Chapter Text
Time had always passed strangely for Death, given his immortality and the sheer length of his lifespan.
The days he’d spent with Geno, however, seemed to stretch on a lifetime. And he liked that. The god tried to burn every fragment of a moment into his memory, knowing that sooner or later, this would end. Geno was still very much mortal - or at least, he was now - and all mortal things died. He didn’t dare try and see how long he had left, choosing instead to live as though they had all the time in the world to prove, over and over, their care for one another.
They were happy. They were so incredibly happy he had trouble putting it to words. It was not perfect, and he suspected it never would be. But it didn’t matter. The good outweighed the bad a million to one. Even Death, coming to know emotion like this only a short while ago, could confidently say he was happier than he’d been in quite a long time.
That was why, when it all came crashing down, it was nearly a fatal blow.
Everything had seemed normal. He’d been visiting as often as he could, given that his job could not be ignored, and rarely went long without at least swinging by to say hello.
Then one day, Geno wasn’t there.
It wasn’t like an ‘oh, he’s away at the moment, come back later.’ It wasn’t a ‘he’s busy,’ or ‘he’s upset at you and needs space.’
No one knew where he was. No one had seen him.
It was silence and emptiness and a feeling deep inside him that something was horribly wrong.
Death didn’t rest for days, then weeks… he lost track of time. He scoured the town, then further, then further until he started searching beyond the world for his beloved, clinging to some faint hope that maybe there had been some bizarre glitch in the universe that put Geno somewhere he didn’t belong. Another world, another reality, another universe…
He looked, and looked, and looked. Then looked some more.
No matter what anyone said, he would not be swayed that Geno was still there somewhere. That the monster who had somehow awakened feeling in this centuries old body, who had won his affections, was still alive and if he just kept looking he’d find him.
The reaper wore himself down to shreds searching, and yet he continued. He was a nervous wreck, and yet still he tore through world after world, barely stopping to snatch up souls as he went, ignoring them aside from a cursory glance to reassure himself he didn’t pick up the one soul he was trying to find.
When he finally gave up…
It was sudden. It was a slap in the face, a realization that it was all for nothing. He had looked and searched and begged and pleaded and done everything in the multiverse… and there was nothing.
The scream he produced was like a wounded animal as it faced its death at long last. To know grief this powerful after such happiness was devastating.
The god felt hollowed and emptied, stripped of everything he had and once was, reduced to nothing. What good was he, if he failed to protect the one thing he loved? How could he be a god and yet unable to do that one thing?
To whatever might hold more weight in the universe than himself, he begged for mercy. To know and feel nothing, to escape the pain… even just an answer. To see Geno’s life end would surely pain him, but nothing like this. For him to suddenly disappear, never to be seen again, erased from existence…
When he could finally rouse himself from his mourning, he was numb. His work went on, as always, but he paid no more attention to it than necessary. He lost himself in the haze of repetition, wandering and trying to ignore the constant ache in his chest.
He paid little attention when he began finding the remains of entire universes, flooded with souls to be carted off. He didn’t want to, because he couldn’t bear to let himself feel again. To be landed in the same mess over when he hadn’t yet even begun to recover.
But when he found a universe teetering on the edge of collapse…
When he saw it being ripped to shreds by a singular being…
When that being turned, and he saw it was a skeleton…
When he looked into the other’s eyes…
There was almost, almost…
Something familiar.