ephemeral ━━ 𝘓. 𝘓𝘈𝘜𝘍𝘌𝘠𝘚𝘖𝘕 ✔

■ tears

Something about sleeping under the palace, inside the dungeon, trapped in a cell, was wrong. There was something she needed to do, but as she tried to reach out for that special something from her mind, her senses faded away into mists. Little bits of pieces she needed to make together blinked out from existence.

The light started to dim, then everything felt too cozy. She tried to stay awake and remember what she must do, but all of it were conjured by the drowsiness she felt. At once, her eyelids started to drop, and she couldn't help but sleep.

The next thing Loraine knew, she was woken up by the noise of monsters everywhere, yelling and pounding to get out. Her situation registered back in her head. She was still in the dungeons. She figured it must've been morning already since the lights were turned on and everyone was restless. The sleeping gas had stopped.

Loraine still needed to get both of them away from here so she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Just as she tried to stand up from her position tho, that was when she realized she was laying her head on someone's lap, and someone's arm wrapped her shoulders with a blanket. She looked up and found Loki still sleeping---his back on the wall and his lap, well, occupied by her.

Loraine felt her cheeks warm. She was too close to him---too much of him confusing her so great that different instincts fought in her head, to stay? Or to leave? Stop. No. She needed to concentrate. She knew one thing and that one thing was the only one that mattered: she needed to break the cell. But as she thought about it, pain quickly flared in her hands, her mind knocked out by the sudden jolt of electricity. She tried to bit back a scream, hoping Loki wouldn't notice but it was too painful and she couldnt help but whimper in defiance.

Loki woke up, startled. He looked down and found Loraine on his lap, eyes snapped closed but her body trembling in pain.

"Loraine?" He whispered, nudging her arms, but Loraine couldn't even reply from the pain leering on her.

Loki leened down, his ebony hair touching her face. He patted her cheeks trying to wake her up, not knowing that Loraine was already awake. Loki thought she was still unconscious so he brought her closer to him and felt her forehead. It was burning.

"Loraine," he called again. This time he touched her trembling hands, closing them on his. He tried to soothe them but Loraine was still seething in agony. "Wake up," he commanded then with a soft voice, he croaked, "stop thinking. Stop thinking of getting me out."

There was something foreign in his tone when he said that, and it made Loraine's heart doubled back. His plea seemed too soft yet heavy. She couldn't quite make sense of it now, but it was indeed different---as if a side of him spilled out. As if Loki was on the verge of dropping everything, as if his tone suggested of giving up.

Then oddly enough, she could feel tears dropping from her head. It took all of Loraine's focus to stop thinking of getting him out, to stop saving him from here, but she had to force herself. She needed to be awake. She needed to tell him it will be alright; That everything will be fine once they got out; That everything will go back to what it once was; That soon, the two of them would continue their friendsh---whatever relationship they had together, and everything will follow the same path laid out before all of this.

So when the pain finally subsided, Loraine was about to say all of them to him. But, caught off guard, she felt a hint of kiss on the crown of her head instead. Her eyes snapped opened.

Loki looked at her quite startled. He adjusted his back. "I wasn't---"

The tears on his face alone ripped off whatever words Loraine would have said moments ago. So, she pointed out, "You're crying." Her hand began to reach his cheeks but Loki caught her before she could.