Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS or the characters. I am not making money off of this story.

NCIS: A Day at the Races

Prologue: Rocks and Hard Places

Agent Lynn Simpson couldn't believe her eyes. Her fellow undercover partner hadn't abandoned the construction of a bomb once the other terrorists had left the basement of the apartment building. Instead, Agent Audrey Donnelly continued pouring fertilizer into the container with grim faced determination. Lynn gave the door another glance to confirm their being alone before approaching her partner. She hoped the other woman was just caught up in the character she was playing and was not convinced of the doctrine they had been fed over the previous months.

"Audrey, they're gone," Lynn pulled out her cell phone and started to send a text to the Senior Agent in charge. "Come on, Fornell is going to be here-"

"No," Audrey snatched the cell phone out of Lynn's hands and smashed it with the heel of her boot. "We're going to see this through."

"See what through? We have all the evidence we need to bring these guys down. We need to give Fornell the go ahead now."

Audrey was returning to her work on the bomb. "You go ahead and leave. I'm staying here."

Lynn felt her stomach drop. "For what? We walk away from the bomb and Fornell has all he needs to put these guys away. Why stay longer with these nut jobs?"

"They're not nut jobs."

"What do you call a group of people who want to blow up an apartment building filled with innocents and call it a battle cry for equal opportunity for the races?"

Audrey leveled a determined look at Lynn. "I call it taking back our America."

"Not my America."

"And that," Audrey started connecting wires to the digital clock, "is why I have to do this."

Lynn pulled her gun out and slid the safety off. "Audrey, you've gotten caught up in the case. The characters we play aren't who we are. This is not right."

"Oh, come on, Lynn. You mean to tell me all those years of working undercover, infiltrating various cells of homegrown terrorists and one specific cause never struck a cord with you? You never were swayed by one of their cultural or societal positions?"

"No," Lynn moved closer to Audrey. "We infiltrate terrorist cells because these people are criminals. Nothing they do should be condoned. Audrey, stand down."

"I can't do that, Lynn."

Lynn clenched her jaw and raised her gun. "Step away from the bomb, Agent Donnelly."

"I'll blow us both up before I do that."

"Audrey, you're not giving me much of a choice here. Please, step away from the bomb."

"How could you not understand their point of view? America is for Americans."

"We are FBI agents, it is our duty to protect innocent people."

"It is our duty to protect America."

Lynn studied Audrey's face. They had been involved with the white supremacists group for six months now. There was supposed to be trust between them, absolute confidence in each other and their characters. Now, it came down to Audrey priming a bomb while Lynn held her at gun point. Just when she thought she had faced every possible situation these covert operations could throw at her, she had been dealt with a curve ball.

"Audrey, either you step away from the bomb, or I will be forced to shoot you."

Audrey lifted up the detonator in her hand. "Either way, I die a martyr."

"Please don't make me do this."

"I'm not making you do this, Lynn. Society and our crooked government is making you. Take a stand with me. Send them the message that the racial discrimination of our people will not be tolerated anymore!"

Lynn slipped her finger over the trigger. "Last warning. Put the detonator down."

"God bless Amer-"

The sentence was cut off by a gunshot reverberating off the basement walls.

Senior Special Agent Tobias Fornell waited in the darkened suburban, shivering and wondering why these busts never happen on a summer night. According to the timeline and GPS locators, Simpson and Donnelly should have contacted him by now. SWAT was waiting around the corner for his go ahead but all contact had suddenly and oddly stopped. It wasn't until he saw three of the cell members come jogging out of the building's lobby that he realized something had gone terribly amiss. He grabbed his radio.

"Go forward with the take down," he radioed to the SWAT. "Three perps just exited the building."

He watched as the team emerged from the shadows and overtook the surprised trio quietly and without incident. Only then did he get out from his car and move toward the restrained men and woman.

"Where are the other two that were with you?" Fornell asked.

"Sir," one of the SWAT members pointed toward the front of the building and Fornell immediately recognized Agent Simpson's willowy form making her way towards them.

"Agent Simpson-"

She paused briefly by his side and handed him her gun. "I'm done, Fornell. I'm done."

He had to almost run to keep up with her. "What do you mean? Where's Agent Donnelly?"

Simpson stopped out of the line of sight of the SWAT team and the arrested trio. He noticed that not only her hands but her entire frame was shaking, almost violently. Her breathing was getting more rapid by the second and he was afraid she was going to hyperventilate.

"Do you need medical attention?"

She shook her head.

"Where's Donnelly?"

"In the basement."

"Is she in danger?"

"She's dead."

Fornell had worked with Simpson on a couple other cases before this one. Her reputation was one of legend and he considered himself fortunate to be handed such a seasoned agent for those cases. A trust had developed, faint but nevertheless present. He put a steadying hand on her shoulder and pushed her into a sitting position on the curb of the sidewalk.

"Tell me what happened."

"She bought into the group's philosophy. She was going to carry out the bombing tonight." Simpson shrugged as her face became pinched. "She gave me no choice."

Fornell looked down at the gun in his hand. "You shot her."

"I told you she was too young for this length of a mission. She was only twenty-nine."

Fornell wrapped the gun in his handkerchief until he could place it in an evidence bag. There would be a hearing but he was certain that Simpson wouldn't be found at fault for the shooting. It wasn't the first time that an undercover officer was forced to take drastic action in the middle of a case.

"We'll head back to the office and I'll call in a counsellor for you-"

Simpson shook her head. "I can't do this anymore, Fornell. You're going to have to put me at a desk until I retire."

"And that would be a waste of an undercover agent like yourself."

Simpson stood up and brushed herself off. She looked steadier than before and had more determination in her eyes. "I'm done, Fornell. I shot my partner. No one in their right mind is ever going to work with me again. And quite frankly, I couldn't go through this again. I'm getting too old for this anyway."

"You're thirty-five! You're at the top of your game!"

"I'm thirty-nine and I'm in the bottom of the ninth. Desk or quit."

Simpson had a nickname around the agency: The Chameleon. She had been through so many undercover operations and had played her part seamlessly. She was indispensable to the Agency and he wasn't about to let her just walk away from her job just like that.

"I'll desk you until you feel up to returning to the game."

"Not going to happen." She started to walk away. "My letter of resignation will be on your desk tomorrow morning."

And just like that, the Chameleon was gone.