Chapter 2

The guard who'd opted to take her to Federal grabbed her arm roughly and shoved her forward. She stumbled and fell down, skinning her knees again. Her cheek grazed the pavement and she felt warm blood trickling to her chin.

"Get up," the guard told her shortly, yanking her arm and collar. She jerked away from his touch. People touching her repulsed her. Jack and Tony were the only ones who ever could. She loved them. Trusted them.

The guard dragged her to a black government van with a bulletproof divider between the front and back seats and watched as he handcuffed her to the door.

Her guard started the car, and Nina looked out the window, watching C.T.U. fade into the background. She ran her free hand through her soft, shaggy hair. She knew the blood on her face had dried a little by now and she could feel her split lip burn. Ouch. That was going to hurt for a while.

Nina pressed her face against the leather seat, curling her legs up behind her. The cold metal of the handcuffs bit into her left wrist and she rubbed it with her free hand. God, she was tired. She hadn't slept in two full days, and it was taking its toll on her.

Tears swam in her beautiful eyes. She just wanted this day to end. But the end was only beginning. She was going to be charged with treason. Murder. Felony. Many more crimes would follow that, even. They were going to kill her, or at least put her away for the rest of her life. It didn't matter. And after all she'd done to protect Jack, she was still going to jail for it. But at least Jack would be protected. He was safe now. She'd gotten his file out of their hands, and she'd protected it. The terrorists didn't have his cell anymore.

Nina closed her eyes and sighed. All she wanted was sleep. She didn't want to deal with it all right now. She couldn't. It was too painful. Nina wrapped her free arm around her slim waist and drifted into an uneasy but much-needed sleep.

(A few hours later)

Nina awoke to someone gently prodding her back. She moaned and squeezed her eyes tightly shut.

"I'm tired, Tony," she mumbled, rolling over.

"Ms. Myers," a voice called firmly from above her. Not Tony.

Nina moaned again, this time slowly opening her eyes. She was cruelly jerked back to her surroundings. Nina was lying on her side still, stretched out in the car. She rose to a sitting position slowly, running her right hand through her tangled hair.

"Ms. Myers," the guard repeated, taking her shoulder and uncuffing her from the door. "I need you to come with me."

Nina allowed him to lead her out into another parking lot. She could tell it was a government building from the row of black vans identical to the car she'd been brought in.

Inside at the lobby, she scanned the walls for some sense of a name. The wall behind her bore stenciled black lettering that read "California Federal Detention Facility." The room was bland. Washed out.

This is my life now, she told herself. Get used to it.

"Excuse me," the guard asked of a secretary sitting in a chair. The nametag she wore read 'Renée.' Her hair was a soft, dark auburn and she had wide blue eyes. She looked innocent, but tough. "I have Nina Myers, the mole uncovered at C.T.U. Los Angeles. She's under your jurisdiction to interrogate, process, prosecute, and hold, if necessary."

If they don't kill me, Nina thought mildly. She thought of it casually, and that scared her.

The woman blinked, and efficiently reached for a phone. "Hold, please," she said to Nina and her guard. Nina smirked. "Richard, it's C.T.U. A guard showed up with Nina Myers, the mole from C.T.U. Los Angeles."

She paused, listening for his response. "I'll send them up."

The woman turned to Nina and the guard. "You can take her to Richard Anderson's office, room 113. Up the stairs and down the hall."

"Thank you," the guard said, dragging Nina by her collar. Sooner or later, she was going to break from people touching her.

They approached another dull room. A thin, balding man in an ill-fitting gray suit rose gracefully to greet them.

"You must be from C.T.U.," he said formally, shaking the guard's hand. "Ah. You must be Nina Myers," he exclaimed, regarding Nina.

Nina glowered at him appropriately, defiantly staring him down. She wasn't some disobedient child; why was he treating her like one?

"I'll process her from here. Thanks for bringing her over," said Anderson, and with that, she and her fate were placed in his hands.

Nina was lead into a holding/interrogation room. She rolled her eyes. It was all going to start from here.

Anderson walked in after her, slapping her now thick file on the table. The guard in the room handcuffed her to the chair. She kept her head down, her pale eyes keen on the floor.

"So…you've had quite the history with us, Ms. Myers," he said, regarding her closely, judging her reaction. She looked at him silently.

Anderson sighed, raising his eyebrows. He opened the file, and sifted through a few papers. "You've been found to have been working closely with the terrorists who conspired to assassinate David Palmer and Agent Jack Bauer. This morning, your murdered Jamey Farrell and also attempted to help the terrorists escape from the warehouse they were operating the mission in. After this, you loaded a disc with intel on this entire day's investigation – yes we know about the disc," he said, after seeing her surprise. "Then, you kidnapped and murdered Teri Bauer, shot and killed three security guards, and tried to run."

At this, he glanced at Nina, whose eyes were rapidly filling with tears. Don't cry, she willed herself, biting her lip.

"What happened to you?" Anderson asked her. "You've served your country honorably for five years and then you betrayed it? That doesn't happen by accident. What did they do to you?"

He was just saying it to get her to talk; she could tell. Still, she couldn't help to respond to his words, because, after all, he was right.

"You wouldn't believe me," she muttered, looking down. He gazed fiercely at her.

"Ms. Myers, you're going to be tried for treason. They may as well decide to have you killed. Now, if you don't start cooperating, it's going to be a whole lot worse than it has to be."

Nina scoffed, but took him seriously. She needed to tell them something, but what?

Her story was ludicrous and she knew it, but it was the truth. She needed a convincing half-truth, something that was enough to be easy to tell.

"Fine," Nina said stonily. "I'll tell you whatever you want to know."

Anderson blinked in surprise, but carefully resumed his former expression. Nina smirked inwardly, but knew she had to start talking.

"Can you explain how you became involved with the Serbian extremists?" he asked her, scratching his cheek.

Nina sighed. "Yes, I got involved with terrorists. Same as Jamey Farrel. They offered me reimbursement for my help in their operation and I helped them. It was only the money. Not a personal vendetta. That's it."

She could tell he knew she was hiding something, but he wrote down her information.

"Do you know their names, other than the Drazens?"

"No," she said. She couldn't betray them. She didn't know if they'd still consider targeting Jack to get her to shut up and do what they wanted.

"You say you were offered money. Did you receive it in advance? Through bank accounts?"

"It wasn't like that," Nina told him. "Once I completed the operation and they smuggled me out of the country, I'd be set up with the money and I could disappear."

"Where would you go?"

"I was supposed to be in Germany."

"Do you know where?"

"No."

"Alright," Anderson said. "I'm going to hook you up to the sensors. Nothing painful; they just check your pulse, monitor heart rate and such. I'm sure you know the procedures."

"Yeah," Nina said. She knew all too well.

(An hour later)

Nina emerged from the room exhausted. It was almost two in the morning by now, and she was wiped.

They had hooked her up to a passive response test after the interrogation and she had remained undetected. After conducting hundreds of interrogations such as hers, she knew how to mess with the responses. The machines were hardly reliable, anyways. They were only useful if one was desperate.

When they'd finally been convinced she had given up all the information they needed, Anderson had drawn up a profile for her, and she was released.

So now she traipsed down a hallway with two security personnel to go to Medical. That was going to be interesting. They were going to stick her full with needles and poke her to death.

They entered a sterile, white room occupied by a doctor and a nurse.

"We have Nina Myers for her exam," one of the guards said, releasing her. Nina stumbled and stopped between the three men.

"Hello, Nina," the doctor said gently, soothingly. He seemed kind, considering he was working in a federal prison facility surrounded by assholes and lowlifes. "My name is Doctor Ellis. I'll be examining you.

He was no Frankenstein, but you couldn't be sure. Nina walked forward hesitantly, shadowed by the guards. Ellis took her arm and led her to a table. The guard unlocked her cuffs and chained her to the table.

"You are right handed, aren't you?" Ellis asked her absently. She nodded slightly. Cautiously.

He first poured a little alcohol onto a cotton swab and began to wipe the smears of dried blood off her face. He was gentle, and though it stung, it felt nice to be clean again. Once he'd scrubbed the blood off, he began to examine her cuts.

"You must have had a day," he said, almost sympathetically. Nina looked at him in shock. This whole day, no one had tried to understand what she was going through. Anderson was all fake nice, the guards had treated her like a lowlife, and Jack had tried to kill her.

She winced as he dabbed a little antiseptic on her forehead, where she'd cracked her head. God, that hurt. The car had done a good job of beating her up, almost better than Jack did. Almost.

"Whoever tried to strangle you did a good job," Ellis said with concern. Nina looked down in surprise to see two sets of bluish finger-shaped bruises etched into her neck.

"Yeah," she said dully.

"Alright, Nina, I'm going to uncuff one of your hands so you can take your shirt off. We need to do a regular physical now."

"Okay." Did that mean he trusted her, too? He must have, because he unlocked her right arm, and she unbuttoned her shirt and took off her black jacket.

"Breathe in," he said. She felt the cold stethoscope pressing into her back. She breathed in and then out. In and out.

He had her do a few other things, drew blood from her finger, and wrote everything down. The guards came to the door.

"Is she done?"

"Yes," Ellis said, standing up. "Here's her file."

They chained Nina's hands together again and she readied herself to lead. Ellis patted her on the back.

"Good luck," he said, smiling at her. Nina smiled back, the first real smile she'd had in a while.