Disclaimer – I don't own them, I just borrowed them. Numb3rs and its characters are the property of those that created them. No copyright infringement intended. All real organisations are used in a fictional sense. Original characters and the storyline are mine however.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

-100-1111-1110-

A group of men moved past where Don was still trying to sleep. He hardly took any notice, the floor was a hive of activity with people from each of the various agencies comprising the JTTF constantly coming and going. This was just another such group, Don only just noting their passing.

There was a sudden burst of sound, music, someone's cell phone ring tone. Don's eyes snapped open as he sat bolt upright. He immediately then hoped that no one had noticed his reaction, at least no one other than Wachowski who had started at Don's sudden movement. The music was the same as that he'd heard whilst he was in the presence of Telford's employer. The phone continued unanswered for long enough for Don to hear more of the tune. A few more bars and he had it, The Ride of the Valkyries. Most music based cell phone ring tones he'd heard were from current or recently released tracks or themes from television shows. He couldn't remember hearing a classical music piece as a ring tone before, not even on Charlie's phone. It was sufficiently unusual that Don was sure that it had to be the same phone. More than good enough for Barnathan, Don though ruefully, the man sure liked his coincidences. This was a good one though. Don needed to see who owned the phone.

Don peered around what he could see of the floor through the room's glass walls, trying to spot the phone's owner before the phone was answered and the music stopped. He'd narrowed the direction down to the small group of three men that had just passed by a moment earlier and were walking away. Abruptly the music stopped. But for once something was going in Don's favour, the phone was answered and raised to an ear.

Don abruptly turned away, it couldn't be. Unfortunately he was sure what he'd seen, who he'd seen. He had some work cut out for him now, he had to find real proof to link the man to Telford and the plot against the mall. It was not going to be a simple matter of telling Barnathan so he could pounce before the remote controlling the bombs could be activated. He would need much more than just coincidence to accuse another agent of terrorism, murder, kidnapping and conspiracy to commit. Considering who he'd just seen, even Barnathan would hesitate to act without more evidence.

Don took a moment to catalogue his condition. The doctor had been right, the muscle relaxant had greatly eased his cramps to the point that they were no longer an issue. His headache was still there but had also reduced to a more manageable level. This was not all to say that he couldn't do with a whole day or so in bed at the moment but he would live.

Don rose to his feet and took a few experimental steps finding he was able to keep his balance without any problems.

"What's up?" Wachowski asked.

"Something I need to do." Don told the man as he started for the door.

"Wait." Wachowski went to the fridge and pulled out a brightly coloured bottle. He handed it to his charge.

Don realised that he must have slept, for a few minutes at least, he hadn't seen the bottle delivered. Don opened the sports drink as he made his way over to his computer and was relieved to see that his team weren't using the cubicle. He sat and took a moment to finish off the bottle. Almost immediately he felt revived. Tossing the empty bottle into the bin in the corner he logged in to his desktop. He opened up a few search windows and wondered where to start. Don became aware of Wachowski standing behind his shoulder, looking at his screen. He didn't want the DHS agent to follow this line of inquiry, at least not until he'd proven his suspicions.

"This is confidential, Agent Wachowski."

Wachowski wasn't apologetic. "I'm to supervise everything you do Special Agent Eppes." He'd already screwed up this evening and didn't want to make any more mistakes. This was his first major incident, if he wanted to continue serving the DHS in a field role he knew he had to improve his performance.

"Supervise yes, but you can do that from back over there." Don waved at David's seat behind him.

"I can't see what you are doing from over there." Wachowski had a flash of inspired reasoning. "How do I know you're not about to send information to the terrorist via e-mail or over the internet?"

A terrorist with an internet site? Don thought incredulously but then realised that stranger things had probably happened. However Wachowski had made a valid point, Don hadn't thought of the possibility and should have. There was a simple solution to the problem and Don didn't need the access anyway. He pressed the speaker button on his phone and dialled the computer section extension.

"This is Eppes, ID number 3695." He said when a tech answered. "I want my external e-mail and internet access blocked immediately."

"I'll need your passcode to verify your ID."

"Hotel-seven-nine-one-victor-tango."

There was the sound of computer keys being pressed. "Confirmed, Special Agent Eppes. You external accounts have been blocked. You will receive a notification in your in-box momentarily. Anything else I can do for you?"

"No, thanks." Don hung the phone up. He could have got the computer section to help but he needed this inquiry kept quiet for now. He opened his e-mail and ignored the ones already waiting for him, he wasn't interested in those. A few seconds later the computer beeped and a new e-mail appeared as promised. He opened it and saw the confirmation that his external access was blocked. Wachowski, reading over his shoulder obviously decided it was good enough as he moved back and took a seat far enough away that he wouldn't be able to read information off the screen. Don got to work.

All FBI computer access was password and ID protected requiring a user to log in then enter a password at various points in the system when entering search fields requesting data and when opening up certain files returned by the search engines. This provided an audit trail allowing those with certain access to track a user's movements thought the system and to see what data was being retrieved. At several points it was also necessary for a user to enter their reason for accessing certain information into a free text field.

Don no longer had his full SAC level access but as a team leader and supervisor he did have access to conduct some audits of a user's trail through the system. He put that to use now, entering his own password and reasons for access as he went. His own inquiries could be traced and questioned. He just hoped his target wasn't keeping track of such things at the moment, he shouldn't be, he should be too occupied with the incident at hand.

Don found his memory fuzzy on the details so he started to rise to get his open Telford file but remembered that Barnathan had taken it. He went back over his running logs and old, electronically stored, reports instead and was able to get the information he needed, the names of the murdered agents and informants along with the dates.

He then conducted his own searches on the names as he had done eight months before when investigating Telford's claims, but this time he clicked into the secondary administration screens each time to see who had accessed the same information and when. He found his own ID on the screen along with a whole list of others, some he immediately recognised as his team, others he didn't know. He checked for the usage closest to the dates of the murders and printed the list out on the printer sitting on the desk beside him. He pulled up Special Agent Gerhardt's file and that of Shelton, her protectee, from New York. He expanded the dates somewhat however as he had less information to work from. He again printed the list of ID codes. The same number was starting to leap out at him.

He switched to another screen and entered the ID codes one after another to obtain the names of the inquiring agents. The repeating ID code came up to the name he'd expected. He printed the page out and left it sitting face down on the printer output tray.

He returned to the other screen and clicked into the ID of his target, pulling up his trail through the records of each person, agent and informant alike. He opened up the reason for access fields and printed out the results. He noted that some of the reasons made no sense, in fact seemed to refer to other persons and other inquiries. Don noted the times and dates of those accesses. Fortunately some of those free text fields included names enabling Don to look those up as well and confirm that his target had conducted inquiries into those others. The timings made it look as though the target had looked at information about an informant or agent by mistake whilst conducting inquiries into another person. It seemed that his target had made some attempt to provide an alibi for some of the accesses. As his target was senior to him Don wasn't able to fully follow that up however as his level of access didn't allow him to simply call up all transactions. He could only search by looking up the same information.

He remembered someone he'd left out. Don looked up his own details, clicking into the appropriate secondary screen. Again the same ID code appeared on the day of Hendrik's murder and his own kidnapping. He scrolled back searching for any previous appearances of the ID code, Telford's employer had mentioned following Don's work 'for some time'. He found periodic hits, especially after some of his more noteworthy arrests. The earliest access he could find was after a particularly convoluted investigation he'd headed whilst he was in Albuquerque.

He remembered the job, an investigation into the corruption of a number of high ranking city officials. Pressure had been put on him from several sources to drop the matter but he'd persevered eventually proving the case and sending several officials to jail for official misconduct and fraud. Don frowned as a memory occurred, he'd actually received a letter of commendation from his target. Don then recalled his advice to David to check his personal file for thank-you letters. He'd never dreamed, nor would David, as to who they should have been looking at.

He worked his way back up the list opening up each file that his target had looked at. He saw that most times his target had read the covering report and left it at that. There was another notable exception. The target had looked at everything involving the Crystal Hoyle case and Megan's kidnapping. He saw the report where Merrick had signed off on his actions and those of Edgerton. His target had approved the ADIC's conclusions.

Don sat back and thought for a moment. He'd received an e-mail from Telford eight months ago in the then current FBI encryption. His target was the obvious source for that. He also remembered that when his passcode had been used by Telford's employer the call for the bogus address check had come in to the FBI's internal inquiry number. An outsider wouldn't know that number. More damning information. Don pulled up that inquiry made under his ID, seeing the note from Merrick that the access had been fraudulent, and printed those pages as well.

A little creative digging was now needed. Don went through some expenditure and visitor records both for LA and New York and was able to place his target in both cities at the times of the murders. He was also able to place his target arriving in LA a couple of days ago. That would explain why the target had been called in for this incident and had arrived so quickly, he was already in town. A few more pages printed out adding to the respectable pile already waiting. It was still all circumstantial, enough to raise questions but not enough, yet, to convict. It was mounting though.

Don exited out of the inquiry screens and opened up the FBI intra-net, pulling up his target's bio page. He read it through carefully noting past postings, major investigations and any listed staff he had working for him over the years. Don also dug up electronic copies of their internal journal, articles found by searching for his target by name. The journals were an in-house publication, originally in print but now produced electronically. A project had been underway for some time to convert older journals to electronic copies as well. The journals were a forum to report on good work by agents, cover new trends in crime, and to list promotions and transfers. Dan had appeared in a few articles himself. It was in one of the older transferred journals that Don got his break.

It was a picture of his target along with several others identified as staff members establishing a new office. Don immediately recognised the man standing slightly behind and to one side of his target. The photo was more than a few years old, the quality down compared to more recent photos. The hairstyle was also different. But for all that the man was clearly Telford. Don had long suspected that Telford had been and possibly still was, FBI. He had in fact searched photographs of agents looking for the man. He knew far too much about procedures to not be an agent. He read off the name at the bottom of the photo. The name was only slightly different to the one he was using now.

He went back to the other system and conducted a search on Telford. He decided that he had to keep thinking of him under that name, the man's real name was too close and Don knew it would be easy to make a disastrous slip.

From reading the article in the journal Don had learnt that his target had mentored Telford from the Academy, sponsoring him into more important positions until adding him to his staff. Then it had gone bad. The file Don managed to pull up showed that about five and half years ago an informant being guarded by Telford had died in suspicious circumstances. The investigation hadn't been conclusive, not enough evidence gathered to charge Telford, but it had been sufficient to force him to resign from the FBI.

The timeline seemed to fit. Don checked the notes he'd made of the dates. It would be nearly five years ago now that the military men had dropped off the face of the earth which would have been when they were recruited. The first execution had happened about four years ago, the next almost two years later. Hendrik was eight months ago, Gerhardt and Shelton a couple of weeks ago. It was a classic serial killer pattern, the gap between Telford's actions diminishing, even taking into account the apparent last minute nature of the threat to the mall based on intel supposedly gathered by Telford in New York.

Don now had a second stack of printouts. He put most of them into an envelope which he placed in his lockable top drawer. The first set of printouts he went over carefully, highlighting various lists of data and included the photo of his target and Telford. He went over to the nearest photocopier and copied everything. The copy went into an envelope, joining the first in the drawer which he then locked. The originals went into a folder.

He sat there holding the folder for a while. He had him, he knew who Telford's employer was but there was nothing he could actually do about it. Knowing the man's name didn't change the fact that he had a remote detonator that he could used to kill innocent civilians. A threat that served to keep Don from taking action for the moment, but he was ready for when the situation presented itself.

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A/N: Not too sure how this chapter will be received. I spent a lot of time agonising over whether to include it or to cut it down dramatically. I decided to leave it as is as I feel these details are important. Does it work?

And since I was asked so nicely, another chapter to celebrate the weekend…