D.Gray-man // Leftover Angels // 06. Suffering
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble cast. Focus: Kanda/Alma, Allen, 14th/Hevlaska.
Rating: T
Warnings: Character death, violence, a dozen kinds of blasphemy.
Word Count: 26,239 (this chapter: 3126)
Summary: Allen's "death" during the fight with Alma sets off a chain of unexpected and deeply strange consequences which bring up questions about the nature of God himself. Hevlaska goes missing, Crown Clown returns without its owner, and angels and demons work together against a common enemy. While grieving for Alma, Kanda must figure out what's going on and which side he should be fighting for... if any.
Notes: Previous: 05. Deicide
06. Suffering
The unholy shriek fell abruptly silent. Azazel stared blindly, eyes rolled up towards the little thorn lodged in his forehead, while his hands clutched at his chest.
For a second, nobody moved. Then Neah, galvanized by the sight of red lines snaking outwards from the points of impact, turned and frantically howled at the army. "Into the cave! Now!"
To Allen, it seemed at first like a terribly stupid thing to order. The cave was crumbling, the caldera behind it roiling with lava. It was as likely to kill anyone who entered as anything else. Then he remembered: the Ark. Whatever Neah thought was coming, he didn't think the miserable, shredded human army would be able to withstand it.
Somehow the magnitude of what had just happened seemed to dissolve the tension between the opposing forces. Lenalee barked out orders, lining everyone up into orderly strings pointed at the cave door. Those still sporting functional limbs gathered the injured and dead. The ice ran red behind them. Neah raced over to the gate and hastily opened it without programming a destination, letting Lenalee and the Noah herd the dazed and staring lines of people into the white city beyond as fast as they could.
It wasn't fast enough. Allen could feel that certainty within Neah, could see it just by looking at how quickly the red lines were overtaking Azazel's skin, cracking him open like overheated crystal. They had seconds left, not the minutes they would need.
Neah waited until the absolute last second, then closed the gate, leaving a handful of Finders and the remaining Exorcists locked outside of it. It wasn't enough, but it was the most that could be done.
The last thing Allen saw was Lavi reaching out to enfold Lenalee in his arms, green eye calm with acceptance.
The world ended.
x.x.x
Kanda was dead.
His soul stood on a soft floor of something like moss. His vision was mostly obscured by thick rolling banks of warm fog, but sometimes through it he caught glimses of straight trunks and low-hanging needled branches. The air was lukewarm but oddly clear and easy to breathe, despite the fog. It was hard to think. The swirling patterns of white hypnotized him, and he was so comfortable. Nothing hurt. For the first time since he had died all those years ago, he felt no pain at all.
He had died many times before, of course, but even here he could tell this was different. He would not be gasping back to life five hundred seconds from now. His body would not reconstitute itself and draw him back into the harsh world of the living.
Kanda grinned. Everything had gone exactly as he'd hoped it would. Now all that was left was to find Alma and... rest.
He pushed his tired soul forward into the mist, following the distant sound of a familiar song.
x.x.x
An eternity later, the world lurched back into existence. Somehow, somehow, all was not lost.
Allen blinked grit out of his eyes and sat up to look around. His comrades and enemy-allies lay scattered around him, half-covered by drifts of fine golden sand. His own legs were partially submerged. The air was sere and dry, but cool. A dark dome of stars arced overhead, luminous at the edges with the reflected light of the soon-to-rise sun.
A desert. He couldn't tell which one. The stately cliffs of stone eroding patiently away to the north suggested China, but were by no means conclusive.
Standing up, he dusted himself off and took stock. His body was in terrible shape. There was no one thing very wrong with it, but it was battered and twitching with the aftershocks of adrenaline. The nausea was awful, but could be dealt with. It was much more important to find out who else was still alive, if anyone.
Lenalee was closest. He knelt beside her and shook her gently. She did not stir, but he could feel the warmth and steady rhythm of life under the bare skin of her arm. She was alive. Though he could not tell how far from death she was, it would have to be enough for now. Lavi lay just beyond her, also unconscious but breathing. Miranda lay perpendicular to them, her right hand stretched toward them, the Time Record still spinning fitfully on her wrist. She must have stopped their time before the explosion hit.
To the right Allen found all but four of the Noah clan laid out in a tidy line. Two of the remaining sat together at the far end of the line, close enough to share warmth but not touching. A few more steps, and Allen could identify them through the gloom -- Tyki and Lulubell. None of the dark figures in the line were breathing. Their eyes were all neatly closed. Allen forewent asking the obvious question. "I'm sorry," he said, though he wasn't sure how much he really was. The Noah had fought for the vision of the future he and Neah shared, and for that he owed them some gratitude, but he also owed them quite a lot of hatred for all the things they had done before that.
Neither of them answered him, or even looked at him. He left them alone with their grief and moved on.
The Finders were, unsurprisingly, all dead. He stared at them for a few moments, willing himself to feel pain over their losses, but found only numbness. He could not hurt anymore. Not right now.
Next he found the other two surviving Noah, Road Kamelot and the Earl. That the Earl had survived was no surprise. Same for Road, he realized -- how many times had they tried without success to wound her physical body? The blast may have reduced her to ash, but she could have easily rebuilt from that. Tyki had his ability to choose what to touch. Doubtless he had made himself fully permeable just before the shockwave hit and let the superheated bits of island pass right through him without harm. Lulubell had probably turned herself into a rock or something similar to weather the tempest. The abilities of the others had not afforded them such protection.
Winters was off by himself. His face was twisted with rage, but his half-open mouth was silent and full of sand. Last of all Allen found Cross, gathering the pieces of Maria's shattered corpse together into his spread coat.
And that was all. The entirety of what was left. Allen had no idea what had happened inside the Ark. He hoped they had all gotten away safely, but found it difficult to hope. Perhaps the entire world was like this now. No more ocean coasts, only vast chasms of dust where the water had been, and only sand and stone between them.
"Allen Walker," said a soft voice behind him.
He turned to find Hevlaska -- Lilith -- standing with her dark hands folded shyly together at her belly button. Her dark hair was full of snarls and fell in her face whenever the wind gusted. He stared into her tranquil glowing eyes and tried for a moment to forget where he was. Gently, she drew him back with a hand on his arm. "I am sorry for everything you have lost," she said. "I wish... if I had been closer to my full strength, I--"
"It's all right," he said flatly, though it wasn't, in any way. "Thank you for helping."
Neah chose this moment to awaken from his stupor. Allen found himself pushed violently out of the way as the angel rose swiftly to the surface, yelling frantically as soon as he found his voice. "Did it work?"
"Yes," said Lilith. "Yes, it worked."
Neah sagged. "Thank you. Thank you, my love. Could you... tell me what happened? Are we safe?"
Lilith hesitated for a moment, looked down, then steeled herself. "Your poison worked even better than you had hoped. It seems even you underestimated the power the One left in the hands of humans. Your friend's magic was... hardly short of a miracle. Azazel crystallized and broke apart. When the tumult eased, Lucifer called the remainder of his Akuma army and had them carry us away from the island. There was... very little left of it."
"What of the pieces?" Neah urged. "Did you--"
She nodded, then placed a thin palm flat against her slightly swollen belly. "Yes. I do not know what will come of this."
Neah threw his arm around her, dragging her tiny form hard into his chest. It was disconcerting for Allen to feel then the true force of his love, the love which had driven him into this suicidal crusade against every active power but hers, to hide himself away from Azazel's murderous gaze until the time was right with more patience than Allen could even conceive of, to risk everything for the sake of a world she would be happy living in. He felt like a voyeur. It was suddenly harder to believe that this was his body, that it had ever belonged to him. He felt as if he had only been keeping it safe for Neah for the sake of this reunion--
No, he interrupted himself. No, that's not how it is. This is mine. I was here first.
Tentatively, he tried for control. Neah pushed him back ruthlessly. He tried again, and was rebuffed with even greater force.
"Neah," he said, sitting down on the throne and leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "I'll let you have this reunion. You've waited long enough for it. But you can't stay. This body is my home, not yours."
The angel appeared in the clearing ten feet from him. His eyes were cold as undersea stones. "You puny fool of a human," he said. "I'll leave when I want to, and not before."
He vanished, leaving Allen to watch him shower kisses on Lilith's forehead, eyelids, the corners of her mouth. In the rush of preparations and the insanity of battle, he had not had time to think about this, but now Allen had nothing but time left. He had always had the suspicion that Neah did not plan to relinquish his body, but he had always believed that if it came to it, he would be able to oust the angel by force. Now he was not so sure. He had witnessed the full extent of Neah's power in the battle, and was now increasingly afraid that the angel had been letting him seize control when he wanted to ease him into a sense of false security.
Panic kindled within him. "Get out," he said to the empty clearing, summoning all his will and throwing it against the amorphous presence of the angel somewhere overhead. "I know you won't die. I want my body back, so get out."
The angel hardly flinched.
The panic flared hot and consuming. "Get out!" he yelled. "Get out! Get out! Get out! Hevlaska--"
As if the mere thought of her name summoned her attention, he felt Lilith break away and take his face in her hands. "My love, what are you doing to this child?" she asked. Her tone was mild, but there was an edge to her voice. "He is crying out."
"Ignore him," Neah said roughly. "We are together, just as we have always wished, and this time there is no one left with the power to separate us. It is perfect."
She took a step back, letting her hands fall. "No," she said.
"...No?" Neah echoed, shocked. "What do you mean, no? I told you I would find a way, and I have."
"Not this way. That child has helped you -- helped us both -- in good faith. It would be wrong of you to renege on your half of the bargain. That is not something the Samael I loved would do."
Allen felt the angel's pain at that like a sledgehammer. He had spent so long in the dark, mulling over his plans and the pathways to freedom, that he had... warped, somehow, into a new and darker person than he had been before Azazel had stripped him powerless and sent him fleeing. It was the angel's own realization of how much he had changed that burned the worst. He had meant to stay pure and redeemed in the light of her love. He had meant to come out a stronger person, even more worthy of her. The realization that he had failed flayed at his heart.
"I..."
"Let me go, Neah," Allen said quietly. "You'll have lots of time to remember yourself and polish up your soul. You don't need me. You've been patient all this time. Be patient for just a little longer."
The angel fell silent, contemplating this. Allen began to hope that he and Lilith had gotten through. That hope died when he felt the enormous and inexorable pressure of Neah's will pushing him slowly down into the dirt of the clearing. It turned to mud around him, swallowing him further -- up to his thighs, now, and still sinking.
"No," Neah said. "No. No more patience. I have earned this."
Allen strugged hopelessly against the sucking quagmire, knowing even as he did so that the angel was not someone he could win against. He would fight, and fight, and drag every last bit of strength out of his soul to throw into it, but this fight he would lose. He was simply too small to take on angels alone. He cried out for Mana for help, but saw then that even that small hope was beyond his reach -- Mana's soul was inextricably linked with Neah's. His curse had been what planted the seed of the angel's soul within him. The angel and the curse were inseparable. It was just him, one young and terrified soldier, alone in the dark under the thumb of heaven.
As if from a great distance, then, he heard a soft voice. It took him a moment to understand what she had said, and by then the pain was stabbing deep into him and rendering him incapable of thought.
"I am sorry, Allen Walker, but I believe this is going to hurt."
The pain was endless, a sword ten thousand miles wide, so much larger than his tiny soul could take. It was like having his heart torn out through his splintering ribs. It was like being drawn and quartered except that his limbs would not break away, even though the release would be sweet by comparison, a clean tearing pain and then death. What he wouldn't give for death. He had always thought that those who wished for it were simply blind to their reasons to fight, but now he had to admit how wrong he had been. No reason could have any power in the face of this all-consuming, all-destroying agony.
Then, suddenly, as quick as it had come, the pain vanished.
Allen curled in on himself, sobbing shamelessly into the soft planes of sand under his cheek. The aftershocks of the pain rippled through him, still intolerable but so much smaller. These he could handle. He was bigger than these. "Annghuh," he moaned, spitting out a handle of enamel chips he had ground off his teeth.
A cool hand caressed his cheek. "I am sorry," Lilith said. "Warning you would not have helped."
"What did you do?" he croaked, his words squeezing through a throat wrenched tight by all the screams he had not managed to force out. "What was that?" Then it hit him -- the echoing silence in his mind, the fathomless hole within his soul. The way the pain centered on the left side of his face. He sat up, bracing himself with his hand to overcome the wave of dizziness. Wetness ran down his cheek and dripped into his lap, into the sand between his legs.
His left eye was gone, torn right out of his head by Lilith's slender fingers, and with it the curse of Mana and all that meant.
"What did you do with him?" he asked, amazed.
Echoing a moment from some time earlier, she flattened her palm against her belly and smiled. "I do not know what will come of this." She hesitated. "This one thing I do know. This world has no more need of gods or demons. It belongs to you, as it was meant to from the beginning."
Allen understood all of a sudden why Neah loved her. She was beautiful, to be sure, and warm and kind, but there was that quiet wisdom in her that ran deeper than the roots of the world. That wisdom was what had allowed her to see someone worth loving in a rebellious, selfish angel of death, what had allowed her to survive patiently through her years of captivity without letting her heart fester into hatred, what would let her find the way to happiness for the remnants of her kindred.
"What will you do?" he asked.
She shrugged -- an oddly human gesture -- and smiled. "I will gather what angels and demons remain, and take them with me into the stars. Together we will walk among them until we find a place to build our new home, and there we will live and try to learn about peace."
"And the Noah?
Together they glanced over to the sad line of corpses in the sand, though it hurt Allen terribly when the ruined muscles in his empty eye socket tried to move the eye which was no longer there.
"When we find our home, I will come back for them," she said at last. "They are immortal, in their strange way. It would be cruel to leave them here in this swiftly turning world without their friend and father. But they cannot come at first. They cannot breathe the void as we can."
"Oh," Allen replied. That seemed to be about all he could think of to say.
He was tired, he realized. Unbearably tired. The last wave of adrenaline was draining out of his system, leaving him battered and pale with blood loss. It was probably dangerous to sleep in this condition, but he could no more have helped it than stop the world turning.
Lilith's cool hands pulled his sagging head down into the firm pillow of her lap. Her fingers smoothed over his hollow socket, and the pain eased. "Rest," she murmured. "Rest, Allen Walker. You have done enough."
Oh, he thought dimly, all right, I suppose.
And then he went sailing blissfully into the dark waters of sleep, and heard nothing more.
X.x.x.x.X
A/N: Next: 07. Redemption
Rating: T
Warnings: Character death, violence, a dozen kinds of blasphemy.
Word Count: 26,239 (this chapter: 3126)
Summary: Allen's "death" during the fight with Alma sets off a chain of unexpected and deeply strange consequences which bring up questions about the nature of God himself. Hevlaska goes missing, Crown Clown returns without its owner, and angels and demons work together against a common enemy. While grieving for Alma, Kanda must figure out what's going on and which side he should be fighting for... if any.
Notes: Previous: 05. Deicide
06. Suffering
The unholy shriek fell abruptly silent. Azazel stared blindly, eyes rolled up towards the little thorn lodged in his forehead, while his hands clutched at his chest.
For a second, nobody moved. Then Neah, galvanized by the sight of red lines snaking outwards from the points of impact, turned and frantically howled at the army. "Into the cave! Now!"
To Allen, it seemed at first like a terribly stupid thing to order. The cave was crumbling, the caldera behind it roiling with lava. It was as likely to kill anyone who entered as anything else. Then he remembered: the Ark. Whatever Neah thought was coming, he didn't think the miserable, shredded human army would be able to withstand it.
Somehow the magnitude of what had just happened seemed to dissolve the tension between the opposing forces. Lenalee barked out orders, lining everyone up into orderly strings pointed at the cave door. Those still sporting functional limbs gathered the injured and dead. The ice ran red behind them. Neah raced over to the gate and hastily opened it without programming a destination, letting Lenalee and the Noah herd the dazed and staring lines of people into the white city beyond as fast as they could.
It wasn't fast enough. Allen could feel that certainty within Neah, could see it just by looking at how quickly the red lines were overtaking Azazel's skin, cracking him open like overheated crystal. They had seconds left, not the minutes they would need.
Neah waited until the absolute last second, then closed the gate, leaving a handful of Finders and the remaining Exorcists locked outside of it. It wasn't enough, but it was the most that could be done.
The last thing Allen saw was Lavi reaching out to enfold Lenalee in his arms, green eye calm with acceptance.
The world ended.
x.x.x
Kanda was dead.
His soul stood on a soft floor of something like moss. His vision was mostly obscured by thick rolling banks of warm fog, but sometimes through it he caught glimses of straight trunks and low-hanging needled branches. The air was lukewarm but oddly clear and easy to breathe, despite the fog. It was hard to think. The swirling patterns of white hypnotized him, and he was so comfortable. Nothing hurt. For the first time since he had died all those years ago, he felt no pain at all.
He had died many times before, of course, but even here he could tell this was different. He would not be gasping back to life five hundred seconds from now. His body would not reconstitute itself and draw him back into the harsh world of the living.
Kanda grinned. Everything had gone exactly as he'd hoped it would. Now all that was left was to find Alma and... rest.
He pushed his tired soul forward into the mist, following the distant sound of a familiar song.
x.x.x
An eternity later, the world lurched back into existence. Somehow, somehow, all was not lost.
Allen blinked grit out of his eyes and sat up to look around. His comrades and enemy-allies lay scattered around him, half-covered by drifts of fine golden sand. His own legs were partially submerged. The air was sere and dry, but cool. A dark dome of stars arced overhead, luminous at the edges with the reflected light of the soon-to-rise sun.
A desert. He couldn't tell which one. The stately cliffs of stone eroding patiently away to the north suggested China, but were by no means conclusive.
Standing up, he dusted himself off and took stock. His body was in terrible shape. There was no one thing very wrong with it, but it was battered and twitching with the aftershocks of adrenaline. The nausea was awful, but could be dealt with. It was much more important to find out who else was still alive, if anyone.
Lenalee was closest. He knelt beside her and shook her gently. She did not stir, but he could feel the warmth and steady rhythm of life under the bare skin of her arm. She was alive. Though he could not tell how far from death she was, it would have to be enough for now. Lavi lay just beyond her, also unconscious but breathing. Miranda lay perpendicular to them, her right hand stretched toward them, the Time Record still spinning fitfully on her wrist. She must have stopped their time before the explosion hit.
To the right Allen found all but four of the Noah clan laid out in a tidy line. Two of the remaining sat together at the far end of the line, close enough to share warmth but not touching. A few more steps, and Allen could identify them through the gloom -- Tyki and Lulubell. None of the dark figures in the line were breathing. Their eyes were all neatly closed. Allen forewent asking the obvious question. "I'm sorry," he said, though he wasn't sure how much he really was. The Noah had fought for the vision of the future he and Neah shared, and for that he owed them some gratitude, but he also owed them quite a lot of hatred for all the things they had done before that.
Neither of them answered him, or even looked at him. He left them alone with their grief and moved on.
The Finders were, unsurprisingly, all dead. He stared at them for a few moments, willing himself to feel pain over their losses, but found only numbness. He could not hurt anymore. Not right now.
Next he found the other two surviving Noah, Road Kamelot and the Earl. That the Earl had survived was no surprise. Same for Road, he realized -- how many times had they tried without success to wound her physical body? The blast may have reduced her to ash, but she could have easily rebuilt from that. Tyki had his ability to choose what to touch. Doubtless he had made himself fully permeable just before the shockwave hit and let the superheated bits of island pass right through him without harm. Lulubell had probably turned herself into a rock or something similar to weather the tempest. The abilities of the others had not afforded them such protection.
Winters was off by himself. His face was twisted with rage, but his half-open mouth was silent and full of sand. Last of all Allen found Cross, gathering the pieces of Maria's shattered corpse together into his spread coat.
And that was all. The entirety of what was left. Allen had no idea what had happened inside the Ark. He hoped they had all gotten away safely, but found it difficult to hope. Perhaps the entire world was like this now. No more ocean coasts, only vast chasms of dust where the water had been, and only sand and stone between them.
"Allen Walker," said a soft voice behind him.
He turned to find Hevlaska -- Lilith -- standing with her dark hands folded shyly together at her belly button. Her dark hair was full of snarls and fell in her face whenever the wind gusted. He stared into her tranquil glowing eyes and tried for a moment to forget where he was. Gently, she drew him back with a hand on his arm. "I am sorry for everything you have lost," she said. "I wish... if I had been closer to my full strength, I--"
"It's all right," he said flatly, though it wasn't, in any way. "Thank you for helping."
Neah chose this moment to awaken from his stupor. Allen found himself pushed violently out of the way as the angel rose swiftly to the surface, yelling frantically as soon as he found his voice. "Did it work?"
"Yes," said Lilith. "Yes, it worked."
Neah sagged. "Thank you. Thank you, my love. Could you... tell me what happened? Are we safe?"
Lilith hesitated for a moment, looked down, then steeled herself. "Your poison worked even better than you had hoped. It seems even you underestimated the power the One left in the hands of humans. Your friend's magic was... hardly short of a miracle. Azazel crystallized and broke apart. When the tumult eased, Lucifer called the remainder of his Akuma army and had them carry us away from the island. There was... very little left of it."
"What of the pieces?" Neah urged. "Did you--"
She nodded, then placed a thin palm flat against her slightly swollen belly. "Yes. I do not know what will come of this."
Neah threw his arm around her, dragging her tiny form hard into his chest. It was disconcerting for Allen to feel then the true force of his love, the love which had driven him into this suicidal crusade against every active power but hers, to hide himself away from Azazel's murderous gaze until the time was right with more patience than Allen could even conceive of, to risk everything for the sake of a world she would be happy living in. He felt like a voyeur. It was suddenly harder to believe that this was his body, that it had ever belonged to him. He felt as if he had only been keeping it safe for Neah for the sake of this reunion--
No, he interrupted himself. No, that's not how it is. This is mine. I was here first.
Tentatively, he tried for control. Neah pushed him back ruthlessly. He tried again, and was rebuffed with even greater force.
"Neah," he said, sitting down on the throne and leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "I'll let you have this reunion. You've waited long enough for it. But you can't stay. This body is my home, not yours."
The angel appeared in the clearing ten feet from him. His eyes were cold as undersea stones. "You puny fool of a human," he said. "I'll leave when I want to, and not before."
He vanished, leaving Allen to watch him shower kisses on Lilith's forehead, eyelids, the corners of her mouth. In the rush of preparations and the insanity of battle, he had not had time to think about this, but now Allen had nothing but time left. He had always had the suspicion that Neah did not plan to relinquish his body, but he had always believed that if it came to it, he would be able to oust the angel by force. Now he was not so sure. He had witnessed the full extent of Neah's power in the battle, and was now increasingly afraid that the angel had been letting him seize control when he wanted to ease him into a sense of false security.
Panic kindled within him. "Get out," he said to the empty clearing, summoning all his will and throwing it against the amorphous presence of the angel somewhere overhead. "I know you won't die. I want my body back, so get out."
The angel hardly flinched.
The panic flared hot and consuming. "Get out!" he yelled. "Get out! Get out! Get out! Hevlaska--"
As if the mere thought of her name summoned her attention, he felt Lilith break away and take his face in her hands. "My love, what are you doing to this child?" she asked. Her tone was mild, but there was an edge to her voice. "He is crying out."
"Ignore him," Neah said roughly. "We are together, just as we have always wished, and this time there is no one left with the power to separate us. It is perfect."
She took a step back, letting her hands fall. "No," she said.
"...No?" Neah echoed, shocked. "What do you mean, no? I told you I would find a way, and I have."
"Not this way. That child has helped you -- helped us both -- in good faith. It would be wrong of you to renege on your half of the bargain. That is not something the Samael I loved would do."
Allen felt the angel's pain at that like a sledgehammer. He had spent so long in the dark, mulling over his plans and the pathways to freedom, that he had... warped, somehow, into a new and darker person than he had been before Azazel had stripped him powerless and sent him fleeing. It was the angel's own realization of how much he had changed that burned the worst. He had meant to stay pure and redeemed in the light of her love. He had meant to come out a stronger person, even more worthy of her. The realization that he had failed flayed at his heart.
"I..."
"Let me go, Neah," Allen said quietly. "You'll have lots of time to remember yourself and polish up your soul. You don't need me. You've been patient all this time. Be patient for just a little longer."
The angel fell silent, contemplating this. Allen began to hope that he and Lilith had gotten through. That hope died when he felt the enormous and inexorable pressure of Neah's will pushing him slowly down into the dirt of the clearing. It turned to mud around him, swallowing him further -- up to his thighs, now, and still sinking.
"No," Neah said. "No. No more patience. I have earned this."
Allen strugged hopelessly against the sucking quagmire, knowing even as he did so that the angel was not someone he could win against. He would fight, and fight, and drag every last bit of strength out of his soul to throw into it, but this fight he would lose. He was simply too small to take on angels alone. He cried out for Mana for help, but saw then that even that small hope was beyond his reach -- Mana's soul was inextricably linked with Neah's. His curse had been what planted the seed of the angel's soul within him. The angel and the curse were inseparable. It was just him, one young and terrified soldier, alone in the dark under the thumb of heaven.
As if from a great distance, then, he heard a soft voice. It took him a moment to understand what she had said, and by then the pain was stabbing deep into him and rendering him incapable of thought.
"I am sorry, Allen Walker, but I believe this is going to hurt."
The pain was endless, a sword ten thousand miles wide, so much larger than his tiny soul could take. It was like having his heart torn out through his splintering ribs. It was like being drawn and quartered except that his limbs would not break away, even though the release would be sweet by comparison, a clean tearing pain and then death. What he wouldn't give for death. He had always thought that those who wished for it were simply blind to their reasons to fight, but now he had to admit how wrong he had been. No reason could have any power in the face of this all-consuming, all-destroying agony.
Then, suddenly, as quick as it had come, the pain vanished.
Allen curled in on himself, sobbing shamelessly into the soft planes of sand under his cheek. The aftershocks of the pain rippled through him, still intolerable but so much smaller. These he could handle. He was bigger than these. "Annghuh," he moaned, spitting out a handle of enamel chips he had ground off his teeth.
A cool hand caressed his cheek. "I am sorry," Lilith said. "Warning you would not have helped."
"What did you do?" he croaked, his words squeezing through a throat wrenched tight by all the screams he had not managed to force out. "What was that?" Then it hit him -- the echoing silence in his mind, the fathomless hole within his soul. The way the pain centered on the left side of his face. He sat up, bracing himself with his hand to overcome the wave of dizziness. Wetness ran down his cheek and dripped into his lap, into the sand between his legs.
His left eye was gone, torn right out of his head by Lilith's slender fingers, and with it the curse of Mana and all that meant.
"What did you do with him?" he asked, amazed.
Echoing a moment from some time earlier, she flattened her palm against her belly and smiled. "I do not know what will come of this." She hesitated. "This one thing I do know. This world has no more need of gods or demons. It belongs to you, as it was meant to from the beginning."
Allen understood all of a sudden why Neah loved her. She was beautiful, to be sure, and warm and kind, but there was that quiet wisdom in her that ran deeper than the roots of the world. That wisdom was what had allowed her to see someone worth loving in a rebellious, selfish angel of death, what had allowed her to survive patiently through her years of captivity without letting her heart fester into hatred, what would let her find the way to happiness for the remnants of her kindred.
"What will you do?" he asked.
She shrugged -- an oddly human gesture -- and smiled. "I will gather what angels and demons remain, and take them with me into the stars. Together we will walk among them until we find a place to build our new home, and there we will live and try to learn about peace."
"And the Noah?
Together they glanced over to the sad line of corpses in the sand, though it hurt Allen terribly when the ruined muscles in his empty eye socket tried to move the eye which was no longer there.
"When we find our home, I will come back for them," she said at last. "They are immortal, in their strange way. It would be cruel to leave them here in this swiftly turning world without their friend and father. But they cannot come at first. They cannot breathe the void as we can."
"Oh," Allen replied. That seemed to be about all he could think of to say.
He was tired, he realized. Unbearably tired. The last wave of adrenaline was draining out of his system, leaving him battered and pale with blood loss. It was probably dangerous to sleep in this condition, but he could no more have helped it than stop the world turning.
Lilith's cool hands pulled his sagging head down into the firm pillow of her lap. Her fingers smoothed over his hollow socket, and the pain eased. "Rest," she murmured. "Rest, Allen Walker. You have done enough."
Oh, he thought dimly, all right, I suppose.
And then he went sailing blissfully into the dark waters of sleep, and heard nothing more.
X.x.x.x.X
A/N: Next: 07. Redemption