Author:DreamBrother

Disclaimer:Numb3rs isn't, and never shall be (sniff), mine.

Author's Note:Thanks, thanks and beyond thanks to those answered my question regarding matching bullet casings etc, the same to those who reviewed. Hope you like this chapter as well. P.S if you recognize any of the names I use for the characters, they're probably musicians or other famous people. I think I'm about to go on a Pearl Jam/Mother Love Bone streak with this fic.

Also, I may have tweaked some stuff for this fic, especially regarding latter half of the chapter. I'm not exactly sure of how the media works in the US regarding the death of law enforcement officers.


Guarding the Guardians

(Part IV)

"Hey David, what have we got?" asked Don and he ducked under the police tape to where his team-mate was standing waiting for him.

"ATF agent Gossard, he was walking home from the bar a few blocks away, he didn't bother driving there, car is still at his apartment. Colby's at the bar now, talking to the people there and Megan's canvassing his neighbours to ask if they noticed anything unusual in the past few days," said David.

"Alright, that's a good start. Any chance we're looking at the same person who killed our agents?" asked Don as he made his way towards the body.

"Hard to say for sure, his MO isn't exactly unique or unusual. But there are similarities. Gossard was shot twice in the chest, centre mass, like Harper, and the casings look to be the same. Can't confirm until ballistics get their hands on it, and the murder weapon, to match," said David.

Don looked at the positioning of the body and asked, "You said he was walking home, right? And his apartment is in that direction?" pointing to the right.

"Yeah, that's right," confirmed David.

"From the way he's fallen, it looks like he turned around to face his attacker. It may be that he heard him behind him but his reaction time was delayed because of the drinks he might have had. Or," mused Don, "our guy deliberately grabbed his attention, not wanting to shoot Gossard in the back. I mean, look at Harper and Collins. The shooter faced down two trained FBI agents in the blink of an eye, even if it was a surprise attack."

"Which means the shooter is confident about his abilities. Looking at his aim, he's probably right," replied David. "But he's a killer. Why is he trying to do the 'honourable' thing of facing his victim, not just shooting from behind?"

"Because he's a psycho, that's why," said Don. He heard his name called and saw two men dressed in suits walking his way.

"I'm Agent Eppes… Where are you guys from?" queried Don.

"I'm Agent Gilmore, this is Agent Wood," said the first man, indicating his partner, "We're from ATF and that's our man there. If the FBI doesn't mind, we'd like to investigate his death on our own," said Gilmore.

"I'm sorry about your agent but I'm afraid I can't let you take the case," apologized Don. "We have reason to believe the same man who killed two of our agents a few nights ago also killed your guy."

"And to our knowledge, you have gotten nowhere finding the man who killed your agents," argued Wood, "let us find the person who killed our man, you concentrate on finding yours. If they're the same person, even better, because that would mean two agencies are working full time on catching him, instead of one."

"We appreciate the offer but like I said before, we're taking this. I promise, we'll keep you in the loop and as soon as we require any assistance during the investigation, you're the first people we'll call, alright?" stated Don, his tone clearly saying that the discussion was over. With a nod, he turned around towards his agent who had called his name. "What is it, David?"

"Gossard's badge. It's not on him. His ID is, but not his shield."

RIPANDREWWOODOFMOTHERLOVEBONEANDLAYNESTALEYOFALICEINCHAINS

"So, Colby, find anything interesting from the bar?" asked Don as the team sat in the war room, collecting all the facts and the tid-bits they had collected.

"Not much. The barman said Gossard was a semi-regular visitor, never had more than a few beers at most, sometimes accompanied by 'other suits', he's probably talking other ATF agents. Apparently, Gossard hardly ever drove to the bar, even if he didn't drink above the drinking limit. Barman said it was because Gossard liked walking home at night if the weather was good, and the apartment wasn't that far way, so it was a mini-exercise for him. Tonight, he had two beers, played a couple rounds of pool with some of the regular customers, something he usually did, and then went home. Thirty minutes later, 911 gets a call, Gossard's dead," finished Colby.

"Alright. Let's see if we can pull the security tapes from the bar, maybe our guy followed him home from there," said Don.

"Shouldn't be a problem, the barman, who's also the owner, is willing to co-operate, he doesn't like having his customers killed off," replied Colby.

"Megan?" prompted Don, turning to his second-in-command.

"Not much from the neighbours, they haven't heard or seen anything unusual, haven't noticed any strangers hanging around outside or nearby, nor any change in Gossard's behaviour. Same cannot be said for his pattern, apparently, he's very erratic. The kind old lady next door was nice enough to tell me that "we worked nice guys like Gossard too hard and how was the poor man supposed to meet and marry a nice girl and raise a family if he kept on running away to chase bad guys." I say Amen to that," sighed Megan.

"The woman reminds me of my dad," commented Don. "Has Gossard's badge been found?" he asked.

"Our forensic team searched his place, came up with nothing. A search of his desk at ATF headquarters also revealed nothing," David said.

"So we've got a missing badge, probably taken by the killer. Any idea why, Megan?"

Megan was prevented from answering when another agent stuck his head in through the door and said:

"Guys, I think you need to see this," pointing to the television which had begun a report.

"Oh crap," chorused the team as the news reader got to the point of the broadcast.

DRIVINGIN5THGEARISAWESOMEFUN

"So, are we going to go the route of health and have the baked chicken and salad that I made, or are we going to say to hell with cholesterol and carbohydrates and order a pizza with everything? Hmm?" asked Alan, looking at Millie who was seated on the couch.

"I say pizza. After a day spent dealing with professors, all whose IQs are near MENSA level, my own health is the least of my worries," commented Millie.

"Those professors you're talking about, do they include a certain curly headed mathematician and an astronaut?" asked Alan, quirking an eyebrow.

"Not today, they aren't. Although compared to telling my astronaut/physicist professor indirectly that I'm kicking him out of the steam tunnels, today was relatively calm," smiled Millie.

"I would think so," said Alan, picking up the cordless, "I'll just order a pizza, we can watch the news until it gets here."

"Okie dokie," said Millie, leaning forward to grab the TV remote and switching it on and flicking to the nearest news channel. When Alan returned and sat next to her, she asked, "How the other son of yours doing? The one who, along with his team, did a nice disappearing act from dinner a few nights ago?"

Alan frowned slightly as he thought, "Don? Haven't seen him since that dinner, he's been working like crazy. Charlie said he was over late last night but had to leave after he got another call. One day, I would like to hide his cell phone so he can know some peace, but that would probably backfire into him freaking out at the thought of losing his cell phone and being out of contact with the G-man world."

Both Alan and Millie paused in their conversation as the news anchor began listing the top stories of that night. The first story she went into detail was about the death of the 2 FBI agents found murdered a few nights ago, which they already knew about, but their attention was grabbed when the lady started speaking about the death of another federal agent, this time Agent Gossard of the ATF, presumably by the same killer. This was followed the item of interest that had grabbed the attention of Don and his team hours ago:

"We at Channel 8 News believe that we have been contacted by the killer. Early this morning, a non-descript small package was dropped off at our station and in it was the missing badge of the murdered ATF agent as well as a short note addressed to the FBI, which reads:

-Three agents down and you are still nowhere near close to stopping me. How are you going to serve those you have sworn to defend if you cannot even save yourselves?-

TBC


So, what think you? I got the idea of the killer contacting the news people from the ValTech psycho. Since his stuff was still shown on TV, I figured this would be as well. Did I make sense, there? There should be a book called "Writing case-related fanfiction for Dummies, all you needed to know but were too afraid to ask."

Fingers crossed for Chapter 5...Reviews deeply appreciated and welcomed. Makes me type faster ;) And anybody want to offer last names for characters before I turn my fics into a place for rock musicians to guest star in?