London, 1836

It was probably the first time in his very long life he could say he'd been concerned for someone. Alexander watched from his post beside the makeshift cot as Timothy shivered under the thin blanket, mumbling deliriously about paper cranes. The reaper had told him about a custom in a distant country about folding one thousand paper cranes to get a wish—that had been before the boy had been claimed by the fever and the smallpox had covered every inch of skin.

As much as Lottie Lewry and her family liked the rascal, he just couldn't stay in the house else he got everyone else infected with the measles. They'd lived on the streets since, with Tim stealing to survive until he was far too ill to keep it up, and Alexander took on the task of snagging bread and fetching clean water to keep him alive. He couldn't heal the boy. He couldn't pay for a doctor. He knew it was inevitable, but it was the first time he'd grown to care about someone, and he wouldn't allow the inevitable to happen if he could help it.

So he kept watch, day and night.

It still sent shivers up his spine when he heard a familiar voice call his name, which he identified without having to turn. "William Spears." William, dressed in a tidy black suit and hair neatly combed back, fixed his glasses upon his nose and asked, "It is fancy to see you here, chief. So is this where you have been since collecting Marie Antoinette's soul?"

Ignoring him, and still without facing him, Alexander inquired, "Have you come for the boy's soul?" When William answered in the affirmative, the white-haired reaper rose to his feet as his scythe appeared in his hand. "I am afraid I cannot allow that."

Alexander swiped at his dark counterpart, who ducked and jumped out of the blade's reach before calling on his own scythe. "May I remind you, chief," said he, "that Article 92.3 of the Regulations allows me to use my scythe on you should you refuse to allow me to carry out my task, and Article 104.1 states you will be tried for interfering with a fellow agent's duties."

"To hell with the regulations, with being a reaper!" growled Alexander as he launched another attack on William. "This boy has been fighting to survive since he was born—he begged and stole so he would not starve because no one took pity on him, and he learned to depend on his wit and skill to stay alive. If saving him means the end of my career, then so be it! I am fed with the likes of it!" He outreached himself to strike his opponent, only to find him gone and looking up in mid-motion—before being struck across the face with William's scythe, breaking his glasses and making him blank out with shock for a moment before the pain kicked in forcefully and blood spurted from the wound.

In the middle of his own suffering, he saw with his good eye as William walked to Tim's side and sunk the scythe into the boy, who gasped as his cinematic record began to play before his terrified eyes. Alexander forced himself toward the boy's side and fell to his knees beside him as the memories flashed in seconds.

A gape-toothed grin on an evening at St. James' Park. A pattering of footsteps down a dank back alley. Moldy bread. Sparring sessions in the building rooftop at night. A whistled song. Lottie Lewry's beautiful smiling face. His first kiss. Bloodied knuckles after pummeling the idiot who'd bothered Lottie. Eating pound cake for the first time. "You've gotta laugh so you dun cry." Alexander fixing an improvised roof over him to keep out the rain.

As the last scene faded, he felt a grip on his trench coat and saw Tim's disfigured hand as the fourteen-year old boy looked up at him with fright in his dark eyes, whispering, "I dun wan' t' die." He breathed shallowly once, twice, then released a shaky third which became his last. Alexander didn't notice when William left with Tim's soul.

He came to himself when there was a cracking of thunder and a flashing of lightning. A dark and stormy night, he thought as he raised his wounded face to the sky. Lowering his eyes back to the corpse, Alexander stared for a moment longer before scooping it into his arms and making his way through the shadowed Whitechapel streets as the sky tore open and down poured water, soaking him to the bone. He passed street after street, moving slowly but with purpose among the rundown buildings of the East End and finally stopping at the riverbank.

The Thames River flowed without mind to the inner turmoil going on inside the grim reaper standing by its banks. The wind buffeted his marred face, contesting with the sorrow within to see which hurt the most. Gripping Tim's body to himself, Alexander felt everything brew within him like the wild storm raging around him and released a bellow of rage and pain into the sky. He screamed till he could no more, till he didn't know if the stinging in his eyes was from the wound or the rain, or if those were tears. He decided he didn't care.

Without further preamble, Alexander stepped into the water, unfazed by the strong current. When the river reached his waistline, he turned to Tim's body and said, "This is not what you dreamed, but it is as much as can be done." He frowned and lowered his head. "I vow to watch out for Charlotte. She will not be worked to death in a brothel or otherwise. I will make sure she lives happy. I swear."

Letting out a breath, he lowered the wrapped body to the river and released it to the mercy of the current, watching as it floated momentarily before being swallowed by the water. It might not reach the sea, but it will travel farther than he ever did in life. He stood there long after he'd lost sight of the corpse, clothes and hair plastered to his body, as he realized he'd lost more than an entertaining companion.

He'd lost his only friend.

London, 1887

"His body never turned up, and I like to think it found its way to the open sea. Lottie Lewry never again knew need. Tim was right: she was too pretty to not be noticed. She ended up catching the eye of a certain gentleman and lived surrounded by jewels and finery till the day she died, but she never forgot the poor and passed on her kindness to her son."

The sun had begun its slow but steady ascent in the night sky, and now a shaft of light shone through a crack in the window, illuminating a pale scarred face half-covered by long silvery-white bangs, a wide smile drawn upon his lips. A hand with long black nails reached into the darkness and drew out a skull with a crown of poppy flowers on it. "Can you believe it, Poppy? It took a human brat to teach a reaper about life. Hee, hee." He paused and leaned his ear to the skull's jaw as if listening. "Oh, the paper cranes? It took me a while, but I folded all one thousand of them and placed one in every place Tim wanted to visit: Paris, Rome, Vienna, St. Peterburg, the heart of Africa… It seemed right."

Doing so did not bring him back, but it put his memory to rest; and, he supposed, that was enough for them both.

A/N: And this is it, Part 3! Thank you for taking the time to read this! Wish you all a great day.