Tone
The world broke in front of me.
One second Archie was moving—fast, unstoppable, all violence and rage—and the next—he dropped.
His knees hit the tarmac first, his body folding in on itself like something had cut the strings holding him upright.
Red bloomed across his chest—two brutal gunshots driven into places that I knew there was no coming back from.
My breath stopped.
His hand went to his heart, fingers pressing into the spreading stain like he could hold himself together through sheer will alone. Blood soaked through his shirt, darkening, thickening, unstoppable.
And his eyes—they found me. Locked there, even as the world tore itself apart around us.
Everything inside me screamed that this wasn’t real, that this couldn’t be real. That it was just a waking nightmare where someone would flip the switch and everything would be right with the world again.
Move.
The word flickered somewhere in the back of my mind.
Move.
I knew what to do. I knew.
Pressure. Stabilize. Assess. Act. My entire life had been built around moments like this. But my body revolted.
I stood there, frozen in disbelief, rooted to the spot like something had reached inside my chest and locked everything in place.
Archie. He came for me. All this way—through blood and distance and everything that tried to keep us apart—and he still found me. We found each other. And now—now I was losing him even before I had found him.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. Not after we’d come this far. Not after everything we hadn’t even had the chance to be.
We weren’t finished. We were just beginning. And the future was already being torn away from us.
The gunfire slowed. Then stopped. Like someone had pulled the sound out of the air. One final shot cracked clean and sharp, cutting through the silence that followed.
Machado jerked. Stilled. Then dropped.
I turned my head.
A man stepped out from the shadow of the plane, his gun still raised, smoke curling from the barrel. His expression was hard—until his eyes landed on the ground in front of me.
On Archie.
Something in his face collapsed.
“Archie.”
His voice seemed to break the spell. Everything in me snapped back into place all at once. I moved, although I don’t remember crossing the distance.
One second I was standing. The next I was on my knees beside him, the impact jarring through my bones as I reached for him with shaking hands.
“Help—!”
The word caught somewhere in my throat, splintered on the way up, and what finally escaped was thin, strangled into a broken, high-pitched sound that barely carried past my own lips.
A squeak that was useless. It sounded small and wrong.
I tried again—dragging in air that burned, forcing it up—but it snagged in the same place, breaking apart before it could become real.
“Help—”
My voice was still weak and fractured.
“Somebody help!”
My hands pressed against his chest, right over the wounds, trying to stem the blood that wouldn’t stop coming. It soaked through the fabric of his shirt, drowning him in red.
Hot, wet and sticky. There was way too much blood.
“Call an ambulance!” I shouted, my voice cracking, breaking. “Someone!”
Archie’s skin was slick beneath my hands. His breathing—it was shallow and uneven.
“Archie,” I choked, leaning over him, my hands pressing harder, desperate, trying to stop the bleeding.
“Stay with me. Stay with me—”
His eyes found mine again. Glazed and unfocused. And instantly, I knew.
He was still with me, but he was going into shock.
No. No, no, no—not when I was right here.
“I’m losing him!” I screamed, panic ripping through me as I cradled his head, pulling him closer. If I could hold him hard enough, maybe I could stop him from slipping away. “I’m losing him—somebody help me!”
“Tone.”
Archie’s voice was barely a whisper. My heart shattered.
“Don’t speak,” I said immediately, shaking my head, tears spilling over before I could stop them. “Don’t speak, Archie. Just—just stay with me. Please. Please—”
My hands shook against him, pressing, holding, refusing to let go.
“No,” I whispered, the word breaking apart as it left me. “No, no, no, no, no—stay awake. Stay awake, Archie, please—”
His eyes fluttered. Struggling, fighting to hold on. And I saw it—the moment the fight started to slip.
“No!” I sobbed, leaning closer, my forehead touching his as I tried to keep him with me. “Stay with me—Archie—please—”
My voice cracked. Broken.
“Archieeeee—!”
The sound tore out of me, raw and ruined, echoing across the airstrip like it was dying. Because it was. He was.
My hands tangled in his shirt, pulling him closer, refusing to let him go, my body curling over his like I could shield him from what was happening.
“No,” I whispered, over and over, my voice shaking, unraveling. “No, no—don’t do this. Don’t you do this—”
His breath hitched. Weak. Fading.
I pressed my cheek against his, my tears spilling onto his skin, my voice breaking into fragments.
“Stay,” I begged. “Please stay. Please—don’t leave me, Archie—”
My hand slipped to my stomach, instinctive, desperate.
“You don’t want to miss this,” I choked out, my words tumbling over each other. “You don’t—you don’t want to miss your son—your daughter—you don’t—”
My voice collapsed completely.
“Please,” I whispered. “Please, Archie—don’t you want to be here?”
For a second—just a second—his eyes focused on me. And I saw it. Everything we hadn’t said. Everything we hadn’t had time to become. All the things that we would miss.
My chest caved in.
“Stay,” I whispered again, softer now, broken. “Stay with me…”
His breath left him, slow and final. And then there was nothing.
No inhale. No fight. The light in his eyes was gone. Just like that.
I froze. Completely. My hands still pressed against him, still holding on, still refusing to accept what my brain already knew.
“No…,” I gasped, disbelieving.
I shook him gently, like that might wake him, like this was something he could come back from.
“Archie…”
There was no response.
My vision blurred, tears falling faster now, my chest heaving as something inside me exploded.
I pulled him closer, cradling him against me, my head dropping beside his as I clung to him, shaking.
“Archie…” I whispered, over and over, like saying his name might bring him back. “Archie…”
But he didn’t move. His breath was gone. And I felt it—the exact moment his breath slipped through my fingers.
Gone forever. Lost.