Disclaimer: Nope, I don't own NCIS: New Orleans. I'm pretty sure you all know that though.
A/N: This is all BonesBird's fault. All of it. She knows why. As a side note, I wrote this tonight and even though I have other (older) things I could be posting, I was told that I needed to post this right away. So I did. Once again, this is all BonesBird's fault. It's from Brody's POV. Warning: Character deaths.
Her world was crashing down around her. Everything she had worked so hard for. It was all taken away in thirty seconds flat. Her friends. Her loved ones. They had all fallen like flies.
Her whole world now lay at her feet. Dwayne Pride, one of the first to include her into his New Orleans family, had been the first they shot execution style in front of her very eyes. She could never thank him enough, could never really explain even to herself what it was that she had felt for him.
James, the man she had once loved enough to trust wholeheartedly and agree to marry. He was splayed out next to Pride, his hands tied behind his back and his eyes staring unseeingly. Those eyes had seen both tragedies and moments of joy, but more than that they had witnessed her at her lowest points in life as well and hadn't judged her.
The last one they had captured, the last one they had forced her to watch die, was Gibbs himself. He had taught her many things during their mission simply by being himself. He had given her someone she could trust with her life, someone to rely on amidst chaos. There were no words for their relationship. It simply was. Now he could no longer give her the stare that would communicate everything there was to say.
They were all gone now. Three of the most important people in her life had been shot before her very eyes and she hadn't been able to do a thing to stop it. She'd only watched on while being forcibly restrained by two men. She had failed them. Had failed their families.
She had promised Laurel that she would bring her father home in one piece. That was the first of a multitude of promises she'd now broken. Her only consolation was that she would likely not survive to break the news to Laurel or Linda.
More than one part of her was glad for that small measure of mercy.
The handcuffs around her wrists no longer made her wrists sting. The hands holding her no longer hurt as they held her so roughly. The pain that had once been radiating up and down her broken leg wasn't even there now. She felt nothing. Nothing except for the crushing heartache filling her chest and stealing her breath away. She could barely even find the drive to force air in and out of her lungs.
As the blood around the three lifeless bodies began to pool at her feet Merri felt what was left of her breath hitch in her chest. This wasn't how the mission was meant to go. This hadn't even been a possibility. No one but her was supposed to be in danger. Her past, those she cared about, had been dragged into the mess though.
She was pushed to her knees as something stung the corner of her eyes. She blinked the moisture away, not willing to shed a tear. That would make this more real. It would be a weakness. It would be less of what she was capable of being. She could imagine the reprimanding expressions of Gibbs and Pride at the mere thought.
She had to be strong for them. It was the only thing left she could do for them now. Not that they even cared right now. There were past that. Beyond that.
As she stared at their motionless bodies she felt everything else melt away. The pain. The regret. The heartache and anger. It was all simply gone.
She was empty.
Cold and empty and unfeeling. It was almost a welcome escape.
She felt the barrel of a gun against the back of her head, but she didn't move her eyes from the three men who had died because of her. They had remained strong for her until the very end. She could do no less for them.
She had no fight left though. Her will to survive had bled out with those she had called family. The last few days were catching up with her and what energy she'd had left was now non-existent. What was left to fight for anyway?
All those reasons now lay in front of her, reminding her of all she had lost.
Reminding her of the pain she had caused in her life.
The gun was removed from her head and she distantly heard a few words of Russian being spoken. Normally she would understand what was being said. At the moment her brain wouldn't comprehend them though, wouldn't even latch onto the words enough to catch a phrase.
A little voice in the back of her head whispered something about shock, but she paid it no attention. What was the point of recognizing symptoms of something that would be over in a matter of seconds? Her life had been forfeit the moment the mission had begun and when the handcuffs had fastened around her wrists her fate had been sealed. She'd only been too stubborn to admit it before.
She felt a cold blade suddenly being held against her throat. A voice followed, the speaker leaning over and whispering in her ear. She knew what was being said. It was a taunt, a last ditch effort to make her speak while also reminding her that she would die very soon.
They obviously didn't understand. They didn't understand that they had killed their chances of getting her to speak when they had killed her friends. She no longer cared what they did to her. In fact she welcomed death. It would be the most humane thing to do to her now. Just to put her out of her misery.
She ignored the taunts and jeers. Ignored the sharp edge of the blade being pressed more firmly into her flesh. She focused instead on the men laying so near, so unmoving, as her heart pounded erratically in her ears. She willed them to move, to take a breath and prove that this was all just a horrible nightmare. To give her a reason to fight one more day.
Not one of them complied with her silent demands though.
Stubborn to the core. All of them. Even in death.
Another voice echoed in her ears as if from faraway. It was a command. A familiar command. Seconds later the blade quickly sliced through her throat and she fell to the ground, her eyes still staring at the three men she'd called friends and family.
Death didn't come as swiftly as she'd hoped. That had probably been their plan all along. To let her suffer just a little bit longer. Her gaze swept sluggishly over the bodies she now lay only inches away from.
Pride.
James.
Gibbs.
Three of the most prominent men in her life. Her blood began to mix with theirs on the concrete floor, mingling together until undistinguishable from each other. She held her eyes open as long as she could, unwillingly to break even that meager contact she had left with them. She wished she could reach out and brush her fingers across their faces just once more, but that wasn't possible. After a few seconds her draining energy won out and her eyes finally slipped closed.
As she drew her last, rattling breathe Merri tried to imagine the faces of those she loved.
Emily. Her beloved twin sister who had been the first to be ripped from her life. That pain had never faded fully. Her sister's smiling face filled her mind's eyes one last time, leaving a dull ache in her chest.
Pride. The memory of his cheerful smile and easy going attitude soothed the ache, if only for a moment.
James. His charming grin followed soon after, reminding her that she was more than just an agent. She had been lucky enough to be loved, even if it hadn't lasted.
Gibbs. That knowing smirk that could either get on her nerves or reassure her that someone else understood. And he had understood. Probably more than she herself had upon occasion.
In a split second, while her heart slowed to a barely noticeable pace as she began to lose her grip on her own life, the faces of many others flashed through her hazy thoughts. LaSalle, Loretta, Sebastian, Patton, her parents, and even Sonja. They all visited her one last time, leaving a warmth in their wake before it melted away to a cold numbness that seemed to seep into every limb and every corner of her consciousness.
The last words from her lips, though unrecognizable and nothing more than a soft whimper, were the words that had somehow become her life's motto...
"I'm sorry."