A/N: Hey all. Here's the penultimate chapter, and the longest one yet. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: CBS owns Scorpion.
Chapter 15: The Rabbit Hole
It was the perfect sunset. All of the clouds were in just the right place, and their purple and orange tinges crossed the sky above the glistening ocean. The water itself was supremely peaceful, its surface undisturbed by the gentle breeze that kissed Walter's skin. And it was blissfully silent, as though he were sitting inside a photograph.
That was the thing about nature: It was always there, always beautiful, and always quiet, in its particular way. Even the chattiest army of crickets or the loudest clap of thunder couldn't disturb the consciousness the way that an emergency siren or a sputtering lawnmower could. Nature, even when it didn't seem calm at all, still carried an inherent calmness simply for being what it was: natural. Even when Walter didn't have the patience to enjoy it, which was often, he never failed to admire it.
And the other great thing about nature was that there never any risk of it admiring him back. Nature was mercifully nonchalant, and never gripped by the raging storms of emotion that brought out the best and worst of humanity. Even the most stoic people could never match the perfect apathy of nature. It would never love him nor hate him, never yell at him, never laugh nor cry because of his actions. It would just always be there.
Tonight, nature was on its best behavior. As the golden light faded from the sky, giving way to the pale indigo of the early evening, he shut his eyes and slowly breathed in the air. He breathed as gently as he could, unwilling to spoil the perfect vision that he was sitting inside in any way.
Then the noise of an engine cut across the breeze, and he winced. He looked over as the truck passed, the driver unaware of the moment that she was ruining. A short trail of black fumes rose from the back of the truck to dissipate in the air above, leaving behind its foul stench and problematic carbon molecules.
Once the truck was gone from sight and earshot, Walter sighed and tried to forget about its intrusive existence, but two cars were now coming from the opposite direction. Frowning, he gave up and stood, turning to his own car, which waited silently on the side of the road.
Technology was calling to him again, and the identity of the unknown hacker still loomed as a large shadow over his attempts at peaceful thoughts. This last mystery still had to be solved, and the damage cleansed.
Then what?
Walking over to his car, he placed his fingers on the hood. He had used technology to create the structure for his entire life. With a keyboard beneath his hands, the ones and zeros that were the building blocks of modern society became an extension of his own nervous system. He could manipulate them any way he wanted to, do anything at all. He was a man without limitations.
And the man he had once been had thrived on that fact. He had been a man without strings, without attachments. He had poured his desires out into cyberspace, plucking whatever he wanted from it. Scorpion had given him a cause, but he had never felt truly bound to it until that day that he met a boy playing chess with condiments in a diner.
And then everything changed. Over the subsequent years, a new man arose within, struggling with and slowly overwhelming his former self. Occasionally, Walter had felt that he wasn't either of the two men, and that he was observing the internal conflict from outside, from a ringside seat on the very edge of his expansive mind. Other times, he had been both of them at once, with conflicting impulses crashing into each other as he stared into the eyes of the woman that he was falling in love with.
Finally, on the night of Toby and Happy's wedding, the new man stood victorious. He was a man that knew love, that understood and accepted his emotions, that was willing to reach out and touch other humans, and be touched in return. His former self was left in the shadows, only being called upon in moments that required compassion to be cast aside in order to most efficiently solve a crisis. The arrangement remained stable even as new and horrific emotions like heartbreak and anger were discovered, because he liked whom he had become. Even through the sadness of the previous summer, he still appreciated his newfound ability to understand and accept the emotions that affected him.
But the new man had proven to be dangerous. Lethally dangerous. He felt too much emotion, and it had exploded outward, taking Mark's life and destroying Anna's.
So, the new man had to be subdued, cast into the recesses where his former self had sat quietly. And Walter believed that, as long as he stayed away from the people that the new man had come to care so deeply about, the new man would sit just as quietly as the old one had.
But maybe technology wouldn't provide the full answer, like it had for his old self. Maybe he wouldn't build his whole life just out of cyberspace like he once had. He turned and looked out at the ocean again. Perhaps nature would help, providing a quiet and safe place where the new man could awaken and feel all of his emotions again, well away from anyone that he might hurt.
But first…
Getting back into his car, he turned on the engine and listened to it hum for a moment. He could make it to Sausalito if he drove late into the night. But perhaps he would stop somewhere for the night, and continue on in the morning. He didn't feel as eager to reach Phantom's house as he had earlier. He needed some time to savor his newfound freedom, to enjoy the distance that he had put between himself and anything that would cause him to feel pain or rage.
Pain and rage. He hadn't thought about the sounds of those two words until now, and the sound that they made when they were squashed together.
Deciding, he drove only as far as Monterey, and stopped at a small, mid-budget hotel. The interior of the lobby was a deep blue color, like the sea at night, and the patterns on the mahogany desk hinted at waves. There was a clear theme here.
"Welcome," said the elderly woman behind the desk, giving him a kind smile.
"Hi. Do you have any rooms available?"
"We certainly do."
He handed her his credit card, then looked around. There was a black-and-white picture on the wall of a man in a naval uniform. Beside it was an even older picture, also featuring a man in uniform.
"My husband's from a long line of sailors. Now he's in the navy, along with our two older sons."
Walter nodded and looked back at her as she returned the card and the key to the room. "Not all of your sons joined?"
"No, my youngest is the rebel in the family. You'll find him right in there, working at the bar." She nodded towards a large doorway in the side of the lobby, through which a restaurant could be seen. "To be honest, I'm hardly beat up about it. He's out of danger."
Walter peered into the restaurant. He should probably eat something. "Do they have seafood in there?"
"Well of course. Uniforms or no uniforms, the sea is still our home."
Walter entered the restaurant. There weren't any free tables, but there was space at the bar. Leaning his suitcase against one of the stools, he sat down.
The young man behind the bar looked like his mother. He was talking to a woman a couple of seats away, and seemed much more interested in the conversation than she did.
"Um, excuse me."
He looked up, frowning at the interruption, then made his way over. "Can I help you?"
"Could I have some fermented fish, please?"
"Ferme… For real?"
"Yes."
"How about I get you a menu and you order something off of it?"
"Okay." The man walked away, and Walter turned to the woman. "I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation."
"Don't worry about it. He wasn't getting what he wanted, anyway. A little young for my taste."
The man came back with the menu and a look of frustration, and Walter could tell that he had heard the woman's words. He had a feeling the woman had intentionally spoken loudly enough for him to hear. After depositing the menu in front of Walter, he walked over to the far end of the bar, speaking with some other patrons.
"I'm Katie," said the woman.
"Walter."
"Pleased to meet you."
"You too." Walter looked down at the menu, not extremely keen to talk to the woman. The fact that her dark hair was reminding him of Paige wasn't helping matters.
"You look like you're on a much-needed vacation from something, or someone. Perhaps permanently?"
He looked back at her. "What makes you say that?"
"Your minimalist responses and immediate show of disinterest. That suggests that you're either a taken man, and an honorable one at that, or you're recently single, and the wound is still fresh. But your demeanor tells me that you're leaving something behind." She gave a small shrug. "But, it takes one to know one, I guess."
Her left thumb absently rubbed the base of her ring finger, and Walter noticed a tan line there. "You're recently divorced?"
"Yes." She lifted her drink to take a sip.
"He cheated on you?"
She raised her eyebrows, and put the drink back down. Then her eyebrows lowered again. "It was the emphasis on the word 'honorable' before, I guess."
"Yes. It suggested that you've previously interacted with men that weren't honorable."
She gave a small laugh. "Previously interacted? Yeah, you could put it that way."
Walter looked back down at the menu again, quickly scanning his options.
"But you look more beat up than I do. She must have hurt you really badly."
He looked beat up? "No, she didn't."
The woman didn't say anything for a moment, but he could feel her watching him. "I understand. Sometimes it's no one's fault. Things just don't fall into place the right way."
No, she most certainly did not understand. Walter made his decision and looked back over at the bartender, who was remaining at the far end of the bar.
"Well, take it from someone who's taken more than one trip down the wrong aisle: Things get better. If I've learned one thing, it's that love is as malleable as any other emotion, regardless of what those poets and teen-girl romance writers out there want to tell you. Anyone can fall in love more than once, and the next person could just be waiting around the next corner."
Walter didn't find her philosophy appealing. As keen as he was to avoid any emotions at the moment, he still wanted to believe in true love. The fact that he had destroyed his own chance at it didn't mean it couldn't exist for everyone else.
Perhaps the old him hadn't retaken control after all.
The bartender was still standing at the far end of the bar. "Excuse me," Walter called. The man looked at him, looking annoyed, and Walter waved the menu. Reluctantly, the man walked over, and Walter tersely placed his order.
"He certainly holds a grudge, doesn't he?" said Katie after the bartender had walked away again.
Walter didn't think he would enjoy working in a bar at a hotel run by his mother. Perhaps he could understand the man's frustration.
"So, what do you do?"
"I… I fix computer issues."
"Really?"
"What about you?"
"I suppose you could say I create computer issues."
He looked at her again. "You're a hacker?"
"No." She gave another small laugh. "I design software."
"I see." He looked down at the bar for a moment, then back at her. "Hey, has your software been affected at all by a virus that's been going around this summer, striking at random?"
She shook her head. "No. But there are plenty of viruses out there to worry about."
"There's been one particularly sophisticated one this summer."
She shrugged. "I haven't heard anything about it."
He nodded, looking down again. He hadn't met her until just now, so there was no reason why she should be targeted. And apparently she wasn't one of the random victims that Ralph had found.
He quickly looked around for any cameras, not seeing any. And his phone was deep in his pocket, and shouldn't be able to pick up the conversation. There wasn't any way for the mystery hacker to find out about this conversation, so Katie would be safe.
"Well, I should probably call it a night. My son's asleep upstairs."
"You have a son?"
"Yes. The only good thing to come out of either of my marriages, except perhaps a few life lessons." She stood and walked over to him, then gently reached for his arm. He immediately pulled away. "Listen, Walter, I know a fellow bruised soul when I see one. Take this." She placed a torn piece of paper in his hand, and Walter saw a phone number on it. "Give me a call if you want to talk. Or anything. It was great to meet you."
She left the restaurant, and Walter looked down at the phone number. He spun the paper in his fingers for a moment, then placed it in his pocket.
He stood where he had been sitting earlier, watching the sunset again. Now, however, it was frozen in the sky at its most beautiful moment, every bit the photograph that it had seemed for a few lovely seconds in reality.
She stood a little ways in front of him, and he couldn't see her face. "Hey," he called.
She turned. It was Paige. The hair really was very similar. "Hi, Walter."
"Uh… hi."
She gave a small smile and walked over to him. As she approached, her clothes transformed from the ones that Katie had been wearing earlier into the black dress that his subconsciousness clearly loved. "It's okay, you don't have to worry about it. You thought about another woman for all of a few minutes. It happens to everyone."
"I… um… There were a few things about her that reminded me of you."
"Well, I would hope so. I think a lot of the people you meet are going to remind you of me in some way. We've spent so much time together that there's quite a lot for you to remember and associate with me."
"Yeah. It's going to be difficult."
"It will get easier." She placed her hand just above his elbow, then slowly ran it upward towards his shoulder. "I miss you."
He allowed the contact, enjoying the feel of her hand on his skin. "I miss you, too."
"I know why you had to leave." Her hand climbed up to his neck, her thumb reaching his jawbone. "It's okay."
He shut his eyes, feeling the heat pulse from her hand. His cheek tingled as her thumb moved slowly and gently across it. He sensed her move closer still, her breath reaching the front of his neck.
"I'm always going to love you," she said quietly, kissing his chin, just below his mouth.
"I'm always going to love you, too." He looked away from her. The frozen sunset was getting brighter. Then it began moving backwards, climbing back into the sky.
He woke up, and looked towards the window. The indigo twilight was fleeing across the sea as the sun chased it away.
Getting out of bed, he entered the small bathroom and looked in the mirror. It had only been a dream, but his cheek still tingled from the feel of her touch.
He shut his eyes, realizing that even though they hadn't gotten back together, this separation was going to be more difficult than the previous one. This time, it had been unilaterally his own decision. The fatal error had been his alone. There wasn't anything for him to get angry about, nothing for him to try to construe against her in order to forgive his own transgressions. Neither she nor anyone else had any fault here. Only he did.
But if he kept reminding himself of why he had to leave, he would be fine.
Phantom's house felt larger when it was just him approaching than it had when he was with the team. Perhaps it was the vastness of the house compared to his small studio, or perhaps it was just the lack of allies by his side as he entered this next stage of the pursuit of the mystery hacker.
He knocked on the door, and Phantom answered. "Walter? What are you doing here?"
"Hi." Walter hesitated. He wasn't sure how much to explain all at once. "I think you can help me."
"You have other people to help you. Where is the rest of Scorpion?"
"In LA."
Phantom looked at him with raised eyebrows for a moment. "Come in." He stepped aside to allow Walter to enter.
The inside still smelled as stale as it had the last time, and the place was still messy. Walter immediately decided that he would stay only for as long as was necessary to track down the hacker.
There was an old couch on the side of the room behind Phantom's desk chair, and Walter sat down on it unbidden. He looked around for a moment, once again taking a trip down memory lane to the unpleasant destinations of his early twenties.
"You seem a little off," said Phantom, sitting in his chair. "If you don't mind me saying so."
"I do mind it, but you already said it."
"Why did you come alone?"
Walter sighed. "I'd rather not get into that immediately. Are you still following Collins's virus?"
"Uh, not as diligently as I was before I told you about it. It felt like I had done my part."
"It's being updated. Manually. We need to find out who's doing that."
Phantom made a face. "You need my help with that?"
"Do you have better things to do?"
"No, I don't." He swiveled towards his computer and began typing.
Walter covered his face with his hands, willing the memories of life before Scorpion to leave him alone. It would be easier if the smell weren't so strong. "Do you ever open a window in here?"
"If it's too hot. I think it's fine right now."
He must have grown immune to the odor and stuffiness that were assaulting Walter's senses.
"I'm running a program to highlight all the variations in the code, so we can see what they might tell us." Phantom swiveled back to Walter. "In the meantime, maybe you can tell me what's going on."
"I told you what's going on."
"I mean with you. You're clearly messed up right now, man."
"I said I don't want to get into that right now."
"Alright." Phantom fell silent. Walter expected him to swivel back towards his computer, but instead he stared off into space.
Walter waited, thinking that he was looking for something else to say. Eventually, Phantom gave a small laugh. "What?"
"Huh?" Phantom looked back at him. "Oh, nothing. A lot goes on in my head." He casually gestured towards his head and then swiveled back towards his computer.
Walter raised his eyebrows, then looked around. "Where's the bathroom?"
Phantom pointed. "Down the hall on the left."
Walter got up and entered the hallway, looking around. There was a kitchen on the right, and he stepped inside it, finding the air more breathable. He leaned against the wall, shutting his eyes and sucking in as much air at once as he could.
This was a bad idea. He had expected Phantom to be more diligent about tracking the virus, but apparently Phantom had thought that his only role was to bring the virus to Scorpion's attention. And now Walter was waiting here, in this smelly, stuffy house that was probably the house that Phantom grew up in.
However, Phantom was clearly an accomplished hacker, and he could help Walter track down the assailant more efficiently than anyone other than Ralph.
Walter opened his eyes again and looked around, not eager to return to the other room. It was a fairly spacious kitchen, with lighter décor and a much more hospitable atmosphere. He went over to the window. Four young boys were playing soccer in the next yard over.
He watched them for a moment. It all felt extremely suburban, a neighborhood for families where children could grow up away from the perils of the city. It was the kind of neighborhood that parents moved into when their children were young and then departed when those children had moved on to their own lives.
Where were Phantom's parents?
One of the children kicked a goal and cheered, then turned to his friends. Walter felt a sharp pang of jealousy, and flashed back to sitting at his computer and looking out his window between projects, watching as his peers took part in athletic competitions. At the time, he had primarily felt disdain for it, as he had no interest in athletics. Now, however, he understood that such games among friends were more about being with those friends than about the athletics involved.
And, of course, now he had friends to miss spending time with.
He didn't know how long he spent standing at the window there, but eventually he became aware that Phantom was leaning against the wall behind him, his arms crossed. Walter turned to him, ready to apologize for trespassing in the kitchen, but Phantom didn't say anything about it.
"Ada told me what happened."
"You communicated with her?"
Phantom nodded. "It's easy. She's always close to her computer. I didn't tell her you were here, only that I was aware you had left your team behind in LA."
"And she told you everything?" Walter was a little annoyed. His friends should be able to keep his secrets.
"I told her I could help you, and that I wouldn't tell anyone. I won't, by the way."
Still, Walter was bothered that Ada had been so quick to trust Phantom. Then again, so had Walter.
"It sucks, doesn't it?" Phantom looked away from him, his gaze falling to the floor. "Sometimes we find out we're the villains of our own stories."
Walter wasn't sure what he meant by that.
"I mean sure, sometimes we get to be the hero, but… Often it turns out we're the bad guy."
Walter didn't want to think of himself as the bad guy, but now he realized that he was. He was the killer. He was the one who had ruined Scorpion, and not just this time. Every time Scorpion had fallen apart, it had been his own fault.
"I guess that's just the role we're supposed to play. We're the ones who never learned how to properly interact with others. We were so busy trying to make ourselves smarter than everyone else that we missed the most important lessons along the way. We're the ones who trapped ourselves in the dark corners on the outskirts of society, unable to make inroads or contribute outside of our personalized niches. Whenever we try to help out in ways we're not prepared to, we do more harm than good."
Walter had a feeling Phantom was mostly talking about himself, as those observations didn't seem to line up wish his situation except in the most abstract of ways.
"And when we get so far out of our comfort zones, that's when things go really wrong. That's when more than just sensibilities are in danger."
Okay, that part might have been more pertinent. Emotions had always been outside of Walter's comfort zone, and when they had built up too much in his mind…
"I… um…" Phantom finally emerged from his musings and looked back up at him. "You're welcome to stay here if you want to."
Walter was surprised by the offer, and immediately thought to decline. But it didn't seem like all of the rooms in the house were as unpleasant as the one that Phantom had made his lair, and this way he would be close at hand to work with Phantom on tracking the mystery hacker. "I appreciate that." But, wait… "Where are your parents?"
"Traveling. They almost always are. They're businesspeople." He said the term with some disdain.
"Alright. I'll stay for as long as it takes to track down whomever is updating the virus."
Phantom nodded. "There's a guest room upstairs. Well, it's my sister's room, but she hasn't been home in years."
From the upstairs window, Walter could see several houses overlooking several different yards. Each one was home to a different family, and part of Walter's mind seemed to fixate on imagining what each one might look like.
During his relationship with Paige, he had begun to think of himself, her and Ralph as a family, but he had never really envisioned family life with them beyond the previews of it that he got from spending time with them during that year. He had never envisioned them living in a house like those he was looking at now. He had never been one to entertain such conventional dreams.
For a moment, however, he allowed himself to think about it. He envisioned Ralph visiting from college, walking through the front door and greeting his mother and his young half-sibling. He would carry his things up to the room that he sometimes occupied and then return, sitting in the living room and entertaining the baby.
Walter shook away the vision. It was never going to happen. It couldn't.
Turning away from the window, he looked at his laptop, which sat open on the desk that had once been occupied by a young girl named Olivia. Olivia was now a married woman living in Chicago, but once upon a time she had clearly had a fondness for pale-pink and flowers, and for lining her mirror with pictures of what had once been a happy family.
She hadn't been home in over two years, and scarcely kept in touch with her brother or her travel-happy parents. When Walter asked what had caused the estrangement, Phantom had shrugged. They had never been good at communicating from the beginning, so the distance and lack of communication had been a perfectly natural development.
The conversation had made Walter want to contact his parents for the first time in a long time, but that probably wasn't a good idea. Megan had always been the one to keep the lines of communication open within the family.
Sighing, he sat down in front of the laptop and focused on what was on the screen. Line after line of code crossed his vision, and none of it was helping him identify who the hacker was or where they were hiding.
It had to be an enemy that Scorpion had made. But they had thwarted so many plots over the years, it was impossible to keep track of everyone. Most of those that they had defeated were in prison. Who wasn't?
He became aware of a knocking at the door, and turned. "What?"
Phantom opened the door. "Do you ever get hungry?"
Walter glanced at the clock and realized how long he had been up here. He hadn't thought about food. "Yeah."
"Good. Cause, you know, everyone has to eat eventually. I get like that too, sometimes. I'll get so into solving a mystery that I'll forget about meals until it feels like my stomach is trying to tear itself out of my body."
Walter winced. "That's unpleasant."
Phantom glanced over Walter's head at the pictures on the mirror, and his face fell a bit. "I'll be downstairs." He disappeared from the doorway.
Walter glanced back at the screen, then stood. He should eat something. Going downstairs, he found Phantom in the kitchen. "So where are your parents travelling, anyway?"
Phantom shrugged. "I don't keep track of it anymore. Haven't for a long time."
Walter opened the refrigerator and found it sparsely stocked. He frowned.
"There are frozen meals in the freezer. That's mostly what I make do with."
Walter raised his eyebrows, then closed the fridge and opened the freezer.
It wasn't until he was sitting down with a microwaved something-or-other that he looked at Phantom again. The younger man was leaning against the counter, staring off into space. "You do that a lot, don't you?"
"Huh?" Phantom looked up.
"You frequently get lost in your thoughts."
Phantom shrugged. "Like I said, a lot goes on in there."
"Do you ever talk about it with anyone?"
"No one ever asks."
Walter found the response surprising. He was used to being with people who were naturally quiet, and they always seemed perfectly content that way. Phantom seemed… sad about it.
Maybe it was the absoluteness of the isolation. Walter had always had people that he could consider to be friends, even if it had taken him a very long time to fully appreciate what it meant to have friends. On the rare occasions where communication felt necessary, there had always been someone to communicate with. Phantom, however, seemed totally alone.
"So, what were you thinking about just now?"
"My parents. Since you asked about them."
"What about them?"
Phantom sighed. He had wanted to talk, but clearly wasn't used to volunteering information. "When I was little, I had a friend who was on the spectrum. Well, I don't know if he was a friend, but… I knew him. I remember being so jealous of all the attention he received from his parents." His shoulders shook as he gave a small laugh. "He probably communicates better than I do now-a-days."
"You're very hard on yourself about communication."
Phantom shook his head. "I've accepted who I am, but that doesn't mean I don't recognize what I could have been if…" He shrugged for the umpteenth time. "…things had gone differently."
"What you could have been?"
"If I had had friends. If I hadn't been trapped as Peter Rabbit through half my adolescence. I would have learned how to actually communicate with people, you know? I would have been invited to parties, made the same mistakes that everyone else was making, learned the same lessons about how to connect with people."
Walter didn't think it was that simple. Some people were naturally non-communicative, himself included.
"You know, for a long time I tried to convince myself that I was proud of it. That I was proud to be alone, and could feel like I was above everyone who avoided or teased me. I even embraced the nickname. I called that place the rabbit hole for a little while." He nodded towards the room that he had made his lair.
Walter blanched. "That doesn't sound healthy."
"It wasn't. I would have been better off scrambling to make friends anywhere I could, with whatever other rejects were out there."
"Have you tried to find others like you in the bay area?" It sounded like Phantom was desperately in needed of an environment with like-minded individuals, not unlike Scorpion or the Warlock's Chest.
"You do know what the bay area is famous for, right? Most of the region is full of nerds, and that makes even them impossible to talk to. They all have their own cliques already."
Walter sighed. He knew a defeatist attitude when he saw one. "Alright. I think maybe you should keep trying. But first, let's track down this hacker."
Three days later, Walter sat on the bed that had once belonged to Olivia, staring at his laptop screen. He wasn't sure how much longer he could stay here. Phantom seemed perfectly content with the company, but it was increasingly causing Walter's mind to go off on all sorts of strange tangents. At least, he hoped it was being here with Phantom that was causing that.
He had thought it would be easier to concentrate when he was away from the others. He didn't have to worry about them, and shouldn't have to think about them as much. But his mind seemed more restless than ever, and every time he saw an old picture or heard a child laugh outside, it went spinning away from the present and into thoughts of the past or future.
He needed to find this hacker and then leave. But he had no idea how to do that.
Abruptly, his screen went black, and then words appeared. "I'm disappointed, Walter."
Walter frowned at the words. He was being toyed with, but it probably wasn't undeserved. "Who are you?" he typed back.
"So disappointed… The old you would have figured it out months ago."
Months ago? He had only known about the virus for a week. How could he have figured it out… Megan's voice? That had been the only indication of the virus that had emerged months ago. Was that the key?
There was a knock on the door, and Walter quickly shut his laptop. "What?"
"Walter?" That wasn't Phantom's voice. "It's Zoe."
He got up and went to the door, opening it. "What are you doing here?"
"Phantom contacted me. He's worried about you?"
"He's worried about me?" That was a shift, or at least it felt like one. Phantom had seemed totally fixated with his own problems.
"Yeah. Want to talk?"
"Not really."
"Well, I did tell you I won't take no for an answer, right?"
"That was about something different."
"Yes, but it applies here, too." She looked around the room. "Let's go for a walk."
Once they were outside, Walter shut his eyes and inhaled deeply, feeling the fresh air cleanse his lungs. The air had a gentle, moist chill, as though it had just rained. He hadn't noticed.
"I understand why you left."
He opened his eyes and looked at her. "Do you?"
She nodded. "That doesn't mean I agree with it."
"I hope you never have to feel what I feel."
"The guilt?"
He nodded.
"Let's walk." She started walking in a direction.
He fell into step beside her, the back of his mind still trying to chew on the hacker's taunt.
"In one of the martial arts classes I tried, there was this guy who looked like one of my kidnappers. When I saw him, I started flashing back. I probably should have left, but I didn't, and as it happened we were lined up opposite each other to spar. I…" She trailed off and shook her head. "If it hadn't been for the gloves, I probably would have broken his nose."
"You didn't seriously hurt him."
"No. But I certainly didn't go back to that class again. I couldn't look him in the eye."
"That's hardly a comparable story."
"I know."
"Zoe, you're never going to be in the situation that I was in. You're never going to see the love of your life get sprayed with a deadly chemical. You're never going to feel the rage that I felt towards her attacker. You're never…"
"I'm never going to have years of repressed emotions come pouring out of me at once? That's true."
"Huh?"
"You heard me."
They fell silent as Walter considered her words.
"Actually…" Zoe stopped walking. "I've changed my mind. Let's go for a drive."
"Where?"
"Berkeley."
He raised his eyebrows, wondering why she wanted to bring him there. "Alright."
They got into his car and started driving. He waited for her to say something, but she didn't. "So, how's school going?"
"The semester's barely begun. But it will go fine. I've been trying to decide whether to rush or not."
"Rush?"
"A sorority. It's not really my scene, but… Maybe it would be good to see a different kind of social environment from what I'm used to."
"College doesn't have any shortage of opportunities for different social environments. You hardly have to join a sorority to find one."
"I know. My roommate is super keen on it, though. We get along well, but we're pretty different."
"If you're ambivalent about it, my advice would be not to join."
"Gee, that's totally unexpected."
"Hey, you brought it up. I'm older and wiser than you, and I'm friends with your dad, so I get to give you advice." Walter was surprised by his own words. When did he ever say anything like this? But the mood had struck. It felt like he was playing the character of someone else, and he felt strangely giddy about it.
"It's been a while since you've talked to my dad. You should grab coffee with him when you get back to LA."
"I'm not going back to LA." Suddenly, the character was gone, and with it, the giddiness.
They fell quiet again, until they arrived at Berkeley. "So, what are we doing here?" he asked.
"Come with me." They got out of the car, and he followed her towards the heart of the campus. After a little bit of walking, she stopped and turned towards him. "Look around. What do you see?"
Walter frowned and looked around, not seeing anything unusual. "Students, buildings, the campus."
"You know what I see? I see dreams. Every one of us is dreaming about all of the things that we want to do in life, all of the roles that we're here to learn how to play. What did you dream about when you were in college?"
"I don't remember. It was a long time ago."
"I don't believe you."
Walter wasn't lying. He thought back. Most of what he remembered from college was avoiding awkward social encounters and trying not to lash out impatiently at the less-intelligent people around him. He certainly couldn't remember what he dreamed about at the time.
"Fine, then how about when you started Scorpion. What did you dream about then?"
"Helping people."
"How?"
"By using our extreme collective intelligence to solve problems that they couldn't."
"So why aren't you doing that anymore?"
"You know why."
She simply looked at him expectantly for a moment. "Give me your phone."
He frowned, but did as she asked.
She took out her own phone and started typing on both of them. Then she handed his phone back to him. "There. Now you have my number, and I have yours."
"Okay?"
"If you need anything, you know where to find me. Thanks for the ride back to campus."
He raised his eyebrows at her final sentence as she turned and walked away. Their trip here apparently hadn't been solely for his benefit. He laughed quietly to himself, shaking his head, then turned back towards his car.
The following day, he found himself standing at the window again, thinking about what she had said. She clearly didn't understand things as well as she wanted to think she did. She was still young, and still naïve, despite what she had been through. She couldn't understand why he couldn't go back.
It had felt good to talk to her, though. It felt good to talk to someone who wasn't Phantom. It had filled in, to some small degree, the gaping hole in his life where his teammates had been.
He recalled feeling the same way a year ago. He hadn't been able to stop thinking about the others, and about Paige in particular. It had been that inability to get over her that had driven him to turn to Florence, taking first her body and then her heart. After the first time, he had been ashamed of himself. It had made him feel so ordinary, so normal, and he was supposed to be anything but that. He wasn't supposed to need what other people needed. But as he had spent more time with her, the pain had slowly alleviated.
He recalled the woman from the hotel in Monterey. Katie. She had given him her number.
He hesitated for a moment, starting to feel the shame again, but then searched around until he found the little piece of paper with the phone number on it. He looked at the number, noting the 650 area code. That wasn't far from here.
He recalled the last time he had seen that area code, when Florence had spoken with her brother, William, who lived in Palo Alto. That was where she had gone after…
Leaving the room, he went downstairs and towards the door.
"Going out?" Phantom asked.
"Yeah," Walter quickly replied, not glancing at him. He went outside to his car and got in, then started driving.
"What are you doing, Walter?" Paige's voice asked in his head. He ignored her.
"You should stop right now," said Toby's voice. He kept going.
"We mean it, dummy," said Happy's voice. He pressed on the gas.
"You're a coward," said Sylvester's voice. Walter turned on the radio, drowning them all out.
He was halfway there when he stopped, pulling over on the side of the road. He shut off his car and took a deep breath, letting the silence fill his mind for a moment. This was why he never drove with the radio on.
"Is it going to help you?" Ralph's voice seemed to echo out of his mind and reverberate through the car. He glanced to the side, imagining the boy sitting in the passenger seat.
"Yes."
"How?"
"Because I can't be with your m… with Paige anymore, and I need to think about her less frequently."
"This isn't going to help you with that. It didn't last time."
"It will make it hurt less."
"You're always going to miss her."
"Yes."
The vision of Ralph didn't say anything for a few seconds, and Walter waited. He looked out through the window as cars passed on the road.
"Do what you feel you need to do," the young voice finally said.
Walter turned the car back on, and continued on his way.
When he arrived, he rang the doorbell. William answered. "Walter?" He was a small, scrawny man with short blonde hair similar to Florence's, and a youthful, inquisitive face.
"Hi, William."
"What are you doing here?"
"Is Florence here?"
William made a face. "That's not a good idea."
"Is she?"
"Walter, I'm telling you, it's a bad idea." William glanced back over his shoulder, indicating that Florence was most likely in the house.
Walter stood his ground.
"Well, I suppose it's her decision. Come in." He stepped aside to let Walter enter. "Sit in there." He pointed towards a small living room, where two cream-colored couches sat opposite each other on either side of a simple, wooden coffee table.
Walter went to sit down, then paused in front of a picture of a much younger Florence and William with their parents. They looked happy in the picture. So much had changed since then.
He sat down on one of the couches and waited. The set-up of the couches reminded him of an apartment Sylvester had lived in years ago. The only thing missing was the chess board on the coffee table between them.
"Even William realizes it. This is clearly a bad idea," said Sylvester's voice.
Walter ignored it, looking down at the table and envisioning the old chess board.
"Walter?" He turned and looked up as Florence entered the room. She looked… good. Really good, actually. She had let her hair grow out a little, so that it was beginning to frame her face. It was a good look for her.
"Hi."
"How are you?" She went over to the other couch and sat down opposite him.
"I'm… I'm okay, I… well, I… How are you?"
"I'm fine."
"That's good." He looked down, knowing what needed to be said first. "I left Scorpion."
She didn't say anything at first. She simply looked at him, leaning back just slightly. "Why?"
"Because of what happened… in Maryland. I… It can never happen again."
"Yeah…" Now she looked down. "No kidding."
"I lost control of my emotions. As long as I'm around them, it could always happen again. I care about them too much."
She looked up at him. "I'm not sure that's the problem, Walter."
"It is. I… I'm dangerous. As long as I'm around them."
"As long as you're around… people you care about?"
"Yes, and so I had to le…" He trailed off, realizing her implication, and shut his eyes. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply that I don't… I do care about you. I did care about you a lot…"
"Walter, it's okay. It's been several months." She sat up a little straighter. "But if I had been the one that Collins nearly killed, I don't think you would have done what you did."
It hurt to hear her say the name out loud, and for a moment he completely overlooked the weight of her statement. But she was right, of course.
"Walter, you're not dangerous. It took an extreme stimulus to get you to react that way. You thought he had killed the woman that you were in love with. And yes, I knew that you were still in love with her. It was plain as day the whole time we were in that house."
He abruptly felt the need to look anywhere but at her.
"And that's a conflux of circumstances that is not going to occur on a regular basis. I mean sure, Scorpion gets itself into trouble from time to time, but the exact set of circumstances that converged for you to lose control like that are not going to happen again. And more to the point, you need to stop suppressing your emotions so that they burst out of you in rage like they did there."
He had thought she would be more understanding. After all, she was the other person who had… "There's still the guilt."
"Oh, I know the guilt. Believe me, I know all about the guilt. I still see Isaac's face all the time, and feel the weight of the gun in my hand. But then I remind myself that Cabe is still alive because of what I did. How is he, by the way?"
"He's fine." At least she had that thought to help her get by. She had saved Cabe's life. He hadn't saved anyone in doing what he did.
"Good. And the others?"
"They're all fine." He sat up a little straighter, his gaze not quite making it back to her face. "I didn't come here to talk about… that day."
"You were explaining why you left Scorpion."
"Yeah. I had to."
"You had to leave or you had to explain?"
"I… both."
She knit her brows together. "Walter, why are you here?"
That was the most difficult question to answer. He looked over at the wall, his eyes searching for nothing. Seconds ticked by silently.
"I'm seeing someone," she said quietly.
His gaze snapped back to her, and he wondered if he had misheard her. "Really?"
"Yes."
Walter leaned back, part of him feeling relieved. "What's he like?"
"He's boring. He's really boring, actually. But that's exactly what I need right now."
Walter nodded. Maybe that was what he needed, too.
Silence fell, and Walter realized that there was no longer any point to his being here. "I should probably go."
"Yes, you should." She stood, and he stood opposite her, then turned for the door. "But… it was good to see you."
"Likewise." He opened the door and stepped outside, then turned back to her. "Florence, the guy that you're seeing now… Does he know that you find him boring?"
"Yes. I decided that it would be best to be up front with him about it. I mean, obviously he can't know the reason why boring is what I need right now, but… We can be honest about anything that isn't classified, right?"
"Right." He was glad that she was honest about it, though he was perhaps a bit surprised that the relationship had survived such honesty. Maybe the guy was used to being labeled boring.
He returned to his car, then looked back at her again. She waved, and then shut the door. He started to open the car door, and then paused.
Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the piece of paper with Katie's number on it. Then he pulled out his phone and started dialing.
He was seven numbers in when the screen went black, and then showed that he was receiving a call. Zoe Elia. She hadn't wasted any time.
He answered. "Hello?"
"Walter, I'm at Phantom's house. Where are you?"
"I…" Had he missed something yesterday? Was he supposed to have been expecting her to return?
"Never mind. Just get back here. Ralph's discovered something."
"I'm on my way."
"Where were you?" Zoe asked when he arrived.
"Never mind that. What did Ralph discover?"
"We think we know where your hacker is," said Phantom. He was sitting at his computer.
"Where?"
"Tahoe."
"Tahoe?" Walter raised his eyebrows. "Of course." It was so obvious that he almost laughed out loud for not having realized it sooner. It had all been about him, all along. Of course it would end with the reminder of his greatest mistake of all, the very peak of the war between his former self and the new one, when he had become so afraid of his own emotions that he had knowingly pushed Paige into the arms of a man who was nothing like him.
"Why of course?" Zoe asked.
Walter shook his head, trying to push away the one memory that he always refused to entertain, but that would be impossible now. "Long story." Turning, he started heading back towards the door.
"Where are you going?" Phantom asked.
"Tahoe."
"I'm coming with you," said Zoe.
Walter stopped walking, but it was a moment before he turned back. "Let me guess, you won't take no for an answer?"
"Correct."
"If anything happens to you, your father will—"
"Don't you dare try to use that as an excuse. You're the one who's too afraid to even go back to LA."
He pursed his lips and stared at her for a moment. "Fine. Let's go." They started walking towards the door. Then Walter stopped and looked back towards Phantom. "Phantom…"
Phantom waited for what he was going to say.
Walter felt himself soften a little, thinking about what Paige would do. "If Paige were here, she would tell you… I understand that you feel you missed crucial lessons with regards to communication, but it's not too late to learn those lessons. You should… You should go out and meet people, and make those mistakes that you didn't make before. You should say stupid and insensitive things, and get people mad at you, and then you learn not to say those things anymore. And you learn what it is that you are supposed to say, even if instinct doesn't always agree. You'll… You'll learn to make friends."
Phantom looked down, and nodded.
"Thank you for your… Thank you for letting me stay here."
"You're welcome. Go get the hacker."
Walter nodded, and he and Zoe left, returning to his car.
"That was nice, what you said to him."
"Thanks."
"And I know you were thinking it was what Paige would say, but… I have a feeling that was all you, Walter."
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, smiling a little at her words. "Get in the car."
She smiled and did as she was told, and they set out for Tahoe.
"So, what's the long story regarding Tahoe?" she asked when they were several minutes into the drive.
"I'm not going into that."
"Fine. Then at least turn on the radio."
