Chapter VI

What Bourne Wants to Do

"All right people, let's wake up," Landy ordered, walking into her team's room. "We're going after Bourne again." There was a collective sigh around the room, one that Landy secretly shared. It seemed that they were always after Bourne. She was more than ready to go after somebody else than the world's best assassin. While tracking him was a challenge, and Landy enjoyed a good challenge, it was becoming repetitive. They would never find him except where he slipped up—which was small—or unless he let them find them. Otherwise they were always left looking at his footprints.

"We don't want him, specifically," Landy continued. "We want to know what he's thinking. Why is he doing what he's doing? So everyone listen to Paz and get your gears moving. Now." She nodded to Paz, who stepped forward. He seemed to be saying something with every little movement; why else did he stand so strangely? But she could as soon interpret it as she could hold the upper edge against Jason Bourne. Who's to say how good Paz was, too: he'd held his own against the other in a car chase and escaped him at Waterloo. Paz was without doubt much more dangerous than he appeared. But then, so were any of the former CIA assassins.

"The situation: One man with two broken limbs in an apartment that had been rented to Nicolette Parsons under a persona, two totaled cars along the streets to Waterloo. Bourne took them out. Look for why. He doesn't start fights; he finishes. Discover the identities, find why they want Bourne dead, and you'll know what he'll do about it," Paz muttered in straight monotone. People took in what he said as they typed away, researching the man who was admitted to the hospital and the IDs of the deceased. Landy watched over them, occasionally asking them to bring something up on the front windows. Paz was silent, looking at Waterloo cameras. Pam thought he was outsmarted this time; they had already run them against new computer recognition programs. He needed to be thinking like Bourne.

"You," Landy said, pointing out one analyst. "What was that?" The analyst went back a few screens. "What's this right here?" she asked again, pointing at his bank account.

"He had a separate account in Switzerland, ma'am," the analyst noted. "He made withdrawals to pay for a plane ticket."

"Check his ID," Landy ordered. The analyst did so, bringing it up on the screen. She and her assistant looked at it. Assuming that this wasn't a false ID, the man lived and worked out of Italy. Her assistant swore. "What?"

"This isn't good," her assistant muttered. "Run this man against any known terrorist watch lists." Sure enough, the man came up on a watch list. The reason was blatantly obvious. "Like I said, not good. Bourne's gotten himself into something."

"Mafia," Landy muttered. "A hit man for the mafia." What had Bourne done this time? She tried to understand the unpredictable man. Without any purpose now, his memory restored, had he decided to put his skills to use and take down various illicit organizations in Europe? How would he have found the mafia and what would put Bourne to take them out? Curse the man.

"Ma'am, according to this the plane ride the hit man took was a week ago," another analyst said. Landy had him bring it up. She stared at the screen.

"Had Nicky had the apartment before the flight?"

"Yes ma'am." That explained it then; the hit man had come after Nicky, not Bourne. The man had just been unlucky enough that Bourne had been there. It also explained why Bourne had left such a trail in London. She had suspected that perhaps Nicky was attached to Bourne after she defected to help him. Bourne had slipped that he was worried about her when he called about the order and talked to Paz later. Now it was confirmed. Bourne was protecting her. So would he hide with her or go for retribution, as tended to be his style?

"Everyone begin checking Bourne's passports; I want to know where he's going," Landy ordered. Typing increased as her team began to hunt down the passport names they likely knew by heart at this point. Heaven knows how many times they had tried to find him this way. "Find out whether he's traveling with Nicky or—"

"Here," Paz said out of the blue. Landy stopped and walked over to see what he was looking at. He pointed to a blurry figure in a Waterloo camera. "That's him and her."

"You sure?"

"I tried to kill him here once. He moved like that, keeping head down and lowering the target size. That's him; I swear. And the girl goes with him into a store, comes out with a scarf and hat. You can see her face here," Paz explained, changing the camera and time. Landy recognized Nicky's face, although her hair was different. That had probably been Bourne's doing.

"Did Black Briar or Treadstone ever do anything with the mafia?" Landy asked him. Paz shrugged; he had never been part of Treadstone, and if Black Briar had done anything it wasn't with him. Landy called to her assistant. "Go get the Bourne file and check for any mafia related targets." The assistant left for his office. Landy turned back to Paz. "What will he do? Hide or fight?"

Paz was silent as he stared at the camera films, holding still as a statue. "He knows who they are. If he knows why they are attacking, he will hide. Otherwise he will fight to know why."

"How do we tell which one it is?" Landy asked, turning to her team to see if they had anything new. To her surprise, Paz pulled out a gun and loaded it; where had he been keeping that? His psychologist had said not to carry weapons to help forget his training. Looks like old habits die hard. She was really shocked when he pulled out his passports. Hadn't those been burned? Where did he keep all of this?

"Have you read 'Hunt for Red October' by Tom Clancy?" Paz asked. When Landy shook her head, he went on. "My psychologist let me read it. The character Jack Ryan thinks he knows what the target is going to do, but to make sure he follows him and finds him. I'll find Bourne."

"So what's with the gun?" Landy asked warily.

"I want to help him if he accepts it. He gave me a new life," Paz answered. "You have my phone; trace it if you want. I'm going to London."

"You realize you'll probably be hours behind him."

"Yes." Paz walked away. Pam shook her head and sighed. She needed a coffee. Picking up the phone, she dialed the director's number. Things were once again becoming complicated. If she ever met Bourne again, she would give him enough sedative to ensure he slept for a year.

*****

"That's who, that's why, and that's what I intend to do," Bourne muttered. Due to Bourne's growing paranoia, they had moved to a private compartment in a different car. For the last ten minutes, through looks and careful, slow words, he had told her why his actions had once again placed her in danger. She had taken it better than he expected; she seemed not to care because he was there. Apparently he canceled out any danger she would be afraid of; that belief was evident in the way she looked at him. Bourne saw that as good; it meant he wouldn't have to be constantly assuring her. David was concerned; he was a danger in and of himself.

Nicky didn't see him as a danger to her, not anymore. When he had lost his memory, she had thought maybe it would have been easier. But it had gotten worse, especially in Berlin. There, she realized that not only did she still love him, but he was a threat to her now; he didn't remember anything and that left him dangerous. He had been terrifying at the time, caught in his anger. She had never been the target of his anger until now, and she had never cried so hard before that. Later she had cried because he didn't remember a thing of it, and she did. His memory presented her with something to fill the silence with. Silence was uncomfortable for her with him sitting right across from her.

"How much do you remember?" she asked. Bourne turned towards her quickly, caught off-guard. What had he been thinking about? It wouldn't surprise her to know if he had his hand on his gun. Not for the first time, Nicky wondered why he even bothered to carry a gun with him everywhere; he could kill somebody in probably fifty ways using a toothbrush. She focused herself on his coming answer; she wanted him to remember the good parts and not the bad pieces.

"I remember when we kissed, in the club," Jason muttered. He was tongue-tied explaining his inner thoughts. He expressed them much better. It had taken a long time for her to learn to 'read' what he was saying in stance. Only after lots of exposure to the killer assassin and reading his file did his moods and thoughts become apparent. "I remember when you became my personal handler." Nicky had always wondered had brought that about; Conklin had told her it was for her own safety. Judging by the brief tension he showed as his knuckles whitened, it was a violent memory.

None of the agents had liked Conklin. Halfway through her work with Bourne, she had tentatively asked why they were so passive and cold towards him. They were mind-washed assassins; they were supposed to be cold and soulless. But it seemed more so towards Conklin. He had brushed it off and muttered that they had developed a hierarchy of sorts, defining which 'soulless murderer' had the edge in power. Conklin was especially not like because he knew of the hierarchy but backed away every time they got antsy; they thought him 'not worthy' of knowing their hierarchy existed; it was for the cold, deadly, and murderous. It had been unexpected side effect of them not thinking and working more on instinct. They had been known to exhibit animalistic characteristics at times. Nicky remembered seeing a photo of one of the agent's handiwork when they had been suffering from a headache. The memory still made her throat tingle and shivers run down her spine…

She jerked back to the present as Bourne spoke. She hesitated a second before guessing as what to he said. It was only vaguely evident in how he sat. Eventually Nicky knew what he had said. "Why did you pick me? What do you see in me?" He apparently didn't see what was so special about him; he was focusing on the negative. Nicky opened her mouth to speak when the shocking happened: Bourne sucked in a tight breath and his body stiffened briefly.

"Are you hurt?" she asked. Bourne didn't answer but stared back. His body posture said no, but she knew better than to trust that at the moment. Bourne could lie in stance as well as verbally. She remembered thinking about him being shot and falling into the water. "Is the bullet still in you?" He didn't move. Finally he nodded. Nicky bit her lip. Here she was, thinking about him, when he still had a bullet in him. She stood up. "Follow me."

Hand still on his gun, Bourne stood up as well. His internal alarms went off when she left the compartment. Quelling his paranoia, he followed her down the hall. It was obvious what she intended. Deciding to play along, he grabbed something off the wall and stashed it in the flap of his coat. How Nicky had missed was beyond him; she was usually more observant. Maybe she was distracted. Bourne himself was frustrated with himself. He had let an assassin actually enter the room and get within arm's reach, all because he was kissing Nicky. It hadn't been the first time. He had let Marie get shot because he was arguing with her; a policeman had snuck up on him Moscow when he was having flashbacks; men had gotten to the door when he was talking in the training facility. He needed to stop getting distracted; eventually it would be the death of him. Or worse, her. He frowned when she opened the bathroom door and motioned him in. Jason Bourne wanted to go back to the compartment; it was visible out here and he could live with a little more pain. David Webb wanted him to shut up; his back ached and his body was sore.

Shutting the door behind him, Nicky's eyes ran over the bathroom. There really wasn't much in the way of medical equipment in the room. She had always kept first-aid in a bathroom, wherever she lived. She felt her cheeks turn pink when Bourne slipped a first-aid kit out of his coat. Either he was a magician, or more observant than her. She needed to refresh what she'd learned before working with Treadstone. She might have to use it sometime, especially if Bourne's plan didn't go as planned.

She placed the first-aid kit on the counter and then locked the door. It wouldn't be easy to explain why she was removing a bullet from his back if somebody walked in by accident. She fiercely pushed down thoughts that she would rather be caught doing something else. She wouldn't be able to focus if those types of thoughts were floating around. "Take off your shirt," she ordered, grabbing tweezers and insisting it was to heal him.

Nicky was shocked when he did. Bourne held still, his back to her, without moving a muscle. How he wasn't grunting each time he touched something was beyond her; she would be afraid to move. His entire upper body was sore and red from his experiences. There were large spots of black and blue from where he hit the water. She could plainly see the bullet wound; it was barely sticking out his skin; the area around it was greenish and infected. Why would he leave the bullet in? His stance reflected nothing of the pain; he had to be hiding it.

"How does this not hurt?" Nicky asked, checking his spine for any dislocation. Bourne kept still, trying to ignore the cool burning sensation created by her slender hands.

"I ignore it."

"That doesn't mean you shouldn't take care of yourself."

"There wasn't time."

Of course; the classic excuse. For doing nothing other than traveling and fighting, he could at least pull the bullet out when traveling. She highly doubted that a man who could leap through buildings and fall ten stories lacked the flexibility and steady hands to do this. She remembered he often mentioned asking for a mission or task while waiting for Conklin to give him one. Now he said he didn't have enough time. She finished checking his skeletal structure and dabbed a swab with rubbing alcohol.

She rubbed it over the infected area and gently around the bullet. Then she placed a hand on his shoulder, placed the tweezers on the bullet, and slowly swiveled it out. Bourne never moved throughout the entire thing; he was braver than she was. She wouldn't have stopped groaning. It made her hurt vicariously for him as she finished plucking the bullet out and tossed it away. She started sterilizing the wound. It was right then Bourne spoke.

"You never answered my question," he muttered.

Nicky paused a second before going on. "You were different," she finally replied. "You were cold, just like the rest, but you also seemed…human, like you still had a soul." She focused intently on cleaning his wounds and treating him, dreading when he asked what else there was. Did he have to ask at the moment? Her cheeks turning pink, Nicky mumbled, "You were…good looking and muscular." Her mumble became incoherent as she tried to speed up the process.

David Webb smiled inwardly. She thought he looked good? Jason's eyes flicked towards the bathroom mirror; he supposed his conditioning hadn't faltered that much. Personally he thought he needed to step up. But if Nicky thought he looked good…an unknown frivolous feeling entered his stomach. He would step up his conditioning. His eyes glanced back to the mirror again as she bandaged the bullet wound. She looked beautiful. His body and mind began to want her. He found himself thinking things that Jason Bourne found distracting and interesting, and that David Webb encouraged.

Nicky finished, and Bourne put his shirt back on. She was slightly disappointed to see his physique, although bruised and battered, vanish beneath his shirt again. They left the kit on the counter and headed back for their compartment. As they left the bathroom, a stewardess passed, trying to hide a suggestive smile. Nicky's cheeks turned pink, and Bourne regretted not being able to read her face from behind. She moved quicker into the private compartment, though.

Bourne sat down slowly, feeling less pained with the bullet out. Maybe he had left it in there a little long. So what? Bourne asked. It hurt, David responded. He forgot the former wound as he noticed Nicky focusing unusually hard on the window, her face still flushed. His body urged him, and Bourne wasn't about to refuse; he still wanted her. He likely never would stop.

Nicky wasn't sure when Bourne switched seats from across from her to next to her, but she turned when he called her name softly. The look in his eyes mirrored what she was feeling. Wordlessly she let him guide her mouth to his. She wanted him, too.