there's no comic sans font, im upset

“-No.” Laurel interrupted their own thoughts, “She’s okay. I’ll find him and we’ll get out of here.” They started moving faster, getting increasingly more manic in their search. While Laurel tried to assure themself that he was going to be okay, the fear remained in their mind. The fear of losing her. Fear that made their blood roar in their ears, making their head spin.

Laurel didn’t know what they’d do without her. If they were being honest, they wouldn’t have made it to today without him. He'd taken them in at their most vulnerable, cared for them (in her own way), even given them a new hand to replace the one they’d lost.

They kept going. Pushing through the way their lungs burned and their eyes stung from the smoke, they kept going. Their determination took them as far as the end of the impossibly long hall where they finally pushed through a large set of double doors leading into a grand ballroom. That’s where they saw her, Harper.

Harper looked... Wild. Laurel got so few chances to actually see her fight, if they didn’t already trust him with their life, they might have been afraid of what they saw. The way she moved was less like a person and more like a vicious animal, lashing out at his opponent. His hair was loose, her outfit dishevelled. Nowhere near the standard of dress she usually held herself to.

“Harper!” Laurel called out to him, “I found you, I-” their words were cut off by their own body, breaking out into a coughing fit. Seemingly the smoke inhalation had caught up to them.

Harper glanced back for a second, never truly taking her eyes off her enemy, but enough that he could see Laurel. “What’s wrong? Are you injured? Just stay there, I can take care of this myself.” At that moment, Laurel understood everything they needed to know. Plenty of people said they found Harper difficult to read. Not Laurel though, they always knew. The trick was her eyes. The few seconds she looked at them, his eyes went through a rollercoaster of emotions. Surprise, panic, relief.

However, those few seconds were a liability. And Harper’s opponent took full advantage. Harper flew from Laurel’s vision, colliding with the ceiling and then falling to the ground with a sharp crack. They didn’t have the luxury of processing what had happened before they all too suddenly had a hand gripping tightly around their throat and they were thrust against the wall, knocking the air out their lungs. On sheer instinct, Laurel kicked out and clawed at the hand, not that it would do any good, they weren’t in any position to actually fight back. Seconds passed and panic began to set in. ‘I can’t breathe. Harper’s hurt and this guy’s going to kill me.’

They opened their mouth as if to scream Harper’s name but no words came out. Only the last of the air in their lungs as Laurel’s vision blurred and darkness threatened to creep in and take them. Amidst this, a figure moved behind the vampire. In an instant, the man was flung far away from Laurel, down the length of the room and Harper was holding them up looking concerned. Her mouth was moving but Laurel couldn’t understand what he was saying, they were much more occupied gasping for breath. Laurel allowed themself to put a more of their weight onto Harper, leaning into her comfort, hunched over as they regulated their breathing once more. Slowly their vision came back into focus and there on the ground they saw a hand. The same hand that had been choking them out not moments ago, except something was off. It was JUST a hand. There was no bloodthirsty vampire connected to it. 

That's when it hit them, what Harper had done. She’d cut off his hand to ensure that he let go of Laurel. If the sight of the severed hand wasn’t so gruesome, they would have been touched at the gesture of protectiveness and caring for their safety. 

They finally began hearing what Harper was saying, his words seemed increasingly panicked with a hint of impatience, “Just take deep breaths okay, can you stand up on your own?” She guided them towards the nearby wall and leaned them up against it, gingerly letting go. Laurel gave him a quick look of reassurance, that was all she needed to turn back to finish what was started.

Laurel wasn’t really paying much attention to the fight anymore, not when everything in their body ached this much. Every muscle burned with the effort of simply standing up, and their right wrist was screaming at them. Granted, pain was nothing new for Laurel but this felt different somehow. Their prosthetic hand throbbed with a strange kind of pressure, and though it was hard to hear amongst the commotion, they could make out a low whistling. Cradling it with their other hand, wincing at the spike in pain as they dared to touch it. It was a challenge just to stand up anymore, the pain was overwhelming and they wanted nothing more than to slide down the wall, close their eyes and just rest, but the thought of Harper yelling at them for even daring to give up kept them upright.

Laurel wasn’t sure how long had passed, it could have been minutes or seconds, they wouldn't know. Their pain-addled mind couldn’t tell anymore. All they could hear was the almost comforting constant of that whistling. Was it their imagination or was it getting louder? They didn’t know. But then they suddenly heard Harper’s voice, she was screaming something but it fell on deaf ears as Laurel’s body and mind were consumed by a somehow worse blinding pain as their vision whited out.