Not quite realising just how tired she had been during the day, and how exhausting it had been to pour her heart out like that, Sienna fell asleep almost immediately next to Reaper once the tears stopped flowing.
It was dreamless and uneventful, but real life couldn't have been less so. As the dawn light began to flood through the window, Sienna was the first to awaken - and her morning daze didn't last long this time.
Jumping out of her skin and stifling a tiny scream at the white mask inches away from her face, and the arm draped heavily over her chest, Sienna lay frozen in her bed.
Oh God, it wasn't just a dream... Last night really happened.
Panicking inside her mind, but trying to calm her frantic heart, Sienna closed her eyes again.
Is he still going to be drunk this morning? Or is he going to have a terrifying hangover?
She really wasn't sure what would be better, but either way it was clear that she wasn't going to be the one to wake him. Except, if she wasn't planning to do that, then she wouldn't be able to move anywhere.
Lifting her head to follow his arm, his heavy weight was resting on her ribs, just above where his claws had dug in last night. Drawing her attention back to her wound, it had bled through the bandage a bit and had stained her shirt, but the bed was fine and it seemed to have stopped already.
'Well, that's a small relief I guess. And he's not pressing on it right now so...' Sienna's whispers to herself trailed off as she considered her situation. Unable to turn over to look at her alarm clock, she would have to just wait until her alarm went off to get up for training.
And at that thought, dread filled her veins with ice. The alarm.
Knowing how grouchy and aggressive Reaper could be in normal situations only worsened Sienna's fears for how he would be if he was woken up at 6am with an alarm. And not only that, but she knew he would be mortified at himself for coming to her room like this.
Frantically rushing to find a way to turn off her alarm without waking him, her planning time was cut instantly short as Reaper stretched in his sleep, yawning underneath his mask and shifting his body, somehow pressing closer into her.
With no time to think, Sienna relaxed her body and steadied her breathing. Even in a terrible mood, she trusted him. Especially after what he said last night... 'I won't let her hurt you'... she felt safe somehow in his arms - even in a terrible mood, she knew he wouldn't hurt her, but it was too late now: she was committed to being 'asleep'. Feeling him wake up, she felt the exact moment he realised what was going on as his entire body froze and stiffened against her.
And then, a whisper:
'Fuck'
He didn't move for another couple of moments, and Sienna managed to hold her nerve. He hadn't sat up yet, and his arm was still slung over her, as if he was trying not to wake her up.
//
His whole body ached, and his throat was almost painfully parched, and cracked as he tilted his head upwards. Thankful to his mask that darkened the bright dawn lights streaming through the window, Reaper looked back towards the girl nestled cosily beside him.
Struggling to remember what happened last night, Reaper felt a feeling he hadn't in a very long time - a pang of fear. It was coated in a cocktail of confusion, and buried by a throbbing headache, but it was there, and Gabriel Reyes knew what it was.
Why it was there, however, was another story that wasn't quite so clear.
Expecting the usual rush of anger that came when he noticed his own weaknesses, Reaper was unnerved by the lack of hot resentment this time. He may have had no idea what on earth was going on, but each time he looked back at the sleeping girl, with her soft cheeks and messy hair splayed out behind her, her comfort and ease in his presence stirred up something within him.
For a moment, he didn't care how he got there. He didn't care about what he couldn't remember last night. Hell, he didn't even care about Soldier 76. Something about this moment pierced his broken soul, gripping his blackened heart.
But while his body told one story, the brain inside his throbbing skull told another.
The only reason she isn't afraid of you is because she's asleep, it called to him.
One voice was easy enough to push away, but as more and more taunted him, telling him how weak and powerless he was, Reaper could feel the shadows pick up and writhe around him, embodying the fury that he knew he should be feeling. But the girl.... this girl.... he didn't know what she was doing to him.
Dragging his eyes away from her face, he let his gaze drift down her body. The duvet had clearly fallen off in the night, bunching up behind her like a butterfly's cocoon.
But his eyes didn't linger long, as the red stain on her shirt slid into his vision. Surprised but not worried, Reaper moved his arm off her cautiously, slow as so not to wake her, but as his arm moved over her wounded side, the site of his own claws made him recoil immediately.
Coating the metal was a dried layer of blood, and it only took the shadow assassin a second to make the connection between himself and her wound.
As if a wall had been broken down, all the anger and fury that Reaper had expected to feel earlier came flooding into him, igniting the flames that he had become so accustomed to in his past
Bristling all over, he shoved himself away from her as he could get, sitting up and leaning heavily against the wall.
He had done this.
The sudden movement crippled him as the pounding in his head worsened dramatically, instantly making him regret whatever reasons he had for drinking so much last night.
But even now, Reaper couldn't keep his anger long, being washed away by something dark and sad.
The sight of the girl who he had watched over the last week - how strong he'd seen her be, and how soft and calm she looked now... It was almost a sense of pride that drove out his anger.
As the situation stood, in a way, it was as if Reaper was the one who drove her to work so hard, to train so hard...
'To become who she is now...' Reaper's low voice murmured.
Noticing the light streaming higher and higher into the room, he knew he couldn't stay much longer. Sighing softly, exhaling the last of his hot-tempered emotions, he placed the blanket back over Sienna before carefully leaning over her and climbing out of the bed.
But with every step he took towards the door, the more something built up inside him, the more it made his feet feel like weights and his heart drop to the floor.
Annoyed at himself, Reaper gave up and turned around. Ripping off his mask, he strode back and crushed all his feelings into a ball, mustering as much courage as he could bear and clenching his claws into a fist.
But as he leaned over her again, and pressed his dark lips against her forehead, his will disappeared - and his body followed suit.
Reaper vanished instantly in a dark vortex of shadows, but as he landed the man let out a heartbroken roar that ripped through his core; voicing more pain, suffering and anguish than any man should ever have to deal with.
//
The bed sprung back up as Reaper lifted his weight off it, and Sienna squeezed her eyes tighter shut, desperately fighting against her will to jump up and stop him from leaving.
He's blaming himself too hard for what he did, it's barely anything, Sienna thought - and it was true. Her wound probably looked bad, but at the moment it only barely stung.
Hearing his footsteps leave across the wooden floor, Sienna couldn't bring herself to stop him, as if it were better this way.
But in the end, she didn't need to stop him. Hearing him stomp back towards her, Reaper let out a huff before the sound of a clasp being unlatched met her ears.
Then, so softly that Sienna thought she had imagined it, a pair of lips pressed against her forehead. It lasted for only a second before the distinct sound of his teleportation blew a gust of air over her, cooling her forehead that burned from his touch.
Eyes wide open immediately in the empty room, Sienna lay silent. Shock didn't adequately describe the way she was feeling, as she tenderly reached her fingers up to brush against the place he had kissed her.
...He had kissed her.
//
I JUST WANT THEN BOTH TO BE HAPPY WHY DO I WRITE SUCH BITTERSWEET SAD SCENES
also omg 30 chapters and over 40k words haha this wasn't meant to be so long what happened