As the world goes dark, Desmond only feels the pain of the Apple.
It feels like a thousand burning knives carving up his arm, tracing patterns like circuit boards into his flesh. Even as all of his other senses fall away and he is sure that he must be dead, he can still feel the cold metal clutched in his hand. It is an anchor in a black void, a point of reference in the endless plain of nonexistence. He is still clutching it when, seconds or maybe millennia later, he hears a sound not unlike the crack of a bullet being fired from a gun. Suddenly, there is painful light and overwhelming noise, and he collapses onto hard dry earth.
He doesn't know how long he lies there, gasping to fill his too-empty lungs with wonderful air, but it is long enough. Long enough for someone to find him, call out to him, touch him.
Try to take the Apple.
The second their hands reach for it, Desmond's fragile mind goes blank with unknowable anger and he is up, clawing at them until he gets it back, but he doesn't stop. He can't stop. There are more hands on him, subduing him, but thankfully they don't try to take the Apple again. Somebody shoves it into the pocket of his hoodie, and then something strikes his temple, hard. He blacks out, body going limp, and once again welcomes the darkness.
He wakes up in a cart.