Uuuuuum... I'm getting married. Thus this is late. Yay.

WARNINGS: So many. Blood and gore, near rape, emotional upheaval, swishy pairings, Allen, etc...

I am down a beta. I'm borrowing the beta I use for a lot of other stuff (saxon_jesus on LJ), but I'm hoping to find someone willing to beta this story... anyway... Oh, and the strange style is something I adopted from another piece of mine. D: They sort of bled because I was working on them both at once.

DISCLAIMER: If I owned D. Gray-man... Kanda would be down to like, 20 petals by now.

– – –

Sixteen: Afraid of Waking

One moment, Lavi was more or less pinned against the disgusting dirt floor by a man (definitely a man) that should have been dead, and the next he was spiraling away, swept up in a torrent of memories too large and informative to fit into the confines of his skull. They started when he was young, when he wasn't Lavi, and stretched over names and years and places and wounds and people and deaths and records; they poured into him unstoppably, matching names and faces and locations, drowning out the present, destroying what he had become. Feeling wasn't something he was allowed to do. Observation. Most of his life was based on the concept of looking without touching. And all of those things, those memories, were preserved with that sort of mentality – uncorrupted by how he might have emotionally reacted to what had happened, but unprotected by how he felt at the moment.

They did not seep back to him, slow and understandable. They did not wash over him in a broken wave. They consumed him. And it hurt. Deep in his skull, where the pressure of a whole lifetime met with the last few months, Lavi felt that someone had planted a rod of iron, barbed and white hot, then proceeded to twist it every time he breathed. But that wasn't the worst of it. There were so many things now, things that had happened, that he didn't know if they were Lavi's or not.

It was someone else who had done some of those things. They were terrible, bad things. The person that Lavi remembered being had left so many wounded and dying men on the battlefield, and had never felt a thing afterward. Most of them had been alive enough to call out to him, to ask for someone to help them, or give them a swift death.

That person hadn't killed to save himself. That person had killed because it was expected of him.

He felt sick just thinking about it.

Recent memories, the last three or four years of his life, the last six months before he had come to stay with Tyki, crept into his mind so tight he whimpered at the crushing sensation behind his eyes. He had the sinking feeling that he had screamed, that he was still making sound, but he could not stop himself. Especially not when he saw, and felt, and understood the things that he had turned his back on.

Some of those things were still him, not some heartless Bookman set on recording the inner workings of the world. Some of the times with Allen, and with Lenalee, and when Johnny had given him a new headband to replace his old one.

And Yuu.

The memories of Yuu were locked up in a cage of feelings that, when he touched them, burned like fire and ached like broken bones, deep seeded and internal. Why he felt that way, he could not say. He only knew that it was Lavi who had done the things that made it that way – had said and touched and lied his way into the mess of broken emotions that defined that relationship. It was his fault that Kanda had yelled at him, his fault that he had stormed away, his fault that the Japanese man hadn't had time to tell him goodbye before he left on that last mission. And it had been his fault – all Lavi's fault – that the two of them weren't friends.

And he could at least handle that.

Still, the apprentice Bookman found himself reaching out to cling to that familiar figure, that shadow from his not-so-distant past. Because Yuu would not change. The man in the cellar was also the man that Lavi saw at breakfast almost every morning – had seen – and the lack of feeling would be the same no matter the situation. Even if Lavi new that he was lonely and sad and terrified and happy. Even if Lavi felt fear crawling like maggots under his skin.

But there was also Tyki.

"Oh, fuck." They were the first intelligible words that came to Lavi's ears in his own voice, produced in a shaking and broken whisper, ragged in his sore throat. The room was still distant, dark, cold, fogged over with the pain that took up all of the space in his head. But he could make out Yuu and his curtain of ebony hair, bloody and tangled, though drawing him into focus made Lavi feel seasick and despicable. Physically, Lavi knew that there were hands on his shoulders, but that didn't mean anything. None of it meant anything. He couldn't yet comprehend what had happened exactly or what he should do about it. Especially Tyki.

"Are you...back, now?" Yuu's voice sounded almost slurred and weak, like he really did not need to be talking at the moment. The observation made Lavi's brain go into overdrive – something important had happened not too long ago, and it had something to do with the state of the room...

Blood. Everywhere. Yuu's. A heart, a lung, a liver, fibrous membranes that Lavi could not recognize – all strewn across the floor. All Yuu's. Worry, dark and cool and somehow blue-gray blossomed in Lavi's hands, worked his fingers to the other man's ribcage.

"He..." Tyki. Tyki had done it. Confusion roiled to life, orange-green, and seemed to fill Lavi's gut. It mingled with seaweed green anxiety, tightened his throat. "Yeah, Yuu, I'm just... my head hurts. I feel sick. How come you look all... round? Oh, it's having two eyes, huh? There's a lot of you on the floor, isn't there? You gonna be alright?" Lavi cut himself off after that, afraid that something else useless was going to fall out of his mouth. With a light shake of his head – which throbbed all the way to the nape of his neck – he went on, trying to focus on keeping what he knew in line with what he wanted to, and not rambling on about nothing. "Sorry. Everything is... off. Muddy. Foggy. Mixed up. I remember... a lot. But what does it mean? What about..."

"Lavi." Yuu's hands moved to hold the sides of the redhead's face in order to keep him still. "Shut up and get us out of here."

"What did we fight about?" Lavi asked, unable to stop the bright orange curiosity contained in his forehead.

"What?"

"Before I left on the mission. What did we fight about?"

The swordsman blinked at him with one eye in the dark. The right one was swollen to the point that Lavi doubted it was currently useful at all – if it had been anyone else, the apprentice Bookman thought, it would never see again. "You told me I wasn't being careful with myself and I told you that I know what I'm doing."

"I called you..."

"Vulnerable."

"And you asked me what that meant. And I said..."

"Weak. Exposed. Like a stupid turtle stuck on his back, wiggling his legs all, 'help me!'"

Lavi closed his eyes. It had gone downhill from there. Such a stupid fight, really. "Sorry. We can talk more later. Right now I need to get you out of—"

Yuu shushed him, but it was much too late for the sound to make a difference. Lavi only saw the flicker of a shadow in Yuu's eye and then they were moving apart from each other, though Yuu did not move very far at all. The swordsman slid to the side and collided with a rack of gardening tools before he collapsed against the ground and stayed there, the mess of his hair blocking his face from sight. Meanwhile, Lavi felt something wind around his stomach and rip him backward, bruising his flesh, driving the air from his lungs. But there wasn't fear in him, not really. Fear would have been fitting.

Instead, there was pain and something like regret.

The redhead knew that the Noah holding him, pulling him toward the stairs, was saying things as they went, but he couldn't hear them. He could only focus on the fact that there was nothing he could do and nothing he could say. There was nothing he knew to. Did he want to tell Yuu that Mugen was just two arm lengths away, moved from behind the bookshelf while Tyki changed into sleeping clothes? He didn't know. Did he want Tyki to take him back inside and claim him, demand that he stay because of his promises? He didn't know. Lavi felt sick with himself for not knowing. He hadn't lied to Tyki, had he? But if that was true, if he loved his enemy, where did that leave him?

Currently, it left him phased through the outer wall of the house and hefted hard against the bed, his left arm twisted up behind his back.

"Tyki!"

"It's too late now, isn't it? I heard what you said. But I won't let it end this way." The man's voice was low and rational, which did not make much sense with what he had just done. His grip was strong, but it didn't threaten to break the limb he held between his fingers. "It was him, wasn't it, before me? It doesn't matter. We've been lying to each other, haven't we?" The sound of tearing fabric filled the room for a moment before Lavi felt it against his wrist, replacing Tyki's hand.

Did he want to fight for his freedom?

"No... I... I don't know... just... wait, Tyki—"

"Wait for you to change your mind?" The Portuguese man took Lavi's other wrist and bound it to the first one, then rolled him onto his back with a half-gentle motion. The man's face, the apprentice Bookman noted, was a picture perfect representation of betrayal. The sad quality to Tyki's soft brown eyes, the flecks of angry gold, the down turned angle to his elegant mouth – was it guilt that they evoked? "Are you going to fight me, Exorcist?"

Lavi swallowed with difficulty. "It's not that simple. It's too fast. I—I know you, Tyki. I remember what you did for me, when I was blind, when I was... lost. But I remember how I became blind. And everything else you did – to Allen, to Yuu. What am I supposed to do now? Love you? Trust you? Go home? What does that even mean?" Lavi felt that he wanted to laugh a little, at his own rambling, at the emotions he could see in Tyki's expression – at all of them meant. The Noah loved him. The Noah of Pleasure, Tyki Mikk, really loved him. "I'm just Bookman Junior, you know? Love, trust, home – I don't have those things."

"Lavi—"

"Didn't. Don't. Can't. Do. God, I'm losing my mind and all you can do is tie me up?"

In one graceful, agonizingly familiar motion, Tyki leaned between Lavi's knees and placed a hand on either side of the boy's head, more or less pinning him to the mattress. For a moment, the Portuguese man paused to search Lavi's face, and his expression softened. "In any case, it would be better if you didn't stay here. If you do, your Order will come after us, and when my family realizes that you have remembered who you were, so will they." His eyes closed slowly, and when they opened again, there was so much honest longing in them it was almost startling. "The thought of... losing you is more frightening than anything I've ever known, Lavi. But I will let you figure out once more if you really love me. You promised me, but—"

"Then... why did you drag me in here, throw me on the bed, and tie me up?" Lavi asked in an incredulous whisper. There were only a few things that came to mind, none of which he could openly accept or deny in his current mental state. "I'm going crazy, and you understand that, so..."

"Lavi." Tyki's expression became a sort of amused grin, layered over with things that the apprentice Bookman could not even think of defining. "Are you frightened of me?"

"I don't know."

Tyki's fingers hooked into the loops of Lavi's pants and tugged the boy's body down the bed, tilting his hips to an unquestionably sexual angle. "Maybe you should be. I am the Noah of Pleasure, after all."

"Tyki—"

"I might blindfold you, to remind me of the first time. You, though... you can imagine whoever you want." He was already reaching for the corner of the sheet he had torn, already set in what he was doing. But his hands, those killing hands, were shaking with uncertainty.

Lavi did not know what to say exactly. It was too much at once. There were memories and feelings, and the ache in his head. But there was one thing he realized the moment Tyki's fingers brushed his temples, blocking the room from sight: physical contact was meaningful, intimate, in an almost terrifying way. It made him shiver from something other than cold. It made his mouth fall open, brought back all of the times before, all of the things before, all of the ways that Tyki had smiled at him, touched his hair, kissed him. They were sweet and purposeful, loving. But was that really what it meant to be loved?

Blood-soaked clothes and murdering hands – was that what it meant to be loved?

"Tyki, I can't..."

With the fabric secured around the redhead's eyes, the Noah hands moved to the fastener of the boy's simple white pants and undid it. Without speaking, Tyki kissed Lavi's softly open mouth, teased with a flit of his tongue. The touch made the younger man shake slightly, his breath hitched in his throat.

"But you will," Tyki whispered, and the ebb of his breath against Lavi's felt like a caress. "Tell me, Bookman... do you still feel when I do this to you?"

Lavi wanted more than anything to tell the Noah that he did, but he couldn't make himself answer. The way his hips were lifted, and the brush of lips against his made him tremble uncontrollably. Because there wasn't just Tyki in those touches, more than just those single-minded, hot-blooded memories. There was Yuu, too. There were arguments and moments of hardheartedness and hurt that lead to fire and trust and attachment, mixed with anger and something deep-reaching and colored like scarlet shot through with gold. The thought brought a protest to Lavi's throat, where it sputtered and died, unuttered. Who would he tell to stop? His memories? The hands sliding across his stomach, tickling his ribs? The phantom shadows of whispers, trickling into his ears?

"You said that you loved me."

'You never tell me how you feel, but you always want me to talk about my own feelings.'

"Was that a lie?"

'Che. I don't... feel anything anymore.'

"Or did you really know love, for just a little while?"

'I know that cannot be true. You feel something.'

"Even if you can't feel it now?"

'I feel...cold.'

Lavi did not know what he wanted, did not know if he stood a chance in getting away, but he had to fight – had to stop everything from bleeding together in a giant mess of things he could not understand. If love was truly what he felt for Tyki, what did he feel for Kanda? It was something similar, there was no doubt about it, but it lacked the amorality, and instead felt thick and heavy, like a dusty old coat, riddled with bloodstains and holes. Lavi could not deal with both emotions at once. He felt sound burble out of his throat, felt fingers bruising his hips, felt pain jolt through his neck and scalp at the tug of a hand tangled in his hair, bending his head back.

He felt fear prickle up his spine and take root in his gut.

A harsh, tearing negative strangled its way out of his throat, bringing with it a tangled, strange sound that he belatedly recognized as a sob. But Lavi did not know how to cry. Then why were there tears soaking into the fabric over his eyes? And why was his throat clenched on the wail that his vocal chords produced? Was it because Tyki was so close to him? Was it because Yuu was likely wounded or dying not six feet beneath him? Was it because of fear or love or hate or some strange thing that qualified as none of them?

"Lavi?"

He couldn't answer. He couldn't even honestly say if that was his name at the moment.

It would be so much easier to just be Bookman Junior.

"Lavi!" The strong hands that held him in place became gentle, and the bruising hold on his hips turned to tender fingers brushing away the fabric that had been bound over his eyes. The Noah was trying to soothe him, the redhead realized, trying to undo what had been done. But it was too late. The tears were there, if silent, and words refused, for a moment, to come. Fear and kindness lit the Noah's dark eyes and made them burn outward with warmth. It was almost like Lavi was not being lied to. "I didn't mean..."

"Tyki... I can't—"

But what was it that Lavi could not do?

'You know... that that thing is... you know... I —'
'Still has you convinced of that, does he?'

The apprentice Bookman was more than thankful when Tyki abandoned his plan and simply pulled him into a bone-crushing embrace, tendrils of dark, curling hair falling around both of them, the older man's mouth pressed to the boy's shoulder. Even if Lavi could not return the touch, he appreciated it more than anything he could name. It was intimate, just as all touches were, but it was safe for the time being, unlike kisses. Safe and familiar.

"I am sorry."
'Stop saying that.'

"I have to go back."

"Lavi—"

"Whether I love you or not, I can't leave Bookman there to think I'm dead. I can't just walk away from everything I've become, otherwise I... would have already." Lavi whispered the last part, slightly frightened by how true it was. Even if it would be easier to be Bookman Junior, that was not who he wanted to be any more than it was someone he completely understood. That person, who had done so many cruel, heartless things, was a mystery to Lavi.

The Noah's arms did not relinquish their hold. "Then you know I lied about his death."

"I don't remember the details of that fight, Tyki, but I know that I was the only one who fell. And... I understand why you lied to me."

"I'm—"

Lavi shushed him. Apologies would not help, nor would they make the future more clear. "We should find each other, somehow. I don't know where I'll go when I get back – or how long they'll keep me off of missions or if they'll even let me go alone – but I will need to see you again, once I've figured all of this out." The redhead found a surprising amount of reassurance in the idea of seeing the Noah again, and he did not find the feeling strange at all. If anything, he found it odd that he doubted himself for a fraction of a second, and lost whatever confidence it was he had in his emotions. "I don't know what I will be like when we see each other, but—"

"I will find you." Tyki spoke softly into Lavi's throat, just a brush of air against the redhead's skin. "Somehow. The Earl will likely order you killed with the rest – Road will understand and help me find you, I know she will. Sheryl..." The Noah made a negative sound and pulled away just slightly, enough to turn his face up to Lavi's. "I do not want to lose you, Lavi."

"I know."

"But I do not want to hurt you, either."

The apprentice Bookman felt himself frown.

"I do love you."

That hurt, Lavi realized. Being loved and lacking the ability to know if he returned that feeling hurt worse than so many, many things that his other selves had done.

"Tyki—"

The bedroom door, with no warning whatsoever, burst inward with all of the force of Hell's Insects, sending splitters raining down around the pair in a shower of debris. There was a fraction of a second that Lavi worried that everything would fall to pieces before him – that Tyki would turn and kill Yuu, that Yuu would dart forward and run Mugen directly through the Noah's chest – but it did not happen. Tyki turned slowly, his golden eyes wide with surprise, to the figure that held weakly to the door frame, still bloody and broken, holding his katana in his left hand. In a fight, Kanda simply would not win. Still, the swordsman leveled his blade at the Portuguese man and narrowed his one, left eye, anger so dark it sent shivers up Lavi's spine, lighting his gaze.

"I told you," Yuu croaked softly, "I cannot die."

"Wait—" Lavi began to protest, hoping to stop the violence before it could start, but there really was no need. Yuu was not at his best, and Tyki was too shocked to move for the two quick heartbeats it took for the swordsman's expression to turn decidedly pained. With a terrible shudder in his shoulders, and a wobble from his sword-hand, Kanda coughed. He did not catch all of the blood that tried to bubble out of his mouth.

Tyki remained immobile, blinking bewilderedly at the Exorcist he had likely thought dead just moments ago.

"Let him go, or I swear to God —" Yuu still managed, even holding himself up with one shoulder and covered in his own blood, too look vicious and threatening. "— I will cut you into ribbons if it takes a million lifetimes to cut you once."

Not an empty threat. Most of Yuu's threats were empty.

"Yuu-chan, get out of here!" Lavi said the words before he could think about them, too concerned for what might happen if the Noah on the bed beside him suddenly turned violent. Lavi did not want to watch the two of them kill each other, nor did he want to think that he was the cause of the conflict – on some strange level. There was already too much blood on Kanda and too much uncertainty between himself and Tyki, there did not need to be more of either. "I'll be fine. Just... don't be stupid—"

"No." The whisper was like smoothed silk, straight and soft and saccharine, nearly soundless. The Noah shifted to sit at the edge of the bed and tilted his face up at the swordsman, his eyes turned so Lavi could not catch the color in them. The boy watched, dumbstruck, as Tyki lifted both of his hands. "Lavi, you have been rescued. The two of you will escape with your lives." He said the words hollowly, and swallowed hard before he went on. "Go, before my instincts get the better of me."

"Tyki—"

"Get up," Kanda hissed over the confusion and concern in Lavi's voice.

The redhead was not sure he wanted to let it end so abruptly.

When Lavi reached the edge of the bed, Tyki released him from the length of bed-sheet with nothing but a finger, tugging the fabric through his arms with nothing but the faintest tingle. With his arms freed, the redhead turned to the Noah in the hope of some explanation, but saw only the swimming gold and black of his eyes, the resignation in his expression.

"Why?" The word cracked through Lavi's lips like a dry, lifeless breeze.

A mirthless smile curved Tyki's lips. "Because I love you," he answered at once, just as softly. "Somehow it matters more to me that you do not hate me than it does that you do not love me." He looked up with his warm, dark eyes, and lifted an elegant, thoughtful eyebrow at the apprentice Bookman. "Now go. We can finish this and you can explain to me where exactly that Innocence was the next we stumble upon each other, Lavi. As I assure you, we will."

Lavi did not want to kiss him goodbye, so he did not, feeling far too unsure to even try. Instead, he simply reached out and laid a palm on Tyki's knee, then pushed himself up, feeling something burn behind his eyes in the manner of tears. But why would he cry? What was he losing? What was he feeling?

The swordsman by the door wavered on his feet when Lavi approached him but still managed to back away rather gracefully, his weapon still lifted toward Tyki. Kanda was taking not chances.

Lavi knew better and did not look back.

– – –

Allen wandered downstairs sometime after dark in the hope of sneaking a loaf of bread (or five) from the very tiny kitchen his inn had tucked away in the back behind the desk. He figured it was there for employees mostly – though he had watched two people order meals during the day – but figured that they would make an exception for someone funded by the Vatican, at least.

The man at the front desk was dozing, which gave the British boy hope. That hope was dashed, however, the moment the door opened to admit a blast of icy cold air and the stench of blood so thick it almost made him gag.

"I told you, I'm fine."

"Yuu-chan, if you were fine, you wouldn't be so hot."

"Che. Lose your fuck-buddy and already looking for a replacement?"

There was a soft, exasperated sigh. "You have a fever, Yuu. A bad fever. And you've lost way too much blood and stuff to be in a good place. Just... lean on me, please?"

"We're here, idiot. It doesn't matter."

Allen stumbled down the last four steps. The time it took him to fall was just long enough for his brain to compute what he was seeing and to send a terrible rush of relief into every part of his body. He felt the sting of tears in his eyes – caused mostly by the fact that both Lavi and Kanda were alive – and felt the painful arch of a smile stretch across his face. No matter the state they were in, no matter the stains or the blood or the brokenness, his comrades – his friends – were safe. In the dim light, Kanda's gaze turned to him in momentary confusion, and then cleared after just a moment to recognize his face.

An odd, crooked smirk split the swordsman's mouth.

Allen almost tripped again.

And then, there was Lavi. The redhead was looking at him with two wide, green eyes, his hair disheveled, his pants mostly unbuttoned, his shirt smeared with blood and wrinkled like he had slept in it. But his smile was genuine and soft, light and yet filled with dark emotions that told of stories and troubles that he would not want to share with anyone.

The British boy did not care. He simply wanted to hug them both.

"What in the bloody blazes?!" The man behind the desk was no longer dozing. He had woken enough to wrench a billy club from behind his chair, which he was now wielding with absolutely no efficiency at all. His lightly colored eyes darted between the three seeming hoodlums before they settled on Kanda, at which point a frown tugged the man's wide, wrinkled lips into a perfect half-circle. He lowered his weapon almost begrudgingly. "You must be with him then, hm? Well, don't loiter there. It makes you look questionable. Just go up the stairs like you know where you're going. The kid's room is the second on the left." He tucked the little club away and settled himself back into his chair with a sigh. "If you need anything, I won't be sleeping anymore tonight, I can guarantee that."

Allen, stomach momentarily forgotten, turned back the way he had come, knowing that they could all discuss what had happened in detail when they got to his room. Here, now, was not the time or the place to ask questions.

Nor was it the time or the place to wonder why Kanda let Lavi's hand rest so tenderly against his back.

– – –

Kanda did not know if he should feel angry or thankful or content or just ill. Lavi was safe, which was something, and the idiot's memories were foggy in places, but more or less restored, which was something else, but there were quite a few problems, too. He could not shake the image of the Noah and Lavi on that bed together, could not rid himself of the feeling that, despite everything, that man really did care for the apprentice Bookman. Not that it mattered. Love did not stop wars or heal scars or save lives, it endangered people and hurt them, it put them at risk and made them do stupid, idiotic things. Like let enemies walk away to fight again another day. Like make him lean into the warmth of Lavi's shoulder and close his tired eye in the hope that it wouldn't open again now that the redhead was safe.

They came into the room at a snail's pace, mostly due to the fact that his strength was waning at last. Lavi was right, Kanda knew, about the fever and his injuries. There had not been enough time to heal anything, and the swordsman honestly wasn't willing to trade any more of his life for the sake of a speedy recovery – it currently seemed better to suffer the disgusting sickness of infection and live than turn into something far less useful the next time he was caught by a stray bullet. Which would happen. It would always, always happen.

There was only one bed, he noted absently, and three people. Bean Sprout's suitcase was at the end of it. Still, without a moment's hesitation, Lavi deposited Kanda on the edge of it and scurried away toward the bathroom, where he proceeded to take every hand-towel and washcloth and wet half of them, chattering to himself as he worked.

"I can't believe I forgot everything. Mostly everything. The import things. And then... Tyki..." His voice became very, very quiet, coming into the room as little more than a terrible whisper. "How did all of this happen?"

Bean Sprout looked at Kanda with one of those curious, worried expressions and lifted his ugly left hand to turn the Japanese man's face into the lamplight. Kanda let him, mostly because he wanted to know what the kid's reaction was going to be, not because he was worried himself. He was just tired and struggling to stay sitting, that was all.

"Do I...want to hear what happened to you, BaKanda?" The British boy's voice had too many layers of anger to be proper, but Kanda found that he did not mind. Sometimes, the brat wasn't half bad, after all.

"No. You know what happened already."

Allen's hand dropped away very slowly, uncertainly. There were no words for him to say, really, but he still made ready to. The chance was lost when Lavi came back with his burden of wet and dry towels, nothing even close to a smile on his usually bright features.

Kanda did not like that Allen had to help him out of his jacket and the tatters of his shirt, but his right arm was still more or less broken. He also did not like how quiet the room became when his companions saw the bruised and battered state of his chest, the red and purple and yellow. He shivered in the cool air and took a wet cloth from Lavi to dab at his face with – which stung and hurt and burned like all sorts of things. After just a moment of that, he felt that perhaps the room was pitching a bit and so lurched sideways, an act that brought his half-clean face into swift contact with the cool, soft fabric of the comforter.

"Yuu, you don't look so good."

"Shut up." Kanda did not think he wanted to look anything but asleep at the moment. What had happened, the details of that cellar, the things that had happened to Lavi – the things he had said to that Noah – could wait for a moment. Or five. "Idiot."

The belated insult called a warm, gentle palm to place itself on the front of his forehead. Lavi's voice was a tiny, meek whisper when he spoke, filled with things that Kanda did not yet understand the repercussions of. "Let's patch you up and... Yuu..." The hand slipped away, but came back again on the swordsman's chest, light, unsure. "Yuu..." The tone had not changed while the redhead had been gone, not in the slightest. The tone of it sent a bolt of longing through Kanda's entire frame and peeled his left eye open, pushed his eyebrows together in an expression he could not imagine in his head.

The redhead hugged him, with careful arms and a slowness that meant Kanda could stop him.

"Yuu... the alleyway...I..." His voice wavered, and his mouth, which was just a half inch from Kanda's chest, gasped softly at the memory. The redheaded idiot was dangling on the edge of some sort of mental collapse, and yet he was trying to apologize. The swordsman did not honestly care. There were a million and one things wrong, so what was just one more? What had happened between the Noah and Lavi – that meant more than how Lavi had acted before he had known who Kanda was.

But Kanda did not think that he could hold any of that against Lavi for long. The illusion of love, the illusion of trust – if anyone was unfit to blame a person for believing an illusion, it was Kanda.

"Che. Tell me tomorrow."

"Yuu—"

"And stop calling me that. Bean Sprout will pick up on it."

Lavi made a snickering, half-strangled laughing sound and forgot all about how he was not smashing his face into Kanda's battered body. "I'm so glad you haven't changed much."

Kanda felt himself start to smirk. He also realized, rather belatedly, that his eye had closed despite his efforts to keep it open. "Tomorrow, idiot."

"Okay."

– – –

The moon had reached its zenith by the time Allen found himself curled up on a spare, beat up, ugly mattress he and Lavi had found in the very back of the closet and had thrown on the floor beside the actual bed. It surprised him a little that Kanda, fierce, angry, beautiful Kanda, looked so bedraggled and worn down and tired, and that Lavi, bright, cheerful, thoughtful Lavi, did not seem to notice the waves of relief coming from the swordsman. The British Exorcist felt oddly like the third wheel in some strange, broken relationship – except that the apprentice Bookman was in his bed, holding him like some slightly oversized white teddy bear that would keep the redhead safe from the dark.

The pressure of those arms around Allen's waist was not at all strange or disconcerting. If anything, it was familiar and soothing. He had not slept next to anyone but Link for a very, very long time, and contrary to popular belief, no amount of bribery was going to get a nonsexual snuggle out of that man.

It also helped Allen deal with the physical relationship Lavi and Kanda seemed to have that he had never noticed. First there was the hug. And then, while they worked to bandage the swordsman's face and at least pad his bruises, and finally set his mangled right arm, there were the little brushes of fingertips, the subtle touch of skin and skin. Before, Allen did not think he would have cared. But now, when he wanted it to be his skin touching Kanda, and he wanted to swordsman to like it...

With a little groan of self-loathing, Allen rolled his face into his pillow. God, he was getting worse by the day – minute – second. At this point, it would be proper to wonder what had happened and where Lavi had been, not feel jealous about the little fractions of intimacy between Kanda and Lavi.

But it didn't matter what was proper. Allen wanted to throw himself at the swordsman's feet and scream out his feelings, whatever that meant.

Lavi's breath on the back of his ear was hot enough to make the British boy reach back and gently poke the redhead in the nose.

"Owie," came the whispered protest.

"Stop breathing on me," Allen hissed, and then took note of his tone. "Please."

"Sorry," Lavi mumbled, and nuzzled his face into the back of Allen's head like a cat showing its owner affection. "You could spoon me, but your chin would be shoulder blade level, and that just ain't comfy. And..." His arms tensed a little, "I can let you go, but I wanna hold on to something for a little. And you're little, hee."

Allen rolled his eyes only because no one could see him do it. It would have been terribly impolite to roll his eyes to Lavi's face, especially when he wanted to sigh exasperatedly on top of it. "I... understand," he said instead, and closed his eyes to the slight lie. But it was okay to lie if it kept them happy, wasn't it? "Are you... alright, Lavi? You don't have to tell me the details of what happened, but I realize that you forgot things, right? And you stayed there. With... him?"

For a moment, the British boy worried that he had said too much.

"I did a lot more than stay with Tyki, Allen. I ate with him and talked with him and..." Lavi's face snuggled more closely against the back of Allen's head. "I'm so stupid," he muttered, voice shaking with uncertainty. "I don't know what to think right now, too much has happened. And it isn't like I can just, not think, you know? And to top that all off, Yuu was in the fucking cellar for like, a day and half or something, having his guts ripped out right there where I couldn't see." This time, when his fingers clenched, it was around some of the fabric of Allen's sleeping shirt.

"He doesn't blame you, I don't think."

"Heh. He's too happy to have me back to blame me right now, but give 'im a week and I'll be the spawn of the Millennium Earl for a month. Hell, he might even demote me to Black Order Official."

"You think he's happy?"

"Uh... he let me hug him, didn't he?"

"In that case, you would have to do something worse than staying with a Noah to reach that level of hatred, I think."

"That's the thing, though – Yuu has a spectrum of hatred that's shaped like a circle. I was already right there on the top, this will push me around to the bottom."

"How does that work?"

"Angry Asian magic."

"Lavi!"

"It's just how he works. There's no way that he can like someone, and the more he likes them, the more he has to hate them. Get it?"

"Somehow, I think he hates everyone equally."

"That's because you don't really know Yuu-chan."

"Tell me about it."

"Would you two just fucking shut up!" Kanda's voice made them both go as rigid and silent as corpses, as did the shaking, pale hand that came up out of the covers and wrestled with the pillow an instant later. The swordsman, in the moonlight, was as pale as death, his eyes sunken into his gaunt face with exhaustion and only God knew what else. "You're both so Goddamn noisy, I bet that Noah can here you from across the street! And you know what else—" He took in a deeper breath and narrowed his one eye in preparation of insulting the two of them in some terrifyingly violent way.

Allen didn't feel like he deserved it, yet. "You and Lavi can be eyepatch twins until your eye grows back?"

For a split second, the swordsman floundered. He seemed like he might simply explode in a torrent of violence and anger, if given the time to recover. However, before he could reach out for Mugen, he coughed thickly, an act that made pain flash in his eye and sent his right hand scrambling to the bruised surface of his chest. The fit lasted longer than Allen was comfortable with, and ended with Kanda tensed on the mattress, his face tilted against the white sheets in obvious discomfort, a speckle of red decorating his lower lip. The swordsman didn't try to continue their argument. He simply lay there, panting and trembling, his left hand twisting in the covers until his knuckles turned white.

Lavi shifted, but it was Allen who left their bed to go to Kanda's side.

"Don't fucking touch me," Kanda growled without lifting his head. But there wasn't anger in his gaze – there were a lot of things, but there wasn't anything like madness burning behind his eye. "I'll be fine. Just leave me alone."

"Then what's wrong?" The British boy demanded, but did not lift his hand to feel the Japanese Exorcist's skin the way he wanted.

For a moment, Kanda looked miffed. "He..." There was anger in that word, at least. "Stuck his hand in my guts, you nitwit. Tore them up like little bits of tissue paper." He cocked an eyebrow as if to ask if Allen could understand what that meant exactly. "It's blood poisoning. Do you need me to spell it out for you any better?" He turned his head against the sheet, breathing in quick, deep gasps. But even if he was falling apart, Allen noted, the swordsman wanted to have his piece. "Go to sleep. There's nothing you can do."

The white-haired teen blinked at him. Slowly, fearing that he might be burned, knowing that Lavi was right there, watching him, wondering if everything would be alright in the end, Allen sank down on the edge of Kanda's bed. Gingerly, he let his left hand come down on the very back of the swordsman's neck, just enough of a touch to feel the heated skin beneath the veil of Kanda's hair. "Kanda." He was fully aware that the Japanese man was refusing to meet his eyes. "Lavi and I are here. We will do anything we can to take care of you."

I will do anything I can.

"Che."

"Let me get another blanket. Lavi, will you get water? As bad as this is going to be, we should make it as smooth a recovery as an immortal prick can have, yeah?"

The redhead was up and nodding in an instant, the tiredness, the confusion in his expression, finally given a purpose that did not require him to contemplate in silence while his bed-mate attempted to sleep. "Leave it to me, Yuu-chan. We'll have you so well taken care of, you won't even have to mention how sick you got in your report."

"...You're both idiots."

– – –

Yay an update? Thoughts? Rants? Flames?