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Rook sat, hands pressed between her knees.
It felt bizarre being inside of a hospital; it felt bizarre being outside of Hope County, period, after the events of the last summer and fall.
(Almost five months- nearly half a year lost to Eden’s Gate, God damn.)
She hadn’t required any hospitalization after Joseph had been arrested, had been treated and released by some National Guard medical specialists. Rook had no lasting physical injuries- and as she had not raised any particular alarms regarding her mental health, she had been allowed to go free for the time being.
‘Free’, of course, was a relative term: The flood of government officials, military, and media had basically guaranteed that there were few places to hide in Hope County now. Everyone, including tourists who had been in the county by chance when Eden’s Gate took over, was expected to stick around while interviews and testimonies were collected. It had only been a recent loosening of these expectations that was allowing Rook to come visit today.
She was a little dazed, after all this time.
It was a lot to adjust to.
Rook glanced around the lobby, and then quickly went back to looking out the window. She didn’t want to look jittery or nervous, even if she was. After everything that had happened, she felt self-conscious about operating in the normal world: Surely there was something about her that would make others single Rook out as an oddity, as someone who’d operated as a guerilla fighter for almost half a year.
Stop being paranoid, or they’ll put you in a room here too.
“Hey, Rookie.”
Rook looked up, smiled. “Hey!” She forced that smile to stay in place as Burke sat down in the chair nearest to hers. “You look good.”
Burke snorted. “I look like shit, but thanks.”
He wasn’t wrong.
But he definitely looked better than the last time Rook had seen him.
[---]
The fallout after the end of the occupation was wild.
When the National Guard rolled in, they did so with extreme caution. From their perspective, everyone in the fucking county had guns and was a potential hostile and they had no way of telling who was a cultist and who wasn’t; the inhabitants of Hope County, on the other hand, had spent literal months fighting to take back their home without the aid of the government and were not especially interested in laying down their arms so easily. It could not be taken for granted that the remnants of Eden’s Gate might rise up and try to save Joseph.
The prison in particular had been tense, as it was where they had brought Joseph after detaining him at the compound.
Whitehorse had led him to a cell, Deputies trailing behind as the Cougars, in hushed voices, hissed and spat and cursed at the cult leader that had destroyed their homes and lives walked past. It was a miracle, frankly, that no one tried to jump in and kill him. Whitehorse had assigned the Deputies, Pastor Jerome, Sharky Boshaw, Grace Armstrong, and Adelaide Drubman to stand watch over him at varying intervals, believing he could trust them not to do anything stupid- or let anyone else do anything stupid, as it were.
It was while Rook was being relieved from her third shift (with Sharky, who was joined by Hurk, and that made for a really weird and surreal few hours) that she had spotted Burke sitting in one of the empty cells close to the main doorway. “Hey,” she’d said. “You okay?”
Burke’s expression was empty. Not angry, not cold, not sad: Empty. “He’s there?”
Rook glanced back to where Hudson and Adelaide had set up shop outside of Joseph’s cell. “Yeah, Joseph’s in there.”
“And the National Guard’s setting up shop, right?”
“Yup, they’re coming in now. It’s, uh… Over, I guess.” She had hesitated then, noticing that her question had not been answered. “Are you okay, Burke?”
“Sure.”
It was the least-convincing ‘sure’ Rook thought she’d ever heard. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“I was going to get something to eat,” Rook had said, even though she’d really intended to go lie down and sleep. She had gotten a concussion after crashing a truck in that Bliss-fueled haze Joseph had set off at the compound, and her head was still pounding a few days later. “You want to come?”
But Burke had shaken his head. “No thanks.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.” Rook had shifted uncomfortably. Burke’s odd and borderline catatonic behavior after being rescued had been chalked up to the Bliss, to Faith’s continued influence over him. But now that he had been successfully detoxed from the Bliss and Faith was no longer a factor, Rook was starting to worry that his mental state was taking a nose-dive: She knew better than most what killing an innocent person while not in your right mind could do to one’s mental and emotional stability, and she had no idea what prolonged Bliss exposure could do short of making them into an Angel anyway.
“What did I do?” Burke had moaned, rocking back and forth as Rook and Tracey stepped into the control room. “What did I do?”
He’d shot Virgil, and would have shot himself if Rook hadn’t thought to throw a Hail-Mary punch at Faith before he could.
(She still wasn’t entirely sure how it had worked; Bliss or not, maybe Faith had been closer at hand than Rook had realized in the moment.)
Rook had gone and gotten food, had had a few token conversations here and there, and then had laid down and tried to sleep. But she hadn’t managed it, throbbing head or not. In the moment Rook had simply decided that she was too keyed up, but in retrospect the most needling concern had been Burke. He was an outsider in Hope County, much like her- but unlike Rook, he had been so fucked on Bliss and then on guilt that he hadn’t formed any bonds with anyone in the county since arriving here. He had no one to check in on him.
I shouldn’t irritate him, Rook had thought as she sat up, debating. He’s almost old enough to be my dad, and he’s a seasoned law enforcement officer. He’s not going to appreciate me hovering over him.
But still, Rook had felt compelled to check in on him.
The day had been ending. The shadows were getting long, and anyone outside of the prison was getting ready to head in.
And yet, where was Burke?
A creeping, prickling feeling had inched up Rook’s back: Burke, generally speaking, did not wander. He tended to keep away from others, but Rook had found thus far that the spots he frequented were fairly predictable and reasonably visible. That she could not find him, that everyone she passed could not seem to recall when they had last seen him, set her on edge.
Except for Sharky.
“Oh, the Marshal?”
“You saw him?”
“Yeah, he was headed outside.”
“You’re sure it was him?”
Sharky had snorted. “Deputy, I make it my personal business to know when a U.S. Marshal is within a dozen miles of me. Keeps me out of trouble.”
“It keeps you out of prison,” Pratt had snapped flatly from across the room.
“Yeah, that’s what I said.”
Pratt had rolled his eyes.
Rook had nodded absently, smiling and backing away and taking off at a quick pace towards the doors. At that point she had simply wanted to account for Burke, make sure that he hadn’t wandered off or had a stroke or something- after all, he wouldn’t be the first person they’d found that had some odd, lingering neurological effects from the Bliss. Given how unusual the drug was, they were still largely uneducated on how exactly the drug might fuck with someone long-term.
Especially someone that had been exposed to as much Bliss as Burke had been.
Rook had walked the parking lot outside the prison, and found nothing. She wondered if maybe she had missed him, if maybe he could have slid right past her without Rook seeing and gone back inside. But Rook had pushed on, wanting to be certain that Burke wasn’t off smoking near a tree or hiding in a bush or something. Sometimes Burke really (and understandably) did want to be away from anyone inside the prison, but he was also cognizant of Eden’s Gate and the idea of not making himself too accessible a target to any kidnappers prowling around.
And so Rook cruised along the trees at the edge of the lot.
She didn’t see Burke.
She didn’t smell smoke.
But she did hear a noise that sounded like coughing, or maybe gagging, and so Rook had moved towards the clump of trees and bushes off the parking lot that she thought it was coming from.
At first, Rook couldn’t process what she was seeing; maybe it was because the evening light was so strange, or maybe it was because she hadn’t been expecting to see what she saw.
And what she saw was a pair of legs, swaying slightly as they dangled above the ground, attached to a body that she recognized as-
“BURKE!”
Rook would later be informed that she had screamed loudly enough, and with enough terror in her voice, that she was heard by the sentries out on the road. It had the fortunate effect of bringing multiple people running to see what was going on, and Burke had been cut down in fairly short order.
Really, Rook doesn’t personally remember much after that.
They’d kept him alive, kept him stable, until the National Guard transported him to a hospital outside of the county for treatment, and that was the last time Rook saw him.
Before now, anyway.
[---]
Burke’s neck still had some bruising.
It wasn’t as horrific as it had been when she’d found him hanging from the tree, but it was still pretty visible.
Rook made a point of not staring at it.
“So… I guess I should just go ahead and ask the stupid question to get it out of the way: How are you feeling?”
Burke shrugged. “I’ve felt worse.”
“Yeah?”
“They put me on meds. I’m not going to pretend my will to live is what it once was, but I don’t currently feel the need to kill myself.” Burke’s eyes didn’t look quite as empty as they had been the last time Rook had seen them, so she was inclined to think that whatever the doctors were doing was working.
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.” Burke cast a gaze back towards the lobby, and then lowered his voice. “How are things, back in, uh…”
“Big topic of conversation around here?” Rook mumbled back, also looking around to see if anyone was watching or listening.
“Oh fuck yes. You’d think it would have died down since we’re barely a week away from Christmas, but apparently not.”
Rook sucked in a breath, trying to think of what relevant things Burke had missed over the last nearly two months. A lot of it was individual updates he would have no context for, since he didn’t really know many people in the country beyond the jail. “Well, just about everything’s calmed down for the most part. The National Guard still has a presence in the county, but I haven’t been interviewed in two weeks so that might be over. Did they come interview you?”
Burke let out a rough laugh, eyes darkening. “Oh yeah, they fuckin’ interviewed me.”
Maybe better to veer away from that.
“They’re pretty confident that the majority of the remaining Peggies have either been arrested or fled the county. I don’t know everything the authorities are doing about it, and I don’t think they want me to.”
Burke nodded knowingly. “They don’t.”
Silence.
Rook didn’t really know Burke, even after all this time. The majority of their interactions had taken place within the context of arresting Joseph Seed prior to the occupation; their conversations following Virgil’s death had been relatively limited as well. Rook had a decent grasp on the basics of Burke’s personality, but ultimately did not know him very well, and that made making conversation tricky. Especially considering the setting and the context under which they had last seen one another.
“You gonna ask why I did it?” Burke asked finally, head propped up on his hand.
Rook hesitated, trying to strike a balance between tact and honesty. “I mean… It wasn’t really a mystery. Not to me, anyway.”
Burke snorted. “I guess it wouldn’t be.” He stared out the windows of the lobby for a moment or two. “I’m… Sorry, by the way. You’re the one who found me after I… You’re the one who found me, right?”
“I was.”
“Sorry.” Burke was avoiding eye-contact. “That wasn’t pretty, I’m betting.”
“No, but it’s okay- I mean, it’s not okay,” Rook corrected quickly. “Please don’t ever do it again, but don’t worry about it- I’m not mad or anything, is what I’m saying.”
“Maybe you should be,” Burke muttered. “I would be.”
“I’m not.” Rook squirmed in place for a moment. “It’s awkward, I know.”
“Do you?” His tone held a challenge.
Oh, he doesn’t know.
That was a weird realization, since everyone else seemed to.
Rook stared at Burke for a moment, and then gently inched the left sleeve of her shirt up. She looked away as she extended her arm slightly, so that Burke could see the jagged scar running up the skin of her wrist and forearm.
“What happened?”
She shrugged a little. “I killed Eli Palmer.”
Silence.
When Rook finally managed to force eye-contact with him, she found Burke’s face unreadable. “Huh,” he said finally. “It looks… Old; relatively speaking, anyway. When did that happen?”
“About six hours after his funeral.”
“During the occupation? Before you saved me?”
“Yeah.” Rook nudged her sleeve back down. “Jacob captured me a bunch of times. He starved me, I lost a lot of weight, I got beat up, he brainwashed me with the music box, by the time I killed Eli I was… Not great. Had a fever, was seriously dehydrated, starved, exhausted, and I had Jacob Seed in my head telling me I was hurting more people than I was helping, so…” She shrugged again. “So.”
Burke blew out a breath, rubbing his face. “Well shit, kid. I’d tell you that’s a bad call, but I’ve lost pretty much any high-ground I might have had to tell anyone how to deal with their depression and soul-crushing guilt, haven’t I?”
“I mean, I don’t think you need too much of a high-ground to tell someone that killing themselves is a bad idea. Hell, if anything it gives you more perspective on how it doesn’t really fix anything.”
“Perspective is tricky,” Burke said with a cynical smirk. “Can’t have problems if you’re not alive anymore, right?”
Rook raised an eyebrow at him. “That the logic you’re floating by your therapist?”
“She’s making a good go of talking me out of it. I admire the effort.”
“I’m sure you’re making her earn her paycheck.”
Burke started laughing at that- a little harder than Rook was expecting him too, which suggested that his therapist had, indeed, been on a real ride with him.
It seemed wise for Rook to divert from the subject of self-harm, if only to avoid more awkward questions about her own incident. “Peaches misses you.”
Burke rolled his eyes. “Seriously?”
“She was sitting on your cot meowing and crying. We had to relocate her for a while so she didn’t get under the National Guard’s feet.”
“Did you hide the bear too?”
“Yup, Cheeseburger’s safe.”
“Where the fuck do you hide a grizzly bear?”
“Right in his home at the F.A.N.G Center, like he’d never left.”
Burke started chuckling a little. “Guess it’s not the most unbelievable thing that the Peggies wouldn’t want to roll up on a grizzly and try to make nice with it.”
“He sat up and waved to the FBI when they came to look at him.”
Burke snorted loudly.
They sat quietly for a few minutes, Rook struggling to come up with a new topic of conversation. She was as reluctant to patronize him now as she had been a month ago- Burke was eighteen years her senior and in no way, shape, or form a greenhorn- but Rook didn’t know how good of an idea it was to overload him with information about what was going on back in the county. A lot of it at this point was the authorities doing their best to find and identify dead bodies; there were people across the country with sons, daughters, cousins, siblings, parents who had joined up with Eden’s Gate, or who just had family members living in Hope County, and they wanted to know if their loved ones were alive, dead, or in prison.
“So how are you doing?”
Rook looked up. “Huh?”
Burke gestured vaguely towards her arm. “Are you okay?”
Ah, the topic she hadn’t wanted to circle back to. This was the danger of silence being left unfilled. Burke didn’t know her any better than Rook knew him, and so it was natural that he would circle back to this. “I’m fine.”
Burke raised both eyebrows at that. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re not thinking of doing it again?”
“No.”
Rook was telling the truth. Emotionally, she felt she was surprisingly… Okay, right now. Sometimes days came here and there where her mood dipped and she wasn’t even sad, but just felt empty and alone and not overwhelmingly excited about the future. She understood just fine what sort of mood Burke was trying to capture in saying that he didn’t have a great will to live, but still wasn’t planning on killing himself. Sometimes the depression that set in after a trauma (such as killing someone who’d trusted you) didn’t make you sad- it just robbed you of any emotion that made life worth living.
At the moment, for Rook, those feelings were short-lived and manageable. She was probably going to have to seek out some sort of counseling at some point, but for now she had zero intention to kill herself. Indeed, ever since she’d made the attempt, she had noticed that Deputy Pratt had been keeping a close eye on her; Wheaty checked in on occasion as well, but it was Tammy that had been surprisingly diligent about radioing from the Whitetails, though never admitting to any concern that Rook might be thinking about offing herself again.
Irritating as it sometimes could be, Rook had resigned herself to this scrutiny with as much grace as she could manage. It could not have been pleasant for Pratt to find her as he had, just as it had not been pleasant for her to find Burke the way she had found him. She could understand why they would be invested in making sure that she didn’t make another attempt.
“You should talk to someone about that,” Burke muttered, avoiding eye-contact again and shifting slightly in his chair. “I mean, I fucking am.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“It sucks, but it’s better than being dead.”
“That’s a slightly different song than the one you were singing earlier, but alright.”
Burke narrowed his eyes at her. “You went through too much to die like that.”
Rook mirrored his expression. “So did you.”
They were silent for a moment, frowning at one another.
“What’s the… What’s the word for a reverse suicide-pact? Where people mutually agree not to kill themselves?” Rook asked after a time.
“Is that what we’re doing now?” Burke asked.
“A… Life-pact?”
Burke made a face. “That makes it sound like we’re getting married.”
“Ew- no offense.”
“No, I’m with you.”
“I’m not going to kill myself,” Rook offered.
“Not currently planning on it either.” Burke said.
“Would promising me you won’t have any effect on your choice if that changes?” Grief, depression, and- as he put it- ‘soul-crushing guilt’ was a weird beast. Some days were better than others, and some days were much, much worse.
Burke eyed her. “My therapist,” he said finally, with a sigh that bordered on the overdramatic, “is of the attitude that any reason to not kill yourself is a good reason, no matter how silly or petty it might sound out loud. So sure, a promise wouldn’t hurt. You prepared to make the same agreement?”
“Sure.” Burke, eyebrows raised, reached across the gap between their chairs; Rook shook his hand, smiling as she pulled back. “You need anything when you get out- or before, whatever- you can call me,” she said.
“I’d offer the same, but obviously they discourage me from taking too many calls in here- gotta focus on myself and my problems- so there’s not much I can do until I’m out.”
“Oh, don’t worry, Pratt’s been watching me real close. And Pastor Jerome’s been counseling plenty of people since the takeover.” Rook cocked her head, eyes jumping to Burke’s neck again; the cross he wore around his neck was gone, although whether that was his doing or the hospital’s, she couldn’t know and didn’t mean to ask. “He’s good to talk to, especially if you’re religious.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Burke glanced back towards the lobby. “You got the time? They took my watch off me when I got to the other hospital, and I keep forgetting to ask for it back.”
Rook checked. “Nearly one o’clock.”
Burke sighed and stretched his arms. “I better head back up. I have a meeting with my therapist soon: You’re the first non-authority figure visitor I’ve had since I got here, so she wants to know how I feel,” he drawled the word with exasperation, “about finally talking to someone who isn’t a doctor or an FBI agent.”
That she was also someone directly related to the incident that had landed him in here was probably on the agenda too.
Rook stood up as he did. “If I’m not allowed to come back, I’ll assume she’s labeled me a bad influence.”
“She better not,” Burke grumbled. “I’m not anticipating a lot of visitors, so-” He cut himself off, pausing before saying, “I wouldn’t mind you coming back, is what I’m saying. No pressure, though- obviously I’m hoping that I won’t be here for too much longer.”
“I can come next week,” Rook said easily. “Things have calmed down. I’m sure the day is coming soon when there won’t be National Guards roaming the streets and I’ll have to be one-hundred percent on Deputy-duty again, but that day isn’t here yet.”
“If you want, I won’t object.” Burke was still for a moment, and so Rook did not move or speak. She’d managed this interaction without making any particularly egregious social mistakes, despite the topics raised and not knowing Burke as well as she would like, and so she hoped to land this metaphorical plane smoothly by not ending their meeting on an awkward note. After a moment, Burke held out an arm. “Come on,” he muttered.
A hug?
Rook could do a hug.
Burke hugged her the way her emotionally-repressed uncles had hugged her as a child, one-armed and with his head turned away, like he was embarrassed to be engaging in such a visible display of affection with someone else. “Thank you,” he mumbled. “For pulling me out. Both times.”
Rook’s self-esteem had risen and dipped more than a few times since she’d killed Eli; Jacob’s suggestion that she kill herself to avoid hurting anyone else had a way of playing on repeat in her head. While it didn’t fix the guilt, the knowledge that she had played a role in keeping Burke alive was something to cling to, that she did not, in fact, make everything worse for the people she tried to help.
“I’m glad I did,” she muttered back.
They parted, and Burke offered Rook a little salute. “I’ll see you around, Rookie.”
“Next week,” she said assuredly. “I’ll come next week.”
Rook did not make promises lightly; she would be back.
For Burke’s sake, and her own.
-End