How could I have let him get to me like that? I should have known that he knew I was following him. Why did I think for one minute he wouldn't suspect I was tailing him?

It should have been obvious he'd be prepared. Only, what he told me was the last thing I ever anticipated him to tell me. He had to be saying it to throw me off guard, right? I wanted to believe that what he told me was a lie, that he said it to merely distract me.

Yet, a small part of me felt that it was real, what he said.

Pushing the news aside, I refocused on what I had been doing. Whatever plan he had going on in that constantly-working brain of his, I wasn't going to let him go through with it. Though he may reach the rooftop of St. Bart's and Moriarty before I could, I could still get there and have a chance to prevent anything bad from happening.

I continued my trek up the stairs. Was I closer to the top than I thought? Whatever is going on, or is about to happen, it can't. I won't let it. I'm not going to let him ruin Sherlock's life anymore than he already has.

My legs screamed in outrage, dying to rest, even for a split second. I forced myself to keep going. I wasn't going to turn around and head back down, I had gone through too much to do so. I threw dark brown hair away from my eyes so I wouldn't miss a step and take a tumble down the stairwell.

As I turned for another flight, a loud bang stopped me in my tracks. The noise replayed over and over in my head. It was no clap of thunder I'd heard. Though I hadn't heard the sound too often in my life, I watched enough crime shows to know what it was.

A gun.

A gun had just gone off.

Someone had just been shot.

The question was: who took the bullet?

I blanched, fearing the worst. I pushed myself harder, needing to go farther. What I'd heard I didn't imagine. How could I imagine something like that?

I didn't know what to expect when I would reach the top of the hospital. I knew what I wanted to see, but knowing how my hopes were crushed before, I was sure what I hoped for would not exist.