Tears streamed down her face tangling with the blood and sweat. After an hour of working, she would have thought that her tongue would have gotten used to the taste but it didn't. She looked down at his bare chest. The brown crust of dried blood laced every inch of him. Her hands shook as she searched around her for the jar. She found it, its glass still warm from constant re-use. Oh how she wished she would get used to the taste. Evey spat another bullet into the jar.

His blood covered everything. It speckled on the sheets and soaked through the mattress, drenched her clothes and his in its sticky residue. It was so hard to believe he could still live after losing so much blood. Evey picked up the needle and skewered it into the edge of the wound. V flinched, his muscles contracting and bulging. She almost felt sick for admiring his muscles at a time like this. She had never realized just how strong he was.

As she cut the thread, Evey stood back to examine her work. She couldn't be sure she had gotten every wound, there were so many of them. She pressed her hand against his chest, feeling his warmth.

It took her a second to realise what she was feeling. His broad expanse of flesh loomed before her, wet, uneven and textured, yet somehow comforting. But something was wrong. Evey looked at his body and realised that it had stopped moving. She pressed her ear to him, searching for a heartbeat and found that it was beating in a rapid hum.

Evey frantically looked for the mirror on her bedside table and, taking it in hand, hovered it over the lips of his mask. After a seconds worth of eternity, she pulled it away. V's body convulsed, and shivered, trowing Evey into an unbearable state of panic. She needed to help him, he wasn't breathing.

An idea struck, but she automatically pushed it aside. She couldn't do it… he trusted her. Before her mind reached a decision, Evey's arms lunged forward and pulled at the straps to his mask. She lifted it up just slightly so she could see his mouth. Darkness gaped up at her and, not even considering what she was looking at, she closed her mouth over the gap and breathed. Her hands crossed over his chest and pushed down. She had never realised how difficult this was. CPR had always looked so easy on TV, but his body refused to deflate. She pushed against him harder, easing his breath out of him.

She gave him another breath and wrapped her arms around him in a tight embrace, squeezing out the air. This seemed more effective. V coughed and rolled to his side, spitting out a smear of coagulated blood. His head cocked back and fourth on his shoulders like a cat coughing up a hairball. Hesitantly, Evey rolled him onto his side. Blood oozed from the guerrilla's lips.

With a shaking hand he lifted up the hem of his mask, possibly out of habit. Evey Hammond decided to take a step back? What if he saw her looking down at his bare face? Would he be angry? After a moment she noticed his eyes, bright and blue standing out like diamonds among coal. They were weakly drifting along the floor, absent minded, almost looking lost. She stepped back to him and realized that he was in too weak a state to see her. Uneasily she rolled him onto his back.

V's blue eyes searched, not knowing what to expect, aching in the presents of all the flashing covers to books. In their travels, they came upon a patch of peach and red. He tried to concentrate and condense the image by failed. He felt warmth coming from her skin, her perfume seeped into his nose. In that moment he was in a state of absolute bliss. But his eyelids were suddenly weighted down. Evey smiled as her love drifted back into comatose with I smile wide across his face.

It had been a long night, but the both of them had made it through. Evey lay across his chest, vaguely aware of where she was. His warmth pressed sweetly against her cheek, her arms draped around his belly. She must have fallen asleep, somewhere in the night. She was vaguely aware of his breathing and… something else… something unpleasant. Her mind scanned her surroundings with a list, making sure that everything was up to speck. She was only really aware of what it was once it had stopped. The grandfather clock in the gallery had just struck 12.

Midnight? Images of the night before suddenly filled her mind. The crowds of people in the streets, the long wait for his return, the death of finch, their dance together to the sound of 'Bird Gerhl'… the memory flashed through her vision spreading comprehension down her limbs like electricity. She had kissed him, and told him she loved and seen him…" the thought was cut short. Her eyes wander down to his face. Still exposed as he lie on the bed. She had seen him. Her eyes lingered on his face for a moment and then she pulled away.

This wasn't right. She had anticipated this moment for so long and now that it had come and passed, she still couldn't believe it. He was right here in front her. Her feet carried her over to him before she had had time to protest.

His face had taken as much abuse as his chest; its skin pink and tattered. So why was she still staring at him? She loved him. That was why. Evey looked back on her words, still unfamiliar to her own lips. She couldn't believe herself… why had she said anything? He would have survived either way, wouldn't he?

Had he even heard her? Did he love her back….no. If he loved her he wouldn't have rejected her. That was plain as day. If he loved her he would have trusted her enough to tell her his plans. She could have helped him, he could have come out ok. Deep inside Evey knew she was lying to herself, if he had told her she would have died trying to stop him. But if she had known from the beginning that he planned to meet his fate she wouldn't have depended on him so much, she wouldn't have done anything so stupid as to fall in love with him. Evey looked again at the man on the bed. No. he didn't love her.

If he loved her he wouldn't have hurt her so much… Evey's train of though was suddenly derailed. Something had changed. The masked man had opened his eyes…