69 Ways #14 -Send Forth The Messenger of Doom

Note: Only a few characters will be brought back from the grave, but only for the sake of telling the story. Otherwise, I'm going to let them rest in peace.

Also, this is where the story turned M.

M, for Masochism.

I hope you guys like this chapter. Most of you should be able to get the reference.

._.

On that day, the Black Order remembered…

The dread that was a life under their rule…

The humiliation of being completely exposed to the Real World.

"Everyone!" cried out the voice of a woman, who stood before her gathered troops. "Prepare for battle!"

At her call, the army of her sisters-in-arms readied their weapons and mounted their "horses."

"We have one target," the leader yelled. "Take it down if it's the last thing you do!"

The women let out a battle-cry.

Actually-

It was just a bunch of inappropriate moaning.

"OI!" A red-headed man shouted over noise. He rushed to the front of the army, motioning for everyone present to pause. "What the hell are you people trying to do?!" he shouted. "I said to deal with the opening in the wall, not to start a BDSM freak show!"

The moaning stopped and the army of prostitutes quieted down to listen to what their actual leader had to say. They dismounted their wooden horses, each and every one of them dropping their whips and ropes and other various "battle" equipment.

Cross Marian shook his head disapprovingly at the scene. Completely embarrassed by the mix-up, he removed his long coat and offered it to the temporary leader, Anita (also dressed in "battle gear," which was actually nothing), who he had left in charge of the situation while he dealt with other matters.

"I'm sorry," Anita apologized. "When you said 'Deal with the large gaping hole,' I thought that you meant…" (1)

"NO!" Cross shouted and grimaced. "Who in their right mind would actually say something as disgusting as that? What I meant was that I wanted you to do something about the broken fourth wall."

He pointed ahead into the horizon, where all was normal and peaceful except for the clearly broken part which lead into the real world.

"You mean Useless Wall Marian*, right?" Anita looked at the large opening. "What a pathetic wall. How can it even serve as a basic defense if it's constantly being breached?"

"Like father, like wall," someone out in the army joked.

"Who was that?" Cross snapped and glared into the crowd. "Who are you calling pathetic?"

No one dared to answer him.

"Again, I'm really sorry about the misunderstanding…" Anita said.

"It's fine," Cross grumbled. "I should have known something like this would happen, what with you being the owner of a brothel and everything."

As there was no reason to have his "mini-skirt army" standing around dressed like this, Cross dismissed everyone. The open field soon cleared off all people and equipment, until it was just him and Anita left.

"So what are your plans now?" Anita asked when they were alone. "If we leave the wall broken like that, it'll cause problems for us in the future."

"…" Cross took out his cellphone. He turned it on and quickly went to contacts, and his finger hovered over the 'call' button. "This counts as an emergency, right?"

"Eh?" Anita blinked. "Well, if we don't fix the fourth wall, the quality of the story will decline and we'll lose all of our readers. So, yes, I guess it does-"

"That's all I needed to hear," Cross said, and pressed down. "You can go home now, Anita. You've sacrificed enough by coming out here with your workers."

Anita nodded and excused herself as she went in the direction that the others had left in. As she walked away, she heard Cross swear when the person he called didn't pick up. She glanced over her shoulder and saw him ordering a golden golem to "bring that idiot here."

He must be talking about his student, she thought with a smile.

Speaking of other exorcists…

She wondered how Chaozii was doing.

._.

"Guys, I think Chaozii is dead."

"…"

Miranda, Timothy, Klaud, Krory, Bookman and Lavi stood in a circle around the recently-somewhat-deceased Chaozii Han, who had (after being pointed out later that evening by Bookman) been stuck to the bottom of Marie's foot for a good portion of the day.

At the moment, they were all gathered in the emptied cafeteria room. After discovering the body beneath Marie's foot, everyone had been forced to leave the scene except for those who had been in close contact with the apparent victim.

"I don't hear him breathing," Marie muttered. Rather than crowding the body, he chose to sit far away from the incident. "I'm pretty sure I killed him."

Chaozii was lying face-down on the ground in the same manner that he had been back in the bathroom. He was covered in red paint, and although it looked like blood, it certainly wasn't. Lavi of all people knew this, as he had been present during the shower-room clean up. But rather than telling anyone the truth, he kept quiet for now and observed as the others discussed how this may have happened.

Although, Bookman seemed to already know. Lavi was pretty sure the old man had just decided to keep quiet about what he had surely figured out.

"I-I'm sure he's not dead, Marie," Miranda nervously looked down at the body. "I know this doesn't look very good, but even if it is true, I don't think you were responsible for this."

"He was under my foot and I didn't notice," Marie said.

"Look, this isn't your fault," Lavi told him. "Maybe someone else beat him up and he was left lying around on the floor."

That part would be his fault.

He should have disposed of the body.

Wait- was he a criminal now?

"Which leads us to who was actually responsible for this," Klaud said. "I'm with everyone else when I say that Marie definitely was not the one who killed Chaozii."

This statement seemed to put Marie in a better mood, but he still didn't leave the spot he had exiled himself to.

"Lavi," Klaud turned her attention to the bookman junior. "When you were on clean-up duty, you didn't notice anything suspicious, did you?"

Let's see…

One possibly dead person, one knocked out person, and an invading Noah.

Which Noah had it been?

If he remembered correctly, it had been Tyki Mikk who had joined them in the shower room. Something about painting.

He glanced at Chaozii, who was still covered in the red paint.

That gave him an idea, actually.

"Well," Lavi tried not to break eye contact. "There was a Noah in there. I'm sure you're all familiar with the name Tyki Mikk by now."

This caught everyone's attention, including Bookman's. The old man's face briefly changed; he apparently hadn't expected this kind of information to come to light.

"What?" Krory exclaimed. "Lavi, why didn't you tell us this?"

"Well, to be honest, I was so busy at the time that I didn't really care," he admitted. "Besides- we have a sort of truce right now, don't we?"

"But you knew the enemy was present and still didn't do anything about it," Klaud said.

"Yes," Lavi nodded. Making sure not to fidget or do anything that might indicate he was lying, he continued: "I was distracted… so it entirely passed my mind when he mentioned wanting to 'make a rainbow' with 'quality paint.'"

"A rainbow?" Marie echoed. "What does that have to do with any of this?"

"Everything," Lavi answered as seriously as he could. "I didn't realize this at the time, but what he really meant… was that he wanted to make a rainbow out of our blood."

Both Timothy and Miranda screamed very loudly. Before anyone could comfort them, Lavi went on to expand the lie even further:

"And now that I think about it, one of the stalls was completely red," he nodded to himself. "I thought at the time that it was just paint, as part of the rainbow Tyki mentioned wanting to create, but I think that was actually Chaozii's blood spread everywhere."

Miranda fainted on top of Krory, who was having a hard time resisting the urge to faint as well.

As for the others, they were completely convinced by his story.

"You mentioned earlier that there were other stalls covered in paint," Marie said. "What color was that paint?…"

Yellow, blue, green, purple, white… and then, there was also the one with the melons.

"Red," Lavi answered ominously. "They were all red."

This time, Krory fainted as well.

"Can someone call for the medical ward to bring two stretchers?" Lavi asked.

"Ah- I'll go get them!" Timothy shouted, and scrambled out of the cafeteria.

He had a feeling that the kid was just terrified by what he had just heard.

Although he felt a bit of guilt for that, Lavi didn't regret his decision to lie. If the others found out that this had (most likely) been Socalo's doing, then who knew what kind of chaos would ensue?

Also, spilling the beans here might result in him having the same sort of horrible end Chaozii faced.

It was better to just pin this incident on someone else. And no one would have to know, as long as they all kept quiet and let the enemy take the blame.

"I had no idea we were dealing with such a psychopath," Klaud said quietly. "Who knew the Noahs could be so vicious?"

"They are the enemy of mankind," Bookman replied. There was a bit of doubt on his expression, but he was clearly going along with the lie that had been presented. "It's only natural that some of them would be capable of such violence."

"Lavi," Klaud turned her attention back to him suddenly. "Who else was on clean-up duty with you?"

He was honest this time as he listed off each person on duty.

"Alright, we'll have to start by questioning Socalo," Klaud decided. "Bookman, could you and your apprentice see what you can get out of the others?"

Uh-oh.

Was she seriously planning on carrying out an investigation?

"Of course," Bookman answered. "I have a few questions of my own that I would like to ask the witnesses if possible."

Oh no.

"Make sure to ask them about the Noah," Klaud said. "I want to know how he got past security, and what he was doing in the showers of all places."

This wasn't good.

If even one part of his story didn't match up with what the others said, he might end up in a lot of trouble.

"I can stay here with Miranda and Krory until Timothy arrives with the stretchers," Marie offered. "And, of course, with the escorts to the crematorium for Chaozii…"

If anyone had been wearing a hat in that moment, they would have taken it off to pay their respects to the deceased.

Everyone began to part ways, but just as they did, Lavi heard a voice:

"'m not… dead…" Chaozii rasped. "I know… who did this-"

Lavi stepped on top of Chaozii to silence him.

"Oops, didn't see him there," he lied. "Sorry."

Chaozii was once again unconscious.

Thankfully, no one noticed him speaking.

When he and Bookman had left the cafeteria and were alone, the old man began to speak.

"Was the Noah really present at the scene and declare his intentions like that?" he questioned. "I could tell you were lying, so don't try to fool me now."

"Ah- so you picked up on that?" Lavi winced.

"Your acting was rather poor," Bookman said.

"Sorry," he half-heartedly apologized.

"If it wasn't Tyki Mikk, then who did it?" Bookman asked again. "I'm going to assume that it was someone you were with."

They were turning around a corner which lead to a long hallway.

"I think it was one of them," Lavi was saying as he stepped forward. "Based on who was assigned clean up duty, I-"

He was cut off.

Running down the hallway at full speed and being chased by a golden flash was none other than Allen Walker.

"AHHH!" the exorcist was screaming. The golden flash, Timcanpy, was biting at his head as he sprinted forward. "Someone help me!"

As Lavi and Bookman fully turned around the corner, Allen spotted them and nearly cried with relief.

"Allen, hold on!" Lavi shouted. He reached to his side where he carried his hammer. "Get ready to dodge on the count of three!"

Bookman stepped away to avoid being injured as Lavi began to countdown.

"One," he called out as he extended his weapon.

"Two!"

"… and," Allen was now feet away from him. "THREE!"

Allen ducked at the last second as Lavi swung his hammer at Timcanpy. The weapon came in contact with the golem, sending him flying in the opposite direction.

"Strike," Lavi said with a grin and deactivated his Innocence.

Allen quickly got back up and looked after Timcanpy. "Is he okay?"

Timcanpy had gotten himself stuck in a wall, but otherwise the golem seemed unharmed.

"What was that about?" Bookman asked as he rejoined them.

"He was trying to get me to go over where my teacher is," Allen responded. "Something about a broken fourth wall, whatever that is."

Bookman suddenly tensed.

"You mean Pathetic Shitty and Useless Wall Marian?" he gasped.

"Um, I think you added a couple of unnecessary words there," Allen muttered. "But yes- Wall Marian. I'm supposed to go over there and help fix it."

"Pathetic Shitty Broken and Useless Wall Marian has been breached?" Bookman covered his mouth in shock.

"The word 'broken' in the title implies that the wall already had been by an enemy," Lavi pointed out.

"This is bad," Bookman said solemnly. "Pathetic Shitty Broken Useless Wall Marian was supposed to prevent The References from entering."

"Well, if it's called Shitty and Useless, then it obviously wasn't given any high expectations," Lavi argued.

Bookman didn't seem to have heard this.

"What are The References?" Allen asked. After seeing Bookman's reaction to the news, he started to take the conversation more seriously. "Is it what I think it is?"

"The References range from anything outside of this world," he answered. "The References enter our world in such an absurd way that it causes us to acknowledge the existence of anything that does not belong in our reality."

"I don't see why this is bad," Allen said. "It sounds like it could make things more exciting."

"But," Bookman continued, "if too many of The References enter our reality, this world will cease to make any sense."

"That's scary."

"Of course it is!" Bookman said. "Having The References around is one way for a story such as ours to tell a joke, but we should be able to rely on our own material from within our own series, D Gray Man. That's what a parody is," he stressed. "Can this really be a parody of D Gray Man if we constantly reach outside to the audience and refer to other fandoms?"

"…No, we can't," Allen answered. "I suppose I should go help and fix Pathetic Shitty Broken and Useless Wall Marian, then."

Timcanpy dislodged himself from the wall. He floated over to Allen and growled, but the white-haired exorcist apologized. The golem calmed down and settled for sitting onto of his head to rest.

"We will go with you," Bookman announced.

"Huh?" Lavi blinked. "But, what about the mystery of Chaozii's death?"

"If the Destroyer of Time is going somewhere, we must follow him to record the history," Bookman stated. "As for Chaozii, we… no, history does not need to know of his fate."

Lavi fully agreed with this.

"I'm sure everyone suspects it was Socalo who killed Chaozii, anyways," Lavi muttered.

"That one was pretty obvious," Bookman said. "I don't even think Klaud is going to bother asking around about this incident."

"Probably not."

With that out of the way, Bookman turned back to Allen. "Did Cross send you the directions?"

Allen shook his head. "No, I'm just supposed to follow Timcanpy."

Timcanpy waved his tail back and forth upon hearing his name.

"We will depart as soon as possible," Bookman decided. "Pathetic Goddamn Shitty Broken Useless Wall Marian must be fixed immediately."

"Hmm? What's this about a Goddamn Pathetic Fucking Useless Shit-Infested Cross Marian?" ** a voice questioned disinterestedly from behind them.

"Kanda, you got the order wrong and you completely left out the part about it being a wall," Allen said as he looked to the swordsman. He stood behind Lavi and Bookman with a paper in his hands, and was wearing an annoyed expression on his face. "It's called-"

"I heard," Kanda snapped. "This wall needs fixing, right?"

"Yeah, our existence as a parody depends on it," Allen replied. "You can come with us if you have nothing else to do."

"If I left such an important task to you three plus that drunk general, the wall would crumble down within mere minutes." Kanda's hold on the paper tightened. "That being said- sign this paper."

He held out the crumpling paper to Allen.

"What's this?" Allen took the sheet and glanced over it. After a few seconds, he looked up. "Alright, I'll sign it. Should I put it under C.S number two, right after shower clean-up?"

Kanda handed over a pen for the signature. "Yes, and make sure you include any good efforts as separate deeds while we're repairing the wall."

"What is that paper?" Lavi asked as Allen used the wall as writing surface. "Why does it sound like Kanda's being forced to be a good person? Am I the only one thinking this?"

"Still, that was harsh," Allen said sympathetically. "I would hate to be stuck with this much community s-"

Mugen suddenly went flying past Allen's head, preventing him from completing that sentence.

"He was about to say 'Community Service,' wasn't he?!" Lavi exclaimed.

Kanda retrieved his weapon and glared murderously at him.

"It's not Community Service," he glared. "It's Community Sadism."

Allen's face twitched, but he went along with this as he continued to sign the paper. "Yes, it's Community Sadism. He was assigned with being the jerk that tags along and motivates everyone for good causes."

"I'm pretty sure you were going to say Community Service."

"What motivates anyone better than a threat?" Allen tried to reason.

"Money," Bookman answered.

"Sex," Lavi said.

"Okay, maybe," Allen allowed. "But what if the threat involves sex and/or money? What about that?"

There was no response.

"Exactly," Allen said.

His lie had convinced them despite all the signs that clearly said this was actually community service.

"You could learn a thing or two about lying from him," Bookman finally said to his student.

"Hey!"

Allen handed both the paper and pen back over to Kanda, pretending that he hadn't just been accused of lying.

"We should get going," he said to the group. "Tim, can you show us where to go?"

Timcanpy fluttered his wings at this cue to leave and began to fly in front of them. With the golem leading them out of the Black Order, the group of four headed out to fix the Wall.

._.

TBC…

(1) - I'M SO SORRY OH MY GOD

*Wall Marian = Wall Maria, the outermost wall in SnK, and the first to be breached after 100 years of relative peace for humanity.

** Whenever a group of characters comes together, one of them is obviously going to get picked on. The most common example so far is Tyki Mikk, but only because I really feel that (if DGM was instead a humor series) he would be the butt of everyone's jokes. Right now as he is not around, Cross is the one who gets made fun of as seen in this example. I'm choosing targets based off of personalities and current cannon character interactions/relationships.

Here's a list of who is likely to be made fun of, based off of what I've written so far:

1st- Chaozii (9.5/10, meaning practically every scene he is in), 2nd- Tyki (9.26/10), 3rd- Link (7.4/10), 4th- Komui (7/10), 5th- Cross (5.75/10), 6th- Allen (4.36/10)

Anyone below 6th isn't really worth mentioning.

Because math.

If anyone is interested, I also made a list of who is likely to be doing the bullying.

1st- Kanda (10/10), 2nd- Cross (9.2/10) 3rd- Socalo (8.35/10), 4th- Lavi (7/10), 5th- Timcanpy (7/10)