Rating: FRM

Warnings: Angst, major character death, hurt/comfort, violence, strategically positioned fluff.

Summary: See title. Friendship-focused Gen Fic with some Jane/Lisbon UST thrown in for good measure. Jane POV.

Word Count: ~10,300 total

A/N: Written for Mentalist Big Bang 2011 at mentalist_bb on LJ. Huge thanks to aprilvolition and oroburos69 for betaing, and extra huge thanks again to aprilvolition for the beautiful and encouraging artwork (which can be viewed on my LJ under the same username)!

I couldn't help myself. Angsty character death is just too tempting. Comments and (especially) concrit will be gratefully embraced; I'm always looking to improve.

I may be cruel, but I do promise a reasonably happy ending.

Disclaimer: Not my characters, just playing with them.

One: Gunfire

Jane hated guns.

Hated them.

Why did there always have to be guns?

Shots popped in the air around them, over and over again. Surely they had to have run out of bullets by now. No one could carry that much ammo. Well, no one other than Lisbon, perhaps. But she was the exception to many rules. Even caught completely unprepared, in the crossfire of an impromptu shootout, she had managed to dig a gun out of the glove compartment and another from an ankle holster while dragging him to safety.

The sharp noise continued to assault his ears as Lisbon crouched beside him, her hand weighing on his back, urging him closer to the ground—as though he was going to do something as profoundly stupid as standing up right now.

Jagged little pebbles on the road dug into his palms as he tried to stabilize himself and remain tucked carefully behind the back tire of the SUV.

He couldn't see anything on the other side of the vehicle, but now was not the time for curiosity to get the best of him. No, definitely not. He would not succumb.

Just as Jane was about to attempt a covert peek past the bumper, another explosive storm of bullets changed his mind.

He pressed himself closer to the dusty tire.

Jane's heart raced, adding to the deafening pounding in his ears. He could hardly hear Lisbon, even though she was shouting into her phone only inches away.

It was going to be okay, though.

Lisbon was in her element.

She could handle things like this. As soon as some backup arrived, she'd have the situation under control. They could go back to the office and he could make some tea and lie on his couch like this day had never gone from bad to worse to incomprehensibly awful.

Jane tried to calm his nerves, but his stomach kept twisting traitorously. He'd be of no use to anybody if he didn't get a hold of himself.

Finally, there was a lull in the gunfire.

Jane waited.

And waited.

Maybe it was over. He sucked in a deep breath. Soon there would be tea and warm leather, and everything would be fine.

A muffled shout cut through the silence, but Jane couldn't make out the words. Someone was hurt. Badly. A male someone. Jane desperately hoped it wasn't Rigsby or Cho. He tried to determine the directionality of the sound in comparison to the approximate location he'd last seen the other SUV in. It seemed to be coming from far away, slightly northwest, maybe—

Jane fell gracelessly backward when Lisbon's hand disappeared, and he instinctively turned to seek her out.

She checked the magazine of her gun, snapped it back into place, then looked at him. "Don't move and don't make a sound," she said in a hushed voice.

She was gone before he even realized she was leaving him here, her image a blur as she swept toward the front of the vehicle and disappeared beyond it. Jane's hand was half-raised to reach out for her, but now it dropped back to his side.

It was okay.

Everything would be fine.

Lisbon would handle this.

Jane held his breath, waiting and listening and trying to keep his imagination at bay.

The air vibrated, and the sounds it carried began to fluctuate chaotically. Cars screeched and revved. People shouted. Sirens sounded somewhere in the distance.

And then…nothing. The noise simply melted away. A quiet stillness descended. Jane could barely hear over the ringing in his ears. Somehow, the silence was louder than the noise it replaced.

Jane was torn between keeping quiet like Lisbon had asked, and calling out for some kind of indication that she was all right. It only took a moment's hesitation for him to mentally override what he should do with what needed to be done.

"Lisbon?" he shouted, his own voice oddly muffled, as though the air was too tired now to carry it.

He should check on her, Jane decided. But she told him not to move, so maybe he shouldn't. Of course, that had never stopped him before, and there was no sense in choosing now to start paying attention to directions. Carefully, he inched toward the bumper and glanced past it, ready to bolt or duck if necessary.

There was a man lying prone, half-on and half-off the road, and another several feet to the left, but no one he recognized. This was promising. Very, very, very promising…

He crawled forward a bit more, his confidence increasing marginally for every moment that he wasn't getting shot.

The air was thick and hazy. It weighed heavily in his lungs. Jane shifted until he had a better view of the road, watchful for signs of movement, but finding none. He stood up slowly, senses alert, eyes scanning—

Jane's heart sank when he saw her lying on road on the other side of the SUV.

Lisbon was only a few feet away, but the distance suddenly felt like miles. Jane rushed toward her, stumbling, trying to call out her name, but his throat seized with the effort.

She was sprawled awkwardly on the asphalt, her hair tousled, one arm lying across her stomach, her eyes closed.

There was blood.

This was all wrong.

There couldn't be blood. She was wearing a vest. It didn't make any sense. It didn't…

Jane kneeled beside her. The blood that shouldn't have been there seeped warmly into the fabric of his pants. Lisbon's blood. God, there was so much. How was he going to get it all back in her? This didn't make sense.

He reached out to touch her. She seemed so calm. And here his hands were shaking and the tips of his fingers ached—everything ached—when he was supposed to be helping, doing…something. There should be ambulances by now—didn't they know they needed to fix her? There should be…there should…

Jane dropped down, sitting next to her with blood staining his hands, and he remembered this. This exact sensation, like the earth was splitting open under him, ripping everything away, but always leaving him behind.

He held his breath until his lungs burned.

She didn't breathe at all.