tinstar | Malcolm x Raylan: Cowboy Surprise

Malcolm x Raylan: Cowboy Surprise

Art was suspicious right off the bat when Raylan took a week off with the express note that his phone would be Out Of Order til the next Monday, but the Chief Marshal wasn't going to look gift horses in the mouth. Not when it suggested he'd have a few days of peace, until Raylan caved to turning his phone back on again. Still, he watched the younger Marshal walk out of the office and promised himself to check into the state of Harlan within 3 days to make sure that the place wasn't on fire. The smoke would reach him before he called, he was sure.

But Art didn't have much to worry about - Raylan had no plans on staying in the state for his vacation, beyond one day spent closing up Arlo's and securing it the best way he could before getting on a plane to New York City. He wanted to surprise Malcolm - it'd been near two months since they'd last seen each other and frankly, Raylan was tired of missing him. They'd called and texted, stayed in a fairly consistent, if odd houred, touch but it wasn't the same.

Once he landed, Raylan rented a car and navigated his way towards Malcolm's apartment, stopping to grab a bouquet of flowers. It was.. Extra, but Raylan didn't want to show up empty handed, just in case. Thirty minutes later, Malcolm's door buzzer was being hit, like Raylan was here to deliver something. Well, he was, but that was half the fun.

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Malcolm huffed a brief laugh.

"It's not a New York thing, it's a serial killer thing," he assured them. "I did most of my work with them out of the FBI's DC office, but since I was sort of the resident expert on this...niche subject, I chased them all over the country. My last case with them was Claude Springer. The Cedar City Butcher? He pickled his victims faces and kept them in jars. I wouldn't say this kind of thing happens 'often', though. I mean. Okay, John Watkins - the Junkyard Killer - shackled me in a basement and stabbed me in an attempt to turn me into a killer like him, but that was an outlier."

---

Jeremy struggled all the way to the cell, still riled up.

"You dumb hicks can't understand what I am. You can't understand what I've done. Bring Malcolm Bright down here. BRING HIM!!"

"Lucky that you came down here then aren't we?"

Rachel had lifted an eyebrow at the telling of John Watkins purposes and all it suggested, but she kept her mouth closed on that for now. Art shifted as he breathed, gut sticking out a little further as they ambled up to the office doors.

"But considerin' how often I see you around my office now, I have a feelin' that that luck might continue."

"Much more than vacations," Rachel quipped. "You must be runnin' up a hellva hotel bill."

--

Raylan smirked at the insult. "Yeah, cause no one's ever killed women before. Real genius. Tell you what's gonna happen. We're gonna put you in a cell and then let the judge throw the book at you. Maybe, if you're real lucky, you'll see him again at trial."

Tim smirked as he hit the button that released the gate to the general cells.

"Get him to talk about me on the news," Jeremy told them. "GET HIM TO TALK ABOUT ME ON THE NEWS!!"

---

Malcolm looked over at Art. ”Technically, you didn't see me last time I was here," he pointed out. Art had been at home with a gunshot wound. But he'd no doubt heard things.

He turned his attention to Rachel. "I'm not going to bill you guys for it, if that's what you're asking. I don't even bill consulting fees when you don't, you know. Ask me to consult. I just like putting bad guys away."

"No," Raylan replied flatly as they came up to the right cell and the cop down the way opened the cell door. Shoving him in, Raylan propped his hand on his hips as the bars closed behind him.

"I'm sure someone will come let you outta those cuffs. Sooner or later." With a faint dry smile that fell after it rose, Raylan and Tim turned around and walked away leaving Jeremy impotently with himself, to scream himself raw if he wanted too.

--

"Ain't gotta," Art defended with a lift of his chin. "I know what goes on in my office." And it was almost a point that he went first into the glass doors.

"It wasn't," Rachel replied with a sweet smile.

Art looked over his shoulder as he continued. "Don't expect that to change either. The Marshals service is real cagey about us doin' contracts outside the standard system. C'mon into my office Bright, I wanna talk to you."

Rachel veered off to her desk, sitting down with a smile.

Malcolm watched Rachel veer off, not liking the degree of satisfaction on her face too much. He started to make for Raylan's desk when Art asked him to come into the office. He looked faintly startled and glanced around on the off chance that maybe Raylan was back, but no such luck.

He followed Art into the glass room and stood somberly in front of the desk with his hands clasped in front of him. 'Come into my office, Bright' was how most of his reprimands from Gil started.

"How can I help, Chief Mullins?" he asked with simple, polite and practiced innocence.

"Deputy Chief, there's only Chief. Sit down," he said with a nod as he moved around to sit in his own chair.

"I think maybe it's time you and I had a talk, got to know each other. Your name's popped up in several case statements, and while I don't mind Raylan takin' the help or the time, I don't like havin' people I don't know workin' on my cases."

"That's fair enough," Malcolm said amicably as he sat.

"I'm a forensic psychologist. I used to work as a profiler for the FBI. Now I work as a consultant for law enforcement agencies that need a profiler from time to time but don't keep one on staff. I do most of my work with the NYPD these days." He made a gesture towards the main office. "Deputy Givens called Lieutenant Arroyo to check my credentials the first time I was here." He paused and watched Art's face. "Is that what you wanted to know?"

"Not so much, no," Art replied. "Anyone can have credentials; I've seen brilliant assholes who couldn't tell their ass from a hole in the ground if they fell into it. But not everyone that works with Raylan ends up followin' him around. Or bein' followed around. I know he took his vacation up north with you.

Fact, I don't recall Raylan ever havin' any friends that didn't work in whatever office he was in. Makes me wonder why we're seein' so much of you out here in the country. You know he's got a kid, right? Cute little thing too, last I saw her."

Malcolm nodded faintly when Art mentioned Raylan's vacation, his brain calculating what he could get away with admitting.

"Yeah, we went to a Yankees game. Saw Times Square. He didn't have time to sight see when you were up on your case," he noted.

The next comment and the seeming non sequitur that followed it made him frown faintly, if only for the way it brushed against the concerns that Winona had wailed at them when they told her about their relationship.

"I've met his daughter. What does she have to do with us being friends?" he asked. "We have similar interests. We have similar jobs," he said with a shrug. "We've both been accused of spending too much time at work."

"Raylan? Sightseein'?" That made Art chuckle once with a little shake of his head as he leaned back in his chair.

"Just makin' sure you understand that Raylan isn't the most.. stable of men outside of his job. Not always his fault, but the man finds himself in severe bullshit on a regular basis. His ex-wife doesn't make that any easier. 'Course, I don't think Winona's ever made anything easier in anyone's life, far as I can tell."

Malcolm nodded.

"I've met her, too. But I'm not sure I agree with you about Raylan. I think a lot of the perceptions about him are...taken out of context. He's probably the steadiest person I've ever known."

"Steadfast only works when his feet are planted on solid ground," Art conversationally argued. "I've been workin' with and knowin' Raylan for a decade at least. He tries, but he drinks too much and he goes lookin' for trouble. The man's married to his job, I swear. Which normally, ain't a bad thing, when people have something to balance that out with."

Art kept his resting sceptical face as he watched Malcolm, judging and weighing his responses.

"You got something to balance it out with?"

Malcolm shrugged.

"Someone to talk to that understands this job and the way it can consume the people who do it because they honestly care about protecting people? It's an alternative to liquid therapy, at any rate," he offered. "I think... I also understand what it's like to be seen as too into the job and not enough into Life Things."

Art shrugged with his face in consideration, eyes moving to the doors as Raylan and Tim came back in.

"He'll regret it if he doesn't see these young years of his daughter. Those moments, he'll never get back," Art said, eyebrows raising with a slight nod of his head to direct Malcolm's attention if he hadn't already noticed.

"I told him that," Malcolm said. "I'm trying to g..."

His voice trailed off as he caught sight of Raylan at Art's direction. He was usually good at hiding his tells, but he hadn't be prepared to see Raylan Givens enter a room without smiling. It only just ghosted across his face before it fell and - instead of looking at Art's face - he looked at Art's desk.

"I don't want to make any trouble for him," he said in a soft, serious voice.

He knew what the game was. He knew when he lost.

The passing look was all Art really needed, but the round about admission that there was something there was appreciated.

"More than likely, he'll make trouble for you," Art replied as he pushed to his feet. "But if you can handle his bullshit.. Maybe you'll be alright. Go on, finish your paperwork," Art said, pulling open his office door.

There was no missing it and Raylan stopped short as he saw Malcolm get up and exit Art's office. The look he gave Art was full of questions, but Art gave him nothing as he shut the door and turned around. With a pinch of his brow, Raylan ambled into the conference room after Malcolm.

"What was all that about?"

Malcolm looked up at him uneasily.

"He knows," he said grimly. "He's got no proof or anything but. He knows."

He turned his paper over to record his account of their second encounter with Jeremy.

"And I can't tell what he thinks about it but he wasn't... upset."

Raylan looked over at the window that looked into Art's office, but the man was already bent over some paperwork himself, half moon glasses perched on his nose.

"Well what'd he say about it," Raylan continued as he slid into his seat, picking up his pen again. "Usually Art makes himself pretty clear when he's upset so that might be a good sign."

"He implied it was unlikely that I was your friend, since you've never had a friend that didn't work in your office," Malcolm recalled. "He said you need something to balance out your work life because you drink too much and get in fights. He said you have to be careful not to miss your baby's baby years and that your ex-wife causes a lot of bullshit. Ummm oh and he found the notion of you sightseeing in New York laughable."

He looked up at Raylan from his paper.

"I told him you're the steadiest person I've ever known and that I don't want to make trouble for you. He said you were more likely to make trouble for me. You're not taking me to the airport after this, are you?"

"God no," he replied without hesitation, face pinching at the absurdity of the thought as he started writing again.

There were several barbs in the retelling, but none that weren't fair.

"Sounds like he was givin' you advice." He didn't look up. "It'll be okay." He hoped.

If Art did have some opinion on it, Raylan was sure he'd hear it. He was also sure that it wouldn't change his mind.

"Advice? ...Oh, well he did say if I could handle your bullshit, then maybe I'd be all right."

Malcolm looked over at him.

"I don't really know what he's talking about when he refers to your 'bullshit'; it seems to be a catch-all phrase."

Raylan looked up at him, face guarded in its stoic netrality.

"It's not. Messed up a couple of cases by sleepin' with a key witness. I let a Chicago thug get murdered in his limo because he threatened Winona. Art knows about that too, but we haven't talked about it. I shoot more people than I save. I've been investigated enough times that I'm sure I've got half a drawer on me alone. I wouldn't call it my bullshit, but he's entitled to his opinion on it."

"You haven't shot more people than you've saved," Malcolm said matter-of-factly and with utter conviction of the truth. He knew it wasn't true, because even for each person Raylan would have shot, he saved people they would have hurt. "That's not mathematically possible."

Malcolm didn't realize that Raylan's body count had risen drastically over the last few years or that Raylan was technically responsible for more bodies in the ground that Martin Whitly was.

"You could check my file, but I stopped keepin' count." He hadn't stopped keeping count.

"Let's finish this shit and go get some food, huh?" he asked with a look back down to his papers.

Malcolm put his pen down and leaned forward slightly.

"Raylan, when you put a bad guy down, how many innocent people do you save each time? How much suffering do you prevent? You only shoot people who earn it with the threat of inflicting suffering on someone else. On you or on others or both." Malcolm needed him to understand the difference between what he did and murder. He was nothing like Martin Whitly. "I learned really early on that the lives saved by stopping a killer are tangible things, not... nice bedtime stories. They're lives. Real lives."

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