Silent Storm
Author's Note: So, I was pretty disappointed that Max wasn't in 2x11, and this came to mind. The musical inspiration was "Silent Storm" by Carl Espen (which means that, yes, I've been listening to far too much Eurovision music. It also reminds me that I'm really upset that I named the last 'fic "Children of the Universe" because, well, that would have been a perfect title for this after Ryan's "the universe owes us" comment from this episode).
Mike awoke to an aching pain in his lower back. Groaning, he rolled onto his side, his hip hitting a hard object in the process. Weston lifted his hand slowly, taking care not to agitate his stiff muscles more than necessary, and groped for whatever had disturbed his sleep. Finally, his efforts produced a cell phone and he frowned. Using his free hand, Mike rubbed his tired eyes and took another look at the phone. Though his mind was still foggy with sleep, the agent knew one thing for certain: it did not belong to him. Mike sighed and sat up gingerly. He switched the phone on, and his eyes were immediately assaulted by the bright light that it emitted. Squinting, he found the contact list and scrolled through it. Ryan. Chris. Jenny. Mike stared at his own name for a moment before deciding to hit the "Call" button.
Within seconds, Mike's phone lit up a few feet away, illuminating part of a coffee table covered with stray papers and a woman's jacket. He paid these items little attention, however, as he reached for the phone. One glance told the man all he needed to know, as "Max Hardy" flashed across his display. Mike ended the call and set both phones next to each other on the table before easing himself back onto the couch.
He stared into the pitch blackness of the room, the events of the previous night slowly starting to flood his mind. He remembered going back to Ryan's apartment after the restaurant stabbing and later walking out with Max. Vaguely, he recalled her asking if he was going to stay at his mom's, a pointed smirk on her face, and her disapproval when he said he was going to check into a hotel room. He barely remembered her offer for him to sleep on her couch, and he was unsure of whether or not he had driven his own car to her apartment. He didn't remember a thing from his slumber, and in a time when his sleep was plagued by recurring nightmares, Mike considered this to be a good thing.
After a few more minutes of silent contemplation, Weston sighed, kicking off the blanket that had tangled itself around his feet, and stood, delicately stretching out his muscles. The pain in his back had begun to ease into a dull ache, but Mike winced at his first few movements nonetheless. He blinked into the darkness, trying to orient himself to his unfamiliar surroundings. His eyes met a hallway that led from the living room, and, grabbing Max's phone along the way, he followed the lone light that shone in the blackness.
Max was sitting at a barstool she had pulled up next to the kitchen counter, a pen in one hand and a half-eaten piece of toast in the other. Her eyes darted back and forth between the laptop she had placed in front of her and the pad of paper on which she periodically scribbled notes. As she took another bite of toast, oblivious to his presence, Mike surveyed her kitchen. The sink was piled with unwashed dishes, and he was certain that he saw a layer of dust coating the stovetop. There was no table, but rather a row of stools perched near the counter. The counter itself was stacked with a mixture of books and loose papers to which there seemed no end. The agent smiled. After his brief visit to her cluttered office, the disarray of Max's apartment did not surprise him in the least.
Mike stepped up behind her, placing her phone next to her computer. Max gave a startled jump. "I figured you were probably looking for this," he mused. "I found it on the couch."
She turned and smiled apologetically. "Sorry. I'm always leaving things lying around," she managed.
Mike chuckled and gestured at the counter. "I kind of noticed."
Max shook her head playfully. "Well," she began, ignoring his last comment, "while you were sleeping in, I was actually making some progress looking for Joe Carroll." Mike followed her gaze to the clock on the wall, and he realized for the first time that it was nearly nine. He smiled sheepishly, and she stuffed the last of her toast into her mouth and turned back to her computer, pulling up a webpage. "I remembered a colleague at NYPD telling me something about some Megiddo project the FBI was running a few years back and did a little research. As it turns out, there's a whole list of cults waiting for someone with high enough security clearance, so then all I had to do was wait for that someone to wake up," she explained. Flashing him a devious grin, she continued, "Now tell me, Sleeping Beauty, would you like something to eat? Or maybe some coffee?"
Mike rolled his eyes. "Coffee would be nice," he muttered, already taking her laptop from her and beginning to access the database. "Project Megiddo is the most comprehensive list of terrorist activity that we have," he elaborated as Max got up to heat the water for the coffee. "Chances are, if Joe's taken over a preexisting cult, we probably have some record of them here."
Neither of the two considered that point further. As far as Max was concerned, Joe had definitely gained control of a preexisting cult. It seemed foolish to believe that he otherwise could have amassed a new wave of followers so quickly, regardless of her uncle's beliefs in Joe's charismatic leadership. "You know," Weston continued, pulling her out of her thoughts, "you could have just requested this information from the Bureau. Project Megiddo was designed to inform other law enforcement agencies about local cult activity."
"Yes, and they would have gotten back to me in several weeks, by which point Joe would have killed dozens more people and moved on to some new hiding place," Max scoffed. She moved to a cupboard while Mike continued typing away on her keyboard. Opening the cabinet, she found the shelf of coffee cups empty and frowned. "Besides, even if I had that much time to waste, they wouldn't give me anything," she added, moving to the sink and beginning to wash two cups. "I've been suspended for six months."
Mike stopped entering details into the Megiddo form upon hearing this. He hadn't ever considered the reason why Max had all this spare time to help Ryan in his hunt for Joe, and he suddenly realized that he was to blame. "Max, I'm sorry. If this is about what happened with Luke—"
"Mike, don't," she said to cut him off. "It's like I told Ryan; I knew what I was getting into. I knew the consequences." She set a cup of coffee in front of him and continued, "Even if none of that had happened, they would have put me on leave after I was…kidnapped." She sighed and sat down on the barstool next to him. "I'm fine. Really."
Mike wasn't sure that he wholeheartedly believed her reassurance, but he respected Max enough not to probe into the matter further. Rather, he set her laptop between them on the counter and took a sip of coffee. Max set her own mug down to scan through the results of his database search. "There are hundreds, if not thousands, of cults in New York alone, but Ryan and I are pretty convinced that the cult has some sort of religious tie," Weston explained.
Max nodded. "That would explain how he could get them to kill for him so easily," she muttered. "And the whole blood sacrifice angle."
"'No redemption without blood,'" quoted Mike.
The words sent a chill down Max's spine. It was bad enough that Joe Carroll could persuade people to kill whomever he wanted, but it was even more disturbing that he could convince them that what they were doing was right. She sighed. "So how many does that leave us with?"
"Seventy-three in the Megiddo database," he answered, "and who knows how many the FBI hasn't found."
Max frowned. She definitely didn't like their current odds of finding Joe before his next attack. "Well, if he was able to take some semblance of control in such a short amount of time, it's probably safe to say that we're dealing with a smaller cult," she reasoned. "Is there any way to order the cults by size?"
"Good thinking," he agreed, his fingers already setting the new search parameters. The screen refreshed and they both skimmed through the updated list. "It's a start."
"It's a pretty good start," Max corrected.
Mike nodded in assent. "I'll just print this and head over to share it with Ryan," he announced, already standing up.
"Ryan is probably freaking out right about now, wondering how we're going to find such an elusive cult. He should learn not to underestimate us," Max said with a smile before walking into the next room. She returned a moment later, handing Weston his coat and the freshly printed paper.
Mike raised an eyebrow. "You aren't coming?" he queried.
Max shook her head. "I'll catch up with you two later. For now, I think I'll stay here and work on identifying possible unregistered cults." Quickly, she added, "Just in case."
"That's a good idea," Weston agreed. He pulled on his coat and stuffed the paper into the case file Max had left on the counter. "I'll see you then." She nodded and he walked out the kitchen door into the hallway.
He had only just reached the apartment door when he heard Max's footsteps behind him. "Mike, wait," she implored. He turned on his heel and she shoved an apple into his hand. He gave her a puzzled look and she shrugged. "You need to eat something. I know that once you and Ryan start dissecting that list, there will be no stopping you."
Mike grinned. "Thanks, Max," he chuckled before once again turning to leave.
Max kept her spirits up until he walked out the door. As soon as the door clicked closed behind Mike, she dropped the façade. Somehow, in their little group, she had been assigned the role of the optimist, but she didn't feel that even she could keep pretending much longer. With a sigh, she retrieved her laptop from the kitchen and settled into the couch. She took one last look at the list they had compiled from the Project Megiddo database and switched the television on. Only one minute of the leading news story about a rise in the sale of Joe Carroll masks to college students confirmed her suspicions. Everyone was a follower, and she wasn't sure that even the best trained optimist could spin a positive twist on that fact.
"The universe owes us."
The words only seemed to mock Weston, searing themselves into his memory. He didn't believe them. Perhaps the universe owed some people – victims, children, the innocent – but Mike knew that the universe owed him nothing. At one time, yes, he felt as if he could be considered innocent, but he knew that now things had gone too far. He had taken too many lives, lied to too many people, to feel as if he could be looked upon by the universe with pity. He had beaten a handcuffed man within inches of his life and then used Max to help him cover it up. His actions had gotten his friend's niece kidnapped. He had gotten his father killed. No, as far as Mike was concerned, he was far from innocent.
He wasn't sure how long ago he had left Ryan's apartment. He would have given anything to stay, to have his friend reassure him that they would someday catch Lily. Catch Joe. Put an end to senseless murders. He had intended to stay, but things rarely worked out the way that Mike Weston intended. He had felt his heart drop when Claire walked into Ryan's apartment, and he wasn't sure if it was because he felt sorry for his friend or if it was simply because he felt so sorry for himself because he knew he would have to leave. They had offered for him to stay, but Mike knew that he couldn't. He was aware that Ryan and Claire needed to discuss what had happened, and so Mike had left.
Weston didn't even realize where he was heading until he parked his car and began ascending the steps. He raised his hand to knock, realizing that he had never felt so desolate in his life, when the apartment door swung open.
Max took one look at the agent standing on her doorstep and ushered him inside. Mike's eyes were awash with the same pain she had seen in them the day of his father's funeral. "Were you…coming to see us?" he managed as she closed her apartment door. She nodded, shrugging off her coat and throwing it on the back of the couch.
"I thought I would see how you were both doing…after—" She stopped when she spotted the fresh tears streaming down his cheeks. "Mike, it's okay," she whispered, pulling him into a hug. "I promise it will be okay."
Mike shook his head, but he made no effort to move away from her. "How can you say that?" he whimpered, his tears falling freely into Max's hair. "You and Ryan…you think that somehow this is going to end. That we're going to come out on the good side of it, but I can tell you we won't. Joe, Lily, they're not going to stop. They're going to keep killing – keep terrorizing – people until they kill us, too. You, me, Ryan. Carrie. Mendez. They're going to kill us all, and you know what happens then? Then they're going to keep killing people, and there won't be anyone to stop them. They have all of these resources. Endless followers, FBI moles, mansions in the middle of nowhere, invisible cults. They've killed my dad…Parker… They've kidnapped you. And now…now they've broken into a government-secured hospital. We're not winning anything, Max. We're not," he spat.
Max sighed. She had wanted to let Weston get this all off his chest, but now she knew that had been a mistake. He had shaken her resolve, and she knew that every word he said was true. They weren't winning anything. They probably weren't going to make it out alive. They were fighting a losing battle, but Max almost didn't care. She looked into Mike's eyes, and he could feel all of the pent up anger she had harbored throughout the years. "You're right. We're probably going to die," she stated. "But so is Joe. And so is Lily. I'm not going to let them get away with what they've done, and neither is Ryan. You don't want to admit it, but you're not going to let them get away with it, either. You can't." When Mike said nothing in reply, she continued softly, "When my dad died, I wished every day that I could have died with him. I wished that he could have been a dentist or a mail carrier or anything that would have kept him with me. I wished that he wouldn't have run into that burning building and left me alone. I started feeling sorry for myself, and I resented what he did. And then…then, one day I realized that he was trying to help people…that he was trying to protect me, and suddenly everything changed. I knew that I wanted to try to be as courageous, as selfless, as my dad, and Ryan, and my grandfather. I swore to protect this city, and I don't care if I got suspended, or if I never get my job back; I'm not going to give up. Because you know what? One day, this will be over, and there's a chance that I won't die, and I'm going to make sure that I can live with what I've done. And so are you, Mike."
Mike wiped away the first tear that rolled down Max's cheek. He was surprised to find that he somehow felt more at ease than he had in a long while. The fist that was crushing his heart had unclenched itself, if only for a small while. Some part of him knew that Max was right, that he couldn't let Lily or Joe escape after all they had done to him, to his family and friends. He would make them pay, even if he could do nothing else. He gave Max a smile, weak and troubled, but a smile nonetheless. He had thought that Carrie had been the source of Ryan's positivity, but, in that moment, he realized that it had really been Max.
Max returned Weston's smile and tightened her grip around his waist. As Mike returned the gesture, she realized that, although she had had her qualms at first, if she was the best optimist that this team could muster, then she would gladly fill that role. Even though she could sense a storm brewing on the horizon, she would convince Ryan and Mike that they couldn't give up on bringing justice to Joe and Lily. And, most of all, they would have to live their lives, no matter the circumstances, because it was the surest way to honor their losses. After all, it's what their dads, Agent Parker, and Claire Matthews would have wanted.