January 2nd, 2013
'This is the worst last supper ever,' Vicente commented, picking up a limp slice of pizza and watching forlornly as a globule of grease rolled over the patina of cheese and pepperoni before dripping onto the cardboard.
'Hmm?' Desmond mumbled, his mouth stuffed full of food and his eyes closed in ecstasy. He wasn't too fussy when it came to pizza.
They were parked a street away from the Abstergo headquarters, and Desmond had insisted on getting some food before they went in - if only because he didn't want to die on an empty stomach. Vicente, as the only one of them who could safely be seen in public, had fetched the pizza from the nearest takeout place. Now they were sitting in an odd circle in the back of the van, surrounded by guns and ammunition, using boxes of grenades and rockets as chairs
Daniel hadn't touched the food at all, simply stating that he worked better on an empty stomach, and was carefully studying a plan of the building that he'd drawn from memory.
'We trigger the fire alarm remotely he said, without looking up. 'Most of the people in the building will clear out into the parking lot, leaving us clear to go in through the basement. We need to get as far as possible with the minimum amount of fuss, so once we're inside we take out the security cameras and any other monitoring systems that we can. I don't expect we'll get all the way to Rikkin's office without being spotted, but the closer we get, the greater the chance there is of at least one of us surviving.
Desmond rolled his eyes. 'That's optimistic.'
'It's realistic, there's a difference. We're massively outnumbered and you're basically just dead weight, so...'
'Screw you.'
'I guess if push comes to shove you'll make a nice, broad human shield. Want another slice of pizza?'
'Alright, girls,' Vicente interrupted grimly. He wiped his fingers on his jeans and nodded at the pair of them, his jaw tight with a nerve jumping in them. 'We know the plan, yes?'
Desmond nodded in the affirmative, and Daniel gave a small, aborted jerk of his head.
'No point in putting it off any longer then.'
They had parked the van right next to an alleyway, one which contained the manhole they would use to access the sewer, which in turn would lead to the basement of Abstergo HQ. The building was built on old foundations, which explained the sewer access, and Daniel had brought with him the security codes required to get in that way. If the codes had been changed, they were also carrying a pound or so of plastic explosives.
Desmond shrugged a double gun holster over his shoulders, and then pulled his jacket on over it. It was lightweight and dark in colour, designed to let him move fast and hide in shadows if he found any. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Daniel slide Harold Kaczmarek's shotgun into a holder on his back, and Desmond felt his stomach tense uncomfortably as he realised that he was already considering the fastest way to remove the weapon from Daniel's body if he was killed. To distract himself, he grabbed two light pistols with silencers and slid them into the holster before grabbing a few extra magazines.
Vicente was hunched over a smartphone of all things, whistling through his teeth as he stroked the screen. 'This is what they get for going digital,' he commented aloud, glancing over at Desmond. 'If they had old-fashioned fire alarms, I'd never be able to do this.' He tapped at the screen one final time and, after a short pause, they heard the shrill of an alarm ringing out through the air.
'Showtime,' Daniel said grimly, pulling his hood up over his head and shouldering his way out of the back of the van. He was loaded up with guns and carrying a crowbar, which he used to lever the manhole open. Desmond jumped out after Vicente, who leaned down to help Daniel move the heavy metal disc to one side and set it down next to a garbage can in near-silence.
Peering down the hole they'd exposed, Desmond saaw a set of old iron rungs leading into the darkness. He clicked on a heavy-duty torch and flickered the light down into the dank depths of the sewer, looking up at Daniel and Vicente with a grin.
'After you,' he said, with false deference.
Daniel rolled his eyes and dropped down onto the ladder with easy grace, Vicente hesitating before following him. For a short, mean moment Desmond considered replacing the manhole and driving off in the van to lead the life of a runaway. Then an image flashed across his mind, of the Kaczmarek kitchen splattered in blood and viscera, and he felt his facial muscles seize up into a grim expression.
By the time they reached Abstergo, Desmond was light-headed from lack of oxygen. It was his own fault: as soon as his sneakers had hit the concrete floor of the sewer, the smell had hit him in a wave and he'd drawn his hand up into his sleeve and clapped the material over his face defensively. Even Daniel had wrinkled his nose in discomfort as he led the way, but Vicente hadn't seemed all that bothered by it.
'We got about thirty cows back home and they dedicate their entire lives to four things: eating, sleeping, shitting and farting,' he'd commented robustly when Desmond had asked him how he could stand it. After a pause he added, 'Occasionally fucking too, though I swear they're farting the whole time they're doing that as well.'
Desmond shook his head. 'Glamorous life of a crime lord,' he said, his voice muffled by his sleeve.
'Quiet,' Daniel commanded sharply, pressing his ear up against the metal door in the small alcove that they'd found themselves in. Apparently this was the emergency-emergency-emergency exit to the building: a very last resort, in case all the other exits were blocked. There was a keypad set into the wall next to it, and Daniel flexed his fingers before reaching up and gently tapping in the code. There was a quiet beep, then the light above the keypad turned green and the door opened a small fraction indicating that it was unlocked.
'Lucky,' Vicente said drily, without much sincerity.
'Yeah, I don't like this,' Daniel agreed, scowling. 'The codes should have been changed since I left. Something's not right.'
With a sense of unease, Desmond thought back to the brief telephone conversation with his father, and wondered if he should tell the other two men about it. He knew that Daniel possessed enough self-control that he probably wouldn't turn homicidal outright, but there was a possibility that Vicente might refuse to go with him if he knew there could be an ambush ahead. Desmond stayed quiet.
'Let's go,' Daniel said softly, drawing a gun and easing the door open gently.
They came out at the bottom of a set of stairs, which they followed upwards until they found themselves in an underground parking lot. There were quite a few cars, but no people, and an eerie silence reigned in the concrete expanse of the place.
Daniel jerked his head, by way of communication, and they followed him over to a bank of elevators on the far side of the parking lot. The deadness in the air began to make Desmond feel jittery, and he drew a pistol as though the weight of it in his hand might make the hairs on the back of his neck lie down once more. It was a relief to reach a wall and to be able to press his back against it, and he reached out with one hand to press the call button for the elevator.
He was stopped by Daniel, who caught his wrist and glared at him. 'You want to announce our presence?' he demanded in a scornful whisper.
Desmond glared at him. 'I'd like to get a little bit higher than the basement.'
Daniel was still holding the crowbar, and instead of responding he let it slide down through his palm until he was holding it fully extended. Then he set it into the thin gap between the two metal doors and leaned his weight on it, grimacing as the doors parted with a painfully load screech.
'You fuckers want to help out at all?' he asked tersely.
Vicente hurried forward and grabbed one door, Desmond the other, and between them they managed to pull them apart. The elevator was nowhere to be seen, and there was a drop of about six feet or so down into a complex system of protruding machinery.
Daniel squeezed past the other two men and swung himself easily around onto the wall, using a protruding metal panel as a handhold. He reached out and grabbed Vicente's hand, pulling the other man through and helping him secure a place on the wall of the elevator shaft. Vicente's door slammed into place with a groan of relief and, realising that he was on his own, Desmond braced himself before leaping through and landing on the opposite wall. The second door slammed shut, and they were left with nothing but the dim, red emergency lighting.
'The alarm's stopped,' Vicente commented, his voice a little strained, and Desmond noticed with a start that it was true. He listened carefully for any voices echoing down the elevator shaft, but there were none.
'We should climb,' he said in a low whisper, as though worried they'd be overheard. Deciding that he was sick of Daniel taking the lead, he began hauling himself up the wall, grateful for the many cables, rungs and divets that made the ascent a breeze. It may have been a while since he had been inside an Animus, but his muscles had not forgotten how to climb quickly and efficiently. He even had to occasionally slow down a little to allow Daniel and Vicente to catch up.
The elevator shaft was a closed space, meaning that they could not see what was happening on any of the floors, but the entire building was still and quiet. It made Desmond feel extremely ill at ease. Even with the fire alarm going off, there should have been a few guards still hanging around - there should have been someone.
'Box is up ahead,' Daniel said, breathless and sounding more than a little relieved. Desmond glanced upwards and saw that, indeed, the elevator was directly above them. As though they could sense the end of the climb was near, his muscles began to fatigue and Desmond hurriedly pulled himself hand-over-hand up towards it.
With groans of relief, they each scrambled onto the roof of the elevator. By Desmond's estimate, they had to be at least fifteen floors up, and he'd hoped that they would be able to take the elevator the rest of the way. When he asked Daniel if this was the plan, however, the older man shook his head grimly.
'We'd need a key card to get it working, and I don't have mine any more. We get out through the doors and take the stairs the rest of the way.'
'And if we run into anyone?' Vicente asked in clipped, tense tones.
'Kill them,' Daniel said bluntly.
Desmond hesitated. 'What if...'
'It doesn't matter who it is,' Daniel barrelled on, fixing Desmond with a fierce glare that was made more intense by the lighting which cast a devilish red glow in his hair and eyes. 'I don't care if it's your goddamn father. He won't hesitate to shoot you, so you don't hesitate to shoot him.'
Desmond gritted his teeth, knowing that what Daniel said was true and hating it. Looking down, he opened the hatch on the top of the elevator, dangled his legs over the edge and hopped through.
'Wait there for a second,' he called upwards. 'I'm going to scout out the corridor, see if anyone's there.'
No reply came, and he didn't wait for one. Desmond leaned forward and pushed the button with the | symbol on it. The doors slid open.
A dozen gun barrels were slowly revealed, one after the other.
Bill Miles was standing in the middle of them, his arms folded and a distant expression on his face. Like some kind of clockwork puppet, he lifted a finger to his lips and then made a beckoning gesture, as the guards around him audibly tightened their fingers on the triggers of their guns.
Desmond felt a lump in his throat so heavy that it hurt to breathe around it. As if hypnotised, he took a couple of steps toward his father, until they were only a foot apart.
Desmond glanced at the guards around him, looked past the uniforms, and realised with a jolt that Shaun and Rebecca were among them. They weren't fighters, not really, so Rikkin must have planted them there to make Desmond more hesitant.
'Call to your friends,' William Miles whispered softly, his eyes hard and grey and vacant. 'Tell them the coast is clear.'
It was too bad for Rikkin that he hadn't yet met the new Desmond Miles.
Moving too fast for the guards to comprehend, Desmond twisted around suddenly, grabbed his father by the hair and - at the same time - yanked one of his pistols from its holster, whipping it up and ramming the barrel of it harshly into the underside of Bill's jaw.
'Guards!' he yelled, as loud as he could, backing away and dragging his father with him, the surrounding men and women with guns forced to part around him. He caught Rebecca's eye as he passed her, but found no recognition or softness there.
Bill was trying to gurgle something, but Desmond suspected that it would be an order to shoot, and so he pushed the gun harder against his father's larynx to keep him from speaking. The guards exchanged hesitant glances, and then one of them (thankfully, no one that Desmond knew) was thrown violently against the wall in a splatter of crimson. The others turned back to the elevator in alarm as bullets began to whip out of it from where Daniel and Vicente had launched there attack.
Thinking fast, Desmond wrapped a hand around Bill's throat and took the gun away for a moment. He took aim, closed one eye, and then fired three times. Rebecca screeched in pain as blood exploded from her left thigh and fell to the ground, her gun skittering away. Shaun took the next two bullets: one through the hand holding his gun, the other directly into his kneecap. He dropped like a stone, and Desmond quickly returned the gun to its original position at the underside of his father's head. His friends might be crippled for life, or they might bleed to death, or Daniel and Vicente might decide to shoot them anyway, but taking them out of the fight had been all that was within Desmond's power.
Realising how exposed he was, he gripped Bill firmly and dragged him backwards, away from where the remaining guards were firing endlessly into the lift, occasionally being spun backwards by a returning bullet, and around a corner. There he slammed his father up against a wall and held him there by his throat, glaring at him furiously.
'You told them I was coming,' he accused fiercely.
Bill simply stared at him with the same intense, yet curiously absent, expression.
'You're my father, you fuck. You would have had me killed. You would have...'
Suddenly Bill jerked an arm upwards, bringing a hand towards Desmond side, and out of instinct he swung his gun around and slammed the butt of it into his father's temple. Bill dropped like a puppet with broken strings, which was probably not far from the truth, and slid down the wall to lie slumped in a half-seated position. His eyes had drooped shut and Desmond could see from the slowing pulse in his throat that he had fallen unconscious.
The immediate danger gone, Desmond became suddenly aware of a more pressing worry. He grimaced and looked down, pulled aside his jacket and found that a hole had been burned into the shirt underneath it. As though in a trance, he lifted his shirt as well and found it: a small, round puncture in his body, just underneath his lowest rib, pumping blood out in time with his heartbeat.
There was a gun lying loose in Bill Miles' fingers.
'Fuck,' Desmond said aloud, then laughed at how astonished he sounded. He was feeling a little light-headed, which had to be from the shock. He hadn't lost all that much blood yet, not all that much...
Desmond poked his finger a little way inside the bullet hole. It hurt, though not as much as it probably should have, and he was a little bit fascinated to feel the softness and gooeyness of his own insides. He kept the finger lodged in there, blood oozing out around it, as he leaned forward and used his blade to make a tear in Bill's shirt, ripping at it with one hand to get at the fabric. Age had not put much fat onto William Miles' belly, but there was silver hair there, and very pale skin underneath.
Desmond could still hear gunfire, though it was less frequent now. It sounded like there were not many people left fighting. He heard the blast of a shotgun and realised that Daniel must still be alive, at least.
Pressing a thick wad of material over the bullet wound, Desmond strapped it into place with strips of his father's shirt, feeling the pain starting to come in earnest as he did so. He wrapped many layers around it before tying them off in a messy knot and pulling his shirt down over it. All this he did as though in a dream, as though watching someone else do it. From one moment to the next, he was certain that this must be a deadly wound, and then equally sure that it was barely more than a graze. He had no way of knowing which was true. If there was stomach acid seeping into his veins, travelling to poison each and every one of his organs, would he be able to feel it?
Either way, there was little more to be done. When he was certain that his intestines weren't about to start spilling all over the floor, Desmond placed his palm flat against the wall and pushed himself upright, sucking air in through his teeth as the felt the uncomfortable ooze of blood escaping him and the wrenching pain that came with it. It was manageable, though, for the moment, and so Desmond picked up his gun again and peered around the corner.
There was one guard left. He had taken refuge behind a trash can and Desmond could hear his whimpers of fear, could hear them right up until Desmond took careful aim, resting his gun hand on the wrist of his other arm for support, and put a bullet through the back of the guard's skull. The man jerked forward and slumped down awkwardly with whatever was left of his face pressed against the metal of his ineffectual cover.
Satisfied, Desmond heaved himself up the corridor just as Daniel emerged cautiously from the elevator. In front of them both was a massacre, with the four of five guards still breathing clearly in no position to do any fighting as they lay on the mangled bodies of those who hadn't been so lucky.
Shaun was directly in front of Daniel, clutching at the mess of his knee with his shredded hand and whimpering softly as he drifted towards unconsciousness. Daniel looked down at him in vague amusement for a moment, then pressed the barrel of the shotgun against the side of Shaun's head, nudging him with it like a cat playing with a wounded mouse. Shaun's head flopped loosely on his neck and he made a distant, discontented noise.
Without hesitating, Desmond moved his own aim upwards so that his gun was aimed squarely between Daniel's eyes. 'No,' he said, in an astonishingly calm voice.
Daniel glanced up at the gun, unfazed, but nonetheless moved the barrels of the shotgun slowly away from Shaun's head and raised his eyebrows in a facsimile of innocence. 'Fine. But we'd better get a move on or they'll all bleed out and die anyway.'
Desmond made to argue, but then looked down at his friends - Shaun and Rebecca - ashen-faced and hovering somewhere between pain and oblivion. He thought of his own wound, hidden underneath his shirt and jacket, and tried to estimate how long he had left before he bled out completely.
'Vicente?' he asked in a strained voice, though he already knew the answer to the simple question. Really, he'd known it ever since Vicente had told him of his decision to come along for the ride.
Daniel didn't bother to make a verbal reply, but instead simply jerked his head back at the elevator from which they'd emerged. Desmond walked around slowly until he could see inside.
Vicente was lying face-down, a fact that - based on the state that the back of his skull was in - Desmond knew he should be grateful for. He waited to feel a sense of sorrow or guilt, but instead all he could see was the back of Vicente's shirt and the patch of crumpled, slightly damp material there, as though he'd been grabbed by someone with a sweat-slick palm and yanked into the path of the bullet that had killed him.
'Are you alright?'
Desmond started at the question, thinking for one stupid moment that Daniel was asking after his emotional wellbeing. As he turned, however, he saw the older man looking at him with suspicious eyes, tracking over his arms and legs and torso in search of injuries.
'Fine. They didn't get me,' he replied in a nonchalant manner, deliberately blocking out the throbbing pain where the bullet had punched through his side.
Daniel was silent for a moment, his eyes running over Desmond one more time. 'Good. How do you feel about heading up to Rikkin's office and blowing the fucker's head off?'
Desmond's body cried out in protest at the concept of actually moving, but he forced a smile and replied, 'Let's do it.'
It was quiet, and everyone knows how that cliché ends. Desmond and Daniel crept silently up staircases and empty hallways, the barrels of their guns preceding them around corners. Desmond told Daniel to take point, which left him free to grit his teeth with every step and every jarring of the hole in his side. Every so often his vision would start to go a little white and fuzzy around the edges, but he forced himself onwards. They were too close to give up now.
'Up ahead,' Daniel said at last, nodding towards a set of double doors ahead of them with a plaque reading ALAN RIKKIN, CEO over it. Desmond swallowed hard and nodded, and they both approached the entrance.
'You think we should knock?' Desmond asked drily, when the automatic doors remained firmly closed.
'Wasn't planning on it,' Daniel replied, pulling a small electronic device out of his pocket and holding it up to the smooth keypad on the side of the door. When it was about an inch away it leapt forward quickly, like an insect, and as soon as it touched the panel numbers began whirring over its glaring digital screen, punctuating the air with the occasional beep.
'Reckon he's in there?' Desmond queried in a half-whisper.
'I'm sure of it,' Daniel replied, speaking normally. 'I suspect we're walking into a trap.'
'Didn't we already do that?'
'That was the first trap. He'll have a back-up plan.'
'If I were him, my back-up plan would be a private helicopter on the roof.'
Daniel grimaced. 'He's too proud to run. Too arrogant. He thinks he's got us right where he wants us.'
'Does he?' Desmond demanded bluntly, feeling another wave of nausea hit him.
The two of them shared a glance. Daniel's expression was inscrutable, and Desmond was gripped with unease, with the permanent reminder that he was on a mission with someone whom he would never dare to turn his back on.
A final loud chirrup came from Vicente's hacking device, and the doors slid open smoothly.
Rikkin was standing with his back to them, but turned at the sound of his office being violated and twisted his mouth disapprovingly, as though disappointed in them for showing up late. He opened his mouth, no doubt to begin making his big speech.
Desmond raised his gun, sighted along the barrel until he had a clear shot at Rikkin's head, and fired.
He'd had no intention of allowing Rikkin to start talking, having yelled at the screen during a hundred action movies where the hero let the villain mouth off for several minutes instead of just shooting them. Unfortunately, Rikkin had learned a few tricks of his own while Desmond had been on the run; a strange glass orb in his hand flickered briefly, and the bullet bounced harmlessly away from him.
'Mr Miles,' Rikkin said, calm and cold-eyed. His gaze slid sideways a little. 'Daniel.'
Desmond slumped against the doorframe. 'Crap,' he muttered. 'We gotta listen to the speech.'
'So nice of you to drop by.'
Oh, it's going to be bad.
Daniel took a few steps forward, unslinging Harold Kaczmarek's shotgun from his back and aiming at at Rikkin from the hip. Desmond felt a sudden twist of defiance in his gut (or perhaps that was just more blood loss) and felt an urge to demand that Daniel hand him the weapon and let him do the deed, but in truth he didn't trust himself to speak at that moment. Trying to press a hand against his side with subtlety, he followed Daniel into the room.
'Hand over the Apple and we'll let you live,' Daniel said, clearly get into the spirit of bad action movie dialogue.
Rikkin hummed thoughtfully at the demand. 'May I suggest an alternative?'
'Fuck you,' Desmond snapped, his voice surprisingly. 'Get fucked and die, you fucking goddamn pain in the ass dick knuckle.'
It wasn't the wittiest of comebacks, but Desmond was tired and the brief tirade did at least succeed in making Rikkin blink a few times, temporarily derailed. After flicking a disdainful, dismissive eye over Desmond, he turned all of his attention to Daniel.
'So,' he said softly. 'You've come home.'
Daniel took another step forward, his finger tightening on the trigger of the shotgun. He didn't reply. It wasn't a question, after all.
'You didn't need to run, Daniel,' Rikkin continued, still in the same amiable tone of voice.
'I know, but I kind of like this whole 'being alive' thing,' Daniel quipped.
'You think I would have had you killed?' Rikkin sounded hurt, as though he was offended that Daniel had thought so little of him.
Daniel stared at him for a moment, and suddenly he looked uncertain. 'Yes, I did. I do.' But the barrel of the shotgun wavered a little.
'Oh, Daniel,' Rikkin continued, a hint of amusement edging into his voice. 'If you had concerns, you should have just spoken to me. I can't believe you... how long have we known each other? We're family, you and I.' He took a few steps closer to Daniel, looking entirely unperturbed by the weapon he was holding. Rikkin raised the glass Apple slightly. 'This thing, this... genetic quirk that you and I share, it only reaffirmed what I have always believed. You and I are cut from the same cloth, and you've been lumped together with the likes of Vidic for too long.'
'What are you saying?' Daniel asked, but there was a greedy glint in his eye, as though he already knew. Rikkin saw it too, and smiled openly. Without taking his eyes off Daniel, he stepped closer to Desmond, who raised his pistol defensively.
'Back...' He decided to give up on the warning and simply fired off several shots at Rikkin. This time he saw the shield: it lit up, faintly blue, as it repelled the bullets and send them spinning into the walls. It extended about half a foot in front of Rikkin, and Desmond could have sworn that he actually felt it press against his skin, like a kind of electricity, as the Templar closed in.
With dreadful timing, Desmond felt his vision begin the fuzz out and sounds around him begin to dim, and as he clawed his way back to clarity he saw Rikkin's fist flying towards him too late. His cheekbone exploded in pain and his head snapped to one side. Then there was a hand in his hair, gripping and twisting, and another squeezing his wristbones together cruelly until the gun clattered to the floor. Desmond barely had any defences left when Rikkin kicked him behind his knee and sent him dropping down, held back from a nosedive only by the hand in his hair.
Desmond looked up blearily. Daniel hadn't moved at all.
'What are you saying, Alan?' he repeated, curiously.
'I want you to come home,' Rikkin said, sounding like he was providing the voiceover for a tourism commercial. 'This is where you belong, and frankly things haven't been the same since we lost you and your particular... skills.'
'And since you took over the world?' Daniel was smiling a little now. Desmond glared at him furiously, but couldn't catch his eye.
'That too,' Rikkin laughed. 'You know what I'm proposing.' He raised the Apple once more. 'If you think you've held power in the palm of your hand before, then you really need to feel the real thing. I can give you that. I want you, Daniel. I need you to come back to us, and I think you know that it's in your best interests to do so.'
Finally, Daniel glanced down at Desmond, his gaze cold. He looked tired. He looked tempted.
'Deal,' Daniel said at last.
'No!' Desmond screamed in frustration, desperation, exhaustion. 'You fucking idiot, don't you see what he's...?'
'I see that he's got you on your knees like a bitch,' Daniel interrupted coldly. 'You want me to pick you over him? Maybe you should have practiced your shooting a little more.'
Rikkin chuckled good-naturedly. 'Would you like to do the honours? I'd like to start talking business as soon as possible.'
Desmond never heard the reply, but he saw the barrel of the shotgun swing towards him, until he was staring into the blackness of it, like a dark cave where a vicious wild animal was waiting. He realised that this must have been the last thing that Clay had seen, before his own father shot him. That look of shock and fear and betrayal, this was what had caused it.
As though he'd been struck by lightning, Desmond's blood suddenly boiled. He screamed in utter rage and flexed his hand, triggered the blade mechanism, and stabbed it down as hard as he could into Rikkin's fancy leather shoe, penetrating his foot with a satisfying crunch. He barely heard the man's scream of surprise before it was drowned out by the dreadful, all-consuming roar of the shotgun.
The hand in Desmond's hair was torn away, taking a few hairs with it, and Rikkin fell backwards in a graceful arc, landing with a quick succession of thuds on the beautifully lacquered floor of his office. His right hand hit the boards last, falling open limply, and the glass Apple rolled over the small hill of his fingertips and trundled away across the floor. Desmond knew that he was immune to the powers of the artefact, but even so he thought that he felt a small snap of something inside him as Rikkin's grip on the world ceased.
A wave of exhausting relief came over him, leaving him weak enough that he was driven to his knees, feeling suddenly quite cold. Unconsciously, he reached a hand inside his shirt and pressed it to the clumsy bandage inside, feeling dampness where his blood had soaked right through.
The gentle rumble of the Apple rolling away came to an abrupt stop.
With great effort, Desmond lifted his head and turned it, just in time to see Daniel straighten up, seeming impossibly tall in his dark clothes, his skin glowing a little from exertion. He rolled the artefact contemplatively between his fingers and looked at it, before turning his razor-sharp gaze onto Desmond. 'You're injured,' he said, matter-of-factly.
Desmond shook his head. 'No. No, I'm not. I'm just ... glad it's over. Look...' He brought one foot forward until the sole of it was planted firmly on the floor, leaned on his knee with one hand and made to push himself back into a standing position. He got about halfway up before a knife slice of pain cut into his middle and he crashed to the ground again, screaming between his teeth and curling his limbs inwards.
With his cheek and temple pressed against the floorboards, he saw Daniel's boots approaching. Desmond groaned in frustrated agony as he was turned over onto his back and Daniel roughly unzipped his jacket, pushing it aside to look at the blood soaking into the shirt underneath.
'Well,' the blond man commented mildly. 'At least this makes things easier.'
Anger surged through Desmond and he spat drily up at Daniel's face. 'Fuck you,' he seethed.
Daniel didn't reply, didn't even smile. Keeping the Apple held firmly in one hand, he ran the other up over Desmond's shirt, up his throat, and then pressed his fingers against Desmond's cheek and a thumb underneath his jaw.
'Please,' Desmond stammered quickly, panicking. 'Please, please, please ... you don't have to do this. I never wanted this shit in the first place, remember? Let me go and I'll never come back, I won't ... I'll just...'
'Sure thing,' Daniel interrupted quietly, his fingers tightening hard enough to bruise. 'Just close your eyes. I'm not a sadist. I'll make it quick.'
For a fleeting moment, Desmond dared to hope that perhaps Daniel was merely messing him around. After all, they'd travelled together, slept mere meters apart from one another with no fear for their lives and eaten at the same table. Desmond had spared Daniel's life on more than one occasion, and Daniel had saved his. Daniel had shown him how to shoot straight, had given him the training which had enabled them both to make it all the way to Rikkin's office and take him out. Surely that counted for something? Surely Daniel wouldn't break that bond?
Of course, he knew that all this was bullshit. Daniel had been completely candid about his character and his intentions. He would have no more trouble over killing Desmond than he would swatting a fly, and once the deed was done he would take the Apple and use it for god only knew what.
Daniel breathed in, and then used his grip on Desmond's face and jaw to spin his head upwards and back, with a sharp and sickening crack.
Desmond howled at the sudden, brutal pain and waited for death, but above him he could hear Daniel cursing through the darkening pall.
'Shit. I must be out of practice. It's really your fault for tensing up, you know? If you could just relax a little you'd be dead already.' He sighed and leaned back far enough to pull one of his guns out of its holster. 'Guess I'll have to do this the messy w-'
He paused, the gun still only half-drawn, and looked down in a mixture of puzzlement and annoyance at his side, where Desmond's hand was wrapped around his rib cage, bent backwards awkwardly at the wrist so as to allow the blade to sink fully into Daniel's torso. For a moment, Desmond could have sworn that he felt it in his fingertips as Daniel's heart stuttered in surprise.
Daniel made an odd, irritated grunting sound and with great effort managed to pull his gun the rest of the way out, manoeuvring it up towards Desmond's head. 'Fuck's sake...'
Desmond desperately twisted the blade ninety degrees clockwise and the gun slipped out of Daniel's hand as he grimaced and toppled over sideways, releasing the Apple and scrabbling to pick up his weapon with one hand, using the other to loosely grip Desmond's throat.
They lay there struggling for several moments, each connected to the other by the left hand like some kind of ridiculous set of conjoined twins, Desmond bleeding profusely from the bullet hole in his stomach and at the same time feeling Daniel's blood running down his wrist. He scratched at the backs of Daniel's fingers with his free hand and managed to beat him to the gun, using a very tenuous grip to toss it away. As it skittered over the floorboards, he cursed himself for not just picking it up and using it.
Daniel tried for a few more seconds to push down fatally on Desmond's throat, before finding himself too weak and giving up on the endeavour entirely. He pulled in air through his exposed teeth and glared at Desmond, his expression softening a little into one of bitter amusement.
'Touché,' he huffed tersely.
The smooth floorboards underneath them were already slick with blood, and almost absent-mindedly Desmond began wiggling the blade around inside Daniel, trying to use the sharp edge of it to rupture something fatally. It wasn't easy; the damn thing was really jammed between two ribs and it was difficult to get any kind of...
'Stop,' Daniel growled.
'Oh, I'll make it stop,' Desmond promised, still trying to work his blade deeper into Daniel, though he could feel himself growing weaker by the second.
Daniel let out a low grunt, then twisted his entire body violently, dragging himself off Desmond's blade. When it came loose his blood arced wetly through the air and splattered across the floorboards where the pressure had built up behind it, but as Daniel collapsed onto his back he clamped a hand against the crescent-shaped slice to stem the flow.
Rolling his eyes and gritting his teeth, Desmond forced himself up onto his hands and knees and began crawling slowly over to Daniel, determined to sink his blade into the man's throat this time and finish the job.
'Wait,' Daniel panted, his boots scrabbling on the floor as he tried to move backwards and away from Desmond. His skin was very pale and his blond hair was spiky and matted with blood, probably someone else's. For the first time since Desmond had met him, Daniel looked like he had run out of options. His limbs weren't obeying him; he couldn't get away.
Desmond caught up with him and swung a leg loosely over Daniel's thighs, straddling him and pinning him in place. Daniel thrashed weakly and Desmond grabbed him by the hair, pushing his head roughly against the floor and exposing his throat. He watched in a kind of fascination as the Adam's apple in Daniel's throat bobbed frantically under his skin, and Desmond pressed the point of his blade against it.
With his head held back, Daniel looked down his cheeks desperately at Desmond and managed to catch his eye. The two men paused for a moment, breathing heavily.
'You won't kill me,' Daniel grated out hoarsely. 'You never could.'
Desmond laughed, and saw his own blood drooling onto Daniel's face.
'There's a first time for everything.'