Death on Two Legs // Shyan

16. Who Wants To Live Forever

"I'm not his motherfucking pet, you piece of shit!" Ryan growled, and Fear laughed at him.
"Seriously, what kind of a man are you, shooting at us from the shadows? Step the fuck up!"
Shane kept taunting, and at that point Ryan was too busy worrying about wether or not he'd live to see the next day, that he didn't really care.
"Don't you hear how cocky I am? Wouldn't you like me to just shut the hell up?"
The next shot went right over his shoulder, inches from his left ear.
"Come on! Are you even aiming? Ryan, these guys are like stormtroopers! Worst shot in the galaxy!"
Shane cocked his head to Ryan's direction as the third shot fired.

There was a crunch, no, almost like the sound of a sharp pencil piercing a sheet of paper, or someone biting into an apple. Shane's entire body leaned backwards as his smile faded, brown eyes staring down at his chest in a motion that had barely any time to happen before he took a shaking attempt of a step back, failing. He fell on his back on the concrete as Ryan opened fire, eyes burning as he yelled Shane's name so loud he felt his throat burn.

It all happened so fast.

A man's body fell from behind one of the boxes, then another from the back of the warehouse. What was left now, was one sniper somewhere on Ryan's right, and he had to run to take cover.
"Shane! Stay with me, all right?!" He tried to yell, but his voice drowned out behind the rapid gunfire. And when he clanced to the direction of his shot down friend, all he saw was a blur of pale skin and flannel, and a hand clutching on his chest with blood pouring from between his shaking fingers.
The sight was frightening. Ryan felt himself slip out of control as he tried his best to aim his focus back on the remaining sniper, to take him out before he'd notice Shane was still alive.
- If he was still alive.

The ground beneath his feet seemed to tremble, tough the fault was in his knees. He dove behind a container, slid onto his stomach in the gravel so that the rain of bullets couldn't reach him but he had a clear view to the general direction of where the shots came from.
Heart bounding, he opened fire again. He could only see Shane's feet from there, so still, drops of blood on his timbs. He couldn't be dead, right?

Finally, the shots went silent.

Either Ryan had killed the man, or they had both ran out of ammo. Fearing for the latter, he ran out of his cover to Shane, whose face looked ghastly pale. Eyes open, fingers still on his chest, blood on his chapped lips like a prop from a horror movie. He looked like a doll, wrong and lifeless.
Ryan began to cry. The tears just came, he couldn't stop himself, and with shaking fingers he reached to find a pulse. The blood was sticky as it smeared on his fingers, the skin on Shane's neck was cool.
What he found was a heartbeat, uneven and jumpy, but it was, and for that Ryan was eternally thankful. He let out a cry of gratitude and for a moment fell limp against the tall man's seemingly still chest. There they laid then, just for maybe thirty seconds in the now silent warehouse before Ryan gathered himself and began to try to get back on his feeble feet.
"Not so fast, bucko." The voice threw chills down Ryan's spine. Footsteps echoed in the darkness, and a graying man in a neat suit appeared in the corner of his eye. Faster than lightning, he drew out his gun, pointing it directly towards Fear's smug face.
"Give me one good reason not to empty this last magazine into your face right now, you piece of shit." His voice was so steady it took even himself by surprise, sticky fingers calm on the trigger. He had never been so ready to shoot in his life, not once.
"Because you're out of ammo." The man answered, voice mocking. Ryan pulled the trigger, just to hear an empty click instead of a gunshot. Then he began to shake like a leaf, not out of fear perhaps, but pure and unfiltered rage. Something rustled on his right, perhaps the man who had shot at him wasn't dead after all?
"I'm going to offer you something, young man. If you leave Madej to me and leave this warehouse right now, I might spare your life."
The man stood there with a look on his face, a look that screamed with self confidence. Fear was so sure he had won, so full of himself that he hadn't even given a glance at Shane's body- or rather the 9millimeter that still laid in his cold fingers. Ryan was fast to yank it off of his partner's hand and shoot to his right, where a wet splat and a thump of a body could then be heard. Fear's face went white as snow. He had lost his only advantage. Shane made a little groan by Ryan's feet, and as the shorter man turned to look at him, his eyes were just a bit open.
"I'm gonna get you out of here, okay, just hang on."
But before he could turn his head back to his enemy, the cold feeling of the barrel of a gun against his temple sent a chill down his already shaken spine.
"Here's what we're going to do: you choose right now, wether to leave Madej to me and live, or fight this and lose. Your move."
Ryan grinded his teeth. How could he be so dumb and turn away just as he was glimpsing victory? His heart ached as he felt Shane's cold fingers under his left hand, holding them to keep himself grounded in reality.
Did he have a choice? Fighting Fear would lead to them both getting killed. He had no chances, hell, the gun was held against his head!