AN: Hi, guys! Long time no see. Well, I've been active on Tumblr, y'see, roleplaying (main blogs are a Daemon and a Mukuro right now). And we have this thing called drabble prompts. Sometimes they're based on the roleplay history, so you might find some things here that you won't recognise, but I'll try my best to keep them generic. This is going to be my Tumblr fic spot. I don't like all the pairings that will be posted here, because some are for birthday presents, too.

Prompt: To Daemon. Kill Me, Haunt Me, Love Me. From Alaude.

Hands of God

"A month or so."

You aren't the only one that this hurts, Daemon thought darkly. That gaunt face, icy eyes rheumy now and skin thin enough to show the ghostly image of his skeleton underneath. Look at that hair, dull, lifeless, flopped over a pale forehead and soaked with sweat. He could practically feel the heat of fever from there.

"Another month with this, Alaude."

Oh, it hurt too much to return his gaze when Alaude looked sideways at him. The eyes that should have been too sharp. "You've already aged so far," Daemon pleaded, gripping the rail of the bed until his knuckles went white. "You've lived enough. Why don't you just end this now?"

For a long time there was no answer, and he thought that perhaps there wouldn't be. Was he too tired to speak, or done with the argument? "I can't do it again," he finally said. His voice was hoarse. "After this, I don't get to age. I only have a little more life because of the consumption." A pause, as if he wouldn't continue, but suddenly he murmured so softly it was nearly inaudible: "Scarcity makes things precious."

Oh, how he itched to slap that face, but it was too weak, too soft, too fragile. How was he still so elegant? "There will be plenty of pain after you die," he spat. "There's nothing scarce about it. You're not living, you're dying. It's not worth it."

"Not giving up my last time," came the answer after several moments of infuriating silence. "I'm not you."

Flinch. "Obviously not," he muttered, glancing away. "You're better off that way."

It was decided.

Until he started coughing blood.

Great, hacking coughs, racking coughs, sounded like they'd break his ribs coughs, coughs that made his eyes water and tears roll down his cheeks. Coughs that spewed blood that was too dark until the handkerchief was soaked. Coughs that wouldn't let him sleep, that must have hurt until the next one began. Two weeks so far, and still weeks to go by the doctor's estimate. No no no.

He couldn't wait to see Alaude's healthy young face again. Couldn't wait to not see him so sick, so sad, so weak. Wrong, wrong, wrong. It was as if his body were trying to punish him for the immortality he would have soon.

Not soon enough.

Daemon's eyes lingered on the ring on Alaude's skeletal finger. It was only a placeholder, where the Vongola Cloud had been, because it was passed onto the third generation by now, and Alaude had explained that his finger had felt wrong without something there. Daemon had gotten him a nicer ring, a flame one, and that sat starkly violet against his emaciated knuckles.

"You're done, Alaude."

Eyelids flickered and watery eyes moved towards him. His expression didn't change, didn't waver. Alaude didn't move. His lips were a thin, pale line. Chapped, dry, peeling. "Wondered," he started to say, then paused with a loud cough into a handkerchief. Sounded like death warmed over. "…when you'd do it."

"You knew I would," he murmured with a long breath. "'S not worth it, Liebe. You'll be young and healthy again. Full of life."

"But dead." The words were a dull murmur. "No heart."

"Plenty of heart!" he retorted quickly. "No heavy, slow, fleshy bag of meat and bones to get sick and wounded. Whatever you want, it's yours. Cities to build and take down again! You are unbelievably French, meine Schatz." Too damn romantic. Wanted to hold onto everything. Life and death and yada yada! Even consumption was a poem! "Go to sleep."

That earned a small snort and a wry smile that cut into him with sudden ferocity. "Do it right," Alaude murmured. "If you're going to do it, you have to look me in the eye."

His breath shuddered out of his lungs as if he, too, were ill. Daemon's jaw gritted, clenching and working as he stared at the man who returned his look without a wink. "What, do you want it to hurt, too?" he demanded.

There was a pause, and he seemed to mull it over. "I didn't think of that. I do."

…No, damn it, this wasn't—

"Alright." He surprised himself with the evenness of his tone. "I'll make it hurt, Liebe. But I won't let you hurt long." Couldn't be something sweet like a pillow over his face, no, had to hurt. Damn it all. "Believe me, the transition to the ring hurts enough as it is."

The knife glittered in flickering candlelight. The sight of that sickening, churning, deathly leech jar out of the corner of his eye was all the encouragement he needed. "Besten Reisen, Schatz."

He kept his promise. It hurt. It hurt so badly that Alaude cried out, thrashed like an animal, squeezed his eyes shut as they leaked tears, but it didn't hurt for long. Not until it was over, anyway.

He wondered if Alaude would ever forgive him.