[Rapture] The End

God only knows what's happening elsewhere in the sunken city. The sounds that echo through the pipes,through the metal that makes up the infrastructure, the vibrations through the glass, the broken pieces of it being dragged by the current past the windows. I hate that I've left Bucky to deal with culminating violence. I don't question his ability to do so, but he'll always be my partner and you don't leave your brother at the eleventh hour. Not if you have a choice.

I made a promise to a doctor, though, and to her patients, and I will not leave them to get through this alone.

I don't have the shield with me, it's on Bucky's arm. I haven't picked up a gun on the way and I refuse to touch the plasmids that have twisted the city's residents into degenerate facsimiles of human beings. I have the closest thing to tactical body armor I could find in the compound under a jacket, and I'm sprinting full out as I race through the labyrinthine network of tunnels and corridors. When I'm in the vicinity of the safehouse I slow, turning to scan the area. Any sounds of combat are distant, and my aim is to keep them that way. To get the girls to a bathysphere and get them out, and Brigid with them.

"Doctor!"

[Rapture] For Bucky

I realize- realized some time ago, long before the sun dropped below the horizon and the cooler night air set in- that I should not just be sitting here. What lacerations and bruises I'm sporting are minor; superficial. My skin is still warm from sitting in the last of the sun, though I'm stripped to the waist so it's leaving me, now. Even the heat soaked up by the sand all day is leaving, dissipating into the evening air and leaving the grains cool to the touch.

Not as cold as the body wrapped in the remains of my shirt and jacket. Between the two pieces of clothing, she's covered head to toe. I know I should move her, should bring her to the forensic team, not that I want to. Maybe straight to the cemetery. There's something I should be doing, but all I can do is watch the water for more bodies. I sit with my knees bent and my arms draped over them, feeling wasted but remaining vigilant, and bear witness as the ocean laps away at the stretch of sand I washed up on, continuing to shift and replace the pieces of shore that were disturbed as I tried uselessly to breathe life back into the lungs of a little dead girl.