Chapter 7

He couldn't breathe. His hands were grasping at his throat as he struggled to force the air into his lungs. He'd never felt terror like this before, he'd always been so sure that he could survive anything and now that he couldn't, now that he could feel his life slipping away from him, he was terrified.

He didn't know where he was, the room he was in was pitch black, but he could hear other people gasping for breath around him.

A shimmer of light appeared in front of him and he saw what looked like a door start to close, although he hadn't noticed that the door was even there before.

There was someone standing in the doorway, highlighted by the light shining behind them.

Just as the door was closing the light reflected onto the face of the person standing in the doorway.

Shaun's eyes snapped open and he shot up, his hand grasping around the knife that he hid under his pillow and yanking it out.

He looked around the room to establish that he was safe before dropping the knife onto the bed and laying back on the bed

This was the fourth night in a row that he'd had the same nightmare, the fourth night since the battle at the Barton farm, the fourth night since he had left all of those people to suffocate to death in the panic room.

He knew that he wouldn't be able to sleep now, he hadn't the previous nights after he'd had this nightmare. His face was starting to betray that he wasn't sleeping and his teammates were starting to notice.

He rolled out of bed and tucked the knife back under his pillow. He pulled on a set off loose workout clothes and walked out of the room, trying to sneak past the others rooms so that he didn't wake any of his teammates, specifically Wanda. Right now he just wanted to be alone but he knew that she wouldn't let him.

He walked into the common area and smiled when he saw the three lions asleep on one of the chairs. Sekhmet stirred but he shushed her quickly before she could wake anyone up, including her two cubs.

He pushed the button for the elevator and stepped in as the doors opened with a ping, hoping that the noise wouldn't wake the others. He pushed the button for the gym a few floors below and waited patiently, listening to the terrible elevator music.

The door opened and he stepped out into the locker room. It wasn't a large locker room, it had been designed specifically for the Dark Unit, the other habitants of the tower had their own, much larger gym but this one was for the Unit's private use.

There was a row of lockers on the wall across from the elevator, a bench in front of them and a row of changing rooms which he knew had showers in the back of them. There was a doorway at either end of the room and he made his way to the one on the right, stepping into the gym.

The gym was full of the usual equipment, treadmills, weights, that sort of thing, but it had a couple of things not seen in most conventional gyms too, like a row of punch bags hanging from the ceiling and, most obviously, a boxing ring in the centre of the room.

At the far end of the room one of the walls was actually sound proofed glass with a door that led to a shooting range, not that Shaun used it. He had been a marksman in the SAS, if he wanted to practice his shooting the range wasn't long enough for him.

He pulled his top over his head and hung it on the ropes on the boxing ring. He stepped up to one of the punch bags and landed a hit on it as hard as he could. He waited for it to swing back into position before he punched it again and again, trying to forget the feeling of struggling for breath.

Every time he punched the bag he hoped to feel his problems rush out of him but it wasn't happening like that, in fact it was just making him feel worse.

He punched the bag and this time when he did the bear tattoo on his arm started to burn. He punched the bag with all of the considerable force of the bear and the bag was torn off of its hook and crashed into the wall.

"You look tense." Someone said from behind him. He groaned a little, he should have known that he wouldn't be able to get away without waking her up.

"I've been having this dream lately." He started.

"I know." He wasn't surprised, the two of them shared everything, whether they wanted to or not.

"Well in this dream I'm suffocating, I can feel my life leaving my body. And I can hear others doing the same. And then I see a door closing and there's a silhouette standing in it." He paused and took a deep breath, reaching up for the ring that normally hung around his neck only to remember that he hadn't gotten it back off of Wanda since the fight at the farm.

"Normally that's where it stops but tonight it went further." He continued "I saw who the silhouette was today. It was me. I was the one suffocating all of those people." Neither of them said anything for a while after they had finished, Wanda stood there watching as he moved down the line to the next punch bag and started to beat on that one.

"I've just…" he paused and caught the bag as it swung back to hit him "I've been starting to doubt myself lately."

"Doubt yourself or doubt Loki?" she asked casually.

"Maybe both." He replied after a moment "Since we went back to the village when we were away I've been having second thoughts." She didn't say anything so he continued "I was reminded that Rose had always wanted to help people, it was what she had lived for. It was what I was about too, it was why I joined the army. But that isn't what we do here." He took a deep breath and lashed out at the bag "All we seem to do is kill. There isn't any saving, there isn't any rescuing, just killing."

"And the killing's starting to weigh you down?"

"That's what it feels like. I've never shied away from killing before but I always had a reason, now I just do it because Loki wants me to."

They both fell into silence, Shaun had said everything that he wanted to say and Wanda was trying to think of something to say that would console him.

"What are you going to do?"

"I don't know." He paused again as his mind ran over what to say next "Do you ever wonder if we chose the right side?"

"Why? Are you thinking about joining the rebellion?" she sounded a lot more hostile now, although she didn't sound entirely against the idea.

"No… yes… I don't know." He huffed and smacked the punching bag one time, letting it swing wildly as he stepped away and went to sit on a bench next to Wanda "Not really. But I was kind of thinking about leaving the Unit. I can't cope with all of the killing anymore. Not without a reason."

"Then what's holding you back?"

"You are." He smiled and placed his hand on her thigh "I don't want to leave you."

"That's sweet." She mumbled as she leaned her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arm around his waist "Have you thought that this is all because you're grieving after visiting the place where Rose died?"

"The thought had crossed my mind." He muttered under his breath as he leaned his head sideways on the top of hers.

Shaun smiled as he watched Wanda step into her room and close the door behind her. He stared at the spot where she had disappeared for a few moments until he felt something rub against his leg.

He looked down and saw Nala rubbing her head against his leg, looking for attention. He smiled as he bent down and scooped her into his arms. He carried her into his bedroom and dropped her on the bed.

The bed was large, easily large enough to fit four people in, not that he ever had. At each side there was a bedside table. On one of them there was an alarm clock and on the other a phone for internal phone calls.

The rest of the room was sort of split into a couple of different sections. One corner was sort of like a study; there was a desk pushed into the corner with a laptop open on top of it and open books piled around it. There was a bookcase next to the desk which was absolutely packed with books, mainly on animals, although there were a couple of his favourite stories and one atlas too. There was a shelf on the wall above the desk and there was a bow sitting on it, nothing high fashioned, just one carved from a tree. On the wall between the shelf and the desk there was a notice board which had one thing pinned to it, a checklist of animals that he wanted to collect.

The other part of the room was a living area. There was a sofa pushed up against the wall with a coffee table in front of it. There was another chair at the head of the coffee table and at the other end there was a fireplace with a large flat screen TV hanging over it. On top of the mantel there was an Xbox with two controllers on top of it. In the corner there was another bookcase, this one piled high with DVDs and video games and next to the sofa there was a mini fridge which he had stocked full of alcohol.

There was a door at either side of the bed, one leading to the ensuite bathroom and the other leading to his walk-in wardrobe. He pulled his workout clothes off and threw them at the wash basket which was sat next to the door to the wardrobe.

People who saw his room often said that it felt crowded but Shaun felt like he had simply made the most out of the space available to him. He didn't like having too much empty space, it didn't feel right to him.

He flung himself on the bed next to Nala and the two of them played on his bed for a while until he eventually fell asleep with the lion cub snoozing on his chest.

He woke late in the afternoon to find that his room was more occupied than when he'd gone to sleep. Nala was no longer asleep on his chest, she was snoozing in front of the fire with Simba and Sekhmet and they weren't the only ones who had let themselves in whilst he was asleep.

Wanda was sitting on the sofa with her feet on the coffee table and an Xbox controller in her hands as she stared at the screen playing one of Shaun's favourite games: Mass Effect.

"How did you get in here?" he asked as he pushed himself into a sitting position.

"You left the door open." She replied simply as she waved her hand and launched the second controlled at him with her powers. He caught it easily and dropped it onto the bed beside him.

"It's a one player game." He told her simply.

"Hurry up and get ready." She muttered as she blasted away at a giant robot "I want to show you something." He rolled out of the bed and landed lightly on his feet, trying not to wake up the lions who were still sleeping.

He had a quick shower in the bathroom and then pulled on a pair of jeans and a top and joined Wanda on the sofa.

"Shall we go?" she held up a finger, indicating that she wanted a minute and he leaned back to watch as she fought until she could save the game.

When she was done she pushed herself to her feet and pulled him with her.

Wanda walked out of the door and Shaun made to follow her but he stopped when he saw something pinned to the notice board that shouldn't be there: an envelope.

He walked over and plucked it off of. There were only a couple of words written on it but they grabbed his attention enough to make him want to open it: Thanks for not killing me.

He opened the envelope and turned it upside down, allowing the letter to fall into his hands.

Central Park. 11pm. Come alone.

BW

He knew who the letter was from, how couldn't he? She hadn't exactly been subtle about it. But the letter raised a couple of questions that he really needed to answer. Like: how did she get the letter in there? And why did she want to meet him?

"Are you coming?" Wanda was standing in the doorway again "What is that?"

"Nothing." He replied quickly as he slid the letter into his pocket "Let's go."