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To all of you who've said Jarod (during the tv series) didn't frequently sweat/perform manual labor: this one's for you. The poor man. I almost feel sorry for him. He, however, rises to the occasion I think--- no, no, not that kind of rising; drag your minds out of the gutter.
Speaking of gutter—
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The sedan jerked to a dramatic halt, scattering grass and sand, and was still creaking its objections when its furious owner slammed closed the driver's side door. She tugged down her sunglasses and her mouth followed suit, unhinging in equal measures of awe and disbelief.
For several moments, she observed as Jarod sparred with a prybar, his stained white sleeves folded at the elbows, his back bent, his dark hair falling obliquely across—and somewhat adhering to—a forehead sheathed in perspiration. A pair of freshly stolen aluminum crutches, recently abandoned when they proved to be an impediment, lay on the ground beside him. He grunted loudly in both pain and frustration and snarled obscenities.
Rachel was displeased. She didn't like this new Jarod, had never even met him and desperately blamed a concussion for the aberrant behavior. He didn't so much as acknowledge her arrival, this man who had stared into her eyes and made love to her. It must be the concussion. She wasn't prepared to examine other implications, accept any other possibility. It was entirely inconceivable that he'd been searching her eyes for someone else, imagining someone else.
Throwing up both arms as if she were a winged creature preparing to launch herself skyward, she strode confidently to Jarod's side and narrowed her eyes.
"Uh-oh," cooed Little Miss Parker. "Here comes the drama queen."
"I just got off the phone with the Director of the FBI. He wants to know why you're so interested in this storm drain."
"Not now," Jarod said.
"Yes now," she shouted.
"I was informed that Hernandez thoroughly searched and logged the contents of this drain."
"He did. He uses the drain camera every chance he gets."
"He didn't physically go down there, he didn't log that cigarette butt," said Jarod with a curt head jerk. He felt Rachel shifting at his side and knew she'd dropped to a crouch.
"Looks like it's been down there for years," she said, squinting. "It has rust on it." Rising, she added, "Probably happened when it fell through the grate."
"Probably," returned Jarod, in a brutal, clipped tone that she'd only recently become acquainted with and already loathed. "Don't you find it the least bit odd that the cigarette is stained with rust but the grate itself is pristine? The cigarette is evidence."
"You don't know that."
"It has to be."
"Has? Jarod, listen to yourself."
"Oh, I am," he said surlily. "I sure as hell am not listening to you."
"Agents," Kirkland interposed, approaching the storm drain with a garbage grabber. "The neighbors are watching."
"Not to mention the ever-present child," protested Little Miss Parker, indicating herself with a theatric flourish. "Language, Jarod," she teased, winking mischievously when he averted his gaze in shame.
"I can't believe you're helping him, Kirkland," spat Rachel indignantly.
"Damn," cursed Kirkland. "The teeth aren't small enough to fit through the slats. Even if they were, this thing would need some sort of extension to reach the butt. I'll see what else I can find," Kirkland called, jogging to the house.
"Isn't there someone you can call?" Rachel asked. "Public works?"
"They'll be here in an hour."
"Then you should rest."
"Can't," he panted. "There's a flash flood warning in the area. In about twenty minutes, the waters will rise and potential evidence will be carried to the bottom of the catch basin and eventually into the Pacific and quite possibly the stomachs of unsuspecting marine life."
"Jarod, this is insane," she said and gasped aloud when he swung his angry gaze at hers. Rachel's face was already flushed beneath the California sun while Jarod remained pallid despite vigorous physical endeavors.
"Fine," he said. "I'm insane. If that's what you want to write in your report do it. That cigarette butt is stained—possibly with blood and not rust after all—and is at the scene of a Federal crime that likely spans an entire decade and two continents and has claimed untold numbers of victims. Think carefully how you will explain to the Director that you obstructed justice."
"But- I-" stammered Rachel.
"Stand on the pry bar," Jarod said.
"What?"
"Do it," he insisted, his forearms and shoulders trembling from exertion.
Rachel obeyed begrudgingly. "It's not working," she said.
"Jump on the bar," he ordered.
"It's just a cigarette-"
"Just a cigarette," mocked Little Miss Parker, revolving her eyes.
"Do it," shouted Jarod ignoring both Rachel's wounded look and Litte Miss Trouble's stray comments, trying again to prise the grate that stood between him and potential evidence.
"I need a plasma cutter," murmured Jarod breathlessly.
"I'm afraid you'll have to settle for the next best thing," Kirkland said, arriving with Celeste Steele's father, Eliot, and a stick welder. "Couple of sixty eleven rods, crank the amps-"
"What the hell are you two talking about," interrupted Rachel. "Isn't that welding equipment? Welders weld. They don't cut."
"What the hell are you two talking about," interrupted Rachel. "Isn't that welding equipment? Welders weld. They don't cut."
"God, she's slow," remarked Little Miss Parker.
"Arc cutting," explained Kirkland succinctly.
"But the rain," Rachel exclaimed futilely. The men were stretching extension cords, considering grounding options and then Jarod was donning earplugs, helmet, and gloves.
Murmuring a few words about grounding and electrocution, Eliot dropped a rubber pallet onto the dead grass upon which he unfurled a massive rubber welcome mat. He jogged out of sight, still stammering absently with a frown of concentration, and returning with a simple canopy that would lend Jarod minimal protection should the weather forecast be inaccurate and a fire extinguisher.
Grief-stricken as he was, Eliot still possessed the presence of mind to consider safety measures that would tip the scale in favor of the Federal Agent, who had been struck by two automobiles just hours earlier and likely wasn't particularly eager to be electrocuted as well. Admittedly, his reasons were somewhat selfish: Jarod, he was certain, was his little girl's only hope.
"Go inside, Burke," Kirkland instructed, feeding the stringer an electrode.
Inside the Steele home, Rachel averted her eyes from the deluge of molten metal. She was quite unable to discern the low rumble of thunder over the explosion of noise emanating from the welder.
At last, the cacophony ceased, prompting her to look out the window. She nearly propelled herself through the glass. Frightened, she darted across a smoldering front lawn that was beginning to sizzle and steam beneath the light mist of rain. Rachel stared in disbelief at the pooling water. "It wasn't supposed to rise here until the rain began to fall."
"The water upstream from here didn't know that," Kirkland said. "Storm drains in town must be clogged."
"Where is Jarod?" Asked Rachel.
"The flow dislodged the cigarette; Jarod went after it. He's on the other of this tow rope."
"Is that blood," she cried, staring in disbelief at the jagged edges that surrounded the drain.
"Uh, it is, I suppose. Cutting wasn't precise."
"Precise? It looks like it was gnawed on by Jaws." The ominous concavity, now overflowing with water, resembled what she imagined the inside of a shark's mouth would look like, she thought but did not say. "He went down through that? You let him? There could be toxins, sewage, dead animals."
"Let him," exclaimed Kirkland with a sharp laugh. "Are you serious?"
"Agent Kirkland tried to stop Agent Mortenson. We both did," explained Eliot. "I was going to grind the edges, dull them at least, but he wouldn't wait. Hey," he said suddenly. "Towels. If I cover the edges with towels he won't wound himself coming back up. I'll be back," he called over his shoulder.
"Wound himself more, you mean," quipped Rachel. "How severe were his lacerations?"
"We won't know that until he resurfaces," Kirkland said.
"How long has he been down there?"
"Nearly two minutes."
"Pull him up," she said, pushing a hand through her hair. "He's already concussed and injured."
"He said ten minutes."
"He can't hold his breath that long. You don't even know how much blood he's lost. He could be bleeding out down there. He could be unconscious. Dead. Pull him up. Pull. Him. Up," she demanded.
"Stand down, Agent," Kirkland snarled.
"I've got the towels," father said, relieved to be useful for a change, to help those who were trying to help his daughter. He hated the seemingly endless waiting, doing nothing. His neighbors brought meals, tidied the house, cared for his wife, Celia, and Tess, his toddler. He was ordered to rest and while his body could, his mind would not. Idleness was an enemy.
"He's going to die down there," Rachel exclaimed, pushing rain out of her face.
"No," Jarod said with a grunt of exertion and a ragged pant. "I'm not. Don't lose this," he said, offering the spent butt to Agent Kirkland who hastily tucked it into an airtight container.
"You're covered in blood," Rachel observed.
"Among other things," agreed Jarod, heaving himself up out of the water with a nod of appreciation at Eliot Steele. "May I?" Jarod asked. Observing the nod, he scooped up one of the towels and pressed it against a wound that ran the length of his ribs.
"We need to get you to a hospital," Rachel said.
"The woman has a point for once," Little Miss Parker agreed. "The labwork's going to take a while."
"No, I have to get this evidence to Takahashi." To Kirkland, he murmured, "You wouldn't, by any chance, happen to have a suture kit on you?"
"I do," Eliot volunteered, jogging away in another heated rush and then returning and explaining, "I pack it every time we go camping. Sounds stupid now. I was prepared for snake bites, lacerations and choking. Nothing could have prepared us for this."
Jarod accepted the kit and, prior to climbing in Kirkland's SUV, reiterated to Eliot his commitment with a boyish grin, "I'm going to find your daughter."
Contrarily, Jarod was not going to find anyone. Jarod was bleeding internally and hemorrhaging the adrenaline that had, thus far, sustained him, bolstered his uncompromising sense of duty, nurtured his longing to deliver Parker safely to her brother and the children to their parents.
Intelligence and desperate longing would carry him only another hour and only as far as a small, efficient laboratory wherein Takahashi's competent hands manipulated state of the art equipment. The latter winced when Jarod pleaded with him not to further compromise potential DNA evidence, to be certain to isolate his blood from any existing DNA. He knew Jarod didn't doubt his proficiency. A sort of forlorn madness had prompted the frenzied remarks- the same madness that infected many parents of missing children. That same miasma of despair enveloped Jarod and oddly, opined Takahashi, it didn't seem to be unfamiliar territory.
"He's not stupid, Jarod," chided Little Miss Parker. "But you are. You can't help her if you're dead," she explained when he frowned in confusion. "You know that. Stop ignoring me," she screamed when he stood to pace the floor.
"It's not blood," Takahashi said equably. "I'll bet you a steak dinner at Dominic's that this stuff isn't rust either. In fact," he began lightly, abruptly pivoting at the crash behind him. "Jarod. Jarod," he shouted at the man crumpled on the floor.
"Jarod," he called, pounding the large glass window with an open fist to gain Kirkland's attention. He was still gesturing wildly when Kirkland threw open the door and glimpsed Jarod's motionless body.
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Chapter End Notes:
I know, I know. We didn't need another reason not to litter.
