Part 1: Messenger

(Now)

So… we're supposed to talk to you like you can hear us, even though… no one knows if you can.

I already said I'm sorry. Don't know if you remember that, or if you… heard me, at all. But I am. I hope you know.

Wherever you are.

Um, your dad came by earlier. I guess if you can hear, you already know that, but… anyway, I have to admit, I more or less hid from him. He was angry and I never thought he liked me anyway, y'know, and… I just get the feeling he wouldn't like me being here.

Gwen said she was coming back later. After her shift, y'know. She said you better wake up soon, because the partner they stuck her with in the meantime… well, she said he's a bigger jerk than you, and that's saying something… Right?...

There's been a pretty steady stream of cops, actually, it's like your friends don't want you to be here alone. Wish you could see. I think you'd laugh, maybe. Band of Brothers stuff. Brothers in blue.

She said she'd give me a ride home, but, I dunno. She said I could stay at her dad's place again, instead of yours, but.

Dunno what I would even do there. Probably just start walking and end up here, anyway.

I'm okay, by the way. Docs checked me out and everything…

This… feels weird. Does it feel weird to you? I don't know if it even feels like you can hear me. So.. maybe some kinda sign? Like, hey, you're boring me.

Tell me, Shut up, Angel.

Please?

…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..

(Then)

Arthur hated retirement parties. The end of someone's career, for whatever reason. Casseroles and punch, spiked or not. People trying to figure out what to say.

And funerals were much worse.

The service hadn't been too bad, even if it had been held in a high school auditorium rather than a church. Family and former partners in the front rows of course, old friends and close friends. He'd been in the back, by choice and because he'd only known the old man a few years, professionally and before he'd transferred precincts last year. And prayers had been said over the grave, he was sure – he said one himself, just for that reason, so others must have done it too – even if they hadn't been official.

McLeod hadn't come to the service at all; she hadn't known Ben personally. She was here now, though, she'd found him as soon as she arrived – fresh from today's shift, with a temporary partner out of respect for Arthur's request for time off, for the funeral - not as out of place in uniform as she'd worried, but she hadn't wanted to stand in one place. Not even with Arthur… though he had to admit, he probably wouldn't want to stand next to him, either – ever, maybe, but especially not today.

One hand held his forgotten punch – not spiked strongly enough; Gwaine was either losing his touch or not here at yet or too torn up over the old guy's death to upend a vodka over the crystal punchbowl. The other was tucked in his pocket, as he stared unseeing out the slider of the old man's house at the backyard.

Needed mowing.

Behind him – he didn't turn – was a hall to the entryway of the house, where a little table held two framed photos and a guest book he hadn't signed. One photo showed Benjamin Angus looking maybe nineteen, his first official picture when he'd made the force. The other was recent, his last promotion to lieutenant of the Nineteenth. In both he wore the same expression. Not stern exactly, but serious, as if he'd seen life and knew it for a bitch. And was willing to go above and beyond to make the world a better place, anyway.

And yet, for those who knew him best, the twinkle of humor lurked there too, even in pictures.

Briefly, the sound of a breathless chuckle reached his ears, over the low murmur of awkward small-talk and the moaning of sympathy around Ben's old sister or cousin or whoever had organized this thing. Her laughter.

Gwennie McLeod. His new partner, and actually, come to think, the longest-lasting since Gwaine and last year. Because she was the perfect partner for him. Patient and sympathetic where he was brusque and quick-tempered, and yet she could draw him up out of one of his self-pitying funks with one flash of those brown eyes and a quick retort.

And, she was one of the very few females of any age he'd ever met who couldn't be fooled by his boy-next-door good looks and turn-on-the-charm smile. Seemed like she saw through his shit every time, and he respected her for it.

He was turning to see her before he'd realized it, short but trim and tough in her beat-cop uniform, her dark hair in its perpetual knot at the back of her neck. Then he realized why that laugh, however brief, had escaped her at a funeral.

Gwaine was talking to her. Tall and dark-haired and attractive in a wild, unshaven sort of way, Arthur supposed, his former partner when they had both carried detective's badges. Christopher I'll-give-you-hell-if-you-use-my-first-name Gwaine had not only kissed the proverbial blarney stone, but had chipped a piece off to carry away with him in his pocket.

The two people he'd have been happy never to have in the same room. For many reasons.

With the vague idea of separating them – threatening Gwaine off or dragging Gwen away physically – he pivoted and made his way across the living room. Old shag carpet and wilty overgrown houseplants and sagging outdated upholstery – to the pair.

"What is this, former and current?" he said. "You two talking about me?"

Gwen rolled her eyes. Enormous, expressive eyes of dark chocolate brown. "You always think everyone is talking about you."

"You make me sound paranoid," he countered

"If the shoe fits," Gwaine said, about half as boisterously as he otherwise might have.

"Is he hitting on you?" Arthur said, pointedly ignoring Gwaine. "Because I can ask him to stop."

"With your fist?" she inquired sweetly, but there was a snap to her eyes now. "I could've asked him to stop, if he was hitting on me -"

"Someone should," Gwaine grumbled, not really put out, but definitely not in his usual good spirits. Then again, no one was. Not here, and now. "It didn't look like you were going to, so…"

"Partners, remember," Arthur growled.

"Okay, Penn," Gwaine said, not taking his irritation seriously for one second. "Don't get your shorts in a bunch."

"And neither of you," Gwen said, deliberately keeping her voice even, though her hands lifted to her hips, "talk about me as if I wasn't standing right here."

Awkward pause in awkward fill-in-the-blank banter, because, even through the kidding, they couldn't really forget where they were, or why they were there. Lighten the moment, but only a moment.

And into the silence between the three of them, a voice intruded – elderly female. "Oh, that's awful. That's so sick. Who would do such a thing?"

Ben's sister, Arthur thought, Clara or Mary or Winnifred or something. The three of them – and several others with the same law-enforcement instincts – turned to the corner of the front room where the lady was ensconced, buttressed by other formidable middle-aged females in unrelieved black.

She was holding a small black device in her hand as if she'd been unexpectedly handed a dead mouse in a fine china cup. Gwaine moved instantly, heading to her side, Arthur not far behind and Gwen trailing them both.

"What's the matter, Gladys?" Gwaine said, crouching down beside her, the other ladies shuffling to give him space.

"Ben's phone just got a message," she declared, shaking her blue-gray curls, angry and upset. "An awful message."

Gwaine took the phone from Gladys' hand, and Arthur sidestepped to see his face. Expressionless, but his eyes were tight as he checked the small screen. He looked at it for what seemed to Arthur an inordinate amount of time; instinctively he reached for the phone. Gwaine looked at him for a heartbeat, and released it.

He didnt jump he was pushed. Im sorry. Alo

"I can't believe it," Gladys sobbed, waving a damp tissue. Gwen snatched a few more from the box on a sideboard and handed them to the elderly lady. "Who would be so cruel?"

Alo. A name? Nickname? Code?

Arthur pressed a button for more information, and only found that the number was local, and not one that Ben had entered in his contacts.

"Gladys, Angus was the best boss I ever had," Gwaine told her in his best calming, don't-worry-the-cavalry-is-here voice. "I will look into this, I promise. And whoever is responsible will get what's coming to him." She gulped, and nodded. Gwaine added, "I'm going to have to take his phone with me, though, if that's all right?"

Arthur was already trying to pick his way through the phone's history – forensics experts would deal with the number, who it might belong to, whether they could pinpoint the signal. But the saved log of incoming and outgoing calls and texts had been deleted – hours before the old man's death, it looked like. Hm.

Alo. A contact name, with a different number saved. Someone he knew, then? Someone posing as someone he knew? There was a hint of confession to the short message, Arthur thought.

No one had wanted to say the S word. Maybe murder was preferable.

Initials, maybe. A.L.O. A-lo?

"Yes," Gladys sniffed. "Whatever you need. Take it. Just –" She waved the fresh tissues and dissolved into fresh tears and the cadre of black-clad battleships closed ranks, nudging Gwaine and Arthur back.

Gwaine took charge of the phone and strode down the hall, through the entryway, out the front door, excusing himself to other mourners arriving and making their way inside. Arthur bumped into three he never saw, his eyes on the tension in the set of his former partner's shoulders in the cheap black suit – ill-fitting, as his own was; probably not his, or at least not for very long. And a cop's salary didn't exactly include things like tailoring.

He stopped on the postage-stamp front yard, tugging at his collar absently as he examined, as Arthur had done, the phone's message log, call log, and voicemail information with one hand. Arthur, for something to do, stripped his tie and stuffed it in the pocket of the suit-coat. He wasn't going back inside, anyway.

"Well?" Gwen demanded.

Arthur told her what Gwaine was finding out. "His logs were cleared the day he – died."

No one had said killed himself. Everyone had been shocked and said, I don't believe it, even while privately admitting it made a certain kind of sense. An old detective forced into retirement by declining health, rumors of a cancer diagnosis kept quiet… a long walk and a quick bridge-jump was an initial shock fairly swiftly gotten over. He could see his partner thinking that record-wiping rather supported the conclusion of suicide.

"And this text message said…" Gwen prompted.

Gwaine read, "He didn't jump, he was pushed. I'm sorry. ALO." Gwen's eyes widened, then narrowed in thought.

"You thinking initials?" Arthur said.

"Maybe. It's a self-identification of some kind anyway. Did you see, that designation has a different number, in his contact list?" Arthur jerked his head in quick assent.

"Are we thinking – sick perv who needs to be taught a lesson," Gwen said slowly, looking back and forth between them, "or a possible homicide?"

"Either way," Gwaine said, "should we find this guy?"

Arthur met his eyes – no trace of devilish humor. Gwaine was rarely serious – it was the way he dealt with the stresses of their chosen profession. And when he was, woe to guilty and innocent alike.

"I'm in," Arthur said.

"Keep it quiet for now," Gwaine advised, shaking back his longish hair. "I'll see what my buddy at the tech lab can find out about retrieving the deleted information, tracking down both these numbers."

"Talk to the ME," Arthur suggested, and his former partner nodded. "I can go this afternoon to check out the bridge?" Without even discussing it, they'd once again divided the options and chosen an angle to pursue. They always had worked well together. When they were working.

"And what am I, chopped liver?" Gwen demanded, her hands on her hips. "Tell me what I can do, I'll help."

"Nothing today, but thanks, McLeod. We will," Gwaine told her.

"Y'all here for the funeral?" a voice called over the fence.

On the front porch of the next house in the neighborhood in a pair of plastic lawn chairs, an old man with white wisps of hair around his ears and the back of his neck, whose feet didn't even reach the ground. His wife was next to him in the other, looking like nothing more than an enormous candle that had been melted in the seat and covered with a faded yellow-check tablecloth.

"Heard 'e jumped," the wife stated, as emotionless as the great lump of wax she looked. "Took a header off the Eighth Street Bridge."

None of them said anything. Arthur could feel Gwen's eyes on him.

"Suicides is eternally damned," the woman observed. As she might have told them, grass needs cutting.

Arthur turned to Gwen, feeling a roaring heat in his chest even as his skin seemed to cool all at once. "Loan me your piece?" he inquired pleasantly.

She put her hand on the Glock at her side, uncomprehending.

Gwaine said, "No, Penn."

"Oh, I think it's justifiable homicide," he said, still pleasant at the autumn sun was bright.

"Arthur," she said.

He looked back at the rubber-necking neighbors and said, "It wasn't a suicide, it was murder, and we will find out who did it."

The little man's mouth formed a round surprised circle, and his wispy white brows climbed his forehead. His wife melted a bit more.

"Cart before the horse," Gwaine said. "But in this case, I hope you're right."

He was letting his feelings get ahead of the evidence. But Ben Angus had died with Arthur owing him one. A big one. An un-repayable sort of one.

If it had been someone else, he'd have warned him off the case. You're too close. Emotions can cloud your judgment.

"Cell phone," he said to Gwaine, a reminder of his task. Even though the dark-haired man had been his senior by a couple of years, and now outranked him. But those sorts of considerations had never mattered to Gwaine as much as results. "And see if you can't get hold of Angus' files back to the first of the year. Specifically if he left anything open when he retired."

"I'll look up his ex-partner, too. Leon Steele – you remember him, right? - left the squad about the same time as Angus this summer."

"What about me?" Gwen asked.

"Go home, take a shower, change clothes, take a nap," Gwaine told her, then pretended an idea had struck him. "Second thoughts, can I come with you?" He gave her his devilish grin and she shoved his shoulder, though she wasn't offended.

"What about you, Penn?" she said. "The bridge?"

"I'm going to walk," Arthur said. They nodded without saying anything; they understood that he wanted to retrace the old man's steps.

He turned to walk away – maybe it was more like, stalk away – hoping the activity would help relieve some of the confusion of feeling over Ben's death that the mysterious message had just stirred up.

Seven steps away, he glanced back. And rather than each going their separate way, he saw the two others in fairly serious conversation, and a particular look on Gwen's face that he recognized. A bit of shock, a bit of sympathy, and a bit of something he'd come to realize was intrinsically Gwennie McLeod. Something like, I'm so sorry for you and I wish that had never happened and I really just want to hug you and make it all better.

Ah, damn. Which one of his secrets had his former partner just revealed? He was going to hit Gwaine when he saw him again, just on principle.

As she began to twist to glance after Arthur with that heart-in-her-eyes look, he turned his back on her.

He walked, taking the most probable route that Ben had walked, that night last week. Time of death, approximately 10:20pm. So it would have been dark, and quiet, and chilly. He'd met nothing and no one to stop him, as far as they knew. Cracked sidewalk, probably an occasional streetlight out, the rest of them buzzing orange and buggy. A few dogs barking as he passed.

And the bridge in the distance, visible from five miles. Not exactly a destination for a casual late-night stroll. And a bit odd, as had been Arthur's initial reaction, for a cop who'd probably pulled more than one floater from the river downstream of that bridge, dealt with the shock and sorrow of more than one bereaved family.

Then again, if he went the vodka-and-painkillers route, it might have been several days until someone was alerted and found him. And the eating-a-bullet choice would leave a mess… Arthur had never contemplated suicide, himself, but he expected the person and manner of discovery would be an issue of consideration.

Traffic wasn't busy, but steady, on Eighth Street. There was a pedestrian walkway separated from the road by a handrail-topped fence. Another, chest-height, separated the foot traffic from the edge of the bridge, leaving a lip of concrete-and-metal about twenty-eight or thirty inches wide.

He watched the stream of vehicles cross the bridge a moment, studying the area all around. It might be worth doing some canvassing of the nearest neighbors, see if anyone saw anything.

Slowly he entered the walkway, and he told himself it was the methodical pace of evidence-gathering, rather than hesitation over reaching the point of Ben's last physical contact with solid ground.

Bits of trash, dirt, grime. Discarded drink containers, paper, bottles, butts.

Crunch. Broken glass, or hard plastic, maybe, near the apex of the upward curve of the bridge. He shuffled a larger piece with his shoe, industrial-grade if he was any judge and rough-textured in a tiny square pattern. Like the tail-light of a car?

No skid marks like a driver had braked before a fender-bender type minor collision. But a full-speed accident at the speed limit of the bridge… would leave more broken glass, more pieces, more damage to the bridge itself, maybe.

He squinted up. Streetlight. Not uncommon. And a lot of crime scene investigation involved ruling out the irrelevant.

The upward arc of the bridge was gradual, and the height not so great that the other side was out of sight. He was distantly aware of another walker entering the pedestrian strip at the northeast side opposite him. But he had long ago lost any self-consciousness at carrying out an investigation with a curious audience. He continued on ten more yards, slowly, seeing no indication of where precisely Ben might have gone over the safety rail.

The black paint was flaking, tiny flecks stuck to his palm where he gripped the handrail, and looked out over the sluggish water, opaque gray tipped with hard, sunlit peaks the wind kicked up. The banks on each side were rough with broken concrete and scree, stubborn weeds now dying. You couldn't look straight down at the water unless you climbed over the railing…

"Don't do it man it ain't worth it," someone said. A drawling young male voice, more humorous than anxious – mocking rather than concern.

He gave the walker a quick once-over. Tall and skinny, he walked with a carelessly gawky stride, but his shoulders were slightly hunched under a grubby long-sleeved t-shirt, gray – or maybe just a really grubby white – number five in faded blue stencil behind a slightly-cleaner baseball in white. Equally grubby jeans with stains and holes, battered tennis shoes with mismatched laces. A navy sweatshirt and an olive-drab jacket both tied around his hips by their sleeves, though the day wasn't that cool. Hands in his pockets. Black hair shaggy over his neck and ears, John Deere ballcap with an added business logo low over his eyes. And a grin halfway between cynical and cheerful.

Arthur ignored the comment and insinuation both. "You walk this bridge often?" he asked.

"Never on a Sunday," the young man returned, but it held the tone of a joke. A teenager, maybe. Eighteen? Or younger, maybe little more than a kid just through a growth spurt. He slowed as he approached Arthur.

"Is it usually pretty busy?" Arthur pressed. "People going back and forth?"

The kid shrugged. "One or two an hour. Depends on when you're asking."

Arthur took a risk. "Last Thursday, about quarter after ten."

Eyes glittered under the fraying bill of the ballcap. "You talking about the latest jumper?"

"Thank you for your help," Arthur said between his teeth, and stepped past the young man, catching a whiff of homeless-hobo or trapped-in-a-portapotty or just-off-a-construction-job-shift. High-school-fall-sports, maybe.

He continued examining both the inner and outer safety fences for any sign of tampering, damage, or struggle – Ben had been a thickset man. Not light, and on the short side. To push him into the river from this bridge, it would have to be an up-and-over. Aware that the other walker had moved on, he did so as well, scrutinizing the scene.

One or two an hour, say twelve hours a day, meant upwards of a hundred people, maybe, had crossed the bridge since Ben had gone over the side – and no telling how much detritus from people before that. It would be a nearly-impossible job, forensically speaking, to try to collect evidence or dust for prints. Useless, probably, if they'd even send a team out.

All he concluded – when he reached the point on the descending northeast curve of the bridge where a jumper would splat instead of splash – was that there was no evidence that was conclusive.

Some instinct pricked the back of his neck and he straightened, turning back toward the southwestern end of the bridge, where he'd come from. The figure of the lone walker stood motionless – at that distance impossible to tell which way he was facing for sure, though Arthur would have put money on his own activities being the focus of the other's attention – for the space of three heartbeats.

Then twitched back into action, loping off the bridge and in the opposite direction of Ben's house.

Not, Arthur reflected, making his way back over the bridge in case he'd missed anything the first time, that John Deere was even the weirdest person he'd ever met, on the job.

I looked out across… the river today
I saw a city in the fog and an old church tower… where the seagulls play
I saw the sad shire horses walking home… in the sodium light
I saw two priests on the ferry… October geese on a cold winter's night

And all this time, the river flowed
Endlessly… to the sea

Two priests came round our house tonight
One young, one old, to offer prayers for the dying… to serve the final rite
One to learn, one to teach… which way the cold wind blows
Fussing and flapping in priestly black… like a murder of crows

And all this time, the river flowed
Endlessly… to the sea
If I had my way I'd take a boat from the river
And I'd bury the old man,
I'd bury him at sea

Blessed are the poor, for they shall inherit the earth
Better to be poor than a fat man in the eye of a needle
And as these words were spoken I swore I hear… the old man laughing
'What good is a used up world and how could it be… worth having'

The teachers told us, the Romans built this place
They built a wall and a temple, an edge of the empire… garrison town,
They lived and they died, they prayed to their gods

But the stone gods did not make a sound
And their empire crumbled, 'til all that was left

Were the stones the workmen found

And all this time the river flowed
In the falling light of a northern sun
If I had my way I'd take a boat from the river

And I'd bury the old man,
I'd bury him at sea

"All This Time" by Sting

The elevator dinged as the light blinked over to the number 3, and the doors parted on a rush of memories for Arthur. Three years he'd worked here.

Familiar faces, some new, nods of recognition and calls of "Hey, Penn, how's it going!"

Followed by the not-quite masked and awkward remembrance of two painful things. One, that he wasn't a detective anymore. Didn't work out of this warren of desks and computer screens and phone lines and file boxes. As his blue uniform – among the sloppy suits and casual street-wear – made glaringly apparent. And, two. That he was there because Ben Angus wasn't. Wasn't with them at all anymore. And retirement rumors had been submerged in the noxious sticky miasma of the s-word.

It was a good thing Gwen followed on his heels. Hers was a new face around here, and a gorgeous face – though he'd never be caught admitting he thought so to anyone – and took the attention automatically and deliberately off him.

"Hello, ma'am!"

"Penn, who's the new wife?"

"Naw, he's the wife!"

"Officer Penn, introduce me, man."

He faced the majority of the room – phones ringing, papers shuffling - with casual nonchalance. "Nineteenth, Officer Gwennie McLeod." He glanced at her over his shoulder, saw her chin up and her dark eyes snapping in a refusal to be intimidated. "McLeod, the Nineteenth precinct reprobates."

Protests, catcalls – "That's right, man!"

He added, "Gwaine's over there."

Gwaine was still at the same desk, the battered metal hulk facing another battered hulk where Arthur used to stash burger wrappers and rummage for paper clips and rubber-bands. The top was clean, the computer screen dark.

"I'm between partners," he said as an explanation to Arthur's questioning look. "You interested in trying to come back?" Not giving Arthur a chance to answer such a complicated and loaded question – in the headquarters of his old unit, standing beside his new partner – he added, "C'mon over here, it's quieter."

He scooped up a grease-stained manila file folder spilling pages out and led them back to Interrogation One, flipping on the light but not closing the venetian-style blinds. Making their conversation private from the rest of the room without arousing too much curiosity or suspicion.

"Lancelot's running late," he added. "You remember Lancelot from the tech department, right, Penn?"

Arthur grunted. He did. Martin Lancelot, a pretty-boy, in a Latin sort of way, smooth and shy – a combination that women seemed to find impossible to resist. He didn't have to try - the way even Arthur with his all-American football-quarterback, boy-next-door good looks and charm had to, sometimes - and women started throwing their–

"He's bringing the print-outs from Angus' phone," Gwaine went on. "Keep this out of the inter-departmental record, for now. I've got another couple of boxes, but this is stuff Angus left open, when he retired." He let the armful fall to the tabletop, where it slid away to Arthur and Gwen, who both reached for the same topmost file.

"Go ahead," Gwen said, but he pushed that one to her and grabbed another.

"We only have our lunch-hour," Arthur reminded Gwaine. "Switching beats." Gwaine would know that gave them more freedom – otherwise they would have had to grab some food while they patrolled – walking or cruising or whatever was best in that part of their precinct.

"Have you looked through this already?" Gwen asked Gwaine, leafing through the first file that had come to her hand.

"Only in a very general way," Gwaine admitted. "The type of case, how long it was open, what's still open…"

"And?" Arthur said. The one he held looked to be a fairly generic gang hit. Drugs involved, ballistics linked to an armed robbery and another unsolved murder, partial prints but no hits in the database, no witnesses, unhelpful grainy image from video surveillance.

"Drug trafficking, sex trafficking, a handful of murders relating to both," Gwaine shrugged. "Honestly? Nothing different than any of us are working on."

A/N: I did not want to start posting this story until it was done (because of the format) and it's not. I've got four chapters for sure out of ten total planned, but I've got another week of NaNoWriMo, and at least another, maybe two or three, into December to actually finish that original. At least that to finish "Angel", too. So I decided to go out on a literary limb and start this today to celebrate getting myself back on track with word count after having company for a week (family is more important than writing; it is in the same way that Mount Everest is) – and I'm planning to post a chapter a week and hopefully not miss any weeks until I'm caught up with my original and this one… Thanks in advance for your patience!

Also, to clarify, while I'm again using core characters from the series, there won't be the 'team assembled' kind of endgame for the guys… this is a Merlin&Arthur-centric story (with a good bit of Arwen thrown in)…