They managed to clear the place in three hours and fifty-six minutes, and he lit the fire personally before walking out to the road in front of the church to meet Lorna and Jim at the car, leaving Armetti's people to deal with the flood. He paused for just a moment to take a breath of real, unfiltered air. Then he got into the driver's seat of the car, and started it up.
Lorna was in the back, Jim had shotgun. Neither of them had communicated where they were going to sit, but a tacit understanding that Jim didn't sit in the backseat unless it was a limo or an Escalade was there. "So, where are we going?" Lorna asked as the car started, raising her eyebrows a little.
He pulled out onto the road, along with four other identical cars, and they started off. "The airport," he responded, glancing to the side as one of the other cars turned off onto an alternate route. Eventually they'd all be going different directions. He'd personally swept all the cars for bugs, and placed signal jammers, but there was still the possibility of actual, personal surveillance, and he wasn't interested in making it easy for anyone following them.
"And then?" she prompted, eyebrows rising further. She hadn't been told the plan at all past fucking over Adler, and she felt like she was probably qualified to hear it, considering that for a little while she'd been Jim's right hand.
"Right now? Switzerland. Just for a night or two, while we wait for our teams at the network to give the go-ahead." They turned onto the freeway.
"Ohh, Switzerland, that's nice," she chirped, sitting back pleased about their destination for once.
He snorted in amusement, and Jim just rolled his eyes. "I'm sure it will be enjoyable for the twelve to forty-eight hours we're there."
"I'll have to buy a watch to bring home," she quipped, just to amuse Sebastian and annoy Jim.
Moran smirked. "I'm surprised that your mind didn't immediately go to swiss chocolates," he shot back.
She made an offended noise. "Are you calling me fat, Moran?"
"What?" He sounded startled. "No! Why would you- no, you like chocolate. That's all, Christ." He snorted, and pulled into the fast lane, accelerating. Jim rolled his eyes.
"Would the two of you kindly shut up?"
She snickered, leaning back in her seat. "Gotcha. Totally had you going. And yes, boss, now I will shut up."
The rest of the ride took place in silence, until they pulled into the airport. Jim had been texting the whole drive, and now started directing them through the airport, until they stopped in a back parking lot. Moran was reminded of when they had first fled, and the situation was similar, a young man waiting for them to guide them through the bowels of the airport.
Lorna was more aware of her surroundings this time around, and kept a close eye on the proceedings, for future reference. What future, she didn't know. But it was better to be safe than sorry.
He was tense as they walked through the airport, constantly waiting for Ines's people to jump them, but half an hour later they were on the airplane and taxiing down the runway.
Everyone relaxed a little as the plane made it into the air. It was unlikely Ines would manage to have it shot down. Lorna decided to spend the long flight to Switzerland in Sebastian's lap, and so sank into it and curled up, not leaving room for much argument.
He rolled his eyes as she climbed into his lap, but shifted a bit to be more comfortable, looping his arms around her waist. Jim watched them almost curiously, an odd expression on his face.
Lorna could feel Jim's eyes on them, but she studiously ignored them, closing her eyes and resting her head on Sebastian's shoulder. She would sleep through as much as the plane ride as possible to pass the time.
Sebastian let her drift off, fingers playing absently with the ends of her hair, thinking over the coming days.
Jim watched them for a while, watching Harrison fall asleep. He felt confused, and he hated to feel confused. "Why?" he asked suddenly, without any preamble, eyes shifting to Sebastian's. "Why did you choose this?"
He glanced over at the other man, and was silent for a while, trying to find words that the other man would understand. "Why do you play the game, Jim? It's the same thing. I don't know why, she just... she makes me feel alive. Happy."
He didn't say anything for a minute, just looked at the enormous, scarred mountain of a bodyguard in front of him with the short, apparently spotless slip of thing sleeping in his arms, and was still confused, but a different kind of confusion. He disliked that confusion even less. "How much does it bother you that we were fucking while you were.. gone?"
He turned his attention back to Lorna for a moment as she shifted a bit in her sleep, and shrugged. "Logically, it doesn't bother me at all, sir. I was dead. You had absolutely no reason to do otherwise."
"Logically," Jim repeated, raising his eyebrows a little. "Implying another train of thought."
He sighed, and looked back up at Jim. "We can't all be perfectly logical, sir. But any emotions I might have on the matter are my problem. Not yours."
"I wasn't scolding you, Moran. I was... Curious," Jim said, with just a hint of disgust, directed at himself.
He caught the sentiment, but didn't comment on it, instead formulating his response. "It's... difficult to explain, sir, to be honest," he admitted quietly. "I completely understand that I was gone. That she needed you, and..." He trailed off, deciding to avoid mentioning that Jim had needed Harrison as well. "I guess what bothers me the most about it, boss, is that I wasn't there. I failed, and I caused the both of you a lot of trouble, caused her a lot of pain because of it. I don't like the reminder."
Jim sighed quietly. He had conflicted feelings. Feelings. Which shouldn't have existed at all. On the one hand, he had a desire to make Moran jealous - he loved poking at primal instincts. On the other, he was friends with Moran. It was a conundrum.
He considered Jim quietly, trying to understand the man's expressions. They were common expressions, but not on Jim's face, and the contrast was disorienting. "I won't let it bother me, sir, like I said..."
"I heard you the first time," he said simply, holding his eyes for a moment before looking away, eyes roving over the interior of the plane.
He nodded just a little, and considered letting it drop. It would be the smart thing to do. But some part of him was curious, too. Insanely intrigued by this new side of Jim that he had never seen before. "Sir... If I could speak freely for a moment?"
Jim's eyes slid back to Moran, and he nodded a little, his expression blank.
He hesitated a moment, then straightened just slightly. "It doesn't bother me that you're showing more emotion. No one else cares. And while it can definitely present some weaknesses, sir, I believe you could also see it as a new chapter of challenges you haven't gotten to test yourself against before. We don't think less of you for it, sir, if you decide to emote every once in awhile." He shifted slightly, aware that the line was miles behind him, and didn't dare look at Jim directly. "In closing, trying to shoot me while on a plane is a terrible idea, if you decide to kill me please use a knife."
Jim snorted, a smirk appearing on his face despite himself at the last remark, though his finger tapped on the arm of his seat in a staccato rhythm. He was agitated. He himself didn't know how to do what Sebastian was asking him. How the hell was he supposed to emote when he didn't know what he was feeling? "It's not that simple," he said after a minute, jaw tight.
"How so?" he asked, genuinely curious, and alive, apparently. A good sign that Jim was in a decent enough mood for this conversation. And where else, when the only ears that could possibly hear them belonged to the pilot- cordoned in his own compartment- and Harrison- asleep on his lap, oblivious.
"You assume that I know how to do that," he said, a little strained. "I don't. Did you? With her?"
He snorted in amusement. "Sir, I tried to kill her, and left her bleeding from a neck wound while I went out and got high. Draw your own conclusions."
He chuckled. "Yes, I remember that. Have you ever heard the last of it? God, she's as mouthy as you are, except she can say whatever she so desires to you."
"She cannot," he objected. "In fact, that particular scenario was a result of her saying something she shouldn't. Though admittedly she has a bit more freedom now."
Jim made an amused noise. "How much are you censoring her, now that she's got a ring on her finger?"
He raised an eyebrow. "...Some," he said defensively. "How much are you censoring me, really?"
"We have a very different relationship. I don't think there's much of a comparison. You've never slept in my bed, let alone lived with me," he pointed out, voice quiet. It was odd, how he had changed since Moran's fake death. That raw, vulnerable period where he'd distracted himself with the one thing that Moran had ever really put a part of his soul into, it had... Stirred him up. He felt discombobulated. Now he felt... Needs. "I don't know what it is anymore, honestly. I've haven't been this confused since I was three, Sebastian."
He sighed, shifting Harrison very gently out of his lap into the window seat, and turning to face Jim, elbows on his knees. "I'm not trying to make this worse for you, Jim. I'm just saying... I'm not going to judge. Honestly... it's fascinating to see."
"I know that," Jim rolled his eyes, flicking his wrist a little. "The problem is that this is all very.. internal. And if it's not in my brain, I'm not good with internal. At all."
He shifted a little, trying to think. "Is there a way that I can help, sir?"
Jim sighed, running his hand through his hair. He was silent for a minute. He braced his elbows on his knees and sighed again. "I miss... Fucking."
He let that sit for a moment, awaiting further details, and when they weren't forthcoming he pressed for them. "...In general, boss? Or Harrison, or me...?"
"All of the fucking above, Moran," he snorted.
He nodded a little, treading carefully. "Neither of us are opposed to you joining in, sir, if that's what you want..."
Jim rubbed his eyes, letting out a tired breath. "I don't know what I want, that's the issue."
He nodded just a little. "Well, sir, I've been in your situation to an extent. Consider me a reference resource if you like."
"I don't see how that will help me if you can't even tell me why it happened to you. I don't guide myself with feelings."
"Neither do I," he retorted, looking just a touch insulted. He sighed, pushing a hand through his hair. "You tell me first, Jim- Why did you shoot yourself on that roof?"
Jim leaned back heavily against the chair, an air of sullen boredom about him. "The game was over. Little Sherly lost, so predictably. I knew going into it that he would assume I could stop it, so I went in prepared to stop him from winning. There wasn't a downside." Not the whole story, but definitely the driving reason.
"Well, we can argue about the downside later," he said, brushing the comment aside. "But that isn't why, Jim, not really. Why was it so important that you won? Why play the game at all? You got no financial gain from it, not compared to your usual endeavors. You lost your security, plastering your face across the media- I was in a living nightmare trying to keep you safe. And you only gained power over one very small group of people. So, no gain in power, no gain in wealth, a deficit in security... Why did you do it? Why did you play the game at all?"
"Because I'm bored, Moran," he snapped, only keeping his voice quiet to avoid waking up Harrison, because this was not a conversation he wanted her hearing. "Being at the top of the pyramid is boring. There's nochallenges. It's stagnant."
He nodded just a little, not phased by the irritation. "So going against Holmes improved your quality of life," he suggested softly. "Harrison does the same thing for me. I don't have anything outside the job, boss, and for a while that was fine. I didn't need it. But once she and I started living together... It was better to go home to her than an empty flat. It was better to sleep next to her than in an empty bed. Rough times were easier. Good times were better. And when I left her, going back to normal, it just wasn't enough anymore. Like you said... there wasn't a downside."
Jim sighed, shutting his eyes. Everything in him felt conflicted. There was no answer to be found, considering every angle. It simply was outside the bounds of normal fucking logic. "I... Need to think about this."
He nodded. "Sorry I can't help more, boss... Words aren't really my specialty."
"This isn't going to be something that words will resolve. Therapy doesn't work on me. My school-teachers learned that, eventually," Jim smirked.
He smirked. "This isn't therapy, boss. This is friends, talking. There's a difference. Another one I learned the hard way with Harrison."
He laughed, surprised (surprisingly). "How'd you learn that at all?"
He shrugged, still smirking. "About the fortieth time she tried to get me to talk to her... I mean, I'd let her talk to me, if it made her function better. Told myself that if she was a better employee it was worth it, and accidentally started giving a shit. That was my first mistake." His grin widened a bit, and he glanced over his shoulder at the sleeping Lorna. "But I wouldn't talk to her. I think it was after that hole..." His finger absently went to trace his words over the blank scar on his left forearm, where his accident in India had left a gap in the perfection. "A therapist couldn't have gotten me out of where I was, boss. I don't know if even you could have, at the time. Harrison was the only one in any sort of position to get me back on my feet. Because somewhere, under everything, I trusted her. Even if I didn't remember her." He shrugged. "A therapist couldn't have done what she did," he repeated.
"God, you're such a sap sometimes," Jim rolled his eyes, but there was no real annoyance there. Honestly, the change in him was hilarious. And as something he had never seen coming, it was almost pleasant. Something to break the monotony.
He rolled his eyes. "Anyone else would be dead for saying that, I hope you know," he muttered, leaning back in the seat.
"Of course I know," Jim scoffed. "But that's the beauty of being your employer. I can poke fun at how you've changed."
He flipped him the bird with his good hand, and sighed. "It'll be good to have the network back."
"It will. I look forward to some proper fixing jobs," Jim muttered.
He nodded in agreement. "Proper sniping and security. No more fucking grifting, no more being kidnapped, no more fucking Holmes brothers..."
"I miss my penthouse," Jim sighed, closing his eyes. "It was laid out so perfectly."
"Mmm... I doubt Ines has let it stay that way, but we'll get it back the way it was," he said calmly.
"What do you estimate is the security risk of staying there, now that another party has taken residence there?" He asked, returning to business talk.
He sensed the shift, and followed it easily. "Minimal, sir, if we contain Ines and her circle. Most of our people will come back to us, then it will just be a matter of restructuring. But if Ines escapes or we notice too many leaks, we can certainly have a relocation strategy in our pocket."
"How much of Adler's leak contained our location? That was something that she had intimate knowledge of," Jim pointed out, a little pointlessly.
"I'm aware, sir. But to be honest, I have no more idea as to the content of that leak than you do. We're going to need to evaluate on the fly."
Jim nodded, falling silent. He needed to start to consider different routes this situation could take. Feelings could wait until things were stable again.
He was quiet for a bit, turning the situation over again as well. "Sir... Do I have your confidence?"
Jim's eyes shifted to Moran. "Yes," he said simply.
He nodded. "Just checking if I needed to hire someone else to restructure the security."
"You have worked with me for the better part of a decade. Every time it looks like you've betrayed me... It's just unlikely by now."
He nodded just a little. "I appreciate that sir," he said quietly. Lapsing back into silence.
Lorna slept for most of the plane ride, and only woke up about an hour or two before landing, which was a truly impressive feat. She noticed something different in the air, but she got the sense that asking would go poorly, so she kept the observation to herself.