"You hear him come home last night?"
"Nope, but I was in the garage." Charlie responded through a mouthful of toast.
Taking a slow sip of his coffee Alan contemplated both his sons.
"Anyway, would love to stay and chat but I gotta go." Charlie grabbed his juice, took a swig and then grabbed his bag and keys.
Alan looked at his watch and read the time, 7:06am. "Thought we were going in to CalSci together."
Charlie shook his head and continued to the front. "Sorry, no can do this morning, but Amita said she could drop you." He pointed upstairs signifying that his girlfriend was still in bed.
As Charlie exited the house Alan grumbled under his breath. "Damn teenagers."
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The bullpen was quiet for a change. Only three agents were present. It had been a slow week for crimes and so everybody was taking advantage of it; everybody but Liz, Colby and Megan that is.
"You sure you're ok with doing this?" Liz wiped a bit of sleep from her eyes as she said this to Megan.
"Yeah, think it's best to mix up the agents she sees. Makes her think that everyone is working it and also means we can use different tactics."
"O-kay, but I was more meaning taking Don out there." Liz explained.
"Ah well, that's an unknown variable but nobody split the atom by avoiding unknown variables."
"Way too much time with Fleinhardt Megan, way too much."
"Jealous Granger? Please do tell me the last time you even had a conversation with a woman let alone got close enough to smell her."
"Nothing wrong with being picky." Colby sneered and went back to the pile of paperwork he was sorting. "So, is it supposed to be obvious to me what's in here or what?"
"Now if it was obvious you'd be team leader, ever want to climb that ladder start thinking like one." It was a comment you'd expect from Don but coming from Liz's lips just seemed weird. Colby bit his tongue on his desired comment and continued scanning the photos and documentation in the file he was holding.
There were photos of Mitchum's drug crew slain. Colby remembered the details he'd read in the other files and the more he looked at these photos the more they confirmed in his mind how they seemed contrived. Ordered, meticulous, made to look a certain way but most definitely there was an element of sadism there. It was almost as if the person doing it knew what they were doing and enjoyed it.
"Think Agent Field was involved in this?" Colby finally asked as Megan was pulling on her holster.
"I don't think anything at this stage, but you show me evidence and…that's a different matter altogether. Anyway, I'm off. You remember anything else just give me a bell on the way to Sophie's." And with that Megan left the building.
Colby stared across at Liz. She stared back and then sighed. "Remember a time when we got to go out and talk to people. Those were the good days." Colby laughed at Liz's comment then stopped suddenly.
"Speaking of, why is it us two shovelling paperwork? Where's David?"
Liz shrugged and pulled out her cell. She was monotone as she read out a text message from it, "Hooked up. Cover me with the boss. Only be an hour later than you guys. Owe you one."
"Man. When am I gonna get lucky?"
"Right now I hope." Both Liz and Colby spun round to see the curly haired originator of that comment, Charlie.
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"Alan didn't look too happy 'bout that."
"Ah, when is he ever."
"So you're sure your doctor is cool with you getting out and about so much."
Don pulled his sunglasses down and stared at Megan. She understood the unspoken words immediately. Don was his own boss and he'd decide what was best for him. End of conversation.
"You bring the folder?"
"Nah, got Colby and Liz going over it like a fine tooth comb. Nothing yet other than a comment that your doodles are most artistic. Colby thinks you've wasted your talent by joining the FBI, shoulda been a great master or impressionist or something."
"Colby thinks cowboy boots are artwork. On topic though, how am I gonna know what it is I need to ask Sophie if I don't have it."
"Relax Don, I photocopied it for you. Glovebox."
The paperwork spilled out on Don as soon as he opened the compartment. In a way he was grateful the pictures were now in black and white, made the blood seem less real, easier to remain detached.
"Good work Special Agent Reeves."
"Well considering you said you'd pay for the coffees I thought I'd better pull through. Speaking of which…"
Don shook his head, cursed inwardly at the tug from the taut skin around his wound and then looked out the window. They were at least ten minutes from anywhere they could stop for coffee. Don hoped Megan could hold out.
"Yeah yeah. Patience. When you're at the top you need to learn patience Megan. Besides, I'm not allowed any so it's pretty cruel to hold me to that."
"If you can't handle the fire Don don't make promises, especially ones that involve coffee and an agent."
Don smirked at that and then looked down at the paperwork in his hands. All of a sudden an image of Marcus Field, crying, slammed into his consciousness. It metaphorically took the wind out of him. The images were so real and unexpected but despite their clarity Don struggled to ascertain details from them. They were like photographs on a billboard, fleeting and invasive. He'd get the gist but never the detail.
"You alright? Need me to stop?"
Don looked across to the concern on Megan's face, realizing his little moment was not so private. "Nah, it's fine."
A few seconds of silence passed between them before Megan spoke again. "You remembered something right?"
"What are you, like inside my brain. Never a moments peace with you around."
"When Crystal Hoyle…well you know. Months afterwards images would just flash into my mind at really inopportune moments. Once I was in the supermarket and just smashed a container of yoghurt when one hit. Kind of like when you see your first crime scene. It never leaves you. I thought it was me not dealing with it but then I remembered…when I first moved here from the east coast same thing happened. Images just flashed into my brain of back home. Sometimes not even images, sometimes smells or feelings. They smash in there and then disappear right away. It was then that I realized that's how our brain works, it's like a constant random slideshow in there. It's constantly flipping and sorting images in there and we have no control over it. Thing is, we only notice it's going on when it's something we don't want to remember. Soon as we are forced to remember it, it's easier to not be so spooked by it."
"Well if you'd have taken a breath in there I would have told you to leave it be…but now I've been lectured by just about everyone, you're the only one who I guess makes sense."
"Oh the pinnacle of my career right here."
Don smiled at Megan and then stared back out the window, thinking.
"Marcus?"
How the hell did she do it? Don was beginning to think the woman was truly inside his head. "Huh?"
"Was it about Marcus? I mean this is why we're speaking to Sophie Field right? You feel like you worked out that maybe Marcus was involved. Saw a pattern and it led you to Marcus or Crowther or something like that and you went round there to confront him. Only he wasn't there. You never got to speak to him."
"No."
Megan frowned and gave Don a stare at his brief response.
"Not the end bit. I don't know. It's like you said. Just flashes of moments." Taking a deep breath and making sure his ribs were up to it Don prepared himself for being honest and open with Megan. He trusted her implicitly but he just wasn't the kind of guy who needed to talk about things. In fact talking made him feel worse. Knowing that people knew what you were thinking, it didn't unburden him, it burdened them and it made him feel worse. Sometimes they'd use the information against him at a later date; his dad was a good one for that. Anything he let slip would be brought up time and time again if it suited an argument and Don simply hated it. It got so that keeping his mouth shut made the world a better place so it just wasn't natural for him to want to go and ruin that with a whole heap of nattering. The irony of the fact his job was all about getting people to open up was not lost on him however.
"You want to expand?"
"No." Damn, yes…
Megan sighed inwardly and continued down the road, they were only a few blocks away now.
"I saw Marcus. He was…I don't think it was good. That's all I know."
Megan looked at Don, they were at Sophie's house now. This was going to be one hell of a meeting if what Don was remembering held any veracity. With no evidence it all rested on Don's memory at this stage and it was proving to be volatile. She looked away from Don and at the house. The vespa was parked out front so she knew Sophie was home. It was now or never for Don.
"Well, here we are. You right to go?"
Don strained to find anything familiar with the house but he came up blank. He began to question whether or not he did see Marcus. How could he tell if what he was remembering was a dream or real? "Only one way to find out." Don unclipped his seatbelt and slowly exited the car, trying not to strain his sore ribs.
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"He told you that?"
"Yeah."
"He never mentioned a thing about this. Said a lot of things but never mentioned that."
Colby felt sorry for the guy. Charlie was desperate to help his brother but the way Colby saw it, Don was the only real key to this case and everything rested on him remembering. Charlie could come up with theories till the cows came home but it meant nothing if Don wasn't prepared to listen. "Well Charlie I'm thinking Don is seeing you more as a brother on this one, not a consultant."
Charlie looked back at Colby with despair. He was trying so hard to not let his emotions bubble to the surface on this one. Focusing really hard Charlie let the numbers siphon themselves to the top of his brain. "What I'm thinking is this file holds a pattern. Despite my brother being backward in coming forward this file was important to him. It holds relevance to the case he was emotionally and personally affected by, he felt responsible and of all the files he had this one has worked its way to be the one that held something for him. So there's something in it that could reveal his last moments. Probably a pattern."
Liz wasn't really following, "Why?"
"Because everything is numbers, that's why. Everything we do has a pattern, a reason, and it can be broken down mathematically. Don found something in here and using a few different techniques I think I can narrow down what it was he saw. We know that we can retrace his last steps."
"Well sounds good Charlie. This file is a compilation of the murders from the Mitchum drug case. Whatever it was Don saw it was a pattern to these deaths. I have to say there's something hinky about them to me and I haven't spent hours pawing over this file. Other files yes, but not this one, so if you can pull something to the forefront that would help."
Charlie took the folder as Liz answered a call to her cell. Charlie looked up at Colby and bit his lip. "And man." He paused and looked down at the folder. "Thanks for letting me do this."
Colby didn't have to respond, everyone knew what was at stake here and they were all glad they were finally moving forward. "You solve this and you may solve the Field case. But we're not paying you double consultant fees on that one."
As Charlie almost laughed Liz slammed her cell shut. "David's got some details on the oil and some more info on the blood finally. I'll go down and meet him."
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The knock on the door had taken quite a few moments to be answered. Megan stood in front with her badge pulled out for ID. Don rested against the brick wall of the home for support, prepping himself for the conversation.
"Special Agent Reeves and Special Agent Eppes from the FBI. We were hoping we could maybe have a few more words with you about your husband if that was ok?"
Sophie Field stood there pale as anything and slowly looked between the two agents. It was if she was in shock. The woman clearly was nowhere close to coming to terms with her husband's death. Megan breathed in deeply knowing this was not going to be an easy interview.
Sophie looked across to Don, a flicker of recognition bubbling on her face.
"Agent Eppes was working with your husband on his last case. Recently he's been injured and we believe there may be a connection with your husband's death. May we come in?"
Sophie remained still as though she hadn't heard Megan.
"Sophie? Can we please come in?" Reiterated Megan.
This time she heard and opened her fly screen allowing the agents to slowly and uncomfortably walk through the door. Sophie grabbed Don's arm as he brushed past her and stopped him. "You…"
Don stared back as she tried to finish her sentence.
"You knew Crowther?"
"Yeah, and Marcus. They were good men."
Sophie nodded. "Read 'bout you in the paper. Anything about Marcus in there…I read it back to front for anything but it's like one day it's news the next…the next he's forgotten. You've forgotten too haven't you Agent Eppes? You come here but you can't tell me anything more than I already know…you need me to tell you about my husband. You worked with the man, he trusted you. Crowther trusted you and you expect his wife to give up the details of his death. When will you people ever do your own work?"
Don gulped and freed himself from Sophie's grip to walk in after Megan. Don steeled himself for one volatile conversation. This is gonna be bad.
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David handed Liz the folder and sat back against the metal bench in the forensics lab.
"This it?"
"Yeah, I don't know if it's good news or bad."
"Well it's certainly a development."
David sighed. "So while they can't tell us which slaughterhouse it came from, it damn well links Don's SUV to that scene in my opinion."
"Yeah, but we never get that elusive answer…how did Don's car, this blood from the abattoir, end up in a desert outside San Diego. We keep turning up fact after fact but none of it makes sense."
"Tell me about it. But I've got a theory." David adjusted himself and pulled out another report. "Oil results. It's engine oil all right. Stock standard. Any gas station sells it so we can't narrow down the chemical make-up any further but what does that tell us?"
Liz studied the report and waited till she finished reading all the results before staring into David's face.
"I'm with you. Certainly is the first explanation we can work with and evidence to back it up. What do you reckon would happen if we gave this to Charlie to add to his data?"
"Reckon we'd see the boy wonder fly, that's what I reckon."
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Colby was getting dizzy watching Charlie work. He was running from his laptop to folders and crunching data at an unbelievable rate. Only Amita could add it faster but Charlie saved himself time at the other end by not having to explain anything to anyone about what he was doing.
"Ah ha."
"You got something?"
"Not yet Colby but already I can see a pattern emerging. See this?"
Colby looked at where Charlie pointed on the board. All he saw was a collection of pixels making a pretty pattern in green. "You gonna tell me what a few green lines mean to a hick like me?"
"It means there is a pattern to these deaths. There's a common factor. I haven't narrowed it down yet but in all this data from the file there's something in here which has taken my computer half an hour to detect using highly complex programming. Don found it himself."
The pride in Charlie's voice could not be hidden. To Charlie everything may be numbers but Colby always admired the loyalty and conviction he had in his brother. Charlie was awed by the fact that he could prove how things worked by mathematics but his brother simply 'felt' or understood the same things using simply his wits. To Charlie Don was the genius, his brain provided better results than Charlie's laptop ever could. And Don's brain provided something Charlie's math never could, an allowance for human error. Some people called it instinct and Charlie didn't believe that, he called it intelligence.
"How long?" Now Colby could see some progress he was becoming impatient to get to an answer.
"Not too much longer. I'd say…"
Charlie's words were cut short as he noticed Liz and David barrelling towards the war room waving some paperwork.
Liz came in and without saying a word handed a copy to Colby and Charlie. She gave them a second to read the details.
"What's this?" Charlie asked after having read it.
"That my friend is the answer to the million dollar question. How does a car end up in a desert while the owner ends up in Pasadena days later? Sort of…least I hope you can help us prove it." Liz beamed.
Charlie was in shock. Normally when he got told he was right, it came from Don. To know that all his fruitless efforts till now had been right felt empty. It was strange, he thought he would feel better, but this evidence, it meant not only was he right, but Don was more than likely still in danger. "It doesn't really prove…"
David chirped in. "No it doesn't really prove anything but from all that we know there's one scenario that keeps cropping up. And it's a good one."
The laptop beeped interrupting the conversation. Charlie looked across to see it had finalized crunching the data. Projected on the monitor was a series of lines that spun out like a spiderweb but connected at one common point. Colby pointed at that point which was labelled N5. "What is N5?"
Charlie gulped and looked at the others. "Not what, who. N5 is Marcus Field."
"So are you saying this is telling us Don worked out Marcus was doing a bit of drug clean up on the side and…" Colby never got to finish as Charlie interrupted.
"No." He flicked open a file and furiously searched for a page. He found it and held it up. "No. This is Grant Fletcher. He was killed while Marcus was in D.C."
"So the program got it wrong?" Colby questioned.
Charlie froze and looked around to David and Liz. "No. That's correct. N5 is the common link. I'm wrong. N5 isn't Marcus."
"Then who is?" Colby asked.
"Oh my god David. Remember when we first went out to question Sophie, she wasn't there. We came back and knew she was because…" Liz began.
"…Because she had a vespa parked in her driveway." David opened the folder and looked at the results of the oil. The report stated it there in black and white. 'Engine oil consistent with use in a small motorized vehicle such as a motorbike or moped.' "N5 is Sophie Field Charlie."
"Where's my brother?"
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A/N Sorry for the delay between chapters, I hope that these 2 chapters posted 2 days apart make up for it, especially considering I think you can now see that we have some answers to some of the more burning questions.