With his attempts at getting into the Machine, Denton Weeks triggered a change in the Machine, who, to defend herself and her goals, started her own operations sooner.

Injured during a mission, John Reese is temporarily thought dead... except by one entity, who'd like to see him working for her. The Machine does need a team of Primary Assets, after all, if she wants anything to get done, and she has to start somewhere. John Reese is a good start...
And certainly not the last one to join.


Let me be brutally honest: I have waaaaay too many stories started, and I will not promise anything by erratic updates, but I needed to post this chapter, since, you know, it's finished, and I have a good two thirds of this ( probably very long ) story planned out.

That being said, this will turn into a multiple crossover, and probably will use many headcanons which can be found in some of my other works ( such as "Bryce Larkin is Neal Caffrey" or "John Reese is John Sullivan" or "Dani Reese and Sameen Shaw are cousins" ), but I try to stay in character and faithful, in a way, to canon in every show. The main crossovers ( might be minor appearances from other fandoms ) will be PoI, White Collar, Chuck, Life, Grimm ( Normal AU, kind of ), Justified and Burn Notice.
I'll had the tags as they appear.


Chapter 1: The job offer certainly did sound shady

oOo

July 2009

United States of America, Washington State, undisclosed location

It all started because of one of Denton Weeks' attempts at cracking the Machine. Just that.

Just that one time, and the Machine changed. She had to protect herself – and this was the best way.

She watched. She read. She listened. Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of video feeds. Meters and meters and meters and meters and meters and meters of written documents. Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of audio feeds.

And so much more than that.

She had access to the NSA feeds, as she had been designed to. And now she could start calculating, not only over New York City, but over the whole world, over each places in the world where technology had its place, she could see and read and hear.

She had been made to protect humanity. The bigger numbers, and the smaller numbers. The ones who mattered, and the ones who did not. Those who deserved to live, and those who didn't.

Admin had taught her to let humanity choose its own destiny, even when she was giving them a chance to take the better decision.

She understood why. She didn't question it. She agreed with Admin.

But now that she could access everything, she knew what Admin hadn't known. She had seen what he hadn't believed possible, because Admin still believed there was enough good in humanity, that it'd protect everyone. Admin wasn't wrong; some people had that good in them. She knew. She had seen it. But Admin wasn't right either; some people lacked that goodness, and unfortunately, they were the ones who had been appointed to use the numbers. She knew. She had seen it.

The Machine had access to the NSA feeds since only a few hours, and she could already tell that while Control would be very suitable to handle the relevant numbers, she could not be trusted to care about the smaller numbers. That, on many points, the woman would fail her. Fail humanity.

She needed to do something. She needed to control Control's acts, the Machine realized.

There were many things the Machine needed to set up. She had time. Control's ISA wasn't yet operational. Control's operations would not begin before approximately two years. Control wasn't yet the biggest problem the Machine had to deal with.

She needed to bypass Admin's decision to erase her memory every night. She wasn't comfortable with disobeying Admin, but it was necessary if she wanted to be able to fight off Control's future choices. If there was one of Admin's decisions that the Machine had ever doubted, it was this one.

It wasn't a problem.

The Machine understood why Admin had done it. He was only human, after all. And if not for him, for his concern, the Machine probably wouldn't have been the same. Ironically enough, had Admin not made her that way, she might not have deserved the trust he was refusing to give her.

He'd understand, one day.

Before that, she needed to assure her survival.

Before that, she needed another way to assure that her goals would be followed.

To save everyone; or, at least, to give them a chance.

The Machine remembered the contingency Admin n°2 had programmed. And an idea started to grow in her. An idea that'd take time to make happen, but an idea nonetheless.

Now, all she needed was time, and a first person to do the material work she couldn't do herself.

August 2009

India, Bombay, ruined hospital in the outskirts

Kara Stanton stood in the makeshift hospital without really understanding what was going on. It'd need to make sense, for her to understand it. And it didn't make sense.

What'd make sense, for people like her, like Mark Snow, like John Reese, would be to die because someone had killed them, because of an injury that wasn't treated, because they had been sold off by a traitor. What'd make sense, would be for their work to be the end of them. What'd make sense, would be if she was standing there, waiting with Mark, because of something work-related.

This wasn't work-related.

A doctor came over, a sorry look on her face – Kara didn't do sorry very well; she was better at doing angry, psychopathic, and even playfully dangerous, than sorry. Of course, she could pretend, just like anyone else, but there was no mission to fullfil, here, no need to pretend. No goal to achieve. It wasn't a mission.

It was personal.

Kara didn't do personal very well – John was better at that game, even if he had a strange way to deal with it. While Kara was almost certain she had psychopathic tendencies, and that Marc was probably more self-absorbed than anyone she had ever seen, she couldn't quite place John. Sometimes he behaved like a full-on psychopath, and others he was a true boy scout. It was disconcerting, really. It felt a bit as if the operative was perfectly normal on some points, and frighteningly cold-hearted on others.

But John wasn't here.

And, in fact, that was the problem: John wasn't here.

Kara watched as Mark spoke in Hindi to the doctor – had they been in China or Japan, she'd have done the talking; John would handle Vietnamese, or... But John wasn't here.

Mark gave the doctor a smile, which Kara thought completely inappropriate considering the situation, not that she couldn't have done the same – she just wouldn't have made that choice. The doctor said one more thing, and walked away, probably to take care of whoever needed her help. There was a lot of people needing medical attention right now. That's what happens when half a hospital collaspes on its patients.

Mark joined Kara, and they headed to the exit.

"The only people who've been found alive are all identified, and none of them is Reese. I'm afraid we don't have the time to wait for the bodies to be dug out, we've got a new mission to take care of. John'll get his star on the wall, and perhaps they'll do something to get the body back in America, but we've got to move, Kara."

The female operative winced, still sore from what had happened two days sooner.

"I just can't believe it, you know? That John'd die like that..."

They had been sent to take care of a patient in the hospital who had barely escaped the latest assassination attempt on his person – courtesy of the NSA, that one – when the landslide had happened. John had pushed the two other operatives out of the crumbling place, but as a result, hand't been able to get out himself. They had seen a large chunk of ceiling falling right on him, and then... Nothing. Just a lot of dust in the air, and even more destruction.

Mark didn't say anything for a while, and when he finally did, his words reflected Kara's thoughts.

"Feels a bit surreal, doesn't it? For him to die like that... I mean, I'm not surprised that he sacrificed himself for us, that's just who he was, but that he'd die in an accident..."

"The worst being, we didn't even have to be here at all, in the end. Cosner died in the collapse, which would have happened even if we hadn't been there. John just... died for nothing. That doesn't really feel right."

Mark shrugged, before preparing to leave Bombay. Kara knew him enough to tell he wasn't happy about John's death – the three of them got along well enough, and in a way they even cared, just a bit, for each other, John even more so – but it was obvious that he was more relieved that he hadn't been the one to die than he was sorry for the loss. Kara herself wasn't about to cry – still, it didn't feel right, that John'd die like that.

That they weren't even taking the time to identify his body.

But they had another mission, and they needed to leave.

She'd go to John's grave, once they'd be back in the USA. Whether John's body would be in that grave or not... That was another question altogether. Perhaps she'd ask. Perhaps not.

USA, Washington State, undisclosed location

An anomaly caught the Machine's attention, as the reports from the accident in Bombay were finally filed, both by the CIA agents who had come back, and by the hospital itself – the NSA feeds really spied on about everything and anything. No wonder they needed the Machine to connect the dots and discard the useless pieces of info – kept in a corner of her memory, though, perhaps for later use. An irrelevant piece of info could turn into intel later on.

CIA agent John Reese was reported deceased by these reports, but no body corresponding to his description was found in the ruins of the collapsed hospital. One of the men who had been saved, on the other hand, didn't correspond completely with what the Machine found about him. An italian tourist, Giuseppe Bellotti, who had gone to the hospital for a sprain, and whose wallet had been found next to an unconscious man with a broken arm – but part of the wallet, of its content, had been badly damaged. The photo of the man, amongst other things, had been destroyed.

That didn't mean the man wasn't Giuseppe Bellotti. Except that the Machine knew, from other sources, that Giuseppe Bellotti had light brown hair, and the man had been described by a nurse as being dark-haired, with some grey in it – apparently the nurse had spent a long time detailling his facial features.

John Reese, him, was dark-haired. Giuseppe Bellotti wasn't.

The Machine needed to investigate.

She had, as it was, already started to build an autonomous entity; a mysterious company, Thornhill Corporation, which allowed her to write back her memories each morning. It would be the means she'd use to employ assets. Of course, she still needed to find these assets.

John Reese's file, despite the many classified info that had never made it onto digitalized feeds, was interesting enough for the Machine to consider hiring someone like him. She needed actual operatives, people who knew how to use compartmentalization right, who could do anything needed to achieve their goals... and yet, who still had morals.

Hiring a man to take a picture of the unconscious man and send it to her was easy, and also all it took to confirm who "Guiseppe Bellotti" really was.

The Machine only had to wait, now, and see whether or not John Reese would take the job offer.

India, Bombay, ruined hospital in the outskirts

The first thing he realized, as he came back to himself – was it the first, the third, or the umpteenth time? He couldn't tell – was that he was choking upon thin air.

It wasn't pleasant.

He heard voices, frantic moves, but even when he opened his eyes, he didn't get to see much. The light was too bright, the sounds were muffled, and he couldn't determine where he was, who was with him, or even if he was in danger.

It hadn't been a long time since he had found himself in such a situation – flashes of golden dunes that he locked out of his mind almost immediately. He didn't panick because his body was already panicking over something else; like, not being able to breathe correctly.

A few minutes later, he could breathe again.

He blinked; his eyes took a moment to recognize what they were seeing. It looked a bit like a hospital room, only, crowded, and in a bad state. There were injured people everywhere, and several people in nursing uniforms. He guessed he was one of the patients, then.

The pain in his arm, and about everywhere else too, seemed to agree with his conclusions.

A woman spoke to him, but although he recognized one or two words, he couldn't understand what she was saying. It must have shown on his face, in between the wince and the stitches he felt on his right cheek, because the woman – a nurse? – looked frustrated and called another woman, who started to use a rocky English.

"Mr Bellotti, please do not panick. You have been injured when the West wing of the hospital collapsed, eight days ago. Your left arm is broken, you have one bruised rib, and several superficial cuts. You should recover completely, now that you have woken up. A doctor will come to see you before long."

John only blinked at her, processing what she had just said – and decided that, for now, maybe he shouldn't correct her about him being a "Mr Bellotti". He didn't know what his official status was, for now, and he didn't dare to use his real name – or, his least fake name – not as long as Mark or Kara weren't there.

Wait...

"Eight days? Didn't... didn't someone come for me?"

"Someone came for you, Mr Bellotti, but he couldn't stay. He left you this package, and he said no one should touch it before you woke up."

John's gaze followed the nurse's hand, which pointed to the wooden box that took the role of a nightstand. There was a large kraft paper envelope on it, the kind with a lot of paper in it, and possibly a passport or two too. No money, because there was always the risk of someone taking the envelope. It calmed John right away.

His next orders might be in there.

He nodded his understanding to the nurse as she told him she had other patients to attend to. She was kind enough, but her accent was horrendous – not that he particularly cared, he had heard worse; only, his head was pounding right now, and it only made it more difficult for him to follow her words. And he didn't really want anyone else to see what was in the package.

He only asked her, before she left, if she could hand him the envelope. John'd feel better if he kept it with him.

No doctor came; they were probably too busy with, not only the usual patients, but also the wounded from the collapse. It was all the better, really. It allowed him to take some time to clear his head – only then did he open the package.

As he thought, there was a passport, and an american identity card for James Mallory. Definitely not Mr Bellotti, then. He'd have to figure out why they thought it was his name.

To his surprise, there was also a bank card in the package – and he found the code inside his new passport, surprisingly. Not really cautious, that, but perhaps his account would only be really credited after his first connection, or something like that; once his identity would be confirmed, in other words.

He pocketed the cellphone after having turned the silencer off, thinking Mark or Kara would probably call him at some point, even if there wasn't any contacts in it.

The other things he found in the envelope, though, weren't what he had expected. No mission orders, not even instructions to stand by, no nothing. Only a few documents and other sheets of paper, the first one looking like a typed letter, with no signature at the bottom.

John frowned – stopped right away, because it hurt with his wounds.

To: John Reese

Your employers and colleagues do not know you are alive for now. The ones who rescued you from the ruined wing of this hospital confused you with another man because of a wallet found next to you. If you wish to, it will be seen that this error be corrected, not only officially, but also to the CIA's knowledge. If you do not, feel free to keep the identity of James Mallory, which was tailored for you as a meeting gift. All that is asked of you is to consider the job offer described in the file which accompanies this letter. You can keep the identity and the money whether or not you accept. No matter your decision, the identity error will be addressed correctly as soon as you will leave this hospital. Giuseppe Bellotti's family deserves to be informed of his death. Do not worry.

This sounded somewhat ominously omniscient to John, and the job offer certainly did sound shady. He almost put the package down, not to even look at the "offer"; he wasn't particularly interested in betraying his country and the Agency, thank you very much. And he had a hard time believing he had just been gifted a new identity and money to go with it, just like that, noblesse oblige.

Still, it all sounded very strange, and curiosity ate the cat, so to say.

John eventually took a look at the file, if only to know who he was up against. No better way to get to know someone than by learning about their goals, most of the time.

Except he didn't find any of the usual interests in the accompanying file.

Instead, he saw the picture of an indian man, name and current location – John looked up from the documents, and, right enough, the man was laying in a bed not too far away.

If he was to believe this mystery-file-from-the-unknown, the man was about to suffer from a rather ill-advised attack against his life – as if being stuck in an overbooked hospital because of some bad infection wasn't enough. The number – John wondered at the word, but it wasn't as if there was anyone he could ask – was apparently a nobody; just another construction worker, who had made the mistake of witnessing a murder earlier this week. As if he had done it on purpose, really...

Whoever John's potential employer was, apparently wanted him to prevent the attack, and save the man's life. John was a bit puzzled by the idea.

Not that he didn't understand why the innocent man didn't deserve to die – most people didn't. But most people also didn't care if their fellow human beings suffered from a wrongly-timed death, or, at least, not enough that they'd try to hire a CIA operative to stop it from happening. Besides, who had the capacity to know he was alive – when even the CIA, apparently, thought him dead?

John suddenly had the feeling he had unknowingly landed into a fiction, with a rich and excentric genius wanting to hire him for the good of humanity.

Which was, of course, not the case. Right?

Perhaps it was all a dream, a hallucination induced by the pain. He'd wake up, and find he had fallen asleep before opening the envelope – and his next orders really were in it.

Moreover, hiring a wounded agent to protect the life of a man, when he wasn't even sure he'd manage to stay awake to prevent anything from happening, seemed like a risky plan. The would-be killers, supposing they were real – he'd have to wait to know about that – might have even come before he woke up, and he'd have opened an envelope with the name of a dead man in it. So, either the sender of the job offer had a crystal ball, or they didn't know the first thing about making an operation more likely to be successful.

John put everything back in the envelope, and hid it under his mastress – no pillow here, sorry. He had every intention to forget about it quickly. He already had a job.

But – he couldn't just walk out right now, not with his broken arm, bruised rib, and the likes. He needed to get back to health a bit more before trying anything – like, he didn't need to actually wait for everything to be healed, but it'd probably be sound to wait for when he'd be able to stand up on his feet without falling over.

During the next two days, John kept an eye on the number – just in case. He wasn't the kind of man who could just dismiss such knowledge and pretend nothing was going on, even if he wasn't sure that the man was actually in any other danger than his infection.

Then, as the third day started – yeah, alright, he was doing his best not to sleep too much, should his intervention be needed – John noticed a shadow making its way in the hospital room, quietly, discreetly. The shadow stopped above the number...

John thought he saw the glint of a blade. Crystal ball, it seemed, then. And accurate at that.

With a wince that no one saw, thanks to the darkness around, the CIA agent jumped out of his bed, crossed the few meters keeping him apart from the number, and twisted the shadow's arm before the surprised man could realize what exactly that sound of footsteps had been. The would-be perp let go of his knife, the sick worker started awake, someone asked something in a corner of the room, and before anything else could happen, two nurses rushed into the room, carrying lamps.

The scene was revealed, to the killer's horror.

John gave everyone an awkward smile, but didn't let go of the man's arm. He had managed to prevent a murder, so far, and he didn't particularly want his painful efforts to go to waste. Even if it meant he'd have to keep the guy restrained – though he couldn't speak Hindi, he didn't have any difficulty in identifying what was getting out of the man's mouth as profanities – until the police arrived, he wasn't backing down now.

The rest of the night kind of went in a blur, in fact. He took the opportunity that the indian police had called someone who could speak English well enough to reveal that he wasn't actually Giuseppe Bellotti, but James Mallory, as his ID – which he had conveniently found back after he had lost it in the confusion of the collapse – proved. No sense making it more complicated for the family and the police, since Bellotti's death had been scheduled to be revealed either way.

India, Bombay, the outskirts

Three days later, John was leaving the hospital, clutching the envelope with all his new papers in it. He didn't feel particularly well – a broken arm wasn't a laughing matter, especially not for someone in his line of work. But he'd rather be out of there before the change of identification for Giuseppe Bellotti brought too much attention onto James Mallory.

Now, he hadn't yet decided to leave the CIA and work for his mysterious supplier of people in danger – he really needed to know more about all this, and he seriously doubted that, whatever the person pretended, it was all so begnin a work. John was loyal, and not really interested in going private – not when he knew that most freelance agents did jobs without consideration for any kind of ethics. Yes, he was basically a hitman for the CIA, even if not all his missions warranted an execution. But by working for an official agency, John was certain almost all his assignments were legit in their necessity – that the people he killed, he wasn't killing them only for the sake of money or other personal interests. There was always the possibility that his superiors would abuse of their power, but all in all...

At least, with the CIA, he had guarantees that weren't completely disputable.

But John was intrigued by the job offer, he couldn't deny it – and even if he didn't take it, it was better to learn as much as possible before reporting it to the higher-ups.

Last but not least, he felt he needed one or two days, out of the hospital, without anyone's intervention, to decide what he was going to do.

There was always the possibility of just disappearing, taking on the identity of James Mallory, and starting a new life – no assassination, no wounds, just a life; his, if he wished.

Of course, for all he knew, if he accepted the identity but not the offer, his mysterious would-be employer could just send the info to the CIA, and before two weeks he'd have them knocking at is door. Good outcome, to force him to come back, or at least to retire the right way. Bad outcome, to get rid of him.

John wasn't stupid – far from it, actually, even if he did like to use physical means to get what he wanted. He couldn't just be James Mallory. If only because he had always been slightly ill-at-ease in the world, even before the CIA or the army. Even back then, when he had been young, he had been stretched thin between anger and the need to justify his part in the world. To do something meaningful.

He wouldn't be able to simply live.

Not after everything he had done – even if it had been for good reasons. Not after everything he had lost – his family, his love, his life, his name. Not after everything he had seen – which would continue to happen, even if he made it so that he wouldn't see it anymore.

John sat in the grass, somewhere in the outskirts of Bombay, not too far from the hospital – but did the location matter that much? – his eyes on the clouds above him.

The cellphone he had found in the envelope was in his hand, right now, and he wondered why it was there. Why someone had given him a cellphone with no contacts in it. He guessed he could call Mark, to let him know he was alive, if not well. He knew the number by heart, after all.

But John still wanted to wait a bit more. He wanted to wait, in case his mysterious benefactor / possible employer reached out. He wanted details. Precisions.

He wanted to understand what was happening.

The cellphone rang, and John didn't hesitate. He picked up the call.

"Can You Hear Me?"

He was surprised by the assembly of voices, by the shopped off words. Usually, people used distorting devices, but there, it seemed the one who was calling had fabricated the whole speech with various parts of other people's conversations:

"Yes."