Brothers in Arms
Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS:LA, if I did, I'd be the one pushing the button to blow stuff up, not the stunt guys, because I could.
Day 4
Deeks groaned as he heard his phone buzzing. This time he didn't think about it twice; he pulled one of the extra pillows that were strewn across the bed over his head. When it began to buzz again he muffled his groan by biting down on the pillow. The third time it buzzed his arms flopped onto the bed and he gave in and rolled towards the edge. He blinked in an attempt to moisten his eyeballs. Once he opened his eyes he blinked in attempt to clear his vision. On the third buzz of the fourth call he picked it up and croaked out a 'yeah?' that sounded more like a grunt.
An overly-chipper Callen burst through the phone. "How's the newly-sober Jake feeling this morning?"
Deeks cleared his throat to make his response understandable, "Like he would rather be sleeping than talking."
"Why?" the question held an undercurrent of judgement and censure with a hint of annoyance bordering on anger. It amazed Deeks how much Callen could put in one word.
"Relax, it was my first day out..."
"You make it sound like you were in jail."
"...And there was a lot to fit in; appetizers at one restaurant, dinner at another, dessert at this great little spot, and dancing at two different places. I'd rather be sleeping because of all the caffeine that kept the night going."
"Fine." He could hear the implied sigh that went along with that one word sentence. He wouldn't need all the caffeine if Callen would let him get a decent night of sleep. Callen continued with "anything I should know?"
"Maybe, we'll see what today brings."
"Well, you should probably start getting ready for work."
This time he just let the sigh out. He suppressed the urge to bang his head against the headboard.
"Welcome back."
"Thanks, talk to you later." He tried to temper the sarcasm, but he was too tired to decide whether or not he was successful. He ended the call and hauled himself out of the bed. He was tempted to fall back into the heavenly mattress, but he was sure Callen would just call him back. He hoped that whoever had stocked the pantry had the sense to bring some sugary cereal, because he needed it today.
The whole wheat flakes and fancy nuts that were masquerading as gourmet cereal passed muster once he dumped half a cup of sugar on them. He was tempted to pull a Kensi and find some donuts of the powdered and jelly persuasion but the building had left him a welcome package and one page caught his eye. He had flipped through the brochure while trying to ignore the taste of his breakfast as it listed the various amenities provided. He dumped his bowl and spoon in the sink, resisting the urge to rinse it and put it in the dishwasher. Another page inserted into the back had detailed his maid service and Jake was not one to clean up after himself, both literally and figuratively.
He rifled through his closet and pulled open drawers until he found what he was looking for: a swimsuit. He wanted to hug Hetty when he got back, but he was afraid he wouldn't have any arms left. He grabbed the suit and headed for the elevator, he was going to get a nice swim in before work. He might not be able to surf, but he could work on his butterfly, which was quite difficult in the ocean.
Half an hour in the pool and he was feeling much better; he realized one was not supposed to swim after eating, but he had started off slow and worked his way up to the hard strokes. Tomorrow he'd hit the pool first.
Here he was again, standing in front of the closet debating clothing choices. When he was himself, it would be plaid button downs, loose long sleeve pullovers, and jeans. Max had preferred grungy T-shirts and lots of leather. Jason lived in gym gear and Dale John Sully, the lawyer, bought cheap suits. Now what did Jake wear?
He flicked through the hangers and searched the drawers, slower this time. He found an assortment of suits, dress pants, dark jeans, button-down shirts, and sweaters. It was a mix that had one defining thing in common; everything was expensive. He pulled a pair of grey dress pants off the hanger, found a dark orange pullover in a soft cotton and searched until he found a button-down that would match. Someone had once told him that blonds looked good in orange. He agreed, he did look good...in orange. The last thing he did before heading out the door was to grab his wallet filled with Jake's cards and checked out his hair, which he had gelled off of his forehead, and his shaving job, he'd cleaned up his beard, in the mirror by the door. He popped open the wallet to read the details off of the drivers license one more time and was surprised to find a post-it note tucked into the same pocket. He palmed it and headed for the elevator. The garbage can in the lobby became the resting place of the crumpled note as he sauntered his way out to the overhang.
The bellhop saw him coming through the doors and called "Mr. Smit, your car will be around in just a moment." Then he scurried off.
Deeks hitched one thumb in his pocket and pulled his phone out with the other hand. He tapped away at it and shifted from foot to foot while he waited. He heard a car pull up in front of him and waited until the sound of the door opening bounced throughout the overhang to look up. But when he did, it was worth it.
As much as he wanted to bounce on his toes and whoop, he only let a small smirk flit across his face.
It was a Jag. A beautiful Jag. Hetty found him a Jag.
He slipped into the driver's seat and ran his hands around the steering wheel. He started up the car and resisted the urge to peel out and instead calmly pulled out into the traffic. For the second time in a matter of an hour he wanted to hug Hetty.
Then it hit him, Hetty set up the op, Eric and Nell set up the backgrounds, Hetty set up the condo and the car. It was a first for him to go undercover with such a wealth of resources behind him. It felt good. He tapped away at the GPS and an address listed under 'Work' popped up. He assumed that was where he should be heading, so he started following the directions. Twenty minutes later he pulled into the underground parking below a converted factory. The post-it had included a parking spot number and the placement of his office space. He found the correct spot, backed the Jag in, grabbed a messenger bag that sat in behind the passenger seat, and climbed out of the car. He walked towards to elevator door, taking the not-quite direct route so that he could familiarize himself with the layout of the garage. He stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the third floor with his knuckle. He closed his eyes and recalled the sketched out map from the note: down the hall to the end, turn left, second door on the right. That would give him an office with a window.
He opened the appropriate door to find a small-ish room that had a desk complete with a computer and various office supplies with two visitor chairs set against the wall. He scanned the room quickly and then headed through the door set into the wall across from the main door. This room was clearly where the magic happened. There was a large desk with two computer monitors placed in the centre of the room. The other three walls were taken up with a wall of cabinets, some of which were concealing filing drawers, an exposed brick wall with windows extending from waist high to the ceiling, and the last two had various paintings. A set of vintage golf clubs were leaning in the corner and the visitor chairs looked much more comfortable than the ones out in the other room. He sat in the chair behind the desk and wiggled down into the cushion. The back of the chair ended above his head and if he was a betting man, he would put money on that it was bulletproof. He should thank Hetty for making sure his head wouldn't get taken out by a sniper.
Suddenly he sat straight up and his breathing shallowed. Here he was all giddy about all the things Hetty and the rest of the team had done to set up his persona.
Jake was not a giddy person.
He leaned forward and put his head in his hands; he needed to concentrate and fix this now. The advantage of putting together an alias by himself was that he had to take the time to completely lay out who he was playing. As he stocked the living quarters he would consider the person's likes and dislikes. As he picked out the clothes he would decide the person's personality traits. All of these things had been done for him and he hadn't had the opportunity to do so. When he'd gone under for the LAPD the backing was lax, Jason Wyler only had a driver's license as Eric had pointed out.
What he needed to do was to mentally cut himself off from the team and replace them with the aliases he had. He hadn't when he was Justin to Kensi's Melissa, but they were just doing surveillance and the threat of danger was minimal. This time there was the potential for considerable harm and possibly death.
He pulled out the license for Jake Smit and placed it on the desk in front of him.
He didn't have a partner named Kensi, he had a slutty friend named Fern.
He didn't have a teammate named Sam, he knew a guy who was a phenomenal sommelier but could never remember his name.
He didn't have two computer geniuses backing him up, he had an 'uncle' who knew a lot of people.
He didn't have a ninja boss, he had a mother figure somewhere in the Midwest.
He didn't have a teammate who went by G, he had a brother that several nefarious groups wanted to get a hold of and he was the conduit.
He did have a Mr. Carl he could call on in dire emergencies.
He set his elbows on the desk, framing the ID card, clasped his hands, and rested his forehead against his hands. He stared down at the card and repeated who he did have several times. After ten minutes of only focussing on his alias he felt as though he had sufficiently replaced the days of growing an alias with mere minutes of force-feeding it into his brain. He slipped the card back into his wallet and stepped over to the filing cabinets to start his discovery of the office.
In the drawers he found the notes he had made on laws and regulations pertaining to the movement of merchandise. He dropped the files on the desk and sat down to work.
Deeks, with his final click of his mouse, stored his encoded notes in a secure file on the computer. His job was to plan out several arms delivery routes. The starting points were Eastern Europe or the US and the end points were several parts of Africa, the Middle East, South America, and Asia. The theory was that Mikhail would 'source' the arms from various spots and preferably sell them to people who shared Mikhail and Jasha's likes, or more specifically, dislikes.
He'd had a minor breakthrough when reviewing international shipping laws, but he needed to do a touch more research to make sure his plan would work. If it did, it would cover any possible combination of start and end points and it was all due to one small loophole.
He gathered up the bag he had walked in with, it was now filled with mindless communication he had scavenged from the filing drawers. He set the computer to hibernate and headed out both doors towards the staircase. He'd been sitting so long, even getting a lunch delivered to the office, and wanted to do some walking before sitting back down in the car.
He pushed the crash bar on the door to the garage with his side and moved towards his car. Two steps and he got an itch between his shoulder blades, that one that was usually followed by bad things.
A/N I: Guys, this one was terrible; I had to watch the season 2 opener to find out the name of Deeks' alias (it's 25 minutes in). The things I do for research... I was re-amazed by the opening sequence of Callen chasing the faceless man, possibly the coolest sequence in the season.
A/N II: Thanks to everyone who's sticking around chapter after chapter. This concludes what I've been considering the intro section and the action starts next chapter. Two hints: it's long and people are gonna die.