A/N: Hey! *wave* This one took longer than expected; partially I was resisting doing this one next when there really are a whole lot of other things to explore, partially it just took a while to plan, and then it took me like two whole days to write. Ridiculous.
Thank you to Shadow Spears, ShadowTrooper1414, jy24, Ryuakilover, Chaoshift, Kittenanimegirl13, pikaree1, ElReyCiervo, Lena-luvs-cats, InsanityOwl, RedHerring1412, SomniumofLight, and guest for reviewing!
Title: Licorice Rope
Author: liketolaugh
Rating: T
Pairings: None
Genre: Friendship/Angst
Warnings: AU ending
Summary: Lenalee hates Jasdevi; she doesn't know why she agreed to go on an errand with them. Or: the story of how Lenalee and Jasdevi became friends.
Disclaimer: I only wish I owned D. Gray-man.
The Black Ark, as it turned out, was structured similarly to the White Ark; that meant, among other things, that there was an oversized central building that overlooked everything.
Even in the White Ark, when the world had been crumbling around them and she'd been worried out of her mind about Kanda and Krory and everyone, she'd spared a moment to wonder what the view was like when the Ark was intact. Now, here, it was one of her favorite places.
As she'd expected, the view was wonderful.
"Dear girl, how do you always manage to find your way up here?"
Lenalee started violently, twisting around to look at the door that she'd been only vaguely aware of a minute before, looking at the approaching Noah.
"You shouldn't sit like that," the Earl chided gently, giving her a warm smile; he'd all but stopped wearing the manic Earl suit after the peace had been made, and it was almost unnerving how welcoming he looked under it. "You could fall, and then we'd be in a right pickle."
Lenalee blinked, surprised, and then glanced down. Her legs were dangling over the edge, the ledge lacking anything remotely resembling a railing or a barrier of any sort. If she kicked her foot too hard, her shoes could easily go flying off into nowhere.
"I fly," she answered belatedly, looking back up at the Earl and giving him a hesitant smile, reaching up to thumb the crest on her uniform coat absently. "It doesn't really matter much if I fall."
The Earl blinked, and then laughed, sitting down a few feet away from her. She shifted around, pressing her back to the pillar she'd been sitting beside, and gave him a curious look.
"What brings you here, Earl?" she asked, more wary than she'd intended to let herself sound. Fortunately, the Earl didn't seem to take offense.
"What are you doing here all alone, Lenalee?" the Earl asked her, gentle and sincere, leaning forward slightly to meet her eyes. The smile that had been so carefree a moment before faded into something more understanding.
That was maybe the most surprising thing about all of this – the Earl was thoughtful, and he was kind. When it came down to it, he'd accepted each and every one of the exorcists as if they were part of his family, simply because Allen declared them part of his.
Lenalee wondered if she felt more uncomfortable about it because she was couldn't forgive them, or because she couldn't bring herself return the favor.
"Most of my friends are with other people at the moment," she said at last, shrugging a little. "Even my brother is with Mightra." She glanced away, down at the cityscape below. "I thought I'd take a bit of time to myself."
When she looked back at the Earl, he'd tilted his head, studying her thoughtfully. It reminded- It reminded her of Allen, actually. Though she knew better than to say as much.
Finally, the Earl's face broke into a grin, so startling she nearly jumped.
"I know what you need!" he declared, pointing at her dramatically. "You need to get out for a day!"
Lenalee blinked, considered, and then asked helplessly, "Huh?"
The Earl beamed at her, looking unaccountably proud of himself. "You see, dear girl, I found myself with a problem. Road's been asking for candy, you see, and we've recently run out, so someone needs to run out and get some." He grinned. "Jasdero and David are the only ones available just now, but of course, I can't let them go out alone." He laughed at the very idea, fond amusement making his tone light and boisterous. "So would you be a dear and go with them?"
"Ah…" Lenalee considered throwing herself off the edge of the building. It wasn't as if she'd get hurt. "Earl, I don't know if anyone's mentioned, but Jasdevi and I-"
The Earl flapped his hands dismissively. "I know, I know, you had a bit of a quibble the last time you met." He beamed. "It's just for an hour or so, I promise! It'll go just fine!" He was looking at her expectantly, eyes sparkling like an excited child now. "You might even have fun while you're out!"
Lenalee bit her cheek, more than a little reluctant. Out of all the Noah, Jasdero and David were probably the ones she resented the most for her own sake, though they weren't the ones she disliked most – that honor went to Sheryl. What was more, she couldn't see any way she'd be willing to spend time with them until they grew up a little.
After Kanda, after Allen, after Lavi, even herself – a couple of teenagers with too much power and the arrogance to abuse it was simply too much. She just couldn't stand them.
The longer she remained silent, the more the Earl's face fell. Finally, looking like a kicked puppy, he appended, "I don't mean to force your hand, of course, dear girl. You're in no way obliged to do this. I'm sure Allen, bless his heart, would be willing, or dearest Tyki when he returns-"
Lenalee made a decision and smiled hesitantly at the Earl, which stopped him in his tracks, expression morphing straight back to innocently hopeful.
"I'll do it," she said confidently, pushing herself up from the ground. "It's just an hour, right? How badly could it possibly go?"
The Earl beamed at her and bounced to his feet, looking properly delighted. "That's the spirit, dear girl!" he cheered.
And then he started dancing, and Lenalee had to smile.
The Earl was silly. If there was anything that reassured her about this situation, it was that.
That was how Lenalee found herself on the streets of London, wandering with Jasdevi and looking for a candy shop that they had vague directions at best with which to work with.
Despite the company, Lenalee felt a little more relaxed already. A little bit of space did wonders for her sense of security, it turned out. She'd agreed to stay with the Noah, to stay with her friends doing the same, but it wasn't nearly the demon deal it had felt like at first. She was still free.
"I can't believe we're being sent out to fetch sugary stuff again!" David was complaining to his twin, hands stuffed in his pockets. "Road's, like, thirty-five years old, ain't she?"
"Yeah, can't she get her own candy?" Jasdero agreed, bobbing his head furiously.
The company really was putting a damper on things, though.
"I'm sure there's a good reason," Lenalee said halfheartedly, casting her gaze about almost desperately for anything remotely resembling a candy shop. It had been maybe fifteen minutes, and already Jasdevi's complaining was setting her teeth on edge, for no reason that she could even readily discern.
In unison, both twins stuck their tongues out at her. "No one asked you, exorcist!"
She suppressed a scowl and instead tipped her head toward a shop she'd just spotted. "I think that's the place we're looking for, anyway."
"Finally!" David groaned dramatically, shoving his way through the crowd.
"Finally!" Jasdero agreed, following in his wake.
Lenalee clenched her fist briefly, brow wrinkling, and then forced herself to relax, edging through the crowd only slightly more slowly than the two Noah. Silently, she chided herself; if she couldn't hold her temper, she was no better than they were.
When she reached the store, the two of them were already exploring the aisles, picking out random treats off the shelves and shouting at each other across the store. Having no idea what kind of candy Road preferred, she went for the lollipops, since she'd actually seen Road with those.
It only took a few minutes to gather a good amount, thankfully; satisfied, Lenalee turned away to approach the register, already reaching into her pocket for her wallet.
"Good evening, ma'am," the owner greeted politely, smiling as she set her purchase on the counter.
She gave him a small, genial smile in return. "Evening," she returned. She opened her wallet, picking out the amount she'd counted to. "Nice day today, isn't it?"
"It's been a cold day," he disagreed, not without a pointed glance down. She repressed the urge to sigh; she'd kept wearing her uniform after the Order disbanded, being the most comfortable with it, but of course, it sometimes presented a problem when dealing with the population at large.
"Not that cold, I'd say," she replied, tone clipped, and then, "Five shillings should do, yes?"
"Yes, five shillings," he confirmed, glancing down. "And- Hey! You!"
Lenalee whirled around, following the shop owner's gaze, and felt her mouth pull into a frustrated scowl. "Jasdevi!" she snapped, turning around entirely and abandoning the bag of candy behind her.
David half-turned in the doorway, stuck his tongue out at her, and then fled the store with Jasdero at his heels, both their pockets overflowing with candy.
Lenalee was not going to stomp her feet like a four year old, but she did make a loud, aggravated noise in the back of her throat and dart after them.
"All of you get back here!" the angry shopkeeper yelled, trailing behind them as both Jasdevi and Lenalee made their way through the crowd with much more ease than he.
It took only a few moments for Lenalee to catch up to Jasdevi, and, knowing that if she caught one of them she'd have both of them, she reached out and closed a hand around Jasdero's wrist, stopping him so harshly that he nearly fell.
"Hey, what gives!" Jasdero complained when he'd recovered his balance, turning around to huff at her.
At the call, David turned sharply and then scowled at her as soon as he realized what had happened. "Hey, let go of my brother!"
"Not until you get back and…" She took a breath, forcing herself to at least pretend to be calm. Why had she agreed to this again? "If not apologize, then at least pay for the candy you just stole."
"It's just candy, who cares?" David asked, crossing his arms in disgust. "No one has time for that kind of shit anyway."
"Yeah, that guy was a jerk anyway!" Jasdero popped in, nodding furiously.
"There you are!"
All three of them turned with identically irritated expressions toward the shopkeeper, who had finally caught up. Red-faced and panting just a little, he fumed at them, looking almost like he'd explode if he got just a little angrier.
"You'll come back-" he fumed, pointing at all of them accusingly. "And you'll pay for that merchandise, you worthless rats-"
David punched him. In the face.
It effectively shut the guy up, but it also attracted the attention of several other people on the street, including two police officers.
"Hey, what's going on over there?" one of them called, starting to push toward them; the crowd parted around them, and people were staring, the beginnings of murmurs starting to stir in the air.
"Shoplifters!" the shopkeeper hollered, clutching at his nose, and Lenalee was losing sympathy for him with every word he spoke. "Thieves! Arrest them, officer…!"
Lenalee became aware that she was still holding onto Jasdero's arm and let go abruptly, stepping back with a frown. Then, sighing slightly, she turned to the officer and said soothingly, "There's nothing to see here, officer, my friends and I were just heading back-"
Someone gripped her elbow abruptly. "That's what they all s-"
Lenalee was spinning around with her knee coming up into the third, previously unnoticed, officer's stomach before she'd even processed his words.
"Free for all!" Jasdevi cheered together.
And obviously, it only went downhill from there.
There was no one in the holding cell save the three of them. That, as far as Lenalee was concerned, was the situation's only saving grace.
Jasdevi were leaning against each other in the opposite corner, and Lenalee had placed herself on one side of the door, keeping a halfhearted eye on the hallway but mostly sulking. Nice though it had been to step out of the Ark for a while, she really, really didn't think it had been worth it.
"She hit me!" Jasdero whined, covering one of his eyes. David patted his shoulder, glaring at Lenalee out of the corner of his eye.
"I know, I know, Dero. We'll get her back when we're out of here."
"Promise?" Jasdero sniffled.
David grinned wickedly. "When have I ever lied to you?"
Lenalee felt like she should probably more concerned about this, but really, all she could bring herself to do was sigh deeply and say, voice tart, "I wouldn't have hit you if you hadn't snuck up behind me in the middle of a fight." Probably. Maybe.
"A fight that you started!" David pointed out, caught somewhere between gleeful and indignant.
"I did not!" Lenalee snapped. "You punched one of them in the face before I did, if you recall!"
"And you kicked the other and tossed him into a wall!" David countered. "Face it, girl-"
"You've got as much patience for these guys as we do!" Jasdero finished, the stitches over his mouth contorting an already mildly unsettling grin.
It irked her probably more than it should have that that was completely true.
Her cheeks burning with humiliation, Lenalee returned, "At least I deal with them! The two of you just act like nothing even matters to you!"
"Nothing does matter to us," David informed her, his grin taking on the slightly insane quality characteristic of the Noah. "Why should we care about lesser beings when we've got all the power we could ever want?"
Lenalee was on her feet before she realized it, the crossmarks at her ankles burning with her anger. "That's exactly what I hate about the two of you!" she spat, the words spinning from her tongue without her say-so. "The whole damn world at your fingertips, and what do you do with it? You treat it like your plaything! You hurt people for fun and then scream and wail when you don't get your way!"
And then David was on his feet too, fists clenched at his sides. "It's not our fault that you're such an uptight bitch fun is a foreign concept to you!"
"Why do you even care what we do, anyway?" Jasdero threw in, arms crossed and standing at an angle from David.
"You're hurting people who don't deserve it!" Lenalee hissed.
"Why should we care about them, anyway?" Jasdero grumbled, mouth twisting into a scowl under the stitches. "What did they ever do for us?"
"Humanity's a big old waste of space," David agreed, bobbing his head lightly. "Can't even take care of their own. What good does it do to spare them?"
Lenalee tried to find words to retaliate and realized she had none; God knew she'd thought similarly enough times, over and over again over the course of her life. She tightened her fists until her knuckles hurt, but it didn't help her find an answer.
"Hey," David said after a moment, sounding creeped out. "Why are you crying?"
Lenalee felt the tears rolling down her cheeks, and reached up to impatiently swipe them away. "Forget it," she said bitterly. "And…" She hesitated, and then forged on. "Maybe you're right… About humans. Maybe they do deserve to hurt." Her voice shook. "But no one. Ever. Deserves to get disregarded as a person."
After a few moments, still neither of them had replied, and when Lenalee looked back up, both of them were giving her matching odd looks. Finally, David shrugged.
"Whatever," Jasdevi muttered together, and, at the same time, went to slump back to their previous seats.
Scowling, cheeks red with embarrassment, Lenalee retook her own seat as well, and stiffly looked back out down the hall.
Why had she said that? Had she expected them to understand? It was the most ridiculous thing, too raw and too honest, a sentiment that never should've passed her lips.
An awkward silence filled the holding cell, pressing in on them and making it seem just a little bit smaller. Lenalee tapped her feet, disrupting it just a little but not quite enough.
"Hey," David said suddenly, making her start. "Girl."
Against her better judgement, she glanced over to Jasdevi, frowning in question.
"You ever pull a prank before?" Jasdero asked, starting to smile as he apparently caught his twin's train of thought.
Lenalee blinked and started to frown, but before she could answer, her ears caught the sound of footsteps, and she looked over sharply, catching the gradual approach of what looked like another officer.
"Hey, some of my boys heard-" the officer was starting to say, but as he drew closer, Lenalee saw his eyes drop down to her chest, and the color drained from his face.
"Heard what?" David asked, bristling again at the sight of the officer, but the man was ignoring him.
Slowly, his eyes returned to hers, and she crossed her arms.
"I hate dealing with police," she said mildly, knowing full well what he was thinking and feeling no pity, because honestly, it had been a bad day and she was done.
"Ah-" He swallowed, eyes darting briefly back down and then to hers again. "I apologize for the, ah, inconvenience, Miss Exorcist."
She held his gaze just long enough to make him even more supremely uncomfortable, and then sighed, reached up to scratch the back of her head, and said resignedly, "Sometimes it can't be avoided." She smiled an unfriendly smile. "But I think it's about time you let us out, yes?"
"Yes, of course," the officer said hastily, reaching into his pockets and pulling out a set of keys. As he was unlocking the door, he asked, hesitant, "May I ask, the, ah, the thievery…?"
"A misunderstanding," Lenalee said, infusing her tone with just the right amount of coolness to make him drop the line of questioning. (There were certain skills you developed after years of generally questionable activity, and the ability to deal with police was one of them.)
"Of course," the officer repeated, and with that, they were let out.
"That," David declared, as soon as they were outside the door. "Was amazing."
Surprised, Lenalee let herself smile a little. "Not really."
"Even old Sheryl can't get us out that quickly," Jasdero concurred, snickering. "It takes forever and ever and ever-"
"I think he does that on purpose, though," David noted with a slight scowl. "Says it 'serves us right'."
Lenalee shrugged. "The Order does have some power," she said wryly.
"Even now that everything's over and done with?" Jasdero asked suspiciously.
"I don't think most supporters know it's over," she admitted shamelessly.
Both of them stared at her.
"Hey," David said after a moment, a wicked grin starting to spread across his face. "Feel like getting a bit of petty revenge?"
Lenalee almost said no, because she was still generally annoyed with everything, but being released so quickly had worn away some of her irritation, and the tone the two twins were taking with her had shifted so abruptly that it was catching her a little off-guard, and so she asked, "What do you have in mind?"
"Wait for it…" David grinned, peeking around the corner, eyes glittering.
Despite herself, Lenalee couldn't help but hold her breath, peering around right along with him. "Are you sure it's going to work?" she asked, voice hushed.
"Of course!" Jasdero hissed, voice unusually quiet for him, though the laughter restrained in his voice was clear. "Now shush, he's coming!"
The candy shop owner emerged from the back room muttering, not even paying attention. Sure enough, he nudged the front door open, and the large container of syrup that Jasdero had carefully balanced on top came tumbling down.
Lenalee clapped a hand over her mouth to muffle her laughter as the owner was drenched in thick syrup – and then the plastic bucket came down on the man's head, and she lost it, half collapsing against the side of the building and face flushing pink.
It was petty – God, it was petty, a revenge for a hard day that hadn't even really been his fault. She loved it all the same.
On either side of her, Jasdevi elbowed her, giving her identical pleased grins.
"So you do know what fun is after all," David jabbed, and Lenalee might've rolled her eyes, but honestly, she was still laughing way too hard.
"Heehee!" Jasdero grinned, and tugged at her elbow. "Let's go before he finds us, come on!"
In a mess of limbs and stumbling and cackling, they made their escape – a clean one this time that involved no police officers. They finally slowed down three blocks away, and Jasdero jeered at Lenalee,
"That was fun, yeah? Yeah?"
"It was fun," Lenalee conceded helplessly, pulling her arm from his grip and shaking his head disbelievingly. "But I don't think it's exactly my… style, I guess." Her anger and frustration was usually discharged in spilt akuma oil or, more often, not at all.
"You don't have anyone you'd like a little petty revenge against?" David challenged, putting his hands on his hips and leaning forward, a wide smirk on his face.
Lenalee opened her mouth to deny it, and then paused, and considered briefly. She and Jasdevi hadn't settled their differences, not really, but somehow their presence wasn't as aggravating as it had been mere hours before, and… Really, maybe they had a point. About her loosening up a little, at the very least.
She smiled, a wicked curve of her lips that brought a mischievous gleam to her eyes, and asked, "Can we prank Sheryl?"
Jasdevi grinned. "Abso-fucking-lutely!"
Lenalee's smile lightened a little and turned genuine, though the gleam of excitement remained in her eyes, and she laughed a little, shaking her head to herself.
"Now." For the first time that day, David threw his arm around her shoulders and smirked at her, and even Lenalee was surprised when she didn't shrug it off. "I don't know about you, but Dero and I have had one hell of a day, and I think we deserve a drink."
"Alcohol, alcohol!" Jasdero cheered, clarifying for Lenalee exactly what kind of drink David was referring to.
Lenalee considered. "I don't have my wallet," she told them; it had been left behind when she'd gone chasing after them earlier, and who knew where it was now.
"You can pay us back later," David said dismissively, Jasdero nodding along.
"Alright then," Lenalee said at last, and she smiled.
They returned to the Ark nearly four hours after they left, with no candy in their possession and with Lenalee's wallet still missing. The Earl and Komui were both there to greet them in seconds; the Earl alternately fretted over all three of them and scolded them, while Komui wailed at Lenalee about boys and the dangers of the streets of London.
But no amount of worried wails could hide the gleam of surprise and relief in Komui's eyes, and Lenalee was sure it had nothing to do with her safe return and everything to do with the broad smile she wore.
And if Lenalee was still a little giggly even half an hour later – she didn't think it was entirely because of the alcohol.
This took an unjustifiably long time, and it's a ways outside my usual, but hell, it was fun. And I got to do a Lenalee thing, finally. *smile* Overall, I think I'm pleased with it. Thanks for reading, and please review!