Demetri scoops up my limp body quickly, speeding off without giving me the chance to see anything more. At last glance, Noah looked horrible. His clothes are stained with blood and I could see his face getting paler.

My Handler's pace is brisk, panicked, and almost more harmful than anything. I can't help but lean into his warmth and try to relax, knowing we'd been bought a few hours of time.

He slows down a few hallways away and meets my gaze. "How are you holding up?"

I have no words, shaking my head.

Nodding slowly, we close the distance to my room. Demetri lays me down on the bed, careful enough to put a pillow under my neck and peel off the excessive parts of my suit. With the door shut, he removes his boots and tucks them beside the dresser. Demetri's movements are calculated, adjusting himself next to me. He raises both hands over my chest, silver light dimly glowing from his hands.

Swirls of numb waves wash over me at first, eventually reverting to the freezing sensation of pain cream. I shiver a little in response. The power combs through all my cells, repairing everything tired and or damaged from all the fighting. Even with this coursing through me, exhaustion sits heavy atop my frame, keeping me down.

My disorientation repairs itself in deep full breaths, helping me focus.

"Please tell me it's not tonight," I murmur, a few tears streaking from the corner of my eyes and into my hair and ears.

He shakes his head, eyes closed in concentration.

"Dem-"

"No, it's not tonight."

I sigh, letting go of the last fear I'd been hiding from.

"I wanted to say goodbye..."

The man tenses like I've never seen before, eyes flickering open with a ferocity unlike that of any look given to me. "What are you talking about?"

"Tomorrow... I was so worried I wasn't going to have a chance to say goodbye before tomorrow."

He swallows, tucking his hands in his lap loosely and staring at me in shock. "Holiday I-"

"Just hear me out," I whisper, reaching out and grazing his shin. "I don't want to win enough that I'm willing to take your life. I don't even know if I want to go back, it's just not worth it compared to the stake everyone else has. Noah's wife needs him more than anyone needs me. You deserve to breathe. To live whatever life you have here. I'd want to live it here even..."

"Holly you don't know what you're talking about," he snaps. "What about your mother, your lover, the people who care for you dearly? The boy who gave his very life for you here, for you to carry on. This is ridiculous, you can't just bend over and die now."

"Demetri, I can't kill you. I'm weak, weaker than you to say the least. But even if I could, I don't have the heart..."

"You must," Demetri growls, jolting away from me and getting up. He looks as if he's about to start pacing or throw something out the window. "You must because if not, I will have to kill you. I don't get a choice... And I can't live- I can't exist with that on my conscience."

"Why not?"

His eyes fixate on my own, body walking him closer to me. "Why must you talk to me like I'm human, like I have something to live and breathe for in this world?"

"I don't know..."

"Why do you try to understand me? Learn about who I am?"

"I'm not sure..."

"I think you do, I think you know some part of it at the very least. What makes you unable to kill me? Forget strength, forget inability or fear. Forget that you don't know your own limits. What is stopping you?"

I take a long hard look at him and attempt to sit up, only managing to prop myself on my elbows. "I'm human. I have a human heart, I love to easy and fall too fast, I get hurt. Constantly. I don't feel like half of us deserved to die, but I don't feel as though you or Atticus should either. No one should be dying... Not today, not tomorrow. None of us."

"Why?"

"Because I care, I care about all of you now, is that some crime?"

Demetri's eyes grow polluted with grief and sadness, gaze roving the room and averting from my own. "Here, perhaps."

"I refuse to feel bad for wanting the people I care about to live."

This rattles him, the shaken look spreading from his face to the entirety of his body. Soundlessly he helps me sit up the rest of the way, parting his lips to speak yet failing to do so. An inner war battles there, fighting for an answer I cannot see.

Demetri's eyes finally focus on mine, narrowing in. "What are you going to do about it then?"

"I'll figure it out," I say. My confidence is waning, my heart aching and unsure. But when I speak these words my eyes harden, steeling with the truth behind them. I am scared, petrified even. But I will figure this out.

His sarcastic smile stops the pounding in my chest, a laugh as cold as ice to follow. "You could always kill him."

"Him?"

"Death."

I shudder. "That's a suicide mission, it has to be impossible."

"Nothing with a heart is impossible to kill, Holiday. Though it might not look it, everyone here is rather easy to end. You simply have to be smarter. Of course, I have to agree. It does sound like a fool's errand."

"But you're saying it's possible?" My brain spins with all the weird possibilities and everything that it might come to bring upon the person who tried.

"To kill The Misogynistic Wonder? Yes-" we stare at each other for a moment, but the sarcasm leaves his lips replaced by something more concerned and skeptical- "I was being sarcastic."

"I know," I reply, peering down at my body to see clean skin beneath dirty ribbons of leather. "What would happen if someone killed him?"

"The soul realms would be in ruins, I suppose. With no one to claim the throne, no hierarchy to sustain the power driven ecosystem, a frenzied war would amass."

"And if said person wanted to assume the role?"

His eyes narrow once again. "They would be an idiot to try such a thing. They'd have to drink straight from his heart and manage to sway the thoughts and opinions of every higher power beyond him. To become a God essentially cursed to watch over Heaven and Hell."

I nod, pretending my mind thinks of it as nothing but a hypothetical.

The one person I wouldn't cower from ending, the one being that could end this all if he chose to. A devious, malicious God with no heart except for the one beating in that ancient chest.

Swinging it would be insanely dangerous.

I'd lose any chance of human freedom.

But I didn't want to go through everything all over again, with the loss, pain and grief tucked away. Still scarred on earth with each and every memory.

I close my eyes and take another deep breath.

Without thinking, I go to take off my torn clothes and pull on some of the old jeans I'd had during my life. The Reaper respectfully diverts his attention to the closed balcony, clearly discontent with our conversation.

Once dressed in something cleaner, I turn to face him again.

"Do not say goodbye unless it is the last breath on your lips," he states, an edge of anger masking the dread I know is hiding.

"Fine," I mutter. "Should we go back to Dinner?"

He shrugs, going to grab his boots and kicking them on against one of the moldings. "It wouldn't seem we have a choice in the matter."

Total Word Count: 22,367

Dun dun. Dun dun. Dun dun na nun na nun.

The shark music coming for the end of a magical and wonderful story with lots to see still yet to come. Stay tuned to see everything I have in store. Just a couple chapters left now, though I am terribly sorry this one is so short. 

Have an awesome night guys!