Time to post, if you're ready!
Sorry for the slight delay but honestly, out of respect for my 3 faithful readers who are so kind to share their feedback with me I prefer to wait for them to be caught up. Of course, no rush needed but things will start getting even more complicated and I'd rather make sure no chapters are missed.
Eteri: Gillian is far too strong and smart to let the past get to her, and she had Cal on her side too. I guess in a way Cal is also on board with no talking about it the guilt is killing him.
Now: if Ward is dead, who is coming after them? Time to find out…
They stayed on the couch for a couple of hours, not talking much and trying to finish some of the food. Ideally they should have tried to get some shut eye time and rest, but sleep seemed out of the question. They were already wobbling through a waking nightmare, the last thing they needed was more of that haunting their dreams.
After a couple of hours, just about when Gillian's head was losing the battle with gravity and she looked like she was seconds away from falling asleep, the phone in Cal's pocket buzzed. He'd rather ignore it, at least a little longer, because he had been somewhat looking forward to seeing her relaxed enough to fall asleep next to him and she was so close to leaning on him. But the phone kept vibrating in his pocket and Cal knew eventually she'd heard it, so he sighed and carefully snuck his hand to retrieve it.
"Sorry love," he smirked when the movement woke her up.
"It's ok." Gillian pulled up straight, only then realising she had nearly fallen asleep in his lap, then jumped to a different topic glancing at the phone now in his hand. "Who is it?"
"Loker, from the lab," he answered, then shrugged when she seemed to question why the young man would be using the phone to communicate with them from literally next door. "Beats me." He sighed, then read the texts. "Reynolds is back, looks like he's got something."
It was easy to see why people like them didn't like text messages. There was no microexpression to see and identify, and even language analysis could only take one so far when all they had to work with were three words a piece. Still, neither of them was really expecting good news.
Gillian stood up and Cal wobbled on his feet right behind her, swallowing one of painkillers the doctor had given him at the hospital. The concern in her eyes was immediate and sincere, but he brushed it off and explained that after having not moved for a while his sore body needed a little pick me up. Then they went through the door connecting her office with the lab, where Reynolds and Loker were sitting side by side, deeply absorbed in watching something on one of the monitors.
"You guys ok?" The agent asked.
"Peachy!" Cal gruffly replied, but Gillian rolled her eyes and decided to provide some more details.
"Yes, thank you Ben. We had something to eat, and managed to get some rest."
"Good, that's good."
Cal and Gillian looked at each other, immediately picking up on the weird atmosphere in the room and the strange behaviour from Reynolds and Loker. They still couldn't see what the two were looking at on the screen, but clearly it was something of great importance and hardly of positive impact on their whole situation.
"Go on then," Cal eventually called them out. "What is it?"
"Well, the good news is that Ward is definitely dead and buried-"
"Cremated." Cal interjected, speaking in between his teeth. "Nobody felt like wasting a coffin on the bastard."
"Ok," Loker muttered with a slightly concerned expression, understanding where Lightman was coming from but still a bit uncomfortable with that level of crass. "Either way, whoever attacked you two at your place and the hospital is not Ward."
"So what's the bad news then?"
Loker and Reynolds exchanged a look, the look of two people who have had a long discussion about something, failed to come to an agreement and were now faced with the prospect of spilling the guts on something they'd rather not share. Opposite them, standing in the place they owned and feeling like unwanted guests, Cal and Gillian also glanced at each other, wondering if they looked that annoying too when they did the same to others.
Eventually, Reynolds sighed and motioned Loker to go on. The young man turned around on his chair and pushed some keys here and there until the face of Lucas Ward came up on the screen. Feeling as a bit of an intruder but unable to stop, Reynolds kept his eyes on the duo to gauge their reaction to the image. Somewhat predictably, Gillian clenched at the sight but recovered remarkably quickly; on the other hand, far more surprisingly, Cal was the one who had to look away after only a few seconds and try to hide his internal turmoil.
"That's Ward," Reynolds clarified, then nodded at Loker and he pulled up a second image. "And that's his brother."
He should have said twin, it would have been more accurate, but also useless. The second picture, clearly a prison mugshot, was nearly identical to the first if not for the haircut, neat and official on Ward, messed up and dirty on the second man. It was disturbing enough to see him once, but two times was definitely one too many. Still, even with everything that those two men had done to them, Gillian felt somehow drawn to the second image and found the strength to step closer, staring down the second image with some kind of indescribable concentration and interest.
"Are you sure?"
Cal's voice as he spoke was the opposite of her reaction, he struggled to get words out and did not like one bit the prospect Reynolds was presenting to them.
"Yeah." By the sound of it, the agent was less than happy to provide that confirmation. "That badge that Foster found at your place, we ran it for prints and DNA. I didn't expect to find anything besides Merton's and maybe Ward, which is what happened, but our DNA database flagged a partial match with a Leopold Warton."
Loker typed away again, isolating the mugshot on one screen and bringing up a file on one of the others. Foster was still staring at the image but Cal went for the file, knowing it would contain information he needed to know, although he probably didn't want to.
"Warton and Ward are twins…well, they were," Loker tried to explain, only then putting on the table a thick folder. "Their parents died in a car crash when they were three years old. There were no other relatives to look after them so they were placed in a foster home. They were together at first, but when they were nearly five they were separated and adopted by different families."
Gillian scoffed, an audible grunt so uncharacteristic of her that the three men glanced at her in honest surprise. Cal's reaction was the shortest lasting one, due to his better knowledge of her. Gillian knew the system, she had dealt with it enough as a child psychologist and had felt the brunt of it on a personal level, and sadly she couldn't be surprised that someone had made the big mistake of separating siblings.
"We know what happened to Ward," Cal carried on then, still keeping a watchful eye on her. "How did Warton end up in jail?"
"He's got a rap sheet a mile long," Reynolds explained while opening the folder. "He got his start in juvie, those records are sealed but I managed to take a look at it. Petty theft, burglaries and break ins, arson-"
"Any episode of violence on animals?"
It was Gillian who asked, pitching in vocally for the first time. There was a round of knowing looks going around the room when Reynolds nodded, they've all had enough training, one way or the other, to recognise the marks of dangerous developments in the crimes of the young Leopold.
"He graduated to major stuff quickly enough," the agent went on. "He's been in jail for grand theft auto, robberies turned violent and bar fights, not to mention a lot of stuff he wasn't convicted of. He's been in and out for years, somehow he's avoided long convictions but-"
"He's been institutionalised."
Once again it was Gillian who interrupted him, seemingly talking more to herself than to them. She was still mostly looking at Warton's picture, but then she went to Reynolds to get the file from him. Cal looked at the agent, waiting for his nod to confirm she was right, which inevitably arrived, then he brought his attention back to Gillian as she flipped through the content of the folder, likely looking for some psych evaluation or report. That was her field much more than his, but he had a fairly good idea of what she was going to find.
"He's a psychopath," Foster stated after a while. "The notes here say that he never showed any remorse for his crimes or his victims, the violence of his action was often over the top and gratuitous."
"You said Ward was a bad guy too."
"No, it was different." Gillian steadily replied to Loker, vehemently shaking her head. "Ward was corrupt and violent but way too organised and careful to be a psychopath. The use of violence for him was functional, a means to get what he wanted and not the expression of uncontrolled impulses. He didn't necessarily take pleasure in what he did, and even though he chose to do bad things he knew the difference between right or wrong." Reynolds couldn't help but glance at Lightman, who looked like he was about to explode. "Everything in here indicates that Warton enjoys exercising control."
"He's toying with us," Cal said then, not sure he was all that happy when Gillian nodded at him in agreement. "He could have killed me at my place, he could have killed Foster." He had to fight back a wave of nausea and panic at the very thought. "He left that badge behind, he taunted Gillian at the hospital. He wanted us to think it was Ward, he knew it would affect us and confuse us." Cal sat down, staring at the mugshot occupying the screen. "Ward was a violent bastard and a sneaky son of a bitch but Warton is far more dangerous."
"Great!" Loker moaned. "Crazy guy is out for blood."
"I reckon that's the bad news part," Cal huffed, then he looked over at Reynolds. "I guess we don't know where he is now?"
The agent shook his head, watching Cal keeping his eyes on Foster as she got hold of a chair and carefully sat down too. She had been through a lot of different emotions in the past minutes, from the surprise in finding out about Ward's long lost twin to the morbid curiosity about him, ending on the uncomfortable notion that a vindictive psychopath was on their tail, yet she looked remarkably composed. Much like Cal, he admired that quality in Foster, but unlike Cal he sometimes wished she would just let the bad things get to her and accept she had to fight back instead of burying everything within.
"No, not yet. He's out of prison on parole but I am trying to understand how and get a better timeline." He responded to Lightman in the end, knowing if he'd stared at Foster long enough she would have been uncomfortable and Cal would have acted on it. "He's been in jail for the past 12 years, on manslaughter charges after he killed a man in a bar fight."
"Twelve years?" Gillian asked, and the agent nodded. "So he was in prison when Ward died?"
"That's what it looks like, but I want to double check first. Information on Warton is a little…murky."
"What do you mean?" Gillian insisted.
"He was supposed to serve a minimum of 15. Somehow he got paroled, hardly for good behaviour considering his record, but I am still trying to figure out when and how."
A long and thoughtful silence followed Reynolds' words, as they all scrambled to find a possible explanation and meaning for the implications of what he had just said. To have three years shaved off a sentence wasn't that unusual, but in legal terms 'a minimum of' usually meant not less than that. Was Reynolds suggesting someone had pushed for Warton to be released early? If so, who could have that kind of influence and why used it on him?
"If it's Warton coming after you," Reynolds pondered out loud after a while, mostly to move everybody's thoughts away from dangerous conjectures, "that would explain a lot. Who you saw," he looked at Cal, then over at Foster, "and the voice you recognised."
They both nodded, although something in the picture the agent was painting didn't sit well with Cal.
"It would also give us a motive," Loker stepped in. "Warton is looking for revenge for his brother's death."
Again, Cal had that feeling that something in the seemingly reasonable suggestion didn't follow logic entirely. Then he looked at Gillian, their eyes silently calling and answering each other, as if they were the only two people in the room, and he was equally comforted and disheartened when he realised she was feeling the same way.
"I can get you somewhere safe," Reynolds said after a while. "We have a name I can actually share with authorities now, not a ghost but a real person. I can make some calls, arrange for a safe house, but it might take some time."
"Here is safe enough," For now, Cal nearly added in his head, but managed to hold back the second part. "We can lock doors and keep an eye on entries with the cameras."
"This guy is not your run of the mill crook, Lightman," Reynolds pointed out, and the scientist had to nod in agreement.
"Yes, but this is a fairly secure facility and we both know you've been working this thing under the table so far, otherwise this place would have been stormed by flashy FBI jackets by now." Reynolds bit at his bottom lip, knowing he had no answer to that. "As much as we know the threat is real and where it's coming from we can't prove much of it, not yet."
"So what are we going to do?"
Gillian and Cal looked at each other after Loker asked, hearing the fatigue and confusion in his voice.
"We are going to stay here, wait for Ben to see how many more favours he can call in to find out more about Warton and his connection with his brother over the years."
"And you should go home, Eli," Gillian continued when Cal stopped. "Try to get some sleep. It'll do you some good."
Loker was about to ask if she thought that was safe, but wisely decided against it. The uncomfortable truth was that he was not a target for Warton, unless of course he decided to stay close to them and potentially step in the line of fire. Still, he didn't like the idea of leaving them on their own but when he looked around the room, his eyes jumping from Foster to Reynolds and Lightman, they all seemed to give him the same green light to be selfish and look after himself.
Eventually, still a bit reluctant, he nodded and stood up, making sure they knew they should call him anytime if needed before leaving the room. Once he had gone, Cal stood up and walked over to Gillian to get the file from her hands, determined to fight back pain, fatigue and personal demons in order to get through it for a thorough reading.
"It can't be that simple," Cal muttered then, shaking his head slightly. "I know it makes sense, if we think Warton is out for revenge but-"
"But why now? And how did he know about us?" Gillian finished for him in one of their frequent displays of shared minds that made people around them equally uncomfortable and impressed. "We're not that hard to find but how would he know what happened back then."
Standing next to her, Cal gently rested his hand on her back and tried to comfort her, something that was becoming increasingly difficult to do because he too felt less and less confident as things moved on. She looked up at him and shook her head no once, to let him know she was ok and didn't need any particular attention for the time being, but also smiled quickly at him to tell him she appreciated the thought.
"There's a lot we don't know yet, I agree," Reynolds said then, trying not to pay too much attention to their silent interaction. "But now I know where to look, and I have a couple of people in mind. From what we found so far it's hard to tell if and how much Ward and Warton had stayed in touch throughout the years but there must be more there."
"You think you can find out more?"
"I can try." The agent huffed and stood up, him too starting to feel the fatigue of the long day. "I know it's not ideal but let me look into Warton more. It's fair to say someone worked to let him out early, that must have left a paper trail. Any chance what happened to his brother was made public in any way?"
"No, not really," Gillian answered him. "Ward was already under investigation and after he died the NSA and the Pentagon had no interest in making a spectacle of it."
"The official story was that he had died during a security operation," Cal scoffed, disgusted by the memory and shaking his head. "At least they had the decency not to give him a posthumous medal or something."
"Alright, you guys lock up in here and stay put. You have a gun, right?"
"Plenty!" Cal remarked, yet feeling not at all enthusiastic about the idea.
"Secure all entries after I leave, and try to stay in the same room. Somewhere where you can keep an eye on the cameras." Gillian nodded and stood up, along with Cal escorting the agent to the exit. "I'll be back as soon as possible, but you call me if you can think of anything."
"Yes Dad!" Cal quipped, earning himself a strong look from the agent and a gentle but firm elbow in the ribs by Foster. "C'mon now love, just trying to liven up things here."
Gillian didn't even dignify him with a response, instead briefly spoke with Reynolds to arrange a few more details before he left. Then she turned around and looked at Cal, who had walked over to the reception desk for a bit of support as he took down another pill. He smirked at her, trying to be reassuring but knowing he was failing miserably at it, then she came closer and brushed some hair off of his forehead.
"I think you could use another round of medication," she stated, not liking the fact that he seemed too weak to protest. "C'mon Cal, let me see what I can do."
"You do know you are not that kind of doctor, right love?"
He moaned playfully, but not with enough energy to make her chuckle. Gillian ignored his lame attempt and stared him down, then gently wrapped her arm around his waist and supported him on the way to his office. She had done it before throughout the day, and the difference in the way his body heavily leaned on her was striking. He was hurt, he was tired and, like her, scared way beyond what he'd cared to admit. A clean bandage and new plasters were hardly going to help, but it was all she could do for him for the time being as they settled in for a very strange night.
Not very original perhaps...