30 Minutes
“Thank you,” Vanessa said, looking away from her son.
Eva smiled at her, and Vanessa closed her eyes. She’d told her midwife that she wanted an epidural. She’d wanted to give birth surrounded by all the comfort she was able to afford. Instead, she’d been kidnapped and had to give birth laying on the concrete of a cell, surrounded by two strangers and a woman who hated her. She’d never put herself through that again, pregnancy had been a nightmare, and her first steps into motherhood weren’t any better. But it didn’t matter now. Her son was here, sleeping on her chest, and he was doing just fine.
Labor and childbirth had taken a toll on her. The pain was still there, but it was nothing like it used to.They’d both meet a doctor soon, and everything would be fine. Vanessa began to wonder why no one had opened that door in front of her yet, but didn’t have the strength to think about it any longer. She was simply too tired.
Once Vanessa was asleep, Karen left her side to go check on Edward. He’d stopped talking to himself some time ago, and no one on the other side had said anything ever since the baby was born. That wasn’t reassuring, and Karen wanted to understand what was going on. He knew about that, and he’d tell her.
“Sir,” she whispered. “Hey, can you hear me ?” she asked, shaking his shoulder.
“Edward !” Eva screamed from her side of the room. Vanessa opened her eyes, the baby stretched his arms, but it worked. Edward was forcing himself to wake up. “Don’t be too nice to him,” Eva told Karen. “If he says he’s fine, treat him like it.”
Karen nodded and turned back to Edward. “She’s angry.”
He smiled.
He wanted to talk, to ask her if she remembered the arguments her and Fleur used to have when they were still a family. How anyone would’ve sworn that their house was hosting a fish market. He used to hate that, the way they were shouting at each other for things that never mattered. Days after it stopped, he’d been ready to give anything to hear them fight about nothing again.
He didn’t say a word. He knew that he had to focus on staying awake, not having meaningless conversations. It wouldn’t be long now, and he wanted his last words to be for his daughter. He’d tell her that he loved her more than anything. For an instant, when Karen took his hand into hers, he opened his eyes and saw Fleur’s face smiling at him.
He smiled back at her, and drifted off again.
***
“I don’t think he chose any random word,” Jessica said, frowning at the keyboard on the wall. “You two know him. Just think.”
Rose was getting tired of thinking. That man was a dangerous psychopath, of course it could’ve been any word that ever existed. He could’ve also smashed random letters on that keyboard and called it a password. “Try ‘I got you XOXO’,” she sighed.
“Sounds about right.”
She took another look at the tests conducted on the door by the bomb squad. She didn’t really understand everything. She wondered how much pressure she could’ve put on that door by herself. Certainly less than Jessica or Matt, since no one had asked her to do anything so far. Her eyes moved away from the documents and landed on the door. And then on Jessica.
She wondered if she would’ve been able to survive the explosion. If Rose asked William, he’d find a way to bring them a protective suit. She was ashamed for even thinking about this, even more when Jessica was the only one who got involved against her will in all this, but Rose was unable to shut that voice inside her head. As much as she was aware of the protocol and the importance her bosses gave to Jessica’s life, many others were on the line. No one was ever truly innocent, except for that baby on the other side of the door. Did he deserve to die so that Jessica Jones could live ? Rose sighed. She’d threatened that child, and now she was using it to justify sacrificing someone in order to save her father. Maybe she should’ve been the one to blow up that door, she thought.
Matt turned towards her. Rose looked up. Her heart skipped a beat. “Can you read minds too ?” she asked. He smiled and briefly shook his head. “Thank God.”
“See ?” Jessica said, punching his shoulder. “She’s thinking about it too. Go get me one of these suits and-”
“Get it yourself,” he stopped her. “And Rose wasn’t-”
“Yeah, I was,” she mumbled. “But I was feeling very bad about it, if that helps.” She looked at the screen next to her, and then at their timer. “27 minutes,” she said. “Say you two run very fast and only need 3 to get back upstairs, it leaves us 20 minutes to figure out that password.”
“So you didn’t take math classes ?” Jessica asked her.
“I’m giving you 4 minutes to argue with me,” Rose calmly replied. “Then I’ll shoot you so you know I’m not joking.”
“And when we’re gone ?”
“I’ll type in a random word, die, but Karen will still be able to grab the baby and take cover somewhere.”
She’d thought this through, Matt thought. Instead of arguing now, he decided to wait until they had no time left. She was, ironically enough, too calm to have a reasonable conversation.
Jessica left her side of the wall and sat next to Rose. “I’ve noticed you people really like your guns,” she said. “Compensating something ?”
“Yeah,” Rose laughed. “If either of you tried to take me down, what’s the only thing that could save me ? He beat the shit out of the strongest regular man I know,” she added, looking at Matt. “I’ve had to go and put a name on people who didn’t care if they were killing. Good or bad, you’re all potentially dangerous to me. I’ve met people that could scare even you. What chance do I have if I don’t have my gun ?”
“Okay,” Jessica sighed. “I was just trying to get you not to shoot me, but sure. That works.”
Rose smiled at her. “You care about staying alive. I’m pretty sure you’ll leave if you have to. It’s not you I’ll have to shoot.”
“But you won’t,” Matt confidently said.
She looked at him. “Refuse to leave when I tell you to, and I guess we’ll find out.”
***
25 minutes.
They’d brought Dex back 11 minutes ago, and no one had come back with an answer yet. Foggy was going insane. Only 25 minutes before Karen died. That, or Matt would stay and force entry on a trapped door, and die.
These people around him had so many protocols programmed into their brains that they didn’t need to communicate anymore. A team had left the building with Dex, brought him inside a van, drove off, and then nothing. No one was talking about what was happening with him. It all seemed like they were all waiting for many people to die.
Without the first thing resembling a plan, Foggy gave up trying to hear something from them and sat next to William. He was hoping for him to say something, but he didn’t even bother looking up.
“Do you have a plan ?” Foggy asked.
“No.”
“Should we make one ?”
“No.”
Foggy punched William’s arm, who finally looked up. He was about to hit him, Foggy knew that much. “You’re gonna let your friend die ?”
“When she dies,” William replied, “I want it to be known that she’s not my friend. I really enjoyed beating her up. Not. My. Friend.”
“Sure,” Foggy scoffed. “I also drive around New York with people who are not my friends.” William arched a brow at him. “Yes, and you’re growing on me.”
“Feeling not mutual.”
Foggy ignored him and leaned forward. “I think we should do something. Talk to him.”
“Poindexter ?” He nodded. “You think you can make a guy willing to blow up babies talk to you.”
“We have to try,” Foggy insisted.
“People are already trying.”
“Not enough.”
William burst out laughing. Foggy had never found him so scary in the little time they’d known each other. “Not enough,” he repeated, trying to calm down. “Do you want to know what they’re doing to him ?”
“I’d rather not,” he replied. “Okay, but hear me out. What if…”
“Yeah ?”
“Shut up, I’m making this up as I go. Okay,” he carefully started again. “I think you care about Rose a little bit.”
“That’s not even her name.”
“But you care, because she’s nice,” Foggy insisted. These people were robots, but he was sure that they’d had a heart at some point.
William sighed. “She forced me to beat the shit out of a blind man.”
“Matt was fine when I found him this morning,” Foggy casually replied. “You, on the other hand…” He stopped. William was glaring at him, and calling to his ego wasn’t the right way to go either. “Please. We have to try and do something.”
William slowly shook his head. “We have protocols.”
“That you’ve already broken a few hundred times.” He held onto his arm. “5 minutes. We’re both going to bury our friends soon. We owe them to at least try.”
William closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
Edward had always been more than a mentor to him. He knew about his whole life, and instead of treating him as a potential threat, he’d shown him another path to follow. The day Edward had arrested his father, he started caring about the poor child left behind. He’d made sure he had a life. That was a debt William would never be able to repay. Everything he’d built for himself, the life he was so proud of, he owed it all to Edward Penquist.
He slammed his hand onto the plastic table between them. “5 minutes,” he said. “And you better get something from him.”
They rushed out of their container. William told a few people about a very urgent bathroom break, then a trip to the medics to another group. It looked like he knew where he was going, and Foggy simply followed him, looking as innocent as he could. They walked around a few barricades, spotted the van they’d put Dex in. William pointed at a few containers in the back and knocked on the one closest to them.
A minute later, the man who’d tried to recruit him earlier slided the metallic door open. “They’re out ?” he asked, looking behind William.
“I want to talk to him.”
The man stepped outside and closed the doors. “You’ve lost your mind, Will. I’m not letting you-”
“I’ll join your team,” William stopped him.
“You’ll just switch sides ?” the man asked. “Just like that ?”
William nodded. “Let us in.”
The man’s eyes finally turned to Foggy, who was now wondering if all of these people were working for the same agency or not. “I can’t let a civilian in.”
“He’ll clean your car.”
“What ?” Foggy asked.
William rolled his eyes at him and turned back to his colleague. “Look, I don’t care what you want. He’ll suck your dick if he has to, but he’s coming in with me.” He took a step forward and brushed some invisible dust away from the man’s uniform. “If Ed dies, I’ll find where you live. How long can you survive without sleep ?”
The man’s eyes widened. He took a step back and pushed the door open. On their way in, Foggy grabbed William’s sleeve. “A bit much ?
William stopped and turned to face him. “Learned that from your good friend Fleur fucking Penquist. Threatening babies, shooting next to pregnant women, that’s her thing. But she’s nice, right ?”
Foggy didn’t reply. Maybe Rose had a dark side to her that he didn’t know of. But her family was being threatened, these were unconventional times. Now that he was himself out of options, he was starting to think that if it all worked, they’d just all confess and try to forget all about it.
He didn’t know how the containers had been arranged, but they walked through at least three of them before reaching Dex. He was sitting behind a curtain, silent as ever. His hand holding it, William stopped and gave Foggy a questioning look. One more chance to leave.
Foggy nodded, and William pushed the curtain out of their way.
***
They only had 19 minutes left, and this was going nowhere. What started as a regular conversation was now completely out of hand.
“It must be about you,” Rose repeated for the tenth time. “He hates you, the whole thing is about you.”
Matt walked past her, shaking his head. “He took both of your parents, went after the flower shop, made you-”
“Only because he thought we were dating.”
“Thought ?”
“Dude,” Jessica sighed. “Not the time.” She turned to Rose. “Try to be nice, we’re trying to save the hostages you sentenced to death. You people have a little file about him, too, right ?” Rose looked down and nodded. “What does it say ?”
“His only known enemies are Wilson Fisk and Daredevil, might extend to Karen Page and the FBI.”
“See ? That’s something.” Jessica pressed a finger on the mic. “Any of you told your kidnapper that Rose- or whatever you want to call her, was working for the FBI ?”
“Jessica ?” Eva asked, clearly confused. “What are you doing here ?”
“Investigating, being a problem… the usual,” she replied. “So, FBI ?”
“He knows she’s not with them,” Vanessa said. “Is the doctor still here ? I’m feeling a little-”
“Bathroom break. Hold on, we’re getting you out soon,” Jessica stopped her. She checked on the camera and frowned. Vanessa was pale, and Eva had to help her to even hold her baby. “She doesn’t look good.”
Rose ignored that and pointed at Matt. “I was right, then. It has to be about you,” she said, for the 11th time.
***
Karen sat next to Edward and shook him up until he opened his eyes. “17 minutes.”
“You have to leave me, now,” he said, his voice ending in another bloody cough. He wasn’t trying to hide it anymore. “I’m proud of you, but you have to go.”
She gently squeezed his hand. “Sir, Ros- Fleur is outside. She’s coming to get you and-”
“No !” he shouted. He immediately groaned and bent over to hold his stomach. “Tell her to leave. It’s an order, leave now.”
Eva went as far as her chains allowed her. She was tired of Edward lying to her, even now that he was dying. “What’s going on, here ?” she asked. “They’re out there, talking about the FBI. Why aren’t they getting us out ? What is Jessica doing here ?”
“I have no idea,” Karen breathed out. “But something is wrong.”
“There are a lot of things in here that are not right,” Eva snapped back.
Edward was trying to say something, and it was maybe what he’d meant when he’d asked Karen to keep some things to herself, but they had less than 20 minutes to live. She looked back at Eva. “There are bombs in this room. And uh…” She glanced at Edward, still holding her hand. “It needs 5 people to turn them off.”
Eva gasped. She looked around their cell. Vanessa had lost a lot of blood and was barely able to keep her eyes open. The baby was less than an hour old. Edward was too stubborn to let himself die for now, but it wouldn’t last. She ended up looking at the chains around her ankles, and then at the pieces of the wall they’d torn down. She’d never be able to reach any of the bombs.
She turned to Karen, and cried. They needed five people, and for some reason no one had been able to get in so far. Five people were in that room, but Karen was all alone. “I’m so sorry,” Eva whispered.
***
William was exhausted like he’d never been before, but this was without the shadow of a doubt the most fun he’d had in a long time. Repeatedly punching Benjamin Poindexter was exactly how he wanted to spend the next 13 minutes of his life.
“Look at him,” he said pointing at Foggy. “He’s out. And I’m sure he means more to your good pal Daredevil than the girl. He’ll get over it eventually. You won’t. How does that make you feel ?”
“Are you sure he’ll get out ?” Dex asked. He closed his eyes when another hit came for his jaw. “How long ?”
Foggy took a step forward, making sure not to cross the safety line William had told him about. There was no line, so he decided to stay out of the two men’s reach. “Why Rose ?” he asked. “Karen, I understand. Vanessa, I understand. But Rose…”
“It’s because they’re dating,” William replied.
“Then he would’ve taken her. But he showed up to her shop before they got together.” Dex looked pretty annoyed with them. The feeling was very much mutual, and Foggy took a few steps back.
Watching someone’s suffering wasn’t pleasant, as awful as they were. He turned his back to them and reminded himself that they had to get answers. Everyone knew that Dex was a deeply disturbed man, but he wouldn’t have gone to such lengths only for Rose not to risk her life. No one was naive enough to think that she’d overpower Matt or Jessica. They’d get her out.
At some point, Foggy thought, Dex had become obsessed with her. Surely it had everything to do with Matt, but he was certain that nothing had happened between them when Dex had come to her for the first time. Foggy had studied the reports Rose had sent her team, and that wasn’t when her shop had been bugged either. He came to her with no other purpose than to meet her. Something didn’t add up, which wasn’t unusual when it came to Rose Parsons.
He walked back to William and stopped him from hitting Dex one more time. He pulled him away and frowned. “When did he come back to New York ?”
“Our first reports are from Fleur,” William replied. “When he deli- Wait, no,” he quickly corrected himself. “We’ve had late paperwork. Back on American soil in July, first report of him in New York mid August.”
“He starts watching Matt, because he’s obsessed with him.”
“Works with Fisk’s wife all along,” William added. “Plans to get revenge on the husband, kills a prison guard.”
“What about that weird homicide in Manhattan ?”
“One of our team was sent to collect him, he killed them all and the woman who lived there,” he said. “Do you mind going somewhere ? How did he get obsessed with a fucking flower shop ?”
Foggy sighed. “Probably watching Matt. He’s been obsessed too, ever since we’ve met her.”
“Creep.”
“Hey, he’s got trust issues,” Foggy defended his friend. “You’d have them if you’d been involved in half the shit we’ve been through.”
“Poor thing,” William said, rolling his eyes. “And then what ? He watches him watching her, and he decides to go after her ? Doesn’t add up, that guy runs on revenge. What-”
Foggy punched William’s cast and ran back to Dex before getting hit. He ignored the imaginary safety line and leaned forward, forcing the prisoner to look at him. “Matt had nothing to do with her death,” he said.
Dex remained quiet, but his arms pulled on his restraints. William punched him again, out of patience. “Why did you take her parents ?” he shouted.
“Hey man,” Foggy calmly said. “He’s insane. He probably hates her for being alive.”
“I’m gonna tell you,” Dex finally said. Foggy turned back to him, waiting for the magic word. “I don’t want to kill her. I’m a better man than they are.”
“That’s it,” Foggy said with a smile. “It’s the-”
He fell backwards, screaming and holding his hands over his eyes. Something got in his eye, and it hurt like nothing before. William rushed to help him, but Dex broke the chair and kicked his face until he was on the ground. He ran away, covered by Foggy’s screams.
***
“Okay, you two better leave,” Jessica calmly said. “I’m making a hole through that door.” She was tired of waiting and doing nothing. There was no way she’d stay there for the next 8 minutes listening to them arguing.
“No !” Matt and Rose shouted at the same time.
“1 more minute,” Rose said. “Except if you want to leave, then I’ll agree to let it happen now.”
Matt faced her and tried to push her towards the exit again. “We are not leaving you here.”
Jessica turned away from the door, already knowing that she’d end up destroying that keyboard that had been mocking her for almost an hour. She looked at the hostages. But as she watched them in utter frustration, she realized that they weren’t in any position to save themselves. They’d wasted so much time arguing without even looking into that room.
“Hey,” she said, loud enough for Matt and Rose to stop arguing. “Come here. Just look. Listen, whatever. Look at them. 5 bombs, right ?” She looked at Rose. “How many of them would be able to do it even if we found that code ?”
Rose frowned. “Karen looks good, and my mother if she didn’t have these chains.”
“They need the three of us to survive,” Matt said.
Jessica nodded. “So either we all leave together because there’s nothing we can do, or we all stay and try something.” She grabbed the timer next to her and gave it to Rose. “6 minutes.”
Rose’s stomach slumped. They’d wasted too much time, and now there wasn’t any left. She looked around her. There wasn’t much, outside of Dex’s DIY supplies. “We could use the metal panels to protect you,” she muttered.
Matt handed her his helmet. “It can take the explosion.”
“I really don’t want to wear that,” Jessica whispered, wincing at the horns. She took it anyway and walked back to her new nemesis, the keyboard on the wall. “What word do we try ? Daredevil ? Fisk ? Superspy flower girl ?”
Dex’s phone rang behind her. She rolled her eyes and picked up. “We’re a little bus-”
“It’s the girl,” William’s voice shouted over many other screams around him.
“Foggy,” Matt whispered, taking a step closer to the phone.
Jessica kept him away from her and pressed her ear against the phone. “What girl ?”
“His girlfriend !”
“Which guy ?”
“Poindexter’s,” he screamed. “It’s in the file, but I’m shit with girl’s names, find out !”
He hung up, and Rose rushed to take Jessica’s place by the wall. She looked at Matt for a second. “Julie, right ?”
He nodded as she was already typing the name in. Right when she was about to press the green key, Jessica grabbed her wrist. “So that’s it ? We’re just trusting him now ?”
“It was about him,” Matt quickly explained. “It’s always about him.”
Jessica let go. Rose held her breath, asked for God’s help, and pressed her finger onto the green button.
Something buzzed under the door, and it opened.
They rushed inside all at once. Rose threw herself at her father’s feet, begging him to open his eyes. Karen jumped into Matt’s arms, all of her questions hanging in the air, while Jessica ran to break Eva’s chains. When the woman stood up on her own and hugged her, she didn’t pull back and simply cleared her throat.
“Hey, superspy,” she called. “I think it’s 4 minutes, now.”
“No time to get them all out,” Matt added.
Rose forced herself to leave her father and ran to the nearest set of charges, doing her best to avoid meeting her mother’s eyes. “Okay,” she said. “Everyone who can stand on their own gets one. Matt, you know where they are, put everyone in position.”
He quickly brought everyone to their spot, all the while listening carefully to Rose’s instructions. She was right, none of it was complicated. A single wire to pull away from the detonator. The only difficulty was the ability of everyone involved to pull at the same time. Once they were all in place, Matt stopped by Rose’s side.
“What if someone is shaking and pulls it out too fast ?” he asked in a whisper.
“We die.”
“Great, then go talk to your mother.”
“Wh-”
“Now,” he firmly said.
Rose sighed and wasted 30 precious seconds going over everyone’s hand placement, until she reached her mother. Matt was right, she was about to kill them all.
“Uh… Mom ?” she asked, the words stuck in her throat. “You have to stop shaking.”
“I can’t,” Eva replied, tears falling down her cheeks. “I’m just very tired, and-”
“I know,” Rose stopped her. “But you’ve done amazing so far. I know Dad is being very ungrateful right now, but you saved his life. You delivered a baby. That was disgusting, but you did it.” She pressed her hand on top of her mother’s and smiled. “Don’t stop now. You’re getting out of here.”
“I’m actually more concerned about trusting a blind dude with colored wires,” Jessica said.
“You begged us to let you blow yourself up,” Matt snapped back at her.
“And I activated the bombs,” Rose finished with a smile. “See ? You’re not the liability, here.” She placed Eva’s hands on top of the correct wire and ran back to her spot by the wall. She took a deep breath and cleared her throat. “I’m gonna count to 3, and then we pull,” she calmly said. “Here’s an example. 1, 2, 3, pull. We pull during the word ‘pull’, alright ? Not after. It has to be-”
“You’re stressing me out,” Jessica stopped her. “I think even the baby understood what you meant.”
“Okay, then. Let’s do this.”
***
“I hope you two understand that your lives are over,” Marianne angrily said, pacing around yet another shipping container. “I’m going to make sure that neither of you ever see the light of day again.”
“So it’s true,” Foggy mumbled, sliding down on his wheelchair. “I’m blind, too.”
William rolled his eyes at him. “No, that’s because you’re high as fuck. It was just a tooth.”
“A tooth that cost us a valuable prisoner,” Marianne shouted. She’d had bad days before, but that was topping every other one. And it wasn’t going to get better. Hostages were about to die, one of them being one of her oldest friends. That was the worst of days, and William was only making it worse.
“I’m not responsible for a collecting squad's inability to collect a prisoner,” he said. “Come on, the guy got shot twice, then some light torturing and a beating, and he still escaped ?”
“Oh, William,” she replied with a smile, on the verge of shooting his face. “I’ve rarely wanted to kill someone more than I want to kill you right now.” She leaned forward and stopped smiling. “And I’ve worked on your father’s case, I guess it runs in the family.”
He looked at her, rage flashing through his eyes. “My father-”
He stopped and looked around the container. They’d been here for a while. He’d called Fleur and then had been dragged to Marianne, and she’d been pissed for some time now. He left his chair, ignored her as she was commanding him to sit back down, and jumped to grab the timer on the table. He held it up in front of him. “48 seconds.”
Marianne ran outside, joining the rest of the teams as they were staring at the building ahead of them. William followed her, but quickly went back to roll Foggy’s wheelchair out as well.
Every member of every team had their eyes on their timers. Foggy’s eyes were covered as he was waiting to be extracted to a hospital, but he would’ve sworn that he felt William’s hand on his shoulder, which William would never admit.
The timers reached the end of their countdowns. People began whispering, but no one made a move towards the building.
“How deep are they ?” Marianne asked.
“We should’ve felt it,” William replied.
His phone rang. William loudly gasped but quickly shoved his hands in his pocket to retrieve it. He didn’t check the number and only picked up, his eyes still watching the front doors of a building that should’ve exploded by now.
“Yeah, it’s-”
“Boom.”
He dropped his phone onto the ground and ran towards the building. That girl would have to die for her awful jokes one day, but it didn’t matter. He heard Marianne calling for the medical teams, everyone hurrying behind him, but he didn’t stop. When he finally reached the hostages, alive, he rushed to Rose and took her in his arms.
“Fuck you,” he whispered.
She laughed. “You wouldn’t like it.” She briefly glanced at the people entering the building and gave him a tap on the back. “You’re hugging me, and it’s making me very uncomfortable.”
“Yeah,” he mumbled, pulling away from her. “It never happened.”
Jessica laid Edward down on a stretcher. Doctors were already taking care of him, checking his vitals and asking an ambulance to meet them here. He was alive, but he wouldn’t be awake for a few days. “You should go,” Rose said, smiling at William. “Go with him, and rest. I’ll join you when I’m done here.”
He didn’t try to argue. Rose kissed her father’s forehead, squeezed his hand, and let him leave to be treated. He’d be fine. Of course he’d lose an arm and most likely a few days of his life being in a coma, but he’d live. He had to.
Next to her, Matt left Vanessa to another medical team. She was barely conscious when they left the cell, but she refused for either Matt or Rose to touch her baby. She allowed Karen to take it however, and no one tried to tell her otherwise. Rose waited to be sure that the baby and his mother were fine before walking away.
Someone stopped by her side to tell her to have her thigh checked. It was still hurting, but she didn’t mind that much anymore. The bleeding had stopped, and she had more important things to do. In the middle of all these people going in and out of the building, running to check on everyone who’d just gotten out, Marianne’s scream to coordinate her teams, Rose allowed herself to breathe. It was over.
She spotted Foggy’s wheelchair. She wondered why his eyes were covered, but that explained the screams behind William’s voice when he’d called them. She stopped by a nurse and pointed at him. “What happened ?”
She slowly shook her head. “I think he’s the guy who figured out the code,” she said. “All I know is that he’s taken a tooth in his eye and we’ve lost the prisoner.”
“Poindexter escaped ?” The nurse nodded. “Shit.”
It wasn’t good. It was even very bad, but Rose didn’t have the strength to give that man another thought. He’d been the only thing she’d thought about all day. She looked around her. There was no escape, he’d probably jumped in the water. He’d been shot, there was no way he’d survive that long.
She walked to Foggy and kneeled next to him. “Hey, it’s me,” she said. “Does it hurt ?”
“They gave me drugs.” He tried to push her, missed, and smiled. “You’re out ! That’s why they’re running around !”
“Yeah, we’re all out,” she laughed. She took his hand. “Foggy, you saved a lot of people today. Thank you.”
“It’s alright,” he scoffed. “I might get superpowers out of it.”
“Please, don’t.” She hugged him, knowing that he’d be fine. They’d kept him here, he’d get his sight back eventually. “Matt and Karen are being checked, they’ll be here soon.”
Before she could leave, he pulled on her sleeve. “You have to tell me. Was I right about you ?”
“I lied a lot.”
“But you’re with the good guys, right ?”
“Yeah,” she scoffed. “I am.”
She stepped aside, leaving room for his friends to join him. They rushed to take him in his arms, Rose briefly told them that he’d be fine, but they weren’t listening anymore. They were all alive, and they needed some time to regroup.
She walked away from them, watching the ambulances driving off one after the other. Rose and Marianne looked at each other for a few seconds. Rose mouthed a small ‘sorry’. Marianne rolled her eyes at her and went back to work. She knew she’d probably get fired for everything. She’d apply to the other branch, but she’d miss all of it. Or she wouldn’t. She was too tired to think about the future now. She wanted to rest, and she wanted to put it all behind her.
Someone put a hand on her shoulder. She turned and smiled at Jessica, who pointed at the last ambulance around them. Rose looked at the medic and their patient and sighed. “What do I even tell her ?”
“I don’t know, maybe how she’s liking her trip to New York so far ?”
Rose burst out laughing. What happened was not the way she’d thought would get her mother to agree with her career. She walked away to join her, and patiently waited for the medics to make their reports. Eva was overall fine. She was dehydrated, underfed and in shock, but she’d get better fast. They put a warm blanket over her shoulder, secured an IV of fluids on her arm, and left after telling Rose that they were waiting for her call to leave.
She sat next to her mother. Both of them remained quiet for a long time, until Rose looked at everything around them and sighed. “I usually have better days.”
“I hope so,” Eva laughed. She took her daughter’s hand and smiled. “How are they all doing ?”
“Everyone’s alive,” Rose replied, squeezing her hand. “Dad’s with William, and-”
“Who’s that ?”
“A guy Dad adopted without telling me,” she scoffed. “But he’s a much better child than his real one, so I’ll let it slide. You really did great there.”
Eva looked around her, and then at the sky, as if looking for something. “What day is it ?” she asked. “Your father wouldn’t tell me.”
“Friday.”
“Oh my,” she gasped. She pointed at something in the distance and smiled. “The last thing I did was talk to him. I should’ve accepted when he asked me to wait for you.” Rose looked at Matt, talking to the medics who took care of Foggy, and nodded. “That man who took us… He said that you two were together.”
“Something like that, yeah.”
“They’re leaving,” Eva said, watching them enter yet another ambulance.
“I know.”
She arched a brow at her daughter. “You’re not going to say goodbye ?” Rose briefly shook her head. “Well, I’m in no position to judge.”
Rose looked away from her friends and smiled. “Right.”
“But he’s very handsome,” Eva said, nudging at her.
“Right ?” Rose replied with a bright smile. “Very cute. It was a nice change.”
“What did I tell you,” Jessica interrupted them. She took a sip from a bottle that surely didn’t belong to any of Rose’s colleagues. “You have to write these things. Dude’s always listening. He doesn’t care about people’s privacy, it’s very annoying,” she finished, waving at Matt as he was closing the ambulance’s doors.
Rose ignored the wave of embarrassment coursing through her as well as the heat in her cheeks and cleared her throat. “You’re still here ?”
“I told you, I don’t have a car.” Jessica jumped inside the ambulance and asked the driver for a quick stop by her place. She helped Eva to a more comfortable seat and looked at Rose before she closed the backdoors. “You’ll try to get me my deal back ?”
Rose nodded and rested her head against a bag full of medical supplies.
Her job in New York was over, and she promised herself that she’d never come back to this city. As the ambulance drove past the barricades, Fleur abandoned Rose Parsons on the docks to rest with the chaos she’d brought into her life.