7: The Inquisition
Robert walked into his work ready to take the worst. He had a mixture of greetings, everything from a few slaps on the back with congratulations, some expression of gladness to see him out of the hospital (he still had his left face bandaged), to a few shifty glances and a parting wave. He made his way to his office, passing Guy’s office on the way. Guy was talking to a few of the other agents; he looked up and saw Robert pass by. The look held a momentary surprise, then back to that hard stare. Robert went into his office and sat down. He started to check his phone messages and email. After a minute or two Guy knocked on his door and came in.
“Robert, what are you doing here?”
The question was not meant to have an answer as Robert looked up at Guy, who stood there, wondering why his orders had been disobeyed.
“I couldn’t take not knowing; I thought I would stop in and check up on things, see what I needed to catch up on.”
“Look Robert, I gave you an order and I expect it to be obeyed. I’ve got enough on my hands right now. I wouldn’t be doing if it wasn’t in your best interest, or if I didn’t have to, but this comes from higher up. If they catch you in here it will only rain down fire on my head. As for catch up, I’ve had to pass off all your work to others, again, orders from up above. You are officially on leave until further notice. Go home this moment and pass the time however you can. You will be having some visits from a doctor to access your mental condition, so be prepared. If you had gone home you would know all this. You are also not supposed to leave your home without calling in; the number is with all the other information we left in your home. You are just going to have to weather this through.”
Robert sat there; taking all this in, how could he have known things were going to be this bad. What was going on?
As if sensing Robert’s confusion Guy sighed, closed the door, and sat down across the desk from him.
“Look Robert, I’m sorry, this isn’t how I wanted things either. I’m trying to keep this all under control, but it is spiraling. I might as well tell you and save you the shock later. We lied to you at the hospital, I was told not to tell you, to let you recover first and to keep things from getting out, but the cop you shot at was indeed hit. No, he’s not dead, thankfully, but you missed hit vest and hit him in the shoulder. If that isn’t bad enough, he is now pressing chargers after receiving extensive surgery and finally having to lose his arm. I’m sorry, this was your biggest case, and without this you would have gotten a promotion, I’m sure of it, but it did happen and we can’t do anything about it except to wait it out. So please, go home, take your mind of off it as best you can and try to rest up.”
Robert’s mind was starting to spin, uncontrolled his eyes started to water. He had never hurt anyone other than his target, and never someone supporting him. To add to that, taking that person’s arm was more than he could take. For all he knew the man may lose his job and have to live off of disability. He would have to change how he lived his life, how he did things. How would his wife react, his family, they too would take part in this challenge. Not to mention his own job was as stake, he certainly couldn’t keep his current position. If he was let go, what would that do to his career? It certainly would be a blemish on his record.
“Robert please, go home.”
Robert nodded, blinking out the tears. Without a word he stood and walked out of his office. He hardly noticed anyone on the way out, but the little he saw were people averting their attention elsewhere. Word spreads fast here. He hardly remembered getting in the car and heading home, he barely remembered opening his door, seeing the folder on the floor with all the information, climbing into bed, and drifting off into a disturbed sleep.
Robert woke up to the phone ringing. He climbed out of bed and answered it. It was a doctor, psychologist, trying to schedule an appointment. For some reason he couldn’t remember why, but he knew he was supposed to, so he set if for tomorrow, better to get it over with. He hung up and then gradually the day’s news came flooding back to him. He sank into the couch and stared at the wall, thinking why this had to happen to him, a mixture of guilt and self-pity sinking in. He tried to think of something else, but couldn’t, he spent the remainder of the day in this state, his spirits as low as they could be, till he finally crawled back into bed and fell into troubled sleep once more.
He woke up in the morning with a bad headache, but he seemed to be over the worse of it, for the moment. He tried to distract himself throughout the morning, making a large breakfast, watching a movie, and thinking of how he would talk to the doctor. He wanted to make sure his stories matched with what he told Guy and Leo, since the doctor must have been provided all the information on the events. He didn’t feel he should let on about Frennur, it would recall too much. Surely the doctor would know of his first event, but he was just going to have to hope he didn’t make too much of a connection.
The doctor arrived after lunch and began by asking Robert how he felt, how he was coping; the usual talk. He told him that he was asked not only to write a report, but to continue with weekly appointments if needed to make sure Robert would not have further repercussions. He had Robert lie down and relive the events, which wasn’t too comforting. Obviously he was more interesting in the seizure and the hallucinations surrounding it. He asked many questions, a few catching Robert slightly of guard, but he was trained to handle these things, so by the end the doctor seemed satisfied with the telling and was finishing writing his notes.
“Well Robert, I do think all this has a direct tie to what happened to you years ago as a child. It is not uncommon to have such long lulls between, though you do seem to face a lot more stress than most people. Having seen your record you seem to be able to grasp your opponent’s intent very well, so you have a sort of connection, not meaning you share the same thought patterns, but that you seem to take a keener interest than most. In so doing you may on occasion stumble on some things that are rather shocking, especially if it comes with disturbing images, such as dead bodies. The connection between your first and second encounter is all too familiar, with such men as, ah, Trent Frennur and this Marson guy.”
“I suppose that makes sense, but what is to be done about it. My goal here is to maintain my occupation.”
“I understand. It is not my job to help you keep your occupation, but to deliver my notes and my concerns and diagnoses. I do think we should set up a weekly meeting if you wish to continue in such a career. Whether that helps you with your job or not, it will help you mentally. You have a lot more to recover from than you think.
“Okay, I will get back in touch with you later; I need to think things through at the moment.”
“Fine, fine, good day to you sir, if you need to talk anything over, or just talk things out, give me a call, here is my card.”
“Thanks, I will.”
With that the doctor left and Robert was left alone again, letting the days go by. It was harder than he dared admit. He couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened, what was going to happen. Every time he got on that train of thought it spiraled out of control and he would fall apart all over again. After five days of trying to waste away the time he started to panic and he kept on wanting to pick up the phone and call Guy, see what was going on. He hadn’t heard anything, he also had not bothered to call the doctor, he didn’t want to talk to him; he just wanted to move on with his life. At this point he would even take bad news, if only to find a way onward. He thought back to the events, trying to wish they happened differently, trying to convince himself he was having a bad dream. He started thinking of his dream; James dead, Frennur approaching him with glee in his eyes, delighted to see the fear in Robert’s own eyes. Why Frennur, what made him always come up.
Robert froze in thought, he still had the files on him at least he could start digging and find out what about Frennur fascinated him so much. He set to work, pulling out
the files, marking the order they were in first, then spreading them out. He started piecing the case together, thinking it through. The pictures were disturbing, but it gave him something to think about, something to do. He started thinking as if the case was still on and it was up to him to solve it. He was reading over Gatchet’s work, getting into his head. After two days of this he had paper spread out all around the house, arranged in different crimes scenes, different investigations. He knew that the case had been solved, but it didn’t make it less intriguing. He studied everything, even the gruesome shots of the victims.
Over the next few days he heard some news that things were still moving forward on his case, the lawsuit had been settled out of court and the FBI was now trying to decide on where to start with Robert. He didn’t care, he had a mission. He was going to figure out his own problem, why he panicked, why Frennur came up so many times. He soon found himself getting bored with other problems; they seemed pale in comparison to what the men tracking Trent had to go through. He found the images bothered him less, found he watching more violent movies when he was taking a break. The breaks became less frequent until all he thought about was the case, along with Marson and all the other cases he had worked on, making connections, drawing parallels, until one morning, when a knock came on the door.