As Mac was slammed into the shipping container for about the fifth time, he had the fleeting thought that he wanted one – just one, mind you- boring day where everything went according to plan. This mission had been a string of several days where absolutely nothing had, from the moment he'd gotten up at home to discover he's forgotten to set the timer on his coffee maker, to his bike developing a spark knock on the way in to work, to his key card somehow having gotten demagnetized and having to wait for Jack, to Matty being so snarky with the team it felt like the bad old days when she'd started with them months ago. Now this.
The concept of an electromagnetic pulse device wasn't exactly new, but the one this small but well-funded group was trying to sell to the North Koreans was extremely compact and efficient. Purportedly better tech than even DARPA had yet to lay eyes on. And Matty wanted it.
To be fair, she also wanted it to not make it to its destination, but she had been pretty clear that making it home with the device would equal happy Matty, coming home without it, even if that served the greater good, would resort in some sort of creative punishment.
The last time they had "disappointed her", it had been two weeks of recruit evaluations. Not the fun, take them into the field and see what they've got kind; the sit in Mac's office and read their files and sort through them based on a highly subjective checklist developed by Matty kind. Mac had been ready to quit and go work at the special effects company Bozer was still scheming about starting and Jack had asked, only half joking, if they'd considered adding a stunt division.
Jack was getting tired. Mac could tell. He complained at the team when he was tired. It was stressing Riley out at least as much as trying to complete the mission, which had been bad enough when they'd been on the ground, but now with the added fun of being at cruising altitude with the cargo door still open, now had the added element of no one wanting to fall forty thousand feet or so to their deaths.
Mac very helpfully didn't point out that they'd probably freeze or suffocate before they hit the ground. He didn't think anyone else would appreciate the information, although it did make him feel oddly better about it. Fed up with getting chewed out over the comms, slammed into the fuselage by the bad guys, and listening to Riley and Jack bicker like they always did, Mac quickly decided on a solution to get rid of the bad guys. If the EMP device got yanked out, so be it, he thought grumpily as he was slammed against the cargo crate again.
A few quick efficient maneuvers later and the bad guys were pulled out of the plane by the force of the cargo crate and its parachute. Unfortunately, one of the guys was apparently as quick a thinker as Mac. And he not only avoided going off the plane, but picked up the EMP device, just as quick as a hiccough, and was looking around, assessing his options.
If Jack's gun hadn't been knocked away in the fight, they'd have had no problem; wouldn't have even needed to worry about depressurization because the door was already open. But Jack had lost his main piece early in the struggle and his back-up a couple of minutes ago. Mac knew because Jack swore as the guy he was fighting with kicked it and he saw it go skittering out the door.
When Riley saw Jack's gun on the ground, instinct and training had it in her hands before thought had even caught up to what she was doing. Once her mind caught up though, once she processed the weight of the weapon in her hands, the flashbacks she'd been having for weeks burned behind her eyes. Mac knew the look, intimately. So did Jack. Both encouraged her with level voices to finish the job. Jack could see there was no way she was going to be able to follow through. He'd been afraid of this, had said so more than once. Mac had practically made him swear on his father's grave that he wouldn't say so out loud to Riley and shake her confidence. Mac had hoped all that time resting and looking out for Bozer would have been as healing for her mentally as it had been for Boze physically.
As Mac watched the last parachute leave the plane with the guy who was probably going to be very rich by sunrise tomorrow, and felt the aircraft pitch with the loss of power, his first thought, before his brain started trying to figure out how to get them out of this was that if they made it out of this alive, was that Jack had probably been right. If they made it out alive, the next job would be getting her past it. He vaguely hoped another mission would come their way before too long. It's what had gotten Mac past it the first time he'd choked in the field.
They all felt the plane slip just a little more. The EMP had also knocked out their comms, their phones, and any other means of possibly getting help. So Mac was more than a little surprised when he glanced at Jack and saw his partner starting to grin one of his crazy I'm about to do something stupid and I think it might be kinda fun grins. "What're you thinking Jack?" Mac asked, an almost warning tone in his voice.
Jack waved them toward the cockpit. "I have always, my whole life wanted to try a deadstick landing!"
"You think we've got a good location?" Mac asked, half-hopefully.
Jack grinned again. "All kinds of farmland 'round here. Some water. I think I can bring her in, more or less in one piece."
"Great," Mac groaned. He just had to add the more or less.
Riley began to ask, her voice still shaking, "What's a dead stick ...?"
Mac shook his head. "You really don't want to know. You ride co-pilot and do what he tells you. I'm gonna see if I can get the landing gear down manually."