Title: Interesting Dynamics

Author: ZombieJazz

Fandom: Chicago PD

Disclaimer: I don't own them. Chicago PD and its characters belong to Dick Wolf. The character of Ethan has been created and developed for the sake of this AU series.

Summary: Hank and Erin are forced to re-explore their complicated 'family' dynamic when an unexpected 'family emergency' causes Voight to have to deal with demons related to his wife's death, his failings in parenting, and the challenges his work has created for his family and for his ability to be the father he wants to see himself as.

Voight didn't even look at Halstead. He kept staring out the windshield, his hands still resting on the wheel.

They hadn't said anything on the drive. Voight had talked into his phone but not to the detective sitting next to him. Halstead hadn't made an effort to say anything to him either. Though, the guy had likely known something was up when Voight had told him he'd be riding with him. Halstead was likely less than thrilled. His body language clearly said as much. He'd been doing it best to gaze out the window and avoid any kind of eye contact on the entire drive over to the fucking stakeout. He'd been doing an ever better at making sure his eyes were glued on the massage parlor down the street now.

"You deal with IED much on your conveys in Afghanistan?" Voight finally rasped.

Halstead gave him the slightest glance. He was clearly trying to look at him out of the corner of his eye without actually looking at him. Voight turned to catch his eye more but that just made Halstead still his movements.

"Yeah. Why?" Halstead muttered under his breath.

Voight just nodded and ran his tongue along his teeth. "Ever have to deal with a kid getting themselves blown up?" he asked flatly.

Halstead let out a breath and cast him a glare. "I got the message, Sergeant," he said flatly.

"Mmm," Voight grunted and gave a little nod, gazing down the street a bit more. "Stuff with the kids sticks with you, doesn't it?" he muttered, giving him a glance. "All this compartmentalization crap. Fine. Good. But when it's kids just doesn't fit into those boxes quite as neatly."

Halstead gave him another small glance but that time Voight had already turned himself and was ready to catch his line of vision.

"I've seen kids in some sick situations. Shooting each other. Stabbing each other. Killing themselves with drugs and gangs. Get involved with these fucks who destroy them. But a kid spread across the road – in pieces – I've only done that once. With my own."

Halstead just shook his head. "You don't have to tell me this," he muttered.

Voight shrugged. "It's what you're on about, isn't it? What you want to hear? Need to fucking hear?"

Halstead cast him an accusing look. "I only was asking Lindsay about it because she's been distracted," he spat. "She's my partner. My friend—"

"That the technical name for it?" Voight put back to him.

Halstead shook his head frustratedly. Voight could feel the eye roll – but Halstead wasn't one to visibly roll his eyes. He was too much of a trained solider to do that.

"I was concerned," he said flatly. "That's all."

"Mmm," Voight allowed. "Sounds like you're very concerned about my family's business."

Halstead caught his eyes. "Yeah, seeing as you're asking me to drag my brother into your mess – maybe I was a little concerned."

Voight gazed at him. "So ask me," he put flatly. "Don't be doing this little dance of garnishing information from anyone with loose lips. Getting the fucking rumor mill going."

Halstead glared at him but then shifted his body angrily so he was looking at him in his seat. "What happened to your kid, Voight?"

Voight shrugged. "Think I was trying to tell you that before you got up on your high horse there," he said.

Halstead shook his head and went back to looking out his window with an even greater intensity. "You know, I don't want to know," he said. "I've definitely learned the less I know with you, the better. Just leave my brother out of it."

"That's not going to happen," Voight said and Halstead cast him a dirty look.

Voight drummed his fingers on the steering wheel for a moment.

"You know, cops don't like admitting when they've got any of that mental stuff on the job. Like we're somehow above it. Because we've gotta be," Voight said. "We can't have no pussies on this job. You either deal or you go do something else. And, OK, fine. I can suck up all the bad shit. Honestly, 99 per cent of it, it doesn't bother me. It just doesn't. If I'm doing my job right – seeing that shit, dealing with it – water off my back. I'll still sleep like a baby at night. But that night," Voight said and shook his head. "You know, I wasn't in shock. But I couldn't tell you what I remember about it. All these fucking little shots. Might as well be photos in an evidence folder."

Halstead gave him a glance and Voight looked at him. "I saw Camille," he said and rubbed at his chin and then gestured at the younger detective. "That's my wife. I remember seeing her. Or what was left of her. But I don't remember it. It's more the feeling. And, you know, at first, I thought Ethan was still in the car too. I couldn't see him but there wasn't much to see. Nothing that looked like people. And my head it's just this fucking … rapid fire … the realization that no, my son wasn't in the car. That blob on the road that all these fucking firefighters and EMTs are standing over – that's my boy. He just looked like this fucking … dirty blanket. Just this little bloody pile of material on the ground. So I'm starting to go over to it – to him – and I've got all these people holding me back – because it wasn't my little boy on the ground. It was just … these broken pieces of a human being."

Voight found the guy's eyes at that. "I didn't think he'd live. Fuck, I didn't think they'd be able to peel what was left of him off the road. When they did that, I didn't think we'd make it to the hospital. And then when they got him to the hospital, and the doctors rolled him into that ER operating theater – I didn't expect him to come out. Fuck, if he did come out, what kind of life was he going to have. How do you piece together that? How do you fucking come out of that as a functional human being? A vegetable, maybe. But a little boy? No."

Halstead looked away at that. But Voight just kept going.

"But, you know, what he did come out of that surgery. And then he went in for another and another and another," he said. "And, you know what, I'm just beside myself the whole fucking time. I'm losing my mind. This was not something I knew how to fix. I don't know how to be a single dad. I don't know how to raise a kid that's going to be in a coma for who knows how long. And if he didn't wake up? What the fuck do I do? But he did wake up. Ethan wasn't all there when he woke up. But he did wake up. And we spent months more in that fucking hospital. He had to learn to talk again. Walk again. Fucking breath on his own again. Seven," Voight stressed. "Seven years old. Now I think you know a thing or two about what a traumatic brain injury does to a person. I think I let you put your buddy downstairs – and he's a nice reminder of you can still have a life after something like this. But I think you've seen brain injury in adults. Grown men. Not a little boy.

"So let me tell you a bit what that's like as a parent. I had a child who woke up not knowing who I was. A kid who for almost two years after his mom was gone still couldn't remember his mom would gone and would ask me every day where she was. I had to teach a seven year old how to get his feet under him again. How to walk. How to run. How to fucking balance. How to read. He had to relearn how to take a fucking piss. I was changing diapers – on a seven year old. And this is a kid who was reading a four. Full books. Bedtime – I didn't have to read him a story. He read to me. He's in the fucking gifted program at school. Whatever the fuck that means when you're in the first grade. He knows the name of every fucking dinosaur known to men. Can point out on a map where every one of them is from. He's seven. He's playing Little League. He's swimming. We've got him on skates in the winter. He is a fucking shining star. And then this happens.

"OK, fine," Voight allows. "Life ain't fucking fair. We deal. I deal. We get through. Do I have the same kid as before that night? No. But I've still got my little boy. So we go on with life. Life throws my family some more fucking curveballs. The kids make some mistakes. I make some mistakes. And, you know what? I dropped the ball. I convinced myself that I'd gotten Ethan to a comfortable place. That he was fine. And I took my eyes off him. I fucked up.

"Now I've got a twelve year old who suddenly can't read. He can't write. He can't do math. He is agitated as fuck. The kid is nearly crawling out of his skin half the time. So I take him to the doctor and say what the fuck? And they go, 'Mmm, maybe he hit his head harder than we thought. We should look into that again.' So I don't know what the fuck is going on. But I know I'm looking at my kid and I'm losing my mind again because this is not normal. And I'm not going to sit around with my thumb up my ass waiting until they get us in front of some fucking specialist who's just going to schedule some tests and we get stuck in a fucking waiting game. I want answers. I want answers yesterday."

Voight nodded at Halstead. "I'm not asking miracles out of your brother," he said. "I'm seeing if he can pull some strings to get us on a cancellation list. Maybe a few spots up the cancellation list so I'm no sitting here losing my mind for weeks until we get in front of these dickwads. I will drop what I am doing and get my son in there on this phone call. I fucked up. That's on me. Not Ethan. And, if your brother's got any thoughts on any of these shrinks or specialists or therapists or who-the-fuck-ever I can get the ball rolling on one of these evaluation reports so I can make sure he's getting the help he needs when school starts up again – I'd appreciate that. Because I don't want to be sitting around waiting for the fucking school to get that in place for him."

Voight sighed and looked out the window again. "Ethan's dealt with a lot of shit. Things that aren't his fault that he's just had to deal with. Things that would have grown men crying in their beers. And he's just sucked it up. He's a good kid. And this isn't just going to be another situation he has to deal with."

Voight saw a couple men walk toward the building and Olinsky and Ruzek got out of their car and started to follow after them. Voight jutted his chin and reached for the door.

"Let's move," he said.

He wasn't sure how much listening Halstead had done for him. If he could even fully understand where he was coming from. He didn't have kids of his own. He hadn't been there. And as much as he thought he could understand – Voight knew that you never truly understood until you had kids of your own. Until you had that helpless little ball of pink and flailing legs screaming at you. Until you realized it was yours – and your responsibility – until death did you part. Thing was the death did you part was supposed to be yours – not the kids. And as soon as you got a glimpse that it could be your kid who goes first – you just fight tooth and nail against it. You put it all on the line for your kids. You drove yourself into the dirt if necessary.

He reached for the door and gave Halstead a last glance. "Set up a meeting for me with your brother – and you can set up the paintball too," Voight said.

Halstead gaped at him and started to almost try to stutter something out.

Voight just shook his head. "Don't tell Ruzek anything you don't want the world to know," he said. "Just don't talk to him unless you want the entire block to hear the conversation."

He slammed the door and started to walk around the car, glancing at Halstead who was still staring at him.

"Give it a few weeks," he said. "Let his ribs mend before you start pummelling him with shit."