Work Text:
Five minutes away is fast-approaching freedom to an anxious kid in a car seat.
Five minutes away is a walk through the park.
Five minutes away is a quick stop by the fast food joint.
Five minutes away is the difference between life and death.
…
Five minutes away is your partner lying bleeding in the dirt, waiting for the extraction that might never arrive. It is bullets whizzing past your ear as you count every agonizing second. It is leaping up to fire at your attackers even while you pray to every god you don’t believe in that you both make it out of here alive.
Five minutes away is too far.
Five minutes away is ducking back behind your upturned car after every shot to see more of your partner’s life gushing onto the ground, knowing you can do nothing to stop it. Not yet.
Five minutes away is your supervising officer shouting into your comm piece to “please God, Nat, be careful. I don’t want to lose you too."
Five minutes away is holding back tears because he can’t die. He can’t. You won’t let him.
Five minutes away is the slim hope that they will get here in time. It is straining your ears in the quiet moments, thinking you can hear the whine of a quinjet engine. It is hating yourself when you realize you can’t.
Five minutes away is torture.
Five minutes away is elation and terror when you finally do see the black smudge of the rescue team in the distance. It is flinging your gun aside and throwing your weight on the gaping hole in your partner’s chest. It is trusting your SO to not let you get shot because nothing else matters right now but making sure it’s not too late, he’s not dead already.
Five minutes away is trying your hardest to stem the river of blood flowing from his wound, with nothing but the ripped fabric of your own sleeve. It is your SO sprinting to your side and helping you load the half-dead agent onto a gurney, all focused intensity.
Five minutes away is sitting in the back of a quinjet next to your SO, hunched up and shaking like a leaf, while his face is grim and just as scared as yours.
Five minutes away is the doctor saying he may not survive, that everything you did may be for nothing, and your SO saying “If he dies, I’m going to kill him.” But it’s not a joke this time. He’s not smiling.
Five minutes away is replaying your first meeting in your head, over and over and over again. It is remembering how he saved your life when he was ordered to kill you, and all the countless times and the countless ways you have saved each other since. It is knowing that despite all your training you will never be able to carry on as before if he dies.
Five minutes away is the doctor coming out again and saying, “He’s stable. He’ll make it through this.”
Five minutes away is finally shedding the tears that you have held in check since he was shot, while beside you your SO does the same.
Five minutes away is the knowledge that everything will be okay now. He will be okay. You will be okay. You don’t have to worry anymore.
Five minutes away is enough.