A thousand pardons.

I am currently experiencing severe writer's block and am wading through my yard-long list of oneshot ideas in an attempt to write myself out of it. This is one of those oneshots. XD

"Oh! Thank God you're here, Mister Exorcist, Thank God!"

"Mister Kanda? Mister Kanda, is that you?"

"Where is he?"

"S-sorry?"

"I asked you, 'where is he?' I want to see him. Where is he?"

"S-sorry…"

"This way Master Kanda! This way…"

"What is th-" the words died on his lips as he looked down and around the space. Heavy boots plowed insensitively over the familiar discolored stones but stopped short when they reached the spot where the liquid spattered across the floor was thick enough to pool. His knees gave unexpectedly, causing the Finder to convulse, torn between turning away and going to the exorcist's side to see what was the matter. But he remained quiet.

It was only too obvious what the matter was and Kanda Yu was known for not liking stupid questions.

A pale hand extended and took the plunge, fingers coming up red. Kanda studied his catch.

Glass clung in some corners of the broken frames, thick and distorting everything visible beyond it but it all looked the same to him. With a quick jerk, his jacket opened then tore, fibers straining for a moment before coming apart in a leathery scrap. Another Finder stopped at the door and ventured in, scanning her fellow's expression for some explanation but she received no reply from his wide distracted gaze. She followed his line of vision to the kneeling exorcist, creeping slowly forward to see what the man was doing out in the scarlet puddle, what could possibly explain why their anticipated savior was- he lurched suddenly and violently, hands raking through the liquid like it was air; nothing, in a frenzy, splashing it everywhere including across his own lap, his own face, surely he'd swallowed- the thought forced the two finder's eyes closed and cemented them there.

Surely he'd swallowed some. Surely.

"M-master Kanda! What are you-"

"He'll need his glasses."

"Sir, he's-"

"He'll need his glasses. Damn fool. He's pretty much useless without them. He'll need his glasses."

"But… but, Sir, he's… he's…"

"We need to clean this up. Now. I can't find the shards in it." For a moment he was still and they prayed he'd come to his senses, woken up from whatever this strange trance was, but then his coat was sliding off his shoulders and off his arms, his elbows, his hands, until they were free of each other. Kanda pressed his coat into the collection of whoever-it-was's most vital fluid, sopping it up in a matter of seconds before tossing the jacket aside.

It left a dark smear across the floor.

"Master Kanda…"

"He'll need his glasses." Carefully, slowly he picked up the splinters, big and small, that belonged to the large frames, seemingly oblivious to the sounds of retreating feet behind him.

His body hit the ground unexpectedly hard but he didn't feel the slightest tinge of pain. He tried to sit up and found he couldn't move.

A piece of glass escaped his lap, then another, then a waterfall of tinkling drops, then nothing.

I never asked where he came from. Kanda's eyes grew larger in surprise as his body twitched an arm out before him. Why are my fingers red? Did he have a family? What if he was married? What if he had children? He swallowed, staring at his fingers. I have to tell them… I have to… What was his favorite color? What color were his

"eyes, dammit! What color were they? What"

about his hair? Was it

"graying"

yet?

"Where"

did he find

"me? What will happen to his things? What"

was his

"favorite"

picture? Does he still have Daisya's

"paper airplane"

from that day he yelled? Why didn't he yell? Why didn't he

"yell, dammit? Did he like"

me? Did he really think of us as

"children? Where are they? Where are they, I have to tell them they're broken… I have to-"

"There! There he is! Careful, I think he's snapped from traveling here so quickly… the stress he must be under-"

"Where… football team? I never… favorite… Marie. Please, don't make me tell… I never… Wife… he had… he'll need them. He'll need them!"

"It's just broken glass, dear, shh… It's just broken glass… Let's get you cleaned up, hm? Come on-"

"I can't! I can't! Please don't make me tell Marie!"

"There, there, dear! It's nothing to fret about. We'll clean it up! Come along; sit up."

"I never asked him… I never asked him…"

"That's the way, dear! Now let's go and get you washed up. You can sleep a spell and-"

"He'll want his glasses…"

"then get on with business, maybe take a shot of two of medicine, hm? Then you'll be all better, dear. It's all alright-"

"He'll want his glasses!"

A thin wrist twisted exquisitely out of the nurse's motherly grasp and the blood-smattered body escaped with just as much ease and grotesque grace (nurses have, ironically, some of the weakest holds) and gravity brought him back to a kneel, hands reaching out for the lifeless lens and scattered pieces of glass, trying, with all the elegance of desperation, to gather them up in his hands as if having all of the fragments simultaneously present would again make them whole while a multitude of white frocks descended upon him like moths to crimson-laced light.

I was there at the funeral without invitation because there are never invitations to a burning.

Everyone who can comes though.

I never came into the hall but I could still hear everything. See everything. Very few people came into the hall actually. Kanda takes up quite a lot of space sometimes, somehow. I think the minister would have even opted to shout from the floor above if he'd been given the choice rather than trespass- because that's what it feels like when you're in his space: trespassing- on the alter next to the coffin with his back to all the world's anger stuffed into one human being. I'm sure he heard every 'che' I heard but I'm not sure if he realized they weren't random, that they came after every 'God'.

I've never seen a man of the Church move so quickly.

It was after the sermon that we watchers began to come out of hiding, flitting across the hall as necessary, murmuring an apology to the pair by the empty token they were forced to pretend was their teacher.

Marie left after two condolences and I'm sure he heard every finder and sentinel that I heard whisper their spectator's shock at such a lack of emotion, their disapproval, and it's a wonder that he didn't snap and give one or two a piece of his mind.

I can't blame their ignorance. Life has just played out for me to know now and them to know later that grief, if you can call it just that, has many faces.

I don't know why I stayed so long, why I waited for him. Perhaps it was curiosity as to how he'd show his feelings, perhaps it was my proper up-bringing that taught me not to leave until the family left, perhaps it was the idea at the skirts of my conscious that this would make us similar- perhaps it was something entirely different but I waited all the same until the hall was a mass of movement again and I couldn't even see him until the noise.

It was the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.

The room froze and focused on the fire where he stood with an arm up and the last shining shards falling out of his hand to shimmer their way down to the stone where they tinkled into many more slivers, echoing up the length of the entire building.

Shock and shame and disgust and chastisement and 'how ungrateful's and 'In God's house's swept across the room and he walked right through them like air: nothing.

He had made his own ceremony, a real one, and I was so glad to have waited.

"Afternoon… Allen."

"Afternoon, Kanda."

He let me walk out into the world with him, listen to the nothing of the nothings who don't understand what it's like to lose a father when you only have but one.

If you have any questions, please ask! :) Sorry it's so awful...I'll be back one day, hopefully...