Author's Note::

This story intends absolutely NO disrespect to the truly fine men and women who do their job as police officers out there every day. It's just that I got an idea from a picture I saw the other day. It was a behind the scenes shot of TC during the bridge scene of MI3. He was wearing his black jeans, black shirt and the brown jacket, zipped open. He was standing with his arms up, gesturing, probably telling someone 'I would like this to look like THIS.' But from another perspective, it could have also looked like ETHAN was standing with his hands up, placating someone who was about to draw a gun on him.

Which got me thinking...and it set the tone for the story.

Summary: After a successfully completed mission, sometimes the deadliest part of the road still lies before you…

Roadkill

He should have known the day wasn't over yet.

It had been one hell of a long mission. Followed by an even more extensive debriefing session at IMF headquarters. And then – to top things off – he had been asked to give another personal report to the Secretary himself.

By the time Ethan had gotten out of the building, his team had gone home and was probably long asleep. It was already dark outside. With any luck, he'd be home before midnight.

That is, if that sound behind him didn't mean what he thought it meant.

"Oh not you, too…" Ethan groaned, almost sure now that some kind of gigantic cosmic joke was being played on him.

"Please, pull past me, please," he groaned in denial as he slowly took the foot off the accelerator of his Mustang, hoping against hope that he was wrong.

But he had heard right. The short whup whup of a police cruiser siren lit up the night behind him once more.

"You gotta be kidding me…" Ethan shook his head in disbelieve.

He hadn't been speeding. His beloved dark-green Mustang certainly wasn't stolen, either. And having the best IMF mechanics at his disposal at all times, he also knew that the car was in top condition. It had to be, considering his line of duty. He always made sure of it.

So, for the life of him, he had no idea why they were pulling him over.

But they would probably tell him in a minute.

And then they'd better just let him go on his way. All he wanted was to get home and fall into bed.

So. Let's get this over with.

As he pulled over on the curb of the otherwise empty side street, he could see the two cops step out of their cruiser, and as he waited with his right hand comfortably resting on the steering wheel and his left in the open window, he saw them approach his car from behind. One of them lagged a little behind his partner, staying to Ethan's passenger side. The other officer came up to his window.

"Good, evening sir. Can you show us your license and registration, please?"

Not knowing what they were looking for, but figuring that if he just let them do their stuff, he'd be out of here faster, he simply fished out the documents from his pocket and handed them over.

The cop on his driver's side then concentrated on the papers, while his colleague shone his flashlight into the car and at Ethan through the passenger window.

"We pulled you over because you were speeding, Sir. I'm afraid we'll have to give you a ticket. It's gonna cost you a little, Sir."

What?

Hang on a second…

"Excuse me?" Ethan reacted. He was tired, but his mind was now starting to focus on what the officer had said. And frankly, he wasn't sure he had heard right.

The second cop had meanwhile walked from Ethan's open window to the backdoor right behind Ethan, where he opened it without even asking Ethan for permission.

"Hey, Jimmy, I think I also see some illegal substances on the backseat," the officer called over to his colleague – and then he threw a tiny bag of what looked like white powder onto the backseat.

"Yeah, Mike, I think we got ourselves a felon here. Let's see what he has to say for himself."

The cop at the passenger window of Ethan's car was now smiling, and took in Ethan's frown with a smug look.

"Sir, would you care to explain what those drugs are doing in your car? And why you were trying to race away from us? You know that's gonna cost you, right?"

Ethan's frown turned into a look of realization, as it dawned on him what was really going on.

'Dirty cops.'

These two were obviously trying to fill their quota, and their wallets, by framing innocents. And with most people – particularly those who didn't dare speak up against two burly officers – it probably even worked.

"Why do I have to get these bozos?' Ethan thought with a sigh.

Alright, time to show them that they had gotten the wrong target to play catch with tonight.

"Listen, officers," and he made sure to put an emphasis on the second word, to show them they didn't really deserve to be called by that title, "I think I can see where you're going with this, so I suggest – in the interest of both our evenings – that you put that bag back where it came from before I start thinking about filing a complaint against you, for falsely pulling me over for speeding when clearly I wasn't."

Ethan's tone would have made everyone who knew him take a large step backwards, wish him a good day and stay perfectly clear off him for the rest of the year, preferably on another continent.

Benji had been on the receiving end of this tone once, when he had managed to damage Ethan's favorite jazz LP in an accident involving popcorn, the kitchen stove and lots of panic on Benji's behalf. Ethan had not been happy. So, had Benji been here now, he could have emphatically testified to the fact that Ethan was well on his way to getting seriously pissed off.

These two rotten apples, however, either didn't realize they were playing with fire, or they simply didn't think that Ethan was a match for them.

"I'm afraid that we'll have to disagree with that, Sir. And if you wanna avoid some serious trouble with us, I suggest we better talk about how high a fine you're willing to pay to us for getting this taken care of right here and right now." The officer smoothly looked around to make sure there were still no other cars or pedestrians nearby. Then he leaned down slightly, also lowering his voice as he addressed Ethan once more: "And don't worry about filing any complaints." The man smiled darkly. "We are officers of the state. So our word will outweigh any complaint you might feel like filing."

Ethan almost said out loud 'Wanna bet on that?', but he caught himself just in time. No need to give them a clue as to his real profession. He could handle these two without them finding out there even was such a thing as an 'IMF agent".

The second officer, on the passenger side of the car, was now shining his flashlight right into Ethan's face, blinding him on purpose.

"You wanna avoid serious trouble, boy, I suggest you step out of this car now, and you hand over some cash…"

Ethan closed his eyes for a second. It was late. It was dark. His plan had been to go home, go to bed and get some sleep. Not this. In fact, the mere idea of getting out of his comfortable car in this section of the city was very, very low on his list of things he wanted to do at this moment.

But seeing as he obviously needed to give these two 'officers' a more detailed explanation of how they were very much barking up the wrong tree, Ethan slowly unbuckled his seatbelt to comply with their order to get out.

"Alright, let me rephrase this in a way that even you will understand." Ethan said as he opened the driver's door and slid out of his seat, using one hand as leverage on the steering wheel and the other on the door frame to pull himself up. As he got out, he took care not to make any fast moves, keeping his hands slightly raised and visible at all times.

But he never even thought twice about the way his jacket moved as he got out.

If he had, he might have been prepared.

But he wasn't.

He had just put one foot on the ground, and was about to fully straighten up, when the one officer noticed the slight bulge under the right side of Ethan's jacket, where the elbow met the ribs. Whatever was under the jacket was still fully covered, but the shape was there.

Instinctively, the officer - no matter how rotten he was in the rest of his duties - yelled at his partner to warn him:

"Gun!"

Ethan was a trained agent. He was fast. But, taking into consideration the long day he had had, he was a second too slow to understand that the gun in question here was the same one that was safely holstered under his jacket.

By the time Ethan noticed his mistake, the second officer had already drawn his gun…and fired.

At first, Ethan didn't feel anything wrong.

Then there was a strange weakness in his left side. Like he had slept on it wrong. As he looked down, he saw a hole in his jacket, also in his shirt, just beneath his rib line. He saw it, he just couldn't feel it…yet.

But as he was about to wonder why he wasn't feeling anything – the pain came. And it came on full force. Like a kick to the gut, only a thousand times worse.

He felt his feet go out from under himself as he collapsed, his body falling sideways against his car. His arm struck on the open car door, and then he slid down against it to the ground. He came to lie on his left side, his head on the ground, and his eyes reacting sluggishly in surprise and shock.

His mouth was open, moving slightly, but no words were coming out.

"Shit! You shot him!"

"Damn it…he had a gun… the guy had a gun!" the first officer looked in panic at his partner, refusing to take any blame for what he'd done, "…he was gonna go for it! You saw him! He was gonna go for it!"

"Jes-.. This could become messy, man…," the other officer took a closer look at the fallen man on the ground, before addressing his partner once more, "You know that if he tells anyone what happened, we could be in trouble, right? Even if nobody's gonna believe him, but there's gonna be an investigation – shit, this was only supposed to work when they paid up and shut their mouth! But this is fucked up, man…this is bad…"

"Okay. Okay, calm down, man. We gotta…we gotta think…let's say we make it look like he really was going for his gun…. Aw shit…you're right… they're gonna check everything…we can't risk that. We can't risk it!"

"Let's get rid of him. Make it look like a gang shooting. We were never here… people die in this part of the city every day. This one won't be any different. Just look at the car. He's probably some hotshot single, nobody's waiting at home for that guy. And even if there is, so what. If he's dead, he can't tell anybody what happened. And we're wearing gloves, they can't trace us!"

"Yeah….yeah, that could work." the first officer warmed up to his partner's idea, and quickly looked around himself once more, to make sure they still hadn't been noticed, before he said, "Alright, let's do this."

Immediately, they began moving. One of them stepped around the open driver's door to open the door in the back. He quickly grabbed the small cocaine bag from the backseat, pocketing it, so as not to leave any evidence of their presence behind. Meanwhile, his partner knelt down next to the man on the ground, careful to avoid the growing puddle of blood spreading slowly on the concrete.

With a none-too-gentle move, he put the driver's license and registration back into the bleeding man's back pocket, giving him a last once-over before getting up again to see if they had missed anything else. But they were clean. Nobody had seen them. And a single shot in the night was nothing to be remembered, certainly not at this time of day and in this part of the city.

So as both officers took one more look at the bleeding man lying next to his car, they quickly re-holstered their guns and hurriedly moved back to their police cruiser. Once they were back in their car, they reported back to the station that they were now on the clock again after their midnight snack break. Then they took off without sirens or lights, not drawing any further attention to themselves until they were well out of sight.

No one would make the connection.

The guy they had shot would just die.

And nobody would ever know.

-o-o-o-o-o-

Don't worry, this is just the beginning…

Consider it an appetizer. More to come, soon. Feedback will help. :o)