Alright good, she was ready, there was a trust. This gave Loki an extra boost of confidence. Trust was like a high for him, a perfect little conscience booster. That and the fact that failure meant death -- it was the perfect cocktail for a Do Not Fail Drink of courage.
He sat still for just a moment, building the nerve and the calm to do this. Calm, it was a funny word in this instance, but he'd have to be. Frantic and fear was of no help, it had no place in this task. Loki would have to block those feelings out.
He didn't need his Norse strength to jerk his arms from the bindings. They left a red mark, but nothing as devastating as what the traps would do to their heads if the timer went out. Speaking of, as soon as he stood, the cord pulled, and tick tick tick tick it went in the back of his skull. He dove for the scalpel, then the X-rays, coming to kneel beside Kenzi so he could work around the trap. Of course nothing about this was easy the fly trap directly in front of her and he'd have to maneuver around to get to her swollen eye. 55 seconds....54 seconds...
The X ray showed that the key was snugly tucked behind the left corner of her eye socket. There'd be no twiddling and scooping the key out. He'd have to cut through it. 50 seconds...49 seconds...
Loki gave her shoulder a deliberate squeeze to let her know this was it, before cradling much of her head as he could for support, peeling back her eyelid--the nails from the trap poking at his forearms--and scooping the tiny blade around her eye for the key. He ignored the blood. This was nothing new to him, perhaps carving into an innocent's face (in this lifetime), just another stain on his reputation. 43 seconds...42 seconds... He did his best to keep the blade away from her bone, and the back of the eye socket, so close to the brain. When it pooled with blood he could hardly see the glimmer of silver behind all the eye fragments and crimson, but it was there, and he scraped it out.
38 seconds...37 seconds... His fingers and palms were sticky and warm from her blood but he scrambled to find the lock behind her device, jamming the key inside and turning it. The device clicked with a groan, releasing from her neck. He then grabbed frantically for the lock at the back of his head 30 seconds...25 seconds... it was hard to grapple. He was wasting time. So he cut the restraints on Kenzi's arms and placed the scalpel in her hand, squatting down and turning the back of the device.
She only had one eye to see with, but hopefully she could find the lock faster than he could. 18 seconds...17 seconds...