A/N: Just a little something random I had a dream about one night. Also, this story is meant to be a one shot, though depending on popular demand, I may be tempted into expanding. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own nothing of the DGM universe.
"Are you sure you saw her?" Lenalee whispered as the trio edged along the side of the building. "I mean, there's a lot of people out on the strip tonight. You sure it was -her-?"
Lavi grumbled something unintelligible as he scratched a finger underneath the headband that kept his unruly red hair out of his face, and Allen only stared dully in response, though all three of them were reaching towards their holsters at this point. Stifling another questioning remark, Lenalee fell in behind Lavi on the right hand side of the building's entrance, with Allen flush against the wall to the left of it. Weapons at the ready, Allen counted them down, and they staggered their entrance so the two males covered either side with Lenalee close behind to aim straight ahead.
The group fanned out as they began to investigate separate areas of the bottom level of the partially constructed, five story building. The neon lights of the surrounding buildings provided mininal light on the inside, prompting Allen, who had taken the right side, to pull out and turn on his flashlight. He could make out some dusty, trampled tarps and the occasional paint bucket along the outer wall.
"Clear," came Lavi's voice from his side, the telltale white beam of a flashlight signalling his approach, occasionally intercepted by the thick, concrete support beams structured methodically around the level.
"Clear on this end as well, though there's a set of stairs back here. Might wanna give these a look, though." The two males quickly converged to her location, and Allen frowned as he spotted what Lenalee currently had her flashlight aimed towards.
"Footprints," he commented, eyeing the dusty prints that were too small and narrow to be associated with the heavier, wider boots of the construction workers. "Not sure how fresh they are..."
"Let's check 'em out," Lavi offered, already making his way up the staircase. "What's five floors," he added dryly, causing Lenalee to grin widely as she followed shortly after. They approached the investigation of the second floor much in the same way as they did the first; a staggered entrance followed by the team branching out to clear their respective areas. Allen decided to follow the trail of the shoe prints, leaving the other two to check out the rest of the floor.
They prints stopped just in front of a support beam, and Allen circled around it to see if they picked up again somewhere, biting back a sigh of frustration when they didn't.
A part of him felt bad for dragging them on what was rapidly shaping up to be a wild goose chase. There was no telling how long those prints had been there, or who made them for that matter. Allen had been so wrapped up in this case... Perhaps he -was- starting to see things.
Out of force of habit, Allen continued to look around the remainder of his area, and had turned to call a clear to the other two when he spotted movement behind the cornermost support beam towards the front end of the building. Turning his flashlight in its direction, he kept his pistol at the ready, walking evenly towards the structure.
"Oy, stop!" came Lavi's voice followed closely by his and Lenalee's thudding footsteps as they made to pursue whoever he'd called out to. Allen's attention was diverted by the sudden disturbance from his teammates, and when he returned his gaze to the corner, he was startled to see the object of his search standing less than an inch away from the barrel of his gun. The spiky haired woman grinned widely, and Allen had barely enough time to register another presence through his shock before the world turned black.
"You had a choice, Mr. Walker."
Allen stared blearily in the direction of the smooth Italian baritone, just barely making out the profile of a tall male with long hair tied neatly at the base of his neck. Despite the disorienting throbbing at the back of his head, Allen forced himself to look around, realizing his movement was restricted by the two masked individuals that held him kneeling against the floor. From what he could see, they were still inside that same building, albeit on one of the higher levels. The spiky haired female was nowhere to be seen.
"I feel like... we gave you ample time to come to the right decision." The tall male folded his arms casually across his chest and continued to stare off into the distance. Allen felt a cool breeze caress his skin, tussingly the silvery blonde locks not currently stuck to his face with sweat. He could faintly make out a noise in the background that sounded suspiciously like someone crying, but his attention was once again diverted as the man began to speak once more. "You seemed to be having a terrible time with the choice so... I've decided to help things along. Bring her here."
The last part confused the still somewhat addled Allen, though his confusion was immediately washed away at the sight of his bound and gagged wife as she was pushed forward by another masked person. "Ryiah," he rasped in disbelief, struggling in vain against his captors to get to her, but they merely dragged him along to the edge of the building, dangerously close to a large opening in the side of the wall. The sound he'd detected from earlier seemed to become louder the closer they moved to the edge, and Allen was sure now that what he'd heard was someone weeping.
"So, I thought to myself," the man began as he pulled up next to the group, peering thoughtfully over the edge of the opening. "I thought... Why hasn't Mr. Walker responded favorably to father's request? It was a very simple request, mind you. One that shouldn't have taken very much thought at all, especially for a man of -your- caliber. So, I asked myself this question, and after thinking long and hard... I decided that trying to beat an answer out of you would be a fruitless endeavor. You would essentially be the only one that suffered, and you could deal with that. You could... -endure-."
"What the fuck do you want?!" Allen roared, feeling an uncontrollable panic rising within him as Ryiah was pushed to the border of the opening.
"I want to -help- you, Mr. Walker. I'm -going- to help you, actually. We'll all be the better for it. Trust me."
"Daddy!" His blood ran completely cold as the wail reached his ears, and he looked around frantically for the source.
"Ah, that's right. A little incentive for you," the black haired man commented coldly, and he waited until the moment Allen spotted his daughter suspended helplessly from a nearby crane before snapping his fingers. In that moment, the clawed hook of the crane released with a decisive metallic sound, and every other noise but the one of his daughter screaming was blotted out in his mind, to include the muffled shriek of his wife as well as his own thundering cry.
He watched helplessly as she plummeted to the ground below, their eyes connecting for a millisecond before he lost sight of her completely. No matter how hard he struggled, he could not break free of his captors, and he would continue to scream himself hoarse long after his daughter's was abruptly cut off.
"Well. That was rather anticlimactic," the man drawled in a bored tone, picking some lint off of his immaculate clothing. "Though interventions are not supposed to be very entertaining, I suppose. Are you in an agreeable mood yet, Mr. Walker?"
Allen barely had enough time to breathe, let alone think, before his wife was thrown unceremoniously over the edge. Black spots dotted his vision as he struggled for breath, his gasps sounding hollow and tinny to his own ears as everything around him became tainted with a red mist.
"How about now? Or would you like to join your family, perhaps? It seems like you would be useless to me either way. At least this way I get the pleasure of paying you back for affronting me. Actually yes, go ahead and throw him," the man added as an afterthought, waving a hand dismissively in his underlings' direction before walking away.
Allen heaved with every fiber of his being against the two that held him, his entire body burning with a furious fire he'd never experienced before. "GET. OFF!" he shrieked, slinging his rightmost captor directly into the one that had thrown his wife with superhuman strength, and causing the pair of them to fall off the level.
"Oh ho," the black haired male chuckled with great interest as he watched from a shadowed corner, the spiky haired woman from before materializing next to him moments later. "He's nearly there. He'll need a little more help, I think."
"Guess I'm up next, then," came the sultry tones of the woman, her grin flashing visibly in the darkened atmosphere.
Allen turned and, with a cry that bordered on the insane, charged the remaining individual. They grappled momentarily, though Allen quickly gained the upper hand before smashing the person's head into a nearby support beam. They dropped to the floor, unmoving, and Allen just stared at the immobile body.
"Fancy seeing you here, Noah," came the woman's sensual voice as she came out into the open, and Allen rounded on her.
"Rhode," he growled, stalking threateningly in her direction. "YOU did this. You set me up, killed my family."
"They were weighing you down, Noah," she responded casually, not seeming the least bit phased as he closed the distance between them, towering menacingly above her.
"STOP. CALLING. ME. THAT!" he roared, infuriated by the darkness of his past being thrown in his face after so brutally murdering his family. He swiped at her, becoming more and more enraged as she seemed to effortlessly dodge all of his attacks.
"You were never meant to live this life, Noah. You were always a part of OUR family, and you always will be..."
These words echoed in his mind even as he jerked awake, breathing heavily and drenched in a cold sweat. His wife turned in her sleep next to him, and he sat as quietly as possible, trying not to wake her as she settled back into sleep. A periodic flashing to his left alerted him of a missed notification on his cell phone, and he reached over to grab it. Unlocking the screen, he saw a missed call from his partner Lavi, as well as a few unimportant text messages.
He froze when he reached the last one, the ID naming the texter as 'Earl'. Allen continued to stare at the unopened message, his hands shaking from a mixture of shock and fear as an overwhelming aura of deja vu invaded his senses. Finally, he opened it, choking back a gasp of disbelief as he read it's contents.
"Time to come home, Noah."