Author's Note: I don't know why I am reading so much into these two characters! I just think they have something that's worth writing about. And there isn't enough of the couple anyway.
So I've been sitting on this fic for ages, since I watched 'Vamonos'. I thought it would be interesting to expand on the relationship between Mahone (equally awesome, by the way!) and Lang. So yeah. I likey the reviews. Gimme some! Please…
Caged
"Hungry? You must be starving."
She feels something like a gladiator as soon as she closes the door, trapped with an edgy bear/lion/any-other-wild-animal-that-could-rip-her-to-shreds-in-the-literal-as-well-as-figurative-sense.
He watches her from the window and makes a strange little noise, part laugh, part cough.
"You'd uh…you'd think so, huh? Given the…circumstances." He moves towards a chair and begins to tap an index finger on the back. "I can't," he seems to apologize. "I can't eat, I can't sleep…can't even turn on the TV. Not until I know it's over."
She stares at the man, more a restrained animal now. She wonders how it came to this. Why it had to. Agent Alexander Mahone, now just Alex. A name uttered in a quiet sort of desperation. She looked up to him. She still does. But she wonders how much that will change if it turns out he did kill those people…
"Alex-"
"How's Cameron? And Pam."
The child, the wife. She almost forgot she wasn't the only one who cared.
"They're doing fine."
He nods rapidly. "Cameron's- doing okay in school? He uh- he was having a hard time with Math…"
"He's fine." She hesitates. "He misses you." She misses him, too. He was her one constant in a life full of broken promises and incomplete hopes and missed chances. Now his eyes constantly flicker from corner to corner, over her, through her. She needs him to focus. She needs him back.
"Sit down, Alex."
"When are we leaving?"
"Soon. Sit."
He does, and the compliance seems strange to her. He's so frail, she's afraid he'll break if she touches him.
"What happened in that prison?"
He taps his foot on the carpet, fingers steepled at his mouth. "Nothing fun, I'll tell you that much."
"Tell me more."
He tells her more than she expected and by the end of it she aches. She can see the imprint on him, of death and hopelessness. Time won't heal it. He needs help. And in this place, so near and so far from home, she knows that he needs her, too. Part of her thrives on it. Part of her is still the young woman with the hopeful eyes and shiny badge worn like a shield. That woman wanted him to want her. Now she's older, frayed, and the needing is enough.
So she sits with him, squeezes his hand, presses her head against his shoulder. They are trapped together, but with him resting his head on hers, it feel less like a prison.
A/N: I've discovered that most of the PB one-shots don't get reviewed here. So I won't beg. I only hope that someone comes across this and enjoys reading it as much as I did writing it!