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The Shabby Man very gently propped Hitomi back up, tying her ankles the same way, arranging her with the others so they were propped up more comfortably to rest aganist the pen-holder on the desk. He touched all of their hands and their clammy foreheads, and then he moved away. He himself lay his awkward body side-down on the blotter, and after a moment's concentration, there was a horrific snapping sound.

The thread that had bound the Shabby Man's ankles to his thighs underneath the black fabric broke: two feet punched their way through the hastily-attached cloth at the back. As if he had been walking every day of his life, he walked around behind the pen-holder and retrieved a pretty flowered parasol that had one difference to normal pretty flowered parasols.

It had an appallingly sharpened stinger on the end. This end was gracefully thrust deep into Hitomi's thigh, in the area of the femoral artery, and pulled back dyed red. The Shabby Man groped around in his pocket as he pulled the parasol out again, tucking it under his arm as he pulled out a tiny cigarette and a stub of a match. This was lit against an equally tiny stub of rough matchbox paper, touched to the end of the cigarette and languidly waved out.

Then he took his hood off.

"Darlings," said the Shabby Man, "did nobody ever teach you not to take candy from strangers?"

Cascati sucked absently on the end of the cigarette, sticking it in his mouth; there were dark oily smears put under his eyes, like tribal facepaint, and his wavy blue-white hair was pulled up in a high ponytail at the back of his head. Burgundia stared, totally unseeing, as her brother amiably stabbed his parasol-spike deeply into Sunil's thigh as well. This was all done with the air of popping down a raised tab on one's soda lid. "I mean, mes petite amies - goodness, that might be bad grammar, I doubt you care - you never eat anything that hasn't been shrinkwrapped first. Or at least tested on your dog. Well, I suppose this isn't the time for recriminations. Dee, I thought you were on a diet, I never expected you to eat the bait. Tut, tut. You break my heart, love, you really do."

Stab. Deep into her thigh.

"And my sweet Ruby Soho. You know, I really did care about you a great deal." Stab. "In a, you know, totally and utterly detached way. Nice poisoning of Silva, there, sweetling, I laughed for days. Bless."

Sweat began pouring down the pink one's brow. Her face twisted into a face of absolute horrer and pain. This was not what she wanted. Not what she needed. This wasn't supposed to be how it happened. She was to weak to fight back. She merely slumped in her bindings and looked down at her bleeding leg. The man had hit a strong artery, and she was losing blood quickly. Her glasses fell from her face with the sweat beading and flowing into the blood on the desk. She looked up at the man as he took his glasses off, his face was nothing more than a blur without her glasses.

"You sick little ********..." Silva said, fighting down the blood lust and the urge to snap his neck casually. This had to be done right. For all the pain he had inflicted... for all the animals and creatures he had killed. "How is this winning when you're about to die?" He asked, his hand shooting out and grabbing for Cascati's throat to lift him to eye level.

Casca laughed again, though it was an understandably slightly gurgly noise. "Don't you understand?" he whispered. "No matter what happens, I won. You'll never get better... I took her from you and she was your most precious thing. And all I ever wanted was to see you hurt and it happened. Do you think this is heroic, precious? Do you think you're in the right? My God, love, we're all useless. None of us toil. None of us create... We just are. We're backwards, we're sterile... and I got you and you're never going to forget it, not once."

The cigarette came up as a painful burning sensation on Silva's wrist. The feien in question probably actually didn't feel it, as far gone as he was - but it gave Casca enough momentum to lean forward, faces close, breath warm on Silva's lips.

"Wake up every morning and loathe me for being the ultimate thief, tesoro mio," he murmured. "Oh, Silva, I loved you so much." And he kissed him on the mouth.

Limp as a ragdoll, Cascati's body tumbled back to the table and slipped off the edge, falling the long way to the floor with a dull thud. It was still grinning.

Silva looked at the human, then at his hand, then turned and headed for Soho, dropping his hand onto her bloody leg and healing her wound as he spoke. "I killed the son of a b***h that did this... but they're all too ******** drugged up for me to really heal." He said as he moved to the second girl.

"They're going to die. And that b*****d's going to win, just like he ******** said he would..." He said coldly as he healed the physical wounds. What he could, at least. They seemed to just keep bleeding. And he didn't have a blade to cut them free with.