Oh geez, I'm so sorry guys! I've been really busy with a lot of other stories the past year, which have taken up all my time! (Some are posted elsewhere, but shoot me a pm and I'll tell ya where, none are dgm or bb though, so be aware.) Sorry, I'm not gonna answer reviews this time, but if that's something y'all want me to continue, just say so. Well, onwards and upwards! I'm sure you all are ready for the chapter, so I'll get to it!
Have fun, stay safe, and have a nice day!
…
Lenalee followed her two roommates back to their tent. Something seemed familiar about Freckles, but she couldn't pinpoint what it was exactly. Shrugging it off, she entered the tent.
"Can I have the top bunk?" Freckles was asking, already scaling the ladder.
"By all means." Smile relented, setting his things down on the lower bed. Lenalee shrugged and dropped her bag at the foot of the cot that was shoved in the corner like an afterthought. "I was just thinking I would prefer the lower bunk."
Freckles' brow furrowed in confusion.
"Ya know, I been thinkin'. You sure do talk all high class like."
"I-I do?" Smile stuttered, an embarrassed smile gracing his face. "It must be due to my working at a manor since I was little."
"That must have been nice." Lenalee said softly. "Why'd you leave?"
"Er, the lord was kind of a pain…" Smile answered, refusing to meet either girl's eyes.
"What 'bout you Butterfly?!" Freckles continued cheerfully. "What're ya doin' in a place like the circus? Yer pretty enough to be a lady, that's fer sure! And ya talk all fancy to!"
"Oh!" Lenalee smiled politely. "I was raised by the church. They took me from my brother, so I hoped I might be able to find him again if I traveled with the circus." It wasn't all a lie.
"That's sad." Freckles frowned. "I hope ya find 'im. Until then, we will be yer new family! You can be like a big sister! Yer so pretty and nice and talented, I'm sure ya will get to first tier soon!"
"That's sweet of you." Lenalee giggled. "Thank you Freckles, you're very kind as well, and so cute too!"
"Hey! Do either a the two a you want some candy? It's even that Funtom stuff, so it's gotta be really good!" Freckles said excitedly, pulling three lollipops from her bag. "I got caramel, milk, and strawberry. Which one would ya like?"
"I-I'll have the caramel one." Smile grinned awkwardly, taking the offered sweet.
"I'll have the strawberry. Thank you Freckles, these must have cost a lot, and you're sharing with us!" Lenalee removed the wrapper from her sucker.
"Nah, wasn't too bad." Freckles blushed. "They're popular, so it's easy to get yer hands on 'em for a good price."
"Still, thank you!"
"S-sure." She blushed harder. "I-if either a ya need anythin' just ask. I've been in the circus fer a long time, and I can offer ya some pointers."
"That would be great." Lenalee nodded.
"Y-yes. Thank you." Smile added.
The three sat in silence as Freckles and Lenalee finished their candy, Smile had simply slid his into his bag, presumably for later. After a while, Smile nervously cleared his throat.
"Shouldn't we get ready for bed?"
"Ya, that's a good idea." Freckles beamed. "We gotta get up early tomorrow!"
Lenalee changed quickly, her nightgown already folded at the top of her bag. She turned around when the snickering started. Smile had become stuck in his night shirt, one hand visible as the other pawed desperately for its sleeve. His face was covered, and his limbs were arranged such that he couldn't pull his head through. Freckles was laughing at him, already in a simple work short that dropped past her knees.
With a small laugh, Lenalee went to help free Smile from the prison he'd become trapped in, guiding his arm, then firmly tugging the shirt the rest of the way down.
"There." Lenalee nodded, smoothing his rumpled hair with gentle hands. "You're all set! Oh! Wait-" she reached around and caught the strings to his eyepatch, tugging until the tight bow came undone. She removed the patch, handing it over to Smile, who looked quite frazzled, his right eye now squeezed shut and curtained by his bangs. "There you go! All ready for bed!"
"Thank you." He muttered, cheeks flushing slightly, before turning to crawl into his bunk.
"Yer such a mom, Lenalee." Freckles grinned; Lenalee just shook her head, used to such teasing. "Oh, uh." Freckles added, staring nervously down at her folded hands. "Can-can ya help me with my hair? It gets all tangled after a day in the circus, and I've never really had anyone ta help me before."
"Of course." Lenalee smiled softly, remembering how nice it had been when someone brushed her hair for her, when it had still been long. "Come and sit next to me."
Lenalee rustled through her bag, looking for her brush, as Freckles scrambled excitedly down the ladder.
The young girl hummed happily as Lenalee started on her hair. Lenalee relaxed, glad she could help Freckles, it was sad the girl had no role models. Lenalee was just smoothing her bangs back, when she noticed. She gasped, looking at the mottled flesh around Freckles' left eye.
"I-I know I'm not very pretty." Freckles whispered.
"No." Lenalee said firmly. "You're beautiful. And your scar isn't something you should be ashamed of. It's a part of you, and you're gorgeous, so it is to. We all have scars." Lenalee showed her the two crosses on her shins, where her Innocence had formed, the rings shifting around her ankles.
Freckles sniffled, before turning and gripping Lenalee tightly around the waist. "Thank you." She whispered into Lenalee's stomach.
Lenalee smiled, and petted the girl's hair while she finished crying. With a watery smile, Freckles clambered back up into her own bed.
…
"So, what do you think?" Lavi asked. "Think I'm gonna be murdered in my sleep by Akuma?"
Allen frowned, shifting to stand so Lavi was between him and Black and Suit, before activating his eye. Allen's gaze darted over them quickly.
"Uh, they're good." Allen frowned, letting his eye deactivate once more.
"Something wrong?" Lavi raised a brow.
"No, uh, it's nothing. Better keep your eye on them, they may know something about the children." Allen said solemnly.
"Will do. Don't get shanked by Kanda, would you?" Levi offered as a parting. "Night!"
"Good night, 'Memory'." Allen replied. Lack grinned and winked, letting his earlier ridiculousness drop, before turning to follow his roommates.
"So, roomies." He grinned. "What're we gonna do when we get to our tent? Paint each other's nails? Play truth or dare? Or, ooooo! We could talk about boys!"
"We will be sleeping and nothing else. I have much work to catch up on in the morning." Suit said firmly, tone leaving no room for argument, but oh, how Lavi loved to argue.
"Awwww, but I so wanted to get to know you two! We're all gonna be working together, after all!" Lavi needled.
"I will only work here for as long as necessary, not a second more, and I do not require information of your person to complete my work." Suit sped up his steps.
"Buzzkill." Lavi pouted. "What about you, Black? Up for some ice-breakers?"
"I am but a simple butler-turned-circus-performer, Memory, nothing else." Black smirked.
"Right." Lack frowned. So, no conventional information gathering then. With a sigh, Lavi let himself into the tent; observing that Suit had already claimed the bottom. Black and Lavi stared at the remaining bunk and cot, then at each other. "I call cot!" Lavi shouted hastily, practically diving onto it. Black simply blinked, before huffing slightly.
"Good, that was the layout I was about to suggest." Suit spoke up, using his hedge trimmers to draw a line in the dirt under their feet, splitting the room neatly into two perfect halves. "This is my territory, please refrain from crossing into it." Suit explained to Black.
"What, I don't get my own portion?" Lavi asked jokingly.
"You are allowed to pass freely between the two, I have no quarrels with your kind, and therefore will not object. I'm certain the devil won't either." Suit explained, Lavi frowned. What a strange guy.
"Very well." Black agreed easily, bowing slightly. "But please, let us not discuss personal business in front of our roommate."
Personal business?
"That can be arranged." Suit huffed, before beginning to strip.
"Woah! Some warning!" Lavi's eye widened.
"Apologies, but I must prepare for bed." Suit didn't slow down until he was redressed in proper pajamas.
Black simply shook his head and hung his jacket neatly up before climbing into his bunk, foregoing changing altogether. Lavi shrugged, slipping into a pair of loose pants and an old shirt, collapsing into his cot carelessly as Suit daintily stepped into his bunk. Lavi rolled his eye. What weirdos. Lavi grinned. Monitoring them would be easy. Quickly, Lavi slipped into sleep.
…
"Come on Moyashi, quit stalling and let's find our tent already!" Kanda growled.
"Fine! I'm coming, Bakanda!" Allen hurried after his comrade.
A few minutes later and it was apparent that they were very turned around.
"Do you even know where we're going?" Allen sniped.
"Of course. I'm not the one with the shit sense of direction." Kanda fired back, continuing to stalk off through the labyrinth of tents, none labeled like the one they were looking for.
"Right. Because you're so good at this kind of thing." Allen rolled his eyes.
"We're just not there yet, idiot. We will be soon." Kanda said.
"Right."
Another half-hour, and Kanda finally threw in the towel.
"Fine! We're lost! Happy?"
Allen smirked back at him, doing nothing to hide his chuckle. "Looks like you leading helped us a grand total of zero percent. Good work."
Kanda scowled, body tensing and hand straying towards Mugen. Just as a fight was began to break out, a figure separated from the shadows and slunk towards them.
"You two again -says Goethe." The kid who had stopped them the night prior intoned.
"Oh! You're from before!" Allen said holding his hand out to the boy. "I'm Red and that's Samurai, do you think you can help us find our tent?"
The kid studied his hand closely, making no move to return the handshake. "You are now part of the circus? -says Wordsworth."
"Yeah, we just joined up." Allen nodded, letting his hand drop.
"Oh. He is Snake. We can help you find your tent. -says Wordsworth." The kid- Snake -cocked his head, before trotting off in another direction. "This way to the rookie tents. -says Goethe."
Allen and Kanda exchanged looks, before Allen shrugged and followed their guide. This was the circus, and, as Allen knew better than most, odd was a staple.
Snake was quick, and he knew all the shortcuts, so it became significantly easier for them to become un-lost than it had for them to become lost.
"Through here, just look for the number in front of your tent. -says Wordsworth." Snake nodded.
"Thanks." Allen smiled embarrassedly. Kanda had already begun heading to their tent. Figures, Allen thought. "Really," he turned to Snake, putting a hand on his shoulder. "Thank you. We would've been lost for a while without you." He smiled. "Hope to see you around!"
With one last wave, Allen left Snake to his own devices and followed Kanda to their tent. When he arrived, Kanda was already sprawled out on the lower bunk, hair loose, shirt discarded for what looked like a sweater, and his uniform pants on. His boots sat neatly under his bunk, along with his bag, with Mugen leaning against the bed pole.
"Took you long enough." Kanda spoke up, not even turning to look at Allen.
"I, unlike some people, actually have manners." Allen frowned.
"Those rusty things? Tch, nothing more than show."
Allen gaped. "I-what? I'm a nice person!"
"Sure."
"I am!"
"Not a very genuine one, at the very least."
'Nea!' He pleaded, turning inward.
'Nope, not getting into this one. You and your boyfriend fight all you want, I'm going to bed.'
'BOYFRIEND! Nea! Get back here!'
"Just be quiet and put out that light, idiot Moyashi. I'm trying to sleep." Kanda grumbled, turning away from Allen.
Arguing in his head and outside it had both became futile, so Allen got ready for bed. With a very red face he snuffed the light and then climbed past Kanda flopping into his bunk when he reached it. He lay a while, staring at the ceiling. His thoughts were a whirlwind, Kanda, Nea, the children, Joker, Black and Suit, all clamoring for attention, it was exhausting. Sighing, he turned to face the wall, not even wincing at how the bed frame creaked and swayed underneath him. He was used to worse sleeping surfaces than this. Slowly, Allen drifted off.
…
Lavi was awoken in the night by a loud noise. He blinked blearily, peering into the darkness of the tent, trying to identify the source. Fuzzily, he could see Black leaning over the side of his bed, Suit's trimmers an inch from his face.
"Where are you going?" Suit murmured. "Lights Out was hours ago, for heaven's sake… I won't stand for you going wandering without your master to hold your leash, so stay in bed."
A second passed, before Black lay back, leaving Suit to do the same. Lavi squinted his eye, trying to discern any further movement. When there was none, he fell back to sleep.
…
He sat huddled into a corner, alone and sopping from the pounding rain. Hidden in a back alley, he could distantly make out the noise from the street. As he sniffled, he could feel the fresh bruise along his cheekbone sting with his movement. He remembered how he got, sobbing harder at the memory.
A nice noble lady had approached him, kneeling down carefully to his height, before extending her hand to him.
"Here," she'd said. "I bought you an apple. You looked hungry."
He'd reached to take it, when she'd caught sight of his arm, stiff and unmoving at his side.
With a shriek, she jumped away, nearly tripping over her skirts as she put as much distance as she could between them, dropping the fruit in the process. The man who was with her came surging forward, hitting him across the face with his walking stick, sending him tumbling to the ground.
"What did you do to her, you dirty little lowlife?"
"I didn't do nothin' ta her!" He'd protested, only to be met with another strike across the same cheek.
"Liar." The man hissed as he tried to cower away.
"He's a demon, look at his arm." The woman trembled. "Let's just go, leave him here, alone."
The man spat on him, muttering 'demon scum' under his breath, before marching off with the woman.
He had held back the tears as he scooped up the now bruised and dirty apple, rushing off into the maze of backstreets and dirty alleys, where he'd only be noticed if tripped on.
While devouring the fruit he hadn't been able to stop himself from crying.
Since then it had started raining, which brought him to where he was now. He had simply huddled where he sat. He had nowhere else to go. At some point he must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he could remember was being awoken by a hand weakly shaking his shoulder.
"Hey." A young boy said. He would have been six or seven, which put the boy somewhere in his mid-teens at the time.
"Leave me 'lone." He said stubbornly, wiping at his nose with his sleeve.
"Ya live out here?" The boy pushed, limp orange hair falling into his eyes.
"'Course. You see anyone out 'ere lookin' for me?" He scowled. "Now leave me 'lone."
"Nah." The boy smiled thinly. "Come with me, meet the others. We take care a each other, we'll take care a you."
"You don't want me." He said, brandishing his left arm as best he could. "I'm a monster. They all say so."
"Yer just like the rest a us, than." The boy patted his head, showing him the stump that remained of his other arm. "A few a us were born like this, others differently, but we're all like you, and we watch out for each other."
"You-you mean it?!" He didn't want to hope…
"A course. Seen ya 'round a couple times, but I never could catch ya ta ask." His smile wasn't happy, and him and his family weren't any better off, but it was somewhere he could stay, where he had others like him who watched his back.
The scene flickered, until he was standing in a garden, wearing clothes that were clean, if not new, his auburn hair pulled back neatly from his face, having been carefully combed by one of his so-called family.
"So, what do ya all think?" Their leader asked.
"A circus?" The youngest girl asked. "Why would we do somethin' like that?"
"'Cuz it'd be fun, and it'd help father out!"
'Father', or Baron Kelvin, the man who'd taken their rag-tag group off the streets. He couldn't bring himself to think of him as a father, or of any of the others as family, but here he had food, so he wouldn't leave unless he had to.
"I'll be Joker." Their leader said, "I can be the ringmaster!"
"Do we all get names?!" The girl who was half in love with the newly christened Joker asked in awe.
"Yup! Let's see ye can be Beast! And he'll be Dagger… hmmm the twins can be Peter and Wendy, and the big guy Jumbo." Joker nodded.
"What 'bout me?! I wanna name!" Their youngest jumbed up and down, she was only a year or two younger than him.
"Hmmmm, you can be Doll." Joker said, rustling her hair, leaving her ruined eye bare for a second.
"I don't want such a girly name! It don't suit me!" She protested.
"'Course it does." Joker frowned. "Because yer our cut lil sis!"
She blushed deeply. He scoffed, kicking at the grass beneath his feet. He was standing a ways back, not wanting to give in to the others' hype. 'This is temporary' he had to keep telling himself 'It can't last, 'cuz nothin' good ever does.'
"What about brother!" Doll exclaimed, breaking him from his thoughts, before fearlessly grabbing him by his immobile arm and dragging him to stand in front of Joker. "Don't he get a name?"
"O'course!" Joker grinned. "He's our lil brother af'er all! You can be Red!"
"Red?" He scrunched his face up. "Why? 'Cuz 'o' my arm?"
"No, silly! 'Cuz of yer hair!" Joker laughed, mussing his aforementioned hair.
"I don't wanna be in no circus." He frowned, backing away from Joker.
"Aw, why not? I got everything all planned out!" Joker insisted. "Beast'll be the beast tamer, duh, Dagger can juggle knives and throw 'em, Jumbo'll be our fire breather, Wendy and Peter can do tightropes, Doll can do the tightrope, and you, Red, you can be our clown!"
"Wow! That's so cool Joker!" Beast exclaimed. He huffed and began to storm off.
'Red' stopped at the tug on his left arm.
"Come on Red!" Doll batted her eyes up at him. "It won't be the same without ya!"
"Tch, yeah right." 'Red' scowled. "I'm better off alone."
He stormed off successfully this time, leaving the others to play. How could they forget their lives on the street so easily? Couldn't they see how they'd get pulled back someday?
"Leave 'im." Joker said from behind him. "We can't force 'im. 'E just needs more time to settle inta the idea a family."
The scene shifted again, this time he found himself outside a towering pair of gates. He was sneaking forward, trying not to make any noise. He was leaving. Screw them, screw their circus, and most of all, screw Baron Kelvin! They all thought this was such a good idea, but 'Red' had seen the look in the noble's eyes, had seen the insanity lurking in their depths, and he'd known what the man would become. He'd try his luck on the streets, thank you very much! He didn't need them! He didn't need any of them! He'd be fine on his own, like he always was! Sniffling, he left that place behind, never looking back.
…
Allen awoke with a gasp, head brushing the ceiling of the tent as he shot up. He was shaking, memories he'd tried so hard to forget welling beneath the surface. He laughed, the sound cracked and crazy sounding. The day he'd left he'd been kidnapped off the streets and sold into the circus, Allen had been so mad, he'd wondered if God was punishing him for wandering off. Falling back, Allen sighed heavily. Red. Neither his hair nor his arm matched that moniker any longer. No one had used it during his time at that first circus; after refusing to perform they'd made him an errand boy, calling him 'you', 'boy', 'scum', or 'shit', among others, but that's always what he'd given his name as, what he'd told Mana his name was. Without Joker, he'd never have had even that, until Mana mistook him for a dog.
'Joker, what are you and the others into?' Allen frowned up at the ceiling.
"Moyashi!" He heard from below, startling him. "Go to sleep! All your tossing and sighing is keeping me up!"
"Whatever, Bakanda." Allen scowled, forcing himself back to sleep.
…
So, here's the deal. The only firm schedule I can give is, once a year, on August 19, I will post. Other than that, my update schedule is random. I'm sorry, but I can't give any better. Also, I am caught up on both stories, so no worries about spoiling anything if you guys mention it.
Onto story stuff, I wasn't originally planning on putting the dream sequence here (instead I was gonna put it way later in the story), but it seemed to fit, so I thought "why not?" Y'all seemed excited for details, so here ya go! We won't get much Circus-Allen realizations until later, but I'm happy with this for now. I've finally got actual plans for this story, plans for an ending and a sequel, so hopefully I can post more regularly! I hope you all enjoyed! Thanks for reading!
-Vetus
