CHAPTER 1

Tires squealed as a red Corvette came barreling down the street, narrowly missing an expensive sports coupe as it continued down the road then skidded around a corner. Six police cars, lights flashing and sirens blaring, followed in pursuit. Leaving the residential area, the leading car disappeared into a tunnel ten minutes later. The police helicopter continued to hover over the tunnel in await for the Corvette, but it never reappeared. The patrol cars also entered the tunnel, but failed to exit the other side without their objective.

"You still watching that?" String asked his surrogate father as he reached for his jacket. "You know, we closed an hour ago." The weather's supposed to get pretty nasty tonight too. If you don't get going soon you're likely to get snowed in," he teased.

Dom wasn't likely to get snowed it anytime soon, but he personally didn't see much point in watching an idiot run from the cops until he ran out of gas or finally gave up. He, on the other hand, needed to get a move on before the visibility decreased any more. Landing on the dock with thirty mile an hour gusts wasn't the most fun.

"Alright, I"m going," Dom replied, clicking the tv set off. "Whoever it was probably gave up inside the tunnel anyway, that or finally ran into another vehicle. They've had so many near misses in the last two hours I'm amazed they haven't hit anything before now." He picked up the keys then reached for his own coat. "You gonna be alright flying out there tonight?

"Made it this morning."

"I know, but if you wanted to wait more than two days it wouldn't be a bad thing and I don't mind."

"I know, and I appreciate it, but I'll be okay."

"See you in the morning then. Assuming the weather is good enough. I don't want you or that bird out tomorrow if the weather is bad."

"I understand," he answered, feeling like he was a kid again getting his first flight lessons. "Goodnight, Dom."

\A/

"What did you expect? You should know better than to come back. Now I finished what I should have years ago. Piece by piece."

What was he supposed to say to that? He tried to think about something else, but the only hing he could think of was being an eighteen year old kid stuck with this psycho and hurting more than he had ever before and knowing his chances of surviving or getting away were getting smaller every day. He was older now and that psycho now spoke a little English, those were the only differences.

Another angry fist landed in his midsection and he could almost hear his ribs cracking.

"I say answer me! Why return?"

"I just wanted to come back and see how some of my old friends were," he mocked sarcastically, knowing it would earn him another blow. He just hoped it would hard enough to knock him out and end the pain.

Nguyen van Long delivered a fierce blow across the back of his head, one that would hurt plenty when he woke up, but finally everything faded into a painless darkness.

He was only half awake, but his head was already pounding and his ribs hurt even more. At some point during his restless tossing and turning he had rolled over onto his stomach, something he needed to remedy immediately.

As he started to ease back over the other way he realized it was going to get worse before it got better. It wasn't going to get better where he was though, so he figured he would just get it over with. He let out an unsuppressed groan of pain as he rolled over and struggled out of the bed. Now he just had to make it down the stairs and to the kitchen. Joy... Sighing, he picked up his pillow and tucked it under his arm. He wasn't coming back up here tonight, that much was for sure.

\A/

The next morning he was still trying to decide whether or not going up to the hangar was a good idea, but when he stepped outside he realized the decision had already been made for him.

A heavy blanket of fresh snow covered the ground and more continued to fall, covering every imaginable surface. The soft white blanket made a picture-perfect scene, but was hardly decent flying weather especially if he wasn't at his best. Dom wouldn't want him flying in with the possibility of it getting worse at any minute, and he wasn't going to argue today.

He retreated back into the warmth of the cabin and threw another log on the fire. Selecting a book off the bookcase, he sat in the chair closest to the hearth, Tet lying at his feet. He reached down the scratch the dog's head, but couldn't find the setting as perfect as he had hoped. He wanted to get back to work at the hangar, wanted to have Le back with him as originally planned, wanted someone to talk to.

Typically he could spend days, if not weeks, alone at the cabin and be perfectly content, but since his latest excursion things had been different.

The dreaded nightmares resurfaced, and he never seemed to be at ease when he was on his own. He constantly felt like he needed to be on the move and whenever possible take backup with hi, He wouldn't sit near the windows or doors and lately his .45 rarely left his side. Quite frankly, it scared him.

He tried to blame it on the medicine or Long's mistreatment, but he had only been with him for a few hours. He feared it was more of a combination of old memories and Long's threat to return. Whatever the cause, he needed to shake it; it wasn't good for him to constantly be worried about it, and he needed to rest and recuperate so he would be ready if Long did resurface.

He continued to sit in the chair tapping his foot tensely, watching as if someone was about to break in at any moment. He hadn't slept well for the last two days because of this restless paranoia, and the less he slept the worse it got. He really needed to do something about this unresolved matter. But what? Why couldn't all the missions be cut and dry – take Airwolf, blow up the baddie, go home?

Suddenly an even more disconcerting thought occurred to him. According to Lexa, that's all there was. She didn't believe all the other details were important, including how or why she did the things she did. It was just do it and get it done. And he had accused her of being the crazy one! At least she was willing to own up to it.

One way or another, this had to go away. He picked up the unopened prescription bottle of Sonata. He wasn't a big fan of medicine of any kind, sleeping pills even less so, but if it would take away this problem it had to be worth it.

He took one pill with a glass of water and started back up the stairs to the loft. He was going to get a good eight hours of uninterrupted sleep and move past this. At least he hoped that was all he needed.