The sound of the gunshot filled the room, so loud that Nezumi hardly knew if he had screamed at all. The air smelt strongly of gunpowder and blood, and the stench was powerful enough that he almost gagged. The man in the lab coat—he didn't look. He didn't need to see.

Shion's shoulders slumped, and all was still.

"Shion…?" Nezumi's voice came out painfully quiet.

Shion raised his head and turned.

"Nezumi!"

Nezumi flinched. Shion was beaming at him, his face a disorienting mixture of relief, concern, and affection. He rushed over. There was blood spatter on the bottom of his coat—fresh, not Shion's.

Shion threw himself down and hugged him tightly. Nezumi swallowed. He met Safu's eyes over Shion's shoulder and her face was flat and emotionless.

"I'm so glad you're safe," Shion murmured. He squeezed Nezumi a little tighter and then let go. "Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?"

"Are you okay?"

"I'm alright. I wasn't hit."

"Shion… You just killed a man."

Shion's smile slipped a little. His eyes lowered, and Nezumi thought he saw them dart toward the body. "Oh… Yeah… But he wanted to hurt you. He needed to be punished."

A sharp pain shot through Nezumi's chest. Don't say that. Please don't say you did that for me.

This was all wrong. Shion didn't hurt people. Shion didn't want to hurt people. Hadn't he told Nezumi that he never wanted to take another life? Maybe he wasn't perfect, but Shion was gentle and kind and more human than anyone Nezumi had ever known. He wasn't a killer.

And yet there was the gun, next to Shion. There was the blood, on Shion. This is wrong. Nezumi stared, and for once he didn't hide his emotions.

I wish you never came.

Shion fingered the cuffs on Nezumi's wrists. "We should unlock these. The key I think…" He trailed off as Safu stepped up beside him, holding out the small remote for Shion to take.

The little piece of machinery looked very clean. Nezumi tore his thoughts away from the boy in front of him and latched onto this mystery. He knew that the man's hands had been covered in blood from his leg, so the remote should at least show some traces… There were some, rimmed around the buttons, and streaked along the sides, as if it had been wiped.

As Safu handed it off, Nezumi caught the smudge of red-brown on the underside of her coat sleeve. They locked eyes. Safu's face was still blank, but he realized now it wasn't devoid of emotion. Her eyes were dark and pleading.

What had she seen? What had happened before they reached this room?

It must have been hell.

The cuffs sprang open, and feeling returned to his limbs instantly. Every muscle ached, but Nezumi wasted no time climbing to his feet.

The sound of an explosion rumbled below, and the ground shook more violently than ever before. The evacuation lights became more insistent.

Emergency alert. Emergency alert.

All personnel, evacuate immediately.

Level 5. Level 5.

"The detonation's started," Safu said, fear creeping into her voice. "We need to get out of the building."

All pain and confusion was shoved to the backburner as they ran for the elevator. Nezumi remembered vaguely that an elevator was the absolute worst place to get caught in during an emergency, but it was a little late for those kinds of thoughts.

They were just about all the way down, when the elevator jerked, making everyone inside stumble. Nezumi's blood ran cold.

You've got to be kidding…

The doors popped open, but they were misaligned with the floor, too high up, and the doors opened barely wide enough for a single person to slip through. The hallway beyond looked dim and fragile.

"You first, Nezumi," Shion said.

Nezumi was acutely aware of the gun still in Shion's hands. He glanced at him, but there was nothing in his expression to arouse immediate suspicion, and given the circumstances, a closer study was unwise. He squeezed through the doors, and Safu slipped out after him.

The floor was wet, and Nezumi skidded a little on it as he landed. He steadied himself against the wall and looked up. There was a body in the hallway, a man's. It was slumped over and he knew they were dead. The evidence was all over the floor and the wall. The profile of the man looked familiar. Nezumi's heart lurched, and he turned away.

The same moment, a thunderous explosion rocked through the building. Shion leapt from the elevator, just as it gave an irritable screech and plummeted downwards. Nezumi realized then that the air in the hall was thick, and although this floor seemed to be intact, he knew that something was on fire somewhere close.

Shion and Safu took the lead, moving as one toward the staircase at the end of the hall. Nezumi trusted that they knew where they were going. In order to get to the end of the hall, though, they would need to pass the body, and Nezumi couldn't help but look—and confirm.

Rashi.

His death was no tragedy, but it brought him no pleasure. A headshot… The shot was perfectly placed, instantly fatal. Either his executioner had been merciful or had really wanted him dead. He was wounded in the stomach, too, and that both complicated the motive and yet changed nothing.

But he had to know. With what feelings and intentions was this man killed? He gazed at Shion's back. How bad is it? Nezumi noticed that although Shion kept his course down the hall, Safu made a marked effort to circumvent the body.

Gray wisps were drifting up the stairs, so Nezumi thought he was prepared before they reached the bottom. The floor was littered with shards of glass, and here, too, there were traces of a violent encounter, but he could find no bodies. Smoke billowed out of nearly every room and there were flames flicking out of a few at the end. Somewhere, people were screaming.

Why is everything exploding?

The emergency alert boomed overhead. Another room blew outward, throwing glass and plastic into the air. Of course. All the computers were connected, to and from, the Mother. This being a top security building, the Mother would have an emergency detonation program, in the event that it was compromised. The virus had infected one computer and reached the Mother, setting off a chain command to self-destruct. All the computers would explode—and there were tons of them in this building, on every floor.

They needed to get the hell out before the entire building came down around them.

Something moved in the smoke. An officer bolted out of the now smoldering room, wheezing, dirty, and bleeding. It looked like he had been caught in the shrapnel burst from the shattered computer, but his injuries were by no means fatal.

He squinted at them and coughed. "Y-you… Evacuate…"

Nezumi tilted his head. The man must have been very disoriented if he had mistaken them for employees. Shion's arm twitched and something in the movement set off an alarm in Nezumi's head. Before he fully knew what he was doing, he darted in between the man and the gun that Shion had just raised to shoot.

"Shion, stop!"

"Nezumi!" Shion jerked the gun to the side, and, thankfully, it did not fire.

There was a clipped shout from behind Nezumi, followed by the hard slap of footfalls across the tiles.

"Don't do that!" Shion yelped. "This gun is very sensitive. I could've hurt you."

"Well then you better be extra careful, because I'm not moving until you calm down. What gives? That man wasn't even a threat." Shion bit his lip and looked over Nezumi's shoulder, presumably to where his target had escaped. Nezumi narrowed his eyes. "If you want to shoot someone so badly, shoot me."

Shion snapped his attention back to him. "Nezumi... Why would you—"

"You came here to protect me, right? You've done it. It's over."

"It's not over. We need to destroy the Correctional Facility."

"It's already self-destructing without your help. There's no need to shoot every person you come across."

Shion was looking at him like he couldn't understand a word he said. Nezumi's stomach twisted. Had he always been so stubborn and illogical?

"Didn't you say you never wanted to do this again?"

This affected Shion for a moment. His face pinched and he seemed to wrestle with his thoughts. But then he shook his head fiercely. "I have to. They're monsters, Nezumi. They've killed so many people, and for what? Experiments? To fulfill some kind of sick need for power? They murdered Yoming, Yamase, Kaze—everyone! They kidnapped you! If I don't get rid of them, it will never stop!"

Nezumi would be lying if he said he didn't on some level agree. The Correctional Facility was rotten and the people who worked in it, knowing the atrocities perpetuated there, deserved some kind of retribution. They cared only for themselves and their own advancement. Other people were just a means to an end, data in a chart or blood in a vial; they were things to be studied and picked apart.

But Shion doesn't think like that.

Spiteful words and condemnation were for other people, people like him, who had never thought highly of humanity and who had never known a hand that wasn't withdrawn when he needed it the most. But Shion was better than him and all the people in No. 6 put together.

Shion reached his hand out whether you asked for it or not, and he held fast. He treated people with respect and kindness, and people loved and respected him in return. It was he who argued for a positive solution where there was none to be found.

This isn't you, Shion. How can I make you remember?

"What about your Mama?"

Shion stiffened.

"What would she think if she saw you? Do you think this is what she would want? You're better than this, Shion."

Shion's eyes widened, and finally Nezumi caught a glimpse of the person he knew.

"Nezumi…" Shion sucked in a breath and lowered the gun. "What—What have I—"

The hope in Nezumi's heart flickered and died. This was not what he wanted either. All the anger and disgust was gone from Shion's expression, leaving only a small, terrified boy behind. Shion had only been able to run on that hatred, and now, stripped of it, he was crumbling.

Nezumi closed the gap between them and hooked a finger under Shion's chin. "Shion, you've got to keep it together. You can't shut down. Not here."

"I killed…" Shion was shaking so hard it was difficult to keep a hold on him. "I killed—oh god…" His breathing grew too erratic for him to speak, and he trailed off with a whimper.

Nezumi felt close to panic himself. Shion was less dangerous now, but this was not better.

"Shion, listen to me. You… you were protecting me. You did what was necessary—" Nezumi choked on the last word. It felt rotten in his mouth. He didn't mean to say that; he didn't want to say any of this.

But what else can I do? How can I make this okay?

Nezumi didn't think he could. He pried the rifle from Shion's grip, and after a moment of deliberation, put it on the floor. There was no need for it now.

"Safu, can you cover us?"

She had been watching him and Shion intently, her expression almost as distraught Shion's. But when Nezumi asked the question, she gnawed her lip and nodded with a fair amount of composure. He was relieved at her ability to compartmentalize.

Nezumi turned back to the petrified boy in front of him and tried to sound firm. "Hold on until we're out, Shion. I know you can do it…"

Shion didn't respond. Nezumi repeated his name, softer, but he just stared wide-eyed at the floor, without seeming to see anything. He reached out and grabbed Shion's hand. He came forward without resistance when pulled, but that faraway look remained. Nezumi nodded minutely to Safu, and, swiftly, she led them through the maze of corridors and stairs.

Every floor they passed through was chaos. Smoke and flame billowed out of the open doorways, and somehow there always seemed to be people screaming from far away.

Shion was dragged along behind him, a constant, distressing weight at the end of Nezumi's arm. The current crisis was a welcome distraction, a reasonable explanation for why he kept his eyes always forward, but he knew he would have to face Shion eventually. They would all have to face what had transpired and… and then what? Learn to live with it? Try to forget? These were nothing but clichés that had no idea what they were talking about, stock lines, provided for bystanders so they could feel like they had some wisdom to impart about the healing nature of time. Such vague advice could never make a dent in the experience of real tragedy. It was like putting a band-aid on a wound that needed stitches.

Nezumi squeezed Shion's limp hand in his, and he had never felt so helpless.

The instant they crossed the threshold into the loading bay, the Correctional Facility exploded. Nezumi was thrown bodily forward and landed hard on the dirt. For a moment, he couldn't hear anything but a low buzzing.

Elyurias?

But no. His ears were only ringing. He carefully pushed himself up onto his knees.

Shion. He searched, and found him just a little off to the side, looking dazed, but unharmed. He checked for Safu next. She had already scrambled to her feet and was running headlong for a car. Sound returned to Nezumi's ears with a painful pop, and he almost didn't notice, because the roar in his ears only changed in pitch. He glanced behind him.

The Correctional Facility was a pillar of smoke and fire. The heat rolled over him in waves, making his skin itch. He squinted at the wreckage and only one thought came to his mind: Elyurias wouldn't need to come. He had fulfilled his end of the bargain. The center of the injustices against Her and the Forest People would be nothing but cinders soon. An appropriate end; what started in flame ended in flame.

"I can't go back," said a small voice.

Shion had pushed himself up onto his knees, and he stared at the car Safu was heading for like it was a death sentence. He was fiddling with something at his side, but Nezumi couldn't see what. The heat from the burning building made it hard to keep his eyes open. He crawled closer to Shion, meaning to grab him and drag him over to the car.

"I've hurt so many people... How can I ever be forgiven?"

Nezumi froze. Shion had a gun in his hand.

How? Where?

These things didn't matter, because Shion had it, and he was lifting it up and up.

"How can I ever face her?"

Shion, what—

Shion raised the barrel toward his head.

Nezumi crashed into him.

"What the fuck, Shion?!" He ripped the gun from Shion's hand and chucked it as far as he could. Shion stared up at him numbly, as if the loss of his weapon was nothing, as if he was already dead. Nezumi buried his fists in the collar of Shion's coat. "You think killing yourself is going to make anything better? You're just killing another person!"

"I'm not as strong as you, Nezumi…"

"That's bullshit! Don't you dare—" His throat constricted and he felt the telltale burning behind his eyes.

Why?

He hadn't felt like this in years, not since he was four. He didn't remember it hurting this much. Shion's eyes watched him, but they were so far away and Nezumi didn't know how to reach them.

Shion turned his face aside. Nezumi fisted his hands tighter in Shion's coat. He wanted to hit him. He wanted to shake him for trying to do something so stupid, for making him feel like he was choking. But Shion looked so small and broken already, and he wasn't even trying to defend himself. The cheek he'd turned to face Nezumi was purpled with bruises, and Nezumi's heart ached.

Why did Shion come for him? He had never asked for his loyalty, for his devotion. But Shion had pledged these things to him despite everything he did to push him away. He never asked Shion to storm the Correctional Facility in search of him, to protect and kill for him. But he had, and in the end he still turned, blackened, bloodied, and bruised, and smiled with that naïve innocence Nezumi knew so well. It was too much to bear.

Shion, I don't know how to fix this.

Dirt crunched close by, and the car pulled up alongside them. The driver's door slammed and Safu was standing over them in seconds.

"What happened?" Her voice was uneven. "Shion?"

Nezumi didn't answer. She might've seen what happened, or she might not have. Either way, he wasn't going to say anything.

Nezumi tried to swallow the brewing emotion and gripped Shion's arm. "Help me get him in," he said, his voice sounding dry and cracked despite his best efforts.

Together they maneuvered Shion into the backseat of the car, and Nezumi climbed in next to him. A small guttural purr came from the far side of the car, and Nezumi spotted Yoming's crow nestled in the corner, watching them with glistening black eyes. How it came to be in the company of Shion and Safu, he didn't much think about, but it reminded him.

Tsukiyo. He looked back at the Correctional Facility. Had the mouse escaped? He had to assume it had; it had plenty of time to do so.

Safu began to drive and Nezumi returned his attention to the boy beside him. He had lapsed back into an unresponsive state. The blank expression of Shion's face scared him, and he could think of nothing else to do but pull Shion to rest his head against his shoulder. Shion's dark hair tickled his neck, and it smelled of smoke.

"How is he?" Safu said quietly.

It was a waste of a question, considering Shion had fallen catatonic, but Nezumi couldn't blame her for asking it. Instead of answering, he tried speaking to Shion. He said his name, but to no effect. He needed to fill the silence, though. It wouldn't do any of them good to be left with just their thoughts, Shion most of all. A distraction was necessary, and Nezumi knew only one that worked almost every time he'd used it: literature.

He searched his mind, but the longer he thought about it, the more distressed he became. Most of his reading hours had been reserved for Shakespeare. I can recite Macbeth and Hamlet, but those are horrible choices. Why did Shakespeare have to write so many tragedies about madness and death? Reciting a comedy felt like an equally insensitive decision. Nezumi grit his teeth. What else? Come on; think!

" 'High above the city, on a tall column, stood the statue of the Happy Prince,' " Nezumi began unsteadily. " 'He was gilded all over with thin leaves of fine gold, for eyes he had two bright sapphires, and a large red ruby glowed on his sword-hilt. He was very much admired indeed…' "

Here he faltered. He hadn't memorized this one. He had read The Happy Prince only twice, and he had only read it a second time because Shion had scoffed at his poor comprehension of the characters and plot. But he felt like he had to use this story. Shion had told him his mother read it to him often, so Nezumi knew if anything was likely to reach him, it was this book.

If I don't butcher the story completely, he thought miserably.

"One night there flew over the city a little Swallow. His friends had gone to Egypt six weeks earlier, but he had stayed behind… and after they had gone he felt lonely. He planned to fly over to Egypt, too, but he decided to rest at the feet of a statue for the night. As he lay, water dripped on his head, and thinking it was rain, he looked up angrily. The eyes of the Happy Prince were filled with tears, and tears were running down his golden cheeks. His face was so beautiful in the moonlight that the little Swallow was filled with pity."

Nezumi swallowed. Maybe this is a bad idea. The Prince and Swallow's story isn't exactly a happy one either.

"The Prince was crying because he had lived and died a pleasurable and happy life, but, as a statue, he could now see how many people had suffered, and still suffered, in his city while he was oblivious. He wanted to help them, but could not move from his pedestal. He asked the Swallow for help."

Nezumi caught Safu eyeing him in the rearview mirror. Her gaze was grateful. He forced himself to continue, filling in as best he could the portions he couldn't remember well.

"The Prince told the Swallow of a struggling seamstress. She needed to finish a rich lady's dress for a ball, but the seamstress's young son had a high fever, and she had spent all her time and money to nurse him back to health. The Prince begged the Swallow to take the ruby from his sword to her, so she might gain the means to help herself and her son. The Swallow did so, and prepared to leave for Egypt the next day, but the Prince begged him back.

"He told him of a playwright who was struggling to write a play for the king. 'I have no ruby now,' said the Prince; 'my eyes are all I have left. Pluck out one and give it to the playwright, so he might buy food and firewood enough to finish his play.' The Swallow could not refuse the sadness in the Prince's voice, so he obeyed, and even brought the Prince's remaining sapphire eye away to a match girl, who had failed to sell her wares, and would be beaten by her father if she came home empty-handed."

This retelling had no poetry or grace, but Nezumi reminded himself that he wasn't trying to impress anyone. Shion would appreciate that he tried, and he might even find the amateurish storytelling amusing. That is, if he's hearing a word I'm saying…

"The Swallow took the last jewel to the match girl, and watched her skip away happily. Then the Swallow came back to the Prince. 'You are blind now,' he said, 'so I will stay with you always.' 'No, little Swallow, you must go away to Egypt,' the Prince protested, however, the Swallow insisted. But there were still more poor and miserable people, and the Prince asked the Swallow to give them his gold gild so they might have a piece of happiness. Leaf after leaf of the fine gold the Swallow picked off, till the Happy Prince looked quite dull and grey. Leaf after leaf he brought to the poor, and the children's faces grew rosier, and they laughed and played in the streets. The winter grew colder… but the Swallow would not leave the Prince, he loved him too well..."

A lump was starting to form in Nezumi's throat. Shion hadn't moved or reacted the whole time. He decided not to finish the story, and the car lapsed into terrible silence.

"Are we supposed to be going somewhere?" Safu said at last. "I've just kind of been… driving…"

Nezumi glanced out the window. Safu had made a straight getaway through the front of gate of the Facility, and if they didn't change course they'd drive straight into the wall of No. 6. He didn't know where they should go. The West Block was probably in shambles. The recent disaster should have calmed the murderous mobs, and he doubted they—or rather he, since it had started because of him—would be in much danger if they returned. He didn't want to take Shion back to that, though. He had seen enough tragedy for one day; they all had. What they needed was somewhere quiet.

Something moved at the corner of Nezumi's vision, and he caught the crow sidling up to Shion. It pecked his coat a few times and then climbed its way up onto his arm to start preening his hair.

Nezumi wrinkled his nose and was about to shoo it away, when he remembered the camera it wore. If it hadn't been damaged, it contained some damning evidence against the Security Bureau. Nezumi narrowed his eyes at the little piece of machinery, vengeful thoughts playing at the corners of his mind. He had always wanted to see the city burn, but so far he had only seen part of it go up in flames. It was time to finish the job.

He met Safu's eye in the mirror. "The Information Bureau."

"…In No. 6?"

Nezumi nodded.

"Why?"

"We have a message to deliver to the city."

"Right…" she said slowly. Nezumi wondered if she thought he had somehow lost it, too. But the possibility of two of her friends being unstable was a terrible thought, so she continued as though she considered him sane and in the process of hatching a plot. "Okay. But how do we get in?"

"How'd you get in last time?"

"The sewers."

Nezumi made a bit of a face. That wouldn't do. Shion would be impossible. "The same way we got out last time?" he suggested as an alternative.

He saw Safu raise her eyebrows. "That's hardly inconspicuous."

"We don't really have time for inconspicuous."

Safu didn't say anything, but Nezumi could hear the hum of the car grow louder as they accelerated toward the wall of No. 6.