Disclaimer: D Gray Man and its characters do not belong to me. Neither does the song, from which I took the title, "When the snow lies red", and the lyrics in the beginning.
Author's note: This is a story strongly fuelled by the frustration at the complete and utter lack of both Lavi and Kanda ever since the manga restarted one year ago. It is also inspired by Avatar's "When the snow lies red", which I think could reflect Kanda's feelings for Alma. Go listen: www youtube com / watch ? v = jMolkStAlS4 it's awesome!
When the snow lies red
For every day there's a night
For every night there's a song
And every song they have sung was meant for you
It didn't matter to you the way it mattered to me
I won't let them forget
I will remember you
When the snow lies red
It took Lavi a long while to figure out what happened. He blamed the state he was in: beaten blue and delirious from hunger and thirst. When he came to his senses that first morning, Kanda was lying next to the bed, passed out on the floor. Lavi remembered staring, not understanding how it was possible that he could just sit up after definitely having suffered broken bones and some internal damage from the Noah, until he saw the dried blood on Kanda's exposed wrist. He remembered touching his lips and feeling the dried, precious substance flaking off them under the touch. He remembered the shocking realization and the feeling of deep gratitude that he thought he would never feel again.
That morning, Lavi didn't have much time to gather his thoughts, before Kanda woke up with a groan of pain and a wince, clumsily sitting up on the floor and holding his head as though it hurt. Lavi remembered the shock he felt at such a display from the normally graceful and indestructible Exorcist. And he remembered noticing only then that Mugen was nowhere in sight and Kanda wasn't wearing his uniform. Not at all: Kanda was clad in normal, well-work clothes that clashed horribly with Lavi's mental image of the artificial apostle.
'You never know when to stop, do you?' the sour man muttered that morning. Lavi didn't understand it back then. It was only after he witnessed Kanda getting hurt and not healing quite as fast as Lavi was used to that Lavi has connected the dots finally. Kanda's life was running out. The realization shocked him and stabbed him with guilt when he realized that he must have taken too much blood, making the other pass out. By then, however, it was far too late to apologise and so Lavi never did. And anyway, Kanda never mentioned what happened that morning or the night before.
They barely talked. Questions were burning Lavi's tongue. Where was Mugen? Why was Kanda not wearing an Exorcist uniform? What happened to exhaust his life like that? Kanda, however, didn't ask why Lavi didn't have his hammer or what happened to bring him to the state Kanda must have found him in. And Lavi didn't really want to talk about it, so he kept his questions to himself and waited. For what, he wasn't sure, but he did and, in any case, they had more pressing problems.
They had no money. The Noah have left Lavi with only the tattered clothes he was wearing and whatever has happened to Kanda, it left him with nothing as well. In order to have a place to stay they needed to work and so work they did, until the incident with the collapsing ceiling, which left Kanda with a broken arm. Perhaps because it has been the building owner's fault that he didn't take care of his tavern's ceiling properly or perhaps because Kanda did push his son out of the way of the disaster, they were allowed to stay in the tavern for free.
'How did you find me?' Lavi asked one day, the fifth day since Kanda broke his arm. It showed no clear signs of healing, or Kanda was more patient than Lavi remembered him. Then again, Kanda was barely anything Lavi remembered: even more silent than before, the samurai tended to look away with such immense sadness it would have broken Lavi's heart if he had one. Even now, when Kanda glanced at him, there was a whirlwind of pain in the black eyes that used to only show anger and hate.
'I wasn't looking for you,' Kanda muttered candidly. Despite the stab of hurt his words brought, Lavi had to smile: it was good to know that at least Kanda's honesty didn't change. 'I was looking for a place to stay overnight and that abandoned house seemed a good choice. What were you doing there? Why-' Kanda cut himself and looked away, the palm of his good arm clenching into a fist. Right then it occurred to Lavi that Kanda didn't know that Lavi and Bookman have been kidnapped by the Noah. He shuddered at the very memory.
'What were you doing in Italy, anyway?' he asked, for the moment ignoring Kanda's question. The only reply he got was a haunted look, so he tried differently. He wasn't going to wait for the answers anymore. 'Even if you lost the Finders, you could have gone no matter where with a phone and called the headquarters for back up. You know how to say that much in Italian, right?' he asked. Kanda blinked owlishly at him, all expression erased by the sudden surprise.
'You don't know?' he asked back in a whisper, in a strangely hoarse voice. Don't know what? Lavi frowned and tried to think what he should know. What happened before the kidnapping felt like another lifetime, but he wasn't a Bookman's apprentice for nothing. Just before the kidnapping, he was stationed in China, together with Bookman, Chaoji and Marie. There has been enormous demon activity in the vicinity, like in some other places, forcing the Black Order to keep camps in permanence, stretching their resources thin. Thinner, perhaps than they could permit themselves.
Lavi recalled the locations of all the Exorcists clearly. Kanda and Allen were stationed in Jordan. When the Noah appeared in front of him, Lavi heard in his earpiece the reports from other camps, alarmed by the apparition of the powerful enemy, but Jordan was silent. He remembered Marie calling out through his headset, both to the camp and to Kanda in person, but there was never a reply. The Noah just smiled mockingly, like he knew something they didn't. He remembered the fear that crystallized into horror when the Noah announced gleefully, after what felt like an eternity of tension, that Kanda Yuu has awakened the Fourteenth.
Lavi's eyes widened as a thought crossed his mind. But now-
'If they had convicted you for what you supposedly did to Allen, you wouldn't be here at all,' he pointed out. Kanda looked even more confused and Lavi realized that he has voiced only half of his thought. He discarded the possibility anyway and didn't bother clarifying, already wondering whether it was possible that more hostages have been taken that day. If Kanda was one of them, he would not know-
'That day, after I have pierced Allen Walker with Mugen,' Kanda started in a hoarse whisper, surprising Lavi by using the "Beansprout's" real name, and Lavi immediately abandoned all his ideas and thoughts to listen. He was sure Kanda wouldn't go repeating his words anytime soon. 'He opened an Ark gate for me and Alma, so that we could escape from the Order and the Noah,' Kanda said. Lavi blinked. Alma? He knew of one Alma, one that Kanda could possibly be speaking of, only that person was long dead. Or was he? Lavi swallowed thickly, seeing the unhidden anguish on Kanda Yuu's face.
Quietly and slowly, carefully choosing his words and just as carefully keeping his tone flat, Kanda told Lavi what happened in the North American branch, while Marie was calling the Jordan camp with desperation and Lavi was wrecking his brains to understand why the Noah came and didn't do anything. With every sentence, Lavi felt more and more nauseous, with every pause, while Kanda visibly forced himself to stay calm, Lavi felt sadder for the man he used to call his best friend. That is, insofar as he could feel sadness in his heart, which has been shattered too many times during his stay with the Noah.
When the silence fell, after Lavi has digested the story and recorded it properly in his mental logs, he told Kanda what befell him. On the normally passive, pale face, he could see shock and revolution and pity. He could see a flash of anger when Lavi mentioned that he hasn't heard of the Order even trying to recapture the hostages or when he told Kanda that secrets seemed to have been more important to Bookman than the life of his apprentice. But that anger, which burned so brightly in Kanda before, was quickly extinguished by sadness. And Lavi understood now this sadness, in the detached, Bookman sort of way.
As he recorded Kanda's reactions almost subconsciously, he wondered if there was enough of them left to still be friends. Not that Bookman Junior was supposed to be anybody's friend, but Lavi couldn't even find it in himself to pretend. It occurred to him that he has never been closer to a Bookman's ideal than right then.
They never mentioned what has happened again. Two days after their conversation, Kanda's arm was mended and they decided almost without any discussion, that they needed to leave and find another village, before the gossip about Kanda's healing spread. They didn't say anything, but Lavi knew that neither of them wanted to be found by the Black Order. Not that Lavi was of any use, now that his Innocence has been crushed by the Noah. He just didn't want to see the people who have claimed to be his friends, his family, people who have made Lavi believe again in mankind, people who have abandoned him to his cruel fate. He simply did not wat to see them.
Kanda, on the other hand, had more to fear, should he be found. He would probably be dragged back and interrogated, perhaps punished and then forced to take up Mugen one more time. Or just frozen and used like Alma has been used, Lavi thought. It was sickening to know to what lengths the Order would go and one more reason that Lavi wanted nothing to do with them. Humans were so horrifying.
Before leaving the village, they stole better clothes and some money. Lavi couldn't even pretend to feel guilty about it and strongly suspected that Kanda didn't care. In fact, he had a feeling that, if he was left alone, Kanda would just wander the world aimlessly, waiting for something to kill him. And the least Lavi could do, to repay the artificial apostle for saving his life, was to stay with him for a while and keep him company until something did. He even started wondering if he could take Kanda with him to the Bookmen and claim the man as his bodyguard in those troubled times. Gramps sneered at such behaviour, but it happened sometimes that Bookmen had bodyguards.
Because, as opposed to Kanda, Lavi knew exactly what he wanted to do, now that another chance in life was given to him: Lavi was going to become a Bookman. He was ready, he knew it. His heart was truly dead, his soul empty and his brain unhindered by emotions. He restarted regular logs as soon as he was able to focus properly and he found back his previous prowess. During the long, quiet evenings, while Kanda meditated, Lavi put all the old logs in a mental order.
All the same, Lavi didn't want to go directly to the Bookmen either. Wanting to get a better gauge of Kanda's mental and physical state, as well as find out what has happened in the world during his forced absence, he let them wander chaotically. They didn't stay long in one place and they took small, insignificant jobs, only resorting to theft when they had no other choice. And once, when Lavi saw a brief gleam in Kanda's dead eyes upon seeing a katana in a shop selling oriental weapons. Of course the fake-Japanese said nothing, only looking away, but Lavi wasn't fooled. The following night he stole the katana, not even sure why he did so but making sure that it was not an artefact of any kind and would not be relentlessly pursued.
Kanda didn't question the gift. He thanked for it with a deep bow. He took care of it almost reverently and practiced kata instead of meditating. It seemed to take away some of his sadness in a way Lavi couldn't understand, but didn't stop the nightmares. Every night, Lavi who never dreamed, was woken up by screaming: short and strangled, followed by heavy breathing and, sometimes, a shuddering breath in the end. He pretended to be asleep and Kanda never called him on the lie, even when one night their gazes met across the room. Sometimes Lavi tried to stay awake to know what the nightmares were about, but Kanda never spoke in his sleep.
Inevitably, they encountered Finders on their way. They always hid successfully and listened to the news. Not always did they hear anything interesting but slowly, the news came, one after another and each of them shocking and sickening. Allen Walker has been imprisoned for treason and has escaped. The Central has ordered the Beansprout executed on sight, even after it became clear that he didn't turn to the Earl's side. Inspector Link has been killed by the same agent of the Central who has killed General Marian Cross. Johnny Gill, who wanted to go after Allen Walker to help him, has gotten intercepted by the Crows. Chaoji has been discovered infected by a Noah's parasites, killed and burned publicly. Crowley has been sent to a certain death on a mission to take down a Noah posing as a Minister in some government. A new Exorcist has been discovered: a mother that has been literally ripped away from her children and dragged to the Order. Miranda has become Fallen after Marie died in her arms, protecting her from a level 4 demon. A rumour has spread about the new generation of Exorcists.
Lavi recorded all the information in the smallest detail. He couldn't care less about the happenings in the Order, other than in the vague terms of Recording the History. He watched what the news did to Kanda. His companion tried to hide his reactions and pretend to be indifferent as well, but there was no hiding from a trained, Bookman eye. Each piece of news was like a stab in the back for the ex-Exorcist, the last two being possibly the worst. Emotionlessly, Lavi noted the clenched fists and a pained grimace as they learnt of Marie's death, as well as the paper-white, shocked and revolted face when they listened about the new generation of Exorcists. The Finders didn't know details, of course, but just the barest rumour was enough. Even in Lavi's mind, their words evoked vivid, sickening images. Kanda could be no different.
Something snapped in Kanda that day, when they found about the new Exorcists, but Lavi wasn't sure what. They continued their travels for a while before the redhead connected the new, determined gleam in Kanda's previously dead eyes to the renewed enthusiasm for training. It was the hate coming back. Lavi said nothing and kept observing, curious to see how far Kanda's hate would carry him. He let himself be pulled into the training schedule when Kanda asked him and he vaguely enjoyed the physical prowess he was getting back slowly. In one town, they have been spotted sparring and Kanda got persuaded to teach some locals self-defence. Lavi eagerly watched how social interaction slowly coaxed the other out of the depression, into something resembling the man Lavi knew before.
They stayed in that town for far longer than they have dared stay anywhere else. While Kanda led classes in a hastily created dojo, Lavi plunged himself into the records of recent history available in the town's library. For once Kanda's job brought more than enough money to survive and Kanda did not protest when Lavi didn't get any job himself. Their interactions, when they would meet in the evenings, started resembling those from before and Lavi didn't want to honestly admit whether it was pretending or real from his side. Instead, he buried himself in work, filling notebooks with the most important logs: the ones he would present to the Bookmen as a proof of his readiness to take up the title.
'I will go and finish what Alma has started,' Kanda announced one day, in the beginning of the winter. They were sitting in the inn's dining room and have just finished eating. Lavi froze as the possible meaning of those words dawned on him. He stared at Kanda and Kanda stared back, his dark eyes full of hate and determination. Yes, Lavi thought, he could only mean to go and slaughter everybody he could in the Black Order. It occurred to him that fate has given him a perfect topic for the report for Bookmen.
'I will go with you to record it,' he said without the slightest hesitation. Kanda looked surprised for a split of a second, but only nodded in reply. They never talked about Lavi's plans for the future, but Kanda saw the notebooks and Lavi knew that Kanda wasn't stupid.
Soon afterwards, fate gave Kanda a perfect day to accomplish his revenge: the completed and tested Fourth Generation Exorcists were going to be presented for Lvellie and the branch supervisors. The Finders, who told them about it, not recognizing Lavi at all and eagerly accepting the alcohol he offered, were very chatty on the subject. There were only four new Exorcists and they would all be brought to the headquarters for the presentation. Lvellie has invited all the branch supervisors, a large group of the lead scientists and even a couple of cardinals, which were implicated in the functioning of the Black Order. To avoid "premature misconceptions", as the Finders put it, all Exorcists would be away on mission that day.
Lavi and Kanda barely even needed to plan what they would do. Intercepting two returning Finders, incapacitating them and infiltrating the headquarters dressed in their thick cloaks was childishly easy. They both still remembered the layout of the building and found their way to the meeting room without a single problem. Nobody tried to stop two Finders, even if they were wearing hoods deeply pulled over their faces. Some Finders were wounded, nearly deformed and many were hiding some parts of their body permanently. With no Exorcists present and a large part of the science team tucked away in the meeting room there was nobody who could recognize them easily anyway.
They arrived at the doors of the room right on time to hear a loud, collective gasp. They exchanged sceptical glances, although it was possibly the best moment to arrive, so they didn't waste more time. In the empty corridor, Kanda drew his katana. They pulled the heavy door open and Lavi made sure to not be seen quite immediately, letting Kanda take the spotlight: he only came there to record the bloodbath that would finish the Black Order or Kanda Yuu's life. Both were fine with him.
Hidden from view of the occupants of the room, standing next to the man he once called a friend, Lavi had just the time to appreciate the dramatic beauty of the moment. The speaker, standing in front of the gathered people, stopped in the middle of the sentence about "side effects of forced" something and turned around abruptly, stepping to the side. Around the large, dark table, heads raised at an armed "Finder" standing in the doorway. Eyes widened as he removed the hood, letting his identity be known. Komui Lee and Bak Chang gasped Kanda's name in disbelief and joy, but soon their faces reflected fear. Lavi glanced at Kanda and shivered despite himself at the sheer hate etched into the pretty face. It was probably more intense than Lavi has ever seen, so it wasn't surprising that the occupants of the meeting room flinched in fear.
But Kanda was not looking at the scientists or even at Lvellie. He was looking at the four children standing in front of the large table. Lavi followed his gaze and emotionlessly recorded the disfigured bodies. He had to swallow down the nausea at the sight of their discoloured skin and the heads that were disproportionately big on the thin necks. Was it a coincidence that their long arms reminded Lavi of the level 4 demons?
Kanda turned his hate-filled eyes to the speaker and the man paled immediately. He also wet himself, Lavi noted duly, as soon as Kanda walked into the room, heading straight towards him. Unnoticed by everybody, Lavi slipped inside and tried to melt himself into the shadows by the wall. Komui Lee spoke again, trying to get Kanda's attention as the armed man stopped a couple of steps away from the speaker who has been presenting the new Exorcists, but it was in vain. The man didn't even have the time to squeak before Kanda moved again. The shining blade cut the head clean off his neck. Blood erupted from the arteries. Even before the severed head fell on the floor, the four children dropped to their knees.
'Kill us,' they begged in unnaturally mature voices. Despite his empty heart and soul, Lavi twitched at the words coming from beings so young, but Kanda obliged without the smallest sliver of hesitation. They were gone in one, swift swipe of the bloodied blade and, with their blood, chaos erupted.
Lavi flattened himself against the wall, recoding the screaming. Komui Lee tearfully begged Kanda to stop, promising to explain everything. Malcolm Lvellie threatened with the Crows, but couldn't hide his fear. Renny Epstein urged Lvellie to call his guards before they would all die. In her wide eyes, Lavi saw that she knew exactly what it was about: the fate she has managed to escape once caught up with her finally. The Branch leaders shouted for help in panic and the cardinals demanded Kanda to stop, as though they had the power over the ex-Exorcist. Reever Wenhamm and some others scientists, who knew Kanda personally, were speechless. But the most interesting was Back Chang: pale and tearful, he grabbed the stone he could use to call the protective spirit and threw it to the side despite the protests of his assistant and two other scientists. Unlike Renny Epstein, he decided to accept his fate, Lavi recorded.
Crows appeared from behind Lvellie and from the doorway. Lavi recorded their presence without the slightest flinch: they were expected. In a fluid motion, Kanda removed two grenades from the Finder's coat and threw one to the corridor and the other just behind Lvellie. And, as everybody fell to the ground, as the explosions shook the building, he jumped.
The dust didn't settle yet, when Kanda fell upon the Black Order's officials like a nightmare. Louis Fermi died first, hands with which he tried to protect himself cut off together with his head. From across the table, a scientist whose name Lavi didn't know pulled out a gun and shot. The bullet ricocheted off the cloak: it was not by accident that neither Lavi nor Kanda took them off. Still in the crouch in which he landed, Kanda pivoted on the table and, in the same move, kicked the man just under his chin, smashing the man's throat before the impact made the chair tip over.
The ex-Exorcist managed to kill another of the scientists seated around the table, before the binding feathers of the Crows encircled him. Lavi winced slightly, but remembered that the binding was the most efficient against the Innocence. And Kanda had none.
The feathers fell, cut in two with the katana. The Crow who threw them shouted in surprise before he too found death from the sharp blade.
Lvellie was yelling into his microphone, demanding backup. Vaguely, Lavi heard the reply: the explosion has collapsed the corridor outside and the backup needed to dig their way through. The speaker asked whether Lvellie would hold out until then, but the Inspector never got the chance to answer: the sharp katana pierced his stomach, forcing a surprised gasp out of his parted lips. Lavi noted that the Inspector hasn't even noticed Kanda's arrival until then.
Kanda grabbed Lvellie's uniform and slowly, deliberately pulled the Inspector closer to him in the dead silence that fell after Lvellie's hand fell from the speaker, cutting the connection. Reever, Bak, Renny and the others were watching them with horror. Even the Crows froze. Lvellie coughed up some blood. Kanda didn't stop until their noses met
'This is for Alma,' Lavi read from Kanda's lips and recorded that as well, together with the slight widening of Lvellie's eyes, as though the idea hasn't occurred to the Inspector before. Excruciatingly slowly, the katana moved up an inch. 'For the pain you caused him,' Kanda said and moved the katana a bit more. 'For the tears he cried,' he added and the katana moved a bit more. With every inch came a new accusation and Lavi recorded them all. Twelve accusations for twelve inches, until finally Lvellie died. Then, Kanda pulled away with a wince and roughly kicked the body off his blade, flicking it to remove at least some of the blood.
'Kanda, I beg you: stop,' Komui Lee, who was close enough to hear Kanda's words, whispered. Lavi only understood it from the moves of his lips, too far to hear the actual words. 'I understand your-' the supervisor of the European Branch flinched when the one he addressed turned to face him, raising his weapon to strike. Lavi noted that Komui realized at that point that nothing he could say would stop Kanda. He was saved by the Crows, who attacked then, forcing Kanda into a vicious fight, out of which he emerged victorious but not intact.
Lavi noted how Kanda held his slashed arm, uncovered by the cloak in the fray, for a moment, before gripping the katana in both hands. There were no Crows left and the scientists panicked even more Bloodied, Kanda turned to the closest person, his next target who just happened to be Bak Chang. Snowflakes started falling and Lavi glanced up briefly to assess the damage done to the roof. It was more than he expected: the gaping hole revealed the cloudy sky and allowed more and more snowflakes to enter.
'I am so sorry, Yuu,' Lavi read from Bak Chang's lips, minutely surprised by the use of Japanese. He recorded the honest remorse on Bak's face as well and the briefest hesitation in Kanda's moves as he prepared to strike. The supervisor of the Asian Branch didn't even try to dodge or protect himself and Kanda's katana pierced him right through the heart, far deeper than strictly necessary, while its wielder bowed his head, next to Bak's face. Lavi wished he knew what Kanda whispered then, but Kanda's loose hair obscured his view too much to read the lips of the swordsman. Consequently, he recorded only the redundant sentiment of Kanda Yuu, because it was clear that Bak Chang couldn't hear the whispered words anymore.
Snowflakes danced in the wind.
Kanda freed his weapon and swiftly disposed of Bak's assistant and scientists, before turning to the next victim: Renny Epstein. Lavi noted that he was limping and recorded the injuries sustained to his left leg. The woman screamed. It was a wordless scream of terror and protest, echoing in the ruined meeting room, broken only when the katana went through her eye and brain, for the moment pinning her to the bloodied wall behind her. Then Kanda turned around and even Lavi shivered at the sight of his face. It was covered in blood, very much like the Finder's cloak he has stolen, but that wasn't the problem. A lone tear was tracing its way down Kanda's cheek, making a trail clear of blood, but there was no emotion on Kanda's face, as though he truly didn't care in the least about what he was doing. The black eyes were dead.
Kanda didn't even wince, didn't hesitate at all, before cutting down Reever, slicing horizontally across the man's torso and cutting his cries of fear short. Komui wailed brokenly and forgot even to beg Kanda to stop, seemingly defeated. He fell under the next blow and Kanda turned to efficiently kill all the others in the room. The scientists tried to fight back, but they were no match against the creation of the non-existent Sixth Lab. The cardinals died praying to God that never listened. Emotionlessly, Lavi counted the victims and noted the ways they died.
Snow was already covering the bodies on the floor, stained red from their blood.
Silence fell as the last of the gathered died. Kanda stopped, half-turned towards Lavi, much to the redhead's relief. For a brief moment, Lavi worried that Kanda would also kill him, but nothing like that happened. The katana clattered on the blood-stained floor while Kanda looked up. Lavi took in the picture: bodies were everywhere, some partly covered by the red snow, some still too warm. The table and chairs were broken, the glasses shattered, red wine mixing with the blood on the floor, staining the white snow. And in the middle of all that destruction stood Kanda Yuu. He lost the Finder's cloak at some point, revealing the black clothes on which even Lavi's trained eyes could barely see the red from his bleeding wounds. His hair was a mess, long since having gotten out of the ponytail he always kept it in, his face turned up towards the sky. Snowflakes were falling on him, melting and slowly washing the blood off his face.
As though erasing his sins, crossed Lavi's mind, but the redhead didn't put it in his record. He watched instead, mentally counting the time and recording all the details he might have missed in the fray. Eventually, sounds from the ruined corridor reached his ears. The Crows and the Finders were coming through, Lavi thought, and recorded the late rescue. Kanda's face was almost clean now, reflecting relief. He hasn't moved and neither has Lavi. Then, a tear trailed down Kanda's pale cheek seconds before the dark eyes closed and Kanda crumbled to the floor.
Knowing what he would find, Lavi went up to the fallen swordsman and checked for life signs. There were none, just like he has expected, so he recorded the death of Kanda Yuu, the Second Exorcist of the Black Order. He pulled back right on time, because Lenalee Lee, in her Innocence shoes, jumped through the hole in the ceiling. She cast a cursory glance around the room, paling quickly, before her eyes stopped on one particular body and she ran towards it with a strangled scream of protest and grief.
Grief wasn't part of his record, so Lavi slipped out of the room before the Exorcist could notice him. Nobody stopped a Finder in the chaos that erupted upon the discovery of the massacre in the meeting room. All of the decision-makers of the Black Order have been annihilated. The one responsible was very clearly Kanda Yuu, found dead among the carnage, a Finder cloak and a bloodied, average quality katana next to him. Eventually, two Finders were found dead near the secret entrance of the complex, sometime later yet, a missing Finder cloak was located close to the main exit of the headquarters. Nobody guessed who Kanda's accomplice was.
Grief brought tragedy. That fateful day the Millennium Earl visited the Black Order's headquarters and Lenalee Lee proved to everybody that even the Exorcists had a leverage that would make them betray everything they fought for. She became a demon and managed to infect an equipment type Exorcist with the virus before none other than Allen Walker, the Noah of Destruction, came to kill her, unable to see the pain of his once-comrade. "Lavi" in a young Bookman's memory protested upon learning that from an old Bookman's records, although he should be grateful. If his "family" in the Black Order has not abandoned him, he would never become a Bookman after all.
But a Bookman felt no gratefulness. A Bookman felt nothing. And so the young Bookman continued on his way, tucking away the memories of his personas from the times when he was an apprentice.