So this chapter is a bit short, but I thought it inappropriate to add anymore than what was here. This scene deserved the isolation of its own chapter. I think you'll agree when you read it. I think I wrote this one well enough, but considering how important it it, I'm still a tad worried about whether I did an adequate job. Fingers crossed I pulled it off!

I present to you chapter 23 of Mockingbird.

Unbearable! The heat is unbearable!

But wait...there's something else besides heat. Scratch that. There's a lot else. My hands, my legs….my legs.

The past few seconds flood back to me as I pry open my watery eyes. I must've blacked out when I fell, but now that I'm regaining awareness, I can't help but pay attention to how acute the pain in my leg is. My arms scrape on jagged edges of wood, but I manage to lift myself up enough to glance back at my legs. What I see triggers my gag reflex.

One of my legs is trapped, if not crushed, but it's the other that sickens me. As if the glass stabbing my foot earlier wasn't enough anguish, this time, splintered wood has pierced the fatty part on the back of my left leg, digging into it more every time I shift even slightly.

I clench my fingers into fists. My mouth opens to scream, but the agony of the sight and feel proves strangulating. I can't move. There's no way I'll be able to free myself like this, and if I can't free myself, then the fire…

Oh, god! Oh god, oh god, oh god! I'm going to die!

But I can't! Right? I've got so much of my life to live! I just turned eighteen! I'm not even a legal adult yet in this country! I promised Mom I wouldn't let anyone dear to her die! And I have to make sure Hanako got out okay!

But if...if I could shoot that first little girl so easily….if I could kill her when she was so young, then why not? Why do I deserve to live any more than she does? And what about that adulterous couple? Sure, they weren't young, or innocent, but they were human lives! And look at how quickly, how simply I snuffed them out. I might've had a reason, but if I die right here, right now, then what's the difference? We'd all be corpses!

I bury my face in my hands. So this is it. I only have until the fire gets to me. If this is what it comes to, then what was the point of the past month? Did I really kill three people just for a day of seeing Hanako again? I'm horrible! To choose a day over the lives of three others! And I'd been so resolved when I did it, too! I thought it'd all be worth it, no matter how selfish, just as long as I could meet her again, but if this is it, then….

But she probably got out just fine, right? At least she's safe, yeah? And Haise will make sure Mom is treated right. With any luck, she'll be released quickly. Hanako won't make any contact with her unneededly, so they'll find no more evidence to incriminate her with and lose reason to keep her. Even if I'm not there the two of them will be fine!

Of course, I was all Mom had...after dad abandoned her...and if Hanako hadn't had me back when her only parent was caught by the doves, who knows how long it would have taken for her to get over her depression? But then again, wasn't it my fault he got caught in the first place? If Hanako hadn't had to protect me, she wouldn't have released her kagune, and people might've never figured out she was a ghoul, and her dad might never have been found!

Then was I the one who caused her all of this pain? Is it my fault? All those nights she spent crying by herself...that was my fault? How could I have done that to her? Maybe it's for the best if I die. Neither she nor Mom will have to worry about me anymore. Yeah, it'll be okay.

It's okay if I disappear here.

"You seem to be a crier, I've noticed."

I stiffen, then hack into my hands. Once the fit has passed, I point my watering eyes upwards. I then startle when I see what appears to be none other than the grim reaper looming above me. Then I register the piercings glittering in the wavering light of the fire, the tattoos swirling about his bare arms, and the familiar half head of hair pulled back away from his face. He leans down in front of me, looking me in the eye.

"You look like you've gotten yourself into quite the predicament."

Unsure if he's real or a hallucination, I don't respond and just gape at the ghoul.

"Were you even going to try to get out? It almost looks like you've given up."

It takes a piece of burning wood to fall from the ceiling to snap me from my stupor. Even then, I find I can only manage four words. "M-My leg. I can't."

He cocks his head, waiting. "Aren't you going to ask me for help?"

Ask him for help? There's no way he's actually here, right? Why would he be? He's got no way of knowing I'd be here. Even if he did, there's no way he'd risk the fire just to come and fetch a human like me. He's not the type to throw himself at possible death….I think….well, actually, I could see it. But he still wouldn't bother with me. Even if he isn't afraid of danger, he's not the type to get involved. So he must not actually be here. He must be an illusion.

"Why him?" I mumble under my breath. "Of all the people I could be seeing right now, why him?" Hanako couldn't possibly have been right about me liking him, but….

"Kiyoko, do you plan on dying here?"

I once again bury my head in my hands. "What choice do I have? I can't get out like this! I'm probably already dying from blood loss or something, if I'm hallucinating."

"Do you think I'm a hallucination?"

I can't help but laugh out loud at that, but the laughter gets cut off abruptly by a cough. "Of course you are. Why would you ever bother coming all this way for me?"

"I see. So you're prepared to die here."

"Guess so," I sniff.

"But you're scared."

I lift my head. "Of course I am! I'm terrified! I'm not ready, but then, who is? I'm sure Chisa wasn't ready to die when I shot her! How is this any different?"

"You have the choice to survive. She didn't."

"A choice? Just shut up. Go away. I don't want to hear it. I'm resigned because I have no choice! So stop trying to make me hopeful! It'll just make it more painful when I die!"

"I can't leave."

"Sure you can. You're only an illusion."

"I can't leave because you're crying."

I gulp, hands quivering as I reach up to wipe the wetness from my cheeks. "There, there's proof you're nothing more than my imagination. Uta, you'd never say something like that."

"You're the one who kissed me, Kiyoko."

I groan. "Why must you remind me when I'm at death's door?"

"Why must you be so adamant that it's your time?" he returns.

"Because it is," I growl. This hallucination just has to be as infuriatingly unfazeable as the real thing! "There's no way I could stand the pain of pulling the beam out of my leg, no way I could walk with that injury, and no way I could get past the fire on this floor to get outside! I'm just done!"

"But if you could get out, would you?"

"I can't!"

"Would you?"

"Do you even need to ask?" I huff.

"So you want to live?"

"Stop asking already! Stop trying to make me waver! I may not be ready, but I'm resolved! Leave me be, Uta!"

"Do you want to live?"

I clap my hands over my ears, the sudden motion yanking my speared leg and eliciting a cry from my mouth. "Uta, please!"

My muscles tense when gentle hands pry my hands from my head. He can touch me? How far gone am I that my hallucination can touch me?

"Kiyoko," he persists, his voice lacking the urgency one would normally have, "there isn't much time for you to decide. The fire is close, so tell me if you want to live. If you want to die, then I will leave you. Just know that burning alive is one of the worse ways to go."

"Christ, Uta! I don't want to die, alright?"

"Then let's prevent that."

"Uta, just-" My breath catches when he grabs me under the arms and begins to lift. Pain bolts through my leg and my breath is shoved out from me with a scream. My tears flow harder, which I hadn't thought possible, as the wood rips back through the tendon. The agony makes me dizzy as he settles me into his arms, made worse by the coughing fit the smoke in my lungs invokes. Black spots swim in my vision as I struggle to make out Uta's face as he begins to walk. He doesn't even look at me.

It vaguely occurs to me as I gasp for breath that there's no way a hallucination could carry me, but the thought barely manages to cross my mind before the world goes dark.

So? What'd you think? Did I pull it off? I spent a loooong time on the conversation...heck, I spent a ton of time on this entire chapter. Strange how so much time can be poured into such a short chapter. So, the end is coming. I'm sure I told you this last chapter, but I really mean it! I've warned you, so please don't be surprised! Ah, but I'm nervous. I'm nervous about how you guys'll receive the ending. It felt like an ending to me, so I ended it there, but originally I'd actually planned a whole other chapter after the next one. So many emotions! We'll just have to see how it plays out when the time comes!

Till then, Kisses from SnowyNeko! MEOW!