Annie Turns Up~About 8 months after Annie was last seen in D.C.; her whereabouts are now known though precarious.
When Annie left D.C., she first went to Canada and from there went to Basel to work on her new cover and identity with Ben Mercer's help. She received some contacts from Chris McCauley in Africa before she left, but she didn't make use of any of them, instead she found her own gig preferring not to rely too much on her past. She hadn't gone to many places in Africa for the CIA and didn't know a soul in the area she was assigned, so she figured it would be a good place to disappear. It seemed natural to Annie to begin working in the non-profit sector, her desire to make a difference in the world drove her to apply for the CIA, now she was taking a different path to making a difference in the world. Perhaps one she should have taken to begin with.
Annie wound up in Mali where she fell in love with the people and babies and children she met with daily in her new role as a health care educator and translator. A few months into her new life she unwittingly got sucked back into a vortex she thought she had extricated herself from. She can't say she didn't have a choice. We always have a choice. Annie refused Rachael's request at first when she read her in on her work for the CIA. She wasn't an operative like Annie, just a source of data for the agency, she never had to carry a weapon though she was trained to use one. Rachael was approached by the CIA while she was traveling in West Africa as a student, they needed assets and she was just the right type to use her studies and travels as a cover. However, Rachael's marriage wasn't a cover, but over the years it was harder and harder to tell Bobby the truth, she was an asset for the CIA even before they met. She was afraid he would think their marriage was a lie, but it wasn't. She had given up far too much of her old life and parents approval for it to be a lie.
Annie and Bobby were making their rounds in the nearby villages to the south of their homebase when a call came through that Rachael had collapsed, she was about six weeks away from giving birth. They rushed to her back to the clinic where Annie and Bobby met her. She was dehydrated and the best course of action was bed rest for her low amniotic fluid. Bobby finally agreed that when Rachael was better she should return to the states to give birth.
Annie stayed with Rachael who told Annie that it was critical that her work continue, trouble was brewing up north and the CIA needed intel in real time. Rachael couldn't very well continue providing intel and there was no one else who was ready to do the work. By then, Katie's cover had been discovered by Calder Michaels who was Rachael's contact, when she sent him the message to look into Katherine Porter, he didn't learn much except the real Katherine Porter was no where near Mali and her picture didn't match the one Rachael had sent to Calder, her latest contact.
Calder had left the DPD and took a post heading a task force on the new Islamic insurgencies in Africa, ISIS was becoming a stronghold as well as smaller groups slowly taking over villages all over West Africa and trying to enact Sharia laws. His heart was always in the field and when it came time to go overt, he refused. Calder found this turn of events involving Annie interesting, but wanted to see it play out. He asked Rachel to keep trying to turn Annie, not letting on that he had a long history with her. Calder also knew that Ryan McQuaid had been looking for her, it was leverage he would use later with Annie if necessary.
Rachael gave Annie the history of what she had been doing and why it was critical to the safety of the women and children of the country. All the fighting and unrest mostly affected the girls and babies. More unrest would cause the next generation more suffering. Annie didn't want any contact with the CIA, she knew if she did this for Rachael she was risking being found out. Rachael needed Annie's help to continue her work, she was way too pregnant to traipse around the countryside tracking terrorists while acting as a anthropologist. She couldn't anyway without risking her baby. Rachael had no idea who Annie really was, but she knew her well enough to know that Annie or Katie Porter could do what she had been doing for the last five years. Annie leaves Rachael's bedside telling her she didn't think she was cut out for the type of work Rachael was doing. That was over a month ago. . .
Annie's hands are tied as she lays on the dirt floor in a darkened hut. She slowly wakes up unsure of how long she has been unconscious. She tries to remember what happened and slowly it comes back to her. She knew she had to free herself. She had no idea if anyone was coming after her. The mud hut she is kept in has little streams of light shining through cracks. She keeps looking around wondering how she is going to get out, looking for anything that can be used as a weapon before the panic sets in. She had gone for a couple of months without a panic attack and she felt one coming on. The darkness choked her, the restraints on her hands brought her back to her hell with Kravec, she started yelling for water, her heart racing. The door swung open blinding Annie with the light. She now knew from her position where the door was, a man came over and slapped her hard. "Quiet!"
"Water, please, I need some water."
He looked at her and grunted, then turned to leave.
A few minutes later he returned with canteen of water. He held it up to Annie and she drank furiously. It was hot and the water helped. "What do you want from me?"
"Money of course American woman."
With that he left Annie in the dark.
Joan, never one to let anything ruffle her, just got off the phone with Calder Michaels. They two had struck an unlikely friendship and considered each other allies. But Joan was pissed for the moment. She was not looking forward to her next call. Joan picks up her phone to call Ryan McQuaid into a meeting at Langley. It was a direct call to his cell.
When Ryan sees the number on his phone, he rolls his eyes, but he has to keep one of his biggest clients happy.
"Ryan, glad you picked up, I need you here at Langley as soon as possible."
"My schedule is packed today, I'm sure whatever it is, we can discuss it over the phone."
Ryan doesn't want to go back to Langley, he's avoided it as much as he could in the months since Annie disappeared. He finds it too painful, there are too many reminders of Annie there. Sometimes Auggie has a beer with him and Calder when he's in town. Calder left Langley and his post as DCS when news of his relationship with Stephanie surfaced. She died and he too wanted to escape DC. He took a job in Africa heading a new task force doing counter surveillance on Islamic militants and insurgencies. Ryan hasn't seen Joan or Calder in a professional capacity for the last few months. When Annie first disappeared he hit her up for intel and picked her brain, everything led to dead ends.
Joan says, "Trust me, you want to be here McQuaid."
"Joan, I have a lot on my plate today, if it's so important, I'm sending my second in command Jim over," says Ryan as he scratches his beard. Jim wasn't going to like it, he hated going over to Langley.
"That's all well and good, but you want to be here too."
"Joan, Langley can't afford to have two of McQuaid Security's top execs at the meeting. I have another meeting at State."
"Cancel it, I'm sending over a video to show you why you will want to be here. This is about an aid worker kidnapped by an unknown group to us. You are going to offer your services to the organization she works for to handle the K and R negotiations. It landed on my desk and it hasn't made it to the mass media yet, but I am sure it will and we need to prevent that. As you know kidnappings for aid workers are on the rise, used by militants to fund their operations. We can't let this one get in the open."
McQuaid is pissed, "Joan , you want me cancel an important meeting at State to talk about some do-gooder who was in the wrong place at the wrong time? Maybe it will teach idealistic college grads to steer themselves towards greater service like the armed forces. Who goes to a war torn region with God knows how many factions trying to dominate and doesn't expect to be in harms way? You know there's a lesson here about how to really affect change in this world. I say let the media get a hold of this one and teach these idiotic kids a lesson."
"Ryan, this isn't some 22 year old."
Ryan rolls his eyes, "So this kid belong to some VIP, I need to start managing and ass kissing?"
"Just watch the video NOW!"
Ryan is pissed off and he presses play with force on his computer. The video transmits on the big screen in one of Ryan's conference rooms. Though she looked different, Ryan recognized her immediately and plopped down in one of the many leather conference room seats. He saw, none other than Annie Walker, wisps of light brown hair escaped the scarf on her head. She was holding a newspaper with yesterday's date while a masked man held a machete like knife to her throat and another stood over her with an assault rifle. Annie looked about ten pounds thinner, there was a trail of blood running down the side of her face along her hairline and a busted bottom lip. The demand is two million cash for her safe return or she would be beheaded or sold to the highest bidder, whatever they fancied said the leader of the group. . .
Ryan can hardly hear as Joan says Algiers station chief intercepted the message as it was being uploaded at an Internet café. We got it this morning even before the agency she works for had time to open up their emails to view it. They are probably viewing it right now and trying to decide how to proceed before calling us. "Come over here now, we have a team strategizing her extraction already, but I'm contracting it out to you."
Ryan, still stunned, can't believe he finally knows where Annie is, all these months, did Joan know too? He has so many questions, but they would have to wait. He says, "Joan we're going to do this over the phone, I'm not going over to Langley, it's faster for us to be here in case we need to move on this."
"I'm waiting on Calder and Auggie to join in, give me thirty seconds."
Ryan replays the video and feels a mix of emotions. He replays the video of the rebel leader pulling off a black mask revealing a beautiful woman with a head covering. She looked much tanner in appearance, but it was Annie. It was her shaky voice reading the demand. She had a bloody lip that trembled as she read, but he noticed something right away, she was tapping on the newspapers she was holding. She was tapping a message. Six guards.
McQuaid stops and stares in disbelief. Again he's helpless while she's in danger. He wants to hold her and rescue her, protect her from further harm, forgetting the anger that he has allowed to build towards her so that he could move on. He had not laid eyes on her in eight months. The last two months, he really tried to move on. He had stopped looking for leads actively and now this. He is stunned into silence, his rant on idealistic NGO workers over. She looks about 10 pounds lighter and has bags under her eyes. Her clothes appear clean showing that she is either well take are of or early in her capture. His mind is in overdrive making lists of what needed to be done. Jim enters the conference room as Ryan replays the video again. "Jesus fucking Christ, is that Walker? What the hell?"
He realizes Joan is still on the other end, Ryan says, "I'll call you back after I make contact, what's the name of her employer?"
"African Maternal & Fetal Health Initiative."
"Jim, can you contact them and offer our K and R services pro bono?"
"On it."
Joan says with some irritation in her voice, "Wait, there's something you need to be read in on. There was a reason we came across this video. These kidnappings of aid workers and execs overseas happen everyday, but this one is different. We need to treat this as more than your run of the mill K and R. We absolutely cannot let this kidnapping hit the media, her story and cover won't stand up to the scrutiny and if they get wind that she is actually a spy, we won't get her out alive."
"What do you mean, she isn't a spy anymore."
Calder Michaels' voice came on the line, "Annie was supposed to provide some intel a day ago. When she missed the scheduled meet, it was a red flag, so we started tracking her movements prior to the drop and waited to see if she would make the contingency. We learned that her jeep broke down returning from a routine scheduled visit of encampments along the Algerian border. The doctor she traveled with walked to the closest village three miles away to get help, but when he returned she was gone. Based on information from the doctor and witnesses, we have pinpointed her possible location."
McQuaid is quiet, ran his hands through his beard. "Dammit Joan, she's there on a fucking covert op? You knew her whereabouts all these months and you kept it from me? I knew you knew something Joan, so help me, if you ever need anything from me again. . .Who else knew, Auggie is he there too? All these months of being my drinking buddy and helping me look and then trying to convince me to stop, shit! Did you know where she was?"
"Auggie and I only learned Annie's location about an hour ago." Says Joan giving Calder an angry stare. Auggie is in the room, but he's just too floored and worried about Annie for words.
"That's bullshit!" says McQuaid.
"Listen, if you're all done here, I need to get back to my desk and work on a plan to get Annie out," says Auggie forcefully. "You can hash all this out later." Auggie leaves the room.
Calder Michaels' voice comes on the line. "Ryan, I know the situation is difficult to comprehend, but let's focus on getting Annie back to safety without compromising her NOC as a health care translator and educator for the African Maternal & Fetal Health Initiative If it gets out it will jeopardize no only her, but the people she got close to here on the ground as well as the many other humanitarian workers under the employ of the CIA."
"We had beers together last month Calder. You lying SOB."
Calder says with his signature slow and low voice, "I will fill you in after we work up a plan to get Annie out safely, but I coerced her into this mission when she showed up on my radar about a month ago and I feel responsible for her predicament."
"Damn right you're going to fill me in. I'm going to get answers. I get all the intel you get in real time," demands McQuaid.
"Of course," responds Joan.
Ryan orders that they get all the info on Mopti region and border towns between Mali and Algeria. They get satellite imagery on that internet café and Annie's alleged last known location. Get the head of the African Maternal & Fetal Health Initiative on the phone. Tell them we will do everything we can to bring their employee back safely. I don't care if they have two million to spare or not, we have it. Then says, get a plane and a team of six men ready to leave for Mali within the next hour.
Ryan is on the phone nonstop trying to get the lay of the land in Mali and hearing all about Annie's work there.
Jim returns to Ryan's office,
"Son of a bitch, is it really her? Now we have a fucking name? Katie Porter? Shit Ryan. Now you're supposed to help her after all the crap she's put you through."
Ryan gives Jim one of his looks. "Yeah, we're going to help her. Are you in or not?"
Jim couldn't refuse being in the field so he was in, of course and he had questions for Annie Walker too.
Ryan and his team arrive on the ground in Mali and meet Calder at a safehouse in Mopti. The region while once insulated from the rebel activity and insurgencies farther north had become highly volatile.
Calder begins, "I know the intersection here. Reports of locals state a group of men brought a hooded figure in with hoots and hollers about 36 hours ago. The location is about 2 hours from here."
Ryan is pissed that Calder didn't tell him where Annie was all these months. During the drive to Annie's location, Ryan demands answers.
"Look, I didn't know until about two months ago that Annie was in Africa. I swear. It was all. . . happenstance. I had an asset, a valuable one here on the ground, she was an anthropologist married to the doctor Annie worked with at the clinic, she informed me that she wanted to leave Africa, wanted out, got herself knocked up and with the increasing violence in the area she and her husband were ready to peel out before she gave birth. My asset identified a woman she had a good feeling about who could continue work of collecting rebel activity and trends, be the new ears on ground. She met her four months prior when she joined the clinic as a translator and field health educator."
Calder stops and looks over. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you, but I needed to know what Annie was up to."
"And?"
"She wasn't up to anything, just went as far as she could to start a new life. There was nothing else to it until my asset identified her as a replacement."
"Really, there was no one else available?"
"No one we have trained in the time we had, things were and are volatile in the region, I needed a seamless transition that didn't result in intelligence gaps."
"Still, you could have told me, if she had protection, this might not have happened."
"No one could have predicted her kidnapping, this incident has nothing to do with her role for us."
"So keep talking, tell me how this all came to be," says Ryan.
"My asset and her husband were kind of the social hub of the expats who worked in the clinic. They hit it off with this new arrival and spent a lot of time together outside of work. She took this woman under her wings. My asset assessed that this American understood language better than she did and was a quick learner. She was personable, athletic, intelligent, and seemed to be running away from something back home. I said I'd vet her, she gave me her name, stopped me cold when she sent me a picture. Katie Porter, a new alias for Annie Walker. I did some digging and learned Katie Porter was a translator and health care educator for women and children. Next meet, I told her that I had vetted her recommendation and would approach. I did and it wasn't a pretty reunion. She nearly took my head off when she found me inside her apartment, Her senses and reflexes are still in tip-top shape. Our girl is feisty, but a bit off her game. She had no idea that my asset was working for the CIA."
Ryan was listening intently, so Calder continued.
"She initially refused to work for us, she did so very adamantly when she turned down Rachael and I approached her. She said her days of working for the CIA were over, she was tired of lies, deception, hurting others, being the cause of pain, etc. . . She told me to "fuck off" and find someone else. I gave her some time to think about it, but then fate intervened as it always does. My asset died in childbirth about a month ago. I needed Annie, the CIA needed Annie to gather intel. Her hand was forced."
"And yet there was a time when you took her job away from her. How ironic that you found yourself needing her again to further your own agenda."
"No, I needed her to stop rebel insurgency and acts of mass killing against hundreds of women and children. Annie's first task was to find the intel Rachael was suppose to dead drop before she went into labor prematurely. She had names, finally names and photos of the men who were burning villages and kidnapping girls. Since she never made the drop, I tasked Annie with locating the intel."
"You didn't give her a choice."
"I was persuasive."
"You told her you'd tell me where she was didn't you?"
"Yes, but that's not what convinced her in the end. I could see in her eyes that she missed DC, missed home. She wanted to ask about you, Auggie, Joan, it took everything in her to tamp down her feelings. I wasn't the one who convinced her, Annie was there when my asset gave birth, apparently, she convinced Annie to do it for her, her family, so that one day her daughter could return to a peaceful Mali. You know our Annie, she won't pass up a noble cause, plus they became family to her."
Ryan is thinking about the family he was supposed to have with Annie, he was supposed to be her family. "Yeah, she always did put others above herself, even to her own peril."
"I know you think I'm an asshole and I feel terrible about what's happened to Annie especially given that she was held in captivity less than a year ago. I hope she psyche is strong, she's the same Annie in many ways, but there's a lot about here that's different too."
"What do you mean by that?"
I just mean, we better get her out ASAP. Not only because I need her intel, but because I don't think she can survive captivity. If properly vetted, she probably wouldn't pass muster to be a field operative. The girl has issues. . . she needs to work through them.
"Damn right she has issues, she's been through hell Calder! And now she's held captive again because of the CIA? God help me if she doesn't get out of this in one piece."
"She knew the risks and she agreed to them."
"You gave her no choice!"
"It's in her blood man, you need to accept that."
