A/N: And we're back for the continuation of the ride! Huge thanks to all of you reviewers out there, some of the most enthusiastic responses I"ve ever gotten! Enjoy! -pj

By the way, my writing is inspired a lot by music and this fic is as well.

Title: Calling All Angels by Train
Ch1: Wreck of the Day by Anna Nalik
This Chapter: If I Die Young by The Band Perry

whimseyrhodes - You make me laugh. You make me cry. You have me compulsively checking my email every six minutes throughout the day...LYLAS!

Disclaimer: I forgot. My bad. Still, nothing mentioned here is mine. Not even whimseyrhodes. She is claimed by the furchins.

Chapter Two – If I Die Young

Sophie swallowed hard and blinked back tears. She never let her emotions get the better of her on a con.

But this wasn't just any con. There was much more than her rep and a few diamonds at stake this time. This time Eliot, one of her own, was the prize for a good performance.

She threw her hands in the air in frustration, "Are you kidding me? There's a man down there, alive. We need to get him out and I don't mean later!"

Roman Alvarez was red in the face, barely controlled rage vibrating through him. He was one man, dammit. The city was in shambles and he had almost a hundred firemen and police officers and engineers reporting to him, trying to organize a safe rescue effort. He was beyond stressed, hadn't had anything but coffee and gum since the quake and his cell phone hadn't stopped ringing.

And this government lap dog thought she could come down here and start calling shots?

He gripped his walkie talkie with white knuckles and took a step closer, sirens, crying and local media creating a symphony of chaos around them.

"There are hundreds of people trapped, ma'am. Now I don't know how things work at FEMA, but here I call the shots and we're just spread too thin right now to try looking for one man. Besides this building is unstable, it could come down any minute and I'm not going to risk more lives by sending guys in there before we're given the 'go ahead', he thrust a hand toward a white tent sitting a few yards away, "We've got engineers who are working as fast as they can to find a way to shore up the collapsed buildings. When they say it's safe, and only when they say, we'll start S&R." He was about to stalk away when he saw those were tears shining in the brunette's eyes and he paused.

Roman sighed, taking a deep breath as he ran a hand through his thinning grey hair and down over his face. His wife used to give him that look.

"Alright," he continued, his voice softening ever so slightly, "just tell me, how do you know this guy is down there?"

"He called me."

Alvarez narrowed his already small brown eyes and frowned, "you personally? Or this guy has FEMA's number on speed dial?"

Sophie's eyes widened, realizing her mistake, "well, I-"

"He's her brother. He was here on business," Parker jumped in for the first time. Sophie had told her once the best way to convince someone you weren't lying was to tell the truth, or as close to it as possible. She was pleased to see the tactic was probably working, as Alvarez stopped looking so suspicious and nodded in sympathy.

"I'll let you know as soon as we know something, okay?" He turned back toward the collapsed building looming in front of them, his radio up at his mouth as he barked out orders and asked for updates.

Less than two hours ago this structure had been a five story shopping mall and Eliot was inside casing the shady third floor jeweler with the 'not quite real' diamonds.

Now it was a barely two story pile of broken concrete and steel, still smoking from small fires that had been put out a few minutes before.

And somewhere, underneath it all, was Eliot. Alone and hurt. Maybe even…

Sophie didn't bother blinking back her tears this time.

oooOOOooo

Eliot's eyes flew open and his whole body went tense as a board.

His leg was on fire.

Immediately the pain was crashing into him, sharp and demanding and crushing every corner of his being so that he couldn't pinpoint where it originated. It seemed to emanate from outside, from all around him, folding him in suffocating, terrifying white agony until he couldn't breathe.

He tried to scream, find an outlet for the pain so that it would not kill him, but his throat was too raw for it to make any real noise. He found himself more frustrated by that than he was frightened.

After a few seconds of trying not to gasp or move, Eliot closed his eyes pushing the pain back and far enough away to allow his brain to form thoughts more complex than hell ouch hurts fuck need ouch ouch fuck.

The air was thick with dirt and dust in near darkness that seemed to be rushing at him from the same place as the pain. The stench of sweat and blood was thicker than before, as if the air had just settled there around him instead of moving on and allowing fresh air to take it's place. He could feel the desperation and decay coating his skin, settling heavy on his tongue, and taste it sliding back in his throat.

Eliot barely had time to turn his head to keep from choking on his own vomit as the panic clashed violently with his rolling stomach.

Immediately after he turned his face away and closed his eyes. The smell of the mess he'd just made mingled with the stagnant air of his small Cubby Hole of Hell and he swallowed convulsively to keep from having a repeat performance.

He was able to take exactly two deep breaths before sound suddenly dropped back in, bringing him fully out of the haze, and he realized his headache was concentrated on his right side.

He coughed. "I'm back Nate, you can quit yellin'."

It came out as a whisper but the collective sigh of relief in his ear told him he'd been heard.

~Eliot. It's good to hear your voice.~ Nate sounded tired and hoarse.

A chorus from the team agreed with Nate's statement and Eliot grunted in response, focusing on breathing through another bout of nausea.

"When can I get out of here, Nate?" He asked after a moment, and stayed silent while he was updated on what the team was doing to rescue him.

His usually unflappable focus seemed to have taken the day off and he found his thoughts wandering away from Nate's voice and toward what his brain apparently felt were more pressing matters. Namely, a more clinical assessment of his injuries, since pain leg pain hand pain head pain everywhere was not telling him much.

Eliot was coherent enough now to know he hadn't been before, so a fairy severe concussion was a given. His left hand arm, so he didn't bother it and used his good one to feel down his body, looking for signs of internal bleeding or infection.

A row of cracked ribs adorned his left side, damage to his pelvis though he couldn't be more specific from this prone position, bruising his daddy would have been proud of all over and dried blood around his 'leg wound'. A dangerous amount of dried blood.

He grunted, unhappy at that realization and turned his attention to his left hand. Using his right, he carefully lifted the unresponsive limb into what little light he had filtering in from the hole above his head.

The entire hand, from wrist to fingertips was swollen to the point of immobility, turning interesting shades of red and purple. It had obviously been crushed under something during the quake and he'd be ecstatic if there were any bones still intact there. Eliot's brow was furrowed in concentration as he carefully tucked his hand into his shirt, cradling it protectively against his chest. Outside, a cloud passed over the sun, lowering the light around him considerably and Eliot closed his eyes against the darkness pushing in on him, refocusing on Nate's voice.

"Yeah Nate, I'm still here," he sighed, "I was just a little…distracted."

There was a pause over the coms.

~How bad?~ Nate asked solemnly.

Eliot just grunted, not seeing what good detailing his laundry list of injuries over the open com, where the rest of the team was undoubtedly listening, would do him.

Nate seemed to understand his reluctance to answer and didn't push.

~Okay. I need you to keep talking, Eliot. I need you to stay awake.~

Eliot shook his head minutely, feeling the world swim even from that small movement.

"I'll try. No promises though."

~Yeah.~ Came Nate's quiet response and Eliot could almost see him lifting a glass of Bourbon to his lips for a drink.

~Sophie and I are out here Eliot.~ Parker's voice suddenly rang out in his head. ~We're coming for you. Just hang on, Sparky.~

~And I'm gonna have a Med Evac Chopper standing by to airlift you out of there as soon as they get you out, okay?~ Hardison promised.

Eliot sighed and nodded his thanks, aware that no one could see him.

"So what do ya'll want me to talk about?"

oooOOOooo

"Eliot?" Nate said loudly, causing Hardison to jump, "c'mon now. What happened next?"

~Uh – um where was I?~ Eliot's groggy voice came across the line. Nate and Hardison exchanged a worried glance.

"Wyoming," Nate prompted, his empty tumbler clutched firmly between his hands where he sat next to Hardison at the table, "you drew a bull no one could ride."

~Oh. Right~ Eliot responded slowly.

Nate got up to pace away some of his nervous energy. Eliot had been growing quieter over the last few minutes and the pauses between phrases were getting progressively longer.

"Stay with me Eliot. Talk."

Suddenly Hardison cursed and Nate whirled around to see the hacker standing, staring at the TV as the building Eliot was trapped in shifted with the roll of a small aftershock, allowing a few tons of brick to fall further down into the rubble.

"Fuck," Nate whispered.

oooOOOooo

"Fuck!" Eliot roared as the heavy wooden beam that had been propped precariously over him moved and dislodged. It feel right over him, pressing across his chest and pinning his crushed hand, though that was the least of his worries.

In a panic Eliot tried to push the beam off him, kicking out his legs for leverage. The movement pulled at injuries he hadn't even known about and sent shooting white pain up from the ones he did and he was on fire again, sweat pouring down his face and back from the exertion.

But it was no use. The beam would not budge. Eliot could feel it slowly crushing him, grinding his already broken ribs further into one another and constricting what little lung movement he'd had even as the last of his outside light faded.

"Nate," he gasped, his blood pumping so hard he couldn't hear the mastermind's response, "I can't breathe, Nate. It's too dark and I can't breathe."

TBC - *gasp* What did I just do? *smacks hand* Bad fic writer. Bad! *Hugs Eliot* I sowy...*grins maniacally*...kinda...