Fic: Newsroom - I'll be there for you - HC Bingo Fill
Title: I'll be there for you
Author: tortuousphoenix
Fandom: The Newsroom
Pairing: Maggie/Jim
Prompt: Bullet Wounds from my HC Bingo Card
Wordcount: 888
Rating: T
Warnings: Someone gets shot
Summary: What happens when Will's stalker comes into the office and Maggie is her usual self.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, all characters belong to Aaron Sorkin
AN: Thanks to whiskyinmind for the beta.
Maggie was curled into a ball in the hard plastic chair beside his bed, tears streaming silently down her face. Part of her knew why he'd done it; she had always known how he felt; and how she felt; no matter how much they both denied it. But even still, she couldn’t let herself believe he had deliberately saved her life.
It all happened so fast.
The ‘madman’ had come into the office just as the two o’clock briefing was ending. He was meticulously dressed and, initially at least, he was very calm. She had no trouble understanding why security had let him right through; he looked like he worked there. Right up to the moment he pulled the gun.
Everyone was still bunched around the conference room door and they all seemed to freeze when they saw the it. Will’s death threat had become a bit of a joke after Neal’s attempt to smoke the suspect out had resulted in hundreds more threats, but all of a sudden it was very real again as she watched the gun being trained on her boss.
Mac’s training seemed to take over automatically. Maggie remembered smiling as she wondered if Mac ever thought all that military crisis management training would come in handy in a newsroom in New York City. It was that little smile that drew his attention and he moved the gun from Will to her.
She remembers Mac talking, knows she tried to reason with him; to calm him down; to diffuse the situation. But for the life of her she couldn’t remember what Mac actually said. He was talking as well. Ranting first about Will; then about her. She remembers him using the word ‘mocking’ and she guessed he was talking about that little smile and, with the benefit of hindsight, she mentally kicks herself for letting her mind wander. She can see herself standing there, unable to move, unable to speak, unable to explain that the smile was nothing to do with him. But she can do nothing but stare at the gun in his hand, trained steadily on her. Thinking about it now, she figures she's lucky she didn't have a panic attack.
She guesses that had something to do with Jim’s hand on the small of her back. She knew he hadn’t been right behind her as they left the conference room but when the steadying hand appeared she had had no doubt to whom it belonged or why he’d found a way to be close to her.
The gunman was yelling at her, asking her something and everyone was looking at her, but she couldn’t speak. Her silence only seemed to enrage him more.
What happened next played out like a movie in her head. The cloudy fragments of broken memory were replaced with the pristine looking big screen that allowed her to see every tiny movement; every look; every gesture; everything that lead to where they were now.
A look from the gunman to Mac, then to Will. A smile and a comment,
“This is all your fault!” Clear and concise, not the raving lunatic she would have expected.
Then she hears the gun go off.
The clearness of the movie ends as chaos erupted. She closed her eyes as she waited for pain that never came. She opened them as his hand left her back, just in time to see him hit the ground in front of her.
She remembers a scream but it takes a second to realise it came from her mouth as she dropped down to his side, instinctively putting her hands over the wound. The tears flowing freely as she repeated his name over and over again, hoping and praying she wouldn’t lose him.
“Maggie,” he whispered as the colour drained from his face.
“What can I do?” she asked, wishing she had his training and could make everything alright.
She watched as he struggled to raise his arm and cup her face with his hand.
“Stay,” was all he could say as he gently caressed her cheek.
Maggie smiled at the thought of him, even in that moment, with a simple little touch; he was trying to take care of her.
“I’m not going anywhere,” she smiled back.
She shifted in her seat as the air turned cool with the darkness of night. But she didn’t leave. She daren’t get up to get a sweater or a warm drink. She couldn’t leave him.
Back in her memory she remembered fighting someone as she was dragged away from him. Looking back she thinks it might have been Neal and makes a mental note to apologise to him when she sees him again, she's fairly sure she gave him a black eye. But the fight didn’t last long as unconsciousness claimed her.
Waking in the hospital the remnants of the sedation didn’t keep her calm for long. That was until she released she was sleeping in the corner of his room. He was alive, although still critical. Mac had been in a seat by the bed but she’d left after Maggie had awoken.
The doctors and nurses came and went, but no-one tried to make her leave. She wasn’t going anywhere. She had said she wasn't going anywhere and that was a promise she intended to keep.