The sky was a surreal shade of orange, painted in areas with highlights of yellow and shadows of deep, rich violet. But the only color on my mind was red. Red was everywhere in my thoughts, in my heart. Everywhere I looked, there wasn't enough red. And What unnerved me the most was that I knew why: Ultimo. I missed him, I missed him so terribly. But the thing is, I was only walking home from school in the late afternoon, I had just seen him that morning. How pathetic of a male high school student like me, huh? But by now I've stopped caring.

There's not really much left to care about when you've fallen in love, everything seems to just fall into place. At least, that's what I've seemed to find in my experiences. It started with Sayama, a girl I met way, way back in elementary school. Or so I thought. As I got older, I found out I was...confused. I still really liked Sayama, I thought she was the girl of my dreams. But then there was my best friend, Rune, who I met at the same time as Sayama. Back then, my eyes were only for Sayama, but years later, I felt something when I looked at Rune. Back then, I had no idea what these feelings meant. I mean, there was no way I, Agari Yamato, healthy young boy, could be falling for another boy, right? Right...?

Wrong. Oh, so very wrong. I didn't know it then but very soon, another boy would come into my life (for the second time, I'd soon learn) who would change the very fabric of my reality. From the moment I stepped into Kokubundo Antiques to pawn my bag for a present for my "precious" Sayama, and I laid my eyes on the boy in the glass case, I knew there was no turning back. My heart belonged to him right then and there. Once again, I didn't exactly know I loved him, but I did know my life had changed, and would never change back. Complicated, very complicated. I still remember everything that happened, very clearly...

The boy with bright red hair, dazzling green eyes, and strange, huge red gauntlets looked so happy to see me, and he knew my name, but...I'd never seen him before in my life...right?

"Nine centuries, Yamato-sama! Uru missed you very much!" he shouted, bursting out of the glass case he rested inside, sending shards of glass everywhere..including into my skin, much to my horrification. In fact, that was all I could think of, other than the fact that this boy named...Uru, did he say?...had the most dazzling smile I'd ever seen, and laughter just as beautiful as it chimed in the air, showing how happy this boy was to see me. I tried to get a grip on reason, and all I could think of was the fact that this must have been a joke. The old man who owned the shop must have dressed up his grandkid and put him in that case to play a trick on the first customer to come in. But I'd soon learn that was certainly not the case...no, this wasn't the case at all...

As I unlocked my door I found myself smiling at the memory, and at the fact that when I opened the door, I'd see Ultimo again. A few weeks after that moment I first (or aprarently second) met him, I had realized that no one, not Rune, not even Sayama, had ever come close to capturing my heart as much as Ultimo had. I truly loved him. I still do. And I knew that was true all over again as Uru sprung onto me with a hug, and a bright, happy smile on his cherubic face.

"Master! You're home!" He chimed happily, laughing his angelic laugh. "Uru missed you!"

I couldn't help but smile a wide smile as I returned his hug, pulling his slender frame close to me, stroking his soft red hair, something that had grown to become a habit of mine.

"Hey, Uru," I said to him softly. "Are you feeling good today?" Uru looked at me a bit concerned, and I had to ask,

"What's up, Uru?"

He blinked, and his bright green eyes were still lit with concern. "You don't seem very happy today, Master. Is there something bothering you?" he asked me, and this time it as my turn to blink. I had to think before I realized why I may have seemed off.

"Oh!" I laughed. "Yeah, I'm fine, Uru, don't worry. I just um..." I trailed off. Honestly, I still wasn't used to being so expressive with my feelings, I still was used to being the average male, trying to be strong and silent.

"Just..?" Ultimo asked, tilting his head and looking up at me with his emerald eyes, which shimmered as always. Oh. That's right, I forgot. Uru hates when I hide things from him, even my feelings. Trailing off at the end of my sentence wouldn't cut it this time. Crap...

"Oh, um.." I began, oh so intelligently. Trying to salvage the little bit of the "cool and collected" front I'd tried to put up (without much success), I continued to say, "I just...missed you today is all.." God, it felt weird to be shy. That certainly was not the type of person I am. I felt like smacking myself then and there, right across the face, but doing that would've probably freaked Ultimo out, which I definitely did not want to do. I settled instead for sheepishly scratching the back of my head and looking away, but looked back when I noticed Ultimo was silent. When I looked at him, I saw such immense beauty that I nearly had to gasp: Uru's eyes shimmered with unshed tears, making his dazzling green eyes even more lustrous. His beautiful, oh so, so beautiful lips were parted slightly in surprise, but formed a small smile. He looked like I'd just made his day, no, like I'd just made his whole life. But just from me saying I missed him..? Maybe I didn't understand him as well as I thought, but at that moment I didn't care, because the next instant, his lithe arms were tight around me, and he said, in such a joyful voice that it made me smile,

"Ultimo missed you too, Yamato-sama! Uru misses you every day!" And when he said this, I thought that maybe I understood him better than I thought, because I found myself with almost the same expression as Ultimo had had just before. Emotions are...complicated, I guess. How the hell does Jealous read them accurately? Dunstan must be more of a genius than I thought, however crazy he may be at the same time.

Speaking of those two, and the other karakuridouji while I'm at it, anybody who had known me for the past few weeks would be wondering by now why I hadn't mentioned them, so I suppose I should clarify why I haven't. The truth is, we won. Ultimo beat Vice, we both beat Dunstan, good defeated evil. Just like a fairy tale ending, huh? But the only problem is, it turns out that while good turned out to be stronger than evil, the fact remains that good and evil are not as concrete as Dunstan thought.

Take Jealous the envious for example. Envy, one of the Seven Deadly Sins, is evil, no doubt. But what if envy changes to strive, and that strive is geared towards becoming or gaining whatever it is you were jealous of? As long as it isn't like what Rune and Jealousy did at the start of the Hundred Machine Funeral, then I would say that it's good, not evil. The key is the goal of self betterment. If someone envies someone because of their beauty or possessions, but instead of hating the person they're envious of, they choose to work to obtain what they want fairly, not hurting anyone, then how could it be evil? If envy becomes strive for betterment, then it's no longer evil. At least, that's what Ultimo thinks, and told me, and far be it from me to think he's wrong, especially with Jealous as the prime example, how he no longer is evil, it seems (though he still can be a jerk). He seems more..human now. He's not perfect, like Ultimo, but he has come a long way from the evil bastard he used to be.

But anyway, off of that topic, for now at least. After the hundred machine funeral, I've had enough of the other douji to last me for a long time. But not Ultimo. In fact, recently it seemed that I couldn't get enough of Ultimo. I lived with him, but it still wasn't enough. I always, always needed just one second longer, just one more touch to his beautiful face, or one more word to be said.

Apparently, my thoughtfulness showed yet again, because I received a light touch to my shoulder, Ultimo looking up at me with concerned eyes, for the second time in 5 minutes.

"Are you sure you're alright, Master?" he asked me. "You've been lost in thought a lot since you arrived at home. Is everything alright?"

Looking down at him, I finally couldn't take it anymore; as I'd said before, there just wasn't enough red, because to me, red meant Ultimo, and Ultimo meant the most happiness I'd ever found. I couldn't think of anything else to do, just like the time he'd been broken by Vice during their first fight I'd witnessed. I bent down and I kissed him on his lips, which felt as perfect as they looked. They were so, so soft, which I had halfway not expected, because he was a Karakuridouji- a mechanical boy. But nothing about him said the word "machine", especially not in that moment.

That was when reality hit me full force.

I realized what I was doing and I pulled away hurriedly, much to the protest of basically every fiber of my being. I couldn't even look in Ultimo's direction, let alone at Uru himself. I couldn't bear to see the look of horror or disgust that just must have been on Ultimo's face. I wouldn't have been able to take it.

I turned to leave, muttering, "Sorry...Uru..." as I reached for the door, but then I felt a pull on my hand; Ultimo had taken it in his own, to stop me from going. I turned back around, looking at him questioningly, and found his cheeks to be bright pink. His eyes seemed to be a darker shade of green than usual, as if he were in a daze.

"Don't leave, Master..." he said quietly. "But...why? Why did you kiss Uru?" His eyes were fixed on the ground, but then flicked up to meet my gaze, looking confused, embarrassed, and...happy? No, that couldn't be it...could it? After arguing with myself over this question for a few split seconds, I decided to gamble, and tell the truth.

"Uru...I..." I began, having to swallow to clear my throat. "I love you."