Bottom of Form 0

Oh...last week's ep...good to see Michael Bellisario on. He was my favorite part of JAG (he played a USNA MIDSHIPMAN...c'mon folks, what could be better than that? And truthfully, he reminded me of this real midshipman...) And now he's on NCIS...(needs to lose the mustache, though!) as a nerdy homeschooled tech assistant! (and I can say that without bias, being homeschooled myself.)

And I tried logging into the site several times this week and last before I could get on….I don't know what's going on there….

For you who've seen this scenario before--I only have one thing to say. I could have done worse--I didn't use the favorite evil twin plot:P

Chapter Seventeen

Special Agent Eric Bradshaw pocketed the number carefully. It had taken a long time to get this encrypted number from Haswari. It had better been worth the manpower his intelligence team had put into it.

He had rehearsed Kate on what to say, over and over again. He didn't know much about her background with the terrorist yet, but he knew it was much more than anyone. That if anyone could get into Al-Qaeda's DC cell's inside, it was Caitlyn Todd.

It was a lot to bear, he thought. She, or any one of them, had no idea what Haswari's next move would be. They were playing with matches when a fire already existed. It couldn't get much worse. At least, Eric hoped, for everyone's sake, it wouldn't get any worse.

Caitlyn Todd reached for the phone. With a nod from Bradshaw, who stood close by, she cleared her throat and spoke.

She asked for Haswari, and she could hear the rustle and muffled voices on the other end. Finally, another voice spoke. The voice that Kate dreaded; the voice that made her face white, her heart beat faster, and her hands grow clammy. The voice that had haunted her, and would probably always haunt her.

Kate drew a deep breath. It was now or never. Here or nowhere. "Ari……I thought I'd be able to reach you here." She spoke calmly.

There was a long pause. Except for the unmistakable sound of his breathing, Kate would have thought that he had hung up on her. She looked quickly at Eric, who gave her a gleeful thumbs up sign. Good. She surmised two things—Ari had recognized her voice, and they had finally thrown him something he did not know.

"Caitlyn?" he sounded surprised, even as he tried to mask it.

"Yes, it's me." She had collected her wits now. Everything was happening according to plan.

Then Haswari laughed. "A trick of Gibbs, I know."

"Oh?"

"Come, now. You don't honestly expect me to fall for this, do you?"

"Is that what you want to believe? I guess you are missing out on a lot, then. But if that's what you want…."She let her voice trail off.

Another pause. Kate waited impatiently. Then the voice of Ari Haswari spoke slowly.

"Speak to me."

"Convinced its Gibbs, are you? Trust me, I wish Gibbs had something to do with this." She spoke the last words bitterly, which gained her a sharp look from Bradshaw. Not in the script. Yet, apparently, it had some affect on the terrorist.

"Do you……Caitlyn? Then tell me, how did you survive a bullet through your forehead? And why are you calling? Surely you couldn't want to negotiate anything?" he spoke his words smoothly, losing all surprise, in his usual fluent way.

"Well, actually….."

"Oh, Caitlyn! Do not mess with me this way!"

"I am not 'messing' with anybody. I have some things to say, and you have two choices as far as I'm concerned: Listen, or don't listen," Kate said, holding her breath as she waited for his response.

"I'm listening."

………………………..

"So, I want two teams on either side of here," and Kate pointed to two spots on the diagram.

"Putting your protection training to good use, Agent Todd?"

Kate looked at Bradshaw in the eye. "It's very different when you are planning it for yourself."

"Mmm. So tell me what else you got."

"Well, I've placed your team here, and I wouldn't feel too bad about getting this whole area covered. With who we are talking about, we can't afford any loopholes."

"You are doing a great job, Kate." Bradshaw's phone rang, and he fished it out of his pocket, looking at the caller ID.

"Boss?……okay, I'll get her on." He put his hand over the speaker, handed it to Kate, and whispered, "He wants to talk to you."

Kate took it, gave him a puzzled look, and held the phone to her ear.

"Fornell?"

"Special Agent Todd. Sorry I couldn't be there to oversee your work. Right now, I'm confined to bed. But then, thanks to your boss, I'm still alive.
"Are you checking up on me, Fornell? Because, I assure you, I have everything under control."

"No, I just wanted to give you some friendly advice," he spoke smoothly.

Kate grimaced. "And what would that be?"

"Don't mess this up, Todd. This is our only chance."

…………………………………………

Alexandria, Virginia. It was known more, perhaps, for its close proximity to the Pentagon, than its historical value. The Old Town of the city was right on the Virginia-Maryland border, and close enough to feel the Potomac Fever in the air of Washington, D.C.

And on the plus side, it had those little details that made it completely perfect on a day like this.

With the familiar smell of the Potomac River in her nostrils, Kate gazed into the waters. It comforted her, knowing what lay on these banks. Not too far up and offshore, the people of the Pentagon were working tirelessly. Across the river, the Anacostia Naval Station lay, where the Anacostia River flowed into the Potomac. And it was here where the Washington Navy Yard sat. It was hard to believe it was so close—that she was looking on the same waters she had seen every day for years. Just a short drive up 400 and across 395, and you were there. Yet it seemed unbearably far from he. And not just physically. It was all out of her reach.

A slight disturbance kept her from continuing her thoughts.

Kate saw a lone figure approaching her. She gave the signal to the teams that lie await, knowing they had started to advance. She was secure—she knew the plans, and no one, not even Ari Haswari, could break them.

So why was her gut telling her something was not going to go perfectly here?

The figure that approached her was not that of Haswari's. He was a younger man, really just a kid, and his eyes gleamed terribly. Kate shuddered. He, like so many others, was fooled into this. Some promise; some hope of better tomorrow. The Hitler's Nazi Youth of the day and age. This kid was excited and ready to do whatever he was asked.

"Agent Todd?" he spoke his words carefully, with a thick accent.

"You are not whom I was expecting," Kate claimed with a gracious smile.

The boy grinned. "He told me to tell you he is not so foolish as to come himself."

He must have then, like Kate, felt the presence of her men before they even appeared. She saw him stiffen, and reach into his thin jacket.

It must have been the fear of seeing so many men that drove the boy to fire at them. The bullet harmlessly hit a post, but not before the team had returned fire. They had better aim than the boy did, Kate knew, and she was sure that he was lying on the ground, the grin still etched on his face.

However, she had no time to look, as in the commotion, several more men appeared, firing at random. It was when she was grabbed from behind and dragged away that she realized her plans had one flaw: she hadn't accounted for this little distraction.

…………………………..

She struggled, but the grip was both firm and deadly. It wasn't until the pandemonium could not be heard that she was slammed against something hard, and finally could look at her captor face to face.

She half-expected to see Haswari. But upon looking, she realized the boy was right. Haswari was no fool—he was smart enough to stay away and send others to do the dirty work.

Kate met the man's eyes defiantly. He smirked at her, and she knew that his stop was just for him to mock her—to show her he was in power. He pushed her along again; and she heard more voices.

Kate knew now any hope of escape was gone. And when she was expertly bound in the back of a tinted windowed SUV, she knew she had failed again. And this time, there was no chance she would get away.

………………………………………

Kate didn't need to look out the window to know they were heading along I-95. There was no mistaking the slow pace, and the sound of the impatient horns, for any D.C. highway. And she knew 95 by heart; it started at the Maine-Canada border, and extended to Miami. Here, many towns were based around the highway—Baltimore, D.C., and the whole metro area. Not to mention the many places she had been at with NCIS: Quantico, Anacostia, Dahlgren, even Pax River and Annapolis required some I-95 travel to reach.

So it was no surprise when she saw the sign s for Woodbridge. Granted, she wouldn't have taken it for the home of an Al-Qaeda cell, but it was situated perfectly. Far enough out not to be noticed, but close to the hustle and bustle of the nation's capital and surrounding area.

Kate felt the car stop, and she was pushed roughly out. She glared indignantly at the man who had pushed her, but soon froze at a sound.

"I thought I told you to handle our Caitlyn carefully."

Now, she was finally face to face with Ari Haswari.