SOLAR WIND

The team had a carefully crafted plan for this particularly dangerous undercover mission. Amongst other details, they had decided they wouldn't arrive to the party together to keep the appearances. So when the time came, one by one, they left their hotel rooms. Except for the happily newlywed couple, clearly, who were currently sharing one of the rented cars. Mac was at the wheel.

Silence.

Mac had given up on letting go the ominous feeling that lurked over him ever since they had designed the plan. There was also this restlessness that showed up when he knocked on Riley's door exactly at 20:14 (after a ten minutes delay due to a fierce fight against his own bow tie that he had won). But it wasn't because of the small box that Bozer had slipped in his pocket before, of course not.

Basically, a nervous and brooding MacGyver meant that he wasn't in a talkative mood. Still, her silence irked him. It made him more aware of her presence. It reminded him that "things were different between them". It frustrated him, different how? His mind spiraled with all type of thoughts, distracting him from the mission and he couldn't afford that. So at the next red light he inhaled deeply and took out the blue velvety box.

"Right, here… Riley, can I have your hand for a moment? No, the left one," he blurted.

She raised a questioning eyebrow but conveyed. Her lips formed a little "oh" when Mac put a ring on her finger.

Something in the world shifted then.

Mac couldn't understand exactly what it was but as he saw the happiest smile taking shape in her pretty face the world shifted slightly. The idea that he was the reason for such an expression to come to existence caused an explosion within him and something buried deep inside him struggled to make it to the surface.

All of sudden his senses intensified, magnified and everything was… more. Mac felt oversensitive in a way he hadn't before. Adrenaline rushed through his veins, his hand burned over hers. It was like his eyes captured colors more vividly and his lungs filled with the purest oxygen.

For an instant he pictured the Aurora Borealis, a colorful display of beauty and overdosed energy. For an instant, a fraction of a second, it was like a coctail of excited particles wind ran all over him. It was like a storm of solar wind that travelled and searched for something, until it reached his hand and found release in the form of the softest caress on their point of contact over that ring.

He really couldn't understand how the simplest action brought out so many emotions within him.

The red light changed to green and they had to let go, the moment gone, leaving their hands hot and itchy and empty. Mac allowed himself to release the breath he didn't know he had been holding.

What had happened there?

Mac smiled at the irony of finding the Aurora Borealis as a fitting answer. A phenomenon yet to be fully explained by science, the same way he still couldn't completely comprehend his emotions. One thing he knew for sure, just as the Nothern Lights were a marvellous showcase of energy discharge, he had just lived through the same delightful experience.

The unreal moment that they shared had left him strangely relaxed, with a lightness that could be qualified as content. And Riley being Riley cracked a joke to ease the tension. It worked. From then on words flowed easily.

"What do we say if they ask how we met?" Mac asked.

"I guess a first encounter at jail isn't very romantic, is it?" she teased.

"Are you kidding? That's the definition of an epic story."

"Worthy of telling to our grandchildren, you say."

He forced himself to not think about the implications of her statement. "They would never get bored, that's a given."

They laughed, flustered and happy.

It occurred to Mac that he hadn't felt so at ease in a long while and he couldn't help but to notice that he wasn't thinking about a foreboding future anymore.

(Later on Mac wouldn't resist the temptation of grabbing her hand and touching their contact point again with the hope that maybe, only maybe, he would experience the Aurora Borealis without actually going to Canada.)

Set after 4x05

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