Lots of things can happen at the end of a count down, at the end of a time. At the end of a life, things can be broken or made new; at the end of a year, there is time to start over; at the end of a day, tasks are begun and finished; at the end of an hour, a meeting could be over; at the end of a minute... Time can pass very fast or very slowly - sometimes both. Never the one you want.
Numbers are tricky things. They're very simple by themselves, but put together? Codes, messages, programs, time, lives... Sixty seconds in a minute, twenty-four hours in a day, thirty days in a month, seven bullets in a magazine, two minutes left to live - numbers can be so much more with something else than they can be alone.
Five seconds to sum up everything that he had discovered, that he had tracked down. Five seconds to sum up things that should take longer than five seconds to explain - and he wasn't sure how he got into these situations anymore.
He hadn't finished talking. He hadn't finished before the man had finished counting. Certainly he was mostly certain that he wouldn't come home that night to fins another impossible task and loaded magazine waiting for him, but he wasn't willing to bet his life on that. Not that he had any choice in the matter - the numbers weren't his to choose.
Numbers are tricky things. A few zeros and Arabic numerals and someone was willing to hunt another person down. A few zeros and arabic numerals and someone was willing to eat someone alive. A few zeros and Arabic numerals, and governments could rise or fall.
A few seconds and an expert loading, and numbers could mean the difference between life and death.
"Please tell me you didn't get to zero."
AN: So I write weirdly... This is inspired by the scene in 3x05 where Aram tries to sum everything up is five seconds and is cut off before he's finished. Also by the scene in 1x11 where Reddington promises to empty the magazine of the gun into his head (I chose seven for the magazine because I don't know if there was one in the firing chamber or not, and Reddington didn't specify what sort of mag it was so I assumed normal - feel free to correct me if you know better.) if he doesn't move the money in under two minutes. Reddington wouldn't kill him without reason, but you can't entirely trust that. 10-2-2015 And now every time I read this I get Finch stuck in my head...