Drove the night toward my home
The place where I was born
On the lakeside
As daylight broke
I saw the earth
The trees had burned down
To the ground
"Don't Give Up"
Peter Gabriel
October 3, 2021
Burbank, California
The late afternoon sun gleamed off the windows on the front of his house, nearly blinding him, as he pulled his car into the driveway. Shutting down the car, he glanced cautiously at his surroundings, trying to be as nonchalant as possible, knowing his son was scrutinizing his every move, it seemed. Both girls disengaged themselves from their car seats, waiting patiently for their brother to get out and open the safety-locked door from the outside. Ally and Abby ran ahead while Stephen stood at his father's side.
"Something's wrong, isn't it?" Stephen asked him.
"Nothing you need to worry about, Son," Chuck told him. He smiled, forcing it, somehow sure that his son knew he was. "The Winterbottoms are all here. Go say hello," he added.
Chuck's children went running en masse into his home when he unlocked the door, excited at the prospect of more company, this time the entire Winterbottom family, plus Carter. They were all seated in Chuck's living room, chatting amicably. He felt like he was the one interrupting in his own house. "Hey, guys," Chuck called over the din created by his children, chatting away about soccer, karate and school.
"Now, Deary, can you explain what this soccer is?" Mrs. Winterbottom asked in her trilly, proper British.
"Oh, Mum, it's football. Americans call it soccer, because they already have football," Corrine explained. Chuck thought how sweet it was that she called her mother-in-law Mum. "I've told you this before."
"American football. All that dreadful head banging and body smashing. I don't know how you can watch that," she scoffed, shaking her hand out towards them.
Chuck moved into his house, smiling, but opening his eyes wide in silent communication with Corrine as he moved into the room. He tilted his head ever so slightly, indicating she should follow him into the kitchen. He reached into the refrigerator, pulling out the leftovers from the meal Alex and his sister had cooked the previous evening. He felt Corrine standing behind him.
"Casey said he was sending Gertrude to talk to you in person," she said under her breath, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one was within earshot.
He nodded, inconspicuously, as he started taking bowls out of the cabinet. "Communication jammer, on a rotating frequency. They're instituting countermeasures but they aren't stable. There's a possibility they could reverse the channel and listen to us." He made a slashing gesture across his throat, then made a mime of a pencil writing on paper using his index finger and his palm.
"It'll be great fun, then, once my mother-in-law starts talking about her bunion surgery. Have you heard her and Hartley argue about the difference between a corn and a bunion?" she teased, lifting one eyebrow, glad she saw the ghost of a smile on Chuck's face at her weak humor.
He pulled a notebook out of a different drawer, pulling a pencil out of the circular holder on the counter. He scribbled quickly: NSA needs me to investigate.
She grabbed the pad from him, and wrote carefully beneath his slanted sentence: Plan for CI tonight?
This is priority, he wrote. She nodded, understanding. She was turning to walk away when he grabbed her arm, adding in a jagged scribble, Tell them not to talk about Sarah.
Chuck glanced upward, noting the curious look on Carter's face, as he was obviously observing the strange interactions in the kitchen, his attention drifting away from the laughing ruckus of conversation surrounding them. Carter put his hand up, gesturing wordlessly to Vivian, that he was getting up, but not to follow. Vivian's eyes followed him as he rose and walked, but after a concerned look, she turned her attention back to her father and grandmother.
"What's the problem?" Carter asked bluntly.
Corrine scribbled diagonally across the bottom of the page. Bugged? Talk about the soup.
He opened and closed his mouth several times, confused, before he replied in a quick stutter, "Is there enough…soup…or do we need to…order pizza?"
Chuck and Corrine nodded to him. Chuck mouthed the words, "I need your help," to Carter. He nodded unevenly.
Corrine opened a kitchen drawer and pulled out a small device the size of a cell phone. It had just one port in, a small shiny black box. Chuck took it, thanking her. It was a short-range frequency interruption device. If Chuck took this with him to his small office space and shut the door, he could talk to Carter without fear of any surveillance. They would both have a splitting headache by the time they were done, but he hoped, with Carter's help, he could solve this problem quickly.
They left to enter the tiny room off the kitchen together while the Winterbottom's chatted away with his three children. He glanced at the time, noting he had only a few hours before the teams in Europe reported back at the next briefing.
October 3, 2021
Paris, France
"What is that, Sarah?" Carina asked curiously, glancing over as she drove the car.
"I'm not certain, but it looks like an implant of some kind, doesn't it?" Sarah ruminated.
"The reengineered prototype?" Carina asked.
"It could be. We need to get this analyzed. See if we can identify whoever's blood is all over it," Sarah told her. She flinched, instinctively grasping the handle on the door as Carina sped through traffic, weaving in and out of cars effortlessly.
"A problem with my driving, Walker?" Carina teased her. "You used to be a maniac behind the wheel, or have you forgotten?"
"No, no," she added, slightly out of breath. "It's just, you know, ten years of driving with infants and young children in car seats and it…puts things in perspective. You know?" The hint of sadness she heard in her own words was ignored by Carina, if she noticed at all.
"There's a message from Alina," Carina told her, glancing down at her cellphone. It was the name she chose, knowing Sarah thought of her with a different name, but staying as official as possible. She instructed her phone to play the message aloud over the bluetooth inside the vehicle.
"The apartment you inquired about has been rented. However, I have another that just became available. But it won't last long," they both heard, her voice affected with a false Hungarian accent, difficult to fein, but done flawlessly.
It was code, and both women looked at each other as they acknowledged the message. Ilsa had followed up on her lead, and now had critical information. Information she needed Sarah to decipher. And the situation was now potentially dangerous, as she believed someone was, or at least at some point had been, following her.
"Looks like Budapest, Carina," Sarah said.
"It's a two hour flight. Let's touch base with Team B, and let them know we're headed out. Find out where they stand with Kovacs," Carina informed her.
Sarah stayed silent, projecting a calm and still exterior. But inside, her stomach was twisted into knots. If Ilsa had found something out, it meant some unknown loose end from 2007 had remained, or been rediscovered. The NSA was protecting her mother and sister, and successful capture of the Hungarian would be a boon for their safety. But after the courier had been killed in CIA custody, they knew there were operatives at work in the U.S. And it was a race to stay ahead of them. She hated being as far away as she was, but this was where she was needed. Where her past history could prove vital, to discover the part of the plot that Ryker had kept from her all those years ago.
October 3, 2021
Burbank, California
Carter opened his mouth, but Chuck held up his hand, signaling him to wait. He switched on the device Corrine had given to him. He knew the frequency was above human hearing level, but it was close enough that he immediately felt the slightest of tickles, like a soundless hum inside his ears.
"Are you ok with that?" Chuck asked him.
"I don't notice anything. Am I supposed to?" Carter asked him.
"No, no, you're fine. My hearing may just be more sensitive. When this is on, as long as we are within five feet of the device, they can't overhear us over the jamming frequency," Chuck explained.
Carter looked nervous, but just nodded along with Chuck's words. Asking him to explain was probably something he couldn't do, didn't have time for, and even if he could, Carter accepted that he would just feel better overall if he didn't know. The information he had found out about Chuck over the last week was eye opening, to say the least.
"I was under the impression you were headed back to CI to follow up on that lead I found yesterday," Carter said.
"I was. Until I found out someone is jamming communications in my house," he said seriously, immediately going to his computer, typing so quickly his hands were a blur across the keyboard.
"And the NSA is doing…what? Exactly?" Carter asked, his pitch rising in his worry.
"Asking me to track it down," he muttered, losing his focus on the discussion as his attention began shifting into his computer and the code he was writing. "I'm faster, and better, than anyone Casey has." There was no boasting in his affirmation, in fact almost a resignation, as if he wished there was someone else besides him.
"And you need my help, why?" Carter asked. "I mean, don't get me wrong. I will help you anyway I can. I just don't know how my accounting skills can help you here."
"You're a good outside the box thinker, Carter. One of the best I've ever seen. Don't think accounting. Just think, as I'm talking. Does that make sense?" Chuck asked him, never looking up from typing.
"Ok, Chuck," he said, sitting beside his boss and friend. "I'll do my best."
"Right now, I'm on the main server the NSA is using from this satellite in L.A.," Chuck said. "I can see the entire surveillance network from this vantage point." Carter looked over Chuck's shoulder at the computer screen. Thousands of green characters, letters and numbers, flashed and flipped as the screen changed almost faster than his eyes could register. After a few seconds, the characters faded, and he could see a map, which was a representation of all the points in the satellite network focused around Chuck's home. When he accessed a toggle on the bottom of the screen, the vantage point shifted, revealing first the grid around his sister's home, then Sarah's mother's home, Echo Park and Morgan's house, Hartley and Corrine's house, Vivian's apartment, Carter's apartment, and eventually Carmichael Industries.
"How many agents does the NSA have deployed for this, Chuck?" Carter asked, his eyes wide as he realized the scope of the Op.
"Probably 50, not counting Verbanski Corp's contract," Chuck mumbled.
Carter watched as he scrolled through each one, painstakingly slowly. What he was looking for, Carter really didn't know. Chuck was concentrating in a way Carter rarely saw him, and he didn't interrupt with a question that wasn't critical. An hour had gone by while they sat in silence. Or rather, as Carter sat watching Chuck work, wondering why his presence was so critical. He watched Chuck, after that much time, start rubbing his temples. His eyes were strained, but also, the interference they were creating was starting to affect him.
"There," Chuck said triumphantly, almost shouting into the silence, making Carter nearly jump out of his skin. "Sorry," Chuck said softly. Carter followed Chuck's finger to the screen. It was Chuck's house again, the map he was looking at. It looked like a spider web, a delicate criss-cross of lines meant to represent all the lines of communication and surveillance. Where Chuck was pointing, one of the lines flickered in and out, ever so slightly. It only lasted for a second. But several seconds later, the same phenomenon occurred in a different area. The longer they watched, the more blips they saw in different areas. Only in the net around Chuck's house and no one else's.
"Are you trying to confirm, block them, what…?" Carter asked, hoping to offer some insight.
"I need to get into their system. Once I do, I'm hoping to first disable. The NSA has a fancy way to track signals like that back to the source. That's the end goal here. If we find out where it's originating, hopefully we can find their base or command center or whatever," Chuck told him.
Another half hour passed, as Carter watched the screen in silence, fascinated by how quickly Chuck was processing an enormous amount of information at breakneck speed. "Oh no," Chuck breathed. Carter watched him pull his hands up, away from the keyboard.
"What 'oh no'?" Carter asked urgently. "What does that mean?"
Chuck's eyes were wide with horror, fixed on his computer screen. He didn't offer any more words, but Carter could see the map as it had started to change in front of his eyes. One by one, the lines that seemed to connect everything started blinking, winking out. Like dominoes, the lines began disappearing exponentially. "The network is shutting down," Chuck explained, as he was standing, fumbling to get out of his chair.
"Isn't that what you were trying to do?" Carter asked.
"Not theirs. Ours. Whoever that was I detected, their disabling the NSA's surveillance. The NSA has the most effective and fortified firewall available, and it took it down like it wasn't even there," Chuck said rapidly, panic edging into his tone. "The NSA has the signal to trace, but it bounced back to this network."
"What does that mean?" Carter asked him.
Chuck was panting as he stood at the door, frantic and intense. "It means we need to get my children out of here. Now."
October 3, 2021
Budapest, Hungary
The rendez-vous point Ilsa had chosen was only 20 minutes from the airport. They made their way easily, due to the extreme late hour in the day, now in the second changed time zone since they'd left England earlier in the day. Carina was driving again.
Sarah had offered to drive, worried about fatigue, and how it seemed to be taking its toll on Carina worse than on her. Sarah knew she was lying about her head injury. She could see the tight squinting she did every time oncoming headlights from the other side of the road glared in the darkness. Sarah had tried talking, as a means to ensure Carina didn't fall asleep at the wheel, but being back here, in this environment, had started to affect her in a way she had not anticipated.
In her long career with the CIA, she had only been in Hungary twice. The first had been the Op with Ryker, and the second with Chuck and Casey after Shaw had interfered and she had gone to handle the situation. So many of the landmarks were familiar, the strange nostalgia tunneling its way inside her. That mission had changed everything, and she had been here, in this city, when she'd realized it.
She had defied orders, not for the first time, especially when innocents had needed protecting. But never anyone so innocent, so helpless. Her gut had told her, after she had killed everyone, that the original explanation had not been sufficient. His refusal to explain, instead just demanding that she do what he said, had been the catalyst. She continued to follow her gut, at the same time realizing her heart had begun speaking to her, a voice inside herself she had not heard for a very long time. Protect instead of destroy. Novel, but deep inside, what had become so compelling.
It had taken her almost two weeks to get out of Budapest with the baby. In the meantime, she had spent hours with the little girl. In her hotel room, in carefully guarded trips out of the hotel to secure locations. So many phone conversations with her mother, asking advice, needing comfort and reassurance. She had never felt that close to her mother in her entire life, at that time overwhelmed with regret. Knowing saving this child meant sacrificing whatever relationship she could ever hope to have with her mother. She had made that decision, for the sake of a sweet little baby she would never know, but who she had hoped someday would know the life Sarah herself had wanted and never had.
Being back here brought all those feelings back, only colored differently now. She had stuffed that heartbreak down deep inside herself when she'd returned to D.C., only to be met with more information that had only further broken her heart. Until she had met Chuck Bartowski. He had lifted her off the ground, shook her up, twisted her around until the world no longer looked the same. The sky was a different color blue, once she had realized that as difficult as a road as it could be, she could have that life with him.
And she was here, thousands of miles away from him and that life, trying to ensure that it was not taken away from her.
They approached the proper location, seeing the signal Ilsa had left for them. She had a base of operations in Hungary, and they had a debriefing to attend. And hopefully get some answers.
The address was correct. The two women entered the building, extra cautious to ensure they were not being followed, as Ilsa's coded message had indicated it was possible. It was a run down, dingy-walled flat where they found Ilsa. The older woman leaned into the hallway, scanning in both directions before she shut the door after they'd entered.
"What did you find in Paris?" Ilsa asked quickly, wasting no time.
Sarah pulled the box out of her belt, offering it in her hand for Ilsa to take. They were all silent, waiting, as Ilsa opened the box. Ilsa gasped as she examined the contents. The older spy was unbelievably unflappable, so the gasp was significant.
"What is it?" Carina asked.
"This is the implant," Ilsa declared. "Obviously removed from someone's brain."
"The Ultima Intersectio?" Sarah asked, her eyes wide.
"The adapter at the end," Ilsa instructed, tilting the open box towards the two other women. "It fits into the housing that every test subject has permanently installed. They did those surgeries first, in large numbers, not always on a voluntary basis. They then added this, to complete it. But it failed every time. The Sentries were after a perfect genetic match to the data they stole from the U.S. government."
"So what was Jacques Robert doing with it?" Carina asked.
"Chuck said his firm had acquired a non-functional prototype from the Hungarian manufacturer. Did he steal it? Is this it?" Sarah asked.
"This was implanted in someone," Ilsa reminded them. "I would assume after the original project was undertaken. Bloody hardware would have been a red flag."
"Implanted, but removed," Sarah added.
"They always removed the hardware from deceased subjects before dumping the bodies. So they could do additional analysis," Ilsa told them.
Sarah and Carina exchanged a look. "Is it possible Robert realized what they were doing, once he got the implant back? Is that what made him hide it?" Carina asked.
"But if he was the only one who knew where it was, why kill him, before they found it? And we know they never found it. Because we just did, two years later," Sarah thought out loud.
"We can think about that later. I need to tell you what I found. I didn't know it was connected, until just now. But you need to hear this," Ilsa said direly. "I need a detailed explanation of the Op Ryker sent you on in 2007."
Sarah blanched, realizing she had never spoken these details out loud to anyone, even her husband. Chuck had flashed on Molly's name, but she was sure he didn't have all this information. "I only found out names later, after I was back in the states and I researched. He told me the people in the home had been murdered by mercenaries who were after their family fortune. The victims were Katalin and Andras Szabo. Katalin was the heir to her parents' fortune, Laszlo and Eszter Reizner. That fortune came from their company, Graphitech," Sarah recited, watching as Ilsa seemed more animated the more she talked.
"Guess what Graphitech had a hand in developing?" Ilsa said.
"Wha…what?" Sarah gasped, unable to process what she thought Ilsa was telling her.
"They had been a moderately successful firm, manufacturing computer core processors. Until they won a bid for a contract from the French government," Ilsa told them.
"Let me guess. Weather satellites," Carina said. Sarah was speechless.
Ilsa flipped through a score of documents on her computer, clicking until she found what she was looking for. "As far back as 2005, there were documents relating to those adapters. Way before any talk of that Ultima Intersectio emerged in 2010. They redacted a bunch, some were erased but recovered."
"Wait, wait, wait," Sarah stuttered. "Does that mean what I think it means?"
"That the implantable version started to be developed at the same time as the original computer program," Ilsa said, confirming Sarah's point.
"That doesn't make any sense. At all. They didn't develop the Intersect until after 9/11, in 2001. It was in its early stages in 2005," Carina told them.
"No, no, that's not true," Sarah interjected. "Chuck's Dad had a working model in 1980. He thought it had failed and destroyed his best friend's life. But he was set up. It worked perfectly, but for a different original purpose."
Sarah's mind was racing. Chuck's entire childhood, and more urgently after his mother had left in 1990, his father had been trying to correct the error he thought he had made, creating Alexei Volkoff. His last attempt had been sent to Corrine MacArthur in the U.S.S.R. in 1987. It had been intercepted, and Corrine had had to flee after her daughter had been taken away, before she could ever attempt to deploy it. But Poshenko, the arms dealer she had fled to, had eventually built his own Intersect, using deleted copies of that same file. The two had been in Romania for over 20 years.
"Is there anything connecting Graphitech with a man named Leonid Poshenko?" Sarah asked.
"The arms dealer?" Ilsa asked. "I can check, but I doubt it would be above board. Graphitech was a legitimate firm. He dealt only in the black market, with no shell corporation to hide behind."
"The forensic accountant from our firm can find a trail, if it exists. I can have Chuck tell him what we're looking for. We're due for a briefing with Special Agent Barker, aren't we?" Sarah asked.
Ilsa pulled out her phone. "Overdue. By several hours," she said, sounding worried. The phone in her hand started buzzing, indicating an incoming call. "This is Casey," she said as she put the phone to her ear.
Her expression changed slowly as she listened. The calm neutrality on her face slowly transformed, her brow furrowing as her forehead creased. Sarah felt her mouth go completely dry and her hands started to shake as Ilsa pulled the phone away from her ear. She clicked the button, switching it to speakerphone.
"Listen, Sarah," Casey started, his use of her given name unusual. The tone of his voice turned her blood to ice. He sounded hushed, sad, like he was trying to offer comfort for something he himself found inconsolable. "I don't know how to tell you this."
"Casey!" she screamed, not aware of the volume of her voice, as her legs nearly gave out. She felt Carina behind her, a hand on her arm, obviously considering Sarah's collapse imminent.
"The NSA surveillance net came down outside your house. They disabled the sensors so we didn't detect it right away. We cannot get confirmed communication with a single officer. Gertrude called, saying her men had been ambushed. She's en route as we speak, but there were reports of…gunfire, inside your house, Sarah." The background noise on the call told a logical mind that he was en route as well, probably almost literally driving over whatever was in his way.
His soft, weak, "I'm sorry," was drowned out by the sound of Sarah screaming. Casey also heard both Carina and Ilsa in the background, trying to calm Sarah down. But she was hysterical. Ilsa cut the connection, and he was left alone in his car as he weaved in and out of traffic, on his way across Los Angeles to Burbank. Cole was on his way as well.
Casey had seen some horrific things in his long career, things that had made him the way he was–detached and emotionless. It was a matter of survival. Alas, he knew he had gone completely soft, and continued to acknowledge that over the years.
Casey knew Chuck had gone back to his house after Gertrude had met him, and tried to trace the source of the interference. Just as Casey knew he would, Chuck had been able to trace through the network, implanting the beacon that would allow the NSA to trace the signal. Their technicians were working even now as he was streaking his way across the city. Had Chuck triggered something that was precipitating this? Or just interfered as something much larger that had been planned already had begun? All 15 officers stationed around Chuck's home were not communicating. That would seem to have been planned in advance.
The thought of finding Sarah's entire family shot to death in their own home, or her children taken was a horror even he could not fathom. But the outrage, the desperation, was fueling a cold and calculated rage that would not be stopped until he knew they were safe, or every single person even remotely involved was left with a bullet hole between their eyes.
October 3, 2021
Undisclosed Location, Los Angeles, California
The Director hung up the phone.
The Assistant had assured her, his team was moving. Capture of the target was imminent. Yes, before they were detected, he had assured her. Circumventing and then eliminating an entire contingent of NSA security was a herculean task. He had chosen his operatives well, she thought, for them to have accomplished such a feat.
Was she pleased?
Emotions were so elusive now. Instead of a complex array, she had been reduced to mild pleasure, or excruciating pain. Bland contentment, or raging anger. No joy, no sadness. They were memories, difficult to access.
How could this please you? Her thought echoed, startling her.
Was she actually remorseful?
How was that possible? She hadn't detected a modicum of remorse over the course of the years, no matter the terrible atrocities she had committed against more individuals than she could recall. Of course, the reason for that was the original atrocity committed against her. That had allowed all of it to happen, absolving her of her accountability.
Because he was a child. The target, he was just a child. Innocent, unknowing, undamaged by the world. She was teaching him, damaging him. He deserved to know the truth, didn't he, before she ended his life, before he had ever really lived?
Has she ever really lived?
Why so pensive? She admonished herself. At what age did life begin? In the womb? At seven? At 27? She was so much older, and her life had never begun, had it? She had given it away before, believing in the illusion of time.
Those thoughts unleashed the anger. She knew who was responsible for that, at the end. Had she never known, until this very moment, as things were coming to fruition, how much jealousy was housed inside that anger? Because the retribution at hand, the payback, left her trembling with the closest thing to pleasure she could feel anymore. They would know who had done this to them, and why. Only then could she truly win.