The doors were locked, but Mac was not particularly interested in accepting physical limits at the moment. A solid kick that he was certain would have made Jack proud splintered the wood and the door gave way to a hard shove after that. He stood just inside, taking a small light out of his pocket and sending it around the room. "I'm here, Murdoc!" he called out. "Now what?"
He was met with silence. He could hear some far away afternoon sounds from a few streets over where there was enough population to warrant it, but that was all. Then, almost silently, the assassin, stepped out of the shadows near the altar.
"Hello, Angus," Murdoc said softly.
Mac glared in return. "I want to see Jack. You agreed."
Murdoc smiled. "I said maybe."
"You've done enough damage. Let him go."
"Oh, Angus. I probably should have mentioned. I don't think he's in any condition to leave here on his own. And since the agreement was for you to stay …"
"No, the agreement was I'd show up. I'm here. Let Jack go. Now."
"Always in such a rush." He glanced at his brother. "It is such a problem with youth these days. No tolerance for taking one's time. No ability to savor the moment …"
"I know, I know. Millennials are ruining everything. Applebee's, department stores, politics, psychopathic killers' ability to brainwash them into joining their organizations, all that sort of thing." Mac took a step toward him. "I've got no interest in listening to you babble until the drone strike I called in makes a crater of your little torture chamber. Jack. Now."
Murdoc took a half step back. "Excuse me."
Mac advanced toward him, feeling cold, and almost welcoming it. "Drone strike. It's on its way. Painted the building with a laser before I stepped in. Sent a confirmation text, too. So, if you've got something you want me to hear, I suggest you talk fast. You've got," he looked at his watch, "maybe five minutes."
Instead of answering, Murdoc took out a cell phone and made a call. All Mac hear was, "In bound? Are you sure? Fine."
Mac looked warily around the crumbling church. He could hear muffled shouting and the sounds of struggle even before a side door opened and Ashton dragged a hooded, bound, and bloody Jack in front of the altar and dropped him at Murdoc's feet. Mac started to edge toward the front of the church where his friend had been so unceremoniously dumped. Murdoc barked, "Get the car," at his brother and drew a gun leveling it at Mac. Ashton bolted out the way he had come, barely throwing a glance Mac's way. Murdoc spoke again, his voice almost as icily calm as Mac felt. "You are just a fly in the ointment MacGyver. Here I thought we were going to have a pleasant little chat, but instead you've made things overly complicated again refusing to play by the rules." He'd begun backing toward the door, his weapon still aimed at Mac's chest, as though the young man gave half a damn about the killer at the moment. "I suppose I could just shoot you both, but I confess I'd rather like to see if you make it out of the trap you've essentially sprung on yourself. And if you can manage to get your Jack out with you."
Murdoc sprang out the door and Mac's slow progress toward Jack became a run again. He dropped down on his knees and pulled the hood off Jack's head. Jack's reaction was immediate and violent. The man's normally soft brown eyes went wide with a strange combination of fear and fury, and even bound he began thrashing helplessly, trying to get as far away from Mac as he could as quickly as he could.
This was exactly the sort of scenario Mac had played in his head a thousand times since he opened that first video. His voice was at once sharp to get his partner's attention through the haze of drugs and pain, and pleading, because he simply couldn't help it. "Jack it's me!"
Jack was backed up against the steps of the altar, unable to move further, and clearly exhausted. He gave a weak shake of his head. "No. No it isn't. You're just another trick." He didn't seem like he had much fight left in him.
Mac moved toward him again. Jack shook his head vigorously and tried to scramble away. "No!"
"Damnit, Jack! It's really Mac!"
Another obstinate head shake and Jack managed to renew his struggles, increasing the bleeding from his shoulder visibly.
Mac knew they didn't have much time left to get out of here and he needed Jack to be still long enough to cut his bonds.
"The Cowboys suck, Jack."
Jack paused, and Mac saw some lucidity pass over the clouded brown eyes. "What?"
"The Cowboys suck. They're the most overrated team in football. Highway to Hell is the worst song in the history of music. Except maybe when you sing Don't Stop Believing at karaoke. And I swear if you don't get your shit together and help me get you out of here, when I get back to LA I'm going to decide I have a thing for older women and go knock on Sarah Adler's door."
He said it all in one breath, and at the angry flash in Jack's eyes when he finished, Mac could see he'd finally gotten through. Then Jack's eyes really focused on his face.
"Mac?" Jack was half asking, half sighing with relief, still about out of his mind.
"Yeah, Big Guy. It's me." Taking advantage of the momentary lull in Jack being torn between the urge to panic and the urge to fight, Mac asked, "They doped you up pretty good, huh?"
"They shot me so full of that pink garbage I'm not sure I've got anything else left."
Mac gave him a small teasing smile. "Ah, c'mon Jack, you're always full of something else. Besides, I can help with that." Mac dug around in the bag he had slung over his shoulder. He took out a smallish plastic cylinder and flipped the cap at the top and the bottom. He squinted apologetically at Jack. "This is gonna suck. Sorry. Don't hit me." He jammed the device against Jack's thigh.
Not surprisingly Jack swore pretty loudly, but to his credit he didn't move. Mac tossed the cylinder away after a few seconds, eyeing his partner. "You okay?"
Jack frowned, not entirely sure at first that he didn't want to hit his partner when he was untied, at least a little, then he said, "Yeah, my head feels clearer already. What did you do?"
"Gave you the same stuff Steve used on me. But in something similar to an Epi-pen. Hard to break, kind of idiot proof, and you don't have to look at the needle."
"All of that's damned smart," Jack said, looking much steadier than he had a few moments before.
"Steve made it work, but it was Mel's idea," Mac said as he got up too, listening for even the slightest sound outside the door in front of them.
"I really kinda like that woman," Jack said, sounding almost entirely like himself.
"Yeah, me too. I owe her a dinner anyway. You can help me make it." Mac glanced at him with another small smile. It always seemed to help to make plans for 'when they got out of this mess this time'. "It's a small dose," he said, as he cut the ropes tying Jack's hands and feet and helping him up and slinging one of Jack's arm over his shoulders. "But it should help keep you level long enough to get out of here."
Mac watch buzzed the one-minute warning. "C'mon Jack, we gotta run, man."
They did their best. They were not very far from the building when Mac heard the whine of the drone overhead. Everything slowed down until it seemed like time was made of some invisible impossibly thick gel they were moving through. Mac hated doing it, knew it was going to hurt his friend, but he gave Jack a hard shove, sending him sprawling onto the broken down old sidewalk behind a junk car far too close to the target area. Mac threw himself on top of Jack, but not soon enough to miss the perfection of the blast. It looked almost like the old building had just collapsed in on itself, but for the force of some of the debris flying outward from the bottom. Less than a half a minute later Mac was coughing stone dust out of his nose and mouth and picking himself up off the temporarily stunned Jack. "Sssss." His breath hissed through his teeth when he realized he must've been hit in the side with some of that flying debris and his coat had been open since he'd been prepared to show Murdoc he was unarmed and the leather hadn't been there to offer any protection. It wasn't really bleeding. Well, okay it was, but not badly. Alright, it wasn't gushing, he thought. He zipped his coat. He didn't need Jack worrying about him right now.
Without thinking, he turned toward his partner and shook him by the shoulder. The wetness on his fingers told him, even before Jack's hoarse cry of pained almost-rage that he'd grabbed Jack's injured shoulder. Mac immediately said, "Sorry!" But events were already in motion. Despite the fact that he was injured, the drugs still in his system, the adrenaline of all that happened to him, and years of training and action had Jack sitting and throwing a wild punch before his eyes were all the way open. Once they were open, Jack's eyes blazed with an unnatural fury Mac recognized from having felt it and he only just ducked the swing leveled at his head. "Sorry, sorry. Didn't mean to hurt you. I'm sorry," he repeated.
Jack quickly got his bearings. He frowned, wanting to apologize for taking a swing at Mac, but somehow not quite being able to bring himself to do it. All he could think to say was something practical. "How we gettin' outta here?"
"We were going to just drive right into Moscow and Matty was going to have a Phoenix jet waiting. But since the car just got blown up, too …" He took out his phone and texted one handed, even as he got Jack a Mylar blanket out of his bag. He'd have to get him indoors and get him a jacket sooner rather than later. After he saw Phoenix's reply to his message, he looked around. "We need to get you inside while I figure us out some transportation."
Jack's brow furrowed, but he nodded. "I guess."
Mac tipped his chin at a dilapidated house about half a block away. "You think you can walk that far?"
"Of course, I can," Jack snapped, and he started climbing to his feet, brushing Mac out of the way even as he tried to help.
Not to be deterred, Mac tried to take his other arm. "Jack, let me …"
Even though Jack wobbled on his feet, though whether that was from the drugs or from his injured and probably infected shoulder, Mac couldn't say, he shoved Mac away. "I don't need your help! I can take care of myself. You look out for you." Jack glared at him, feeling the same glowing coal of anger he'd been feeling since his captors had first drugged him.
Mac's eyes went wide and he stepped back. "Sorry … I … Sorry. Let's go."
Jack shook his head. Every time he looked at Mac, instead of the instant protective affection he was used to feeling, he felt … unsettled. He knew it was the drugs, knew they'd been using all sorts of creative psychological and physical tortures on him together, but that didn't change the feeling that there was a small panicking animal trapped inside his ribs at the moment. Mac looked so hurt, and Jack knew that somehow, he was the cause of that, and it wasn't simple worry, but he just didn't have it in him to do anything about that at the moment. Still, it was Mac. So, he tried. "No, Mac … I'm just … well, you know how this shit feels in your system."
Mac nodded. Then he turned away quickly and started leading the way to the abandoned house. When Jack stumbled on the stairs, Mac reached out to help him. Jack clenched his jaw in pain that was more general than caused by the stumble, but Mac said he was sorry anyway. Jack gave him a curious look. But he found himself mumbling in frustration with his racing thoughts anyway. He was feeling like he should have been more sympathetic to Mac when he'd been drugged with this junk, and then that made him feel even grouchier.
When Mac got Jack inside, he insisted on having a look at Jack's wounded shoulder, an ordeal that resulted in Jack taking another involuntary swing at him. This time Jack did manage to say his was sorry, but he didn't manage to sound it. Mac got another cylinder of the medication Steve sent along out of his bag, hoping that another dose to counter what Murdoc had been drugging him with would help Jack get back to at least semi-rational, which, Mac thought wryly, was about as rational as Jack ever got. Instead of helping the situation, Jack interpreted it as some sort of threat and went from panicked, to argumentative, back to panicked, to just plain stubborn, to finally sort of whiny and oppositional. Mac had the fleeting thought that Steve and Mel should both be given some sort of medals of valor for putting up with shit like this every day and that he would never, repeat never, call Melody bossy and mean again, even to tease her. Finally, he got Jack calmed down, convinced that he really was the honest to goodness got-kicked-out-of-scouts-honor Angus Henry MacGyver, also known as Hollywood once upon a time, and that he was really just trying to help and Jack let Mac give him the shot. Although he did so grudgingly, and Mac apologized at least ten times in the less than two minutes the whole thing took. After that he was able to actually finish cleaning and bandaging Jack's shoulder until someone more qualified could see to it. Mac eyed his bandaging job with concern. He was competent at advanced first aid, but since becoming friends with several medical professionals he'd spent more time around their work when he wasn't the subject of it, and had subconsciously started holding himself to a higher standard. And if he was honest with himself, he knew he was stalling. He felt guilty for needing to leave Jack alone to get them a car. He decided it would do. He'd done what he could, and between what he was now certain was an infection in the wound and the damage from the hook, Jack was probably looking at surgery anyway.
Mac made sure Jack was warm enough, had some water and a protein bar, and that he promised to stay put. "I'll be back as soon as I can." Mac said, then something almost like pain passed over his face again.
Jack gave him the look, but Mac didn't give him any time to say anything. He just opened the door and slipped out.
Mac was gone less than an hour, but had managed to get Jack a coat and get them a car that was frankly ready for the junkyard, but which he thought could limp its way to the small airport in Tula. Matty had gotten them a flight on a crappy little private plane to the closest airport that could accommodate the Phoenix jet, which was in St. Petersburg. Since he'd sent Matty the videos he'd received she assured Mac she'd kept the crew to essential flight personnel and their team doc. She hoped to just bring them home but Steve would make the call when they arrived about whether they should transport Jack home or if she should find them a hospital.
When Mac had relayed the plan to Jack in the car on the way to their airport, it had taken a supreme act of will (and that was saying something; Mac knew he was a man of will, just as stubborn as they came, and a little proud of it most of the time) not to get irritated when his partner immediately said he was going back to LA tonight come hell or high water. Things had gotten a little heated. Finally, knowing that he didn't have it in him to argue Jack into another shot, nor did he have any mental gas left in the tank to argue a hypothetical, (not to mention that part of him just wanted to give in to whatever Jack wanted, because in his mind, he was responsible for the state his partner was in) Mac just said, "If it's left up to me Jack, I'll take you home tonight and well lay on the couches and watch Die Hard, okay?"
When they got on the small plane for the short hop to St. Petersburg, Mac first made sure Jack was reasonably comfortable. Then, instead of his default of distracting himself with a book, or music, or doing something on his phone, Mac just wedged himself up against the fuselage, rested his head against the shade he pulled over the window and closed his eyes.
Jack thought maybe Mac had fallen asleep, and somehow, in spite of the drug, he managed to take a nap himself.
But Mac wasn't asleep.
Mac's too perfect memory was treating him to a show of Jack's reactions today.
A show about how bad things were.
And how much worse they could have been.
Or would be next time.
