Silence, the Sound of Insanity

What does it mean to exist? What is existence if life has no meaning?

What does it mean to love? What is this four letter word without emotion and people to reciprocate it?

What does it mean to be sane? What good is sanity if the whole world is a bloody punch line?

Allen wasn't a philosopher – nothing of the sort actually – he was just your average sixteen year old boy. Well, maybe not average.

xXx

He's such an idiot. Stupidity should be illegal. If it was, shit like this wouldn't happen.

He's a fucking hypocrite. Hypocrisy should be illegal. If it was, shit like this wouldn't happen.

He's a damn fucking enigma. Being such a mystery should be illegal. If it was, shit like this wouldn't happen.

Kanda didn't care about him – he didn't care about anyone, and he was no different – he was just your average cold hearted eighteen year old boy. Well, maybe not average.

xXx

They weren't anything to each other – never had been anything to each other – and yet somehow Kanda found himself sitting at Allen's bedside in the hospital. The boy was exceedingly pale, the normal flush of life nowhere to be seen, and his mercury colored eyes closed to the world from which he'd tried to escape.

Allen wouldn't know it, but ever since he'd been admitted to the hospital he was visited daily by the navy haired male. In those early days he remained unconscious and there had been fear that the doctors had been too late to prevent any permanent damage.

For those couple days Kanda sat in the single chair in the room reading, occasionally glancing up at the boy, irritably wondering when the idiot would decide to wake up. Kanda wasn't entirely sure why it was he felt inclined to visit but something about seeing the boy in such a moment of weakness back at school had made it impossible for him to just turn the other cheek.

Kanda had known Allen through a mutual friend and in their few encounters they only ever managed to bicker. Perhaps, it was these trivial little arguments that brought him to Allen's bedside day after day. Perhaps, it was because Allen had always come off as an unknown force of nature that he couldn't find it in him to brush off the incident and ignore the silent cry for help torn into the fragile wrists.

After Allen woke, he had all manner of visitors, some students, other teachers and still others who the boy had interacted with at some point in his life. Kanda avoided them all like the plague, while doing so he noticed how very disgusting humans could be. They came under the guise of visiting an injured friend, only to treat him like some sort of spectacle, asking insensitive questions and chattering about the most meaningless topics. They never stayed long and never sat down as if somehow it would imply that they were to be visiting for more than a couple minutes. After the superficial concern they'd wish Allen well and say that they'd come visit again soon even though they had no intention of doing so. For most it seemed that these visitations were more an unpleasant obligation than a genuine desire to see the boy well. Such was painfully obvious and yet Allen always smiled at them, playing along like the naïve boy they all saw him as.

During those few days Kanda had visited late in the evening when visiting hours were already over. Allen was usually asleep by then so he could play the silent companion off to the side in the chair by the bedside.

The first time Kanda had visited while Allen was awake the boy had been shocked speechless for a moment. Never in all his musings had he thought he'd see this eternally scowling face visiting him. After over his initial surprise a smile spread across his face – the same foolhardy mask of joy that he'd worn when visited by his other peers.

"You want to know why I tried to kill myself?" Allen's voice had been smooth, as though long practiced. Kanda met Allen's gaze, cobalt eyes boring into silver ones without revealing any of the thoughts floating about his mind.

Silence

"Don't worry, everyone does. They want to know if I crossed some sort of unknown threshold, whether I have some kind of afterlife knowledge – insight into a death that they all fear."

"Yeah," Kanda muttered, not shifting his gaze the slightest, studying the barest flickers of emotion passing across those silver eyes, "something like that."

"I'm sorry, but I can't help you." Allen's voice had been dull though the smile remained as though horrible stain on his pale features. Kanda found himself hating that smile even more than he had while they were in school. It was loneliness and bitter resignation coated in porcelain and painted with blushing ink.

Silence

xXx

Allen was the kind of a guy everyone loved – superficially – he resonated a kind of ethereal hope that most are never privy to. It was impossible to look at his smiling face and not feel something stir inside you. He was always surrounded by friends and it seemed as though nothing could ever dampen his cheer.

Why then was he found half-dead amongst splintered mirrors, hands a mess of blood and lacerated flesh?

The picture perfect, innocent idol had in a single moment shown his ugly face to the world – a frightening display of hopelessness sprawled out on the bathroom floor, tiles stained vermillion and the metallic stench of blood hanging heavy in the air.

There was worry and there had been panic, there had even been awe. Everyone had something to say about Allen Walker and the incident. Most had decided to believe that their precious, innocent idol had been forced into the act, or that someone had done it to him. After all, it just wasn't possible for Allen Walker to be so tainted.

It's funny how people's minds work, how they formulate elaborated stories to rationalize events, believing that the world will be all sunshine and rainbows if they hide away in the lies they've chosen to surround themselves with.

Funny and utterly sickening.

xXx

"You again." Allen's voice was a bit groggy even as he pasted on his smile. Clearly he'd woken not too long ago. Kanda took a seat in the chair beside the hospital bed with a slight nod of greeting.

Silence

"What is it today?" Allen cocked his head to the side in the most adorable fashion, brows knitted together as if confused by Kanda's repeated presence. Not that such was unexpected; everyone had visited Allen once and only once and here Kanda was, the second day in a row, sitting in that same chair as the night before, backpack dropped to the ground beside him and a calm though ever menacing countenance about him.

"How are you?" Kanda's voice was stiff in his question. It was a noncommittal question; superficial in nature but begging something of concern.

Silence

"It is a simple question."

"I'm breathing," Allen muttered as he turned his gaze towards the window, the sun already dipping low on the western horizon, the sky a vibrant image of reds and oranges. "Take it to mean what you want." Though appearing ever the bliss ridden fool, there was a somber quality to the response. Almost as though there was too much confliction behind his mask and such radiant though aching emotions were leaking out through the worn edges of his smiling perfection.

Silence

xXx

He was the most unlikely visitor that Allen could have had. Kanda Yuu wasn't known to get involved with other people or their problems. Naturally, it was rather curious to find said male visiting the younger boy in the hospital and even more curious that it would become something of a routine for them both.

Allen had never been on good terms with Kanda and yet, he found himself unwillingly looking forward to the older male's typically silent company – Allen was no stranger to being alone but he'd never been too fond of hospitals and Kanda was the only visitor he got after the first week. The navy haired male came in for a few hours every day; often times he said nothing, but sometimes he'd do something or say something that made Allen wonder.

Part of him would laugh at his own stupidity, mulling over things that he had no business in – Kanda's thoughts were his own and had nothing to do with Allen even if he did pass through the older male's mind in some way, shape or form. The laughter was often so deafening Allen would be reeling from the unpleasant coldness that came with the hollows when it finally stopped.

xXx

"Good evening. How was your day?" Allen asked cheerily as Kanda entered the room taking up his normal place and producing a book from his bag.

"Fine." His voice was a bit heavy, murmured as though fatigued. Allen frowned a bit at this as the male began to read.

"Is it nice outside?" Today in particular Allen wasn't in the mood for silence. He wanted something to fill the emptiness. His head was aching from the piercing cacophony of notes that just refused to pick up its rests.

Silence

"Is it such a difficult question?" Kanda sighed as he met Allen's eyes. The boy was hardly ever this persistent in pursuing conversation. More times than not, Allen seemed satisfied with the silent company – possibly even preferring it to the mindless chatter he'd had to endure during the first few days of his waking.

"There's no snow, but it is cold," Kanda muttered waiting patiently for Allen to speak again.

"What day is it?" Sure enough, another seemingly trivial question fell from pale pink lips. This time Kanda responded without pause.

"December twentieth. Why?"

Silence

Allen opened his mouth as if to speak but closed it again as he noted another presence in the room.

"Excuse me, but you'll have to leave now. I need to speak with Allen alone." The voice came from a blonde haired man in a lab coat. Allen recognized him immediately as the therapist that had visited a couple days ago, when Allen had first woken up.

Without a word Kanda stood and headed out of the room, not sparing Allen a second glance – when he left the room he never looked back.

"Allen do you remember me?" Bak asked as he walked over to Allen's side setting his clipboard down on the table.

"Yes, it's a pleasure to see you again Dr. Chan. How have you been?" Allen responded with an easy cheerfulness.

"I've been quite well thank you. It's alright if you just call me Bak, I want you to think of me as not only your doctor, but your friend."

"Thank you, that's very kind," Allen said his smile brightening as he awaited the man to begin the questioning he hated.

"Last day we were talking about what made you try to kill yourself," Bak said feeling slightly intimidated by the silver eyes watching him intently.

"No, as I recall you were trying to get me to talk about my reasons." Though his comment was biting, the smile and lightness in Allen's voice did not falter.

"Allen, I want to help you and the only way that's going to happen is if we talk this through and find out what's bothering you."

"I'm sure you're a great guy Bak, and I'd be more than happy to be your friend," Allen paused as he pinned Bak's gaze so that he could be sure the man was listening to him, "but frankly, I know what's bothering me, and I don't feel like talking about it."

Silence

Bak couldn't exactly place it, but something about Allen seemed off. There was a glimmer of something in his eyes that just seemed so out of place.

xXx

Five days later found Allen staring at Kanda. The male had come in like every other day and sat down like every other day. He carried nothing today, save for a small paper bag with strange characters Allen didn't recognize scrawled down its side.

"Why are you here? It's Christmas, shouldn't you be with your family?" Allen's smile was heavily subdued and Kanda almost frowned as he took in the mellowed countenance with interest.

Silence

"Will you be talking to me today?" Allen asked and again was met only with a critical stare.

Silence

"Merry Christmas, Kanda." Allen sighed as he slumped back into the pillows more, drawing up the sheets to his neck and allowing his eyes to fall shut as he listed to the soft sounds of breathing. For a good ten minutes or so they remained in silence, though peaceful, Allen couldn't find sleep.

"I heard it was your birthday." Kanda's voice shattered the stillness and jerked Allen from his peace. There it was…that dreaded word that haunted him every Christmas.

Silence

"Did you…want anything?" Kanda sounded a bit uncomfortable in his questioning, obviously with little experience in such things.

Silence

"Here, you like sweets don't you." Kanda slid to the edge of the chair for a moment to reach the paper bag he'd been holding to Allen when still nothing had been said.

"Thank you." Silver eyes studied Kanda's expression with interest, as he held the gift, warmth suffusing through the bag and into his bandaged hands.

"Are you allowed to go outside?" Kanda asked though he suspected that the answer would be no. Regardless, he got no answer. Striving to restrain his rapidly climbing irritation he turned his gaze to the window where a soft snow was falling.

Silence

"There's something you should see." He wasn't all that sure of what it was that would make people happy, especially not this person, but he found that his old man was quite fond of the decorative Christmas trees that were arranged about city hall. Though more inclined to painting landscapes, the old man took a delight in immortalizing the joyful faces of the people skating on the frozen over pond and the festively decorated trees and lampposts about the square. He himself found the place rather nice – though he strolled through after midnight when everyone was already home and there were few people in the area to ruin it.

Silence

"Say something." Kanda found himself almost beside himself with anticipation though it didn't reflect in his voice or expression at all.

"I think you should go." Kanda stiffened at the words, his eyes narrowing and scowl darkening. So much for trying to do something nice for someone – it was a complete waste of time and energy. Allen felt only minutely guilty for sending Kanda away like that when he knew that the older male was doing this for his benefit but he was never in the right frame of mind on this day.

Allen hated Christmas. Why? Because the day just so happened to be the day his life started. Allen loathed the dreadful day with every fiber of his being. It gave him bad feelings and stirred things inside him that made him so nauseous that he couldn't stomach anything, made the laughter in his head all the more louder and made him itch to silence it. Kanda couldn't be around when he was so unstable…bad things always happened when he got like that.

xXx

"Your nerves are still repairing, so your movements will be jerky. " The nurses always avoided looking Allen in the eyes. They always smiled and hurried about, trying to get out of the room as fast as possible. They had all been won over by Allen's smile, but what they found unsettling was the dark expression that would rise in the silver eyes when they tried to tell him of the progress of his recovery.

Silence

"At this point we can't tell if it'll be like it was before. The tendons were almost completely severed and-"

"Go away." There was no lightness in Allen's voice, no false joy or mirth. It was dismissively cold, matching the violent turmoil in his gaze. He didn't want to hear such damnable news. He already knew he had made a bloody mess of his wrists and they'd told him many times before that it was too early to tell the extent of the damage to the tendons and the nerves. It was the same old shit that he just didn't want to hear.

xXx

"Allen you have to work with me, or you're going to be taken to a home for troubled teens after you're completely healed." Bak said almost pleadingly. "Just answer a couple questions and-"

"And what? You'll let me leave? You'll let me just walk out the door like nothing happened?" The smile that had always lit Allen's features seemed so far away now. In its place was a bitterly sardonic smirk that tugged at his lips.

Silence

"What if I told you it was an accident? What if I told you I was possessed? What if I told you I'm pissed off that I'm still alive?" There was a dark quality in Allen's voice that sent shivers down Bak's spine. "Would it matter? Would it make a difference in whether or not you let me go?"

"I just want to help." Bak mentally cursed, his voice coming out with much less conviction that he'd intended.

"Just because you are older than me doesn't make it your responsibility to take care of me, and it doesn't give you or anyone else the right to dictate how I live my life. I appreciate what you're trying to do for me, but if I had actually wanted to die, I would have succeeded."

"Quite talkative today aren't you." Bak said after a moment, brows furrowing together in thought. He'd not wanted to entertain the idea, but as a doctor it was his duty to think of everything and not rule anything out without proper evidence.

Silence

"Who are you?" Bak asked and felt a stab of fear course through him as he stared into somewhat amused silver eyes.

"Whatever do you mean?" Allen's voice was rife with sinister humor, a frightful smirk tearing up his lips and making his eyes sparkle with violence.

The smirk that lit Allen's features had no resemblance to the sweet though false smile he always wore. This was his curse. This was the reason he'd done what he did. Bak was the first one to figure it out, the first one to recognize the shift in personality even though it was painfully obvious.

"Who are you?" Bak repeated the question with further emphasis.

Silence

xXx

'Who am I? Such a deceptively simple question is it not? I am Allen. But such simplicity doesn't ring true; there is more to who I am – much more. I am just half of the equation. He is the other half. The Musician, the unstable pierrot that emerges when I'm at my weakest. He is everything I would never want to be, yet he is me.

I'm not delusional enough to believe that perhaps he's another person; we are one in the same, two halves of one soul. What? Is it peculiar to fear yourself?

While clearly me, he is also not. He is better than me, and he is stronger than me in every way. He is much more extreme, going past his limits to get what he wants no matter the cost. I hate the choices he makes. But in me he instills such a mind numbing terror that I can do nothing but watch as he ruins all that I've worked so hard to accomplish and hurts the people whom are important to me.

We fight for dominance and as of late he's been winning more and more frequently. That is my reason. That is why I tried to stop the insanity. No matter the cost to my own well being I couldn't allow this to persist. With every day I lose something that makes life worth living, my façade hardens and I hide away more and more of myself until I barely understand who I am anymore, this is the weakness he uses. The more I fade, the stronger he seems to get and I fear that one day he'll completely take over and I will cease to exist.'

xXx

"What an odd question Bak. I'm Allen." The doctor's eyes studied the grinning face with bewilderment, wondering how he'd not seen it sooner.

xXx

"It's late. I thought you weren't going to come today."

"You miss me?" Kanda asked with a slightly arrogant smirk.

"Perhaps," Allen said with a smile.

"I saw your doctor in the hall." Kanda's voice became more clipped as if he was wary about bringing up the topic. Allen seemed none too pleased about the choice in conversation either, directing his gaze elsewhere and refusing to respond.

Silence

"He asked me the strangest question." Kanda continued a bit more firm in his resolve.

Silence

"Aren't you the least bit curious about what it was?" The navy haired male prodded as Allen turned his gaze back to Kanda.

"I already know." His voice was colder than it had been a moment ago, the smile slowly fading.

"Then would you care to explain to me why he asked me that?" The gears in Kanda's mind were working overtime trying to make sense of the other side of Allen that was emerging before him.

"I'd rather not." The cynical glint in the boy's eyes made Kanda cringe internally. Sure he'd been sick of seeing the fake mask of joy – and whether this made him selfish or not – that look was not what he'd wanted to see.

Silence

"Is it true?" Kanda asked after the lengthy silence that stretched between them.

"I don't think you should come here anymore." The reserved gaze with the underlying hostility didn't suit Allen, and it shocked Kanda more than he let on. Though disturbed by the recent events, he wasn't ready to leave just yet. He was seeing things that he was sure were never meant to be seen by anyone and yet, he could not draw his eyes away.

Silence

xXx

Allen couldn't answer him. Allen couldn't tell Kanda why Bak asked him if he was always himself. He couldn't tell him that he didn't have another voice that was trying to suppress him and take over. And he couldn't tell him that Bak was delusional.

Allen had no idea what Kanda meant to him, they had built some sort of relationship over the past two weeks – an indefinable and truly fucked up relationship, but a relationship nonetheless. All he knew was that it wasn't safe for Kanda to be at his side when he was losing grip again.

xXx

"Your friend hasn't visited since Monday. Did something happen?" Bak asked.

"He talked to you," Allen said with a bitterly cynical lilt to his voice and an accompanying disdainful smirk.

"I only asked a question."

"And what a lovely question it was too." The mocking joy did not go unnoticed by the blonde doctor as he fought of the dark feelings of insanity clutching at his heart by just being in Allen's presence. "Bravo Bak, I commend you for making it so easy to push him away."

"What do you call yourself?"

"I'm Allen, and you are a fool to think anything else." Silver eyes stared directly at Bak, heatedly boring into the young doctor as if trying to break his will.

"Was it you who tried to kill him?" Bak asked, if nothing else this question was important and he desperately wanted it answered, though the grin that followed removed all hope of making any progress into this case.

"What in the world are you going on about? Have you been getting enough rest?" Allen feigned concern and ignorance, enjoying toying with the foolish doctor.

Silence

"It's no use playing me. I know what this is and I can help."

"Help?" Allen let out a sharp laugh at the prospect, eyeing Bak with disbelief – he actually thought he could help?

"Yes, I can help make things better. There are medications that-"

"You really are a damn fool aren't you?" The humor in Allen's voice only seemed to grow with each word. "You say you know that I'm not Allen and yet you talk to me about helping silence this supposed other presence."

Silence

"Tell you what; I'll let you in on a little secret." Allen said after drinking in the unnamable expression on Bak's face – something along the lines of bewilderment and realization.

Silence

"This isn't a case of dissociative identity disorder like you've been thinking. It's nowhere as simple as that. I am Allen and I am always aware of everything around me and everything I do."

Silence

"Do you understand doc?" Allen asked with a grin as Bak slowly made his way to the door, with a cloud of gloom hovering over him.

"I'll see you again tomorrow…Allen."

Bak was perplexed. That was what he did. It was too easy to mess with people's minds, too easy to manipulate, just like a bunch of notes on a score. Allen hated it, hated toying with people like that; his music was always structured, never a note out of place.

Allen had managed to calm himself down by the time the nurse came in for his progress update, but such control fled in a sixteenth of the time it had taken to regain it once the nurse gave her observation for the day.

"I'm sorry, but it doesn't look like you'll ever have full use of that left hand of yours again."

Silence

"The tendons were just too damaged."

Silence

"With therapy, perhaps you'll regain some of the mobility but-"

"Shut up." He could listen to no more of this. He could take no more of the damn piteous side glances from the damn woman or her depressing prognosis.

"Mr. Walker I know this is diffic-"

"I told you to shut your fucking mouth damn it!"

"I'm sorry, please excuse me." With a flash of fear in her eyes she quickly shuffled out of the room. No sooner had the door closed and her footsteps receded down the hall, Allen snapped.

"You damn idiot! Are you happy now? Are you fucking satisfied with yourself? The only thing we had left you had to go and send that shit straight to hell too? We'll never play another song you selfish bastard. This hand is just as fucked up and dead as you are!"

It was self-loathing in the most peculiar of fashions. He was pissed off, he could think of nothing but wanting to hurt, wanting to end the pathetic existence that could no more function for him. Allen had fucked up badly. He'd never before shared the want for death and silence, but he was sick of the pitiful sobbing that could be heard behind that damnably happy façade.

xXx

"Allen! Allen!" Bak called as he searched floor after floor for his missing patient.

"Dr. Chan." A nurse said, drawing the man's attention.

"Did you find him?" Bak asked desperately.

"There's no sign of him, and security said that according to their monitors he never left the room."

xXx

One day. He gave Allen one more day to do as he pleased. After that day was up, he was going to do the deed and rid the world of the sorry existence that was Allen Walker.

xXx

"By your attire I take it you weren't released," Kanda said as he stared at the pale boy standing on his doorstep in nothing but the white pajamas that had been provided by the hospital. It was freezing outside, the boy's breaths escaping in sluggish puffs of white.

Kanda stepped aside to allow the boy in, frowning when Allen merely looked up at him.

"If you only had one day left what would you do?" Allen asked breathing heavily from the exertion. Over two weeks bedridden made the motor functions slow and made running all the more strenuous.

Silence

"Would you wallow in regret or make the most of the time you had left doing something you loved?"

"Are you dying?" Kanda asked, brows knitting together in displeasure at the question, wondering what the hell could have happened in the past three days he didn't see the boy that could lead to him standing on his doorstep asking such a very morbid question.

"Answer the question please."

"I'd be fighting to the very last," Kanda said noting the flicker of desperation in the silver eyes before him.

Silence

"Regrets are a waste of time and laying back to do something I loved is like saying I give up." In that moment Allen felt something in him twist. This was why he'd grown to enjoy Kanda's presence – the strength and balance in this man was something he'd never seen before in another human – he was one of a kind.

Silence

"What is this all about?" Kanda asked feeling irritation begin to gnaw at his nerves.

Silence

"You better give me an ans-"

Lips pressed against lips. Allen understood a bit of what it was that Kanda meant to him now. But it was far too late for anything of the sort.

"Thanks."

Allen didn't waste a second after the word left his lips before turning and running down the street. Wide cobalt eyes stared ahead in shock. It took no more than a moment for the older male to snap out of his shocked stupor, tugging on his shoes and grabbing his jacket as he ran after Allen. He didn't even register what he was doing until he was just a few feet away from the retreating form.

"Wait!" Kanda called but received neither an answer nor compliance.

Silence

"Wait just a fucking minute!" Kanda snapped as he reached out, catching Allen by the arm, jerking the boy to a stop.

"Why are you following me?" Allen frowned.

"Why did you kiss me?" Kanda growled ignoring the look of confusion on the younger boy's face.

Silence

"What the fuck is going on?" Kanda demanded more urgently, his anger reaching new heights as the snowy haired boy just stared at him.

Silence

"I want to know why you told me not to come back and then showed up at my door! I want to know why you asked me about what I'd do if it was my last living day! I want you to explain to me why the fuck you kissed me!"

Silence

"I want to know, and I better get a fucking answer!"

"Why did you visit me in the hospital?" Allen asked white brows furrowing and lips pursing into a pout.

"What?" Kanda asked a bit taken aback by the sudden question.

"You heard me. Why did you come in every day for two weeks to see the fucked up idiot who went mental in the school bathroom and slashed his wrists till they looked like a Morton Andersen painting if it were only comprised of red hues?"

Silence

"Can't you answer me Kanda? Don't you have a reason why after all these years you decide to become a part of my life? The first time I met you, you wouldn't even shake my hand!"

"Che, this is stupid." Kanda grunted as he draped his jacket around Allen's shoulders and scooped the boy into his arms so he wouldn't be running through snow in his bare feet any longer.

Silence

"What kind of fool runs out of a hospital without shoes or a jacket in the middle of winter?" Allen stared in shocked silence at Kanda's face, studying it for some sort of explanation for the action as he was hauled back to Kanda's house.

xXx

After getting Allen back to the house, Kanda dumped him rather unceremoniously onto his bed with a scoff as he dragged the comforters up over him, leaving for a moment and returning with a cup of hot tea.

"Drink," Kanda ordered as he pulled a chair over beside the bed, taking a seat as though in the visiting chair at the hospital. Just under an hour passed in silence, Allen sipping the tea he'd been given and feeling the warmth suffuse through his frozen limbs, and Kanda presumably meditating in the chair.

"Death isn't as bad as everyone makes it out to be. It's just an extension of living – a change of state in which one exists, a dream that never really ends." Kanda's eyes snapped open at Allen's voice though he made no comment.

Silence

"It wasn't because I pitied myself or because my guardian disappeared or anything as superficial as that. I suppose I just got tired of losing and it seemed so easy. It only hurt for the first quart, and then everything went foggy and numb. The rest is just the anticipation. There was no pain, not even when it became hard to see, or when my blood was too thinned and my heart stopped. It was just too easy; I'd be silencing the insanity while forging a path into something new."

Silence

"My parents abandoned me when I was still a child, I don't even remember their faces – hell I don't even know their names. I killed the man who took me in, and the guardian I had disappeared yet, somehow, my choice hadn't anything to do with any of them."

"So you wanted to die?" Kanda asked though the answer was obvious.

Silence

"You don't have to give in." Kanda said, the ever present scowl taking a vacation in favor of a pensive and more serious expression. "Whether or not you have a voice in your head that's driving you insane, you don't have to court death. Lots of people are screwed up, it's not just you."

Silence

"Do you want to die?"

"What does that matte-"

"It matters," Kanda snapped, Allen stiffening on the bed while looking down to his hands and hearing a malicious laughter in his head. Did he still want to die? To some degree yes, but it was different than how it had been almost three weeks ago. Sure, he was still losing and the silence became overwhelming, but there was someone there this time that was real – someone that confused the hell out of him.

"I did."

"I don't give a shit about how you felt about it two weeks ago or a day ago. Hell, I couldn't care less if you wanted to blow your brains out a minute ago. What do you want right now?"

Silence

"What do you want this second?"

"I want…I want to understand you," Allen muttered with a sigh.

"You can't do that if you're dead," Kanda said dully, "so, tell me straight, do you want to die?"

"No."

"Then don't even think about killing yourself idiot." With that, Kanda's tone lightened considerably and though Allen told himself he was seeing things, he could have sworn the older male's expression too had softened.

"But-" it wasn't his turn anymore, he'd tried to kill himself and failed miserably, and now it was his turn and he never failed.

"Listen, I'll make a deal with you." Kanda's voice drew Allen from his morbid thoughts, confusion taking the place of his confliction.

"A deal?"

"In a couple hours it'll be January first. Watch the first sunrise of the year with me, then you can do whatever you want."

Silence

xXx

"Do you do this every year?" Allen asked as he curled closer to Kanda, the older male slinging an arm around his shoulders reassuringly. It was his personal tradition, sitting on the rooftop to welcome the first sunrise.

"Yes."

Silence

"I know I told you that you can do whatever you want, but I won't stand by and let you kill yourself."

Silence

"You think you can stop me?" The voice that met Kanda was much darker than he was used to and held a sadistic amusement.

"I've seen my fair share of crap and trust me, a stupid Moyashi with a personality problem doesn't even make the mark."

Silence

"Life's not fair and it hurts, but it's worth it. You'd see that if you weren't trying so hard to hide from things when they don't turn out right."

Silence

"You don't want to die and yet, you want to die; well, so does everybody else in this forsaken world. The voice you hear that you can't stand is your own, and there's nothing about silence that will ease your pain."

"You don't seriously think that would make me have some sort of epiphany, did you?" Allen laughed, the first rays of sunlight beginning to break the horizon.

"No. That would have been a miracle for someone as stupid as you." Kanda smirked as he lifted Allen's chin, capturing the pale lips with his own.

"Kanda, why-"

"Now, yell your resolution to the sky." Kanda said smirking at the pink tinted cheeks and the softer register in the boy's voice.

Allen stared up into smoldering cobalt eyes; brain a muddled mess before turning his attention to the rising sun.

"I want to try living!"

A smirk tugged up the corners of Kanda mouth as he tightened his grip around the lithe frame at his side.

Time ticks heavy burdens onto every weary soul, but just as the coming of a new year can be seen as another set of burdens, it is also a rebirth – the hour glass turning, and the first grain of the year dropping into an otherwise empty cavern.

End

A/N: Happy New Year! Hope everyone is doing well. School starts back on Monday and so does club activities – I'm pretty desperate to bring my marks up this term so I don't know when the next story will be up.

This was beta'd by Seihi L, so thanks should be given to her for the lack of mistakes.

Anyway, thanks to everyone who's read and reviewed my works.

Comments are welcomed – they make me happy :)