Over the next few days, Mouse feels Jay and Erin's eyes lingering on him often during quiet moments at work. The scrutiny occasionally makes the back of his neck prickle, but for the most part the awareness of it is just like a soft brush against his skin, familiar and even comforting. He doesn't say anything about it, content to let them reassure themselves, just as he and Erin did that first night in Jay's apartment. Mostly Mouse is thankful that despite the way they watch him quietly, they don't start to treat him like fragile glass.

At least, not until almost a week later, the day Voight barks "Full unit gun requalification, before end of shift." Jay and Erin grin mischievously at each other, a challenge, and through the morning the team razz each other. Near the end of the day, the unit is getting ready to head down to the range, and Ruzek, grinning and bouncing, stops in front of Mouse's desk.

"Hey, Mouse, my man, you gonna come down and show us what you can do?" Mouse glances up, Ruzek's meaning taking a moment to sink in, but Ruzek is already talking again. "C'mon, man, you were a Ranger, so we know you can shoot, and we know you got some moves. I'm curious, you're curious, right Atwater?"

"Huh?" Atwater glances up from his desk where he's messing with the keys on his computer. "Oh, yeah, yeah," he agrees absentmindedly.

"Uh." Mouse glances over to see Erin biting her lip, Jay with worried eyes.

"That's cool right, Boss? If Mouse comes down to the range?" Ruzek calls over to Voight. Mouse turns to look at Voight, silently pleading that he'll say no, no a civilian can't go to the range with the cops, no, Mouse can't shoot a gun. But he keeps his face impassive, habit or choice, or fear of seeming weak. Voight casts an appraising gaze over Mouse.

"Yeah, let's see what you got kid."

And suddenly saying no is no longer an option, if it ever was. So Mouse ignores the looks on Erin and Jay's faces and stands.

They troupe down to the gun range, and Mouse leans against the wall and watches as the team runs through their official requalification. Voight and Olinsky are carelessly casual; Voight strides up, thrusting his gun arm out and firing, tactactactactactac, fast and aggressive. The sound doesn't seem real to Mouse, like in the terror from bangs like slamming doors and fireworks he has forgotten what a gun sounds like, up close, in person, forgotten what the real sound of a gun means. He doesn't flinch. Olinsky slumps over in his mellow way and fluidly raises the gun, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, then sets the gun down, takes off the muffs and slumps off. Antonio wanders over and picks up the gun, squares his shoulders and fires, pap, pap, pap-pap-pap-pap. Ruzek struts in, squaring up theatrically. He takes a moment to line up – for all his bluster he still knows the seriousness of this moment – and then fires, bang, bang-bang, bang-bang, bang, then straightens up, puts the gun down and squints at his target. Atwater swaggers up, carefully checking his weapon and sighting the targets before, pow, pow, pow, pow, pow, pow, deliberate and patient. Erin glances at Mouse before she walks to take her place, small hands wrapping around the black metal, swinging it up. Mouse doesn't watch the bullets rip yawning holes in the target – he sees only the way her hands expertly catch the kickback, snap, snap, snap, snap, snap, snap. Jay strides up last, taking up the gun familiarly. Mouse watches Jay force the anxious tension out of his stance, taking a single breath, and then he brings up the gun, exhales; bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam. They all use the same gun, in the same room, at the same distance, but somehow the sound is different each time, or maybe that's just Mouse trying, or trying not, to remember what a gunshot sounds when it's his hands, his gun, his bullet.

"Alright!" Ruzek says, patting Mouse on the shoulder enthusiastically as Mouse straightens up from the wall and steps forward.

"Mouse," Jay says quietly beside him, fingertips resting out of sight on Mouse's wrist. Mouse glances at Voight – watching expectantly, hands in pockets – and Mouse gives Jay a tight smile and steps up to the range.

The Glock 17 is a type he hasn't used since basic training. He remembers the light press of the Glock 19 in its holster; they didn't use it all that often really. A handgun doesn't really cut it in war. But they're similar guns, and his hands remember. He snaps on the muffs – a luxury, he thinks cynically – and any sound of the others floating behind him is extinguished.

He picks up the gun and his fingers move without thinking, nimble and steady and quick. He doesn't hesitate, doesn't stop to think or plan. His body remembers, like instinct. He raises the gun and fires, onetwothreefourfivesix, into the target at the end of the lane. And this, finally, is what a gunshot sounds like. He places the gun on the table and slips the muffs off.

"Damn," Ruzek laughs as Mouse's target slides along the track to the front. Two holes around the centre of the head, four in the centre of the chest. "Remember, two to the chest, one to the head. You never know how resilient those fuckers can be." A familiar pattern twice over, as instinctual as the rest. Mouse ducks his head, looking away from the dark empty circles on the target. Let Ruzek think it's modesty.

It's not; Mouse knows he's a good shot, at least from close to mid-range. He was a good enough sniper to pass Ranger school, but if anything was going to fail him out it would have been that. But when it comes to closer range, Mouse is as good as Jay. Maybe better. There was a time when Mouse took pride in that; before he learned that being a better shot really just meant being better at killing. If he didn't know firsthand how the way tiny figures crumpling in a scope, like puppets cut free, the way the people screamed and heads swivelled looking for a source, like an act of God… if he didn't know how much these things haunted Jay, he might have envied him the distance.

When he does glance up again, he doesn't look at Ruzek, or Jay or Erin. He looks at Voight, still standing, hands in pockets, in the same place. Still watching him. Voight doesn't look away when Mouse catches him staring, of course not. Mouse thinks he sees satisfaction in Voight's face, but also, he could almost swear, sadness, a kind of apology… Voight looks away.

"Not bad, kid," Olinsky says, patting Mouse on the shoulder, and continuing past to amble out of the range. Antonio chuckles and follows Olinsky. Mouse walks after them, Ruzek falling into step behind him and the rest of the unit trailing them. They emerge from the stairs to the main floor, sunlight glinting off the floor, illuminating the dust tracked in. Mouse squints in the brightness. The unit starts heading up the stairs to Intelligence to pack up. Mouse hesitates, feet stuck to the floor – "Mouse?" Jay's voice – and then he's moving, not up the stairs but out the door where it's sunny but brisk. Goosebumps rise on his skin.

They find him around the side of the building, leaning against the chill of the brick, head down, hands in pockets. They flank him against the wall.

"Hey," Jay says softly. "You okay?"

Mouse swallows, eyebrows drawing together.

"I don't know."

Erin puts her hand on his arm. He doesn't look up.

"I'll get our stuff." She squeezes his arm gently then lets go, and he listens to her footsteps as she walks away. Jay shuffles closer so their shoulders press together. Mouse sighs and rests his head on Jay's shoulder, closing his eyes. His eyelids glow red from the sunlight on them, illuminating the spider webbing of veins. His body feels heavy, exhausted as though he'd done something much more strenuous than pull a trigger.

He hears the clatter of Erin's shoes trotting on the sidewalk, a rising crescendo until she comes to rest in front of them.

"Hey, ready to go?"

Mouse feels Jay nod and opens his eyes, raising his head with effort. Erin, in front of him, presses bundles he recognizes as their bags and Jay's jacket into Jay's arms. Mouse's jacket she hangs onto, wrapping it around his shoulders, the soft fabric seeming to scrape across his skin. She slides an arm around his waist, and again he's struck by this, the casual comfortable way that she touches him, she, a woman all too familiar, like him, like Jay, with how the body can be a weapon, flesh poison, touch pain.

Erin guides Mouse to the car – hers – and he slides into the backseat. Jay passes Erin the keys and slides in after him. They pull out of the lot, leaving Mouse's car behind. Belted into their seats, the middle space yawns between Mouse and Jay, and Jay wraps a hand around Mouse's to bridge the gap. Mouse entwines their fingers and rests his head against the window, staring out at the street. Erin parks at Jay's building and they unfold from inside the car, this time Jay wrapping an arm around Mouse's waist, lightly, gently, afraid he might break. Mouse might be annoyed except for the fact that his bones feel made of glass.

They sit him down on the couch. Jay wraps him in a blanket, Erin gets him a glass of water. They perch on the cushions beside him, and when he doesn't flinch, settle in further. The electricity of the lightbulbs seems to hum in the silence. He can almost taste Jay's concern, Erin's growing nervousness. He frowns at the glass of water on the coffee table, condensation beading on the surface.

"The last time I fired a gun," he begins at last, "I killed 11 people." He brings his knees up to his chest. "Whatever else they were, whatever they did to us, they were still people." Jay's breath hitches. "Someone's father, brother, son, best friend… They believed in what they were doing too. I used to wonder if they had nightmares, if they went to bed at the end of the day, after what they did, and laid awake, and if we haunted them like they haunt us. If their hands felt unclean. If they told themselves the ends justified the means. If they felt fear, regret, remorse before the bullet hit them." His finger traces around the other wrist absentmindedly, the scarring so faint it can only be seen at the right angle, in the right light, if you know what you're looking for. "People talk about serial killers, who killed 5, 9, 13 people, and call them monsters. 13 people, like it's an immense number." His hands still. "You ever count?"

The question slips out and he wishes he could swallow it, wishes he could swallow every word he just said, cram them back inside his brain. Because he looks up at Jay, so pale, freckles standing starkly out on his skin, eyes dark with pain, and he knows that every word was a knife, carving into familiar scars, and he could have carried those poisonous words inside him, could have borne their sharp heavy weight, he could have swallowed them back the rest of his life to not be the reason Jay's breath comes in short, half slipping into the hell they'd clawed their way out of.

"Sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he whispers, pulling his limbs in closer, making himself small, trying to pull the shrapnel back inside, suck the explosion back in, undo the collateral damage. But that's not how the world works. You can't unexplode a bomb – I should know.

Jay's arms wrap around him, lightly trembling limbs, and rests his head against Mouse's shoulder, and whispers Mouse's own words back at him. "Not your fault." Mouse squeezes his eyes shut. Do you ever count? Do you, could you, like me? One, two, skip a few… How much blood is on our hands? How much of it innocent? Suddenly he remembers Erin, and his eyes open, heart like a newly rung gong, and he looks at her.

His breath freezes in his lungs at the look of horror in her eyes, wet with tears, but then she lays a hand on Jay's arm, the other on Mouse's hands and the look in her eyes melts into an immeasurable sadness, and he realizes she wasn't horrified by him, but for him.

"I don't know if you guys are ready to talk about this stuff with me," Erin says quietly, "but if or when you are, I'm here. Okay? I'm here." She squeezes Mouse's hands gently. He closes his eyes and rests his forehead on his knees. Ready? No such thing, not for this. But even so, maybe Mouse would say more, maybe he would, except it's not only his story. It is inextricably entangled with Jay's, twisted up until the different strands of their pasts, their experience, blend together, become indistinguishable. And however wonderfully equal it feels, the three of them together in this place, in the end Erin is tied to Jay first, strongest, most. And it's not for Mouse to tell this story. You can't unexplode a bomb, but you can defuse it, contain it, move it. So these knives he swallows.

Jay withdraws, leaving one arm around Mouse, shifting to catch Erin's hand. Mouse feels the sudden negative space where Jay's other arm had rested. He opens his eyes and shifts to cross his arms on top of his knees, resting his chin on them and twisting his head to look at Jay. Some colour returned to his face, the pain in his eyes shut away again. Jay meets his eyes, maybe forgiveness, maybe apology. Mostly what Mouse sees is not now, not yet, not for a long time, maybe not ever, right? Mouse ignores the clamoring of knives, and returns a small sad smile. Right.


AN: Confession time: So I actually finished this chapter like a week and a half ago, and kept forgetting to post it. Oops. But here it is!

You know how I feel about reviews.