Archive of Our Own ^beta

It was exhausting, layering memories one atop the other like they could be heavy enough to drag Allen out of that dream. Wherever he looked there was wheat and a dry wind, distant trees sparse and far between. It was an unnerving landscape, and despite the feeling of unwelcomeness which settled deep in Allen’s heart - as though he didn’t belong here, and never could - he felt tied to it like a cloud. Felt himself drifting apart, losing himself the longer he remained. Disappearing. He was disappearing, and all he had to anchor himself were memories and determination.

Cross had disappeared and Allen wasn’t certain he hadn’t imagined him being here, in the world of the Fourteenth. In Nea’s world. His heart. But Cross was a distraction, just like the rustle of the wheat dancing in that dry wind. Just like the tears he dashed from his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket. Distractions. They were just distractions. He was being consumed, slowly. He couldn’t stay here. He couldn’t. So he closed his eyes to those distractions, closed his eyes to the silken waves of golden grass shimmering as the sun beat down and wind passed through. He ignored the realness of it all, the thirst in the back of his throat. Hand on the knotted bark of the large dead tree, he ignored how it didn’t feel like a dream.

Focus. He had to think, he had to remember. What mattered, what happened? Johnny. Johnny mattered, and. His head, god. Bleeding, and Allen had let it happen. He’d have died if it weren’t for Kanda, and Allen had let it happen. Kanda. Kanda mattered, he did. He’d scared Nea back into hiding, he’d come back after…

Alma, crying. Fracturing. Reaching for Kanda with blind eyes and dying hands. Alma was important. And Lenalee. Lenalee, who cried when he told her he had to go. And Lavi, and Krory and Miranda. So many people counted, mattered too much, and the more he thought about how much he didn’t deserve the ease of disappearing into Nea’s heart the heavier his body felt. Exhaustion creeping up his spine, and he layered memories on memories of the people he fought for like armour against the slow drain of Nea’s thirst.

A body fell against his, tore Allen from his thoughts and from the tree. Flailing fists, warm blood dripping against Allen’s cheek. Eyes flying open, Allen had a brief moment to notice the scenery had changed in some way he couldn’t place before Nea was on him again. Wrathful, he struck Allen against the chest to leave him without breath and kicked his feet out from under him before he could retaliate. There was a deep cut on Nea’s lip, still dripping, and his teeth and chin were smeared with his blood.

Wheezing, Allen struck out and tried to push himself up, push Nea’s hands away. Taken by surprise, he couldn’t do anything to stop the Noah from striking him in the face to lay him back on the ground. No matter how he writhed, he couldn’t tear his arms from where Nea knelt on them. Hands were closing around Allen’s neck and he still hadn’t managed a breath, looked up desperate and frightened into Nea’s savage gold eyes and wrenched his body when Nea’s thumbs bore down on Allen’s throat.

“Don’t take me,” he hissed, blood and spit falling on Allen’s lips. “Not now,” he growled, hands tightening with his face close enough to Allen’s that he could see the terror in his furious eyes. “Don’t!”

Allen twisted, tried to drive his knee into Nea’s back, tried to dislodge him any way he could. Choking and heaving, Allen clawed at Nea’s thighs. The Noah dragged him up with his grip on Allen’s throat and beat his head down against the cobblestone path. Ears ringing, Allen blinked his eyes open after a second too long with his head throbbing, thoughts blanked and scattered, vision too distant to focus on the bare branches of white trees clustering overhead. Instinctively tugging against Nea’s hold on him, Allen felt tears spilling down his cheeks. Lips swollen and pounding with blood that had nowhere to go, heart beating behind his blurry eyes, Allen fumbled weakly at Nea’s legs.

Part of him wondered if the drops he could feel falling on his face were blood from Nea’s cut, or tears from his scared eyes. “Please,” he begged, and it sounded like a sob, but his hands didn’t relent in their vice grip, “please don’t take me.”

Chest burning, head spinning, Allen closed his eyes to the distractions. Branches like bony fingers stretching up to cradle a comical moon, cold cobblestones bruising his body, Nea’s scared, fervent eyes. Crying eyes. Johnny. Johnny, who Allen had saved time and again. Johnny, who had come to save Allen.

I want to escape.

He filled himself with the thought, let it consume him like instinct. Electricity shot through him like he’d been slammed into a brick wall, and Nea yelled and tore his hands away when the shock flowed through him from the handcuff on Allen’s right arm. Gasping a short, ragged breath, Allen closed his eyes against the dizziness and cracked his head forwards against Nea’s. Dazed, he managed to tear an arm out from beneath Nea’s knee, bruised and grazed against the stone, and smacked the Noah hard enough to make his ears ring.

Allen dragged another deep breath past his bruised throat and wheezed, hand curling into a fist which he used to strike Nea in the nose. “I’m going home!” he choked, voice a hoarse whisper.

“Don’t-” Nea choked but he was already off balance and it didn’t take much for Allen to dislodge him from his perch atop his stomach. “Joyd, he’s-”

Whatever Nea was saying, Allen didn’t give him a chance to finish. With a clumsy backhand strike Allen knocked him down and rolled away, pushing himself to his hands and knees with some difficulty. Arms shaking, head spinning, he lifted himself to his unsteady feet and looked blearily down at the injured Noah. “I’m going,” he stumbled over his words like his mouth wasn’t quite working. “I’m going,” he said, and the world spun when he turned around. He took two steps down that dark cobblestone path before his legs gave out. Vision going grey, collapsing into the fuzzy ringing in his ears, he managed to catch himself on one of the bone-white trees before falling onto the path. Face against the stones, he mindlessly insisted, “Home, I’m going home. I’m going.”

Staring dazedly at the inside of his eyelids, he basked in eternity. Spinning, everything was spinning. The stones he slept on were whirling counter to the direction of his head and it was all going too fast, it was making him sick. His head felt full of dull thoughts and sharp pain and he’d forgotten Nea was there for a moment but Johnny was nearby, he was. Because the handcuff hadn’t shocked him again, because Allen could feel him. He didn’t know, couldn’t formulate words or thoughts or anything more than a slur through the ringing dizziness in his head, but he knew. He had to get back to Johnny.

He had to get back to Johnny.

Sucking in a deep, shuddering breath, Allen tried to open his eyes and pull himself out of the dizziness. He was concussed, probably, from that blow to his head. He was falling. It was too much, it was too hard, and he was rising and flying and falling and when he wrenched his eyes open it was only to have the wind knocked out of him again.

Scattered, blinking hard into the too-bright sunlight, Allen hardly had time to recognise the figure charging at him as Tyki Mikk before he was too close. Bleary, he saw the brief moment of recognition spark in Tyki’s eyes, saw the way the fist aimed for his face swung to sink through the bricks by his head, saw the way his expression morphed from disgust to distress all moments before his body slammed against Allen’s. There was a moment where the wall he’d been thrown against was hard and bruising up against Allen’s back, and then he was falling again.

Not because the wall had broken - he had the sickening feeling of going through it and it was only when he landed hard on the floor of whatever building they’d fallen into, cushioned by Tyki’s arms around him, that he realised the Noah had used his ability to phase them through the brick so Allen wouldn’t be harmed by his charge.

It was silent for a long moment, and still. After being thrown from one fevered attack to the next, Allen suddenly found himself stationary. His face had pressed against Tyki’s chest when they’d collided, and his hazy eyes locked on the red spot which had blossomed on the Noah’s white dress shirt. Blood. Red blood. Allen’s blood.

Tentative, cautious of the slow movements Tyki was making to unravel his arms from Allen and push himself up, Allen brought his fingers to his throbbing lip. Pulling his hand away, he saw blood on his fingers and remembered Nea’s cut. His cut. Realised this was a fight Nea had started, which Allen hadn’t allowed him the chance to end. Head throbbing, he glanced wide-eyed up at Tyki who was hovering over him with his hands pressed to the floor on either side of Allen’s head.

Quietly, surprised to find his throat uninjured, Allen said, “Tyki?” like he wasn’t sure what was meant to happen next. He wasn’t. And nor, from the caught expression on Tyki’s face, did he.

“Watch yourself, boy,” he said, voice as quiet as Allen’s. He was breathing a little heavily, and sweat clung messy curls to his scarred forehead. “You’ll get killed at this rate.”

Allen swallowed against the memory of choking under Nea’s hands, wondered why Tyki had even bothered to stop. Wondered why he cared enough to stop. That desolate place was still stuck in his head - the golden fields and blue sky and dry wind, the burning thirst which hadn’t left his throat even now. He tried to open his mouth, but his jaw was wound too tight and distressed, his head too scattered, and his lips pressed into a wavering line.

Tyki’s careful eyes watched him, refusing to pull away further. Refusing to release Allen to the world that hated him so much. Slowly, he brought a hand up to catch one of the tears streaking across Allen’s temple into his hair. “He was crying,” Tyki said, and Allen thought maybe he knew exactly what he was talking about. His hand stilled, thumb resting against the corner of Allen’s eye. Quietly, he murmured, “And now you are too.”

Sucking in a wavering breath through his nose, lips pressed tight and unsteady, Allen closed his eyes so Tyki couldn’t see him fall apart. He felt a sigh pass across his cheeks and breathed sharp, unsteady breaths while Tyki lowered himself to his elbow. “Allen,” Tyki breathed and Allen felt his chin tremble under the weight of keeping it together, “I know.” He opened his teary eyes when he felt a warm weight settle lightly against his shoulder and realised Tyki had dropped his head to rest against Allen’s. One hand framing Allen’s face, the other supporting most of Tyki’s weight, and it was the closest thing to a hug as Allen had never expected from the Noah.

Breaths coming erratically, Allen’s hand curled around the first thing he found - the front of Tyki’s shirt. His head was still spinning - not aching because the concussion hadn’t been physical - and he could feel delayed panic at Nea’s attack rising like a bubble in his chest. It was hard to breathe around and the tighter he gripped Tyki’s shirt the larger it got. He caught his voice, held it, spoke when he had enough air in his lungs to form words. Wound tight, uncertain, he pleaded with the Noah holding him, “I’m still here, right?” because from the depth of his heart he couldn’t tell.

“You’re still here,” Tyki confirmed, voice calm and steady in a world that was falling apart. His hand brushed across Allen’s temple, into his hair. Cheek against Allen’s ear, he heard every nuance in Tyki’s steady voice when he said, “You are. I promise.”

“I fell-” Allen choked on his anxious breaths. “I f-” he fumbled with his words, lips catching on his teeth when he sucked in a sharp, sobbing breath.

“I caught you,” Tyki reminded, his fingers stroking slowly through Allen’s hair.

Allen’s hands tightened on Tyki’s shirt and he felt that bubble of emotion swell so large he thought it might burst. His shoulders hunched, his whole body curled towards Tyki with the way he struggled to hold it there, to smother it and let it die. A sob tore out of his throat and tears were falling too quick to count, his hands shaking where he clung to Tyki. Gasping for breath, unable to stop the cascade of sobs now they had started, he choked out, “I thought- I thought I- don’t want to, I don’t,” and it didn’t make sense, none of his words made sense but Tyki, the Noah, the enemy. He let Allen cry and he let him sob whatever unintelligible shit, and he let him press his face to his tailored shoulder and hide his tears there because he was scared and he didn’t want to disappear.

And Tyki knew, didn’t he? Because he hadn’t disappeared. He was here. He was still here. He was still Tyki Mikk. Allen didn’t know him well, but he knew Tyki Mikk. He knew him from the monster of Noah’s Pleasure which Allen had awoken in him. He knew what it looked like, and what it felt like, and the Tyki that had saved him from Apocryphos was not that monster. The Tyki that had wanted to tear his arm off to save him was not that mindless creature. The Tyki that held him now, and caught him so he wouldn’t fall. He was human, as much as he was Noah. And Allen could only imagine that this was what it felt like to live with both.

Fingers clenched in Tyki’s shirt, his face buried in Tyki’s shoulder, Allen whispered hoarse and distressed, “I don’t want to disappear.”

Tyki laughed a little, and Allen felt his shoulder shake with it. “I won’t let you,” he promised, and Allen realised he smelled like summer. Warm and comfortable and clean like linen drying in the wind. “I still have to beat you at something,” Tyki reminded, and Allen thought he understood why Tyki was letting an him cry all over his shoulder, “so I won’t let you.”

Allen nodded against him, said, “Okay,” and sniffled. He breathed in quietly, took in as much of Tyki’s warmth as he could and repeated, “Okay." Not because it was, but in the hope that it would be.