Tony ran up the stairs, following the numbers on the Geiger counter. They were raising so fast now, that he had no time to realize what they were actually representing. Picking up the phone, he composed the last dialed number:

"Renee, it's Tony, I'm almost at the bomb."

"Tony? What happened to Jack?", she replied with a worried tone.

"He's fine. I'll do this. Can you put Cassar back on?"

Renee almost felt ashamed of how relieved she felt hearing those words.

"Sure…Hold on – she said, still in disbelief, while connecting the direct line with the NEST team – Ok, you can talk."

Tony pushed a metal door leading to the roof and heard the Geiger counter spiking up in an almost continuous noise.

"Mr. Cassar, I'm Tony Almeida, I must be very close to the bomb, the numbers on the counter are stuck, I think it can't help me anymore. What am I looking for?"

"Mr. Almeida, you have to look for a small case, about the size of a laptop, with four metal bars in it", explained Cassar still looking at the picture of the other rods.

"A'ight."

Tony put the useless counter on the ground and started using his other phone as a light to search the place. Suddenly a small led caught his attention. Getting closer, he found the case attached through some wires to a bottle filled with some substance and a pulse watch. By instinct, he covered his face with his left elbow.

"Ok, I got it. It has a pulse watch as a timer, we have less than two minutes left."

"Ok, send me a video of it."

"A'ight."

Tony placed the phone with the light on the ground, near the case, and used the other to share the video.

"I can see now. You just have to cut first the green wire and then the red one and it should stop", explained Cassar.

"Ok."

Tony put the speaker on and placed the phone down. Then, he extracted a knife from his pocket to do as Cassar told.

"Ok, it's done. The clock stopped. What do I do now?"

"Our team will be there shortly to prevent further leaks of radiation, just get away from there as fast as you can."

"Yeah."

Tony started running back to the metal door. Once closed behind his back, he coughed repeatedly and then began running again towards the ground floor.

Out of the building, the police had already set up a perimeter to prevent not authorized people of getting close to it. As soon as Tony exited the main door, Jack made a few steps in his direction.

Immediately Tony stopped him.

"Stay away from me, Jack!", he yelled. Then, in a lower tone, he added what everyone was waiting to hear: "Bomb is secured."

Jack sighed in relief.

"Great job, Tony. You saved a lot of lives tonight."

A few moments after, the NEST truck arrived and people in hazmat suits ran towards the entrance of the building. One of the men, stopped close to Tony.

"Mr. Almeida? I'm Robert Cassar, thank you for what you've done. Now you have to go with my men down there to wash away any trace of radiation from your skin and clothes."

Tony nodded and followed one of the men towards their truck.

After a while, the NEST team had removed the rods, putting them back in a lead shield to transport them away. Tony was now sitting in the back of an ambulance with new clothes on, lacing his shoes up.

"Mr. Almeida, we need to take you to the hospital to run more tests and have a real evaluation of your radiation poisoning", said a paramedic.

"No, I have to finish something in the field first. How much do you think I have left?"

"It's hard to tell, with the level of radiations you experienced, it could be a matter of a few days or a few weeks…I'm sorry."

"Ok…and when will the symptoms start?"

"Again, it depends on many factors. Usually, they could start within an hour from the exposure or a day and that's a reason more to come with us now."

"When the symptoms start, will I be contagious?", Tony asked, ignoring the last part of the sentence.

"No, radiation poisoning is not contagious."

"A'ight, so I won't be a danger if stay out a little longer", he concluded, getting up.

"No, but I still recommend you getting hospitalized soon, since initial symptoms like nausea and vomiting could evolve rapidly in something more serious like internal bleeding and respiratory problems."

"When I get sick, I promise I will come to the hospital. Now I have to go."

The paramedic sighed, not being able to convince him.

"Mr. Almeida, wait! – he stopped him – At least I can give you these potassium iodide pills to reduce the absorption of radiation and these anti-nausea medications. They won't do miracles, but it's still something. You can take one every three/four hours."

"A'ight, thanks – Tony said, taking the pills container.

In that moment, Jack approached the ambulance and came to talk to Tony.

"Hey –he said, trying to hide his apprehension – How bad is it?"

"They can't tell yet", he cut off abruptly. Then, moving a few steps away from the ambulance, he continued:" Listen, Jack, we need to go and finish that thing now, before it's too late."

Jack sighed.

"Tony, what did the doctor say? Don't you think it would be better for you if you–

"No, Jack – Tony interrupted him, getting more upset – I've honored my part of the deal, doing everything you asked and more. Now it's time that you honor yours."

Jack paused for a moment. When he offered that deal in the morning, he just needed Tony to collaborate with them and it wasn't really his plan to respect it till the end, but now things had changed and he would've felt like crap letting him down.

"Ok, wait me in that car, I have to make a couple phone calls", Jack eventually replied, giving Tony the car keys.

"A'ight."

Tony took the keys and went to sit in the passenger's seat of the SUV. Once inside, he placed the keys in the ignition and then leant back to the sit, taking a deep breath. The moment he had been waiting for all these years was getting closer, but the weight of everything happened during that day and what still had to come for him was inevitably dragging him down in a spiral of distressing thoughts.

A few minutes later, Jack reached the car and got in.

"Ok, I managed to get information and thermo sat coverage on the location Wilson is spending his house arrest. I've got also his debrief file and everything the FBI has on his conspiracy group on my PDA", Jack explained, passing the PDA to Tony.

"A'ight, good", Tony took the PDA and started looking on the files on it.

Jack went to start the engine, but stopped before turning the key as a thought came to his mind.

"Tony"

Tony lifted his head from the screen and turned back to him.

"Yeah."

"I didn't even ask you how you're feeling – Jack asked in a soft voice, letting out some sadness – Are you in pain now?"

Tony laid his head back down on the PDA but without really looking at it.

"I'm fine for now. I just want this to be over."

"Yeah – Jack nodded – You know, maybe there is still something they could do, you said it yourself, they don't know how bad it is yet. Last year I was in a similar situation, but then this experimental treatment came out and–

"Jack, stop it, ok? – Tony cut him off, turning back to him – When I was on the roof, the Geiger counter froze on 999 CPM just because it didn't have enough digits to grow further. So, spare me this optimistic crap: when the symptoms kick in, it's over."

Jack felt like adding something else, but he knew he was right.

"I'm so sorry, Tony", was all he was able to say.

"Yeah, sure – Tony replied in a sarcastic way – Until this morning you probably would've killed me yourself if you had the chance, so don't act like you care."

"Well, things are a little bit different now, don't you think? Until this morning I thought that the person I've known and cared about for years, the person who devoted his entire life to protect people and that I considered my friend, was gone forever, replaced by a ruthless murderer who was willing to put innocent lives at stake to have his revenge. But, today, I've seen that person coming back and I'm sorry to lose him again."

Feeling the emotion in Jack's voice, Tony avoided his look again.

"That person died many years ago, when Michelle died", he stated coldly.

"That's not true", insisted Jack, getting more emotional. Tony, on the other side, started feeling uncomfortable that his detached approach was beginning to crumble.

Jack paused for a moment further, in order to find the strength to open up and tell the rest of what he wanted to say: "You know, among all the things that I regret, there are two that have been haunting me for all these years and that I'll never be able to forgive myself. The first is having trusted Nina and not having been able to stop her before she killed Teri. The second is having asked you, Michelle and Chloe to help me to fake my death to avoid being capturing by the Chinese. I can't stop thinking that, if had turned myself in from the beginning – Jack's voice began to crack – maybe none of this would've happened, maybe Michelle would've still been alive and you both would've had the lives you deserved."

Hearing all of this, it was getting harder for Tony to hold back his emotions.

"Please don't do this, Jack – he whispered fighting back his tears – don't put this on you. You've been a victim in all of this, just like me. The way the government has used you and sold you out to cover their ass when they no longer needed you was simply outrageous. Helping you to escape was the only right thing to do at the time and I don't regret doing it. Too bad it was eventually useless, since they captured you anyway a few years later…God, I can't even imagine what you've gone through during those two years in China."

Tony stopped to look back at Jack, whose mental scars for the period spent in the Chinese prison have never completely healed.

"Anyway – he resumed – what I was trying to say, is that it's not your fault for what happened after we helped you escape. It was Wilson who ordered the hit on me and Michelle and it was Henderson who actually did it. It's their fault if our lives have been destroyed and, since you've already taken out Henderson, Wilson is the last person who still has to pay for this. So, stop feeling responsible for what happened to Teri or what happened to Michelle. I don't blame you for that and you shouldn't blame yourself neither."

Jack felt overwhelm by emotions. The remorse that has been eating him alive for years was still far from being finally eradicated, but knowing that Tony didn't blame him for what happened to them was indeed a kind of relief.

"Thanks Tony", he said under his breath.

Then, he dried out his tears with his hand and regain his fully focused face.

"Now let's go get that son of a bitch", Jack stated before turning the engine on.

"Yeah", replied Tony finally satisfied.