A/N- This story is angst, character death, but also romance. It's the fruit of so many thoughts and theories and spoilers about where the show is going with several weeks to wait until it actually returns. I thought I'd weave them all into a worst case scenario story, and then try to see our heroes through. This fic is backdropped against a casefile. Though, I think, a slightly more complex one than from my previous fic.
Spoilers up to 6x12. AU from there.
Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, the only thing I gain from their use is hiatus survival. Lyrics from 'Ghosts That We Knew' used without permission. No harm intended.
PART I
Chapter One
She couldn't do this.
Teresa Lisbon had always sworn that if ever she found herself caught in a rushing current, if ever she were submerged, overwhelmed, lost, that she would fight against it for all she was worth. She wouldn't be someone who capitulated to the unrelenting tide, who resigned themselves to drifting away. No, she'd keep swimming, damn it, find the shore, return quickly to solid ground.
But it had been three months. Three months, and here she was, struggling to draw air into her lungs. Her chest was on fire, her throat constricted. She was drowning, and she just didn't have the energy to keep treading these waters in avoidance of the fate she had once thought herself so capable of rising above.
The bathroom sink's porcelain edge bit into her forearms where she leaned against it, bent over, feet slowly slipping against aqua tile as they grappled to find stability beneath her trembling weight. Her head was spinning, and with one tear-clouded look at herself in the mirror, her face blotched red and plastered with damp tendrils of hair, she gave in and lowered herself down to the floor. She wrapped her arms across her naked chest, drew up her knees, and allowed her cheek to press into the cool linoleum. Gasping, shaking, she lay there, the occasional sob that would well up and break it's way through the torment she had become immersed in echoing between the walls.
'Special Agent Teresa Lisbon is fit and ready for duty.' That's what the report from the psychiatrist's office had stated not five days ago. It concluded that she had come to accept her role in the events that unfolded this past January. That she was devastated, but that was healthy. Guilt-ridden, but that was normal. In pain, but coping appropriately and moving forward. Lisbon had been pleased when she'd received a copy of the report late last week, knowing that the Austin FBI office had received one, as well. And, sure enough, Kim Fischer was on the other end of Lisbon's phone when it had vibrated a few hours later.
"Everything's a go. Abbott submitted the paperwork this afternoon and the Deputy Director signed off on it almost immediately. You're welcome to start back on Monday." Lisbon could hear the other woman's smile. They'd genuinely formed a bond somewhere along the way. Not a close one by any means, they'd hardly spoken apart from their time on the job together. But they were kindred spirits of sorts, two women who'd proven themselves capable in a man's world.
"That's the news I was hoping for when I got my mail, today."
"Looking forward to getting back into the grind?"
"Yeah, you could say that. It will be nice to finally have something to occupy my time besides learning how to make great-tasting meals 'for the whole family' in under an hour and watching people fail lie detector tests." And besides sitting in silence, hot tears sliding down her cheeks. Besides listening to the endless litany of self-flagellation that ran inside her head. Besides going over and over and over the 'what-ifs' that haunted her, tormented her...
"Hmm, that doesn't sound so bad to me, actually, but I'm glad you're feeling better, Teresa. I'd kind of gotten used to having some girl power here, it'll be good to have you back."
"Well I just hope Jane hasn't been too much trouble." Too much trouble. She knew from Cho that although Jane had been morose and quite short with others, he had been, for the most part, deferential and helpful on a number of cases in the months of her absence from active duty. She'd almost started to worry the FBI wouldn't want her to return.
"He's... Jane. You know. Sort of. We've been getting by. But like I said, it will be good to have you back."
"Thank you. I guess I'll be seeing you all on Monday. Anything I should read up on?"
"Nope. We just wrapped up something in Louisiana, but you probably know that from Jane?" Lisbon stayed silent in the pause that followed, not confirming any contact with her partner outside of work. Fischer took the hint. "Anyway, we have nothing new assigned at the moment. It'll be a fresh start for you Monday."
A fresh start...
Lisbon, who had been pacing absent-mindedly, had frozen in that moment, stricken. She'd been doing better. She had been. But something about those words... they jarred against the fragile composure she fought so constantly to maintain.
A fresh start.
A fresh start. For her. Even though she was the one who'd screwed up. She was the one who had been too caught up in feeling free from worry and stress for the first time in God knows how long to stop and take Ardiles seriously, to really consider why he'd sought her out with his concerns. Her. Specifically.
"Oh, God, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," she'd murmured into the disconnected phone line after managing her goodbye to Fischer. But no matter how many times she had said those words since January, Lisbon couldn't feel any forgiveness, couldn't find any reprieve from suffocating remorse. Apology had become the mantra that carried her through each day now, like a heartbeat. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry... but still, she could never say it enough to make the words anything more than a laughably hollow offering in exchange for the sacrifice made to her carelessness.
A fresh start.
Ever since learning of the horror that had been discovered in San Francisco, she couldn't accept that she deserved normalcy, deserved the ability to get up and follow routine, to be little, mundane... to live a life untouched by what she'd done.
She didn't deserve what a fresh start would offer.
Normalcy mocked her. Normal was what she'd had as someone else fought for their life. And right up until Dennis Abbott came rushing over to where she and the rest of their unit were finishing up case reports from the Whitaker murder, up until he had ordered them all to follow him—immediately—that day, too, had been deceivingly, cruelly normal.
"What's going on?" Teresa Lisbon, along with Patrick Jane and Kimball Cho, had been hastily ushered into the Austin FBI office's war room. They were greeted by a large group of men and women, some sitting around the large dark table that occupied the center of the glass cell, but most standing like human panels around the transparent walls, obscuring the view of anyone outside who might be wondering, like Teresa, what the fuss was about.
The moment they had entered the room, a hush had fallen, and the last sound for several long moments had been the gentle snick of Abbott closing the door behind them.
"Something is very, very wrong." Jane muttered from her right. Then, loud enough to address the room, "Is this about the vending machine? Because I honestly didn't know the glass would shatter, you see people kick them on TV all the time. And Lisbon and Cho here," he added, pointing to them as if no one would know who he meant, "are innocent, they had no idea their snacks were pilfered."
Lisbon rolled her eyes beside him and quietly hissed, "That was you?"
"Well, I didn't mean it to be."
"You don't kick FBI property, I don't care if you think it'll break or not."
"It took my dollar and then failed to keep it's end of the bargain."
"Jane-" she started, but their hushed exchange was interrupted by an older woman clearing her throat and glaring at them from where she sat at the table. Three chairs across from her were left open, and she stretched out her hand toward them, palm up, in impatient gesture for the Lisbon, Jane, and Cho to take a seat. They complied.
"You have no idea why you're here, today?" The woman asked them, her red manicured nails tapping the table.
"No." Cho answered.
"Let me start with some introductions. I am Special Agent Doris Saliba, Chief Supervising Agent for the California field office. And behind me are Special Agents Michael Davis, Leland James, and Audrey Laughlin from Illinois, New Mexico, and New York, respectively, where they each hold the position of Chief Supervisor. Everyone else can be properly introduced later, but let me assure you that we have assembled our best people to be here today." Agent Saliba handed a pile of three thick navy blue folders to Cho, and he passed two to Lisbon, who gave one to Jane. They exchanged concerned glances, growing more anxious with each passing second.
"Now let's get right to it. We have reason to believe that your lives are in danger. We believe this because as of last night, you three are the only living members of your old unit that you served in before the dissolution of the California Bureau of Investigation."
Another hush fell as it seemed like the whole room held their breaths, just waiting for Saliba's words to sink in for the three longtime colleagues. The only living members... the only living members... the only... living...
"Please tell me you're not saying..." Lisbon felt a knot in the pit of her stomach, her apprehension increasing tenfold. It couldn't be. It couldn't be. Under the table she felt Jane's hand close over her knee, and when she turned to look at him, she received all the confirmation she needed. He was staring at his open folder, face white, eyes... almost wild.
She whipped her head around to Cho. His trademark stoicism had been replaced by horror. Abruptly, he slapped his folder closed, pushed back from the table, and, shouldering past Abbott and Fischer, briskly left the war room. No one tried to stop him.
Lisbon closed her eyes, sucked in a deep breath, and finally began taking in the contents of her folder. There were numerous sheets of paper clipped inside, typical case report documents, and she could see the glossy edges of photos peaking out from beneath them.
Her heart hammered. This couldn't be happening.
Contained on the summary page were several names she knew very well from her days in California, and also several she didn't. As she read on, she realized that the unfamiliar names belonged to family members of the people with whom she had worked so closely for the majority of her career. So many names, every one an open homicide case. Lisbon was starting to feel lightheaded as she scanned further down the page, and by the time she finished, she was trying not to vomit. It was worse than she had even imagined, unbelievably worse.
No, no, no. This couldn't be happening.
Osvaldo Ardiles. Unsolved homicide.
Wayne Rigsby. Unsolved homicide.
Grace van Pelt-Rigsby. Unsolved homicide.
Madeleine Rigsby. Unsolved homicide.
Lisbon had reached under the table to grip Jane's hand where he was still grasping her knee, and they shared a look. Ardiles must not have been paranoid. Not at all.
And she could have nipped this in the bud. The opportunity had been hers.
Nearly four months from that day, she was planning to just move on, get up each morning, begin to function once again like nothing had happened.
A fresh start.
What right did she have to that kind of normalcy? What right did she have to look forward to a fresh start when she was to blame for destroying the one Rigsby and van Pelt had made for themselves? And Maddy, so very little Maddy, she'd barely had her start at all.
Mercifully, Benjamin Rigsby had been with his mother the weekend half of his family had been taken, but he would have his own start marred for life. Every time he found himself in need of guidance, every time he'd look out into the crowd after a school performance, or wanted to celebrate a victory, his father wouldn't be there for him. Not ever. His sister, too, gone. Lisbon knew what it was like to lose a parent as a child, how it shaped you around grief and sorrow, how jealousy over peers who didn't know how good they had it with two people to love and protect them, to give them a heritage, tainted friendships. Now, in return for her heedlessness that cost the little boy a happy, normal future, she was being offered a fresh start.
That Thursday afternoon following Fischer's call, Lisbon had quickly managed to pull herself together, let a now familiar numbness settle over her, and keep going. But the thoughts surrounding her fresh start were relentless as they pursued her through the rest of the evening, through Friday, over the weekend, and on into Monday. She couldn't escape them as she settled in to watch a badly done courtroom reenactment on TV. They warred with Jane's voice for dominance in her mind when he had shown up at her door on Friday, insisting that she please eat, he'd brought her favorite, and again, on Saturday, when he'd tried to coax her out to the shooting range to let off some steam. On Sunday they followed her to the hairdresser, the nail salon, and finally home, where she ignored Jane's phonecall and curled up in bed just before 6:00 pm.
Then Monday morning... Monday morning as she woke up to an alarm clock for the first time in weeks, as she washed her freshly clipped locks, and stared at herself in the bathroom mirror while she brushed her teeth... Monday morning, as everything went normally for her and she prepared for her fresh start, her determination to accept it and move on collapsed around her.
Later, Teresa wouldn't be able to say how long she'd been on the floor before exhaustion overtook her and she closed her eyes, her shuddering ceased, and her arms loosened their protective grip around her.
But she did remember the final thought that carried her away once she surrendered to the grief. Like father, like daughter.