Disclaimer: There are several dialogue lines taken from "Chuck. Vs. the Beefcake" that belong to the episode's writer, Phil Klemmer.

Author's Note: The story is called Intersect(ion) (it's just that ff doesn't allow parentheses in the tittle) not to mix with another story called Intersection, written by Frea O'Scanlin. Basically because I'm not in any way as good as she is.

To say that the atmosphere in Broyles' office was tense would be an understatement of epic proportions. It reminded Olivia of her childhood in Jackson, of those summer afternoons when the skies darkened and tinted everything of a sepia tone and the heat was so sticky that it was difficult to breath and she knew a storm was about to break.

Charlie was the first person that caught her sight, even if he was cross-armed in a corner of the room. He just arched an eyebrow as a greeting.

Broyles was sat down behind his desk, with the elbows resting against the table and his fingers intertwined, forming a bridge in front of his somber face. He stood up as he extended his arm to point out two men in suits that Olivia had never seen before. "Agent Dunham, these are agent Steve Sheridan from the Directorate of Science and Technology and Major John Casey, from the NSA."

Agent Sheridan was a rather dull looking man, the kind of person that one could meet in a cafeteria and as soon as one was asking for coffee his face was completely erased from memory. Major Casey was tall and very muscular, with light eyes that looked at her as if he wanted to skewer her and a perfectly chiseled jaw. It was surrounded by such a powerful aura that he seemed to be able to block the sun if he put himself in front of her.

Olivia didn't move or made as if to shaking their hands. "To what do we owe the honor?"

She felt Broyle's warning stare.

There seemed to be a silent discussion between Agent Sheridan and Major Casey that was resolved by a pleading look from the agent, a vigorous head shake from the Major and the agent taking a step forward. "We're here because it has come to our attention that you've been investigating about a woman named Lucy Kwon," he said in a rather monotonous voice.

"The name isn't familiar."

"I think you know her as Lucy Johnston."

That name she knew. "She was one of the corpses we found in a common grave in L.A."

"Yes, Agent Broyles informed us about it."

Olivia crossed her arms. Why was she there if they had already talked with her boss?

Agent Sheridan inhaled profoundly, as if he needed all his energy to keep talking. "She was an agent of the NSA."

Olivia uncrossed her arms. That had to be the first time that the intelligence services were helpful and honest.

"Have you any idea of how she ended in a common grave?" she asked.

"The NSA didn't know her whereabouts. She was on leave."

"Oh, like Bradley White. Didn't you know about his whereabouts either?" She noticed that Sheridan squinted. She had touched a nerve. "That's why you told her mother he was dead a week before the corpses were found?"

"He disappeared. We sent the letter because his dead was the most logical outcome."

"Why? What was he up to?"

"That's classified," he answered, stern.

"What was his job? What was Lucy's job?"

"Classified."

"Do you suspect any criminal or terrorist organization to be behind their deaths?"

"Classified."

"Have you found anything relevant relating this investigation?"

"Classified."

Olivia couldn't help snigger, the situation was beginning to turn into a kafkaesque situation. She glanced at Broyles and Charlie out of incredulity. They didn't seem very pleased either.

"Then why are you two here?" she asked.

Agent Sheridan loosened his tie and collar a bit. Olivia saw how Major Casey kicked the back of his leg surreptitiously. "We're here in the attempt to reach for a... deal," Sheridan uttered.

"About what?"

"There are national security related issues in the stake. So we'll like to ask for you to close the case."

Olivia couldn't believe what her ears were hearing. "Under what pretense?" The two men didn't answer. That boiled her blood a little more. "People died. We can't close the case without finding out what happened. Without telling their families what happened."

Agent Sheridan raised his hand, as if to appease her. "I've explained myself poorly, it seems. We want the FBI to close the case, that doesn't mean there won't be an investigation, but it would be carried out by the CIA."

"The CIA has no competence in these matters."

"They are our agents."

"It's a criminal investigation. Our jurisdiction, not yours."

A condescending smile grazed his lips. "C'mon, Agent Dunham, we know it's just semantics. It's not your division's jurisdiction either."

"What do you know about our division?"

"That you investigate all kind of spooky happenings. Very X-Files."

"I would say that a common grave with ten bodies that apparently died because their brains over-saturated with information fits perfectly in our type of cases."

Major Casey took the floor for the first time, his voice was deep and a bit intimidating when he asked: "What do you know about that?"

Olivia chose to be bold. "What do you know about Project Intersect?"

The Major approached her until he was at an arm's length. Olivia could feel the shadow of danger hover over her.

"For your own good, don't say that name ever again," he said.

"Are you threatening one of my agents?" Broyles asked. His question had been so quick that Olivia realized she wasn't the only one to sense the atmosphere thicken.

Major Casey changed his demeanor. It seemed as if he realized how his words came out. His stare softened. Somewhat. "Your investigation has led you to national security matters. I'm not authorized... Nobody here is authorized to tell or know anything about them."

Olivia didn't react well to threats. She never had. They used to make her even more stubborn. "It's that why those ten people died?"

Major Casey grunted. Olivia didn't know what to make of that sound.

Agent Sheridan opened his mouth to talk. Major Casey silenced him with a hand gesture. He seemed determined to finish the conversation himself.

"From a fellow marine to another, stop this investigation. It has nothing to do with your division's work and you're going to step on the toes of people that can destroy your career."

Olivia looked at the Major's Marine insignia ring, then at him. She smiled. "From a fellow marine to another, I can't do that, it would be a betrayal of my duty."

Major Casey lowered his head and rubbed his nose. "I had my fill of stubborn blondes for this week," he mumbled.

It was in that moment when the office's door opened and Harris entered into the room. Olivia cursed to herself. His usual deprecating smile faded at the sight of Sheridan and Casey.

"What's happening here?"

Broyles handled the situation in the moment. "Gentlemen, this is Sanford Harris Consultant for DHS. Sanford, these are Agent Sheridan and Major Casey. They are here to ask for a case Agent Dunham is leading."

"Why I'm not surprised?" he asked in a low voice. Then he addressed the two men. "You're not FBI, I gather."

"No, sir," Sheridan answered. "I'm an agent of the Directorate of Science and Technology and Major Casey is a member of the NSA."

"And I, a liaison of the Pentagon, wasn't asked to join this meeting because..."

"We didn't want to bother you with what seems a small misunderstanding," Broyles said. Olivia was impressed of how his usual slow delivery made that lie look like the truth.

"What misunderstanding was that?"

"Since Agent Dunham's investigation deals with matters of national security we've asked her to close the case and leave it to us," Sheridan informed, all diligent.

Harris looked at Olivia with such glee that she felt like slapping him.

"And as I reminded them, this is a criminal investigation. It's our jurisdiction," she said.

"Our agents died."

"Even then."

Harris caressed his chin with a pensive gesture. "Well, I'm sure that if I talk with our guests I'll be able to solve this problem. You share this SSI with me and I'll make sure that our agents don't trespass the boundaries."

"You're not authorized to know anything," Major Casey said.

Olivia loved Harris' annoyed expression. She began to like this Casey guy.

"It's Top Secret information," Sheridan explained.

That was the first time that they said how kind of classified information they were guarding. Not confidential or even secret, but top secret. The kind of matters that maybe the President, if he asked nicely, would know. Basically because the CIA liked to do everything behind people's back. And the NSA was involved too, which made the situation even worse.

"The problem is simple," Major Casey said. "Our agents died, that's for sure. The Fringe division, even the FBI, can investigate all they want. They won't find anything, because this is beyond your reach."

"You could help," Olivia said.

"But we won't." He deliberately looked at Broyles. "And you can't make us."

"We're all government agencies, we work for the good of America, don't we?" Olivia asked. She knew she sounded awfully naïve.

Major Casey's look at her was almost sympathetic. "Look, I've come to talk to you personally because I respect you. You did a good job as a CID agent." He threw a judgmental glare at Harris. "I didn't want this to leak. But if the only way to stop this nonsense is my superiors talking with yours so they rap you on the knuckles, you give me no choice."

Major Casey stormed out the office with Sheridan at his tail. Olivia was left with the sensation that she was living in a parallel world. She was right and doing her job, so how it came that the people covering a murder could act so high and mighty as if they were doing her a favor?

"I bet you'll be happy, you pissed off the NSA and the CIA," Harris said.

He, on the other hand, seemed delighted. She had made new enemies, after all.

"Sir, you won't let them get their own way, will you?" she asked to Broyles, trying to conceal the uneasiness in her voice. "We are competent to investigate this case. They can't enter here and force us to do as they please. Not when I'm sure the CIA and the NSA are involved, somehow."

"More reason to stop provoking them, don't you think?" Harris said.

"The FBI doesn't stop an investigation just because it can bug some powerful people."

"Of course not, but in this case, these powerful people can stop this investigation."

"Until then, I don't see any reason to close the case."

"That would be all right if you were the only one affected. This can affect all of us." Harris' face became somber. "You don't want to make more enemies, Philip. Enough people want to close this division already."

Starting with you, Olivia thought.

"Besides," Harris kept talking. "Why is this case so important? Does it have anything to do with the division's objectives?"

"You suddenly worry about that?" Olivia retaliated.

"Stop, you two," Broyles ordered.

He sat down with a heavy sigh. An invisible weight seemed to hunch him.

"Sir, if I may," Charlie said. They were the first words he uttered, so he grabbed their attention immediately. "You could give Dunham a week to see if she can get more information. I doubt that the CIA or the NSA would take radical measures in one week and if she doesn't get anything important in that time we will know for sure that it's not worth it."

Broyles extended his right arm and lent his fingers against the table as he thought it over. When he looked up at Olivia again his expression was unreadable.

"One week," he said.

Olivia nodded once. "It would be enough."

Contrary to her bravado, Olivia doubted she could find any relevant thing in a week. She wasn't sure even if a year would be enough. All relevant information was at the hands of the people that weren't willing to give it to her.

In spite of it, Olivia kept revising files and making phone calls. She also pestered Walter from time to time to know if he had remembered the name of the scientist in charge of Project Intersect (whatever the hell that was.)

A day passed by and in the midday of the next -when Olivia was drawing smilies on her notes because there was nothing else she could do- Charlie passed a phone handset at her that would change everything.

"The real estate company that sold the houses in Meadow's Branch," he told her.

Olivia picked the phone in a hurry. She had been trying to contact them since she found their name. She had feared the CIA had "made them disappear" or something.

"Yes, Dunham speaking."

"Agent Dunham, I'm Sherry, I call you from Green Horizons. I think you wanted to talk with us." She had the usual chirpy tone of saleswomen.

"I've left you several voice messages."

"I'm sorry, due to a restructuring we're moving our headquarters. It's been a little chaotic."

"It's all right," Olivia lied. "I have some questions about a housing development called Meadow's Branch, in L.A."

Olivia could sense a sticky silence coming from the other side.

"It's for a federal investigation," Olivia added, to put pressure.

"Are we... in any trouble?"

"No, as far as I know. I just wanted to make you some questions."

Sherry sighed loudly. "We'll do as much as we can to help."

People were so nice when they didn't have anything to lose.

"Do you know how it happened? How all that people disappeared?"

"No. In fact, we didn't know anything bad had happened until the police called us."

"The police." Strange, L.A. police didn't seem to know anything about the case when she called.

"Yes, they told us that they've found the entire suburban area deserted. You can imagine how shocked we were."

Olivia could indeed. It was bad publicity for them. "Before it happened... did you see anything suspicious or weird? Anything, even if it looked irrelevant at the moment, that could help us?"

"I wish, but we really didn't see it coming. The area was pleasant and peaceful, and the neighbors seemed to have created a very stable community. Poor, poor people." Sherry sobbed. "And poor Carmichaels."

That name didn't ring any bell. "Who?"

"Charles and Sarah Carmichael. They bought one of the houses three days before the disappearing. Such a bad timing."

Olivia revised her files, knocking over the vase with the pencils in the process. The Carmichaels weren't mentioned anywhere. She didn't know what it meant, but she decided to pursue this new piece of information.

"They were in the community when it happened, I gather."

"Yes, they moved to Philip Yeager's former house. I was surprised by how quick we could resold his house."

Olivia had an inkling of how that happened.

"Have you any idea if the other neighbors knew them or...?"

"I don't think so. In fact, one of them... was it Bradley? Called to ask if we had their references."

"And did you?"

"Well, I didn't get what he meant by references, Meadow's Branch isn't a private building. I told him that we examined their jobs and income. He was the owner of a small software company, she was a housewife. They seemed a perfectly normal couple."

"Did you meet them?"

"Not personally. A middleman came and bought the house for them. I saw a picture of them, though. "

"Anything significant about them?"

"No. As I've said they looked like a normal lovely couple. He was a slim young man, with brown curly hair and she was a blonde knockout. I can't tell you more than that."

"And they suddenly disappeared two weeks ago, like the others."

"That's it."

Olivia extended the interrogation a little longer, to no avail. In the end, the only thing she could get was a new name: Carmichael. Charles and Sarah Carmichael.

She searched the database for more information. Carmichael, of course, was nowhere to be found. Not exactly. If one looked for certain data, like the Tax ID, yes, he existed, but he didn't have a personal profile. His civil self didn't seem to exist. And his wife Sarah was even more of a ghost than him.

Olivia resorted to the news in the area of L.A. To see if she could find something more. After long, boring hours, she ran into a tiny mention about Charles Carmichael: he apparently lost 100.000 dollars in a charity event Lone Kirk hosted a year before. Lone Kirk was a criminal now in jail for trafficking with counterfeit plates. That couldn't be a coincidence.

Olivia did a recap: ten bodies were found in L.A., the ten were probably agents of the CIA and the NSA, all of them lived in Meadow's Branch, the Carmichaels went to live there just before all the people disappeared, they seemed to be strangers for the rest of the neighbors, the neighbors that –she shouldn't forget it- died due of an over saturation of their brains, and that linked them to something called project Intersect.

It frustrated her. It was as if she had all the pieces on the table, but she couldn't figure out how to put them together.

She spent the rest of the day in the FBI headquarters. No breaks for lunch or coffees, no calls to her sister. She even stayed a few hours when the rest of the people had left. Alone, in the middle of the dark room, with a desk lamp on as only company. She revised all the data again and again and again, until her vision clouded. It was that moment when her rational side took over and made her stop.

Her trip to the parking lot seemed unreal, like a scene taken from a horror movie. The blonde that is about to get killed by the psycho. Olivia shook her head to dislodge that idea from her mind. She didn't need any of that.

When she reached her car she unlocked it with the remote. When she used the handle to open the door, she realized she had locked it. That was the last straw. Did she leave the car open? Was she so distracted lately? Could she trust her mind again?

She decided not to worry about it and entered into the vehicle. The moment she made as if to take the seat belt she felt a sudden movement and something held her shoulders in a strong grip to yank her backward. The speed and the strength of the movement stopped her breathing and left her lightheaded for a second. Before she could react, she realized a hand clasped her left arm and immobilized it. When she looked she saw that it was tied down with her own seat belt. Somebody was grabbing it. She couldn't move her arm, not without breaking it. Very clever. So very professional.

Olivia felt something cold and sharp on her throat. A blade.

Somebody was behind her, threatening her life. Who? Was he an assassin? But if he was, why wasn't she dead already?

Olivia inhaled sharply. A pleasant smell to grapefruit. Weird. She was facing a nice smelling professional.

"Listen to me," the stranger hissed into her right ear. The voice was soft and unmistakably feminine. "Stop poking your nose into what happened in L.A."

Olivia had a moment of perfect bewilderment. She didn't know if she should feel enraged or afraid by the fact that everyone was interested in her leaving her current case aside. In the end, anger won.

"Who are you?"

"Somebody who's here to tell you that nothing good will come to you if you keep digging."

Olivia turned her head all she could to catch a glimpse of the other woman. She hit Olivia's jaw with her forearm to prevent it. Olivia continued her interrogation. If she couldn't find who was attacking her, at least she could try to find something more about all that mystery.

"Why so interested in warning me?"

"You're FBI. You're supposed to be one of the good guys."

"Supposed?"

"I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt." The woman exhaled deeply. "Look, it's simple. Or you are with the good guys, and then this investigation is none of your business. Or you're with Fulcrum, and then I'll make sure that you won't see the next sunrise."

Olivia was too confused to react to the threat. "Work for who?"

"Why are you so interested in knowing what happened to those people?"

"Because that's my job." Olivia couldn't believe that nobody got it. "Ten people died. Somebody has to find out why."

The other woman heaved a sigh of disdain. "Believe me, they don't deserve your dedication."

"You knew them?"

"Unfortunately." She sounded disgusted.

Olivia glanced at the rear-view mirror. The woman had pointed it towards the ceiling. She'd have to trust her ear and instincts to decipher the other woman's feelings.

"Who were them?" Olivia asked.

"Dangerous people."

"They worked for the CIA and the NSA."

"Their allegiances were elsewhere."

That changed the entire scenario. "Are you telling me they were... moles?"

"I'm telling you that we did what we had to do. They gave us no choice."

That woman seemed awfully chatty for some professional threatening her life, Olivia mused.

"Did you kill them?" she asked point-blank.

The woman snickered. "After a fashion." She moved behind her to get more comfortable or maybe to make easier to prevent any chance to escape. Olivia wasn't sure. "They're dead and I'm not sorry for them. They were cold blooded killers. They deserved to die."

That answered some question, but left open a dozen more.

"Why using such a complicated method?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Bullshit.

"You fried their brains with some device that saturated them with images." No answer. "Does this anything to do with the objectives of Project Intersect?"

The woman tightened the hold on Olivia's left arm. The knife grazed her neck.

"Don't say that name ever again," she warned.

"I'm sick and tired of everybody reacting to that name as if I insulted their mothers." She felt the need to punch something, but she thought it over. She inhaled in and out a couple of times to focus herself. "That project seems to kill people and I don't like it. Whatever it is, it must stop."

"You have no idea of what you're talking about. It's a national security issue. This is bigger than you and me. Much bigger. The Intersect is a name that draws too much attention. I'm doing you a favor asking you to stop your investigation. Fulcrum won't be that nice."

"It's the second time you say that name."

"It's one too many for your own good. Forget this case, you and your little conman friend. All your team. Forget you ever laid your eyes on it." The woman approached Olivia's ear as much as she could. "I don't want to come here again and be more... conclusive. I would hate to perform a tracheotomy on you. Did I make myself clear?"

Olivia didn't open her lips. She immediately felt a hot sting of pain on her throat.

"Did I make myself clear?" the other woman repeated, pressing her knife a little more.

"Yes," Olivia hissed.

"Good. Let's not have this conversation ever again, OK?"

Olivia couldn't answer back. A heavy thud on the base of her head sent her to obliviousness.

Olivia passed the ice pack from her right hand to the left before it went to sleep and put the pack on her nape again.

"I hate this case," she mumbled at nobody in particular in the laboratory.

"Well, you wouldn't have one if you weren't so stubborn," Charlie said.

Olivia glared at him.

"Look, Liv, I know how you feel about it and I support you," Charlie continued. "But this seems one of those spies' games, not part of the Pattern. You already have enough troubles,"

"I think he's right," Peter said.

"Not you too," Olivia whispered. "Is there any clues about the woman that attacked me?"

"Sorry, Liv, the cameras didn't record anything. That stranger was like a ghost."

"It's a FBI building," she reminded him.

"Yes, which worries me, because it means she knows how to go through our security measures all too well."

Olivia tried to ignore her throbbing head. "Did your friend get anything about that information about the Intersect that was blocked?" she asked Peter.

He stared at her in dead silence, then shook his head. "Not much. Not more than we had. The Intersect was a project developed by the CIA in collaboration with the NSA. The idea was to create a kind of super spies that could possess the entire intelligence database in their heads. It was all experimental until 9/11, apparently. After that date the two agencies pushed the agenda and tried to make it an official project for the entire intelligence service."

"And what happened?"

"The FBI refused. The Intersect didn't have a good record with the people that had offered themselves as guinea pigs."

"In what sense?"

"I don't know, but bearing in mind that the Intersect meant filling a person's brain with big chunks of sensory information, I suspect it has something to do with those candidates going nuts." Peter rubbed his face. He seemed tired. "Anyway, that's when the project went Top Secret."

Olivia waited for him to continue. He didn't. "And?"

"And that's it."

"Isn't there any way of finding out more about it?"

"It's top secret. Even I have my limits," Peter said, rather annoyed.

Olivia threw the ice pack at the table. Her nape was so cold that it was completely desensitized, anyway.

"This can't be the end of it. There has to be a hole, a crack that could allow us to know more."

"Why are you so obsessed with this case?" Peter asked.

"Because somebody has attacked me. And because I don't like scientists using people as guinea pigs!"

She noticed Walter getting upset out of the corner of her eye. He began to fumble with his hands. Olivia turned her head to him, the surgical tape on her neck stretched her skin.

"Don't you remember anything yet, Walter?"

He shrugged. "I'm sorry. I've-I've tried but... Nothing." He dropped his head, looking ashamed.

At his back, Astrid frowned.

"What is it?" Olivia asked her.

"Walter has been busy all day," she said.

He threw Astrid a dark glare. His stare softened when he addressed Olivia. "I've been thinking of using some experimental drugs on me, to excite my memory."

"Walter!" Peter cried.

The man slouched a bit more. "It could be useful... in the future."

His helpless expression moved a side of Olivia that was usually padlocked. The one that cherished memories like her mother's perfume or the first time that baby Ella grabbed one of her fingers.

She sighed and approached Walter with weary steps. When she was in front of him she managed to smile. "Walter, this case is important and I want to solve it, but I don't want you to do anything stupid."

"I'm sorry."

Olivia shook her head no. "Don't worry, OK?" She put her hand on his shoulder to rub it affectionately. "Do you want me to buy you something?"

"No... I have chocolate ice cream." He suddenly seemed to remember something and looked at Astrid. "Don't I?"

"Oh, I forgot!" She ran to the corner where the freezer was. She came back with a plastic container in her hand. "I'm sorry, Walter."

Walter cracked a soft smile. "Don't worry, Asterix."

Astrid ignored his mistake and gave the ice cream to him. "You'll have to wait a little before eating it. I'm afraid it's covered in frost."

Walter gave a start. "Stephen Bartowski!" he shouted.

Astrid and Olivia gaped at him.

"The scientist's name. Bartowski!" he explained.

Astrid and Olivia looked at the ice cream container. It must have had magic powers.

Peter approached them. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, yes!" Walter was beaming now. "Stephen. He was a nice fella. His bodyguard frightened me, but I liked him."

Olivia looked at Astrid, she bolted for the computer before Olivia uttered a word. During several minutes there was only the sound of keying and clicking the mouse. Olivia would swear she could hear the same air due to the otherwise complete silence in the laboratory.

"Here he is." Astrid announced. Olivia put herself at her back, to have a perfect look of the screen. "Stephen J. Bartowski, age 57. Computer engineer. Last known residence Encino, California."

"That was in... 1991. Any clue of where he can be now?"

Astrid shook her head no. "I already checked it. None."

Olivia wasn't going to give up, not when she could see the light at the tunnel's end at last. "OK... Does he have family?"

"Yes, a wife, who is missing, apparently, and two children, living in L.A. Eleanor Faye and Charles Irving."

"Charles?" That was just too much coincidence. "Can you find a picture of him?"

Astrid clicked and the face portrait of a young man filled the screen. He had brown curly hair, brown eyes and a rather silly smile grazed his lips.

Olivia smirked. "What are the odds of the son of the the Intersect's creator living in L.A., having a name and looks very alike to Charles Carmichael's, and no relation with him or the project?"

"You're saying that they're the same person?" Peter asked.

"I'm saying that we're going to L.A. to find out."

Olivia took Peter and Walter with her. As always, Astrid would wait at home. They left Charlie in Boston too, so he could cover their backs in case Harris began making too many questions.

Broyles made sure the FBI in L.A. knew of their arrival and Olivia received all kind of resources when they met their western colleagues in the afternoon of the next day, from a car to a complete file about Charles Bartowski.

First, they took a look at his house, a Spanish style building in Echo Park. It seemed a nice quiet place, with a beautiful courtyard decorated by tropical plants and a fountain in its center. Peter remarked on how old Hollywood it looked.

Nobody was at home.

The trio (or rather, Olivia) then decided to pay Charles a visit at his workplace, the Buy More in Burbank, where he worked as a Nerd Herd technician. As a cover job it was genius: nobody would ever think that a Nerd herder could work as a spy.

Luck wanted that when they parked next to the entrance door of the store, they witnessed two thug looking men and a woman in a suit getting out. They were dragging a lanky young man with curly brown hair that for the look of it was babbling as he walked. He was wearing a short sleeved shirt, a grey tie and black pants; the uniform of the Nerd Herd.

"Is that-?" Peter began to say.

"Yep, Charles Bartowski."

"What are they-?"

"Abducting him, apparently."

"What do we do?"

"Follow them."

Walter laughed behind the couple. "How exciting."

The kidnappers put Bartowki into a black sedan. The woman and one of the men went in the backseat with him, the other drove.

The pursuit of the sedan took Olivia and company to a deserted industrial state which forced her to make a detour to avoid suspicions. So when she parked the car in a suitable place, the kidnappers had already entered into one of the premises. Two henchmen were guarding the entrance.

During ten minutes they waited, to see how things developed. Nothing happened. It exhausted Olivia's already thin patience.

"I'm going in," she decided.

"What are you-?"

She ignored him and opened the door. "Stay put, Walter." She glared at Peter. "You too"

"Me too? Olivia..."

She got out and opened the trunk.

"Olivia!" Peter shouted, coming out as well. He faced her. "I'm not going to let you go alone."

"Peter..."

"No." He made a energetic gesture with his hand. "Look, I'm no hero, but I won't stay here while you go in there and meet who knows what."

Olivia confronted his resolute expression with a cold stare of her own. He didn't yield an inch. She swore in a low voice and reached for her second regulation gun. "All right, take this and put on the vest."

Peter grabbed the weapon taking care of not touching the trigger.

"Stay behind me all the time," she instructed him. "And Peter." He raised his stare from the gun to her. "Use it only when there is no other choice."

They approached the premise through the back alley. Several windows darkened by dirt covered the walls. It was impossible to open them and even if it wasn't, Olivia didn't want to risk it. In the opposite side to the main entrance –and the henchmen guarding it- they discovered a back door. It was secured by a chain and a padlock.

Olivia pulled it with no effect. It was solid.

"I can pick it," Peter said.

"Really? It's been a good idea to take you with me then."

He didn't reply to that. Instead, he knelt down and took out a small bag from his jacket. When he opened it, Olivia could see a collection of lock picks.

"How is that you carry those?"

"In case Walter gets locked in the bathroom again."

Olivia decided not to press the issue and let him open the door, which he did several minutes later, just when her anxiety was reaching uncomfortable levels.

Olivia made sure that the coast was clear. Then she guided Peter through a labyrinth of pallet pillars.

She could hear distant sounds as they approached the center of the building. A female voice shouted something, Olivia couldn't make out what. The noise became clearer, turned into people talking, until they got a glimpse of people. Olivia crawled and reached a bunch of boxes that covered her. She craned her neck, so she could spy the four people in front of her.

It was then when she heard loud and clear: "Me. I'm the Intersect,"

Peter and Olivia exchanged dumbfounded looks.

The man that had said those words was tied up to a set of shelves by a chain. Clear whip wounds plough his back, perfect crimson lines over his tank top. His face showed up signs of having suffered a few blows too.

"No, he's not. It's me, OK?" said Charles Bartowski, He was tied up to a wheelchair. "And I resent the fact that I couldn't stand up to torture. Do your worst. In fact, you could stick that incredibly long needle in my eye and I still wouldn't tell you anything!"

There was a blonde woman, also tied up to a machine that Olivia couldn't identify. She was looking at Bartowki with a mixture of worry and homicidal urges. She didn't seem scared at all. At least not any way as freaked out as any average girl would be in the same situation.

The kidnapper woman -a brunette with a chilling expression in her eyes, now that Olivia noticed- approached a table full of all kind of pointy instruments.

"This needle?" she said, taking it in her hand. She walked towards Bartowski as she raised it, in a very menacing manner. "You want me to put this needle in your eye?"

Olivia drew up her hand to her gun, ready to jump in at any moment and stop the torture, even at the cost of her life.

The kidnapper woman brought the needle closer to Bartowski's left eye. He had his stare fixed at it, as if he was mesmerized. "Y-you k-know... On-on s-second thought..." he babbled. Then he rolled his eyes and collapsed in a dead, so hard that he took the wheelchair down with him and hit his head.

"Wake him," the kidnapper woman ordered to her men in a harsh tone.

"That's a very... creative way to avoid torture," Peter murmured into Olivia's ear.

Olivia studied her surroundings to find a way to interrupt the torture session and ask some questions. There weren't many options: the hostages were in a kind of a cage and she and Peter didn't have the best angle for a surprise attack or a shooting. Besides, she didn't want to begin shooting randomly and kill people. For starters, she didn't even know who the good guys were in this. Her instincts (and common sense) told her that probably the ones tied up were the heroes in the story, but after everything she had seen in her life, she couldn't be 99 percent sure.

One of the kidnappers came with a bucket and splashed water over Bartowski's face.

"It's freezing!" he yelled, waking up. "Please, no more torture!"

"Enough!" the female kidnapper said. She was filling another syringe with an unknown liquid. "We will try... a different approach." She walked towards Bartowski again. "Tell me who the Intersect is by three or I inject Agent Walker with enough Ricin to kill an army."

Olivia heard Peter gasp. She suspected it had everything to do with the fact that the blonde woman, now identified as Agent Walker, was quite attractive.

"One..." the kidnapper woman began her counting.

Agent Walker seemed more worried for Bartowki or even for the other tied up man than for herself, if the quick glances she was directing to one and the other were any indication.

"Two..."

Olivia couldn't wait anymore. In for a penny, in for a pound. She touched Peter's shoulder with a hand to instruct him to stay put. Then she drew her gun and leaped out.

"FBI! Freeze!"

They stared at her as if a chihuahua singing rap had just showed up in front of them.

Nobody had time to react, because in that instant sirens rang outside. An assault team burst into the building to the cry of "CIA! Hands in the air!" Olivia hardly could feel outrage at the sight of a CIA assault team operating on American soil, since one of the agents approached her, the submachine gun pointing at her, as he shouted her to drop her gun and lie down on the ground. She complied reluctantly. She could see out of the corner of her eye how the female kidnapper ran away. Peter knelt down next to Olivia with his hands behind his nape. Another agent was aiming at him.

"I'm a FBI agent," Olivia said, trying not to yell. "Let me go."

"Shut up and don't move!" the agent told her.

"Could you please listen to her?" Peter said. The agent guarding him kicked his left side. Peter groaned. "At least frisk her to find her badge."

The agents didn't take the slightest notice of what he said.

"We're wearing vests with the freaking letters FBI on them!" Peter shouted. "Isn't that enough?"

Olivia leaned her hand palms on the ground to raise her torso.

"I said don't move," her guarding agent yelled.

"I'm a FBI agent. If you let me, I could identify myself."

The agent brought his weapon's barrel next to her forehead.

"Easy, soldier," said a deep voice behind him. "You can let her go."

A man showed up to lower the agent's weapon with a hand. The agent's eyes popped out of his head and he nodded hastily, like a child in front of a parent. The man didn't let any emotion show in his face. He was tall and muscular, and something in him made one feel that he could block the sun if he put himself in front of anybody.

"Major Casey," Olivia greeted. "What a coincidence."