05.07 - Home Run
When one of Toronto's most wanted is caught on camera, Gail has a welcome distraction from the hell that is her 'simple' drug case.
Warning: Child abuse is talked about, but does not occur, in this chapter. The after affects however may be uncomfortable for some readers.
"How dangerous is this?"
For the first time since Vivian had known him, Marcel looked and sounded scared. Traci didn't look very scared. Chloe sure did, as did Frankie.
Gail... Gail looked different. Cold. It was hard to place where Vivian had seen the expression before, but when Gail shook her head, just a little bit, it clicked. Gail looked like Elaine did on that weird interview. In all likelihood, Gail had never seen the video of her own mother talking about how she felt to have learned of her daughter's kidnapping.
The video was from when Elaine and Bill had stepped through security to claim their baggage. Vivian had it memorized. Elaine was staring at her phone, her mien serious and distracted, while Bill listened to his own. Texts and voicemails no doubt. Then they heard their names called and Elaine looked up. With only a nod to Bill, she stepped up, gave everyone a fake smile, and said they'd just arrived, but were headed straight home to see their daughter. They would talk to the press later.
Then someone asked that question. "How did it feel, Superintendent, to learn of your daughter's kidnapping while you were thousands of kilometres away?"
Elaine had paused. "I've sat with hundreds of parents, telling them their child was dead. Missing. Arrested. I can't count the times I've comforted others. I know now how futile and helpless those words are. Now, excuse us. We'd like to see our daughter."
That was it. That was all Elaine said. But in that moment, the pause before she spoke, Elaine wore the same face Gail did now. Anguish and fear.
"We back off. Wait. Let it ride out a little."
The others exploded. Back off? But they were close now! They had to be. Gail was firm however. Let it cool. Keep watching, keep investigating quietly, but let it simmer. The crime would out itself, she insisted.
Vivian, wisely, said nothing about it. She nodded, asked what she could do, being the odd one out in the mix, and took her marching orders home.
Well. Not home. Something in Gail's about face bothered her greatly. Vivian couldn't quite put a finger on it, and she wasn't sure how to broach the subject with her mother. But Gail knew something more and was reluctant to tell.
After Vivian was dismissed, and listened to Traci grumble as they went down the stairs, she found herself at a loss. The court had pushed back the date for her deposition again, probably due to the fact that the clown was guilty. By which she meant the literal clown. And really Vivian cared more about getting to the bottom of whatever was bugging Gail.
But there was only one person who could help her understand that. One person who knew Gail and policing well enough to read the situation and explain it.
She knocked on the door and was surprised when Elaine's caretaker opened. "Vivian. Hello."
"Hi, Diane." Vivian smiled and held up a bag. "I bring lunch."
Diane looked worried and pulled out her phone. "Elaine didn't tell me—"
"Oh no! No, this is impromptu. Sorry, she didn't forget." Vivian felt sheepish. "I'm sorry, I just had a short day. Court got canceled."
From the back, Elaine called out. "Diane, dear, who is it?"
"It's your granddaughter."
"Which one?" And Elaine laughed just like Gail did. That sarcastic, biting laugh that cut and soothed all in one. "Did I forget a lunch?"
Vivian chuckled. "Hi, Elaine. Surprise schwarma?"
"Oh! This is why you're my favourite! Come in, please, I need someone talented to kick my ass at chess."
Diane rolled her eyes. "She's such a brat."
"We did warn you." Vivian hung up her coat and split out the lunches, having not forgotten that Diane loved the beef and lamb combo, before coming into the living room. "Hi, Elaine." She leaned down to give her grandmother a kiss on the cheek.
Elaine looked good. Actually great. The medication had done more than stem the tide of the degenerative disorder, it had breathed new life into Elaine. She smiled more, laughed more, and apparently went running. On a treadmill.
As they ate lunch, Elaine told her about the gym she'd started going to, and how they offered her a discount on a yearly membership. "I leaned on the counter and told the young lady that, at my age, month to month is more fiscally prudent."
Vivian burst out with a laugh. "God, I can totally see Mom saying that in a few years."
Elaine flashed a smile. "Well. That's my girl."
"You're all such a pain in the ass," teased Vivian. "How's Gordo? I haven't seen him around much."
"Fine. He's in DC for some conference of docents at the Smithsonian." They chatted around that for a little while and, as Vivian cleared plates, Elaine's gaze grew sharp. "Diane, do we have any of that espresso?"
"Uh, no. We're out."
Elaine sucked in a breath. "I hate to be a pest but..."
Diane chuckled. "Vivian, do you mind sticking around? It'll be about an hour..."
An hour. Elaine was no dummy, realized Vivian, for perhaps the millionth time. She knew Vivian was there for a reason and was buying her a private audience. "Oh, take your break too, Diane. Vivian can baby sit me."
"Are you sure?" Diane hesitated as she got up.
"Oh sure," said Vivian, grinning. "I really have a whole free afternoon. You can ride on a motorcycle, right, Elaine?"
As Elaine perked up, Diane scowled. "No. Motorcycle. Take a ride." She pulled on her coat. "Honestly, you're all a pack of wolves." Both Vivian and Elaine howled as Diane laughed and left.
The second the door closed, however, Elaine shifted from congenial grandmother into sharp Superintendent Peck. "Alright. We have at least two and half hours, Vivian. What's going on?"
God. It was a relief. While Vivian did love her weird, black humored grandmother, she adored the woman Gail referred to as Herr Peck. The woman who understood the evil in the world and how to face it head on. She was one of Vivian's idols.
"I'm working on a case." She paused. "The Crave?"
Elaine frowned. "The drug case? Why did Gail bring you in on that?"
"Well... the New Years Murders. The suspect was wearing a tracking anklet."
"Ahhh, did you find out how they jimmied it?" When Vivian blushed, Elaine beamed. "That's my granddaughter." She leaned over and patted Vivian's knee. "So what's gone sour?"
"Mom..." Vivian took a deep breath. "Mom got scared. She told us all to back off and wait."
Elaine seemed to recognize the significance in the words and sucked in a breath. "Gail asked you to back off?"
Vivian nodded. "In those words. Back off, let it ride. Wait."
"That's interesting," said Elaine, in a tone that implied deep concern. "What happened?" When Vivian hesitated, Elaine smiled. "I am aware that Sgt— Inspectors Anderson and Price are assisting in this endeavour, dear."
"It's hard," Vivian whinged. "I'm never sure how far I can go."
"Well. Should I call Gail to ask—"
"No!" The speed of Vivian's reply startled Elaine. "Sorry. Mom doesn't know I'm here."
Both of Elaine's eyebrows popped up. "Really."
Slumping in the couch, Vivian tried to think through her explanation. "Mom... Mom isn't IA, Elaine. She's a detective. And she's a damn awesome one. Her closure rate is insane! It's better than yours! But she thinks like a detective. And ... so does Traci and Chloe and Frankie and ..." Fuck. Was she allowed to mention him?
"Monsieur Savard?"
"Yes." Vivian exhaled. Thank god. "They're detectives. They're great, but they don't think like IA."
"No, they don't," agreed Elaine. "I thought Cappelletti was working that angle."
"He is, but he's only got the cop side. They questioned Sgt. Lester about it."
Elaine shook her head. "Him I don't know."
"Road sergeant at Thirty-Four."
"Probably feeding to that homophobic asshat, Galbraith," muttered Elaine. "Did they let him go?"
"Yeah. Censured and warned for not keeping good evidence track. Then Cappelletti screamed at Frankie, said it was her fault for calling in IA for evidence oversight and then he yelled at Gail because she pushed for Frankie." Vivian paused. "I mean, it was a ... um. They played it up." Elaine nodded, following along. "But that was two weeks ago."
"And Gail just said, today, to back off?" Elaine's voice was calculating and thoughtful.
"Yeah- yes."
"And you don't know why, but you think Gail's afraid?"
"Yes."
Elaine leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. "Obviously something happened. Something they didn't tell you. Alright. Think sideways. What scares Gail?"
"Me or Mom getting hurt," said Vivian, without thinking.
"I'd counter or me and Steve," Elaine said, acerbically.
Vivian flushed. "Family getting hurt."
Her grandmother pursed her lips. "Thank you. Well. I know Steve and Holly are fine. You're fine, as is your young firebrand. I'm doing well. Is everything alright with Inspector Price and her family?"
She took the question seriously. "Uh, well she and Dov finalized the divorce papers. Chris is in college. Has a girlfriend still."
"Later I'm going to ask you explain if a non-binary person dates someone of their same ... ah ... birth gender is in a homosexual relationship or not."
Wearily, Vivian replied, "Honestly, I just call it queer."
Her grandmother smirked just like Gail. Or Gail like her. "Is Anderson seeing anyone?"
"She was—" Vivian stopped and felt her blood chill. Oh fuck.
"Vivian, dear, please remember to breathe," said Elaine calmly. "With me, please. In and out."
Vivian synced her breathing with Elaine's, which did help to calm her. "Frankie was dating an EMT, Mac, for a couple years. But, uh, Mac dumped her when Frankie took the promotion."
Elaine gave Vivian a slightly quizzical expression. "And?"
"And Mac got punched out. Two weeks ago."
The aged matron of Peck studied her face silently. "Vivian. Was an arrest made today in that incident?" Dumbly, Vivian nodded. That had been all over the station. Jenny had hauled in the woman. "Someone is going after the loved ones," said Elaine quietly.
And Gail... Gail was afraid for her family.
"I think the kid knows," said Gail quietly.
"That we have sex? Certainly." Holly didn't open her eyes. She wanted Gail to be quiet for a bit longer, to let them revel in the lingering sensations of the physical.
It had been a very physical night. Holly had gone to her beginner yoga class with Rachel, while Gail and Lisa had gone into the hot yoga class. When Gail had first mentioned to Holly that she did yoga, they'd been friends and nothing more. Holly had been surprised and commented that the physical benefits of yoga were questionable at best. Because having hundreds of people do the exact same exercises, regardless of bodily differences, was dangerous.
Gail had told her she knew all that and went to an instructor who had small classes and gave individual attention to his students. Everyone did what they could. Holly had been skeptical until she'd found out about Gail's PTSD. Then it suddenly made sense. Studies had shown that combining the physical with the mental helped heal survivors of physical trauma. She may not have known for months what had happened to the other woman, but even Holly could see it left physical scars.
Still, Holly scoffed at the idea of yoga. She was fit, athletic, and in good shape. She didn't need the meditation that Gail did, and had never really suffered sustained trauma. Thank god. She was a perfectly normal, genius lesbian. Hell, their kid didn't do yoga either.
And then fifty happened. Holly slipped a disc in her back by opening a fucking car door. Her lower lumbar started tweaking. A nerve in her neck got pinched and one afternoon, turning her head too quickly to laugh at one of Gail's jokes, the stab of pain shooting down her spine from that sent her to her knees.
Old age sucked.
Her doctor suggested chiropractic therapy and, god help them, yoga. Just the basic stuff to help her stretch and keep her muscles moving. Physical therapy first, to master the motions needed to strengthen the muscles and prevent a repeat, but yes. Yoga.
A few years of doing yoga had moved it from an annoyance to something somewhat enjoyable. But now that Holly was comfortable with the process, Gail stopped going to the easier yoga classes. They weren't challenging enough for Gail to get her mind off things. For Holly, yoga was for her muscles only. For Gail, it was one of the only ways she could calm her mind and stop racing thoughts of inadequacy.
Something was going on in Gail's cases at the moment to heighten that old fear. She was worried and tense and the hot yoga usually was enough to quiet her thoughts. Not always though, and that night when they got home, before Holly could get in the shower, Gail propositioned her.
Very rarely did Holly say no to those requests. Especially now that her body was accustomed to the physical rigours of yoga, her energy level was usually high afterwards.
Now, though, now she was in that lovely post orgasmic lassitude state. Her limbs were pleasantly heavy, a little sore in some places. Deliciously sore. And Holly was draped over the bed diagonally, her head comfortable on her wife's stomach.
"That this is dangerous," said Gail.
Her chatty wife.
Ugh. Gail had too much on her mind.
"Sex isn't inherently dangerous," said Holly, trying to get Gail's mind off whatever was stuck.
"Holly." Gail whinged. She actually whinged.
So much for post coital bliss. Holly sighed and rolled over, stretching over the majority of the bed. "How dangerous is it?"
Gail shifted and rolled to her side, facing Holly. "They're going after family."
"So?" Holly frowned and let her head loll to the side, to better look at Gail. "That's normal, isn't it? You do it."
"Live-ins. Wives, husbands, girlfriends, boyfriends you live with." Gail reached over to caress Holly's cheek with the back of her fingers. "We pressure. Yes." She looked and sounded a little ashamed.
Holly understood that. Gail hated parts of her job. She loved lying to criminals. She absolutely adored flaunting her genius over them. Gail loved kicking losers in the ass. As a patrol office she'd been amazing. As a detective she was incredible. As head of OC and Major Crimes, Gail's abilities were mind blowing. To Holly at least.
But yes, Gail felt sick when she had to do the darker parts of her job.
"Honey," she said softly. "It's not like you're doing that."
"But I am," whispered Gail, her voice small. "They're cops. That's me. And someone punched out Mac because she and Frankie were dating."
From that short a distance, Holly didn't need her glasses to gaze into Gail's eyes. The stormy blue was wet. Oh. Her poor, sensitive, cop. Holly reached over and wiped the tear trickling down Gail's face. "Honey." She scooted closer to kiss her wife's cheek, where the tear trailed.
How many times had Holly watched Gail cut her own heart out for the police? She loved the blue and the badge. It was Gail's raison d'être. Gail was always meant to be this, this woman who ran out into the world and protect it from itself. Who fought and saved and shielded. A woman who saw the need for greater things.
Oh, Gail was human. She was petty and vindictive and mean. She had a dark humour and a wicked way with words. Gail was evil in her own way. Childish. But she was also, at her most base level, a good person. From birth on, she'd been taught to sacrifice, and that was the only world Gail knew.
That alone would have been enough for Holly to love the woman. That selfless part of Gail's nature drew Holly to her side. Of course she was bitter and cold. Gail saw the horrors of the world and yet she went back out there, over and over. And when the people who should have been with her, on her side, defending others, was the source of the horrors...
How that hurt her wife.
Right now, Gail was in agony for a case that had her people, her cops, betraying the people they were sworn to protect. She'd been unable to stop Mac from getting hurt. She'd been unable to shield their daughter from the truth of how horrible their fellow officers were.
And the worst part of it all was Gail had to go on putting people in danger, in harms way, until she'd caught the ringleaders. She had to watch people get hurt. People she liked, people she trained and people she loved.
Holly couldn't help that. She'd done her part and had to stay the hell out of the way and trust Gail. Which she did. When Holly said she trusted Gail with her life, she was literal about it.
Now and here, all she could do was comfort her wife a little. She kissed Gail again and pulled her close, wrapping her arms around the pale form, holding her. While Gail cried, silently as she so often did, Holly held her and said little. What could she say? She could lie and promise things would be better, but she didn't know. They didn't know. They couldn't know.
So she just held on.
"I'm here," said Holly softly, the words less than a whisper. "I'm here."
She needed a distraction.
Gail pulled up a list of open cases, as of yet unassigned, like she did every morning. She skimmed the list, picking out a few and handing them off until she was left with the most serious ones. Those she read carefully. In the reading, Gail determined who would be best to solve each case quickly, who would do it best, and who would learn the most. Then, finally, she assigned the cases in a way that would benefit the city as well as her team.
The problem was that didn't take any Gail brain power anymore. She'd been doing the job for far too long now to have the assignments be challenging at all. It was simple. It was boring.
Sighing, she sent off the assignments and went out to get another cup of coffee. The room was quiet. Most of the time things were quiet. While they handled major cases, the definition of major was pretty subjective. A b&e here, a theft over or under there, and then once in a while a celebrity robbery or a high profile murder. But generally no, it was a quiet and predictable job.
Gail sniffed the coffee and, finding it a bit stale, emptied it out and took the time to brew something fresh. It was a brief distraction. Again. She really wanted, needed, something big.
"Boss?"
The tremulous voice of one of her more mediocre detectives quavered through the air. Leon Cutler. She had inherited him, a detective Butler had picked before he left, someone supposedly with great prospects. He had not grown into them. In fact, Leon had been little more than a disappointing average his entire career. But. With recruitment as low as it was, and a lack of viable rookies to take the spot, Gail had left him there.
After all, someone had to handle theft-unders and the mountain of mediocre mishaps that fell under Major Crimes.
"Yes, Leon?" She arched her eyebrows and sipped the coffee.
"I have something weird."
There was a strange silence that filtered the floor. Everyone looked over. Leon, unimaginative and boring Leon, never said anything was weird.
"Oh?"
He nodded and held out his tablet. "This ... I have a theft under at the Mac's? The guy who shot the sign?"
Gail nodded. Some moron had robbed a Mac's Convenience store and, in trying to shoot the camera, shot out the sign which alerted a cop on the street to the situation. They had him arrested but there was a possibility he was tied to more crime. "Sure," said Gail, knowing all too well that Leon would just wait.
Leon hesitated and tapped play on his tablet. "Here's the video. Watch- would you watch the fellow by the pastries?"
That was the weirdest request ever, so naturally Gail took the tablet and watched. She spotted the pastries right away, their glorious sugary goodness calling to her even on the small video. Holly gave her a disappointed look every time she picked them up at the store. By the time Vivian had come around, Gail stoped even trying to buy them.
She watched the snacks and saw a man cross past them, wearing an unbranded ball cap, his head down. Possibly him. She frowned. The gait was masculine, by which her brain decided the angle of legs and hips were male. The little Holly that lived in her head, however, pointed out that while t-injections didn't change bone structure, they did impact muscle development. Which changed how a person walked.
Fine, shut up inner Holly. Presumably male, unknown subject.
And hadn't she thought that about another criminal before? Wait... Gail hit pause.
"But—"
"Leon, hush." She closed her eyes and ran through rap sheets. It had been a small jacket, something she'd read recently. Gail frowned and tried to visualize every single photo she'd looked at in the last month. At one point in her life, she'd been phenomenal at that work.
Nope. It wasn't working at the moment, damn it all. She sighed and opened her eyes, tapping the play button. The unsub in the screen turned, picking up Hostess cupcakes (really? Hostess?) and put it in their basket. There was a tattoo on the back of the hand.
She knew the tattoo. That wasn't a gang tattoo, that was a unique, personal, tattoo.
"Huh," she whispered. That tattoo wasn't just on an unsub or some random criminal she'd glanced at. It was something else. Something bigger. Something she actively strived to memorize. Not the photo. No, she'd read a description of the tattoo and it's location, but she didn't have a photo of it.
"Uh. Yeah, just wait." Leon pointed at the screen.
Gail squinted a little, as if that would help her concentrate. Elaine would scowl. Bill would have growled about ruining her view for the shot. Shut up, ghost of Bill. On the video, there was no sound, but suddenly the unsub flinched and his (aha! It was a he!) eyes snapped towards the counter.
His face was clear on the video.
Immediately, Gail placed the face, the tattoo, and the name.
"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph," said Gail. "That is Donald Stevens," she hissed.
The room had a pregnant pause. Then they erupted into clamour. Gail quickly threw the video on to the tv on the wall, replaying it for everyone. As the tape played, they fell silent yet again.
Because the most mediocre and average member of their team had spotted one of Toronto's most wanted, on camera, buying a goddamned mass produced cupcake.
Vivian eyed the screen cap. It was a blurry, grainy, zoom in photo of a cellphone with something on the screen. Half? Halp? Help? No. HA11 ... HA eleven? What the hell? She couldn't read the rest.
"Can I see the original video?"
"Nope," said Sgt. Smith.
She sighed. Of course. "How, exactly, is this ETF?"
"It's code."
In that moment, Vivian wished she wore glasses so she could remove them for dramatic effect. "That's not our job, Jules," she pointed out, slowly. "Crypto is over in anti-terrorism."
"And they kicked it to us because the code translates to a chemical formula."
"Ha isn't an element. The closest you get is the whole argument about 105 being named for Otto Hahn, hahnium."
Julius stared for a moment. "What was it named?"
"Dubnium. For Dubna, the anglicization of the city in Russian where it was discovered." She remembered Holly remarking, in her most disparaging tones, that Дубна́ was just too much for Harvard to swallow. "It's near Moscow."
"Your mind is a ... Is this why you won't play Trivial Pursuits with us?"
"That and pub games are dumb," admitted Vivian. She'd been playing them, trivia with Dov, memorization with everyone Peck, and fun science facts with Holly, since before she was adopted.
"Huh." Jules shook his head. "It's a G."
Hg? That was mercury, which wasn't a bomb component. Unless someone was making Hg(CNO)2, aka mercury(II) fulminate. Oh. "Hg I I," she said abruptly and looked back at the print up. "How many ... wait, what the fuck do they sell with mercury anymore?"
Her boss laughed. "Seriously?"
"Hg is mercury. Used to be hydrargyrum. Hydra from water, argyum from silver."
"Why not change it?"
Vivian snorted. "You're talking about people who argued about naming Dubnium after the city or the scientist, Jules. They get pretty het up."
"Alright..." Jules sighed.
"Oh! Light bulbs."
"What?"
Vivian tried not to roll her eyes. "Fluorescent light bulbs have mercury. No idea how you'd extract it... What was in his shopping cart?" Jules handed over another, equally shitty, photo. "Hostess cupcakes? Can we get a receipt?
"No, he ran when shots were fired."
She blinked. "Drop the cart or left it?"
"Left, but it was tripped over by the shooter. No way to know."
Wasn't that the luck? No receipt. No clearer pictures of items he may have been trying to buy. "Anything missing from the store?" Vivian knew the odds on that were insanely low.
As she'd expected, Jules gave her a side eye. "Nice try, Peck. If it was easy, we'd be done."
"Can't blame me for trying."
Her sergeant gave a smirk. "I sent the inventory to your inbox. Figure out how to make a bomb."
Vivian snorted. "Any bomb or a mercury bomb?"
"There ya go." Jules clapped her shoulder and left.
She sighed. It wasn't particularly hard to reverse engineer a bomb. Once exploded, a bomb was still much the sum of its parts. Even if the parts were thrown over a large area, one could add it all up and make sense of it, basically because all bombs were the same at their hearts. But. Usually Vivian had something to start with as a shape. It was like colouring books.
The shape of a bomb was defined by its designer. The shape, the lines, were drawn by a creator who envisioned the bomb. The parts, the colours, were suggested by the shape, but a person could always doodle outside the line. And that was made it so hard to figure out the details of the design, the lines.
And here, Vivian was tasked with guessing the lines based on the possible colours.
Okay, fine, it was a cool task to be given.
A lot of the time, Vivian's job was normal. She put on a uniform, she put on a vest, she strapped on a gun, and she went out into the world to make it safer and better. That was something everyone there did. All her brothers and sisters in uniform, did the same thing.
But some mornings, Vivian was handed a specialized task. She was told to solve the impossible and uncover a mystery. Unlike her mother, unlike Gail, she didn't have to discern the motive and method of man. But just like Holly, she had to solve a puzzle. She had to unravel the question, based on the answer before her. She had to invent.
Well actually, maybe it was a lot like Gail too. Maybe it was a mixture of the two. Maybe she was solving the mystery by unraveling the motive of the man behind the bomb, while piecing together the puzzle of what made up the bomb.
Yeah. Okay. Fine.
At least it was interesting.
It was hard not to grin when she saw her daughter in the lab. Holly covered for it by sipping her tea, but she knew that her staff saw right through it.
Over at a table, Vivian had her head down and was working with Aaron Haversham, one of Holly's less imaginative but very pedantic young workers. They had a variety of items from convenience stores spread on the table, some taken apart and some not, and a lot of weird drawings on reusable paper.
They were making a mercury bomb. Or at least they were trying to. Right now, they seemed to still be measuring the amount of mercury in each item. Normally that kind of work went to the anti-terrorism group, but the odds of one of Toronto's most wanted actually being involved in that kind of plot was so far fetched, they dismissed it and left it in Gail's hands.
Of course, Gail had opined to Holly that she felt the idea was idiotic herself. Obviously cryptography was too bored these days, but without any actual bomb threats these days, why the hell not.
That was, perhaps, one of the reasons Holly didn't mind Vivian being in ETF quite so much. Most of her bomb work was checking out abandoned suitcases left at the train station. Or a mock bomb for a kid's movie that scared a grandparent. Outside of training exercises and Safary, Vivian rarely touched a live bomb.
Plus it meant Holly got to see her kid a lot. Vivian was often in the lab with her counterpart on other squads, or teams, or whatever they were called. After Safary, and the whole painting thing, Vivian's stock had skyrocketed. She was going to be a third class constable soon, and likely would be tapped to lead a squad of her own far sooner than Gail ever was.
But. Vivian was a cop unlike her mother. Where Gail was efficiently lazy, Vivian was pedantically prepared. Gail read people like their lives were laid out for her. Vivian read scenes and situations. Human motive versus motive force, as it were.
Holly smiled, pleased with herself at the joke.
The mass spec beside her beeped, bringing Holly back to the actual reason she was in the lab. She had her very own case that day.
Sometimes Holly missed having regular cases, where she'd go out to a scene and collect bones and meet sexy straight girls who turned out to be not so straight. She missed being young enough to enjoy the fieldwork. She missed the weird places and the armpits of the city.
And then again, she really didn't. Being brilliant at her job was not about the location, after all. A TV van had been stolen in the middle of them filming a story about a theft that had been incredibly similar to the one Gail was working. Another convenience store. When the van had been recovered, a dead man was inside. The kicker? He was the lead suspect in the original crime.
Gail had laughed so hard she wheezed.
But Holly had drawn the case by sheer luck and was busy going over the evidence in both the van and the original scene, at which she had been present. In fact, she'd seen the van stolen. Holly had been finishing evidence collection when she heard the shout. Looked up, she saw the van squeal off down the road, doors banging.
It was, perhaps, not the most glamorous case Holly had picked up in her years, but it was fun. It was funny. Except for the part where there was a dead man. She read the report from her mass spec analysis and scowled. The dead man did have some of the trace from the original scene, but not enough. Not what she'd expected at least.
"Well, that's odd," muttered Holly, and she double checked the results.
That was a habit. She always double checked everything. Even as a baby forensic pathologist, she'd been pedantic and serious, checking and double checking results. Holly always compared them beyond just what she was looking for. And, as it so often did, her exacting nature outed an unexpected result.
"Excuse me," she said a little louder, and the room paused. "Haversham, Officer Peck. Would you come here?"
The two shared a look and then quickly safed their work before walking over. Vivian bore a curiously interesting expression, but all she said was a polite, "Ma'am?"
"Does this look familiar?" She held her tablet out, the chemical compound lit in yellow.
Vivian's mouth moved as she read the line. Her eyes flicked across the report and back again. "That's ..." The girl — the woman stopped. "Wait. Mercury fulminate. Mercuric hg?"
Holly smiled and nodded. "Chloride."
"No one's used that for syphilis treatment in a million years," said Vivian with a sneer.
"You can use it as a reagent to make an amalgam with aluminum," Holly pointed out.
"Yeah and Dumas wrote about how you could use it to kill people," retorted Vivian. When everyone looked at her, she sighed. "Yes that Dumas who wrote the Three Musketeers. He also wrote a multi volume crime book, Celebrated Crimes, and in ... uh volume four or five, he talked about this guy Antoine François Desrues, who offed a noblewoman with it. Only he called it a corrosive sublimate."
There was a ripple of laughter through the room. Wanda was the only one who dared speak. "You know, I'd always wondered what would happen when your and Gail's kid grew up, Boss."
Holly smiled. She refused to hide it. Because she knew how hard Vivian had worked to learn all of that. She'd watched her daughter fall asleep at her desk, trying to cram hundreds of thousands of years of crime history into her mind. And for Vivian, it was a mind that more readily absorbed the facts and patterns of science.
The young woman had always grasped the logical world so much faster. She was so confused by the motives of people all her life, but so determined to understand it. Science came easy. Science made sense. And Vivian was talented at applying science to crime in the practical sense.
As Wanda said, it was exactly what happened if a cop's kid was raised by a scientist. Jerry was nearly exactly the same way. He was more wild, with piercings and tattoos, punk hair (he had a dyed mohawk at the moment). And he also worked with the Canadian Space Agency, NASA, Elon Musk's group, and more.
Speaking of Jerry, Vivian quoted him as looked up at the ceiling. "Oxide can be used to 'make' oxygen, but it's too dangerous to use on interstellar travel. Not stable enough. There are far safer uses." Then Vivian channeled Gail a little. "What kind of morons would use that anyway? What point would they have?" She frowned. "Nessler's reagent?"
Behind her, Haversham made a noise. He scoffed. "What good is detecting ammonia?"
"What good is ammonia?" Vivian countered him with a smirk.
"Cleaning cat pee?" Haversham scowled. "That's really reaching."
"Chlorine gas," drawled Vivian.
"Jesus!" Haversham threw his hands up. "Counter terrorism?"
The cop grinned. "Actually cleaning up blood is what I was thinking." That drew silence from Haversham, and Vivian went on. "This isn't very convoluted. Think about this. Our suspect is one of Canada's most wanted, but not for homicide." She pointed at Haversham. "No, homicide isn't the primary reason people land on the list. It's sex crimes." Vivian made a fist. "Our guy? Impersonating police which resulted in kidnapping a young boy and his sister, who was later found dead in a park. Now. It's been years, the boy is still missing. Suddenly our suspect shows back up and he's making something with ammonia."
In that moment, Holly was crazy proud of her daughter. She'd finally realized why people had children. It was so they could admire the best traits in themselves in another person. That was such a narcissistic Gail-type thought, but it was so true. She saw the best of herself in Vivian's quick mind. She saw the best of Gail in her selfless nature.
But just then, she saw deductive brilliance.
"You think the boy escaped and your suspect is trying to figure out if tracks were covered?" Holly sat down on the edge of a desk, in awe.
The original case had been before Vivian's time on the force, but absolutely when Vivian was well aware of the world. In fact, it had been one of Andy's last cases in youth and sexual crimes. The case that Gail opined could had broken McNally. Of course Vivian had listened to and remembered the details.
"But..." Haversham was bewildered. "Why? I mean, I get why making ammonia detection. Cheaper than bleach, and the smell throws off the dogs. And checking for it... wouldn't they know?"
"The reagent turns different shades. You'd be able to match it to other ammonia cleared blood stains and have a decent comparison," said Wanda. "And shit like that has been all over the discovery channel for yonks." As an aside to Haversham, Wanda added, "Criminals looooove Mythbusters."
So did Gail. Holly opted not to say that out loud. Instead she asked, "How quickly could someone make Nessler's reagent with the supplies from a quick-e-mart?"
Vivian and Haversham shared a lot. "With the Internet? Four hours." Vivian shrugged. "If they'd done it before, less."
"Well then. I get to have a curious conversation with OC," said Holly with a sigh. "Write that up, both of you. I need it in two hours."
That would give her enough time to process her own evidence and come up with enough background so Gail could connect the dead man to one of Toronto's most wanted sex offenders.
But she couldn't shake a terrible feeling.
How old was her dead man? Young. Early twenties at best. Which made him young enough... god. Holly grimaced and tapped up the DNA results, pulling them up along side those of a decade old missing persons. A young man kidnapped by a fake cop.
The odds of finding the boy alive in the first place was low. Gail knew that. It had been almost ten years after all. And she knew Andy knew that too. Still. To find out that Holly's db was Cary Hopper, the young man missing all this time, hurt.
"This shit is why I never went into juvenile crimes," muttered Gail.
Andy, to her credit, didn't sass Gail or snap at her. She had her eyes on the prize. "What's the name of that thing? Where people go along with their captors?"
"Stockholm Syndrome." Gail sipped her tea to force herself to be calm. "It's related to PTSD, actually."
And PTSD was a disorder Gail was far too intimately familiar with. After all, she lived it every single day. And that year had been a rough one. Between her mother's issues and being held hostage herself, Gail had been talking to her shrink a lot. Sleeping had been problematic, stress was high, and now she had a fucked up drug case that still didn't make sense.
Ugh.
So Gail pushed that aside somewhat. As much as she could wallow in her own angst at the moment, Andy needed her support. That meant Gail had to be that Gail Peck. She had to be the legacy cop who had watched people struggle through that kind of pain her whole life. Not to say that Andy was incompetent or unprofessional or even unprepared. It just...
Andy McNally was a good person. She was stupid sometimes, she was naïve and could be incredibly innocent, but Andy was a good person. And being good at heart meant that moments like these, where the evils of the world painted her black and blue, Andy was ill equipped to survive these moments.
That was Gail's world. That was why Gail was in Organized Crime and Andy was the uniform sergeant. They knew their worlds, their strengths, and their weaknesses. After all this time, they knew.
"Why did he die?" Andy gnawed on the side of her thumb.
"Myocardial infarction." Gail paused. "Heart attack."
"I know that one," grumbled Andy. "He's young to have that though."
"I thought so too. I asked the lab to go back over his sister's autopsy report. Turns out the two of them had a small heart deformity. Stress could cause a fatal weakening of the arterial lining or something."
Andy scowled. "That sounded familiar."
"S'what caused her second heart attack." Gail jerked her chin at the photo of her mother, currently sporting a Fu Manchu.
The other cop followed the look and nodded. "How... uh. So there's this rumour she's losing her memory."
Gail blinked. "That took longer than I thought."
"Well Steve isn't here anymore to spread rumours like herpes," Andy pointed out. "You know what's funny about that? He'd spread all that shit, and you'd end up owing him weird favours."
Smirking, Gail nodded. "He's good at that."
Andy picked up her own tea mug and sipped it. "Okay. Cary is dead. Can Holly's nerds find any trace to ... I don't know? Find him?"
"She's working on it." Gail swirled her tea thoughtfully. The lab was working overtime to try and narrow down the locations of where Donald might be. Meanwhile, Gail was hoping to make headway on motive. Assuming Vivian's theory was correct (and Holly felt it was based on the circumstances), Cary's death was still peculiar.
"Normally you'd be going over your theory," Andy said slowly, jarring Gail somewhat.
Gail hesitated. "Yeah. Yeah I would."
Her friend nodded. "You caught Donald on tape, buying stuff to ... what?"
In all their years, Andy had never been one to stand in Gail's office and go over the wall and solve the crimes. It wasn't her nature. And here she was, asking to do just that.
Well. Gail took a deep breath. "Okay. So the theory, based on the items purchased, is that Donald was looking to make a ... it's called Nessler's reagent, it's a chemical compound that detects ammonia. Among other things."
"Specific," muttered Andy.
"Ammonia's good for getting out blood. My guess is he was trying to see if the ammonia used somewhere was done to cover up blood."
Andy screwed up her face. "Blood? Who the hell knows how to do that?"
"Anyone who watches those science shows. They had a whole episode about it, since that crime lab show? The one with Lilly Aspell?" It seemed Andy didn't know the show. "Anyway this tv show had one of those episodes where no one has technology, and the head of forensics had to check for blood someone had cleaned up with ammonia. So it's reasonable, and recent enough."
The uniformed sergeant made a noise. "Cary did it," she said softly.
"What?" Gail startled and nearly dropped her tea.
"Cary has a baby face. He's about sixteen though, and he's not cute anymore. It looks like maybe this year puberty took hold? Hard to say, but Donald replaced him with someone new. Probably five years ago. As that kid got older, Donald went to look for someone else. Cary, he killed the kid and tried to cover it up."
Gail stared at Andy. The woman wasn't a detective. She herself agreed that it wasn't her skill set, or something Andy even wanted to do. But there was a certainty with which she spoke that told Gail that Andy had a bead on this particular situation. She saw it. God. Andy saw the horror.
"Hence Stockholm Syndrome," Gail said carefully.
"Yeah. Five years, Donald probably groomed Cary. And he looks like that kid from that singing show? It was on when we were rooks."
"Oh, Glee?" Gail blinked. There had been a gay character with an impossibly young face.
"Right! That kid was just young all the time." Andy nodded.
It felt odd to defer to Andy like this, but she had that groove. So Gail did what she did when anyone had it like that. She set the stage for them to shine. "So why rob the second store?"
That part had, to be honest, eluded Gail somewhat. She could understand killing her replacement. Hell, when Holly had moved on to someone else, Gail briefly entertained the thought of hunting the woman down and arresting her. Instead, she'd actually met her at a Pride celebration a few years later, and rather liked the activist. Maybe they'd gotten along well due to the fact that the first thing said was she saw why Holly wasn't over her ex.
But that wasn't this. That was self-hatred and jealousy and ... oh. Well. Okay, it was the same, really.
"He wanted to be caught," said Andy. "The first time, Donald went to the store himself, right? But the robbery brought attention and he worried he got caught on camera." She crossed her arms over her chest. "He's not stupid. We know what he looks like. So he sends Cary out, not knowing Cary is the killer."
"Not to rain on your parade, but we don't even have a body."
"Why else would Cary do something as showy as steal a TV van?" Andy turned and faced Gail. "Do you remember our rookie year? When we had that wife being beaten and she went back to her husband?"
Of course she did. Gail sighed and nodded. "I kind of hoped we'd have a follow up of her killing him," she said, darkly. Instead they'd revisited her a dozen times before they took the kid away. Last Gail knew, the woman was still with her abusive husband.
"This is more likely."
Suicide was more likely. Well. Not suicide. "He wanted to be caught?"
"I think he wanted suicide by cop, honestly," said Andy. "Stealing a van would end in a chase, and then he'd be chased and gunned down."
Gail snorted. "We don't kill in most high speed chases." The last twenty years had brought amazing additions to ways the police could end a chase. Caltrops of course were popular, but Gail loved the special gun that shut off a car's engine and applied the brakes gently.
Science was so cool.
"How many people know that outside of ... what's that US state that has all the chases?"
"California," said Gail with a dark smile.
She'd been involved in a few herself, one with teen Vivian in the car. The most memorable had been when the criminal, and then she, had hit a patch of black ice on the Quay. Scared the hell out of her and, later, Holly, who had heard about it that night. That was a very long time ago... God, they hadn't been living together even.
"Okay, Andy, so let's say this is right. Cary fell in with Stockholm and joined Donald. Maybe he even picked the new kid, but now it's been a decade and it's time for another one. And this time, Cary's a man. And maybe he's feeling guilty and jealous and scared so instead of sharing the new kid, he kills one and covers it up. Which leads to Donald getting caught on tape. Which leads to Cary being caught ... and dying. It's a hella coincidence."
"But." That was all Andy said.
"Okay, smart ass. Find me a scene."
That was Gail's actual work at the moment. Take the two known scenes, the fact that there were no cars involved, and find where they might be holed up.
And fucking Andy McNally looked at the map Gail put on the wall, looked at the locations, and picked up a pen. "Did Cary have a bus pass?"
"He did not."
The sergeant nodded and drew a circle around each store. Then, at the intersection of her circles, she drew a third. "There."
"You know it takes three data points to triangulate," said Gail gruffly.
"Sure. But if Cary was having guilty feelings, then he maybe wanted to point us right."
Gail sighed. Of course McNally was deducing with her heart and not her head. "Well. Not like I have anything else to go on. Send patrol there, wouldaya?"
And Andy smiled, looking better than she had that morning. "Who do you think you are? My boss?"
"Viv! You were on the news!" Christian's booming voice greeted her. "I can't believe I had today off."
Vivian rubbed her forehead. "Volume, C. Volume. And how'd you know I wasn't Jamie?"
"Because I got home an hour ago," replied the firefighter. She had a bit of an edge to her voice. "Did you really catch one of Canada's most wanted?"
"No. McNally did."
Gail had been adamant that, as long as it was safe, Andy was to slap the cuffs on the criminals. Therefore, Vivian had been tasked with ensuring the raid was safe. The good news was that the house had been totally safe. The bad news was that the working theory of the oldest captive having killed his successor wasn't quite right.
The Mercury had been to make a poor man's blood test. That part they'd gotten right. Vivian had been on the raid just in case it had been a bomb, or an ammonia bomb. Thankfully not.
No the problem was the house had held four boys under the age of eight.
Cary, the original captive, had been disposing of the boys when they reached eight for a decade. The latest death though had been of Donald's favourite boy and wasn't that disgusting? The captive boys had been fighting, and Donald wanted to see if they'd covered up an own murder. He thought they'd used the ammonia from their own pee to clean the blood.
It would have been brilliant if it didn't turn Vivian's stomach so much. The boys hadn't been fighting, they'd been trying to escape. And the dead one had killed himself when their attempts hadn't worked.
No one would really ever know why Cary stole the van either. Dead men told no tales. But privately Vivian felt Andy was right.
"You busted in on it, though. I saw the drone footage," insisted Christian, snapping her back to now.
"Drone?" Vivian blinked.
"CBC flew a drone after your van and caught the whole thing on camera," he explained.
Vivian winced. "That explains why Traci was livid." The inspector had been snappish and over protective five. Vivian had assumed it was because Andy and Traci were friends.
Weirdly, Andy had seemed okay. She'd also stuck close by Gail, of all people, and Gail had seemed alright with that. What Vivian knew about their relationship was confusing and complicated. She knew Gail had been at Andy's when she'd been kidnapped by Perik, and yet they'd never been close friends, for example.
No, Gail was much closer to Traci and even Chloe. But ... Elaine had mentioned before that Andy and Gail used to run into each other at cop events as kids. Andy was a few years younger, though, which was a huge amount at fourteen and eighteen. At fifty something, it mattered a lot less.
Thinking about that, Vivian lost the thread of the conversation. Christian was talking about how bad ass Vivian had looked, and how it had been awesome to see Andy make that arrest. "I mean, it's the biggest of her career," he pointed out.
"I'm going to grab a shower," Vivian said, in lieu of replying to her overeager man boy roommate.
As she closed the door to her bedroom, Vivian heard Christian ask, "What did I do?"
"Jesus, where to start?" Jamie was her most snarky.
Vivian smiled a little. Good. Jamie could talk to C. Right now, she just wanted to get every single possible scent of anything related to the house off her. She'd showered at the station, but this was a case where it all lingered.
Pulling her sidearm out, Vivian hesitated. She kind of wanted to clean that too. Fuck it. She wriggled out of her boots and jeans and grabbed her gun cleaning kit. At least it was something she could do and zen out. Was that why Gail went to yoga sometimes? Maybe a run would be a good idea... Vivian had toyed with the idea of going to the gym.
The bedroom door opened. "So, this is happening," said Jamie softly.
Vivian looked up. Her girlfriend had her head in the door. "Hey."
"Hey." Jamie pulled her head back. "C, we're good. Go ahead and start making dinner will ya?" She didn't wait for a reply and came in, closing the door. "This was not one of my fantasies."
"What? Half naked women cleaning guns?"
"I'm sure you just didn't want to get grease on your jeans." Jamie sat on the end of the bed. "How bad was it?"
Of course Jamie had caught on. Vivian shook her head. "I don't want to talk about it."
Her girlfriend made a noise. "Viv."
Yeah. What did she really expect. But she really didn't want to talk about it. "Jamie, you don't want to hear about it," Vivian said firmly. "You've seen those places."
Flophouses. Squats. Crash pads. They all had a certain stench of unwashed and human waste. Not always horrible. Vivian recalled a punk crash pad she and Rich stumbled on in their second year, which was vegan. That one was alright. But the more destitute the inhabitants, the harsher the smells.
Sweat and fear. Feces. Blood.
The house had smelled of that. Of terror. Of abuse. And really, it brought up a lot of confusing memories and feelings for Vivian.
"I know," said Jamie softly.
Vivian nodded and silently finished cleaning her gun. They didn't talk while Vivian tidied up and went to get herself washed up. In fact, Jamie was still sitting on the end of the bed, waiting, when Vivian came out of a far too hot shower.
The firefighter waited until Vivian was dried off and in sweats and a tank top. Then she spoke. "What are you thinking?"
With a sigh, Vivian sat down beside her girlfriend.
She was thinking a lot of things. She was thinking about her sister. About the myriad ways her life might have gone. She was thinking about how it was likely her mother took the abuse for her children. She was thinking about those children, living in fear.
And she was thinking about the older boys, how they had lost the light in their eyes. How they'd looked like kids she'd seen before and never forgot. That was a haunting memory she really didn't want to dwell on. Hell, she tried to actively forget the brief time she'd been in the system, but Vivian had long learned that was impossible.
"I'm thinking about those kids," she finally said. "I'm thinking about Semra, that girl being forced into marriage? I'm thinking about Skip, this kid who saw his foster brother get a double tap." Vivian leaned back and looked up at the stained glass windows that ran the top of her tall ceilings. "I'm thinking about Gabe Rodriguez. First kid I ever found dead. Besides Kimmy, I guess."
"Viv..." Jamie sounded hesitant and her hand gently touched Vivian's.
"I'm thinking it all sucks. A lot. And I really don't want to think about it. Because... god. We should have done more." Vivian sucked in a breath. "We should have done more. Found them sooner. Saved them. I don't know, done something."
The hand on hers gripped her fingers. "You know it doesn't work that way." Jamie was practical. She was calm. She was steady.
"I know." Vivian flopped the rest of the way back, throwing one arm over her eyes and holding Jamie's hand with the other. "It's just ... what I'm thinking."
Jamie hesitated and then lay down beside Vivian, their legs dangling off the end of the bed. "You never do anything uncomplicated, do you?"
"Nope." Vivian popped the P just like Gail did. Then she added, "Sorry," in a small voice.
"I knew what I was getting into before I moved in," remarked Jamie and she squeezed Vivian's hand. "Can I say... please never go into child services."
Vivian snorted a laugh. "I'd eat myself from the inside out. No thank you."
Her girlfriend didn't laugh. She sighed and just stayed there, lying beside Vivian. It was a moment where Vivian was well aware she should say something more. She should express her thoughts more than the piecemeal she'd managed. Talk to Jamie about the rush of twisted emotions.
Because Vivian didn't want to say that the whole thing made her feel filthy. Ashamed. There were so many things about being a cop that she loved, and so many more she hated. Failing people, like those poor kids, would eat at Andy. The woman would always think she could have done more. And she knew Andy would feel that more viscerally than Vivian ever could.
But what Vivian saw were the excuses. How it was okay, and funny, to dress rookies up like gay men or different genders, just to stop crime. Because, god, yes, it was. It made sense to lie to people to get information they wouldn't give willingly. That was how the world worked. And she understood people had to laugh at the dark humour or they'd never make it...
Still. She felt dirty.
Ashamed.
That they left people like that one the street because of manpower. That they prioritized. One life mattered more. Respect of one mattered more. Colour mattered. Gender mattered. Sexuality mattered.
And sometimes, seeing a kid or kids or anyone beaten down because the system failed them, because the system prioritized...
Yeah. Vivian didn't always like it.
Her mother was prioritizing just then. Gail had put the safety of her officers and their extended family above that of solving a crime. And Vivian couldn't say if it was the right or wrong choice. The cops, they'd accepted and voluntarily taken on the life. The family... the parents hadn't. Children nope.
Lovers.
Vivian tuned her head and looked at Jamie's profile. Her girlfriend, her lover was staring at the ceiling. Thinking. Jamie's teeth worried her lower lip, like it did when she was thinking hard.
There were explanations Vivian had that she couldn't express to her girl. She couldn't tell Jamie anything, not why she was worried or what she feared. And even if she could, Vivian wasn't certain she would. Why make Jamie suffer through the same doubts?
At the end, Vivian knew a few things for certain. She wanted to be the kind of cop who fixed the latent problems still in the force, the ones her mothers shrugged at and accepted. She wanted to push the police to be who they should be. She wanted to prevent people from hurting each other, stop them from suffering, and somehow do it without a psycho ego trip like people saw on the news.
And she knew how hard an uphill battle that was going to be. That was a life's work. A work Gail didn't do. Neither did Holly. Elaine had tried, but fell to her own sins.
Oh yes, it was hard. But she had to try.
This was, perhaps, not as much of a break episode as I'd intended. And there's a lot of terrible, uncomfortable things going on. Gail is afraid that more innocent people will get hurt just for being connected to the cops working the case. Which lands her with the free time to close an old cold case of Andy's... which is not comfortable at all when the truth is revealed.
Everyone hurts.
This is one of those where you lose when you win.
