Flora had never been a sound sleeper; the shadow of the dig site always made night feel as if were a perpetual state, and thus made sleep rather hard to come by for her. It took sheer exhaustion for her to really fall into dreamland. So, as it was, the poor girl was tumbling about in her sleeping bag, accidentally kicking a thoroughly unconscious Carter. It seemed she would never achieve slumber; and of course, the crazed mutterings heard just beyond the tent door weren't helping much.
"Dear me, dear me, I must be mad! There is no scientific evidence to prove - no, not even a scrap - that she is attractive!
"Well, her eyes are quite beautiful, 'course I wonder why they're purple. Would make a wonderful subject for my experiments...
"And her laugh! And, and, and! Oh, there is so much about her!"
This effectively aroused Flora. The delusional rant had spiraled into a broken sort of laugh that sounded quite unnatural. Curious, Flora opened the door a fraction and peered outside into the darkness she was so accustomed to.
Ah. It was Daryl. That wasn't a surprise; it was widely accepted that the scientist was the most eccentric resident of the valley. With his shabby clothes and stooped figure, it was doubtful anyone could have to come to another conclusion. But he was interesting to Flora. She'd always wondered how he'd look if he cleaned up a bit; Daryl would easily surpass her, and perhaps many others, in height were he to straighten that forever arched back, bent by the weight of past failures. With a clean lab coat and his hair combed and cut, he could be positively handsome! This absurd thought made her giggle.
But her laughter startled the poor scientist. He caught her eye as he whipped around to the tent door, and promptly fled in the opposite direction. Flora laughed even harder at this as she watched his shadow diminish into the distant village.