This ties to "How Mitch Never Met Heather" and "Spin."
Disclaimer: Jericho is not mine.
"Do you have a better plan than driving up to the blockade and demanding that they hand Heather over?" Roger asked him as he fiddled with the strap of the seatbelt across his shoulder.
"Yeah, plans aren't always my strong suit." Mitch replied trying to tell himself that it wasn't necessary to grip the steering wheel as tightly as he was.
"So I'm just here to what . . . watch you get yourself killed or because you didn't feel like going out by yourself on your little suicide mission?" The other man snarked at him.
"So you do believe there is something wrong in New Bern?" Mitch countered - not taking the bait.
"There's something wrong everywhere."
"This isn't the time for philosophy."
"No, it's time for you to pull over and figure out what you are doing."
"I'm getting Heather back." Mitch responded in a clipped tone while noting that his knuckles were going white. He really needed to ease up on his grip on the steering wheel, but his hands didn't seem to be responding to his commands to loosen.
"That is not a plan."
"Look," he took a moment to peer at the man in the passenger seat of his car, "everybody is playing like we're all working together here. Are they going to throw that out the window by not letting me see her when I'm actually on the doorstep?"
"That depends on what the game is and just how involved Heather has managed to get herself." Roger replied matter of factly. The quickness of the response combined with the calmness of it told Mitch a lot about where his head was.
"How many towns gone bad did you pull your people through before you got home?" He asked. He wondered if anyone else had bothered to ask Roger that in the time he had been back. Something told him that the number wasn't very high.
"More than I want to think about."
"Enough that you know what you're looking at when you see it?"
"Every messed up little burg is messed up in its own unique way." He paused as if waiting for some sort of a comment from Mitch. When none came, he sighed and continued. "There are some common themes. Usually, they involve someone in power keeping a tight hold on their own importance."
"Think that's Constantino?" He never had liked that man, and it wasn't entirely because the two of them had been on opposite sides of the law in Mitch's youth. He had had a couple of run ins over minor things in the neighboring town - enough for Mitch to remember that the man had been the type that micromanaged everyone that worked for him with a hefty dose of his way was the only way perched on his shoulder. It wasn't a power gone to his head thing (Mitch had encountered a few of those along the way as well); it was an I know what's best for you sentiment that had always pushed Mitch's buttons the wrong way.
"I've never met him," Roger was shaking his head. "I thought I told you you needed to pull over. You don't want to get any closer before you know what they're doing. Any town that is even remotely organized is going to have patrols as far out as they can push it. New Bern has plenty of people to draw from - it's likely that they are out pretty far."
Mitchell didn't want to do it, but he could recognize the wisdom of the words even when he didn't like them. A younger him would have sped up in response to that comment. A younger him had been an idiot who didn't know what it was like to lose people that were important. A younger him had no understanding of how something like that left you holding on tighter to the people you got gifted. He pulled the car over.
"Here's what I know for sure . . .," he began knowing he had made the right decision (and not just the expedient one in going after Roger) when the other man stopped him to ask for clarification of something that let him know that he was not only listening - he was thinking things through and forming the base for a plan.
"Alright," he said after about ten minutes of back and forth. "I kind of wish we had talked this through earlier," he informed him. "There are some things that we could have used - not to mention a little time to hammer out the details, but you work with what you've got." He paused. "I'm sorry," Roger told him and Mitchell found for once that he didn't need a translator to not take what was being said to him in the worst connotation possible. Roger was Heather's friend too - not the same way that Mitch and Heather were friends, but there was an acknowledgment there that he knew he hadn't been being the kind of friend that Mitch could have come to earlier.
"You're here now," Mitch shrugged the comment off tapping the steering wheel with his finger and giving him a look to tell him that what he said had been acknowledged but now was not the time.
He and Roger had never had much to say to each other - nodding acquaintances was what he had once heard Heather call it. On this occasion, the only topic of conversation to be had between them was the rudimentary sketching of some semblance of something resembling a plan. Even Mitch wasn't quite ready to label it an actual plan. It was more of an outline really - or a set of steps to follow in case certain things might occur. Unless, of course, Heather was standing at the roadblock at the entrance to town waiting on them when they got there.
That, of course, wasn't very likely. Nothing ever worked out that easily for Mitch. His mother used to say things about people who only learned the hard way, and there had been a long time in his life where she was absolutely right about that. He liked to think he was better now. But hard way or not, Heather was coming home.