You know what they say about the good of the many, how it's more important than the good of the one. Well, maybe sometimes that's true. But sometimes, some people...
As a friend of mine would say, it's crap.
There was a room, four walls, a ceiling, a floor, a single door always locked.
There was a man in the room. They rarely allowed him outside for any length of time. When they did, he often forgot those moments. Often, too, he didn't realize he was still in the room. After all, he was insane, most of the time.
When he wasn't, he tried to escape. And he would make himself remember where he was, why he was here, as much as he could recall, as much as he knew.
They had betrayed him. That was what he remembered.
Only somehow he couldn't make himself believe it.
The door opened. A doctor in a white labcoat entered.
Maybe a stranger. He couldn't remember if he had ever seen this one before. It took conscious control not to leap at the man's throat, control he only barely managed, and that an effort so great his hands shook.
"Feeling better today?" the doctor said, blandly, though he knew the danger. "Is it getting any easier?"
"Go to hell."
The doctor didn't respond. They never did. "You've shown admirable discipline. But it would be easier on you if you simply capitulated."
"Go to hell," he repeated.
And this time the doctor looked him straight in the eye, unflinching. "You're already there, you know."
Of course. They had sold him out, handed him over to these soft-spoken devils in their sterile white coats. This was the abyss, fifteen feet square, with padded walls and no windows. There was no escape from here. There was no hope.
But somehow, as painful as it was, he couldn't make himself believe that, either.
She was so engrossed in her work that she nearly didn't hear the doorbell, almost decided not to answer it when she did. But that would be suspicious, when they would know it was too early for her to have gone to bed.
She drew the cover over the table, removed her labcoat, and shut the door to her study. Brushing her hair out of her eyes, she crossed her apartment and opened the door just as knocking began. "Yes, who's--"
And stopped, blinked at the tall man on her stoop. "Eggy? What are you doing here?"
He blinked in turn at her abrupt surprise. "I'm sorry, if this isn't a convenient--"
"No--no! Come in." She took his arm and drew him inside, stood on her toes to brush her lips against his in a more welcoming greeting. "What does bring you here? I don't mean I mind in the least, but you're practically the last person I expected to see--"
"My colleagues and I came to LA on business," he explained, "and since we haven't even conversed on the telephone in over a month, I hoped to see you in person. Perhaps provide a pleasant distraction." He held up a folder of papers. "An associate obtained these. They are a pair of preliminary studies to be published in Science later this year; I thought you might appreciate an advance service."
She smiled and accepted the folder with as much eagerness as many women would have for chocolate or flowers, and gave him a longer kiss to show her gratitude. A week ago she would have been thrilled to see him. It had been too long, and she had been lonely of late. But now, when she was so close...
He sensed it. "Claire, if you're busy, I can come again tomorrow, or whenever would be best."
He would probably fly out from New York if she asked it. She had known him for almost a decade, but in ten years they had never done anything to formalize their intimacy. Both scientists, both separated from normal people, normal relationships, by their obsession as much as by their genius, they found in one another a kindred need. Their science and their work came first, and neither took offense at the other's priorities. All the same, what they shared was precious to both.
And she knew she could trust him, as she could trust only a very few others. "No, stay, please," she said. "You might, if you're willing, be able to help me with something."
"Of course," he agreed instantly. "What is it?"
"I'm working on a project. On...my own time." She saw him cock his head and nodded in answer to the unspoken question. "Yes. Without the sanction of my superiors."
"Ah." He passed no judgment, simply waited for her explanation.
She didn't know where to begin. "Here, it'd be simpler to show you." Taking his hand, she lead him to her study.
At one time the room had contained a small television, a desk she rarely used, and shelves of books she had no room for elsewhere. All of this had been relegated to a far corner in order to make space for the lab table, refrigeration unit, and various esoteric equipment, including an electron microscope and several cages of rats.
He examined the displays with interest, adjusted his glasses and poked his long nose into the racks of test-tubes and piles of computer printouts. "So what are you trying to synthesize?"
She sighed. Clasped over her chest, her hands tightened. "A counteragent."
"A counteragent? What is it intended to counter?"
"A mistake." Her eyes fell on the rows of tubes, most of them empty. She wasn't seeing the glass at all, nor the colored liquids within. Before her mind's eye memories flowed by, of needles and pain and stark desperation. She shook her head. "No, not a mistake. A crime."
She could hear his anxious questions, could hear her own pleas later, asking, begging to be allowed to continue her work. To be able to put right what her colleagues had wronged. "A sin."
The touch of his hand against her cheek restored her balance. She leaned her head into his shoulder, grateful for the release, to be able for a moment to drop the barriers she had necessarily erected around herself. His arms wrapped around her, demanding nothing, only giving the comfort of warmth, shelter. It was an illusion, that anything could be put right by a simple hug. But it strengthened her.
"We made a gland, a synthetic organ," she said. "We implanted it in a man. It worked as it was supposed to, but...there was a problem. One of our scientists was a traitor. He sabotaged the project."
"This gland--what does it do?"
"I can't tell you, not what it was designed to do. That's classified. What it's not supposed to do...that's what the original counteragent was for. But it...lost its efficacy. I've been trying to make a variation of that formula, though just lately it occurred to me, what if instead of making another counter, a neutralizing agent, why not design instead an epinephrine inhibitor. Dangerous, but at this point his system has probably been saturated for so long--" She stopped. "I'm sorry, I know you don't understand--"
He smiled. "It's all right. I'm accustomed enough to no one understanding my own discoveries; it makes for a pleasant change not to understand someone else's. Besides, I did follow most of that." Blue eyes went piercing behind the round-framed lenses. "This concerns your project of the last few years, does it not? The one you haven't been able to tell me of?"
"Yes," she said. "And no. Officially, it's no longer my project. He--" She swallowed, continued. "It's no longer under my agency's administration. Officially, it's no longer my responsibility. But it's not a matter of duty. It hasn't been for a long time. Now it's matter of...of..."
"Friendship," he said, and raised an eyebrow at her expression. "Yes? I haven't seen you this worked up about anything since Gloria's recovery." She had told him all the details of that case, once its classified status had been lowered. "You've mentioned him to me before. Daniel Faulkner, isn't it?"
"That's an alias," she said quietly.
"I wouldn't have expected otherwise. I do not need his real name to understand."
"You shouldn't be jealous."
He looked honestly affronted. "Of course I'm not. To begin with, we agreed early in our association that we would not be. I've gone on several dates in the past year; I assume you've done the same. Our work does leave us occasional moments of free time. If you ever were to find someone well suited to you, I would be happy for you. I believe you'd feel the same for me if the situation were reversed. I enjoy all the time we have together, little as it is, and will never regret it. I couldn't. But I understand we lead separate lives."
He embraced her again. "But beside this, nothing you've said has given me any reason for jealousy. You aren't in love with him, any more than you are with me. Less, I think. But he's your friend. Believe me, I know how much friendship is worth." He tilted his head to look down into her face, and his eyes glowed warmly. "I couldn't love you like this if you didn't understand. So, what can I do to help?"
It was a Friday. It was past five o'clock. Enough was enough. After ten minutes of standing in place, useless as a fur coat on a cat, Hobbes cleared his throat. The director looked up from his perusal of the report. He studied the two agents standing silently before his desk, and finally nodded curtly. "Good job."
"Thank you, sir," Lewis got in quickly. "It was nothing we couldn't handle." Though I could have handled it better alone, his sideways glance at his partner seemed to suggest.
The director's dark eyes flicked between the two men. "You're dismissed," he said.
"Thank you, sir," Lewis repeated. Hobbes was already heading toward the door.
The elevator took long enough to arrive that the other agent caught up with him. They didn't exchange a word on the ride to the ground floor. When the doors finally slid open, Lewis turned to him. "We'll need to prepare a cover report for the screen office. I'll have it done by Monday. Make sure you're here early to sign it."
Hobbes shrugged. "Yeah, whatever."
Lewis's eyes narrowed. "I'd leave all the paperwork to you, if I thought you'd bother to do it at all. That kind of half-ass bullshit you might be able to manage."
Give it a rest, kid, Hobbes was tempted to say. He'd been writing reports most of his life. This jerk didn't know how easy he had it. Making up false reports for the records of the FDA required less brains than a retarded frog. He'd love to have seen Lewis trying to justify an Agency mission under the auspices of the Department of Fish and Game. Now that had taken some real creativity. All they needed now to write a convincing record was a list of illegal substances.
There were other advantages to the Agency's changed cover. He had a better office in the new building, with a great view of the skyline. And the Agency had profited. Better equipment thanks to the bigger budget. They'd even expanded their operations in several areas.
It didn't make up for what they'd lost. Not by a long shot.
"See you Monday, partner," Lewis said as they exited the building. The acidity in the final word was enough to wither the plants on the main desk.
"Have a good weekend," Hobbes replied serenely. "Go shoot yourself on the firing range," he added under his breath.
Lewis might or might not have heard. He didn't respond, only marched to his black BMW and slammed the door shut behind him.
Hobbes climbed into his own car, a silver Taurus like the ones he used to drive way back when still with the Bureau. A couple years old, but dependable and fast. The upgrade was courtesy of the Agency's budget increase.
Lewis was navigating a turn, cautiously to keep from scraping his finish in the narrow lot. For an instant Hobbes considered pulling out immediately, ram the man's precious Beamer and hopefully demolish both cars. The Agency could afford to get them new ones. With a bit of luck they'd both sustain minor injuries, score a couple weeks' sick leave.
Nah, wouldn't be worth the paperwork. He watched the sleek vehicle roll past, gave his partner a sarcastic wave.
Partner. Now there was a joke. He'd had a partner before, a real partner. He knew what it was like, to have backup he wasn't afraid to put his back to, to know that they could handle any job together, and when there wasn't a job could still handle each other. Trust wasn't something that came easy to him by a long shot, but when it was there it was solid, unshakable. There were damn few who deserved it.
Lewis didn't compare. Partner in name only, and not even that within a month, Hobbes guessed. He probably had already filed for the transfer behind his back. That would make five in two years, six if they gave him a new guy. Must be some kind of Agency record.
Why did he stay with them? Two years...he should have given up by now. It was a lost cause, that was becoming obvious. Bobby Hobbes was no quitter. But when the situation was hopeless...even if Claire was holding on...
He clamped down on that train of though fast. Those tracks led straight to depression. Focus on the bills on his desk. Focus on the rush hour traffic. Focus on his job--on the work he didn't believe in.
He had. For a long time that had been all he had believed in. Faith in his duty. Faith in his country.
Good thing he had found more, or he would have had the mother of all breakdowns when the truth came out.
He nearly had, when he was told they had gone through with it, despite all their protests. It had torn him up on so many levels that he had nearly convinced himself he couldn't handle it--locked himself in his house, stopped going to work, stopped going to his shrink, stopped taking his meds. It could've killed him, and he still wasn't sure that hadn't been his intent.
Then Claire had come over and explained things. Not quite that cut and dried. It didn't cover how she'd broken in. How he had nearly physically attacked her, did rip her apart with his words. How she had cried, and then she had pleaded with him, not sounding at all like herself, demeaned herself by shattering her objectivity to shake down his walls, get through to him.
Finally she did. He had gone back to the Agency, even if nothing was the same, there or in him, and accepted the new partner the Official's replacement assigned him. He closed his mind and focused on his duty.
And waited, until he nearly forgot what he waited for, and wondered if anything really mattered as it were.
Entering his apartment, he double checked the door locks and security system, hung his jacket on the hook, locked his gun in the drawer--couldn't keep it accessible for someone breaking in to find, and he couldn't hold it while cooking--and ambled to the refrigerator. Empty. Not that he was hungry tonight, anyway.
After poking around the cabinets, he located a can of soup and emptied it into a bowl. He had just stuck the bowl in the microwave when the phone rang. He picked it up. "Yeah?"
"Hobbes?"
"Kee--uh, Claire?"
"Yes." Clipped, impersonal. A knot of cold dread lodged in the pit of his stomach.
"Has something happened?" He didn't dare ask anything specific. She would know what he meant.
"Only personally," the cool voice on the phone said. "My great aunt Hannah died. It wasn't unexpected, but...I've been thinking about taking a vacation. I don't know where. I've been recalling old acquaintances--would you like to have dinner sometime, Hobbes?"
"Sure..." he managed, though truthfully he hadn't registered anything she had said after "great aunt Hannah died." It was their code phrase, the most important of the few they had worked out together. The signal that all was ready, at last.
Two years. It had been that long? It felt like forever...it felt like no time at all. As if he had gone to sleep and dreamed everything, and now he had woken up. It was time. The words echoed in his ears, an alarm clock ringing in his mind. It was time.
He wanted to shout, to wave his arms, hell, he wanted to dance. More than anything he wanted to ask her if she really meant it. But he didn't dare, on this open line. So all he said was, "Sorry to hear about your aunt. Dinner'd be great. This Wednesday at 6 be good for you? At Bernulli's? They got a great scallops pasta dish, with those little bay scallops that fit in your mouth without taking a really big bite."
"That sounds delicious," she said. "Thank you, Hobbes. I'll see you then."
She hung up.
Hobbes stared at the phone, exhaled a deep breath. He couldn't shout, when there was probably someone outside the window watching, listening in.
It was time.
Dinner? The microwave beeped and shut off. He took out the bowl of soup and began to wolf it down, mumbled a curse when his tongue was burned but kept eating. He was starving.
Suddenly everything was making sense again.
"So the man you're meeting with Wednesday was his partner?"
For the first fifteen minutes of the drive their conversation had stayed to more personal details, the final good-byes for who knows how many more months. But she knew his curiosity couldn't be suppressed forever. Claire glanced over at his tall form folded into the passenger seat, and nodded. "Hobbes is still an agent."
"Why did he stay with this Agency, if he feels about it as you do?"
"For the same reason I did. To have an in, when the time came."
"Waiting for you to perfect the new counteragent formula."
"It's far from perfect," she sighed.
"It's as well as you could make it," he told her, as he had been reassuring her all this week. Late at night, when she had awoken from nightmares more vivid than the usual specters, he had been beside her, a solid, warm presence to wrap her arms around, lulling her back to sleep. He had murmured to her the same solace he repeated now, it being all he had to offer. "You've done what tests you could. The only real proof will be to use it on the actual subject, and you can't do that until you have him."
"But what if I'm wrong," she whispered. "Or what if I've been wrong--what if I'm too late. Maybe I shouldn't have waited..." She had no way of knowing what might have happened. Perhaps they had already found a replacement counteragent. Perhaps all their patience, all her efforts, had been pointless.
As useless as their objections had been then.
"You can't do this to him!"
She had argued against it, logically, passionately, it hadn't mattered. Darien Fawkes had been given into their hands without protest, at least from anyone who counted. He had fought it, and she had, and Hobbes had, but nothing had come of their efforts. How were they to suppose now would be any different, despite all their plans?
"You're sure there's nothing more I can do?"
The gentle bass of the man beside her cut through her troubled thoughts, momentarily dispersed them. She summoned a smile for him. "You've done enough. More than enough. The counteragent wouldn't be ready now without your help. It's a pity you never became a biochemist--"
He smiled wryly. "I've heard that from scientists of as many different disciplines as have appealed to you. I believe we both found what we were most suited for, however. Though if you ever developed an interest in psychokinetic--"
She almost laughed. "No, thank you. What I do is already far enough out there for me."
"Yes. You'll have to tell me more about it, if you ever have permission." He looked out the window. They were turning into the airport's driveway. The muted longing in his tone echoed her own feelings. "I hope you can come to New York soon, when this is all over."
"We'll have to go somewhere," she murmured.
"If you ever need a place to stay--or to hide--our doors are open," he promised. "We're high-profile enough to offer a good degree of protection, even from the forces you may be facing." He hesitated. "You are sure--"
"I'll be fine. We'll be fine." If she said it enough times, perhaps she could make it true. She pulled up to the curb. "You better get going. You'll miss your plane, and I have an appointment to make."
"This man you're visiting now. He is..?"
"Was. He was my boss. The Official." The designation came naturally to her lips, for all she hadn't spoken it for over a year. Someone else filled that position at the Agency now, but the title had been retired with the man. "He promised to help, when we were ready. I only hope--" She cut herself off before she lost the last threads of her composure. This farewell was hard enough, on top of everything else.
"I hope he helps you as much as you need," he said, and leaned across the seat. Their lips met, and she closed her eyes, wound her fingers through his thick blond hair, not wanting to let go. At last they parted, reluctant, but driven by a sense of duty. He cradled her cheek in his hand for a moment, softly intoned, "Good luck."
Then he climbed out of the car, took his bag out of the back seat and headed for the terminal. At the double doors he turned, waved. She waved back, then drove away, avoiding a glimpse of his tall figure in the rearview mirror. As she maneuvered through the complex maze of airport ramps and lots, she felt the emotion constricting her chest ease, harden into pure resolve. She had no time for pains of the heart. And she needed to fortify herself for what was next.
By the time she exited the airport, her eyes no longer burned. The road was clear before her under the bright sun. So too were the memories, which she allowed to come. Better to deal with them now than when she met with the man himself, to think back two years to how it had all begun...
He had called them all in at once. That should have been their first clue. The Official wouldn't suffer the three of them together in his office if he could avoid it, on the grounds that he was a government employee, not a kindergarten teacher. Nevertheless, she was summoned along with Fawkes and Hobbes, sat beside them at the conference table and tried to look prim and mature, quite a feat with the two of them next to her jostling and joking like eight-year-olds.
"So what you think, Keep?" Hobbes wanted to know. "Think he could've done it?"
"Ah, give it up, man," Darien protested, "not six parakeets, not in three different bars--"
"They were in different states. I'm telling you, this guy--"
"I'm sure you're wondering why I asked you here," the Official said, with his usual impeccable timing.
"'Asked'?" Darien echoed skeptically, under his breath.
The Official ignored the sarcasm. "In the next couple weeks, this Agency is about to go through some changes--big changes."
Hobbes sat up. "Am I getting laid off, sir? Because I think--"
"Hey," Darien also straightened in his chair, "you're not seriously firing Hobbes, are you?"
"--after ten years of working my--"
"--really don't want to deal with a new partner--"
"--honor your decision, but after every--"
"--don't you owe him something--"
"--I mean, the guy goes insane, even if usually he's a pretty good--"
"I'm not firing Hobbes," the Official pronounced, loudly enough to override the pair of them. "No one is being fired." He said it with his usual force, but he wouldn't look any of them in the eye. That should have been their second clue; the Official never had trouble facing anyone. But he barely glanced at Fawkes at all then. And Eberts, standing by his shoulder as always, stared fixedly at a point over their heads and offered nary a comment.
"Well, good," Darien said finally. "Uh, why are we here, then?"
"Let the Official get to it," the Keeper suggested.
"Yeah, Fawkes, let the boss get a word in edgewise--"
"The Agency," the Official spoke over them again, "is being assigned a new screen office."
"A new screen?" Darien frowned. "What, like a new slide projector? What's that supposed to mean?"
Hobbes grinned. "It means, my friend, no more chasing monkey smugglers or avenging national symbols of flight. It means we're leaving the Department of Fish & Game and becoming part of--what are we becoming part of, sir?"
"The Food & Drug Administration," Eberts offered, when the Official forbear to reply.
"The FDA? Sweet!" Hobbes whistled.
"Does that mean my research funds allowance will be raised?" Claire inquired eagerly. "Since the lab will be entirely justifiable."
"So we're going to be FDA agents?"
Hobbes nodded. "In name, anyway. We'll see some real action now, partner!"
"No. He won't."
The Official was imitating Eberts' concentration on a point on the wall above their heads. He wouldn't meet any of their suddenly riveted gazes.
"What are you saying?" the Keeper said slowly.
"Whatcha talking about, Fawkes won't?" Hobbes demanded simultaneously.
Darien stood, his height enough that his head intersected the Official's line of sight. "What's going on?" he asked, calmer than the other two. They fell silent, and Fawkes didn't ask again, only stared steadily at his boss and waited.
"Another outfit has requested your transfer," the Official broke the silence at last. "They say we haven't been 'preserving the advantage of secrecy' in regards to your ability, and we've taken 'inadequate measures for protecting a critical government asset.'"
"Whoa, I'm an asset?"
"Shh!" The Keeper batted his arm.
"I argued against this, of course," the Official continued, "tried to tell them that preserving and protecting you was harder than it sounds--but in the course of the Agency's reorganization, the transfer was approved. You've been reassigned."
"So, who gets him?" Hobbes asked.
The Official's hesitation was so brief it was almost unnoticeable. "The CIA."
Claire nodded. It wasn't hard to deduce; very few government organizations knew of the existence of the I-man project, and given the successful resolutions of the missions the CIA had brought to them, they must have been eager to take out the Agency middleman in order to use Fawkes directly.
"Well, that's a step up the ladder," Hobbes remarked in the pause following. "Congrats, partner."
"Wait a minute," said Darien. "That's it? After everything, you're just--trading me away? Like a baseball card?"
"Think of it more like an all-star player moving up in the league," the Official told him.
"But who says I want to go up?" Darien objected. "What if I want to stay where I am?"
The Official shrugged. "Then I'm sorry, Fawkes. This is the way it goes."
They all protested, of course. But not too much; Hobbes had his job to consider, and the Keeper had her research--which they were assured would be allowed to continue. "It's not like Fawkes is going to be on another planet," the Official reasoned. "He'll be based at the CIA office in LA. You can see him whenever you have to. And they need your research."
Need it they did; they took the formula for the counteragent, and replicated the synthesis equipment. She personally trained two doctors in its use, and Darien got along reasonably well with his new caretakers. If he hadn't volunteered for the transfer, neither was he dragged into it entirely unwillingly. "It's no worse than getting shanghaied into this outfit," he told his Keeper the day before he left, but it was said jokingly, and with a hint of regret.
Hobbes was uncharacteristically quiet, both before and after Darien left. The Official wisely did not assign him a new partner, instead gave him solo assignments, or put him with other agents for single missions. He did his job as competently as ever, but there was a certain spirit lacking. Claire too found herself looking forward to work with less enthusiasm than she had at one time, despite the move to the new facilities and the wonderfully extensive laboratory. She continued study on Quicksilver along with her other projects, though it seemed less urgent, with a well-funded CIA team paralleling her research.
Darien kept in touch, though they couldn't share many details of their various assignments, and Claire couldn't tell if he was enjoying himself any more or less from what he did say. During one conversation she had the impression he was missing the Agency, the team and the work, but she couldn't tell from where she drew that idea, or whether she was simply projecting her own feelings.
Despite her misgivings, she thought that overall it was going well for him, was even comforted thinking he might have truly found his niche at last, and the Agency had just been a step along the way. Hobbes was less content, but she believed he would get over it, when he realized it was true for Darien.
Perhaps Hobbes had noticed something she hadn't. Perhaps his trained instincts had warned him something was wrong--or maybe his paranoia.
No. He hadn't known, any more than she had. Even with all of her knowledge, even with all Hobbes's paranoia, how could they have guessed?
The Official--no, simply Charles Borden now, Claire reminded herself--lived at the same house he had resided in for ten years that she knew of, and likely much longer than that. It was a modest, nondescript, suburban dwelling, its only feature of note the small but carefully tended flower garden in front. An odd hobby for a former director of a top-secret agency, but there was little about the Official that had been usual. And probably even more she didn't have any idea of, she mused, walking up the pebbled terrace to the front door.
No sooner had she rung the bell than he answered it, looking doddering and amiable in a rumpled suit. "Claire. Come in. Come in. Would you like some tea?"
She allowed him to usher her through the door. Once it closed behind her, he dropped the grandfatherly routine so quickly it could make one's head spin, mild blue eyes going sharp and hard. "So you have a substitute counteragent," he demanded without preamble.
She nodded. Over the phone she had not been able to say anything; now she shortly confirmed the success of her recent experiments. "It's as good as it's going to be. I need the information you promised."
"I made the arrangements as soon as you contacted me. I have what you said you required. You're sure you're ready? And Agent Hobbes?"
"We're ready."
"Good," he said, bluntly. "Very good. I wasn't sure you were going to be in time."
That caught her off guard in spite of herself. "What do you mean, in time?"
Was there sympathy in his sober countenance? Maybe even concern? "I've been keeping tabs on the situation, waiting for you to get it done. You don't know the whole story yet. I didn't know if you could pull it off at all, and I was beginning to have my doubts. As it is, if you'd taken much longer, you might not have had a target to retrieve."
She leaned against the back of the sofa for a moment to brace herself, closed her eyes. When she opened them again Charlie Borden was still watching her steadily. "I'm sorry," he said.
The shock of the apology tipped her delicate balance, impelled her to speak when she would have stayed silent. "After what you did? How can you say that now?" She glared at him, all her suspicions rushing to the forefront of her mind. "Why are you bothering to help us at all? You're the one who told us there was nothing we could do."
"I remember." His eyes stayed on hers, boring into the shadows deep inside. "I made a mistake. I'm counting on you to rectify it. Even if what you're planning barely has a chance, it's the only one I have. Don't disappoint me."
"Fine." She drew herself up. "Give me the information we need, and we won't."
Bernulli's was a classy place. Wednesday evenings, as on most others days, it was full, though not crowded, humming with activity but never unpleasantly loud. Hobbes checked his watch, adjusted his tie, and glanced around surreptitiously at the dining patrons and eager-to-please waiters. No one stuck out obtrusively. If there were spies, they were good. Hopefully not good enough to overhear a conversation amid the rest of the chatter, however.
"Bobby?"
He looked up. His contact had arrived. She wore a long black dress and petite gold earrings, utterly appropriate to the setting, not in the least suspicious.
God, she was gorgeous. Somehow he always managed to forget that. Slender without being skinny, brilliant but not conceited. Elegant all around. He stood, smiled at her, the first real smile he had made in weeks. "Hi, Claire. How you doing?"
He moved hastily to pull her chair out for her before she could do it herself. "You cut your hair," he noted while she sat down. "It, uh, looks nice." He preferred it long, but her face was lovely either way.
She brushed her fingers self-consciously through her cropped locks, gave him a wan smile. "Thank you. It used to get in my eyes when I was working." She studied him for a moment. "You look good. Haven't changed at all."
"And that's a good thing?" He wondered if it were true. She was different. More than the hair. Her makeup couldn't completely hide the shadows under her eyes. She didn't look like she had been sleeping any better than he had for the past week.
But it wouldn't be gentlemanly to point that out. "So how's work?" he asked. Keep it casual at first. Lull any observers into less close attention. And he didn't know how she was doing, beyond the certain crucial specifics. They still worked for the same Agency, but in different departments, different buildings. Their paths never crossed.
She played along willingly. "Fine. My latest research projects are coming along well. I have a couple papers almost completed. And you?"
"Oh, same old grind. Boss is a bastard, partner's a prick. Good thing these government jobs got nice benefits or we'd all have split years ago."
They continued with the small talk. The waiter appeared, took their orders and left again. Hobbes fooled with a breadstick, nibbling as they spoke. Claire kept her hands folded in her lap, except for sipping occasionally from her water glass.
When the appetizer came she leaned forward to take one of the stuffed mushrooms, and said softly, "I met with Charlie two days ago."
His fist clenched involuntarily. The breadstick snapped in two. "Yeah?" he said, as quietly. "How'd you manage it?"
"He had agreed to give us help."
"I'd rather give him a sock in the jaw."
Claire sighed. "That's why I went alone." She put the mushroom on her plate, gazed down at it with no hunger. "It doesn't matter what you think of him. If we're going to save Dar--" Hobbes motioned to cut her off, but she had already swallowed the words. "If we're going to do this," she restated, "we need the information he's supplying. Even retired, he still has connections we don't."
"What was the point of us sticking where we are, except to have connections?" He waved his hand. "Forget it. So? What'd you get out of him? When is this going down?"
Claire glanced around the restaurant, lowered her voice further, until she was barely more than subvocalizing. "They may be an opportunity soon. On Fridays--"
"Day after tomorrow?" He could barely get a handle on his excitement enough to keep his own voice down.
"It may be safer to wait, at least a week--"
"Screw that," Hobbes whispered fiercely. "Friday? We gotta get moving. It's been too long already. We aren't waiting any longer." His eyes narrowed. "Two more days, buddy. Just two more days."
Claire looked as if she might dispute it, then didn't. He saw understanding, agreement, in her face. She was more rational, the analytical scientist, but she was feeling this urgency as much as he was. It had been too long, far too long already. Logician or not, she must remember as well as he did a year and a half ago, the last time they had seen Darien Fawkes. And looking into her shadowed eyes, he could see he wasn't the only one haunted by the too-clear memory of what they had had no choice but to abandon him to...
More than two months after Darien was reassigned to the CIA, Hobbes got a call from his ex-partner. Excepting a few e-mails they hadn't really been in contact, and Hobbes was surprised by how naturally they fell back into their old patterns of teasing and retaliation. Like they'd been separated for a long weekend, not weeks. "How's it hanging, Hobbes? Anything wild on the pharmacy front?"
"Nothing I can talk about on an open line. How are you doing, Fawkes? Pissed off your new boss yet?"
"Only a couple times."
"Couple dozen, you mean."
"Enough about me--bet you and the Official and Eberts are getting along great."
"Just dandy. You know you always were the trouble."
"Yeah, but I'm worth it. Did I mention I got a raise?"
"You got promoted from GS 6? You son of a--"
"Hey, none of this was my choice anyway. But Hobbes. Seriously. How's it going?"
"It's going fine. You know I've been in this gig a hell of a lot longer than you have, kid. You sure you're managing without me, though?"
"Without your sane and sensible guidance? Yeah, I'm getting by somehow. Actually it hasn't been difficult. They haven't given me anything serious."
"Really?" That did surprise Hobbes. He had assumed the CIA would be working their new toy for all he was worth. They certainly hadn't had any qualms about using Fawkes while he was with the Agency.
"I guess they're saving me for something special." Fawkes hesitated. "Actually, I've been thinking...at least I felt like I was doing something when I was with the Agency. Helping people, playing at being a hero. It was, I dunno, kinda fun."
"Yeah, Fawkes," Hobbes agreed. "It was. Have to admit it, it's not the same without you."
Darien took a moment to reply. "Yeah," he said at last. There was something indefinably altered in his tone. "It's not the same here, either."
Hobbes wondered if Fawkes had ever been told that before. That he made a difference, anywhere, to anyone. He opened his mouth to confirm it.
Darien started talking first. "That's sort of why I called. It's okay here, but I think...I was more useful in the Agency. So I'm going to apply for a transfer back."
"From the CIA? Ask them to put you back here?"
"Yeah. If they'll let me go. I'll tell them I'm more of an asset there than here. And you've got the new FDA funds; there shouldn't be problems 'protecting' me anymore. I thought you'd know the rigmarole for that better than me. Who I should apply to, that stuff."
"Uh--sure! I know who you can ask. They might not approve it, but--" Hobbes was already thinking through the best plan of attack. "The Official can pull some strings, and I got a couple of favors I can call in. If that's what you want--yeah, we can make this happen. I'll e-mail you the details, what forms you'll need, who you'll need to kiss up to--know you hate that, Fawkes, but if you want to get anything through a bureaucracy that's the only way you're gonna do it--"
"Yeah, I'm ready for all that crap." Darien sounded satisfied. Happy, even. "Great. Thanks, Bobby. I'll be in touch."
"See you, buddy." Hobbes hung up. He was surprised by how he felt himself. Not just pleased, but relieved. Like things were back on track. He could practically see the pieces of his life, always a fragmented pile, sliding back into more comfortably positions. Returning to work the next day he was almost startled not to find Fawkes there.
He sent the e-mail he had promised. But Fawkes never replied, and didn't contact him again. When Hobbes tried calling him he got an answering machine. The message he left brought no response.
The Keeper shrugged when Hobbes mentioned he hadn't heard from Darien in a week. "Neither have I. He's busy, I imagine."
So maybe they had finally put him on a real mission. And that must have changed his mind about requesting the transfer, because Fawkes never followed through on it.
Hobbes called a couple more times, at last got hold of Darien. Their conversation was brief, and Fawkes sounded tired, distracted. "Been rough. I can't talk about it. You know how it is, Hobbes."
"I know." They might work for the same government, but their agencies were not privy to the other's secrets. "Don't let it get to you. You can handle it."
"Of course. I'm their super-agent, right?"
"Just keep telling yourself that. You'll do great."
The matter of his transfer never came up. Hobbes didn't bother calling again, and neither did Fawkes. Hobbes put it out of his mind, focused on his job. Wasn't worth getting annoyed about. Just the way things went. It wasn't like Fawkes had been anything more than his partner for a couple years. In the Bureau he'd been partners with that guy, what was his name--Hawkins. They had been partners for three years, and they never exchanged so much as a holiday card.
Still, he couldn't help but worry a bit--his screwed-up paranoia wouldn't allow it otherwise. The Keeper told him nothing was wrong, and he believed it. Mostly. No reason for it to be otherwise. Nothing suspicious in the silence. Fawkes had just moved on.
So it went. Until the Keeper called him, late one dreary, rainy, Saturday night. "Bobby? Are you free to come to my place? Darien's here."
"Fawkes?" Hobbes rolled his eyes. "So he is okay. That--"
"No." She paused for a heartbeat, and what he heard in that silence was enough to jerk him out his chair. He was standing before she said, "He's not okay. Can you please come quickly?"
They stayed at Bernulli's only long enough to finish their dinners. Not bothering to linger over a desert they had no stomach for, Hobbes and Claire drove directly from the restaurant to Claire's apartment.
Hobbes parked his car in the street and reached the door right behind the Keeper. The first thing he did upon entering was to scan for listening devices, using the detector he had given her last year. It was a state-of-the-art gadget, he had assured her, not available outside of the government and highly restricted within. She never asked how he had managed to obtain it, and used it faithfully once a week. So far she had never found a thing, but one never could be sure.
Hobbes too came up empty. His grunt was not satisfied, however. Prowling around her living room, he closed her blinds, then stalked to the stereo. "Mind if I play something?"
She shook her head. He flipped through her CDs, selected a classical collection and slid it into the machine. The gentle strings of a Vivaldi concerto filled the air.
Only then did Hobbes relax. "Gotta love Baroque tunes," he remarked. "Counterpoint violins are better than shouting for screwing up bugs. Hard to filter." Turning from the stereo to face her, he crossed his arms. "So, what's the plan?"
"First you should hear what the Offi--what Charlie told me." Claire also folded her arms over her chest, unconsciously protective, a guard against what she had to discuss. "Darien is no longer with the CIA. He hasn't been for several months."
"Yeah. We guessed he might not be. So where is he?"
Claire focused her gaze on the biochemistry journal on her coffee table. "A hospital adjunct. In a ward for the criminally insane." She heard Hobbes take a step back, then forward again; she couldn't raise her eyes to his. "He has yet to be charged with a specific crime. They're holding him in some kind of protective custody."
"Those sons of--"
"There's more." Claire kept her eyes on the fine print of the journal's major articles. "He's been placed under a particular program. Some of the details are in the paperwork Charlie gave me. The gist is, it's a study. Medical research."
Hobbes swore again, softly. "They've made him a lab rat again."
"Yes...no. Maybe. Bobby, whatever this program is, it's supposedly government funded, but I haven't found a single listing of it on any official register. And Darien is the only patient in that ward under the program--as far as I can find, he's the only one anywhere. This isn't a coincidence. They aren't just using him for some drug study."
"They know about the gland?"
"I think they have to. But I don't think they're trying to help him.
"Are we ever that lucky? So what else do you have?"
"Charlie's looking for more information. But..." The Keeper bit her bottom lip. "What we suspected then, what they were trying to do. They might've gone through with it. They very well might have. In which case..."
"In which case our problems are that much bigger," Hobbes said resignedly. But he knew as well as she did that either way, it was his former partner who would suffer the most.
Hobbes broke speed limits and most other traffic laws making it to the Keeper's apartment within ten minutes of her call, the night Darien appeared at her door. It was still more than enough time for his imagination to come up with a dozen dire fates which could have befallen Fawkes.
"He's not okay," she had told him. The truth was both better and worse than he expected. Better because physically he was unharmed, except a few scratches where he had run into a bush.
Worse because mentally he was not doing well. Not at all. His eyes were streaked with that terrible red, on the cusp of the full scarlet of quicksilver madness.
Upon reaching Claire's place, Hobbes barged through the door to find Fawkes seated on her sofa, leaning over with his elbows on his knees and his head bowed. At his entrance Darien's head jerked up, his bloodshot gaze taking a moment to focus. "Hobbes..." he murmured after an instant, and it wasn't clear if it was a greeting or a question.
The Keeper appeared, clutching car keys as she shrugged into her coat. "Bobby," she said hurriedly, touching his arm. "Thank you for coming. I have to go to the lab. Fortunately I've been working with the counteragent factors this past week, but it'll take me an hour or so to prepare a dose. It'll be too difficult to argue with the night watch to let him in--you'll need to stay here with him."
"No problem." Hobbes's attention was fixed on Fawkes. "You just hurry."
She nodded and was out the door. Hobbes approached the couch. Darien watched him, eyes narrowed in discomfort. "Stuck babysitting, huh," he said, but the strain it took him to sound casual was obvious.
"Yeah," Hobbes replied, almost as tense. "How you feeling?"
"Peachy. Never bet--" A gasp of pain interrupted the smart retort. Fawkes hunched over, one hand shooting up to the back of his neck.
When the spell passed, he swallowed, lifted his head with effort. "I'm sorry, Bobby."
Hobbes stared at him. "About what?"
"This. Everything. I wanted to call you before, but they--crap!" He winced again, twisting his head as if to turn away from the agony.
Hobbes dropped onto the couch beside him and took hold of his shoulders. "Tell me about it later," he instructed. "For now just hang in there. The Keeper'll be back soon. You're gonna be all right." He waited until he felt Darien relax minutely, let go and sat back. "How close are you, anyway?"
In answer Fawkes raised his arm, wrist toward him to reveal the snake tattoo. All but the head glowed vivid red.
"Oh, great," Hobbes groaned. "You aren't gonna go psycho on me, are you, Fawkes? I mean, it's been a few months, that's a lousy way to catch up on lost time." Never mind how Darien had got here, or why he had come back to them for help. That could be discussed later. Right now the important thing was getting him to stay sane until the Keeper returned. "Hang in there. You can do it, buddy."
"I'm trying." Fawkes exhaled, air hissing through clenched teeth. "Got it covered..." He closed his eyes, slowly inhaled and released the breath, mouthing a measured count. On his knees his fists were clenched tight enough to bleach the knuckles.
After a few breaths he opened his reddened eyes again. "Hobbes, you shouldn't be...if I lose it..."
"You won't. I ain't letting that happen," Hobbes averred. "You want anything? A glass of water? Or maybe watch some TV? The Cascade Jags are playing the Lakers, that should be a game worth--what?"
Darien had straightened up and was looking at him with a sort of wide-eyed bewilderment, comical but for the bloodshot whites. He shook his head at Hobbes's query, a hint of a smile tugging at his lips. "Nothing. You do know I'm on the verge of quicksilver madness here, right? You remember that? Me trying to kill you, that kind of thing?"
"Kinda hard thing to forget, Fawkes. I'm advising against it, speaking as your friend. Insanity ain't all it's cracked up to be. So, you want to watch the game?"
Fawkes gaped at him for another second, then flopped back against the couch, closing his eyes. "Not really. Unless you want to. Actually--" His breath caught and his entire body went taut, but he bore the pain, continued, "How about you tell me how it's going at the office. What's not classified. Been...missing the place."
So Hobbes talked. He complained about Eberts, complimented the Official's handling of a matter he wasn't allowed to divulge the details of, and tossed around the names of the various agents he had worked with over the past couple months. Darien listened, to some of it anyway; he drifted in and out, peripherally engaged by Hobbes's gossip, then all his focus shifting inward to wrestle the demon which clawed at his brain, tore at him from the inside with honed talons. It showed itself only in spurts, flashes of agony.
It hadn't been this bad before, Hobbes was positive. Or maybe Darien never had fought it so hard. There almost seemed a shimmer around his eyes, not tears, but as if the crimson cast of madness was pulsing with its own life, and he restraining it with pure force of will. This was an entirely internal battle, one with which Hobbes could do nothing to assist him, nothing except continue to talk calmly and show his support, not turn aside for all that the increasing red of his eyes was damn unnerving.
It was likely the longest hour and a half of his life. Near the end Darien almost lost it. A stab of reaction shot through him painful enough that he cried out. Then, too soon recovered, he stood up, twisted around to face his former partner. Every motion was slow but smoothly controlled. When Hobbes met his eyes they looked filmed in blood, and burned. "I think you should go," Fawkes said, and it wasn't Darien's bass but even deeper, with the utter poise of a stalking predator.
Hobbes shook his head, also getting to his feet. "Not a chance, big guy." He grabbed Fawkes by the arms, felt the tension holding him rigid. "I'm not going anywhere." He steeled himself. "You're gonna get a grip, or you're gonna kill me, because I'm not gonna fight you, and I'm not leaving."
Fawkes jerked, fingers hooked into claws to reach for his throat, and for an instant Hobbes thought it was all over. He stood his ground, stared scarlet-eyed murder in the face without cringing. And Darien made a strangled whimper, like a kicked dog, and tore away, crumpled on the floor with his arms wrapped around himself. Hobbes knelt beside him, gripped his shoulder reassuringly and murmured a steady stream of encouragements, and silently wondered how any man could survive an assault on his soul.
The Keeper returned five minutes later. Hobbes helped Fawkes onto the couch while she prepped the hypodermic, then pushed up his sleeve to inject his arm with swift precision. As the needle pierced his skin, Darien released a long, shuddering breath, sinking into the cushions.
"There, feeling better?" Hobbes asked.
"You're lucky, mate," Claire remarked, taking hold of Darien's wrist to check the monitor as the segments faded from red to green, one by one. "If I hadn't been planning to synthesize a batch of counteragent for tomorrow's tests--" She frowned. The segments had stopped changing color, leaving half the snake still red. "Darien--"
Fawkes craned his neck to get a look at the tattoo. "Yeah. That's about as good as it gets now." He sounded calmer, in control, though there were still lines of pain etched around his eyes.
"What do you mean?" the Keeper demanded.
Darien stretched, arching his back, then rubbed his neck reflexively. "They've been giving me a lot of counteragent. Even gave me access to own supply. They'd shoot me up when the snake was half full, sometimes less. I asked them about it, but they said they had it covered."
Claire's eyes were wide and intense. "But I warned them about that! Darien, if they aren't careful, that could build your resistance to the counteragent--"
"I know." Darien grimaced. "I told them that. They told me they had it covered. That's what they always said. I don't know why I believed them--hell, I know why. I wanted it to be true. It was so easy, almost like being normal... Geeze, I thought you guys were bad, but at least the Agency was honest about the dangers. Them, they just reassured me, didn't ever actually tell me a damn--" At their expressions he reigned in his mounting panic. "Yeah, I warned them. They didn't care. And then, last month..."
He trailed off, his gaze turning inward again. Hobbes was chary to disturb his focus, especially so soon past his battle with the madness; he was clearly exhausted, pushed to his very limits. But they had to know, now that he was in a position to explain. "What happened, Fawkes?"
Darien drew a deep breath, shoulders lifting, then dropping. "I went in and they told me they were out of counteragent. They said I had to wait."
"Why didn't they come to me?" Claire demanded.
"They told me they had contacted you," Darien said. "They told me you couldn't help, that you weren't working on the I-man project anymore, and you didn't have any suggestions." He looked at Claire. "They didn't contact you, did they?"
She shook her head wordlessly.
Darien shrugged again. "Thought so. But I didn't realize it at the time. So I did without." He rocked forward, his hands clasped tightly before him. "The madness came faster. I swear it did. Only took a day when by my count I had three, and I didn't quicksilver at all. I remember sitting there, just watching the snake go red... They wouldn't lock me up. I suggested it, in case, but they didn't. They had people watching me, one of the doctors and a guard.
"I don't remember everything, after I snapped. I smashed up the room, attacked the guard, the doc too, I think. Finally they must have tranqed me. I woke up in a padded cell." He smiled with black humor. "Just like home. I though I was back at the Agency for a second. Then the doctors came in.
"It had been six days. Nearly a week. They told me they'd had 'complications' making the counteragent. I hadn't been sedated for all of it, but I don't remember anything past the first day. Guess quicksilver can make memories vanish, too. They told me I didn't hurt anyone..." His brow furrowed. "That's wrong, though. I remember breaking the guard's arm. I heard it crack. Maybe they meant nothing permanent, I don't know.
"But the counteragent hasn't been working like it should since then. When I suggested they call you about it, that I should come see you myself, they 'advised' against it. Told me--" he chuckled, a wet sound like choking, "--told me they had it covered. I had to get out of there. Made it to you. You can help me. Please..."
He reached out one hand, groping as if he were blind. Claire took it immediately, squeezed. Hobbes patted his shoulder for lack of anything better. "We'll help you, Fawkes," he promised. "Whatever you need, we'll do it."
Darien nodded, his eyes shutting even as he tried to blink them open. Then he exhaled, sagging as if everything had been drained from him, leaving only an empty husk. His slack fingers slipped out of the Keeper's. By his measured breathing he was asleep.
Claire stroked back his sweat-soaked hair in a vain effort to smooth it, left her hand resting against his temple in a brief caress. Darien twitched, then soothed into a deeper repose.
"Whatever you need, buddy," Hobbes quietly repeated. "We'll help you."
The Vivaldi CD ended and restarted again from the opening movement. Hobbes paced the relatively secure confines of Claire's apartment, thinking out loud. "Why'd the CIA let anyone else have him? They were the ones who wanted him so bad to begin with, and we know why. So how come they gave him away?"
"We might be able to answer that better after the fact," Claire replied. "Perhaps we'll find some clue of who we're actually dealing with. Charlie didn't know. Bobby, if he didn't know, then the organization behind this program is of even higher secrecy than the Agency--much higher. I've never heard--"
"I have." Hobbes covered another lap, nine steps right and nine left, the anxious motion of a man who must move or else jump out of his skin. "Only rumors. Nothing but that, I thought. But something so beyond top secret it's barely part of the government. The President probably doesn't know it exists; maybe one member of his cabinet does. The ultimate guardians of national security."
"What are we talking about here? The men in black?" Claire joked weakly.
"For all I know." Hobbes stopped, stuck his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched. "In the FBI academy, I knew a guy, a Mulder-style wacko, who insisted that every government building had a secret sub-subbasement. The Omega level. Even I thought he was nuts. When I found out about the Agency, I thought maybe that's where he got it from. But I've heard a few things here and there, over the years. Enough to think that maybe he wasn't crazy after all."
He shook his head. "This is stupid. It doesn't matter. CIA, the Omega Division, same difference. They're bigger than us, more powerful than us, and they're using Fawkes. They don't care what they do to him, as long as they get whatever the hell it is they want. They'll do whatever they want to us, too, if they catch us, but we're the only chance he's got. So, why is Friday the best day for the rescue op?"
Claire collected herself with a sharp shake of her head. "I have here the files Charlie gave me. Apparently this program works with Darien primarily on weekends. Friday evenings they sedate him for a weekly physical examination. Then he is either taken elsewhere, or special doctors come to him. I don't have any details, only the regular schedule. But there is a period of time he'll be accessible, and if he's already sedated we should have less difficulty bringing him with us."
"Can we be ready by this Friday?"
She glanced at the file folder on her table, then back to Hobbes. "I need to talk again with Charlie, and it'll be a push--but yes. We should be able to manage it.
"All right." Hobbes checked his watch. "It's past midnight. So we're doing this tomorrow. We get Fawkes out. Or else we go down trying."
Friday invariably was the longest day of the week. This Friday didn't simply drag. Hobbes was convinced his watch went backwards when he wasn't looking.
He couldn't say it was a boring day. A brief car chase lead to a longer pursuit on foot before he and his partner finally cornered three small-time crooks with connections to a big-time syndicate. Supposedly the Agency was tracking the commerce of surplus prescription drugs to the black market. The truth was somewhat darker, because medicines were far from the only thing being smuggled. Hobbes didn't know all the details, and didn't care to. Neither did Lewis.
Hobbes couldn't say why that non-curiosity in his partner annoyed him as much as it did. It made him feel almost obliged to ask for more information from their boss. He had to stop himself from so questioning the director when they made their preliminary report that afternoon. Admittedly it wasn't that difficult to put his curiosity aside, with most of his mind on another matter.
Lewis didn't notice his preoccupation. "You better be on the ball next week," he did condescend to say before they left for the weekend. "I'm not covering your ass if you're late again. Yesterday and today was enough."
"Yeah, whatever." Didn't really matter as it were. Today might well have been his last day at the Agency.
"Hey, Hobbes." Hobbes turned at the difference in his tone. Lewis met his partner's eyes with a small reluctance. "You did good today," he admitted. "If you hadn't shot out their tire we'd have lost the perps."
"Thanks," Hobbes said, surprised. "No sweat."
"So, got any plans this weekend?"
Oh, me and an old friend are breaking into a secure facility to save my ex-partner from a clandestine government organization which is researching his biosynthetic gland for unknown but almost definitely unethical purposes. That is, if we're not too late to help him, and if we can succeed in breaching state-of-the-art defenses with some computer hacks and a lot of luck, and if we can then escape with a man who is probably about one baby step away from being a complete psychopath.
Hobbes shrugged. "Nothing much. What about you? Hot date or did she wise up and dump you?"
Lewis's halfway amicable expression darkened like an oncoming stormfront. "Screw you. Be here Monday before nine or I'm going straight to the director. I don't need to put up with this." He stalked out the doors.
"Guess she did," Hobbes mused, and gave Lewis time to leave before departing himself. Then he drove directly to Claire's place. It was already past five. No time to spare. Borden had promised to have everything they needed, so from here on it was up to the two of them.
The night Fawkes came to them for help, Hobbes and the Keeper were awake until three in the morning, discussing what he had told them. At last, having come to no definite conclusions, Claire retired to her bedroom, and Hobbes sacked out on the futon in her study. Darien spent the night on the couch where he had crashed.
The next morning they spoke with Darien, and with his agreement called the Official at the Agency and explained the situation. Their boss listened patiently. When Hobbes was through, he asked, "Fawkes is there at Claire's house now?"
"Yeah. He says he's feeling okay, but Keeper says he's going to be on the edge within three days, whether or not he quicksilvers. She wants him in the lab for tests and stuff."
"If she thinks it's best, all right. Bring him in."
"Are you sure, sir? Because we don't want to compromise the Agency, but if the CIA guesses he might have come back here, then we'd have to deny it, and I don't--"
"Bring him in," the Official repeated. "What time will you be here?"
Hobbes looked at the others. "An hour sound good to everyone? Okay. We'll be there in an hour."
So the three of them drove to the FDA offices. It wasn't until they were getting out of the car that Darien tensed. "Gland bugging you?" Hobbes muttered anxiously.
Darien shook his head, gaze searching the parking lot. "No...there's something..."
"Agent Fawkes."
Three men materialized from behind a sleek, silver van. All were in suits, two square-jawed and broad-shouldered as football jocks, the third tall but slight. He approached with smooth assurance, flanked by the burly pair.
Darien stared at the central man. "Giles?"
"You have to trust us, Fawkes. As your former colleagues here do." The thin man nodded congenially at Hobbes and the Keeper as he slid forward. Darien took a reflexive step back. Suddenly, with seamlessly quick stealth, Giles reached forward and jabbed a narrow metal tube to Fawkes's chest.
Something hissed. Darien lunged to the side, shimmering and vanishing as a ripple of quicksilver washed over him.
He was too late. One of the other men calculated his feint and grabbed his invisible form, shoving him against Claire's SUV. With a silvery tinkle, quicksilver cascaded down, revealing Fawkes braced against the car door. His brown eyes were wide and fixed on the Keeper, on Hobbes, with unmistakable accusation and a despairing betrayal.
Then he collapsed, eyes closing as his legs gave out. His captor caught him as he sagged.
Everything happened so fast Hobbes barely had time to pull his gun. "What'd you do to him?" he hollered, aiming at the man holding Darien.
"Dr. Giles." So snarling, Claire slapped Giles, hard enough that the man's head snapped back. The instrument dropped from his hands and rolled. She swiftly scooped it up.
"Fawkes?" Hobbes asked. When Darien, slumped against the car hood and supported by the man who had stopped him, made no response, he glanced to Claire. "What the hell is that?"
"A hypospray. High pressure injection. Fast acting." Her face was white as she brandished the silver cylinder at the other doctor. "What was in here? What did you give him?"
"Only a sedative." Giles rubbed his cheek where her blow had landed, then peremptorily snatched the instrument from her hands and pocketed it. "I'm sorry for the dramatics, but given his state of mind we didn't have much choice. If you'll excuse us."
"Hold it," Hobbes said. His gun didn't waver, still pointed at Giles's man. "You're not moving an inch--"
"Let them go, Hobbes."
Claire and Hobbes started and glanced back. The Official had emerged from the FDA building, his face grim and unreadable, Eberts a colorless shade at his side. "You're interfering with another agency's operation."
"Like hell! They just drugged Fawkes--"
"Agent Fawkes is CIA, not Agency," the Official said harshly. His eyes moved to Giles. "Doctor, take your patient and go. I apologize for my agents' transgressions."
"You're CIA?" Hobbes demanded.
"He's one of the doctors I trained in working with the QS gland," Claire said, icy fury sharpening her words. "Have you been deliberately building his resistance to the counteragent, Giles? Do you have any idea the damage you are--"
"The situation is fully under control, Doctor," Giles smoothly declared. "Please put him in the van, agents." He gestured to his men, who eyed Hobbes's gun still aimed in their direction, then shrugged and ignored the implied threat. The man supporting Darien half-carried, half-dragged him to the silver van while the other slid the side door open. They stowed him in the seat in the back, and the first man clambered in after him. They had a brief view of Darien draped over the seat, his head drooping awkwardly. Then the other man closed the door on both of them, went around to take the driver's seat, and started the engine.
"I don't know what Fawkes told you," Giles said, "but you must realize he's not thinking clearly. He's not been well. We're doing everything we can for him. Rest assured, we understand his value." He nodded cordially to the Official. "Thank you for your assistance. I'm sure you can explain everything to your agents; I have a patient to attend." He climbed into the passenger seat, and the van pulled out of the lot.
Hobbes turned and immediately headed for his own vehicle.
"Bobby, get back here now," the Official commanded.
"No time," Hobbes called back over his shoulder. "If we don't move it we're gonna lose 'em. You got them off their guard, we have to take advantage--"
"I'm telling you this only one more time, Agent Hobbes," the Official said. "This is another agency's business. It's not our concern."
Claire's eyes widened. "You set him up." She spoke with soft certainty. "You knew they were here--you told us to bring him so they could get him."
"We can't afford to interfere whenever we want to. They know what they're doing. Agent Fawkes is their business now. This isn't worth losing our careers."
"You fat bastard--"
"Sir," Claire said, still calmly, "do you know what they're doing to him? Regardless of Giles's allegation, Darien was not delusional. I've considered what he told me--"
"It's not our concern, Doctor."
"--if I'm right, the consequences--"
"Listen to me, Claire."
"--I don't know if they have a connection with Luke Lawson, or came up with it independently--"
"It's over," the Official growled, with the force to override her. "You and Hobbes are to put him--it--out of your mind. Whatever happens to Fawkes is no longer Agency business." His eyes flicked to his aide. "You better write up a memo, Eberts."
"Yes, sir." Eberts was staring down at the ground as intently as if the sequel to the book of Revelation were being penned on the lot's asphalt.
"Up yours," Hobbes snarled, savage. "Maybe you don't owe Fawkes nothing, maybe the Agency doesn't, but I do. He was my partner. He saved my life. There's no way I'm letting him go to hell without a fight." Drawing his badge from his pocket, he threw it down to the pavement at the Official's feet, then spun on his heel and stalked to his car.
The Official waited a moment in considering silence, then picked up the badge, handed it to Claire and instructed, "Stop him. He's no good to Fawkes if he can't keep his head." And turning, he walked back inside the building, Eberts trailing behind him.
Claire followed Bobby, understanding as the Official did that after the sleepless night and the shock of Darien's removal, Hobbes needed time to cool down, to release his anger before facing the situation clear-minded. There were other, better ways to handle this that wouldn't get them arrested or destroy their careers. This was a civilized country, where the sovereign rights of an innocent man would not simply be tossed aside. Open battle was not needed here to save him, only the logic and persistence to prove their point to an oblivious bureaucracy. They would manage this without breaking faith with the ideals they had always served.
Neither of them knew then that the brief glimpse through the CIA van's window as it drove away would be the last time they would lay eyes on Darien Fawkes.
Three and a half hours after leaving the Agency, Hobbes was walking into the psychiatric adjunct building of the San Bernardino County Hospital. He strode freely down the halls, following the route he had traced out on the hospital's floor plan. No one so much as glanced at his identification tag until he reached the set of fortified double doors leading to the north wing.
The receptionist behind the glass screen on the right wall was backed by a uniformed guard standing before the doors. Next to him, a black plaque with white block letters labeled the entrance to the Brighton Ward for the Criminally Insane.
The guard nodded once to Hobbes. The receptionist behind the glass looked up from her book. "Can I help you?"
"Yeah." Hobbes stepped up to the window and brandished his badge. "Good evening. I'm a federal agent. I have business here. Need to talk to one of the patients."
One plucked orange eyebrow went up. "Kinda late for an interrogation, isn't it?"
"This can't wait for Monday. The sting's tomorrow and if we don't have these names--anyway, I should be registered."
The receptionist checked her computer, squinted at his badge and nodded. "You're Vecchio? Yeah, you're listed. I'll call one of the doctors. There's a chair over there." She aimed her chin at the plastic seat across the hall and returned to her book.
Hobbes sat down and waited, tapping his fingers and hoping it was just his imagination that the guard was glaring at him. Claire had assured him that this part at least would go smoothly--or had conveyed Charlie Borden's assurances, which wasn't quite the same thing, to Hobbes's mind.
The ex-Official had come through on at least some of the bargain, providing the necessary false ID and making a timely addition to the hospital computer's schedule. The Keeper had given Hobbes the newly minted card last night. His picture was as lousy as the one on his real ID, and the name worse. "Vecchio? Oy, my grandma'll be rolling in her grave."
"There wasn't much choice," Claire said. "He didn't make up the name--rather than try to add an entirely new persona to the authorized database, he, or his hacker, rather, attached your data to another agent's record. Since the real David Vecchio is stationed in Chicago, there's little likelihood of him appearing here."
"So who is the Official's hacker, anyway?" Hobbes thought to ask, but Claire didn't know, and they had other concerns.
"The ID will get you through the door, but once inside he couldn't guarantee you'd be given free reign," she said. "And I can't come with you. I know at least one doctor on the staff personally, and I may have met the others, including those involved with Darien. It's very possible I encountered some of them during my time with the DOD. If they recognized me--"
"I follow. You're pretty well-known in those circles. And I'm a nobody agent."
"That's what they've needed to think," Claire said sharply. "Don't begin believing it yourself. Playing this subterfuge for this long should have proved that to you as much as it proved the lie to everyone else."
"Hell, I've always known how talented I am. Don't need the reminder. Though it's nice to hear it aloud." He grinned at her. "Especially from you."
She smiled back, that frustrating little smile of hers that could be teasing or just as easily be honestly meant, then grew serious again. "Once inside, it's up to you. If this goes wrong--"
"I know. We won't get another chance, once they're on to us." She had told him that, over a year ago, explaining why they so desperately needed to be patient, bide their time until everything was ready. If they failed in the first time, even if they weren't caught, they would never succeed against the increased security which the attempt would effect. This gambit was all or nothing.
It scared the hell out of him. But Bobby Hobbes was no stranger to pressure. Although every nerve in him was strung taut with tension, they sang with exhilaration, not petrified anxiety. One chance meant this had to succeed. He had to succeed. There was no other choice.
"Agent Vecchio?"
He stood up. A man in a white coat had emerged from the locked doors. He extended his hand to Hobbes. "I'm Dr. Lapier. You're here to question a patient?"
"Yeah." They shook. Lapier squeezed briefly and released as fast as was polite.
Hobbes gave the doctor a quick once-over, stifling a chill. He recognized the name from the Official's list. Not hospital staff, but attached to the project studying Fawkes.
Could he suspect? Hobbes dismissed the notion immediately. There probably weren't many doctors here at all on a Friday night. And even if Lapier knew Darien, there was little reason he would recognize Fawkes's former partner on sight. Much less chance that he'd have an inkling of their plans.
Nor was Lapier especially threatening in appearance. He was of medium build and medium height--putting him a couple inches taller than Bobby--with brownish hair thinning but not yet balding. All that saved him from stunning mediocrity were his eyes, which although a nondescript, muddy hazel, were slightly too wide-set, round enough to bulge. They had a disconcerting habit of locking onto objects without wavering or blinking.
Hobbes shrugged off his momentary alarm, quick enough it was unnoticeable. "Let's go, don't have all night." He brushed past the doctor and the guard, striding through the opened doors with brisk professionalism. Lapier had to hurry to catch up.
"Please keep your voice down, Agent," the doctor requested when the doors clapped shut behind them. "It's after curfew, so the patients are asleep."
Hobbes had studied the ward in close detail; he knew exactly where he was going. He headed for the elevator without delay. The sterile gray halls were half-lit, to enforce the perception of night for cells without windows to the outside. Barely visible through wired glass portals in the locked doors, patients slept in dark rooms.
Lapier produced a keycard to operate the elevator. "Third floor," Hobbes told him. At the doctor's askance look, he shrugged casually. "I've been here before, know my way around. Not my choice to disturb you at night, but this is a priority case."
"Ah." The elevator chimed as it came to a stop and opened. Hobbes stepped into the hall, the doctor at his heels inquiring, "Now, Agent, who are you here to see?"
Hobbes checked his watch, as if the late hour were his major concern. "Guy by the name of Fawkes. Darien Fawkes. Before he went bonkers he was a professional thief, and we think he had dealings with an international ring of--"
Lapier, halting in his tracks, cut short the fabrication. "Fawkes isn't available."
Realizing the doctor no longer walked with him, Hobbes also stopped. "What do you mean, he's not available?"
"Mr. Fawkes is in no condition to answer questions at the moment." Lapier offered a thin, unconvincing smile of placation. "If you'd given prior warning, we could have arranged something. Perhaps later this week..."
Hobbes pretended to consider it. "The sting's tomorrow morning; this really can't wait. Can you just show me to his cell? I'll take whatever I can get out of the guy."
"I'm afraid not." The doctor turned back to the elevator. "He's drugged at the moment, but even if he weren't it's unlikely you'd get anything useful out of him. Fawkes is severely schizophrenic. His psychosis is such that he's rarely coherent and often delusional, so you wouldn't be able to trust what answers you got from him. I'd advise you abandon this line of inquiry as unfeasible."
"Sorry to hear that," Hobbes said. As he spoke he scanned the hall, looking and listening for signs of another's presence. No one was in evidence. And they were right out of range of the security camera over the elevator. "I have to try, though. Boss won't listen to excuses unless I've at least seen the guy. Please, I just need a minute."
"I can't allow that, Agent." Lapier's thin smile might have widened in triumph. "Begging won't help. As a doctor, I have a responsibility to my patients, and I don't think your interrogation would benefit Fawkes. We can't risk triggering a violent episode. And he particularly hates anyone connected with the government."
"Gee, I wonder why," Hobbes said, and swung his fist.
He clocked Lapier on the jaw, and followed up with a blow to the back of his head. The doctor dropped like a lead weight, no so much as a whimper escaping his slack lips. Hobbes massaged his bruised knuckles, muttered, "How come you science-types always got such hard skulls?"
Only a few steps down the hall he had spotted a maintenance closet. He dragged the doctor's unconscious body over to it and stowed him inside, leaning against a mop bucket. A quick frisk relieved Lapier of his keycard and a ring of keys. After a moment's thought, Hobbes removed his white coat as well. The sleeves were a little long but it fit reasonably otherwise. With a roll of packing tape on the closet's shelf he secured the doctor's wrists behind his back.
The corridor was still empty. The guards made their rounds only once an hour, and there were few doctors or orderlies on the night shift. Hobbes closed the closet door and tried keys until he found the match. He slipped it off the ring, locked the door, then gave the key a sharp kick. With a second kick the grip snapped off, leaving the key's shaft embedded in the bolt.
That should hold him long enough. In the labcoat with his borrowed keycard in hand, Hobbes strode purposefully down the hall. If he looked like he belonged here, it was less likely he would be questioned.
The route from the floorplans was burned into his memory. He turned down a hall, used the keycard to pass through a set of double doors, turned another corner, and he was there. The corridor was exactly like the rest, except the doors lining the walls here had no windows, and their steel was reinforced by double locks.
At the end of the hall, the doors were closed but the identification tags were empty, save the final one. Inside its plastic sheath, the medical chart was headed by a typed name: "Fawkes, Darien G."
"What's the 'G', Fawkes?" Hobbes muttered under his breath as one by one he tested the keys in the lock. "Don't see you as a 'Gerald', you were born before Ford. Gary? George? Gingrich? Goofball?--that's it!" The sixth key slid neatly into the tumbler.
He turned the key and it sprang, but the red light on the electronic lock below still blinked. Holding his breath, Hobbes swiped the keycard through the slot. The diode went dark and a steady green light flashed on. With a metallic click the bolt unlocked.
"All right," Hobbes breathed. Setting his fingers on the handle, he pressed down and swung the door outward.
The cell beyond was dark, the dim florescents from the hall casting their murky ambience over the padded walls. In the far left corner, the gray light picked out a cot bolted to the floor, and outlined the figure of the man seated upon it. Clothed in a shapeless white jumpsuit, his dark hair a blot against the uniformly neutral surroundings, he turned his head slowly toward the intrusion. Red eyes reflected like a cat's through the shadows.
Hobbes stared, all his expectations not enough to brace him for the simple shock of seeing his friend, alive. It took a second for him to overcome tongue-tied recognition enough to whisper, "Hey, Fawkes."
Parked in the far corner of the San Bernardino County Hospital's back lot, Claire sat in the rental car, waiting. Hobbes had been inside for less than an hour, but it might as well have been an eternity. Every minute pricked like a pin, needling her with the incessant pressure of time. There was nothing she could do, not until Bobby returned. She didn't dare turn on the radio or the light to read by. She couldn't draw attention to the car, or particularly herself inside. In untouched silence she sat and watched the back wall of the hospital building, the deserted loading docks lit by the single floodlight, the narrow fire-escape like a black spider's web strung down the side wall. Hobbes should be coming out of one of the two doors to the left, either the hospital kitchens or the fire exit. But not yet. Not this soon.
She trusted him. There were few others with whom she would have agreed to this plan, or gone to for assistance at all. Bobby was one of the only, perhaps the only person she would trust this much. He was quick, and very competent, and absolutely loyal. Not to the Agency anymore. But to what mattered...to who mattered. She didn't doubt him. Nervous as she was now, she wouldn't be here at all if she didn't believe in him.
Hobbes had wanted to charge to Darien's rescue immediately, when the time had come that they had finally realized there was no other way. The day after the Official retired, he had concocted a daring but reasonable plan of attack to retrieve his former partner. And she had rejected it flat-out. She had handled the situation terribly, she admitted now, but at the time she had been at the end of her rope, and they were both in a very tight spot, having already crossed the line multiple times in the course of their protests.
But she had come close, too close, to driving away Bobby entirely. It had been difficult to get back on his side. She had to bare her heart to win his trust--and he had earned her trust then, greater than ever before, because he never spoke of that time again, never embarrassed her by bringing it up, even obliquely.
Nevertheless, she still remembered every moment, every whispered plea, every tear. As well as she remembered their conversation afterwards, in the calm which fell when both of them had expended their last emotional reserves. It was then that they had hammered out the plan. She had stated the situation plainly. "We have two choices. First, we can do as they are instructing--forget everything we've seen, continue with our jobs--"
"Like hell!" Hobbes exploded.
She nodded. "My sentiments precisely. Which leaves the second option. Even if we succeed in engineering Darien's escape, we'd still have to handle his quicksilver madness. It would be difficult to hide him in such a condition, and dangerous for all concerned. We need a new counteragent, but I must have access to the labs to have any chance of developing it. We couldn't keep him out of their hands while I do that. The only solution is to continue as we've been doing until we have a new counteragent, then free him. After that, with Darien, we can decide on our next course of action."
"That's it," Hobbes agreed. "That's what we'll do."
"It will take time," she warned. "I don't know how long--to be honest, I don't know if I even can create an effective counteragent."
"You will," Hobbes told her, in a tone not to be contradicted. "You do that, and then we get him out."
"It may be years--"
"I get it," Bobby had said, and that was that. They had both done what they needed to do, she continuing her research, Hobbes tenaciously sticking with the Agency in spite of everything, though she know how rough it had gotten for him in the last year.
And now they were here. She sat in the car Bobby had rented yesterday, using a name she was fairly certain didn't exist outside his imagination and an anonymous, untraceable Agency credit card. She watched the hospital and counted the seconds. They would come soon. Soon, this trial would be over, and everything else would begin.
Until then, she waited.
Darien stared at the man in the doorway, his scarlet eyes glazed, swaying as he sat up on the cot. Muted confusion crossed his face, then, gradually, realization, recognition. Anger, surprise, panicked disbelief flashed in quick succession over his shadowed features, all undercut by drugged lassitude and more jarring despair.
"Fawkes?" Hobbes whispered. It was all he could do to keep his voice from shaking. "It's me, Darien. It's Hobbes. We're getting you out of here."
Fawkes moved as if to stand. Instead he wilted, slowly slipping down until he lay across the bed, one arm draped over the edge so his long fingers crumpled against the floor.
Hobbes was beside him without being aware of moving. He took Fawkes by the shoulders, gave him a hard shake. Darien's head lolled back and forth, his eyes remaining closed. Either the drugs or the shock had felled him; he was completely unconscious. And unlikely to wake soon. Hobbes had been hoping to reach him before the weekly dose of sedatives had fully kicked in; this would have been easier if Fawkes could have walked out under his own power.
But what was done was done, and besides Fawkes might have been harder to handle awake. Hobbes thought fast about the alternatives. Carrying Darien would be the simplest, but he wasn't a lightweight, and if a guard or a doctor spotted them in the halls it would definitely look suspicious. There wasn't much time to spare, however. The project doctors would come for Fawkes within an hour for their weekly tests or whatever they did. Moreover, eventually Dr. Lapier's absence would be noted, or else he would wake up and either break or shout his way out of the janitor's closet.
Hobbes touched Darien's shoulder. "I'll be right back, Fawkes," he promised, even though the man was too far gone to hear. Still, it took all his will power to get up and walk out of the cell, leave him even for a moment. He had the terrible feeling that Darien would vanish again if he once let him out of his sight.
At the very end of the hall, only a few meters further down, Hobbes found what he sought, an empty gurney parked against the wall. He wheeled it back to the cell and loaded Fawkes onto it. Hefting him wasn't as difficult as it should have been; he weighed far less than was normal for a man of his height. Darien had always been lanky, but now he was gaunt, either starved or consumed by the hyper energy of the madness. Hobbes entertained a few brief but satisfying ideas of what he could do to those responsible for this, should he ever get hold of them. Preferably with his bare hands.
With Fawkes's long body arranged on the stretcher, Hobbes pushed the gurney into the hall. He shut and locked the cell door behind them, hoping that no one would bother to check inside to see that the room was empty. A forlorn hope, since they almost definitely monitored what locks were opened and would investigate once Lapier raised an alert. But he took whatever optimism he could get.
Just walking was difficult; Hobbes felt his legs cramp with the tension of holding himself to a measured, quick but not a suspiciously hurried pace. He wanted to run. He wanted out of here as fast as possible, probably almost as much as Fawkes did.
Everything went smoothly, they moving undisturbed through empty halls, until they reached the back elevator. The gurney fit in fine, and the lift sank smoothly down, but it stopped before reaching the first floor. Hobbes stared at the red diodes blinking the number '2', silently wishing them to change, continue the descent.
Instead the doors slid aside and an orderly in white entered. He nodded to Hobbes, amiably enough, but then gave a hard look at the gurney and its occupant. Dark eyes returned to Hobbes for another, more searching regard. "What are you doing with him?" the man asked.
Keep it cool. "Dr. Lapier's request," Hobbes replied evenly.
The orderly was eyeing him, trying to place him. Hobbes went out on a limb, figuring it better to be on the offensive. "I've never seen you around; who are you?"
It worked; the man shrugged, loosening a little. "I usually work day shift. Filling in for a friend tonight. Name's Mitchell."
"Vecchio," Hobbes introduced himself, extending his hand and willing Mitchell not to examine his ID too closely. The orderly was black, broad-shouldered, and had at least half a foot on him. Unlike Lapier, he wouldn't go down with one punch. If he noticed something was amiss...
He didn't. They shook, and as the elevator descended Mitchell inquired sociably, "So where are you taking Fawkes?"
"You know this guy?" Hobbes couldn't help but ask, his gaze involuntarily shooting to Darien's unconscious form.
"I've talked with him--I know, it's against policy, but it can't hurt to show a little compassion. When he's lucid he's a bright man. I've brought him a couple books; he likes to read. He doesn't get any visitors--only Lapier and the others, and they don't seem to be doing much for him."
"What's he in for?" Hobbes tried to imitate only passing curiosity, though he doubted he was successfully concealing his interest.
However, the orderly didn't seem to mind; instead he responded to the care in his associate's voice by warming himself. "Don't know. He's been here a few months now, but I don't think it's for a crime. Might be because he presents a danger to himself and others." They had reached the first floor, but Mitchell didn't seem inclined to leave yet. "I don't know exactly what's wrong with him--I'm working toward my psych masters now, but I've never studied a schizophrenia quite like his. Some kind of paranoia...he thinks there's something inside of him, devouring his mind from the inside out."
Hobbes had pushed the gurney out of the elevator and was covertly surveying the hall. The doors to the right should lead to the kitchens, and the service exit. Almost home-free--but Mitchell was still here.
What the orderly was saying suddenly registered with Hobbes. "Paranoia?" God, he knew that feeling too well, on the edge of insanity, too close to back away but far enough distant to clearly see what you were about to fall into. Only the fears weren't only paranoia in this case, and Darien was already falling...
Mitchell mistook his suppressed horror for humor, and frowned. "It might sound funny, but if you heard him talking about it--it's enough to give you nightmares, just what he says. I've seen him when he goes manic; I can't imagine what it's like to live with that hanging over you."
Insightful or no, they didn't have time for this. "Yeah...well, I better getting moving, or the doctor'll have my hide," Hobbes said, adjusting his grip on the gurney. Just a little further, Fawkes, and we'll have you safely out of here...
"Hey, isn't Dr. Lapier's lab in the other direction--"
Suddenly, without warning, red lights snapped on up and down the hall. A muted alarm began wailing.
Hobbes glanced at Darien, then back to Mitchell, and with a sigh reached under his coat for the gun in his shoulder holster.
The orderly watched him with an evaluating frown. Abruptly he turned, and before Hobbes could stop him he had slid his card through the door's lock and was entering a code, fingers flying over the keypad. Hobbes gritted his teeth and took firm hold of Darien's gurney, vowing not to go down without a fight, or at least without a run for it.
The lock clicked, and the door opened.
"The kitchens are right through there," Mitchell said quickly. "The hexagonal key will get you through the side door to the back lot. I'd hurry."
Hobbes only gaped at Mitchell, until the orderly made a sharp gesture toward the exit. Then Hobbes hastily shoved the gurney through the door. "Thanks," he gasped over his shoulder.
Mitchell smiled grimly. "'Do no harm'," he quoted, more to himself than to Hobbes. Then he shut the door on them, re-locking it, and continued down the hall without looking back.
Claire almost stopped breathing when she heard the siren, low but unmistakable. A bright floodlight flashed to life, defining the deserted parking lot in stark white illumination. In the far corner of the lot, her car was barely still concealed.
She deliberated for a moment, then drew her revolver and took careful aim through the open window.
The crack of the gunshot overwhelmed the tinkle of glass as the light shattered. Again cloaked in darkness, safe from a camera's prying lens, she blinked back afterimages and stared at the shadowed hospital wall, wondering if she dared still hope.
An instant later, before she came to any conclusions, the side door banged open, and dark figures barreled out of it into the lot.
She ground the gears shifting as she zoomed over. Hobbes had picked up Darien off the gurney in a fireman's carry. He wrenched open the back door, undelicately wrestled Fawkes's limp body inside, and dove in after, slamming the door behind him. Claire stamped the accelerator, and they roared into motion.
"Not the driveway," Hobbes panted. "They'll be watching the main gates. The shoulder's low to the left. Go over."
Claire nodded and put on the gas. They hurdled the curb and bumped onto the grassy divider, flattened a low hedge and then rolled onto the street.
Hobbes had secured Fawkes. After strapping on his own belt, he leaned forward to touch Claire's shoulder. "Not too fast," he advised. "Last thing we need now is a speeding ticket."
She swallowed a giggle that came more from tension than humor, and risked a glance in the rearview mirror at her passengers. "How is he?"
Hobbes glanced down. Fawkes was stretched across the seat, his head on Hobbes's knee. "Okay, I think. He's way out but his breathing sounds good."
They drove a couple miles, Hobbes watching intently out the back window. "We weren't followed," he determined at last. "We can go to the rendezvous."
Claire took the next turn, easily navigating the city streets to the business district. In a few minutes they reached a vacant street corner. A plain dark vehicle was parked before them. "That's it?" Hobbes asked.
"That's it." Claire took the key out of her pocket. "He left it here this afternoon and took the bus home. No one will think twice about it parking in his driveway, since it belongs there." Hobbes had suggested the switch, but Claire had arranged the details.
After checking again for a tail, they exited the rental car. "Just leave the keys in the ignition," Hobbes instructed. "It'll be gone within an hour."
Darien didn't react as he was moved to the cramped back of the new car. They laid him out on the bench seat. Claire took a moment to check his pulse and thumbed up his eyelids. "They've got him on a heavy sedative," she confirmed.
"But he'll be okay?"
"He should be." She shut the car door and reassumed her position in the driver's seat, pulling onto the street again. "I imagine they've mapped his physiology carefully enough to administer safe dosages. He should awaken within a few hours."
"What about the quicksilver? You got the new counteragent all ready, right?"
"I have it. However, I can't use it until he's conscious and I've fully assessed his condition. His system needs to be clear of whatever they might've given him before I try it, or I don't know what the side-effects might be."
"He has to be totally clean--"
"Except of the quicksilver, yes."
Hobbes twisted to look back at Darien, limp on the seat, his closed eyes sunken. "Doesn't that mean he'll be wacko?"
"If our information is correct," Claire said grimly, "he should be quite accustomed to the madness by now."
They drove mostly in silence, muted by the enormity of what they had done, torn between the surprise of success and the sobering realization that it was only the beginning. Hobbes spent the ride alternating between leaning his head on his hand with his elbow on the window, and looking back at their sleeping passenger. Claire watched the road steadily and only lost control a few times, glancing at the man on the seat behind her while stopped at red lights.
When at last they pulled into the apartment's driveway, Hobbes only said, "This the place?" and Claire simply nodded confirmation. Hoping no one was watching out their window, they carried Darien to the door, which Claire unlocked with another key produced from her pocket.
"The guy's not home?" Hobbes asked.
"He'll be back tonight. He's often out late on Fridays. Driving in at this hour shouldn't seem suspicious."
Once in the silent apartment, Claire located the hall lightswitch, and lead Hobbes down to a white doors. The room inside was bare of all furnishings, except a neatly made bed, two chairs, and a portable cot against the wall. "I asked him to prepare the room for us," Claire explained. "Put Darien on the bed. I have restraints but I'm hoping they won't be necessary."
Hobbes complied, then looked around the empty room. Faded paint marked squares on the walls where pictures had recently been removed, and the floor bore scuff marks of furniture cleared to make a room suitable for their purposes. "Who's place is this? I know you told me the guy can be trusted, but who's going through all this trouble? If he's gonna be back soon anyway, you can tell me now."
"You wouldn't believe me if I did. It's just someone who wanted to help." Claire's faint smile vanished as she bent over Darien and gently examined him. "He shouldn't be out for much longer now. I better take a blood sample." She departed, returned a moment later with a hypodermic, a stethoscope, and a blood pressure cuff.
"You got a Keep set up here, too?" Hobbes inquired. "This your boyfriend's place or something?"
"No, of course not; he lives in New York," Claire said, distracted as she listened to Darien's heartbeat. "I brought most of my equipment here yesterday. I don't know if I'll be able to return to my flat anytime soon, especially if my involvement in this is realized."
"Lives in New York--" Hobbes began to ask.
Then he stopped. When Claire had slid the needle into Darien's arm, he had reacted with a faint groan. Hobbes's attention was instantly on him. "Fawkes? You there?"
"Darien?" Claire said calmly, touching his cheek. His lashes twitched.
Hobbes cocked his head as he heard the apartment door open and footsteps tramp inside. "Sounds like whoever-it-is is back."
"So is Darien," Claire remarked.
Hobbes looked down again in time to see Darien's eyes flutter open, foggy and dazed. In spite of everything, Bobby grinned. "Hey, partner. Glad to have you with us."
Darien's brow wrinkled slightly as he blinked, trying to focus. His lips moved but he wasn't up for speech yet. Hobbes reached down to grip his shoulder supportively.
The footsteps hurried down the hall, and the door was flung open. Hobbes glanced over, then did a double take.
"You're safe, Darien," Claire said reassuringly, as Darien stared at her in half-aware shock.
In a similar state, Hobbes stared at the man in the doorway, and demanded, "Eberts, what the hell are you doing here?"
Hobbes stared at the man in the doorway, and demanded, "Eberts, what the hell are you doing here?"
Eberts sighed. "I live here, Robert."
"But that--you mean--"
Eberts, ignoring Hobbes's dropped jaw, turned to Claire and her patient. "How is he?"
Claire's attention was entirely centered on Darien. She kept her voice pitched low and moderated, the gentle tones one would use to soothe a frightened animal. "Darien, do you know me?" Without looking away from him and in the same mode she answered the question, "He only just awoke; he's drugged and still is dazed."
More than just dazed. The ceiling light was purposely turned low but even through the dimness Hobbes could see Fawkes's wide eyes were too dark, the whites stained scarlet. His gaze jumped from person to person without seeming able to focus, without any recognition.
"But you got him out." Eberts sounded either amazed or flatly disbelieving.
"Obviously, Eberts," Hobbes hissed, his ire automatically rising. He hadn't spoken face to face with the Official's former lackey for months, but nothing had changed between them.
"Boys," the Keeper reprimanded, softly.
Hobbes winced internally. Now was not the time for petty sniping. Eberts was merely a target for the anxiety churning his stomach, as he watched Darien regain consciousness--if it was Darien at all, if anything was left within the madness--
Needing to offer reassurance almost as badly as he needed it himself, he stepped forward to touch Darien's shoulder, lightly, just to call attention to himself. "Fawkes," he said, but that didn't feel right, "Darien...hey, buddy. How--"
He didn't get any further. At the sound of his name Darien blinked and turned those disturbing red eyes onto Hobbes. For an instant there was only confusion in his face; then remembrance struck like a bolt of lightning.
Darien jerked up, his mouth opened, and he screamed. It wasn't with rage or fear, but pain, without any articulation of words. His eyes remained locked on Hobbes as if he could not force them away.
Horrorstruck, Hobbes stared back, rooted in place as Fawkes hollered, until Claire grabbed his arm and forcefully pulled him to the door. "I'm sorry, Bobby, but leave," she plead. "Wait in the hall, we'll try to calm him down..."
He craned his neck to look over her shoulder. Eberts, only momentarily frozen, had been quick to act and had Darien by the shoulders, was blocking his view of Hobbes while trying to quiet him. Before Hobbes could do more than nod agreement, Claire closed the door in his face.
The screams had stopped, at least. Left alone in the hallway, Hobbes leaned against the opposite wall and caught his breath. His heart was pounding like he had run a five minute mile. He felt as if he had been physically attacked; his chest hurt and he had to clench his teeth to keep from gasping. He had expected, he had known it would be bad, had steeled himself for Fawkes to be changed, and of course for him to be angry, if he still believed they had betrayed him. But that reaction...and just to him, because the Keeper and Eberts were with him now and all was quiet.
He could have been angry, but he was only terrified at first. Fury built slowly as he waited, anger at the human monsters who had done this to Fawkes, and at Claire and Eberts for whatever privilege they had that he lacked, and then at himself for whatever part he might have unwillingly played...
It felt like eternity but was in reality closer to a quarter of an hour when Claire emerged from the room. "He's asleep again," she said. "Restlessly but Eberts is watching him. I'm taking the opportunity to test the blood sample and see if there's anything I should be concerned about."
"Claire," Hobbes said urgently, "what was that in there? When he saw me?"
She brushed her bangs back from her forehead, though they were too short to get in her eyes. "I don't know. He's definitely experiencing quicksilver madness, and it may be an advanced state we never saw. I don't mean to be insensitive, Bobby, but we don't have much time; I don't know how long he'll sleep."
Hobbes nodded and stepped out of her way. Then, for lack of anything better and since he didn't dare enter Darien's room, he followed her to the study, where her equipment was spread haphazardly across a desk and a card table. There were still pictures on the walls here, a couple art prints and framed photographs. Eberts was in several.
Hobbes shook his head. "Claire, how'd you get his help?"
"Eberts? He came to me, actually." She sat down at the desk and began prepping a slide of the blood sample for the microscope. "He volunteered his help only a little after you and I began planning."
"Like, a couple years ago? And you agreed? Isn't he still with the Agency?"
"So are we," Claire reminded him.
"Yeah, well, we don't head Accounting."
The Keeper slid the slide under the scope and squinted into the eyepiece. "He has an impeccable reputation. Almost above suspicion. It's unlikely there's anyone watching him or his house. We need that immunity, to keep Darien safe."
"Can we trust him, though?"
"He's already helped us."
"He has?" Hobbes's eyes narrowed. "Wait, he's the Official's hacker?"
Claire nodded, then pursed her lips as she siphoned another fraction of the blood sample and dripped it into a testtube. "Bobby, I need to concentrate," she said apologetically.
"Okay. I'm quiet. Won't hear another word out of me." He sealed his lips, leaned back in his chair, and watched her work with all the patience he could muster.
Hobbes hadn't dozed off, precisely, but his eyes were half-mast and he had lost track of time when abruptly he snapped into full alertness. He launched to his feet.
Claire looked up at the retort of the chair legs clattering against the floor. "What?"
He looked at the clock. He had been sitting there for an hour, but the awareness of time wasn't what had awoken him. "I don't know. Did you hear something?"
"I've been concentrating."
"How's it coming?"
"I think it may be safe to try it."
"Good. Great."
"I'm preparing the dose now. It won't be much longer."
Hobbes started for the door. "I'm going to check on him." When Claire opened her mouth he raised his hand. "I'll just sneak a peek inside. Won't even enter the room." But he needed to check. Something wasn't right. He was familiar enough with paranoia to know the difference between psychological crossed wires and genuine concerns, even if it didn't help him handle the former any better.
He knocked on the guestroom door lightly, and when there was no answer, opened it. And swore.
The bed where they had left Darien asleep was empty. Eberts was on the floor by the door. Hobbes crouched and shook his shoulder, not gently.
Eberts groaned and blinked., struggled to sit up. "Wh...what--Robert!"
"Did Fawkes do this?"
"Don't know..." Eberts winced and raised his hand to the back of his head, where a splendid blue bruise was forming. "Thought he was asleep...I was going to check on your progress--"
He left Eberts on the floor and ran the short length of the hall. "Crap. Damn. Shit." Hobbes decided he needed to learn another language. English didn't have enough expletives.
The front door was still locked. He booked it the ten feet back to Claire's makeshift lab. He could have shouted but didn't want to alert Darien. He probably was still in the apartment--he had faked being asleep until Eberts had opened the door, though it hadn't been locked. Maybe he was so used to doors being locked that he no longer tried them. And was screwed up enough in the head not to know what safety meant anymore.
The apartment wasn't big; he shouldn't be able to hide long--unless he went invisible...
"Claire," Hobbes began, "we have a prob--aw, hell."
Claire had found their fugitive. Or rather he had found her.
Darien's hands were around her neck, not quite tightly enough to cut off all air, but the flesh was white where his fingers dug in. She stared up at him, breathing shallowly, her eyes wide with as close to terror as Hobbes had ever seen in her.
But it was nothing next to the absolute fear on Darien's face as he stared down at her, terrible red eyes filmed with liquid tears. "Stop it," he whispered. Hobbes strained to hear the hoarse entreaty. "Stop this. Stop it now."
He jerked up his hands, forcing Claire to her toes to lessen the pressure on her throat. A tiny whimper escaped her, but Hobbes saw her hand behind her back reach down to the desktop, groping for the hypodermic she must have dropped when he attacked.
It was out of reach. Hobbes took a step toward them.
Darien's head whipped around. A shudder rocked him as he saw Hobbes, but he didn't loosen his grip on her.
Hobbes raised his empty hands, placatingly, tried to imitate Claire's soothing tone of before. "Easy. You're safe. You're with friends. Remember us?"
"No. No. It's all a lie. You're here. It's a lie."
"We're real. It's me, Darien. Hobbes, remember? And that's Claire. You don't want to hurt her. We're helping you."
"Stop it." He was shaking. "Stop it. Just stop it."
Eberts was in the doorway behind him, watching in shocked silence.
Claire was choking, beginning to hyperventilate. Hobbes could see her trying to keep calm, could see her failing.
"It's a lie. Stop it. Please. Stop it! "
Eberts jerked at his cry. Claire couldn't even whimper now, but her hands gestured desperately.
Hobbes shot forward and crashed into Darien, checking him like a hockey player to knock him back, breaking his grip on Claire. Gasping for breath, she staggered back, leaning heavily on the desk. Darien stumbled into the wall, pushed himself off it, but Hobbes tackled him, wrestling him into a headlock.
Fawkes struggled with the manic violence Hobbes well remembered, but his strength was nothing to that he used to have when taken by the quicksilver madness. Still, Hobbes was scared he would do himself real harm if he kept it up. "Calm down," he told Darien, all but begging. "We're not gonna hurt you, I promise. We'll make it stop. We'll make it better."
"No! You can't--you can't be..."
He abruptly went still. Hobbes, suspecting a trick, didn't release his hold. Darien was still conscious, but passive, as if all the hysteria driving him had snapped like a string pulled too taut. Hobbes felt him tremble. "It's a lie, I know...I'm sorry..."
"What?"
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." Darien's voice caught like a sob. "I'm so sorry, Bobby, I don't, I don't remember..."
"Hey--you know it's me?" Hobbes felt a sudden stab of relief so keen it stung. "It's all right, we're here for you, Fawkes. We got you out of there. You're safe now, you hear me? Just let us help you."
"Stop it..." Darien was beyond listening, not just insane but absorbed by a grief Bobby couldn't comprehend. "You're here so it's a lie...stop it..."
"Keep holding him," Claire said quietly, kneeling beside them, a hypodermic of clear fluid in her hand.
Hobbes nodded. Eberts took position on the other side as she raised the needle. He held Darien's head still as Claire brushed the hair back from his neck, then with swift precision injected the compound into the small swelling that marked the location of the quicksilver gland.
Fawkes jerked as the needle penetrated, but Hobbes and Eberts held him firm while she depressed the plunger. By the time she withdrew it he was already sinking down, shadowed scarlet eyes closing. "No..." he whispered, and then with a final tremor he was gone.
Hobbes looked to Claire. "You okay?"
She was rubbing her throat, but at the question she shot him a baffled glance, as if she couldn't imagine why he'd ask. "I'm fine."
They brought Darien back to the bedroom, laid him on the bed in silence. When finally he was settled, Hobbes released the breath it felt like he had been holding for the last hour. "God. They really fucked him up. Will he--is he gonna be all right?"
Claire raised her eyes from Darien to meet his with effort. "I hope so." Unconsciously her hands closed into fists at her sides. "I wish I could say better--I didn't imagine the...extent..." With iron will she reestablished control, her voice flattening into a businesslike tone of exposition. "The new counteragent should be more effective, but it will take his physiology a little time to adjust. Plus, in his current condition--" Her eyes drifted back to Fawkes, then were forced away, mask renewed--"With his stamina this low, he might be out for several days. I expect twenty-four hours at least. I'll set up an IV to replenish his nutrients..."
"But he'll be okay, when he wakes up?"
"Better than he is," the Keeper said evasively.
Eberts glanced to her, then cleared his throat. "What he was saying could indicate--"
"Yeah, what's with that crap?" Hobbes demanded. "He looks at me like he's seeing a ghost."
Eberts and Claire exchanged another look. Then Claire said slowly, "We could be mistaken, but from his reaction...I believe they may have told him that you...that you are dead, Bobby."
She deliberately didn't say more, but Hobbes could put two and two together. He added that hypothesis to Darien's half-coherent apologies and felt sick. "Oh God. They told him he did it. Those sons of bitches."
All too clearly he could see it. Darien alone in that room, and they told him his worst nightmare had come true, that he'd completely lost control--it would have been involuntary homicide, and he wouldn't have had any memory of it. Didn't matter one iota; Hobbes knew the way his partner's mind worked. His conscience would have scarred him and never let the wound heal. And seeing a reminder of that crime, what he was sure was a hallucination, at best a trick, must have hurt worse than the gland's agony. Hobbes scraped his hand across his eyes. "Those bastards..."
Claire and Eberts were waiting in silence while he assimilated it. "Okay," he said finally. "What do we do about it? Prove to him the truth?"
"Hopefully when Darien is able to think clearly, he'll be easier to convince," Claire said.
"I'm going to be here when he wakes up," Hobbes decided. "I'll hammer it into his thick skull whether he wants it or not. You don't get rid of Bobby Hobbes that easily. Fawkes better not have forgotten that."
"I doubt he could have, no matter how he tried," Eberts muttered.
Hobbes glared at him, then saw the slightest hint of a smile on the other man's lips. Not happiness, it wasn't even humor, really. But some things don't change and there was comfort in that. He needed the stability. They all did.
"Don't worry, Eberts, he won't have forgotten you either. You IRS types always stick in the memory. Like root canals do."
"That's it, I'm going to see to Darien and get to bed," Claire said with a yawn. "Listening to you two always puts me to sleep."
Hobbes and Eberts looked at one another in surprise. "Ouch," Hobbes said. "Score one for the Keeper."
Claire rolled her eyes and headed to her temporary lab, leaving the two of them alone together. Eberts made to follow her, but once they were in the hall Hobbes blocked his way.
"Hold it, Eberts," he said. "I want to know why you're doing this." He folded his arms and narrowed his eyes up at the other man. "You and the Official both. You didn't give a damn before. You threw Fawkes to the dogs like he was a piece of meat, sold him out--"
"Like a slave." The Keeper appeared at the doorway, her face closed.
"Yeah. That's what he always was to you. You never cared before--what happened?"
Eberts shut his eyes with something like genuine pain. "I'm sorry that was your impression. It wasn't true, in either my case, or the Official's."
"I never knew what to think," Claire said quietly. "I had to believe Darien meant more than that--what work I did, I did because I believed in the Agency. I believed that though we did what we needed to get the job done, we hadn't lost our compassion. We worked for the greater good, but we didn't ignore who we might hurt. We did all we could for everyone."
"Fawkes was one of us," Hobbes said. "He was an agent. How was I supposed to believe we can protect the nation, when we don't even protect our own?"
"You're right," Eberts said. "I'm helping you now because you're right."
"Then why didn't you see it sooner? When it really could've meant something? We got Fawkes out, but you saw him." Hobbes jerked his thumb toward the closed bedroom door. "The worst enemy of the state doesn't deserve what we did to him. Fawkes, God... At least Claire and I fought it. You and the Official let it happen. You could've done something--"
"You think we didn't try?" Eberts didn't speak loudly, but his voice shook with anger. "I didn't have any influence."
"You, no," Claire agreed. "But the Official--"
"Why do you think he was forced to retire?" Eberts snapped.
"'Forced'?"
"They couldn't fire him, and they couldn't terminate him, though they'd probably like to. He knows too much about too many people in high places for them to do that. But they made him leave. He pushed too hard. The only reason he stopped protesting when they drove him out of the Agency directorship was because he knew it would be useless, and because he knew he needed to keep what connections he still had. He knew you'd try this eventually, and he knew you would need his help. He asked me to stay with the Agency for the same reason."
"He asked you to stay?"
"Yes, Robert. He ordered me to stay. Of all of you, I was the only one who hadn't lodged a formal protest. The Official instructed me not to, in the interests of preserving my impeccable reputation. Other than contacting you, I was to forget I had ever known the name Darien Fawkes.
"You know I always have been exemplary at following instructions, but I assure you, that was one of the hardest I have ever been given." Eberts adjusted his tie, almost self-consciously. "I don't ask for your trust. But we have more important concerns now, and it's quite late. If we could see to Darien and then sleep, I'll try to answer whatever interrogation you want to give me in the morning."
Claire only nodded and returned back inside the room. Hobbes again stopped Eberts from following her.
"Hey," he said, awkwardly.
"Yes, Robert?"
"Eberts...uh..." He wiped his forehead. "Look, man, I'm sorry."
"Apology accepted," Eberts said stiffly, and made to move by him.
With a noiseless sigh, Hobbes let him pass. "Well, you can't say I didn't try," he muttered to whatever unseen force might be listening, and went to join them in the lab.
With Claire overseeing Hobbes and Eberts, they set up an IV for Darien and a couple other necessities. He was so deeply asleep he didn't stir as the tube slid into his vein, and his reflexes were almost nonexistent. "You sure this is normal?" Hobbes demanded yet again.
"Fairly certain, yes," Claire replied, and repeated her explanation. "The counteragent is acting to negate the effects of the quicksilver. His body has to reacclimatize itself to the lower levels, just as it originally had to adjust to the quicksilver's presence. You know, Darien was in a coma for three weeks when they first implanted the gland."
"He was?" Hobbes frowned down at the still man, torn between astonishment, pity, and anger. They had been putting Fawkes through hell from the very beginning...he hadn't understood that before. Sure, he had known Darien was an unwilling agent; though he enjoyed some of the perks of the job he had always insisted he wanted the gland out and himself free. After a while he had started to come around, look past his own self to responsibility, to duty, to what he could do for his country...
And to repay Darien for everything he'd done, his country cast him into hell.
There was once a time when Hobbes could have accepted this. He could have told himself it was what needed to be done, and if he personally found it morally uncomfortable, well, those who commanded him were made of sterner stuff. In the grand scheme of things, what did one man really matter? Especially a convicted criminal determined to squander whatever gifts he had. So the guy did a couple good deeds and got screwed anyway. Shit happened.
He couldn't do it anymore. Couldn't turn his back and cover his ears. Patriotism wasn't worth the price of his soul. Nothing was.
But if Fawkes were truly lost, he might as well have sold it, because nothing was going to mean anything anymore. If they won--if he'd let them win--
"Bobby!"
Claire's hand on his arm snapped him out of it. He belatedly realized that she had called his name several times, looked to her guiltily. "Yeah?"
"Eberts has brought food. Do you like take-out Thai?"
"Yeah. That'd be great for, uh--"
"Breakfast, actually," the Keeper said, nodding toward the window, where the sky was rosy with dawn.
They ate in the kitchen, a silent repast, each tangled in their own thoughts. When they had stowed the plates in the dishwasher Eberts said, "I have a couple errands to attend to; I'll be back as soon as possible."
"Not gonna go report on us to anyone, are you?" Hobbes asked.
Eberts returned his suspicion with a level gaze. "And of course I would tell you if I were, Robert. But you can come shopping if you'd like, in case you're worried about me pasting coded messages onto soup cans to be scanned by the register at the grocery store."
"Wiseass," Hobbes muttered, as the other man departed. "Okay, he's helpful, but does he have to be so annoying?"
"When dealing with you, apparently it's a requirement," Claire sighed.
Hobbes ignored her and made his way back to the guest room where Darien lay. Claire followed him, advising, "It would be best just to sleep now. Seeing as we didn't last night."
"Thought Eberts got a couple hours in."
"You could have as well. I suggested as much."
Hobbes shrugged as he took the chair by the bed. "Wasn't tired."
"Nevertheless, you need rest."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll catch up tonight. Besides, Fawkes is sleeping enough for both of us."
"That hardly counts." Claire sat down on the cot, angled to keep Darien in her line of sight.
Hobbes eyed her sideways. "It was a long night. You're looking peaked. Maybe you should lie down."
"I will if you will."
"Okay, okay."
He didn't move. Neither did she. After a little while, Hobbes said, quietly, "Dammit...he doesn't look like he's getting any real rest, either." Fawkes was still, except for the measured rise and fall of his chest. But his eyes were cast in deep shadow, ringed in darkness, and his cheeks were hollow. Even unconscious, his brow was drawn up in fine lines of pain, like faint scars. Hobbes grimly wondered if they ever would heal.
If only Fawkes would just open his eyes...and if only they would be clear of any red, clear of the madness...just clear...
When Eberts returned to his apartment that afternoon, all was quiet. Upon entering the guest room, he found all three of them. Darien was still unconscious. Claire was on the cot, sitting up propped against the wall with her legs stretched out and her eyes closed. Hobbes had tilted his chair until the back leaned against the wall; his head was rocked to the side as he snored.
Eberts shook his head disparagingly. After last night of course they were exhausted. They could have laid down and slept comfortably. Darien wouldn't awaken for hours yet, according to Claire's most positive estimate.
Fawkes's breathing hitched for a moment, evened again. Eberts turned his attention to the object of their concerns. Under Darien's closed lids one could perceive his eyes shifting. His body might be in repose but his dreaming mind was a