A/N: Okay, I know this fic fell off the grid for a while, my two-shot post S4 fic took over… It just needed to be written, because like the rest of you, I absolutely can't wait for season 5, even though it is gonna be really short and the last season :( Anyway, we're back, and if you guys remember, Mary is about to be the bait in a trap for Raph.
Mary walked into her house, full of fried chicken and confidence. I can do this she repeated to herself over and over again. She had a wire on under her shirt, and Marshall in her ear, literally- she was wearing an earpiece- and she was ready.
"Mary are you sure you're okay with this?" Marshall asked for the umpteenth time, still not at all sure that the sting was a good idea.
She smiled at his concern, but made her voice sound annoyed. She couldn't deal with mush, not with what she was about to do, it would throw her off. "Jesus Marshall, how many times do we have to go over this? I want his balls on a platter, and I want to be the one to put them there. Besides, this is the best way to catch him. He killed two US Marshals. We've got to get him."
She could almost hear her lanky partner's hands go up, signaling surrender. "Well, I don't like it, but I understand it. Go get 'em Mare, we'll be close by."
Mary nodded, though Marshall couldn't see it, and walked calmly into the one room of her house that had no windows- her bathroom. There she proceeded to check her backup gun in her ankle, as well as the one in the small of her back. She double checked that her wire and earpiece were as invisible and secure as possible, then flushed the toilet in case her ex-fiance was already in the house, and exited the bathroom.
She looked around, but saw no sign of him, so she sat down on the couch to wait, turning on the TV and trying to look as absolutely normal as possible, knowing that there was a good chance she was being watched.
She didn't have long to wait. Unbeknownst to her, Raph had snuck in the front door while she was in the bathroom, and had been watching her from a back room ever since. He saw her sit down on the couch to watch tv, and once it seemed like she was relaxed and off-guard, he tiptoed over to where she was, and covered her mouth with a wet rag.
Mary had only a split second to react, and it wasn't fast enough. She smelled the sickly-sweet odor of chloroform, immediately flashing back to the last time she had a run-in with the chemical. She threw an elbow backwards, trying to break Raph's grip on her head so she could escape the fumes, but by the time she made contact everything was spinning and her blow barely grazed him.
"That's what you get…bitch." Raph muttered, just in time for Mary to hear before she lost consciousness. He didn't know, at this point, that Marshall could hear him and was hauling ass over to Mary's house, but he loaded her swiftly enough into his newly-stolen truck and was off before it could make any difference.
For the second time in a week, Marshall broke every traffic law in the book. Once he heard Raph's words, he had the car in gear and was starting to drive. When he heard no response from Mary, and no pained, Dominican-sounding screams, he exchanged a panicked look with Stan and pushed his department-issued Tahoe to its absolute limits. "MARY?" He half-screamed into the microphone, and when he heard no answer except a car door slamming through her wire, a lone tear rolled down his cheek, which he wiped away angrily before saying "not again. Oh god not again."
Stan looked about as bad as Marshall did. "Jesus… How did this happen?" he exclaimed, full of anger.
"I don't know," Marshall answered honestly, "I didn't like this, but I didn't think this would happen either."
Marshall's reply, however, wasn't even heard by Stan, because he was already calling in the situation to ABQPD. By the time Stan had hung up, they had reached Mary's house, and the police weren't far behind.
Marshall ran into the house, looking around desperately even though he knew that she wouldn't be there. Once he had established what he already knew-that she was gone- he looked around more closely, trying to find any clues as to where she ended up. All the while he was listening to any feedback from the wire, timing how long he thought they'd been in the car, and talking into Mary's earpiece even though he was pretty sure she was unconscious, otherwise she'd be fighting back.
His second sweep of his partner's house turned up the cloth that Raph had used to render Mary unconscious, confirming Marshall's original suspicion. Without touching it, so as to preserve any potential evidence, he kneeled down and took a small, careful smell. "Stan!" he called out "We've got chloroform."
Stan, still on the phone, followed Marshall's voice into Mary's living room. "Damnit." he cursed "He couldn't take her in a fair fight so he put her out of commission." He took a breath then forced his voice back to a thinly- controlled calm. "CSU is on the way, they might be able to-"
Marshall held up his hand, hearing something on the other end of the wire, and Stan immediately took the cue and stopped talking. "The car's stopped I think. That was…" he checked his watch "about fifteen minutes. That gives us some idea of how far they went."
Stan nodded. "Okay. Go back to the office, get a map, and start looking at possible locations. If you figure out where she is, call for backup and go. Don't wait for me."
Marshall nodded and was out the door practically before Stan even stopped talking. He tore through the lobby, muttering apologies to anyone who he knocked down. He debated taking the stairs rather than waiting for the elevator, but realized logically it would only feel like it was faster, and he didn't want to end up worn out.
When the elevator finally came, he paced inside the tiny box for the relative eternity it took to get to the top floor of the Sunshine Building. He was out of the elevator before the doors were fully open, and running into the office. Eleanor stood up immediately at the look on his face "Marshall, what the hell happened? Is Mary okay?"
He shook his head. "She was kidnapped" he said, his voice breaking, "I can't believe I let this happen again."
Eleanor sucked in a breath of shock and worry, grimacing at both the pain that Marshall was going through, as well as the obvious blame he was putting on himself, and in fear for the female inspector who she had managed to become tentative friends with in the past months. "Oh god… how did this happen?"
Marshall took a deep breath, and forced himself to control his emotions again. There would be time for that when Mary was safe again. He didn't let himself think about any other option- she would be okay. "The sting went bad. He must have snuck into her house without her knowing, then he snuck up behind her and knocked her out with chloroform. We…I… couldn't get there in time. They were already gone."
Eleanor didn't even think before enveloping Marshall in a hug. It was clearly meant only to provide friendship and comfort, which is exactly what it did. "It's not your fault, you know." Eleanor said quietly.
The usually unflappable US Marshal choked out one small sob. "I shouldn't have let her do it Eleanor… Or I should've been there. Damnit, then she'd be home safe, and this would all be over."
"There is no 'let' with Mary, she was going to do this, and she's lucky that she has such good friends looking for her. Marshall, we're GOING to bring her home." Marshall broke the contact and sat down at his computer, seemingly back to normal, although anyone who knew him would be able to see the tension in his facial features that seemed to radiate through his body like a never ending electric surge.
"They were in the car for approximately fifteen minutes, I'm going to use that timeframe to hopefully figure out where she is." Eleanor nodded, standing over Marshall's shoulder as he brought up a map. All of a sudden he heard a groaning sound through his earpiece, an indication that Mary was awake.
"Mare, I know you're awake. I promise you I'm going to find you and you're going to be okay." Mary came back into awareness to the sound of her partner's voice in her ear. She started, before remembering the earpiece.
She looked around. She was, once again, in a basement. Jesus, what is it with criminals and basements? You'd think maybe the second time around I'd be kidnapped by someone with at least a fucking hint of originality. She noticed two distinct differences between her previous kidnapping and the current one, however. First of all, both her guns were gone, which was bad. Second of all, she wasn't chained up, which was good. Oh and she still had means of communication, and for the moment, she was alone.
"Marshall…" she whispered, not wanting to be heard and potentially draw unwanted attention.
"Mary!" she heard her partner's relieved voice. "Where are you? Are you alone?"
She looked around her but could see no windows or any way of identifying where she was. "I don't know," she whispered, "but yes, I'm alone, for the time being."
"Are you hurt?"
She did a quick self- assessment. "No. I don't think so. I'm not restrained either. He must've thought the chloroform would hold me for a while longer than it did. I wonder if a person builds up a tolerance to the stuff or something."
Marshall breathed a sigh of relief. "Okay, keep talking for as long as you can. Tell me what you see."
"I'm in a basement, again, no windows, stone foundation, there's a harsh smell in the air, like rotten eggs or something like that, the place is filthy…"
Marshall took stock of the information, latching onto the one thing that could prove useful. "Okay Mary, have you ever smelled sulfur before?"
She thought it over, head still somewhat foggy from the drugs but otherwise functional. "Tenth grade chemistry maybe. Why?"
"Do you remember what it smelled like?"
Mary thought about it, and made the connection. "YES! That's what the smell is. Its sulfuric. How fucking poetic, right?"
Marshall laughed, amazed at her ability to keep her good humor in a situation such as the one she was in. "It is rather perfect. Regardless though, that will help us find you. There can't be that many parts of Albuquerque where sulfur is common enough to make a smell that strong. I already have a time frame on your car ride, so between the two I should be able to narrow it down well enough to find you."
"Good, I- oh shit he's coming" Mary whispered harshly, making an attempt to mask her fear which, if Marshall hadn't known her quite so well, probably would've worked.
"Okay Mary, stay calm. I promise you we're coming for you." Marshall kept talking to her, knowing that there's no way anyone outside of Mary's ear could possibly hear his speech. "Try to keep him calm, but if you can fight your way out, do it."
"Who were you talking to?" Raph's voice, ripe with rage, was a shock to both Mary, and Marshall who had turned up his earpiece in order to hear Mary's barely-whispers. Marshall nearly fell out of his chair. Mary just stood where she was, looking defiant.
A/N: Well, that's it for this chapter. Next chapter the sh*t is gonna hit the fan even more than it already has. In the interim, please review!