"We love the things we love for what they are."

- Robert Frost

HER HAND was clasped with his, barely clinging on to those cold, clammy fingers. As they lay on the damp ground, their backs pressing against each other, they could do nothing but wait.

Slowly, Iris could feel the weight of death pulling them both in and out of consciousness. It was a disorientating feeling, numbing your insides and blurring your mind. She had lost track of how many times Sniper had kicked and punched her; how many cries she had yelled, for her voice had now gone hoarse and the pain had amounted to so much that she could barely move.

Sniper had left the room momentarily, although she couldn't figure out how long it had been exactly since his presence was consuming them, his dark figure watching, ready, eager to pounce. He had wanted them to die a slow, painful death. One shot to the head was too quick. Adam Harris hadn't savoured this moment for years only to kill her straight away. So instead he took short breaks to gain more strength, returning with just as much ferocity and anger as before.

As soon as the door shut, she had crawled over to Hunter, attempting to console him with reassurance – the love of another person that he had been deprived of. She barely felt a reaction from him, apart from the occasional twitch of his fingers and the soft whimpers that gurgled out of his throat. Every so often she would press her hand against his wrist to feel for a pulse, letting out a cry of relief when it was there, still there, but hanging on desperately.

What had she done?

How had this happened? An innocent boy, already experienced in the art of grief, mixed up within the mess that was her life and her mistakes only.

Iris slowly moved herself around, leaning her weight on one elbow so she could look at Hunter properly. Two trembling fingers reached out to brush some hair that had fallen into his face.

He had been able to fall asleep after she promised she wouldn't let Sniper touch him, whispering a song that his mother used to hum around the house to slowly ease him into it. He looked so peaceful. If you let yourself forget about his blood-soaked shirt and the pale and sweating of his skin, he was nothing but as he used to be.

She looked away in fear that she would cry again. Sniper had seen enough of her tears. Too many, in fact, and now she was sick of it.

Sick of lying, limp and useless, sick of feeling as if everything was her fault. Despite the pain drumming and hammering itself in every part of her body, she suddenly understood what it was really like to care.

Shakily, she moved, finding herself able to stand on two feet.

Before she fought to rid her mind of despair and neglect.

Now, she would fight for the chance to live a better life. And to give someone else a chance.

To give hope, all those times it had been taken from her.

♥♥♥

"Hey. Listen." One of his fingers brushed hers as they stood with their backs pressed against the tree. "I'm sorry about everything that happened between us. I know...things didn't exactly end well."

Ember looked up at Chase, feeling her stomach flutter against her wishes. Of course it would be hard to look at him. He had the same face that she fell in love with, the same voice, the same mannerisms. Every movement was like a stab of memory to her heart, reminding her of the time they had spent together. "It's okay." She smiled briefly before looking away. "I'm just glad you came back to help. I don't think we could have done it without you and all," She gestured to the group around them, "this."

"Okay, we've surveyed the area – they've got sensors and guys at every entrance, which is front, left side and back." Rylan was moving towards them with Levi and Scab at his side. He was dressed in a brown jumper that seemed slightly too small, one gun slung across his chest. "The Cameras are decoys, so I guess they didn't have enough to budget that, but we've got to find a way in without setting off the sensors."

Scab nodded, cracking his knuckles. "The only way we can do it is if we go above. Get our guys to push someone up onto the roof, which is just flat concrete. There's a crack that we can drop in a device to Iris and Hunter to make sure they're okay and that they move to the opposite side to prevent any debris falling onto them."

"But surely they'll see us doing that?" Ember asked, shivering as the breeze pushed against her unhappily. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Wrench readying himself for battle, zipping up his jumper and loading up with ammo.

"We'll have surrounded the entrances, so those guys won't see, and even if they do they'd have to get through all of us first." Levi looked in the distance to the building, which was barely noticeable from where they were standing. It was a gaze of longing and desperation. He was aching for them. What Ember was feeling was probably a fraction of the fear in his heart. In a second, Levi could lose everything. "We'll be fine." He was saying, clearly taking her pained expression as that of terror rather than sympathy. "We've got way more guys and way more shit to use against them."

"Okay." She breathed through her nose, accepting the gun that was handed to her. Wrench was now ready along with the rest of the guys, all of them standing in a circle, waiting for that order. The order.

Wrench and Chase nodded to each other as a sign of respect.

The rest of the men shook hands.

Rylan patted Levi's back.

Scab, Rex and Leon bumped shoulders.

Ember closed her eyes.

Clearing his throat, Levi took one more look at the building as it would be for the last time, untouched in the distance. "Let's do this."

♥♥♥

This time, Sniper hadn't expected Iris to be standing there, waiting for him.

She knew what he had expected: her body, on the edge of death, lying there, wilting like the last remnants of a flower.

But she refused to be like that, even if her body ached in disapproval. She was ready to fight, even if it brought upon her death itself.

"What the fuck are you doing." Sniper said as he entered, sneering. If it was possible, his eyes were even more soulless than before, like pits of unending darkness.

"I'm pissed off." She replied, although her voice was so strained that the words hardly came out. She cleared her throat and persevered. "I'm fucking pissed off that you think you can do all this shit and get away with it."

Sniper laughed, the sound echoing around the room like the bells of insanity. "You're pissed off. Well would you look at that. Poor baby."

She'd had enough of him already. One of her bruised arms swung around and slammed the side of his head, hard. It was so quick that for a moment he clutched his ear with wide eyes, stunned. Then, as if reality clawed itself back into his mind, his face warped into a look of fury, one hand reaching for his gun.

"I've had enough of you now." He held it up to her.

In a split second she used her elbow to send it flying across the room, skidding along the floor. Sniper, now without any backup, was forced to use only himself as a weapon.

Iris dodged one punch. Two. Three. With each movement of her body, she felt like keeling over in pain but yet doing it all over again. The impact of fighting back was both crushing and empowering, but both made her feel a little bit more alive.

One of her legs kicked his, sending him toppling over onto the floor.

Sniper scoffed, scrambling back up. "You think you're gonna win this? Please, you're half alive."

"Everyone has a reason for their nicknames, as you said, Sniper." She grinned. "We both know what Revenant means. Now, where's your gun again?"

♥♥♥

Wrench was part of the group travelling in the vehicles towards the building at high speed. This meant that they could reach it quicker without being shot at first sight. With each bump and hurl, he felt his adrenaline pumping through his veins. This was what he had always been good at. It may have been the end of his time in a gang, and he had chosen that path, but that didn't mean he hadn't missed the excitement of a fight, the pure thrill and hunger of it.

The opposition started firing at them as soon as they were jumping out of the car, but it was clear they were vastly outnumbered.

"Stand back." One of them shouted. "Get the fuck out of our turf."

"Fuck that shit." Wrench replied, firing back. The gun kicked against him with every pull of the trigger. He wasn't used to firing guns, nobody used them in London apart from in rare occurrences – they were louder, harder to hide, and always, always brought repercussions. He didn't actually like using them at all, but here he was left with no choice. They couldn't exactly run up with knives in their hands – they'd be shot dead before they took one step.

One of his men cried out as he was shot in the leg, falling down in a heap. Trying to stop himself getting distracted by it, Wrench continued, firing one of the guards in return, hoping that the fallen of his men would be able to move away and take cover.

Wrench knew he was winning, and he could tell because he could already see Levi and the Sangue moving towards the right side of the building, where they would climb onto the roof. He had done his job now – the guards had been distracted.

But, for a split second, so had he.

Wrench felt his body move with the impact before the pain came.

Suddenly, there it was, slamming into his bones, shattering his insides. The feeling of it was so intense that he was left weak with fear, weak with the knowledge that they had got him, they had beaten him.

And no, not one bullet. Not one, but two.

Two of them. One in his shoulder, one in his upper rib.

The blood was everywhere. He had never seen so much of it. The fact that it was his made him gag and throw up, only making the throb of his pain worse.

He was crying, but he couldn't hear himself.

The pain struck him in multitudes. Waves and waves of agony, stopping even the smallest of movements.

The ringing. The throbbing. It was all over him. He couldn't make it stop.

He wanted it to go away.

It wouldn't. It wouldn't go away.

And then-

Everything had been dulled, as if someone had turned down the volume. For a moment, he could make out someone shaking him, speaking to him.

Ember.

How had she gotten there? How long had he been there, useless?

He could feel himself speaking back, replying, but he wasn't sure if she was hearing him.

All he could see were her tears, and each drop that fell from her distraught eyes onto his burning cheeks, giving him a sense, at least, of what it felt like to be yearned for, at last.

♥♥♥

Levi had assumed that the minute he would be standing on the roof, he would be filled with a sense of excitement, finally in the same place as his brother after all these weeks, finally struck with the knowledge that Iris too, was close, almost within reach. Only, as soon as both feet had made it, and his knees straightened, his body was consumed with nothing but terror.

What if they got there, and there was nobody to save? What if they were too late?

He watched as the men below them fought, as gun shots sounded continuously in the air. The building wasn't exactly tall, but he could see the tops of the trees surrounding them and the fields further out.

Breaking him from his thoughts, Rylan cleared his throat. "I'm going to drop the walkie talkie into the hole now. It's just big enough, hopefully there's nobody else in there to catch it instead. If nobody replies, I'm going to tune in with the guys below to see if they're able to make their own way in. If not..."

"If not what?" Levi asked. He was already fearing the worst.

Rex was avoiding his eye contact. "If not, then we have to go through with it and blow the roof, hoping they'll get out of the way or be elsewhere. There's no other choice."

It was as if they were expecting Levi to yell in disagreement – they were spaced out from him, eyeing him nervously to gage his reaction.

But Levi understood that they were trying their hardest, and if there was no other way, then that was what it would have to be.

"It's okay." He nodded. "Let's just try and get them out as quick as we can."

Rylan dropped the walkie talkie through the hole and waited for five seconds, before passing the other one to Levi.

Crouching down, Leon peered through the hole. " I can see...oh, shit. They're fighting." He froze. "What the fuck?"

"Who's fighting?" Levi moved towards him.

"What the fuck is Sniper doing there?" Leon could barely utter the words, moving out of the way so Rex and Scab could look for themselves.

For a long moment, the gang stared at each other, shell-shocked.

"Sniper is the one behind this?" Rex breathed, his eyes flitting around frantically as if mimicking the thoughts of disbelief in his head. "That's why he's been gone all this time. That's why-"

"Fuck." Scab shouted. "Fuck! He went behind everyone and hurts one of us? Tries to kill one of us? Fuck, what a fucking-"

"Calm down." Rylan said. He too was just as shocked, but it seemed as if his mind was thinking more sensibly than the others, despite the sudden turning of events. "We need to carry on as we were. Just because it's Sniper doesn't mean we can sit here getting angry about it."

"Iris is fighting him." Leon shook his head. "He's going to kill her, she's not herself."

Levi moved to look for himself in an abrupt drive of fear, but one of Rylan's arms moved outwards, acting as a barrier to stop him going further. "Levi, I don't think you should look. If you see something you don't like, you won't be acting yourself. We need you at your best."

For a moment, Levi contemplated pushing past him, desperate to see a glimpse of what was going on. But after taking a deep breath, he paused. Rylan really was the rational one in the situation.

"All we can do now is see if Hunter or Iris hears us on the receiver." Rylan gave the others a look as if to say, shut the fuck up and listen to me.

The Sangue fell silent.

Levi, recollecting himself, turned away, pressing the button on the device. "Hello? This is Levi." He paused, waiting for a response. "If either of you are there, please reply. This is Levi. Talk to me." He swallowed, feeling his throat tighten. "Hello?"

Silence.

"I can't see the walkie talkie anymore." Leon was saying as he continued to look through the hole.

Levi clenched his fist in fear, feeling his nails jab into his skin.

"It's ok." Scab gave him a smile of reassurance. "They'll hear you. Keep going."

Levi nodded, unsure. "Hello? This is-"

"Levi? Is that you?"

Hunter.

His voice.

It was him, it was really him.

"Hunt, shit, Hunt." Levi felt himself crying, but he was too relived to care that the Sangue were witnessing everything. "Hunter...I'm so... I'm so sorry. So so fucking sorry. Tell me you're okay. Please, please."

"I'm okay." He sounded weak, his voice quieter and less energetic. "I'm losing... blood Levi. I'm... scared. Where are you?"

"You don't need to be scared. We're here, okay? I'm right above you. Right here. Where's Iris?"

"She's..." He breathed in a trembling breath. "fighting Adam. Or Sniper. Iris...calls him...Sniper."

His heart surged for the girl he had fallen in love with. She was still going at it. Still fighting. Even after everything, she was still fighting.

"Okay, I'm going to need you to follow my instructions, Hunt. I need you to move on the opposite side of the room from the hole in the ceiling."

"I don't know if I can...that's where Sniper and Iris...are." He paused, collecting his breath again with a soft cry. "It hurts to m....to move."

"I need you to do this for me. Please, Hunt. It's the only way we can get to you without hurting you."

"What if Sniper...hurts me?"

"I won't let him." Levi looked up to the sky, trying to stop the rest of his tears from falling.

He knew his mum would be proud of both of them, looking out for each other. If he could do one thing with his life, it would be to ensure that Hunter was okay.

After a couple of minutes, there was movement from the other line, other voices. Then Hunter's one, soft and fading. "I've...moved. I'm-"

A gunshot sounded beneath them.

Levi shared a look of terror with the Sangue, the sound ringing in his ears. "Do it. Do it now, fucking set it off."

Rylan connected the explosive device next to the crack and they all ran backwards, waiting for the impact.

The building groaned as it tumbled and broke, falling apart before their very eyes.

And without hesitation, Levi and the Sangue ran into the gaping space, jumping into the very room that had for so long frequented their fears.

♥♥♥

His body was falling apart in her arms and she could do nothing about it.

It had happened so quickly that Ember wasn't even given a chance to save him, to pull him away to safety. Not one gunshot, but two. Two pieces of metal lodged into his body, forcing him to lay in a pool of his own blood as it trickled out, staining everything around him.

She didn't even care that it was over her, either. She needed him to be okay. He had to be okay.

"Please, please don't give up on me." She was crying, her lips trembling as his squinting eyes fluttered in her direction. "Please, Louis. Please, speak to me. Please."

"Hey." His voice was slurred, unrecognisable. "I'm here."

"Don't you dare fucking die on me. Don't fucking do that to me." She wailed, clutching his body against her chest, desperate to keep his warmth existing, right there.

But his movements weren't as strong as they used to be. Even the soft stroke of his finger on her wrist was riddled with weakness, with a trembling that send her mind spiralling into despair.

"Don't." She pressed two hands on either side of his face, staring into the fading of his eyes. "Don't. Don't. Please. No. No."

She couldn't then make out what he said next, for the world around them was too loud and unforgiving, not letting her truly exist in his last moment. As it happened, she wept tears of what could have been, knowing that, once his body began to loosen and become limp, she would always wonder what was said, what he was thinking.

♥♥♥

Iris didn't even have time to comprehend it.

One minute she was fighting with as much strength as she had left in her, the next the gunshot pierced her ears, thudding around the room. For a minute she was plunged back into that night, the sound that killed Davis, that began it all.

She looked around, terrified that Hunter was the victim, only to see him beside her, with the gun in his quivering hand, and Sniper's body at her feet.

She let out a cry, but it was dulled by the explosion above, the opening of light that filled her lungs with fresh air and hope.

Levi.

Rex.

Rylan.

Scab.

Leon.

They were all there, running towards them, the familiarity of their faces sending her into cries of relief, the tears flooding down her body as the group embraced, shaking and trembling and stuttering and stumbling and sobbing and yet-

And yet there.

Finally, all there. 

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡    

AUTHORS NOTE: This chapter was so equally depressing and exciting to write. Bittersweet, as they say. 

I'm not going to write much or I'll cry myself to sleep, so, without further ado, I present you with the knowledge that the next chapter will be the very last. 

I love you guys so much,