Riley looked a little freaked out during their interrogation of Kendrick. Jack wanted to say something to make it alright for her. He really did. The way she was looking at him, like a stranger, like someone she'd known all along she should be afraid of, pained him deeply.
But his bigger worry was the look on Mac's face.
When Kendrick revealed Nikki had been involved with stealing the virus, with putting Mac in a position to get shot, all for a payday, Mac looked like someone punched him in the gut. Or maybe stabbed him in the back. Then it slowly morphed into an expression Jack recognized from Mac's stint in the hospital with the bullet wound he now knew Nikki was responsible for. It was similar to the one he wore when Jack had told him they hadn't been able to find Nikki's body. And she was getting away, just as lost as he thought she'd been in the depths of Lake Como. Riley saw it, too. She didn't even know the guy and she wanted to help wipe that look off his face.
Then Jack realized he knew where to look for her, thought maybe they could stop her. "Those engines were too small to be commercial. I heard a Bell Ranger.
I think we're looking for a private airport, one that services planes and choppers."
Riley started typing before he finished speaking. It only took a second before her face lit up. "Got something. It's in San Carlos, ten minutes from here."
Both Jack and Riley breathed an involuntary sigh of relief when Mac's game face slipped securely back into place. It was like he'd simply shut the door on his feelings and was entirely mission focused again.
"Call Thornton, tell her to ground all airplanes in the area. We can't let that virus leave the city."
Riley made the call, while Jack slid into the driver's seat and got them moving. Despite the breakneck pace he set to get them across the city, he stole occasional glances at Mac. Instead of giving Jack a hard time about his driving, or talking to Riley and Thornton, or even taking the opportunity to interrogate Kendrick further on the drive, Mac was just staring straight ahead, poised on the edge of his seat.
They whipped around a turn and Mac's arm fired out to grab the dash to keep from being thrown from his seat. When he still didn't make a comment about Jack's driving, Jack flashed him a look of real concern. "You doin' alright there, pal?"
Mac sighed. "Not really," he admitted.
"Do you…?"
"The airport!" Mac pointed, interrupting any further inquiries Jack might have made as to Mac's state of affairs.
"Hang on!" Jack warned as he hit the gas to get through the security fence. If they stopped at the gate of this private airfield they'd never get inside in time to stop Nikki. Thornton was having a hard time getting through to the tower here to ground the flights. She thought it might be by design since the wealthy patrons of places like that tended to be disinterested in government interference.
Mac was on his feet and out of the van almost before it came all the way to a halt.
He scanned the area for any sign of Nikki.
Damn it! There was a private jet taxiing and clearly getting ready for take off. That's got to be Nikki.
"Mac!" Jack shouted when he saw the plane moving.
"I see it!" Mac answered, taking off at a sprint.
Angus, no! He heard her voice in his head, plain as day. He realized what part of his brain was planning without permission from the rest of it. What the hell? he asked himself, even as he clawed his way onto the landing gear.
His stomach dropped as the plane's wheels left the runway. Worse still, his still-recovering chest and shoulder screamed as they took his full weight. He gasped at the sudden sharp pain and then again as his left arm cramped, letting him know there was no way to was going to cooperate with him clinging to the bottom of this plane like a freaking barnacle on a ship's hull.
He scrambled to brace his feet against the compartment door to take some of the weight off.
The good news was he was able to find purchase and brace his feet, immediately easing the strain on his slightly less than totally rehabbed GSW.
The bad news was in the process of hooking his feet on that door, he'd looked down. Mac didn't like being on the ladder at home to paint the trim on the second floor windows. He hated the amusement park rides Jack and Boze always dragged him on. Honestly he didn't love being on the inside of a plane, but he could reasonably ignore how high up he was.
He was flatly terrified to be where he was right now. Especially because if he couldn't get the damned thing back on the ground in a hurry, he was definitely going to fall. And he would die in the worst way he could actually imagine. Falling.
Not only that, Nikki would get away. She'd never answer for what she'd done. And that virus would kill innocent people.
That thought refocused Mac in something other than how far away the ground was. He was able to think more actively about how to get back on the ground and accomplish the mission. He eyeballed then wiring he was hanging onto.
Yes! The hydraulics for the landing gear weren't buried.
He lost his footing again and he was pretty sure he was having a freaking heart attack. But now that he had a plan, it was easier to just keep his shit together, resituate his feet, and cut the appropriate line.
He'd just gotten back to feeling pretty stable with his grip and his feet when the plane banked for its return to the airstrip. On one hand it was great. It meant his plan worked and he'd be back on the ground in a minute.
Unfortunately on the other hand, the ride got really rocky with the decent. He couldn't seem to keep his feet where he needed them and would up mostly swinging from the plane's undercarriage. He was damn near panicking by the time they neared the runway, convinced he wasn't going to be able to hang on long enough to survive this desperate play to stop Nikki and the virus getting away.
He tried to get himself to let go when he thought they were low enough to get out of the way of the landing without hurting himself. But his fingers just wouldn't release. He sort of wished Jack was there to give him a shove like he had a few times when they'd had to parachute in places. Or Boze. Their teenage years involved a lot of situations where Mac had needed a push, real or metaphorical. From asking out Darlene Martin to bungee jumping. Although what had made Mac think either was a good idea was still a mystery to him, even all these years later.
When the wheels jolted against the runway, Mac was finally able to release his grip. He rolled away from the plane and lay on the pavement for a second, reassuring himself he was actually alive and back on beautiful solid Earth.
When Jack and Riley came running up to him, he made himself get to his feet. He was pleased that he looked a hell of a lot less shaky than he felt as he followed Jack into the cabin.
When his eyes met Nikki's over Jack's shoulder his breath caught. In part because the part of him that had loved her couldn't help the split second of relief that she was really here, really alive, and really looking at him with those incredible blue eyes. But it was mostly because the rest of him was registering the triple level of her betrayal both of him and of the country they'd both sworn to protect. That part of him felt the bullet hit him square in the chest again. Felt like his heart had stopped.
Then her eyes narrowed at Jack and he knew without a doubt she'd kill him and never lose a second's sleep over it. He didn't know what made him do it. Maybe it was the part of him that had lived her. And maybe it was the part that always made him do things that caused Jack to call him a "reckless little shit." But he stepped in front of Jack and locked eyes with Nikki.
"If you're going to shoot him, you're gonna have to go through me."
