"And some certain significance lurks in all things, else all things are little worth, and the round world itself but an empty cipher except to sell by the cartload, as they do hills about Boston, to fill up some morass in the Milky Way."

– Herman Melville, Moby Dick

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

He isn't sure how many hours he's been here. His head is pounding, he can't process anything clearly, and his whole body aches from having being twisted in an unnatural position for hours.

Not to mention it's fucking freezing in …. Wherever the hell he is. His toes went numb a long time ago.

So basically there are two things keeping him conscious at this point: a white-hot ribbon of anger aimed at Donovan Boyd, the handler into whose hands he had stupidly put his life and who clearly had screwed him over, big time (whether accidentally or deliberately, Sam most definitely intended to find out if he lived to tell this particularly sorry tale) … and a crackling, electric current of fear over what Brennan had done with, or to, Andy.

There's guilt in there, too – guilt that he brought this upon himself, brought it upon her, with his recklessness. There's colouring outside the lines, and then there's just taking stupid, stupid risks, and he's getting a huge karmic kick up the sphincter for it right now, far surpassing anything that Frank and the rest of the white shirts will be doling out should he survive to experience that little closed-door meeting. But there doesn't seem much point in beating himself up about it right at the moment, because Brennan is doing a more than adequate job of that already.

Waterboarding. Unoriginal, but simple and every bit as effective as the academy textbooks and the lectures had assured him it would be. How reassuring. The terror's pretty real, his whole body thrashing in the restraints, the musty smell of the old farmhouse and the sound of Brennan's mocking voice burned into his brain. He's trying to keep his mind focused on giving Brennan something the sadistic asshole wants to hear, something that will make him stop this, but he can feel himself slipping under, coherent thought evaporating like mist in his fingers. Welcome darkness closing in.

Until Brennan swings a hammer at his knuckles.

The explosion of pain does at least have the effect of bringing some clarity. All he can think of to do at this point is goad the bastard into losing his temper. Fortunately, goading is something he's good at. And it works: Brennan drops the hammer, goes for a right cross at Sam's jaw, and stalks from the room. With no means to break his fall, Sam goes down hard, but it's worth it, because the chair gives way and he's able to wrench an arm free.

It's only seconds till Brennan's back, though, feels like seconds anyway, and then he's cast in some sort of real-life version of Mortal Kombat, knowing he's favouring his hand and his knee and that with his head swimming he's not the most formidable of opponents. Anger and fear are keeping him on his feet, barely, but pain and exhaustion are beginning to win out over both of those. Sam's going down, and he knows it, and he's out of time …

It's Shaw's voice which penetrates the fog in his head and saves him from having Brennan's callous chuckle being the last thing he ever hears. As Sam is lying on the floor trying to suck some air back into his deflated lungs (and concluding that he has a cracked rib in the process), he thanks the universe once again for the unassuming guy who's his brother and as good a cop as you could ever hope for.

Turns out he can still bear weight on the knee, so he waves off most of the help and makes it out of that hellhole with a minimum of assistance. His heart is still thudding like a sonuvabitch, and the satisfaction of seeing Brennan wrestled out ahead of him isn't really doing it for him. Mostly, what he manages to feel is tired.

She's there when he emerges from the house, in one piece but with terror and shame and desperation twisting her features. He locks eyes with her as he stumbles off the porch, and they stare at each other for a long moment. But he really can't think of anything to say. He's going to need to some time to sort that out.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

It already feels like the longest fucking day of his life, and a night of tangled sheets and slick tongues and one quite spectacular back walkover (she was showing off), already seems like a lifetime ago. But there's still miles to go before he can sleep: being checked out and stitched up at the hospital, followed by a not exactly warm and fuzzy debriefing from Frank, with a promise of a much longer and uglier one, with the details of his suspension, the next day. Somewhere in the middle of all that Ollie manages to bring him up to speed on how Andy has blown their little tryst wide open, though mercifully his friend neither acts surprised nor disapproving.

The same will probably not be said of the rest of the squad. Jerry, in particular, looks like he has a big lecture on stupidity brewing, and it's not like Sam needs Barber to outline for him the nature of the clusterfuck when he can i.d. it perfectly well on his own, thanks. He ducks out before Jerry can get a head of steam going and heads to the locker room to see if he had the sense to stash anything in the way of clean clothes in there before he left.

Slowly his head is clearing, helped immeasurably by the fact that Oliver had detoured to a Timmie's on the way back to the barn and scored them a couple of turkey clubs and industrial-sized double-doubles. Caffeine deprivation, that's all it was. (Right, Sammy.)

"You okay to drive?," Shaw asks when he sees Sam fishing out the spare set of keys from his locker. Sam just nods and says, "All good. I just need to get home and crash for, like, a week."

"Not a week, my friend. I'm going to swing by and make sure you're still breathing tomorrow, okay?"

"As long as you know enough not to show up empty-handed. Or before noon."

The suspension is expected and he's just going to take it on the chin. Absolutely no point in getting pissed about that. And strangely, though he keeps waiting for the anger to start welling up about McNally, keeps expecting to feel like all of this is her fault, the blame feeling just isn't showing up for the party.

Huh.

Sam's not sure whether maturity is creeping up on him or whether he's just so damn crazy about this girl that he'll forgive anything and everything, but he's kind of owning the clusterfuck. And where once he would have just filed the whole experience under 'more trouble than it was worth', all he can think of now that he's fed and caffeinated and medicated and coming down from the adrenaline, is whether she's okay and whether he can catch her before Traci or someone gives her a lift home.

He'd kind of like to explore that whole 'normal' thing.