FIC: In the Arms of the Wicked, Part 5 (Colby/Charlie, Megan, David, Don, Ian, others, PG-13)
Title: "I remember"
Series: In the Arms of the Wicked, Part 5/?
Characters: Colby/Charlie, Megan, David, Don, Ian, Larry, Amita, mention of Liz.
Rating: PG-13.
Spoilers: Season 5.
Warnings: None.
Summary: Don shares the bad news with the team, and Charlie and Colby talk about their relationship for the first time in days.
Feedback: Yes, please. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own anything (characters, situations, etcetera) except my OCs.
Beta: The fantastic twins_m0m.
Previous chapter
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Part 5: “I remember”
Of course Megan knew that this would happen. As she sat at the table at Don’s apartment, her eyes wandered around the room, watching the people that were around her. Charlie and Colby were on opposite sides of the room, David walked around, and Don, also seated at the table, just kept running his hands over his face. In the meantime, Larry was extremely occupied in a corner, looking thoughtful and away from the world.
Soon the team was complete. When Ian rang the bell of Don’s apartment, everyone welcomed him. Megan asked him where Dr. Farrow was.
“He decided to go home,” Ian announced, looking slightly irritated.
“Why? Wasn’t he supposed to help us out?”
“Let’s just say that he has a big mouth and it turned out to be my job to keep it shut.”
After those words, Megan saw Larry wave his hands in a gesture of impatience. Something had to have happened between Ian and Dr. Farrow for him to do that, most probably an awkward moment or discussion that had taken place at CalSci.
“What will we do about him?” David asked, approaching the others at the table.
“Look, we’ll talk about that later. I asked you to come here for another reason, okay? So let’s stay focused,” Don said with a somewhat angry tone of voice.
To Megan, what he was thinking was more than obvious. Since she had heard at the FBI that Agent Carl McGowan would take over Amita’s case, she had been sure that he would mess up things even more.
“What is it, Don?” Colby wanted to know.
His boss shook his head, licked his lips and took a deep breath. “All right, I’ve some news for you… Carl McGowan is following the India case.”
The news caught everyone but Megan by surprise.
“What? Why?” Charlie asked.
“There were some pretty irregular things in it, Charlie. I can’t blame him for wanting to keep an eye on us, really. It’s what anyone would do.”
It seemed that David wasn’t satisfied with that answer. “But Don, there has to be something important for McGowan to be around - something that really caught his attention.”
“Yes, yes. There has to be a material source of information that is interesting and suspicious enough for a man of his range to intervene in the case,” Larry added, joining the others.
Don’s silence meant he was about to give more bad news. As he seemed to have trouble telling his team about it, Megan held her breath and waited. She watched him get up and lay his hands on the table as he finally spoke.
“He knows about the sound files that were recorded during the kidnapping at the house.”
When there weren’t any gasps of shock this time, Megan shook her head. She could expect some heavy discussion in any minute.
“So? I understand that the tapes were destroyed by someone,” David muttered, looking right into Don’s eyes.
Strangely, Don swallowed before answering, “No. There are copies of them.”
David’s dark eyes went wide and he was absolutely out of words. As his agent tried to catch his breath, Don continued, “I thought they were gone, David. I didn’t…”
“Forget it. Just… forget it,” David whispered as little drops of sweat slid slowly over his skin.
“Are you ok?” Colby asked, and his partner awkwardly nodded.
Charlie had a question, too - one that was really important. “Which tapes does McGowan have?”
“All of them. The system makes automatic copies for safety and they’re immediately sent to a secure server. I don’t how the hell I missed that,” his brother answered.
“All… of them?”
“Yeah. All of them, Charlie… including the ones about you and Colby.”
Feeling pain and worry fill her heart, Megan analyzed the way Charlie was looking at Colby. He was definitely afraid of what may come.
On the other side, Colby was trying not to look back at his lover. The green-eyed agent kept avoiding making eye contact with Charlie, like he was ashamed of something or like he thought that everything between them was already destroyed.
“Carl asked me to go to his office tomorrow morning,” Don continued, while everyone else remained silent. “He wants to ask me some questions about what happened at the house.”
“Are you going to be OK?” Megan wanted to know.
Don simply bit his bottom lip and admitted, “I don’t know, but I’ll do my best.”
She nodded, completely out of breath, suddenly feeling the urge to leave. She hadn’t had that feeling in years; not since her job at the DOJ. And the memories of that time weren’t nice.
Of course Megan wanted to stay and try to support Don and the others, but the need to get out and catch some fresh air was too overwhelming for her. So she got up and announced, “I just remembered I have to visit Liz tonight, so I better get going. I’ll keep my cell phone with me so you can contact me if anything happens.”
“Tell her that we’ll go to see her soon and that we’re all thinking of her, all right?” her boss asked her.
“Sure.”
“Wait, Megan. I’ll go with you,” David unexpectedly said, as if he had forgotten about Don’s bad news. Megan didn’t ask him about the reasons because she really didn't mind the company, even if she wanted to get away from the place. Her heart ached that her mind couldn't find a way to fix everybody’s problems.
“Okay,” she muttered as she waved the others goodbye and gave Larry a quick kiss on the cheek. Followed by David, she left Don’s apartment and they both took the elevator. There, she couldn’t restrain a little smile. “You’re a good guy, doing this for Liz. She hasn’t received a lot of visits so far, given the situation.”
He shook his head. “She’s our friend. She should know that we care about her… Liz risked her life fighting Amita in Charlie and Don’s house. Being there for her is the best thing we can do for her. She deserves a lot more.”
“That’s true,” Megan agreed. Inside, her heart felt the warm caress of kind words being spoken. At least there were still some good things around in her life, something that could make painful memories go away for a minute or two.
Once outside Don’s apartment, they walked towards her car in silence. Suddenly, David stopped. When Megan turned around, she found him buying a bouquet of flowers. She observed him asking a street seller for pink lilies and returning to the car.
She didn’t turn on the engine until he was inside the vehicle. There was something touching in the air, in that moment, and she couldn’t stop staring at the flowers David was holding.
“I just thought…” he muttered.
“They’re beautiful.”
David smiled sadly in response, looking at the flowers, too. Megan had to use all the energy she had left to hold back the tears as she hit the gas. Kind words were now accompanied by a nice gesture, and that was all that was needed to brighten up her day.
XxX
“This is a mess, Don,” Ian said as he, Don and Larry walked into the kitchen. “You do know what’s the usual policy on gay agents? It’s a lot worse than being abused while wearing the uniform.”
“I know, I know! And I have no idea what to do. I thought those tapes didn’t exist anymore, and now I have to deal with them again, and…”
“Excuse me… Did you just say ‘again’?” Larry asked.
Curious, Ian followed Don’s eyes as they landed on the physicist. There was no doubt he was hiding something. “Don.”
“I don’t know what I said, maybe I did say ‘again,’ but who cares,” Don excused himself angrily. “So Dr. Farrow really went home?”
All right, if you don’t want to talk about it… “Yes. And he won’t talk about the case to the press anymore, trust me.”
“What happened?”
Larry took the lead. “A little encounter… not exactly pleasant, by the way.”
“Well, we can’t deal with the whims of irresponsible people like him,” Ian stated.
“But we need him,” Don said.
I hate it that you have a good point. “Mmm.” Placing his hands on his hips, the sniper walked around the kitchen. “I don’t trust him.”
“Me neither, but he’s the expert on Egyptian artifacts here. It’d take us ages to figure out details by ourselves, and we have that Consul on the way. It’s not like we can waste time.”
In a way, Ian agreed with Don. But before he could give him an answer, he saw what time it was on the kitchen clock from the corner of his eye. “I gotta go, I’m sorry,” he said, but he made a stop before leaving the room. “I’ll get Dr. Farrow to the office tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Ian.”
“You’re welcome.”
The way out of Don’s apartment was full of subtleties. “Granger,” he told Colby as he passed him by. “Professor,” he greeted Charlie as the mathematician opened the door for him. There was sadness in their eyes, and it seemed that they were going to have an important talk any minute.
XxX
Colby wondered who would be the first to talk. After all, Megan and David had gone to the hospital to see Liz, Don and Larry were talking in the kitchen and Ian had just left. In the living room, the only two people were him and Charlie. With the plus of the horrible, awkward silence, that was making things even harder.
If he could only raise his voice, open his mouth and talk… He hated that it was so difficult for him. Besides the memory of being abused by Amita and the guilt of causing her to go crazy, there was the presence of Dr. Farrow around Charlie. All that had to make it impossible for Colby and his lover to get together again.
And suddenly, Charlie’s voice filled the room, breaking the silence.
“Remember when I told you that we had five percent chance to be happy together?”
The images of Charlie saying such a non-romantic comment made Colby spontaneously smile. “Yeah, I do.” When he noticed that he was already talking to the person he loved, he realized that it was natural once the ice had been broken. Still, things weren’t okay between them, and he had to say the first thing that ran through his head. “And you? Do you remember when we said that we’d take it slow and then we did exactly the opposite?” Colby quietly asked.
A little sad smile appeared in the corner of Charlie’s lips as he sat beside Colby at the table. “Yeah… It feels like it was a million years ago, not only two months.”
Colby took a deep breath, the good feeling mixing with the sorrow of loss. “Well… now something has made us finally slow down.” That was the truth, anyway. They had taken things for granted, they hadn’t developed their relationship the way they should have. They had make mistakes, they had hurt Amita and now they were supposed to deal with the consequences.
There was something else Colby needed to say. He could hear little sobs coming from Charlie, and when he turned to him, he could see his lover’s fingers resting on his hand.
Everything was so silent and strange that the sudden change of atmosphere made the pain really hard to handle. But just when Colby was about to apologize about everything that had happened with Amita, Charlie let go his hand and whispered, “I’m the one who should say sorry.”
Then he left.
Colby didn’t look at him He felt the absence of Charlie’s warm skin on his, and the room suddenly seemed to be extremely cold.
Maybe too cold.
He covered his face with his palms. He wanted to do it, he wanted to tell Charlie that he wanted to continue with what they had, but he just couldn’t.
And he couldn’t hold back the tears.
XxX
Again, that blonde woman was observing the doctor’s work from outside. She was clearly their boss, as she wore formal clothes and kept taking down notes that eventually would end up in the patient’s file.
Amita hated the process - she truly did. But she also knew that it was necessary for her to go through this, and that even if she didn’t want to cooperate, doctors would make her do it.
“We need a blood sample so we can proceed with the parentage tests,” one of the men said, as he took out a needle from a medical unit.
Feeling overwhelmed by the situation, Amita took control of her own body and forced it not to tremble. That way, she was able to nod and remain still as doctors took the vial of blood.
She didn’t blink as she watched the needle slowly get filled with the dark liquid being dragged from her arm. Her mind was somewhere else - on the worry of how to take care of a new life when she couldn’t even take care of hers.
Series: In the Arms of the Wicked, Part 5/?
Characters: Colby/Charlie, Megan, David, Don, Ian, Larry, Amita, mention of Liz.
Rating: PG-13.
Spoilers: Season 5.
Warnings: None.
Summary: Don shares the bad news with the team, and Charlie and Colby talk about their relationship for the first time in days.
Feedback: Yes, please. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own anything (characters, situations, etcetera) except my OCs.
Beta: The fantastic twins_m0m.
Previous chapter
Next chapter
Part 5: “I remember”
Of course Megan knew that this would happen. As she sat at the table at Don’s apartment, her eyes wandered around the room, watching the people that were around her. Charlie and Colby were on opposite sides of the room, David walked around, and Don, also seated at the table, just kept running his hands over his face. In the meantime, Larry was extremely occupied in a corner, looking thoughtful and away from the world.
Soon the team was complete. When Ian rang the bell of Don’s apartment, everyone welcomed him. Megan asked him where Dr. Farrow was.
“He decided to go home,” Ian announced, looking slightly irritated.
“Why? Wasn’t he supposed to help us out?”
“Let’s just say that he has a big mouth and it turned out to be my job to keep it shut.”
After those words, Megan saw Larry wave his hands in a gesture of impatience. Something had to have happened between Ian and Dr. Farrow for him to do that, most probably an awkward moment or discussion that had taken place at CalSci.
“What will we do about him?” David asked, approaching the others at the table.
“Look, we’ll talk about that later. I asked you to come here for another reason, okay? So let’s stay focused,” Don said with a somewhat angry tone of voice.
To Megan, what he was thinking was more than obvious. Since she had heard at the FBI that Agent Carl McGowan would take over Amita’s case, she had been sure that he would mess up things even more.
“What is it, Don?” Colby wanted to know.
His boss shook his head, licked his lips and took a deep breath. “All right, I’ve some news for you… Carl McGowan is following the India case.”
The news caught everyone but Megan by surprise.
“What? Why?” Charlie asked.
“There were some pretty irregular things in it, Charlie. I can’t blame him for wanting to keep an eye on us, really. It’s what anyone would do.”
It seemed that David wasn’t satisfied with that answer. “But Don, there has to be something important for McGowan to be around - something that really caught his attention.”
“Yes, yes. There has to be a material source of information that is interesting and suspicious enough for a man of his range to intervene in the case,” Larry added, joining the others.
Don’s silence meant he was about to give more bad news. As he seemed to have trouble telling his team about it, Megan held her breath and waited. She watched him get up and lay his hands on the table as he finally spoke.
“He knows about the sound files that were recorded during the kidnapping at the house.”
When there weren’t any gasps of shock this time, Megan shook her head. She could expect some heavy discussion in any minute.
“So? I understand that the tapes were destroyed by someone,” David muttered, looking right into Don’s eyes.
Strangely, Don swallowed before answering, “No. There are copies of them.”
David’s dark eyes went wide and he was absolutely out of words. As his agent tried to catch his breath, Don continued, “I thought they were gone, David. I didn’t…”
“Forget it. Just… forget it,” David whispered as little drops of sweat slid slowly over his skin.
“Are you ok?” Colby asked, and his partner awkwardly nodded.
Charlie had a question, too - one that was really important. “Which tapes does McGowan have?”
“All of them. The system makes automatic copies for safety and they’re immediately sent to a secure server. I don’t how the hell I missed that,” his brother answered.
“All… of them?”
“Yeah. All of them, Charlie… including the ones about you and Colby.”
Feeling pain and worry fill her heart, Megan analyzed the way Charlie was looking at Colby. He was definitely afraid of what may come.
On the other side, Colby was trying not to look back at his lover. The green-eyed agent kept avoiding making eye contact with Charlie, like he was ashamed of something or like he thought that everything between them was already destroyed.
“Carl asked me to go to his office tomorrow morning,” Don continued, while everyone else remained silent. “He wants to ask me some questions about what happened at the house.”
“Are you going to be OK?” Megan wanted to know.
Don simply bit his bottom lip and admitted, “I don’t know, but I’ll do my best.”
She nodded, completely out of breath, suddenly feeling the urge to leave. She hadn’t had that feeling in years; not since her job at the DOJ. And the memories of that time weren’t nice.
Of course Megan wanted to stay and try to support Don and the others, but the need to get out and catch some fresh air was too overwhelming for her. So she got up and announced, “I just remembered I have to visit Liz tonight, so I better get going. I’ll keep my cell phone with me so you can contact me if anything happens.”
“Tell her that we’ll go to see her soon and that we’re all thinking of her, all right?” her boss asked her.
“Sure.”
“Wait, Megan. I’ll go with you,” David unexpectedly said, as if he had forgotten about Don’s bad news. Megan didn’t ask him about the reasons because she really didn't mind the company, even if she wanted to get away from the place. Her heart ached that her mind couldn't find a way to fix everybody’s problems.
“Okay,” she muttered as she waved the others goodbye and gave Larry a quick kiss on the cheek. Followed by David, she left Don’s apartment and they both took the elevator. There, she couldn’t restrain a little smile. “You’re a good guy, doing this for Liz. She hasn’t received a lot of visits so far, given the situation.”
He shook his head. “She’s our friend. She should know that we care about her… Liz risked her life fighting Amita in Charlie and Don’s house. Being there for her is the best thing we can do for her. She deserves a lot more.”
“That’s true,” Megan agreed. Inside, her heart felt the warm caress of kind words being spoken. At least there were still some good things around in her life, something that could make painful memories go away for a minute or two.
Once outside Don’s apartment, they walked towards her car in silence. Suddenly, David stopped. When Megan turned around, she found him buying a bouquet of flowers. She observed him asking a street seller for pink lilies and returning to the car.
She didn’t turn on the engine until he was inside the vehicle. There was something touching in the air, in that moment, and she couldn’t stop staring at the flowers David was holding.
“I just thought…” he muttered.
“They’re beautiful.”
David smiled sadly in response, looking at the flowers, too. Megan had to use all the energy she had left to hold back the tears as she hit the gas. Kind words were now accompanied by a nice gesture, and that was all that was needed to brighten up her day.
XxX
“This is a mess, Don,” Ian said as he, Don and Larry walked into the kitchen. “You do know what’s the usual policy on gay agents? It’s a lot worse than being abused while wearing the uniform.”
“I know, I know! And I have no idea what to do. I thought those tapes didn’t exist anymore, and now I have to deal with them again, and…”
“Excuse me… Did you just say ‘again’?” Larry asked.
Curious, Ian followed Don’s eyes as they landed on the physicist. There was no doubt he was hiding something. “Don.”
“I don’t know what I said, maybe I did say ‘again,’ but who cares,” Don excused himself angrily. “So Dr. Farrow really went home?”
All right, if you don’t want to talk about it… “Yes. And he won’t talk about the case to the press anymore, trust me.”
“What happened?”
Larry took the lead. “A little encounter… not exactly pleasant, by the way.”
“Well, we can’t deal with the whims of irresponsible people like him,” Ian stated.
“But we need him,” Don said.
I hate it that you have a good point. “Mmm.” Placing his hands on his hips, the sniper walked around the kitchen. “I don’t trust him.”
“Me neither, but he’s the expert on Egyptian artifacts here. It’d take us ages to figure out details by ourselves, and we have that Consul on the way. It’s not like we can waste time.”
In a way, Ian agreed with Don. But before he could give him an answer, he saw what time it was on the kitchen clock from the corner of his eye. “I gotta go, I’m sorry,” he said, but he made a stop before leaving the room. “I’ll get Dr. Farrow to the office tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Ian.”
“You’re welcome.”
The way out of Don’s apartment was full of subtleties. “Granger,” he told Colby as he passed him by. “Professor,” he greeted Charlie as the mathematician opened the door for him. There was sadness in their eyes, and it seemed that they were going to have an important talk any minute.
XxX
Colby wondered who would be the first to talk. After all, Megan and David had gone to the hospital to see Liz, Don and Larry were talking in the kitchen and Ian had just left. In the living room, the only two people were him and Charlie. With the plus of the horrible, awkward silence, that was making things even harder.
If he could only raise his voice, open his mouth and talk… He hated that it was so difficult for him. Besides the memory of being abused by Amita and the guilt of causing her to go crazy, there was the presence of Dr. Farrow around Charlie. All that had to make it impossible for Colby and his lover to get together again.
And suddenly, Charlie’s voice filled the room, breaking the silence.
“Remember when I told you that we had five percent chance to be happy together?”
The images of Charlie saying such a non-romantic comment made Colby spontaneously smile. “Yeah, I do.” When he noticed that he was already talking to the person he loved, he realized that it was natural once the ice had been broken. Still, things weren’t okay between them, and he had to say the first thing that ran through his head. “And you? Do you remember when we said that we’d take it slow and then we did exactly the opposite?” Colby quietly asked.
A little sad smile appeared in the corner of Charlie’s lips as he sat beside Colby at the table. “Yeah… It feels like it was a million years ago, not only two months.”
Colby took a deep breath, the good feeling mixing with the sorrow of loss. “Well… now something has made us finally slow down.” That was the truth, anyway. They had taken things for granted, they hadn’t developed their relationship the way they should have. They had make mistakes, they had hurt Amita and now they were supposed to deal with the consequences.
There was something else Colby needed to say. He could hear little sobs coming from Charlie, and when he turned to him, he could see his lover’s fingers resting on his hand.
Everything was so silent and strange that the sudden change of atmosphere made the pain really hard to handle. But just when Colby was about to apologize about everything that had happened with Amita, Charlie let go his hand and whispered, “I’m the one who should say sorry.”
Then he left.
Colby didn’t look at him He felt the absence of Charlie’s warm skin on his, and the room suddenly seemed to be extremely cold.
Maybe too cold.
He covered his face with his palms. He wanted to do it, he wanted to tell Charlie that he wanted to continue with what they had, but he just couldn’t.
And he couldn’t hold back the tears.
XxX
Again, that blonde woman was observing the doctor’s work from outside. She was clearly their boss, as she wore formal clothes and kept taking down notes that eventually would end up in the patient’s file.
Amita hated the process - she truly did. But she also knew that it was necessary for her to go through this, and that even if she didn’t want to cooperate, doctors would make her do it.
“We need a blood sample so we can proceed with the parentage tests,” one of the men said, as he took out a needle from a medical unit.
Feeling overwhelmed by the situation, Amita took control of her own body and forced it not to tremble. That way, she was able to nod and remain still as doctors took the vial of blood.
She didn’t blink as she watched the needle slowly get filled with the dark liquid being dragged from her arm. Her mind was somewhere else - on the worry of how to take care of a new life when she couldn’t even take care of hers.