Chapter nineteen – Entertainment value
When Kanda came down to breakfast there was only a light smattering of people spread throughout the café. Of course, seeing as it was still absurdly early he hadn't been expecting much. A brief scan of the room showed that the beansprout was nowhere to be seen. Scowling up a storm Kanda marched over to the counter.
"Ooh, Kanda. You're up early. Soba, I presume?" Jerry smiled brightly at him, pink dreadlocks bobbing as he made to cross the room.
"Oi. Have you seen the Moyashi?" Kanda said before Jerry could get too distracted. It was a quirk of the middle aged man to never be silent for long.
"Moyashi?"
An irritated noise. "Allen."
"Oh, yes. He left not all that long ago… hmm… That's strange; I know it was in here…" Jerry barely payed the increasingly annoyed Kanda any attention as he rustled through the cupboards in search of some elusive soba ingredient.
"How long ago?" Kanda demanded through tightly clenched teeth. "Was he alone?"
Straightening up Jerry cast him a concerned look. "You're being unusually persistent. Did something happen?" Something seemed to cross his mind for tanned hands shot up to his mouth and eyes widened in a comical show of surprise. "Is Allen in trouble?"
Don't wanna deal with this so early, Kanda thought bitterly. "No. Just answer the fucking questions."
"He left maybe twenty minutes ago, alone. I thought it was strange so I asked, but he said he was meeting up with you all later."
Fucking irritating, conniving sonnova –
Trying to reign in his temper Kanda gave a grunt and snapped, "Hurry up that soba."
Jerry tsked at him, waving a spatula in his face. "Not a morning person still, I see." He chastened before prancing off to prepare him his meal. In Jerry's absence Kanda promptly slammed his head against the counter, just standing there trying to keep staring into darkness for as long as possible.
I am, he decided wearily, so fucking over this crazy shit.
However, the problem with being 'so fucking over it', was that it didn't magically make it go away. In fact, it had a rather annoying habit of blowing up in his face all the more. And when that happened, Kanda's self-control was bound to snap and there would be dead shit as far as the eye could see. As far as they eye could see with a god-damn telescope.
From somewhere beyond his bloody musing Kanda heard a loud yawn and an annoying, "mornin' Yu-chan. How come you didn't wake me?"
Baka Usagi was up early. Somehow Kanda's day seemed to be fast going down the drain.
"I didn't wake you," He said through tightly clenched teeth as he finally managed to find the inner strength to raise his head off the counter, "because I didn't want to have to put up with you for one second longer than I have to."
Lavi pulled a face and leant on the counter next to Kanda, ignoring the evil eye the samurai wannabe was giving him.
"You're in a lousy mood this morning." Lavi observed as he plucked a muffin from behind the counter while Jerry's back was turned. Turning the mix of blueberry goodness over in his hands he gazed at Kanda with curious eyes.
"I'm always in a lousy mood," Kanda snapped, "and you have to pay for that muffin fucktard."
"And if you're in a lousy mood," Lavi pondered as he thoughtfully munched on the muffin while ignoring Kanda's kind suggestion, "it's a good indication something is bothering you."
Gee. Like Kanda couldn't have figured that out on his own. Scowling he opened his mouth. "Yes. And it's really fucking moronic and has red hair."
Another bite of purple tinted muffin disappeared between Lavi's mighty chompers as one skilful green eye… eyed Kanda with careful interest. Another bite. More staring.
"For fuck sakes! If you have something to say, say it before I rip your mouth off!" Kanda snapped, slapping the palm of his hand down on the counter.
Lavi looked at Kanda's furious expression and a grin spread across his face with all the subtlety of a charging bull. "It's because of Allen, isn't it?"
"What the fuck? Not everything has to come back to the damn Moyashi." Kanda growled, wisely not mentioning that Lavi was, in fact, completely accurate in his assumption. Why make more problems where they shouldn't exist.
Lavi gave a feminine little tut and wagged his finger at Kanda. "That's not the right attitude if you ever want to get some."
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU –."
"But," Lavi pondered, cutting over Kanda's spluttered shouting with ease, "where is he? I stopped by your room on the way down and neither of you were there." He turned his sight back on Kanda. "Do you know where he's gone?"
Kanda had never been so grateful to see Jerry returning with his soba in his life. Slamming down some money he snatched it and stalked angrily away, obviously fuming.
"Neh, Yu-chan! Wait up!" Lavi pleaded as he shoved the last trace of the muffin in his mouth and made to dash after the long haired teen only to feel the sharp tug of a very muscled and yet feminine hand grabbing his shirt.
"Where do you think you're going without paying for that muffin?" Jerry asked crossly.
"Eh, what? Hold on a minute, I don't have any money on me! WAIT! YU-CHAN!"
Pisses me off, Kanda thought irately as he pushed the door of the café open and stormed out.
oOo_oOo_oOo
Allen was mildly exhausted. He'd never thought it would be so hard to get himself spotted by the very same people who had seemed to have been stalking him. But, as fate would have it, it was nearing one in the afternoon and he was yet to see a single NOAH.
Letting out a sigh he flopped down on a shaded park bench and tugged at the collar of his shirt to let some cool air touch the heated skin of his neck.
The park was rather quiet considering it was a school free day. One or two student aged teens lounged around beneath shadowy trees, ears plugged up firmly with earphones or perhaps cradling a book. Scattered around the green grass were young families picnicking, of just enjoying a small moment of scarce peace with each other.
Allen gave a fond smile as he watched a young child snuggle closer into his mother's lap whilst he continued to nap, maybe seeking the familiar warmth of a mothers comforting embrace.
I wonder, Allen thought absently, what that feels like?
Once proposed the question would not leave and Allen found what had started off as a brief and unexpectedly comforting break from his suicidal hunt quickly turning sour. This in itself was rather unusual.
Allen was only human, and he'd had more than enough time in his existence to think about the lack of birth parents in his life, and, even more depressing, the lack of a mother at all. But no matter how much he'd pondered it, it had never really bugged him before.
"It's only natural," he remembered saying to Mana with curious eyes when he had inquired, "Nobody wants to have a freak as a child."
A small smile tugged at Allen's lips as he recalled Mana's surprised expression and the tenderness in his own gaze. "But I'm happy to have a 'freak' as my child, Allen."
He always knew just what to say… Allen gave a small chuckle as he glanced back over at the mother and child duo. It doesn't matter that I didn't have that. Mana was more than enough. Any more would have just been greedy.
Logic and reasoning having prevailed Allen straightened on the seat and prepared to get up and continue his stroll through town.
"Why, Allen… With the way you're walking around all on your own, you'd almost think that you wanted me to come and find you." A cheery voice sounded beside him in unison with the click of a zippo lighter and the familiar fumes of high brand cigarettes.
Slowly turning his head, Allen saw that Tyki was indeed lounging comfortable on the bench beside him, grinning with a newspaper propped open on his lap like he'd been there the whole time. Evenly, Allen lowered himself back into the seat as his heart sounded an uneven beat.
"I can see how you'd think that," Allen said with as much assertiveness as he could, "Seeing as how I was."
Tyki raised his golden eyes from the paper he was reading to look over at the glass faced young boy with quirked eyebrows. Allen met his gaze evenly, determined not to look away. Slowly, Tyki pulled the cigarette from between his teeth and breathed out a spiralling pattern of smoke.
"Oh?" He said gently. "I was under the impression that you were trying to… You know… Forget about us and all that." A small smirk played along his lips as he put the smoke back between his lips and looked back at the newspaper. "Politicians today," he muttered absently as he ruffled the pages, "no sense of right and wrong."
No sense of right and wrong…
Allen swallowed slightly. "I've been on my own for hours. Why'd you only come now?"
"Well," Tyki drawled, "It was such a bold move. You made me curious of your intentions. I thought I'd hang back and watch awhile. But you were sitting here all grins like you were thinking happy thoughts, and well…" Gold eyes looked back up mischievously, "I couldn't just stand back and let that happen."
"I can see how me being happy would be a disappointment and all," Allen shot back without missing a beat, "but if you were curious why not approach me right away?"
Tyki gave a snort and turned the page of his newspaper. "I'm not Rhode."
Allen's mouth mysteriously felt dry all of a sudden.
"Now," Tyki said and slammed the newspaper close with such force Allen had to jump, "why exactly did you want to be found?"
You'd think in all the time I was wandering around, Allen thought wildly, I would have thought a concrete way to ask him something.
"What," Allen said, because 'what' always seemed like a good way to start a question, "do you want with me? I mean, why, after all this time, are you coming after me again now!"
Tyki eyed him with sadism clear in his expression. "What and why, huh?"
"Yes," Allen said firmly, "What and why."
Tyki took his cigarette out and tapped it on the edge of the bench to watch the ashes crumble away from the smooth white of the paper. "What's to stop me from knocking you out and dragging you back with me?" He pondered loudly.
Thump, thump, thump, thump.
Allen's heart speed up audibly. "Because you're curious about me."
Golden eyes slowly slid over to look at him. "I am, but I could find out so much more by taking you back with me. Besides, it's not like the Earl would exactly like me to let you waltz off after you walked right up to me…"
ThumpThumpThumpThump…
"If you try to take me anywhere I'll bite my tongue off and kill myself." Allen said bluntly.
Tyki blinked at him in surprise, staring at him for a full minute with eerily golden eyes. Please, Allen begged silently, buy it. Please buy it. Another minute passed and the newly formed ashes on the smoke slowly fell away on their own.
And then Tyki laughed.
Not just a chuckle or a small giggle, full blown laughter. "You haven't changed one bit have you, kid? Your entertainment value is priceless!" He roared as he slapped Allen heartily on the back, nearly giving him whiplash.
"Oh, geez… Kill yourself!" He howled as if it was a big joke, cigarette dancing between his lips without falling out. "Ah, you're such a riot." Tyki chuckled as he wiped a tear of laughter from his eye and gave Allen a wide grin.
Allen himself realized he might be turning purple from holding his breath. Doing his best not to look like somebody who had been suffocating for the past few minutes, he let the air whoosh out from his lips in one soft gust and greedily sucked in more.
"I always did like you," Tyki confessed to him, "you always managed bite back."
"I didn't like you one bit." Allen said in return.
"Oh, my poor heart…." Tyki snickered as he got to his feet; taking one last drag he stubbed his cigarette out on the edge of the park bench before putting his hands on his hips and leaning dramatically backwards to ease his back of kinks.
"Wait, you're leaving?" Allen blurted out, leaping to his own feet.
Tyki gave him a raised eyebrow. "What? You wanna come with me?"
"Well… No… But, aren't you… Going to make me?"
Tyki observed him seriously for a moment. "When I left today I received no orders to take you back with me if I met you. So, I see no need."
"…What?"
Tyki shrugged and gave a smirk. "What can I say? If I drag you off now things won't be interesting. I'm a guy who likes interesting things. I'm curious to see what you'll do. But, next time we meet it won't be like this. There will be no mercy. In fact, if I were you I'd probably take this warning to leave. The boss feels like it's about time."
"About time for what?" Allen asked desperately as Tyki began to walk away. Receiving no answer he called after the retreating back, "Aren't you going to answer any of my questions!"
Tyki raised one hand as he walked but did not turn around. "If you want to know, why don't you ask that Master of yours?" he said carelessly, leaving Allen standing stupidly in front of a park bench while aging leaves swirled around his diminutive form.
oOo_oOo_oOo
Kanda had spent a vast majority of the day training with his sadly neglected Mugen in his special room. Being physically exhausted meant his mind would hopefully stop working itself around in circles, because if he kept up all this thinking for much longer he was going to drive himself insane.
This was without factoring in the overall irritation this morning's breakfast had afforded him. Just thinking about it riled him up all the more until all he wanted to do was hurt anyone with in hurting range.
And that pissed him off even more.
Being angry and violent was practically in Kanda's job description. It was part of what made him, him. All the same, even he was not nearly idiotic enough to not realize that in the past few days he'd been moodier than normal.
He blamed that infuriating sprout.
See? No matter what he thought of he wound up going in circles! Because everything wound up back up at Allen, and from there to the damn secrete keeping to his irritation and how the irritation was caused.
"Damn circles!" Kanda muttered angrily as he viciously slammed the door to the room open.
"Oh, um, hi Kanda. I see the circles are bothering you again…"
Kanda looked up in surprised to see Allen leaning nervously on his desk, jacket held loosely in his hands like he'd only just gotten back. Kanda narrowed his eyes as he felt his irritation leap up full force again.
Slamming the door closed he leant Mugen against the wall and turned around to snap, "And where the fuck have you been all day?"
Allen jumped guiltily and his long slender fingers tightened around the loose cloth of his jacket. "I had something I needed to do." He said softly without looking at Kanda. This was, as everything was, irritating.
"Do something, huh? Che! Are you going to share or is that a secrete too?" He growled as he crossed the room, using the sweat towel draped over his shoulders to dab at his sweaty face. Allen opened his mouth but Kanda cut over him, "Fuck! You don't have to answer you moron!"
"But you asked me the question." Allen shot back but Kanda was already storming across the room to the bathroom.
"SHUT UP!" Kanda snapped as he lost control of his temper. Flinging the bathroom door open he made to step inside so he could, for the love of god, shower away this anger that training hadn't seemed to get rid of, only to stop onto something metallic and squishy.
A second later there was a sharp pain in his foot and he looked down to see Timcanpy's ridiculously large teeth firmly clasped around the tender flesh of his foot.
"Tim!" Allen cried, reaching for the golden ball just as it detached from Kanda to avoid the wild swing of deadly limbs aimed at him. Upon one look at Kanda's face Allen rushed to apologise. "I'm sorry! He's been in a bad mood for weeks now and hiding in the strangest places and –."
"For the love of god, shut up Moyashi!" Kanda snapped and Allen instantly fell silent.
Temper, temper…
Groaning, Kanda ran one hand over his face. "Look, I didn't sleep last night so I'm in a bad mood," he said through tightly clenched teeth, "just let me have a shower and I'll calm down a bit. So just… God, I don't know! Go to a corner and assume the foetal position and stay out of my way." Kanda instructed before ducking into the bathroom and slamming the door.
Surprisingly, the shower did help unwind him a little bit. The warm sluicing water unknotted his tense back and calmed down the unjustified anger that had been running through his veins since the previous night.
By the time he stepped out of the shower he was willing to… well, not really interact with others, but at least now it'd only been mildly annoying as opposed to mortal suffering.
Feeling vaguely more human, Kanda tied up his hair and stepped outside the room fully expecting it to be empty and received a strange thill of surprise when he saw Allen sitting at his desk with his head in his arms.
I swear to dear god if I go up to him and he's doing something totally lame like crying, I will slap a bitch…
Approaching softly Kanda reached out one hand to shake the beansprout awake only to see the slight shifting in old man white hair. Pausing, Kanda watched as Allen turned his head over to look at him.
"Feeling better?" Allen asked.
"No." Kanda said bluntly with no conviction.
Seeing straight through him Allen gave a genuine warm smile. "That's good…"
Kanda felt a strange tingle in his blood as those silver eyes looked up at him. Must be coming down with something…
"Hey Kanda?" Allen asked, jerked Kanda from his musings.
"Che. What?"
Allen bit his lip and for the first time Kanda realized that Allen looked rather thoughtful and deeply troubled. Reeeealy troubled. The kind of troubled one might look if they were thinking about walking into what they knew was a death sentence.
Allen rolled his shoulder uneasily and asked, "Would you like to come with me to meet my Master?"
OoO
A/N: Unbetad as of right now. Will be fixed later by my brilliant and dedicated Beta :D
A shout out to Angel Fantasy whom I bumped into on a community in live journal after I asked for some fanfic recommendations XD
And CROSS! Cross is finally coming into the fic! . (This excites even me and I'm the god-damn author)
Review maybe? Don't make Kanda slap a bitch.