The room was still, quiet and empty. There was no soft moonlight to cast through the small enforced windows and the stars pinpoints were lost behind murky clouds. In total darkness, the young man lay; sweat beading on his forehead like blooming buds. His chest rose and fell under the thin sheet in the steady but weak rhythm of sleep. What nightmares caused his brow to furl wasn't too great of a mystery. The red iron hot bands of the curse were bright against his pallid skin. It was pulsing with the life of the Master's heart, slowly constricting its captor's life force.

To him, the scene was played out as if by soft candle light. There was little a vampire could miss in even the blackest of pitch. Night had always been such a kind bondage to its children.

Tsuzuki watched him, attracted and repelled by the warm smell of his beloved mortal. Since the very first time the emerald eyed imp had intoxicated him with such a show of passion and drive, the vampire always wondered if the thrill wasn't the fact he could rob such a fire with none but a kiss of his fangs. There was a type of poetry to snuffing out the candle's light before it could fade. That way, in memory, one would always recall its brightness, never its failing.

But such thoughts were short lived, mere flights of a weak will. Never once had he drank from this one, fearing that the frail hold he managed over the boy's empathy would break. He never wanted to know what this one would see when he looked into his soul. Nothing would destroy him as completely nor make him as complete.

"Hisoka."

The sleeping form stirred, the blonde hair stuck to his forehead as his head turned to look around the room. He couldn't see anything without the kind lending light, those beloved eyes remained unfocused, glazed over with the drugs he had been fed to fight the continuous fever.

"Hisoka."

The name glided on the silence, parting it like a hand that drew the boys face in the direction in which Tsuzuki stood, a shadow against shadows.

The boy's tension drained from him, replaced by a look of the faintest relief and recognition. He settled his head back against the sweat-dampened pillows. "Oh, it's you. I was wondering how long it would take you to show up here, uninvited, might I add."

"I find it amazing that even short of breath, you can sound like such an imp. Is that anyway to greet a concerned friend?"

Hisoka's brow furled, his eyes squinting in the darkness towards the formless voice. "Don't flatter yourself. My illness," he paused, drawing in a hard won breath, "is none of your business. Softer than the silence engulfing him, loneliness, like a faint perfume drifted against his senses. "Tsuzuki?"

-Despair-

"It is my business." Came the reply, conveying with it the stronger scent of morose.

Hisoka made to rise up from his bed, gripping the pillows more like they were constraints to be freed from than objects of comfort. "Why can I sense what you're feeling?" He asked, eyes closing from the pain, part real, part sensed.

-Defeat-

"It's harder to shield from a clouded mind. Ironically so." Footsteps fell in the darkness, drawing closer to the bed. Hisoka could sense the movement and for reasons he couldn't grasp, he felt an unrational fear for the older man. It grew with each step, growing in his mind, until he screamed; "Don't touch me!" /Don't make me feel it/

Tsuzuki drew back his hand, instead choosing to kneel at the side of the bed.

"Please…don't touch me…" Hisoka breathed, inching away from the feelings collecting next to him until his side pressed against the cold wall. "I never…felt it from you." He closed his eyes tight, causing the unshed tears to flow down his cheeks.

"Hisoka…"

"The severity of your emotions pierces my soul. What are you that I never felt this…this before? No human could live with that crushing their hearts, it's madness you breathe."

Tsuzuki rocked back on his heels, resting his weight against the backs of his shoes. He lowered his head, closing his eyes from the sight of the boy's tears. "I'm sorry. No matter what you think, you must understand. It is my business. No matter what has passed between us before now, you are my business. I seemed doomed to forever bring innocent souls to feed my master." A heartbroken smile, deep as a scar and as shallow as a reflection, crossed his face like an after thought. "And no, no human could live with such pain. That, I believe, is one of the reasons my master gave me a heart that could not be crushed, no matter what the cost to my soul."

Across from him, the breathing had picked up in speed. He could hear the heart frantic inside of him, knowing that it beat now only at the grace of his master.

Frozen in that moment, it was crystal clear. His redemption sat dying across from him, the way his sister had, the way everything he had ever believed in had. Slowly, painfully, and he, he had wanted so badly to do anything, stood unable to act.

/I can't save him. I can't save anyone./

Behind him, the shadows seemed to pull to the corner, condensing in on themselves until the small reflection of glasses peered out from the darkest point.

/He's damned to die. There isn't anything I can do./ The kneeling figure lower his head further, cupping his face with his hands.

/You can't see the strength in yourself./

Out loud, Tsuzuki laughed softly. "I know just what kind of strength rests in me. Don't for a second fool yourself that it is a noble thing."

"Who are you talking to?" There was anger in that familiar voice now. Anger that thinly veiled feared and confusion.

/He dies then, a sacrifice for yourself pity./

"I can't do this thing that you ask me! Should he die simply because the devil saw in him something worth admiring?" Warm arms wrapped around him, embracing him. If Hisoka could see his newest guest, Tsuzuki couldn't guess. Time had seemed slow, as if he had all the time to feel the hands pulling his away from his covered face. Centuries of time to stop the velvety cool hands from lifting his face away from his chest, to slowly reveal to his tear stained eyes the boy cowering in the corner before him. Endless time to understand the words whispered against his ear. Silent words, meant only for him, words that smelled of the grave.

"He's already dead, Tsuzuki. But you see life in him still, don't you? Under that soft, oh so soft skin, you see the life trapped. You see the heart beating within the one the Master carved." The hands dropped away from his face, leaving cold prints lingering on his flushed cheeks.

"Do what you want. Give him true death or torture him and yourself for however long the master deems fit. I have already done too much."

In the silence that followed, Tsuzuki watched himself raise up like one would watch a stranger. Those weren't his hands moving to rest on the edge of the bed. It wasn't his face lowering towards the youths, breathing in his fear like the most delicate of scents. It couldn't possibly be his lips kissing the dream that was his neck. The shadow lord had been right; he could feel the life fighting under the burning fever that was his master's power. So close, its throbbing pulse caused the flesh to hit against his eager mouth, over and over again.

It seemed like he had forever, forever bathed in that warmth.

/…no…please…/