- chapter 1 -

Pins, Bullets and Journals

Digging into a case that demands Callen's presence make Eric and Nell realize how dangerous it may be.
"So any mail with any anomalies is now meant for me, you mean?"

Disclaimer: Of course, any resemblance with actual persons, places, buildings, and addresses are purely coincidental. This means that names or incidents which come by in this story are simple fictitious. All, except for the ones who were made up by CBS, Shane Brennan and R. Scott Gemmill. I gladly used the NCIS team for this story

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Los Angeles || NCIS office of special projects

Callen?"

He looked up from the file he was working on. Checking paperwork wasn't exactly his favorite part of the job, but well, he had to deal with reports, journals, exact recording of events, financials and filing every case, whether it was closed or still open with dead ends, cold cases.

"Callen?" Eric repeated, closer now since he dropped himself in the empty chair behind Kensi's desk. He took one of the ballpoints which he started click-clacking frantically, and Callen sighed, putting his pen away.

"What, Eric? What you've got?"

Eric Beale shrugged. "There's this e-mail. Addressed to you. I think you ought to take a look at it."

At the quizzical look when Callen checked his mailbox without discovering anything, Eric added, still click-clacking, "not your own. The central one. Upstairs. I—well, I don't know what to think of it."

"Can't you check with the others?"

One click. And another one. Then Eric put down the pen, let his gaze go over the empty bullpen. "With who? So far there's only you and Mathilda DuBois from HR. She don't do cases like this. Sam's with Kam and you know that. Densi... I mean Deeks and Kensi are somewhere in the Wyoming bush-bush. The only ones to share with is you, and Nell, Hidoko and Mosley. But they're not in here, yet."

Callen leaned back in his chair now. "So any mail with any anomalies is now meant for me, you mean?" he smirked.

Eric, however, shook his head. "This one is different, Callen. It's meant for you. It was addressed to you. It really is and you need to look at it." Again he took the ballpoint and started air-drumming it.

It was irritating. And so, Callen got up and he reached the computer before Eric even entered his own work space.

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Lewis Baker. The name didn't ring any bells at all. The message however was worrying indeed, Callen agreed on that. Somehow, it was addressed to G. Callen, but without the exact mail address it disappeared in the spam box.

"So, this came in when?" he wanted to know.

"Two hours ago. I noticed it later, minutes before I discussed the matter with you."

"You didn't discuss it. You came and told me. This is serious, Eric. Probably no spamming or spoofing, right? Tell me, what you know about this summer camps?"

For a few seconds, Eric wondered if Callen was just fooling him. But then, he realized that the older agent had quite a different youth than he himself ever had. "Parents send their kids in there, since school holidays tend to last weeks longer than the summer holidays the parents have. So, as a parent, you go and look which kind of summer camp fits best with your child's capabilities, hobbies and so on. You'll have to trust the staff completely. And well, sometimes they're just young too. Like high-school graduates or college kids, that young."

Callen just nodded, still leaning against the large table and trying to gather his thoughts. "Any chance you can learn more about this guy Baker? Age, for example, and if it is him who actually is trying to tell me what, or if he is sending this message on behalf of someone else. I mean… that would make more sense, right? So if you—"

"Anything," Eric understood. "It should only take a minute Callen."
He copied and pasted the name that appeared in the e-mail address as well, watched his screen and then he said "et voilà." Another few taps and the information he looked for was put on the screen.
"Baker is volunteering at this acting and drama classes for kids aged 10 to 12." A short pause from Eric, who then continued "He's 21. A wanna-be actor."

He closed his eyes for a brief moment. "There's no other way in communicating with him, or the director of this summer school?"

Eric just looked up, adjusted his glasses in a nervous way and shook his head, again. "Nothing. No other way."

"Well then…" Callen sighed deeply, having made his decision already. "I guess there's no other way but going in there, right?" He now put his hands in the pocket of his jeans. "Give me another fifteen minutes, Eric, to take what I think I may need. Ear wigs. Burn phone. Things like that. Meanwhile, see if you can reach Nell. Get a SWAT team ready as a back-up team, and do inform Mosley, will ya?"

The technical analyst's eyes widened and he swallowed several times. "But… but you can't do that, go in there. Dzjee."

"Eric," Callen said. "Listen, Eric. What choice do I have? Too many lives are at stake in there. And someone in there knows what I'm doing. Right now, there's no time for me to find out who. But you, you can. And I trust you to do that." He laid his hand on Eric's shoulder. "This is what we do, right?"

Thanks for reading!