If Fiyero hadn't turned his head at the sound of her voice, he would have almost missed it. The gun's rapport echoed in the courtyard ominously, and he saw Elphaba wince. It all just happened so fast. With a sinking feeling, he saw her face turn pale.
Fiyero felt as if his heart had been dissolved. No! It couldn't be. It wasn't fair. He watched his strong, beautiful angel look down at the blood spreading across her, her eyes and mouth wide open with shock. She looked up at him disbelievingly, as if asking for an explanation. Then she crumpled to the ground.
"NO!" He didn't realize he was screaming until Glinda tried to quiet him. He caught her up in his arms, pulling her too late to safety as he held her unmoving body against him tightly, not caring that he was covered in her blood. "Elphaba? Faba?" He shook her, trying desperately to believe it was somehow sleep closing her eyes. "Fae! Fae!" He cried her name, sobbing as she didn't answer him.
"Fiyero…" Glinda started gently, tears now falling from her own eyes. She touched his shoulder softly, a reminder that there wasn't time for this mourning now.
"No!" He shook her off violently, pulling Elphaba more tightly against him. He wouldn't leave her. It couldn't be true. It couldn't. He needed her. "No, no, no, no nonono," his body wracked with sobs. The company was now echoing the guards' hostility, and Fiyero thought bitterly it was all a little too late.
Mercus shared a shocked and terrified look with Glinda. "Fiyero, we have to…"
"No!" He growled. Nothing could tear him away from her. She couldn't be gone, and even if she was so cruel as to leave him without her, he would hold what he could of her until the moment came to join her in the afterlife she so resolutely denied. Glinda reached a hand out to touch her, but Fiyero pulled her more strongly against him, unwilling to let anyone else share in his tragedy no matter how entitled they might be.
"Let me see. Maybe we can save her." The emergency medic from Mercus's troop said.
"You can save her?" he choked out. He let go, bonelessly moving out of the way to watch with bated breath. They could save her. She would come back to him. The others shared a look, and he knew they were thinking it how enormously cruel it was of the medic to give him false hope this way, but he seized it immediately anyway, holding on for dear life. With a hateful look to his friends for not believing in her future, he knelt beside his love, superstitiously needing to touch her as if that could keep her alive. "Fae, baby, please wake up. Open your eyes sweetheart. Please. Just…don't…." He stroked the hair away from her face with such tenderness that Glinda openly wept on Mercus's shoulder.
Then the medic moved him out of the way, and he stepped aside to watch tensely for any sign of revival. He had never felt grief like this before, this raging torrent of hope and dread, destroying him in its eternity. While he prayed for release from this nightmare, he was grateful at least for this time before the hope was forever extinguished. Held in its bittersweet embrace of hope and fear, he dared not even breathe for fear of breaking the spell.
Finally, the medic hung his head. "I'm sorry. There's nothing I can do."
"No! No, no you have to try something else, you have to… She…she can't be…" his head bowed to his chest. He grabbed her back against him. "Elphaba, please. I love you. Don't leave me here. Please come back." He sobbed, his forehead resting against hers. It was his worst fears come true, and he felt his own life slipping through his fingers. If she died…he couldn't even complete the thought. There was only a deep nothingness there to swallow him whole.
Suddenly she drew a shaky breath, and Fiyero's heart nearly failed him under the strong swell of emotion that poured through his veins. He sucked in a huge, shaky breath of his own, eyes wide with hope. Frantically, he checked to see her lungs inflate, laughing and sobbing in desperate relief. He crushed her against him, nearly delirious with the divine intervention.
"What happened?" she slurred painfully.
He just smiled blearily at her, unable to coax his brain into any thought but, She's alive. Thank God, she's alive.
The medic asked her some questions about her physical state, and she said she was fine, just worn out. Her eyes flicked from Glinda's tear-stained face to Mercus's worried stare to Fiyero, evidence of his distraught outburst all over, and she looked confused. Mercus explained with a husky voice, "We thought we'd lost you there, kid."
In some weird kind of automatic self-preservation, she'd managed to cast a sort of healing spell on herself, and the strength must have knocked her unconscious. It seemed so preposterous until he remembered the other impossible things she had done, even before her powers had been cultivated as they had by now. They discussed how it might have happened, but Fiyero wasn't really listening, not caring what had saved her as long as she was truly safe now.
Fiyero couldn't look at her eyes for fear of coming apart again, and he settled on watching her chest rise and fall, proof of her life. She found his hand, squeezing it. "It's ok. I promised, remember?" That did it. Nearly shaking at the force of his emotions, he pulled her against him. The others looked away awkwardly at their private expression of lamentation.
"Fae…" he gathered himself with the last shred of strength he had to keep from sobbing. "God, don't ever do that again."
"I won't," she promised. She kissed his forehead, and he brought his lips to hers fervently kissing her everywhere his lips fell as if to prove his gratitude for her return.
After a moment, she said, "Well, isn't anyone going to help me up? I believe we were in the middle of something." Mercus and the medic helped her up, and Fiyero followed her, lost without her touch to prove her reality.
"Are you sure you're alright?" Mercus asked disbelievingly, and Elphaba nodded breezily, as if she almost died everyday. Fiyero was too upset to even focus enough to be angry that she would continue to put herself in harm's way by continuing this damned mission. He followed her meekly, still overwhelmed with the loss and recovery of her. Mercus looked at Glinda with concern, but she nodded to continue his part of the mission. He chanced a quick glance at Fiyero, but at the sight of his old friend still weak and covered in blood, he had no words.
Glinda herself looked as if she'd been wrung out in the last few minutes as well. "Elphie, you…" She faltered, and Elphaba took her arm.
"I know, Glin. I know. But we can't think about that now. We have to finish what we came for."
Dorothy was now staring at Elphaba with that same hero-worshipping look her blonde friend had attracted. "You saved my life," awe infused in every word. "Even though I held a gun on you? You're the most un-wicked person I've ever met." Elphaba smirked at this, offering her thanks, but the look on her face when Dorothy launched herself against her in a tight hug was priceless. Fiyero would have laughed if he didn't still feel as if he'd been tossed around in a cement-mixer for hours. As it was, he was merely capable of a meager shadow of a smile.
She finally managed to get everyone back on task, and they headed off in pursuit of the Wizard yet again. As they turned around the corner, they were met with yet another surprise. Covered in soot and dirt were two very unexpected people – Nessa and Boq. They looked at Elphaba's and Fiyero's clothing which was covered in blood, and with wide eyes, asked, "What happened to you?"
"We were about to ask you the same thing."