Airstrip near the Hudson. Monday afternoon. March 8, 2004.

Jones and Graham waited in the shadows while Peter approached the hangar. He'd given Jones his badge and gun, taking instead the weapon Jones had arranged. He'd practiced with it once before, but that had been months ago. He hoped like hell this worked. If it didn't, someone was probably going to die.

Kate and her dad weren't murderers, as far as he could tell. Henry described them over the feed as more venal than criminal masterminds. But you never knew what a desperate person might do. The pilot was another matter. Neal had found the pilot's name in the paperwork in the cockpit, and Peter had run it. The guy had a reputation for violence on two continents, and ran with a dangerous crowd. The pilot probably knew how much information Neal and Henry and Mozzie could gain about him and the flight destination while locked up in the plane. He'd be motivated to silence them permanently.

Mozzie had eaten his long-awaited lunch and then returned to the plane to "finish" cracking the second code and to get caught up on the plan. Now he was back with Kate, Gil and the pilot, explaining the frequency and the code phrase, convincing them that he hadn't missed anything. Neal and Henry were still inside the plane.

Peter pounded on a door to the hangar with a half-empty bottle of Scotch. "Henry!" he yelled. "Henry Allen Winslow! I know you're in there. I tracked your phone. Get your ass out here right now, or so help me I'll shoot the lock off this door!"

Instead of opening the door he'd knocked on, they raised the massive door the plane would pass through. Gil and the pilot hung back with Mozzie. Kate approached Peter, taking care to look very innocent and bewildered. Her nose wrinkled as she couldn't help but smell the Scotch Peter had purposely spilled on his suit. Before she could try to sweet talk him, Peter said, "Think he can get me fired? You tell Henry it's time for a reckoning. Daddy's here. Henry!" After yelling Henry's name, Peter sneered at Kate. "I remember you. Saw you meeting Neal at that café last month when I was following him. You're that tramp of a girlfriend of his. So he's here, too." He stepped forward with a speed and purposefulness that took Kate by surprise, grabbing her around the neck so that she stood in front of him like a human shield. He pulled out the special gun and pointed it at her. "Henry! Neal! You got ten seconds before I shoot Kate."

The door to the plane opened. Gil seemed to be telling the pilot to let them pass, and Neal and Henry climbed down to the ground. While everyone else was distracted, Mozzie disappeared.

The pilot had the gun now, instead of Gil. Kate's father was arguing and gesturing, obviously wanting the pilot to stop pointing the gun in Kate's direction.

Kate went limp. To Gil and the pilot it would look like she had been choked into unconsciousness, but it was really the chemical mix on Peter's suit jacket sleeve that had knocked her out. Gil stepped forward, but paused when Peter started yelling again. "Damn it, Caffrey! You're worse than your old man. You turned my son against me, and no one I've sent has been able to kill you. Some jobs you have to do yourself." He raised his gun and fired at Neal.

He should have hit Neal in the shoulder. That was the plan, and Peter had excellent aim. But it couldn't be that simple. Henry had another plan in mind. He pushed Neal out of the way and the bullet hit him in the chest. Henry fell to the ground, a mass of red blossoming on his white shirt. His hands had reached toward the wound, but slipped away when he hit the ground. Neal knelt beside him, and looked desperately up at Gil. "Call 911!" he demanded.

The pilot had climbed into the plane and started the engine. He was taxiing out of the hangar.

"Wait!" Gil ran parallel to the plane, stopping beside Peter. "I know who you are. You're Robert Winslow. Kate told me about Henry and a little about you when she was dating Neal. We're not part of this. Just give me my daughter and we're out of here. You can do whatever you want when we're gone. We're not telling anyone. We're leaving the country and not coming back."

The plane was outside the hangar now. Peter pressed the mechanism that lowered the overhead door, and told Gil to open the pedestrian door. With Gil outside, Peter shoved a reviving Kate into his arms, then closed and locked the door behind him. He watched through the window as Gil rushed toward the parked plane. Once he and Kate were inside, it headed for the runway.

Peter unlocked the door and let in Graham and Jones. Henry sat up, still holding his chest, and groaned. "Shouldn't rubber bullets bounce?" he asked.

"It's not exactly a rubber bullet," Jones said. "It's a dye pack that explodes when it makes impact."

"It made an impact, all right," Henry complained. "Knocked me over, knocked the breath out of me. Hell, I think..." He took a sharp breath as he tried to stand up, and Graham steadied him.

Peter returned the gun to Jones. "Take this back to the weapons supply, and take Neal with you. He can get started on the paperwork for this latest fiasco. Graham and I will take Henry to a hospital to check out his ribs."

Neal looked unhappy, but to his credit he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, calming himself a little before he protested. "Peter, please. Let me go with you. I... He's..."

"He's going to be fine. Come here, Neal." Peter stepped outside the hangar and around the side of the building for some privacy, and Neal followed. "It was barely two months ago that I witnessed a two-bit thug pointing a gun at your head, and the heat of the moment I threatened to fire you. That was a mistake, one I'm not going to repeat now, no matter how tempting it is." Peter paced away a few steps and back again. "Damn it, Neal! After that incident you promised you'd think twice about taking these kind of unnecessary risks. You said you'd consider how it hurts the people who care about you. Do you remember that?"

"Yes, Peter, I –"

"Well, I have to say you don't act like you remember it. Going after criminals when you're officially taking an afternoon off. Armed, desperate criminals. With no backup, no clear plan that I can see. What the hell were you thinking, Neal? Did you think I'd be okay with this?"

"No."

"Did you think I wouldn't find out? That it was okay as long as no one knew?"

"No."

"I'm at a loss, then. What were you thinking?"

Hands in this pockets, eyes downcast, Neal said, "I was thinking I wanted a chance to say goodbye to the woman I loved."

That gave Peter pause. After a moment he said, "Neal, I saw Kate when you met her at the café and here a few minutes ago. I didn't see concern for you in her eyes either time."

"I get it, Peter. She doesn't love me. She's too wrapped up in Adler to have feelings for anyone else. But it doesn't change the fact that I loved her. I wanted... I needed closure."

It was hard to keep railing at the kid when his voice held so much pain. "This isn't over, Neal. I need time to process it all, and then we'll talk. I can't let you slide on this. There have to be consequences."

"Yes, sir."

###

At home that night Peter slipped a microcassette into a player, but didn't hit Play. He kept thinking back to earlier, at the hospital. While waiting for the results of the x-ray, Henry had contrived to send Graham away on an errand, leaving him alone with Peter. It had been tempting to give Henry hell, but it was clear he'd already gotten an earful from Graham, and he was still in some pain. As he put his ruined shirt and jacket back on, Henry handed Peter the watch. "Listen to the recording, Peter. All of it. You need to hear it before you take any rash actions toward Neal."

Peter had slipped the watch into his pocket, knowing Jones could download the recording as soon as he got back to the Bureau. "I'll listen to it," he said.

"Promise you'll look after Neal? I'm not going to be able to. Not for a while."

"You going somewhere?"

Henry nodded. "Back home to Baltimore tonight. I'll probably be packed and on my way before Neal gets home. The rest of the week I'll wrap up things at Win-Win and then I'm gonna hit the road. I need to get away, think things through." He shook his head. "Neal always says the stuff with his dad messed him up. And I knew he was right. I could see what it did to him. But I didn't get it. Not really. Not until I learned the truth about Robert. Now I get why it made Neal run. He needed to get away from everything."

"And now that's what you need?"

"Yeah," Henry said.

"But he wasn't alone," Peter pointed out. "You were with him."

Henry shrugged, then grunted as the gesture stretched the muscles over his ribs. "He was a kid. But it's not just that. If I'm around Neal, I'll automatically start acting like I've got everything under control. But I don't. And I don't think he's ready to see that. That's what went wrong today, Peter. He knows what I'm going through, knows how it can mess someone up. And he still trusted that I had it all together. But I didn't. I missed things, and it all fell apart in that hangar because of it. Neal thinks I'm this genius hero." Henry grinned. "And usually I am." He let the smile slip and let his pain show. Not just the physical pain, but the emotional pain that wore him down. It showed in his face, in his slumped posture. "He thinks that he couldn't cope when he was eighteen because he was weak, because he was a kid. And he believes that I'm stronger."

"You're afraid of disappointing him."

"Yeah."

"Don't you think he deserves to know the truth? Let him realize you need help, and then let him be there for you."

"I think he deserves a break. He's got a lot to deal with now. Not just the memories of being abused, but once things slow down, Byron's death is going to hit him hard."

"You have to stay in touch," Peter insisted, "if you want him to take a break and deal with his own issues. That isn't going to happen if you drop off the map. He'll be worried and insist on finding you."

Henry nodded and repeated, "Promise you'll look after him?"

"I promise," Peter said. Then Graham returned, followed by a doctor who said Henry had a couple of bruised ribs. The doctor prescribed a pain medication and rest, and then rushed off to the next patient.

And now, home in his living room, Peter pressed Play. He heard the parts he'd missed, when Neal and Henry first arrived at the hangar. He listened to the conversation he'd heard before, when they agreed that Win-Win should take over the Adler investigation. But this time instead of a period of silence, he heard a click.

"Is it off?" Neal asked.

"Yeah. It isn't broadcasting anymore." But it was still recording. Apparently Henry had known that, even if Neal didn't.

"Listen, I'm used to you holding back, adjusting the plan as you go. I trust you, man," said Neal. "You know that. I've always followed your lead. But what the hell just happened? Did you have a plan at all?"

"There were some glitches," Henry admitted.

"More like gaping holes. You realize Peter is going to explode when this is over. He's gonna say I'm too reckless and then chain me to my desk for a month."

"He won't do that," Henry promised. "I'll tell him it's all my fault."

"No. We don't work like that. We never have. We're in it together. It's not like I'm some innocent kid you tricked into this situation. I followed you into this with my eyes open. I'll take the punishment, whatever it is. Just get it together before the next time. When we..."

And this time the recording really did stop. There had been something Henry didn't want the FBI to hear. It picked up again where Peter remembered, and he pressed the Pause button. He checked his watch, and realized it wasn't as late as he'd assumed. He was tired, worn out from the eventful day, but it wasn't too late to call.

He mentally flipped a coin, and called Henry first. "You get home all right?" he asked when Henry answered.

"Yeah. Is everything... is Neal okay?

"Far as I know. I'm going to check on him next."

"Did you listen to the recording?" Henry asked.

"Just got through the part that wasn't broadcast. Sounds like another part was left out, though."

"Nothing important. As long as you heard that it wasn't Neal's idea. He was worried about losing your trust. That's important to him. If I jeopardized that, I'd... well, I couldn't do that to him."

"We'll get through it. And tempting as it may be, I'm not going to chain him to his desk. I was thinking a little community service might be the right approach."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I think he's going to be frustrated that he can't help out his big brother while you're struggling. Might be good for him to help someone else. Pay it forward."

"Makes sense. Can you wait until tomorrow afternoon to talk to him about it? I need to do some research, but I have an idea I think would work."

Peter agreed, and wrapped up the call as it became apparent Henry had nothing more to say. Then he called Neal. "I've been talking to your cousin," he said.

"Is everything... Is Henry okay?"

"Seems to be."

"He didn't say goodbye. He was already gone when I got home."

"I think Graham got them an early flight."

"Right," Neal said. He waited a moment to add, "And he took your call? I've left him a couple of messages, but he didn't get back to me."

Peter was afraid of that. "He messed up today, Neal. Big time. He put his life and yours on the line, and he knows he almost lost. I don't think he's ready to face you yet."

"He knows I'll forgive him," Neal protested. "Everyone makes mistakes, and I should have realized he had too much going on. I should have insisted on going over more details before we went into that hangar. But I still trust him."

"That might be the problem. He doesn't think you should trust him. Deserving your trust is a pressure he can't handle right now, on top of everything else."

"That doesn't make sense."

"I think it will, if you give it time. That's what he needs, Neal. Give him some time. You said you forgive him, but he isn't ready to forgive himself."

Peter could hear a door open, and the sound of traffic. Neal had walked out to the balcony. "So Robert gets what he wanted. Henry can't stand to be around me."

"He probably can't stand to be around anyone right now. We barely spoke more than a minute before he wanted to hang up and be alone." Peter stood and walked out to his back porch. You couldn't see the stars in the city, but he looked up at the moon. It gave him a sense of solidarity to know Neal was seeing the same thing. And he had a feeling that in Baltimore, Henry had retreated outdoors as well. "I don't have Noelle's degrees in therapy, but in this job you learn some things about guilt. There are times you don't solve the case, or don't catch the bad guys, or don't catch them before they hurt someone. There are times you feel like you let down a victim or another agent. It tears you up, and you start to question whether anyone should trust you again. You don't snap out of something like that overnight, especially if the person you let down was a friend."

"The more I try to contact him, the more pressure he feels," Neal said. "You know, these concepts made sense when Henry was studying them to get his master's. But in real life they suck."

"Real life's a bitch," Peter agreed. He heard Neal's snort, relieved that the kid could laugh even a little. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm good. I'll see you tomorrow."

Back in the house, El stepped out of the kitchen with a mug of tea. Normally Peter didn't go for tea, but after shivering on the porch, something warm without caffeine to keep him awake sounded very appealing. "I think I'll have one of those," he said.

"Peter, are you all right?" El asked, following him into the kitchen.

Peter thought about that as he programmed the microwave to heat a mug of water. He felt sad for Henry and Neal, for the pain they both felt. It wasn't something that would go away soon, or that he could fix for them. He felt happy that he'd been able to talk to them, and help guide them in some small way. He felt pride that they confided in him. He tried describing the bittersweet combination, and faltered near the end, concerned that it sounded sappy. It was a relief to hear the microwave beep and retrieve his mug of steaming water.

El wrapped an arm around his waist. "You're in the Dad zone."

Peter nodded. The Dad zone was a good place to be.