Chase walked through the door of the Chief's office.
"What's the big deal?" He dropped into the chair in the corner. "You pulled me out of my Ikebana class, so this had better be important."
"Chase, you need to remember that I'm the boss here. I'll pull you out of whatever class I want to for any reason or no reason at all."
"Sure, Chief. So what is it? The Russians, the Chinese a terrorist network?"
"The British."
"I didn't think we were at war with the Brits."
"We aren't, yet, but they sent one of their fresh recruits over here to observe how we do things."
"Oh no," Chase jumped to his feet, but the hydraulics in the door slammed it shut. He turned back to the Chief. "I work alone, there's no way you're going to saddle me with some wet behind the ears kid."
"Flowers are really hard to come by in Antartica."
"What?"
"Mess this up, and that's where you will be spending the rest of your time until retirement." The Chief pushed the button to release the door. "Your partner is waiting out in the hall."
Chase fled through the door and was met by a young man dressed in sharply pressed trousers and a blazer with a crest on the pocket.
"So, what do I call you?"
"My name is James."
"OK Jimmy, the first thing we need to do is get you some real clothes." Chase walked down the hall to the duty desk.
"What have I drawn, Sam?"
"Surveillance job at the Cricket Club. You'll want to dress snappy, like the kid."
"Cricket Club?"
"I'll explain on the way, sir," James said. Chase glared at him but let him lead the way to the car.
"MI5 is recruiting awfully young these days," Chase said.
"I'm not MI5. MI5 doesn't know I exist."
"So who does know?"
"I'm not sure. I haven't been cleared for that level yet."
Chase rolled his eyes and pulled out into traffic. He had barely gone a block before he noticed that they had picked up a tail.
"Hold on Jim, this could get interesting." Chase began with a sudden right turn and a quick lane change to a left turn. The tail, a large black car followed smoothly. Chase made an illegal left turn onto a one way street and headed for the highway. Cars weaved and honked while the drivers flashed a multitude of rude signs. He pulled out onto the road leading to the ramp and was pleased to see that the black car had vanished.
"You might as well get on the freeway," James said, "We need to head south to the club."
The black car made a reappearance as Chase accelerated up the ramp.
"Blast," he muttered, "these guys know their business." He pushed the gas pedal down and took off with the other car in close pursuit.
"So where's the button for the rocket launchers?"
"What?"
"Rocket launchers, where's the launch button?"
"No rocket launchers."
"What about tail guns?"
"Nope."
"Oil slick?"
"Nope."
"Super-turbo boost?"
"Nope."
"So what can this car do?"
"It gets good gas mileage," Chase said, and slammed on the brakes. "and it stops really fast since I had the brakes done." The black car shot past them and Chase pulled out behind them.
"Shouldn't we shoot them or something?" James had a gun and was lowering the window.
"No, we shouldn't. What could we learn if we kill them?"
The younger man put his gun away and Chase was sure he was pouting. They followed the black car south until they were well out of town. Several time the other car tried to get behind them, but each time Chase would hit the brakes and stay back. The car finally took an exit ramp and began making what appeared to be random turns.
"Good, but not that good." Chase said. He pulled his car over to the side of the road and parked.
"What are you doing?" James said. "You just lost them?"
"No, I let them think that I lost them."
"So you put a GPS tracking button on them?"
"No GPS button," Chase said, "but there are only two ways to get out of that neighbourhood, and I happen to know that the other road is all torn up with construction. You watch, Jimmy, while I catch some shut eye."
"The name is James," the young man said, but Chase pretended he was already asleep and ignored him.
He was rudely awakened by a poke in the ribs.
"Here they come." Jimmy had his gun out again.
"Put that thing away before you shoot yourself, or worse, me."
Chase put the car in gear and, after a few other vehicles were between him and his quarry, pulled out to follow them. The black car drove without any extra turns or other precautions to a warehouse in a run-down neighbourhood.
"Do you have bullets for that pop gun?"
"Of course, and three extra clips."
"You might want to chamber a round then and follow me." Chase led the way along one wall, checking the doors and windows.
"I could climb the pipe up to that ledge and walk along to the open window."
"Why would you want to?" asked Chase.
"So I could get inside."
"The other side of that window is at least forty feet off the floor. Why you think they left it open?"
"That's OK," James said, "I'll use my watch."
"Your watch?'
"Yes, it has a micro-filament climbing wire in it. What does your watch do?"
"It tells time." Chase spotted what he was looking for. "Stay close." He sidled up to the door behind a pile of garbage and pulled out his lock pick.
"You ever done this, Jimmy?" he said, then looked around just in time to see the kid's feet disappear through the window. "Stupid kid," he muttered and picked the lock. He pushed the door open, and as he expected it was almost completely blocked by garbage on the inside. He slipped through the gap and listened.
He could hear the echo of several people walking around in the mostly empty warehouse space. No shouting yet which meant that they hadn't looked up yet. If the kid was lucky they would want to ask questions before they shot him.
Chase made his way through the shadows toward the open window. It was slow going edging around crates and avoiding the trash and less pleasant things between the crates and the wall. Most of the crates looked like they had sat there since Chase's grandfather's time, but one box was bright new wood shining in the sun. The writing on it looked like Parsi, but he couldn't be sure. The faint odour coming from the sun-warmed crate aroused his suspicions.
Before he could investigate further a burst of laughter came from just ahead. Chase lay down and chanced a look past this last crate. Jimmy's fancy watch had let him down, or rather it had failed to. He was gracefully twirling in mid air fifteen feet from the floor while a half dozen men watched. One was running up stairs at the far end to bang on a door. Chase recognized the man who came out. He was a broker who had more aliases than the Agency could list. He bought and sold everything from drugs to weapons to people. Wherever he went misery followed.
Chase didn't like him much.
The broker looked up at Jimmy hanging there and took a gun from one of the men who were standing around. He pointed the gun at the kid.
Chase didn't like the kid much either, but he hadn't done much more than annoy Chase. And there was always Antarctica. He sighed silently and shot the broker. Twice. Once in each arm. The men all scattered and went on high alert trying to track where the shots came from in the echoing building. Chase moved back several crates and found a gap. He slid through and shot a couple more of the men. He heard popping from where Jimmy was hanging. At least the kid was trying. The broker's men were starting to shoot now so it was easy enough to use the noise of gunfire to cover his rapid run to another spot where he could take down a few more men.
In a matter of minutes it was all over. Chase found a bin full of packing and pushed it under Jimmy. The kid dropped into it, then struggled out. Amazingly none of the bullets had hit him. Chase was fairly sure that none of his shots had hit their mark either, so maybe it came out even.
"Why did you shoot him?" James said. "He was just going to tell me everything."
"No, Jimmy, he was going to shoot you. The bad guys only brag in the movies." Chase nudged the broker with a foot. "I'll take him back to the Agency. Then he will tell us everything."
"I had everything under control."
"No, you made a mess of things, Jimmy, you're lucky you're not dead." Chase took a deep breath. "Why don't you just wait here and watch the bad guys."
"My name," said Jimmy through clenched teeth, "is James, James Bond."
"Sure, Jimmy," Chase said. He went over to free the contents of the crate. With an attitude like that, Chase thought, you're not going to go anywhere.