"But his leg…" Joelle said, striving to sound in control. "The wound needs cleaning…. It'll get infected."
"That should not be your primary concern," Janvier said pointedly, and a look of revulsion crossed Joelle's face as she backed away from Callen. Following behind her, Janvier shut the door to the hold, leaving Callen both figuratively and literally alone in the darkness once more.
CHAPTER SEVEN - PRESENT DAY (MONDAY MORNING)
Up in Ops, an incredulous silence still hung in the air. No one wanted to voice what they were all thinking. In the end, it was Kensi who spoke first, quietly, her voice wavering.
"At the end…. That was a gunshot… Wasn't it?"
Sam nodded.
"How can this be happening?" Nell whispered, addressing it to no one in particular.
Sam took a deep breath. His mind was a jumbled mass of thoughts, but one thing was crystal clear. Callen had already been involved in this situation far more than he had let on. His ex-partner's subdued mood on Friday all made perfect sense now. With a deepening sense of foreboding, Sam gathered his thoughts and took charge.
"Nell, get me everything you can on whatever this Incognito thing is that he's referring to. Eric…. I want that video analysed. I want a location, I want to know when it was sent, and how. I want to know *exactly* what happened, pull it apart frame by frame if you have to." He paused, taking another steadying breath. "Look, I know this is hard. I know no one wants to watch that video again. I know we're all reeling from what we've just seen and heard, but we need to get up to speed and quickly. I want to talk to Vance…"
"You can't," Nell interrupted unhappily. "He's on a flight. He won't be down here for, err," she looked at her watch, "At least another four hours."
"Okay," Sam said, though he was feeling anything but. "Let's use that time to work out what we do know. For example, we know Janvier is out of prison…." Close to him, Kensi shuddered, and Sam gave her a sympathetic glance as he continued. "We know he's got Callen."
"We know he shot him," Kensi said quietly.
"Yes but that doesn't mean a damn thing." Sam's voice rose forcefully. "We heard a shot, that's all. We didn't see for sure that it hit G. It could have been a warning shot. Janvier wants something, that much is clear. We need to sit tight, not panic, and work out what it is."
"I didn't believe you," Nell murmured, her eyes still wide with strain. "Yesterday evening… You were worried about him then. We could have done something…"
"There's nothing we could have done, Nell," Kensi said kindly, but Nell didn't look reassured.
"The camera moves," Eric said, still sounding unlike himself. "It looks like it's on a tripod at the beginning of the film. Some place pretty dark, a warehouse, an abandoned building maybe. I can't tell!" Eric's agitation was clear, and Sam made a pacifying gesture with his hands to reassure him. Eric sucked in a breath and continued shakily. "When the shot is fired, it's almost like it gets knocked over, see…" Reluctantly, they all watched the big screen as Eric once again played the final seconds of the film, this time in slow motion. Callen went from being focused and central in the frame to a darkening blur as the camera fell in a smooth arc to the ground, and then abruptly stopped filming. "I've re-played it over and over in slo-mo," Eric continued after a pause. "It's just too dark and blurry, too much movement from the camera, to tell if a bullet hit home. Hit Callen, I mean."
"Well for now we need to believe it didn't." Sam spoke forcefully, and around him the others nodded in tacit agreement. Sam turned to Kensi. "I want to bring Deeks back in," he said to her, watching her carefully. "Can you handle that?" Kensi nodded. "Good. We need our team together on this."
"I'll ring him," Kensi said quietly, but Sam was already leaving the room. Eric and Nell looked helplessly at one another before turning back to their screens, frantically typing as they began to work up every angle they could think of.
Time on the boat was dragging for Callen. For close to 24 hours now he had been restrained, mostly in the dark, and he was fed up with feeling so helpless and confused. Concussion had muddled his head all night, so that he swung from feeling restless one minute, to dozing off the next, each time re-waking with a jolt to the uncomfortable realities of the situation. Now that he was properly awake, he was left with an edgy, urgent feeling that he wanted something – anything – to happen.
Resting his head back against the pillar, he closed his eyes again. Eyes open, eyes shut, it made no difference. There was absolutely no light in the hold. He started once again to go through his sequence of leg exercises, gritting his teeth each time he moved his left. Gently, he allowed his head and neck to drop from side to side too, controlling his breathing to minimise the pain in his stomach and doing everything he could to calm and focus his mental state in readiness for whatever might happen next. There was a new volatility to Janvier, a violent physical side he'd not displayed in their previous interactions. It made him all the more dangerous.
The click of the door opening made him jump. He glimpsed a shadowy outline of a person in the doorway, and strained to hear the quiet footsteps coming down the steps and approaching him. He blinked against the sudden light of a small torch being shone over his face and down towards his injured leg.
Joelle was crouching down next to him. Her bent head and the way the light fell meant he couldn't see her face.
"You never answered my question," he said to her.
"What did you do, on the film yesterday? I've never seen him so mad!" Joelle's voice wavered ever so slightly.
"You tell me, and I'll tell you," Callen repeated, still desperately trying to make out Joelle's features. "Are you working with Janvier?" Joelle nodded – Callen felt the swish of her hair. "I don't believe you," he pressed.
"Well I am," Joelle admitted, finally lifting her head to meet Callen's piercing gaze in the torchlight and seeing the flicker of distrust still there in his eyes. "But only because I have to, Callen! I have to! He's got my family!"
There was a stunned silence. Holding the torch between her teeth to get a better angle, Joelle carefully tried to peel away the frayed edges of Callen's trouser leg where it was stuck to his skin with dried blood. He took a deep breath, trying to absorb her information.
"How? WHERE?" he asked incredulously, wincing when her fingers lightly brushed the wound on the outside of his thigh. She put the torch down next to him.
"I need to find something to clean this up," she muttered. "Be right back."
Helplessly, Callen watched her hurried exit. He could hardly believe what she had just told him. Janvier must have known all about their operation, must have known he could get to Callen through Joelle, by using her family. How had he known? Callen involuntarily shuddered. This was turning out to be far bigger, far more serious, than any of them could possibly have imagined.
He glanced down at his leg, but even with the light from the torch Joelle had left on the ground beside him, he was too securely tied to see properly. He hoped it wasn't too serious – with any luck not much more than a graze. He'd felt the warmth of blood on his leg at the time, but oozing, not flowing freely. Overnight it had congealed and stuck to his trouser leg. Though Joelle had been careful, he was pretty sure she'd started it bleeding again when she tried to peel the fabric away. He waited impatiently for her to return.
"You need to explain!" he hissed as soon as Joelle crouched at his side.
"It's complicated," Joelle said evasively as she shined the torch on Callen's leg.
"Isn't it always," Callen replied. He watched dispassionately as Joelle cut a larger hole in the fabric of his jeans so she could get to his wound. "You're going to have to do better than that Jo… What's going on? Does he know you're here now?"
"Janvier? Of course he does! He controls everything, Callen. He made me come and check on you."
"He must know we'd talk," Callen mused aloud. He hissed in pain as Joelle cleaned inside the wound, breaking his train of thought.
"It's going to need stitches," Joelle said worriedly. "It's deeper than it looks, Callen."
"Great," Callen sighed. "Can't you untie me?"
"I wish I could," Joelle whispered. "But there's two guards outside the door. And he's expecting me to only be a few minutes."
"Joelle…." Callen pleaded. She kept her head bent down to his leg, ignoring his beseeching tone as she rummaged through a small medical pack she had brought back with her, trying to find something suitable to deal with the open injury. Butterfly strips turned out to be the best she could find – she didn't think they would hold, but it was all she could try. "At least tell me what's going on?"
"Like I said, it's complicated… Okay, okay," she hurried on, flashing a quick glance in Callen's direction. "The CIA had some unconfirmed rumours a couple of weeks ago about the Incognito theft. They believed Janvier was involved somehow, and they put together this plan to embed me in with him and his crew… I know you think Vance and yourself engineered getting Janvier out of jail, but we'd already oiled the wheels in advance, so to speak…"
"You WHAT?!" Callen was fuming. "You have NO idea how dangerous this man is! What the hell were you thinking?"
"Stay still… I guess the plan was to maintain control," Joelle said, concentrating hard on adhering the butterfly strips to Callen's leg so that she could avoid looking at him while she talked. "You should know what the CIA are like, Callen. They thought if they could get an agent of their own on the inside with Janvier, it would be easier to locate and recover the stolen hard drive before it got sold, as well as find out which country was trying to buy it… That could point to who was involved in the theft, Callen…"
"And they chose you?"
"Well not at first. But then Vance and the other big-wigs got involved, and they insisted that as you knew Janvier the best you *had* to be the one taking the lead… But we were able to turn the tables, create a reason for us to work together…"
"Your high-value prisoner doesn't exist?"
"Exactly. But creating him, making it impossible for you to work on this without me, making it look like a joint operation… You and Vance would think you were leading it, but…"
"But I gave you a way in, to get to Janvier? Because of the revenge he harbours for me?"
"I guess that's how you could look at it… But Callen, it wasn't meant to go down like this, believe me it wasn't. The evening before the prisoner transport, Saturday evening, Nick and Peter were taken, and Janvier used me to help him capture you too. That wasn't the CIA's plan, Callen, I swear. You were never meant to actually get caught by him – we just needed the *idea* of him getting his hands on you, to get close to him and gain his trust. Janvier was already ten steps ahead, and I have no idea how. We didn't know he already had contact and was working with people on the outside – other than me of course."
"Where are Nick and Peter now?" Callen said gruffly. Sorting out what Joelle had told him, her connection with Janvier, the lies, the CIA involvement… it would all have to wait for now.
"They're here, on this ship. They've been here since Saturday. They're unharmed for now, but I have to keep doing what Janvier wants, Callen, or he'll kill them!" Joelle's voice rose in distress and Callen bowed his head. He stretched his fingers towards Joelle's hands on his leg, straining against the ropes. She clutched his hand, making eye contact with him at last, and he could see the raw emotion in her face. "I'm sorry, Callen," she said, squeezing his hand tightly. "I'm sorry that whatever Janvier wants you for, it probably isn't good… but it's my family. I had to protect them."
A/N: Who has guessed yet what Callen might have done to make Janvier mad enough to shoot him? Will the team work it out as well?
