Gil awoke suddenly, his head snapping up from where it was lolling his chest. He was no longer on the cot, but a quick once-over confirmed he was just as restrained in the chair. The port in his arm was still there, no longer attached to anything.

"Oh good, you're awake again." Gil's head was yanked back by the hair. Tom grinned gleefully down at him, pulling harder while Gil grit his teeth against the pain. He ran his nails along the exposed neck, 'I wasn't expecting it to be like this." He released Gils hair and spun around to the front of the seat so he could straddle Gil's lap. "You know? I spent so much time building up to this moment, and now you're here." He clawed down Gil's chest, eliciting a sharp intake of air. "And it's so hard to pick where to begin. The possibilities are endless."

"Why? Why are you doing this?"

Tom quirked an eyebrow, looking almost coy as he kept running his hands up and down Gil's chest soothing over the scratches he'd left. "Well I needed to get your attention somehow."

"You have my attention now. Why are you doing this?"

Tom's hands stilled and something ugly flashed across his face, too quick for Gil to identify. "You didn't pick me."

"What?"

"You didn't pick me. And that was fine. I understood. It wasn't personal, you were just doing your job. Swooping in, saving the day, and disappearing again. That was fine, that's what you did. But then you went and picked the Whitly boy." His hands were now clenched painfully hard on Gil's shoulders, nails embedding into the flesh.

"Malcolm?" A spike of fear went through Gil's heart as he thought about Tom going after Malcolm. Malcolm, in some misguided attempt to rescue Gil would probably let Tom capture him and Gil knew he wasn't strong enough to handle what would happen then. "No, don't-"

Tom snarled and smacked Gil across the face. "Don't. It's just you and me here now, that's how it's going to end. Don't go begging for his life now."

Tom got off of Gil's lap and picked up a syringe. "I suppose it is a bit unfair to continue to hold the fact you don't remember our first meeting against you, it was some time ago and I was going by a different last name that day." He inserted the needle into the port and pressed down on the plunger. "Reston."

25 years later and Gil could still remember being powerless to stop that young woman from walking out of the station with her husband. He'd known that the next time he saw her she'd be dead he just hadn't realized how quickly he'd be proven right. "… Amelia."

Tom pulled back sharply. "What?"

"You were Amelia Reston's son." A look of understanding came over his face even as sweat started to prickle at his brow as his body reacted to whatever it was that Tom had injected into him, "I couldn't stop your father from killing her… and that's why. I didn't -" The inside of his skin itched, like there thousands of ants marching under the dermal layer. His hands began to shake.

"Oh no no no," Tom soothed, taking Gil's face in both hands and forcing him to look up into his eyes. "Do you remember that night? You came to my house. Even with that bitch screaming obscenities at you when you dragged away the man that beat her you treated her with such kindness. And then you came and sat with me. Do you remember? You gave me a candy and you told me about how I was strong and brave and how I had done the right thing. I'd never felt safer than in that moment, your hand on my shoulder."

Gil's breath was coming in short gasps now, it felt like the ants had made their way up behind his eyes and they were angry, his hands convulsed helplessly in their bonds. "You wanted me to go somewhere safe but I didn't want to leave my mom just then. She was so angry. But you showed me I was strong. She threw me out. It was time to be brave, like you said I was, so I loosened the brake line on her car so it would fall out as she drove." He grinned, "You should be feeling the Haloperidol now. It causes intense feelings of restlessness, involuntary spasms, hallucinations. Mostly though it just makes everything feel… more. So when I do this-"

He ran a scalpel along Gil's collar bone, slicing neatly though. Gil screamed in agony, it felt like fire across his skin, even the blood that poured from the wound felt like it was boiling as it dripped down. Tom leaned down and lapped at the blood, drawing out another scream. Tom grinned, the blood in his teeth making him look even more deranged. He nuzzled against Gil's neck and enjoyed the feeling of the man convulsing underneath him. Pressing his thumb against the cut elicited a pained groan. "I was already on the train back to boarding school when the line finally fell out and that stupid cow and her stupid husband went off the side of the Hudson." He huffed a laugh. "Of course you would have thought that her death was your fault. Because you're good. Every loss is a personal failure, right?

Gil had let his partner deliver the news to the family, unable to bear the prospect of explaining how he'd let the man he had known would kill Amelia go off to do just that. It was not a solace that he'd had the decency to at least take himself out too. But this confession, his mind was struggling to process it, hazy with the drug in his system and the overwhelming pain. "You killed them."

"I don't think I would have realized I could have if you hadn't reminded me of my own strength. I might have continued to play the victim and I would have thanked them for the privilege." Tom bit down on the crook of Gil's neck, breaking delicate skin. Gil howled in pain. "For five years, you were the most important figure in my life, despite your absence. And then one day I turn on the television and there you were, hand on another little boy's shoulder after vanquishing another monster. Did you give him a candy too? Tell him how brave and strong he was and how he'd done the right thing?"

Gil couldn't answer, his head felt like it was stuffed with cotton and he felt like he was stuck in the moment before a fall, when your stomach swoops and gravity disappears.

"That was fine. That was your job. But then the boy was still there. Long after the job was done. Why was he so special he got to stay and you never sought me out that way? Why was I so forgettable?" Tom sighed. "I was angry at first. My therapist told me I had latched onto you to deal with the loss of a father figure and gave me these exercises to work through the your perceived rejection of me. That Christmas I found it was actually a lot more therapeutic to burn her family home to the ground back in Dayton Ohio. Oh how they screamed."

Tom began cutting neat straight lines across the first cut he'd made on the collar bone. Gil bit his lip to hold back any sounds. His convulsions were lessening, the ants were receding. He mostly felt clammy now and nauseous, though he wasn't sure if the nausea was from the drugs or the story.

"And then the boy was gone. And he was gone for a good long while and just as I was starting to get over you picking him over me he was back. This time working for you officially." Tom stabbed the scalpel into the ball of Gil's shoulder and twisted. No amount of lip biting was going to hold back the sound Gil made this time. "Another man might've lashed out at the boy, or try and replace him. I managed to work through my feelings, and a few more therapists, evaluating what exactly was the relationship I wanted from you and I realized I didn't want what you and Whitly had. You looked at him as a son and he saw you as a father. I want more than that. I want you to look at me like I am your everything because you are mine."

Tom thumbed a tear away from Gil's face, a gentle gesture that contradicted the harsh grinding of the scalpel into his shoulder socket. Gil hadn't realized he was crying. God how many people had died because of him, because he hadn't seen that that young boy 25 years ago desperately needed help. Why hadn't he followed up with the kid? He'd let his frustrations at the limitations of his job keep him from doing everything he could and now at least 20 people were dead. A wave of lightheadedness swept over him, he realized there was a lot more blood coming from the wound on his shoulder than he'd expect, Tom must've cut too deep and nicked an artery.

"You look at me like I'm the enemy right now. And that's ok. That's what we're going to work on. Breaking down those walls that make you you and me me until all that's left is us. What do you say?"

Gil promptly passed out.