Disclaimer: I do not own -Man or any of its characters.
Allen's POV:
In a mountain range in Spain selected for its negligible population, I sparred against Lenalee and Lavi, teamed with Kanda on my side and Komui as our tactical observer. It's now been three years since General Cross disappeared - for the second time. And if anyone considered there to be a third side to this war, we're it - 'We' being myself and everyone living on the Ark. I'm truly grateful for their presence, since I was the only one that really needed to leave the Church. There are only three undiscovered pieces of Innocence left – somewhere - in the world, and very few exorcists to fight against the Earl. Teamwork has been the name of the game for some time now, and whenever we weren't on missions, we were honing our skills together. For this particular match, we limited ourselves to techniques that would destroy up to level 2 akuma.
The leaves of the trees were just turning color, and there was pleasant crispness to the air. Some twenty minutes into the match, Lavi was taking a barrage of swings at me with his big hammer, and he's movements have gotten nearly quicker than I can evade. I dodged with effort and put more distance between us, but his handle extended to follow me. He switched to a lancing technique and his hammer changed shape to become more pointed. I fired scatter-shots at him the whole time, and when I maneuvered to his blind side, I hid myself behind a large rock. His now-crystal-type weapon was much attuned to his thoughts and emotions, but I was still better in that respect.
Once situated, I went out of cover and used my cannon repeatedly to guide him to a position where he was between Kanda and me. I changed my position constantly and he couldn't pin down where I was at any given time. The dust my attack kicked-up aided me as well. Kanda was in a close-combat fight with Lenalee, so fast that it was a blur of activity, but he managed to free himself just long enough to send a vibrant blue burst of energy Lavi's way – the shape being more tall than wide. Lavi had little choice but to be hit by either Kanda's fire or my wide ranging attack. He used his hammer to go vertically upward, but not in time to avoid the hit. He fell to the ground, and I was upon him quickly; my left arm grew and was holding him down solidly. My right arm was aiming a knife at his throat. We were training for a fight with one Noah and one level 3 akuma, and the best method to fight a Noah was to subdue with Innocence and incapacitate with traditional weapons.
We both stayed frozen that way, breathing heavily. When we looked at each other, it was as opponents. But the longer we stayed, eye to eye, the more we could see friends in each other once again. Lavi acknowledged the defeat and I let him go. I allowed myself to feel pleased by the victory for only a moment before I turned to go return the favor to Kanda.
Both Kanda and Lenalee saw me approach, though I ran along the high ground in an attempt to avoid being seen. Kanda backed off, likely because we were both better long-range fighters than she is. She jumped high in the air and achieved the higher ground easily. I tried to shoot at her as she did so, but failed to come close. Kanda took that time to come nearer to me. Lenalee came down, dropping at the speed of sound, and Kanda and I ran like hell to avoid it. She missed us, but the shock wave made us fall down hard. She came at us with a flying kick. I managed to grab her with my left arm but the force caused by her speed pulled at my shoulder; I knew it would be sore for the rest of the battle.
My arm fell to the floor. She kicked it, with the one leg of hers that was sticking out from my fist. I wasn't about to let my arm get broken over a sparring session, so I let her go. The determination never wavered from her face. She stumbled upright and then jumped to the air again. I turned to Kanda and, well, he always seemed to have a determined look on his face. I thought it was time to try a tactic we had talked about. I said "I'm going up!" and ran the distance between me and Kanda. He let go of his crystal-type sword and it reverted to a bangle on his wrist. When I got to him, I stepped on his waiting hands and pushed myself straight up while he threw me at the same time. The maneuver worked surprisingly well because I managed to meet Lenalee in mid-air, with me still going up and her going down. It took her by surprise and she didn't block as I clawed diagonally across her back. I had enough control of my arm to round the ends of my claws to prevent real injury, but I exerted enough pressure to make sure that it counted as a hit.
If she yelled out immediately afterwards, I couldn't hear it through the wind. But I saw Kanda land a hit against her. I let myself feel the total victory as my jump crested with the feeling of weightlessness. Coming down, I saw Lenalee kneeling on one knee with her back to me, and when I put my attention to Kanda I saw him looking back up at me. He was too far away for me to see his expression, but I found myself wishing that I could.
All in all, I only had to wait a few seconds and I was on the ground again. I bent my knees deep, and I was just a little jarred by the landing. I started walking over to Lenalee to make sure that she was alright, but her brother beat me to it. I could hear his carrying-on and I was sure that he wouldn't tolerate my presence well at the moment. So, I stopped moving. Lavi walked up behind Komui and he gave me a shrug with both arms that said "Do what you want, but at your own risk".
I b-lined for Kanda instead. He was also moving towards me, so we met half way. I felt more and more like smiling the closer I got to him. "Nice teamwork" I said. I was no longer able to hold it back, and I gave him a huge grin. Of course I was happy for being able work so well together; we've all come so far. But I knew that my smile was because of something else as well. And when he looked at me with that confident expression and displayed a proud little smile back, that something else felt even stronger.
I could feel my cheeks starting to flush. I wondered for the thousandth time whether Kanda knew that he had this effect on me. He gave me a once-over and then focused on my weapon arm. "Let me see," he said mildly as he grabbed me on the forearm. He bent at the waist some, and moved my arm to meet his face a half foot away. It was bruising up but there were no lacerations. He had a good eye to see the purpling on that arm.
"It was because of Lenalee getting out of my grip. My shoulder hurts the worst though." I said as he took his closer look. It was the way he moved my arm in his inspection that made realize how sore my shoulder was. I gritted my teeth a little but it didn't hurt enough for me to pull my arm back.
"Yes, I remember." Satisfied with the inspection of my arm he said, "Well, it's nothing that needs to be treated. How about your shoulder though?" He stepped closer to get a good view of the shoulder in question. My heartbeat, which had been slowing after the fight, sped up again. "How well can you rotate the joint?"
I moved my arm to the side and rotated it around slowly. There was a lot of strain, but nothing seemed out of place. "It will be fine in a few days," I replied.
Kanda nodded, satisfied with the response.
Lavi, Lenalee, and Komui walked over to us then, and the shift in focus was welcome. We stood in a circle and Komui commenced giving the four of us our battle notes. "Lenalee and Lavi, you started off strongly as a team but then you let yourselves get separated. Lavi, at the turning point it looked like you were so focused on fighting with Allen that you didn't know where anyone else was. Lenalee, you kept track of everyone's whereabouts very well, but you didn't use it to your advantage enough. You actually fought your best once Lavi was out of the fight. Allen and Kanda, you've learned to read each other very well. You each use the general strengths of the other to your advantage, and it looks like you've practiced some techniques. Overall, you are the best two-person team that we have. All four of you, we'll keep switching it up with two, three and four person teams. Improving the strongest teams is first priority, but keep improving your weaker combinations as well."
As Komui was going on, I knew there were many things I wanted to discuss with everyone. How we could improve from here. And looking around, I could tell that everyone else felt the same way. So Komui's summation was just a starting point, and from there we hammered down how much improved we thought we were, and revised what our training schedule should be.
"If the four of us need to be split into teams of two, the most well-balanced combination is still me and Allen, and Lenelee and Kanda. But if only two are needed on the field, then Allen and Kanda is the way to go," stated Lavi.
"Different situations will always call for different teams. But we don't usually see what we're up against in advance. So we all still need to work hard on doing well together. So, I agree with Komui on this," said Lenalee.
"Yes, there's no need to alter the routine we have set. Teamwork, stealth, strong body, strong mind and connection to our Innocence are all being trained," said Kanda.
Then I said, "Ok, if we do that, then our next team training is in a few days. All of us working together against Komui's obstacle course. We'll have to think about how to improve before then." And then, after a pause, "In the meantime, we'll keep up the pace of visiting three to five towns per day in our search for Accommodators." We managed to keep ten unclaimed pieces of Innocence for ourselves when we split from the Black Order, and we've been searching for future Exorcists just as the Order always has.
It grew silent then, and everyone was thinking pretty hard. When it got like this, it was best to go off on our own for a while, so I urged us to move along and said "Lenalee, would you like to take your turn first washing up in the lake we found?"
"Actually, Lavi and I were going to practice some more. So, you and Kanda can go ahead." Those two were in good enough spirits, but I could tell that they were being hard on themselves for losing the match. Not feeling the need to dissuade them from practice, I let them be. I offered for Komui to come along with us, but he had no interest. He was already reading from his piles of papers under a nearby tree.
I both looked forward to and dreaded the time alone with Kanda.
