January 15th, 2009
Parker Center, Downtown Los Angeles
Another day in Los Angeles, another handful of homicides. At least, that's how Charlie Crews generally looked at it.
Sure, L.A. wasn't the murder bonanza that it once was, but there were still fairly regular 187 calls. The worst part was, every time Charlie heard that code come over the radio, he couldn't help but think about the murders that had landed him in jail thirteen years ago.
Nonetheless. He'd been exonerated, and now his job was to make sure that the victims of murder received justice.
Of course, sometimes things made it hard to concentrate. For example, a tall, statuesque blonde walking across the homicide division floor straight toward Charlie's desk.
"Well, hello Agent Walker," Charlie said, greeting Sarah as she arrived at his desk. "Long time, no see."
She shook her head. "It's not Agent Walker anymore," she replied. "It hasn't been for two and a half months."
"Oh." Charlie looked nonplussed. "Then, uh, Ms. Walker, what can I do for you?"
"Is there someplace we can speak in private?"
Charlie frowned, and looked toward the south side of the room. Interrogation 1 was occupied, as was #2… "Follow me," he said, headed for Interrogation Room #3.
He turned off the recording and monitoring equipment as they entered, letting the door swing shut behind him. "Alright, Sarah, what's going on?" he asked, confusion evident in his voice.
She sighed. "Please tell me you've made progress on Novikov."
Charlie slowly shook his head. "The feds won't let us anywhere near him," he told her. "We even think about him, and we've got Graham breathing down our necks."
"Figures," Sarah grumped, rolling her eyes. "He's always been a stickler for detail."
"Speaking of which, what happened to him?" Charlie asked.
Sarah cocked her head. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, what happened to him to make him look like his face had been flattened with a frying pan?"
Sarah allowed herself a small wry smile. "His face got flattened with a Bartowski fist."
A grin began to form on Charlie's face. "Chuck Bartowski punched out the director of the CIA?"
Sarah nodded. "After Becky died," she explained. "He walked out into the waiting room, saw Graham sitting there, charged like a bull, accused him of being responsible for Becky's death, and then proceeded to beat the shit out of him."
Charlie shook his head again. "That's incredible," he said. "Although, I'm surprised Graham didn't file charges."
"Director Graham and I had a little… talk," Sarah replied. "Right after I quit."
Two and a half months earlier
Sarah pulled back her arm, and slammed her fist into Graham's face as hard as she could. She was rewarded with the sickening sound of cartilage popping and cracking as his nose was shattered.
"Agent Walker!" he howled. "I'll see you destroyed for this!"
"Destroy away, sir," she hissed at him. "I quit."
Graham's jaw dropped, and he just stared at her. He looked ridiculous, his eyes bulging in shock, blood flowing from his broken nose. "What do you mean, 'you quit'?" Graham wheezed. "You can't just quit!"
"Oh, I'm pretty sure I just did," Sarah shot back.
"A word, Agent Walker?" Graham snarled, holding a hand to his nose and rising to his feet.
Sarah rolled her eyes. "I'll be right back, Chuck," she said as she followed Graham out of the waiting room.
Chuck didn't reply, he just nodded. The adrenaline was disappearing, the catatonia setting in as Ellie held him in her arms.
Sarah burst through the doors behind Graham. "KELLY FORDHAM," Graham snapped as soon as he saw her.
"Oh, don't you even dare," Sarah shot back. She flexed her left hand, the pain from her broken ring finger shooting through it and focusing her mind with piercing clarity. She looked down at the hand – the blood from her torn up skin was starting to seep through the bandages. They would have to be changed soon.
"You quit, she comes back to life, Walker," Graham growled. "Not only that, but I'm sure the Los Angeles Police Department would love to hear all about that little episode with Mr. Bartowski just now."
Sarah rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Please, sir," she whined mockingly, her words dripping with sarcasm. "I'm the best goddamn operative the CIA has. You know it. How many times have you yourself said it? I have so many rock-solid identities that I could disappear, and you'd never know where to find me."
Graham laughed bitterly, an unfortunate barking sound emanating from his mouth. "Please. Follow Bartowski, find you."
Sarah shook her head again. "Chuck would disappear with me," she told him. "But I don't think it's gonna come to that, and I'll tell you why."
"Oh, will you," Graham smarmed. "Do enlighten me, Agent Walker."
"One WORD about this, one mention of Kelly Fordham, one hint that the LAPD is interested in Chuck for assault and battery, and the entire world will know that the CIA, and specifically, its director, is harboring a terrorist in Los Angeles who is wanted by the LAPD on multiple counts of murder," Sarah snapped, the last four words very carefully enunciated. "And I don't think that would go very well for you, especially if you're expecting to be a holdover from Bush to the next President."
And that was the magic button. With one sentence to the right reporter, Sarah could destroy Director Graham's career, everything he had worked for. He would be a joke, a laughingstock, a has-been, perhaps even considered a criminal. And if there was one thing that the former juvenile court judge from Phoenix wasn't about to be, it was a has-been.
He stared at her for a long moment, finally lifting his sleeve to wipe the blotch of blood covering his mouth and chin. "Fine, Walker," he spat. "What exactly is your plan?"
Sarah folded her arms and leveled her gaze at Director Graham. "You leave Chuck alone," she replied. "I stay here in Los Angeles, a civilian. I keep watch over Chuck, keep him safe – and you know I will. The NSA leaves Casey here for missions. You don't go after him, you don't go after me, and we'll all be happy."
Graham nodded. "That… is acceptable," he gritted out through clenched teeth. "But if there is one word, Walker, one single word about this incident, your ass is grass."
"My lips are sealed, sir," Sarah deadpanned.
"So, I've been a civilian since November 1st," Sarah told Charlie. "The only problem is, civilian life is boring. The NSA has kept the bad guys off of Chuck's back pretty well. I've gotten to spend some time with him. However, most of the time, if he's not at work, he's working on the Beast –"
"The Beast?" Charlie asked in amusement.
"His 1970 Dodge Challenger," Sarah explained. "He's almost done with it. Says he might start calling it the SuperBeast."
Charlie shook his head and rolled his eyes, but smiled. He understood.
"Anyway, with all of that, I'm, well, bored," Sarah said.
"You're bored."
Sarah shrugged. "I can only spend so much time at the Glendale PD's shooting range."
Charlie raised an eyebrow. "And so that's why you're here?"
Sarah nodded reluctantly. "I was hoping that maybe the LAPD had something that they could use me for."
Charlie brought his hands to his face and steepled them beneath his nose, looking over at the former CIA agent pensively. "Alright, Sarah, let me ask you this. Do you have any experience with law enforcement, with investigation?"
She shook her head. "No. What I do is gather intelligence, and kill people. I do both extremely well. I could probably out-shoot anybody in the LAPD with the possible exception of your SWAT officers, and I can get a confession out of a target with a minimum of resistance."
Charlie smiled slightly. "Yeah, you're definitely an agent," he said. "What you're not is a detective, or an officer."
Sarah's face fell. "But," Charlie continued, "we do have a unit within the force that we keep very quiet. It's off the books, covered under the mayor's discretionary fund. It's called the Special Enforcement Task Force, or as we call it, SET."
Sarah narrowed her eyes. "Special Enforcement?" she asked. "Meaning…"
"Have you seen L.A. Confidential?" Sarah nodded. "It's like the unit that Russell Crowe was part of, except not quite so blatant."
Sarah crossed her arms and looked at Charlie, less than pleased. "So, basically, I'd be a thug and an enforcer."
He shook his head. "Not at all," he rebuked her. "You would be doing exactly what you did in the CIA – gathering intelligence and taking care of problems, just you'll be doing it for the LAPD instead."
Now Sarah's interest was piqued. "Tell me more."
"IT'S ALIVE!" roared Chuck, as the Challenger's Hemi engine thundered to life. The quad-Holley rumble of the 440 cubic inch engine rolled across the Glendale neighborhood, feeling almost like a minor tremor.
The Beast was finally done. The damage from the shotgun blast on Halloween had long since been repaired. The Dodge's entire body had been sanded, and then painted a glossy jet black. The bright yellow interior had been installed, and the car generally looked, as Devin put it, "badass."
Chuck's original plan had been to rename the car the SuperBeast, but that morning, as they were putting the final touches on it – pinstripes, detail markings – he had decided on something else. And so, he had enlisted Anna Wu to inscribe, in meticulous calligraphy, one simple five letter word on the Challenger's trunk-mounted spoiler.
In the same bright yellow as the interior of the car, the spoiler read simply, "Becky."
Devin, Morgan, Casey, and Ellie could think of no more fitting tribute that Chuck could pay than to put her name on the car he had poured so much of his life into. And now, she was about to roll out onto the streets and wreak havoc.
Devin stepped out of the Challenger. "She's all yours, Chuck," he said. "Tear it up!"
Chuck slid behind the wheel of the Dodge, feeling the rumble of Mopar power. He pulled the door shut, and pressed a button next to the radio.
The heads-up display appeared above the dashboard. "Sweet," Chuck mused with a grin. Right in front of him was all he needed – speed, RPMs, fuel, thermostat, and oil pressure, all without ever looking away from the road.
Ever the nerd, Chuck decided he needed some appropriate driving music. Fortunately, when he and Morgan had had their nerdgasm months beforehand, they had thought it would be a good idea to install Bluetooth controls and voice recognition software on all the systems.
"Ozzy, 'No More Tears'," Chuck instructed the computer. Immediately, the distinctive bass lick began to roll out of the Challenger's sound system. Chuck's grin turned into a feral smile. He popped the transmission into first gear, and pressed the gas.
The Dodge immediately took off, leaving a cloud of smoke and dust behind. Chuck whipped out onto Doran Street, and headed toward Brand Boulevard. A left turn put him southbound on Brand, headed toward Los Angeles.
A few minutes later, he crossed San Fernando Road, and Brand turned into Glendale Boulevard. Chuck flew into Los Angeles going eighty-seven miles per hour.
Chuck was approaching I-5 when he saw a much newer Dodge Challenger roar out onto Glendale behind him. Just like his, it was black, although it looked to be a 2009 model.
And then it turned into a most unwelcome sight as red and blue lights illuminated in the grille and the windshield. "Aw, SHIT," Chuck groaned. "Kill music!"
The stereo system immediately went quiet. Chuck decelerated rapidly, and moved over into the right lane. He took a right onto Glenfeliz Boulevard, and pulled to a stop on the right hand side of the road, the police interceptor stopping behind him.
By the time Chuck heard the officer's footsteps reach his driver's door, his license and registration were in his left hand, hanging out the window, his forehead resting against the steering wheel. That's when he got the shock of a lifetime.
"You know, driving like that can get you killed," Sarah Walker said to him.
Chuck's head jerked backwards, and he turned to look out the window in shock. "SARAH?!"
"Do you have any idea how fast you were going?" she asked him, mock-sternly.
"What the hell?!" Chuck gaped. "Since when are you a cop?!"
She shrugged. "Since today," she replied. "Now, do me a favor, don't drive that fast anymore?"
"Sarah…"
"Chuck," she said, the sternness in her voice real. "You could hurt yourself. You could damage the Intersect. If you do that, the government might decide you're no longer worth the risk."
Chuck sighed as Sarah's words sank in. She was right, as usual. Even if she wasn't a CIA agent any longer, she still knew the Company better than it knew itself. "Alright," he acceded, nodding. "But why are you a cop?"
Sarah smiled, but it was a cold smile. A smile of death. In fact, she made Chuck almost think of the Big Bad Wolf, which was why he almost shuddered when she whispered, "Why, the better to get back at Novikov, Chuck."
Chuck drew in his breath sharply. A million thoughts crossed his mind, but there was only one that really stood out.
Oh, shit.
