"Yeah, babe, just give me a minute."

Evie pulled into the parking lot of the mortuary, her phone balancing precariously between her shoulder and her ear. She pushed the door open as she grabbed her purse in the opposite seat, stepping into the chilly morning air in the parking lot. The pavement was dark and slick with water from the morning's showers, a normal occurrence in the city. She paid it no mind—most likely, it would start raining again in a few hours.

The windows of the building were dark, as normal. She saw reflections of the street behind her on the windows, of cars passing by and pedestrians walking alongside them.

"You at work now, baby?"

She nodded silently before unlocking the door and pushing it open with a clink of her keys. "Yeah," she said after a moment, realizing that Henry couldn't see her nod on the other end of the phone. She sighed as she tugged on her white coat over her scrub suit, flicking on the lights as she made her way to her desk.

"Any news of…?" she asked quietly into the phone. Altaïr had left a file on her desk, along with a request to finish off whatever was in it scribbled onto a sticky note in his normal messy handwriting. She flipped through it as she listen to her husband over the phone.

"Nothing huge, just whisperings of what we already know. He's doing something out there, and I don't think he wants to be found, Evie. I'm sorry I couldn't find more. I'll talk to Connor, alright?"

She nodded forlornly before bidding him goodbye ("I love you, you know." "So you say," "Do you doubt me?" he laughs. "I don't know, from the way you look at your dinner, I'm getting suspicious." Another laugh) and, with a sigh, slipped her phone into her pocket before sifting through the pages in the folder Altaïr had left her.

(She loves her husband more than life itself.)

Malik al'Sayf, a coma patient. Anoxic brain injury, hit by a car seven months ago. Seven months? That...was a long time. Why so long before they let him go? Maybe Haytham would know.

She nodded, biting her bottom lip absentmindedly as she scanned through the pages within. Rubbing her forehead in an attempt to focus on her current responsibilities, she turned around and headed towards the storage area.

She froze when she saw the figure huddled besides Altaïr's desk, wrapped in his coat and sitting next to the vent for the heater. Was he naked? She wasn't sure.

"Uhh…" was her response.

The figure tensed up suddenly, before looking up towards her hesitantly. She reached for her phone and started dialing Altaïr's number without taking her eyes off the figure. He looked uncomfortable. Of course he was. Some stranger had just seen him here, of all places, and immediately started calling someone he didn't know without so much as a word exchanged between them.

She pressed her phone to her ear, setting the file down on the desk as she waited for him to pick up.

"What?" he said groggily, once he did. She bit her lip before speaking. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered if she had woken him up. Why had he still been asleep? He rarely slept in, unless Maria had kept him–

She shied away from that train of thought rather forcefully. Probably baby Darim, if she was to be honest. The little devil. "There's someone here. Could you, like, come on over?"

"Who is it?"

"How the hell am I supposed to know who he is? Just come over, okay, you live only a few streets down."

She heard a heavy sigh, followed by shuffling and a quiet click.

"Alright, I'm coming. Should I bring Maria?"

"Yeah, bring Maria, sure, just...hurry up, 'kay?"

"I'm hurryin', just chill." She heard mumblings following that, something along the lines of of all days to have someone break in and lots of hopping about and cursing and a loud Desmond watch the baby. She would have laughed, but the man before her was...well, he was still there and looking very, very confused. She made to hang up, but then decided to ask one more thing of her friend.

"Hey, Altaïr, bring a change of clothes, too, 'kay?"

"What?"

"Bring a change of clothes."

There was a long pause, before a sigh followed by a hefty amount of swearing came through.

"Fine. Bye."

She tucked her phone back into her pocket before crouching down in front of the man and watching him quietly. How did he get here?

"Hey," she said quietly. He kept watching her, and she sighed. After a moment of silence, she stood from where she had crouched.

"My name's Evie. I work here. Mind telling me how you got in?" she said, a hint of impatience creeping into her voice.

The man furrowed his eyebrows and glanced down at the ground, probably trying to collect his thoughts. She sighed and scratched her head.

"My coworker should be here soon. He's bringing a change of clothes for you. When did you last eat?" she asked. He looked fairly skinny, like he hadn't eaten for some time. He was clean, though, not like the homeless in the area.

She fished an apple she had been saving for lunch out of her purse and handed it to him after wiping it down with her sleeve. He took it from her outstretched hand hesitantly before curling back into his ball under Altaïr's jacket. She sighed and turned back towards the file she had set down, chewing her bottom lip as she read through it once again. She might as well do what Altaïr had left the day before. She still had about ten minutes before he got here, anyways.

"Don't touch anything," she instructed the man as she turned to leave. He nodded silently, clearly confused by his situation. She didn't blame him, honestly.

The hall echoed with her footsteps as she walked towards the refrigeration rooms, armed with a pen and a manila folder. What she found awaiting her in said room was more than a surprise.

The door was slightly ajar when she reached it. Rolls of gauze were scattered across the room, some half unwound and others completely so. There were papers scattered everywhere, and one of the carts holding medical equipment was toppled on its side. One of the cabinets above the sinks was open as well, and several plastic baggies were spilled out. And one of the units was left open. She double checked the papers, just to make sure. Yep, the same one Altaïr had put this Malik dude into.

A thought suddenly occurred to her, right then, but she pushed it away under the premise of insanity. He had been sent from the hospitals, and they always made certain their patients were dead before sending them in. Unless…?

She stepped off that train before she ended up in Conspiracy Land as she began to clean up the mess left in the room. She had a job to do, and that came first before anything else.

Except maybe her husband.

And Jacob.

Her phone rang.

Her lips pressed thin at the number. Not one she knew, but she knew who was calling. She answered it.

~o:O:o~

Shay was already there when Altaïr walked through the door. He looked to be fairly composed, but not enough so to come off as meticulous, as per usual. He glanced up when Altaïr strode in, with his bag slung over his shoulder casually. Shay jerked a finger towards the other man's desk, in a wordless response to Altaïr's unasked question. He silently appreciated the other man's quiet nature (at least, when at work—Evie had told him of times he had been more...rambunctious) as he himself did not enjoy talk. He paid him no more of a mind than usual.

Maria trailed in after him, looking clean and composed as always. How she had managed in the ten minutes' notice, he did not know. Another mystery he had yet to discover for his own use, for sure. She directed him towards a huddled lump in the corner beside his desk, and he didn't bother murmuring an offhand comment about already heading there in the first place. Shay appeared to be absorbed in his paperwork. Whether that was a good or bad thing, Altaïr had yet to decide.

He froze when he saw the figure, his knees pulled up to his chest and holding a jacket—Altaïr's jacket, the one he always left at his desk—to himself. Wasn't that…?

He let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding rather pensively. "Shay," he said quietly.

The other man grunted in response, scribbling down some quick characters on a sticky note as he did so.

"Could you get this guy dressed? I need to talk to Evie," he said, handing the bag of spare clothes to the other man. Evie and the hospital, that was—why in the world would they be sending over a living man?

Altaïr considered him to be lucky; if he—Malik—hadn't gotten out of those freezers quickly, he would have soon frozen to death. Yes, he would have words with the hospital. Lots of words.

Maria crouched down next to the man—no, he had a name—next to Malik, exchanging a few quiet words with him. She offered him a drink out of a fresh bottle of water she had dug out of her purse, which he accepted with mumbled thanks. His words sounded slurred, if Altaïr heard him correctly.

Slightly concerning. Perhaps he should get him checked in with Aveline.

Shay hovered quietly in the background, his large stature almost intimidating in the slightly dimmer lighting of his corner. He gestured for Malik to follow him to the restrooms, probably to dress him as Altaïr had requested. Shay had to catch the man as he tried to rise, however. Al'Sayf wasn't strong enough to support his own weight, then. Unsurprising; he had been in a coma for half a year, after all. Supposedly. Were his papers to be trusted at all, in this situation? Altaïr wasn't sure.

It bothered him.

Maria turned towards him after the two men left. "You should go talk to Evie about what happened." Not a suggestion, that. There was a silent steel to her voice. Altaïr nodded.

"I'll go do that."

She smiled and pecked his cheek before slipping behind his desk and picking up a few medical papers. She swatted them at him when he didn't leave immediately.

Evie was in the back room, scrubbing at her hands rigorously and her hair beginning to fall out of her usual bun. Her mouth screwed slightly as he approached. She wasn't okay.

"You okay?" he asked. There was no way she was okay.

"No," she replied briskly before turning the faucet off rather forcefully and taking a deep breath to calm herself. Yeah, she definitely wasn't okay.

"What happened?" he asked, gesturing vaguely towards the mess of medical supplies and instruments littering the floors and counters and everywhere, really.

She let out a frustrated groan before her head fell into her still-wet hands, clearly not wanting to explain.

"The guy," she said after a moment of silence devoid of groaning. He stared at her flatly.

"The guy," he drawled.

"The guy," she repeated. "Al'Sayf. What is he doing here?"

"That is, in fact, a question I was hoping I could find an answer to soon enough."

She huffed at a stray strand of hair rather irritably.

"-And before you ask, he came in the same way all the others come in," he added.

"On a gurney."

"Dead and on a gurney, yes. Supposedly."

"Why didn't you check if he was dead?"

Now it was his turn to huff. "That's the hospital's job. Besides, he's been a coma patient for half a year. Half a year, 'Vie. They let him off when he wouldn't wake up, gave him the meds and everything. Supposedly. I don't know why the hell he's alive."

She started at him blankly. "Supposedly."

"Supposedly, yes. Because he was supposedly dead when he got here."

She closed her eyes for a moment, her lips pressed together once again. She ran her somewhat-more-than-damp-hands through her hair as she pulled it out of its bun. She wasn't normally this exasperated with anything. Granted, they didn't normally receive living men into a place meant for the dead. But still.

"Jacob?" he asked her. She nodded slowly.

"Just called. Said he needed me to help him with something, something important, but never said what."

Ah.

She continued. "He called from a payphone in Kent. He sounded hurt. Again."

She had procured a small mass of bobby pins from her hair, now damp and hanging limply around her head. A fist clenched the pile tightly, unaware of its actions.

"Any guesses on what he needed?" he asked. Most likely research on something illegal or immoral—the past few years hadn't exactly helped Altaïr's view of the younger of the twins.

She laughed, a dry and humorless thing. "Probably information about father and his associates again. He's taken quite the interest in him, so it seems. I would be suspicious, but…"

He waved her aside before she could finish. "You've been busy. And stressed. Don't worry about this Al'Sayf fiasco, I'll handle it. You get home and rest."

She arched an eyebrow at his last statement. Oh, he knew. She couldn't hide much from him.

"Did Maria tell–"

"About your little situation? Maybe she did. Maybe she didn't, though, and I just happened to notice your sudden dislike of your yogurt that you ate almost religiously before, or your newfound love of cheap chinese food. Whatever the case, I do know, and I know enough to tell you to get out of here before I ask Maria and Shay to do so themselves."

"Maria w–"

"–ould agree with me, unless you've already forgotten of our own sharir saghir at home."

She glared daggers at him.

He smiled.

Oh, yes, he knew about the baby.

~o:O:o~

oho yes more stuff

jacob is important in this fic, just fyi, as are a number of other not-mentioned-often characters so far

guess who we'll be seeing next?

thats right prepare for jacob shenanigans and maybe desmond too probably

also i think these chapters will stay around 2-2.5k words so ican write in between wltla updates but yeah