Disclaimer: I don't own Fake, sure wish I did though :)

Look After You

Chapter One: Click, Click, Boom

By: Irish

Dee frowned down the sight of the high-powered rifle. He shouldn't be here covering Ryo. Ryo should be here covering him. Ryo was the sniper. It should be Ryo with this asshole in the crosshairs, both hoping to see his partner in the edge of his scope and not wanting to see him, because it would mean he was in the line of fire. Dee shifted his weight slightly; again something Ryo would never do. Ryo wouldn't so much as twitch if he were on fire if he had someone in his sights. Dee wasn't a sniper. It was Ryo's damned rifle Dee was holding; using the top of an open squad car door as a tripod to keep it level. It was Ryo's scope he was looking down. The bullet had been loaded and chambered by Ryo. Ryo's finger prints were probably still on the damned shell. It should be Ryo standing out here in purgatory while he forged into Hell.

It was as he was thinking that Ryo's finger prints were still on the shells, as though sealed with his personal sigil, that his own hands were resting on the weapon in a mirror image to Ryo's and if the rifle were dusted for prints, it would look like their hands were intertwined, that things went bad. Although part of Dee's mind was thinking these things, simultaneously fretting and mooning, the front half of his mind was completely focused on the man in his (Ryo's) crosshairs.

He should have fired the second he knew it was going south, which was several full seconds before anyone else out here, or even Ryo in there, knew it. The Asshole swung his gun towards the hostages. He'd done so many times before, but this time, Dee could see the Asshole's finger was tighter on the trigger, applying more pressure. His facial expression had gained conviction, his eyes looked resolute. Dee should have shot right then. It probably wouldn't have even cost him unpaid leave under the circumstances. But he held, because it was only his gut and IAB wouldn't believe his gut. More importantly, Ryo wouldn't believe his gut. Ryo would think that he was firing prematurely to protect him, that Dee had seen provocation where there was none. So, Dee held his shot for seconds, that later, he would have gladly had back even if it meant Ryo's inevitable disapproval, loss of respect, and the possible insistence that they couldn't work together any more. All of that would have been worth it. But he held the shot, just like Ryo would have, pretending he didn't see the minute indications that this sweep of the Asshole's gun was real and not another feign. He looked through the sight with Ryo's dispassionate sniper's gaze.

-O-O-O-O-O-

The Asshole (Dee thought of that as a proper noun) was still waving his gun around, screaming. Dee could catch a few words on his lips through the sight. 'Government,' 'communist,' something Dee though might have been 'race wars,' but wouldn't have been willing to place a high stakes bet on it. That was one of the reasons it was Ryo who was sent in as a facilitator. Dee didn't look white; Ryo did. Irony really was a bitch.

Dee didn't really have all the details on the how or why of this hostage situation. All he knew was that some middle-aged weekend warrior in fatigues and a potbelly had decided to try robbing this bank. What he was hearing as he stood, waiting, watching, was that this guy was some sort of Montana militia man with a radical right agenda. A dumber Timothy McVeigh.

Ryo's hands danced into the circle of Dee's vision and he resisted the urge to slide his finger off the trigger for the few seconds it would take to shift the scope over to his partner. He wanted to see what he could read in Ryo's eyes. Ryo didn't look like he was making any progress and Dee wondered if Ryo thought he was. Dee resisted though; his crosshairs never leaving the Asshole. The Racist Asshole, Dee amended.

It was supposed to be Ryo standing here, looking down the crosshairs, both wanting and not wanting to see his partner. Ryo was the sniper and Dee was the front man. Dee was always first around any corner; through any door. That was the way Dee liked it. The way he needed it to be. So, Dee was front man and Ryo never protested. Dee didn't know if it was because Ryo agreed or understood that while he could lose Dee and move on that Dee just didn't have the emotional fortitude to do that, or if it was simple practicality. This way they always knew their roles. They could act without needing to confer first. Ryo was also, by far, the more accurate shot. Ryo's accuracy was dependent on stance. This was true of most cops. That was way they emphasized stance so strongly in the academy. A proper shot took a second of set-up, though.

Dee was a very accurate shot, himself, but his true talent was in speed. There was no one that he'd ever contested against at the range who could draw faster; and privately Dee thought there wasn't anyone at all who could draw faster. He shot with as much accuracy from the hip as he did in proper stance, and despite being a southpaw, none of these factors changed when he shot with his right hand. Dee had also been shot , and stabbed, more than once. He wasn't afraid of it any more. Once you knew how bad it hurt (less then most people expected) it wasn't so scary.

All this meant, that in strictly practical terms, Dee was the better choice as front man. He was more likely to be effective if things went to shit suddenly, at least enough so to give Ryo the second he needed to be at his best, and clean up what Dee had started. Yet here he was, in Ryo's shoes, not the one in there and in danger. He was out here, waiting, waiting and praying.

-O-O-O-O-O-

Dee's heart beat twice and then the weapon was almost on the hostages, and he couldn't see Ryo in his scope, that would be another heartbeat yet, but he knew then that Ryo realized that the gun was about to snuff out an innocent life. Ryo entered his line of sight like an unexpected wind.

-O-O-O-O-O-

Dee should have been here and he should be behind his rifle, watching through the crosshairs, looking at exactly two decisions: to fire or not to fire. When he did fire, it would have been with perfect clarity and decisiveness. There would be no doubt. Instead, he was standing in the lobby of a damned bank, sweat soaking his shirt under his Kevlar and the hair at the nape of his neck, and every goddamned breath he was faced with not just one decision that only had two possible out comes, but half a dozen decisions with innumerable possible outcomes, some of which were contingent on other decisions he needed to be making simultaneously or had made already. This wasn't what he was good at. He was good at cascading decisions, like a Venn diagram, if/then, cause and effect. This was unpredictable. Ryo need to keep track of his words, the Target's words, filter out the hostages, watch every detail of his own body language, and the Target's body language, nuances of expression, then process and account for all of that to decide what he said or did next. This was Dee's forte.

Dee didn't think in if/then, his thinking wasn't linear (anyone who ever had a conversation with him knew that). Dee thought in a tapestry, or at least that was what Ryo equated it to. Dee made connections, often through leaps of logic, weaving a bigger picture. That's why Dee was the front man. He took in the bigger picture and Ryo saw only the components. But the chief had sent Ryo in to function as the facilitator. He wasn't the negotiator, that person was on a phone somewhere behind the established perimeter. Ryo was there to encourage the Target to keep talking, to reinforce what the negotiator said by being a face, and someone on the inside who knew every detail of the situation. Chief had sent him because he passed easily as white, where as Dee didn't (the irony being that Dee very well may have been) and because Ryo played by the rules. If Dee felt the negotiator was talking out of his ass, he'd do whatever Dee thought was best, fuck protocol.

"Let the hostages go," Ryo said for what was easily the hundredth time. "You have me, that's worth an awful lot. You won't have to listen to the baby cry." The baby hadn't stopped crying since Ryo had entered the lobby, and it was even starting to set his teeth on edge, and he wasn't the one holding hostages.

The Target's eyes flicked between Ryo and the hostages, and the gun swung from pointed to him to pointing at the hostages. It had bounced back and forth as long as Ryo had been in here and he realized almost too late, that this time was different. He saw the muscles of the Target's forearm start to bunch as he worked to squeeze the exceptionally strong pull on the trigger of the stolen weapon.

Ryo had been trying to think like Dee through this whole encounter. Now, when he probably should have switched to his own analytical thinking (the shot will go wide, a baby is a very small target, he's not familiar with that gun) and waited for Dee, or someone else to take the shot, he did what Dee would have done. He struck, throwing himself in the line of fire of his own team, a hand sweeping out gracefully and knocking the Target's gun upwards. He felt just a moment of smug accomplishment as the report deafened him and the slug buried itself in the ceiling. Not only had that gone smoothly, he bet it looked damned good too.

That moment only just registered in a freeze-frame moment, before someone hit the fast forward button and flung everything forward in a blur. Ryo was following through with his other hand, to knock the gun away as the Target's arm came down again, but the Target had spun slightly, changing the angle of his body relative to Ryo's. Ryo connected with the Target's gun arm, but he hit high, near the elbow, and felt the Target's gun hand bounce off the back of his Kevlar vest. Ryo took a step back, hand sliding down to the Target's forearm, intent on grabbing his arm and twisting it around his back to subdue him and get him to drop the gun in the process.

Ryo had shifted his stance and was just starting to get the leverage to twist the Target's arm when he felt a hot tearing pain just below his arm pit. It felt like when you pulled a muscle hard, that stretching hot pain followed by something tighter and more gripping as the muscle seized up. The relatively minor original pain seemed radically under-proportioned compared to the seizing pressure in his chest, he felt like his Kevlar vest had suddenly shrunk two or three sizes. He couldn't draw a proper breath.

He continued to follow through with his intended motion for a moment, only his fingers let go of the Target's arm, his own arm falling bonelessly to his side. Ryo could still feel the arm, but only in the most distant way, and it wasn't responding to what he was trying to make it do. A nerve, Ryo thought distantly, I did something to a nerve when I pulled that muscle.

He was still contemplating that possibility, time having slowed again, when the Target spun away from him violently, as if jerked by an invisible rope. Before he even finished the odd marionette pirouette, though, the back of his head exploded in a fine mist. The Target jerked and spun once again before he could even hit the ground.

Good shot, sweetheart Ryo thought, then, for some reason he couldn't quite fathom, he was looking at the ceiling.

-O-O-O-O-O-

Dee saw the Asshole's gun kick back, what no one else had seen because the muzzle had nearly been pressed against Ryo. He saw that, heard the front edge of the second report, and started firing.

He was aiming for the Asshole's head, but only got his shoulder, just a flesh wound but enough to knock him back, Dee saw through the cascade of broken safety glass. Dee's hand flew to the slide, ejecting the casing and cambering the next cartridge so fast that his fingers were have looked like double-time CGI, almost a blur. The kickback of his own gun (well, Ryo's) had thrown him further off the mark than he realized, and the second shot went wide, breaking a mirror on the back wall of the lobby. Before the shards of glass were even hitting the marble floor, Dee had chambered another round, his next shot's report covering the sound of dozens of square feet of mirror shattering to splinters on the hard floor.

Dee's hands were now moving faster than his speed of thought, he had the rhythm of the weapon now, and fired the fourth time before he full registered the fine rain of blood and gray matter caused by his third shot. That fourth shot hit the Asshole again as he fell, Dee having tracked him automatically, like a clay pigeon. Fuck you JFK conspiracy Dee thought, having a faint idea that he'd fired well enough to disprove any second gunman. He didn't chamber the next bullet, he'd list his line of sight anyway. The line of the perimeter had been mostly quiet up until that moment, and now it broke out in a flurry of not-quite-chaos. Cops rushing in to secure the scene, paramedics right on their heels. Dee was surprised no one else had fired.

Calmly, Dee set the rifle back in the squad car. Ryo would be pissed that he hadn't put it away proper to start with, but he'd be absolutely livid if Dee dropped it to the ground like he wanted to. Once it was out of his hand, though, he was running into the building himself, ignoring the door and jumping through the mostly-floor-to-ceiling window he'd just shot out. Ryo was on the floor, but there was surprisingly little blood. That gave Dee no comfort though. It just meant Ryo was bleeding where they couldn't see. He didn't know quite how he ended up on his knees near Ryo's head. A lot of things were a blur at the moment. With all the other cops already on the scene, Dee felt no further obligation to secure the area or investigate anything.

"Baby?" Dee took one of Ryo's hands, staying out of the way as the paramedics removed his Kevlar vest and cut off his shirt. "Baby, you look at me," Dee demanded, seeing that Ryo's eyes were open and he was blinking fuzzily. Slowly, Ryo's eyes rolled to him, staying steady on his face.

"Dee?" Ryo rasped, almost gurgled, really, then started to cough, blood welling from his lips. Dee took his handkerchief from his back pocket and calmly wiped the blood from Ryo's lips, as though he didn't know that it meant Ryo was in a real bad way.

"Shh, shh, baby, don't try and talk, okay? You're hurt pretty bad, but we're going to get you fixed up, okay?" Dee smiled, tender, none of the fear bordering on panic he felt showing on his face. He was every bit as pale as his partner though, under the perpetual tan of his olive skin. "But try not to cough, that's only going to make it worse."

"Can't… breath too well," Ryo said, and Dee wasn't even sure if Ryo had heard him. Ryo's body jerked with another sort of gagging cough. Dee had the handkerchief near his mouth, and it caught most of the fine mist of blood that Ryo expelled in a harsh breath, more trailing down his chin. Dee wiped it away with a clean corner, blood blooming like roses on the white cloth.

"I'm sure not, it'll be okay, they're going to help you with that soon." Dee soothed, smoothing Ryo's hair back out of his face. "Turn your head to the side a bit, okay, I don't want you to choke." Dee couldn't have said if Ryo made any effort to do so, but Dee hadn't waited for him to, already gently pivoting his head so that the blood that was coming up would pool on the floor instead of Ryo's mouth. "Just keep your eyes on me, though, okay." Dee smiled again, though it wavered at the corners.

"Were movin'." One of the paramedics called, and Dee heard the stretcher rattle as they lowered it to the floor.

"Do you want help lifting? I used to be one of you guys," Dee said, shifting to look at the paramedics, though his hand was still on Ryo's hair. They nodded, after conferring with a glance, and Dee helped them lift Ryo onto the stretcher at the proper count, then rushed after them to the ambulance. He didn't even bother to ask if he could, just hopping in after them. He had worked his way through the academy as a paramedic, having managed to graduate high school from a school-to-work program that trained students who weren't expected to continue their education in practical skills. He'd chosen emergency medicine, because it funneled best into what he wanted to do, be a cop. It had helped him pay for his two years of school and academy afterwards, and had covered the gap between when he graduated the academy and when he was able to actually be on the force. He knew how to stay out of the way in an ambulance.

Dee could tell things weren't good. Where that bullet had entered, it had surely hit at least one lung, and quite possibly both. The blood that Ryo was spitting up suggested that as well. Not to mention any other number of vital organs. Dee stayed grimly by Ryo's side though, calm, collected on the outside. He was near panic on the inside though. He couldn't lose his partner.

The ride to the hospital was interminable. Ryo clearly fading away fast. Dee demanded time and again that Ryo keep his eyes open, keep looking at him. As they drew near (or what Dee guessed was near) the monitors in the ambulance showed his heartbeat growing erratic, near arrhythmia, and Dee knew Ryo was slipping from him. "Stay with me baby, please," Dee whispered as Ryo's eyes drifted closed. "Stay with me, I need you," There was no response though, and the paramedics hands flew with more fervor as they tried to save Ryo's life. Dee stroked Ryo's hair over and over, not sure he'd see Ryo's dark eyes open ever again. "I love you, baby… I love you."

When Ryo flat-lined, Dee sat back on his bench, letting his hands stray from Ryo just long enough for the paddles to be used. He said nothing else, Ryo was past hearing him. Now, again he was the one left to wait, and pray.

-O-O-O-O-O-

Author's Note: Hey everybody! I didn't really intend on starting a new story, what with all the other ones that I haven't even posted a chapter to in a year or more. The truth of the matter is, though, that I actually haven't been writing at all for almost year. I haven't been feeling much like a writer, I suppose. But, finally I actually wrote something, and after consideration, I've decided to post it, so at the very least, people know I'm not dead. Also, knowing I have people who read and enjoy my work encourages me to write more. Thank you to everyone who has hung in there through this long dry spell. I hope to have new chapters of old favorites up sooner rather than later, but we'll just have to see how it rolls.

I also want to give a shout out to my friend Jax who helped with some of the plotting for this story. I have no idea how long this is going to be, I'm actually aiming for shorter rather than longer. Hope everyone enjoys!