It was their own decision to die. No one drove them to take their own lives; they did it of their own volition.

The only true driving force that made them do it to each other…was love. Their love was strong enough to last through death and into the afterlife, maybe even after that…or so the two of them believed, believed strongly in until the moments of their passing. And, if their esoteric beliefs were as true as they made them out to be to each other, they believed in that even after their souls parted from their bodies.

However, to this day, nobody in that time knows that truth, the certainty of their ardor. It is doomed to eternally rest, undisturbed in the depths of a closed box…

12:52 PM, July 13th, 2012.

It was a beautiful, sunny day, a scene torn from the sets of a cheery Hollywood movie. The sky itself seemed to be simply gushing happiness, taking the form of lush and fluffy white clouds dotting the sky like big wads of sweet cotton candy, and the backdrop of cerulean blue behind those puffs of white made for lovely contrast against them.

Nothing could ruin this day. It was perfect, and would stay that way eternally, perpetually locked in that manifestation of pure, unsullied happiness.

Two boys were walking down the street, standing next to each other as they made their way to an unknown destination. Their obituaries would turn up in the local paper a few days later. For now, though, they were simply being happy, reveling in the beautiful day that had been presented them.

They didn't hold hands; they didn't make their relationship so obviously public, but if you watched the way they interacted with each other, talked to one another, you could see that their bond was something more than just a platonic friendship.

However, no one didwatch this and notice the affection between them that day…

One of the boys seemed to be guiding the other. Black, spiky hair, a pale complexion, and a striking gold gaze made the "leader" boy (who was really nothing more than a child, really- he was only about 16) a ringer for the odd one out. Something about his presence was strange as well, as though he already knew for absolute fact that he was a black sheep, an outsider to society…a freak, to put it bluntly. The other boy who was with this strange, dark one was a lot less peculiar; aside from his blonde, spiky hair (which was styled much differently than his guide's- or could you say lover?-), his blue eyes, nay, his whole essence spoke of normalcy and friendliness.

To put it simply, this was a textbook case of "opposites attract".

The black-haired boy continued to lead his blonde counterpart through the streets, taking twists and turns that the blonde child hadn't experienced in a long time…but, nonetheless, the paths and bends brought about in that boy misty memories from times of old.

They both knew what they were going to do today.

It wasn't an instantaneous decision, after all. They had to plan for this kind of thing.

Eventually, the black and blonde haired boys found themselves in the forest surrounding the town they lived in, and then also, in due course, found themselves at their destination of years past; an old tree house, one the two of them had spent countless hours within, sharing secrets and strengthening their bond with each other. The black haired boy climbed up the ancient, almost rotting wooden ladder into the tree house, climbed inside it, and waited at the top for the blonde to follow up and do the same.

With a helping hand from his lover, the blonde hauled himself inside the tree house, and took no time in pausing and noticing how much had changed in the now musty-smelling place he and the other person with him had cherished as their own place, their own kingdom, their own world.

"Hey, Ventus…you remember this place, right?"

The azure-eyed boy moved his gaze from a wall filled with old drawings (their old drawings) and cobwebs to the source of the voice that uttered his name, attached with a question…much like the way you attach a string to a balloon before you let it float off into the heavens, if you wanted to be romantic about it.

"Of course I do, Vanitas. Why wouldn't I?" Ventus responded. "This place was…just amazing when we were kids, huh? We used to spend all our time here, talk here, draw here…" he drifted off, letting his line of sight coast from floor to ceiling, taking in his surroundings.

…He knew that these bookshelves, these wooden boards, these memories, would be the last things he saw in this life.

It wasn't that bad of a thought, really.

Vanitas smiled at him, though that smile was less cheery than it was simply…there. Ventus knew that his lover had never learned to smile properly, and it was probably his fault he couldn't. After all, the blonde himself had been the one to attempt teach him how, and when he'd tried, Vanitas had refused, insisting that lifting the corners of your lips to show delight was impossible for him, as well as pointless.

That had been a small while after they'd first met, quite a few years ago.

Once they'd warmed up to each other, the black haired boy had surprised Ventus one day by showing up at his house, unannounced, prattling on to him that he could finally smile, all the while having a very nearly manic grin plastered on his face. The blonde had been ecstatic, glad to have made a step in the back-then friendship, but even then, that smile Vanitas had shown him had been…odd. There had been nothing behind it. It was just his mouth curled up, nothing more than that. It was almost sad, knowing that his friend's emotions were still holed up, despite his endeavoring to make them apparent to him.

Yeah, it was very sad…

Ventus's train of thought came to a screeching pause as Vanitas, quick as ever, dashed up to the blonde and enveloped him in an embrace. The black haired boy's lips skimmed over his lover's ears, whispering into them.

"I love you, you know." He said, holding tighter onto the blonde. This was no simple, friendly hug they were sharing; Vanitas's arms were entwined around Ventus's waist, and the blonde himself had his arms wrapped around the other boy's neck. Most certainly, this was an intimate hug for an intimate moment.

"…I love you too."

He knew what was coming next. Inevitable, but no longer frightening…

Vanitas slid his hands from the blonde's waist, up his chest, eventually meeting at his lover's pale face, which he cupped in his hands. The innocent look in Ventus's eyes, their familiarity to him, was enough to make the warm, tender feeling he was so used to experiencing around this boy well up inside the black haired boy's chest. He smothered that sensation with a short, slightly rough kiss to his lover's lips, pulling away moments later to once again look the blonde in the eye.

It was around this time that he noticed the beginning of tears beginning to form in the corners of Ventus's eyes, but the small, wan smile accompanying them on the blonde's face assured Vanitas that these weren't tears of sadness. They probably weren't ones of joy, either, but as long as his love kept smiling, that was okay. As long as he was happy…

Hands still holding the blonde's face, Vanitas let loose the terminal words that would seal the two of their fates.

"Are you ready?"

Ventus's smile grew a bit, and his hands, which had since left the space around his lover's neck and had been hanging limp at his sides, went up to place themselves comfortingly upon those that were already pressed at the area where his neck met his head. Tears still sat in the blonde's eyes, motionless, refusing to run down his cheeks and ruin what may well be the best day of both of their lives.

Vanitas took that touch and an answer and, with no hesitation in the slightest, bound his arms around Ventus's neck and pulled him down to the dusty, nearly nostalgic rug below them. With gentle intention, the black-haired boy untwined his upper limbs from his lover's neck pushed the blonde onto his back with a soft thump. A small cloud of dust rose from underneath Ventus's body.

When the hands of his lover went up to his neck once more, Ventus thought that Vanitas was going to cup his face again and say a few words like "don't be scared" or something along those lines, but instead, those hands went up and grasped at the blonde's neck with full conviction. It was nothing but tender clasping, sure, and the pressure they applied was nearly nonexistent, but the underlying message the touch sent was clear enough: no more waiting, now. We've crossed the line.

Golden eyes stared peculiarly into blue, and the crooked little smirk that formed upon Vanitas's face was something that made the blonde curious. He'd thought that, out of all the times Vanitas had ever been serious (which had been most of the time), why did he have to pick now to stop and regress into his trickster ways?

Around the time the blonde realized he was already talking about his life from the past tense, the boy above him leaned down and planted a tiny peck on Ventus's forehead, short and sweet and probably the last one they'd ever experience in this life. Rather than pulling away after the kiss, Vanitas hovered an inch or two above where he'd lain his lips seconds before and whispered a few words to the only slightly anxious boy below him.

"This isn't going to feel very nice. Sorry about that…are you sure you want to go through this now, Ven? Are you prepared?" That grin was still on his face. Even minutes before the end, he still managed to be his somewhat maddening, Ventus-teasing self. Even if he wasn't exactly "teasing" at the moment, it was the same face and the same voice he used when he was.

With a small gulp, the blonde responded with a tad shaky, "Yeah".

It wasn't that the boy was scared or wanted to leave; it was simple the very human, automatic alarm that took over once someone knew, with perfect certainty, that they were going to die then and there. So, Ventus wasn't scared, not in the least; it was simply his body hesitating.

Vanitas's quirky little smirk continued, and his voice took no time hesitating. "On the count of three. Okay?"

Ventus nodded, now fully and startlingly aware of the hands around his neck. The end is nigh.

"1…

2…"

There was no three, because as soon as two was reached, Vanitas's smile dropped off his face and he tightened his grip forcibly around the blonde's thin neck, crushing the windpipe and vital arteries within the column of bone and flesh.

Ventus's eyes jolted open far and were wide with an expression that resembled something like fear; though Vanitas thought that was ridiculous, since they bothknew there was nothing to fear about dying or the afterlife. Coupled with those upsetting eyes was a face pulled taunt and a mouth opened wide in an attempt to pull oxygen from the air; though all that issued forth from that mouth were horrifyingly strangled, cut-off sounds and gurgles, the sounds one might hear in their darkest and worst nightmares.

Vanitas stared down at his quickly expiring lover, observing how twisted that innocent face he loved looked, listening to what might have been his lover's dying screams if his neck wasn't currently being throttled by the black haired boy's strong hands.

He didn't really feel anything as he slowly snuffed out the flame of Ventus's life—not anything internally, anyways. Sure, he could feel the cartilage-ringed tube that was the blonde's trachea being crushed beneath his fingers, cutting off his air supply and ultimately killing the boy in a few minutes or less, but emotionally, he was feeling zip.

Ventus would "die", then he, and then they'd meet again. Not much to feel about.

For a moment, Ventus's choked screeches seemed to amplify, and Vanitas wondered idly if his lover was finally coming to an end; but no, the face that was now spilling tears from its eyes and great amounts of unconscious saliva from its mouth, as well as snot from the nose which he couldn't seem to breathe through was not showing any signs of giving up anytime soon.

Instead, Ventus's spit-slopping mouth was trying to move…like it was trying to make words, but couldn't speak them.

Vanitas let up his grip a little bit, just enough so that a suffocated sentence might be able to meander its way up Ventus's dreadfully damaged throat. Prolonged suffering be damned.

"Gu-guh….ooh..."

Suffocated, smothered words. Choked out of a permanently destroyed windpipe.

Vanitas wondered, nonchalantly, what he might have wanted to say. "Goodbye," maybe. "Thank you." Something along those lines.

With his gnarled words spent, Ventus's eyes nearly began closing….but then, without any warning, Vanitas seized up his lover's head and snapped his neck with no hesitation. The sound was loud and thick and reverberated sickeningly across the small room, and now the blonde's face was permanently stuck within that half-faded appearance as his still-breathing lover laid his lifeless, strangely angled head back to the floor. Fluids still remained upon the blonde boy's face in dissonant unison with his almost peaceful, partially closed eyes…and Vanitas thought it was simply beautiful.

Beautiful in life, beautiful in death, as well.

He was betting that he'd be beautiful in the afterlife, too.

Vanitas gazed first at his lover's eyes, now clouded over with the onset of death. They were as they'd always been, strikingly cerulean blue and certainly appealing. He dragged his sight from those to the blonde's now crooked neck, eyeing without any real feeling the dark bruises forming upon the column. The immediate memory of his hands being there, creating those bruises with unremorseful force, popped up with no real surprise.

Dismissing those morbid thoughts, the black haired boy's stare then fell upon the next step of the plan; the edge of the carpet that lay beneath the two bodies that remained upon it. A tiny, virtually unnoticeable lump lay beneath the thick fabric that made up the rug beneath them, something you wouldn't know was there unless you expected it to be.

Since Vanitas did expect it to be there, he lifted up the corner of the carpet and pulled out what would be his own demise; a deathly sharp knife, meant more for cutting through the flesh and bones of animals being prepared for meals than for what it was about to be used for now.

With a small chuckle, he admired the blade as he turned it over in his hands. It glinted coldly in the afternoon sunlight that shone through the windows, and Vanitas realized with a small pang of guilt that he may have been given an easier death than the one he loved so dearly. He'd have to make up for somehow.

He had a way to repent in mind.

Vanitas flopped on his back next to Ventus's body, raising a cloud of dust, just as his lover had done a mere 5 minutes ago. Softly, with extreme care, he lifted up one of the blonde's motionless hands. For a small moment, he simply let the boy's hand dangle in the air, admiring it for no apparent reason. It wasn't that he was stalling his own death...it was simply that he liked Ventus's hands. He liked everything about the kid, actually. So you could say this was just a final recognition and appreciation of the thing he cared (and will always care) about the most, though both life and death.

Halting his observance, Vanitas took the knife in his other hand and placed it in Ventus's, using his own hand's strength and positioning to make it seem as if the blonde himself were holding the blade. This, of course, was impossible, but Vanitas thought it couldn't hurt to imagine it. He was allowing Ventus a sort of retribution in return for giving him a difficult death while he himself would suffer a quick one; such a thing certainly couldn't be unreasonable, right?

He imagined what Ventus might say, if his throat was not crushed and if there was any life left in his body. "Is this really okay?", he might say. "Are you comfortable with this?" He wouldn't actually want revenge on him, Vanitas didn't think. Ventus was not a strong believer in punishing someone in such a way. He'd really only go after someone if they attempted to hurt him or those he loved, and he'd never condemn them to death.

But he was going to die anyways, so what was the point?

Vanitas (or, in his mind, Ventus) lowered the blade to his throat, just barely touching the pale skin beneath the knife. Once more, he uttered a chuckle. Something like, "Hey Ventus, you ready for your revenge yet?" tumbled from his mouth, and then his smile dropped off his face completely.

He tilted his head back, as much as he could have done while laying down. He didn't want to screw this up; if he botched this job, things would be more ugly than they needed to be. He raised the blade and moved it to the side, just a little bit...and swung down.

The knife severed his jugular vein and carotid artery, just as he'd planned. The bleeding was instantaneous, just as much as the pain was, but there was more bulk in the former. Blood was everywhere now: spilling from his neck in a rushing red torrent, onto the rug below, and even soaking through that. The world had been dyed a sickening red.

It was a mere minute or so until Vanitas lost enough blood to black out. He didn't have enough time to look back at Ventus, to reach for his hand, anything to say a final goodbye in that life.

But he thought about him. He thought about him until he was unable to think any longer, and then he was gone.

It was nothing to be sad about, though.

If they both fell into Hell, they'd be rescued together. If they ascended to Heaven, they would meet again. Either way, they would never be without each other. So to both, this was nothing more than a happy death to this single life.