That Maverick With The Dog

by Dan The Man

10. Epilogue: Plausible Deniability

10 - Epilogue: Plausible Deniability

"It's my turn with Ian now."

The words came tumbling out of my mouth as if they weren't even my own. Icy air travelled down my lungs, a cold shiver was running down my back as I stood up and headed back into the office of my boss.

Every day for he last two months, the same six words hammered the same question into my mind:
What had I gotten myself into?
I remembered how less than a hundred days ago, my life was straightforward and easy... Then I just had to break into this damned house.
I wonder how this things would have gone if I just had decided not to break open his bedroom and take a gander at his photo albums. Was it really that difficult to resist?
If I had decided not to answer to... who or whatever came to surprise me as I did just that?

Did I believe it, Helen asked me just now. It wasn't the first time she asked me that, nor would it be the last time. Why was she asking me things I could not answer?

In any case, her words did nothing to prevent my decision. In fact, I think she just gave my the doubts the coup-de-grace.
Almost resolutely, I closed the door behind myself as I found myself in Ian's office.

"Okay," he began.
"It better be important. Because, really, I don't want to talk about this issue anymore today. You should only be happy Fisher chose not to press charges, no thanks to you."

I harrumphed.
"Yes..."
I reached into my inner blazer pocket with a hesitant hand and placed the piece of paper on his desk.

He leaned over and looked at it.
"And what is that supposed to be?"

"It's my..." I stuttered.
"I want to resign."

Ian looked up at me with hatefully squinting eyes.
"Fitz, get back to your desk before I end you..."

He didn't take me seriously... I stood my ground, then I recited the reasons for it as I had practiced them in front of some mirror earlier.
"I mean it. After some self-reflection concerning my actions during the last assignment, and the errors to which it lead, I have come to the conclusion that I am uncapable of carrying out my duty to a degree of professionalism that is considered adequate by this agency."
I wasn't even lying. This was exactly the conclusion I had come to again and again since then.

Ian, however, had other plans.
"Do you know what shit I had to go through to pull you out of the bureaucratic quagmire that you yourself moistened?"

"Yes." I answered and closed my eyes.

"Do you know how deep I had to crawl up the judiciary's arse to ensure that you and your no-good partner came out of this unscathed? The Fisher trial is coming to an end today at 3 pm, and neither your name nor the name of this agency had even once been mentioned. You can thank me that we can all live our lives on as before."

Live our lives on? Who was he kidding?

"And you asshole seriously want to tell me that you still like to resign now, despite all."

"I cannot do this anymore." I tried to explain.
"I have been working here for years already, and, you see, I have always been trying to follow my own logic. But what I saw in Fisher's house that one time..."

"What about it?"

"I..." There came the loss for words again.
"I understand what you're saying, Ian. Don't get me wrong, you are completely right. WHat Helen has been suggesting is ludocrious. It is nonsensical. It is fantastic and highly unprofessional. I agree with you completely. And yet still... the whole body of evidence made me think... there is something very wrong with this after all."

"Didn't I tell you to forget all about it?"

I nodded begrudginly.

"They why the hell didn't you? I told you, this case, Fisher, 'Dashie' or whatever, it's done and dusted. Now I want you to throw away this resignation statement before someone sees it, get back to your desk and wait until I send you next fucking case files."

"I can't do that." I said.
"As much as I wish I could... and I really do... I don't think I can completely accept the result of this investigation. Too many things still haven't made sense.
How else could I have explained it to him?
"Many things have stopped making sense to me now, actually. The rules have changed, Ian, and I can't seem to follow up."

"Forget about it." he repeated roughly.
"You'll never hear of this again. It's over. And if you don't think you have acted completely professional back then, well, tough luck. Just don't fuck up in the future. Don't follow your guts, you idiot, follow your heart."

I nearly choked on my own heavy breath.
"W-what?"

"You heard me." he simply said.

"What do you mean with that? 'Follow your heart'?" I inquired uneasily.

"What?" he asked skeptically.
"Brain. I said, 'follow your brain'. How the hell did you come up with heart?"

Heart... Follow your heart, Anthony. Do what you think is right. I remembered those words from somewhere. Who said that?
Was it me, my own subconscius telling me what I was actually thinking? No, it couldn't be, I couldn't make something like that up if I tried.
I imagined a motherly voice, a mature woman's voice speaking to me, telling me this. Why a woman? Who was she?
The memory came creeping back, syllable for syllable. Then it occurred to me. This woman, this voice... although i had not shed a thought on it ever since that day two months ago. I din't think i had any recollection of her voice left, even during records department session, when I was asked to reconstruct what I heard for the other investigators.
Celestia.
She was the one who told me that. Even though I don't remember exactly when or how.

"Fitz?" Ian beckoned me with an exasperated voice.
"Do you want to talk about anything else, or will you get out already?"

Suddenly, I was thinking about something completely different. Something very urgent. For an instant, I hardly even remembered what I had come here for in the first place, so quickly was another pressing issue dominating my thoughts.
"Ian..." I said and scratched my forehead as I tried to sort my mind out anew.
"There is something really urgent I have to do. It's important."

"Good for you." he answered sarcastically, his joy about me finally leaving was unmistakable.
"Just don't be back before 5, okay?"

I nodded haply and went into reverse, heading for the door.

"Fitz!" I heard Ian shout.
I turned around just in time for him to crumple my resignation and throw it at me.

+++

Through the corridor (Helen was already gone, though I hardly noticed), down the stairs and out onto the parking lot next door.

As I sat in my dark green Sedan and adjusted the rear mirror, I took a second to take a deep, yet straggling, breath of the warm June air. Cars rumbled by on the nearby alley, pigeons skipped from one highrise above my head to the next one, and somewhere far away, a lone airplane was crossing the sky.

And today, Ian said, was the last day of Brian's trial in court? Today was the day in which he would or would not be sentenced. I knew it was all taking place at the District Court right now.

I knew, I had to go there. Though I didn't know why, yet. I just had the urge to speak to Brian again. No idea about what, and no clue why, but I just had to.
Following my heart. Brains and guts were out to lunch.

The District Court was less than ten blocks away, near city centre. The session was public, but it was still a small company. Brian had no friends or family left to attend court and support him. The trial was not highly advertised. No relatives of the victims. No press was there to cover the trial of a suspected terrorist - probably as a result of FIS' inervention - they wanted to hush up this entire scandal as much as possible.
There would only be a dozen people attending, and that included Brian, the judge, the aldermen, the defence counsel and the prosecutor.

I parked before the main entrance, but did not even get the chance to get out.
There was Brian, standing between the marble columns of the court's entrance, shaking the hands of two elderly men with suits and suitcases. A single photographer was fluttering around like a moth, taking pictures here, calling for posing there, and generally anticipating to get back to the editors out of sheer boredom.

It was over. I had missed the trial itself, it had ended sooner than even we had expected.
In any case, Brian had gotten off scot-free, just like we had predicted. There wasn't enough evidence to convict him of any crime really - the judges settled on fining him 8,000 for obstructing police investigations in two cases. And that was that.

Brian himself didn't look too good though. He smiled at the judge and his lawyer, but his smile was weak, uninspired and worn out. He closed his eyes for a few moments every few seconds and began rubbing them. He wore a cheap grey suit with an unsipid beige tie which he got from some warder.
He was free, but he was punished.

I waited in the car until the crowd had scattered a little bit. I immediately spotted Brian rushing away, eager to get back to his own four walls, like a mole trying to get back below the earth. As pathetic and squishy as he looked in that moment, I really had to wonder how I could have ever doubted that he wasn't a terrorist.

He ran out onto the street, trying to hail a taxi.
Yeah, I remembered, he didn't own a car to begin with.
After a few minutes of fruitless waving, he sat down on the bench of a nearby bus stop.
Now that he was alone, I finally summoned the courage to go to him.

He saw me approaching him, and at first, he didn't want to believe it. When he looked in my direction a second time, he looked angered, scared and confused at the same time.
It was just me, the least subtle fed in the world, trailing a subject that had just been acquitted. How insane I must have seemed to him.

Before he could try to get up and quickly walk away from me , I raised my voice.
"Mr Fisher."

I noticed him beginning to breathe erratically, hiding his hands in his pockets.

"Mr Fisher? A word, if you have time."

"What do you want?" he spat.

I needed a second. I looked around awkwardly, trying to seem casual.

"What, do you want to apologise or something?" Brian commented cynically.

Why should I, I thought.
"I was only doing my job." I tried to justify.

"Sure." he uttered and looked away again, trying to ignore me.

What should I have said. Then I suddenly knew it.
Something I should have probably told him much earlier.
"Look, I need to talk to you. I think you might also find it interesting."

He still looked away.

"Also, I can give you a lift, if you like."

(You may want to play this)

Comments

[Mother3Forever]

(Sniff) Oh god...the feels....they hurt....