The room was cold, a listless reminder of where Kouzu was. Everything within him wept. He was a saddened shell of his former glory; a boy turned to ash when he realized the one thing in his entire existence… the only human being to have ever meant a damn thing in his life… was lying there, on that frigid bed without a hope in hell of ever waking up.

Her heart-rate monitor bleeped every few seconds, the dancing line becoming her thread to life was now hanging precariously in the balance, waiting haphazardly above the Fate’s sharpened scissors that were poised to snuff her out.

No hope.

That was what they had said, they’re unfeeling words burying themselves like red hot daggers to his soul, tearing him apart until he could feel no more, yet the tears wouldn’t stop. He begged her, pleaded with the pretty blonde before him to wake up. To flash her sky-blue eyes on him one more time. There was no world beyond this room, no world that existed save the one with her in it. Without his lover; this planet, this world, this life, this existence meant nothing more than a passing breeze in the harsh throes of winter. She was everything to him, meaning more than the very air he breathed.

His heard himself sob harder, burying his face deeper into his free hand while the other clutched frantically to her limp, waxen appendage. If this was the end for her, then it too would be his end. No one would love him as she did. No heart could feel for a monster like him as she had grown to. No one could ever be her.

He looked to the ceiling, his mind a whirl of racing thoughts, all of which encompassed this young woman lying mutely in front of him, “please, God.” His voice could barely make it above a strained whisper, vocal cords raw from crying and screaming hours before.

“I’ve never asked you for anything in my life. Please, God… Please,” he was in tears again, the crystalline liquid carving rivets down his cheeks, “don’t take her from me.”

Not a moment later, the infuriating, life-ending sound of Vanessa’s monitor flat-lining filled Kouzu’s ears. A kind of freezing dread sunk beneath the surface of the young man’s heart, encasing it in a sheet of icy glass. His long fingers clutched hopelessly to her hand as a flurry of white coated doctors and nurses blurred into the room, struggling to bring their charge back to life. They fought to yank Kouzu back, his tight grip whitening his knuckles, but he couldn’t hold on. Just as she couldn’t hold onto life, he couldn’t hold onto her hand.

He watched in vivid slow motion as her pretty, rainbow polished fingernails flopped back to her side, lifeless and void of warmth. She wasn’t going to wake up wake, not this time… and inwardly Kouzu felt himself die.