Chapter II: Terror
"Lavi… Why are you betraying us?"
"Aren't we your friends?" The voices are growing louder, crowding his entire head. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly to avoid looking at the ugly mangled corpses of his friends as they drag their destroyed bodies toward him. He can still picture their lifeless eyes staring into his soul. He slashes out with the knife just as it appears in his hand out of nowhere. It connects solidly with a body. A loud shriek follows of the sick wet sound of metal slicing through muscle.
"Why are you leaving us?"
It's takes every fibre of his being not to reply to the never-ending questions and accusations. He keeps slashing, listening to the movement around him as his knees shake.
"Lavi...Lavi...Deak? Alex?"
Someone whispers quietly,"Who are you?"
Lavi doesn't grace them with a reply, snapping his eyes open long enough to figure out where he can run away to.
But the scene has changed. It's a place from his past, a busy market place in England that Lavi had been fond of. People brush him as if he isn't there. Only one person stands before him and acknowledges him with beady black eyes.
"Bookman…?"
"Disgrace!" The smaller man hisses. He points at Lavi, his metal tipped fingers shining. "You are nothing to the Bookman clan. Just a selfish child."
"Bookman, please, I can explain! I can change, I can-."
"No."
Lavi steps backwards as he recognizes the stance Bookman takes. "Please…" He begs.
"No. You can only die."
Lavi screams. If not for the multiple hands holding him down, he would've launched himself across the room.
He can barely make out Allen's face through his foggy vision."It's okay, Lavi, It was just a dream!"
But he can't calm down. Quick, shallow breaths are making him feel dizzy, but he's can't calm down. Until Yuu slaps him across the face. Hard.
"Owwwww!Yuu!" Lavi groans, voice a crackling mess. According to Bookman he always knew when Lavi was having a nightmare because he would shriek like a cat that was being gutted whilst alive. Apparently this is still the case.
The samurai is not as forgiving as Bookman is though."Shut. Up. You've been screaming and thrashing for the last half hour."
Lavi screws his eyes shut again, concentrating on breathing. He breathes in for seven counts and out for eleven, a trick he had been taught to use for meditating. "Sorry," he tells Kanda meekly. The redhead rolls onto his stomach and smashes his face into his pillow so his friends can't see him turn an embarrassing bright pink.
"Are you okay?" Allen asks gently. "You had us worried, we couldn't wake you up."
"Just a nightmare," Lavi mumbles into his pillow. "Sorry if I woke you up." Damn. His whole body is aching like a bitch. His arms are already turning purple from where Yuu and Allen had held him down and he feels like he just ran a marathon.
The nurse prods at his side. "I need to take your temperature," she says softly. "Can you turn over for me?"
Lavi grumbles but does as she asks.
Someone takes his hand delicately, as if afraid he might shatter. The redhead glances to the small dainty hand that holds his and follows the arm up to the shoulder and shoulder up to the face. Lenalee gives him a genuine smile- the first one he's seen from her in a very long time.
"There's nothing to be ashamed of Lavi," she tells him sweetly. "We all have bad dreams sometimes."
Lavi forces himself to smile wide. "Yeah… Thanks, Lena."
It's another twenty minutes before everyone finally leaves him alone, and another hour before the nurses stop staring at him with thermometers ready to strike. He still has a slight fever, and they're worried.
He waits patiently though, till everyone starts falling asleep again, and the nurses are occupied with Krory. Then he makes his escape. He bolts out of the infirmary, ignoring the shouts that trail after him. He runs in two large intricate loops until he loses the people that tried to catch him and stands with his hands on his knees in front of his bedroom door.
Lavi attempts to catch his breath as he sticks his key into the lock and turns.
Holy shit. Oh, how he had missed this dinky little room. He didn't decorate or keep trinkets or show any personal style but damn. He had missed the slightly musty smell, the wallpaper that peeled away in the top right corner above his bed.
For his first plan of action upon being free, he moves a chair up against the doorknob. Someone would come looking for him here eventually, but for now he just wanted to be able to take a shower in peace without nurses looking at him funny.
He digs through his drawers for clean comfortable clothing and chances upon a oversized green sweater that Bookman had given him for his birthday five years ago in secret. It was the only thing he had ever been given and the only present he was allowed to keep. Bookman must have planned on letting Lavi keep it, because he had grown a lot since he received it, and even now an extra two inches hang past his fingertips and the bottom goes nearly a foot below his waist. No matter what though, he treasures it.
He grabs that, forgoes boxers, and also takes a pair of sweatpants. Lavi quickly throws that into his tiny bathroom and the searches his laundry for the cleanest towel he has. He really needs to do laundry,
Upon finding a towel that doesn't smell too musty, he retreats to the bathroom.
Lavi didn't realize how badly his entire body was bruised until he had peeled his shirt off. His torso is a like a canvas that had three cans of purple and blue paint dumped on it without discretion. The worst of it is centered around his left shoulder and his chest. He couldn't even remember half the blows that were the cause of his pain.
As soon as he steps under the steaming hot spray he groans. The water felt amazing on his tired muscles. He can barely keep himself standing under the comfort of the warmth that washes away the grime and blood of one of the shittiest weeks of his life. He can only justify an hour of scrubbing before the water starts to go cold, so he sighs and gets out. He dries of halfheartedly and pulls his clean clothes on over still damp skin.
Lavi collapses on his bed, but he knows he isn't going to get any sleep.
*(*)*
Allen awakens to see a very displeased Bookman standing over him with narrowed eyes.
"Oh…" Allen says nervously. He yawns. "You need something?"
"Do you know where my idiot apprentice has run off to?"
Allen is confused and it shows. He sits up quickly, looking to the bed across from his. It's decidedly empty, the sheets thrown aside as if the person that had been under them was in a hurry to get away. "I don't know, I'm sorry. He had a really bad nightmare, woke everyone up with his screaming. He calmed down after a while and we all just went back to bed. I don't remember seeing him go."
If Allen didn't know better he'd say that Bookman almost looked concerned for his understudy.
He goes now to the nurses, and questions them.
The Head Nurse can only tell him what Allen already has. "We've got someone out there looking, but he isn't in immediate danger. He's completely stable. His fever is still there but it's very low."
"Besides Bookman, I think he just wanted a little space. If something bad happens he'd let us know." Allen smiles faintly, hoping that he's somewhat reassuring.
The smaller man just makes an unhappy sound and paces out of the infirmary. "If he's well enough to run off, he's well enough to do his duties as my apprentice."
There's only a small amount of places Lavi could be seeking refuge, and he isn't stupid enough to go somewhere public like the library or the mess hall. He would be an idiot if he went to his own room, but again, there aren't many places he can stay out of sight. Besides, no one would check the most ridiculously obvious place. Lavi must have been counting on that.
Bookman doesn't bother to knock. He just uses the extra key that Komui had given him, As soon as he tries to push the door open though, he's met with resistance.
"Go'way," Lavi murmurs weakly.
Bookman pushes the door a little harder, and it opens, albeit with a small struggle. He enters the room, surprised that he had so easily defeated the barricade. He frowns at the chair that had been used to keep him from getting in.
"Lavi, it's supposed to face the other way, so that the back of the chair is against the handle."
The redhead glances up from where he lay in bed. "Aw, fuck."
Book man chuckles quietly. The humor of the situation quickly diffuses when he's sees that state his apprentice his in.
Lavi's skin is flushed and he looks like he's sweating under the thick clothes he's got on, not to mention a quilt. He catches sight of the bruises that litter the boys arms and an ugly purple bruise that peeks out from under his sweatshirt.
"I just wanted some peace and quiet, Gramps. Can't I be left alone for five minutes?"
He must not be in that bad of shape if he's complaining. "I heard you had a nightmare earlier this evening."
Lavi throws an arm over his eyes, very done with this conversation already. "I have them all the time. How long have you known me?"
"Something is different. You are not yourself."
Lavi rolls one emerald eye at his teacher. "You're overreacting. I'm fine. I just needed a nice shower and my own bed. There's no reason for you to get your ponytail in a knot. I'm fine."
Bookman doesn't seem to accept this, but he gives in. He'll decide to trust his apprentice for a while longer with the hopes that things will resolve on their own. "Okay. If you say so, it must be. But if you're to be here then I suggest you take a minute to gather you archiving materials and head back to the infirmary. You have better things to do than loaf around. Your five minutes of peace and quiet is over"
Lavi grins his best shit-eating grin. "Will do, Gramps."
Bookman leaves after threatening to chase him down if he isn't upstairs in exactly five minutes, but as soon as he's out of the door, Lavi falls back into bed.
It keeps replaying in his head like a chant. Like something those nightmarish visions would say to him over and over until he took his life.
"Something is different. You are not yourself."
Lavi stares at the ceiling and it stares back him blankly. "How should I act if I don't know who I am?"
For once, he's glad that a voice doesn't reply.
:::
A/N sorry about any typos. its late and i work tomorrow. I'll iron it out tomorrow evening! Anyway thanks for reading, and a big thank you to those of you that reviewed, faved, or followed. thanks! please review some more so i know what to fix!~!