13. Reckoning

Complete story — includes the ending

Following Sonya's death, Michael and his team flee from both law enforcement and James' organization, when taking James out becomes their only viable option. The rest of the team kidnaps a communications engineer ( Alan Ruck ) who helped James receive and transmit encrypted information from a satellite dish on top of an abandoned building. Jesse hides with Charlie from James' hit squad when they are ordered to kill Madeline and Charlie. Madeline sacrifices herself when detonating a C-4 bomb, destroying the safe house and 3 assassins, giving Jesse time to kill another 2 assassins. Michael's team retrieves the hard drive for the CIA and takes out James and his squad despite running out of ammo. Mortally wounded, James destroys the entire building when he activates a dead-man device, presumably killing Michael and Fiona. Some time later, Sam and Jesse take the hard drive to Strong, and its information allows the capture of more than 100 dangerous terrorists. Strong declines to prosecute their crimes while rewarding Michael with his CIA star. Sam and Jesse decide to continue Michael's work of helping people with tough problems. In the final scene in an unspecified location, Michael asks Fiona what to tell Charlie when he asks future questions about their tumultuous life, she tells him to start at the beginning with: "My name is Michael Westen. I used to be a spy..."