Work Text:
"There is a note in your file I'd like to discuss, Mr. Larkin."
"The bombing, right? Armitage-Delta?"
"It says you were briefly a suspected co-conspirator, but the charges were dropped. I'd appreciate a more complete picture, if you're willing."
"That is... a long story, and not a pleasant one, but alright. Where should I start?"
-
The door slid open, grinding into its socket as he raised his fist to knock. He was taken aback; the Stacks wasn't exactly a safe neighborhood for leaving the apartment unlocked, and she was hardly a trusting sort these days. Anxiety roiling in his stomach, he carefully looked both ways down the hall before poking his head through the door.
"Angie?" No response, no sight of the owner. Old instincts made him wish for a sidearm as he stepped inside.
The tenant was nowhere to be found, though signs of her were everywhere: trash can stuffed to overflowing, dishes piled carelessly into the sink, empty boxes and packing material strewn about. He'd never been to her place before, but none of it was encouraging. An odor he'd dismissed as merely odd grew more pungent, more concerning; a sour haze that triggered his alarms. He couldn't place it, but his mind went right to 'flammable' as an assumption.
"Angie, it's Reid!" he tried again. A deathly silence was his answer.
-
"Tell me about Angela Kagan."
"Lot to say there. If I had to summarize... she was sharp. Had an eye for the big picture, a head that could keep all the details straight. Might've had a career as an analyst, but took to field work instead."
"Were you close?"
"Sort of. After the mission we went separate ways, but tried to keep in touch. I happened to be in town that day and invited her out to lunch. She said yes, but never showed up, didn't answer messages. Had a hunch something was wrong."
-
There wasn't much space to search, but every detail told him more of the story. Take-out boxes and a dusty stove, blinds drawn and empty liquor bottles everywhere. Her terminal was on and locked, her couch worn down on one cushion only. The centerpiece was a man's picture on a well-used dartboard. Reid recognized him instantly: Weston Brooklane IV, CEO of the Armitage-Delta Group, recently outed in a scandal for the ages - one that had ruined countless lives, including theirs. The fake smile was always grating, even with dart holes right between those cold blue eyes.
A cracked mirror distracted him from old grudges, and he stared for a moment at his shattered reflection. Tired and cleanshaven, worry in those chestnut irises, short blonde hair actually brushed for a change. His career had taken the better part of his thirties, and it showed in the lines on his face. The deeper scars were all underneath, some hidden by the fraying jacket and dress shirt missing a button or two. He hadn't had cause to buy anything nicer in years.
With a sigh he stepped away, approaching the bedroom; the smell grew stronger. Inside was wall-to-wall madness taken right out of a psychiatry textbook. Poster boards were overrun with photos and connecting lines, handwritten notes in a clumsy scrawl; he could just make out dates on some of them. Brooklane's mug sat squarely at the top, and it wasn't hard to guess at the pyramid beneath him. Upper management, lead researchers, the board of directors, key personnel - each marked with a set of numbers he couldn't decipher.
The walls themselves were even worse, dents and scratches covered by a patchwork of hasty scrawls - likely made when space on the board had run out. The writing struck him as stream-of-consciousness; everything from grocery lists to rifle maintenance tips to the words "IT WORKS" written over and over. Threaded through the mess was a series of calculations he couldn't even begin to parse, bracketed under a single word that he did know: Delphi. Despite the humidity, his blood ran cold.
-
"The mission you were on together. You said that was supposed to be a peacekeeping operation?"
"Yeah, A-D was having trouble on Savoda-318, one of its colonies. Put together a unit to police 'rival settler groups'. Intel was way off. Instead of a couple pissed-off militias, both sides had their own mercenaries, with full cavalry and artillery support. We... basically didn't."
"And then a year later, someone blew the whistle. The company knew there'd be heavy casualties."
"Yeah, about 83% of the unit. They'd planned it that way. The hell of it was the size and scope of the project - and how accurate they were."
-
One wall stood out for its more orderly writing, a list of names and ranks that he almost knew by heart. Some had lines drawn through and a cause of death: Major Eugene Daughtry was near the top, heart attack; PFC Janice McTiernan, shot in a protest six months ago. A few names up was Captain Martin Bettinger, a good friend and the pilot who'd flown them out of there. And then there was his own name: Corporal Reid Larkin. Alive because he was lucky - and the field medic hadn't given up.
He'd watched Jan mantle a mech, a desperate act that had saved many of them. Bettinger had personally dragged him to the shuttle after the near-miss with a mortar. He felt an urge to salute, to bow his head in prayer, to touch the wall and think of the dead - all of them, braver than him. None of it felt sufficient. It had all been a waste, a needless crop of death and pain for a twisted harvest.
'Count to four, inhale,' he reminded himself, making a fist. 'Count to four, exhale. Let it pass.' Despair wouldn't help; he had to focus.
That sulphureous smell tugged at his nose, cutting off the self-pity and calling his attention to the bathroom. The door lay ajar and the sickly yellow lighting made it easy to see the problem. Seemingly given up on hygiene, Angela had converted the bathtub into a makeshift chemistry lab. Canisters and beakers bore some powdery residue, set along racks with improvised burners. Bits of wiring and electronic miscellany lay scattered about, along with tattered MSDS paperwork.
Above all his eyes were drawn to diagrams on the walls, detailed instructions for some makeshift device. Dread played on his nerves as took a closer look at the leftover material. Sure enough, nearly every container had a flammable warning somewhere on it. The one that didn't was the worst of them: a lead-lined case on the floor, the foam insert with space for something cylindrical. His breath was stolen at the sight of the yellow marker on the side, the unmistakable trefoil of radioactive material.
He was far too late, and he knew it.
-
"Just so I've got the details straight, what exactly was the company doing?"
"The whistleblower revealed it was all for Project Delphi. The name is indicative; they were trying to make a prediction engine, raised on a diet of combat data. Towards what end... I don't know. A-D was an agribusiness, at least on paper, and by all accounts the project was expensive pipe dream. Yet Angie seemed to think our mission was a test of a working prototype."
"What do you think?"
"I don't think they got that far, but it would explain a few things. The casualty estimates were mostly accurate, and they even had a list of those who they expected to die. I'm one of the few they got wrong. Lucky me, I guess."
-
Reid didn't know how long he stood there, just staring at the empty case; seconds felt like minutes as his mind scrambled for ideas. Motive, opportunity, and method had all clicked together, and it was obvious where she was going: the Armitage-Delta building downtown, in the heart of the bustling corporate plaza. Reporters had a near-constant presence outside since the scandal broke, and hundreds worked in that one building alone. God only knew how big a bomb she'd made.
Just as he stepped back and went for his phone, it began buzzing in his hand, startling him. One look at the number made his stomach churn, threatening a lunch he hadn't eaten. His hand shook as he accepted the call. No words came to him. All he could do was listen.
Soft breathing. Someone swallowed. "Remember Sarajevo?" Her voice once had a natural lilt to it; now it was flat and lifeless.
He stood frozen in place, like he'd stepped on a mine and dared not move. It took a moment to remember the countersign. "I remember you were there that day. Angie, where are you?" It felt pointless to ask, but he had to hear it.
"It's too late. This has to be done."
"Please listen to me-"
"They're like you, you know. Cautious to a fault." Sounds of traffic; she was on the move. "Terrified of leaving things to chance. All this is them trying to load the dice."
"Angie, come on, this is crazy," he said, stalling for time. She was beyond his reach rhetorically, and he had no hope of catching up to her. Thinking quickly, he spotted her comm unit back in the bedroom and made his way over, reaching for the touchscreen. "It's over, you're gonna kill a whole bunch of people for-"
"They haven't stopped anything, Reid." She wasn't shouting, but her words took on the sharpness of a knife, easily cutting him off. "It's so much worse than you know, so much older. They've been handing the project off through shell companies and hand-picked successors for centuries. Brooklane's just the latest. He inherited the project and saw money in it, and it's nearly ready to go now. They're not going to stop just because it's in the news."
From anyone else it would sound deranged, the type of conspiracy ranting one would pay to avoid, but the mess she'd left behind said she believed every word. With his free hand he punched in an emergency call on the apartment line, pressure building steadily in his skull. He tried to ignore it, digging fingernails into his palm as he waited for the call to connect.
"Everyone loses it all at some point." Her voice quivered, and he picked up the vague chatter of passersby over the phone, unaware of the danger in their midst. "Today's my turn, I'm just sharing it with them. Reminding them that even the stars go dark one day."
A click over the other line. Success. "Emergency services." The bored-sounding operator was about to have a hell of a day.
-
"It must have been difficult, hearing her as she went through with it."
"For a while it was all I could think about. Could I have done anything different? Anything that would have mattered at all? I doubt it, but I don't think I'll ever know for sure."
"I understand. No one likes feeling powerless. And yet..."
"Yeah. One thing poker teaches you that chess can't: sometimes you can make all the right moves and still lose."
-
Reid took a deep breath, steeling his stomach and raising his voice. "Angela, I know what happened to us was awful, and I know it's just the tip of the iceberg, but this bomb won't solve anything!" he said, making sure the other line could hear him. "Blowing up Armitage-Delta - no one's going to care what they did after that! They'll just say some random terrorist snapped and killed a bunch of people, that's it!"
No response. He heard a faint chime from Angela's end, a canned announcement with the company jingle. She was in the lobby, perhaps waiting at the security checkpoint.
"Sir? Can you please identify yourself?" asked the operator, suddenly more alert.
"Look, A-D fucked us all and you want them to burn, I get that," he continued. The pressure only mounted, squeezing his mind; he felt like a rookie acrobat walking their first tightrope over a bottomless pit. "God knows I want that too. But not like this. The company's already on IPS-N's shitlist. Blowing up their headquarters now would make it about you - about Angela Kagan - and all the innocent people you killed. Not about them."
Still nothing at first. Eventually, she breathed; it sounded like she shuddered. "I still hear them, Reid," she said, quiet but not beaten. "The ones that didn't beat the odds. They can't rest until this is done."
The emergency line was silent, but he sensed that the operator was listening. He had to buy them time. "Angie, I know you lost people back there. We all did. It's a needless pain, i-it's... space, where people should be. It hurts, and... saying that it hurts only cheapens how much." The stammer came from someplace personal, and he put a hand on a nearby dresser for support. "But this isn't justice. This is you passing that pain onto other innocent people. Making more like us. More space that can't be filled."
Reid paused for a moment, his eyes closing. He didn't have to dig deep for the memory that followed, and his voice came in almost a rasp as his throat tightened. "The dead don't care. I was close enough to know." The mother of all understatements. The medic had dragged him forcibly from a dark and comfortable place, waking him to bandages where an arm should have been. "All I wanted to do was let go."
There was commotion on the other end. Sounded like security. When she spoke, it was a ghost of a whisper, the tiniest sliver of doubt in it. "And... what is it you want now? What keeps you going?"
He sniffed, swallowed, a tear trying to escape his eye. Friends that were there for him. Months of rehab for the new arm. A caring psychiatrist. The little joys of life, from music to morning coffee, from a lighthearted show to clouds parting on the way to orbit. There was no one thing that made it okay, that kept getting him back up no matter how dark it got - just countless little things that fueled every step. So rarely did he speak of them, but they had all saved him. Helped him hang on just long enough.
One look at her apartment and he saw exactly why she'd done this. He wasn't late by minutes, but years. With sorrow cracking his voice, he uttered a single word. "Lunch." There was so much more to say, and not nearly enough time for it all. "I-I just wanted to buy you lunch. See how you were doing, y'know?"
Harsh shouting, someone calling out in panic. "That... would've been nice," she said, one final hesitation. Her voice leveled off, returning to a hollow baseline. "Sorry I stood you up."
"Angie, please-"
Some were running, screaming. An alarm sounded. "Someone has to kill it."
The line went dead. From where he stood, the city didn't even shrug.
-
"The explosion flattened the building and killed dozens outside. It's a miracle it was only that many. Their entire executive board was killed, along with the CEO and most upper management. Naturally, the company went belly-up not long afterward. Background radiation was a problem in that district for years afterward."
"How'd they think you were involved?"
"I was in kind of a daze; apparently I warned the landlord about the apartment and just... started walking. Cops picked me up on the street somewhere. They'd traced the call, but there wasn't any actual evidence. Just walked in on a hell of a thing."
"That must have been awful, I'm sorry. Are you alright to continue?"
"Good enough. Honestly, it helps a little to talk, so... thank you."
"Of course, and thank you for clarifying. Now, about the job I have in mind..."