A/N: I was going to wait a little while - but then I thought 'stuff it' so here's the next one. Marginally shorter chapters this time!

In Sickness And In Death

Chapter 1: You're Getting There

It was Friday, which should have said it all, but in this case there was much more to Garret Macy's Friday morning than the usual lethargy and extreme desire to get home and relax even before he had reached his place or work. He glanced at his watch, which was on his wrist, which was, incidentally, connected to the hand that was now gripping the steering wheel loosely and directing it towards the scene of the latest bout of death and catastrophe he had been summoned to. A quarter past seven. He sighed. Work sucked, sometimes.

But this was not his average call out. It had been a frantic voice on his cell phone earlier, a frantic voice telling him about a train wreck with possibly fifty plus people dead. The details weren't clear, because they simply didn't have the information. That was up to him.

He had dialled the numbers of his team, and they had expressed their distaste at the situation before hanging up and assuring them they'd be here. Which was why he was mildly surprised when one didn't show up.

"Jordan here yet?" he asked Bug who had come to meet him, as he was climbing out of his car.

"Not yet," he said. "She'll be here soon, though, probably banked up behind the morning traffic. Peak hour, you know."

"Yes, I do," he said, surveying the smouldering wreck in front of him. The field was alive with activity, rescue teams were attempting to save as many lives as they possibly could, the fire brigade was putting out the flames that had engulfed two out of the many carriages.

"What's the situation?" he asked, grabbing hold of his 'bag of tricks' and heaving it out of his car, closing the door behind him and following the doctor.

"Train wreck," he said.

"I can see that," Garret replied sardonically. "Specifics, please?"

"Ten carriages, two derailed. They don't think any are alive from the two that caught alight."

"Do they know what caused it?"

"Possibly foul play," Bug said grimly. "Which is the reason for this…" He waved his hand at the myriad of FBI agents and the two detectives from the Boston PD, two they knew quite well.

"Morning Doc," Woody said. "What a lovely morning for a train ride."

His companion, Detective Lois Carver rolled her eyes knowingly at Garret, who smiled, and turned back to Bug.

"How many in each carriage?"

"Up to 25 in each," he said.

"Great," he said. Bug nodded grimly. "It's going to be a hell of a long day."

"Who else is here?"

"Sidney got here shortly after me, Nigel's yet to come."

"We'll have no one left at the morgue, once the bodies start coming in."

"Want me to give Jordan a call?"

"No, I want her here. You go, when the time comes."

Bug nodded. "Guess we better get to it then, huh?"

"You and Nigel erect the tent when he gets here, send Sidney to me," he ordered, and Bug nodded again, walking off to do his bidding.

----------

Jordan yawned widely and threw the pills into her mouth, washing them down with a gulp of water from a glass that was sitting on her coffee table – probably from the night before. She couldn't remember, hence her dilemma. She wasn't supposed to be working today, it was her day off, but duty called and she had been summoned by Garret to a train wreck just outside Boston. The night before, under the illusion that she could sleep in the next morning, she had stayed up late and drank a little too much, which was basically out of character for her, but it had been a long day and she wanted to have a degree of numbness, which was now eluding her,

Her head was splitting, punishment for her binge the night before, but she ignored it as she climbed into her car and turned on the ignition. Her blood ran cold, however, when there was an unexpected movement in the back and she suddenly felt cold steel against her head.

"Good morning," she said in a low voice, meeting the eyes of the man in the back seat.

"Drive," he said.

She put her foot down on the pedal. "I would have done that without the…aid of a gun. See, I drive practically every day. Its not an enormous stretch."

"Shut your smart mouth," he said quite calmly, as if chiding a child.

"Any particular destination?" she asked, equally as sedately.

"Just turn when I tell you to."

"Is it alright if I swerve if we're about to run headlong into another car?" she asked. "Or is that the point?"

"I told you to shut up. Little girls should be seen and not heard."

"And little boys should was their hands before dinner. Never going to happen."

Surprisingly, he laughed. She had, up until then, no fear, she would get out of this, she always did. But then he had laughed and she realised she was dealing with someone who was at least mildly intelligent, which was disconcerting on its own, but coupled with the fact that she thought she recognised this man, it was more than mildly so. Not being able to place the face, she let it go.

"So," she said. "Any particular reason for this? Robbery? Because I assure you, you wont get much joy here. Talk to my boss, he's the one who won't give me a rise."

"I will," he said, delighting in the fact the she narrowed her eyes – he had unbalanced her.

"Not robbery then," she deduced, and he nodded. "Um…boredom?"

"While boredom is quite a strong motive for kidnapping and murder, sadly it is not the reason today."

"I see," she said, taking in a deep breath at the mention of murder. "You're some kind of weird stalker? Live in my apartment block, maybe? See me hang out my washing, stare through my windows with binoculars?"

"Nope, not today. You're getting there, though. Keep trying."

"Okay," she said, staring ahead, willing someone to see that she had a gun to her head, but no one was looking. She made a mental note to take very detailed notice of drivers and their passengers in the future.

"Oh come on, Doctor. You know better than most the motives for killing people."

"And I, better than most, hate guessing games," she snapped, then calmed down as the barrel was pressed harder into her head, but she pressed her lips shut.

"Left," the man growled and she turned sharply, hoping to unbalance the man but the attempt was futile from the start.

"Nice try," he drawled.

"Revenge," she said. It made complete sense, he knew her, or enough of her to know she was a doctor, it even explained why she found him familiar – vengeance suggested she knew him, at least in passing. Maybe a grieving husband or a bereaved father, she didn't know, didn't even particularly care. She was going through, in her mind, all the means of escape she could possibly initiate. None were looking too good, as all involved pretty certain accidental or otherwise death.

"Bingo," he said quietly watching the road.

"Well there's not much point in revenge if the person you're getting revenge against doesn't remember what they did in the first place."

"Its okay, I fully intend to completely fill you in," he said. "I'm sure you'll recall once I give you the details."

"I'm sure I will," she said.

"It's a pity we met under these circumstances," he said. "I think I would have liked you."

"Such a shame," she agreed scathingly.

------------

"How many so far?" Garret shouted over the drone of a chainsaw a few meters away, trying to extricate living victims from the carriages that hadn't been totally annihilated. Garret had assessed the situation, as was his was, and had found out that out of the ten carriages, five had escaped unscathed, three were in a pretty critical, though not fatal state, and the two he had been assigned to were completely ruined. They had had to wait for the fire itself to be put out, then for the place to cool down before they could go in, but the rescue teams had given them the go ahead, according to them the place was stable enough for the moment, so there weren't too many hitches. He spotted Nigel fending off a television crew and grimaced. Vultures came to mind, spotting the rotting flesh, deciding it was juicy and circling above until they could drop and feast. They were only doing their jobs, as he was, but it didn't stop him being more than a little irritated.

"We've got eighteen," Bug shouted back. "Its lucky the fire was put out in time, only a few right at the front are completely burnt to a crisp."

"Lucky," Garret agreed grimly, and went back to searching. Their instructions were to find as many whole people as possible, as many people as they could without moving anything. Most of the people, however, were trapped under seats, wall and rubble, so their initial job was almost done.

"Over here!" Bug shouted, and bobbed down next to the body. Garret waved Nigel, who was coming towards them anyway, over.

"Over there." He stuck his thumb in Bug's direction and went back to sifting through the smaller, lighter bits of rubble, watching out of the corner of his eye as Bug and Nigel lifted the body onto a stretcher and carried it into the tent which was only few metres away, before emerging and resuming their search.

Sidney was the next to call out.

"Dr. Macy!"

Garret looked and waded through the debris towards the ME, and they went through the process together. When they had navigated themselves and the deceased in their care out of the smoking wreck, taken the body into the tent and wrapped it up, Garret pulled his phone out.

"No sign of Jordan?" he asked Sidney, while dialling a number.

"Nope, nothing. Want me to ring her?"

"No, I've got it, go back and help the others."

"Right," he nodded and walked out of view.

"Hey Emmy, is Lily in? Ok." He waited, tapping his foot.

"Lily!"

"Hey, Garret, I heard about the train wreck, everything okay?"

"Yes. People are going to be coming in soon, you know the drill."

"Yes," she sighed heavily. "Are you sending someone back with the first of the bodies?"

"We're a little understaffed," he said. "Can you send a couple of the interns?"

"Consider them there," she said. "You sound strained."

"Yeah, a little," he said. "Hey, is Jordan there?"

"No...I thought she was with you?"

"No. Can you try and call her please? Tell her to get her ass down here fast or I'll fire it."

"Yeah, sure."

He bade her goodbye and hung up.

"Hey, Dr. Macy."

He turned to address the detective.

"Woody. Found anything out?"

"Oh yeah. The feds are being their usual charming, munificent selves. We know everything." He motioned over to where Detective Carver was talking animatedly with one of the agents, who was obviously doing his best to skive her off. Garret made a sound in his throat, he could only imagine what a wonderful time the detectives were having trying to get information.

"Anyway, who'd rely on the FBI? If we want information, we'll get it ourselves."

"That's the spirit," Garret said grimly before turning and heading back to the train.