was a lesser man he might admit that the burning lump in his belly was stark fear. "Stay here. I'm gonna go look-"

"Look for who?" said Marie, popping up from nowhere. Her eye was uncovered, if a little swollen, and when she looked at Black Star he felt like he'd just jumped headfirst into a frozen lake. That thing always gave him the heebie-jeebies, useful as it was.

"Soul and Maka," he said grimly. Marie understood at once.

"Wait," she said, turning. "Stein! Everyone! To me!"

It only took maybe half a minute for everyone to limp up, but it felt like forever, and Black Star had to pace to keep from running off himself; it wasn't till the circus was all gathered around him, a bloody, battered, nearly finished group, that he realized he could see them clearly, and that the shadows were deep gray rather than black. It was the ragged edge of morning. The sun would rise soon.

"Too fucking late," he hissed to himself, feeling rabid, suddenly as full of energy as he'd been when the night started. Bearcat was fierce, and she had a fighter's spirit that was both terrible and beautiful, in a way that reminded him vaguely and for no real reason of the mother he'd barely known, but she and Soul were both gone, and Jacqueline's goddamn awful prophecies always came true.

"Soul and Maka are missing," Marie said, pitching her voice loudly to carry to everyone over the muted moans of the injured and the labored breathing of everyone else. Her eyes kept scanning beyond the train cars, keeping watch. "What- they're all leaving, the monsters, they're just walking away, I don't understand…"

"Yeah, okay, well that's good, so can we fucking get going and look for them?" he demanded, planting his feet.

Stein shot him an irritated glance. "Or the person with the fancy supernatural vision could look, since they're probably close," he drawled, lip curling.

"...Oh. Right."

Marie snorted eloquently- it looked like it hurt- then did a slow spin. Watching her face change from concentration to shock as she stopped made Black Star feel the same swooping sensation as when the train hit a particularly big bump. "Behind the tent," she said, and then they were all running, even Lord Death. Tsubaki and Black Star took the lead, but Liz and Patti were just behind, smoking guns at the ready, and Lord Death was a boiling murderous shadow right behind them, emanating palpable malice.

Black Star pushed himself faster as they rounded the corner of the big top and left the fire behind. He hadn't been watching, he'd promised her he'd watch and keep them safe, and now his friends were-

They were both bleeding, or maybe just covered in it, he couldn't tell, but there was an awful lot of it, and Black Star skidded to a stop so fast he nearly fell right over. What the fuck was happening? Maka looked mostly okay, but Soul had her in his arms, and she wasn't moving, not consciously anyway, except for the doll-like way her head lolled about as Soul tried to both carry her and fend off the golden-haired woman who was flinging both verbal abuse and some sort of crackling dark energy at him, and who the hell was she? And- christ, why did Soul have so much blood on him?

"Medusa," Lord Death said, in a tone that was both perfectly smooth and perfectly threatening. "It's been a long time. I thought you'd died years ago. Hoped, rather."

She spun around, teeth bared like an animal, and if her body wasn't monster, her eyes were. Black Star lifted his blade and began stepping very carefully to the side, towards Soul, who was clearly trying to get around the woman while she was focused on Lord Death. On the other side, Kid began the same sort of slow-motion slide forward, his heavy gun lifted and at the ready, face stern and merciless.

She flicked a finger before they could do more than take a few steps, and suddenly the grass was rippling and whispering, and Soul froze, clutching Maka closer to his chest, staring in horror all around him at the ground.

Black Star let himself close his eyes for a very brief second when he realized what that rippling was, as dozens of snakes began to lift up from the grass and twine around Medusa's legs. Soul was surrounded by snakes, and Maka's dangling hand was swollen and vicious red, and Black Star knew people thought he was a dimwit sometimes, but he could put the pieces together.

"There's no time," Soul shouted suddenly, paler than Black Star had ever seen him. It startled everyone; Mira gasped audibly. They'd all been expecting… what? Growls, threats, madman ravings? But Soul was lucid, he was fighting and he was winning, and Black Star didn't know how Maka had done it, but he'd move mountains before he'd let her die without the happy ending she'd earned. "Hurry up! Do your thing! Kill her!"

Soul was shouting at Lord Death, who was still staring at the cornered snake-woman like she was dirt on his shoe. It was really amazing how he managed to convey so much sheer hatred from behind a mask. "Don't worry, Soul, you'll be okay." But he didn't move, and the snakes danced hypnotically around Soul, and Medusa's lips curled. Black Star watched and wondered, with slow horror, if perhaps Lord Death couldn't do anything against this snake woman, this monster who wasn't monstrous, this thing who was so devastatingly familiar. He'd seen the look that was on her face before. He'd seen it when his best friend tried to tear his throat out.

"You and your circus," she said silkily. "You and your stupid fucking circus, traveling around, ruining my fun. It's got to stop. This boy was a nice surprise, though. It's kind of you to give me a party favor, though I didn't know you kept my kind around. Slumming it?" The rasping of the snakes grew louder, and Soul, surrounded, closed his eyes and bowed his head to press his face to Maka's, shaking all over; Black Star felt fire in his feet, and only Tsubaki's cool hand on his arm held him back.

"You," Lord Death said levelly, "are something unlovable, something cursed, and it's beyond time I gave you what you deserve."

He lifted his hands, and the wind picked up, as it had a thousand times that night, burning and wild, bearing the scents of blood and burnt wood and sour fear, and with it came the hiss of a thousand snakes, rising up from the grass like daisies to the sound of Medusa's delighted laughter.

"Oh?" she said, still smiling, obscenely lovely, perfectly hideous. "Try your little tricks, and we'll see how many holes I can put in those two."

Soul's head was still bowed, but then he lifted it, and his features were stone. "Chrona," he said loudly, over the wind and the snakes; his voice cracked.

"Soul, this isn't a good time to lose it, okay?" Black Star snapped.

Soul ignored him, kept going like a man possessed, looking all around. "Chrona. Maka says-" Tsubaki gave a broken gasp of relief- "She says that you are not unlovable. She says she could love you. She can love anyone, believe me, she- she could love you." Soul took a deep rattling breath, and Lord Death shifted. Medusa only looked irritated. "Chrona, she could love you. She could help you. She helped me. She's good, and she's pure, and she purifies everyone. She makes them better because she believes in them!"

Right when Black Star was about to ask who the hell Soul thought he was talking to, a pale blur shot out from the dark hidden corner between two train cars. Medusa shrieked, shrill and wild, unbearably loud, like a tree falling or a mountain breaking apart, and her blood was very dark and sizzling on the ground.

She went to her knees, slowly, shining eyes very wide and shocked, mouth delicately slack, and for a moment, with brutal pulling sorrow, Black Star could see her as the little girl she must have been once, pretty and curious and maybe a little mischievous, innocent, human. Only the strange blood spilling from her throat in dark shining ribbons, lacing down her collarbone and white shoulders and onto the slim hands she raised, told the truth.

Her face stayed the same as she died, falling face-first onto the grass.

It was all very quiet for one surprised second. The pale blur, standing over Medusa, resolved into a person, blinked wide eyes at Soul and said tremulously, wringing their gory hands as something strange and black twisted around their neck and shoulders, "She can love me? Me? Are you sure? Are… Nobody's ever loved me."

Soul was staring all around him at the ground, watching the snakes slither away, and he barely looked up. Just then the sun finally crested the mountains, highlighting the pink smears in his white hair. Tsubaki began to cry silent tears that dripped off her chin like diamonds, turning her face up to the sunlight, and Patti sat right down on the ground like her legs had spontaneously broken, face screwed up. Black Star felt a heavy sense of finality sweep over him, not peace, but exhausted resignation, and as he looked at Maka's drawn motionless face, the feeling was possibly the scariest thing he'd experienced all night. "Maka didn't say that," Soul choked out, beginning to pick his way cautiously towards them; the snakes didn't seem to care. "She would have, though. I know her. I had to- use her words- she wasn't expecting you. We needed your help. I'm sorry. But I meant it."

Chrona said nothing after that. They crouched down next to Medusa's body, which was already steaming, and wrapped their hands around their head, rocking back and forth. Whatever the black stuff was on them- it reminded Black Star oddly of Lord Death's cloak, and wasn't that a creepy thought- began to whip and flail at them, but they didn't move. It sounded like they might be crying, though, soft little whimpers like a child.

Tsubaki looked at Black Star, then Lord Death, and then she went quickly over to Soul and put her hands on Maka's cheeks. Her tiger was roaring silently, over and over, mouth gaping wide and pink. "What happened?"

"She got bit," Soul snapped, shoving past her towards Stein. "Help her!"

Stein put two fingers on Maka's neck, and for a long moment, nobody so much as breathed. "She's alive," Stein said briskly. Everybody sprang into motion then, aches and pains be damned. Black Star catapulted over to snatch Maka out of Soul's wavering arms and carry her to the big top and the medical supplies, Mira began unbandaging herself at record speed and shoving them at Stein, as if Maka was bleeding out rather than poisoned. Tsubaki placed a soothing arm around Soul, who looked very much as if he either wanted to die, or was simply about to, and Blair came prowling over to snag Medusa's corpse by the heel. She dragged it unceremoniously off in the direction of her cats.

"What?" she said, flicking a piece of hair over her shoulder haughtily, when she caught everyone looking at her. "They're hungry. It's been a stressful night for the poor dears."

"Should they really be eating… that?" Mira said irritably, nearly elbowing Patti in the face as she hovered over Maka. Black Star tripped her neatly out of his path.

"Get out of my way, everyone," he bellowed, finally making it into the big top and setting Maka down gently on the sheet Liz had already laid out, next to Stein's old box of supplies.

It was still very dim in the tent, and Harvar, visibly upset for once in his poker-faced life, conjured a swirling palmful of sparks without being asked. Maka's face was heavenly in the glittering light, and the constellations pricked into the canvas splayed out across her skin like a blessing, scattering faded stars in her tangled hair.

Stein picked up her hand, a scalpel ready in his own, and Soul covered his eyes. Black Star, watching with bated breath, felt very much like doing the same.

"...Ouch."

Everything was very fuzzy, and her arm hurt distractingly, but, judging by how white the blob hovering over her was, she was pretty sure she was in Soul's trailer.

"Maka? Oh, god- I love you. I love you."

"You too," she croaked, blinking a few times. It felt like she had sand behind her eyelids. "Ouch."

A warm hand took her own, and the bed shifted as Soul sat. "You said that already," he told her.

His voice was steady, but the way he was holding her hand, so tight- "What hap'n?" she managed, squinting at him.

He was crying a little, she saw, and he wasn't bothering to wipe his face, or maybe he didn't realize. Well, she wouldn't tell him. He looked oddly beautiful just then, a fallen angel with shining wet cheeks and a smile like nothing she'd ever seen before, wide and wonderful. "Do you remember the woman with the snakes? And Chrona?"

She wanted to nod, but that jarred her burning arm, so she mumbled, "Yes."

"Well, um, she's dead, but one of her snakes bit you. You were-"

"Wait," she interrupted. "Wait. You said you loved me too."

Soul's grin grew, amazingly, bigger. "Uh, yes. So?"

She swallowed and coughed a few times to clear her throat. "So kiss me, stupid."

He did, reverently, carefully, like she was spun glass. She didn't feel like glass. She felt angry, and, as the snake-woman's face came back along with the rest of the night, worried. "Everyone okay?" she asked, once he pulled away.

"Yep. Few injuries, but yours was the most serious." He took her by the chin, very lightly, searching her face. "Don't do that again, okay?"

"Okay," she agreed, flexing her twanging hand. It was wrapped with what looked suspiciously like Mira's best bandages, and it hurt when she moved it too much, but the pain helped clear her head a little. She felt more alive by the second, and it was making her giddy. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. Thanks to you."

"Me? I didn't do anything."

"Well, I sort of- plagiarized you, I guess." Soul looked terribly pleased with himself, though, and she chuckled rustily.

"Tell me everything, from after I got bit," she ordered, snuggling down into his quilt and tugging on his hand.

He looked startled, and it took some coaxing, but eventually he got in bed beside her and helped her sit up, pillowing her head on his shoulder. "Stein said you weren't supposed to move," he warned.

"Too bad. I feel fine." She wasn't really lying. She only had a headache and a sore arm and what felt annoyingly like a few stitches in her side, but after coming face to face with death, that wasn't bad at all. She felt bubbly, too, like her veins were full of champagne- she'd survived. She and Soul both had, everybody had, and it was over. She didn't just want to dance around, she wanted to do cartwheels and set off fireworks. "Go on!"

"Um." He shifted, frowning. "I was- well, you know. Medusa- that's her name, I guess Lord Death knew her-"

"Knew? Past tense! So she's dead!"

Soul looked affronted. "You can't just skip to the ending!"

"Okay, okay, sorry, go. Go on!"

"Okay. She kept telling me stuff, she got in my head. I think- she was a monster, like the rest, or worse, she just didn't look like one." He wrinkled his nose for a moment, then pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I don't know which is worst, honestly. And then I saw you get bit. It woke me up, but you just fell over- I mean it, don't ever do that to me again. I tried to hit her, to get to you, but I couldn't touch her. But I heard shouting, and I knew it had to be close to morning, so I…"

"What? What?"

"I told the monsters to go away. Talked to them." He shrugged, uncomfortable, looking off into the corner at nothing. "I was hoping help would come, if everyone wasn't busy, you know, killing things. And they did, everyone came only a minute later, and then Chrona-"

"Horsefeathers! I forgot about Chrona!"

"Chrona's fine," Soul said, looking perturbed as she shoved a hand against his chest to sit up fully. "You need to rest, and also quit interrupting me if you want the damn story!"

"Fine." She clamped her jaw shut and waited expectantly, sitting half in Soul's lap now. "Well?" she said, when he didn't do anything but put his hands on her hips.

"That's about it," he admitted, laughing just a little. He was still happy, lips quirked up at the corners, and Maka felt dizzy looking at him. If her heart got any fuller it would burst; no mere human was meant to feel this sort of perfect, love-drenched joy. "Chrona killed her. I, uh, acted as if I were listening to you, and then I told Chrona you said you could be friends, that you'd help. And it worked. Chrona… well, Kid and the sisters are keeping an eye on him."

"Her?" Maka offered, screwing up her face in an effort to remember.

"Uh. I, uh… I can't tell, to be honest. Anyway, they're okay, they're just really upset and they really, really want to talk to you." He patted her hip, looking pleased. "You literally made a friend in two minutes, you realize that's completely ridiculous, right?"

She snickered. "Don't complain. It took me weeks to make friends with you. I had lots and lots of practice."

"True. So that's it. Stein had to cut your hand a little, you'll have a scar, but he worked some sort of magic with his creepy chemicals and you didn't die, so that's… good. That's it, really. Everyone wants to see you. Black Star nearly went into hysterics, which was hilarious, so you better make fun of him."

"I will," she promised, snickering. "I can't believe this. I knew you had it in you! I knew you could do it!"

Soul was beet red. "Shut it!"

"No!" She grabbed his face and kissed him, hard, very pleased with everything in the entire world. She was so happy just then, so perfectly overjoyed, that she felt sure if he let go of her hips she'd float clean away into the beautiful summer sunlight outside. "I won't! I'm going to lavish you in praise every chance I get for at least a year. You're going to get terribly conceited. Your head might not fit in this wagon after a while."

He laughed, pressed kisses into her neck and her hair and her cheeks, and into the palm of her good hand when she brought it up to teasingly fend him off. "It was only because you believed in me," he told her archly. "I told Chrona that. That you make people better because you believe in them like nobody else."

She looked at him very carefully, taking his face between her hands again to hold it still, and he didn't fight it, though he did slant a wary glance at her bandaged hand. "I love you," she said, drawing it out and looking him right in the eyes. "You said that about me? I love you."

"I love you too," he mumbled, leaning forward until their foreheads bumped. "We really should tell everyone you're fine."

"Later," she said, closing her eyes and angling her head to slant her lips across his, featherlight and languid.

He smiled against her mouth. "We got a telegram from your parents, too, this morning-"

She stopped trying to kiss him at that to squawk, "How long have I been sleeping!"

"A whole day, and yes, I was very worried, thank you for asking. They'll be here any time, probably, if the trains are on schedule."

"Both of them?" she said, incredulous. "Huh. My father might, uh, threaten you a little, he's like that, just so you've been fairly warned, but after everything I think I can handle him."

Soul had closed his eyes, and he looked a little sick. "So you remember. Lord Death said it might work, it might not, he did it, uh, while you were sleeping-" He pulled his hands off her and tilted his head back against the wall, eyes still shut tight. "So I can go get Tsu if you'd rather, or Mira, or…"

"What are you saying?" she said, confused. "Put your damn hands back on me right now before I hit you again."

He cracked one startled eye and peered at her from behind his hair. "You- what?"

"You, being a moron, thought that I'd turn tail and run the moment I got my memories back," she said grimly, grabbing his hands and planting them forcefully on her waist again. It wasn't anything like the sensation of losing her memories had been, it was simply as if she'd woken from any other nap, which was probably why she hadn't even realized at first. She knew all the things she'd always known, and she knew the things she'd learned with the circus, too. She knew Aka was Morvich, and Tsubaki's tattoos moved, that her father liked to buy her books, and she knew how to read again, she simply knew it without having to ever glance at a page. She was whole, and healed, and her love for Soul still burned fierce and steady. "You're wrong. You are it. You and the circus, but mostly you. You're it, and I've fought for you and nearly died for you, so no, I'm not going anywhere!"

He had both eyes wide open now. "Well, you don't have to shout."

"I'm a loud person."

"I know that already."

"I took piano lessons once," she informed him, giggling at the recollection, slinging a leg over his lap until she was astride him. "I wasn't very good at it. I only took a few before they asked me to leave."

Soul's lips twitched. "Oh? Good thing I've got enough talent for both of us, then."

"Terribly, terribly conceited," she reminded him. "Will you be quiet and kiss me now, please?"

He cast a skeptical glance down at their admittedly rather compromising position. "You're still sick-"

"Which is why you're going to be on top," she informed him, trying very hard to sound cool and collected. Her voice just came out as a squeak.

His jaw actually dropped, and an incredible blush spread up from his neck to the tips of his ears. "Uh- just what sort of books do you remember?"

"Plenty," she said waspishly, and then, when he had the nerve to continue looking cautious, she lost her temper and rocked her hips in a slow, deliberate slide against his own.

His breath caught, and his hand twitched on her waist before sliding, agonizingly slow, up beneath her shirt, which, funnily enough, looked like one of his. "If you start to hurt-"

"I'll tell you," she promised. The skin of his neck looked delicious, and when she leaned in to kiss it, then pull the flat of her tongue across his leaping pulse, it was.

"Bearcat," he mumbled, voice amused but not really aimed at her, and then he put his arms around her and flipped her gently onto her back, rising over her, planting his elbows by her face and brushing her bangs back carefully.

She felt very small, looking up at him, small and precious and happy. He kissed her slowly, searchingly, for a long time, and it wasn't until she'd wrapped her legs around his that he began to unbutton her shirt.

With every button undone, he kissed her newly revealed skin, dragging his tongue over every inch with flawless attention, and she had to bite her lip to keep from giving voice to the rising, trembling heat he was stoking. She wasn't wearing a camisole, and her nipples were tight and electric already. She blushed to see them when he pulled her shirt away, gasped quietly as the fabric slid over them, and Soul took in a slow breath. A sliver of sunlight was leaking through the closed curtains, and he traced it with his mouth across her belly to her breast; when he closed his teeth on her nipple, she jerked, dug her good hand into the sheets, and only barely held back his name.

He grinned devilishly up at her. "Sound is good."

"Oh." She grinned back, a little nervously, but still happy, overwhelmingly, blazingly, crazily happy. How had she ever gotten this lucky? "Get on with it, then, and I- wait, take your shirt off too! Fair is fair."

"You're just as bossy as ever," he observed with a snort, sitting back on his knees to peel his shirt off. Maka took advantage of that to get her own arms out of her unbuttoned shirt, and then she took a deep breath and wriggled out of her knickers.

Soul froze. He looked as if he didn't even have a pulse, and she had to giggle at his thunderstruck expression. Nothing else could have made her feel so much better, so empty of fear. "Come here already," she said, holding out her arms and trying very hard not to blush at the way his eyes went right to her chest.

"Huh?" he said dazedly.

She rolled her eyes. "Idiot. Do I have to tell you everything? I've read a lot of books that are very inappropriate for a young lady, trust me, but that's a bit different than doing it, so you- what are you doing?"

He raised a haughty brow at her from his new position kneeling between her legs. "Oh, I'm sorry, was this not in your books?"

"I- well-" Suddenly she felt terribly shy, as if she'd been holding the feeling off only to have it break through and overwhelm her all at once, and she'd have clamped her knees closed if he hadn't been between them. "I don't, uh, know about this. And, um, I mean that literally. It wasn't in the books..."

He watched her from under his moon-pale lashes, then turned his head ever so slightly to press a barely-there kiss to the inside of her knee. His lips felt like frozen fire. "If you don't want to we can wait," he murmured, warm breath ghosting over her sensitive thigh, and she felt the rapturous heat inside rise higher.

"Uh, actually, on second thought-" That was all he needed, and she laughed a little, breathlessly, as he snaked his hands around her thighs to hold them in place and kissed her knee again, letting his hot tongue smooth against her skin. She let her head fall back to stare at the ceiling. It was too much to look him in the eyes right now, to actually see him working his way up her legs; it was very nearly too much to simply feel it, to feel the barest scrape of his teeth against the tender crease where her leg met her body, to feel his breath against where she was already wet, and if she had to see the sinful sight she might actually die, because already she felt on the brink of flying apart.

Then he flicked his tongue against her and she did fly apart, entire body convulsing a surprised sort of revelation, and when he did it again she said desperately, "Soul!"

He looked up at her heatedly when she said it, and she realized with vague embarrassment that she'd given in to aroused curiosity at some point and was watching now- vague only because seeing his tongue flick against her, feeling it, was overpowering everything else, including, after about ten seconds, all rational thought.

She was making all sorts of sounds now, whimpers and soft whines, she was curling her toes and clawing at the bedding and thrusting her hips up into his face, practically strangling him with her thighs; it would have been horribly embarrassing with anyone else, but this was Soul. At some point he slid a hand up to gently link with her own, the bandaged one, and she managed to open her eyes to look down at him.

He had his gaze on her, intently, and he held her hand as he pulled the flat of his tongue over her one more time. He held her hand as she closed her eyes and shuddered, arched, moaned through the overwhelming pleasure.

It was almost brutal. It took her over, shook the earth and her bones and left no room for anything else, and when she opened her eyes again in the aftermath, trembling and flushed and deliciously warm all over, she was irrationally afraid for half a second that she'd lost her memory again, because she could barely work her mouth to speak.

"That's much better than when I do it," she told him after a moment, because he seemed to be waiting for something, and it was the truth.

His eyebrow went up again. "I definitely want more details on that at some point."

Suddenly the heat was back, all over, tingling and yearning, and Maka felt herself go even redder. "Uh. All right?"

His lips curved crookedly, and she bit down her own lip when she saw that his were glistening. "All right." Then there was a bit of an awkward moment, in which he didn't budge and she could only flop backwards in a boneless heap.

"Well?" she said after a beat, reaching her good hand down to pull him up her body by the hair. He settled atop her again compliantly and she sucked in an unsteady, eager breath at the feel of him, nudging hard against her hip, but then he still didn't move, even when she tried to press herself against him. "Are you going to take your trousers off or not?" she demanded.

He just looked at her, stroking a lock of hair back from her sweaty face, as if they had all the time in the world, as if there was nobody for him but her, and she suddenly had to blink back tears.

Soul seemed to get it. He leaned down to kiss her neck, but she put a hand on his chin and aimed his lips at hers. It took a second to figure out why he tasted so strange, but it wasn't bad, just odd. A little exciting, even, especially as she remembered how he'd looked between her spread legs. Books could allude all sorts of interesting, scandalous behaviors, but they had nothing on the real thing.

He did manage to get his trousers off, thankfully, after a bit more kissing, though it was impossible to do while lying on top of her, and he had to hop off the bed to kick them off his feet. Maka ended up goggling at his nakedness, entirely helpless to look away from stiff flesh and smooth muscles, and he scowled at her, pink spreading across his cheeks.

"Do you mind?" he demanded, crawling back on top of her.

"I've never seen one before," she objected. "Can I touch it?"

"Oh, fucking Christ, you're going to kill me. Yes, please yes," he groaned, thrusting into her thigh as if he couldn't help himself; that thought, the thought of him helpless, out of control because of her, was so wonderful that she reached a hand down without anymore thought.

He jerked into her palm with a surprised hiss, pressing his face into her shoulder, and now he was the one making improbably sexy sounds. She gloried in it, experimenting, a little afraid at first that she might be being too rough, but his desperate moans and, as she held firmer, the way he sucked and bit her neck, told her he liked it just fine.

He was much softer than she'd imagined even as he was so very hard, very warm, velvety, and she felt her own hips begin to rock again as she rubbed a thumb over the slight slick wetness on the tip. Soul actually begged, "Maka!" at that, broken and rough and pleading, so she did it again, pumping her hand up and down and pressing her knees together as the hot teasing tension swelled again.

Then he swallowed and grabbed her wrist. "Wait," he grunted.

"What? Why?"

"You damn- I'm going to come, that's why!" He went up on one elbow again to scowl at her, gripping her wrist firmly.

Maka frowned right back. "My readings have informed me that that's sort of the goal," she snapped, wrapping her legs around his waist and digging her heels into his thighs, trying to pull him down into her. At this point it wasn't even a want, it was a need, and she decided to tell him so at the top of her voice, because he was being very stupid and uncooperative; his eyes went wide as the tip of him pressed against her wet folds.

"Fuck fuck fuck," he said passionately, grinding his teeth, and then, squeezing his eyes shut tightly and pinching the bridge of his nose, "I- what if you get knocked up, Maka, we shouldn't-"

She sighed. "I asked Blair about that sort of thing weeks ago," she informed him, rather reproachfully. "You've really got no faith in me. And I even saved your life."

He rolled his eyes dramatically. "How was I supposed to know?"

She was going to die, or she was going to kill him. Why the hell were they talking so damn much when touching felt so good? She pushed her hips forward insistently, feeling the strange pressure, and then gasped, "I just told you I've wanted this for weeks, will you get inside me alread- oh! Oh, oh, oh Soul!"

"Better?" he panted, managing an astonishing level of smugness; she growled and lurched up to latch her teeth into his shoulder, wrapping her arms around his back at the same time to tug him down.

"Yes better, a lot better," she got out, and then he was moving and she thought, now I see.

It didn't hurt much. It burned a little at first, and she felt odd and stretched, but it didn't hurt, and it got rapidly better. It didn't feel as good as his mouth had, but it still managed to be good enough to have her clawing at his back and shoulders before she even realized it, crying out, back arching. She shivered as his chest brushed against her tight nipples, bit him again, desperate to pull him deeper before she lost her mind.

"Bearcat, ow," he grunted, trapping her wrists under his hands, very carefully avoiding her bandages; she'd have thanked him for the consideration if she hadn't been a writhing, moaning, gasping wreck beneath him.

He looked about the same as she felt as he moved over her, sweaty and rumpled, eyes shut tight and his face screwed up in desperate bliss that made her grow even wetter, and she tried to match her movements to his, but his hips were snapping forward too fast now for her to keep up, so she clamped her thighs around him and watched his face.

He stopped suddenly, held his breath, then, with an almost agonized expression, he swooped down to kiss her roughly, pushing deeply into her, and it was invasive and a little sloppy and wonderful. She pulled his lower lip between her teeth, ground herself against him with abandon, and he shuddered, tongue stroking hotly against her own before he finally pulled away.

"Love you," he said hoarsely, and then he rolled off her and flung one forearm over his head, staring up at the ceiling as if he'd just survived an avalanche or something equally dramatic, chest heaving.

Maka, lying there with her legs akimbo, an astonishing amount of sticky wetness between them, nipples still damp from Soul's tongue and her lips numb from his kisses, barely recovered from a potentially deadly snakebite, of all things, felt a sudden, insane urge to laugh. She held it in until he turned over to look at her, but then it worked its way out and she had to bury her face in his chest.

"I'm not laughing at you," she managed, after she'd regained some self-control. "I just- that was- that was so much more than I'd been expecting." She pulled back a little to look up at him, then grinned to herself as she saw a little red mark on his neck.

"Don't worry," he sighed, rearranging himself so he could put an arm around her while she lay on his shoulder, then tugging the sheets up to their bellies and kissing her nose. "I already knew you were a bit screwy."

"Shut it." She slung a leg over his calf and wound an arm around his neck. "Soul, I meant what I said. You know that, right?"

"Hmm?" He was already half asleep, so she punched him in the stomach.

"Ow, dammit, haven't you hit me enough for one lifetime?" he demanded, slitting one eye at her.

"Not yet. I meant it." She had an embarrassingly large lump in her throat. "My whole life I've been waiting for something to happen, I've been looking and hunting and feeling incomplete and just- waiting, and you were the answer. You were my answer, to everything, every question I ever asked, and what if I'd never found you, I'd be half a person-"

He put a finger to her lips, very gently, and his eyes were warmer than she'd ever seen them. "My head won't fit in the wagon if you keep going," he whispered.

She smiled at him, and Soul smiled back.

FOOTNOTES

1: 'Knickers' isn't just for British people. Other words for 1920's era 'panties' I found were underpants, underpinnings, etc, but I liked knickers better.

2: Screwy means nuts or crazy.

Author says: HOLY SHIT IT'S DONE. It's over. What the fuck I do with my life?

Well, first of all, thank you so much to all my readers, everyone who's stuck with me through this crazy story, and taken the time to review! I love all of you so much!

Secondly, thanks for all the b-day wishes from the last chapter. :)

Third, if you want more stories from me that aren't just posted on here (drabbles and the like) I do have a tumblr, the link's on my profile and I love chit-chatting with people, so there's that.

Fourth, THANK YOU AGAIN! Seriously, I write for my readers, and I never in a bazillion years expected this story to get the response it has. I'm really grateful, and I think I learned a lot. Love you guys. Take care and thank you for reading Dire Circus! -RDH

EDIT 2015: There is now a sequel to this! You can find the short sequel by clicking on my profile and looking for 'The Dire Circus 2'. In addition, there's a collection of short drabbles in the same universe that you can find on my profile titled 'Piano Keys & Dirty Knees'. Thank you so much everyone! 3 I can't even explain how much the support for the Dire Circus universe means to me!