Many thanks to all who subscribed to the story and posted reviews. I don't use beta readers and English is not my native language. So, I'm relying on your magnanimity more than you can imagine.
A few words on what is ahead. 12 chapters total, so 5 are still ahead. While the story has a very definite finale with regards to a certain issue, it's also a part of a much wider plot and will have a sequel. All major elements of the latter are already mapped out.
CHUCK VERSUS AGENT INSANITY
Chapter VIII
Who's Better?
Finally Casey woke up. He had the most terrible headache in history. Even Ronald Reagan could see that from the shelf.
'What time, what day, what had happened?' He wondered, groaning. And then he remembered. Chuck had another of these kung-fu flashes.
'I'll kill him,' Casey growled, remembering how the nerd started kicking him.
Well, at least he knew how to turn Chuck into a karate machine now. It was night. He turned the lights on and looked around.
Had anybody been here? He wasn't sure but he could check.
He went into the bathroom and opened a cabinet. He took out a gadget that controlled all hidden cameras throughout his apartment. He reviewed the entire feed from the living room, the scene with Chuck, kicking and punching him.
'Good job, Bartowski,' Casey grunted. Fast forward. Here it was.
'Ah, Carina, long time no see!' Casey smirked.
She was looking around. Sedating him with something. How did she find his secret safe so fast?'
It was under the couch, dug into the floor. You have to move the couch, the carpet, the cover. Then deal with the lock of the safe. Did she have some kind of a device that detected metals typically used for manufacturing safes?
She must have taken the disk with the video feed.
Casey grunted again. Sorry Carina. He had the video file, heavily encoded, uploaded via secure vpn connection on one of those anonymous internet servers. He went to one of his computers, downloaded it and started the decryption process. In less than 5 minutes the entire feed was there again. He fast-forwarded to the stretching segment where Carina was naked in the bedroom. He captured several frames, and uploaded on his mobile. Then, he sent three of those to Carina's mobile.
'I hope you're sleeping now, Carina,' he snickered.
Carina's phone was beeping. She quickly reached it as she didn't want it to wake Chuck up. She saw the pictures Casey had just sent her and chuckled. Idiot.
They were often playing that kind of games, trying to outfox each other. Stay in shape. She turned on her back and started typing on the mobile's keyboard.
'Done with the hibernating, Sugar Bear?'
She knew that would hurt him. 'Sugar Bear' was how his tragic love Ilsa had used to call him.
It was not only Chuck who knew about Ilsa. Carina got access to his NSA file thanks to one of her NSA nerds.
She went on texting. "Heard from Chuck how he kicked your ass the other day. Maybe you're now watching this feed. Or maybe I have it myself and will upload it. Create a myspace account on certain NSA colonel. Showing him ass-kicked by a Buy More computer nerd and sleeping unconscious afterwards. Should make an Internet sensation on youtube."
She put the smiling face icon at the end of the message and sent it back to Casey.
'Hope Casey's head doesn't explode because of this,' she murmured and tried to sleep again.
But her mobile beeped up again. Another message from Casey.
'Ok, you're good. Will come to see you both tomorrow.' Carina read.
Nooo, that won't cut it, colonel,' she thought.
She sent back: 'Check your new myspace account tomorrow.'
The answer came back immediately: 'OK, you are better. Congrats. Sleep tight.'
Now Carina finally felt content. She replied: 'See? You could say it. Was it so hard to tell the truth for a change? Don't send more. Sleeping. If you send one more, better check myspace tomorrow. Over.'
She fell asleep.
Casey grunted at the last. Would she dare?
If she posted the feed she would expose both the Intersect and a highly regarded NSA agent. It would be professional suicide. With every other agent, Casey would be 100% confident that nothing would happen after such a crazy threat.
But Carina was so wild, so unpredictable. He didn't seriously believe she would do such a thing but he couldn't be 100% sure. Crazy woman.
Casey wondered how much he knew about her. Very little outside their joint ops, he realized. Her file said something about a couple of successful operations in Latin America and that was it. There was something mysterious about her. How did she get to replace Sarah as Intersect's guardian in the first place, anyway?' He had no idea.
Carina had carefully built her reputation as loose cannon. Gradually, step by step. Without crossing the red line.
Since she was the best at the DEA, her bosses were willing to forgive her escapades. Ah, they would say, waving a hand. That's our girl, a bit wild, that's her style. But she is the best and she always delivers. We just can't afford to let her go. Not now with all this going on.
Thus, her reputation gave her much more freedom of action than so many other secret agents had.
xxx
Don Friedman was sitting in his office. And cursing. As head of the Drug Enforcement Administration he thought he had some prerogatives. It turned out he was wrong. He couldn't believe it.
There was a very important operation ahead and Fionna McKinley would have been perfect for the team he was having in mind. But then, when he called her, she told him that she was involved in another inter-agency operation and couldn't be part of his plans.
'What?' Friedman couldn't believe his ears. 'Last time I checked you were still a DEA officer and I was the head of this ....!'
Oh!' Carina exclaimed, 'haven't they informed you yet? Sorry, boss. I'll call you back in 20 minutes.' And then she hung up on him.
Don's eyes were wide open, he was probably red with anger. In front of him, his secretary was still standing and staring at him. He rushed her out of the office without explanation.
He was walking there back and forth wondering whether he had to change his plans – the operation as he had devised it so far was centered around Fionna.
He checked his watch. Only 8 minutes have passed. He called her again. Nobody would pick her phone however. Incredible!
Several minutes later it occurred to him to tell somebody to locate her by tracking her mobile. He was just about to do that when he got a call. One of his direct lines.
It wasn't Fionna, however. It was the Attorney General, the big boss.
While they knew each other in college and were some sort of friends, each took his own path afterwards. Don in law enforcement, and his current boss changing private practice with government positions, depending on whether his party was in power.
'Hey Don, I need to talk to you. I have a 20 minute window in half hour. See you then.' On this the AG had hung up on him.
The DEA chief already suspected this had something to do with Fionna so he didn't bother to call her phone again.
Once he got there, the AG met him personally, let him in his private office and poured some whiskey for him.
'I'm really sorry that you haven't been informed about Agent McKinley. She was temporarily reassigned. For the time being you should plan your things without her,' the AG had started.
Friedman tried to protest and explain how important McKinley was for his op but he was interrupted. Very politely. Especially considering that the AG was powerful enough to kick him out without explanation.
'I'm sorry, Don.' The AG stopped here. He was looking for the right words. He needed to move away from the topic without divulging anything in his explanation. 'The only relief to your pain I can offer is buy you a dinner."
He then remembered that his wife liked Don. They had been together on private occasions only a few times since college.
Hey, why don't you come to my house, Pam's gonna love to see you both. OK?
And before Friedman was able to say anything, a personal assistant came in without knocking and informed her boss that the White House was calling urgently.
'Thank you, Meg, the AG now turned to Don and told him, "I'm sorry I have to take this call now, see you tonight.'
Don was out of the office before he could say anything. Once he was out, the AG turned to his secretary and said, "Great, Meg, that's why you're the best. You came in just in time.'
There was no White House call, of course. Later, another secretary would call the DEA chief and tell him that the AG had been summoned to the White House and their private event would have to be rescheduled.'
Don was cursing while going back to his office. Damn, now he had to rethink everything again. Hours and hours of deliberations how to penetrate this new group that was sending all these drug-loaded submarines along the West Coast had just gone down the drain.
He wondered what other agency Fionna could be involved with. The fact that the AG would turn up to cover for her without divulging any information... wow, he didn't even want to know what she was involved with now.' He grimaced and entered his office.
Fionna McKinley, of course, was the official name Carina was known under within the DEA. Everybody thought she was of Irish of British origin.
Ever since the FBI were to protect her family, they have had to hide their Italian origins.
FBI agents told them to immediately get rid of their Italian accent.
'How long do you think it will take the mafia to find you with this accent?' an FBI agent had asked them.
'If we place you in this small town, where the local people had never seen an Italian, you'll immediately attract attention. Oh, yeah, wise guys, wink,wink. Either hiding on their own or under witness protection. Then the word will spread and your lives won't be worth my grandmother's lipstick, he told them.
The FBI placed them in a safe house and gave them one week to learn and practice a new accent and totally, once and for all, get rid of the Italian one.
Carina had always been very careful with her true identity. She was inclined to present herself as 'Carina' or 'Sandra' only to people she considered true friends and only if she thought it was absolutely safe.
She had already spent many hours in hotels and stakeouts with Sarah, and had judged her to be really good person before she told her her 'true' name.
During one such stay in a motel in Indonesia, Sarah Walker had said to her, 'I wonder what your real name is, ... when I think of you, what should I call you in my mind?'
Carina had thought for a while before she answered. She decided to be both honest and play it safe:
'Sandra, think of me as Sandra, OK?' she said with an impish grin.
Ok, Sarah replied, I believe you and will think of you as Sandra.' ("Yeah, if you're are "Sandra" then I'm La Gioconda")
Thus, while Sarah believed her real name was different, in her thoughts she had always thought of her as "Sandra", which was indeed her real name.
That's how good Carina was at manipulating people, whether truly good, as Sarah or those who she had to deal against out there in the spy jungle.
xxx