Hello wonderful readers *smiles* I have to give up talking about anime/fanfiction and I CAN'T READ FANFICTION EITHER! This is for lent btw XD So yeah, bakaxusagi – I'll read Post-It Thief when my 40 days of torture are finished *shoots self* Oh and Jo-chan - I'll re-write your thing at some point *cries* Stupid technology...
Thank you to Geeres, kh07gl, dark-Yuuki-sama, Stavarn100, patrick the almighty observer, bakaxusagi, Lingering Sorrow and MidnightAbyssx02 for reviewing/favouriting/subscribing. Review replies are at the end. I have over 50 reviews now! *cheers* Thanks for all your support guys :'D So here's chapter 7 for you all, which is a long one too ^3^ Enjoy!
Note - whenever there is a flashback, Lavi will be referred to as his persona during that time, or by nicknames/no name. I can't call him Lavi since he is only called that in current events. Sorry if it gets confusing :S
[DISCLAIMER]: I, unfortunately, do not own D Gray Man or any of the characters that Katsura Hoshino-san has created.
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Can I explain the spun truth whilst drinking bitter coffee?
Oops, looks like it.
The mask shows a part of a wonderful person.
Don't shut out warm thoughts.
The needs of a time respond.
Suzumura Kenichi - Persona
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Chapter 7 - Moving Onwards
To say Medic was happy was an understatement.
After hugging Lavi until he could no longer breathe, leading to Allen having to physically pull the woman off of the red head before he passed out, Medic promptly burst into tears, only being consoled eventually by Allen introducing himself.
"Allen Walker?" Medic asked, wiping her eyes and blowing her nose. "It's nice to meet you."
"Likewise," Allen replied, feeling somewhat confused and a little worried by the woman standing before him. Lavi gave an awkward laugh.
"You're kinda scaring Allen, féijíchǎng..."
"Sorry! This must be some first impression, huh?"
"Wh-who are you exactly?"
As Allen asked this, Lavi grinned and patted Medic on the head, earning a sniff and quiet murmur about 'how much he'd grown' in reply.
"This is Medic! She basically took care of me while I was here," the red head answered, fondness in his single green eye.
"And a hell of a handful you were at that," Medic said with a chuckle. Lavi pouted indignantly.
"It's nice to know you were taken care of," Allen murmured softly, smiling. "Everyone else here seems pretty horrible..."
"They're not that bad sometimes," Medic mumbled awkwardly. "They're just... severly opinionated?"
"I see..."
Both Medic and Lavi laughed at Allen's dubious expression. Then, as Lavi ruffled the other teen's hair fondly, Medic's eyes narrowed as she smirked.
"So who exactly have you fallen in love with? You don't win the bet unless she's here to see me."
Lavi froze then laughed somewhat awkwardly, even more so when Allen looked at him quizically with a frown.
"Well, uhh... that person is... Allen?" Lavi answered, blushing slightly.
Medic's smirk widened.
"Oh? Well the bet was that it had to be a girl who you brought before me," the brunette stated evilly, chuckling at Lavi's annoyed expression. "Looks like I win, baka usagi-chan!"
"But féijíchǎng, that's unfair!" Lavi whined, walking up to Medic and poking her forehead in annoyance.
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not, bakame!"
"Is too! You're so stubborn, féijíchǎng..."
"I'M NOT FLAT CHESTED!"
"Oh really? Well, I certainly don't see any developments in the boob department..."
At this the brunette woman stamped her foot indignantly, cheeks flushed with embarrassment and annoyance.
"H-how dare you! Does he treat you like this Allen-chan?" Medic asked, turning towards the rather baffled, and embarrassed, white haired teen standing a few metres away (for his own safety).
"Umm, n-no not really... ?" Allen replied nervously, backing away from the woman currently walking towards him with a rather creepy expression. Then, all of a sudden, Medic stopped and smiled.
"Well that's okay then!"
And with that the brunette woman sat down on her desk, smiling serenely at the both of them. Allen, who was now rather confused, turned towards Lavi with a raised eyebrow. The red head shrugged in reply.
"So..." Medic began, leaning back a little as she spoke. "Since you lost the bet baka usagi-chan, you have to tell me about your travels with Bookman."
Lavi laughed, rolling his eyes. Then, with a sigh, he sat down on the edge of a nearby bed and looked up at the ceiling.
He began with the day he left Headquarters, slowly and methodically describing the years since that point with an almost bored tone of voice, as if his past wasn't really all that important. As he talked, Allen listened intently; he knew next-to-nothing about his red headed friend, so to hear Lavi actually openly discuss the events of his past was something the white haired teen refused to pass up.
Some of what Lavi spoke about was quite sad, at least to Allen. The warfare he had to record as part of his duties as a Bookman, the lives lost that became simple words in ink on a piece of parchment and nothing more. Allen could tell that certain wars had affected Lavi more than others; the Dungan Revolt especially seemed to cause the red head to feel bitterness.
However, some of what was said was quite amusing, like Bookman getting drunk at a beer festival in Germany, and Lavi being forced to play the female lead in a travelling play in order for Bookman and himself to safely cross the French-Italian border.
And, in addition, some of what Lavi described was downright amazing. The variety of countries that he had visited for one: the United States of America, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, France, Switzerland, Italy, Madagascar, Japan, Germany, Russia - the list was endless. And Lavi had had the opportunity to meet with members of royal families across the globe, leaders of great armies, political masterminds. It seemed like something out of a novel. However, as Lavi told them somewhat seriously, it all came with a price.
And, as his friend talked, Allen found himself feeling somewhat concerned; throughout most of his descriptions Lavi came across as detached, almost as if it had been someone else who had watched a village of Native American Indians be burnt to the ground by an American army, someone else who had been shot by a stray bullet at the age of seven and nearly died, someone else who had witnessed the deaths of hundreds on one of the many battlefields of the Mahdist War.
But why did Lavi come across like that? Allen found himself unable to answer that question. Surely a part of Lavi had suffered and felt pain towards the bloodshed he had witnessed. He had to; he was only human.
Suddenly, however, Allen's worried thoughts and feelings for his friend were pushed to one side as Lavi described how Bookman and himself got to the Black Order.
"Well, we were basically broke at the time," Lavi explained, grinning sheepishly. "And once we got to India we knew we had to find a quicker way of getting to Paris, 'cause the Order was getting pretty impatient with how long we were taking to get there. So we asked around about getting a horse, and realised pretty quickly that we wouldn't be able to afford one. So whilst Gramps tried to persuade a peddlar to 'lend' us his one, I ended up in a game of poker with some kid wi-"
"A kid?" Medic interrupted, looking amused. Lavi laughed, cheeks flushing slightly in embarrassment.
"Yeah. I never got to see his face though; the pub was too dark to see anything but the cards really," the red head said thoughtfully, leaning against the wall behind him. "Anyway, the kid beat me hands down and cheated me of my clothes and my money. I ended up getting arrested for wandering around Mumbai naked, thanks to that bái chī!"
"A pretty heartless kid, huh," Medic murmured.
"Tell me about it!" Lavi grumbled, crossing his arms. "And you know the worst part? The kid had the nerve to say nolite te bastardes carborundorum as I left the pub stark nake-"
"W-what!"
Startled, Lavi turned to face Allen, frowning at the younger teen's shocked expression.
"Uhh Allen? You okay?" the red head asked tentatively. Allen didn't reply, blinking. Then he blinked again. Then, to be sure, blinked a third time as he tried to confirm his thought processes.
And that's when Allen started to laugh.
It had started out as small giggles at first, then progressed rather swiftly into loud hoots of laughter. Soon enough the white haired teen was clutching his stomach with one hand and wiping tears of mirth away with the other. Lavi blushed, pouting indignantly.
"It's not funny!"
Of course, Allen just laughed harder at that comment. Eventually, when both Medic and Lavi started to wonder if the boy had lost the plot completely, Allen calmed down, hiccuping and grinning.
"Care to tell us what's so amusing Allen-chan?" Medic asked, raising an eyebrow. Allen turned to face Lavi, smirking.
"On that day were you wearing a white shirt, black bandana, tight beige trousers and white underwear?"
And, rather suddenly, Lavi knew what Allen was laughing about.
"W-wh-what? It can't... I swear we never..."
"It was me, Lavi. I always quote that mock Latin phrase when I beat people."
"B-but... I would have remembered you back in Germany when..."
"It's a small world, huh?"
"YOU BASTARD!"
Allen jumped at the sudden outraged exclamation from his friend, grinning sheepishly as Lavi stood up and walked towards him.
"I had to, stupid!" Allen cried, backing away as Lavi reached forward and grabbed the collar of his jacket. "Master told me he was going to drink 20 bottles of Romanée Conti, and they cost £2000 a bot-"
"Tickle fight!"
"... Eh?"
With a sudden grin, Lavi dropped Allen back onto the bed he had been sitting on and started tickling him, soon reducing the younger teen to laughing uncontrollably and trying in vain to wriggle away from the red head. Then, with a triumphant smirk, Allen managed to get his arms free and started to tickle Lavi in revenge.
"You two are so stupid..." Medic chuckled, rolling her eyes. As the pair of them fell off of the bed, both laughing and making teasing comments, the brunette Bookman Clan member found herself smiling nonetheless. Because Lavi had changed so much since the day they had first met, almost as if he was a completely different person.
And seeing him so happy and full of joy made Medic feel very happy indeed.
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Flashback - Early 1873
"Oh would you just keep still!"
Medic scowled at the young teen sitting before her, trying her best to keep the needle in her hand straight as she continued to administer the vaccination. The blonde boy winced as she pulled the needle out of his arm, only increasing the irritation Medic felt.
"Keep this pressed against it and get out," she snapped, rolling her eyes as her patient pressed a cotton wool ball pathetically to the pinprick wound on his arm before leaving the infirmary. Medic sighed and sat down on the edge of her desk, pinching the bridge of her nose.
It had been a very long day.
First of all, a group of trainee Guardians decided to have a food fight in the Cafeteria at breakfast, earning them severe beatings from Head Guardian. So, of course, it was Medic who had to deal with their injuries and their incessant whining.
Then, to top it all off, Cook got her lunch order wrong and gave her a plate full of soba. Which she hated. So Medic ended up eating cold leftover ramen after Lunch Hour was over.
And, because fate just seemed to hate her guts, Head Archiver sent her several Shepherds to inoculate against diphtheria, and all of them whined like little girls while she did so. All in all, Medic was not in the best of moods.
So, when the door to the infirmary suddenly burst open, all Medic could think was that her day was just about to get that much worse. And she was right. For the person who had just entered the infirmary was Bookman himself, and he was carrying something in a blood covered blanket. But it wasn't what he was carrying that frightened Medic; it was the emotion in Bookman's eyes.
Regret.
And in all the years she had known him, Medic had never seen or heard of Bookman regretting anything.
"B-Bookman?"
Almost as if the old man hadn't heard her, he walked forwards and placed his bloody package on the nearest bed to Medic. With a small cry, the brunette realised that Bookman had been carrying a someone, not a something.
For lying on the bed wide eyed and terrified was a young boy with an eye patch covering his right eye and dark red hair, though it was hard to tell if his hair really was red due to the huge amount of blood covering the boy from head to toe. His single visible green eye was glassy, as if he was in shock. And though the child was wounded, with several small slashes on his arms and a rather deep one on his neck, Medic knew that most of the blood covering the boy wasn't his own.
"Wh-what the hell is this ? !" Medic stammered, raising a hand to her mouth. "Who is this child? What happened to him?"
"I can't answer you now."
At this, Medic turned towards Bookman with a furious expression. Before she could say anything, however, the old man silenced her with a raised hand.
"Attend to his... injuries... I will tell you about it all later," Bookman explained, a look of regret again flashing within his eyes. "And be careful - the boy is rather shell-shocked."
And with that the old man walked away, closing the infirmary door behind him and leaving Medic alone with the silent child.
"Guruhairu..."
Though she honestly would rather be anywhere else, with any other patient than the one lying before her, Medic put up a professional mask to hide her horror, walked up to the bed, and kneeled down so she was at eye-level with the boy.
"Hey there," she said with a small smile, waving her right hand in front of the boy's eye. "My name's Medic. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?"
No response.
"I guess this is gonna be quite difficult then, huh..." she mumbled, standing up and getting a flannel and bowl of water from a nearby cupboard.
Placing the two items in her hands down on the bedside table, Medic checked the boy for injuries and verbally made a list of them, adopting a purely clinical countenance.
"Head wound, probably from a blunt object. Several cuts varying in depth, most on the arms and one deep one on the neck, probably from a small dagger," Medic murmured under her breath, gently pulling down the blanket still wrapped around the boy's lower half and unbuttoning the child's rather tattered shirt. "Bruising around the neck, possible attempt at strangulation. Dislocated right shoulder. 3 broken ribs. Bruising around the sto-..."
Medic froze. The sudden urge to vomit made her turn away, eyes wide and tears sliding down her cheeks.
It was now rather obvious what had happened to the boy. And all the brunette could think of to console herself with was thank God the child had lost his sanity.
Turning back around and wiping her tears away with a shaky hand, Medic picked up the flannel, drenched it with warm water, and quietly went about the task of cleaning up the boy before her, being careful of his wounds.
Soon enough, the bowl of water was a deep red colour. In fact, Medic had to change the bowl six times before the red headed child was clean. Carefully bandaging the boy up and changing him into some spare clean clothes that were far too big for him, Medic gently covered the red head with a blanket.
"You can rest now..."
Her words instilled no response, the boy's eye as wide and blank as it had been since he had entered the infirmary. Even when Medic had cleaned the cuts on his arm, head and neck with disinfectant the child hadn't even blinked nor flinched.
It unnerved her, his almost deathly cold stare. It was unwavering, unchanging, devoid of life, feeling and emotion.
Medic couldn't stand it.
With gritted teeth she prepared an injection; a sedative, one that would hopefully give the boy some peace. Without hesitation Medic slid the needle into the child's rather frail looking arm, pushing down on the plunger with a trembling thumb.
For a while nothing happened. Then, with an almost weary sigh, the boy's eyes slid shut, his face becoming peaceful as his breathing became deeper and slower. The red head looked very young in his sleep, so much so that it pained Medic to look at him.
As she sank down on the edge of a nearby bed, staring down at her shaking hands and trying not to cry, Medic knew that the sleeping child before her was beyond saving. And in a cruel way she was glad.
Because any shred of sanity that the boy had left wouldn't be worth saving.
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"Who on Earth do you think you are ? !"
Bookman remained passive towards the anger being directed towards him, eyes emotionless, face expressionless. He ignored everything said to him and waited until all was silent before speaking.
"You asked me to pick a successor. I have chosen the best candidate I have seen so far."
"Best candidate?" Clan Head echoed incredulously. "That child is nothing more than an orphaned street urchin that would be better off dead than continuing to live such a miserable life!"
"You would have done it good to have left it where you found it," Chief Translator said, his tone contemptuous. "He is clearly not mentally sane-"
"Agreed."
"-and he is far too young to be able to become a Bookman-"
"Agreed."
"-and, most importantly, he is not of Clan blood."
"Agreed."
"So why," Clan Head asked, frowning at his brother's replies. "Have you brought him here and asked for him to be your apprentice?"
"Because he is the only one who can be my successor. That is why."
"We don't do wishy-washy answers, Bookman," Guardian Head growled, anger in his eyes. "Do you mean to make a mockery out of the Clan?"
"Of course not," Bookman replied, meeting the gaze of the Council members without any indication of doubt in his eyes. "I just know when I have found the right person."
"Like you did with your previous apprentice?"
Bookman fell silent.
"You made a mistake by choosing him - did he not ruin your chances of continuing to document the Noah Clan? And he also ended up becoming an accommodator of all things!" Clan Head murmured disapprovingly, shaking his head. "He died a coward's death."
"He died at the hands of the Akuma - no more, no less," Bookman replied, his tone becoming ever so slightly angry. "He was chosen by the Innocence and he had no other choice."
"He could have rejected it."
"And then he would have turned into a Fallen One."
The room was quiet for a while. Then, with a sigh, Clan Head stood up and walked up to Bookman, stopping just in front of him.
"We will give you one chance, and one chance only," he explained, voice grave and very serious. "In four month's time you will bring that child before us to be judged."
"Thank you, Your Gra-"
"But be warned, Bookman," Clan Head interrupted, smirking. "If it isn't mentally stable in that time, we will have to Erase it."
And with that the Guardian by the door opened it at Clan Head's request. Knowing that the meeting was over, Bookman bowed his head in acknowledgement and turned to leave.
It was going to be a rough couple of months.
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"Stop!"
Running footsteps. Exhausted pants for breath. The faint rustle of fabric. These sounds echoed round the main corridor as a red headed boy ran as fast as his legs could carry him towards the exit.
There's nowhere to run, Hóng sè.
"No!"
The boy ran faster, eye wide and full of panic. His surroundings started to fade out. Suddenly, he wasn't at Bookman Headquarters anymore. He was at Home. And he was chasing him.
"Leave me alone!"
The child practically screamed those words, an all-encompassing fear filling him from head to toe. He wasn't going to make it; the footsteps were right behind him. The red head put on one last burst of speed, hoping to evade both his fake assailant, and the ones actually chasing him.
But, just as the large double doors came into view, the Guardians pursuing the boy grabbed onto the back of his t-shirt, dragging him kicking and screaming to the ground.
Caught you now, Hóng sè!
"Would you stop screaming, you damn jiànhuò!"
"Tie him up! Quickly!"
"N-no... qǐng! I don't want-"
Now it's time for you to make your choice.
"Gahh, h-he punched me! Wāng bā!"
Live or die?
"LET GO OF ME!"
"Call Bookman, someone!"
You know what will happen if you choose to live, don't you?
"Stop."
I wonder...
"Stop!"
Will you scream for me, Hóng sè?
"STOP!"
"What on Earth is going on here?"
Standing with a concerned expression a few metres away was Bookman, eyes marginally wider. In front of him were 4 Guardians, pinned under them the young red head under Bookman's care. The boy was crying, his single green eye wide open and full of a terror so extreme that Bookman had to avert his gaze. The child was repeating 'stop' to himself over and over again, even though the Guardians were doing nothing but restraining him.
He was hallucinating. Again.
It had been just over three months since Bookman had brought the young red headed boy to Headquarters. He had been catatonic for the better part of it, and in fact had only gained his speech back and a little bit of his sanity, somewhat, just under two weeks previously.
Medic had been overjoyed when the boy first spoke, quietly asking why he wasn't at home and where his mother was. So it made it all the more heart-breaking for her when Bookman informed the boy that he could not go home, and that his mother was dead.
Now, Bookman was not one for emotion. He was a Bookman, after all. Expressionless. Emotionless. Objective. A Bookman could not be biased, so that he could record the hidden history of the world without twisting the facts or manipulating the truth. So why, Bookman found him asking himself, did his heart hurt to see the young red head break down and cry as he remembered the events that occurred the day his mother died? And why did he feel regret that the boy was now bordering on being psychotic and hallucinating so much so that he doubted the child would ever recover from his insanity?
Because he could have saved him. That's why.
If he had been only a few minutes earlier, a few hours earlier even, he could have stopped everything from happening. The boy would still have a mother, and he would still have his sanity.
But Bookmen aren't meant to get involved. They're meant to stand on the side-lines and simply observe as events occur.
And this juxtaposition of human nature versus the duties of the Bookman Clan was a conflict that all Bookmen had to carry until the day they died.
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To say he failed the test given to him by the Council was an understatement.
The young boy had spent most of the meeting in complete silence, staring down at his small leather shoes and completely ignoring the 12 men standing before him. When they asked him questions, he did not answer. When they shouted at him, he acted as if there was no-one even in the room with him. He was in a world of his own, and he even started humming as the meeting started to near its end.
Oddly enough, Bookman did not feel any anger towards the boy whatsoever. Instead, he blamed himself for not doing more to help the child become more mentally stable. Bookman had tried everything, but nothing had worked. The boy still kept hallucinating and fading out of reality, and he also seemed convinced when he was situated in the real world that his mother was still waiting for him at home.
"You've failed us, Bookman," Clan Head muttered, glaring at both his brother and the red headed boy standing before him. "That child will never be accepted by this Clan."
"I just need more time," Bookman replied, coming across as both passive and slightly pleading, eyes downcast.
"No. He will be Erased tomorrow, and that is the end of it."
"What does 'Erased' mean?"
The 13 men in the room all turned and stared at the boy who had just spoken. The red head's expression was both innocent and guarded, and for a brief moment seemed more like the sort of person he had been before That Day, as Bookman had heard the boy refer to it as.
"It is none of your concern," came the almost flippant reply from the Clan Head. "You were given no permission to speak, brat, so keep your mouth shut."
The boy did not reply. Sighing, Bookman looked up and met his brother's eyes.
"I only ask for one more month."
"I cannot give you that time, Bookman. Cease your arguing."
"You can and will, Your Grace."
"My mind will not waver! Cease at once, or so help me I'll ha-!"
"There is someone I know who can bring his sanity back."
At these words the 12 Council members fell silent, eyes narrowed. Curious, the Guardian Head leant forward in his chair.
"Is that so? And who is this person?" he questioned, smirking a little. Bookman remained passive, eyes glinting in the dim candlelight.
"A member of the Noah Clan."
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The Cafeteria was bustling with activity as Lavi and Allen sat down to eat, the former holding a single plate of spaghetti bolognaise and the latter holding a rather precarious pile of plates chock full of a variety of foods. The other people in the hall all turned to stare as the pair of them found an empty table and sat down, especially at Allen. The atmosphere became pretty awkward pretty quickly.
Luckily for them however a young Shephard, dressed in the typical grey colour of his trade, tripped over and knocked down an Archiver, spilling the older man's soup everywhere in the process. A fight then ensued between the Shephard and the Archiver, conveniently diverting the entire hall's attention away from the two Exorcists.
"Nice timing," Lavi murmured, trying not to smirk as he began eating his pasta. By this point Allen had already gotten through half of his food.
Unlike the white haired boy sitting opposite him, the red headed Bookman took his time with his meal, enjoying the warmth slowly spreading through his body as he ate. He still felt a little unsettled though, despite feeling a hell of a lot better than he had done earlier. He would much rather be at Black Order Headquarters eating Jerry's food.
However, having Allen with him, slurping up his food as if it was water whilst smiling contentedly, and knowing that Bookman was probably smoking and reading some archives a floor or two below them whilst pissing Head Archiver off in the process, and seeing Medic again after so much time apart - all of it dimmed Lavi's anger and discomfort, making him feel calmer and more in control of his emotions.
"Ahh, all done ~ !"
Patting his stomach with a sated expression, Allen leant back a little and looked around the Cafeteria, silver eyes observing what was occurring in various places around the hall curiously. Then, turning around towards Lavi and tilting his head, Allen waited until the red head had finished eating before opening his mouth to speak.
"Lavi?"
"Yes, Allen?"
"How is the Bookman Clan structured?"
At this, Lavi raised an eyebrow and put down his fork.
"Why do ya wanna know?" he asked, his tone of voice laced with curiousity. Allen chuckled a little in reply.
"It just seems as if certain people are all dressed the same, like they're in some kind of uniform," the white haired teen said, resting his head in the palm of one hand. "Is it similar to the Order?"
"I guess so," Lavi replied with a laugh, pulling his bandana down off his forehead and running his fingers through his hair. "Well, there's the Bookmen of course - there's only me and the stupid panda though."
"Why's that?"
"There can only be one Bookman and one Bookman Junior - that's how it's always been."
"Oh... Well, what about everyone else?"
"Hmm... There's the Archivers, who wear brown and work downstairs, making sure all the records are in order and properly preserved. And then there's the Students, who wear navy, and they're all studying to become proper members of the Clan. Oh, and the Teachers wear white by the way. Then there's the Shepherds. They're kinda like Finders, I guess, except they find places of historical interest instead of Innocence."
"And what do the Shepherds wear?"
"Grey."
"Ahh, so it was a Shepherd who knocked that man's soup over!"
At this Lavi laughed, single eye filled with amusement.
"So, who are the ones dressed in black?" Allen asked, looking inquisitive. Lavi seemed to find this inquisitiveness quite adorable for some reason, and made a mental note to make Allen more curious about things in the future.
"They're Guardians, and their job is to keep people in order within Headquarters and in some of the nearby towns and villages too."
"So they're kind of like Exorcists in a way?"
"I guess... They use their power for their own means a lot of the time though."
"Oh... so more like officers from Central then?"
"Probably! Except minus the obsession with Lvellie."
Both of them laughed then, for a while, Lavi and Allen sat in amiable silence, staring off into space. Then eventually their eyes met, and both of them smiled.
"So, what do ya wanna do for the rest of the day?" Lavi asked, stretching a little.
"Hmm... well Bookman will probably need help with the poems, right? We should go and see where he is. And Link's still gone as well..." Allen replied, looking contemplative. Lavi pouted, expression downcast.
"But that's boring, beansprout!"
"The name's Allen!"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Lavi grumbled. "Why can't we go bother féijíchǎng instead?"
"We've bothered her enough already, I'm sure," Allen answered stubbornly, poking the older teen's forehead with a gloved hand.
"And you shall go bother her some more!"
Both boys jumped. Standing behind them, with a cup of green tea in his hands, was Bookman. The old man glared at Lavi vehemently, making the red head wince.
"I have already started working on the poems, and do not wish either of you to distract me," Bookman said flippantly. "And as for you, brat, I do not wish to see you until you have learnt some manners and respect for your elders!"
"But Gramps, he deserved it!"
With a loud thwack Bookman hit Lavi on the top of his head with a fist, slamming the teen's face straight into the empty plate on the table before him. Allen winced.
"OWWW! Damn lǎo bù sǐde, what was that for ? !" Lavi snapped, standing up and glaring at the old man. Bookman scowled in reply, pointing towards the exit leading out of the Cafeteria. With a resigned sigh and muttering under his breath as he went, Lavi walked towards the exit with Allen in tow, leaving the old man to drink his tea in as much peace as he could have amongst all the hustle and bustle within the hall.
Deciding to go bother Medic since they really had nowhere else to go, Lavi and Allen headed down the busy main corridor, went up the stairs that were just before the first set of dormitory rooms, and soon found themselves standing outside of the infirmary door. Pushing it open, they found the room to be completely empty.
"Oh..." Lavi said, disappointed. "Where is she?"
Looking around in case she was simply in the store room or hidden from view behind one of the many screens situated around the beds, the two Exorcists found nothing but a grey furred hamster, which was randomly nibbling on a piece of parchment on Medic's desk. Upon seeing it, Lavi gave a delighted cry.
"Ahhh it's the hamster that féijíchǎng takes care of!" he exclaimed, picking the small furry animal up and cuddling it. The hamster bit Lavi's hand in return.
"I don't think it likes you," Allen said with amusement, gently stroking the top of the hamster's head with a finger. It decided that it didn't like Allen either, and bit his finger too. Both Exorcists' pouted.
"I forgot about its temper," Lavi grumbled, sucking on his now-bleeding ring finger. "Stupid fuzzball..."
Upon observing the hamster closer, Allen noticed that it had a curious marking on its chest that looked oddly like a tattoo. Then he smirked.
"Hey, don't you think it looks kind of like Kanda?" Allen asked.
"Holy crap, it does!" Lavi answered, laughing. "We should call it Yuu then!"
So the hamster from that moment onwards was called Yuu, though the real Yuu was completely unaware that a hamster had just been named after him. At that present moment he was trying to eat his evening soba whilst Komui and Reever tried to strangle each other with bits of spaghetti.
"Hey, Yuu was eating a note!" Allen exclaimed, shoving the hamster off of the piece of paper (and showing it as much courtesy as he would the real Kanda), holding it up to read it. It said:
To baka usagi-chan and Allen-chan,
I'm running low on a few things, so I've gone to town to buy some stuff. I'll be back in a few hours though, so no using my petroleum jelly for 'creative' purposes unless you want me to end up interrupting you, ahaha.
Ja ne! Medic xx
"Ahh, so she's just gone shopping," Allen murmured, handing the note to Lavi. The red head read it, then tucked it inside his jacket pocket with a nod.
"I guess we're just gonna have to wait, huh..."
For a while the both of them were silent. Then, almost simultaneously, they realised what Medic meant by 'creative' purposes.
"J-just to clarify, I have no idea where she even keeps that stuff!" Lavi stammered, cheeks flushed with embarrasment as he raised his hands defensively.
"A-and I'm allergic to it anyway, so we wouldn't have been able to do s-something like that!" came the equally embarrassed reply from Allen.
"Yeah! ... Wait, you're allergic to petroleum jelly?"
"Yeah... It makes my skin turn all spotty and itchy."
"Man, that sucks..."
"..."
"..."
"... Well, this is awkward..."
"Yep..."
For a while the two of them were silent, both looking embarrassed and rather awkward. The physical aspects of their relationship, shall we say, had never really come to mind before. Both Lavi and Allen had just about accepted that there was something more than friendship between them, never mind considering what that entailed exactly.
So Lavi found himself wondering, as he stood in silence and idly perused through a few medical textbooks, if he even wanted such things from Allen. And upon getting a mental image of being 'creative' with him, as Medic had so put it, Lavi whacked his head rather hard with the book he had been reading.
There was a time and a place for such things. And Lavi decided that imagining doing things of a somewhat sexual nature with the person currently in the same room as himself was a very bad idea.
"So..." Allen began, raising an eyebrow at the now red-faced Lavi, who had his face literally buried in a book. "What are we going to do now?"
"Uhhh... I don't really know..." Lavi said with a somewhat muffled voice, still not raising his head.
"Well that's helpful," Allen grumbled. After a few more minutes of awkward silence in which Lavi went to go check out the store room (to hide his embarrassment no doubt), the white haired teen suddenly noticed a list taped to a nearby headboard. It had at least ten things written down on it, and it had the words 'Go and buy on Wednesday 7th' which was the current date.
"I think Medic's forgotten her list of things to buy," he commented, walking forwards and pulling the slip of paper off of the headboard into his hands. "We should go find her and give her the list."
"Okay," Lavi answered after a while, still looking awkward as he walked back into the infirmary and stood before Allen. "There are a few villages nearby, so we should check all of them."
"Got it!"
Just as Allen headed towards the door, with Lavi following close behind him, the white haired teen suddenly froze, smirking.
"Lavi?"
"Y-yes?"
"You do realise that I wasn't joking when I said that I'm allergic to that stuff."
Lavi's jaw dropped. Smirk widening, Allen turned around and took out the small pot of petroleum jelly that the red head had tried to sneakily tuck into his trouser pocket without Allen noticing. Said red head pouted.
"And to think I thought of you as unobservant..." Lavi mumbled, snatching the pot from the younger teen and shoving it inside a nearby box, pushing past Allen out of the door. The white haired Exorcist laughed.
"I'm only observant when I need to be, stupid."
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Link was pissed off.
For a supposedly logical and intelligent group of people, one would think that there would be more than one phone in the entire building. But, instead, there was only one. And it was currently out of order. And Link had spent almost three hours looking for the damn thing.
"How on Earth am I going to reach Central now?" Link murmured angrily, slamming the dead phone on the table in front of him. Pinching the bridge of his nose and sighing exasperatedly, Link found himself wondering why on Earth he hadn't been more concerned when his golem got broken on the way up the mountain.
Suddenly, he heard approaching footsteps and two voices that he didn't recognise. Narrowing his eyes, Link hid behind a nearby statue of Charles I and watched as two men dressed in black entered the hall and stopped a few metres away from him.
"Man, I'm beat! How much longer is our shift?"
"About an hour."
"Ahh good! We can go bother Cook for some food afterwards, that okay?"
"Sure, why not."
For a while both men were silent. Then one of them, who had short blonde hair and a scar across his left cheek, turned towards his companion with a contemplative expression.
"Have you heard yet? About Bookman coming back?"
"Yeah," the other man replied, running a hand through his shoulder length brunette hair. "I heard it's something to do with the war those Exorcists are fighting in."
"Well what I heard is that he apparently came back because he needed to check in with his apprentice. Ya know, the whole 12 year thing."
"Bookman has an apprentice ? !"
"Of course, stupid! He's gettin' pretty old now. His apprentice is the red headed one."
Silence. Then the brunette frowned.
"But isn't the red head an Exorcist? Same with the white haired kid?"
"Well, yeah. Bookman's currently logging the Black Order so he and his apprentice are gonna have to be Exorcists."
"I see..."
"... Hey, have you heard the back-story on that red headed guy?"
"No. Because I'm not nosy."
"Oi, that's harsh! As Guardians we always hear gossip don't we!"
"Sure, whatever."
The blonde Guardian pouted.
"Well if you wanna know, his past is mega screwed up."
"And?"
"His mother was a prostitute."
"And ? !"
"And he was mentally insane for a while."
"AND ? !"
"And he killed the man who was like a father to him. At least that's what I heard."
Link froze at that, eyes widening. Lavi killed his father figure? The blonde CROW leant in closer, full of curiosity to find out more.
"It's probably not true, you idiot. That guy became Bookman's apprentice when he was, what, six? There's no way he could have killed a grown man, never mind the guy who was like his father, at that age."
"Ohh, so you have heard a few things then!"
At this the brunette Guardian started arguing indignantly with his companion. Neither noticed as Link snuck out of the hall and into the corridor outside.
This was all very interesting, Link thought as he walked down the passage towards the lift, which was about a 5 minutes walk away. The red headed teen must hide a lot under the masks that all Bookmen had to adopt, and Link found himself wanting to figure out exactly what Lavi was hiding.
Suddenly, Link heard footsteps approaching behind him. He turned around, senses wary. Then he sighed as he saw that it was only Lavi and Allen coming to greet him. Link narrowed his eyes at the red head standing before him.
"What ya doin' down here, Two Spot?" Lavi asked, acting oblivious towards the distrust he saw in the CROW's eyes when he in actuality made a mental note of it.
"I was looking for a phone," came the almost flippant reply. "Seems the only one in the entire building is broken however."
"Well we're just heading out to some of the local villages to find Medic," Allen said, smiling a little. "You can come with us to find a phone, if you wish."
At this Link's eyes widened a little, wondering why the white haired teen would actually ask for his company. Lavi seemed just as confused.
"Okay then, I will," Link murmured after a while. Allen smiled.
"Then let's get going, shall we?"
So the three of them headed towards the lift with Allen feeling happy to get out of the building and get some fresh air, Link feeling guilty about misjudging Allen's character, and Lavi wondering exactly why Link had given him such a distasteful look.
Because even though Lavi wore masks, so did Link, and the red head knew that the CROW was hiding something. And he was going to find out what it was.
/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
[TRANSLATIONS]
- féijíchǎng = flat chested (mandarin chinese)
- baka usagi-chan = my dear stupid rabbit (japanese)
- bakame = bloody idiot (japanese)
- bái chī = idiot (mandarin chinese)
- nolite te bastardes carborundorum = don't let the bastards grind you down (mock latin)
- guruhairu = a sort of phrase used to indicate frustration and just general bad feelings ^^" (japanese)
- Hóng sè = Red. This is what Lavi was called when he was a child (so pre-Bookman HQ) (mandarin chinese)
- jiànhuò = despicable creature (mandarin chinese)
- qǐng = please (mandarin chinese)
- wāng bā = bastard (mandarin chinese)
- lǎo bù sǐde = literally means 'an old man who just won't die' XD (mandarin chinese)
- ja ne = see ya (japanese)
/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
So there's chapter 7 ^^ By the way, in the flashback where Lavi's running away from the Guardians the sentences written entirely in italics were part of Lavi's hallucination. Oh and Lavi's full past, I can confirm, will be in the next chapter. Be prepared, 'cause it sure as hell ain't pretty -.-" ANYhoo - review replies (because ff . net still hates me *goes to emo corner*):
- Geeres = I'm in need of one of your hugs, moyashi-chan *slumps* Why does everything hate me right now? -.-"
- Stavarn100 - I quite agree ;3 And thank you *smiles* Oh, and as for your oneshot, I have major plot block with it atm *flees* Sorry :'S It'll get done soon, I promise! Hopefully I'll get some inspiration soon...
- kh07gl = Your reviews always make me smile ^3^ And yeay for flat-chest! She's swiftly becoming one of my favourites to write, and I'm surprised - I've never really liked OCs in fics... Well, who knows XD
- bakaxusagi = Aww I hope you get out of your writer's block soon! I look forward to seeing Allen and Lavi properly meeting for the first time :'3 And thank you so much for your compliments *blushes* I'm glad you think Lavi's IC, and that you like Medic-chan ~ And I had so much fun looking up wars between 1874 and 1884, especially with the persona names :D Thanks again ~
- patrick the almighty observer = I think you pronounce it "ka-oh nee chu-chong shi-bah di-ee" but I'm not sure ^^" Apparently its an actual insult used over there, and one that will probably get you into a fight too XD And I've always wanted to write his past for that reason - I wanna try and justify how he acts in my head canon *laughs*
- MidnightAbyssx02 = Hey, I have no problem with you being Anti Lena *smiles* Everyone's got their preferences, right? And as to who's the Heart, well, you'll find out at some point ;'3 I've been leaving clues already, ya know *grins*
Thanks for the reviews, and I hope to update in about a week's time. Love you all :'3
xrowa-chanx