My very first attempt at writing fanfiction. I'm hoping to continue it, but I'll see what kind of feedback I get before I write more chapters.

The title is from .com/watch?v=mc954nt-7Io That Bon Jovi song cuz it was the first thing that popped into my head.

I apologize if there are medical inaccuracies.

It always would have been like this, she thought as the bullet caught her through the back of her right shoulder. Even if I hadn't gotten out of there... I don't think it could have been anyone else. She fell; fell so hard, her face hitting the uncaring concrete as her world turned into a sheer wall of blinding pain.

After a few seconds, just lying there, she felt a sharp nudge in her side. Someone was rolling her over with their foot. She wished they wouldn't. She was busy counting, counting to see how much longer she could make it with at least two broken ribs from earlier and now the lovely bullet that had gone clean through her shoulder. Her eyes were still screwed shut, but she didn't need to see him to know he was there.

His voice, so cold, always so calculated. He had always scared her a bit, although she never would have admitted it to anyone. The Terminator, with his indestructible glasses, his slashing knives. Even after all these years, an encounter with Roan could still mean a slash to the stomach with those curved knives he is so very fond of. "I never expected you to make it so easy for me, Nikita" he said, with a faint hint of cruel amusement in his voice. "Really, you have come down in the world." She heard him step a few feet away, she knew what he was going to do to her. He was going to kill her and then dissolve her away and there was nothing she could do but lie there and hoped she bled out first.

She was slipping away, then, she could barely concentrate on what was happening, she could barely feel her own body. His words slid in and out of her mind and then got all jumbled up and nothing made sense. She heard the gun go off, fully expecting it to be the last thing she ever heard. She was defeated, right? Michael, Alex, Birkhoff, Owen, Ryan, Sean….. None of them could help her now. It occurred to her a few seconds later that if that gunshot had been meant for her, she should probably be dead right now. Which meant... someone else was shooting? Was this a good thing or a bad thing? She couldn't tell. Thinking was the most exhausting thing she had ever done. She contemplated opening her eyes for a second or two and decided it wasn't worth it.

She heard the soft whumph of a falling body hitting the ground some ten feet away. She heard a voice calling her name, she wondered if it was Carla, maybe. Or all the people that owed her their deaths, all the agents and targets, some with names and some without. Or maybe the mother she had never met, if she had already gone on. But that wasn't right. She felt something like recognition stirring in a corner of her brain. But she couldn't connect the voice and a name; she could barely even stay conscious.

Her tired mind started listing the options, and then gave up. What was the use, really, anyway? It wasn't as if she had a chance of surviving Roan once he had her like this.

She let her world slowly fade to black.

He ran towards her inert body, sniper rifle still in hand. This entire nightmarish day had been a blur, ever since the mission went sour and they had been separated. Somehow, Division got wind of the op and now Roan was here and oh god, there was so much blood. It seemed like too much to even be possible.

Michael paused there for a second, the tiniest second, feeling anger and pain and bewilderment as he looked down upon the graceful form of the woman he loved with all his heart.

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no, you are not leaving me, not again," he found himself muttering as he wadded up his jacket and pressed it into her shoulder, desperately trying to stanch the flow of blood. The soldier in him assessed her injuries. The bullet looked as if it had passed clean through her shoulder, and since she had met up with Roan she probably had a few broken bones as well. She wasn't quite gone yet, but she would die all too quickly if he didn't do something to stop the flow of blood.

He heard a voice yelling vague insults in his ear, and realized that Birkhoff was on the coms. He had been trying to talk to him for two whole minutes, apparently. Michael had no way to know if Birkhoff was telling the truth, he really hadn't being paying much attention to anything else since he saw Nikita go down. After his immediate reaction, which happened to be to shoot Roan and then run to his girl, his world was flipping upside-down and he didn't know what he was going to do next.

All he knew was that Nikita was bleeding out in front of him and probably should go to a hospital. A hospital where Division could use their facial and voice-recognition software to find them. He scooped up her petite form in his arms, ignoring Roan's fallen body, and ran out of the warehouse into the waiting car outside, speeding awayas fast as he dared.

At first, Birkhoff couldn't tell what the hell was wrong with Mikey. Fortunately, being the shadow walker and possessing such raw amounts of pure awesomeness, he could pretty much make out what the dude was trying to say. Wasn't hard to guess, really, Mikey would never freak out and stop talking unless something was seriously up with Niki.

"Dude. Dude. DUDE. MIKEY! What the hell happened to Niki?"

It took a few agonizing moments for him to answer, and Birkhoff felt his heart stop when he heard the terse reply, "She's hit. We're coming in. Get ready for a long night."

Of course, it probably didn't help that he had been drinking Red Bull non-stop ever since Division showed up at the exact same warehouse they were trying to rob. It was pure chaos trying to figure out what the hell happened to everyone, but as far as he could tell Niki had gone after the goods while Mikey went to take out the strike team from the catwalks.

He nearly fell backwards out of his chair as he tried to scramble up as quickly as possible. This whole being part of a team deal really did suck sometimes.

Roan lay on the cold concrete floor, assessing the situation as if it were an ordinary mission. That was who he was. Always calculating, always assessing, and never acting irrationally or emotionally. What was the use in all that? All it caused was unnecessary interest in whatever you were doing. And that was the last thing that anyone wanted.

He realized he was getting sidetracked. This would not do. It would never do. He replayed the loop, starting from the beginning, reviewing the origins of the situation. Really, he mused, the only rational way to deal with this mess of a mission.

Current situation: Shot in abdomen. Poses immediate health risk and must be treated as soon as humanly possible to minimize damage. Additional Disadvantages: Unaware of opponents. Limited visibility: Lost glasses. Advantages: Nikita poses no immediate threat, has been effectively neutralized. Potential for recovering firearm if able to move in immediate area.

He moved forward into his thinking process, already plotting, already planning his next move.

Most likely scenario leading up to current situation: Nikita was shot, drawing attention. We have confirmed sighting of Michael in the area. The shot that took me out was long distance, and shot from a high altitude. Most likely situation: Michael heard shot, came to find Nikita, viewed me about to complete the kill and clean the body. Unknown threat, most likely Michael then fired from the catwalks of the warehouse.

He knew what he was most likely up against. He tilted his head ever so slightly, cracked his eyes open , and was rewarded with a glimpse of a blurred shape that vaguely resembled his glasses a few feet away. To reacquire them is crucial to my next course of action in any scenario. He stopped all movement immediately, and listened intently. He heard a man's voice, and immediately identified it as Michael's. Situation confirmed. Completion of mission: "Kill Nikita" unlikely without additional support. Medical attention first. Roan listened some more, and after a few minutes determined that Michael posed no immediate threat. The man was entirely focused on Nikita, pathetically trying to get her to stay with him. Ah, love. He could never accept such a weakness. Look what it had done to Michael, ravaged his world once when he lost his family and then made him weak, traitorous, and pathetic again for Nikita. It also made him make stupid mistakes like carry Nikita away without checking if Roan was still alive or not. Loving someone would give Roan a permanent disadvantage, one he could never neutralize. And that was what he did best. Neutralize disadvantages. Forever.

So, what do you think? Continue? Not continue? Kind of a clichéd situation, I guess…. But I had fun writing Birkhoff and Roan.