I'm a terrible person, I know! It's been, like a million years since I last posted so don't hate me too much... I have the rest of the story written so my postings will be more frequent. And how about the upcoming movie! It looks so good and I'm so excited to see it! I'd love to chat about it if anyone wants. Anyways, here's chapter 23.

Also, I don't own Kingsmen

Shock had done a number on Elaine's nerves. Her chest ached like it never had before, her head pounded, and her hands shook as it held a death grip on Eggsy's gun. The only sound in her ears was the sound of her rushing and pained breath. Eggsy's head was heavy on her lap and his chest was alarmingly still. If not for the rattling wheeze from his lips, she would think him dead.

The sound she had heard in the abandoned building settled down and the silence that stretched out before her was worse than the machine guns.

But she kept her arms out. Gun drawn. Hands shaking.

When the industrial door in front of her opened, she immediately pulled the trigger. The safety was off, thank god, but she missed the person stepping out and shot the wall beside the stranger. The bullet ricocheted off brick with a crunch. Keeping her eyes on the door, it opened once again with a hand held up in peace. A voice followed.

"I ain't here to hurt you," A southern drawl called.

Elaine kept Eggsy's gun drawn, but she paused, her finger resting over the trigger.

The man behind the door stepped out, his hands still raised. Cowboy hat and boots, the man looked completely out of place in the industrial complex in St. Paul. Seeing that Elaine was hesitating, he stepped closer. Elaine raised her gun and screamed at him.

"Don't come any closer!" She screamed, but it was closer to a sob than a threat. Eggsy let out a wheezing cough, blood sputtering out of his mouth. His hands twitched, but then he was still. Elaine only managed a glimpse at him before snapping her eyes back up to the stranger.

"I'm here to help." The southerner looked at the scene around them. The man's age showed through the wrinkles cracking by his eyes. Under his hat, gray hair dusted his temples. But, Elaine could see that he was still at the peak of his life; strong arms and alert blue eyes. These alert eyes were still scanning the scene around him; up on the rooftops, at doors half-opened, darkened windows with broken glass panes fogged from dust. His eyes left the scene and settled on Eggsy. "Looks like Sir Galahad could use some medical help."

Elaine looked down at Eggsy again, his face beaten and bloody. She could feel his warm blood seeping into her new suit.

"I can't trust you." Elaine's voice evened out as she settled into an icy fear, she knew she would kill the man in front of her if it meant protecting Eggsy. "And I have more bullets."

Elaine actually didn't know how many bullets she had. And even if her gun was unloaded and if there happened to be a pile of bullets right beside her, she would have no idea how to reload.

"Elaine, right?" The man said. "You can call me Brandy."

He stepped closer to her and the panic reaction went off in Elaine. Putting her head down, she held onto the gun even tighter; if that were possible, aimed for where he stood, and pulled the trigger. Her arms shook with the backlash of the gun, but Elaine held steady. Then, she kept shooting. Over and over again until there was a click that made Elaine's heart drop. She kept on pulling the trigger even if the gun only clicked. Her head was still down and tears streamed over her face made red with anger and fear.

A hand laid on her shoulder, then the other came to her hands, taking the now useless gun out of her hands. Letting go, Elaine leaned forward and covered as much as Eggsy's body as she could.

Again, she waited.

Elaine felt the man backed away from her, but she kept her head down and dared not to look up. She concentrated on the feel of Eggsy's broad shoulder beneath her cheek, the uneven wheezing of his chest, and she counted the breaths he rattled out against her skin.

The stranger had stepped away, but Elaine heard him.

He spoke words into a phone. Mentioned Galahad and her own name. Elaine knew it was to inform everyone else who wanted to kill them of their location.

Elaine recoiled when the man walked back to her. He knelt down beside her and offered her his phone. Rising up with hesitance, Elaine put the phone to her ear.

"Elaine?" A familiar voice greeted.

She paused, the phone slipping in her hands from the sticky coating of cooling blood. A shiver ran down her spine.

"Roxy?" She whispered.

Eggsy groaned and Elaine realized her grip on his hand was turning her knuckles white. It took great effort to loosen them.

"Yes, thank god you're alive. Brandy told me what condition Eggsy's in and were coming soon, alright? Are you okay? Elaine?"

Elaine heard what Roxy was saying, but she could only look at Eggsy's bloodied face, watching but not seeing. There were so many bullet holes in his jacket, but only a little blood seeped out of them God only knew the amount of internal bleeding he had sustained. Or the conclusions. Would he ever be the same after this? Would he even be alive?

This stupid man; this stupid, arrogant, wonderful man who loved Elaine better than anyone in the world lay before her dying. A lump rose up in her throat as Elaine realized her soulmate was fading away in her arms.

Roxy was still talking to her but now that the world was calm and a certain degree of predictable, Elaine's mind was left to replay the sound of machine guns; the feeling, the terror of being shot, but not dying.

"Elaine?... Elaine, can you hear me?" Roxy said again, her voice growing in anxiety.

"Yeah," Elaine answered, her voice numb.

"We've sent Brandy to protect both of you, okay? He's on our side."

Elaine's deadpan eyes moved to the southerner in front of her, who was now kneeling in front of them. He gave her a half-formed smile. In the back of her mind, she knew Roxy kept on speaking; telling her to do something.

"-back to Brandy," Roxy said.

"What?" Elaine asked, snapping back to the present.

"Can you give the phone back to Brandy?"

Elaine nodded and held the phone out with hesitance. Brandy slowly reached forward and took it from her hand.

The next moments went by like a blur to Elaine. Unmoving from her kneeling position, the southerner began picking up the pieces of chaos around her. He knelt down towards Eggsy and stuck a needle in his neck. The weak rattling of Eggsy's breath gasped as he opened his eyes but then closed them again just as quickly as they opened. Whatever Brandy gave him made his breath stronger and, Elaine noticed as she held Eggsy's hands, his pulse strengthen.

"Will he be okay?" Elaine asked. Her legs were numb from kneeling with Eggsy's body resting on her, but she couldn't move an inch. Elaine barely had the nerve to speak.

Brandy wrapped a bandage around Eggsy's head and nodded, looking up at her.

"He's in bad shape, sure, but rest assured I'll make sure he comes back kicking." Brandy gave Elaine another half-smile before digging in a bag Elaine didn't notice he had.

Elaine stared at the man. When he went back to bandaging the dying man in her lap, Elaine looked down at her hands. Dark blood pooled under her nails and there was not one inch on either palm that wasn't coated in Eggsy's blood. The suit the Kingsmen had gifted her was now drenched in the blood of one of its men and Elaine honestly couldn't tell if all this was her fault.

She knew it was.

Day had fallen into night and Brandy was finished bandaging Eggsy's wounds. Brandy said something but Elaine didn't hear him. The next moment, the weight of Eggsy was lifted off her legs and Elaine felt terribly and suddenly vulnerable. Brandy carried him into a car that Elaine didn't remember seeing a moment ago.

She stayed where she was, staring at the blood left on her legs, at the pool of his blood that had coalesced around her.

"Little lady, we need to get going," Brandy said from beside the car.

Elaine didn't move.

The next time he spoke, his voice came from beside her.

"You're still in shock," He said. An observation more than a question. "Can you move?"

Elaine shook her head.

Brandy said nothing but stood up and gently grabbed her arms. Elaine's legs were stiff and her joints cracked loudly as she stood.

Everything was just a blur. The hours just sort of fell into each other without Elaine's attention. Brandy helped her into the car and Elaine looked in the back seat and loosened her stiff shoulders when she saw Eggsy's chest rise and fall. But his breath still rattled and his face looked pained, even while unconscious.

They drove for a while, out of the cities and through quiet, darkened suburbs until Brandy stopped at an empty house in the country.

All the adrenaline was drained from her and there was no more energy to ask him where they were. But the Southern man had kept Eggsy and her alive this long, she might as well go along with his plan.

She walked when Brandy asked her to walk and sat where Brandy asked her to sit and drank water and pulled a weighted blanket around her when Brandy instructed her to do so. The safe house they were sitting in now was cold from lack of use and smelled like dust and had shag carpet from the 70s. Curiosity momentarily rose in Elaine, but the only thing able to occupy her mind was Eggsy's near-dead eyes and all the blood he left in the industrial park in St. Paul.

The sound of his wheezing; his tortured breaths wouldn't stop repeating between her ears just as the sound of machine guns kept replaying without her trying to recall what they sounded like.

At some point in the night, Elaine found herself by Eggsy's side, holding his lifeless hand up to her lips and kissing his clammy skin every other moment.

She didn't even know where they were. One moment, She was shaking over Eggsy's dying body, and the next moment she was in an unknown room and still over Eggsy's dying body.

Everything went by so fast; Brandy put Eggsy in a van and they had driven out of the streets of St. Paul in the suburbs… then past the suburbs and through rolling cornfields until Brandy stopped at a little house out in the middle of nowhere. Not that Elaine cared. She let the world slip from her attention and moved in foggy shadows.

Eggsy was cleaned up and all his wounds were dressed, but he was still unconscious and his injuries were severe enough that he needed a hospital. Elaine vaguely remembered yelling at Brandy that they needed to get Eggsy to a hospital and Brandy told her why they couldn't, but for the life of her, Elaine couldn't remember why.

"He'll be alright, miss," Brandy assured. "I've worked with Galahad a few times and he's a resilient son of a bitch."

Elaine lowered Eggsy's hand from her lips and turned her head an inch towards the stranger.

"By worked with, you mean killing people?" Elaine snapped. She would have had more reservations about verballing challenging someone like him, but the shock didn't wear off yet and she was sure she would pick a fight with just about anyone right now.

In response to her snap, the man pulled up a metal folding chair to the side of the room and sat down next to her with an understanding nod.

"I was told that you've got amnesia. I suspect that some of its worn off."

Elaine just looked at him, then nodded.

"Tell me what you think you know, and then I'll try to educate you on what is real."

Elaine sat back, placing Eggsy's hand (with great care) to his side. Guarded, Elaine kept her body turned away from Brandy.

"Before… before I lost my memory, I thought… I don't know. Maybe that Eggsy was part of a ring of assassins if that is a thing? Then the car accident happened and they took me in and now… Now I don't know what to think. Maybe the Kingsmen are a mob and the tailoring is just a cover? Military? Spies? I don't… I just want to forget everything."

The way Eggsy treated her; the way Mr. Brown and Roxy and all the other 'Kingsmen' she had regular contact with treated her, there was no way they could be part of something sinister. But Elaine wasn't naive enough to ignore everyone was clearly hiding something from her. And that something involved guns and death.

She snuck a suspicious glance at Brandy. He nodded, took his hat off and leaned towards her, his elbow settling on his knees.

"You're right about some things. The tailoring is a front. But we're not assassins, not the mob." He shifted in the metal chair, leaning back then crossing his arms as he gazed at Eggsy's unconscious face.

"So are you a Kingsmen?" Elaine asked.

"No. I'm a Statesmen, that's the American division." The man said. Then his expression broke into a smug grin. "Like the Kingsmen, but better."

Elaine felt if Eggsy were awake, he would have bit back against the comment, like a familiar banter. If the way Brandy's eyes softened into something morose and pained was anything to go by, he was expecting the same charming banter from the now comatose brit.

If only he would open his eyes and say something to make Elaine roll her eyes. She quietly took in the information. Not that she actually got the information she needed; she was just as in the dark as before.

"You haven't actually told me what the Kingsmen are. Or Statesmen, for that matter." Elaine dropped the guarded expression an inch, turning towards Brandy.

"I better leave that to your people."

"Wouldn't you be my people? I'm American."

The man chuckled.

"Merlin sent me and mentioned if I let either of you die, it'll be my head. The Kingsmen, whether you're aware of it or not, are now your people. Good people, too. They'll protect you to hell and back."

Elaine looked to Eggsy. Every time she thought he was beaten, would never get up again, he pushed through and kept fighting. Elaine didn't doubt Brandy's words for a moment. She met Brandy's eyes again.

"When will my people get here?" Elaine asked.

Brandy smiled.

"They're on route as we speak. They'll probably be here in a couple of hours or so."

Elaine sniffled with a nod. Standing up, she asked which room she would stay in. He showed her and Elaine thanked him with reserved words. Closing her door, she collapsed on her bed and stared up at the ceiling.

Elaine was lounging in her bed at the safe house. Brandy was out in the living room. All they had to do now was wait for her people to arrive. Elaine had overheard Brandy's one-sided phone calls to a man named Merlin, and from what she could tell, they would be here any minute.

Her people.

Elaine liked the sound of that. Mr. Brown, Roxy, this mysterious Merlin, all the suited knights that she met in the shop. They were her people. And that also included Eggsy. If he survived.

Sleep was just about to overtake Elaine when she heard Brandy standup in the other room.

"Elaine?" he called.

Elaine sat up and was about to respond when she halted. A different voice answered in the other room, the tones familiar. Faintly, she listened to the conversation.

"Sorry, I couldn't sleep. I'll get out of your hair." A woman's voice said, imitating the tones of Elaine's voice.

Footsteps approached her room. The door creaked open and there she stood, Evie with freshly dyed hair. And coincidentally, she found an outfit that looked identical to the one Elaine was wearing. Evie silenced her with a look as she said goodnight to Brandy and then closed the door.

"How did you get in here? How did you know what I was wearing? How d-"
Evie silenced her again.

"I have a lot of tech, Lainey. And getting in here was alarmingly easy. But it helps that we're identical." She walked to the window and peeked through the blinds before moving them back. Then she checked the door again, listening to be sure their conversation was private. Then, Evie embraced Elaine in a tight hug. Elaine winced and pulled away.

Looking at her curiously, Evie looked over her for injuries. Elaine wordlessly lifted her shirt to expose the nasty bruise from the bullet.

"I found out today that bulletproof doesn't mean bruiseproof." Elaine shrugged, but even that hurt her entire body.

Evie just nodded knowingly. She stepped away from her sister and sat on the bed. Elaine stood silently watching her sister's sad eyes.

"I'm glad you got out of that alive," Evie whispered, balling her hands into fists. "I knew too late and then I was helpless."

"Were you there?" Elaine sat down next to her.

"No, but I saw the carnage." Evie snaked an arm over Elaine's shoulders and pulled her in.

They were both silent.

"I'm breaking you out of here."

Elaine just sat on the bed, looking at her. A wave of Deja Vu washed over her and with that came the nostalgia so strong Elaine was almost sick.

"Do you remember when our lives were normal? No one trying to kill us?"

Evie sighed, guilty heavy in her eyes and her shoulders caving a little.

"A week ago I accepted the job offer I've been waiting years for." Elaine shook her head ruefully. "I could be in my apartment right now stitching or going into work at a place I've been studying years to be skilled enough to even deserve."

Elaine paused, a lump rising in her throat. She looked down at her bruised arms, the deep scratches at her wrists she didn't even know she had, the blood beneath her nails that belonged to the man she loved.

"I got mowed down by machine guns today. Hell, I was shot. I mean, what the fuck?" Elaine turned to her sister, tears in her eyes and despite the lump in her throat, Elaine started laughing.

She was in a room with her sister, whom she no longer knew, and contemplated screaming so Brandy would run to her. Elaine had no idea when her life became so corrupt, so twisted up in knots. Honestly, it was comical in its absurdness and laughing was the only thing she could do right now.

But this was her sister. People were after them. She had to listen.

Elaine's laughter turned to shaking and she leaned into Evie as she fell apart.

The two sisters had sat until both their eyes dried. Elaine's head still rested on Evie's shoulder and the electric panic that had been buzzing through her veins settled down into an anxious restlessness.

"Tell me everything," Elaine ordered, sitting up.

"No, we have to leave." Evie stood and reached for a bag Elaine hadn't realized she lugged in with her. "We've already wasted a bunch of time."

Elaine sighed. She had resolved to follow Evie lead, the least she could do was gather her bearings.

"Tell me the plan, then once we're safe, tell me everything."

"We're going to escape this safe house, then we're going to fake out deaths, and then we're running away to Cuba and we'll hide there as long as possible."

Elaine nodded taking everything in.

"How do you know this will work? These are advanced agencies we are dealing with. And why run at all? The Kingsmen are on our side. Be reasonable, Evie."

Evie shook her head and sighed. Walking up, she knelt by the bed and looked desperately into her sister's eyes.

"We can only trust each other. Everyone else is out for their own gain. Trust me, Lainey. Please."

Elaine nodded. Eggsy was on her side, she knew that. But she also knew that Evie would go out on her own. And one thing she learned about her people was that they never gave up. Elaine would go with her sister and convince her that the world wasn't as terrible as she thought it was. In the meantime, her people would find them and take both her and Evie under their protection.

"I'll follow you," Elaine said. "But I have to say goodbye first."

Brandy was sitting in the front room. Everything was good. Used to long shifts of boring patrol, he sat watching the door and keeping a close eye on the progress of the Kingsmen. When he found Elaine and Galahad, it had looked like the assailants had gone above and beyond to try to kill them. Not that they succeeded. Galahad was hanging on, the tough bastard always did, and Elaine walked away with a few scrapes and thankfully, no internal bleeding from the bullet bouncing off the suit.

He looked up when Elaine walked out of her room. She gave a self-conscious smile and then disappeared into the makeshift medical room.

The sound of Eggsy's slow breathing was music to Elaine's ears. He lay on the cot, eyes closed, and she instantly thought of what Maisey said. When she was in her coma, he sat by her side through most of it; foregoing rest and protecting her when he had a job to do. And what was she doing? Running away, yet again.

Maybe she had things turned around. She had thought before that he didn't deserve her, but remembering everything, he made the sacrifice, he went out of his way to protect her, to love her.

Elaine was the one lacking in affection, in sacrifice, in love.

"I'm so sorry," Elaine said, wiping her nose on her sleeve and holding back the tears. "I forgot everything. I forgot how stupidly amazing you are and… god… I was so stupid. I'm the one who doesn't deserve you."

She ran her fingers through his hair, down his jaw.

"And I'm only going to add to your pain. And to be honest, you'll probably hurt me just as much if I were to stay. You've sacrificed so much and if I stay, you'll only do more stupid things for me. But now, it's my turn to be stupid. You deserve that, and I want to be someone you deserve."

Elaine leaned down and kissed his cheek.

"Ready?" Evie asked.

"Ready." Elaine nodded.

They both stood facing the window, their escape. Carrying nothing with them, except the few weapons Evie carried with her, their travel would be fast and light. Elaine zipped up the black sweater and pulled the hood over her head. Evie did the same.

Placing the explosive on the window, they both ducked behind the bed and waited. The explosion wasn't as dramatic as Elaine expected, but big enough to blow a hole in the wall and disable the cameras outside that side of the safe house. The door was locked and barricaded behind them, but they only had a few minutes to completely disappear.

Before Brandy had time to run around and catch them, the sisters escaped, running into the night.