Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS LA or any of its characters. This goes for all chapters

Thank you to my reviewers, SilverSentinal21 and justdreaming-83

2 hours later

Callen gasped for breath as he fought his dizziness. The burning in his back pain caused spots to dance in front of his eyes, as he lay sprawled on his stomach across the floor of the cell. He didn't know how long it took, but he eventually managed to push himself into a sitting position. He thought about Isabella remembering their earlier conversation. She had frowned more than smiled, deflected all his questions deftly, like any top operative and had sat as far away from him as possible.

He looked around the cell he was sitting in, eyes darting around, taking in everything. There were no windows, so no way to tell the time. When he was able to make himself move again, Callen began to crawl around the cell, knocking on different spots on the walls, testing their solidity. He clenched his fists and hissed in frustration as he realized that they were reinforced concrete walls, impossible to break even when he was in top shape, let alone in this mess he was in now. Finally, the pain became too much and he slumped down onto the icy cold floor. Feeling like punching the walls, he couldn't fight the memories of his interrogation.

"Tell me about your latest cases." The captor ordered in a malicious tone. He prowled across the room as he bore his eyes into Callen's. The captor slowly moved behind Callen, staying quiet, with a twisted smile that didn't reach his eyes. Callen hated not knowing what was happening behind him. He twisted his body as much as he could to one side, straining to see what was going on. He gave up with a grunt as he realized that he was too tightly cuffed to be able to turn around enough to see anything.

Suddenly, Callen heard the whistling of the whip as it flashed through the air. He arched his back as the shock of the blow hit him,

"No" Callen said, jutting his chin out.

"Your latest cases." The captor repeated.

"No!" Callen forced out between gasps, pain evident in his voice.

The captor lashed the whip forward, contacting with flesh in a sickening sound, creating horrible cross patterns across Callen's back.

"So, your latest case, did it have terrorists in it? Crazy bomb makers? Drug dealers?

The answer was on the tip of Callen's tongue, in the front of his mind. It would be so easy to answer, but he couldn't. His primal instincts and sense of duty clashed with each other as the pain seared through his body. Grinding his teeth, he said:

"Oh yeah, all three, plus a couple of child traffickers, corrupt cops, and mass murderers."

The captor's eyes darkened with anger as he pushed his whole body forward into the next lash, ripping apart skin and causing more blood to flow. He bit his lip and stayed silent, not really trusting himself enough to make another sarcastic remark without giving everything away. It wouldn't hurt a dark side of him argued. It's just one case, and it wasn't even a really important one. But still he stayed silent. He had sworn in the beginning he wouldn't give anything away, and he wasn't going to go down with so little of a fight.

The whipping continued. The captor kept silent for a while. Lash 5…6…7…8…Callen counted mentally. At the ninth lash, the captor spoke again, with a tinge of amusement in his voice, "Oh Agent Callen, need I ask more probing questions? You know what I want, you know what to do."

Pain smoldered behind Callen's eyes. As the tenthth lash came down, Callen's knees buckled and his face twisted in pain. His body began involuntarily shivering from shock and pain. Wooziness took over him and he vaguely heard the captor swear before getting dragged into his cell.

Isabella P.O.V.

Isabella stared into the captor's black eyes. They seemed to echo the black pool of water in the corner of the room, dangerous, but cool and collected. She squared her jaw as she glared at him, determined to not make this easy for him.

She tried to read his eyes, in order to understand what he was thinking. Don't give in, she reminded herself. Giving in will be like killing yourself.

Suddenly she was pushed over to the corner and her head was pushed down underwater, the captor's hands roughly tearing at her hair. In panic, she accidentally let go of some precious air and watched as the bubbles slowly gurgled to the surface. In the rational part of her mind, she knew how she would have three minuets before permanent brain damage set in. But the other part of her simply panicked, resisting desperately, until finally the pressure disappeared and she surfaced, sucking in deep breathes of air. She saw the captor approach her and instinctively tried to shrink away as he reached out with a long, dark baton with electrodes sparking at the end. As the captor jabbed it into her skin, her muscles convulsed and pain reverberated through her body. Before she had a chance to recover, her head was shoved down again. She could hear the voce of the captor, muted through the water, counting down. 1 minuet, 59 seconds, 58 seconds, 57…each second lasted a lifetime as everything slowed down. She wondered why she had never written the kind of letter that would be opened after her death. She guessed it was because she believed that if you had something to say, say it while you're living. But still, she had never properly thanked her teammates, her partner, all the people who worked alongside her everyday, serving their country, risking their lives, risking this kind of situation happening. Stop it Isabella, you're going crazy." When she was finally pulled up again she heard the captor saying

"Well, well. You know, drowning is a rather precise method of torture. It deals with fear rather than pain. I thought I'd try this with you, see how it worked…"

The words didn't register in her mind as the baton was swiped across her skin and she became paralyzed for a moment. Then down again. It was like living her own worst nightmare over and over again. A nightmare she had tried so hard to forget. No, don't think about that. On and on it went. Up. Zap. Drown. Up. Zap. Drown.

Callen opened his eyes and made the effort to sit up when Isabella was thrown back into their cell. The movement caused the pain to flare up again but he struggled against it, his concern for Isabella fueling his determination Isabella immediately half faced away from him, sitting with her knees to her chest, hands wrapped around her knees, shoulder hunched. "Hey, how's it going?" he asked.

"Great! Missed your sunny smile." Isabella answered, trying desperately to smile, and sound carefree.

Callen smirked, remembering something similar he had once said to Hetty. "You see any ways we can get out of here?" he asked her, careful not to mention the interrogation just yet.

"Yeah. But they all involve getting a gun, which I don't see happening."

Callen took a deep breath, burying the fiery pain and preparing himself for this task he knew he had to do. He normally wasn't one to say things like this but it had to be done for the good of the both.

"Isabella," He said gently, "Look, being trapped in here is going to suck, alright? But, believe me, they'll be even harder if you keep your guard up not just against the captor, but in here as well."

Isabella turned to glare at him, eyes angry and flashing: "So you're asking me to trust you? To let my guard down? As if yours hasn't been up all this time, to!" she practically snarled.

Callen recoiled, He hadn't even realized he was doing it, but she was right. "I am sorry about that," he said honestly. He paused for a second, "You okay?"

Isabella looked slightly surprised at this sudden change of subject. "Well, I could be better," She grudgingly admitted.

It wasn't a completely honest answer, but it was better than the abrupt answers earlier on. A thought suddenly hit her as she turned to face Callen.

Shoot, she thought, how could I be so stupid? Here he was asking after her and she didn't even know how his wounds were looking. True, he wasn't showing any extreme signs of pain, but being a trained federal agent, she knew better than that.

"Let me see your back," She ordered, grabbing the medical kit the captor had thrown in after her and not really caring if she sounded rude.

Callen raised an eyebrow but turned. Isabella examined the wounds. This was going to hurt him, but it would go faster if she could keep him calm and still. Talking to him might help. She began to talk as she tore open the package of the first wipes and started to clean the wounds. "Right well, this is going to sting."

Callen laughed: "That's like when doctors say you'll feel a little pinch, then cut open a huge hole in you."

"Sounds like you have quite some experience with doctors." Isabella said, as she smiled, remembering her own experiences with various doctors.

"Yeah. My doctor, Doctor Richardson told me I'm under strict orders not to let him see me in a hospital for at least two more months."

Isabella laughed, "That's pretty impossible!"

"абсолютно правильно" (Absolutely correct)

"Russian?" Isabella raised her eyebrows, surprised. "How did you learn that?"

"A little girl in a foster home taught me," Callen replied softly. A shield passed over his face and he leaned back slightly away from Isabella.

She wasn't sure how to reply, so she didn't, instead just concentrating on cleaning the last wound. When she was done, she gently took him by the shoulders and spun him around. As much as she didn't want to admit it, he was right. It would be a lot easier for the captor to break them if they were tense 24/7. Well, she wasn't going to get sucked into the captor's little game.

"I have some bad childhood memories about drowning. My parents often sent me off to my grandmother, and she was horribly strict. Do anything wrong and she'd stick my head underwater for ages. I can control my fear of it now, but its still a bad thing for me." Isabella swallowed as she finished. She deliberately relaxed her hand, realizing that she had dug her fingernails deeply into her palm while talking

Callen listened, then reached out for her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze, then let go. He appreciated her telling him, and the physical contact was his own little way of saying thank you.

Callen estimated it to be around fifteen hours later the captor came on. Callen actually felt a strange kind of relief when he saw the screen light up. The wait itself for something to happen had almost been worse than the torture itself. He simply said: "Round two," then shut off.

The video' s started again. It was much, much worse this time. Skin was sliced, bones were broken, and faces were burned. At the sixth agent, the captor picked up a huge, sharp, pointed knife and smiled cruelly. "Do you have anyone you love, Agent Michaels?"

"Sure, not that I would ever tell you about them," the agent replied, fiercely glaring at the captor.

"Tell me her name, Agent Michaels."

"Look psycho, I've already told you, it's not happening."

The captor grabbed the knife, drove it into the agent's upper arm and pulled it down lightning fast all the way to his palm. The agent screamed in pain and surprise.

Callen shivered. He fought off a wave of nausea as the captor repeated the motion first across the agent's chest, then his thigh. Blood stained the agent's muscular body, streaming from the cuts. As the torture continued on screen, Callen felt a cold hand touch his shoulder. He wheeled around, prying the hand away from him, tense, about to attack. Instead, he stared into the swirling mists of Isabella's eyes. Since the moment they met, her eyes had been closed and guarded, but they weren't now. They contained so much sadness, more than Callen had ever seen in somebody's face. He realized he was gripping Isabella's wrist too tightly, and slowly let go.

"You know, you really should refrain from touching agent's like that, it kind of startles them," Callen said trying to joke, wanting to chase away the sadness in her eyes.

Isabella didn't even smile. "It might startle them, but it also reminds them they're not alone," Isabella said quietly, her voce full of sadness.

Callen wondered if there was a story behind the action, for her eyes to contain so much sadness." Thank you," he said simply. Then he reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder. Seeing she was confused, he explained, "You're not alone either, Isabella," he said, his voice soft and gentle.

This time some of the sadness did leave her eyes. "Thank you," she said with a tiny smile.

A horrible groan interrupted them. As they glanced up, they were shocked to see that he agent had received many more cuts during the time they had been talking. His whole body had terrible trails of red running across it. As the captor raised the knife once again, the agent's eyes widened and he looked terrified.

"Stop...I'll tell you whatever you want to know, just stop!" Agent Michaels whimpered.

Callen and Isabella shared a glance. No, no no no no running through Callen's mind. He can't give up, he can't.

The captor laughed, then walked over to a table and pressed a button. Instantly, the video was muted. "Why do you think the captor muted the video?" Isabella asked.

Callen shrugged. "Thinks that if we know what information he wants to know, we'll have an advantage? That we'll come closer to figuring out who he is? Both of those reasons? I honestly don't know.":

Callen and Isabella watched for a few minuets as the exchange of information continued. Then, suddenly, the captor whipped a gun out and shot the agent twice, once in the head, once in the heart; after that, the screen went blank

Silence echoed through the room. Callen and Isabella were both too shocked to say or do anything. Their eyes met, and somehow they both understood the other's unwillingness to talk about what had just occurred.

The room was still for a few more minuets, then Isabella said: "So, that little girl who taught you Russian, what was she like?"

Surprise, then understanding, flickered across Callen's face. His face lost some of its grieved expression as he though of more joyful times. "Sweetest little girl I ever met. She was clever, too. She loved rope skipping, and went everywhere with her blue and pink rope. "I was fourteen at the time, and she was four. She liked to pretend that it was the opposite, though. She gave me this little book, and would put a sticker in it every time I mastered a phrase in Russian. She loved playing teacher." Callen said, laughing a little.

"Do you still keep in contact?"

Callen shook his head, a cloud passing over his eyes. "She died a while ago."

"I'm sorry."

Callen nodded, accepting the sympathy. "What about you?" he asked, "What's your family like?"

"What, aside from my crazy grandmother?" Isabella joked.

"Mmmhmm."

"Well, I'm an only child. I'm pretty close to both my parents, but I was always Daddy's girl. I mean, I love my mom; she and I get along really well, kind of like sisters. But I always truly admired my dad. He seemed to know some things about everything. Going to museums with him, he would know about all the exhibitions, know the history of everything in there. He had a point of view about everything. I was always with him, learning from him. I miss being able to be completely honest with him, now that I'm an agent." The idyllic smile that had lit up her face began to fade with the last sentence.

"You're lucky to have a close family. Most agents I know don't." Callen said with a touch on envy.

"Yeah. Most people who become agents have had something go terribly wrong in their lives, haven't they? Maybe I'll tell you about what went wrong in mine, someday." Isabella said, noticing his envy. My life hasn't exactly been perfect, either.

They were literally locked together in hell. Locked in a terrible nightmare. And yet, out of that, there slowly was an incredible bond forming between the two agents. A bond closer than anything either of them had ever experienced before.