Regret Tastes Like the Tears I Can't Cry

The room is quiet, almost unbearably so. Allen is an abhorrent picture of anguish lying there atop the bed, a thin sheet barring from view his body from his chest down, skin tinted grey in a partial transformation. His eyes are closed and his face is devoid of expression, but that in itself is worrisome. He doesn't tremble, he's brow is smooth and his jaw is lax – there is nothing to suggest the horrific state of his internal being. And I know he has nightmares. This sleep is something else, something darker, something wrong, but all I can do is sit idly by and wait.

My muscles coil with wonton desire. I need to be moving, need to be doing something. My body knows better than I that it's in these silent motionless moments that thoughts begin to stray.

"Really Kanda, why?"

"I was the one that awakened him into Nea…"

I hadn't cared then because I hated the order. I hated them more than the akuma and more even than the Noah. So much so that I thought fuck them all, let the Noah take over the Moyashi if it's going to. Let it wreck their plans and raise a little hell. I thought if I just ignored it, if I pretended I didn't see the pain in the damn brat that the 14th would make the Order pay and I could just sit back and watch them get what they deserve.

"But now…this regret simply won't let me die peacefully."

I was so absorbed in myself and my hatred that I saw him as a coincidental tool, a loose cannon, that I could just tip in their direction. I always kept him at a distance. Yet, he never stopped reaching out to me, and then with Alma… these wretched feelings roiling within me refuse to quell their incessant nagging. Guilt. I don't think I've ever truly felt the emotion before. Not like this.

When he burst out of that akuma…he was just so infuriatingly beautiful. But there was a hardness in his eyes – those eyes rimmed in red paint set against the chalk white of the matte upon his skin. With his hair slicked back like that I couldn't help but think how unnatural, but I can't say that it wasn't appealing, especially with his innocence – the unblemished white cowl, and the carnival mask that no longer caressed his face – the feathers about him reminded me of the baroque paintings on the chapel ceilings. Yes, a beautiful bastardized angel.

At that moment, I couldn't hide my surprise, my awe. And had anyone been looking at me, I'm sure they'd have said that's the moment that I truly fell – thoroughly enraptured by that demon in white.

He didn't even look at me then… those hardened silver eyes had been set firmly on the little girl cradled against his form. When he set her down and patted her head…

"I've shown you such a dreadful performance…I'm sorry."

When he wiped away her tears…

"Be careful on your way back home."

His smile had been empty.

It wasn't the kind of smile I was used to, the forced everything's-fine-cause-I'm-a-martyring-idiot smile. No, this one had been rife with a somber resignation and I felt it clench at my core.

He didn't even look at me once and then he tried to run. How fucking irritating. Even when I'd pinned him down – practically straddling the moron – he refused to meet my gaze. Damn brat, always pissing me off. I wanted to hit him. Every muscle in my body was tense with anticipation and anger and relief. Despite it all, I'd acted so nonchalant about him still being him.

"It appears that somehow you haven't turned into the 14th yet, huh."

Then that expression on his face when I asked about that Crow… the bewilderment and grief in those sterling eyes… I'd never truly felt the weight of the emotion those eyes could carry than I did at that moment and I couldn't stop the jealous writhing in my chest at knowing that behind those eyes he was thinking about that damn Vatican dog.

Then during the fight when those same eyes became ravaged with rage, I could taste his desire for vengeance in the air – he knew exactly who was to blame. His anger clearly wanted to rampage through the Akuma appearing around us but despite his own afflictions he thought of the crowd of people first. Just like always he was vainly trying to be mankind's protector.

As he was drawing them away, he spared a glance down at Johnny and me and in that expression all thoughts of Link vanished. The regret and longing I saw in the tight draw of his lips and the faint flush on the crest of his cheekbones… I wanted more than ever to become his savior.

"Don't touch me!"

The violent rejection when we'd caught up with him made me cringe inside. It was the words that followed, however, that really got me.

"Kanda, I really don't get you… I was really happy that you're alive but what about Alma? Weren't the two of you finally free? Despite that...Why…Why are you wearing the Order's clothes? Why the bloody hell are you throwing away your hard-won freedom?"

He was thinking about me the whole time. Me and Alma… and the freedom he gave us. He didn't see himself. There were only others in his eyes, always others in his eyes. He began to cry. Not for himself. Not for the uniform I was once again wearing. Not even for me. Those tears were for Alma. He really is a fool, to cry for everyone but himself. That Alma could have known kindness from this person, no matter how brief, spread warmth throughout my chest, the muscles there constricting. This body has seen more emotion in these past few months than in the entire culmination of my life, and it's all because of this idiot.

When he collapsed into unconsciousness clutching the wound I had created in his abdomen, the ache in my chest grew. His innocence was still trying to protect him, even after Nea had awakened. At least that's what Johnny seemed to believe. More than protecting him, though, I see it as a strange kind of attachment… not unlike this feeling that has been brewing inside me since I met him, what now seems like a lifetime ago.

Sitting here in this dark room, I can't help but wonder of the nature of this inexplicable attraction that draws me to him. Even when he was made up as a clown, a part of me knew it was him.

"Trying to wake him up again?"

"Yup, we might as well try reading aloud General Cross' debt notices this time but I don't think this is an ordinary sleep. He's probably fighting with the 14th's memories."

"That boy's A Noah… The worst-case scenario of Allen Walker disappearing... The probability of that…It's not non-existent."

Alma had known something about Allen. They were very different but they shared that same loss; because Alma knew the loss of self, he knew the pain Allen was in. This pain I can't even fathom.

"Allen's fighting."

Johnny is holding his hand, kneeling at the side of the bed and clutching at that hand like he wants to be the anchor that'll draw Allen back.

"The battle's only begun, right, Allen?"

He's smiling and cheering him on, full of that blind faith and optimism so reminiscent of the façade of the Baka Moyashi from so long ago.

"It's here. Your Goal is here. I'll keep calling for you! I'll be a signpost for you. Alright?"

Holding his hand and calling to him… I can't do anything like this.

"Thank you..."

The words that fall from my lips, I know it's arrogant of me to say, but I can only hold strong to Mugen and cut down the threats that come his way. I want to save him, but unlike Johnny, I can't smile past the unfavorable odds. So, for now I'll do the things only I can do.

And when you wake up, I won't let you go again.

End

A/N: So, clearly I got caught up in the whirlwind of life and didn't get to post anything else for Yullen week, to which I sincerely apologize. I have the themes still and a couple of them are in the near-completed stage, but I just haven't had a chance to sit down and work on them.

Now, when I woke up this morning I had every intention of setting to work on my research paper but as fate would have it I checked my email first – bad decision on my part since tangents are abounds from my inbox. One of the messages I received was from xXCherryLicoriceXx, who asked if I was going to write something around the newest chapter. To be honest I haven't been following the manga as closely as I used to so I had about eight chapters to catch up on, which I ended up doing right after reading her message. After that I set to writing this piece. It's not much but it was a refreshing break from my studies. So, this is for Cherry-chan (I hope you don't mind me calling you that).

I'll try to finish the piece I have going for the Fingertips theme for sometime next week since I love you guys so much and Tuesday is Valentine's Day. But first there's my course work to tackle.

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

Comments are welcomed – they make me happy :)