A/N: I'm posting this Christmas Day 2020. This is currently the last chapter I have finished because I've been focused on other stories and admittedly a little blocked lately. The ideas are there, but they're not flowing out my hands the way they have in the past. I've also been caught up in reading other Chuck authors. To all the Chuck readers and authors, I give you my deepest thanks, both for the wonderful stories you've created and also for the kind words of encouragement you've given me. They have both truly inspired me. 2020 has been a difficult year for pretty much the entire planet but just like the good times, the bad times don't last forever either. Things will get better.
"Chuck, what is it?" Sarah asked.
He pulled his phone out and silenced the alarm. "I only have that alarm for one thing," he looked at her pleadingly. "Please don't be mad at me."
"What's going on?" she asked, genuinely confused.
"That alarm means that someone is trying to access your un-redacted CIA personnel file," he said.
"Chuck, what the hell?"
"I didn't read anything, I promise!" He said quickly. "All I did was hack in and set a series of passive triggers on your file. If someone were looking at your redacted file, I'd have gotten a different kind of alert. This one specifically means that someone is trying to open the encrypted un-redacted version of your file."
"You hacked into the CIA and set an alert on my unredacted file? How the hell did you do that? When did you do that? Why didn't you tell me?" She wasn't sure if she should be mad or impressed.
"It was one of the first things I did when you asked me to join the Task Force and I figured it would be easier to ask forgiveness than permission," he said weakly.
"Chuck, I'm not mad that you did it, I'm just confused why you thought you couldn't tell me about it first? I mean right now I'm thinking it was a stellar idea."
"I guess I was a little afraid you'd question my motives, but really it was me questioning my own motives. I so badly wanted to look at your file and I thought you'd see that as my intent, rather than to protect you."
She looked at him and understood his perspective. "Chuck, the idea of you reading even my redacted file scares the crap out of me. I don't think either of us could handle you reading my un-redacted file. There is some seriously bad shit in there that up to now we have only talked about in an abstract way. That file has the cold hard facts. My insecurities about the shit I have done have not magically vanished in the weeks since our drive to Carmel, I'm just selfishly ignoring them because I want to be with you. If you read that file, I don't think we would be, and I wouldn't blame you in the least."
He pulled her back into their embrace. "For the time being let's just agree to disagree on all that. Right now, I think we need to focus on who's trying to access your file."
Sarah hugged him tight. "Chuck, just calling to ask would initiate questions about how we knew."
"We don't have to ask, I planted a sort of tiny Trojan horse to track anyone who tried," he said. "I can track it from my laptop."
That seemed completely impossible to her. "Chuck, I have more than a passing familiarity with CIA computer protocols and what you're talking about doesn't seem even remotely possible," she said, still hugging him tightly, a small part of her brain imagining the horror on his face as he read her file.
He laughed softly as he kissed her forehead. "Sarah, how much better are you at shooting guns than me?"
"Uh, seeing as how you've never shot a gun, a lot."
"Would you call me a boastful person?" he asked.
"No, not in any way shape or form. Even in regard to things you have every right to be boastful of." She put a certain tone in her voice and squeezed him a little tighter.
He blushed but didn't otherwise acknowledge her meaning. "Ok, so I'm going to say something very boastful right now. I'm a better hacker than you are a marksman."
Sarah couldn't help but giggle as she pulled out of the hug. "Ok, Anne Oakley, show me the goods."
He smiled and cracked his knuckles as he sat down and pulled his laptop over to him. She caught the briefest glance of a picture on his screen before it suddenly changed. He opened several similar command windows and somehow seemed to be typing commands in all of them at once. "How are you typing in all of those command windows at once?" She asked.
"They aren't command windows, they're Linux emulator windows. Each one of those windows is its own separate virtual computer. And what you're looking at isn't even my laptop. It's a Windows 7 guest terminal in the VIP lounge of Delta Airlines at O'Hare airport that I've taken control of remotely," he stopped what he was doing then entered a specific key combination and Sarah saw the screen change to a normal Mac desktop with a picture of them kissing on the dance floor at the fish fry two weeks earlier. "This is my laptop."
"I like that picture," she said, squeezing his shoulder.
He smiled and his fingers started flying across the keyboard again as the previous screen appeared. "Joe sent it to me. Anyway, when I connect to the terminal at O'Hare remotely, it causes the screen at that end to blank out and people just think it's off or broken and move on to the next one. From this Windows 7 terminal I use the emulators to route my commands through several satellites from a couple of different cellular carriers. What I'm typing is actually a series of scripts that I've written for each emulator. The scripts then run the appropriate commands in that emulator, so it looks like I'm typing commands in all of them at once, but it's just the scripted process you're seeing. So I'm not actually hacking in from one terminal. I'm using the emulators to simultaneously create multiple connections and I split my commands between them. The packets that contain the commands are coded to arrange themselves in the correct order when they arrive at the actual target of my hack.
"Think of it like a long train but each individual train-car takes its own path and then when they get to where they're going, they organize themselves in order. And the train-cars are all coming from different places all over the world. It slows things down a little, but it's basically untraceable because you can't see the source of the hack. The packets show up separately from all over and wait for each other at the last router hop in the chain. It almost looks like the hack originates from that router. I've tried to break it and I can't. But here's the thing; even if they did trace back to my source, they'd trace back to the Windows 7 PC at O'Hare. If I thought for a moment they were on to me, I have a program I can activate that will brick that PC in about thirty seconds."
Sarah shook her head, completely mind blown. "Chuck, this is staggering."
He chuckled. "Baby, you ain't seen nothing yet. This is just so we can get to a point where we put our ear to the door, so to speak," his fingers never seemed to slow down as he talked. "This just gets us to the firewalls in a hidden manner so we can start to probe for cracks and be safe from detection. Depending on the strength of the system, It can take some time to find a weakness that gives us the ability to start running simple commands on the other side of the firewall, then we gradually build up to more sophisticated commands. Sometimes I attack the firewall directly rather than try to sneak past it. It sort of depends."
"Ok, so all this just to get to the firewall. How in the hell do you get past CIA firewalls?" she asked, still completely bewildered.
"On a scale of difficulty, I give the CIA a seven."
"Well that's a little terrifying," she said.
"Uh, yeah. I mean, it's a seven for me. For other hackers… I don't know, let's just say, my kung-fu is strong!" He gave her a grin, but she didn't get the reference and just gave him an arched eyebrow in return. "So, uh, anyway, since I was here last time, I sort of left some shortcuts to get back in. Not true back-doors because those are too easy to detect in a random security sweep."
She continued to watch him until a familiar screen came up. A terminal login for the CIA mainframe. "Voila," he said, a little smugly.
"Jesus Christ, Chuck. Everything I know about CIA security protocols tells me that this is impossible. You're sitting in front of a Mac laptop connected to the WiFi of a freaking Buy More. Like you're not a hacker, you're a fucking magician."
He chuckled wryly. "I won't bore you with the details, but I'm nowhere near the Buy More WiFi. Nothing about how I'm connected to the internet right now could be traced to this physical location. So anyway, getting to the point to get a terminal login prompt can be difficult, but again, where do we go from here?" He asked. "All that work to get here, seems like a lot of effort just to be stopped by a simple username and password prompt."
"Yeah," she agreed.
He hit one key and the login boxes auto populated and she was looking at a logged in terminal connection to the CIA mainframe.
"And voila again," he said as he looked up at her with a mischievous grin.
"Chuck, if this is some elaborate ruse, I will shoot you with my gun. I have one you know," she said with a deadpan expression.
He laughed and stood up. "Ok, Agent McSkeptical. You tell me, it's a system you're familiar with, browse around. You might have a little more access than you're used to."
Sarah sat down and started browsing through the system, starting with relatively low security mission logs. "How aggressive can I be here? Will I set off any alarms?"
"If any files have been tagged the way I had yours tagged then maybe, but my experience is that once you're in at this level, they sort of expect you to belong here. That's kind of the point of hacking, to get full access. So, go nuts. Even if what you're doing sets off alarms, you're logged in from an effectively anonymous terminal. That connection will look like it came from the firewall itself."
She was still half thinking this was a practical joke. He couldn't possibly have just hacked into the CIA mainframe in less than a half hour. She was able to pull up her mission logs from several missions and found one in particular, at which point she knew it wasn't a ruse. She was looking at the mission log from one of her assignments with the CAT Squad a couple of years earlier. It was her log, so she knew it was real. She felt goosebumps run down her arms and she was suddenly in awe of Chuck's skills. She stood up so quickly that he jumped a little. She grabbed his ridiculous grey polyester tie in her hand and pulled him to her.
"This is the hottest thing I have ever seen in my life," she said as she pulled him in and kissed him with every bit of her animal desire. She gave it a solid ten count before she pulled away, just as his hands started to slip down her back and under the waistband of her slacks. She spent a moment catching her breath and saw that his eyes were hooded and cloudy.
"Chuck!" she said, giving him a little shake.
He was breathing hard as he shook his head. "Yeah, Chuck's here! Yowza!" He grinned at her.
"Now that we're in, how does the little Trojan horse you created work?" Keep it together Walker, you're an agent of the CIA heading up a fucking Executive Order Task Force. Not a hormonal goddamn teenager.
Chuck looked at her longingly and she almost gave in but held strong. She'd endured torture that wasn't this bad. He slowly sat down in the chair and she saw him make an adjustment as he sat that caused her groan internally as she visualized what he was dealing with.
"So, uh, yeah. Uh, the Trojan," Chuck shook his head again. "Before we look at that, I need to check something first."
"What do you need to check?"
"The status of your file." Sarah watched him open several separate screens and documents.
"Damn. I was afraid of that. Whoever it was, they were able to override the copy lock and made a copy of your file. It's still encrypted, but they have it now and can attack the encryption."
"Can you tell who 'they' are?" she asked.
Chuck nodded. "Let's find out. So, all terminals on a network have to continuously announce their presence, even the one we're using. It's a particular protocol that makes that announcement. When they tried to decrypt your file, my program piggybacked on their protocol stack and made an adjustment to that announcement on their terminal so that it includes some additional information. That additional information is stored in a log file."
His fingers zipped across the keyboard again and less than a minute later a simple text file appeared on the screen. "This log file has the MAC address of that terminal. That's a hardware address coded on the physical network chip at the manufacturer. It's possible to mask or hide it but impossible to change it. You can see here it's not even being masked. Whoever it is either doesn't know how, isn't aware of the risk or just doesn't care."
He brought up what looked like several command windows again and started running separate commands in each of them. "They aren't making any effort to hide themselves at all. The same internal IP address has been assigned to that MAC address for the last seven days and it's been communicating on the network non-stop, which means it hasn't been turned off in that timeframe."
She saw him login to another system via a terminal. "This is one of the many network switches in the data center. I'm tracing the IP address back to a specific port on a specific switch. I should be able to find a network diagram that tells me what physical office is connected to that port. This might take a minute, there's a lot of switches to trace it through."
She watched as he worked and still couldn't believe what he'd done was real. After several minutes she saw him browsing through a directory structure looking for something, mumbling to himself as he went, "Come on, I know you're in here somewhere you little fucker, you can't hide from the Piranha," she heard him mutter quietly and had to stifle a giggle.
After another minute he gave a victory shout and Sarah saw a huge network diagram come up. It looked incredibly complex, but he zoomed in and found what he was looking for then referenced another document. He looked up at her and grinned. "I got 'em. The terminal that tried to access your file is in office 5E951 at the Pentagon. That office is assigned to Brigadier General Diane Beckman."
Sarah pulled up the other chair and sat down slowly. She forced herself to slow down her thought processes and not jump to any conclusions. She realized Chuck had said her name.
"Yeah, Chuck?" she asked distractedly.
"Who is General Beckman?"
"Oh, just the Director of the NSA," She said quietly.
Chuck looked at her with wide eyes for several long seconds. "Why would the director of the NSA be trying to access your unredacted personnel file?" he asked.
Instead of answering, Sarah pulled out her phone and called her former boss. After several rings she heard him answer. "Graham, secure."
"Walker, secure," she replied.
"Agent Walker, I find it very interesting that you're calling me seeing as how I just received an alert that someone overrode the lockout on your personnel file and was able to make a copy. I have to assume you received a similar alert."
"I did, Sir. Given the nature of my new role, I wanted to be alerted if someone took an interest in me, so I had my technical team tag my file," Sarah said evenly. "Did your alert tell you who copied the file?"
"No, unfortunately the alert wasn't able to capture that information."
"Sir, we were able to trace the connection back to General Beckman's terminal in her office at the Pentagon," she said. "Do you know of any reason why she would want or need access to my file?"
"At some point I'd like a write up from your technical team on how they were able to capture that information," Graham said, sounding impressed. "To answer your question, no, I don't know why she would be interested in you. I suppose the argument could be made that she has the clearance to look, but given what we're facing, the timing is suspicious, as is the fact that she did this without talking to me first. Under normal circumstances, I would call her and demand to know what she's doing poking around in my domain. I thought she and I had a solid relationship built on mutual respect. It's out of character for her to do something like this."
"I can't imagine it will take her long to decrypt the file, given her resources. Sir, I have to ask. Is there anything in there relating to the recent events with my former handler?" Sarah asked.
"No, of course not. According to your file you took a leave of absence about three months ago and are now looking at possibly transferring to the FBI. I updated it with that information the day you accepted your current role." Graham explained. "But there are a lot of references to your former handler, obviously. Sarah, I can't imagine that this group has managed to infiltrate this deep into our intelligence organization. I've known Diane Beckman for a long time. She has an impeccable record."
"Sir, I don't disagree with you but is it a risk we can take? I don't have to tell you how much worse this scenario just got if the Director of the NSA is compromised." The silence on the other end of the line meant he understood completely.
He eventually spoke up. "I agree with you," he sighed. "How do you want to proceed?"
Sarah thought about it for a moment. She had significant investigative authority and thought this was an appropriate time to exercise some of it. "Sir, given her position, I don't see how we could allow her to continue in that post if there's even a hint that she's working against our interests. She has access to basically everything. I have to inform you, utilizing my E.O. authority, I'm going to initiate a covert, yet extensive forensic analysis of all her computer and communication systems, both related to her primary role as Director of the NSA as well as any personal systems she might have. If I find anything that suggests she might be involved in the previously uncovered conspiracy, then I will have no choice but to take steps to arrest her subject to Title 8, section 805 of House Resolution 3162," she said, her tone grave. She saw Chuck's eyes go wide at this and he opened his mouth like he had a question.
"Sir, hold on one moment please," Sarah said, then hit the mute button on her phone. "What is it Chuck?"
"I know this isn't my area of expertise, but what if Director Graham were to call General Beckman and demand answers right now? It might throw her off balance. And if that's what Graham would do anyway, it makes sense for him to stick to his normal procedures. He could conference you in without her knowing."
Sarah thought about it for a moment and couldn't see any downsides. She unmuted the phone and asked, "Sir, do you see any reason why you can't call General Beckman right now under the guise of your alert and demand clarification, with me conferenced in but my presence on the line not mentioned?"
Director Graham was quiet for several long seconds. She could almost hear him considering the ramifications and knew that he would want answers as much as she did. "I can't think of any reason why I shouldn't just call her and ask point-blank," he said. "Hang on one moment."
Sarah heard several clicks on the line, then heard the ring that signified an encrypted call. It only rang twice.
"General Beckman, secure," a feminine voice said.
"Graham, secure."
"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised at your call, Langston," the General said.
"Good evening, Diane. I'm just wondering why you didn't call me before you went digging around in my systems. It's extremely rude if nothing else and not something I think you would tolerate from me, Diane," the Director said, firmly but politely.
Sarah heard the General sigh. "No, you're absolutely correct Langston. I apologize, but you should know that it's not something I undertook lightly. I had an agent go dark a few days ago. It seems he had a failsafe setup that would send me a file if he didn't check in each day. I received the file yesterday and now I have to assume he's been either captured or killed by those he was investigating."
"Who was the agent and what information did the file he sent you contain?" Graham asked.
"His name is Thomas Forsythe. The file he sent me was a hard copy of everything he had discovered pertaining to several NSA operatives who were working for another clandestine organization. The file also implicated several CIA agents including one of the senior handlers on the Operations side, Kieran Ryker. The file included the names of the five senior agents he managed so I copied the files for all of them. None of the agents he managed are implicated, but I needed to start somewhere."
"Diane, what else does the file say about this organization?" the Director asked.
"Langston, I'm reluctant to talk about this over the phone, even on a secure connection," she answered.
"Just tell me the codename of the group if you please, Diane," he asked politely.
The line was silent for several seconds until the General finally spoke. "There was only one reference that Agent Forsythe thought might be for the group itself. He thought it was codename Fulcrum."
"I'm sorry about this, Diane, but you've stumbled onto something here. Agent Walker, I believe that's your cue," Director Graham said.
Sarah announced her presence on the line. "General Beckman, my name is Sarah Walker. Based on my authority under Executive Order 273455, you are hereby ordered to immediately turn over all materials sent to you by Agent Forsythe, as well as his full and unredacted personnel file," Sarah said, using the most authoritative voice she could muster. She saw Chuck close his eyes as a shiver passed through him and she fought the urge to lean over and kiss him. She heard some spluttering from the General as she struggled to process what Sarah had said.
After a few moments, the General seemed to gather her thoughts. "Graham, what the hell is going on here?" she asked, sounding mostly angry, but Sarah thought she detected a thread of fear in her question as well.
"As I said, Diane. You've stumbled onto something. I can only read you in on this with either the President's or Agent Walker's permission," he said plainly.
"I don't understand. Agent Walker is one of your senior field agents. I'm familiar with her reputation."
Sarah jumped in. "General Beckman, you mentioned previously not wanting to talk, even on a secured line. We agree with you. Would you be willing to come to Los Angeles with Director Graham later this week?"
"I guess I don't have a lot of choices, under the circumstances," she said after a few moments. "I will bring the items you requested with me."
"Thank you, General. I look forward to meeting you in person. Director Graham, I'll follow up with you soon with a status report."
"Thank you, Agent Walker," the Director said.
"That may have been the craziest conversation I've ever heard," Chuck said after she hung up. "I know you cited the Patriot Act but I don't know what specific section you referenced."
"It's the section that discusses specifics on the fight against terrorism. Section 805 talks about material support for terrorists."
"That makes sense," he said.
"Chuck, how difficult would it be for you to target General Beckman and gain access to all her electronic systems? Find out if there is anything linking her to the conspiracy?"
Chuck smiled. "Not really all that difficult at all to target her office systems, now that she's been tagged by my little Trojan horse. But her phones and personal systems will be more difficult, obviously."
"Ok, do what you can. I know you've got your hands full with all of this," Sarah motioned towards the racks of computers. "But obviously, this is a high priority too."
"It's not a problem. Once I get to the point of configuring the systems, a lot of it is hurry up and wait. I can multitask when I get to that point," he said.
Sarah looked at the server racks Chuck had been working on. "If nothing else, it confirms that I made the right choice for us to have our own independent systems," she said.
"The fear is that this General is associated with the same group as your former handler?" Chuck asked.
"Yes. That would be like an almost worst-case scenario for us. The only worse case would be Graham or the President or Coburn being part of it, but if that were the case, I'd likely already be dead." The matter-of-fact way she said it caused Chuck's eyes to go wide and his face to go pale.
"Jesus, Sarah!"
She just shrugged and nodded. Chuck ran his hand through his hair and Sarah thought he looked genuinely afraid for the first time since it had all started. She was beginning to realize how selfish it was of her to bring him in on this, especially knowing he wasn't trained for any of it.
"Chuck, I'm so sorry to have gotten you involved in all of this. It was incredibly selfish of me. I understand if you want out," she said quietly.
"What?" He looked a little hurt by her words. "How could you say that?"
"Chuck, I can tell you afraid of what's happened. You're not trained for this, it's only natural for you to be afraid of what's on the line here. This is life or death, and it wasn't fair of me to bring you into this."
"Sarah, you're right, I'm terrified, but not for myself," he said quietly as tears formed in his eyes. "I'm terrified of losing you."
She understood then what his expression of fear had meant as the thought of losing him made her heart skip painfully in her chest and her breathing labored. She stood up and pulled him into a fierce embrace, hugging him tightly. "I'll be here as long as you'll have me, Chuck. Let's go home. You can finish this tomorrow."
He embraced her for several long seconds then pulled back and gave her a soft but heartfelt kiss. "No, I'm going to finish this tonight. It's more important than ever that we don't waste any time," he said. "You can stay if you like, but you might be a little bored watching me put computers together."
She smiled at him. "I'll stay. Maybe I can help, and you can teach me some things."
With his direction, she was able to help and together they had the primary server systems built and ready to configure just before midnight. Chuck rubbed his eyes, obviously exhausted as they were putting things away and cleaning up. After he locked up and they were leaving the store, he said suddenly, "I'm going to stop by the Audi dealership tomorrow morning and buy that car."
Sarah gave him a confused look. "Are you sure? It is a pretty expensive car."
"I did some math earlier and realized that with the Carmichael Consulting front for the task force, combined with my potential income from Nerd Herd Cubed, I could be making as much as a million dollars a year. That on top of the Stanford settlement… I love that car. It's awesome and I've got more than enough money to buy it. I realized tonight that life's too damn short and uncertain to sweat the small stuff."
She grinned at him. "I couldn't have said it better myself, Chuck."
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Tuesday morning Sarah found herself once again sipping coffee on their balcony, pondering the day ahead as Chuck leaned back in the lounge chair next to her. She angled her chair so she could prop her bare feet in his lap and he idly starting rubbing them with his free hand.
"I'm so digging this new routine we've got going on here. Coffee on the balcony first thing in the morning. Ahh, this is so nice," Chuck said with a sigh as he closed his eyes. He set his coffee down and started kneading her feet in earnest as she bit her lip to hold back the moans of pleasure at the sensation
Sarah smiled as she looked at him, which she found she often did when she looked at him. She wanted nothing more than to spend the morning on their balcony, letting him rub her feet while they enjoyed the morning breeze. But important tasks beckoned. She sighed as she reluctantly spoke up, saying, "The other routine for us has been to ask about plans for the day. I assume you're going to the Buy More today to finish building the servers?"
He opened his eyes and looked over at her. "Well first I'm going to the Audi dealer to buy my new car, but then, yeah, I'll head to the Buy More. We were able to get the hardware done last night, now comes the software piece, which will be fairly involved. I should have the foundation of the systems I want done today, if I can avoid any Nerd Herd drama. They've actually been working more diligently the past few days because of all my corporate meetings. And we've got our little soiree with them here tonight. I told everyone to be here around six. What about you?"
"Well, yesterday afternoon I was able to get in touch with a civilian military contractor we might use as guards for our Gitmo friends when we relocate them. Bryce and I have a meeting with the owner of the company this morning at her office downtown. Carina and I are going to try and set up some interviews with the Vice detectives who've applied to be part of the Task Force. I was able to arrange for the purchase of the strip mall yesterday and they gave me all the master keys so I have to get with Joel Stanton and work out how they're going to get access to get their men and materials into the basement so they can start work on the build out of Castle. I should be home by six tonight to be here while you meet with your future employees," Sarah smiled at the last part.
"That means you've got a pretty full day as well. That's a bummer, because I was sort of hoping we could get lunch together if you were anywhere near Burbank this afternoon," Chuck gave her a pouting lip that she thought might be the cutest thing she'd ever seen as she laughed at him.
"Sorry, Chuck," She said as she giggled. She took on a more serious tone after a few moments. "I'm afraid it's only going to get worse from here. Especially once we bring on these detectives and start ramping up our investigations."
"Hey, if this is none of my business just tell me, but I was curious about Rebecca Wright and how she's doing. You mentioned the strip mall and it reminded me."
"No, it's fine, you can ask. The situation with Rebecca and the SSMC was really messed up. She was basically seduced by a sociopath. She's a young woman, probably a little lonely because her best friend moved away, and she'd been wrapped up in her surrogate father's death and dealing with watching her inheritance implode. She was in a vulnerable state and Jimmy Thatcher was able to capitalize on that, manipulate her to the point that he had her under his thumb. I think he would have eventually started using her to launder money through her properties. I'm embarrassed to admit that when we first got there, for a short while I thought she might be working with the gang, but she was there under duress. She genuinely didn't know how to get away, Thatcher had such tight control over her."
Chuck looked genuinely angry, an expression that she wasn't used to seeing on him. "God, I can't tell you how happy I am we're sending those guys away. I remember hearing about gang activity on the news or reading about it online, but I was always sort of removed from the reality of it, living in my own little suburban bubble. But to see those women on the cameras as the police were taking them away," he paused as he shook his head and looked at her. "I've never felt that kind of anger before, Sarah. I wanted those guys to feel the pain they put those women through."
Sarah looked at him with compassion in her eyes. "I know how you feel, Chuck. Sometimes I forget, having been dealing with some of the worst bad guys the world has to offer for the last 10 years. They do real harm to innocent people and they profit from it. You reminded me that there are still good people out there. Good people who deserve to be protected from guys like Thatcher, and from guys even worse than him. I still don't want to go back to my old job, but I'm not as upset about how this task force thing fell in my lap as I was the first couple of days. And another thing I've been meaning to tell you and I'm sorry it's taken me this long; you did an amazing job the other night. You were instrumental in the take down of the SSMC, Chuck. We couldn't have done that without you."
Chuck blushed from the praise. "All I did was sit in the van; you guys did the heavy lifting. But thank you for your recognition. Carina and Bryce gave me a pat on the back as well, when they came over Saturday night. I have to say, I'm proud to be a part of any team that includes you guys."
Sarah took his hand and kissed it. "We're lucky to have you, Chuck," she said softly. "After what you showed me last night, it's no wonder the NSA was after you six years ago. I never would have believed what you did was possible and you made it look easy. Hey, speaking of which, we still need to get your amnesty papers drawn up. Graham will be in town later this week. He'll need to sign them."
He nodded and said, "Yeah, I've been meaning to do that. I'll call the lawyer who helped me with the Buy More contract."
"Remember not to talk about it over the phone though," Sarah said.
"Got it," he looked at his watch and groaned. "It's almost 8. I guess we should get things moving."
They stood up together and she leaned up to kiss him. "The jury is still out on the whole death by horniness thing," she whispered in his ear, nipping his earlobe as he shivered.
"Oh, my God, it won't be if you keep doing stuff like that!" he moaned.
She grinned at him and said, "I don't want you to forget what you're missing."
"Not much chance of that," he whispered, leaning down to kiss her again.
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Sarah and Bryce stood up from the comfortable leather chairs in the lobby of Verbanski Corporation's office in downtown Los Angeles as the owner of the company approached them. She was a strikingly attractive woman in her early forties with raven black hair and a pale but pristine complexion.
"Thank you for meeting with us on such short notice, Ms. Verbanski," Sarah said as she shook the older woman's hand. She hoped she still looked as good in her forties as Gertrude Verbanski did. "I'm Special Agent Sarah Walker and this is my colleague, Special Agent Bryce Larkin."
"Ms. Verbanski," Bryce said politely, shaking her hand.
"It's very nice to meet you both. I'm happy to take time for the FBI," she said.
"You have an impressive facility here," Sarah said. Her research on Verbanski Corporation showed that they had surpassed the two-billion-dollar mark in contracts with the Department of Defense and the State Department the previous year and were on target for even more in the current year.
"I'd be happy to give you the dime tour," she said as she motioned for them to follow her. She walked them around the various training grounds that had been setup in the low-rise building. One particular section had dozens of personnel standing in rows working through various advanced Tai Chi forms, all of them synchronized in their movements. It was visually impressive.
"A large percentage of our recruits come from Special Forces. I take pride in reinvesting in the people that work for me, which explains our expansive training facilities here. This is our headquarters, but we have another office in DC and one in North Africa that are almost as extensive. I've found that investing in our training programs allows us to attract the best talent. We stopped actually recruiting for security forces last year. Once word gets out that we have an opening, the resumes come pouring in. But in addition to providing security forces, we also provide cybersecurity, engineering and construction for military and civilian contracts all over the world, although we currently have a focus in the Middle East, for obvious reasons, as well as Central and North Africa."
"This all looks great. We actually have a special project that I think you can help us with. Do you have a secure conference room where we can go to discuss the details?"
"Certainly. Actually, all our corporate meeting rooms are secure faraday cages that are swept randomly every day. Follow me."
Once they were settled in the conference room, Ms. Verbanski spoke first. "So, please tell me, how can Verbanski Corporation help the FBI today?" she asked.
"Before we get into that, Ms. Verbanski, I need you to sign this National Security Non-Disclosure form. What I'm about to reveal is code-word secret that only a handful of people have been read-in on. I'm sure you're familiar with the language," Sarah said as she pulled a leather bound folder out of her bag, removed a slip of paper and slid it across the desk to the other woman. She read it quickly then signed it with a flourish.
Sarah took the document back and slipped it back into another folder in her bag. The leather-bound folder was actually her signed Executive Order, which she slid across to Ms. Verbanski.
"This is an Executive Order, signed last week authorizing the formation of a special investigative Task Force, led by myself. We are performing a closed book investigation into multiple intelligence agencies, including the CIA and the NSA. As part of this investigation, we have detained 21 CIA field agents and analysts along with 12 former CIA contractors in an ongoing conspiracy," Sarah explained.
Ms. Verbanski slid the folder back across the desk. "I'm impressed, Agent Walker. Unless you are one of those genetically blessed individuals who are much older than you appear, your experience belies your age. You would seem to be at least a decade too young to be assigned to such an important task."
Sarah smiled and said, "You aren't the first person to make that observation and almost certainly will not be the last. And yes, I am quite young for the role, but I have a unique qualification for this particular task force."
The older woman nodded. "So how can we help?" she asked plainly.
"There is a detainment facility just outside of Helendale, a couple hour drive from here-"
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but are you referring to the Desert View facility?" she asked.
"Yes actually. Are you familiar with it?"
Ms. Verbanski nodded and said, "Yes, I've been considering buying it. We need a remote location for fast infil-exfil troop exercises. We're getting requests for more of those kinds of operations and I'm currently leasing space at Vandenberg, but with security there, it's not ideal."
"Well, I'm hoping I can convince you to use it for another purpose. The thirty-three individuals I mentioned are currently being held at Gitmo. We want to contract with you to lease the Desert View facility as their new holding facility, using your people as guards," Sarah said.
Ms. Verbanski paused for a moment as her eyebrows furrowed. "Not to tell you your business, but are you sure you want to bring them onto US soil?"
Sarah nodded. "We actually have a plan that we hope will trick them into thinking they're in the Afghani desert," she said. "Since it was his plan to begin with, I'll let Agent Larkin lay it out for you."
Bryce sat forward in his chair. "The general idea is that we control their access to external information by outfitting them with sleep masks as well as hoods. The hoods will have a mixture of pungent essential oils on them to mask outside smells. We begin the relocation operation very late, don't let them sleep much in transit, and keep them in the air long enough to make it seem like we're on the other side of the world. We bring them to Vandenberg, transfer them to a DC-3 then fly them to a dirt strip we'll have to prep out in the Mojave near the facility. From there we bus them to the facility on a military grade prisoner transport bus. Once we get them inside the facility, we hit them with a special tranquilizer and when they wake up, they won't know up from down. We'll have a bullhorn out in the desert playing a call to prayer at appropriate times of day to enhance the illusion."
Ms. Verbanski nodded, seemingly impressed. "That is a pretty bold plan. On the surface I don't see any flaws. Verbanski Corporation actually owns a couple of DC-3s. If we come to an agreement, I can include one of them to help you with this little project," she paused for a moment as she looked at Sarah intently. "I have to ask, what is your intention as it pertains to interrogation of these individuals?"
Sarah took on a grim demeanor. "What would your response be if I told you no holds barred? That the threat they represent is so great that any and all methods were on the table?"
"Then I would tell you that it has been very nice to meet you and I wish you the very best in your endeavors, but I don't think we are the outfit for you," Ms. Verbanski replied honestly.
"I'm glad to hear that," Sarah said. "Other than the psychological manipulation we'd be perpetrating against them with this geographical ruse, I do not intend to subject them to anything other than what is standard under CIA guidelines. That mostly entails limited sleep deprivation combined perhaps with some chemical persuasion, but I draw the line at any kind of physical torture. That includes water boarding, controlled electrocution, beatings and the like. As I'm sure you know, those methods are generally unreliable anyway. Eventually people tell you whatever they think you want to hear just to make the pain stop."
"That is my experience as well, but I'm more concerned about my people. I invest huge amounts of money into all of my field personnel and while all of them are hardened combat veterans, few of them would tolerate being asked to perform those kinds of tasks. Some of them I'm sure could do it, would do it if asked, but I've never asked and I've no intention of ever doing so. And I would fire and have prosecuted anyone under my employ who undertook these types of actions on their own."
"I agree," Sarah said plainly. "As it pertains to the personnel we use for this project, I'm not looking for mindless drones who obey every order without question, but I am looking for those who will understand that these people represent a massive threat to the security of the United States, and treat them accordingly. Each one of these individuals has received extensive training in psy-ops, and will do everything they can to manipulate their guards."
Ms. Verbanski actually smiled. "My response to that is, let them try. For an operation like this, we would only use former special forces personnel who also received fairly comprehensive psy-ops training from their time in the military, and which I have only expanded upon as part of the training I provide. And keep in mind that my personnel would also each have at least two active duty tours of combat behind them. I think they could handle your rogue spies on just about any level," she spoke with no small amount of personal pride regarding her people.
"I'm very glad to hear that," Sarah said. "Based on the information I've provided to you so far, do you see any roadblocks that would prevent us from coming to an arrangement?"
Ms. Verbanski shook her head briefly and said, "Not at all. How many people do you anticipate needing?"
"Well, you tell me," Sarah replied. "Since you've considered buying it, I have to assume you're at least passingly familiar with the facility itself. It will need some security enhancements, and as I understand it, it is equipped to house nearly 250 inmates at maximum capacity, whereas we need to detain less than fifty."
"Well, when you factor in the guard towers, I'd say you're looking at a minimum of forty men spread out across two twenty man teams working 12 hour rotations."
"That's actually lower than our estimate but I would defer to your expertise on this one," Sarah said.
"That's just the guards. I'm assuming you'd also want us to provide some support staff as well. Cooks, maintenance, janitorial, et cetera. They would also be former military but not necessarily special forces. Figure a staff of fifty to cover everything."
"That falls in line with what we were thinking."
"So, we have a personnel count of fifty men, plus the facility costs, plus the engineering and construction costs for the guard towers and protected approach. You mentioned that you only want military grade vehicles used around the facility which means we're going to need not only the vehicles themselves, but also a staging area nearby. And you want us to lease the facility on your behalf."
"Yes, that's correct. You leasing the space provides a lot of operational cover. Since it's a training facility for your company and since you provide security for DoD contracts, you have the authority to claim National Security exemption from state inspections," Sarah explained.
"That is correct and we've had to exercise that authority in the past with the State of California, so we're familiar with that particular battle," she admitted. "What's your timeline for this operation?"
"Honestly, ASAP. Yesterday ASAP. We're already behind in our investigations and I need to show not just some forward progress, but serious momentum in my first status meeting with the President at the end of the month," Sarah said. There was no such meeting yet scheduled, but she knew it was coming eventually.
Ms. Verbanski pulled a small tablet computer out of the planner she'd been carrying and started plugging in numbers to a calculator app. After a couple of minutes she looked up and said, "We'll obviously need to fine tune all the details, but I believe I can provide everything you've asked for, including the DC-3 and site prep for the landing zone in the Mojave, military vehicles, the facility itself, the construction and engineering, and personnel for eleven million dollars per year plus a one million dollar up-front retainer to get things started. I would need a one year commitment with automatic one-year contract renewals."
Sarah thought about it for a few moments, then said, "Give us a 3-month contract buy-out option after the first year.."
Ms. Verbanski smiled. "I think that's reasonable."
"Ms. Verbanski, you have a deal. How quickly can you have the contracts drawn up?" Sarah asked.
"For the most part, they already are," Ms. Verbanski replied. "We've written a lot of contracts for the DoD and other government agencies, I'm sure we can find one that's close to what we've discussed and modify it appropriately. It will be much faster than writing a new one from scratch. I should have something ready for you to sign by the end of the day. In a show of good faith, I'll get started on the leasing arrangement with the facility today as well as start lining up some of the other items on the list."
Sarah stood up and held out her hand. "Ms. Verbanski, thank you for taking the time to meet with us today. I look forward to working with you," she said honestly.
"The pleasure is mine. It sounds like you're doing some important work. I'm happy we're in a position to help you," Ms. Verbanski replied. She shook hands with Bryce as well, then said, "I'll show you out."
Bryce was driving the FBI Crown Victoria with Sarah in the passenger seat. As they were pulling out of the parking garage next to Verbanski Corporation, she asked, "Any thoughts on the meeting?"
Bryce glanced at her for a moment before speaking. "Other than I'm impressed?" he asked with a chuckle. "I mean, she's like an older version of you. It's not surprising you guys would make a connection. I could tell she was impressed by you as well. I'm surprised she was willing to close a deal so quickly, but then how often do eleven million-dollar contracts just walk through the front door?"
"For her? Probably more often than you would think. They're on track to close more than two billion in Federal contracts this year and several hundred million in civilian contracts. She's got a solid reputation in an industry rife with corruption. She started the company herself and is the sole owner. You're right that she's impressive. Comparing me to her is a compliment, so thank you for that," Sarah said.
Bryce shrugged. "You're welcome, but I'm just calling it like I see it," he said. "Does it interest you? Her line of work? Starting and running what amounts to a mercenary army? Before you got pulled into this Task Force, did you know what was coming next?"
Sarah chuckled. "No, I had no idea what was next, and I was just getting used to that idea when Coburn dropped this on me. Graham made me take a six-month leave before he'd approve my resignation. Coburn caught me in the lobby at the Federal building the day Chuck had his Stanford hearing and asked me to meet with him the next Monday morning. The plan had been to ask me to help here and there. Just keep me involved in law enforcement even if only peripherally. Graham didn't want to let me leave without letting me know I had options. Then the shit hit the fan when those contractors flipped," she laughed for a moment, remembering her first meeting with Coburn. "God, I was so angry when Coburn told me that Graham wanted me to head up the task force. In retrospect, I'm a little embarrassed at my outburst. I screamed at Coburn and actually kicked a chair. Almost broke the heel on my shoe."
Bryce seemed a little shocked at that. "You screamed at the SAC of the LA FBI and kicked a chair?" he asked.
Sarah laughed again. "Yeah. It didn't faze Coburn in the least. My rage just rolled right off of him. Just as I was starting to calm down, he told me that funding for the Task Force was going to come from Project Intersect, I lost it. I was furious. I just walked out of the meeting. Of course, I had to agree at that point."
"Yeah, I've been meaning to ask you about that. Project Intersect is like a bad penny. It just keeps turning up, especially considering Chuck's involvement," Bryce said.
"It's one of the reasons I agreed to take on the role. Well, agreed so quickly anyway. I told Coburn I'd do it by the time we got to the elevators, him dogging my heels after I stormed out of the meeting. I sort of already knew I'd agree to the role and figured it would be an opportunity to see what all the fuss was about with this encoded images thing."
Bryce gave her a meaningful look and said, "I know Graham is coming to town to read you in on this, so I feel ok telling you. They're close, Sarah. The Intersect computer has been built and they're ready for human trials. They're not sure what to expect though, which is why they haven't moved forward yet. Some of the scientists on the project are afraid it will kill whoever they try to upload the data into. Cerebral hemorrhage was a phrase I heard mentioned often."
This information stunned Sarah as it was a direct contradiction of what Graham had told her previously. "You're telling me that they've built a computer that can, in theory, upload information into the human brain?" she asked.
Bryce nodded. "Massive amounts of information. Imagine having a huge subset of both the CIA and NSA intelligence databases in your head and the ability to access it in real-time, parse information and make intuitive connections about threats. Not just that but having dossiers of all the bad guys in the world, ready and waiting in your head for when you need it, accessible in a flash." Bryce snapped his fingers as he said 'flash' to emphasize his point.
Sarah wasn't sure how to respond to what he was describing. It felt a little how she thought describing an airplane would seem to someone from the 18th century. "Chuck said that it had incredible potential as a teaching tool. For example, giving someone the knowledge on how to fly a helicopter."
"Yeah, the scientists would talk about that a lot. They called that "imbedding a skill set" and it was supposed to be something they could do in the next iteration of the Intersect computer. That along with language skills. Imagine being fluent in Mandarin in thirty seconds."
"Jesus," Sarah gasped. "You're telling me this is real? I got the impression they were years from working this out."
Bryce shrugged. "Like I said, the computer has been built, but they're not sure how to proceed with human trials. It's not like it's FDA approved. They can't upload the data into just anyone. It would have to be a highly skilled, trusted agent. How do they risk killing someone like that just to test the theory?"
"They should test it on Ryker. He already knows where a lot of CIA skeletons are buried, so if it works, great. If it kills him..." Sarah couldn't bring herself to finish the thought, wondering what Chuck would say if he knew where her mind went. She wouldn't shed any tears if Ryker died, but she also knew she was out of the assassination game. Chuck had fundamentally changed her.
Bryce seemed to intuit her line of thinking. "Chuck really got under your skin, didn't he?" he asked.
"Yeah," she said with a smile. "From the first minute of being near him. It was like the air was magnetically charged around us and I was drawn to him. At least that's what it felt like to me. I didn't know that such a genuinely good person could exist before meeting him."
"That's Chuck," Bryce said with a sigh.
Sarah looked at him and thought she understood a little of what he was going through. "You know, you'll have to let go of that guilt eventually, right?" she said. "He really is past it. He doesn't even think about it anymore. That right-cross he gave you last week was his closure. You can have your best friend back."
Bryce nodded but didn't look like he agreed. "I understand all that intellectually. Wouldn't the world be a much better place if forgiving ourselves was that easy?"
Sarah sighed at that. "Isn't that the truth," she said wistfully. "I've done some genuinely evil shit in my career, that I've very much glossed over with Chuck. Anytime the subject comes up, he just says he won't judge me for things I had to do in my job. A small part of me wants him to judge me harshly, but for the most part I just want to find a way to forgive myself and let it all go knowing I'm done with being that person. It's just that all the old 'Greater Good' arguments we use to defend our actions are so tired and weak."
"So you're saying there are definitely lines we won't cross in this fight we have in front of us?" Bryce asked.
Sarah looked at him and said, "Of course. Otherwise what are we even fighting for? We can't say we're fighting to uphold certain ideals if we're willing to throw those ideals away when living up to them is difficult. Living up to your ideals is supposed to be difficult; that's what makes them ideals. Greater good arguments are just an excuse we use when we feel like living up to our ideals makes us look weak. But I'm learning that it's not a weakness, it's a strength."
"I'm glad to hear you say these things out loud," Bryce said. "I knew that was how you felt, and I feel the same way, but you know how this job is. We're the living embodiment of the 'greater good' justifications our superiors are so fond of. We may as well be the sharp edge of a sword named 'Greater Good'. I can admit that it was starting to wear me down and I know you've got more years in the field than I do, which is a little crazy given that I think we're the same age."
"Yeah, let's just say I was recruited young," Sarah admitted. "And my career in the field didn't follow the typical path."
"I thought I was recruited young," he said with a chuckle.
"From what I understand, you were. We're both outliers, I was just a little further outside the bell curve."
Bryce nodded. "So, getting back to Verbanski, I'm assuming you want me to liaise with them to implement our relocation plan?" he asked.
"You assume correctly. Carina is heading up the candidate selection process, going through the files of the applicants. I'm helping with interviews but I'm probably going to hand that off to her discretion. I'm heading up the build-out of Castle as well as working with Chuck on the systems side of things. The four of us will need to have a meeting with Coburn later this week, go over where we're at with things. Chuck has some interesting things to share."
"What about our surveillance systems?"
"It's all been ordered, enough equipment to outfit two vans very similar to the one I borrowed last Friday night along with a lot of other ancillary surveillance equipment. Micro-cameras, bugs, gps transmitters and an assorted grab bag of other tech goodies. Not quite as high tech as what was on the CIA van, but Chuck says it's not far off and we won't notice the difference. As far as putting it all together, that's one of the things Chuck is working on too. I think you'll be impressed with his plan and he's been working hard on it."
"My experience is that few things Chuck puts hard work into aren't impressive. You should have seen him at Stanford. Everybody loved him but there was some jealousy there too and I include myself in that category. The academic stuff was just so easy for him. In typical Chuck fashion, he didn't hesitate to help the other guys out and it's not like the other guys weren't already intellectually impressive. I mean it's Stanford after all, but Chuck was on another level."
"Did Chuck tell you that we ran into Joe Grant a couple of weeks ago in Carmel?"
"Yeah, he mentioned it while I was there on Saturday before you got back from meeting with Rebecca Wright."
"Joe couldn't stop talking about how Chuck saved his ass sophomore year. He also mentioned that he wasn't the only one that Chuck helped out."
Bryce smiled. "I remember that. Joe was freaking out that he was going to lose his scholarship. Chuck was able to help a lot of the guys in our fraternity. There were guys there smarter than Chuck, but they were arrogant about it. They'd maybe help out when someone was struggling, but they'd lord it over you."
"And Chuck doesn't have an arrogant bone in his body," Sarah observed.
"Exactly. When he helped, it was because he genuinely wanted to. Helping made him feel good. He liked seeing the other guys succeed," Bryce said. He paused for a moment before continuing. "You know, thinking about it now, bringing Chuck on is probably one of the smartest things you did. The guy is relentless when it comes to helping his friends. I can only imagine how hard he'll work for you. As you may have noticed, he's plagued with self-esteem issues, which only drives him to work that much harder. Almost certainly a result of his parents disappearing when he was a kid, and what Jill and I did to him didn't help matters. But beyond all that, the guy is a genius with computers. Have you seen what he can do with a computer and an internet connection? The guy isn't a hacker, he's a magician."
Sarah laughed. "I said that exact same thing to him last night. He hacked into the CIA mainframe last night in less than a half hour to show me something. For a moment I seriously thought he was pranking me. But I looked for myself and it was real. He said in his opinion, hacking into the CIA was about a seven on a difficulty scale."
Bryce's eyes got wide at her admission and he shook his head. "That's not cool. That it's only a seven, I mean, not that he hacked the CIA. I'm sure it's not his first time."
"He's going to get amnesty for all his prior hacking activities. It was one of my conditions for taking on the role."
Bryce nodded. "That's good. I'm glad he won't have that hanging over him and moving forward he can exercise his skills with appropriate authority behind him." Bryce pulled the car up to the curb in front of Sarah's apartment complex.
"I'll let you know once the contracts are signed with Verbanski so you can start working with them right away. Keep me in to loop with any issues that come up," Sarah said as she unbuckled her seatbelt.
"Will do, boss," Bryce said with a nod. Sarah stepped out of the car and scanned the street looking for possible surveillance vehicles without consciously thinking about it. Once she was satisfied there was nothing unusual, she made her way into the lobby thinking ahead to the Vice Squad interviews she had scheduled with Carina.
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A/N: I get a lot of questions about Bryce and I think I've been clear on how I feel about the show version of him. He obviously doesn't have the canon history with Sarah here - that was nothing more than a plot device to drive Chuck-Sarah relationship angst as part of the WT/WT trope. That clearly doesn't exist in this AU. The character I'm writing shares only a name and the Stanford history. Bryce as I'm writing him is a genuine CIA Case Officer (real world CIA doesn't use "Agent"). He's not a James Bond wannabe. He is a professional.
A/N 2: I'm not a fan of the hyper-sexed CIA glamour-spy cliché. I also despise how the show created this idea of CIA agents as government sanctioned prostitutes - either male or female. That's one of the most enraging things they did at the end. Sarah accepted the idea from Quinn that she married her mark - a man she was investigating as a terrorist who murdered the Director of the CIA as well as her former lover and partner, Bryce. Since there's no reasonable way to believe this would not include sex, by definition that makes her a CIA sanctioned prostitute. They turned Sarah into a prostitute. I will always hate the writers for doing that, and if I'm completely honest, I'm a little angry with the actors for letting it happen. Couldn't they see it? Couldn't they push back on that idea? Actors have power in how their characters are portrayed, especially when they're that established. I'm sure these statements are going to make a lot of you angry, but convince me I'm wrong. Please don't resort to ad hominem attacks - it really just highlights how weak your position is and I won't respond anyway.
A/N 3: As I've mentioned previously, I've had these past nine chapters ready to go for a while. I'm about half-way into chapter ten but I'm also working on "Destiny" and "Stolen Life". Patience is appreciated. As are reviews. I fully accept constructive criticism, in fact I welcome it as it makes me a better writer.