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Ciel awakens from a dream about steam engines, racing clocks, and someone who tells him he’ll be fine. That the timepiece isn't dashing towards his demise. And all he thinks, cold feet on birchwood as he slips from between the white of his linen, is how he wishes you’d get out his mind. It's not quite hatred: it lacks hatred’s usual bite. But it's something… something venomous, like when a friend leaves you alone for the fourth time.
Something… not right.
But even in his nightmares, Ciel wants to hear it, wants to hear you tell him those words, those lies. Humanity isn’t a knob to turn off, even in a heart as black pitched as Phantomhive’s. And what a wonderful liar you were; you almost convinced him there was something to love about this life. You made blood red and grass green, produced the rattle-rattle of shaking leaves; like a technicolor transition, like the needle prick of cold things. Ciel’s haunted by your eyes, the way flowers bloomed in your sight.
Sometimes he thinks he'd like to see you in the next life, but Earl Phantomhive is a realist, and knows there'll be no such thing for his kind. He shouldn’t, wouldn't have to say hi. Just give a touch on the shoulder, find a smile you lent him once upon a time, say 'you're alright' 'protect your light' 'you deserved better, I apologize'.
He knows you wouldn't understand. You might ponder who this fellow was, maybe be afraid for it was cryptic, a foreign thing to tell strangers on the street, but you don't have to remember. All he wants is for you to be fine. Maybe he'll walk by, only glance; because even if your body is different—a girl, a guy—he's getting to see the same soul, one final time.
Ciel does wonder if you'd remember him. It's wishful thinking, to think he'd be no more than a stranger to you, a stranger with mismatched eyes. But would nostalgia say hi? Would he smell familiar, remind you of home, of nighttime? Would shades of sapphire make you believe you've seen familiar in someone’s eyes, an upside down star remind you of his sight? Would you lie awake at night, soul pressing kisses to your spine, whispering to yourself 'I think I knew someone, once upon a time'?
Would you remember being his light?
Tea time in the dawn, rays peeking through a rainbow, the joy of your love returning home: that’s it. That’s what you were. You were light. His bones know your name, remind him in tones he can't comprehend, inscriptions like Hebrew, Avestan, an ancient dialect. They tell him stories; reminisce about someone he once knew, whisper 'they'd be alive if it weren't for you' and Ciel does not deny them for Earl Phantomhive is a realist, remember, and realists do not deny the truth.
Sebastian bathes him, but cleans nothing. Every part of him is stained; he can't forget you.
To the divinity that made you, it was a job done right; pouring heaven into a bottle, took your wings to make lashes, made a nebula your aura. He grieves so much it's a reprise. He sees pieces of you everywhere, in midnight fireflies, hears your hum in wind chimes, rubs too hard at his eyes and sees you smiling wide; sometimes laughter makes him question if he's losing his mind.
It's on these nights, Ciel remembers how to cry.
Standing by the window, he watches the sky, thinks, sighs. Salvation? That’s not a word he likes. Would God believe him if he confessed he hadn't meant to snuff out your light? That he was charmed by the sunshine too much to make you leave his side? Selfish, yes, but when has he ever been right? You taught him how to feel the Earth shift, hear butterflies, but he no longer wants your gift.
He no longer wants to believe he’ll be fine. He never truly wanted hope. Earl Phantomhive has no love for life. Ciel wants nothing, for nothing is his birthright, to not see colors where he had only perceived monotone, mere black and white.
It's always sad to watch the brightest star's dimming light, but black holes consume everything, even if they do not wish to: it is their nature, their design. Oh, but what he’d give, just to see the stars swirl in your eyes just one more time.