Cognizant

Title: "Cognizant" (1/1)
Author: Jimbo
Subjects: Danny Witwer (Colin Farrell) and John Anderton (Tom Cruise) of 'Minority Report'
Date: April 10, 2006
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters -- just borrowing them for the fun of it.
Warnings: A little violent, maybe a little angsty and a little slashy.
Dedication: To Mistress Marilyn. Happy Birthday! (Hope this is a fandom you can appreciate!)
Notes: 'Minority Report' is a very cool film set in 2054 in Washington D.C. where the Department of Pre-Crime has functioned for six years, effectively eliminating murders through the visions of three 'precognitives' who foresee the crimes and a police force who arrest the perps before they can act. It's about sight and perception and the dreaded Thought Police, and it featured intense performances by Tom Cruise, Colin Farrell and Max Von Sydow as Lamar Burgess, the director of Pre-Crime.

Time seemed to stand still.

Danny sat there, slumped uncomfortably against the wall, his head angled down so he could see the red stain spreading across his crisp white shirt. When Lamar fired the gun, he felt a strange sort of surprise, a mild protest over an act that seemed as simple as it was unexpected, an act that should have been monumental, that should have been heralded by the sounds of hovercraft and approaching police or at least the wailing alarm that accompanied a Red Ball, Pre-Crime's warning of an impending murder.

But there had been nothing but the sudden thump in his chest and then the smell of the gun as the smoke curled lazily from its muzzle, shiny in the glare from the wall of windows behind Lamar. He couldn't help smiling as he realized he'd been shot with the same gun he'd handed to the man not five minutes earlier, John Anderton's gun, the one Danny himself had recovered that day from the scene of the former chief's downfall, a crime that despite the alleged perfect prescience of the precogs had somehow been staged to ruin Anderton.

And now in Anderton's apartment where he had arranged to meet Pre-Crime's aging director to try to explain the nearly inexplicable fraud affected to frame Anderton, Danny had let down his guard for long enough to allow the man to ambush him, never suspecting until Lamar tipped his own hand, the one holding the gun, that he was the mastermind who had manipulated Pre-Crime's nearly infallible system. And by then it was too late, too late to even pantomime "Stop!" before Danny's young life was rudely interrupted.

As Lamar approached, Danny waited for the second and final shot, lifting his father's St. Christopher's medal to his lips, the medal he so often fiddled with as his mind wrestled with the puzzles of his work, the agile fingers of his left hand compulsively tethering and un-tethering themselves with the long chain. Now he kissed the medal, figuratively kissing his own ass goodbye. But the old man just stood above him like a threatening precipice, his eyes glazing over as his shadow engulfed the Attorney General's most promising protégé. Then he answered Danny's smile with just the corners of his own sad mouth before walking slowly away.

And Danny was left to wait for his life to drain away with his waning strength and his leaking blood, strangely devoid of pain, squinting against the halo of sunlight that had been briefly cut off by Lamar's towering form. If he could stir himself to move, he could probably find an earphone on the desk not five feet away. But his right lung had been punctured and his breath was shallow, and behind the blinding glare from the windows he believed he could sense rather than see the familiar outline of his father, cut down a dozen years earlier on the steps of their church in Dublin, waiting to accompany his successful young son on his next ascent.

Danny's life had been full of upward motion, excelling in his educational pursuits before a brief but notable stint as a homicide detective that led to the Justice Department and finally to this investigation of D.C.'s controversial model program, Pre-Crime. Pre-Crime was about to go national if the pundits who predicted the success of the national referendum were right, about to spread its moral dilemma across the country, effectively shutting down murderers before they could shoot or stab or throttle, and thus, before they could actually commit a crime. And Danny had been assigned to ferret out the weaknesses in the system, the fatal flaw just waiting to be laid bare.

Well, wouldn't a hole in his chest be considered a fatal flaw?

While Danny's career had been mercurial, his life itself was somewhat uneventful as lives are usually measured. Three years at seminary had prepared him to accept death as a spiritual event, and three years as a homicide detective had acquainted him with death's reek of reality. But nothing in Danny's conscious mind or even in his rare imaginings had readied him for exiting his life so quickly or ignominiously. How could he meet death when he had never actually embraced life? There were so many things he hadn't done and people he hadn't known. How could he leave now when he was leaving behind so little?

He had never successfully sowed his seed or shared a vow or even been in love.

And now, waiting to die, regret rose like a choking lump in Danny's dry throat, and for the first time since he saw his father's pale face on those slate steps, he wanted to cry. He wasn't finished with his life. Damn it, he wasn't even finished with his investigation! He had been wrong about John Anderton, the tortured cop who led the Pre-Crime team with a passion incited by his own loss of his small son, whisked off six years earlier at a public pool when his dad looked away at the wrong instant. Yes, Anderton was wounded, and his obsession with his own loss didn't allow for that wound to heal as he continually relived his mistake and wallowed in guilt. Yes, he was flawed, resorting to doping away the pain every night so he could rest enough to function during the day.

But he was a pawn, not a black knight.

And Danny wouldn't have a chance to admit to Anderton that he had been wrong, wouldn't have the opportunity to try to stem the overwhelming tide of evidence against the man, wouldn't even be able to scrawl out the name of the real perpetrator in his own blood on the floor next to him like a character in a bad novel. He would have to make his amends to John Anderton in the next world, because his hold on this one was slipping away too fast to matter.

And even in the few seconds since the gunshot, so many things had occurred to him.

He had rarely danced. He liked the music from the Old Country and he used to listen and watch as his friends lifted a pint and flirted away their Saturday nights, too constrained by his own Life Plan to join in, both early on when that plan was built around the Church and later when it was dedicated to the Law. He had occasionally thought about dancing, knowing he'd be good at it as he was at nearly everything, quick and nimble and sure-footed, but he just had never gotten on his feet and done it.

And now his legs seemed paralyzed. He couldn't feel them.

It was too late for dancing.

Recently he had stopped going to church regularly. He worked seven days a week, driven by his own energy and ambition, confident enough in his Faith that he didn't feel the need to rest on his knees even once a week. If a priest happened to walk into Anderton's apartment now and found him there dying, he wouldn't know exactly what to say, except perhaps, "Bless me, Father."

That would probably be enough.

He had rarely been drunk, crazy-out-of-his-head, falling-down drunk. For some reason no amount of alcohol seemed to be able to completely muddle his thoughts or confuse his reflexes. Unconsciousness would come before inebriation, so why bother to drink at all? He could certainly toss back a few with his colleagues while his alert eyes watched for weaknesses, but it was a tactic for fitting in, not for having fun. His heart was never in it. Only his head.

Now he wondered for a moment what it would be like to succumb to Anderton's addiction, the neuroin hypos he had whiffed incessantly since his son's disappearance. He wondered if doping would have done for his mind what alcohol never could, released it, relaxed it, allowed it some needed rest.

Even sleep had offered little rest to Danny over the years. His dreams were often continuations of the puzzles that obsessed him during his waking hours, directed by the same unrelenting awareness that drove his days. He often chewed gum and fiddled with his religious medal, disguising these nervous habits as best he could behind the force of his eyes and his words and his smile. He liked to box during his rare off hours, because it offered him the chance to both punch and dance at the same time, testing his breath and his heart for fitness, not real strength. He was like a Catholic version of a whirling dervish, always in motion either physically or intellectually, or both.

He should have used his gifts of health and intelligence more thoughtfully while he could. He should have written a poem or a love letter or even a recipe to leave behind him. He should have used his voice to sing, his lips to laugh, his lungs as a bellows during rigorous passion, not exercise. He should have used his arms to reach for someone he wanted more badly than he wanted success, just once.

He could picture his graveside, and it was empty of real mourners. His death would be met with official regret, his murder blamed on the same man who was being so skillfully ruined by someone pretending to be his friend, supporter and surrogate father. The man he himself had come to Pre-Crime expecting to investigate and invalidate.

Anderton. John Anderton.

Wasn't it Anderton's face he saw now, folding forward out of the light, a hologram from one of the tapes spread out on the desk, recordings of a once-happy life ready for Anderton to play as he gave himself over to his memories and his addiction?

"Witwer?" said the hologram.

He couldn't answer. He wouldn't answer. He had no intention of talking to a holographic recording, even at this point in his life, the final point.

"Who did this?"

Was it really John Anderton? Had he been stupid enough to return to his own apartment, or had he been astute enough to realize it had long ago been searched and abandoned? Danny was too tired now to decide if Anderton was stupid or astute.

Or both.

Anderton's intense eyes stared into his. Those eyes were different than Danny remembered, not the same blue-grey he remembered, but darker and a bit smaller. Yes, Anderton's eyes had been surgically altered so he could make his way unrecognized around the city, fooling the sensors and the recognition software as only someone bold enough to have his fucking eyes removed possibly could.

"I thought you set me up," Anderton said. "But you know the truth, don't you? You must have found out, and you were killed for it."

Yes, killed. Was he already dead, listening to Anderton talking to his corpse as he hovered somewhere close by? Or was a spark of whatever made him Danny Witwer still clinging to the familiar form he had inhabited for too short a time?

"Who was it, Danny? Tell me before it's too late."

But it was already too late. Couldn't Anderton see that? He was already dead or near-dead, and nothing he said about the case could possibly matter a damn now, if it ever had. The precogs were a hive brain, and Anderton had broken into the temple where the three floated in proton milk and taken Agatha from her cradle, the female who was the key to their uncanny cognition. And without Agatha the precogs were unable to see the future, so Danny's own murder hadn't triggered a Red Ball and John Anderton would probably end up taking the responsibility he had inadvertently earned.

Instead of blaming Anderton, Danny found he felt compassion for him. "John," he whispered, smiling again. "John, hold my hand."

Anderton's rheumy eyes welled up, and he crouched down and reached out toward the left hand wrapped in the chain of the religious medal, staring at it for a moment before deciding on the right. He took Danny's fingers in his own and squeezed a little.

"Jesus," he said. "I'm sorry."

"You're not to blame," Danny managed to say. "Not for this or the other."

"You know I didn't murder Leo Crow."

Danny blinked and tried to shake his head. "For your son, John."

Two tears now trailed down Anderton's face, one from each eye. "This is so fucked up," he said vehemently. "It should have been different."

Danny silently willed Anderton to tell him how things could have been different, how the two could have met under totally different circumstances, how Anderton wouldn't have been a doper and a burnout, and he wouldn't have been a climber and a cynic, how they might have become friends and shared a few drinks and a few laughs, or even lovers and found their bodies and their physical skills well matched. So intense at work, Anderton was probably equally intense in play, and Danny might have enjoyed sparring with the man in a boxing ring or on box springs even more than acting as Anderton's antagonist in the events that had finally brought them both down.

Anderton had been an able opponent. Now Danny wondered what else he might have been.

If Anderton had been his friend, would he have come to Danny for help with his addiction, confessing the loneliness and despair that drove him to compulsive work and drug abuse? Would he have spoken bitterly of his ex-wife, the slim, self-possessed woman who had coldly received Danny in her home and adamantly ejected him when she tired of his questions? Would he have spoken lovingly of his son, reliving the all-too-few moments of joy the two had shared, some of which Danny had witnessed while snooping through Anderton's recordings? Would he have wept over his loss, secure in Danny's sympathetic presence?

If Anderton had been his lover, would they have jockeyed for position in bed the way they did within the walls of Pre-Crime? Would Anderton have tried to use those strong arms knotted with muscle to hold Danny down, white teeth showing beneath his triumphant grin, speaking volumes with those determined eyes, the original set, without actually saying much more than Danny's name as he moved over him? Would he have been willing to relinquish his position when Danny found a way to wiggle free, giving up gracefully when Danny extricated himself and began his own amorous attack? Would he have fucked as desperately as he had fought when Danny chased him in the Lexus factory? Or would he have simply sighed with relief in the arms of someone as strong and as capable as he was?

Danny had never really had a close friend or a lover. But now he enjoyed imagining what it would have been like to have found both in one man.

If only there were more time.

"Lamar," Danny finally said, gifting Anderton with the name.

"Lamar? Lamar shot you?"

Anderton sat quietly, processing this thought and connecting whatever dots he could. Danny started to drift, finding it harder and harder to make out Anderton's face through the halo of ever-brightening light surrounding his head. Time was slipping away and taking Danny with it.

Danny blinked again and took a shuddering breath. "Sean," he whispered.

"What?" Anderton squeezed Danny's hand hard now, almost painfully. "What are you saying?"

"I'll watch him for you. Okay?"

Anderton's face convulsed for a brief second, his eyes shutting tightly. Then he leaned in close, his stare intent on Danny's face. "Okay," he said, smiling. "That would be great, Danny. I could trust Sean with you."

Danny mouthed the words "thank you," before reluctantly closing his eyes, unwilling to die with that glassy stare he had seen on all too many corpses. Now he understood, however, why so many bodies seemed to gaze at nothing. He hated shutting out the light and shutting out Anderton's face, the last he'd ever see. It was so damned hard to let go.

He could still feel Anderton, even if he couldn't see him. He could feel the warmth of Anderton's hand in his hand and Anderton's breath on his face, feel the empathy in Anderton's expression, feel the compassion in Anderton's bruised heart. And feeling so much for John Anderton, he realized he could love him.

Danny's last breath was peaceful and his last living thought one of love, not of regret.

And it only took an instant more for Danny to see everything, more completely than he'd ever seen anything. He could no longer feel Anderton's hand although he could clearly see the suffering on his face, and he wanted to say something comforting to this man he now loved. But by then he was ready to let go.

Time had run out.

The End