Hi guys! (and thanks for the reviews that kept me inspired this whole week) Okay. I definitely suck at studying. I promised my parents I'd work harder and here I am, unable to get rid of random ideas popping into my head, because them plot bunnies just won't leave me alone. And, for once, this chapter isn't in bold, becuase I'm using the PC so congratulate me! THough, I apologize for the inconsistensies in the format. I'm lazy_ though I recall saying that to you people already.

Whatever. Here's the chapter, a tribute to Shoichi since today is his birthday.

I don't own KHR

Shoichi Irie

The red head would never admit it, but when he saw Byakuran perish in the orange flames that engulfed him, something stirred in him, something within the depths of his being, something so familiar that he couldn't stop telling himself it wasn't true.

Because it was the feeling of losing something important. The familiar ache of misplacing something valuable, something loved and treasured.

Now that was weird, because he hadn't lost anything at all. He wasn't close with Yuni, so the reason was definitely not the child.

So who had disappeared?

He stopped himself from even considering that it was Byakuran.

Because Byakuran was Byakuran and Byakuran was the enemy.

It had become a chant now, for the twenty five year old, who had gone through hell and back, trying to look for loopholes, trying to search for impossible scenarios, making the most absurd plans reality.

He had done so much, been through so much, lost so much just to defeat the albino. The pain and destruction the man had caused was too much, and punishment was inevitable.

That was what he should think, right?

He was one of his enemies too? Wasn't he? Someone easily disposed of and toyed with.

Byakuran was someone that did not deserve sympathy of all things.

Yet the very same brain that had schemed the Millefiore's boss's failure, was the very same one that now told him he was mourning for the man who had come closest to destroying the world.

The mere realization of that tore Shoichi apart.

But the feeling comforted him, because it assured him he was human, yet it made him uneasy at the same time. If his thoughts leak out, he'd be considered a traitor. He'd be killed without second thought.

Although he supposed the loss he felt was normal. Hard as it was to admit, Shoichi could never once look at Byakuran, and not see his best friend.

Even when Byakuran enumerated his plans of destroying the world, and told him of how he planned to destroy the earth's balance, Shoichi could only see the boy who at sixteen became his only friend.

It had been tough for him back then, moving to another country, having to speak a language he knew he wasn't good at, and simply being different.

How thankful he was back then that Byakuran was his roommate. How thankful he was that the man had a mind like his, and that their conversations had all been intellectual, not english, not japanese. Just the smart talk about machines, innovations.

Conversations that gave him hope.

When Byakuran almost destroyed the Giglio Nero, Shoichi watched, and yet the only person he could see was the same boy who had riled him up too many times and yet still made up to it.

He had lost count over how many times they had argued over trivial matters, from an error in an equation, to a wire attached wrong to a device.

Sometimes, he was wrong, but sometimes, it was the albino. Byakuran was better at accepting mistakes than he was. And grander too. The albino always bought him a humongous sundae every time he was proven wrong.

Shoichi had to buy him a pack of marshmallows if it was the other way around, but how could that match to a hundred dollar treat staring right at him with its strawberry and chocolate and vanilla flavor?

When Byakuran plotted the Vongola's demise, Shoichi could not see anyone else but the marshmallow loving boy he had grown up with.

Who'd put marshmallows in his pizza. Put them in his soup. Put it in bread. Eat it with rice. He could only smile fondly, remembering the many times he had told the albino that it was disgusting, or the many times he had tried to take the treat away from his friend because too much sugar was bad for the health.

And Byakuran would argue with him, give him a pleading look, and he would always agree, because those amethyst eyes always triggered this spot in him, telling him that he owed the albino a lot, if not his own life.

When Byakuran actually enacted his plan to destroy the world, Shoichi immediately sided against him. He teamed up with people that wanted his best friend dead, people that hated him to the core, and he helped them.

He helped them devise the greatest plan that would end Byakuran once and for all.

Yet he could never get rid of the hesitation that lay beneath his schemes, the tiny pieces that told him he was going to lose a friend. He was, he knew that.

He knew too, that to the Byakuran of the present, he was disposable, he was a pawn. And that hurt him, because he could never look at Byakuran and see someone less than his best friend.

Tears fell down his cheeks as he saw Byakuran burn, as the brunette fired his flames at him, with the desire to destroy.

It was the end.

A memory flashed before Shoichi, a time back at college, where Byakuran got himself into the worst fight of their student days. He could no longer remember what the fight had been about, just that Byakuran was beat, and his opponent was battered and bloody and half dead.

Shoichi had stood between them just in time, taking the blow before his best friend could take the life of another.

Byakuran returned to himself then, staring shocked at the red haired teen, his face covered in his own blood.

"I could've killed you." Were his words, and Shoichi remembered smiling at him, proudly telling the albino with a smack to the head.

"I swear. I'd always be there to fix your messes, because you seem to have this amazing ability to make a lot of it." And they had laughed.

Shoichi stared at the albino, who looked straight at him. Pure coincidence it might be, he couldn't bring himself to believe it. They had shared the same memory, at the same reminder that brought them back to the time where everything had been right. And at the same time too. Although the epiphany had come too late, because the damage was irreversible now.

Only Shoichi could understand the smile that Byakuran had given them, a smile that said, in their own unspoken language.

"Thanks for cleaning up the shit I leave behind." And Shoichi smiled at him too, despite the tears that refused to stop falling.

"I promised you didn't I? I'd fix your messes."

And Shoichi let himself cry, let himself embrace the hollow, empty feeling as his best friend perished before him. He could care less about the Vongola, about the arcobaleno. About the world he had fought so hard to save. He could worry about that all later.

Because right now, his best friend was dying.

Because right now, he was losing the most important person of his life

Because all this time, they were still best friends.

And he couldn't do anything, but mourn, as the scheme he had worked so hard on, ended with success.