Beware the Air
Summary: When a threat to national security is made, the Eppes' brothers are enlisted to help find the culprits before it is too late.
Disclaimer: NUMB3RS is the creation of Cheryl Heuton and Nicolas Falacci and I have no legal rights to the characters and their backgrounds.
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Megan gripped the steering wheel as she maneuvered her car through the late-night traffic. The conversation she had had with Mr. Eppes had not gone well. He had sounded incredibly upset over the phone and she had offered to come pick him up and drive him to the hospital. In point of fact, she didn't think he was in any shape to drive and it was easier to pick him up and drive over to the hospital with him, then to worry about whether or not he would make it in safely. Colby and David had driven Don's SUV to the hospital.
Arriving at the Eppes' residence, she saw Mr. Eppes pacing in front of the door, coat already on, wringing his hands. Spotting Megan's vehicle he rushed down the porch steps.
"Megan, have you heard anything yet?"
"No, nothing yet; I'm sorry. We should be at the hospital in about ten minutes. Traffic is very light this late at night."
Alan buckled up his seat belt and turned to Megan. "What happened to my son?"
"We aren't sure, Mr. Eppes. He's been helping us with our investigation about Emily's abduction. He must have been getting close with his equations because someone attacked him in our building."
Alan's heart leapt at the word attacked. "Is he going to be alright?" He asked this with a small catch in his voice.
"I'm sure he'll be fine. The paramedics put him in an ambulance, and although he was unconscious, he was breathing."
"I just… I just don't know what to say. I never expected Charlie to get hurt like this. I'm learning to accept Don finding himself in situations like these, but even with him being an agent for almost 10 years, I still get scared every time I don't hear from him for a few days."
"Charlie will be alright. You'll see for yourself in a few minutes."
"How did someone attack him in an FBI building? That's what I don't understand. It's supposed to be a secure location."
"We believe that Charlie was attacked by one of our own agents." Megan said this with bitterness tingeing her voice. She could not believe that one of their own had attacked her colleague and friend.
"Another agent? Megan, what's going on? What are my boys working on?"
Shaking her head she looked over at him. "I wish that I could tell you. This goes beyond me, beyond Don even. I don't know all of the details." She struggled to give him at least partial information without actually giving anything away.
Alan shook his head in misery. "I understand that you can't say anything. I'm just… I'm just worried about my sons." Wiping at his eyes, he turned his head to face forward as he saw the hospital come into view.
Megan remained silent, unable to find words to provide comfort. Instead, she reached one hand towards Alan and gave it a small squeeze of commiseration.
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Megan and Alan arrived at the hospital and found Don, David and Colby in the waiting room of the ER. They were still waiting to hear from a doctor regarding Charlie's condition.
Don approached his father. He could see the grief in every line of his body and he reached out to give him a hug, while whispering reassurances in his ear. His voice was hoarse from his barely contained emotions and he knew his father felt the dampness on his collar, as surely as he felt the dampness on his own. The other agents turned away from the two men, unable to witness the display of emotion from their boss.
"Is there someone here for Charles Eppes?"
Don and his father broke apart at the words and rushed up to the doctor for news of Charlie.
"We're Charlie's family. Is he going to be alright?" Alan said, desperate to hear any news about his son.
"Charlie's going to be fine. He was injected with a relatively knew street drug called the Death's Draught. It induces a temporary coma-like state. Normally we would pump the stomach as it's usually given orally, but since it was put directly into his blood stream, we're going to try to flush it out of his system. From his toxicology results, we can see that he wasn't given an extremely high dose, so we're lucking in that sense. We're hopeful that when he wakes up, he won't experience any side effects. He also has a few bruised ribs and one cracked one. We've put some binding on them, but there isn't much we can do for them except give them time to heal on their own."
"A coma? Side effects?" Alan asked.
"It's more like blacking out or losing consciousness. Death's Draught has been known to cause hallucinations, impaired motor controlled and possible memory loss. We won't know if your son will experience any of these until he awakens. We're hopeful that he won't display any of these side effects as his dose was relatively mild. We're hopeful that he'll awaken in the next 18 to 24 hours.
"18 to 24 hours!" Don exclaimed.
"It's the progression of the drug, dependent on dose."
"Can we see him?" Alan asked.
"Yes, they're just finishing inserting the breathing tube. Unfortunately, your son's ability to breathe has been affected by the drug. A nurse will come out shortly and take you to see Charlie. I warn you that he won't be responsive and he has bruising around his face, probably caused when he was thrown to the floor by his attacker, so please don't be alarmed."
Nodding, Don turned to his father and they exchanged another hug, this one of relief.
As they waited for the nurse to come and get them, Alan asked Don, "Donnie... Can you tell me what's going on?"
Trying to rub the weariness out of his eyes, Don turned to his father. "I'm sorry, Dad. There's not much I can tell you other than what you already know. Charlie was attacked in our building and we think it might have had to do with Emily's disappearance. I wish that I could tell you more."
Seeing the guilt in his son's eyes, Alan nodded and touched Don's shoulder. Rubbing his son's upper arm up and down, as if trying to ease the load on his shoulders, Alan refrained from asking for more information.
As Don sat in the waiting room chair, with his father's calming presence easing his aching heart almost as much as the doctor's words had, his mind went over everything that happened in such a short period of time. He couldn't wrap his mind around it. If someone was going to go through all of the trouble to attack Charlie, why wouldn't they do something more life-threatening? To have Charlie attacked in a federal building, by one of their own agents, no less, made him think that Flannigan was either extremely ballsy or was starting to come unhinged. Neither scenario sat well with him.
Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by a hand grabbing his. Looking up, Don saw that a nurse had come to take them to Charlie's room. Nodding to his father, Don squeezed his hand and got up. They followed the young woman down the hall, passed several doors. Stopping, she gestured to one of the rooms and said that she would come by to see them out in fifteen minutes. Don nodded, but Alan had already gone into the room. Bracing himself, Don followed his father.
His footsteps faltered as he was confronted with the sight of Charlie, lying in the hospital bed. Temper warred with horror in his mind as he looked at his little brother's prone form and silently cursed the agent who had put him there. Staring at the unmoving figure of his brother, he felt his heart clench; ever since he could remember, Charlie had never been able to remain still. He was constantly moving, his hands gesturing whenever he got excited about a math problem, or his head bopping to some tune that only he could hear. Even when they were children, he had been in constant motion, his child's body trying to keep up with an adult intellect.
Don walked closer to Charlie's bed and reached over to take one of his hands in his own. Don stared at the bruises marring his little brother's face and fought down the feelings of anger and sadness that threatened to break free. He found himself gently rubbing his thumb along his brother's hand, trying to will it into its normal, frenetic motion.
Alan stood on the other side of the bed, looking down at his young son's still form and brushed a hand through his curly hair. Leaning over the hospital's bed rail, he placed a soft kiss on his forehead.
Father and son stood over Charlie in silence, each thankful that their loved one was going to be alright, yet both still shaken by what could have happened. They remained there for over a quarter of an hour, until the same nurse that had escorted them to Charlie's room came back to tell them that their time was up. Giving Charlie's hand a last squeeze, Don leaned down and whispered into his ear, "I'm going to find her for you, Buddy."
Alan and Don left the hospital room and started back towards the waiting room where Don's team was waiting. Stopping in the hallway, Don turned to his father, guilt lying heavily in his heart, "I'm sorry that this happened, Dad. I don't know how or why but, I'll do my best to make it right."
Alan reached out and grabbed both of Don's shoulders. "It's not your fault. You couldn't have known that it would happen. You trusted your agent and the blame lies with him. In fact, your brother is the one that dragged you into this. Well, now, that's a first." Alan paused and gave his eldest son a half-hearted smile. "Find whoever did this to your brother. Find Emily - that's what he would have wanted you to do. It's why he was so working hard in the first place and why someone wanted to hurt…" Alan's voice broke, and he couldn't complete his last sentence.
Staring at the anguish on his father's face, and remembering Charlie's still form and how hard he had worked to help find his friend, Don was filled with a sense of urgency and purpose. Grabbing his father in a hard, quick hug, he told him that he was going to go meet his team in the waiting room and go over everything again, to see if they could come up with any more leads.
Alan nodded, returned the hug and said that he was going to call Art to pick him up. Don asked if he wanted him or Megan to give him a ride, but he declined and said that Don needed to find whoever did this and stop them. Although Alan did not know exactly what his boys were working on, he could clearly see how important it was for Don and his team to close this case quickly.
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After Don parted ways with his father, he headed over to the waiting room where the three other agents stood, huddled together, talking quietly. When Don entered, they all looked at him expectantly.
Don nodded and said, "He's going to be okay. He has some bruising and you heard what the doctor said about his ribs and what Mark slipped him. He should be awake by tomorrow evening." Don gave himself a moment, pushing out the thoughts of what could possibly happen when he did wake up. He looked at each one of the agents in turn and said, "I just want to say thank you for all of your help, for looking out for Charlie and my dad. It's above and beyond the call of duty and I appreciate it."
"You don't have to thank us, Don. Charlie is one of us." David said. The others nodded. Don looked at his team and felt a quiet sense of pride in his brother, for gaining the agents' respect, and for his team, that had accepted Charlie into their circle, no questions asked.
Taking a deep breath, Don looked around the room to make sure it was empty. "As much as I would like to stay here and watch out for Charlie, we need to figure out what the heck was the point of all this. I mean, we're assuming that Mark attacked Charlie for a reason; probably because he was getting close to finding out the truth of this whole mess."
"Yeah, but why just put him out of commission temporarily and not…" David left the question hanging, in deference to Don.
Don nodded his understanding.
"Well, not only did Mark put Charlie out of commission, but it got all of us out of the FBI office," Colby observed.
The agents gaped at each other once Colby's innocuous statement sunk in and took on a whole new meaning.
They said, almost in one voice, "Emily's data files"!
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A/N: My knowledge of drugs and their effects are minimal. Thanks to Emerald124 for pointing out that there are drugs which exist that counteract general anesthesia immediately. To make up for my lack of "drug knowledge", I just made one up (although, part of its name and effects are taken from Harry Potter, so please do not sue, Ms. Rowling!). The next chapter will hopefully be out shortly. As always, reviews, comments and suggestions are appreciated! Thanks!