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“Maybe leave it to the adults before somebody dies.”
“No one died, and no one will whilst I’m in charge.”
“You’re not in charge, I am. Pay up or get shut down.”
Barnes watched as Anthony Lockwood, the jumped up little brat, slumped back, crossing his arms with a huff. What was with this kid? Didn’t he know how dangerous it was to run an agency with no adult supervision, no oversight? Didn’t he care? He certainly looked like he cared. Passion warred with obstinance on the boy’s pale face.
He was awfully pale, Barnes noted, and sweat was beading on his forehead. And now that Barnes really looked, he was trembling slightly. He had thought when they had hauled him in from Sheen Road that he was simply nervous about being questioned by DEPRAC. Plus he had just been through a serious ordeal—that was cause for a bit of panic. Barnes had often been told he made people panic simply by walking into a room. But this Anthony Lockwood didn’t seem nervous. He seemed…ill. He sat across from Barnes, shoulders slumping, looking more fatigued than even the Sheen Road debacle warranted. After a long moment studying the boy, Barnes pushed back from the table and headed for the exit, deciding not to worry about it. Not his circus, not his monkeys. This boy’s wellbeing was not his problem.
“May I go Inspector?” the boy said tiredly from his chair.
Barnes paused in the doorway, turning back. Lockwood was staring at him, eyes still flashing with defiance, fever bright. Barnes nodded, a quick, sharp jerk of the chin. He watched as Lockwood pushed back from the table, rising unsteadily to his feet. Long, thin fingers grabbed for the table edge as he swayed in place before steadying himself. The young man smoothed down his rumpled tie then grimaced slightly, flexing his right hand. He cleared his throat and took a shaky step forward. Barnes was already running back towards him as he began to fall, eyelids fluttering as his knees buckled. Barnes skidded on his knees, catching the boy’s head just before it hit the ground.
“Call an ambulance!” he shouted over his shoulder.
He cradled Lockwood’s head in his lap, one arm supporting his shoulders as he laid a hand on the boy’s cheek. He was very cold to the touch even though sweat was soaking through his thin shirt. Barnes was instantly certain what this was. He none too gently laid Lockwood down on the interrogation room floor and ripped his shirt open, searching for evidence of ghost touch. It didn’t take long to find. Halfway up the boy’s thin arm, just above the elbow was a small patch of skin that could only be described as frostbitten. But it wasn’t from cold. It was ghost touch. Barnes had seen a thousand cases, most of them deadly. His heart stuttered as he saw it. It was probably already too late. Damn him, WHY hadn’t the boy said anything?!
“Adrenaline, I need adrenaline,” he shouted even as another officer ran in holding a med kit. He fumbled for a second opening the box and tearing through it for the adrenaline shots. It was probably already too late, it was definitely too late, it had been too long. Barnes mind raced, repeating this defeatist mantra over and over again even as he tried to cling to hope. He couldn’t have an agent dying on the department floor, he couldn’t, he wouldn’t. Especially not this one. Not this stupid, arrogant boy. He still needed to pay his fine, Barnes thought somewhat hysterically.
His fingers wrapped around the adrenaline shot and he tore the wrapper off and slammed it into Lockwood’s bicep, rubbing the skin firmly and grabbing another shot just in case.
He hovered over the boy waiting, watching his narrow chest rise and fall with shallow breaths spaced too far apart for his liking. He stared at the patch of affected skin, cold and hard and bluish-black like a dark patch of ice in a deep pond. In the distance he heard the wails of an ambulance. Then Lockwood’s breath hitched and he took a gasping, shuddering breath. Barnes clasped Lockwood's wrist, rubbing small circles absentmindedly on his skin as the boy slowly swam back to consciousness. His eyelids fluttered and then he was staring up at Barnes with clouded confusion and vulnerability.
“It’s okay, you’re okay son,” Barnes said firmly. Lockwood stared at him, fear and pain in his dark gaze. Then a wall came crashing down and his face was suddenly a mask of cool calm and flippant disinterest again. He turned his head to the side and coughed raggedly, already trying to push himself to a sitting position as the paramedics filed in pushing a gurney. Barnes put a steadying hand on the boy’s shoulder, searching his face. An EMT knelt next to them and wrapped a blood pressure cuff around his arm, while another leaned in and flashed a penlight in his eyes, forcing Barnes to back away.
“I hear you were ghost touched young man,” one of them said. “You need to go to the hospital.” He turned to Barnes. “You administered adrenaline Inspector?”
Barnes nodded curtly as he backed towards the wall and out of their way. The EMTs continued to work, murmuring questions and taking vitals. When it was time to go, Lockwood protested riding out on the gurney, insisting he was fine and just wanted to go home and have a rest and a cuppa. One stern glare and a demanding point of a finger from Barnes and the boy rolled his eyes tiredly and was helped onto the gurney.
Barnes watched with narrowed eyes as Lockwood rolled past him, head dropped back wearily on the pillow, eyes lidded. The boy’s gaze slid to Barnes as he passed and he nodded almost imperceptibly. Was that gratitude from the young agent? Barnes released a shaky breath as he ran a hand over his face, adrenaline wearing off from what was surely at least the second most eventful interrogation he’d participated in during his career.
See, this was exactly why agents shouldn’t be unsupervised. A young agent being ghost touched would never have gone unnoticed with proper safeguards in place. And he was going to use that argument as ammunition going forward to shut down Lockwood and Company. Before somebody died.