As the eerie and almost otherworldly song entered his ears, pain coursed through Nezumi's head so intensely that he felt as if he was going to die. He stumbled and fell onto the staging prop, the sleeve of his pale teal costume changing from a flowing sheet like water into a dishevelled heap. Barely hearing Shion's cry of distress in the distance, he called out in his head for the white haired boy before falling into an abysmal darkness.

Shion…

Later, he heard the voice of a bee. No, not one bee, a million of them, the colony surrounding him with vicious intent against a blood red sky, chorusing hauntingly that they would bring him peace.

He tried to run, but Nezumi was stuck in mud, and found that the short legs of a child he had was stuck in a vacuum, mud sucking him in further down into despair. He was all alone, with no one but the malicious parasitic bees surrounding him. The mud sucked him down more and more; feet, legs, knees, hips, waist, chest, neck, head, nearing his outstretched arm, pleading for help. And suddenly, another hand, Shion's hand grasped his.

He awoke with a start, to find himself lying on his own bed, in his own home (if you could call it a home). He was covered in a cold sweat, and the pain in his head felt like a huge hangover. As his blurred eyes focused, he realised the Shion was on top of him. "Nezumi! Can you hear me?" he called excessively loudly in his panicked voice. Nezumi looked down to see his sweaty hand clasping Shion's own, just like in the dream, with a pressure that threatened to break his delicate digits.

He saved me again...Nezumi mused.

He realised that he was still wearing the clothes that we wore at the performance, as well as the makeup, making him redden slightly at the thought of Shion seeing him dressed this way. The jewelled wreath of beads that he wore on his dusk blue hair shimmered a bit as he turned his head slightly in a feeble attempted to mask his embarrassment.

He wasn't exactly sure why he was so conscious around Shion, but he pushed it out of his head and lifted his eyes to meet Shion's eyes.

"Shion…"

Hearing his own name being softly called, Shion finally calmed down enough to breathe out the air that he didn't know he was holding in.

"Nezumi…" he cried. "I wouldn't know what to do if I had lost you… I wouldn't… you don't…" Tears that had been welling up in Shion's crimson eyes finally dripped out one by one, rolling across his pale cheeks and falling onto Nezumi's rose red lips. They tasted salty, and he sat up and lifted his hand to Shion's face, brushing them away.

"Don't cry, idiot. I'm fine now." "I thought that I had lost you to those bees when you fainted. I was so scared…"

It surprised Nezumi to see that his existence meant so much to someone else, especially since all his life no one, not a single person had given a rat's ass (pun intended) about whether or not he lived or died. To them, he was just another nuisance, another bug that they needed to squash since it was dirtying their pristine world.

But to Shion, he was a friend. No wait. Not just a friend. More. And to him, Shion was…

"...the world". Was that his own voice? Apparently yes, as Shion looked up. He looked so cute, arms like a puppy dog, cheeks flushed pink. "Did you say something Nezumi?"

Nezumi wanted to deny it, partly because he was somewhat of a tsundere and partly because he felt like he'd been caught in the act red-handed. But in front of Shion, his defences were down.

He felt so safe yet so vulnerable in front of this white-haired boy, who couldn't even defend himself. Nezumi smiled to himself; it really was as Dogkeeper said. "You've gone soft."

So instead of saying no, Nezumi leaned in and whispered slowly into Shion's ear; "You are the world to me, Shion." He heard Shion gasp and pull back, cheeks even more red than before in a violent blush. "Wha-" began Shion, before being briskly silenced by Nezumi's lips.

Both were shy at first, but then began indulging themselves in each other, realising how much they wanted to be together, how much they'd held back in this cruel world. The only person that mattered in the world at that very moment was the very person each boy was wrapped around.

Pulled tight around one another, closing the gap as much as possible, lips brushed again and again, wet with lust and passion. Shion's hands ran through Nezumi's untied silky hair as Nezumi's calloused hands slid over Shion's bare back.

As they kissed, Nezumi realised that it wasn't only Shion's tears that he was tasting anymore, his own falling out silently, though he wasn't exactly sure why they came at that moment.

He thought that, he was crying because it wasn't fair; because it wasn't fair that though they were together now, they would always be separated by No. 6. That goddamned city would continue to pull them apart, no matter how far they ran away from it. Its parasitic presence only grew stronger by the day, manifesting itself, tentacles wrapping around anybody living and sucking the life out of them, until they became rotten corpses, just like the parasitic wasps that were about to kill its citizens on Holy Day.

But though he knew the day when they had to be separated had to come, he prayed. He prayed, perhaps for the first time in his life, that he and Shion could be together, together just for this one moment.