“NO!”
Emily’s shout rang louder in your ears than the gunshot itself.
The entire world spun in slow motion as you fell to the ground, catching a glimpse of Morgan lunging towards the Unsub with a rage you hadn’t seen in him before.
You hit the ground with a thud that vibrated through your head and the world finally stopped spinning.
Suddenly Emily was crashing into your view, almost falling on top of you with how fast she fell to her knees at your side. Her hands working faster to rid you of your jacket and shirt than they had the night before.
“(Y/N) can you hear me? Come on (Y/N) stay awake for me.”
That voice. Always so cool and calm, so dominant and raspy, it’s what made you fall for her in the first place. But something was wrong. Her voice; it didn't sound like normal. You blinked, trying to rid your vision of the hazy edges and focus up on her deep brown eyes.
That’s when the pain hit.
A hot, burning, searing pain in your left shoulder and ribs. It wasn’t how you imagined it to be. You knew it’d hurt of course, but not like this. You had imagined a sharper, more insistent pain. The one they described in the movies.
“No no no (Y/N), keep your eyes open for me.”
Emily’s desperate voice snapped you out of your thoughts, unaware that your eyes had fluttered closed again. You forced them open. The hazy outskirts of your vision slowly growing, cutting out what clear vision you had left.
‘This is it’ you thought, ‘this is how I die.’
You led still, unthinking, watching the undetermined shapes and colours cross your vision, waiting for the bright white light or the hand of whatever God was out there to stretch forward and take you on to the next chapter.
Nothing happened.
The pain worsened. The sound of your blood rushing past your ears became louder, only penetrated by the pained cries of Emily as she applied deep pressure to the two bullet holes in your torso. Your eyelids grew heavier and you submitted to the darkness suddenly pulling you down.
“DON'T YOU DARE (Y/N)! DON’T YOU DARE DIE ON ME!”
You felt a tear splash onto your cheek and you forced your eyes to open, blinking hard to regain any focus you had left.
Using all your strength you lifted your right arm, clenching your teeth so as to not scream in pain.
“No, please babe, just lie still. The ambulance will be here soon.” Emily reassured, wiping your hair off your forehead and pushing your arm back to the ground.
You tried again, lifting your right arm up and across your body and placing it on top of the hand applying pressure to your wounds. It was warm and sticky from your blood but you didn’t notice.
“Promise” you rasped, “promise you’ll pray for me.”
Your faith wasn’t strong, and you knew Emily’s wasn’t either. You’d discussed it some time before, sat on the sofa at her apartment with wine after a particularly taxing case. Both of you had agreed that there must be some sort of higher power out there, you just didn’t know what.
“I’m not going to need to pray for you (Y/N).” Emily sniffed, “you’re going to be okay.”
“Promise anyway?”
“I promise.”
You looked up at her. Her deep brown eyes now red and puffy from crying, her raven black hair sticking to the tear tracks on her face. She was so beautiful.
You closed your heavy eyelids slowly and forced a smile.
“The ambulance is on its way.”
You heard Hotch’s voice distantly but opened your eyes to see him standing over you, a hand placed on Emily’s shoulder.
You adjusted your gaze and looked up at him. He smiled weakly but you could see his eyes weren’t telling the same story as his mouth. They were full of rage, full of fear and sadness.
He moved away and was replaced by JJ who walked round to your other side and knelt down next to you.
“It’s going to be okay (Y/N), Morgan shot the unsub. I’m so sorry this happened. We would never have let you get so close to him if we knew he was armed.”
Her apology confused you. It had been your decision to negotiate with him, your choice to stand in front of him without your bulletproof vest and gun still in its holster around your waist. You smiled up at JJ, accepting her apology nonetheless.
“Look after her for me?”
You looked at JJ, your best friend, with sad eyes. Then turning your focus to Emily while still talking to JJ.
“She likes foot massages after difficult cases, there's a stash of her favourite wine at the back of the cupboard on top of the fridge in my apartment for when she’s stressed, and don’t listen to her when she says she’s okay, she almost always needs a hug. She’s been my whole world for the best year of my life and I’d hate to see this break her.”
You turned back to see tears running down JJ’s cheeks. “I promise to look after her (Y/N).”
“No, JJ, what’re you saying?! (Y/N) you’re going to be okay. Look, the paramedics are here now, please, you’re going to be okay. You have to be.” Emily pleaded, her shoulders being pulled backwards away from you by Morgan as the paramedics rushed to your side, plugging you into more machines than you could keep track of and shouting medical jargon to each other.
You maintained eye contact with Emily, watching her strain against Morgan’s grip until she finally gave in.
You relaxed into the cold hard ground, feeling the weights on your eyelids pull them closed.
“(Y/N)!” Emily shouted, but it was somewhere in the distance.
The paramedics, announcing they were losing you, panicked.
The beeping of your heart monitor suddenly became clearer, you listened to it beep a few more times, before changing to a long, extended beep.
Emily’s scream was the last thing you heard before it all went quiet.