Chapter thirty-two – To lead the charge
Allen awoke to a fuzzy haze and a pounding in his head.
His eyelids were heavier than he could remember, and opening them was a considerable feat of strength. They fluttered once, twice, and a third time before he was able to keep them open.
He was in a room of some sort. All light beige walls and white tiles that were so clean the shine from them made him squint and caused his head to protest loudly – a kind of eerie shrieking noise in his ear like he could hear the gears of his mind whirling at half-capacity.
I don't know this place, he thought vaguely, I don't know…
He tried moving – just a twitch of his wrists – and felt something cool and smooth restrict against his skin. He turned his head slightly – blinking back the explosion of blue and red that followed the aborted movement – and caught a glimpse of silver cuffs tight around slender wrists and interlocking chain weaving through iron bars at the head of his bed.
Handcuffs, his mind supplied helpfully, those are handcuffs.
Allen had the faint idea that he was meant to be alarmed about this; that he should be worried and concerned and maybe cry a little, but for the life of him he couldn't remember why.
Footsteps echoed loudly and there was a creaking sound like badly oiled hinges. Allen tried to lift his head but found it made him too dizzy and instead lowered it slowly on to the blissfully soft mattress beneath him.
"How are you doing, Allen?" Somebody asked; a vaguely familiar voice that he couldn't place.
"I don't feel well," he said, only to find his tongue fuzzy and far too heavy. His words came out a garbled mess and Allen frowned, because that didn't sound at all like what he was trying to say.
"Ah, the sedatives wearing off. You're a bit disorientated. Not to worry though, I can fix that."
No, Allen thought suddenly with such a spark of clarity that for a brief instance the world righted itself. No, I don't want this.
Smooth fingers gripped his arm and jerked it painfully so that it rested at an odd angle as the cuffs around his wrist resisted.
From where he laid, Allen could see a brilliant red mark in the crook of his exposed elbow – a needle puncture point.
Remember, he thought fiercely, just try to remember.
There had been green and silver and brick buildings swimming above him. Black clothing and gold eyes, fingers hard around his wrist. The sickening feeling of an injection.
Kanda sprawled out on the ground, not moving.
Kanda… Allen thought. He had the feeling that the word – the name? – should have evoked some reaction in him, should have made him feel or do something, but he couldn't connect it in his mind.
There was a sharp pain and Allen blinked to see a needle sinking into his elbow, another red dot beside the first.
"There we go," the voice said, "You just go back to sleep now."
No, Allen thought.
"Okay," he murmured and his vision swam white, then black, and he retreated back into darkness.
oOo_oOo_oOo
Kanda had the strangest notion that the world was made up entirely of red.
It was strange because he knew for a fact it wasn't. There were blues and greens and white hair that fell above thin shoulders, silver eyes rimmed with dark bruises – knots of pink scar tissue on a small, battered torso .
But red was all he could see.
(Like Allen's arm, all alarmingly grotesque twists of hardened flesh that looked like blood).
He'd been hovering on the border of consciousness for a while now. Sometimes, voices slipped through like trickles of water flowing through cracks in a stone, and other times he was able to force his eyes open for just a second, only to be greeted with an explosion of red that coloured everything around him like blood.
This is fucking ridiculous, he thought as he heard a sound like chair-legs scrapping on a floor and voices echoing back to him, this is fucking ridiculous, I need to wake up.
Why? His mind asked in returned. Why do you need to wake up? It's so nice and quiet here, just sleep a little longer.
Kanda wanted to. The darkness was so nice and relaxing and empty – nothing to hurt his head. His brief attempts to wake up had all been met with loud noises and bright flares of crimson that hurt to look at.
Just stay a little longer…
But no, that wasn't right. Something was off.
His mind was at peace in the dark, but his body felt too cold, like it was missing something it was so used to during these explorations into sleep. It was like he was lying all alone in the middle of the artic, and it made his stomach squirm.
Ah, Allen wasn't here.
He was so used to falling asleep with Allen curled up at his side – a space between them, usually – but still close enough to feel the heat radiating off his body, the whisper of his breathing. Sometimes, when Allen had his nightmares, he would squirm and frown like somebody was pressing a gun to his head.
When that happened, Kanda would take a deep breath and skirt just a bit closer to run his fingers along his forehead, pushing strands of hair off sweaty skin and praying to dear god Allen didn't wake up because there was no way he'd ever be able to live this down if he did.
And then Allen would stop squirming and his brow would unwrinkle and the soft noises that had been escaping his lips would fall into silence. When this happened Kanda knew it was okay to move away now, to put that space back between himself and the sprout. But he never did, not right away. He continue touching Allen's forehead until the tension in his own shoulders relaxed and he was sure there would be no more nightmares tonight.
Sometimes, when the nightmares were worse than most and it took a good while to calm Allen down, Kanda would fall asleep with one hand tangled in his hair and the other interlocked with Allen's own fingers.
Allen.
And just like that, Kanda bolted awake, sitting up so fast that a gasp ripped from his stomach and his vision twisted in that alarming shade of red that it had been. Beside him there was a yelp and a curse and then hands were at his back easing him forward.
Something wet fell off his forehead and landed softly in his lap. When he was able to look down at it, Kanda saw the fussy outlines of a damp washcloth that must have been folded calmingly over his brow.
"Yu-chan! Are you are alright? Thank god you're up!"
The annoyingly familiar voice jerked him closer to coherence and Kanda gasped, "Allen? Where's Allen?"
Silence met his question and Kanda looked upwards from the bed to see Lavi standing beside him, face tight and drawn, a strange ash pale that was immensely out of character compared to his usual cheerful complexion.
Kanda's heart thudded loudly in his chest and without pause he swung his legs up over the edge of the bed he was lying on, ignoring the twinge of his ankle that protested painfully, and lurched unsteadily to his feet. The floor seemed to ripple beneath him in time with a flicker in his vision, and Kanda listed dangerously to the left. When Lavi yelped and reached out to steady him, Kanda latched firmly onto his wrists. "Tell me where Allen is," he growled dangerously.
"Well, Kanda," came a voice from the doorway, "we were kind of hoping you could tell us…"
Komui stood just out of the threshold of what Kanda now recognized as the medical building of the school. His hair was tied low at the back of his neck as if he'd been doing something that required utmost attention and his eyes were more alert than Kanda had ever seen them. Just behind him, somebody else lingered.
Kanda squinted for a moment, unable to quite make out who it was with the way they leant easily on the wall just behind Komui, his vision not yet a hundred percent back to its miraculous 20/20 superiority.
"What happened?" Kanda rasped and even he couldn't recognize the dangerous edge to his voice, but he approved of it immensely. Lavi's hand resting on his shoulder tightened. "There was… I don't… I was attacked by that bastard with the top hat."
"Tyki Mikk," said a bored voice from behind Komui and Kanda froze. "I didn't think they'd be quite so bold to sneak into the school like idiots."
Komui took a step back and Marian Cross stepped forward from where he'd been standing behind him, nonchalantly smoking a cigarette as if he wasn't standing in a sick room or his protégé was missing.
Beside Kanda Lavi spluttered noisily but Kanda just narrowed his eyes and stepped forward, distantly aware of Lavi's hand tight on his shoulder and his exclamations that seemed to be sticking in his throat rather than pouring out in mindless babble.
"You knew this would happen," Kanda accused, scrunching his hand into a fist by his side to stop them trembling from sheer desire to wrap them around Marian Cross's throat. "You knew this would fucking happen and you didn't do shit about it you piece of –."
"Kanda," Komui snapped, stepping forward back in front of Cross and taking Kanda's arm in a tightly furled grip. For some reason Kanda felt his teeth clam shut because for once, he didn't want to flippantly disobey the Headmaster and his words sensed this, sensed this and jammed up tight in his throat to stop any other hurtful phrases from pouring through blood spotted lips, skin blotched with red from where he'd been instantly chewing to stop the panic springing back.
Cross didn't even seem to care about the dramatic teenager in front of him and instead just blew out one more lungful of gusting white smoke, stubbing out the butt on the doorframe beside him before adjusting his hairs so it swung behind his shoulders and turning to look at Kanda with casual disdain.
"I warned you, boy, that you didn't know what you were getting into."
"I don't –."
"But you didn't listen," Cross talked over Kanda's aborted attempt at speech. "You didn't listen and now you've gone and complicated everything."
"Are you saying it's my fault?" Kanda felt red hot outrage boiling inside of him and it was everything he could do not to tear everyone in the room to shreds.
Cross narrowed his eye. "There was a plan in place, believe it not. We were dealing with this. And then you thought you could take on a NOAH by yourself not once – but twice."
Kanda didn't even know how Cross knew about the forest when they hadn't even told Komui, but he did think it highly unfair to accuse him of picking a fight with a NOAH when all he'd done – all he'd fucking done – was to leave the constant surveillance for all of a minute to get a key.
"It's not my fault," he hissed.
"it's not my fault," Cross repeated with a mocking sneer. "Stop behaving like an unbeautiful child and own up to your mistakes like a man. Only a child searches for excuses for something that had already been done. Stop crying and do something about it."
He turned and swooped out from the room in a flash of black, gold and red. Distantly, Kanda saw a metallic flash among the curls of his hair and realized belatedly it was Timcanpy – the same metallic flash that had been with Cross that day when they'd first met. It kind of explained why Cross was aware of so much.
"Marian! Marian!" Komui turned to call out into the corridor where Cross had dramatically swept out only to turn around with a frustrated expression on his face, running one hand tiredly through his hair.
"Ignore him Kanda; he might not look like it but he does care for Allen, he's just pushing the blame for this on you." It was hard to be convinced when Komui looked so uncertain himself. "I don't condone the pair of you sneaking off like that, but you're teenage boys and we should have taken that into consideration. Don't worry; we'll find Allen. You two – and Lenalee – will stay here with the guards. We can fix this. We won't let anything happen to him; it's not like before."
"But it is though." Komui blinked and Kanda startled and the two of them both turned to see Lavi standing dangerously still with a decidedly blank look on his face. He hadn't spoken – not beyond mindless babbling – since Cross had come into the room and Kanda had all but forgotten he was there. "They have half a dozen NOAH and Allen; and what do we have? Three teenagers, a teacher and a mad genius. I'm not an idiot, you know, I'm almost a mad genius myself." Lavi tapped at his head with a sardonic smile. "But I don't have to be one to know the odds aren't in our favour. Can we even count on Cross? Is there anybody else we can turn to? Don't promise things you can't be sure about Headmaster, don't go giving people false hope like that."
Kanda didn't quite know how Komui managed to look so composed when Kanda was sure he himself was looking at Lavi had just sprouted a second head an announced his intention to pursue a career in botany.
"What would you suppose I do then, Lavi?" Komui asked softly. "There is more to this than you know."
"I know there is more to this than I know." Lavi winced a little at the sullen way that sounded. "But you're not understanding what I'm trying to say." Lavi took a deep breath, ran jittery fingers through red hair. "Kanda and I – Lenalee too – we know Allen. You can't just go expecting us to stand still and stay in the dark; we can help. You just need to let us."
Komui was silent a moment looking between the two of them with a strained expression. Kanda hurried to arrange his face into something that less resembled an axe murder.
"You're, both of you, it's…" Komui closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I know you care for Allen, but this isn't playing at being heroes; this is real danger, real life-or-death things. You can't just - ."
"Lavi's said it already," Kanda cut in, "But I'll say it again; we're not idiots. We know exactly what this is; and we don't fucking care. If you won't let us help you, we'll find a way to help ourselves and then shit will just get messy." Kanda narrowed his eyes. "I don't care who I have to destroy, but I'm going after Allen and you're either with me or you're against me; make your choice."
For a moment Komui looked at him like he was looking at a stranger; like he couldn't quite remember when it was Kanda had grown up enough to become the kind of person that would risk his own life for someone else's, no matter how dear they were to him.
"Okay," he said after a moment where there was nothing but three sets of uneven breathing. He closed his eyes for a moment before opening them and looking skywards like he was seeking answers.
"Okay," he said again. "I'm with you."
oOo_oOo_oOo
Allen was having the strangest dream.
He was standing the middle of an absently empty room; he couldn't see things like walls or floors – it was far too dark for that – but somehow, a beautiful door loomed before him, all swirling lines and carved intricateness.
Beside him was a chair – a beautiful old antique thing – but Allen knew he mustn't sit in it. It wasn't his.
It was a strange thought, and distantly somewhere far off Allen recognized this as a dream, but in the now – in the strange room with the door and the chair – it didn't seem to matter.
It was deathly silent and Allen couldn't even hear his own breathing, nor his footsteps as he slowly pottered closer to the door, skimming his fingers over the smooth markings. They felt just as velvety soft as he thought they would, and on an absent level he realized he wasn't wearing his gloves, but it didn't seem to matter.
Beneath his fingers the door rattled slightly and Allen pulled back in surprise.
Somebody was trying the handle on the opposite side; the silver swoop of the metal going up and down in a slowly repetitive motion.
No, he thought suddenly and stepped back to the door just as he heard the slight creak of it beginning to open. He threw himself bodily against it and it slammed shut, his quick fingers darting out to feel along the wood he found felt the chink of a lock.
The door clicked behind him and the handles movements turned into aborted shakes as the lock prevented it from turning.
The person behind him tried once, twice, three times, before it stopped altogether.
Allen let out a breath he didn't even realize he was holding.
Behind him, somebody laughed. A low, drawn out chilling noise that caused the wood to vibrate against his back.
"Oh, Allen," Neah said. "This door isn't going to keep me out forever."
Allen's head hurt, so vicious and sudden like it hadn't in so long. He fell down to his knees and his fingers darted up to clutch at his temple like it would easier the feeling of ice splintering deep inside his skull.
Behind him, the door handle began to twist again; letting loose small clicks every time the lock stopped it going any further. It coincided with the thumping in his head and Allen couldn't – he just couldn't anything.
"Allen, Allen, Allen."
His name sounded foreign in his ears and Allen had never felt so much pain in his life.
"Allen, I'll see you soon…."
The clicking stopped and the room fell into silence.
Allen opened his eyes and looked up. The door looked so much older than it had mere seconds ago; rust creeping up open the metal lattice and the lock looked damaged and dull, like it was so close to giving in.
Allen swallowed, closed his eyes again and wished it all away.