REVELATIONS Part 9

Revelations Chapter 9

Allen Walker, Lenalee Lee, and all characters in the -Man Universe do not belong to me. I am merely borrowing them for a while to suit my purpose. If it wasn't clear before, I will reiterate that this is an Allen Walker X Lenalee Lee story. Nothing super lemony….just some overdue conversations.

*This story takes place a little bit after the anime ends and way before the whole Kanda-centric storyline that's currently going on in the manga (not that I don't like Kanda…I heart him…but he's just not the focus of this particular story). So, this starts a couple of months after the Level 4 is defeated at HQ and General Cross is able to speak with Allen for a moment wherein he lets him know that Allen is the vessel from which the 14th will be reborn. Furthermore, that Allen will eventually be taken over by the 14th and, once that happens, he will kill someone he loves.

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Black Order – Asian Branch: Lenalee's Quarters

"I will tell you something I've learned about me, Lenalee. And then you will have to decide whether you ever want to see me again…"

Allen turned his face away and Lenalee was filled with dread as she gazed upon his profile. She slowly pulled her hands away and straightened her back rigidly.

"I've seen that look before. I will never forget the expression you had on your face when you came back from your meeting with General Cross that night. There was this resigned sadness about you. And after that, you stopped talking to me."

"Lavi was right. It should always have been your decision, not mine. I'm sorry for taking that away from you. I thought I was doing the right thing."

"You're scaring me, Allen-kun."

"Truth is, I'm scared, too, Lenalee."

Lenalee reached across the still air that hung between them and gently stroked the thick lock of hair that covered the side of his face. She remembered doing this when she woke up under the bridge, when Allen had come back to them, apologizing to her for Suman. She remembered feeling as if it comforted her just as much as it did him and she hoped it would again.

Allen closed his eyes, wanting to lock this moment away in his memory with all of his senses, not knowing whether he would ever have the chance to be this close to her again.

"Whatever it is, I'm not going to abandon you, you must know this!" Lenalee continued. "After all we've been through together…you can't think I would leave you now. Please, what is it?"

"I…I am not only the tool of the Noah, I am one."

Lenalee stopped all movement. Even her breathing seemed to cease. Allen waited for the blow.

"What?" came the soft, broken whisper.

"I have been implanted with the life and memories of the 14th Noah. He has already begun to manifest himself within me."

Lenalee had let her hands drop on to the bed in front of her, having them support her weight as she leaned forward, as she stared unblinkingly into Allen's smooth face.

"I don't understand, Allen-kun. I don't understand…"

"You must have heard the rumors. When we came back and from successfully keeping the Earl from downloading the akuma plant, there was a swirl of them floating around Headquarters."

"Y-yes, I heard them but why would I even pay them any heed…?"

"Because they were apparently true. Even I didn't know to what extent."

"But how….no…." Lenalee rocked back on her heels and covered her face with her hands. "No, Allen-kun!"

"You know in your heart that it's true. You're smart, Lenalee. I'm sure you've already realized that it explains why the ark moves at my command and how I knew how to use the key with the music. On top of that, I see him sometimes."

Lenalee tried to slow her heart from racing to the point of jumping out of her chest and she could feel the hot tears waiting behind her eyes. But his last statement was jarring enough to distract her from her own physical reactions.

"What do you mean you see him?" she asked, as her hands slowly fell away from her face.

"At first, I saw him in my dreams. I didn't know who or what he was then; just a figure, I guess. But then I would see him in my reflection, hear his voice in my head, even have conversations with him. He talked to me inside the ark…he told me what to do. I was in his room. My room. Everything was familiar to me in a place I had never been before. I had never laid hands on a piano before, Lenalee. But I played it as if I had known how to all of my life."

Lenalee felt as if she would implode. All of these things made sense to her in her mind. It simplistically explained the mystery behind everything that had happened inside the ark, why Howard Link was assigned to him by Louvelier and therefore was under such scrutiny by Central. At the very least, this was not something Allen would just admit to without some basis. But her heart was not accepting this at all and the rejection of the idea was so fierce that Lenalee began to shiver.

"How…why…?"

"I will try to answer you with as much as I know so please bear with me. They told me the 14th's will and memories were transferred into me. I don't know how or when but I suppose it must have been when I was very young, around the time I met Mana. I never knew something like that occurred. I certainly didn't feel any different. Master said that the 14th was out to kill the Earl, though I don't know why. After his attempt to do so, life for him and Mana was a never-ending road to stay alive."

"He and Mana? Your father knew the 14th?"

Allen took a moment to answer as it was something he had yet to come to grips with himself and it pained him still to recount it.

"Mana was the 14th's older brother."

Lenalee's eyes fluttered closed with the weight of what that sentence meant. She started to feel the sensation of light-headedness counterpointed by a top-heaviness, almost enough to make her fall over. She stopped herself immediately by placing a steadying hand on the wall next to her. If she was feeling this way, she could only imagine that Allen's devastation dwarfed hers as the sun does the moon.

There were so many things she wanted to ask him; so many questions flooded her mind that she couldn't figure out what order in which to ask them or even if they would make sense. Why was all this happening? Why Allen? He didn't deserve all of this suffering…

Lenalee opened her eyes, slowly breathing in through her nose, hoping that her voice would not waver when she spoke at last. She needed to be strong for Allen. This was not the time to add to his struggles by falling apart, no matter how thoroughly disarmed she felt at the moment. She decided at least one question stood out as being the most important…

"And what's going to happen to you, Allen-kun?"

One side of Allen's mouth turned up, almost in a smirk, and he let out a quick breath.

"I don't know. And I can't tell how much control I will have over it either."

Lenalee shook her head almost imperceptibly, not understanding fully.

"My master told me that, eventually, the 14th would manifest himself in me," Allen went on, "and that he would overtake me to where the person known as Allen Walker would recede…into nothing."

"No…"

"His desire is to destroy the Earl. His goal is not that different from ours, when you look at it that way. He wants it so much that he had prepared a way for him to come back so he could continue on, even after the Earl killed him. That's how driven he was...is."

"Allen-kun. You don't plan on letting this happen, do you?"

"I plan on fighting it for as long as I can and as hard as I can."

"That's not what it sounds like to me!"

Allen turned his face to Lenalee. He seemed so tired. Shoulders heavy with a burden no one could fathom and his heart broken so many times from loss and anguish. She could cry for him. But what good would that do? What good had any of her tears done for anyone? Allen was not to be pitied. That would not be what she would offer him as a friend and comrade. He deserved so much more than tea and sympathy.

"Please believe me, Lenalee; I don't want this to happen either. But I'm not so much afraid of losing myself as I am of losing…others."

Lenalee quietly slipped her way to the edge of the bed and slowly stood up, facing the door.

"I understand if you want to leave, now, though…it is your choice, after all…" said Allen, under his breath, in hopes that stating a prelude to the act might make it hurt a little less. Hadn't he prepared himself for this at all? He bowed his head so he wouldn't have to watch her leave.

Lenalee started moving toward where Allen was sitting at the foot of the bed. She stopped in front of him and turned to face him. Allen dared not look up at her, not wanting to see the disappointment, the frustration, or just the sadness. All he could see were her feet, perfectly aligned together and pointed toward him, unmoving. Was she going to say goodbye? He could hardly bear it. He would rather she just walked out silently without another look than to have to listen to her parting words. He had to keep telling himself that this was best. If she was no longer in contact with him then maybe it would be enough to protect her…

"Allen-kun, look at me!"

Suddenly Allen felt Lenalee's hands gripping him on his shoulders and shaking him once. She was bending over him, her face only inches away. In his surprise, he impulsively did as she asked.

"I won't ever leave you. Ever. Do you hear me? Are you trying to get rid of me or something?"

"N-no…it's not like that…" retorted Allen, waving his hands defensively in front of him.

"Good, because you can just forget any notion of that happening."

Allen, despite himself, smiled. Was he feeling relieved when instead he should want her as far away from him as possible? Selfish.

"Remember what you told me that time, Allen-kun? That time when I was panicking over leaving Crowley behind inside the ark?"

Allen kept looking into Lenalee's soft yet determined face. Locking eyes with her made him focus and her words seemed to him like an oasis in a desert.

"You said," she continued, "that you would not give up. That you would keep struggling and protect everyone."

"Yes, I did say that."

"And you believed it."

"Yes."

"I believed you, too. I want to keep believing that, Allen-kun. You have to fight this, if not for yourself, then to protect your friends."

"I would never allow the 14th to hurt you or anyone else."

"I know that. But that's not what I meant."

Allen tilted his head slightly, puzzled.

"You know that my friends and family are my world."

Allen nodded.

"You're a big part of that world. If you were to somehow disappear…" Lenalee's thoughts quickly flashed to her one recurring nightmare.

"I understand, Lenalee. I wouldn't want to be responsible for that."

"You just have to do one thing, Allen-kun. You just have to keep being you. That's all. Then everything will be okay. You're stronger than this thing. You're the strongest person I know."

"That's saying a lot considering the people you know."

"Yes."

"Thank you, Lenalee. I just needed to be reminded. I also made a promise that I wouldn't let the 14th have me."

"You did?"

"Yeah, when my Master told me all of this, I was so indignant that everything I worked for could be taken away that I wanted him to know that my life was my own."

Lenalee felt some measure of assurance at last. She let her hands slide off Allen's shoulders, down his chest and onto his lap as she herself knelt down before him as the tension in her legs finally gave way.

"I'm going to make sure you keep that promise, Allen-kun," she said lightly, looking up into his face.

Allen placed his hands over hers. "I promised Mana something, too…." Allen trailed off and his peaceful expression receded away as the tide pulled out by the moon and was replaced once again with the resigned sadness that Lenalee had seen that night. She knew then that it wasn't the idea of losing himself to the 14th that was eating away at him. It was something else.

Lenalee lowered her head, resting her cheek atop Allen's hands which had folded over hers.

"Tell me about your father, Allen-kun. Tell me about Mana.

TO BE CONTINUED