Part VI
Darien was jerked out of a sound sleep for the third time, as every nerve from the waist down decided to fire at once and remind him that he was not the man he used to be. He bit his lip and kept the shout that wanted to escape inside. If it weren't for the fact that he knew this was a good thing, he'd seriously consider doing something drastic to end it.
As the pain faded, though, he regretted that thought immediately. He would endure it. He would get better, get well. And if he didn't... He took a moment to consider that. Even Claire wasn't infallible, so permanent impairment could still be a possibility he'd have to face. He would, he decided, try to live the best life he could, whatever the circumstances, with friends who cared about him. He would still have his mind and his hands; he'd be able to find something he could do, something he could enjoy. Heck, he could go back to school, and finish this time, get a degree in a subject he liked and see where that took him.
He buried his face into Alyx's hair, thankful that he'd not woken her up this time. The last time his legs had flared into agony, she'd spent twenty minutes massaging the cramps out of his lower back just so he could fall back to sleep. They'd talked for a while, until the need for sleep had attacked him with a vengeance. What really surprised him was that she was treating him the same as always. Somehow he knew that, even if he never walked again, that still wouldn't change. To her he'd still be the same person he had always been.
She had told him something of the fear she had felt while watching him earlier as he fell towards the abyss, forcing herself to stand back and do nothing to stop him. But she hadn't asked Darien what had changed his mind, why he'd suddenly found himself unable to end it all, to end the misery he believed he would face. Why he'd suddenly found himself able to step back from the ledge and actually want to live. He wasn't too sure himself. He'd just known somehow that death was not the answer, not now.
Moving away slightly, he worked the chain up and over his head with one hand. His other arm was underneath her, their fingers tangled together up under her chin. Working slowly and by feel alone, he got the chain undone and slid the ring off it. Finding her right hand, he slid the ring back on her finger, where it belonged. She sighed in her sleep and snuggled back against him, as if part of her knew what he had done and was pleased with his decision.
As soon as she had settled, he brushed the hair off her face and lifted himself slightly to whisper in her ear. "Partners. In all things." If nothing else, he felt the need to remind himself of the promise. To say it out loud, if even if she really wouldn't hear him right now. Sometime soon he'd say it to her when she was awake, but for now this would do.
Settling himself back down, he curled against her so that he cheek rested in the cup formed by the curve of her neck and allowed himself to drift back into sleep.
Darien was rolling himself back and forth in the space at the foot of his bed when Alyx came out of the bathroom, still braiding her hair back. He did a double take, and then had to fight the urge to laugh at her. She was wearing the one and only clean pair of jeans she had left at his apartment. That pair, unfortunately, had had a run-in with a bottle of bleach at some point, and then had accidentally been washed with some of his more vividly colored shirts. All the bleached areas had turned this odd, glowing shade of yellow, and the rest of the fabric had taken on a sickly greenish hue. They were ugly as all get out, but perhaps that was the point. She'd even taken it one step further by going through his collection of shirts and pulling out the dark red one that proudly proclaimed 'Bite me!' across the front.
The boss was just going to love this.
"Well, now I know why you picked this shirt for me to wear." He failed to keep the grin off his face. He was currently wearing a comfortable pair of jeans and that snug, orange, short-sleeved shirt that she claimed caused her eyes to water. Of course, that just made him want to wear it more often.
"What? You don't like the fact that the orange just screams 'target'?" She moved closer to him. "Besides, you match my toes now." She squatted down before him and set her right hand on his knee. "How are you feeling?"
He set his hand over hers. "Better. Not great, but better." Part of him still wanted to crawl back into bed, pull the covers up over his head, and ignore the rest of the world. He was still somewhat depressed and angry, but the despair and the conviction that he was worthless like this were mostly gone. "Do we really have to go in today? We could make some popcorn and watch movies." He was at least half-serious, and she knew it.
"Tempting, but we really should find out who did this to you, don't you think?" Her logic was annoyingly impeccable, as always.
"Great, I'll get to spend the day down in the Keep, bored, while you and Bobby get to work."
She snorted. "And since when did you want to work?" She shook her head at him. "You still have eyes and arms and, hopefully, a brain hidden under all that hair. You're gonna help, believe me; we have hours of video to go through. By the time we're done, you're gonna wish you'd gotten to stay down in the Keep being poked and prodded all day."
Darien groaned and Alyx laughed quietly. She got to her feet and walked over to the closet to get out her sneakers. She'd snuck them in there yesterday while Claire had been keeping him busy. Darien knew Claire had to have been in on this, but he wasn't really angry. He could probably even convince himself it had been justified. If he'd stayed in the hospital, he would have just continued his downward spiral and not been able to stop it. At least this way he'd been forced to face his issues head-on, had hit bottom and gotten past the worst of it, and could see how foolish and self-centered he had been.
Now that he could think with some vague resemblance to rationality, he knew that this involved more than just himself. He even remembered Hobbes saying something about maybe Alyx being the real target, and that he could still be in danger. Marvelous.
"I know it's not that much fun, but I'd rather not having you moping about here alone all day, and we can protect you better at the Agency." She moved over to his door and opened it. "Besides, then you wouldn't get to use this."
Alyx turned about and rolled a slick-looking set of wheels towards him. The wheelchair he was looking at only shared a vague relationship to the beast he sat in. If he was currently sputtering along in a Yugo, the piece before him was a souped-up Viper.
"I thought this might be a bit more your style." She was watching him very carefully as she moved closer, as if unsure of his reaction. "Darien?"
"Ummm, yeah. Where did you find that thing?" He was both stunned and repelled by it. It was bad enough to find himself in this one, but for her to think he might want another... He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.
"I'm sorry. I thought you'd be more comfortable in this one." She didn't sound upset; in fact, she sounded rather cool. This was not a good sign.
"Alyx, don't be. I'm still just not...." He stopped shaking his head. "It hasn't quite sunk in yet, okay?"
"Believe me, I know." She parked the new chair next to him. "I came home to find you not only hurt, but refusing to see me. Bobby was completely guilt-ridden and near suicidal; Claire was a total mess, worried that the Official might do something stupid; and all you could do was lie there wishing the rest of the world would forget you existed." She locked the wheels and stepped away. "I know."
It had never even occurred to him that anyone else might be upset about this. That it had done anything more than cause some lost sleep for the Keeper, maybe. Bobby had apologized for two days straight until Darien had simply begun to ignore him, but that Bobby might have been feeling more than just a little guilt never crossed his mind. Not that he'd been using it at the time.
He realized that she hadn't mentioned how his being hurt had affected her. "Alyx, what happens if Claire is wrong and I can never walk again?" When she looked like she was going to protest, he said, "Humor me."
She moved over towards the counter and ran her fingers along the surface. "You'd have some decisions to make about what you'd want to do."
"The gland." Darien watched as she turned to face him.
"The gland, where you'd want to live. A few other things. And stuff the panhandling crap; don't forget about your offshore account. I think you could manage to live quite comfortably off of that." She wasn't grinning, not even a hint of a smile.
He had forgotten about that account, and she was right. Even like this, he could live high on the hog for a long time with that money. He could be doing that already, actually, but except for a couple small items he had pretty much ignored it. "It's Arnaud's money. I'd rather forget it existed."
"Oh, cut the self-righteous crap, Darien. Like you never planned on spending the five mil you stole from his casino." Her voice dripped sarcasm. "Think of the money as some payback for what he did to you and to Kevin. It's there if you need it."
Okay, she had him there. He'd had quite a few uses planned for that money, but had lost it and very nearly himself before he'd had a chance to. And now he'd upset her again. "Alyx," he began, but she had turned away from him again, her back stiff, every line of her body proclaiming that now would be a good time to shut the hell up.
Leaving her alone for now, he looked over at the new chair and decided he might as well give it a try. Unstrapping his legs, he made sure the wheels were locked on both before shifting himself over. The difference was immediately noticeable. The support was different, and fit better to his frame. As he made the adjustments for his legs, he decided he was going to like this piece of machinery. It was stripped down in comparison to the standard-issue one, designed for someone who would be moving a lot as opposed to sitting in place for long stretches. There were no armrests, and the wheels were designed to allow for better control with the brakes. A simple flick of his thumb could set them, and there was even a secondary control that allowed them to be used to slow the chair. She had obviously kept his height in mind when choosing, as his legs were bent comfortably and not sticking out in front of him to whack into every single thing because of their length. The chair was also narrower, which would allow him to pass through the substandard width of the doorways at the Agency with far greater ease.
Flicking off the brakes, he rolled over to Alyx and stopped behind her. Reaching out, he set a hand on her back to get her attention. "Hey, you still talking to me?"
Turning about she looked down at him. She sighed. "Yes, for now anyway." Then she got this twinkle in her eyes. "I think I could get used to this."
"To what?" Darien was looking at her, wondering what she was talking about this time.
Leaning over, she put her face on the same level as his. "Being taller than you. It has such potential." She moved closer, almost but not quite touching him. Her eyes fluttered shut, and he swallowed hard.
He had to convince himself she wasn't being cruel, intentionally or not, that she didn't want him in this chair any more than he wanted to be here. That she was trying to find a bit of humor and ease the tension in a situation that was painful for both of them. He reached out and caressed her face, watching as her features relaxed just that last bit, smoothing out the few lines that had been there. When her hand settled atop his free one, he suddenly got a flood of emotions. He could feel her trying to stop them from bombarding him, from forcing him to know how confused and hurt she still was, how frightened for him she was, how she feared losing him to depression and despair again.
All this happened in less time than a thought and she tried to pull her hand away, but he stopped her, holding her hand firmly in his own. Once they'd taken their relationship that last step, he never allowed himself to be bothered by these small lapses in her control. Without them, he might never have understood exactly how deep her feelings for him ran. So he held on, and watched as her eyes flew open to stare at him in surprise.
"Darien, please." She tried, without any real strength, to free her hand from his hold. "Please!" There was a hint of panic in her voice now, and he allowed her to pull away. She stood up and backed away a couple of steps.
"Alyx..." She shook her head and he stopped. When he didn't continue, she closed her eyes and went about slowing her breathing. It took her several minutes, but she finally regained control, at least outwardly, and Darien could only wonder what it was that had set her off, what she had picked up from him that made her want to get away from him.
"Come on. We're already late, and Claire is expecting you." She moved around him, giving him a wide berth, and picked up his black leather jacket, which she tossed to him as he rolled up behind her. Once he had struggled into it, she handed him a pair of fingerless gloves with tough leather across the palms. "Until you build up calluses, you might want those."
He knew she was right, but decided to wait until later to put them on and stuffed them into one of the jacket pockets. When he looked back at her, her jacket and backpack had magically appeared and she had her keys in her hand. He could see that she was still upset about something, but followed her lead and made no comment about it. She'd tell him, or not, when she was ready and not before. He made an attempt at humor. "Can I drive?"
She shook her head, a small smile gracing her lips. "Not today, I think. Now come on, before Claire starts a manhunt." She opened the door a waved for him to go first. "After you."
Bobby yawned and rubbed his eyes. He had lost the ability to focus about twenty minutes ago but hadn't realized it until now. He paused the tape and looked over at Alyx, who was fast-forwarding through one of her own. They'd spent the last several hours going through videotapes from the area around where Fawkes had been shot, with no luck. He'd been doing it for an hour before she showed up, but she had made up for it by running through the tapes twice as fast. The pile was slowly getting smaller, though without the results they were hoping for.
Security at the Cruise ship dock had been a bust. Whoever set them up had been smart enough to disarm the security systems there completely, and without setting off any of the back up alarms. They had some vague eyewitness accounts of funny-looking black jeeps being in the area earlier that morning, but the sources were questionable, as they were mostly drunks and transients who lived or had crashed overnight in the area.
So far they had Bobby's account and a possible location for the shooter, and nothing else. Zip, zero, zilch, nada, bupkus. And he was getting cross-eyed from staring at the crappy video images that most of these places had. He heard Alyx grumble as she ejected and then switched to a new tape.
"This bites," she snarled as she hit the fast forward button, her eyes glued to the screen before her.
"I agree, but it has to be done." Bobby hit the play button and turned back to the screen.
"But it would be so much faster with the digital transfer machine. We could load all the images into the computer and let it look for matches." She ejected the tape and reached for the next one.
"Huh? You mean we don't have to be staring at these?" He waved at the monitor in front of him.
Alyx paused hers and looked over at him. "Nope, but Ms. Pritchard turned down my request." She sighed. "This is one of those occasions when I miss Eberts."
"The cold-hearted, snake skinned, tighta...." He trailed off, looking at Alyx, who was staring intently at his screen.
"Rewind your tape Bobby." She got to her feet and moved over beside him.
"Huh? Sure." He rewound until she motioned for him to stop.
It played a bit before Alyx said, "Freeze." On the screen was a mini van with a tired-looking mom ignoring the off center camera taking her picture.
"What, kid? She's just a soccer mom feeding the troops." He saw nothing remarkable about the picture.
"Not her. That." She tapped the upper corner of the screen where vehicles driving by on the PCH could be picked up. According to the manager of the Jack in the Box, the camera had been knocked off center by a rather enthusiastic group of twenty-somethings out partying the night before. "Tell me that isn't a 'funny looking jeep'."
On the road, partially hidden by some landscaping, was a Humvee. It was just barely in the camera shot. "Damn kid, good catch." He checked the time code and figured out this shot had been taken about three minutes after Fawkes had been hit. Leaving the tape where it was, he sorted through the others, looking for the nearest businesses to the fast food place. Alyx had moved to do the same. Within an hour, they had a rough outline of the vehicle's movements in the seven minutes following the shooting. By some miracle, they'd also gotten a partial plate and were hoping that, with some enhancement, they'd get more. They still weren't entirely sure where he'd parked to take the shot, but they had a place to start.
Alyx was about to pick up her phone to speak with the Official when there was a knock at her door. Before she got a chance to say anything, Ms. Pritchard opened it and stepped in with a pinched look on her face. She took one look at Alyx and her rather unique attire and the look only tightened more, making her look decidedly like a dried prune.
"Agent Silver, do you think it is at all possible you could control your..." She paused with a pained expression on her face. "Your boyfriend? He's doing wheelies in the halls and disrupting the accounting department."
Wheelies? In the halls? Bobby realized Fawkes must have gotten bored and started goofing around in the wheelchair. At least he wasn't moping about any longer. Whatever had happened yesterday had obviously helped and gotten Fawkes past the worst of his depression.
"No," Alyx said as she made a few more notes on the paper before her. "You have a problem with him, talk to him."
Ms. Pritchard stiffened. Bobby hadn't thought it possible. He hadn't realized ice could get harder than frozen solid.
"Miss Silver, it is not my job to baby-sit bored agents, no matter how self-important they think they are." She looked Alyx up and down, her nose wrinkling in distaste. "Given your status, you could be more responsible in both your attitude and..." she sniffed. "Attire."
Bobby saw the slight narrowing of Alyx's eyes as she lifted her head to look at Ms. Pritchard. He watched as she casually walked around the desk to stand before the taller woman. When she looked the woman up and down, Bobby knew an explosion was imminent. He just wondered what form it was going to take, and whether he should take notes or make popcorn.
"Mr. Fawkes is an adult, not a child, and I am neither his mother nor his Keeper. His life is his own and I have no say in it. As to my attire, I have spent the last day and a half trying to help that very same Mr. Fawkes put his life into some sort of order and, except for a very short time to upload some information, have not been home." Bobby was impressed; Alyx almost sounded bored with the entire thing, and it was effective. Ms. Pritchard had frozen in place -- okay, pretty normal -- and her eyes were locked on Alyx's.
"The shirt I wore especially for you." Alyx continued, taking a step forward. Ms. Pritchard actually backed away a step. "Your job is not to lecture me on my partners, my clothing choices, or my life. Your job is to get me the information or equipment I need to get my job done. You have failed to do that, and have wasted my very valuable time by coming in here and attempting to put me in my place." Alyx tipped her head slightly to the side. "I answer to the Official. Not to you. If and when he chooses to admonish my behavior, I will take my actions into consideration. Then, and only then, will I make any necessary changes. Until that day happens, I would suggest you get out of my office and pretend you actually know what you are doing by getting me the equipment I need to get the job done."
The woman didn't move. In fact, it looked like she was about to explode.
"Ms. Prickly, I'd listen to the kid if I were you. You're expendable, as far as the Fat Man is concerned." Bobby waved in the direction of Alyx. "She ain't. He'd fire you in a heartbeat to keep her here."
The woman sucked in a breath, turned precisely on her heel, and left the room, slamming the door behind her. Bobby started laughing. "Holy shit, kid. That was great."
Alyx leaned back against her desk and began to shake with restrained laughter. "I'm sooo glad she gave me an excuse to do that. That woman could freeze the Pacific."
Bobby laughed harder. "Volcanoes would stop flowing after one look."
"Ice rinks would no longer need fancy cooling systems," Alyx added.
"Frosting beer glasses could be done by the gross." Bobby sank back into his chair, nearly in tears he was laughing so hard.
"Thought that was my job," Darien said from the doorway as he looked at the two of them. They'd been laughing so hard they'd never heard him open the door.
"Hey, partner. You're looking better. Spiffy set of wheels." Bobby couldn't help but notice that he did indeed look better. Not quite back to his old self, but not completely withdrawn from the world anymore, either. "You finally wandering in to help, or you planning on annoying the accounting department some more?"
Darien rolled a bit further into the room, noting the stacks of videos, including the one small pile on Alyx's desk. "Ms. Prickly has got a major bug up her ass. I offer a to carry the two foot stack of papers for Diane and the 'ice woman cometh' goes off on me about interfering with the 'vital work necessary to keep this Agency functioning.' That woman makes me wish for the days of Eberts, double agent or not."
Both Bobby and Alyx chuckled, just barely managing to not break out in laughter again. "Fawkes, somehow I don't think she'll be here much longer."
"Thank god," Darien muttered. He really couldn't stand the woman. She reminded him of his fifth grade teacher, who had been as straight-laced as they came and had been convinced that Darien was nothing but trouble. She'd been right, of course, but that wasn't the point. "Claire turned me loose, and I was wondering if you guys wanted to get some lunch?"
His question sounded tentative to Bobby's ears, and he wondered if maybe Fawkes was feeling a bit guilty about his behavior the last few days. "Sure, Fawkes. I know a place. Get you some fresh air and everything."
"Bobby, I refuse to eat at Wadja's hellhole. You may have a cast-iron stomach, but I don't. One of these days, you're gonna get more than you bargain for in one of their burgers." Alyx actually shuddered, and Darien couldn't blame her. He refused to eat at the place himself. Any place with a 'C' rating he avoided like the plague.
"No, not Wadja's. A place I know not too far from here. We'll get some work done as well." Bobby picked up the stack of videos off Alyx's desk, as well as the timeline she'd written down. There was also another request for equipment so that they could speed this up a bit. They needed to get the video into the computer system in order to do the enhancements they needed. "I'll take these to the Chief and let him deal with 'her frostiness'." I'll meet you two at the van in ten minutes." With that, he left the room, leaving Alyx and Darien alone.
She was still leaning against her desk and watching Darien, a bit warily he thought. "Alyx, thank you for not telling Claire, about... about yesterday." He had assumed she would, for his own good, but Claire had said nothing and when he explained about the cut -- claiming it was an attack of klutziness -- she'd simply nodded and changed the bandage.
She nodded at him. "Of course." She pushed away from the desk and moved around it to grab her jacket from the back of her chair. As she came back around, Darien moved to intercept her. Though she'd been laughing just minutes before with Bobby, she now seemed subdued.
"Talk to me." Darien reached out and took a hold of her right hand, rubbing the back of it gently with his thumb. "What happened this morning?"
She shook her head but didn't pull her hand away. "This is neither the time nor the place."
She was meeting his eyes, but they were unreadable. For some reason, that wall she used to hide behind was back, the mask that she used at work once again real, and he couldn't understand why. He'd thought she'd gotten past the hurt last night. She had chosen to sleep with him, in his bed, instead of on the couch like she so easily could have. He'd thought by putting the ring back on her hand that she'd know how he felt, how he wanted their relationship to be. She was just as much a friend as Bobby had become, but he wanted -- needed -- more from her.
He tugged on her hand pulling her closer. She came willingly enough, but her expression never changed. "Alyx, let me back in, please."
Her eyes closed for a second and she relaxed her posture. "I can't. Not till you let me back in." Then she stood and stepped away, his hold on her hand forgotten. "You're still lost in there, Darien. Find yourself first."
Darien followed her movement as she crossed the room to the door and stood there waiting patiently for him to precede her out. They did still have to meet Bobby, even though his hunger had mysteriously vanished.
Pushing the chair, he rolled past her and out into the hall, thinking. He wasn't quite sure what she meant. As far as he was concerned, he was getting better, well, on all fronts. Claire had been more than pleased with both his physical and mental states. She wanted him to start some of the more intensive therapies tomorrow, and he had agreed; if there was the slightest chance he could recover, he'd do whatever was necessary to get there.
His lingering depression and anger were perfectly normal; Claire had said so herself. So long as he didn't allow them to consume him, he should be fine, eventually.
By the time they'd arrived at the van, he was no more enlightened than when Alyx had made her statement. "Alyx, I don't understand."
She leaned her forehead against the side of the van for a moment, then turned to face him. "I can't feel you. It's like a huge, Darien-shaped hole inside me where you used to be. When I touched you this morning, I got nothing." She turned away and unlocked the side door. "And it wasn't me." Her voice was low and full of suppressed emotion.
Well, that would explain the look of panic in her eyes this morning, but it didn't explain what was going on.
"You know I can feel what's happening to you, if you're hurt or something."
Darien nodded. He'd noticed it over the many months they had worked together, but he also knew it happened, to a lesser degree, with Bobby as well.
"Yesterday, when I broke that glass, I 'felt' what you did, but I've not felt another one. Before or since." Alyx slid open the door to the van and sat down on the floor facing Darien. "It's nothing new; you've been blocking me off and on since... since you learned I wasn't dead. It's gotten progressively worse since you decided to stay." She swallowed hard. "I'm sorry, but I did what was necessary. For everyone."
When Darien found himself unsure of what to say, she simply stood and moved into the van and began rearranging a few things, to accommodate the wheelchair, he assumed. He hadn't realized he'd been doing anything of the kind, and was sure it had to be unintentional. He didn't really have anything he wanted to hide from her, was more than willing to sacrifice a little of his privacy in order to have her with him. He had tried to not broadcast what he was feeling when she showed up at the hospital, but wasn't he trying to do that any more. Was he?
Bobby showed up then; he'd watched most of this exchange from just out of earshot. It had been obvious they were discussing something private and personal that he didn't want or need to hear. So he'd waited patiently until Alyx had turned away and climbed into the van, leaving Fawkes alone. Something was up between them, but now was not the time to stick his nose in. Things were still too precarious where Fawkes was concerned and he didn't want Fawkes diving back under that blanket of depression he'd just barely crawled out from.
"You guys ready?"
"Just about, Bobby. Need to get Darien secure, then we can bail." Alyx said as she came into the doorway. "Ready, Darien?"
"Uh, I guess so." Darien had no idea what she was talking about. He'd planned on getting out of the chair to get into the van. Alyx had other ideas. Using her mind, she lifted him, chair and all, into the van where she quickly went about locking the wheels and securing the chair itself in place.
Alyx slid the door shut as Bobby climbed into the driver's seat. "You okay back there, buddy?"
"Good enough, Hobbes. Lets get some lunch." He looked at Alyx, who sat in the passenger seat and never even looked back at him. "And some fresh air."