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Rue made her way down the long hallway, gun in hand as she advanced. Past one, two, three doors, right turn into the fourth. Her breathing echoed in the empty hallways, but her steps were nearly silent. Hallways bled together like spilled paint, their differences mixing into a solid blend that she couldn't distinguish between. She felt hollowed out, a pilot of an empty shell that merely went through on what it knew to be its directive.
Even as she opened the final door and beheld the person laying on a cot, Rue couldn't reach through the fog and sink her fingers into reality. "Come on, let's go," she prompted, tugging them out of bed and along behind her. She turned, leading the way back through those halls, the halls that blurred and twisted in front of her and yet she knew every step she needed to take. Her soft steps were overshadowed by the stumbling steps of the person tucked in behind her, her breathing wiped out by the harsh gasps of the winded target.
It was starting to seem like there was nobody else in this entire building, but Rue knew that was part of the plan. What use was a handler if they didn't perfectly plan out her route, keep her away from nasty surprises? Even as the hallways stretched out beyond comprehension, warped in front of her, she could always tell that she was exactly where intended.
She felt triumph flash into her chest as she hit the final door, cold air and the soothing night dark embracing her as she did. She turned to check on her target, realizing even as she did that the harsh breathing had cut off even before the door. They had been behind her a second ago, yet… Rue quickly returned to the door, cautiously peering inside. Stepping even one foot back inside burned, shot bolts of wrongness up her legs. One, two, three doors back and she found her target. Cowering in place. Frozen at a threshold.
"Come on," she hissed, reaching forward and grabbing their arm. They gasped, looking up at her.
Her own face stared back at her, blankly terrorized, unable to act or move beyond this point. She was stuck, she was stuck, she was tied in place by words and punishments and instructions that no longer served her, she was bound by all she had ever known and she could not move on. She stared at the reality as the halls pressed in, crushed her until she couldn't even turn away from the apocalypse in front of her.
Decisions were always phantoms, something she pretended she had available to her and knew had no corporeal weight to them. Her hand shook as she raised her gun to the head of the target, the target who stole her own face and looked at her and begged for a solution, for a final decision. She pulled the trigger.
Rue made her way down the long hallway, gun in hand as she advanced.