Can't help myself but count the flaws

Claw my way out through these walls

One temporary escape

Feel it start to permeate

"Young Blood"

The Naked and Famous

May 19, 2036

Cairo, Egypt

"This is a satellite image MI6 transmitted at their last point of contact," Del said as he pressed a few keys on the computer. "Most of this structure was completely leveled in October of 1992 in an earthquake," he added, running his finger along a dark shadow on the image.

"Only 5.9, but the buildings in Cairo at the time were so old and none had been earthquake-proofed like they have in other parts of the world," Stephen mumbled, almost under his breath.

"Thank you, Mr. Cesspool of Useless Information," Del grumbled back. "Cozy, how do you stand it? It's like working with a life-size Echo."

"It's not useless," Stephen argued indignantly. "At least not all of it," he added under his breath.

"I'm used to it. It's very cute," she teased, knowing she could very easily irritate Del back to neutral using phrases like that.

Ignoring all of that, Del continued, "Hanafi was just coming to power in the area at that time. He was supposed to be working with the government to rid the terrorists in the area…and he ended up taking over as the head of almost all the organized crime in Northern Egypt for almost 20 years."

The view on the screen changed, the shot much more detailed as the satellite zoomed closer. "This is lidar assisted, but you can see there is significant evidence of subterranean activity."

"And MI6 thinks what? The mummy is here?" Stephen asked.

"You see this?" Del said, pointing to a sharply outlined object that appeared to be contained inside the active subterranean area. Stephen and Cozette nodded. "That's cement. It's nine feet long, three feet wide, and four feet tall. The mummy was transferred to Great Britain in March of 2032, for the purpose of the traveling exhibit that Egyptian Antiquities allowed for one year. It was stolen during the Summer Olympics in early July of the same year. It was transported out of Egypt in a cement casing with those exact specifications."

"That seems pretty cut and dry. Why did MI6 and/or Interpol pass the baton to us?" Cozette asked.

"Officially?" Del said sarcastically. "Because of Temhota. Stepanov's fingerprints are all over this." After a pause, he added, "The real reason? Because MI6 knows you can breach this fortress better than all of their agents put together."

Stephen let that sink in, not for a moment letting that thought inflate his ego. "They had to have built that down there. It was stolen out of that structure in the British museum. Do we have a plan for recovery…if I'm the only one who can get inside?"

Del set his steady gaze on his partner. "They're counting on you clearing out the hornets' nest. The terrain is treacherous…and that's the easy part. Once you do that, the Egyptians will take over. There just aren't any adventure archeologists out there willing to get to it."

"Where's Indiana Jones when you need him?" Stephen mumbled to himself. Del let that go without comment.

"What about Hanafi, Del?" Cozette asked. "He's technically still a part of all of this, right?"

"If what MI6 believes is true, then Hanafi paid Temhota to steal the mummy. If we can recover said mummy, we find out why. Once we know why, we can find him. That's the plan," Del instructed.

"So we roll after dark, correct?" Stephen asked to confirm.

"Correct. Study the hell out of these plans…you know, let that little computer in your head soak it up and incorporate its way into your subconscious mind. Right before nightfall, we begin surveillance. I'll stay in the van. Once it's dark, you two make your move. We have backup from the GIS, but they have been instructed to follow our lead. They will be five minutes out at all times," Del said.

"Sounds like a plan," Cozette said. More quietly against Stephen's ear, she whispered, "You have time to call your mother before we go. You can let her know what you found out…and what your plan to fix it is."

He had a good three hours to review the data. Then another hour where he could call his mother at a reasonable hour and let her know that he had a strong hypothesis about how to correct the problem with his father's Intersect.

May 19, 2036

Burbank, California

Sarah was alone in her house. It was so strange, she realized, as she couldn't remember the last time she had been. Her mind scrolled back an impossible number of years…a backyard campout that Chuck had done with the kids when they were small. Was that really how long ago it had been?

Sarah and Chuck had always worked together, even when she had cut back at the office and just tutored languages for a while when the children were little. Even as her children had grown and gone to college, leaving the nest so to speak, there was not even a single day that Sarah could recall when Chuck had been somewhere while she was at home. Stephen had lived with them until just recently, and now the girls were back for the summer between graduation and graduate school. It was mind-boggling, but at the same time, Sarah knew it was true. They were just close and it worked for them spending the amount of time together that they did.

She knew she was worried and anxious, but she could also accept rationally that part of her troubled state of mind was just the fact that she was here…and Chuck wasn't. She missed him, even after just a few hours. She refused to give in to believing that fact was pathetic or hopeless. She had spent 26 years alone before she had found him. She had missed him her whole life, never even knowing of his existence, never understanding that she had missed it. Anyone who couldn't understand that was just ignorant to the idea that two people could need each other so profoundly and still function in a normal relationship.

His absence had caused the fierce protector inside her to the surface, more than once. All of the cold calculation and razor-sharp ruthlessness was there at her disposal when it was needed. Chuck knew it was there, accepted that it was part of her, a part that he had never been afraid to look directly upon and never flinched away. Now was no different.

She had no way of knowing how this situation would play out. There were a thousand things that could go wrong, and her brain was turning them all over, like shuffling a deck of cards in her head. All she knew for sure at this moment was that Chuck needed her to fight for him. Whatever that required, she was ready and willing. She heard Ellie's voice in her head, from right as she had been leaving the hospital.

I know this is scary, Sarah. I'm scared too. But the only thing I know for sure…is that Chuck loves you. That doesn't just mean nothing.

Sarah knew that. That was why she had answered Ellie the way she had.

You know something else, too, Ellie. I love Chuck. And that means everything.

May 19, 2036

Cairo, Egypt

"Mom? Can you hear me?" Stephen said into the encrypted line on his cell phone. The connection was spotty, something that happened infrequently, but a sometimes problem.

"The connection's bad, but, yes, I can," Sarah replied.

"I know what happened to Dad," he said quickly, knowing the poor connection plus the mission prep he still needed to do required haste on his part. "There was a file included in the debriefing packet Casey showed to Dad after the Sentries were taken down in the fall of 2021. It's too complicated to explain the whole thing, but part of the program my grandfather built to correct the defective Intersect in Hartley Winterbottom was activated by a three dimensional watermark. A piece of the program in the key. It was designed to pull out Hartley from underneath Volkoff. In Dad, it's just…wearing away his own personality."

His words only made Sarah more anxious. "What does that mean?" she asked, sensing an upbeat tone to her son's voice that wouldn't be there if he didn't have at least some idea how to fix the problem.

"Again, long story. But what you need to know. My grandfather's engrams are what is keeping Dad as much of himself as he is. The Sentries were after me, in part, because my brain works like that program. Aunt Ellie can realign Dad's Intersect to my engram. Everything I studied tells me that it will work. Tell Aunt Ellie, Mom," he said intently.

It was good news, Sarah told herself. Better than she had anticipated just this morning after talking to Ellie. Stephen was mid-mission, and she would not burden him with more to worry about. Despite the news, Sarah worried over something she kept inside herself. If Stephen's engram was keeping Chuck still Chuck, it was already degrading. Stephen didn't know what was going on, how much worse things had gotten literally overnight. "When are you due back?" she asked, trying to sound casual and neutral.

"Three days max, Mom," he told her.

It was an eternity. Chuck was missing. Most of the control he had over that program was gone, if last night was any indication. Nothing she could do but wait. "Stay safe, sweetheart," she said softly.

She had no idea what the situation would be, three days from now, when he returned. But she called Ellie just the same.

XXX

"Are you two lovebirds ready?" Del asked when Stephen and Cozette stood, the hours-long surveillance in the van on a quiet Cairo side street completed. The night sky had gradually shaded pink, orange, light blue, purple, and now was black, the few brightest stars visible against the backdrop and mixed with the power of the electric light from the city.

Stephen zipped the last of his weapons into place, moments before Cozette had finished doing the same. Without knowing specifics, Stephen and Cozette had adopted the same team dynamic his parents had as well. Cozette always packed lethal force, deadly weapons like loaded guns, knives, and poison darts. They were a last resort. Stephen carried no guns of any kind, but had his own lethal weapons, most prominently his bow. He carried a tranq pistol. Both of them had taken lives, in the line of duty and when necessary. It wasn't easy, but at least some solace was always found from the fact that no one's death caused by either Stephen or his fiancee was done in cold blood. Killing was a last resort.

Stephen had been on a mission with Del when he was 21 the first time he'd been forced to kill someone. The mission had been to extract an agent taken captive in Morocco. He and Del had found her, tortured and barely alive. Del had carried her, being the stronger of the two men, but that had meant Stephen was on the offensive in front of them on the way out. It had been the last guard before they were clear who had disarmed Stephen. His only option was to engage the guard in hand to hand combat. The only way to escape that brawl was by commandeering the guard's own firearm and using it to ensure not just himself, but Del and the prisoner survived.

He knew he had killed the guard because he had no other option. He still had taken a brief leave afterward. It was a conversation with his father that stayed with him. Stephen had asked his father if he had ever had to kill someone while he had been a spy. Maybe intuition or just some stray bit of Intersect knowledge kept the conversation focused on his father, not his mother. Stephen always had the impression that asking that same question to his mother would get a very different answer. Chuck's reply had been cryptic, masking some bits of intelligence that Stephen guessed were still classified.

Chuck had told him he had believed he killed someone for the first time when he was 28 years old. He explained in almost the same words that he had had no other choice. It was either kill whom he had killed…or watch that same person kill Stephen's mother. That knowledge had been erroneous, but the intent was still the same. The only other instance had been during that time after Stephen had turned nine and the Sentries had come after him. Again, the fatal shot had been taken to save Sarah. His father abhorred killing, but he could, and he had, to protect someone he loved.

It wasn't the same, Stephen had said. But it didn't need to be, Chuck had reminded him. Stephen was himself, part of Chuck, but also part of Sarah. He was destined for something else, and he needed to define his own boundaries for himself. As he always had, Chuck finished by telling his son how much he loved him, and how proud he was. Stephen had never looked back from that moment.

"Are we good?" Cozette asked, testing their earwigs, pressing her index finger against the silicone plug inside her ear canal.

"Check," Stephen said, the second after Del replied the same word. "Remember, the word 'craft' is the code word. That calls the cavalry. It also clears out the bad guys, which is less than optimal."

"See you soon, Del," Stephen said with a quick smile as he moved to exit the van with Cozette.

XXX

The building on the street was nondescript, a newer bit of construction in an old city. The surrounding buildings, the ones that had survived the earthquake in 1992, had much more architectural character than this, a flat and square box. All of the action with this place was underground, and the access to the cavern beneath had been hidden since the earthquake. In the dark, it was a challenge, but Stephen had committed the map from the satellite to memory and somehow it had integrated itself into his Intersect, so seamlessly that sometimes Stephen couldn't draw the line to say what was memory recall and what was Intersect.

Stephen took the lead and Cozette trailed behind. Del stayed in both of their ears, ensuring they were informed about any company they could encounter on their way. The entrance to the underground area was situated behind a small stone wall partition surrounded by trash storage. Cozette assisted Stephen, pushing aside the cement slab that exposed a dusty cement staircase. He lowered himself into the hole and began descending the stairs.

The air was musty and dusty. He had to steady his breathing so he didn't cough. He ducked several times to avoid thick cobwebs that stretched from the ceiling in almost every corner. He was halfway down when he heard Cozette drag as much of the slab back into place as she started climbing down. "We're descending," Stephen whispered to Del via the earwig.

"At the bottom of the stairs, there are two people. One is on the right, the other on the left," Del said. They weren't really guards, Stephen told himself. Just hornets, as Del had so named them during the briefing. The faster they moved, the greater the chance of success without bloodshed. Silently, Stephen moved, drawing his tranq pistol and taking out both of the men.

"Check," Stephen whispered for Del's benefit.

"Go ahead about 500 yards. The entire expanse of that original cavern is clear. At the other side is another flight of stairs. Your next obstacles are at the bottom of those stairs," Del said.

They moved as silently as ghosts through the musty room. Stephen could see Cozette's shadow on the stone floor, cast by the dim wall sconces that provided the only light despite their wrist beacons. The direction of the light warped his shadow, casting it at an odd angle, so that it almost blended with Cozette's, making it difficult for him to tell whose limbs were whose in the shadows as they moved. It was an apt image, he thought, as he filed away that emotion while he focused. They went down the stairs and took out the second set of men.

"This is too easy, Del. What gives?" Stephen asked.

"Don't speak too soon, Bartowski," Del grumbled. "Around that corner, there are 15, count 15, men in the adjacent room. Make it through here, the cement casing is down the final set of stairs. But there are ten more on that level."

"Twenty-nine against two?" Stephen coughed. "No wonder MI6 passed the baton," he grumbled.

"We could call GIS," Cozette whispered. "Those men would be trapped down here, wouldn't they?"

"I have no way to confirm that," Del replied. "There may be escape routes the lidar can't read."

"We just have to move very fast," Stephen reasoned. "All 15 in less than five minutes reduces the risk of them alerting their friends downstairs."

"Think you can do that?" Del asked sincerely.

"Sure as hell gonna try," Stephen quipped fatalistically. "Ready, Babe?" he asked quietly over his shoulder.

She nodded once. "I love you," she said softly.

"I love you," Stephen replied, a ritual they always indulged in when it was a potential matter of life and death. Just in case, they never wanted to leave that unsaid.

She came up on his left, her gun poised in a double-handed grip. He shifted his right arm, engaging the compact bow fitted against his forearm, a special design feature of the jacket he wore when he was on a mission. He shifted again and the bow elongated like an extension of his arm, tethered in place but accessible at all times. His quiver had an electronic cover that retracted at the same time. His arrows were sometimes lethal, but always incapacitating, which was what they needed in this situation. As fast as they could be, the element of surprise was lost after a maximum of six individuals. Zette could take down three with her gun, he an additional three with his arrows before the others began reacting. That left nine against two. Still difficult, but not impossible, at least, not for the two of them together.

He felt Cozette close behind him, close enough that he felt her breath on his neck. "On my mark," he whispered, raising the bow into the air. "Now."

He spun around the corner, turning immediately to the right while Cozette dove to the left. He raised his bow and shot the closest man, then a second, followed by the third. They dropped soundlessly, the rest of the people in the room unaware that anything was amiss. He heard the soft pops of Cozette's gun…one, two, three. Six bodies were on the floor as they advanced. Their presence became known as the seventh man turned. The engagement began.

The room was mostly stone walls and floor, but unlike the first large room they had encountered, there was rudimentary furniture in this area…a desk, a few chairs, and a large table. One of the assailants upturned the table, crouching behind it for cover. Cozette flattened herself against the corner on the left while Stephen rolled across the floor to the other side. She hit one more and he fell. The instant Stephen stopped rolling he fired two arrows in rapid succession and another two fell. That left six, three of which were behind the table.

Cozette advanced from her position, exchanging fire with the three men who stood at an angle to where she had minimal cover. She fired, then ducked back quickly as the stone near her head exploded as a bullet made contact. The force of the explosion pelted the side of her face with sharp, tiny shards of stone. The moment it had taken her to shut her eyes to protect them upset her balance and her rhythm. She aimed and missed, then howled as she felt her upper left arm burn. She pulled back, seeing the wound through her torn sleeve, the bullet having only grazed her arm, thankfully. She watched as the flash bang grenade rolled past her towards the table. She braced herself.

The world exploded in a painful shower of light and sound, disorienting like a strobe light. She was incapacitated, but Stephen recovered very quickly. His Intersect somehow protected him from the deleterious effects of that type of stun grenade. He was on his feet, three arrows in three men before she could even raise her head. The effects had just begun fading when she watched him lower the bow, lift his tranq pistol with his left hand and shoot the remaining three behind the table.

Instead of moving quickly to the third flight of stairs, he rushed back to Cozette, knowing he had heard her cry out during the exchange of gunfire.

"Are you alright?" he asked breathlessly, his eyes tracing right away to the bloody wound on her upper arm.

"Just grazed. I'm ok," she replied, breathless herself. He still ripped off a swatch of cloth from the bottom of his shirt and wrapped her arm haphazardly in an attempt to staunch the bleeding.

"Craft, Del," Stephen said, making eye contact with Cozette as he said it. He didn't confer with her, deciding in the moment, with her injured and ten more on the lowest level, he needed the backup, the risk of the others escaping minimal at the place they were.

"Copy, Bartowski," Del said crisply in his ear. "GIS is there in three, I repeat, three."

"Tell them to hurry up, Del. I can hear them down there. The flash bang set them off. I didn't have a choice, but…" he gasped desperately.

"Pull back, Bartowski," Del almost shouted. "Go back up the stairs. It'll buy you a few minutes."

He had his bow in one hand and Cozette's uninjured arm in the other. He was already moving, one step ahead of Del's instructions. "Don't have to tell me twice, Del. We're moving," he said as he hustled.

"One minute forty seconds. That's their best," Del updated.

"I hope it's enough," he huffed as he ran up the stairs, pulling Cozette with his as he climbed

They came face to face with the business end of a machine gun.