Hi everyone! I hope you have had a wonderful week and everything is going well. Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows, favorites, and views! Not going to lie, every lovely review just makes me want to write more. It is really an amazing feeling knowing that my writing pleases you guys.

About this chapter: For a little bit, I stayed in third person POV and I think for the rest of the story there will be more of that so I can show more perspectives. The last part of the chapter is Aina thinking/talking to herself, trying to sort things out in her head. Originally, it was going to be a short separate chapter but then I decided to just attach it to this one and have a really long chapter instead. I hope you guys like that!

Warning: swearing, rape, mentions of rape and death. Little darker chapter but I'm just trying to keep it real.

Song for the chapter: Halsey - Gasoline (I absolutely LOVE her songs), I think it fits the mood.

Enjoy reading!

Chapter 14: I like 'em crazy

Allen was panting hard, every single muscle in his body was screaming from exhaustion but he didn't care. He needed to restore his Innocence as soon as possible, he could not let his body hold him back. Every passing day, every failure brought the darkness in his soul closer to the surface, threatening to engulf his soul. He couldn't let that happen, not while his friends are fighting in the frontline, there was no way he could allow himself to fail.

"You are distracted, Walker," Fou chided him as she transformed her arms back from blades. "What's gotten into you this time?"

The white-haired Exorcist was indeed distracted, his mind kept going back to a certain blonde girl that was a mystery to him. Every day, he would pass her room just to see that she was still there, every time changing his mind about confronting her about everything. He wanted answers, but at the same time he could not listen to any more lies. He had enough on his plate as it was, he didn't need her to manipulate him any more.

"You are thinking about Aina, aren't you?" She asked, her voice surprisingly softer than usual. "Don't think I am going soft but I used to know her… before she disappeared."

"You did?" Allen asked, surprised. "Oh, yeah, she did spend some time here. Was she always…like this?"

"She was and wasn't. The Order was different back then," she explained, turning her gaze away from the boy so he couldn't see the guilt on her face. "They were desperate to the point that they forgot what was right and wrong. They did…unforgivable things to undeserving people. She grew up in the hands of people who never saw her as a person, only as a tool."

"Yet she is handcuffed to the bed. Are you going to keep treating her like a tool?" Allen asked sharply. It was all true after all. He suddenly felt pain in his chest, imagining all the torture she had to withstand. Was this Holy War really worth all of that?

"It is not like that anymore, idiot," she hissed. "She is extremely angry which makes her unpredictable and dangerous. I don't think Bak has forgiven her for fleeing the Order, he used to care about her like family. Anyways, it is probably too late to ask for her forgiveness and I highly doubt she has any to give."

"You are wrong, it is never late to ask." With those words still lingering in the air, Allen finally decided that it was time that he paid her a visit and got to the bottom of things. He was still angry at her for misleading him and lying, but he felt like he finally understood a little more about her. Even without the details, he knew that she had to suffer through intense experimentation, and he was not sure if her fleeing was really betrayal anymore. She had no one, just like him.

Allen decided that it was better if he took a bath before going to talk to Aina, he was drenched in sweat thanks to Fou. He had no idea what exactly he was going to say but he needed to see her. Despite how much he didn't want to, he felt pity for the girl, even though he knew that was the last thing she needed. But what did she need? Once he was ready and changed, he made his way down the hallway towards her room (or rather prison cell), running through different scripts in his head. The hallway was unusually quiet which made him rather uneasy, so he sped up his steps. Unlike any other time, there were no finders in front of the room which was against Bak's orders ever since the girl almost broke the neck of the nurse. Something was not right.

When he finally reached the glass window, he immediately knew what was wrong. Aina's small body was covered by a bigger one, her arm flying around the stranger, trying to hit and scratch him to her best ability. She was kicking hard but the man didn't seem to feel any of that. For a second his mind went blank with confusion but then it hit him, hard.

She is getting raped. Right here. Right now.

The white-haired boy burst through the door with such power that the walls shook as the door bounced back from it, but the man didn't seem puzzled the least bit. He just snarled at the boy in disdain.

"Wait your turn, boy," he spitted but Allen was not going to comply. He jumped at the man and grabbed his shoulder to pull him off of her, but he pushed the Exorcist away easily, making him stumble over the small table that was next to the bed. Unfortunately, there were nothing useful on it, Bak made sure of that after the girl threw everything at the nurses who dared to enter the room.

"Get off of her!" Allen yelled angrily and pushed himself off the floor. The man looked at him from top to bottom and burst out laughing.

"What is a freak like you going to do? Maybe if you had your precious Innocence I'd be scared but you are just pathetic now. I can't help it, I like 'em crazy and oh, she is something," he purred and to emphasize his point he reached between her legs. Allen say the girl's eyes widen to the sensation and he felt his mind cloud with fury. He launched himself at the man again and this time he managed to kick him off the bed. Using the opening, the Exorcist ran to the nurse call button to alert them.

"If I were you, I would stay down there," he warned the man, to no end. The elder jumped to his feet with rather surprising speed and lunched himself at the boy who managed to avoid his punch last minute. His sparring sessions with Fou prepared him for much worse than this. "Even without my Innocence, I can beat up a disgusting pedophile like you."

"I'd like to see you try, boy," he hissed and continued to go after the white-haired Exorcist. Allen knew that he could do serious damage to the other one and in that moment that was exactly what he wanted to do. Only one glance at the girl's ripped clothes and shocked expression was enough for him to forget all restraint and go after the man with vicious anger.

It was not just about the fact that he tried to rape her, someone who was so vulnerable and young, but the fact that he showed no remorse for it. What was worse, he seemed to believe that he had the right to take advantage of her like that. For that, Allen believed, he deserved every single kick and punch, and even more. It didn't matter that the man was bigger than him, he was merely a human, a pathetic, fragile creature compared to Allen. Innocence or not, he stood no chance against the boy. His mind was clouded with rage as he pounded the man with his fist until someone yanked his body away.

"It's enough," he heard Fou say and he was ready to tell her to piss off when he noticed the rage on the other's face. She was staring at the man on the ground, her hands shaking from her own anger. "I will take care of him. You go…just make sure she is okay."

Allen didn't answer, there was no need to tell Fou that Aina was most definitely not okay. He turned his back to the guardian and slowly walked to the bed, he feared that if he saw the man again he would not stop until it was too late.

"Aina…" He whispered painfully as he covered the girl's fragile body with the blanket. She was shaking uncontrollably but she still managed to catch Allen's hand and pull herself into a sitting position. Her hand was trembling as she held onto his forearm.

"Allen," he said, her voice so faint that the boy wasn't even sure he heard his name or just read it off her lips. "I cannot… do this…anymore." As she said those words, tears started flowing from her now dull, lightless, green eyes, still holding onto Allen's hand. The boy let out a deep sigh and sat down on the bed and pulled her onto his chest.

She cried there silently, her pain too deep to be able to make a sound, her body too weak to give voice to her sorrow. After all those years, she finally broke, her soul shattered into pieces and Allen finally saw how truly broken she was.

"I am so sorry," the boy said softly, running his hand over the girl's hair. She pushed her face deeper into his chest, her chains jingling quietly as she latched onto Allen's shirt. She needed to feel something real, hold onto something that was safe.

"I don't want to feel like this anymore," she mumbled into his chest. "I wish…to die."

"Don't say that!" Allen retorted quickly, grabbing the girl by her shoulder to force her to look into his eyes. "Don't say that." He repeated softly.

"This is not living!" Aina said hoarsely, shaking her handcuffs in front of the white-haired boy's face. "I cannot…I cannot…I would rather die than go through those experiments again."

"No one is going to experiment on you," he answered running his fingers down her cheek to wipe away the remaining tears. "I won't let anyone touch you ever again."

"Allen…I am so tired." Her soul was tired, tired of all that life had put her through.

"Sleep, then," he answered softly and pulled her back onto his chest. She didn't resist his hold, Allen wasn't sure if she could resist anything after what happened.

He could not forget her face when he first saw her after the incident, so broken and lost. How she gave up and was so ready to die. How much did she have to suffer to get to this point? The thought of dying was not foreign to Allen, he himself wished to be dead many times. Even after surviving Tyki's fatal touch, he often wondered why God decided to spare him. That is why he knew what it was like to give up completely, to lose desire to keep on living. Maybe it was because of this understanding that he could not let go of her even when Bak came in with a nurse to take care of Aina.

"Allen, you need to let the nurse examine her," the older man said softly. "I need to talk to you. But not here."

The white-haired Exorcist hesitated before he gently pushed the girl off of his chest and rose from the bed and followed the other man out to the hallway.

"You can say it here," he said firmly, stopping in front of the big glass window.

"I know you probably don't trust me, us, very much after what happened," the blonde man started but then stopped, waiting for Allen to say that he did. However, in that moment, that was the last thing the boy would say to the man. "I can promise you that we won't do anything that would hurt her in any way. That part of the Black Order is history and I do not wish to repeat it. I am deeply sorry for what my predecessors did, I wish I could undo it. Especially, what happened today…that was under my watch. I just never thought someone would attempt to do something as horrible again to her. After what happened in the past…"

Bak seemed to get lost in his thoughts, talking to himself more than he was to Allen.

"Again? What happened in the past?" Allen asked, yanking the man back to reality. As he suspected, he did not mean to share that hint with the Exorcist. "Tell me."

The blonde man hesitated for a few moments but then let out a deep sigh. He knew that he could trust Allen with anything pertaining the girl after seeing the damage he had done to the finder, he just wasn't sure that he trusted him with the dark secrets of the Order. It was clear, however, that the white-haired boy was not going to let it go.

"For a long time we thought Aina's Innocence was in the healing of her blood. It was the most passive Innocence we ever encountered and the most fascinating in a way, it opened up a lot of opportunities for testing. One of our Exorcists took a liking to her, as an apprentice we thought, and he was great at teaching her martial arts and how to defend herself. I was very young at the time and merely an assistant in the science department but I could tell that she grew attached to her master. We were happy for that, she seemed to take the…experimentations a lot better. Until one day we heard screaming from the training room." The branch head had to stop for a second to brace himself from what was coming in the story. For so many years, he tried to forget about it and erase every bit of the memory from his head. Everything came rushing back in that moment.

"She was just lying there," he continued, his voice shaking as he recalled what he saw. "Her clothes were ripped…but we of course didn't see that until we pulled her dead master off of her. That's how her true power resurfaced."

"What do you mean her real power?" Allen asked, confused. "She killed him?"

"I don't think she wanted to kill him, she just wanted…it to stop. Aina is able to manipulate the light around her, make it into any form she wishes. She was never the same after that…Of course, that couldn't get in the way of science. So everything just resumed like nothing had happened." Bak knew that it was wrong, worse than most things they had done back then.

"Are you going to apologize to her?" Allen asked sharply.

"What?" It wasn't that the branch leader did not want to apologize, he just didn't believe that it would mean anything after all these years.

"Or are you going to keep her shackled for the rest of her life when her only crime was to escape your torture?" Bak would normally not allow anyone to talk to him like that (well, besides Fou) but Allen had a point. Was he so blinded by his pride that he made everything even worse? He was no better than his predecessors then, no matter how hard he tried.

"Of course not," he responded quietly. "I'll see to her release, I hope it is not too late."

"You better do a great damn job at apologizing because we cannot afford to lose her," Allen responded firmly and left the man alone ponder what he would say to Aina.

She was in no state to talk at that moment, so he decided to come back in a few days. After nine years of resentment towards the girl and ignorance about his own guilt, he was not ready to face her yet. Because when he finally would, he wanted to mean it. He really did hope that it wasn't already too late.

I am so sorry, Aina. I had never meant for all of this to happen.

"Aina, I need to talk to you," Bak said after a few moments of awkward silence since he entered the room. "If you'll listen."

"Is he here to make sure I do?" She pointed at Allen who just smiled at her softly. At least her wittiness was back. "Nevermind, the chains should be enough."

"I am here to apologize." The blonde man's voice was slightly shaking but Allen didn't know if he noticed at all. "I should have said this to you a long time ago… I am sorry, Aina. I am so sorry for everything that you had to go through, and still do. I think deep down I had always known that you ran away because of what we did to you, not because you abandoned your duty as an Exorcist. I was just a coward and too proud to admit that, so instead I put all my guilt and shame into hating you for being a traitor. So often, I wished you did actually betray us, so you could at least repay all that suffering that we caused you. But you didn't… and I don't know how I could ever make it up to you. I don't know how I could ask for your forgiveness."

"You were my friend Bak," she whispered quietly, averting her gaze from her visitors. "This cannot just be undone. I am so angry… I feel like it is eating me alive."

"Will you let me try?" He asked, stepping closer to the girl. "I cannot erase the past but I can change the future. Your future." With that, he released the shackles binding the girl to the bed. For a few moments, she stared at her wrist but then she turned to the two men in the room, her face lacking any emotion. Allen wasn't sure if it was because she was about to go berserk or because she didn't know what she felt in that moment.

She wanted revenge so bad, but she was furious enough to want to do it the right way. To punish those who truly deserve it. Bak was just a pawn, a young, misguided assistant, a coward that had no power to help her. She hated him for that, for being so weak, but she couldn't blame him. No, her hatred went far beyond this branch. It was the Church, those two-faced maniacs that she really despised, and promised herself to make them feel her wrath.

"Lie to me one more time, and I swear to God, I will kill you," she said firmly, her gaze thundering.

"Aina, I meant it. You are free, free to do anything you want. We have already prepared a room for you just down the hall. I want you to see that the Order is different now, we are here to serve you, Exorcists. I was wrong to handcuff you but I hope you understand why I did it, and forgive me." The Chinese man felt like he had been waiting to say these words for centuries. It felt like a thousand tons were shifted off his chest, all that guilt and shame that was bottled up inside of him finally got released and he felt his conscience clear. Not completely, because what they had done to her could never be corrected, but he made a huge step towards rehabilitation. However, he needed to discuss the situation with Komui soon, he wasn't sure what Central would do if they discovered that the girl lived. That part of the Order had not changed, unfortunately.

"I will show her to her room, Bak," Allen said. He knew that the branch leader would understand why he offered it, he needed to talk to her. Not just about what happened but everything. It was time that she came clean.

Bak looked at the girl agog, but her expression remained emotionless. "Very well, then."

There was no answer from Aina, she barely even looked at the branch leader, but Bak didn't blame her for it. That was what he always liked about her, she never pretended things were fine when they weren't. He always knew where they stood, and in that moment he understood that she was not going to talk to him for a very long time. He could only hope that one day he would be able to regain her trust. The blonde man let out a deep sigh and left the room; he didn't remember the last time he felt that relieved.

There was silence in the room after the door closed, neither of the Exorcists knew what to say. Allen wanted to question her about everything, yet the words didn't seem to formulate.

"I am going," Aina broke the silence finally but didn't move. The boy was standing too close to the door and she want to feel his presence more intensely than she already did.

"You are a General," Allen blurted out suddenly, slightly angrier than he intended it to. "A bloody General."

"So what? It is not like it has any meaning," she retorted, shrugging. "It was a pathetic try to make up for…nevermind."

"For the experiments or for what your master did to you?" It was unfair and cruel to bring it up, to use this knowledge against her but Allen was angry. Something about her just got on his nerves every time and he couldn't help it. And that something was the fact that she pretended to be okay when he could tell how broken she really was. He didn't want her to pretend in front of him anymore.

Her eyes widened with surprise first but her expression soon turned into anger and incredible frustration. "You have no right to talk about that."

"You had no right to lie to us," he responded firmly which made her snort despicably.

"Oh spare me your bullshit, Allen," she hissed. "You think I had no right to lie to you. Did you think we had something special? That I could confide in you and tell you all the horrors of my poor, broken soul? You should know better. You don't care that I lied, nor do you care about that I pretended that I was someone else. It does not matter, Serena or me, it doesn't make a difference. Don't pretend that you care about me when in reality, this is all about your ego."

"Something special?" He snorted sarcastically. "I don't even know who you are anymore. And yes…maybe it was about my ego. You lied to us, your fellow Exorcists, and jeopardized our mission and lives. For what? Only because you were scared to face your past. You can lie to yourself all you want, Aina, but nothing is going to change the fact that you are a coward."

"Jeopardize your lives? How many times have I healed you wounds? Hm?" She was furious. "No secret is more important than the life of an Exorcist. I lied about who I was and what I can do, but my devotion to God's will has always been true. My name and my powers were a lie, but I wasn't. I am a coward for running away from the Order but I only did it to fulfill my true duty as an Exorcist."

Allen didn't answer, he let the tension and the silence linger between them, making every second excruciating. Aina broke the silence again, her whispers faint and hesitant. "I thought you understood."

"I understand why you chose me," he responded, his voice emotionless and sharp. "Because I am so naïve and good that I would never see through your lies. You really gave me everything you've got just to keep your precious façade up. All those things you told me about the Order might be true but that doesn't make you true. Your room is five doors down to the left."

Allen didn't wait for her response, he didn't want to hear any more excuses and lies. He was gone before the girl could even open her mouth to answer, leaving her alone in that dreaded hospital room. She barely even noticed the pain in her knees as she fell to the floor and the light from her eyes faded even more. It was the utter emptiness that shook her soul to its deepest point, the lack of emotions that left her more hollow than ever before.

When the human soul breaks it doesn't hurt, it doesn't ache, there is no sadness, no sorrow, and even that burning, flaming anger is gone. You become an empty shell, a shadow of what you once were, a weak imprint of your former existence. You breathe, your heart still pumps the blood that keeps your body alive, your muscles keep your body moving, but you…you drown in your own darkness.

I was losing my mind. With every second, every breath, and every heartbeat, I could feel the rage slowly eating up my mind and the panic taking away that little reality that I had left. The weight of my past was crashing down on me, sending shivers of despair through my body and my soul while burning me from the inside with unstoppable fury. My mind was clouded and numb, all reason ceased to exist, it was overtaken by the feeling of complete desolation. I was utterly pathetic, yet too powerless to do anything about it.

Your past finally caught up with you, what were you expecting?

I thought I would have more time. For a just few weeks, I was finally free, I got to experience what it was to really, truly live. Even though I was an Exorcist and I had a duty to fulfill, I still felt like I was free. Even under the crumbling weight of my dark secrets, I felt the most weightless that I had ever been, so untouched by the horrors of my past. It felt so right. It felt like I was given the life I deserved, how being an Exorcist was meant to be. Being Serena was the best thing that had ever happened to me despite it all being a lie. I would have traded the rest of my life for another week of pretending, no matter how shameful that thought was. I wanted to keep on lying so desperately it hurt in every inch of my being.

All these lies…Was he one too?

Allen… Those silver eyes that stirred me inside in places where I had no idea I existed, a part of my consciousness that I kept locked away was ripped open with such force that it scared me. For he was the reason above everything that I wanted to remain free. Everything he was, pure, naïve, and innocent, yet so strong and powerful, enticed me irreversibly; he really was a child of prophecy. Even without knowing the whole ugly truth, he understood how broken I was and never judged me for it. All he ever wanted to do was repair what was broken, to mend my shattered reality. I envied him so much for how he saw the world, his utter and eternal positivity, the colors that he still saw in this world. My world was dull, the colors had died a long time ago. I wanted to see the world through those silver eyes, feel all that it had to offer through his heart and his sweet, intoxicating touch.

You yearn for something that was built on pretense. How could he ever forgive you?

Do I even deserve forgiveness? Does it even mean anything? Nothing mattered anymore since there was no way I could ever leave this place. Just like before, I would be their prisoner and lab rat, so they can torture me until they figure out where my ability's threshold is. Allen didn't mean anything in the grand scale of things. Yet, I felt myself craving even his hateful words, anything to make me feel alive and fill the void inside of me. I would take every bit of poison from those sinfully sweet lips until I drown in his hatred, I'd take anything that is him. I clung onto his being not for affection or love, no, I needed him to keep out of the valley of darkness that I had been edging closer and closer to. He was like air to me, air that I didn't want to breath.

Why don't you hate him for his loyalty to the Order?

He was a victim of the deceit, he had to be. Once again, he naivety overcame his reason and he fell for the Oder's manipulation. I couldn't blame him when the Black Order was playing with our lives in the name of God, whom we all served. He handed us our Innocence and for that we owed him our service and the Order employed that service. They declared themselves the protectors of God's will and such we belonged to them.

Then why does it bother you to look into those eyes? Are you scared of what you might find?

What if I wasn't the only one putting up a mask? Was he another form of torture that the Order came up with just for me? Nothing would make the High Generals happier than to crush my soul into even smaller pieces, to pulverize my existence, and trample my will. Sending his light to me to blind me, make my eyes get used to the light, just to rip it away and toss me back into the darkness. No… I could not possibly be that important to them to come up with such a scheme and that was what made it so much more painful. That now it was his choice to take the light away, from his own free will. I should hate him. I must hate him. Then why did I feel such relief when I realized that he was alive?

Don't be stupid. You are drawn to his pain, even now, you are looking for him.

I was drawn to his pain. My blood, my Innocence, relished in his pain. As much as he wanted to fix me, I could not deny the urge to mend his broken soul as well. Maybe it was my Innocence, maybe it was me, but something made me cut my wrist for him and bleed until I almost died just to save his life. That thought scared me more than anything in my entire life. I was a being of survival, yet I was so ready to throw that away just to heal him.

You belong to him.

I couldn't. I was toxic, broken, pathetic, and he deserved better. They all deserved better than me. God deserved better. The Order could go to Hell for all I cared, but those few people, who showed me there were more than just suffering to being an Exorcist, they didn't need someone so fucked up as I was. I rewarded their compassion with lies and manipulation, I tricked them shamelessly and there was no excuse for that. And Allen… I did him the worse, for I gave my all to him, body and pretense both, and I relished in burning fire of his touch and kisses, craving more and offering more lies every time.

Bullshit. There was nothing pretense about that. You have been lying to yourself the whole time.

I had to, for admitting how he made me feel made it all too real. Nothing about him made sense to me anymore but I was so adamant on fighting whatever was between us, for the sake of my own mental well-being. Yes, I was terrified to live in a world where I cared about anything and anyone, so I wouldn't have to face their loss. It was just easier to walk around alone, to live with my heart closed and never let anyone see break through. For what I had done, I couldn't face that with an open heart.

That's right, you are a monster. What would they do if they knew what you had done?

They would finally stop trying to save me. They would know that I don't deserve it.

What are you going to do now?

There was nothing I could do. The Black Order had claimed my life once again and I was trapped to live out the rest of my life in misery. Why did God give me this path?

You already know the answer. You need to suffer, so your blood can empower God's soldiers.

I want to be a soldier. I wanted nothing more than that.

Except for him. You want him more.

I couldn't. It wasn't right. I could never let myself admit that.

So, what do you guys think?