Warning: Spoilers! Also, this isn't a happy fic

Dearest

A cold and dreary night, storming away with the rain pounding down on the roof of the tiny little shack, the fire crackling in a depressed sort of way as the people inside sat around in a detached circle, the wind howling in a creepy sort of way and making some of us a little more scared than necessary; tonight wasn't going to be a good night.

Of course, you can always easily be proved wrong.

Lavi was across the room from me, for once just as depressed as the rest of us. I wasn't sure if he would have been able to be cheerful no matter how hard he tried tonight. We had lost one of our numbers. One of our most important numbers, the greatest loss since Master.

Tonight, we had lost Krory. We don't even know how it had happened, it had been too fast, but the last we had seen of him was him turning into ashes, and the look on his face…

The moment before he had fully disappeared, it had been my eyes he had looked into. His eyes, so full of fear and agony, had suddenly become tear filled. In that last moment, the fear disappeared, replaced by a smile that said he accepted his fate, and that he would take it without regret. Then, with his last breath, the very last words he ever spoke…

Were thank you.

Why did he have to thank me? It only made me feel worse. I should have been able to save him. I should have been able to get in the way of that attack, and I should have been the one to take the blow. Krory never deserved to die. He deserved to live; a whole lot more than I did, the future Fourteenth.

Only Lavi knew about this. Krory didn't know anything about it, didn't know what I was destined to become, the Destroyer of Time, when he had died. He had passed on his thanks to the one person who deserved it the least. I was a monster. I hadn't even been able to save that one soul from disappearing.

"At least…" Lenalee whispered from her spot in front of the fire. She had two blankets wrapped around her, and Kanda sat next to her like a guard dog, glaring at the door of the abandoned cottage. "At least he'll be with Eliade now."

"He'll probably drool all over her." Lavi muttered, in a half hearted attempt to be funny. Only Lenalee gave a weak attempt at smiling. I stared at Lavi, his single eye downcast, filled with some emotion I couldn't name. Hate? Anger? Or was it acceptance of this world, of the fate it had in store for him?

He looked up, his eye moving directly to me, and for a moment we stared at each other before I looked away, feeling ashamed. Lavi knew, didn't he? I wasn't someone worthy of being thanked, and he had heard Krory. He had been fighting right next to me when it happened. Maybe it was fate that Lavi and I would be the ones to watch him go, since we were the ones to first befriend him, we were the ones who brought him to the Order.

Maybe it was just irony.

Very suddenly, Miranda broke into tears in her little corner. Across the room from her, Bookman, next to Lavi, stood. I watched him walk across the room with dull eyes, barely taking in the fact that he was about to go and comfort Miranda. I couldn't do that. I couldn't comfort anyone, not even myself. I was a little envious.

When he sat down across from Miranda, who was curled up in a little ball, my eyes strayed back to where he had been sitting, to where Lavi was sitting on top of an abandoned crate, his red hair hiding his face. In the few seconds I had looked away, he had taken off his green headband. He was in his hand, swinging a little, his arm hanging limply at his side as his other hand covered half of his face.

Would Lavi cry, too? Would he ignore the rules of the Bookman clan to never get too involved in something so that he could cry for his friend? Even Bookman looked distressed, and surely Lavi was much weaker?

Lenalee sat with her back to the fire, staring with blank eyes down at the floor. I hadn't noticed before, but she was clutching Kanda's hand. Looking at his face, there was no hint of a blush, just his oddly determined look as he stared at the door, as if waiting for one of the Noah or for an Akuma to appear. Knowing Kanda, his way of showing his sorrow was probably to fight it all out.

"We should make some beds for the girls in one of the rooms," Lavi said suddenly, standing up. From my position next to the door, I watched him disappear into one of the two small rooms that were attached to this room. One was a kitchen, the other a bedroom. Presumably, we would most likely be sleeping in here while Lenalee and Miranda got the room. Something told me Kanda would also be going there. I was sure he wouldn't be getting a wink of sleep tonight. Tonight, he would play as Lenalee's guardian angel.

"I'll help," I whispered, standing up. I didn't want to be with all of them anymore. I only wanted to be near Lavi, the person I was closest to in the Order. The only person who knew what I was. Near him, I felt it would be okay to show how ashamed I really was.

The little room wasn't very impressive, but it had a bed. The cottage must have been abandoned very recently, because there was only a thin layer f dust over the already made bed, which would be just big enough to fit two female bodies. There was even a comfortable looking corner good enough for a paranoid samurai.

"Allen, are you okay?" Lavi whispered when I entered. I was a little surprised he asked me this as if he had been expecting me to follow him. He didn't seem surprised at all about the beds already having been made. Now that I thought about it, he had been the one who had gone ahead to make sure the place was safe. He had probably already seen inside here. Had he only gone for me to follow him?

"I-I should be fine." I whispered, "More importantly, we should barricade the window so that no one can see inside. If Miranda and Lenalee are going to be in here-"

"Allen." Lavi whispered, stepping forward. He grabbed my wrist, pulling me away from the doorway and away from the view of the others. They were just out of ear shot, and if any of them decided to look over they would have seen me there. They would have seen Lavi there, if he had come any closer. "You're such an idiot. I can see that you're blaming yourself for all of this."

"But it's my fault!" I whispered, looking into his single emerald eye desperately. I could feel the tears threatening to come as I felt all of my feelings come forward. Why did he have to say it like that? Why did his voice have to be so gentle and understanding? Why couldn't he just look at me with contempt and let me be ashamed of myself?

"No it's not. You couldn't have helped that attack. There was no way you could have. No one saw it coming, and the reason I was able to annihilate that Akuma so easily was because he had been staring dumbfounded at where he had killed Krory because he himself hadn't been expecting that attack. There was nothing you could do. There was nothing I could do. You're not the only one who regrets this." Lavi said firmly, staring into my eyes. I felt my breath hitch, and I bit my lip. He was right.

"I-I'm sorry," I whispered. "I should have thought about how you felt, too…I didn't think…"

"It's fine." Lavi muttered, detachedly. He turned away from me, towards the window. Had I made him angry? It served me right.

The silence between us was almost painful. I hated when Lavi was angry with me. Usually, he was so carefree and didn't care what I said, and he was always able to take what I said easily and shoot it right back at me. Sometimes, though, it wasn't that easy. Right now seemed to be one of those times. Krory had just died. One of our most important friends, one of our most important comrades, had just died.

"Allen…I've been thinking." I think it was the sudden weakness in his voice, the vulnerability in it, that surprised me. He sounded so desperate and weak, and for a moment he really was just a teenaged boy frightened of the things around him and not the Exorcist and Bookman that he was supposed to be. Hearing his voice break like that, my own resolve and strength broke away.

At that moment, on that last night, we were just two normal human beings, two boys who were scared and helpless in the midst of a war we had been forced into.

"After Krory died…I started to think about how important every one was to me. I started to think…about how I wanted them to know just how important they are to me." Lavi's voice didn't go above a whisper. "Always, no matter how much I tried to deny it, you were the one who was most important."

I didn't say anything, knowing that if I did it might ruin everything. my heart was beating feebly in my chest, and for some reason, what Lavi was about to say next, I already knew. Maybe I'd known it since that day he had almost died, vanished into nothing inside of the Ark. Maybe I'd known it for much, much longer.

"No matter how I think of it or take it apart or lay it out or try to ignore it, the only way I can say it is that I love you." Lavi said, his voice clear despite the fact that it was barely above a whisper. His green headband was still clutched in his right hand, dangling helplessly. It was moving, almost as if shivering. Was he shaking?

I didn't say a word. Instead, confidently and as if it were natural, as if it were the only way it could possibly be, I wrapped my arms around him from behind. A single tear fell, running along my cheek and washing away the dirt it encountered as it fell to the floor with an inaudible drop. His body, so much smaller than I had realized, shivered in my embrace.

He turned around, wrapping his arms around me as well. Resting his chin on top of my head, his fingers clutched at my shirt, my exorcist coat long forgotten on the floor by the entrance. I listened to the steady beating of his heart, my own heart beating frantically.

Lavi pulled away a little, leaving his arms around me, and I lifted my head from his chest. I looked into his face, which was still so full of sorrow, the face which knew all of my secrets, that understood what I had been going through, that had smiled at me just as easily and carefree as always despite what he knew.

Without a second thought, and without any regrets, I leaned on my toes and pressed my lips to his.

In that moment, my whole world changed. Instead of bearing with it alone, we bore with our burdens together. For those blissful few minutes that we stood there, wrapped in each other's embraces, our lips connected by our passion and sorrow, we were one. I could feel everything he felt, and he could feel everything I felt. We understood each other completely.

But everything has to come to an end. It was Lavi who pulled away first, though I could see it plain on his face that he didn't want to. "We have to get back to the others." He whispered. I just frowned, dropping my arms from around him. He, too, released his hold on me, leaving his lingering touch.

Nothing had changed inside the room, but at the same time everything had changed. No one was paying enough attention to notice the way Lavi and I were closer to each other than necessary, the way he sat beside me by the entrance instead of back on his crate, the way our hands were joined discreetly just out of view. No one except for maybe Bookman.

Sorrow can connect people in ways they never thought possible. It can open up new doors, reveal truths that had once been ignored and denied. It makes a person realize what they have, and not want to lose it. That night, it had been sorrow which had made Lavi realize he no longer wanted to hide his feelings, and sorrow that had made him confident in telling me his feelings despite who he was.

That was also the first and last night we had together.

I never even got to say the words 'I love you' to him. It wasn't his fault, it wasn't my fault, it was no one's fault, not even the Akuma who burst through the door the next morning.

It was no one's fault that it was Lavi who was leaning directly against that door, still fast asleep, just like the rest of us. It was no one's fault that I had still been asleep, that I hadn't noticed my eye reacting until it was too late. I awoke just as the Akuma came. I watched as the hand of the Level Three went through his chest, ripping out his heart.

The sight of his heart, still beating, in the Akuma's hand, was at first something I couldn't comprehend. At first, I thought I was just dreaming, that it wasn't real. Then, when I saw Lavi's face, his eyes opened and staring directly at me, no life in them as blood began to dribble from his lifeless, open mouth, the truth came rushing down on me.

Kanda was the one who came out first. The moment he saw Lavi, his anger was visible. I had never heard Kanda scream that loudly before. I watched as he charged at the Akuma, and as the Akuma pulled his fist out of Lavi's chest, crushing his heart into dust. Maybe that was what awoke me; maybe it was Lenalee's cry or the fact that a tear suddenly escaped Kanda's eye.

Kanda was the only one who had been closer to Lavi than me.

In that moment, Kanda and I connected. I only had to look into his eyes for him to understand everything. It was us together, Lenalee and Miranda crying in the doorway of their room and Bookman pulling Lavi's body away with the saddest expression I had ever seen him wear, that destroyed the Akuma. It took a total of three seconds, maybe less.

Kanda ran out of the house, not even looking back. I knew he would be gone for a while, most likely to hunt for more Akuma, and to drown out his own deep sorrow, so much deeper than the loss of Krory. Bookman, for the first time since I had met him, sobbed over Lavi's body. Miranda and Lenalee sobbed, holding each other. All I could so was stare at Lavi's lifeless body.

Everything disappeared. All I could see was his face, dead and yet still so young and beautiful. His lifeless eye, staring into nothing, which had last looked at me, just like Krory. Yet, this time, if Lavi had smiled, I think I would have been able to forgive myself.

But Lavi didn't even have the chance to smile.

I didn't have the chance to tell him I loved him.

He had been mine for such a short time, only to be lost so soon. To everyone.

Without looking back, I left the house.

I never looked back.

Instead, I held Lavi's memory in my heart, and with his memory, I disappeared forever.

I wouldn't allow the Fourteenth to be reborn. I wouldn't allow Krory's death to be in vain. I wouldn't allow Lavi to die.

Not without me.

The End

A/N: Yeah, it sucks. I wanted to do it in more detail and stuff, but then again this is my first ever one shot, and with that in mind I had to think of something short and something that didn't go on for more than one chapter. So, I decided to do something that everyone seems to do, just for a bit of exercise. I need to start practicing these things a bit more. Maybe then I can learn to appreciate them and actually read them a bit more when I see one. Hehe.

Well, maybe I'll revise this, make it longer and a bit sappier and with a bit more detail, but for right now I'm focusing on other things. I just wanted to get this out of my chest (the killing people off thing, because lately I've been having creepy thoughts and I didn't want it ruining my other stories…--cry--)