Double Agent

○ twenty five ○

| Ezra |

Fuck.

This is not happening.

Fuck.

I can't think. I can barely even breathe. I can't lose her. I can't.

I scoop her up into my arms, panic setting in as I calculate all the time it'll take to get her to a hospital. Too long.

"What happened?" D'angelo thunders, coming face to face with me.

"Syringe to the neck. Get out of my way," I slide past him.

"I have a medic," he urges, looking down at Isadora against my chest before edging to the stairs.

"No one is putting their hands on her. She needs a professional."

"She'll be long dead by then, boy. These things are common in clubs."

Another bout of terror seizes me. He's my last resort.

"Move." I order.

The medic swipes his hand over the bottles lining the bed in one of the backrooms before I lay Isadora down on it. The standard of hygiene is so low it's in hell. The walls are dingy. His stethoscope is broken. He checks the site for a second. A second too long.

"Fucking more faster." I snarl and reach for my gun.

"It's venom," he nods, turning behind to fiddle with some vials on the shelf, "Rattlesnake, I believe. You won't believe how common it is. We have antivenom-"

"Stop fucking talking and start fucking moving. If she dies I'll put a bullet through both of you, clean, and I won't stop there."

Seething, I slam my fist into the wall, splintering the wood and bruising my knuckles. She has to survive. She's not fucking dying.

I swallow the panic. I've been through this simulation a thousand times before. Stay calm, the first rule. Stay calm. But this time it's different. This time it's a thousand times fucking worse because every time I look at her on the bed my heart constricts and I shake.

He injects something else into her. I stare at it, cursing myself for putting her life in their hands. I scrutinise the needle and his techniques, eyes burning.

It's a waiting game. For two hours, I watch her chest rise and fall. Watch the flush come back to her cheeks and the moroseness of the venom flood away. I align my own breathing with her breaths, feeling my own life come back to me.

He checks her heartbeat and blood pressure one more time before nodding at me, "You can take her home. She's stable."

—

I set her down gently on my bed, watching as she turns and curls into the pillow. My hand runs over her jaw, watching her for a moment as she lets out soft breaths, her baby hair fluttering about her face. She's told me many times how uncomfortable it is to sleep in 'going out clothes' as she calls it, so for some reason I find myself tugging her out of her clothes, slipping one of my jumpers over her. She mumbles, turning over to occupy my side of the bed. I clench my jaw; even narrowly escaping death she still finds a way to piss me off.

I don't sleep at all through the night. I only watch her, making sure her chest is moving, making sure she doesn't go deathly pale again. Colour suits her.

Only at nine in the morning do her eyes flutter, taking in the room before landing on me sitting by her on the couch. The sun hits her hazel eyes at an angle, lighting them up as she stares at me with recognition. I let out a breath.

She furrows her brow, "You okay?" she asks in that voice.

My teeth grind against each other as I think of ways to explain the actual living nightmare I've just been through, or that I should be asking her that question instead.