Epilogue

Grand Inquisitor Lee Gibbs looks at the bloody gold banded black cover in the woman's hand. The underside of the polished bill is covered with blood, the back rim soaked with blood and worse.

"She took Miriam Goldbloom to the diner. I followed and executed them. She was working for them, which is why we never got anything on the railroad. After she was dead, someone came to collect them. She was going to defect, betray INCIS. Who knows what secrets she carried to the grave?"

"Did you take this other?"

She reaches into her pocket, pulls out an Imperial ID chit. "He tried to shoot his way out. After having to kill my best friend I wasn't in the mood." She hands over the chit.

Gibbs inserts it into a slot on his desk. The plasma screen on the left wall turns on, showing the weathered face of a grey haired man. "Old enough to know better," he observes.

The name beside the picture is Michael Franks.

"You did well." Gibbs tells her.

"Thank you, sir."

"With this information we come one step closer to wiping out the railroad. Excellent work."

"Thank you, sir."

"This Operation is Classified Alpha One. David was never here, Goldbloom was never here. Mossad never came."

"I understand, sir."

"We helped the Mossad dispose of a very inconvenient traitor, and they're grateful. You'll see some material indications of that gratitude."

"Thank you, sir."

"I did offer it, and a deal is a deal. I do need a Deputy Grand Inquisitor. As of now, you're it."

"Sir, thank you sir!"

He rises. "Situation briefing at 0800 tomorrow."

She salutes sharply, her fist punching the air before him. "Long live the Empire."

He returns the salute as sharply. "Long live the Empire."

x

Taking the bloody cover with her she exits the offices, ignoring Sumner and the two armored guards. In the outer hall, Jennifer Shepherd stops, looking at the gold trimmed hat in her hands and reflecting upon her friend and the capriciousness of fate.

Michael is safe, beneficiary of the same railroad he conducts. That safe spot and the railroad it commences are abandoned and the path realigned.

Jennifer knows she's not safe; no one in the Empire is ever wholly safe, but her position is now vastly changed. She is now Second to the Grand Inquisitor of INCIS.

Gibbs is good, vastly good, intelligent and resourceful, but he's not superhuman. And despite how lucky she's been in manipulating the circumstances, neither of them is infallible.

For now she and Gibbs stand at the pinnacle. She knows he doesn't trust her, and she will never trust him. In INCIS no one ever fully trusts anyone.

As Deputy Grand she'll have the power and position to help the Brotherhood far more effectively than in the past. She wishes McGee and Palmer - and O'Mallory, their final charge - could have lived until she was in this position where she could've helped them. Maybe in the future she can do something effective enough to make their deaths meaningful.

For the moment she's safe. Kait Todd bears her guilt and Gibbs doesn't suspect her.

She vows to be very careful. If she lives she knows the day will come when Gibbs will become too confident.

Gibbs will make a mistake.

And that will be the end of Gibbs.

Or of her.