Hey so I'm back with another angsty fic. lol. Sorry to the people waiting for an update for my other fics. Anyway, here you go and tell me your thoughts on Mana and Allen's relationship.

Haunting

The fourteenth was Allen's shadow but Mana was the one doing the haunting.

That was what Link thought even if Allen only said good things about him. Even if Allen's reason for fighting was Mana. Even if Allen would've killed himself if not for Mana.

Link just didn't get it, why would Allen be so firm in the belief that his foster father was always in the right? He might not uncover the answer and it should have bothered him but he knew Allen wouldn't ever open up so it was a lost cause.

In fact, the most he had ever heard was from the meeting with Cross and Allen when Link saw Allen crumble for the first time.

"Did he love me... or did he love Neah?! Tell me...!"

He had just broken down as though life no longer held him an applicant and he was free to go. It was then that he saw the exorcist as himself.

It was then that he realized that Allen was already broken.

"Stop wearing that damn mask of mana."

It hadn't been the best thing to discover when the person Link had attached his hope to was nothing more then a broken shell barely able to function. It had been a terrible day for both him and Allen, if for different reasons.

"You're just a vessel of the Noah."

Allen was just a shadow of Mana, a mere mask ready to shatter at the slightest touch. Neah was the one brushing against it pushing him to his limits.

Mana was the one whispering into Allen's ears like the devil himself, muttering devious chants bring him to his knees. The one to cause him to lie, lie, lie, and lie. It was Mana who hovered over him like an ominous black cloud waiting to rain on his parade with acid. Waiting for him to melt until he just a mass of bones ready to be hung on display.

"No matter what happens, no matter what, never stop, always keep walking."

It Mana haunting him in every movement, every word spoken, every thought. Mana was puppet master manipulating Allen behind the curtain hiding the true monster.

"Keep walking forward."

Or rather, Link thought, Allen was the clown forever smiling at the audience while Mana was the ringmaster burying a dagger in his back and deforming it so bad that the crimson red had leeched on to the front of his pure, white blouse. Yet still, Allen was smiling like he was but a peasant recognized by a kind king. It was so hypnotizing, so enchanting, so mesmerizing but so appalling.

And Link was the bystander unable to tear their gaze from their act as though it was in slow motion and if he blinked, he would've missed just one tiny action. Even as Allen cried in pain, he still smiled, even as he feel to his knees, even as he died with the dark, red liquid pooling around him. One would never think watching a person die in frames would have been so enrapturing, it was like he was spellbound by Merlin himself. It was bewitching seeing every drop of blood slowly drip down and gather in the puddle around him.

"Our injuries will heal as long as we're alive. But the scars will remain."

The worse thing was Link couldn't help but be glad. He didn't want to be involved in such a twisted, poisonous relationship. Neither did the audience who had all had cheerful masks in front of their faces, Link could've sworn he saw Lenalee in the mass filled with people who had done nothing to help Allen throughout the years hesitating to bring her black and white, smiling mask up on her horrified face drained of color. It was sickening to watch such a cheerful and honest person wear a facade just like everybody else gazing upon the stars of this repulsive show. But Link was just a bystander. Just an observer. Just a dog who's master was Leverrier.

All of them had the same ending, no matter which he chose; he wouldn't help.

But that too was just an excuse.

The truth was that he didn't want to cry over the boy who he had betrayed. So he too slipped on the black and white mask like Lenalee had but with no hesitation. His decision was final.

"Help the fourteenth, Neah. Forget Allen."

He didn't want to cry over spilled milk.

So... like it wasn't supposed to come out as this...

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