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It certainly isn't the first time he and Finch have been captured somehow or another, but it is the first time since Finch "died."
And it's the first time Joan has woken up cuffed to what feels strangely like an examination table. It's bent in such a way that he's reclining at an angle, his hands cuffed to it at about the level of his shoulders. The cuffs are the type of padded leather he remembers from the ward—in fact, the examination table is rather the same as well, bent at the knee and the back.
He blinks in the dim light, vaguely nauseous, head aching, mouth dry. He wasn't hit over the head, this time. No, there were some sort of darts—a sedative. He breathes out weakly, and looks around. No-one else in the room, and he can't hear much of anything.
He tries the cuffs, but he can't quite manage to wriggle out of them. It seems he'll have to wait for his captors to return before he can escape.
###
Their assailants return with more than just themselves—Joan bites his lip. Finch is there, cuffed and pale and sweating. He has a few bruises and scrapes, but seems otherwise intact. "Finch," he says, relieved.
"Seems like he's happy to see you. He'll be a lot less so in a bit, just you wait." Louis Adair—the man they'd been investigating. He looks gleeful. "Y'see, Joan, dear, we tried to squeeze information out of Finch here, but he wouldn't budge. And then—well, we realized he might sing a little easier this way."
"What way?" He asks calmly, glancing at Finch. He thinks he knows, but—
"Well, if he won't sing 'cause we're causing him pain, that's one thing. But if we hurt you..."
Yes, he thought as much.
"Good luck," he scoffs.
"Yeah, you say that now. I had a feeling you would. Y'know, I've never got to try this before."
Joan watches him fill up a syringe with—something. He winces at the clumsiness of the pull. "Tap it," he demands. "And push the plunger down a little—"
One of the man’s assistants hits him in the gut, and he groans, wheezing. "Shut it."
"I'm no good to you dead, I assume."
"...hm," Adair mutters. "Fine, I'll heed the good doctor’s advice. This'll hurt. You see, I can't use this to interrogate someone alone. I mean, we tried, but he was too out of it. Apparently there's a point where the pain is too much. Seems perfect for this though, don't it?"
"Get your hands off him," Finch snarls, lurching impotently against the two men holding him as Adair takes one of Joan's wrists. He looks like a wild-thing, eyes blown wide, hair fallen onto his forehead.
One of the men punches Finch in the sternum, and he doubles up, wheezing.
Adair fiddles with something at the back of the table, and suddenly Joan's arm has far more range of motion.
He doesn't hesitate. It's an awkward angle, but he manages to get a jab in anyways, with a satisfying crack as Adair staggers back. He nearly drops the syringe, nearly, and he sees Finch trying to take advantage of this in the corner of his eye, but then—
Click.
Both he and Finch still. Adair is clever; while Finch may have been able to use one of his men as a shield, or otherwise dodge, Joan is still anchored down. The gun is pointed at him. "You won't," Finch says, sounding very sure of himself. Joan is certainly only he can hear the slightest tic of uncertainty in his voice. "You need him, to get anything out of me."
Adair eyes him critically. "The information isn't worth my life, little bird. If it comes down to it, I'll shoot your partner like a dog. So you'd best behave."
Finch takes a loud breath, but he stays very still.
"Will you behave?" He grips Joan's wrist, holds it down, and puts the gun to his temple. Joan stares at him with utmost loathing, cringing slightly from the loaded barrel. Any old idiot can kill someone with a gun by accident, and Adair has his finger on the trigger.
"Yes," Finch says falteringly, sounding at war with himself. Undoubtedly he hates being yanked around like this.
"Good, good. Antony?" There's another man, in the corner of the room, one he hadn't noticed before. "Keep your gun on our lovely guest, would you?'
He puts his own revolver away, and Joan squints at the man in the corner. He seems to have more sense—his finger is resting away from the trigger.
He shrinks with disgust as Adair runs an amused hand through his hair, "Haven't never seen a man with hair like this, have you, boys?"
"Almost'd look like a woman from behind," one of them chuckles brutishly.
"Almost looks like one from the front," Adair comment—and then he grabs his chest, a handful of his—and his eyes widen slightly. He jerks, startled, and Adair tuts. "My, my. Sad that beard has ruined your pretty face. We might have to see what's under that shirt in a bit, hadn't we, Joan?"
He scowls, feeling a little shaken at the idea—being tortured with pain is one thing, but—that kind of violation, he doesn't... know how he'd handle that.
"Leave him alone," Finch whispers.
"Hm, I will. In a moment." Adair manages to force his arm down on the table, "Stay still, now."
He makes a fist despite himself—he'd rather the man not mutilate him searching for a vein, or try to stick it into him somewhere less straight forward.
"What is it?" He asks faintly.
"You'll see soon enough, my dear."
"Poison?" He guesses.
"Of a sort." He pats Joan's arm once the syringe has been emptied—he feels nothing out of the ordinary, only the vague sting of having been pricked by a needle. "Right," he does something again—and the chain becomes shorter again, making Joan wince as his arm is forced to bend. "That will need to set in. Unless, of course, you'd rather tell me everything, Mr. Finch? Then I can give your lovely friend the antidote, and this whole ugly mess will be done with."
Joan gives Finch a hard look and a slight shake of his head. He can weather this, whatever it is.
"It won't kill him?" Finch asks.
"No, no, the effects are completely temporary. I mean—the poor dear will wish it did, but he will live. I swear it to you."
"If it does—if—" Finch's chest heaves.
"I'm fine," Joan insists. "I'm alright."
###
He is not alright.
At first it simply makes him tired, going from a simple fatigue to a bone-deep sort of weariness that has his limbs leaden and his head dipping back against the padded bench. And then he starts getting the cold and hot flashes—frigid one moment and sweating the next. He sleeps fitfully like that for an indeterminate amount of time—less than an hour, he thinks—and when he wakes he's terribly nauseous.
Not like he might actually vomit, no, but the kind where his stomach is twisting and upset and he's left feeling woozy and ill. And then it becomes fierce, horrible cramping, feeling rather like his guts are writhing, like someone’s grabbed a handful of his innards and twisted as hard as they can, until he can't breathe with it, and then the pain has him momentarily blinded.
"Sun and solstice," he mutters to himself, swallowing and panting. "Guh—damnation—ah—ah-nh-ah—" by the time Adair drags Finch back into the room, he has his good leg curled up in deference to the way his whole body wants to curl into a ball around the pain roaring through his midsection, trembling, breathing in rapid, small, sipping breaths, and he has his eyes scrunched shut, as if that might help somehow.
"Ah," he hears Adair say, "Looks like it's working."
"Joan?" Finch asks, sounding agonized. "Joan?"
There's a jerking sound, the sound of cuffs clanking and feet shuffling, and he manages to crack his eyes open as he hears that damnable click again. He has to cringe away from the light they've turned on, though, squinting his eyes shut against it with a soft, pained noise. "I—hah–'m fine, 'm okay—don't—don't—" fuck, he can't, "—do—n't do 'nything stupid," he manages to heave.
Finch's breathing gives him the notion that he really, really wants to do something stupid. He feels eyes on him other than his, however, and flinches as a hand touches his face. "Oh, you're stronger than I thought, Joan. The other one was sobbing and pissing himself by now."
Joan, unexpectedly, barks a laugh. He feels mad. He feels like he is dying, but—he manages to stare Adair down hatefully, and spit blood in his face from when he'd bit accidentally into his own cheek. The man rears back, wiping disgustedly at his face. "Bastard," he chokes, "'ve been through worse, you stupid inbred fuck—" he fights against the way his back tries to arch against the pain, and fists his hands against the restraints so hard they strain, sobbing for breath.
Adair, if anything, looks fascinated.
And Finch looks sick.
"I might just have to keep you," Adair says, with a grotesque little smile. He turns to Finch. "Let's get you settled in, shall we? It may be a bit longer before the good doctor breaks. I want you to watch."
They chain Finch to a metal chair by the lead of his cuffs—and they search his shirt, his trousers, all the seams and hems and folds for lockpicks.
They find all of them but one, which he knows is tucked into a tiny compartment in his damned shoe, but Finch isn't in a position at the moment to reach it. Once the room is empty but for them, he certainly tries, though he knows it's hopeless.
"Just—just hold on, my dear, I'll...I'll have us out of here soon. I swear it." He sounds nauseous himself. And frantic.
He tugs on the chains, and they bang and chime and cut into Finch's skin, until he's bleeding, and— "Stop," he manages to choke out.
"Joan—" Finch yanks on the chains again, like a man possessed, like he's considering breaking his hands to get out of them.
Joan whimpers, head tipping back against his will as another vicious cramp steals his breath. He hears more clanking. "Fi—Finch, please," he gasps.
"I'm trying, love, I'm trying—"
Clank. Clank. Cl—
"Stop it!" He—he screams at him. He doesn't mean to, but he's nearly out of his mind, at this point. He can barely breathe; it feels like everything inside of him is being crushed to pulp.
Finch stills, eyes wide and harrowed.
"I—" his voice cracks precariously, and he realizes with dawning horror that he's going to cry. "You're—hn—y-you're hurting yourself," he chokes.
Finch stares at him, trembling. His hands clench. His wrists are bloody and bruised. "I'll heal," he says, faintly, but he doesn't do it again.
They sit there in silence for a moment, but for Joan’s helpless little noises, the ones he can’t dam behind his teeth, sobs and gasping breaths and weak, straining whines. He feels like he isn't getting enough air. Like he might pass out. He remembers, abruptly, how Taggart had coached him through giving birth, a few years ago by now. Those memories are usually buried very deep, but he can't help but think of it now. This is—the pain is different. Not worse, no, but different. Still, he attempts to even his breathing. It's a different technique to the one Joan himself has used to coach the few and far between mothers he's helped to deliver. The pattern he was trained to use is a little deeper and slower, but he can't manage that right now.
Finch moves again, he hears, "Are you—" his voice chokes, "—are you okay?"
"Mm—'m gonna pass out, if I don't...try to—" he pants for a moment, all his breath gone from speaking, and tries again to pattern it, in-in-out, in-in-out. "Hah—that's...a little...better."
Finch seems to understand, at least, but he's still shifting anxiously. "What can I do?" He says quickly, "I—I know Morris was to get us help, send reinforcements, but—"
"Just—" he swallows hard, "—just being here is good," he manages to rasp. "Don't—give 'em anything."
"I won't," Finch promises shakily.
"I love you," Joan slurs, wincing again, chin hitting his chest. God damnit.
"I—I love you too, Joan." Finch says. he hears the chains rattle, but he isn't yanking on them to try to get to his picks anymore, his own hands be damned. His lead is anchored to the floor, but with the way they threaded it in the whole thing keeps his hands behind him enough that he can just barely get them on the armrests, and the angle is such that he can't quite touch the bottom of his shoe. "When we get out of here," Finch says, "I'm going to draw you a hot bath with that rose scented salt you like so much," ah. He's trying to distract him. Keep his mind off the pain. Joan struggles to focus in on the words, with a wan, trembling smile. "And I'll have the blankets heated for you, and that rice pad you usually use on your knee when it acts up, and when you're snug as a beetle in a rug—"
He makes a choked, warbling noise that tries to be a laugh, "It's—nn , oh, hah—it's bug, F-Finch, beetle doesn't rhyme—"
"Fine," he says, mock-haughtily, eyes shining with grim humor and so much love it leaves him breathless in a different way, "a bug. And I'll have your favorite tea waiting, the expensive stuff, the one with the dried bits of cherry and the bergamot, or maybe chamomile and mint to help if the nausea lingers, and then I'll comb your hair until you're asleep, and—"
The door bangs open. Joan heaves short, dizzy breaths, forgetting himself. He looks at Finch, trembling, and manages what he hopes is a reassuring smile.
Adair is frowning, when he comes into the room. "You still aren't screaming," it sounds like an accusation. Joan stares at him defiantly, or as defiantly as he can while he's wincing and panting.
"Go t' hell."
Adair smiles an ugly smile, and Joan realizes with a dizzy lurch that he has another—he has the syringe again, empty, and the half full vial from before. Oh, hell and damnation, no—nonono—
He only realizes he's speaking aloud when Finch says, "Joan, Joan, breathe."
"Nh—no, no—dn't—get the fuck away from me, don't—can't—"
He jerks, trying—trying—to get away, and he can't, heaving tiny, panicked little gasps as one of the men who'd come in with Adair holds him down. His sweat soaked hair falls into his face, and when they loosen the chain he shifts back as much as he can and tries to headbutt the man leaning over him, kicking out, twisting— a hand grips his ankle and yanks, forcing him to cry out and still as his bad leg aches sharply, trembling as Adair presses a knee on his wrist and manages to get the second dose into him. "There," Adair snarls viciously. "Maybe that will get one of you talking."
He leaves the chains loose, this time, and Joan pants weakly as he watches them leave.
"Joan," Finch says quietly, urgently, "Joan, can you get off that table with your hands like that? Can you get to your picks?"
"Hn...m-maybe," he whispers, fumbling to sit up. He can't—he can't get far, "Ohhh god—I think 'm going to vomit," he mutters, clamping his jaw shut until his teeth grind, breathing sharply through his nose, arms curled around his seizing middle. He knows he's short on time here, but—
"Joan, my love, Joan I need you to focus, okay? Just for a little bit, then you can rest, hey? I'll take care of everything, I just need you to get your lockpicks." Finch sounds frantic.
He manages, somehow, to find the correct seam where the thin little picks are sewn into his vest. He isn't known for his skill in this department—he doubts he could pick the damn things now, especially—but he can try to get them to Finch, and then they'll be saved.
His strength is flagging already, though, as he fumbles with the seam—he needs to bust it to actually get to them, but his usually-steady hands are shaking and weak, and he can feel the tiredness he'd felt the first time setting into his bones, compounded by his ordeal. Still, he needs...he needs to—
Ah—there! "Got it," he whimpers, "Got it—"
"Okay," Finch says hurriedly, "Okay, I need you to toss them here, love. Underhanded—nice and easy, use your good arm, my dear, not the dominant hand—aim a little more to the right to compensate—yes," Finch's voice trembles with relief and triumph as both of them hit his thigh, and he manages to catch them before they slide off. "Yes, brilliant, my dear, excellent, you did so well. Just—just hold on, okay, Joan? I'll have us out of here in—"
Finch's voice dies abruptly. Joan, who has had no choice but to lay back down on the bench, panting weakly, now both drowsy and in terrible pain, watches the door creak open. The man who'd yanked on his bad leg strides towards him. He stares, sweating and shaking.
Finch has stilled, concealing the picks in his sleeve. The man reaches for Joan—he has his gun out and in his hand, and both of them freeze, or, Joan freezes as much as he can. His trembling has taken on a near violent bent, teeth chattering. But the man simply tips his head this way and that. Checks his pulse. Looks into his eyes with a penlight.
"Don't want you dead yet," the man grumbles. He walks to the door—Finch shifts, like he's going to start picking his cuffs, but the man simply calls out, "Oi! Bring me a pitcher of water and a cloth. Doctor’s fever's getting a bit out of hand."
The man walks back into the room, at Joan's side, and waits. He's watching them too closely for either of them to try anything, not that Joan could, anymore. A general ache from how badly he's shivering has joined his terrible stomach pains, and he can barely keep his eyes open. His mouth is terribly dry.
He doesn't know how long they wait—he can hardly... "di—did–" he swallows, and his throat clicks dryly. What did the man send for? When he came in? "...water," he complains hoarsely. "Please," he mumbles.
"Shut it," the man growls, "are you deaf? I just asked one of the boys to bring some."
He huffs weak breaths, drifting in and out of consciousness, one hand clutching absently at his belly as if that might stop the horrible pain roiling through him. He hears Finch talking to the man in a low voice, and the man responding, but he can't make sense of the words.
Then, there's blessed cool water on his neck, on his face. "Stars—" he croaks, and then someone coaxes him to take small sips of cold water. It upsets his stomach further, but his mouth is finally approaching the level of dampness it should be again. His face feels like it's on fire.
The man snorts. "Should've known you were one of that lot. You look like one of them sunworshippers."
He whimpers. He can't be assed to argue the point, or to give a damn that he blundered.
He dozes more, somehow, ebbing in and out of it. More water comes, occasionally, and the man soaks the cloth and tucks it against the back of his neck at some point. His vest is removed—he thinks he was fumbling at it, begging— too hot, please—can't...can't—please—and he yanks at his shirt until some of the buttons rip.
He thinks Adair comes back. There's some sort of heated discussion. He hears Finch snarl at someone to shut up, once. Someone leaves. Comes back. A hand—Adair's—touches his face. His voice is impatient, "When should the second one kick in?"
"Any minute now."
"Hm. Think he'll live?"
"Yes," the man says. Joan absently wonders whether the man is a doctor, or simply knowledgeable in this area. "Another dose would finish him, though. You shouldn't have—"
"I'll do what I damn well please," Adair snarls.
He leaves again.
When he comes back, Joan's started to shake some of the worst of the initial fever. And that's when everything goes downhill. The pain he was feeling before multiplies sharply, until he's whining on every exhale, trembling, and then—he needs—he needs away from it, he needs out, he's done, he can't—
He tries to get up, to get out, and is stopped by an aching pressure on his wrists.
A hand shoves him back down onto the bench. He curls up on instinct, sobbing, fumbling at the cuffs. Someone—someone straightens him out, a large hand in his shoulder, a forearm pressing his thighs down until he's lying flat. He dry heaves from the pain, and something cracks.
"No more," he sobs, "n'more—please—make'tstopmake'tstopIcan't—needitt'stop—nnhah—hah—n'more—f'rmercy'ssakestop—p'ls—"
He struggles weakly against the hands holding him down, choking on tears, hands balled into shaking fists.
"Joan," Finch. Finch—he sounds like he's crying.
"Help me," Joan begs, "m'keitstop—"
"Joan, I'm sorry," Finch says.
"Good," Adair says, and Joan gets a swimming, double-visioned glimpse of the man sneering down at him. He pats Joan's cheek. "Want to tell me anything, Finch?"
"Go to hell!" Finch's voice booms through the little room. "Don't fucking touch him, get away from him!"
Adair barks a laugh. "We'll see if you keep singing that tune after I've left you here for a few hours. He could be like this for days, without the antidote, you know. He'll despise you by the end of this. And it'll be deserved. All you have to do is tell me who sent you—who you really are, and all of this can stop. We've seen your face around, of course, and know your names, but who you really are, that's what I want to know. Besides Garette Finch the genius crime reporter, and Joan Tarc the poor, sunworshipper sympathizing doctor."
"No," Finch chokes.
"No? Hm. Alright then. You hear that, Joan?" Adair pats his thigh consolingly, "Poor dear, look at you."
He sobs. "Garrett—Garrett please—!"
"I'm so sorry, my dear."
Adair shakes his head pityingly and walks out the door. "Come on, gentlemen, we'll let them stew for a while longer. I have other things to do."
And then they're alone again, and the door is locked behind them.
"Please," he finds himself wheezing, scrunching his face up and his eyes shut as he tries not to dry heave again. He tugs weakly at his cuffs, "M'keitstop—gh—hhh–" he turns his head side to side fitfully, hardly able to breathe. It feels like there's an anvil on his chest, and like he's swallowed a second one, one that's been made molten, balled up low in his gut.
"Breathe, darling, breathe, like you were doing earlier, in-in-out, in-in-out." Finch coaxes him until he tries, but it isn't helping like it was before. "I'm getting out of my cuffs now, my dear, and then I can find our things and get us the hell out of here." There's a soft clanking noise, "There—there," suddenly there are hands on him, Finch's hands, kind and harried. "Okay," he says faintly. He's working at the cuffs on his wrists, but Joan can't stay still. "Joan," he whispers, "Joan my love I know it's hard, I know, love, I'm so so sorry, but I need you to stay as still as you can for me. Please," he holds Joan's wrist in his hand, and kisses his temple gently. "Come on, I know you can."
He tries. He does. But the shaking isn't in his control—the writhing and flinching he was doing was, however, and somehow Finch manages to pop the lock on the cuffs and pull his hands out of them. They're the soft leather ones meant for hospital patients.
"Can you stand, love?" Finch keeps looking to the door.
"Nh...no," he gasps. "No," he repeats, shaking his head weakly.
Finch nods worriedly. "I figured," he mutters. "Okay," he breathes, "alright. Keep doing those breathing exercises, love. I—I'm going to pop the lock on that door and see if I can't find our things."
Finch leaves, somehow. Unchained, Joan finds himself balled up with his arms hugging his waist and his head on his knees, sobbing and rocking as he tries to breathe through the pain.
The door creaks, and he flinches, whimpering—but the hand that splays along his back is kind and gentle. "Shh, shh, love, it's me. I have your revolver, and most of our things. Here—" Joan shivers as Finch drapes his coat around his shoulders. "Where is your vest?" He mutters to himself, "There—in the corner." He hears shuffling, and then— "Now the hard part. Joan," he says urgently, "Joan, my love, I can't carry you. You're too tall, and heavier than me.' There's a hand on his arm, "Are you hearing me?"
He manages a weak nod.
"Right," Finch breathes. "We need to get out of here. Put your arm around my shoulders—just like that, yes. Feet on the ground, careful."
"...cane?" Joan croaks. That was gifted to him at the war’s end by his brother—it's irreplaceable.
"I have it," Finch says, "Will it even help right now?"
"Y-yes—should—"
The wood handle is comforting in his hand. Finch still has to support much of his weight, of course, and he keeps doubling up, knees buckling, but by some miracle they manage to hobble out of the warehouse together. Finch looks around anxiously, "I knocked out a few of them. Shot one. Dead."
Finch has only shot a gun a bare handful of times, and never to kill. Always by necessity—usually Joan is the one doing the shooting, given it's one of his areas of expertise—and it clearly troubles him to have killed someone like that, but Joan can't—he— "'m sorry," he manages to warble.
Finch takes a sharp breath, "No, darling, no, just....just focus on putting one foot in front of the other, Joan. Hang in there. We'll be home soon."
"An'idote?" He croaks.
Finch grimaces. "Shattered. Adair shattered it."
He makes a choked sound he can't help, something like a strangled, keening sob.
###
Eventually Morris manages to find them. Finch had found one of their established places to relink, thankfully, because by then he was nearly insensate. He rouses to Finch and Morris talking rapidly. He's—he's lying on his side in the recovery position, with his head in Finch's lap. The man’s hands are on his back and in his hair. "—got a cab coming. Woodward's sent for a doctor. We'll get him sorted, Finch."
He must lose time, because he blinks and he's in the carriage. Morris and Finch must've carried him.
He leans forward and vomits.
There's a bit of scrambling and a startled shout from Morris. Finch has an arm around him to keep him from tipping off the bench.
He thinks they pay the driver double, but he can't be sure because trying to get him out of the carriage is its own ordeal. He's awake enough—and fussing enough—that they can't quite manage to just carry him out as they'd apparently hauled him in. It takes Morris at his back and both Finch and the doctor on the ground outside of the carriage to get him down the two steep steps, and even then he nearly bowls the two of them over. Woodward is cursing somewhere in the background.
The next he knows, he's lying on his own bed while Woodward's physician examines him. She has him squeeze her hands, answer some questions:
"how much pain are you in?"
About a fraction less than giving birth, and three times more than being shot repeatedly. Or, in his words, "fuck off, I h'te everything—someone give me enough morphine t'kill a horse b'fore I do it m'self— "
He thinks he tries to fight her for her kit when she refuses, but he's weak enough that all he really ends up accomplishing is getting Finch and Morris to pin him to the bed while the both of them apologize profusely, and promise he usually isn't like this.
Eventually, he does end up medicated, somehow, someway, and he gets to watch the doctor, Woodward, and Morris filter out of their room while pleasant warmth seeps into his bones, and some of the pain finally leeches away. He's sore and shaking and feverish, but he doesn't feel like he's dying anymore.
Finch hesitates, lingering at the side of the bed.
He reaches out clumsily, and his hand is caught immediately. "Love you," he sighs, words maybe slurring a little. He squeezes Finch's fingers, and his husband smiles a ghostly, guilty smile. He kisses his knuckles. And then leans over him, and kisses his cheek, the bridge of his nose, his cheek again, his jaw, his temple, the corner of his mouth—
"And I you. Damnation, Joan...I'm so sorry—"
"Don't," he mumbles, letting his eyes slide shut. He squeezes Finch's hand again. "Don't. 'M...I'll be okay. Just—draw that bath? An' make sure I don't drown in it?"
Finch laughs fondly, "Yes, that I can do, love. Right away."
He kisses him one last time, chaste and loving, and then walks off to do as he was asked. Joan sighs shakily.