Chapter 3

In a small room of Red's hospital/safe house, Liz paces anxiously back and forth, glancing up every few seconds to look through the glass doors at Red, who is finally lucid and sitting upright on the exam table, listening to the doctor. Dembe is in the room too, having arrived shortly after Katarina dropped them off and sped away, Liz finally remembering to call him once Red was whisked away by his doctor, finally in the proper hands. Dembe had burst through the door, lacking his usual composure and not saying a word, just gently squeezing Liz's arm before slipping into the room with Red.

Liz has been waiting since then.

(And it makes her a little sick to her stomach that she's not allowed in there to sit with him, to hold his hand as he receives whatever troubling news that is making him look so somber, but she has to push aside the hurt and remind herself sternly that she's not his wife –)

"Agent Keen?"

Liz whips around, startled out of her thoughts.

"Yes? How is he?"

"We did an MRI," the doctor starts, falling quickly into debriefing mode. "He had a cerebral edema, which we treated with –"

"Sorry," Liz interrupts tactlessly, too frazzled to be more polite. "I didn't mean what are his symptoms. I meant, what's the cause? What's…What wrong with him?"

The doctor looks away, growing visibly uncomfortable.

"I, uh, can't say."

Liz's heart sinks.

"Because he told you not to?"

The doctor looks down at his feet, sheepish and guilty. Liz glances over the doctor's shoulder at Red, still sitting on the exam table, looking exhausted but determined, jaw clenched and studiously avoiding her gaze.

(He doesn't trust her.)

"You can go in and see him now," the doctor offers instead, just as Dembe opens the door and emerges from the room.

"Liz, Raymond is –"

"Will he see me?" she interrupts yet again, unable to contain herself.

"– waiting for you," Dembe finishes calmly, looking at her evenly before turning to the doctor.

"Thank you for everything, doctor. If you'll follow me, I'll walk you out…"

They depart the safe house, leaving Liz alone with the looming prospect of talking to Red. While she's desperate to see him, desperate to hear his familiar warm voice wash over her and eradicate the disturbing memory of his strangled breathing and muddled speech, she's nervous.

(And she can still feel his head on her thighs.)

Taking a deep breath, Liz walks into the room, pulling the glass door shut behind her.

Red doesn't visibly acknowledge her, just starts speaking impersonally to the wall, and Liz can immediately tell that he's embarrassed.

"I've had the most…interesting headache," he rumbles, and Liz feels something ease inside her at the sound of his voice as it should be. "Colors and images. And acid trip…but with pain."

Liz feels her throat tighten, distinctly remembering the sight of his glazed eyes casting about, confused and unseeing.

"I'm glad you can joke about it," she says stiffly. "It terrified me."

Red shifts uncomfortably on the exam table, the paper crinkling loudly underneath him. He's still not looking at her.

"Thank you…for getting me here."

It sounds genuine, if regretful, and Liz feels obligated to tell him the whole truth.

"I had help."

That gets his attention, finally swiveling his head to look at her, and their eyes meet. Liz gazes back at him with concern, observing his heavy eyelids and bloodshot eyes, and he looks like he could lie down and sleep for days.

"…Did you?"

She's about to answer him when an unfamiliar motion at his side catches her attention and she manages to tear her gaze away from his face to glance down at the hand resting on his thigh.

It's trembling.

(And the unexpected sight of him exhibiting any kind of weakness, any frailty, any visible clue to his mystery illness, has her resisting the urge to wrap her arms around him and cry.)

Red follows her gaze and quickly, self-consciously tucks his shaking hand behind his leg, turning to resume staring blankly at the opposite wall.

(Shutting her out.)

And, suddenly, the sight of his trembling hand pulling her over the brink of something invisible, all the tension and fear of the last few hours comes crashing down on Liz, and tears gather in her eyes before she can stop them.

"Red," she croaks, desperate and upset, and her tone gets his attention, has him whipping right back around to face her.

She wraps her arms around her middle in some misguided attempt at self-preservation.

"Red, what's wrong with you?"

He blinks at her, confused and concerned at her sudden change in demeanor.

(He still doesn't get it.)

"Red," she says, trying in vain not to let any tears fall. "We were talking about her and then you just – you just collapsed, and I didn't know what to do. I know I pushed you too far and I'm sorry, I was just so – so upset, but please, tell me what's wrong. I understand if you don't trust me but please, if nothing else, just tell me how to help you next time, I need to know what to do, because, Red, I've never felt so helpless, and I was so scared you were going to –"

But then Red starts to sway where he's still seated on the table, her sudden onslaught of emotion too much for him in his weakened state, and Liz surges forward to support him, wrapping her arms around him to keep him upright, all the while babbling a self-chastising stream of words.

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, god, I'm so stupid, you should be resting, I'm so sorry –"

And she feels him leaning heavily against her, a sensation far too reminiscent of their perilous journey here, and Liz just focuses on supporting him, desperate to help.

(Because, more than anything, she wants to be a salve to his burns, the balm to his wounds, however mysterious and unknown, and she just wishes he would let her help him because yes. Yes, it's about time.)

It takes a moment of deep breathing on his part, his back rising and falling in a steady and comforting rhythm under her hands, before Red has enough strength to pull back and look her in the eye.

"Lizzie…" he murmurs, soft and deep and so, so tired. "I don't want to tell you because I don't want you to feel any obligation to care for me. That's not your responsibility. You have your own life, Agnes, and…my problems are my own."

And Liz can see the earnestness in his eyes, the complete and utter willingness to suffer alone, all to spare her.

Like always.

"Lizzie…I'm just an old man."

And the tears she's been valiantly holding in finally spill free and cascade down her face, unable to stand the worthlessness shining out from Red's precious, lined face.

"No," Liz disagrees fiercely, cupping his face with one hand and reaching down to clutch his still trembling hand with the other. "No, Red, you are…so much more than that."

And she brings his shaking hand up to her lips to place a fervent kiss to his palm.

(And she could never think of him as an inconvenience, an irritation, a burden, because she loves him far too much for that and she just wishes he believed it –)

And the way he's looking at her right now, his eyes shining with tears, love and gratitude written all over his face, warm and trusting, only brings into sharp relief the way her mother looked at her in the car on the way here, cold and calculating and suspicious.

Evil.

And the next words out of Liz's mouth are some of the easiest she's said in years.

"Katarina is in a safe house about three miles east of my apartment. She always has one man posted outside and two or three more inside with her. There are no other exits out of the apartment, you'll have her cornered easily."

Red simply blinks at her, his lips slightly parted in shock.

"Lizzie, what –"

"If you don't think she should be saved, then that's enough for me," Liz says firmly. "But I would ask you to consider helping her disappear. I know you don't think she's worth saving – especially after she tortured you for information – but she did help me get you here today. And I couldn't have done it without her, Red."

"Then why are you selling her out?" Red asks, still clearly dumbfounded.

"Because I chose you over her today and she's finally realized that I'll keep doing it," Liz says simply, giving a little shrug. "And as long as I keep fraternizing with the enemy then, in her eyes? I'm an enemy as well."

Red can only blink at her, disbelieving, and Liz sighs.

"I'm tired of it, being caught in the middle," Liz murmurs, shaking her head. "But I have no reason to trust her and every reason to trust you. You're right, she's a danger to us. You, Agnes, me."

And Liz presses another kiss to his hand, warm and grounding, like a promise.

(And she doesn't miss that it's stopped trembling.)

"From now on? She's the enemy. I chose you, Red. And, if you'll let me, I want to help you."

Liz tightens her grips on his hand.

"Whatever's ailing you, Red. We'll get through it, you and I. Together."