Chapter Text
The pain is startlingly, annoyingly bright for such a small injury, Harold thinks. Too bad he can't drift into his mental exercises. Unfortunately, though, the area is unsecured and John's lack of internal balance is considerable, so he has to be in the moment with excruciating, pinsharp focus. He deserves this outcome though. It is a kind of natural justice and he needs to suck it up, as Lionel Fusco might say. It is his fault after all. On so many levels.
Harold is not by nature a superstitious man, but he certainly blames himself for not anticipating this. It had all been going too well. With John's CIA handler dead and taking his unhinged former colleague with him in one fiery blast, they had fewer enemies. The dead handler, Snow, was the perfect person to frame as the Man in the Suit, bringing that irritation, too, to a successful conclusion with just a few keystrokes. John was safe, and if Harold had a few nightmares about getting shot storming Rikers or choosing the wrong combination on the bomb vest that madwoman had strapped his partner into, it was only Harold's business and a small price to pay compared to the hell of bank robbery, explosion, imprisonment, beating, torture and psychological abuse John had endured.
The reality was, thanks to excessive high speed hacking and Carter's iron nerve, John was cleared and a free man; and when it counted Harold had chosen the right number. The pain of getting up all those steps and the terror of facing a bomb after losing everything he loved to one before had barely registered compared to the overwhelming drive in him to save his best and only friend and he had done it. He, Harold, had rescued John. The pathetic, crippled little geek saved the day.
He'd felt almost smug. Almost John’s equal.
Pride goes before a fall of course and two successful Number cases that had followed their secret victory on the rooftop had further lulled him into dropping his guard. He had forgotten that nature abhors a vacuum. That a weeding out of the various powers in their little corner of the world would have the inevitable consequence of giving lower level thugs ideas.
Then the Machine had started failing. Numbers given a little too late. Failure rate high. His own role the one comromised, while John remained exceptional. Exceptional but fighting a losing battle.
Now he's basting in the fires of guilt for not examining the wider drifts and patterns enough. He took his eye off the big picture that was his job and traded what he was good at for the shortsighted, short-term wins, moving in John's sphere instead of his own; thinking his being in the field would make John safer. As though an expert operative like John could possibly need him when there is Shaw and Carter and Fusco. What was he thinking, flying onto a storm-drenched island like some film hero of a bygone age? What was he doing, engaging in that ridiculous road trip with Root, leaving John and Miss Shaw scrambling to catch up? Did he really think he could save John in any other way than as fingers on a keyboard?
As soon as the Machine was back to full capacity and he had two capable, professional operatives and two assets in the field, he should have gone back to his lair because that's all he'll ever be. Fingers on a keyboard in the shadows alone. He's too broken to be or do or have anything else. But oh no. Because he's an idiot. All these years away from the relentless misery of educational establishments and it turns out he learned nothing: he's still replaying the same anguished adolescent mistakes of the pasty, awkward, flawed little nerd he is deep down. Still trying to fit in, to have friends, to be cool, to belong.
He couldn't make real friends so he built one. How desperately sad is that?
He was briefly happy as Nathan's shadow man and the Machine's programmer... creator... parent? Nathan dragged him to parties and opened windows and doors on life beyond his desk. The Machine gave him a purpose. And then it gave him Grace, who broadened his world with international art and wide dreams. But he lied to both of them, Nathan and Grace. Kept his core self hidden.
Bitterly, he thinks he really did make the Machine in his own image after trying so hard not to. A closed system that only spits out numbers, just a clue someone needs attention based on an enormous amount of data sifting and no useful human intuition. Like Father, like Daughter.
He is a closed system. After so long, he doesn't know how to be any other way. He's not sure he has ever known how to fully be a person.
Except with John.
John makes him feel like a person.
John is the exception to absolutely everything. Exceptional at being an outlier, at being unpredictably magnificent. Harold is a world-class genius, and an almost complete failure as a human being, but as a watcher of humans he is unparallelled so he knows, truly knows, John's rarity. John is indomitable, retaining his humanity and warmth and goodness in situations that would have crushed anyone else.
So, if he's ruthlessly honest, the draw of fieldwork for Harold is not the adrenalin or the physicality. It's John. Just John. And today his selfish desire for that human connection almost got his only real friend killed.
It's his fault they were captured. His inability to run and John's refusal to leave him. Eight numbers had come up: eight teen girls connected via the foster care system, preyed upon by a trafficking ring. They had eventually tracked the girls to the docks: locked in a container, they were due to be shipped out the following morning and Harold had panicked and started banging on containers.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Idiot.
He is an idiot.
Men with guns appeared - of course they did - and even John couldn’t kill all of them and so he was pitchforked into his worst nightmare, being forced to watch John surrender to save his foolish life then watch John be tortured for the source of their information.
It was a revoltingly claustrophobic experience. Two sweaty, unwashed masked men in a container, John and Harold tied to opposite chairs, the scent of blood everywhere in the muggy heat. One man was shorter and thickset, the other tall and oddly lopsided, one shoulder higher than the other. Their accents were Russian, their casual brutality betraying experience with violence. Not necessarily with torture though.
“What do you think?” John murmured. “Knots aren't bad but these guys are a bit green.”
“Perhaps an olive branch to smooth things over?”
Baseline established: the safe codes a little obvious but a good check-in.
Then the taller man smashed his fist into John's face once, twice, three times, so fast it was breathtaking, an explosion of violence and noise that slammed through Harold as though the blows had been meant for him. John spat blood, his eyes blank and hostile. “You will give us the source of your information.," the man demanded, raising his bloodied fist, and Harold cracked like an egg.
“The NYPD!” he choked out, improvising.
“Liar!” The taller Russian backhanded him and he tasted blood in his mouth. His? John's? His neck was screaming with the pain of the sudden impact.
John said something soft in Russian that earned him more blows. When the punches stopped, he said it again, with a low laugh, and more violence rained down on him. It was clear to Harold that he was drawing their focus to himself on purpose.
He had heard John hit and shot and stabbed through the earwig; even watched recordings of John resisting interrogation with varying degrees of torture and violence. Before, he had wanted to know what he was getting into… know who he was getting. After, he had felt it was somehow his duty to watch or listen, to bear witness, to be there for this man who was suffering in his name and for his cause. He had thought he could cope with this. But watching it in real time close up where he could potentially influence the outcome was not the same at all. Harold couldn’t walk away, do his breathing exercises and return, couldn’t stare at a picture in the library as a mental break. He had to watch, and this close he saw that John’s impassive face under interrogation was not impassive to him. He could read John’s minute tells. He was angry with himself and worried about Harold and digging in for lengthy self-sacrifice to spare Harold pain and that was the most awful thing. Sitting there wearing John’s blood spray on his glasses and being completely useless and helpless.
When they got their knives out, Harold was begging them to stop within moments, but John started whispering in Russian. When his interrogator leaned in, John smashed him with a head butt. After that, he ended up bathed in his own blood from dozens of gashes, while Harold used all his energy not to break and sob. Eventually, he failed.
It turned out letting their captors know how deeply the two of them were connected was a grave error on Harold's part. They had dismissed Harold, seeing him as neither mastermind nor threat, and focused entirely on John, but when John wouldn’t break they switched tack with devastating effect.
The stocky man untied one of Harold's hands - his left - and forced it out. The other gave John an ultimatum.
“You do not seem to be taking us seriously. So here is what we will do. I will demonstrate on your little friend here the seriousness of your position. I am told there is a game popular among our young people: a truth or a dare. We will play this game, you and I. I desire a truth, but you choose a dare, so I dare you to break one of your friend's little fingers.”
“No.”
“Of course you will say that. But you see, if you do not, then I will break two of them. So, mister no name, which will you choose? One…or two…?”
Behind John’s work mask, the untouched agent, Harold could see the sick horror in his eyes. He doubted those men would realise. It was only that he knew John so well. He had to do something to make John play along to give Shaw, Carter and Fusco time to catch up with the trackers in their clothes.
“If I’d known it was that kind of party, I’d have brought vodka and lime,'' he snarked to John, his voice coming our surprisingly steady. He blessed his own lack of affect, the natural shield it gave him.
“ Lime, really?”
“My preference.”
“You won’t be holding any drinks after this.”
“It's all right.”
“It isn't.” The taller Russian pointed his gun at John.
“Make up your mind.”
“Untie my hands,” John gritted out. Then John was rubbing at his wrists, stalling, gaining them precious seconds.
“Get on with it.” The taller man gestured with the gun.
“I’ll tell you what you want to know,” John said then.
“Yes. Yes you will. But first, this. A little demonstration. A show of respect.”
John slid one hand gently under Harold's and the other Russian let go and stepped back.
“Choose a finger and snap it,” tall and crooked demanded. "He can sit there knowing it's your fault he can't play the piano or whatever and you can rethink your stubbornness." The relish in his voice revealed him as a sadist and Harold, not generally inclined toward violence, would have liked very much to punch his smug mouth, but right then his whole world was John. He was shocked by the tremors in John’s hand. Shocked by how cold his hands were. John’s breathing was wrong. Had they broken his ribs? Punctured a lung?
"If you force me to continue, I am going to kill you both," John said quietly, conversationally, in a tone Harold knows will feature in his nightmares. "Alternatively, you can have the information." John was bluffing. Harold knew his friend would never give up the Machine. Knew, too, that John couldn't risk combat in close quarters in a container with uneven metal sides. It would undoubtedly result in damage or paralysis for Harold. He knew John would have calculated those odds.
"As I said, one or two. Your choice. But not for much longer."
Carefully, Harold pressed down slightly on John's cradling hand with his ring finger. The best option as far as he was concerned, since it gave him a finger either side to strap it to while it healed, while leaving his index free. It would interfere only minimally with his coding.
John was staring at him like a man looking through the gates of hell.
Then John shifted his grip and Harold felt him gathering his strength. He maintained their eye contact.
Steady, John.
His own heart was pounding as John singled out the finger Harold had indicated. It looked stupidly tiny in his big, bloodied hand. He gave John a tiny nod and sucked in a lungful of air, planning to scream as loudly as he could manage in case Shaw and the Detectives were searching the location.
Then the pain was… well, the pain was there and Harold screamed and screamed and screamed until the gun pointed at him with the command to shut up and then he just breathed through the pain as he always did.
Moments later, a frenzy of barking sounded, the door to the container was wrenched open and Bear had the Russian’s gun hand in his mouth. Then John had the gun, then neither Russian had functioning kneecaps.
Their screams were even louder.
+++
For years, John has had symphonies of voices screaming in his head. His own. Innocents’. Others’.
He suspects from now on, there will only be one.
+++
Harold wonders what dark thoughts are swirling in John’s brain. He is sitting on a low wall, watching the ambulance crew talking with Carter, and John is… John is all wrong.
“Looks like you got a problem, glasses,” Fusco drawls laconically.
That obvious, then.
John has come nowhere near Harold since they were both untied. He dropped the gun and raised his hands after shooting the Russians, and Carter, taking in the situation at a glance, had tasked Fusco with dragging them away while she untied Harold and John got himself free. John had given him a searing check over, hollered for medical assistance in a voice Harold had never heard him use, then slipped away to check the perimeter before questioning the Russians. He returned from that with his hands bloodied and Harold decides he does not want to know.
Bear wouldn’t leave his side, despite John attempting to send him to Harold several times. In the end, he made it a sharp order and Bear slunk over, so John’s distress must have been acute. Harold can’t deny the comfort he finds in stroking Bear as the dog drops his heavy head in Harold's lap, but without him John looks painfully alone as Shaw finishes whatever she was talking about with Carter and gets up close and irritating to interrogate him.
“Do we?” he responds absently to Fusco. Conversational filler, making time. Shaw’s body language is jagged. John’s is broken. Oh dear.
Without warning, Shaw slugs John in the jaw. He makes no move to evade and her punch lands full-force. She strikes out again - a body blow. John absorbs it silently, straight on, giving her maximum soft target area. Harold can't even imagine how much effort it must take to override his trained reflexes like that. She squares up again, says something. John doesn't react. She downs him and is winding up for a vicious kick before Harold can fully find his voice.
“Stop!” he manages, struggling up and limping forward.
He can hear his own pain and panic - the opposite of the calm he knows John will need - but it gets through even Shaw's thicker than average filters and she scuffs to a stop.
“He hurt you,” she growls.
“John did exactly what I asked of him. If you need to be angry, be angry with me, Miss Shaw.”
Bear, who has been growling protectively by Harold’s side, now darts to the fallen John, taking a guarding stance and whining uncertainly, his head whipping between Harold, John and Miss Shaw.
“You are stressing Bear. He is not used to his people fighting.”
John has already put a hand up to comfort the confused animal and now Shaw crouches to stroke him too, pointedly ignoring John who lies where he fell, making no effort to get up or make himself less vulnerable to renewed violence. A thin trail of blood meanders down his face. He does not wipe it or even seem to be aware of it.
Harold feels heavy and tired and sad beyond measure.
“Yes, Detective Fusco,” he murmurs. “It seems we do indeed have a problem.”
“Yeah. Wonderboy's broken. What the hell happened in there? I thought he was Mr. Tough Guy.”
“Everyone has their breaking point, Detective. It would appear that harming me in any way is his.”
Fusco pales, his eyes widening.
“Yeah, that'd do it,” he says vehemently. “Hell, that'd definitely do it.”
“What exactly are you implying, Detective?” Harold murmurs over Bear’s barking.
“Oh, come on. Even you can’t be that dense. John's crazy about you. Heart on his sleeve nuts over you. You can't tell me you never figured that out. He lights up at your voice. You can practically see it from space!”
“Detective, I really don’t think you should mistake gratitude for-”
“My God, you really didn’t know. Are you part Machine? I always wondered.”
“That's quite enough.” He’s flustered. Horribly so. It can’t be true, can it?
“Fine, fine. My bad. You need anything else?”
“No thank you.”
“I guess I'll see you around. I hope you, you know, fix this.” He gestures vaguely at John.
“I plan to.”
His finger hurts, raw pain sparking like a live wire, and his whole body aches so much he feels as though too much movement will have him wailing like an infant, but he has an operative to salvage. An operative currently clinging to Bear like the last survivor of a shipwreck.
He approaches John warily.
Then there is a flurry of noise on the police radio. It appears John’s interrogation has borne fruit. They found the girls in a room in a nearby warehouse. Harold speeds up his approach.
“Miss Shaw, I need you and Detective Fusco to accompany Detective Carter to see to those girls please. Then come and watch the outside of the library in case our shadowy friend returns, and John will apprehend the remaining perpetrators of all this.” Miss Shaw shoots him a surprised look, and John a filthy glare, but she goes, Fusco trailing after her.
+++
John is alone with Harold.
That doesn't feel right.
He thought he had taught the reclusive genius a little more self-preservation than that.
Of course, Harold is used to seeing him as his operative, not as a threat.
That will change.
He would quite like to shoot himself in the head about now, but the Numbers are relentless and he has to finish this one before whatever is coming to him happens.
John hasn't cried since Jessica died. He wants to now.
He wishes Harold had just let them beat him to a pulp. It's what he's for and it would hurt so much less than this.