Author's Note: I've had this story in mind for almost 2 years and I finally decided to explore it. The line in the Imagine Dragons songs (by the same name) will be used later, because I think it's so very Harry and Ruth. It took me a little while to figure out how to structure this story, so I decided we'll have a few short chapters. Not sure how many; I'm making it up as I go. Please review and let me know your thoughts!
I Bet My Life
It was nearly all Harry could take. He was so ready to resign and sell his house and move to a cottage by the sea and never look back. He wanted to say 'bugger the Home Office' and be rid of all the mess of the world.
Connie's death and her betrayal and the years and years of lies were almost enough to push him over the edge. But Harry Pearce had been betrayed before. Harry Pearce had lost friends before—both to ill ideologies and to death. And he was left standing on the wall.
Safe in his office with its aggressive red wall and its clean glass and chrome lines, Harry knew he should be grateful for Malcolm's quick thinking in directing Lucas to rescue him from being kidnapped by the Russians. He'd nearly not made it, but he was back where he belonged and had barely a scratch. He'd suffered a lot more for a lot less before. Though he was getting a bit old to be knocked about the way he used to. Harry was useful by virtue of his field experience, but he was most useful behind a desk nowadays.
And really, that's why he was still here. He was useful. He was needed. He could do good by standing on the wall and making the difficult choices. Working with Connie despite her treachery had been a difficult choice but the right one. Going to talk to the Russians had been a difficult choice but very much the right one. He'd done a lot of that in his time.
The most difficult, by far, and the one that haunted him every single day since, was Ruth. He'd made the choice to let her sacrifice for him. To let her go. To say goodbye and watch her take his very heart on that boat with her. He'd not felt fully whole since she left. And when he was feeling hopeless and low, like he was now, Harry recalled her sacrifice and her brilliance and her beauty and her kindness. And when he wanted to give up, as he did now, he knew he couldn't. Ruth had given up everything to make sure he could stay in the job and continue to make the difficult choices to do good. And for her, he'd continue doing it.
Harry's wallowing was interrupted just then when a sharp knock came before the door to his office was opened. Malcolm came inside and closed the door behind him, looking very concerned indeed.
"Malcolm? I thought you'd gone?" Harry asked in slight confusion.
"I had. I came back. One of the junior analysts called me."
"What for?"
"A few years ago, I set up a series of alerts. Particular names and legends in the system to be flagged with an instruction to direct it personally to me. One of my alerts popped up on a commercial flight manifest, so Travis called me."
Harry vaguely knew who Travis was, a young transfer from Section A who, if Harry recalled correctly, had a very unfortunate stammer. "What's your alert for?" he asked Malcolm.
"A name. A name I put on the alert as a bit of a stupid longshot, not expecting it to ever come to anything. But when Travis called and told me what the alert had been, I immediately came back to the Grid to check it and to do my own work in verifying it. And I did. It's real."
The obfuscation was more than Harry had the patience for right now. "What's real, Malcolm? What do you need from me?" he asked perhaps more sharply than was warranted.
"The name on my alert is Ruth Pearce."