Kio looked at the angel sleeping on the other side of the room. His long blond hair was spread scross the pillow like a halo, an aura of light around his troubled face.

Kio sighed. He usually looked so peaceful in sleep. He stood up and walked over to look closer. The bandages around his neck which Kio had wrapped so lovingly around the swan-like curve three days before. He sighed. The wounds were bleeding again. The lie carved into the flesh of his neck stood starkly in spreading brown stains aganst the formerly pristing white of the bandages.

"Beloved"

It was a lie. No-one who truly loved someone would do that to them.

But Soubi was beloved, he just didn't know it. Kio sighed again and walked back to the table at which he had been working. He sat down, picked up his pen and paused, taking one last look over at the friend he couldn't protect. The man he loved.