The sound of the door clicking open was enough on its own to wake Grelle up she'd been sleeping for so long, but she kept her eyes closed. Gods she felt like death. Well, she was death, but she really did feel miserable—like she'd been hit by a bus, or practically dismembered by a demon with a Death Scythe.

She heard Auden sit up in her recliner in a hurry, excited by whomever had come through the door. Probably it was Sebastian.

"You're back."

It was.

Grelle cracked open her eyes just slightly, so that they would look like they were still closed and tried to mimic a sleep breathing pattern. She wanted to watch this exchange.

Sebastian took off his coat, hung it on the back of the door as he closed it softly, trying to be quiet. Good. At least she looked somewhat convincing. Auden struggled out of the recliner since she didn't put the little foot bar down or sit it up, and went right over to him. She looked up and he put his hands on her shoulders.

"Did you get him?" she asked, her voice trembling.

"I made a promise, didn't I?"

Grelle saw the tension flood out of Auden's body and tears sprang in that same moment to her eyes. "Thank you," she said, though it came out as a sob.

"Hey," Sebastian said, smiling down at her and wiping her cheeks with gentle fingers, "no more tears. All right?"

Sniffing a little hiccup sniffle, Auden nodded, but her bottom lip pouted out and trembled and she couldn't help but cry a little more though they were tears of relief. Sebastian held her in his arms, cradling her head against his chest. They were never affectionate with each other when Grelle was awake or around, which was ridiculous since she would have been the last person to be offended by it and the first to think it was adorable, but regardless of the fact, she knew they were close. And seeing evidence first hand was just as precious as she'd imagined.

She'd created rather a conundrum for herself in the process though. She had absolutely no idea how to fake waking up. She couldn't just pop her eyes open, and she didn't want to make a big show. What had it been like when she'd woken up before? She still felt like hell, so probably it had been labored, but she couldn't really pinpoint anything about it. Did anybody know what it looked like to wake up? Probably she should wait until the pair of them had stopped hugging to save Auden any unnecessary embarrassment.

"How have things been here?" Sebastian asked, letting her go.

Auden went into the bathroom and came back wiping her nose with toilet paper as she said, "She's been sleeping a lot. Like all day." She frowned a little concerned frown.

Sebastian put his hand atop her head, stroked her hair. "It takes a lot of energy to recover. Her body needs to sleep so she can heal. We don't need to be worried about it yet."

Yet? Since when was sleep a bad thing? And speaking of… Grelle fluttered her eyelids open as realistically as she could manage. Sebastian noticed the movement the second it started and came directly to her side, ever the faithful companion. He took her hand in his and lifted it.

"I have shorn their necks from their miserable bodies, gutted the them from tip to toe, and sent their souls back to the venomous pit from whence they crawled—for you, my love."

He kissed her knuckles and then, turning her hand over, reached into his pocket and pulled from it a pair of teeth. Fangs. Demon fangs. Probably those belonging to the one who had put all these pretty holes in her. He dropped them into her hand.

"Well good morning to you, too." She blinked at the set of teeth. "Did they suffer?"

"Greatly."

A smile crossed her mouth and she leaned her head back on her pillow to look at him, laughing a little. "You know just what to say to a girl."

Smiling, he leaned over her and touched his lips to hers. All of his tension was gone now, she could feel it. Sometimes she forgot he was a demon, forgot that that came with certain needs. Not that she didn't understand, just that she felt a little sorry for not providing for him sooner than now—and without getting herself practically chopped into pieces. She made up for it by kissing him back, just the way he liked.

He smiled at her when he pulled away, brushed her hair back with gentle fingers—fingers which had only just lately dug into demons' flesh and probably ripped their hearts from their chests—and kissed her forehead. She returned the smile and looked down at the teeth in her hand. It was a lovely gesture—a bit dark, and a bit gory, but that was Sebastian for you. She couldn't say she didn't find it at least a little bit hot.

"I think these will make a nice pair of earrings, don't you, Auden?" Grelle held one of the fangs up to her ear and looked Auden's way to send a smile.

Auden stared back at her like she'd turned into a giant toad and grown nine thousand eyeballs, but Auden looked at her like that all the time so the expression only made Grelle laugh.

Sebastian stroked her cheek to get her attention, so she looked his way and he said with a frown, "You don't look much better, my love."

"I don't feel much better."

"Death Scythe wounds are merciless."

She grinned at him. "You would know."

That made him chuckle, but not less concerned. "Still, you ought to be healing faster."

She shrugged. "There's a lot to cover."

As if in response, he picked over her, that momma hen frown about his mouth, straightening tubes and arranging her hair and adjusting her blankets and putting her gift teeth back in his pocket and every little thing he could think of. She let him. It was in his nature to be meticulously nurturing as contrary as it seemed for a demon. Even after all that he still met her eyes and said,

"What can I do?"

She smiled at him. "Hand me my water and give me a kiss?"

Laughing a little, he obeyed, turning to retrieve her mug from the bedside table and place it in her hands before leaning over and pressing his mouth fervently to hers.

As he pulled back she looked at him, and he paused and looked back, and after a moment, gave her another kiss. Several, in fact. All of them good ones. When he did move away she took a drink from her water and smiled.

"Thank you, love," she said.

He took her hand. "I'm just happy you're still here."

She laughed. "Me too."

Even as he smiled at her and she laughed, Sebastian noticed a flicker of pain shift through Grelle's features. She tried to hide it, and nearly succeeded, but it returned, and the second time she could not disguise the contortion of her face. Sebastian frowned.

"Grelle?"

"Ah."

She sucked in a breath. Her hand twitched in his and clutched tighter. She writhed once, ever so slightly, turning on her hip.

"What is it, my love?"

Grelle couldn't answer. Her teeth clenched shut, the line of her jawbone clearly visible under the skin of her cheek. When the tension did release, it was to let out a sharp cry and take in a gasp of air. Her nails dug into his hand. Sebastian glanced over at Auden, and she was standing up, all the color gone out of her, staring at Grelle and trembling.

"Get help," he said, and pushed the button on the side of the bed as Auden bolted from the room. He looked at Grelle. "Grelle. Grelle, my love, what is it? What's going on?"

A scream shot out of her and she sat bolt upright, but was too weak to make it fully and so collapsed midway through the motion. Sebastian tried to pull her forward, to help her sit up like she seemed to want to do, but she began to shake so fiercely he didn't dare exert much force. Her fingernails drew blood from his skin. What was this? What was happening? Grelle became tangled in the wires and tubes all around her. Sebastian just stared, helpless. A moment ago Grelle had been fine. The heart monitor beeped wildly.

Auden burst back into the room, trailing a doctor and a team of nurses in her wake. The doctor took one look at Grelle and cursed, snapping at his team. They crowded the bed and shoved Sebastian out—or they would have if they had been able to prize his hand from Grelle's grasp. As it was he fought his way back in to their huddle as they crowded around her and worked feverishly.

"You know what this is?" Sebastian demanded of the doctor, breaking his eyes from Grelle for but a moment sufficient enough to give the man a solid glare.

"We were afraid this might happen. Corey, double that." He pointed and one of the nurses put his hands on one of the bags of liquid attached to Grelle.

That was no explanation. "And?"

"Her body took too much damage and hasn't healed. Her soul is rejecting it. It's trying to escape."

Grelle screamed like that was exactly what was going on. Tears streaked down her face which was turning colors under all the bruises as she struggled for air through the pain.

Sebastian's head began to swim. "Can you stop it?"

"We're trying."

They worked so swiftly doing so many things, that even if he had been paying attention to them, Sebastian would have missed most of what was going on. But he wasn't paying attention. His eyes were locked on Grelle. She shook. She was blue. She screamed.

"Do something!" Sebastian shouted.

A nurse stepped over to remove him. "Mr. Michaelis…"

Grelle's cries ceased at once. Her eyes rolled back in her head. She fell limp against the hospital bed and the monitor let out one long beep.

"Corey, get her body on life-support. Meg, Scythe scalpel, now."

The nurses tried to pull Sebastian out of the way but he would not be moved. Corey was forced to work around him. Meg passed the doctor a shining silver knife. Corey began attaching new tubes and wires to Grelle and another machine. The doctor made one small incision just below Grelle's collarbone above her heart and inserted something and instantly her Cinematic Record appeared, but flowed into a tube attached to whatever he had inserted. He and Meg switched tasks to helping Corey.

Sebastian stared at Grelle, at the complete absence of expression in her face, at the coldness and the loss of color in spite of all the color of her bruises. The team shocked her, hurt her, but started her heart. It didn't change anything. She stayed under.

All the same the doctor let out a sigh of relief. He said something to Sebastian. Sebastian didn't listen.

They disappeared and left him there, clutching Grelle's lifeless hand, the bright luminance of her soul siphoning out through a clear plastic tube into the clear plastic bag they'd hung above her head. Sebastian felt… He didn't feel. Hollowness stung at his eyes. Tears would not surface. An arid and icy wind blew across his heart. Agony echoed in the emptiness.

His knees met the ground with a crack. That wind raged, conjuring up a harrowing howl. Her hand was cold in his. He was making that sound, not the wind. That was him. Grelle was…gone.

A small hand touched his shoulder—a cold hand, a little reaper's hand. He turned his face and there was Auden, eye-to-eye, looking down at him, tears filling those eyes and falling all over her face. She put her arms around him and started to sob. He'd forgotten she was there.

Auden had never seen Sebastian express emotion of any kind like that. He was always so calm and collected. That cry of absolute anguish had torn her already broken heart to shreds. She held onto him as he knelt on the floor beside the bed, and she cried. He needed her. They needed each other. What would happen to them if Grelle never woke up? What would they do? Auden couldn't think about it.

"Sh-she won't leave us, Sebastian," she whispered fiercely. "She w-won't."

Sebastian did not reply. Auden clutched her arms tighter around his neck anyway. He didn't even move. When Auden opened her eyes, the room was engulfed in shadows. She started. Where had those come from? She pulled back. They were coming from Sebastian. His eyes were open but they were blank. And glowing. Two points of empty purple-red light. She shivered.

"Sebastian?"

"I wish I had not killed those demons in such haste," he said, his gaze unfocused beyond her toward the wall. "I would summon them from the very pits of hell and make the rest of their lives an eternal agony."

Auden shifted back. There was so much venom in his words. Behind his eyes, those demons were suffering again in his mind. For a few moments he relished in it, but the images faded and a quiet cry slipped out of his lips. His eyes squeezed shut.

"Grelle."

He pawed at her hand, struggled to his feet.

"Grelle, please. Come back. Don't leave me here. Please."

He gripped her arm in his hand, staring down into her face and searching, pleading. Tears began to fall from his eyes.

"Don't leave me, don't leave me, don't leave me…"

He cried out over and over again and in his grief, gripped Grelle by the shoulders and started to shake her as if to wake her up.

"Sebastian! Stop it!"

Auden tried to pry him off with all her strength, and she nearly had him when he shot back of his own accord and flew to the plastic bag Grelle's soul was draining into. He stared at it, raised a hand. Gently, his fingers pressed into the side. The glow of her soul illuminated the wet streaks down his face.

"Oh, my love. How could they do this to you?"

Auden couldn't look at him anymore. She couldn't stand the pain in his eyes. She stood where she was and stared at the floor though it was warped by her tears. She wiped her nose, clenched her fists. Grelle couldn't die. Not now. Not after she'd been okay. Not after Auden had thought she didn't have to worry. It wasn't fair.

Suddenly she was wishing she'd gone with Sebastian to kill the demons. Wishing she had a little bit of their blood on her hands. Wishing she could have paid them back for what they'd done to Grelle. To her. To Sebastian. She dug her nails into her palms. The world never had been, and never would be, fair.

Sebastian drifted away from the bag that held Grelle's soul—a strange glowing soup of film strips—and took up her hand in his own. He pressed it to his chest, fell to his knees, and just held onto her, sobbing quietly.

It made Auden start all over again.