Tristavee

Casey lay on the couch of the Bartowski's apartment, foot propped on a pillow, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose, concentrating hard on not humming the tune that floated through his head. Ellie had the good drugs and had numbed him happy because he'd refused outright to go to the hospital. It was dangerous to be in this state and he garnered his torture resistance training because if he got too relaxed, he'd compromise his cover. There were too many people in the house.

"Am I hearing this right, John?" Devon balked, coming out of the kitchen with a banana and some kind of power juice. "You jumped out of your car in the middle of the freeway?"

Casey increased the pressure of his fingers on his nose and scrunched his eyes shut, willing his temper to stay in check.

"It was a parking lot," Chuck spoke on his behalf. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the couch, as though he were defending Casey.

"A.k.a. the 101 at rush hour," Devon laughed in agreement.

"Barefoot," Ellie added, critically. "Why, John? What were you thinking?"

Casey sighed and forced himself to sit up, despite the heaviness of the meds. He'd had enough. "If it's all the same to you, I think I'll go home."

"No, it is not all the same. It's not even similar," Ellie said, rushing to him, partly apologetic, mostly mother hen. He let her push him back against the pillow and didn't even swat her away as she fussed about. "You're going to get yourself killed if you don't give yourself time to recover."

"Chasing after that shooter in the courtyard – also not wise," Morgan chimed in, entering from the back hall armed with a grape soda. It annoyed Casey how black and white they saw the world. No one had criticized Devon for risking his life and going into the courtyard to drag Tristavee inside. Casey yawned to show he planned to ignore their criticisms rather than respond.

Ellie sighed in resignation, satisfied for the moment that Casey wasn't currently dying. Folding her arms across her chest, she took to pacing the space between the living room and the kitchen, wanting wine and trying to resist. Devon intercepted her, stilling the nervous motion with a warm embrace.

"Did they ever find that shooter?" Ellie asked quietly, looking both scared and vulnerable. Morgan sank on the floor next to Chuck and initiated a conversation about how the X-men would have responded to the increased crime in the neighborhood, and Chuck responded lightly with more confidence than he had any right to given what he knew about the situation.

Casey's chest tightened, knowing it wasn't even up to the local police to figure out what happened that night. It was up to him. And as much as Tristavee needed to be out of the equation, she was an integral part. He sighed and closed his eyes to the noise of the room. When he was in his own place eavesdropping on this crowd, there was so much more control – like he was the life guard staying perched over the pool. Now he was stuck here in the crowd and he felt like he could drown in the chaos. When he heard the knock on the door, he immediately reached for his gun, but Chuck stilled his hand. Casey had too many drugs in his system and instinct was taking charge.

Agent Walker entered, smiling uncertainly at the gathering. "I didn't realize there was a party," she said. "I would've brought wine."

"We're practicing abstinence tonight," Ellie said, looking at Casey as she said it. He'd asked for scotch earlier and she'd said no because it would interact negatively with what she'd give him.

"That's really not necessary," Casey told her.

"Oh, thank God," she squeaked, ducking into the kitchen to find a glass.

Walker nodded slightly, then made some excuse about finding something she'd left in Chuck's room. Chuck jumped up to follow her back, telling Morgan to stay put by the couch. Casey gave them a few minutes, then stood up and followed them down the hall.

"Hey –" Devon said, stepping in front of Casey in face-off, poking a finger at his chest.

Casey's fist clenched. "Can."

It was the simplest excuse, and Devon raised and eyebrow, but stepped aside. "Pee sitting down, bro."

-----

Agent Walker had news; else she would've waited until morning. She'd watched the tapes, contacted D.C., and done all the things he was so desperate to do, except he'd been drugged into a stupor. He barely had his head on as it was, and he sat heavily on the chair at Chuck's desk and rolled it closer to the bed so he could prop his foot up.

"What did you find?" he asked.

"5'8" white female with dark hair."

"And blue eyes," he added eagerly. She had his eyes!

"That describes about 5% of the female population," Chuck commented, but Casey was too excited about the prospect even to glare at him.

"She must have known where the camera was," Sarah said, in that quiet, reluctant voice she used when she was trying to make the most out of a less than ideal situation. "She kept her face turned."

Casey furrowed his brow. "No," he said. "No she didn't. She was looking everywhere, checking for danger."

Sarah was silent for a moment, glancing sideways at the wall, searching for the words she wanted. "I've sent an agent to pair the waitress with a sketch artist."

Casey's jaw dropped in frustration. He'd been hesitant to provide a description because he thought he'd hallucinated her, but now he had the picture and he was sure of what he'd seen. "I know what she looks like! Hell, give me a pencil. I can draw her from memory!"

"Casey –"

"What?" he cut her off sharply.

She pressed her lips together and placed her hands on her hips, her eyes searching the room as if the words she wanted were on the posters hanging on Chuck's wall. "I looked into the records for Emily Mareau –"

"It's her mother's name," Casey explained quickly, sitting forward. "She didn't change it."

"I know," Sarah said quietly.

"We have to be careful," Casey said, dropping his voice. "This thing runs deep. Who would do something to a civilian –"

"Casey, listen," she said, urgent and quiet. He didn't want to hear, but she kept talking. "There is no conspiracy. Emily is dead."

The news hung in the air like a dead cow in a butcher shop – raw, brutal, but completely expected. Casey stared at her, blinking occasionally, mind whirring but body frozen.

"I'm sorry, man," Chuck said, placing a hand on Casey's shoulder.

The physical contact knocked the pent up thoughts from his mind and Casey spoke quickly. "We drove to D.C. for Reagan's inauguration."

Sarah's head tilted sympathetically. "John –"

"No. No!" he shouted. "You can't keep taking her away!"

Jumping out of the chair, Casey went for the window, needing to get back to his apartment and sort through the intel himself. Chuck jumped on his back to stop him, but Casey tossed him aside easily. The helpless yelp as Chuck rolled off the bed onto the floor broke through the dementia that had taken hold of Casey and he paused with one foot out the window.

Pounding the window frame once with his fist, Casey sat slowly on the sill and surveyed the scene inside Chuck's bedroom. Sarah stood patiently, not trying to stop him, looking at him with pity. Chuck checked his head for bumps and whined about getting thrown. Casey had to protect the Intersect. Had to. It was his duty, and he knew that this choice was the right one. He couldn't screw this up.

Seeing he'd calmed, Sarah came to the window and tugged on his elbow to get her to move, but he swatted her away, swung himself back inside, and sank to the floor. Emily was dead and someone was screwing with him. The poison, the suggestive photograph, the wild goose chase to the DMV – it had to be an effect of the toxins in his system. It was time to pare down the situation, like he'd done for Chuck. The most important question was whether Casey was a danger to the mission. The mission was his first duty.

The answer was a firm, resounding yes. Tristavee had followed him to this complex and so had her would-be killer. She'd been shot just outside this very window, and a stray bullet could easily have hit the Intersect. Until the shooter and his motives could be determined, Casey was endangering the asset by staying put.

Next question – had they been compromised to the point of requiring Chuck's extraction? Not likely. Casey had been the target and the intel on Emily predated his entrance to the service. This could be a very old vendetta and was not likely related to his current mission. Chuck was fine for now.

Casey, however, needed to be extracted. His cover was clearly compromised and he had so many drugs in his system that he would very easily crack under torture. Question next, how deep did this conspiracy go –

"Casey, I'm sorry," Sarah said gently, kneeling next to him, but not looking at him.

Scratching his eyebrow, Casey looked at her, briefly considering her part in all of this. He had gone under cover a number of times in his career, but never with a partner. Usually, the only person who knew anything about him on an assignment was his handler. He always thought he'd preferred working alone, but there was something about having another person on the job with him. It wasn't like having a handler who was simply aware of his double life. She shared the double life.

"Lock down," he said softly. "You have to take me to the castle."

She nodded, understanding the request. "There are NSA safe houses in the area," she said. "The castle isn't designed for housing."

Casey's jaw clenched, not wanting to express doubt in the NSA because he'd devoted his life to that service. "The Intersect is safest if I'm in isolation."

Sarah nodded again. She understood. A handler would not have. A handler would've extracted both Chuck and Casey. Sarah understood, because she was here living this double life with him.

"Tomorrow, then," she agreed softly. "Now get off the floor. I hear Devon coming to look for you."

-----

Casey liked the castle better than any NSA safe house he'd ever stayed in. It was incredibly secure, had a direct link to D.C., and housed an insanely complete arsenal of weapons and spy gadgets. All his surveillance fed into here, giving him an excellent eagle-eye on the Buy More while saving him the annoyance of working there. He had appropriated a mini-fridge from Buy More to round out the complete lack of amenities, and he thought vaguely about finding a couch, but he didn't want to desecrate the castle by making it too homey.

After three hours in lock-down here, he already felt saner. Every element of this place centered on the Intersect and the mission and helped him focus on what needed doing. First on the list was to review the surveillance footage from the day he'd been poisoned. Walker had already checked them for signs of the attacker, but Casey wasn't looking for that so much as a way to improve surveillance overall. He needed to find the hole that the person had slipped through.

Of course, he also wanted to review the restaurant tapes, because it didn't seem right that they had missed Emily – Tristavee – completely … unless the feed was aimed only at the door. That would make sense, excepting the fact that nothing made sense, really. She hadn't declared her identity and fought to convince him. He'd just seen her and known. He tried to recall if something had happened earlier that morning that would've triggered the hallucination of Erika, but everything was so hazy and fragmented and he couldn't remember what questions he'd asked or what answers she'd given.

"Lunch time!"

Casey jumped out of his chair and drew his gun before Chuck had even finished the declaration. Chuck was too accustomed to the reaction to flinch, and he came nonchalantly down the stairs, armed with two white, plastic grocery bags. Holstering his weapon, Casey cleared off some space on the desk to set up the food.

"Did you find anything new?" Chuck asked, setting the bags down and setting up a simple picnic. Casey's jaw slackened in surprise – he'd been expecting pizza or Chinese takeout at the fanciest.

"What is this?" Casey asked, his hand ghosting over the spread – a loaf of wheat bread, a jar of spicy mustard, a pound of deli-sliced ham, a bag of apples.

"I, uh," Chuck stammered, looking uncertainly from Casey to the food. "It's what you always pack for lunch. I can get something else –"

"This is fine," Casey said, keeping his eyes averted as he made himself a sandwich. Chuck wasn't allowed to know him this well, and every time the kid made simple gestures like this one, it made it all the harder for Casey to do his job, because Casey knew that kill order was coming.

Chuck knelt backwards on one of the chairs and spun slowly, keeping uncharacteristically quiet as Casey constructed the perfect sandwich and then put the perishables in the mini-fridge. Casey could tell that Chuck had a question burning a hole in his mind, but he wasn't going to invite anything. He was alarmed when Chuck pulled the photo from his pocket – the one of Casey with Emily.

"I thought you didn't want the minivan and the Costco runs," Chuck said softly, looking at the picture like it held the keys to his future happiness.

Casey snatched the photo harshly and sat down, finding a lighter on the shelf near the other incendiaries and burning the picture.

"Don't want. Not never had."

This picture was dangerous in Chuck's possession, and it only served as a reminder of how Tristavee had screwed with his head. Tristavee… Chuck had flashed on that name … how, unless…

"Why haven't you given a description of Tristavee?" Casey asked. "You flashed on her."

"I flashed on a tattoo on her ankle."

Casey pressed his lips together in frustration, letting the last charred remnants of the photo fall to the table.

"What did the tattoo look like?"

Chuck shrugged and spun the chair again. "Blue tear drop, a dove, and few numbers embedded in the wing. Sarah looked into it already."

Chewing thoughtfully, Casey reclined in his own chair and stared at the ceiling. He had nothing to do here but check and double-check the work that was already done, searching for a new leaf to turn.

"Casey, why would Tristavee pretend to be … you know?" He couldn't say the word daughter any more than Casey could. It was too unfathomable. "Where would she get that photo?"

Tristavee had stolen the identity, for certain … nearly certain. Either that or Tristavee's parents had stolen the papers to create new identities for themselves and the girl had misinterpreted the documents when she'd come across them.

"She said she found the papers in Gramma Vero's attic," Casey recalled, thinking he should write it down before it slipped his memory again.

"Vero as in short for Veronica?" Chuck asked.

Casey jumped out of his chair, sending it toppling, and ran for the computer. "Vero as in long for 'vee.' Trista Vero!"

Accessing the CIA database, Casey ran the name, but he didn't have to wait for the computer's encoded response. He recognized the sign of a flash in Chuck's eyes.

"Code name, Sad Truth," Chuck whispered, his knuckles gripping the chair so hard they turned white. "I know where she is."

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