Disclaimer: I so obviously don't own either Dark Angel, Max Allen Collins, or his Dark Angel book, Skin Games.
Spoilers: Set after Skin Games.
Note: If you're interested in more White-centric & M/W fics (as well as every other DA sort imaginable) go to The Broken World via the link in my profile (click the pic once you reach my lil old angelfire site and it'll lead you to the emerald city. Uhh.. The Broken World)
by Sorrow
In frozen horrification, Ames White stared at the television, as it revealed his world collapsing before his eyes. The face of his NSA partner, Otto Gottlieb, now filled the screen. Ames felt the room close in on him as Otto began to relay some of the questionable deeds of his partner that he had been privy to over the past year.
{{We have now uncovered a connection between Ames White and the serial killings that have taken place over the past few days. The doubts that I have harboured towards my NSA partner have now materialised into conclusive evidence against him. But I can assure you that as a person who has worked alongside him for several months, this is not the first incident where Special Agent Ames White has twisted a combination of the law, forensic evidence and the lives of others, to further his own hidden agenda...}}
So engrossed was Ames in watching his life wash down the drain, the sudden shrill ring of the telephone startled him out of numb shock, propelling him from his dazed stupor at last. Grabbing the receiver from it's cradle as if to stifle the sound, he began to bark out a remark regarding the trace he had ordered on the Eyes Only cable hack. Obviously, this sudden change in his future had surprised Ames so much, he was yet to truly recognise just how doomed his future was.
Barely had he choked three words from his mouth when the voice on the other end of the line cut him off, informing him in a clear cold voice to report in immediately. Focus within the NSA had suddenly shifted from Eyes Only to Ames White. And the spotlight of inquisition was a damning one.
Now as he slowly hung up the phone, Ames noticed how his hand shook ever so slightly. The message was brief, but it spoke a thousand words. And none of them would save him. He wasn't fool enough to follow the order. In this harsh post-pulse world, it would carry a penalty that even a fellow familiar such as Senator McKinley, could not save him from.
Ames raised an uncharacteristically unsteady hand and burrowed his face into it. Rage seethed within him. His free hand instinctively clenching into a fist. There was no time to find an outlet for the hatred and panic that burned within him. He had to leave. Before they came for him, as no doubt they would.
Once again the phone began to ring. Suppressing the desire to hurtle it across the room, Ames White instead spurred himself into action. He strode to his desk and pulled open a drawer. If he hadn't felt so secure about his home security system, he would have held concern in leaving a stack of papers such as these within an oh-so-predicable secret compartment at the back of the drawer. Shoving his contingency plan - his secondary alias that not even the Conclave were aware of - into an inner pocket of his suit jacket, he began to move towards the door.
But one thing caught his eye and caused him to halt. Turning, he hesitantly approached the desk once more. An oh-so-predictable family photograph perched upon the glossy wooden surface, within a gilded gold frame. Unlike the portrait photograph of Wendy, Ray and himself that stared at him from the wall opposite, this one was much less stoical. A snapshot of a memory - a holiday in another part of the world. One that could even be deemed as sincere.
As the phone continued to ring, Ames picked up the picture and stood in indecision as he stared down at the image of happier days. His eyes wandered across the laughing carefree face of his son, the smiling trusting eyes of his wife, and his own face - one free from self-reservation and narrow-minded contempt for the world. Well... almost.
He drank in the details, memorising every feature, before letting the photograph slip from his fingers and land upon the desk once more. It was time to make a new life. And to do that, he had to let go of the old one.
As the phone finally ceased to fill the room with its piercing cry, Ames exited the house, not bothering to pay the room a parting glance. Time was short. And he'd wasted too much of it already.
Ames realised he had been driving in circles, at about the same time he became aware of his mind travelling in the same direction. Through the streets of Seattle he made his way, heading in no particular direction, using his new ID to gain him access through sector check points. Fortunately, it seemed his picture had not yet begun to circulate throughout the sector booths. It had dawned on him as he pulled away from his home, that nowhere was safe. Anger still fuelled him, but it was slowly being smothered by a new feeling. One he was entirely unaccustomed to, and not at all comfortable with. Fear.
Without doubt, Ames knew that his career within the NSA was well and truly over, the Eyes Only broadcast had revealed information that now made him a wanted felon. There were transgenic haters out there who would see his actions as justifiable. Sure he had set up the murder of an NSA agent and a couple of cops, to put heat on the freaks. But what was a couple of lives taken it was for the good of... mankind?
He had to be insane to think that kind of excuse would sit well within the high court. And besides, Otto held suspicions about the team of Phalanx he had brought into Jam Pony. No doubt that too would soon be investigated. And once they dug back a bit further, it would be revealed that he had the transgenic, Mule, in his custody before the beast was beaten and broken on national television. He was in the vicinity when the blind girl, Annie fisher had been murdered. He blackmailed a transgenic into hunting down his fellow freaks...
Ames should have disposed of Otto after the Jam Pony fiasco. In hindsight, he realised that he should have allowed Otto in on the mission. Once within the Jam Pony building, he could have taken the guy out himself and pinned the blame on the transgenics. It would have been the perfect set up. It would have worked. And he would never be in this situation right now.
But unfortunately, in his desire to eliminate the transgenics, namely 452, he had grown careless. He had relied too much on Otto's subservient personality and his own special brand of familiar-bred arrogance. As Ames turned down yet another narrow broken city street, he silently admitted to himself that both his over-inflated ego, and burning hatred for the transgenics, had blinded him. And so by the time he realised the threat that lay in Otto, it was too late.
Arranging for Otto to meet the sector cop who had the thermal imager had been White's attempt to right the wrong of letting his partner live. He had waited nearby, ready to snatch up the imager before anyone found the bodies in the sector 11 checkpoint booth. But unfortunately, the damned psychotic transgenic had played happy hunter before the cop had the chance to meet with the NSA agent. He should have stepped in and finished the job that the freak Snappy... Skimpy... whatever... had failed to carry out. But he had always preferred to commit murder indirectly. And so Otto had been left alive, and with more questions than ever.
When Otto phoned to tell him of Dunphy's death, Ames had continued to act foolishly. Ordering him to desert the scene and phone Clemente with news that a transgenic had committed another murder. Then he had ordered his partner to leave. To go on god damned holiday in the middle of a murder inquiry! Ames knew he should have simply finished him off, but somehow, he couldn't bring himself to carry out the task. Yet another foolish move on his part. Because by his panicked reaction, he had given the seed of doubt that had crept into Otto's mind, nourishment by which it could grow.
Now, he couldn't even turn to the protective wing of the Conclave. After his attempt to eliminate 452 during the Jam Pony fiasco had failed, Ames had been called to face a meeting with the Elders. Their anger had been immeasurable and in no uncertain terms, they had warned him that another mistake such as this, would be unforgivable. They felt enough chances had been dished out already. No one had spoken in his defence. Not McKinley, not the Priestess he had consulted with on a few occasions. So long as they felt he was of use to them, they would offer their support, but not when the he stood before the Conclave as one who was dangerously close to being in the very least, excommunicated.
As his father had before him.
While Ames illegal activities had been performed for the ultimate benefit of the breeding cult, and often under their order, they were only willing to pat him on the back if he continued to maintain their secrecy. But as things stood right now, there was a wide open chance that the breeding cult would be revealed for all the world to see via Eyes Only cable hacks. The general public would most likely laugh it off - at first. But with Otto's suspicions to back the cyber-journalist's claims, an investigation would be launched. Starting with the 'tactical insertion team' that Ames White had stormed Jam Pony with. The team who were 'on loan from another agency'. The agency in question, being the kind that sought to see all of humanity scoured from the face of the earth.
There was no doubt about it. The secrecy which the breeding cult had struggled for thousands of years to maintain, now teetered on the edge of being unveiled. And the blame would rest entirely on one. Ames White.
Perhaps he could bring 452 to the Conclave, and seek redemption. But how? His attempts to trap that damn bitch had always come to nothing. And now she was cocooned within the relative protection of Terminal City, surrounded by hundreds of her own kind like some damned queen. And surrounding them... the National Guard, the US army, and news crews from around the world. She was untouchable - now more than ever. Regardless of whether or not he could eliminate 452, she was no longer the only threat to the existence of the familiars.
Ames knew that he'd be no better off turning himself into the Conclave, than he would be turning himself into Langford Prison with his hands outstretched and awaiting handcuffs.
Dragging his thoughts back to the instantaneous present, Ames finally pulled his car against the curb and turned off the ignition. It had been twenty minutes since the Eyes Only broadcast had chased him from his home. Soon, his picture would be everywhere, and with a big fat WANTED: $50,000 REWARD sign tagged to the bottom of it. He had to go into hiding while he worked out how to clear his name. But how? Formulate an intense cover of deceit and denial to hide himself behind? Plausible deniability... How when the evidence against him was so damning? When the chance of the breeding cult's cover so precariously close to being exposed? He was expendable to both sides, and he knew it.
Think damn it!
Ames slammed his head into the back of his seat while simultaneously punching the steering wheel. This of course did nothing to help his thoughts run any clearer. What the hell was he going to do? His world was collapsing against him, threatening to crush him beneath its weight. And he just wasn't strong enough to hold it back. Never before had he faced this kind of uncertainty. In the past, help would always be a phone call and a fe nos tol away. But not anymore. Now, he was truly alone. There was no one else in the world he could rely on except himself.He had now joined the ranks of the hunted. Alongside the transgenics themselves. Unfortunately, right now, the freaks had a much better chance of survival than he.
At that moment, a thought weaselled its way through the frantic confusion that churned within Ames's mind. At first, he shoved it away, tried to bury it beneath the rest of his lost hopes. But it bobbed to the surface once more. As he sat within the car he knew he would soon have to ditch, Ames finally allowed this thought to turn over inside his mind. Examining it back to front and inside out, he soon realised it was the only idea that could possibly work. The only way in which he might be able to exchange this mess of great magnitude for another - albeit smaller, mess. One that carried no penalty of death.
Closing his eyes and taking a deep calming breath, Ames slowly forced the silent screams of frustration inside his head to subside. It was time to accept that drastic measures must be taken to save his own life. And if he had to bite a bullet, he preferred it to be a metaphorical one. Therefore, he had to find his father.
A/N: Thanks Northern Star and Sammie for encouraging more in the way of White-centric writing, and thanks Enigma for giving me a last minute plot. This was just going to be a standalone - a more detailed yada yada on the thoughts that White went through after the EE broadcast at the end of SG, but if anyone's interested, it may just turn into yet another WIP to add to my collection... ??