"Damned U.N.C.L.E. agents," snarled, to himself, Uder Hoffmann, even as he sped away, still quickly careening in and around the rest of the traffic. His anger directed toward the fact that Illya Kuryakin had killed the two T.H.R.U.S.H. thugs that had come along to help ensure his successful planting, for subsequent remote detonation, the particularly dirty bomb put into his expert custody.

He knew he would have to work a little harder at not getting caught or stopped by anyone in authority of law enforcement. Whether they be Secret Service, or simply uniformed officers patrolling in and around the White House and the Congressional Building. He also knew that if anyone, working on behalf of T.H.R.U.S.H., had the where-with-all to pull this off, it would most certainly be him.

As to the two U.N.C.L.E. agents sent to stop him...

"We can't let him get away, Illya," Napoleon Solo said, stating the obvious, as the two of them stood outside their now thoroughly "dead" sedan, situated on the side of the semi-crowded, with cars, the highway leading away from Dulles International Airport.

"And we won't, Napoleon," replied Illya, even as he stepped in the path of oncoming traffic, P-38 pistol in hand, and fired once through the windshield of a car heading straight for him. Its startled driver slammed on the breaks, just as Illya stepped to the driver's side with gun still in hand and, now, aimed directly at the man seated behind the wheel. "Sorry to do this, sir, but we are in need of your automobile. I'm afraid you have no choice in the matter, but to get out."

"Okay, okay," loudly stammered the man behind the wheel. "Don't shoot, don't shoot."

His hands held up beside each side of his head in the universal symbol for surrender, the man waited until Illya opened the driver's door, even as Napoleon was climbing in on the other side, before getting out the instant the still blonde operative of U.N.C.L.E. opened said driver's door. Gun still aimed at the man holding his hands up in surrender.

After climbing in behind the wheel, and solidly shutting the driver's door, even with his P-38 still in hand, Illya stated quite emphatically, "Don't worry, the car shall be returned to you after we've finished our mission."

"Returned to me?" puzzled the man, still holding his hands in a surrender fashion. "How will you do that? And what 'mission'?"

"From the address on your registration," chimed in Napoleon, even as he held up what he had pulled from the glove compartment.

"In the meantime," Illya said immediately after Napoleon, several denomination of bills being handed out the driver's side window, "grab a cab back to your apartment house. I'm sure your employer will understand when you tell him you were car-jacked by armed assailants on the highway."

"Car-jacked?" pondered the man, having never heard such a phrase before, but accepting more than enough cash to, indeed, hire a cab, of which there were several in the immediate vicinity of Dulles, to take him home. He could only hope that he might be compensated for the bullet hole in the middle of his windshield, as well.

Stomping on the gas pedal, the car was sent speeding away, swerving in and around other traffic, in a manner meant to maintain a half-mile, at least, distance from the speeding van carrying the dirty bomb. That way the clicking sound from their fully-transformed communicator pens, due to the radioactive material itself, would still lead these two agents of U.N.C.L.E. directly toward wherever Uder was inevitably heading.

Speaking of whom...

Having sped his way through traffic, keeping at least a half-mile distance from his current traveling location and that of the U.N.C.L.E. agents, who, unbeknownst to Uder, were attempting to maintain said half-mile distance of the radioactive material making up the heart of this particular explosive device, Uder Hoffmann made his way off U.S. Route 50, approaching from the East, in order to park the van.

Pulling into the area along Ohio Drive, SW, between the Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson Memorials, Uder Hoffmann would arm the explosive device, surrounding the radioactive material, before leaving seemingly innocent van just where it was, while Uder would hail a cab that would take him back to Dulles wherein he would fly away on the T.H.R.U.S.H. operated plane.

Whereupon he would wing it back to New York City and the secret East Coast headquarters for T.H.R.U.S.H., secure in the knowledge that the remote detonation, once in the air, would send the United States government into a sudden tailspin. Thanks to the deaths of not only President Johnson, his Cabinet, and Congress, but of thousands more living and working within the Washington, D.C. area.

"Halt!"

The single one-syllable command did, indeed, caused the slowly leaving-the-parking lot T.H.R.U.S.H. operative to stop in his tracks.

"Put your hands up!" came another loud command, but this one by a different voice than the one that shouted for him to halt barely a single second or two before.

Having been trained not to simply surrender, without a fight, by those responsible for training such T.H.R.U.S.H. operatives, Uder Hoffmann slowly turned toward those two voices, hands seemingly in surrender position, before eyeing those responsible for the five words of simplistic-yet-forceful commands.

He was only slightly surprised to see that those attempting to capture him, without a fight, were the same two U.N.C.L.E. agents that were earlier giving chase on the highway leaving Dulles International Airport.

Two agents who had taken the time to assemble the necessary pieces, secreted away in hidden inner pockets of their expensively stylish coats, to nakedly turn their P-38 pistols into rifles, with extra long bullet clips in place of the shorter ones used earlier in pistol fashion.

"I must say," Uder said with a smirk, "it is a bit of a surprise to see you two, after leaving you helplessly sitting on the side of the highway several miles from here. Congratulations. I am seldom so surprised. However..."

With a fast flurry of hand and feet movements, Uder pulled forth, from his own leather shoulder holster, only not as soft as those worn by Illya and Napoleon, a Luger, which he quickly fired, three times, in the direction of the two U.N.C.L.E. agents.

And, at the self-same time, moving to take cover behind a parked car through which 9-millimeter bullets could not fully penetrate.

Then again, his Luger's 9-millimeter ammunition had not the penetrating power to take care of the two U.N.C.L.E. agents, already crouching behind two other parked cars.

A veritable hail of bullets were fired from U.N.C.L.E. pistol-rifles, in between ducking behind respective parked cars whenever return fire was received from a T.H.R.U.S.H. Luger.

Realizing that the detonator carried by Uder Hoffmann, someone whom was so committed to the detonation of a dirty bomb that he would do so whilst exposing himself to the radioactive material released...

"Give me some cover fire," Illya Kuryakin requested of Napoleon Solo, even as both were ducking down to avoid a volley of Luger-fired 9-millimeter bullets, as said bullets pinged loudly against the opposite side of two parked cars.

Napoleon nodded, as Illya, still ducking behind the cars, made his way around them, even as Napoleon popped up and unleashed several rapidly-fired bullets back in the direction of the equally hidden Uder.

Uder, having ejected a spent clip in order to slap a full one in its place, half-stood, behind the bullet-riddled rear of the car providing him with cover, in order to fire back several well-aimed bullets...

Which made even more holes in the rear of one parked car, that had provided cover for a no-longer-there Illya Kuryakin, and the front of the one providing cover for Napoleon Solo.

As this give-and-take gun battle was occurring in very real time, Illya had made his way around other stationary cars to end up on the same side as Uder...

"Surrender or die!"

Not being one to give up so easily, Uder quickly took haphazard aim in Illya's direction, but before he could open fire, in a manner that would most definitely seriously injure, or even kill, the U.N.C.L.E. agent Number Two, Section Two...

Pft! Pft!

Two bullets, unleashed through the silencer-equipped, as was Napoleon's, cylindrical metal rifle barrel, and found deadly homes in both heart and head of a now dead Uder Hoffmann.

Standing, pistol-rifle still at the ready, Illya hurriedly made his way to the unmoving, bleeding out body. Kicking away the loosely held Luger via a shiney shoe made of the finest Italian leather.

"Clear."

Now it was Napoleon's turn to move in, his own pistol-rifle also heald at the ready, to trot over, even as Illya fished out the portable, handheld remote detonator from a coat pocket. Switching it off with his thumb.

Now the two U.N.C.L.E. agents breathed easier, as Napoleon Solo pulled his communicator pen from his front pocket, twisted the clip all the way open, before speaking into its microphone...

"Open Channel D, open Channel D."

"Report, Mr. Solo."

It was only slightly surprising to Napoleon that Alexander Waverly's voice would be the one to answer. Slightly, because, whenever his top two agents were on a very much life-and-death, to important political figures, missions, he often hung around the communications room awaiting a report. Preferrably a positive one.

"We've killed the T.H.R.U.S.H. agents, and have secured the device. No little 'Dirty Birdies' are going to go off in D.C., sir. Napoleon Solo out."

Having converted their communication devices back into innocuous ink pens, placed back into the visible inside pockets of their suits, and transformed two pistol-rifles back into holster-friend pistols, with the three accessories needed for such a transformation back into their secret inside pockets...

Two U.N.C.L.E. agents returned a stolen-at-gunpoint car to its rightful owner, then grabbed a cab back to Dulles so as to take their U.N.C.L.E. supplied airplane back to New York's LaGuardia Airport.

After reporting in and being debriefed, the two would head back to their respective apartments for some much needed down-time.

But, in Napoleon Solo's case, there would be a slight surprise awaiting him...

"Well, hello, lover," said the sultry voice belonging to the same blonde Napoleon had left behind nearly a whole day before. Standing in his bedroom's doorway, wearing nothing but one of his expensive white shirts.

"Well, hello," he said in half-smiling response, his eyes taking her in from toe-to-head. A very approving visual at that. "Guess the two of us have some 'making up' to do. Especially seeing as how I had to leave you behind for my job several long hours ago."

"Yes," she said sexily, while walking out to take him by the tie in order to lead him toward said bedroom. "Now I'm going to make sure you finish what we started. Any objections?"

"Not from me," Napoleon Solo said as sexily as she had done. "Lead on."

THE END