WAR ROOM, FBI OFFICE, 0330 AM

David hung up the phone with the detention center and addressed the group. "He's there. He met with Charlie's lawyer, and they just logged him into the solitary confinement unit. The arraignment's set for the day after tomorrow. Charlie, your FBI credentials will get you in any time you need to talk with him, but Alan will have to see him within visiting hours."

"Solitary confinement?" Charlie's voice broke. "Why? What – why are they doing that?" He turned away from them, fighting tears.

David walked over to Charlie, putting a hand on his shoulder. "Because he's a federal agent. It's for his protection. They put him in the general population, they'd find him dead or tortured half to death within the hour."

David held him a little more tightly, knowing his words had hardly the reassuring effect he wanted. "They're keeping him safe, that's all." Charlie nodded, a halfhearted, heartbroken nod.

"Charlie - isn't that where they held you? When they brought you in after that whole Pakistan thing?" Another nod. "And you handled it just fine. No offense, but Don's a hell of a lot tougher than you are."

Charlie raised his head and met David's eyes, something the agent knew both Don and Charlie well enough to recognize as a sign of trust. "For two days. I was there for less than two days, and I went voluntarily. One of the guards asked me for my autograph! They practically pampered me and I was still scared to death. Don – Don hates being alone. He won't even spend the night in his own apartment unless it's with Robin."

David had to look away. It was painful enough to process this without learning new ways for his gut to twist in a knot. "Don's a lot more than our boss. We can't work this case on the clock, but you can bet we won't be getting a lot of sleep around here until this is cleared up."

"If it can be," said Nikki. "Look, I might as well be the bitch that says this – we are all assuming he's innocent."

Liz shot her a look that could have slain a demon. "If you have to say that, you don't know Don."

"I haven't dated Don, you mean. I'm just sayin' – loyalty doesn't always have to be blind. Good cops go dirty, it happens every day."

Colby faced her with a direct stare. "I'm alive because of blind loyalty. Don's, in fact. If you can't have faith in your people, then you've got nothing."

Nikki took a step back in spite of herself, throwing up her hands. "Okay, fine. Give me the damn koolaid and I'll be at my desk when you need me." She walked out, passing Amita on her way through the door.

Amita ran to Charlie and hugged him. "Alan called me. Is Don here? How can I help?"

Charlie returned the hug, continuing to cling to her arms as though she were a lifeboat after they separated. "Don's been framed for online investment fraud, and he's going to – they're holding him in solitary without bail, and when they took him out of the building he didn't even want to talk to any of us, and they have a tape with his voice on it they say –"

Amita kissed him to silence the flood. "It's going to be okay. Don's going to be okay. What can I do?" She held him, reassuring him and trying to ground him with her touch. Charlie returned her kiss with sudden passion and turned to face the rest of the team, sans Nikki.

"Okay – Amita and I will take a close look at those online accounts and financial records shortly, but assuming the FBI techs already looked for obvious misdirects, we're going to need some possible suspects to compare the results against before we can extract any useful data. Ahh – motive."

He started scribbling on the board. "Revenge, right? Don's arrested a lot of people, I'm sure some of them would have vindictive tendencies which might motivate them to do something like this."

Liz nodded. "And you, Charlie. It's not unthinkable that someone wants to strike at you through Don."

Charlie closed his eyes. "What you're saying is I could be responsible for this. That Don's-"

"No," said David, his voice sharp. "What she's saying is that you both work for the FBI, you're both potential targets, and striking at family is a traditionally sadistic means of revenge. Because it's a valid theory doesn't make you responsible for someone else's actions."

Charlie gritted his teeth and forced his way through, accepting David's words only as a coping mechanism. "Okay, what else?"

"Diversion," said Colby. "Maybe a case you or Don is working on, maybe someone figures with Don in jail, the case dies."

David nodded. "Appeals, too. We should look at anyone who has a trial or an appeal pending where Don was a lead investigator or has key testimony. He loses credibility to a jury if he's accused of a felony himself."

Charlie wrote down the theories. "Okay – so we're going to need the files of every case Don and I are working on, every pending trial, and every person Don's ever sent to jail."

Colby leaned over and pretended to whisper in David's ear. "He doesn't ask much."

"Nope, never does," agreed David.

"That money, in the offshore account – is it real?" asked Charlie.

David double-checked the files. "Yep, and so were the charity donations. The account's frozen, so someone's out a little over a million and a half dollars. Expensive frame job."

"They could've had him killed for a lot less," commented Liz.

"Thanks – thanks for that," muttered Charlie with a mock glare that carried just a hint of real anger. "Okay. So we're looking at an organization, a person, or a company that's either so big that they write off over a million dollars without blinking, or a smaller operation with their entire future riding on whatever motivated them to do this."

"Plus access to some serious computer experts," said Amita. "This is high-end hacking, in multiple fields. I mean, to set up a dummy website so successfully, link all of the IP addresses to Don, set up and fund the offshore account – I'm almost thinking they would have had to use several different experts."

"Okay, money, technological expertise…" Charlie scribbled on the board some more, then stopped and rubbed his forehead. "The recording – in order to create a composite that would make it past the FBI lab, they would need sophisticated sound mixing equipment."

David was shaking his head. "What kind of outfit spends this much money and devotes all these resources just to set up an FBI agent for white-collar fraud? I mean, say he's convicted. It'll destroy him, but at the worst he'll serve maybe a few years."

Colby looked down. "Unless someone on the inside really wants to get their hands on him personally. Maybe getting him into prison is just the first part of the plan."

Amita gave him a sideways, horrified look, and he shrugged. "You don't solve cases by being squeamish, even if they do involve your friends."

Charlie took control of the room again, somehow managing to block out the exchange. "Now. If any of us develop alternate theories, Amita and I need to know so we can factor them into our research. If you guys can start working on accessing those files, I'm going to make analyzing the recording my first priority. Amita – can you get a group of TAs together at Cal Sci to help enter all this data? We're going to have to write a program to analyze it and filter the results."

"Okay," said Amita, picking up her laptop bag and kissing him lightly on the cheek. "I'm going to go get started."

"Okay. Bye. And – thank you."

"I talked to Victor Nychev about the recording a little while ago, he said he'd get it over here in a few hours," said David.

Charlie set the marker down and ran his fingers through his hair. "While I wait for that tape, I'm going to go see Don."

Colby, David, and Liz all exchanged uneasy glances. After an awkward silence, Colby stood. "Come on. I'll drive you down there."