Fic: Old Harry's Game - part 4
Title: Old Harry’s Game, Chapter 4
Author: Kirsteena
Fandom: Life on Mars
Spoilers: Set after 2.02, spoilers for 2.07 and 2.08
Rating: White Cortina.
Pairings: None
Word Count: 2284
Summary: Harry's hunt continues
a/n: Part 4 has arrived! part 1 here, part 2 here , part 3 here . Thanks to marsorbiter for the bunnies, and emeriin for her wonderful beta reading. 2 more parts to go - post them soon, promise.
DISCLAIMER: Life on Mars is copyright Kudos and the BBC. All Rights Reserved. No copyright infringement is intended and no money is being made.
“Williams or Morgan. Williams or Morgan. Williams or Morgan.” Harry was pacing the length of his flat again, deciding which track to go down first. His pacing was interrupted by a knock on the door. Who could... There was only one person it could be.
“Gene. Come in.” Harry opened the door to see the expected face outside.
“Evening Harry. How are you today?”
“As well as can be expected. Drink?”
“Thought you would never ask.” Gene smiled.
“I heard about that Fletcher lad.” Harry decided that attack was the best form of defence - and he had to face it, it had been all over the news. “Must be rough trying to lead that one” he chuckled.
Gene gave a wry grin. “Just a bit.”
“How is it going?”
“Apart from us having no bloody clue, just peachy. Anyway, I should be getting back, I just popped in to check you were ok.”
“I’m fine, you don’t have to check on me every day.”
“I want to.” The words, spoken so simply, cut through Harry. He smiled a genuine smile at Gene.
“Thank you.” Gene nodded, then left.
What had he started? He stared out of his window, watching the disappearing form of Gene Hunt. Thought about what he had done. He watched the Cortina pulling away at speed. Never did anything by halves, did Gene. He chuckled gently. For the first time he began to have doubts about what was happening. Was he right to think the way he was? Gene obviously still cared. Surely that was enough? He closed his eyes against the sudden tears that burned.
After a moment, he opened them again, and resumed his contemplation of his surroundings. He noticed a movement in the shadows outside. Frowning he looked closer. There was a figure there. Standing, having a smoke. He looked further down the street. A car. Looking very like an unmarked police car. Harry’s face hardened. So, Gene suspected. Well, since he had made him, it was understandable. Good. Any feeling of regret he had vanished in an instant. No more playing. Time to do what he had to. Preston it was - might as well lead his new friend on a little bit of a chase. A wry grin crossed Harry’s face as he imagined the Super’s expression when the expenses landed on his desk. Putting that thought aside, he turned to his phone. Asking the operator to put him through, he waited, listening to the ringing at the other end of the line. “Hello?” a voice answered.
“Alfie, it’s Harry.”
“He is fine, Mr. Woolf. Now please don’t contact me again.”
“One more thing?”
“Don’t you think you might have been asking for too many ‘one more things’, Harry?”
“Any information on two coppers - DI Williams, and DCI Morgan. That’s all.”
There was a pause at the other end of the line “I’ll see what I can do - but this is the last time Mr. Woolf. I’m starting to get pissed about this.”
Gene walked back into CID, and went straight into his office. Sam watched the door for a while, then, as curiosity got the better of him, he wandered through the double doors. Gene was sitting at his desk, reading a file. He looked up as Sam walked in.
“Well?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know. He seemed normal, but...” Gene sighed. “No, I have done the right thing. And he will have realised what I have done by now.”
“So your next visit is gonna be the interesting one?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure you are ok with this Guv? It is not too late to stop it.”
“Don’t confuse me Sam. Not now.” Gene stood up and walked out into the main CID office. “Ok you lot, question. Were there any unusual robberies or anything going on in the last two days that Fletcher might have disturbed? He may have got caught up in something.”
Ray shook his head. “Nothing unusual. Few minor robberies, but if they were going to hold a copper, would have been the big guns. Now’t going on there.”
Sam rubbed his face. “Ok, I am out of ideas - anyone got anything - no matter how stupid it seems?” Silence gripped CID. “Well, if you think of anything, no matter how stupid, at this stage we need anything you can give us.”
Gene was watching his team. “Go home. Go to the pub. I don’t care. Just don’t be here. Get some sleep, come in fresh tomorrow. You are no use to us exhausted.” Sam nodded at Gene, then watched as the team slowly walked out the door, most likely straight for the sanctuary of the Railway Arms. “Come on Sam, I’ll buy you a drink.”
An evening spent seriously drinking with Gene was never a good idea, Sam ruminated later. The table was strewn with both pint glasses and tumblers for the whisky chasers. Most of the rest of CID had retreated to one corner, leaving Sam to deal with Gene. Annie was hovering close by, just in case Sam needed help. Ah well, Sam thought, he needn’t worry about meeting himself in the future - his liver will never survive many nights like this. Both of them were extremely drunk, which meant that Gene got more morose as the night went on.
“Y’know what is wrong with this city?”
“Wassat?”
“No respect, five years ago, no-one would have taken a copper. ‘least, no-one who knew what was good for ‘em. Now... No ‘spect for us.”
“You should see it in my time.” Sam muttered.
“Eh?”
“Nothin’”
“I’m gettin’ too old for this shit.”
“You? Old?
Gene stared at Sam for a moment. “Yes. Me. I’m getting old. It happens. All this business with ‘arry only proves it.”
“God, you are a depressing drunk, you know that?”
“Me? You aren’t that much better. You get drunk, you start gabbling on about ipods and... and... ‘Nokia’ and such crap. I mean, what the hell‘s a Nokia?” Gene emphasised his comments by poking a finger into Sam’s chest. For some reason, the thought of his mobile phone made Sam laugh. Hysterically. Gene just stared at him. “You are drunk, Sam.” It was like it was a revelation to him.
“I am.” Sam giggled at the thought. “So are you.”
“Maybe.”
“How are you getting home? ‘Cause no bloody way you are driving like that.”
“Erm...”
“I’ll sleep on the sofa” Sam sighed.
After a short walk home, where Sam had half carried Gene - made more difficult considering how drunk he himself was - and a struggle up the stairs, Sam removed his camel coat, then poured him onto the bed - no easy task with a man the size of Gene. Gene muttered to himself, and almost immediately started snoring.
“Bloody marvellous.” Sam wrestled with Gene for a bit, and eventually pulled the green top cover off the bed, covering him up with the remaining blankets. He grabbed a cushion off the chair, and settled down on the floor. Oh, for his own king size bed in 2006. Slowly, Sam drifted off to sleep.
“Did you think that bringing the big man here would keep me away, Sam?” Sam awoke with a start to stare into the face of the Test Card Girl. “You should know by now, nothing keeps me away.”
“Wh... What do you want?” Sam stammered quietly, snatching a quick glance at the slumbering form in his bed. Gene was still snoring away.
“Why can’t you find the black man Sam? He isn’t far away.”
“That’s easy for you to say” Sam muttered back at the strange girl.
“It is like a game of hide-and-seek - but you have to find him before the bad men get him. But then it will be easy for you, he is close.”
“If he is so close, you bloody find him!”
“What is the point in that? At least this way you are busy while you are sleeping. Isn’t this more fun?”
“Fun? You think this is fun?”
“You know it is, Sam.” With that, Sam woke up properly with a start. He sat there quietly, trying to stop his heart from racing and let his breathing catch up with him. He glanced over at Gene, who was still sleeping like he didn’t have a care in the world. He would have thought that tonight, with company there, he would have been safe from her visit. Slowly, he fell back asleep.
Sam was suffering the after-effects of his hangover the following morning. Nursing a bottle of Lucozade, he sat at his desk with his head in his hands. God, this decade was going to kill him! They were no further forward, and Gene was prowling about like a cat on a hot tin roof. The danger signs were there for a Hunt-sized explosion at some point today. Ray and Chris had wisely made themselves scarce. Annie sidled over to him.
“You ok, sir?”
“Ungh. Why did I drink so much?”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time?”
Sam smiled up at Annie. “Anything turn up overnight?”
“Not a thing.”
“Tyler, get in here!” The inevitable yell came from Hunt’s office. Annie grimaced at Sam, who was busy putting his jacket on.
“Oh, God” was Sam’s only response, and slowly walked into the office. “Yes, Guv?”
“Why the hell haven’t you lot started door to door enquiries? Should have been started yesterday! Do I have to think of everything myself?”
“No, Guv, but we had everyone checking warehouses and the like. Manchester is kind of a big city, especially when you don’t know where to start looking.”
“I don’t want excuses, Gladys. I’ve got the top brass on me back asking why the hell we haven’t found him or gotten any clues by now. We need to get on with it.”
“Running around blindly in a panic isn’t going to get us anywhere, Guv.”
“Your ‘methodological’ approach isn’t either. Now get everyone out there, start from a single point, work outwards, and get asking questions. Bang some heads if you need to. Is it so hard?”
Sam realised that what was going to follow was inevitable, so decided to goad Gene on. “Always your response isn’t it, Gene? Punch first, ask questions later.” He found his collar grabbed and he was slammed up against the filing cabinet, much the same way as when he first walked into 1973’s CID.
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what I said it was.”
“You, Detective Inspector, live very dangerously at times.” Gene snarled, then let him go. Sam absently noted his hangover was gone. Not the world’s safest hangover cure but for now, it would do.
Gene had also calmed down. “Just organise a door to door search, Tyler. He has to be somewhere.”
Harry smiled gently to himself as his train pulled into Preston station. It had been ridiculously easy to lose his shadow. Make sure you turn up at the station at the last minute, buy your ticket fast, hurry for the train. Poor sod didn’t even know which way he was going.
Except there he was. Must have got on the train using his warrant card. Ah, well, no time to worry about things now. First stop, the library.
Hunting through the electoral register, Harry carefully made note of all the Sams, Samuels and those with the middle initial S. Those without a Mrs Williams living in the same house were discounted. Left him with eight S. Williams of around the right age, and 3 with the middle initial S. Just as well he knew Preston well from an eight month tour of duty here when he was a Sergeant. This should confuse them back in A Division. He headed for the bus station, keeping a careful eye on the detective following him.
He had a carefully prepared cover story. Retired police officer, collecting for the Police Benevolent Fund. Even managed to pick up one of those collecting tins. No-one could refuse a good sob story. Drawing himself up to his full height, he knocked on the first door. With an oily smile on his face he appeared cheerful as the door opened.
“Mrs Williams?” A woman in her 50s, hair in curlers, had opened the door. Harry bit down his disappointment. So much for the date of birth on the register. “My name is Harry Woolf and I’m collecting on behalf of the Police Benevolent Fund...”
Five hours later, Harry was no closer to finding DI Williams. As he sat in a cafe, hugging his cup of coffee in his hands, he scoured through the names on his list. Nothing. None of them had ever been a police officer, most of them had never even been to Manchester. He drained his drink, hauled himself out of the chair, nodded once at his shadow, who blushed and ducked his head, then chuckling to himself, he headed back to the station.
“Preston?”
“Apparently Guv. He got an early train, went to the library, then paid a visit to a dozen or so houses, all over the town, then headed back here.”
“What the bloody hell is in Preston?”
“No idea Guv, But... Harrow thinks Harry might have clocked him.”
“If he has, I’ll get it in the ear tonight. Wait a sec... wasn’t Harry posted to Preston for a while when it was a DC or a DS?”
“You tell me, you’re the one who served under him.”
“He back home?” Sam nodded. “Right, I’ll go visit him, then head home. Prove to me missus I’m still alive.” Sam laughed.
“How does she put up with you?”
“Told you before, me legendary prowess as a lover.”
Author: Kirsteena
Fandom: Life on Mars
Spoilers: Set after 2.02, spoilers for 2.07 and 2.08
Rating: White Cortina.
Pairings: None
Word Count: 2284
Summary: Harry's hunt continues
a/n: Part 4 has arrived! part 1 here, part 2 here , part 3 here . Thanks to marsorbiter for the bunnies, and emeriin for her wonderful beta reading. 2 more parts to go - post them soon, promise.
DISCLAIMER: Life on Mars is copyright Kudos and the BBC. All Rights Reserved. No copyright infringement is intended and no money is being made.
“Williams or Morgan. Williams or Morgan. Williams or Morgan.” Harry was pacing the length of his flat again, deciding which track to go down first. His pacing was interrupted by a knock on the door. Who could... There was only one person it could be.
“Gene. Come in.” Harry opened the door to see the expected face outside.
“Evening Harry. How are you today?”
“As well as can be expected. Drink?”
“Thought you would never ask.” Gene smiled.
“I heard about that Fletcher lad.” Harry decided that attack was the best form of defence - and he had to face it, it had been all over the news. “Must be rough trying to lead that one” he chuckled.
Gene gave a wry grin. “Just a bit.”
“How is it going?”
“Apart from us having no bloody clue, just peachy. Anyway, I should be getting back, I just popped in to check you were ok.”
“I’m fine, you don’t have to check on me every day.”
“I want to.” The words, spoken so simply, cut through Harry. He smiled a genuine smile at Gene.
“Thank you.” Gene nodded, then left.
What had he started? He stared out of his window, watching the disappearing form of Gene Hunt. Thought about what he had done. He watched the Cortina pulling away at speed. Never did anything by halves, did Gene. He chuckled gently. For the first time he began to have doubts about what was happening. Was he right to think the way he was? Gene obviously still cared. Surely that was enough? He closed his eyes against the sudden tears that burned.
After a moment, he opened them again, and resumed his contemplation of his surroundings. He noticed a movement in the shadows outside. Frowning he looked closer. There was a figure there. Standing, having a smoke. He looked further down the street. A car. Looking very like an unmarked police car. Harry’s face hardened. So, Gene suspected. Well, since he had made him, it was understandable. Good. Any feeling of regret he had vanished in an instant. No more playing. Time to do what he had to. Preston it was - might as well lead his new friend on a little bit of a chase. A wry grin crossed Harry’s face as he imagined the Super’s expression when the expenses landed on his desk. Putting that thought aside, he turned to his phone. Asking the operator to put him through, he waited, listening to the ringing at the other end of the line. “Hello?” a voice answered.
“Alfie, it’s Harry.”
“He is fine, Mr. Woolf. Now please don’t contact me again.”
“One more thing?”
“Don’t you think you might have been asking for too many ‘one more things’, Harry?”
“Any information on two coppers - DI Williams, and DCI Morgan. That’s all.”
There was a pause at the other end of the line “I’ll see what I can do - but this is the last time Mr. Woolf. I’m starting to get pissed about this.”
Gene walked back into CID, and went straight into his office. Sam watched the door for a while, then, as curiosity got the better of him, he wandered through the double doors. Gene was sitting at his desk, reading a file. He looked up as Sam walked in.
“Well?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know. He seemed normal, but...” Gene sighed. “No, I have done the right thing. And he will have realised what I have done by now.”
“So your next visit is gonna be the interesting one?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure you are ok with this Guv? It is not too late to stop it.”
“Don’t confuse me Sam. Not now.” Gene stood up and walked out into the main CID office. “Ok you lot, question. Were there any unusual robberies or anything going on in the last two days that Fletcher might have disturbed? He may have got caught up in something.”
Ray shook his head. “Nothing unusual. Few minor robberies, but if they were going to hold a copper, would have been the big guns. Now’t going on there.”
Sam rubbed his face. “Ok, I am out of ideas - anyone got anything - no matter how stupid it seems?” Silence gripped CID. “Well, if you think of anything, no matter how stupid, at this stage we need anything you can give us.”
Gene was watching his team. “Go home. Go to the pub. I don’t care. Just don’t be here. Get some sleep, come in fresh tomorrow. You are no use to us exhausted.” Sam nodded at Gene, then watched as the team slowly walked out the door, most likely straight for the sanctuary of the Railway Arms. “Come on Sam, I’ll buy you a drink.”
An evening spent seriously drinking with Gene was never a good idea, Sam ruminated later. The table was strewn with both pint glasses and tumblers for the whisky chasers. Most of the rest of CID had retreated to one corner, leaving Sam to deal with Gene. Annie was hovering close by, just in case Sam needed help. Ah well, Sam thought, he needn’t worry about meeting himself in the future - his liver will never survive many nights like this. Both of them were extremely drunk, which meant that Gene got more morose as the night went on.
“Y’know what is wrong with this city?”
“Wassat?”
“No respect, five years ago, no-one would have taken a copper. ‘least, no-one who knew what was good for ‘em. Now... No ‘spect for us.”
“You should see it in my time.” Sam muttered.
“Eh?”
“Nothin’”
“I’m gettin’ too old for this shit.”
“You? Old?
Gene stared at Sam for a moment. “Yes. Me. I’m getting old. It happens. All this business with ‘arry only proves it.”
“God, you are a depressing drunk, you know that?”
“Me? You aren’t that much better. You get drunk, you start gabbling on about ipods and... and... ‘Nokia’ and such crap. I mean, what the hell‘s a Nokia?” Gene emphasised his comments by poking a finger into Sam’s chest. For some reason, the thought of his mobile phone made Sam laugh. Hysterically. Gene just stared at him. “You are drunk, Sam.” It was like it was a revelation to him.
“I am.” Sam giggled at the thought. “So are you.”
“Maybe.”
“How are you getting home? ‘Cause no bloody way you are driving like that.”
“Erm...”
“I’ll sleep on the sofa” Sam sighed.
After a short walk home, where Sam had half carried Gene - made more difficult considering how drunk he himself was - and a struggle up the stairs, Sam removed his camel coat, then poured him onto the bed - no easy task with a man the size of Gene. Gene muttered to himself, and almost immediately started snoring.
“Bloody marvellous.” Sam wrestled with Gene for a bit, and eventually pulled the green top cover off the bed, covering him up with the remaining blankets. He grabbed a cushion off the chair, and settled down on the floor. Oh, for his own king size bed in 2006. Slowly, Sam drifted off to sleep.
“Did you think that bringing the big man here would keep me away, Sam?” Sam awoke with a start to stare into the face of the Test Card Girl. “You should know by now, nothing keeps me away.”
“Wh... What do you want?” Sam stammered quietly, snatching a quick glance at the slumbering form in his bed. Gene was still snoring away.
“Why can’t you find the black man Sam? He isn’t far away.”
“That’s easy for you to say” Sam muttered back at the strange girl.
“It is like a game of hide-and-seek - but you have to find him before the bad men get him. But then it will be easy for you, he is close.”
“If he is so close, you bloody find him!”
“What is the point in that? At least this way you are busy while you are sleeping. Isn’t this more fun?”
“Fun? You think this is fun?”
“You know it is, Sam.” With that, Sam woke up properly with a start. He sat there quietly, trying to stop his heart from racing and let his breathing catch up with him. He glanced over at Gene, who was still sleeping like he didn’t have a care in the world. He would have thought that tonight, with company there, he would have been safe from her visit. Slowly, he fell back asleep.
Sam was suffering the after-effects of his hangover the following morning. Nursing a bottle of Lucozade, he sat at his desk with his head in his hands. God, this decade was going to kill him! They were no further forward, and Gene was prowling about like a cat on a hot tin roof. The danger signs were there for a Hunt-sized explosion at some point today. Ray and Chris had wisely made themselves scarce. Annie sidled over to him.
“You ok, sir?”
“Ungh. Why did I drink so much?”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time?”
Sam smiled up at Annie. “Anything turn up overnight?”
“Not a thing.”
“Tyler, get in here!” The inevitable yell came from Hunt’s office. Annie grimaced at Sam, who was busy putting his jacket on.
“Oh, God” was Sam’s only response, and slowly walked into the office. “Yes, Guv?”
“Why the hell haven’t you lot started door to door enquiries? Should have been started yesterday! Do I have to think of everything myself?”
“No, Guv, but we had everyone checking warehouses and the like. Manchester is kind of a big city, especially when you don’t know where to start looking.”
“I don’t want excuses, Gladys. I’ve got the top brass on me back asking why the hell we haven’t found him or gotten any clues by now. We need to get on with it.”
“Running around blindly in a panic isn’t going to get us anywhere, Guv.”
“Your ‘methodological’ approach isn’t either. Now get everyone out there, start from a single point, work outwards, and get asking questions. Bang some heads if you need to. Is it so hard?”
Sam realised that what was going to follow was inevitable, so decided to goad Gene on. “Always your response isn’t it, Gene? Punch first, ask questions later.” He found his collar grabbed and he was slammed up against the filing cabinet, much the same way as when he first walked into 1973’s CID.
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what I said it was.”
“You, Detective Inspector, live very dangerously at times.” Gene snarled, then let him go. Sam absently noted his hangover was gone. Not the world’s safest hangover cure but for now, it would do.
Gene had also calmed down. “Just organise a door to door search, Tyler. He has to be somewhere.”
Harry smiled gently to himself as his train pulled into Preston station. It had been ridiculously easy to lose his shadow. Make sure you turn up at the station at the last minute, buy your ticket fast, hurry for the train. Poor sod didn’t even know which way he was going.
Except there he was. Must have got on the train using his warrant card. Ah, well, no time to worry about things now. First stop, the library.
Hunting through the electoral register, Harry carefully made note of all the Sams, Samuels and those with the middle initial S. Those without a Mrs Williams living in the same house were discounted. Left him with eight S. Williams of around the right age, and 3 with the middle initial S. Just as well he knew Preston well from an eight month tour of duty here when he was a Sergeant. This should confuse them back in A Division. He headed for the bus station, keeping a careful eye on the detective following him.
He had a carefully prepared cover story. Retired police officer, collecting for the Police Benevolent Fund. Even managed to pick up one of those collecting tins. No-one could refuse a good sob story. Drawing himself up to his full height, he knocked on the first door. With an oily smile on his face he appeared cheerful as the door opened.
“Mrs Williams?” A woman in her 50s, hair in curlers, had opened the door. Harry bit down his disappointment. So much for the date of birth on the register. “My name is Harry Woolf and I’m collecting on behalf of the Police Benevolent Fund...”
Five hours later, Harry was no closer to finding DI Williams. As he sat in a cafe, hugging his cup of coffee in his hands, he scoured through the names on his list. Nothing. None of them had ever been a police officer, most of them had never even been to Manchester. He drained his drink, hauled himself out of the chair, nodded once at his shadow, who blushed and ducked his head, then chuckling to himself, he headed back to the station.
“Preston?”
“Apparently Guv. He got an early train, went to the library, then paid a visit to a dozen or so houses, all over the town, then headed back here.”
“What the bloody hell is in Preston?”
“No idea Guv, But... Harrow thinks Harry might have clocked him.”
“If he has, I’ll get it in the ear tonight. Wait a sec... wasn’t Harry posted to Preston for a while when it was a DC or a DS?”
“You tell me, you’re the one who served under him.”
“He back home?” Sam nodded. “Right, I’ll go visit him, then head home. Prove to me missus I’m still alive.” Sam laughed.
“How does she put up with you?”
“Told you before, me legendary prowess as a lover.”