Red in Tooth

By Thalia Drogna

Author's Note: I realise that updates to this story have slowed to a crawl, but this is actually the conclusion to the main plot of this story. There's a recovery epilogue coming up. In case it wasn't obvious for this story, my usual beta has been absent for this entire work. Don't blame him for the grammar, punctuation and typos that have been present through out.

Of course, they picked this week to use Red in Tooth and Claw for an actual episode name. It's an obvious choice so it was bound to come up sooner or later.

Jane slept while Lisbon did the required groundwork for his plan, which was not an uncommon occurrence he had to admit. This time it was at Doctor Talavera's insistence and had been one of her conditions for allowing the slightly unconventional visitor access to his room. She might be prepared to bend some rules to keep her patient happy but she had pointed out that Jane was still seriously ill, and tiring him out wouldn't be good for his already weakened body. She had explained that his recovery would hopefully be shortened if he rested properly and let his body heal, but equally it would be lengthened if he expended all his energy on talking and planning.

However, Talavera had been surprisingly easy to convince in the end and none of the arsenal of tricks that he'd had up his sleeve had been required. He admitted that he was slightly disappointed about that. It was yet another puzzling fact to add to the mildly engaging diversion that Talavera's identity was for him. He disliked most doctors for being too cautious where it was not required and too reckless where care would have been more appropriate. Talavera was the opposite. She didn't seem to care about visiting hours or having a murder suspect in his room, but she monitored his vital signs like a hawk. It would come to him, he was sure. He just needed to give it the right stimulus. In the meantime he had to catch Marcus Addison's murderer.

When he awoke from the prescribed nap, Lisbon was back at his bedside.

"They've all been told," she said. "It's just a matter of waiting now. I brought you your book. I found it on the couch back in the bullpen." She placed the dog-eared copy on his bedside table, but although he appreciated the gesture, reading didn't really appeal at the moment.

He looked around the room, and tried to persuade his brain to accelerate to full speed. He would need to be sharp for this. He shuffled into the most comfortable position that he could find, whilst still having needles and tubes poking into his body, and took a deep breath.

"Good, then you should get out of here." Saying just these few words heralded a long, dry, coughing fit, and without even needing to be asked, Lisbon reached for the glass of water on the table beside the bed. She was going to give it to him, but he ended up putting a hand on it while she simply held it to his lips, helping him to drink. Jane was both touched and somewhat freaked out by this small gesture, but he tamped those thoughts down and concentrated on the arrival of his guests. He really didn't want to confront his own weakness at this moment, or that he had long recovery ahead of him.

"Maybe this isn't such a good idea at the moment," said Lisbon, obviously jumping to the worst conclusion about Jane's cough.

"It's going to be fine. If I don't look like I'm at death's door then this isn't going to work. Go on, leave me to it."

"Jane, you pretty much are at death's door. You're still on dialysis and constant monitoring."

"Details," replied Jane flippantly. "Go, you're scaring off our murderer."

Lisbon somewhat reluctantly got up from her seat. She came over and checked that Jane had the call button within easy reach. "Okay, you know what to do as soon as anyone turns up. We've got a camera and mic wired up in here, but we couldn't get anything in the corridor so don't take any chances. We'll be watching, but because this is a hospital we couldn't set things up exactly how we wanted to, so we're on the floor above…"

"Lisbon…" Jane interrupted the CBI agent as she was about to take him through the plan yet again.

"Okay, okay, I'm going," Lisbon headed for the door, she could see that Jane was still tired. She opened the door to the corridor, gave him a quick glance and stepped out of the room.

Jane gave a quick wave to where he knew the camera had been placed. He wondered who was currently keeping watch over him at the moment, he was imagining Cho hunched over the monitor but it could have been any of the other team members. He did a rapid assessment of his body and was somewhat disappointed to discover that he didn't actually feel much better than he had earlier. He was still weak and his vision was annoyingly blurred. His eyes just didn't want to focus on anything and squinting didn't help.

He reached for the book that Lisbon had left him, but immediately realised that he didn't even have the energy to pick it up, much less read any of it. He was already tired again, so he decided that he would close his eyes for a while. He didn't even realise that he'd fallen asleep, but apparently he had because he was awakened by the door to his, now dark, room opening. It seemed that he'd been sleeping for a while. Whoever it was didn't bother to turn on the light, they just came in and closed the door. They waited a few moments, probably giving their eyes time to become accustomed to the dark. Jane felt for the call button that had been on the bed when Lisbon had left, but it didn't seem to be there now.

The person, a man by the heaviness of the footsteps, was now approaching Jane's IV stand, and the streetlamp outside the window caught a glint of metal in their hand. Jane was about to speak and reveal that he was actually awake when the door opened a second time. This time a woman had entered, Jane was certain of it.

Jane coughed, his voice sounding horribly weak to his own ears. "Well, now that you're both here…"

He practically heard the sharp intake of breath that was their surprise at his being conscious. Obviously Van Pelt and Rigsby had spun their story well and everyone concerned believed that Jane was still unconscious, exactly as they had been supposed to.

"…there's no need to sneak around in the dark. You should put the light on, Lois."

Lois felt around for the light switch and everyone blinked as they came on. The harsh hospital lighting had a habit of making everyone look pale, Jane concluded, whilst also making the shadows on faces contrast much more darkly. Lois Birchley and Jonathan Barnes looked positively sick at having been found out. However Jonathan was wielding a syringe that was very close to the port of Jane's IV line and it was clear that his intentions were bad.

Jane realised that Lisbon would need a moment to get to him, from CBI's listening position on the floor above. He needed to keep them talking and make sure that they got enough evidence to convict. He really hoped that they were paying close attention to the video feed. To make matters worse Lois produced a gun from a pocket and held it in shaking hands towards Jane. He calculated that it was unlikely that she'd use it, because the sound would carry in the hospital, but she was so nervous that it could go off accidentally. The syringe was still his most immediate worry.

"What exactly is in the syringe? Something to wake me up so that I'd be able to tell you where the diamonds are? That probably wouldn't have been very good for me in my current condition, and it would have been a waste of your time since the police already have the diamonds in their evidence locker."

Barnes mouth gaped for a moment. "You have no idea what you've done," he said.

"I know exactly what I've done. I've identified the killers of Marcus Addison. The question is exactly how it happened and how he ended up with the diamonds. I know that they were in the snake, it probably ate a dead mouse which had them stuffed inside, and snakes regurgitate the parts of their meal that they can't digest. They were perfect for smuggling the diamonds into the country from all those places where diamonds are plentiful but linked to bad men. I should think that snakes are probably plentiful there too. But how did Marcus get the snake?" Jane's voice was normally commanding in situations like this, but here he had to make do with what he had. It was not up to his usual standards, and getting raspier by the moment.

"The smart thing would be to stop talking," said Barnes, putting the syringe into the port on Jane's IV but not depressing the plunger. "I used to work as a veterinarian's assistant so I know my way around drugs and this stuff is a powerful stimulant. I was going to be careful about how much I used, but if you don't shut your mouth then I'm going to put it all into you."

Jane held up his hands as best he could in a gesture of submission. "Sorry, I'll be quiet." His brain was racing. This hadn't been part of the plan.

"Jon, if the police have the stones, then we need to get out of here now. They'll want their money back," said Lois. She didn't specify who "they" might be, but Jane could guess.

"I know," said Barnes, simply. "But he's seen us and can testify against us."

"Did I mention that I might be able to help you?" asked Jane, looking between the two.

"What can you do? You were stupid enough to be bitten by a snake," said Lois.

Jane fixed Lois with a look that seemed to strip off her clothes and see exactly what was going on underneath.

"I used to be a psychic. Well, of course I wasn't really psychic, but I can tell you things about yourself that would make you think that I am. For example I know that you and Jonathan here have been seeing each other for about six months. You got into the diamond smuggling business not long after that, when Romanos approached you. He'd found out about the affair and used it to persuade you to help him get the snakes out of the secure port area. The store often imported snakes, so it made sense and he knew that Marcus was too straight laced to do it."

Lois and Barnes exchanged a look which he knew meant that he was right. Jane noted that no one was threatening to kill him at this point so decided to continue. If they were paying attention to him then they would be more off guard when Lisbon walked through the door.

"Tom Courtney, our Animal Control snake expert, told Agent Van Pelt that there was another snake in Marcus' collection that was suspicious. The other snake with the dodgy background, that was you too. Obviously I don't know the exact story, as I said, I'm not actually psychic, but Marcus found you out. He ended up with the illegal snake because something went wrong and it was in your office when he visited you at some point. He recognised it as a species that you shouldn't have and you couldn't talk fast enough to make him believe that there was a valid reason why you'd have it. I expect it had already coughed up the diamonds by that point, so you weren't bothered that Marcus took it. In fact you may even have given it to him with some sob story." Jane eyed up the woman. "Yes, you actually made a gift of it to him. However he was now suspicious of you, which meant that when Kumiko told him that you'd been to see the snake importer, he started to wonder if something was going on."

Lois nodded and edged closer to Barnes. "He came to my office just after I'd collected the Long Nosed Viper. We had a huge argument and he took the snake. I knew it was about to cough up the diamonds any day, so Jonathan and I went over to Marcus's house that night to get it back. Marcus wouldn't give it to us, he just spouted stuff about animal welfare and said he'd be contacting the authorities about it. He'd keep our names out of it, but Romanos would have to be reported. We couldn't let him do that. They'd have known who gave the cops the information."

Barnes also nodded. "Marcus dropped the stupid snake and then we couldn't find it. At least we knew that he left the pet stores to Lois in his will, so we reckoned that we could siphon enough cash out of the business to make a payment on our debt." He paused. "We're dealing with some very bad people here, Mr Jane. Marcus just didn't understand that it was him or us."

There was the sound of running footsteps approaching outside the door, and Lisbon and her team burst in. She had her gun in her hands, stretched out in front of her in the usual stance that she employed for situations like this one.

"You're under arrest, both of you. Jonathan, step away from the IV line and Lois, put the gun down. You don't want to add a second murder to your list. We could still cut a deal with the DA if you give us enough information to bring down the smugglers and get you both a reduced sentence."

Barnes still held the syringe, he shook his head. "No, you're all going to back out of here and down the corridor. Lois, make sure they do it and they get all the way down. If you don't then I'll put all of this into Mr Jane's IV. He won't last long if I do."

Jane stiffened. This wasn't the way that this was supposed to go at all. All that was supposed to happen at this point was that Lisbon, Rigsby, Cho and Van Pelt put handcuffs on the suspects. There wasn't supposed to be any further threatening of his life.

His mouth was good at self-preservation, even if the rest of his body might have trouble occasionally. "Jonathan, where are you planning to go? How are you and Lois even going to get out of the hospital, never mind the state?" asked Jane. "I can't even stand so I'm not a great hostage. Or are you really planning on becoming a cop killer?" Rhetorical questions were good here, and would hopefully make Barnes think long enough to be distracted and ignore the tell-tale signs of what Cho was planning next.

"Shut up," was the only reply from the man who currently held Jane's life in his hand.

"Boss?" asked Cho, and Jane knew that he was asking for permission to take the shot. He was the best marksman on the team and without the addition of a syringe full of stimulant into the equation, it would have been an easy call. Jonathan wasn't even that far away. Jane was aware of a surreal moment where everyone in the room was hanging on Lisbon's reply.

Lisbon's eyes were fixed on Barnes trigger finger. Her expression showed only an unemotional determination to get the job done. The quickest of quick glances at Jane let him know that she hadn't forgotten him though. With her eyes still on Barnes she spoke. "Do it."

A shot rang out in the hospital room. It was loud in the enclosed space and the blood that blossomed on Barnes head was too red against the white background of the standard issue hospital tiling. His hand spasmed slightly as he went down and half depressed the plunger of the syringe. Jane immediately realised what had happened.

"Lisbon!" Jane reached for the needle that pierced his arm, the one that the drip line ran into, but he couldn't make his muscles co-operate.

"Oh no," said Lisbon, stowing her weapon and rapidly moving to Jane's side. The heart monitor was beeping insistently. "Call Talavera," she shouted over her shoulder, shoving Jane's ineffectual hands out of the way and immediately began to disconnect the IV, pulling at the tape on his arm. With a sharp tug she had the needle out. "Jane?"

Jane was breathing heavily as he looked up at her. He tried to form a sentence that told her how he was feeling, but at this moment he couldn't manage it. His heart was trying to beat its way out of his chest.

"Jane, I need you to calm down for me. Whatever was in that syringe, it didn't have time to get through the IV line," said Lisbon. She looked back at Rigsby, who was busy cuffing Lois. She was apparently too shocked by the death of her partner to remember she had a gun in her hand and had been easily disarmed by the agent. To Jane this was all peripheral to his main task of getting air into his lungs.

Jane was well aware that Lisbon had no real knowledge of how long the drug would have taken to make its way into his arm. She was just saying things to make him feel better, however he did his best to calm his breathing, and was surprised to discover that he could. Perhaps Lisbon had been right about the drug after all.

Talavera came into the room at a full out sprint, but slowed down a little when she saw Jane's heart rate going down. Jane left Lisbon to explain what had happened whilst he continued his careful breathing and got it more under control. Talavera put on a pair of latex gloves and removed the syringe carefully from where it still hung from the IV stand. She laid it carefully in a kidney dish.

"I expect you'll want that for evidence," said the doctor.

"Yes, thank you," said Lisbon.

"I'll arrange another room for Mr Jane as well. He can't stay here, and I'll order a complete blood panel just to be on the safe side." Talavera had already picked up his chart and was writing on it. "In fact the sooner we get him moved to somewhere quiet the better."

Jane finally had had enough breath to speak. He looked up at Lisbon with just a little accusation and a plaintive look in his eyes. "What took you so long?"

Lisbon sighed. "There was a five car pile-up on the interstate. All the injured were brought to this hospital and it's chaos out there. We couldn't get through the crush. Birchley and Barnes probably decided that it was a perfect distraction. They were almost right. But you should have pressed the damn call button and you didn't. It was only when you started talking that we realised that anything was going on at all."

Jane did his best to shrug. "I couldn't find it."

Talavera bent down and picked it up off the floor, curl of dark hair falling across her forehead. "It must have got knocked off the bed while you slept."

Jane didn't answer because something in his memory had just clicked. "Vicky Talavera. Your mother was Isabel Hernandez."

Talavera gave a small nod, looking a little like a deer trapped by a car's headlights. "I didn't think you'd remember."

Lisbon was looking a bit perplexed, as she glanced between the doctor and her patient.

"I'm sorry it took me so long. I think I can probably put it down to all the nice drugs that you've been giving me. Normally I don't forget a face, especially the women that Red John killed, and you look a lot like her."

"Everyone says so," said Talavera with a small sad smile.

"I guess that explains why you've taken an interest in my care."

"I'm a doctor, you'd have received the same level of care from me whoever you were, but I've read a lot about you Mr Jane and I know that one day you're going to find the man that murdered my mother."

"Yes, I am," said Jane, considerably calmer now than he had been previously. He didn't really believe that Talavera wasn't giving him special treatment because he was a fellow survivor of Red John's terror, but she was probably in denial so he didn't pursue it further. "Thank you for taking such good care of me." He found that he really meant it too.

"You don't need to thank me, I'm doing my job. Besides I don't get that many really interesting snake bite cases." Talavera replaced Jane's chart and went to check the wound where the IV had been removed.

Lisbon had a small smile on her lips and a slight tilt to her head as she watched the exchange. Lois was being ushered out of the room by Rigsby and Van Pelt, and orderlies were now entering to move Jane to a room that wasn't the scene of a shooting. Cho would be heading back to the office to do the mountains of paperwork that were required after shooting someone in the line of duty. Lisbon would be needed back at the office too after having given the order for Cho to shoot. She had a quick, and quiet, consultation with her agents.

She looked back at Jane. "Grace is going to stay here to keep an eye on your transfer and get a statement. Are you going to be alright without me for a few hours? I'll be back as soon as I've got Lois signed in to custody and started the arrest paperwork."

Jane nodded, and gave her a dismissive wave of his hand. "I'll be fine Lisbon. I'm sure Van Pelt is quite capable of keeping an eye on me."

However he really did appreciate the extra concession of leaving Van Pelt to keep watch. He was still feeling vulnerable and weak, and his inability to even detach a drip line that potentially could have killed him was weighing heavily upon his mind now that the incident was departing into the past. He was totally aware that there was no real reason for Van Pelt to be staying with him, he could just as easily file a witness statement the following day.

He needn't have worried as the transfer to his new room went seamlessly, without even a bump over a cracked floor tile. By the time a nurse had reattached the traitorous drip line into his arm and all the machines around him had been checked to make sure they were working properly following the change in location, he was sleepy again. He couldn't ever remember sleeping this much in so little time, but he knew it was a combination of the snake bite antivenin and the other various drugs which were being pumped into him to combat the allergic reaction and pain from his leg. He barely even noticed being hooked up to the dialysis machine again, as he drifted into sleep with Van Pelt sat doing paperwork at his bedside.