[ He honestly didn't think a human heart could take this kind of pain without rupturing, but there it is, still beating away in his chest with suffocating intensity. Hearing his words repeated back to him, watching her so broken when she always seemed so strong... even back then, by the remains of the Devil's Compass, when he first realized that maybe he loved her just a little... she was strong. It was a bad moment, really bad, but she was still herself.
She wasn't lost like this. She wasn't crying.
As he steps in further, there's only three words left in his head. A mantra, repeated with feverish desperation as he wraps his arms over her shoulders: please don't disappear.]