[DROP] perchance, to dream

slow down, you're doing fine

Flora shakes her head, aqua eyes still wide and fixed on Melita as the Honeybee gasps herself awake. "No, I just saw you drop." The words come out faster than she means them to, stripped of most of her usual sparkle as she shifts back enough to give Melita room to stand, though not so far that she’s more than an arm’s reach away.

Glancing toward Asta and Sunjata, Flora’s expression tightens in agreement without quite losing its edge, because leaving suddenly seems like a very good idea. Then her gaze catches on the small pouch near Melita. For a second Flora just stares, lashes narrowing, the strange heaviness behind her eyes pushed aside by sharp, immediate suspicion. She points toward it with one gold-ringed finger, her mouth twisting into something wary and curious. "What’s that?" she asks, looking from the pouch back to Melita. Souvenir?"

Flora

you can't be everything you wanna be before your time

we are crooked souls trying to stay up straight

Relief struck Noah the moment Deimos' eyes opened. The rigid tension that had locked through his body, though, did not loosen but a fraction. His ears remained angled toward the surrounding jungle, his glacier gaze sweeping the glowing Peepholes with lingering distrust. At the Sword's question, Noah's attention settled fully on him. Confusion lingered in the older man's voice, and Noah found himself searching Deimos' expression for signs that something was still wrong. Whatever he had experienced had clearly been more than ordinary sleep.

No, he answered through the bond, the response immediate and firm. Nothing except those lights.

His tail lashed once behind him as he glanced back toward the glowing hollows. Every instinct he possessed urged distance. Whether the lights had caused what happened to the Raeling and the Sword or they just accompanies it did not matter to the Sentinel. Remaining beside them while trying to make sense of what had happened seemed foolish. Let's get a little farther from this first. He suggested, caution threading through the bond. If something here can put you down that easily, I'd rather not stand in the middle of it while we figure out what happened.

Perhaps they could connect with the others that were also in the jungle, following the lights.

~FIN

NOAH