1. Step by Step

The first fell without consideration, but every step counted, every step was progress. Every step was another short distance away from the past. Sometimes, Sam lost count.

DI Tyler leaned over, his bloodied elbows on his knees, looking at his desk. Work spread out over it like a fan. He decided that he should care, and for once in his life, he had to think about it first.

Step two.

Something happened in between, before he ever got to the vending machine in the hallway, and he was certain that it was important. Something he needed to remember for his report. Something someone said, and...damn, the coffee was terrible.

Step three.

Annie checked his tie. His suit. His hair. He shrugged her off.

Step four.

Rain. Naturally, because it was not much of a Mancunian funeral without it. Rain, wet, cold, sad. Everyone was sad, some people were crying. Chris, he was crying. Annie was not, and the effort was breaking her apart. The grief weighed down on them like the rain, thick and inescapable on everyone but Sam. He did not feel anything, and after due consideration, he decided he preferred it that way.

Step five.

Remembering hurt. Hurt like being branded, like swallowing bleach. Not remembering, well...that was nothing.

Step...one.

---

Five years later, DCI Tyler sat down and looked at his desk and surprised himself. He remembered. Not that he forgot, because he never let it go completely, but he did not allow the memory to play out. He stepped around it, this one thing that smothered him, not remembering it and keeping it safe from hurting him any more. Time drifted by like novocaine in his blood, his senses clouded and dulled from the effort of years, hoarding the worst of the past as a way to keep it from dismantling his life.

Remembering was its own selfish agony, but that day, not remembering felt even worse.

---

The gun shot still echoed, harsh and loud and far too close.

"Gene, Gene...don't..." He fell to his knees, pushed his hands into Gene's chest to get him to lay back down all the way. All the way back into the blood.

"C'mon, Sammy, we got 'em."

"Yeah, we do, so just stay still." Sam pushed again, and felt lukewarm wetness seeping into the knees of his trousers.

"We don't got 'em by laying here in the alley." Gene waved a hand in the direction of the ambush. He looked fine, actually, except for his displeased expression and the thick red aura spreading out from under him.

"No, Ray got them. Damnit! Stop moving!" Sam looked up to see Annie on the Cortina's radio, yelling something at Phyllis. It was confusing, because she was close enough for him to hear what she was saying, but nothing registered other than Gene squirming against his hands.

"Why?"

"Gene?" Sam looked down at him in surprise.

"Yeah?"

"You were...shot."

"Yeah. See...the blood." Gene looked off to the side where the red slick flowed away from him.

"Okay, okay, so you know you were shot. So stay still."

"I'm fine, Sammy."

"No."

"No? You arguing with your betters?"

"I'm arguing with the idiot lying on the ground bleeding..."

"Shot in the back. Sneaky bastards. Cowards. Cock-sucking..."

"Hey."

"Not personal or anything." Gene leered.

"Oh, thank you. That makes it all better."

"Right! So let's...nnngggh..." Gene had tried to roll away but fell back ungracefully. Sam leapt forward, one arm going under Gene's shoulder to brace him and immediately soaked to the elbow. Sam thought blood should be warm, but it chilled his skin. What little he saw of Gene's back made no sense, no more sense than Annie's yelling at the radio behind him. Nothing made sense. Gene rocked back and forth.

"Gene?"

"Can't move. Legs. Can't..." Gene looked confused.

"Can't? As in, it hurts?"

"Stop mothering me. Geroff. Ow."

"Christ you are such a baby..." Sam rolled his eyes as he pushed Gene down again. This time his hands left bloody prints on Gene's chest.

"Can't as in can't." Gene wheezed, closing his eyes. "Shotgun?"

"Yeah." Sam shook him a little to get his eyes open again.

"Sounded like. My back..." For a brief moment, worry flashed in Gene's eyes. Sam forced a calming smile, but he suspected it was more a reflection of Gene's own grimace.

"Does it hurt? Gene?"

"No." His eyes drifted shut again.

"Gene! Stay with me. Stay, come on, don't pass out like a girl."

"You're...the girl. You pass out." Gene looked up at him, his eyes lost and filled with pain.

"Believe me, it's on my To Do list."

"Your what? Oh, fuck..."

"Hey, just keep still. It's not all your blood, here, I've got some of my own on this shirt. Don't freak out on me." They argued physically while Gene's hands flopped around, seeking purchase, and Sam tried to counteract. He ignored the blood, brackish and dark, and his mind buzzed with the possibility of performing CPR without actually pumping the life out of Gene entirely.

"Unh." Gene tipped his head back, groaning, then went still.

"Gene!"

"You with the yelling."

"I learn from the best."

"Prefer you yelling in bed."

"Shut it, Annie's right over there...Gene, look at me." Sam leaned in close.

"I do."

"I know."

Gene smiled again, but it was tense, and his lips were white. The blood kept creeping along the ground, following gravity and Sam's hopes. Gene was breathing heavily, his eyes opening and closing at irregular intervals. Sam wanted to turn him onto his side but from what he saw of the wounds when Gene fell, there was not a single pressure point he could use to stop the blood loss, which was pumping out in a heart beat. As long as Gene was somewhat conscious, though, Sam refused to panic. He felt other people fluttering around them, probably Annie and Ray and he did not care who else. He focused on Gene, who looked back at him, sane and confused and drifting.

"Sam..."

"Hey, hey, wake up. C'mon."

"Too pretty...you..." His mouth moved slowly, his words slurred with wayward tongue.

"Now you flatter me?"

"Yeah."

"Gene, come on, please, just keep your eyes open...jesus, jesus, Gene, stay, please, stay..."

"Hunh. Cold."

"Oh christ, oh christ, Gene, hang on, just hang on, look at me, look at me..."

"...pretty..."

"DAMNIT! GENE! DAMNIT! STAY!"

"...sam?"

"NO!" Sam waited, clutching, hands slick with the oily blood. He was lost, completely lost, confused, furious, and immobile. "...no no no no no..." The refrain became a chant and then a murmur as he watched what was happening to him, to them. He denied it and refused it and ignored it as sirens ground the air, the ambulance at least two blocks away yet. Two blocks and one lifetime.

"...Gene?"

His voice whispered off the walls around them, unheard.

The ambulance barreled into the alley and someone tugged him up and away. Sam stumbled backwards, staring back at the clear, empty green eyes, then shoved off the hands plying at him and walked towards the Cortina.

Step one.

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