Chapter 19

It wasn't the first time Simon had looked down the barrel of a gun. It was, however, the first time that the gun was the least worrying part of the situation. The gun was made of metal. Cold, Inanimate. Just a tool for someone else's intentions. It was the man with the gun in his hands that terrified him, in so many ways.

"If you were going to kill me anyway then why didn't you just do it last night?" he asked nervously.

Keats took a step forward and gently closed the door behind him.

"I didn't bring the gun for you but since you happen to be here it's a nice bonus." He smiled. "Killing two birds with one stone. Well, one bird and one nerd."

Keats' words shook Simon up more than the thought of being shot himself.

"Alex?" he gasped, "you're here to kill Alex?" He glanced at her motionless form. "She's already in a coma! Why do you want to kill her?"

"Because I want to make sure this time she's not going to stop me from getting what's mine."

Simon's eyes scanned the room for any kind of patient alarm button or some other way to alert someone to the situation but the alarm was over the opposite side of the bed and there was a comatose Alex in the way. Besides, the last thing he wanted was to endanger the lives of the hospital staff.

Falling back on his training, he tried to keep his cool and engage Keats in conversation; to win his trust and talk him round.

Yeah, right, thought Simon. That's all very well for dealing with a hostage situation. It doesn't take into account what happens when you're dealing with a time-hopping crazy-man.

He didn't give the whole hostage negotiation technique much chance of working but it was the only thing standing between himself and a bullet.

"If you weren't here to kill me," he began, "then why haven't you been to kill Alex before now? Why wait until I was here?"

"Because I didn't know where she was before," Keats said simply. He looked at Simon's clueless impression and gave him a little smirk. "Thanks for finding her for me. You saved me a job."

"Huh?" Simon's training went out the window as his confusion reigned supreme.

"Fantastic things, computers," smiled Keats, "the amount of information you can find, just at the click of a button… if you know what you're looking for. Otherwise, it can take an eternity." He noted with glee the anxiety flashing across Simon's expression and continued. "I had a feeling you were going to do a bit of snooping about. Couldn't get me out your head after last night, eh?"

Simon bristled.

"Just relieved to get you out of my bed," he spat.

"Robin's bed," Keats corrected with a smirk, "…and Robin's database login. Did you really think that pathetic fight was fooling anyone?"

Simon felt his cheeks flush.

"So, what, you've been monitoring our database activity?" he asked quietly.

"Your techie friends were only too happy to help," Keats told him, "especially when I informed then that I have… 'very real fears' that you were not ready to return to work yet, as your counsellor can testify to."

"Why did you get them to monitor Robin too?"

"Had a feeling you were heading for a suspension. Your behaviour's just been so… erratic," Keats smiled amiably, "rolling up drunk, getting into cars with strange men. Very kind of Robin to let you use his login really… considering what he saw last night."

Simon's blood boiled. He wanted to scream, wanted to throw a punch at that smug face, but knew it would only earn him a bullet in the chest. Instead he silently counted to ten, waiting for his anger to fade a little, then composed himself enough to ask a question.

"So you watched me searching for your file," he began in slow, measured tones, "and then for Alex. How did you know I was coming straight here?"

"I didn't," Keats rolled his eyes, "you've not heard a thing I've been saying, have you? Got cloth in your ears or something? I came to kill her," he aimed the gun at Alex in a pointing motion as though using it as a replacement, metal finger, "not you."

Simon hesitated.

"Why didn't you just search for her yourself?" he asked, "why wait until I found her?"

"Because," Keats hissed, "I didn't know who I was searching for."

Simon frowned.

"What do you mean?"

Keats trained his gun back a Simon and his mind drifted off a little.

"Being in a coma for four long years," he began, "…have you any idea what it's like to wake up from that? How much has gone? Its like being a baby all over again, learning it all for the first time." His gaze travelled upwards as though staring at the ceiling as he continued his tale. "At first I didn't know anything. I didn't know who I was, where I'd been, I couldn't remember anything at all." he scratched his head. "It took me a long time to work out this wasn't even my body."

A wave of nausea filed Simon from his toes to the top of his head.

"You what?" he whispered.

"I began to remember some of it. Slowly." Keats began to pace, never for a moment lowering his gun, "I remembered who I was…and who I became. Oh, I was merely 'him' once," his speech became a jumbled collection of recollections, "I was a man. A man who endured a terrible injury when some bloody idiot decided protocol was only there to be used when it suited him. I woke up …he woke up… somewhere else. Confused at first, but determined. Didn't want anyone else to meet the same fate. Made sure everything was done by the book. Not afraid to look at every last detail." he stopped pacing and turned to Simon. "But it wasn't enough. He wanted more." A smile came over his face. "I wanted more."

Simon swallowed and ran his tongue around his lips.

"What do you mean?" he whispered.

"Everything has its opposite," Keats informed him, "just like day has night and the deserts have the seas." He paused. "And self-appointed Gods have their self-appointed Satans."

Simon edged back a little. Forget the training, he thought. There was nothing in the hostage 101 handbook that covered this.

"You're crazy," he whispered, "you're insane. You're trying to tell me you're the devil in spectacles?"

Keats gave a deep laugh in sheer amusement and entertainment at Simon's assumption.

"Do me a favour," he shook his head, "there's no such thing as the devil - I was talking metaphorically."

"You're talking bollocks," Simon corrected.

Keats sighed.

"I'm not the devil," he said, "but with Hunt going around all… Saint Peter…except a lot less saintly… there was all this energy floating around… represented everything he didn't. It just needed someone take on the role. To counter everything he stood for." He sighed. "Balance in all things."

Simon's heart began thumping so hard he feared Keats could hear it from across the room.

"If you don't think you're some kind of devil," he began, "then what did you mean about… waking up in the wrong body?"

"I was in the body of someone I hadn't been for years," Keats sneered, "Someone good. Someone who cared. I couldn't remember a lot but I knew that much." he paused, "as I worked to get my life back I remembered some things… small things… things that made me angry. I remembered you but not your name. Same with young Alex here. The details were gone forever. So I had to find out for myself."

Simon nodded slowly.

"The mental health post," he guessed.

Keats raised an eyebrow.

"You have done your research," he smiled. "It took a while to get there… I didn't seem to be… settling back into work very well. Kept moving around."

"Why didn't they just let you go?"

"After the way my life was put in danger in the first place… they wouldn't dare. Knew I'd have sued them for every penny I could get my hands on. So they kept moving me, until…" his face broke into a smirk, "…I found the perfect fit."

"And you waited all this time to find me?" Simon whispered.

Keats nodded.

"I had a couple of false alarms," he admitted, "but my persistence paid off in the end."

Simon shook his head slowly.

"Don't tell me," he began, "did one of these false alarms end in a fight and another in a charge of manslaughter?" Keats didn't respond, uninterested by Simon's question so he decided to try another. "OK, answer me one thing," his voice shook a little as he tried to stand bold, "if you couldn't remember my name or Alex's then how come you had no problem remembering Gene Hunt?"

Keats snorted through his nose.

"Hunt isn't something you can forget," he said, "like your eyelids remember to blink, and your stomach remembers to digest. Your mind remembers Gene Hunt. Once you've met him," he spat in distaste, "you can't get the parasite out of your head."

Simon shuddered. He hadn't been too fond of Gene at first either but Keats had a very twisted view of things that was shaking him up more and more.

"So what was last night all about?" his voice almost gave out as he asked a question he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer to, "If you'd found me then why not just kill me?"

"Oh, believe me, I thought about it," Keats told him, "for many months and years I imagined finally tracking you down and thought about how to stop you breathing the same air as me. But by the time I found you it didn't seem like enough somehow." He gave an evil sneer. "When Alex took away my chance at taking you it was just the start of the end for me. Between her and Hunt I saw all my hopes slip away and ended up back here, in a clapped out body and a job with no authority. I had to start all over again. I should have had your soul, moved on, job done for now, back for Hunt and DI Drake when I had the chance."

"So you wanted me to suffer?"

"If I couldn't take your soul the I could at least destroy it," Keats smiled. He casually scratched an itchy elbow with his gun. "It was fun watching you going slowly round the bend and losing everything. You looked so innocent laying there in bed, all peaceful and quiet. Must have been having sweet dreams, eh? I quite enjoyed the drugging as well. Amazing what you can find laying around in CID. GHB, Rohypnol… One man's evidence is another man's…"

Before Keats could finish his sentence, something inside of Simon snapped right there and then. All his hard work, trying to keep his cool, trying to remember his training, everything went to pieces in that one moment.

"You bastard," he cried, seething as flashes of the previous night came back to haunt him. Visions of Keats closing in on him, hearing the whispers, feeling his hot breath as he sneered his words into his ear - they all came back to Simon and bubbled up like a vat of acid inside his chest. Losing control, he lunged forward, not even sure what he was intending to do, except that it would involve as much violence as possible. But Keats had anticipated his movement and took no time in taking fast aim at him, then pulling the trigger without a second thought.

For Simon, everything seemed to happen in slow motion.

Time itself began to lose its shape and form. It no longer followed the natural pattern of seconds into minutes into hours that he had been used to all his life.

The moment the gunshot rang out he anticipated the pain, and although in real life it was only a split second before it penetrated his flesh it felt as though he was waiting for the moment forever.

When it hit, it felt like eons passed without pain, without action, without motion. To say his life flashed before his eyes would have been an exaggeration, but thoughts of death and unfinished business certainly filled those endless moments.

And then it struck him; the power and the pain. The force of the bullet struck him somewhere just below his chest. He was never very good at anatomy so he didn't try to work out where the pain and blood were radiating from; instead he looked up at Keats with a gaping mouth and wide eyes, almost wishing to find it was all some kind of illusion or joke.

The sneer Keats returned to him left him in no doubt that the bullet buried deep inside of him was destined to end his life. The agony was becoming all-consuming now. His vision began to swim as he stumbled to the floor clutching his wound like a cliché in a movie.

He could hear screaming, only vaguely aware that it was his own. In his mind all kinds of fast, tiny thoughts were crashing around. The thought that someone would have heard the gunshot and would be there to save him soon; the thought that - as far as places to get shot went - being shot in a hospital was probably the better end of the deal; the thought that Robin would get home and find him gone and the thought that he was about to breathe his very last, final few breaths in the same room as evil personified.

Dark, cloudy, blurred. His vision was failing as his eyelids kept closing, trying to shroud his dying form in darkness to hide from the world.

The call of passing was getting stronger now. Every breath hurt too much and his body began to fail as the blood flowed like an endless river. After all he had been though, to come so far and fight so hard then lose his life this way - it was a cruel twist and a sick joke created by fate.

As though fighting against a ten ton weight he forced his eyes open one last time, hoping to take one last memory to the grave with him, but the sight that greeted him was not one he wanted to see. Knowing that time for action was short after the gunshot and the screaming, a dark shadow was closing in on Alex's bed. Simon forced himself to keep his eyes open to watch in horror as Keats lifted a pillow from a nearby chair and lowered it callously over Alex's peaceful, beautiful features.

Something happened.

Something rose inside Simon like fire.

It was a burst of strength; of pure energy, of determination and defiance. He'd already put the Grim Reaper on hold once before - he was sure he could delay the inevitable by just a few moments .

How he managed to move his body, Simon honestly did not know. With a heavy, lumbering motion he hauled himself up from the floor and gave a terrible, thunderous howl before lunging at Keats, grasping his ankle with both hands and pulling it so hard that he lost his footing and fell to the floor. One foot struck Simon in the head while his gun tumbled through the air and landed on the floor. Both men reached for it but the boot in the head had caused more injuries to add to his collection and Simon lost out to the laughing Keats who took his gun back and stood up, straightening his tie and mocking Simon by leaving him sprawled across the floor.

"Now, where was I?" he smirked, grasping the pillow once again and turning back to Alex.

As a last, desperate move Simon reached out and grabbed a machine that was sitting beside him. Dragging it over, he found it was a portable resuscitation machine and momentarily wondered if watching Casualty for two decades was enough training to use one. He could barely see, barely even move, but by now he was crazed with desperation and hatred for the demonic man before him. Fumbling at the controls and turning a couple of knobs, he hoped that the TV dramas got it right so that he would too.

Taking the paddles while still sprawled across the floor he pressed them hard against the backs of Keats's legs and an almighty scream rang out. This time, almost a whole Jim Keats fell on Simon, making the single foot he'd encountered previously seem like a treat in comparison. Once again his gun tumbled from his grasp but this time it was Simon who had the luck.

As it fell beside him and his fingers closed around it he closed his eyes in relief and surrender. With the last action his body would allow, he pressed the gun against the side of Keats' neck and pulled the trigger. He knew right then that he had taken a life to save another. Jim Keats was not a person that the world was going to miss.

Time slowed down again as darkness took over.

With eyes still closed, Simon gave in to the damage and the pain. He lay across the ground, barely registering the sounds of doctors and nurses rushing into the room to find out what the commotion had been about, fading I and out as they worked to revive him and slipping deep into unconsciousness as those around them tried to work out what had happened.

He felt his last breath leave his lungs.

Then, nothing.

Then,

Something.