Immortality

Chapter One - Time's Wingèd Chariot

Author's note: And here it is, the sequel to Inamorata. Read it, please, because if it's not popular enough I won't continue it. I've got other stuff I want to work on more, so if you guys don't support it, it's not going to happen. That being said, I love your votes and comments, so rock on!

Perched high in the rafters, Nightingale paused as she heard something that shouldn't have been there.

There came the sound of gunfire from ahead, rapid-fire bangs that thundered and echoed through the cavernous space. Her heightened hearing allowed her to pick out individual voices shouting above the sound. There were at least five people crying out over the roaring of bullets - it sounded like two women and three men.

"Firefight," she murmured into the mic at her wrist.

"Where?" murmured a voice in her ear. Pierce's voice, filtering through the comm in her ear, sounded as close to panicked as an agent was allowed to show. A firefight was not something they had expected when David had revealed the tactical plan to them.

It was supposed to be a quick job, fast and deadly, four arrests made and no one, not even the criminals, harmed.

That was evidently not how it had gone and now Pierce, who was running recon for the agents currently on the scene, sounded as though he was about to shoot himself in the head, death by his own hand an apparently preferrable situation to what would be David's anger if anyone ended up with a wound more severe than a scratch.

"Down the hall, I think. It's difficult to say from here," murmured Nightingale. "What's the plan now?"

There was a long pause.

"What's the fucking plan, Pierce? We don't have all day, Nick and Caroline are-" began Nightingale, growling into her mic.

"They're in the warehouse! Thirty feet along the beam you're on and you'll be on a catwalk above them. Drop down from there!" cried Pierce, the comm crackling with the hysteria in his voice.

Nightingale glanced back over her shoulder to find David. She did not have to look far, for he was close behind her, a hair's breadth away, loading his gun with swift, expert movements. His hands moved fast and he was utterly deadly as he cocked the weapon and held it in sure fingers.

"Let's go," he said, looking up at her.

Nightingale had her gun out as fast as he did. She held it loosely in one hand as she straightened up and tiptoed forward.

She flew along the beam quickly, balanced perfectly, confident that she would not fall. Fifty feet below her, machinery loomed in the dark, turning the abandoned factory into the maw of some behemoth, ready to swallow her up if she fell.

But she wouldn't fall. Even David, whose nimbleness was exceptional, moved at a slower pace than she did, and so when she had reached the catwalk, she had to pause and wait for him to climb the ten feet down and join her.

"Ah, you've finally found your way," she sniped at him, shouting over the gunfire. "It only took you several years."

He glowered at her and pushed past her to the railing of the catwalk. Below them, Nightingale could make out the situation. Nicholas and Caroline, separated but both having found cover, were sitting tight as two men and one woman - the drug mules David's team had been tracking for a year now - fired at them.

"Idiots," she muttered. Dealing drugs was a crime, of course, but this lot had made it worse - possession of a firearm was illegal, and attempted murder, especially the attempted murder of two police agents, was adding insult to fucking injury.

"I'll take those two," said David, gesturing. "You take that one."

He had to speak directly into Nightingale's ear to be heard and, despite the fact that she had known him twelve years, having him so close to her surprised and alarmed her.