The hands on his shoulders helped, at least a little, to keep him grounded when he started to feel himself spiral, but it just wasn't quite enough. By the time Vash's confused questions came, he had already worked himself up into a ball of raw nerves, his face twisting into a horrified frown before he was shaking his head furiously.

"I can't-...I can't keep 'im away from his family! I'll find Nico, I can't ask 'im to stay with me, he doesn't deserve that, none of you deserve that! You can finally be happy! I can't take that away from you!"

He was crying again, but the crying itself didn't seem to be the reason he suddenly couldn't seem to take a breath. The pain in his chest and the almost physical feeling of something squeezing his lungs until he could only gasp for air were the only things that could make him let go of the desperate hold he had on his coat. So he held onto both; clinging to his coat with one hand and reaching up with the other to clutch at his chest.

That alone was what managed to begin to bring him out of the spiral of self-hate that rolled through his head, but it wasn't necessarily better, especially not when it brought back the very horrible memory of sitting next to Vash and waiting, and then feeling his breath beginning to catch in almost the same way as he felt his life slipping through his fingers.

Something was wrong. Something was wrong, and he couldn't breathe. He visibly swooned, eyes blinking as they went unfocused, and he let out a soft, woozy moan before wilting against the frame in front of him, his forehead resting on Vash's shoulder.

"Help-...Vash-...help..." He wasn't even sure if his voice had formed words, realizing dimly that his hearing had gone muffled and his vision was narrowing down, going fuzzy at the edges. He was losing consciousness. Why was he losing consciousness? Why can't he breathe?