Hey, it's an update! I know it's a bit late, but it's summer vacation. ARK gets a suspect in the case and someone makes another appearance they shouldn't have.

Un-beta'ed, so quibble away!

- o – o -

Chapter ten: Come Away to the Water

Vince lay next to his wife, watching the early-morning sun play across her hair. In this kind of light, her normally reddish-blond hair looked like it was awash in fire, coppery-red and glowing. He smiled and wound a strand around a finger, content to just watch while Dana slept. Last night's revelation had taken a lot out of both of them. The make-up sex, though… That had been fantastic. Later, he'd have Orwell and Anarchy find out why—exactly—the walls in this particular apartment building were so thick. Maybe. Not.

The vigilante kissed his wife's temple gently, smiling as she stirred a little. A sleepy smile spread across Dana's face, and judging by how she curled up around his pillow, she was having a good dream. Vince didn't want to disturb her—wanted to hold her in this moment, between sleep and wakefulness—forever. Like this, she was beautiful beyond belief.

"Vince?" Dana's sleepy murmur brought Vince out of his thoughts.

"Good morning Dana," Vince replied, pressing a kiss to her temple. "I love you so much." Dana peered up at him from underneath her eyelashes. Vince was about to kiss her again when his com unit buzzed like an angry bee. The vigilante sighed and rubbed his eyes with one hand, wondering if smashing the piece of equipment would delay his darling partner for another few hours—hours that he could spend with his wife, as a matter of fact.

"Tell them to go away," Dana grumbled into Vince's chest, wrapping her arms around him. The vigilante was all too eager to do that, especially with Dana's hair tickling his nose. He'd missed this, so damn much. If not for the fact that he was supposed to be a dead fugitive, it'd almost be like any morning they didn't have work waiting for them. He sighed as his headset buzzed again.

"I think I might just do that," Vince muttered under his breath, fitting the unit over his ear. "Orwell, this had better be good."

-Like sleeping with the wife who should think you're still dead?- Orwell replied, tone snarkier than usual. She probably hadn't had her coffee yet.

"Orwell, you're perverted. Stay out of my personal affairs," Vince replied, kissing his wife again. He could almost imagine the look on his partner's face about the sounds coming through the mic. He really didn't care, honestly speaking.

-Get back to the lair, Vince- Orwell sighed. –We need to talk.- It spoke of how long they'd worked together that Vince could find no reason to argue with the blogger. Feeling Dana's eyes boring into his back, the vigilante got dressed. He pressed another kiss onto Dana's lips, trying to promise her what he couldn't actually say with words.

As Vince left the apartment on Sycamore Boulevard, he made a mental note to buy Dana flowers. A lot of flowers.

- o – o -

"Someone got laid," Anarchy muttered to Orwell as he brewed a fresh pot of coffee. In the week that he'd been in residence in Orwell's hideout, the guest room/secondary processing room had gone from orderly to barely controlled chaos. The only are that remained untouched was the table the coffeepot rested on and the coffeepot itself. After all, in their line of work, only coffee was sacred.

"Anarchy, shut up," Orwell muttered into her hand. She buried her face in her half an hour ago, both in an attempt to stave off another migraine and to try and dredge up another pass code into ARK's servers. She'd hit on some interesting things, but all the relevant sources were hidden behind a new encryption she had never seen before. Anarchy hadn't seen it either, which meant they were due for at least three days of trying to crack it open.

"Yeah," Vince added. "Please, never mention my sex life again." He glowered at the hacker, who smiled back, a look of glee on his face. "Orwell, what was…" he yawned, jaw cracking. "What was it that was so urgent?" The vigilante really thought he should have gotten more sleep the night before, but… Well, what Dana wanted, Dana got. And what she wanted was some good material to hold over Vince's head, should he try to vanish on her again. (Vince wondered, privately, what would happen if he asked for a repeat of last night's events. He'd probably get hit with a frying pan…)

"Nothing you'll want to hear," Orwell replied, pulling up the relevant feed from the local NBC affiliate. There was a press conference happening in front of ARK Towers. The scrolling bar at the bottom stated that a suspect in the abduction of Jacob Philips and the murders of at least twenty known individuals had been arrested and was in interrogation.

The mug in Vince's hand shattered, sending a spray of coffee over his hand and one of Anarchy's lurid purple shirts. He didn't even notice that his hand was bleeding, or that the shards of ceramic were digging into his palm even further.

Somehow, this was…wrong.

- o – o -

Fleming studied the man in Interrogation One, wishing—not for the first time—that he could have Chess' input into the situation. This had been far too easy. Somehow, he had never thought that capturing a sociopathic killer would be so easy.

And there's the pot calling the kettle black, Peter mused. He had his own problems to be sure, but he'd… Well, alright, he'd been brutal when it was necessary to send a message, but never on a scale like this. Even Chess would have been sickened by the level of methodical torture that the dead men in the cold room in the morgue had undergone prior to their deaths.

The man in the interrogation room was middle-aged and reasonably fit for someone getting on in his years. Thinning grey hair was brushed over his scalp in an attempt to cover up the fact that he was balding. All in all, he was rather unassuming and didn't look like a serial killer.

…of course, then again, neither did he. No one in the world, aside from the Cape and Orwell, even knew that he was Chess. Peter sighed, a frown creasing his forehead. Despite refusing to admit it, his two primary nuisances weren't actually as big a threat right now. He was going to have to do something drastic…

"Charles!" Fleming snapped, breaking the silence in his office as he called for his personal assistant. "I need two notices sent out, and a letter of credit extended to the team trying to find Officer Philips."

The man nodded, pulling a PDA out of an inner pocket in his suit jacket. "What notices would you like sent out, sir?" the man asked. He was, as always, an impeccable source of help. Fleming had done his best to keep the man away from the more sordid aspects of ARK, and it had paid off with unquestioning loyalty… Genuine loyalty, actually. He wouldn't question anything.

"I want all funding pulled from the searches for the Cape and Orwell," Fleming said, pulling up the relevant spreadsheets on his holographic screen. "And tell the team looking for the Appraiser and Philips that their budget has just gone up two-hundred percent."

It was a fact of Charles' undying loyalty and unquestioning faith in his employer that he didn't even question the changes. "Of course sir. Would you like to announce this personally, as a show of support to the public?"

Fleming smiled. "Schedule that, if you would." He turned to face the floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the city, silently dismissing his assistant. As soon as Charles was gone, Fleming stood up and yanked his tie off, heading for the sideboard. While Samuels had recommended he not drink more than once a week—an attempt to see if that would cure his minor anxiety issues—he was tossing those orders out the window. Being this close to a case like the one currently giving him control of the city…

Well, it wasn't much of a surprise that he needed a drink.

What an idiot.

- o – o -

Thomas Sexton stared at the man who was, allegedly, responsible for the deaths or disappearances of almost thirty men. All of them had been good, upstanding employees of ARK Corporation. And this was the bastard who'd been fingered for it.

The security chief didn't even stir as the door opened to admit his partner, Thomas Sawyer. The man was pulling double rotations, between regular shifts at work and the bodyguard duty with the Faraday kid. Sexton was fairly sure, though, that he'd be able to make the bastard sitting across from him crack in a few minutes. Not blinking had, apparently, been a good skill to develop.

"Coffee, Sexton?" Sawyer asked, holding the cup out. Sexton took the cup, still not breaking his uninterrupted staring contest with the suspect. The other man was starting to sweat, and looked incredibly nervous. Although given that he was face-to-face with the man who'd rightfully earned the nickname "lidless wonder", it wasn't much of a surprise.

Sawyer turned to the suspect and smiled. "You know, Mr. Jackson," he said pleasantly, "Sexton isn't likely to stop staring at you until you tell us where you've gone and stashed Philips. Of course, when you do, he'll probably tear you apart and eat your eyes on toast just so you can't escape." He smiled at the man, who was definitely sweating now.

"Sawyer, shut up," Sexton remarked. He still wasn't blinking, which made Sawyer wonder what he did to keep his eyes from drying out. Maybe he was a lizard or something… He grinned at Jackson. "And I wouldn't tear you apart to get your eyes…I'd just take them out with a spoon. Of course, a sick freak like you would probably enjoy that. I mean, considering what you did to the others, and were probably in the process of doing to Philips…"

That was what made Jackson crack.

Watching a man who was, unfortunately, their only suspect break down and start blubbering was rather pathetic.

"I had an alibi!"

Sawyer and Sexton looked at each other as the man's confession continued.

"Flip you for it," Sexton said, pulling a coin out of his pocket. "Heads, you get to tell Fleming, tails means I do."

Sawyer lost. As he left, he saw Sexton pulling something out of both of his eyes. So that was how he'd done it… Painful, but effective.

- o – o -

Fleming stared at the picture on his screen, feeling rather sentimental. His daughter was almost seven in the picture. He didn't remember which employee had snapped the picture, but he still treasured the shot. His little ballerina had her arms outstretched like she was flying. Jamie had convinced him to hold her over her head so she could pretend she was flying with her mummy. It was the first time his little girl had smiled since her mother had died. He sighed.

Sentimental, aren't we Peter?

Before he could question where the thought had come from Charles entered with Sawyer.

"Sir, we may have a slight problem with the suspect…"

Oh shite.

- o – o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Hoping for more mushy stuff from Dana and Vince? Drop a line and let me know!