WARNING - character death alluded too within this oneshot. minimal swearing. Read at your own caution.

The girl in the third row in his Biology Lab class was something like a piece of stardust.

She was small, with tiny hands, tiny feet, tiny words and the only big thing about her was her eyes, how they soaked up the world in sunlight tinged green, as if everything was for the taking. But she hardly ever took - always the first to ask to pass the sheets around the room, always the one to hold open a door for someone else. It reminds him, these small actions as she would step up to help another student with a computer's keyboard, explaining that the 'k' key is jerky and needs a harder touch than the others, that there's more people like Gon in this world.

However, she was quite weak. If he were being rude, useless.

When he'd first talked to her, she'd thought he was a professor, (although he could see her point - he was wearing a suit and holding a briefcase, as well as towering over her small 5'1" frame) asking him about what was on the agenda for the class for notes and his annoyance had skyrocketed. His hands had folded like origami cranes, loose wrists but hard palms, and had yelled for the fourth time that day "I'm a student!" But immediately, the way her shoulders had curled in and her head ducked down into her collarbones, had caught his anger on his teeth. She pushed an apology off her tongue like a diver's body and had skittered away to another part of the room.

The guilt had ate at him. Even moreso that, whenever the two crossed paths, she'd fumble and trip and make their paths diverge away from each other as far as possible, putting as much land between them as there were oceans. But he'd pretended he didn't care - he'd had an education to be getting on with.

But this was interrupted when this useless girl fumbled with handing him papers, when she'd helped him with schoolwork, as if she were - no, that one interaction couldn't have made her afraid of him. But the way she'd practically ran when she was finished with him, when he'd said thank you and she'd squeaked and turned her gaze elsewhere. The way her hands had shaken like bumping volcanoes when they brushed.

Soon, this piling guilt on his chest bent his bones, curved his ribs until the air was too heavy to swallow whenever he'd caught her eyes, green like water hit by sunlight. He'd caught her at a library, tucked on a ledge hidden away by the books and dust and old flickering lights, nodding to a pair of headphones in her ears. A storm pattered outside, slamming it's hands against the window and he wondered if she'd known then the tiny tremours and jerks she'd give whenever they came close enough to touching her.

"Why're you scared of me?"

"Gyah!"

"Oh crap - I'm sorry!" His sudden presence had caused a hurricane in her chest, which had thrown her off the ledge and down towards the carpeted ground, book flying somewhere distant as she'd rushed to meet it. He didn't catch her. She landed heavily, and a few books rattled like teeth in their wooden gums. But he'd dropped beside her, already taking her wrist lightly and pulling her forwards to check for bruising along her shoulders. A doctor in even the smallest moments. "Did you hit your head or anything?"

It took her a moment, to understand who exactly was parting the escaping hairs on the nape of her neck where it had cracked painfully against the wall, and she immediately pushed herself away, scooting like a child across the ground. There'd been a heave of breath in her lungs, a rise and fall that wasn't natural and lifted her painfully small chest like a thrumming music note.

He held out a hand, a stop sign against his fingers and once again, she'd jerked. A brow rose, but he'd let the subject drop. "Are you okay?"

A nod, sharp and fast.

Leorio sighed. "That's good then," he'd said, and he watched as her own brow had crumpled like a building, sharp brows twisting together into confusion at his answer like molded steel. There was a beat of silence between them, as he clutched a hand through his hair, pulling at the spiky strands as he pushed it through and down to scratch the hairs at his neck, before sticking it out, smile soft in the corners like candlelight. "I'm Leorio!"

"I know."

"Right, 'course you do," he muttered, and retracted his hand into his pocket. Between them, the music spilling from her headphones creates a noise other than her slowing breathing and the angry yelling of rain outside, as it punched the windows. A nervous laugh lifts like a bubble in his chest. "So, you listen to Brigade?"

"What did you say when you walked in?"

Her head was tilted, spilling thick neon blue locks like a waterfall over her shoulder, headphones tucked loosely into the curly strands, hanging like broken threads. She didn't attempt to pick them out, gaze focused on the dark-haired man. Her legs had loosened slightly from their position against her chest, but her fingers still gripped the carpet like it was her only lifeline in this ocean of awkwardness.

Leorio swallowed thickly around his own lump in his throat, and peeled his eyes to somewhere else, wondering if he should answer her. But he did, and he watched as her expression had screwed up, leaning forwards towards him.

"T-That's none of your business!"

He ignored how quickly she'd fallen back into herself, how she'd tucked herself back into the small space where the world couldn't reach her, between cobwebs and protruding rub bones. "Ne, why not!?"

"Because!"

"That's not an answer!"

"That's not a question you need to be asking!"

"I don't care; I have a right to know!"

"It -" Leorio paused, gathering his breath back into his chest, reminding himself he didn't come to fight. Similarly, a world away from him, she did the same, curling her mouth around that desperate breath to calm her own bouncing blood. Slowly, he relaxed his breathing and tossed her an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry, a-again. I always seem to mess up around you - first I shout at you and terrify you, then I make you fall off a ledge and now...gyah, I'm sorry."

And there's something. It's small, something broken that's repairing itself in the depths of those wide green eyes that swallowed everything, but he can still see it and it plucks both their lips up when the tension eases from their chests, and Leorio's guilt no longer swallows him whole. He didn't ask why she looked like she was rebuilding herself, like her lungs had concaved long ago. It hadn't been his place.

"I accept your apology. I'm just a little jumpy and -"

"Still, no excuse on my part. Uh, would you...wanna get coffee?"

"In the rain?"

"Oh," he'd laughed nervously, pulling himself from his knees to grab his briefcase that had been flung like a rag doll to somewhere else, possibly beside her book. "Perhaps when it's nicer out?"

"Sure, that - oh my god, you're a tree!"

"I'm a - ohahAHAHA!"

"It's not funny!"

She was still quite useless, despite their coffee arrangements.

She knew nothing of Nen, of the aura he could see that peeled from her body like waning tides; how it flickered when he spoke, using Gyo, how incredibly blissfully oblivious she was to this wide, flickering candle she exuded and lived inside of. It made him smile, but he worried about her fatigue and under the premise of "doctor's orders!" handed her food off his plate when she looked tired.

She's was looking tired more and more.

Her feet still stumbled, still tripped over the misplaced carpet edges and imaginary objects, and he'd had to catch her more times than he could count, arms slipping around hers subconsciously after the first ten times. She didn't traditionally thank him, but laughed and disguised her numerous tumbles and falls in an attempt of a fake damsel-in-distress. It made him laugh, from the belly of his soul.

But this useless girl, who forgot deadlines and meetings and what was the appropriate time to call talking about turtles in the pond at the back of the school - she was kind. She was kind, with eyes that Leorio hadn't seen in years when she waved to dogs in the quad, slid across the common room in mismatched socks and dropped to the balls of her feet when a child, with their visiting parent of sibling, asked her for a question or a request. More times than he could count, children had flocked to her and himself by association for piggy back rides and laughter. Both were more than happy to comply.

She was a tumble of vine leaves and shredded grass stains an early April morning, the hours small and quiet, lay flat on her back with a blanket tucked around both their heads. She'd made him shed the suit that constricted his chest in exchange for loose pants and a t-shirt. She herself was curled in a thick onesie, hood hanging low over her eyes as she pointed out dripping constellations and stars that didn't resemble anything remotely physical. When he'd called her out on cheating, she'd stuck her tongue out at him, crossing her arms loosely over her chest.

Leorio repeated the action exactly, ignoring how his grin split his face afterwards.

"So how do you think the turtles are doing?"

"Every single time, it's always the turtles!"

When she'd turned those wide eyes on him, he had found his breath caught on some splintered part of him, something he hadn't tucked away quick enough and worried that she'd see. But her mouth split, a wide gaping grin that spilled laughter in it's wake, and had rocked him to the center of his soul. It stirred, something crumpled and forgotten there in the recesses of his being; something that hadn't been unfolded for a long time beginning to unbend.

"But I worry!"

"I know, but they can take care of themselves," and when she'd tucked closer, throwing an arm loosely over his stomach, it caught again, like some twigging vine he hadn't seen wrapping around his middle. Without hesitation, he pulled his arm around her shoulders and tucked her closer, murmuring of hypothermia as a disguise for the red that bloomed over his cheeks when he pulled the blanket over her shoulders. "And you call yourself a biology major..." and she'd laughed, a wide, shrieking sound that possibly woke up all the dorms and terrified a few dogs from their own sleep but he didn't care.

It was a feeling he fell in love with, long before he fell in love with her.

She'd met them by accident.

He was waiting outside their usual place, arm thrown over his shoulder, briefcase dangling on two fingers, when he was suddenly propelled forwards like a tornado had pressed against his back, briefcase flying off his hands and pressing into the pavement. People stared but the laughter that accompanied the voice was familiar and it made his eyes go wide.

"Leorio!"

Perhaps a tornado had.

"Gon! What're you - Killua? Kurapika!" The other two followed behind, with a small child with thick brown hair and a pleased expression on their features tucked around Killua's arm. The white-haired boy saluted, whilst Kurapika merely chuckled around his smile, hands loose by his sides. No longer fists made of rock, and Leorio could feel his heart swell.

The boy was still sat on his shoulders when something else that was familiar hit his ears.

Standing over them, briefcase handle curled between her hands at her legs, was the blue-haired girl with an amused smile on her face. Leorio had skittered to stand, feet falling and slipping on the ground in his haste, laughing nervously and retrieving the case from her hands, ignoring the way Gon swung from his shoulders like a rocking pendulum. The child next to Killua had laughed at the sight, whilst Kurapika snorted behind his hands, ignoring the display.

Killua, however, wasn't as kind with ignoring what his eyes saw.

"Whose this?"

"None of your business!"

"Leorio!"

"What? It isn't..." he'd argued, but it trailed off as the small child, introducing themselves as Alluka, joined into the group and immediately roped the girl into a conversation, who had been more than happy to converse with her. Leorio's smile had widened at the sight softly, but when he'd turned back up to look at his friends, noticing the slightly surprised looks on both Killua and Gon's features, Kurapika mouthed "girlfriend?" playfully. Leorio had made a noise in the back of his throat angrily.

Killua, once again, interrupted.

"You two on a date?"

"Brat! No we aren't!"

"Leorio, leave the poor child alone!" She'd commented as Alluka had gotten themselves scoped up into her arms, threading their small chubby fingers through the hair that spilled over her shoulders, laughing at the texture of curls. Leorio had relaxed at the request, face collapsing into slight annoyance.

"Well, if it isn't a date, how about we join you? Alluka likes you, so it's good enough for me."

Beside him, Gon nodded. "Uh!"

"Sure, that sounds great!"

Kurapika didn't comment on the way Leorio's glare fixated on the white-haired child for most of the coffee break.

When she'd first collapsed, he'd known what to do. Had known to support her head, regulate her breathing and call for someone far more qualified than a wannabe, trainee doctor.

But he'd locked his hand against hers, two shaking appendages, lifted her to his chest and led by example, just like how she'd always learned by example - deep breaths in and out and she'd tried her hardest to repeat the actions, but it caught on something thick in her chest, that sent her painfully small body arching around it. Pain exploded in her ribs and he counted the seconds, minutes until the sound of sirens broke his flurry of thoughts.

He'd waited, along with a small collection of their group of friends, for hours in the waiting rooms. Coffee and food runs were frequent and soon, the doctor came in. When everyone left after the news had been given, giving their condolences, he'd entered her room and grabbed her hand, locking the fingers together once again.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"It's not exactly something I wanted to broadcast."

"I could've helped."

"Leorio," she'd wheezed, and those hands had taken his face, smoothed out the spots from teenage years gone, the tears that collected on his eyelashes and removed the glasses. She was still blurry, but she'd moved up towards him, until she was sitting on the edge of her bed, painfully clear with the tube around her nose and the whiteness of her skin. Even with his chair small and low, and her own bed higher than his waist, she still felt painfully small in his arms as he'd shuffled to meet her in the middle, arms wrapping around her waist, head level with hers.

Her forehead pressed to his, and he ignored the way he could hear the crack of her ribs when she breathed. "You helped more than I could've ever imagined. Thank you, so much."

When he'd met her mouth, he tried to forget the way his hands had clenched in the robes of her hospital gown, as if trying to hold onto her for time that wasn't his to spend.

The stardust girl from the third row in his biology class doesn't come into school again.

Leorio doesn't stargaze as often, and helps the turtle family at the back of the school nurse a youngling that's slipped and hurt their leg back to health. On his own this time, and he forgets deadlines and meetings and assignments over the next few weeks, but he always takes care of the turtles.

When Kurapika calls, a sad ring in his chest on the voicemail for him, Leorio is the one that doesn't answer the phone this time.

Leorio leaves for the Dark Continent.