Two months later.
Cyrus burst into the oval office, finding himself slightly out of breath even though he only ran 20 feet.
"Fitz, come now. Come now. Come right, right now."
Fitz turned around from staring through the window which had been his habit as of late.
"What is it?"
"We have a new report, I think it might be her."
Cyrus motioned for Fitz to follow him and then ran out. Fitz followed behind him, not exactly enthusiastic because after two months every time he got his hopes up about someone reporting that they might have found her, he always ended up disappointed; within seconds he was in the situation room.
"What's going on?"
His national security advisor began speaking.
"Sir, we have an undercover CIA agent working for Sa'ed Farrokh, the wealthy Iranian mobster-"
"And" Fitz interjected.
"He's been working his way to the inner circle and he got some intel saying Farrokh has an american female scientist being held prisoner at his Yazd facility. "
"Was he able to id her as Olivia Pope?"
"No sir that is what we are waiting for. This report was sent in a few weeks ago but I wanted to make sure we had the right person before bringing it to your attention," his security advisor answered.
"So what are we waiting for now?" Fitz asked.
"Confirmation sir, we can't risk blowing his cover but he was trying to confirm her identity. He was on duty last night at the facility, we are waiting now on word from him about whether he was able to gather any more information on her."
"When do you expect that will be?"
"It can be at any moment sir, once it is secure to brief us he will send some information our way."
"Okay, let me know the moment you hear something."
"Yes sir."
Fitz turned to head back to the Oval Office but before he stepped out the door one of the analyst called him.
"Wait?" one of the analyst called out.
Fitz turned back around.
"He just sent something through the channel."
The analyst squinted as he looked at his screen.
Fitz's heart began to race..
"Sir he says-"
Fitz could see the analyst making sense of the message as he read it, he figured it must've been in code.
"He says-"
"What? What did he say?" Fitz asked anxiously.
"He says it's her, he says he was able to make a positive id, he says she has brown and black curly hair, brown skin, high cheekbones - just like the picture."
"That's her!"
"He says you will need to organize a rescue attempt now because they are planning an execution in 54 hours."
"Execution? Why now?" Fitz asked.
"He didn't specify any reason sir."
"Can you pull up the compound on the satellite?"
"Yes sir, we have the coordinates, I'm pulling it up now," one of the state department workers said.
Fitz took a breath and sat in his chair. Within a few moments the images of the compound were on the screen. The house was a fortress, it was heavily guarded and he realized that one seal team wouldn't be enough to get her back so he decided to bring in reinforcements.
"Get centcom on the line now, I want task force blue briefed and prepped for deployment before the moon reaches its apex in Yazd, also get me the Iraq defense secretary."
Within moments Fitz was on the phone with various heads of state from Afghanistan, Yemen and Iraq gathering members of their special force teams to aid his seal team members in the mission. They weren't exactly allies but they often joined forces on security issues. They only had a five hour window to prepare and carry out the rescue, in which time they transported all the foreign special forces to the navy base to rendezvous with the seal team members and planned the entire mission; everything from entrance and exit strategies to which seal members would be fighting and who would be spearheading Olivia's rescue.
By the time it was 10pm in Yazd, the seal team was just a few miles outside of the facility in a CH-47F Chinook, the fastest helicopter in the world, followed by the Yemeni, Iraqi and Afghanistan forces. As they neared landing, the captain began speaking to his men.
"Alright boys, our goal is to get Ms. Pope out of there safe and sound and capture that son of a bitch Farrokh dead or alive, those are the orders from our commander-in-chief, there is a lot of firepower down there, watch your back, watch each other's back, so that all of us can leave here tonight to see another day."
They all huddled together and turned their body cameras on so that Fitz and the defense secretaries and advisors could see the mission in real-time as they waited to descend the helicopter.
Once they were on the ground, they made their way into the facility, the snipers who were in place took out armed guards on by one. As the shots rang out and their presence became known, a firefight ensued. Two of the soldiers who were tasked specifically with finding Olivia immediately headed to the house.
Fitz watched as they made their way through the house in search of an entrance to the basement where the CIA agent reported she was being kept. They came under fire from guards multiple times but each time they managed to defend themselves and kept moving forward.
Once they got to the basement, it seemed less like a house and more like a well-funded prison. There was a long white hallway with a white metal door at the end as the CIA agent had noted. They quickly ran down to the end of the hall and tried to pry the door open but it was locked. The captain fired at the lock until the structural integrity was compromised enough to allow the lock to be pulled off. Before they entered the room, they called Olivia's name.
"Ms. Pope?" the captain called.
There was no answer.
The other soldier peeked into the room quickly and upon realizing she was alone, he entered.
Everything in the room was a blinding white. Fitz saw Olivia laying on the floor shivering uncontrollably. Once the captain was close enough for Fitz to actually see her face, he felt numb.
She was dressed in white, her hair was wild and curly and spread out all over the floor. Her face was pale, under her eyes were dark as if she hadn't slept in months, her cheeks were hollow and he lips were a bluish color.
The soldier stooped down beside her.
"Ms. Pope?"
She didn't respond, she just stared at him blankly, as if she was in a fugue state.
"Ms. Pope?"
"Is she alive?" the other soldier who was keeping watch asked.
"Barely" the captain answered.
He scooped her up and headed quickly to the door.
"It's freezing in here, let's go."
As they walked down the long hallway, two Iranian militants appeared from the entrance and opened fire.
"Cover her, cover her."
The captain shielded Olivia as the other soldier fired on the two Iranians, killing them both. They ran quickly up the stairs, through the house and out into the yard to find most of the militants dead and his soldiers gathering all the live ones to be taken prisoner.
"Did you get Farrokh?" the captain asked.
"Yes, sir, alive," one of his officers answered.
"It's time to roll out boys,"
"More come!" one of the Yemeni soldiers screamed.
The gate entrance became flooded with insurgents fighters who opened fire immediately.
"Whiskey Tango Foxtrot - where did they come from?"
"Get out of there now!" Fitz ordered.
"Yes sir," the captain replied.
They began throwing grenades in the direction of the fighters as they ran for cover. Along with the work of the snipers, they managed to clear the path to the helicopter.
"Standby for the package," the captain said to the medical helicopter that was waiting by the chinook.
Once Olivia was safely in the helicopter it took off, the soldiers stayed back for a couple of minutes to round-up Farrokh and his other associates dead and alive to make sure everyone was accounted for and then they headed out.
Everyone in the situation room began cheering the successful mission, everyone except Fitz.
"We got Farrokh! One of the biggest arms dealers in the Middle East, we got him," his defense secretary screamed.
Fitz waited for them to calm down before he began.
"What is the status of Dr. Pope?"
"She is en route to the navy base, they haven't given us any updates as of yet sir," one of the analyst answered.
"Anything happens and I want to know immediately and as soon as she's able, I want her on a plane, stateside."
"Yes sir."
"Good job ladies and gentlemen, good job, once those men are settled I want to thank them personally."
"Yes, Mr. President," his defense secretary answered.
Fitz went back to the oval to compose himself, Cyrus walked in seconds later. He found him pacing slowly by the window.
"I thought you'd be happy that- you got her back, after months of raids and reports, after months of you walking around like a goddamn zombie-"
"Did you see how she was shivering? She looked- I should have found her months ago."
"You did everything in your power to find her, the important thing is that she didn't die, she'll be back here soon and then you can go back to being a normal and productive human being."
"She's gonna hate me once she finds out what Gerry did, and that's if she doesn't know already and doesn't already hate me- how am I supposed to face her-"
"Calm down Fitz, just calm down and take a breath okay. Gerry died a month ago, so you don't have to lead with that, you don't even have to tell her if she doesn't know, you don't know what kind of state of mind she's gonna be in, maybe telling her wont do her any good."
"I'm not gonna lie to her and I'm not gonna be able to look at her, knowing what Gerry did to her."
Cyrus sighed.
"I understand that you feel guilty about what Gerry did but that can't be the first thing you say to her."
"I know, I know, I just can't believe we finally found her - thank you by the way."
"For what?" Cyrus asked.
"For helping me, you said you would help me and you did so... thank you."
Cyrus walked over and patted him on his shoulder.
"Ehh, what are friends for."
Fitz smiled half heartedly.
"Why don't you call her family and let them know you found her," Cyrus suggested.
"She doesn't have any family, well… she has a father but they weren't close."
"Yeah but I can't imagine her father not wanting to know his daughter is alive."
"Me either but he hasn't reached out to anyone to know if she's okay or not, if he did, I would have known, all her friends did."
"So call her friends."
"I will, I'm going to, I just want- I need to make sure she's alright first and then I'll let them know."
"Okay, well I'm gonna head back to me office to try to get some work done are you going to be okay if I leave you here?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine."
Fitz waited in the oval for just over an hour until one of the state department workers came to get him.
"Sir, we just spoke with the doctors and they want to transfer her on a military med plane to the US, they gave her a shot of adrenaline and they also gave her oxygen but they don't have all the equipment they need."
"Why does she need adrenaline and oxygen?"
"Sir, they said she had a very low blood pressure and that she wasn't breathing sufficiently."
Fitz became a little worried but tried to calm himself.
"Okay, tell them to take to her Andrews base and then airlift her to James Madison. If anything else comes up I expect you to come and tell me personally."
"Yes sir."
The next day.
Fitz waited impatiently in the hospital waiting room. She arrived early morning and now it was almost two in the afternoon and the doctors were still treating her and running tests. Fitz called Abby early in the morning and she drove four hours from New York with Harrison and Huck and had arrived shortly after noon. Fitz met Harrison on his second visit to see Abby after she was brought back to the states, he'd never met Huck before and Olivia never mentioned him either. When he met Abby for the first time, he felt like he practically knew her because Olivia talked so much about her, same with Harrison.
After waiting for another half hour Stephen finally emerged.
"Stephen what's going on?" Abby asked.
"Normally only family can visit if the patient hasn't given permission for non related visitors but I managed to convince them to break protocol since Olivia doesn't really have any family and also they didn't want to say no to the president."
"So we can see her now?" Fitz asked.
"Yes, I'll take you guys to her room, follow me," Stephen said.
They all followed Stephen to Olivia's room that was down the hall. Fitz froze when he walked into the room and saw Olivia.
"Why is she hooked up to a ventilator? What's going on?" Fitz asked frantically.
"She's not breathing sufficiently," Stephen answered.
"Why?" Abby asked.
"Can you tell me what's going on, the army doctors weren't exactly forthcoming," Fitz demanded.
"She has pneumonia and acute respiratory depression syndrome, we found a substantial amount of water in her lungs, that coupled with the cold environment she was kept in didn't do any favors for her lungs."
"Why is there water in her lungs?" Abby asked.
Stephen was hesitant to answer their questions.
"Stephen," Harrison scolded.
"Do we need to get another doctor in here?" Fitz asked.
"Stephen tell us!" Abby half-screamed.
"I can't share anything until she wakes up and gives me the okay."
"Stephen, Olivia is lying there on a ventilator, you better tell us what's going on right now."
Stephen threw his hands up emphatically.
"She's been tortured okay! They waterboarded her, that's why there was water in her lungs, she had bruises on her ribs, legs and arms from here they held her down and beat her. She has three broken ribs that haven't healed properly and they've barely been feeding her, she's suffering from severe malnutrition, if she had been there a couple more weeks her organs would've shut down and that just physically, we have no idea what's going on in her head or how bad the mental damage is."
"They've been torturing her?" Fitz asked as if he didn't want to believe it.
When he saw her on the ground in the white room, he knew it but he had been telling himself that it wasn't true.
"Yes but we won't know to what extent until she wakes up."
"So you haven't spoken to her?" Fitz asked.
"No but the army doctor that flew over with her deals with these kind of cases all the time and he was able to confirm it."
"When will she wake up?" Fitz asked.
"We can't be sure as yet, the medicine she's on will keep her sleeping for a while and that's good because her body needs a lot of rest and time to recover, for now we're just replenishing her strength by giving her a food drip."
"Thank you Dr. Finch," Fitz said sincerely.
Stephen nodded politely in response.
"You're welcome Mr. President,"
Stephen turned to Abby, Huck and Harrison.
"Don't touch her or I'll kick you guys out," he half-joked.
"Thanks Steph," said Abby.
Fitz waited patiently until visitation was over and Abby, Harrison and Huck had to leave. He'd been pretending to work while her friends were around but really, all he could think about was Olivia. Stephen was annoyed that he wasn't abiding by the visitation hours but there was nothing he could do about it so he gave up and left.
Once he was alone with Olivia, he walked over and sat on the chair beside her bed. Her took her hand in his and held it against his cheek. Her fingers were bony and felt frail against his skin. He laid his head on the edge of her bed and closed his eyes, he couldn't control the guilt and grief he felt over what happened to her.
"I'm so sorry, I promise I'll never let anything happen to you ever again, no one will hurt you ever again. I'm so glad you're home I think I was gonna lose my mind if you were away any longer."
Fitz sat by her bed the entire night and in the morning he gave her a kiss on the forehead and left, reluctantly. He didn't want to share his time with her so he stayed with her at nights when Abby, Harrison and Huck had to leave.
He actually quite enjoyed his time with her at nights, after missing her for so long, it felt good to just sit beside her and listen to her breathe and watch her sleep while he did his work. After five days in the hospital, the dark circle under her eyes were vanishing and she didn't look as pale as before.
As the minutes, hours and days went by, her breathing dramatically improved; enough that after a week, her doctors took her off the ventilator and then it was just about waiting for her medication to wear off so that she could wake up.