Guess who accidently deleted this story and all it's reviews and is having to republish it?

She only had to hold on for a little while longer. A few more minutes, only a few more minutes, someone will find her soon, they had to. But even as she repeated the mantra in her head she questioned her body's ability to follow through with her mind's promises.

Breathing had become too much of a task for her to cope with at that point. She felt like there was smoke festering around in her lungs, burning her when she tried to breath in or out. Was this how she was going to die, suffocation?

A sound jerked her away from trying to pull as much air as she could into her yearning body. Temporarily putting a halt to her wondering about her possible fatal demise.

It was getting closer, the noise. Steps, she thought, but she wasn't entirely sure. and she wasn't sure she could really trust herself and her instincts anymore. Still though if her senses were still serving her well then, the noise was getting closer. A figure now visible in her blurry vision, casting a shadow over her, allowing her to partially shield herself in the darkness of the ally.

A tremor of fear ran down her spine as she tried and failed to make out the face of the person approaching. She could normally see past the depravity she worked with every day and see the good in the world, in humanity. Now though her mind was not capable of that sort of positive thinking. What if it was him? What if he'd come back to follow through on his threat? To make her a victim of her own unit?

That fear and adrenaline seemed to fuel her enough to allow her to let out a yelp, like a wounded animal calling to the pack. It wasn't a word, just a desperate groan, but anything that would garner nearby attention would be enough. She hated to potentially put a passing civilian in any sort of danger but surely she had earned the right to ask for help at this point.

She wasn't sure how loud she was, the ringing in her ears making it impossible to tell, but she could see the figure still closing in on her. They were talking to her, she could see their jaw moving, but she couldn't make out a single word, it all just sounded like a long ramble.

Eventually they got close enough for her to risk a glance up at their face through the matted veil of hair covering her eyes.

Amanada.

It was the older detective. Her mentor. Amanda would help her.

She could see Amanda trying to evaluate her injuries. She would attempt to reach out to touch her every few moments but without much control over the movement she would see herself flinch away from the delicate touches.

Stop it, she's trying to help, just let her.

Slowly a voice of reason managed to kick in and even if the burning in her lungs prevented her from being able to verbalise it Amanda seemed to sense it when she stopped moving away from her touch, allowing her to keep two fingers gently on an unbruised patch of skin on her wrist monitoring her pulse while her other hand explored the slashes and bruises scattered around.

Her slight awareness was a blessing and a curse she realised though as a rush of fatigue washed over her. Her remaining energy rapidly depleting away into nothing.

"Stay with me Kat." She finally managed to make out a full sentence, a distant part of her mind registering the slightly stronger than usual southern accent. But she couldn't make out any more than that, could barely keep her eyes open anymore.

She had done all she could to stay alive at this point. She'd forced herself to stay awake when all she wanted to do was curl into a ball and die. It was up to someone else to look after her now, if she did die at least she knew she'd done all she could in her state.

The ride to the ambulance passed in a blur, for both detectives. Amanda was trying and failing to provide as much comfort as she could to Kat. But she was clearly heavily disorientated and completely unaware of what was going on around her.

In the midst of it all though she managed to find a second to send a quick message to Olivia. Informing her briefly of the situation and telling her which hospital they were on route to. She needed Olivia here, Olivia was always better with victims, she could just form a connection with them immediately, they trusted her. Kat trusted her, she looked up to the Captain more than she looked up to her, Olivia had more power, she could support her in ways Amanda couldn't.

She wanted Liv there for Kat because she deserved the best, not so she could fly under the radar and try and avoid the guilt of not being able to support her mentee.

"Stop!" She heard Kat hiss in one of her moments of partial consciousnesses, as she jerked around on the gurney like she'd been touched by a live wire, trying to get away from the paramedics searching hands.
"Kat, Kat, calm down. You're safe now, it's okay, you're okay!" Even as Amanda said the words she knew it was a lie, Kat wasn't okay, and for all Amanda knew she still wasn't safe.

After a few minutes where both her and the paramedics attempts to calm Kat had failed Amanda nodded to the suggestion of sedating her,as though she was an animal being put down, not able to decide for herself what was best for her.

It was for Kat's good, not so Amanda didn't have to see that look in her eye anymore.

Once she got to the hospital Amanda was unsurprisingly pulled away by the hospital staff, shouts of a collapsed lung and getting her into theatre being thrown around. Kat needed help right now, she didn't need Amanda hovering around like some sort of helicopter mom.

As the medical staff pulled her away and Amanda was left stood on her own in the corridor she finally felt the full weight of what had happened lay down on her shoulders. She propped herself up against the wall to keep herself upright as he head spun, she hadn't felt that dizzy since her pregnancy with Jessie, her mind going at 100mph while her body stayed routed firmly to the ground as though she was on a fairground ride.

Kat didn't deserve that, whatever that was.

"Amanda!" Olivia's voice broke through the haze to her as she attempted to block out the groans of pain Kat had let out from her head as they ricocheted relentlessly around in her mind. The sounds and the flashes of seeing her on the floor half head, and then in the ambulance lashing out at anyone who dared to touch her, unable to distinguish helpful hands from hurting ones.
"How is she? What happened?" Olivia demanded her eyes briefly landing on the splotch of blood staining the front of her shirt.
"I've no idea, I just found her. And she wasn't really in a state to tell me what happened, or do anything else for that matter." Amanda rubbed the sweat on her forehead with the back of her hand.
"But she'll be okay?" Fin who Amanda hadn't even noticed attempted to confirm, noticing a flash of guilt on Olivia's face he hadn't seen since Mike's death.
"They think she's got a collapsed lung, internal bleeding, that's what they're worried about." She gestured over in the direction Kat had been wheeled in, not answering Fin's question. "But I mean the extent of her injuries... Someone really put her through it." Amanda shook her head.

There'd have been no need for that level of violence, Kat was strong, but even she would've been rendered unable to fight back with only half of her current injuries.

"She's strong," Fin again offered up as an attempt to encourage the two women.
"You didn't see her,"

Kat was normally so cheery and loud, a complete contrast to everyone else in the squad, a slither of light they'd all needed. Seeing her left for dead, demeaned, broken down, unable to even call for help, barely able to breath, it had triggered something deep inside her, awoken a rage that up until that point she'd managed to conceal.

This isn't the time to blow up, Kat deserves more than that.

"You've sent unis?" Amanda questioned.
"Already there, CSU are on route to collect all they can, I'll make sure any surveillance is watched and re watched, we'll get them Amanda."

They'd already got Kat.

Ralphie Morris didn't take long to arrive at the hospital, quicker than any of Kat's family anyway, clearly having learned of Kat's condition through the grapevine which had inevitably been twisted and warped to suit different narratives.

He didn't take long placing the blame for her attack squarely at the feet of her new squad either. As though they needed verbal confirmation of what they were all thinking.

"You were supposed to look after her, to keep an eye out." He accused; his tone venomous.
"All due respect, I know she means a lot to you, she does to us to, but she wasn't on duty, we had no reason to believe she was in danger." Olivia defended.
"No reason?! No reason? Your unit, your squad Captain, it attracts danger and sadists, I thought you of all people would know that by now." He spat out, briefly Amanda wondered just how sick Olivia got of knowing that when she was around William Lewis was never far from people's minds, but Fin was quick to jump to her defence.
"Sergeant that's out of li-"
"I knew she should've taken those threats more seriously. I told her that. You're her captain for Gods sake though, why didn't you insist?!" He raged, no pause for thought.

"What threats?" Amanda pounced on the new bit on information like a bird of prey circling a injured rodent.
"She said she told you all."
"Well newsflash she didn't. Now tell us what threats, and if you talk to my Captain, or my partner like that again then it'll become an issue, clear?" Fin demanded.
"She really didn't tell you?" He searched their faces, why would she have lied to him?
"Tell us what Sergeant ?" Olivia demanded, quickly running out of patience.

"It was back when she first joined vice, one of her first undercover ops. It was meant to just be a one time thing, but it ran a bit deeper and she ended up under for months, way way longer than she should've been aloud, I mean she was brand new to the job." He paused looking down, his own unit had clearly failed her too. "We let her get to close to a suspect, well a suspect's brother, but he was complicit in importing class A drugs into the country."
"And what? She was made?" Fin tried to hurry the story along.
"No. She got all the evidence we needed, more than even. But she was upset when the ADA told her he was pushing for as many charges as he could against the brother, Liam, she hid it quite well but I could tell y'know. She tried to tell him that whatever it was that she saw in him, I mean God knows what, was real. But he didn't believe her, even when she all but sabotaged her own testimony. He said she was as good as dead, that he would make sure someone played with her like she played with his emotions, that nobody got away with that."
"And what he got out already?"

Olivia was belligerent, it was a clear and obvious threat against one of her Detectives that she should have been made aware of upon his release, it was ludicrous that this was how she was finding out.
"He wasn't directly involved with the imports, and he fed the usual bullshit story about finding God and righting his wrongs."
"They all do, but how'd he find Kat?"
"I've no idea. All I know is I got notified last week he'd been released, which means so did Kat. I told her she should lay low for a while, that she should make sure you're all aware, that I was going to contact you," He looked to Olivia, "To make sure she was protected, much as she hates it." He rolled his eyes, Kat was too similar to herself Amanda decided. "But she said she'd already told you, that you all knew to keep an eye out and that she would be fine, that she could look after herself, and that he'd probably forgotten about her. She said the threats were heat of the moment that he wouldn't follow through."

Olivia shook her head, she and Amanda had clearly rubbed off on the youngest squad member, and not in a good way. "Put an alert out on him now." She ordered the sergeant.

The next three hours went by slowly, way way too slowly for their liking, with copious amount of take out coffee consumed by the four of them.
"Kat Tamin's family?" A Doctor finally called out.

"How is she?" Amanda asked as they crowded round the man in pale blue scrubs.
"Lucky, one of the broken ribs pierced her lung, we managed to fix it, but a few more hours, she might not have been so lucky. She had numerous other injuries though, none of them fatal on their own, but together that's another story."
"But she'll be okay?" Ralphie asked.
"Eventually we think so, but we can't make any promises, complications are still a possibility. She has 3 broken ribs, a fractured collar bone, severely bruised midsection and legs, a concussion, partially crushed windpipe which definitely didn't help the breathing situation, and dozens of shallow slashes and puncture marks."
"Was she sexually assaulted?" It was Liv who was brave enough to ask the question they'd all been thinking, but not dare ask as though they could in someway jinx the answer.
"No obvious signs of trauma, but we'll need her consent to do a kit, she should be waking up soon, we'll ask then."

No obvious signs of trauma. It was a lifeline Amanda decided, what she had been through was obviously horrific, but at least she might have been spared that particular horror.

"When can we see her?" She asked, she wanted Kat's confirmation that she hadn't been violated, and then when she was better she wanted to smack her round the back of the head for lying.
"She's still asleep for now, but you can go in, only two at a time though so you don't overwhelm her when she wakes up."

Standing outside Kat's room Amanda calmed slightly seeing the rise and fall of the younger detective's chest, she was okay for now at least.
"Sergeant I understand she means a lot you, trust me I get it I really do. But... If Kat does have something she needs to disclose then maybe she'll feel more comfortable with just me and Amanda."
"But the doctor said-"
"I know, but trust me, that doesn't mean nothing happened. And it's important to get the full story, we don't want her leaving something out, for the cases' sake and for her own sake." Ralphie took a step back, keeping his eyes set on Kat through the window, not wanting to believe the implications of Olivia's statement.
"The least we can offer her if something did happen is the most comfortable disclosure we can."

Please leave a review if you've got the time, I'm rather bitter about losing the ones I accidently deleted, haha.
Should be updating soon :)