1x1 with Cloudsong

[cloudsong]

The sight of the explosion still burned behind her closed eyelids, tormenting her mind constantly in a never-ending loop that seemed to never cease. It was all a blurr to Nerea for a moment.  For a moment she allowed herself to dwell on the unknowing, content to not register the guilt that would no doubt overcome her with grief, and instead focus on the mower real pain from the injuries she had obtained.  It had only been moments ago that she had awoken from the unsettled unconscious state in which she had entered since the demons had destroyed the hideout, and momentarily she allowed herself oblivion.  And while she didn't really want to, it was impossible to ignore the memories that were slowly beginning to overcome her pain-stricken mindset. 

The first thing that came to her mind was remembering Archer, racing after her, calling her name... He had been trying to stop her from opening the portal, and obviously he had not been successful. In that moment of grief, when she had realized the truth of their relationship and had wanted nothing but to escape, the repercussions of her actions had not dawned in her mind. In that moment, it had not matter to her that she would be a truly destroying the few humans remain on this earth - the humans that had taken her in, however much she disliked them.  It was only now beginning to register how much damage she had actually done, and still she had not fully awoken.

There was a large gash above her left eyebrow, which stung immensely.  She was unsure of how she had managed to survive the demon attack, but her life alone was something that she did not think she deserved.  Who else had survived?  Was Archer alive?  Had he been taken by the demons?  All of these questions tortured her and she slowly pulled herself up, wincing as pain flooded her mind as a result of her bruised body.  

The first bit of sunlight that she saw with her brown eyes was agonizing.  I used to brightness, she reached out in an attempt to shield her gaze, only to bring her hand back in pain. Her fingers dripped with scarlet blood, the result from the gash on her for head. Hastily, Nerea wiped the thick liquid on her pants, uncaring of her own damage, but intent to see what she had inflicted on the others.

(short, sorreh! XD)

[Leviathan]

Archie was in a world in which there was no such thing as a Flawed; in this world, the demons had never invaded and because of this their taint on the world had never happened. In this world he had a loving girlfriend, and a son, who he often brought to the park to ease his hyper and wild temperament. It was a wonderful place, and somewhere that he wished that he could stay forever, and it felt like forever, in that moment when he was pushing his little son on the swing, and listening to the chirping of the birds; it felt infinite. But it was only a moment before a banging came from overhead, some kind of bombs dropping from planes, something terrible was happening, and ruining his perfect paradise, and the last thing that he heard was his son screaming, before he was knocked out from the blast.

Eyes jolted open as Archie released a sour (and painful) cough, which shattered his lungs. Blinking rapidly he heard sounds coming above from the ringing in his ears, and he could hear sobbing coming from the distance. With a groan, he gripped his side as he stood up realizing then that there was a small piece of cement stabbed into his leg. Gulping he decided that it was not important, he had to make sure that Nerea was okay, she was his master after all, plus he felt personally involved with her as some kind of mild friendship, she had done enough to call him a friend, he should be willing to do the same. Of course that was what had caused this all, her running away from camp, opening the door, letting the demons flood into the camp. There would be no redemption for her, she would be killed, no matter her gender; and Archie felt a pang of responsibility for that, and for some reason he couldn't let that happen.

Now he just needed to find her, to get her to run away before Jacques came to, that was if he was even alive. Limping and holding the stab-wound his pale form began to search for his master, he had to find her, he just had to. That was when his eyes came across her form, she looked uninjured except for a head wound, but that was enough to make his heart race with anxiety. "Nerea!" He called, uncaring of the informality in his tone, this was a circumstance that worked outside of the norm, and his protocol to keep his master safe at all costs kicked in. "Ner-"! He tried to run towards her, but instead collapsed in a heap of blood and flesh. Coughing up the vile red liquid he gritted his teeth in intense pain running through him, there had no doubt been a lot of internal damage done to him, and he was facing it's wrath. But for some reason he was uncaring of his own lethal injuries, but instead on that one non-life threatening wound of hers. Was this how having a friend felt? Putting their own injuries in front of your own? If so, he had not felt like this before, and this was all very new to him.

Looking up at the sky with his blood-shot eyes he wondered if there was something beyond, if there was a heaven and not just a hell. He hoped so, because if he was going to die he wanted to go somewhere as perfect as the dream he had, had. But that was unlikely he had in a sense been touched by a demon, and no way would heaven allow someone like him to come up into their ranks. "I'm going to die, and I'm going to hell..." He thought aloud with a single tear rolling down his face, Flawed weren't suppose to have emotions, but right now it sure enough felt like something running through his system and making him feel human. But that was unkind of him to think, he wasn't human, it was just the thought to dying that was getting him on edge. As he coughed up some more blood he rasped, his breath becoming more hollowed and weaker.

His life was ending.

[cloudsong]

Nerea heard someone close by beginning to come to consciousness, and although all of her mind was not yet steadied, she had enough instinct to duck down slightly behind the rubble. Of course in the back of her mind, she knew that should this creature be a demon, her life would be over no matter how much effort she made to hide. But should it be a human from the resistance, the chances of her survival were still slim. Only a few would have seen her open the portal, but Nerea was sure that word of that would have travelled fast among the survivors. And it was otherwise obvious to anyone with two working brain cells, as no one in their right mind would attempt to open the gates during a time demons were out roaming the streets. No one except for the newcomer of course; the girl who had so obviously wanted nothing but to leave since her arrival. Their deaths were on her hands, and Nerea realized that the penalty for what she had done certainly would be death, no matter her gender nor species. But as her mind began to uncloud from its foggy, painstricken state, she began to remember the reason she had come in the first place - the man who she had grown strangely attached to, despite their differences. Deeper even than her own will to survive was the fire of protection she felt towards Archer. While their last communication had been in argument - almost ending in tears on her own part - Nerea still could not push away the burning desire she felt to protect him. This was all her fault, and although she cared little for the life of Jacques and the others, she somehow knew that protecting this man would be a task worth dying for.

Her dark brown eyes focused immediately on the source of movement, and for a moment she seemed confused that he was calling her name. Was this someone wanting to kill her? It took her a moment to see that the man that crouched in a crumpled mess a few yards away was the Flawed she had so desperately been searching for in the first place. The second this realization hit, she had scrambled up from her fallen spot, desperate to reach him despite the throbbing pain she felt from her headwound.

Archie was a mess. It seemed as though he had tried to rise from his spot, and had only gotten a few feet before collapsing again. He was calling my name. The message seemed to repeat through her mind as if on a broken record, and it seemed as though her steps - despite her desperate determination - were never fast enough. Nerea reached him only just as a fat tear was rolling down his cheek, burning a trail of clean skin amongst the torn, rubble-filled paleness that claimed most of his features. Nerea was by his side in a second, uncaring of the pain that rushed through her body as she fell to her knees beside him, breathing seeming to come out in hyperventilations as she registered the distress from his tone. His words were barely audible, but they were enough for her to make out. I'm going to die. I'm going to hell.

"No! No - you're not, I won't let you die," she choked out, not seeming to realize that her own eyesight was beginning to blur from the tears that were slowly forming. It was unknown to her the reason for her tears. Of course she was too proud to admit that the sight of him so broken made her so strongly remember Jack - her old friend - and how he had died at her side. She felt powerless overall, not having any tools to attend to him medically. The only thing she could do was hold on to his chest with her fingers, one hand reaching down to wipe away his tear.

I won't let you die.

[Leviathan]

Archie was surprised when he felt the wind swoosh beside him and he soon realized that it was Nerea next to him, with his rasp breath and narrowed expression, a slight smirk appeared on his face, a mixture between joy and amusement. "I am going to die," he declared, he could feel his life ebbing away and there was nothing that could be done to change that, "but it's nothing less than I deserve." He choked on blood, as he spat some up again, his entire frame shivering as he did so. He was fighting to stay alive this very moment, and he was going to make sure that he at least got to warn Nerea of what was going to happen to her if she stayed. He needed to make sure that she was kept safe, and the only way to do that would be to make sure that she understood what happened to people who caused chaos for the group. But then again she probably already knew that this wouldn't have a very happy ending to it. But when did life every provide something like that?

He took one of his bloodied hands and placed it on top of hers which was laid on his chest, "you have to get out of here." He shut his eyes for a moment as a violent shock of pain weaved its way through his core. "They'll kill you for doing this, no matter who's in charge, and no matter what gender you are." He explained in a low and panicked voice. He slightly squeezed her hand as he looked up at her with sorrow in his eyes. "This is all my fault," he coughed, again shaking him and causing him to narrow his eyes in the intense and insufferable agony. "I shou-... shouldn't have said what I did, it made you upset and then you ran." He could feel his heart slowing with his life, as no doubt everything that had been ruptured within him was now starting to take account on his outside form. "Before I died I always hoped that I would do something right, though I suppose that the only things that I was destined to do were evil things." He gritted his teeth as the worse shock yet ran through him, making him arch his back, and grasp very tightly onto her hand.

"I never should have been like that with you Nerea, I'm so, so sorry. But there's nothing that I can say that can or will make this right. You've just got to promise me that after I go you're going to start running and you're not going to look back." His voice was fading, along with his fighting spirit which was keeping him alive. He couldn't hold on for very much longer, but there were a thousand words in which he wished he could say to her, to even attempt to make up for his behavior earlier, but he didn't have the time to do so, as his time was fading quickly. When he looked up and saw that she was beginning to cry he shook his head slightly, "don't cry for me, please. I don't want the last thing that I see being someone in mourning." He said with haste, his lower body going rigid with the oncoming death.

"Please just run, please!" He cried out as hallucinations started to grasp onto him, visions of his past and everything that had happened up to this point in his short pathetic little life. His eyes flicked wildly as pictures of different events (most of them gruesome and unpleasant) flashed by his view, and this made him even more distressed then he had been before. But he needed to make sure that she knew how important running away was, he was not going to have her die as well. "Please... go..." Those were the last words to be spoken by Archer, as the life faded from his eyes and everything went cold. His body once full with life was now numb and an empty shell. But of course our story doesn't end here with his death, oh no, this is where the real part of it begins...

[cloudsong]

The flicker of his old personality - the Archie that would smirk and be sharp towards her - made the situation only much worse. Nerea could not control her shaking as he declared that this was his end, and that he accepted the premature death. What was worse however, was his the desperation and determination embedded in his words as he took her hand, telling her so clearly that she had to run. It was impossible to accept that he was going to die, much less the idea of leaving him now, before his last breaths had wrung through his body. She clung to his bloodied hands, finding them to be her anchor as she fought the curse within her from wracking pain through her form.

I suppose that the only things that I was destined to do were evil things. His words were like bullets, hitting her hard as she felt his pain as her own. How could this man still think of himself as worthless? When in this moment, he was her whole world. Nothing more was there for her to look forward to, nor to even live for. In this broken, cruel world, this man - who had not long ago been her source of pain - was the only thing she had. And like Jack, he was dying before her eyes. Nerea couldn't bare it.

"Don't even say that! This isn't your fault! It's none but mine. If I wasn't so selfish, none of this... none of this would have happened to you...." Her voiced trailed off, and she broke off as he spoke once more, telling her not to mourn. She couldn't waste his last words by interrupting, and so she clung to them, one hand gripping his own, and the other held underneath his head. For the life of her however, she couldn't keep her fingers from trembling, and her breaths continued to come out much faster than they should.

Archer's eyes began to glaze over before she could say more, and suddenly she grew desperate. Her eyes widened and she leaned forward, desperate to jolt him back into life, desperate to feel his grasp from within their interlocked fingers. But there was nothing, and his final words of telling her to run continued to repeat through her mind, clouding over her muffled cries. Without realizing it, she had fallen over his still form, trembling as the curse overtook her strengths. But the pain that usually was so impossible to bear seemed to be distant, and she barely registered it in her heartbroken mindframe. She was sobbing now, aware that Archer was far away now - as he had said that he did not want to see her cry. He wouldn't be able to see her now, crying wordlessly into his bloodied chest, uncaring and unaware of the pain stabbing every fiber of her being.

"Don't leave me," she whispered in a break from her sobs, breaths coming out in wracked gasps, hurting and nearly choking her.

[Leviathan]

ONE YEAR LATER
(says in spongebob overtone)

Goddammit lost again! How could he keep putting bets on the wrong target?!

One of the many games of the underworld were pitting souls against other souls, and betting on the victor. The demon Moriphus - or his 'human' name Marty was a veteran amongst demons, being one of the first children of Lucifer; and because of this he assumed the role of a war veteran human form which was littered with scars and markings on his chest and legs. Everyone knew to fear Marty, as he was only one step away from being an arch demon himself, but one thing that everyone seemed to beat him at was soul-wrangling. "Lost again, eh Marty?" A younger demon laughed as they both looked over the pit which was used for the fights. "You know the drill." There was a cigar hanging out of the other demon's mouth, and Marty caught onto this. Quickly he grabbed the cigar and pressed the end of it into the other demon's forehead. Demons being hot was just a myth, they were in fact quite cold creatures and not very resistant to fire.

"Be quiet and show some respect before I make your manhood into a pretty little hat for ya." Marty walked away from the pit knowing full well where he needed to go. Demons didn't have money to bet with but they bet with other means; like guard duty, torturing duty, or (and Marty's least favourite) new orientation to the damned souls which had just arrived. That was what he was doing today, having to show the new souls around, and bring them to their cells. Maybe if he was lucky one of them would get out of hand and he would get to beat 'em up, it would sure as hell brighten his mood. One strange thing that no one knew about Marty was in fact that he had sympathy for the humans in a way, they were so weak and pathetic there was no point in hunting them to extinction, it was a coward's fight. But would be tell his father that; of course not! He'd be damned worse than any of these souls, and he wasn't an idiot. Whatever Lucifer wanted, he got without question.

As he made his way through the streets of the main castle and surrounding city in the underworld, he headed towards the left sector, which was where new souls came in. It was kind of funny watching them freak out and realize that there was such thing as a hell, and he always found delight in their screams that they were going to be here for the rest of eternity. But it got boring after awhile, and soon their screams just became noise and everyone who knew Marty knew better than to annoy him. But there was an oath he promised to his father, new souls weren't to be tortured on their first day here, beaten yes, but not tortured. He hated these laws and dictations though it was something that he got used to over the many thousands of years.

As he made his way to the intuition he looked at the flood of souls which were waiting in a outside stadium type thing. He quickly made his way up to the stage and cast a look over the crowds of screeching souls. "SHUT UP!" He demanded, speaking into an amplifier, his words hitting the ears of everyone like knives cutting through their voices. "Now my b*tches," he had an uncanny smirk on his face which would no doubt frighten a lot of the crowd, "welcome to hell! What you think that we can't be formal? Heh- clearly you're wrong, which isn't really surprising given your natures. In a few moments you'll be filed away in your cell sectors, but first we want to formally greet you. My name is Moriphus and I'll be working as some kind of guardian over you assholes, you'll do what I saw or else you'll end up like this poor fellow." As excepted another demon brought a heavily wounded soul onto the stage, he wasn't a new soul, but was far from being the oldest. What was his name? Arthur? Artie? Or no - Archie! He was a notorious soul for being wild and uncaring, but that was how most of these souls were. Often he would ramble on about some girl, and how he knew she'd do the same thing if she was in his position. He'd break - eventually.

Without warning Marty lunged at Archie, beginning to savagely beat him up, the poor and injured soul doing nothing but cowering into a ball on the ground as if he were trying to protect himself. Heh, good luck with that.

[cloudsong]

The year following Archer's death was nothing more but a memory. Nerea was like a walking spirit in the time after his passing, keeping hidden from the demons, but only just. Her uncaring attitude towards life itself had made her an easily spotted target, though it was mere luck that kept her alive all that time. The desire to live and survive had all but died with Archer, and so her capabilities to keep hidden had been weak. It was no surprise that when Jacques and his gang finally tracked her down, Nerea didn't fight them. As the man had looked into her brown, lifeless eyes, they had shown no sympathy with their gun. The gunfire was only heard, and not felt. And after that, there was a darkness that she welcomed.

The next thing she knew, Nerea was in a place she did not recognize. It was unlike her world, and was so cold. She was lying in a heap on the floor, surrounded by hundreds of feet from others standing around her. It took a moment to steady herself, and to really register the blood-curtling screams that were surrounding her. For a brief second she was her old self, uncaring about what this next chapter might be, until she heard the loud voice on a megaphone. It was loud, unpleasantly mocking, and it frightened her to no end. But it wasn't just Nerea who was terrified, for it seemed like every soul around her was trying desperately to escape the pit, tearing at each other and nearly stepping on her in their panic.

So this was Hell? She had died and gone on, to perhaps the worst scenario. Nerea pulled herself off of the ground, taking in the view from a better angle. The speaker on the megaphone seemed to be enjoying the task of mocking them, and much to her surprise, it rubbed her the wrong way. It was in her nature to want to protect others, and it felt for a moment as though the man on the stage could do nothing as worse as he had already done.

But she was wrong. Oh, how wrong she was. When Moriphus began to drag out a wounded man onto the stage, Nerea felt as though her world had stopped.

She was not herself as she was suddenly pushing past the others, shoving them aside in her desperate attempt to get to the stage. When she managed to reach the front, the souls behind her were already yelling. But she didn't seem to even notice them with her wild eyes. She only had eyes for the soul being tortured before her. "Stop it! Stop! Leave him alone, you monster!" She was screaming other obscenities too, not caring that it would probably give her the same fate as Archie. Everyone else seemed to quiet behind her, as her nerve was unbelievable. Stupid, yes. Incredibly stupid, as everyone could plainly see. But Nerea didn't care anymore about being beaten. In here eyes, the only thing she saw was Archer, and how it was her fault that he was in this position. Her fault that he had died in the first place.

[Leviathan]

Archie

Archie hadn't done much in the past year, which felt like an eternity in itself. He was beaten, bruised, shredded, everything in which would kill a human if they were still alive. But this was nothing less than what was deserved - he was a Flawed, and no matter where he was and what he was doing that would never change. He was an animal and so it was proper that he would be treated like one, his sanity was slowly dripping away by the day, and with each night that passed after the endless torture he found comfort in the strangest of thoughts, one of which would often be that Nerea was still alive, and that he had done everything that he could to protect her. He just hoped that when she passed on that she would go somewhere else, he prayed that if there was a heaven that they would accept her. But he wasn't naive, he could remember the demon's taint on her, a claiming of sorts, even though she was not a Flawed it didn't mean that she couldn't be touched by something demonic.

Today was one of the better days, by which he was going to be used to show the newbies what happened when someone went against the rules. He and the other souls who were often troublemakers were the ones used to make an example of. Maybe it was thought that some sense could be knocked into them that way? Regardless it was better than labour duty, in which they worked in the lava pits, and it was easy to slip and fall into the burning pits. Because the souls couldn't die again they would just sit there in the flaming pit... melting. It was one of the most horrific things that you would ever lay your eyes on. Luckily Archie had never fallen in before, though he'd seen so many people that he was numb to it all. That's what hell did to you, it made you numb to everything human that had once made up your being. But then again he never was human; was he?

When he had been called out onto the stage he was expecting of Moriphus's strike, what he wasn't expecting was to hear the sound of someone calling out for this to stop. This made him narrow his eyes a little bit, especially when he realized that he knew that voice; yes he knew that voice very well! "Nerea!" He shouted, pushing Moriphus off him with a hefty shove, slamming the demon into the rough ground of the stage that he had been standing on. Without thinking he jumped off the platform and into the crowd where he saw Nerea at the front. He ran up to her, and quickly wrapped his arms around her in a friendly hug. Though it was desperate and fleeting, as he quickly pulled away; his heart pounding nearly out of his chest. "Dammit; what are you doing here?!" He demanded, had Jacques finally caught up with her? He wasn't sure how much time had passed on the surface, but she didn't look much older than she had been when they'd last seen each other.

He couldn't think at the moment, and he most certainly couldn't act, he knew that he would come to regret his actions of pushing his demonic master off of him, though there wasn't much that could be done about it now. Archie looked at Nerea with his blazing eyes, trying to see if there was anything about her that would explain why or how she'd been killed. Those who died by sickness or fire often carried their scars over onto the next existence (aka. purgatory) but she looked only lightly underweight with no marks to show that she had died in a fire. He was glad, that seemed like one of the most painful ways to die. To her he probably looked like a sight, filthy, covered in blood, and pale from lack of sunlight. Burns and rope marks were infected in his hands, and his eyes were mostly red with blood-shot. Bitterly underweight and skinny you could feel his ribcage whenever you got close enough to him. Of course everyone down in hell starved considering that there was no food or water given to any of the slaves. Sometimes if you were good you got vinegar but that was it.

____________________________________________________________

Marty

Marty had not been expecting it when the soul reared back and knocked the demon flat on his back, tumbling into a heap on the ground. After a moment, his eyes flared with venom as he pushed himself back up. To attack a demon at all was an offense, but to attack someone only a couple of years away from becoming a right hand of Lucifer, well that was something in a totally different tier. Never before had something like this happened before, and yet the main and primary feeling that was surging through him was pride, that one of the damned had taken in upon themselves to fight against one of the demons and defend themselves. That was until he saw the reason that the boy had shoved him off and saw him hugging another soul. There was something off about this girl though, as if she was sent from heaven itself. It was crazy, and he knew that but that was the feeling that radiated off from her, and made him all the more curious of what she was doing here.

Brushing himself off, he shrugged off the attempt to straight him up by another demon, and muttered something about being a pansy suck-up under his breath. As he walked over to the edge of the stage he began to clap, a wolfish grin on his face, and he literally looked like he belonged in somewhere worse than hell. "Very nice," he said with a sway in his voice, as if he expected one of them to say something back. "Is this your little girlfriend? The one you always get on about?" He narrowed his eyes, and his grin sharpened. "You don't think I notice do you; don't think that it's not my job to know everything that happens under my father's roof." He gracefully leapt down from the stage and walked towards the two. "You know I always love a good romance, especially oh what was that one tale - ah, yes Romeo and Juilet! I loved that play, so much drama, compassion, and oh yes... death." Cynical and sadistic he stopped a couple of feet away from the two of them.

Rolling his neck he proceeded to grab Nerea by the arm, being able to read all about her through her blood, ah what an interesting case. Murdered for such a foolish mistake, and her relation to the moron Archie? Just some kind of friendship formed a year ago, strange how he was expecting something more but there was nothing. But no matter, he had the information that he needed now, well not all of it. In fact after a couple of fleeting moments of holding onto her arm he had to pull back with a hiss. Looking down at his hand there was a large round burn, and this caused him to smirk licking his lips. "Oh pretty you're going to pay for that." Even if she hadn't meant it, she had still hurt him. "You!" He shouted at one of the demons, "bring these two to the hold, I want a word with them."

The hold was a place in which the worst of the worst souls were kept. Murderers, rapists, everything that belonged in the worse damnation possible. Of course usually rebellious souls weren't permitted into the hold, but there was something off about the girl, and he needed the boy to come with in case he knew something that he couldn't read from her blood. But there was something more in this girl that Marty could seemingly understand why this Flawed had befriended her, there was something in her that made even the worst of the worst feel... well, human.

[cloudsong]

The look of recognition that passed across Archie's bloodied features was heart-wrenching, as it made her realize that this probably could be the only light he had seen in his entire year here in Hell. He had pushed down his captor without a second thought, and was running towards her. The few souls that had been standing in her way moved out, probably not eager to get in the path of Moriphus in his inevitable oncoming rage. Though they were all new to the environment, it was very obvious what fate would become these two rule-breakers who decided to go against their leader to get to the other.

Nerea clung to him as he hugged her, not seeming to even register the blood he was getting all over her. She had long since become uncaring towards little things like this, and the bigger thing at stake here was her need to once again protect this man from the torture that had been inflicted on him since his arrival. When he pulled away, she was nearly shaking, overcome both by the pain of her curse, and the heavy emotion from seeing him being beaten.

"Jacques found me with his men," she replied shakily. "I... I tried to run, but I couldn't anymore. He shot me." Her words were heavy, as if the emotional part of her was tearing her apart. It was impossible for her to see how wounded he was.

She seemed as though she was going to say more when suddenly the voice of his captor was sneering down at them. Moriphus had jumped down beside them and was approaching, the words coming from his mouth laced with sadistic hate as he sized them up with his unkind eyes. Nerea would be lying to say he wasn't intimidating, and perhaps in any other scenario she might have feared him. But the presence of Archie by her side gave her the courage and determination to stand her ground, even stepping forward slightly as if posed to protect him. It was a similar action than she had had only a year ago, back at the rebel camps when the men had beaten Archie. Like now, it was impossible for her to just take that, and she narrowed her eyes, ignoring the foreboding feeling that perhaps she should be respectful towards this man. After all, he seemed like the one in charge. This didn't change the fact however, that she valued her companion's life over her own, and would die protecting him. Until her last breath, she wouldn't stop fighting.

When Moriphus suddenly lunged forward and grabbed Nerea by the arm, she flinched, pulling away from his harsh grasp. But of course he was stronger, and his grasp didn't seem to budge at all. That was, until he suddenly withdrew, a large burn on his hand from where his grasp had come in contact with her flesh. Her eyes widened as she realized that it had come from their contact, as nothing like this had ever happened before. Rather than replying however, Nerea just glared at him, knowing that nothing she could ever say would change his mind.

The only thought that comforted her in that moment was that at least they wouldn't be separated. For as long as she could, Nerea planned on staying with Archie to protect him.