I know I never made this clear, but this story isn't in America, thus the cars they drive in are backwards. The passenger rides on the left, and the driver drives on the right. Also they drive on the left side of the road. Sorry, once again, for not saying so sooner.
Tuesday, November 29th, XXXX
1700 hours (5:00 P.M)
Because of Daylight savings and the changing of seasons the days were growing shorter, and the nights longer. Even though it was only five in the afternoon it would be dark in an hour. The sun was already halfway down in the sky, projecting an orange-red glow from the horizon. It grew colder at night, for there was no more sun to spread its warmth out.
Lavi pulled his coat closer to his body, shivering at the sudden drop in temperature from just a couple hours ago.
"Mind explaining why we couldn't have just waited in the car again??" he asked, annoyed at his partner.
They had parked it one block away from the Marley warehouse and walked the rest of the way.
Kanda wasn't minding the cold at all and had his coat unbuttoned. He was leaning against a building in an alleyway where they were currently, eyes closed, arms folded, trying to concentrate on something before Lavi's voice knocked him out of his musings.
"Do you really think he would show up if a suspicious black car was parked in front of the warehouse?" Kanda directed his irritated tone at Lavi without even opening his eyes.
"We've been waiting here for HOURS! Do you even know he's going to show up?!" Lavi waved his hands around animatedly as if to intensify the meaning of his words.
"No with you yelling like that," Kanda said, finally opening his eyes and looking in his partner's direction. They were narrowed, shooting a warning to Lavi for him to keep quiet. He did, settling himself against the building opposite Kanda in the alleyway looking in the way of the warehouse, still not completely satisfied with the answer he got.
Half an hour passed in silence. Kanda was quietly meditating and Lavi was rubbing his arms to keep warm. The sun had gone down even further in the sky, making it turn to shades between light purple and midnight blue. There was less and less light with each passing minute, and Lavi's patience was actually growing thin, however possible that was. He had the most patience in the world, but he couldn't stand the cold.
"Yuuuuuu, can we go now? It's freeziiiing!!" he whined to Kanda.
"Idiot, I'll crush you!" Kanda said in a dangerous tone. Lavi never seemed aware of the danger in calling Kanda by his first name and frankly he didn't seem to care.
Lavi was about to retaliate in whining more when Kanda rushed over to him and put a hand over his mouth.
"Shh," was all he said, looking in the direction of the warehouse.
"He's here."
Tuesday, November 29th, XXXX
1735 hours (5:35 P.M)
Allen was standing a good distance away from the warehouse. He knew he should have come sooner. Finding the small item that he came to retrieve would be impossible to do in the dark, and it was almost night time. He did have a flashlight with him, however the batteries were almost dead and it never had a bright light in the first place. It's not like he had any money to buy a new flashlight or batteries.
Not wanting to waste any more time than he already had, Allen made his way to the entrance of the warehouse, hoodie pulled up over his head to shield his ears from the cold and to make sure no one saw his face if they were around.
The police had already cleared out earlier in the day, and only the 'do not cross – police line' yellow tape was left, wrapped around the perimeter of the building. Allen ducked under it and slipped inside a door that stood slightly ajar.
Now inside he walked over to the light switch he already knew how to locate and tried to turn it on. When he flicked the switch up the lights didn't come on. He figured the police would have shut the power off to the warehouse, and thus the reason for the flashlight. He reached into his hoodie pocket and took it out. Turning it on, its dim light spread out through the room to its limit. There really wasn't much light being produced from it, so Allen hurried to one of the stairs and climbed up to the second floor of the building, not wanting to waste the precious time he had with it.
The metal door that had been knocked down was no longer on the floor. Someone had picked it up and leaned it against the wall inside the room, so Allen walked in easily through the doorway and started shining the flashlight onto the floor, searching for his lost item.
He dreaded stepping back into this room, but controlled his disdain in order to just get in, find the item, and get out.
It wasn't like this was an easy task, however. The floor was filthy, and made it hard to find any small object on it.
It looked like he was walking around in circles as he searched the floor, which, in fact, he was. He didn't want to miss a single spot as to where the item might have fallen. He decided to get on his knees so that his face was closer to the ground.
As the seconds went by he started to become impatient and anxious, his mind troubled that he wouldn't actually be able to find it after all.
"I swear to god if you lose this I will haunt you until you die," The words echoed through his skull as he remembered them. A chill went down his spine as a mental picture of the person who said those words to him went through his head. Along with that mental picture came a wave of emotion, anger, rage, and sadness that Allen tried to desperately shake away. He had to focus on the task at hand.
Giving up on searching in that one spot anymore he stood up and went to walk to another when his flashlight dimmed, flickered, and went out. The room was deprived of the little light it had and Allen found it hard to see with his eyes so used to the light.
"Perfect timing," he mumbled to himself as he began hitting the flash light with the palm of his hand. For the first few hits it blinked on but then quickly went out, and after a while it didn't come on at all.
"Are you serious?" Allen growled at the flashlight. Frowning in frustration he started hitting it even harder, but it didn't work. Giving up on the flashlight he shoved it back into his hoodie pocket and was thinking about just searching the floor with his hands when a voice came from behind him.
"Looking for something?"
Allen froze where he stood. He recognized that deep voice. It was that detective from the day before. He didn't think he would actually come back.
Shit.
Not even bothering to look back at the man he made a quick dash for the other door of the room when another voice came from that entrance.
"Whoa, where do you think you're going?" Came the words teasingly. He couldn't see the man's face, but he knew who it was. Stopping dead in his tracks he realized that there was no way out, and cursed himself for not being more careful.
Taking a few steps backward to distance himself from the man he was now facing he heard a gun cock behind him. Knowing the other man had taken his weapon out Allen did the same. Reaching into his sweatpants pocket he pulled out a Jericho 941 pistol, and as quickly as he could he turned around, cocked it, pointed it in the other man's direction and fired. The man cursed, showing that he wasn't dead but still must have been hit, and Allen guessed that the man had lifted up his own gun to shoot back when the person behind Allen shot first.
He had aimed his gun at the back of Allen's head without knowing, but the bullet missed and instead hit his hand and knocked his gun out of it. It fell to the ground and slid across the floor, completely out of Allen's reach.
Not cursing like the other man did, Allen just bit down on his tongue and held his hand in the other. This was when the man he shot at turned his flashlight on and pointed it right at Allen's face making him squint from the brightness of it. The other man followed in suit and they both closed in on him in the middle of the room. Completely defenseless, Allen could do nothing but stand there and glare at the man he was facing.
"Little brat," the detective seemed less than pleased as he hissed at the boy standing in front of him. He had yet to put his gun away and was holding it securely in his left hand.
"Lavi, get that kid's gun," he ordered his partner. As the man directed to moved to retrieve the gun his flashlight's light ran across the detective's face and Allen saw a trail of blood moving down his right cheek.
The bullet must have just grazed him then, he thought as he stared at the man's face.
The detective's pissed off expression turned into a wry smirk as he finally disarmed his gun and put it away. He reached into one of his pockets and pulled something out of it. It seemed like a small item but Allen couldn't make out what it was. The detective shone his flashlight on it and it took a few seconds to register into Allen's mind just what he was holding.
It was a ring. A light blue rose sat in the middle of two slanted and somewhat overlapping half-circles that rested on top of two silver double-loops coated with tiny diamond stubbles.
"My ring!" Allen gasped as he identified the object the detective was now holding. He made a move to walk forward and take it, but thought better of it, remembering the person behind him still had a gun out.
"You know, I found this little thing a few days ago, but I haven't the slightest idea who it might belong to," Kanda said in mock bewilderment as he played with the ring in his hand. "And it's such a nice ring, too."
It had then just occurred to Allen how he had really gotten possession of it.
"You, you took that from me when you pinned me against the wall two days ago! When you were holding my hands behind my back, you must have slipped it off my finger!" Allen said, voice now filling with rage with every word he spoke.
"Did I? It's strange how I don't seem to remember such an important event as that ever happening," Kanda frowned in confusion, eyes now on the person in front of him.
"But, I suppose if it's yours, then I really must give it back to you, don't I?" Kanda sighed in resignation. He reached his hand out to the kid with the ring sitting in the palm of his hand. For a second, Allen had actually believed he was going to give it back, and reached out for it with his right hand. But at the last second Kanda quickly wrapped his fingers around the ring and retracted his arm. Allen, knowing it was too good to be true, let his arm fall back to his side as Kanda went on to say "but, as long as I have it, I should trade you for something, right?"
"If you're asking for money from me then you've got a better chance at finding another one of those rings," Allen stated in a monotonous tone as he glared daggers into the man's face.
"Oh? Is it a one of a kind?" Kanda asked as he started playing with the ring again.
"It is," Allen practically growled. He hated giving out information of any sort, but the man standing in front of him was really starting to pull at some threads and he wasn't paying attention to what he was saying.
"What I want, for this ring, Allen Walker, is information," he said it as clear as sunshine, however Allen still had some trouble comprehending as to why someone like him would trade such a ring for just information.
"On what?" Allen asked, now very skeptical and wary of the detective.
"On how you got that scar."
Allen stiffened at the statement, and all of a sudden he became fully aware of the presence of the man standing behind him.
Kanda frowned at the response he got, and pocketed the ring.
"Ah, hey! Give that back!" Allen reacted to the man's action and stepped forward, holding his right hand out.
"Only when I get my information," Kanda stated and walked up to the kid so that he was practically towering over him. He bent down so that he and Allen were face to face, but they were way too close for Allen's comfort and he took half a step back.
"What?" he questioned the man's actions as a light blush crept up to his cheeks, for reasons beyond his understanding, as he had only then realized how striking the Asian man's features were.
"Blood-shot eyes, your breath smells of alcohol…We got ourselves a little druggie," Kanda smirked as he straightened back up. "How old are you anyways? Thirteen? "
"I'm seventeen!" Allen barked, annoyed at the put-down the man just shot at him.
"Really? You're pretty short for somebody so old," Kanda continued. "And what's with this white hair?" He put a hand on Allen's head and started ruffling it, "Some new rebel look?" he teased. Allen swatted his hand away.
"It's not like I bleached my hair!" he yelled, "This is just how it is!"Allen was now irritated and had half a mind to punch the detective in his face when Lavi spoke up behind him.
"Jeez, can you guys stop bickering like little children? I guess I have to be the adult here then and break up the fight. Really Yuu, I expected better from you," he said in an egotistical tone while pretending to chastise Kanda.
Kanda looked over in Lavi's direction and shot him a death glare while speaking the words, "I'll deal with you later," through gritted teeth.
Lavi shrank back into the shadow of the room, knowing he had stepped over some invisible boundary line.
"Anyways," Kanda said, redirecting his attention to the kid in front of him once again, "if you're not going to give us any information here, then I guess we'll just have to bring you down to the station with us."
The statement fazed Allen a little, but he didn't let it show. "If you bring me down there I'll be dead within the hour."
Surprised by the statement Kanda narrowed his eyes just the tiniest amount and asked, "Why do you say that?"
Allen sneered at Kanda, almost in disbelief, that he didn't know what he meant. "Are you kidding? You of all people should know. The mafia, they're everywhere. In schools they're teachers, in government they're politicians, even presidents. And they're definitely in the police. They could be the very partner you work with," Allen glanced to the person behind him and Lavi looked back at him in utter confusion. "If you take me to that police station I'll definitely be killed."
"And I want to know why," Kanda told him.
Now confidence struck his voice and Allen laughed when he said "You don't work for that police station, do you?"
Kanda didn't even seem affected by the statement and all he asked was "How did you know?"
"Hey, we're not supposed to give out information like that!" Lavi said, now stepping back into the light.
"It's not like I'm saying something he doesn't already know," Kanda said blandly.
"Why else would you have asked me how I got this scar? You must work for INTERPOL, right?" Allen felt like he had just won the battle.
"Smart kid," Kanda complimented.
"You don't have to be a genius to figure it out," Allen retorted.
"No, but you would have to be involved, and you just proved it big time," Kanda sighed and rubbed the back of his neck with his left hand. "Well, it's not like I was going to take you down there anyways."
"What?" Allen asked, not understanding what Kanda meant.
"Do you really think I could just waltz in there with you in handcuffs? To them, you have nothing to do with anything and it would look bad on me, especially with the Chief dead now."
"So he was a part of it too, huh. No wonder he was killed. The mafia was targeting him for a long time, you know," Allen gave a wry smirk, but he felt it falter. He was getting weak. He had completely forgotten he had been shot in the hand, however possible that was, and now the blood was slowly seeping out from the wound. He pulled down the sleeve of his left arm and wrapped it around his hand to stop it from bleeding.
"I guessed as much," Kanda pondered, hand on his chin, staring at the ground. He hadn't noticed the kids' condition.
He picked his head back up after a few second to speak to Allen again, "For the time being you'll be staying at one of our houses."
At Allen's shocked face Kanda guessed what he was thinking, smiled back, and said "because we have the right to, because you're a minor, and because you really can't do anything against us. That's why we can do this."
"That's not fair!" Allen shouted childishly as Kanda moved over to him and grabbed onto his right arm.
Of course it is," Kanda said, pulling the kid to the flight of stairs closest, Lavi following behind. "It's fair for us."
Somehow, the chapters get shorter with each one to go by. I was going to continue it, but with the next scene coming up, it would have extended this chapter much longer than I want for them to be.
Anyways, it's official, this will be a YULLEN.
Personally I'm a fan as well.
I don't really have much more to say so until next time,
Read, review, and stay strong.
-Xenophili