Name, Rank and Serial Number

Chapter 9

After a few days, Billy's fever finally broke and he began to stir on his own. The doctors removed the ventilator and he was able to breathe on his own. He was still sleeping more than he was awake, but he had been able to answer questions and recognize those around him so once again a collective relief fell over everyone. Billy was recovering and other than a long road of healing then physical therapy ahead of him just to get him back on his feet again, there was no apparent permanent damage.

The visits still had to be just one person at a time so as to keep Billy from exhausting more than his body could handle, but no one complained least of all Billy. The first person given the privilege of a visit had been Rick. Billy had asked for him. For no really good reason, Rick had wondered why he had specifically wanted to see him.

He once again walked into Billy's room, the familiarity not at all comforting. Billy opened his eyes and turned his head to greet Rick with a weak, but sincere smile.

"Young Rick, I fear that you may have taken up permanent residence here."

Rick smiled.

"Maybe just a little."

"Seriously, lad, you're looking a wee bit ragged around the edges. You need to go home and get some rest," Billy said, his concern authentic.

Billy was concerned at the exhaustion that he saw in Rick. The rimmed redness within Rick's eyes, the weariness on his face borne out by the sagginess of his skin. Clearly the young operative hadn't been sleeping or eating well and he knew it was because of him.

Rick had been touched that after every thing Billy had gone through, all of it life threatening, he would be so worried over how he was feeling. He didn't know whether it was because he was exhausted, but Billy expressing such a simple concern for him after almost dying seemed to overwhelm him with emotion and it almost brought him to the brink of tears.

Billy noticed it. The expression spoke volumes of the struggles that Rick had endured and was working on overcoming. He felt responsible for them, irregardless of fault. Rick had become more than just a young charge placed into all of their cares, more than just a body to occupy an empty desk or to compliment their team with a fourth member. For Billy, he had become his personal responsibility. No more than his commitment to Michael and Casey, but different, perhaps because he saw a little of himself in Rick, understood the struggle he was going through because he had gone through something similar himself, maybe even worse.

Michael, Casey and he were jaded professionals of the spy game. They had told their share of dirty little lies to agents and assets alike to get what they needed and had gone through hell and back at the hands of assassins and people like Vlad. They had also stared into their own hearts of darkness, took forbidding glimpses into their shadowy souls and had been marked by what they had seen and done. However, Rick's inexperience, his youth, his innocent devotion to good were worth protecting. Billy had always known that the more missions Rick went on, the more those beliefs would be tested, being captured and tortured, witnessing torture inflicted was already challenging them, still, those experiences didn't have to redefine them, not if Billy could help it.

"I'll be okay," Rick said. "We've all been worried about you."

"Aye, I know, but the doctors seem to feel I'm finally on the mend this time round providing I behave myself."

Rick could only smile again. He had decided that there was nothing more reassuring than hearing Billy making jokes about his recovery.

"There was a purpose for me asking you here, but once that's accomplished, you have to promise me to go home and get your rest, in turn, I will promise that I'm not going anywhere, physically or spiritually, so you'll be able to rest easy now."

Rick took in a deep breath of relief and nodded.

"There was a moment when my fevered brain recalled a...painful memory from my time in the British Secret Service, a memory I have done my best to erase -"

"You don't owe me an explanation. You were hallucinating -" Rick insisted gently.

"Ah, not completely, lad. I had a moment of lucidity when I knew where I was and who I was relating the tale to," Billy said. "I need to put that part of my past behind me once and for all. It's defined me for far too long and as for owing you…make no mistake, I owe you much more than just telling you a meager chapter of my checkered career, but I hope that by doing so, entrusting it to someone who could benefit from the telling of it, it will bring me some peace and some clarity to you as well."

Rick's expression softened and he sat down in a nearby chair, caring to listen attentively for as long as Billy had needed him to be there.

"Nick and I, we came through University together, went through training together too. We were best mates. We'd done countless missions, many of them close calls. I acted like a right arrogant git back then, thinking I was James Bond or some such thing. Nick, he was the practical one, yeh? By the bloody book and all…but one mission…changed everything…changed me."

Billy closed his eyes in weariness.

"You don't have to do this now -"

"Yeh, I do, mate because I'm not sure I'll have the wherewithal to face it later and quite honestly, it's important to me that you know this."

Rick nodded.

"We were assigned to investigate a threat to the Queen, routine really or so we thought. I should have known that nothing about the job was routine, still, we didn't think anything of it, in fact, I was acting like it was beneath us both."

Billy closed his eyes and shook his head.

"We were ambushed while checking out a location given to us by someone whom we thought was a credible source. Turns out she was anything but," Billy swallowed down his emotion. "We got pinned down and in a stupidly reckless attempt to take down one of the conspirators, another one whom I hadn't seen was bearing down on me. Nick, he saw him, shouted and ran towards me. By the time I saw him…yelled at him to stop…it was too late. He'd caught the bullets meant for me."

Once again Billy fought off the impending emotion threatening to pull him under.

"In a rage that Casey would have appreciated, I killed the bastard…but I knew it was too late for Nick…too late for me…" Billy paused to take in a breath. "I got sanctioned for my reckless disregard for protocol and was 'encouraged' to leave the Service. Just as well because I had decided to quit by then if they hadn't suggested I leave. I'd lost my way there."

Rick had nothing but compassion and sympathy for Billy.

"Moral of the story, lad is that it was all for the best. Ending up in the ODS saved me from drowning myself in liquid self-pity and set me on a better destiny. It gave me purpose again and I now believe that everything happens for a reason. Still, what happened to me then changed me in ways that I can never get back, but it also gave me some much needed and newfound perspective and that's a good thing."

Billy's strength was waning and Rick could see it in his eyes, but he also saw him determined to fight off unconsciousness to finish what he had wanted to say.

"There is still a part of me that would give anything to relive that day and die in Nick's place not because of guilt anymore, but because he was the better man. He had so much more to give than I did and I regret his loss to this world, but that's all in the past now. In many ways, his death has given me more reasons to live than I ever had possessed before. I believe that my recklessness then was borne of an inner death wish or at the very least a complete lack of appreciation for life. It took Nick dying to make me see that. I now honor him by never casting blame or recrimination because it's a waste of time. What's done cannot be undone. I'm not Liam anymore. I'm glad to be Billy Collins, a member of the ODS."

Rick nodded.

"I know that what you went through has given you doubts and it's understandable, but I'm here to tell you that there is nothing to regret for you or for me other than maybe that you had to go through it at all. I would make the same choices all over again without hesitation. There's one thing you'll need to find a way to accept about me for I'm too long in the spy craft to change now and that I will never accept not giving all I have to keep you, Michael and Casey from harm. This is immutable. So you mustn't harbor any guilt for what happened. Every decision was mine to make and I wouldn't take any of them back, not a one."

Billy finally had to surrender to the combination of meds and fatigue. His last words had been driven home effectively for Rick. Like Billy, there would always be a part of him that would wish things had been different, that it had been him instead of Billy who had suffered the torture, but hearing Billy absolve him, having him accept that in the end, nothing would have changed from Billy's perspective, made his acceptance of what had happened, his ability to move past it easier. Billy had given all of them an implied pass that he had hoped would be enough for any of them to survive should Billy ever not and though losing Billy would haunt them all if it ever happened, they knew that because of his gift of forgiveness, they would be able to move on, if not so easily as he would like to believe he could be forgotten. On that, Billy had well underestimated his impact.

FIN. Thanks for reading and for reviewing. I hope that the conclusion was satisfying. I really enjoyed writing this story. It became a monumental one from starting out as just a simple hurt/comfort story. Thanks for sticking with it.