Wow guys, thank you so much for the support! I'd kept this fic open just to see the reaction, but all your lovely reviews were more than enough to keep this going :) I'm estimating this to be around 3-4 chapters long, but I guess we'll see how it goes.
Once again, flashbacks are in italics and brackets, and I don't own anything of this amazing show or its characters.
Thank you so much!
...
The first thing that strikes Hunter is the stink of fear.
Fear mixed with blood.
It's a terrifying combination, one that gives just a hint the horrors that Bobbi's been through in the past few hours. And yet standing outside the door, staring at the blood splatters on the floor (which, for some reason he can't explain, Hunter just knows belongs to his ex-wife), he refuses to believe that Bobbi will be reduced to anything except the fiery soldier she's always acted as.
(He eyes the sheer amount of blood on her clothes with wide eyes. "Jesus, do I even want to know what the other guy looks like?" he asks, not making any move towards her- because past experience as shown Bobbi won't have any of it.
She snorts and walks to the bed- was she limping?- and promptly collapses on the covers. "Credit me with some skill, Hunter," she mumbles into the pillow, "there was more than one guy." Her eyes flutter shut.
Bobbi's asleep within seconds, and later he'll marvel at how she even got home with a shattered ankle, three broken ribs and countless knife wounds. He doesn't question it though; if there's one thing he knows about his girl is that not even bloody Thor could get in the way of what she wants)
He knows with a dreadful clarity that Bobbi is on the other side of that door, but if anyone else is with her is unknown. The fierce pleasure he feels at the possibility of killing the people that have taken her should be alarming, but the thought of Bobbi is stronger.
If that traitorous Hydra bastard had done anything to her… Hunter doesn't actually know how to finish that thought; he's always tried to ignore that deepest recess of his mind, the one that kept him up at night wondering if the job was really worth the bloodlust that overtook him sometimes.
He twists the doorknob, surprised when he finds it unlocked.
He hears a muted sound from the other side and freezes, some distant part of his mind reminding him that he should probably call for May before racing into an unknown situation. He should wait to take in the variables. He definitely shouldn't be prepared to race in guns blazing without even knowing what's going on.
But it's Bobbi, and to be honest he's never really thought clearly around her.
And with that final thought, he throws the door open and raises his gun.
And he doesn't even register what he's seeing before he hears a shot. He flinches, bracing himself for the pain he's sure is going to slam into his mind at any second.
But then he feels a spray of blood hit his face and forces himself to look.
And suddenly he.
Can't.
Breathe.
("Marry me."
She whirls around to face him, her eyes bright with adrenaline from the fight. She raises her gun, and for a second Hunter's absolutely positive she's going to shoot him in the head, but then she fires and the bullet passes harmlessly over his shoulder, smashing into the chest of the man about to catch Hunter unaware from his back. Bobbi takes the momentary break in attackers to push a strand of sweaty hair off her face and God, she looks beautiful.
"You never do things the easy way, do you Hunter?" she says in a somewhat breathless voice.
He grins at his ability to be one of the few people to catch her off guard.
"Well love, the whole romantic evening, getting down on one knee; does that really sound like us?"
The echoing sound of footsteps running towards them ends the precarious moment, and Bobbi grabs his elbow and drags him down behind the cover of an upturned desk. Just in time, as a wave of bullets slams into the area they'd just been standing.
She turns her head sideways to look at him, a playfulness in her tone as she says "honestly, I think the least you could do is get me a ring."
He barks out a laugh. "Really? Nothing about our lives are normal and yet you want something as mainstream as a ring? Pathetic. I'll give you the world, Bob, if you just say yes."
She unloads her gun, checking the amount of rounds left with practiced ease, and throws a glance around their temporary shelter. "What exactly am I agreeing to?" she asks as the sounds of the fight scream around them.
"Never leave me."
The smile he gets is blinding, and the ferocious kiss- hard and soft against his lips all at once- is all the agreement he needs.
And her eyes are the brightest he's ever seen them when she answers "I think I could agree to those terms.)
"Bob," he gasps, shock and horror rendering his voice a mere whisper.
He races forward and falls to his knees in front of her limp form. "Bob, Bobbi!" he repeats, desperately trying to illicit a response from her. He tries to ignore the shaking of his hands as he unties the cuffs around her wrists- Jesus, her fingers- because this was not happening. It couldn't. It was a nightmare, a terrible, horrible nightmare. Nothing more.
So why wasn't he waking up?
His hands reach up to cup her cheeks, trying to illicit a response from her because she was too damn still and- bloody hell- the bloodstain low on her shoulder was growing at an alarming rate.
He hugs her body to his, lifting her from the damn chair and placing her as gently as possible to the ground where he could pressure her shoulder. That's when he heard a pained gasp escape from her.
The elation he feels that she hasn't left him yet is crushed at the look of absolute pain in her eyes.
He places his hands on her face again, forcing her to keep eye contact. "Bobbi, Bobbi, you stay with me, alright?" He's begging, but he can't bring himself to care, because she's gasping for air and it's like there's nothing he can do except pray she doesn't bleed out under his hands.
He doesn't bother telling her she's fine- they're both too realistic for that- and her ever weakening heartbeat beneath his fingers is proof enough of his failure. Because God, oh God, she'd taken a fucking bullet for him.
"Stay with me, Bob, stay with me" You promised, you promised you'd never leave me.
Her eyes are frantic, and maybe that's what scares him the most. Because every damn wall she usually had to keep him out is gone and the emotions on her face are startling, if just because of the fact that she's allowing them to be seen.
There are very few things that scare Lance Hunter. His life and job as an agent-turned-merc-turned agent had provided him with a scale in which the bar for fear had been set extremely high. Torture and pain was never a fun thing to experience, but they came with the territory. It was the perception of death that was the funny thing. As macabre as it sounded, the expectations that had been placed on agents in high distress situations (i.e. staring death in its ugly face) that it provided almost the final challenge; the final battle to see if you were worthy of the job you'd signed up for. It was the twisted sense of honour that bore agents to the end.
But when it came to the suffering of those around you; the deaths of those you cared about, suddenly it was unacceptable. Suddenly their lives meant more than the any job in the world. People like him and Bobbi needed things like that; they needed each other as reminders of their humanity, of the lives they had outside of work.
So no, there are very few things that scare Lance Hunter.
But watching Bobbi die in front of him was terrifying.
Sorry to end it there, but the next chapter just seemed like it'd flow better if it included May finding them etc.
So, few things to ponder. I'm really liking writing the flashbacks, and I have a few ideas about what I'd like to include next. Obviously, the ones so far have been relatively light-hearted, but I'd really like to delve into the more emotional scenes of their relationship as the drama that we saw throughout the episode plays out (also I'd pay to see Bobbi set fire to Hunter's car, so there's that :p). All I'm wondering is if there's any that you'd like to see; just drop me a line! I'd love to hear it.
Also, with regards to Bobbi's line in the finale where she "doesn't want to do this anymore", I'd taken that to be that she doesn't want to be an agent anymore. But then I read a (frankly quite terrifying) comment that she doesn't want to be with Hunter anymore, which I'd never really considered either. What do you guys think?! Honestly, I don't think I could take them not being together, but that's okay. I've learned to trust the AoS writers (I think...)
Anyways, I'd love to hear what you think of this story so far, but thank you regardless for giving this a read!
-F
