A/N: So here's chapter 10! Hope you enjoy it!

Don't own them :(

Chapter 10

"So who is this guy again?" Jane asked, gripping the edge of the desk. Brandt began to pace.

"Sidney Burke. We used to keep an eye on him. He seemed to be connected to some biological weapons deals. We lost the track of him when he was supposedly killed three years ago. Now he's showing up here with this Anti-God thing… It can't be a coincidence!"

"Are you sure it's him?" Ethan seemed to be the absolutely calm, if not for the slight twitching of his fingers.

Brandt nodded.

"We are wasting time," he said. The time they might not have. The time Benji might not have.

It didn't take them long to get to the hospital in question. Asking for the needed person didn't take long, either. The reply, however, couldn't mean any good. The man hadn't turned up at work that morning.

The team could do nothing else but drive to his house, vaguely trying to think of some roles on their way, just in case. At this point they were barely concerned about being uncovered. Burke was their only hope to find Benji. They weren't giving up. Or losing any more time. None of them wanted to talk about the suspicions roused by Burke's absence at work. All three of them knew they all had certain worries but they pushed them away.

As they pulled over near Burke's apartment and rushed towards the door, however, some of their worst suspicions were confirmed. The front door was open. Each of the agents could practically hear the others' heartbeat when they stepped inside, on full alert, prepared to any movement or noise.

Inside it looked as though a tornado had passed though the house. The furniture was lying randomly around the place, mostly broken and torn. Pieces of shattered glass could be seen here and there. Clothes had also been thrown around. After about two minutes of cautiously moving forward the team found the owner of the place. With a bullet hole in his temple.

For a moment they just stared at the body. It was Jane who was the first to unfreeze.

"I'm gonna call the police," she muttered, taking her phone out and dialing Thompson's number.

Brandt felt his knees give way as the female agent walked out of the room. Careful not to ruin any piece of evidence he sat at the edge of a chair nearby and hid his face in his hands.

Hope is a tricky thing. You can keep it and you can lose it. And then you can get it back. Brandt had gotten and lost his hope way too many times lately. Ever since he had found out his journey had been over he had hoped to talk to Benji as soon as he had gotten to the US. That hope had died out when he hadn't found his friend in the bar. Then he had waited for the Englishman to return from the mission. He hadn't come back. They had been sent here to find him (Brandt didn't really care about some weird professor guy or any of his inventions at this point) but whoever they were playing against seemed to always be one step ahead. The former analyst simply didn't know how many more times he could revive his hope only for it to be killed over and over again.

Ethan's hand on his shoulder snapped him out of the thoughts.

"We'll find him," the team leader tried to sound reassuring. William knew him too well now to buy that fake reassurance.

"How?" Brandt croaked. He didn't wait for an answer though. "We don't even know whether he's alive at all! God knows what could have happened in this time! If he was alright he would have gotten in touch by now!"

He fell silent, breathing heavily and trying not to sob, feeling his eyes go wet. He swallowed and shook his head fiercely, fighting all this with only slight success.

"How can you be so sure?" he added a bit more calmly. He wanted Ethan to tell him some crazy plan now, or to reason him, anything. He wanted to believe Ethan. Jane who was standing beside him (he hadn't noticed her walking back into the room) also had tears in her eyes.

"I can't," Ethan admitted, and both of the other agents felt their hearts drop. "But we have to keep trying. If there is any chance to find Benji, we can't miss it. We can't forget about our actual mission though. Even if we don't get Benji back… alive… we still have to accomplish the mission and finish what he has started".

Brandt could say he would prefer some fake reassurance over what he had just heard but instead he just nodded. He heard a police car pull over outside the house and stood up from the chair, turning away from his teammates as his surroundings became blurry.

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Two more days went just like that. They had talked to the professors but none of them had told them anything relevant. The agents had never felt so useless. And then something finally happened.

"It was Thompson," Ethan announced, putting his phone back into his pocket. "A man whose description fits to Dr. Wickham was reportedly seen in a car three days ago".

"So the guy was on some kind of holiday and we've been stuck on this mission?" Brandt mocked. "How do they know it was him?"

Ethan just glared at him, making the younger man sigh and nod.

"So, what have you got in mind?" he asked.

"Jane and I will follow the trace of the man. Might lead us somewhere. You stay here and watch out for anything".

"But there's nothing going on here!" the ex-analyst complained. Another glare from the leader, however, made him look down and nod in silent agreement.

They didn't waste any time before doing as agreed. Jane and Ethan left and Brandt felt more alone than ever.

That evening he walked down the same street where Benji and his teammates had been shot. It was just as almost entirely deserted as it must have been back then. After looking around at the surrounding buildings and remembering the window the sniper must have been shooting through (they had already been at the corresponding flat) he turned to walk back. And that was when he felt a puncture in his arm and everything went black.