Hold

It was only one small thing, but the conversion was amazing. Lenalee was a little less of a lolita-fetish bombshell, a little more like a warrior. For the first time in years, she looked her age.

Sad-looking pigtailed girls brought to mind thing like lost dolls or candy shortages or other trivialities that could be easily remedied. Those who looked on felt confident that they could help and make her smile again. Of course, Lenalee's little things had always been civilians being taken hostage, friends dying, and akuma crashing in through the front door of her home. Imminent-apocalypse type things.

But they had always managed to get her spirits back up, hadn't they? They (and she) had all worked hard to solve her "little things" hadn't they?

But now, clutching her knees, the needles of the pine tree shuddering raindrops on her, her hair was in a practical, hastily tied ponytail. There were lines under her eyes. She looked a young mother who could have lost a young child. It was hard to feel like you could do anything for her.

No wonder Komui had preferred her the other way.

Allen thought all this as he stared at her. Lenalee had once been the idol of the Order, with so many eyes on her miniskirt, her classic beauty, her graceful violence. It had made him cringe. (Not that she'd cared. Her paranoid brother made her out to be a challenge, and anything that was connected to his complex wasn't worthy of her attention.)

Allen was the only one who saw her now.

Lavi came out on breaks but didn't even want to speak to her, the gorgeous girl he had once wanted to date. He stumbled out into the dismal and cold autumn drizzle, looking like Hell. His hair was mussed and the skin under his eyelashes were dusky with sleeplessness, as deep as any of his eyeshadowed girl friends'. Sometimes his eyes were faintly red. But he'd always be smiling sincerely and rub his head ruefully to further dishevel his red locks.

"He's fine." He said to Allen, meaning 'pass it on to Lenalee'. "It's taking a while, probably the Earl's pulling off one petal at a time to prolong the torture…but like you said, he lost his ability to feel pain almost immediately, so right now he's almost bored…"

Allen knew that there was more to it than that. He sensed it, that he could try to fix it, at least. Two best friends, one having to watch the other die and the other having to watch the other watch him. What was happening to Kanda, that was cut and dried and would come to an end. Things couldn't be so easy for Lavi, who was getting worn out from looking after him. All that, but even if he was fed up with being heartsick, he couldn't die from it.

Yesterday, Lavi had quietly asked them to leave. He said he knew it was cold out, but that it wouldn't take much longer. Kanda was getting visibly feeble, and Lavi's look had forbid them from bringing up his pride.

All this, and Allen was still only in love.

"Don't you see Lenalee?" he asked.

She was only a little way off, nestled in the high branch of an evergreen, dew-dropped and comatose.

Lavi tilted his head up, mildly interested as if Allen were pointing out a bird.

Maybe Lavi was tired. Maybe he just didn't care anymore. He had always been fair to both his best friends, and if hadn't been so close to the end, he might have still been. But maybe the twinge of guilt pushed him to it when he saw her, definitely a mature woman and not a little girl, whose grief was heavy, complex, unfixable, and too close to his own.

He turned back to Allen and gave him a strange, crooked smile.

"Yea, she looked just like that when she thought you were dead. Must be the same thing for her all over again."

And he went back without glancing back at either of them again.

Lavi sure did know how to make him jealous.

Allen knew he needed to be more like Lenalee. Whenever she was reminded she wasn't working on her weaknesses, she would consider how to find strength seriously. How upset she was didn't change that.

Allen was the only General in the group. He needed to think things over more carefully, like how he was going to find the Earl and win this war. He had to stop obsessing so much about things that were out of his hands, like recovering Komui and the scientists, who might have been abducted like the time Lulubell invaded headquarters. He should hate himself for not recognizing what really was in his hands, for allowing one of the men with him to accept death. Without a doubt, he was a useless failure of a General.

But he hadn't wanted to make Lenalee fight the Earl with him when they had almost no one (And now they were going to be more shorthanded than before.) He'd clung to not only his friends, but the tears Lenalee shed over her missing brother. He never saw Kanda until Lavi, who had always seen it, made Lenalee see him. Now they all knew and were supposed to be looking at him, although Allen couldn't, and Lenalee was so depressed about it she wouldn't leave her tree.

Always, always, his eyes were on Lenalee.

---

Allen tore off the bottom few inches of his shirt with his activated claw. Kanda was so much taller than him that one of his dress shirts could spare the material more than Allen's. But there was no way to ask either him or Lavi without it being awkward. When Lavi emerged to air out from the stifling heat Kanda still needed, there was a flicker of apology in his expression. But it was minor compared to the intimidating, incomprehensible hope in his eye. Allen didn't approach him.

Allen started sowing. He'd mastered it when he was with Cross because his demonic master had never given money or clothes to his charge. Mana was the one who had taught him, though.

Allen was pushing himself to be less sentimental, so he tried not to connect the memory of his late father with Lenalee. But it was hard training himself out of thinking like an orphan. A skill he learned from when he was with his foster parent, the first time he had felt truly loved, possibly paving the way for him to feel that way once again.

Too wistful. Too exaggerated. And besides, he was too old to consider himself an orphan anymore. Allen hunched over his work. He blew a tuft of white hair away from his scar when it got in the way.

It was a just a gift, that was all. From one friend to another. If Lavi weren't so busy he would have come up with something similar. Maybe Kanda would have even been able to figure it out. It was only an unlucky coincidence that it was those two's fault that she needed cheering up in the first place.

"Allen." Komui had said to him so seriously once that Allen was sure that something important had happened involving the akuma. That was the only time Komui only took on that tone.

"Yes?" Allen, his newest general, had also snapped into business mode. Allen put unnecessary pressure on himself. The only prerequisite to becoming a General was achieving a synchro rate over one hundred percent, and Allen's crown-clown had cinched that since his mid-teens. The title was only a formality. If the last generation of Generals had proved anything, after the promotion honor wasn't expected to replace being selfish, bloodthirsty, or just plain weird.

But they were, undeniably, trump cards. They made new Exorcists strong. They were at such a level that the Noah actually feared their nick-of-time intervention. Allen wanted to feel like he could do that. Turn the tide at any point.

He was a bit too busy to do that now, though, because he was sowing.

"Allen, I trust you to take care of things."

"I'm sorry…sir?"

Komui was solemn and anxious. He acted as if he couldn't remember how to structure English sentences.

At that moment, Allen comprehended fully for the first time that Komui was Lenalee's brother—he had the same sleek dark hair and the same short, dense eyelashes that rimmed the same piercing, thoughtful gaze. Lenalee was not a short girl and her brother shared that trait. His own set of long legs had him towering over Allen. If someone took away of Lenalee's gentleness and feminity, this Komui would be what would be left, and he had Allen pinned under an apathetic scrutiny. It was faintly disturbing.

"Lenalee…and I…we are as used to having to depend on ourselves as much as you. You know, of course, that our parents died when she was very young. I took care of her then. Then she raised herself in the Order."

"Yes." Allen mumbled, dreading what was coming next.

"I think you know Lenalee very well…because you know yourself very well, Allen. And when the time comes, I…" Komui trailed off abruptly. It was like he was almost fighting off helplessness, so he could get his message across uncorrupted. Allen thought he should interject 'I understand, sir' to console him, even though he would panic over Komui's vague wording later. But Komui seemed to return to his wits.

"Even though you both were separated from your care-givers, you learned how to take care of yourselves." Komui said matter-of-factly. "I think it's only people like that who really know how to take care of each other. They are the only ones who don't fall apart if separated. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it's perfect for this world."

"Yes…sir."

His words had hurt in a lot of different ways. Allen had always thought Komui was one of those people who believed—that the world could, and would, throw off some dusty prophecy and proudly live on. And well, didn't that trickle down into thinking they could all individually hope for the future? Allen knew they were soldiers, he knew that Komui was the most of aware of it all as their leader…he couldn't sort out his feelings for the man, his superior and the brother of the person he loved more than anyone else in the world.

So Komui, Lenalee's only family, was saying that he was the right one to take care of Lenalee, because she was the type who could take care of herself and he was compatible with that. Big brother Komui was ready to relinquish responsibility and just let them be together in whatever way they turned out.

But they were also his soldiers. And he knew that after wars, comrades sometimes became survivors.

Komui's soldiers, comrades and whatever else besides. As a couple, or parted, Komui only wished them the best, his sister and the man who loved her.

Allen felt chilled from the light rain. He put his hood up, although it darkened his vision and made it a little harder to see what he was doing. He let his work get longer and longer in his hands and he wondered if he was doing the right thing.

---

"Beansprout!"

Lavi hadn't used that nickname in years. Allen had gathered up all his courage on his eighteenth birthday to tell Lavi he really, really hated it—he thought someone who was an official adult shouldn't have to live with the indignity. Lavi had listened. (He'd half-heartedly hoped Lavi would be able to get Kanda to drop it too, but Kanda had to grow up at his own rate, which was a lot slower. He'd kept it up until a few months after Allen's promotion to General.)

But now Lavi, who was almost default affectionate, was using it the wrong way. He sounded genuinely pissed, which was Kanda's prerogative with the word.

"Are you a moron?" He pointed a shaky finger at what Allen held in his hands.

Allen blinked in confusion. He had jumped when Lavi had come up behind him. The familiar, aggressive shout had reminded him of someone else.

"Lavi, what's wrong? Is Kanda…?"

"What? What about Kanda? He's fine! What's with…" Lavi's jaw snapped shut. He took a deep breath shut his brilliant green eye. When he opened them again, his smile was gentle. He was no longer the intense Lavi that had put Allen's tongue in a bind ever since he had come back. "Naw, you know what Allen? She'll love it."

He dropped his thick white scarf on Allen's head and wound it around. "Guess you coulda used this…but looks like you're about done anyways. Sorry, I know it's cold out here. Hang in there. I'll probably be able to get back to you guys tonight."

Allen guiltily stared at his hands. "Lavi, I'm--"

Lavi stopped him with a raised hand and a grin. "Don't think about those kind of things when you're making something like that. She's gotta be the one on your mind."

Allen remembered what Lavi had said. She likes you, tell her, I'll take her if you're not going to go for it, Allen, put that away, that's for akuma!, you let me hit on her because you know I'm not the one she wants, who else would she choose, go, Lenalee loves Alllleeennn, Lenalee loves Allleeeennn…

He said it all over again with a single jaunty thumbs-up over his shoulder as he ran back. Maybe it was because he took off his scarf, but Lavi's shoulders seemed airy and free as he reported back to his best friend's deathbed. Allen worried that there was something wrong with him—but realized he didn't really care. Seeing Lavi like that again was worth a hundred apologies. The vote of confidence had been extra. A gift.

Slowly, Lavi was starting to see all of them again. And somehow, even though Kanda was this close to finishing up, that was the right thing to do. Lavi knew it.

He knew.

Allen took a breath, tucked Lavi's scarf tighter around himself, and started to climb after Lenalee.

---

"Be careful."

Lavi had been concentrating on not falling asleep by biting his tongue. When Kanda spoke, he jerked, and his reply was muffled from the lingering sting.

"Wha?—nm, Yuu, ow' oo feeleh?"

"Are you drooling?"

"Mm-nh…" Lavi moved his tongue around in his mouth until the numbness wore off. "Sorry, what?"

"Allen and Lenalee are in love."

"Huh? Um, that's okay….he liked her better than me anyways, and it's been a long time already…"

"Baka-usagi, it is not okay. Not for you. They will be stupid, and that will be dangerous."

---

Lenalee glazed-over eyes slid into focus when Allen reached behind her head and took out her ponytail.

"Allen…ow." She said. It was hard to take out rubber bands without breaking a few hairs or catching on some snarls, especially when you weren't the one removing it. Allen winced and flushed.

"I'm sorry."

---

"Yuu-chan, this world has always been dangerous. Do you even know why words like 'stupid' and 'dangerous' exist? They mean--

---

Lenalee stared at the white hair ribbons Allen had made for her and took them from him like he had been carrying a living thing. Her hands wound around them—no one ever exclaimed over her hands, they were brown, and plain, and normal, so why not keep your eyes on her deadly, fluid, sculpted thighs, calves, feet, stylish in jet black. Average length fingers, nails that weren't long or short, palms that shone from wet bark. Allen, who'd once had his heart literally, physically broken once but felt less fear then than right here right now, was too scared to see her expression.

He remembered those hands that had pulled him back, insisting that he not die, had slapped him so hard that his head whipped sideways on his neck, teaching him a lesson about causing friends pain, had…had…maybe slipped into his a few times before, getting Lavi to back off when he got too fresh, needing comfort when Kanda began another mysterious pseudo-death coma, teasing Komui when he went into his one of his fits, or…

Allen also knew those eyes when he was finally ready to face them. He'd often seen Lenalee cry before; there were a lot of things to cry about. She had had prophetic dreams about all of them dying.

Some of them really had died. Some of them were dying. Just once—no, always—Allen wanted her to cry about something else, happy tears or pleasure tears or he-loves-me tears.

He wanted to know what kind they were now.

---

--that people are willing to do more than just survive."

---

Allen wasn't quite as familiar with Lenalee's lips, which casually fell onto his like it was in tangent with the present he hadn't even explained yet. He felt a tremble in her lower lip—wildly hated it in a moment of recognition, knowing that it was all that was left of Miranda getting killed and Bookman passing and Komui missing and Kanda dying and Lavi grieving—everything that wasn't Allen, he wanted gone, just for now.

Allen, who loved her, loved her, loved her, whom she loved. Allen, who was giving her the strength to stop quivering against the kiss she initiated and turn it smooth and powerful and, and,

She completely forgot what else. And that was the right thing to do.

---

Kanda was laughing. Lavi couldn't really say it was him, but…Kanda dying wasn't really Kanda either. This Kanda was a little more like almost-toddler "Yuu," who had always let him call him that without any qualms about a tooth-achingly sweet "-chan" attached until he started hating the nickname at ten and started sticking people for ornery offenses at twelve. This Yuu had laughed himself sick when Lavi collided with a tree branch during a race, until he saw how serious it was, and then held his own shirt against Lavi's eye until help came.

"Baka, did you seriously think that that was a big deal?"

"White is the traditional color for death and funerals in China. Women aren't allowed to wear it in their hair any time else, so--"

"By that logic, you're the one who killed me."

Lavi had been about to punch Kanda in the arm to make him stop, near-death or not, but that halted him.

"Huh?"

"Four. The word for death and four are the same in Chinese with a different accent. There's a lot of superstition around it. When you came back, that made four of us. So…" Kanda giggled, if there was a masculine, mellowed, somewhat threatening way to giggle. "You killed me."

"How do you even know stuff like that?"

Kanda flexed his hand a little, his equivalent of a shrug.

"Lenalee and I were talking about something…comparing characters or kanji or something…"

"You…made casual conversation?"

"Shut up, Lavi."

Lavi wasn't religious, but he didn't know who else to thank that the curse that had given him the worst days of his life was giving Kanda some of his best. Kanda no longer felt pain, he was leaving a war-torn world that would have meant no rest for him ever, and…the very, very last thing to go was his ability to release endorphins. He didn't care that Kanda was technically giddy and light-headed from happy death-hormones. Also technically, Kanda was happy because his friend had made him that way.

"Lavi, you're an idiot." He died with those words and a laugh. Lavi smiled and placed a hand over Kanda's eyes since he had given his scarf to Allen. He didn't know whether Yuu had been consistent to his last moments or not.

---

The white cloth in Lenalee's hair tickled his throat when she rested her head against his chest.

---

The seals swirled around them like a flock of birds circling to land. Wood and fire, Lavi thought, and their symbols glowed red.

He would clear the skies and this stupid misting. It was annoying and could stand to be purged while he was at it.

Deftly turning his innocence in his hands, Lavi slammed down the hammerhead. A fiery dragon writhed out of his hands.Maybe Lenalee and Allen would be mad at him for starting without them. But, he thought wryly, it might be better to let them wrap things up and arrive by themselves. If they saw the light piercing the heavens, they would come. Maybe. But his guess was Kanda wouldn't have minded their absence, considering the circumstances. Lavi didn't.

"See ya, Yuu!" Lavi shouted over the roar of the flames.

Yuu turned into ash and blew away.

---

Allen sleepily thought over what Komui had said. It had seemed so…pessimistic, so pragmatic. Completely out of character for the nutty scientist/romantic. But, he realized now, it had been in keeping with both Komui's hope for their happiness and his respect for all his soldiers. He and Lenalee would live, love, fight together, maybe die, maybe survive, keep on fighting alone as needed. Love made no difference to death, but death made no difference to love. They would, as they always had, understand. Even if war ran its course and one of them became casualties—Allen was Allen and Lenalee was Lenalee.

Love without fear, Komui had meant. This is what you two you will know, because you have already learned it. Even if one of you is left behind, the one you love that lives on is strong. He or she will still fight. He or she will still love.

Keep on walking, Mana had said to him. Allen couldn't help but feel sheepish at his own thick-headedness. It had gone back to his father after all. The first valuable thing he had ever been taught, and it had taken this long to know what to do with it.

Love is for life, but there is love after death. It still mattered. Allen yawned into the top of Lenalee's head. Well, duh, he reminded himself drowsily.

---

Lavi held the winking ball close to his chest. It was pretty warm. He wasn't being sappy, the thing was as crabby as its wielder had been, clinking against its restrictive rings as it bounced around. The Mugen had been extremely active, Lavi reflected, and Kanda had been out of commission for about a week. His innocence was wound up.

He felt kind of sorry for it, although he knew it was insentient. It really, really wanted to destroy akuma, and it had no one to help it with that—it was the closest that one of Kanda's most valued things would come to missing him. Hm. All terribly tragic things considered, it was just violent. Lavi looked down on it affectionately. Yuu might have sacrificed his life for it, but he had picked the object that had resembled him best.

Take that, you stupid lotus, he thought.

"Straight to Allen you go." He told the jittery weapon. Maybe it was too optimistic to think that Allen would be able to carry out his General duties normally…but Lavi felt like being optimistic. He considered dubbing the innocence "Kanda junior," but decided it was just too weird.

Oh. That was right. Lavi wasn't a Bookman junior anymore. He was the official thing.

Meh, he thought. There wasn't any advantage to being with the Church anymore—its remnants were distracted, ineffective, young. An objective view would be impossible.

I can't be uninvolved when I'm one-third the entire fighting force, Panda, he thought. If I die, there goes the whole damn secret history, because who the hell would have thought about taking on an apprentice at this age? Bookman hadn't until he'd shriveled into half his original height.

Lavi had read his work and his predecessors', all of it. It was his property now and its most recent additions were excellent. Bookman had been a perfectly respectable Bookman in that aspect, but somehow he'd completely misjudged his charge to be, what do you know it, responsible. (Play along perfectly with being an Exorcist and then completely deny it as soon as it stopped serving the Bookman cause. That kind of responsible.)

Dammit, if Lavi HAD to be responsible, he chose to be an Exorcist. From now on, the job would mean plenty of life-or-death battling and meager record keeping. Lavi knew there was a high probability that Panda's hope for the future would get whacked by an akuma before getting any meaningful work done.

Lavi felt bad about that, but as no pity was forthcoming for himself, he figured that he'd be able to get over bundles of paper that no one (alive) knew about.

Who else really knew about Allen and Lenalee now, anyways? Yuu'd passed them on like a baton in a relay; Lavi was going to take them to the end. It wasn't everyday a hardass like Yuu played games.

And… well…Panda was gone. No more pressure to rationalize himself to the dark side. How had Lenalee put it…? She didn't care about the world, she cared about HER world. Her only world and his 49th one were synonymous enough.

He'd left Lenalee and Allen on the other side of the hill, so he swung up on his hammer and flew.

---

Lavi spied Allen and Lenalee sitting under a tree, like the old nursery rhyme, curled up together under a blanket. Cute, he thought indulgently, and whipped it off.

Lenalee screamed when the cold air hit her. Lavi immediately plastered his hand against his eye, fighting the urge to leave slits of space between fingers. He lost and generously allowed himself just one, a tiny one.

"God! Sorry, I thought you guys were cuddling!"

"We were!" Lenalee snapped, yanking back the blanket. "That's what you do, after you…you know!

Lavi had had plenty of experience with Allen's blush; his best friend got flustered easy. He'd thought there hadn't been much else to it. To his stupefied, wordless delight, he found out that Allen got red well below his neck.

"Stop looking!" an exasperated Lenalee exclaimed him as she groped for clothes with the arm that wasn't holding the blanket up.

"I wasn't!" Lavi lied.

"Then how…" Lenalee was definitely losing her temper. That strained, wrathful voice he knew so well was creeping up and jabbing at his instinct to run. "Do you know exactly where to hold that out?"

Lavi had innocently collected his scarf from the ground and was offering it to Allen despite covered eyes. Allen,preoccupied with looking as if he were being stewed in tomato juice, made no move to take it.

"Lavi!" Lenalee exploded. "Ooo…I can't kick you right now!"

"Because you're naked?" Lavi suggested.

"YES, because I'm naked!"

"D'ya want me to get your bra? I think I see it on that tree branch."

Lavi find out what it was like to have five fingers the size of javelins curl up into a metallic fist and give him an uppercut worthy of Goliath. Quite like Lavi to forget Allen's innocence could put him into a full-body cast without any indecent exposure.

"Lavi, you…I…I hate you!" Allen managed. (His cheeks were rosy and his free arm thrown protectively around Lenalee. It was terribly adorable of him, and terribly nice of Lavi to notice, considering that Allen's activated claw was giving Lavi grass burns by grinding him against the earth for a good twenty yard's distance.) Lavi was impressed that this situation hadn't summoned demonic poker-face Allen, although if shy Allen didn't get it together soon, Lavi was going to lose all the skin on his back.

While Lavi was pinned and guaranteed distracted, Lenalee made a grab for her uniform hanging from a neighboring bush. She jammed herself into it. With great dignity and speed, she collected the various shed garments as Allen tossed Lavi around like a doll. She discreetly dressed him since he was busy— she left his shirt, because Allen's arm was exceptionally so.

When Lavi was finally able to spread out on his back, smeared green all over, he found a mostly-dressed Lenalee peering down severely at him and a hotly bothered and topless Allen glaring at him. There were tufty white bows at either side of Lenalee's head and Lavi could see a line of darkened blotches of skin on Allen's collar bone.

"What do you have to say for yourself?"

Ah. Exactly the kind of self-righteous, non-blasphemous grade school one-liner he expected from Allen.

Lavi spat out a clump of dandelions. He stretched out an arm, a vibrant orb tucked between his fingers.

"This is for you. Cute hickies." He gasped. "Your hair's pretty." he added to Lenalee.

---

Lenalee blasted through the skies, drawing three colored rings in the space above the clearing in a span of seconds.

"I felt so stupid, ya know." Lavi was telling Allen. "I coulda started looking for that cure any time, but I wanted to play around. And when I finally grew up, things had already gotten to the point that being grown up didn't help anymore."

"I think we're all feeling like that." Allen reassured him. He squinted anxiously after his…his…Lenalee, willing her to land and stop exposing herself to an aerial attack. They needed to know they had an open path and keep going, though.

"I know!" Lavi whacked Allen on the back. "But damn, it was great, wasn't it? And I gotta tell you, as soon as I started being mature about it, it got all depressing. It's gonna take some work, but let's have fun while we're saving the world. Up for it, General Beansprout?"

"Hey! You said you wouldn't call me that anymore!" Allen whirled around from monitoring his…his...

"Your girlfriend's lookin' to land! We better give her some space."

Lenalee slammed into the ground, heels pointed down. Her familiar pigtails flew up along with their new decorations.

"All clear!" she proclaimed breathlessly. A length of red ribbon dangled out of her pocket. She drew it out and gave it to Allen. "I think you left this in that tree."

"It was in a tree? That's pretty kink-"

Lenalee nonchalantly roundhouse kicked him so fast that she whistled.

"Onwards, General!" Lavi shouted later, hanging off his hammer and ignoring his black eye.

"Lavi, stop being silly." Lenalee scolded. She reached for Allen's waist. He raised his own hands to touch hers resting there, but she deftly hefted him up, testing his weight for a few seconds. Lavi grinned at his priceless, crestfallen expression. Lenalee dropped him after a moment.

"Oof. You're heavier than when you were a kid. I'd like you carry you, but I might drop you. Better ride with Lavi, Allen. Be careful."

She took his face in her hands (she did have to reach up) and gave him a kiss full on the lips as Lavi whooped.

By the time they were up in the air, it was already sunset.

Allen behind him was engaged in a unique version of hand holding with Lenalee, who was having a difficult time matching her pace with Lavi's innocence. She kept getting too far ahead and would stop for them, but then they would shoot forward, bypass her, and then she'd have to catch up. Every time they lined up for a split second, they would extend their arms and grab hands. Catch and release. Sometimes Lenalee would do something fancy, duck under and over, and her fingers would flicker on Allen's hair, his shoulder, his face.

"Oi! If he falls, you're going to have to catch him!" Lavi yelled.

---

Allen smelled the moss on her skin, heard the catch in her voice as she said his name. These days he knew her hands far better than those legs everyone had worshipped, which had really been just her skin-tight boots, striking black stockings that had tapered to knife-like heels. They'd been enthralled with their mystique, dark sacred relics, and Lenalee had been like a beautiful, charming shrine for them, the rumored Heart of Innocence.

But Allen now knew what her legs were like bare, flesh-toned, too delicate and soft to be weapons, ending in ten curled-up toes. They matched her hands, a warm olive color. Those whacked Lavi in the back of the head when he teased Allen too much and pointed at dots on towns that was rumored to feature a resistance group headed by an eccentric Asian man.

They gripped his paler ones at every opportunity.

Lavi had helpfully volunteered to patrol for the night, although he could have done it with a bit more class by not winking suggestively as he left. He was a ways off, so high up that he couldn't possibly see them through the forest treetops.

"Allen." She, not a soldier, pressed her cheek to his. He laid a kiss on her heart, its steady thud the sound of his own feet walking forward.

End.

---

Author's Note:

I am SO done with this fic…yee-ah, it was supposed to be optimistic from the beginning but I was told it got sad when Kanda started to die. Oops, hope this fixes it. Um. World War II is in progress. Follow the (failed) allegory and the result should hypothetically be the same. Yes, the apocalypse is inconclusive. Let it be.

Can you believe that this whole fic came to me when in half-sleep and wondering if Lenalee would have any issues with white hair ribbons? I'm Chinese, so I can't seem to resist letting some of those traditional beliefs leak into my writing. Like I said, it got out of hand, and I had to try to wring some coherence out of this second part. Erg, sorry if it disappoints and is lamely sappy, I didn't have much planned for it. I will try to never let myself write a sweet, non-screwed up romance again.

Thanks for reading.