#or beth

Before he could even get a word in, there were yells outside of the cabin. The windows were thankfully caked over in dirt and grime, both inside and out. "Sousa said they ran this way!" A yelled. "Sousa had his head knocked by the Detective. You sure it wasn't the other way?" B asked. "Are you kiddin'?" C said, annoyed, "Why the fuck would they be goin' to the drops? They would 'ave been hearing 'em before and ran the other way." "All right. Wha' about the cabin?" The two men that were strong enough to fight stood up if necessary. Murdoch also eyed the wall, wondering if he could propel himself into anyone that was stupid enough to barge in given a good hand hold. A dismissed him. "Nah, why would they be that close? They need to get to the Government boys and get those two safe. They wouldn't stop."

A crackle of thunder rang through the air. "Sounds like we should. Wherever they are, they're about to get caught up in a 'pour." "Clegg's not gonna be happy." "Clegg can come and search for them himself," A complained, "The storm will either stop them and we can catch them later, or it's gonna kill them." The three started trailing off, going back the way they came. Brackenreid saw that by scrubbing a bit off the windows and peering out. When they were completely out of sight, he nodded and they each breathed sighs of relief. Before another crack in the sky warned them about the storm coming through. "Right, we're not going anywhere for a while," he muttered, looking around. Watts settled against the wall, curling up into a small ball. He was almost hidden behind Murdoch. The older man appeared to be setting himself up as a physical guard. If he wasn’t also teetering off. "All right, Bugalugs, three hours?" He nodded. Three hours of sleep, three hours on watch. "I'll take first," George said, volunteering himself, "I've had the most sleep out of us right now." Brackenreid nodded, the train ride down and then the search for both of his detectives wearing on his body. He chose a close enough corner to pop up for action before hunkering down. The storm that the men heard came in quickly and loudly. Nothing had been left in the cabin to act as a barrier to the noises outside. It made it harder to listen for enemies. George was completely focused on the door and the rattling windows. Was one going to be a man trying to get in, or the wind about to break it open? Murdoch shook his shoulder to get his attention. "Sir!" he hissed, the situation making him jump. He sat down next to him. "Sorry," he said, sitting down next to him. Brackenreid didn't even move at the sound. Watts looked over at the two of them before settling back down. The two sat there for a few minutes, listening to the storm brew around them. "I'm sorry." George took a glance at him. "About how I've acted." "Sir, as soon as I found out the threat, I completely understood." He shook his head. "Not just the pushing that I did." He looked to Watts, now knowing some of the other events that had been playing out in Station House Four. "I haven't been paying the best attention to those around me. I should have helped search for you after the twins kidnapped you and hurt Effie. I should have known more about what was happening to everyone around me." He sighed, because this was emotions and thought processes that he didn't want to have. Murdoch didn't want to think about how he failed at what he was supposed to be best at. A detective that doesn't think about what was happening to his friend, his best friend. Who, in their right minds, did that? Even if it was unconsciously. "I was too focused on the Black Hand, but I should have at least acknowledged it. Then, Julia and her pregnancy. I..." "Sir. Murdoch," he said, gaining more attention from that, "Instead of apologizing for the past, perhaps you should focus on the future. You know you haven't been doing well, so actively changing that would be a wonderful way of acknowledging it." That, was not what he was expecting. "And I forgive you, at this point. At least you figured your actions were less than helpful for the last few months." Oh. "Effie will not on my behalf, though. She has already told me so. Says you need to be shunned for two years." Murdoch agreed with her. "So, if I need anything, I should send Julia?" "Well," he wavered. The two laughed a bit. George now had some questions. "So, sir, what exactly happened? All I got from the Inspector was that we were going in for you and Watts." A loud clash stopped him before he started. He didn't consider it a good sign, but he regularly ignored them anyway. "Clegg killed what turned out to be a Government official back in Toronto. He threatened Anna and Henry. I went down to New York to check on her and found Clegg's illegal operations," he told, "Then I was approached by Terrence Meyers." Spy shenanigans. "Oh, boy." "Meyers told me Clegg had Watts kidnapped due to information and his translation abilities. I went undercover to find Watts. Clegg was already suspicious about a 'new' member. The fight, actually, helped with throwing off his attention. Then, he saw my face." George turned to him as he relayed that last part flatly. "I woke up taped to a chair before finding out they were going to use me to pressure Watts into giving up the information." "Taped? To a chair?" He nodded. "Yes. Apparently, someone has created a form of the duct tape that I have back home down here in New York. They call it duck tape. Clegg had been using it on his victims." His mind connected the one in Toronto with two more in New York that Meyers told him about. Then, Watts, and himself. It was briefly jarring. "It may also be stronger than the stuff I developed at home. I'm going to find a roll of it to bring back after this is all over." George nodded. This was familiar, normal, and comforting. William Murdoch discussing an invention, then having problems with said invention. Usually it was mechanical. This time, it may have been legal. More so than his automated lawn mower going after the neighbors. The storm was not getting any weaker when Brackenreid took over watch. George and Murdoch both settled along the wall, napping the best they could. He had moved over to the front of the door. If anyone was gonna come harm his men, it would be through his failing body. Which will not be because he had explicit instructions not to die. His wife's orders. The windows barely held, and the door wasn't that good either. Hell, he was reminded of one of the storms that passed through his camp. Loud as the first wave of rifles shooting at the enemy. Many a men woke up thinking they were on the front lines. The cut off whimper he heard made him think that it was just the storm outside. But he looked over to see Watts awake. His arms were over his ears and he flinched at the next thunderous boom that shook the walls. "Watts?" The man approached carefully. He wasn't armed, but the boy had managed a right hook that felt like one of Murdoch's old punching hits. Another loud crack and those arms tried to tighten. "Oh, bloody 'ell," he muttered. The older man tried again. "Watts." He shook his head. "I'm not telling you," he mumbled, "I'm not telling you." What the hell was he talking about? "Watts. Watts, what the hell do you think-" Thomas, you thought it yourself. Your men used to think that thunder was gunfire from the front lines. He wasn't sure why his wife's voice managed to repeat some of his thoughts, but it made a lot of sense. Clegg must have shot a gun near him to threaten him into cooperating. Bloody hell. A tug on his shoulder and he turned to see Murdoch standing by him. "He apparently also shot him trying to escape," he informed, apparently catching that the man had figured one of the reasons for the reaction. The older man carefully moved an arm away from his head. Brackenreid was processing it while Murdoch managed to get an ear free so he could mutter a reassurance that he wasn't in Clegg's hands again. Watts lowered his arms once he realized he was in the cabin, with Brackenreid and Murdoch. The other detective was satisfied that the younger man wouldn't go into a fit when he brought both arms down. He then turned to his inspector. "Also, I'm not the only one that needs to apologize for previous actions." Right. No one was happy when they found out about his threat that came out in a heated moment. The fact that he got innocent people hung always blackened his conscious. He never wanted to think about what would happen if it came to light. What good he had done since then unraveled by overturned convictions, cases reopened. Never mind what would happen to Four. Himself, Murdoch. All of them would be put under a microscope like the ones in the Morgue.

Watts was staring at his shoulder intently, arms wrapped around his legs. He didn’t try to look at the man’s face. It was something that he had trouble with at the beginning, and they were getting somewhere before the problems with Walker and Mr. Strange. Now he was back to ignoring his eyes. There was a small window of merely pounding rain and winds instead of thunder. And he needed to use it wisely. “I wouldn’t have gone through with it,” he admitted.

“Then why did you even threaten me with it?” Watts asked, voice choked, “You know-”

“I know.” He knew as in he lost Glenn Scott his job. As if Percy Giles had more years tacked onto his sentence because he was a homosexual. As Jack Walker had his business destroyed. As Llewellyn Watts would have lost the only family he had anymore. Crabtree, Murdoch, and Doctor Ogden would have still kept up with him, but there was no way he would have kept his job. Or any parts of his life. No one would hire a homosexual like Watts. Scott managed to get a security job. Watts would have been beaten for trying to become a Pinkerton. As if he even would, if the man knew what they did for companies in America. “I know what would have happened. You don’t think I haven’t seen good coppers lose everything?”

“Why?”

He sighed. That wasn’t the why of a detective trying to figure out a motive to a murder done years ago by those that wanted someone to be punished for a crime. The why came from a child man that had an image of a good man ripped away by the truth of something horrible that he had been involved with. “I arrested them. I was sure of my gut and the evidence we had they did it. Then I kept talking to them, listening to why they wouldn’t have done it, why they couldn’t have done it. Why they couldn’t have gotten the murder weapon. And something started to crack in the case. My DCI told me to ignore it and move on. The prosecutor did as well. But my gut got a nasty feeling. And I found one of the pieces of evidence, a gun, was the wrong one. The one they brought to trial had been used with a different crime. When the Defense tried to move on that, they replaced it with the correct one. But it was enough for me to become suspect. It wasn’t enough to stop their hangings. Someone had to pay for the crime, whether or not they actually committed it.”

He couldn’t tell if Watts understood that. His eyes closed when he started talking, taking in the words and playing them out in his mind like a nightmare of his own making. “Guilt by association,” he said, trying to work through this new information. “The knowledge that you knew of a crime and did nothing to stop it.” Brackenreid bowed his head.

“But you did.”

He raised his head back up. The man was surprised at the thought process Watts went through. “You were in the process of trying to clear their names. Just not quick enough before they did. The others are guilty, for knowing the truth. For evidence tampering.” There was a tiny rueful look at that. He remembered his own attempt at keeping the murderer of his brothers behind bars. “The guilt by association is not yours. Not in this case.” The grip of his arms tightened on his legs. The inspector finally realized it was a mock hug he was trying to give himself. “You could have explained it then. I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t have, gone, by what I was thinking. I, we could have-”

“Llewellyn,” he stopped, the very use of his first name quieting the young man and startling him into looking directly into his face. “Someone in Scotland Yard managed to get a false gun used as evidence in a crime then had the real one exchanged in when the Defense motioned for it to be examined. They wouldn’t have allowed their shame to come out.” He steeled himself for the next words. His wife would be proud. “I am sorry, that I used your private life in a hasty decision to stop you from moving forward.” He was surprised, and it was probably the first time in a long time that someone had apologized, sincerely and for a serious reason like this, to him for that.

His further words were stolen away by lightning that was so close as to brighten one of the windows to near daylight. Which meant the clap of thunder after it shook Watts enough for him to try screaming at the noise. Brackenreid reached out and grabbed a hold of him. Tucking him under his chin, the move stopped the instinct and silenced him. “It’s all right, Watts,” he mumbled, feeling him shake when he wrapped his arms around him. If he could quarter Allen Clegg, he would. “If you want to, uh…” He didn’t know how to say it and bloody hell, I need Margaret here. She’s better with this. “Well, I gave Crabtree a hug yesterday.”

He’s not sure if Watts had the same problems with hugging people as Murdoch did, or if society told him he shouldn’t be hugging people not related to him, but his arms were tentative in wrapping around him until he realized that he wouldn’t be pushed off for doing so and got to squeeze and slump into the older man’s hug. I think Crabtree would call it melting.

And if the other two men woke up a bit earlier than their three hours to take over watch, well, they didn’t say anything.

“We should leave now.”

Murdoch sat next to Brackenreid. He had been sleeping on and off during the storms, mostly trying to stay awake for George’s shifts to talk and iron out more issues. But now he was listening to the rain start to lighten, and the majority of thunder left that Watts was sleeping deeply. George had offered his shoulder as a rest while he also got another round of napping. He had been waiting for the storm to have a sudden dark turn again, but nothing had happened for an hour that indicated it was strengthening. It would be the best time to run.

“It’s still dark and raining,” he pointed out.

“The majority of the storm is trailing off. Using both as cover, we might be able to get far enough to a safe point,” he said, looking back to the other two. “This may be the only time we can get out safe.”

The bloody man had a point. He hated the fact that the man made a good point. He got up and checked outside while Murdoch woke the other two. Anyone that was tired immediately jumped awake at the rain that got on their heads once they stepped outside. “Where now?” Watts asked, out of the loop with everything involving Meyers and his help.

“Back to New York?” Crabtree asked.

“Maybe Meyers will find us,” Brackenreid muttered, “Be the right time for an appearance.” Murdoch didn’t say anything as he led them away from the road and to a point he was told about before his own capture.