B for Beck

by Assbitch67

Beck has had her life planned for her whether she liked it or not... But for some reason it all just keeps going to shit. Maybe it has something to do with her ability to kill a full grown man with a paperclip and snipe a grape inside a shot glass from nearly 6 miles away. But, hey, the cute Doctor at the BAU that doesn't know how to carry his Revolver seems to tolerate her.

2. Betrayal

Betrayal

•••

"To me, the thing that is worse than death is betrayal. You see, I could conceive death, but I could not conceive betrayal." – Malcolm X

–

SIXTEEN YEARS LATER

–

"Hey there, all you middle men," the iconic and familiar scratchy vocals of Brian Johnson greeted the morning through a pair of earphones underneath a matte black helmet. The woman wearing it smiled to herself as she kicked the kickstand from beneath her bike and turned the throttle of her baby, letting her booted heel rest on the side as she sped down the familiar streets of D.C. heading towards Virginia.

The loud growling of the bike didn't drown out the sounds of Rock And Roll Ain't Noise Pollution or the deafening wind blowing past her ears over the helmet as she breezed through her morning route.

It was only a half an hour commute to get from her small apartment in the District to the GBC in Langley, so of course she was always about fifteen minutes late to work.

She pulled into her special spot a few yards away from the entrance on her precious Suzuki GSX. She kicked the stand back down and pulled out the keys, making sure to pocket them in her jacket pocket as she unzipped it and threw her leg back over to stand fully on the asphalt. She pulled off her helmet before climbing off the bike and making her way towards the front door.

With her music still blasting and the light tapping of her Converse tennis shoes on the tile floor of the George Bush Center for Intelligence, the woman pulled out her credentials and her badge to scan at the security check point where a handful of armed guards stood waiting.

"'Morning, Agent," one of the guards (Trudeau, she presumed his name was) greeted her, a flirtatious smile on his lips. This was his sixth week on the job and he still failed to catch the hint that she didn't date where she worked, just like she didn't eat where she shit. Go figure, he also had no clue what her name was either.

All the 'Agent' could do was return the smile reluctantly as she dropped her keys, helmet, phone, wallet, government-issued gun, and personal knives onto the table beside the metal detector. She tore her earphones out of her ears momentarily as she walked through, quickly picking them back up before she could miss one of the best parts of the song.

"Here ya go," Trudeau held up her badge for her, pausing momentarily to read the name on it. "Special Agent Rebecca Ryder. Counterterrorism, huh?"

Agent Ryder smiled at the guard as she pocketed the rest of her belongings, snatching up the badge from his hands and pocketing that as well. "You sound surprised," she replied cheekily. Of course he was surprised. From the mere look of Agent Rebecca Ryder, one might think she was some secretary. It sucked being a stereotypical short Asian woman; her height of 5'1" was her villain origin story if she ever was one.

The guard shrugged. "I'm not," he quickly tried to redeem himself. "You take down lots of those terrorists out in the Middle East?"

Agent Ryder scoffed. "Lemme let you in on a secret the CIA's been keeping for quite some time," she leaned forward ever so slightly and whispered, "There's more here than there are out in the desert." The guard looked a little off put by her words, but she only winked as she walked off, continuing her trek down the hall towards her office.

After the short elevator ride up, she made it to the main hallway and stopped just outside the general office at the vending machine. It was a morning ritual of sorts for her, always stopping here for her breakfast. Most normal people at Langley usually just grabbed a coffee and bagel from the break room, but for Agent Ryder, coffee was too bitter and bagels were too bland.

The agent pulled out a five dollar bill from her wallet and slid it through the money slot. Once it was accepted, she pressed a few buttons and waited on her two snacks to pop out the bottom. She got the same every morning: a fruit punch Snapple and a bag of gummy bears.

With her helmet, badge, and breakfast in tow, the agent waltzed into the bustling office of the CIA's Counterterrorism Unit. She liked to call it the 'Pit' because of the way it was shaped. Up above was a large walkway circling around the small office cubicles and a center walkway in the middle. There were office and conference rooms on the top for her superiors and the cubicles for her coworkers and herself. Her cubicle was located closer to the entrance right beside the main office. She had the privilege to choose it to remain closer to her boss.

Her boss, as luck might've had it, was none other than Bruno Hawks. The same man that had rescued her from that jungle in Vietnam.

Later that day sixteen years ago, Hawks had talked his superiors into allowing little Dai to stay in the US so she could put her skills to good use (as he'd put it). And they did.

The Army got into contact with the CIA that had helped orchestrate the operation that they had helped take down. The Agency ended up setting up the little Asian girl with a new life and a new name. A few days after her rescue, Dai was then known as Rebecca Ryder. Or Beck, for short.

Hawks was with her every step of the way after getting discharged from the Army and joining forces with the CIA. He was there when they assigned Beck a foster family to continue her training and schooling. He was there when the Agency was choosing which professors would best suit her academic needs. And he was there for her when she turned eighteen and was finally able to be recruited by the CIA where Hawks offered her a job on the spot as field agent for his unit. Now, here she was.

And speaking of the devil, Beck spotted Hawks in his usual tailored suit speaking with someone unknown wearing a casual get-up of jeans and a button-up shirt near the top of the main catwalk standing in front of the Hub, which was the large array of screens that played different pieces of footage from different cases they were all working individually.

As Beck grew closer to her desk, her eyes still focused on the two men, she felt a close presence as she set down her belongings onto her small desk.

"Psych eval," her coworker, Olivia Hopkins, muttered in explanation beside her. Beck glanced at her sidelong from over her shoulder to see she was looking far off where Hawks was talking with the odd man dressed in jeans. Well, technically, she couldn't judge either considering she was dressed in jeans as well, but at least hers weren't faded, blue, and baggy.

Beck popped open her Snapple as she pushed her helmet under her desk with her boot. "Who requested that?" She asked Olivia.

Beside her, Olivia shrugged. "Not a clue. Hawks," she suggested. "Maybe it's got something to do with Saudi."

Beck inwardly groaned. God, she hated that place. Her and a few of her teammates had just gotten back a month ago from Saudi after being in deep cover for almost three months. It was a simple fake death and extraction for some CIA informant one of her coworkers was in charge of though, so she doubted the psych eval was because of that. But, either way, Beck just shrugged. "Maybe," she replied before taking a swig of her Snapple.

"You still drink that crap, Ryder? What are you, four?" Another one of her coworkers, Kruger Spence, scoffed as he walked past the pair of ladies, a cup of coffee in his hand.

Beck scoffed. "Yep, four inches deep with my foot up your ass if you don't watch it," she shot back, Olivia nearly choking on her own coffee beside her. Spence clamped his mouth shut the rest of his walk to his cubicle and Beck grinned in victory. "God, he's a prick. As if a month in Riyadh with him wasn't enough, we come back and still have to put up with him."

Olivia gave her a noncommittal hum as she seemed to hyper focus on the coffee in her cup. Beck took notice but figured it must've just been the nerves from the possibility of a psych eval. Her and Olivia had grown somewhat close since Beck had started. It was an odd sort of relationship Bec would loosely describe as a friendship and more of a 'reluctantly drawn to you because you're young and I feel bad' kind of thing.

It was a known fact amongst the other 22 people in the CT Unit that Beck was the youngest person there, in both the unit and the agency. At first, most of them discredited her due to just how young she was and because of the suspected favoritism between her and Hawks. But over time and after more field missions, it became clear to the unit that desire her age, Rebecca Ryder wasn't someone to be dismissed so easily and she came to prove herself indespensible to the team.

Still, it was hard for her being only 23 in an agency full of full grown adults in their thirties, forties, and fifties. The closest person in age to her was Gina Sanchez who absolutely hated her guts for some unknown reason.

Olivia, however, was somehow drawn to Beck. Beck figured it was just because she was a mother and somehow felt the need to be maternal with her. It was weird, but they kept their boundaries.

Beck took her focus off of Olivia and turned it towards the cap on her Snapple bottle like she did every morning. "Hm. Mosquitoes are attracted to people who have just eaten bananas," she read off the cap.

Olivia gave her coworker an odd look. Beck shrugged. It seemed only she found these little facts to be interesting in this unit. It seemed a lot of the agents in the unit couldn't care less about the little things.

"Can I have your attention please?" Hawks called up from the top of the catwalk. Both Olivia and Beck, as well as the other agents in the Pit, turned their attention to their director as he spoke. "Today we'll be holding one of our psych evals conducted by Agent Gideon of the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico." Hawks gestured to the man in jeans beside him who, from the looks of it, seemed closer to age with Hawks. He also looked oddly familiar to Beck... where did she know him from?

"I'll be calling you in one at a time," Agent Gideon announced. "Starting with..." he took a glance down at the file he held in his hand. "Supervisory Special Agent Olivia Hopkins." His eyes glanced up and quickly landed on the woman beside Beck.

Beck and Olivia shared a knowing glance. "Wish me luck," Olivia muttered bitterly, pausing momentarily to throw her empty coffee cup into the trash can at her feet and making her way towards the catwalk where Gideon and Hawks stood. Beck watched as Agent Gideon led Olivia into the small interrogation room at the top of the Pit.

Beck swallowed hard at the sight of her coworker being taken into the room. The thought of getting her mind picked apart by some stranger made her skin crawl. It wasn't like she had much to hide, but what if the questions about her past came up? Hawks had to have given Agent Gideon files on all of them and surely he looked into how odd hers must've looked.

The thought stuck with her the rest of the day as she continued on with her work. It was somewhat boring. She was assigned with filing her reports and sorting through her logs she kept while in Saudi to be processed and filed away later. Still, even as she did something as moot as filing reports, she found herself so caught up in thinking about the types of questions the psych evalutaion would entail for her. Or maybe she was just blowing it out of proportion.

That was the conclusion she came to during her lunch when she made her way into the break room and noticed she wasn't the only one who seemed to be unnerved by everything.

Standing near the coffee maker, stirring in what looked to be lots of cream with a shaking hand, was another one of her fellow field agents, John Summers. He had been the one in charge of the operation in Saudi. He was a bit of a harass when it came to work, but when the work was finished most of the time, Beck always noticed this lost look in his eyes as if he wasn't sure what to do next. It was like, without a mission or a cause he was completely helpless. It would explain why he busted his ass with every single case that came sliding across his desk. He worked so hard, Beck couldn't remember a day he had a vacation in all of her five years of being with the Unit.

Summers hadn't seemed to notice he was no longer alone in the break room when she walked up beside him and made a grab for one of small sandwiches on the table. His eyes jumped up when he noticed her movements. "Hey," his raspy voice greeted her.

Beck glanced up at him through her bangs that hung over her face. "Hey," she replied. It was always weird talking with Summers. He was always just work, work, work, work. It was like he didn't know how to talk about anything but work. It also made him a bit hard to approach in normal situations, like casual small talk in the break room. "You ready for this psych eval?"

Summers seemed to stiffen at the question. His shoulders squaring as he turned back to the coffee in front of him. "I guess. I mean, it's not like I've got anything to hide," he replied in an almost suggestive voice.

Beck wrote it off as just one of his odd characteristics. "Not a lot of people do. But, still, I doubt it's fun having your psyche picked apart by some stranger," she figured as she took a bite of her sandwich.

Summers shrugged as he walked over to the table where she was and took a seat across from her. "Agent Gideon isn't much of a stranger to me. I've known him for some time. Call him an acquaintance of sorts."

"Must be nice to have some form of relationship with the guy about to pick your brain," she joked.

Summers shrugged nonchalantly. "I suppose." His head bowed as he continued to stir his coffee. Beck found the action odd. He'd been stirring that coffee for some time now but had yet to actually drink it. It was a clear sign he was nervous about something and if it wasn't the psych evaluation then it had to be something.

Beck took the chance she had to ask. "Everything alright?" she prompted. "You seem a little... off."

Summers glanced up at her, his eyes hard and his expression soft as he seemed to consider her for a moment. Beck tilted her head slightly in an unspoken question as to what he was looking for when surveying her. He didn't answer as he bent his head back down to his coffee. "You were right," he eventually responded to her first inquiry. "I am a little nervous about the evaluation." That was bull.

Just then, the break room door opened. Beck didn't bother to turn around to know who it was. "Summers," Hawks spoke from the doorway. "You're up."

Beck watched Summers intently as he nodded up at Hawks from over her shoulder. He stood up from the table, leaving behind his well-stirred coffee and cream as he started towards the door.

"Good luck," Beck dumbly spoke as he passed.

"Hopefully, I won't need it," she heard him mutter in response as he walked away.

Hawks, however, remained in the doorway and decided to walk in after Summers was gone. He must've noticed her reluctance to finish her sandwich when he sat down in the seat beside her. He didn't notice Summers' coffee. "Nervous?" He asked her.

"Nope," she replied, her arm reaching out across the table to grab ahold of the coffee cup Summers had left behind. It felt like a waste to just throw it awa nd something told her he wasn't planning on coming back to drink it himself. She took a quick swig and repressed the urge to gag. "Why would I be?"

Of course, Hawks saw right through her facade. He always did. "You hate coffee," he stated the obvious.

Beck shrugged as she took another drink and repressed yet another gag. "I didn't get a lot of sleep last night," she gave him a lame lie.

Hawks let out a heavy sigh. "Beck," he started, his voice soft yet firm as he spoke. "If this is about Vietnam, you don't have to worry. Gideon already knows."

Beck nearly choked on her third sip of coffee and didn't bother to hide her gag after she swallowed. Her wide eyes found his as she set down the cup and cleared her throat. "You told him?"

"I didn't need to," he replied nonchalantly. When Beck furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, Hawks tilted his head back ever so slightly. "Wait, do you not remember Gideon?"

"He looks oddly familiar. You mind explaining that?" She shot back.

Hawks let a small laugh escape his lips as he smiled. "Becca, Gideon was the one that found you all those years ago. How could you not remember that?"

Beck blinked once, then twice. She was a little bit shocked. Now that she thought about it, she did recognize those forehead creases. Jason Gideon. The same man that had carried her out of the thick jungle brush and gave her that granola bar in the hospital. God, it was such a long time ago she was surprised she even remembered. "Gideon. That's... that's him?"

Hawks nodded. "I'm shocked you didn't immediately recognize him. He hasn't changed too much."

Beck rolled her eyes at him. "Forgive me for not remembering a guy I knew for a few days over a decade and a half ago," she retorted bitterly.

"Gosh, has it really been that long? Just yesterday I could've sworn I was explaining to that short little seven year old which Beatle was which," Hawks chuckled to himself. He shook his head after a moment. "God, I'm getting old."

Beck scoffed. "No argument here."

Hawks rolled his eyes. "You're a real smart ass, ya know that, kid?" Beck shrugged innocently and Hawks could only shake his head in response. He couldn't even get mad at her. The girl didn't get to have a real childhood, who was he to give her hell for acting like an overgrown kid now? "Ya know, Sanchez said she overheard you tell Kruger you were gonna shove your foot up his ass this morning."

Beck tried to suppress her amused snort, but it still managed to escape her lips. When she glanced up at Hawks and noticed the look that said 'not funny' she three her hands up defense. "He was being a prick," she gave her vague reasoning. "And of course Sanchez has an issue with it. She has an issue with everything I do. Maybe she didn't like the joke because she can relate to having something stuck up her ass," she grumbled bitterly as she brought the coffee to her lips again.

Hawks rolled his eyes at her antics. "How am I supposed to explain the twenty-three year old in my unit telling her superiors she's gonna shove her foot up their asses?"

"Put it in my psych eval," Beck shrugged.

Hawks snorted. "God, what am I gonna do with you?"

"Not ship me off to the Middle East for another three months, that's what," she quickly exclaimed, Hawks laughing some more at her antics.

Just then, the break room door opened again. Beck and Hawks peered at who had entered as they quickly sobered up. Gina Sanchez stood tall at the door, her eyes on Beck as she stated, "Agent Gideon's ready for your psych evaluation, Ryder."

"I'll be right there in a second," she replied.

"He wants you now," Sanchez pressed her.

"Alright. I'm going," Beck shot back. Sanchez glared at her one last time before stomping off again. Beck turned back around to face Hawks. "Something's up there, I'm telling you." Hawks snorted again, watching his prodigy down the rest of the coffee with a wince before making her way out of the door.

Beck left the break room and tried not to let her nerves get to her as she walked up the catwalk, past the Hub, and towards the interrogation room. As she stepped inside, she caught sight of Agent Gideon sitting at the end of the table, a file set in front of him and his reading glasses at the tip of his nose as he opened over to read it.

"You ready for me, sir?" Beck called to him.

He didn't look up when he answered, "Yes. You can shut the door behind you, Doctor Ryder."

Beck grimaced awkwardly, shutting the door behind her before slowly making her way towards the table. She took a seat across from him and patiently wasted for him to finish reading what she assumed was her file. After all, he did call her 'Doctor'. No one called her 'Doctor', not even Hawks.

After what felt like eons of sitting in awkward silence, Gideon eventually spoke. "You've made quite a name for yourself, Doctor Ryder," he stated, his eyes not leaving the file in front of him. "Last time I saw you, you were getting ready to be processed with the Agency at only seven years old." There it was.

Slowly, Gideon glanced up at her over the edge of his glasses, a smile forming on his lips. "Do you remember who I am?"

Beck returned the smile and nodded. "I do, sir," she replied. "It's good to see you again."

"It's good to see you too, Dai. Although, I've noticed you now go by Rebecca," he exclaimed, his hands gesturing to the file in the table.

"Actually, no one really calls me that, except for my mom when she chews me out," she explained.

"Ah, yes. You were with a foster family in Texas after we left you," he read from off the file. "General Phillip Ryder, his wife Elizabeth, and their three children: Jacob, Alice, and little Max. A normal American family living on Randolph Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas."

Beck nodded. "Yup. Jacob just got married to his wife, Colleen, and Max just turned three," she supplied.

She had grown up with a family, yes, but it wasn't exactly normal. Apparently, she wasn't the first child soldier to have been brought back to the States, so there was a bit of a foster system in place already. All military families of course. And in this case, General Ryder was happy to take in little Beck.

Jacob, her older brother she'd been raised with, was thirteen at the time and wasn't exactly accustomed to dealing with damaged little Asian girls who could barely speak English. Still, he managed to be the best big brother she could ask for. He played with her, babysat her while their parents were at work, and even helped her with her English homework. That was about all the homework he could help her with because while he was learning about the Pythagorean Theorem in 8th grade math, Beck was being taught about the socioeconomic impact of systemic racism in the Western world at the age of twelve.

That was where their childhood differed.

Beck was never a normal kid. From the moment she was placed in that foster home, her mom, dad, and brother had tried to help her feel as normal as possible. But with privatized tutors, teachers, professors, and trainers, preparing her for a life of war, she was far from normal.

"I see here you've got quite a lot of education under your belt despite no prior record of ever attending school, neither privatized or public," Gideon noted on her file.

"I had private tutors from different universities," she explained. "I was told I had photographic memory that allowed me to excel in academics."

"Your file doesn't mention that," Gideon seemed to chastise the paper in front of him with a frown. "Then again, it also doesn't mention your origins."

Beck shrugged. "Hawks made sure to keep it off the records," she stated.

"He's looked out for you, hasn't he?" It wasn't exactly a question for her, more like a query for himself to ponder. "He got you this job here? Gave you this life?"

"I'm grateful for everything he's done for me," she stated firmly.

Gideon pondered her words as he slowly closed the file. "This is what you wanted, right?" He asked as he carefully took of his glasses and glanced over at her, carefully gagging her reactions and answers. "This is the future you wanted for yourself after we rescued you in Vietnam?" This was the psych eval.

"I couldn't imagine myself doing anything else," Beck answered truthfully.

"All you've ever known is death and war," Gideon remarked. "You don't ever want to just be... normal?"

Beck shrugged. "It's normal to me." Gideon sighed heavily at her answer. She wondered if maybe he was disappointed in her answer.

Gideon clasped his hands together in front of him on the table and leaned forward. "So, tell me about your latest field operation."

"It was three months in the hot Saudi desert in deep cover. I was accompanied by three other agents; Supervisory Special Agent Olivia Hopkins, Supervisory Special Agent John Summers, and Assistant Director of Operations Kruger Spence. Director Hawks and Associate Director Sanchez were both on surveillance, monitoring us carefully while there," she explained, her voice monotone as she reported what happened just like she did on paper. Firm and clear.

"What was the purpose of the mission?"

"It was an extraction," she answered. "Agent Summers had been working on the Saudi case for over a year. There have been several organizations in the Middle East that were being funded by a Saudi diplomat, Hassan Nadir. We'd been having trouble cracking down on these organizations due to just how well they were staying off the radar. But, somehow, Summers had managed to turn Nadir's wife against him after finding out she had been... assaulted by him on multiple occasions. She'd become our informant in exchange that we get her and her children out safely from Saudi."

"And that's why you were you there, to help your teammate with his assignment?"

Beck nodded. "But it wasn't just his assignment. It was going to help the unit as a whole getting the information Aaliyah Nadir was willing to give to us. It was all of our mission really and I was glad to help."

"How did you help, Rebecca?"

"Well, my job as a field agent is really just to do as I'm told. I'm not exactly leader material just yet, so I followed my orders."

"Which were?"

"To carefully get Mrs. Nadir and her children to safety by faking their death, which would allow Summers to successfully smuggle them out of the country without anyone noticing."

"Is that a regular thing here?" Gideon prompted. "Faking the death of a family?"

Beck let out a heavy sigh. "Sometimes. Other times, it's eliminating an entire family for the safety of a country."

"Have you done that before, Rebecca?" Gideon asked her. "Have you killed a family?"

Beck paused momentarily before answering, "Yes."

"It can't be easy– killing."

Beck shook her head. "It's not," she told him truthfully. "But... Orders are orders."

"Do you ever feel as though you should be questioning these orders? I mean, how could killing a family really be apart of the greater good of a country?" Gideon prompted her.

The agent took a deep breath. "Orders can be questionable at times, but I trust my superiors to have the best motives and reasoning behind why they have me do what I do. I know that if my team needs me to do something, it's for a purpose."

"Hm," Gideon hummed as he considered her answers. Beck watched as he leaned back again. He grabbed his reading glasses once more and pulled up the file he'd been reading earlier. He had a pen in his hand as he began to write something down. It was a few moments of awkwardly sitting and waiting for his next question to come when he eventually spoke again. "You can go now, Rebecca."

Beck nodded stiffly before standing from her seat and walking out. By the time she was out of the door, she had began to notice her fists were clenched at her sides. When she began to relax them, she felt just how clammy and sweaty they were.

That psych evaluation had been no joke. Suddenly she felt like barfing for no reason whatsoever. It was crazy just how simple as a few deep questions could get to her. But, she did the right thing by answering truthfully, right?

A few hours later, Beck found herself finishing up her last report of the day. Gideon had finished everyone's psych evals and had gone to talk to Hawks in his office for a fee minutes. When he came out eventually, he had nodded towards Beck as he left. She gave him a small back and questioned what he made of her after the evaluation. Did she pass? How does one pass an evaluation?

It wasn't long after Gideon left that Hawks called Sanchez into his office. Beck paid no mind to it and kept at her work, her earphones plugged into her phone and her heel clicking against the ground to the best of Fleetwood Mac. It was nearing the end of The Chain when the loud sound of a door slamming grabbed her attention.

Beck, along with a few other agents, glanced up to see Sanchez storming out of Hawks' office. She was moving with purpose and, boy, did she look pissed as she made her way to her desk, grabbed her belongings and left the Pit. Beck furrowed her eyebrows wondering what the hell that was about. Maybe she didn't pass the psych eval.

"Beck."

Beck turned at the sound of her name being called. She looked up to see Hawks calling for her from the doorway of his office. Shit...

This was it, she thought to herself as she walked over. This was where he told her she had failed her psych eval and was getting reassigned to the Narcotics Unit. God, nothing was more boring than tracking cocaine in Miami. Please, don't let her go tracking cocaine in Miami, she silently begged as she made her way into Hawk's office, flinching when he shut the door behind her.

"Take a seat," he gestured to the chair in front of his desk as he himself sat down across from her. She did as she was asked. "Beck-"

"Please don't send me to Narcotics," she blurted out before he got the chance to finish what he was going to say.

Hawks frowned at her outburst. "What?"

"I don't know what Gideon told you about my evaluation and whether or not I passed, but please, don't reassign me to Narcotics. Anywhere but Narcotics," she pleaded with him.

"What? Becca, I'm not reassigning you," Hawks explained. "I'm promoting you."

Beck blinked in surprise. "You're... what?"

Hawks nodded. "Agent Gideon gave me his evaluation of you and I've decided to promote you to my Associate Director of Operations based on his judgement."

Becky's mouth hung ever do slightly as she processed what he was saying. "Associate... Director of Operations– wait, isn't that Sanchez's position?"

Hawks let out a heavy sigh at her inquisition. "Sanchez's evaluation was less than appealing for someone who's to be in charge of field operations. She's been demoted to strictly Surveillance until further notice. You're to be taking her position."

"I'm... Sir-"

"No need to thank me now, Becca, you've earned it," he told her with a beaming smile. "So, go home, pop open some champagne, and celebrate. You start your new job as Associate Director tomorrow. I expect you here bright and early."

"I-Uh..." she stammered with her words for a moment before swallowing her previous protests and dozens of questions. "Yes, sir." Stiffly, Beck stood from her seat and walked out of the office, shook to her core about her new promotion and what it all entailed. On one hand, she was glad she passed her psych eval, on the other she was completely shell-shocked on this new promotion. She just went from the youngest agent in the agency to the youngest senior officer ever. Was she even ready for this kind of responsibility and leadership?

Beck tried not to let it tear her apart on her way back to her apartment. That night, she went home, took a hot shower, ate some take-out, and tried to get some sleep knowing that in the next few days, things were gonna change.

She just would've never imagined them to change so soon.

Then three days later, she got the call.

—

Beck sped to Langley on her bike. Her earphones discarded in her back pocket. There didn't need to be upbeat music at a time like this.

She pulled into her parking space, jumped off her bike, and sped through security, not bothering to even acknowledge Trudeau today as she snatched back her belongings from him and speed walked to the elevator.

She passed by the vending machine today. It was 3 am and she had no appetite, not tonight.

It was always busy in the Pit when she came to work, but tonight... Tonight it was crazy.

The Counterterrorism Unit was scrambling when Beck walked through the Pit doors. There were agents clicking away on the computers at their cubicles, agents running around searching for paper files, and agents on the phone shouting into receivers for more information.

But through all the chaos, Beck went straight for the main office door up top only to find the office to be empty. She walked over to the edge of the catwalk and called down to Olivia who was behind her computer screen, typing away. "Olivia," she called out. The agent snapped her head up at the sound of her name being called. "Where's Hawks?"

Olivia shook her head. "He got called away."

"Now?!" Beck called out exasperatedly. Of all the times to get called away. It was like everything was going to shit tonight and it all started with a call that woke her up at 2 am telling her that John Summers was dead, Aaliyah Nadir and her children were in the wind, and Hassan Nadir was in the States looking for them which only meant one thing: there was an inside informant working with the terrorist funder.

Beck gripped the railing of the catwalk tightly at the thought of it. A mole within the unit. It could've been anyone. But why? Who would do it? Who would risk everything? What was in it for them?

And, God, Summers. Shit... It was insane to think a man she'd been working with for over five years was suddenly dead. And not just dead, found slaughtered in his own home. Officially, he'd committed suicide. But she knew Hawks had had Sanchez go and clean up the mess that was left after someone had brutally tortured Summers.

Tortured.

Beck was gonna be sick.

"Hey," Beck turned her head to see Spence making his way down the catwalk towards her. "You alright, Ryder?" She could practically see his eagerness to discredit her newly earned authority as Associate Director just because she was getting a bit sick with all of this shit going on, and she wasn't about to let him beat her down. She could handle this. It was her job.

"Just tell me when Hawks is back and stay the hell out of my way," she snapped at him as she walked past. Her fists were clenched and her jaw set as she was determined to find out who the hell was behind all this.

Beck made her way down into the pit towards where her surveillance team was waiting near their Hub. "Califax," she called to one of the agents at her computer. "Pull up the surveillance footage outside of Summers' apartment," she ordered.

"Yes, ma'am," Califax replied as she leaned closer to her computer and projected four different video feeds set up outside of John's apartment. One angle was the parking lot just outside, another was one of the entrance of his apartment complex, one was the street around the corner, and the last one was of the balcony area. It all seemed to be quiet. Minimal movement, nothing suspicious. Which just made her even more suspicious. This was someone skilled enough to not leave a trace and who knew where these cameras were... Someone who had access to surveillance.

Beck felt the tingle in her spine that told her she was being watched and slowly turned to her right. Up above on the catwalk was Sanchez. She had a handful of files in her hand, her eyes glued to them, but Beck knew she had been looking at her moments ago. Could she be the informant? She had the motive to after her position was taken from her. But how could she have had the time in three days after being demoted to get in touch with Nadir to plan all of this?

Beck groaned as she turned back to the screens in front of her. None of this was making any sense.

"Look, it's them..."

Beck glanced away from the screens for a moment when she began to hear whispers around her. It seemed as though the bustling and chaos stopped for a moment as something in the room shifted from tense to intense. She had begun to notice all the looks people were shooting in the direction of the entrance behind her. She followed their gaze and when she turned to see what they were all looking at, she was surprised to see a group of people she'd never seen before walking in, led by Agent Gideon.

"Who's that?" She asked out loud to no one in particular.

"Those are the people here to investigate us," Adams, another surveillance agent, explained to her from behind his desk, his eyes glued to the team just like everyone else's. "They're from the Bureau."

"Quantico?" Califax gasped from beside him. "Didn't Hawks say that Agent Gideon guy was apart of some unit at Quantico? The, uh... Behavior Unit?"

Beck drowned out the gossip as she studied the team walking in behind Gideon. The first one behind him was a tall man in a well-tailored suit. He had jet black hair similar to her own and bags beneath his eyes that told her he didn't sleep much. He carried himself differently than the rest of the people there, similar to Gideon, but a bit more professional. He must've been their Unit Chief.

After him was a much more muscular man. He was darker, had little hair on his round head, but a goatee on his face. He wore a muscle tee and had his holstered gun on display on his belt. He was the muscle of the team, she could tell.

Beside him was a more petite woman. She was brunette and from the way she was looking out at the sea of people around her, she was clearly a bit weary and overwhelmed and trying not to show it beneath her perpetual bitch face. She reminded Beck of Sanchez with the way she walked and ultimately dressed. Great, she thought to herself, there's two of them.

And finally, at the end of the line of FBI Agents, was someone she wasn't sure how to read. It was a man, but he wasn't exactly what one would consider when talking about the FBI. He was tall, lanky, and had long hair gelled back. He was wearing baggy clothes and looked like more of a college student rather than an Agent of the Bureau. Beck found herself wondering who let this kid pass the fitness test with how small he was. She wasn't tall by any means either and he probably trumped her by a foot and a half at least, but even she had to admit he was skinny as hell. Plus, he brandished his gun at an odd angle at the front of his hip where anyone could see and take easily... Maybe he was just the brains of the operation.

Still, as they walked and Beck watched them come directly down the aisle of the Pit towards her and the rest of Surveillance.

"Hey, Gideon," the familiar voice of Hawks caught Beck's attention. She hadn't even noticed him coming in and here he was walking out of his office to greet Gideon and his team.

Beck watched as their Unit Chief stepped forward and shook hands with her Director. "Special Agent Hotchner," he greeted him.

"Oh, I know who you are and your team, too," Hawks replied before letting go of his hand. "I've got the personnel files all set up for you guys. Video, whatnot. It's all there in the conference room. If you have any questions feel free to ask one of my senior officers."

Beck inwardly cringed when Hawks turned towards her, the team's eyes following in suit as they studied her like she had them upon arrival.

"This is Rebecca Ryder," Hawks introduced her. "She's the Associate Director of Field Operations." Gideon seemed to raise his eyebrows at the new title she'd gained in the three days since she'd seen him. Beck could only grimace in response. "And this is her second in command, Agent Gina Sanchez." Beck peered over her shoulder to find Sanchez close beside her instead of up on the catwalk where she'd been earlier. She seemed to grow even more pissed at being introduced as Beck's second in command.

"Hi," she greeted them all bitterly before turning to Beck. "Califax said you'd want to take a look at these," she stated as she shoved the files she'd been looking at earlier into her hands.

Beck took them, she could see Hawks continuing to give the FBI Agents the rest of the short tour of the unit out of the corner of her eye. "Thanks," she replied in a monotone voice.

"And don't think just because I'm you're new 'second-in-command' that I'll be getting you anything else," Sanchez snapped at her once the team and Hawks were out of arson and in the back conference room setting up their investigation. "You don't deserve this title and I'm going to enjoy watching you crash and burn under this kind of pressure, kid."

Beck had been biting her tongue when it came to confrontation with Sanchez. With Spruce, it was fun to snap back at him with retorts because she knew he'd take it in stride and not hate her at the end of the day. But Sanchez has hated her from day one and made it clear that if given the chance, she'd do to her what she did to John Summers and make it look like an accident. Well, she wasn't going to have it anymore. Especially if there was a good chance she was the mole. She wasn't going to bite her tongue anymore.

"Alright, Sanchez, look," Beck stated firmly as she slapped the files down onto the desk beside her. "I couldn't give a shit less whether or not you've got some kind of vendetta against me because you couldn't pull your shit together to pass something as simple as a psych eval. But right now, I'm gonna need you to stow your crap because our coworker is dead. Summers is dead-"

"You think I don't know that?" She snapped back. "I'm the one who had to pull the trigger and shoot through the head of his corpse!"

"Then you should know better than anyone here that this isn't a fucking joke," Beck lowered her voice as she spoke. "You can hate me all you want, but don't ever question my ability to do my job, especially when there are lives on the line. John Summers died to keep Aaliyah Nadir and her family safe. I'm not about to let either of them die in vain because you're too busy acting like a God damn child." And with that, Beck grabbed the files off the desk and pushed past Sanchez to get to the break room around the corner, leaving her second in command to stand in the middle of the Pit alone to process her words.

Beck meant each and every one of them, too. She had a job to do, people to save, and a mole to find. She wasn't going to let a stupid little grudge and a few FBI agents distract her.

As Beck made her way into the break room, she made sure to lock the door behind her. It might've looked suspicious, but she just needed her space away from all the chaos and she wasn't trying to hide anything, she herself knew that.

Frustrated and exhausted, Beck threw down the files onto the table and ran her hands down her face. Her eyes opened and fell onto the coffee maker, the pot only having less than half of the coffee made earlier left inside. Beck hated the shit, but she needed to stay alert and awake rig now through all of this madness.

She walked over to the pot and poured herself some coffee into a cup. After it was full, she reached over for the cream and poured in a decent amount until the dark brown coffee turned into a light brown. She took a small black straw and stirred it well. As she stirred, she couldn't help but think back on the way Summers had over-stirred his coffee anxiously waiting for his psych eval. She wondered if he knew he was going to die, if he knew he was in danger, if he knew there was a mole. She remembered he wasn't afraid of the psych eval, that was for sure. Was he afraid of what it entailed?

Beck looked up from her coffee as the thought crossed her mind: had John Summers called for his own unit's psych eval? If so, why?

Beck grabbed her cup of coffee and took a seat at the table, pulling the files in front of her. Had he known? Had Summers known about the mole? If so, how?

Beck flipped through the file and realized just how recent it was created. It was file on Summers. His psych eval from Gideon was near the back. Gideon's scribbled writing was a bit hard to translate, but she managed. She made out words like 'determined', 'hard-working', and 'Obsessive Compulsive Disorder'. She kept reading. 'Post Traumatic Stress Disorder', 'threw himself into his work', 'performs well under pressure', 'quick thinker who planned everything down to the last detail', and finally, 'closed off to hide his overcompensation from losing people in his life.' Beck frowned. Who knew just how much someone could be picked apart from a few questions and half an hour.

So now she knew who John Summers was. All she had to figure out was where Aaliyah Nadir was hidden and who the mole was.

John Summers planned everything down to the last detail. If, theoretically, Summers had called for the Unit's psych eval early on, why? He had to have had good reasoning. What had happened recently that made him suspect his own team?

Nadir.

Hassan Nadir had come to the States recently. She remembered hearing Summers get pissed about it the day before the evaluations. Hassan had come to the States and it wasn't hard to piece together why: he knew his wife and children were here. And, of course, no one could've known about the Saudi operation except for... Oh, God...

—

"Bruno Hawks, Gina Sanchez, Olivia Hopkins, Kruger Spence, and Rebecca Ryder," Gideon listed off the name of possible suspects.

Only five people could've been the mole as determined by Gideon and his team because only five people knew about the Saudi operation. His chest tightened at the thought of Rebecca Ryder being a suspect, but there were aspects to her that fit the profile. Big aspects.

"Five for five," the team's technical analyst, Penelope Garcia, confirmed from her place projected on the screen at the end of the conference room.

Gideon frowned. "See what else is on the tape," he requested. He vaguely heard her click out from the screen with a mere 'alright'.

Gideon leaned down against the table beside him, his brain working at a million miles a minute. It could've been one of the five people working closely with Summers... He chose them to help him with this operation to begin with... Why?

"John Summers would have only trusted seasoned agents... of which in this unit there are only five," he spoke his thoughts aloud for the team to listen in.

From across the table, Agent Elle Greenaway spoke up. "So, he guessed that the mole had to have been one of his five bosses."

"Actually, Ryder wasn't his boss at the time," Gideon remarked. "She's just recently been promoted, but before they were equals." The team cast odd looks to one another, wondering as to what their teammate was getting at by mentioning that fact. Agent Hotchner, down the way, could practically see the fears turning in his head as he considered that fact about Agent Ryder.

Standing beside him, Agent Derek Morgan put in his two cents trying to piece together the puzzle of the mole in the Counterterrorism Unit. "Before he officially extracted Aaliyah he wanted to know which one not to ask," he concluded. "Could Ryder being his equal have anything to do with his request to have her be evaluated?"

Gideon's frown deepened. No. He'd evaluated Ryder himself. Nothing about her screamed treason, if anything all she perturbed was the desperate need to belong to something. And in her case, she wanted to belong to an agency like the CIA. She wanted to feel secure. She wouldn't go against that for anything... But still... He couldn't rule anyone out...

"Gideon?" Hotch calling his name broke him out of his inner turmoil with himself. He hadn't realized he'd been standing there so quietly until then.

"We need to match up with them, one-on-one," Gideon eventually broke out of his head and began to sort out the seperate files of their five suspects.

He handed the first file to the team's resident genius, Dr. Spencer Reid, who carefully slid it in front of himself so he could speed-read through it. "Kruger Spence." Gideon figured Reid would have no problem trying to work with someone so close in intelligence as himself. Granted, they were on a different spectrum of intelligence, but Reid knew his way around that. He was a genius after all.

"Assistant Director of Operations. Recruited at the age of 18 after graduating from M.I.T.," Gideon recalled from already havi gone over his file before his psych eval only a few days ago.

Reid picked up where he left off on his file. "It says here he had six years experience as a weapons systems designer and an IQ of 197. He butted up against the system and didn't deal with authority, and they moved him into field operations in China for eight years before transferring him here."

Gideon knew Reid was coming up with the same conclusion that he was. He had probable cause to betray his unit and country and clearly had issues with his authority enough to go against it. But, still, no hard proof as to why a weapons system designer would be interested in aligning with a terrorist funder.

Next up, Greenaway started reading the file Gideon has handed to her.

"Olivia Hopkins," she read aloud. "Divorced mother of two. She spent nine years in field operations in Europe. She also visited Riyadh with Kruger and Rebecca." Gideon saw the sidelong glance Greenaway gave him at the mention of the girl he seemed to fixate himself on. He didn't react, only continued to stare out the glass windows of the conference room overlooking the unit. He couldn't find where Rebecca was, but he still kept an open ear to pay attention to the files.

The next one up was Morgan.

"I've got Gina Sanchez," he stated as he picked up the file in his hands. "West Point graduate. Black belt in two martial arts. Served in Iraq doing psychological operations with military intelligence. She joined the CIA five years ago. Speaks three languages, including Arabic." Morgan signed before continuing. "She's also formerly known as the Associate Director of Operations after she got demoted due to a psych eval." All eyes fell back to Gideon once more.

He signed. Another candidate with probable cause to commit treason. When Gideon first evaluated her, he could tell she too had issues with authority. Not because she didn't trust them, but because she was so self-assured of herself she believed she could do better. Her getting demoted probably didn't help her mindset too much either.

Hotch picked up his file next. "Bruno Hawks," he read. "Deputy Director of Operations. Extensive field ops in the Middle East, South Asia, and Europe. Did his military service with Jason Gideon." Gideon felt eyes on him once more as he turned his attention away from the window and glanced down at the file in front of him on the table.

"Rebecca Ryder," he read the name on the Manila folder. "Newly promoted Associate Director of Operations. Adopted by US Army General Phillip Ryder and provided a private education by the US government as apart of a prodigy program. Highly trained in over eight forms of martial arts. Speaks ten languages. A proficient weapons specialist. And is the youngest agent in the unit after being recruited at the age of eighteen and has been apart of field operations in the Middle East, South Asia, Europe, Northern Africa, and South America."

The room was silent as Gideon peered down at the photo on the file staring back at him of a young girl with bright eyes and a dream of helping people with her knowledge of death and destruction. She couldn't have done this, he felt it in what remained of his soul. But... even he knew he was biased and had to reply find out for himself, that's why he took special interest in her. Because to anyone on the team, from a distance, Rebecca Ryder looked like the prime suspect as the mole. She had the sources, the experience, the skills, the brains, and the power to do so. But, Gideon knew this girl. She had no incentive, no purpose.

"I know that if my team needs me to do something, it's for a purpose." Those were her words. That's what she'd said to him. That she had her purpose, that her loyalty and trust was here with this agency. She worked her whole life towards this job and this sense of security after what had happened to her as a child. Gideon had to know for certain that she didn't do this...

When he broke his gaze away from Rebecca's picture, he saw his team's eyes on him. Waiting for his orders on what to do next. He followed through with advice.

"One thing I've learned over the years profiling CIA agents: spies are some of the smartest liars in the world," he stated. He glanced out across the tale towards his team. Each of them had their own knowledge, their own way of problem solving. They never failed to astound and impress him with just how much they could accomplish together and individually. "Be smarter."

—

She was a suspect.

It stuck with her in her core as the thought processed within her head. She was a suspect. She was a suspect for the murder of her teammate John Summers. She was a suspect for being a traitor working with a terrorist and abuser... God...

Beck stood from her seat at the table and took a step away from the files.

"Jesus," she let out an exasperated breath as she pushed her hair out of her face, her fingers running through the straight locks and grabbing hold of it to pull. This was insane. This was madness. This was... too much. God, Sanchez was right, she was gonna crash and burn under all this pressure- NO!

No! She was not about to let bitchy Gina Sanchez get to her. Not right now. Not ever. This wasn't about their little dispute. This was about catching a killer, a terrorist, and a traitor.

Beck grabbed hold of the coffee cup on the table and took a swig. It tasted like shit, but she downed it nonetheless. For Summers. "Come on," she heaved, tossing the empty cup in the trash beside her, her hands lying flat on either side of the file on the table in front of her. "You can do this. Pull it together, Beck... This isn't about proving your innocence. You've got nothing to hide. Just keep your head down and do your fucking job."

The sound of the break room door being opened caused Beck to stand up straight, her hand quickly coming up to shut the file on Summers closed out of habit. When she spun around to face the door, she was surprised to find Gideon stepping through, a key in his hand still stuck in the lock he'd just opened. Beck suppressed the urge to groan when she remembered she'd locked that... Yeah, like that didn't scream 'suspicious'.

"Sorry," she apologized half-heartedly. "I just needed my own space away from all the chaos..." It wasn't a lie. She didn't need to lie. She had nothing to hide.

Gideon gave her a reassuring smile in return. There were no teeth, but his skin still crinkled at the corner of his eyes. He was trying to come off as approachable, but even he knew they both too on edge for this to be comfortable in the slightest. "It must be stressful for you. Your new promotion and now all of this..." He gestured to the madness occurring outside the break room.

Beck nodded. "Yeah, this is..." she scoffed and shook her head. "'Stressful' is one word to use, I guess."

Gideon frowned at her clear dismay. "You know, most people that work their whole lives towards a job would be pretty excited to get promoted the way you did..." He exclaimed in a highly suggestive tone that made Beck's skin crawl slightly. "You didn't want that promotion Hawks gave you, though. Did you?" This was just like the psych eval, only this time both of them were aware what he was fishing for in that brain of hers: proof. Whether it was towards her innocence or guilt, she wasn't sure yet.

The agent new she couldn't lie. Why should she? It would get here nowhere in the end.

Beck pursed her lips before reluctantly admitting the truth, "No."

"So, why'd you take it?" He prompted her, his voice going up an octave indicating his blatant confusion in regards to her actions.

She huffed as she turned and began to pull all the files into a neat stack on the table, trying not to look at him as she responded, "I don't know, okay? Hawks, he's... he's given me everything. A home, a family, an education, training, this job! Everything! And now this promotion, it's just..." Beck let it a heavy sigh as she spun back around to face Gideon. "I didn't ask for it. I didn't even want it. I was good at what I did. I was fine with where I was at. And then this happened and it's just..." She paused for a moment to catch her breath before continuing again. "I feel like I've been set up for failure because deep down even Hawks knew I wasn't ready for this kind of responsibility."

Gideon let her words and explanation process for a moment. They stood in silence, her confessions lingering in the tense air of the break room before Gideon broke it with a simple question, "So, then why'd he promote you?"

"I don't know!" She snapped at him. "I don't know, okay? But I do know I have a job to do." With that, the short young woman grabbed the Summers file and started towards the break room door.

She was almost there when Gideon abruptly grabbed her arm, halting her in her tracks. Out of habit, Beck used her free hand to grab his wrist and rip it off of her arm. They stood there, frozen in time, his wrist being gripped tightly in her small hand in between their faces. She was glaring daggers at him and Gideon only stared down at her as if she was missing the most obvious of things.

"Something's not right here and you know it, Rebecca," Gideon told her.

"Is everything alright in here?"

Beck quickly dropped Gideon's hand as they both turned towards the familiar voice of Bruno Hawks who was, sure enough, standing in the break room doorway. "Everything's fine. We were just talking," Beck lied through her teeth. She saw something flash in Hawks' eyes. Something she could've only described as fear in that moment. But, she didn't have much time to unpack it when the sound of Spence out in the Pit got their attention.

"That's enough!"

Oh, shit. Something was happening out there.

All at once, Gideon and Hawks quickly left the break room to see what was happening, Beck hot on their tails. When she walked in, she immediately saw what was going on. In the middle of the Pit was Olivia standing face to face with the female FBI Agent. Olivia had a frown on her face and looked about ready to drop-kick Sanchez Jr. in front of took a lot to really piss of Olivia, so whatever that agent must've said really struck a chord with her. Spence too, by the way he was intervening.

"This is in violation of her civil rights," he angrily stated as he walked towards them from down the Pit aisle.

Hawks was already approaching to try and diffuse the situation. "Until they find the Sleeper, and we find Aaliyah, all rights are revoked," he stated firmly.

The statement made Beck shift uncomfortably. She felt as though she was being watched. Sure enough, when she glanced over her shoulder from off the steps of the break room, she could see that kid from the Bureau staring at her, studying her. He must've seen how unnerved she looked. She hated looking this vulnerable and was quick to set her jaw and swiftly turn back to the scene playing out in front of them, hoping Revolver boy would do the same and stop looking at her from afar.

"Where were you on the night that Summers was murdered?" The lady agent prompted Olivia, ignoring Spence's protests from before.

Olivia pursed her lips. There was something she was hiding, Beck could tell. Olivia was laid back at times. If someone came at her the way this agent was, she would've but back just as quick like she did all the times Spence would hit a nerve with her for those months they were staying together in Saudi. But, right now, she was completely silent. Everyone was.

Until Spence spoke from beside her.

"I was with her... in her apartment," he admit, a guilty expression on his face. Beck fought the urge to let her jaw drop to the floor at the realization that her teammates were hiding a lot more than they let on. An affair for one.

"Well, you're a married man," Gideon remarked from where he stood a few yards away. "At some point you must've left to get back to your wife, right?" Spence clamped his mouth shut. He turned to glance at Hawks, a thousand apologies written in his expression as he shook his head in remorse. Gideon then turned his attention to Olivia who was still standing silent before the lady agent who'd begun to back off. "You wake to an empty bed?" He asked her.

Beck noticed her lip quivering as she answered, "...yes. I did." Her voice broke as she spoke. But just as soon as her vulnerability showed, she was back to being the defensive Olivia recognized when she turned back to the lady agent in front of her and asked, "Are we done here?"

No one answered her, but Spence was quick to interject. "My wife will testify that I arrived home at 1:30 AM."

Beck rolled her eyes, Hawks speaking the exact thought that crossed her mind. "We all know none of this will ever reach a court," the underlying threat in his words hung in the thick air.

"Look, if you wanna arrest us for having an affair, be my guest," Spence told the FBI agents in front of them, his arms out in surrender. Beck rolled her eyes. God, he was a prick. Olivia deserved better and now he was dragging them both down with his fat mouth. She couldn't deal with this anymore.

As Hawks dismissed the group that had come to form around the middle of the Pit to get back to work, Beck pushed through to get back to the Surveillance Hub. As she was walking, she passed by the Revolver kid, his eyes still following her every move. "Enjoying the show?" She muttered bitterly as she swiftly passed him to get to the computers behind him where the rest of her people were waiting.

Alright, back to work. No more drama and turmoil. She needed to find where Summers hid Aaliyah Nadir before she was killed. Now, what did she know about Summers?

He was a control freak when it came to work. He planned everything down to the detail. He didn't just hide Aaliyah and her family anywhere, he hid her in a specific location for a specific reason. But where, and why?

"Adams," Beck called her agent to attention. "Can you pull up any and all uninhabited buildings? House for sale, buildings under construction, abandoned stores and warehouses, apartments not under lease," she listed off.

"Yes, ma'am." Adams began to type away at his computer screen at the speed of light. His fingers moving quick against the keyboard as he began to get the date she requested. Eventually, he hit the final button and a map of the area appeared with thousands of little red dots appeared on screen. All possible locations that Summer had stashed Aaliyah.

"Uh, can you narrow down that search to a five mile radius near John Summers' apartment building?" A new voice chimed in from beside Beck causing her to stiffen.

Adams glanced up momentarily, Beck turning as well to see the Revolver kid standing beside her, his eyes scanning the screen above them. He turned and glanced down at her, he grimaced as if asking for permission to continue what he had been trying to add. And for some odd reason, she felt compelled to accept his help.

Beck turned to Adams. "Do it."

Adams did as he was told and a few moments later, thousands of red dots was narrowed down to only a couple dozen within a five mile radius.

Beck nervously crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes scanning each dot for any kind of pattern or indication that Summers had any reason to hide Aaliyah and the children there. "It narrowed it down, but not much," she muttered mostly to herself, but loud enough for the Revolver kid to hear. "Summers was crazy about this case. He'd been working on it for a year. He isn't going to hide a woman he promised safety just anywhere..."

"No, he wouldn't..." the kid agreed in tandem, his eyes glued to the screen like hers. "Was there any place in particular Summers would talk about visiting near his apartment? A favorite park? A movie theatre? Restaurant? Store? Fishing spot?"

"I don't know," she answered truthfully. "He didn't talk about his personal life while here. No one did, really... We didn't really talk much to begin with, but when we did it always about work. It was like he knew nothing else."

"So, it wouldn't be somewhere personal to him," Revolver Kid deduced. "He'd have to have a logical reasoning as to why he would hide them there."

Beck paused momentarily before turning to Adams. "Eliminate all houses and apartments in the search," she ordered. Adams obliged and with a few clicks, half of the red dots on the screen disappeared leaving about two dozen left on screen. "Summers wasn't looking to keep them in this hiding place for long, he was planning on going back to them before he was captured."

"He would be hiding them in a temporary place. Somewhere no one would immediately think to look," Revolver Kid finished her thoughts in a rushed jumble of words. Beck turned to him and nodded.

They were on the same page. It was an odd feeling, matching a sort of fast, quick-banter, idea bouncing with someone. In all her years with CTU, it never felt natural the way it had just been right now with this Bureau kid. Maybe it was because there was just so many secrets they were all hiding.

Abruptly, Revolver Kid held out his hand between them. "Dr. Spencer Reid of the Behavioral Analysis Unit," he introduced himself.

Beck glanced down at his hand and took it in her own– well, more like put her tiny palm in his very large hand for him to shake. "Agent Beck Ryder of the Counterterrorism Unit," she introduced herself.

Dr. Reid furrowed his eyebrows. "Beck?"

"Short for Rebecca," she explained as he released her hand from his.

"No, I know that. It's just, most women who have their traditionally feminine name shortened to a unisex nickname, usually do so reluctantly after years of having the name being used by a male figure in their life," Dr. Reid explained in a vast expanse of breath in a short period of time that made Beck blink in surprise at just how much information someone could fit in a single sentence. "Your file said you were adopted, but spent most of your life busy in this training program that kept you away from home. I was just curious as to why you use 'Beck' instead of 'Becca'."

"Preference," Beck shrugged. "Plus, it's better than 'Reba.'" Dr. Reid tilted his head in curiosity at her answer. He opened his mouth to ask another question when all the screens on the Hub suddenly fritzed. "What the hell is this?" Beck demanded of her team.

"I-I don't know," Adams stammered as he began to panic-type on his keyboard. "The system just randomly crashed."

"Can you find the source?"

"No. I'm trying," Califax exclaimed from beside Adams.

"Try harder!" Beck snapped.

After a few moments of quick typing and mouse-clicks, the screens came back online.

"Figure out what the hell happened," Beck ordered her team. "I wanna know where that came from and who set that on our systems."

"Yes, ma'am," both Califax and Adams replied in unison as they quickly got to typing.

Beck, tuckered out from that momentary set-back, turned back to Dr. Reid who was glancing up at the screens, a frown on his lips as he tried to piece together a puzzle only he could see. Beck was about to ask him what it was he was seeing when the sound of her name being called caused her to clamp her mouth shut and turn towards the source. She found the Unit Chief of the BAU standing at the top of the catwalk near the conference room gesturing for her to come near. "You're needed," he vaguely stated.

Beck pursed her lips. "Keep working on that glitch," she ordered her team before starting off towards the conference room where the Unit Chief was corralling her as well as Sanchez and Spence. She walked in, Dr. Reid on her tail as well as that lady agent that had confronted Olivia earlier.

On one end of the conference room stood the Bureau agents, Gideon included. And standing near the door were Beck, Sanchez, and Spence. Within moments of walking in, Hawks entered from the second entrance of the conference room, his arms up in exasperation as he asked no one in particular, "What? What's going on?" Yeah, Beck wished she knew, too.

"What are we doing here?" Spence asked the Bureau agents in a frustrated tone.

"Well, clearly they have something to tell us, Sherlock," Beck retorted with a roll of her eyes. Tensions were high and shed just about had enough of Spence's shit.

Spence glared at her sidelong, as did Sanchez beside him. He turned back to the agents and asked in an outrage. "You're pulling us away from our assignments? There's a woman out there whose life depends on us." Beck bit her tongue, he had a point there.

Just then, Sanchez seemed to point something out Beck had nearly overlooked. "Where's Olivia?"

Beck glanced around Spence, past Sanchez, and then to Hawks. He had that same dead look in his eyes as he made a half-attempt to glance around the room like she and Spence were doing now: fear. She was scared, too. Beck turned to face Gideon. "Where is she? Did you arrest her?"

"Olivia Hopkins was murdered ten minutes ago. Her neck was snapped," the monotone voice of the Unit Chief echoed through the conference room.

"Just like John Summers," Gideon added, his eyes scanning the four agents in front of him gauging each of their reactions to the news.

Beck felt something shift in her stomach. It felt like it could've been throw-up, but Beck didn't feel sick she felt in shock and in disbelief. Murdered? Olivia? She'd just seen her a few minutes ago.

"What are you talking about?" Spence scoffed from beside her. "You're lying! Where is she?"

"She's dead..." Beck muttered beneath her breath in disbelief at the very idea, her eyes glued to the edge of the table in the middle of the room as she tried not picture her teammate's dead body lying in some office. She'd once told her she wanted to retire from the CIA one day. She warned to finish her therapy, get custody of her kids again, and go move to Palm Beach in Florida to go soak up the sun. Olivia knew her place wasn't behind some desk. It disgusted Beck to think that was where she died.

Spence began to grow worried at her words and the lack of response from the agents. "Look people don't just get murdered inside the CIA," he remarked, his eyes wide with fear. Fear and sadness.

"We do it all the time..." The words left Beck's mouth before she could stop them. Her eyes looked up from the table as she gained the courage to turn to her remaining teammates next to her. "We're trained for this. We are. And it was one of us. One of us killed her!"

"Becca," Hawks said her name in a soft whisper, trying to stop her from escalating the situation more than it already was.

"No," she firmly replied, refusing to back down from this. Someone had just murdered her teammate, and they were undoubtedly in this room. "No. We need to figure this out now."

Sanchez seemed to take her words to heart as she glanced up at Spence between them. He took notice and glared at her in response. "What are you looking at?" He defensively asked her.

"I realize the enormity of this, but Hassan Nadir is still out there looking to kill his wife and I need every agent on this," Hawks cut into the tense moment with emotionless words that just cut through the tension like a plastic knife. Reluctantly, Sanchez and Spence began to file out of the room, but Beck stayed in place, her eyes focused on his, but they were downcast. He couldn't meet her eyes. Why couldn't he meet her eyes? What was he doing? "That includes you, Agent Ryder."

"Olivia was just killed and you're worried about-"

"I need your head in the game!" He raised his voice at her. Any normal girl that was only half this man's size would've strayed away and backed off, but Beck knew her strength. She didn't even blink. "And I want you back to work. That's an order." What was he doing? What the hell was he doing? That was all that was going through her head as she watched him storm off back the way he came to his office, Gideon brushing past Beck to follow him. She couldn't move.

What was happening?

What was Hawks doing?

What did he do?

No. She pushed that thought from her head. It wasn't him. It couldn't have been him. He wasn't the mole. This was his unit, this was his life. He, like her, worked his whole life to get here to this position. He had a wife, kids, a team, a successful career. He hd her. Why would he be the mole? He wasn't. That was it– he wasn't. He couldn't be and it was insane to think so.

You have a job to do, she told herself inwardly as she spun on her heel and walked out of the conference room, walking past Dr. Reid as she did so. She could feel his eyes on her, but she didn't bother returning the stare as she made her way to the Surveillance Hub again. This time, she took a seat at her own desk, the Summers file still lying on top as she logged into her computer. She was going to find Aaliyah, find Hassan, and force him to tell her who this mole was because there was no way it was Hawks. No way.

Beck impulsively glanced over her shoulder at where the Unit Chief and the muscular agent were talking with Sanchez who seemed more than defensive, but pissed. She motive. She hated her guts and now Hawks after her demotion.

Then she looked across the edge of her cubicle and saw Spence being questioned by the lady agent and Dr. Reid. He had motive. He had been having an affair with Olivia who maybe might've found out what he was doing and needed her to stay quiet.

Both of them could've been equally guilty, but either way, she had to get this done. She had to find Aaliyah and now.

Beck lowered her head in her hands, her eyes glancing over at the picture of Summers' ID on his file. "Where'd you hide them, Summers?"

"Good luck."

"Hopefully I won't need it."

He planned everything down to the last detail...

She was looking at the wrong person. The wrong identity.

Beck grabbed Summers' file and flipped to the last page.

Reba Nunez. That was her deep cover, her secret identity in Saudi that she held in order to get close to Aaliyah as her temporary driver. That was how she faked Aaliyah and her kids' deaths. They all had their roles in this unit, on this mission, in this life. That was how Summers viewed this world.

He planned everything down to the last detail...

Jim Sauceda. That was Summers' deep cover. But, while Beck was a driver, Summers had a different cover completely while in Riyadh. He was in charge of extraction. "So, how did you get them out of there, John?" Beck asked aloud to herself. Finally, the last page flipped on his deep cover profile. Saudi Shipping Company... Shipping company... Shipping.

He planned everything down to the last detail...

"Adams!" Beck shot up from her desk and made her way over to the Surveillance Hub again. "Find me the nearest shipping yard to Summers' apartment."

"Yes, ma'am," Adams replied, quickly starting to type away. "Uh, got it. North up I-95 close to Langley." A red dot pinged onto the location in the computer screen.

Beck's smile broke into a full on grin as she stood straight up and called out to the conference room. "I've got her!"

—

"I can have a chopper on the roof, fueled and ready in two minutes," Sanchez exclaimed as she walked down to the Pit off the catwalk.

All of the CTU and BAU were gathered around the Hub with Aaliyah's location pinged on the screen above. Apparently, Beck wasn't the only one who had found Aaliyah and it was now a race against the clock to get there before Hassan did to her what he did to Summers.

"I can be there in about ten minutes by bike if you want to send me with a small field team," Beck interjected from where she stood near Gideon, her question directed towards Hawks.

He, however, wasn't having it. "There are thousands of containers at that port, what makes you so sure Aaliyah's in one of those containers?" He prompted the teams around him.

"We deduced," Beck replied. "It's the only good lead we have right now, Hawks. You have to let us take it." She stared up at him, not paying any mind to Gideon grabbed a pencil off of her desk behind her as she saw that same flash of fear in his eyes that she did earlier. Come on, she silently begged. Come on.

"Why don't we send in a SWAT team," the Bureau lady suggested. "Split 'em up, have them search in grids."

"It won't work," Beck responded.

"Why not?" She became defensive by her questioning her authority. Oh yeah, she was definitely like Sanchez.

"Why? Because Hassan has diplomatic immunity," her Unit Chief explained for Beck. "This mission can't exist."

Beck stepped forward then, her eyes glued onto Hawks' facial expression trying to read them as she begged, "Let me go. You know I can do this." He still wouldn't meet her eye and she inwardly felt a piece of her soul crumble. "Send me with a small team. I'll even take Sanchez." She felt like that young little girl that had just been found on the jungle floor again, begging the same man instead of taking her, he would let her go. Come on. Don't do this, she silently begged of him.

"Yeah, and how do we know neither of you are the mole?" Spence interjected with his big fat mouth again. God, if they ever made it out of this she was seriously going to shove her foot up his ass like she promised.

"They're not the moles," Gideon suddenly stated from behind them. Everyone turned around to see if maybe they heard him correctly. They did. "Morgan take Gina with you," he abruptly ordered the muscular Bureau agent. Beck felt her mouth drop slightly. Why her?

"Wait," Hawks protested. "This is my command. These are my people."

"We have jurisdiction here," the Unit Chief stated matter-of-factly before adding, "And there's nothing you can do to stop us."

"This is my career on the line," Hawks replied.

"Then Rebecca will go instead," Gideon stated. Beck turned to him, her eyebrows furrowed. He glanced down at her with the same look in his eye as though he was telling her she was missing the obvious yet again. What did that mean? What was she not seeing that he wanted her to?

She watched him hand the piece of paper he'd written on to the Unit Chief before turning back to Hawks and smiling knowingly. "You trust her, don't you?"

Beck turned to Hawks and found him staring down at her. He seemed to be contemplating something and she saw his eyes flicker to Sanchez then back to her before he eventually gave a firm nod of approval. "Always."

Beck returned the nod and went back to her job just as the BAU agents moved in on Spence. She wanted to believe he was the mole, but something else told her he wasn't...

She turned to Sanchez who looked totally pissed. "Call that chopper," she ordered her. If Sanchez wanted to say something to her, she kept it to herself as she sat at her desk and picked up her phone to call in that chopper. "You're with me, right?" The agent asked Agent Morgan, as Gideon had addressed him.

He nodded. "Seems that way," he replied.

Beck spun around on her heel to address her team. "Califax, I need you to use thermal imagery to search for bodies in each and every single one of those shipping containers. As soon as you find Aaliyah, you direct us from on the ground, got it?"

"Yes, ma'am," Califax nodded before turning back to her computer screen and typing away.

"Green, Adams, Duncan..." Beck began to call different agents from behind their desks. She hesitated on the last name. "Sanchez," she finished. Gina lifted her head up in surprise at her hearing her name being called by Beck. Beck was pretty surprised herself is she was being honest, but she nodded all the help she could get. And she had given her a speech about stowing her crap. "With me. Let's go."

Her team, including Agent Morgan and Sanchez, all started towards the infirmary to get on their gear. Beck was on her way over as well when a firm hand grabbed hold of her arm. Once again, out of habit, Beck grabbed the person's wrist from off her arm and held it up between the two bodies. When she turned to see who it was, she was surprised to find Dr. Reid staring back at her.

"Doctor-" she began when he abruptly cut her off.

"We don't have much time," he explained.

Back narrowed her eyes up at him. "Time for what?"

"Gideon's evaluation for Sanchez was that she believed herself to be superior to her peers because of her extensive background and experience. Her behavior could possibly lead to questioning authority and loosely following orders or not following them at all. She's a narcissist who felt threatened by you because of your own extensive experience that trumped hers as well as the ability to carry out orders no matter what," Dr. Reid explained in a flurry of words.

Beck shook her head. "What does this have to do with finding Aaliyah and her kids?"

"Hawks." The one word out of his mouth sent her heart plummeting. He didn't need to say much for need of an explanation, she knew what he was implying.

"No-"

"Agent Ryder, listen to me," he insisted. "Gideon told me you'd have a hard time believing me when I tried to tell you this because of your close relationship with Hawks. He told me you couldn't be convinced that he's the Sleeper, that you'd have to figure it out yourself which is why I'm telling you what he found out in his psych evaluations of both you and the woman you replaced."

"Sanchez hates my guts and thinks she's better than everyone. That doesn't prove Hawks is the mole, Dr. Reid," Beck retorted defensively, not wanting to believe a single thing he was saying. It wasn't possible. It wasn't true. She wouldn't even consider it. Not him.

"That's not the reason Hawks demoted her and promoted you," the Doctor explained. "Gideon's evaluation of you found that you were the complete opposite of Gina. You worked towards this job– this life, not because you wanted to better yourself or your country, but because you found security in something familiar. You were willing to do whatever it takes to keep that security, following orders included."

Beck shook her head. "I don't understand..."

"You do."

Beck stared up at him, his light brown eyes meeting hers. Something Hawks had never been able to do with her, even growing up, was look her in the eyes. Now, here was Dr. Spencer Reid of the BAU staring into her crumbling soul, hoping she would understand the message he was trying to convey to her.

"Gina Sanchez doesn't obey orders without question," he stated. "You do. And Bruno Hawks knows it."

He suddenly pulled his wrist from out of her weak grasp. His eyes were still on hers as he backed away, the sound of his shoes against the tile of the hallway as he left her alone with her millions of thoughts and questions. She stood there for a moment, processing what she'd just heard.

She took a deep breath and pushed it to the side, she had to find Aaliyah Nadir and her children right now. Hawks could wait.

—

The chopper landed at the container yard in ten minutes. As soon as their feet hit the ground, Beck, Morgan, Adams, Duncan, Sanchez, and Green were all going their seperate directions.

Sanchez and Dunacn took to the far left with the helicopter trailing over them, Adams and Green went down the far right, and Morgan and Beck jogged down the middle through the containers.

"Talk to me, Califax, where are we going?" Beck called into her comms as she kept pace with Morgan's long legs that carried him down the rows of shipping containers.

"Califax stepped away. It's Reid," the Doctor spoke on the radio.

"Help us out, man," Morgan called into his radio. "Give me something."

"A hundred meters South West of your current location," came his quick response.

"Thank you, Doctor!" Beck shouted in a sing-song voice before picking up her pace into a sprint and heading off into a different direction that what they were going towards. Her bangs blew in the wind, the rest of her free pieces from her ponytail whipping around as she ran, Morgan hot on her tail.

Eventually, their sprint settled down into slow and stead walk. Morgan went to the right, Beck moved to the left, her gun now drawn and out as she carefully maneuvered herself around the shipping containers.

"Dr. Reid," she called into her radio.

"They're right in front of you," he responded.

Beck turned her head and aimed towards the large container directly in front of her. Sure enough, there was a small opening on the door with a cracked lock. In the bottom corner was a Saudi flag. This was it. This was where John Summers had stashed Aaliyah and the kids and where Hassan was right now with them.

"Morgan," Agent Gideon's voice came through the comms. "Make the arrest, it's FBI jurisdiction. You're in charge."

They were going to take him in alive... It made sense. With everything Hassan knew, Beck was sure the CIA would want him alive. So, why was Gideon telling Morgan to do the obvious? And why make a point topping out jurisdiction...?

He planned everything down to the last detail...

John Summers sure was a control freak and now it was working towards her advantage... Or disadvantage.

This is your call, she told herself. You have one shot at this, Summers set it up perfect for you. Just like everything else in your life, it's all been set for you to make that choice. This was it. Was she to trust Gideon who just came back into her life s few days ago or was she to trust the man that's been a constant in her life since the day she was rescued?

She wanted to pice Hawks the benefit of the doubt, she did. But then she remembered what Dr. Reid had told her about her promotion.

"Gina Sanchez doesn't obey orders without question. You do. And Bruno Hawks knows it."

She followed orders without question. That was all she knew how to do, her whole life. She was raised that way since her time as a child soldier in Asia. Did Bruno Hawks know then too? Was that what all this was? The final showdown to test that theory shed been wondering about in the back of her head of whether or not she had been used by him because of this ability to only obey? Was that why he brought her back to the States, gave her an education, training, job, and promotion? Why he let her come here in the first place to hunt down Hassan?

This was it.

He planned everything down to the last detail... And now it was her turn to pick up where he left off to finish what he couldn't.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute. I think we found something." Morgan paused at the door of the shipping container, bringing Beck back to the present. "On three," he whispered to Beck, she nodded in agreement, her hand coming up to the metal door.

"One... Two... Three.."

On three, the pair three open the metal doors. As soon as they were out of the way, Beck and Morgan already had their guns up and trained on Hassan Nadir holding his wife against him... with the barrel of a gun pressed against her temple, his two children nearby in the wall, crouching away in fear.

"FBI!" Morgan shouted to Hassan at the same time Beck shouted, "Drop it!"

Morgan stepped forward and Beck held back. "Let the lady go and put the gun down," he ordered him. He refused to do so and remained in the same position they'd found him in. "I said put the gun down!" Morgan repeated more dimly as he closed in on him.

Eventually, Hassan did as he was told. He pushed Aaliyah to the side with her children and gently place the gun on the shipping container floor. Beck didn't falter as she kept her guard and gun up, still trained on Hassan, but her eyes continued to dart towards Morgan.

"Diplomatic immunity, my friend," Hassan exclaimed smugly as he held his hands above his head in surrender.

"Uh-uh. You got it wrong, my friend," Morgan retorted. "This container hasn't passed through Customs. Officially, we're not on US soil," he explained to the man whose smug smile slowly began to dissipate. "Summers was a smart man." Damn...

Beck inwardly cringed. This was her shot.

He planned everything down to the last detail... This included.

In a swift motion, Beck stepped behind Morgan then, her gun's barrel pressed against the back of his head as she exclaimed, "Yes, he was..." She felt Morgan stiffen beneath her aim and she knew he'd probably hate her after this, but he'd understand soon enough. "Drop your gun, Agent," she ordered in a firm voice.

She watched as Morgan slowly lowered his gun, the barrel no longer pointed at Hassan as he placed it back into his holster.

"Good, now kick his away," she ordered the agent. He did as he was asked. Kicking Hassan's discarded weapon to the side. Carefully, Beck stepped away from Morgan and turned her weapon onto Hassan. "Walk," she commanded, gesturing the barrel towards the exit to the container. Slowly, he began to walk. "You too," she called to Aaliyah and the children. They did as was asked and followed Hassan's lead outside of the container into the open light provided by the hovering chopper above.

"Rebecca, what the hell are you doing?" Morgan demanded as he followed the family's lead, watching as Beck lined herself up with Hassan who stood a few yards away with his hands up, his wife and kids t the side where Morgan stood, watching this trained woman aim her weapon at him.

"Just following orders, Agent," Beck replied as she held her stance and maintained her aim.

"Morgan? Morgan?" Agent Gideon called out on the radio. "Morgan, what's going on?"

Beck watched out of the corner of her eye as Morgan reached for his radio and called in a reply, "Gideon, we've got a situation here!" Come on, she silently pleaded with some higher power that she'd been wrong. That Spence or Sanchez really was the Sleeper. That Hawks was going to come onto that radio and shout at her telling her to bring in Hassan Nadir ALIVE. Come on... She just needed to hear those words.

Then she did.

She heard those words.

"Rebecca, don't do this."

Only, it wasn't from the person she needed to hear it from.

"Beck, don't do this," Agent Gideon begged her over the comms.

God dammit, COME ON! "I don't take orders from you, Gideon!" Beck shouted back in defiance. Morgan probably couldn't tell through the wind whipping up her black hair all around her face or the shitty lighting the helicopter provided, but there were tears blooming in the corner of her eyes. "Hawks! What do you... what do you want me to do?"

Come on... Come on... Come on...

"Please! Please, stop this!" Aaliyah begged for her to stop. God, even Aaliyah knew this was wrong. She was pleading for her to spare the man that raped and abused her for years. All she needed was the same from Hawks.

"Hawks?"

Come on... Come on... Come on...

Then she heard him for the first time.

"You know what to do."

Come on... Come on... Come on...

"Say it," her voice cracked as she called back over the radio. But inwardly she was pleading, don't say it, don't say it, please don't say it. Don't prove me right. Don't tell me it was all for nothing. Don't tell me all you ever did was use me. Don't. Please.

"Becca, what are you waiting for?" She heard him ask in a frustrated tone.

God, no... Come on!

Gina Sanchez doesn't obey orders without question.

Beck took a deep breath in.

You do.

Then she let it out with an answer, "An order."

And Bruno Hawks knows it.

"Finish him," he ordered. "Finish him!"

He knows it...

He knows it...

He knows it...

"Beck, don't do this!" Gideon shouted again. She wasn't going to.

"You're gonna cut the feed, right?" She called back to Hawks. "You're gonna keep me out of trouble like you always have?" The tears were pouring over now. The wind barely managing to get her hair to cover them. Morgan could see them from where he stood, but Hassan was too focused on the gun pointed at him to notice that the woman holding it was crying.

"Always, Becca," he replied, confirming all her worst fears and darkest nightmares. That she'd been used. She'd been used as his weapon. All this time... Always... "Always."

God damn it, Bruno.

Rebecca Ryder then did the unthinkable and turned her gun up and away from Hassan Nadir, aimed it up at the sky and fired. Five. Consecutive. Shots.

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Morgan flinched the first time. Hassan and his family flinched for the first three. Beck didn't flinch not once.

Beck held a cold hard stare on Hassan as she put her gun away in her holster. She watched numbly as Sanchez, Duncan, Adams, and Green all closed in, grabbing Hassan and cuffing him quickly as the familiar sounds of sirens began to approach. She figured right now would be the time that Gideon, Dr. Reid, and the rest of the BAU would expose Bruno as the one who aligned with Hassan for money in exchange for his wife's location, ultimately leading to him killing John Summers, then Olivia Hopkins, then attempting to use a girl he'd told he thought of as a daughter to do his bidding by killing the man he aligned himself with to begin with.

She felt so numb and cold and empty. And for the most part, alone.

"Hey," Agent Morgan's hand on her shoulder broke her from her scrambled thoughts. "You alright?"

She glanced up at him through her messy bangs and answered him truthfully, "No." With that, she brushed past him towards the chopper landing nearby that Hassan was currently being shove into. She climbed in across from him, Morgan jumping in beside her. The ride back to Langley didn't take long, but the entire time, all Beck could think of was whether or not Hawks thought it was worth it yet.

—

When the field team returned with Aaliyah Nadir, Hassan, and the children in tow, they were met with more agents. Some to take Aaliyah and the children away to the infirmary to get checked up on, and the others to escort him to an interrogation room.

Beck walked along side the agents escorting Hassan, Morgan and Sanchez close by. And as they walked through security and up to where the Pit was, they caught sight of a very different group walking out of the CTU. It was a set of agents walking Bruno Hawks out of the Pit in handcuffs, among them were Spence, the lady agent of the BAU, the Unit Chief, Dr. Reid, and Agent Gideon. He looked pissed, but not defeated. In fact, when Hawks' eyes finally met hers for the first time, all she saw was smugness.

Then it all went red.

The petite woman picked up her speed, walking past Hassan and his guards and ignoring the shouts of protest from Sanchez and Morgan behind her. Her vision slowly grew more red until she stood right in front of him. The agents escorting him out, shied away out of fear of the pissed off agent storming towards them. So when she abruptly threw a hard punch against Hawks' nose, all they could do was yank him in one direction, while a pair of large arms pulled her away in the opposite direction.

"You bastard!" She spat at him as she struggled against the firm hold around her middle. Hawks fell backwards slightly, his nose a deep shade of red as crimson liquid began to ooze out from his nostrils. It did feel satisfying to hear the crunch of his nose beneath her fist, but nothing could make the pain of betrayal go away.

And it was just like a knife being twisted deeper and deeper into her back.

After Hawks regained his balance and could properly look back at his old prodigy, it was like he morphed into a completely different person before her eyes. "You little bitch," he growled back at her. "You were supposed to be better than this!"

Beck scoffed. "Me? You betrayed your team! You betrayed your country! You betrayed me! And for what? A few million dollars?" She spat back. "If anyone was supposed to be better, it should've been you."

"We could've been unstoppable together, Becca!" He shouted.

Beck felt a piece of her crumble and die from within at his words. "I don't want to be unstoppable! I'm not a power-hungry sociopath like you!" She screeched, the arms around her waist pulling her back against them to keep her from running over to her old mentor and strangling him before he had the chance to break in his cuffs.

"Did you even feel anything when you killed John? Or Olivia? Or when you were so quick to throw Spence under the bus?" She demanded answers from him. "How far were you willing to go, Bruno? Would you have killed me...?"

The silence from him was louder than anything he could've ever said in response.

Beck let out a cynical scoff as she backed away from him. This monster in front of her that used her. From the very beginning. All of it was a sham. He'd done it all, telling her he'd cared for her and that he wanted what was best. When in reality, all he wanted was someone he could aim and fire at without any repercussions. And she was stupid enough to obey.

Before the tears began, Beck yanked herself out of the iron grip the BAU Unit Chief had pulled her into and stormed away. She briefly heard Hawks call her name once, twice, three times. It was the last thing she heard as she walked around the corner into the CTU Pit.

—

Agent Gideon found her sitting alone in the CTU break room. A cup of coffee in front of her, her jacket pulled over her shoulders, and her motorcycle helmet at her feet. Her eyes were downcast, starring at the cream in the coffee spin inside the cup, going around and around and around. He couldn't imagine how she must've felt right now.

"Rebecca," he greeted her tentatively from the doorway. It was then as he got closer that she had an earphone plugged into her phone. He could hear the sounds of a whining electric guitar playing from the second earphone. He recognized the song... "The Scorpions? Kind of old fashioned, don't ya think?"

She didn't answer him. She didn't even react.

"Rebecca, look-"

"Did you know?"

Her voice was barely above a whisper, but Gideon heard her loud and clear.

He paused momentarily, choosing his next words widely before replying, "Did I know what?"

Slowly, she glanced up at him through her jet black hair hiding her pale complexion underneath. "Did you know back when Hawks wanted me to come back to the States?" She clarified. "I don't remember much, but I remember how uncomfortable the idea of me becoming a CIA agent in training made you. Was it because you know what he had planned for me?"

Gideon let out a sigh. "No. No one could've known, Beck. Not you. Certainly not me," he answered her truthfully. "This isn't your fault. Any of it. Bruno made his choices, and now it's time for you to make yours. What're you thinking, kid?"

"I'm thinking I seriously need something stronger than coffee if I'm going to be making any other rational decisions tonight," she replied sarcastically.

"Maybe you should get something to eat first," he stated. He recalled not having seen her eat anything since arriving. He knew she shouldn't be this way in an empty stomach, it would only make matters worse for her. "There's a vending machine down the hall. What do you want? It's on me."

She shrugged nonchalantly. "Anything sweet sounds good."

"Alright, I'll be right back with that." Gideon stood up and walked out of the break room. He got to the vending machine and wasn't really sure what to get her and ended up paying ten bucks for a gummy worm bag, a granola bar, and a cookie pack. But when he walked back into the break room with the snacks, he was surprised to find that she was gone.

Beck had vanished. The only thing she left behind was her CIA badge, government-issued gun, and the keys to her apartment in DC. Beside her belongings was a sticky-note attached to the half-empty cup of creamed coffee that had a message written in perfect, delicate penmanship he recognized as her own that read 'consider this my official resignation - Rebecca Ryder.'

That was it. This was all Beck had left.

Gideon, being the sentimental man he was, took the sticky-note from off cup and pocketed it. He liked to keep memorabilia of the victims he'd saved at the BAU, but Beck was different. He saved her years ago, but today... today she saved herself. And he felt as though she needed to be commemorated for that, whether she was there to see it or not.

That was the last he'd heard of Rebecca Ryder after that night. She left his life just as soon as she'd came, just like the last time they'd met. But he wasn't worried. Jason Gideon knew she'd pop up again, probably sooner than he thought.

He was right, of course. Just not in the way he thought he would be.