So here it is! The last chapter. I didn't go back to watch the pilot, so my timing in this chapter might be off. I also made some political references in here, because I realized the timeline lined up w/ the election, and I could SO see Cho being the one to follow it religiously, and I also saw him as being pretty liberal, so please don't be offended by that. ssPlease review, and thanks to everyone for reading this story, and keeping me going writing it. And I apologize for getting so lazy at the end. Also, I'm thinking of doing some longer one-shots (or maybe two-shots) based on some of these chapters at some point, so if anyone has a favorite chapter they'd like to see me do, please review and say. sThanks again!

***

September, 2008

Van Pelt was new.

Walking for her first day into the CBI headquarters—a formidable brick building with a menacing, black iron gate around it.

She was wearing a loose-fitting gray button down—her least sexy piece of clothing—with her dark red hair slicked back into a bun. No make-up or earrings, which she hadn't done since High School. Flat black loafers that pinched her feet, and looked like something she might have worn with a private school uniform in the second grade. She'd been going for sleek and professional, and had wound up looking like some strict Catholic schoolmarm. And not the sexy kind, either. The one who rapped your knuckles with a ruler when your shirt wasn't tucked in.

Her oldest sister had called her early that morning from Iowa to wish her luck. "You'll do great, Grace," she'd said. Van Pelt wasn't entirely sure this wasn't true, but she was fairly certain her sister didn't believe it. Her whole family hadn't gotten used to her being a cop—she was too sweet, they'd said, and too trusting. Certainly too wide-eyed and much too beautiful to ever really be any good at it. There were other things she could be, they said, more suitable to her nature. Like a Kindergarten teacher. Or a catalogue model.

They didn't understand or approve of her choice of profession, she knew, and so she appreciated the gesture from her sister, even if she didn't believe her own words of reassurance.

Breathe in. Breathe out. The young man working the metal detector smiled at her a little more than he smiled at everyone else. He told her that her unit worked on the sixth floor.

She could do this. She could do this. Push the six button in the elevator after the door closed. Her stomach seemed to drop with each floor, before hitting a resounding thwack when the elevator doors opened. Okay. Okay. Okay.

The room was almost empty, which surprised her. There was a young Asian guy at the desk to her left, face buried in the New York Times. Okay. She would go up to him. Easy enough. What would she say? Hi, I'm Agent Van Pelt. It's my first day with the CBI, and I was told this is where I should report. Okay. That worked. She practiced saying it in her head a few times, before walking over. She would say that.

"Hi… first day, um—am I in the right place? I mean, sixth floor--" Or… that.

The young guy looked up from his paper. He was fairly good-looking, well built, with closely cut dark hair, and eyes that looked perpetually ironic, like he was always telling a joke. He smiled at her. "You nervous?"

She was. "God, am I that obvious?"

He grinned again, shooting a conspiratorial look at her. "No," he replied. "On my first day I was so terrified that I ran directly into my bosses' boss, tripped over him, and spilled coffee all over his new suit."

Van Pelt smiled back. Okay. This guy wasn't bad. "And? What happened?"

He shrugged. "I'm still alive. Even if I pushed back any chance I had for a promotion by at least five years."

She laughed. He stuck out his hand from his sitting position. "I'm Cho," he said.

She shook it. "Van Pelt."

He narrowed his eyes. "You're Van Pelt?" He shook his head. "Shit."

She frowned, and shifted uncomfortably. Was it because she didn't look like he expected? That happened a lot. But his reaction was somehow different than that, like there was something else at work here. She didn't know if she should be offended or not.

"Sorry," he said after a second. "Jane—our consultant—well, he saw your signature before you got here, and said what you were going to be like." He broke off, and shook his head. "And that asshole is always right. He said, uh—you'd be fairly young. Female. Very pretty."

There was another moment of blank silence, during which Cho's eyes widened and he tried to recover himself. "I mean—that wasn't a come-on, it wasn't like that. It's what he said."

As he spoke, she felt herself relaxing. Somehow, his sudden burst of discomfort had put her at ease.

"No worries," she said. "Is Jane your profiler?"

Cho considered. "Sort of. He kind of observes, reads people, but he works cases, too, like a detective, but he's very much not a detective."

"Then what is he?"

Cho shrugged. "You'll understand better when you meet him."

"Oh. Is he usually here?"

"He's full time, yeah. But he got himself suspended a few days ago, for a month, long story. I think he's out of town, actually, I haven't been able to reach him. But he'll be back soon enough. Probably too soon."

Cho got up, rounded the desk. Standing, he was a few inches taller than her, but not so tall, not towering over her. He left his newspaper on top of his computer. "Come on," he said. "Rigsby and the boss are in her office." He pointed to the glass door in the far corner of the room. "You can go knock, she's expecting you. I'm going to make some coffee. Want a cup?"

She shook her head.

"Tea?"

"No, thank you."

He nodded and turned off into a small kitchen. She walked closer to the door, and the two figures inside became more visible. Lisbon, whom she'd met briefly—very briefly—when interviewing with Minelli. He had been walking her down the hallway when they passed her, jogging off somewhere presumably important. They had shaken hands, and Lisbon was gone in the next second.

She was shorter than Van Pelt, and maybe five to seven years older. Her hair was loose around her shoulders now, and she was wearing a pair of fitted black pants and a plain white cotton top. She wasn't dressed provocatively, but she wasn't hiding her femininity, either—she had the look of a woman not to be trifled with.

The man towered over her, broad-shouldered with long limbs. He was a big guy, but not fat—attractive, with kind features. He was smiling.

"What?" He was saying. "It's a perfectly valid question."

Van Pelt remained standing there, frozen on the spot. She was supposed to walk in. She was supposed to reach out and knock on the door. But she couldn't.

"Rigsby," Lisbon said, "We're not getting case-closed pizza for the Tolliver case."

She was trying to look stern, Van Pelt could tell, but couldn't hide a certain amusement.

"Why not?" He looked mischievous. "It's your turn to buy, isn't it? You being cheap, boss?"

Lisbon rolled her eyes. "So Jane is out for a few days, and you're vying to be the most annoying?" She cocked her head to the side. "It doesn't work on you, Rigsby."

He was undaunted. "All I'm saying is, we get pizza when we close a case, right? And the Tolliver case is most definitely closed."

"Because Jane got the guy shot! That so doesn't count!"

Van Pelt frowned. She assumed this was the "long story" behind Jane's suspension. But he got a guy shot? Just who the hell did the CBI have working for them?

"Well, we can mourn him between bites of cheesy pizza. I'll look really somber and grave, if that helps ease your conscience."

"I think we need to have some rules on what qualifies as closing a case to get pizza. I'm going to have to tack an addendum onto the case-closed pizza constitution."

"Like?"

"Like if Jane, or anyone, gets the murderer shot by his wife during any point in the investigation, the case closed pizza tradition is null and void."

Okay, now the story was really confusing. The murderer's wife had shot him? How could that be Jane's fault?

"Well, that's not fair. You can't just go adding on addendums. That's not how it works."

Shockingly, Lisbon erupted into a loud peal of laughter. It obviously surprised Rigsby, too—Lisbon didn't strike her as someone who laughed very often, and she got the distinct impression that Rigsby had never made her laugh before.

"Of course that's how they work! That's what they are, Rigsby! Add-on's!"

"How do you know that?"

She was still laughing. "It starts with the word add!"

Cho appeared next to her, holding a mug of coffee. She expected him to question why she was still there, why she hadn't gone in. But he didn't. He seemed to understand. He gently took her elbow, and guided her into the room.

Lisbon was still snickering, leaning over a file. Rigsby was standing close by but not too close, also laughing.

"Boss, Rigsby," Cho called from the door. "This is Van Pelt."

They both turned. Rigsby shook his head, firmly. "You're Van Pelt?" He sighed. "Goddamnit."

They all turned to look at him. Rigsby colored at his outburst. "I mean, our consultant--"

"She's heard the story," Cho broke in.

Lisbon looked at the clock. It was six after eight. "You're late," she said, her green eyes narrowed. Van Pelt wondered at how fast she had gone from amusingly busting Rigsby's chops, to being stern and imposing.

"No, she's not," Cho said. "I gave her a tour around the squad room. It was my fault."

She exhaled and nodded at him appreciatively, grateful for the lie. She could hardly tell her new boss that she was late because she was too paralyzed to knock on her office door.

Lisbon accepted the explanation with a dismissive nod. Risgby reached over to elbow Cho in the side.

"So you put down your newspaper to actually talk to someone? Amazing." He turned to Grace. "Cho is consumed by the upcoming election. Anyone who talks to him while he's reading about it gets their head bitten off."

"I'm not that bad."

"Oh, no?" Lisbon asked. "And just what were you reading about?"

"A recap of the convention. It's important!" Cho insisted. "I wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything."

"That, you don't have to worry about," Rigsby replied. "You're the only liberal democrat I know who watches every single speech of the Republican Convention."

"You have to know what they're thinking."

Van Pelt laughed. Her father had been a dyed-in-the-wool conservative, and all of his daughters had become liberal democrats, perhaps out of rebellion. She wondered whether something similar had happened to Cho.

"Well," Lisbon broke in, "Cho, Rigsby, I need you to go type up your reports on the Tolliver case. Van Pelt--" she shrugged. "You stay with me, I'll show you around."

She did her best not to sigh. Okay. On the way out, Cho smiled at her, and pushed his chin up with his fist, as if to say, buck up. Rigsby gave her a once-over, not lasciviously, but admiringly. He ducked his head nervously, and shot her an awkward grin.

It was going to be okay, she told herself. The hardest part was over.

***

Cho and Rigsby were best friends. That became obvious on her first day, when they took her to lunch at a cute little sandwich shop downtown. They ribbed each other, gave each other a hard time, but there was an unmistakable affection under the surface.

Cho insisted that she get a Rueben, Corn Beef, with extra sauer kraut. It was the best sandwich she would ever have in her life, he said.

Rigsby paid for her, but not for Cho. She'd noticed already that he tended to watch her a good deal more than she thought strictly necessary—that in some sense, he was infatuated with her, in awe of her. And it was sweet.

On her third day, Lisbon walked up to Cho and, shockingly, laid a chocolate chip muffin on his desk. Even more surprising, Cho wasn't thrown off in the least. He grinned up at his boss, who muttered, "They were out of cupcakes." Van Pelt didn't ask.

She learned quickly that any mention of the consultant would illicit an eye-roll from the boss, and instant irritation. There was some sort of tension between them that was undeniable, even without Jane's presence, that she didn't understand. Not at all.

Rigsby would joke about calling Jane for this or that—when the coffee pot tanked, he mentioned that Jane had fixed it the last time, and he could call him for help.

Lisbon didn't even look up to issue her threat. "You call him, Rigsby, and it will be the last thing you ever do. Got that?"

On her fifth day, they caught a double homicide. A young woman and a doctor killed violently, with a big smiley face drawn in blood on one of the walls. Preparing to go to the scene, she heard Rigsby and Cho whispering heatedly to each other.

"We should call," Cho was saying.

"We absolutely should not! I'm fond of having all of my limbs, thank you."

Cho rolled his eyes. "Grow a pair, would you? It's Red John. It's his case. You know that."

"Then why not let the boss call?"

Cho shook his head, with finality. "I'm calling him. Jane's got the right to know, better than any of us."

"It's your funeral, man."

On her eighth day, she met Patrick Jane. She was standing around in the squad room, when her eyes fell on a good-looking blonde guy. He was wearing a gray suit with matching vest, which was weird, but somehow attractive. He didn't look like he belonged there, but he didn't seem to be looking for anyone, either.

"Can I help you?"

His eyes widened in amusement, and then settled on understanding. She was very confused.

"You must be Van Pelt." His voice was all genial and pleasant, but there was a hint of a self-satisfied smirk in his eyes. "I'm Patrick Jane."

"Oh!" She replied, feeling stupid. "I heard you were out of town."

"No, nowhere to go." The words were sad, but the tone was unchanged. She didn't know how to react to it.

"Oh, ok…" She'd skirt on past it. That would work. She tried to sound upbeat. "Did you pick a desk yet?" She gestured to one near the window. "I think that one gets more light."

More light? Seriously? Did she just say that?

But he grinned at her. "Sure, that one. More light, by all means." The smile was charming, it made him even more handsome.

She left the room then, going over the moment in her head. Somehow, Patrick Jane was very much not what she had expected. The trouble-maker who had just gotten a man shot; who profiled people based on their signatures; who made Lisbon's job hell. He wasn't at all what she pictured—he was a charming, fairly young, good-looking man. And yet she knew that there was something deeper there, something solemn about him lingering below the surface that she couldn't quite place. She didn't really know what to make of him.

But if anything, she thought— remembering his twinkling blue eyes, his honeyed voice, his self-assured, easy way of standing—Lisbon's tension with him made much more sense than she had originally realized.

***

Rigsby wanted pizza. Van Pelt had come to realize that Rigsby always wanted pizza. No matter what time of day it was.

Lisbon didn't. She said it was too fattening—and furthermore, she said, Rigsby was a walking heart attack sundae with hypertension filling and high cholesterol on top.

Jane didn't care. He would eat whatever you put in front of him, provided it was edible, or close to it.

Cho wanted Mexican, and Grace wrinkled up her nose at the thought. Something about the spice, the heaviness—it had never been one of her favorites.

"And what about the new kid?" Jane asked, turning to her. "What do you want?"

Lisbon cut in. "Don't let him call you 'new kid', Van Pelt. I swear, you give him an inch, he'll never leave. I've learned that the hard way."

Jane looked injured. "That hurts my feelings a little, Lisbon."

"Yeah? Then go cry about it." Lisbon looked up at him, eyes flashing, practically spitting fire.

"Ouch," Cho put in. "And Lisbon gets one in under the gun. Beautiful." Cho and the boss shared a look then, of two people both in on some kind of conspiracy.

"Quiet," Rigsby said. "Your vote, Van Pelt?" He had a way of speaking to her that was more gentle than any of the others, but never sounded patronizing.

"You guys pick."

"Pizza!" Rigsby said. "Boss still owes us case-closed pizza for the Tolliver case."

"I do not!"

Jane grinned. "Well, why not? The case got closed."

"Don't you even start on me, Jane."

Cho came to stand next to her, watching the three of them go at it. They both laughed as Lisbon turned to share an exasperated look with Van Pelt, which she returned. Cho took his cell phone from his pocket, and began dialing the Mexican place. He shook his head at Van Pelt, ruefully.

"Welcome to the CBI," he deadpanned.

"Cheers."