Thank you all for the reviews, I am glad that you all are excited to see what happens next. In answer to which pairing is my favorite for Allen, I would put it in this order: Tyki/Allen, Kanda/Allen, and Lavi/Allen. I enjoy Poker Pair the most, but between Laven and Yullen, it really depends on my mood and the way the story goes. I hope you enjoy this chapter! I haven't written anything past it yet!
Chapter 35
Three Souls, One Body
"Please explain to me what is going on Pierrot," Allen said through ground teeth. "Why am I chained to this chair like Neah?"
The Fourteenth looked towards Allen, studying him carefully, wondering why he spoke with such familiarity. Had Mana spoken to his son about him? He certainly looked familiar, now that he saw him in their mind. He still had white hair, a scar, and a deformed arm, just like his nephew's physical form. But he could see Allen's personality now, and it was definitely a more mature expression than he expected to see on a teenager. The fire in those silver eyes looked familiar to Neah. He couldn't quite name it though.
"Well, I would like you two to bring each other up to date on what is happening after I am done discussing the schedule I have worked out for us concerning who controls your body." Pierrot saw the protest on Allen's face and held a hand up before he could speak. "Allen, there are three conscious souls residing in your body. Only one person can be in control at a time, while the other two are forced to stay in a now cramped space; we have no other choice but to share."
The young General scowled, but imagined his subconscious as a crowded cell, This blackness already felt like one, and if he was stuck with Neah or Pierrot for too long he would feel like he was going stir-crazy.
"Fine," he agreed softly. He tilted his head up to gaze at Neah. "Is that agreeable to you?"
"As long as we get equal amounts of time," the Fourteenth replied. Pierrot leapt onto the table happily.
"Then it's a very good thing I have it all planned out," he announced with a troublesome glint in his eyes. "There are twenty four hours in each day, and three of us. We each get eight hours. Considering Allen is the only one with a lover, I say he gets to have the night hours. You and I will share the daylight hours whenever."
He looked thoughtful for a moment. "It's almost noon. I will take my first eight hours now…"
Allen and Neah looked enraged.
"Hey!"
"You cannot decide that on your own!"
The Heart smirked at them crookedly.
"You two have a lot to discuss. I know everything about your lives," he told them. "However, there are things that neither of you know. Things that will change your lives and hopefully bring you together closer."
Allen felt his stomach twist lightly, knowing that his Innocence was about to drop a big 'bomb' on both him and Neah.
"What things?" he asked warily.
Pierrot's smile never diminished, but his eyes became sad. He walked over to Neah, whispering in his ear the fate of Mana Walker. When he pulled away, the Fourteenth Noah was shocked, eyes wide and blank, his breath frozen. Grimly the Heart walked over to Allen, stooping down just as he had with Neah.
"Allen," he whispered in a voice both kind and loving. "You are the child of Maria and the Earl; you are my younger brother."
In that moment, the young General found himself in a similar state of numbness, unable to comprehend the words whispered to him. But a series of images entered his mind (courtesy of Pierrot, no doubt) and explained it to him. Confirmed the Innocence's words.
"Farewell Allen. Neah. Good luck talking everything out," Pierrot called to them. He disappeared into a column of light, leaving the two alone in the darkness.
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"What did he tell you?" Neah asked out loud. He seemed like a shadow now, tears having worn circles under his eyes and he looked exhausted. He looked lost. Allen did feel a little bit better seeing that Neah took the news better than he had. Then again, he went through Mana's death twice. Lived through being cursed. And Neah was no stranger to mourning. The boy who had raged at his mother's lost suffered so much more. Even Mana's death could not bring tears to his eyes. They must have dried up long ago.
"I'm not sure you want to know," Allen replied. He looked Neah in the eyes, gaze softening. "You know, I never knew Mana had a brother. He didn't really talk about you very much. I suppose he wanted to forget about your death…you know, try to deny it ever happened?"
Neah glared at him. "You're just like the Earl, lying to me—"
"About what?" Allen asked in confusion. "We have yet to talk to each other, except for that one dream I had when I nearly died. Even then, I don't think you were fully awake…"
Neah bent his head down slowly.
"Forgive me, I automatically assumed that you knew. The Earl lied to me He told me that if I brought you back and used a different host that you could take me to Marian, who would lead me to Mana. I didn't know that my brother—passed away," he whispered. He shut his eyes, trying to channel the irrational anger away. He was a human and had every right to be angry. But as a Noah, it could rampage all too quickly. He couldn't let his nephew see that. He couldn't' let Mana's precious son witness his true vicious nature.
"Mana was never right in the head. Not after you died," said Allen's gentle voice. The young man sighed, giving Neah a sad smile when their gazes met once more. "He always used the words you told him: 'Keep walking, never stop'. It kept him going every day."
Nah chuckled humorlessly. "It wasn't my motto. It belonged to Bookman's—"
"It belonged to me," the young General interrupted. "I gave you those words a long, long time ago."
Neah's eyes widened in realization. "You're Allen. The original Allen? But how?"
"It's so complicated, Neah. I—there is no way to put it—I am the Earl's son. The one that you and I were looking for," Allen said hesitantly. H waited for Neah to react, and when he received none, he decided to continue telling his old friend what he had learned. "The Heart had disguised itself as a plain jewel, undetectable to anyone. The Earl bought it in a store and gave it to Maria as a gift while they were courting. Then when she gave me over to an orphanage, she left it to me as a memento from my parents. He fully woke up after I took in you memories, or that is as far as I can piece together from the images he gave me from his point of view."
Allen resisted the urge to pause. He had never expected to see the face of his mother, even as Bookman's Apprentice. For Pierrot to share those precious memories…he didn't have enough words in the world to thank him.
"The nightmares were awful, and I tore at my left arm until it became infected and they amputated it. When it grew back, I ran away. I got locked in a room where they used to store meat. The Innocence saved me It placed me in a cocoon where all of my years reversed until I was a child again, a toddler." Allen chuckled then. "It must have been fate for Mana to find me in that circus. He had been burying a dog he had named after his brother's friend. When he adopted me, he named me the same thing: Allen."
"What was it like?" Neah asked softly. "Was he happy?"
"He was happy. He raised me and even in the bad times he would shake it off and tell me 'Today could have been so much worse. We are lucky to be alive.'" Allen scowled. "I supposed I should thank his insanity. I used to think he was happy because we were together. It was really because he saw you in me. He thought you had returned."
The Fourteenth looked broken for a moment, unable to understand how his older brother had come to be so wrecked and wretched. This was his brother. This was Mana.
"He died in a carriage accident one day. The people were kind enough to bury him under an old tree that overlooked the scenery. It shouldn't surprise you that the Earl came to me while I was grieving at his grave. And I – being a naïve and ignorant child—took his offer and called Mana's name." Allen shook his head and pointed at the scar on his face as much as he could with a chained hand. "I was lucky. Mana was angry; he cursed me to see the souls of the Akuma to repent for what I have done. And Pierrot activated that night for the first time and killed him."
In the silence that followed, Allen expected to hear Neah yell at him, to curse him. The Fourteenth had always been loud, outspoken, brash, quick to take offense. But now the Fourteenth had nothing to say. He was quiet, his expression to difficult to read. Allen honestly had no idea what to make of this reaction to hearing his story.
"I'm sorry," Neah whispered. His voice barely carried and Allen wasn't sure he heard correctly.
"I'm sorry," Neah repeated a little louder. "This is all of my fault. What happened to you, what happened to me, the Noah, and Mana. I'm responsible for it all."
Allen slowly understood what had happened.
"Pierrot told you something, didn't he?"
"Yes. He said that I let myself be controlled. All of the pain I have suffered and caused others to go through is because I allowed myself to be a puppet of destruction. It was never you or the Earl; it was always me," he explained in an anguished tone. "The Heart showed everything to me about the Earl's past, and then he showed me even more. The Apocryphos is the one that killed my mother. It used my brother to make the Earl angry at him, and then caused me to blame the Earl for attacking her and my brother. I allowed my rage to consume me. Just like it wanted. If I didn't do any of that—"
"It's too late to change anything," Allen interrupted. He closed his eyes for a moment, recalling all of those familiar faces. It was sad to think of them. "We can only mourn and try to make up for what we have done. I am grateful to you, Neah. If you hadn't done that, I would never have met Tyki, or the people in the Order. I wouldn't have met Lavi, or escaped the fate all Bookman must live. I am grateful to you for all of those things."
Neah stared at Allen in awe, as if he were an angel that had descended from heaven.
"I don't understand," he said softly and in wonder. "How do you do it? How do you remain so pure in this war even after everything you've been through? Even after you've been betrayed over and over again by those you love?"
Allen tilted his head to the side, not sure if he had an answer to such a complicated question. He wasn't really pure; he had done a lot of things to sully any purity he had. And he had not only been betrayed, he did a lot of betraying himself. However, there wasn't any other way to explain his optimism than this:
"I guess…it's because the world is just that precious."
He smiled then remembering all of his good memories and his bad memories. He had come so far in life. It would be a waste to simply give it up.
"Allen, you shine so brightly. I was never the one people flocked to," Neah admitted with a small chuckle. "It was always you."
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Adam and Tyki watched over Allen's unconscious form, the both of them trying to keep it a secret from the rest of the family that Allen had resurfaced. They didn't want to give anyone false hope about the internal war with the Fourteenth. Adam hadn't even wanted to tell Tyki, but the Noah of Pleasure had walked into the room shortly after Allen fainted. Now they sat side by side, waiting for the young man to wake up, unsure who it would be: Neah, or Allen.
Tyki was toying with Allen's button, set on his lover's scarlet ribbon. He had been given these two things as an amulet. He didn't quite understand how it worked, but the amulet was supposed to guard against the Fourteenth in case he ever attacked Tyki. Allen had even enchanted his playing cards using an old trick he remembered Cross using. He didn't explain how to use either one, but it made Tyki a little leery. What if it simply blew up in his face one day? Allen wasn't exactly known for his magic. As a matter of fact, Tyki had been sure Allen didn't know any.
"I am worried about something," Adam confessed. The Noah of Pleasure glanced at him.
"What do you mean?"
"I am concerned about how I should continue through this war. I can sense the presence in Allen's body a little bit more now. The Innocence doesn't just reside in his arm and in his body; it courses through his blood too, as if it is trying to hide some secret," Adam explained. "I can't help but wonder why Innocence would go this far if it wasn't the Heart."
"I thought Lenalee Lee was the Heart," Tyki reminded him, trying to push the Earl's suspicion away.
"You and I both know that is only our hope. In reality, Allen is far more likely to be the Heart. He simply resembles the Heart too much, in personality and even in appearance." Adam sighed. "Tyki, I am one hundred percent sure. He is the piece we have sought for 7,000 years. Allen Walker is the Heart."
The Noah of Pleasure bit his lip and looked away. He knew what the Earl was worried about. It had been on the minds of all of the Noah, even the ones who did not know Allen very well.
"Earl, you can't destroy the Heart," Tyki said at last. "If you did that, we could very well lose Allen. He has that hole in his heart. I have always wondered why it never healed, but at this point it doesn't matter. The Heart is the only thing keeping him alive. You can't kill him."
Adam bowed his head. "I know. That is why…I must apologize for not being able to give the Heart eternal rest."
Suddenly Allen flopped over, his eyes wide open and a crooked grin on his face.
"That is alright father!" said a cheerful voice that did not carry quite the same inflictions in the voice as Allen or Neah. Tyki jerked back a little while the Earl stared at the figure in disbelief. "I can assure you that until my little brother is old enough, I do not mind being here one bit."
"Pierrot?" the Earl whispered. Allen's eyes—a cooler and darker gray than before—softened into an expression full of love and adoration.
"Yes, it truly is me," he confirmed. Adam snatched him into his arms, crushing his son into a hug. There were tears pouring from his eyes. He knew that the body belonged to Allen, but he simply could not express himself in any other way than holding his son for as long as he could. One of Adam's hands found its way into the white locks and began to rub them like a parent would a young child. It didn't matter that his son was grownup.
"7,000 years," he sobbed. "I have waited 7,000 years for this!"
Pierrot tightened his arms around his father, his own eyes beginning to mist a little. For those thousands of years, he had been deep asleep. He had barely been awake for two centuries. He couldn't even imagine how his father had managed so many years.
"I'm here now," Pierrot replied. "I'm here, and there is a way that we can fix everything."
Adam pulled away, just far enough to look at his son.
"How?" he wondered.
"The entire thing that started this war is that people feared us and they committed a crime against the Noah family," Pierrot replied. His eyes sparkled like the night sky. "There is a way to reverse it, father. If you gather all of the pieces of Innocence, I can return to my physical form. There would be no more need for the Exorcists, no more need for the Akuma. There could be peace."
The Earl frowned. "Can the Order accept that?"
"I don't know. But I can see through my other pieces of Innocence, and there is a group of people very close to us," Pierrot replied. "If we can bring them to our side, then I am sure that we can work our way through the Order to the Vatican and Central."
Tyki merely stared at them, completely lost as to what was going on. He finally settled on asking one question.
"Who exactly is coming near us?"
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"I did not mean for us to make that stop in Spain," Lavi told Kanda in a whiny voice. It had taken them a while to reach Europe, Spain specifically, and Lavi's curiosity had led them into a shop that turned out to be a nest of Akuma. They were forced to stay in Spain for two days due to injuries (though Kanda's blood had shortened the original time much to the disgust of Lavi and Link). Kanda was pissed off for two obvious reasons. The first was because of the delay caused by Lavi's idiocy. The second reason was because Link was still following them diligently, making note of everything they said or did. Now he understood exactly how Allen felt, being under constant surveillance under this man's watch. He couldn't even approach Lavi for more information concerning Allen's private life or Walker's whereabouts because he didn't want to accidentally mark Allen as a traitor. Needless to say, Kanda was at his limit for patience.
"I don't care if you meant for it to happen or not Baka Usagi," he growled at Lavi, unsheathing Mugen and pointing it at the red-head's pale throat. "If you do something like that again, I will gut you navel to throat without hesitation!"
Lavi gulped, all of the blood draining out of his face as he held his hands up uneasily.
"H-Hey, easy now, Yuu—"
"Don't call me that!" Kanda snapped irritably. His blade bit deeper into the soft flesh without breaking the skin yet. From the sidelines, ink scowled in annoyance. He too had obviously had enough of Kanda and Lavi bickering.
"Calm down Kanda, he is not worth it," the blond man said. "And you, Lavi, need to stop baiting him."
The new General refused to remove Mugen from Lavi's jugular. He really felt like killing him once and for all after what the red-head had dragged them through. For Link, he completely understood the General's irritation, but he felt it was completely unprofessional. If he had known what it was going to be like joining Lavi and Kanda on a mission, he would never have volunteered to go. As it was, he never wanted to go on a mission with either one individually either. Link would say that these two together were an awful combination, mostly due to Lavi's constant goading. Kanda's short fuse certainly did not help the matter.
"If you aren't going to stop arguing any time soon, I'm just going to leave now," Link announced. He had witnessed this scene play out too many times before and he was sick of it. "I'll be at the hotel by the train station. If you survive tonight, Lavi, meet us there at dawn tomorrow morning."
Lavi began to panic, sweat rolling down the side of his face as the blonde turned his back on him and began to walk away.
"Wait! Two-dot! Pimple! Link! You can't do this to me!" Lavi shouted. "Don't leave me with Kanda! I'm going to diiiiiieeee!"
He was ignored coldly, and soon Link disappeared in the crowd. Kanda waited a bit longer before releasing Lavi and sheathing Mugen. Most of his anger seemed to have disappeared almost instantly. It confused Lai.
"Tch, he took his time leaving," the General muttered. Lavi wiped the sweat off of his face.
"You id that as an act, to get him to leave?" he asked in shock. It had felt quite real to him. "Are you even that smart?"
"Idiot, I needed to talk to you. And I vented all of my irritation at you a moment ago," Kanda explained. He scowled at Lavi. "Well, out with it. Tell me about Moyashi's lover, since he's the one I have to find."
Bookman's Apprentice arched an eyebrow. "You didn't ask about it in front of Link. Why are you so curious now?"
"If it wasn't something that would have gotten him in trouble, you would have already explained it to me," Kanda replied gruffly. Lavi shook his head, wondering why he had underestimated Kanda so much.
"Alright. You know his lover better by the name Tyki Mikk. He's one of the members of the Noah Clan," the red head explained calmly. "From what Allen explained to me, he has two human identities: the first is as a vagabond, which I really hope he is not using right now. It would be very hard to take Allen with him without being noticed, but it would also make it hard for us to find them."
"And the second identity?"
"The second identity is where Tyki Mikk is the brother to the Prime Minister of Portugal. Unfortunately that means Allen could be in any residence belonging to the Camelot family, but they are all in this country, so it would be much easier for us to find."
Kanda processed all of the information away carefully.
"Is there anything else we need to know?" he asked. "For example, his relationship to the Noah, and his degree of trust in them would be helpful in trying to figure out who he is in danger from."
"From what I know, the Earl views him as a grandson, or even as one of his own Noah. Allen told me he is on very good terms with all of the Noah that were involved in his disappearance three years ago—"
"Four," Kanda corrected. Allen was sixteen now, his birthday had gone overlooked during the relocation process of the Black Order's European Branch.
"Four years ago," Lavi corrected dutifully. "But he also told me he wasn't too sure what to make of the newer member of the family."
"Do you think they are helping him then?"
"I do," Lavi answered. Kanda sighed, rubbing his forehead tiredly. He glared at his companion.
"Why did the Moyashi trust you with all of this information?" he demanded irritably. "You just told me all of it without hesitation!"
"He trusted me because I am Bookman's Apprentice and remain neutral in this war. And while I cannot say I am not emotionally moved by some of the people here, I can promise you that it doesn't affect my work." Lavi shrugged. "Besides, I only told you all of these because he trusted me to divulge in that in that information if he was ever in trouble. I think if he wanted anyone other than me to know, it would be you."
Kanda looked away in order to hide his blush and the fact that he had no response to that. After a few moments he returned to glaring at Lavi.
"Hey, Baka Usagi," he began. "Let's ditch Link."
The red-head's eye widened as he realized that the blonde was no longer watching them. It was the perfect time to get rid of him. He grinned at his friend's wonderful idea and looked forward to the prospect of not having someone watching over them the entire time. The best part was that Link had never even asked them where they were going. For all he knew, they would continue traveling through Europe on the lookout for Allen.
"Kanda, yet again you have shocked me with your intelligence."
The new General made a sound of annoyance. He tilted his head in the direction of a nearby store that sold clothing.
"Come on, let's get some coats to cover our uniforms," he ordered. "Then we can go on this search for the Baka Moyashi."
And I am done with this chapter. So now you know most of my big secrets that I had been trying to point at all the way back in One Raindrop Raises the Sea. I have really enjoyed reading all of your reviews and theories concerning this big plot thingies such as Pierrot as the Heart (does he count as an OC?) and Allen as the Earl's son.
Oh, and one of the stories I was talking about writing is already posted and completed (it is kinda/sorta oneshot). Warning though, it is kind of a fic that I wrote and forgot about, and finished. But it is cute and has a happy ending. Y'all can read it if you want.