Person of Interest Fic: Funneled
Title: Funneled
Author: radioshack84
Characters: Reese, Finch, Carter, Fusco. Gen.
Rating: T
Warnings: None
Word Count: ~5,800
Summary: Bullets, bombs, bad weather, and beer. All in a day’s work. Set post-"Firewall".
Written for the pofinterest-fic summer gift exchange. Thanks to karri-kln1671 for the beta.
It wasn’t quite déjà vu, but it was close enough, Reese reflected as he traversed the hotel via the kitchen, then the laundry level, trying to make it back to the west stairwell without encountering Novak Construction’s security team. Unlike his last time in a hotel, he wasn’t being pursued by the FBI or an HR hit squad. He wasn’t exactly being pursued by the construction company’s private security force either, but since they’d gotten a good look at him when they’d put a bullet in his leg fifteen minutes ago, he’d decided it was in his best interest to stay out of sight until the job was done.
The sheer size of the Percival Whitfield Hotel would, in theory, make that a simple task. The building was the latest obscene creation from Novak and was touted to be the greatest hotel in Manhattan. Certain sources indicated otherwise, though. From reports of structural instability to accusations of faulty wiring that could turn the place into one massive firetrap, the PWH had been a point of contention among city officials and private firms alike ever since its opening two months back. That, of course, hadn’t stopped the masses from checking in. Room rates were already at a premium, and unless you knew somebody who knew somebody, the waiting list stretched to the end of next quarter and beyond.
Tonight alone, a large electronics expo, a banquet honoring new investors from one of the biggest Wall Street firms, and two high-profile wedding receptions were on the docket for the four enormous ballrooms of the PWH. Finch, Fusco, and Carter were currently in attendance at one of those receptions, keeping an eye on the groom who, by all indications of the Machine, was the intended victim of an unhappy, newly-acquired in-law. Reese had been planning to join them when he’d gotten a call from Finch, saying that another number had come up and would he please look into it before joining the party.
John had, and his investigation had led him to Edgar-Collins Engineering, a contractor often used by Novak, then straight to the PWH. He doubted that the number he was tracking had anything to do with the groom fifteen floors up, but if he was on the right track at all the design flaws of the hotel were more than just rumors and everyone currently in the building was soon going to be in a whole lot of trouble. John huffed out a breath as he exited the humid confines of the hotel laundry into a narrow service corridor. It was devoid of personnel, so he crouched briefly behind an equipment cart to survey the damage to his leg. The bullet had entered about mid-calf and from the look of the wound it was small-caliber, but there was no exit, and small-caliber or no it was bleeding badly for a leg wound. With no bandages available and no time to find any, Reese pulled the handkerchief from his pocket and gritted his teeth as he pressed it against the wound, tugged his pant leg back down over it, and tightly wrapped the makeshift dressing with the duct tape he’d found on the cart. He was disappearing into the stairwell by the time a curious maid poked her head out of the laundry room behind him.
Five minutes later, he had scaled six flights of stairs and was staring at an open electrical panel. A trace of a smile crossed John’s face as he paused long enough to catch his breath. The mechanism was just as described--not a bomb, per se, just a small charge placed with precision--probably enough to injure someone in close proximity, definitely enough to start a fire. The defective materials used in wiring the building would do the rest, so stated one Mr. George Hayes, Senior Electrical Engineer for Edgar-Collins.
Reese withdrew a small tool set from his jacket. His hand trembled slightly as he reached out with the screwdriver--adrenaline combined with blood loss, if the light woozy feeling in his head was any indication--but he unfastened the cover of the device with relative ease. It was a simple design, no vibration sensors to speak of. A quick snip of the blue wire, detach the cell phone trigger wire, short out the board for good measure, and the device was rendered inert. So stated Mr. Hayes after a bit of...persuasion. Reese thought that crushing the cell phone with his heel and pocketing the explosive material had been implied, so he did both.
In a way, he was sad to do it. Not that he wanted to see the building destroyed or damaged, but neither did he really like the thought of helping a vengeful engineer upset about a lost bid to get away with a plot that, if successful, would have most certainly cost lives. It wasn’t as if Mr. Hayes would be getting off easy, though. Novak was onto him, too, and had been in pursuit even before John had arrived at the PWH. The bullet currently lodged in his leg was a souvenir of the crossfire, and Reese doubted that Hayes was smart enough to evade Novak’s men forever.
At any rate, the charge was disarmed. Hayes had assured him, under persuasion, that it was the only one that had been planted, and Reese was tired. Actually, tired was an understatement. He checked the time and wearily limped toward the elevator. The wedding reception would be winding down before long, and as he hadn’t heard from Finch in over an hour, things there were likely under control. He decided to meet up with the others back at the suite Harold had reserved.
-----
“I told you vodka shots were a bad idea, Fusco!” Carter hissed as they maneuvered a staggering Finch through the door of the suite he’d directed them to.
“Hey, you can’t lay all of this on me. Those kids with the beer bong are equally guilty.”
“C’mon, guysss. It’s a paarty. Lighten up! Have a drink! I got the room with the mini-bar for a reason!”
“I think you’ve had just about enough, Finch,” Carter said, glaring at Fusco again.
Lionel shrugged. “They’re Russian, Carter, they toast with vodka instead of champagne. What did you want me to do?”
“Gee, I don’t know, maybe fill his glass with water instead?”
“He was sober to start with. If he’d wanted water, he’d have had water. I’m not his mother.”
Carter looked at him with a raised eyebrow and Fusco held up his hands. “All right, all right, truce. You have to admit that the bride’s cousins and their homemade beer were bad news though. I’m already halfway to a hangover, and I only had one.”
“I have just the cure, Detective!” Finch exclaimed happily, weaving his way back from the mini-bar with a bottle of beer in each hand. He held one out, and Fusco grabbed it from him just before the bespectacled man stumbled and fell onto the couch with a grunt, and promptly started giggling as he tried in vain to open his beer.
Fusco had no such difficulty, and ignored Carter’s look as he took a swig from the bottle. “Where’s Reese, anyway? Wasn’t he supposed to meet us at the reception?”
“Don’t worry, Detective. We’ll save him a beer!”
“You’ll save him one yourself at this rate,” Fusco commented, watching as the other man scrutinized his beer from all angles as though it were a chess board, then tried to pull the cap straight off like one would a cork from a bottle. Shaking his head, he turned to where Carter had switched on the TV and his eyes widened in surprise. “Is that what I think it is?” he asked.
“Yep, some tourists got video of a funnel cloud on their phones about twenty minutes ago. The weather service just confirmed it.”
“Question is, how the hell did he know about it?” Fusco nodded his head toward Finch, who was still being thwarted by the bottle cap. Their mysterious colleague had left his drinking competition at the reception abruptly and insisted that they all go back up to the suite to continue the party, since the weather was getting bad. As they’d already taken measures to ensure the safety of the groom, the detectives hadn’t really questioned Finch’s motives.
“I try really hard not to think about how he knows the things he does,” Carter answered.
Just then, the sound of multiple voices and footsteps filtered in from the hallway. Both became more numerous as they grew closer, and the general tone didn’t strike her as content. “What’s going on out there?” She moved cautiously toward the door and peered through the lens. There were maybe 30 people in the hallway, with more flocking in from the direction of the elevators. A few disappeared into rooms, but most just milled about looking worried.
“They’re being funneled,” Finch said.
“What do you mean?”
“Because of the funnel cloud,” he said, matter-of-factly, and started giggling again.
Before Carter could ask him what in the world he was talking about, the phone on the counter next to her started ringing. Glancing at Fusco, who shrugged, she picked up the receiver. “Hello?”
“Good evening. This is Pamela from the concierge desk. We’ve just been informed that the weather service has issued a tornado warning for the immediate vicinity. For your safety, we ask that you remain in your suite and keep away from any windows without reinforced paneling. Bathrooms are ideal. Also, your floor is a designated emergency area, so please excuse the intrusion of other guests not registered on the floor. We will notify you as soon as the danger has passed, and we apologize for the inconvenience.”
“Thank you,” Carter said and hung up. She relayed the news to the others.
“The funnel is here? Oh nooooooo!” Finch’s eyes grew wide as saucers and he staggered to his feet, his still-sealed bottle of beer thudding to the carpet, forgotten, as he hurriedly weaved toward the suite’s bedroom door and disappeared through. Immediately, there was a loud crash and a thud, glass shattered, Finch groaned, someone else swore, and the distinct sound of a gun being cocked on the other side of the door stopped the two detectives in their tracks before they could follow Finch.
-----
Reese was in pain. The heavy kind of pain that didn’t just hurt at the site of the injury, but radiated until half of his body was on fire with it. The kind of pain that wouldn’t let him sleep, but had drained away his strength to the point that he couldn’t properly wake up, either. So he was stuck in limbo, lying in the dark...somewhere.
Occasionally, the pain would gain enough traction to taunt him back to partial awareness, and when it did he opened his eyes, but that helped little considering his surroundings were pitch black. He began to test his other senses, in lieu of vision. Touch was almost useless through the pain, but by moving just his arms he discerned that he was lying on a relatively soft surface. That was all the further he got in his inventory before a bright flash and a crack of thunder startled him. He jumped, and the resulting agony in his leg stole his breath and whited out his vision worse than the lightning had. Time passed, but eventually the pulsing fire began to boil back down to that dull, heavy burn again, and Reese came back to himself to the sound of his own panting and the pounding of pouring rain. His eyes managed to focus for a few moments on the torrents of water lashing the window above his head before the rhythmic patter and the pain-fatigue sucked him back into oblivion.
When he surfaced again it wasn’t due to discomfort, not entirely, but to his perimeter alarm being tripped. Reese had to admit that, in hindsight, a tray of glasses and a couple of bottles of scotch made for poor security, even when strategically placed behind a door. For one thing, they didn’t stop an intruder from opening said door, only tripped them once they got through. For another, the door was too close to the bed, so a tripped-up intruder with enough momentum not only wound up well inside the room very quickly, but also on an unavoidable collision course.
This particular intruder was no exception, and crashed down on top of Reese with a groan. Reese swore, the sudden impact to his injured leg causing him to see stars, and he instinctively grabbed his gun from under his pillow. There was something odd about the intruder, though, especially his reaction when Reese cocked his weapon.
“John? Is that you?” whispered the intruder’s voice from very near Reese’s face.
Reese blinked. “Harold?”
Before he had a chance to say more, Finch was clumsily shifting off of him, or trying to, and turned toward the half-open door, shouting, “In here, detectives! I found him!”
John winced at the volume and the further jostling his leg took from Finch’s uncoordinated movements. The computer genius practically fell onto the opposite side of the bed next to him. “Finch, what are you doing?”
“I’ve been funneled!” Finch exclaimed, laughing, and it was then that Reese realized that the alcohol he was smelling wasn’t coming entirely from the broken bottles on the floor. Was Finch drunk?
“You’ve got that right,” Carter called out, inadvertently answering Reese’s question as she pushed open the door the rest of the way and flicked on the light. “What are you doing in here, Finch? I thought I heard...” she trailed off as she took in the sight before her. Broken glass and liquor covered the carpet, and Finch and Reese were sprawled on the bed side by side. They were shielding their eyes against the sudden brightness and, in Reese’s case, holding a gun--even if he didn’t seem quite sure where to point it. Finch was grinning. Reese...wasn’t. His pant leg and a small area of the white hotel comforter were soaked in blood, and his face was nearly as pale as the clean parts of the bedding. “John? My God, what happened to you?”
He turned his head toward her slightly, looking dazed, but didn’t answer. That almost worried her more than the blood. He was never at a loss for words, always having a comment for her, teasing or otherwise, unless he was just plain pissed off. The only other time she’d seen him like this was that night in the parking structure, months back. There had been a lot of blood then too. “John?” Carter tried again, shaking off her thoughts and hurrying over to the bed.
The motion must have caught his attention, because this time he met her eyes when he looked at her. “Hey,” he said, voice much softer than normal, “how was the party?”
At that, Carter snorted. “Fantastic, if you ask him,” she said, gesturing to Finch, who was sitting up now and was no longer grinning. Apparently the sight of Reese’s blood was enough to considerably dull his buzz, although he still looked like he was having a hard time putting two and two together about what was going on. Carter turned her attention back to Reese. “What about you? What happened to your leg?”
“Stray bullet. It seems I’m not the only one who has a bone to pick with George Hayes, and for good reason,” Reese said, pushing himself up with a wince.
Carter shoved an extra pillow behind his back and grasped his shoulders, helping him ease back against it. “Hayes is the one Finch said you were keeping an eye on?” At Reese’s nod, she asked, “Where is he now?”
“Still running from hotel security, I suppose...though maybe not if their aim has impro--improved,” John said, sucking in a sharp breath and closing his eyes as the fire pulsed through his leg once again.
Carter frowned at his barely-concealed moan. His hair was damp with sweat, and the tight set of his jaw spoke of a lot more pain than he was letting on. “We need to get you to a hospital.”
“Might be a little difficult in this storm.”
It wasn’t exactly an objection, she noted, and pulled out her phone. “You’d be surprised how much faster the response is if I flash my badge.”
“You...might want to hold off on that for the moment,” Finch said, sounding more like himself, if a bit frantic as he looked at his phone.
“Why’s that?” Fusco asked. He’d followed Carter into the room, but had remained silent during her exchange with Reese.
“John and I have been tracking Mr. Hayes’ phone. He’s still here, and I don’t think his motives are entirely...savory.” Finch paused and swallowed, suddenly looking a little green. “Uh...please excuse me for a moment.” He clamped a hand over his mouth and quickly handed his phone to Reese, making a beeline for the bathroom.
Reese looked at Fusco disapprovingly. “You shouldn’t have let him drink so much, Lionel. Remember last time?”
“You and Carter...why do you assume that this was up to me? You know what, never mind, next time I’ll just arrest him in the middle of the best man’s toast, because that won’t draw any attention.” Fusco rolled his eyes and downed the rest of his beer in a single shot.
“He’s just had a rough couple of months, that’s all.” Beeping from Finch’s phone, and then his own, put the discussion on hold. “Hayes is close.” John tapped at the phone’s screen for a few seconds and looked up when the bathroom door opened. “Harold, what’s near the sun deck at the opposite end of this floor?”
Finch shrugged and limped back across the room unsteadily, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. “Not much,” he said with a weary sigh, “guest suites, a utility closet used by the housekeeping staff, and the deck itself. Why?”
“The wiring schematic I was going over with Hayes earlier...I thought I remembered something else being there. A junction box, maybe?”
Finch retrieved his phone from Reese and in a few moments was viewing the diagram in question. “Oh, that’s not good.” He passed the phone back.
“That’s the ground lead from the lightning protection system...he’s going to try again, and in this weather it won’t take much.”
“Unless he gets electrocuted in the process.”
“I doubt he’s concerned. When Novak’s security gets to him he’s a dead man and he knows it,” Reese said, checking the remaining bullets in his gun before smacking the clip home with the heel of his hand. He gritted his teeth and swung his legs over the side of the bed, leaning forward and breathing heavily as he waited out the inevitable pain and headrush. It was more intense and lasted a little longer than he’d expected and he must have leaned further than necessary because Carter’s hands materialized on his shoulders again.
“Don’t you think maybe you should stay put?” she was saying.
He answered without looking up, “If Hayes manages to disconnect the lightning rod from the ground and attaches it to the hotel’s regular electrical system instead, it’s going to make his explosive from earlier look like a firecracker. I’d rather be elsewhere if that happens, as would everyone else. You and Lionel need to evacuate this floor right now, preferably the entire building. Take Finch with you.”
“And I suppose you’re going to go stop Hayes by yourself,” Fusco piped in. “Can you even walk?”
“If not, this likely won’t end well.”
Fusco shared a look with Carter, and sat down next to Reese, pulling one of John’s arms over his shoulders. “Let’s make sure it does end well.”
-----
As it turned out Reese could walk, but having Fusco there made the process go a lot more smoothly. For instance, this way he had an anchor to keep him from being knocked down and trampled by the somewhat-panicky guests swarming toward the stairs at Carter’s urging, whilst he and Fusco fought the crowd to get to the opposite end of the floor. Fusco only had to flash his badge once to convince an overly-concerned young woman to move on her way. Everyone else was too preoccupied with leaving to worry much about the stocky guy and the really pale guy in a suit who seemed intent on staying behind.
Reese and Fusco soon cleared the crowd, and John checked the GPS on his phone. “We need to hurry, Hayes is already outside.” He switched his phone for his gun and quickened his pace as best he could. When they reached the narrow walkway leading out to the deck, Reese stopped and squinted into the darkness beyond. He could just make out a figure through the rain, standing near the location of the junction box and conduits.
“How do you want to play this?” Fusco asked.
“Quickly. Once he gets those cables disconnected, we’re racing the next lightning strike.” Saying no more, he nodded to the detective to open the door, and together they plunged into the storm.
Out on the deck, the wind howled. Seventeen stories up, they might as well have been on the balcony of the penthouse. The PWH was the tallest structure in a comparatively underdeveloped portion of the city, offering them little protection from the forces of nature. Raindrops and tiny hailstones whipped by horizontally and stung their exposed skin.
Reese took a moment to get his footing and then retrieved his arm from Fusco. He limped forward, straight toward the unsuspecting Hayes, who had his back turned and was tinkering with the conduits attached to the side of the building. With the element of surprise on his side due to the darkness and the noise from the storm, Reese wasn’t expecting the screwdriver Hayes swung around with the instant he touched his shoulder. The engineer’s face was an expression of pure panic--even more so on seeing Reese--and John narrowly avoided being stabbed in the stomach.
Batting away the offending object, he landed a blow to Hayes’ jaw, but it had little effect on the shorter man, who seemed to be on an adrenaline high. Hayes gave him a surprisingly strong shove in return and backed away a few steps, eyes wild. Reese staggered, off-balance, and would have fallen if Fusco hadn’t righted him. Starting forward again, John and Hayes eyed each other warily. Hayes glanced to the conduits and then back to Reese.
“Unless you’re planning to reconnect those wires, I’d stay away from there,” Reese called out above the storm. He could see that Hayes had freed the grounding leads, but hadn’t attached them to anything yet.
“And why would I do that? Any minute now, the world’s going to see how low-quality Novak Construction’s work really is.”
“Do you know what funneling is, Mr. Hayes?”
“What?” Hayes cocked his head to the side in confusion at the non-sequitur.
“Funneling. It’s when you herd people together into a defined space to control them for your purposes. The storm warning did that for you. It brought everyone from the middle floors together here, as you knew it would. The hotel staff was trying to control them to keep them safe from the storm, but you’re just trying to kill them.”
“Casualties are often unavoidable in-in-in a massive electrical failure,” Hayes stuttered nervously, stepping back as Reese slowly advanced. “Those assholes at Novak need to learn that lesson!”
“They won’t learn it tonight. This floor, and the rest of the hotel, are being evacuated as we speak, Mr. Hayes. Your advantage is gone.” Reese stepped forward. Hayes stepped back. “Reconnect the ground leads.”
Hayes shook his head. “Even if I don’t get the leads hooked up to the electrical system, the place is still going to go up in flames with that much voltage coming down the pike.”
“Wrong answer, Mr. Hayes.” Reese stepped forward. Hayes stepped back.
Hayes’ heel caught on something solid and he stumbled, a horizontal bar in the middle of his back keeping him from falling, but not before he got a good look over the edge of the deck’s corner guard rail. “Wh-whoa!”
The engineer pushed himself upright and tried to shove his way forward past Reese, but Reese shoved right back, lifting him up and pinning him in an even more precarious position, shoulders and upper back over the rail’s edge, seventeen stories of air on either side. “How does it feel to be funneled, Mr. Hayes?” Reese asked.
“Hey, whoa! Take it easy! Let’s talk about this!”
“I’ve been talking. You’re not listening.” Reese leaned Hayes a little further over the edge and let go of his collar, so only his weight against Hayes’ legs was keeping the engineer from plunging over. It was a move not only for intimidation, but also so Hayes wouldn’t see his own grimace of pain as the bullet in his leg continued its apparent attempt to rip the limb apart
“I’m listening! I’m listening now!” Hayes squeaked from below, his voice rising at least an octave as his head and upper back dangled in open space. “I’ll do whatever you want! Please, let me go!”
Reese tilted his head to the side and managed a dark smile. “You want me to let you go?”
“Yes...NO! Help! Somebody help me!” Hayes shrieked.
“Help yourself, Mr. Hayes. Reconnect the ground wires, and I might just be able to get Detective Fusco to protect you from those other men who want you dead.”
“All right, all right! I swear I’ll fix it, just don’t do this!” Hayes cried out, hardly noticing in his panic the strange look that had come to his antagonist’s face. The next thing he knew, the tall man’s eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed, his anchoring weight disappearing from Hayes’ body. With a scream that bested any horror flick ever made, Hayes tipped backward over the rail.
He was still screaming a good ten seconds later, even though Fusco had grabbed his shins at the last possible moment and started to haul him back from the edge. The detective had been watching the scene play out with morbid curiosity from a short distance away, and had wondered what Reese wanted when he’d reached a hand behind him and somewhat-urgently motioned Fusco over. Lionel had still been about five feet back when he saw Reese’s knees buckle, and had actually had to dive over him to get to Hayes in time.
Now, he had Hayes back on solid ground, but the man was a mess--whimpering and trembling, curled up on the deck, but there was still work to be done. The sky continued to pour and lightning illuminated the insides of the low clouds, clouds that were too close to the building for comfort.
“Hey, buddy, you okay?” Fusco asked, crouching down next to Hayes after he’d checked on Reese.
“H-h-he’s d-d-d-de-de-deranged,” The engineer stuttered so badly that Fusco could barely make out the words, but he got the general idea.
“Yeah, that’s one way of putting it. Look, are you gonna clear up this mess you’ve made, or did I just throw out my back saving yours for no good reason?”
Apparently Hayes’ brush with mortality had made him less nonchalant about his life. He was galvanized into action by Fusco’s comment and staggered to his feet, racing back across the deck to fix what he’d broken. Fusco sighed, wiped the rain from his eyes, shivered, and wished for another beer as he contemplated the best way to get Reese back inside.
-----
John dreamed of lightning. Lightning and bombs, striking and setting off a chain reaction of explosions that blew apart his leg from the inside out. Lightning and the Machine, powering each other in a synergistic loop of intelligence and force that was at once terrifying and spectacular to behold. Lightning and metal spires, high above the earth, with himself atop the tallest, wrangling live wires, casting off into oblivion the people tangled within: Peter, Snow, Elias, Hayes--their screams echoing as they fell...
Reese awoke with a start, his own scream dying in his throat, the sound that came out unrecognizable as anything other than a grunt followed by a hoarse wheeze. It was still dark, he felt sick and sore, his leg ached terribly even though it had already been blown up a few times by the bombs, and he’d accidentally thrown Hayes off the building by passing out in the middle of an interrogation. Without the engineer to fix the lightning rod, everyone was still in danger. He had to get them out of the hotel, but his movement was being suppressed. A tangle of wires held him back, but he shoved at them with arms that were too tired and heavy, kept struggling. He had to get free, he had to--
“John, stop!”
He heard the clicking of heels across a hard floor. A soft, dim light switched on to the side and behind him, and he was suddenly looking up at Carter’s concerned face, her hand warm on his arm. “Joss?” he rasped, still trying to sit up. “What...”
“You’re in the hospital. Everyone’s safe, just take it easy before you tear something loose.”
Reese found he didn’t have much choice. His short struggle had burned through the nightmare-induced adrenaline, and left only pain and lethargy in its wake. Mostly pain. Eyes slipping closed, he tried to breathe through it. He felt Joss’s hand slide down and squeeze his briefly before she closed his fingers around something vaguely cylindrical.
“Morphine, if you want it. You’re already getting some, but your doctor says you’ll heal faster if you’re comfortable.”
Reese gave a slight nod of acknowledgement, but the button remained unpressed, loosely resting in his hand. “How bad?” he asked.
“As far as gunshots go, it could’ve been a lot worse. The bullet hit the bone but didn’t break it.”
“Did they get it out?” He knew from past experience that bullets caused all sorts of discomfort while they were lodged in places they shouldn’t be, but he’d never had a wound that felt like this after surgery--especially with morphine on board masking the effects.
He heard a chair slide across the floor, and it creaked slightly as Carter sat down with a sigh. “Yes, quite a while ago.”
She didn’t elaborate, and eventually Reese found the energy to power his curiosity and opened his eyes. The detective was curled up in her chair, a flask in one hand, and was staring intently at the floor. Reese frowned. “I didn’t take you for the type to drink on the job, Detective.”
“I’m not on the job. Hayes is in custody.”
Her tone was too severe for the subject matter, so John waited her out as he rode another wave of pain. Carter took three more swigs from her leather-wrapped flask before she spoke again, a combination of anger, fear, and frustration lingering beneath her calm, quiet tone. “You came real close this time, you know that? The bullet didn’t crack your bone, but it chipped and the fragment traveled up and wedged itself between your femoral nerve and artery. All the walking around you did after nicked the artery and you came close to bleeding out before they even figured out why.”
“That explains why it hurts more than it should.”
The detective shook her head. “Yeah, well, you’re just lucky Finch doesn’t hire idiots. They removed the fragment a couple of hours ago and your leg should be fine, but they said it may take a while for the nerve to calm down, so enjoy the painkillers.” She took another sip and proceeded to stare at the floor some more.
“Hey, Carter, you okay?” he asked gently.
“Let’s see, in the last 24 hours a crazy Russian woman tried to have her new son-in-law killed, an equally-crazy engineer who couldn’t take no for an answer tried to kill everyone else, you got shot, the first tornado the city’s seen in years touched down and caused millions in damage, and I had to deal with Finch after he rediscovered the joys of a beer bong. Yeah, yeah I’m just great.” She let out another sigh and looked up at Reese, her expression and voice softening a bit as she met his eyes, “If you get morphine, I at least deserve a drink.”
Reese chuckled softly. “Well, when you put it like that...cheers,” he said, raising the control in his hand like a glass and pressing the button.
She returned the gesture with her flask, smiling slightly, and the two of them lapsed into a comfortable silence. Reese relaxed as the medication started to take hold, and sleep was sounding like a pretty good idea when something occurred to him, “Did I really throw Hayes off the building?”
“Yeah, but I pulled him back from the brink...and let me tell you, he was heavier than he looked. I’ll be sending you my chiropractic bill,” Fusco said from the doorway. He was carrying a bag of take-out and offered a carton of Chinese food to Carter. “You know, you almost weren’t kidding when you said this place was nicer than the hotel,” he commented, taking a look around the room.
“Apparently Finch doesn’t cut corners,” she replied, digging into her Szechuan beef.
“Speaking of Finch, where is he?” Reese asked.
“Still sleeping it off down the hall,” Fusco said. “The doc wanted to keep an eye on him after he found out how much he’d had to drink.”
“Did he say anything more tonight about his...time away?”
Carter shook her head. “I doubt he’d mention it to us, anyway. We were there, but you were the one who found him, got him out of that factory.”
Reese frowned slightly, about to reply, but his brain didn’t seem willing to form a coherent response. Instead, he just nodded as his eyes drooped closed of their own accord.
“Finch looks a lot better than he did a few hours ago, though,” Fusco added. “The banana bag must’ve helped.”
“Bananas? I thought he was opening a pomegranate factory with a giant soda machine,” Reese said seriously.
Fusco blinked. “What are you talking about?”
“The soda machine is really smart, Lionel. It can kill monkeys.”
Carter laughed. “Morphine,” she explained to her confused colleague and stood up, squeezing Reese’s hand once more. “Get some sleep, John. We’ll see you tomorrow.”
Fusco and Carter were halfway to the door when Reese’s voice stopped them. “Detectives?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for looking after Finch, and...stuff.”
Fusco chuckled at the inarticulate, but very sincere, sentiment. “Sure thing, pal. Feel better.”
THE END
Author: radioshack84
Characters: Reese, Finch, Carter, Fusco. Gen.
Rating: T
Warnings: None
Word Count: ~5,800
Summary: Bullets, bombs, bad weather, and beer. All in a day’s work. Set post-"Firewall".
Written for the pofinterest-fic summer gift exchange. Thanks to karri-kln1671 for the beta.
It wasn’t quite déjà vu, but it was close enough, Reese reflected as he traversed the hotel via the kitchen, then the laundry level, trying to make it back to the west stairwell without encountering Novak Construction’s security team. Unlike his last time in a hotel, he wasn’t being pursued by the FBI or an HR hit squad. He wasn’t exactly being pursued by the construction company’s private security force either, but since they’d gotten a good look at him when they’d put a bullet in his leg fifteen minutes ago, he’d decided it was in his best interest to stay out of sight until the job was done.
The sheer size of the Percival Whitfield Hotel would, in theory, make that a simple task. The building was the latest obscene creation from Novak and was touted to be the greatest hotel in Manhattan. Certain sources indicated otherwise, though. From reports of structural instability to accusations of faulty wiring that could turn the place into one massive firetrap, the PWH had been a point of contention among city officials and private firms alike ever since its opening two months back. That, of course, hadn’t stopped the masses from checking in. Room rates were already at a premium, and unless you knew somebody who knew somebody, the waiting list stretched to the end of next quarter and beyond.
Tonight alone, a large electronics expo, a banquet honoring new investors from one of the biggest Wall Street firms, and two high-profile wedding receptions were on the docket for the four enormous ballrooms of the PWH. Finch, Fusco, and Carter were currently in attendance at one of those receptions, keeping an eye on the groom who, by all indications of the Machine, was the intended victim of an unhappy, newly-acquired in-law. Reese had been planning to join them when he’d gotten a call from Finch, saying that another number had come up and would he please look into it before joining the party.
John had, and his investigation had led him to Edgar-Collins Engineering, a contractor often used by Novak, then straight to the PWH. He doubted that the number he was tracking had anything to do with the groom fifteen floors up, but if he was on the right track at all the design flaws of the hotel were more than just rumors and everyone currently in the building was soon going to be in a whole lot of trouble. John huffed out a breath as he exited the humid confines of the hotel laundry into a narrow service corridor. It was devoid of personnel, so he crouched briefly behind an equipment cart to survey the damage to his leg. The bullet had entered about mid-calf and from the look of the wound it was small-caliber, but there was no exit, and small-caliber or no it was bleeding badly for a leg wound. With no bandages available and no time to find any, Reese pulled the handkerchief from his pocket and gritted his teeth as he pressed it against the wound, tugged his pant leg back down over it, and tightly wrapped the makeshift dressing with the duct tape he’d found on the cart. He was disappearing into the stairwell by the time a curious maid poked her head out of the laundry room behind him.
Five minutes later, he had scaled six flights of stairs and was staring at an open electrical panel. A trace of a smile crossed John’s face as he paused long enough to catch his breath. The mechanism was just as described--not a bomb, per se, just a small charge placed with precision--probably enough to injure someone in close proximity, definitely enough to start a fire. The defective materials used in wiring the building would do the rest, so stated one Mr. George Hayes, Senior Electrical Engineer for Edgar-Collins.
Reese withdrew a small tool set from his jacket. His hand trembled slightly as he reached out with the screwdriver--adrenaline combined with blood loss, if the light woozy feeling in his head was any indication--but he unfastened the cover of the device with relative ease. It was a simple design, no vibration sensors to speak of. A quick snip of the blue wire, detach the cell phone trigger wire, short out the board for good measure, and the device was rendered inert. So stated Mr. Hayes after a bit of...persuasion. Reese thought that crushing the cell phone with his heel and pocketing the explosive material had been implied, so he did both.
In a way, he was sad to do it. Not that he wanted to see the building destroyed or damaged, but neither did he really like the thought of helping a vengeful engineer upset about a lost bid to get away with a plot that, if successful, would have most certainly cost lives. It wasn’t as if Mr. Hayes would be getting off easy, though. Novak was onto him, too, and had been in pursuit even before John had arrived at the PWH. The bullet currently lodged in his leg was a souvenir of the crossfire, and Reese doubted that Hayes was smart enough to evade Novak’s men forever.
At any rate, the charge was disarmed. Hayes had assured him, under persuasion, that it was the only one that had been planted, and Reese was tired. Actually, tired was an understatement. He checked the time and wearily limped toward the elevator. The wedding reception would be winding down before long, and as he hadn’t heard from Finch in over an hour, things there were likely under control. He decided to meet up with the others back at the suite Harold had reserved.
-----
“I told you vodka shots were a bad idea, Fusco!” Carter hissed as they maneuvered a staggering Finch through the door of the suite he’d directed them to.
“Hey, you can’t lay all of this on me. Those kids with the beer bong are equally guilty.”
“C’mon, guysss. It’s a paarty. Lighten up! Have a drink! I got the room with the mini-bar for a reason!”
“I think you’ve had just about enough, Finch,” Carter said, glaring at Fusco again.
Lionel shrugged. “They’re Russian, Carter, they toast with vodka instead of champagne. What did you want me to do?”
“Gee, I don’t know, maybe fill his glass with water instead?”
“He was sober to start with. If he’d wanted water, he’d have had water. I’m not his mother.”
Carter looked at him with a raised eyebrow and Fusco held up his hands. “All right, all right, truce. You have to admit that the bride’s cousins and their homemade beer were bad news though. I’m already halfway to a hangover, and I only had one.”
“I have just the cure, Detective!” Finch exclaimed happily, weaving his way back from the mini-bar with a bottle of beer in each hand. He held one out, and Fusco grabbed it from him just before the bespectacled man stumbled and fell onto the couch with a grunt, and promptly started giggling as he tried in vain to open his beer.
Fusco had no such difficulty, and ignored Carter’s look as he took a swig from the bottle. “Where’s Reese, anyway? Wasn’t he supposed to meet us at the reception?”
“Don’t worry, Detective. We’ll save him a beer!”
“You’ll save him one yourself at this rate,” Fusco commented, watching as the other man scrutinized his beer from all angles as though it were a chess board, then tried to pull the cap straight off like one would a cork from a bottle. Shaking his head, he turned to where Carter had switched on the TV and his eyes widened in surprise. “Is that what I think it is?” he asked.
“Yep, some tourists got video of a funnel cloud on their phones about twenty minutes ago. The weather service just confirmed it.”
“Question is, how the hell did he know about it?” Fusco nodded his head toward Finch, who was still being thwarted by the bottle cap. Their mysterious colleague had left his drinking competition at the reception abruptly and insisted that they all go back up to the suite to continue the party, since the weather was getting bad. As they’d already taken measures to ensure the safety of the groom, the detectives hadn’t really questioned Finch’s motives.
“I try really hard not to think about how he knows the things he does,” Carter answered.
Just then, the sound of multiple voices and footsteps filtered in from the hallway. Both became more numerous as they grew closer, and the general tone didn’t strike her as content. “What’s going on out there?” She moved cautiously toward the door and peered through the lens. There were maybe 30 people in the hallway, with more flocking in from the direction of the elevators. A few disappeared into rooms, but most just milled about looking worried.
“They’re being funneled,” Finch said.
“What do you mean?”
“Because of the funnel cloud,” he said, matter-of-factly, and started giggling again.
Before Carter could ask him what in the world he was talking about, the phone on the counter next to her started ringing. Glancing at Fusco, who shrugged, she picked up the receiver. “Hello?”
“Good evening. This is Pamela from the concierge desk. We’ve just been informed that the weather service has issued a tornado warning for the immediate vicinity. For your safety, we ask that you remain in your suite and keep away from any windows without reinforced paneling. Bathrooms are ideal. Also, your floor is a designated emergency area, so please excuse the intrusion of other guests not registered on the floor. We will notify you as soon as the danger has passed, and we apologize for the inconvenience.”
“Thank you,” Carter said and hung up. She relayed the news to the others.
“The funnel is here? Oh nooooooo!” Finch’s eyes grew wide as saucers and he staggered to his feet, his still-sealed bottle of beer thudding to the carpet, forgotten, as he hurriedly weaved toward the suite’s bedroom door and disappeared through. Immediately, there was a loud crash and a thud, glass shattered, Finch groaned, someone else swore, and the distinct sound of a gun being cocked on the other side of the door stopped the two detectives in their tracks before they could follow Finch.
-----
Reese was in pain. The heavy kind of pain that didn’t just hurt at the site of the injury, but radiated until half of his body was on fire with it. The kind of pain that wouldn’t let him sleep, but had drained away his strength to the point that he couldn’t properly wake up, either. So he was stuck in limbo, lying in the dark...somewhere.
Occasionally, the pain would gain enough traction to taunt him back to partial awareness, and when it did he opened his eyes, but that helped little considering his surroundings were pitch black. He began to test his other senses, in lieu of vision. Touch was almost useless through the pain, but by moving just his arms he discerned that he was lying on a relatively soft surface. That was all the further he got in his inventory before a bright flash and a crack of thunder startled him. He jumped, and the resulting agony in his leg stole his breath and whited out his vision worse than the lightning had. Time passed, but eventually the pulsing fire began to boil back down to that dull, heavy burn again, and Reese came back to himself to the sound of his own panting and the pounding of pouring rain. His eyes managed to focus for a few moments on the torrents of water lashing the window above his head before the rhythmic patter and the pain-fatigue sucked him back into oblivion.
When he surfaced again it wasn’t due to discomfort, not entirely, but to his perimeter alarm being tripped. Reese had to admit that, in hindsight, a tray of glasses and a couple of bottles of scotch made for poor security, even when strategically placed behind a door. For one thing, they didn’t stop an intruder from opening said door, only tripped them once they got through. For another, the door was too close to the bed, so a tripped-up intruder with enough momentum not only wound up well inside the room very quickly, but also on an unavoidable collision course.
This particular intruder was no exception, and crashed down on top of Reese with a groan. Reese swore, the sudden impact to his injured leg causing him to see stars, and he instinctively grabbed his gun from under his pillow. There was something odd about the intruder, though, especially his reaction when Reese cocked his weapon.
“John? Is that you?” whispered the intruder’s voice from very near Reese’s face.
Reese blinked. “Harold?”
Before he had a chance to say more, Finch was clumsily shifting off of him, or trying to, and turned toward the half-open door, shouting, “In here, detectives! I found him!”
John winced at the volume and the further jostling his leg took from Finch’s uncoordinated movements. The computer genius practically fell onto the opposite side of the bed next to him. “Finch, what are you doing?”
“I’ve been funneled!” Finch exclaimed, laughing, and it was then that Reese realized that the alcohol he was smelling wasn’t coming entirely from the broken bottles on the floor. Was Finch drunk?
“You’ve got that right,” Carter called out, inadvertently answering Reese’s question as she pushed open the door the rest of the way and flicked on the light. “What are you doing in here, Finch? I thought I heard...” she trailed off as she took in the sight before her. Broken glass and liquor covered the carpet, and Finch and Reese were sprawled on the bed side by side. They were shielding their eyes against the sudden brightness and, in Reese’s case, holding a gun--even if he didn’t seem quite sure where to point it. Finch was grinning. Reese...wasn’t. His pant leg and a small area of the white hotel comforter were soaked in blood, and his face was nearly as pale as the clean parts of the bedding. “John? My God, what happened to you?”
He turned his head toward her slightly, looking dazed, but didn’t answer. That almost worried her more than the blood. He was never at a loss for words, always having a comment for her, teasing or otherwise, unless he was just plain pissed off. The only other time she’d seen him like this was that night in the parking structure, months back. There had been a lot of blood then too. “John?” Carter tried again, shaking off her thoughts and hurrying over to the bed.
The motion must have caught his attention, because this time he met her eyes when he looked at her. “Hey,” he said, voice much softer than normal, “how was the party?”
At that, Carter snorted. “Fantastic, if you ask him,” she said, gesturing to Finch, who was sitting up now and was no longer grinning. Apparently the sight of Reese’s blood was enough to considerably dull his buzz, although he still looked like he was having a hard time putting two and two together about what was going on. Carter turned her attention back to Reese. “What about you? What happened to your leg?”
“Stray bullet. It seems I’m not the only one who has a bone to pick with George Hayes, and for good reason,” Reese said, pushing himself up with a wince.
Carter shoved an extra pillow behind his back and grasped his shoulders, helping him ease back against it. “Hayes is the one Finch said you were keeping an eye on?” At Reese’s nod, she asked, “Where is he now?”
“Still running from hotel security, I suppose...though maybe not if their aim has impro--improved,” John said, sucking in a sharp breath and closing his eyes as the fire pulsed through his leg once again.
Carter frowned at his barely-concealed moan. His hair was damp with sweat, and the tight set of his jaw spoke of a lot more pain than he was letting on. “We need to get you to a hospital.”
“Might be a little difficult in this storm.”
It wasn’t exactly an objection, she noted, and pulled out her phone. “You’d be surprised how much faster the response is if I flash my badge.”
“You...might want to hold off on that for the moment,” Finch said, sounding more like himself, if a bit frantic as he looked at his phone.
“Why’s that?” Fusco asked. He’d followed Carter into the room, but had remained silent during her exchange with Reese.
“John and I have been tracking Mr. Hayes’ phone. He’s still here, and I don’t think his motives are entirely...savory.” Finch paused and swallowed, suddenly looking a little green. “Uh...please excuse me for a moment.” He clamped a hand over his mouth and quickly handed his phone to Reese, making a beeline for the bathroom.
Reese looked at Fusco disapprovingly. “You shouldn’t have let him drink so much, Lionel. Remember last time?”
“You and Carter...why do you assume that this was up to me? You know what, never mind, next time I’ll just arrest him in the middle of the best man’s toast, because that won’t draw any attention.” Fusco rolled his eyes and downed the rest of his beer in a single shot.
“He’s just had a rough couple of months, that’s all.” Beeping from Finch’s phone, and then his own, put the discussion on hold. “Hayes is close.” John tapped at the phone’s screen for a few seconds and looked up when the bathroom door opened. “Harold, what’s near the sun deck at the opposite end of this floor?”
Finch shrugged and limped back across the room unsteadily, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. “Not much,” he said with a weary sigh, “guest suites, a utility closet used by the housekeeping staff, and the deck itself. Why?”
“The wiring schematic I was going over with Hayes earlier...I thought I remembered something else being there. A junction box, maybe?”
Finch retrieved his phone from Reese and in a few moments was viewing the diagram in question. “Oh, that’s not good.” He passed the phone back.
“That’s the ground lead from the lightning protection system...he’s going to try again, and in this weather it won’t take much.”
“Unless he gets electrocuted in the process.”
“I doubt he’s concerned. When Novak’s security gets to him he’s a dead man and he knows it,” Reese said, checking the remaining bullets in his gun before smacking the clip home with the heel of his hand. He gritted his teeth and swung his legs over the side of the bed, leaning forward and breathing heavily as he waited out the inevitable pain and headrush. It was more intense and lasted a little longer than he’d expected and he must have leaned further than necessary because Carter’s hands materialized on his shoulders again.
“Don’t you think maybe you should stay put?” she was saying.
He answered without looking up, “If Hayes manages to disconnect the lightning rod from the ground and attaches it to the hotel’s regular electrical system instead, it’s going to make his explosive from earlier look like a firecracker. I’d rather be elsewhere if that happens, as would everyone else. You and Lionel need to evacuate this floor right now, preferably the entire building. Take Finch with you.”
“And I suppose you’re going to go stop Hayes by yourself,” Fusco piped in. “Can you even walk?”
“If not, this likely won’t end well.”
Fusco shared a look with Carter, and sat down next to Reese, pulling one of John’s arms over his shoulders. “Let’s make sure it does end well.”
-----
As it turned out Reese could walk, but having Fusco there made the process go a lot more smoothly. For instance, this way he had an anchor to keep him from being knocked down and trampled by the somewhat-panicky guests swarming toward the stairs at Carter’s urging, whilst he and Fusco fought the crowd to get to the opposite end of the floor. Fusco only had to flash his badge once to convince an overly-concerned young woman to move on her way. Everyone else was too preoccupied with leaving to worry much about the stocky guy and the really pale guy in a suit who seemed intent on staying behind.
Reese and Fusco soon cleared the crowd, and John checked the GPS on his phone. “We need to hurry, Hayes is already outside.” He switched his phone for his gun and quickened his pace as best he could. When they reached the narrow walkway leading out to the deck, Reese stopped and squinted into the darkness beyond. He could just make out a figure through the rain, standing near the location of the junction box and conduits.
“How do you want to play this?” Fusco asked.
“Quickly. Once he gets those cables disconnected, we’re racing the next lightning strike.” Saying no more, he nodded to the detective to open the door, and together they plunged into the storm.
Out on the deck, the wind howled. Seventeen stories up, they might as well have been on the balcony of the penthouse. The PWH was the tallest structure in a comparatively underdeveloped portion of the city, offering them little protection from the forces of nature. Raindrops and tiny hailstones whipped by horizontally and stung their exposed skin.
Reese took a moment to get his footing and then retrieved his arm from Fusco. He limped forward, straight toward the unsuspecting Hayes, who had his back turned and was tinkering with the conduits attached to the side of the building. With the element of surprise on his side due to the darkness and the noise from the storm, Reese wasn’t expecting the screwdriver Hayes swung around with the instant he touched his shoulder. The engineer’s face was an expression of pure panic--even more so on seeing Reese--and John narrowly avoided being stabbed in the stomach.
Batting away the offending object, he landed a blow to Hayes’ jaw, but it had little effect on the shorter man, who seemed to be on an adrenaline high. Hayes gave him a surprisingly strong shove in return and backed away a few steps, eyes wild. Reese staggered, off-balance, and would have fallen if Fusco hadn’t righted him. Starting forward again, John and Hayes eyed each other warily. Hayes glanced to the conduits and then back to Reese.
“Unless you’re planning to reconnect those wires, I’d stay away from there,” Reese called out above the storm. He could see that Hayes had freed the grounding leads, but hadn’t attached them to anything yet.
“And why would I do that? Any minute now, the world’s going to see how low-quality Novak Construction’s work really is.”
“Do you know what funneling is, Mr. Hayes?”
“What?” Hayes cocked his head to the side in confusion at the non-sequitur.
“Funneling. It’s when you herd people together into a defined space to control them for your purposes. The storm warning did that for you. It brought everyone from the middle floors together here, as you knew it would. The hotel staff was trying to control them to keep them safe from the storm, but you’re just trying to kill them.”
“Casualties are often unavoidable in-in-in a massive electrical failure,” Hayes stuttered nervously, stepping back as Reese slowly advanced. “Those assholes at Novak need to learn that lesson!”
“They won’t learn it tonight. This floor, and the rest of the hotel, are being evacuated as we speak, Mr. Hayes. Your advantage is gone.” Reese stepped forward. Hayes stepped back. “Reconnect the ground leads.”
Hayes shook his head. “Even if I don’t get the leads hooked up to the electrical system, the place is still going to go up in flames with that much voltage coming down the pike.”
“Wrong answer, Mr. Hayes.” Reese stepped forward. Hayes stepped back.
Hayes’ heel caught on something solid and he stumbled, a horizontal bar in the middle of his back keeping him from falling, but not before he got a good look over the edge of the deck’s corner guard rail. “Wh-whoa!”
The engineer pushed himself upright and tried to shove his way forward past Reese, but Reese shoved right back, lifting him up and pinning him in an even more precarious position, shoulders and upper back over the rail’s edge, seventeen stories of air on either side. “How does it feel to be funneled, Mr. Hayes?” Reese asked.
“Hey, whoa! Take it easy! Let’s talk about this!”
“I’ve been talking. You’re not listening.” Reese leaned Hayes a little further over the edge and let go of his collar, so only his weight against Hayes’ legs was keeping the engineer from plunging over. It was a move not only for intimidation, but also so Hayes wouldn’t see his own grimace of pain as the bullet in his leg continued its apparent attempt to rip the limb apart
“I’m listening! I’m listening now!” Hayes squeaked from below, his voice rising at least an octave as his head and upper back dangled in open space. “I’ll do whatever you want! Please, let me go!”
Reese tilted his head to the side and managed a dark smile. “You want me to let you go?”
“Yes...NO! Help! Somebody help me!” Hayes shrieked.
“Help yourself, Mr. Hayes. Reconnect the ground wires, and I might just be able to get Detective Fusco to protect you from those other men who want you dead.”
“All right, all right! I swear I’ll fix it, just don’t do this!” Hayes cried out, hardly noticing in his panic the strange look that had come to his antagonist’s face. The next thing he knew, the tall man’s eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed, his anchoring weight disappearing from Hayes’ body. With a scream that bested any horror flick ever made, Hayes tipped backward over the rail.
He was still screaming a good ten seconds later, even though Fusco had grabbed his shins at the last possible moment and started to haul him back from the edge. The detective had been watching the scene play out with morbid curiosity from a short distance away, and had wondered what Reese wanted when he’d reached a hand behind him and somewhat-urgently motioned Fusco over. Lionel had still been about five feet back when he saw Reese’s knees buckle, and had actually had to dive over him to get to Hayes in time.
Now, he had Hayes back on solid ground, but the man was a mess--whimpering and trembling, curled up on the deck, but there was still work to be done. The sky continued to pour and lightning illuminated the insides of the low clouds, clouds that were too close to the building for comfort.
“Hey, buddy, you okay?” Fusco asked, crouching down next to Hayes after he’d checked on Reese.
“H-h-he’s d-d-d-de-de-deranged,” The engineer stuttered so badly that Fusco could barely make out the words, but he got the general idea.
“Yeah, that’s one way of putting it. Look, are you gonna clear up this mess you’ve made, or did I just throw out my back saving yours for no good reason?”
Apparently Hayes’ brush with mortality had made him less nonchalant about his life. He was galvanized into action by Fusco’s comment and staggered to his feet, racing back across the deck to fix what he’d broken. Fusco sighed, wiped the rain from his eyes, shivered, and wished for another beer as he contemplated the best way to get Reese back inside.
-----
John dreamed of lightning. Lightning and bombs, striking and setting off a chain reaction of explosions that blew apart his leg from the inside out. Lightning and the Machine, powering each other in a synergistic loop of intelligence and force that was at once terrifying and spectacular to behold. Lightning and metal spires, high above the earth, with himself atop the tallest, wrangling live wires, casting off into oblivion the people tangled within: Peter, Snow, Elias, Hayes--their screams echoing as they fell...
Reese awoke with a start, his own scream dying in his throat, the sound that came out unrecognizable as anything other than a grunt followed by a hoarse wheeze. It was still dark, he felt sick and sore, his leg ached terribly even though it had already been blown up a few times by the bombs, and he’d accidentally thrown Hayes off the building by passing out in the middle of an interrogation. Without the engineer to fix the lightning rod, everyone was still in danger. He had to get them out of the hotel, but his movement was being suppressed. A tangle of wires held him back, but he shoved at them with arms that were too tired and heavy, kept struggling. He had to get free, he had to--
“John, stop!”
He heard the clicking of heels across a hard floor. A soft, dim light switched on to the side and behind him, and he was suddenly looking up at Carter’s concerned face, her hand warm on his arm. “Joss?” he rasped, still trying to sit up. “What...”
“You’re in the hospital. Everyone’s safe, just take it easy before you tear something loose.”
Reese found he didn’t have much choice. His short struggle had burned through the nightmare-induced adrenaline, and left only pain and lethargy in its wake. Mostly pain. Eyes slipping closed, he tried to breathe through it. He felt Joss’s hand slide down and squeeze his briefly before she closed his fingers around something vaguely cylindrical.
“Morphine, if you want it. You’re already getting some, but your doctor says you’ll heal faster if you’re comfortable.”
Reese gave a slight nod of acknowledgement, but the button remained unpressed, loosely resting in his hand. “How bad?” he asked.
“As far as gunshots go, it could’ve been a lot worse. The bullet hit the bone but didn’t break it.”
“Did they get it out?” He knew from past experience that bullets caused all sorts of discomfort while they were lodged in places they shouldn’t be, but he’d never had a wound that felt like this after surgery--especially with morphine on board masking the effects.
He heard a chair slide across the floor, and it creaked slightly as Carter sat down with a sigh. “Yes, quite a while ago.”
She didn’t elaborate, and eventually Reese found the energy to power his curiosity and opened his eyes. The detective was curled up in her chair, a flask in one hand, and was staring intently at the floor. Reese frowned. “I didn’t take you for the type to drink on the job, Detective.”
“I’m not on the job. Hayes is in custody.”
Her tone was too severe for the subject matter, so John waited her out as he rode another wave of pain. Carter took three more swigs from her leather-wrapped flask before she spoke again, a combination of anger, fear, and frustration lingering beneath her calm, quiet tone. “You came real close this time, you know that? The bullet didn’t crack your bone, but it chipped and the fragment traveled up and wedged itself between your femoral nerve and artery. All the walking around you did after nicked the artery and you came close to bleeding out before they even figured out why.”
“That explains why it hurts more than it should.”
The detective shook her head. “Yeah, well, you’re just lucky Finch doesn’t hire idiots. They removed the fragment a couple of hours ago and your leg should be fine, but they said it may take a while for the nerve to calm down, so enjoy the painkillers.” She took another sip and proceeded to stare at the floor some more.
“Hey, Carter, you okay?” he asked gently.
“Let’s see, in the last 24 hours a crazy Russian woman tried to have her new son-in-law killed, an equally-crazy engineer who couldn’t take no for an answer tried to kill everyone else, you got shot, the first tornado the city’s seen in years touched down and caused millions in damage, and I had to deal with Finch after he rediscovered the joys of a beer bong. Yeah, yeah I’m just great.” She let out another sigh and looked up at Reese, her expression and voice softening a bit as she met his eyes, “If you get morphine, I at least deserve a drink.”
Reese chuckled softly. “Well, when you put it like that...cheers,” he said, raising the control in his hand like a glass and pressing the button.
She returned the gesture with her flask, smiling slightly, and the two of them lapsed into a comfortable silence. Reese relaxed as the medication started to take hold, and sleep was sounding like a pretty good idea when something occurred to him, “Did I really throw Hayes off the building?”
“Yeah, but I pulled him back from the brink...and let me tell you, he was heavier than he looked. I’ll be sending you my chiropractic bill,” Fusco said from the doorway. He was carrying a bag of take-out and offered a carton of Chinese food to Carter. “You know, you almost weren’t kidding when you said this place was nicer than the hotel,” he commented, taking a look around the room.
“Apparently Finch doesn’t cut corners,” she replied, digging into her Szechuan beef.
“Speaking of Finch, where is he?” Reese asked.
“Still sleeping it off down the hall,” Fusco said. “The doc wanted to keep an eye on him after he found out how much he’d had to drink.”
“Did he say anything more tonight about his...time away?”
Carter shook her head. “I doubt he’d mention it to us, anyway. We were there, but you were the one who found him, got him out of that factory.”
Reese frowned slightly, about to reply, but his brain didn’t seem willing to form a coherent response. Instead, he just nodded as his eyes drooped closed of their own accord.
“Finch looks a lot better than he did a few hours ago, though,” Fusco added. “The banana bag must’ve helped.”
“Bananas? I thought he was opening a pomegranate factory with a giant soda machine,” Reese said seriously.
Fusco blinked. “What are you talking about?”
“The soda machine is really smart, Lionel. It can kill monkeys.”
Carter laughed. “Morphine,” she explained to her confused colleague and stood up, squeezing Reese’s hand once more. “Get some sleep, John. We’ll see you tomorrow.”
Fusco and Carter were halfway to the door when Reese’s voice stopped them. “Detectives?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for looking after Finch, and...stuff.”
Fusco chuckled at the inarticulate, but very sincere, sentiment. “Sure thing, pal. Feel better.”
THE END