A/N: 1) KateMcK, continues to be super awesome. She makes my stuff so much less crappy. 2) JXO is supposed to be in the same place as the actual airport in Leesburg but bears no resemblance and is entirely fictional. 3) If you'll remember, last time Chuck was having an unpleasant encounter with an Intersected "zombie" and Sarah, Casey, and Carina were off to find him. And away we go:

Death was wrapping around him like a shroud, blotting out light, sound and sensation, but somehow a piercing whistle broke through. Maybe it was the sound of his neurons coming apart with the lack of oxygen, his last perception, but instead of fading into nothingness, Chuck saw a pinhole of light open, then widen. It was like unstopping his ears except with his whole body as all sensation returned at once. He came to and found that the smothering pressure had lifted from his mouth and he was gasping for air. The weight of the creature was lifted off him and he felt hands turning him onto his side. He coughed and spat the saliva from his lungs in between gulping deep breaths.

"There, breathe deep, my boy. You're okay now. That's right, deep breaths. My apologies, Charles. That's the first time this one has shown any kind of initiative. Hah, can you believe it? All this planning — so many years of it — and then I allow my workforce to behave so carelessly at the end. They left you in here for their own amusement. It was so much easier to stay focused on these little details when I wasn't the only one running the ship. Ah, well. Soon enough …"

Chuck rolled on his back to see the owner of the voice though he already knew the name.

"Van Breeda."

"Bas, please. You've always known me as Henrik but we should be honest with each other, yes?"

Chuck wanted to say that he only recognized the guy from the old NSA photos he'd been given to memorize, but he knew that wasn't true. There was something vaguely familiar about the mustache, the wavy blonde hair, and the barrel chest hovering above him, but the more he concentrated, the further it slipped from his grasp.

Van Breeda was still talking but Chuck interrupted him. "I've never met you in my life."

"Ah, my apologies. Of course. The suppression is so effective on you, even now. If only so for the rest of the population we could have avoided so much …" He clucked his tongue and sighed. "Well, no matter. What is cannot be changed."

Chuck sensed something odd in the man's deep, subtly accented delivery, but couldn't pinpoint it.

"But as I was saying, I'd like that you thought of me as a friend. Sorry to keep you wrapped such as this but we can't have any unexpected behavior at this point, yes? We must get you ready for your role — your greatest accomplishment … and mine. Charles, you are going to help me save the world."

"Hah!"

Sarah pounded her fist triumphantly as the numbers began to spool down her screen. She was sitting at the table in Casey's hotel room, eyes trained on a laptop like a predator eying dinner. Her cell chirped and she snatched it up.

"Casey, what'd you find?"

"We found a witness."

"They saw Chuck?"

"Probably. She saw a person on a stretcher being loaded into an ambulance outside of 1754 Lamont within our time window."

"Decoy?"

"Doubt it. She's been a long time resident there, and we …"

Sarah cut him off. "You found it … the ambulance?"

"We did …" Casey paused.

Oh god.

"… but it was abandoned."

Sarah deflated. She'd heard the "but" from a mile away and, for a moment, thought he was going to say they'd found a body.

Casey continued. "We're looking through traffic cam data now. They had to transfer him to something."

"Is the NSA helping us?"

"We haven't called the General yet. Figured it's better to hold off till we have more."

"You're right but how ..."

"Carina's been lying her ass off to her interim boss. Just working him like a mark. He doesn't know which end is up anyway. They brought someone in from outside her department."

"Typical."

"Anyway, he's swinging whatever weight he has and he's been getting her access. Their facial recognition software isn't as good as the NSA's but it's better than nothing ... and it's working off our database now, so ..."

Casey actually sounded impressed which was a bit of a turn around from earlier. Sarah had to admit, she herself had gone from cursing Carina to praising her name, and now she practically wanted to kiss her.

"She has a method. You have to give her that."

Casey grunted.

"Okay, so the team that came after us outside the Afterwords Cafe, they had tranqs. Look for a van or something where they could monitor Chuck's vitals and ..."

"We know what we're doing, Walker. You just focus on your part. You make any headway with the bug?"

"I pulled data from the secondary. I was right. Someone tried to erase it. I just need a little time to cross reference the site codes."

"Do it quick. I'm coming to pick you up in a few minutes. Be ready when I get there." Like his boss, Casey hung up with little warning.

Sarah dropped the phone on the table absentmindedly, already focused on the sporadic text dumps on the laptop screen from the script that was matching the cell site codes with locations. As she watched, one refrain ran through her head, becoming more like a mantra with each repeat.

Please be okay. Please be okay.

Chuck felt he could sympathize with a landed tuna. Van Breeda — he refused to think of the man as "Bas" — had winched him up, still wrapped in plastic, onto a wheeled contraption that left him hanging from between his shoulder blades by a harness. He had to admit it was more comfortable then lying on the floor, but he wondered what the protocol might be for asking to use the bathroom. A follow up thought sobered him. Maybe he wouldn't live long enough to find out.

Van Breeda was puttering around his lab, a sprawling low-ceilinged space of tables and carts, lit like the sun by overhead LEDs. The tables were mostly empty of clutter and — Chuck found this particularly disturbing — just long enough to accommodate a person. The carts, on the other hand, were overflowing with equipment of all types, electronic and medical, much of which looked to be homemade. Van Breeda was happily chatting away at Chuck as if he were relating the details of an old boyhood adventure, his tone warm and grandfatherly. This, and his obvious penchant for tinkering, reminded Chuck unsettlingly of his father, and as he listened he finally recognized what it was that he'd noticed about the man's speech earlier. It was like Van Breeda was having a conversation with himself, never expecting or wanting anyone to respond. Chuck read volumes into that.

"And I must thank you for your performance on the Enterprise Dawning … for coming off the ship alive. It was most …"

"You can thank Sarah for that."

"Erm … yes." He seemed doubtful.

"I owe my life to her, period."

"I see. As you wish. But as I was saying, good show. If I had known Shaw would have decided to risk your life like that I would have surplussed him months ago." There was little ambiguity whether he meant fired or killed.

"You've wanted me safe all this time? You could have fooled me."

"Charles …" He seemed offended at the interruption. "… I've done for you more than a father ever would, but you must see how difficult it is to run such a decentralized organization as the Ring — such a silly name, by the way, no? The geometry … so entirely inappropriate. Efrelt always felt there was so much power in names though he never thought about their meaning. But where was I … yes, my unruly network. It would have been lovely to have only used my pets to accomplish these things … these goals, but you've seen the limits to their abilities. I've been forced to use unaltered material and it can be highly unpredictable." Chuck shuddered at the meaning of 'material'. "Nevertheless here you are, my favorite project, safe and sound."

Neither safe nor entirely sound … and I'm not your damn project. "Somehow I don't believe all that conflict was by accident. You had Shaw and the Elders working at cross purposes. How could you see that ending in any way other than violence?"

The additive insult of all of the interruptions seemed to be getting under Van Breeda's skin. His face began to redden. "Are you so slow you don't see the plan?" Chuck had, in fact, guessed the plan, but was playing dumb to keep the man talking. "That little confrontation accomplished quite a lot, I think. No matter what happened I would have come out ahead. A committee is useful for organizational purposes when things are stable but when things need to get done quickly they only stand in the way. Fermin, Effrelt, and the others knew how to play the long game but they didn't know when to pull the cord … the trigger. And Daniel … his nose was too far in front of his face. He didn't know where his duty ended and ambition began … and his bizarre understanding of what it was I was trying to accomplish …" Van Breeda shook his head, chuckling.

"So you're not intent on world domination?"

"My boy, you could learn much by keeping your mouth shut and your ears open. This is not one of your comic books. You're very smart, very smart indeed. I'm proud to see you using that potential at last, even for such petty purposes, but … your sense of responsibility is so limited. Look at the mess we live in. Humanity, our species, is in doubt. Evolution has created this marvelous ape with such ability and potential, but it's still just an ape. We haul the baggage of deeply ingrained instincts with us wherever we go, honed from millions of years of evolution, but only recently have we lived in a densely packed, developed world. Now those instincts are entirely out of context. You see, the technological evolution has outstripped the biological."

Chuck wondered if the man was aware of the irony that those same instincts he derided were probably what was driving his megalomania. He doubted it. As he listened he realized that, though the problems Van Breeda was identifying might have been real ones, his answer to them was nothing more than ego worship. He kept it to himself, letting the frustrated despot expound. The more he talked the more time Chuck had to figure a way out of his imprisonment. And the man sure seemed to enjoy talking. Chuck imagined he had kept most of the specifics of his plan to himself for years, not trusting them to the pawns he manipulated. The fact that he now felt safe to relate it all in loving detail did not bode well. Chuck's ears perked up as the man seemed to be coming to a conclusion far earlier than he had expected.

"… and thus we will be able to stop shooting the gun at our foot … stop letting our biological history, those anachronistic compulsions, send us into war, starvation, and decay. The technology that was used so efficiently to add to your mind will be used to subtract from others. Now you see?"

Damn. Why did you have to suddenly get so succinct? "So, what makes you think you're the one who knows what's best for the rest of us? How do you know which instincts to cut which to keep? You're only one man, just an ape like the rest of us."

For a second, Chuck thought he'd made a mistake. For one frighteningly intense moment an ancient, visceral hatred flashed across Van Breeda's composed features revealing the beast inside, the one he so wanted to repress in others. It was as if his skin had split open and the true Van Breeda stepped out, bellowing, "I am not a man. I am the Almighty!" Then the mask slipped back in place and a kind smile dimpled his face.

"So defiant, Charles, but you lack the wisdom to keep quiet. I will not be making those choices … what to cut and what to keep, as you say. The goal is mine but I must delegate those details. The job of identifying and removing counterproductive behavior in such a way to allow humanity to realize its potential requires access to an immense databank of information, synthesizing billions of pieces of data simultaneously and updating as conditions change. No, my brain is not capable of that task, even were I to strip it of its duties in helping me navigate my day. This requires a computer of capacity and promise that has never been realized in the history of human invention, in all of humanity for that matter … that is until now … until you. Your brain, my wonderful, brilliant Charles … your brain is a one of a kind work of art. A most perfect genetic aberration, a gift that your father's potential and that of thousands of others could never match. Your mind will be the vessel through which our modern society is born, the savior of our species. Don't be afraid. I'm giving you the greatest honor bestowed on any human, alive, dead, or yet to be."

Van Breeda brought his feverish visage within an inch of Chuck's.

"My son … I will make you a god!"

"I don't understand."

Carina and Sarah were sitting in the back of the van, inspecting their load-out on the way to meet a six-man hostage extraction team near Leesburg Virginia. As Casey drove the redhead poked at Sarah's guilt buttons, playing the card that she was volunteering for this mission and deserved information. The truth was Carina just hated secrets, at least the ones kept from her.

"What don't you understand, Carina?"

"No, don't even play her game, Walker." Sarah caught Casey's glare in the rearview mirror. "I'm not kidding. She's like the devil in a skirt."

Sarah rolled her eyes, not needing any lectures when it came to Carina. The woman was as much intelligence officer as DEA agent but with less discipline then either. Still, she was a friend and, perhaps more importantly, she was likely to be more objective about the evidence since she had no personal ties to Chuck.

Carina let her glare linger on the rearview mirror for a few moments then turned a wheedling smile on Sarah. "I just don't get how reanalyzing tracker data helps you find Van Breeda … that's who we think has Chuck, right?"

Sarah suppressed a sigh and shook her head. "Forget you know that name, for your sake and ours."

"Uh-huh … so if Van Breeda is so important why didn't the data get analyzed right the first time?"

Clearly Carina was taunting her so Sarah ignored it. "It did get analyzed correctly but some of the data had been altered by … an agent of our target." Sarah ignored the disgusted grunt from the driver's seat.

"Shaw?"

"Damn it, Carina!" Sarah was beginning to think it was the refrain to their song. "Is there anything you don't know already?"

"You tell me."

"No thank you. You can forget that name too and any context associated with it. And no … he didn't change the data. He never knew about the tracker."

"Hold on. One of Van Breeda's agents changes the data on the tracker and you're telling me they don't even bother to tell Shaw he has one?"

"Forget it. You already know enough. Just assume there's a logical reason."

In fact, all Sarah had was speculation, though General Beckman concurred on most of it. It seemed likely that Van Breeda was at the top of the food chain and that Shaw and the Ring had ended their usefulness to him, maybe had even become liabilities or competition. He'd had no reason to tell Shaw about the tracker, hoping the government would clean up that little problem for him. That meant the disaster on the ship was likely just a happy accident as far as he was concerned. It was a sickening thought for Sarah to consider, that her last several years on the job may have only accomplished the goals of her enemy.

And now, on the day that the Ring was being dismantled, Van Breeda took the initiative to abduct Chuck rather than disappear. It did not suggest a man who was afraid or desperate and it reaffirmed her take on the situation.

She emerged from her thoughts to see Carina looking expectantly at her. "Sorry. What was that again?"

"You're not even listening to me? Where's your head, Blondie? I said, how did you know the data had been compromised and how did you get the correct locations? How do you know we aren't being led to a decoy or a trap?"

"Well, you never really know that for sure, do you?" It was said with a condescending tone and Sarah realized Carina was starting to get to her. She took a long breath and answered the question. "The way they changed the data suggests whoever it was didn't have a lot of time. They were sloppy and left some information behind that contradicts the changes."

Sarah could see that Carina wasn't satisfied but there was no way she was giving up information on CIA technology to a DEA agent, friend or not. The truth was, that while the MCT-130 had a main antenna for receiving GPS signals, it also had a secondary transceiver for cell signals to transmit the target's location if queried. The last five thousand cell site IDs that it connected to were recorded to memory and this could be used to identify the target's location if they were partially shielded from GPS signals. Whoever had altered the GPS data had only bothered to strip the address files from the cell site data, leaving it largely intact.

Carina frowned. "I have to trust you on this, don't I?"

"Yup. I never made you any guarantees. You still in?" Sarah knew the answer but felt a little like pushing Carina's buttons for a change.

"Of course. I said I was in, didn't I?"

"You did." The testiness made Sarah smile inside but it was also nice to hear Carina would be coming along. She could be a nuisance but she was also a good person to have around when things got ugly.

"Okay, so now tell me what you got off the tracker."

"The only discrepancy I found in the tracker's memory was a single flight two months ago, directly from Bob Hope to JXO …"

"Hmmm." Carina nodded. "Busy regional. Not heavily used by the CIA as far as I know. But I didn't think one-six could handle coast to coast flights, and seven-five is commercial only."

Sarah wasn't surprised that a DEA agent would know her regional airports and runway designations. Particularly since JXO had been used for cocaine ferrying flights up from points of entry in Florida up until six years before.

"They finished lengthening one-six last year to support the Gulfstream crowd. Anyway, he landed at 00:47, never left the airport, and then headed back to LA only an hour and a half later. No vehicles arrived at or exited the airport for more than an hour on either side of his visit, unless they went off-roading or figured a way to tunnel under the fence."

"And how do you know that?"

"You're not the only one who can lie their way into pulling security footage."

Carina's lips spread in a devilish smile. Sarah knew Carina loved nothing so much as to seduce her towards the dark side. "So either Shaw met someone who likes to hang out at small airports in the middle of the night or …"

"Or they have their base of operations there … and I told you to forget that name."

Carina ignored this. "Well that's just great. That place is a nightmare, unless they've knocked down the old hanger complex."

"Nope. It's gotten worse. They expanded it … but on top of that, the operator sold some of the land to a developer for a meeting center."

"Inside the airport?"

"You know, fly the parties in and meet in neutral territory."

"So, a drug smuggler's convention center."

"Yeah, pretty much, except it was so obviously a trap for identifying higher up producers and distributors. It almost never got used and then only for legitimate business. And now …"

"Ghost town?"

Sarah nodded. "They haven't booked anyone since January 2008."

"Another large mostly empty building on the property then."

"And worse than that, they built a tunnel underneath one-six from the Center to the pilots lounge and hanger complex, the idea being that "executives" could take their little electric golf carts directly from and back to their planes. Can you imagine how easy it would be to set up an operation there? Someone from the airport would have to know about it but there wouldn't be too many people to pay off. If we had a little more time …"

"I know … bank records … but we don't have time. So you think, with that van the lawyer was driving, heading west towards Leesberg, JXO is the destination? Walker, there's a lot of other quiet, isolated little places nearby that it could have been going to."

"The lawyer" referred to one Denise LeFavre, a staffer for the senator most likely to become the Senate Intelligence Oversight chair after the rigged election in November. Traffic sensing cameras had captured her driving a van leaving the area where the ambulance had been abandoned within a plausible time window for having picked up Chuck. An hour later the same van was recorded traveling west on SR 7 towards Leesburg. The likely connection with Van Breeda through the senator and the direction of travel had been enough to convince Sarah, but Carina was still giving her a hard look. Sarah said nothing, recalling having recently said something about running an operation based on hopes and good intentions.

How prophetic.

Carina relented, as Sarah knew she would. "So, do we have the plans for any of the buildings?"

Sarah frowned. "Yes, but there's no guarantee that anything matches them now. With the windows blacked out and having remote access through the tunnel, someone could have altered quite a lot of it."

Carina looked contemplative for a moment. "So what you're saying is we're looking to steal back your boyfriend from a monster who may or may not be hidden in a large mess of buildings with underground access, unknown security, unknown force strength, and for which building plans might be completely unreliable? And we've only got nine people to do it with, six of which are likely to tell us to fuck off once they've heard the lack of details?"

Sarah nodded.

Carina smiled like a six-year-old on Christmas morning. "Blondie, you and I always have the most fun together."

Van Breeda's breath smelled like cheese and anise tea and it made Chuck gag. The fevered expression of ecstasy, only inches from his face, left no doubt that the man was drunk on his own delusions. His pupils were dilated to the edge of his irises. This man had not heard the word "no" in quite some time. Chuck decided to change that.

"Mr. Van Breeda, what if I don't want to be a god. I mean, if you want me to reach my potential, then let me find it on my own."

At first Chuck thought the man hadn't heard him, then he worried he'd poked the bear again, but Van Breeda only stepped away, a look of disdain and disappointment on his features.

"Find it on your own, Mr. Bartowski? You were working at an electronics store installing driver updates till you tripped and fell into your own destiny. And what have you done since you've been made aware of your gift? Put out small fires for the NSA and CIA? Pardon me if I don't put too much faith in your ambitions. Not that it's all your fault. Your parents saddled you with small dreams and a smaller-minded morality."

"The only thing my parents failed at was being there."

"Well, yes. At least in your father's case. What a cockup he turned out to be. He tries to convince everyone that I'm a monster and then the first I show any interest in his family he runs away. He abandons his family." Van Breeda laughed derisively. "And why does he do this? He thinks I come for him? Ha! The Narcissist he was. A good scientist maybe, and his mind had potential, but really … it was never about him. Oh how beautiful to have been there when he finally realized it … far too late of course. He couldn't come back." He made a little hop and pumped his fist. "Oh yes, Charles, he really mopped himself into a corner. Do you know how easy it was to blame so much on him once he wasn't around to defend himself? He would have been on the wanted list for the rest of his life … should have been. That strutting fool, Larkin … Oh mijn God, wat een kakker! That … asshole destroyed so much. And speaking of the fool, do you know who it was that had you thrown out of …"

"Yeah, it was Bryce. I know that already."

"On your father's orders. He was afraid of what you would become if exposed to the Intersect program. He tried to sabotage your application the moment you sent it off. I'm the only reason you ever got into …"

"My grades got me into Stanford."

"No!" Van Breeda's face burned bright red for a moment then cooled. "Without me your father would have left you begging for community college. Ah Stephen …" He chuckled, shaking his head. "When he found out you had been imprinted with the Intersect, what was the first thing he tried to do? He suppressed it. And all those times when you and your sister where on your own and needed food or a place to stay, do you think it was the kind-hearted Stephen Bartowski who helped you? Never. It was always me! Your father … always sabotaging your lives right and left, just to keep me away, and all I did was help you. You were just children. Who abandons children? I'm the one who wanted the best for you! Me! He only ever wanted you to fail just to get back at me. He was jealous."

Chuck could see the mask slipping aside again, so easy to do since Van Breeda had no need to conceal his true self. The man was a sociopath and exceedingly vain. But the things he was saying about his father … could they have been true? Chuck needed Van Breeda to keep talking so he let his curiosity take over.

"Jealous of you? What do you have that Dad would ever have been jealous of?"

"What a good question and so many possible answers, but which one?" His voice abruptly became quiet, his frenetic movement stilled. He turned a sad smile on Chuck. "Your mother was a beautiful woman. An amazing woman. I have no doubt that it was her that gave you that work of art in your head." He blew out a long sigh. "Such a waste … but, as always, what is is what has to be."

"Waste? What do you know about my mother?"

"What do I know, Charles? I know that her sacrifice was one of my greatest regrets in this entire endeavor."

"Sacrifice? What do you mean, sacrifice?" A prickling cold sensation began to creep up from Chuck's finger tips.

"Yes, yes. You should know this. It is only right." Van Breeda had averted his eyes the moment he'd brought up Chuck's mother but now he held direct eye contact. "Mary was an inquisitive woman. Much like you, though you wouldn't have known it at the time. That inquisitive nature is a dangerous and attractive quality for a man like me. Our friendship was doomed to failure for that reason, I'm sure of it. She asked such probing questions, your mother. She had a passion for knowledge, but like your father, that open-mindedness didn't extend to her children."

It was like watching the prelude to a car wreck but being powerless to stop it. Chuck didn't need to hear what came next but couldn't plug his ears.

"Your father poisoned her against me. That was the start of it. Just one time … just once, Charles. That's all it took. I suggested that I test your imprint retention capacity and with all that toxic fear in her mind she heard me asking to peel back your skull and hook you up to electrodes. Your father ruined everything for you, don't you see?"

No, he ruined it for you.

"And that was it. I was cut off. No access to you … nul, zero, zed. Without such an overreaction it never would have happened. I had to send you the device without her permission. It was the only way … through your sister. You were a boy who loved his father's gadgets. The instant you saw it you would know what to do, you'd think of nothing else. But I acted carelessly. Mary found it first and she was going to tell your father … the whole team would find out … I would be cut out completely and the world would remain ignorant about evolution's greatest innovation. The Botticeli — your mind, Charles — would have stayed in the basement forever. She was packing to take you and Ellie away when we found her …"

"She wasn't leaving us …" Chuck felt himself spinning, the world beginning to shift against its axis. He spoke in a barely audible voice. "You … killed her."

"No, my boy, no Idid not. I could not part with her, not then. I could only relieve her mind of your father's influence … but like chemotherapy, the process was truly inefficient. So little remained after."

Chuck's body began to shake, convulsing against his plastic cocoon, rage eating away his vision in great red bites. Then a yawning horror opened in his mind, imploding every memory of his childhood since the moment his mother had left. He'd been so mistaken about her. He'd held so much anger for so long, so deep, but she had never deserved any of it. She had only been trying to save him from this monster.

"I am afraid those I imprinted at first were not destined for longevity. Also, such a waste. She aspirated during a feeding some years ago … I think … yes it was eleven years. She went quickly; there was little I could do. Oh, Charles … now you look devastated. But it has been so long. Does it matter why she's gone? The outcome is the same."

The full speed reversals, from rage to regret to loss, left him weightless, like a charred residue. His mother was gone … forever, but not before Van Breeda had made her into one of his … Chuck couldn't finish the thought. The gate on his emotions slammed closed with violence. It was like one moment standing in rush hour traffic on the 405 and the next in a sound proof room. He wondered distractedly if something similar had happened to Sarah when he'd returned at the memorial.

No!

He was not going to be another victim of Van Breeda's sickness. The man was a plague and caused misery wherever he meddled. The only thing to be done was to stop him and Chuck knew that he was the linchpin. Van Breeda was unhinged, vain, and unfamiliar with contradiction. Maybe it would only take a little nudge.

Chuck spoke in a calm, even voice. "No, it changes everything. Now I know that my mother never abandoned us. Like you said, she was an amazing woman: intelligent, fair, empathetic … maybe one of those that made up for the crude, stupid, and violent people in the world … don't you think so?"

"I told you, it was truly a waste."

"And this wonderful shining ideal of a human being, a woman with two children she loved dearly, who she might have raised to be model humans themselves … she was cut down in the prime of her life by a pathetic mistake of nature, one that no one would have missed, who never accomplished anything other than death and failure. Why? Because it — that mistake of nature — couldn't deal with rejection."

He wasn't sure which word had done it but Chuck saw that he'd scored pay dirt. The mask didn't simply slip, it vaporized in the white-hot, roaring fury of an erupting ego.

"It! It! I am not an it, I'm the it! I am the architect, the creator of what humanity will become. I am God, Jesus, Vishnu, and Allah to your pathetic race!" Chuck felt his face coated in spittle. "I'll project my will into every corner of fucking humanity! When I clench my fist …"

"I'm sorry, you're the god? You're barely up to the task of carrying out your plans as it is." Chuck watched carefully to see if his guess was correct. The reddening of Van Breeda's already flushed features spurred him on. "And weren't you the one that needed to delegate to me. Wasn't I the one that was going to become god because you were so … what's the word … inadequate?"

That did it. Van Breeda's bottled rage, previously dissipated in chaotic motion, suddenly exploded into violence. Chuck watched in a detached way as Van Breeda flew at him with a metal cross brace. He saw his death in the man's face and closed his eyes, unable to process the suddenness of his plan's success.

Huh, how about that. Second time tonight and I still have yet to see my life flash before my eyes.

The anticipation seemed to slow time as the blows refused to fall on his head. Then, when Chuck heard a chuckle he opened his eyes to see Van Breeda smiling, the hand holding the cross brace falling to his side.

"Well done, Charles. Misguided, yes, but very well executed. You are very astute even under pressure. One more asset that must be wasted, but so it is. It is good for me that I do not need your heart and mind as I can see they are lost to me. So much defiance."

Oh thank god! As much as he realized his little plan had failed Chuck also felt relief. He wasn't ready to die. And there was still plenty of that incurable optimism inside that somehow he would get out of this and see Sarah again. He wasn't about to let Van Breeda off the hook, however, regardless of the deferral of his emotions.

"You killed my mother and destroyed my family. You've turned people into slobbering horror movie inspirations and all for the childish dream of controlling the world. I mean … what is that? Seriously, grow up, Bas." He accented the name with a mocking tone. "And not only that, you admit to it like you think I would forgive you all of it. Like I owe you gratitude? My heart and mind? You are truly delusional. All you'll get from me is my disgust … and pity."

To Chuck's disappointment Van Breeda's manner was suddenly very distracted as he watched a screen at the end of the bench nearest him. "Yes, yes. That's all very fascinating, your devotion to banal human virtues. But you should first see the results of that loyalty."

Van Breeda turned the screen around and Chuck saw a black and white image taken from a low-light camera. There were several people decked out in operations gear, arrayed around a hole in the ground. It took Chuck several moments to realize he recognized a few of them: Sarah, Casey, and …

Carina? What the hell?

"I see you know these people. Look at your face, how your eyes light up. Is that hope?" Van Breeda heaved a deep belly laugh. "Ha! You have such faith in them." The laugh nearly doubled him over and tears began to stream from his eyes. "Oh, my." He suddenly seemed positively giddy. "I haven't felt like this in years. It's like you've removed the weight of oceans from my shoulders. Thank you, Charles. Your misplaced optimism is that exact kind of refreshing naiveté one finds in children. So touching and pathetic. At the same time I want to hug them and strangle their life out, watching their sweet faces. I can never decide which. And with you … what shall I do. Shall I finish your misery and begin the imprint or do I let you watch your friends die first?"

"Leave them out of it! Just do the imprint but forget about them."

Van Breeda guffawed again, slapping his hands on the table.

"Oh, I think you've made the case quite clearly, Charles. Watch them die it is."

A/N: Well, he's just an unpleasant sort, isn't he? Yes, I managed to underestimate the amount of words I needed (again) so there's still two more chapters and an epilogue to come.