Fic: The Art of Being Lost and Found (20/?), blue cortina, dakfinv
Title: The Art of Being Lost and Found (20/?)
Author: dak
Word Count: 1715 (this part); (28,134 in total, so far)
Rating: blue cortina
Warnings: none here
Summary: Post 2.08. When the Guv goes missing, CID is saddled with an inept "interim" DCI. To find Gene, and the truth, Ray must team up with a hated enemy.
A/N: In this chapter - answers! Well, at least some. Please enjoy!
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15
Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19
“Ray. C’mon Ray. This ain’t fair,” Chris hurried after him, tugging at his arm, desperate to get his attention. Ray’s focus was entirely on the struggling man in front of him who was being dragged down the hall.
“He’s been holding out on us. It’s time we had the truth,” Ray replied coldly, shrugging Chris off as he entered the isolation room after the orderly.
“He’ll tell us now. If we talk to him.”
“Oh, we’re going to talk. Soon as I’m certain he ain’t lying anymore.”
Sam protested pathetically as he was forced down on the bed.
“I’ll tell you. I will!” he promised. “Chris is right. I’ll tell you!” In his fragile state, he couldn’t fight as his wrists were strapped to the bed. “Tight! Not so tight. Please. I don’t need it that tight,” he begged the orderly. The man took an extra pull on each strap, then walked away. Sam collapsed his head on the pillowless bed as Ray stepped up beside him. “You,” he stared at Ray, panting heavily, “are a bastard.”
“Course I am. Now, tell us what you know.”
Sam kept his mouth shut.
“You promised you would or was that just another lie, DI WIlliams?”
“Ray...” Chris protested.
“Either you help or you get out,” Ray turned and snapped. Chris shut his mouth and fumbled with his cigarette pack. Confident that smoking would keep the lad silent, Ray returned his attention to the still-fuming suspect.
“Why did the Guv come to see you the day we thought he disappeared?”
Sam stared at the ceiling, chest heaving and eyes burning, but did begin to answer.
“He came to see me a lot, if you’d bothered to check the rest of the log book.” His voice was shaking. Ray could tell he was hanging onto his composure, and very likely his sanity, by only a thread. “Usually at the weekend. Saturday or Sunday. About twice a month.”
“You told me you hadn’t had any visitors.”
“I lied.”
“Old habits, eh?” Ray sneered.
“Piss off,” Sam turned his head towards the wall.
“Why did he come to see you?”
“Because he didn’t believe all Morgan’s shite. He trusted me.”
“Hardly,” Ray snorted.
“You think you know him so well, DS Carling? You hardly know him at all, so don’t begin to tell me what you think he believed,” Sam yelled, pulling at the straps. He collapsed back on the bed as the outburst became too much for him to maintain.
“Where is he?” Ray struggled to maintain his own fragile calm. He didn’t normally go for hitting sick blokes, but this was oh so tempting.
“I told you I don’t know,” Sam sighed.
“Fine. Who took him?”
“You don’t bloody get it, do you Sergeant? Old habits?” Sam laughed cruelly. “Gene wasn’t taken. Gene left. On his own. Goodbye. Farewell. Screw you.”
“Is that what you think? Then maybe you don’t know him as well as you think. The Guv would never abandon his city and he would not abandon his team.”
If Chris wasn’t in the room, Ray would have slugged the sick bastard by now, surely.
“Blood is thicker,” Sam muttered, raising his eyes to stare at the ceiling.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Gene loves his city. But family comes first.”
“We are his family.”
“In the close-knit brothers-in-arms way, yes. But, in the if he married your sister and he’d be arrested for it way, no.”
“Can’t you talk sense?”
“No. I’m crazy. Remember?” Sam tried to raise his restricted wrists.
“Try, Boss,” Chris mumbled, his fingers shaking around his fag. Sam stared at him then relaxed. Ray couldn’t tell if the bloke had taken pity on the lad or if he felt guilty for jerking him around.
“About...a week before they took the cast off his leg, Gene received a letter.”
“From who?”
“Don’t know. Not signed. No return address. But, it shook him up. Bad.”
“What would scare the Guv?” Ray asked in disbelief.
“Exactly. Which is why I...persuaded him to let me read it.”
“Forced is more like it, probably,” Ray snorted. “So, what’d it say?”
“It was from a woman, we’re fairly certain. The handwriting. Use of language. I think it was a woman. It could have been man. It’s been awhile since I read it. But we were so sure it was a woman...”
“Focus, Boss,” Chris spoke calmly. Sam nodded, almost imperceptibly, and continued.
“It said there was this little girl. Six or seven. It said she was in trouble. That her mum had died and...and this group, drug dealers, or...I can’t...Maybe stolen goods? The details. I can’t...remember the details. It’s all gone...fuzzy. Blurred.”
“So these nasty blokes had this kid?” Ray repeated.
“Right. Yes. And they had started using her. Run errands, and the like. The woman, or whoever, they said, she said, they said they wanted to help, but they weren’t in any position to do so.”
“Sad story,” Ray sighed. “Guv hates kiddie fiddlers. But, why would it scare him?”
“The letter...it said the girl...it said she was Gene’s niece.”
The room fell very quiet. Not even a heartbeat could be heard.
“The Guv...” Ray whispered, “Gene doesn’t have a niece.”
“That’s what he thought. He would’ve kept thinking it, too, except...there was a photograph with the letter. Said it belonged to the girl. Was a picture of Stu. Had ‘Daddy - 1965’ scribbled on the back. Gene and his brother look so much alike. Different noses. They don’t have the same nose. Gene’s is much smaller.”
“Where’s the letter now?”
“What letter? Oh. That letter. I don’t know. Only saw it the once. But, he wouldn’t have taken it with him. Maybe the picture. But not the letter. Too dangerous.”
“Gene went to find her,” Ray concluded and Sam nodded in confirmation.
“I tried to persuade him. Told him we should go through the proper channels, but...”
“He wouldn’t hear it,” Ray finished.
“Does that surprise you?” Sam sighed. “So, we started planning. He was going to take an extended leave. Hadn’t taken a holiday in a long while. Since he made DCI. The stress of the Johns debacle. Plus Terry Haslam. It would’ve made sense. He was going to leave me in charge of CID. The only one who knew what was really going on. He’d keep in touch with me, let me know if there was trouble. If I should bring anyone else in.”
“But then Morgan came back...” Ray started piecing it together.
“...forced me to have a nervous breakdown, and you all...” Sam closed his eyes as his body shuddered. “I thought he scrapped the idea. But after I was allowed to have visitors, he came to see me. Not doing anything, it was eating him up inside. He couldn’t eat. Sleep. He couldn’t imagine what was happening to this child. A child who could be his last blood relative.”
“So he went through with it.”
“I told him it wasn’t a good idea. I told him I wasn’t stable enough to handle the stress, but he just...” Sam shook his head. “He had to do it.”
“Where did he go, Sam?”
“He had to do it,” he repeated, sitting up as much as he could.
“I know. Where, though? North? South?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he sneered.
“Sam?” Ray looked at Chris, then back to Sam. Tyler wasn’t speaking to either one of them.
“You shouldn’t even be here. You’re not supposed to be here. I don’t want you here!” he started screaming, tugging violently at the restraints.
“Chris. Get someone,” Ray ordered. “Sam? Tyler? It’s Carling,” he called out to him, trying to force him back down to ease the strain on his wrists.
“Go away! Leave me alone. You’re supposed to leave me alone now!” He continued to fight, futilely kicking his legs.
A breeze brush past Ray as a flurry of nurses, orderlies, and one Dr. Wynton rushed into the room, pushing Ray aside.
“I suspected this would happen,” she sighed, shining a small light in Tyler’s eyes. “I should not have left him off the electroconvulsive therapy for so long.”
“There’s not even a telly here,” Sam whined, looking up at the doctor, but not quite at her.
“I know,” Wynton nodded and pat him gently on the head. “Let’s get him to the ECT room.”
The orderlies nodded, removed the brakes from the bed, and started wheeling Sam out of the room. He continued to scream at the unseen forces. Ray hurried after, not waiting to see where Chris was.
“What’re you going to do with him?” Ray asked the doctor as he jogged after the bed.
“Continue his therapy immediately. We cannot allow the hallucinations to continue or worsen,” she answered as they stopped in front of the lift. “You can continue your visit once we’ve finished.”
“I’m going with you,” Ray announced as the doors parted.
“I’m sorry, DS Carling, but this is a medical procedure and I cannot allow--”
“I want to know what’s happening to him,” Ray demanded.
“Fine,” Wynton agreed after a pause. “But stay out of our way.”
They filed into the lift and took it two floors up. Ray followed as they wheeled the bed down the hall. Sam’s voice had grown hoarse from shouting, but still he didn’t stop. They turned left, into a room filled with equipment Ray had only ever seen on Doctor Who.
“Stay back here,” the doctor pointed to the floor as she shut the door and began preparing the machinery.
Ray stood silently as Tyler’s legs and waist were strapped down. A nurse injected him with something and Sam calmed slightly. His mouth was coaxed open and something inserted inside while another nurse rubbed some sort of goo on his temples. Sam’s pleas were muffled now.
Dr. Wynton announced they were ready. Sam continued to struggle meekly as his attendants stood clear. Wynton held up a metal rod with a rounded end, one in each hand, and placed them on either side of Sam’s head. She nodded.
A switch was flicked. Sam’s body lurched. She nodded again.
A switch was flicked. Sam’s body lurched. So did Ray’s.
He was quiet and still once it was all over.
So was Sam.
Author: dak
Word Count: 1715 (this part); (28,134 in total, so far)
Rating: blue cortina
Warnings: none here
Summary: Post 2.08. When the Guv goes missing, CID is saddled with an inept "interim" DCI. To find Gene, and the truth, Ray must team up with a hated enemy.
A/N: In this chapter - answers! Well, at least some. Please enjoy!
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15
Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19
“Ray. C’mon Ray. This ain’t fair,” Chris hurried after him, tugging at his arm, desperate to get his attention. Ray’s focus was entirely on the struggling man in front of him who was being dragged down the hall.
“He’s been holding out on us. It’s time we had the truth,” Ray replied coldly, shrugging Chris off as he entered the isolation room after the orderly.
“He’ll tell us now. If we talk to him.”
“Oh, we’re going to talk. Soon as I’m certain he ain’t lying anymore.”
Sam protested pathetically as he was forced down on the bed.
“I’ll tell you. I will!” he promised. “Chris is right. I’ll tell you!” In his fragile state, he couldn’t fight as his wrists were strapped to the bed. “Tight! Not so tight. Please. I don’t need it that tight,” he begged the orderly. The man took an extra pull on each strap, then walked away. Sam collapsed his head on the pillowless bed as Ray stepped up beside him. “You,” he stared at Ray, panting heavily, “are a bastard.”
“Course I am. Now, tell us what you know.”
Sam kept his mouth shut.
“You promised you would or was that just another lie, DI WIlliams?”
“Ray...” Chris protested.
“Either you help or you get out,” Ray turned and snapped. Chris shut his mouth and fumbled with his cigarette pack. Confident that smoking would keep the lad silent, Ray returned his attention to the still-fuming suspect.
“Why did the Guv come to see you the day we thought he disappeared?”
Sam stared at the ceiling, chest heaving and eyes burning, but did begin to answer.
“He came to see me a lot, if you’d bothered to check the rest of the log book.” His voice was shaking. Ray could tell he was hanging onto his composure, and very likely his sanity, by only a thread. “Usually at the weekend. Saturday or Sunday. About twice a month.”
“You told me you hadn’t had any visitors.”
“I lied.”
“Old habits, eh?” Ray sneered.
“Piss off,” Sam turned his head towards the wall.
“Why did he come to see you?”
“Because he didn’t believe all Morgan’s shite. He trusted me.”
“Hardly,” Ray snorted.
“You think you know him so well, DS Carling? You hardly know him at all, so don’t begin to tell me what you think he believed,” Sam yelled, pulling at the straps. He collapsed back on the bed as the outburst became too much for him to maintain.
“Where is he?” Ray struggled to maintain his own fragile calm. He didn’t normally go for hitting sick blokes, but this was oh so tempting.
“I told you I don’t know,” Sam sighed.
“Fine. Who took him?”
“You don’t bloody get it, do you Sergeant? Old habits?” Sam laughed cruelly. “Gene wasn’t taken. Gene left. On his own. Goodbye. Farewell. Screw you.”
“Is that what you think? Then maybe you don’t know him as well as you think. The Guv would never abandon his city and he would not abandon his team.”
If Chris wasn’t in the room, Ray would have slugged the sick bastard by now, surely.
“Blood is thicker,” Sam muttered, raising his eyes to stare at the ceiling.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Gene loves his city. But family comes first.”
“We are his family.”
“In the close-knit brothers-in-arms way, yes. But, in the if he married your sister and he’d be arrested for it way, no.”
“Can’t you talk sense?”
“No. I’m crazy. Remember?” Sam tried to raise his restricted wrists.
“Try, Boss,” Chris mumbled, his fingers shaking around his fag. Sam stared at him then relaxed. Ray couldn’t tell if the bloke had taken pity on the lad or if he felt guilty for jerking him around.
“About...a week before they took the cast off his leg, Gene received a letter.”
“From who?”
“Don’t know. Not signed. No return address. But, it shook him up. Bad.”
“What would scare the Guv?” Ray asked in disbelief.
“Exactly. Which is why I...persuaded him to let me read it.”
“Forced is more like it, probably,” Ray snorted. “So, what’d it say?”
“It was from a woman, we’re fairly certain. The handwriting. Use of language. I think it was a woman. It could have been man. It’s been awhile since I read it. But we were so sure it was a woman...”
“Focus, Boss,” Chris spoke calmly. Sam nodded, almost imperceptibly, and continued.
“It said there was this little girl. Six or seven. It said she was in trouble. That her mum had died and...and this group, drug dealers, or...I can’t...Maybe stolen goods? The details. I can’t...remember the details. It’s all gone...fuzzy. Blurred.”
“So these nasty blokes had this kid?” Ray repeated.
“Right. Yes. And they had started using her. Run errands, and the like. The woman, or whoever, they said, she said, they said they wanted to help, but they weren’t in any position to do so.”
“Sad story,” Ray sighed. “Guv hates kiddie fiddlers. But, why would it scare him?”
“The letter...it said the girl...it said she was Gene’s niece.”
The room fell very quiet. Not even a heartbeat could be heard.
“The Guv...” Ray whispered, “Gene doesn’t have a niece.”
“That’s what he thought. He would’ve kept thinking it, too, except...there was a photograph with the letter. Said it belonged to the girl. Was a picture of Stu. Had ‘Daddy - 1965’ scribbled on the back. Gene and his brother look so much alike. Different noses. They don’t have the same nose. Gene’s is much smaller.”
“Where’s the letter now?”
“What letter? Oh. That letter. I don’t know. Only saw it the once. But, he wouldn’t have taken it with him. Maybe the picture. But not the letter. Too dangerous.”
“Gene went to find her,” Ray concluded and Sam nodded in confirmation.
“I tried to persuade him. Told him we should go through the proper channels, but...”
“He wouldn’t hear it,” Ray finished.
“Does that surprise you?” Sam sighed. “So, we started planning. He was going to take an extended leave. Hadn’t taken a holiday in a long while. Since he made DCI. The stress of the Johns debacle. Plus Terry Haslam. It would’ve made sense. He was going to leave me in charge of CID. The only one who knew what was really going on. He’d keep in touch with me, let me know if there was trouble. If I should bring anyone else in.”
“But then Morgan came back...” Ray started piecing it together.
“...forced me to have a nervous breakdown, and you all...” Sam closed his eyes as his body shuddered. “I thought he scrapped the idea. But after I was allowed to have visitors, he came to see me. Not doing anything, it was eating him up inside. He couldn’t eat. Sleep. He couldn’t imagine what was happening to this child. A child who could be his last blood relative.”
“So he went through with it.”
“I told him it wasn’t a good idea. I told him I wasn’t stable enough to handle the stress, but he just...” Sam shook his head. “He had to do it.”
“Where did he go, Sam?”
“He had to do it,” he repeated, sitting up as much as he could.
“I know. Where, though? North? South?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he sneered.
“Sam?” Ray looked at Chris, then back to Sam. Tyler wasn’t speaking to either one of them.
“You shouldn’t even be here. You’re not supposed to be here. I don’t want you here!” he started screaming, tugging violently at the restraints.
“Chris. Get someone,” Ray ordered. “Sam? Tyler? It’s Carling,” he called out to him, trying to force him back down to ease the strain on his wrists.
“Go away! Leave me alone. You’re supposed to leave me alone now!” He continued to fight, futilely kicking his legs.
A breeze brush past Ray as a flurry of nurses, orderlies, and one Dr. Wynton rushed into the room, pushing Ray aside.
“I suspected this would happen,” she sighed, shining a small light in Tyler’s eyes. “I should not have left him off the electroconvulsive therapy for so long.”
“There’s not even a telly here,” Sam whined, looking up at the doctor, but not quite at her.
“I know,” Wynton nodded and pat him gently on the head. “Let’s get him to the ECT room.”
The orderlies nodded, removed the brakes from the bed, and started wheeling Sam out of the room. He continued to scream at the unseen forces. Ray hurried after, not waiting to see where Chris was.
“What’re you going to do with him?” Ray asked the doctor as he jogged after the bed.
“Continue his therapy immediately. We cannot allow the hallucinations to continue or worsen,” she answered as they stopped in front of the lift. “You can continue your visit once we’ve finished.”
“I’m going with you,” Ray announced as the doors parted.
“I’m sorry, DS Carling, but this is a medical procedure and I cannot allow--”
“I want to know what’s happening to him,” Ray demanded.
“Fine,” Wynton agreed after a pause. “But stay out of our way.”
They filed into the lift and took it two floors up. Ray followed as they wheeled the bed down the hall. Sam’s voice had grown hoarse from shouting, but still he didn’t stop. They turned left, into a room filled with equipment Ray had only ever seen on Doctor Who.
“Stay back here,” the doctor pointed to the floor as she shut the door and began preparing the machinery.
Ray stood silently as Tyler’s legs and waist were strapped down. A nurse injected him with something and Sam calmed slightly. His mouth was coaxed open and something inserted inside while another nurse rubbed some sort of goo on his temples. Sam’s pleas were muffled now.
Dr. Wynton announced they were ready. Sam continued to struggle meekly as his attendants stood clear. Wynton held up a metal rod with a rounded end, one in each hand, and placed them on either side of Sam’s head. She nodded.
A switch was flicked. Sam’s body lurched. She nodded again.
A switch was flicked. Sam’s body lurched. So did Ray’s.
He was quiet and still once it was all over.
So was Sam.