A/N: Some of the events of my story A Conflict of Interest are vaguely alluded to in this chapter, but it is not at all necessary to have read it. Just a note for regular readers. Oh, also-- there are certain topics I'm spending only a few sentences on (namely, in this chapter, how Michelle feels about Tony's protectiveness) because I explored them at length in A Conflict of Interest. Anyway, here's the next chapter. Please leave feedback-- I'm having a tough time with the next few chapters, so any input as well as comments would be appreciated.

Chapter Two: Repercussions

"Bauer," Hammond was saying, "I don't care. It's paid leave until we have documented proof that this habit is over, and then we'll talk about whether you still have anything to do with CTU. For now, however, it's not open for discussion."

"Brad—"

"That will be all for now, Jack." When he made no move to leave, Hammond added pointedly, "Would you excuse us."

"Fine." Jack stood, a violent look in his eyes, and left the conference room without another word.

"Now, Michelle."

"Yes?"

"Tony is obviously no longer running CTU, and Jack won't be involved for several months at best, if he's ever approved to go back in. You're next in command."

"Yes," she said again, simply.

"Mistakes were made yesterday. Costly mistakes. But your overall performance was distinguished, and you're looking at a rank-status upgrade."

Michelle nodded shortly. "To what?" He turned a binder toward her, showing the paperwork for the upgrade. Masking her shock, she managed to answer, "That's… that's fairly major, Brad."

"The bottom line is," he said, acting as though without interruption, "That it's almost entirely definite that you're going to take over CTU. Things are a mess right now, and we can't afford bringing in someone who's not familiar with the system and personnel."

"Brad, what is it you're trying to say, here?"

"Michelle, I have my reservations about you because of your relationship with Agent Almeida."

"Marriage," Michelle cut in, "It's a marriage."

"Semantics," Hammond dismissed, "I'm trying to tell you that for whatever reason, the people above me were impressed with what you did yesterday and they want to see you in charge. But make no mistake about it: you're going to need my blessing."

Resisting the almost irrepressible urge to tap her pen in impatience, Michelle managed to keep her professional veneer intact. "Please get to the point, Brad."

"What I'm saying is this: you're currently Acting Director at CTU, and it's not going to be long before your position is officiated and your rank status is raised accordingly. That's what all of my higher-ups want, and there's nothing I can do about it. But I don't like the situation, so if I were you, I would make very certain not to screw up anything. Do you understand my point…Miss Dessler?"

"Are you threatening me, Brad?" Michelle asked coolly, her eyes locked on his.

"No, I'm not," he returned, "I'm telling you that you have a choice, here. It's CTU or Tony—you can't have both. Either you assume responsibility as Director and put that first or you can concentrate on Tony, but it has to be one or the other."

"Excuse me?" she asked, fighting to keep the mask over her disbelief. Was he honestly saying that if she kept the job that was rightfully hers, he was going to try to keep her from Tony?

"What are you going to do, Michelle?"

Jesus, he was as serious as always. Her mind was working quickly. Her first instinct was to say Tony, without hesitation. But there were other things to be considered. Did she really know that if she did that, Hammond wouldn't still try to get between them? Knowing him, it was as likely as not. More importantly, there was a bigger picture to worry about. If she knew anything, it was that CTU was in turmoil, and it was going to need a strong leader. She wasn't willing to forfeit that to someone unfamiliar with not only the agency itself, but with the staff. She owed it to them to remain in her position; to give them some stability. And, after all, she couldn't afford to take a pay cut; not now. Not to mention that, when you got down to it, Hammond's ability to interfere with her and Tony was going to be limited. It wasn't a choice, really.

"I'm going to be Director," replied Michelle after a brief pause.

"That's your decision?"

"Yes."

"Fine. Paperwork for rank status upgrade is ready…" he paused and handed her a folder, which she reached for. Opening it, she began looking over the documents. "And," he continued, "You are the special agent in charge of the Counterterrorist Unit, Los Angeles branch. We'll have the paperwork sorted out in a few days."

Driving from Division back to CTU— her agency, she couldn't help thinking— she remained uncertain. Whether or not it was wise to question a decision once it was made was irrelevant; she was second-guessing herself and she couldn't help it.

She felt categorically horrible about the decision she'd come to. Tony had committed treason for her, and she was choosing her job over him? When she phrased it that way, it sounded truly awful. But at the same time, she justified, it wasn't as though by choosing to keep her position, she was adversely affecting Tony.

Hammond would try to get between them, and chances were he'd have some success. Bur even that had to be limited; there was only so much he could do, with no real guarantee that he wouldn't do it regardless. Though he'd liked Michelle to begin with, Hammond had harbored feelings of hostility toward Tony since the Nina debacle, and those feelings had only intensified after Tony had become involved with and then married Michelle.

It was hardly that Hammond feared Michelle would be another Nina—on the whole, he liked and respected her. But he felt that romantic involvement was totally inappropriate and had held it against both of them—but especially Tony—since they'd announced their engagement.

So, Michelle reasoned, her decision regarding her job was essentially immaterial to how Hammond would deal with her situation with Tony. And, anyway, there was more to it than that. Loosing both of its heads and countless field agents, having been on active protocols for two days without reprieve, and nearly every person on staff working straight through the entire time— well, CTU was in a tumultuous state at best. Michelle felt that it was her obligation as a professional to see CTU through this hell.

The more she thought about it, the more sense it made to her. But that did nothing to dispel the sick feeling that had settled in the pit of her stomach. Because though she felt that the choice she'd made had been the right one, it wasn't the choice that Tony would have made. She knew that.

For all the time they'd been together, Tony had been protective; that was just the way he was. Most of the time, it was sweet and comforting: when he would keep his arm around her waist when they walked out at night, or when he would carry her from the couch to the bed when she fell asleep watching the news after a particularly long day. But when he got himself worked up just because she was going into the field, it annoyed her. To be fair, she'd been hurt in the past, once fairly seriously, but she still hated it when he tried to keep her safe at the expense of the job she had to do. Whatever the situation, he was always almost obsessively committed to her well-being. And in the past, she had wondered in her infrequent moments of insecurity, if he loved her more than she did him.

And this—what he was willing to do for her—she knew she wouldn't have done the same. That hurt—it stung with a fire that made her suddenly hot so that in a split-second she went from a feverish chill to feeling every one of the one-hundred-two degrees of heat in her body.

Realizing that she was only a minute or two from entering the CTU parking lot, Michelle blinked back the tears mixing guilt, horror, and fatigue. At a stoplight, she flipped down the mirror and checked her makeup, wiping away the bit of smeared black under her eye and making a mental note to touch up her mascara when she got the chance.

Entering CTU a few minutes later, Michelle was handed a briefing packet by the night-shift head of CTU. The night shift was a minimal team—if there was ever so much as hint of a crisis, the main staff was called in immediately. The extra people had been used the night before for manpower, and then sent home as soon as the virus was secured so that they could relieve the exceptionally overworked and exhausted main staff.

Michelle glanced through the packet, and then looked back up at the night head. "Can you have a briefing for my department heads ready in ten?" He nodded, and with a curt "Good," Michelle was on her way to her office. Logging onto her system and glancing at the screens in her workstation, Michelle was suddenly struck with a thought.

This wasn't her office anymore. Well, it was; yes, but as Director, she would be taking over what had been Tony's office. And Michelle was dismayed when she felt a twinge of triumph mix with her regret. She tried to tell herself it hadn't been there, but it was.

Hastening to justify it, she thought: It's not that I'm even remotely happy about what's happened. This is tearing my life apart, and it's breaking my heart, and I didn't know that it was possible to feel so cold inside. But… that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to be glad for the little bit of good that came out of it, does it? Even if it was at the expense of him. But, no, that's not how it is! It's not like the fact that I'm taking this position has anything to do with Tony's… to what happened to Tony.

And even as her thoughts chased themselves around in circles, she could feel tears glistening in her eyes and she ran a finger lightly along her hairline, mimicking the way Tony did it. It felt nothing like it.

With a deep breath to pull herself together, Michelle glanced at her watch. She had just a few minutes before the briefing started. Not allowing herself the luxury of thinking about her misery, Michelle forced herself to begin looking over the records from the night in preparation for the briefing.

When she returned from the meeting in the conference area, Michelle looked around what had, since the bombing three years ago, been her office. CTU was not exactly the kind of placepeople hung up pictures oftheir kids. As it was, that would have been pointless for Michelle anyway, since she didn't have kids, and if she wanted to see her husband while she worked all she had to do was glance up and try not to drool.

But in any case, there wasn't much for her to do to move. Transfer a few insignificant files that she hadn't bothered to upload onto the main servers. Collect paperwork—there wasn't a lot of paperwork that was actually made out of paper in CTU, but there was still some—and gather up the notebooks and folders from her desk. Clean out the contents of one drawer. The "personal" drawer. It wasn't very personal, really. It was the kind of thing every sane woman keeps on hand at all times. A box of tampons. A chocolate stash. A bottle of Advil. Extra nylons.

It didn't matter, because the fact remained that she had completely transferred herself to the upper-office in less than fifteen minutes. Terrified by the finality of it all, Michelle was shaking as she sent the memo notifying her staff that she could now be found in the director's office. That was it. Just like that. It was as though Tony had never been there. As though he hadn't given up his life for this job. As though he had disappeared into thin air. But he hadn't! Had he?

"So what you're telling me, Ms. Dessler, is that the virus is now completely contained?"

"Essentially, Mr. President," Michelle said with an air of authority that, despite all the command she had wielded prior to today, still felt new. "We can't completely rule out the possibility of the appearance of another case for another twenty-four hours, but every person in each quarantine zone has been tested and either released or… isolated."

"Isolated?" he asked, his voice grim.

"Yes, Mr. President. As you know, clinics have been set up across the city for infected citizens, sealed for biohazard. We've done our best to make this as… to prevent as much suffering as we could," she finished, thankful that she'd kept her voice from cracking but painfully aware of the tears glistening in her eyes.

"How many people were infected?"

"Final casualty figure… three thousand four hundred and fifty-three. Six hundred twenty-six of those were children." Her voice had caught, as she choked over the last syllable. Taking a moment, she glanced down at the table and took a few deep breaths.

The president's face contorted as he struggled just as much as she to keep his composure. "Their names?"

"We've sent those to your office, Mr. President."

"Good." Silence ensued. Michelle wondered if they were even going to be able to make it through five more minutes of this videoconference. At length, he continued. "Regarding the reopening of traffic flow…"

Nearly an hour later, the conference had ended, and Michelle was walking back toward her office. The clicking of her heels resonated all too loudly in her ears, an inescapable reminder of just how real this was. Michelle entered the office, closed the glass door behind her, and sank into a chair. For a moment, she felt as though there might be a chance she could get to work. Just a moment. Her elbows resting on the desk, Michelle dropped her face into cupped hands. For a few seconds, she simply stayed like that, trying hard not to cry. Then, moving suddenly, she reached into the drawer and took out her Advil, shaking out two and swallowing without bothering with water. This headache made her feel as though she could scream, it hurt so badly. And she hoped, vaguely, that the ibuprofen would bring down her fever and stop the damned shaking.

But it didn't matter. None of it mattered. The job—that was what mattered. Gritting her teeth, Michelle reached for the keyboard and got to work

It was almost midnight, and Michelle was finally getting ready to leave. The rest of the shift had left almost two hours ago; only she and Chloe remained, tying up ends. And so it was Chloe who entered Michelle's office, laptop in hand.

"What is it, Chloe?" Michelle asked, faintly annoyed. She could only hope that there wasn't yet another problem with which she would have to deal before leaving. She needed to get to bed. Badly.

"Are you getting ready to leave?"

"Yes, I am. You should go, too Chloe; get some sleep. Things are going to get worse around here before they get better," Michelle answered distractedly, reaching across the desk to disconnect her laptop.

"Yeah, well," Chloe sighed, standing in the middle of the office awkwardly, "That's usually what happens when an infectious deadly virus is released into the general population."

"Chloe," Michelle said sharply, stopping what she was doing and looking up. "I do not need your sarcasm right now. I just… I'm exhausted; you are too. Let's just wrap up and go home… okay?"

Embarrassed, Chloe bit her lip and looked away. "I wasn't trying to…" her voice trailed off. "I didn't mean to sound that way," she muttered, looking away again. Michelle's features softened. She knew perfectly well Chloe couldn't really help it.

"It's okay, Chloe," she sighed. "Don't worry about it." Michelle went back to gathering her things, periodically turning toward the computer screen to scan a final report she was in the midst of approving. When Chloe made no move to leave, she paused and glanced up. "Did you need something?"

"I…" biting her lip again, Chloe hesitated. "I just wanted to make sure you're okay. Are you… okay?"

"No." Michelle said flatly as she finished what she was doing and stood, facing Chloe.

"As in… not okay in the sense that you've slept, like, six hours in the past three days or not okay because your husband's in federal prison being charged with treason?"

"I'd rather not get into this right now," Michelle stated tightly, her face blank and yet painfully drawn.

"Fine," Chloe sputtered, turning to leave. But just before she closed the door behind her, she looked back over her shoulder. "But when you do, I'm here."

Rolling her eyes, Michelle picked up her laptop and logged off her system.

Half an hour later, Michelle was again standing outside her door, and again afraid to enter. Why was it that she wasn't afraid of taking down an armed terrorist by herself, but she was afraid to walk through her own damn door? But asking herself that was just a way of hiding from the truth, because she knew perfectly well why she was afraid. She was afraid to be by herself. She was afraid to face the demons. The events that kept replaying in her mind:

Picking up the phone and hearing Jack's voice. "He's been shot." Suppressing tears and screams and total collapse as she headed the office and gave orders. Coming to the realization that there was no one to whom she could hand over CTU, and trying to save the city, country, world from an infectious and deadly virus while wondering if her husband was going to die, and knowing that she couldn't be there with him, like a wife should.

Tony returning, Michelle finding out that he'd been deceiving her, and realizing that she'd been totally oblivious to that fact. Watching the marriage that both thought—no, known—was a strong one rapidly deteriorating as hour after horrific hour slipped by.

Being sent to the Chandler Plaza Hotel, and leading her agents into the possibly infected building against every protocol on the books, and then watching them, one by one, die agonizing deaths, believing that she would follow. Shooting the innocent, frightened civilian as he tried to save himself.

Getting kidnapped, held at knifepoint and gunpoint. Escaping from them by ingenuity and pure determination, only to purposely get herself caught again for the good of the mission. And then finding out what Tony had done to save her… that he had committed treason for her, but also that he had committed treason at all. Tony being taken away, and Michelle feeling a part of her die as he left. And then Michelle being horrified at him for making such an irresponsible, flat-out bad decision, appalled that he could have been responsible for inciting what had happened at the hotel to happen all over the country.

For it was the images of the Chandler Plaza Hotel that haunted her most.

The little girl, no older than eight, bleeding and crying and begging her mommy to make it stop. The mommy dying, and the little girl terrified and in horrible pain, and too scared to take the pills without her mommy to tell her if it was okay. Michelle going to the girl and hugging her, and telling her that she'd see her mommy soon, even though Michelle had never believed in an afterlife. Holding the girl on her lap, squeezing her close, and rocking her back and forth, because someone had to give this little girl human touch. Holding the girl until being called away to deal with a possible security breach. The breach turning out to be nothing, but returning to find the little girl dead.

Michelle found herself crying again, and this time it was for the little girl— Katy, she'd said her name was—and everything she stood for. All the unnecessary death, but not just the death. Death was merciful compared to what that little girl had gone through.

And then Michelle felt anger towards Tony. Up until then, she had been upset that he'd been taken away, dismayed that he'd been arrested, and anguish that he'd been put in the position that he had. But as she stormed into the house, no longer afraid to enter, it was anger that consumed her.

Anger that he had done that—anger that Tony was going to help Saunders, so that what had happened to Katy would happen to thousands of children across the country. Anger that he had put her life above the lives of American citizens when she'd spent the whole day showing in every possible way—from going into the hotel without hazmat gear to allowing herself to be caught after she'd escaped from her kidnappers—that she valued innocent lives far more than her own. But he'd ignored that. He'd ignored what she wanted, and he'd ignored basic ethics—and that made Michelle furious at him, more furious than she'd ever remembered being.

What made him think she wanted to be forced into accepting the guilt of being that for which he martyred his happiness? And that for which the world came to a screeching halt? For what if, because Tony had chosen her above all else, the virus had been released and millions of people had died? What in hell made Tony think he had the right to do that? Not only to saddle her with the guilt of the deaths of all those people, but to cause those deaths in the first place? The thought that her husband—the man she'd loved to oblivion, and the man she'd had every reason to believe was as devoted to the greater good as she—that he had done what he did held a grip on her like nothing else ever had.

But when Michelle finally made it into the kitchen, the anger evaporated instantly and was replaced with fresh tears. Because as she entered the kitchen, images began to flash through her head. Tony laughing at her inability to cut a tomato. Tony making dinner as she sat at the counter with a glass of wine. Tony creeping up behind her and whispering into her ear. Tony holding her while she cried, stricken with guilt from the first time she herself had had to use torture. Tony submitting to her when she pounced on him one night and they had sex on the kitchen floor.

And in that moment, she hated herself for being angry with Tony. Tony, whom she loved more than life itself. Tony, whose presence brought light and security to the dark and perilous life she'd inadvertently chosen. Tony, who had sacrificed everything so she could live. How could she be angry with him for that? How could she be angry with him when she loved and needed and missed him so much?

Michelle was far too physically drained and emotionally exhausted to understand her own feelings at that time, but even if she hadn't been it was doubtful that she'd have been able to sort through them. A mad mess of emotions tangled among each other and tugged at her this way and that, but the truth was that in retrospect, she could lump it all together in one word: pain. Pain for all the unspeakable horrors she'd witnessed and experienced that terrible day.

"I can't make that meeting."

"Michelle, you do realize how important this is to building Tony's case." the defense attorney said pointedly, an accusing note in her voice.

"Yeah, I realize it. Believe me: I realize it. But right now, I have exceptionally important issues that need to be dealt with. I can't make the meeting," she sighed, reaching up to twist a curl around her finger.

"More important than your husband's trial for treason?"

Staring into blankness, Michelle paused a lengthy moment. "Yes," she said finally, looking up although there was no one there to meet her eyes.

Michelle was on the phone with the lawyer for almost two hours that night, so that by the time she finally crawled into bed it was nearly three in the morning. She was shivering with cold as she burrowed into the bed that felt so unnaturally big and empty. Struggling to control the shaking, Michelle wished with a pang of loss for Tony's warm body to envelop her and keep her safe.

But he wasn't there, of course. No. Of course not. He was in prison, right then. Prison… and it was because of her. Because of her. Too weak and tired to keep the thought from assaulting her, Michelle could feel guilt crashing down on her like the massive swell of a whitecap breaking against her.

If it wasn't for her, this never would have happened to Tony. Even then, Michelle was fully aware of how irrational and childish the idea was, but as she lay in the empty darkness, trembling from loneliness and fright and utter emotional exhaustion just as much as from fever, she was powerless to reign in control over her own emotions.

And so she was consumed by guilt for the position in which Tony had been put. After all, it was she whom Tony had loved past the point of responsibility, and therefore she who had ultimately, if inadvertently, been the cause of the whole mess. It was her fault, somehow, she was certain. Just exactly what she could have done to prevent the situation evaded her, but that did nothing to lessen the overwhelming feeling of fault she placed in herself.

And the situation—what a damning situation it was! He was in prison, now, because of the choice he'd made, and while Michelle was no expert, she knew enough to know that prison was a hellish place at best—and that was the place to which Tony had gone, for her.

And now, as he husband suffered god-knows-what kind of misery, she was left to save the world all by herself, terrified and lonely and so very, very cold.

Too soon, the alarm clock forced Michelle back into the realm of wakefulness. Light flooded her bedroom—as if to mock the darkness that had managed to take over every corner of her life over those few short days that seemed to span an eternity.

Awakening, Michelle felt dampness against her face. Though hours had passed, her pillow was still soaked with tears from Michelle crying herself to sleep the night before.

The persistent beeping of the alarm reminded Michelle that there were more pressing matters to be addressed. Groaning, she managed to disentangle herself from the covers and drag her aching, shivering body into a standing position as she prepared to start the day.

It took no longer than an hour for Michelle to transform herself from the exhausted, tearful, and undone woman that she was to the impeccably groomed and emotionally masked professional in a business suit and carefully blank expression.