We're to the backhalf of the story now folks, thank you to everyone following and sharing their concern to our poor Peter and Olivia. Strong subject matter here, so beware. I own nothing.
-s
Adrenalin spikes in Peter's chest as the light fills the room and he's up and sliding into his jeans without the foresight of adhering to the pain as it radiates in his chest like a battering ram. Olivia scrambles for her own clothes behind him, pulling on her underwear under the scant protection the blanket provides. Peter stands, slightly hunched and half naked like an angry bear in front of her.
There's loud and thunderous clapping emanating from the door way as Tony slides in looking like he's just hit jackpot. He continues the ovation, rolling his hips as he takes in the strewed clothing with obvious glee. Olivia wraps the blanket around her shoulders and stands next to Peter.
"Very impressive, Bishop! Truly inspirational." Tony taunts as he takes in Olivia with sickly amusement. Peter's eyes drop to search out a gun that's missing from Tony. His heart picks up and he feels like they might have a break. Tony's voice breaks him momentarily form concentration.
"I mean, I knew you were good," he goads, hitching up his pants around his hips, "but I didn't know you were this good." His hands clasp together joyfully and Peter's on edge, feeling his hands shake in anticipation as the realization that Tony being the only barrier to the opened door. They just couldn't be this lucky. His breathing evens as he traces their escape in his mind; trying to calculate the time and hoping against hope its dark enough outside for them to hide.
He knows Olivia notices it too, reaching down to retrieve her fallen clothing under the unabashed gaze of Tony's wondering eyes.
"Pretty, this one." Tony mutters to himself, close to Peter and watching Olivia shrugging into her top appreciatively. His eyes shift back to Peter again, his face close enough that Peter smells the stale coffee and cigarettes on his breath. Peter continues to regulate his breathing, pushing the pain down in his chest to sit coiled in the pit of his stomach. Tony makes little clucking noises on his tongue as his eyes skirt their way back to Olivia shoving her legs into her jeans.
He leans into Peter, who scrunches his hands into fists, the adrenaline rising in spikes and he's trying hard to not look at the opened door like a siren. He's almost startled when Tony's voice hisses against his neck when he talks. "How was she?" He asks. A chill ripples Peter's spine.
Peter levels his stare at Tony, the intensity of fury masking every other emotion. He's ready: he takes a step back ready to propel through Tony but he stops when another figure enters the room. The stocky thug stalks in the room and Peter's crestfallen: he's carrying the gun that was absent from Tony.
Tony was just goading him and now his plan is back peddling. He feels Tony's hand on his naked shoulder and he flinches. "You don't mind sharing, do you?" He asks with a straight face. Peter takes a step back and shakes away Tony's hand. The pain rises in his chest but it's quickly replaced with something else. Fear.
"Go to hell." Peter spats, taking quick steps back to Olivia's frozen figure. The man quickly flanks Tony as he takes out the gun to hand over to Tony's waiting hand. Peter glances sidelong at Olivia, and sees her face has gone white. No, no, no…
"Come 'er, sweetheart." says the man as he bunches Olivia's hair in his fist, pulling her away from Peter's grasp. Peter's instinct pushes the arm holding her hair and the pain skyrockets in his broken ribs, but he pays little attention to it. The man pushes a hand against Peter's sternum and he's lost all breath to the blinding fire. He collapses to his knees, his hand clenching tightly against his throat like it would force air to come to him. He feels like he's drowning. Little spots of light explode as he chokes on nothing.
Through watery eyes he finds Olivia pushed face first into the side of the concrete wall, the man's fist still balling her hair against her skull and trapping her between the wall and himself. Tony's behind Peter now, laughing outwardly as he points the gun at the back of Peter's head. Peter's voice is lost, he tries to call out to her, but her name is strangled in his throat.
"You see, Bishop" Tony can hardly hide his excitement, "Your friend here was rather rude to Archer the last time they met. I think it's time she makes it up to him." Fire rages inside Peter's skull and tries to sit up, only to be kicked back down by Tony, adding to a new swell of pain.
Archer is hovering over Olivia's pressed figure and their gazes meet. Her face is white but blank, her lips curling downward but otherwise motionless. Even as Archer reaches down to unfasten the front of his pants does she finally clamp her eyes shut. She's not going to fight with the gun trained at the back of his head. He tries to call out to her to do something, anything but his voice is still disguised in his raw throat. Peter squeezes his eyes shut to pinpoint the pain to force it down.
"Get ready for the show." Tony whispers from above and Peter opens his eyes again, the fire cranking in his veins at an alarming pace as he watches in slow motion the events as they play out in front of him:
Archer has Olivia's pants down around her hips, her nails stamped into the concrete she's pushed against. The man's mouth is moving outside Olivia's ear but he hears nothing, the thunk-thunking of his heart beating drowning everything else out. Olivia's eyes open to find Peter and she lets a lip quirk, her battered face smashed against the concrete and obscuring her profile. The unmistakable click from the hammer clicking back in the gun Tony's aiming. And finally, the penetrating ring of Tony's laughter at forcing Peter to watch the giant man align his hips up with Olivia's and he finally snaps.
Everything explodes in white hot rage. He's not even aware of the movements his body is making; he can only watch with the curiosity of a bystander as he twits around to knock the gun out of Tony's unsuspecting hand and it clatters away out of sight. He see's Tony's alarmed face as he winds up an arm to barrel his fist down on the side of Tony's head without the foresight to react; the momentum jerking him backward and he crumples. Peter's head swivels back to Archer, barely aware of transgression as his face is buried in Olivia's neck and trying to shake out of his pants with one hand. Olivia's eyes are wide and alert as Peter ascends on them both, he can tell in the slowed time that she braces herself against the wall.
Archer never sees him coming until Peter's fingers are clamped in his hair and forcing his face into the side of the wall with a sickening thump and time catches back up with Peter. Archer makes a wet sound as he slides backward off Olivia who falls with them in a heap of entangled limbs on the ground. Peter feels the paralyzing pain I his chest but the fury is powerful; beating little angry bullets in his skin. Olivia rolls away to slide back into her pants as Peter lifts his arm to fire fist after fist into the face of the man who had already stopped protecting himself. He senses Olivia scrambling back into the corner, trying to find the gun no doubt, but he's hardly concerned with any of that. He alternates his rage between fists as he continues to rain punches on the man in any place he can reach. He knows with absolute finality that he's going to kill him.
"We've gotta go!" Olivia yelps as she races back over to Peter, grabbing his relentless arm to pull him backward off the man. The pain is splitting his chest apart at the seams but he shakes her off, dropping back down on the man, his fury not yet spent. It's not until she spins around into his view, dropping low to demand his attention does he freeze, his name puncturing the sound of his breathing when she almost yells it.
"Peter!"
He lets his arm drop and his chest shakes. He stares at her through blurry eyes for a pregnant moment as she takes his hand away from the unconscious man and lets her pull him upright. When he's too slow, she pulls him harder, the pain cresting but he's upright; letting her pull an arm over her shoulder for support and he realizes that the door is still open. He casts a look backward, Tony and Archer still spread out on the hard concrete floor, unrecognizable under all the blood. They're out the door and Olivia locks it behind them, rounding the corner of the kitchen and carrying most of Peter's weight.
"To the left," he pants, trying to clear his mind through the thick fog, feeling suddenly his knuckles burning on his hands. She turns them through the kitchen and Peter recognizes the equipment laying new on the counters. They're through the back hallway and out the door leading to the back porch in moments that feels like hours.
Peter's naked feet touch soil for the first time in days. It's wet and cold and the sensation is overwhelming. The sun has set; the sky cast in reds and oranges and reflecting off the expansive foliage that surrounds them. The cold air burns his lungs and prickles the skin on his chest. He feels Olivia panting beside him.
"Which way?" She demands, gripping his arm hard around her neck as she drags him along. When he doesn't respond fast enough she leads them to the east, half running half dragging Peter as he fights for consciousness over the pain. The house comes to life behind them, voices carrying into the darkness as they race furiously to the cover the plant life can provide. Peter begs him limbs to respond, to help them along and it's terrifying that the men inside the house could soon be following them. He shakes his head and grits his teeth, burrowing through the pain to move his legs astride with hers, taking step after step away from their captures and into the night.
"They're coming." Olivia pants beside him, pulling him to the right and the sentence lights a new thrill of terror in him, his feet muddy and sliding in the ground as they make their way further from the angry voices and darkened figures that are surely following them.
"Olivia," he tries hoarsely, his tongue cement paper in his mouth. She already knows what he's going to say, he's going to suggest that she leave him behind.
"Not a chance." She mutters with a ring of finality. He hears the clomping of feet around them, but they continue on, breaking into a full srint despite the protest of his broken rips. He breathes in the cold air and it makes him dizzy, like he hadn't breathed in years. They're another mile or so from the highway and he's guiding them northeast now, praying there would be someone on the road for help.
The clumping feet fall silence, the sound of their ragged breathing the only thing filling the night. They continue in a flat run, awkwardly leaning on each other like a twisted three legged race. The air is fire in his lungs, concentrating hard on finding the road. He's practically willing his body to continue moving. They run hard for what seems like forever, covered in more darkness now and Peter's starting to feel desperate; worried if they've missed the road, if they took a wrong turn. But another couple of hard, sliding steps up a hillside and he spots it, glinting like a ray of hope under the moonlight and he's ecstatic. They're almost there.
The blood pumps furiously in his head, they slide a little as a rock overturns under her foot and she slips, knees grinding down against the hard asphalt of the landside. It's he who pulls her up, helping her find her footing without looking at her, his face still trained on the exposed pieces of road from under the brush that surrounds them. They're so close…
A gunshot rings out in the cold night; deafening him as she jerks them to the ground in a heavy heap. FBI reaction to gunshots, he knows. The pain burns his chest, but he doesn't lose sight of the road, concentrating on it like it might disappear if he looks away. It's dark now, almost black and they're so close. He can see the gravel on the road.
"C'mon Olivia," he calls to her, squinting his eyes on the road as he rolls to his knees to pull her back up. It's the gasp she makes that finally makes him look down at her. She's lying on her back on the landscape her hand clamped over her chest by her shoulder. The sounds of footsteps draw near to them, but Peter can't make out which way they're coming from.
"Olivia, let's go!" He calls desperately, feeling instinctually something amiss. "Olivia?" He voice rising in hysterics when she doesn't move, he lifts her into a seating position and pries her hand away from the spot on her chest. His stomach drops when he pulls it away; her shoulder is covered in blood, her hand sticky and dark in the moonlight. Realization hits like a ton of bricks.
"Olivia, no." He calls, cradling her against his chest and bracing a hand against the wound. It feels hot against his skin as the cold night feels suddenly colder. The footsteps are close now, his eyes scanning the tree line for the approaching figures. Braches cracking, leaves rustling, it's all lost sound as he cradles her, his chest heaving in pain. The road might have been hundreds of miles away now, for all the good it was to him.
"Peter," she croaks, her breathing hitching and rippling in her chest. The dark figures close in around them as they move from the shadows of trees surrounding them. His voice is broken; he can't even offer her words of solace; of comfort.
All was lost.