Again. I haven't updated for incredibly long. I'M SO SORRY! Thanks for the reviewers and favouriters and you, who's reading - special thanks to Exile Wrath for getting me back on track of writing. Oh, and while I'm at that, do check out this Yullen I've cowritten with Exile Wrath and fanimeLex, posted in Exile's account. It's called EncountErs. :D

The story should be self-explanatory. I will thus shut up.

DISCLAIMER: Don't own DGM.

When Allen first opens his eyes after his many hours of sleep, he yawns, looks at his clock and goes back to sleep; the clock reads 6.30am. In his laziness, he fails to notice a red, heart-shaped-ish door materializing from nowhere in the middle of his room.

When Allen opens his eyes again, maybe after another hour or so, he idly sits up in bed, and really OPENS HIS EYES, and finally discovers a notsouhmpleasant sight in his room.

Road and Lenalee are right there, seated on the floor, reading some weird manga by the name of Glamorous Lips, and nosebleeding.

The moment they notice Allen's awake, they jump up.

"Which do you prefer, chocolate or sweets?"

Answering by instinct, Allen immediately replies "Both."

"CHOOSE ONE!" they shout simultaneously, and the boy in bed gets shaken out of his drunken-like stupor.

"Uh, uh, uh," he stutters, racking his brains as he tries to come up with an answer. Frantically, he bites his lip. Then he comes to a realisation: technically, chocolates ARE sweets, right? So nervously, he replies,

"S-s-sww-swee-ts."

Instantly, Road's door appears, and they fling open the doors to disappear inside, leaving Allen to wonder what that was all about as he gets out of bed.

(the clock reads 6.45am.)

Kanda's at the training room, meditating (lusting over youknowwho) in his emo corner, when BAM! out comes Road's door, and BAM! he's sucked into it.

Tyki's wondering what will happen today, when he gets the topic of the day, when BAM! out comes Road's door, and BAM! he's sucked into it.

Lavi's mugging at the library, because of some stupid test Bookman's going to give him later on, when BAM! out comes Road's door, and BAM! he's sucked into it.

They appear in a pitch black room, with a lit fireplace somewhere in the front of the room, but the light doesn't aid them in sight; instead, it's just this weird, crackling fire in the middle of nowhere. The fire's all they can see.

Lero's voice comes over the speakers behind them, in a somewhat crackling form as well.

"Week 1 of the Fanfiction Competition. Your theme is Sweets."

Then, the fire in the fireplace ceases - and the fireplace opens to reveal a path of blinding bright light. But again, they still can't see each other, but keep walking in dumbstruck silence towards the light. It's a wonder none of them can speak.

The light's further away from them than they expected, and each can hear the other's breaths which comfort them because they know they're not alone. They keep walking. They don't talk. Maybe they can't? But the setting they're in is almost magical, it defies every law they can think of, and so they have to keep quiet. Something like that. They half-expect unicorns and rainbows to fly across that metre-long gap of light pouring in. Or something.

All of a sudden, the three boys feel their thoughts split from unity to their own, and they realise that they've been sharing thoughts.

Lavi realises that he doesn't seem to be getting any nearer to the light, and stands still on the floor, and realises that they're on separate treadmills going backwards.

And he finds his voice.

So do the other two, because all of a sudden he hears Kanda vulgaritying and Tyki threatening Road about all the things he can do with his butterflies, and Lavi decides to help the two poor guys.

"Uh, guys? Yuu-chan? Tyki-chan? We're on a treadmill. I don't think we're, uh, getting any closer to the light..."

AND THEN the treadmill changes direction and brings them TOWARDS the holy beam of light, and it starts increasing speed and gaining momentum, and WOAHWOAHWOAH is all the trio can think of, before

FOOOOOOOOM!

They're thrown OFF the threadmill, INTO the light and BACK doing what they were before entering the Door.

Allen's rather surprised at the turn-up of people at their cafeteria table that day - neither Allen nor Kanda nor Lenalee are there, and so he shares a kind of awkward lunch with Krory and Miranda because they're not as talkative as the others are (excluding Kanda).

When he's done, he decides to take a peep into each of their rooms, to see what's up and what they might be doing.

Lavi's room is first.

Hesitantly, Allen knocks on the door of the bedroom Lavi shares with Bookman, to see if he's inside. There's no answer, but Allen cracks open the door to take a little look, and finds it barren of living creatures except for micro organisms, which he can't see, but know it's there.

Then he goes to Kanda's room, and is about to knock, but feels Kanda's murderous aura in there. So he decides it's probably a wiser choice to keep the knuckles away from the door. He does hear a sound of furious scribbling, though.

When he gets within 10 metres of Lenalee's room, he already hears evil cackles, so he decides to back away as well.

Why are his friends so antisocial and unwelcoming today?

Tyki's not having a very good time with writing everything. In fact, he's gone to his most inspirational place in the Ark - the akuma factory - and he still can't get anything flowing out of his pen from his marvellous and brainy brain.

Sweets? What type of topic? Granted, it wasn't as bad as writing about... lions, for example, but still. The Noah was sure that Allen would never choose such a dumb topic like that. Allen'd probably choose something better, like Chocolate, or something like that. Sweets. Seriously. What to write about edible sugary stuff? Yuck! (Tyki was currently on a diet.) At least chocolate isn't that fattening. Not dark chocolate. And if the topic had been Chocolate, then he can write about Valentines Day, or something. People give more of chocolates rather than sweets for Valentine's. Right?

Even though he's trying really hard and desperately, he needs help. Proffesional help.

And so, with a sigh, he goes to his room, grabs his piggy bank (yes, it's a pig) and goes to look for Road. Besides, he just needs to pay once - if he wins this week's competition, and the weeks beyond, he gets free beta-reading service!

But of course, theoretically that's pretty impossible in the huge universe of the Ark and beyond, so with years of experience, he just says one word:

"Road."

And out appears the door, and out she appears!

"Seriously. I'm like some sort of fairy god-mother," Road grumbles as the doors open. "I was just in the middle of reading my new shipment of doujins, so you'd better make it quick."

Tyki takes a drag of his cigarette, and narrows his eyes into the sky. "I need help." His tone of voice indicates his reluctance in bending down to ask ROAD for help when he's the one tutoring her.

This is where Road's mouth curls into an evil smirk. "What for, dear Tyki?"

"...for the contest."

"Speak up~! I can't hear a thing~!"

"The contest! Okay?" Tyki's about to lose his cool pretty soon.

She smiles. "Gooood. I'll assume that you want the beta-reading service?"

"Yeah."

"Money up-front, please."

"How much?"

"As much as you think necessary! The more, the better our services."

"That sounded really wrong. Minimum price?"

"Because you're thinking wrong, baka-Tyki! Minimum price... No less than $60."

"Road, that is a LOT of money."

"And that's just the minimum! If you want a decent job done, that'll be at least $150."

Then Road adds the clincher:

"You love Allen, don't youuu~?"

That sells it. Tyki digs out $200 from his piggy bank, hands it over, and Road laughs as she pushes him into a door in the Ark.

Lenalee has her business plan all laid out and ready as she heads to the library. The moment she enters, she announces in a way that Lavi can hear,

"Wow, Kanda's story was amazing! I WONDER how Lavi's story is going to be?"

Lavi's not having a very good time with his story, and hearing that KANDA's doing better than him, he starts to get pretty nervous.

"So," Lenalee sweetly says as she reaches the future bookman's table, "How's your story coming along, Lavi-kun?"

"Ah... Great! Awesome! I've got it all planned out!"

"I took a course in psychology once, Lavi."

"Fine..." Lavi groans and rests his forehead in his palm. "Can't get anything really going. What's with the topic, anyways?"

She decides not to tell him that it was chosen by the person he's writing it for. "Would you like our helpful beta-reading services? We're always here to help, you know? At a fee."

It's now or never. "Fine! I'll have it!" he says in exasperation, all the excitement drained out of him. "Will $30 be enough?"

"$30? That's obviously too little. The minimum's $60! Or, if you want, $300 would provide you a very excellent service. The average is $150. But with $300, the quality of our help will be formidably raised!"

Lavi figures that a girl who uses such big words has got to be pretty good at what she's saying. And he DOES have enough money, after saving up for years. All he has to do is win the first competition, and get the free beta-reading service, and because of the free service he'll do well again, and it'll just keep spiraling upwards! Awesome!

"Okay then!" he cheers up a great deal. "I'll pay you now~!"

Lenalee knew that it was a good choice for choosing Lavi. "Sure! Thanks for being so easy to work with!"

After the transaction of money takes place, she sits down by Lavi, and they immediately start work on the writing.

There's an annoying umbrella with a pumpkin on top that's magically appeared in Kanda's room. Just when he was trying to get into the writing spirit!

"Lero! Lero!"

"GO AWAY, STUPID ANNOYING THING!"

"No, no, don't kill me..." Lero protests, as he starts sweating profusely. "I'm only here to ask if you need the beta-reading services!"

"Okay."

"What? Seriously? So soon?"

"But I'm paying $10 only."

"Lero... The minimum is $60..."

"Then $60."

"Huh? Huh?" By now, the umbrella feels like he's being drenched in perspiration. He never knew that convincing Kanda would be so easy. And he has a feeling that the murderous aura emitting from him is NOT something to be played with. "Uh, okay then, uh, Road-sama asked me to give you this..."

He passes over a notebook, and with a curt nod, Kanda opens it up, hands over the money, and Lero flees.

The last bit was very very rushed. Terribly sorry. But I figured I had to get it done today, instead of never. OTL

Hope you enjoyed that chapter~! I know that the fanfic's moving at a pretty slow pace, without much plot progression, but the next time I update it'll be announcing the results. Who's going to win? Review/PM me who you want to win xD Or who you think will win. I think it's kind of evident (I mean, look at the amount of money each person paid!), but I'll try to surprise you. :D

Thanks again for reading! See you next time~!