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“We won. Maybe not the way you wanted, but—”
“Well, this doesn’t feel like winning.”
“But it’s probably as close as you’re ever gonna get. So what do you wanna do?”
Buck chewed his lip, turning away to pace further into the office. He wanted his job back, he already knew that. That was still the end goal and nothing was gonna change that. Accepting the settlement wouldn’t just mean never getting to work as a firefighter again (because who in the country would ever hire him after taking the money after suing the department?), it would effectively mean losing his team forever. He’d lose Maddie by extension, because Buck wasn’t going to get between her and Chimney when he’d caused this rift in the first place. She deserved to be happy.
The only avenue was forward. He couldn’t give up now after it had already cost him so much. It would all be for nothing.
He couldn’t take the money.
Buck shook his head, turning to face Mackey again. Mackey had a bright expression on his face, like the cat that caught the canary, but it froze when he took in Buck’s expression.
“I want my job back, my team. So I wanna move forward with the lawsuit, take it to court.”
“Kid—Buck—” Mackey said, holding a hand up as if to halt Buck’s train of thought. “C’mon, let’s think this through now—”
“I did, I thought it through,” Buck said, watching as Mackey seemed even more flustered by this response. Mackey shouldn’t be this invested in his answer... “If I take the settlement, I’ll never be a firefighter again, nevermind work with my team. I knew that was a risk going into this, but that was if we lost. That’s not the situation right now, right?”
“Buck, I need you to stop and really think about what you’re turning down here—”
“Was your end goal winning my case or driving it to a settlement?” Buck asked, narrowing his eyes at Mackey. The ambulance chaser persona was finally shining through. “Because if they’re offering a settlement in the first place, that means they think we can win, right? Why wouldn’t I want to keep pressing forward with the lawsuit if it means I get my job back on the other end of it?”
“Millions of dollars, kid!” Mackey said, sounding exasperated. “You’d never make that kind of money at your job. What if you get injured again, huh? At least this way you’re set for life.”
“With no reason for my team to talk to me anymore,” Buck said, pain lancing his chest at the thought. “At least if I can go back to work, I can make amends...start rebuilding what was there.”
Mackey snorted derisively. “You have far more faith in them than is realistic. If you try to go back to work, you’re gonna be miserable. Every attempt you try to make to mend bridges is gonna be thrown back at your face and you’ll feel worse.”
“I have to try,” Buck muttered. He squared his shoulders and stared Mackey in the eyes. “You asked what I wanna do. I wanna turn down the settlement offer and get my job back.”
Mackey’s eyes flashed, then he shook his head, sitting down at his desk. He opened a drawer that Buck couldn’t see and reached for something. “You are unbelievable, kid,” he said, and there was a tone to his voice that came off as vaguely condescending. “Sit down.”
Buck eyed him skeptically. “If you’re gonna try to convince me—”
"You're not leaving this office until you sign the settlement paperwork.”
Buck resisted the urge to scoff. He gave Mackey a quick once over, an obvious motion to highlight how much of a physical disadvantage Mackey would be at if he were moronic enough to try and physically keep Buck from leaving the room. There was no chance Mackey could actually stop him if Buck really wanted to walk out.
Mackey straightened up and placed his hands on his desk, revealing what he’d been digging for in his drawer. It was a gun, aimed directly at Buck.
“Sit down,” Mackey repeated, and there was a hard edge to his tone now. Maybe walking out of the office wouldn’t be as easy as Buck thought it would be. Buck gulped and sat down in the rolling chair in front of Mackey’s desk.
“Is this the part where you try to convince me to settle?” Buck asked, eyeing the gun. “Because if so, I’ll just turn around and tell them you forced me to take it at gunpoint—”
“Shut up—”
“And what are you gonna do, make me sit here until someone brings the paperwork by? They literally just called you with a number, I came over ten minutes after you got the news. You don't have the paperwork for me to sign, it hasn’t even been made yet. Are you seriously gonna point a gun at me until someone shows up with it and sees you holding me hostage?"
“Shut the fuck up, Buckley! I need to think—”
“You weren’t exactly thinking when you pulled a gun on me—”
Mackey stood up abruptly from his chair and walked around his desk to get close to Buck. The gun didn’t waver from it’s target, but Mackey’s demeanor had completely shifted. Where there was once a collected, smug, confident lawyer, there was now desperation, ferality, and darkness.
That didn’t stop Buck from speaking his mind.
“What’s your plan right now—?”
Mackey stepped in close and promptly pistol whipped him across his temple. Buck blinked away stars as pain radiated from the area, but he still felt mostly clear-headed after the hit. It’d hurt mostly from the heft of the gun, since Mackey hadn’t exactly put much oomph behind the hit.
“Shut up,” Mackey hissed, looking almost distracted as he visibly tried to pull together some sort of plan.
“Dude,” Buck said, gripping the arms of the chair simply for something to do with his hands. He was tempted to check the wound on his forehead—he definitely felt blood trickling and that was going to be an issue if this ended up taking a long time—but he didn’t want the motion to be misconstrued as threatening. He flicked his eyes to the glass panels next to the door; it was the middle of the day, surely someone else would see what was going on eventually. “You’re really not thinking this through.”
Mackey’s frenzied gaze followed Buck’s and he cursed, rushing over to the panels and hastily dropping the blinds. Part of Buck wished he hadn’t brought attention to it, but at the same time...if someone had noticed something, it had the potential to cause more casualties if Mackey panicked.
Mackey was already panicking.
Why the fuck did Buck have to go to this lawyer in the first place?
“Untie your shoes,” Mackey ordered.
“What?”
“Untie them, take out the shoe laces,” Mackey repeated, waving the gun impatiently. Buck complied, taking both shoes off and unthreading the laces. If he ended up having to run, he didn’t want floppy, unlaced shoes slowing him down. “Tie your right hand to the armrest, as tight as possible around the wrist.”
“With one hand?” Buck asked, unimpressed.
“You can use your mouth if you need to. Make sure it’s tight, I’ll be watching.”
Buck did as instructed, using one shoelace to wrap around his wrist and the armrest a few times, and then leaning over to use his teeth to help secure the knot. Once that was finished, Mackey took the remaining lace and wrapped it around Buck’s other wrist, fumbling as he tried to do the job one-handed until the last possible moment to keep his grip on the gun. Buck had hoped up until that point that he might have a chance to try and overpower Mackey and get the gun, but now, he wouldn’t be able to untangle himself before Mackey got a shot off.
Apparently the man was thinking something through. But still.
“Now what?” Buck asked, giving Mackey an unimpressed look. “Now I can’t even sign anything—”
“Shut up—”
“Do you ever say anything else?”
“Do you ever stop talking?” Mackey punctuated the statement with another pistol whip, this time aimed at Buck’s jaw. Blood promptly filled Buck’s mouth as his lip was sliced, both split from the gun and from cutting his mouth on his teeth. Buck spat the blood out and wished mildly that he had the distance to hit Mackey with it. The blood taste returned—blood thinners, fuck—and Buck consoled himself with the reality that he’d probably get another chance at it.
“No,” Buck said once his mouth was clear. He was being a bit of a shit at this point, but what else could he do? He didn’t have any plans for the rest of the day and it wasn’t like he was on speaking terms with many people at the moment...no one would really notice his absence right away. He’d have to rely on some good samaritan checking in on Mackey when they noticed his office light still on at the end of the day—which, yikes, that was daunting to think he’d have to be there that long—or Mackey would be expected to show up somewhere, or...something.
As much as Mackey didn’t seem to have a plan, Buck didn’t know what to expect either. For now, Mackey was dead set on getting money from Buck’s settlement, but what would happen when he realized that had become completely unattainable? He was already unbalanced...how much worse would this get?
Maybe Buck’s best hope was to keep Mackey irritated and distracted enough that he wouldn’t come to the conclusion that he’d fucked himself over with this situation.
Mackey was still too far away, so Buck spit the next glob of blood somewhere onto his desk. “You know if I bleed out from the blood thinners, I definitely won't be able to sign the settlement, right?”
Mackey’s face spasmed at that, and he gave Buck a quick once over. “You won’t bleed out,” he decided.
“How long are you expecting to keep us here? Because, uh, yeah, that’s definitely a possibility. I’m not gonna stop bleeding,” Buck said. He had both the mouth and head wounds to worry about, and head wounds were bleeders. That was probably what should be concerning him the most at the moment. “You should probably try to stem the bleeding or something.”
“With what? I’m not calling 9-1-1.”
“You could use your tie.”
“No.”
Buck rolled his eyes. That was rude. “I guess I’ll just keep bleeding on your floor then.” Mackey growled, stalking up to him and punching him square across this face, this time without the gun. Buck promptly felt blood drip from his nose. “Wow, if you keep this up, the cleaning bill alone is gonna wipe out your entire share of the settlement. Never mind the legal fees, since, you know, you've technically abducted me. Don't worry, I know a mediocre lawyer."
“Are you incapable of shutting your mouth?”
Buck grinned, and hoped the unnerving effect was enhanced by the blood on his teeth. "I have literally not talked to another human being in weeks because of you, so guess who you get to hear talk for the next undetermined amount of time?"
“If you don’t shut up, I’ll gag you,” Mackey threatened.
“You probably should’ve done that right away. I could’ve screamed for help way earlier than this.” He wouldn’t have, not with the gun being pointed at him, but watching Mackey’s face spasm again was worth the statement.
“If I gag you, you’ll choke on your own blood and die,” Mackey said, and wow, that was morbid and very uncomfortable sounding.
“No, thanks,” Bucks said quickly. “Been there, done that. Well, minus the death part. It was close though.”
“Then shut. The fuck. Up. And let me think,” Mackey hissed.
Buck decided to keep his mouth shut. At least for a little while.
It took three hours for Mackey’s office phone to ring.
The three hours during which Mackey continued to mutter to himself, Buck continued to drip with blood, and various uncontrollable snarky comments (such as “You’re the expired bargain brand version of Lionel Hutz”, “You’re definitely not smarter than a fifth grader”, and “Go suck a cactus”) had been met with additional punches.
Buck’s shoulder felt soggy with tacky blood from his nose and temple, and his mouth was perpetually stained with the taste of copper—which felt like a weird descriptor because blood was iron-based and it would definitely be green if it were copper-based—
“I want money and a clear path out of here,” Mackey was saying. Buck didn’t even hear him answer the phone, he wasn’t even holding a phone—
“Can you let us talk to Buck? We’re not gonna even start working with you until we know he’s okay.”
Oh, the phone was on speaker.
Oh, that was Athena!
Buck missed Athena.
“Hey, ‘Thena,” Buck said.
“You okay, Buckaroo?”
“‘M bleedin’,” Buck said, the words sounding muddled with the blood in his mouth. He was due for another spit—Buck aimed at a stack of business cards at the corner of the table.
Mackey gave him a disgusted look, but didn’t stand from his desk. “I want what the city just offered Buckley.”
There was a pause on the other end and then an unfamiliar voice said, “You have to know that any money offered to Buckley wouldn’t be given in a lump payout. It would’ve been over the course of months, if not years. Getting that kind of money together is going to take time—”
“Well, you don’t have time,” Mackey spat. He gave Buck a cruel grin that had his hair standing on end; the look reminded Buck that Mackey’s clarity and mental state seemed to rely on getting his cut of the money. “Like Buckley said, he’s bleeding. I don’t think I need to tell you what that means for him.”
There was silence on the other end, which told Buck that someone did need to tell the unknown person about Buck’s situation. Buck was just glad Athena was there; at least someone out there cared about his well being in this situation.
Although, maybe that wasn’t much of a fair thought. Clearly whomever was negotiating for his release cared on some basic level. They wouldn’t bother trying to talk to Mackey otherwise. It kind of felt nice to know people were working to free him just for the sake of his safety.
It was also kind of pathetic. How desperate was Buck for someone to look at him in a positive light that it took the near-required concern manufactured by a hostage situation for someone to care about him? Maybe that wasn’t fair either. Even if this was her job, Buck thought Athena would be there for him anyway. She’d want him to come out of this situation alive.
So would the team, even if the last time he’d seen them had been Hell on Earth. From apathetic to disappointed to scathing looks...his team had had a right to look at him like that after, as Mackey had said, being raked through the coals. And for what? He’d wanted to be back with his team, but not at the expense of his relationships with them.
He never should’ve gone through with the lawsuit in the first place. He wouldn’t be in this situation otherwise. Buck really wished he could apologize to them in person.
"Hey Athena, tell Bobby that I'm sorry I didn't realize how much of a moron my lawyer was before this whole thing started. That's my fault, that's on me."
Mackey growled, smacking his palm on the table in frustration. “If he doesn’t shut his fucking mouth, you’re getting him back in pieces.”
Hmm, that was definitely veering into dangerously deranged territory. Maybe Buck should stay silent for a bit.
“Just hang tight and stay calm, Buckaroo,” Athena said. That was a very kind way to say ‘Shut the fuck up so you don’t get killed.’
Not that Athena would ever say that to him. Not in that way, at least. Maybe her face would convey it though.
“How injured is—”
“You’ve heard enough about Buckley!” Mackey roared, and Buck flinched when the gun smacked against the desk. It was still aimed at him and he didn’t want to be on the wrong end of a misfire. “I want to know what’s being done about getting my money!”
Buck really didn’t care about that. He was starting to feel really tired, and while intellectually he knew that was a terrible sign, all he wanted to do was take a nap while Mackey and the hostage negotiator argued over his release. He should’ve passed more messages onto Athena before the threat to dice him up was made. Not that he really knew what else to say beyond ‘Sorry I started this whole mess. If it makes you feel any better, I think I’m being punished pretty significantly.’
A hand threaded into his hair none too gently and Buck hissed as his head was yanked from side to side in a jarring shake. Bloody spittle shot from between his teeth and sprayed Mackey’s white shirt and Buck grinned languidly at the achievement.
“Answer them, Buckley!”
“Wha’s the ques’ion?” Buck slurred. He really wanted that nap now. He couldn’t even hold his head up anymore, the weight nearly entirely supported by Mackey’s grip on his hair. Mackey shook his head again and Buck couldn’t muster up more than a pained whine at the motion. Mackey should stop, he was probably shaking more blood loose—actually, Buck wasn’t sure that’s how that worked—
There was a sudden breaking of glass followed by a hiss, a BANG, and suddenly Buck was blind—he blinked rapidly but the white vision blurred and mingled with black spots and he couldn’t see anything—something hard shoved into him and hair was yanked out by the roots as Mackey tried to keep ahold of him—Buck’s stomach swooped as the chair titled and toppled and he was falling—
Buck’s head cracked against the floor and the black spots took over his vision entirely.