Author Notes:

My first fic in five years! It's a bit sloppily written, but what the hey. ;)

So, I've just binged (in under a month!) all of Breaking Bad and the current three seasons of Better Call Saul for the first time and I've developed a ridiculous crush on Bob Odenkirk. Send help!

I've got a couple of ideas for fics, and I thought I'd start with a take on the third season's finale episode. While my favorite characters are obviously Jimmy and Kim, I'm curious about Howard Hamlin and his development. It struck me, during the last interaction between him and Chuck, that he got to experience, for the first time, something akin to Chuck's treatment of his brother. So, I wanted to do both a character introspection and a take on what could happen immediately following the events in the last scene.

As always, R&R. 3 Cross-posting on AO3

Some Say the World Will End in Fire

Howard Hamlin was enjoying a blissful night of uninterrupted sleep in the wake of what had been many sleepless nights when the phone on his bedside table rang shrilly. He snapped awake with a jerk, though it took him a moment to make the mental connection between the noisy ringing and the concept of phones-that-needed-answering.

"..that the phone?", mumbled his wife next to him, half-asleep herself.

He half-grunted his assent as he sat up and glanced blearily at the alarm clock across the room – 2:17 said the red neon numbers – before picking up the handset.

Who could be calling at 2am in the morning?

"Who is this?", in the back of his mind, Howard cringed at his bad phone manners, but he wasn't really awake yet, and really, who expected politeness at two in the morning?

"This is APD Sergeant Hanson. Am I speaking with Howard Hamlin?", said the voice on the other side of the phone.

"Yes, this is he speaking. What can I help you with?", he said, slightly more awake than before.

A bad feeling was starting to creep up Howard's spine. At that time of the night, that kind of a call could never be good. His mind immediately leapt to scenarios involving breaking and entering at the HHM offices, then to theft, then to potential issues involving one of their clients.

But if a client was in need of legal representation, they'd phone the offices in the morning. The only way they'd need a lawyer in the middle of the night was if they did something really bad, got arrested, and were demanding to see their lawyer right now, an idea that made him want to rub his face in tired exasperation.

"I'm calling with regards to a Charles McGill, of 1607 San Cristobal Road. We understand that he is a partner at your law firm, HHM.", though phrased as a statement, the implied question was obvious.

"Yes, that's right." Well, that went in a direction he wasn't expecting.

"Mr McGill is one of our senior partners," he continued. "What's this call about?" Howard's confusion was replaced with a growing sense of concern at the sergeant's reply.

"Mr. Hamlin, we've called you to ask if you have the contact details of any family members of Mr. McGill who should be contacted in case of emergencies. We understand that he has a brother, but we do not have a home telephone number for him. Given that you and Mr. McGill were partners at such a prestigious law firm, we figured you might have the brother's contact details."

Howard's mind was running with a million scenarios. Was Chuck ok? There was something strange about the sergeant's wording, though his sleepy mind couldn't quite identify it. Why couldn't Chuck give them Jimmy's number himself? Barring that, if something happened, surely the police would find the number at his house instead of having to phone up his work colleague.

"Um… I have the number of Jimmy's law practice… well, it's not his law practice per se anymore, but I don't have his personal phone… I can try to get a message to him-"

"Can you confirm Mr. McGill's brother is one James Morgan McGill?" the sergeant cut him off curtly.

"Yeah, erm..yes, that's right." Howard responded, feeling completely wrong-footed.

"And he has an office at 6311 Montaño Road?" the other man quickly added.

"Um, yes. That sounds right, I think." Howard repeated, inarticulately. "I can check that for you-"

"No need, Mr. Hamlin. We'll continue attempt to contact Mr. James McGill, but if you're able to contact him before us, inform him that he needs to contact us immediately."

"Wait.. what's this all about?" Howard cut in this time, becoming increasingly frustrated with the way the conversation was going. "What's happened to Chuck? Is he alright? He has an illness; you see, he cannot be exposed to electricity-" The sergeant cut him off again.

"Mr. Hamlin," a pause followed for a moment, as if the sergeant was debating answering the question. "There has been an incident at Mr. McGill's residence."

"What kind of an incident?", Howard responded, trepidation seeping into his voice.

"Mr. Hamlin…," the hesitation in the sergeant's voice was palpable, "there was a fire in Mr. McGill's home which spread throughout the house. No alarms were set off and the fire department was only called when neighbors noticed the blaze. We have been able to identify a body, most likely belonging to that of Charles McGill."

Howard forgot how to breathe. For a moment he wondered whether that was really air rushing through his ears or if he was imagining it. The absurdity of what he had just been told wasn't quite registering, a fact reflected by his reply.

"What…?" he said stupidly. "How-"

"Mr. Hamlin, I'm afraid we cannot discuss the details of the incident beyond that. If you are able to contact Mr. McGill's brother, tell him to contact the Albuquerque Police Department immediately. We will likely contact you further in the morning concerning a statement. Can you confirm your offices are at 100-101 Sun Avenue?"

"Er.. yes, that's… that's correct… I can't believe it… I-"

"Thank you for your time, Mr. Hamlin, especially at this late hour. Good night." the sergeant cut him off again one last time – Howard had never been interrupted so many times in his life – before the call itself was cut and the line went dead.

Howard starred at the silent phone in his hand for a several seconds, incomprehension written on his face.

Next to him his wife stirred.

"Everything ok? That sounded serious." She said softly.

"That… that was the police." he swallowed thickly, as he continued staring blankly at the handset in his hand.

"Chuck's dead." He blurted out.

"Oh my god." His wife gasped, sitting up in their bed and moving to sit next to him. "How? When?"

"Sometime tonight, I'd guess. They said there was a fire in the house. The fire department wasn't called until it got bad and the neighbors saw it, apparently." He replied mechanically.

"Why did they call you?"

Howard shrugged his shoulders inelegantly; he felt numb.

"They couldn't get a hold of Jimmy, so they called Chuck's most immediate colleague." And I guess having both of our names on the company sign contributed to it.

"My god… I can't believe it," his wife repeated.

Howard shook his head in equal disbelief and shock. He vaguely noticed that his hands were slightly trembling as he grasped the phone more firmly and started dialing a familiar number.

"Who are you calling? Jimmy?"

"Kim." He replied. "She'll definitely have a contact number for Jimmy beside the one for their offices."

He passed a tired hand over his eyes; he was not looking forward to this conversation.

The phone rang several times before it was picked up and he heard Kim's sleep-filled voice on the other side.

"Who's this?" she said, echoing his own blunt answer minutes before.

"Kim, it's Howard. I'm sorry for calling this late.. well-" he glanced at his alarm clock again – 2:25 it glowed – , "early, really. I… um.. I've just had a call from the APD. They need to get in contact with Jimmy. It's about Chuck."

"What? What about him? What do you mean?"

"Look, do you have Jimmy's home number?"

"Howard, what about Chuck? What happened?" she replied, completely ignoring him.

"I… I should really tell Jimmy first." A pause filled the silence.

"Um.. ok, give me a moment." Kim responded, followed by the sound of bedsheets rustling. He thought that maybe she was getting out of bed to get her address book to dictate the number to him. Instead, he heard what sounded like a groan from someone being poked awake.

"Hey, wake up." Kim's voice sounded a bit muffled, like she was holding the phone against her. Howard guessed, with some surprise, that she was trying to wake up her sleeping partner.

"Jimmy! Wake up." She intoned forcefully.

A startled yelp was heard thought the phone.

"Wha..? I'm awake.. w.. why am I awake?", Howard heard Jimmy's startled and confused voice in the distance. "What time is it?"

"Howard's on the phone." Another pause.

"What does he want?", came the gravely, somewhat whiny, response.

"He said he got a call from the police about Chuck."

"What?! Give me the phone." The sound of more bedsheets rustling was quickly followed by Jimmy's alert voice on the phone.

"Howard? What do you mean the police called you? Why did they? What's wrong with Chuck?!", Jimmy's voice was demanding and insistent.

"Jimmy-" Howard froze, uncharacteristically. He hadn't been prepared to speak with the man so soon after receiving the news himself. It just didn't occur to him he'd be there, and he mentally kicked himself for not having realized how close he and Kim had gotten.

They went into practice together; of course they're back to sleeping with each other, you idiot!

"If.. if I'd known you were at Kim's, I'd have told them – the police – to call you there directly. I.. I just have your office number, and I thought Kim would have your personal number.." Howard cursed himself silently for his nervous rambling.

"Howard. What. did. the. police. call. about?" Jimmy cut in pointedly.

"Jimmy… I… I don't know how to say it…" Howard's throat felt surprisingly tight. Never in his entire life would he have thought he'd be in a position of telling someone their brother was dead. In spite of everything that had happened between all of them, he would never have thought they could have ended up here.

"Howard," Jimmy's unnaturally calm voice interrupted Howard's thoughts, as though he was steeling himself for what was coming, "What's happened to Chuck?"

The momentary pause allowed Howard to take a deep breath and gather his words.

"Jimmy, the police said there was a fire at Chuck's house. The… the neighbors called it in. They.. the firefighters or the police, I guess… they, um, found a body inside."

Howard heard Jimmy's sharp and ragged intake of breath on the other side.

"W…what?" Jimmy's voice cracked, and he coughed once to try to clear it.

"What do you mean? A.. a fire? Are you sure?" his voice was small and trembling.

"Jimmy, I'm so sorry," was all Howard could think to say.

"Jimmy, what 'fire'.. what happened?" Howard heard Kim's voice nearby.

"He.. he says.. there was a fire at Chuck's … there's a …they found a… he was inside." Jimmy's choked voice echoed through the phone and Howard wished desperately to wake up and find it all had been a terrible dream. This was wrong on so many levels.

He could hear Kim's equally hesitant voice mumbling questions and words of comfort at the same time, clearly not knowing how to respond herself. But how could any of them have the proper words at a time like this. 'What were the right things to say?', Howard wondered to himself.

"No. He must have heard it wrong." He heard Jimmy exclaim, replying to something Kim said that Howard didn't catch.

"Jimmy, if the police called… I don't see how he could have gotten it wrong. Let's .. let's call the APD."

"No. No! It's not… it just can't!.. it's Chuck! This is stupid! It's a bad joke!" Howard could hear Jimmy's angry voice through the phone, but it sounded even more distant than before. He assumed the other man had gotten up and out of bed. Probably pacing the room, he thought.

"Howard?" Kim's voice was back.

"Kim, I'm so sorry. I don't know what else to say. I don't understand it myself."

"Howard," she repeated, unwaveringly, "what else did they say? Did they explain what happened? Anything?" It was obvious she was trying to be the strong and collected one.

"They said Jimmy needs to call them or go to the station. They've been calling your offices, but there's obviously no one there, and said they'd go there in the morning."

"Jimmy, we need to call the police and talk to them." Kim relayed.

"No! No, you tell that lying son of a bitch that this isn't funny! Who does he think he is?! It's sick! It's a sick joke! Who does that?!"

Howard's eyes shut of their own accord at hearing Jimmy's raw emotion-filled yells over the phone. He didn't take it personally; he wasn't quite sure how he'd himself react to news of this sort, and from someone you didn't really trust.

He heard Kim's attempts to pacify her friend – boyfriend? lover?

"Jimmy… we.. we need to keep our heads here. Howard wouldn't… this isn't the kind of thing anyone would joke about. Let's just call the police, ok?"

Jimmy's harsh breathing could be heard through the phone, wherever he was in relation to it. Howard could tell he must be close to crying, and it childishly made him want to hang up the phone and pretend this wasn't happening.

"But it can't be true. It can't." came Jimmy's emphatic, tearful response.

There had been times over the past ten years, through their petty bickering and occasional rude ribbing, when Howard had wanted to knock Jimmy down a peg or two – when he had been downright outraged at the other man's irreverent and lackadaisical regard for the law, ethics, and taste. He had agreed with Chuck that some kind of wake-up call was needed, and he hadn't been against Jimmy having his license suspended for a year. Through it all, however, he would never have wanted to hear Jimmy sound as broken as he did at that moment. He felt a twinge of guilt at having caused it.

"Howard?" Kim's voice wavered marginally as she called out to him again.

"I'm here."

"Thank you for calling us. I'll keep you updated." She said succinctly.

He could tell a dismissal when he heard one; Jimmy needed to be comforted right now and they needed to get in touch with the police. They had a tough road ahead of them.

"Kim, if either of you need anything, please don't hesitate t-"

"I know. Thanks.", came the interrupting reply, followed by a click that signaled the call was ended.

For the second time in under an hour Howard was left staring at the silent phone in his trembling hands.

He felt his wife shift in bed, bringing a comforting hand to rest against his arm.

Shoving the phone back into its receptacle, Howard rose suddenly from the bed. He paused for a moment, as if not quite sure why he had risen in the first place. His heart was hammering wildly with conflicting emotions. He caught movement out the corner of his eye, and abruptly moved to leave the bedroom before his wife could make further attempts at comfort.

"I need a moment." He mumbled back as he left the room, trying to keep his voice even.

He walked until he reached the kitchen, restless with pent-up anger, frustration, and sadness, and stood there uselessly. For a moment, he contemplated making a cup of coffee or tea or anything just to have something to do, but in the end settled for just taking a seat at one of the kitchen stools and resting his head on his shaking hands.

How did everything get this fucked up?

Chuck was dead.

Howard couldn't help the nagging accusation that repeated in his head – the very real possibility that it wasn't an accident. It was far too coincidental to be an accident. Howard fired Chuck from HHM – the firm he helped establish – and a couple of days later he dies in a fire?

You took away the only thing that gave him a sense of purpose. What was Chuck is not the enterprising brilliant lawyer who built Hamlin Hamlin & McGill from scratch? You took the thing he cared about the most away from him.

That in itself brought another train of just-as-unwanted thoughts to his mind – namely to do with Jimmy. The man had sounded so lost and pained over the phone as he tried to process the news.

Howard let out a shaky breath.

There was no lost love between Howard and Jimmy, as anyone who knew them could have easily deduced, but he had never hated the man. Nor did he have any serious ill-will towards the less-than-ethic lawyer, even after their mutual name-calling and explosive disagreements.

However, if there was one thing about Jimmy that had taken him by complete surprise - one thing that almost made him admire him -, it was the realization that despite everything that happened and the harsh words exchanged, Jimmy loved his brother very much.

Howard realized it that the moment he saw the long list of grocery items and necessaries that Jimmy brought Chuck on a regular basis, and which he'd been bringing faithfully without complaint for the better part of a year and a half.

He'd confirmed it the moment he caught that flash of betrayal that crossed Jimmy's face when he realized his own brother had blocked him from the Sandpiper case and had conspired to keep him from being considered for a position at HHM yet again.

He'd recognized it the moment he heard that dammed taped conversation where Chuck took advantage Jimmy's brotherly love and care in order to weasel out that confession against Jimmy's obvious sense of self-preservation. Jimmy couldn't stand to see someone he loved hurting, especially knowing he'd caused it. However askew his moral-compass was, he still had a good heart.

Conversely, Chuck hadn't been bound by fraternal affection. He hadn't seemed to care if Jimmy was hurt as long as Chuck's perceived sense of justice and lawfulness was maintained. That was something Howard had not realized until that moment in the boardroom at HHM when Chuck made it clear he would happily ruin the firm's reputation and destroy their friendship over a personal vendetta.

Howard had understood, at that moment when Chuck showed his true colors through betrayal and self-interest, a little bit of what it must have felt like for Jimmy to put up with his brother all those years. Everyone had been legitimately surprised at Jimmy's hard work of silently putting himself through law school and studying for the bar exam. That kind of dedication and determination was the kind of thing HHM could have used. Everyone had been even more surprised when Jimmy brought in the Sandpiper case – amazed at the quality of the work he had put in. Everyone was positively surprised except the one person who should have had his back: Chuck - a man who would happily ruin his brother's sense of self-worth, driving him further into his bad habits, over a personal sense of justice.

What must it have been like, Howard wondered, having a brother you loved unconditionally telling you that you were not just a bad lawyer but a bad person, on a regular basis?

Damn you, Chuck! You selfish, condescending, self-righteous asshole.

Howard had looked up to Chuck almost as much as he'd looked up to his father, and he had been disappointed and hurt at Chuck's accusations and threats. He'd been disappointed that Chuck failed to live up to his expectations, in a way, and that he would have such little regard for Howard, to say such insulting things to him.

How much tougher must it have been on Jimmy to love his brother so much he'd throw himself under the metaphorical bus, only to have it thrown in his face?

And now, Jimmy would have no resolution. Howard knew Jimmy had cut ties with Chuck – it was evident and, if he was honest with himself, healthy that he should distance himself from that familial relationship. Chuck did not care for his brother, and there was nothing Jimmy could ever do to change that. But Howard also knew that it probably didn't make Jimmy love Chuck any less.

And now Howard had taken that away from Jimmy too.

He sighed, trying and failing to quash his sense of guilt.

Howard sat in his kitchen pondering these questions and wondering if there was anything he could have done differently. He couldn't help worrying for Jimmy – a man he could never befriend but could understand more than he wished he did. He sincerely hoped Jimmy didn't do anything foolish because of this. He also couldn't help worrying for Kim – again, another person who wasn't really his friend, yet whom he had known for just as long. The crazy and estranged HHM family he thought bitterly. He dearly hoped Kim wouldn't be hurt while trying to protect an emotionally unstable Jimmy.

How did things get so fucked up? he thought once again.

The now-remaining senior partner of HHM sat through the early hours of the morning and well after the sun began shining through the kitchen windows thinking about the choices people make, morality, and what makes a man good. He made plans for what he would tell the police when they inevitably came looking for reasons for Chuck's instability from his former place of work. He made plans for how he would break the news to the other partners and to the firm. He made plans to call Kim later today and check in on her and Jimmy. Howard Hamlin made plans, knowing that from now on, everything had changed.