They've got him, they've got him by the arms and by the hair, his mouth gagged, his throat so, so vulnerable.
And his eyes, bloody hell those eyes, staring me down, pleading with me to help, please just help.
The boy I love, about to die.
And I can do nothing. Even if my hands weren't bound, even if my leg wasn't broken, I am paralyzed, paralyzed with fear and regret and guilt and the terrible, terrible feeling of complete uselessness. A level 6 Agent, bull, I can't even keep the boy I love alive.
The smart one. The engineer. The one who nearly cried after reading Tiger Rising, the one with more compassion and honesty and raw goodness than I could ever have imagined possible in a human being. Being executed to destroy me.
And it's working. Bloody hell is it working. My mind is in ruins, my body is quaking, everything I consist of melts as I stare at him in mute horror, in the hands of such terrific evil.
Don't they realize it should be me?! It should be me, the attempted murderess, me, the borderline psychopath, me, the one who walked away; it should be me dying.
But no. I watch the bullet come up through his back and out of his ribcage. I watch as his blood begins to spill out in rivers from the gaping hole in his chest. It's him who's been shot through the heart; not me, not the deserving one.
His eyes lock with mine one last time before they roll back in his skull and he goes limp.
I am screaming as they release him and he falls. I try to stand, to run, try to get to him, save him, but hands hold me back, and my struggling and thrashing isn't working, and he's bleeding out—
And with a shudder, I can see the life leave his frail form, can see the final, painful breathe and I break, my mind shattering into a million pieces. I am pain, I am insanity.
Hydra has won.
I am annihilated.