After the fires before the flood, my sweet baby, I need fresh blood

[47redbirds]

Mike is a number of things. Secretive, oddly retentive about the chore wheel, Brigg's second-in-command, and smart as a whip. He also trusts Billy. Maybe not implicitly, but he does. It's been a while since Billy's first task, and while he still stays by Mike's side for the most part, the crew's beginning to respect him, too. Not just Johnny--Jakes had made a point to shake his hand after a particularly hairy getaway between him and the Chechens.

Mike starts drinking with Billy after a good run. He's damn good at pool and can hold his beer for someone who looks so straight-laced, even with scruff. Boy-band or not, the only personal thing that wound up causing a stir outside what they do is Mike punching someone in The Drop because they were harassing a girl. For a criminal, he's oddly well put together.

It's one o'clock in the morning when Mike texts him. It's nothing but an address to a motel and a room number, but when Mike texts it's mandatory Billy shows up. Another exercise, maybe. Another deal. The whole Graceland group had been very careful with Mike--most of the stuff he was a part in he either never got to actually see the transaction or it was far too minor. Not all the heat is off of him, it seems, but he's trusted. Mike trusts him enough to send him the text. It's the room to the corner, and it's run down and shitty. When Mike opens the door, it looks like he hasn't slept in days despite the fact that Billy was asked to get him out of bed since Paige wasn't there. He's also smoking, which is both disconcerting and never seen before.

There's something else, though, and it's not just his hair pushed back from his face. The white tank top he's wearing is spattered with red liquid, as is his chin. His hands are covered, even the one holding the cigarette while he exhales and lets the other in. It's blood.

Once Mike closes the door, it's immediately apparent why: there's a girl in the bathtub, the tiles covered as someone stabbed her more than a few times, and on the bed a man. What is probably a man judging from the fact that he's naked--his face has been mangled, it seems, by a rather large number of bullets to the face as well as a champagne bottle.

Mike takes another drag of the cigarette.

"Thanks for meeting me here."

Comments

[47redbirds]

Mike knows he shouldn't be helping him. No one helped Mike, not with his first kill, not with his first cleanup. Not even when he saw a man with so much conviction that he blew his brains out, right in front of him. Mike didn't have help. Why should Billy?

...because Billy still has a chance, Mike realizes. Notices it the moment the other starts sobbing. With his free hand, he locks the door from his position an then draws Billy into an actual hug. The most intimate he's ever been with anyone not Paige.

Billy, at his core, isn't tarnished. Not yet. He's bad, and he does bad and immoral things, but he's not corrupt. He's still white, still whole. And now Mike was chipping away, creating a grotesque version of the Billy he once knew. He couldn't even stop himself. It was part of the job.

"When I saw my first dead body," he says slowly, "I was 8 and I didn't really understand what was happening. "

[heroeswork]

It was only when Mike spoke that he realized what was happening. He didn't really hear the words at first. He just connected that it was Mike beside him. Arms around him. And for a split second, thought he knew what would happen next. A knife, maybe. Or those hands going for his throat. Mike was an ice-cold killer and Billy was weak. It was an irrational flash before reason caught up. But it was enough to make him jerk back, out of Mike's embrace. To stare at him, before he calmed down. Mike was still Mike. He wasn't always a ruthless killer.

Billy nodded. Slowly. It wasn't until his third mission that he ever saw a dead body. That must have been devastating to a child. But he couldn't find a way to engage the statement. Billy, who was always so charming and always knew what to say, was stumped on how to carry a conversation.

So he went with something he'd been unable to say earlier. "What I said before, about the blood..." he shook his head. "It's why I drive." No, that wasn't what he wanted to say. But he couldn't seem to piece together the right words.

[47redbirds]

Mike lips his lips, not because he doesn't know what to say but because he's trying to say it. It's not that he was comparing himself to Billy, or wanting his sympathy. One-upping the man's tragic night. Just trying to relate, trying to tell Billy he's not alone. Sometimes when he tries to express himself, though, he hits a brick wall. Can't really find the right words to say.

Information, he can get. He can whittle. He can charm and manipulate if he really wants, but heart to hearts were hard.

He's still holding Billy, strangely intimate, strangely welcoming, the shower running.

"I understand. If I could have gotten anyone else, I wouldn't have." There's a truth to that, too, and Mike is still holding his shoulders. Still trying to word it. To make Billy feel safe.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry. We won't call you in until it's absolutely necessary if it's that bloody. But, Billy..."

No. He can drop that. Ask again later.

"Never mind. Here." And Mike is already carefully undoing the other's shirt.

[heroeswork]

It had been his idea at one point to outright seduce Mike. To not only earn his trust, but a way into the man's bed. But he'd pushed the idea to the back burner. First because of Paige, second because he wasn't entirely sure Mike as interested in men in that way. And those hands on his shirt, Mike's tone, it was all a perfect set up. The sort of situation he could turn into something very useful.

And yet, that was the furthest thing from his mind. Because when he looked down at those hands, all he saw was the blood that had been on them. Drenched in it, like he'd run his hands through the blood on the bed. Carefully, he reached up to urge Mike's hands away, his own hands resting on the man's forearms. Not touching where the blood had been.

"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather be alone right now..." His voice wasn't exactly cold, but it was very much detached. As he started to realize just how little he knew Mike.

Billy prided himself on reading people. Picking up the things people thought they'd hid. And yet in all the time they'd spent together, he hadn't seen even a glimmer of what he'd seen tonight. And if he didn't know Mike, he couldn't do his job. He couldn't stay on task. Not until he got his head on straight.

[47redbirds]

Mike only did the first few buttons--only to make sure the other would actually get out of his shit before the shower, with the state he's in. It would be worrying if he hadn't gone through it himself with the Bello incident.

He looks down a few seconds, gaze on the tile. He's not surprised if he's the last person Billy wants to see now: Mike's the one that ask him to do it. Clean up what he could.

He nods, then, to himself. Presses a hand on the other's chest, over his heart, as if to check it wasn't beating too fast. The other wasn't having a heart attack, but till.

"You going to be okay?" He asks. Still touching him.

[heroeswork]

Billy's heart wasn't racing too terribly, but that hand pressing to his bare chest certainly did the trick. Billy tried to ignore it. It was such a strange gesture to make. He tried to not let the reaction show itself on the surface. But the hand lingered, and Billy swore he could feel the sticky, half dried blood on it. He could even smell it. He couldn't see it, but every other sense told him it was still there.

After a moment, he tried to pull away, still not looking at Mike. But his back was against the door. He didn't have anywhere to move. He brought both hands up to Mike's wrists, trying to keep his grip gently, pushing one way while he shifted the other.

"I will be..." Billy managed to say, leaving the "once you're out of the room" unsaid.

[47redbirds]

"Okay." Mike took a breath, not bothering to hide the worry in his voice or eyes. "Can you--" No. Mike is in no place to ask anything of Billy. He dips his head, trying to be cognizant of the other. Trying to be understanding.

He sounds like a sociopath, even to himself when it comes to that reasoning. Still, it's the truth. He lowers his eyes, finding himself staring down at Billy's chest instead. For some reason, eye contact wasn't working for him.

Guilt?

"If you feel up for it, head upstairs? Second door on the right. I'll leave you alone, but please come see me. Please."

[heroeswork]

That got through to Billy. It was one of the few stumbling blocks of this mission. He hadn't been allowed upstairs. The space reserved for house residents alone. There was no chance of getting even a casual glimpse of what was up there. And now, he was being invited up?

He lifted his head, torn between being afraid of Mike and his own job. This is what he'd been waiting for. But at what cost had it come?

"...upstairs?" he asked, obviously stunned. Wouldn't Briggs strangle him for even setting foot up there? And all of a sudden, he was reminded of what Mike had said earlier. About the Briggs and the bag. Before Mike could reply, Billy shook his head. and lowered his gaze again. "That's not a good idea."

[47redbirds]

"It's fine," Mike assured. "Actually, I really want you to. I'll call ahead and let the house know if you're really worried about it, but everyone knows what you did today. They know you're here to stay."

It's meant to be comforting--meant to be something, and Mike chews at his lip, wondering if it's okay. Wondering if any of this is okay.

"Please, Billy." He's worried about Billy, he really is, and expressing it isn't the easiest thing to do. He takes a small breath. "Just come upstairs. My door will be open. I want to give you your space right now, alright?"

[heroeswork]

Again, Billy shook his head. Not looking at Mike. Not moving from his spot on the floor. He'd been through hell before. Captured by the enemy. Tortured. He had the scars to prove it. But what he imagined might happen...he wasn't sure he was prepared for that. What could possibly pass as an initiation in this group? With what Mike had said to that guy after the bottle ran out...Billy shuddered at the idea.

"Briggs, he..." Billy cleared his throat, dismissing the idea. No, don't even mention it. "I think it'd be best if...if I stayed as I've been. For now." He flicked a glance up at Mike, then back to the floor. This is what the mission had been for. Earning trust. Earning his way upstairs. Into the inner circle. And now that it was offered to him on a silver platter, he couldn't take it.

[47redbirds]

Mike's eyes widened, and he can't help himself. He actually laughs, even if it's a light chuckle. There's no humour. "Briggs? Briggs thinks you're alright. I'm the one that didn't trust you."

It's the truth. Honest to goodness, and Mike tries his best to smile. It's one of his dashing ones, oddly charming and boyish but at the same time handsome. It's also the same smile he gives when he's giving a false sense of assurance.

"Please. If not for you, then for my sake of mind."

[heroeswork]

Billy looked up again. That bright smile he'd once found so endearing seemed almost sinister. A mask hiding the monster he'd found in that hotel room. Did Mike forget what he'd said before? Or was he hoping Billy wouldn't wouldn't bring it up? Neither side seemed appealing. What was Mike hiding? What followed now that he was supposedly trusted?

He couldn't think of an argument that didn't twist his stomach. So he just nodded. Agreeing with no intent to follow up. He just wanted to be alone Truly alone. Maybe after his shower, he'd go out onto the beach. At this hour, it would be empty save for clusters around fires and even those would be scarce now. He could go out on the pier and look up at the stars. Where it was quiet. He could imagine that it was not the Pacific ocean before him, but the Firth of Forth. Where it mingled with the North Sea. Just like when he was a kid. When things made sense.

With that in mind, something to help hold himself together, he moved. Just enough to allow Mike to open the door.

(from Mike)

[heroeswork]

Maybe it's his selfishness again, but Mike feels that stab again. Guilt. He should have kept Billy down. Kept him quiet and just the wheelman.

Briggs and Mike had argued, too, and that image is fresh in his head. Briggs was ready to trust him when Mike was the one who was suspicious. Now? Now he trusts Billy, all right. Just at the cost of fucking him up.

Mike's not sure he likes that cost. So he nods his head, clapping a hand on his shoulder and squeezing. "Go shower," he says softly. "You'll feel better." And with that, he left.

[heroeswork]

Billy flinched at the pat. He tried to hide it, but he was too tense. He let Mike go, giving only another nod. It took him a while to get to his feet. To get rid of his clothes. Repulsed by the fact that he found blood on both the front of the shirt and the cuffs of his pants. Both would end up in the trash before he left the house.

The shower helped him a great deal. At least to clear out the worst of what was in his head. Perhaps if this were the first time he were face with such horrors, he would have taken longer to just be mobile. But once he was able to push away the irrationality caused by so much blood, he was able to think a little clearer. He still didn't trust Mike. The fact that Mike could go from being so incredibly cold to acting like everything was fine really worried Billy. Even in the car, after the house, Mike had seemed completely normal. Well, what Billy had assumed was normal. That warm, friendly Mike that he'd been growing to enjoy spending time with. But which was the real Mike?

He'd let himself get too close, he decided. It was that which finally kept him from going upstairs to Mike's room. He'd taken the lid off that box that he kept his heart in. Exposed it to this strange family. But now it was time to put the lid back on. Feeling at least a little better, he dried himself off and left the bathroom, a towel around his waist. The clothes he'd worn went into the trash and he found the clothes he kept there for his impromptu overnight stays. A teeshirt, beach shorts, sandals. The night was still warm enough he didn't need much else. And so dressed, he went for the front door. He hesitated near the stairs, looking up. This was it. This was what the mission was for. But he didn't trust himself to handle it well. Not when he didn't know what he was getting into. The invitation was there. He could take it up another time.

He walked out of the house, locking the door behind him. He considered just getting back into his car and leaving. But that would mean returning to his team. Explaining what had just happened. He wasn't up for it. So he headed for the beach. The pier. And just walked. Just listened to the soft sound of the waves.

He found his way to the end of the pier. And there he just sat down, legs folded under him, staring out at the black void where night sky and dark ocean met. There were too many lights behind him to make out much in the way of stars. But it was enough to just focus on the roar of the waves beneath him. It allowed him to let his mind drift. To let himself feel whole again. To think of home. To think of times and places where he didn't have to torture people to get close to bad people. Where he could do what was necessary to get the job done and no one got hurt.

Where there was no blood. No Graceland. No Mike.

[47redbirds]

Mike waits. Mike waits so while he waits he makes lists, because he hates waiting and is trying to process what had happened. Goes through what he has to do tomorrow. What he has to follow up on afterwards, who he's going to tell what and who gets the whole story. If he organizes, if he makes lists and keeps his anxious and proactive side away, he can ignore everything.

He knows Billy goes to his room or out when the shower stops, and so he starts making another list. He lists people to replace Billy, in case he dashes, and he immediately stops once he gets to the sixth person.

He's not selfish. Mike's not so selfish he can just replace something he's broken. Billy is more than a thing, or a dispensable pawn. He's more than his assets--Billy is a person. A normal, if criminal, person. One that Mike suddenly vows not to break as much as he's broken himself.

He knocks on Billy's door. There's no answer, so he opens it--the downstairs rooms were never locked on principal--and doesn't find him there. Briggs is home, though, and Mike knocks on his door, softly. Explains the situation, and asks for advice.

"First of all, don't tell Charlie."

"No, I know, I mean Billy."

"First time?"

Mike thought for a moment. "Yeah, but it's more than that. I don't think he trusts me. I don't blame him."

"He doesn't trust you now that you trust him?" Briggs' eyebrow raised. Not judging, just questioning.

"When we do this, do you notice how none of us look shaken?"

"Armor. We've done it longer than him, Mike."

"No, I mean I'd just...turned it off, simple as that, and Billy was so shaken, so completely overwhelmed--"

"--You're wondering you stopped caring."

"I still care," Mike said softly. "Just not as much as I probably could."

"I think you should talk to him, Mike. That probably spooked him more than the blood thing."

And so Mike listened. He listened and he to the beach. It was the only place he could think of Billy to go, really. Sure enough it was the pier. None of the normal places the house hangs out in, he notices, but another spot. Just near the docks.

He makes a point to make his footsteps known, though he doesn't stomp. Mike's main concern is he'll startle the other--he's dressed in jeans and a hoodie a little too large for him instead of the usual dressed-down way he normally spins things. "Billy," He states a good way away. Takes a moment to hold up two beer bottles as he says it behind Billy, far enough he isn't in arms reach in case he scares the other.

[heroeswork]

Billy's calmed down enough that when he hears it, he doesn't flinch. But he also doesn't look up right away. He needed to compose himself. To suppress the urge to tell Mike to just go away. To insist on being alone. Anyone else would have been a comfort. Even Briggs, though Johnny was the one who'd help the most. But it was Mike he needed to figure out. And yet there he was. Billy had chosen this spot because it was hard to see a single person. No one from the house came out here, and he knew for a fact it was impossible to make out the end of the pier in the dark from the house. And yet Mike had found him still.

He just turns back toward the water, leaning both his arms on the rail, folded and resting his chin on them.

"Starting to wonder if you've got me chipped for GPS," he said, managing to sound almost like himself. But there was a faint resignation in his voice.

He didn't ask Mike what he wanted, because he didn't want to talk about it. Any of it. He just needed time to put everything back in the boxes where they belonged. Including his heart. That was perhaps why it had hit him so hard, why that cold monster in the hotel had frightened to his very core. It wasn't that Mike was a monster. Billy had been dealing with monsters on a daily basis for years. It was that he'd let himself open up. And he'd left that box open when everything else exploded. And it had been exposed when he put up that wall. Once he repaired the worst of the damage and got the lid back on that particular box, everything would be okay.

[47redbirds]

"I thought about it," Mike doesn't waste his time in taking a seat next to him. He saw and opportunity and he needed to take it, needed to make damn sure the other's okay. "Turns out GPSes aren't in our budget." It was a weak joke, too, and Mike just hands the beer over to the other.

He opens up his, and doesn't quite visibly squirm but looks slightly squirrly for a moment. Settles on fixing his eyes to the inky blackness, gulping a few sips down right away so he can say something. "You know, since I was little, I've always wanted to be an FBI agent. Always. I think I wrote a letter to them once when I was 8, I was obsessed. You know, like how some kids wanted to be astronauts or ballerinas?"

[heroeswork]

Billy took the beer, but he didn't open it. He didn't even try. He just took it in both hands, lowering it into his lap. Looking at it in the faint light that reached them from the beach. But he wasn't really seeing it.

Those words. The story. Did Mike know the truth? Had Billy's reaction given him away? Was he made? Would someone as involved in this business have reacted different? Taken up that invitation upstairs? He twisted the bottle between his fingers, watching it. Why was Mike telling him this?

"Life leads us to places we never planned," he remarked, still in that same tone. Easier to hold onto that then suddenly act like everything was fine. Until he figured out if Mike knew anything.

[47redbirds]

"No shit," He states softly. Staring at the ocean is easier--Mike doesn't do monologues or reminisces about the past. It's not him. Mike is always thinking ahead, always ready to go.

He's trying, one more time. Trying to connect with Billy, to be what the other needs. He glances over at the other, taking a swig, and as he launches in again his eyes go to the stars.

"I got pretty far, too. The practicals--I aced pretty much everything physical. Written exams? Not a thing. Honours and a full ride through the academy tuition wise because of my academics, but the moment I put a pen to paper every single question suddenly seemed unimportant and completely irrelevant. You want to know why?"

[heroeswork]

All Billy wanted to do was shove that lid back on. Close himself off. Not open up or connect. Not until he knew for certain what it was he was opening himself up to. He was in too deep. He needed to find a way out. But he also needed to find out why Mike was telling him all of this. Was this what he'd been waiting for, or had Mike found him out? A scenario played out in his mind. Some minor detail--a receipt, a note, something small left in the pocket of his pants that identified him. A card with his real name in the pocket of his shirt. No, he wouldn't have been so sloppy. So, why then?

But then Mike posed that question. And Billy, so accustomed to the subtle and social aspects of his job, saw all of the options open up before him. Just as he always did. Seeing social situations the way tacticians saw physical attacks. All of those options leading to other options. A web he could manipulate. It meant he was starting to piece things together. But it wasn't complete. Not knowing the real Mike, he couldn't tell just how far this would go. But there was one that stood out, among the rest. Intuition highlighting to before he even consciously knew why. The praise in the car, the talk in the bathroom. Mike wanted him to confide.

So that's what he did. Or appeared to do. He couldn't voice everything, but he could at least make Mike think he was. He hoped. "I think I saw why," he admitted. "In that hotel."

[47redbirds]

Mike half-smiled, looking almost amused. He could let Billy bite. He was still trying to get something across, trying to tell Billy he wasn't alone without making it seem like a 'yeah, well, pity me, too' contest. This was about Billy and just Billy, even if Mike's using a story from himself.

"And what did you see?" He asks. Wondering if he needs to say anything else. Did Billy get that Mike could just turn his moral compass off when he needed to?

[heroeswork]

A monster, Billy wanted to say. But he was supposed to be a criminal himself in this ruse of his. Maybe not the ruthless, murdering kind. But the sort who did the menial tasks for bad men. The one who got the body from murder to dump site. Even if he neither pulled the trigger or dug the grave.

He was close to assuming what Mike was trying to tell him. It wasn't that he thought the moral compass could be switched off. It was that he assumed it was missing entirely, Mike was just very good at hiding it.

"I saw..." he was still too shaken to come up with a solid lie. So he chose the truth closest to what would pass in this situation. "...a man unlike the one I've come to know." A slow breath and he forced himself to continue. "You know already how good I am at...reading people. But what I saw there, in you...it was something I'd not seen even of a hint of before tonight."

[47redbirds]

Mike exhales and smiles, all soft lines and an almost sort of relief. His shoulders dipped, and for a brief moment it was like whenever the group had a bonfire going, or talked about Charlie's sauce nights.

"Because I couldn't help thinking that in the end, it didn't matter which side you were on. You were going to see and do some fucked up shit. I've heard stories from people--big people, important people-about what officers and the FBI and DEA have done. Most of them, they say it's justified. That all of the stuff they do is bad, there are stories worse than what we did because they wanted to get the bad guy. Because they were the good guys, whatever price they had to pay from murder to torture to god knows what else, it didn't matter. And I just looked at the page of the entrance exam and realized something." He shakes his head, as if it's a charming anecdote about his old dog that died. "I'd rather be on the side that knows they're pieces of shit than the ones pretending theirs smells like shit."

He'd never told anyone that, but he rubs a hand on his stubble, much like he'd done at the hotel room. "It's hard, at first. Petty crime? Driving people for drugs and money? That stuff, that's easy. It's stuff... things and situations like this that there comes a point where you have to shut yourself off. Have to tell yourself that no matter what happens you have to look at yourself in the mirror the next day. You have to look straight into your own eyes and find a way to bury whatever it is you did because otherwise, it's going to eat you alive. And you... Fuck, Jesus Christ. Billy, if there was anyone--anyone else, I wouldn't have done that to you. I wouldn't have, I swear to God."

[heroeswork]

Billy's hands tightened around the bottle, still unopened. Mike was wrong. When bad things were done in the name of good, the thing that made it all worth it was knowing lives were saved. It's not that it's justified, it's just that it's necessary. You don't stop bad people unless you're willing to be on their level. That's why Billy was there. To be on their level and take them down from the inside. He could never do these things if it wasn't to protect innocent people.

But he couldn't say any of that. Nor could he say he'd done similar things in the past. However, he hadn't buried it. Hadn't shoved it away in a dark corner. He brought it into the light and let it go. Any time he saved even one life with his actions, it made it all worth it. It lightened his burden until he was able to release it entirely. But this was too heavy. He couldn't let it go.

"Is that what I saw, then?" He asked, still in that same tone. "Everything you've had to bury to do what you do?"

[47redbirds]

"Just...." He made a waving finger with his hands. "Turn off the part of you that thinks it's wrong. And it gets easier, and easier, and easier.."

Billy was understanding it. Most of it. Mike is halfway through his beer, looking at the moon. Looking at anything but Billy right now. "I'm not sure how to really say this, but having you help out... Part of me knows it was necessary. It's logical, it's planning, it's what anyone else would do. The other part, you're like this eager-eyed kid who wanted to be a cop and saw too much. Started on your way to turning into a really ugly son of a bitch." Into him. He doesn't say that, only shoots the other a slightly nervous smile, eyes watery in the dark.

"I shouldn't have made you do that. Shown you that. I shouldn't have twisted you to make it easier to shut that part of your brain off. I think... I think we need you because of that little switch. Because we're all so fucked up--I'm having problems telling right from wrong and I had no idea I was until today."