Allen had felt a vague feeling of doom for the entire hour before Kanda found him. He'd spent the several hours since leaving Lavi in a shroud of melancholy, which was something that was becoming increasingly familiar as the few days since his waking in the laboratory passed. Allen wouldn't go so far as to call himself depressed, but there were things about being alive again and being in his new home that weighed on him more than he thought they would.
Somewhere during those hours of aimless melancholy, Allen ended up in his rooms and an almost just as aimless feeling of dread settled on his shoulders. As if he were apprehensive about something that was going to happen, but he didn't know what that something was.
The feeling drove him a little crazy in the hour it took for that thing his instincts were worried about to happen, so much so that when the hour was up and his bedroom door was thrown open with force to reveal his demonic host in the doorway, Allen was almost relieved.
"Almost" being the operative word, there.
Even if their last interaction had been the breath of fresh air in their new relationship that Allen had needed to feel more comfortable with the other man, his host was still an intimidating figure. And if the way he attacked that Harpy in the forest and the way it reacted to him was any indication, there was a good reason for that.
The demon in question stepped into the room, his lengthy height on full display (whatever it may be). Allen watched with stiff shoulders, his tongue feeling equally so, as Kanda cast his cold blue eyes judgmentally around Allen's bedroom. The boy found himself desperately wanting to know what it was that the older man saw.
To Allen, the room looked incredibly large and while the colors seemed incredibly dour to him, it was still beautifully furnished. Ignoring those, the room felt lived-in but undeniably empty. Some books Allen took from the library were the only personal items in the room. He doesn't know if Kanda saw that or cared about it. . . . Was he disappointed?
The demon seemed to grow tired of looking around the room and turned his head to Allen, not even bothering to take in the boy's appearance. Instead, he just honed in on his face. Allen felt his body stiffen even more and how surprising it was that that was even possible!
The demon opened his thin lips, briefly showing off his sharp canines as he spoke. "How have your first few days here been?" He inquired, sounding mildly disinterested in the question even as he asked it.
"What?" Allen said at first. Then he jolted as his brain caught up to the statement and his response to it, hurrying to get a better response out before he angered his host. "Oh! It has been . . . fine, a lot to get used to."
The demon hummed in response. What that hum was supposed to mean, Allen couldn't even fathom, though not for lack of trying. "So you would say you've settled well, despite the attack earlier?" Allen might have thought he was imagining the mocking lilt to the words if it wasn't for the barest hint of a smirk that passed across the demon's face.
"Uh, yes! I would say that . . ." Allen said with wide eyes. I wonder where he's going with this, Allen wondered, though he needn't have.
"Since you've had time to settle, I think it is about time to let you know what I expect from you." The dark demon stated decisively.
A small lump formed in Allen's throat. What he expects from him? "What you expect from me?"
The demon took two swift steps towards the boy and Allen only stopped himself from stepping back through sheer force of will. Kanda was now standing less than a foot away and looming over him. He didn't even have that threatening of an expression on, it was mostly intensely blank!
"Were you told about why you were brought back?" The demon answered his question with another question. His blue eyes pierced into the younger boy like actual daggers.
"I . . . I was told I was to be yours. Your lover . . . or something." Allen muttered distractedly, hypnotized by those cerulean eyes. He still didn't know how to feel about that order, mostly because he didn't feel anything about it. Even as most of the numbness in his ability to feel things waved as time went on, he still felt numb regarding this.
It meant absolutely nothing to him.
Kanda's nose seemed to scrunch briefly at the mention of being a "lover", but he quickly straightened his features out again. "Quite. I let you become acclimated to your new life before requiring action from you, but that's over now. From this day onward, we will spend a few hours every day together." The demon ordered.
Allen peered at him curiously. "What will we be doing?" He dared to ask, tilting his head in curiosity.
The demon was quiet for a minute. "We will be doing things that human lovers do. I've watched them and we will emulate them." He seemed to think that was enough of an explanation. Allen didn't.
"But why?" Allen - perhaps unwisely - pressed. "Why are we going to be emulating humans? Why do you want a lover in the first place?" He couldn't help it, he wanted to know.
The demon tsked irritably, warning the younger boy off. "You don't need to know that, you just need to know what you're told to do. We will pick up tomorrow, any questions of importance?" The demon asked impatiently, as if he already wanted to leave.
This didn't make any sense to Allen, he really didn't get it. Why did the demon want a lover when he seemed to dislike sharing his company with anyone? Why did he find it so important to emulate humans? Why did he create Allen for this instead of finding himself another lover, perhaps another demon? He thought about how he wanted to say that . . .
"Would another demon not be better for this?" Allen tried to keep the hesitance out of his voice. Couldn't a demon understand Kanda better? He didn't even know the first thing about demons as a species, nevermind how to be a good lover to one!
This question actually made the demon pause. "No." He said finally, his voice quieter this time. "No, another demon would not be better." He finished.
There was . . . something . . . in his voice that made any other questions Allen might have had dry up in his throat. He wanted to ask . . . but he didn't. There was a solemnity there that even one as curious as Allen couldn't help but respect.
There was something he didn't know there that Kanda did.
The boy also couldn't help but be aware of a small - very small - burst of warmth that appeared in his chest at indirectly being told that he was better than Kanda's own kind. He didn't want to know where that came from, but he nonetheless knew it was there.
"If that is all." Kanda said suddenly. As if that were the only parting words he needed, the demon turned and quickly made his way to the door, reaching for and opening it before Allen properly had time to react.
"Wait!" Allen followed him hurriedly with smaller steps and called out right before Kanda left the room, suddenly needing to have his answer to something very badly. The question - the need - came to him almost as quickly and without warning as it had with Lavi.
And he was expecting the same response.
The demon responded by stopping and turning around to face the recovered human, a mild look of confusion on his dark features.
"I-Is who I was before . . . before all this - before I died - does it really not matter at all? Is it really something I should just forget? I know I don't remember any of it anyway, but . . ." Allen turned away here, feeling silly even as he forced himself to ask.
The words Lavi had said still rung in his head. That it didn't matter who he had been, just who he had to be now. It still felt stifling, claustrophobic. Like it was trying to crush who he had been with the weight of who he should be-
"I don't think so." The surprising words, spoken by his demonic companion.
Allen's eyes snapped to him in shock as he struggled to understand the words he didn't dare hope to hear. "What?" Allen could only barely manage to ask. Had he just . . . heard that? It must be a mistake.
"Did I stutter, Beansprout? I said that I didn't think so." The demon replied semi-irritably. Luckily for Allen's frazzled mind, he chose to elaborate. "I don't think who you were before is unimportant. It may be unimportant to myself, but your own past should be important for you. Even if you don't remember it, a person's past has a way of haunting you, following you where you go and arising at inopportune moments."
As if on cue from those unsettling words, Kanda's eyes got a faraway look in them before abruptly resettling on Allen with a startling intensity that actually caused the white haired boy to take a half step back. The demon continued as if he hadn't noticed.
Also, what did he just call him?
"If it bothers you that much, ask the vampire or find out yourself. Just don't let it distract you too much. Your primary attention should be learning to be a perfect lover to me and doing what I direct you. Remember what your main task is and there shouldn't be a problem." Having given his permission, the demon didn't say anything more and swirled out of the room with his usual demonic flair.
His footsteps were so light that Allen wouldn't have believed he was walking if the boy wasn't witnessing it. Only the sound of the door creaking signalled the older man's disappearance.
Allen just watched him go with a feeling of numbness. That couldn't have happened, right?
He'd dared to ask the question, but he hadn't dared to hope for a better answer than what he had gotten before. Certainly not what he'd just gotten.
Kanda, the irascible demon that is Kanda, just . . . he just encouraged him, didn't he? He told Allen what Lavi wouldn't, that it was okay to still care about your past no matter what and that he should look into it. Sure, the encouragement had a caveat to it that he shouldn't get too distracted, but he still said it!
Allen felt a wide smile tug onto his face as he stared at the door to his room.
Kanda . . . Kanda . . .
. . . he wasn't so bad, was he?
