Chasing Phantoms

Part I: Mad World

Chapter Four: Give Me a Word That You Can Keep

Three floors below, a door swung open with a rusty creak from lack of use, immediately followed by the clicking of heels. Tucker sat at the top of the stairwell, hoping that whoever this was, that they would not bother him. It had begun as a typical Monday morning. Tucker spent the first three hours of his day with his fellow techno-geeks in the basement per usual, talking about the latest processors and new video games they could play on their PDA's. That had all been normal. They pushed their glasses up their noses like usual; they snorted when they laughed; they talked about nothing that actually mattered. The day had begun like every other day of the week, but when Tucker emerged from the sub-basement like he did at ten o'clock every single day, there was no Daniel to talk about Doomed 9 with; there was no Daniel to chat about the latest model on the cover of Maxim.

Tucker was new, and so was Daniel. When he had first switched from cybercrimes to real field work, he had thought that he would never be thought of as a good agent, a real one; he had thought that he wouldn't find a friend in his department. But Tucker had found Daniel, and now that he had been gone undercover for a week, Tucker began to feel the loneliness he had always feared. There was no one to crack lame jokes with; no one to order takeout and sip beer with. A week and a half had gone by, and Tucker felt pretty damn lonely. He sighed and told himself mentally to suck it up. He had to grow up. Daniel would be gone for months, and he sure wouldn't appreciate an account of Tucker moping around when he returned. He couldn't afford to sit around all day just waiting for someone to talk to; Kim would probably just send him to cybercrimes permanently for not doing his job as a field agent.

Waking from his momentary daze, his eyes noticed a pair of lime green patent heels staring at him from a couple stairs below. His eyes moved upward cautiously over the black, standard issue slacks, the freshly pressed white button down, the well-cut black blazer, wondering who would actually come here – no one ever used the stairs. He nervously pushed his hat back out of his face and moved his glasses back in their proper place on the bridge of his nose instead of the tip, his heart rate picking up under the gaze of the looming figure above him.

"Agent Grey," he said, his voice a bit strained from the steely look she was giving him. He swallowed once, finding his voice again. She watched him raise his head to meet her eyes. Her heart jumped for a moment; she had forgotten just how much he had struck her when they first met.

"Did you need me for anything?" he added to his greeting.

She smiled crookedly; her teal eyes were electrifying and he felt his cheeks warm under her gaze. He didn't know why he was acting this way around her. He had been here almost three months – there was no reason for him to feel nervous. He had been with tons of girls, but this woman here was making him blush. He cursed himself mentally for being so weak around her. She was nothing to him, right? Her smile only widened, and his blood pressure rose, his heart beating steadily, but strongly against his chest. She sat down next to him on the stairs.

"As a matter of fact, I do," she said, her teal eyes fiercely analyzing his blue ones. She watched him swallow nervously, trying to figure out how much she could trust him – how reliable he would be for the job she had at hand for him – before adding, "Agent Foley, relax, Kim is not hunting you down, and no one is looking for you upstairs. She knows you're here. Actually, I personally wanted to find you."

She smiled at him, not crookedly this time, but genuinely. She liked toying with people, hunting down their weaknesses, but she gave up toying with him. She just couldn't bear to do it to him, and she was a bit angry with herself at the thought. Sure, he was attractive, but she'd been around handsome men before. She'd figure it out eventually.

"What was it that you wanted to talk to me about?" he asked, regaining his composure before the beautiful woman. She gave him a sympathetic look.

"How are you holding up? You've only been here a few months. The switch form CIA to FBI is pretty rough. Trust me, I know."

"I'm doing alright. I still can't believe I have to wear this monkey suit every day. I could go into Langley wearing my pajamas."

"I'm sure you'll get used to it, Foley. Kim never did, but then again it's not like she would ever give up her green pants. That and, she has a lot of leverage on the director. I don't know how, but she does. How is working on her team?"

"It's a bit lonely with Agent Fenton gone, but we don't have any new victims. I'll admit that the whole murder and serial killer stuff is hard to get used to." He grinned and continued.

"I puked at my first autopsy and my first field assignment with a dead body. That stuff makes an impression on a guy, and the whole team. You don't really want an agent that can't hold it together at a crime scene. Kim hasn't let me out of the pen since, but I don't really think that I mind all that much."

"So she keeps you on a leash? You only work on the computer aspects?" said Valerie questioningly, but she was slightly amused.

"What else can I do Agent Grey? I'm damn good at what I do. I went to MIT and was scooped up by Langley the second I graduated. Unfortunately, I'm not like Daniel and Kim. They're both smart, but they have that gut thing going on. I'm a math person, not a people person – I think logically – It was never my job to figure out how other people think. Like hell I know how to figure out who killed who. I like the tech, and it's good enough for me." And the girls, he thought silently, giving Valerie a side glance.

"Don't worry about Kim. She's a complete workaholic, but she knows what she's doing. Kim was a bounty hunter, and she hasn't really let that go. Don't let her overwork you – she's got some old wounds that haven't healed yet. I'm surprised you and Danny were hired so soon, but I guess she found the right agents for the job. You worked at Langley?" Valerie asked, looking impressed but critical.

"Yeah, I worked at Langley. I didn't do anything really interactive. I was one of the basement guys that designed their software and wrote programs to track terrorist cells. I rewrote their recognition software once because it was glitchy, but I didn't really have anyone to talk to about the real world. It wasn't exactly James Bond."

"I worked with the CIA too, but it was a bit more James Bond for me. They stuck me up in New York as a weapons technician. I could have been running my dad's old company after university, but he lost everything. The new weapon he was unveiling was tampered with; when he went to demonstrate it, it didn't work right. The stockholders sold everything and the whole business went bankrupt."

She finished – a sad but fiery look in her teal eyes. Tucker's unusual blue eyes met hers, and she had made her decision.

"I need something of you."

"I was waiting for you to ask. You didn't come all the way up here just to chat about me adjusting. I've only been here a few months and we're not exactly best friends." He looked at her apologetically and added, "Not that I'm opposed to getting buddy-buddy with you, Agent Grey."

She wasn't the least bit miffed – actually, she was quite pleased. His honesty and lack of restraint when talking were enjoyable and refreshing, as opposed to the people in her department. They were always so composed and treaded on eggshells, always wondering if they were going to leak a secret. Valerie looked at him for a few moments, knowing she would have to ask him now, but for a few seconds, she just stared. Her cheeks were warm, but she mentally thanked her dark skin for not revealing her blush.

"Of course, Foley, but in that case, you can feel free to call me Valerie. Daniel and Kim always call me Valerie."

She pulled an unsealed envelope out from the pocket inside her blazer and handed it to him. Tucker opened it and his eyes moved back and forth as he scanned it intently.

"Why do you need me? You have way more experience designing weapons than I do. I don't see how I could help past what you already know…"

"I need your help because I have already drawn up a design and made a prototype, but it doesn't stay powered up enough to actually work. Sometimes it works after a charge and then runs out, and other times it doesn't have enough power to even start. We need this in the field, but we can't have agents charging this for days and maybe it working once. That's why I need you Foley. I need fresh eyes – a fresh brain to look at this, and I can't trust the men in my department. They have no idea how sensitive this information is; you are the only person in this whole damn building smart enough to figure this out."

Tucker was flattered, but his mind was already working quickly to piece together everything that would need to go into the device and what would solve the problem Valerie was facing. He realized that he didn't have the blueprint or the device in front of him, meaning that he had no way to actually work on it.

"Valerie, how am I supposed to-"

"The plans are at my house," she said sharply, cutting him off mid-sentence. "I am going to need you to come over. Can you come tonight after work?"

Tucker panicked for a second, but put on a poker face and replied, "Tonight should be fine. I get off at five, since we have no case right now."

She stood up and nodded, affirming the plans. Taking the envelope from his hands and pulling a pen from her blazer pocket, she scribbled down an address and telephone number on the front.

"I will be expecting you at six sharp. You may stay for dinner if you like. I will probably order pizza or takeout once you get there."

Valerie gave him back the envelope, and with finality, turned around and sashayed down the steps easily and deftly. He wondered what it was about this woman in particular that made his knees go weak as he watched her lime green heels click down the stairs before she rounded the landing and continued down to the basement, and even then, he sat still, listening to the rhythmic sound of her heels until he heard the door shut three floors below.

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