A/N: Okay! So here's who quite a few of you have been waiting for - Kanda. Hope you like! And don't worry about the new OC, by the way. I swear that Alexei's the only OC who'll stick around for more than a few in-story days.

Thank you to neah20, Animejessi, GoldenLombaxGirl, Katherine Sanderson, alexc123, karina001, Yami-The Lord of Darkness, and guest for reviewing!

Title: Fear of Infinity

Author: liketolaugh

Link: drive. google. (com /) open?id=0B4a0w418KzaUc1lJXzJtX1lTZzA (remove the spaces, remove parentheses - it did not want me to put that there)

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.

"Three states away," Kanda said flatly. "I hate America."

"It won't take long," Steve assured him, hiding a grin. "The East Coast's states are much smaller; on the West Coast, three states is about the height of the country."

"I hate America," Kanda repeated with feeling, leaning back and glaring at the back of the head of the finder in the passenger seat. "Where are we going?"

Two of the finders had come and gotten them from the gate, and the others were with the accommodator. The drive would be pretty long, from what Kanda understood, hence two drivers.

"Maine," Lavi answered, opening the mission folder and examining it. He scanned it quickly, taking in every detail, and then passed it to Steve, who started to read.

It was a woman, about 24, allegedly with an Innocence watch, which projected a shield that could be thrown. Rhapsody Aries. Her whole town had been wiped out, but she's survived, though she couldn't use it well enough to save them. The finders had gotten her out and were holding her nearby, having explained the situation.

"I'm surprised the Order never seems to fly anywhere," Steve admitted, finally passing it to Kanda, who immediately started reading it intently. "It would be a lot faster, wouldn't it?"

"Faster, yeah," Lavi confirmed. "But have you ever seen an akuma attack on an airplane?" He didn't wait for a response. "No? Neither have I. You can tell 'cause I'm not dead."

Steve grimaced, imagining that particular scenario. "That would be bad," he admitted.

Lavi chuckled, leaning back with his hands behind his head. "You bet it would," he said cheerfully. "So let's not open with that, yeah? New exorcists tend to be a little sensitive." His grin widened, green eye lighting up with almost childish delight. "It's great, though, that we're getting another new exorcist. We haven't gotten one since Timothy, you know? And now there's Alexei and this new girl." He laughed and shook his head, while Steve smiled in amusement and Kanda scoffed quietly at his antics.

"When did Timothy arrive?" Steve asked curiously.

Lavi shrugged. "I dunno, a little over a year ago? Anyway, we're probably getting so much done just because the missions are so much more frequent." He rolled his eyes. "Never been so busy in my life, I'm telling you! It's ridiculous." Absently, he rubbed his throat, where bruising was clearly visible.

Steve gave him a concerned look. "Are you okay?"

Lavi started, then sharply removed his hand with an easy grin. "Yeah, I'm fine, don't worry about it. Loki fixed my breathing right up, actually, so it's all good. Didn't know he could do that."

Steve gave him a surprised look. "Loki healed you? Really?" To Lavi's surprised look, he elaborated, "He doesn't do it that often; he says that it can cause permanent damage if he's not careful."

Lavi's gaze melted into thoughtfulness. "That so?" After a moment for thought, he shook his head and asked, "Hey, how'd your mission go? Everything alright? You seemed a little shaken up when you got back, and Allen got hurt pretty bad."

"It wasn't great," Steve admitted, grimacing. "Two Noah showed up, but we only fought one, and it still didn't go well."

"Which one?" Lavi asked with interest.

"Tyki Mikk?" Steve asked more than said, wondering if Lavi would recognize him by name. Lavi did, grimacing in sympathy. "He did something that took me and Thor out of commission for a bit, so we weren't in any position to help when he went after Allen."

"Yeah, he does that," Lavi admitted. "Unnatural interest, really. Anything else?"

"…Yeah," Steve said, with a small frown, glancing away. "We met Neah."

Lavi flinched, and then a tearing sound drew both their attention to Kanda; he'd torn the mission folder in half, and his hands were shaking, clutching the two sheafs of paper.

With a soft curse, he dropped them, letting them scatter, hands still shaking.

"Seventeen days, wasn't it, rabbit?" he asked, voice low.

Lavi lounged back. He wasn't fooling anyone; Steve could see the tension in the line of his shoulders and the darkness in his eye. "Think this is one thing you remember better than I do, Yuu," he said quietly.

"Is something wrong?" Steve asked worriedly, gaze flickering between the two exorcists.

"Yuu hates Neah," Lavi explained, after a glance at Kanda in which Kanda did not stop him. "Blames himself – the first time Neah came out, back when he was still hostile, it was his fault."

Not 'he thought it was his fault' – it was. Steve wondered about that, briefly, but then Kanda spoke.

"Thought I could make up for it by going with him, back then." Steve surmised that he meant when Allen had been driven out of the Order. "But then it didn't really get any better." Kanda swallowed, glaring a hole into the window. His voice was ridden with self-recrimination. "You can kill a man, you can spit on his grave, but you don't turn him into his worst nightmare. You don't."

Lavi nudged Kanda across Steve, grinning a grin that only looked slightly forced. "Guess that means you can't cut his hair, huh?" he joked lamely, forcing a smirk.

"I'll cut your hair, stupid rabbit," Kanda snapped back, glaring. Steve relaxed, smiling fondly at both of them and shaking his head.

They talked a bit for a while longer, passing the time. Kanda fell asleep, eventually, and Lavi shot Steve a grin and then started braiding the other boy's hair, while Steve shook his head in amusement.

"He's going to kill you, you know."

"He can try!"

17 Days to Invasion

There you go! That's another day passed, and Kanda's arrival, which I'd been getting inquiries about. By the way, I recently bought volumes 19-21 - that's the end of the Phantom Thief G thing, the Third Exorcist arc, and the Mystery of Kanda arc. So, basically everything I didn't have a good understanding of. (Obviously, I'm remedying that.) For one thing, I've just learned that apparently, Tsukikami is always around Timothy, so soon I'm gonna go back to last chapter and fix that. *grimace* My constant errors and near-constant efforts to remedy them aside (if you go back through this, you'll see that I've marked several chapters as having been edited), thanks for reading, and please review!