I think my bestfriend is going to die and I don't know what to do, he wants to say, but instead tugs on a weary smile, pulls his knee closer to his chest, and nods again.

The boy with a heart of fire is not a boy anymore.

This is what Killua realizes, after Pitou dies and then Pitou's residual nen dies and time starts moving again.

He had gone in expecting this to be as far from ideal as humanly possible (Gon, dead; Pitou, smiling), but somehow this is infinitely worse (Gon, gone; Pitou, beyond recognition).

When he looks at Gon ('s flickering shadow) his chest burns as if his rib cage and lungs have been punctured and collapsed in on themselves. Like he's was drowning, gasping for air (clarity).

//

I'm alright, Gon says softly, in a voice like ocean waves.

No, Killua thinks, no no no no no. His legs have sprouted roots and sunk themselves into the Earth; he cannot move.

Trembling lips move in cinematic slow motion to form a mottled whisper of words: "Ja, ken-"

"Gon!" Killua screams so hard his voice shatters like rose colored glass.

"-gu."

And then Pitou is dead and crumpled on the uneven forest floor, body pummeled until flesh and bone coalesce into a lapis lazuli-blue mess, the remaining tendrils of weak nen clinging to their jigsaw puzzle form like the last vestiges oder daylight; and then the forest is sleepy and sonorous, the quiet buzz of cicadas slowly filling the cool night air; and thaen Gon is Gon again, yet at the same time entirely different, no longer strange, unfamiliar cheekbones and a form too powerful for one thirteen years old boy but still blurred around the edges like something from another world.

The force of the blast sends Killua flying backwards past columns of trees that scrape at his exposed skin, ragged red dripping languidly down his cheeks and shoulders.

The moment his feet touch the ground he is off again, freewheeling through swathes of twilight towards the graveyard-clearing, towards broken enemies and skin stained the color of cheap wine, uncertainly making his clenched fists shake and his stomach twist into unpleasant, tight knots.

When he reaches the detonation site, Killua thinks with a jolt that Gon is Gon again-almost, sort of, but not really. His hair is a sweeping spill of darkness across his motionless form, winding over small, small shoulders and curving around narrow wrists like a bed of funeral flowers the color of midnight. Everything is back the way it should be. Pitou is dead (defeated). Gon is triumphant (defeated). Killua has alarm bells ringing in his ears and cymbals crashing down on his thoughts (afraid, so, so afraid).

Is he okay? Is he okay? Gon, Gon are you okay? Can you hear me?

Killua wants to touch him, wants to press a finger to the inside of his wrist or throw an arm around his neck, but what if there is no pulse where moonbeams alight on freckled skin, what if it is cold where ice inter-penetrates still waters? Heart hammering like a sledgehammer, he kneels down beside Gon, reaches out across stretches of unlit sky and circles his wrist with two fingers.

-and the weak pulse that flickers like the beat of a butterfly wing under Gon's skin is the most beautiful song Killua has ever heard.

//

Gon remains bone-cold and promise-quiet even as Killua gently lifts him off the ground, brushes dirty and leaves of his clothes, maneuvers him onto his back. His hair, unlike the rest of him does not retreat into itself and vanish like a dream; it slides slickly down Gon's back and wraps crow black arms around Killua's neck, and he can't help but feel like he is suffocating, like each breath is being pulled through waterlogged lungs and coming out as nothing more than a tiny, high-pitched whistle.

So Killua tries to loosen the noose around his neck, piling the black tresses high on his shoulders and bunching them up, but it tumbles back down all around him with every half-hearted attempt. The thick strands of hair are too heavy in his hands (too heavy for Gon), and they feel alien, plastic, artificial.

He wants to cut it all off.

But Killua doesnt. Instead, he let's it drag behind them like the train of an elaborate black dress (funeral marker) as he carries Gon out of the woods.

//

Upon returning to the palace Killua learns of the chimera ant king's inescapable demise, of Netero's sacrifice, of this "triumph" that has everyone chiming in to form a relentless chorus of relieved sighs, rising and falling with the lull of night.

We've won, the tired voices tell him. Despite everything, they're smiling.

Killua wonder why the the sweet taste of victory has left him bereft of even the will to keep breathing.

//

"Gon-is he, will he be okay?" Killua asks quietly.

The doctor chews on her lower lip, alerts his searching gaze.

"Well. . . We've never had a case quite like this before, and to be honest even the doctors here don't really-"

"Will he be okay?" He repeats, softer.

Something about the candid determination (plaintive resignation) in Killua's voice draws her eyes back to his. She clears her throat, swivels her chair around to face him properly. In the doctor's eyes Killua reads a wordless apology; in his eyes she sees a gallimaufry of burnt-out emotion.

"We're not sure."

//

"You should take a rest! Go to sleep, catch a few winks. I'll watch over Gon for you, if you'd like," Knuckle grins down at him, and the glow he radiates is suddenly too much sunshine and too much warmth , to Killua who has known only bleary hospital lights for the last few days.

Killua blinks the sleep (sun-glare) out of his eyes, nodding along propitiatingly. "Thanks, but I'm alright."

Peering down at him with his eyebrows scrunched together, Knuckles frowns. "You look like you haven't slept in days. Are you really okay?" His tone is balanced precariously between skeptical and concerned.

I think my bestfriend is going to die and I don't know what to do, Killua wants to say, but instead he tugs on a weary smile, pulls his knee closer to his chest, and nods again.

"Yeah."

//

Once Killua catches a glimpse of Gon when the nurses are changing his bandages.

By now he's replayed the events of that day at least a hundred times over in his head. He can recall every miniscule detail, from the too-light weight of Gon on his back to the way blood spurted to easily from the stump of Gon's arm. The taste of iron lingers on his lips like a ghost's fleeting touch.

So when the nurse dressed in bleach white stepped past Killua with rolls of gauze and linen he follows her movements until he is up against the glass wall that separates Gon from the rest of the hospital wing, the tip of his nose pressed flat against the smooth, cold surface.

He watches with child-wide eyes as a nurse lifts one closely mummified and slowly begins to unwrap the bandages, layer after layer after layer of dove-white falling away like snow melting in the sun until there are no more layers to peel away until all that is left underneath is

-a hand, a wrist, an arm, bone dry and brittle like the gnarled branches of a tree.

For a moment, Killua forgets how to breathe. Gon's- this is Gon, he reminds himself vehemently, this is what you failed to prevent, this is what you did to him-arm is so, so thin, it looks like it will snap with the slightest movement. Everything is bad, bad, bad, worse than he'd imagined.

His vision blurs; swallowing hard, he tears his gaze away from the ward (away from Gon).

And this is when Killua realizes fully, for the second time, that boy with the heart of fire is not a boy anymore.

My bestfriend is going to die and there's nothing I can do.

He feels sick to his stomach.