It was supposed to be safe. Routine. Just a stakeout. Jake had complained about how boring it would be, pouting exaggeratedly. He'd held it as best he could, but quickly broke into the broad, lip-biting grin that made her melt a little no matter how many times she saw it.
Jake, who'd leaped out of the car and pelted after their perp the second he'd appeared, Amy right behind him. Jake, who'd cornered him in an alley and warned him to drop the weapon.
Jake, who wasn't wearing a vest.
The perp's eyes gleamed dangerously in the low light. In a blink, his gun was raised.
Multiple shots. Amy's ears rang. Muzzle flashes dazzled her.
She gave herself a mental once-over, making sure she was unhurt. Blinking the lights out of her vision, she saw their perp and winced at the grisly sight. Unquestionably dead. She turned her head to check in with Jake.
And saw him prone, hand pressed to his chest.
For just one moment, she stood rooted to the spot while ice ran through her, while her world began crashing down around her. A flicker of movement spurned her into action.
"Jake!" She skidded to his side, barking their location into her radio, voice high and fast. "Officer down, gunshot wound to the chest, I repeat, officer down with a gunshot wound to the chest."
"Amy..." he moaned.
"Jake, oh god." A dark stain spread on his shirt. She pried his fingers away from its source and tried not to focus on the ragged hole revealed, instead covering it back up with her own two hands and leaning as much of her weight onto it as she could.
Jake screamed. "I know, I know, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Amy whispered.
He bit it off, clenching his jaw, and the raw sound bounced off the close walls. His face was twisted in pain.
"Least it... it wasn't you that - that shot me this time," he forced, voice hitching.
"Only you would try to be funny while you're bleeding in an alley." Amy's words were full of tears.
With a grunt of effort, Jake moved his hand to rest on top of hers. His squeeze was weak. For just a second, Amy flipped her palm upwards to squeeze back.
His blood looked black. It slicked their fingers. It pulsed in time with Jake's heartbeat, a warm flush against Amy's hand. She repressed a gag and renewed the pressure. A strangled groan slipped out from behind clenched teeth, ending in wet, choking, gasping.
"Shh, I know, just hang on, it's going to be fine, you're - you're going to be fine."
His breathing settled into a ragged and shallow inhale, exhale, each one scrabbling for the next. Amy considered letting up on his chest, but there was so much blood already; the growing stain was swallowing him up.
"Ames..." The fraying thread of sound barely reached her ears.
"Jake?"
"M'tired..."
Panic shot through her. "I know you are, but you have to stay awake. You hear me? I need you to stay awake."
The alley was quiet but for the breathing of two people. Red dotted Jake's lips.
"Jake?"
His eyes slipped closed.
"No, no no no no." Amy shook him, tapped his face. "Wake up, please, Jake, open your eyes, I need you to open your eyes!"
She slapped him, hard. His brow twitched, and glassy eyes made an appearance.
"Oh thank god." She bowed her head and took a shaky breath. The world remained intact a second longer. "Jake, baby, look at me." She cupped his face in her hand. His gaze meandered to her vicinity, but went right through her. She saw his lips form an Amy, but there was no sound.
"You need to stay awake," she searched for comprehension in his look, "Please, baby, don't fall asleep." She prayed he understood.
The bleeding was slowing. She could feel his heartbeat weaken. His hand spasmed, then lay cold and limp. His ring glinted. His eyelids fluttered.
"No!" Amy lunged forward, as if to chase him into unconsciousness and haul him back out. The red handprint smeared on his cheek. "Come on, come on." She tried desperately to rouse him, but his eyes stayed resolutely shut. Tears fell thick and fast, mingling with the blood. "Hold on, just hold on." She sobbed. "I can't - I can't be without you, Jake."
Sirens split the bubble around them. Hope sparked. "That's help, they'll fix this, this isn't how it goes, right? We've only just got married, and you always wanted to be a dad, and-"
The chest beneath her hand stilled.
She couldn't feel a heartbeat.
And the world, held at bay all this time, finally, finally came crashing down.
Amy wasn't sure if it was her hands that did compressions, her mouth that breathed for him. She felt far away; this couldn't be happening. She wasn't there. She was a passive onlooker in her own body: she felt the sickening squelch with every compression, tasted the metal on her tongue, but it was happening in a dream. She couldn't see the nightmare through the tears.
Hands grabbed at her, pulled her away. For an instant she fought, breaking away, pushing through the people swarming him, shrieking Jake's name. More hands held her back.
"Sergeant, please, they're trying to help!"
Reality snapped back into place. She blinked the tears from her eyes, and the bodies resolved into paramedics lifting Jake onto a stretcher and carting them away, shouting urgently. More were covering the body and taking it away. She couldn't summon the energy even for anger. She chased after Jake, through the thickening crowd, the beat cop following.
She saw his shirt cut open, saw them fit plastic into his mouth to force breath into his lungs, saw them load him into the ambulance, heard them shout "Clear!"
She saw his body jerk, then lay pale and still.
Again.
And again.
She was going to be sick.
And then she heard the shout, and saw the jerk, and heard the most beautiful thing in the world: "We've got a pulse!"
Amy though she might pass out from the rush of relief. Her legs were weak and her vision tunneling when she bounded into the ambulance before they could shut the doors.
"Sergeant!" The beat cop. "You should come back to the precinct, we need a statement."
Her stare was utterly wrecked. "He's-" her voice broke. "He's my husband."
"Oh." It was very small.
Amy took Jake's hand, gripped it tight enough that tendons stood out on her forearm. The doors slammed shut on the cold night, the flashing lights, and that cop's mournful look.
