“You have feelings for Elliot. Now –” he said a little more firmly, because Cabe was opening his mouth to argue with him, “– I’m not going to judge or make assumptions as to whether these feelings are sexual or romantic or even completely platonic. But you’ve been acting distant all week, ever since you slept with him.”
“I have?”
“You have. You’ve been quieter, more distracted by your own thoughts. Gabriella’s noticed it too, as has Ronnie. They’re both worried about you, though I promised them I wouldn’t tell you that.”
“I’m not a stranger to one-night stands, James,” Cabe said monotonously, half-lidding his damp eyes and peering through the wet lashes to drive the his lack of amusement home.
“No, you’re not.” Flint looked at him, seriously. “Which is why the way you’ve been acting this week is concerning your teammates.”
With a heavy sigh, Cabe shrugged his one good shoulder beneath the blanket. “I guess... I guess that day I saw a different side of him, and something... something started to... develop.” Cabe dropped his feet down and leaned forward on his knees, burrowing his face into the blanket the way a child might when he wanted to hide from the world. “And I guess I’ve just been feeling... weird.”
“Because you’re feeling something other than lust for a man who isn’t Aaron Boone?”
Cabe was still for a long time before he finally straightened back up again, leaning back in the camping chair. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess...”
“That’s normal, Cabe.” Flint’s voice was sincere and sympathetic. “Is this the first time it’s happened since...?”
“Yeah.”
“Then it’s extremely normal,” concluded Flint with a soft nod. “You feel guilty because you may be feeling something intimate for a new partner, even if it’s a man you’ve only slept with once on a whim. Look.” Flint shifted again, nudging himself forward on the stool so his knees were against Cabe’s, offering the physical comfort and support he knew his agent needed but would never outright ask for. “I’m not going to bombard you with the usual idioms or expressions about how your partner would’ve wanted you to move on and live a happy, fulfilled life, because I’m sure you already know them all. I’m sure you’ve already had to endure them all from friends and coworkers. But what I will say is this: whatever afterlife Agent Boone did or didn’t believe in, if any part of him is still present in this mortal realm, it would not want you sitting out here, hating yourself, until you get frostbite.”
For the first time since nearly getting his face smashed in by a low-flying filing cabinet, Cabe let out a genuine laugh. “No, he wouldn’t... he would kick my arse all over my flat for moping around because I got laid. And then he’d drag me to bed ‘cuz I got work in the morning.”
Flint mirrored his laugh, without quite as much gusto. “That he would. And then he would tell you to get your ass into therapy and start treating yourself with kindness instead of killing yourself over every perceived flaw and crime.”
He... he had a point. Boone had never been the kind of guy to dwell on his problems and make mountains out of molehills. If he sliced his arm, he treated it well, wrapped it, and made sure it healed properly. If he broke something around the house, he shrugged, threw it out, and bought another one. There was no doubt that, in this situation, he would be telling Cabe to suck it up, get treatment, and move on with his life.
That was just the kind of guy he was.
“I know... I know. You’re right.” Cabe’s hand was reaching down, groping the air for the neck of his beer bottle, when he paused suddenly to fix his supervisor with a very sober look.
“James,” he said seriously. “Just... thanks, man. For putting up with my shit. And for tonight... I... I kinda needed someone to take the blunt hammer of truth and reality to my face and just... not stop ‘til I woke up.”
The expression Flint reciprocated with was just as genuine, just as somber, and just as grateful. “You can always count on me for that, I can promise you now,” he replied with a light chuckle. “You’re a good agent, Cabe, and a good man. You deserve your happiness, regardless of any dark force which tries to deny you of it.”
“Thanks... I’m right tired though, so if I don’t receive all these compliments in a super polite fashion, please don’t take it personal.”
“I won’t.” Flint coughed and cleared his throat, the chilly air finally working its way into his lungs. “Though, before I go... I do have one more question for you, if you’re in a place where you can revisit some of the things we spoke about before?”
Cabe’s fingers, which had gone back to their hunt, finally found the neck of his beer bottle and hoisted the beverage into his lap. “I... I’m in an okay place. I think I cried most of it out by now, anyway.”
Flint nodded very seriously, his hazel eyes earnestly seeking out the other agent’s. “In the desert, when you’d lost Aaron and thought we might never find you... why did you keep holding on?”
That... that’s a fucking good question.
His slow, exhausted mind whirring, Cabe gave himself at least a minute to chew over the logic and reasoning behind why he had struggled and strained for so long out in the heat and cold. It was surprising for him to learn that he couldn’t actually come up with a solid, legitimate answer, rather than just stating some overused and possibly untrue cliché.
“Honestly?” he finally said, probably looking more enlightened and yet also more confused than he had done for the entirety of the night. “I don’t even know.”
“Well, I strongly recommend you figure it out,” Flint was saying as he rose to his feet, gingerly to avoid mistreating all the joints that had remained bent in the same position in the cold for so long. “Because that’s what’s going to keep you alive in the future... or what’s going to get you killed.”
Cabe was gradually slipping back into the depths of his own mind as Flint stepped around the patio table toward the sliding door. But his mind, oddly, seemed a less dark place all of a sudden. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, Flint had planted a candle in his heart, and in the bright flickering glow he was finally able to see every single crack, scar, and tear that had been silently plaguing him, killing him, for the past fifteen months.
And now that he could see them – now he knew that not only were they there, but they were fixable, they were normal – it was as if things were suddenly a lot lighter.
There was hope. There was a way out. There was a future.
“Get some sleep, lots of it.” Flint’s voice jarred him from his thoughts as he eased open the sticky, stubborn door. “You’ve got to be at WrightTech for two tomorrow, so I’m sending Ronnie with her car at ten. You’re still not finished with your exceedingly egotistical client, and who knows, if we’re lucky, he may not try to you killed again next weekend.”
Flint stepped inside the apartment, then paused, and rocked back onto the Oxford that was still anchored to the balcony. He put his hand on the door and watched Cabe as he took a long, slow drag of his beer, before sighing and just saying what was on his mind.
“You know... it’s the hardest thing, saving people who don’t want to be saved. Especially when they don’t even know they need rescuing. Good night, Agent Sparrow.”
And then, Flint was gone, leaving the younger agent to mull over whether his supervisor had been referencing the Anomalies they worked with day-to-day... or Cabe himself.
Twenty-Two
It was just after seven when Agent Veronica Moss parked her little Fiat at the W.A.R.D. office in SoDo Seattle. As expected, Flint’s modest black sedan was already in the lot. He’d probably been there most of the night, scouring over the debriefs and trying to connect any two dots he was able to discover a link between. She’d fully anticipated his workaholic reaction to a crazy hectic night; it was the reason she’d picked up the biggest, pulpiest jug of organic orange juice she’d been able to find for the staff room refrigerator before driving into work.
Her Docs squ
eaked against the entryway as she gained access with her keycard and pushed the weighted door inward. Gunther raised his head from the sudoku he was doing on his cluttered desk, grunting his usual grunt of a greeting.
“Good morning, Gunther!” Ronnie said brightly, flashing a warm smile. He was eyeing the gigantic jug of orange juice under her arm. “Sleep well?”
“Here all night,” the security guard responded gruffly. “Damn wolf sniffin’ ‘round outside again.”
Ronnie smiled sympathetically at the grumpy old man. It was probably just a coyote or a dog, but she didn’t want to crush his spirit. “Isn’t that just the worst? Well, I hope you get to nap at some point today!”
“Don’ ever sleep,” was his grouchy reply as she stepped around the desk, through the doors, and toward the elevators at the back, shaking her head in amusement.
Flint was in his office with the door open, which was his way of communicating to his team that visitors were welcome. Ronnie still made sure to knock politely before poking her head in. “Morning, boss-man. I brought you your fix.” She hauled the orange juice into sight, her muscles trembling under the effort to hold it up one-handed. “Figured you’ve probably been awake all night and could use a sugar boost.”
The Supervisory Senior Agent smiled tiredly at her as she entered the humble-sized office, shifting some of the papers on his desk so that she could set down the orange juice and two tall glasses.
“It’s not freshly squeezed like in California,” she said apologetically as she cracked it open and carefully poured the first glass, “but it’s organic at least, so that’s a plus.”
“Natural sugars are the best sugars,” agreed Flint with a nod. He waited patiently to be passed his own glass, pausing so that she could finish filling hers before committing to drink. He made a noise of approval. “Tasty stuff. Good work, agent.”
“Why, thank you.” Ronnie gulped her own beverage. She preferred her juice smooth, but she wasn’t going to complain if it was a little extra... well, juicy.
“You look nice today. Is there some sort of date I missed in my workaholic stupor?”
Ronnie’s painted lips curved in a shy arc. “Not really... kinda felt like poop when I woke up this morning. Figured dressing up would make me feel a bit chirpier”
Flint raised his eyebrows as he sipped his drink. She could see the tiredness in his eyes from yet another night without sleep. “Did it work?”
The agent handler fixed him with her most cheerful grin. “What do you think? Chirpy enough I can handle a certain grumpy Sparrow this morning.” Ronnie hesitated suddenly, biting her lower lip. “How is he? I mean, I know you text me after you went to check on him, but I’m looking for a little something more than thirty-five characters.”
Setting his juice down on the desk, Flint sighed. “We chatted, admitted some home truths. He’s struggling... but he’s admitted he wants and needs help. So we’re going to work with him, and make sure he doesn’t need to take any leave unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
“Leave isn’t going to help him, it’s only going to make it worse.” Ronnie tapped her finger against the rim of her glass anxiously. She was in her own head for a few moments before asking, “It’s Boone... isn’t it? His old partner?”
Flint smiled at her sadly. “You know Agent Sparrow better than he thinks you do.”
“He’s still in mourning?”
“I don’t know if he ever even started.” Flint sat back in his leather office chair and rubbed his left-hand temples with two fingers. “But he’s realizing how important it is that he come to terms with his emotions, and shed the negative ones... which is the first step to healing. As his main handler and his best friend, I’m afraid that puts quite the burden on you.”
Ronnie shrugged. “I’ve been taking care of his ass for a year now. Nothing unusual to me.”
“Also, as your supervisor,” said Flint, his words adopting a more professional tone, “I need to know that you feel comfortable approaching me if your senses tell you something with Agent Sparrow is... off.”
Swirling her glass to give herself something to stare at while she spoke, Ronnie replied, “Of course I feel comfortable with you. I’m just... worried about him?”
“Do you still trust him to perform his job to the best of his ability?”
“Of course.”
Flint’s lips broke into a smile again. “Good. So do I. But my trust means nothing if the agent handling him when he’s hot is lacking it. You’re the one standing between him and death, Ronnie – him, and Agent Dasilva. You’re their lifeline. And being able to put your full and utmost trust in them and their reactions is absolutely imperative.”
Ronnie was flushing beneath her blush, trying to hide it to little avail. It was only too common, despite her sunny and positive outward appearance, for Ronnie Moss to crawl into her tiny car exhausted at the end of the day, wondering if her presence at the office even made a difference. To have it confirmed verbally by a supervisor was...
“Th-thanks,” she mumbled, close to the red smear left by her lipstick on the glass. “It’s... hard to remember that when you’re behind a screen and they’re out in the field, knee-deep in crap.”
“You weren’t behind a screen last night,” said Flint pointedly. He rubbed his chin in thought, a light layer of five o’clock stubble dappling his usually clean-shaven skin. “Why were you on the recurring floor?”
Immediately, Ronnie’s huge dark eyes dropped to her knees in shame.
“I... I was going to send Agent Faraj...” She paused to swallow thickly. “But he was almost into the real C.C.T.V. feed for the recurring floor, and I knew we would need the surveillance footage for evidence, so...”
“So you took up his sword and armor, and rode forth to slay the beast alone?”
Ronnie winced. “I know it was stupid... but I knew I could get to the recurring floor sooner than Dasilva if I took the elevator and used the master keycard Mr. Wright gave you to keep secured in our rooms... I’m sorry, it was loud and, and chaotic, and everything was –”
Flint held up one firm hand. “Agent Moss. Please, relax. You’re not on trial here. I’m more looking for an insight into your mental state at the time.”
Ronnie’s heart suddenly dropped into her gut and knotted itself tightly within her intestines. “Am... am I going on leave!?”
“No,” Flint said with lightness to his voice. “Of course not. We don’t put operatives on leave for abandoning their posts once like that. You were concerned about the time it would take Agent Sparrow’s backup to reach him, concerned it wouldn’t be quick enough, and bought them some time. Was it stupid? Possibly. But it worked, and because of it, we didn’t lose our operative, and we didn’t lose our client.”
“But we lost our Assailant,” countered Ronnie, with a sadness woven into her voice. “Someone died... the toll wasn’t a perfect zero. And... that means we lost our only real lead, too.”
“Not... exactly.”
Ronnie’s face twisted into a confused frown. “Say what?”
“These reports came in from the lab this morning,” Flint announced, sliding the manila envelope from atop the plain black binder and handing it to the junior agent. “The full post-mortem and discovery of last night’s Assailant from Dr. Chakrabarti in Scientific Research. She sent over some... very interesting photographs from the process.”
If possible, Ronnie’s face screwed itself up even tighter. “Boss-man, it’s a good thing I know you so well, ‘cuz that sounded hella creepy.”
“You can sit there and call me creepy, Agent Moss,” Flint was saying as she opened the envelope to withdraw what was inside, “but if how you’re going to respond to these photos is anything like I imagine, you may find that accusation comes boomeranging right back.”
Courteously granting herself the second or two it took to fling her supervisor a playful pout, Ronnie eventually dropped her eyes to the small stack of letter-sized snapshots.
Okay
, what in the name of totally freaking illegal and fucked up biotech...!? Her hands flipped through each bloody, close-up photograph in turn, allowing her the proper time to study each one closely. After five or six, she finally raised her gaze again, her words drenched in horror and fear, and maybe even a tiny little bit of curiosity. “What... what the effing hell is that thing?”
“A piece of radioactive, highly-advanced technology that was found nestled between the frontal lobe and motor cortex of her brain during the procedure,” explained Flint, though from the tone of his speech and the way his nose was wrinkled, he was just as disgusted as his junior. “It was attached using a bioengineered material to the brain in three places – here, here, and here.”
Ronnie watched as his finger moved across one snapshot of the tiny metal device, which was placed next to a dime and was roughly the same size; Flint pointed out a pair of naked wires, each about the width of a single hair, and a third on the other side the width of a keychain split ring.
“That’s... that’s gross...” Ronnie switched to the next photograph, shaking her head slowly from side to side. “Why? What’s it’s purpose?”
“Well.” Flint sighed, probably to try and drop some of the weight from his shoulders. “Dr. Chakrabarti has her suspicions, especially given the fact that it was surgically implanted near the parts of the brain that control movement, emotions, and behavior... she believes it may have been used to electronically alter or influence this woman’s actions and desires.”
Ronnie blinked at him, finally tearing her eyes away from the photos. “You mean like... like some sort of mind control?”
“Possibly.” Flint stifled a yawn with some success and reached for his orange juice again. “This is all speculation. The device is currently entirely non-functional. According to one of the techs at the Spokane office, the inner circuitry is completely fried. It may be a fail safe that was triggered when she realized she was going to be taken into custody.”
Black Tie: Book One of the Sparrow Archives Page 34
