Chapter 25

Gazing into the Abyss

"Whoever fights monsters should see to it in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
-Friedrich Nietzsche

"I don't get 'pissed'" -Walter O'Brien

BANG

The sound of Walter hitting the steel door at full speed and strength was deafening.

Zoric seemed to break out of his spell of admiration, and replace it with fear. He must have realized his attempts to connect with Walter had been in vain, and now recognized the danger he was in.

The jail door protecting him from Walter was still standing, but Walter was readying another charge. Zoric started running upstairs.

"No!" Sonia yelled. Even amongst everything, her focus stayed on catching Zoric.

The guards' momentary shock at Walter's charge wore off, and they rose their weapons to fire on him. Cabe threw open his own cell door and tackled the man closest to him. Their fall threw him into the second man like a domino, momentarily unbalancing him.

BANG. Walter hit the door a second time. This time the sound was accompanied by a loud groan of metal. The door was giving way.

Cabe began wrestling for the gun of the man he tackled, and Toby soon joined the fray, but he noticed the second guard was recovering.

BANG. With the third hit the solid steel door flew off its hinges, slamming into the man readying his gun. Walter emerged from the cell.

He turned to Cabe and Toby's grapple with their opponent and sped to them. Walter reached around and grabbed the man who was now kneeling over his friends and slammed him against the adjacent wall.

The corrupt lawman's feet hopelessly scrabbled for footing that was a good foot beneath him while trying to pull at the iron grip around his throat. Walter bared his teeth at him. Cabe half expected Walter to kill him right then and there, but instead Walter lowered the man to eye level and through clenched teeth commanded one word.

"Sleep."

The compelled man went limp in Walter's grip. Walter then stepped over and threw him, very unceremoniously in the empty cell Toby and Cabe had resided in.

The second guard had partially freed himself from beneath the door. It looked like he had a broken leg, and likely had a concussion, but his arm still worked. Stunned, he raised the gun that was in his hand and pointed it at the first thing he saw.

Paige.

Walter sped over and grabbed the man's arm, breaking it. The man let out a scream and dropped the gun as Walter dragged him from under the door and threw him to join his comrade in the cell.

Once they were both inside Walter slammed the door shut and with a yell, twisted the metal at the edge of the door to lock it in place. Walter then leaned against the door, breathing heavily, looking exhausted. Cabe had a feeling it wasn't just physical exertion he was exhausted from.

Damn. Cabe thought. What the kid had just done was beyond impressive, and he wasn't just referring to his display of strength.

Nearly blind with rage, he had resisted killing these two men, as easy as it would have been. Cabe also had no doubt part of Walter had wanted to, especially when Paige's life had been threatened. The kid had used his anger to drive him, but hadn't let it overcome him.

They all then heard the door at the top of the stairs open again.

Sonia. She was going after Zoric.

"Sonia! Wait!" Cabe started running up the stairs. Walter beat him to it, though Cabe wasn't far behind. Walter opened the door into the main room of the station.

They emerged on the floor and were met with the sight of Sonia struggling with the last remaining man Zoric had bribed. They saw Zoric disappear through the door to the next room.

Walter rushed and grabbed the man away from Sonia and with a single punch to his face, knocking him motionless to the ground. The man was unconscious, but alive.

Sonia wasted no time once she was free and pursued Zoric again. The whole team was now out of the basement, and they followed her into the next room.

This room as rundown like the rest of the station, and Zoric was trying to open a back door to exit outside.

The door wouldn't budge due to either being locked or its worn condition. It likely hadn't been opened in years. The door had a large window in its center, allowing a thick beam of sunlight to flow over Zoric as he struggled. Walter couldn't approach, as Zoric still had his ring.

That didn't stop Sonia though, and Cabe was close behind. She ran at Zoric full speed and pushed him to the ground. She pulled out a gun; likely grabbed from one of the unconscious men. She pointed the gun at his head while standing over him. Displayed on her face was all the anger and pain she had held in most of her life.

Zoric held his hands up defensively.

"Sonia…" Cabe said carefully. "We need him to get the intel on the others. You're better than this. You're better than him."

But Sonia didn't seem to register what he was saying. Cabe was also worried about what Walter would do. He had shown incredible restraint thus far, but he was pacing back and forth, just out of reach of the sunlight still covering Zoric and Sonia. He looked like a wild animal waiting for a safe opportunity to pounce.

This situation could turn for the worse at any moment. There was a lot at stake. Not only the intelligence that would lead them to the other twenty-three war criminals, but also Sonia's humanity; her soul. Walter's own humanity wasn't out of danger yet, either.

They suddenly had one less concern when Paige came behind Walter and put a hand on his shoulder. No words. Nothing else. He stopped pacing and looked at her. A heavy breath left him, like all the tension was being released from his body. His features returned to normal and he took a steady step backward to Paige's side.

As Walter took a step backward, Zoric looked to him one more time and reached his hand out towards him.

"Please, vampire. Do you not realize how magnificent you are? A magnificent monster. I apologize if I somehow insulted you before. Imagine what we could accomplish together. We could cleanse the weak and build a regime of strength. Help me."

Walter would never accept, of course, but everyone was curious how or if he'd answer. In reaching out, Zoric's hand exited the patch of sunlight. Walter calmly approached and grabbed it to hold it still as he took back the ring that was his. He didn't harm Zoric in its removal.

Walter placed it back upon his finger and said only four words in reply. The words were straight forward, as if stating a simple, obvious fact to an ignorant child.

"Your offer is absurd." He then walked back to Paige's side.

Cabe recognized that constantly calculating look. Normal, genius, familiar, robotically calm Walter was back.

But that left Sonia. She still had the gun trained on Zoric. Her hands were shaking, showing she still hadn't decided what to do.

"You see me as a monster, child, yet you contemplate murder, and take company with a creature of death itself. So go ahead, and kill me." Zoric taunted her with a sneer.

Sonia made a quick glance at Walter before looking back at Zoric.

"You killed my family, and now I can kill you." Her hands stopped shaking, signaling she had made a decision. "But I'm better than you." She lowered the gun and looked at Walter. "And so is he. That 'monster' over there, as you say, is more human than you can ever be, and I have more humanity than you ever will."

Zoric had lost, but their job was not done.

Cabe turned to Walter. "Do you think you can get what we need from him?"

Walter calmly nodded and approached Zoric. He picked him up from the floor and looked him in the eye as he concentrated.

"Tell us how to find the others in your network."

****SVD****

They collected a flash drive containing the locations of the other war criminals, handed to them personally by Zoric, no less, with a little influence from Walter.

With the drive and his blood sample, their work in Cuba was done, and they just met their plane in time before the extraction window closed.

On the plane trip back to Los Angeles Cabe sat next to Sonia while everyone else slept.

Sonia looked good. Her life's pursuit had been completed, and Cabe had no doubt a big part of her was now at peace.

"I know that must have been hard, letting Zoric live, but it was the right thing to do, and now he and all of his network will face justice. I'm proud of you."

Sonia looked up at him and gave a small smile. It was the same smile she gave him all those years ago when they first met. It was a smile of hope.

There was one last thing Cabe needed to address, however.

"Look, about Walter…," he started slowly, trying to ease into the subject.

Sonia furrowed her brow and gave him a sidelong glance. "What about him?"

"I know what you saw must have been confusing and frightening, to say the least, but I just want to assure you, Walter is a good man. He may be different, but he's nothing like the monster Zoric thought he was."

Sonia gave him a perplexed look. For a moment it crossed Cabe's mind maybe Walter made her forget what she saw before they boarded the plane, but that wasn't possible. She had never been out of his sight.

"Cabe, I've seen true monsters. I've seen the faces of evil and the horrors they inflict. Your friend Walter," she turned to look at the sleeping genius, "is not one of them. He saved us all. I have been consumed with pain and anger for so long it blinded me and influenced every move I made. I started to feel I was losing my own humanity chasing these men." Sonia looked down and folded her hands in her lap, It looked as if she was trying to distance herself from the memory of her darker side.

"I would have killed Zoric today if it wasn't for what you said to me," she continued. "Who am I to judge someone who has more strength to keep his humanity than I did? And if I did judge him just for what he is, how would that make me any different from Zoric?" She looked back up at Cabe, meeting his eyes with a promise. "His secret is safe with me."

Well, Cabe thought, impressed. That was certainly a way of looking at it.

He put a hand on her shoulder. "I think you're going to be okay, kid. You've got a good head on your shoulders. I think with all this behind you, your future is going to be bright indeed."

"Thank you for everything, Cabe. For the first time since you found me, I feel like I can move toward the future. I feel hope."

A little more to go in this section, but what did you all think of my very amended episode? Let me know! The more feedback, the faster I'll post the next chapter!