Dull whiteness, but nothing else. Mana was sitting on a hillside. He was somewhere between sleep and awake, on the edge where you can still see the dream but can no longer remember. No cold. No heat. The snow touching his face passed right through.

Choked sobs, then silence. Mana turned his head and saw a child sitting before a grave, no tears in his eyes, nothing but an empty expression. Someone who'd lost everything, even his own will to live. Mana knew this child.

Mana tried to move toward this child to comfort him, but something rattled and kept him from coming closer. Chains. Mana was tangled in two long chains. He looked to the child who was beyond weeping once more. What's wrong? The words made no sound.

A shadow appeared behind the gravestone. A tall fat man stepped out, an oversized painted grin on his face. "Would you like me to bring your daddy back from that God you hate so much?" he asked.

Mana recognized this man. He knew this man. The Millennium Earl! No! He tried to tell the boy. He tried to fight the chains binding him off. Don't trust him! Overwhelming grief forced Mana to his knees. The chain had done it when he grabbed it. It had crushed him in his own grief for his brother and for the child before him.

The boy looked up at the Earl. "You can bring him back?"

Don't! Mana shouted. Allen! Please! He fought off the chain that contained his grief. It fell away and vanished. He tried to rip off the next and felt overwhelming love for Raine and Allen and regret for leaving them. Why was this happening? Why?

"Of course," the fat man replied. He gestured behind him, where a skeleton-like doll now stood. "Just call out his name. He'll be sure to hear." His eyes flashed at Mana.

No! Don't! Allen!

"Mana!" Allen shouted, his voice shaking with tears he could no longer shed.

If it were possible for the dead to feel pain, Mana did now. He was picked up and thrown into the Akuma. The remaining chain squeezed tighter, twining suffocatingly around Mana and attaching itself to the skeleton.

"A-Allen," the body sputtered.

Allen's dead eyes sparked with something. "Mana?" He walked toward the skeleton, dazed, like someone let into the light for the first time.

"H-how could you?" the body asked. "How could you turn me into an Akuma?"

The boy stopped. He looked lost. So lost. The Earl grinned. "That's right, Mana Walker, and now your mine. Kill this boy and wear his skin!"

The body moved on its own. It raised an arm and swung down with a blade, cutting Allen's face and eye. Stunned, the boy touched his eye and stared at the blood on his hand. Then the Akuma spat out metal cords that wrapped around the boy to strangle him.

"Curse you, Allen Walker!" the body shouted.

No! Allen! Mana tried to shout. He wasn't saying any of this. The body was using his voice against him. Don't listen to it!

Tears ran from Allen's good eye. Then his hand glowed and exploded.

A claw. A huge claw that seemed to move on its own. It smacked the Akuma away, sending it flying.

There was no pain for Mana, though. Only warmth. The Innocence wouldn't hurt his soul, only his prison.

The claw moved on its own, dragging an injured and unwilling Allen with it. "No!" the boy sobbed. "Run Father!" he shouted.

The Innocence had broken the body enough to allow Mana to speak. "A-Allen," he managed, the words truly his. "I love you. Please destroy me."

The claw closed around the Akuma and smashed it to pieces. "Mana!"

Nothing was holding him there, but still Mana stayed. He couldn't leave Allen, not like this, not with the boy sobbing, his hair bleached white and a scar over his eye because of the curse. Mana knelt before the boy, stroking his hair as he'd always done when the boy had had a nightmare, whispering words of comfort he knew the child couldn't hear.

Allen didn't react to the crunching of feet in the snow, but Mana did. He spun to face the intruder, even if he could do nothing. His fists fell uselessly to his sides. "Cross?"

If the general could see him, he ignored the ghost. "Would you like to become an exorcist?" he offered the child.

The boy looked up, broken for a second time. He didn't seem to understand the question.

"Exorcists fight Akuma," Cross explained, his voice surprisingly gentle. "They're demons that trap souls. They're toys for the Millennium Earl to control for all eternity." His face softened. Mana had never known the man to be so kind. "You have an anti-Akuma weapon inside you. With it, you can free the souls within the Akuma."

"So Mana's…?"

Cross nodded. "He's probably gone to heaven by now." He offered a hand to the child. "Will you become an exorcist?"

The boy took the general's hand.

Mana smiled. Allen was in good hands now. Take care of him, he said to Cross, though it was obvious that they couldn't see him. He turned away and took his first steps to whatever lay beyond death. At last he could rest.

Yay! It's over. I promised I wouldn't end it with Mana dying, and technically I kept my promise.

Before anyone points it out to me, I know the dialogue with Cross is probably dead wrong. I didn't have the manga on me while I was writing this scene, but I think I got the gist at least. And that's all I wanted. …Allen's memory of all this is probably hazy at best anyway. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

I'm sorry that it took so long for me to finish this story. I hope you can all forgive me for taking far too long.

Thank you for reading and sticking with me this long! I truly appreciate it!