A/N: As a treat, and also because I'm not going to get a lot of internet time to update as I please, I'm posting this today instead of some other time. Also, I just realized that, despite having FINISHED my basic timeline, I now need to EDIT it because I forgot about the Third Exorcists entirely. And I don't understand the Third Exorcists that well, so this is a problem. Dammit.

Title: Fear of Infinity

Author: liketolaugh

Rating: T

Pairings: None

Genre: Drama/Adventure

Warnings: None

Summary: When Loki mentions two more Infinity Stones, aside from the Tesseract, that fell to Earth thousands of years before, the Avengers are thrown into a centuries-old war between Dark Matter and Innocence - also known as the stones of Mind and Soul.

Disclaimer: I only wish I owned D. Gray-man, and the Avengers are but a dream that is not my own.


Steve reacted just in time, swinging his shield off his back and ducking behind it just as the akuma fired, only hitting the vibranium surface of the shield.

"Innocence, activate," he hissed. Toxic green spun around the rim of his shield to form a bright lime ring. His words, though, were echoed behind him, and a luminescent rod had buried itself in the akuma before it was done transforming.

Steve looked up to find Clint with his bow out and up, glowing green, eyes dark and focused on the dead akuma.

"Careful, Cap," he warned, voice low, deadly serious.

Steve nodded silently and straightened up. Behind, Lavi whistled.

"Damn," he muttered. "Never seen reflexes like that outside a parasite before."

The akuma exploded into dust about then, and Lavi frowned as a light concentration of gas began to settle into the air.

"Ah, crap," he muttered. "I forgot to tell them that akuma gas is poisonous."

Allen turned his head to give Lavi an incredulous look. "Lavi. That's important."

"Yeah, yeah," Lavi muttered, a little embarrassed.

As it turned out, though, this was a virtual non-issue, because at that moment, an akuma transformed from a man in a business suit. Then another out of a woman in a nice dress. Then a third, a teen boy in ragged jeans.

Then, abruptly, they weren't in the middle of a peaceful small-town street at all; they were in the midst of a battle that was already viciously in progress, and they were not prepared.

Coulson took advantage of the momentary mayhem this resulted in to duck away from the Avengers and toward the crowds of citizens, who were only just getting over their shock and starting to scream when he made to usher them away.

Several of them transformed and tried to kill him.

Coulson was unaffected.

Natasha's gun was drawn and active in as little time as it took to say the words, blazing lime bullets shooting from the barrel.

A few of them, she noted with a furrow of her brow and a brief glance downward, didn't come out on the first try.

Bruce had Hulked out within seconds, shirt tearing open and expression twisting into pain and rage, violent green sparks crackling along his body. Soon he was tromping off, fists smashing into akuma indiscriminately and with great glee.

Thor was swinging his hammer, driving it into akuma after akuma, a feral grin on his face and an excited gleam in his eyes. Loki hung back, covering Clint as he hustled up to the nearest impossibly high and nigh unreachable perch and making sure that all akuma attempts to sneak up on Thor ended in explosions and noxious dead akuma gas. Not that they were aware that it was noxious yet.

All in all, Lavi thought, letting his hammer enlarge as it dropped into his waiting hand, they adjusted pretty quickly to all this.

Then again, he supposed that this was the part that they were used to, the fighting, even at the drop of a hat. Maybe especially at the drop of the hat. It was the paranoia, the despair that they weren't used to. Not yet.

They would be, Lavi supposed. Eventually.

Tony, though, was having trouble, jumping around avoiding akuma and not able to stop long enough to focus on summoning his armor. Lavi moved to cover him, but a swish of white and Allen was already there.

"I'll cover you!" he called to Stark with a smile, already turning, the long claws of his left hand flexing slightly in anticipation.

"Gotcha, beansprout!" Tony returned, having already picked up on Lavi's nickname for the young exorcist.

"My name is Allen!" Allen complained. A moment later, he leapt into the air, lashing out at a row of akuma. "Edge End!" he added, setting his claws aglow and making the blow that much more deadly.

Tony crouched down slightly, and with Allen keeping the akuma off his back, he closed his eyes and summoned the armor to himself. Each piece snapped into place one by one, rapidly covering his body, and each one bringing a little spark from the Innocence in his arc reactor, making it glow brighter and his grin wider.

Finally, he straightened, gold-titanium gauntlets curling into fists, and he gained a feral grin only JARVIS saw.

"Bring it on," he challenged, firing up the armor in a blaze of green.

Just then, the Hulk landed hard beside Allen, nearly squashing him. Allen didn't mind too much, just flashing a smile up at the bulky monster and taking off to delve into the depths of the fight, a little too pleased with this turn of events. The Hulk ignored him, gleefully tackling the first of the level twos, a bipedal with hammers for arms and a manic grin that soon reversed.

It didn't get to do much smashing.

"HULK SMASH!" Hulk bellowed at the smear of akuma on the pavement, stomping his feet and huffing proudly even as green sparks of Innocence ran up and down his arms. "PUNY MONSTER NO MATCH FOR HULK!"

"Yeah!" cheered Lavi, apparently pleased by this. Exorcists were insane, Steve thought amusedly, watching as Lavi brought down his (huge!) hammer on an akuma before it had time to do more than open its mouth. It was kind of alarming. "Go, Hulk!"

Hulk looked at Lavi and grinned, exposing his large tombstone teeth, and then moved on to hammer his fists on the akuma.

That one level two signaled the beginning of a whole wave of them, the level ones becoming simple afterthoughts in between.

Lavi had to admit, watching the Avengers fight was definitely awe-inspiring, even against an unfamiliar foe. They worked together seamlessly; Clint shot down an akuma pursuing Natasha as she got a lift from Tony onto the back of one akuma with an impenetrable-skin power that apparently didn't stand up well to bullets at point blank range. She called out a warning to Thor even as Steve nodded at him, and Thor threw his hammer into the trajectory of Steve's shield, sending both careening in different directions as Thor rolled out of the way of the falling akuma, which Natasha swung off of to collide feet first with a sword-armed akuma sneaking up on Loki. Loki gave her a curt nod and clenched his fist, blowing up another akuma before it could sneak up on Thor.

Unbeknownst to Lavi and Allen, the Avengers were having fairly similar thoughts about them, if substantially more disturbed. Allen leapt and took out an entire row of akuma with a swing of his claws, while Lavi grinned and called out, "Fire Seal: Hellfire and Ash!"

They didn't have to wonder what that did for long, because what happened was that a giant fire snake came out of the ground and started killing akuma.

Steve was very certain that the future was only getting more insane, and now it was getting disturbing as well. This did not make him happy.

Nor was he any happier when Tony suddenly noted, "He looks like a clown." Then, "Why does he look like a clown?"

Within moments of this, Steve noted that Allen did look somewhat like a clown.

As he noted this at the same time Allen activated Cross Grave, causing a large number of akuma to blow up, it did not make the situation anymore lighthearted.

"Whoa-a-a, what's that?" Clint asked over the comm, sounding mildly alarmed.

'That' was a bipedal, very dangerous looking armored thing, presumably a level three akuma, flying through the air to land hard on the ground, creating a small crater.

And for the first time, Steve heard an akuma speak. As none of the others had really had time to say much. Except 'Innocence'. He gathered that they hated Innocence, which made sense when tallied with Loki's explanation of the Soul and Mind Stones' rivalry, not that that made this any less disturbing.

"Exorcists!" it crowed, sounding entirely too delighted. "Master Noah told me to expect some, but which ones are you?"

"Does it matter?" asked Lavi casually, cocking an eyebrow. "You're dead no matter who we are."

"We'll see," it crooned, head turning to look at Clint, high on his perch. A moment later, "Say goodbye, exorcist."

He didn't even see him move.

"Where'd it go?" Clint demanded, turning his head back and forth. Within moments, he spotted the akuma, honey yellow armor giving him away in the brand-new crater a little way away, Allen's distinctive white cloak standing over it, and long black claws buried in its chest, an unforgiving expression on the boy's face.

Allen murmured something to it, but none of them could quite hear what. Whatever it was, it made the akuma chuckle as it crumbled away.

The battle didn't last long after that, just a haze of chaos and adrenaline and akuma after akuma crumbling, leaving behind billows of strange gas.

Finally, they stood in the middle of the half-decimated street, breathing heavily and a little worse for the wear.

"All clear?" Lavi asked Allen between panted breaths.

Allen looked around, gaze intent, and then relaxed. "Not a one," he answered. "Let's get out of here."

Lavi grinned tiredly and nodded, pulling up his scarf and tying it around his head so that it covered his mouth and nose.

"Uh, why-" Clint coughed, not managing to finish his question.

"Lavi forgot to tell you that akuma gas is toxic," Allen explained, sending Lavi a slightly dirty look. "So everyone except Mr. Stark and the Hulk should cover their mouths and noses until we're out of it."

"Why not us?" Tony questioned, landing beside him.

"You're immune," Allen explained. "Because your Innocence is parasitic, it purifies your body of the akuma virus."

Steve nodded in acknowledgement, pulling up his shirt to cover his mouth and nose. Thor, Natasha and Clint followed suit, and Loki conjured up a handkerchief to do the same.

Lavi grinned again and spun his hammer in one hand, watching it shrink, and finally stuck in back into his belt. "Mission accomplished," he declared, voice slightly muffled. "Now let's go. This place stinks of akuma."

"Does it ever," Clint muttered, following Lavi as the exorcist started to move away somewhat hastily from the clouds of noxious gas.

"It's only been one day since we joined up with the Order and already things are becoming alarming," Tony noted with interest, following with clanking steps. "I like it."

"You won't for long," Lavi threw over his shoulder, casting them yet another grin. "It's all downhill from here, folks. You ain't seen nothing yet."


Battle scenes really aren't my strong suit, huh? *frown* Nor akuma speech. It all sucks. My akuma speech, I mean. Crap, all of it. Oh, well. It's not like akuma stick around for any substantial period of time. Thanks to all who gave me info, and please review!

Edited 3/26/2015