A/N Taking Hannah in a bit of a different direction in this story. Not for her sake so much as Sarah's.

"Let's send Charles Carmichael someplace far away, then."

"They call you 'Tough Guy'."

"Say goodbye to the nice man, Chuck."

"Note to self: Kill Daniel Shaw!"

"Sarah, can I ask you a question?" asked Hannah.

Sarah nodded.

Hannah pointed. "Are you really married, or is that just the standard beautiful woman's ploy to avoid being hit on?"

Why? Don't I look it? "Very married," said Sarah, looking down at the rings on her hand. "Very happy. Why do you ask?"

"Most women I've ever met who are 'very married and very happy' can't stop talking about it. We've been in the air an hour now and I haven't heard you mention your husband once, and now you're saying you want to kill Daniel Shaw." Hannah pointed at Sarah's napkin. "I'm guessing he's not your husband."

Sarah smiled, amused at the idea of stolid, passionless Shaw being anyone's husband, much less hers. "No, he's just a colleague. My husband's name is Chuck."

"Chuck? Do parents still name their kids that?"

Sarah tried to look insulted, but couldn't quite pull it off. "He goes by 'Charles' for professional reasons. We like to keep our private lives private."

"So you're on this flight for professional reasons?"

Time to change the subject. "I wouldn't be in first class if I wasn't. I'm not that kind of girl."

Hannah downed her drink in a gulp. "Who is? This is my last trip in this cabin, too. I'm flying back to Paris to clean out my office."

"Oh, I'm so sorry to hear that. Who did you work for?"

"Private investor. I was his resident computer geek and tech whiz, he would fly me all over the world to look after his interests. Guess he decided he couldn't afford me anymore." She signaled for another drink.

"I hope you'll be all right."

"You mean money?" Hannah waved a hand. "I've got money, he invested for me, too. It's just, I thought he valued me, you know. He sent me first class because he valued me. I could fly first class myself but what would be the point?" Her drink arrived, and she tossed back a good bit. "But no, it was about him, always him, his reputation. Men."

"I can tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt that not all men are like that."

"Because of your Charles-but-my-friends-call-me-Chuck? I'm very happy for you. I'm sure he's a saint."

"He's the most wonderful man I've ever met."

"And here you are, flying to Paris alone."

Sarah touched her glasses. I'm not alone. "If Shaw hadn't tricked me into taking this flight I'd be with him right now. I'm the one who has to work at it here. I'm the one who's undeserving."

"Hey!" Hannah pointed a slightly wavering finger at her seatmate. "Don't you ever sell yourself short like that. Too many people willing to do that already. You think it's a coincidence we're the only women in this cabin?" Another one bit the dust.

"Perhaps we should go back to our seats." Perhaps we should get away from the bar.

"Oh, you think I want to go to Paris alone? Clean out my office and take a coach flight home sober? When he's paying for my drinks? That's a win-win in my book."

Sarah put her hand on Hannah's glass. "I've been numb. It doesn't help."

Hannah pulled the glass out from under. "It'll help today." The stewardess took the glass.

"It's your tomorrow I'm worried about."

"It's too late," said a gruff voice from behind Hannah. Hugo Panzer stood there, waiting for his own drink and looking on dispassionately. "The effects of alcohol are enhanced by high altitude and lower cabin pressure, sometimes as much as three hundred percent. Given her lower mass, I'm afraid your friend is already gone, she just hasn't gotten there yet."

"She's not my friend," said Hannah, wrapping her fingers around Sarah's glass.

"I am your friend, Hannah," said Sarah, gripping the other woman's arm. "This is what friends do for each other."

"Let go!" Hannah jerked her hand back, splashing the contents of the glass all over Panzer's shirt. She went from combative to shocked instantly. "Oh, gosh! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." She grabbed Sarah's napkin and started wiping up Sarah's drink, starting at the top of his shirt and working her way down.

"I think I can handle the rest," he said when she got to his waist, taking the napkin from her. "Your friend is right, you need to get back to your seat." He swept her up easily. "Watch my drink," he told Sarah.

"I'll put it by your seat."

He nodded, and carried Hannah down the aisle, following her slurred directions. If anybody thought it was odd nobody was about to say anything.

Sarah thought it was Heaven-sent. The second he was gone she took his drink to his seat as promised, pulled out his claim ticket and scanned it with her pen before putting it back and heading over to join them at her own seat. "Thanks. You've been a real gentleman."

He gave her a curt nod and was gone.

Sarah grabbed her book of puzzles and stood up.

"Sure, time to go potty," mumbled Hannah. "I do all the drinking and you do all the peeing. What are you, pregnant or something?"

Definitely 'or something'. "I'll be right back." Sarah put her book down and walked forward, to the water cooler. She put the cup in the holder at her seat and got a small bottle of pills from her pocket. "Here," she said, handing Hannah the pill and the water. "Take this. It'll ease your inevitable hangover." The pill would do more than that, it prevented the inebriation in the first place, but Hannah had no need to know that.

Hannah took them. "You are my friend."

"Yes, Hannah, I'm your friend." Puzzle book in hand, Sarah left her seatmate to doze while she sought out the nearest access to the cargo hold. She aimed her pen at the lock and was rewarded with a series of numbers to unlock the elevator. She wrote 'license plate' on her book and scanned it before getting on the elevator. A string of letters appeared, the baggage claim ticket for Panzer's luggage. She had it memorized before the elevator stopped.

Oh, great. Pallets of luggage, stacked and webbed. Hopefully Panzer's bag wasn't in the middle of one.

Hugo Panzer sat in his seat, not quite enjoying his well-watered Scotch. He preferred it neat, but he also knew a lot more about the effects of alcohol at high altitude than Tiny Upset Lady did. He put the glass back in the holder, wiping the water from his fingers with a crumpled up napkin.

Sarah was getting sore, stretching high and bending low, so many bags and tags, including her own. There had to be a better way than this. She stood and stretched, looking around. What's that? Something silver, something different. A casket! Customs didn't search caskets, did they? No they didn't. And what do you know, the tags match!

Okay, a real dead, real old guy. In the pockets? She patted him down gently but there was nothing. Where would it be that someone could just reach in and get? She gripped the sleeve and flipped over the top hand. Bingo! And Eww!

She stuck the key in her pocket and stood. The camera behind her ear stopped showing her the image of the ceiling. Instead she saw the image of Hugo Panzer, just as he started to strike.

Chuck yelled "Sarah!" as the screen went black.

"Chuck, you're spiking!"

"Ellie, Panzer's got Sarah."

Panzer possibly had Sarah, but Sarah definitely had good reflexes and a pair of nunchuks, and she knew how to use them against unarmed, very large men. This very large man quickly learned to stay out of range. "Daniel Shaw, huh?" he said, holding up her napkin. He crumpled it for effect. "We didn't know he had a partner. He won't soon." He reached into a block of luggage and pulled out a short sword. "Why don't you come over here and I'll make this quick. You must know those sticks have no chance against a sword."

If Sarah had been trying to defeat him with her sticks he might have been right. Instead she fought a purely defensive battle, using the sticks to deflect his thrusts as she danced around him. Twice he tried to block her into a corner with his bulk, twice she squeezed past him.

"I can do this all day, little lady," he said, not even breathing hard. "You haven't even touched me."

Sarah swung her hand at the last strap on the pallet next to her, the razor edge of the fingernail parting it with ease. Third time was the charm. Hugo went down under an avalanche of baggage. "Haven't been trying to," she said, watching him struggle, dazed. She stepped forward, swinging her sticks for the coups de grace.

"Chuck, what's happening? Your vitals have gone down."

"It's all right, Ellie." Chuck blew a kiss to his wife, not that she'd be able to see it but he could at least see her. She turned the pen to show Panzer, unconscious and restrained. "Sarah's got Panzer. And the key."

Sarah stopped by the bathroom for a quick touch-up before going back to her seat. It wouldn't do to look like she'd just been through a major brawl with a human tank. She found her new friend, up and alert and looking uncomfortable. "How you doing? Sober?"

"Stone cold. Don't feel good," said Hannah. "Stomach hurts."

"Really?" Her pills shouldn't have made her feel nauseous.

"Your drink didn't help."
Sarah looked down at a glass in her seat's holder. "I didn't order any drink. I told you, only one per flight."

"I know that. I figured you wouldn't want so I drank it myself. It tasted terrible, how can you drink that?"

"Which stewardess?" Sarah looked around.

"I don't know, they all look alike," said Hannah, groaning. "She said it was from the man in 22-B."

22-b was Panzer's seat. Somehow Sarah doubted that he'd sent her a drink as a gesture of gratitude. Sarah grabbed Hannah's arm, threw it over her shoulder and lifted the smaller woman out of her seat. "Come on, Hannah."

"Where are you taking me?" A stewardess moved to intercept them.

"We've got to get you to a bathroom before you throw up all over the seats." The stewardess moved out of her way. Sarah slammed the door open, dropped Hannah on the toilet seat and slammed the door shut again.

Hannah doubled over, clutching her stomach. "I said pain, not nausea."

"I know you did," said Sarah. "In an hour, you'll be in more pain than you can possibly imagine."

Hannah looked up. "Huh?"

Sarah knelt, trying to gentle the coming blow. "You're not sick, Hannah. You've been poisoned."

"Why would someone poison me?"

"They didn't. They were trying to poison me, but you drank it first. And to save you the effort of asking why someone would poison me, I'll tell you: I'm with the CIA."

A/N2 What is it about Sarah and Tech Support?