Chapter Text
Their actual professional relationship had begun with a rather routine visit to the IT department.
Hardy had barged in, and Akram had been the only one without the foreknowledge to either fake a phone call or flee to the break room. Not that it mattered much, he had been about five minutes from trawling the digitized files out of boredom—and he had already been expressly forbade from doing so again—so any kind of actual work to do was welcome.
Hardy had dropped into an abandoned chair and rolled forward, colliding with Akram's desk, and never once stopped talking until he left. He had introduced himself by asking all manner of questions about cybersecurity features, without bothering to even ask Akram's name. He had only needed a virus cleaned from the ancient, battered laptop that had apparently come down with a, quote, "case of the I clicked on a dodgy link and then it died's," unquote, and stayed at Akram's desk the whole while, chattering.
But he'd come back asking theoretical questions the next day, mostly about hacking, before he shifted into the more personal. Had sat for nearly two whole hours and asked Akram everything he could think of, most of which sounded suspiciously probing. He'd watched Akram with the narrow-eyed gaze that would eventually become familiar to him. At the time, though, it had made him bristle. It was a familiar sensation on the surface, being examined. It had always started with something like, "So. What did you do back in Syria?" There was often a texture to questions like that, edging away from curiosity and into barely concealed prejudice.
Though, for all his rough demeanor and invasive presence, at least Hardy knew better than to outright probe for answers Akram didn't want to give.
Or perhaps he was simply better at reading Akram's dwindling patience than the rest of his coworkers.
That third day, Hardy had outright asked if Akram could hack into Stephen Burns' phone. He didn't do it, of course. But to his eternal surprise, Hardy had only asked what they—he had said the actual word then, they—could do instead.
In the end, they had decide they couldn't do much. Rather, Hardy decided.
"I played my blackmail card to get you this job, we're gonna be on our own for this," he said, drumming out a gentle pattern on the table between them. Their basement had not been cleaned, so they were again claiming Hardy's kitchen table, but Moira had assured them there would be no more delays. Hard to find the time, he supposed, while using their budget to spruce up the rest of her department. Not that he blamed her, exactly. He hadn't been in IT long, but long enough to see the state of their tech. "Burns retired sometime after our conversation, so we don't exactly have someone up top we can get help from."
"Do you think we will need it?" It would certainly be easier, but there wasn't a sign yet of who had actually pulled the case, how untouchable they were. No clue whether it was ever even a nefarious act to begin with.
Hardy shrugged, head still buried in the pages he'd no doubt memorized, likely already having the same thought. "Hard t'say until we figure out who put a stop to the whole thing first time around."
"If anyone did. I'm struggling to see a reason anyone would interfere." Akram had hoped having Hardy would unlock some insight, would provide some reason for the lack of trail to follow.
"We need to figure out what Carl was doing in those months before he went missing." He sounded calm, but his expression was stormy. There were pieces missing, data that should have been collected first was absent from the pages. Another reason Akram had found the case so interesting, and why Hardy had always felt so frustrated. "We've got two week's worth of phone data, emails, receipts. That's not nearly enough time to see a pattern."
"Or any deviations," Akram finished. There was little out of the ordinary in what they could see, but there was too little of it. Just enough to see the shape of something that was no longer there. A gaping hole that would complete the picture. "I think Rose will hate that as her first task, but…"
"Aye, yeah. But she's very good at it." He huffed half a laugh, smiled fondly. Then he turned a more impish smile on Akram. "I'll put you on Moira for that one, though, mate."
Akram felt his stomach drop a little. Burns may have pulled enough strings to get him the job, but Moira was the one who got to say whether or not he could keep it. "Why? She doesn't like me and, honestly, she frightens me a little."
Hardy cackled at him, as he often did. "You need practice, for one thing. We're gonnae get top billing on Moira's shit list for pulling this stunt, eventually you're gonna need to figure out how to talk to her without pissing yerself."
"I do not—" Akram broke off with a huff. He wouldn't call what he was doing pouting per se. But. "It's your fault he dislikes me, anyway."
"How is that my fault?!"
"You are the one taking IT workers into the field."
"Be that as it fuckin' well may, I wasn't the one who pushed a guy down the stairs!"
"He fell."
Hardy gave him a bland, unimpressed look, eyebrows raised. Which was, probably, entirely fair.
"Perhaps he tripped."
Hardy snorted, and returned to the pages laid out in front of him. "And anyway, she and Carl go back. She always had a soft spot for him, let him get away with everything," Hardy said, dismissive. "That should soften her a wee bit, don't worry."
The last time Hardy had said not to worry about Moira, they'd both ended up shot and nearly fired. Not that that needed said aloud. She had cornered them while Hardy was still bed-bound and couldn't escape. She had even ordered Akram into his wheelchair and pushed him down the hall herself, just so she could yell at the both of them at the same time.
Occasionally, Hardy would joke about his ears still ringing.
"Alright, assuming we have system access and a proper office by tomorrow, we need to start with sorting through the digital evidence." He sat back, staring off into the distance as he sorted through the file in his mind. "There is a lot that Fergus requested that was only received after the case was taken from him. We're gonnae be playing catch up."
"I will handle gathering the assets. We can see that a previous three months of footage from the ferry was requested, but I do not see any indication that that footage was received."
"You might be better at computers, but you're not getting out of sweet-talking Moira."
Akram tried not to sigh in disappointment. He had, in fact, hoped that would save him the trouble. "I would be more than happy to had off that duty to yourself, if you knew where to look for any of the unsorted files. And the deliberately forgotten ones." He had had more than a few boring days in IT spent poking around the database for anything interesting. What he had found was a hidden mountain of evidence that had gone so long without being properly tagged, that chain of custody had long-since been broken. "I am sure you know better than I."
"Fine, Mr. IT. You get Rose transferred downstairs and then scour the database." Hardy smiled, sweetly. Aside from being dangerously perceptive, the man never liked to cut anyone any amount of slack. "I take it you think that footage he requested isn't where it should be?"
"I would doubt it. From what I saw, evidence technicians largely ignore incoming evidence if the case is not open and active." It had annoyed Akram to no end, despite the fact he could do nothing about it and, at the time, had no reason to know it was even happening. "The footage he requested should still be somewhere on the server, even if it was never properly tagged."
"Don't start going over it til we've been to see Fergus. He'll no doubt have some insight that didn't make it into that file, either. It would be helpful to at least know what he was actually hoping to find." He scratched his chin, thoughtfully. "Moira'll be on our tails about picking a case, but I don't think we should tell her who we're lookin' at yet. We have more than enough cases to go though, I think we can push it another week or two."
"So I shall throw evidence tech under the proverbial bus, yes?"
"That'll certainly distract her from us," Hardy laughed. "Right, what else d'you got?"
"Are there any past cases of Carl's that would be worth looking into? Anyone that you can think of who would have any vendetta against him? More importantly, looks like our invisible man?" Not that he believed that would be where they found their answers. Nothing about the case felt right to either of them, perhaps all they could do was rule out the obvious.
"Carl's personal Rogues' Gallery isn't worth mining." Hardy shoved back from the table and rose, wincing as he did. He still had lingering pain and weakness, which he would likely have forever, but he didn't look defeated by it any longer.
He moved slowly as he made his way further into the kitchen. He had graduated up to a cane a week prior, and was still getting used to it, still finding his balance after using a walker for so long.
"The problem fuckin' is, he was never half as important as he liked to act. He never made international news, never caught terrorists, never saved anyone important or famous. He's not got a list of exploits like detectives in books and movies. He was a fuckin' cop. He solved murders and robberies, put people away, and then went an did it again the next day." He went through the movements of making another pot of tea, something to occupy his hands. "I'll grant you he did it with a speed and accuracy that made me question my own skills on occasion, but that never once made him more than what he already was."
"So he could not possibly have made an enemy of, say, the Lord Advocate?" He raised his eyebrows at the annoyed glower Hardy sent his way. "He would never have angered the leader of a criminal empire? On purpose, no less?"
"You really think he was targeted?"
It would have made so much more sense if he had been. There was no indication in his behavior to suggest he was looking for anyone, nor that he was aware he was being followed. There was no reason for him to have been there, no indication that it was anything other than a simple day trip—save the fact that no one knew he was going.
"No, I do not. Which is why his file feels so compelling."
"Cos it reads premeditated," Hardy finished and paused to lean his hip against the counter. "The crime itself is very… thorough. It's fuckin clean. A crowded ferry, no witnesses, barely any clues. Dogs didn't catch a scent anywhere out of the ordinary, nothing of his washed up on shore, divers didn't find anything."
"The crime certainly feels planned. Maybe not for this day, this one particular moment, but whoever took him planned to take someone."
Hardy nodded along with him, eyes distant and lips pursed in thought. Again circling the same thought as Akram. "Carl was the opportunity, but the crime would have happened regardless," he said, finally. He stiffly moved back over to take the stills from Akram, glowering at the small glimpse of the man in the bottom corner of the image, "This was never about Carl. This fucker 'ere, he's involved. Somehow."
"You are right. You don't stay out of sight of every camera by accident."
"And Carl knew that, too, probably. The only time we see his face is after Carl has taken his hat, and let the wind take it."
"But did he know, or was this simply happenstance?" Akram hadn't had a chance to watch the entire video, they were still locked out of the digital evidence until Moira saw fit to provide them with better tech, but the stills told a story. "What made him approach that man, out of everyone on that ferry?"
A man hunched over the ferry railing, queasy and trying not to be, turns to see someone standing further down the deck. He smiles, tries not to retch as he straightens and swaggers himself over, closer to the camera. Carl leans against the railing, hip cocked and arms crossed casually over his chest. He looks visibly ill, even if he attempts to look charming.
They talk, Carl laughs, they shake hands. All Akram can see of the other man is the bill of a cap, until Carl reaches forward to pluck it from his head. Carl laughs again, goes to place it back on the anonymous man's head, only for the wind to catch it and rip it away from his loose fingertips. Their faces turn to follow it's path across the sky, providing a glimpse of blonde curls and a heavy brow.
Carl winces, looks bashful, looks apologetic as he says something. He backs away, telling the man to stay put with one out stretched hand, while the other hikes a thumb over his shoulder to telegraph his path away from the mess he'd just made.
Within five minutes of the last timestamped frame, Carl will be gone without a trace.
Meet cute. Attraction, maybe. The Carl standing on the deck was certainly putting on a show, but frozen and grainy it was impossible to fully parse intent.
There were two interviews with Carl's wife, Victoria. They had been separated at the time, though she insisted they were on fine enough terms. Hardy had made a point to mention Carl's feelings on the subject of cheating: he would never. Without a tether, Carl could well have simply intended to flirt and then failed miserably. That could have been the deciding factor in his fate, could have caught the attention of the right person. Yet, that still didn't feel quite right.
He could have been on that ferry to trail that man, specifically. He could have been looking for someone suspicious, though there was no indication as to why, no hint of what he was working on that would have led him to that ferry to begin with. No witnesses reported him acting strange, no one interviewed reported him acting out of the ordinary in the weeks before, no strange texts, no suspicious phone activity at all.
Not even Hardy had noticed anything untoward, and regret over that fact was plain to see on his face. Across the table, he continued to study the stills. His expression had softened, ended up somewhere close to heartache, something like grief.
All they had was a flat shade of the man they were looking for, and not much else to go on.
"Who was hunting who?" Akram asked, finally.