/\/\/\/\/\
Lizzie strode into the containment room where Red sat chained to a chair, the box having rectracted behind him just moments before.
"Where's the girl? It's been four hours. Your people haven't made any demands."
He looked up at her as if she had physically wounded him.
"My people? I told you Zamani would take the girl. I told you that's all I knew. This is in your hands now."
"I need your help with Zamani." She bit out, her anger boiling in her veins.
"How about a trade? You tell me and I'll tell you. Tell me about the scar on your palm. I've noticed how you stroke it." Her eyes blazed, she could feel her lips pursing. You bastard. He was testing her. In the middle of an FBI black site with cameras everywhere. He was testing how well she knew her fake history.
"There was a fire. I was fourteen."
Red smothered a smirk as he noticed that she'd unconsciously begun to stroke the scar.
"Someone tried to hurt you."
"Not exactly, no." He couldn't stop the smile now. That was rather close to the truth and a dark side of him couldn't help but be proud. The best lie is always the one closest to the truth.
"May I see it?" Lizzie hesitated before unfolding her fingers and showing him the scar that crawled up from her palm to her wrist.
"Is a child really what you want?"
"How on earth..." She was taken aback by the sudden conversation shift.
"But a baby won't fix what happened in the past."
"You lost the right to speak about parenthood when you abandoned your wife and daughter on Christmas Eve." She snapped, wanting to cut him as deeply as he had her. It worked. The Concierge of Crime mask was firmly in place.
"The girl. You won't find the girl until you learn to look at this differently."
"And how should I look at this?" She scoffed.
"Like a criminal. May come easier than you think. Shall I show you?" She scowled at him. Oh he was definitely getting it later. And by 'it' she meant a sharp object directly into his carotid.
/\/\/\/\/\
They stood in the war room where all of the boards of pictures and attempts to connect the dots were displayed. The handcuffs around Red's wrists were a far sight better than being chained to a chair inside of the box in Lizzie's opinion.
"Well, at least you know what Zamani looks like." Red said, pointing to one of the pictures before laughing and moving to another photo. "Oh, my goodness! I haven't seen him in years. Very interesting fellow. Completely unrelated to this. You're pointing at the wrong guy here." He practically floated around the boards, taking in all of the information, shaking his head and pointing.
"Miroslav. They call him The Chemist. A highly regarded munitions expert. He left MIT to work for the Russian, Vor Usoyan. Last two years... very expensive freelancer."
He moved onto another board. "I don't know what the hell any of this is." He waved it off carelessly and moved on.
"Ooh, the German. A banker. Name's Reinhardt. He's most likely moving the money. What about the girl? What do you have on the girl and her father?" He looked over at Lizzie expectantly.
"Your 36-hour timeline would suggest a singular event. Something in D.C. I'm not sure how the girl fits."
"What about the Chemist?" He asked, clearly trying to lead her in a certain direction.
"Important...well paid... Whatever Zamani's planning is expensive. Some sort of attack?" Lizzie didn't want to admit it, but she was rather enjoying playing the game of wits with her dad.
He shook his head. "You're thinking like a cop. Cops are so objective. They're obligated to protocols. Make it personal."
"Okay, this is nonsense." Ressler cut in, clearly impatient.
Lizzie ignored him and tried to grasp the straw her dad was dangling in front of her. "Zamani's sick. CIA says he carries Nipah virus. Dying makes him dangerous."
"So what does he desperately want before he dies? And how does that relate to the little girl?"
"Her father, the General, spent time in Bosnia... supporting NATO troops in the Bihac Pocket region. Zamani's home. He bombed a chemical weapons facility... poisoning the village. It's about his family."
"They died, Zamani survived." Red nodded his head, clearly agreeing with her assessment.
"He wants revenge. He hired the Chemist to build a bomb, detonate it in Washington. He's gonna use Beth to settle the score... deliver the bomb."
She could swear she saw pride in his eyes.
/\/\/\/\/\
Lizzie ignored her brother as he opened the door for her, choosing instead to storm through the hotel room in search of her father. She quickly found him sitting in the dining room, his legs crossed casually as he finished a crossword.
"Did you send him? Are you the one who did this?"
"Did what?" Red looked genuinely confused as he sat at the dinner table, where he had been attempting to complete a crossword.
"He was in my house! My husband is on a ventilator because Zamani came..."
"Calm down and tell me what happened." He tried to placate her, just like he used to do when she was little and in the middle of a tantrum.
"Don't play stupid. You're the only thing connecting us. He told me you're obsessed with me. Why the hell does he think that, Dad?" She spat the name like a curse. "You profess that you're staying away to keep me safe, yet you're apparently telling all your bad buddies about me!?"
"Did he mention the girl or the bomb?" He asked as if he hadn't heard a word she'd said.
"We're not a team."
"Zamani."
"I'm not your partner. I'm your daughter."
"What did he say?"
"I don't know!" She finally screeched in frustration. "He said... he said something about casualties... and chemical agents, and... he talked about you. He even thanked me for getting rid of the Chemist."
"So the bomb's still in play." He placed the newspaper down on the table and rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
"Why the hell was he in my house?! Tell me! You know him! Why is my husband dying in a hospital right now?!" She threw out her arm and tossed the lamp across the room, casting the room in shadow.
"The truth is, despite your feelings, your husband doesn't matter. Zamani did you a favor, Lizzie."
Lizzie walked up to him and slapped his cheek, causing his head to whip back from the force.
"Don't you dare. Don't you fucking dare. You just walked into the FBI and ruined everything. I was trying for normal. I could have had normal but you came in and wrecked it all!" She screamed, pacing the floor and finally allowed the tears to fall. "And do you have any idea what that was like? Fearing that they had found out, that the FBI had somehow found out what you are to me? Seeing you – seeing my father caged and chained like an animal! My first day. My very first day, I get your entire criminal history displayed out in front of me like a god damn story book! We had a deal!" She could see he opened his mouth to speak, a pained look on his face so continued over him. "I would never see this part of you. When you were with me, you were my dad – just my dad. The man who protected me, loved me, spoiled me. I was to never see the monster."
"Elizabeth—"
"You've ruined everything. And now my husband lays dying because of whatever stupid plan you've got going."
Lizzie stormed out, ignoring him as he called her name several times before she reached the door and slammed it shut behind her.
/\/\/\/\/\
Later that night, once she had cooled down slightly, she called him.
"So here's how it's gonna work. You tell me how I find Zamani and make this right, or I wash my hands of you. Understand?"
"Yeah." He seemed to choke out the single word.
"But if you never speak to me again... you'll never know the truth about your husband."
"You know nothing about my husband." She hung up.
/\/\/\/\
Lizzie watched a live video feed that one of the techies had set up for her of the meeting in the conference room. She saw Cooper at one end of the table and her father on the other with Ressler and a transcriptionist between them.
"Who is the Ukrainian?" Asked Cooper
"I'm not gonna tell you." Lizzie bit her lip at her father's blatant lack of deference. What was he playing at?
"You gave him a chemical weapon."
"He took it. That's the price of doing business, Harold, with certain people who can get certain things done. You know that. You never look at the larger picture. The bomb didn't detonate, the girl is safe, Zamani's dead. Frankly, I think this all went down rather swimmingly." Lizzie had never seen her father's charm mixed with the dangerous criminal before. She didn't like the combination.
"This was never about Zamani." Ressler spat. "You surrendered and infiltrated the FBI to get at our intelligence."
"Your intelligence?" Red scoffed. Clearly he didn't think much of the FBI.
"To get that weapon."
"I certainly don't want your intelligence, Agent Ressler. I'm quite happy with my own. I think it's more likely that I tried to help you in good faith and had to finish the job myself because... you couldn't."
"I think we're finished." Cooper went to stand when Red's words made him pause.
"Well, this was fun. Let's do it again. Really, let's do it again. Understand, Zamani was only the first." Red crossed his legs and leaned back as if he didn't have a care in the world.
"The first what?"
"Name. On the list."
"What list?"
"It's called The Blacklist. That sounds exciting. That's why we're all here, of course. My wish list. A list I've been cultivating for over twenty years. Politicians, mobsters, hackers... spies."
"We have our own list."
"Agent Ressler, please. We all know your Top Ten is little more than a publicity campaign. It's a popularity contest at best. I'm talking about the criminals who matter. The ones you can't find because you don't even know they exist. Zamani was a small fish. I'm Ahab. And if you want the whales on my list, you have to play by my rules."
Lizzie had to admit. Her father had style.
"I never sleep in the same location for more than two nights in a row. I want a fully encrypted 8-millimeter tag embedded in my neck... not that garbage from AlphaChip you stuck in my shoulder. I want my own security. I've compiled a list of five acceptable applicants. Pick two. Whatever I tell you falls under an immunity package that I negotiate myself. And finally, most importantly, I speak only with Elizabeth Keen."
Lizzie laid her head on the desk at which she sat none to gently. How the hell could her father expect her to act as if they had no prior relationship? Especially when he was so blatant about his preference for her? How in the world was she going to explain that away?
/\/\/\/\
Later that night, Lizzie was ripping up the carpet in her dining room, having decided that attempting to remove her husband's blood stains was a lost cause. She soon noticed the cut out of a door once she revealed the hard wood and pried it open. Sitting on her heels, she took out a wooden box and opened it, fearful of what she may find.
/\/\/\/\
She walked through the holding facility. Not a prison. Her father was not in prison. She swallowed as the guard opened his cell door but couldn't hold back a tear as her father was revealed in a blue jumpsuit, opening his eyes as if he'd been napping or lost in thought.
"You've discovered something curious about your... husband, haven't you, Lizzie?"
