Jack knocked on the double doors to Courtroom B-27. "SWAT, coming in," he yelled out. He'd been told to expect a half dozen people, including a bailiff who was still armed. He slowly pushed the door open not wanting to spook someone overtired and undertrained who might be in there. The room was dark and he turned on a flashlight. "SWAT," he said again.
There was movement and he turned his weapon toward it. A middle-aged man, a judge by the look of the robes, stood from behind his desk. The bailiff, his weapon drawn but lowered stood next to him.
"Turning on the lights," someone said behind him and the fluorescents thrummed to life.
The occupants blinked in the light.
"Hey. SWAT boy." Jack turned to the exhausted sounding voice.
"Ms. Vega." She smiled at him while brushing the dust from her suit. "Anyone injured?"
"We're all fine, Jack, thank you." Time slowed and shifted as Jack turned toward the speaker who had put an oily sheen on the polite words. Still handcuffed but perfectly dressed, Hugh Lancing smiled at him.
No. Jack’s pulse sped up and his vision narrowed. He felt his finger move like someone else was controlling him. It slid slowly down, following the curve of the trigger. Maybe not so slowly, as it happened between one breath and the next but that space felt nearly infinite. Lancing's smile broadened.
The concussing crack of a shotgun came from down the hall and everyone hit the floor again.
Time returned to normal. It took a whole two minutes to neutralize the man with the shotgun before the occupants of courtroom B-27 were ushered down the hall and hopefully out of the building. From there they moved to courtroom B-25 then B-23. Room after room, hall after hall, they worked up the building while others worked down. There were bodies, survivors, some who resisted, and some who surrendered. Jack tried to forget the moments as they passed, not wanting them burned into his memory. He knew it would be futile but he could try. At one point, he felt blood on his cheek. He wasn't sure if it was fresh or if he'd reopen the cut from the botched Jones arrest.
They crossed over with the fed teams and were double checking floor five when the all clear came in and the orders to report back. One of his men sat down hard on a bench. "Nope." He pulled the young man up by his arm. "Keep moving. You sit down for more than twenty seconds and you're not getting back up, so let's get somewhere where we can collapse first."
The fed who had briefed them, in his nice clean FBI windbreaker, was the one to greet them as they stepped out into the offensively bright afternoon sun. The warmth of it made him aware of how gritty his face and eyes felt. Sweat was drying on his body and his mouth tasted like he was waking up from a bad fever.
"Good work everyone; we'll need to debrief you—"
"No." Gonzales stepped forward just as Jack contemplated hitting the agent. "The only members of County SWAT who have properly slept in the last 36 hours, are the ones who are still in the hospital from the cluster fuck that was our operation two nights ago. These men, all these men, are going home, sleeping for twelve hours, getting some breakfast and then, if they're feeling up to it, you will be allowed to debrief them, and if you try to stop us from that plan I will let Jack hit you and everyone here will swear under oath you walked into a wall."
"So spake Jesus," Dan said leaving the agent to blink in confusion as County SWAT stumbled past.
Chapter 31
The message from Lydia had arrived from someone else's phone. It was just a quick one. She was safe, she was fine. Amalie had cried. Isaac cried as well, not aware until that moment how much he'd been holding in. Lydia had been in his life as long as Amalie and while their relationship would never be romantic or physical, he'd spent the night contemplating how large her place in his life was.
Her message had come in hours earlier. Isaac managed to use his ID to get closer to where the medics were treating the injured, and the survivors were being interviewed. The press was still hovering around the barriers eager to shove a camera in the face of the first person to get out.
Amalie was leaning against a light pole, drumming her nails on the rough metal. Every thirty seconds or so she would check her phone, then go back to drumming her fingers.
"She's fine, you know she's fine. She just has to go through the bureaucracy."
"She almost dies, and they're making her do paperwork."
Every so often a tent flap would open and a haggard looking individual would step out, blinking in the sunlight. Half the time they were wrapped in a Red Cross emergency blanket and clutching a paper cup of weak coffee. Every lawyer Isaac had ever met lived off gallons of coffee. Once the adrenaline was done draining out of peoples' systems the caffeine withdrawal headaches were going to be ugly.
The tent opened again and Lydia stepped out. Her suit was dusty, and her makeup smudged, but her back was strait and there wasn't a hair out of place. Amalie ran to her and the kiss would have melted the internet if anyone nearby had cared enough to lift up their phones.
Isaac hugged her next, holding her tight. She squeezed him right back. "Let's get you home."
"Yeah." He let her go but she put a hand back on his arm.
"Wait. Hold on." She squeezed her eyes shut and tilted her head back making the 'trying really hard to remember something important' face. "How does your SWAT boy know Hugh Lancing?"
"What?" It was a complete non-sequitur to the situation and his brain stalled.
"I'm prosecuting this asshole called Hugh Lancing."
"I've encountered him. He's an asshole. I heard he'd gotten arrested but I didn't hear for what."
"Pushing a metric shit-load of E through town. We were in a pretrial hearing when shit went down. Then this morning SWAT boy comes through the door looking like a big damn hero, then Lancing calls him by name and I swear to god I saw his finger get really close to the trigger on that gun of his."
Shit. Some things clicked into place.
"When was he arrested?"
"Few months back. Picked him up at some nasty leather bar."
"Any idea if Jack was part of the arresting team?"
Lydia shrugged. "Maybe. They sent in SWAT."
Isaac rubbed his face as things clicked into place. Jack goes in to help arrest someone, Lancing recognizes him, Jack freaks out, Isaac assumes it was something he did, and there they were three months later, not talking and miserable.
"Fuck," he muttered into his own hands feeling like both an idiot and an asshole for not making more of an effort to confront Jack.
"Go get your boy," Amalie said patting his arm. "I'll drive Lydia home, you get your own car."
"He's not my—"
"Go. Find. Jack." Her look was hard and bore no argument.
"I'll go find Jack."
♦ ♦ ♦
No one at the Sheriffs' Office asked questions when Isaac flashed his ID and asked for directions towards where SWAT members might be. They all looked exhausted. He knew he could text Jack and ask where he was but it didn't seem right. They needed to talk face to face without either of them running. He saw a few men in SWAT t-shirts who looked even worse. They didn't ask what he wanted either, just pointed him to the locker room. He knocked softly before stepping in. He didn't see Jack right off, so began walking down the rows of lockers. At the third one he saw Jack slumped on a bench a large man standing next to him, hand on his shoulder.
"Jack?"
Jack's head snapped up. There were dark rings under his eyes and a cut on his cheek. He looked thinner and drawn. He didn't say anything.
"Are you KMC?" The large man asked.
"Who?"
"Kinky Married Complicated."
Isaac laughed in exhaustion though it wasn't funny. "Yeah. I guess that's me."
"He's not fine," the man said.
"I'm fine," Jack mumbled.
"He hasn't slept in 36 hours."
"I'm fine."
"He's been in two active shooter situations with fatalities in that time."
"I'm fine."
"And he's been going downhill the last three months. Under eating, over exercising."
"I'm fine." Jack dragged out the last word.
Isaac's stomach twisted in guilt. He should have gone after Jack, should have followed up, asked for a real explanation instead of making assumptions about the silence, and running away like the coward he was.
"Take him home, fix whatever went wrong. Put him back together."
"I'm—" Jack started again.
"I talked to Lydia," Isaac cut off Jack. "She told me about… stuff. I get what… I think I get what happened."
Jack slumped further into himself.
"Let me take you home. If nothing else, you're not fit to drive." He held out his hand and held his breath. "Please."
Jack stared at it for a long time, then slowly and stiffly, like an old man, rose to his feet.
♦ ♦ ♦
Jack was asleep almost as soon as his seatbelt was clicked into place and slept all the way back to the house. Isaac drove carefully, short on sleep himself, though not to the same extent. It occurred to him on the way, that he didn't know where Jack's apartment was. Not that he would have taken Jack there but it felt like one more oversight on his part.
"Jack," he said softly not wanting to jolt him awake when he could still be on a hair trigger. He'd signed off on bodies from a botched arrest of a dirty officer from a couple of nights before. The debrief must have run into the courthouse mess if Jack was involved in that.
"Jack, time to wake up." He settled his hand onto Jack's shoulder. "Jack."
Jack snapped awake clawing at his seatbelt.
"It's okay, it's okay. We're home. There is a shower and a bed waiting for you. It's okay." Isaac slowly reached over and unclipped Jack's seatbelt before rushing around the car, barely keeping Jack from falling out.
Inside, Amalie was sitting on the couch, Lydia stretched out with her head in her lap. "We didn't make it upstairs," Amalie said in a loud whisper. "Murrcat peed in the kitchen. He's mad at us. Hi, Jack."
"Hi." He gave a small wave.
"I'm going to take him to bed."
"Good idea."
If Jack had any objection to being talked about instead of to, he didn't voice them. He didn't comment as Isaac led him to the extra bedroom, took off his shoes and his clothes, and helped him into bed.
"You're staying?" he did ask as Isaac began to undress.
"I'm not leaving you alone and I could use some sleep myself."
Jack nodded and was asleep before Isaac even finished undressing.
♦ ♦ ♦
It hadn't been more than a few hours when Jack opened his eyes. He wanted to be asleep. He needed to be asleep. Instead his head churned, sorting the memories of the last two days, twisting and meshing them, trying to fill in gaps. He prayed to his mother's god and Clare's goddess for sleep, but it refused to come. A small sob of exhaustion pushed its way from his lips. Isaac stirred and he tried to fight back any more sounds, but failed.
Isaac opened his eyes full of too much kindness and Jack broke. The last two days, the last three months, his whole life came out in choking sobs. He tried to curl up, tried to turn away but Isaac held him close and tight. He was such a coward and such a fraud. He wasn't sure how long he cried. Every time he managed to force it back, he'd hear his father's voice in his head or feel Lancing's eyes on his body. He pictured himself pulling the trigger like the coward he was. The whole time Isaac held him, making little soothing noises which made it worse.
When his head was pounding and his eyes felt like they were on fire, he managed to choke out three words. "I'm a coward."
"No, you're not."
He shook his head. Isaac didn't understand. "I almost killed someone. Someone I was supposed to be trying to save."
"Almost is the key word there. Almost. There is a vast difference between did and almost. You came out of one bad situation and went into another. You led your team. You saved people. You took your training and experience and made good use of it."
"I was never in combat," Jack confessed, his head was throbbing but his mind felt numb, flayed down past any emotional nerves. "Outside of basic I was never even trained for it. People see army on my resume and a bunch of acronyms they don't understand, and they look at my body and make assumptions. I've never lied. Never confirmed but I don't correct. And I should but—" Jack tried to take a deep breath but it was ragged and left him coughing.
"It's okay, slow easy breath."
There were things he didn't like to talk about, things no one ever talked about. But someone needed to know. Someone needed to understand, if they could.
"My father is head librarian at one of the largest libraries in the country. I could recite the better part of the LCC by the third grade. My mother is from… money. Blue blood. She does lots of volunteer work. Friends of the opera, veterans support fundraising, historical building preservation. Stuff like that." Jack stared at a point over Isaac's shoulder, unable to meet his eyes. "I'm eight inches taller than my dad. Seven taller than my brother, a solid foot taller than my sister, and my eyes aren't the color they should be." Isaac nodded and Jack was sure he understood. "My sister went to Yale; my brother went to Harvard. I worked at a coffee shop, had a 3.8 GPA, and only 14 hundred on my SATs. I could have gotten into perfectly good state schools, but if you weren't going ivy league…" Jack had fought with his school counselor over that as she shoved college applications at him. "Year after high school I made coffee and hung out with the coven, went to concerts and protests. Lost my virginity against a tree at a Mayday bonfire. That was fun."
"Sounds like it."
Jack could still remember the way the bark had scraped against his back as the girl wrapped her legs around him.
"I was happy, I think, that year. I think that was the last time I was happy. After a year, my father came into the shop and we had a fight. Nineteen years of passive aggressive bullshit turned into a screaming match. He told me what I was good for, where I probably came from, and exactly where I should go."
It had been late and Jack had been closing up, the shop empty. Someone who popped their head in hoping for a coffee called the police, so sure the screaming was going to turn violent.
"I spent the next few days just wandering around town, thinking, then stumbled into a recruiting office. Do something, be something, do something with this." He gestured vaguely at his body. Isaac stroked his head. "After basic you can apply to go into extra training, medical, engineering, whatever. I tried to get into special forces, airborne, something like that, except they make you take this test called ASVAB and something pinged on that test, and then they found out I could type 98 words a minute and—"
"You didn't get into special forces."
Jack had been sure there was an error when he was handed his assignment for further training. It made no sense to him. He'd been the second-best shot, never needed to be disciplined, excelled at all the physical tests and requirements. "I had a full four-star general tell me that he could walk down the street and find ten people willing to shoot at other people, but only one in a thousand that could handle the personnel database, which is stupid because, yes it's a little counterintuitive but not that hard, especially up against the Table of Organization and Equipment. My safe word is ROWPU because the first time I was asked I'd just spent three days dealing with a Reverse Osmosis Water Purification Unit that had been shipped to a training unit outside of Seattle instead of a support unit in Afghanistan, and it was the first thing that popped into my head."
"It is one of the more interesting ones I've encountered." Isaac’s voice was light but soft. "Most people just use Red or something like that."
Jack shrugged. He'd never really used it. "When I got out of the army, I swore I'd never do that much paperwork again. I applied to the force, then SWAT. I figured I could be useful there. I didn't think I'd make commander. Didn't even really try. I just sort of floated up into it. I'm not a leader, I'm…"
"That's not true. N
ot in the slightest." Isaac's words were forceful enough to startle Jack.
"A leader wouldn't have frozen, I froze, wouldn't have even—"
"No." Isaac cut him off. "You are a leader and a good one. Bad people put you into a bad situation. You think combat experience would have made yesterday easier? I can bury you in neural science research on what any stressful situation can do to the brain, in both the long and short term. Hugh being there was bad luck."
"I thought about shooting him," Jack confessed.
"And a lesser man might have, but you are not a lesser man."
"He could still talk."
"And? He likes fucking with people's heads. That’s what he gets off on." Isaac's voice was full of enough venom to catch Jack off guard. "And not to bruise your ego, but there are federal judges on the roll at the Windsor Club. If Hugh wanted to drop names you'd be at the bottom of the list." Jack nodded even if he still felt rattled right down to his teeth.
"I still feel like a fraud." It wasn't an exaggeration. It was possibly the truest fact in his life.
Isaac gave the longest sigh Jack had ever heard. "Do you know why I work on dead people instead of live ones?" Isaac asked.
"No."
"Because I couldn't handle not being a god."
Jack looked at him not sure what to say.
"You want to talk about feeling like a fraud? My parents are doctors, my grandparents are doctors, my siblings are doctors. I cut up dead people. In med school you get lectures about how you won't be able to save everyone. There will always be people who are too sick or too injured or just don't want to be saved, and they will die. And we all nod our heads and say we understand, but somewhere in the back of our minds we all think that we're going to be different. We're going to be the special one who saves everyone. And I lost a few while I was training, mostly old people with long lives, junkies who ODed for the fifth time, homeless who just died. People I could mentally brush aside, but there was the first night I flew solo, but I shouldn't have had to."
Isaac looked away from Jack focusing instead on a blank patch of wall.
Tactical Submission: A Windsor Club Story Page 25