Until I Collect Him

Disclaimer: He's not mine in the sense that he's Lizzie's, he's not mine in the sense that he's Death's, and he's not mine in the sense that I own absolutely nothing associated with The Blacklist.

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Chapter 3

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In Brussels, I met Donald Ressler for the first time. I was really only there out of curiosity: I hadn't seen my charge in awhile, so I stopped in. There was never any real danger, though I wrote up a colorful report with some minor exaggerations to justify the trip.

My funniest visit with Reddington was, hands down, the mescaline-fueled trek through the desert. At one point, naked and complaining bitterly about how hungry he was, he sat down on the side of the road and demanded the universe bring him a vehicle to take him to Tuba City. He leaned forward and traced a wavering line in the grainy earth in front of him. "I'm not walking another step, not another one, not past this line…"

I smiled, and shook my head, thinking about the boundaries I'd set for myself when I'd first been given charges. "You know the problem with drawing lines in the sand?" I said as his eyes rolled back, the dehydration finally taking its toll, and he slumped backward onto the ground. "With a breath of air they disappear."

Lucky devil, that one. Less than five minutes later a truck drove by, slowed, stopped, and reversed back to where he lay. One of the men got out, nudged my charge gently with the toe of his boot, and pulled out a cell phone to call the highway patrol to come pick up the 'naked dead man on the side of the road'.

The second time I saw the girl, she wasn't a girl anymore. She was a woman, and she was stabbing my charge in the neck with a pen.

I disliked her immediately.

And things just got more complicated from that point on. 2013 was a busy year. As was 2014, and 2015 started out just as bad.

But I'm getting ahead of myself again.

The woman's name had changed since I saw her as a girl, and I figured if she couldn't keep her own name straight then I didn't see why I should have to spend energy remembering it either.

He just kept putting himself in danger for her, and it was infuriating. Getting called out at all hours, sometimes multiple times in a week, and everything related back to her.

Less than six months later he left a pub at the drop of a hat and flew across the world, all because Donald Ressler told him the woman had been 'detained'. He didn't even press him for details. He just went.

But despite the torture, and the pain, and the fact that he was three heartbeats away from a heart attack and collection in the warehouse later that day, I count this as one of my very favorite visits.

…people aren't supposed to remember us. If they die—and see us—but end up being revived, they don't recall anything about it. Some people say they have an out of body experience, or feelings of floating, or tell vastly exaggerated stories about bright lights or family members. But as Reddington tended to the bleeding man in front of him, one of the things he said—and for a moment I doubted what I'd actually heard—was exactly what I'd told him in Marrakech. About books and chapters and judgment.

I sat down on the cot, right in the middle of Donald Ressler's chest, even though it was very poor form on my part. I don't really even have legs, but in that moment I felt like I couldn't stand up a second longer.

Not that being rude to people could get me in too much trouble. Maybe just a metaphorical slap on the wrist.

…but influencing my charge's ability to withstand the effects of the drugs he was injected with later that day during his torture session, and keeping his heart going, past the point of normal human endurance…? Could most definitely have gotten me fired.

Or worse.

But I did it anyway.

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TBC.