Leon Orcot (under_arrest) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-06-06 19:10:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, dan smith, leon orcot |
Who: Leon and Dan
What: Leon breaks Dan out of jail
When: May 14th
Where: The precinct
Ratings/Warnings: Low/none
Status: Complete
Leon hadn’t been getting much sleep over the weekend. On top of the always depressing Mother’s Day - the first one he would spend with Chris, no less - he had to deal with Liv’s completely insane request. It wasn’t his problem that Liv couldn’t control herself and steal a fucking ring, and it definitely wasn’t his problem that Dan had gotten it into his thick skull to get himself arrested in her stead. Obviously the two of them were meant for each other; neither of them could control their goddamn idiotic fucking impulses.
He and Chris had spent most of the day at the cemetery, and then Leon had taken Chris to play outside for a few hours so that the kid didn’t go to sleep with visions of gravestones in his head. But Leon laid in bed for a couple of hours trying to get to sleep, before finally giving up, cracking a bottle of Jameson, and planting his ass on the couch to watch whatever the hell was on TV at 2 in the goddamn morning.
What the hell was Dan even thinking? Oh sure, he loved Liv, but her turning into a fucking kleptomaniac and getting herself busted wasn’t Dan’s problem. Hell, Leon had even warned her when they’d been at the mall earlier in the month. Whether she was using her old ‘the brain made me do it’ excuse or not, Liv had done the crime and Liv should be doing the time. There was no ands, ifs, or buts about it. She was guilty. Dan wasn’t. Dan shouldn’t be in prison.
There was the matter of Liv’s diet, he guessed. It wasn’t like she could get a steady stream of brains into the prison, and what was it she said would happen if she didn’t eat? She’d turn into a full fledged, shambling, brainless, brain-eating monster. He frowned to himself. Still not his problem. Still not risking his job over. Still not worth breaking someone out of prison for. A crime had been committed, and someone had to be punished for it. He repeated that to himself over and over again, and then he swore out loud and got to his feet.
“Chris,” he said loudly, peeking into the boys bedroom. Chris opened his eyes, clearly heavy with sleep. “I’ve got to get to work. You need anything, you can text me or Alex,” he said, and then headed out the door, trying very hard not to think about what he was doing.
Once at work, it wasn’t hard to convince Silverman that he needed a smoke, and probably a coffee and a doughnut, and Leon would be more than happy the man the computer if he wanted to go out and do that. It probably should have been harder to make the entire case just disappear, but it wasn’t. Leon tried to ignore the gnawing feeling of guilt in his gut as he pressed delete. No one had gotten hurt, and the ring had been returned. No harm done. Victimless crime. Then, he went through the paperwork at the desk, found Dan’s file, and shredded the write up. Victimless crime. No harm done. Liv wouldn’t steal again, Dan wouldn’t take the rap for her again.
He grabbed the keys for the jail cells, and made his way to the back. “Hey man,” he said, once he was outside of Dan’s cell. “How’re you enjoying the digs?”
For all the reasons that Dan should have gone to jail for, stealing a ring brazenly, out in the open and right in front of the jeweler's nose was not one of them. And yet, here he was, locked up Friday afternoon and left to rot over the weekend. He’d briefly entertained the thought of calling Carolina to see if maybe she could work some of her magic and spring him. However, as soon as he thought of it, he quickly realized what a bad idea that would have been. They were days away from finalizing their divorce, but nothing was official yet. Carolina may have left the marines, but she was doing something with her time, something that Dan assumed required her very special and very strict security clearance. Him getting pinched for shop lifting may cause a ripple in that very special and very strict clearance and Dan did not want to have to hear about it.
So Dan did not call his soon-to-be-ex-wife and prepared for a few hours in a cramped cell with little to no privacy and next to nothing to do. He asked the sergeant on duty if he could at least have something to read. The response he got was a loud and obnoxious laugh and a few moments later a ratty old magazine was thrust through the bars for him with a “this’ll do for now. Don’t worry, you’ll have plenty to read once your arraigned.”
He was then told that said arraignment wasn’t going to happen until Tuesday.
Dan read the magazine once. Twice. Three times. And when he’d grown bored with that, his mind wandered. He thought about all the things he’d done in his life. All the bad things. He was a changed man now, but that didn’t make-up for the crimes he had committed. Did that mean he was where he belonged? Dan had started to wonder.
He was deep in those thoughts when Leon broke into them, causing Dan to look up. He peered at Leon through the bars a little confused. “What are ye doin’ here?” He asked. “Aren’t ye homicide?”
“Yeah,” Leon grumbled, because he didn’t know what else to say to that. He was homicide. He had zero business here, and if anyone caught him here he’d have zero excuses. He asked himself, not for the first and probably not for the last time, what the hell he was doing here. Let Liv and Dan sort it out.
He wiped his palm on his jeans, and slipped the key into the jail cell door. Act normal, Orcot. No one will think anything is off if you act like nothing is off. People acting like squirrely little fuckers is what got them caught half the time. There was absolutely nothing weird about a police officer letting a prisoner out of his cell; it happened all the time. “Come on,” he said gruffly, turning the key and opening the door. “You’re getting transfered.”
“Transferred,” Dan repeated. The IPD must have been extremely short handed if they were sending a homicide detective to transfer a lowly prisoner charged with shoplifting. Sure the ring had been expensive, but no one had died. Dan eyed Leon wearily a moment, before nodding and wearily pushing himself to his feet. “Aye, then, best be on our way then. I’ll be happy when this business be over.”
This was so strange, walking out of a jail cell. It had been even stranger sitting inside of one. Dan had been a detective once. Hell, he’d even stood right where Leon was standing now, a similar set of keys in hand, locking up a prisoner for selling or buying or being caught with some kind of illegal substance. He looked back over his shoulder at the uncomfortable little bed and the less-than-private toilet in the corner and frowned. “Alright then,” he said and offered his wrists for Leon to put the cuffs on. “Let’s get this over with, shall we?”
Leon stared at Dan’s hands for a moment. He hadn’t even thought of cuffing Dan, but he probably should have. Prisoner transfers were never something he’d had too much to do with. He had avoided the job whenever he could. He reached for his belt where he normally kept his cuffs, and then remembered that he wasn’t exactly on duty and wasn’t wearing his utility belt.
“We’re fine,” he grumbled, moving toward the exit and pushing Dan gently down the hall. “Just get moving.” Preferably before someone came along and saw this.
Dan’s eyes moved towards Leon’s waist and noted that Leon’s utility belt was markedly absent. This caused Dan to raise a brow slightly. A cop without his cuffs? A cop without his gun? Slowly Dan raised his eyes up to Leon’s face. “Yer not really transfering me, are ye, mate?” He asked as they started walking. He glanced back over his shoulder. “Not that I wantcha to cuff me, but it’s gonna raise a few brows if ye perp march me out there without any restraints.”
“I was just planning on telling them someone posted bail,” Leon said, already realizing with mounting frustration the downside to such an approach. Like if someone tried to actually confirm that, or realized that Leon wasn’t even supposed to be working right now. “I’ve never done this kind of thing, okay?” he snapped. “I don’t know what the hell I’m supposed to do here.”
Poor Leon. Dan suspected Liv had somehow managed to convince the homicide detective to bail out her poor falsely accused boyfriend. He was putting a lot on the line by doing this. Not just his job, but he could face some serious jail time himself if he was caught. As much as Dan appreciated (and was flattered) by Leon’s willingness -- as reluctant as it may have seemed – the last thing he wanted was for Leon to get into any kind of trouble for his sake. He also knew that Liv would be absolutely devastated if things went south and Leon ended up in a cell alongside Dan.
He stopped after a few steps and turned back towards Leon. “I’ll tell ye whatcher gonna do. Your gonna put me back in the cell an’ go on home t’ yer brother or your boyfriend,” he said. “I may be innocent in alla this, but if ye walk me out that door, you won’t be. Yer a good cop, Leon. No way I’m gonna be the reason that changes. Plus, if anything should happen to you because of this, Liv would be beside herself.” He grunted. “And it wouldn’t make me very happy either.”
Leon would be lying if he said the offer wasn’t a tempting one. All he had to do was lead Dan back to his cell and wipe his hands clean of this whole mess. Had the offer come half an hour earlier, he might have accepted it, even if it meant that his favourite bartender was locked away for the next couple of years.
“I’ve already trashed the police report,” Leon said, realizing that there was no way at this point he could just leave Dan in his cell. That would probably just lead to even more questions. No, Leon was already chest deep in this quagmire. “I’ve gotta see this through now.”
Dan let out a sigh. “Ye did, did ye?” He shook his head. Well, it was too late to turn back now. “Alright. Since yer already down this path, it’s gonna be me responsibility to be sure nothin’ happens that’ll getcha into trouble.” He looked again towards the door that lead out into the station proper. “We’re not goin’ that way,” he said. “If the police report is gone then there’s no reason fer me to be here. Maybe no one’ll notice the two of us walkin’ through all casual like, but the cameras will. Honest buggers that they be. And if anyone does start noisn’ around, best we not be seen at all.”
Dan looked back towards the other end of the hall. “This is the first time I’ve been a guest of the good city of Irvine so I don’t know the place outside my little cell.” There was another door at the far end of the hall and he gestured towards it. “Where does that lead?” He asked.
There really wasn’t much that would make Leon feel better about breaking someone out of jail, but there was some relief in the fact that he was going to at least watch Leon’s back while he did it. And that he apparently had a better idea of what exactly to do than Leon did, whose entire strategy had been ‘wing it and hope for the best.’
He followed Dan’s gaze. “That hall leads to CSI,” Leon answered after a moment. “But there’s an exit past their lab.” He looked at his watch, frowning to himself. “It’s early enough that, if we’re lucky, there won’t be anyone there.” And if there was, well, that was something they’d have to figure out on the way. Leon wasn’t much of a liar, but if pressed he could probably cobble something together.
Dan knew what he was doing perhaps a little too well given his claimed profession as a bartender. How many bartenders seemed to know how to do a jailbreak? Fortunately, the question hadn’t seemed to cross Leon’s mind and as far as Dan was concerned the other man was all the better for it.
“We go that way, then,” he said and started walking towards the door. With any luck the squints wouldn’t be in their labs at this hour of the morning. Not that Dan really knew what time it was. “Did ye think to grab the baggie that’s got my cellphone, watch an’ wallet in it while ye were shreddin’ the police report?” He asked. While the watch wasn’t particularly important, Dan would have liked to have both his phone and his wallet back.
“Shit,” Leon cursed, because he hadn’t thought of that. For that matter, he still had Silverman’s keys in hand. He couldn’t exactly walk out of the precinct with those without getting his head chewed off. And maybe some questions asked. “You just… wait over by that door and try not to look suspicious,” Leon said, though he wasn’t exactly sure how Dan would pull that off if someone happened to wander by the holding cells and see him standing there. Without another word, he ran back the way he came to replace the keys and grabs Dan’s things.
Try not to look suspicious. Right.
Dan did as Leon instructed as best he could. He kept his eyes on both of the doors, and racked his mind for some kind of excuse as to why he was suddenly outside of his cell should anyone actually catch him standing there. Everything he came up with sounded ridiculous, but he figured the worst that could happen was that he’d just be put back in the cell and everyone could get on with their day. Leon wouldn’t get in trouble and Dan would eventually be exonerated. Theoretically.
Still, Dan was a bundle of nerves as he stood there and waited, head bouncing back and forth between the two doors. Time crawled to a stop while he waited.
Silverman wasn’t back yet when Leon went out there, but he wasn’t going to sit around and wait for him. He put the keys in a drawer, scrawled a hasty note that he had to go, and then grabbed Dan’s stuff.
Then, he was back in the holding cell area, and let out a breath when he saw Dan still standing there, thankfully without any other cops around. “Got it,” he said, holding up the ziploc bag so Dan could see it before handing it off. “Let’s make like a tree and get the fuck out of here,” Leon grumbled, pushing open the door he’d left Dan standing by. He stepped through first, taking a quick glance around the corners, and then waved Dan to follow him.
Eager to put all of this behind him, Dan quickly followed after Leon. He moved quickly, but quietly, keeping an eye on Leon for any sign that trouble was afoot, and looking out for it himself. Fortune seemed to be on their side that morning and the two men were able to make their way through the rest of the police station and outside.
It had been three whole days since Dan had seen the sun and while in the grand scheme of things that wasn’t that long, he was extremely thankful to be outside again. Still, he saved his relief until they were down the street and around the corner. Only then did Dan allow himself even a moment’s pause.
“Thank ye, Leon,” he said, casting a look towards the detective. “I owe ye.” He offered his hand to the other man. “I know this was no small favor to ask ye and I’m sorry you were put into this situation. It’s not much now but if there is anything you need, let me know and it’s done.”
“Don’t mention it,” Leon said. “Seriously.” Because if Leon could never think about this again, he’d be a very happy man. “Besides, doing this kinda thing for favours seems kinda skuzzy,” he added after a moment. He’d feel a whole lot less crooked if he wasn’t getting favours for this. “You need a ride home?”
“If you did this kind of thing for a favor, then, aye, it would be skuzzy,” Dan agreed. “But I don’t think that was your end goal here.” A man like Leon didn’t risk his entire career, one that he obviously took pride in -- or had -- just to get someone in his pocket. “But if all you want is to just never talk about this again, I can do that.”
Another glance over his shoulder, almost as though he were afraid a set of uniforms were coming after them. Of course there wasn’t. “I think you’ve done enough to help me this morning,” he said with a slight sigh. “I can’t impose on you anymore. I’ll find my own way home.”
That really was all Leon wanted. To forget entirely about this entire thing. “And maybe a beer,” he added after a moment, because he probably deserved that much at least.
“Alright,” Leon said after a moment. “You take care, man. Try not to get yourself arrested again.”
“I’ll getcha yer own keg,” Dan promised. A small price to pay, everything considered. He stood awkwardly in the silence that followed and then nodded slowly at Leon’s instruction. “Aye,” he said. “I got no plans on spending another weekend as a guest o’ the county.”
Dan thanked Leon again, gave the man a hearty handshake and made a mental note of the keg he’d order special for Leon. Then the two men went their separate ways into the early morning light.