"and he suddenly knew that if she killed herself, he would die. Maybe not immediately, maybe not with the same blinding rush of pain, but it would happen. You couldn't live for very long without a heart."
― Jodi Picoult

With the closing of the massive gate, the last of Gajeel's strength left him. As if watching through the eyes of a dream, the world around him tilted and he landed hard on the grass. He'd never felt a weakness like this before, so drained of energy that he could barely muster the strength to keep his eyelids raised.

"Levy…" he breathed her name, clinging with all that he could muster. He cast his eyes around him, beseeching into the clearing mist for her frame. He dug his fingertips into the soft earth and pulled himself up with shaking limbs.

"Levy!" he called weakly, his arms fighting to hold his weight aloft.

"Gajeel…"

Her voice was impossibly far away, her light nothing but a dim haze meters away from him. He forced his arms forward, tried to lift himself onto his legs but found himself only falling back to the earth. He gritted his teeth against the tremors his weary limbs were sending in protest of his actions, bit against the dull weakness in his arms and legs to crawl what suddenly seemed an immeasurably far distance. Foot by foot he pulled himself to her, desperate to hold her, to see if she was ok. He didn't look down to the grass when he felt the slick wetness in his fists, refused to believe her injuries were so extensive.

But when his hands finally brushed her pale skin, there was no denying the chill in her body.

"Levy," he pulled her to him, saw the pain lace across her face as she faced him. The gash ran from her shoulder down her side. Blood tainted her beauty, crimson that was pooling around them stealing the rose that was once in her cheeks. Her brown eyes, however, filled with relief as she gazed up at him. A smile spread across her lips and tears began to streak down her face.

"You're ok…" her voice was barely a whisper.

Gajeel tried to return the smile, desperately tried to fight the pressure building like a tsunami behind his eyes. He gritted his teeth so hard he felt a dull pain throb in his jaw. He was shaking, but this time not from frailty. He was holding back sobs, fighting the pain in his chest.

"I'm sorry…" she sighed, her eyebrows gathering together as she spoke, "I couldn't just let you be killed…"

"So you put yourself in my stead?" he bit out bitterly, tears beginning to gather at the edges of his vision, "Dammit Levy… you weren't supposed to get hurt!"

"It's ok…"

"Like Hell it's ok!" his voice was shaking as he pulled her closer, feebly wrapping his arms around her as he brought her against his chest, "It'll never be ok… I can't live through this eternity without you…"

She brought a tiny hand to his face, her fingers ghosting gently against his cheek, "You'll live on. It may take time, but soon, I'm sure, you'll forget about me…"

"You…" he silenced her, red eyes staring deeply into her brown, "There's no way I could ever forget you."

She smiled, then. It was a tiny, sad smile, as she let her hand slip down his neck to his chest. He brought a large, tanned hand to hold hers. He cupped it against his heart, willing the life to be transferred to her, praying that he could somehow stop her light from fading any farther.

"Please tell me, at least, that one day I might see you in paradise…" he whispered, hot tears streaking down his face. His chest could no longer keep the sobs at bay and his shoulders tremored wretchedly against the sorrow in his heart.

She didn't respond. Her broken body was all but limp in his grasp. Her heat was almost gone and her pale light was no more. She rolled her head against his arm.

Silently, she whispered a phrase Gajeel immediately recognized, "Do you sing?"

A sudden realization came to him as she stared down at her, all porcelain skin with sapphire hair framing her face. She remembered him. Not the him that had met her at Jude Heartfilia's deathbed, no, she remembered the mercenary. She remembered the man who'd nursed him in his last minutes as a human on the earth.

"How…?"

"Shhh…" she smiled gently, knowing all too well her time was nearing to an end, "Please…"

The tears fell harder from his face, pattering gently down on her neck and chest,

"Down yonder green valley where streamlets meander
When twilight is fading, I pensively roam
Or at the bright noontide in solitude wander
Amid the dark shades of the lonely Ash grove
Twas there while the blackbird was cheerfully singing
I first met that dear one, the joy of my heart
Around as for gladness the bluebells were ringng
Ah then little knew I, how soon we would part.

As he sang, her head lulled back against his arm. Her cerulean locks were like feathers brushing his skin. The tiniest bits of light began detaching themselves from her to glitter in the air, floating on the slightest bit of wind into the sky like hundreds of infinitesimally small fireflies. The brown eyes were dull, staring at him as if he were far away and not really so close holding her frail, broken body in his arms.

"Still glows the bright sunshine, o'er valley and mountain
Still trembles the moonbeam on streamlet and fountain
Still warbles the blackbird, its note from the tree
But what are the beauties of nature to me?
With sorrow, deep sorrow, my bosom is laden
All day I go wandering in search of my love
Ye echoes Oh tell me, where is that bright maiden?
She sleeps neath the green turf, down by the ash grove.

Her body was light, her form no more than a shadow. Gently, her eyes fluttered shut and the worried crease between her brows smoothed. The pain etched across her features turned into an eerie calm. Try as he might to keep his voice from wavering, the quiet sobs he tried so hard to keep hidden were making it hard to keep himself steady.

"My lips smile no more, my heart loses its lightness,
No dream of the future my spirit can cheer;
I only can brood on the past and its brightness,
The dead I have mourned are again living here.
From ev'ry dark nook they press forward to meet me;
I lift up my eyes to the broad leafy dome,
And others are there, looking downward to greet me;
The ash grove, the ash grove alone is my home."

She was gone. Nothing of her remained. No light, no warmth, not even the red stains of her blood lay on the ground around him. He gazed up to the heavens, a cry snaking past his lips as he wept there in the darkness. His body was past the point of breaking down, his heart felt like a void in his chest. He clenched his fists and pushed them into the ground, slumping his head forward to press into them. The smell of the earth filled his nose, the cold unyielding scent making him feel all the more alone.

He didn't care for his accomplishment. What was there to be proud of with Levy gone? How was he supposed to exist without that enchanting light in his life any longer? She was nothing now. Not a soul, or a human, just the fluttering of light that drifted on the breeze and vanished from him.

He couldn't save her.

Worse, her death was because of his weakness.

All of their deaths.

Levy, Lucy, Natsu, and Grey. And Juvia? He didn't even have the strength to search her out and see if she was well. Or maybe she was just like him, collapsed in a sorrow so deep it was like an ocean crushing her.

He lay down in the grass, buried his face where hers had once been. Fatigue was his only relief from the sorrow that turned him to cold stone on the ground. Exhaustion was what took him away into darkness and gave him peace, if only for a short time.