First off, I'm sooooo sorry I took so long to update this. It seems I had a really bad case of writers block. But I'm back and ready to update this fanfic regularly again!

Washington D.C

Some things in life never seemed to change. Vacations were planned and canceled; engagements made and terminated; brothers and husband's killed. But the omnipresent golden arches of McDonalds were always around.

Sullivan was now free of his luggage – he and Elena had dropped his bags off at her apartment, then walked the five blocks nearest of the ubiquitous restaurants in the Washington Metro area. The breakfast rush was tapering off, and Elena grabbed a booth while Sully ordered their food. Five minutes later, Sully returned with two sausage-egg-and-cheese biscuits, two orders of hash browns, a coffee, and a Coke.

"Breakfast of champions," Sully announced as he set the food on the table.

Elena stared at him. "Uh huh."

"Eat up," he urged as he grabbed a biscuit from the tray.

Elena took a hash brown from the tray and began to pick at it, putting the morsels in her mouth in slow, detached movements. Sully was halfway through his biscuit – he hadn't even realized how hungry he had been – when he noticed Elena's demeanor.

"Not hungry?"

"Hungry." Elena dropped her hash brown onto the tray

"Just no appetite."

"Elena you gotta eat. If we're gonna get through this, we're gonna have to keep our strength up. Emotionally and mentally we're shot, but if we start wasting away physically…" He let the thought hang in the air between them. Hoping it would give her some impetus to keep pushing on. But, as Sully knew all too well, it was damned hard.

"I know. I just…" She drifted off. An uncomfortable silence filled the void.

Sully looked at his biscuit, then back at Elena. "You want to talk about it?"

"God, Sully, it was horrible." Her words tumbled out in an avalanche of emotion. "I was coming back with the last of my stuff. We were supposed to drive to the airport. Sending my husband off on a big adventure. But when I got to the apartment, he didn't answer. The apartment was quiet, and the peephole was dark. I figured he had gotten another ride, or perhaps overslept, but he would have let me know if he didn't need me to pick him up, and he never would miss this trip. I tried calling his cell, but there was no answer. And I heard his ringtone from inside the apartment. I thought he might be in the shower or something, so I used my key to get in."

Sully raised his eyebrows and took a long pull of air. All this was too much for him, but regardless, it was where they were. And as distasteful as the story's ending was sure to be, Elena needed to tell it. And Sully needed to hear it.

"But everything was wrong," she continued breathlessly, as though the story had been kept inside her for too long and now was forcing itself out. "It was too dark, like some supernatural shadow had been draped over the room. I called his name, making my way toward the bedroom, and then gagged on a scent I'd never smelt before. I wanted to run away, just flee and never look back. But I couldn't. So I went to the bedroom. Forced myself not to gag as the smell became stronger. I opened the door and.. His head… so much blood. Blood everywhere." She took a few quick heavy breaths, the composed herself and continued. "The police are calling suicide, but-"

"But no freaking way," Sully finished her sentence through a mouthful of sausage, egg, and biscuit.

Elena snorted a quick laugh despite herself, which quickly gave way to the prevailing frown. "Yeah, no way."

"The don't even know Nathan so they didn't factor that into their official assessment." Sully exhaled sharply through his nose. "So what evidence pointed the cops to a conclusion of suicide?"

"They say there was no sign of a struggle, no sign of forced entry, no evidence of anyone else inside the apartment. And the gun was fired through the…" She paused, cringing.

"Take your time."

"No, no, I'm fine. The gun was fired from under his jaw through his…" She looked like she was about to vomit, then regained her composure. "…through his brain."

Sully made a face. "Not Nathan."

"No, Sully. Not Nathan at all. Especially with everything that was going right in his life. He was really stoked about the new adventure he was planning. Some real breakthrough that was supposed to make his career." She looked down at her hands resting on the table. "And of course there was me…"

Sully tilted his head as Elena, fixing her with a compassionate gaze. "There still is you, Elena."

"Yeah, I know, I know." Elena raised her eyes to Sully, looking as though on the verge of tears. "Geez, Sully, how in the world are you holding up like this."

"I'm not. My jet lag is probably disguising how I'm feeling. Believe me, I'm pretty screwed up right now." Sully exhaled a shuddering breath and took a bite out of his hash brown.

Elena placed her hand on Sully's arm. "Well, I'm here now, Sully. And vice versa, I think."

"Yeah," he said, thinking guiltily of the jealousy he'd felt for her just a few days before. "Definitely." A brief pause, a silence that seemed to echo the emptiness they felt, the void Nathan had left, the absence of any sense of the future.

"So what was so interesting that he ran across?" he said, trying to change the subject to something more productive than wallowing in grief. He took another bite of his biscuit before continuing. "I mean it sounded like something that the world ought to know."

"He said he backdoored into something. In his research he stumbled across a mob-blamed shooting that happened six years ago, which didn't add up. And it led him to the threads of something much bigger. Some sort of cover up."

Sully put the remains of his biscuit down. "A cover-up? And what, some G-men killed Nathan because he was the man who knew too much?" He shook his head. "C'mon Elena, this is real life, not some video game. The government goes around spending money they don't have and covering up sex scandals, not murdering their own citizens to keep someone from publishing his allegations on a six-year-old murder charge."

Elena's face flushed. "Well, Nathan's dead, isn't he? So we're left with two options: he killed himself, or someone else did."

Sully cocked an eyebrow. "But the government?"

"I never said the government killed him. You sad that. I was just telling you what he was working on. Like you asked."

Sully looked at her, a blank expression drawn across his face. "You're right. I'm sorry. My mouth got away from me there."

"It's alright." Elena gave Sully a crooked half-smile. "We're both a little messed up right now. I think an extra dose of patience might be in order."

Sully nodded. "Sounds good. So did he say exactly what this government cover-up or whatever was supposed to be?"

"Not to me. I think he might have been a little afraid… For me at least." She chuckled softly, then fixed him with a gaze that seemed curiously cold. "He was really excited to tell you about it though. Figured you'd be proud of him. His adventuring buddy."

Sully blinked, cocked his head curiously, but the look in her eyes was gone just as soon as it had appeared. Or maybe it had never been there at all. Sully sat quietly, looking pensive as he furrowed his brow and stroked the stubble on his chin.

"What?" Elena asked. No trace of the coldness. Must've been my imagination. Sully thought. Too much, too soon.

"Can I borrow the key to Nathan's place?" Sully asked.

"Sure, but why?"

Sully pointed a thumb toward the door. "I wanna go over there and check it out. See what he was working on. Research-wise."

"Okay…" Elena reached into her pocket and withdrew her keys. "The cops cleared out pretty quick. Declared it a suicide… took him to the morgue. Cleaned up the scene, shouldn't be any issues."

"Do you want to come with? Could show me around and stuff."

Elena shook her head vigorously. "Not yet Sully. I can't go back in there just yet."