For a good while, neither of them moved.
Lisa stayed lying beside the creature's head, her paw still resting on her neck, and Lohan kept the filaments connected for a few seconds longer than necessary, just to be sure no trace of pain, fear or consciousness remained in that body.
When he finally retracted them, he felt the silence of the chamber weigh on him in a different way, no longer heavy with tension, but with a quiet sadness, like the kind that comes after a funeral where everything that needed to be said has already been said.
"It's over," Lisa said, finally, getting up slowly and wiping her face with the back of her paw, with no shame at all for having cried. "She's at peace now."
"She is," Lohan agreed, and noticed that his own voice came out hoarser than usual, even over the mental link.
