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Tristan fell.

Pavia, still holding onto his head dropped
too, and Kira followed, pulled down by her heartstrings.

She hugged him, trying to control the shakes
wracking his body, but nothing worked. The cry had stopped, leaving
only silence, but it was almost worse, an absence not only of sound
but also of the man.

His eyes rolled into the back of his head,
leaving only whiteness visible. His limbs jerked, left, than right,
shifting up only to slam down to the ground. Kira was flung to the
side, as his body continued to twitch uncontrollably.

Another scream pierced her ears, tearing his
vocal chords with its strength. It puttered out into a whimper,
then a panting breath, and then words.

"No, no, no," he repeated, in a low voice, a
barely-there whisper. "What am I, no, stop, no, don't, I can't,"
Tristan continued, his voice getting louder. His left hand balled
into a fist, slamming into the ground over and over with each word,
bloodying his skin and the wood beneath it.

"Tristan," Kira reached out, tried to touch
him, to comfort him. She couldn't watch him fall apart anymore. She
knew what was coming, what would happen if he remembered, but
watching him break right before her eyes was too much.

She touched his hot skin, burning flesh that
felt as though a fever had quickly spread along his body. Her
fingers were rejected. He twisted away from her touch, staring at
her as if she was someone else, someone he refused to look at let
alone touch.

"I'm sorry," he said, his body still jerking,
"oh god, I'm sorry, I didn’t mean, I can't control it, you just,"
he crumbled again, hugging his knees into his chest, rocking slowly
back and forth on the ground whispering apologies and refusals over
and over again.

His skin was whiter, more ghostly than when
he had been a vampire. His eyes had come back, but they were
trapped, stuck open and staring at a scene Kira wished she could
understand just so she could help him in some way.

And then his body stopped, his limbs fell
open on the ground, unmoving, and his breath became shallow. Pavia
had been right: no human could survive remembering the emptiness
that came from being a vampire. No human could live with the
soullessness, the horror, especially not Tristan, the artist, the
believer.

He was dying, dying from remembering
everything about his life.

But Kira refused to let than happen.

She jumped forward, placing her hands over
his heart, on the firm chest she used to fall asleep on. Her powers
surged, but Kira willed them away, refusing to let the darkness
confuse her thoughts. Instead, Kira pumped her hands, pressing on
his chest.

She leaned down, sealing her warm lips
against his cold ones, and for the first time, the fact that his
lips were cold frightened Kira. Because they weren't the cold lips
of a vampire, they were the cold lips of death.

She forced air into his still lungs. Pumping
one, two, three. Breathing. Pumping. Breathing.

Beat damn you, Kira thought, refusing to cry,
because crying would mean that he was lost. Just start beating, she
repeated again and again, just stay alive a little while
longer.

And almost as if he heard her prayers,
Tristan's lips opened and he gasped, sucking air into his body. His
heart sped, getting stronger, slowly regaining a life of its
own.

Kira pulled back as his eyes fluttered open.
He sat up—dazed, confused—he looked around.

"What's going on?" He asked. Still her
Tristan, Kira sighed, recognizing the tone in that question. She
reached over, stroking his cheek while a small, sad smile spread
across her features. It was time to say goodbye. "It feels like I
was dreaming, like I'm waking up and everything else is slowly
fading away…"

He touched his forehead, squeezing his eyes
tightly shut and then opening them again. "Kira?"

Her hands fell to his lap, holding tightly
onto his fingers.

"Tristan," she said, sighing, "I'm going to
miss you, more than you'll ever know." And he wouldn't know, his
memories would be gone, but Kira would keep them close to her
heart, alive enough for the both of them.

"You're doing this aren't you? I mean, it was
your idea?"

Kira nodded, hoping he would understand. For
a moment, pain danced across his features, but then it softened and
he broke free of her grip to run his fingers lightly along her jaw
line.

"You're always trying to save me," he said,
letting a lopsided grin takeover.

"You won’t need to be saved anymore," she
told him softly, bittersweetly.

"You saved me the moment you let me love you,
let me know that some part of me was still capable of being
good."

"You didn't need me to be a good person," she
said, shaking her head. He had always been that way, been gentle
and kind, at least to her.

"But I did. You brought me back to life, more
than once," he stopped, shaking his head, trying to pull at a
fading memory. "How did we meet? Will you tell me again?"

A sob pulled on the back of her throat. It
had begun. Her voice was shaking. "At school. In our English
class."

He laughed, "That's right. Then what
happened? Did we go to the marsh?"

Kira closed her eyes slowly, taking a deep
breath. She couldn't do this. So instead, she leaned down, putting
her head on his shoulder, the little nook next to his neck. Tristan
wrapped his arms around her, holding her close.

Kira listened to his beating heart, his
beating human heart. She did that. She saved him. She brought him
back to life.

Tristan lightly pushed her back, made her sit
up, and gripped her shoulder strongly. His eyes were clear,
focused, like he understood everything that was going on—as if his
entire life were flashing right before his eyes in the moment
before it disappeared entirely. And maybe it was.

"I love you," he said, his voice
steadfast.

"I love you too," Kira told him, trying to
equal his resolve, but her voice was cracking. He was dying right
before her eyes. The Tristan she knew, the one she loved, was
almost gone forever.

He gripped her face, running his eyes over
the curve of her lips, her lashes, her cheeks. He wiped away the
tear she couldn't contain, kissing it away, and then leaned down to
gently kiss her lips one last time. It was salty, but perfect.

He pulled back. Kira couldn't move. The
resolve was vanishing, the light, the memories. Kira watched them
flash and fade.

"Thank you," Tristan whispered, and then his
eyes closed and he fell, as if in slow motion, back to the ground,
curled on his side like a sleeping child. A small smile curved his
lips and he face looked relaxed, perfectly at peace.

Kira was the opposite. Her hand covered her
mouth, holding back the crying sounds she wanted to make. Her tears
fell silently. Her body shook.

Pavia, job done, let Tristan go. She stepped
over his body and wrapped her arms around Kira.

And though she was cold, and technically
Kira's enemy, it didn’t matter. Kira hugged her back, crying into
her shoulder, getting comfort from the woman who had somehow become
her friend.

"He's gone," Kira cried. Tristan, her
Tristan, was just a memory living inside of her head.

"He's alive, Kira, he's right there,
breathing, because of you."

Kira looked over Pavia's shoulder at
Tristan.

"He's in a better place now," Pavia
whispered, continuing to hug her tightly. "You saved his soul, you
saved him."

She heard Pavia. She knew the words were
true, but it didn't ease the pain.

Kira leaned back, letting her go. The only
person who could truly make her feel better at that moment was
Luke, who was still in the town square, hopefully convincing
everyone that a fight was fast approaching.

A fight that wouldn't stop just to let Kira
ease her wounded heart.

She sniffled, drawing the tears back in. "You
have to leave," Kira said, "you have to leave and you have to bring
Tristan with you. I'm trusting you to keep him safe."

"Wouldn't it be better to leave him with you?
Inside the wall?"

Kira shook her head, reality crashing back
down. "I don't know what's going to happen to me, if I'll even be
able to keep it together. If vampires find a way in, come looking
for me, I won't be able to keep him safe. I can't use my powers,
not to fight." The shadows were too close.

Pavia looked down, her features soft—her
hard, sarcastic exterior had evaporated. "I won't let you
down."

They both knelt, leaning over Tristan's body.
Kira brushed a strand of ebony hair from his face, looking at him
one last time with love in her eyes.

Pavia reached out, but Kira stopped her with
a touch.

"You told me once that vampires couldn't
love…" Kira trailed off.

"I was wrong," Pavia said.

"But it's why you want to turn right? For
that chance?"

Pavia nodded slowly, wondering where Kira was
going.

"Could you love him?" Kira asked, her voice
barely above a whisper, her fingers still gently stroking his
cheek.

"Not as I am now," Pavia said, Kira shifted
to look into the vampire's clear blue eyes, "but the girl I once
was, the one I want to be again, I think she could. I can see her
falling head over heals for a guy like him."

Kira nodded. There was nothing else to say.
And Pavia understood. She reached under Tristan's body, lifting him
easily from the ground. Kira stayed seated, glued to her spot as
Pavia turned and walked away, disappearing into the basement.

Stones scraped, shuffled below her, and then
Kira was alone. Pavia and Tristan were gone, escaping through the
tunnel, running with vampiric speed out of Sonnyville.

Kira curled into a ball, slipping over onto
her side. She dreamt that his arms were around her, cradling her,
rocking her back and forth to sooth the pain. She didn't think it
would be this hard to say goodbye. But it was, it was hard
remembering everything that Tristan had just forgotten.

The first time they met, she fell right then.
Looking at him, meeting those crisp blue eyes seconds before class
began, it had been enough. That afternoon in Charleston he had been
a puzzle she couldn't wait to solve, a challenge that hooked her
interest. Even when she realized what the secret was, that he was a
vampire, she hadn't been able to stay away. The day in the marsh
was still perfect, something no one could take away.

The memories played one by one, making her
smile, laugh, cry some more, until finally her thoughts reached
England. Her chin shook remembering the night they had shared, when
Tristan was the happiest she had ever seen, when he believed the
future was theirs for the taking, that the two of them could be
together forever.

But Kira had always known differently—they
were doomed from the start. But, she smiled, Kira wouldn't have
changed a thing, not even today, not even the end. He was at peace.
The haunt to his eyes, the walls Kira had always wanted to bring
down, they were finally gone. His soul was healed, and if that
meant he had to forget, Kira would remember their happiness enough
for the both of them.

And that thought made her sit up, because
this wasn't the girl Tristan had fallen in love with, it wasn't who
he would want her to be. More than anything, Tristan wanted Kira to
be happy, to be the fighter, the spark of life.

Kira rubbed the tears from her eyes, drying
them, and stood, taking a deep breath to steady herself. The day
wasn't over yet.

But one thing was. She had made her choice—it
was Luke, it had to be Luke. Her parents would have wanted her to
choose love, and even Tristan would have wanted her to choose
happiness, to live her life. So she would try to let her Punisher
powers go, to release them, to split herself to save herself.

To choose love.

To choose Luke.

But just in case, Kira had always known what
the back up plan would be. She would rather die than fall, would
rather have her friends mourn than fear her. If the price to keep
the conduits alive was death, Kira would do it, because she was
strong, and because she refused to be the killer Aldrich wanted her
to be.

That was her vengeance.

Kira walked slowly over to the suitcase
resting in the corner of the room and slipped open a zipper. A
small pocketknife fell out, the one she knew Luke kept in his
bedside table. It had been a gift from his father when he turned of
age, when he went on his first mission.

And Kira had stolen it to do something Luke
would never ever agree with.

She flipped open the blade, feeling along its
edge. Razor sharp.

If she couldn’t split her powers, couldn't
transform into a true conduit, couldn't stop herself from falling,
there was another option. It wasn't just turning into a conduit or
falling into an original vampire. There was death too—a third
choice that only Kira and the Punisher Council had been willing to
admit existed.

Kira flipped the pocketknife shut, stuffing
it into her sneaker, wedging it somewhat painfully beside her
foot.

Just in case, Kira told herself, she needed
it just in case.

But then her heart lifted.

Luke was close, Kira could feel him, could
feel the excitement bouncing off of him in waves. The Council
meeting must have gone well, his thoughts were bubbling over the
bond, but Kira let them come, let them flood her senses and
overwhelm her—a river of champagne.

Instantly, her mood began to shift. Happiness
tingled down her arms, her legs, up her spine into her very
thoughts.

Kira began to laugh, because the closer he
came, the closer he was to knowing that Kira had made her choice,
and he was it.

Kira raced to the door, peering out the glass
to wait and watch for his blond head to appear around the
corner.