Bet you thought I'd forgotten about this AU, huh? Well, honestly, I kinda had. But truth be told, I've also had the other two chapters for this AU planned/sitting in my WIP folder for over a year. I just didn't want to work on them until I'd gotten this one done, since they're both part of the 'alternate timeline' in this AU, if that makes sense. Probably not. I mentioned this in one of the other chapters before.

Anyway. I've been working on some older AUs lately, like the dolphin trainer au and the knight/princess AU, and I figured this one really needed an update too, so here we are. This is kind of the last "canon" chapter for this AU, at least as of right now. I don't really know where else I can take this. I'm totally open to ideas and suggestions.

Also, no, this isn't anywhere close to being edited/proofed. I planned on having this finished a week ago, but I've literally been playing The Witcher 3 for the last week and I had to tear myself away from it tonight so I could get this damn chapter up. I really wanted something posted before uni goes back in a couple more weeks, and HIMY and the step-parent AU aren't close to being ready, so... Yeah. I'll fix the errors in another week or two. For now, enjoy! Reviews are always greatly appreciated.

For All Eternity

When their fourth human had died, Lucy had just smiled at her reaper and said she'd see him soon before she'd returned to her designated space to rest and unwind for a little bit. Bickslow had only stuck his tongue out and said he'd see her never, just like he had for the last three humans, and then he'd jumped down from the skyscraper just to show off that he was better when it came to teleportation.

When their fourth human had died, Lucy had just never thought that the day where she never got paired with Bickslow again would come. For nearly four centuries, she'd spent almost every minute of every day by her lil' baby reaper's side, and for nearly four centuries, Lucy had never been able to imagine spending so much time with anyone else in the universe.

But when the next human was assigned, and Lucy was sent to the expectant mother's suite, there was no Bickslow in sight. At first, Lucy just thought that he was late, although she wasn't quite sure how he could be since the only time he'd arrived after her had been the day he'd been reborn as a reaper. But still, at first, Lucy didn't think much of it. She only tucked herself into the corner and waited for her next human to finally be born, and her favourite reaper to finally arrive.

But her reaper never arrived, or at least her favourite one never did. The hours turned to days, and even when her human was a week old, there was still no reaper in sight. Lucy just didn't know what she was supposed to do. She wondered if there had perhaps been an error, and if it was one of those rare cases where a human only had a guardian angel assigned to him; it had never happened to her before, but she'd heard stories of it. She wondered if at that very moment, Bickslow was just sitting in his own designated space and biding his time, waiting for an assignment to given.

Lucy considered going to see the elders at one point, to perhaps ask where her reaper was or what was going on with her newest assignment, but she knew it would be a waste of time. The councils never bothered with such trivial matters, only ever caring about the reapers and angels stupid enough to abuse their powers or break the rules that governed them.

It was when her human was a month old that Lucy seemed to meet her reaper, though, right as she followed the new family into the small doctor's office.

"Oh, shit. You must be the angel!"

Lucy scanned the room quickly, seeing the woman with long brunette hair draped comfortably over the examination bed on the far side. She sat up once she saw Lucy, a lopsided grin on her face as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

"I'm your new partner!"

Lucy stared at the woman in the bikini top and capris. She'd thought Bickslow's sense of fashion was weird, but this was something else. "You're… You're the reaper?"

The woman nodded, taking a swig from the large bottle she had in one hand. "Sure am!" She thrust her free hand out in Lucy's direction. "Cana, by the way."

"Uh… Lucy," she murmured, hesitantly shaking her hand.

Lucy almost couldn't believe it was happening. She really wasn't going to be paired with Bickslow that time. She'd gotten so used to it that she really had just expected to spend yet another seven or eight decades with him. But apparently even in death, the universe was cruel. She just didn't really know what to do, because she just really hadn't seen that coming.

Still, as unexpected and worrying as Lucy found it all, because she didn't even know if she'd ever see Bickslow again, Lucy couldn't help but wonder where the hell her new reaper had been for the last month. She should've met Cana weeks earlier. And, granted, Lucy did kind of wish that she hadn't met Cana, just because she wasn't the lil' baby reaper she'd been mentoring and had teasing her for the last four centuries, but that wasn't the point. She already knew her human that time around wasn't supposed to die for another nine-two years (and to think the average life expectancy had once been thirty), so if she was stuck with Cana, Lucy was sure as hell going to get to know her. Or, well, she'd try to.

"You, uh… You know the human is a month old already, right?" Lucy pointed out cautiously, watching the woman take another drink. She was fairly certain Cana was actually drunk, and the last Lucy had checked, reapers couldn't even get drunk.

"Oh, yeah, I know," Cana chuckled. "Sorry 'bout that. Was down the coast with some buddies. You angels throw quite the parties."

"…Huh?" Lucy shook her head. "Actually, never mind. Just tell me if you're actually going to do your job and be around or not." Because that's what reapers were supposed to do. They were supposed to watch their humans just as much as the angels did, but of course, very few did. Apparently they had better things to do with their time, or at least that was what Lucy had to assume. She didn't really get it.

Cana scratched the back of her head. "I mean, there's not really much point for me to be here, y'know?"

"Excuse me?"

"He's still got another, what, ninety-something years to go? I don't really get off on making kids' lives hell."

Lucy gawked at the reaper. "But… But that's what you're supposed to do!" Reapers were made to cause mayhem. The sooner they collected a soul, the better. She'd heard a few reapers say that the souls of children were far nicer than those of adults. It had always creeped Lucy out a little, especially when she'd heard some of them say how sweet infant souls were, but they were still reapers and that was just what they were like. Lucy had long since stopped questioning the laws of their universe. Still, it was odd that Cana didn't want to do her duty. "You're supposed to make their lives hell!"

Cana shrugged and picked herself up from the examination table. "Yeah, well, guess I'm just a shitty reaper then, eh?" It wasn't the first time she'd had an angel tell her she was doing her job wrong. It had just been a while since it had happened. "I'm making your job easier, anyway. You have less to worry about if I'm not here trying to make everything go wrong for the human," she said.

"That's not the point!" Lucy shrieked.

"If it makes you feel better, I'll check in every year or so to make his life miserable for a few days."

"W-Well, yes, that would make me feel better."

"Great. In that case, I'll see you in a year, angel-face." Cana saluted her and took another swig from her bottle. "In the mean time, I have somewhere else to be." Lots of places to be, really, but in any case, it wasn't a doctor's office with an angry angel and a crying infant.

Lucy huffed and crossed her arms as the reaper took her leave. She should probably enjoy having a reaper that insisted on not being there, but she just didn't. Lucy had always prided herself on following the rules, and she was sure she would've been a law-abiding citizen before she'd died. But after six centuries (at least according to Bickslow since he'd read her file in the archive), Lucy still had a hard time understanding how people could have so little regard for rules and guidelines. Most of the time, they were there for a reason. Even if they weren't there for a reason, what was the point of ignoring them?

She just didn't know.

What she did know, was that she would almost do anything to get her lil' baby reaper back. As godforsakenly annoying as he was, he was far better than Cana. But maybe she was biased.

"Who the fuck are you?"

The angel smiled sweetly at him, extending her hand to him as her fluffy white wings spread proudly on her back. She was quite possibly the only angel Bickslow had had the misfortune of meeting that didn't hide her wings. Lucy had always said they were mostly useless, but that hadn't stopped him from always requesting to be wrapped up in them. They were so fluffy and warm. Still, the angel in front of him was clearly no Lucy, and he wanted nothing to do with that angel's wings. Nope.

"Howdy there! I'm Mira!" she said, her teeth just as bright as her hair, her wings, and her damn clothes, too. "I'm your new buddy!"

Bickslow shook his head and turned back around. "Nope. I'm out. Fuck this." He hadn't signed up for that shit. Where the fuck was Lucy?

"Naw, come on now," Mira crooned, following him out of the room. "What's the matter with you? Are you havin' a bad day, hun?"

"Yes, I'm having a bad day!" Bickslow shouted over his shoulder, barely stopping in his attempt to get over her. It was a good thing humans couldn't actually see their kind, otherwise he would've walked into at least a dozen bystanders outside the small clinic, and the angel's wings would've knocked at least two dozen to the ground, and he knew how that felt - Lucy had hit him with them a few times. "And don't call me hun!"

"Oh, I'm sorry. Would you like a cookie? Will that make you feel better?"

"No, I don't want a damn cookie! And stop following me! I don't like you!" The sooner he got away from the annoying guardian angel, the better, so with the next step, he was stepping onto one of the large, metal beams that made up one of the last remaining landmarks from his time, and looked out over the bustling city.

It had grown so much since he'd been alive, and since the last time he'd been there when his first human as a new reaper had died. It almost wasn't recognisable anymore with almost every city looking the same those days with the same tall skyscrapers with the solar panels and gardens every few floors, all connected by their own chaotic network of roads way up in the sky. But it didn't need to look the same as it had when he'd still been a human. It was still his safe haven, his spot above the world, and it had been his favourite place with Lucy. And with Lucy nowhere to be found, his safe haven was the only place he wanted to be.

He didn't really know what to do without the damn angel. She'd taught him everything he knows and helped him realise that dying really wasn't such a bad thing. She'd made his afterlife pretty damn fun, and for the most part, actually worth living - because he could always just request to be seen by the elders and ask to be reborn or just sent on to the next world like all of the souls he collected got to do, but he just hadn't wanted to do that. Why would he choose to die when he could spend an eternity next to a literal angel?

Well, that was what he'd thought would happen anyway. Lucy had said that they were really lucky to keep getting paired together, but Bickslow had always just joked that it was a sign they were destined to be together for all eternity. He'd believed it after a while, too, but maybe that had just been foolish. Maybe it really had been nothing but stupid luck.

Right then though, Bickslow felt like the unluckiest person in the universe.

"You want a cookie?"

Bickslow nodded, silently accepting the chocolate chip biscuit from the woman and taking a small bite. After three years with the white-haired angel, Bickslow had grown rather fond of the cookies. They didn't really make him feel any better, but they tasted good.

"Do you want to maybe mess with the human a little bit too?" she asked, placing a hand on his shoulder and furling her wings behind her. "I'll even turn a blind eye, as long as you don't properly try and take his soul, because that just won't do." No humans ever died early on her watch. Never. And for her to condone the amusing torture that Bickslow's kind was so fond of… Well, it was a big thing. But she knew her new reaper friend was hurting, and consider she was stuck with him for the next nearly ninety years, Mira figured she'd at least try and cheer him up a little.

"No, it's fine. I'm not really feeling it today," he mumbled. It was hard to be interested in making a three year old throw another completely unnecessary tantrum when all he could think about was how Lucy would be telling him off for being mean if she were with him right then.

He could almost hear her voice if he focused long enough. "Bickslow, that wasn't very nice!" She'd scowl at him, too, and she'd roll her eyes and try not to smile when he pointed out that he was just having a bit of fun, but she always smiled anyway, because she couldn't help it. He could almost see her smile still, every time he closed his eyes.

And on the days like that, where he didn't at all feel like making his human's life problematic for a few minutes or hours, he remembered the quiet days with Lucy, the ones that always fell on their last human's wedding anniversary and where they'd just go somewhere else for the day and do nothing but talk and enjoy each other's company. And each time, he'd just tell her how much he wished he'd known her when he'd still been alive, because being able to have some kind of life with her would've been so damn great. They couldn't do anything or be anything in their world. All he'd been able to do was tell her he loved her, and nothing else.

It had taken him two centuries to realise he missed being alive, because it had taken him two centuries to fall in love with the guardian angel. And another two centuries later, all Bickslow could still think about was how much he would've loved to have a proper life where he got to get married, have kids, and grow old with someone like Lucy, just like all of the souls he'd collected had done. But he'd died far too young and far too early, and now there he was, finally realising just how painfully lonely immortality could be.

"You're missing your old angel friend again, aren't you?" Mira said softly then, and Bickslow gave another silent nod. He'd eventually told her about his previous partner a few months after their current human had been born. For the most part, Mira still didn't understand why Bickslow was so miserable, but then again, she'd also never been paired with the same reaper more than once. As far as she'd always known, that just didn't happen. Mira was sure that if she'd spent nearly four centuries with one reaper, she'd be a little upset at first too, but she wouldn't be crying over it three years later. It was pointless making friends as their kind, because you would probably never see that person again once you went your separate ways. Bickslow just hadn't learnt that yet, it seemed. "Oh, bless your heart," she sighed, wrapping her wing around him. "It really was bound to happen at some point."

"I guess…"

"It's probably time you just forget about it. Sulking won't do you any good." And it won't do me any good either. Well, technically, Bickslow sulking made her job easier, but it was getting kind of annoying. She was usually a kind person, but she was definitely not going to be putting up with a miserable reaper for the next ninety years. No sir.

Forget about it? Like that would ever happen. Bickslow would quite literally rather die than forget about it, and being reborn as a human again or being sent to the next world was sounding ridiculously appealing right about then. But… He couldn't do that. He had to believe he'd see Lucy again at some point, and it wasn't like he'd be going anywhere anytime soon. Eternity was a long time, after all.

"I'm just… gonna go," Bickslow announced after a moment. He'd grown to tolerate Mira, but sometimes he really hated her. Or, really, he hated just behind around her, but then again, he hated being around anyone that wasn't Lucy. Even with the other reapers at the archives that he'd come to know over the last few years, Bickslow never quite felt comfortable. Something always felt like it was missing and that something was wrong. The only time that feeling went away was when he went and reread Lucy's record, or when he read her daughter Arden's record, or even the records of the family he'd left behind when he'd died. His little sister's was still hard to read, though, even after all that time.

Still, it wasn't like he needed to be watching over his human right then. With Lucy, he hadn't really minded just sitting and watching and doing nothing. But with Mira, while he wasn't torturing the poor kid and making his life (and his mother's life) miserable, he had no reason to be there. He knew he had no hope in hell of collecting the kid's soul early, so he wasn't even going to try.

For the time being, there was a comfy chair at the archives calling his name.

Leaving the archives behind once again, Lucy returned to her human at the park where he was happily pushing his six-year-old son on the swings. There were so few parks like that around those days, so Lucy couldn't help but love the times her human visited them. Parks always made her think of when Bickslow had still been a new reaper and their first human together had always visited the park to play on the swings.

Every now and then she'd been visiting the archives just in the hopes of maybe catching Bickslow there. At first, she'd been going every few nights, since she'd known that he'd always gone when his human had been sleeping. After a while, she'd gone maybe once every couple of weeks. And now, she went once every few months if she was lucky. But after forty-seven years, Lucy was beginning to wonder why she still bothered. She had no hope in hell of ever meeting Bickslow again, and she knew that far too well. She'd just let herself get attached when deep down, she'd always known she shouldn't have.

She'd been walking that earth for more than half a century. She should've known better than to let herself catch feelings for the stupid reaper. If she hadn't, then she probably would've been fine and she wouldn't have cared half as much about being separated. Four centuries was still a long time to spend with just one person, but it would've been so much easier to forget about it all if she'd just seen Bickslow as an annoying reaper and nothing else.

"Have you given up on your old reaper yet?" Cana asked, sitting herself down on the tree branch next to Lucy.

So it's that time again. Lucy had to give Cana for sticking to her word. She'd been showing up every now and then for the last forty-seven years, just to mess with the human a little. "Almost," Lucy mumbled. There really was no point of trying to run into him again in the archives because she knew it just wasn't going to happen, but she just wasn't ready to completely give up just yet, as much as she wished she could. "Anyway, I take it you're here to begin making his life miserable again?"

"Why else would I be here?"

In hindsight, it had been a stupid question. That was the only reason Cana ever appeared. Lucy never really minded much when Cana came to torture the human, just because she knew it was always going to happen. Sometimes, Lucy even wished that Cana would just take his soul and be done with it; Lucy had already said she wouldn't intervene, which was a first in all the centuries she'd been an angel, but Cana had refused and said she wasn't interested in cutting his life short.

Still, while she didn't care about the mindless suffering Cana inflicted, Lucy just really couldn't deal with it on that particular day. Her human was having a good day, and all Lucy wanted to do was watch him be happy and enjoy living, even if she'd seen it countless times before. It was really the only form of joy she had those days, although it really might've been a bit of a stretch to say that her human made her happy. Nothing really did those days. But, Lucy didn't think it would be fair to ask Cana to wait just another day or two, not when she was technically already doing her a favour by only making an appearance once or twice a year.

But they were friends, or at least something resembling it; Lucy wasn't really sure if she'd ever had a proper friend in all her time as an angel. Well, apart from Bickslow, at least. Still, Lucy really didn't mind Cana, and for a reaper, she was more than tolerable to be around. Lucy was almost inclined to think that the woman ending up as a reaper had been a mistake. But it was because Lucy liked to think that she and Cana were close (well, as close as an angel and a reaper should get) that she was comfortable enough to ask Cana that she just give her one more day.

"Is there any chance you could just… wait?" Lucy asked quietly. "I mean, just… Just for another day. I kind of just want him to enjoy today, if that's okay…"

Cana shrugged. "Sure thing."

"Is… Is that it? You're not going to argue with me?"

"Nah. Why would I do that?" Cana said. "I mean, I wouldn't be doing any of it at all if you hadn't made a big fuss about it when the human was still a tiny thing. Suits me fine not messin' with him today." She really never enjoyed it, but in all her years, Lucy still wasn't the first angel she'd had to make that kind of deal with. It just really had been a long time since the last one. If Lucy wanted the human to have a good day instead of his usual prescribed bad-luck-bonanza, then that was fine.

Lucy looked back down, giving a solemn nod. It was hard to forget that she really could've just had an easy ninety-something years if she'd just let Cana do what she wanted. Sometimes she felt bad for it, but Cana was the first reaper Lucy had met that didn't actually enjoy her job, and Lucy just hadn't known how to deal with that at the time. Still, she was there to protect and watch over her humans, and she liked doing that. There wasn't really any point of being an angel when she was paired with a reaper who didn't give a fuck.

Cana sighed after a moment, swirling the last of her drink around in the bottle before she downed it quickly and discarded the rubbish. She'd admit that it was kind of nice to just watch the human have a bit of fun, but she couldn't sit there all day and watch it like Lucy did. She didn't really have a reason to be there if she wasn't torturing the guy. "Well, since I don't need to be here, I guess I'll—"

"Wait." Lucy grabbed Cana's wrist, pulling her hand back away a second later. "Would you… Would you mind staying for a little while?" she asked quietly, glancing back to the reaper quickly. "I… I wouldn't mind the company." That was probably what she missed most about Bickslow. She'd gotten so used to having a reaper next to her all the time that the last nearly five decades had been almost painfully lonely. Lucy knew she needed to just push past it since it would no doubt be the same with the next reaper - they'd be there just to make her job difficult and disappear when it suited them, just like every other normal reaper did.

Right then though, Lucy didn't want to do that. She just wanted to sit and watch, and know that she wasn't quite alone, even if it would just be for a little while.

Cana gave a small nod, almost a smile on her lips as she looked back to the human in the park. Perhaps staying for a little while wouldn't be such a bad thing.

After a long ninety-three years, Bickslow had finally been allowed to collect his human's soul. Strangely, it hadn't been old age to finally bring the damn human down. It had been a little dose of the flu. Still, the moment he'd finally collected the soul and sent it on its proper path, all Bickslow had wanted to do was get himself as far away from the white-haired angel as he possibly could. It had been a ridiculously long ninety-three years, and Bickslow was just glad it was finally over.

He never knew how long it would be before he was reassigned, but that didn't stop him from heading to the archives again. That time, he stopped on his way to the angel section just to greet the familiar reapers in the hall. He'd only learnt the names of a few reapers in the nearly five centuries he'd been a reaper. He'd learnt quickly that it was hard to meet other reapers or angels while assigned, not unless he made a conscious effort to visit the few common grounds in their world, but he'd never really found the need to when he'd still been paired with Lucy.

When he was finished at the archives, Bickslow returned to his designated space to wait out his reassignment. He'd always liked the short naps in his off-time, mostly because they filled in the time and made him feel somewhat human again, but they'd still never really been necessary. It was like eating, though. He didn't need to do it, but he enjoyed it sometimes anyway, just because he could. Still, that day, as he collapsed down onto the perfectly made bed in his tiny, square space, Bickslow felt tired. He felt genuinely drained, as if as soon as he closed his eyes, he'd sleep without trouble for the next three days, and that just wasn't supposed to happen.

He hadn't so much as yawned in the last five centuries, but right then, Bickslow could barely keep his eyes open. Apparently being stuck with the poster child for guardian angels for nine decades had been more exhausting than he thought.

But if it was like that then, what was it going to be like after he collected his next human's soul? Was he always going to feel so depleted after he was paired with someone that wasn't Lucy? If that was the case, Bickslow really wasn't sure he wanted to deal with that. He was already beginning to see how pointless it was continuing to hope that he'd run into Lucy somewhere again. The chance of them both being in the same place at the exact same time was near impossible, and Bickslow really didn't want to accept that, even if he knew that it was the truth.

But it was as if just thinking about Lucy and whether or not he'd always feel so tired as soon as he was done with the human just exhausted him even more. And… Bickslow didn't really want to think anymore, not while it was so exhausting. He just wanted to sleep, perhaps for the next day or two, and just shut his brain off completely. For once, he didn't want to think about Lucy, or about what the next few centuries of his life would be like. He just didn't want to think about anything.

He didn't bother changing out of the clothes he usually wore. He merely made himself comfortable and willed sleep to take him. But the moment he did, he felt that annoying tug on his very being, and he couldn't help but groan into the soft pillow as he was summoned for his next human's birth.

Lucy had always preferred it when the humans were welcomed into the world in their family homes or surrounded by close relatives, rather than the cold hospital rooms that had barely changed in the last few centuries. Those days though, it was rare for a child to be born away from the skilled doctors and nurses. When it did happen though, Lucy couldn't help but enjoy it. It was the one thing that reminded her of the world she'd been born into, one that was long forgotten by the rest of the world and had just become part of the world's long history.

Strangely, Lucy hadn't liked having to part ways with Cana as her last human had finally passed, but it hadn't been able to be avoided, and Lucy knew that. Once more though, Lucy couldn't help but dread meeting her next reaper, and it had been centuries since she'd last been scared of that moment. The last time she'd dreaded meeting her new partner had been when Bickslow was still around, when she'd naturally thought that she'd never see him again once their first human had finally passed. Still, while part of her still missed the moronic reaper, Lucy well and truly knew that she never should've been paired with him more than once in the first place, and she'd finally accepted that she'd probably never run into him again, and… Well, that was fine. It had to be fine.

Still, with the impending arrival of the next human - a girl, finally, which relieved Lucy to no end since she almost always got stuck protecting stupid boys - she couldn't help but dread meeting her reaper. They were still annoying, and most of them were nothing but cruel. Lucy didn't think there'd ever be a day where she didn't loathe their entire race. Well, most of them, at least. She'd probably been lucky with Bickslow and Cana, and after five centuries of good luck, Lucy was certain she was bound to be paired with the most horrible reaper that existed. Because that was just the way the universe worked.

With the small living room in the human's house becoming just a little crowded (not that anyone actually saw her, but still), Lucy merely sighed and went to explore the rest of the cosy home, perhaps see where it was the human would spend the next few months of her life. She knew right away that the human would have a life full of joy and love once she saw the decorated nursery, everything in the same pretty shades of yellow or pink, and with her given name painted in glittering silver above the bassinet. It was one of the nicer rooms Lucy had seen over the years, that was for sure, and somehow, the homes the humans grew up in always managed to say a lot about their future.

She ventured into the kitchen to see what ridiculous dishes the human's grandparents had laid out; why a buffet was necessary at a birth, Lucy really had no idea, but it surprisingly wasn't the first time she'd seen it. Lucy didn't really think much of it when she saw the tall man with blue hair sitting on the counter and stuffing his face with a brownie slice, only assuming it was one of the guests who was more interested in the food than the baby (which, honestly, Lucy didn't blame him for). But that was before she walked past him to look at the dishes laid on the table, and she glanced back out of curiosity, and saw the one face that she really hadn't been expecting to see.

And, judging by Bickslow's wide eyes staring back at her as he paused licking the chocolate icing off his fingers, he hadn't been expecting to see her either. And, he really hadn't been. Not even a little bit.

"Human?" Lucy managed to ask, finding her voice again somehow after she bumped into a chair. She was positively certain Bickslow wouldn't have been there if he wasn't the human's reaper, but still, she had to ask. There was a tiny chance she was hallucinating or something.

Bickslow only nodded, too dumbstruck to actually say anything. But he was more than ready to catch Lucy and wrap his arms tightly around her when she squealed and jumped towards him, and in a second, the kitchen was left behind and they were surrounded by blooming flowers and ferns in a nearby garden.

He really hadn't thought that would happen, that they'd be paired up once more to spend close to another century together. Bickslow was almost inclined to think that it was a dream and he was really just asleep in his bed in his room and that he hadn't really been summoned for the human's birth, but he knew it wasn't a dream. Reapers didn't dream when they slept. But knowing that it was actually real and Lucy was in front of him just made him want to hold onto her forever, because part of him believed that it was just a mistake and that before long they'd be assigned to separate humans once more, and Bickslow really didn't know what he'd do if that was the case.

In his mind, the second he let go of her, she'd disappear again. So he just wasn't going to let go of her.

"Fuck, I didn't think I'd ever see you again." He unwound his arms from around her waist just so he could lean back and hold her face, almost just to see if it really was her and he wasn't completely mistaking her for someone else. But it was Lucy, because it really couldn't be anyone else. "I missed you so damn much. God, I can't believe it's really you. I didn't… I really didn't think this would happen."

"It's really good to see you, too," Lucy laughed gently.

He'd missed that sound more than he'd thought. It was the one thing he could never get sick of, even if it was the only thing he'd have to listen to for all eternity. "God, I wish I could kiss you right now. I really do."

Lucy shook her head. "You can't," she whispered.

"I know."

She almost wished that he could, or that he would, but she'd never see Bickslow again if he did, and one lousy kiss was never going to be worth losing him over it. Lucy had always liked to follow the rules, and she was sure she'd been the same even when she'd been alive. As much as she hated the ones that governed her then, the ones that forbid her from doing anything other than saying how much that stupid reaper meant to her, Lucy could never break them, no matter how tempting it was. She'd much rather have Bickslow at her side to constantly roll her eyes at, than to not have him at all. She knew that Bickslow felt the same, too.

But with her lil' baby reaper back in front of her again, Lucy knew that she'd just been stupid to let herself believe that she really would've been fine with not seeing him ever again. She didn't think she'd ever be able to move on from the damn reaper, not even if she tried.

She just had to hope that luck would be on her side again, and that maybe, just maybe, she'd be stuck with him for the rest of eternity. She couldn't really think of anything nicer.