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Chapter Text

The mountain lion crept up next to him, and instinctively he delved deft fingers into her pelt, scratching behind her ears. Thick and soft, even the barest action of petting Beyonce’s fur was the calming draught he needed after the day he’d had. Ziggy Buggs looked out over the horizon, sprawled on the rocky outcrop of a ridge by Cassidy Trail. He could see a couple fishing in the river below; the din from white water on the rocks jutting out like saw-toothed blades drowned out whatever conversation they were having. He wondered if it had been him and Flop by the river if they could be overheard. Probably. The thought made him smirk while Beyonce nuzzled into his hand. He missed that fucking idiot.

Flop was gone, off for the weekend on some LOA. He’d been…not distant necessarily, but. He hadn’t been around. Sure, Ziggy knew it was temporary and that had always been fine in the past. Hell, he’s gone on an LOA of his own and Flop had fucked with him. They’d been fighting a lot lately over the Michael Simone shitshow. But they still had their good moments. Those moments just didn’t exactly…sooth him. Not right now. 

At the hospital earlier that day, Odessa had said Bobbi Russell had looked up to him and would appreciate a visit after what she had been through. And he couldn’t refuse that. But he hadn’t been prepared to see her like that, bandaged and broken. Nor had he been prepared so see whatever new brand of sick serial killer’s video of her torture. It had brought the hackles up and he’d wanted to flee, needed to. He wanted to help. Wanted to give a kidney. Wanted to catch the sick of a bitch (or bitches). But all he found himself doing in that moment was pacing. And thinking of Fae. 

Where was Fae Adaire? 

She’d been quiet for months. Not since the poaching incident had he heard from her. Via text or otherwise. Something in him thought he heard her voice by the ranger station that day. Something in him told him she was lying about not knowing where he was. But he couldn’t prove it. And with everything else on his plate of late, she had fallen to the wayside and become his last priority. 

So he’d texted her. Simple as that, right? Except for the life of him, he couldn’t remember ever texting her first. She reached out, she made first contact, and he followed. That was the procedure. One he’d implemented for years when he was dealing with people like her. The serial killers out looking for fame or an ear to listen to their twisted ramblings. He’d always played the back half of the field, distant but vigilant. It was better not to feed into their psychosis. 

But Fae wasn’t like most serial killers, was she? He tried to reason with himself as the sun began to make its slow trudge toward the horizon line. Fae needs help. She’s not entirely complicit in what she does. The voices fucked her up. Without medication…

He lifted his hand from Beyonce’s head and ran it through his hair. He glanced down at his phone. No new texts. Radio silence. Again. Somehow the silence was more unsettling, like the calm before a storm or the eye of a hurricane. He could’ve gone to someone in the PD about her after the Parsons’ fire. Could’ve outlined previous locations she was known to be at but…fuck, that had been years ago. He could’ve gotten her picture out to the press. Could’ve started a manhunt to put her back in custody…

But he hadn’t. And he didn’t know why fully. Other than the fact that if someone else in the PD caught her - especially after the shake-up - he didn’t know how she would be treated. The departments had swapped and changed so much over time, there were so many new faces… Could he trust those people with her? He could barely trust himself. Just glancing at the text he’d sent made him take a deep breath to steady himself. He wished Flop was there. He could trust him with Fae. He’d told him all about the case, about Jack… he’d been there when Ziggy had spoken to Fae on the radio. Flop had even been leaving food in places for her…

But it was that kind of kindness that could make him a target. And it was that kind of ‘do-what’s-right’ attitude that had gotten Flop mixed in with the nuclear bomb that was Michael Simone. Anyone even vaguely associated paid the price. 

So, Ziggy heaved himself to his feet and started walking toward the Charger, his steps rapid and manic. He would do nothing about it for now. Yes. Yes, that would be good. He would check up on Bobbi again in a day or so, see if anyone had donated a kidney… If they hadn’t, well…he’d try. Get checked out. Tested. Whatever. That would be good. He wouldn’t tell Flop about Fae for now, that seemed the easiest route. The better one. Yeah…

Beyonce jumped into the back of the car when he held the door open. Overhead, a crow flew by and called. It sent a shiver down his spine for some reason, but he brushed it off. Fucking birds. In the drivers’ seat, he drummed his fingers on the wheel and watched the sky turn into inky twilight. Somewhere deep down, he hoped someone else donated a kidney. He felt shame coil in his belly like a snake, ready to quietly strike. It would be better if less people knew about his past addictions. And they were in the past, he told himself. It had been a long time since he’d done coke. And he was paying the price for it even now. If only he could talk about it. 

Chapter Text

Ziggy hadn’t been himself, and even while yelling at him, Flop could sense it. Sure, they yelled at each other plenty. He came to think of it as their love language. Some people liked gifts, affirmations, touch… they liked to get in each others’ faces and argue. And then things settled down, they joked and bellowed with laughter. And continued on. 

This was not one of those times. 
And to be honest, it was mostly Flop’s fault. 

“Ziggy, you go and put yourself on the FRONT FUCKIN’ LINE and you expect ME to just be OKAY with that?”

“It’s…okay, you’re twisting my shit. My words. That’s not what I-”

“YOU WERE THERE. That’s enough. You knew the risks and you said ‘oh la di dah, let’s fuckin’ party’-”

“FLOP. That is not-”

“-And you have the balls to fuckin’ what? Tell me what I did, answer a simple phone call-”

“No, no, no, not so simple-”

“-and then you do this? You could have died-”

“WOULD YOU FUCKING LET ME TALK FOR ONCE, GODDAMNIT?!” They were speeding down Great Ocean Highway, and Ziggy was coasting way too close to the barrier. Flop gripped the side of his seat, ready to flip, but Ziggy swerved at a moment’s notice, his strange new blue eyes (fucking contacts, that bastard) held his in the rearview mirror. Flop snapped his mouth shut and crossed his arms once he determined the danger was over. At least, the physical danger. 

“Sorry.” He muttered, knowing he sounded like a huffy teenager who had to apologize for shoplifting. 

“It’s fine,” Ziggy ground out between his teeth, falling into his usual silence. His silences had been…ultra silent these days, Flop thought. Which usually was fine, he talked enough for the both of them at any given occasion. But they hadn’t seen each other in days, and the first time they could ride together…they just ended up fighting. No funny business. No jokes. Just yelling…or silence. And he hated it. 

“What did you want to say?” Flop queried, pretending to check his phone. 

Ziggy sighed. “I was gonna say… you were there when Snow talked to me. Snow was put on the spot. Bundy and Brian weren’t there. He had info, and he had to act on it. He asked for me. Did you want me to leave Snow hanging?”

“No, but-”

“No, no. Alright, if it’s my turn, it’s my fuckin’ turn, okay?” Ziggy huffed and steered the car into the parking spot in front of Flop’s beach house and killed the engine. He didn’t move. “I can’t do that to Snow. I know you’re gonna say some shit like ‘there’s other cops on duty’, but after all this new bullshit, new hires, whatever… do you think Snow was thinking ‘let’s get some training in the green ones, see how they work out’?”

“No…”

“No. He wanted officers he knew he could depend on. Me, Rhodes, Octo, Mack… we didn’t even tell half the PD what was happening until it was happening. I’m sorry, okay, that I put myself in that position. All I got was blown up and my hair fuckin’...fucked. But I’ve been blown up before. And I’m not gonna bring up the Pez shit again, because you already know what I’m gonna say. This was different. This was the job. If you don’t want me to do my job, what the fuck do you want from me, hmm?”

They sat in silence again for a moment, and Flop fiddled with the door handle. “I don’t know…just…you safe-”

“We’re fucking cops, Flop. Safe isn’t in the ‘creed’ or whatever.”

“Yeah…”

“So can we drop this? Because I can’t… I have so many fuckin’ things to say and you just…fuck, you don’t listen.” Ziggy drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. He took out his phone and thumbed through his texts, letting out a low exasperated sound. 

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Just. I gotta… I dunno. I’m going off duty, you can take the car if you want-”

“You’ve been on duty for two hours-!”

“And that’s all I’m doing today, okay? Just. Take the Charger to MRPD. I’m gonna just… I gotta think, okay? Will you let me do that, or are you gonna keep interrupting?”

Flop stared at his husband, concerned. What did he have to think about? What they were arguing about? They’d barely talked other than going over the Michael Simone bullshit. He hadn’t even told him about his trip… and he just wanted to up and go off duty?

“I can’t drive the Charger-”

“Yeah well I’m command, so just fuckin’ do it, okay?” Ziggy opened the door, got out, and slammed it. “I’ll see you later.”

“What? When-”

“Later.” Ziggy walked down the narrow path to the door and entered the house, door slamming behind him. In the wake, Flop scooted over to the driver’s seat and started the engine. He sat for a moment, ruminating. What the fuck was going on?

Chapter Text

He never listened, that was the problem. He spent so much time fucking talking that he never listened. And the only way to get Flop to listen was for Ziggy to walk away. Silent treatment. Plain and simple. The only problem was, once Ziggy had thrown himself down onto their bed at the beach house, the cravings started. And try as he might, this time he couldn’t fight them. He got up and paced around the room, tugging on his collar. Why bother? The whole situation was shit. The Flop situation, the Fae situation, the Bobbi situation. If he’d already ruined his chance of donating a kidney, and the look on Louise and the doctor’s face said as much, what was the harm in just... A little. A line or two. He hadn’t done any in…months? Maybe? He couldn’t remember the last time. Had it been after Juno had given him some? Before the restructure, that was certain. Fuck, he couldn’t ask Juno again… That wouldn’t look good. Especially now…

He swiped through his phone. Stopped himself. Tossed it on the bed. Kept pacing. No. No, he’d been doing well. He’d been staving off the cravings just fine. He could do it. But the problem was…he’d been too busy to think about coke. He buried himself in work and that took the power away from it. And now with no capacity to put himself back on duty that day, it would be real fucking difficult to keep fighting. 

From the bed, his phone buzzed. He raked both hands through his hair and let out a shaky sigh before grabbing it and checking the latest text.

Hey. When you’re ready to talk, you let me know.

Ziggy shook his head, thumbs tapping sporadically over the screen, writing and rewriting in frustration. 

Listen, I don’t want to keep having this same conversation. You just keep talking in fucking circles and I can’t keep repeating myself. 

He walked out of the room and went through the sliding glass door to the balcony, resting his arms on the railing. He could have said just about anything. Could have said ‘okay, sounds good’ or some shit. But lately the way Flop handled things or just kept hammering the same point over and over was getting tiresome. Maybe that was the problem. He wanted to talk about shit in a way that got them from point A to point B without stopping at point Q or whatever over and over and over. Sometimes when Flop wasn’t around things were easier. And he hated to think that, because he cared about Flop. He enjoyed their life together for the most part. It was just shitty spots like this that didn’t exactly fill him with admiration for the guy. 

His phone buzzed again.

The way I see it, you don’t want to talk about the hard shit and that’s understandable, but it’s fucked at the same time. You don’t want to keep repeating yourself? Neither do I. But I keep doing it because your reckless ass doesn’t listen. And I just think one day I’m gonna lose you because of it. So. 

He wanted to throw his fucking phone off the balcony. 

I’m not being reckless. You weren’t there. For good reason. 

Reckless. He kept saying that like he wasn’t the fucking problem half the time. Was it reckless to do his goddamn job? No. Shit happened all the time. Any day he could be shot, bombed, stabbed. And he had been. So why was now so fucking different? Because Flop had gotten himself into a bit of trouble himself being reckless with his connections to Seaside? Was he trying to just gloss over that? Make it less about him and more about Ziggy to save face? At the end of the day, Flop hadn’t gotten into trouble. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t in the future, the way he talked to people and explained his actions didn’t exactly inspire confidence all the time. 

The phone buzzed. He glanced down. 

Fuck you. 

Now he’d done it. Shame crept up on Ziggy, and he tried to call him. Flop refused the call. He tried again. Immediately refused again. 

Fine. 

Ziggy scrolled through his contacts and selected a number, hands shaking. 

“Hey, Ziggy, how’s it going-”

“You still got uh…what was it? A brick of cocaine?”

“...uh yeah, sorry about that I uh. I mean hypothetically I was joking-”

“I don’t want a brick, but uh. Maybe…if you had a couple lines or a gram or so I uh. You know. Would be interested.”

Silence.

“Uhhh sure. Yeah, yeah okay. Didn’t think you’d say…alright yeah. Text me your ping-”

“I’ll meet you in Paleto by that gas station that sells the pins. Give me fifteen minutes.”

“Okay, I uh-”

Ziggy hung up and took the keys to Flop’s Raptor. He headed outside, door slamming in his wake.

Chapter Text

She didn’t mean to do it. She told herself that over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over-

The flames were higher now. Her hands shook. Her jacket sleeves were drenched in gasoline. She couldn’t put it out even if she wanted to. And she didn’t want to. But she knew she should. It was easier to think now that the screaming had stopped. 

The sirens were getting closer. She had to go. But the fire was so bright on such a dark night. The smell wasn’t as nice. It reminded her of Parsons’. And the two men…

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

She couldn’t think about that. 

Headlights swept over her. 

“WHAT THE FUCK-” 

It was the nice man. The one that left her food. She smiled slowly, and sprinted away while he stood next to his police car, stunned. She ran across the highway and into the trees and the inky depths of the night. She kept running until his legs began to shake with exertion. Only when she came to a small cave did she stop, panting and exhausted. She calmed her breathing to listen. Only the sound of the wind and distant sirens. No footfalls. An owl. 

She wondered about the nice man. Where would he go now without his home on the beach? Such a nice house. She felt sad. From inside her jacket, she pulled out the picture frame she’d taken before setting the house ablaze. She lit the flashlight on her phone and gazed down at the picture. Ziggy and the nice man were in suits. They looked happy. She wondered what that felt like. She wondered where Ziggy was now. Even if she did bad things…she was glad he wasn’t home. 

Chapter Text

The fire took hours to put out. Flop sat numbly in the back of his car, door open with his head in his hands. He’d tried to call Ziggy but he wouldn’t pick up. 

“Hey,” Snow said, touching his shoulder to rouse Flop from his thoughts. He looked up, eyes red. “You okay?”

He let out a shaky laugh. “Am I okay? You’re really gonna ask that right now?”

“Sorry. Uh. I mean…well. Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

“So Stubble and Ripley said it’s still not safe to enter to check for…well…”

“Yeah.”

They sat in silence for a moment, Flop brushing away tears angrily. 

“You know the last thing I texted him was ‘fuck you’. And if he’s… if he was in there, I’ll never fucking forgive myself.”

“You didn’t mean it-”

“-I meant it. He pissed me off. Told me it was a good thing I hadn’t been there for the Michael Simone transport.” 

“I uh. Well that’s… I mean, it wasn’t necessarily his decision… it was mine. It wouldn’t have looked right, considering… Look, I know you weren’t mixed up in things. But just you know. You’re capable. But-”

“-I put my foot in mouth so much I can taste lint from my own socks?”

“Wow. Okay.That’s…that’s harsh but uh. Well.” Snow hunkered down on his heels and shrugged. “Look, we don’t know he was in there, and that’s a fact. So don’t go imagining the worst. We’ve gotta talk about Fae Adaire. You’re sure it was her, right?”

“Yes, I’m fucking sure, I already told you. She was standing there, staring at the fire. I pulled up and yelled, she looked at me and fucking smiled, and took off into the woods.”

“And you didn’t follow her?”

“Would you follow a deranged serial killer into the forest while YOUR house was burning down?”

“I…okay, valid. Okay. Well at least uh, you know. The asset fees will go down-”

Flop stared at Snow unblinking. 

“Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood…” Snow coughed and stood up. Flop watched him walk away to the barriers where Baas and Tessa stood. He should go over there. Ask questions. Talk. But he didn’t feel like talking just then, if he was honest. He just wanted to go home. The apartment only now. But he didn’t want to leave, not before he knew. Not before he was sure. 

His radio was on low, but he heard a crackle and someone begin to speak. Tessa, Baas, and Snow looked over at where he sat in the car and pointed. Snow started walking toward him. Flop turned up the radio. 

“Um, Ziggy…where have you been?” Tessa’s voice crackled. 

“I was off duty for a while, just clearing my head. I’ll be up in the mountains doing license checks.” His husband’s voice crackled to life on the other end of the radio, and he stood abruptly, smashing his head into the door frame on accident. 

“Ziggy, you - you gotta come home, it’s uh. Well-”

“BREAK.” He said, grabbing for the button. “GET YOUR ASS TO THE BEACH HOUSE NOW.”

“Flop, we don’t need to do this over the radio,” Ziggy said, his voice fast but weary. 

“Well. TL;DR Fae Adaire lit the beach house on fire and I thought you were inside. Get to the beach house. Now.”

There was silence. Snow stood beside him, looking uncomfortable. 

“What.”

“If you don’t get your ass here now, you’re gonna wish you were in that fire, Ziggy.”

“I’m…yeah. I’m. Okay. Yeah. Fuck.”

Chapter Text

“You know, I shouldn’t even be surprised.” He slammed the door to the apartment behind him, following Ziggy up the stairs. He wanted nothing more than to jump in the shower and wash away the smell of smoke from his body. But that wouldn’t happen quite yet. They were going to fight again. And he didn’t know if he could hold back. 

“Flop, listen, okay-”

“Ohhh no,” Flop said, shaking his head. He perched on the edge of the counter and let out a low, humorless laugh, spreading his hands. “What’re you gonna say, huh? ‘Oh, I did it because I was stressed, I did it because I was pissed, I did it to hurt you’-”

“I didn’t do it to hurt you-”

“Well congratulations, you achieved a gold star in that fucking department without trying that hard-” 

“Flop, I’m sorry-”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Did the middle of my sentence interrupt the beginning of yours? What could possibly be so bad right the fuck now that you just HAPPEN to not fucking mention to me? You're so damn irresponsible. Why can't you just get your life together? I can't keep supporting you like this."

Ziggy leaned forward, his face inches from Flop’s.

"Screw you. I'm doing my best here and all you do is criticize me. Maybe if you stopped being a dick for two seconds and gave me some credit we could actually work on our problems."

"Work on our problems? How're we supposed to do that now that a fucking serial killer is out there, sending us messages like this? She burned down the fucking HOUSE, Ziggy! I thought you were dead, you know. I thought that you were inside. And now we have to deal with your fucking addiction, Fae Adaire, insurance claims on the house AND TWO CARS. And all you can say is to stop being a dick so 'we' can work on 'our' problems. That's rich."

“What do you want me to do, huh? Apologize more? Fuckin’ grovel? Pull a you and buy you a truck when shit gets rough? I’m not the only one not talking about shit. You keep going over the same argument over and over to avoid everything else. Pot, kettle.” Ziggy turned away from him and rubbed at his face with his sleeve. Of course he had a fucking nose bleed. Of course he did.

"You need to talk to someone about your shit, Ziggy. I'm not a fucking bell hop. I can't take all your baggage.” He rubbed his face with both hands and stared at Ziggy’s back tiredly. "You know if the PD found out about the coke, you'd be fired, right? You want that? To be fired? I already pay for everything. You take and take and take from me. So when are you going to start giving? When you're canned? I took your keys to the house once, I'll do it again."

“Is that what you want? To kick me out again?” Ziggy’s voice was quiet.

“I want you to get help-”

“I’m not going to a fucking therapist.” He turned around abruptly and crossed back to Flop, fidgeting. 

“Oh here we go. I effectively just kept your goddamn secret, to save your goddamn job, and all you want to say is ‘I’m not going to a therapist’. You won’t tell me what’s going on, you need to tell somebody-”

“-every time I try, you talk over me! I-I…you do this all the fucking time. The only time you aren’t doing it is when you’re gone.”

“So that’s it, your life is better when I’m not around?” Flop leaned toward Ziggy. “Is that what you want?”

“That’s not fair, and you know it. That’s not what I meant.”

Flop shoved Ziggy away from him. “Not fair. Not fair. Oh you don’t get to fucking play that card with me right now, Ziggy. Don’t you fucking dare.”

“Don’t-”

“No! I’m so fucking angry with you right now and I just. You aren’t getting it. So fine. I’ll pull a you. I’ll talk to you later.” He strode out of the kitchen and into their bedroom, locking the door. So much for that shower. 

“Flop, come on,” Ziggy said through the door. “Come on, please.”

“NOPE. You made your bed, now you gotta lie in it. Goodnight, Ziggy. Sleep in the shower for all I care.”

Chapter Text

Ziggy sighed. He leaned his back against the door, and after another deep breath, he settled his head against it and closed his eyes. He stayed that way for a while until he heard the sound of drawers slamming. He let out a heavy breath and slumped. So maybe he deserved this. Yeah. He deserved this. 
His phone buzzed. And buzzed. And buzzed again. Sighing again, he pulled it from his pocket. 

I’m sorry. 
I’m sorry.
I’m sorry. 

Fae. Of course it was. He pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes until he saw stars. He was so close to fucking losing it. He’d royally fucked it. And now Fae…

Where are you.

He got to his feet and went into the kitchen and stared at the sink filled with dishes. Flop had been asking him to do them for weeks… The pile was pungent at best, the water foggy. Mold had started to grow in a few bowls and mugs. He started stacking dishes on the side of the sink to drain the water and rinse the sink before adding soap and water so hot his hands ached. And then he set about washing everything methodically, using the task to let his mind wander. 

Why. What was the fucking point? What did she stand to gain from this? Or was this a cry for attention? A way to dull the screams she heard… if she was still hearing them. Or perhaps they were worse now. She hadn’t killed anyone. Yet. But what would have happened if he’d stayed in the house, fallen asleep in bed…

He didn’t want to think about that right now. 

His phone buzzed. He set down his sponge and dried his hands, which had turned red and angry from the heat of the water. 

I can’t tell you that. You know that. 

His thumbs flew over the keyboard. 

And you know that’s not good enough. You can’t do this. I wanted to believe you were lying low and minding yourself, but clearly I was wrong. Why? Why did you do it? Answer that for me at least. 

He went back to the dishes and waited. And waited. And waited. By the time he was done and had cleaned the sink out, thrown away the sponge, and settled his back against the counter he still didn’t hear anything from her. He scrolled up. She had never responded to his message asking about her well-being. Instead she’d lit the house on fire. So. Her way of reaching out was not ideal. 

He drummed his fingers on the counter top and listened. The apartment was silent. Flop had stopped slamming shit around in their room. The quiet did nothing to soothe his wired mind. His thoughts raced around his head. He knew the migraine would kick his ass in a couple hours. After that, the chemical taste would set in before he brushed his teeth. And the slow comedown would probably make everything that had happened so much worse. Again, he had done it to himself. And he would pay the price. 

His phone buzzed again but it wasn’t Fae. It was Snow. 

You guys good? 

He replied. 

No, but it is what it is. Did you check the woods by chance?

He waited. 

I did. No sign of her. There’s a cave on that ridge, she could’ve gone there after the fire, but by the time I got through doing a sweep of the area she was gone. 

Fae wouldn’t be caught unless she wanted to be. That was the problem. If Snow went looking for her, she wouldn’t show herself. If he went looking for her…well. That might change things…

But he’d already pissed Flop off enough for one night. If he happened to wake in the middle of the night and find him gone without a trace…well. He wasn’t willing to find out what would happen. And there was no shot he would call Snow to pick him up and search together. But tomorrow… Tomorrow maybe he would do something. 

Ziggy scratched the back of his neck and sat on the couch, slowly taking off his boots. They thunked down heavily on the wood floor beside him. He heard rustling from the bedroom, followed by the creak of footsteps. Crossing the room quietly, he rested his head against the bedroom door to listen. It sounded like pacing. He sighed. 

“Flop?”

No answer. 

“...I love you. Just…yeah.” He crept back to the couch, fitting his body awkwardly in an uncomfortable position. Before he started to drift off, his phone buzzed one more time. With bleary eyes, he checked the last notification. 

You know why.

Chapter Text

Early the next morning, Flop crept out of their room, took a quick shower, and dressed for work. Ziggy was still passed out on the couch, and though Flop was still angry with him, he noticed the sink clean and clear for the first time in weeks. He grabbed a throw blanket and gently placed it over the other man’s sleeping form without waking him. He’d heard Ziggy’s whispered words through the door last night. It frustrated him to love this man. But what could you do. 

He took Ziggy’s truck to the ranger station and left it in the back. He went to this locker and riffled through it, finding a water bottle from yesterday before downing it and leaning his head on the locker door. 

What was he going to do? He had to get with Snow or whoever had controlled most of the scene at the fire last night. He had to compile a list for his insurance claims. Most of his cars had been parked elsewhere, but the two he’d been trying to sell had gone up with the house. They had to find Fae, figure out why she had targeted the beach house… but something in him told him he knew why. If she’d been watching Ziggy, she knew about him as well. Had she been getting the food he’d left? Had she contacted Ziggy? Maybe that was why he was acting…fuck. He was an idiot. The one thing that had made Ziggy shut down and shut him out last time had been texts from Fae. And the only way he’d gotten him to open up about it the last time was to ask directly. But instead, Flop had berated him about his recklessness. Hadn’t let him speak. He hadn’t helped. Ziggy had to talk to someone, and while he wanted to be that someone…maybe that wasn’t for the best.

“You okay, Flop?”

Flop sighed and lifted his head, rubbing the place where the cool metal had left a red spot on his forehead. He put on his campaign hat and turned, spotting Bundy by the desk, his arms crossed. 

“Define ‘okay.’”

Bundy looked at him for a moment in silence. 

“Why don’t you just tell me what’s going on. With a little less sass this time, hmm?”

“Sorry, I uh. It’s been a long night. I dunno if you heard, my house went up in flames.”

“Hmm. Which one? I wasn’t on duty yesterday and just got on today so,” Bundy said, spreading his hands. 

“The beach house. Uh. I don’t know if you know about an old serial killer case from 2019 but uh. She…and Ziggy was uh. Fuck, it’s a long fuckin’ story.”

“Well, let’s got up to Cassidy Trail and check for fishing licenses. By then you’ll at least spit out half a formed story at least.” Bundy motioned for Flop to follow and so he did, hopping into the passenger seat of his Charger once he pulled it out. 

“You got permission for the Charger?”

“I’m Legacy High Command, Flop. I asked Baas and he said ‘sure’. So I’m running with it until someone tells me to knock it off.”

“I don’t think uh, anyone will tell you-”

“Nope.”

Flop stayed quiet for the first few minutes of the ride, trying to get his thoughts in order to the best of his ability. When he did, he opened his mouth and spoke for the rest of the ride as Bundy remained silent. That was one of the best things about the other man. He was an information sponge. While Flop needed to fill a room with spoken thoughts, Bundy listened. Retained. And reacted later. When Flop started talking about Ziggy, Bundy cleared his throat and looked at Flop in the rearview mirror. 

“Okay. Now, I wasn’t in the PD when that case happened but I’ve heard about it.” Bundy turned the Charger onto the trail and parked on the side, overlooking the calm section of the river. “Where was Ziggy during all of this?”

“Uh. The mountains.”

“If he was in the mountains, you would have seen his blip-”

“Off-duty.”

“...okay.” Bundy turned and looked at Flop, assessing. “Why.”

“We had a fight-”

“Yes, as you’ve said. Don’t bullshit me, Flop. I may only have one fucking eye, but I can still tell when you aren’t saying the whole story.”

“If…I can’t. Ziggy’s got some…real fuckin’ issues, and if I say some shit, he’ll get fired or… I dunno. It’s not good.”

Bundy sighed. “Well, has he gone to a therapist?”

“He won’t go.”

“Stubborn ass.”

“Yeah.”

“You know, I used to think the same thing. The whole ‘suffer in silence’ bit. But then I got married and well, you know I tell her pretty much everything. But there’s still some things I can’t talk to Lennon about, you know? So I went to therapy. Especially after the Dungeon Master shit and well. Shit with death. When you’re in deep shit, and you can’t talk about it with the people you care about, an outsider’s perspective can really help. Especially if you feel like dumping your problems on a loved one will be a burden.”

“But he’s not a burden-”

“That’s not up to you, Flop. If he feels that way, he feels that way. Your job is to lend support. And maybe getting into constant fights instead of talking like civil people isn’t the best way to lend support.”

Flop sighed and sank down into his seat. “What do I do then?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Bundy smirk. “I’ve got some ideas.”

Chapter Text

When Ziggy tried to call Flop the next morning he didn’t answer. His head was pounding from a migraine. He’d woken up covered in a blanket he didn’t remember having the night before, so at least he knew Flop still gave a shit. But it would have been nice to talk. His truck was gone when Ziggy tried to take it to work, so the Coquette would do, he supposed. Pulling into the drive at the ranger station, he saw the tail end of his truck behind the building and no other cars in sight. Flop must be out on patrol somewhere, he thought, parking the Coquette and heading to his locker. He kitted himself out and went to pull out his Charger. Before he could climb in, his phone rang. Snow. 

“Hey.”

“Hey, Ziggy. Uh, question.” He could hear Snow huffing as he avoided a group of people. He must’ve been at MRPD. The place sounded like a zoo. “So uh, I got here a bit ago and something was left in the mailbox overnight that you might want back. I don’t suppose you’d know if it went missing, considering the fire and all but uh-”

“What is it?” Ziggy said, tired. 

“It’s a picture from you and Flop’s wedding. I had it checked for prints myself, and they match Fae Adaire’s.” 

He closed his eyes and put his free hand to his forehead. “Okay…”

“Still no luck finding her. Can’t track her with a K-9 either, the trail’s gone if there ever was a solid one. Has she contacted you at all? I know last time she had-”

“She told me she was sorry last night. I asked where she was, she wouldn’t tell me. I asked why she did it and all she said was that I know why.”

“...do you or-?”

“She wants help, and she thinks I can help her because I did last time. But I don’t know… I can’t get as close as I did last time. Not… it wouldn’t be good.”

“No…”

“If she reaches out again, I’ll let you know but uh. To be honest, I don’t think I should be involved that much in this. I think she’ll do something else, I don’t know if that means killing again or another fire or what but… that was the only way to track her last time. To follow her carnage trail. So…” He started to feel light-headed. His head was pounding. “Hey listen, I gotta go. I’ll catch up with you later.” 

“Wh-”

He disconnected and left his Charger parked in the drive and headed up to the office. He dug through the desk drawer until he found an ancient bottle of aspirin and downed four pills dry. His mouth felt like a combination of sawdust and dirty regret. Did he brush his teeth this morning? Fuck. He slunk over to the green sofa and threw himself down on the sofa, arm over his eyes, and tried to breathe deeply to stave off the nausea creeping through his gut. 

He must have passed out. For how long, he didn’t know. The door the office slammed and he jumped, reaching for his gun with wild, bloodshot eyes. 

“You really gonna shoot me, Ziggy?”

Bundy stood by the door, his head tilted and as mild-mannered as usual. Some people thought Bundy was too serious for his own good, but Ziggy knew he had a different side to him now that he wasn’t High Command anymore. He felt the same way to a point. 

“No, just…spooked me, that’s all.”

“Yeah, I figure after what happened last night, you’d be on edge.”

Ziggy sighed. “Yeah. Not a great night.”

“Tell me about it.”

Ziggy let out a dark chuckle and rubbed his face. “Long story. Listen, I gotta get out there-”

“I agree. Let’s go.”

“Huh?”

“It’s been a while since we rode together. Let’s go.”

Ziggy got to his feet and sighed. “I was gonna ride solo for the first bit. Wake up, get my bearings, that kinda thing-”

“You misunderstand me.” Bundy smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I wasn’t asking. Flop is riding with Beric. I’m riding with you. Safety in numbers. There’s a serial killer with connections to you on the loose. Your house went up in flames.” He opened the door and held it for Ziggy. “Don’t worry, I don’t talk much.”

That’s what Ziggy was worried about. 

Chapter Text

Bundy was quiet when they got in the car, and his version of quiet was unsettling. He picked at his nails and stared out the window as Bundy turned onto the Senora Freeway. He had no idea where they were going. He glanced down at his phone just as he felt something drip from his nose, blood splattering onto the glass of his screen. 

“Fuck,” he muttered, pressing the cuff of his sleeve to his nose and closing his eyes. 

“You alright there, Ziggy?”

“Never better.”

“Hmm.” Bundy kept to the speed limit and drummed his fingers on the wheel. “That happen a lot?”

“Uh…not…well. It’s uh…nervous habit.”

“A nervous habit.” Bundy glanced at him in the rearview mirror. 

Ziggy sighed in frustration, pinching the bridge of his nose to stem the flow. “Yeah. Nervous habit. Don’t…do the thing you do, okay? The calm lawyer shit is annoying.”

“Why-”

“Bundy, I swear to God, if Flop told you to give me some Bundy-ass talk…”

Bundy smirked. “Oh no. He didn’t.”

“Good.”

“It was my idea.”

“What the fuck!?”

“I don’t know the whole thing, and honestly half of it is none of my fucking business. But Flop’s been…well, Flop. And he’s worried about you.”

Ziggy sighed, checking that he’d stemmed the flow of blood from his nose. “I’m fine.”

“That is absolutely untrue.”

“Yeah, okay. Unlike you, I don’t have fucking cozy chats about shit, okay? Some shit is better off buried.”

“You think I don’t bury shit, Ziggy? I bury shit every day. I wake up and think about burying shit. Every night. I go to sleep next to my fucking wife, and think ‘I’m gonna bury this, I’m gonna bury that’. Burying doesn’t fucking help. I’ve tried. And so have you. Maybe you know some of the shit I’ve buried, maybe you don’t. So. What have you?”

Ziggy looked out the window. “I don’t…you can’t ask that of me.”

“So what can I ask of you, Ziggy? What, ask you for a fishing license? Some tips on patrol in the North? That ever present knowledge you seem to just have at the drop of a hat about the flora and fauna of the island? What, work shit? Is your life anything other than work? And if you can’t answer that with a ‘yes’, ask yourself why. Why is that?”

“...I can’t.”

“So at least you recognize there’s a problem here.”

“I…fuck, Bundy. Don’t ‘lawyer’ me. I don’t need a lawyer-”

“-you need a therapist.”

“No-”

“-yes-”

“Would you fucking stop?! Jesus Christ, you’re just as bad as Flop.” Ziggy stared at Bundy as he pulled off the highway and over a wooden bridge. They turned around the corner and the lighthouse came into view through the trees. Bundy kept talking.

“He cares. And I care. Differently, obviously, but… he cares about you, and instead of confiding in him, you’re what? Running away? Hiding beneath your buried pile of bullshit until you suffocate? What’s it gonna take for you to dig yourself out, huh? Something happening to Flop?”

“Don’t say that.”

“Already did, I’m afraid. And if you’re so afraid of connecting and actually fuckin’ working on your marriage, why did you do it in the first place?”

“...it started as a…joke, I guess.”

“It started as a joke.”

“I dunno! We fucking dated for what, a week? Two? And then got married. And immediately joked about getting a divorce…and then…alright, the joke of it stopped. It became more than that.”

“When did you know?”

“Know what?”

“That you were in love and not in a comedy?” Bundy parked the car by a tree and shut off the engine.

“...months later. I was uh. I was. I was having issues…and uh. Well. We went to the mountain. Near the wind farm. And we talked. For hours. And I guess I uh. I realized I gave a shit. A hell of a lot of shit. About him. Flop.”

“Just out of thin air, huh?”

“No. Not…not really. Just…like the fog lifted or some shit, and I could just see he uh. Well he cared. So I started caring.” Ziggy looked out the window. “Why are we here?”

“To have a chat. C’mon, the lighthouse is really something.”

Chapter Text

Bundy takes Ziggy down the winding stairs to the lighthouse and stands silently beside him on the dock. He closes his eye and breathes in the salted air, a fine mist dusting his hair. He purposefully did not look at Ziggy. He didn’t need to. The other man was a mess. It didn’t take a professional to see that. Dried blood coated the underside of his nose and in his well-past-five o’clock shadow. The bags under Ziggy’s eyes looked packed and ready for travel. He was fidgeting so much, Bundy thought he could detect the other man’s teeth start to chatter despite the heat of the day. He had his suspicions but continued his silence. Waiting. 

Waiting was the best part. And he was a patient man. And frankly he’d been a little bored of late. The chaos of the department restructure was settling down, and there seemed to be less and less people fishing and hunting. It had been ages since he’d caught a poacher. Been on an intricate case. He lived for investigations. 

And sometimes he just really, really enjoyed the tea. 

“What do you know about Norman Bones, Ziggy?” Bundy said finally, wishing in an ironic way that he could still smoke. 

“Uh. I dunno. Serial killer, right? People say he’s some spook or something. Flop took me to a billboard once and told me he was still alive, but it just said some bullshit about an AC unit.”

“What are you…no. Nevermind, just listen. Norman Bones was a serial killer. Snow was in charge of the case. He, Norman, was executed by firing squad and dumped here.” He gestured to the waters below him and watched Ziggy take a step back. 

“Okay…that’s…how romantic.”

“Well, this place is pretty romantic for me. This is where I got married.”

“And you uh, you knew all this? Beforehand or-?”

“Oh no. Not until I ran into him and he told me he was the God of Death.”

He could feel Ziggy’s eyes on him, and he shrugged. 

“I didn’t believe it either. But shit got bad. We were living here with Cleo and Pez. The plants started dying. People were hurt. I had half of the PD on a mission to kill this guy, and it didn’t work. He took my daughter to purgatory, an island covered in fog-”

“What?” Ziggy’s voice was quiet.

“Yeah. Can’t see shit other than this big crow skeleton that looks like whale bones, some crosses. You know, creepy shit. Why?”

Ziggy scratched the back of his neck. “I dunno. I don’t know if I necessarily believe… I mean, Flop said a bunch of shit about the guy, you know? And I know it was like, some weird grief response he had to his brother’s death and everything but-”

“Ziggy, look me in my eye and tell me I’m lying to you. I shot Norman Bones in the fucking head. With the AWM Michael Simone gave me. Multiple times. And I dropped to the ground like a leaf. I came to in the hospital and my kid was gone, Pez was…eh, that’s a detail for another time.” He sighed. “The fucker gave me pneumonia. All those things are true. I know how Flop can be, but he’s telling the truth. Mostly because Norman Bones is in the business of deals. And at some point, Flop made a deal. I don’t know the specifics, but uh. Norman took his memories.”

Ziggy ran both hands through his hair, fingers shaking as he sighed. “Uh, okay. Okay. Yeah that’s…yeah.”

“Do I sound like I’m bullshitting you?”

“No.”

“Flop helped me out during the Norman shit, okay. He was here. He’s got his own bullshittery to deal with, and he will eventually I’m sure. But you’ve got problems, and making jokes about them and digging a hole to essentially shit them into isn’t the way to go about it. So you talk about it, even when it seems ridiculous or inconsistent.”

Ziggy picked at his nails and didn’t respond. 

Bundy sighed. “It’s your turn now.”

“Huh?”

“You pick a place. Somewhere that’s…poignant.”

“What the fuck is this, some goddamned Angst Greatest Hits compilation?”

“It works. Don’t hamper my methods. And dig in the glovebox for some napkins or something and clean yourself up.”

He started walking back up the stairs before he realized Ziggy wasn’t following. He was still standing on the dock, head hunched. He waited, wondering what was going through the other man’s head. He wanted to text Flop and ask the question he had plaguing him, but he refrained. He would let the evidence carry the situation. Ziggy looked up, rubbing beneath his nose with his sleeve before heading to meet Bundy on the stairs. 

Chapter Text

Maybe he was kidding himself to think the universe had something up her sleeve for the first time in a while, and maybe he was a fool to think it would work out. Maybe he wanted it with such desperation, he was willing to ignore the breadcrumb trail of broken promises that littered his feet. 

You could chalk it up to being busy, you could chalk it up to bad timing. It felt interesting to try something for once, to just try instead of being afraid. That didn’t mean he didn't feel hurt, and he knew he would. He could feel a weird guttural ache that wouldn’t quite reach his throat. He knew Ziggy’d fall back into old habits and cope terribly. 

He sometimes thought that if he was gone, Ziggy would miss the idea of him, of what he thought he was. He sometimes thought about it in the way of the poppy fields in France after a battle. After the earth had been dredged and flooded with blood, they began to unfurl their petals just enough for a whistling and whirling shell to strike them down and singe all their best parts black. Ziggy had come into his life at first like a flood of nutrients, and now dropped like a bomb, ready to flatten him. 

“You doing okay there, Flop? You’re a little quiet.” Beric glanced at him from the driver’s seat of his Taurus as they cruised into the MRPD garage. 

“Huh?” Flop jumped as the tires squealed to a stop. 

“You. You’ve been quiet. That’s not usual.”

“I guess not,” he sighed, picking at his nails. Beric opened his mouth to speak, but someone knocked on Flop’s window and startled the two of them. Flop glanced up wild-eyed to see his father standing with crossed arms, a deep frown on his face. Flop rolled down the window. 

“Hey, Dad.”

“Get upstairs now, Flop. Captain’s Office.”

“What did I do?!”

“Just get upstairs, Flop. Don’t be so petulant. Beric, I’ll take him from here, you can go back on patrol.” Dark turned and walked away. Flop sighed and unbuckled his seatbelt, giving Beric a withering look. “Why do I feel like this is gonna be bad?”

“No…that’s probably not the uh, case. Maybe he wants to check how you’re doing?”

“He could’ve called or texted me! Not treating me like I broke my grandma’s vase and sending me to my room without dinner!”

“...weren’t you adopted as an adult-?”

“I said what I said!” Flop declared, before getting out of the car and trotting after Dark. “I don’t know what I did, but I really apologize for it. Is this about the beach house thing? I’m sorry I didn’t reach out to you and Matt about it yet, you were both off duty and I haven’t had time between that and making sure Ziggy was okay and-”

“Flop. Stop. It has nothing to do with… Jesus Christ. No.” They headed up the stairs and through the bullpen at a quick pace, and Flop started to realize the usual tension in his father was worse than usual. His jaw kept clenching and unclenching, his back uncomfortably straight. Dark held the door open for him. Matt was there, pacing behind the desk. Snow was deep in his tablet and only looked up when the door closed and Dark cleared his throat. 

“What’s going on?”

“Oh, good, you didn’t tell him? You know how dramatic he gets,” Matt said, continuing to pace. 

“If I’d told him in the motor pool, he would have screamed it to the entirety of Mission Row. At least in here, I installed sound proofing.”

“He’s just going to panic anyway, he’s your son-”

“He’s yours too, don’t try to push the responsibility all on me, honey-”

“Okay, can you please just tell me what’s going on?” Flop said, sounding tired. As much as he enjoyed the banter between his fathers, he wasn’t feeling it today. He had too much to think about. He’d spent half of his shift already calling the insurance company, dealing with shitty criminals, and worrying about Ziggy. 

Snow cleared his throat from the corner and tucked away his tablet, cracking his neck from side to side. “Someone vandalized Mission Row not too long ago, and we need you to confirm something.”

“Okay…”

“The wall across from the alleyway by the homeless camp under the bridge? There was a message. Written in blood. Stubble found it, he’s testing the blood now. But I suspect it’s for you.” He pulled out his phone and passed it to Flop. On the screen was the side view of Mission Row, and directly to the left of the doors was a large and dripping message.

CHECK YOUR PHONE, FLOP

“What…”

“Check your texts.”

He pulled out his phone and swiped through his texts, noting he’d had nothing from Ziggy all day. There was a message from a number he didn’t recognize. He tapped on it, and a video popped up. It was Ziggy and Bundy, standing in a tunnel with their backs turned away from the camera. He hit play, and the sound of water and eerie dripping filled the room. And breathing, soft breathing. 

“How long do you suppose you can go on like this, Ziggy?” Bundy said quietly, his voice echoing. 

“I don’t know. I…shit’s fucked, I get it. I’ll talk to Flop. I will. I just…you know he is. It’s hard to think straight around someone who talks in circles.” Ziggy’s voice echoed through the tunnel as well. He sounded as tired as Flop felt, if not more. 

Ziggy and Bundy kept talking, but the camera turned away from them. A soft, high voice started to speak as the operator moved further away from the two men. 

“Help him. Or I will.”

Chapter Text

“Turn left here.”

“....when I said ‘poignant’, I didn’t think a tunnel that connects to the sewer would be, you know…the ideal we were going for here.”

“What do they say in movies about therapy? ‘Trust the process’.”

“If you’re thinking therapy in the movies is the same as real life, you’ve got a problem there.”

Ziggy didn’t answer, merely got out of the car when Bundy stopped at the entrance to the tunnels under Bridge Street and took a deep breath. He scanned the area, his hand instinctively going to the butt of his pistol. He hadn’t been back there in a long time. The saw mill, the motel, the recycling yard - he’d been there on calls before. In the daylight. With backup. And it still made him nervous. 

This was different. He remembered crouching over the body of Sarah Labeck, and turning to see Fae standing at the end of the corridor. He remembered drawing his gun and running after her. She had followed them in, staying behind with just enough distance. When Rhodes and Snow had gone to clear the other tunnel. He’d heard her laugh when Snow had gone and Rhodes was getting the other patrol car to transport the body. 

“We’re walking the tunnel. That’s what I did last time. She…the Butterfly Killer demanded we not bring cars down when uh…the last time I was here. When we found the seventh victim. And whatever you do, Bundy, don’t fuckin’ leave me alone down here, alright? I…it happened last time and I will literally shit my pants if something happens.”

“Okay…I have a spare pair in the trunk, but I’ll stick close. You clear the left, I clear the right?”

“Mhm.”

They started into the tunnel slowly, guns drawn. Their footsteps echoed and reverberated off the walls, sending chills down Ziggy’s spine. He tried to keep his breathing even and under control, but each time he heard the skittering of a rat, an ominous creak, or the magnified sound of dripping water, he startled and whirled around in agitation. 

“Last time I was here was…fuck…October, I think? 2019? I had Snow and Rhodes with me. Snow had Fenton but we left him in the car initially. Cleared the tunnel together like this. All the way down to where it branches off at the corridor with the grates and shit. And all along the way, we kept finding bloody footprints, fingernails, and CD cases with the bloody butterfly. That was her MO.” His voice was hushed. They neared the midway point and he watched as Bundy cleared the ladder and catwalk above them. When Bundy jumped down in the water with a sick squelch, he winced. 

“What did the fingernails signify? And the CDs?”

“The fingernails were her way of counting victims. The victim number coincided with the number of fingernails we found.”

“So seven fingernails removed…”

“Yeah. While she was alive.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“The CDs were recordings of her watching and stalking the victims. Planning. Noting where they worked, if drugs needed to be used to overpower them, where the best place to snatch them from would be…I had to reverse the audio on all of them to figure them out.”

“That’s…extensive.” 

They came to the last stretch of tunnel before the corridor, and Ziggy began to tense. He rolled his shoulders before heading to the corridor entrance, gun raised. It looked much the same as it had all those years ago. Except this time it was empty. He let out a sigh of relief and turned to look back down the tunnel. 

“The last time…uh. The body was down at the end there, and Snow and Rhodes went down to clear the rest of that tunnel. While I was kneeling over the body, someone stood right here and watched me. Fae. All I could make out was a long red coat and a weird mask. Kinda…I dunno. Bug-like? Like an old school gas mask but snub nosed…I dunno. I drew my gun and she ran. When Rhodes was getting the car later, I was alone again and I just…I kept hearing laughter. Over there where the trash piles up by the gates…it uh…I felt like I was in a fucking horror movie. Every time I come to an old scene from that case…I hear shit. Like my memories are fucking with me. I hear the old audio, the static from it…the laughter…the struggling…” Ziggy went quiet, breathing heavily to combat the sounds from starting even then. 

“How long do you suppose you can go on like this, Ziggy?” Bundy said quietly, the sound of his name echoing around him.

“I don’t know. I…shit’s fucked, I get it. I’ll talk to Flop. I will. I just…you know he is. It’s hard to think straight around someone who talks in circles.” He started to pace, holstering his gun and running a hand through his hair. “I don’t normally…I don’t talk like this, okay? And I don’t unpack…I’ve never really tried to do anything about how this case fucked me up…”

“You should. Especially if she’s out starting shit again, there’s no telling how much worse it could get-”

Ziggy’s phone rang and it took all the willpower he had left in himself to trap a scream in his throat. He coughed hoarsely and answered it without checking who it was. 

“Hello?”

“Ziggy, you need to get out of there.” Flop.

“What? How do you-”

“Fae sent me a text with a video of you and Bundy down there. She’s behind you.”

“OH FUCK THIS, okay. Okay. We’re leaving. Where are you?”

“Mission Row with my dads and Snow. Please come here.”

“Alright yeah, yeah. We’re…fuck. We’re going. I’ll see you soon, okay?”

“Promise?”

“Yes, I promise. I…I love you, okay? You fucking idiot. I’ll see you soon.” He hung up. “She’s in the tunnels, we gotta…I’m not going back out that way. We’ll go to the end of the corridor and out the other side and loop around.”

“Good plan.”

Chapter Text

When they made it back to Mission Row, Ziggy made a beeline for the captain’s office. His hackles were still up, and cool sweat stood out on his brow. They passed by several people but he didn’t give them the time of day. He needed his husband. No one else mattered. Not even Nancy, who squawked at him in disdain when he brushed past her and ripped open the door. Flop was on him instantly, willowy arms grasping his body, all tension and sound. 

“Thank fuck,” the other man muttered in his ear, kissing his temple. Ziggy closed his eyes and held on tight, knowing he was incapable of letting go in that current moment. He didn’t know how long they stood like that, entwined and desperate. It wasn’t until Dark cleared his throat that Ziggy broke away, straightening his tie in the process. He tinged pink on the apples of his cheeks, slightly embarrassed but nonetheless relieved.

“What were you doing in the tunnels?” Richard said, hands on his hips.

“Uh…Bundy and I were talking.”

“...Huh.”

Ziggy looked to Bundy awkwardly. “I um. Thanks for…you know. What you said…I uh. Well. I’ll think about it, alright?”

“Sure, Ziggy. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“That’s…is that…necessary?”

Bundy smirked. “I’m not done yet.” He nodded to Dark and Rhodes and pulled out his phone which had begun to ring. “Hey, Love,” he muttered, leaving the room to talk to Lennon. 

Ziggy grabbed Flop’s hand and pulled him toward the door as well. 

“Where the hell do you think you’re going? You didn’t answer me, Ziggy-” Dark started. 

“I’ll talk to you about it later, Richard. I need to talk to Flop right now, alright?”

“Ziggy-!” Richard called as the door closed behind them. Ziggy pulled his protesting and squawking husband through the bull pen to the filing room and shut the door, locking it. 

“What the fuck, Ziggy-”

“Nah nah nah. Listen, okay? I got something to say. Okay. Alright. Uh. Fuck. Gimme a minute.” Ziggy started to pace. And Flop stayed quiet. Thank God or whatever for small mercies. His mind was jumbled, his heart stuttering in his chest. He didn’t know what to say exactly, just…he had to say something. Something that would fix them. Keep them together. Keep them going despite all the bullshit they put each other through, even if it wasn’t on purpose. And some of the time when it was. 

He turned and looked at his husband. Again he could see how tired Flop was. Tired in general from the events of the past day or so, and from what he himself was putting the other man through. So, he opened his mouth and just…started talking. And once he started, it was hard to stop. 

“Okay. I uh.I say I’m fine all the time even when I’m not because I see no other way to convey exactly how fucked disappointment gets me. I find myself more frustrated in…in situations, okay, than in people…people should always be, you know, riddled with mistakes and…and never be some key to unlocking something like…in you that’ll fix yourself, right? That should never be the case. People are not keys. People…fuck, people are like sidewalks and stepping stones, like pot-hole-ridden dirt tracks, bright red brick roads, empty freeways with medians with stunted trees. The right people lead us and guide us to a better understanding of ourselves but like…we are still the ones walking, grittying, or riding those paths, and it's up to us to be who we need to be at the end of the road. We should matter before others, because in the end roads are closed for construction, for accidents, for block parties or some shit-”

“What…the fuck…are you talking about?” Flop asked, his brows raised. 

“Fuck. Okay. I’m saying like…okay. I feel like sometimes I don’t see that you’re a path that leads me back to helping myself, alright? Because I always say I’m fine and bury shit, okay, when in reality I believe in all the other four letter words like ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ and ‘love’ more than I believe in ‘fine’. So. I’m gonna…I’m gonna start doing better, okay? For myself first, but like, for you too. Because you help guide me, yeah, but I gotta be the one doing the walking…does that make sense?”

“...you could have said that without getting all fuckin’...poetic or some shit,” Flop said, smirking. 

“Flop, you wanted me to fuckin’ TALK, right, so do you think mockin’ me right now-”

Flop held up his hands and laughed. “No, no I didn’t mean…I like the uh…I like the bit. It’s…it’s a nice change. Where’d that come from?”

“Other than being afraid for my life and Bundy emotionally bullying me?”

“You’ve got a point.” Flop stepped closer and readjusted Ziggy’s tie, letting his hands linger on Ziggy’s chest. “Thank you. For not getting murdered to be here and actually…say shit. It’s…thank you.”

“I’m gonna try this time. If I have to…fuck, if I have to go to therapy or…I dunno…worse…I’ll do it, alright? Just don’t tell anyone, it’s embarrassing.”

“I promise.” 

Chapter Text

Why did they still have Christmas decorations up? It was the better part of June, and she didn’t understand. It was ridiculous. But so were they.

She was on the roof. The nice man and Ziggy were watching Animal Planet. Something about ocean dwelling fish. Ziggy didn’t seem that interested. The nice man was yelling. They seemed so relaxed despite that. Hmm. 

She texted. 

You seem so at home with such noise.

She watched Ziggy freak out. Start staring around. Panicking. Pacing. Nose bleed. Interesting. 

Where are you?

That would be far too easy, she thought. Far, far too easy. What a strange thing. Like suffocating under water, so easy…

She hopped off the roof and walked down the street, typing all the time. 

That’s too easy, Ziggy. Try again. 

She wanted to be different. Wanted to be normal. If only that was possible. Acceptable. If she had stayed at Parsons’....

Around the corner she stopped and stooped, tying her shoes. Sent another text. 

Are you feeling okay?

She smirked and wondered if Ziggy was as disconcerted as she hoped. 

What do you want?

She thought. And thought. And thought. After a while, she answered. 

I want you to tell me how the end looks if I get worse. 

Chapter Text

“So this is the spare one. Sorry it’s not as fully decorated-”

“Lennon, it’s great. Really. We appreciate it. Right, Ziggy?”

He pursed his lips, he needed to pace. But he stayed stationary, willing to accept their new lot in life. Flop wasn’t as forgiving. He elbowed Ziggy. 

“Huh? Yeah…yeah okay. Alright. Yep.”

Ziggy stood silently for a moment, staring at a stuffed bear perched on a shelf. Its eyes shown in the overhead light, black and reflecting his face in doubles. He looked terrible. He knew that. He felt like horse shit. He’d finally felt the lasting effects of the coke binge leave his body. But the aches were starting. And his pacing and anxious mind were not helping. After receiving the texts from Fae, he and Flop had fled the apartment in a rush. Had bolted to MRPD. They’d claimed the couch in the Captain’s Office until Bundy had come off duty and unceremoniously told them his wife would not allow them to sleep cramped on a couch overnight. So they’d gone to the Bundys’ Inseno Road house, conveniently close to other members of the PD. And the Bundy’s themselves, who would be staying as extra ‘protection’. And Ziggy hated that feeling, the feeling of needing. He didn’t want to need protection or commiseration or guidance from anyone. He wanted to bury his head in the sand and just get things over with the next morning. But that wasn’t going to happen tonight, that had been made clear. Especially by Lennon. 

Her hand fell on his shoulder, and Ziggy instinctively jerked. 

“Sorry, Ziggy. I didn’t mean to…well…you seem deep in thought…”

“Who’s bear is this?”

“Cleo’s.”

“Ah. Makes sense.” He turned away from Lennon with a tight smile and grabbed his arm. “I need some air. Just out back. Uh. Thank you for…well. You know, letting us crash, I know it sucks and it’s kinda inconvenient-”

“Ziggy, you don’t have to apologize. It’s not your fault-”

“Hmm. Maybe.” He headed out of the room and to the back outlook of the house, enjoying the way the salted sea air hit him as he left the house.  He gripped the railing and exhaled, hanging his head. Wishing yet again for the thousandth time he’d had the courage to take Fae out when he’d had the chance. In the tunnels. At the plant. In the end. But that wasn’t to be. He’d mulled the point over and over again in his head, and had come up with the same conclusion. He’d hope for the best for her. He’d hoped she could be saved. But the more she targeted him…them… the more he felt as if at some valid point, redemption just wasn’t a possibility. No matter her mental state. And he knew a thing about uncertain mental states…

“You get the tour from Lennon?” Bundy crept up silently, his phone still to his ear. 

“...yeah. Yeah, I did. I uh. Well. Alright, I appreciate this and all-”

“-but you don’t like it.”

“No.”

“Look, I understand this isn’t easy-”

“Let’s not. Please. I just. I want to think.”

“About?”

Ziggy sighed. 

“The next time I see her, or if you see her, or Flop, or anyone from the PD… she gets downed. I don’t care by now. She fuckin’...she fuckin’ torched Flop’s house, she knows about our apartment…she knows we’re together…Snow found my wedding pictures in a fuckin’ cave for Christ’s sake. I dunno. I just…I’m not here to play games with serial killers. That’s why I joined the Rangers.”

“I understand that.”

“So she’s shoot on sight. I don’t give a fuck anymore. And I don’t know if that’ll matter.”

Chapter Text

He didn’t fully understand, and maybe that was the issue. Maybe that was why Ziggy kept leaving him by the wayside. Hmm. 

Flop had gone to sleep alone the night before after he and Lennon had talked over a cup of tea. She was worried about them. Worried about Ziggy. But said Bundy would handle it “in his way,” whatever that meant. Bundy had been handling it, certainly. Which Flop knew was coming from a good place, but it still pissed him off a little that even though he and Ziggy were getting back to a better place, Ziggy still wouldn’t open up to Flop. He didn’t expect instantaneous change or results, that would be ridiculous. But for fuck sake, something - anything - would be a step in the right direction. Anything better than silence. 

Which he didn’t receive when he woke up. 

Ziggy was up and throwing clothes about the room. Out of the bag he’d packed with care. 

“Ziggy.”

“What’s my fuckin’...the uh. The button down, the plaid one? The stupid one we match in whatever…yeah that one.”

“It…was on the left side. If you had actually looked.”

“Hmm.”

His husband was insufferable. Most of the time, Flop wanted to yell at him for it. But he decided today wasn’t the day. Although…

“Ziggy. I had the bag packed for a reason.”

“Hmm? And was that reason stupid as shit?....Sorry, Flop…I don't mean to be an ass but…ya know…”

“Oh I know. How did you sleep?”

Ziggy laughed in his boisterous way and didn't reply. 

“So you didn’t. Interesting.”

“Flop, don’t.”

“Well. Okay. I’ll go back away again-”

‘Don’t you fuckin’ start.”

“Oh why, you gonna talk to Bundy about it instead?” He stood up from the bed and threw the covers off, marching from the room. “Be my guest. Have someone to confide in. Surely as long as it’s not me, my God. What point would that serve?” He shut the bathroom door in Ziggy’s face with a flourish. He was proud of it.

Chapter Text

He had made a point to ride with Flop that night when they were too claustrophobic of ignoring each other and of Bundy’s house. They had patrolled in relative peace, occasionally talking about random other shit than what they needed to talk about. And silence. That’s what they needed to talk about. Ziggy was fine with silence. Flop was not. And he once again was minimal on the words of the day. Which again, unusual. But Ziggy didn’t know how to get it through his husband’s head that he was supremely fucked. And trying. But trying was gradual, not an all-at-once bullshittery. That wasn’t going to work. 

He parked outside the ranger station and mumbled that he needed new armor. He went in, grabbed what he wanted, and went out the side door. Breathed in the dusky air of the surrounding hills. Listened to the crickets. Wondered what would be next for him. 

He blinked, and the image of the flash of a red jacket behind a tree made him stop in his tracks. Flop collided with his body, apparently tired of waiting in the car,  and cried out, but Ziggy ignored him and rushed through the weeds with his flashlight, scanning the area. He could hear the blood in his ears, the rapid beating of his own heart. His neck felt clammy so he wiped a free hand over it, glancing behind him to his husband. Flop glared at him initially before his features softened, a look of concern replacing it. 

“What’s up?”

“Did you see that? Northeast stand of trees. I saw…well I think I saw…thought I saw uh, someone over there. Walking by. Red coat…Maybe…?”

Flop started forward, brushing past Ziggy. The arc of light from Flop’s flashlight scanned the area in wide, swooping motions. 

“No…”

“I swear, I coulda seen…the red coat like…okay. Okay, I’m not fuckin’ crazy, okay? Alright? I’m not.”

“Okay.”

“Flop, I mean it. I thought I saw…” He stared at Flop, who had stopped listening to him and was engrossed in his phone. “You know what? Forget it.”

“Huh? What’d you say?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“No, what’d…God, why are you being so fucking petulant?”

“I…fuck you, dude, I’m not…nah. Nah. It’s fine. Let’s just fuckin’ go. I’m sure an S+ will pop off in a minute anyway, I’m sure that’s more your speed.”

“You don’t have to be a d-”

Their radios beeped in tandem. An officer down. 

“C’mon,” Ziggy sighed, his hackles still up. He knew they needed to talk again. Flop always needed to talk. But for the life of him, Ziggy didn’t know where to start. 

Chapter Text

“It’s good to see you, Ziggy.” She rustled some papers on her desk and stared over her clasped hands, a calm determination in her eyes. He blinked and looked away, clearing his throat, feeling too big for the small chair she had in front of her desk. His fingers drummed nervously on his thigh. The fighting with Flop had gotten to the silent treatment portion of the program over the last few days, his anxiety an unclimbable hill, and now he was here in Parsons’ with Pixie to attempt to figure it out. The only problem was, no one knew he was there besides Pixie. And his phone, while off duty, waa buzzing constantly. It didn’t help the low panic that seemed to flow through him now.

“Yeah, yeah. Good to see you too. Under the circumstances, I guess uh…well. Yeah.”

Pixie blinked and stretched languidly, unfurling her fingers over an empty notepad and a digital recorder. She clicked it on and continued. “I know you’re a man of few words, Ziggy. Unless you’re talking about a case. But this is good for you, you know that, right? This is a step in the right direction. Now. I’m just going to ask simple questions, nothing hokey or too deep. So relax.”

“Uh. Sure. Alright.”

“Okay. Now. Where do you go when you get upset?”

Ziggy sighed, but answered right away. “The mountains. It’s peaceful. Just me, the silence, the fresh air. I-I can’t even begin to count the number of times I’ve just taken a drive there and ended up lost in my thoughts for… I don’t even know. Feels like hours sometimes. But sometimes that’s just what you need. Get you out of your own head for a moment, alright?”

“That does sound peaceful. And that is a good coping mechanism for a lot of things, you know. A healthy one. Patrolling the mountains as a ranger must be convenient?”

“That’s… definitely an upside,” Ziggy said, a laugh escaping the corner of his mouth before quickly vanishing. “I’ll admit, the patrol routes are nice. But it’s just… peace, I suppose. Everything about it… I don’t know… it just soothes anything I’m worried about…makes it disappear for a few moments. Even if it doesn’t make the problem go away completely, it lets you forget about it for a minute, you know what I mean?”

“Hmm. Yes, I see. I understand, believe me. A lot of people choose nature to escape to. My question to you is…what are you trying to escape?”

“I uh…well I don’t…there’s not necessarily one thing that I uh…I mean, c’mon. Escape is escape, it doesn't need a reason…right? I don’t need to justify-”

“I’m just asking a simple question here, that’s all. You spoke about inner turmoil, forgetting…what are you trying to forget? Past cases? A current case that isn’t going away? Something in your interpersonal relationships-?”

“My relationship with Flop is solid and healthy,” Ziggy muttered quickly, crossing his arms.

“I didn’t mean to imply-”

“Yeah. but that’s what everyone does, don’t they? They just think it’s not or isn’t going to work out. I mean, yeah. We fight a lot. About stupid shit. Shit that doesn’t even matter, playfully or whatever. It’s fun to get a rise out of each other. I can’t imagine being with someone who wasn’t…I dunno…at least a little bit annoying at times.”

“But what about your relationship right now…?”

“It’s…well. Not…entirely… playful at current.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning the fighting is uh…a little more serious but uh. Hey, you know, sometimes that happens too. It just gets how it gets, okay?”

“Have you tried discussing why-”

“Why? We both know why. It’s my fault why, and I know that. Which is why I’m here. So…so help me, shrink me…or do some exercises or whatever and get me back to normal so I can just…I can do my job, have my partner, and go about my life like usual, okay?” 

“...Therapy is a lot of work, Ziggy.”

“Yeah, okay. I get that.”

“It’s not a quick fix. I’ve worked with people far more fucked up than you-”

“Gee, thanks,” Ziggy muttered wryly.

“I’m just saying, those people took a hell of a long time. Or no time at all, when you think of it. Because they tried to strong arm their way into therapy working for them. They tried to fix themselves before talking to me, and gave me all the A+ answers. But that doesn’t mean shit when the real work isn’t being done.”

“Okay…”

“So yeah, I am going to give you things to do. A journal, yes. Just write down your thoughts and feelings when you feel particularly stressed, on and off duty. For a week. And when you feel like you’re about to dip into an uncomfortable conversation with Flop…try to turn it around. To nicer subjects, or if you want, talk a little deeper about what’s bothering the two of you. Other than the obvious…”

“Yeah…the obvious being…well. You know about the shit with Fae Adaire-”

“And yet you haven’t spoken about it yet. But we can save that for another time.” She stood up.

“Another time? But it’s only been like 20 minutes-”

“Ziggy, as far as I can tell, I need you to want to cooperate in order to actually be successful. So perhaps after the journal and your first exercise, you’ll be in a better mindset.”

“But I…okay. I need this to work. I need this to just…be okay again.”

“Desperation does not always solve intricate problems in our minds. Come back to me next week with proof that you want to make a change, not just need to make a change. And we’ll plug on.”

“Okay I’ll…I’ll do the journal and…the Flop thing.” 

“And try to get a good night’s sleep. You look like shit.”

Chapter Text

Ziggy hadn’t seen Flop for a full day after his brief session with Pixie. Beric took Flop out, and Ziggy stayed on duty well past his usual time that he had four different partners as ride alongs. Each one asked why he didn’t just stick with Flop. He gave no response. Dan Faily immediately shut up. Juno muttered under her breath. Snow skirted the issue, which was nice. But his last partner was Bundy, and Ziggy geared himself up internally while Bundy barely said a goddamn word. 

Which pissed Ziggy off. He needed someone chatty to keep his mind off his unanswered texts and phone calls. From the distance that was building between himself and his husband. 

He and Bundy coasted through the hills, getting no hunters or poachers. When the sun rose, they looked for people fishing. His neck ached from constantly swiveling his head. Anxious. Looking for any sign of the familiar red coat, a demure figure skirting through the brush. He kept arguing with himself that he was being irrational. She wouldn’t be in the hills. Not in broad daylight. But then again hadn’t she been before? Or had that even been her? Was his mind playing tricks on him? Was his paranoia filtering through his actions, making him come unglued?

“You know, Ziggy, if you think she’s gonna jump out of a bush, you can just hit her with the Charger instead of staring around like a fuckin’ owl.” Bundy had been silent for so long that when he spoke, Ziggy jumped. And when he jumped, he turned the wheel so sharply he coasted off the rocky path beside the river and straight into the water.

“FUCK!”

“Eh, it’s okay. Flop drove it last, I’m sure it needed a bath.”

“I’ve been driving it. All day. This isn’t…this isn’t Flop’s fault.”

“I’m aware.” 

He and Bundy swam from the vehicle and stood shaking off on the shore of the river. Ziggy stared as his car slowly sank in the water and said nothing. Bundy glanced at him momentarily before calling the Charger in to dispatch for a tow. Bundy checked his GPS with a low murmur, and took out his phone. He called someone while Ziggy sank onto a rock and hung his head. His body hadn’t stopped shaking. His nerves were up. He felt high strung and worthless. He tried to take several deep breaths before he stood and started to pace, occasionally clenching his fists in the process. 

“We have a ride coming to pick us up,” Bundy said in a calm voice. 

“Good.”

“...you know, if you need to talk-”

“Bundy, I am…fuck. I’m on a real short fuckin’ leash right now and I just…dude, I don’t want to snap. I really don’t.”

“That’s understandable.”

Silence. 

Ziggy glanced up from where his eyes were focused on the brush to Bundy, who stood stoically examining Ziggy was the air of a man browsing a specimen in a zoo. He sighed. 

“I already tried to talk to Pixie yesterday.”

“Oh? And how did that go?”

“It was brief. She said…she said she wanted me to show her I wanted therapy before we did a longer session. Do a journal, be nice to Flop, that sort of shit.”

“...and have you-?”

“How the fuck am I supposed to do what she says when every fuckin’ time I call or text Flop, he Donowalls me? Huh? Tell me that.”

“Ah.” Bundy looked out across the river. “Could kidnap him.”

“...are you kidding-”

“Of course I’m kidding. Kind of. Well, if it was me, I’d just go find him at a scene and throw him over my shoulder.”

“And take him somewhere scenic.”

“Mm. Yeah, pretty much.”

Ziggy fell silent again, thinking as his boot collided with a stone. He watched it skip across the rippling surface of the river in three skips. He took out his phone and thumbed through the texts he had sent Flop in the last day. 

A photo of Sock with a tennis ball outside the Bundy’s where they had been staying. 

When will you be off duty?

Flop, pick up the damn phone

A photo of Tessa in the office, hungover and working on warrant requests, falling asleep. 

FLOP PICK UP THE PHONE. PLEASE.

Can you please talk to me?

How was the vault?

A Taurus pulled up, and Juno honked her horn. Bundy jumped in the passenger seat and set about explaining the situation. Ziggy barely listened as he threw his body into the back seat and slammed the door, his fingers gliding over the warm glass of his phone. 

I went to therapy yesterday. With Pixie. I can’t tell anyone else about it but you. 

“PD Tow is out, but Henry should be coming with the tow truck in a few minutes,” Ziggy heard Juno say. He nodded and cast his attention out the window as they sped down the trail back to the highway. His phone vibrated in his hand. 

Why not just tell Bundy. Leave me out of it. 

“God fucking damn it,” Ziggy muttered, fingers flying over the screen. 

“You okay, Ziggy? If you need to talk-” Juno started. 

“Juno, the only person I want to talk to right now is pissing me off. Don’t add yourself to the list.” 

It’s about my…thing. I can’t talk to him about that and you know it. I’d rather talk to you. I need to talk to you. You would understand. 

He hit send and waited. A minute later, the phone vibrated again. 

Maybe, maybe not. Have you thought that maybe we don’t know each other as well as we hoped?

Oh this motherfucker. He wanted to throw his phone out the window. Wanted to find Flop and throttle him. Wanted to yell. But instead, he sat in thought. He knew Flop. Knew him very well. He could prove it. 

As Bundy and Juno carried on a flagrantly too-cheery conversation, Ziggy went to work on the longest text of his goddamn life. 

I don’t know you? Flop Dugong, like hell I don’t know you. The fucking ‘Seaside Cop’. How you felt about killing the guy Jasper placed as a decoy. All that shit with Reggie. The lengths you’ll go to protect people, even getting stupidly caught up with Michael Simone’s bullshit…even if tangentially. I know you love sunflowers. You can’t buy pistachios without the shell or you’ll eat the whole bag and you want to savor it. I know you love the color red. You sing Fleetwood Mac in the shower even when you don’t think I’m listening. You sleep on your stomach with no pillows when I’m not around, and I think you’re demented for it…but that’s you. I know you, Flop. So why the fuck would you say something targetted to hurt me like that, huh?

He leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes, his heart racing. He’d never really admitted any of that before. Like the bad things in his life, sometimes, well…he buried the good things as well. Why? He didn’t need to feel ashamed about them. They were the reasons Flop was who he was. The little things he both liked and were annoyed by. But maybe being married was just a litany of the good and bad, the gray area of the two. Maybe that would be enough. 

His phone vibrated again and he looked down. 

Meet me at the ranger station. 

He smiled. Maybe, just maybe…things would work out after all. 

Chapter Text

Watching was always easier. People in this city didn’t seem to have the patience for it. She had been around in the shadows long enough to know that reacting and running, talking outright…that led to capture. And she wanted to be free. That was all she ever wanted. Patience was key, though. Quiet. 

Some of these people in this city were far too loud. They were often caged.
She would not be like them. 

It was quiet here at least. She sat in the back of a Ranger Granger outside the station. Waiting patiently. Watching Flop pace the driveway while he looked at his phone. What was he waiting for himself? He had been upstairs for over an hour. Long enough for her to creep into the car. Grease paint in red and white marked the steering wheel. In the back, a clown mask had been tossed under a spare tarp. She wondered who else had the habit of using this car. 

Headlights lit up the drive towards the ranger station. She ducked behind the drivers’ seat, listening. The car pulled into the driveway and shut off, and a familiar voice greeted Flop. She smiled. 

“Did you mean what you said?” She peaked from behind the seat as the headlights went off, and Flop met Ziggy at the drivers’ side door once he’d gotten out. 

“What part?”

“Are you kidding me? The…what the fuck was it…sunflowers and fuckin’...pistachios-”

“You do sleep fucked up, I’m not gonna lie-”

“Whatever, asshole! Just…look. It’s…sweet in a weird…in a you way, I guess. And look, to be honest I’m not…I’m not trying to dig at you or hurt you I just… I’m fuckin’ frustrated, Ziggy!”

“Join the club.”

“Yeah.”

They fell into silene, and she took out her phone, pondering, scrolling through past messages. Her mind was clear for now. She needed to use it to her advantage. 

“So. Therapy, huh?”

She perked up, eyes fastened on Ziggy. 

“Yeah, therapy. With uh. With Pixie. I’m gonna go…I dunno, once a week I guess?”

“...you’re actually going to-”

“I told you I was gonna do something about it and I uh. Well. Look, I know I’m stubborn or some shit but I… I don’t…fuck. I can’t keep going crazy-

“-Crazy? I was-

“DON’T YOU START. Okay. Okay. Look, I can’t keep doing this shit. To myself, or to you. You’re…you.”

“I’m me.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, that I’m me.”

“FLOP. I mean you’re, you know, important to me or whatever. Fuck off.”

“Yeah. Sometimes.”

“No, no no. You are. Just because I’m a shitty…you know, I don’t do the whole…whatever. Look, sometimes it’s just…you react a certain way and it gets heated. But we just gotta…figure it out, okay? I’m sorry I’ve been out of it-”

“-with Bundy.”

“I’m not cheating on you with BUNDY he’s MARRIED.”

“SO ARE YOU.”

“YOU WERE LITERALLY RIDING WITH LENNON EARLIER, AM I SUPPOSED TO THINK - no. No, we can do better than this.” 

She watched the back and forth of the two men with interest. The conversation seemed to receed and swell like a roiling wave. Bundy, she had heard that name before. The man with Ziggy in the tunnel. The one with the eye patch. Lennon…his wife? Hmm. 

Ziggy and Flop started to walk away toward the ridgeline. A mountain lion bounded out of Ziggy’s car and followed them. She waited several minutes before quietly slipping out of the car and behind the station. She couldn’t hear the two men. Only a soft murmuring of wind through the trees and the mild disturbance of underbrush from rabbits fleeing into the night. Behind the ranger station sat another car, strange hearse-like vehicle that reminded her of the Adams Family. She tried the handle. It was locked. Glancing inside, she saw a dusty badge laying in the passenger side cup holder. 

“Lennon Bundy, Doctor. Los Santos Medical Group,” she whispered under her breath. 

Chapter Text

It started like any normal day. He and Lennon left the house, went to UwU Café, picked up the Charger from MRPD, and went to Otto’s for a tune up. On the way to the firehouse, Lennon mentioned how tired she was. When he’d asked, she smirked and muttered that Flop and Ziggy had made up. 

“Oh? How could you tell?” Bundy said absently, partially listening to her and the radio at the same time. 

“While you were passed out, dead to the world, they came home at like, four in the morning. Giggling.”

“Giggling.”

“Uh huh. I had to mom them to quiet down.”

He pulled into the Firehouse. “Well, it could’ve been worse-”

“Oh it got worse later.”

“Huh? What, they wouldn’t stop gig…oh. Oh yeah. Well, they’ve had to deal with us so…”

“Yeah, that’s why I wasn’t even that mad, to be honest. It’s good they’re…you know. Back at it. Back together. You know what I mean.”

He smirked. “I know, love. Alright, have a good shift. Come give me a hug, I’ll try to check up on you later.”

After that, he’d gone to the ranger station to finish paperwork. He was there for approximately 3 hours before another Charger careened into the drive and broke his focus. He waited for the quiet to resume, but the sound of Flop’s voice muffled through the floorboards told him he probably wouldn’t get anything else done. He stretched and made his way out of the office and down to the lockers. Flop was talking a mile a minute as he finished stocking his duty belt. An off duty Ziggy lounged against the closest locker, his arms crossed comfortably across his chest. Ziggy was smiling and it was good to see. Flop started putting on his chest armor, and Ziggy adjusted a strap, winning himself a slap to the hand. 

“Quit it, I can put a vest on!”

“It’s like riding a horse, you always double check the tack-”

“I and NOT a HORSE, ZIGGY!”

The way Ziggy and Flop had bantered and griefed each other was something he had missed seeing or hearing about for what seemed like weeks. When Flop batted Ziggy’s hand away, the other man merely pulled his husband closer, whispering into the shell of his ear. Flop murmured in return as Ziggy’s hand slid into place at his lower back, edging him closer…

Bundy cleared his throat. 

Instantly Flop jumped away from Ziggy, seemingly preoccupied with buttoning the cuffs of his uniform shirt. He muttered quietly to himself. Ziggy just leaned back against the locker, laughter in his eyes as his attention averted to Bundy. 

“How’s the shift going?” Ziggy asked. 

“More boring than yours, apparently.”

“Ah. I uh…I went out earlier, Shift One. I didn’t feel like sitting alone at your place, so you know. Buddy system and whatnot.”

“Well. That’s progress,” Bundy said, his brows raised, inquiring. 

Ziggy adjusted his gloves and looked away for a moment. “Yeah. Uh…anyway, sorry we didn’t see you earlier yesterday, you know, we stayed up pretty late and-”

“Oh yes, I heard.”

“You heard?”

“Mm. Mhm. From Lennon,” Bundy said, trying oh so hard to keep a smirk from surfacing. She was pretty tired when I took her to work earlier, you know.”

“Sorry,” Flop muttered, sheepish. 

“Don’t say sorry to me, tell her. But don’t worry, I’ll get you back.”

“Oh god. That’s…yeah… Well. Alright, let’s go, Ziggy. I gotta fill up the car-”

“Typical,” Ziggy muttered.

“-AND take it to Harmony, so I hope the diner’s open-”

“I told you we should have stopped at Maldini’s on the way here!”

“And I SAID I didn’t want pizza for dinner-”

“Oh, my apologies, sergeant, whatever you say.”

“Oh my god, Ziggy, for fuck’s sake, don’t-”

“Oh, is ‘sir’ what you like better? You sure liked it-”

“ZIGGY! Let’s go. See you later, Bundy…” Flop’s cheeks were crimson, his smile rueful. 

Bundy bid the other two men goodbye with a wry shake of his head and set about arming himself for the day. He would get gas himself later and fire off the last two search warrants he’d been working on to Crane or Norman Adams. He didn’t have a ridealong scheduled. He was looking forward to the peace and quiet of being alone. 

He cruised around the city for a time, listening to the radio. It was a quiet night, all things considered. Only one boost popped off shortly after midnight, and immediately everyone and their cousin jumped at the chance to drive in circles. He took the time to coast through the mountains for solitude, then came down to Vinewood to scout for burglaries. He’d been texting Lennon sporadically since dropping her off - he hadn’t heard from her in almost an hour or so. She must’ve been on a call. 

When he finally did pull up to the firehouse, no EMS stood outside to greet him. None in sight. He called Lennon. No answer. He texted her. Waited a minute. Then called Kiki. She picked up immediately. 

“Hey kid, where’s everybody at? Y’all out there on calls or-?”

“Um. Well, we were. Me and mom…and then… I honestly don’t know how it happened, I went in to the 24/7 for maybe ten minutes? But then I came out and she was gone and I couldn’t find her and so we’ve been looking…and I just-”

“Okay. Here’s what you’re gonna do. Slow down. Take a breath.”

A soft, shuddering exhale issued through the phone.

“Another.”

Another exhale, this time longer.

“Feel better?”

“Yeah. Um. Sorry, dad. I just…I’m a little panicked right now - I’m probably not making the most sense…”

“No, not really. Just take it slow. Who can’t you find?” He sounded calm because he wanted to be calm. It always started like this. A normal day. A normal day…

“Mom,” Kiki muttered.

Bundy took a low breath and closed his eyes for a second. Suspicion confirmed. “When did you last see her?”

“A half hour ago.”

“She didn’t answer when I tried to call her. And no texts.”

“She hasn’t answered me either, or Veronica. We’re looking. But mom…she isn’t on duty anymore. It’s like she signed out…she was riding with me in the ambo earlier…”

“Jesus Christ,” Bundy said, under his breath. “Okay. I’ll…I’ll put out a 311, get patrol out there for her. Make sure all of EMS is doubled up for the rest of the night. Keep searching…I’ll reach out if I find anything.”

“I’ll do the same…I’m…I’m so sorry, if I had just not gone in…but Mom was thirsty and just wanted water, so I offered to get it. She’s been so tired today-”

“I know, kid, I know. It’s not your fault, okay? You couldn’t have known. It’s okay.”

They said their goodbyes while Bundy tore down the street to Mission Row. His ears were thundering with the sound of his own heart beating quickly in his chest. Once in the motor pool, he put out a 311 with Lennon’s description and last known location, courtesy of a text from Kiki. He transitioned the search to channel three, his anxiety mounting as his fingers drummed on the steering wheel. Fuck. Goddamnit. It had been so long since Lennon had been taken. Not since she was a doctor. And there was no telling just who the culprit could be, given their history. He didn’t know where to start. Kiki and Veronica were combing areas they knew Lennon frequented. Part of him wanted to start with places important to them. The mountain trail leading to the lake,one of their first date spots. Two Hoots Falls, where he’d proposed to Lennon with the help of the rag tag family. The lighthouse, where they’d been married and suffered one of the toughest trials of their relationship and their family at the hands of Norman Bones-

He jumped at the knock on his driver’s side window.

Ziggy was standing outside the car, his sunglasses off and tucked in the pocket of his green flannel. Bundy rolled down the window and opened his mouth to speak, but Ziggy cut him off.

“I heard about Lennon…”

Bundy sighed. “311 information is all I’ve to to go on, and frankly I don’t think it’s enough-”

“I uh, didn't hear about it from the 311.”

“...how then?”

“She texted me.”

“Lennon? She never answered me-” Bundy started, relief flooding his system. 

“No…not Lennon…Fae. She…just look.” Ziggy thrust his phone through the open window. His hands shook. Bundy’s eyes scanned the text. 

It’s quiet here. The doctor is good company. I need help and maybe she can help me. She’s very kind. I wonder how long she will stay that way. Not all people stay kind in this world. 

Chapter Text

In the back of his mind in the deep recesses where he kept his memories of Hilda and Hank, of killing Jack, of waking up in cold sweats knowing anyone in his tight circle could be a target, he thought he knew the place. It wasn’t anywhere Fae had dumped a body before - it was too early to say whether or not Lennon’s discovery would be dead or alive. It was too early to tell if Fae’s time in Parson’s had helped her take control of the voices inside her head, egging her on to kill. 

Which was why, in his reasoning at least, the place would have to be one separated from previous crimes. Somewhere out of the way, hidden. Off the beaten path. A place she felt comfortable, or a place she knew would give her answers about Ziggy. If that was what she was after in the first place. It had been too long for him to be able to tell. He felt rusty, lethargic. Useless. And yet…maybe he was onto something. Maybe…

They had made the captain’s office the base of operations for Lennon’s search. As the hours ticked by, Ziggy lost count of how many false reports were made, botched comms on the radio that perked Bundy’s spirits, or unknown number calls that aimed at taunting for taunting’s sake. Every few minutes or so - or at least it felt that way - someone would come into the room and mutter something to Bundy before casting a glance at Ziggy. And every time they did, he felt more and more at fault as time went on. For the third time, Flop came in after patrolling and sank onto the couch, his exhaustion evident. 

“She’s not at either of the houses, the hospital, the firehouse, the lighthouse, Two Hoot’s Falls, or the lake by Mt. Gordo-” Flop started, listing on his fingers as he went. 

“Thanks, Flop,” Bundy murmured from behind the desk, his brows raised over the screen of his laptop. “I’m sure she’s not at the Mirror Park Tavern either, or Smoke on the Water.” He buried his face behind the screen, and Ziggy shot Flop a look from his place by the bullpen windows. They knew he didn’t exactly mean anything by the sarcasm itself, but it was still aggravating nonetheless. Ziggy closed his eyes briefly before looking out into the bullpen. Richard and Matt were huddled over a computer talking, Richard was wearing his old dispatch headset. He had been listening in on all channels and ATC for hours looking for strange calls. 911s for Lennon’s own phone. Like Fae used to do so many years before. It was strange, this new iteration of the case. Especially old faces like Dark and Rhodes, who had been there in the beginning. Adding Flop and Bundy into the mix… Things were changing. Things were different. Maybe his first instincts were wrong. 

He didn’t have any new texts from Fae. It wasn’t for lack of trying, that was for sure. He’d been texting her most of the day. They were losing daylight now. Every time he opened his phone, his unanswered questions stared bak at him like accusations. Little f=digs of information he didn’t know and couldn’t know. He kept taking breaths and counting. Telling himself to try. Reminding himself he needed to see Pixie again soon. So far he had staved off the usual static. The only time it had started to creep into his mind and make itself home was when Flop had mentioned places Lennon had been held when kidnapped, and Bundy had commented on the burned out motel in Sandy Shores. The one some other serial killer had taken Bundy and Lennon to last summer. Ziggy hadn’t listened further. He was too busy keeping the subtle notes of Fur Elise at bay, brows furrowed in concentration. 

“Ziggy.”

He turned toward Bundy at the desk. 

“Can you think of anywhere-”

He sighed. “No. No…I…can’t. Look, I’m sorry, Bundy. I really am. This case…it’s been a part of me for years and as much time and effort as I spent on it…don’t you think I’d say something by now if I knew what the fuck was going on in her head?”

“I know, I’m just-”

“I get it. I’d do the same. I’m just sorry y’all got mixed up in this shit. I really am. This is my case, my responsibility. If I’d have focused on it earlier and not been such a whiny bitch-”

“Ziggy, don’t.”

“Don’t what? Tell the truth? Nah. Nah, I’ve been useless. That’s on me and no one else. I shouldn’t have gotten you involved. I didn’t need help.”

“You did, though.”

“Well, did it have to come from you? Did it? Did I have to jeopardize your family? No. If I were you, I’d be pissed or something. I dunno.”

Bundy was silent and stationary for so long, it was a wonder if he even let out a breath. When he did move, he leaned his elbows against the edge of the desk and ran a hand over the closely cropped hair at the base of his neck. He opened his mouth to speak but shook his head after a moment like a dog with water in its ears after a strenuous swim. Before he could find the words to speak, a knock came from behind Ziggy’s back. He turned and saw Richard briefly before he wrenched open the door to the room. 

“Check the latest 911. It’s some cryptic shit. From Lennon’s phone.”

All eyes in the room went to their respective screens, scrolling the logs of 311s and 911s alike. Ziggy’s eyes fastened on the message, and he read, lips moving as he continued. 

911|(609) Lennon | Bundy # 4154826638:

To some she is a Lily of the Valley - a delicate thing that soothes. Gentle. To some she is a hot house rose, ill tempered for harsh conditions. To some she is a forget-me-not - beloved, small yet stunning. Without sun, water, and nutrients she will wilt, losing the last of her petals and will to bloom. The just and skilled gardener knows when to snip the stem, prune to end the suffering. It all depends on timing. 

Chapter Text

She blew out a shaking breath, trying to shift stray red tendrils of hair from her line of vision. The room was dim, the barest hint of light filtered in - dustmotes danced in the light and breeze coming from beneath the door. Her only exit. She could feel a wooden edge dig into her back at the midpoint. If she leaned back, her shoulders only met open air, but her head met an obstacle, something earthly. Greenery. The leaves tickled her cheek as she turned her head. She shrugged away from their touch, hands going up in reflex to bat away their interference, but she could do nothing. Her hands were bound in thin wire at the wrists, digging into the delicate skin, rubbing it raw. 

Lennon had fallen asleep briefly, which was an amazing feat considering her anxiety was through the roof. Her mouth was disastrously dry. Her tongue shyly peaked out to lick her scabbed and dry lips. When she’d been taken she had bitten quite hard on her lower lip when the soft spoken woman had put a cloth over her mouth. This was her third time waking after the kidnapping. The first time, she awoke to the darkness of a car trunk and gentle humming. It soothed her back into unconsciousness. 

The second time she woke up, she was beneath a tree near Cassidy Trail - she could hear the river distantly. A woman stood with her back turned, staring out across the expanse of rocky outcrops. When Lennon shifted and let out a groan, the woman turned towards her.

“You have very kind eyes,” she muttered. 

“...thank you…”

“You’re welcome, doctor.”

“...I’m not a doctor anymore…”

The woman tilted her head to the side, confusion evident. “No? When did that happen…why…?”

Lennon cleared her throat and swallowed, her tongue like sandpaper rubbing the roof of her mouth. “A…couple months ago…there were problems at the hospital…I didn’t…I didn’t feel like the hospital was safe anymore.”

“Oh,” the woman whispered, tugging a stray dark strand of hair behind her ear. “I know what that’s like. Why did you keep your hospital ID in the car then?”

Lennon frowned. She hadn’t seen her hospital ID in so long. She didn’t even have a medical license anymore, thanks to the utter bullshit that was the hospital system. She didn’t remember the last time she’d even had it…

“The…car behind the ranger station…like a hearse but-?”

“Oh,” Lennon murmured softly. She was starting to feel light headed again. “Was it in there?”

“It was. In the cupholder.” The other woman was quiet for a time. She was shaking. A breeze strolled through the area and whispered through the woman’s long dark hair again. She looked frail but there was a spark still left in her, a glimmer of something that was keeping her going. Lennon’s mind was in such a struggle. Part of her wanted to scream, to give in to the panic that was welling in her chest and bursting to break free.. The other part of her, the logical side that enjoyed puzzles and finding solutions - the reasons she had been in the medical field in the first place - was curious about her kidnapper. She needed more info. 

“I still…um…I still help people. I’m with EMS snow. Is that what you want? What you need? Help?”

The other woman turned toward her again, tears threatening to fall from thick lashes. She smiled. It did not comfort Lennon. “I’ve been offered a lot of help lately. Options. I just…don’t know what to do.” 

Lennon tried to sit up to speak. When she did so, the wire around her wrists tightened and her vision went a little blurry. She leaned her full weight back against the tree, sagging. The other woman frowned.

“I may have used too much…I’m sorry. You must be uncomfortable…”

“It’s…what did you give me?”

“Something I stole out of an ambulance…I’m not sure…” Before she could ask any other questions specific to whatever she had been dosed or drugged with, Lennon’s vision emptied into thick black oblivion and she was gone again for a time. She didn’t know how long. 

This was the third time she had woken and this time was different, as she was alone. And the place, the smell of it in the darkness was…familiar. Maybe she could blame it on being drugged, maybe she could blame it on the blackouts, feeling weak without food or water. Her mind felt slow, annoyingly sluggish. Focus. The smell. It was earthy. Floral. Dark. No, that had nothing to do with it. Focus. Wood behind her, some kind of platform…greenery…

Doors slammed outside and she shifted again, feeling woozy. Something else was digging into her thigh but she couldn’t shift it without tightening the wire or passing out, she knew that. She also knew if she didn’t get out of her bindings, the lack of blood flow could be catastrophic in retaining those hands… She opened her mouth to call out, but only a tired croak issued from her chapped lips. 

“San Andreas State Park Rangers! Is anybody in there?” 

Lennon smiled tiredly as the door burst open, and three figures blocked the early morning sunlight from blinding her. She glanced away from the figures briefly to her dimly lit surroundings and blinked owlishly. The ivy trellis walls, the bouquets she’d worked on… Oh. 

She looked down at her hands. Floral wire bound her wrists, it’s dark green sheen darker in places where her skin had broken and bled. When her husband rushed toward her and wrapped his arms around her, she gave in to the darkness again and was out before he could radio 52s. 

A CD case dislodged from beneath her in Bundy’s scramble to support her limp body. The case slid a foot into the room, a dried and smudged butterfly crudely drawn in blood on the cover. 

Chapter Text

The sterile smell was an assault to the senses. He’d paced the lobby more times than he could count, but a feeling of familiar dread sat lodged at the bottom of his stomach. That familiar weight. He could hear the static start to crescendo, a soft voice adding to the mix. It was low and gentle. Soothing. Unlike Fae’s however, it was male. When he opened his eyes, Flop was staring at him with an eerie calm, hand out to touch his shoulder tentatively. 

“Ziggy, please. Just...can you sit?”

“Yes, I am capable of sitting-”

“That is NOT what I meant- Look, c’mere.” Flop led him over to two chairs against the wall beside an overly large LSMG hiring poster. Ziggy sat gingerly, a muffled crinkle issuing from the inside of his jacket. Flop kept a level gaze on him until he looked away. 

“I didn’t want to leave it in the car…the CD.” He tapped his pocket, their find from inside Truth and Justice Floral safely inside an evidence bag. Bundy kept two on him at all times, apparently. 

“What’s going through your head right now?”

Ziggy let out a long, low breath. 

“Sure you wanna go there right now, Flop?” Ziggy stared down on his hands, dangled haphazardly between his knees. He didn’t like this version of Flop either, if he was honest. The cool, calm, straight-forward attitude. He knew it worked - he did it. It was coping firsthand. Shut everything out. Focus. Pinpoint problems. Find solutions. But the problem with this problem was that he was part of it. “Why don’t you go first?”

Flop sighed. “Well for starters, how the fuck did Lennon get picked up by Fae? Why? What’s the motive with that other than nabbing someone close to you…and then what? Not kill her? I mean, thank God she didn’t but…it doesn’t fit the pattern from before.”

“Patterns can change. You know that.” So it would be work. Ignore everything else. Fine. “It’s been years. She had an outburst, and took out the beach house. Then she leaves messages. She’s quiet, won’t answer. Then Lennon’s picked up. Then I dunno…”

“We need to listen to the CD, Ziggy.”

“And we will, after we check up on Lennon and Bundy,” he replied tightly. He repelled the thought of touching the evidence bag even though he desperately wanted to. He didn’t want to listen to it. Would it be another song, prepped and ready with Lennon’s name included? If so, why wasn’t she like all the others? If it wasn’t that, would it be a recording of Fae’s movements? How she tracked Lennon? Tracked them? Or was it something else? And if so… would it be better or worse than the other two options? 

The doors to the ER from the lobby opened and Bundy walked through with Lennon, an arm wrapped around her. A ranger jacket rested over her shoulders. As they crossed to Flop and Ziggy, Ziggy could see bandages wrapped around Lennon’s wrists as she cupped her hands in front of her, head down and eyes towards the floor. Ziggy felt a pang of regret. 

“Lennon, do you mind giving Flop your statement now that we’ve…processed mentally…everything…”

“Sure,” she murmured, perching stiffly on a chair beside Ziggy. She reached out and grasped his hand. “I’m okay. It isn’t your fault.”

“Yeah okay, and-”

“No. Listen to me. I can see it in your eyes. The guilt. I know it. I know the feeling. It doesn’t help. Don’t make me mama bear you like one of my kids.”

Ziggy squeezed Lennon’s hand and offered her a tense smile before standing up and leading Bundy away from their spouses. His feet lead him toward the stairs and he was vaguely aware that he was headed toward the place he paced when Bobbi Russell was in the hospital. It felt like so long ago…

Once Bundy reached the top of the stairs, Ziggy took the evidence bag from his pocket and stared at the dried bloody butterfly on the cover of the CD. “My laptop doesn’t even have a disc drive.”

“Funny little trend, isn’t it.” 

“Hysterical.” Ziggy shifted uncomfortably. “We can get back to the station, run this through the lab while Flop does his statement…I can leave them my Charger-”

“Lennon left our Mustang in the valet downstairs…We’ll take that. And listen Ziggy, for what it’s worth-”

“I know.” He sighed. “I know how you guys feel about this whole situation and I appreciate that. I do. But it doesn’t change how I feel about it myself. I’m gonna deal with it. Let’s deal with this first though, yeah?”

They left the hospital and jumped into Bundy’s white Mustang. At the next stoplight, Ziggy heard a sigh from his companion. Before Ziggy could question him, Bundy turned instead of going straight toward MRPD. “Looks like there’s a cop stack. I’ve got another idea… hopefully she hasn’t had it repossessed by the State…”

“What are you talking about?”

“You’ll see,” Bundy said, gunning it down the street. After several moments, he pulled the car to a jarring halt outside of a large glass building in Vinewood. 

“Oh. A.L.P.H.A. Demi still own this?”

“Uh huh. We’re about to see, I haven’t been here in a minute. But it’s Demi. She definitely has a computer with a disc drive.” 

They were in luck, the doors were unlocked. Bundy led him through a maze of macabre oddities encased in glass, and even more glass walls. Once in the lab, Ziggy set to work, donning a pair of disposable medical gloves as he went. He took several swabs and samples from the case as Bundy prepared vials and started logging information in the report. While Ziggy started to test the samples, Bundy removed the CD from its case and inserted it into the lab computer. 

He hit play. 

At first, nothing happened. Ziggy stood rigid, hands braced on the counter top. He glanced at Bundy, who shook his head. 

“Nothing.”

“Maybe…”

And then it started. A low note that slowly unfurled into clamoring static. Beneath, a song started. 

“Butterflies are free
Butterflies are free

I knew the day you met me
I could love you if you let me
Though you touched my cheek and said
"How easy you'd forget me"”

“That sound…okay, that’s gotta be something from the ‘70s-” Bundy started.

“Shh. Wait.”

“So why the cryin'?
Was afraid we're lyin'
When we both agreed
There'd be no tears in our goodbyin'

Butterflies are free
Butterflies are free
Why aren't we?

Butterflies are free
Butterflies are free
Why aren't we?”

The static and music lowered to a murmur. Quiet talking, Fumbling. Quiet swearing. A short burst of laughter. A murmuring, trembling voice. 

“We aren’t free, are we? Doctors can help. For so long. But how to start? How to end?”

A sob. Breaking glass. The slam of a door. The music trundled to an end. Low breathing. Static. 

Then silence. 

Chapter Text

It was hard not to internalize everything that had happened in the last few days. And it was too late to stop bottling for sure, those feelings were already on their way to that…bottling factory… Fuck, even his metaphors were swimming aimlessly through his head. So he took a page out of Ziggy’s book. He went to the mountains, Sock whining from the passenger seat. 

“Hush, boy. We’re good. Well…we’re okay.”

Coasting to the top, he killed the engine and climbed out of the Charger before he stared off toward the horizon. The sea glistened, sunlight shimmering and dancing through the waves in the very distance. A gentle breeze filtered through the forest closer to him, and closer still the wind turbines oscillated merrily. 

His mind went back to the previous evening, where he and Lennon had a good talk. After Ziggy and Bundy went off to write up the report and run the evidence, Flop and Lennon went for a drive in Ziggy’s Charger. They headed up to Beaver Bush and made a pass through, looking for signs of Fae. Lennon told Flop she thought Fae had been getting into cars that were parked out back. Bundy often parked back there. So did Ziggy. Fae had taken Lennon’s old SMHG ID from on of their cars, and had grabbed Lennon from outside the hospital. Fae had pretended to need a repair kit for her vehicle, a stolen local car, and Lennon had realized too late. Something, an old sock or scrap of clothe, had gone over Lennon’s mouth. And she had woken up in the trunk, beneath a tree, and inside Truth and Justice Floral respectively. 

“What did you do when you realized she wanted a doctor…and you weren’t one?”

“I just…told her I was EMS. That I could still help… but she didn’t seem to know where to start. And by then, I was losing consciousness…”

“Because of the wrist ties?”

“...she used floral wire, the type I use to put together the bouquets for the shop? She must have come in before…she knew it was our shop somehow, I mean…”

“And she didn’t try to hurt you or anything?”

“...no. She just…wanted to talk. To rationalize her problems. At least, that’s the feeling I got. She doesn’t know where to turn for help. So she’s following this connection to us through Ziggy and vice versa. Because well. QWe’re giving her a response.”

He ruminated on that a little as he sat in the dying light of the sun, his elbows on his knees. Last night he had listened to the recording after Ziggy and Bundy were finished at the lab. They came back to the house late, half past three in the morning. He was still awake and waiting, watching the house while Lennon was asleep. Ziggy sent the file to his phone from the lab computer and handed Flop his earbuds. 

What he heard did not give him a whole lot of confidence that things wouldn’t get worse. That Fae was slipping. She was clinging on to what she could, that was clear. And she hadn’t acted yet. But she was surely slipping. He just wasn’t sure which way she would fall in the end. 

Bundy had gone off to bed and he and Ziggy sat up until well past morning in their living room, talking about their theories. Whenever Ziggy attempted to ask his thoughts, Flop blocked the attempt by redirecting the questioning to a line in the report, or a section of the recording. In his mind, he was doing himself a favor. Staying on track, keeping himself steady. 

After the sun had crested the skyline and the Bundy’s windchimes went into overdrive in a stirring morning breeze, Ziggy got up with a gruff sigh. 

“Flop. Okay, listen. I know things have been shitty lately-”

“Understatement of the year,” Flop murmured, remaining on the sofa. 

“Ah. Yeah. I just…you know, if talking about it helps-”

“Never thought I’d see you wanting to talk about things.” 

“Yeah well, I said I’d try. I don’t want to, but we should. You know. Talk about this. Tell me what’s going through your head?”

He remembered making a joke and brushing it off, remembered saying something off-the-cuff bullshit about Ziggy getting soft in his old age. They went to bed without pushing the issue. When he woke late into the afternoon, Ziggy was gone. Typical. What was not so typical was the fact that he left a note. He was going out on Shift 2 with Bundy to check old spots, run through the data. It made sense, he told himself. Bundy was the consummate detective and a great sounding board for ideas. And Ziggy was Ziggy. Though he loved going on duty and doing the bare minimum sometimes, often joking about getting out of reports…he lived for a mystery. And he’d been a detective longer than Flop had, and even longer than Bundy. 

And it made sense in his mind, he knew it did. But it didn’t keep him from feeling left out. Even if it was potentially his fault for not wanting to talk…

“Alright, boy,” Flop said with a sigh. “Enough moping, huh?” He brushed errantly under his eyes, his fingertips coming away with black smudges. Great. How emo did he look, for fuck’s sake…

Flop stood and whistled for Sock to follow him to the Charger. After they climbed in, Flop cranked the radio and strapped his harness on. Maybe some Ranger Shit would clear his head. A good run down the mountain. That would solve something. It had to. 

Halfway down the mountain, the Charger’s left tire blew. Flop corrected as best he could, but this side of the mountain had a penchant for erosion  because of the wind farm. The ground was mostly sand with a dash of gravel, not enough to secure any footing. He careened down the rest of the slope sideways, one hand on the steering wheel, one hand holding on to Sock’s collar. The Charger struck a tree 30 feet from the bottom of the mountain. It wrapped the tree. Any eerie silence settled in, punctuated by the whine of Sock. He limped toward the tree after being thrown from the vehicle. As he approached the mangled wreck, a panic button fell from the passenger side window and struck a stone. The beeps issued in the wilderness, amplified. A flurry of crows took off from a nearby tree. 

Chapter Text

“Goddamnit, you fucking idiot! You could have gotten yourself killed! Do you even know what I thought when I saw where you Alpha’d? Huh?”

“Let me guess,” Flop said from the hospital bed, wincing as she adjusted his broken arm in the sling. He rolled his eyes and settled. “You’re gonna tell me anyway-”

“Oh my God, now’s not the time to-to act like a fucking CHILD-”

“I am NOT being a child! It was an accident-”

“No shit! You’re dumb, but you’re not stupid enough to do it on purpose, even if you are a dramatic bitch-”

Someone tapped his shoulder, and Jeffrey Bundy turned toward the intrusion, away from his place as an audience member of the most idiotic game of verbal tennis. Matt Rhodes stood before him outside of Flop’s hospital room, arms crossed and clearly dragged out of the house against his will. He was wearing a rumpled LSPD Instructor hoodie, sweats, and Crocs of all things. Bundy raised a brow at the other man before shaking his head. “Sorry you had to get out of bed, Rhodes-”

“Oh trust me, this would be worse if Richard was here instead of me.” The blond man yawned, wincing as his son began to yell over Ziggy. Bundy edged the door closed with his foot. The loud slam of the door did not stop the couple arguing inside. 

“How long’s this been going on then?”

Bundy checked his watch. “About forty-five minutes. Started after Flop woke up, after the arm was reset-”

“So he was driving a Charger off the mountain-”

“-typical ranger shit-”

“Right. And he crashed, got banged up, broken arm…hmm. Okay. So what you’re saying is, things are relatively fine, given the circumstances.”

“Right.”

“The yelling isn’t about the crash, is it.” 

Bundy sighed, leaning the full weight of his body against the door jamb. “I think...it partially was, at first but uh ...seems more like not…”

”You know, the last time they were getting into it was during the days after Michael Simone was handed over.”

“Ah. I remember the case going to shit before my eyes after we met with the Senate.”

“Oh yeah… You took time off after that, didn’t you?”

“Yeah. It pissed me off, not getting to go to court on that one. I don’t know. Things are better now. Far more interesting…”

“You’re helping Ziggy with the Butterfly Killer thing still?”

“I don’t seem to have much choice when she kidnapped my wife…”

“Yeah. See, I see this going in one of two ways. Flop is going to get hurt because of this woman and Ziggy is going to fly off the handle…more…”

“Or?”

“Or something happens to Ziggy and Flop…” Matt trailed off. The conversation in the room was now whispered threats, which was something different at least. Bundy could tell Rhodes was choosing his words carefully. “When something bad happens Flop is a fixer. He does everything he can to be helpful and sort out a situation. But him getting involved in this old case… I don’t personally like it, and I even worked if briefly back then-”

“Ziggy took me to the sewer tunnels, the ones under the bridge.”

“He did? Huh. Did you know we had to transport that victim in my CVPI?”

“Oh?”

“The detailing afterward, my God…” Rhodes shook his head. He adjusted his stance and glanced at Bundy. “I’ve got this. You go home. I can handle these two.” Matt Rhodes thrust the door open with such force that the loud bang echoed through the hall. Bundy watched as Rosabelle Briar almost turned the gurney of an unconscious Denzel Williams into a wall before directing him into the doorway of the next room over. 

That was when he decided to check out. When Rhodes’ voice overtook Ziggy and Flop’s, he turned and started toward the elevator. He hoped beyond hope he could make it to MRPD to clock off and pick up Lennon without getting a 78s, a phone call, or hearing anything Harvey Holden related. The odds were never in his favor for that one. 

But for once, whatever ruled Los Santos was in his favor. He skirted a couple talking to Dr. Kate in hushed tones and headed to his car, ready to decompress. He would text Ziggy on the way and see if he was staying in the hospital with Flop overnight or coming to the beach house. Jeffrey had half a mind to tell him to stay there while he and Lennon stayed at Route 68…

He went out the back way through the EMS garage, preparing himself to check his Charger for bombs. Reflex. Habit. 

But he didn’t get that far. He stopped halfway across the parking lot and watched as a woman ran out from behind his car, her ragged hair whipping in the wind. He opened his mouth to shout at her. Caught her eye. His hand went reflexively to his belt, glancing across the taser. But she was too fast. And he already had an inkling who it could be…

He checked his car more thoroughly than normal, positioning the mirror in ways he hadn’t thought of before to check the undercarriage. He needn’t have bothered. Everything was fine. Bundy jumped into the Charger and careened out of the South Side towards MRPD. Once there, he clocked off and changed into old PT sweats, feeling claustrophobic in his own uniform. He picked up Lennon from the fire station, and they headed to Otto’s for gas. 

Bundy opened that gas tank door and a note fluttered to the ground next to his back tire. He frowned. Bent over. Picked it up. 

“What’s that?” Lennon said from the passenger window. 

He shrugged and opened the note, carefully touching the edges. 

Please. Tell Ziggy I’m sorry. He won’t talk to me. I apologize for keeping your wife from you, though she was good company when she could be. I wish more people in this city were like her. Please. Talk to Ziggy. Ask him if I’m still able to be saved.