I wrote a one-shot called Cobain a while back, and this is a follow-up to that one-shot, though I think that it works just as well as a standalone little story, so you don't have to actually read Cobain if you want to understand this.

Just a bit of warning...it may go a bit farther than you would expect.

Quote of the day:

Because I could not stop for Death,

He kindly stopped for me;

The carriage held but just ourselves

And Immortality.

-Emily Dickinson, Because I could not stop for Death

There was a part of Iori that figured that it was honestly probably just the morphine and other drugs that the nurses had been constantly pumping into his bloodstream for the past month or so, but having to be hospitalized in a full body cast wasn't actually so bad when it came down to the brass tax of things. He had been put on suicide watch for a while since the event that led to him breaking practically every bone in his body was Iori hurling himself out of a second story window, but if it came down to it again, he would have made the same decision to jump. Considering his options, Iori actually preferred his body cast and broken bones over what would have been the alternative. He cared about Yagami Hikari very deeply as a friend and comrade, but when he saw her approach their group with food she made herself to show her appreciation of them, Iori felt that it was safer to jump out the window than to eat what she had cooked.

The company wasn't so bad either, Iori often being visited throughout his time in the hospital by friends and family, pretty much all of them also helping him out by finding different ways to destroy get-well food that Hikari wanted to bring him whenever she tagged along with anyone to visit him, but there was one visitor in particular, a visitor that went to see him daily, that Iori couldn't help but become increasingly annoyed with. The first time the visitor in question made the trek to his hospital room it had actually been quite frightening, but as with most things that become familiar, the whole ordeal had started to become more and more mundane. Had Iori's entire body not been broken, he would have shook his head at the sight of his most annoying visitor sitting across the room reading a Teen Beat magazine.

"Don't you have somewhere better to be?" Iori just sighed as he kept on staring at the TV hooked up to one of the walls in his room, for some reason it always being turned on to whatever was the popular soap opera of the week, "I'm pretty sure Russia is going to be starting another war soon. Or it might be America really, but either way shouldn't you be really busy?"

The Grim Reaper just rolled the darkness of the never ending abyss in his empty eye sockets, gaze focusing on the next big teen heartthrob's latest antics that was being regaled in the magazine he was reading. "Russia and America are always starting wars. Besides," the Harvester of Souls lazily pointed his hooded face in Iori's direction, "relieving a dying kid from the pain he's suffering to take him up to Heaven? That will look great on my resume. Plus, you're one of the Chosen Children! I mean you didn't really do much other than stand around with that armadillo of yours, but hey, at least you got to watch the important people actually do stuff."

"I did stuff." Iori quietly offered, trying to remember what he actually contributed to any of the victories that the group ever had.

Death just snorted. "Like what? That time you almost got everyone killed because you felt bad about lying? You're a real Motomiya Daisuke there, Ace."

Iori opened his mouth to argue, but went quiet since Death did actually have a good point right there. He mentally shrugged off the thought though, instead at that moment wishing that he could move just one of his broken fingers to change the channel so he could find some refuge from the daytime soaps that tormented him. His body might have been broken, but the real part of him that was at risk was his mind from having been forced to watch so much crappy TV.

"Whatever," Iori just sighed, accepting that he was defeated, but hoping that he could at least be defeated in a comforting sort of way, "if you're not going to leave can you at least change the channel? Put something exciting on. Like, I dunno, something on the National Geographic Channel."

Again, Death just rolled his nonexistent eyes as if he was a petulant preteen girl. "If that's your idea of exciting no wonder your role on the team was 'boring kid who tags along'. And besides, don't get mad at me for being here. It's my job."

"Well, if I'm not dead," Iori started to reason, "then is it really your job? If I promise not to jump out of any more windows, can you leave me alone? I'm in a body cast. It's not like I can do anything."

The Reaper of Souls considered for a moment, and then closed his magazine and set it off to the side. Death then stood up and brought a bony finger to his chin as he continued to think, before grabbing his scythe and pacing around in a small circle. "You make a good point, kid. Before I run the idea up to the boss though, you mind telling me why exactly you tried to kill yourself?"

Iori narrowed his eyes at the Rider of the Pale Horse, before breathing a sigh of relief in appreciation when he realized that Death was perhaps going to actually go with what he was suggesting. "My friend Yagami Hikari made lunch for us, and she really is a horrible cook. I mean, like lethal. Once, she brought brownies to school for librarian appreciation day, and the librarian was diagnosed with cancer a week later. I figured I'd take my chances jumping out of a window."

The Grim Reaper deliberated on Iori's words for a moment, before shaking his head in sadness at the recognition of Hikari's name. "Ah, yes, Yagami Hikari, the Dark One."

Eyebrow raised, Iori questioned further. "The Dark One?"

Nodding, Death only felt pain in his heart. "The prophecy states that Yagami Hikari's cooking is a sign of the End of Times. The taste alone has forever tainted the Light with shadows, and she will bring doom upon the world. She will blacken Paradise itself." The Angel of Silence continued after taking in a deep breath, "There is only darkness left for you, Iori, and only death for your people. Hikari's brownies are only the beginning. The stars will fall from the Heavens, and a third of the oceans will turn to blood. Your friends are strong, Chosen Child, but Hikari's terrible cooking is beyond strength."

Iori and the Reaper sat in silence for a moment or so after that strange little rant, before, after swallowing some courage, Iori figured he'd just continue with his original point. "So, maybe it'd be okay for you to stop coming by?"

The Grim Reaper just sighed as he then turned around to pick up his Teen Beat magazine and used his ancient scythe to open a portal to the afterlife. "I'll see what I can do, kid. Though I'm not sure if the Boss will be okay it."

After Death then stepped through his portal to another dimension, Iori closed his eyes, thankful for finally having some privacy, and he started whistling a short happy tune that almost made him forget that he was in a full body cast. The peace didn't last long however, because it was then that Iori's newest surprise visitor opened the door to his hospital room and made her way inside.

"I hope you're feeling better today, Iori-kun!" Hikari's sweet and melodic voice rang out through the air as she entered the room, "I made you some get well soup!"

Panicking eyes searching all around him, Iori began to desperately hunt for any wires that were close enough for him to reach that would cause his body to fail him.

He hoped that the Reaper would find his way back soon.