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It’s been two weeks since Kepler had gone out on assignment. Two weeks since Kepler had walked out Goddard’s front doors with an “I’ll only be out a few days, Mister Jacobi. Try not to damage anything too badly while I’m away,” tossed over his shoulder. And then he was gone.
And then a few days passed, and he hadn’t come back.
And then a week passed, and he hadn’t come back.
And now two weeks have passed, Kepler was missing, and nobody would tell Jacobi anything.
It’s not like Jacobi could do anything about it. Kepler wouldn’t tell him anything about the mission unless it was to say need to know in that infuriatingly smug tone of his. So, here he sat in his lab, making intricate, deadly explosives in an attempt to occupy his mind and stop the tremor in his hands.
The thing is, this isn’t the first time that Kepler has gone out on a solo mission since Jacobi was recruited. It’s not even the first time since the SI-5 was formed nearly a year ago, although it was still just Kepler and Jacobi.
And if Jacobi had any say in the matter, it was going to stay that way.
But, it was the first solo mission where he hadn’t come back when he said he was going to, and that scared Jacobi. Kepler always came back when he said he was going to. He might be exhausted, bloodied, and a little haunted after the mission, but he still came back.
The one and only time Jacobi had genuinely pressed him on what happened on those missions, Kepler’s eyes went so cold and he wouldn’t even look at Jacobi for days.
So now, instead of trying to figure out what’s going on, Jacobi just makes sure that he’s there for Kepler after those missions in whatever capacity he can be.
Which he can’t do if Kepler doesn’t come home.
He’s startled from his thoughts by the sound of an email coming through on his laptop. That shouldn’t be possible because he disabled all notifications five days ago after every little ding had him rushing over just to be met with some stupid game night alert.
Marcus Cutter <[email protected]>
Subject: Get in my office
Now.
Jacobi threw the bomb he was working on into one of the detonation chambers, sprinting to the elevator as he heard a muffled BOOM sound behind him. He could always make more bombs, but this is what he’d been waiting for, and he wasn’t going to take any chances.
Even with their advanced technology, the elevator ride up to the top floor where Cutter’s office was still took forever. Especially considering that Jacobi’s lab was in one of the subterranean levels of this absurdly huge building. Who even needs this many floors?
Finally, finally, the elevator arrives at the top floor and Jacobi’s skidding through the halls before the doors even finish opening. He blows past the secretary of the week, nobody seems to stick around ever since Rachel Young got promoted, completely ignoring her yelling “Hey! You need an appointment!” as he throws open the door to Cutter’s office.
Marcus Cutter looks up from his laptop, seemingly unbothered by Jacobi barging in, and simply smiles at him. “Ah, Daniel! So glad you could make it! Why don’t you take a seat?”
Jacobi fought the brief urge to grab one of the chairs in front of him and just walk right back out, and, metaphorically, took a seat.
“How are you doing today, Daniel? Make any fun bombs lately? Anythi—” Oh fuck this.
“Is this about Kepler? Are you finally going to tell me where he is and why he isn’t back?”
Cutter’s smile tightened and then stretched even wider, almost like he was readjusting and fixing it in place. Then, he said, “I would appreciate a little more respect from you, Daniel, but yes, this is about Warren. And,” he continued, cutting Jacobi off before he could speak again, “we’re on a bit of a time constraint so I would appreciate it if you didn’t interrupt me again! Are we clear?”
Jacobi’s whole body deflated and he slumped back into his chair. “Yes, sir,” he muttered.
“Good boy!” Those words coated Jacobi like tar, sinking into every crevice and weighing him down, nothing like how those words coming from Kepler made him feel like he could take on anything. Who knows how many showers it was going to take to get those words off of him.
“Now, there is a private, class A, very high-tech Goddard Futuristics jet waiting to take you to Warren’s last known location, which you are going to get on as soon as this meeting is over. On that jet is a case file that you are going to read. That case file contains the details of Warren’s current assignment, and you will not discuss its contents with anyone. Your primary objective is to ensure that the mission has been completed, and then you can worry about trying to get Warren out of whatever pickle he’s gotten himself into.”
Jacobi was only partially listening after the words last known location. He knew that something had gone wrong, now he just had to figure out what it was.
“The deadline for Warren reporting back to me is well past, and I afforded him some leniency but it’s time to wrap things up.”
Wait. What?!
“Sir,” Jacobi paused, choosing his next words carefully because an angered Cutter was a murderous Cutter, and Jacobi wanted to live long enough to get Kepler back. “How long has it been since you’ve last heard from the major?”
Alright, that was good. If anything, this could just be him gathering information for the retrieval aspect of the mission.
Cutter flashed Jacobi a look that sang I know what you’re doing~ but answered him anyway. “One week and four days. The last time he contacted me was at 0800 hours on the third day of his assignment and I haven’t heard from him since.”
One week and four days. Cutter had waited one week and four days before doing anything about Kepler’s disappearance!?
Instead of saying any of that out loud, he took a couple of calming breaths before nodding at Cutter. Because, contrary to popular belief, Jacobi doesn’t actually have a death wish. Not at the hands of Mr. Cutter, at least.
“Alrighty then. I don’t care what you do or how far you have to go to complete this assignment, you will have it completed.” A twinkle entered Cutter’s eye, and Jacobi braced himself for whatever creative threat that was about to be thrown at him. “If you don’t get it done, I will personally drag you and Warren back here myself, make him watch as I very slowly cut you open, and then, when you’ve died an incredibly painful death, I will put a bullet right through that pretty little head of his! Am… I… Clear?”
Jacobi was honestly just proud of himself for not passing out, and was doubly proud that his voice didn’t shake when he said, “Crystal, sir. I won’t let you down.”
Cutter clapped excitedly, all traces of the man who had just threatened him with a drawn-out, excruciating death fading back under the surface. “I’m glad to hear it! Now, if you don’t have any more questions for me, you’re free to go.”
Jacobi was out of that room in one second flat.
*
When Jacobi gets on the jet, there’s a shiny black case file lying inconspicuously on one of the jet seats, which he then picks up and sits in a completely different seat. If the file was there, that’s probably where Cutter intended for Jacobi to sit, and Jacobi took some small amount of comfort in sticking it to Cutter, even in such an insignificant way like this.
He felt the weight of the file in his hands, marveling at the fact that something so tiny could hold all, or at least most, of the answers he hadn’t been allowed to have for the past two weeks. As the jet began to take off, he flipped open the file and started reading.
Then he read it again.
And again.
After the fourth time, he gently closed the case file and took a couple of deep breaths. He wouldn’t put it past Cutter to be watching him through the security cameras he was sure were hidden around here somewhere. Then, he flipped it back open and read it one more time. It wasn’t even particularly long, but it went like this:
Target: Felix Solace
Affiliation(s): Former Goddard Futuristics employee, ties to Hyperbotic Systems
Offense: Leaked highly classified blueprints of current projects to competitor (Hyperbotic Systems)
Resolution: Elimination of immediate family, slow capture, execution
Additional Information:
Wife (34) - Amelia Solace
Daughter (11) - Delilah Solace
Son (8) - Michael Solace
Daughter (3) - Olivia Solace
After that was a set of coordinates which was likely the location of where Felix Solace had stashed his family and a picture. The picture seemed to be recent based on the ages of the kids. Felix and Amelia sat on a blanket laid on a field, two of the kids, who Jacobi guessed were Delilah and Michael, had their arms wrapped around their parents from behind, and Olivia was clinging onto her mother’s arm off to the side. They all looked so happy.
And they’re probably dead, a voice whispered in his ear.
As much as Jacobi didn’t want to admit it, if Cutter had put Kepler on this mission, that was the only option. Kepler didn’t fail mission objectives, not even ones like these.
Seeing the word resolution made his blood boil. Like it was a perfectly reasonable course of action to kill a man’s innocent family, his kids, for his own mistakes. It was a stupid fucking mistake don’t get him wrong, people didn’t betray Marcus Cutter and just get away with it, but this… This was all of Goddard’s problems wrapped up neat in a bloody little bow, never to be thought of again after the deed was done.
God, no wonder Kepler looks so awful after coming back from a solo mission if they’re all like this. It makes sense that Cutter would send his best agent to do his dirtiest work, but killing innocent kids? Not even Kepler could remove himself from something like that.
Oh. Oh shit.
All of the times that Kepler refused to talk about these missions came rushing back. The coldness, the defensiveness, the complete and utter avoidance of anything to do with it all made sense now. Jacobi wouldn’t be surprised if it was Kepler’s way of protecting him from the darker side of their already morally ambiguous (read: abhorrent) work.
Fucking moron. He should’ve known that Jacobi would’ve helped. He would have tried to share the load, do the whole goddamn thing himself if he had to, if it would lift even an ounce of the burden off of Kepler’s shoulders.
He didn’t have to be alone. Jacobi was right here.
He then caught a glimpse of another piece of paper sticking out behind the original mission. All it read was,
Retrieve Warren Kepler. No matter the cost.
“Mister Jacobi! How are you enjoying the flight so far?”
Jacobi would deny until his dying day that he screamed. If very aggressively pressed, the most he would say was that he let out a yelp. Not a scream.
“Oh! Oh dear! Are you okay there, Mister Jacobi? I didn’t mean to scare you!” Jacobi was certain that there weren’t any other people on the flight, which could only mean, “I’m Enlil. I’ll be your pilot for this trip! Or I guess you could say that I’ll be your autopilot. Ha!”
Of course. Jacobi had been given one of Goddard’s best jets, of course there would be an AI running it, it only made sense. Best not to upset the thing controlling the giant flying metal death trap he was in though.
“Enlil’s a cool name. Like the Mesopotamian god, right? ‘Lord of Air’ and all that?” So what if Jacobi had sat in on a couple of mythology classes while he was still at university? He was still cool!
“Yes, exactly! I mean, it makes sense right? Considering I’m a jet and all that.” Well, he couldn’t argue with the truth.
“Soooooo. Enlil. What’s up?” If he remembered correctly, Goddard AIs only spoke up when it was in their programming to do so, and on one of Goddard’s top jets, presumably one Cutter flew frequently on, the AIs probably weren’t programmed for fun little chats. Even if this one seemed to have a bit of attitude to it. Ergo, something was up.
“Oh! Right! Mister Cutter wanted me to show you this video that he received this morning after you finished reading the mission file. If you would direct your attention to the screen to your left, the recording will begin in just a moment!”
Jacobi did indeed direct his attention to the screen to his left, and when it switched on, the case file dropped to the ground as any blood he had completely drained from his face. His nails dug into his palms so aggressively that he felt the skin split as the face of Warren Kepler appeared in front of him.
Only, it wasn’t really his face. The face on the screen was more bruise than skin, there was blood, new and old, seeping from multiple cuts, one eye was fully swelled shut and the other wasn’t far behind, and his nose was definitely broken. The only part of his face that seemed relatively unharmed was his mouth, and even then he was sporting a split lip. Clearly, these people knew what they were doing and they wanted Kepler to talk.
For now, at least.
“Mister Jacobi?” He didn’t even blink when the voice sounded through the speakers this time.
“Yes, Enlil?”
“Would you like me to play the video?”
“Yes, Enlil.”
The video begins with a few seconds of silence, Warren Kepler being the only one in the frame. He’s badly beaten and there’s a bit of chain tying him to the chair before the rest disappears off-screen. The room is stark white, lit by fluorescent lighting to an almost blinding degree. Then, a figure dressed in all black walks into the frame, and since the camera is centered on Kepler’s face, the face of this figure is off-screen. They position themself behind Kepler, gently laying their hands on his shoulders and drumming their fingers lightly. Kepler does nothing that indicates that he’s registered the presence, simply stares directly at the camera with the eye that’s still open.
“So,” the voice begins, “we’ve run into a bit of a conundrum.” Their voice is being run through some sort of modifier, so no information can be drawn from it. Kepler’s lips twitch upwards at the word ‘conundrum’ before flattening themselves back out. He seems almost smug for the brief moment he seems anything at all.
“Your little pet here killed the family of a… let’s say a colleague of mine. We managed to snag him before he escaped. Slippery little thing.” The ruffle to Kepler’s hair earns them nothing, and the motion back down to his shoulders has a disappointed flow to it. “We have a little inkling that he might’ve been sent from our friends over at Goddard Futuristics, but we haven’t managed to get a peep out of him in over a week. I must say that I’m impressed, you definitely found yourself a stubborn one”
Their fingers trailed along Kepler’s shoulders, down along his collarbones, and back up, coming to rest with a loose grip on his neck. “Fortunately, I’m not in the business of giving up, so I have a proposition for you since our little friend here has decided that we aren’t worth his breath.”
Suddenly, their grip tightened, and Kepler’s face tensed noticeably. “If I do not hear back from you with an offer within three days, I will make sure that he won’t even be able to scream as he dies.” They waited a few more moments before releasing their hands from around Kepler’s throat and he’s thrown into a hacking cough, fighting to get oxygen back into his lungs.
“Have anything to say to the camera, pet?” Kepler looks at the camera, he never really looked away, and bares his bloodstained teeth, looking to all the world like a predator trapped in a cage, ready to strike. “Ah, it was worth a shot.”
They walk around Kepler, coming to a stop before the camera and completely obscuring its view of him. “Remember,” they sing-song, “three days.”
And the video cuts to black.
The silence in the jet feels much heavier than it did just a few moments ago and Jacobi feels compelled to break the silence. “Enlil?”
Enlil responds immediately, voice as chipper as it was before. “Yes, Mister Jacobi?”
“When did you say Cutter got this video?”
“This morning! At about 0600 hours!”
This morning. Right. Best case scenario was that now Jacobi had two more days to find Kepler and get him out of wherever he was. Also, why the fuck did Cutter want him to ‘complete the assignment’ if he already knew that Kepler had eliminated his targets? That guy is a whole other level of deranged.
“And how much longer until we land?”
“About two hours and forty-three minutes!”
“Thank you, Enlil.”
“Anytime! Let me know if you need something!”
Two hours and forty-three minutes, huh? Well, it’s time Jacobi got to work. He has a commanding officer to save.
*
After getting off the jet, it took off, leaving Jacobi with a code that would call the jet back when he was ready to leave. He was told that it would take about thirty minutes after sending the message for the jet to arrive, so he would have to try to time it well.
Thankfully, he’d been dropped off nearly on top of the coordinates for the Solace’s last known location, so he figured that that would probably be a good place to start.
Jacobi pushed open the door to the house, expecting mass destruction, signs of a fight, maybe even some bloodstains here or there. He was met with what might’ve been the cleanest house he’d ever been in in his life. He could literally see his reflection on the floor. There wasn’t even any dust on the tables or counters, which meant that this place had been cleaned recently. Almost like…
Aha! He spotted a piece of paper on an otherwise pristine table and almost instinctively scooped it up before pausing and slipping on some gloves. He wasn’t going to be taking any chances with these guys, for all he knew this paper could be laced with all sorts of nasty shit. A quick skim revealed just four words: Come and get him, followed by another set of coordinates.
Jacobi was getting sick and tired of all these coordinates. Who the hell did he look like? Google maps?!
One final sweep of the house revealed nothing. Everything was sparkling clean and perfectly aligned. It looked more like an Ikea ad than a house, which meant that a damn good cleaning crew came in to tidy up after Kepler and to leave that note for whoever came after him.
Unfortunately, this meant that Jacobi was walking face-first into a trap set for him by some very powerful people.
Fortunately, he was Daniel fucking Jacobi, and they had no idea who they were dealing with.
*
After some digging, and a shitty night’s sleep, Jacobi managed to find his way to a decrepit warehouse in the middle of fucking nowhere which also happened to be sitting right on the coordinates he was given. First of all: what a cliche. He was honestly disappointed in the lack of creativity here. Second of all: Jacobi was kind of unnerved by the size of the warehouse. It was just… normal. It wasn’t this huge, sprawling labyrinth that Jacobi had been expecting. By all accounts, it should be relatively easy to find Kepler in there.
That’s why he was worried.
These kinds of missions were never as easy as they seemed, there was always a catch.
Even so, Jacobi didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. Kepler was in there, and he was hurt. Badly. And that wasn’t going to be enough to save him if Jacobi didn’t make it on time.
Luckily for him, that jet had been stocked with everything he needed for a dangerous extraction mission and then some. He was equipped with some of Goddard’s best firearms, a few neat gadgets (that he wasn’t exactly sure how to work but how hard could it be?), and a high-tech, somehow lightweight bulletproof vest with a matching helmet. He really hoped that they worked.
But the best thing that they’d left for him, and what had taken up the rest of his time on that jet, were the materials to build a series of interconnected bombs. Small, but very mighty. Definitely mighty enough to bring that warehouse to the ground, and burn it to ashes for good measure.
Finally, after carefully scoping out the warehouse, gathering as much information as he could, checking, double-checking, and triple-checking his guns and his bombs, and then checking them one more time for good measure, the sun set.
He made his way to the warehouse slowly, taking note of where he stepped, of any potential dangers, but there was nothing. Not wanting to let his guard down, he slipped around the back, to a window that was very conveniently cracked open, and rose juuuust enough to peek inside.
Empty.
The warehouse was one big empty room with a whole lotta nothing in it. Well, that’s just great then, isn’t it.
“Welp, might as well test out some of my new toys,” Jacobi muttered to himself. He didn’t like how quiet things had been. Ironically, he was about to change that.
He took out his hearing aids and put in some fancy noise-canceling, ear-protecting plugs. Then, he took out an object the size of a golf ball, flicked the switch, and tossed it in the building. Hopefully, it would emit a soundwave at a precise frequency that would knock out anyone hiding in there.
After counting to fifteen (was it fifteen? He really should’ve read those instructions better), he put his hearing aids back in, and hauled himself through the window, landing silently on his feet. He didn’t see anything from where he was standing but that didn’t mean that there was nothing there, so he unholstered one of his guns, silencer already equipped, switched the safety off, and moved toward the device in the center of the room.
He got there without any trouble and scooped it up, there could be no trace of his being here outside the complete (and definitely accidental) obliteration of this place.
The next step was to do a full sweep of the interior, now that he was actually inside the warehouse, he could see that there were a few crates lying around. He looked inside every single one, finding nothing, until the last one.
When Jacobi lifted the lid of that final crate, he found the unconscious body of a sharpshooter slumped over, some kind of rifle that Jacobi’d never seen before resting in his hands.
Jacobi shot him in the skull at point-blank range without hesitation.
As the body recoiled from the impact, Jacobi heard an odd creaking noise that shouldn’t be coming from something made of wood. It was the sound of a sheet of metal groaning under a shifting weight.
Jacobi, after reholstering his gun, grabbed the man by the arms and heaved him out of the crate. He also stuffed the rifle in his bag because he had a feeling that, if he’d never seen anything like it before, it was probably something that Goddard would want to take a look at.
Looking down at the bottom of the crate, he found that the bottom had been completely removed, and that the crate had been strategically placed over a metal trapdoor in the floor.
Huh. Well, I guess that explains the stupid empty warehouse.
When he pulled on the handle, it opened smoothly, they probably weren’t expecting him to get this far.
Jokes on them, thought Jacobi, I’m about to get a whole lot further. And then everyone died explodey ever after. The end.
*
The trapdoor led him into a plain white room, similar to the one he had seen in the video on the jet. Of course, he wasn’t anywhere near lucky enough to find Kepler here. What he did find though, was a small camera situated in a corner of the room, red light blinking. He gave it his sharpest grin and acquainted it with both of his middle fingers before slipping out into the hallway.
There were two people walking towards him, probably scientists judging by their lab coats and clipboards. They were talking excitedly to each other until one caught sight of him. Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open but no sound came out before Jacobi shot her in the head. The other woman didn’t even have the chance to scream before she met the same fate.
He couldn’t hesitate. Not now. Not when it was Kepler’s life on the line.
So, he kept moving. He chose to head in the direction that the scientists had come from and hoped that it was the right decision, leaving bombs at precise intervals for the big finale. Every time he came across someone, he killed them before they could even fully register his presence.
He turned a corner and was met with four people who already had their guns raised. Finally, a challenge. Because that was a better thought than finally, people who are fighting back so I can kill them with a clean conscience. When they shot at him, he dove towards them instead of away, catching a couple of bullets in his vest that were sure to bruise, but that he could barely feel over the rushing of the blood in his veins.
The man in front hadn’t been expecting it, and stumbled back just enough for Jacobi to get inside his guard and slit his throat with the knife he’d slipped up his sleeve. While he was choking on his own blood, Jacobi pushed him into the other three in order to stall the next barrage of bullets. It mostly worked, but Jacobi could feel the tell-tale burning of a graze on his arm.
He made quick work of the other three, diving low and slicing the Achilles tendons of one just to pop back up and send a bullet flying straight through the eye of another who couldn’t move out of the way in time due to the grip his fallen companion had on one of his legs.
Jacobi managed to kick the incapacitated man’s gun out of reach before being tackled at the knees by the final agent. Thanks to his extra time in the sparring ring with Kepler, he quickly managed to roll them around, situating himself on top, and drive his knife through the back of the man’s neck, severing the spinal cord and watching him fall to the floor, lifeless.
He stood, looking down the hall at the man who was trying to drag himself away. He hadn’t even had the forethought to grab his gun, which meant that Jacobi could walk over to him with no fuss. He wedged a foot under his stomach, flipping him over and pointing his gun directly between his eyes.
“Now,” Jacobi said calmly, “why don’t you tell me where my commanding officer is?”
Immediately, the man started babbling, “Please don’t kill me! I’ll tell you! I’ll tell you I swear!” God, what kind of agent was this? Jacobi would’ve taken his secrets to the grave in his position. This man had no sense of loyalty, which, he supposed, worked out well for Jacobi.
Still, he sneered down at him, dramatically wiping his knife on his pants before sheathing it and slowly lowering himself to the floor. He let the barrel of the gun touch down on the man’s forehead, trailing it down his face and using it to tilt his trembling chin upwards. Jacobi bared his teeth and the man let out a choked sob, “Well? Where. Is. He?”
“They’reholdinghiminobservation,” he rushed out.
Jacobi let out a slow breath and said, “One more time, but slower. And with directions if you wouldn’t mind. Then, I might let you go.” He channeled as much of his inner Kepler as he could, pleased when the man went even more pale and tears started leaking out of his eyes.
“Observation! They’re holding him in the observation room! Keep going down this hallway until the end, it’s the last room on the left. Now, please.” He was begging now, hands clasped in front of him like Jacobi was a diety that would offer him mercy if only he pleaded enough.
“Thank you for your cooperation.” Jacobi stood and took two steps away before spinning on his heel and shooting the man dead where he lay. “Unfortunately, I’m not feeling particularly merciful at the moment, and Kepler doesn’t like it when I leave witnesses.”
His eyes caught the blinking red of a security camera and blew it a kiss, twirling the gun and offering a wink before following the instructions that the man gave him, leaving another bomb among the bodies as he left.
Jacobi only ran into one more person before he got to that final room. They took one look at him, stained red and grinning like a madman, and made it an impressive two whole steps before they hit the floor, blood pooling around them.
He twisted the door handle and found it to be locked. Good, he thought, I was hoping that I’d get to use this. He stuck one of his in-case-of-emergency bombs on the door handle, took a few steps back, and set it off. The door blew open with a BANG, and Jacobi stepped through the smoke into the other room.
There, as expected, sat Kepler. While Jacobi already knew that his face had been badly injured, it hadn’t prepared him for the reality that the rest of his would have received the same treatment. Where there weren’t gashes in his clothing, there were holes burned through or blood stiffening the fabric as it dried.
After the initial flash of—not fear, it couldn’t have been fear—something passed across his face at the sight of Jacobi, his expression settled into a distinctly unimpressed stare. He even went so far as to raise an eyebrow, something which clearly pained him, in order to really drive home the whole I do not care for your dramatic entrance, Mister Jacobi look.
Jacobi felt as though he had earned a dramatic entrance, and Kepler wasn’t going to take that away from him.
Then, there was the small matter of the person behind Kepler, pressing a gun to his temple.
Now that Jacobi wasn’t looking through a purposefully placed screen, he could see that she was a woman with long, red hair tied back in a braid, and probably in her mid-to-late forties.
He went to raise his gun and she clicked the safety off, a soft sound that echoed through the now-silent room. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” she warned, “We wouldn’t want you to get all the way here just to lose your friend at the last moment, would we?”
Jacobi opened his mouth to respond, but a sharp look from Kepler steals the words from his mouth. Instead, he lets his face go cold and gives her a curt nod, slowly lowering his gun to the ground.
“Very good, now kick it over.” He does what she says, sending the gun sliding over and coming to a stop right beside Kepler’s chair. “And now the rest of your weapons.” After a slight jut of the chin from Kepler, he slowly removes his second gun, his knife, and his bag from his person, and slides them over to her one by one.
Jacobi decides to start speaking, even though he’s pretty sure that he’s not supposed to. “Okay, I’m completely unarmed. You caught me, whoop-dee-fucking-doo. Can we get to negotiations now?”
Kepler’s shoulders slump minutely while the woman lets out a surprised laugh. “You’re direct, I appreciate that,” she says. “What are you willing to offer?”
This is the most important part of Jacobi’s plan. If he can’t play this well, they’re essentially fucked. “I’m going to reach into a side pocket in my vest here and pull out a USB, is that alright?” She dips her chin and he takes that as permission. What he pulls out certainly looks like a USB, but if things worked out, it definitely wasn’t going to function like one. “This holds the name of who we work for, and the full blueprints and schematics for one of our current top projects.” He holds the USB out for her to take. “I’ve been sent to offer this in exchange for him.”
The him in question squints at Jacobi. Kepler knows that Cutter would never give up anything, even if it was to get his prized pet back. While his mind was likely running through different theories of what Jacobi was trying to do, Jacobi’s mind was a little more like please take it please take it if you don’t take it we’re fucked please just take the fucking stick I swear to God.
She takes her time, looking between Jacobi and the USB while Jacobi makes a concentrated effort to not hold his breath. Eventually, she beckons him forward and extends her hand for him to place the stick, and it takes everything in Jacobi to not sigh in relief.
He steps forward, places the USB in the palm of her hand, waits until the gun drifts away from Kepler’s temple and hovers behind him in her distraction, and then pushes the button he had hidden in his other hand.
10,000 volts of electricity proceeded to flow through the woman, causing her muscles to spasm, contract, and finally, give out as she fell unconscious. Jacobi wasted no time in grabbing his gun and shooting her in the head, just to be sure.
Jacobi turns to Kepler, hands fluttering above him, suddenly uncertain. “Sir? Are you okay?”
And finally, for the first time in what Jacobi assumed to be nearly two weeks, Kepler spoke. “I’m just fine, Mister Jacobi. She kept the keys in her jacket pocket.” His voice was rough from disuse and he fell into a coughing fit as Jacobi found the keys and began unlocking the chains that had kept Kepler trapped here this whole time.
After Kepler shook his arms free, unable to conceal a wince at the action, he took the keys and worked on getting his legs out. Jacobi took this opportunity to set a few more bombs in the room, confident that everything he’d placed would take out at least a good chunk of this facility.
He finishes up just as Kepler’s trying to rub some feeling back into his legs. He lifts his head to see Jacobi staring at him and his expression shutters, he straightens up and attempts to push himself to his feet. He gets about halfway up before gently lowering himself back down, forehead shining with a thin layer of sweat.
Jacobi walks back over after collecting his discarded weapons and bag, one hand extended towards Kepler, and says, “Let’s get the hell out of here, sir.” Kepler grabs his hand after a moment’s hesitation, grip weaker than it normally is, and their combined efforts get Kepler on his feet.
Instead of letting go, Jacobi swings Kepler’s arm around his shoulders, holding him up when his knees threaten to buckle. “Don’t worry sir, I got you.”
Kepler rolls his eyes but says, “Greatly appreciated, Mister Jacobi. I assume that you have this place rigged to blow?”
At least his voice sounds better. “Aww, you know me so well! All we gotta do is get outta range and this place crumbles.”
“Then I suggest we do so.”
“On it, sir.”
It’s slow going, getting out of the facility. Jacobi assumes that Kepler hadn’t been allowed to move around at all, so his muscles had likely begun to atrophy alongside some serious cut-off circulation. Luckily, they don’t run into anyone else on the way back to the trapdoor. Everyone’s probably escaped or is in hiding. Jacobi can’t bring himself to feel sorry for the bastards who don’t make it out before he blows this shithole to hell.
The trapdoor takes some effort, but they manage to make it up and out of the crate with some sweat and creative thinking. Kepler’s out before him, and before Jacobi pulls himself up, Kepler’s got his hands raised in supplication, making him pause. He looks through the hole that the sharpshooter had originally planned to use to kill Jacobi and sees a kid standing in front of Kepler.
He looks nineteen, maybe twenty, years old, and his hands are shaking as he points his gun at Kepler. Without a second thought, Jacobi aims through the hole, and shoots the kid in the knee. He goes down, gun clattering on the ground, and Jacobi pops up and shoots him in the head before he can reach for it again.
No hesitation. No mercy.
Kepler’s giving him an inscrutable look when he steps out of the crate, but that’s relatively par for the course by now. Jacobi hooks Kepler’s arm around his shoulders once more and leads them out of the warehouse. When he deems them far enough away, he pushes the button on the detonator and doesn’t even look back to watch the explosion, all his focus centered on getting Kepler as far away from that place as fast as possible.
They stop a few minutes later at the top of a hill, and Jacobi sends out the code that should call the jet to their location. “Our ride should be here in about thirty minutes, sir.”
Kepler doesn’t respond, and when Jacobi looks over, he sees that Kepler’s got his jaw clenched and that his hands are trembling nearly imperceptibly. He thinks that he catches an unusual shine in Kepler’s eyes, but he blinks and then it’s gone. “…Sir?” This might be the most unsettled Jacobi’s been this entire mission.
“You weren’t supposed to know about these missions,” he finally says.
“I know.”
“They’re worse than anything else we do. I’m sent to kill innocent people.”
“I know.”
“I was trying to keep you safe.” Kepler’s voice breaks on the last word. “I asked Cutter to send me on these missions so you wouldn’t have to. I didn’t want you to go through this.”
Jacobi’s voice goes impossibly soft when he says, “I know. And thank you.” After a second, he takes Kepler’s hand into his own, and Kepler lets him.
Kepler’s breath shudders out of him and he slumps against Jacobi like he’s the only thing keeping him upright. They don’t say anything else until the jet arrives, and Jacobi helps him up the steps, lays him down on one of the seats, and tells him that he’ll wake him up when they get home.
Jacobi smiles when he sees the steady rise and fall of Kepler’s chest barely two minutes later.
*
When they land, Jacobi tells Enlil to tell Cutter that he’ll be in tomorrow with a mission report and that Kepler’s been retrieved. After Enlil cheerfully agrees, Jacobi basically shoves Kepler into his car and drives him back to his place, sitting him down on Jacobi’s toilet in the bathroom as he grabs the first aid kit that he keeps under the sink for cases like this.
“Sir,” he starts cautiously, “I need you to remove your clothes for me. Can you do that?” Kepler looks up at him, exhaustion in every line of his face, and silently begins to peel his clothes off. And Jacobi means peel as in literally, with the amount of blood that has basically fused Kepler’s clothes to his body, and it’s a struggle to remove them.
Jacobi steps in to help when Kepler’s fingers fumble his shirt buttons for the fourth time, methodically unbuttoning them for him and guiding his arms through the holes. Kepler seems to give up after that, letting Jacobi take point in removing the rest of his clothes. He does do so with more gentleness and care than he’s shown anything else in his life, trying to peel the clothes off of half-scabbed-over wounds as painlessly as possible.
When he’s done, he leaves the bloodied clothes in a pile, making a mental note to burn them all later, and gets to work on cleaning Kepler up. He turns on the faucet to the bath, making sure that the water is nicely warmed before allowing it to fill up. Meanwhile, he takes a warm cloth and gently dabs at Kepler’s face, cleaning off the worst of it before guiding him into the tub.
As soon as he’s fully submerged, Kepler’s eyes drift shut and his body goes lax, so Jacobi takes the washcloth and some soap and gently wipes almost two weeks’ work of blood and grime off of him. He’s not even sure that Kepler is here anymore, it seems as though he’s drifted somewhere else entirely. When the water turns a murky brown, Jacobi drains the tub and fills it up again, guiding Kepler’s head under the faucet to wet his hair.
The second the water touches his head, Kepler’s eyes shoot open and he starts clawing at Jacobi’s arm, scrambling to get out of the tub. “Woah! Hey, it’s okay. It’s alright, I got you.” Kepler’s clutching onto Jacobi, and Jacobi barely remembers to turn off the faucet before he wraps his arms around him, regardless of the fact that he’s now soaking wet.
The bastards must have waterboarded him, Jacobi seethes. He feels a wave of fury roiling in his gut, but keeps his grip gentle, his words soft as he soothes the man in his arms. “I have you. I got you out. You’re safe. Let me take care of you.” Slowly, Kepler calms down and lets Jacobi lower him back into the tub.
“Alright, sir, I’m going to start washing your hair now, but first I’m going to pour some water over your head, is that going to be okay?” Jacobi waits for Kepler’s jerky nod before cupping his hands, scooping up water from the tub, and letting it soak Kepler’s hair. He does this a few times, letting Kepler get used to the feeling, before pouring some shampoo in his hands and lathering it into Kepler’s hair.
Jacobi makes sure to take his time here and, sure enough, Kepler’s eyes begin drifting shut once more, a soft sigh escaping his lips. “I’m going to rinse the shampoo out now, okay?” He’s answered with a light hum and begins the process of rinsing Kepler’s hair, letting his nails drag against his scalp in an attempt to soothe.
It seems to work, and Jacobi’s able to finish up and drain the water without any more trouble. He leaves the bathroom to grab a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt for Kepler, the biggest he owns, and returns to find him in the exact spot he left him.
Jacobi allows himself a brief, fond smile before helping Kepler up, drying him off, and setting him back down on the toilet seat so he can properly dress his wounds. Any bleeding that removing the clothes caused has stopped, so Jacobi applies some antibiotic ointment on his injuries before carefully wrapping gauze around the ones that need it. Only one of them looks like it needs stitches, and they’ve been through this enough that Kepler barely even flinches which Jacobi makes quick work of it.
Jacobi quickly sets his nose and then rubs aloe vera on the few burns he has. Muttering sorry whenever he brushes against something particularly painful and Kepler hisses through his teeth.
He then takes out some bruise cream that he’d bought but never used, and carefully rubs it into the bruising on Kepler’s face, his ribs, his arms and legs, basically everywhere. Kepler remains pliant the whole time, letting Jacobi lift his arms or tilt his chin, and Jacobi’s chest warms at the huge amount of trust that his superior officer is placing in him right now.
He didn’t think that anyone had ever seen Kepler this vulnerable, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to make him regret it.
When Jacobi had done everything he could, he helped Kepler into some clothes and led him to his bedroom. “Kepler? You should get some sleep. I’m gonna clean some things up and then I’ll be back to check on you.”
After Jacobi made sure that Kepler was properly in bed, he tidied up the bathroom, putting the medical kit back away for the next time one of them was fatally injured, and made his way back to his room. He walked up next to Kepler, and lifted his hand to brush some damp hair out of his face. Kepler’s hand shot out and grabbed hold of Jacobi’s wrist, giving it a light tug until he got the message and crawled into bed next to him, taking out his hearing aids and laying them on his bedside table.
As his head hit the pillow, all the tension that the past couple of weeks had built up in him seeped away. That time spent worrying and wondering where Kepler was, then the meeting with Cutter, finding out what Kepler’s solo missions were, then the actual getting Kepler out, and making sure that he didn’t punch through a wall while patching him up had taken more of a toll on him than he thought.
Now, looking at Kepler’s relaxed face across from him, Jacobi let his eyes close, and sinks into sleep.
*
No! Nononono. NO. Where are you? WHERE IS HE? Come back come back come back please don’t leave me come back. How could you do this why did you do this no wait COME BACK. Don’t go. Please don’t go, don’t leave me alone I need you please don’t go. NO. Where are you?! WHERE ARE YOU?
*
Jacobi woke up to someone shaking his shoulder. He was sweating and out of breath, legs tangled up in his sheets. He couldn’t hear anything, everything sounded like it was coming from above water and he was trapped underneath. He felt something cool being pressed into his hands, hearing aids, and fumbled to put them in.
All of a sudden, sound came rushing back. “-ister Jacobi? Jacobi, can you hear me?”
Oh right. Kepler was there. Jacobi looked at him, he was shaking. Why is he shaking? He looks down at his hands and realizes that it’s not Kepler that’s shaking, it’s him. Kepler sits up, looking much more aware of his surroundings than he was earlier, and pulls Jacobi onto his lap.
For a moment, Jacobi simply lies there, shaking, until he feels something damp under his cheek and he realizes that he’s crying. Oh god, he’s crying on Kepler. But, when he tries to sit up, Kepler’s arms hold him in place and he just doesn’t have the will to fight it.
When Kepler’s certain that Jacobi isn’t going to pull away, he threads his fingers through his hair, grounding him as the shaking slowly stops. “Daniel,” he begins softly, and Jacobi’s breath catches on a sob because he never thought he’d get to hear this again, “tell me what’s wrong.”
Jacobi sucks in a shuddering breath before whispering, “I thought you were gone.” Kepler stays silent, hand beginning to stroke Jacobi’s hair in an attempt to encourage him. “You were gone for weeks and nobody would tell me what was going on. Then Cutter calls me up to his office and sends me on a fucking rescue mission and I get on that jet just to see that video.”
He winces thinking about how Kepler had looked in that video. “I thought that you were going to die. And it was going to be all my fault because I wouldn’t get there in time to save you. I thought I was going to lose you. I thought I was going to be alone. And then I got to you and you couldn’t even stand.”
Jacobi’s thoughts drift back to Mr. Cutter and he gets angry. “Not to mention that apparently Cutter has been sending you to kill innocent people. Not even rival companies with collateral. He purposefully sends you after fucking kids and you always come back looking so empty and I hate it.”
There’s nothing left to say, so he tries to calm his heaving breaths and lose himself in the feeling of Kepler’s fingers dragging through his hair.
“Daniel, I want you to listen to me very carefully.” He turns Jacobi so he’s lying face up. He’s greeted by Kepler looking down at him. He looks serious, but also…tender. “I am safe. I am safe because of you. You got me out. You did what you had to do and I’m alive because of it.”
Tears start trailing down Jacobi’s face and Kepler wipes them away with his thumbs. His hands are cupping Jacobi’s face and he starts to wonder if maybe this is the dream. “You did everything right, Daniel. Everything’s going to be okay. I’m here. I’m not leaving you alone, I promise. Do you understand me?”
Jacobi just pulls Kepler back down onto the bed, burying his head into his chest and clutching onto his shirt with a grip so tight that his knuckles turn white. One of Kepler’s hands drifts back to his hair while the other circles around his back, holding him close. “Get some rest, Daniel. I’ll be here when you wake up.”
I love you, Jacobi thinks, I love you I love you I love you.
But he doesn’t say it. He can’t. Not if he wants to keep this. So, instead, he relaxes his grip on Kepler and pretends that he doesn’t feel the kiss pressed into his hair as he drifts back into sleep, feeling the safest that he ever has, Kepler back with him.
He’s exactly where he belongs.