Part Seventeen

They reached Montana in a matter of hours. Alex had a mind that it was supposed to take longer, but if Aldo was willing to stand upon the gas pedal in order to get them there then Alex was certainly not going to complain. He ignored everything else save for the way that the scenery was whipping by outside the window, the looks that he was being given, the dark paths that his thoughts increasingly wanted to go down now that the first mission had fallen apart and a new one had been chosen in its place.

Some members of their party were easier to ignore than others. Scofield-Michael-whichever name the mess that his identity had become would turn towards for the moment. Either way, someone needed to pull him to the side and tell him that perhaps the reason that he was a loner was not his own choice nearly so much as it was that way that he had of staring at people. Michael watched because he wanted to turn desire into an algorithm that he could follow until he could find out why the numbers had suddenly twisted sideways on him. Alex did not return his gaze because he had discovered that the small taste for chaos that he had had as an adolescent had either been called up from its decades-long dormancy or had grown entirely anew. If he looked at Michael, he was sure that this surging thirst for revenge within him would be written for all to see.

Aldo parked them a good mile away from President Reynolds's mysterious estate and cut the lights without comment. Alex approved, and thought that he might have brought them to a halt even further out if he had been the one in charge. Without knowing what kind of security system was out there, they were effectively walking in as blind as the moonless sky that stretched above their heads, and Alex could not stop himself from being possessed by a nerveless sense of foreboding. He knew this enemy, perhaps as well or better than did Aldo himself. The chances that they did not have someone stationed to report suspiciously parked cars were slim unless there was something even more confidence-raising in the house itself.

A glance at Aldo's face destroyed any need for Alex to voice those thought aloud, for it said that on this matter at least they were in perfect agreement. Something was happening here that would not be advantageous to their group or their mission in the slightest, just as surely as they could not turn back because of it. Aldo ordered them out of the car with a gesture and instead into a thick stand of trees that seemed to reached for them like something out of a fairy tale. Alex could remember being a soldier still and glided forward easily, but he could not help looking at Michael's face as he did so. A smile touched at Alex's lips and was gone again before a witness would have a chance to believe that it was real. Michael was a man who would have been pleased if he could have carried out this entire battle in a jungle constructed entirely of asphalt and Bluetooth.

The only sound beneath their feet was that of the summer growth rustling, and yet Alex's nerves were still so ragged that by the time that the stately house was in view he was on the verge of drawing his gun and firing into shadows. They were not noticed, they were not detained. Alex could not even see any guards who could have done the detaining. This utter lack of security for the man that the Company was willing to kill unquestioningly for? It did not compute, it did not make sense, and the things that could not be made to make sense were-a glance towards Michael-deeply dangerous.

"This is wrong, man," Burrows said. His voice was a rumble in the dark. "It shouldn't be this easy."

"Nothing is ever easy," Michael replied, and effectively put an end to all discussion on the matter.

There was a security light above the front door, a laughable little thing like one expect above a doorstep in suburbia, but that circle of light was still enough to make them glide away on mutual, unspoken agreement. Aldo stopped by the fuse box on the side of the house long enough to cut several wires with an efficient jerk of his pocketknife; the lights above the doors winked out. They still crept around towards the back. Alex's sense of impending danger found a whole new plateau to climb to, a new surge of adrenaline to dump into his bloodstream. Michael would have been the first to reach the door if Alex had not grabbed for his forearm and drawn it back with a softly uttered, "Don't," at the same time that Michael said his name.

Aldo wound up doing it instead. The door swung open easily beneath his hand, and now Alex I knew /I that there was a bear trap hiding just beyond the shadows. He threw a glance at the darkness standing with solemn gaze behind them before he slid in after the previous three himself. The door began to swing closed on automatic hinges; Alex did not lunge forward to stop it until too late. It was not until he tried the door from the inside that he discovered why there was such lax security on the grounds itself.

"Motherfuck," Alex said in the suspiciously calm voice that came just before the meltdown, twisting unsuccessfully at the knob as if more effort would someone convince it. When everyone turned to look at him, Alex had the very grimmest of smiles to offer up. "I certainly hope that Terrence Steadman is here." He jerked hard on the door again. "Because we're going to have a hell of a time getting out of here as it is and I don't want to do it empty-handed."

Burrows swore an oath that put Alex's own to shame and leapt past his father and brother so that he could try the door himself. He made it rattle in its frame as he shook the knob. If a silent alarm had not been triggered when they had cut the electricity, Alex did not see how the occupants of the house could not be woken by such a sound now. He glanced towards Michael and saw that Michael's face was almost entirely eaten by the shadows of the kitchen, so that Alex was guessing at his expression far more than he was seeing it. He drew the details from memory borne of hours spent staring at the mug shot before he had ever drawn near the real thing. Michael was uninterested in Burrows or in Burrows' racket at the moment, presumably under the same line of reasoning that Alex was following. It was too neat, too clean. If there had ever been an element of surprise, then surely it was lost now. They should have known.

Alex had spent the past two days worrying, worrying, his mind spinning in endless circles while his body carried on the task of trying to dig himself out of the trap that he had made for himself. The clam was startling, cleansing. He locked eyes with Michael as they both adjusted to the darkness. Michael took another scan of the kitchen and said softly, "Lincoln. It won't work."

Burrows paused, stared at Michael as if his brother had taken his brain out and then set it down on the counter beside him. "What?" he managed. "Mike, you kidding me, we're trapped in here like Fox River-"

Yes. They were. In the deep and sudden calm, Alex found room to smile. Michael was wearing the same expression of faint amusement. When a plan came together, so beautifully and tightly that none of the seams could be seen, there was a weight to it, a solidity, that had to be appreciated. "This place was not designed to keep anyone from getting in," Michael said in that level way that he had and that Alex was beginning to recognize as a sign that Michael's mind was already whirring three steps ahead.

As his eyes continued to adjust to the darkness, more and more of the details of the kitchen became apparent to him. It was immaculately clean, with long, smooth countertops made of marble and an arrangement of seasonal fruit in the bowl on the island. It could have belonged to any upper class home anywhere in suburban America; Pam herself had talked about redoing their kitchen to look like it someday. The only detail that stuck out as odd was that of the blenders, plural. There were three of them, and each one was sleek and modern enough to belong in a restaurant rather than a private home. Alex tilted his head to one side and felt a line draw itself between his eyes.

The dark stone of Fox River, the home was not. Prisons were defined by much more than their building materials, however.

"He's right," Alex said. Burrows gave the door another hard yank that rattled it in its hinges and sent a spike of pain through Alex's brain. He fought back the urge to wince. There was an ache behind his eyes, growing stronger by the moment-consequence of being off of his pills for two long. He had left them behind at the safe house along with his old clothes. Withdrawal or not, he had not wanted to touch them.

"It was built to keep someone in," Alex finished. He pinched at the bridge of his nose as Burrows continued to be the living embodiment of insanity, if repeating the same action over and over again and expecting a different result counted as it. "Do you have to keep doing that?" Alex's voice rose of its own accord and was difficult to bring down again. Stupid, even if they all knew that they were well and truly trapped. The outlines of said trap were still hazy; they could be holding on to any number of monsters.

Burrows' slow-burn glare told Alex that yes, actually, he did have to do that, and would be more than happy to use Alex as his battering ram if Alex wanted to keep running his mouth. Alex was so glad that they were all getting along now, he really was. He would have loved to tell Burrows about how happy he was, and with his head pounding like a rotten tooth and his ability to focus growing more sulky and recalcitrant by the second, a few other things besides. Aldo muttered, "Damned Slovakia curse," and Michael rolled his eyes upwards as if he was asking who he had killed in his past life in order to deserve this, though Alex guessed that he still could have been studying the architecture. He was willing to put an equal amount of money on both of those options.

A fine group of mutineers they had turned out to be, and Alex was so frustrated by the way that they had allowed themselves to be swallowed up by the bear trap even as they had seen the teeth gleaming in the grass that he thought that they deserved to be caught. Michael's calm and even far away expression was not adding him any more than the growing withdrawal symptoms were, and Alex could not stop himself from asking in a snotty voice that was more suited to an adolescent than a man, "Share with the rest of us?"

Michael came back down to earth long enough to show a faint and Sphinx-like smile. As much as Alex had enjoyed the feel of those lips under his own mere hours earlier, there was a part of himself that would not mind flattening it for him. "What's the best way to break a man out of prison?" he asked Alex before he answered his own question. "By starting on the inside with him."

That urge was not fading any time soon. Alex pinched at the bridge of his nose again so that he would at the very least be able to stay in control of it and would not point out that, if Michael had had enough foresight to get tattoos of this place secreted somewhere across his body, then he was more clever by far than even Alex had given him credit for. He suspected that it may have been a part of what Michael had been doing all the same, moments before when he had mentally divorced himself from all of them. There was still a part of Alex that was just interested enough in the puzzle to push all of his other instincts to the side and see how it played out.

The house was new construction, its sleek hardwood floors not nearly old enough for the seasonal expanding and contracting that would make them start giving off betraying creaks. Alex still heard the soft pad of an approaching person several seconds before the voice actually called out, and had drawn his gun before he had a chance to think. There was enough light from the rising moon coming through the windows and his eyes had adjusted enough to make picking out his target easy.

"Hello?" said a male voice that tried and failed to fully control its tremble. "Who's there?" A small and slightly doughy man appeared in the kitchen doorway, fumbled for the switch, and gasped when it did not respond. He drew in a second and much louder gasp when his eyes adjusted enough to allow him to see the figures that were assembled in his kitchen. Standing as he was by the door and with the full benefit of the moonlight coming down over his head, Alex's imagined that Burrows' profile in particular was very distinctive.

Alex hoped that Steadman's eyes were adjusting quickly, and that he could see the gun in Alex's hand very clearly. He hoped that the barrel looked as big as Steadman's head. Alex's finger tugged back against the trigger, keeping himself balanced right up against that edge, before he could pull himself back under control again. The living embodiment of the entire mess that he had found himself in, standing right there in front of him. Alex did not think that his physical reaction would have been greater if Oscar Shales himself rose from the grave and stood before him with a sick rictus grin, clots of dirt falling from his shoulders and mold spreading across his skin.

All things considered, that Alex's breath only caught in his throat and that his finger stopped before he could actually fire a shot was a sign of some considerable restraint. Burrows let out a growl that hardly sounded human and threw himself away from the door, past the arms of his father and his brother as they tried to stop him. Alex did not bother; he understood the sentiment behind the sound.

Burrows seized Steadman by the neck with a speed that made a mockery of all his bulk before Steadman had a chance to flee by more than a foot. He hurled him against the kitchen wall with a strength that made Steadman yelp in pain and caused the walls to rattle. It proved once and for all that the president had stranded her dear brother out here without the benefit of guards. If they existed and yet did not come running at that sound, then the only other explanation was that Steadman had killed them all himself.

Alex stepped to the side as Michael went after his brother, circling so that he had a clear shot of Steadman that would not involve putting bullets into Michael and Burrows as well. He noticed that Aldo was doing the same from the other side. Old soldiers, they locked eyes with one another for a moment.

Burrows shook Michael off with no more effort than if his brother was an errant puppy, while in the moonlight they could all see that Steadman was turning blue. "You son of a bitch!" Burrows roared into Steadman's face. The sound echoed and reechoed until Alex became convinced that, even if Steadman had killed his guards, that noise must surely have been enough to wake them up and make them wonder what the hell was going on.

"Linc!" Michael yelled as Burrows' hand tightened even further around Steadman's neck. If it was possible for a human hand to crush vertebrae on their strength alone, then he was surely close. "Lincoln, listen to me." Michael gave Alex a quick glance, as if asking if he was going to get in on this, as if there was a club when it came to murderous rage, that once you had entered and then backed out again you were the go-to guy when it came to talking people down from that rage forever after. It was made worse by the fact that it was probably true, but Alex was not yet at the place where he could stop seeing Pam with every careless second, and he could not make himself care. He felt his mouth twist and hook his head hard once. Michael's look was disappointed and a little disgusted as he turned back to his brother.

"Lincoln, Lincoln, listen to me," Michael said. He jerked hard against Burrows' arm again. His voice seemed to be finally sinking in; Burrows at least glanced in Michael's direction before he went back to seeing if he could make Steadman's head swell up like a stress doll's. "You broke out of Fox River because you're not a murderer."

"Don't need him alive now to prove that I didn't kill him three years ago," Burrows said in a suspiciously level voice that made the hair on the back of Alex's neck stand up. "Kill him now, it won't be counted as murder." The way that Burrows was clenching Steadman's neck within his fist was already making Steadman look as if his eyes were on the verge of popping out of his skull and dangling by their stalks, but Alex thought that his eyes went even wider then.

Steadman's mouth worked for several seconds as he tried to find the air before he was finally able to whisper, "Not true."

Burrows' eyes narrowed, and he slammed Steadman back against the wall hard enough to make it rattle again. Alex was frankly amazed that Steadman did not simply twist Steadman's head off then and there and leave it rolling around on the floor, as Alex himself would have been sorely tempted to do. "What are you talking about?" he growled.

"You have to let him breathe," Michael said, though he did not sound as if it was any kind of human compassion that was moving his tongue. The stare that he was directing Steadman's way as Steadman wiggled and squirmed at the end of Burrows' arm was many times over more riddled with disgust than any of the worst that he had directed Alex's way.

If the glare that Burrows was pinning Steadman to the wall with was anything to go by, then Steadman's inability to spontaneously develop telepathy was a moral flaw against him. He gave Steadman one more squeeze and a slam against the wall as a nonverbal reminder that misbehavior would not be wise before he released his grip on Steadman's throat and stepped back. Alex was amazed that Steadman had not yet left a dent in the wall as a result of Burrows' tender ministrations.

Steadman slumped and would have fallen if he had not grabbed for a rack of decorative plates in order to steady himself. Several of them fell down to the floor and shattered; no one paid any attention. "Won't work," Steadman repeated. Even in the shadows, they could see the marks left by Burrows' fingers against Steadman's neck. They would transform into bruises dark as pitch within the hour, and Steadman was barely managing to speak legibly now. "There were surgeries, there were steps."

"They pulled your teeth," Alex said flatly, thinking of an item that he had seen on the news less than two weeks before the Fox River escape had taken place. The blenders made much more sense now. Michael looked both shocked and disgusted, but he ought not have. He would do the same if Burrow required it; so would Alex if that was what it took to save Cameron. The entire room was a crosshatch of insane sacrifice and familial devotion.

"Yes," Steadman agreed in a low croak. A curious expression moved across his face as he looked towards Alex, as if he thought that he recognized him but could not quite say from where. "You can't prove that I'm the president's brother unless I agree. And I won't." Steadman straightened, using the wall as support, until he could look Burrows in the eye. "I won't turn on Caroline like that." For the first time, he twitchiness subsided from Steadman's face and looked at them with something that resembled resolve.

Alex had never seen anyone less adept at reading a room in his life.

"You want to put a bet on that?" Burrows said. He leaned forward and into Steadman's face, placing his arms out to either side of Steadman's head until he had made himself into a living barrier. He needn't have bothered, as much as Alex was enjoying the image of Steadman physically trying to melt back into the wall and disappear; Burrows' mere presence and barely-checked fury were enough to keep any sane person from fleeing too far.

"Later," Michael cut in smoothly before Burrows could turn the verbal threats into physical ones. Though he was eyeing Steadman as if he was not even sure that the man was still human, he was at least under control of himself. Burrows looked as if he might easily slip whatever internal leash he was using to check his own behavior at any moment, while Alex's gun was turning so slick in his hand that he was going to have to lower the weapon in a moment or else risk firing it without intending to. Only Aldo was wearing anything that approached Michael's mask of calm, and he looked as if he could easily use it to take Steadman apart one piece at a time at any moment.

"How do we get out of here?" Michael asked Steadman, though Alex noticed that he, too, had seen his father's predatory stance. He shifted subtly until Aldo could not make a sudden lunge towards Steadman without going through Michael first. "Are the windows bulletproof?"

Steadman let out a mirthless chuckle and, after watching Burrows for a moment to make sure that the movement was not going to get his own arm snapped off at the elbow, pointed towards the kitchen door, through which the dining room table could be seen. Alex squinted and noticed that all of the chairs were mismatched.

"I don't know," Steadman said in dull tone. "I'm not allowed a gun. For obvious reasons." Yes. He had the look of a man who at this point would not mind committing suicide by taking a few of his captors down with him. Alex knew it well; it tasted like bile. "They're chair-proof, anyway."

Alex lifted his gun and calmly fired a bullet at the windows set into the back door. There was a tremendous booming noise, but what really made everyone flinch was the way that the bullet immediately ricocheted and shattered one of Steadman's precious blenders. Shards of plastic flew everywhere and obliged the rest of them to duck and shield their eyes.

"They're bulletproof," Alex said calmly while Burrows and Aldo stared at him in frank disbelief. Only Michael did not appear to be surprised. He looked as if he was on the verge of tugging Alex to the side and asking if he was all right, and then Alex really would have to punch him in the mouth. An Michael was supposed to be the smart one.

While Alex was still stewing over this, Michael pulled himself up by several estimations as he looked at Steadman, that cool hint of a smirk playing over his face, and said, "Veronica died on the phone." Burrows twitched, and Aldo looked as if he was on the verge of putting his arm out to restrain him from rushing forward again. If that event should occur, Alex thought it more likely that Burrows would simply snap it off at the elbow before he allowed himself to be talked down.

Steadman was going to leave the impression of his shoulders in the plaster if he pushed himself against the wall any harder. "I didn't have anything to do with that," he said.

Michael's smirk deepened even further and took on a mocking edge that was matched by the way that Burrows was nearly shivering with the urge to put his fist into Steadman's face. The end to everything, standing right there in front of him. Alex wondered if he really looked any different.

"I believe that you think that," Michael said, before he punched in a series of numbers on his cellular phone and held it up to his ear. When a voice at the other end of the line answered, he said, "Yes, I would like to report an intrusion at the president's estate. Michael Scofield and Lincoln Burrows are threatening the life of her brother." He hung up before the person on the other end could respond and continued to give Steadman that chill smile.

Steadman looked astonished. "If you know how she died…"

"Fool me once," Michael responded calmly. He glanced once in Alex's direction, as if asking him if he was ready. Alex caught himself nodding back without conscious thought. He was ready; he had been ready for the past year. He had only gotten himself turned around and pointed in the wrong direction when it came to knowing what he was ready for.

'Fool me once, shame on me,' Alex thought darkly, thinking of Pam's body sprawled across the bed, Cameron's die eyes, Michael's mouth insistent and hungry on his. 'Fool me twice, shame on me.'

End Part Seventeen