Beyond
Summary: Suddenly he can feel again. (Maybe they're not beyond saving.) Drabble- Carlos, Kiera. During and after the events of s03ep06.
Warning: Drabble.
Set: During and after the events of s03 ep06 – Wasted Minutes.
Disclaimer: Standards apply.
A/N: I needed a silver lining. Something, anything. Oh, and I love the irony of the company's name. Sonmanto. Nice one.
Carlos first conscious thought after the blur and battle-vision of the gun-fight in the warehouse is triggered by Kiera's voice.
"RUN!"
He reacts, instinctively, because she is Kiera and she is his partner and because it's her voice he has come to know for the past year (One? Two?) and his finely-honed intuition senses the danger. There is no pause – no she's not my Kiera, no what if she has a hidden agenda. Not even a she killed my Kiera. It is her screaming for them to run for their lives, and Carlos thinks RUN himself and reacts.
The door slams shut with a dull sound and the air is clean and fresh in his lungs. The ERT is in front of him, panting, shell-shocked and yet professional. Carlos turns around and thinks Kiera and cannot see her anywhere and the door is closed.
His first instinct is to drop everything and go right back, because his partner is still in there.
His second thought is that Kiera is tough, and she will make it out by herself.
Then he realizes that it's not his Kiera anymore but a woman who looks like her and acts like her and even sounds like her and nevertheless is responsible for his Kiera's death (in a weird, twisted, strange way he cannot puzzle out but that has everything to do with the things he felt for her and never admitted and nothing with the fact that this Kiera actually is innocent because, heck, it could have been her, but still she is alive while his Kiera is not and that is everything that matters). And for a fleeting second – a second for which he will always and forever hate himself – Carlos wonders whether it would matter if this Kiera died in the warehouse right now.
(Revenge for-)
The door opens and she stumbles out of the building and collapses in front of him. The door slams closed again.
Instinct, again, has him kneeling next to her within seconds. Her arm feels thin and fragile when he turns her around. Her pulse, when he checks for it, is fluttering like a baby bird but it is there. Relief washes over him and is followed by guilt so thick it makes him choke. This Kiera's skin is warm and alive under his fingers, warmer and softer than the skin of the dead woman in the abandoned basement he keeps visiting. Her heart-beat steadies while he cannot force himself to take his fingers off her pulse point and a fierce joy floods him – she's alive – and he wants to pull her up roughly and hug her. Kiera's eyes flutter open – grey in grey, stormy clouds in a winter sky – and for a second he cannot think. And then she moans and tries to scramble back to her feet, and Carlos is doused in a shower of cold water as realization hits.
This is not the Kiera he knew.
But she looks so much like her. She dresses like her, she sounds like her. It's Kiera. She's so devastated when she realizes what is going on, just like the Kiera he knew would have been. She looks so small when she's grieving, and her hands are so strong. His Kiera had this look on her face when she was remembering her son and her family – the same this Kiera is now sporting. She's looking through him, something both of them did and do so often he feels invisible. It is that look that makes Carlos want to scream at her, I'm here, don't you see me, I'm right here. He thought that look, like so many other things, had died with his Kiera. Now, this Kiera is wearing it again. And he can feel something when he looks at her-
For the first time Carlos thinks: she is dead.
His Kiera is dead and this Kiera is alive. She's dead, and this Kiera is alive and works with him. She smiles like his Kiera and is devoted like his Kiera and who knows, maybe his Kiera would have been as driven as this Kiera. Would have fought for her future as much as this Kiera, would have made the same bad decisions, would have angered him just like this Kiera did.
It is like waking up from a deep, deep sleep.
Carlos is far from being fine. He still feels betrayed, left behind and lost. He still grieves for his Kiera, still hurts with Betty's betrayal, still cannot contain his growing suspicions towards Dillon. He still thinks that something is very, very wrong. He still misses his partner, and struggles with the fact that she still is right there. He's not fine in any interpretation of the word, but that had to be expected. And Carlos thinks that – maybe, maybe – this can still be patched up in some way. Maybe he won't drink the half-filled bottle of Whisky still waiting for him on his living-room table tonight. Maybe he'll think of what to do next instead, of how to fix things with Betty. Of how to talk to Kiera. Maybe he can find it in himself to trust this Kiera a bit more, to not pepper her with sarcasm and irony whenever she says something. To not remind her, day by day, that she is a fake in his eyes. Maybe he will give his Kiera a proper burial this weekend. She doesn't deserve the cold, empty basement she is staying in right now.
Maybe he can be a better person tomorrow than he is today, because who knows?
For the first time since it all went downhill, Carlos has the feeling that there is a way they can save the world. Help themselves, even, him and Kiera. And all the other people that are struggling along with them right now. Maybe Dillon can see that corporations shouldn't lead police forces. Maybe Betty will help them without them needing to watch her. Maybe Kiera can find peace, somehow. Maybe even the two Alexes can find a solution. Because not everything has to end in pieces, hasn't it? There has to be a way. Somewhere, somehow.
Maybe, just maybe…
Maybe they are not beyond saving.
(At the end of the day the Sonmanto case has developed into a veritable shit-storm for the VPD, Dillon's mood is even shittier and the short, victorious feelings Carlos had when he arrested the company's representative dies with the realization that he will have to pay dearly for this short moment of satisfaction. Kiera ran off and hasn't shown up since and suddenly the bottle of alcohol in his apartment is much more alluring again, his resentment towards Kiera is back and he seriously, honestly, thinks that Liber8 did a good thing today.
So it seems like he's slowly starting to see sides, isn't he?
Because what is it worth to be able to voice your opinion when you're restricted by your work, and what is it worth arresting the bad guys when you're punished for it later? All of this doesn't make sense. Strangely, one thing is still clear in his mind. His Kiera is dead, and this Kiera is alive. He can still remember her warm skin under his fingers, her pulse beating steadily. She's alive. It's the greatest wonder of all. So yes, he is pissed at her because he's up to his neck in the shit she created in the first place. But that is fine. His Kiera would have done the same. He knows it with the same security he knows his own name. She will turn up soon, sigh and roll her eyes and sit with him, and the desk duty will be a hell of a lot better when she shares it with him. Strange how he can already predict her reaction, but he doesn't think of it just now.
Suddenly, he wants to talk to her very much.)