Chapter is a hair longer than it was supposed to be. And some stuff happened I wasn't counting on. And it took longer than I wanted. And I didn't get done with TWTS. But… meh. I guess you can't have it all. I work ten days in a row between this and next week, so don't expect me to crap out another chapter just yet. ^^;

Comp crashes make reviews vanish. I got to the ones I could find in my inbox still. Sorry about that. D:

Warnings: Yaoi. Sex. Hints of pairings besides Lucky. A little violence? Slight OOC on Allen's part? Sorta?

Disclaimer: I own not D. Gray – Man. If own I did, Allen a serious brat would be.

-- -- --

Chapter Eleven: Connect the Space Between

Allen had managed to wrench a few things out of Kanda, but the processes of getting the older man to talk reminded him a lot of pulling teeth. If everything that Kanda told him over dinner was true, the British boy could only guess, but most of it seemed true enough, from the story of how he and Lavi had begun to talk to how Kanda had come to realize that he might actually miss the idiot. It was all rather endearing. The only thing that didn't quite mix was the liar's tick in the swordsman's right eyebrow. Allen knew what it was. Too many games of poker had honed his eyes so sharp he could call any bluff.

But he didn't call Kanda's. That was the idea of trust.

Instead, when dinner had finished and the two of them returned to the room, he watched the Japanese boy go about his nightly routine with just a bit of interest and, when he saw that they were both completely prepared, placed himself between the unarmed swordsman and his bed. It had been a whim that first time – an act that hurt more than it should have, but he had needed to do it. Now, if Kanda turned him down, he would mope off into his own bed and pout despite his age, just because that was irritating and irritating things brought the swordsman to action.

Kanda cocked an eyebrow at him, rolled his eyes, sighed, and finally smirked. "I'm not sleeping next to you no matter how afraid you are of the dark."

Allen narrowed his eyes and held out his arms, presenting the cleanest opening to his chest since the moment he had thrown himself at the swordsman.

"Fuck you."

"Just one!" Allen took a step forward, and found it only half-amusing that Kanda took a matching step back. "I swear, I won't bother you until the next time we have to share a—" The hand that extended in his direction didn't claw his face like he thought it might have, nor did it gather his shirt and throw him away. Instead, it tangled in the back of his hair and yanked him forward until his chest touched Kanda's and his back bent in the direction of the force pulling on his hair. A rush of warmth and panic filled his chest before he froze, unable to bring his arms up or demand a verbal response.

Kanda's face was very close, his dark eyes nearly the only thing Allen could see. It shouldn't have been that frightening. "You're so caught up in trying to make me share my feelings with you, but you haven't thought one bit about what that might mean talking about, have you?" Kanda's voice was a very dangerous whisper, cold and breathy, the exact opposite of his body so close to Allen's. "You think Lavi hugs me, runs, and I chase him so I can gut him? You think that's it? It's that simple for me to be close to people and that's as far as it goes?" He almost laughed to himself, but the sound came out like a scoff instead.

"Kanda—"

"Che. There's a lot more, Bean Sprout. Care for an example?"

No, Allen thought without saying it. Because you don't really trust me.

Their faces touched.

That was the only way he could describe it, because Kanda did not kiss people, he did not kiss people, and he would not kiss Kanda if he did. Allen could feel that the swordsman's lips were smooth and soft despite the cold, that he parted them to press at the British boy's mouth with his tongue, that the whole ordeal was wet and would have been better if he had any idea what he was doing. It wasn't unpleasant, but it was Kanda. The guy didn't do anything with a lover's touch.

When the contact broke, Allen found himself just as speechless as he had been the moment before it started.

"Think about that the next time you want me to tell you why I'm missing him."

-- -- --

Lavi stayed just one night in the Kamelot house, but it was a night he would never forget as long as he lived. He slept wound in Tyki's arms, safe and sound, and dreamed of hammers and lightning, fire and brimstone, blood and machinery. But there was nothing to see. There was no color or light, no shapes or faces. There was scent and sound and feeling, but not once did he see the things he dreamed of. When he woke, clinging to Tyki for fear that the rush of acrid smelling bullets falling from his nightmare sky would strike him and send him tumbling into the sea bellow, it occurred to him that he hadn't seen anything at all. Not even the stars.

It frightened him more than anything he had ever known.

When Tyki climbed out of bed a few hours after the end of the dream, Lavi went with him, taking all of that fear of that sightless dream and shoving it into the very back of his mind. He didn't tell anyone about it, not even the man who half-carried him down to breakfast, but the memory lingered until, in a flurry of housecoat, Road greeted him with a hug that nearly crushed very bone in his ribcage.

She seemed genuinely glad to see him. He let that brighten his mood a little, and stood rather crookedly on his left foot while he touched her hair and traced her features, trying to build a face to go with the extremely excited quality of her voice.

She had large eyes and a tall forehead, a wide mouth, a short, slightly-upturned nose. Maybe she was a very short, very childish thirteen-year-old. It was hard to tell.

"We're having eggs Benedict," Road told him, taking the hand he wasn't using to hold himself steady. "And jam on toast. I bet Uncle Tyki has been feeding you stale bread and day old coffee grounds, so this will be a nice change, hm?"

Lavi couldn't help but smile at her. The change in her attitude, however sudden, was a welcome one. If she would welcome him, maybe the others would follow. "I taught him how to fry eggs, actually, though he still overcooks them." He tilted his head in Tyki's direction, grinning a little lopsidedly, and allowed Road to pull him a step forward. "Not that I mind."

Road hummed. "Uncle Lavi can cook then?"

Tyki choked on air.

This time, Lavi knew exactly why Tyki's lungs had decided to rebel. It made the boy grin. The gentle press of the Portuguese man's hand in his, paired with the memories of what had happened in the bathtub before they came, made it that much better. Maybe it wasn't love yet, but it was like, for sure. And it was just too cute for the older man not to know how to handle someone else taking notice.

"What's the matter, Darling? Swallowed your tongue?"

"Lavi—"

Road cut him off with a laugh, tugging at Lavi's hand. "Breakfast! Blushing can wait!"

-- -- --

Allen didn't sleep very much that night, too busy running ideas around in his head. When he did sleep, he dreamt of Kanda in ways he had never imagined, and woke aching and blushing and hating himself. It had been a stupid kiss meant to show how much he didn't know. It had been an example of all the things he could never know unless he was told. Did Kanda kiss Lavi? Allen didn't know. And he wouldn't. Not unless Kanda talked.

The thought made Allen a little uncomfortable. And that discomfort had nothing to do with his awkward dreams and strange thoughts.

Even after an icy cold shower and a lot of avoiding looking at Kanda, those thoughts followed the white-haired teen down stairs to breakfast and held tight to stomach while he ate. Because no matter how mean Kanda was, that was only Allen's second kiss. And it hadn't been that awful, not when he thought about—but he would not think about it. He was not Cross. And Kanda had not meant it in any way, shape, or form. Not for Allen.

"Che." Kanda intoned from across the table, finishing his bowl of… whatever he ate when soba wasn't available. "Did you eat too much at dinner, brat?"

"No…" Allen answered softly, noting that he hadn't yet made it through his third plate. Timcampy was munching along, however, happy as could be. "It's just hard to eat when I'm thinking about what you did last night."

Kanda's spoon went down again before it came up toward his mouth – and his lips – and Allen had to look away from it. "The idiot sprout doesn't have an iron cast stomach after all?" There might have been an emphatic roll of the swordsman's eyes.

The British boy shook his head. "It's not like that. I just…" He was blushing, he could feel it. What would Lou Fa do if she saw him now, turning pink over a guy? Not that it mattered. She tried much too hard anyway. Allen began to push his fork into his eggs in the effort to bring them toward his gullet. "It was nice, that's all. Wet, but nice."

"Unless you want to be eating the rest of your meal through of your Innocence, you need to explain what the fuck you are talking about."

Allen looked up then, at Kanda's dark eyes and his long hair, at the harsh angles and the determined line of those dark, elegant eyebrows. He wasn't Cross, no, but he couldn't deny that he wanted to lean up and try that face brushing thing again, that the thought didn't twist his gut and choke him. It didn't matter if Lavi had done that to Kanda, nor did it matter that Kanda was looking at him with eyes as cold and icy as glaciers. The soft firelight and the color of the swordsman's skin… those things carried so much more weight, now.

"You kissed me, Kanda," Allen said slowly and evenly. "You wanted me to see that there are things I don't know about you that I might be uncomfortable with, and even though that's thoughtful, I think I really rather liked—"

Kanda's spoon went clattering against his bowl, abandoned. "If you finish that sentence, I will—"

"How it felt. And now… when I look at you…"

"No wonder you were moaning…" Kanda did something awkward with his shoulders, shrinking into himself. His expression, usually so very angry and cold, shriveled into something like disgust. Even so, he looked just as elegant as he had a moment ago. Maybe even more so, because the line between his eyebrows had smoothed.

Allen felt his face drop. "Moaning?"

"In your sleep, Bean Sprout." Kanda shuddered. "Either I was dying and you were wounded, or you were dreaming that I was—"

"Don't flatter yourself." Allen lied in a growl, stabbing a pieces of sausage with his already egg covered fork. They were going to be cold by the time he got them to his mouth, he was sure. "Because you did that, I'm thinking about it now, I did not dream about you. Egotist. That's just…" The white-haired teen put the fork in his hash browns rather violently. "Ew. And every time I look at you…"

"Then don't look at me. Or talk about it. It never happened."

"Well, fine by me."

The table fell into awkward silence.

Allen tried to eat his cold meal with his sweaty fork while Kanda tried not to look at him. For the remainder of the British boy's plate, they sat in silence, not looking at each other. But Allen didn't like silence. He didn't like it at all. He wanted to fill up the space between them with something besides awkwardness and glares, if he could help it. But there wasn't really a way to do that that he could think of. Not without making it painfully obvious that he was trying. There was only one thing he could think of, and it was bound to get him killed in only a moment.

"Kanda," Allen didn't look up from his plate. Instead, he reached for his orange juice and drained the cup. "I know that you don't like me, and that's fine. I'll stop trying to get you talk if you want me to." He looked up then and tried to ignore the fact that Kanda was pretty when he was surprised, even if he look more like a turtle than he did like a woman. "Just… I'm here, okay? Even if the things you have to say are as shocking at the kiss, alright?"

For a moment, Kanda just stared at him.

The British boy pushed himself up and leaned enough to press his lips to the swordsman's.

It was sweet and short, nothing like the one from the night before. He didn't try to involve his tongue at all, or coax Kanda into responding, he just pressed close and the pulled away, watching Kanda's eyes linger on his lips for a half a moment.

The swordsman's confusion only lasted a moment and then he was glaring daggers again, hiding whatever other emotion had flickered behind his dark eyes. "I get it, brat. Stop repeating yourself all the Goddamn time!" He pushed himself up rather violently and his chair shrieked against the floor. "I'm done. Let's get to the hospital already."

Allen couldn't help but smile a little. "Alright, Kanda."

-- -- --

Breakfast was as uneventful as a meal could be. Lulu left early, Trisha felt ill, and the Earl was called away to meet a broker in northern France. Thus the four of them, Sheryl, Road, Lavi, and himself, had eggs and muffins and talked about the weather and other pleasant things, as simple and human as any other family for seven towns.

Just the thought of it made Tyki's blood boil.

It was true that some violence was enough for him. Killing the boy in the alleyway had been more than enough to sate him, but what he had done to the Asian fellow with the sword was insufficient. He wanted more. He needed more. There were still seven akuma at his disposal – a level four, two threes, two twos, and two ones, and he knew exactly what he wanted to do with at least two of them. The others… if the Exorcists showed their faces in Carrickmines so quickly, he would be shocked. They were still twenty kilometers off the mark, the last he had checked, and with any luck they would remain so.

Knowing Allen Walker, however…

Tyki didn't finish his food. He was too busy thinking of blood and death and Lavi, and how the three of them couldn't have been any more connected than they were.

It was dumb luck that the boy fell asleep on the sofa while he and his niece discussed the darker aspects of family life. The Exorcist was still worn-out from his dreams, his thoughts, and walking, and he shivered in the spring chill, but didn't wake even when Tyki wrapped him in a coat and hefted him from his resting place. It was a blessing. As large as Lavi was, Tyki hardly found him to be a burden at all. And they would arrive home walking through the Ark that way faster than they would with Lavi limping.

By noon, the Noah brought the redhead back to the little house in Ireland, still swathed in his coat, making little sleepy sounds. It was a moment of pure, unrestrained laziness that made Tyki curl up beside him and wrap an arm around the boy's waist. Despite his wish for violence and his plans for his remaining henchmen, he wanted – for the moment – to lay himself down and simply listen to slow, gentle rhythm of Lavi's breathing.

Outside, it began to rain.

Tyki didn't get up to draw the curtains closed or kindle a fire. He held his coat and the Exorcist wrapped in it close enough to feel Lavi's heat. That would be enough.

"Are we home?" The question was little more than a cracked breath of air against the bedding, because Lavi did not turn to look at him.

"Yes. We're home."

Lavi nodded, mussing his hair, and gathered the material of the Noah's coat more firmly around his shoulders. He looked prepared to sleep again, but at the same time he didn't. His face, and the band of linen that blocked out his eyes, didn't relax the way it usually did – indeed, the apprentice Bookman fought to roll over after a moment. When he had himself facing Tyki, he reached out and touched the older man with lingering fingers, gathering the material of his shirt.

"Good."

Resisting the urge to do something violent was simple for Tyki, but it never crossed his mind to stop himself from kissing the redhead in his arms. He simply did it without thinking, deep and hard, all of Road's suggestive phrases and all of Sheryl's suggestive looks pushed out of his mind. What did Love and Dreams care what Pleasure did? Love and Pleasure were brothers, true, but it was none of Sheryl's business if Tyki wanted Lavi and not someone else at the moment.

The apprentice Bookman began to pick at the button's of Tyki's shirt, completely indifferent to the fact that he was still wearing a coat himself. Tyki let him.

"You know, it doesn't take a blind man to see that you're not thinking about what we're about to do, but…" Lavi mumbled, and pulled Tyki's shirt from his trousers. "After dinner and breakfast and nightmares, I just want…"

'I just want…' The words made a little sense to Tyki.

He slipped a hand beneath the fabric of the jacket Lavi wore and rolled until his weight pressed the boy into the maroon duvet and the mattress. The wooden bed frame groaned a little, but neither of them seemed to mind. It was a natural response, echoed softly on Lavi's lips. The older man gathered the fabric of Lavi's borrowed white button-up before he sank down take the boy in another kiss, the same as before, demanding, slow. What would the others do if they saw the passion behind that? He wasn't Passion. He was Pleasure. He did things with lazy determination in a way that he would find personally satisfying.

This didn't add up.

Every sound Lavi made, every touch of his fingers on scared skin, every beat of his heart – Tyki wanted to make the younger man feel. It wasn't a self satisfying thought. He wanted, somehow, to make the redhead beneath him suffer as much pleasure as he could.

And Tyki wanted to hurt something while he did it.

His hand pulled the shirt upward before flattening on Lavi's chest. The boy withdrew a bit, breathing deeply while his fingers followed the ridges of Tyki's ribcage and parted the curtain of the Noah's shirt to either side. Without pause, Tyki shrugged off the garment, letting the rumpled white fabric gather around his elbows before he dropped it behind him indifferently.

"I'm wearing too much."

Tyki smiled at the words, and sat back a bit, putting a knee between Lavi's and removing a bit of his weight. "Take something off. I'd rather not accidentally pull out your liver aiming for your shirt."

Lavi lurched backward, fighting with the thick wool of the Portuguese man's coat. He might have been smiling or grimacing by the look on his face, crooked, showing his teeth. The strangled laugh that opened his mouth a little wider marked it as the former, but the rouge to his cheeks could have gone either way. "Your God given powers get faulty when it most matters? That must be a problem sometimes." He pulled his arms free before returning his hands to the surface of Tyki's chest. "But… right now…"

"You would rather be close quickly than sensual?"

"No, I just wanna have you. Because even if I don't really like the family, I like you."

"I'm flattered." Tyki chuckled, and pressed his mouth to the curve of Lavi's throat for only a moment before he mumbled against it, softly. "The family? What's with the articulate?"

"It's an article. And it's not like I have a family. So yours is the family."

Tyki nodded a little against Lavi's skin. "I see." Really he didn't, but it didn't seem important. The golden flesh against his lips, however, did. His kisses, which were short and warm, increased in speed with every inch that he covered, moving down the line of the boy's neck to his collarbone, which he breathed against for a moment indecisively. One of the hands on his chest came to his right nipple and rubbed it experimentally, goading him on.

Lavi made a weak sort of sound the moment teeth touched his skin.

Tyki knew that he would leave a bruise. Tyki also knew that Lavi wouldn't care even if he could see it.

It only took a few seconds for the mark to be made, then he slid downward, over the bunched fabric of the shirt Lavi wore, until he could lay his lips on the trembling flesh of the boy's chest. The pink scars were fading toward white on Lavi's ribcage, hardly of note, and the Noah closed his eyes to them. It didn't matter what blemishes there were on Lavi's skin when he had made them. They might all have been claims like the one on the redhead's collarbone. Claims that, in the room's unlit state, stood out in stark comparison to the purpling bruise by the line of Lavi's throat.

Tyki couldn't see any of it with his eyes closed. He could only follow the curve of Lavi's body with his mouth. He laid open kisses down the right side of the boy's ribcage, then painted a line to his navel, dragging his tongue in slow lines as he descended. In the end, it was an awkward position to be in, what with how the bed ended not too far away, but he managed rather well. The hand that pushed him lower was enough for him to be sure of that.

Lavi's fingers curved gently in the Noah's hair, a distinct contrast to the shake in his voice when he spoke. "Will you let me?"

The Noah looked up at the flushed pink of Lavi's cheeks and the soft, pouting quality to the boy's mouth. Yes, he would let him. Tyki would let him live, let him speak, let him walk and hear and see if he could, if only Lavi would touch the sides of his face with those trembling fingers.

"Can you? Even though you can't see?"

"Yes." Lavi nodded, and his fingers clamped a little in Tyki's hair before trailing to the shells of his ears. "Even if you don't let me finish and instead we… you know, I'd still get to taste you. And I'd know…" A drastic blush took his face, innocent in a way that Tyki couldn't even think to describe. "Your dimensions better…"

With a soft laugh, the Noah licked and kissed his way back to the boy's face, which he smiled at regardless of the cloth that still blocked Lavi's eyes. He touched the redhead's inner thigh and watched Lavi arch at the touch, a narrow breath sucked between his teeth. "Something tells me that if I let you, this whole day will be devoted to surviving the rain on body heat alone."

Lavi shivered. The hand on his thigh moved a little, starting a slow, stroking rhythm. "You can talk me out of it… but we might still spend the whole day surviving the rain…"

Tyki could not resist the little smirk that Lavi offered him and moved forward, kissing and pulling at the shirt Lavi still wore in an effort to be rid of it. Under his fingers, unhindered by the hands the redhead tangled in the Portuguese man's hair, the fabric was first parted and then cast aside indifferently, landing on the floor in a rumpled heap. Warm arms wound around Tyki's neck and pulled him down again the moment he meant to withdraw from the kiss, and started another, deeper than the last. His right hand continued to move against Lavi's left thigh all the while.

And under his hand, Lavi's hips lifted in invitation.

"Talked out of it." The boy gasped against Tyki's mouth. "Very persuaded."

Tyki smiled into the next brush of lips. He pushed below the line of Lavi's pants to continue the rhythm he had establish against the heated skin he found there, caressing with the tips of his fingers. Lavi's arms tightened again, and Tyki cupped the boy intimately in response, squeezing with gentle fingers.

That heated flesh, Lavi's willingness – it was almost enough to keep him from thinking of boy-whores and Akuma. Almost.

"Lavi," it was a bit hard to form the name when the apprentice Bookman was reaching for his pants. "As much as I understand wanting, I don't understand why you want… me after everything you've remembered. You must know that those people, the names and faces, I have hurt them. And you will remember eventually, and when that happens—"

"You said I was neutral before Nyoibo." Lavi cut him off in a voice that was a bit like a growl. "So we can just see what happens when the time comes, alright? Right now, I want you. Can't that be enough?"

Tyki let his hands wander to the redhead's hips and pull them into him, bending the apprentice Bookman away from the mattress with the motion. It wasn't as good as it would be with skin, but the contact drove the boy's knees into the Noah's ribcage and hitched the breath in Tyki's throat. It would be enough. Living moment to moment had always had a distinct flavor to it that he enjoyed, and this could be just another of those moments, even if he wanted it to last forever. Now, with Lavi rocking so the bandage around his face was bound to fall away, there was no time at all to wonder.

"Yes," Tyki hissed, bending his neck to align his mouth with Lavi's ear. "It is enough."

"Then fuck me so that I won't give a damn who you are."

The Noah of Pleasure felt himself smile.

With a hand that went through the nightstand with little more than a thought, Tyki reached out for the jar of petroleum jelly he had since invested in since corrupting the only bottle of olive oil in the house. He found it rather easily and drew it through the wood, then placed it on the bed beside him.

"Pants," he said simply.

Lavi nodded. "Help so I don't screw up my ankle?"

Tyki took a gentle hold of the fabric around Lavi's waist and pulled it down the boy's body, over his narrow hips with little more than a thought about the button. Normally it was harder than that in these situations, but now…

The Noah continued to try and push away the offending garment while he pressed his mouth into the newly exposed skin, taking care to watch where he touched most strongly. "Lift," he growled against the very lowest part of Lavi stomach, and dragged the material away in the split second that Lavi followed his instruction. From there the work was a bit more delicate – the right pant leg tried to catch on the thick parts of Lavi's wood-and-gauze cast – and Tyki had to slow, dragging the fabric back with tender fingers.

He used it as an excuse to breathe warm air against Lavi's right thigh.

"Take yours off, too." Lavi commanded softly, fumbling to catch Tyki and pull him up the moment his pants were discarded. "And just so you know, when my ankle is better, we're totally doing this with you taking my role. Curiosity, you understand?"

Tyki laughed softly and he pushed himself up again, leaning over the Exorcist while he worked at his own pants. "Well, by the sound of things, you've done it that way before and don't remember. And I don't have much choice in the matter." He picked up the container of petroleum with his left hand and pressed his right to Lavi's stomach; a hand came to rest on his chest while another stayed curved softly behind his neck, keeping him close. From that angle, with Lavi's knees lifted around his hips, he could see every crinkle in the falling linen around the redhead's eyes.

"I know how it works," Lavi mumbled, blushing. "But I don't know what it feels like. It's like… trees. I know how they are, but—oh…" The apprentice Bookman tensed at touch on his stomach sliding lower. "I don't remember… what bark… feels like…"

"Would you like me to do what I did before? With your hand?" The Noah whispered, fingering the container of lubricant and ignoring the throbbing in his gut. He let his eyes wander down the line of Lavi's neck to his shoulders to his chest and up again, frowning softly. They were healthier than they had been when the boy had first recovered from his fall, though they lacked the muscle tone he might have expected on an Exorcist. Tyki could watch the tendons dance under Lavi's skin when Lavi shook his head.

"I wanna touch you this time. Just warn me."

Tyki let his right hand come up from the boy's flesh and opened the jar, never letting his eyes waver from the pouting turn of Lavi's lips. "Have I told you that you might be the strangest person I've ever met?"

Lavi shrugged a little, smilingly. "Maybe. Why?"

"Because," Tyki dipped his fingers into the jar and coated them before putting it on the nightstand, "I believe it is something that you should know." He moved his hand between them and bent close once more, catching the boy's lip in his teeth for a brief moment before he spoke. "Now, Lavi…"

The redhead hummed a response. The hand he had on Tyki's neck pulled softly downward.

With slow, gentle strokes, and thoughtful multitasking, the Noah moved his fingers in a teasing circle the same as he pressed his mouth to Lavi's. It didn't surprise him that the boy gasped and arched into him, nor did it shock him when fingernails grazed his back almost painfully, a word of desire burning on Lavi's lips.

He wanted it, too.

At the first press of a finger inside of him, Lavi hissed and tilted his head back, a motion that finally loosened the bandage on his face to the point that it slithered down and gathered by his throat. Not that it mattered, the boy's eyes were squeezed shut with determined force. "I wish… God, I wish…"

Tyki felt his face take on a slightly pained expression. He knew what Lavi wanted. "I'm sorry." His finger pressed farther inward and he leaned closer, speaking to the turn of the redhead's jaw. "But you and I are—"

Lavi arched into the Noah, bending in a way that stole the breath right from the older man's lungs. "I don't blame you. I just want to see."

"Lavi," Tyki pressed a second fingertip beside the first, desire and heat and emotion too powerful for him to resist for a moment. Part of him wanted to apologize again, take the time to truly pleasure the body beneath him – the rest… "When was the last time you opened your eyes?"

"A day or two ago." The redhead answered softly. "Why?"

Tyki looked from one eyelid to the other, knowing, dreading, thinking that it might be a mistake to call them open. But he had to. Lavi wanted to see him and Tyki couldn't say that he didn't want to be seen. And if the boy remembered, if the apprentice Bookman recanted every nice thing he had said and every tender touch, perhaps they could both end the night bloodied and satisfied. "Keep them that way if you don't think you will see."

"Ty—" At the accidental shift of the Portuguese man's hand, Lavi choked on the name and his eyelids, fluttering with the dark red of his eyelashes, opened, his mouth formed into a gasping circle. For a split second his emerald-and-jade eyes turned at nothing – they only opened and then shut again while his hips lifted into Tyki's hand – and then they were blinking at the ceiling, watering slightly. The pupils matched, Tyki noted, even if the irises were still different.

Out of worry the Noah slowed the movement of his fingers, letting them come together in case the redhead called a halt to their progress. If something hurt, or if something went wrong…

Slowly, Lavi tilted his head down and let his gaze fall to the man between his knees.

His eyes widened. His hips paused.

"Tyki!?"

Tyki blinked, eyebrows furrowed. "I'm sorry?"

Lavi shook his head, shaking, blushing, unsteady and uncertain. He closed his eyes again for a moment before he opened them, focused – truly focused – on Tyki's lips. "T-Tyki Mikk?" His voice was small. His face was a shade of red that clashed horribly with his hair and increased the contrast between his slightly mismatched eyes.

The Noah worried for a fraction of a second that his face was enough to bring everything back. He pushed the idea aside, frowning softly. "What is it, Lavi?"

"Holy fuck." The redhead shifted, which in turn moved Tyki's hand, and his eyes shot from the Portuguese man's face to arm and back again. The boy was terribly flustered, a state that was made more obvious by the color still rising in his face and neck. Tyki had never known anyone with the ability to blush with their whole body, but he thought Lavi might have done it in that single moment. "You're so… you're… and your nose…"

Tyki felt his face starting to fall.

"I can see you. And God, you're so… can you – I mean, I'd really like to just look at you but I'm… and you're… hand…" Lavi looked so helpless with his fingers fumbling with Tyki's hair and his eyes darting from one place on Tyki's body to another, so very lost with what to do with himself. The Exorcist had never seemed innocent or pure, not since his first words of innuendo, but now he might have been a blushing virgin without the slightest clue what he was doing.

"Breathe, Lavi. We've done this before. Are you…" The Noah struggled with a way to word what he meant to say for a moment, and finally moved his fingers wider. "Do you remember anything?"

The apprentice Bookman shook his head without taking his eyes from Tyki's face. "No. Nothing. Not important. You… oh, it'll be you…" Lavi tilted his hips and tightened his hold on the back of Tyki's neck. "Would you move your Goddamn hand before I have to do this alone?"

"Ah, I had thought for a moment that you had forgotten what we were about, Lavi." Tyki lied smoothly. His fingers, still slick and buried almost as far as he could press them, began to move again, scissoring with gentle motions.

"You know what, forget the hand, I'm prepared enough. I know how to relax."

"Lavi…"

"I'll lube you myself if I have to!"

Tyki blinked for a moment before removing his right hand from its place and taking the jar once more in his left, glad that he had left it open. He scooped a liberal amount into his hand and then spread the cool gel down the aching length of his erection, moaning softly at the temperature, at the contact on his neglected flesh. It didn't surprise him in the slightest when Lavi's hand joined his, nor did it seem to surprise Lavi when Tyki let out a second breath, slow and warm. There was fire in his gut and those fingers, and the eyes that drank the Noah in with every passing second, drew that fire outward, filling his chest and his hands and his loins. With a sound that might have been a growl and a hand that was slightly less than gentle in Lavi's hair, he leaned to take the redhead in a kiss that made the fingers wrapped around his length squeeze slightly.

His tongue touched Lavi's. The hand against him slid to his hip and Lavi bucked into him, a startled, pleading word in his throat.

The Noah pulled the boy up by the hips and pressed himself down and forward, all too aware of the hand sticking in his hair and the mouth sharing his air, the legs that wrapped around him, the groan that escaped him. If there was one thing he thought of this Exorcist at the moment, it was that he might lose himself in indulgences if they continued as they were. If Lavi continued to open himself up and pull Tyki in, drowning him in sensations.

He hoped that he knew the boy's body well enough to ease them together without much of an issue. He prayed that Lavi still had his eyes open, regardless of how close they had become.

The tightness of Lavi's body, coupled with his hands on the Portuguese man's skin, were enough encouragement and reassurance for Tyki to move slowly and consistently. He tilted until he was sheathed within the body beneath him, his sweat-slicked chest pressed to Lavi's, and then waited. The puff of air on his shoulder was enough to tell him that even if the apprentice Bookman wasn't saying so, there needed to be a moment of adjustment.

"Tyki?"

The older man shifted until he could look down at Lavi, and blinked at the mismatched eyes that looked up at him. "Lavi?"

Lavi looked first at the Noah's face and then his chest, and his hands moved to play along the scars that were still there for Lavi to see. Tyki didn't respond to the touch. He waited.

"You're so… God, don't take this the wrong way, but I had no idea you were this good looking. My mental image was so off…" Lavi shook his head, once again not letting his gaze leave the man above him. "I just wanted to tell you that I am by no means disappointed. Now please, move before I make you."

Tyki grinned a little before he complied, and touched the side of Lavi's face with his dry hand. "I trust you feel fine then?"

Lavi smirked at him, two-eyed and suavely. "A little sexually frustrated."

That was close enough.

The Noah eased his hips back and then forward, only to be met by a jerk of Lavi's pelvis that was both wonderful and frightening at once. It quickened his idea on rhythm rather suddenly and he threw himself into the next motion. One of Lavi's hands moved to fist in his hair again, cleaner than the one previous.

"More," Lavi whispered, and dragged himself up to take Tyki's right ear into his mouth and gently nibble it, delicate and sweetly painful with every tender brush of his teeth. "I don't know about you…I could go faster…"

Tyki chuckled darkly and brought his hips forward slightly faster, slightly harder, relishing the little tremor the motion caused in Lavi's frame and how it echoed up his own spine. The slick muscle wrapped around him and the quick panting of breath on his neck were enough make him jerk a little sooner than he had meant to, fire in his gut and his chest. Lavi was terribly close to him. Lavi was looking at him, feeling him, moving to meet him. Tyki couldn't imagine anything more intimate than the touch of fingertips on his scarred back and the thought did not frighten him. He wanted it. He wanted, somehow, to forget the bloodlust in the well of desire he found in the redheaded Exorcist's body and indulge the pit of yearning gathered in his abdomen.

Lavi's tongue caught the side of Tyki's throat and the Noah shivered, gasping at the sensation. The heat had spread to his arms and face, warming him to the point he thought he might burst into flame if not for the cool air around him. And, somehow, Lavi felt hotter. The apprentice Bookman might have been filled with something liquid and molten, like magma burning just under his skin.

They did not take note of Lavi's ankle this time, but the boy did not complain about it. He seemed far too busy bucking into Tyki's hips and whispering words in myriad languages, too distracted to find the ones that might have encouraged the Noah.

When Tyki heard himself ask permission increase their tempo in Portuguese, he almost laughed. When Lavi answered in the affirmative in the same language, he almost stopped. They did not fall away, however. Tyki fisted one hand against the mattress while the other helped Lavi's hips rise to meet him, steady and hard, fast and deep. There were fingers on his chest and on his back and Lavi's mouth gasping against his jaw – they all sent tendrils of pleasure spiraling up and down Tyki's spine. He held tighter. As close as they were, as far as he had buried himself inside of the Exorcist, he felt that there was something more that Lavi did than just touch him, something he couldn't understand.

It was in the apprentice Bookman's voice when he moaned a single syllable of encouragement.

There was little else for Tyki. There was pressure and heat and the lingering sent of flames, fingernails and the sound of his name, broken with desire. Harshly, uncaringly, he lifted Lavi's hips to improve their angle and fumbled with the open-mouthed kiss the redhead struggled to give him.

It was too late, too fast, and too good – he couldn't think or multitask. He could only hold on to the trembling body against his and pray that it was as good for Lavi as it was for him.

A loud, desperate sound filled the redhead's throat and he tensed suddenly; all of the places he touched the older man went rigid. He was tight and hot and Lavi, and somehow those things felt good and meant good to Tyki, even if he couldn't quite wrap his brain around why at the moment. The haze of pleasure and the knot of pressure didn't quite distract him from the hand that pressed unsteadily to his chest. It might have been those gentle fingers that pulled him over the edge and sucked him into oblivion; drawing a thin line of air from his lips the same as it released the heat from his abdomen. It didn't matter. He gasped Lavi's name and rocked until there was nothing left of the pleasure, until the body beneath him was shivering and the arm that still wound around his shoulders sank to the small of his back.

"Sorry," Lavi whispered, and the fingers on Tyki's chest trailed a delicate line to his jaw. "I was looking at you and it was too much, so I… sorry."

The Noah pulled himself gently backward and grimaced when the length of him left the warmth of Lavi's body. The moment of discomfort only lasted until the redhead touched him again, wrapping him in a tangle of arms like he had before. "It's fine, Lavi. I wouldn't have noticed if you hadn't mentioned it."

The boy nodded. Gradually, Lavi worked himself against the mattress until he was flat on his back, Tyki leaning over him on one arm, the other draped around his middle. That way, when Tyki placed his head gently on the pillow, Lavi could look up at the Noah's face and study his features, both eyes bright with something like curiosity.

"Tyki?"

The Noah smiled at his name, at the lingering uncertainty in the apprentice Bookman's features. Lavi's eyes were somewhat hooded by nature, wide and lazy, lending themselves to smiles and frowns with equal enthusiasm. They were tender now, and searching him for something he couldn't name.

Tyki met them each in turn, noting that the right was somehow different than the left in something other than color – though he couldn't name it. It didn't really matter anyway. "Is something wrong?"

The boy shook his head. "No. Just using my eyes."

"See anything interesting?"

Lavi laughed like that was the most amusing idea in the world. "There's you for one. I just… you're interesting?"

Tyki almost sighed. Instead, he leaned down enough to kiss the skin of Lavi's forehead and then pulled away, smiling at the redhead's slightly shocked expression. "Stay here for a moment; I'll get you a towel. Then you'll have to follow me into the living room so I can start a fire and perhaps put on some coffee, hm?"

"Fire…" Lavi whispered, and his eyes took on a slightly nostalgic glimmer. "Sounds great."

-- -- --

"What do you mean he can't stay here?!" Kanda's voice, which had gone from soft, to normal, to an irritated yell, echoed a little in the hospital hallway, reverberating from the bare white walls with all of the volume he had packed into it. The nurse he was yelling at, however, simply pushed up her perfectly round glasses and looked up at him with dark green eyes that didn't need to narrow to glare. Kanda remained nonplused. "There's a floor, isn't there? Give him a Goddamn newspaper and that's it."

"Kanda…"

The woman cleared her throat and pressed her thin lips into a thoughtful line. "Howard Link is not in a condition to be disturbed, Master Exorcist. I don't care if the Pope himself wants to see him – the answer is no." She didn't look down at her clipboard when she pressed it to her abundant chest. Instead, she held Kanda's eyes, irritation dancing behind her glasses the same as annoyance swam in his gaze. Allen didn't think he had ever seen a nurse so fierce before.

"And how soon can we disturb him?" Kanda growled a bit more lowly than he had spoken before. Perhaps his hands were shaking with anger, it was hard to tell.

"I would give him two weeks." The nurse said without a pause. "Maybe four."

"What the fuck is wrong with—"

"A hairline fracture in his skull, Master Exorcist. If he so much as tries to stand there's a chance his brain will hemorrhage – and I'd rather not take that chance or any other." She sighed and shook her head softly, as if she truly cared that he was hearing something he didn't want to hear at the moment. She was most likely nice under all of that… nurse-ness. "Someone will call you if his condition improves or declines."

Kanda looked like he was thinking very hard about hitting a woman.

Allen smiled as brightly as he could and placed a hand on Kanda's shoulder, much the way he had seen Marie do in the past, only with his smaller hands. It worked, however. The swordsman didn't look at him and didn't go after the woman, he just stood there, glaring like it was as natural to him as breathing. "It's alright Kanda, we'll just have to contact Headquarters and ask Komui what we should—"

"Admit him."

The nurse and Allen, both silenced by the words, looked at each other before turning to Kanda with matching frowns. "Excuse me?" The white-haired boy questioned, eyebrows lifted in curiosity.

The swordsman gave him a look that called him an idiot in almost every language of the world. "Admit him into the hospital. Give him a…" He lingered over the invisible curse word with expert ease, waiting just long enough for both Allen and the brunette to guess what he was insinuating, "room. We fought not long ago. Maybe he took a bullet."

"Kanda—"

"I will not waste a bed on this… perfectly healthy individual!"

Allen knew what was going to happen, but he really didn't see any way to avoid it, so he didn't. He stood there, in the white hall, and allowed the boney angle of Kanda's elbow to connect with his right temple. He didn't try to save himself from smacking into the far wall or sliding down it, nor did he try to defend himself from with swift kick that Kanda planted in the middle of his stomach. Allen's breakfast lurched at it and his head throbbed, but they were well placed blows, gentle, even if they hurt. If the Japanese boy had wanted to cause real damage, he would have, Allen knew that. That wasn't the point. He needed to remain in the hospital where he would be watched and Kanda needed to leave it to find Lavi, but if they wouldn't let an unhurt person stay without reason, the solution was simple. Allen needed to be a hurt person.

He played it up, groaning as Kanda moved away, holding his face and slumping onto his side. The floor was cool against his skin and he pretended that it felt good, even if it really only made the headache a little less painful.

"Che. Can he stay now?"

"You… you monster!"

Allen opened his eyes at those words to find the nurse kneeling down to inspect him, completely oblivious to the effect those words had on the swordsman behind her. The British boy smiled wanly at the long-haired man and gave him a sly wink in the hope of breaking the stunned look on his face – and when it failed, Allen puckered his lips as if for a kiss instead.

Kanda's expression dissolved into an oddly crooked smirk of amusement.

"I'll be back in two days, Bean Sprout. If you recover early, I will kill you." Kanda's dark eyes, still somehow laughing despite his seeming inability to do so with his mouth, shifted from Allen's face to the back of the nurse's head. There wasn't any anger, this time. It had been there for so long that its absence was almost foreign to the boy on the floor being poked with boney fingers. "Well?"

She bristled and turned her green eyes toward Allen – he quickly schooled his features into an expression of what he thought might have been agony. Luckily, she didn't see through it. "It would a breech of my oath to send him away. He can stay one day, at least. If you come back before then, I will have the police arrest you."

"Hmph." The swordsman shrugged, turning away. "They won't take me. Monsters don't belong in prisons, do they?"

Allen watched as Kanda began to walk toward the doors, and the fabric of his coat swished behind him at an opposing tempo to his hair. When Allen thought about it, Lavi's disappearance hadn't changed a lot about the swordsman – not really – but it had made him say things like that, made him more open, made him closer to Allen. And even if there were more bruises and fewer moments of blatant name-calling and rivalry, there were new insights that Allen never would have made before, and words he never would have guessed the meaning of.

Monster didn't mean Exorcist. Not to Kanda, at least.

-- -- --

Slightly angsty note to end on but… well, it happens. I hope you like the chapter! Sorry it took so long. Work has gone crazy – I'll try to post what I have when I can, it's all a matter of what gets written faster. Thanks for reading and reviewing! (BTW, you people out there who fave/alert without reviewing… I completely understand. But it wouldn't be a bad thing to know what you like about the story, ne?)