Disclaimer: I don't own D.Gray-Man. If I did, I wouldn't be writing this painful little tale.

Summary: "Neh, Yuu-chan," Lavi asked. "Why do you hate Allen so much?" Kanda didn't answer. It wasn't Allen he hated.

There were many types of smiles in the world, Kanda reflected.

There was the kind of smile worn by the enemy that made you think: Holy crap, I'm gonna die. Kanda prided himself on being able to give these kinds of smiles to his enemies and people he didn't like.

There was the kind of smile worn most often by children that told the people around them that they were happy. Kanda's fingers grazed against his beads, the image of a black-haired little girl with a violet-blue sheen in her hair and dark eyes. The girl was crying, but she was smiling; Kanda's last image of his little sister before Tiedoll had taken him from Japan to become an Exorcist.

There were coy smiles, worn by teasing lovers and sly prostitutes. That kind of smile disgusted Kanda.

There were embarrassed smiles, which someone wore when they were caught in the act of something stupid. Kanda saw this smile on too many people for his liking.

There were grins, the kind that idiots like Lavi wore whenever they found something 'fun'. Kanda also knew that it was a good idea to flee whenever he saw it.

There were smirks, which were only arrogant smiles worn by someone who was going to win some great prize. According to Lavi, Allen had this kind of look when playing poker. Needless to say, Kanda didn't believe Lavi.

Then there were smiles of love and affection for a beloved. Kanda saw these passed between Lenalee and her sis-con of a brother often enough.

Then there was something that Kanda Yuu had come to call the Allen-smile.

It scared him.

Kanda was in the habit of not lying to himself. His time in this world was shorter than most by choice and he didn't want to leave the world with any regrets because he was too busy trying to lie to himself. When Allen came, Kanda almost regretted that he couldn't lie to himself like all the other people in the Order, because he was the only one who could see that Allen's smiles were the most frightening.

Allen smiles were not happy ones. Kanda didn't believe that the damn moyashi was ever truly happy. If it wasn't an Allen-smile, then maybe it was a content smile, but those were as rare as the blooming of a lotus. When Allen played a card game, he would wear a smirk (as Lavi insisted).

Allen smiles were the kind of smile that displayed soft love that knew no boundaries. Allen loved explicitly and whole-heartedly. It was the kind of love that had no rules and no discriminations. Allen simply loved everyone. The boy had a martyr complex the size of the newly captured Ark.

He had heard about Allen trying to save Suman Dark, even though Allen Walker and Suman Dark had never met before that moment. The moyashi must have been wallowing in the deepest pool of regret and self-hatred when he couldn't do anything to stop the Noah, Tyki Mikk from killing the older Exorcist. Lavi had explained how he tried to exorcise the Noah from the one who'd killed Suman Dark, but instead, the Noah had been completely taken over by his blood and gone mad. Without Lavi ever saying it, he knew that there was a slim possibility that the Order would've had a prisoner by the name of Tyki Mikk.

It shouldn't be possible for one tiny, under-grown human boy to love like that. It was painful and excruciating to have that smile on him. And every time Allen smiled at Kanda like that, he'd say something—anything!—cruel to get the boy to stop smiling at him like that!

"Neh, Yuu-chan," Lavi poked at the swordsman's forehead with an inquisitive finger, jerking it back nearly as quickly, as if afraid the appendage would be bitten or sliced off. It was a well-developed reflex, to be sure.

"Don't call me that," he growled, hand twitching on reflex towards Mugen.

"Why do you hate Allen so much?" Lavi asked. Kanda frowned and didn't answer; he simply returned to his book and continued reading.

It wasn't Allen he hated.

He hated Allen's smiles and all the legitimacy of the boy's love that the rest of the Order refused to see.