This is the final chapter. I'm sorry if you don't get it or are confused at the end but there is almost no way I can really explain this. It's merely a by product of my mind while mulling over the CSI episode I saw last week. I hope you enjoy the conclusion...

Death Knocks Twice: Part 2

Another rough sputtering cough and Neji blinked, coming back from the memory to the current time. It was too much to be real. He wished he would wake up but knew better then that as he ran his shaking fingers through her light hair tangled with twigs, dirt and clotting blood.

She clenched her blue eyes closed in pain as she suppressed the coughing with difficulty and blinked back her tears. She couldn't lose it now, not in front of him. She didn't want to hurt him by having to see that. This was enough pain to endure at the moment…

Jen tightened her fingers around his hand pressed to the rip in her side and breathed roughly, the spiking tension was making it almost impossible to talk but somehow she found words. "Guess I wasn't fast enough this time huh?" She started simply.

He didn't know how to respond. Here she lay smiling and joking has her pulse weakened against him. Neji could feel it through the blood pushing between his fingers so rapidly. "Yeah…" He choked, voice not sounding like his own in any sense.

Jenina coughed again, weaker this time and smiled sickeningly. Eyes hooking to his while he tried to think. Their teammates were gone, they were out in the middle of nowhere, and the blood just wouldn't stop! It was only the will to help Jen through this that Neji kept from panicking completely.

Knowing full well he was struggling with the harsh situation Jen could think of nothing to do. Was it really her place to be comforting him or should it be the other way around? In her mind it didn't matter, other people had always come first. So whether wrong or right, she turned towards him and set her arm around his back, too weakened at this point to pull herself closer.

Neji clenched his fists to stop their shaking and pulled Jen to him, raising her onto his lap as he crouched in the dirt. His memory flashed and he saw her in this same posture, holding a dieing little girl she didn't even know so tenderly…

It was if the door had been unlocked, he suddenly knew what he was supposed to do. It all made sense. He shifted his grip and held her tight as he dared, then slowly started to rock back and forth in a simple rhythm.

The tension lifted drastically and he calmed almost instantly, the situation didn't matter anymore, the warm crimson soaking into his shirt was trivial. All that mattered was right now, right here, in this simple affectionate action.

Jen smiled into his chest softly. She never thought that they would be in this position or that he would do this for her but it didn't matter. Nothing else mattered but still she spoke up, afraid that she wouldn't be able to talk again unless she spoke now. With a shuddered breath she stated, "I…sure am going to miss, all this." It was difficult and her wound protested with another shot of infliction.

Neji continued the pattern and ran his hand from her forehead to the base of her neck, gently picking out bits of leaves and twigs from her tangles as he went. The small genuine expression could not have been any more sincere as he smiled and sighed in her ear. "No…you won't." He said, finally understanding another aspect of this girl he grew to call a mystery. It was such a tragedy though, that he could only be enlightened through this manner.

Taking another deep calm breath, Neji picked a tune and started to hum gently in her ear, swaying back and forth to the beat as she closed her eyes peacefully, accepting the darkness tearing at her body as Neji continued to hold her.

It was with that calm sense of caring and understanding Jenina left this world but Neji continued to rock, hum, and stroke until he felt her final heartbeat faded to nothing.

At first he didn't want to look at her, he was afraid of what he would see but it was quickly swept aside and he let his grip go enough to look down at her stilled body. As with the child he had recalled earlier, Jen's face was in such a relaxed place he almost thought her to be asleep instead of dead but he knew better then to wish for that kind of hope now.

With a chaste kiss Neji shifted her to the ground and folded her arms, unconsciously now copying her actions from his memory. And with a final look he stood and glanced her over again.

Had he at anytime before now faced this he probably would have broken down immediately. He had never lost a teammate before now but it was odd how light his heart felt. No guilt, no remorse, no questions at all.

He smiled and kneeled to untie her forehead protector to take back to the village. 'Now I understand. It doesn't hurt because I know I did everything I could do at the time. There was no other way I could have wanted that to end so I leave here with no pain…' Neji stood straight and gripped the cool metal I his hand. "Thank you Jenina…at last I've solved your mystery…" He said to the dead clearing and walked away with a lighter mind, only to look back once with a final smile.

The End.