A/N: Another thank you to Zettel for pre-reading as well as a belated shout out to my son for helping me transcribe the cyrillic text in the last chapter.

It's not something that you plan

One night in a world of pain

And you finally understand

Not all the king's horses, not all the king's men

Could put it back together

"Fall From Grace"

Stevie Nicks

November 29, 2012

Zurich, Switzerland

David felt like jumping out of his skin. There were too many words, too many things he wanted to ask, to say; he couldn't find a place to start.

The cold wind had turned Halmstad's cheeks florid, despite the paleness of his face. The man's usually calm exterior had eroded, the skin around his eyes pinched in dismay.

"I owe you an explanation." Halmstad stuffed his hands into his pockets, slightly shaking his head. "Although it's…a ridiculously long story." Halmstad locked eyes with David. "There are only a handful of people in the world who know it all." The softest ghost of a smile appeared then faded. "But I trust you, David. I do."

David braced himself. The air was chilled, the wind penetrating his jacket. A long story? His hands were numb in the cold. But somehow this man seemed to have all the answers, answers David had come to find.

I should have realized somehow Halmstad was involved. Halmstad had been the ultimate puppet master of everything David had ever done since first undertaking this role, controlling it all. Two years ago, no one had ever heard of him, and now nothing happened behind the scenes without his knowledge. No deeds were done without his say-so.

"Do you know Charles Carmichael?" Halmstad sounded weary, like each word he spoke was leaden, as if his mouth had overexerted in uttering them.

"Of him, yes. Is there anyone in the entire network who doesn't?"

Halmstad chuckled softly, though he seemed more sad than amused. "Impeccable reputation notwithstanding. There aren't many men like him, in any world. You always reminded me of him, David. It's why I know I can trust you." His face went slack as he turned to make eye contact. "He's Sarah's husband."

The cold air burned in David's lungs at his sharp intake of breath. As he had explained to Halmstad, David only had second-hand knowledge of the master spy. By reputation alone, the information seemed absurd. Master spies didn't marry or have babies.

Someone has to be looking for her…Ciel's words echoed in his head.

Halmstad continued. "She was…taken…in January of this year. On a mission in Japan. Mary, or Marseille as you know her, contacted me right away. Sarah's husband was looking for her. All of the CIA was looking for her. For months." He took a deep breath, gesturing as he added what he thought David had interpolated. "Mary is Charles' mother."

What about the baby? David wanted to interrupt, but he knew the answers would come in time. He just needed patience.

"Mary finally found the base in mid-October. She infiltrated the base, hoping to rescue Sarah, only to find Sarah was nine months pregnant and about to give birth at any time." Halmstad's voice grew husky, strained. "She…wasn't pregnant…when she was taken, at least not that her husband was aware."

David's stomach clenched with angst at the picture Halmstad had just painted. As Halmstad continued, the feeling worsened. He shifted his feet.

"Sarah was likely raped, at least once, while in that base." His voice was low, sinister, brimming with hatred. "David, her captor was Nicholas Quinn."

David stopped short, almost losing his footing at the mention of the man from whom he was protecting Ciel. Was it a coincidence? In David's experience, there was almost nothing nefarious that somehow didn't make its way back to Quinn.

Halmstad seemed to understand, emphasizing the connection with raised eyebrows and a grim smile.

"Mary contacted my daughter for assistance. She waited in Japan for Victoria. By the time Victoria arrived, Sarah had given birth." Halmstad grimaced. "Horrific is too kind a word. She was in labor for over a day, with almost no attention, no medical treatment. She was bleeding to death, slowly…and yet…she almost escaped, fighting with an unimaginable strength." Halmstad's voice broke, and he quickly cleared his throat.

Did he know her personally? If Mary was a close friend and Sarah was family…it was possible.

"Mary got her out of there. And my daughter took the baby. And both Mary and Victoria have disappeared." Halmstad's eyes misted with tears. "You were the last one to see Mary. And as far as I know, Mary was the last person to see Victoria. And that was over a week ago."

David stayed silent, absorbing it all, more things making sense, but so much still mysterious.

"I contacted the CIA about the location of Quinn's base, anonymously, as soon as I got word from Mary in October. But then Mary and Victoria disappeared, and if Sarah had no memory, I'm certain Charles thinks she's dead. I've tried contacting him and it seems he's…gone off the grid." Halmstad groaned with exasperation. "I never anticipated this much going wrong."

"Can't you just…reach out? Let them know what you know?" David asked. He thought of Sarah's husband, a legendary spy, but also a grieving husband who needed to know his wife was alive. Desperately.

"I can't, David. There's a particular reason why I work in the shadows the way I do." Halmstad stopped walking. He looked at David, but couldn't hold his gaze.

"This is the part no one knows. The story I wish I didn't have to tell." He kept his gaze averted and started walking again. "Charles' father was my best friend 30 years ago. I worked for MI6 and Stephen worked for the CIA. We were scientists.

"Stephen created a…computer program that…allowed information to be directly loaded into the brain without a person needing to learn it. Revolutionary, but in its earliest developmental stages when MI6 needed a nuclear science expert for a mission to the USSR in 1980. I was no agent. I hated guns, I was afraid of my own shadow. But no one else could do it, no one even understood what needed to be done. I asked my friend for his program. It could upload my cover identity to my brain so I could believe it, become him. Stephen told me it wasn't ready, and wasn't tested. I begged him and eventually, he relented.

"But the identity took over my personality. The man I had been was lost beneath the cover. He became the exact opposite of me. The CIA lost control of the mission. Eventually they had to disavow me." He winced. "Because the identity I uploaded was…Alexei Volkoff."

David choked and coughed, gasping like he was drowning. As he struggled to catch his breath, he felt like his legs had turned to rubber, his head threatening to float from his shoulders. Halmstad made a quick motion, probably an attempt to pat David on the back, but the younger man shifted away, dramatically adding space between them.

Still wheezing, David asked, "You're telling me… you're Alexei Volkoff? How is that possible? You're British, aren't you?"

Stung by David's physical rejection of him, Halmstad growled with aggravation. "You've heard of the Intersect, haven't you?" He sounded impatient.

"Of course I have, but–"

"You knew Carmichael's reputation. Is it so hard to believe that the rumors were true? That Carmichael was the human Intersect?"

David was reeling, speechless. All he could do was nod, waiting for Halmstad to explain.

"His father built the bloody thing…and I was the first recipient. Only it went horribly wrong, as you could imagine." Halmstad started visibly trembling. "I don't remember any of it, David. Thirty years of my life, gone, in the blink of an eye. Volkoff did all of those unspeakable horrors…while the real me was sleeping underneath. In a coma in a living, moving body. Stephen, and Mary, his wife, spent their entire lives trying to fix what had gone wrong, trying to…mitigate the damage that Volkoff was doing." David heard him stifle a soft sob. "My God, David, I had a daughter with a woman I don't even remember during that time!"

Daughter…He had said Victoria…Victoria was…Vivian Volkoff?

"Vivian…" David whispered, uncertain he had said it out loud until Halmstad looked at him sharply.

"Our names are different now. Hugh and Victoria Hammersmith. My birth name was different. Vivian used her mother's name." Halmstad's face crumpled as if he had been struck, some unbearable pain seizing him. He took tangible hold of himself before continuing. "Those identities, the second chance at life the both of us received–we had that only because of Charles. He forgave us the unforgivable…while his future wife lay dying in a hospital half a world away because my daughter put her there."

David's mind struggled to keep up, digesting the information to process later. It made sense with the timeline…Hammersmith's appearance on the scene in Europe and Volkoff's supposed death while in secret custody of the CIA coincided perfectly.

Halmstad's voice became distant, like he was giving a lecture in a college hall. "There is no way to atone for what I did, and hiding behind my ignorance of it is no excuse. I had to do…something. Something that gave me purpose, some hope. Nothing I can do is enough, but whatever I can do, I will. Charles never would have asked for my help; he let us go unconditionally. But I knew what happened to Sarah. I couldn't sit idly, not when I was partially responsible for it happening in the first place."

"Responsible? How?"

"Quinn was rogue CIA. He worked for Fulcrum and The Ring…and for me. I made him a rich man, a thousand times over. My last act as a Volkoff was to dissolve the company. I'm sure he felt cheated, that some of that money belonged to him. The man was unstable, and borderline psychotic…and he blamed Carmichael for everything bad that had ever happened to him. He thought he deserved the Intersect, even though after the last time I saw Charles in Russia, he no longer was an Intersect.

"Sarah ended up downloading a version of the Intersect to save her husband. That's why Quinn abducted her. Because she had it, and he wanted it. Now that I know what you told me, I'm fairly certain Sarah's memory loss was caused by that program. Hers was defective, like mine, not like the version Charles had before."

"She had burns all over her scalp, perfect circles…" David offered.

"We had intel that he had a way to transcribe the program from a human brain. Quinn may have a functional Intersect ready for download, even as we speak. Only like I said, it's defective. And he knows it. There is a way to fix the defective program. There's an apparatus that was disassembled and separated, to protect it. Quinn knew I had one of the pieces, although I ended up losing it in a poker game to a member of the Ring. There are two other pieces, one of which is in the DNI in the U.S. somewhere. He's searching for all the pieces, I know he is."

Halmstad swallowed hard, so loud that David heard it over the wind. "What I don't know is why Quinn didn't kill Sarah after he extracted the Intersect. He has no mercy, no compassion. Even if Sarah's pregnancy started to show before he was done, he still would have no qualms about killing her. I can imagine…all sorts of horrid reasons, and they keep me awake at night. Mary and Victoria, if they are still alive, are in terrible danger. And the infant…"

A stray thought crossed David's mind, a trilling alarm. He grabbed Halmstad's arm, stopping his movement. "My God…Ciel has no idea who you are! Do you know what would happen if she found out?"

"She would kill me with her bare hands, and rightfully so," Halmstad replied grimly. "I don't deserve less. It sickens me that she blames herself for Felipe and Lucia, even peripherally, when ultimately it was by my directive that Quinn paid that man to drive into the crowd."

"Doesn't she have a right to know?" David asked.

"She's safe where she is, doing what she's doing. Or at least she was. It's my duty to ensure that she stays safe. I know that's why you're here. But now…now, we're–"

Halmstad stopped mid-sentence, his eyes impossibly wide as he gazed at a point over David's shoulder, a point directly behind him. "What?" David asked, resisting the urge to whisper, based on the older man's expression.

"Walk past me and keep going. Don't turn around. Get inside the nearest public building and stay there." Halmstad spoke urgently, pointedly.

"What…"

"He didn't see your face, he saw mine. Go! Now, David. Get to Montreux, and Ciel and Sarah. Please."

David was fearful, but he did as Halmstad asked, urged on by the older man's mention of Ciel. What had he seen? One of Quinn's men?

Was Halmstad followed? Was I?

He was two hours from Ciel in Montreux. It felt like the other side of the world.

November 29, 2012

Berlin, Germany

Meticulously, thoroughly, Chuck worked. Every place Parsons went, Chuck tracked him. Every transaction, every footstep. He used security cameras and hacked his way through almost every computer network in the city.

What Chuck eventually discovered was that Parsons was in Berlin because he was searching for someone. A man named Renny Deutch, a German arms dealer. An old associate of Alexei Volkoff.

It was odd, Chuck conceded. He anticipated Quinn and his men being concerned about their missing money. What was Parsons doing seeking out an arms dealer? And he wasn't reaching out conventionally, not seeming to be in the act of procuring weapons, rather tracking the man himself, following his movements.

It was a brief sojourn down a rabbit hole, and Chuck shook himself out of it. He was looking for Parsons. No, he was taking Parsons and getting some goddamn answers. What Parsons was doing in Berlin, why he was looking for Renny Deutch…or Bigfoot or anyone else for that matter…Chuck didn't care. All he cared about was tracking Parsons to a place where he could corner him.

All the while Chuck had been searching, he had been planning the next step. It was daring, dangerous, something Chuck might not have ever contemplated before he stopped caring about his welfare. But it was what he needed to do.

Still working at the computer, solidifying his plans, he heard the distant shuffling of what sounded like multiple people walking in a hurry, heavy, booted footfalls.

The CIA!

Damn it, of course, they'd tracked him here! He had every intention of hacking the security cameras from the airport, but instead, exhausted, he had fallen asleep. That was hours ago. Chuck was confident there was no one in the current employ of the NSA or CIA who matched Chuck's computer skills. He could have easily masked his movements before anyone would even be aware, but after so long now…they'd caught up to him.

His spy skills had done nothing but improve, due to Sarah's tutelage over the years. This was just sloppy, amateurish, letting himself be so singular of purpose that he forgot the precautions he should have taken. The sounds increased in volume, indicating the team was moving closer. They sounded to be on the same floor…

Frantic, running out of time, Chuck stuffed his computer into his backpack, then ran through the room, grabbing his things and stuffing them into the bag before hastily zipping it and flinging it onto his back.

The only way out was the window. Although he was on the seventh floor. Chuck unlatched the window, stepped onto the balcony, and slowly lowered himself over the ledge. His palms were slick, but he was amazingly calm and steady as he dangled his legs below, looking for a purchase on the ledge to the floor below. He closed his eyes and jumped, uncomfortably indifferent as he found himself in front of the window instead of splattered on the pavement below.

The room was dark, unoccupied. Using his boot heels, he kicked the window in, breaking the glass. He wondered how loud the crashing sounded from above, but he didn't wait to find out. He ran out the door and into the hallway, into the nearest stairwell, and then sprinted with all his strength to the bottom floor, jumping four steps at a time with his long legs.

On the street, having evaded capture once again, narrowly, he knew didn't have much time. He was going to find Parsons, but he was going to have to take the man with him out of the city.

Chuck's contact information was old, second-hand, if he was being honest. The man lived in Zurich, Switzerland, the first stop Sarah and he had planned when they took the train from Paris when they had decided to run away. It was the same man she had contacted from Lisbon when she planned to meet him in Prague the year before, the same man who had helped her secure documentation when she had fled with Molly from Hungary. It was now two years since Sarah had shared that with him. A lot could happen in two years, but it was all he had.

And now he needed to travel with Parsons. He could fly to Zurich, or take the train. The train was safer, he knew, though a much longer trip, almost nine hours. It was a long time to hold someone captive; Chuck knew firsthand, as he had experienced it when Quinn had taken him from Los Angeles to Japan. He could keep Parsons tranquilized, but the man would need to be conscious to board the train. Risky. But his only option.

{}{}{}{}{}{}{}

The evening had progressed, the streets quiet now that it was well past dinnertime. Chuck was soon finding, especially after his building acrobatics, that his short sleep had not been sufficient to cure his jet lag, only alleviate it for a time, and that time had ended. It was a fatigue beyond just sleepiness, reaching to his bones, draining his essence.

Chuck was confident he had avoided detection by the CIA, at least for now. He had tracked Parsons to the coffee shop across the street from where he stood now on the dark, deserted sidewalk. All of Quinn's men knew what Chuck looked like, so he knew he needed the element of surprise.

Outside of the cone of light from the overhead streetlight, Chuck was shrouded in darkness. He could see inside the coffee shop, its garish fluorescent lighting washing out all the background color. A dark figure, in a black trenchcoat, came into view through the window. He stretched out his hand. Chuck saw the flash and the puff as the man fired the gun. The figure bent, as if he were retrieving something, then stood upright again and tucked his gun into his belt. When he turned, his assassination of some unseen individual now complete, Chuck saw it was Parsons.

Had he just murdered Renny Deutch? Was that why he was searching for the man?

Chuck was still indifferent, alarmingly so. None of it mattered at all, only getting close enough to Parsons to tranq him. Once disarmed, Chuck could force him onto the train, then knock him out again until they reached Zurich.

Where he could get his hands on some sodium pentathol. Just the thought of it twisted his stomach with perverse, vengeful pleasure, even as he worried what Sarah would think if she could see what he was doing now.

He convinced himself she would understand.