Russell Adler x Reader

Thirty

The mission had turned out to be easy.

You and Adler had walked into a hidden base of the Soviets, took everyone out and stole a shit ton of intel.

The people inside the base had been very few, maybe three dozen, and strangely bad equipped for soldiers who guarded a place that seemed as essential and important as this one.

"Adler.", you grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him out of hearing range from the rest of the team. "Something is off."

"I know.", he said and leaned against a wall next to you. "I agree that this is... weird. Keep an eye out for me, will ya?"

"Sure. But I won't catch a bullet for you."

"Don't worry. I won't catch one for you either."

"Not yet."

"Daring thing to say, angel."

Chuckling, you turned around the corner and jumped into the helicopter again. As soon as your feet touched the metal, a cold shiver crawled down your spine.

Something truly wasn't right.

Adler sat down next to you. But this time, he didn't sit in a casual, relaxed manner, with his legs spread and his head leaned back. He was sitting up straight, so straight that his shoulders shivered under the tension.

An obvious sign of his distress was the finger that he rested on the trigger.

The bird rose into the air again.

His attention turned to you. A silent command left his lips.

Immediately, your hand grabbed the gun that was strapped to your leg. But you didn't pull it out yet.

Alarming the others for no reason or too early would have been foolish.

Adler's foot tapped on the ground.

At first it annoyed you, until you realised he use a pattern that was close to morse code.

"Stay alarmed.", he tapped. "To your right. Suspicious."

Without making it obvious, your eyes wandered to the right.

Someone was sitting across from you. It must have been a man, or a bulky woman. Either way, that person was holding the gun just like Adler, ready to shoot.

One hand was wrapped around a combat knife.

The sight was enough to make you throw all doubt out the window.

Something was really terribly wrong.

Slowly, you positioned yourself in a way that would make it easier to jump up.

But a helicopter wasn't a good arena to fight in.

One wrong step and you'd fall out the open sides into nothing.

Below was the jungle and its high growing tress, but even a madman wouldn't have tried to survive a fall from the sky by aiming for the treetops.

Your fingers twitched on the gun.

Adler shifted.

All of a sudden, everything fell into chaos.

The entire team started acting all at once, jumped from their seats and wanted to point their weapons at you and Adler.

The person to your right pulled out the knife.

Out of reflex, you raised your pistol and fired a shot as a warning.

The bullet hit the shoulder. Grabbed by the sudden force, they stumbled back and slipped, but managed to hold onto the helicopter door with one hand.

"Leave em'!", Adler shouted and jumped up to open fire.

You pressed your back against his.

The helicopter wasn't big, most people could have grabbed you if they had wanted to.

But Adler's quick thinking saved your ass that day.

He managed to shoot a good portion of the team before one of them jumped close and started wrestling with him for the upper hand.

You aimed over his shoulder and put a bullet to the attackers neck.

Blood splattered and screams of agony made him curl.

Adler used that moment, grabbed them and pushed with all his might.

The force of the air did the rest and tore the body into the depths with such force that a tree caught the fall and shattered the spine. All that was left was a deep dark spot across the green leaves.

"Adler!", you jumped in front of him to catch a blade that was about to pierce his eye.

The sharp metal dug into your hand, tearing skin and flesh apart so that blood poured out and covered your entire arm.

Screaming, you pulled a face but wrapped your fingers tighter around the knife to fight back.

Without hesitation, Adler reached out and hit the attacker straight in the face.

An unpleasant cracking sound filled the silence.

Groaning, the guy stumbled back, hand pressed to his face while blood poured out from between his fingers.

You raised your gun to take a clean shot.

But the pilot had other plans.

All of a sudden, the helicopter started shaking and flying unstable.

Struck by surprise, you stumbled to the side and almost slipped off the edge.

Adler's hand grabbed you by the collar and pulled you against his chest.

Everything was shaking and it looked like the pilot was planning on crashing the bird.

But the danger was still existent.

Screaming, the last remaining member of the fake team came running at you two.

Out of reflex, Adler pushed you out of the range and raised his hands for protection.

But the attacker twisted and lowered the blade.

Instead of going for his forehead the blade cut his face. Groaning, he turned to the side in an attempt to escape. Blood was running over his cheek and down his neck, soaking into the hem of his shirt.

The helicopter started to loose height.

The treetops were getting dangerously close, way too fast.

Panicking, you pulled out your hidden gun for emergencies, raised it and fired a shot.

The bullet could have hurt Adler as well.

But you were lucky.

It hit the attackers side of the head, cracked the skull and got stuck halfway through. They immediately dropped dead.

Grunting, Adler pushed the body off him. Not a moment later his legs gave in.

"Adler!", you rushed to his side to inspect the cut.

It was deep, but not dangerously so. The blade could have cut into his mouth, but had missed a good few centimetres.

He was under shock, breathing heavily, and struggling against the pain, but otherwise would be fine.

For the breath of a second, you felt relived.

But suddenly your heart dropped.

The helicopter crashed into a field of trees.