7:30pm Paris

The operatives walked into the Paris International Airport. They had been here only hours before but now they were on a mission. The men and women darted between the tourists and past the check in counters toward the security checkpoint.

Yvette stopped at the police door near security. Knocking, she held her badge in her hand. A man came to the door, "I am Officer Yvette Dubois, we are here to meet a plane. Your boss was supposed to be briefed."

The man asked a question in French and Yvette responded in kind. He headed into the office area leaving them outside the secure room. Yvette turned back to the Americans.

"Breathe, this is Paris; it's not supposed to be breakneck speed." She saw their anxiety.

"You're the one supposed to be stressed at finally meeting Hampton." Dalton pointed out.

"He's not on the plane." She said it so matter-of-factly.

"How can you be sure?" Jaz wondered.

"Taking a commercial flight will mean he has only one choice: the main exit, one way into the airport. He needs choices: ways to get out, many doors to use."

A man approached the group from the office. Dalton noticed the supervisor stripes on his uniform. The man spoke quickly to Yvette in French. Yvette shook his hand and introduced the team as an American embassy security attachment.

"Embassy?" Jaz raised her eyebrows when the locals stepped away.

"Would you prefer to be arrested for not having a work permit?" Yvette grimaced, "They want us to go through security. You don't have any weapons, right?"

"What do you take us for?" Dalton gave a non-answer as he made a mental note. She is not vouching for us.

"You went from the airport to the embassy so I'm pretty sure you got weapons." Yvette pointed out as they moved to the airport checkpoint.

"How do you know that?" Jaz wondered.

"Do you really think I am going to let a special operations team lose in Paris without any overwatch?" She raised her eyebrows then turned away from the team and stepped through security.

The Americans looked at eachother. Every new fact threw them off balance. But the only way to go was forward. Dalton took the lead and stepped toward the metal detector. They would see this job through no matter the cost.

2:47pm, USA

"Any chance we can get a copy of the flight manifest?" Hannah wondered as they waited for the plane to touch down.

"Airline wants a warrant and we don't have enough yet." Patricia told them.

"How about FISA?" Noah recommended.

"Don't even joke about that." Hannah retorted.

"I would rather deal with Tehren than that screwed up process." Patricia stood behind her main two analysts watching multiple video feeds from the Paris airport. "You look rough." She told Dalton through the earpieces the Americans wore.

"This is my traveling look." He teased.

"Not a good look on you." She threw back.

"I told him that already." Jaz smiled at the banter.

"How'd you get the Paris cameras?" Dalton wondered.

"Don't ask." Noah chimed in.

The US bound crew fell silent as they waited. The quiet was uncomfortable.

"How did you meet Yvette?" Hannah asked Noah. She had been dying to ask him and kept waiting for Patricia to leave. But that wasn't going to happen anytime soon.

Noah glanced at Patricia. She nodded.

"I met her on my first job out of the Farm. Before I decided that operations was more my style." Noah shrugged.

"You were a field agent?" Hannah's eyes widened.

Noah looked flustered, "Only one job."

"What happened?"

"An American operative went silent after arriving in Romania and I was supposed to find him. Yvette was also after the American."

"But you found him first?"

"We found him together. He was dead. Evidence said he was killed before I arrived."

"Who killed him?" Hannah asked.

"No idea, I never heard what happened."

"And Yvette?"

"Helped me get away from the locals. My language skills weren't very good and they spotted me as an American. The country was having law and order issues and I would have been good for ransom. She helped me avoid the kidnapping. But we were rural and there was no one to turn to. We were on the run together for two stressful days trying to get back to Bucharest. We got found a couple of times. She's a tough fighter. And I…I wasn't." He recalled, "She protected me and got me to the American embassy. You learn a lot about someone when they are under pressure."

"Hopefully that is enough." Patricia had already pulled the reports to check Noah's history with Yvette. Noah had no prior assignments before meeting Yvette who was already a highly experienced foreign agent and she definitely was in control of that situation.

It was now a red flag but it was Hampton who recommended Noah for the field job in Romania. Hampton had taught some classes at the training farm and Noah's skills had impressed him. Patricia was glad Noah was in the US and not on the scene to be manipulated, especially with his Hampton connection. Of course, Patricia also checked Amir's file and the years he spent with Yvette and the terrorist's group. After reading the reports from the Africa terrorism unit, she was worried about Amir. That assignment was over two years long and everyone has a breaking point.

Is he really in control, or is Yvette?