"The real gods," Hakkai said, "would tell you it's because, knowing what we lost to dying young, we succumb to despair."

He glances up with dry amusement in his gaze, and loses the joke he'd been about to make to the sight of Gojyo's fingers darkened purple with blight where they tap against his arm.

He bites back the urge to call Gojyo by his first name -- it's not that being on first-name basis is too familiar, but Hakkai's not sure that he can say Gojyo in the tone of a new acquaintance -- and settles for a slightly choked, "-- Your hand."