Title: Existing

Synopsis: There was a difference between something that was born and something that was made. /Kanda-centric, sorta dark/

Rating: T

A/N: I don't usually write about Kanda (because I hate him) but I'm in an angsty mood, so this came into existence. Yeah. So Kanda fangirls, enjoy. I know it has nothing to do with him having relations with Lavi, but we'll just have to deal with that, won't we.

Disclaimer: I don't own DGM, its characters or anything affiliated with it.

…

"I think that God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability."

-Oscar Wilde

…

There was a difference between 'born' and 'made'. A baby was born so it was treated with compassion, with baby talk, with smiles and love. A hat, on the other hand, was made so maybe it was kept in good condition, but it felt no joy, no love, nothing from the person who owned it. It was just an item to be held and admired occasionally but to eventually be put on a shelf and forgotten about. To a hat, this was a natural occurrence; the order of things. If a parent were to do this to a child, however, a stir would be made and they would never hear the end of it. The child was to be taken care of; that was something that everyone knew.

Perhaps it was different. He was not born, but he was human… or at least part. Was there a difference between a human and something that was part human? Or was there even anything that was like him in the world? Since that person was gone, there was no one like him, was there? Still, he was not a hat. He knew that. No matter what they said and how they treated him, he would be conscious and have emotions, no matter how he tried to hide them.

"Yu? Are you alright?" A scientist asks him, thinking that they are close, that he would care because she helped to create him. She was not his mother, but there was some of that instinct still there, even if it was a lie to fulfill her academic means. She treated him with the same care and respect that she did with any other experiment that she made. The people like that were the closest things to a family that Yu had, now. "You're being very quiet."

What she didn't realize was that he was always quiet. It wasn't something different; there was no change in current mood that made him quiet. It was just who he was. The only difference was that she had never spoken to him before. Before he had come out of that pit she had been sent to a different branch of the Order, never able to fully see her creation as it matured. Even so, she now thinks that she knows him and understands him, but she does not. How could someone know something if they have never spoken to it, never even seen it before?

There is nothing to say to her, so he does not respond. Silence is golden, he was told, and he takes that to heart. Especially in a situation with a moron like this scientist. Education meant nothing; some people would always be morons.

"Kanda? Is that you?" Bak Chan, Edgar's son, walks into the room in a new looking uniform with a silly hat. He holds a clipboard and a pile of papers, probably work for the Order. It surprised Kanda that he would still be working for them because of all that went on in the Asia Branch. He heard that he had been promoted to Head. Since Kanda last saw him, he has cut his hair short. Since Kanda last saw him, his parents were murdered. Bak smiles and it doesn't appear to be fake. "It's nice to see you; it's been a long time."

It hasn't, really. Time is relative, isn't it? It's been almost a year since the disaster in the Asian Branch. After all of that Kanda had been shuffled to the Oceania Branch, where he stayed for a few months while they tried to figure out whether or not they would keep him, and had just moved to the European Branch three days ago when they decided they had invested too much capital in him to destroy him. Seeing Bak makes him remember what happened… It makes him angry. And also sort of sad, at the same time.

Memories of Alma were pushed to the back of his mind where they belonged. Bringing them forward would only cause more problems that he didn't want and didn't need. Bak needed to go, and quickly.

He clenches his fists. "Hello," he says, with as much forced politeness as he could muster. The woman scientist looks at him with reproach and clicks her tongue at him.

Obviously she is unpleased with her creation. What she made was not what she had wanted him to be. That was a difference between being born and being created; when created, one wanted to start over if they made mistakes and perfect it. When a person was born they were accepted, even with their flaws. It didn't matter if they had a bad attitude or had some sort of darkness in their soul that ate away at them every moment that they lived. If a person was born then they were acknowledged. If they were created they were hated and called a bad model.

Since Kanda obviously wasn't a good enough prototype, she was probably making plans in her mind for the 'Third Exorcist 2.0 Project! New and improved Kanda model coming to stores near you!' It made Kanda want to be sick.

Somewhere in the back of his mind Kanda knew that he was cynical and cruel. A life that he couldn't remember had been shoved into his body and two people lived in it at once, both mourning in their own ways. Within himself was a war; he wanted to live but he wanted to remain in the past at the same time. Contradicting feelings that should have never existed crashed within him, tearing him apart from the inside each with their own agendas and ideas.

"You've grown a lot." For some strange reason Bak did not seem phased by the lack of friendliness that Kanda showed him. Bak just talked to Kanda as if he were a normal person who was treating him like a normal person. It was so much different than how people talked to him in the Order. "Last time I saw you, you were this high," as he talks he raises a hand a few inches lower than Kanda was at standing height. Had he grown? He had barely noticed. "You're not as much of a bean sprout as you used to be."

Bean sprout? That sort of derogatory name was unforgivable. "You cut your hair. It looks bad." Maybe those words would be enough to scare this guy off for a while.

Strangely enough, it wasn't. Bak looked shocked for a moment, but then he laughed. "It's been a little weird to get used to, but I think that it's growing on me bit by bit," he pauses for a moment, his voice getting a little softer. "I thought that I needed some sort of a change in my life. This was all I could think of doing." Kanda realizes what he has said, though he does not feel bad. After what has happened to him, he cannot bring himself to feel sorry for anyone else. He is not, after all, entirely human.

There was an excuse in that, he knew. He was not human so he could leave the emotions behind. It didn't matter; no one expected anything better of the Third Exorcist Project ver. One. There was no one to impress and he didn't care what they thought in the first place.

So if that was so, why did he feel that feeling deep within him as Edgar's son spoke? That feeling that he tried to shut away and hide so that he could just go on life being numb and uncaring.

"Anyways, I can see that you don't want to talk, so I'll just-"

"It's not that bad," Kanda tells Bak, not looking him in the eye. "I mean, your hair. It looks fine." He said it because it was true, not because he cared, or anything of the sort.

The woman scientist stares at Kanda; that was the first thing that Yu had said in her presence that was anywhere near kind. In fact, it was the first thing that Yu had said in her presence that was more than monosyllabic, at least to her ears. Maybe some of the defects in his personality were just momentary kinks working themselves out… "Thank you, Kanda," says Bak with a small smile. "I appreciate it."

"Yeah, well, your old hair looked bad." Kanda retorts, not wanting to seem like this would be more than a momentary fancy of his.

"I'm sure that it did, Kanda," Bak says smiling before giving a quick and polite greeting to the scientist and excusing himself due to needing to get packed before returning to the Asia Branch that afternoon.

Emotions were for humans. They were for people who were born, not made. Living miracles, not created items. Still, when he had seen Bak there was something inside of him, pulling at his insides. Edgar had always been kind and smiling and Twi, despite being a bit naggy at times, had always looked out for him. Maybe they had cared about him despite who he was and maybe…

Maybe he had cared about them, just a little, despite who he was.

Lost in thought, Kanda hadn't realized that the woman was talking. "-that boy, riding on the laurels of his parents, just because they died he thinks that he can take over the Asia Branch-" And as he listened to her speak he realized that she was talking about Bak. Bak who had helped him when he was running away, Bak whose parents died at the hands of his only friend, Bak who seemed to work hard for what was right and Bak, the only person there to treat him like a human and not an experiment.

"You're an idiot," he tells her as he gets up and walks away.

…

Fin