Chapter 3: Bigger Problems for the Smaller Opersations Manager

A/N: After I wrote my final installment for the series of stories that comprised the 8 #-Appreciation Weeks on the NCIS:LA Magazine's website, I received many requests to continue those stories in the reviews and PMs. I saw "Deep Trouble II", and I was in the same ocean with a similar target, but that was as close as it got. So this story is probably going to be far from canon, too. I wrote this based on the two teaser photos for the episode "Third Choir" and the one of Callen where it looks like he is trying to match Deeks' hair styling. Some of the dialogue from previous canon episodes are used here. Parts of this story are condensed from other stories that I have already posted. I hope you enjoy it.

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Nate arrived the following morning before any of the agents did. He was not surprised that Hetty was in her office already, nor that Nell and Eric were already up in ops. He stopped in Hetty's office to officially check in before going to work.

"Morning, Hetty. Can I get you a refill on your tea, or are you good?"

"Good Morning, Mr. Getz. Thank you, I am fine. I imagine that you will want to go to the office you usually use to conduct your interviews?"

"If that is okay with you, Hetty. It is the one that furnishes the best mood with those I am interviewing. It's large enough to have the couch, and the two overstuffed chairs in addition to the desk and regular chairs. The only thing that I wonder is if they fixed the blinds, so that the light can be lowered."

"If it hasn't been seen to already, I will have it done today."

"Thank you, Hetty."

Nate went over to the small kitchen and rummaged around in the cabinet until he found his favorite coffee cup, the one with the picture of a bald Sigmund Freud, pinching his nose with one hand to kill the smell, and holding the dead Schrödinger's cat by the tail with the other. Filling his cup, he went up the stairs and briefly thought of stopping in ops, before going to his office. Knowing that he would have to interview the Operations Manager, and not wanting to get on her bad side so early in the week for breaking her rule of no food of drink in ops, he thought better of it and went right to his office.

As he sat down behind his desk and turned on his computer, he found that he had an interoffice memo already waiting for him. He recognized it as coming from Nell, and saw that it was password protected. Each member of the team had their own link with his computer here, and each had their own password to ensure privacy. Using the password she provided, Nate opened up Nell's memo to find the files she had mentioned the day before. One of them was quite lengthy, so Nate gave up all thought of transcribing his mental notes of the meeting he had with the political analyst yesterday, and sat back in his chair and began to read. It wasn't long before he opened a new file, and just book-marked it so he could write his notes about the incredible story he was reading.

Half an hour later, his coffee gone and a page and a half of notes already written, Nate rubbed the bridge of his nose and decided he needed to get up and move around just a bit. He closed the files he had opened, and placed them in a heavily encrypted folder before he turned his computer off.

He wandered back down to the kitchen for another cup of coffee, noticing that Hetty was on the phone, and the call was not a pleasant one. On his way back, he stopped in the bullpen, and engaged in some light small talk with the four agents seated there.

All of a sudden there was a loud, sharp, piercing whistle from the balcony. Every eye in the bullpen looked up. The doors of ops swooshed open and Eric and Nell rushed out. Hetty didn't even bother looking at how surprised everyone appeared to be. She just said, "We have a case." and led the way into ops.

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Nate put his coffee cup down on Callen's desk and followed the agents up into ops. When he got up there he saw Callen look over at Eric and Eric shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders, telling him that he had no idea what was going on.

Hetty was the one who led the briefing. All of a sudden, the plasma held the picture of a man the team had encountered before.

"This is..." Hetty started to say.

"Mattias" Callen spat out the name, remembering that this man tried to kill off Hetty the last time that they had an encounter with him.

"I thought we were done with him after you gave him Renner's book of old, cold war spies. I know that Nell doctored the information he received, but that was what, two, three years ago?" Sam asked.

"You didn't know it, Hetty, but we had a final meeting with him." Callen confessed. "We showed him another book, and threatened to give it to his wife. It was all about the little love nest that he set up for his mistress, and his secret bank accounts he was amassing for his retirement. We told him if anything, and we made sure he understood what that word meant, if anything happened to you, he would end up with nothing, because all of us would come after him."

"I so hope that his wife found that out on her own." Kensi added.

"Unfortunately, I have learned that would no longer is a threat for him. Neither of the two women are in the picture any longer. His wife was electrocuted in their home eleven days ago when a radio walked across the bathroom, and jumped into the tub as she was taking a bubble bath. His mistress decided to jump out of a fifteenth story window while she was home alone last week."

Deeks asked her, "Has the LAPD looked into these two deaths? On the surface that seems very suspicious."

"No matter how many suspicions we may have, Mr. Deeks, there was nothing officially found to suggest that it was anything else than an accident in both cases."

"So in other words, a professional hit, and a possible LAPD cover up?" the detective wanted to know.

"You may form your own opinions on the matter. Officially, both cases have been closed."

Sam looked at Hetty with suspicion written all over his face, "So, what are we supposed to do about it? From what I can see, we have nothing to do with those deaths. It's not a military or governmental matter."

"Mr. Hanna, do you recall the circumstances that led up to the team having to go to Afghanistan?"

"Yeah, Hetty, I was there so I knew about it."

"Would you say that was a military or governmental matter?"

"Well, I guess it was governmental, because the White Ghost was supposed to be a terrorist."

"And would you say we should get involved if the same three letter agency tried to do the same thing, only with a different recipient and in our own back yard?"

"I would say we should, especially if it involved a member of our team, like the White Ghost involved Kensi."

"It does, Mr. Hannah."

Sam looked around at everyone up in ops before speaking to Hetty again. "I don't know of anyone who is even remotely related to Mattias, unless it's G, but I doubt that. You are the only one who knows much about him."

"Precisely, Mr. Hannah. His family and mine were together in the Theresienstadt concentration camp during World War II, near what now is the city of Terezin in the Czech Republic. They were among the lucky ones, not having to work in the mines, but were required to sort through and repack the clothing confiscated from other Jews, so it could be sent out for Germans who had lost their homes from Allied bombing. After the camp was liberated by the Russians, both families made their way west and settled in Stuttgart, less than a block away from each other. We both were born in the same year, and grew up together, for almost eight years, as children in Stuttgart. Then my distant relatives here in the United States heard about us, and sponsored our move to this country. Mattias' parents had no such relatives to sponsor them, so they moved back into the East German zone, just outside Berlin, where most of their family was living."

Callen looked at her in amazement, "So, Mattias is a childhood friend of yours?"

"Let us just say, an acquaintance, Mr. Callen. We both are products of our environment. I grew up among all the freedoms of the West and chose the occupation I am in. He grew up under the regimentation of the Communist State, and was assigned to the life that he lived. Both of us did well. Sometimes we worked together, other times we were opponents. But we always remembered where we came from, and how easily that other person could have been us."

"So, we are gonna go up against the CIA one more time?" Deeks asked.

"It would appear so," Kensi answered her partner.

"Ah, Hetty, just one..." Callen was cut off by the tiny Operations Manager.

"Already noted. Mr. Hanna, Mr. Callen, you will please make yourselves available to Dr. Getz today, so he can sign off on your psychological evaluation, and you can join in this operation?"

This time it was Nate who tried to get a word in, even raising his finger to try to get Hetty's attention.

"Ms. Blye, Detective Deeks, you will go and pick up Mattias and bring him to the boat shed. I'm downloading his address to your phones now." She pressed a button on her tablet and the address appeared. Deeks raised his eyebrow at Kensi, but she just shook her head, telling him they could talk about it later. "Please make sure that you are not followed as you deliver him here."

"Yes, ma'am, they both said and turned to leave.

"Ms. Jones, you and Mr. Beale find out all you can on Mattias, especially over the last five years. I will shortly send you a list of aliases that I have known him to use to help your search."

"Dr. Getz, if you could perform a cursory examination of my two senior agents, that they can join in this operation, I will provide you with unlimited access to them and to me when the time permits."

"Oh no, Hetty. You are not going to do that to me again. This case will end and another will begin and there will be no time available for me. No. When this case ends, I will get unlimited time with all the staff that I can conduct the psychological evaluations. No new cases will be accepted."

"Fine, Dr. Getz. I will then expect two senior agents available later this afternoon."

Sam and Callen were left looking at each other with a puzzled expression on each of their faces as Hetty marched out of ops to get the aliases for the two techs.

"Gentlemen," Nate addressed the two agents, "you heard Hetty. If you want coffee, go get it and then I will meet you in my office."

"Both of us?" Callen asked.

"Well, Hetty did say, 'a cursory examination'. She wants you available as soon as possible. I am supposed to make that happen, so, yes, both of you."

"Okay, will see you there in five."

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Five minutes later all three men were in Nate's office. Nate looked at each of them and said, "You both realize that I have been granted unlimited access to the two of you after this mission is over?"

Both of them just grunted their answer.

"Okay, now, how many fingers am I showing you, as he held up his fist with only his index finger extended."

"What?" Sam asked.

"How many fingers do you see? It's a simple question. Do you have an answer?" Nate asked.

Sam shook his head. "One, you are showing just one finger."

"Callen, how many do you see."

"Same as Sam, just one."

Nate started writing on a sheet of paper he pulled out of a folder that was on his desk, as he said, "Both agents were able to process visual information and came up with a correct conclusion to questions pertaining to that information."

Looking back at the two agents, Nate continued by asking, "Callen, when you get hungry, do you usually get something to eat?"

"Yeah..."

"And Sam," he looked now at the big man, "when you get hungry or tired, do you get something to eat or go to bed?"

"Of course, what kind of stupid question is that?"

"Just bear with me for a moment." Nate continued writing on that form, "Both agents exhibit normal reactions to their bodily needs and deal with them in the normal way."

Finally, Sam, do you hate Callen enough to want to kill him or otherwise harm him?"

"No, of course not. He's my partner. Why would I want to do that?"

And Callen, do you hate Sam enough to want to kill him or otherwise harm him?"

"No. I would never do that to Sam. Why?"

"Nate continued to write as he said, "Both agents able to deal with interpersonal relationships."

Then he looked up at the two of them, "Okay. Report to Hetty. You two are free to go."

Callen looked so surprised as he asked, "That's it? Nothing more?"

"Nope." Nate continued to write on the page. "Tell Hetty I will send a copy of the report as soon as I'm done."

As they got up and left the office, Callen said to Sam, "I just wish all the evaluations would go like this."

Overhearing him, Nate told the departing agents, "Just don't count on it." and started laughing.

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Hetty had just sent a list of aliases for Mattias up to Nell and Eric. There were 22 German, 3 Hungarian, 4 Romanian, 3 Czech, and 7 Russian, and these were just the ones that she knew of. Even she was surprised when she saw how many there were, each indicating a different time that she or another US agent had encountered him. Then she remembered of all the aliases that she had used in her previous work with the CIA and NCIS. **Ah, Mattias, we are truly warriors of the old school. I doubt if there will ever be any that lead as many different lives as the two of us have done.**

Just then Callen and Sam knocked at her door pillar, and as she looked up, she almost laughed and added a post scrip to her last thought, **I truly forgot about Mr. Callen. If he lasts as long as we have, of which I have very serious doubts, the number of his aliases will probably be more than the two of ours combined.**

"I thought that you two were supposed to be meeting with Mr. Getz. I want you...

"Relax, Hetty, our meeting with Nate is done, at least for the time being," Callen told her.

"Yeah, he said he would send you the paperwork as soon as he had it written up, but that we were free to go and were supposed to report to you," Sam added.

"Excellent. Then get over to the boat shed and wait for Mattias to arrive. Find out what is going on with him and why this is happening to him now. I'll have Eric patch the feed from there into ops."

"Okay, Hetty. Anything in particular you want us to look for?" Callen asked.

"I'm afraid that Branston Cole's little black book of spies is trying to bite us in the ass ...again."

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Callen and Sam only had to wait about fifteen minutes before Kensi and Deeks brought Mattias into the boat shed. As they came in, Callen stuck his head out the door, looking to see if there was anyone following them. "Are you sure you weren't followed, he asked Deeks?"

"You know how Kensi drives, Few people can follow her normally, and when she is sure that she doesn't want to have someone on her tail...", he thought better of continuing that comment in words, but, as his thoughts continued and a great big smile came over his face, he just shook his head.

Kensi hit him in the shoulder, hard.

"What was that for? I didn't say anything wrong."

"But you were thinking it." she said as she glared at him.

'Oh, yeah, I was." An even bigger smile was on his face.

That gained him an even harder shot to his shoulder.

Callen walked off to where one of the hidden cameras was placed. Looking up, he called out to the tech in ops, "Eric, I want you to keep your eyes open to the cameras you have around the boat shed. If you see anything suspicious, any hint that they were followed, I want to know it, like yesterday."

"On it, Callen," was Eric's reply.

Callen turned back and saw that Kensi and Deeks had already put Mattias into the interrogation room. He entered with Sam, and the junior agents left, closing the door behind them.

"Why are we here, Mattias? I thought that all this ended a couple of years ago." Callen asked, standing over the old man.

"I have nothing to say to any of you. I will only talk to Herta."

"Herta?"

"Your boss, the Gartenzwerg [Garden Troll]"

"What do you want with Hetty? Didn't you understand what we meant with the message that we were sending you the last time we saw you?"

"I know, you told me you would take everything away. Well, there is nothing more to take away from me. That is why I need to talk to Herta."

Callen and Sam left the room and Hetty's voice came over the com. "I will be there in a few minutes, Mr Callen."

A short time later Hetty entered the boat shed. She said nothing to her agents, just went into the interrogation room and closed the door.

"I'm here, Mattias, what did you want to tell me."

"I need your protection, Herta."

"From whom?"

"From the Russians who disagree with the power set up in their country, from the CIA operating here, and from certain people in your own governmental agencies, that want to clean up all their loose ends."

"That is a formidable list, Mattias."

"I am one of those loose ends that they are trimming more and more until they come to the final cut and I will no longer be connected to this fabric of life."

"And do you know of any other loose ends that these intimidating groups want to trim from this fabric?"

"Yes, Herta. ...You."