Disclaimer: I do not own Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol or any of the affiliated characters

Chapter 10: Forfeit

I hadn't looked at the clock when I'd finally collapsed in my bed, but I had assumed it was sometime early in the morning. I'd known there was no way I was going to manage to get up at six again, so I didn't feel too badly when I saw the digital clock saying it was just past nine the following morning.

I got dressed and walked out of my room just as Benji blearily entered the bathroom, probably not even seeing me. I went down the stairs, immediately checking to see if Will's foot was sticking off the couch. I had been creating a series of scenes in my mind as to how my next encounter with him would go after what happened at the gala.

But I really didn't have to worry about an awkward conversation, because he wasn't even on the couch. He was in the dining room - or he had been, until he came running out and nearly slammed into me. I got hit with enough muscle to make me lose my balance, but he caught me and stood me back on my feet. "Sorry," he apologized quickly. "Is Ethan up?"

"I don't think so," I replied, flustered and confused.

"Oh, well," he said, and he took off up the stairs, taking them three at a time.

I ran after him. "What happened?" I called over the sound of our feet. When I reached the upstairs landing, Ethan and Jane were already in the hall, and Benji was just opening the bathroom door.

"What's with the stampede?" he asked.

Will ignored him and addressed Ethan. "Cibulka offered a second deal to someone yesterday."

Ethan's eyebrows furrowed. "Who?"

"Robert Edgewood. He's an American, part owner of an oil company. And he said no."

"Are they going after him?" Jane asked.

Will nodded, and looked at me. "Cibulka is sending Reynolds and Baker to handle it. I have a location, but we need to go now."

I gripped the undersides of the jeep's chair as Ethan flew through the local streets and harshly broke the speed limit on the highway, swerving around people and cars.

"Get in the right lane," Benji said urgently. He had his computer on his lap and was holding on to it, his knuckles white. He didn't know where to look - down at the screen that was giving him directions to Edgewood's hotel, or at the road. It wasn't like he could do anything about the speeding, but like me, he may not have been able to tear his eyes away from Ethan's driving. "Take this exit."

Ethan bothered with neither the brakes nor the blinker as he took the turn off, and continued his hazardous driving through the merge and into the parking lot of the hotel.

"That's them!" I shouted, seeing my former partners out the window. They were just entering the building. Ethan finally slammed the brakes, each of us flying forward and then being slammed back by the seat belts.

"I got Edgewood," Benji said, his fingers flying across the keyboard of his laptop. The rest of us jumped out of the jeep, pulling our guns out. The slamming of the doors made Reynolds and Baker turn around, and by that time, we were in full charge after them.

Their eyes met mine, and I saw the briefest flash of astonishment before they turned and bolted through the hotel entrance. Feeling an unexpected sense of satisfaction, I pushed myself to run faster. "You two take the back!" Ethan commanded.

I didn't know who he was yelling at, but I changed my direction and heard pounding feet behind me, too heavy to be Jane's. Will came up beside me as we ran across the well-manicured lawn and to the back of the building. The pavement at the front entrance wrapped around the back and separated, branching off to an employee parking lot or sloping down under the hotel into a parking garage for guests.

Will and I grabbed onto the wall of the building to help us in our full-speed turn, and I nearly stumbled going down. I caught myself, and looked up when I heard tires screeching. Coming at us was a black sedan with tinted windows. One window, though, was open, and I couldn't tell if it was Reynolds or Baker, but I could see the nozzle of a gun.

Coming out of my stumble, I wasn't running as fast as Will, who grabbed my arm and yanked me around the nearest thick cement upright just as shots rang out. We remained there, breathing heavily, until the car broke through the measly barrier and revved up the incline.

"Come on," Will said, moving his grip on my arm down to my hand and pulling me up. I knew we wouldn't catch them on foot and began to scout for a car to hot-wire, but Will seemed to be a few steps ahead of me.

He handed me the spare helmet, one already on his head, and straddled the motorbike. "You know how to drive this thing?" I asked, mounting it behind him.

He knocked back the kickstand with his heel and turned it on. "Let's find out," he called over the sound of the engine. It surged forward, and I wrapped my arms around his waist as we blew past the broken barrier and out of the garage.

"There!" I shouted, but my voice was drowned out by the bike, so I pointed instead at the black sedan that just pulled out of the hotel. He nodded and floored it, forcing me to rewrap my second arm around him.

It turned out he could drive a motorbike, but that wasn't what I focused my attention on as we flew down the main road, taking the exit back onto the highway, where we'd just seen the black car go.

We slingshotted off the exit ramp and swerved into the left lane, ignoring the car horns behind us while we chased down my former team. They had a head start on us, but the bike was faster; soon, we'd pulled up beside them. And then the window rolled down.

Baker had to concentrate on driving and shooting, but he was doing a decent job. Will bent low over the handle bars, and I pressed myself against his back, hearing the bullets whizzing by us. Will laid off the accelerator, moving back and out of range of the gun, sticking to the car's blind spot.

I tightened my left arm's hold around Will and took a few shots at the sedan. I broke the side view mirror, then moved on to shooting at the front tire. I only got two shots - one hit the hub cap and the other the pavement - before a force knocked me, Will, and the bike forward. My third shot went wide, hitting the car door, while Will only just managed to get the bike back under control.

I glanced behind me to see a dump truck and I cursed under my breath. We could take the sedan, but a motorbike stood no chance against a dump truck - especially when that dump truck was trying to run the motorbike off the road. It didn't matter that the driver didn't have a gun; his size had already won him the battle.

The truck moved forward again, squeezing itself between us and the black car, pressing us against the guard rail. If it swerved into us, we would be dead. I grabbed Will's right arm, careful with the gun in my hand. We both knew this would end badly if we took on the dump truck, and there were too many cars on the highway to maneuver to the other side before we reached the upcoming V in the road.

Will sped up and we zoomed down the left branch, leaving the black sedan and the dump truck to take the right, going in two completely different directions, them towards the east and us back to Riyadh. Finally, we began to slow down once on the local roads again, and I realized we were a short walk from the apartment building that held the room of my old safe house; it was down the next alley. I took my hand off his arm, feeling something strange now that I had my senses back and my heart wasn't racing as quickly as it had when we were facing the dump truck.

On my hand was a wet, sticky, red smear. I looked to where my hand had been: blood flowed freely down Will's arm to his elbow, and there was an enormous stain on the sleeve of his t-shirt, which was ripped. I tapped his other shoulder. "Pull over!" I shouted, just loud enough for him to hear now that we slowed down.

Before he'd even turned off the bike, I had dismounted, ripping off my helmet and his. "What?" he asked, booting the kickstand down. His face didn't have it's usual color, not looking horrible, but much more ashen than normal. He caught sight of my hand, the one smeared with blood. "Are you hurt?"

"No!" I yelled, because it was obvious to me, but he looked taken aback. I pointed at his upper right arm, which was still bleeding freely. How did he not feel it?

He looked. "Huh." Huh? That was it? He didn't even sound surprised - mildly impressed, but not at all surprised. "So that's what that was."

My eyebrows shot as high up on my forehead as they could go. "What?"

"I felt a sting in the parking garage."

I didn't lower my eyebrows; I physically could not lower them. "And you didn't think to check?"

"We were kind of in a hurry." He shrugged with his good arm. "So are we going?"

"Going?"

"Back to the house?" He said it more like a question. "To meet up with everyone else?"

I shook my head and pulled his good arm. "We're right by my old safe house. We'll go there instead." I didn't give him a chance to argue as I pulled my phone out and turned down the alley.

"Cass," Ethan breathed with relief. "Are you okay? You're with Brandt, right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, realizing that I was suddenly supporting some of Will's weight; he'd lost enough blood to make him a little wobbly, and his adrenaline was starting to wear off. "But a bullet grazed Will." I opened the door to the building and helped him up the stairs.

"Where are you?"

I reached the door to the apartment and found it was locked. Will propped himself unsteadily against the wall while I retrieved my bobby pin and began to pick the lock, holding the phone to my ear with my shoulder. "We're at my old safe house."

There was a pause, in which time I felt the lock give and opened the door. "Will you be okay there?" Ethan didn't sound too pleased.

I instructed for Will to sit in the recliner while I locked the door and went to collect the first aid kit from the bathroom. "Probably. He just really needs to get cleaned up."

"Fine. I'm guessing you lost them?"

"A dump truck tried to run us off the road. We didn't really have a choice."

"All right." In my mind's eye, I saw him pacing and pinching the bridge of his nose. "They have Edgewood, and Cibulka called and wants to speed up the meeting because of what happened. Just be careful and get back here soon."

I came back to the main room, where Will was sitting in the chair, his face scrunched in pain now that his adrenaline had worn off. "I'll do my best."

Wow. Can't believe we're already at chapter 10. Only four more to go! I've actually had this story done for a while and I've been editing it as I've been posting, so that's why the uploads have been so quick. probably one more chapter today and the last three to finish it up tomorrow.