Detective Mike Hanson was in a foul mood. He knew he probably shouldn't be. If their intel was correct, they were about to rescue over a dozen women, pulling them out of what could literally qualify as a version of hell on Earth. This was the type of day he lived for. This was the type of day every cop lived for. Mike knew he should have been fired up.

As fired up as his eager young partner, at the very least. Brett was clearly nervous, constantly switching focus between watching the SWAT unit prepare for the raid and checking his own vest, gun and goggles. "They're going in ahead of us, right?" the junior detective asked for the third time. "We're fine carrying just our service weapons?"

Mike ignored the questions, confident that Brett already knew the answers. The older detective's mind was far too preoccupied by the one thing that was sticking in his craw. The one thing that was the inspiration of and the continuing fuel for his bad mood: the source of the information that had brought them all there in the first place. "You're sure that this is the right tunnel?" he asked his former partner, certain that their location in the basement of an abandoned building was going to be the start of a wild goose chase that was going to make them all look like idiots.

Jo nodded. "It's the right depth below ground. We go any lower and we hit the subway."

"Yeah, but this is blocks away from the church," he muttered under his breath. "How the hell would a blind man know..."

"Mike?" Jo warned in a tone that broached no argument.

"Yeah, Jo?"

"Don't ask, don't tell."

The simple coded message shut down Mike's active ability to argue the point. He recalled, as he always did, what his former partner had told him the day they established the code phrase. I know things have gone way beyond weird, Jo had told him. But when has Henry ever steered us wrong?

He hasn't, Mike had replied. Yet.

Mike could still remember the way that Jo had glared at him. Look, you know I trust Henry with my life. Especially now. And now he's trusted *us* with *his* life. Call me overly attached to him if you want, but I feel like we need to honor that...

"Don't ask, don't tell," had become their shorthand way of honoring that trust. It meant that no matter how crazy Henry Morgan had made their lives, they needed to trust that, however crazy one of his leads might sound, it was going to lead them to getting justice for the victims by putting the bad guys where they belonged. Apparently, thought Mike, Jo thought that trust needed to be extended to some goddamned street vigilante...the detective sighed in defeat when he realized the error in his thinking. Jo wasn't the one who was extending her trust to Daredevil.

Henry was.

Matt Murdock, in return, had entrusted his life to all of them. Mike knew that he could probably end the man's life with a single well-placed phone call.

But if he made that call, Mike knew he would lose Henry's respect and friendship. And the loss of Jo's respect and friendship wouldn't be far behind.

There were very few people in the world that Mike Hanson would blindly walk over hot coals for.

Jo Martinez was one of those people.

And if she was asking her to do that now...

Well, he'd do it. But he didn't have to like it. "You know," he grumbled, "Don't ask don't tell is one of the reasons I put in for this damn transfer in the first place..."

Jo smiled, knowing that her former partner's last statement was patently false. "C'mon," she nudged him, "it looks like SWAT's ready to go in."

The three cops caught up to the SWAT team as their commander was wrapping up a briefing that sounded like an odd combination of combat tactics and kindergarten safety tips. "We don't have plans of the tunnels down there, so keep your locator beacons on and stick with your buddy," he told them. "I don't want to lose anyone. And remember, those girls will be sitting ducks in those cages, so don't take the shot unless our slimebags are up and moving. All right, gentlemen? Let's do this."

SWAT filed through the tight tunnel entrance, moving with surprising noiselessness for a large group of men carrying automatic weapons. Mike suddenly found himself grateful for his borrowed pair of night vision goggles. Murdock was right about one thing, he thought, I wouldn't be able to see a damn thing without these. The group moved with swift purpose, pairs of men filing out to clear each branch of the tunnels as they came across them...but never moving forward until the departing pair retuned, giving the silent signal that the tunnel was clear for a hundred yards away from what Mike considered to be the 'main artery' that the majority of the group was traveling through.

The fifth pair, though, returned without giving the clear signal. Instead, they gave the signal for the group to follow them. The group moved single file down the narrow tunnel space, with Mike bringing up the rear. The detective heard clanging noises as the silent group stalked the tunnel, but it was only when the group stopped that Mike heard it.

Crying.

Goddamn it, he thought, Murdock was right.

"FREEZE!" The SWAT commander yelled. "ON YOUR KNEES! HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD!"

Three men yelled back to the SWAT commander in an angry panic, before Mike heard what sounded like the angry footfalls of men running. Three shots rang out, inspiring a cacophonous mob of screams as the captives responded to the loud, violent noise with shock and terror. As much as he was tempted to turn and run from the sound, Mike followed the rest of his team as they filed into the space. He knew that he had a job to do if, by some miracle, they found the girls. And now that that miracle had occurred...

'HEY!" he screamed, trying and failing to get the attention of hte rapidly disorganizing group. "HEY!" he screamed louder, to no avail...

Mike shot his service weapon into the solid cement above his head. It caused a shower of irritating pieces of plaster to rain down on top of his head, but it got the job done; all heads turned in his direction as the room fell silent. He prayed that his broken Albanian would be enough to get through to the frightened women that surrounded him. "You're safe now," he told them. "We're here to get you safe, get you well, and get you back home."

A few of the girls sobbed quietly. Others whispered to each other or called out "Faleminderit," which Mike knew to mean "thank you". But there were no more screams. The girls were still shaking, staring with desperate, wide eyes at the SWAT team members as the men used heavy-duty bolt cutters to rip open their cages.

But there was no more fear.

There was no more panic.

For the first tme since these girls had been taken from their homes, it seemed to be sinking in that there was hope.

And if that was all that they could give those girls...Mike just hoped that was enough.

#

CSU brought in what seemed to be an entire sporting goods store's worth of camping lanterns and other floodlights so that they could triage and treat the girls, examine the bodies of the three men that SWAT had taken down and search the cavern for any more evidence that could prove crucial to their investigation.

Jo was the first person to catch Mike's attention during the search. "Hey Hanson," she called out, "you gotta see this."

Mike wove his way through the cramped, overcrowded room until he stood over his partner, who was kneeling next to an open footlocker at the foot of a military-looking cot. "What'cha got there, Jo?"

"See for yourself," Jo replied. She stood up and backed away from the footlocker, giving her former partner the chance to take her place.

Mike moved so that he could see the contents of the footlocker...and didn't know whether to laugh, roll his eyes, or curse at what he was seeing. "Oh you gotta be kidding me," he insisted.

Jo knelt down next to Mike and pulled one of the many cleanly pressed black shirts out of the trunk, putting one of the crisp white clerical collars on top of it before handing it to her partner. "Either one of these guys really was a priest," she mused, "or..."

"Or they used the outfits to try to look like priests in order to lull the girls into a false sense of security," Mike agreed.

"Hey Mike," Brett called out to his partner. "You're never gonna believe this."

Mike joined his new partner...and started to let out a string of Albanian curses as the final puzzle piece fell into place.

"Am I missing something here, gentlemen?" asked Doctor Andrews.

"That guy," Brett replied, pointing to the gunshot victim at their feet, "looks like he could be the younger brother of our current prime suspect."

"Which means I gotta go eat crow in front of Matt Murdock," Mike exclaimed. "A whole hell of a lot of crow..."