Chapter Text

Waking up has never been this difficult, but with an ache that has no intention of leaving burrowing into his every bone, and a headache the size of Florida pulsating through his skull, Jake is having a pretty tough time figuring out why he’s even bothering with waking up. He’d much rather sleep this off.

Unfortunately, it becomes immediately apparent that falling back to sleep isn’t going to happen for him. It’s not that he’s not tired, because he definitely could just pass out right now with no effort. What’s holding him back is the overwhelming stench of blood and the unrivalled certainty that it’s his.

So why is it so hard to open his eyes and get himself up and off the floor? Why does his entire body beg him to stay put? Why did he have the most awful feeling that waking up is going to bring a world of consequences that he isn’t ready to deal with?

But, as Santiago has told him a million times, there’s no benefit to putting off a small job. And waking up properly is a small job. At least, it should be. Maybe he should break it into parts. Make it smaller. Make a mental checklist, check. Now, add items.

Great plan.

First things first.

Jake opens his eyes. He blinks. He groans. This isn’t good. Nothing he sees is familiar or helping him feel less out of sorts.

There’s a thick layer of dust coating the ground around him, though a large puddle of blood has disintegrated the dust closest to him. The blood, he notes, is dry. This means that he’s not bleeding anymore, which is good. He’s also been laying on the floor with some kind of injury for longer than is advisable. That’s bad. Not quite terrorists in Nakatomi Tower bad, but still bad. There is a sheet and a splintered beam of some kind, along with various other types of crap. If what he can see now is any indication, this place is a trash heap. Someone needs to do room-service soon.

Which brings him to the next item on his to-do list.

He needs to sit up.

With considerable effort, and perhaps a whine and a groan or two, Jake manages to manoeuvre his limbs into position. His body screams its disapproval of movement in general. Still, Jake isn’t worried about the pain as much as he is about the incredibly alien feeling he has. Like his body is different. Different in a way that he doesn’t understand well enough to articulate.

He just knows that something is very, very wrong.

But that’s a problem for later. Jake’s not even managed to climb to his feet yet. He’s barely even on his hands and knees. Why is this so hard? Why does everything hurt so much?

“Up,” Jake wills himself. “Just like in Madame Hooch’s classes. You can do it.”

And he does. Leaning heavily on the wall and squinting through the pain, Jake is finally able to get a good view of the place he’s in.

“Where in the Chuck Norris am I?”

Although he receives no answer, Jake smiles.

“I doth believe I have coined a new phrase. Suck on that, people who coin phrases as their jobs.”

Jake isn’t entirely sure whether that’s a thing, but he’s kinda sure it has to be because really, where else are they coming from?

Upright, but barely managing it, Jake uses his new perspective to try and figure out precisely what is going on.

The place is a mess, whatever it is. Dust coats everything, every surface is covered in tins of food or bottles of water, and the windows are so filthy that Jake can’t tell whether it’s daylight outside or not.

He’s never seen this place before, and it only adds to the deepening sense of terror.

Something is really, really wrong.

“OK, here I go,” Jake mutters as he pushes away from the wall and towards the kitchen table.

His fingers grip at the edge of the ageing table, the legs of it groaning under the weight he’s adding, as his own legs prove themselves not to be up to the challenge. There, beneath an inch-thick layer of dust, Jake spies a newspaper. Maybe it’ll help jog his memory.

Or not.

Why is it called ‘The New Mexico Herald’?

And why is the date April 3^rd, 2017?

Last Jake had checked, it was March 10^th, 2016.

“Did I invent time travel?” Jake asks aloud before pulling a face. “Nah. That doesn’t sound right.”

So, what’s happened? Are the team playing a trick on him?

No. That can’t be it. The squad would never give Jake a severe injury for the sake of a joke, and if they did, there’s no way they’d leave him to suffer from a newspaper dated a year in the future. Something else has to be going on, but since every possible option pushes anxiety into his throat, he decides to box it away. An entire childhood of knowing his father was cheating on his mom and conveniently ignoring it has made that almost too easy.

Nothing super strange to see here. Everything is probably OK. Jake hasn’t just woken up in a strange house with a head injury and potentially a year of memory loss.

Something else has to be happening.

Maybe he’s still dreaming.

It’s definitely something other than what all the signs are pointing at.

But, as he can’t figure out what that is yet, it means he needs to move onto item three on the Santiago inspired checklist.

Going outside.

He might not have solved whatever crime he’d come here to explain. Still, his squad will understand that he’s not exactly in the best place to be investigating anything. Especially not alone. Which is super weird, because there’s no reason that he would be alone.

But let’s not think about that, he reminds himself. Outside first, thinking later.

 Or, maybe thinking never, if this headache gets any worse.

The door is jammed shut, and it takes all of the energy that he has left to yank it open. It sends him crashing against a moth-eaten sofa, and he sneezes as the dust, that seems significantly lighter here than anywhere else, lifts into the air.

“Forensics dream,” Jake murmurs as he gets back onto his feet.

Outside, the sun is shining high in the sky, and while there are no other houses around, Jake can see a road about two miles directly down from the house. No squad car though. Nor any other vehicles. Why on earth would he go into a house like this? And how did he get there, if he didn’t drive?

Nothing makes sense.

But now isn’t the time for worrying. Now is the time for walking. And while Jake has some grave questions about why he’s clearly weaker than usual, he decides to also put those at the back of his mind.

One foot in front of the other. That’s what’s important. That’s the only way he can find help.

At the end of the road, Jake is ready to just lay on the floor and melt into a puddle of sweat. The heat has left his clothes damp, and it’s making the injury on his head sting. He just wants to go to his house, shower and sleep.

But if that newspaper is to be trusted, then Jake has more significant issues than the fact that he has a concussion and smells like he’s lived with the ninja turtles for months.

With a relieved smile, Jake flags down the first car he sees. A white car pulls to a stop, and a woman rolls down the window slowly, eyebrows knitted together as she looks Jake over.

“Hi, I know this must look strange, but I need to use a phone. And be somewhere where there is more… stuff.”

“Are you bleeding?”

“I am.”

“Should I take you to a hospital?”

“Do they have phones?”

The woman pauses before answering, leaning back in her chair and pursing her lips.

“They do.”

“Then, the hospital would be great.”

“I’ll let you in on the condition that you don’t murder me. And if you do, know that I have kids. All very young. They need me, cause their dad ran out on them. And my Ma is dying. She relies solely on me to keep her in good spirits until then. And—”

“I promise I won’t murder you. I don’t need any incentives. Honest. I’m a cop.”

“Oh?”

The lock clicks and the woman leans over to push the door open.

“Thank you. I really appreciate this.”

“I imagine you do. What happened to your head?”

The car begins to move, and the woman turns off the radio.

“Uh, I don’t know. I’m having kind of a strange day, and I Hashtag just woke up like this. I’m supposed to be in New York.”

“Woah. Long way to go. What brought you down here.”

“No idea.”

“Dude, that’s insane.”

“Agreed. When I woke up, I was like, ‘What in the Chuck Norris am I doing here?’”

The woman flicks on a turning signal and pulls onto the highway.

“I don’t get it. What does that mean?”

“It means I don’t know how I ended up there. People say it all the time.”

“I’m pretty sure they don’t.”

Sensing that his defeat isn’t too far away, Jake shrugs and pretends to reluctantly allow the woman to win. Really, what’s the worst thing that could happen, the saying dies here? Jake will find ways to popularise it. He’s got skills with a z.

“Here’s the hospital,” the woman announces as she pulls up. “You can get off here.”

“Title of your sex tape.”

Immediately horrified, Jake tries to remedy his mistake, but the woman’s voice barrels over his.

“I’m pretty sure my sex tape would have a radder name, but thanks for weighing in.”

“Sorry. Force of habit. Thanks for the ride. I owe you one.”

“Sure. No worries, man. Just get your head checked out.”

She drives off with a wave, and Jake feels gross for not even asking for a name. But there’s nothing to do about it now. He’s got to embark on the next point on his checklist. To use a phone.

Jake makes his way inside, dodging around harried doctors and disgruntled patients until he reaches the nurses' desk.

“Could I use your phone, please?”

The nurse doesn’t bother looking up, he simply just points towards the payphone on the wall.

“Uh, could I borrow some quarters, too?”

With an annoyed huff, the nurse looks up. Immediately, his face crumples in concern.

“You’re bleeding.”

“Is that really my most noticeable feature? I know I’m bleeding. I need to call my precinct to let them know where I am, and then something can be done about the bleeding.”

“You’re a cop? Hey, here.” The man reaches into his pocket. “Take as much as you need. When you’ve finished with your call, come back, and I’ll have someone fix you up.”

Jake accepts the handful of coins with a grateful nod and rushes over to the phone. The clatter of the coins hitting the coin basket feels productive, and Jake smiles as he punches in the number for the 99.

No matter what, as long as he has his squad with him, he can get through whatever has gone on.

“You’ve reached Captain Holt. I can come to the phone right now.”

Jake sighs. No matter what is happening, he's got the squad to watch his back.

“Captain, it’s good to hear your voice. I’m having quite the day.”

The silence that follows adds weight to the pit of Jake’s stomach. Holt had once said that pausing between a conversation was a waste of time, and to do so could only be excused when one was receiving life-changing information. Even then, more than a second and a half a silence was ‘plain dramatic’.

“Who is this?”

“Jake. Peralta? Come on, you don’t recognise my voice? Do I not talk enough around you?"

“What is your badge number?”

"Wierd question, Cap'n."

"I'm not playing games."

There's anger in Holt's voice that Jake has never heard aimed at him before. Holt has never been anything but calmly disappointed or rational.

“Uh, nine-five-four-four.”

Another pause, and another ton of panic added to his worry.

“Jacob, it is good to hear your voice.”

“It’s never good to hear those words. Look, I’m not sure what’s going on, but I’m in New Mexico, and the newspaper said it was two-thousand and seventeen. But it was March twenty-sixteen last I remember.”

“Jacob, please tell me exactly where you are.”

“Um, I’m not sure. I’m in a hospital. I woke up in a random house, and it was a-dirty. What’s going on? I’m starting to freak out.”

“Jacob, I do not know how to tell you this. Well, I do. That was a ridiculous thing to say. What I mean is that it is hard for me to tell you this, knowing that the news will be less than pleasing. It is not twenty-seventeen.”

Jake pulls a face and shrugs.

“But that’s great news.”

“It is twenty-nineteen.”

The ground takes Jake’s body as it’s own, and Jake puts up no fight.

The last thing he’s conscious off is the nice nurse coming to his side.

Chapter Text

Chapter Two

Even during the laziest seasons of his life – his teenage years and college years respectively – Jake has never had this many problems with waking up. He hates hanging onto the edge of sleep and not knowing why he won’t let go. What is waiting for him once awake? Why would he rather sleep forever than deal with the real world?

“I believe Jacob is waking up.”

Ah, that would be why.

Back to the beginning of The Santiago To-Do List.

Open your eyes.

“Indeed, he has opened his eyes. Jacob,” Holt’s face shivers for just a moment. “Jacob, it is good to see you.” Holt stops for a moment to take a breath. “My apologies, I’m overcome with emotion.”

“You are?”

Memories of a phone call come back so fast that Jake gasps.

“Tell me I imagined that I was three years in the future.”

“That is impossible,” Holt says, and Jake sighs in relief. “You cannot be in the future. Only the present. You have simply lost three years of memory.”

“Lead with that next time,” Jake growls.

“Jacob, calm down.”

“No, Kevin, I don’t think I will. I have zero memory of the last three years. How can I calm down? Where have I been?”

For a man that never emotes, Holt is showing a startling amount of worry. Which is to say, his brow creasing imperceptibly.

“Captain,” Jakes implores. “Holt. Where have I been?”

Holt steps forward and puts his hand on Jake’s shoulder. The weight of it feels alarmingly good, but it also warns Jake that what he’s about to hear isn’t good.

“You’ve been missing for two and a half years. You’ve been legally dead for one.”

“Dead?” Jake breathes. “Dead? Wow. Cool. Cool cool cool cool cool, no doubt no doubt no doubt.”

“I understand you are stressed, but I urge you to get a hold of yourself. Whatever has happened, we can fix it.”

“Oh, really? You can fix that I’ve been missing and have no memory of anything? And oh my god am I thirty-eight now?”

“That hardly seems pertinent,” Kevin says.

“Well, you’re hardly pertinent.”

“That is an incorrect use of that word, Peralta. Now please calm down before you worsen your condition.”

Breathing hard through his nose, Jake struggles to nod, though he doesn’t try to hide that he doesn’t necessarily agree with the idea. He’s allowed to freak out. He’s lost three years of his goddamn life. Panicking is maybe the only reaction he could possibly have that would be normal.

“I want to go home,” he says miserably.

“And we will take you there. We just need the doctor to sign you off.”

“Did they say what was wrong?”

“You received a blow to your head. Our personal doctor will be coming to see you when we have returned home.”

Sounds fancy.

“If I’ve been dead for a year, do I even have health insurance?”

If he’s honest with himself, that really isn’t his first concern. Being around Amy for so long just brings that to the forefront of his mind, and he can’t get rid of it. There are so many more important things to worry about.

“Do I even have any money? I think I may have written a will when I started the force. My first CO told me to.”

His breath hitches, and he squeezes his eyes shut.

“My mom,” he whispers. “My dad… I can’t believe I’ve put them through this.”

Holt sighs. His hand inexplicably finds its way into Jake’s, as though holding hands was a normal thing for the two on them to do.

“We will solve these problems as they arise. You need not worry now.”

Kevin steps forward and places his warm, heavy hand on Jake's forearm, squeezing just enough that Jake can feel it.

“Raymond and I will be there with you, Jacob. You have been missed.”

Tears spring into his eyes as a doctor comes into the room. Kevin breaks away immediately to talk to the doctor in low tones, and Jake uses the time to scrub at his eyes and look down at the hand being warmed by his boss.

“Mr Peralta, you need to sign these papers to be discharged. Your… fathers? They’ve agreed to take you home and have you seen by their personal doctor. Here is my card in case the doctor wishes to speak to me.”

Holt accepts the card with a nod.

“Have a pleasant day.”

The doctor leaves and Jake, smirking, turns to face Kevin and Holt.

“He called you my dad’s.”

“We heard.”

“And you didn’t deny it.”

“It seemed irrelevant.”

“Sure.”

Trying to keep some of the cheerfulness he feels, Jake accepts help from Holt as he struggles to get out of bed.

“My body feels different,” he admits.

“I imagine that is a side effect of not remembering that last few years.”

“I feel weak,” Jake whines. “Why couldn’t I have spent the last three years working out?”

Holt hands over a pile of clothes and closes the curtain between them.

“Are these yours?” Jake asks as he holds out a pair of large jogging bottoms.

“Yes. I wear those clothes only when I am sick.”

“Oh,” Jake grimaces. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Oh, Raymond, I believe that was sarcasm.”

“I am aware. That is why I replied with a contraction.”

“Of course. My mistake.”

Jake quickly pulls the clothes on, frowning at how different his body looks. Not many new scars to be noted, but he’s much thinner now. His hip bones are unfortunately prominent. Jake has never been particularly ashamed of his body, but now he’s not feeling great. He needs a few sour gummy worm burrito’s to earn back his old body.

Once he’s back to how he used to look, then he’ll be closer to getting his life back. He definitely needs to add to his list.

The curtain hooks scrape along the rail when Jake calls that he’s ready.

“My, you look like a child playing dress-up,” Kevin notes. “In other words, you look quite adorable, Peralta.”

Looking down at the clothes that hang off him in every possible way, Jake frowns.

“Um, thanks?”

“Indeed. Shall we?”

Holt nods to his husband and then Kevin brings in a wheelchair.

“Hey, wait. I didn’t agree to that,” Jake complains, as he leans heavily on the bed.

“It is hospital policy,” Kevin says with a slight raise of his eyebrows.

“Fine,” Jake concedes, as Holt takes his arm and lowers him in. “But only if you go fast and make car noises.”

“I will do no such thing.”

Slumping, Jake settles in for the ride.

B*9*9

“I don’t understand why we can’t just go to my house,” Jake whines as the car pulls up in front of the Holt/Cozner residence. “I want my stuff!”

“You’ve been dead for a year, Jacob. You do not have a house. Your stuff, however, was put into storage at the precinct.”

It’s a small mercy, but it’s enough for now. Holt and Kevin have explained as much as they can, though they did explain to Jake that talking on an aeroplane should be a punishable offence.

They told him that things are not going to be normal for a while, if ever. Being dead comes with many repercussions, and among them are the truths that he no longer has an identity. He didn’t understand much about what they said, as they said a lot of things while using many big words. At one point, Kevin made a comment that was deemed far too philosophical, and it turned into a debate that Jake immediately drowned out.

What Jake does understand is that one day, he went out to get coffee and simply never returned. It took fifteen minutes for the squad to notice that something was up, and an hour before a full-scale search time was launched.

“Charles was beside himself, as was Santiago. By the third week of your disappearance, we’d lost every lead.”

Hearing the sent chills through his body. He tries to imagine what it would be like if he were in their shoes, and one of the squad had gone missing. He’d never have given up searching. And from what Holt has told him, it was under orders that they ended their own search.

“But I’m back now,” Jake told them with shaky confidence. “I can tell the… people who do the apartment stuff that I want to move back in.”

“A landlord, Jacob. And we will look into it.” Holt’s promise sounds slow, which is as expressive as he can probably get. “Let us get you settled.”

Jake pushes against the seat to lever himself to his feet. Once he’s standing, he uses the side of the car to keep upright. Once they realised Jake was weak; they’d informed the airport that Jake needed assistance. However, he can appreciate that maybe he needs the chair for a little while longer.

Holt comes around from the driver’s side and allows Jake to lean on him as they enter the house.

Inside, Holt has to keep an arm around Jake’s waist as they move into the private lounge. Once he’s lowered onto the sofa, Kevin begins to call the doctor to tell them that they’re ready.

“And after this, we can go back to work, right?”

“Once you are back on your feet and legally alive once more, we will discuss the date upon which you may return to work.”

“Captain come on. I can’t just… not go back. I’ve got to investigate this!”

“We have a precinct full of perfectly capable detectives, Peralta. We will entrust them with the case, and I believe that they will be able to, as they say, ‘get to the bottom of it’.”

Jake has zero expectations about what is going to happen to him. How could he? Nothing he’s dealing with is familiar enough for that. He can’t imagine not going back to work, though.

“Hear me out, Holt, please.”

“There is nothing to hear. You cannot simply return to work after experiencing such trauma.”

“But, there is no trauma. To me, it’s just the day after yesterday, and yesterday I was at work.”

“But today it is three years on from your last memory. Not to mention the weakness and head injury. You are not fit for work, nor will I clear you for duty.”

“That’s not fair.”

Holt doesn’t offer a response to that and turns to converse with Kevin. Cheddar comes over and lays down by Jake’s feet, so he feels as though he has at least one friend.

“The doctor will arrive soon. In the meantime, may I offer you a beverage? Perhaps some camomile tea?”

Shaking his head, Jake settles into the couch with his arms crossed. He doesn’t want tea; he wants to go about his life as though nothing has happened while also investigating the mystery that is the last three years. Is that too much to ask for?

B*9*9

 “Amnesia of this degree is uncommon, and unfortunately, there is no cure.”

“Couldn’t you just hit me really hard on the head?” Jake suggests.

The doctor blinks twice.

“Absolutely not,” he scolds. “This is not a cartoon.”

“My apologies. Jacob enjoys living in fantasy’s and often has difficulty separating fact from fiction.”

“Felt kinda pointed,” Jake mutters under his breath.

“As I was saying, there is no cure. However, there is a strong chance that the memories will filter back on their own. Being around things he finds familiar will help him with his condition. Until then, I can only recommend he gets rest and a healthy diet to get his weight back up.”

“Understood,” Kevin nods, and he begins leading the doctor out. “Thank you for your time.”

The door closes softly, and Jake bites his lip to try and hide how disappointed he is. He’s never been great at allowing himself to wallow in sickness or injury. He much prefers just suffering through illness until he gets the better.

“I understand you must be frustrated.”

“Frustrated doesn’t even cover it. I want to go back to work. At least let me see the squad?”

Holt breathes heavily through his nose.

“We will see how you are feeling in the morning. Until then, we will follow doctors orders. You need rest and food.”

“Fine.”

“Thank you for understanding.”

B*9*9

The next day, Jake is sat in Holt’s car, fidgeting with the window buttons and purposefully ignoring the fact that he’d woken up screaming in the middle of the night. Holt and Kevin had ‘attended to his distress’, and he’s mortified. He’d been sweating so bad that his clothes stuck to him, and worse; he’d been crying. Neither Holt nor Kevin allowed him to be ashamed, but it didn’t stop his face from burning red after they had talked him down from a panic attack.

Jake isn’t wholly unfamiliar with anxiety, since his job kind of demands it. Not to mention his past. That doesn’t mean he’s never had a panic attack, though. His trembling has yet to come to an end. Holt was extremely reluctant to let him come.

“But if you leave me here, alone, who knows what kind of trouble I can cause. I’m basically a toddler if you think about it. Gosh, I hope you don’t have any expensive china.”

All it took then was an imploring look from Kevin and Holt finally decided maybe taking Jake to work wasn’t such a bad idea.

As they pulled into the parking lot, Jake noted that the trembling was much less a result of the morning. In fact, he felt kind of sick.

“Are you sure you’re ready?”

Not even a little.

“I was born ready.”

His shaking voice probably gave him away.

“I do not believe you had any say in whether you were born ready,” Holt frowns.

Sighing, Jake moves to open the door. At the same time, Holt engages the locking system.

“Jacob, please be warned that the team are, as of yet, unaware of your return. This will come as a shock to them, and it may take some time for them to come around. Be patient.”

“My middle name is patience.”

“False. You do not have a middle name.”

“It’s a saying,” Jake sighs. “I was just letting you know that I’m so patient that it’s in my name.”

“Inaccurate. If your middle name eluded to your personality, it would be ‘immature’ or ‘hyperactive’.”

“Can we go in now?”

The locks disengage, and Jake steps out of the car. Stretching out, he immediately grabs the waist-band of the jogging bottoms before they fall to his ankles.

“Please tell me some of my clothes were put into storage.”

“I’m afraid not. We saved your jacket, but keeping your clothes seemed impractical.”

Nerves nip at his stomach as they start to walk through the garage, and Jake feels as though he’s drunk a dozen cups of coffee. He’s not ready.

“You’re growing pale, Peralta.”

“Can you just pick one of my names? Jacob or Peralta. You’re giving me headrush every time you change it.”

“Do not deflect. Are you well?”

There’s no way to escape Holt’s piercing gaze inside the small elevator.

“I’m fine.”

“You will be required to rest in my office for some parts of today.”

Scoffing, Jake frowns.

“You’re telling me I need to take a nap?”

“The doctor recommended rest. I believe in the excitement of the day; you’ll struggle to remain upright. Therefore, yes. I am telling you to take a nap.”

“You’re not the boss of me.”

“If you wish to get your job back, then I am.”

“I don’t like it when you’re mean.”

The elevator dings and Jake does his very best to avoid stepping behind Holt as all the eyes in the office turn once, and then double-take.

Terry is the first to move, stepping around his desk and taking two steps forward.

“Jake?”

“Hi, guys.”

There’s a roar of noise as everyone stands up at once, and Jake steps around Holt to accept his fate.

Chapter Text

Chapter Three

“Jake?”

Terry takes another step forward, squinting. Gina, who was sat leaning on Rosas desk, pales and stands up too.

“Terrance! What’s up! My man. My dude. My – OK, ow.”

Terry’s arms wrap around Jake, squeezing him tightly.

“You’re going to hug the life out of me.”

“Don’t tempt me, Peralta,” Terry says wetly.

“Are you crying?”

Terry doesn’t comment, but he releases Jake. Amy, Rosa, Gina and Charles are suddenly in front of him.

“Jake, is that really you?” Charles asks, coming forward slowly, uncertainty.

“Yeah. It’s me.”

A sharp pain blossoms on his arm, and he turns to find Rosa with her fist up.

“If you ever do that again, I’ll cut out your spleen. Understand?”

“Unnecessarily graphic, but OK.”

“Where were you?” Amy demands.

“Why did you leave?” Charles whispers.

“What were you thinking, taking off like that?” Terry admonishes.

“I didn’t-”

“Did you miss me?” Gina asks.

“Are you OK?”

“Are you hurt?”

“Three years, Jake.”

“Do you know what you’ve put us through?”

“STOP!”

The room spins, the faces blur together, and soon the noises become too much. Jake’s brain begins to rattle.

“Jake?”

“Just…”

Jake crouches down, covering his ears, trying to abate the shaking. The noises are too much. His head is pounding. His skin feels oddly numb, and he’s not sure if people are still touching him, or if he just has phantom pressure around his arms.

“Come,” Holt says, his voice working its way through all the noise. “My office.”

A hand on his elbow helps him to stand straight, but he keeps his eyes squeezed shut. Heat creeps up from his chest and spreads across his face. He’s led around his concerned friends and into the office. The door clicks closed, and he’s lowered into the couch.

“You are OK. It is just us now.”

“Too much noises.”

“Many, Peralta. Too many noises.”

Jake opens his eyes so that he can glare.

“I knew that.”

He’s pretty sure he did. His head is too messy right now to know the rules of grammar or whatever.

The sofa dips beside him, and Holt puts a tentative arm around Jake’s shoulders. Feeling too weak to protest, and vulnerable enough to need it, he allows Holt to pull him in enough that he’s leaning on his boss’s shoulder.

“This is weird,” Jake mumbles.

“Physical contact in a time of need is not weird. It is normal.”

“Not when it’s your boss.”

“Technically, until you are legally alive and working here again, I am not.”

“You really should pick what the situation is here. You can’t tell me you’re not my boss now but pull rank when I want to go to work.”

The quiet in the office helps his breath come back and with it shame over breaking down. How is he ever going to face the team again?

“I think maybe we need to approach this differently,” Holt muses. “I will call a team meeting and explain what we know so far. Then, I will come and collect you. They may ask questions one at a time. Once that is over, you may speak with the team one-by-one. However, you must eat by twelve and then rest for at least one hour.”

“Sure, dad.”

A heavy hand lands in his shoulder.

“Good.”

Jake rears back at Holt’s lack of complaints and cries out when the man leaves the room.

“I feel like I didn’t win that,” Jake tells the room.

No one replies, but he does feel the tell-tale burn of eyes on the back of his neck through the blinds. Holt calls from the rooms attention of the bullpen and informs them that there will be a debriefing on the situation.

While he waits, Jake decides to have a little wonder around the office. Nothing looks too different, especially from this side of the desk. The books, the closed laptop, the phone, the pencil case with the LGBTQ+ flag. However, two things on his desk weren’t there three years ago.

Stepping around the desk, Jake swallows back his emotions as he finds a picture of himself on the first Halloween heist in a frame with a small plaque. Leaning in, he reads the words ‘RIP the worlds best detective/genius’. Beside the picture frame is Jake’s Rubix cube, left unsolved.

“Jacob, we’re ready for you.”

Holt says nothing when Jake turns away and wipes at his eyes. Something deep within him wants to ask; did you really miss me that much? He keeps it hidden, though. Asking would sound pathetic, and of the two answers, one would make him feel like crap. So, he follows Holt through the empty bullpen and into the briefing room.

There’s a notable shift in the room as he enters. Everyone sits a little straighter, and all the eyes follow him.

“You speak first, Peralta. And then the floor may ask questions.”

Jake nods, fingers tapping out a staccato on the podium as he eyes the team. It’s simultaneously like he’s barely been away and that there’s a giant, gaping hole between them. Like they’re on opposite sides of the canyon, but they’ve crossed the space, and Jake hasn’t.

“Um, well, I guess first things first, I have no memory of the last three years. Yesterday, I woke up in a dirty house, I hitch-hiked my way into the nearest town, and then called Holt. Um.” Jake bites the entirety of his bottom lip. “I have nothing else to offer. I literally remember nothing. Please, if anything important has happened, oh. Has there been another Die Hard?”

“Stay on track,” Holt reminds him.

“Right. Yeah. The track. Anyway, yeah. I don’t know what I’ve been doing or how I went missing. I’m not sure what questions you could possibly have.”

Immediately, Amy’s hand shoots into the air.

“Santiago.”

Her shoulders drop a little, and her head tilts to the side.

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

“I was here, working. It was a normal day. It was like I’d just teleported from my desk to the floor of the cottage.”

“Do you remember… us?”

“The squad? Yeah.”

“No. Us.”

“Us? Being partners?”

Amy’s shoulders slump further, and Jake’s eyes widen.

“Were we… you know…”

“You were boinking,” Hitchcock offers.

“Gross,” Amy and Jake complain.

“It’s not on the list of words we can’t say. It’s better than—"

“Hitchcock, if you can keep your helpful additions to yourself, it would be greatly appreciated, vomit emoji, angry emoji, hashtag; you suck.”

“Thanks, Gina. Anyway, uh, I’m sorry, Ames. I don’t… remember that.”

Amy nods, muscles clenching in her jaw.

“Sorry.”

“Oh, don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault.”

Guilt settles in his stomach like a tonne of cement when the bags under her eyes darken.

“I will, though. Remember. If you want me to.”

Amy smiles at him, but the haunted look doesn’t leave her eyes.

“Enough about Amy,” Charles says, earning himself a dirty look from everyone, though he clearly does not care. “Jake, did you miss me?”

“I don’t remember anything, Charles.”

“Right,” Charles nods and looks around the room. “But you missed me?”

“Sure, Charles. I missed you.”

Looking pleased with himself, Charles grins and nods, leaning back in the chair.

“How’re are you feeling?”

“Honestly, Terry, not great. I’m wearing Holt’s sick-day clothes, sleeping in their spare room and being told that it’s 2019. My body is weak, my head is constantly hurting, and I’m really not sure what I’m supposed to be doing.”

“We’re here for you if you need it.”

“Thanks, Terr-Bear. I appreciate it.”

“Jakey, we’re ignoring the elephant in the room,” Gina announces, long fingernails tapping against the back of her phone.

“Which is?”

“What’s is like living with Holt?”

Jake grins.

“It’s like going from having no dad to having two. Kevin made me pancakes!”

Gina grins at him, and he smiles back, almost like when they were in school when one of them would get called to the front of the class for causing trouble. They never could keep a straight face.

“Please note that Jacob is on doctors orders to rest regularly. You are welcome to continue talking, but at twelve, it is lunchtime, and then he must rest in my office.”

“Ooh, nap time,” Gina squeals. “I can get in on that action.”

“Holt, come on,” Jake hisses.

“You heard the doctor. It is for your own health.”

“You just enjoy bossing me around.”

“I assure you, I take no pleasure in such things.”

“Look at that! Your right eyebrow twitched. You’re basically wetting yourself laughing at me.”

“I most certainly am not.”

Snickering in her sweater sleeve, Gina rolls her eyes. “He is.”

“So, life updates? What did I miss?”

A lot.

Jake has missed so much. It hurts with every new piece of information, and Jake tries to keep his devil-may-care smile in place as each punch hits.

Charles got married again to an art curator that he proved innocent of insurance fraud and adopted a son. Terry and his wife had another child, a girl, that they named Ayla. Diaz came out as bi and had a whole drama thing with her parents and has dated so many people since then. Gina left the nine-nine to pursue a career in other stuff, like the internet, which was wildly successful.

“I’m not really working here. I just came in cause Holt said he needed me to explain the filing system again.”

“I will admit, I am surprised that you fell for the rouse. As we both know, you had no filing ‘system’.”

Hitchcock and Scully have not changed at all, though they do mention the new hotdog place that opened down the road. Between them, they took such egregious advantage of the opening offer that the place had to close down almost immediately.

“Jake, we’ve missed you.”

Jake takes in the faces of his family and feels a lump rise in his throat. He’s been away from them all for a year. He didn’t even know he was gone, but he misses them so much.

“I’m sorry.”

Gina stands up and pulls Jake in, pushing his head into the crook of her neck. They never do this around people, but she obviously knew the tears were coming before he did.

“I’ll come with you to tell your parents.”

Nodding, Jake doesn’t protest as he’s led out of the room and back into Holt’s office.

“Kevin and I prepared lunch for you, Jacob.”

While he eats the sandwich and fruit cup, Gina talks utter nonsense to him. He only listens partially, enjoying the familiarity of the exchange. That is, until-

“What, you had a baby?”

“She’s called Enigma. We call her Iggy for short.”

“With who?”

“Whom,” Holt adds.

“Well, that’s where it gets a little confusing, actually. There’s this Boyle cousin, and really, you wouldn’t be able to tell, since he’s actually very attractive. Ah, and normal. I suppose he was technically my cousin at the same time but—”

“Wait, what?”

“Yeah, it’s a whole thing, Jakey. You obviously missed that. Our parents got married. After Boyle and I called off our little thing, obviously.”

“You and Charles?”

“You knew about it.”

“I don’t remember it.”

Gina falls silent in a rare moment of thought.

“You missed so much, Jake.”

“Three years is a long time, huh.”

“So long. Especially when your best friend is gone.”

“Gina, I’m—”

“If you say you’re sorry one more time, I’m going to give you a bad review on G-rated. It stands for Gina-rated. It’s where you upload people’s pictures and personal details without their consent and rate them. It’s number one in the iTunes store.”

“That’s awful.”

“On an unrelated note, let’s take a selfie. Say, ‘Back from the dead!’”

Jake throws up a peace sign.

“Back from the dead!”

“We look Ah-Mazing. Hashtag; Who are we. Hashtag; Ghosting. Hashtag; But did ya die tho. Hashtag; Whodunnit.”

Jake watches as Gina taps out two dozen hashtags on her Insta pic and posts it.

“Woah. Is that two hundred likes? It’s only been up for five seconds.”

“That’s the price of being a star, Jakey. Unending appreciation for my genius.”

For a moment, Jake almost forgets about why he’s so tense, but one look at Holt’s desk floods anxiety back into his veins.

“I wish I knew what happened to me.”

“You’re in a building full of detectives, honey. Someone will find the truth.”

“I want to—”

“Absolutely not,” Gina and Holt both say.

“We have talked about this. You cannot simply go off and start investigating your own disappearance. You are in no state.”

“I’m in the perfect state.”

“I agree with Holt. You need to take some time away.”

“I’ve taken three years.”

“And you remember none of it. You’ve got so much that needs to be done first. You’re still legally dead. Hell, ya ‘rents think you’re dead, still. The clothes you are wearing look ridic- no offence Cap. Let’s solve those problems first, and then join the investigation afterwards?”

“We will all help you get back on your feet,” Holt promises. “Until then, please rest.”

Any protests are cut off by Gina, pushing him down into the couch.

“Take a nap, my little crying face emoji. I’ll make an itinerary. First, clothes. Second, parents. Third, we’ll get you alive again.”

“I’m not even tired.”

“Irrelevant. Doctors’ orders.”

With a huff, Jake turns around and curls into himself on the couch. He’s not looking forward to seeing his parents again, because it’s going to be so much harder facing his mother after so long. She must have been so lonely.

It’s impossible to predict how his dad would have felt. Happy that he didn’t have to pretend to want to be around Jake anymore? Devastated that he missed his chance to get to know his only child? Unbothered, because what happens to Jake simply doesn’t affect him?

Jake falls asleep to the thoughts of returning to his family, only to be rejected again.

*B*9*9*

An hour later, Jake is woken by Gina blowing on his face.

“Your mom follows me insta.”

“She saw the photo,” Jake says, sitting up.

“Yerp.”

“Oh, no.”

Chapter Text

Chapter Four

“How did you not know my mom was following you?” Jake complains as they climb into her car.

“Jake, babes, I have over twenty-five million followers. You expect me to know them all?”

“Wow, really?”

“Right? I’m like the queen.”

“And you named your baby something weird. So you’re like Beyoncé, too.”

“Who did you think I was talking about before?”

Gina offers her fist, and Jake hits it with his own.

“Tell me about the baby, then.”

For someone who’s shown admiration for so few people, hearing her talk to reverently about a baby is jarring. Gina promises that Jake will meet Iggy eventually, but she’s is staying with her father until Gina returns home. For the meantime, ‘I’ve got you to look after, kiddo’.

Jake is grateful for her dedication to helping him, but the nerves that wrack his body quash the only near-positive thing he’s able to experience. It doesn’t help that Gina’s driving style seems to be more ‘my energy pushes people out of my way, Jake. I’m like Moses’ than ‘safe’, meaning his stomach spends most of the drive trying to escape through his mouth.

“You know if you think about it, you’re like little Anastasia.”

“What?”

“Anastacia. The Russian princess?”

“I’m not following.”

“There were movies about her. You know they’re important if they’re making movies about them.”

“Was it a documentary, because you know I—”

“Animated, kiddo. You’ve no excuse. There was a rat thing, songs, random bad guy, lots of green and purple. You’d love it.”

Jake shrugs again.

“Oh, my poor, uncultured princess. Let me tell you a story.

“In 1917, the King or Czar or whatever – Anastasia’s dad – abdicated. That means he gave up the throne. There was this big revolution or something. Anyway, the family had to go on the run. I don’t remember where they went, exactly, but they disappeared for a year. I think they were kept in some big house somewhere. They left in body bags, cause some police people went in and shot them all.”

“This story is awful,” Jake complains.

“Well, that wasn’t the interesting part. The interesting part is that ya girl, Anastasia, was lost. No one knew where she was. Thus, the rumours began. The biggest trope from the story is that she became an amnesiac, like you, and went missing, just like you!”

“I won’t complain about being a princess,” Jake shrugs. “But that story is messed up, yo.”

“You asked.”

“You remember this conversation wrong.”

In the time that they’ve been talking, Gina has successfully managed to drive them to Jake’s Mom’s house. They’re silent for a moment, both staring up at the door.

“This is going to be awful,” Jake whispers. “What if she doesn’t recognise me?”

“You’re the one with amnesia, not your mom.”

“Oh yeah.”

Gina moves first, turning off the car and stepping out. She waits for Jake to gather his bearings, though she doesn’t do so patiently.

“You ready yet?” she asks, rapping her knuckles on the window. “Jake, are you ready now? Now? Are you ready now?”

More annoyed that truly ready to face his Mom, Jake gets out. His footsteps sound louder than usual, and the air sits heavily in his lungs. His Mom shouldn’t have to deal with her son dying. Sure, it was a discussion after four glasses of wine after he first joined the force. His mother understood the risks of his job, but Jake had never truly appreciated how it would affect those around him until now.

The door opens before Gina even manages to ring the doorbell.

“Jake.”

Jake is pulled into his mother's arms instantly, and he melts into her warmth. He tucks his head into her shoulder and sobs, not caring about being outside in the open or having people see.

“You’re alive, you’re alive, you’re alive,” Karen whispers, holding him tightly.

Jake can’t do much more than cry into her shoulder, his tears soaking her shirt.

“Let’s get inside,” Gina says, ushering the two through the doors.

Karen keeps a firm grip on Jakes’s hand as they move into the living room. Filled with warmth and familiarity, Jake sits down on the couch next to his mother. Gina sits on the couch opposite, leaving back and watching.

“I can’t believe I’m seeing you,” Karen says, hands exploring Jake’s face. “You’ve lost weight.”

“It’s this special diet I’ve been on,” Jake says wetly, brushing tears away with the back of his hand.

“Not that you’d know,” Gina adds.

“What does that mean?” Karen asks and then turns. “What do you mean, Gina?”

“Mom, don’t freak out, but I have no memories of the last three years.” Jake grimaces. “It sounds like a bad movie plot.”

“I’m in it, Jake. There’s no such thing as a bad movie with me in.”

“I don’t understand,” Karen says, retaking Jake’s hand.

“Well, that makes two of us.”

“Karen, the bare bones of it is that Jake disappeared, and returned with three years of his life missing. He has no idea what he’s been doing this entire time.”

“But I—”

“Son?”

Jake’s eye twitches as he turns around to find his father stood in the doorway between the kitchen and lounge.

“Dad?”

Roger stares, mouth moving as he tries to form words.

“You’re alive.”

Jake looks to his Mom and then back at his dad.

“What are you doing here?”

Roger blanches.

“I could say the same thing.”

Jake shakes his head.

“What’s going on?”

Suddenly, the room feels exceptionally suffocating. Jake fights for breath as he tries to piece everything together and fails. Between the overwhelming guilt, the struggle of not knowing anything about where he’s been the last three years, and now the shock at seeing his father at his Mom’s house; it’s too much.

“Jake, darling, you need to calm down.”

“I’ll get some drinks,” Roger says, sounding dazed.

With a hand on his heaving chest, Jake leans forward and tries to breathe normally. Gina is on one knee in front of him, her hands on his thighs.

“Come on. Breathe. You’re OK. You’re safe. Remember, you’re at your Mom’s house.”

“Yeah,” Jake nods. “Yeah.”

“That’s it. Just breathe.”

Roger re-enters the room with a tray. Four tumblers sit with amber liquid and ice inside. They clink against one another as his shaky hands set them on the coffee table.

Then, he sits on the sofa staring at Jake.

“What’s going on? How’re you… we thought you were dead?”

“Jake doesn’t have any memories of the last three years,” Karen explains.

“Oh?” Roger’s face jumps through a series of expressions. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

“I was at work?” Jake offers with a shrug. “Nothing of real importance. Nothing that would suggest I was about to go off the grid.”

“How did you lose your memory?”

“I don’t know,” Jake hisses.

“Sorry. Sorry. Of course. I’m just… wow. I’m so surprised.”

“Yeah, you and me both. What’s going on here? Why are you at Mom’s?”

Jake isn’t sure whether he regrets asking, but he sure is horrified when he gets the answer. From the look on Gina’s face, she feels the same way.

“I can’t imagine there’s anything that works less as an aphrodisiac than a funeral. Especially not your own sons,” she grimaces.

“We were both so caught up in our grief,” Karen explains.

“Yeah, and we weren’t sure what to do with it, you know? I came back here and slept on the couch. Things just… went from there.”

“But mom,” Jake implores. “You remember what he did, right?”

“Vividly,” Karen says.

“Then, why?”

“Because, Jake, my life was suddenly very empty and the only person who understood was your father.”

“Oh please,” Jake snorts, standing up suddenly. “He never cared about me.”

Roger flinches and hangs his head.

“Jacob Peralta, you watch what you’re saying.”

“Why should I?” Jake cries out. “He left. He left and didn’t come back for years. When he did come back, it was always for his own benefit. He wasn’t interested in seeing me. He was only interested in using me.”

“That’s not true,” Roger pleads.

Without even backwards glance, Jake storms out of the house. He doesn’t spare a thought for his belongings, which are left in Gina’s car. He doesn’t even give himself time to consider that maybe he’s not in the best condition to be storming anywhere.

He just needs to get away.

Away from everything and everyone.

Most of all, he needs to get away from the shame. He’s been panicking a lot recently.

Hadn’t all of his teachers at school said that he was ‘happy-go-lucky’ and that nothing ever seemed to bother him? So why is he suddenly an Anxious Annie all the time, and unable to just brush stuff away like before?

Maybe he’s not as unaffected by the missing time as he’d first felt.

“Thank god I found you.”

Freezing, Jake turns to find Gina leaning out of her car window.

“Get in the car.”

“I need some time alone,” Jake mutters.

“You’ve been gone for three hours, Jakey. Your Mom is worried, and Holt will kill me if I lose you.”

Three hours? That explains why his feet hurt.

“Come on. You look like you’re going to collapse any second.”

“I feel like it,” Jake says as he climbs in.

“Could you try and be slightly less dramatic in the future?” Gina asks as they turn around. “You can’t just disappear like that.”

“Apparently I can,” Jake huffs.

Gina sighs and suddenly pulls up at the side of the road. Jake is about to protest, but she holds up a finger. Snapping his mouth closed, Jake glares in annoyance.

“I will do this once, and only once, understand? I hate explaining other people’s emotions to them just because they’re too stupid to do it themselves.”

“Hey—”

“Ah ah ah,” Gina says. “Momma is speaking. You, little ducky, need to listen and listen well. Consider this a Gine-mendement.”

“A what?”

“It’s like the ten commandments, but less dull and more me. Anyway. You’re not as angry at your dad as you think you are. Though you’re not as mad as you should be, but that’s just my opinion, and I’ll get into that much later on.

“You think you’re angry at your dad for boning your mom.”

“Gina, ew.”

“You’re actually angry at all of us.”

“What? No—”

“No. I’m speaking. You’re angry at us because you feel like you were forgotten. To you, it’s a matter of days, and everyone’s lives have moved on. But it’s been three years. Our lives had to go on. It’s not a sign that we didn’t love you. It’s not even a sign that we stopped grieving. Don’t think about it in terms of you. Think about it in terms of us. You’re allowed to be angry, Jake. You’re allowed to be furious. But only for a little while. Get it out of your system. Understand that no-one has done anything wrong, not us, not you.”

Gina, having said her piece, starts the engine of the car and starts driving.

“We’re going to buy you some clothes now. And then I have to take you back to Holt. You look dead on your feet.”

“I don’t have any money.”

“Oh, honey,” Gina chortles. “I’m rich. It’s all on me.”

“Wow. Thanks, Gina.”

“Thank me later. It’s my money, so I get to choose the clothes.”

“I trust you.”

“Speaking of trust; your dad, dude.”

“You said I shouldn’t be angry,” Jake reminds her.

“I said you shouldn’t be angry for long. About moving on. But you should be angry about Roger’s hand in your disappearance.”

Jake must look suitably confused, because Gina groans.

“Come on. You’re supposed to be a detective, man. Your dad’s face when you said you didn’t remember anything from the last three years? Relief. You know what that means, don’t you?”

Realisation settles in his stomach like sour milk.

“My dad had something to do with my disappearance.”

“Worse than that. I think Holt knows more than he’s letting on.”

“Gina, that’s quite the accusation.”

“I have reasons. Let me explain before you wet yourself with attempts to defend your gay dad. Listen. When people go missing the law states that you have to be missing for at least three years before you are declared dead. You got a year and a bit. At the time, I didn’t think anything of it, but while you were napping, I was doing some research. To be declared legally dead so soon after a disappearance means that there has to be overwhelming evidence to suggest such. Your case left nothing. There wasn’t a single shred of evidence that would lead us to think you’d died.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“Well, I didn’t understand why you would get special treatment. So, I made a phone call. Guess who pushed to have you declared dead so early?”

Jake’s shoulders sag.

“Holt.”

“Exactly. And why would he do that?”

“Because he knew something that everyone else didn’t.”

“Indeed. I know I was against this before, but I think you need to investigate your own disappearance.”

Chapter Text

Chapter Five

If Jake thought that he’d have some time off from having surprises thrown at him like flaming baseballs intent on burning him to a crisp, he was wrong.

“I can’t believe Dad… I mean Holt… I mean, Captain Dad… I mean—”

“You mean both,” Gina says. “Both you bio-Dad and your work Dad.”

“Yeah. I can’t believe my Dad’s might be in on this.”

“Well, I for one am unsurprised to learn that Roger has taken yet another opportunity to screw you over. I’ve always said—”

“That’s he’s the biggest A-hole.”

“You know me so well.”

“Well, you did say it every day since he left until we graduated high school.”

Gina’s smile carries an edge to it that cuts off every joke Jake wants to make. The information he’s trying to process is a bit much for him, though he recognises that he really doesn’t have much choice.

“First things first, we need to get you some clothes. And then, you have to pretend that I didn’t tell you what I did about Holt. He’ll know if you suspect him.”

“Yeah, yeah, got it.”

“Do you, Jake? You’ve never been a great actor.”

Immediately offended, Jake leans away and shakes his head.

“I was amazing in Fiddler on the Roof.”

“You were a tree.”

“A very convincing tree.”

They bicker all the way to the mall, but Gina stops abruptly as she appraises the options.

“Take these,” she orders, shoving an armful of jeans and shirts towards him. “Try them on.”

With an open-mouthed smile, Jake accepts the pile.

“Is it time for a montage?” he asks.

“Indeed. I’ll do the music.”

For thirty minutes, Gina films Jake as he comes out and struts up and down the aisle to the sound of ‘Lets Dance to Joy Division’ by The Wombats. She cheers and judges as he spins and returns to the dressing room.

“Do you mind?” some elderly lady complains as he dances around her.

“Hey lady, you’re ruining a perfectly good montage,” Gina calls.

With a disgusted look, the woman hobbles away and straight towards a security guard.

“We should leave,” Jake says.

“Indeed.”

Gina pulls three jackets and a hooded sweatshirt from the racks, and they race to the check-out counters as the guard starts towards them.

B*9*9

“Does this shirt say, ‘I love Jesus’?” Jake asks, holding up a hoodie to his chest as they drive away.

“It does.”

“Oh. Cool.”

“Now, the next step in our master plan; we go to Holts, you act normal, and we start the paperwork for bringing you alive.”

“I’ll be like a red-tape zombie.”

“Great name for a band,” Gina comments.

“Right?”

As they pull up to the Holt/Cozner household, Gina turns around in her seat to stare at Jake intensely.

“Don’t let them know. If Holt knows you suspect him of anything, it’ll make investigating the truth so much harder.”

“I won’t.”

“You will, and we both know it. Just… try to keep your interactions short.”

“Jeez, Gina. I know what I’m doing.”

Inside, Holt and Kevin are sat in the lounge.

“Did you have a nice day?” Holt asks.

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

A sharp elbow to the ribs reminds Jake of the plan.

“I mean, yes.”

“What did you do?”

“Yes.”

“You’re acting rather strange, Jacob. Is everything quite alright?” Kevin asks, setting his book to the side.

“Yes. Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Jake and I need to start on the paperwork for his un-death. Don’t interrupt.”

With a strong hand wrapped around his bicep, Jake is forcibly yanked out of the lounge and towards the kitchen.

“What was that?” she hisses.

“What do you mean? That was me playing it cool.”

A single raised eyebrow speaks volumes, and Jake cringes.

“OK, OK. I know.”

“That was a bad tree, Jake.”

“I can’t help it. What if Holt had a hand in my disappearance? What if Holt—”

“What if Holt, what?”

Jumping, Jake turns to find Holt standing in the doorway.

“You were acting rather unusually earlier, which for you is truly saying something. Is there something the matter?”

“No,” Jake laughs. “Of course not. Why would there be anything wrong? Everything is fine and dandy. It’s all cool.”

“Smooth,” Gina mutters.

“Thanks.”

“I was being sarcastic.”

“Ah.”

“Do you need any help with the paperwork?” Holt offers.

“No thank you, Raymond. We’re perfectly fine.”

“Well, I am just through there if you need anything. Ms Linetti, we will be eating dinner at seven-thirty sharp. Would you care to attend?”

“I’ve got to get home to the baby.”

Holt nods once, eyes searching over the two before leaving.

“That was close.”

“You’re the worst,” Gina complains.

B*9*9

Gina leaves with the promise to file the paperwork in the morning. As her car disappears down the road, Jake turns back into the house to join Holt and Kevin at the kitchen table.

“How are you feeling today, Jacob?” Kevin asks.

“Better, I guess. Gina bought me some new clothes. I got to see my mom. I took a nap in Holt’s office.”

“Excellent. Well, I thought you might want to know that this weekend, Raymond and I are planning to go away for our anniversary. While we are away, you will be staying with Sargent Jeffords. I hope that suits you well.”

Blinking, Jake frowns.

“Can’t you just leave me here?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Fine. But I don’t need to be babysat.”

“I beg to differ. Even in normal circumstances, I would not leave you alone in our house. Now, with three years of memory missing, you are vulnerable and much more of a liability.”

“That’s rude.”

“Do you disagree?”

Jake opens his mouth to argue.

“No.”

“That is what I thought. Raymond will drop with you with Sargent Jeffords after work tomorrow. We will return on Monday.”

While the prospect isn’t exactly an exciting one, it does open up the opportunity for Jake to take a few days to think about what he’s learned. Plus, if Holt is away, there’s no one to stop him from investigating.

That night, Jake falls asleep content in the knowledge that he’ll be able to unmask the mystery of his disappearance.

B*9*9

“Jacob, you need not do this.”

“We both know I do.”

“The squad needs you.”

Jake’s calves burn as he runs. Someone is behind him, he’s not sure who, only that they’re incredibly dangerous. A gunshot rings through the stale night air, and Jake trips over his shoelaces. There is a flash of white as pain erupts in his shoulder. A hand immediately reaches up, and he can feel blood oozing between his fingertips.

“I told you what would happen if you ran, Jake.”

Screaming, Jake tries his best to get to his feet. Arms grab his shoulders, and it feels as though someone is pressing a hot rod to his shoulder.

“Jacob!”

He has to fight. If he doesn’t, he knows exactly what will happen. He can’t let them… he can’t let them win!

“Jacob, you must wake up.”

His eyes sting with tears as he fights his way out of the hold, only to be further restrained.

“Jacob, you are going to hurt yourself. You must wake up!”

A sharp pain sparks across his cheek, and suddenly, Kevin is standing over him in a dark room, hand aloft.

“K-Kevin?”

Kevin sighs and sits at the edge of the bed. Arms that were wrapped around his chest, pinning his arms to his sides, release their hold and Jake sees Holt looking equally as relieved.

“I had another nightmare,” Jake guesses.

“You were quite violent this time, Jacob.”

“Did I-did I hurt either of you?”

“No. But you did say your shoulder was hurt. Would you care for me to look at it?” Kevin offers.

Jake slowly reaches a hand up to his shoulder, trying to remember his dream.

“Nah, it doesn’t hurt.” Jake’s hand drops to the duvet. “Sorry.”

“Nonsense. Just go back to sleep. We will see you in the morning.”

“Yeah. See you.”

Jake doesn’t fall back asleep. Instead, he lays, staring at the ceiling, wondering why he suddenly has wildly violent dreams.

B*9*9

At the precinct the next morning, Jake takes his box of belongings from the storage room and rifles through what they saved of his life. Mostly, it’s knick-knacks from his desk. There’s his badge, a tie, his leather jacket – which he immediately puts on – his phone, wallet, three copies of Die Hard, and a book he doesn’t recognise by an author he’s unfamiliar with.

He takes the whole box with him to the dreadfully empty desk that sits directly in front of Amy’s.

“Hey, Peralta.”

“Ames. How was your evening?”

“Not bad, I guess. I’ve started reviewing the evidence we had when you went missing.”

“Oh yeah?” Jake’s head pops up from the box. “Mind if I take a look?”

“I don’t know, Jake. Holt said not to.”

“Holt isn’t the boss of you.”

“He is.”

“Well, OK. Point. But are you going to let him tell you what to do?”

“Yes. That’s literally his job.”

“OK, fine. Valid. Valid.” Jake pauses, searching for something he can say to convince her. “Santiago, look. Put yourself in my shoes. Wouldn’t you want to be investigating your own disappearance? Don’t I have a right?”

When Amy looks behind her at Holt’s office, Jake knows he’s won. Maybe he should consider a career in negotiation? He’s clearly very skilled.

“OK, fine. But if Holt finds out, I’m saying you stole them from me.”

“Deal.”

Amy promises that she’ll send the evidence she has via email. Jake reminds her that he doesn’t have a computer.

“Sargent Jeffords, could you get Jake a computer, please?”

“It would be my pleasure.”

Terry carries in the computer and a monitor under one arm, and a basket filled with wires, a keyboard and a mouse in the other.

“Here you are, Jake. I’ll set it up for you.”

Jake leans back in his chair and watches as Terry installs the computer and plugs everything in. Finally, with a flourish, the power button is pressed, and the computer whirs to life.

“Thanks, Terrance.”

“The girls are real excited to see you again,” Terry says.

“Yeah? Gods, I bet they’re all grown up now, huh.”

“They’re still my babies,” Terry almost growls. “It’ll be a fun little sleepover.”

“Am I hearing this correctly?”

“Boyle!” Jake shouts, hand jumping to his chest.

“Sorry, Jakey. Didn’t mean to scare you, but are you going to Terry’s house? Terry, are you babysitting Jake?”

“No one is babysitting me, Boyle,” Jake complains.

“Yes, I am babysitting him. Holt trusts me,” Terry says, rising to his full height.

“It’s not babysitting,” Jake reminds them.

“What about me? We’re both parents, Terry, but I’m Jake’s best friend. Which means I know him best. Tell me, Terry, what is the best way to put Jake to bed?”

“Warm milk and a story.”

“I’m not a baby,” Jake whines.

“Nice try, but what Jake needs is a warm blanket – fresh from the dryer – and the TV turned on low.”

“Come on Boyle, I told you that in confidence.”

“I have three children, Charles. I know what I’m doing.”

Jake, unable to take it much longer, stands up. This draws the attention of both Terry and Boyle.

“Stop talking about me as though I’m three years old. I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself. I don’t need anyone to look after me or warmed up a blanket. I’m a grown man.”

“I know that, Jake. I just want to make sure you’re comfortable.”

“And I want to know why I wasn’t given priority,” Boyle says, hands on his hips.

“How about I take him tonight, and you take him tomorrow night?”

Terry and Boyle continue their conversation over Jake’s head.

“It’s the custody battle my dad never engaged in,” Jake says to Amy.

“Give them a break. They missed you.”

“Yeah, I know that, but I feel like I’m being treated like an idiot. I don’t appreciate it.”

“No, but we didn’t appreciate spending two and a half years without you. This is the new normal for a while. Just let it happen, OK?”

Reluctant, but aware that Amy might be right, Jake just shrugs. He creates a new email and writes it down. Amy sends over a file and Jake sends it to the printer.

“What are you doing?” Holt asks.

Jumping back, Jake tries to make it look as though he wasn’t just caught with his hands in the cookie jar.

“I’m collecting some papers for Amy,” Jake lies.

“You are lying.”

Jake stares for a moment.

“I’m printing off some information about amnesia.”

“Oh. That is uncharacteristic of you.”

“I wanted to prove the doctor wrong. I saw it in the muppets movie. If you hit someone over the head when they have amnesia, you’ll bring their memories back. I’m certain of it.”

“Well, that is in character.”

“I’ll let you know what I find.”

Back at his desk, Jake spreads the papers out in front of him.

“What did Holt want?”

“To know what I was printing.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I was researching proof that getting hit on the head could bring back memories.”

“That’s… yeah, I imagine he believed that.”

“He did.”

Amy rolls her eyes, but she wears a quiet smile as she types away at her computer and fills in paperwork. It feels like he never left, right up until Holt calls him into his office. Jake quickly shoves the papers away.

“Yes.”

“It is time for your lunch and your rest.”

Snatching the little brown bag and throwing himself into the couch, Jake glowers at Holt.

“I was busy.”

“Let me save you some time; the answer is No. Hitting someone on the head will only result in more trauma. No science worth its salt will tell you otherwise. Now, eat your sandwich, drink your juice, and take a nap.”

Jake feels insanely ridiculous as he sits on Holts’ sofa, eating the little triangle ham sandwiches and drinking apple juice from a carton.

“I don’t know why everyone insists on treating me like I’m incapable.”

“It is not because we do not think you can look after yourself, Jacob, despite your propensity to do exactly that.”

“Then, why?”

“Because we need to know that you are cared for. We failed you once, Jacob. We cannot fail again.”

For a moment, the only thing Jake hears is his own breathing and the steady thrum of his heart.

“What a dark thought to fall asleep to. You could really do with picking up some tips from Terry and Boyle about how to help me sleep. Top of the list; don’t make me feel bad.”

Pulling the blue blanket from the armrest over his shoulders, Jake turns to face the back of the couch so that Holt can’t see how red his eyes are getting.

B*9*9

“Hey, did someone try to get into my phone?” Jake asks.

He was mostly surprised that the phone was left behind, and so when he charged it up, he was expected a million messages from mourners. Instead, the phone was completely empty.

“What?” Rosa leans over Jakes's shoulder and takes the phone. “It’s been wiped.”

“No duh. That’s why I was asking.”

“Well, you can check, right? You’ve got the model that signs out of the cloud and erases the data if someone tries to hack it. It takes a picture. So, re-download your account. See who the last few photos were of.”

Rosa remains in position as Jake takes the phone back and goes through the motions. It takes longer than it should to remember his password, which is the same for everything.

“You don’t remember your password, dude?”

“Hey, give me a break. I’m having memory issues, OK.”

Finally, he gets in, and the phone starts to download everything.

“Look, five hundred notifications. I knew I wasn’t a loser who – wow, are two hundred of those messages invites to Farmville?”

He opens the list and scrolls down the invitations.

“Boyle,” they both mutter under their breath.

“There you go. Open that folder.”

Jake does. Both he and Rosa gasp.

“Holt?”

“When were they taken?” Rosa asks.

Jake checks the time stamp.

Today.

While Jake was sleeping.

“Holt sent us out for pizza. He paid. Said we needed the break.”

With a quick check around the room to ensure no one else was around, Jake motions for Rosa to lean in.

“Gina said that Holt pushed for the declaration of my death. She reckons both my Dad and Roger—I mean Holt and my Dad—I mean—”

“I know what you mean.”

“Anyway. She reckons they both know something about my disappearance. This… does not look good.”

“No,” Rosa agrees, “it doesn’t.”

Jake bites on his bottom lip as he tries his best not to panic.

“I’m in. I’ll help you solve this. But promise me, Jake, you’ll look after yourself. I’ll help on the single condition that this doesn’t hurt you. Understood?”

“Gotcha. I’ll be super cool. No need to worry about me.”

“I will never be able to stop worrying about you, Jake.”

With that proclamation, Rosa walks away, and Jake looks back down at the phone.

“Oh, Holt. What have you done?”

Chapter Text

Chapter Six

Suspecting that Holt did something and holding proof in his hand is akin to thinking you’re going to trip and then actually plummeting to your death in the Grand Canyon. Jake’s heart pushes against his lung as he falls from the dizzying height of unending trust to the blood-soaked ground of betrayal.

For a few seconds, everything around Jake falls apart, and he barely notices when Rosa calls Gina. The two of them, noticing Jake’s distractedness, lead him into the ‘Nap Room’ to talk.

“What’s the stitch?” Gina asks as she frowns in disgust at the strange stains on the couch.

“Holt tried to get into Jake’s phone.”

“Ah.” Sympathetic understanding dawns on Gina’s face. “So, the plot thickens. What was he trying to do?”

Mentally, Jake slaps himself. They don’t know what is going on yet, so to automatically assume that Holt is guilty would be ridiculous. And unfair.

“No idea,” Jake shrugs. “But we know he sent the squad out today for pizza, and while I was… resting—”

“Napping.”

“Whatever. While I was taking a rest, Holt tried to access my phone.”

“Let me guess; in doing so, he not only gave you all the evidence in the world, but he also erased the phone. Old people are so predictable. I assume you’ve reconnected your cloud account?”

“Yeah. Boyle sent two hundred Farmville requests.”

“Charles is a monster,” Rosa growls.

“Agreed,” Gina nods. “But that’s not the biggest issue. The issue is that we know that Holt really is a suspect.”

“I mean, maybe not. It might be an accident. Maybe he sent an email he didn’t mean to?” Jake suggests. “Or maybe he wanted to find a photo or something. I mean, really? Holt? Do we think he could have hurt me?”

“I’m not sure,” Rosa says. “Holt is viciously loyal to this squad. He wouldn’t do anything to hurt us, and as weird as it is, he has a weird father-son vibe thing with you, Jake. I don’t think we can jump to him being a suspect.”

“Woah, Rosa. Calm down. What was that monologue about? We caught him in the act.”

“Gina, think about it. Do you honestly believe Holt would hurt Jake?”

“No,” Gina drawls. “He wouldn’t. But he’s clearly involved somehow.”

“Agreed. We need to figure out how and why.”

Rosa and Gina begin exchanging theories, but Jake’s mind is set firmly on the knowledge that his father is involved. He wants, more than anything, to be surprised, but instead, he just feels bitterly disappointed.

“I want to talk to my dad,” Jake says.

“We should find a way to get into Holt’s computer,” Gina muses. “He meticulously notes every coming and going in his life.”

“You think he’s going to have written down, ‘be involved in Jake’s disappearance’?” Rosa sneers.

“I want to talk to my dad,” Jake repeats.

“Look, I spent a long time working for Holt. The man accounts for everything he does. He even wrote down every time Cheddar used the bathroom. I guarantee he’ll have written something about this.”

“I’m going to talk to my Dad,” Jake says. “You two continue ignoring me.”

Without a backwards glance, Jake meanders back to his desk and picks up his cell. He speedily messages his father and then returns to working his way through the evidence.

No one was joking when they said they didn’t have much to go on regarding his disappearance. In the small pile of papers, there are three photos of Jake from high angles. Obviously CCTV cameras. None of the pictures gives anything away. In one, he’s talking to the coffee shop dude. In another, he’s tying a shoelace. In the third, he’s walking with a drink in hand, grinning. In each of the photos, he looks normal, uncaring and unassuming. Which means Jake didn’t know he was about to go missing. There are reports from witnesses, who say they either saw him ordering coffee or entering an alleyway.

In that same alleyway, they found his badge and gun lying beside an industrial trashcan. There was no evidence of anyone but Jake being there, nothing to suggest there had been a fight. In fact, Amy had noted that the gun and badged looked like they had been placed down. Not thrown, like one would assume. Which only added to the absolute lack of available evidence.

“It was almost as though you just decided one day to just up and leave,” Amy had said.

The thought had sent a shiver down Jake’s spine, and he hates to imagine that it was the truth. There’s no reason he can think of that he would do such a thing. There’s nothing that would motivate him to leave behind his weird little family, especially without saying a word.

The grating sound of a phone vibrating on the desktop jolts Jake from his musings. He picks it up to see a message from his father promising to be at the station in an hour.

At least someone will have some real answers, he thinks. No matter how badly his father may have messed up, it’ll be better knowing something rather than nothing. And who knows? Maybe his dad didn’t have a hand in the whole thing? Or, perhaps he did, but he had an excellent reason for it?

Jake just needs to give people the benefit of the doubt, his father included. Because, sure, Roger hasn’t been the greatest father, husband, friend or person, but this? Too far. Too much. It’s almost absurd to think that he really did have something to do with it.

B*9*9

“I’m sorry, Jake. I had no other option.”

“You could have not,” Gina cuts in.

“It wasn’t an option,” Roger insists, hands flapping helplessly. “You have to understand.”

Jake can’t think of a single thing to say. He just leans back in his chair, staring at his father. Usually, when Roger does something terrible, he doesn’t really have the self-awareness to acknowledge it. The man is known for taking his own mistakes with a pinch of salt and laughing at anyone – mostly just Jake – who says that it’s more than just a small issue.

The abandonment, the lies, the broken promises: they were all met with a casual, ‘it’s not that big a deal’ from Roger.

Not now. Jake’s father is pale, sweating and shaking. All the bravado, all the charisma: it’s gone, and in its wake, it’s left a poor imitation of a father.

“Just.” Jake takes a breath and shakes his head, clearing it. “Just tell us what happened. Everything.”

“I don’t—”

Whatever excuse Roger was working up to is cut off with a loud slam.

Jake jumps away and then frowns when he spots the dagger that Rosa has driven into the table a millimetre away from where Roger’s hand is resting. Roger snatches his hand towards his chest, breaths heaving and eyes wild.

“Tell us what you know, or I’ll cut out your tongue.”

“I—I can only t—tell you what I know,” Roger says.

“Ok, so we’re threatening a severe injury for a confession. This is perfectly fine,” Jake nods. “Totally within the law.”

“He’s not even under arrest,” Gina says.

“I’m not? So, I can just leave?”

“Don’t even think about it,” Rosa threatens.

A little burst of hope dies out in Roger's eyes. Jake observes his father, trying to find something that explains why he would be involved with his disappearance. If he hadn’t already admitted to it, Jake would have a hard time believing his own father had done something.

“Why, Dad?” Jake asks, eventually.

“I had no choice, Jake. They were going to kill me.”

Breath catching in his throat, Jake tries to understand whether he feels fear at the prospect of his father’s life in danger or relief that there really was a good reason for this whole mess.

“They?”

“Some men. I think they were involved in a drug thing. I’m not sure. Maybe a whole cartel or something.”

“What do you mean, you’re ‘not sure’?” Rosa demands. “You don’t sell your son to people you don’t know.”

“I didn’t sell anyone,” Roger says, flinching away.

“You sold him out,” Gina clarifies. “You let him get taken.”

“Hold up. I didn’t ‘let him’ get anything. It wasn’t as though I offered him up on a plate.”

Images of his father pushing Jake towards a group of bad guys is swept away and replaced with the fantastical vision of his father fighting evil dudes to save Jake.

“You didn’t?” he asks, trying

“No, of course not. Jeez, son. You thought I’d let them take you away?”

“I didn’t have a doubt in my mind,” Gina says.

“Thank you, Linetti.”

“Don’t you speak her name,” Rosa growls. “Tell us what you know.”

Roger takes a deep breath.

“It started after some men tried to board my plane with enough cocaine to fuel the construction of a damn city. They had a man on the inside, I’m not sure who – we never did figure that out – but they managed. It was me who discovered the drugs as we were disembarking the plane. Obviously, being the law-abiding citizen I am, reported it to security.

“Well, it turned out that the ‘inside man’ was working in the security department. The guys transporting the drugs found out that I knew and cornered me on my way back to the hotel. They threatened to kill me unless I let them haul drugs on the planes I fly. I was caught between a rock and a hard place, you know? Either I let them commit serious crimes, or I die.”

“You let them?” Rosa asks.

“No. I let them believe I would, but I told Jake first.”

Gina, who is now leaning against the door, groans.

“No, no. It was the right thing to do,” Jake says. “What happened next?”

“I told you what was happening.”

“We got to that part,” Rosa says. “And then?”

“I figured Jake would catch these guys and save us both from a world of trouble. We had a plan. I was going to let Jake fly with me, and he would catch the bad guys, and everything would be A-Ok.”

“Sounds like a great plan,” Jake says.

“It didn’t work out that way.”

“Obviously,” Rosa cuts in.

Jake flares at Rosa, begging her to drop it. Before anyone else has the chance to further the tension, Jake cuts in.

“So, when did I go missing?”

Gina leans forward as Rosa uncrosses her arms.

“I came in the day before the flight. You said everything was ready, that you’d kept the information to yourself like I’d asked, and that you’d see me after you made the arrests.” Roger swallows, casting his eyes down. “That was the last I heard from you. I waited for you at the terminal, but you never showed. When I got to the cockpit, the men were there. They said that if I ever wanted to see you again, I would have to keep my end of the bargain.”

The silence that follows is filled with unspoken questions and unoffered answers. Anxiety builds up in Jake, vibrating through his veins, and he tightens his jaw.

“And then?”

Rosa has never sounded so quiet before. Somehow, it’s more terrifying, and from the way Roger’s adam's apple bobs, he thinks so too.

“That’s it. Jake never showed, and I never saw him again. I figured… well, when I asked for proof that he was still alive, they refused to show me any.”

“What about the drug dealers?” Jake asks.

“I reported them to the police in Quebec. They were arrested.”

The room feels suddenly very claustrophobic. The walls start to close in, the lights dim, and something cold and heavy drapes itself over Jake's chest.

“So, you only know that they have something to do with it? You don’t know where I’ve been?”

“No. I thought you were dead. I would never have told the police otherwise.”

“So, were no close to finding out where I’ve been? Do you at least know who these guys are?”

“They escaped police custody. The police never managed to get names or prints.”

Jake stands, the back of his legs pushing the chair back so that it clatters against the wall.

“Let’s go for a walk, K?” Gina offers.

Without waiting for an answer, Gina grabs Jake’s arm and pulls him out of the room. He stumbles alongside her until they come to a stop on the rooftop. The cold air cools against his skin, and his neck itches as sweat slowly travels from his hairline to his collarbone.

“Jakey, you’re freaking out, and you need to not do that.”

“I can’t… breathe.”

“Yes, you can. Breathing in,” Gina instructs, filling her own lungs, “breathing out.”

Being in his thirties, Jake shouldn’t need visual instructions on how to breathe. Yet, here he is, pain flaring across his skull as the oxygen it needs is held captive in his chest.

“You’re going to pass out if you don’t do anything. Jake, you need to breathe. If you don’t, I’m going to have to do that kiss thing, and after fifth grade, we both know that’s a terrible idea. Please, breathe.”

Bending at the waist, Jake tries to inhale oxygen, but his lungs have locked up. He can’t. He’s going to die.

“Jacob?”

A pair of giant hands grip Jake’s biceps and lift him from the ground that he hadn’t realised he’d fallen to.

“Come to my office,” Holt says, half carrying, half dragging Jake. “Linetta, follow.”

The next thing Jake is aware of is his own hand being pressed against a chest.

“Follow my breathing, Jacob.”

The chest inflates, a second passes, and then deflates again. After five tries, a weak, shuddery breath wracks Jakes body, and oxygen floods through him. He sags into the cushions, deflating as his lungs fill. Breathing slowly gets easier and easier until Holt no longer needs to guide him.

“What happened?” Holt asks.

Gina helps and looks over at the door.

“Terrence, are you calling me? You want to buy tighter shirts? I’ll help!” Gina shouts in response to nothing. “Sorry guys, I have to go help Terrence with his wardrobe.”

Jake blearily watches Gina abandon him. He’s relatively sure – almost one hundred percent certain – that Terry is not asking for Gina’s assistance. If the mild twitch of Holt’s eyebrow is anything to go by, he is not convinced either.

“Jacob, what brought this on?”

The sofa dips as Holt takes a seat beside him.

“Were you investigating your disappearance?”

“After you explicitly told me not to?” Jake scoffs. “Yes.”

With a sigh that ruffles Jake’s hair, Holt places a hand on Jake’s forearm. The weight helps ground Jake, but also makes him feel as though he’s about to get told off and sent to his room.

“I asked you not to investigate for good reason. The stress will not aid in your recovery.” Another sigh and Jake’s stomach drops a little further. “I will call Kevin. Maybe we should remain home this weekend.”

“No!” Jake cries, standing up before he realises what he’s doing. “No. Don’t do that. I’m fine. I won’t… don’t stay on my account. This won’t happen again.”

“Jacob—”

“Honestly. I’m fine. And Terry will be there, so he can help.”

With a deep hum, Holt finally nods.

“But I want you to stop researching your disappearance. I thought we had come to an agreement on the matter.”

“You came to an agreement. I never wanted to not investigate.”

“Because you are not well yet.”

“Is that the only reason? You’re worried about my health? Nothing else?”

“What other reason would there be?” Holt inquires. “For what other purpose do you believe I would be averse to your detective skills being put to work?”

Jake searches Holt for any hints of a lie, and though he doesn’t find any, he still knows that something is amiss. Holt is definitely involved somehow. He just doesn’t know in what capacity.

“No. I just don’t understand why you’d want to cut me off.”

On his feet, Holt gestures towards the blanket on the arm of the sofa.

“Do you need to take a rest?” Holt asks.

It’s tempting. Jake’s mind is swimming with exhaustion, and his limbs are heavy.

“No, I’m fine. I’m going to go find Gina.”

Without another word, Jake pushes himself up and away. He offers Holt a slight nod and leaves the office.

In the bullpen, eyes still find and linger on him as he moves. Whispers follow his footsteps. Suspicions are shared, and doubts are aired.

“Gina.”

Gina looks up from her place, leaning against Terry’s desk and quickly says something before sauntering over to Jake.

“Rosa’s in the break room. Come on.”

With his fists clenched at his side in an attempt to keep his anxiety at bay, Jake nods. He and Gina cross the room together. Rosa is nursing a cup of coffee, eyes dark and mouth turned down. When Gina closes the door behind her, Rosa sets her cup on the table.

“Roger didn’t have much more to say. He never heard from the men again, and he never thought to pass the information on to the 99. Roger didn’t want to admit that he’d flown drugs across the country, because he would lose his licence. He said, and I quote, ‘he was already dead. There was no point in making it worse’.”

Rosa slams her fist onto the table.

“Your father is a real piece of work, Peralta. But, he didn’t say anything about Holt. He doesn’t know why Holt would be involved. Said there was no reason for it.”

“And so the mystery continues,” Gina hums. “Sorry that your dad is such an A-hole, Jakey. Do you want me to burn his house down?”

“What? No. Jesus, Gina.”

“It’s just an offer that I’m putting out there. Take it or leave it.”

“I’ll leave it, thanks.”

“Kk, pineapples. You let me know if you change your mind.”

With a bright smile, Gina ruffles Jake's hair and departs the room.

“I know we don’t do this, man, but if you ever wanna talk. I will listen.”

“Thanks, Rosa. I think I’m good.”

Her eyes graze over Jake, and she offers a little smile.

“You’re not,” Rosa says. “But you will be.”

And with that, Rosa squeezes Jake’s shoulder. She walks out of the break room, leaving Jake alone to ponder the fact that his dad never thought to tell anyone what had happened to him, and that there’s still a chance, small as it may be, that Holt had nothing to do with it.

Chapter Text

Chapter Seven.

“Come on, Jake. Let’s head home.”

The hulking figure of Terry looms over Jake. The last hour or so has been spent staring at a blank screen, trying to remember what happened to him. He was hoping that speaking to someone involved would bring him at least some answers. Instead, he got loaded with a world of disappointment that his father, even in the event of his son’s death, couldn’t pull it together to be a good dad.

More than that, though, Jake is angry that he still doesn’t know anything. Sure, they have a very vague understanding of who may have been behind it. It’s not enough to function, though. Without the middle, all Jake has is the bookends of knowledge. The first page and the last page of a story. Without the filler, he might as well know nothing.

Useless.

He needs to figure this out before the not knowing kills him.

“Jake?”

Pain flares across Jake’s elbow as he’s startled by Terry’s hand tapping against his forehead. The desk rattles with the force of his jolt.

“Jeez, Jake. Jumpy much?”

Stuffing his panic deep, Jake lets his teeth show with a wide grin.

“What exactly do you expect?” Jake teases. “I was literally missing for two and a half years. Who knows what torture I was suffering? Sue a guy for being jumpy.”

The reaction is instantaneous. Terry’s face pales, and Amy stands up from her desk, eyebrows pulled together.

“It was supposed to be a joke, but in hindsight, that maybe wasn’t the greatest one,” Jake admits, leaning back into his chair, grimacing.

“You think?” Terry frowns. “Jake, we don’t know where you’ve been any more than you do. Terry’s had dreams, man. We all have.”

“Yeah, I used to cry myself awake all the time,” Boyle adds, spinning his chair to see them. “I had wet dreams about you for a year.”

Jake cringes.

“What?” Boyle cries out to a harmony of annoyance.

“Ugh,” Rosa groans. “We agreed that you’d stop calling it that.”

“No. You asked me to stop. I agreed on nothing.”

Boyle rather proudly straightens his back at this proclamation.

“Terry agrees with the room here, Charles. You say so many blatantly sexual things. I’m surprised you’ve not even tried to stop. You’re a father now. Do you want to be a bad influence on Nikolaj?”

“Nikolaj,” Boyle says.

“Nikolaj,” Terry repeats.

“Nikolaj,” Boyle corrects.

“Dammit, Boyle. You’re missing the point.”

“And what is the point?”

“That if you can’t be trusted to watch the way you speak around your son, how can you expect to be asked to watch Jake?”

Shoulders dropping, Jake grabs his bag and stands.

“I’ll see you guys on Monday?” he says lamely.

He quickly throws his things into a bag and walks away.

Jake heads to the elevator to the tune of everyone saying goodbye. He keeps his eyes firmly on his feet, studying the squeaky clean-ness of them that he’s not genuinely familiar with. Gina refused to buy him the sneakers he wanted. His mom had apparently locked his cool sneakers in storage. She has forgotten where. For now, he’s stuck with the sneakers that Gina picked up. The instant he’s solved the mystery around his disappearance, he’s going to figure out where his damned sneakers are.

His mom is the greatest for saving them, but she’s so flighty.

At least she didn’t try to treat him like a helpless kid.

He knows that Amy said everyone is just being over-protective, but do they really have to talk over his head like that? Jake has been self-sufficient ever since his dad left. Nothing has changed. He doesn’t suddenly need people to watch over him.

Well.

He doesn’t need people to watch over him like that.

“Sorry, Jake. I’ve had a hard time separating Daddy Terry from Work Terry recently. Come on. Let’s get home. Sharon is making Tuna Bake.”

“Awesome.”

“I know you’re having a tough time, Jake. Things are hard right now, and they’re going to continue being hard for a long time. But we’re all here for you. Terry can be a great therapist if you need him to be.”

The elevator doors open, and they both step inside. The sad smile Jake offers the office says more about his mood than he has the words to express. As they descend, Jake lets his shoulders slump, and he leans against the wall.

“Yeah. Sure.”

The ride to the Jeffords household is silent. Despite the sidelong looks Terry gives him, Jake doesn’t have the energy to give in. He doesn’t have an ounce of conversation left him. He feels drained in every way.

The silence lasts until they walk through the door.

“Uncle Jake, Uncle Jake!”

Two little girls slam into Jake, and he’s almost sent crashing to the floor. He would have probably broken his back on a princess castle if it weren’t for Terry grabbing him by the scruff of his jacket and hauling him back to his feet.

“Girls, calm down. You’ll get someone hurt.”

Jake stares down at the girls.

“Weren’t you babies before? How did you get so big?”

“We didn’t get big, you got small,” one of the girls explains.

“That’s not how that works,” Terry corrects gently. “Come on, girls. Let’s help Uncle Jake find his bed.”

“Yay!”

With excitement unfitting for the task, the girls race through the living room, passing their younger sister. Ava is sat in a bouncer, and her bright eyes follow her sister’s. She babbles excitedly and waves her arms around in solidarity.

“You sleep here,” Cagney or Lacey says.

“Yeah. And look, MooMoo,” Cagney or Lacey points.

“Oh. Cool. That definitely doesn’t look chewed on,” Jake smiles. “Or gross!”

The girls joyously begin naming things in the room, then checking with Jake to see if he is listening.

“That’s a chair!” the girls say.

“It is. Very good.”

“And that’s a pillow.”

“Yeah.”

“Cagney! Lacey! Come back in here now.”

Without a second spared, they run from the room, chattering nonsense as they go. Jake drops his bag on the bed and stares around the area. It’s small. It’s obviously the babies room if the discoloured rings on the floor are anything to go by. The walls are painted a neutral blue, like the sky on a hot summers day anywhere other than New York. Where the crib was is an empty space, though a lone toy sits in the corner.

Terry and Sharon must have moved it out before he got here. That was nice of them.

“Jake, dinners ready!”

“Coming.”

“Don’t forget to wash your hands,” Sharon adds.

Jake finds the bathroom quickly and scrubs his hands clean. He catches his reflection in the mirror, looking miserable, and Jake forces himself to smile.

Dinner is a joyful affair. Mostly, it involves Sharon and Terry cajoling the girls into eating their vegetables and feeding Ava while also trying to steal moments to eat themselves.

“Jake, eat your carrots.”

“I don’t particularly like carrots,” Jake shrugs.

“I wasn’t asking.”

Stabbing a lone carrot, Jake lifts it to eye level and frowns.

“But—”

“No buts. You eat the veggies, or you don’t leave the table,” Sharon says.

“It’s a rule,” Cagney or Lacey says.

“Rules are meant to be broken.”

“That’s not true at all,” Terry sighs. “Eat the carrots, man. They’re good for you.”

If the girls weren’t watching him with such interest, Jake might have been inclined to revolt, but instead, he eats the carrot. It doesn’t taste completely awful, but it’s still a carrot, and Jake still resents them.

“See, wasn’t hard, wassit?” one of the girls asks.

“Cagney, don’t talk like that,” Sharon admonishes.

“You do,” Cagney whispers under her breath.

Either no one else has heard, or they’re not feeling up to saying anything about it. Jake hides a smile around his fork.

At eight, long after the dishes had been washed and the children had been bathed, Terry and Sharon are wrangling the children into bed.

“Check for monsters,” Lacey demands.

The girls were put into near-identical pyjamas, except for the colour. Lacey was wearing lilac, and Cagney was wearing – according to Sharon, at least – sea foam. Not that it mattered to Jake. He was just grateful that he could tell them apart.

“Yeah,” Cagney cries. “I don’t want the monsters to take me like they took Uncle Jake.”

Frozen, Jake feels ice slide down his spine.

“Monsters aren’t real,” Terry says.

“You said, Daddy. You said ‘Only a monster would take Jake away’. Remember?”

Terry’s shoulders drop, and he bows his head.

“I’ll check.”

Once the space under the bed, the closet and window frame are all deemed to be ‘monster free’, the girls agree to go to sleep. Terry tucks them in, even when they wiggle around and giggle.

“Sleep tight, girls. Love you to Pluto and back.”

“Love you too, Daddy.”

The light is shut off, though a glow in between the two beds suggests there’s a nightlight. Terry pulls the door closed, though he leaves a little space.

“They’ll be back in ten minutes,” Terry says, rolling his eyes. “Now come on, let’s get you in bed.”

Jake follows though he freezes halfway.

“Wait, what? It’s eight.”

“Bedtime.”

“No, Terry. It’s not. It’s ‘crack a beer in front of the TV’ time.”

“Jeez, I’m sorry, Jake. Terry so used to having children to deal with, I almost forgot.”

The sheepish smile Terry offers alongside his apology is enough to show Jake that it wasn’t meant to undermine him. Of course not. Terry is a family man. It’s natural for him to fall into the role of ‘daddy’.

“No worries, man.”

“Go get into your pyjamas, and then we can look into those beers.”

Jake is maybe a little too enthusiastic in his haste if Terry’s smile is anything to go by. It doesn’t matter. Jake has no shame to share. He hasn’t had the chance to just relax with a friend in, what, three years? The life at the Holt-Cosner household is built upon a rigid system that demands the routine is adhered to.

But Terry has children. Routine can’t be rigid, because life with kids around, especially three of them, is unpredictable.

With his pyjamas on, Jake resists the urge to ounce into the lounge area. Terry is sitting on the sofa with Sharon curled up into his side. Terry pats the space on his other side and the gestures with a bottle of beer for Jake to join him.

“We’re about to watch Iron Man fight with Captain America.”

Jake gratefully accepts the bottle of beer and then settles in.

He never makes it to the end of the movie.

When he wakes up the next day, he finds himself sprawled out on the bed.

“Uncle Jake, Uncle Jake, Daddy says breakfast is ready.”

With a grumble, Jake rolls out of bed and begins the day, doing everything he can to not think about how Terry very likely carried him to bed last night.

~

“You don’t want to go play, Jake?” Sharon asks as they sit in the park.

“I’m in my thirties. I’m happy to just soak up the sun.”

“Really? Because six months before you disappeared, I seem to remember a thirty-minute conversation about how you wanted to visit every water park in America.”

“Water parks are for adults too, Terry.”

“If you say so.”

“I do. Otherwise, the rides wouldn’t have height limits. Here, I am the height limit.”

“That made no sense.”

“I just meant that I’m too tall to use any of these things.”

He waves a hand towards the large, multi-purpose climbing frame. It has a slide, monkey bars, fireman’s pole, and a tunnel. Jake can’t use any of it, even if he wants to.

“Besides,” Jake says, waving a book, “I brought something to read.”

The book is the one that had been in the box. It doesn’t look like something Jake would read, and he has a very particular taste.

This book is some YA about a boy who was kidnapped as a child and then forced to overcome his warped understanding of the world while on the run with an amnesiac. It’s a lot, and that barely seems to cover the base plot. Jake can’t deny that it sounds interesting, but he cannot figure out why he’d have been reading it.

Flipping through the pages, Jake stops on page 31 when the sight of his own handwriting scribbled in the margins.

The words are barely legible, a style he’s perfected over the years, but he can just about make sense of them.

His heart stops.

“Terry, I… I need to go.”

“Wait, Jake, you can’t just leave!”

“I have to go see Boyle.”

“I’ll drive you.”

“No. I need to go alone. I know the way.”

That’s a lie, Jake has no idea where he is, but Gina set him up an Uber account, and he remembers where Boyle lives.

“Is something wrong? Did you remember something?”

“I’ll call, Terry.”

And with that, Jake runs out of the park, the words from the book scribbled in his head.

“Don’t trust anyone but Boyle. They’re coming. They plan to kill me.”

Chapter Text

Jake learns quickly that technology has changed enough since his disappearance that he can’t really understand it as instinctively as he did before. The Uber app is pretty hard to figure out, and with a gulp, Jake ducks into a café and asks the friendly barista to help him.

“You’re not connected to the internet,” she explains. “Here, I’ll put you on our wifi.”

“Thank you.”

She smiles politely, as though the problem was obvious and now she clearly thinks he’s an idiot. Once he’s connected, she shows him how to call a cab and how to input the address.

“Should be here in five,” she says. “Anything in the meantime?”

“Uh, I’m pretty bad for spilling things, so I’m not sure I should.”

The polite small drops and she nods coldly.

“Understood. Have a nice day, Sir.”

Sir? Jake doesn’t remember if he’s ever been called Sir before. Though, not remembering something means extraordinarily little these days. Maybe he was called ‘sir’ the entire time he was away?

Jake leans against the counter and looks out of the window onto the bustling streets. He wonders if there’s a possibility that one of those people were involved in his trauma. Is he being watched? And now, with this new information, he can’t even say whether or not the others had a hand in it.

It doesn’t seem likely, but there’s no telling these days.

He has so many questions.

What singled him out for such a complex, life-changing crime? It seems a stretch to think that he’d have been taken out just because of his dad.

It has to be bigger than that.

Something so big that he felt the need to warn himself not to trust anyone but Boyle. Something that suggests he knew something would happen. Something that meant they didn’t want to kill him, just keep him away from everyone he knows and loves.

“Your car is here.”

Jake jerks out of his internal monologue and blinks stupidly.

“Sir?” the woman says, cautiously. “Your car?”

“R-right, yeah, t-thank,” Jake stammers back.

Outside, a sleek black car has pulled up against the curb. With a grateful wave, Jake heads out of the cafe climbs into the back of the vehicle.

The driver says nothing as they leave the curbside and head into traffic. Jake normally would talk the entire drive. He loves cab drivers. They always have the best stories to tell. This time, however, he’s happy to have the silence. He has problems focusing on a single train of thought if there are no other sounds – something his high-school teachers insisted was ADHD – but now he feels like the less, the better.

He flips open the book again. In all the pages, there is only the one note, but Jake knows that it’s about his disappearance. It has to be.

The question, though, is why?

It’s not a secret that Jake and Boyle trust each other implicitly, but what does it mean? Does Boyle know something about his disappearance that he failed to tell Jake straight away? Even in his own mind, with the evidence pointing very clearly in that direction, Jake has a hard time wrapping his head around it.

Boyle can’t even keep his own secrets from Jake, let alone Jake’s secrets. Boyle is the human equivalent of a celebrities unprotected cloud account. So, there’s no conceivable way that Boyle would have kept this a secret. Not from the squad for two years, and not from Jake.

Which means that this note is implying something else.

It’s implying that no one else can be trusted but Boyle; not because Boyle knows something, but because everyone else does.

And if that doesn’t send ice through Jake’s veins, he doesn’t know what would.

“Here you are, sir.”

Sir? Again?

“Right, sure, thanks.”

Stepping back onto the street, Jake feels uneasy. He’s knocked back a step as someone ungracefully knocks into him, and the incessant beeping of horns has his nerves fraying. Quickly, but without looking suspicious, Jake hops up the stairs and presses Boyle’s doorbell several times over.

“Hello?”

The voice is fuzzy, coming from the call box, but Jake is very certain that it is an elderly lady.

“Uh, I’m looking for Boyle? Charles Boyle?”

“Oh, deary, you’re about a year too late. Charles moved. I may have his address here somewhere, though, if you’re willing to wait.”

“Oh, no ma’am. I should have called him anyway. Thank you.”

Frustration almost leads Jake to kick a trash-can, but a gaggle of school children saunter by, and he manages to find calm in himself.

Whipping out his phone and stepping into a doorway of a closed bakery, Jake dials for Boyle.

“Jake? Thank God!” Boyle shouts. Jake flinches away, holding the phone at a distance while Boyle chatters away. “Jeffords said you were on your way over, and I couldn’t get a hold of you because your old number was disconnected.”

“Yeah, Gina had to call and make them give me another number. Can you send me your new address? I’m at your old place.”

“Go to the pizza place two blocks over. Third best Pizza in Brooklyn. Number one for mouthfeel. I’ll meet you there.”

“Thanks, man.”

Jake pushes his phone back into his pocket and heads back into the crowded street, easing his way around careless people. In a way, though it’s suffocating, it feels good to know that some things never change. That’s the New York charm, he thinks. The city may evolve, but the people stick to certain habits like a fly to sellotape.

Maybe that’s not the greatest analogy.

In the near-distance, Jake spots the glowing pizza sign beckoning him. It doesn’t look like anything special, just a regular pizza joint with red leather seats and stained tables in the booths. However, if Boyle says this place is good, then it’s worth trusting him. The man may have questionable taste in food, but he’s never wrong about Pizza.

Unless he’s talking about Sal’s. In which case, Boyle definitely doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

“Hi. I’ll take a slice of pepperoni at display temperature.”

“We don’t serve food at display temperature.”

“Could you just put it in the fridge for a few moments?”

The clerk blinks in confusion, rolls her eyes, and then shrugs.

“Sure. Whatever.”

The seat squeaks as he settles in. The rock music played on low volume fails to cover the sound of the teens shrieking in delight a few booths away from him. The familiar scent of Pizza floating on air does little to dissuade the overwhelming evidence that the tables were recently scrubbed down with bleach.

“Jakey!”

Boyle scooches into the seat opposite.

Without explanation, Jake slides the book over to Boyle and opens to the page with the note scrawled into the edge.

“What does this mean?” Boyle asks, brows drawing together.

“That’s what I want to know.”

Head snapping up, Boyle meets Jake’s gaze head-on.

“Are you asking me where I’ve been keeping secrets?”

“No! No, I don’t mean to imply… No. I just was hoping this made sense to you.”

“Because if it doesn’t, that means—”

“That I can’t trust the team,” Jake finishes.

Boyle looks back down at the note, shoulders dropping.

“Sorry, Jake. I don’t know what this means. I don’t know any more about your disappearance than you do.”

“Damn.”

“I’ll help you, though. Whatever I can do, I will.”

“In that case, I’ve got to fill you in on what we know so far.”

Admittedly, there’s not an awful lot to tell. He explains what they learned from his dad, and the suspicions he, Rosa and Gina have gathered about Holt. By the time he’s finished, the Pizza is gone and so has the group of teenagers.

“And you think you wrote this note to yourself as a warning?”

With a nod, Jake leans back and rubs at his temples. There’s a slow pressure growing, and he knows he’ll have a headache soon.

“Let’s get to mine. I’ll put some tea on, you can meet Nikolaj, and we can start investigating. I promise you, Jake, whatever I can do to help, I will.”

~

The ride to the apartment is done in contemplative silence. It’s a relief to get into the apartment, where there are a little more life and enough of a distraction to tear his thoughts away from theories on why he can’t trust the squad.

“Genevieve! I’ve brought Jake home.”

What follows the announcement is the sharp tap-tap-tap of heels on the wooden floor and the soft patter of feet.

A woman with a short bob of auburn hair and a small boy with curls and a missing tooth round the corner.

“Daddy, daddy, daddy!” Nikolaj cries as he throws himself forward.

Boyle kneels on the floor and catches his son.

“Niko, say hello to Jake.”

“Hello, Jake,” the boy whispers, sticking a hand out.

“Hello.” Jake shakes the boy's hand. “Nice to meet you. And you, Genevieve.”

“Boyle’s told me so much about you. Having you back has really put the spark back into the bedroom if you know what I mean.”

“I really wish I didn’t,” Jake mutters.

“OK, Niko; Daddy and Uncle Jake have some super cool police work to do.”

The boy speeds back out of the room the moment Boyle sets him on his feet. Genevieve kisses Charles on the lips and follows.

“Cute family, man. I’m happy for you.”

“I’m happy for me too. Especially since they’ve finally met you. I was worried I’d have the spend the rest of my life with people who had never met you before.”

“That’s insane. But I’ll let it slide. Come out. Let’s see what we can find.”

Boyle leads them both to the kitchen table and puts the kettle on the hob. Jake watches as Boyle pulls two mugs down from the cupboards and picks two tea bags to put in.

It’s a domestic scene, and Jake wonders, suddenly, if he will ever have that.

“How far did Santiago and I go?”

Boyle stills, body going rigid. Anxiety floods Jake’s system, and he immediately wishes he hadn’t asked. What if the answer he gets ruins everything? Sickness pools in his stomach as waves of possibilities flood his mind.

“You got pretty close,” Boyle admits, grimacing. “From what I understand, you went on a date after laying down some rules. No sex, no PDA, no telling anyone; keep it casual. Then, you had sex, killed our captain with your work PDA – this was when Holt was shifted over to marketing for a short time – and you finally admitted to the squad what was going on. It was short-lived because not much time passed before you disappeared.”

“We killed a captain?”

“I wouldn’t worry. The man had a medical condition. Plus, he was not very nice.”

“I definitely regret asking now,” Jake sags. “Let’s talk about my abduction.”

At any other point, Jake knows that Boyle wouldn’t give up the opportunity to talk about Jake’s relationships. Still, instead of pushing the subject, Boyle simply pours the boiling water into the cups and brings them to the table.

“When exactly did I go missing?”

“Oh, one moment!”

With a clatter and a scrape of the chair, Boyle scarpers away and into his home somewhere. With his pen tapping on the table, Jake waits, humming to himself.

Boyle’s new place looks much better than his last. Bigger, more homely. On the fridge, there are some pictures of what might be three pineapples, but could also be a family. On the counter, beside the refrigerator, there are boxes of cereal that Jake likes to eat. Besides that, a few little trinkets; cereal toys, a basketball participation trophy and tacked to one of the cupboards is a ‘Tumbling Terror’ certificate.

Something ugly roils in Jake’s stomach. It’s a mix between a cramp and nausea.

“Hey, I’ve got my diary here.”

“You have a diary?” Jake says, forcing a laugh.

“Well, yeah. After Ginny and I tried to conceive, we started to keep track of our love-making.”

“I thought you said—”

“Yeah. I couldn’t. We just wanted to try. Anyway,” Boyle shrugs and flips through the pages. “Here. September 14^th.”

Jake looks at his name, circled thrice in different colours. He’s been sandwiched between ‘10am sex, G=3, C=1’ and ‘9.33pm sex, G=1, C=1’.

“See, these numbers—”

“I know what the numbers mean. I’m not sure I appreciate that you’ve put me in your sex diary, man. That seems kind of gross.”

“Where was I supposed to write it?”

“I don’t know, but preferably somewhere that isn’t documenting your sex life.”

“Are you upset that I had sex after you went missing?”

“No, of course not.”

But he is. Jake can’t lie to himself. He’s upset that Boyle – that everyone­ – got to live their lives, and he was stuck god knows where.

“It’s OK, you know,” Boyle says.

Jake looks back up from the table, meeting Boyle’s sincere gaze head-on.

Before Jake left, Boyle was wildly enthusiastic about the strangest things. He was a great detective, but his general demeanour made that easy to overlook. Now, though, Charles seems different. More serious.

“We didn’t keep going to spite you. We kept going because we had to. You’re not selfish for being sad about it. I understand. We all do.”

“I feel bad for feeling—”

“Don’t resent yourself for having emotions, Jakey. My therapist told me that part of being human is having the freedom to feel what we feel. Having sense is the freedom to know whether those feelings are valuable.”

“All therapists are hacks.”

“You know that you’ll have to see one before you join the force again, right?

“I’ve been fine without one so far,” Jake scoffs.

“Have you?” Boyle replies with almost as much disbelief. “And besides, it's really not a discussion. It’s an ultimatum. Jake, if you don’t go to a therapist, you won’t get to work on any cases. At least, not out there.”

“I’m not going to be on desk duty. I’m not Hitchcock and Scully.”

“Then you need to see a therapist. I can set you up with someone if you want?”

“Whatever. We’ll talk about that later. For now, let’s see what we can learn from this date.”

Boyle brings a laptop to the table and hands it over to Jake.

“I need to let Jeffords know you’re here. Do you want to stay here tonight?”

Jake nods despondently. Boyle steps out of the room again, leaving Jake to scowl at the very thought of sitting down with another therapist who is only going to ruin his life again. Therapy is a resort he refused to end with.

“I won’t sugarcoat this,” Boyle begins as he sits down. “Terry isn’t happy with your running off the way you did. He also wasn’t pleased with my institution that he should have kept a closer eye on you.”

“Look, let’s just… let’s just get to the bottom of this mess, and we can go back to the way things were, OK?”

Boyle opens his mouth, determination painting his features, before leaning back in his chair and nodding.

“Sure.”

“Let’s check my dad’s calendar. He’s old, so he doesn’t know how to hide those things.”

With a few quick clicks, Jake is pulling open his fathers’ online calendar and searching through the dates.

“There.”

‘September 14^th, 3pm – see Jacob Peralta at 99^th Precinct.’

“Why did he write your whole name?” Boyle asks.

“I’d love to say it’s a hint to something, but actually my dad only calls me son when he wants something.”

“That conniving son-of-a—”

“Thanks, but my Grandma wasn’t all that bad.”

“Right. Sorry. So, this means your dad came by, right?”

“Yeah. My dad told me that the day I went missing, he was waiting for me at the airport. I was supposed to be on a plane.”

“So, he lied?”

“Yeah,” Jake whispers. “I guess he did.”

Chapter Text

Chapter Nine

“So, I called Rosa,” Boyle admits as he re-enters the living room. “Your dad is going back into the precinct tomorrow.”

“Daddy, can we watch a movie?” Nikolaj asks, setting down his toy truck and looking up with pleading eyes. “Please?”

“Sure, buddy. What do you have in mind?”

Nikolaj whoops in excitement and throws himself towards the TV to browse the movie selection. While he’s distracted, Boyle sits down beside Jake.

“Is that OK?”

“Sure. Whatever. I just want this whole thing to be over.”

Nikolaj bounds back over to them, talking a mile a minute about ‘the best movie ever’. Jake shoots Boyle an unimpressed look when Nikolaj presents High School Musical, and not Die Hard.

“He’s too young for those movies,” Boyle says out of the corner of his mouth. “Great pick, Niko. Want to put it on?”

Excitedly, Niko does precisely that. Once the movie has started to play, the boy jumps onto Jake’s lap. It knocks the breath from him, but as Niko makes himself comfortable, Jake settles. Genevieve brings in a large bowl of popcorn and hands a bottle of Orange Soda to Jake.

It’s nice.

B*9*9*

The next morning Jake wakes in a bed that he remembers falling into. He stretches out, groaning with relief as his joints crack. When Jake relaxes his muscles, his entire body slackens. Nothing is exciting about the ceiling, but he stares at it for a long time anyway. For now, in the waking silence of the house, and with a blissfully empty mind, Jake just lounges.

The tell-tale sounds of breakfast being prepared – the knocking of pans and crockery – Jake is shaken out of his calmness. He stirs slowly, swinging his legs off the bed and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. With a yawn that turns into a groan, Jake pushes away from the tantalising warmth of the bed. After a moment, he makes his way into the kitchen.

“Morning, Jacob. How are you feeling today?”

“Tired. How about you?”

Genevieve laughs, a pleasant tinkling sound, and shakes her head.

“I’m fine. My favourite part of the day is watching my two boys come in, all sleepy, and feeding them up, so they’re ready for the day.”

“Sounds cute.”

“Oh, it is. Look, here’s Niko!”

Nikolaj, wearing a two-piece set of pyjamas with little aeroplanes over it, comes into the room rubbing his eyes.

“Good morning, baby.”

“Mornin’ mommy,” he yawns.

“What do you want for breakfast?”

“Fruit loops, please.”

“And you, Jacob?”

“Oh, same?”

“Sure thing. Coming up!”

Nikolaj seems to wake up a little when he sees Jake. He skips over to the table, stumbling only a few steps away.

“Morning, Buddy.”

“Morning Uncle Jake! Did you sleep good?”

“Sleep well,” Genevieve corrects as she sets down two bowls of cereal. “And Niko, please sit in your own seat for breakfast.”

Nikolaj nods happily as she climbs out of Jakes lap and into the chair next to it, but not after pushing it as close to Jake’s chair as he can.

“I had a dream about living in China,” Niko explains. “I spoke Chinese and ate Chinese food and had lots of friends! There were so many wolves there.”

If China has a connection to wolves, Jake doesn’t know anything about it. He lets Niko’s dream rambles wash over him, though he nods his way through breakfast and offers ‘Mm-hms’ when they seem necessary.

“Morning!” Boyle crows as he enters the kitchen, fully dressed. “My beautiful wife,” he says, kissing Gen on the cheek. “My lovely son,” he grins as he kisses Niko’s forehead. “My very-alive best friend.”

Instead of getting a kiss, Boyle squeezes Jake’s shoulder. And then he doesn’t let go.

“Uh, Charles?”

“Sorry,” Charles grins. “It’s just nice to feel that you’re really here.”

Boyle lets go and begins to hum as he starts up the coffee machine. Gen collects the empty dishes from the table.

“The mornings were always the hardest,” she whispers. “One of Charles’ favourite parts of going to work was getting to see you.”

A substantial weight unfurls in Jake’s stomach. Boyle is shaking, he notices. As the man pulls three cups from the cupboards, they vibrate, knocking into each other.

“I’ll go see a therapist.”

There’s a clatter that startles both Jake and Niko into jumping. Boyle steadies the mugs on the countertop and turns around, confusion pulling at his eyebrows.

“If that’s what it takes for me to be able to go into work every day and set things back to normal, I’ll go.”

“That’s—” Boyle coughs up his emotions. “That’s great, Jakey.”

The smile Jake offers in response, is pained. The thought of going to therapy fills him with squirming anxiety, but the look of Charles’ face is more than worth it.

“OK, we’ve got about forty minutes before I have to get to work and Gen has to get this little genius to school. There’s a spare towel in the bathroom for you, Jake.”

“Thanks, man.”

B*9*9*

Showered and dressed for the day, Jake feels anything but ready to go back to work. Knowing what he does about him and Amy, Holt’s return and the potential lies he’ll uncover from his father fills him with nervous energy.

“You OK?”

“Peachy.”

“Jake…”

With a sigh that seems to melt his body, Jake shrugs.

“Not really.”

Boyle nods.

“Can I do anything to help?”

Jake shifts in his seat so that he can look at Boyle properly.

“You’ve done more than I could ask for, man. Thanks.”

“You don’t need to thank me. You’d do the same for me.”

Jake would. He knows that in a heartbeat, he’d do everything he could to help Boyle. If the circumstances were the same, Jake would stay up every night, making sure that whoever hurt his friend was behind bars.

“So, we’re almost here. Do you want coffee first, or…?”

“I’m OK.”

“OK.”

Silence precedes them. Jake watches the tarmac on the road blurring. He already regrets agreeing to see a therapist. Sure, it’ll keep him around for the sake of the squad but opening up is not his style. Never has been, never will be.

If one were to ask his friends, he’s sure they’d say he was a mysterious mixture between being a completely open book and as closed off as possible. He’ll talk about things to hide his real problems. Possibly his ‘daddy issues’ are the best example of that.

Jake has always found it easier to joke about the problems he had with his father to hide the hurt he’s always felt. It’s much easier to say, ‘hey, I’ve got daddy issues’ than it is to say, ‘my dad left because I’m impossible to love’.

“Here.”

Jake hadn’t even noticed the ground turn from potholes and trash to the smooth grey concrete of the parking garage. Across the floor, he can see some familiar faces climbing out of their own cars. These same people turn to stare as Jake and Boyle walk towards the elevator. Their gazes sear a burning hole into the back of his neck, and it takes a lot of conscious effort to not cringe away from it.

“Some of the people on the other floors didn’t believe us when we said you’d come back.”

“Really? They didn’t believe that I’d come back from the dead two years after it was reported?”

“Well, when you put it like that, it sounds reasonable.”

The elevator begins to ascend.

“Got any good murders?”

The woman on his left shoots him a horrified look.

“We have to be desensitised,” Jake explains.

“It’s a coping mechanism,” Boyle adds.

The woman is not appeased. She steps closer to the elevator wall and hurries out when they reach her floor.

Maybe they shouldn’t talk about cop stuff in the elevator.

“Peralta!”

Jake jolts, stepping back and knocking into Boyle, who’s hands come up to steady Jake. Jeffords immediately notices the flinch, and the hard lines in his forehead soften.

“Jake,” he says. “Come here.”

With an encouraging push from Boyle, Jake leaves the elevator and accepts the proffered seat. Terry sits too, turning his chair to face Jake, and scooching it forward, so their conversation can remain private.

“Jacob, you’re obviously going through a lot. I want you to know that the whole team is here for you, no matter what.”

“I know that.”

“Then why are you keeping secrets?”

Jake’s back goes rigid quickly. Jeffords’ eyebrows shoot up.

“Before you lie, remember that, despite being apart for so long, I still know you very well. One might say, I know you too well.”

Jake squirms in the chair.

“You understand the concept of a secret, right Terrance?”

It takes a single look of exasperated disapproval for Jake to swallow back his sass.

“I have to.”

“You don’t think we have anything to do with it, do you?”

“Of course not,” Jake lies.

“Jake, come on. We’re your family. We would never—”

“Look,” Jake says harshly, cutting Terry off. “I don’t have the luxury. I don’t know what I’ve been doing for two years, and past me told future me not to trust anyone, and who can I trust more than myself?”

“Literally anyone in this precinct, Jacob. You do remember that time you said, ‘I have to trust my instincts’ and jumped out of a window, only to hit the edge of the dustbin and break an arm?”

Jake does remember. Unfortunately.

“Well, that’s different.”

“It shouldn’t be.”

“I’m sorry, Terry. It’s nothing personal. I just… I can’t.”

“Then I’m sorry, Jake, but I’m going to have to tell Captain Holt that you’re investigating on your own.”

“Why don’t you just call him Holt like the rest of us? He’s not here to tell you off, you know.”

Terry closes his eyes, and his chest rises and falls with a large breath. When he opens his eyes again, Jake can see the deep sincerity there.

“Captain Holt and I understand that getting into our positions took a lot of work. We have to overcome many, many barriers in place. Being a person of colour in this country comes with many stipulations in a contract we did not agree to sign. To have gotten here means that we truly deserve the titles. I won’t strip that away from him.” Terry waits, and Jake nods. “And don’t think I don’t know you’re trying to distract me.”

“Dammit.”

With a silent dismissal hanging in the air, Jake trudges over to his desk. Amy looks up as he approaches, her deep brown eyes filled with concern.

“You OK?”

“Sure. Fine. Fantastic.”

“Jake—”

“I know. I’m sorry.” A coldness sweeps over him. “Amy, I’m so sorry. For not remembering us. For disappearing. For leaving you.”

Amy’s chair creaks as she leans back, her lips twitching down.

“Boyle told you about us.”

“Yeah.”

“Can I ask a question?”

Jake nods.

“Do you remember liking me?”

“I… I don’t know. I think so? Maybe? I guess, aside from the initial shock after I found out, I was happy to learn that we’d gotten together. Not just because you’re beautiful, cause you are, but because you know… I—I respect you.”

Colour burns across Amy’s face, and her frown softens.

“We can talk about this at another time. Preferably when you start getting your memories back.”

“Good plan.”

“What’s the other plan?”

“What other plans?”

“Oh, come on, Jake. If you think the entire office doesn’t know that you’re investigating your disappearance, you’re dead wrong. We all know. So, what’s the plan here? After I’ve finished finalising your paperwork for becoming alive again – thank you for that, by the way. These forms are beautiful – what do you plan to do next?”

Struck with indecision - Jake isn’t sure whether he’s annoyed that he’s so transparent, or whether he’s amused that she’s genuinely enjoying the paperwork – Jake simply shrugs.

“Uh, my Dad told us a story a few days ago that was apparently a big, fat lie, so he’s coming back in today. Rosa is going to interrogate him. Then we’re going to work from there.”

“If you need any help, I’m here for you, Jake.”

“Thanks, Ames. You sure you’ll be OK with going up against Holt like that?”

Blanching, Amy puts up an unconvincing smile.

“Oh, sure,” she rambles. “Totally. I can break the rules. Laws are meant to be broken. Wait, no. Rules. I’m loosey-goosey.”

Jake smiles. It's so endearing when she does that.

“Don’t worry about it for now. Boyle and I are on the case, and so is Rosa. When the time comes, I’ll ask.”

Amy seems satisfied, and much less panicked now. Jake appreciates that. Cute as she is when she’s stressed, she shouldn’t feel that way. Especially not for him.

Jake switches his computer on and waits. He’s not sure what to look for. Where to begin. After a moment’s hesitation, Jake leans around his screen to spy that Holt’s office is still empty. With a heavy sinking heart, Jake logs into Holt’s calendar and searches back to the date he disappeared.

From the Monday before he disappeared to the day the squad knew something was wrong, Holt was on vacation. It doesn’t say where he went, but that’s not exactly unusual. It does strike Jake as odd, though. Holt rarely takes vacations that last longer than a weekend. What changed? Why then? Coincidence?

“Jake.”

“Shit.”

Shutting down the page as quickly as possible, Jake spins in his chair and then sinks into the hard leather.

“Rosa. It’s just you.”

Rosa frowns, narrowing her eyes.

“I’m not going to ask.” She nods her head towards the interrogation rooms. “Your Dad is here. Go into the observation room. I don’t think you should be in there.”

“What? He’s my Dad—”

“I know. I’m telling you, dude. Trust me.”

And that there is the problem. After finding the note, Jake isn’t sure if he can trust the team. He must have had a reason to write that note. He’s still annoyed that Boyle pulled Rosa back into the investigation. Saying no now will raise suspicion, though, and he knows that if Rosa were to learn he was weary of her, there would be no way to rebuild that lost trust.

“Sure.”

It really isn’t worth losing a friend over this. Whatever old Jake was thinking, it must have been wrong. There’s no good reason not to trust his squad. They’re his family. His people. The people he needs to be able to trust everyone else. They need to have his back.

Rosa turns on her heel, boots clacking as she strides away. Jake hastily closes down the tabs and follows, turning into the observation room. The edge of the table digs into his thigh as he leans to watch.

Roger is sitting with his back straight, his careless smile a stark contrast from how pale and clammy he looks. His hands, which are clasped before him on the table, betray a slight tremor, and his eyes are wide and wild.

“Mr Peralta, thank you for coming back.”

“Uh, sure. Where’s Jake?”

“He’s busy,” Rosa snaps. “I’m going to be asking the questions from now on. I want straight answers. The more truths you tell, the less this will hurt.”

“Hey, champ.”

The wall slams into Jake’s back, knocking the air out of his lungs as he forces himself away from the newcomer.

“Jesus, Gina.”

“Sorry ducky. Didn’t mean to scare you. I guess I’ll have to cool down the grand entrances.”

Gina walks over and squeezes Jake’s forearm. Calming, Jake relaxes.

“Rosa told me that she was calling your Dad in again and that maybe you’d want someone with you in case he says something… unfortunate.”

“Thanks, Gina.”

“Don’t thank me, you idiot. I’m here forever. You know that.” Gina smiles, mischievous with a hint of warmth. “Dentist?”

She holds out a stick of gum, and Jake shoves it into his mouth.

“Listen here, Roger. Your son has been missing for two years, and you know something that you’re not telling us. You say you were waiting for Jake at the airport, but we now know you were lying. I can’t believe I didn’t remember, but you came here the day he went missing, didn’t you? Why did you lie? What are you hiding?”

The air grows cold, and Jake shivers. Gina rubs her hand up and down his back, but he’s not sure it’s helping.

“I don’t know—”

“Don’t lie. We know you were here. You lied. I want to know why. Why did you come to the precinct, if you were due to meet Jake at the airport?”

“I—I, well, you know, I—”

Rosa slams her fist down on the table, and Jake jumps. His father loses all colour in his face.

“I lied. I spent the weekend in Vegas.” Roger takes a long, shuddering breath, and then practically spews the truth. “They paid me most of the money upfront. It was, hell, it was a lot. I decided to… spend it. I must have been monitored though because I called Jake to tell him what was happening. The next morning, when I went to speak to him about it, he was gone. Within a few hours, I heard that he was missing. I just knew it was because of me.”

“And you didn’t get a call? No ransom demands?”

“Oh, sure. The people wanted all the money back. Said if I paid, they’d let him go.”

Everything stills. No one breathes. No one except Roger, who seems unaffected by this admission, even makes a noise. It’s like a vacuum just sucked the life from the room, and then, a moment later, the energy rushes back in.

“I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!”

Jake dodges around Gina and skids out of the room and into the interrogation room. He wraps an arm around Rosa’s stomach and pulls her away.

“Don’t, Rosa.”

Gina comes in next and walks straight up to Roger. The resulting slap stings the air, and Jake flinches away.

“You bastard,” Gina whispers. “You absolute bastard. How dare you. How could you? To your own son?”

Roger doesn’t reply. He ducks his head, and Jake releases Rosa. She plants her hands on the desk.

“You’ll pay for this.”

“Does mom know?” Jake asks.

Roger shakes his head, still staring at the tabletop.

“Right. Well.” Jake nods, searching the room for something to say. “You tell her, or I will.”

Roger looks up, angry.

“Don’t you dare.”

The acidity in his voice pushes Jake a step back.

“Get out,” Rosa demands. “Before you do more damage than you’ve already caused.”

Rogers wastes no time scrambling away and rushing from the room. Jake doesn’t watch. He just waits until the door has been closed, and then sags against the table.

“You OK?”

“No,” Jake admits. “But I’m not sure I’m as surprised as I should be.”

“Your dad has always been a piece of work,” Gina agrees.

“One thing still doesn’t add up,” Jake says.

“What’s that?” Rosa asks.

“Why didn’t I put up a fight? My stuff was found carefully put on the ground, and I was last seen entering an alley with no cameras. It’s hard to find anywhere that isn’t being watched.”

Gina chews on her lips. Rosa stills.

“That’s a mystery for another time, I guess. At least we have something to go on for now.”

“It’s not much.”

“It’s better than nothing.”

B*9*9*

Holt is in his office by the time they return to the bullpen. He calls Jake into the office.

“How was your weekend?”

“Pleasant. Sergeant Jeffords tells me that you left his care?”

“I went to Boyles.”

“For any particular reason?”

“I wanted to meet his family,” Jake lies.

“Of course. Well, you will be returning to mine and Kevin’s house this evening. If that is alright with you?”

“Yeah. Sounds grand. Party time.”

“Indeed. Now, I have work to do. Santiago says the process of getting your death status overturned is going well. For now, keep yourself occupied. Preferably without interrogating your father against my wishes.”

B*9*9*

That evening, after a mostly quiet dinner, Jake goes to bed. Holt was upset with him, that much was very clear. The thing is, Jake can’t bring himself to be too bothered by it. He’s happy to be treated like a functioning adult again. Although he’s not sure where to take the investigation from here, he’s confident that they’re going to get somewhere.

B*9*9

Jake wakes up to find that he’s on the balcony of the 99^th. The stars twinkle like glitter on a dark canvas. A cold breeze covers him, and he realises that he’s sweating heavily. His skin is sticky and gross. His back is covered in dirt and dust from the ground.

His arms feel weak as he pushes himself upright. His head swims, and he curls over to the side to throw up.

Jake squeezes his eyes closed and wipes his mouth on the sleeve of his pyjama top. He grimaces as the smeared vomit and takes a few deep breaths. He spits out as much of the taste as possible, but the smell of sick still lingers.

With unsteady steps, resulting in a few stumbles, Jake makes it all the way to the door, only to be pulling uselessly at the handle.

“Hey!” he shouts, banging on the door with his fist. “Let me in!”

His voice is too soft, and his fist barely impacts the door at all. Using the wall to guide him, Jake starts knocking on the window. The whole squad is in, but no matter how hard he hits the window, no one even twitches.

Movement on the other side of the bullpen snatches Jake’s attention, and his fist freezes on the window. Dark eyes meet Jake’s, and blood-red lips part to reveal sharp white teeth. The man reaches into his coat and pulls out a gun.

Silence settles around him heavily as the bodies of the entire squad hit the ground.

“No!” Jake screams, beating against the window harder now. “Stop! Please, stop!”

Holt’s body is the last to hit the floor. The man, still grinning, points the gun directly at Jake.

“If only you’d come quietly,” the man says sympathetically.

He pulls the trigger, the window spider-webs with cracks, and Jake falls backwards.

“JAKE WAKE UP!”

With a gasp smothering a scream, Jake lurches upwards and straight into Kevin’s arms.

In what feels like an instinctive move, Kevin’s arms wrap around Jake’s shoulders. Holt has his hands-on Jakes biceps.

“Calm down, you are safe,” Kevin promises.

Jake’s entire body quakes and his eyes burn.

“He shot everyone.”

“Who did?”

“I—I don’t know. Someone?”

Kevin nods and gently releases Jake.

“I will go get you some water.”

Kevin leaves. Jake pulls his knees into his chest. His sweat-slicked skin makes him feel gross, and Holt seems to sense this. He leaves the room for a second, and Jake feels the loss. He doesn’t want to be alone. Fortunately, Holt returns a second later with a wet face cloth.

“Here. Kevin will be back in a second.”

Gratefully, Jake take it and cleans his face and neck. The coldness helps to alleviate the remaining panic.

“I am going to book an appointment with the therapist Boyle suggested. These night terrors are getting worse. You are going to seriously hurt yourself.”

There’s no energy left to argue. Besides, Jake promised. He owes Charles that. And even if he doesn’t like it, it’s worth giving therapy another try. It’s not like it’ll make his parents’ marriage fall apart again.

He just hopes it doesn’t ruin any of his relationships with the squad.

“Here.”

Kevin hands Jake a cold glass of water, and Jake is encouraged to take small sips.

“Go back to sleep. We will talk about this tomorrow.”

Once the door is closed, Jake turns to lamp on, filling the room with light. He can’t handle being in the dark. Not right now. Not with the images fresh in his head. Instead, he reaches into his bag and pulls out the book he’d had in his box from the evidence room.

‘The Killer and the Kid’.

“Can you tell me about the time—”

“We met the evil witch?”

Alex meets his father’s eyes in the rear-view mirror. He nods quickly. He doesn’t want his Dad to think he doesn’t want to hear it. It’s his favourite story.

Jake settles against the pillows and loses himself in words.

B*9*9*

By the time Holt and Kevin are waking up, Jake is on the seventh chapter, and things have gotten really interesting. Nonetheless, he tears himself away and shoves the book under his pillow—time to start the day if the knocking on his door is any indication.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jake groans.

Holt’s footsteps disappear. Jake grabs the towel from the dresser and heads to get showered.

B*9*9

“Did you sleep?” Kevin asks.

“Sure.”

“Did you sleep after the nightmare?” Holt clarifies.

“Not exactly, no.”

“Meaning?”

With a dramatic roll of his eyes and a heavy sigh, Jake finds a crumb to focus on.

“No. I did not sleep.”

Jake blows air into his cheeks, expanding them. He knocks his heels against the legs of the chair and waits for some kind of chastisement. When no one speaks, he risks looking up, only to find that Kevin and Holt are having a silent discussion.

“What?” Jake demands.

Holt has the nerve to look annoyed at the disturbance. He turns away, fills a cup with coffee and passes it over to Jake.

“I will book your appointment for tomorrow morning.”

“Appointment?”

“With the therapist.”

“Ah.” Jake swallows a scalding mouthful of the coffee and pretends it didn’t hurt. “Yes. Therapy.”

Kevin passes over a glass of water, and Jake gratefully gulps it down, soothing the fire in his mouth and throat.

“I know you are not ecstatic about receiving help, and that is a problem you can resolve while speaking with the doctor. I do, however, believe that if you have reached a point where you are unable to sleep through the night, then you need it more now than ever. It is simply not healthy to go any amount of time with inadequate sleep.”

“Says who?”

“Says any health professional worth their degree.”

Jake opens his mouth to protest but concedes with a shrug.

“I’ll go see the stupid therapist, OK? But only because Boyle wouldn’t be able to survive without me.”

The conversation steadily moves onto other topics, breakfast is eaten, and slowly, they begin to prepare for the day.

B*9*9*

“You look like shit.”

“Thanks, Gina. You come all the way here to tell me this?”

“No. I came all this way to drop off a document for Amy to fill out so that you legally won’t be how you look.”

“Awesome.”

“Did you sleep last night?”

Jake shakes his head and turns away, not wanting to look at her once her face has fallen with worry.

“I’ve got a therapist appointment tomorrow,” he explains offhandedly.

Fingers wrap over his shoulder, pulling Jake back around to face Gina head-on.

“Really?” Gina’s smile widens when he offers a nod. “Jake, that’s amazing! I’m so proud of you!”

“Uh. Thanks, G.”

“Now, come on. My husband and baby are in the nap room. I want you to meet them.”

Without a moment spared for an answer, Gina hands over the document to Amy – who looks far too excited by it to be healthy – and then grabs Jake’s hand and drags him across the room. She throws the door open, and there, sat on a sofa, is a man and a child.

“Milton, meet Jake. Jake, meet Milton. And this little beauty,” she says as she lifts the baby into her arms, “is Enigma.”

“Milton, nice to meet you, man,” Jake says, offering a hand.

“You too. Though, I never thought I’d get to.”

“And you’re a Boyle?” Jake asks.

“You’d be surprised how many people ask me the same question with the same tone.”

“It’s just that I’ve met most of Boyle’s family and you’re really… nothing like them.”

“Yeah, I’m kind of the outcast of the family.”

“How’d that happen?”

“Well, I dropped out of high school, and everyone just kind of treated me like a waster after that.”

Gina’s cooing and baby talk lighten how heavy the conversation is beginning to feel.

“Sorry about that, man. You manage to pick yourself up afterwards?”

“Oh, he totally did,” Gina joins. “Tell him what you do.”

“I, uh, snowboard professionally.”

Jake hopes his jaw hasn’t dropped quite as far as he feels it has.

“Yeah, that’s how everyone reacts,” Milton jokes. “Except for my family. I’m not sure what’s going on there.”

“Jealousy,” Gina coos as she bounces Iggy.

“Well, anyway. Cool. I love to hit the fresh powder on the mountains,” Jake says, each word coming with less certainty than the next.

“Yeah? Do you go often?”

“Recently? No.”

Milton laughs in understanding, but from over his shoulder, Gina is giving him the stinky eye.

“It’s been great meeting you, man, but I need to put Iggy down for a nap. Coming, sweetheart?”

“Yeah. Kk, Jakey. You behave and do whatever papa Holt tells you to do. Keep me up-to-date.”

“Keep grinding man,” Milton adds, patting Jake's shoulder. “You’ve really taken a dark cloud from over our life. Both for Gina and the Boyle clan.”

With that depressing admission, Jake is left alone in the nap room, staring at the door.

Of course, it would have hurt people. He’d just forgotten that to the Boyle family, he was like a mythical creature. They were all very interested in his life. Plus, whatever turmoil Boyle was experiencing, some hey were likely taking on the second half of that.

“Dammit.”

As much as he hates to think it, Jake knows he has a lot to make up for to Boyle and his family, and to the rest of the squad.

But reparations come later—first, detective work.

B*9*9

“Jacob, are you still awake?”

Jake shoves the book beneath the pillow as Kevin enters the room, hair strangely immaculate but clearly still very tired.

“No?”

“You’re still struggling to sleep?”

The concern is palpable, and Jake shifts around on the bed.

“Hopefully your therapist will be able to help,” Kevin says.

“Sure.”

“Can I offer any assistance?”

“How?”

“Well, before your disappearance, there were several occasions where you fell asleep as I discussed my work. Perhaps it will be similar to counting sheep?”

“I really don’t want to—”

“It is no trouble. I may actually make some progress in my theories.”

Jake doesn’t let his scepticism show as he wiggles down and pulls the duvet up his chest. Kevin sits on the chair he’d put by the bed and launches into an explanation about something that Jake can’t even begin to understand.

B*9*9

“What would you prefer I call you?”

There’s a steady rhythm as Jake taps his fingers on the armrest of the leather chair. The therapist, an elderly woman with a wave of white hair, pulled over her shoulder, sets her pen to paper while her eyes pierce into Jakes.

“Jake.”

“OK, Jake. Raymond said on the phone that you have been having nightmares?”

She leaves the question hanging, and Jake nods.

The air conditioner hums in the corner. The branch of a tree outside brushes against the glass. A piece of paper hidden beneath a small stack of books on the desk flutters in the breeze from the AC, and Jake doesn’t realise he’s even watching it until the man draws his attention back.

“Your attentions are easily drawn away.”

With an empty shrug of his shoulder, Jake makes a conscious effort to look at him with renewed focus.

“Would you like to talk about your nightmares?”

“I guess.”

Jake tries to tell him what he’s seen, analysing and weighing each word. He doesn’t want to say something that will get him labelled as crazy. The man sits and listens without so much as a hum to distract him.

Even as he talks, though he thinks it sounds a little like a monologue, Jake has to remind himself to stay on track. He peters out sometimes when new sounds pull at his attention, but eventually, he manages to finish.

“Those sound quite troubling.”

“Well, yeah.”

The silence in between goads Jake into breaking it.

“I don’t know what they mean. I don’t remember anything, and I don’t think the dreams are accurate. But, I can’t sleep much anymore, so I figured… well, Ray figured that I should get therapy or whatever.”

“What is your relationship with Raymond?”

“He’s my boss. Or he was my boss.”

“And now?”

“He’s my ex-boss.”

“Is that the only capacity?”

“Only capacity what?”

“Is that the only way you view him?”

Heat burns in his cheeks as he increases the tempo of his finger tapping.

“I guess he’s kind of like a dad?” Jake sighs. “It’s stupid.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Holt’s not my Dad. He’s a great guy, and he cares for me; he cares for the entire team!”

“And what is your relationship with your biological father?”

“Uh, not great, I guess.”

“You guess?”

 “I see your tricks,” Jake accuses.

“Tricks?”

“Yeah. I know you’re just asking questions for me to answer.”

The therapist smiles bemusedly.

“My job is to help you. That involves asking questions. What did you expect to happen?”

The leather of the chair squeaks when Jake shifts his weight.

“Did you think you’d be laying down and I’d be using a watch to lull you into a state of hypnosis?”

“Yes.” Jake doesn’t hesitate to tell the truth. He’s aware that he’s relatively transparent.

“Most people do. How about we try something similar? Could you close your eyes for me?”

It’s a task that leaves Jake’s skin tingling. He’s not sure why, but closing his eyes builds up anxiety that squeezes his chest. Anything could happen, and he might not be able to stop it if he doesn’t see it coming. He can’t stop them from grabbing him from behind, whispering in his ear about a bomb… a bomb that will…

“I need to go,” Jake says.

The therapist is blinking rapidly when Jake opens his eyes.

“Sorry,” Jake hurries to say, as he grabs his jacket. “I think—thank you, you’ve helped me a lot.”

“Call me when you’re ready for another session,” the therapist calls after him.

Jake doesn’t spare the second to reply.

He has to find out who was going to plant a bomb, and where, because he knows that it is the reason he left.

He just knows.

Chapter Text

Chapter 10.1

Jake is standing outside, hair dripping with the mood-appropriate rain, waiting.

Waiting for what, one may ask. And the truth is, Jake doesn’t know. So far, all he can figure out is that he’s waiting for something.

A bomb. A threat. It’s a thin memory, coated with grime and uncertainty. He’s too scared to touch it in case he destroys it permanently.

There’s a face, but no features. A voice with no accent. All Jake can think about is the place. The alleyway that he disappeared into. Maybe he’ll remember? Something might come back to him. Maybe?

This time, Jake doesn’t ask for help with the Uber App. He calls a car and asks to be dropped off on the corner of the street. With mumbled gratitude and wave, Jake steps into a puddle and soaks his socks.

“Damn.”

The water in his shoes squelches with each step he takes, and there’s nothing he can do about it. He can’t even distract himself from it. Not that it matters. His clothes are slowly becoming more water than fabric, and the New Yorkers rushing around him with their collars up, and umbrella’s obnoxiously swinging spare him a pitying glance.

With the skills that he’s gained throughout his career, Jake ducks beneath umbrellas and steps around those whose attentions are rigidly fixed on their phones. By the time he’s at the mouth of the alley, he’s dripping, and his chest is heaving with exertion.

Now, standing there, looking down into the dingy, trashcan-lined alleyway, he’s wondering exactly what he thought he would gain from this. Nothing looks familiar. He takes a step in, and looks behind him, waiting for someone to appear. No one does. He takes another step. Then another. And finally, he stops in the middle and turns around.

There’s nothing here. Nothing that suddenly sparks his memory.

It was stupid to expect it to. Going to the scene of the crime is what the criminals do. There has to be a better way to get… information.

Jake could slap himself.

He quickly taps in a number to his phone and listens to the ring tone, foot tapping against the wet concrete. The rain patters on the trashcan lids, and rattles down the drainpipes.

“Hello?”

“Yeon-Woo? It’s me, Jake.”

For a moment, there’s nothing but silence.

“You’re joking, right? This is a pretty sick joke.”

“I’m guessing you heard the rumour that I died, right?”

“Heard? Jake, I went to your funeral.”

“Well, it’s complicated. But I’m alive! And I have questions. Reckon you can find some time to give me a hand?”

“Sure, man. Meet me in that pizza place?”

Jake hangs up, almost giddy with excitement. This is a step in the right direction. If anyone is going to know what’s up, it’s his CI. Some detective he is. This really should have been his first call. Whatever, he thinks. This will help him get to where he needs to be.

“Jacob?”

A warm wave of familiarity washes over him as Sal, his favourite chef, steps up to the table, eyebrows drawn together. Jake smiles and pushes out of the seat. He wraps his arms around the man’s middle and squeezes.

It takes a moment to realise that he’s not being hugged back.

“Sal?”

“Jacob, is that really you? It’s been—”

“Two years. I know.”

“One of my staffers mentioned… display temperature… but I didn’t—I never would have dreamed—Jacob, it’s good to see you.”

Finally, Sal’s arms tighten around Jake. It feels like all the hugs he’s ever needed in one. He breathes in the familiar scent of too much cheese, flour and a hint of cologne.

“What happened?” Sal asks once he’s pushed Jake back far enough to look him over.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”

Sal looks more confused by this proclamation, but just as he’s opening his mouth – likely to inquire further – the man Jake has been waiting for shows up.

“Sal, I’m super sorry. I’ll explain later, but I need to talk to this guy.”

“No worries, Jakey. I’ll bring you some pizza and orange soda on the house.”

“You’re the best.”

Jake slides back into the seat and grimaces when he hand comes away from the table with a sticky substance smushed into his palm.

His CI, a Korean American called Yeon-Woo, threw himself down into the seat opposite, eyes wide and hair a little wild. Jake lets himself take in the kids entire appearance. Two years hasn’t really changed much. The boy still has the same bright, cheeky smile, same shiny black hair and dimple on his left cheek. The only difference is the lack of glasses.

“Oh man, I was like, so psyched to hear that you were alive.”

Apparently, his tendency to talk a mile a minute with the enthusiasm of a rabbit on amphetamines hasn’t changed much either.

Jake smiles.

“Dude, you were totally dead, last I heard.”

The smile melts as chills prickle across Jake’s body. For a second, while he thinks, he clenches his jaw.

“There’s been talk?” he asks, trembling hands gripping the edge of the table.

“Sure, man. Of course. Everyone’s been going on about that cop that tried to take down the biggest dealer these streets have seen for a decade. Though, apparently, the rumours are wrong. You ain’t dead. Unless I’m dreaming, you’re very, very alive.”

“I am. Alive. Listen, Yeon-Woo, I know I’m asking a lot here, but I need to know who this. Who put the hit out?”

Jake knows that answering, giving anything away of this calibre and being discovered, could put Yeon-Woo’s life in danger. Still, he’s not sure where else to go. Ever since Jake thought of asking his CI, he’s been unable to convince himself out of it. If he’s truly honest, he hasn’t even tried. But suddenly being up against Yeon-Woo’s youth and fragility it is pouring guilt into Jake’s mind.

From the looks of it, Yeon-Woo is aware of this.

The man blows air into his cheeks and falls back against the seat. In the kitchen to the left, there’s a clatter followed by a dejected yelp. Jake fidgets without meaning it, unable to rid himself of the anxiety that he’ll not be getting the answers that he needs today.

“Come on, Yeon-Woo. You’re being quiet. That’s not your MO.”

“Jake, I’m not sure I can tell you.”

Yeon-Woo looks between the table and his lap, chewing on his thumb-nail contemplatively. Jake can feel the tension rolling between them. His hands start to sweat. He rubs them on the front of his shirt.

Jake has never considered himself to be an easy person to leave wracked with nerves, but apparently New Jake is a wreck.

Though, Yeon-Woo has also never made it through an entire sentence without saying ‘dude’, ‘like’, or ‘man’ before, so perhaps the two things are connected.

“What if you die?”

The energy that had thrown Jake into a fit of fidgets and a long mental tirade drains so suddenly that it leaves him slumping a little. His mind, for perhaps the first time ever, goes completely blank.

“For Jacob and his friend!” Sal announces, pushing a pie onto the table and thumping a bottle of orange soda beside it. “Welcome back, Kiddo.”

“Thanks, Sal,” Jake whispers, heat creeping into his cheeks.

“Don’t thank me, son. Having you back in my store is thanks enough.”

Yeon-Woo cheers with none of the reservation he was displaying just a second ago. He doesn’t even wait for Sal to leave. The kid simply dives in and takes a mammoth bite out of a pizza slice that is bigger than his hand.

“Man, this place has the best pizza in Brooklyn.”

“Yeah,” Jake says. “I think so too.”

Grateful for the distraction, Jake lifts a slice and takes a bite.

Perfect.

Only Sal can do it so perfectly. He always has, and always will. Sal is one of the most reliable people in Jake’s life.

“Look,” Yeon-Woo starts again, mouth full. “If I tell you this, and you get close enough for them to know you’re alive, your life will be on the line, right? So the way I see it is that if I were the one to tell you, I’d be the one killing you.”

“If anyone killed me—”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. The killer is the one who pulled the trigger, but that’s not how I’ll see it. Ever. To me, I might not be pulling the trigger, but I am putting you in their scope.”

Horrifyingly, it makes sense. Which is also a little out of the ordinary. The kid has always had street smarts; always knew who to get involved with, and when things were too much. That’s part of the reason he became a CI in the first place. He tried his best to keep away from the real crime, but when he caught a glimpse, he knew that not saying anything would make him complicit.

“What are you up to these days, kid?”

Grease stained lips stretch out, revealing teeth.

“Dude, I got into college.”

 B*9*9

An hour and a half later, Jake has learnt a little more about English Literature than he ever planned to learn, and Yeon-Woo is breathless from talking non-stop.

“I bet your mom is real proud of you.”

“Mom and Dad are psyched. They always thought I was gonna be this huge screw-up, but I proved them wrong. I’m almost completely off the streets now. Though, a lot of my friends are supporting me through college — using totally legal means, mind you — so I can’t leave it behind for good. I’m trying to get those dudes to join me, though. College is a trip. Last week, my professor called me into his office, and he gave me a beer while we talked about my paper.”

“Sounds awesome. Man, I wish I’d’ve gone to college.”

“Never too late, that’s what my school motto is.”

“I’ve got a job.”

“You’re back on the force? Already?”

“Well, no. Not exactly.” Jake straightens his back. “But I will be, once I’ve solved this mystery.”

Yeon-Woo looks out of the window for a moment. He scratches his nose and then sighs.

“His name is Garett Snick. He’s in jail right now. Has been for three months; armed robbery, I heard. He’s the only person I know that is in on this and close enough to have the real answers.”

Jake jumps up from his seat and grabs his cell phone.

“I didn’t hear this from you!”

“You bet you didn’t. Hey, yo, who’s paying for this pie?”

“Oh, yeah.” Jake throws himself back down. “It’s free. I’m never gonna turn away from free pizza. I’m part ninja turtle like that.”

Yeon-Woo snorts into his drink, and the two continue to eat and talk about college life until the food is gone.

“Man, it’s good to see you. I’m glad you’re alive.”

“And I’m proud of you for getting into college. Keep it up, man, and maybe I’ll get you a place on the force.”

“Thanks, but I’m good. I think that for the moment, being a police officer isn’t the best path in my life. Or anybody's.”

Yeon-Woo leaves with a wave, and Jake steps back out into the wet streets. The rain has stopped, but the puddles are still deep, and a few cautionary umbrellas are up.

In five minutes, he’s at the precinct.

“Jacob, where have you been? Your therapist called and said you left without explanation. I have been worried. I have been calling.”

Jake cringes and pulls out his phone. There’s a list of missed calls, mostly from Holt, but there’s two from his mom and one from his dad.

“Sorry, Holt. I won’t do it again.”

“No. You will not. Now, come sit in my office where I can keep an eye on you.”

“Offer sounds great, but I’ve got to call my actual parents. I’ll be commandeering the nap room.”

Jake doesn’t bother to wait for permission.

“Mom?”

He closes the door behind him and allows the pillows on the couch to swallow him.

“Jake, where have you been? I’ve been calling.”

“Sorry, Mom. I’ve been busy doing stuff. Is everything alright?”

“Not exactly, no.”

Jake sits up, blood rushing in his ears and heart-rate picking up.

“You’ve been missing for two years, and in the week or so that you’ve been back, I’ve seen you once.”

Screwing his eyes shut, Jake nods.

Crap, mom. I’m so sorry. I’ve been so distracted.”

“So distracted that you forgot about me?”

“Apparently, yeah. Look, how about I come over tomorrow?”

“Good. I’ll make dinner. Your father has been very odd recently. Maybe this will be good for him too.”

“Yeah. Totally. I’m sure this will perk Dad right up.”

If his mother hears the resentment in his tone, she doesn’t show it. She simply goes on as though everything is normal.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at five-thirty?”

 “OK. Love you, mom.”

“Love you too, Jakey.”

If Jake is honest, he can’t think of anything worse than seeing his father and having to hide the hurt from the betrayal, but he can hardly tell his mother that. He’s better off just going, behaving and accepting things for what they are.

He tucks his phone into his pocket and heads over to Rosa, who’s got her feet up on the desk and is twirling a penknife between her fingers. Her eyes are fixed on Scully and Hitchcock. Every little twitch leaves them both flinching.

“Jake, Holt’s been asking after you for like, three hours. What the hell, man?”

“Sorry. I had to meet with my CI. Listen, Rosa. I need a favour.”

“Name it.”

“I need you to go visit a man called Garett Snick. He’s the closest name I could get to being involved in my case, but there’s no way I’ll be able to slip Holt for long enough to do that.”

“And also you’re not a police officer anymore.”

“Right, that too. Let’s not talk about that.”

“Sure thing. Want me to pass on any messages?”

“No. I think whatever you say will be threatening enough.”

Rosa smirks and tucks the knife into her boots.

“I’ll let you know how it goes.”

With Rosa leaving, boots clacking against the ground, Jake notices how Scully and Hitchcock seem to relax. They must have done something to piss her off.

“Hey, Jakey, Holt has been worried about you today,” Boyle says, straining a smile. “You walked out of therapy?”

“I’ll go back, I promise. I just had stuff I needed to do.”

“Sure. Cool. Cool.” Boyle’s head twitches in what might be a nod, but Jake can’t say with any kind of certainty.

“Boyle, I swear. I’ll go back. Whatever it takes to get back onto the force.”

“And if you don’t get back on the force, you can always take over Gina’s job.”

“Uh. I guess.”

“Yeah. Things will be fine. Back to normal before you know it.”

Boyle looks a little better for his realisation, even if Jake secretly plans to never become a secretary. He’d be far too close to Holt, and even putting aside his suspicions, Jake couldn’t handle that. The man is treating Jake like something fragile. Like a child. Jake is many many things: impulsive, unpredictable, excitable, infuriating, distracted, and - if Amy is to be believed - a tidsoptimist. Jake may be all those things and more, but one thing he is not is a child.

And he won’t be treated like one if he can help it.

“Jake, my office.”

With a heaving sigh and a roll of his eyes, Jake drags his feet to Holt’s office.

“Close the door.”

The door snaps closed behind him. Jake holds his hands behind him, sure that if Holt were to see how twitchy they were, he would know something was up. He doesn’t want to give anything away.

“Jacob, you seem anxious.”

“I think I’m entitled to feeling a tad anxious, considering the circumstances.”

“Yes. Yes, I suppose that is true. I, too, would be unsettled by such an event.”

Holt does not say anything further. He simply locks eyes with Jake, as though waiting.

Well, he’ll be waiting a long time because Jake does not break so easily.

“I’m not a child!”

Dark eyes flicker towards the window and then back to Jake, which is the only indication that he even heard Jake. Again, Holt simply watches Jake, waiting.

“I just think that you should treat me like the adult I am. If I don’t answer your calls, it’s cause I’m busy doing… adult stuff. I shouldn’t have to check in every ten minutes like I was some wayward pre-teen who couldn’t look after themselves. I’m thirty-six, for goodness sake.”

“Thirty-eight,” Holt corrects.

The leather on the sofa protests as Jake throws himself down, crossing his arms.

“I have an apology to make, it seems. I had not intended to make you feel as though I were babying you. I merely worried about your health and safety, since you have just begun to recover from a traumatic event; a trauma that goes beyond the physical ailments you suffered.”

Jake turns to look at the city from Holt’s window.

“I want you to understand that I trust you, but I am still worried about you, and I will continue to worry about you.” Holt picks up the Rubix cube and frowns at it. “In the time that you were away, I spent a lot of time asking myself why I had not been able to protect you.”

“That’s not your job,” Jake says, voice softer than he intended it to be.

“No, it may not be, but that does not mean I did not feel as though I should have been able to do more. The last time I left you alone to do as you wanted, you did not come back for two years. I do not…” Holt pauses, which is so wildly uncharacteristic that Jake can’t help but look at him. “I do not wish to make the same mistakes again.”

Jake refuses to feel bad. He can’t let Holt lure him into a sense of guilt when he’s done nothing wrong.

“Sorry,” Jake mumbles, fingers pulling at each other on his lap.

“Do not apologise. You have done nothing wrong.”

“I was angry.”

“And you are entitled to your feelings.”

“Well. Whatever.”

Jake scrunches up his nose and blinks away any moisture that may be acting traitorously.

“I did not mean to upset you.”

“My dad sold me out.”

The words leave his mouth before he has the chance to even think about what he’s saying. It’s like word vomit, and Jake is left in the lurch as his words take effect. Holt, who is hard to catch off-guard, tenses up.

“What do you mean?”

The cat is, as they say, out of the bag. Jake isn’t sure if it’s worth trying to put it back in, but at the end of the day, Holt isn’t the type of man to let something like that go undiscussed.

The files on Holt’s shelf are the exact colours of the LGBTQ+ flag, Jake notes with interest. How he manages to keep all of this space clean is a mystery. Jake can’t even keep his drawers clean. Speaking of, where is Algernon get to? Jake hopes the little mouse is still alive and —

“Jacob, what have you found out?”

Blinking, Jake drags his attention back.

“Doesn’t matter.”

“It does, and you have to speak to me about it. I can help you. But only if we talk.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

There’s no angry sigh or irritated words. Just a look.

“It’s not even important,” Jake insists.

Holt moves so suddenly that Jake finds himself flinching back, trying to escape into the sofa cushions. One second Holt is behind his desk, and the next, he’s sat beside Jake, one hand resting on his knee and the other on his shoulder.

“Jacob, you need to tell me what you know.”

“But—”

“Jacob, for your own safety, tell me what you know and where your investigation has led you.”

Suspicion rears its ugly head, and Jake swallows any accusations he may have.

“I found out that my Dad was supposed to run drugs for someone, and that he threw me under the bus for a wild weekend in Vegas.”

“What else did you learn?” Holt asks urgently. “What else do you know?”

Nothing! Jeez,” Jake lies. “Why? What do you know?”

“Nothing.” Holt seems to realise he sounds like he‘s lying. He coughs. “Nothing.”

Jake chews the inside of his mouth as he tries to hide any of his emotions. Holt didn’t get this far without becoming a talented detective; nor did Jake for that matter.

They both know the other is lying now, so it’s just a game of who can figure out the truth first.

B*9*9

That night, as Jake is making his way to the stairs, there’s a knock at the door. Jake turns to see Holt and Kevin share a conspiratorial glance at one another.

“What‘re you two up to?”

“Now, do not get angry—”

“Which is exactly what someone says when they know the other person has a reason to be angry.”

“But, as you have been having some issues sleeping recently, we decided to enlist the help of your friends.”

As he speaks, Kevin opens the front door and Gina is standing there, grinning like she’d just won the lottery.

“Jakey, Baby, Mommy is going to get you to sleep real quick.”

She slips into the house, grabs his hand and then drags him up the stairs and to his room.

”Into bed,” she demands. “Chop chop.”

”Exactly what is happening?”

“Holt has employed my genius to put you to sleep. With my background knowledge on you and my perfect child-rearing talents, I was choice number one.”

“Actually, Boyle was busy.”

“Kevin, you’re ruining my authority.”

“You have no authority,” Jake gripes as he’s pushed into the bed. “Leave me alone.”

“No. Your sleepless nights are making you dangerous. If you don’t get a few hours in soon, you’ll die.”

“I’m not that that’s how it works,” Jake contests.

“What would you know? Maybe they released a paper on it last week? Do you read scientific journals?”

“It’s actually common knowledge that lack of sleep is detrimental to one's health,” Kevin chimes in.

“Kev, if you keep this up, he’ll never fall asleep.”

“Fine. I will leave you to it for the time being.”

With a nod and a smile, Kevin moves away from the door and his footsteps dim as he walks into his and Holt’s room.

“Now, where were we?”

“You can go home, Gina,” Jake implores. “This is ridiculous.”

“Not as ridiculous as you refusing to sleep. Now, come along. Scooch up.”

For a whole second, Jake has no idea what she means, but she signals for Jake to move over, and he obliges. Once he’s cleared space, Gina climbs in beside him and lays on her side, facing him.

“I’m not refusing to sleep,” Jake explains. “I’m just not tired.”

“Oh, sure. Real convincing.”

Jake fights the urge to turn over and face the wall.

“Remember when we had those sleepovers at Nana’s? She used to make us her famous hot chocolate and then send us to bed?” Gina says, smiling contently.

“I remember we never slept, and we were zombies all through school the next day.”

Gina blinks.

“Is that how those days ended?” she laughs. “Oh yeah. I forgot. Well, then, I seem to have overestimated how much use I’m going to be tonight. I always thought we talked until we fell asleep.”

“No. That’s what we told Nana so that she wouldn’t stop us from having more sleepovers.”

“That tracks.” Gine pulls his mouth to the side in a grimace. “Oh well.”

There’s something ridiculously comforting about how Gina really hasn’t changed all that much since he left. Sure, she has a baby and a boyfriend, and maybe she started her own online cult - “It’s not a cult, Jake. It’s a worshipping circle, and I’m in the middle.” - but she’s still the same Gina Linetti that he’s known his whole life.

“Want to hear about how Lin Boyle married my mom and then cheated on him?”

“You don’t know me at all if that’s the kind of question you even need to ask.”

Gina chuckles and then launches into her story, hands waving, voices changing and the whole she-bang.

By the time Holt and Kevin are waking up, Gina is drifting off, and Jake is trying his best to do the same. But sleep seems to recognise that it only brings nightmares, and it sticks to the edges, lulling him into a drowsiness that he can’t shake.

“More coffee please,” he begs once they arrive at work two hours later.

“Jacob, you are shivering with caffeine right now. You need water and rest.”

“I can’t rest. Resting is for the weak. And for those that didn’t just drink three gallons of coffee.”

“Well, we shall have to try something. You are shaking like rice on an amplifier.”

“Huh. I never took you to be the descriptive type,” Jake hums.

“Come along. Let us see if we can give you something to do until you run out of energy.”

That ‘something’ turned out to be manual labour. Any other day, Jake would have complained so loud that the people on the first floor would have known how little he cared to do physical work, but not today. Holt was absolutely right. The constant movement made it easier to not tremble with his caffeine overdose.

“You good?” Rosa asks as she moves over to his side.

“Peachy. Learn anything?”

“When you’re not talking five hundred miles an hour, I’ll fill you in. Until then, keep up the good work.”

“Aye Aye!”

For the next few hours, Jake carries boxes from the storage room to Boyles desk. Boyle then checks the system to ensure everything has been entered into the computer - a task delegated to Hitchcock and Scully - and then, once verified, Jake carries it over to the shredder and shreds the paper.

It’s a lot of work, but mindless. It gives Jake time, in the moments where he’s idle (at Boyle’s desk, for example) to use his phone to research Snick. There’s not an awful lot to go on, and the man is as most active criminals are; elusive. He doesn’t have any social media accounts. No E-Harmony. Just a single article in a newspaper dated the day he was locked up.

Hopefully, Rosa has had more luck.

“I can do the rest,” Terry says, patting Jake on the back. “You go rest.”

“I don’t need to rest.”

“Really? Cause you’re looking pretty tired.”

“I’m fine.”

“I’m not accusing you of not being fine. I’m saying you look tired. You can be both fine and tired.”

“You’re being pedantic.”

“And you’re being impossible.”

Jake folds his arms over his chest and glowers at Terry.

“Alright, man. It was just an offer.” With his hands up, Terry slowly backs away, though as he reaches his desk, he mutters, “look like you’re gonna pass out, but Terry will carry you when you do.”

“I’m fine!” Jake shouts, before heading back to grab more boxes.

Jake is steadfast in his assessment. He’s fine. He’s got coffee and commitment to keep him going. Holt wants to ‘tire him out’ as if he were some toddler on a sugar high, but Jake will prove that, once again, he’s a grown man and is better than that.

Thirty minutes after his loud assertion that he was totally fine, Jake‘s body decides to prove him wrong in the most dramatic way. He was already struggling, and it was only the intense focus on his legs and arms that stopped him from noticing Terry’s creeping. One step late and the box falls to the floor with a clatter. If it weren’t for Terry, Jake would have joined a second later.

“I have to admit, Jake, I thought it would take less time.”

Jake grins at Terry from his place in the man's arms.

“I aim to please.”

“Really? I’d have assumed you aimed to infuriate.”

If Jake thought he had any dignity left, he was definitely depleted of such thoughts as he was carried bridal style through the bullpen and towards Holt’s office. From his spot next to Terry’s left bicep, Jake can see how Hitchcock is helping to pick up the scattered papers.

“You’re doing it wrong,” Hitchcock growls.

“Well, there aren’t exactly instructions on this thing,” Scully whines.

Jake doesn’t think he’s ever met two people more incompetent than them.

“Put him on the sofa.”

Except for himself, of course.

“Sure thing,” Terrance - because he’s a traitor and doesn’t get a fun name anymore - offers an obligatory nod and dumps Jake.

It’s only after a seconds thought that he even thinks to add a blanket. By that time, Jake is so frustrated with being man-handled and babied that he uses his feet to kick it to the floor.

“You’re so grouchy when you’re sleepy,” Terry notes.

“Stop talking to me like I’m five.”

“Well, I’m sorry Jake, but if you act like one of my children, then you can only blame yourself for Dad Terry making an appearance.”

“That will be all, Sergeant Jeffords,” Holt says with a nod.

“Remember that conversation we had yesterday?” Jake says with gritted teeth.

“The one where you claimed not to be a child?”

“Yeah.”

Holt, whose attention had been focused on the paperwork in front of him, sits straight, leaning only slightly into the back of his chair. Jake waits for him to say something, but when he receives no words, he grabs the blanket and rolls over on the sofa.

“I’m not going to sleep.”

“That is fine. As long as you are resting, you are not causing any problems.”

Jake rolls over and glowers.

“I am not causing problems!”

“I am sure that both Hitchcock and Scully would disagree with you on that claim.”

Jake levers himself higher and peaks over the edge of the window. Somehow, Hitchcock and Scully are still cleaning up the papers. But now, rather than just a few scattered documents, there’s also a smashed plant pot and a large mustard stain on Hitchcock’s shirt.

“How in the world—”

“I have been asking myself the same question for as long as I have been here.”

Jake flops back onto the sofa with a huff and wraps himself tightly in the blanket. Holt returns to his paperwork and Jake settled in to watch. Maybe he’ll be bored enough to sleep? You can’t dream if you only nap, right?

Wrong.

“Jake!”

A sturdy pair of arms wrap around Jake’s biceps and chest, holding him still. He comes to struggling, but Terry’s calming voice in his ear and a thumb rubbing over his knee brings him back.

“You‘re alright, Jake. You’re OK. You’re safe.”

“S-shot me,” Jake forces out. “C-can’t r-run any w-where.”

“You’re in Holt’s office. You’re OK. You’re safe. Don’t worry. No one will hurt you here.”

With a long-suffering breath, Jake allows himself to fall limp in Terry’s hold. Images flash in his mind, but the heartbeat pounding against his back from Terry is enough to remind him that he’s alive. That the squad are OK. That it’s was just a dream.

“You OK, man?”

Words don’t seem inclined to come forward, so instead, he hums.

“We will return home early,” Holt decides, standing up with groan from his place at Jake's knee. “Come along.”

Jake lacks the energy to argue and is pushed upright by Terry.

“I’ve got it for from here, sir.”

Holt inclines his head, puts a hand on Jake's elbow.

“Send Santiago this evening.”

“Yes, sir.”

Jake isn’t aware of very much until he’s being gently lowered onto the sofa at the Holt Household, cheddar yapping at his feet.

“It is OK. Just stay there for a while, and I’ll go get you some juice.”

The nightmare was very very real, and he's sure he’s had that dream before. The one where he’s running, and someone is shooting at him. 

It takes him a second to pull the shoulder of his shirt down. There, just beneath the shoulder, is an entry wound.

“It was a memory.”

“What was that?”

Holt returns to Jakes field of view and his eyes immediately find the wound on Jake's shoulder.

“This scar is old.”

“I was shot for realsies.”

Somehow, despite everything he’s learned recently, the information still sends his brain into hyper-drive. He was shot. Someone shot him. He has the scar of a bullet entering his body.

Which means his ‘kidnapping’ wasn’t as consensual as he thought it was. What an odd thing to be relieved about. And with that relief comes a weak headache.

If his dream - or rather his nightmare - is to be trusted, then Jake was attempting to leave at some point. Considering how it doesn’t hurt and the way it’s healed, he can only assume it was early on in his kidnapping.

“I’m a detective. How did I not notice before?” Jake muses. “Hey, is there…” he tries to look at his back, but can’t twist far enough. “Is there an exit wound?”

Holt puts a warm hand on Jake’s arm and pulls him forward gently. He peers at his back, jaw moving in apparent distress.

“Yes. Does it hurt? Should I call for our doctor?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” Jake mumbles. “My head, though—”

“I will fetch you a Tylenol. Stay here.”

The emphasis on the order isn’t lost on Jake, and he’s not even sure he blames Holt for it. For now, though, Jake has no sense of where he wants to go or what he needs to do.

This case needs to be solved, but obviously, things are getting a little more hectic than they should. Several stories are overlapping one another, and none of them makes much sense. He was shot, he went willingly, Holt is involved, his father is at fault, there was a drug ring, there was a note in a book. There are so many different things to factor in that it feels like a jigsaw puzzle, except the pieces, are from different boxes. They simply won’t fit together because they can’t.

“Here.” Holt holds out his hand, two little white pills sitting in his palm. “Take these.”

The pills are all too noticeable as they slide down his throat, and Jake does his best to not choke.

“What do we do now?”

Jake has always teetered between being wholly self-reliant and dangerous, dependent on other people. If he were alone for too long, he’d survive solely on gummy worms and orange drink, and he’s sure that everyone around him is painfully aware of this fact. However, if it came to a case that left everyone else scratching their heads, Jake is equally capable of solving it entirely by himself. It’s a skill, one he’s honed and moulded over the years.

To most, he’s an anomaly. To his friends, he’s an overgrown child with the mind of detective and the sense of an idiot.

Despite all that, Jake feels suddenly and awfully vulnerable.

He’s completely lost his edge for detective work, and now, under the care of his boss, he's not even able to feed himself. He’s entirely at the mercy of the world, and the world knows it.

How devastatingly humiliating.

“We will find the best path forward when we have more details.”

So simple, and yet not enough. The cold prickles at his shoulder, so Jake covers back up, thumb resting over the spot where the bullet entered. The thought leaves him cold.

“How about we try and write down the series of events?” Holt suggests.

If Jake were in a better mindset, he might have wondered why Holt sounded a little manic. It wasn’t like the man to get so emotional. But, the reason Jake didn’t notice is the reason Holt is feeling a little on edge.

Jake has never, in the entire time they’ve known each other, sounded so scared.

Which makes Jake feel worse, because only with hindsight does he recognise that Holt might have needed a few words of comfort there.

Jake’s lack of reply spurs Holt into action. The older man produces a pad of paper and two pens, placing one in Jake’s hand when he doesn’t reach for it.

“Start at the beginning. We can chronologically map everything out. Maybe it will help us if we knew what needs to be filled in.”

“That… doesn’t sound awful,” Jake says slowly. “OK.”

Kevin is welcomed home to obliviousness. Two heads at the kitchen table are bowed. Holt is sitting in his chair, posture perfect, while Jake has one leg swinging wildly and the other is folded underneath him. Together, they’re fixated on the sheets of paper that litter the table.

“Busy day?”

Kevin’s prim voice causes Jake to topple from his seat at the table.

“Oh, hey Kevin,” Jake chirps, laying on his back on the tiled floor. “Hope you’re doing well.”

“Jacob.”

Jake rolls over and pushes himself back to his feet.

“We’ve been putting the case into a timeline.”

“Oh? And how has that been going?”

“Swell,” Jake says.

“Indeed,” Holt replies. “We have created a timeline, and we now know what needs to be filled in.”

“Well, that is a job for another day,” Kevin says.

“Agreed.”

“Hey, wait! We haven’t—”

“No shop talk at home, Jacob,” Kevin warns.

Shoulders slumping, Jake groans. Holt helps him to order the pages and then files them away with the promise of ‘tomorrow’.

“Santiago will be over in a few hours to attempt what Linetti failed,” Holt says as they eat their fish steaks. 

“Do you believe she will have more success than Gina?”

“I certainly hope so.”

Jake bites his tongue. He doesn’t want to accuse the men of anything, not after the long conversation he had with Holt a few days ago. Still, he distinctly feels like a problematic toddler right now.

All this talk about putting him to sleep; it’s frustrating to know that he even needs help.

“I don’t want to go to sleep,” Jake tells them.

“But if you do not sleep—”

“I understand that there are going to be problems with my health and blah blah blah, but I don’t like sleeping. It’s a waste of time, and I could be using that time to— Oh Kevin, did we mention I was shot?”

Clang.

Kevin near slams his fork against the plate, his face tight and his eyes growing dark.

“I beg your pardon, Jacob?”

“I was shot. I had a nightmare at work, and I was shot. Not today. While I was in captivity. But I remember that bit now. Isn’t that crazy?”

Whitening knuckles and a shaking frame go unnoticed by Jake. He jumps into an explanation about what happened and how his nightmare played out. It’s Holt, in all his wisdom, that reaches out and places a comforting hand on his husband's thigh.

“But don’t worry, man. It doesn’t even hurt. It was just a surprise, is all. You know how it goes.”

“I assure you that in my line of work, I absolutely do not know ‘how it goes’.”

Jake swallows hard. He reluctantly allows his gaze to flicker up to Kevin’s, and he grimaces when he sees the anger there.

“Did I make you angry? Was it the shop talk?”

The edges of Kevin’s anger melts, face smoothing out into concern.

“I am not angry, Jacob. Or, I am, but not at you. I am angry at those who took you, hurt you and kept you captive for so long.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

Jake volunteers to clean up. 

It’s the least he can do for their hospitality, and the most he can do to keep his mind away from the terror’s it’s trying to relive; to block out the truths he desperately doesn’t want to accept.

First and foremost, he doesn’t want to accept that Holt had anything to do with this, but all the little signs point in his direction. He hates that his father had such a heavy hand on his kidnapping and loathes how little his father did to get him back.

Finally, Jake is disgusted with himself for giving himself away so easily. And for what? For him to wake up several years later with no memories and three horrible truths to face about the people he desperately wanted to trust? Life sucks, and he hates that. He hates everything. Everything is stupid and—

“Jacob, mind yourself.”

Kevin appears at his side suddenly, hands reaching over to relieve Jake’s grip on a shard of broken glass. When did that happen?

“Oh, crap. Kev, I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“How about you go sit down? I will clean up this mess.”

“But—”

“Truly. It is no trouble for me. For you, however… well. You are allowed to not be OK. Go. Sit. Detective Santiago should be with us soon.”

“Right. To read me a bedtime story?”

“If that is what you need to sleep, then yes.”

They’re just trying to help, they’re just trying to help, they’re just trying to help…

The mantra follows him as Jake moves to the living room and curls up into the sofa. He can’t get angry. Despite the deepening suspicions that Holt is involved with his disappearance, Jake is desperately trying to convince himself that the man did it in a good way.

Does it make sense? No. Does Jake care? Also no. Anything to keep him sane.

And getting frustrated at his treatment won’t change that for one second.

“Ah,” Jake hears Holt exclaim - by which he means that Holt’s voice took a tinge of surprise - “Diaz.”

“Sorry, Cap. Amy was held up. She’s almost finished with the paperwork and didn’t want to get out of ‘the zone’.”

Jake can’t see, but he can hear the air quotes. Jeez, Ames is such a nerd.

“Is that whiskey?”

“Best sedative I know of.”

Jake waits, trying not to be an active eavesdropper, but also not working particularly hard to not hear anything.

“Well. Come on in. Please ensure that he does not get so drunk as to be sick in the bedroom.”

“You got it, boss.”

Seconds later, Rosa steps into the lounge, bottle of amber liquor held aloft in her hand. Holt relieves her of her leather jacket, and she takes a moment to remove her boots before pointing at Jake.

“Shower. Pyjamas. Bed. Now. I’ll be up in fifteen minutes.”

“Do not bother arguing Jacob. This truly is for your own good. Even if the methods are… inadvisable.”

What point is there in pushing against this weird regime? Rosa could kick his ass a million different ways, and he wouldn’t even notice until he was already incapacitated. And since he hasn’t tried the ‘alcohol method’ yet, there’s not saying that it won’t lull him into a dreamless sleep.

Might as well go along for now.

“I’ll see you in fifteen,” Jake says with a mock salute.

Chapter Text

By the time Rosa is coming in the room, two crystal glasses clinking in the hand not holding the bottle, Jake is in his PJ’s and under the covers. He’s also so lost in his thoughts that Rosa has to snap her fingers by his face. She grabs his wayward fist as he lashes out in order to come back to life.

“Woah there, cowboy,” she warns, pushing his arm back. “You OK?”

“Yeah. Yeah, grand. Just… jumpy.”

Rosa grimaces and then pours two fingers into a glass. She hands one over. Jake pushes himself up, rearranging the pillows, and takes the glass.

“Thanks.”

She holds out her glass, and he knocks his whiskey against hers.

“To you being found,” she says.

“And to us solving the case.”

They both down the drinks and Jake coughs as it sears in his throat.

“Burny, just the way I always drink it.”

“Moron,” Rosa says with a fond smile.

She tilts the bottle again and pours them another two fingers. This time, Jake only sips at it, trying not to pull a face at the taste. Wasn’t there a better option?

“It’s better than beer for getting to sleep,” she explains as if she had been reading his mind. “Beer is too carbonated. Whiskey is smooth. You’ll drift right off.”

“Smooth?” Jake scoffs.

“If you’re not five, it’s smooth.”

“Ageist.”

Rosa props her feet up on the bed and levels him with a thoughtful stare.

“I went to prison. Spoke to Garett. I got names, information, stuff we can use to investigate further.”

“What’s the word?”

From the satchel, she’d dropped on the floor beside the chair she produces a pile of papers.

“Meet Sascha Brewing. Known mob ties, criminal record longer than my arm with a total jail time of five minutes.”

“How is that possible?”

“Friends in high places. Places like the police bureau.”

Jake swears under his breath and takes the manilla folder with the man’s details. He flips through the pages, reading as quickly as he can, soaking the information and storing it away.

“OK. So, no names. Just a certain connection.”

“Exactly. I did some research into Sascha and Garett. Looked into places they’d been in the last three years, checked phone records, all that jazz. Found this.”

She hands over another folder, this one with three photographs, a hotel sign-in, and a receipt.

“The week after you disappeared, Garett and Sascha came to this hotel.”

Jake looks at the first two pictures, trying to see if their faces mean anything. He doesn’t recognise them at all, though.

The third picture, however, knocks the air from his chest.

“Holt was there too,” Rosa adds sourly.

“Yeah. OK. Cool. Cool cool cool cool cool cool cool. Holt met with the people who likely kept me away from my life for two years. That’s dope. That’s fine. I can deal with that. Cool. Cool cool—”

“Stop freaking out,” Rosa orders. “Down your drink.”

Scrunching his face, Jake does as she says. It burns a little less this time, but hopefully, it will numb him enough to work past this.

“So, we’ve got names. We’ve got faces. We now need to confirm with your father that they’re responsible. Can you message your Dad?”

He nods, and then almost immediately freezes.

“What’s wrong?”

“Crap,” Jake hisses. “I forgot to go to my Mom’s for dinner.”

Rosa sighs.

“Call her now. Apologise. Say you’ll be there tomorrow. I’ll message and get Gina to go with you.”

His phone trembles as he scrolls through his contacts. Disappointment at himself dries his mouth as he holds the phone to his ear.

“Hey, mom.”

“Jacob Peralta. What on earth do you think you’re doing, standing me up?”

“I’m sorry Mom, I—”

“I’m worried about you. I miss you. Jake, I had to spend two years believing you were dead, and now you’re alive again, I’m not even getting to see you. It hurts. Jake, I love you, and I want to see you. Is that so much for a mother to ask?”

His eyes sting.

“I’m sorry. I miss you too. I love you too. I swear it was an accident. It’s just… it’s been a long week. I’m trying to figure out what happened.”

“I understand that you want to know, but what about now? What about the people around you right now? We need you here. Your Dad and I… Jake, I miss you.”

“Can we reschedule? Gina will bring me to you tomorrow. OK?”

“Fine. I’ll call Gina now and arrange it. I can at trust her, at least. She’s always been able to wrangle you in a way I never could.”

“OK, mom. Sorry.”

“I get it. I’ll see you tomorrow, son.”

“See you, Mom. Love you.”

“Love you, mostest,” she whispers back.

Harshly rubbing his sleeve over his eyes, Jake is gratified to find that Rosa suddenly finds the wall very interesting.

“OK. So, I’ve got a dinner date with the ‘rents tomorrow. I’ll message my Dad now, but he’s not great at answering texts.”

“That’s fine. We can solve the rest of the case later. For now, we need not get you too excited. Drink up.” She pours more into their respective glasses. “Let’s get you to sleep.”

“How?”

“I’ll tell you a story. How about that?”

With a glint in her eye, Rosa begins her story.

“When I was in ballet school, there was this girl, Natasha, and I hated her. We always got into fights…”

Jake drinks through the story, and slowly but surely his eyelids grow heavier. The last thing he’s aware of is Rosa prying the glass from his hand and her fingers running through his hair with a sad smile.

“Coffee,” Jake groans.

“No egg concoction today?” Holt asks, a laugh in his voice.

“No. Don’t talk ‘bout food. Just coffee.”

Kevin hands over a steaming mug, and Jake gulps it down, the burn not dissimilar from last night.

“Any dreams?”

“None,” Jake mumbles over the rim of the mug.

“That is probably not the greatest way to overcome these problems, but I’m glad you finally got some rest.”

Jake had slept for much longer than he was used to. It was almost time for Holt and Kevin to go to work. He was still in his pyjama’s. Maybe they’d leave him to recover on his own, possibly on the sofa with cartoons.

“I called Detective Santiago. She will be here at eleven to take you to the courts to finalise your ‘alive’ status. Until then, please refrain from breaking anything.”

“Scouts honour.”

“Have you ever been a scout?”

“That’s hardly pertinent,” Jake says, distracted the moment a certain fluffy boi comes trotting inside. “Oh, hey, Cheddar! How’re you doing? Who’s a good boy?”

Cheddar totters up to Jake and accepts his praise with a wagging tail. Feeling like he’s side-stepped the question, he proceeds to scratch Cheddars stomach with a smug smile.

“Remember, Amy will be here at eleven. Do not leave the house.”

Jake nods to Holt and Kevin.

The cheerful tune of the Ninja Turtles opening credits scene soon fills the void left by the couple, and Jake settles in with Cheddar on his stomach to drown out the hangover with a smile.

“I am such a Mikey,” he tells Cheddar. “Holt and Kevin are both Leo. Boyle is Donnie, and Rosa is totally Raph. Though, maybe Holt and Kevin are Splinter? Terry is probably Leo. Amy can be April. Yeah. This feels right. Hitchcock and Scully are Bebop and Rocksteady. Wow. It all fits.”

Soon, Jake’s mind fills with images of the Ninja Turtles working in the office. Jake, wearing an orange mask, comes skating into the room with a cheer. In contrast, Boyle, in his purple mask, is working tirelessly at the computer, offers a humoured smile to Jake.

“Woof!”

Jake looks around. Did the turtles have a dog? Mikey had a cat, he knows that, but he doesn’t remember there being a dog…

“Woof!”

Jake sits up, blinking away the dream and blearily searching the room for danger.

Cheddar is sat on his haunches, barking at the front door. The cartoon is still playing in the background, but it’s not so loud that he can’t hear the person calling his name.

Fear sparks through him like fireworks. Nausea crawls up his throat. What if they’re back?

“Jake?” comes a voice and another round of knocking. “Let me in. I know you’re in there. I can hear the Turtles.”

The fear melts immediately.

With a leap that would win him a gold in the Olympics, Jake is by the door. He opens it and reveals Amy, in her signature pantsuit, smiling.

“You recognise the show?”

Amy’s cheeks burn red, which causes Jake’s heart to flutter a little.

“Uh, yeah. When we were… you know, together… you showed me a few episodes.”

“Really? What did you think?”

“It’s a cartoon, Jake. I thought it was colourful and simple.”

“Uncultured swine,” he mutters, earning himself a gentle slap on the arm.

“Come on, nerd. We’ve got to bring you back to life.”

With a last longing look at the TV, Jake offers Cheddar a heartfelt apology for leaving and gets dressed quickly.

“Ready.”

With a warm hand wrapped around his wrist, Amy pulls Jake out of the house and into her waiting car.

“Here.” Amy hands over a stack of papers and a pen. “Sign those.”

Jake rifles through the pile, stopping to add his signature where the colourful indicators demand.

“Do I get to have another birthday because of this?”

 A flutter appears in his stomach when Amy gives him a fond, warm smile.

“Sure, if you want.”

“Awesome. I want everyone to dress up, and I want to be the king.”

She laughs at the joke, even if Jake hadn’t intended for it to be one.

“That sounds fun. I’ll bring the ice cream and jelly.”

“Oh my god, I would love that.”

The car ride is nearly forty minutes long, and in that time, Amy does her best to explain the political landscape of the last few years.

“Why do I get the feeling that you wouldn’t have cared about this at the time?”

“Because you know me better than that?”

Her laugh is enough to power him for hours. It fills him with warmth. It’s the emotional equivalent of the perfect day. Nothing could go wrong with Amy here.

“What?” she asks, nervously tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Heat rises in his cheeks when he realises he’s been staring.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t apologise. Just tell me what you were thinking.”

Jake’s mind is a scrambled egg right now, and the words that come to his mind are both stupid and wholly unconvincing.

“Wouldn’t it be so cool if we were ninja turtles?”

Amy sighs, something Jake see’s rather than hears, but her smile doesn’t falter.

“You’re lucky that we’re here, because I know that’s not what you were thinking. How about we grab a coffee after we’re done? Talk for a bit?”

Jake’s palms start sweating, and he swallows thickly, averting his eyes from her face.

“Jake?”

Now she sounds freaked out, and that’s 100% worse.

“Sure. Coffee like. I mean, sure. I coffee… good. Dammit.”

Amy puts her hand on his forearm, nails digging a little.

“Look at me, Jake,” she implores.

“I don’t want to.”

“Please, don’t be weird. Just look at me. Tell me what’s wrong.”

Is there anything wrong? Why is he getting flustered, like he’s talking to Jenny Gildenhorn? When was it Amy that made him feel like this?

Nothing. I’m fine.”

“You’re a terrible liar, have I ever told you that?”

“Maybe. I don’t remember.”

“Not funny, Jake. Let’s get you through this quickly. I have a feeling you’re going to be a toddler in comparison to everyone else here.”

“Well, that’s just rude.”

“Tell me you don’t think it’s true as we’re leaving,” she challenges with raised eyebrows.

Excitement tingles around his ears as he nods with determination.

Inside, everything seems impossibly grey. Jake, in his bright orange t-shirt and khaki shorts, is like a beacon on a dark night. Despite the room being no bigger than the bullpen and filled with around fifty people, the conversation is so muted that Jake can hear their breathing.

“Nowhere is this quiet.”

Jake flinches as five people turn and shush him. He’d whispered it. It’s their fault if they could hear a whisper in a room this size.

“Jesus—What is this, a funeral?”

“Jake, stop,” Amy hisses. “This is a place of reverence.”

Jake’s snickers die out when he realises that Amy was not actually making a joke. She was serious. Dixie Chick serious.

Damn.

With a sharp look and a silent, one-sided conversation, Amy leads them towards a large desk by the wall on the opposite side of the room. Behind it sits a woman in a dirt-brown cardigan and horn-rimmed glasses with one of those necklaces on.

“Is she worried she’ll lose them?” Jake asks from the corner of his mouth.

“That’s not what they’re for,” Amy sighs.

Once they’re in front of the lady, Jake puts on his best-winning smile.

“New cardigan?”

Jake’s conversation point falls flat, and Amy elbows him and apologises for his behaviour.

“Paperwork, please,” the woman drawls.

Amy takes the stack from Jake’s arms. She hands it over with a polite comment about how ‘she must love working here’ that’s met with as much enthusiasm as Jake’s cardigan talking point.

The woman stays silent as she fingers her way through the pile and types into her computer in an agonisingly slow fashion. She stamps a few sheets, prints a new page and hands it over.

“Goodbye.”

Eye’s widening, Jake isn’t given a chance to comment as Amy takes his hand and pulls him away.

“I feel like all the colour drained from the world when we walked in here,” he notes miserably. “I thought there would be more of a thing, you know? A hoopla. A celebration. A few cheers, at least. This place sucks.”

“Speak for yourself, Peralta. This is like paradise to me.”

“That should not be as endearing as I found it.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” Jake says quickly.

“So, about the toddler thing?”

There’s denial on Jake’s tongue, ready to lash out and prove her wrong. Unfortunately, he’s terrible at lying, and he would very much like to see her smile.

“Fine. Yes. Everyone in there was a boring old miserable adult, and I felt like a child in comparison. Happy?”

He gets the smile, and it’s reward enough.

“Very. Come on. Let’s go get coffee.”

They climb back into the car, and Jake holds the sheet of paper that officially claims he’s alive again. It feels heavy in his hand, and yet seems very unimpressive. To him, it’s basically another birth certificate, but that room sucked all the excitement out of his re-birth.

Rude, really.

“Here. They serve really nice coffee.”

“Cool.”

So sue him, he’s not feeling the most conversational right now. How is he supposed to? Things are so, so messed up.

“I’ve got to be at my Mom’s for six.”

“I know. Gina will pick you up from the precinct. Don’t you worry about it. Now, what do you want? It’s on me. Consider it a birthday present.”

Jake goes with a Mocha, simply because choosing from the long list was very confusing and he really wasn’t sure what most of it was. The man said that one had chocolate in it, so who is he to say no to coffee and chocolate mixed together?

“How do you feel?” Amy asks once they find a seat away from the hum of noise.

“Out of sorts,” Jake admits. “I guess I really don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. I don’t want to be like this anymore. I want to just be able to do things properly.”

“I don’t think you’re feeling it wrong if that’s what you’re worried about,” Amy says with a smile. “Do you want me to talk, or do you want some space?”

“Yeah.”

“How’s the investigation going?”

“It’s kinda going in all directions. I’m not really sure what’s happening anymore. But tonight, while I’m with my Dad, I’m going to get more answers.”

“Your dad?”

Gosh, didn’t he tell her? Has he really kept her out of this?

“He… uh, he kind sold me out to some drug dealers. He’s the reason I went missing. Or, at least we think so. There’s possibly more to it, but we’re slowly getting answers.”

The cup in Amy’s hand trembles and she slowly puts it back down on the table. She doesn’t look back up at him, choosing instead to furrow her eyebrows at the table, her hand trembling.

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault. It’s his.”

“What has he said?”

“Well, I can tell you what he hasn’t said, not properly. He hasn’t said sorry. From what I understand, he… I can trust you, can’t I?”

It feels stupid to ask after already giving the plot away. Jake’s own advice to only trust Boyle has previously been disregarded to enlist the help of Rosa. Gina too, even if the two women were brought on before he knew about it.

Not trusting Amy, though, that’s big. And it feels wrong. The way her mouth twists, Jake can tell she doesn’t appreciate the insinuation either.

“Before you get angry that I asked, I want you to know that I left a note for myself saying not to trust anyone but Boyle.”

Amy leans back, eyebrows raised.

“Why would you leave yourself a note?”

“I don’t know.”

“Was it addressed to you?”

Jake throws his mind back, searching for an image of the note.

“No.”

“Then why do you think it was for you?”

Face falling, Jake opens his mouth to reply, only to realise that he doesn’t have an answer to that. He doesn’t know that it was for him. Nothing about the note indicated that it for him.

“I guess I just assumed.”

“You assumed that you would get amnesia and need a note written to yourself? Come on, Jake. That doesn’t make sense.”

“Well, now that you’ve pointed it out, it doesn’t.”

As the logic falls into place, Jake cringes. How could he have been so stupid? Why would he have written a note to himself like that?

“So, it was meant for someone else. But who? Why would I write it and not tell them?”

Everything Jake thought he knew has been thrown for a loop. There’s another layer to this. Another person involved and in a good way. Not in the ‘Holt possibly had a hand in it’ way.

For whatever reason, that makes Jake smile.

“Where did you find it?”

“A book.”

“Was it ‘The Squad’?” she asks with a playful smirk.

“No. I threw that book away after he… you know. No, it was a book called ‘The Killer and The Kid’.”

Amy’s eyes widen.

“What?”

“You… you borrowed that book from me. Said the cover looked cool. The day you went missing, you told me you’d finished, and you were going to give it back. I didn’t… I didn’t even think about it because, well, you’d disappeared. It wasn’t even on my list of priorities anymore.”

“So, the note…”

Jake feels sick. He leans forward, pushing his hands into his eyes. He’d left her out for so long, and he should have had her in from the beginning.

“I’m so sorry,” he mumbles.

“Don’t be. You’re allowed to be wary. No one can blame you for having trust issues after your Dad did that.”

She sounds confident, but when Jake looks at her, dark spots dancing in his vision from the pressure, she pales.

“I was supposed to help,” she says, looking up to the ceiling. “And I messed it up.”

Her eyes grow glossy, and Jake rushes to stop her tears before they come.

“Wait, no, this isn’t your fault!”

“You wrote a note for me, and I didn’t even look for it.”

“I hid it from you. You can’t blame yourself for that, Ames. That’s… that’s ridiculous. It’s not your fault.”

“You sound so certain, Jake, but if it had been anyone else—”

“I won’t let you do this. It’s not your fault. If anything, it’s mine. I should have put the note on your desk or something. I don’t remember what was going through my mind when I wrote it, but really, I shouldn’t have put it where I did.”

“You can’t blame yourself for this.”

“And I won’t let you, either.”

“Fine. So, we agree. It’s no one’s fault.”

“It’s Rogers fault,” Jake says, concretely.

“Yes. Agreed. Roger’s fault.”

With that settled, Jake sticks the straw in his mouth and sucks until he reaches the end. He allows the obnoxious slurping noise to continue until several people turn around, eyes narrowed.

He slams the cup down, the remaining ice rattling around the bottom.

“So,” Jake says, nose twitching. “Why would I say that you could trust Boyle? Boyle certainly doesn’t understand why he’s being singled out - though I’m sure it’s mostly to do with how much I trust him - there’s no specific reason for either of you to be on this list. Any thoughts?”

“Honestly? None. I can’t help but think that, since you wrote the note and all, there has to be something a little bit more specific than ‘I trust these guys’. Because you trust Rosa, Terry and Holt, right?”

“Uh.”

“‘Uh’? What? ‘Uh’, what, Jake?”

If he was writing a note to her, then there’s got to be extra reason to trust her. There’s no reason that he shouldn’t fill her in on all the wild, wild details. Besides, a fresh perspective will hardly hurt. Amy is one of the smartest people that he knows.

So, for the next forty minutes (and with another Mocha to keep him happy), Jake takes her on a journey of the investigation so far. When he explains Holt’s apparent involvement, he can see the cogs in her brain working, storing the information and trying to make sense of it all.

“Let’s head back to the precinct, OK? I can help from there.”

“It’ll be just like old times. We can pick up a coffee, put our heads together, solve the case and then go to Shaw’s for a beer afterwards.”

“You’ve got that meal with your mom.”

“Damn. Why do I keep forgetting about that?”

“Either you don’t want to see your parents, or you’re nervous.”

“Wrong. It’s neither. I have amnesia.”

In the car, the music takes Jake by surprise, and Amy takes him through the History of Music from the last three years.

“So many people died, what the hell?”

“It’s all quite messy. The drama is far worse, though. Listen to what happened with Kanye West.”

By the time they’ve arrived at the precinct, Jake is gaping and trying to wrap his head around what she’s saying. Most of it doesn’t seem real, but a quick look on the internet assures him that, not only is it real, it’s worse. People are insane.

“Things change, Jake, and life always seems more ridiculous than fiction. Most stories are predictable. Most people are not.”

“That’s true, I guess.”

Jake notices that Amy has a skip in her step as she leads them to the elevator. Her fingers dance stochastic on her thigh as it rises, and Jake wonders whether she’s just excited about getting to work on the investigation.

“Surprise!”

Noise explodes as the doors open, and Jake flinches back into the elevator with an unintentional whimper. His vision swaps the bullpen and the people for the field and a gunshot. His hand jumps up to his shoulder, and phantom pain explodes across his arm.

Amy doesn’t miss a beat; she grabs Jake’s hand, squeezes and then immediately tells Boyle, ‘no, we’re not back together’.

“Sorry. Terry should have realised you wouldn’t like surprises as much as before.”

“Dammit, Terry. Didn’t you think?” Boyle cries.

“You helped me plan it,” Terry reminds him.

The room shifts and no one seems sure what to say.

“We had nothing to do with it,” Hitchcock announces proudly.

Trust Scully to fail to read the room, Jake thinks.

“I’m not even sure we’re invited,” Scully shrugs sheepishly.

The familiar chatter, coupled with the reassuring pressure from Amy’s hand, pulls him back into the now. He swallows down his embarrassment and steps forward, out of the elevator and into the party.

A banner that reads, ‘Happy Alive Day, Jake!’ hangs above his desk, and a few balloons float around the room. There’s music in the background, and Boyle, Hitchcock and Scully are all wearing party hats.

“Is there pizza?” Jake asks, with a grin.

“So much. And we didn’t even eat any of it!” Hitchcock tells them, throwing out his chest.

“There are certain things you shouldn’t say out loud, Detective Hitchcock, and they show us the low bar that you hold yourself to.”

“Eye eye, captain.”

Jake will probably place a bet later that there’s no way Hitchcock took that advice in. Amy tightens her grip for a second and then let’s go. They both walk in, passing through the gate.

The first person to accost him is Terry. He’s wrapped in a tight hug and lifted from the ground. Boyle is next, arms circling Jake’s waist even though the man is not short enough to need to do that. Rosa punches him in the arm playfully. Hitchcock and Scully simply slap his shoulder.

Holt, however, shows no physical affection. He gives a nod.

“Welcome back from the dead, Detective Peralta.”

“Detective?”

“The paperwork went through the moment you got your certificate of life,” Terry explains excitedly.

“It is not official yet but give it a few days or a week, and you will be back on the payroll. It will be a pleasure to work alongside you again.”

The party is short-lived. Holt reminds everyone that there is a strict one-hour time limit and that the moment they’re done, they must return to work.

“Peralta, a word, if I may?”

As he’s wiping pizza grease from his mouth, Jake jogs over to Holt’s office.

“Close the door.”

Anxiety sparks uncomfortably in his stomach. He takes his time closing the door, eye’s locking with Amy, who gives him an encouraging nod.

“Sit, please.”

“What’s this about, sir?”

“Your living arrangements.”

Oh.

Jake sinks into the sofa and furrows his brows. He hadn’t really thought much about where he was going to live since he first came back to New York. He misses his old apartment, but there’s a charm to living with Holt and Kevin. The breakfast, the sense of safety, the cleanliness. Cheddar is a massive positive in that situation too. He’s not sure he’s ready to give that up.

“Kevin and I have spoken about this in private, and we understand you may be averse to the idea, but we strongly believe that you would benefit from staying with us for a few more months.”

“Months?”

“Hear me out, please. We have reasons.”

Jake nods, even though he wasn’t trying to insinuate that he didn’t like the idea. If anything, it sounds perfect already.

“You are still going to be attending therapy, and since we have no reason to believe that the case will be closed any time soon, we think the safety we offer will be good for you. The security at my house is high. Not to mention it will mean you do not need to wake from your nightmares alone.”

Somehow, Jake had forgotten about that. He can’t think of anything he wants less than to inconvenience them with his sleeping problems. If there’s anything that could make him feel like less of an adult, it’s being held as he screams about monsters under his bed.

“You will not be a burden. You will not be in the way. You will simply be a welcome participant in our lives until we can be sure that you are no longer in danger.”

For Jake, it sounds tantalising tempting. His heart tugs at him, begging him to take the offer. Holt and Kevin have made him feel safe, given him food, a bed, a clean environment. Could he really go back to living on his own? Could he genuinely sleep knowing that he’s alone?

“You make a good point. I’ll accept your offer.”

“I made several points.”

“Whatever. I’m still game.”

Holt smiles. It’s a small change. A slight wrinkling around his eyes. A few teeth showing. A low loss of tension around his shoulders. Small, but to the well-trained eye, a vast difference.

“Good. I will let Kevin know. You may return to the party, but I expect you to start setting up your workspace. Speak to Detective Santiago. She will guide you through the process of applying for your job.”

“Thank you, sir.”

The chair at Jake’s desk has never felt more like home.

B*9*9

“Jakey.”

His mother holds him tightly against her, and he doesn’t try to get away, no matter how uncomfortable it might make him feel. Even when he sees Roger appear in the background. Even when Gina snickers into her elbow and disguises it as a cough. He holds his mother equally as tightly.

“I’m sorry I kept forgetting to come over.”

“You’re only forgiven if you never forget again.”

Jake snickers into her shoulder, unsure precisely what joke to make, but confident that there’s something there to laugh about. Whether his mother feels the same way is not something he’s confident in.

“Come on in. I’ve got pizza in the oven, and your father is going to get some wine from the store. Gina, you’re free to drink with us. We can just order you a cab, or you can stay the night.”

“Thanks, Karen, but I’ll pass.”

“Your loss,” Roger calls.

Jake winces at the voice. Gina’s fingers snakes around his wrist.

Jake forces a smile. If he pretends that everything is fine, then he can get through the night without losing it. His mother does not deserve to be dragged into this mess, and if he can help it, she’ll never hear a whisper of what’s been done without her knowledge.

“Let’s sit.”

With Gina and Jake sat side-by-side on one sofa and Karen sat on the opposite one, they’re perfectly poised for conversation, but Jake can’t think of a single word to say.

Fortunately, just after Roger ducks out to grab wine, Karen launches into a story about how two or three months previously a man in the art store had tried to explain some kind of furniture paint, but Karen knew he was wrong. It escalated into the man calling her names and being banned from the store after flying into a rage.

“I think his pride was hurt, but he was telling me about furniture paint? As if I’m not the leading authority on the matter?”

“Pshaw,” Jake bursts, hoping he’s showing the right amount of rage. “I’m sorry that guy sucked, mom.”

“Oh, it wasn’t just that man,” Gina interjects.

“Gina is right. It’s most men. Contradict them, or point out how they’re wrong, and they just lose their shit.”

“It’s kind of wild,” Gina shrugs. “But if you say anything about that—”

“They fly into a rage. I get it. That’s… insane.”

“Not you though, Jakey. I raised you better than that.”

“That we did,” Roger calls as he re-enters.

“You don’t get to say that when you didn’t raise me at all,” Jake retorts before he has the chance to stop himself.

Roger’s face falls, and Karen’s face immediately hardens. Suddenly Jake feels like the ten-year-old who broke the kitchen window with a tennis ball.

The tension in the room starts to rise, and Jake feels itchy all over. Before Karen has the chance to chastise him, and he can see it coming in the way her eyes narrow and her lips thin, Jake stands up.

“Dad,” Jake suddenly snaps. “Could we have a word?”

“You boys behave. I’m going to check on the pizza.”

“Me too.”

Gina throws Jake a look of warning before disappearing into the other room. Filling his lungs with as much air as he can, Jake forces himself into feeling some modicum of bravery to nicely accent the anger that hits him when he looks at his father.

“Look, son—”

“No. No talky. Me talky. You; stay quiet.” The words rush out with the air he trapped. “You did something that I don’t-don’t think you can ever come back from.”

The thought hits Jake hard, and he almost feels the need to step back. He hadn’t really considered how his life-long battle for his father’s attention might end, but it has. Finally.

It’s taken a lot of effort on Jake’s part to try and gain his father’s approval, but if there’s anything he’s learned from this experience, is that his father doesn’t have the approval to give. If he did, it wouldn’t be worth shit anyway.

Their conversations now on will be ones of necessity, rather than want.

“Look at these two pictures. Are either of them familiar?”

Roger slowly extends an arm to retrieve the photos, tensed and ready to bolt.

“Uh, both of them. After I agreed, I met with this guy in New York.” Roger points to Garett. “This other man—I never got his name—he found me in Vegas. Told me what was going to happen if I didn’t accept the shipment.”

Jake snatches the two photo’s back. Sascha Brewing and Garett Snick are definitely the leaders in this. They’re the ones to look into if Jake wants to find answers. It’s a jump in the case, and this will definitely benefit them in learning the truth.

“Right. Thanks.”

“Son, I—”

“Please. Dad, whatever you want to say, don’t. You’ve gone too far, this time. I’ve let you get away with the abandonment, the inattentiveness, the… whatever else you’ve done. But this? Basically, selling me to the bad guys just so you could go wild in Vegas? That’s too far. You can’t make up for this. There’s nothing you could do to fix it.”

There’s a strangled cry that shocks both Jake and Roger. Karen is stood in the doorway, holding a tray of pizza and four glasses of wine. Gina, with her sixth sense, grabs the tray before Karen drops it.

“This is about to be the most awkward pizza dinner I’ve ever had, and I had my first date at Sal’s,” Jake jokes.

Neither Roger nor Karen react.

B*9*9

The evening is spent in tense silence. Jake tries his best to create some form of conversation, but nothing comes to mind. Nothing to cut through the silence and even Gina can be seen squirming and itching for something to take the pressure out of the room. Gina, the girl who used to purposefully create awkwardness just to watch people suffer, is uncomfortable.

“You sold our son?”

Roger stills, a slice of pizza hanging from his hand, his face stiff. Slowly, he places the slice back onto his plate and sighs.

“That’s not what happened,” Roger begins.

“It’s not far from the truth,” Gina shrugs.

“Thank you, Miss Linetti, but this is a family matter.”

“Hey, Gina is family,” Jake argues. “That’s something you’d know if you’d have been around long enough.”

“Let’s not start fighting,” Karen says placidly.

“I’m not sure I’m even sure where we’d start,” Jake says, crossing his arms. “The abandonment? The selfishness? The fact that he went for a wild weekend in Vegas knowing that I was going to be in danger for it, and then failed to tell anyone about it. What would we be arguing about?”

Karen, pale and shaking, turns to face Roger.

“Is that true?”

Shame reveals itself in Roger's face for the first time. Jake wishes it were enough, that he could trust that his father would never risk him like that again, but there’s no way. Roger has well and truly ruined his chances at forgiveness.

“Next time I come over, I think it might be healthy if you weren’t here,” Jake admits to his Dad before standing up and stepping away. “Sorry, mom. This isn’t your fault, but I’ve spent my entire life trying to make this guy proud of me. Now, it wouldn’t mean anything. He’s not worth an ounce of my time.”

Karen pulls Jake into her arms, a hand running through his hair and the other squeezing him tightly.

“I understand. He won’t be here next time you come. Which better be soon, understand?”

“Yes, mom.”

“Bye, Karen. The pizza was good.” Gina looks around for something else to say and clearly comes up short. Karen smiles.

“No, it wasn’t,” Karen admits as she hugs Gina. “Get him home safe.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

As they drive, Gina reaches over and squeezes Jake’s knee.

“I’m proud of you, you know. For standing up to your Dad.”

“It’s been a long time coming.”

“That it has.”

B*9*9

“How was your evening?”

“Oh, great,” Jake says, rolling his eyes.

“Would you like to tell me what the problem is?”

Jake had been happy to sit on the sofa, knee’s pulled into his chair as he stared glumly at the black screen on the TV. He was content to run the disaster over and over until his stomach turned. He’s not sure whether he feels more angry or disappointed. All he knows for sure is that there’s a powerful desire to just break.

He wants to scream and cry and punch things. He wants to feel everything in bulk so that he won’t need to feel it again later. To just get it all out. Maybe, just maybe, that’s what he needs to better process his emotions. To get over this problem with his Dad. That is if he can ever get over it.

Maybe therapy isn’t the worst idea, after all.

“I’m fine.”

“Ah, yes. Often people curl into a ball on a sofa when they are ‘fine’.”

“I am,” Jake persists.

To prove a point, he disentangles his limbs and settles loosely into the corner of the sofa. When he’s sure there isn’t a tense muscle in his body, Jake levels Kevin with his best ‘I’m so fine, it’s crazy how fine I am’ look.

“You do not have to talk, Jacob, but my offer to listen has no expiration date. I do wish to help. Please, keep that in mind. Oh.” Jake breaks eye contact to look at the door when the bell goes, and Kevin slowly stands. “Santiago is perfectly on time. I guess I should not expect anything less.”

“You called her in? She didn’t mention that earlier. I’m not five, you know.”

“Needing help is not something to be ashamed of, Jacob.”

“Easy for you to say when it’s not your dads hiring a babysitter for you,” Jake complains as he follows Kevin into the entry-way.

“What was that?”

“Nothing,” Jake lies quickly. “Uh, tell Ames I’ll meet her upstairs. I’ll be ready soon.”

Jake takes the stairs two at a time. By the time he’s at the top, he can hear Amy greeting Kevin. He rushes through the shower, and when he returns to the room still towelling off his hair, he finds Amy with her feet propped up on his bed.

“If you even try to talk to me like I’m five—”

“Yeah, yeah, you’ll throw a tantrum and refuse to sleep; Holt’s already given me the run-down on your insecurities. Didn’t we talk about this, Jake?” Amy says with a hint of sadness. “Have you been giving Holt a hard time?”

For a very childish, but thankfully fleeting, moment, Jake is tempted to lie and turn away. Instead, he shrugs.

“I don’t believe you came here to judge me. I was under the impression that your job was to help me fall asleep. What’s your plan?”

“I’m going to bore you into sleeping.”

“Title of your sex tape.”

“Lay down, or this won’t work.” Amy waits until Jake is laying down, hands behind his head, so he doesn’t feel too weird. “Now, settle in for the story of how paperwork brought you back to life.”

“Clever.”

“I know you well enough to put you to sleep, Jake. You’re kinda simple like that.”

“I resent that statement.”

“Also, I only agreed to this because you’re adorable when you’re asleep.”

“Excuse you, I’m adorable all the time.”

With a sly smile and a wink, Amy shrugs and tugs a hefty pile of papers from her bag. She sets them on her lap, let’s her entire body relax and begins to read.

“It all started with a P67D form. You need to have that signed by the body that gave your doctor his medical degree. Then, we go to the doctor…”

There are too many steps in this process for Jake to try counting, and he’s asleep before Amy is even a quarter of the way through her tale. The last thing Jake see’s before he loses the battle with his eyelids is Amy’s soft smile and the way her eyes seem to be filled with warmth.

B*9*9

The dark floor below looks tantalisingly far, but Jake has tried other methods before, and it didn’t work then. He’d woken up a few days later (maybe it was days? He really didn’t have a way to tell) in a pool of vomit and a killer stomach-ache. This is better.

This time, he reached into his mind to search for the most effective methods. This one, from what he understands, is quicker and far less painless. The cases he’s worked have taught him that much.

Jake huffs a laugh as his fingers reach up to brush over the bedsheets that rest over his shoulders. At least he lasted longer than the damned kidnappers thought. After a year a half, after they’d learned Jake wasn’t valuable enough to rake in whatever they were looking for, Jake had already decided that he was going to go through with this. He just had to wait those six months longer to prove those bastards wrong.

The hope of seeing his family, his real one and his work one, had long since evaporated. He knew that it wasn’t safe to try and leave and that nothing was waiting on the other side but heart-ache and lost.

Yes.

This is the better option.

Jake stretches out, not sure why exactly, just enjoying the cracks he hears across his body.

“Sorry,” he whispers to the air that won’t reach the people he wants to talk to. “For this. For everything. I love you all.”

With that, Jake bends his knees…

…and jumps.

B*9*9

“No!” Jake screams, bolting upright in bed, his hands reaching up to his neck and ghosting over the pain he’s long-since not felt. “Oh. Oh. Crap.”

“Jake?”

Startled, Jake jolts, turning to find Amy still sat in the chair. Her hair is a mess, and she had little red lines etched into the side of her face. Blearily, she pushes out of the chair and moves to sit on the edge of the bed, her cold, soft hands taking his clammy hands into her own.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, barely above a whisper.

“I… Jesus, Ames, I think I know why I suddenly decided to return to the living.”

Forehead wrinkling, Amy cocks her head to the side. Awareness creeps into her eyes as she wakes up.

“I—”

“Jacob?”

Holt and Kevin are stood in the doorway, features dancing from worried to relieved when they see him awake.

“I think I lost my memories when I tried to kill myself.”

Chapter Text

Two cups of hot chocolate later, and Jake has his face in his hands as he recounts his dream.

“But it’s a dream, so…”

“I think it’s a memory,” Jake corrects, wincing at the hurt look on Amy’s face. “I woke up… well, I woke up with a piece of broken railing next to me, and a bedsheet. I’d written it off as unimportant, cause the place was a mess, and I didn’t know where I was so in the confusion I…” Jake cuts himself off, unsure how long he’d be rambling for if he didn’t reign it in. “Now, after that dream, I think I understand now. I tried to… die, failed and in the process gave myself Amnesia.”

Saying it out loud doesn’t offer any kind of relief. Instead, it settles a weight on his shoulders.

“I tried to die,” he repeats, looking to Holt. “What if I’d succeeded?”

The thought brings moisture to his eyes. Amy sneaks her hand into his and squeezes. It saps some of the fear, but not all of it.

“We will figure this out, son. We need to think now. In the morning, we will need to go back to New Mexico. See what we can learn.”

Kevin jerks sideways, eyes narrowing.

“Is that wise?”

“I do not see how else we can investigate this case.”

“I suppose.”

“I want to come,” Amy interrupts. “I can help.”

“No, Amy. You need to stay at the precinct. We need you on sight in case anything comes up. We will, however, keep you and the team updated on our efforts. Jake can send a running report. I imagine that will keep him from getting too bored.”

The hot chocolate catches in Jake’s throat. He splutters into the elbow of his PJ’s.

“You’re letting me come with?”

“Of course. You are the only witness. Perhaps seeing this place you described will help bring back some memories. It would also set me at ease to have eyes on you. We still do not know what kind of threat looms over you at this time.”

“Cool, cool, cool, no doubt. I’m good for a road trip. I’ll make a mixtape.”

“You most certainly will not,” Kevin insists.

Jake opens his mouth, ready to complain, but Holt and Amy both add in their agreements, so he lets his shoulders fall.

“Whatever. I’m taking headphones.”

“That’s probably for the best. Jake’s music tastes are atrocious.”

The argument is pointless because even Boyle - the man famous for agreeing with Jake on almost everything - also thinks Jake’s music taste leaves something to be desired. It’s likely not worth the breath.

“And I want snacks.”

“I shall go pack our overnight things.”

“Do I even have a passport?”

“You do! I picked it up on my way over, actually.” Amy digs through her bag and produces the little leather-bound book. “Here.”

Immediately, Jake is flipping to the photo page, and he lets out a groan.

“You couldn’t have picked a better photo?”

“As if you’d do the same for me,” she challenges with a smile.

Again, Jake realises the argument is dud. He absolutely would have. His photo actually isn’t as awful as he’d have made hers. He’s just got his face twisted, and one eye looks distorted. Will it make passing borders hard? Yes. Will it also cause some people to laugh when he explains the story? Well, probably not because border control is annoying, but he’ll smile every time.

“I would have,” he admits with a sly grin. “Thanks, Ames.”

“You’re welcome. I’ll head out now. I’ll let the team know you won’t be in today, and I’ll keep you updated on whatever happens our end.”

Within the hour, Amy has gone home to sleep the final hours before work and Jake, Holt and Kevin are in the car.

“This music sucks.”

Immediately, Kevin passes an iPod to the back seat, along with a bottle of orange juice.

“Thanks.”

Jake curls into the backseat, plugs himself into the music. He pulls out The Killer and the Kid and settles in to finish reading.

The journey takes around ten hours in total, including the drive to the airport, the waiting, the flying and then finding the cottage.

“We will start at the hospital,” Holt decides. “You can work your way back from there.”

Jake nods, though he’s really not sure if he’s qualified to be giving directions like that. Fortunately for them, though, Jake can see how much confidence - however misguided - Holt has in him, and it stirs up a little self-assuredness.

“We can turn into the hospital from here,” Jake points. “And we came in from the highway. So, just drive until we find it? We didn’t make a lot of turns. Just one onto the highway and one out of it.”

“Did you drive for a long time?”

Rubbing the back of his neck, Jake shrugs.

“Dunno. Sorry.”

“No need to apologise, Jacob,” Kevin assures. “You were under duress. You cannot be expected to have the route mapped perfectly in your head.”

“Yeah…”

Jake doesn’t mention that that journey was possibly the only part of that day that he wasn’t under duress. He felt safe in the car with that woman. Even though he didn’t know her, Jake has always felt the most comfortable around people who showed a clear sense of humour. He didn’t realise at that time what had happened. He didn’t know just how duressed he should have felt. Is that a word? Duressed?

“OK. Do you think you will know when we should turn off?”

“Um, when there’s a long country road?”

Holt nods. If he’s annoyed by Jake’s lack of absolute lack of certainty, he doesn’t outwardly show it. They drove silently for a while until finally, Jake sees the entrance on the other side of the road.

“That looks like where we came onto the freeway,” Jake points.

“Excellent.”

Holt smoothly exits the freeway at the next exits and follows the road until he’s able to back-track onto the other side of the highway.

“Now, we just drive. It’s somewhere around here, about two miles from the road.”

It’s not long until Jake is pointing once again. The road up to the cottage is bumpy and uneven, but all Jake can think about is how his stomach is twisting. He doesn’t want to go back. He knows that the house is evil. And probably not just because of the dust.

“Are you feeling quite alright?” Kevin asks, twisting in his seat. 

“You appear unwell.”

“I think I might be,” Jake admits.

“Well, we are in no rush. We can wait for as long as you deem necessary.”

“Thanks.”

It takes ten minutes. Ten agonising minutes of Jake drinking water in an attempt to settle his stomach. More than half of it he spends convincing himself that he’s safe, that it’s just a house. He can’t be hurt again. He won’t be left here. They’ll take him back.

“You’ll take me back, right?” he finally asks, as his breathing starts to speed up.

“Of course, Jacob. We would not leave you behind.”

“You are safe,” Holt promises.

The nod he offers in response is jerky, but Jake can feel doubts rearing their ugly head. To refuse them refuge, he forces himself out of the car and onto the dirt road. Holt and Kevin hasten after him.

Without sparing them a backwards glance, Jake walks towards the house. His body feels light but dense at the same time. His legs are made of led, his hands of jello and his nerves of soft cheese.

I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I can’t do this—

“Jacob, come. You are safe.”

Together, they try the door. Unlocked. It swings open to reveal the dusty interior that Jake remembers. He sneezes, and then again, before stepping over the threshold.

“My, this is quite filthy,” Kevin comments, nose wrinkling.

“So sue me, I wasn’t in a cleaning mood while locked inside here for two years.”

Though, Jake isn’t actually sure how long he was here for. That’s probably a question for later.

On the floor, by the farthest wall from the door, Jake can see flies buzzing around the dried blood. Next to it is the unmistakable bannister beam and a grey bedsheet with a ring at the end.

“Oh.”

Jake collapses into one of the rickety table chairs, hands covering his face as he tries hard not to remember what he must have been feeling in the build-up to that decision.

It strikes him how his survival was sheer dumb luck. If he hadn’t gotten injured, if he hasn’t lost his memories, there’s no saying how long he’d have been there for. He could have tried again until he indeed was dead, and then what? He’s have been left to rot? Would someone have come to check on him?

“It’s time to do some investigating,” Jake chokes out with a poor imitation of his usual flippant attitude.

“You can take a moment to just take it all in,” Kevin says.

“No. I’ll do that later. The less time we spend here, the better.”

“I agree. My clothes will never rid the smell of dust. I fear I will bring out an allergic reaction in everyone I ever meet from here on out.”

Kevin hums in agreement, his hand finding Jake’s shoulder and squeezing. It’s the silent rallying he needs to stand back up and start his search.

Upstairs, there’s only a bed with the sheets strewn across the floor. A window above the bed is the cleanest thing in the entire house. Jake imagines himself lying in bed for hours in the morning, merely staring out at the sky.

After checking under the bed and in the corners of the room, Jake returns downstairs.

“NothingNothing. Absolutely Nothing Nothing. I don’t understand. I couldn’t even find clothes.”

“Oh, I found those,” Holt calls.

Standing by the sink, Holt points into the sink. Weak sunlight struggles to filter through the dirty windows, and as Jake approaches, he’s suddenly grateful for that. Jake looks in and finds a grey shirt (which was likely white) and a pair of soft-fabric shorts. Mostly an uninteresting outfit, except for one thing.

“Oh, dear,” Kevin exclaims. “Is that a bullet hole?”

In the shoulder, with a stain of brown, is a hole that lines up perfectly with the hole on Jake’s shoulder. It’s dark enough that he doesn’t really need to take it in and think about it too much.

“I can’t believe they were making me handwash my own clothes.”

“I am impressed that you actually washed them,” Kevin applauds.

Jake laughs, because really, what else is there to do?

There’s so much more that Jake wants to say, but there’s so little he’s actually able to get past his lips. He wants to vent his anger at not understanding anything. He wants to shout and scream and probably break some stuff. He wants to demand that Holt tell him precisely what the man’s role in his disappearance is.

He feels like a bottle of soda being shaken over and over and over but never being opened. The pressure is building. He should let it out.

But instead, he just casts his eyes away.

“Oh, hey, a box!”

The box is as tall as Jake’s knee’s and as wide as his arm. It’s already been opened, and the label reads ‘03-04 supplies’. Behind that box are several folded boxes, and upon closer inspection, Jake can see that they all have numbers on.

“Dates,” Jake says as he opens the box. “Beans and water. For real, was this all I ate for two years? No wonder I’m so thin.”

“Indeed. Though, I believe this may be healthier than gummy worms wrapped in fruit roll-ups.”

A choked gasp from a grimacing Kevin brings heat into Jake’s cheeks. He’s been eating so normally since living with them that he’s actually ashamed of his old habits.

They’ve ruined him.

“There is a shipping label,” Holt announces. “Lochese’s Super Mart. We should go there and see what we can learn. There seems to be very little here, other than clear evidence that Jacob never cleaned.”

“Hey! I washed my clothes!”

No reply is offered, so Jake guesses he shouldn’t expect one. There’s enough evidence to suggest that maybe Holt has a point. The place is utterly filthy, and he’s only been away from the cottage for a few weeks. He can’t blame it on disuse.

Together, they head back out onto the road. The GPS on Holt’s phone takes them about an hour out of town to a store that proudly proclaims itself ‘Lochese’s Super Mart - For All Your Daily Needs’.

“We shall ask for information about the monthly deliveries. Hopefully, they will be forthcoming.”

“And if they’re not?”

“Well,” Holt shrugs and smiles. “Amy has spoken to the judge, and he has issued us a rush-order warrant.”

“Wow. You really are good. How do you work so quick?”

Holy simply smiles at him.

Mysterious.

With that, they exit the car and head inside. Music plays on the speakers, slow and soft. Beneath that, the sound of fridges buzz and towards the counter Jake can hear a TV show playing a laugh track. The floors squeak as they walk, and the air con is running full blast. Jake pulls his jacket around himself a little tighter.

At the counter, there’s a kid, maybe sixteen or seventeen. He’s acne-ridden, with a red vest and a badge that suggests his name is ‘Hello’.

“Excuse me, my name is Captain Raymond Holt, and I would like to request some information about a delivery.”

“To set up a delivery, you need to sign these forms,” the boy says, pushing a piece of paper towards them without looking away from the TV.

“Oh, this is the ‘We’re on a break’ episode.”

“They were on a break,” the boy insists, turning around.

“Preaching to the choir there, kid,” Jake says. “But if they’d just had a conversation, communicated, they would never have been in this mess in the first place.”

“Right? They’re both idiots.”

“We are not here to set up an order,” Holt says loudly.

The boy turns away from Jake and fixes a confused frown on Holt.

“Then what do you need, sir… oh, uh, Captain?”

“There was a box of supplies being delivered to this address.” Holt slides over the packing label. “We would like to know who set it up.”

The boy looks at the paper and then back at the three of them.

“I’m sorry, Captain, but I’m not really allowed to share information like that.”

“We have a warrant.”

The boy shifts, his Adam’s apple bobbing.

“Can I call my boss? I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do in this situation.”

“I can assure you that he will also be legally required to give us the details.”

“Oh. Uh, my boss is a woman,” the boy says. “But… I guess. I guess she won’t be angry if I—I have to.”

Despite the realisation, he’s still hesitant as he types on the computer.

“It’s a direct debit order. That means, uh that someone pays automatically for the deliveries. It’s a monthly subscription for—uh, gross—beans and water. Who needs that on a repeat order?”

“Is there an end date?”

“Um, next year, August.”

Jake dreads to think about what they may have been planning for him. Would they have been letting him go?

“It’s run out before, but they renewed it after two months.”

“When?”

“Last year, around April time. They changed the order, too. It used to have newspapers.”

“Can you give us the bank details?”

“With the warrant, do I have the option to say no?”

The boy is clearly nervous, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Jake is impressed that he’s brave enough to question them.

“No, I am afraid not.”

With a nod, the boy clicks something and then a printer whirs to life beneath the counter.

“Here, these are all the details.”

“Thanks, kid. You’ve been a great help.”

“I don’t feel like I had a choice. If I get fired, I’m billing you guys.”

Guilt and anxiety force Jake to stuff a couple dollar bills into the tip jar. He offers a salute, and then they leave.

“Joey is a problematic character,” he shouts over his shoulder before the doors close.

“You’re telling me!” the kid shouts back,

They climb into the car and slam the doors shut.

“You don’t think he’ll get into trouble, do you?” Jake asks.

“I will inform the local PD and request that they check in on him. I would rather his safety did not weigh on us.”

Kevin takes the wheel from there. Holt takes out his phone and starts making phone calls. First, he contacts the local PD to request they have a squad car placed outside the store. Then, he calls the 99 and rattles off the details. It’s only because of Jake’s keen ear that he hears Terry on the other end. After that, he checks in on Chedder, who had been left in the care of their neighbour.

Meanwhile, Jake slumps in the back, feeling as though all the life had been drained from him.

He wasn’t prepared for the scene that he was met with. Though they had returned to seek answers, he was still startled by his own actions, even if he doesn’t remember them.

Trying to end a life is not a decision one comes to lightly. It’s not a seconds thought and then a mistake. It’s calculated. It’s processed. It’s a come to terms with, and later enacted upon.

Failure has never been such a blessing.

Unfortunately, it might also bring about problems he’s not prepared to deal with.

For what reason had he not left earlier? If walking away was so simple, why, then, did he stay inside? There must have been something that kept him inside. Some reason that he would keep eating beans every day.

“Terry is going to contact me when they have a name. Until then, try to sleep.”

A protest is lodged in his throat as a yawn forces itself past his lips. Dejected, Jake curls into the door, headphones in, and falls asleep.

B*9*9

The world shifts and Jake stretches out. The car has rolled to a stop in front of the car rental lot. The sun is touching the horizon. People rush by.

“We are here,” Kevin informs.

They clamber - or rather, Jake clambers - from the car and begin the short walk into the airport.

If Jake never has to see New Mexico again, it’ll be too soon.

From the moment they’re inside the airport, Jake isn’t given a chance to do much. Holt rushes them through check-in and then holds Jake’s bag while ushering him into the bathroom.

“It is a short flight, and you are in the window seat. I would rather not have to stand up during the flight at your convenience.”

The eye-roll doesn’t go unnoticed, but Jake doesn’t put up a fight for it either. He’d rather sleep through the flight, and bathroom breaks will only interrupt that. Once he’s finished, they grab a quick meal with wine and beer, then board the plane.

“Turn off your phone please, Jake.”

Another eye roll, but also another uncontended order. Just as the screen starts to shut down, Jake notices a missed call from an unknown number.

Spam, he decides, as they lift off.

A threat, he realises, as they touch down.

B*9*9

Everything is made of cotton wool.

His brain, the car seat, the air. Cotton wool.

Any words shared between Kevin and Holt are lost to Jake. There’s urgency in their tones, a fear that strikes in his heart, and yet he cannot make sense of them. His brain is firmly fixed on the precinct. He’s able to visualise it with such clarity that, had it not been for the thrum of panic that surrounded him, he would be able to convince himself that he was there.

He knows where everybody is and what everybody is doing.

Boyle is sitting at his desk drinking coffee and telling anyone that will listen about Nikolaj’s advanced palette. Terry will be eating yoghurt and dutifully listening to Boyle. He loves the team more than he lets on. He wants to be a part of their lives if he can be. Hitchcock and Scully will be doing as little work as possible in a way that only they could genuinely think is subtle. Rosa will be working hard on whatever case she’s been assigned, never breaking a sweat and likely playing with a weapon of some kind.

And Amy. She’ll be sitting with her back straight, her head high and her feet planted firmly on the ground. She’ll be helping whoever needs it the most, continually doing her best to out-do herself even though she could stop now and still be perfect. From her hair to her clothes to her nails: Amy Santiago is the most perfect person on the planet.

The whole team are in that office.

And hidden somewhere in the building is a bomb.

“I will keep him safe,” Kevin promises. “You do what you need to do.”

Jake jerks out of his panic when the car pulls to a stop outside of the house. Kevin climbs out and then opens the backseat door.

“Come on.”

“What? No! Holt, I’m going with you!”

“It is not safe.”

“I don’t care if it’s not safe, I have to go! I need to help!”

Kevin and Holt share a significant look, and then the next thing Jake knows, he’s being hauled from the car. He doesn’t want to fight back, lest he hurt Kevin, but at that moment, he realises that he might not be strong enough to do that, anyway.

As he’s being dragged out, Jake does the only thing he can think to do. He wraps his fingers around the door frame. It’s childish, and as he finds out seconds later, entirely ineffective. His theory about not being strong enough rings incredibly accurate when Kevin manages to pry his fingers away with ease.

“Jacob, please do not make this harder than it already is.”

He struggles anyway, though Kevin doesn’t seem perturbed in the slightest.

“I can’t just be kept at home like some dog,” Jake insists. “Holt, they’re my family. I need to help! Please!”

“And you are our family. We will not lose you again.”

“Don’t—”

“Do not let him out of your sight,” Holt instructs.

“NO!”

Kevin uses his foot to close the door, and Holt peels out of the street fast enough that grit is thrown up into the air behind the wheels. Jake’s dismay is weighty, and he watches as the car gets smaller and smaller until eventually, it’s entirely out of sight.

“I need to help,” Jake whispers.

The words are weak, much like Jake has become. Kevin’s hold is no longer restraining as much as it is comforting. He’s pulled a little tighter to Kevin’s chest, and a warm hand rubs up and down his arm. The other arm, the one still wrapped around his chest, might be the only reason he’s still standing upright.

“It’s all my fault.”

Immediately, the arms tighten.

“Not at all. This is not your fault. How could it be?”

In a surge of energy that comes from nowhere, Jake pushes away from Kevin. Though he stumbles, Kevin doesn’t try to stop him.

“It is,” Jake cries, wincing at the volume of his own voice. “If I hadn’t… hadn’t…”

“Been kidnapped?”

Jake throws his hands up.

“I don’t know. Maybe. Yes? It’s… I shouldn’t have left. You were all fine until I came back—”

“Don’t you dare.”

All the blood in Jake’s veins stop. His entire body stills. There’s ice in Kevin’s voice, a wave of unchecked anger that is so foreign it throws Jake’s heart into overdrive. Kevin starts to advance, finger aimed at Jake’s chest like a knife.

“Don’t you dare say things were ‘fine’ while you were gone. Things were not fine. Things were never fine. When Gina came to visit, the mere mention of your name would sour her mood for the entire evening. Terrance dedicated his life to finding you, and if it weren’t for Sharon begging him to stop, he would have missed his own children growing up. Boyle was inconsolable. He was considering leaving the force because going to work was too much of a reminder for him. Santiago threw herself into her paperwork and didn’t surface for six months. Rosa became reckless and was always putting her life in danger.

“And Holt?” By this time, Kevin’s finger is bruising Jake’s chest directly above his heart. “Holt became a different man. Losing you broke him. When he lost you, I lost my husband. So, don’t you tell me that everything was fine, Jacob Peralta. The day you went missing brought about the darkest time of our lives.”

For a moment, Jake thinks that it’s raining. It’s embarrassing how long it takes him to realise that he’s crying.

“Oh.” Kevin shivers, warmth returning to his eyes. “I am terribly sorry, Jacob. That outburst was… regrettable.”

Ignoring the apology, Jake takes a step back and swallows back to oncoming sobs. He’s better than this, and if he wants to prove it, he needs to stop crying.

“We need to save them,” Jake chokes, “otherwise it will be a million times worse.”

Kevin takes Jake’s hand. For a moment, Jake is worried that he’s about to be dragged inside the house and locked in his room.

“I do not think there is much we can do for them.”

“What if I can find out where the man orchestrating this is?”

That brings a pause in Kevin’s movement. There’s a second, one in which Jake can clearly see the consideration.

“How?” Kevin says, finally.

B*9*9

“Jake, I dunno if this is such a cool idea, man.”

“Yeon-woo, please. My family are in danger. I need your help!”

“Help me Obi-Won Kenobi, you’re my only hope.”

Yeon-Woo’s mocking takes a dark edge at the end, and there’s a crackle over the phone. The kid is sighing. He’s already given in.

“This didn’t come from me, dude, OK? Look, there’s word that they have a warehouse on 5th and Rochester. They’ve got it legally, and apparently, they’re running a legit business from there.”

“But it’s probably a front.”

“Bang on the money, man. I can’t help you much further. I hope it saves your fam, though.”

“You’ve been amazing.”

Jake shoves the phone in his pocket and flags down a cab. Kevin, though clearly anxious about their going against Holt’s orders, climbs into the cab after Jake.

“7th and Brocklehurst, please,” Jake calls to the driver.

“What is going on? What did the boy tell you?”

In low tones, Jake passes on everything that he knows. Kevin takes it in with pursed lips and a tight nod.

“I know this isn’t ideal, but Holt and the team are in danger. We have to appeal to the guys who set it up. And hey! J and K back at it.”

“Please do not say that again.”

It’s not until they’re out of the cab that Kevin thinks to ask the question that Jake is dreading.

“How?”

“By handing myself back over.”

The words serve to stun Kevin temporarily, and Jake knows the struggle is coming before it’s initiated.

“I will not allow you to—”

“I’m not looking for permission. Look, the warehouse is on 5th and Rochester. Let Holt know. Once they’ve neutralised the threat at the precinct, they can come here. But if there’s a chance that going to the source will stop them from detonating the bomb, then we have to try. And if that involves giving myself back, that’s my choice to make.”

Jake is walking away before he gets a response. They’re on a time-sensitive mission, and there’s no way that Jake is going to let them win. Not again. If he has to be the trade, he’ll do that. For his family, he’ll do anything.

“If you get hurt, I will never be able to live with myself,” Kevin tells him.

“Well, there’s a chance I won’t have to live long enough to be guilty about that.”

Even to his own ears, Jake knows he’s talking utter crap. There’s nothingNothing he wants less than causing the people he cares about more pain. This is a necessary pain, though. It might save them from more pain in the future. Maybe.

“Jake—”

“Please, Kevin. Don’t. Whatever you want to say, don’t. This is for everyone at the precinct.”

Jake pushes forward, unable to force himself to look at Kevin. He needs to keep pushing forward. Has to focus on the task at hand.

Once they’re at the warehouse, Jake bends his knees. Step one to a pleasant surprise is to stay hidden. Kevin copies. Jake slowly rises up until he can see just over the top of the window. There’s no movement inside, but it also looks like your typical storage warehouse. Mostly empty pallets though.

With a twitch of his fingers, Jake signals that they’re going to inch further and further towards the scrapyard at the back. Once at the ten-foot-tall chain-link fence. The gates are locked with a thick coil of iron chains and a padlock the size of Jake’s fist.

“You good at climbing?” he whispers over his shoulder.

When no reply comes, Jake jerks around. Kevin is gone.

“Peralta.”

Straightening up as though lightening has been shot down his spine, Jake turns to the voice. He sees a man holding a gun to Kevin’s head.

The man looks familiar. The gun seems familiar.

A headache slams into the amnesiac detective with enough force to knock him to his knees.

“I know you,” Jake accuses faintly. “You shot me.”

“And it looks as though I’m going to get the pleasure again.” The man offers a crooked yellow smile. “Bring him inside.”

The next thing Jake knows, a boot is knocking him to the ground, and in a flash of bright white, he’s unconscious.

B*9*9

A burning pain sears through Jake’s skull as he comes into awareness. For a moment, he considers going back to sleep and letting the headache wear off. Still, when he tries to twist around, to change his position, he realises that he can’t.

“Ah, you’re awake.”

Jerking out of his half-awake state, Jake searches the immediate area and comes to find himself tied to a chair. Kevin is on his right, mouth covered, hands tied behind his back and looking quite calm considering the circumstances. The area around them is dark, with a single light swinging above them. It’s damp, Jake can taste that on the air, and it’s empty. The voice echoing from the walls gives that away.

The man pacing in front of the two chairs brings back that piercing pain, and Jake gasps, bending over as far as he can go. He shuts out the world around him as the agony crackles across his brain.

“What’s wrong with him?”

A cold hand grips Jake’s chin and lifts his face back up.

“Not sure, boss. Seems to me that he’s just got sick or summat.”

“I know your voice,” Jake rasps.

“Oh?” the face of the man who shot him appears directly before him. “Oh. Is that why you decided to leave?”

Jake curls his lip at the man, who gets a manic gleam in his eye.

“You lost your memory. What was it? A knock to the head? Finally tried to take yourself out? I assumed you’d last another year if I were honest. You’re very stubborn.”

“Yeah, I get that a lot.”

If it weren’t for the near-blinding shots of pure agony surging through his skull, Jake would have come back at that with some flawlessly hilarious quip, but he can’t. That really is the best he has to offer.

If he dies, Kevin better alter his ‘famous last words’.

The man, Sascha, comes forward and grips Jake’s face so tight that he’s sure to have bruises around his jaw.

“Maybe, since you couldn’t do a good job, I should finish it for you?”

The pain intensifies, and Jake struggles to hold back his scream.

“What is happening? What is wrong with you?”

Kevin shouts into the gag, his voice muffled. The man with the coat that smells like fish pulls the cloth out of Kevin’s mouth. For a second, the man works his jaw. He then fixes the bad guys with a look.

“I think maybe he is having a negative reaction to resurfacing memories,” Kevin explains.

“Are you a doctor?”

“Indeed, I am.”

Not of medicine though, Jake knows. So, what is the man’s plan?

“Maybe if you were to give him so water, or something for the pain?”

“Do I look like I’m running a nurse’s office?” he asks. “He doesn’t need to be out of pain. He just needs to be out of my way.”

“Why? Why come after us now?” Jake manages to ask.

He clenches his jaw, but the pain is already receding. Not fast enough for his liking, but still. It’s going. And that’s better than Nothing Nothing.

“Well, I didn’t know about your grand escape until a few hours ago. One of your team tracked a credit card to my alias, so I figured they’d made some discoveries. I was going to end them and then send someone to end you. Fortunately, you’ve made this is a little easier. For me, of course. Not for you. I never did like New Mexico.”

“Why not just kill me straight away?”

“For lots of different reasons. Mainly because bodies are easily found by those who wander. It’s not worth the risk. I also figured that I could use you, one day, if it were ever going to benefit me to swap your life for something.”

“In two years, there was nothing you wanted from the police force?” Kevin asks.

“Nothing I couldn’t get from those already on my payroll.”

“Like Holt?”

Sascha raises an eyebrow, while Kevin seems to flinch in his seat.

“I know you met with him. You and Snick. In that hotel.”

A cruel, dark sneer distorts the man’s already ugly features. Fear seeps into Jake’s veins, spreading over his body. Maybe he doesn’t want to know the truth. Knowing, even minutes before his death, would still be devastating; both for Jake and Kevin.

“Holt wasn’t working with us, though I won’t deny that we were hoping he would. No, he was interviewing us for a lead he had on an unrelated case. Garett and I got quite the kick out of that one.”

That doesn’t make any sense. Why would Holt be meeting up with the two people involved in his best detective’s disappearance if he didn’t know about the connection?

“Can you at least tell me why you took me?”

“Amnesia goes pretty far back, huh. Fine, I guess I can do some storytime. It’s not like you’re going anywhere, anyway. And don’t worry, I’ll keep you updated on the bomb in the precinct. I assure you it will be quite the show.”

Jake throws himself against the restraints, cursing up a storm. Sascha waves a hand, and the other man - the one without a name - silences Jake with a dirty strip of cloth. Kevin gets the same treatment.

“How rude of you,” the man laughs. “Now, where was I?”

Keep him talking, Jake thinks to himself. Let Holt and the team solve the rest.

He needs to have faith that they’ll be OK. Otherwise, what else can he do? He was hoping that they’d just let the bomb thing drop once Jake walked into their lair, but apparently, that was a little ridiculous.

While Jake waits, he tries to get somewhat comfortable. His most significant discomfort, aside from his headache, comes from the restraints on his wrists. They’re digging into the skin, and his fingers are growing numb. He remembers something about blood circulation and decides that fidgeting is likely the best way to keep his hands from going numb and falling off.

“So, it all started on a cool summers day. There I was, happy that I was expanding my business when suddenly I get the news. My pilot went on a wild weekend away, spent the incentive, and then changed his mind. Well, that’s not going to slide. I’m running a business here, not a forgiveness centre.”

What is up with this dude? ‘This isn’t a nurse’s office’, ‘this isn’t a forgiveness centre’. He’s cracked, Jake is sure. Just how deep does that go?

“He knew I was coming for him, so he turned to his fallout guy; you.” At this, Sascha casually pulls a gun from the back of his jeans and waves it towards Jake. “He asked you to fix his problems, and you were all too willing. Unfortunately, that brought you to our attention. When given the ultimatum, you gave up your life to save your fathers. I watched him, you know after we told him that we were going to kill you instead of him.

“He sighed in relief.”

Jake knows his father too well to even try and dispute that, but yet the news still blows hard enough that his back aches against the hard chair.

“Yes. Your own father. Even we are not that cruel, and we were the ones who took you. However, I’m jumping here. I gave you the ultimatum you accepted. You were to leave, and any attempt to escape would result in pain for you and death for your loved ones. You were more than willing, but even in a small act of defiance, I quickly taught you compliance.”

There are more questions now than he had before, but Jake, in all his fidgety glory, can feel the ropes loosening. The Other Bad Guy rushes off to answer the phone.

“You’ve been there for a while now. It was exciting, in a way. Like putting something into a storage container, something valuable, knowing that one day, it would either sort itself out or would become incredibly valuable.”

But why did he stay if he knew that the food was being delivered regardless of whether he was there or not? Why wouldn’t he leave and just keep his return quiet?

“I guess if I didn’t find you alive like this, I’d have heard it from one of my informants anyway,” Sascha shrugs. “Either way, you’ve become a problem again, and you’ve brought that problem to my door. Now, you’re going to have to suffer the—”

The Other Bad Guy returns quickly and then whispers something in Sascha’s ear. Whatever it is, it’s not good, not for Sascha at least.

“Get the van ready. We’ll transport them away and deal with them then.”

Just as Other Bad Guy is about to step away, the doors of the warehouse slam open, a boom of noise echoing around the room. From there, several things happen at once.

There’s another bang, one from a gun. The ropes around Jake’s wrist fall to the floor. He launches himself towards Kevin, and then Other Bad Guy and Sascha crumple to the floor.

“Holy crap.”

Rosa and Amy stand over the bad guys, feet on their back and guns pointed at their heads. Terry is edging towards Jake and Kevin, slowly, eyes focused on Kevin.

“Are you OK?”

Jake waits, then turns and looks to check on Kevin himself. The man, with the cloth still in his mouth, is looking at Jake’s stomach.

“Call an ambulance now!” Terry shouts.

“Kevin? What’s wrong?”

Holt appears then, hands wrapping around Jake’s upper arms. For a moment, there’s utter confusion, and a second later, there’s darkness.

B*9*9

“Hey, dum dum. How’s being shot in the stomach feel?”

“Rosa?”

Or, that’s what Jake tries to say. His throat is so dry that the single word burns, and he coughs. Pain lances through his stomach, and he grits his teeth against the urge to scream. He’s outstanding at not screaming.

“Hey, hey, stop that,” Rosa demands, one hand holding a cup with a straw and the other stroking Jake’s face. “Stay still. Here. Drink this.”

Cold water washes down his throat, and it soothes it for now.

“Not too fast,” Rosa warns, pulling the cup away.

“What happened?”

“You got shot. Obviously.”

“Again?”

Rosa has been, and likely always will be, impossible to read. However, for one very, very brief second, her features soften into confused concern.

“Kevin filled us in a lot of what was said. I guess that’s what he meant when he said he was keeping you compliant. How do you feel?”

“Floaty.”

At this, Rosa grins, all her teeth on show. It’s not a nice smile, not by a long shot. It’s kinda terrifying, and yet so familiar that it’s warming.

“Yeah, the doc said you were on the hard stuff.”

Jake’s gaze slides past her and takes in the rest of the room. Somehow, he managed to get a pretty sweet private room. There’s no one else there, though, and Jake feels his heart-rate spike.

“What—?”

“You’ve been here a week, dude,” she responds. “Everyone else is fine.”

“Mindreader,” he whispers, relaxing into the pillow.

“No, you’re just an open book.”

“Am not.”

“Are too.”

“Am not,” Jake insists.

“You really, truly are. Before I call in the doctor, do you want anything?”

Shame burns at his cheeks when Jake whispers the name of the person he wants to see the most, but Rosa doesn’t even twitch. She makes the phone call and then lets the nurses know that Jake is awake.

For twenty minutes, Jake is subjected to a million questions he has no idea how to answer, a dozen personal touches that he tries not to cringe away from, and a fact that he isn’t sure he appreciates.

“If it had been a millimetre to the left, you’d have been paralysed.”

“Wow, thanks for that information.”

How else is he supposed to reply? Obviously not like that, because the doctor throws him a dirty look and leaves.

Rosa, on the other hand, snickers into her elbow from her place in the corner.

Once all is said and done, Jake and Rosa are alone again.

Then comes a knock at the door.

“Jacob?”

Holt steps in, and Rosa immediately scarpers. Jake wishes she wouldn’t, but he’s sure he’d react the same way.

Or maybe he wouldn’t. Social cues were never his strong suit.

“How are you feeling?”

“Like I’m high on meds.”

“That would make sense. The doctors informed me that you are heavily dosed.”

The air in the room thickens, and Holt doesn’t even flinch from the look Jake is giving him. Instead, he seems to recognise what is coming and settles into the chair next to the bed.

“Kevin informed me of your suspicions.”

The threat of being shouted at seems very high. Whether or not it would affect Jake remains to be seen. The drugs are pretty strong, and the desire to care is not. The feelings, however, will not last long.

“I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“You were not wrong to think I was involved. Just, perhaps misguided.”

“You were involved.”

It’s not a question. It’s a statement. One that punches Jake in the gut and pushes the air from his lungs.

“Not in the way you are thinking. In fact, you requested I was involved. You told me of your upcoming departure on the day of.”

“But — why?”

“You trusted me. I dearly wish you had not done so, but I understood why. You wanted to keep everyone you loved — the family you had created, just like I said on thanksgiving — safe. And you did. But it never felt worth it.”

If he were less high, Jake is sure that he’d be tearing up right now. As it is, his response, quite worryingly, is to laugh.

“My life over theirs?”

“It is more complicated than that. Please, allow me a moment to gather my bearings. This is a conversation that needs to be had, and it needs to be had with some grace. You need to understand everything I have to say; otherwise, those suspicions may never leave. And we need them to leave.”

There is nothing Jake wants more in the world right now than to never suspect Holt of foul play again. There’s already and edging of guilt coming in just from the idea that those suspicions may have been wrong.

“You wanted me to do whatever I could to stop the team from searching for you. At every avenue, I threw them off the scent. I pushed to have you declared dead earlier than is usually advised. I even met with the men I knew had taken you. They never suspected me, but I had gotten rather good at knowing whether you were alive or not just from some leading questions. Had I learned of your death, I would have done everything in my power to assure their arrest, but it never came to that.

“When you returned, however, that opened up many new problems. You no longer had your memory, and that was a small blessing, but I could not tell you why. I was keeping your own secret from yourself. Again, I found myself doing what I could to throw you off of your investigation. I tried to erase your phone, I tried to limit your resources and time. I knew that they were not aware you had returned, and I intended to keep it that way.”

“But we started to investigate them together,” Jake says, eyebrows knitting together.

“Indeed. After I learned that you had could have tipped them off with Rosa’s visit to Snick, I knew I needed to get you out of town for a while.”

“You knew that the team would be in danger and—”

“The team were never in danger. The person they hired to drop the bomb is a triple agent. There was never a bomb.”

“So, I—”

“Put yourself and my husband in danger for no reason whatsoever.”

Kevin could have been killed. Jake has been told his entire life that he was reckless, but this is the first time that it has affected another person.

“I should have told you the truth, Jacob. I am unhappy that you managed to drag my husband into that situation, nor am I impressed that you almost died. Still, those things would not have happened had I been honest.”

“It’s my fault,” Jake moans miserably. “Kevin could have died. I should have listened to you.”

“We both know that will not change any, even now.”

Jake may want to deny that, but it’s the truth, and he’d be a fool to pretend otherwise.

“So, now what?”

“Now,” Holt says, his deep voice rumbling and comforting, “you rest. You’re in dire need of healing. And yes, when you are released from the hospital, you will be returning to live at the house until we can get you back on your feet.”

If Jake wanted to protest, it was lost as he began slipping into sleep. Holt stayed with him, talking about the week until Jake was deep asleep.

Over the next few days, Jake woke for an hour or two at a time and then fell asleep again. Different people would be there. Sometimes Terry, sometimes Boyle, sometimes Rosa. Mostly though, it was Holt or Kevin.

On the day that he was awake for five hours, he woke to find his mother holding his hand and tucking a strand of hair behind his ear.

“Mom?”

“Oh, Jake, honey. You’re awake.”

“Mom, hi.”

Swallowing against the panic, Jake searches the room. Fortunately, there is no sign of his father anywhere. Muscles relaxing, Jake turns back to his mother.

“I’m leaving your father. Gina told me the rest of the story, and I’m so sorry I didn’t know sooner.”

There’s no way his mother could have known, but still hearing her admit that she wasn’t complicit removes a worry Jake hadn’t realised he was carrying around on his shoulders. His mother seems to notice, and her fingers splay over his shoulder.

“I’m so glad you’re home,” she whispers.

“Me too, mom.”

The conversation doesn’t get easier from there; Jake has to tell her everything he’s learned, and he isn’t exactly thrilled with it. From the tightness around her eyes and the way her nails start digging into his skin, Jake can tell she’s not happy either.

“You left of your own accord?”

“Not exactly. It was more like I was coerced with threat of death hanging over the head of everyone I know and love.”

Karen chews on that for a little while, and Jake lets her. It was a struggle for him to understand too. Finally, with a sigh, she kisses his forehead.

“I love you.”

It’s another week until Jake is taken home, and even then, he’s ordered to remain on bed rest. This time, he doesn’t complain. Moving is a struggle, and so the only time he does move is when he goes from the bedroom to the living room.

Most days, Jake is left alone with Cheddar and a phone nearby. His mother will visit every day or so, bringing food or just sitting with him to talk. Every night, another member of the team comes by to help him sleep, and every morning, he’s woken by Holt or Kevin, who then near-enough carry him down the stairs.

Every day is building anticipation to the day that he can return to work. Although the doctor said one month, Holt promised that if Jake behaved during the day, he could be back in three weeks.

Regardless of the last three years of Jake’s life being a complete mess - most of which he doesn’t understand at all - he still had his family to return to.

Of course, there’s always a chance that his memories will return, but at least he knows for sure that he will never be without a family.