This is the sequel to Masks and the other one-shots linked with it. It is also my first proper multi-chaptered fic in this fandom. Admittedly the title is not particularly creative, but don't judge it by its cover.
Disclaimer: Chris Nolan owns everything!
Steve McAllen was a man of habit. His house was a semi-detached house that looked like every other one in the street and since his wife left him soon after his military career had failed, it was far too big to be comfortable, yet he chose to live there because it was easier.
He also had a glass of whiskey with a drop of water every night before going to bed, ever since then. He would go into his study, look at the photos of his children (who had left him with their mother) and contemplate anything and everything.
So when he entered his study that evening, he certainly did not expect his chair behind the desk to be occupied. He also did not expect the man to be playing nonchalantly with his very own gun, which was supposed to be locked up in a safe in his bedroom.
He froze, the glass of whiskey halfway to his mouth.
"It's nice to finally catch up with you Mr. McAllen." The man drawled; head cocked slightly to the side like a predator waiting to attack. He did not look particularly dangerous in appearance what with the slightly worse for wear tweed jacket and pastel-coloured shirt, but the look on his face promised nothing good.
"I'm sorry, am I supposed to know you?" The ex-army general asked, the vague twang of an Edinburgh accent still there despite his two decades of living in Reading.
"Not if I did my job right." The man's smile was positively shark-like, his gray eyes icy as they met his. "You see, I am what you might call an expert in dreaming."
Almost instantly the alarm bells in McAllen's head started ringing. His eyes darted around the room, but the only weapon there was, was the gun the stranger now very calmly placed on the desk in front of him, the barrel pointing right at his gut.
"How did you find me?" He found himself asking, whiskey-glass forgotten in his hand.
The man had pulled out a red poker-chip from his pocket, rolling it over his knuckles in a practiced manner. The smile was still there, turning into a warped smirk. "Easy enough since you didn't cover your tracks properly. You should really never sign with your real name for anything to do with your dummy corporations."
McAllen swallowed, but accepted it. So he had not exactly been thorough, but really, he had been sure Waverley would have done away with the whole affair by now.
"If you're wondering about your partner, I guess you should know that the police are still keeping his body under lockdown. They suspect he was involved in drug shipping." The stranger seemed to have read his mind.
"Mr. Eames, is it?" He finally found his voice again and took a careful sip of his tumbler, shifting his eyes to contemplate the golden colour of the liquid.
The man nodded, the poker-chip still slipping through nimble fingers as if he was not threatening a man in his own home but having a casual conversation of no immediate importance. He seemed to be studying the photos on display on the desk and he did not like that one bit.
"How did you get my gun?" It was not what he had meant to ask, there were too many questions racing through his mind right now, none of them particularly useful. These years as a civilian had made him soft.
Icy slate-coloured eyes slid back to his. He looked almost bored, the poker-chip caught between two fingers and then disappearing back into a pocket. "If you had done your homework, you would have found why the MI6 was so interested in pulling me into their operations. I don't only steal information out of people's heads."
While McAllen still scrambled to say something coherent, knowing that there was very little chance of him making it out of this alive, the stranger, or rather, Eames, picked up a photo of his three children and wife taken in happier days.
"You had a lovely family." He remarked as if he was talking about the weather, deliberately using the past tense, "And two daughters I see." When he looked up again, his eyes were no longer cold, but burning with a barely controlled rage that made McAllen's skin crawl.
"Listen, Waverley had the idea. I just…" He started to say, just to say anything at all, but Eames was having none of it.
"I don't particularly care who had the idea." He told him, voice a low growl, "I care about what happened."
McAllen started to sweat when the man's hand fell onto the desk, right next to the handle of the gun.
"You knew what was happening. You went along with it." The hand retreated as Eames leant back in the chair adopting an air of relaxation when his expression clearly spoke otherwise. He was tapping his fingers on the handles, the sound clearly deliberate, adding to the tension already in the room.
McAllen, felt more and more like he was playing with him, like a cat would with a mouse.
"I mean I knew the two of you were a bunch of bastards for trying to sell out your own bloody country, but this…" He did not finish the sentence, just shook his head, fixing him with a glare.
"As if you were any better." McAllen abruptly downed the rest of his whiskey, relishing the burn of the alcohol. He tightly gripped the glass and ignored the mildly quizzical look the other man adopted.
"I know you will kill me." He began, and then paused, staring the other man right in the eyes. "How many have you killed before? How many lives have you destroyed?"
He vaguely noted that though Eames had not moved from his position, there was a new tension in his body, hands clenching into fists slowly. "What makes you deserve any semblance of a family when I lost mine?" He carried on nonetheless.
He had not even finished speaking when Eames' eyes narrowed dangerously. In the silence followed by his statement, McAllen vaguely wondered if the numbness in his body was due to the alcohol entering his blood, or if it was the knowledge that there was no way out of this situation.
Perhaps it was what he had wanted all along when he had agreed to Waverley's plan, or even earlier when they had gone after whoever had stolen the information about their betrayal in their sleep; when they had killed this man's partner in a bloodbath.
"This is not about family." The other man's dark comment shook him out of his thoughts. "This is about destroying the life of an innocent little girl."
Almost casually, Eames sat up straighter and picked up the gun, studying its polished surface in the dim light. "You see, you could have just taken me out. Very few people would have shed a tear."
McAllen could not help but look away when the cold gaze zeroed in on him again. "Only, you didn't and now I'm here to make you pay for what you've done."
He clicked off the safety of the weapon, eyes still locked firmly in those of his would-be victim. "It's really easy enough. By the end of this, you will wish you had never laid a finger on my daughter and my body-count will simply have increased by one." He cocked the gun and fired with barely a seconds warning.
McAllen felt like he had been punched in the gut. The empty glass in his hand slipped through his unfeeling fingers and shattered on the carpet. He gulped, eyes dropping from the smouldering satisfaction in the other man's eyes to his middle, seeing the crimson soak the old shirt he was wearing.
The world tilted and he weakly tried to grasp at the bookcase next to him to keep himself upright, but it was no use and he awkwardly collapsed against it, the pain increasing to an agonising burning sensation that made him gasp.
Through this haze he watched Eames push back the chair and walk around the desk to crouch down in front of him, gun hanging from his hand. "This will take a while." He informed him, the callous smile back in place.
TBC...
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