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[It had almost been like watching the world move in slow-motion.
Harry Flynn, friend-turned-backstabber slumped against the pillar in the ritual chamber of the great tree of Shambhala, Chloe standing distant and wary for good reason, Elena heroically stepping in to dissuade the villain of his notions of hopelessness. Nate knew better than to bargain with someone who incarcerated him for kicks - he always wondered what Harry had told Chloe when he got back to the boat after the museum lift, if he'd said that Drake had been caught on his own, nobody's fault but his - and Harry has earned distrust. No fucking honor among thieves.
Then he sees the grenade clenched in Flynn's fist, the pin gone and the lever released, Elena is too close and Chloe screams her name just as Nate steps back and the percussive explosion blows him off his feet, hitting the tile with a crack and singing his forearms.]
-lena, [he wheezes, rolling onto his side as his ears ring, Chloe's voice is muffled in the background like a television on the other side of a wall, it smells like smoke and blood, like he can taste the TNT filler on his tongue. For an instant he can see her body lying prone on the floor in the fog of shattered masonry and debris, panic wells up in Nate's throat like bile because she's dead, oh God, no, no, she can't be, she can't-] Elena!
[And when Nate sits upright so quickly his head spins the haze is gone, the tinnitus persists but the chamber at the heart of the ancient city is no more. He is alone, sprawled on the marble of an enormous entrance hall.]
Are you fucking kidding me?!
[With a groan that belies both extreme pain and extensive experience with being in extreme pain Nate gets to his feet, hoping the opulent space is a figment of his imagination and not a box of six months' worth of memories being dumped on him all at once.]
Fuckin'- goddamn piece of shit-
[Adrenaline high only maintained by a healthy fear for the well-being of someone who isn't even present - and who knows if she is? What if she's not? What if she's - Nate stumbles into the foyer.
She's fine. She has to be. She has to be.]
Harry Flynn, friend-turned-backstabber slumped against the pillar in the ritual chamber of the great tree of Shambhala, Chloe standing distant and wary for good reason, Elena heroically stepping in to dissuade the villain of his notions of hopelessness. Nate knew better than to bargain with someone who incarcerated him for kicks - he always wondered what Harry had told Chloe when he got back to the boat after the museum lift, if he'd said that Drake had been caught on his own, nobody's fault but his - and Harry has earned distrust. No fucking honor among thieves.
Then he sees the grenade clenched in Flynn's fist, the pin gone and the lever released, Elena is too close and Chloe screams her name just as Nate steps back and the percussive explosion blows him off his feet, hitting the tile with a crack and singing his forearms.]
-lena, [he wheezes, rolling onto his side as his ears ring, Chloe's voice is muffled in the background like a television on the other side of a wall, it smells like smoke and blood, like he can taste the TNT filler on his tongue. For an instant he can see her body lying prone on the floor in the fog of shattered masonry and debris, panic wells up in Nate's throat like bile because she's dead, oh God, no, no, she can't be, she can't-] Elena!
[And when Nate sits upright so quickly his head spins the haze is gone, the tinnitus persists but the chamber at the heart of the ancient city is no more. He is alone, sprawled on the marble of an enormous entrance hall.]
Are you fucking kidding me?!
[With a groan that belies both extreme pain and extensive experience with being in extreme pain Nate gets to his feet, hoping the opulent space is a figment of his imagination and not a box of six months' worth of memories being dumped on him all at once.]
Fuckin'- goddamn piece of shit-
[Adrenaline high only maintained by a healthy fear for the well-being of someone who isn't even present - and who knows if she is? What if she's not? What if she's - Nate stumbles into the foyer.
She's fine. She has to be. She has to be.]