A/N1: Yup, yup, yup. Ownership of Chuck. Yup.
A/N2: Mazel tov to Yvonne Strahovski and Tim Loden on the birth of their third son. Now the parents have to move from man-to-man coverage to a zone defense.
A/N3: Chapter break in the middle of the action last week. That was cruel of me. And now it seems as if I haven't posted since last year. (I know. Another dad joke.)
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Recap: Fulcrum agents have declared open war against the Federal officers who have come to arrest Roark. Fitz, Leo and Billy are in a gun battle with Fulcrum in front of the building. Rachel, safe in a locked SUV, is doing what she can to direct her men back in Castle. Stephen is downloading the roster of Fulcrum agents, while being protected by Sarah and Marco. All three are about to be hit with dozens of Fulcrum agents trying to get into the closed computer wing. Zondra is stationed outside the building at the fire door to the computer room, covering the exit for those teammates inside. Casey is putting the unconscious Chuck into their vehicle and will shortly be on his way back to help Zondra.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Marco stepped forward to pick up his stick. He looked at the five downed men on the ground and, with a small smile, spun the stick in his hands. A critical observer might have decided it was a bit of a triumphal spin of the weapon. Or maybe even a less critical observer, if truth be told.
As he spent a couple of seconds looking at the downed men, he heard the sound of pounding feet down the corridor. Looking up, he saw twenty or thirty armed men heading his way. He instantly grabbed two of the weapons of the downed men at his feet with a few magazines of ammo.
With the tip of his stick, he destroyed the keypad lock on the wall and then banged on the door behind him and yelled, "Sarah, it's Marco. Let me in." The door opened towards him and he threw himself inside. Sarah pulled the door closed behind him.
He looked at her and said, "Shitstorm on its way."
"Right," said Sarah. "We have to buy time for Stephen to do his thing. We'll have to stop this door from opening." She looked at the door for a moment and said, "Belts." The door opened outwards from the room, so barricading it wasn't an option. However, it had one of the automatic closing mechanisms just above the door on the hinge side. The two metal bars from the mechanism stuck out into the room forming a 'V.' Sarah and Marco heard noise from the other side of the door as the Fulcrum agents arrived and found the destroyed keypad.
Sarah went to one of the people Chuck had tranked and pulled off his belt. She handed it to the taller Marco, who fed the belt through the gap between the two metal bars and cinched the belt closed through its buckle on one of the two. Pulling it taut, he began to wrap the belt around the two bars, as close to the door as possible. He pulled on it to keep the strap as tight as he could.
Meanwhile, Sarah was taking two other belts from the unconscious Fulcrum agents. Making a loop through the buckle, Sarah hooked it to the lever style doorknob of the door. As Marco finished putting the strap on the bars of the automatic closing mechanism, he saw what Sarah was up to and began to pull a heavy desk towards the door. Once it was close enough, Sarah hooked the second belt to one of the legs and tied the two belts together. To open the door, Fulcrum would have to move the desk.
The noise on the outside of the room was increasing and they heard the sounds of gunfire impacting the metal door. Sarah touched her watch and said, "Zee, Fulcrum is trying to get in here. When they can't they'll come around to you to try to get in that way, so heads up."
"Right, Sarah. Got it," the other woman replied calmly.
"Stephen," said Sarah, wiping some sweat from her face with her sleeve, "we're on the clock here."
"Understood. Just a few more minutes." His eyes were glued to the screen in front of him.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Casey had just arrived at their SUV, carrying Chuck, when he saw Frankie and Marty getting out of their car. Each man had a pistol in his hands.
Holstering his weapon, Frankie ran to Casey and said, "Here, Colonel, let me help."
"Go around to the far side of the truck." Frankie did so, as Casey unlocked the vehicle with the push of a button. "Back door," said Casey, opening the back door on his side.
He bent and put Chuck's upper body on the back seat. From the other side, Frankie reached in and took Chuck under the arms and pulled the limp body across until his head was not quite at the door opening. Casey bent Chuck's long legs and arranged him into a more comfortable position. Frankie closed the door on his side.
Casey murmured, almost to himself, "Stay in the car, Moron."
The sound of gunfire reached them from the back of the building. They heard the quick bark of Zondra's weapon firing in response. The men looked at each other understanding the urgency.
Casey closed the back door on his side and tossed the truck's keys to Frankie. He said, "Don't leave him or Sarah will have your balls for earrings."
A ghost of a grin came and went from Frankie's face and he said, "No shit, Colonel. I got this one."
Casey turned to Marty and said, "Get a long gun and follow me."
A moment later they were jogging through the bushes to the gap in the fence. Casey hit the dirt and crawled through the gap they had cut earlier. Ruefully, he realized with the action in the RI campus, he could have blown a hole in the fence using explosives and it would make no difference now that they were no longer covert, but he didn't have time to do so at the moment.
As he hurried through, he saw, in the distance, Zondra crouched behind the solid concrete landing outside the fire door and firing her weapon at a group of Fulcrum agents who had come around the east side of the building. Coming through the gap, he saw another collection of Fulcrum agents come around the west side of the building, behind Zondra. She had no cover of any kind from that direction.
Casey reacted instantly and began to fire at the men while saying, "Zee, tangos behind you. Am engaging."
Marty ran past him towards the enemy. He stopped after twenty yards or so, dropped to one knee, and began to fire at the men behind Zondra. Bodies of the Fulcrum men began to pile up at that corner of the building. Zondra continued to fire at the men to the east with similar results, while trusting Casey and Marty to handle the men at her back.
The moment Marty opened fire, Casey jumped to his feet and ran past his teammate, taking a knee about twenty yards past Marty. He began firing at the men and Marty jumped up to rush forward. Casey yelled, "I'M OUT." Marty stopped in mid-rush and began to fire. Casey dropped the empty magazine from his weapon and inserted a full one. Once Casey began to fire again, Marty leaped forward and resumed his rush.
The Fulcrum agents were, of course, firing back, so far inaccurately. But as Casey and Marty got closer to Zondra, the distance to the enemy would decrease and their accuracy would increase. Although Casey and Marty wore black combat fatigues, Casey knew that that did them no good on the floodlit lawn.
As if his mind had been read, one of the floodlights on the top of the building shattered with a rain of sparks and broken glass. The sound of a heavy weapon's boom came to them across the lawn. Moments later, a second light was shot out. The destruction was repeated until all the lights had been destroyed and the lawn was bathed in darkness. Seems Jack's sniper nest had a view of the back of the building. He'd seen what was happening and taken action to give Casey and Marty more concealment. Just the kind of heads-up decision making and initiative that Casey had learned to expect from the Special Forces.
After a handful of more coordinated rushes forward, with a couple of pauses for each man to reload, Marty and Casey arrived at Zondra's position. They took positions with their backs to her each on a knee, facing the western side of the building, the area from which they had no cover.
"Hey, guys. Welcome to the party," said Zondra. "How's it going?"
"Just another day at the office, Zee," said Marty, keeping his eyes on the western corner over his gun sights.
They heard another couple of booms from Jack's sniper rifle as he engaged more Fulcrum targets.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
The sound of the gunfire in the front of the building had become sporadic, but Rachel saw the Federal agents still crouched behind cover. At least most of them. She saw a handful, including Fitz, Billy and Leo, aggressively moving from cover to cover to get a better position to shoot at the Fulcrum agents inside the building. Many of the other agents were providing them covering fire, but not themselves advancing.
Rachel suddenly heard the sound of helicopter rotors. She twisted around in her seat, looking out the windows of her protective vehicle, trying to see what was happening. She crawled over the seats into the front of the SUV and craned her neck. There, to the east, were a series of aircraft lights heading for the campus.
She tapped her phone, which still had the open line to Castle. "Brett, you still on with the Ventura PD?"
"Yeah," he said.
"Ask them if they sent any helicopters to the campus. Or if they heard from any other agency that did."
Seconds later, Brett was back on the line, "No. Any copters are not theirs."
The helicopters were closer, but were only visible as red, green and white lights in the night sky. She decided to count the green lights, hoping that each light represented a single helicopter.
"Ok. Johnny, stop what you're doing and get on to the FAA. Tell them that eleven helicopters just arrived at the campus. We need to know where they came from, but more important...much more important, is we need to know where they are going if they leave here. We now know Fulcrum's escape plans. Have the FAA flood this place with radar or whatever. Oh, and Homeland Security. Maybe they can direct satellite coverage or something. God only knows what gadgets they have. And anything else you can think of."
Johnny said, hesitancy in his voice, "Will do, Boss. But, uhh, why should they listen to me?"
Rachel sighed and said, "Do the best you can. Bluff. No, even better. Just start saying the name Carmichael over and over until you get a supervisor or something. Someone with power. Don't be afraid to make enemies."
"Ok, Rach. I got it," said Johnny.
"Great. When you're done, get on to the Coast Guard. We don't know which way these choppers will head when they leave here. If they leave here, I mean. If they head west, out to sea, there might be a ship standing by. Same deal. Just yell Carmichael until you get the cooperation you need."
"Right," he said.
Rachel said, "Jorge, let the other three teams know what's going on. Remember we don't know if the bad guys just brought in reinforcements or if these are the getaway cars."
"Right, Boss," said Jorge.
Rachel watched as, one by one, the helicopters began to land on the wide-open lawns of the Roark Instruments campus. She didn't see any fresh Fulcrum troops leaving them, which was a good thing.
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
The sound of automatic weapons fire pounding on the door to the computer room made conversation difficult. But Marco and Sarah had been rearranging the desks so that they might have some cover in the event the door was breached. As they watched the inside of the door, they saw the door handle blasted out of the door by a stream of fire from the other side. The strap connected to the desk fell loose.
As the Fulcrum agents would have had the same training as Sarah and Marco, neither was surprised when the breaching fire turned upwards and began to hammer the upper edge of the door, where the other strap was jamming the closing mechanism. They looked at each other with grim expressions.
XXXXXXXXXXX
The big helicopters were coming down on the lawn when the boom of a large caliber rifle echoed off the buildings. One of the copters seemed to shudder on its descent as one of its rotor blades flew off. The chopper suddenly nosed over and headed down to the ground at speed. It impacted violently, the remaining rotor blades digging into the grass. Only a few moments later, it caught fire and began to burn fiercely. No one could be seen to escape the flames.
XXXXXXXXXXX
Eventually, the strapped closing mechanism on the door was shredded by gunfire and the door was pulled open and off its hinges.
Sarah yelled, "Stephen, time to go."
"Just another second, Sarah. Almost done here," he responded.
Four men rushed through the door into the computer room. Sarah and Marco were crouched behind overturned metal desks and were firing at the men from that barely adequate cover. The doorway funneled the Fulcrum men right into the kill zone Marco and Sarah had created. Sarah killed two with bursts from her weapon. Marco killed another. But that left one man inside the room with them. He began to lay down covering fire to keep Sarah and Marco's heads down. Three more men made it inside before Sarah killed the first man.
Bullets were flying around the room like swarms of angry bees, as everyone in the room had a weapon spitting fire.
"STEPHEN, LET'S GO. GO," screamed Sarah.
Crawling on his hands and knees, Stephen made it to the mainframe and disconnected the portable hard drive containing the Fulcrum roster. Bullets smashed into the wall near him.
Marco announced, "I'm out."
As he had no more ammo, Sarah commanded, "Fall back."
Marco moved back to the fire door and lunged through it to the outside. Three more men rushed into the room, Sarah only managing to kill one. The air was hazy with the dust of plaster and destroyed ceiling tiles. All their ears were ringing from the gunfire in the confined space.
"STEPHEN, BACK. GO. COME ON."
Sarah moved back herself, until she could feel the breeze from outside the fire door, but Stephen was pinned down by the volume of fire from the Fulcrum agents.
Stephen yelled to Sarah, "HERE." He tossed her the hard drive which she caught one-handed.
She tucked it into a pouch and screamed at him, "LET'S GO." She loaded her last magazine of ammo into her weapon.
Stephen started to move from cover, only to be driven back by the bullets of the enemy, although Sarah laid down as much covering fire as she could. Without being riddled with bullets, he wasn't going to leave that spot.
Stephen screamed at her, "KILL ME." She looked at him with shock. "KILL ME. DON'T LET FULCRUM TAKE ME. KILL ME." Her mind frozen by his demand, Sarah continued to look at him as the bullets buzzed around. Finally, he screamed, "AGENT WALKER, IT'S YOUR DUTY. IT'S YOUR DUTY. KILL ME. DON'T LET THEM TAKE ME ALIVE, AGENT WALKER."
He was right. They couldn't allow Fulcrum to capture Orion. Fulcrum would torture him to create a new Intersect and an army of Intersected Fulcrum spies. A huge danger to the nation. She shifted her aim and looked at Orion over the sights of her weapon. And looked at him. He looked right back at her, his face expressionless. Her eyes got blurry and her hands holding the weapon began to shake. It was her duty to kill Orion. He was right. It was Agent Walker's duty. She had no idea how long she crouched there frozen, but her cheeks were streaked with tears by the time she'd broken the nightmare grip on Sarah's psyche.
No. Fuck her duty. Fuck it. No.
Her weapon shifted and pointed at the ceiling, her eyes bored into his, and she screamed, "SAVE YOU LATER...DAD."
She emptied her remaining ammo at the Fulcrum agents, taking down an additional two, and lunged backwards out the fire door, slamming it shut behind her.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
The Fulcrum helicopters were waiting with their rotors turning for the Fulcrum men and women to evacuate the Roark facility, lit by the fire from the corpse of the one burning copter.
With the boom of the high caliber sniper's rifle, another one was grounded when the heavy bullet hit the rotor coupling atop the cabin. After a few moments, the crew left and ran to another nearby chopper.
A black SUV came from one side of the building and began to race towards the assembled aircraft at 50 or 60 miles per hour. It bounced violently over a curb and didn't seem to be slowing down. Fulcrum men near the helicopters began to fire at it without any discernable effect. The fast-moving truck slammed into the tail rotor of one of the helicopters, spinning the machine ninety degrees. The truck spun in a quick turn, its wheels digging into the grass, and headed back towards the line of aircraft, repeating the maneuver with another helicopter's tail rotor.
In the flickering dim light cast by the burning helicopter, a stream of Fulcrum agents was leaving the building and heading for the copters. Many of them were firing at the Federal agents in a running gunfight. A handful of them seemed to have a prisoner.
The demolition of the Fulcrum helicopters proceeded between the sniper's rifle and the truck. Whoever the driver of the truck was he or she showed little regard for their own safety, as the spinning tail rotors took a toll on even the armored body and glass. Steam began to leak from the hood, as damage to the radiator became evident and soon catastrophic.
The truck limped to one side of the open field with the waiting helicopters and Mike Colt bailed out on the far side with a M134 Minigun in his hands, it was a ridiculously huge weapon never designed to be handheld. He began firing over the hood of the damaged vehicle at the Fulcrum agents running to the helicopters. The monster weapon fired up to 6,000 rounds a minute, every fourth round a tracer, and as Colt hosed down the Fulcrum agents, many fell like blades of grass before a giant scythe. In the firelight it looked like a scene from Hades. But, still, some made it to undamaged helicopters.
Despite the efforts of the Federal agents onsite, including the various teams from Castle, five helicopters filled with Fulcrum agents made it into the air. Colt picked up the M134, twisted it around and fired from his hip at the rising aircraft. The one closest to him seemed to shred in midair as the glittering stream of lead literally ripped it to pieces. It burst into flames and the fireball fell to the ground. The remaining four helicopters disappeared to the east.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
A/N4: The M134 Minigun is the same weapon used by Arnold Schwarzenegger in Terminator 2 to shoot up police cars. Although I gave it to Mike Colt here, entirely for the cool factor, it is impossible to use as a handheld weapon for even the strongest men. It's too heavy and the mammoth recoil would render it thoroughly uncontrollable. But I did love the idea of Michael Clarke Duncan wielding such a monster to take down a Fulcrum helicopter.
A/N5: This is not a cliffhanger, although the next chapter will pick up soon afterwards. At the end of Dream Job, in canon, Roark escapes his facility by helicopter with the captured Orion. So, once again, New Day is canon adjacent. But canon, in my opinion, made it too easy for the bad guys. This is the Federal government we are talking about. They may be slow and cumbersome, but they wield immense power. This is the last chapter of the Roark Arc. Next up is the beginning of the arc based on a combination of First Kill and Colonel in which we not only see the power of the United States government, but are affirmed in our understanding that Chuck Bartowski and Sarah Walker, and their friends, have a firm grasp of the levers of that power. And they will use it. Goddamn, they will use it.
A/N6: Happy New Year, my friends. Let me know what you think of this action-packed chapter. Oh, and stop by the FB page for this stuff. It's where some of our friends hang out sometimes.