A/N: written: August 4, 2012
edited: August 11, 2013
I don't own the characters!
He lets go, and for a moment, he feels everything.
His senses are heightened. His vision sharpens, zeroes in on the tiniest details: The tear in the corner of Thor's eye, the quivering of his outstretched hand; the sweat slicked on the scepter he'd gripped so tightly; the resolute one-eyed gaze of Odin; the twinkling of the rainbow bridge and the stars behind it as he descends into the supernova after the Bifrost. His ears decipher the rawness to his not-brother's voice, the desperate, feral cry that had been forced from his throat when he'd seen him let go. He smells the acrid tint of flame in the air. He tastes blood on his tongue.
It is quiet as he falls, a blank canvas he can paint with lovely falsehoods, but he leaves it blank because that's what he wants to do. He's going to die free; he's going to die alone, plummeting through the void with Thor's scream replaying in his ears and Odin's eye boring into him. He's going to die a king; he's going to be a tragedy.
The stars dig into the spaces between the bones in his back, his lungs tighten precariously, and he dances the line between consciousness and repose. He exhales slowly, one long breath into the open air, and he can still hear Thor screaming.
The silence threatens to smother him and then he feels nothing at all, nothing for a long time.