still alive somehow

The world had condensed to nothing but this warehouse in all its freezing cold and stale air. His skin prickled against it and he was sure his body hadn't stopped shivering since he first woke up here — whether that was from the blood loss or the shockwaves of pain each time he moved or the cold he didn't know anymore. He didn't know.

He didn't know anything except that it had been days since he'd seen the stars.

He was probably going to die without ever seeing them again.

His body was shutting down.

This much was obvious. He knew it because he'd seen it happen to men before, when he'd been on the other side of this. When he'd strung a man up by his wrists until his toes scrambled for purchase on the floor and his shoulders popped out of their sockets. When he'd left them to his own men, ignoring their pleas for mercy. He'd seen it when he came back later to find a man with dulled eyes and a delirious, broken mind and the raspy, desperate rattles of breath that signaled death had picked its next victim.

He lost feeling in his fingers first. It could have been from his dislocated shoulders, the ones that would give him permanently hampered range of motion should he miraculously escape from this. He told himself that over and over again until the words didn't sound real in his head. It's just from the shoulders, he can still make it out of this. Rozanov can still find him.

But then the numbness spread lower, settling over wounds that had hurt from the very beginning. When he realized that he hadn't been in so little pain since before the warehouse, the truth became painfully clear.

This was it. His body hit its limit. His mind was still fighting, as ragged as it was held together between his desperate fingers, but his body had had enough. There was nothing else he could do, no limit he could force himself beyond.

He was going to die.

He wasn't afraid. It would be a sweet relief compared to the agony he'd suffered in this warehouse. He only regretted not appreciating the stars when he had them.

Novikov's men still said things to him. Tried to tend to his wounds to prolong his suffering, no doubt so they could renew his torture once the threat to his life was over. He couldn't hear them anymore, not over the roaring pulse of blood in his ears as his heart struggled to push its lifeforce to his brain.

It was how he missed the gunfire, at first.

It wasn't until he realized the men had stopped hitting, and cutting, and burning, and taunting that he recognized the sound for what it was.

Rescue.

The first hands that touched him were terrifyingly gentle and unsteady. It was unnatural the way those strong hands quivered as they ghosted just over his bareskin, like the man belonging to them was too scared to even touch him.

Please, please touch me. Let me feel your hands on me one more time.

"It will be okay, Shane, I promise. I promise you." Even Ilya's voice shook, the once impermeable facade of a dangerous crime boss long abandoned at the door of the warehouse.

"You found me." He thought the words sounded slurred and unrecognizable on his tongue, but the cracked open and broken expression on the face that pressed in close to his made him think maybe the man before him understood after all.

He always had understood him in ways no one else could.

"You think I wouldn't? So little faith in me, sweet boy," Ilya said, voice cracking around his poor attempt at humor. "Stay awake for me, yes? I will get you out of here. I'll take you home."

"Stars."

His body dropped, but he never fell to the ground. Strong, shaking hands caught him and held him with as much care as anyone could possibly manage.

"Shane, I don't understand. We will see the stars, but you have to come with me. Shane, Shane! Listen to me, stay away for me. Be a good boy and stay awake, yes?"

He hummed, the sound unfeeling on his lips.

Time passed strangely. He thought his body was moving, his feet half-dragging along as Ilya struggled to both carry him out and protect them from Novikov's men. Eventually, Shane's body became too heavy and too boneless even for Ilya's form and he tumbled to the ground soundlessly. From the red spattered in tiny dots on the cement near his eyes, he thought the fall should have hurt. It didn't.

He didn't feel anything, his body protecting him from the rest of it.

"Stars, Sir, stars."

"Please, Shane, don't fucking do this. You have to come with me, I am taking you home let's go, I–"

One final surge of strength. His mom once told him that no one is stronger than a man inches from death, the strength a final gift from his failing body.

One last gift.

Shane reached his bloodied and twisted hand up to rest on Ilya's cheek, down his jaw and his neck. He smeared lifeblood on pale skin but all he could focus on were the moles dotted along the smooth expanse of skin in patterns worthy of an artpiece.

"Thank you," Shane wheezed, his breath rattling in his chest. "I missed these stars. Thank you for bringing me the stars."

Something shattered in Ilya's expression, his hand coming up to cover Shane's hand and keep it pressed to his face. Shane could feel Ilya's strong heartbeat pulsing in the artery running up the length of his neck. A miracle.

"You are tired, aren't you? My sweet boy, you have fought so hard. I am proud of my shchenochek, you must be so tired."

He nodded, the joint loose and neck unnaturally pliant. He was so tired. He'd used the last of his strength to touch the stars, and now his fingers still pressed among them but only because Ilya's hands held him there.

Even now, Ilya knew exactly what he needed. Knew what was best for him.

"It's okay, Shane. It's okay. You don't have to fight anymore. I know you fought as hard as you could."

"'m miss you."

"I will miss you too, my perfect Shane. I will see you again."

"Stars?"

"I will bring you the stars, I swear to you I will." Ilya's hand clenched tighter around Shane's against his own skin, like he was trying to keep Shane tethered to the world solely through that touch alone. "You can rest, Shane. Ya tebya lyublyu."

"Okay."