fic: The Rules of Battleship (sociopaths, Pete/Patrick)
title: The Rules of Battleship
fandom: Wentzdom
pairing: Pete/Patrick
summary: For at least two weeks, it's on the front page of every single newspaper and magazine out there. Sweet red-headed boy, kidnapped years ago by one of the country's - no, the continent's - no, the world's most infamous, dangerous, evil, fascinating criminals, and now returned to his home and his family.
warnings: Gleefully unrepentant sociopaths, death of minor characters, Pete Wentz.
notes: For channonyarrow, who, when I demanded that my flist give me things to write, cheerfully suggested, "Sociopaths!" This is set before The Line Between Us and Them.
disclaimer: Oh my god, this is possibly the least true thing I have ever written.
For at least two weeks, it's on the front page of every single newspaper and magazine out there. Who, after all, could resist this story? Sweet red-headed boy, kidnapped years ago by one of the country's - no, the continent's - no, the world's most infamous, dangerous, evil, fascinating criminals, and now returned to his home and his family.
PATRICK STUMPH RETURNED TO FAMILY!
STUMPH FAMILY CRIES TEARS OF JOY AS KIDNAPPED SON RETURNS
SAYS MRS. STUMPH, "WE'RE JUST SO GLAD HE'S OKAY AND BACK HOME."
PATRICK FREE OF PETE WENTZ; HOW DOES IT FEEL?
AN IN-DEPTH LOOK AT THE COUNTRY'S MOST FAMOUS CAPTIVE
Even when the headlines focus on something else, there's generally some sort of byline about Patrick or Pete to be found. How Patrick is settling in, whether he's going to go to college, what his plan for the future are; the selection of the jury for the Wentz trial, what Pete's cell is like, statements from the arresting officers.
And, of course, constant repetition of the facts that everybody in the country knows by heart. Patrick was kidnapped six years ago, when he was fifteen. Wentz never bothered to hide it, but nobody could ever find him, and through the years, as his crimes against humanity began to pile higher and higher, nobody had any idea what had happened to Patrick.
Three years after the fact, Chris, a disgruntled ex-member of Wentz's "cult", had given a statement to the police in which he'd mentioned a "red-haired kid of Pete's." He turned up dead the next day, before they could ask him to elaborate, but it had given Patrick's family hope - hope that had proven founded when agents arrested Pete three years after that and had found Patrick, six years older but without a scratch.
And now he's home. It's the perfect story - an innocent boy in distress; a loving, heartbroken family; an evil villain to rival all others.
What the papers don't mention is that at the time of Patrick's kidnap, the majority of the attention it got was statewide. Scarcely anybody at the time even knew who Pete was, save some in-the-know Chicago denizens and a few others. Patrick was young, but he wasn't blonde and female, so the media didn't make as much noise as they might have. It was only when Pete started gaining notoriety that everybody remembered his kidnap of "that poor Stumph boy"; after all, it made for a great human interest story, a perfect example of Pete's heartlessness.
It's important that you understand this. It's important that you understand it all.
-
The problem with Pete fucking Wentz - Pete Lewis Kingston Wentz, murderer, terrorist, charismatic leader of what authorities are calling a cult, for lack of a better word - the problem with Pete fucking Wentz is that he's playing a game and nobody but him knows the rules or the pieces or what he's playing to.
He goes days without even responding to what the feds and the shrinks say, and then there are days where everything they insinuate has him standing and slamming his chair to the floor, has him laughing hysterically, has him sighing in irritation. Every time they think they've elicited some sort of real response, he throws them for a loop and they're right back where they started.
They go through a laundry list of his crimes, because Battleship is as good a game as any. Mentioning the death of the defector to whom he refers as "Hey Chris" elicits cockiness; he smirks triumphantly, leaning back in his chair and putting his feet on the steel table.
"Asshole had it coming," he says.
A hit, except the next day they bring the topic up again and Wentz, fucking Wentz, props his elbows on the table and asks concernedly, "So who was it that killed him? You never told me. I'd like to shake that guy's hand."
They ask about his devotees: a miss. "You know, kids will follow any new, crazy thing," he explains, shrugging as if to ask, Hey, what can I do? "I mean, I definitely appreciate whatever fanbase I have, but I don't know if it had anything to do with me. Unless they want me for my body."
Other murders they're trying to pin on him, even without too much evidence: a miss.
The riots everyone knows he incited: a miss.
His alleged association with eco-terrorist Andy Hurley and infamous criminal Joe Trohman: a miss. He just grins that obnoxious, horsey grin.
And then they mention Patrick.
Agent McMurtry throws it out there almost randomly, going backwards down the list: "Oh, that's right. The Stumph kid."
Pete glowers down at the table, tapping his knuckles against the metal. "His name is Patrick," he mutters venomously.
"Oh, I know," McMurtry says, coolly appraising Pete's response. "Six years, Wentz. You took him away from everybody who loved him and kept him for six years. Why'd you do it? What was the point?"
The table ought to be a dripping mess right now, from the acidity in Pete's glare. His feet scuff the ground; a muscle in his cheek twitches from clenching his jaw so tightly.
"God, you must have scared that kid," McMurtry continues, ducking his head to meet Pete's eyes. They've learned the hard way not to force Pete's chin up to get him to look at them. "Did you get off on that? Did it turn you on, making that kid miserable for years? Screwing him up so badly he's probably going to have to go to therapy for the rest of his life?"
The only warning they get is a snarl, before Pete lunges across the table and breaks McMurtry's nose with a swift, solid punch. McMurtry staggers, and Pete drops onto him, hitting and elbowing every surface he can reach.
"You don't know anything!" he roars as the guards drag him off. In takes four guards, in the end. When you see him in person, Pete always surprises you: first with how small he is, and second with how strong he is. Then again, he has made a career out of being the angriest person in the room - out of being the scariest, the cleverest, the one willing to do anything.
Four guards, and they still have to inject him with a sedative before he can do even more damage.
-
Patrick's parents can't stop touching him; they can't get over the fact that he's home, it's real, it's not another cruel dream.
Patrick hugs them back just as hard, but they can't help but notice that he's antsy. They've been trying to take it slow, help him get acclimated back into normal life, home life, but Patrick seems so restless. He turns on the TV and flips through the channels so quickly that it's just a blur of color and noise. He picks up a book, sets it down, picks up another book. He hasn't even touched his instruments since he got back. He finds all the newspapers and magazines his parents have hidden and reads the articles about himself and Pete, he surfs the internet in search of pictures and information.
"Where is he?" he asks his parents one day. Nobody trusts him to live alone, so he's back with his parents. Sometimes they're a little surprised when they look over at him and notice that he's not fifteen anymore; it seems like they've gone back in time to six years ago, when he was just another high schooler. Well, almost seems that way; Patrick doesn't have to do homework anymore, or even study for his GED. As it turns out, Pete arranged it so he could finish high school online, under a fake name. They don't understand why.
"Where is who?" his mother asks, lightly enough that it's obvious she's anxious.
"You know," Patrick says. "Where's Pete? Where did they put him?"
"Away," Mr. Stumph tells him firmly. "Away for good. The highest security prison in the country."
"And he's never getting out?" Patrick asks.
"No, sweetie," his mom says, rubbing his arm. "The jury will convict him, and then he'll never, ever get out, not for the rest of his life. You don't have to worry about that."
For the next few days, Patrick's internet history is almost entirely filled with sites about maximum-security prisons.
-
It takes forever to collect all the statements. All the details could be important, if not for the authorities, then for the psych students who are already writing their dissertations on one Pete Wentz.
(Patrick's own statement was the shortest; he was meeting up with a friend - he can't remember who, now - and that friend knew Pete, and somehow he got to Pete's apartment. They moved a couple of times, he couldn't remember to where. He's blocked most of it out of his memory and can't swear to anything, and testifying against Pete would probably be a bad idea, signed Patrick Stumph.)
None of the devotees regret anything. They all seem to think of Pete as their own voice, a conduit for all the dark things they've ever hidden over the years, the bad thoughts they shoved into the corners of their brain. Pete is charming, seductive, a god.
When Pete gets thrust in front of the press, though, he gives his followers full rein to say whatever they want - "I'm not going to force them to keep their mouth shut," he says, his voice edged with that familiar mix of viciousness and glee. "They've had too many assholes telling them to do that over the years. I'm not ashamed of anything I've done."
They're so proud of him, and they spill everything.
"Oh, of course he knows Andy and Joe, they hang out all the time! Everybody knows that, Christ." Her voice is lined with scorn.
"He never kills people just for the hell of it," one boy says knowingly, then frowns as if doubting his words. "I think. Whatever."
"And then there was the time he hooked up with Mikey Way - god, the Ways are so cool! Not as cool as Pete, though." She sighs nostalgically, wistfully. "I saw the two of them together in person once. It was the best moment of my life."
"Well, yeah, he has ties to Ryan Ross." She rolls her eyes. "He fucking got Ryan started, you know? Ryan wouldn't be anywhere without Pete."
"We all knew that he killed Chris. Asshole."
"I only helped blow one or two things up. That was fucking awesome. Wentz can do fucking anything, you know?"
"Come on, of course he's a douche. Pete Wentz is a massive tool. But - c'mon, he's Pete, man. It's okay if he's a massive tool."
"Yeah, I think he killed that chick. Audrey. She hurt Patrick, of course he tortured the bitch."
Agent Burbank's eyes narrow. "Why would he care if she hurt Patrick?" Her voice is suspicious.
The girl flicks her outrageously magenta hair out of her eyes, looking at Burbank disdainfully. "Because it's Patrick. Pete would do anything for Patrick. They're, like, epically soulmates." For a moment, the lines of her face soften; she smiles, faintly, sweetly. Then she glances at Burbank again and the disdain returns. "It's not like he's subtle about it."
-
There are guards posted outside Patrick's house. They're there in case one of Pete's followers, someone in his network (and nobody really knows just how extensive that network is) tries to take Patrick out, or bring him to Pete.
The guards are focused on anybody trying to get into the house, but they notice the opposite, too, a small figure creeping out the back door and away. It only takes a couple of minutes before they grab Patrick and bring him back into the house.
The guard gets doubled. Patrick's therapy time gets doubled, and he's already been going every day. The Stumphs worry even more. Patrick doesn't say a thing.
-
"I need to see him," Pete says.
"Not a chance in hell," Agent McMurtry tells him.
"I need to see him."
"Why?"
"I need to see him."
"Answer our questions, and we'll see."
"I want to see him first."
"No."
"I need to see him."
"And what if he doesn't want to see you?" Pete doesn't immediately reply, so McMurtry presses on. "He's in therapy. He's with his family - people who love him. Soon he's going to realize just how much you fucked him up and he's going to want nothing to do with you."
"You don't know shit," Pete says calmly.
"Oh yeah? I can make sure that you never see Patrick again. Do you really want to insult someone with that kind of power?"
"I'm going to see him," Pete replies. "One way or another."
-
Pete gets convicted, no surprise there. Evidence or no evidence, no jury in the world would let him go free.
The prosecution was pushing for the death penalty, but even their lawyers weren't good enough for that. Pete is too charismatic, too horrifyingly fascinating for the jury to agree to kill him. And then there was the defense lawyer, Brian Yarner; when Pete couldn't compel the audience to follow him, Yarner spun the prosecution's words until they and the jury didn't know which way was up, what was true and what being tortured to death really meant.
The verdict: life imprisonment, no parole. But really, considering everything Pete's done, that's a pretty astonishing reprieve in and of itself.
-
"Patrick, in my professional opinion, I don't think going to the prison to see Mr. Wentz is a good idea. It could derail all the progress you've been making over the past six weeks."
Patrick crosses his arms, sinking into the psychiatrist's sofa until the top of his hat is about level with the back of the couch. Dr. Byrne has all sorts of theories about why Patrick wears hats all the time, but he thinks they've got more important things to focus on in their sessions right now.
"Why not?" Patrick demands. "Maybe I need to face my fears. Maybe it'll be good for me."
Honestly, Dr. Byrne has no idea what would be good for Patrick. One day he displays the classic symptoms of Stockholm Syndrome; the next day, he'll despise Wentz, or be terrified of him, or not seem to care one way or the other. In general, he appears to be rapidly regaining his mental stability, but Dr. Byrne has worked with other traumatized patients, and none of them have made such accelerated breakthroughs. Patrick is... baffling.
"The answer is still no, Patrick."
"I'm twenty one," Patrick protests, his face starting to redden to match his hair. He uncrosses his arms and rests the palms of his hands on his thighs. "Why do I need your permission, or my parents'?"
"Because you've just survived an intensely traumatic experience," Dr. Byrne explains, trying to will Patrick to understand. "You're making progress, Patrick, but Mr. Wentz is an unpredictable variable. I wouldn't put it past him to try to break you, just to see if he could."
"Pete won't hurt me," Patrick grumbles. "He didn't do it in six years, he won't in one hour-long visit. You guys make it seem like he can do anything, but he can't. All you're doing is making his ego even bigger."
"Swelling his ego or not, underestimating Mr. Wentz has proven to be a dangerous idea."
"He won't hurt me," Patrick repeats, more firmly.
Dr. Byrne hesitates, trying to phrase things delicately. Patrick's proven that he can take some harsh truths, but Dr. Byrne doesn't want to become the enemy here. "Patrick, you have to remember that Mr. Wentz is, by all evidence, a sociopath. Emotions mean nothing to him, except as a means to an end. You can't trust anything he's said or done - or not done, as the case may be."
Patrick sits and lets this hang in the air for a while. His fingers dig into his jeans. Eventually, he responds, "So, what you're telling me is that Pete doesn't care about me, I can't take care of myself against him, and I'm not allowed to go see him - not now, and probably not ever."
Dr. Byrne watches Patrick carefully, waiting to see how he reacts. Will he be angry? Will he lash out?
But no, Patrick just sits back and sighs. "Is this another one of those things that I'll understand with another few months of therapy?" he asks.
"I certainly hope so," Dr. Byrne says sincerely, and that appears to be the end of that. They spend the rest of the session discussing Patrick's lingering anxiety over going into record stores, especially the one where he met the friend who introduced him to Wentz.
-
Agent McMurtry and Agent Burbank slam into the visiting room one day. Pete grins at them cheerfully; the grin only widens when he sees the magazine that McMurtry slams onto the table with shaking hands.
"What. The hell," Burbank growls, her eyes narrow and focused on Pete.
Pete strokes the cover lovingly. "Oh, man, Trick. I hope he remembers how to contact my lawyer."
"How long have you been planning this?" McMurtry demands.
Pete looks up with wide eyes, which he has to know doesn't make him look innocent in the slightest. Exactly the opposite, in fact. "Me? I didn't plan a thing. This was all him." He smiles proudly. "How big was the explosion?"
"Like hell you didn't plan it," McMurtry snaps.
"I didn't," Pete says easily, grabbing the magazine and tipping back his chair. One hand goes behind his head, the other rests on the picture of Patrick getting handcuffed and wrestled into a police car while buildings burn in the background. Pete's thumb absently caresses Patrick's two-dimensional face. "But he got put at home, right? Guards and shrinks and nobody letting him come to see me?"
"For his own good," Burbank growls, glaring at Pete.
"Well," Pete says smugly. "Nobody puts baby in a corner."
-
Everybody expects Patrick to get put in an institution for the criminally insane; no dice. He threatens to escape and blow a hole around Chicago if they even try.
Patrick's lawyer - Pete's lawyer, too - never attempts to suggest it. It turns out the trial goes really quickly when you're attempting to get into prison. And in the end, they have to do it; Yarner is too good for them to give Patrick the death sentence, but Patrick's too dangerous for him to be put in anything other than a maximum security prison, and the best of the best is the one where Pete is kept.
The media has a field day, rerunning the coverage of the arrest, of the trial, of the Stumphs insisting that "that Wentz sonofabitch" destroyed their son's mind. Patrick splashes onto even more front pages than he did before; after all, the only thing people love more than a victim is a villain.
-
A spot opens up in cellblock D, and the head of the prison, the Big Boss, arranges for Patrick to be placed there. Pete and Patrick are close enough to see each other; they're not allowed to talk, not where the guards can see them, but they manage.
Soon Joe comes to join them, and then Andy a little while after; it's amazing, how prisoners keep dying in cellblock D with such coincidental timing. With Joe and Andy there, Pete and Patrick can pass messages to each other.
The first message they pass is this: "Everything they said was wrong. They sunk your battleship?" Patrick asks.
Pete replies, "Checkmate."
fandom: Wentzdom
pairing: Pete/Patrick
summary: For at least two weeks, it's on the front page of every single newspaper and magazine out there. Sweet red-headed boy, kidnapped years ago by one of the country's - no, the continent's - no, the world's most infamous, dangerous, evil, fascinating criminals, and now returned to his home and his family.
warnings: Gleefully unrepentant sociopaths, death of minor characters, Pete Wentz.
notes: For channonyarrow, who, when I demanded that my flist give me things to write, cheerfully suggested, "Sociopaths!" This is set before The Line Between Us and Them.
disclaimer: Oh my god, this is possibly the least true thing I have ever written.
For at least two weeks, it's on the front page of every single newspaper and magazine out there. Who, after all, could resist this story? Sweet red-headed boy, kidnapped years ago by one of the country's - no, the continent's - no, the world's most infamous, dangerous, evil, fascinating criminals, and now returned to his home and his family.
PATRICK STUMPH RETURNED TO FAMILY!
STUMPH FAMILY CRIES TEARS OF JOY AS KIDNAPPED SON RETURNS
SAYS MRS. STUMPH, "WE'RE JUST SO GLAD HE'S OKAY AND BACK HOME."
PATRICK FREE OF PETE WENTZ; HOW DOES IT FEEL?
AN IN-DEPTH LOOK AT THE COUNTRY'S MOST FAMOUS CAPTIVE
Even when the headlines focus on something else, there's generally some sort of byline about Patrick or Pete to be found. How Patrick is settling in, whether he's going to go to college, what his plan for the future are; the selection of the jury for the Wentz trial, what Pete's cell is like, statements from the arresting officers.
And, of course, constant repetition of the facts that everybody in the country knows by heart. Patrick was kidnapped six years ago, when he was fifteen. Wentz never bothered to hide it, but nobody could ever find him, and through the years, as his crimes against humanity began to pile higher and higher, nobody had any idea what had happened to Patrick.
Three years after the fact, Chris, a disgruntled ex-member of Wentz's "cult", had given a statement to the police in which he'd mentioned a "red-haired kid of Pete's." He turned up dead the next day, before they could ask him to elaborate, but it had given Patrick's family hope - hope that had proven founded when agents arrested Pete three years after that and had found Patrick, six years older but without a scratch.
And now he's home. It's the perfect story - an innocent boy in distress; a loving, heartbroken family; an evil villain to rival all others.
What the papers don't mention is that at the time of Patrick's kidnap, the majority of the attention it got was statewide. Scarcely anybody at the time even knew who Pete was, save some in-the-know Chicago denizens and a few others. Patrick was young, but he wasn't blonde and female, so the media didn't make as much noise as they might have. It was only when Pete started gaining notoriety that everybody remembered his kidnap of "that poor Stumph boy"; after all, it made for a great human interest story, a perfect example of Pete's heartlessness.
It's important that you understand this. It's important that you understand it all.
-
The problem with Pete fucking Wentz - Pete Lewis Kingston Wentz, murderer, terrorist, charismatic leader of what authorities are calling a cult, for lack of a better word - the problem with Pete fucking Wentz is that he's playing a game and nobody but him knows the rules or the pieces or what he's playing to.
He goes days without even responding to what the feds and the shrinks say, and then there are days where everything they insinuate has him standing and slamming his chair to the floor, has him laughing hysterically, has him sighing in irritation. Every time they think they've elicited some sort of real response, he throws them for a loop and they're right back where they started.
They go through a laundry list of his crimes, because Battleship is as good a game as any. Mentioning the death of the defector to whom he refers as "Hey Chris" elicits cockiness; he smirks triumphantly, leaning back in his chair and putting his feet on the steel table.
"Asshole had it coming," he says.
A hit, except the next day they bring the topic up again and Wentz, fucking Wentz, props his elbows on the table and asks concernedly, "So who was it that killed him? You never told me. I'd like to shake that guy's hand."
They ask about his devotees: a miss. "You know, kids will follow any new, crazy thing," he explains, shrugging as if to ask, Hey, what can I do? "I mean, I definitely appreciate whatever fanbase I have, but I don't know if it had anything to do with me. Unless they want me for my body."
Other murders they're trying to pin on him, even without too much evidence: a miss.
The riots everyone knows he incited: a miss.
His alleged association with eco-terrorist Andy Hurley and infamous criminal Joe Trohman: a miss. He just grins that obnoxious, horsey grin.
And then they mention Patrick.
Agent McMurtry throws it out there almost randomly, going backwards down the list: "Oh, that's right. The Stumph kid."
Pete glowers down at the table, tapping his knuckles against the metal. "His name is Patrick," he mutters venomously.
"Oh, I know," McMurtry says, coolly appraising Pete's response. "Six years, Wentz. You took him away from everybody who loved him and kept him for six years. Why'd you do it? What was the point?"
The table ought to be a dripping mess right now, from the acidity in Pete's glare. His feet scuff the ground; a muscle in his cheek twitches from clenching his jaw so tightly.
"God, you must have scared that kid," McMurtry continues, ducking his head to meet Pete's eyes. They've learned the hard way not to force Pete's chin up to get him to look at them. "Did you get off on that? Did it turn you on, making that kid miserable for years? Screwing him up so badly he's probably going to have to go to therapy for the rest of his life?"
The only warning they get is a snarl, before Pete lunges across the table and breaks McMurtry's nose with a swift, solid punch. McMurtry staggers, and Pete drops onto him, hitting and elbowing every surface he can reach.
"You don't know anything!" he roars as the guards drag him off. In takes four guards, in the end. When you see him in person, Pete always surprises you: first with how small he is, and second with how strong he is. Then again, he has made a career out of being the angriest person in the room - out of being the scariest, the cleverest, the one willing to do anything.
Four guards, and they still have to inject him with a sedative before he can do even more damage.
-
Patrick's parents can't stop touching him; they can't get over the fact that he's home, it's real, it's not another cruel dream.
Patrick hugs them back just as hard, but they can't help but notice that he's antsy. They've been trying to take it slow, help him get acclimated back into normal life, home life, but Patrick seems so restless. He turns on the TV and flips through the channels so quickly that it's just a blur of color and noise. He picks up a book, sets it down, picks up another book. He hasn't even touched his instruments since he got back. He finds all the newspapers and magazines his parents have hidden and reads the articles about himself and Pete, he surfs the internet in search of pictures and information.
"Where is he?" he asks his parents one day. Nobody trusts him to live alone, so he's back with his parents. Sometimes they're a little surprised when they look over at him and notice that he's not fifteen anymore; it seems like they've gone back in time to six years ago, when he was just another high schooler. Well, almost seems that way; Patrick doesn't have to do homework anymore, or even study for his GED. As it turns out, Pete arranged it so he could finish high school online, under a fake name. They don't understand why.
"Where is who?" his mother asks, lightly enough that it's obvious she's anxious.
"You know," Patrick says. "Where's Pete? Where did they put him?"
"Away," Mr. Stumph tells him firmly. "Away for good. The highest security prison in the country."
"And he's never getting out?" Patrick asks.
"No, sweetie," his mom says, rubbing his arm. "The jury will convict him, and then he'll never, ever get out, not for the rest of his life. You don't have to worry about that."
For the next few days, Patrick's internet history is almost entirely filled with sites about maximum-security prisons.
-
It takes forever to collect all the statements. All the details could be important, if not for the authorities, then for the psych students who are already writing their dissertations on one Pete Wentz.
(Patrick's own statement was the shortest; he was meeting up with a friend - he can't remember who, now - and that friend knew Pete, and somehow he got to Pete's apartment. They moved a couple of times, he couldn't remember to where. He's blocked most of it out of his memory and can't swear to anything, and testifying against Pete would probably be a bad idea, signed Patrick Stumph.)
None of the devotees regret anything. They all seem to think of Pete as their own voice, a conduit for all the dark things they've ever hidden over the years, the bad thoughts they shoved into the corners of their brain. Pete is charming, seductive, a god.
When Pete gets thrust in front of the press, though, he gives his followers full rein to say whatever they want - "I'm not going to force them to keep their mouth shut," he says, his voice edged with that familiar mix of viciousness and glee. "They've had too many assholes telling them to do that over the years. I'm not ashamed of anything I've done."
They're so proud of him, and they spill everything.
"Oh, of course he knows Andy and Joe, they hang out all the time! Everybody knows that, Christ." Her voice is lined with scorn.
"He never kills people just for the hell of it," one boy says knowingly, then frowns as if doubting his words. "I think. Whatever."
"And then there was the time he hooked up with Mikey Way - god, the Ways are so cool! Not as cool as Pete, though." She sighs nostalgically, wistfully. "I saw the two of them together in person once. It was the best moment of my life."
"Well, yeah, he has ties to Ryan Ross." She rolls her eyes. "He fucking got Ryan started, you know? Ryan wouldn't be anywhere without Pete."
"We all knew that he killed Chris. Asshole."
"I only helped blow one or two things up. That was fucking awesome. Wentz can do fucking anything, you know?"
"Come on, of course he's a douche. Pete Wentz is a massive tool. But - c'mon, he's Pete, man. It's okay if he's a massive tool."
"Yeah, I think he killed that chick. Audrey. She hurt Patrick, of course he tortured the bitch."
Agent Burbank's eyes narrow. "Why would he care if she hurt Patrick?" Her voice is suspicious.
The girl flicks her outrageously magenta hair out of her eyes, looking at Burbank disdainfully. "Because it's Patrick. Pete would do anything for Patrick. They're, like, epically soulmates." For a moment, the lines of her face soften; she smiles, faintly, sweetly. Then she glances at Burbank again and the disdain returns. "It's not like he's subtle about it."
-
There are guards posted outside Patrick's house. They're there in case one of Pete's followers, someone in his network (and nobody really knows just how extensive that network is) tries to take Patrick out, or bring him to Pete.
The guards are focused on anybody trying to get into the house, but they notice the opposite, too, a small figure creeping out the back door and away. It only takes a couple of minutes before they grab Patrick and bring him back into the house.
The guard gets doubled. Patrick's therapy time gets doubled, and he's already been going every day. The Stumphs worry even more. Patrick doesn't say a thing.
-
"I need to see him," Pete says.
"Not a chance in hell," Agent McMurtry tells him.
"I need to see him."
"Why?"
"I need to see him."
"Answer our questions, and we'll see."
"I want to see him first."
"No."
"I need to see him."
"And what if he doesn't want to see you?" Pete doesn't immediately reply, so McMurtry presses on. "He's in therapy. He's with his family - people who love him. Soon he's going to realize just how much you fucked him up and he's going to want nothing to do with you."
"You don't know shit," Pete says calmly.
"Oh yeah? I can make sure that you never see Patrick again. Do you really want to insult someone with that kind of power?"
"I'm going to see him," Pete replies. "One way or another."
-
Pete gets convicted, no surprise there. Evidence or no evidence, no jury in the world would let him go free.
The prosecution was pushing for the death penalty, but even their lawyers weren't good enough for that. Pete is too charismatic, too horrifyingly fascinating for the jury to agree to kill him. And then there was the defense lawyer, Brian Yarner; when Pete couldn't compel the audience to follow him, Yarner spun the prosecution's words until they and the jury didn't know which way was up, what was true and what being tortured to death really meant.
The verdict: life imprisonment, no parole. But really, considering everything Pete's done, that's a pretty astonishing reprieve in and of itself.
-
"Patrick, in my professional opinion, I don't think going to the prison to see Mr. Wentz is a good idea. It could derail all the progress you've been making over the past six weeks."
Patrick crosses his arms, sinking into the psychiatrist's sofa until the top of his hat is about level with the back of the couch. Dr. Byrne has all sorts of theories about why Patrick wears hats all the time, but he thinks they've got more important things to focus on in their sessions right now.
"Why not?" Patrick demands. "Maybe I need to face my fears. Maybe it'll be good for me."
Honestly, Dr. Byrne has no idea what would be good for Patrick. One day he displays the classic symptoms of Stockholm Syndrome; the next day, he'll despise Wentz, or be terrified of him, or not seem to care one way or the other. In general, he appears to be rapidly regaining his mental stability, but Dr. Byrne has worked with other traumatized patients, and none of them have made such accelerated breakthroughs. Patrick is... baffling.
"The answer is still no, Patrick."
"I'm twenty one," Patrick protests, his face starting to redden to match his hair. He uncrosses his arms and rests the palms of his hands on his thighs. "Why do I need your permission, or my parents'?"
"Because you've just survived an intensely traumatic experience," Dr. Byrne explains, trying to will Patrick to understand. "You're making progress, Patrick, but Mr. Wentz is an unpredictable variable. I wouldn't put it past him to try to break you, just to see if he could."
"Pete won't hurt me," Patrick grumbles. "He didn't do it in six years, he won't in one hour-long visit. You guys make it seem like he can do anything, but he can't. All you're doing is making his ego even bigger."
"Swelling his ego or not, underestimating Mr. Wentz has proven to be a dangerous idea."
"He won't hurt me," Patrick repeats, more firmly.
Dr. Byrne hesitates, trying to phrase things delicately. Patrick's proven that he can take some harsh truths, but Dr. Byrne doesn't want to become the enemy here. "Patrick, you have to remember that Mr. Wentz is, by all evidence, a sociopath. Emotions mean nothing to him, except as a means to an end. You can't trust anything he's said or done - or not done, as the case may be."
Patrick sits and lets this hang in the air for a while. His fingers dig into his jeans. Eventually, he responds, "So, what you're telling me is that Pete doesn't care about me, I can't take care of myself against him, and I'm not allowed to go see him - not now, and probably not ever."
Dr. Byrne watches Patrick carefully, waiting to see how he reacts. Will he be angry? Will he lash out?
But no, Patrick just sits back and sighs. "Is this another one of those things that I'll understand with another few months of therapy?" he asks.
"I certainly hope so," Dr. Byrne says sincerely, and that appears to be the end of that. They spend the rest of the session discussing Patrick's lingering anxiety over going into record stores, especially the one where he met the friend who introduced him to Wentz.
-
Agent McMurtry and Agent Burbank slam into the visiting room one day. Pete grins at them cheerfully; the grin only widens when he sees the magazine that McMurtry slams onto the table with shaking hands.
"What. The hell," Burbank growls, her eyes narrow and focused on Pete.
Pete strokes the cover lovingly. "Oh, man, Trick. I hope he remembers how to contact my lawyer."
"How long have you been planning this?" McMurtry demands.
Pete looks up with wide eyes, which he has to know doesn't make him look innocent in the slightest. Exactly the opposite, in fact. "Me? I didn't plan a thing. This was all him." He smiles proudly. "How big was the explosion?"
"Like hell you didn't plan it," McMurtry snaps.
"I didn't," Pete says easily, grabbing the magazine and tipping back his chair. One hand goes behind his head, the other rests on the picture of Patrick getting handcuffed and wrestled into a police car while buildings burn in the background. Pete's thumb absently caresses Patrick's two-dimensional face. "But he got put at home, right? Guards and shrinks and nobody letting him come to see me?"
"For his own good," Burbank growls, glaring at Pete.
"Well," Pete says smugly. "Nobody puts baby in a corner."
-
Everybody expects Patrick to get put in an institution for the criminally insane; no dice. He threatens to escape and blow a hole around Chicago if they even try.
Patrick's lawyer - Pete's lawyer, too - never attempts to suggest it. It turns out the trial goes really quickly when you're attempting to get into prison. And in the end, they have to do it; Yarner is too good for them to give Patrick the death sentence, but Patrick's too dangerous for him to be put in anything other than a maximum security prison, and the best of the best is the one where Pete is kept.
The media has a field day, rerunning the coverage of the arrest, of the trial, of the Stumphs insisting that "that Wentz sonofabitch" destroyed their son's mind. Patrick splashes onto even more front pages than he did before; after all, the only thing people love more than a victim is a villain.
-
A spot opens up in cellblock D, and the head of the prison, the Big Boss, arranges for Patrick to be placed there. Pete and Patrick are close enough to see each other; they're not allowed to talk, not where the guards can see them, but they manage.
Soon Joe comes to join them, and then Andy a little while after; it's amazing, how prisoners keep dying in cellblock D with such coincidental timing. With Joe and Andy there, Pete and Patrick can pass messages to each other.
The first message they pass is this: "Everything they said was wrong. They sunk your battleship?" Patrick asks.
Pete replies, "Checkmate."