[ His heart twists and contracts at the question. At least he knows who Leah is, knows why he's asking. It would be so easy to utter a platitude here -- Carver is clearly out of it, not tracking where he is, mentally someplace else -- but Harold's promise to John years ago that he would never lie to him is something he's silently and spontaneously kept to the rest of the team as well as they joined. It's a policy that's never served him wrong. The one time he betrayed it to protect John, tried to shield him from a number that involved domestic violence, he'd come to regret it.

So he says, ] I don't know, [ unvarnished and raw.

He needs to center him, give him something to stabilize with. Harold did this; he won't leave him in this state, even if he's frantically guessing at how to handle it. Abandonment, he's sure, is the actual worst sin, if such a thing existed. ]

Bear's commands are in Dutch, [ he tries. ] He was trained for the military, so they're words that won't be said in casual conversation. I need you to memorize them. Are you ready?

[ Learning a list of Dutch words might serve as a grounding exercise, he hopes. ]