A/N: Just as promised, the third chapter. Expect the fourth chapter ... hey, why not tomorrow, just to show you guys the whole huge wait won't be happening again.Enjoy, and remember my only payment is reviews, so I'd love some!
Disclaimer: 24 belongs to Fox, not me! All lines, characters, and situations you recognize are not mine.
Never Without You
Chapter 3 – Rejoining the Fight
3:00 – 4:00 PM
3:04:00
Tony watched the pilot of the helicopter, hoping for a lead found in Powell's cell phone or bag. Jack flipped through the dead man's cell phone, presumably recent calls before opening his own cell phone and tapping in a number from memory.
He watched absently as Jack called someone from where he stood by the car, presumably CTU. Driscoll had been sending back up for Jack in the vain hope that they would get there in time to be any help. When CTU backup got there … well, Jack certainly wouldn't need him anymore. He felt a pang of loss before he tamped it down violently.
There was nothing for him in this life. He had given this lifestyle everything and gotten nothing back but pain. Of course, there was a voice in his head that whispered to him that this job had given him the best years of his life, but his current pain drowned it out.
Sure, life with Michelle had been beautiful, but really it only served to make everything else look ugly. Once one has seen paradise, can anything else compare?
Somehow though, he had managed to forget. To convince himself that he was imagining how wonderful it had been. Now though, with that same adrenaline rushing through his body, with CTU a phone call away, in the field with Jack Bauer by his side, it was impossible to fool himself.
At least he hadn't seen Michelle again. There was an insinuating voice that whispered the evil thought in his head, yet.
That was crushed with an even more fervently violent insistence. Ridiculous.
A car driving up by the heliport served as adequate distraction. "Here's the back up." He said, talking to the pilot.
Jack's cell phone rang but he took the call and hung up as he walked over to one of the CTU agents. Tony watched with foreboding as he conferred briefly with the agent and walked back towards Tony. "Come on Tony, we have to go."
But Tony was suddenly feeling an odd reluctance, the antithesis to his earlier worry about having to leave. Now that he was facing this point of no return, the found himself struck with fear and memory. This life had pulled him apart so viciously last time, why would he want to go back?
"Look, Jack, uh, I think I'm done here today." He tried to phrase it so it didn't sound as though he was running away. It didn't work.
"What are you talking about?" Jack asked, not understanding.
"CTU back up's here. You don't need me anymore." The adamant words carried little power when backed by his tone, which sounded lost.
Jack seemed exasperated. "I need you to see this through with me."
Yeah, right. Like Jack needed a former agent who had been arrested for treason and hadn't been in the field for a year and a half. He dismissed the other reasons he didn't want to come and focused on the fact that he wouldn't be useful. "I appreciate the sentiment, Jack, but you don't need to prop up my ego."
In retrospect, it was lucky that Jack knew Tony well enough to know how to deal with this. "Tony, this isn't about you. If we don't find the override device within the hour, we're going to have six major nuclear disasters. So please, get in the car. Let's go." And he walked off, heading for the car.
Well, what choice did he have? He had known that this could happen when he had volunteered to help out. Now … it was no longer his choice but his duty, his responsibility. Then again, perhaps it always had been. Perhaps when he started looking at it that way, he had never had a choice in this matter. If that was true then he might as well give up the fight. After all, he thought glancing at Jack's retreating back, I already know that I'm going to go.
He followed after, feeling a confused mixture of relief at having decided and dread at what could come of this decision.
3:18:53
The drive had been silent, but that wasn't unexpected. They were both tense with worry and adrenaline and the ride had dragged on. When they finally reached the hotel, Tony let out a quiet sigh of relief.
A funny feeling passed over him as he noticed the back up that was waiting for them. Like so much of the past couple of hours, it was familiar in a strange way. He had never expected to see any of this familiarity again.
The agent who appeared to be in charge approached Jack as soon as they got out of the car. He looked vaguely familiar, but all his smiles were directed at Jack. "Hey, Jack. Good to have you in the field again."
Well, he understood that sentiment. It also meant that the man had been working at CTU when Jack was a field agent there, which meant that the agent would know Tony, though Tony might not know him. After all, he had been director of CTU but didn't particularly know many of the people in Jack's department. "Thanks, Lee. Do you remember Tony Almeida?" Jack replied, confirming Tony's suspicions.
He placed an emotionless mask on his face just in time for the harsh comments. "Yeah, I don't know what he's doing here though." That was a question Tony had wanted to ask himself. With all this trained CTU back up team, what was the point of having him there?
"I want him here." Jack said, short and to the point, as per usual.
"He's not authorized to be in the field." Tony was starting to dislike the man, but refused to let it show in the face that this Lee guy scrutinized.
Jack backed him up with solidity that Tony found somewhat comforting. "I'm going through that door first. I want him there to back me up."
Lee knew when to drop it. "Fine," he said, clearly annoyed, "Get me another vest!" He called out to some of his fellow agents. Tony pulled on the supplied bulletproof vest as Jack and Lee talked.
"You got a visual on the suspects?" Jack asked.
"We've got a fiber-optic camera inside the room. According to the manager, we're grabbing a mid-40's female and a teenage male, possibly mother and son. Both Middle Eastern." He said, voice holding a hint of smugness.
Jack was all business, "Okay, we need the suspects alive. They're no good to us dead."
"I've been briefed." Tony disliked the man, though how much of that was his personality and how much because he had brought up sore points, he wasn't sure.
"Let's go."
An agent spoke up from the side of the room in front of a video screen. "Agent Castle, I have a visual on the woman." Tony walked over with Castle and Jack to see the image of the woman.
She was middle-eastern and lying on the bed, clutching her arm to her chest. Tony frowned, looking more closely at the sleeve of her shirt, which looked bloodstained. He winced in sympathetic pain.
"What about the kid?" He asked, remembering Castle's briefing.
The agent shrugged, "I haven't seen him yet."
Waiting wasn't Jack's strong suit, and especially not under so much pressure. "We have to go. Now."
They prepared to raid the room, Tony acting on automatic as he had earlier while saving Jack and Audrey. At least his body had not forgotten how to prep to enter a room with a hostile inside.
"Are you ready?" Jack asked quietly.
"Go." Tony replied.
They slammed open the door with guns brandished as Jack yelled, "Don't move!" and "Drop the weapon!" as the woman pulled out a gun as though to shoot herself.
Jack raced in and grabbed the woman's gun before she could shoot anyone and Castle was on her before Tony could blink. "Where is the override?" He pressed on the woman's wound, which was still bleeding. "Tell me who's got it. Tell me now."
Tony was in no way averse to torture. When you had worked at CTU alongside Jack Bauer as long as he had, it was hard to be. Sometimes, it was simply the only way of getting information in time to save the innocents. He was not about to sacrifice innocent lives so terrorists could keep a few rights. This, however, was inefficient and ridiculous.
Jack yelled, "Agent Castle!"
Tony echoed him, "Castle, stand down."
"Agent Castle!" Jack again.
"Please stand down!" Tony said again, uselessly. He gave it up as he said the words and went for a more efficient way. He grabbed Castle and pulled him off the woman who was gasping with pain. He slammed him up against the wall, dislike for the man showing when he neglected to soften the blow.
"We have to get her to talk!" Castle insisted, defensively.
Tony grimaced at the man. "She's going to go into shock before she dies. Calm down." Years of directing CTU made him recognize the unwilling, rebellious look on Castle's face and it made him no happier. So the man hated him for giving orders where they weren't wanted. Perfect.
"Agent Castle, step outside. Now! I want her prints and photograph sent over to CTU immediately." Tony appreciated Jack running interference, but was bitter that he had to. It wasn't his fault though and Jack had to have expected some resistance when he brought a convicted traitor to work in the field with him.
As Jack left the room, Tony looked after him uncomfortably then over at the woman in the bed. She looked terrified and pained. He couldn't exactly do anything for the former, but he spoke to her about the latter. "Come on, let me see your arm."
She hesitated before letting him see the arm. It didn't take long for Tony to know what he was seeing. Bullet holes weren't exactly unfamiliar wounds to him.
"Jack!" He yelled out, deciding that whatever Jack was telling Castle couldn't be that important.
"Yeah?" It obviously wasn't, seeing as Jack was back in the room in a moment.
"This is a bullet wound, probably a couple of hours old." He said, wondering what that meant even as he reported it.
3:30:13
Tony was a natural leader. He knew that, knew he worked best when he was heading things up. When he was under someone else's command, he had a tendency towards insubordination. It was one of the reasons he had disliked Ryan Chappelle so much. Well, that and he was just an ass.
So it made sense in that capacity that he seemed to take over the mission. Jack was communicating with CTU and Tony was overseeing a doctor's treatment of the woman. "I want you to give her something for the pain, but make sure she stays lucid, understand?"
The man nodded and Tony went over to check on Jack. "Did you find out who she is yet?" The question reminded him of a million others like it he had asked his analysts at CTU.
"Yeah. Her name is Dina Araz. She immigrated to the United States five years ago, became a citizen two years ago. Married to Navi Araz. He's also a nationalized citizen. Owns an electronics store in Carson. They have one son, Behrooz, 17. A junior at the local high school. None of them have criminal records." Tony fixed the information in his mind. You never knew when it might come in useful, especially if he continued helping Jack interrogate the woman.
"Did they pop up on any watch lists?" Tony asked. That might be helpful.
But Jack shook his head. "No. They must have slipped under the radar. Let's send some teams over to the house and see what we find."
Jack was slipping back into the CTU partnership with Tony as easily as Tony was based on the way he phrased things as questions or suggestions. He could almost fool himself into thinking that Michelle and Chase, their respective second in commands, were there.
At this point Jack's cell phone rang again. Jack answered it impatiently. "Yeah?"
"Hold on Erin, I can barely hear you." And he walked out of the room. Tony took their regained partnership as a sign that he could follow.
"Go ahead." Then a pause as he looked at Tony. "Erin, I'm going to put you on speakerphone. Hold on a second. You're on."
"This conversation happened an hour ago between mother and son." Driscoll's unfamiliar voice sounded tinny on the speakerphone, but he could hear both sides of the conversation now and was strangely touched by the show of trust.
The woman, Dina, and her son, Behrooz, came across loud and clear on the cell phone. Near the end, Jack and Tony's eyes met, both knowing that this was good. After he hung up, Jack said, unnecessarily, "We got our leverage."
Tony sighed mentally. He had been worried that they wouldn't be able to break her for a while, but with a weak link like a son she would do anything for … that was all Jack needed.
And indeed it was. Tony watched carefully, as Jack played their cards just right to get her to accept an immunity deal for her son.
3:45:32
The whir of the fax machine alerted Tony that they were about to get exactly what they wanted.
Jack half ran, half walked over to the fax and ripped the paper out of the holding tray. It was obvious enough that he was getting impatient. Only Tony was close enough to hear his whispered, "Thank god."
He thrust the form at Dina as though he could make her accept it faster through sheer will power. "This is a pardon for your son, signed by the president."
It only took her a moment to look over the paper before she replied, cold and clear. "This is acceptable."
Jack prompted her, "Where is he?" He was obviously irritated by the time this was taking. Thinking about it, so was Tony, but he was somehow more used to the wait. It came from what they were used to doing at CTU. Tony was more prone to sitting in the Situation Room or in the main floor, watching the progress of field team from computer screens. He knew what it was like to not be able to do anything.
Jack though, Jack was a field agent to the core. He hated the tense wait more than any field situation.
Tony tuned out his mental ramblings to hear her answer. "He's at Lindauer Memorial Hospital. It's not far."
Castle was apparently trying to redeem himself in Jack's eyes based on the way he snapped to action. "Set up a perimeter around Lindauer Memorial." He ordered his men, rather unnecessarily.
"I want you to call him." Jack instructed Dina, "Give me the phone, we have to record the call." He took her phone and plugged it up to a computer with as little fuss as possible before handing it back to her.
Their call was enough to reassure Tony that mother and son truly cared about one another. Sure, the woman had probably been planning this for years, but he felt sorry for the son who had most likely been dragged into this with little to no explanation.
Then again, it was hard to be the son of two terrorists without having done some fairly serious crimes. His mother had wanted him to have a presidential pardon at least, though whether that was just for consorting with terrorists or for some other crime, they hadn't been told.
Jack and Dina managed to work out that he would wait for Jack and the team in the emergency room, as crowded as they could get it. As they hung up, Tony alerted team and Jack, "We're transferring the suspect. They want him sent over to protective court right away."
"Copy that," Castle replied. Evidently, Jack had said something that helped ease Castle's hostility towards him.
"Let's go." Jack ordered. Tony felt a little like he was taking another step down the road back to that old life. Oh well, too late to turn back now and he had known that all along. It was always too late to turn back.
3:54:12
The drive had been incredibly awkward. Even more so than his drive with Jack to the heliport while chasing Powell. The silence had been blended with tension and pressurized by dislike between the occupants of the car.
And driving up to find police vehicles surrounding the hospital was not the sight they had particularly wanted to see. Jack was the first to say something about it. "Tony, did you notify security?" It was posed to try to avoid sounding accusatory, but it sounded so anyway.
"No." Tony replied, just as confused and worried about the sudden security presence as the others were.
"Something is wrong." Dina said, radiating fear. Tony, Jack, and Castle disregarded her.
Jack turned to Castle to give him instructions. "Set up a level three security cordon around the hospital."
Castle acknowledged the request with a, "You got it." But Jack was already halfway out of the car.
"I'm going with you!" Dina demanded desperately, but all she got from Jack was an annoyed refusal as he jogged into the hospital.
Tony watched Jack go for a second before turning to Castle who was directing his men.
"Organize with the hospital as the center point, but put extra strength in the main exit and these other three ways out." He was directing them, referring to a map of the hospital on a laptop near him.
Tony's cell rang as Castle continued explaining how they would set up the perimeter. "Hold on a second," he excused himself.
"All right." Castle replied, not sounding particularly bothered to be rid of him. "Have your men on both sides …" he continued.
Tony turned away and was impressed with himself when he answered without saying his last name, especially after all this devolution back to his old life today.
"Yeah?"
"Tony, it's Jack." He sounded frantic, or as frantic as Jack Bauer can get. "Navi Araz is here. He's already killed his wife's brother." It only took Tony a second to identify the name as Dina's husband.
"What about the boy?" Tony asked, keeping his mind focused on the goal.
"I don't know. We're going to have to lock down all the exits. I think he's headed for the parking garage. I need you to meet me on the east side of the building with backup." Good thing Castle already had extra security on the exits. It shouldn't be hard to close them down.
"Copy that." He said and hung up before turning back to Castle and his men. "We're going to the east side of the building. We need back up teams there right away."
After distributing the orders, Tony rushed back over to the car Jack, Castle, and he had driven in. Dina still sat in the back seat, looked strained. "What's happening?" She asked, sounding desperately worried.
He didn't have time for this. He pushed down on the gas and sidestepped the question. "We're still looking for your son."
"There's more. Tell me!"
Tony got impatient with it all. "Mrs. Araz, we're going to find your son, all right?"
He didn't wait for her reassurance and instead pressed down harder on the gas.
The rest of the drive was full of a tense silence that Dina spent nearly in tears. Tony found himself immune to her pain, as he tended to become in high-pressure situations. The only person whose tears had always affected him was Michelle and … he stopped the train of thought by speeding up even more.
He grabbed his cell phone and took his eyes off of the road for a moment to tap in Jack's cell number.
"Jack, we're in the garage now." He said when Jack picked up, urgency in his voice.
"I'm almost there." Jack responded, sounding tense. "Can you get an ID?"
He glanced around and replied, "No, nothing yet."
It wasn't long after that that he heard the first gunshots. Driving towards them was second nature to someone who had worked at CTU for as long as he had. Besides, doubtlessly, Jack was there.
As he had guessed, Jack had his gun up and pointed at a man across the way. Tony memorized his features with a careful accuracy and then turned his attention to the boy he was holding hostage, presumably Behrooz.
"Tony, stop the car." Jack yelled out.
Tony obliged as Dina screamed to her son and he screamed back, confirming Tony's assumptions on who he was. Jack and Tony watched helplessly as Navi Araz took his son through a door that led down to the basement.
"Keep her in the car. Let's seal all the exits of the basement. He's got nowhere to go but down. Set up a link with CTU now!" After all the excitement, it took Tony a moment to remember that he wasn't actually working for CTU right now. It took him an even longer moment to remember that he had been arrested for treason. It felt like a release to forget those things that had been so central in his mind for so long.
"Copy that." He said to Jack before speaking into his headset. "Call CTU. We need back up here." Then he turned to Dina, who seemed to be in a state of panic. "Mrs. Araz, calm down. We'll get your son. Calm down."
The link to CTU took little to no time to set up and soon Jack was talking to Erin Driscoll again.
"We've got all the entrances and exits covered. He's trapped down there." Jack stated.
Tony shrugged, putting forward an idea. "Let's try to open up a negotiation."
It sounded reasonable to him, but Dina scoffed at the very idea. "My husband won't negotiate."
She sounded calmly, eerily certain, as though she had just accepted that she and her son might die, and that it was a very likely possibility. However, it had to be better than the desperate, shrieking creature she had been earlier when she saw her son.
"Why is that?" Tony asked cautiously.
"He doesn't need to." She said, in that same strained and serene voice. "He has to assume I have agreed to help you in return for my son's safety."
Tony connected the dots and realized what Dina already knew. Navi knew that he had the chief bargaining chip. Dina was their only lead and she would only respond when she had her son back. He felt like cursing.
"Well, he won't stay down there with him forever." They could wait him out, couldn't they? Of course he had forgotten the pressing time that was ticking away before their very eyes as every minute passed without locating the override.
"He won't. In two hours, all the reactors will have gone critical. After that, it won't matter what I tell you, and he can kill my son. I am only helping you to save his life. I believe in our cause, and if you can't save my son, I am happy to see the reactors melt down." Tony recoiled at her harsh voice and met Jack's eyes, revolted and annoyed at the classic terrorist fanaticism.
"Did you get that?" Jack asked Driscoll, keeping his eyes fixed on Dina with a disgustedly frustrated look.
4:00:00
A/N:Hope you liked it, even though writing all this without Michelle is driving me nuts. Ah well, there are quite a few fun scenes in there anyway! But don't listen to me, give me your own feedback! Thanks for reading and the next chapter will be up very shortly.