Heath had spent countless hours bent over his desk, pouring over Charles's most recent documents and financial reports to try and get a lead on what could have happened to the man's son. The only thing he'd been told by the man's wife had been that the disgusting lowlife had actually sold their son into the Spades Gang in order to pay off their selfish debt. It's been only a few days since Heath had discovered the man's traitorous wrongdoings, but it still set off his temper in unexpected ways. Just the other day his fist had been sent flying through the wall in a fit of rage over how he'd been stupid enough to trust the man. Hate. It was the only word that could describe how he felt about his superior officer now. Trust had been broken, and now all Heath saw was red.
If he had to be honest with himself, Heath didn't even know why he'd come to this place. Everything he'd learned in Charles's files had pinpointed this as the place that his son had mostly likely ended up — yet rather than alerting the Military to raid the place, he'd decided to come here, alone, instead. There wasn't even any kind of empathy left in his heart for the young man's misfortune. Colton was tied to Charles, the dirty officer, and for some reason Heath was having a hard time distinguishing between the two. The man's wife was just as dirty as he was — although she was just a civilian, so what she chose to do didn't really impact the Military much — which made the Lieutenant wonder if Colton was also in on it all.
Maybe he hadn't even been sold to the gang unwillingly. Maybe he was just as complicit in the gang's crimes as his parents were?
The thought draws Heath's hands into fists at his side, but he quickly releases the anger and shakes his head. It didn't matter. He'd discover the truth soon enough — he wasn't going to be blind to it this time around — but for now, his duty was simply to see if Colton was even there.
Heath draws the hood on his hoodie up over his head, mostly hiding his face so that he wouldn't be instantly recognized. Being higher up in the hierarchy meant that he wasn't doing foot patrols as often as he used to — but that didn't mean there wasn't the possibility that someone in there might recognized him as Military. This wasn't the first time he'd gone undercover in his decades of being in the organization, so there's no hesitation in his step as he heads down the dark alley way to the location he'd learned about. Getting in to the establishment was fairly easy — the gang wasn't lacking in their security, but they were definitely confident enough to assume only those with nefarious intentions knew about one of their dens. That worked just fine for Heath.
The heat from so many bodies packed into a small room was what greeted Heath first, quickly followed by raucous cries of fight onlookers as he got further into the room. Hazel eyes find their way over to the cage that sat in the middle of the room, some kind of fight going on between a man and an Infected — he could tell what it was by the animalistic growls that floated over the spectators' shouts. But Heath wasn't here for such entertainment, and he ignores the fight as he makes his way around the edge of the room, caution in every step now that he's in the belly of the beast.
He doesn't even know where to begin. He glances in the direction of the Staff Only sign at the back of the room, but knows better than to go barging in. This was recon, and his best bet was to not draw attention to himself. Hesitating, Heath decides to sit himself down at a table close to where the back rooms were, his gaze wandering from the restricted area over to the fight to make it look like he was there to watch.
It's there he waits, formulating a plan in his head.
Straddling an upended suitcase of sorts, Colt kicked legs out in front of him. Swinging his feet and letting the heels of his worn out shoes bounce back off of the old leather case. He did this almost rhythmically, one two, one two, like a nervous tick. Inside the back room the loud boisterous shouting was muted, dull and hollow as it filled the room. It was hot. The air humid and thick like you could swim through it and where breathing was difficult, voluntary. The opposite of second nature. He lifted an arm and wiped at his brow with the bend of his elbow. The other hand still holding onto the object of his obsession; a bag of blood.
His fingers kneaded the dark crimson, squishing it from one side of the semi-transparent bag, to the other. He was miles away. At home, secluded in his room, above ground. The very reminder that they were beneath the streets made the room feel even smaller. Colton wasn't claustrophobic, but he thought he could eventually be if he had to stay here for the rest of his life.
They would find him.
His dad would be combing the streets, going door to door, surely; but would he look under them? He would. Between his dad and Heath, his righthand, they'd figure it out. Colt nodded to himself. Trying with every fiber of his being to persuade him and everyone else that lived inside that it were true.
Another door towards his back slammed open and Colton jumped. Dropping the bag of blood and hopping off his improper seat fast. A man that sometimes worked at these events glared, lurching forward like he might take a bite out of Colt himself. "Didn't I tell you to get them riled up? Get off your ass and move it. We need a fresh one, now!""Oh-okay!" Colton moved towards the chute and began yanking on a chain that would lift the barrier so that another Infected could head down the chainlink alley and into the fighting pit.
"No no no! No you go get the dead one out in the cage. You're so fucking stupid." Colt quickly dropped the chain as the barrier hit the concrete floor with a shrilling bang. It made the other man jump, and out of that embarrassment he began shouting again and threw the nearest object, a wrench, at Colton's head. "Sorry, sorry!" Colt ducked, but quickly scrambled out of the back room and ran towards the cage.
The loud rumbling of the crowd threw him off focus as he peered at the man whom had just won the fight against the Infected. He was walking around the cage, brandishing his knife painted in blood and seemed to be enthralled with the roar of the onlookers. "COLTON!" his boss growled from the open door, barely above the crowd, but Colt had heard him with crystal clarity. He quickly stirred to life and entered the cage, grabbing the Infected by the feet and began dragging them as best he could out. The crowd barely seemed to notice, as most were settling bets and making new ones for the next match-up.
Once Colt got the body into the back room he felt a foot land squarely on his lower back, shoving him forward and almost on top of the dead being. "Clean that shit up, if I have to tell you what to do next time you're gonna get more than a wrench thrown at you." --and with that the man released the next Infected into the cage and disappeared further into the back somewhere.
Colt pulled himself to his feet, staring down at the disgustingly mangled body as the blood pooled.
Heath blinks, almost not believing that he was seeing what he was seeing — surely things weren't supposed to work out that quickly? Hell, he knew they didn't normally work out so quickly, and easily too. Yet his eyes weren't deceiving him as he looks back over at the fighting cage just in time to see a young man wander out from a back room attached to the cage and grab the dead Infected — it was Colton Holcombe, he was sure of it. He'd seen the kid just a couple weeks prior, and has known him for almost his entire life, so he would never mistake that face. Even from a distance he could tell that Colton didn't look the same as he normally did. But then again, who would, after being sold off by their very own parent to a gang known for its nasty reputation? It's been a week now, too...
The Lieutenant doesn't immediately react. He simply watches with a critical gaze as Colton struggles with the dead body, dragging it along the floor with a smear of blood in its wake. He observes the door the Infected is brought through, and only once it closes again behind the dead combatant, does Heath push himself away from the table he's at. Slow enough that the chair doesn't make a sound to draw attention to him. Keeping an eye on his surroundings, to make sure that no one was watching him, Heath finally makes his way over to the Staff Only section. There's no guards, which in other circumstances might have been labelled as odd — but the Military officer knew better than anyone that it was done out of arrogance more than anything.
Besides, the Spades had guard dogs just past the door — of the Infected variety. Most people weren't stupid enough to go snooping where they didn't belong. But Heath wasn't about to back down now, and one more cursory look is thrown over his shoulder before he pushes the door open and enters the dimly-lit hallway of the back area.
The man keeps his breathing to a minimum, stealthily making his way down the hallway, pausing long enough to listen at each door to see if he could hear anything. Nope, nothing, nada — he was about ready to head back down the hallway a second time before he suddenly hears a shout from a room at the end, followed by the sound of loud footsteps leaving the room. Whoever it was that had shouted like that had been talking to someone. Heath approaches the door, and quietly turns the handle enough to peer in through the door. Was it stupidity that made him act so rashly, or merely arrogance? Then again, he'd been in the Military long enough, and undercover enough times, to know when a situation seemed safe enough to push the limits. Thankfully, he got lucky.
The figure standing further in the room has his back to the door, but Heath can recognize Colton, even from the back. Hazel eyes carefully take in the room to make sure they were the only ones — ignoring the dead Infected at the younger man's feet, it was inconsequential now — before he enters the room and approaches Colton with quiet footsteps.
Well, shit. Up close and personal, he'd forgotten just how much the young man looked like his old man. For a brief second he's blinded by white hot rage. It boils beneath the surface of his skin, curling his hands into fists and threatens to boil over. He can still feel the betrayal stuck in his throat, a raw betrayal that proved even the hardest working officers could fall to corruption like rats. He scarcely even breathes as he struggles to rein in his temper, a festering wound that demands compensation.
Then suddenly he's calm. The calm before the storm.
"C'mere kid." There's no greeting, no other way of announcing his presence before he suddenly has a hand wrapped around Colton's arm, dragging him out of the room. Heath heads for a room near the opposite end of the hall, closest to the exit should he need to make a quick escape. He hadn't heard any noise coming from the room earlier, so — while still careful to check before opening the door fully — Heath proceeds to open the room and throw Colton inside, before closing the door behind them. It appears to be a storage room. Perfect.
"How's life been treating ya, kid? Surprised to see me?" Heath finally greets the other man with a force grin on his lips.
It was still jarring, no matter the amount of death and disturbing scenes he had been subjected to over the course of the last week. He wasn't quite desensitized, not yet. His eyes loomed over the creature. Limp and lifeless, the blood continued drawing a bigger and bigger circle around it and consequently Colt stepped back when it neared the toe of his shoe. He was drawing a blank. Unsure of what he was suppose to do next. In that absence of purpose, his mind wondered.
It wondered loudly.
It's dead. Is it dead? It's moving. No-no look at the chest. The chest of holes. Look at it I said! Physically Colt snapped his view up to the Infected's neck, just beneath the collarbone. It moves. It breathes. Colton focused further, the blood on the floor now reached his shoes and he didn't notice. Breathing, in. And. Out. The more he looked the more he realized it was right. It was breathing, it wasn't dead, and as soon as it gathered enough strength it would rise and Colton would be on the menu. As the last means of confirmation, Colt kicked the body near it's hip; which made it move naturally from the force but he didn't see it that way.
He jumped, startled as adrenaline shot through his system. Perhaps the next step would have been to vacate the room and lock it behind him, but he didn't get that far. In perfect sequence a hand wrapped around his arm and pulled him along. He almost screamed. Instead the shock and surprise manifesting in a whimper-like grunt.
Colton had been so completely engulfed in his present predicament that he hadn't heard anyone enter the room. Which was a situation that had often happened in his case; when his mind was too loud to let him focus. It took a few moments for him to collect his understanding even now, figuring he was being hauled off by the man that had threatened him previously.
But it wasn't. "Heath? Heath!" He was practically stumbling over his feet trying to keep up with the bigger man, all the while staring up at his much taller frame. He couldn't hardly believe what he was seeing. Perhaps, another hallucination, now toying with his hope.
Having made it to the storage closet and practically tossed in, Colt stopped himself short from running into the shelves of various supplies. He turned quickly, facing Heath. Physically he was shaking, his hands twitched and in order to calm them rubbed his palms against the thigh of his pants. "No-not good." he trembled but soon a grin appeared on his lips.
He was saved.
"Does dad know? He sent you? You're getting me out of here? How? It was the Spades! Right, right they took me out of the market. I just, well I got lost. It doesn't matter, I'm sorry." He was talking so fast and when he realized it he brought his hands up to his temples and pushed, trying to slow down. "We gotta go, we gotta go right now!" He moved towards Heath and consequently the door he stood in front of.
His lips screw themselves into a thin line as Colton suddenly begins shouting his name, clearly out of surprise — but the last thing either of them wanted was a commotion that would draw some Spades gang member over to investigate. Worse yet — he didn't exactly want these thugs to know his name. But thankfully the closet wasn't too far away, and they were both in the room with the door shut before anyone would stumble across them. For a moment after his greeting, Heath's face goes blank of emotion. He watches — observes — the younger man as he stands across the room from him, his body visibly shaking as he nervously wipes his hands against his thighs. His answer comes out as a stutter, and Heath gives a shallow nod to show that he heard and understood.
But it's a struggle for him.
There was still anger crashing around inside him, fouled memories once more boiling to the surface as he looked on a face that looked so much like his father. He's drawn from his thoughts when a grin suddenly appears on Colton's face and he begins speaking, rambling on as he tended to do — the Military man was used to it of course, considering he'd practically seen Colton grow up from a young kid into the man he was now. Heath was used to his... Quirks, and a part of him did feel honest relief at the fact that Colton clearly hadn't been broken in yet. The Lieutenant had no idea what the Spades gang could possibly be doing with them, but he seemed to be relatively in good shape overall.
"Woah, woah, easy there kid! Don't go rushing out and causing a commotion," Heath warns when Colton suddenly finishes his speech and darts forward, proclaiming that they needed to escape right that minute. Hands raise to grasp Colton's shoulders and keep him from running towards the door again, a hold meant to keep the younger man grounded. Hazel eyes flicker back and forth as he takes in Colton's frantic expression, before he lets out a sigh and releases the younger man.
"We can't go just yet. The building is packed — we'd just make a scene," he begins to speak as he wanders away from the door, trusting Colton not to just dart out like a dog released from its leash. Heath wanders over to the shelving unit Colton had nearly been thrown into when they first entered the room, and kicks a crate sitting on the ground away from it. He then proceeds to sit down on the crate — looking it over twice to make sure it would hold his weight first — before fishing a cigarette and lighter out of his coat pocket. It's maybe not the smartest thing to do, considering the smoke could attract unwanted attention, but Heath needed it. His nerves were shot... And it wasn't from the undercover work.
"Sit," he commands curtly, pointing at another crate nearby with his newly-lit cigarette, his other hand shoving the remaining pack and lighter back into his pocket. "Before we go anywhere, we need to talk. Shit... Do you know how difficult it was to track down your sorry ass? Stronghold is a maze, you're lucky I found you at all. Not like your father was any help, either." Heath's expression visibly wrinkles into something of distaste before he covers it up by taking a drag of his cigarette, the lazy trail of smoke drifting up from the tip and slowly filling the small room they sat in. The nicotine rush seems to do him some good, calm his nerves.
"Okay-okay!" he hurriedly whispered when Heath came alive and held his shoulders. His reaction was as mentally restraining as it was physical. The evident disappointment was clear in Colt's eyes when he shortly there after dropped his head and took a step back as he was released. It hadn't occurred to him exactly that he wasn't in the clear just because of Heath's presence. Apart of him, a very large part, assuming that since the man was here, all was well and good again. They couldn't stop him from leaving. The place would be surrounded, surely? Any moment now a squad would burst into the underground hideaway and arrest every last jabberwockie there.
They just had to wait for them.
Right? Right.
Heath's next admission only secured that idea, even though he hadn't exactly said so. Colt heard what he wanted to hear, and sometimes more than that. Often times. Heath moved away from the door, leaving Colt still standing there. As if to appease a need inside of him, he reached out and touched the door briefly with the tips of his fingers. The moment was quick, and done slowly enough that it wouldn't of suggested he was going to ignore Heath's instruction.
Colt turned around, a little startled when he heard the crate squeal quietly into place where Heath had kicked it. It broke his trance. He watched as his dad's good friend lit up a cigarette and almost instantly filled the room with the familiar smell. His father had the same habit, as did many in their particular line of work. For a second Colt had the urge to bring his shirt up over his nose as he had done as a child. Quiet protest and visual evidence of his disdain for the smell, even though it had always done little in the way of masking it. He wouldn't though. He was nothing but elated to see Heath and didn't wish to oppose him in any way.
Quickly he grabbed the pointed-out crate and took a seat, hands coming into his lap and picking at his cuticles. "I'm sorry, I … I didn't know how to get out of here. I was gonna try to get out to the surface but, but I thought they'd find out, they kept me down here, taking care of those... those things." He knew it was his fault. If he had paid more attention he would of realized he was being followed. "Did they... ask... for money?" Lacking the right words, Colton had meant to ask if he had been ransomed. It was really the only reason he could think of that they'd want him, son of a Captain.
"Was dad not going to pay?" It stung to think, but Colton was wise to their families short-comings... not to mention the fact his father was proud. Too proud to negotiate with kidnappers.
Heath watched as Colton appeared to be in some kind of trance with the door, but he doesn't say anything — even if he wonders if the kid was really going to be stupid enough to make a break for it, after he was already told to hold his horses. Thankfully the sound of the crate being moved across the floor draws his attention back to their current situation, and Heath relaxes some knowing he won't have to make a jump to stop Colton. Hazel eyes lazily observe the younger man as he takes a seat on the opposite crate, already fidgeting and playing with his hands.
A trail of apologies begin to leave Colton's lips as he starts to speak. Heath doesn't say anything at first, simply sucks back the nicotine of his cigarette as he listens. Fear. Unease. The kid was never very good at hiding his emotions as he spoke — which was a good thing in this case — but it does provide some semblance of confidence in the Lieutenant that it was very unlikely Charles's son had anything to do with his father's downfall. At least, it certainly sounded like he was convinced that he had been stolen by the Spades and used as some kind of lackey to take care of their fighting dogs. It doesn't completely sweep the negative feelings Heath currently had under the rug, but does bring out a bit of sympathy for Colton.
But the conversation turns to a sour note when Colton stutters and questions if he'd been ransomed — if his father was not willing to pay the price. In a split second the sympathy is gone, once more replaced by a rage at having been betrayed so cruelly.
He can't help it. He laughs.
It's a cold and joyless sound, one created because of a scathing response rather than one of mirth. A deep, dark chuckle that lingers a little too long as he takes another drag of his cigarette, eyes pointedly trained to Colton's face to see the younger man's reaction. It's a humourless thought, that Colton was still holding out hope that his father would be the one to save him. After all Heath had done to try and track him down, and still, he put his father on a pedestal? The nerve.
"Oh they asked for money alright, and your father paid them the asking price," he muses with a wry grin, salt embedded in every word as anger once more sweeps over him.
"You." He points the cigarette in Colton's direction, blunt with his words as he continues to speak. "Clearly you don't know what's been going on under your nose, so let me be blunt about it. Your father? Dirty. He's been funding this gang for years with his addictions, and as soon as they came knockin' at his door for more, he sold ya off like some kind of prized cattle." There's very little sympathy in the way he speaks. Blunt, and to the point. He doesn't see a need for sugarcoating the truth.
"Your mom's been just as much in bed with the Jabberwockies as your dad. Hell, took her long enough to fess up what he did with ya after he got dragged off to the Military compound." He pauses for a moment to take another drag, before he leans forward with his arms supported by his knees, eyes trained to Colton's face as he blows out the smoke.
Laughter fills their small and insignificant storage closet, quiet, but loud all in the same breath. It was a lying type of laughter. The kind that went through the motions of the familiar reaction, but held no signature, no genuine hallmarks. Colton's brows curve in confusion, uncertain of where it came from, or better yet why. There was nothing humorous about his situation, and it didn't seem to come from a nervous tick neither. That wasn't Heath's style anyway. No, there was a sort of … offense to the tone in which he used.
Colt noted this but his mind wandered, as it often did, and settled on an idea that Heath was laughing because of course his father wouldn't pay. The thought was ludicrous, downright laughable. He wouldn't pay because there was a much better plan in the works, the plan that was already unfolding with the obvious situation at hand; that Heath had already found him. So it was a stupid question. Stupid and worthy of a laugh.
That's what he thought of as the chuckle continued, giving him this needed time to meet such a conclusion. He would be wrong, of course, as always. "Then why-" Colt begins to barge into the first statement, further confused now more than ever that his father had paid. He doesn't have to wait long. Heath continues, not missing a beat, and Colt's brows drop further into his eyelids the more he listens.
"What?" he mouths, barely speaking the question out loud. Colt shook his head in disbelief, but he let Heath finish, punctuating with the fact his father had been taken to a compound. At this point he stood abruptly, the crate beneath him squealed some as it's pushed back against the cold concrete under their feet.
"That's... not true!" he begins to shout but quiets to a hissed whisper. Having looked at Heath with admiration, as savior, a hero, up until this very moment, he then glares. Colton wasn't sure how any of this connected to his parents addictions, but it couldn't be correlated.
"Listen, I-I know they've had problems, but that doesn't make them dirty! Come'on Heath, you know my dad. He might of bought from them, but that's not... that's not funding them! Not like that. You've got this all wrong."
He paced the floor in front of Heath, clearly unable to cope with the story that was being fed to him. "You've got it all wrong Heath." In that moment it wasn't comforting to know that the only person he had 'left' was the same person that was accusing his parents of working with the jabberwockies, of selling him to them. TagHeath Langstrum
Posted 08-22-2021, 01:58 PMThis post was last modified: 08-22-2021, 01:59 PM by Colton Holcombe
He doesn't really know what kind of reaction he expects from the younger man. Outrage, fear — betrayal, for sure. Truth be told, Colton always was a rather unpredictable individual, so with his blunt words and rather stoic expression, Heath doesn't know how to prepare himself exactly for what was going to come to light. At first Colton seems surprised by the truth, which makes sense, but whatever he feels from it explodes the moment Colton stands up, shoving the crate backwards with the rapid movement. Heath winces slightly from the noise, but his attention is swiftly returned to the other man when he...
Oh no. No, he better not being doing that!
But damnit, he was. He was defending that son of a bitch.
Whatever reaction Heath was expecting, it certainly wasn't going to be a defense of Charles. Heath's face is lit up only by the tip of his cigarette and the dull light of the closet, his brows starting to tighten as his lips draw into a smooth, concentrated line.
But oh, it gets even worse from there. Not only is Colton starting to ramble now — defending his father and having the nerve to tell Heath he was wrong, even though he was the officer directly responsible for finding out the ex-Captain's dark past — but he then admitted he knew Charles had paid the Spades in the past! Or, at the very list, admitted that he didn't see anything wrong in the dirty money his father had paid to the very gang that made the Security Branch's life hell. He ignores the erratic pacing of the young man, his attention focused instead on that face that looked too much like Charles to be comforting. That face that was denying the truth, telling him he was wrong over and over.
A man like Heath only had so much patience before he would snap, and it didn't take long before he was on his feet as well, the squeal of the crate being pushed backwards masked by the thuds of the man's boots as he took rapid steps towards Colton. Cigarette done and tossed on the ground, he doesn't even linger long enough to extinguish it before he's advancing on the shorter man, a brute force that crowds Colton backwards until he's suddenly pinned up against the door, an angry Lieutenant in front of him.
"No, clearly I don't know your father. Not as well as I thought. I'd always looked up to Charles as someone good, someone respectable, but instead he was down here rolling in the gutter with trash like the Spades," he growls out in a low, dangerous voice. "Yet you have the nerve to fucking stand there and tell me I'm wrong after I had to come all the way down here to save your sorry ass? Do you not get it, Colt? Your father sold you like a piece of meat to save his own hide!" The anger overwhelms him now, boiling over as he suddenly grabs the front of Colton's shirt and shoves him harder against the door.
"How do I know you're not in on it? Hm?" Paranoia. But after having his trust so brutally shattered, being up close and personal with a younger version of Charles was sending Heath even further off the deep end. "Like father, like son, maybe? "
The second squeal of the makeshift crate seating arrangements pierced the small enclosure of the closet and Colton began to consider he may have went too far. Gotten a little... too emotional. He tensed up at the low thuds of each of the steps that were aimed in Colt's direction. Physically his body turned some, pivoting on his feet so that he wasn't exactly 100% facing Heath. Somehow, facing things head-on was not as easy, recoiling into himself was his natural response and Colton didn't disappoint. He was cornered, even if there wasn't a corner to speak of. Having taken steps backwards until there were no more to take, he felt the door's cool interior façade pressed against his back and right shoulder blade.
In that moment he couldn't ever remember making Heath as angry as he was now. Annoyed, sure. That was a possibility of any given day with the youngest Holcombe. But angry? No, not even angry.... furious. This didn't even compare to the time Heath caught him snooping in a file he had dropped off for his father. The file with at least a dozen photo images of a brutal double homicide, clearly not meant for civilian eyes. They had stuck with Colton for weeks, the visuals, and when Charles tore his home office apart looking for the particular file -- had found that Colt had hidden it, misplaced it. There had been anger, but still, nothing like was in front of him now.
"I didn't take it, I didn't. The file." Colt muttered under his breath, in so low a whisper it was impossible to make out what he had said; but it was a clue to what was in his mind. Replaying the shouting and the anger of that moment in their past. He said this to himself as Heath continued with his whiplash of words and corrections. The strings of his response were getting harder and harder to comprehend as sweat began to bead on Colt's forehead. Heath's voice echoed while Colt's mind went elsewhere, and when he looked around, he saw his dad's office; not the storage closet.
"Like a piece of meat" the voice inside of his head repeats Heath, and then images of what he had hoped he had forgotten danced in his mind. The bodies, torn to shreds, blood splattered everywhere like red paint.
It's then Heath grabs his shirt and pushes him harder against the door, gathering his attention, but causing Colt to almost squeal from being startled by the sudden movement. He squirms, tilting his head back into the door and rocking it from one side to the other as his hands come up and over Heath's, trying to get him to let go.
"I didn't kill anyone Heath!" he practically shouts, the past memory superimposing itself over this one and twisting it into something else completely. "You have to believe me!" he looks Heath directly in the eyes, before looking beyond him, at the wall that held shelf after shelf of supplies.
It was moving. Slowly sinking inwards and pushing the crates against the floor. Squeals, Squeals, Squeals. He heard them like nails going down a chalk board. "Please please, we have to leave, please." His hands that had wrapped around Heath's now gripped his shirt, begging and pleading with him to get them out of the room before everything caved in on them.
Heath notices the way Colt curls in on himself, like a defenseless animal trying to protect itself from the wrath of the predator hovering over it. He notices — but doesn't do anything about it. It's not enough to dissuade his fury from being taken out on the younger man, not even when he hears small muttering coming from Colton. Nothing stops Heath from unleashing his wrath on the son of the man who had betrayed him so cruelly. The Lieutenant couldn't shake himself of the thought still that Colton was wrapped up in his father's dirty business, and that for some reason, the young man deserved whatever punishment came his way.
It's not until hands clasp over his own that he finally snaps out of his own head, his eyes refocusing themselves on the fear lingering in Colton's eyes as the young man finally twists around in the Lieutenant's grasp enough to face him head-on. Colton begins to blabber on about something that wasn't even relevant to their current situation — screaming something about not killing anyone.
"Calm down kid, I didn't say you did—" he begins to speak, a bit more control to his voice from just a few seconds earlier. But he's cut off when Colton's fear intensifies, his grip on Heath's hands transferring to his shirt now as he begs the man that they have to leave.
Heath twists his expression into an unfriendly grimace, irritated now by Colton's reaction. But it doesn't take him long before he realizes the younger man isn't exactly looking at him — and then it clicks. Colton had practically grown up with Heath around, which meant that Heath had seen the good, the bad — the ugly. Now that he was thinking straight, no longer wrapped up in his own hell of Charles's treachery, he recognizes the signs Colton's currently exhibiting.
"Oi." A deep, powerful, commanding voice. When that doesn't immediately snap Colton out of his shift from reality, the man does what he deems to be the next best thing — he relaxes his grip on the younger man's shirt just enough to raise a hand and slap Colton across the face. It's not meant to be hard enough to hurt, or to punish the poor kid, but rather done as a means to try and bring in enough pain to draw Colton back from whatever psychotic break he was currently having. It's not the best method by any means, but... Heath does whatever he has to in the heat of the moment.
"Jesus, Colt, when was the last time you took your meds?" he demands, a gruff but slightly softer tone than previously. He doesn't even know if Colton's going to be able to answer him, but the man realizes now what's happening with Colton, and why he's acting so skittish. It didn't surprise him — it's been at least a week since he was kidnapped, and somehow he doubts the bastard Charles had thought of his son's medical condition when selling him off to the Spades.
But that is exactly what he had said. The accusations were bleeding together, intensifying with each breath Colton took under the influence of the stressors he currently faced. No, Heath hadn't said he had killed anyone; he never had, but he had accused him of being dirty -- just like his father. They were two completely different things, but Colt lumped them together in his mind. One was just as worse as the other, and so they were thrown into a mixture of suspected guilt and made Colt fearful of a verdict.
Calming down was out of the question.
The room was collapsing, much like his mental state, and Heath wasn't taking him serious. He struggled, twisting his shoulders and trying to break free of Heath's grasp. The sound that came from the other's lips did little more than confirm to Colton that he wasn't going anywhere. Heath was even more aggravated, which Colt assumed spawned from the trespasses he had apparently incurred. Murder, working with the Spades, it was all the same.
"No, I didn't do it! It wasn't me!-" There was no doubt Colton would have kept pressing his innocence. His voice would have continued raising until he put them both in jeopardy with being detected by the gang. It was then he felt the smack slam against the side of his face, making his gaze turn over Heath's opposite shoulder.
It stings. The warmth of reddening flesh crawls up his cheek and makes him appear as if he's almost blushing. It gives him pause for a moment as he let's go of Heath to bring that hand up to the side of his face and cradles it with a low and disgruntled "Oow.". The light assault broke his train of thought, the voices inside of his head stilling for just a moment from the external stimuli.
He quiets down outwardly, perhaps doing exactly what Heath had wanted, but confusion begins to rapidly repopulate his mind. He recoils, still holding his face as if he had been betrayed. He doesn't look at him nor the walls, but instead closes his eyes and tries to block out everything around him. "What does it matter? It says nothing can help." He drops his hand and opens his eyes for a split second, looking around the room, but squints them closed again like he didn't like what he saw. "Nothings gonna help me, you're not going to help me, we're just going to get flattened in this room. Like a pancake. Like pancakes on a Sunday morning."
It's obvious he's still fighting with something, but he's distinctively more quiet about what frightens him, giving the illusion he has improved. "My face hurts." he muttered in a whisper, as if he weren't talking to Heath at all.
The slap seems to do the trick — a blossoming red that spreads across Colton's face in the wake of the older man's hand. An imprint that is nothing short of assault, but at the very least it seems to drag Colton out of whatever hell his mind was currently stuck in. Heath doesn't react when the younger man touches the angered welt on his face with a mumble of complaint, and when he recoils in on himself, Heath allows him. If anything, he takes a step back to put some space between the two of them again — allowing himself to cool his head and remind himself of his job here. It wasn't like he'd spent an entire week trying to track down Colton, just to assault the poor kid as soon as he got on his nerves.
The Lieutenant's lips twist into a dry sort of grin as the younger man begins to speak again, commenting about how nothing mattered. He didn't answer Heath's question — not directly, at least, but the pessimist way in which he spoke about their current predicament led the man to believe that there was definitely something wrong with Colton again. He'd seen it in the past; he knew what to look for.
This didn't bode well for them indeed, although for different reasons than Colton claimed. Heath didn't know if he'd be able to escape cleanly from a Jabberwockies-infected building with someone that was currently living in a different reality. The last thing he needed was for the kid to blow their cover, and have the gang jump them. Heath narrows his eyes at the thought — no, he couldn't allow that to happen. Revenge was what he sought his entire life, and he wasn't about to throw that out the window for the son of the man that had stabbed him in the back.
"Sorry, alright?" the man grumbles when Colton once again mentions that his face hurts, and the Lieutenant reaches out and puts a hand on the younger man's shoulder, almost as if to comfort him. "But don't think I came all the way down here just for something to do. Your parents wanted you to disappear, do you hear me? It wasn't easy tracking down your lost ass." His tone is grating — aggravated — and he doesn't look at the younger man's face as he speaks. Once more the larger man sighs and moves away, taking a seat back on the crate as he once more lights himself another cigarette, savouring the rush of nicotine.
"Only when Hell freezes over would I let those bastards flatten me," he continues, using Colton's words as he pointed in the direction of the door. "So calm yourself, kid. I'll help ya. But you're useless to the both of us right now in your current state." The gears in his head begin to turn. "I'll help ya... But you're gonna have to do something for me in return. You know, as payment for your rescue." There's a grin on his face now.
His eyes were still closed tightly, as if he were deathly frightened of what surrounded him and Heath inside this storage closet. The heart in his chest drummed rapidly in the confines of his rib cage. The adrenaline and fear, unable to be physically expressed outwards; which was what the slap across his face had stipulated, recoiled itself into a emphasized inhale and exhale pattern. His chest rose and fell with each breath, well on his way to hyperventilating perhaps. His brows curved, almost like he were in pain, but he was trying to focus, hoping to calm down and not bring attention to himself again -- no matter how futile that hope was.
Faintly Colton heard the apology, but it didn't register until he felt Heath's heavy hands on his shoulder. He opened his eyes then, staring at his father's former closest confidante. All around them the walls were getting closer and closer, but Colt forced himself to stare directly at Heath. In a moment of clarity, a fleeting glimpse of clarity, he questioned "Why?". That was the real question wasn't it? Why would his parents, the two people that raised him, supposedly loved him, try to make him disappear? It made more sense to deny that that was the truth than to entertain the very notion that it was true.
When Heath moved away to sit back down on the crate, Colton moved too, looking around the room as if he were puzzled, then neared the wall to his left, pressing his hand to the cold drywall and concrete. He pushed gently, digging his fingertips into the flat surface, before he brought his hand back and looked at the bottom of his hand. It had stopped moving, for now. He didn't understand what had made it stop, but he wouldn't question it.
"What?" Colt turned when Heath spoke again, reading the body cue that was given and the point to the door to look back over at it. He quickly looked back, "Oh." Answering his own question internally he ran his hand through his hair, pausing at the nape of his own neck and squeezing it as if it were some form of self-soothing.
"That's easy for you to say, I'm not like you." he noted, pulling his hand down from his neck. The walls began moving again, but he couldn't see them, he only heard them. Like nails on a chalk board, the walls screeched in the back of his mind against the concrete foundations.
At the idea that Heath would rescue him, Colt looked up, a gleam in his eye. He ignored the walls. "Whatever you want me to do, when we get out of here, I'll do anything Heath. Anything." He was ready to sign up for a life time of debt to just make it to ground level again, away from the jabberwockies, safe and sound in the inner Citadel.
Colton still doesn't seem to be in the best of shape, but after the slap — and consequential apology — he appears to be more grounded, much like when Heath had originally found him earlier on. At least, that's how it appears to the Lieutenant on the outside, and he lets out a small sigh of relief. He doesn't respond to the younger man's question of Why — it was too difficult a question. More than that, it just brought anger back to the forefront for the man once again, and he tempers himself so that the red in his vision slowly bleeds away.
The voice that speaks up at him from the dim lighting of the storage room, that tells Heath the younger man is nothing like him, is once again so painfully close to his old man's voice that Heath has to take a moment to remind himself this wasn't Charlas. That bastard was probably rotting in a Military jail by now, or at the very least, being tortured for information on how deep he'd gotten himself in with the Jabberwockies. Heath doesn't know, doesn't care, and the least Colton knows about it the better as well. Especially with the plan he begins to come up with.
The grin on Heath's face as his plan begins to form in his mind is equally matched by Colton when he realizes the Lieutenant offered to save him — although the younger man's smile is much more innocent than the one currently sported by the Military officer.
"Nah, it's not going to work like that, kid," Heath interrupts Colton's frantic words with a shake of his head, quickly dismissing the idea that he would be owed anything after rescuing the kid.
"You see, you're in too deep right now. I only barely found ya just now, what with the whole place swarming with Jabberwockies. If we try to leave now and you have another..." he trails off, eyes narrowing as he focuses his gaze on Colton's face, "episode while I'm trying to get you out of here, I'm done for. Besides, you're too much of fresh meat to them right now to slip out undetected." He doesn't even realize that the word meat had been a trigger for Colton earlier. But it was true: Colton was new, and shiny, recently given up from a high ranking Military officer. No way would they not notice if he suddenly up and disappeared, and that would make the rescue plan a hell of a lot harder.
"Tell ya what. I'll get you the meds you need, and in return, you'll be doing recon for me. Now that you're in the gang, you can be of some use to me," he continues with a grin, although there is no warmth in his eyes.
Got My Target on You
Posted 08-12-2021, 01:08 PM
