Disclaimer: The
following is a work of fan fiction based on Human Target which belongs to Fox.It is in no way intended to infringe on the copyrights of Fox.
Disclaimer: The following is a work of fan fiction based on White Collar which
belongs to Jeff Eastin and USA.
It is in no way intended to infringe on the
copyrights of Jeff Eastin and USA.
With a big
special thanks to mam711 for
your beta reading, and your editing and
all your help and support with this story. It’s been a long journey, but with
your help it’s been worth the ride. All
mistakes are mine.
The
picture of “The Thinker” used in the title
banner is from an original work of art by my niece Mary Daniel,
This story is for Eileen, with love and best wishes
for the best sister a girl could have, for your encouragement with my writing
and for looking after my web site, here’s to the next year, and for Mary for her
original art work of “The Thinker,”
used in the title banner. To Alice
and Alec just because I can. Happy New Year Every One.
The Ryan Exchange
Notes:
Set during the second
season of Human Target, and in a White Collar post-season-3 AU.
The art robbery is based
on a real-life art robbery featured in the Sky Art series “Art of the Heist”.
The methods of the robbery have been copied, and yes, the security really wasn’t
that brilliant, which resulted in the loss of three priceless paintings in the
mid-eighties.
Warning for implied
future OT3 and for implied off screen sexual assault .
Note: The assassination
firm that Junior and Guerrero were employed by was founded and ruthlessly run by
Joubert, known as the Old Man.
Main Characters: White Collar Peter, Neal and Elizabeth
Human Target Chance, Guerrero and Winston
Part One
2004
San Francisco
Christopher Chance looked
at himself in the reflection of the window: his dark hair was now shot through
with gray, and there were more lines on his face than he cared to remember, but
he was still in good shape given his 62 years.
But Chance was aware that
he didn’t have much longer in the field; he was slowing down, and that could get
him killed. Close personal protection was a young man’s game; he had taken on
the mantle of Christopher Chance in the 70s, when the previous Christopher
Chance had found him, a good cop in a bad situation, drinking himself into an
early grave.
That Christopher Chance
had offered him a way to find redemption, and had passed on the creed that he
lived by: “no one deserved to die,” along with his name when he retired.
Thirty-four years on, he
liked to think that he had made—like the others Christopher Chances before him—a
difference. But how long could he continue to do this job?
He needed to find himself a replacement, but where and who?
Just then his thoughts
were interrupted as the young secretary came out of the office. “Mr. Pucci will
see you now, sir.” She led him in, closing the door behind him as he entered.
Chance looked around the
office critically, almost bored by its ostentations; if this client thought he
was going to be impressed, he would be sadly mistaken. The man might be richer
than Solomon but he was still a man with a problem, and rich or poor, that was
where he came in.
The client was at least
straight to the point, “As my associate told you, there has been an attempt on
my life; I have reason to believe that they will not stop until I am killed, so
it is only a matter of time before they are successful.
"I accept threats like
this; it is the price for doing business in some of the places that my
Foundation works. But they could target my future wife. I need them stopped,”
Marshal Pucci said.
Chance had taken away the
CCTV footage and the reports on the attempted assassination bid and that night
has sat down with Martha May Travis, an old friend and expert with a computer,
and she had processed the raw footage from the CCTV cameras.
Both of them were leaning
over the monitor when suddenly Chance said “Stop,” and pointed to a blurred
figure. “Can you enlarge that?”
Martha nodded, working on
the section trying to increase the resolution; it was still grainy, but Chance
could see the man clearly enough to recognize him, and swore under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” Martha
asked, concerned.
Chance tapped the screen.
“That, Martha, is Junior, Old Man Joubert’s right hand man, and the one that
he’s grooming to take over when he retires. The kid is good, but he’s kinda wild
from what I’ve heard.”
“Surely that makes it
easier, Chris,” Martha said.
“You would think so; this
is the guy that dropped onto the top of a 60-floor office block by parachute,
and then abseiled down, fired through the window, and killed his target.” He
paused. “The problem is that his wild plans tend to work, and because he’s
unpredictable, he’s successful.” Chance played the tape further; the second
assassin he quickly identified as Ben Taylor.
“Junior and Taylor make a good team, Martha. Luckily it wasn’t his usual
partner, because he was one cold-blooded bastard and he wouldn’t have made the
mistake that Taylor did, which allowed Pucci to get away.”
The telephone rang and
Martha watched Chance as he answered it; his face became grim.
“Well?”
Chance turned to her.
“The problem had just gotten worse. Nelson said that he heard Guerrero’s in the
city.” Seeing the puzzled look, Chance sank down in the seat opposite her; he
had always tried to limit her connection with his business, preferring her to
work in isolation for her own safety.
“Who’s Guerrero?”Martha
asked. Seeing his look, she added, “I am not an idiot, Chris; from the way you
say his name he has to be bad news.”
“I’ve beaten Taylor
before but now he’s been pulled off the job, and Guerrero’s back; he’s the one
that took one of my clients out right in front of me.”
“Luke Green.” Martha could remember
Chance hitting the bottle over that one.
“Yeah, a long shot from a
hotel two blocks away. He tortured the security protocol from one of the
security co-coordinators, and….” Chance trailed off; he still had nightmares
about that one.
Of the two assassins
Junior and Guerrero it was Guerrero that had him worried; the man was a frigging
enigma: there was no picture of him, just a name, and a rough description that
he was small—only around five-foot six—and dressed casually. Not much to go on,
but what concerned Chance was the rumor that Guerrero was a sociopath, and that
made him more dangerous: when he focused on a target he never let go.
0-0-0-0-0-0
One week later, and the
mission, Chance decided, was going south in a frigging hand basket.
The hotel complex
that the Foundation was using had more exits than a sieve had holes, and had
that in common with Pucci’s security; if an unaccredited journalist could get
close to Pucci, armed with nothing more lethal than a pencil, then he was a dead
man walking if Junior or Guerrero got close to him.
The only way he was going
to save his client was to pull a Hail Mary play; any part of it could fail and
leave his client exposed, but it was the only way. He had spotted Junior first.
There was no mistaking the blond, good-looking and well-built; he had charm, and
seeing him work was an education. He moved among the delegates at the Pucci
Eco-Conference easily. He was blending in, and passed himself off as middle
management without stretching the imagination. Chance could see how Pucci’s
security had missed him; he could have had Pucci’s security try to pick him up
but he needed to play this out. Because until he knew where Guerrero was, he
couldn’t guarantee Pucci’s safety by just removing Junior from the picture.
Also, if they moved in on Junior, it could herald the start of a bloodbath if
the assassin started to shoot his way clear, and for Chance there was no such
thing as collateral damage.
Chance started putting
his plan into action—try to draw the assassins away from population—so with the
help of James Gill and Paul Allen, old friends of his, he managed to work a car
version of Three-Card Monty, drawing Junior and Guerrero away from his client,
to a place where he could turn the tables on them.
Parting from his client
went against every fiber of Chance's being, his very creed: he liked to keep
them close, but against these two he needed freedom of movement. Also, for the
one of the first times ever, he wasn’t sure that he could win.
He decoyed the assassins
to an old disused hotel that was under restoration.
First he got his decoys
clear, sure that Junior wouldn’t pursue them; they would go after him: they
would want answers and if he got this wrong he would find himself at the mercy
of Guerrero. So that was how he
found himself taking part in a lethal game of tag with the two assassins through
the old hotel, drawing them towards that area he had booby-trapped.
It was times like this that Chance was beginning to feel all of his 62
years: his heart was pounding and his breath was coming in painful gasps, but he
had to keep going to lure them to where he wanted them in his kill zone.
The assassins were good,
maybe too good; they were leapfrogging each other’s positions. A couple of times
it was close, and he had had to rely on his knowledge of the hotel layout to
keep him one step ahead; he doubled back through a service passageway to lead
them right into his traps. It was just a matter of which one got caught in it.
0-0-0-0-0-0
Guerrero was the one that
got hit; it didn’t take him head on: if it had, he would have been dead before
he hit the floor, but he caught a bullet in the chest. His momentum carried him
forward, one hand clawed the air, and then he was down, his gun sliding across
the floor as he landed hard; he tried to reach for it, but the pain in his chest
made him curl up on himself.
Junior immediately began
to put down covering fire to get to him but Chance opened up and drove him back;
now that he had Guerrero down he had to keep him down. But when he looked back
at him, Guerrero had managed to drag himself behind one of the rolls of carpet
that had been left in the middle of the room for laying. It barely gave the man
any cover, and the bloodstain on the floor showed he had been hit hard.
“Guerrero.”
Chance heard Junior
yelling to his partner, trying to find out how badly he was hit. “Damn it to
hell,” Junior swore under his breath; he knew that his partner was in serious
trouble. “I'm coming to get you; hang on,” he told him.
Guerrero’s reply was
typical of his partner, “Get …. the fuck …. out of here.”
Guerrero's breathing was ragged, and Junior knew that he wasn’t going to
make it without help.
Junior was all too aware
he could walk away from this, but there was no way he could or would leave
Guerrero behind.
“Chance,” Junior called
out.
“What do you want?” the
older man yelled back.
“I'm coming out.” Junior took a deep breath and stepped out from his cover, his gun
hanging off his finger by the trigger guard, and he moved forward.
“Put the gun down,”
Chance ordered from cover; he wasn’t stupid enough to step out himself yet.
“Kick his gun over here, and drag him out.”
Junior did exactly as he
was told; all that was important to him was getting to Guerrero. “Hang on, bro.”
He lifted the roll and dragged that away, rather than risk moving his friend.
Ignoring Chance, Junior knelt down quickly, then ripped open his partner’s shirt
to check on the chest wound; there was blood bubbling at the wound when Guerrero
exhaled, and there was that sucking sound when he breathed in.
Junior did the only thing
he could: he pressed his hand over the wound, and looked up at Chance as the old
man slowly and carefully emerged from his cover, waiting for the bullets that
would end their lives; they never came.
“Okay, Junior.” Chance
gave him a thin smile, “Don’t look surprised; I know who you, and who the freak
is.” He could hear the sound of police sirens, Pucci’s men were right on time
with the backup. “You tell me who hired you or I will kill you; two assassins,
the police aren’t going to be too put out by your deaths.”
Junior just looked at
him. Chance was just about to speak again when Guerrero began to struggle to
breathe, his blood-stained hand reaching out, clutching at Junior's wrist.
Junior swore and quickly took his hand from the wound; it was a sucking
chest wound, and by covering the wound he had allowed Guerrero to breathe more
easily, but it had allowed the air to get trapped in Guerrero’s chest solving
one problem, creating another.
Chance could see the
emotions flitter across Junior's face, and it surprised him; there was, he saw,
very real concern for Guerrero. He knew that they worked together; it had never
dawned on him that they could be friends, that anyone would want to be friends
with Guerrero. But Junior had risked his life and his freedom to help him. That
didn’t make sense; he had never known assassins to do that before.
“That wound—he still
stands a chance to live, if you get him to a doctor soon.” Chance saw the look
that Junior gave him; he was weighing up the odds. “But I need a reason to let
you walk. Who hired you, Junior? Favor for favor.”
“The Old Man didn’t say
who the contractor was, but it’s someone close to Pucci.”
“Who?” Chance demanded,
as Guerrero struggled for breath.
“I don’t know,” Junior
yelled back at him, his attention fixed only on his partner.
Chance swore; he was
running out of options. His gaze fixed on the wounded man; he couldn’t let
someone die and not try to help them, even if it was Guerrero.
Chance saw the plastic
sheet that had been used to cover the furniture even as Junior tried to help
Guerrero’s breathing ease again. The older man shook his head; he couldn’t
believe he was going to do this. “I am going to cut us a square of that plastic
sheet, then we're going to seal it over the wound with the masking tape, but
leave one side free.” Chance worked quickly, thrust the plastic at Junior then
tossed the masking tape to the younger man. Stepping back as Junior worked, he
explained, “It works as flutter valve to allow the air to escape and so it
doesn’t get trapped in his chest, but at the same time stops him breathing
through the chest wound.” Junior finished quickly, then carefully sat back on
his heels, ready to act if Guerrero started struggling again, but this time his
partner was breathing easier.
Looking at Junior, Chance
shook his head slowly; the younger man was an assassin, at the top of his game,
but he wasn’t totally immoral—there was still something in him that could be
redeemed. Junior wasn’t willing to let his friend die; a lot of assassins would
never had surrendered their guns—they would have allowed their partner to die
rather than risk arrest. Junior had risked death and arrest for an animal like
Guerrero. If he had been anything but an assassin, Chance knew that he was
looking at a man that could finally take the mantel of Christopher Chance from
him.
“Get him out of here,
Junior.” Chance lowered his gun. “Next time you and he won’t walk away.”
Junior looked at him
carefully, as if weighing what he had said, and then lifted Guerrero up
carefully; the man might be smaller, but he was heavier than he looked, by the
effort that Junior put into it. At the door, Junior paused, not turning to look
at him, just staring ahead. “Why?”
“Because no one deserves
to die.” With those words ringing in his ears, Junior walked away. He had gone
after Pucci twice and failed both times; he wouldn’t go after him again.
continued in The Ryan Exchange Part Two
you might also like to read The Bogeyman Part One which has Ryan Exchange part one as its base.