A few days after Tyki left, Allen brought Lenalee to the rose bush in the garden. "What are we doing here, Allen? Are we going to admire the flowers again?" Lenalee asked, confused. "No, Lena." Allen turned to her and gave a smile. The last few days, Allen hadn't been as stoic or reserved. He even began gracing her with these rare smiles which, unlike his polite and fake smiles, shone brighter than the sun. It was another of his endearing qualities that he kept hidden and she soon learned to notice them. Allen's voice pulled her out of her reverie. "We're going to pick some." Lenalee was so surprised to hear him say this. Allen hated people touching his flowers and he never allowed them to be harmed or picked, not by himself nor anyone else. "B-but...you hate people touching them!" Lenalee gasped out. "The castle is kind of barren, isn't it?" Allen said, airily, as if he were talking to himself. "Wouldn't you like some flowers to decorate it?"

It was then that she realized he was doing it for her. "Allen, that is...you don't need to..." Lenalee wanted to decorate the castle, but she didn't want to impose on Allen after all he had done for her. He, however, interrupted her before she could tell him that it was unnecessary. "I don't mind the roses being picked, as long as it is by you." Allen looked into her eyes with enough emotion to melt glaciers. Lenalee felt her heart start to beat faster and found she couldn't continue to say no with him looking like that. They then spent the afternoon picking flowers and gathering them into bunches. They would talk about random things and joke with each other to pass the time while they worked.

"Allen, why do you love these flowers so much? Is it because you like roses or because they're the only healthy flowers in the garden?" Lenalee asked, offhandedly. "You know, I really like roses." Allen said, thoughtfully, with a face as if he had just discovered something he had forgotten long ago. "I used to give them to a lot of guests at the castle before the curse. The people and the gesture were meaningless, but the flower was always special." Allen fingered the roses gently. Lenalee noted the faraway look in his eyes and wished she could have been part of the world he was remembering. I think we have enough flowers." She said. Gently, she touched his shoulder, drawing him out of his memories. "Alright!" Allen smiled, excitedly. "We'll paint the castle red!"

(POV Change Line... POV Change Line... POV Change Line...)

Lavi was astounded, to say the least. He had been walking down the hallway coming from checking on Kanda to make sure that he was working on schedule. His other friend was on time as usual and, after dodging several murder attempts from said friend for calling him by his first name, Lavi was on his way to The sight that lay before him made him think that he was asleep. His master and good friend, Allen, was helping Lenalee to shower the castle halls in big red flowers. Alen was tucking flowers into every nook and cranny in the place with this wide smile and a look of pure bliss on his face.

Lavi wanted to think that he couldn't remember ever seeing Allen like that, but he did. Lavi had a memory that was amazing by most standards and he could remember back when he was a child. Back to a time with a nicer, more innocent Allen who loved everybody. He would always smile even when he was alone and his eyes sparkled with wonder at the world. Lavi had always believed that fame and wealth had tainted him. He had known or maybe hoped that Allen could easily go back to the way he was if he wanted to. After all these years, though, Lavi had started to lose that unwavering faith he was known for. And then the curse happened and his not-so-unwavering faith was to be tested once again.

Now, for the first time in who knows when, his hope was being fed so it can grow. Allen had always just about bitten his hand off whenever Lavi had tried to care for his roses and with the fact that he was cutting them and letting Lenalee put them all over the palace, Lavi certainly had no clue what could have brought on this profound change. "Hi, Lavi!" Lenalee's light voice chimed. It seemed that in his shock, he had been standing in the middle of the hall practically begging for them to notice him. Lenalee and Allen ran up to him, excitement evident of their faces.

At the prompting, Lavi recovered enough to hide his shock behind an easygoing, if not slightly strained, smile. "Hey, you to! What are you doing here?" He asked, gesturing to the flowers. "We thought we would brighten the place up." She offered and Allen nodded along with her. "Allen is helping me and you should help too!" Lenalee brightened up at the sudden thought. Out of the corner of his eye, Lavi could see that Allen, even if he were still smiling, was giving him a look as if daring him to say no. Not that it mattered, of course. Decorating looked like a lot more fun than he had had in the castle in a long time. Even if it didn't, this new change of heart was too great to not encourage and so he had to take part; he didn't want Allen regressing because of him. "Sure, I'd love to!" Lavi bounced around giddily as he said it before being handed a bouquet of freshly cut roses and went to work.

(POV Change Line... POV Change Line... POV Change Line...)

Tyki had been making his way through the forest all morning until midafternoon. And he had to say, it was pure hell. Every tree in the forest after certain point were dead and mangled and also blocked out any and all sunlight. A lesser man would have been terribly afraid and probably would have stopped their mission. But he was not like that and there was no way he was going back without his princess. Overgrown plants and vines and roots that pretty much shot out of the ground like they were reaching for the sky tripped him up at every turn. I can't believe I'm doing this. That thought had been rather recurring the last few hours. After not long at all, he was covered in scratches with a few bruises here and there and the beginnings of callus on his fingers. It was the hardest work he'd done in a long time.

After a while, he surprisingly came across another living creature. A cute, adorable, sweet, little white bunny. A slight smile tugged at his lips at the sight and kneeled down in front of it. As he reached out his hand to pet it, though, the bunny pretty much exploded. Not as gory it sounds. Tyki jumped back and watched as the bunny morphed into a giant creature seemingly made of metal and guns sprouting forth from it's body. Tyki ducked out of the way as a hail of gunfire was unleashed upon him. Needless to say, Tyki hot footed it out of the area, nearly careening of the edge of a precariously placed cliff. When he had finally made his way out of the twisted forest and into the town below, he decided that that had been the strangest thing he ever had to do.

He had been admittedly shocked when he saw the castle and the town just as Komui had described it. He preferred not to think about the fact that although he had been warned about the cliff well ahead of time, he still almost fell off of it just as Komui did, like an idiot. Since his pride could never let him admit any of this, of course, he naturally blamed it on his being panicked and shocked by the scariest bunny he had ever seen in his life. He had believed Komui when he talked about the monster and the abandoned village and his sister being taken. He had believed him and yet, it all seemed so fantastic, you can imagine why he was slightly surprised to actually see it all with his own eyes.

Tyki went right to work setting up camp in one of the decaying homes in the center of town. He had a bag of crude supplies he brought from home and that was it. He wasn't foolish or sheltered enough to think that he would be able to get food or drink at an abandoned city where he is on a search and rescue mission, but he also knew that he had to pack light if he wanted full mobility. It was getting dark when he finally settled down, but he found it hard to go to sleep. Whether it was because he was in a foreign place doing a dangerous thing in trying to rescue a princess from a monster, because he was sleeping on the uncomfortable rotted ground of a cabin (which, quite naturally, also contained holes in the floorboard) or if, most likely, he was simply worried that the unstable roof would collapse in on him while he was asleep, effectively killing him in his sleep or, even worse, trapping him under the rubble until he died of other causes. Maybe some combination of the three.

During this time of unrest, he was formulating his game plan on how to rescue the fair Lenalee from the clutches of the monster. Now that he was there, and since he didn't know what that foul demon was doing to the poor girl, but knowing that she must be frightened, he did not want to wait any longer than was necessary. He would sleep until he had enough energy to sight the monster and then he would go to the palace and take him by surprise. Then he would ride away with Lenalee into the sunset...and you get the rest. With that in mind and his confidence swelling, he finally fell to sleep with a light heart. Things didn't go quite as planned, though, the next morning when he woke up just to come face to face with an angry looking Asian man with long black hair with a scowl plastered on his face and a murderous glint in his eye. Crap.

How do you guys feel about the akuma bunny? I thought it was cute. Just so we're clear, it was not an "akuma" as in, created by the Earl. I made it into a type of cursed animal. A creepy, badass animal you can only find in the woods of Mater.