Chapter revised 2010-12-22.
The Fourteenth's random italics in his speech were nicked from Darkest Before Dawn by Mad Half Hour. Check it out, it's insane...literally. :)
Time.
The Ark was never one to abide by any fixed rule set; always defying what was logical for a thing of such proportion.
After all, who knew which dimensional plane it resided on anyway?
It could not create food from thin air, but somehow even a parasitic accommodator was able to not require sustenance for...what was it?
Had it really been two months of idle wandering?
And so, why did a hundred years pass in the other world?
To wake from slumber~~
The Fourteenth wasn't the kind of mind that got bored easily.
In fact, that was exactly what was required if one was to stay low in someone else's for thirteen years, unnoticed and undetected, and especially when having to wander the Ark.
It wasn't as if there was anything else particularly interesting to do.
There had been one occurrence some time ago that was out of the ordinary, in fact. Occurring only about eight or nine or ten or even eleven days after his completed transformation, there came a knock at the door that led to the Asian Branch.
A polite knock. Not Levrrier's crew's torrential barrage of spells made of what felt like the Noah and Akuma's own Dark Matter, but a polite, 'oh I don't really mind if you ignore me I just want to have a nice chat' type of knock.
The Fourteenth mentally nudged the mind of the original Allen, whose avatar-self turned around and faced the undecipherable form of his other counterpart.
"You have a visitor."
Allen didn't react at the too overly melodic voice, the blank and misty look in his eye staying depressingly lifeless.
"From the Asian Branch."
Allen's eyes showed a small spark of curiosity, but it was just that – a spark. A thought fragment: who...?
"Let us see, then, won't we?"
Walking to the door, he opened it towards their patient guest.
Bak Chan – for it was him – was standing there, just looking at him, an odd auraic emotion engulfing him completely. He had aged at least thirty or forty years, his golden hair now an extremely faded bronze with signs of stress from long ago running through his veins.
It would have been an underestimate to say that there was a shock between the age difference of their physical appearances, with Bak looking near seventy and Allen still the same age he had been before. Bak's eyes hovered briefly across the stigmata, the Fourteenth's piercing yellow irises, the ashy skin and then widened at the sight of the black, Innocence-embedded hand sticking past his sleeve.
"Good morning..."
The small part of relieved, compassionate warmth he felt emanating from Allen was certainly interesting, and he allowed the other's mind to surface again after a deep polite (mocking?) bow to the chief. Bak's surprise visibly increased tenfold as he undoubtedly watched the Noah features ebb back to the ones he knew before from the time he'd dived after Lenalee and entered the Ark, but no small amount of his concern came from seeing the now silvery blue eyes as merely oceans of lost darkness.
Lenalee. His friends.
For the first time in three months, a true smile graced his face with the sight of someone he recognized and knew, somehow avoiding the deep depression he normally fell into upon thinking about them. Bak had gone to the trouble to visit him after all, even after his fatal mistake and his stupid decision to shut himself away. There was no disgust or prejudice in the curious glances toward his Noah, only simple scientific curiosity, and Allen couldn't describe how welcome and accepted he felt as a result. This feeling rose in his chest, and he found himself breaking into hysterical giggles, tears streaming down his face and clutching his sides in a one-person hug.
"Allen..." Bak began, but simply embraced him as old friends would. "You...how...and Noah...?"
The addressed gave a half-shrug, automatically leaning closer to the warmth of another before being racked by another fit of hysteria.
"How...long?" He whispered weakly after he stopped choking on the air and salt, surprised at how hard it was for himself to speak and not the Fourteenth.
"Fifty-two years, seven months and twenty-three days since we heard that you sealed off all the doors, since no one knows the date when you exactly left."
...That long?
The Fourteenth smiled disconcertingly in response to the flash he heard and 'looked' towards Allen's mind. The Ark is unpredictable. Where do you think we are when we're inside it?
Understanding came from Allen, the Fourteenth could feel it, but the outside conversation continued without hesitation.
"It...Nice to see you, Bak Chan." His speech was getting easier, somehow not even needing water to soothe his throat. "Where are the others?"
Bak's eyes and aura shifted strangely, as if he had just breached a taboo.
"Rikei is the only one still alive now, driven into insanity by an Akuma some time ago and Fou is looking after him so he doesn't hurt anyone else or himself any further. Both Lou Fa and Shifu were killed in the final fight between the Earl, his supporters and the Organization, Lou Fa after being sliced by a Level Three's blade in an ambush from behind when distracted from lookout duty and Shifu from the Blood Bullet whilst making an important delivery to Headquarters."
"Fight between...does that mean the Earl was killed?"
Shaking his head sadly, a broken smile showed itself. "No, none of us were powerful enough for that. Miranda Lott's Innocence was the first to become the new, more powerful Crystal type, actually, followed by a child called Timothy Hearst and another member named Ilya Novikov, who died in a kamikaze strike against the Noah of Lust, Lulubell, but bringing her down with him. Levrrier used the egg you retrieved to convert some of our members to half-Akuma via biological conversion and it took about the lives of seventeen of them to seal the Earl in a crystal that's impossible to escape. There was no choice since we were losing major forces, and making hundreds of normally non-combative troops in a mad and desperate rush was the only answer."
The Fourteenth was revolted, and it was the first time Allen's expression showed some major emotion by displaying his disgust. "Converting humans into half-Akuma...that's sick..." He drifted off, feeling his mind being overlayed, stigmata appearing once more and eyes changing colour. "Are you sure you killed off all the Noah?"
Bak nodded, slightly disliking the rawer power coming from him now. But as the Exorcist's skin tone hadn't darkened, he had to deduce that the original Allen was still there and listening. "You brought down Road Camelot, Tyki Mikk, Skin Bolic and Jasdevi alongside the Ark back then, so that's four of thirteen. The remaining nine were accounted for – Lulu Bell, Cyril Camelot, Raviel Damont, Dmitri Kovosky, Allene Jormansen, Niko Farkas, Louvain Mancini, Karmine Rosaby and Lausse Makela, if those names ring a bell to your Noah." He sighed. "So many Finders were changed to increase the forces, and only a handful of people survived with one or two Exorcists among them; I was lucky since I only lost half my left arm."
Indeed his sleeve was slightly off, normal-looking until just past the elbow joint. The Fourteenth had retreated back again after that, not paying much attention as they exchanged awkward pleasantries, one because he hadn't seen the other for over half a century and the other knowing that he hadn't seen him for that half-century, but having only a small span of time pass for himself.
But since that, nothing much had happened.
Bak's visit, however, had done much to lighten Allen's spirits and somewhat bring him back to the world and restore the way he used to be. Fou had come to tell them one or two or three weeks later (who knew?) of his death and they just handed her the over-extravagant bunch of flowers they had specially picked and she delivered – it would have been odd if Allen Walker, looking no older than he did since the war and missing for eons, appeared from the barrier that was supposed to not be in use anymore and attended the funeral in person.
Timcanpy had left with her to record the ceremony, being easier to hide. But not even halfway through viewing it, he had broken down and could not watch any more.
What was the need to anyway, when Bak had been his last and only fixed tie to the outside world left?
As much as the Fourteenth didn't care about what the two of them did with the rest of their lives, Allen's grieving now only seemed to be out of pure habit and not genuine. Knowing there was nothing left for them within the Ark, especially considering how slow time was passing by, he gave his counterpart nearly a week (or perhaps it was past one?) to recover and gather his senses, before going back to the outside world where he could find himself, or Allen, a new crowd (welcoming or not) and something to do with his life.
He found it was much harder to make a gate than it had used to be, but he achieved it with the piano nonetheless, first playing the tune through to remove all the unnecessary gates that were present in the world before forming one at the edge of the forest the Exorcist Headquarters had been based upon.
Once he stepped through the door, Crown Clown activated to shield his face, he was greeted with the sight of an extremely old, wise-looking man with white hair and wearing the most peculiar set of robes.
And then came the pain of the soul fragment chained to him.
It looks like the place is in need of an Exorcist, little one.
Welcome to your new life.
End of Chapter One.