A second or two passed.

Mac caught the almost imperceptible tensing of muscles that preceded pulling the trigger.

He held his breath.

When nothing happened, he stepped forward like it was what he'd been expecting all along and took Nikki's gun. He handed it off to Jack and patted her down. Anyone else might not have bothered as anything more than a formality. Nikki favored jeans that were basically a second skin and tops that weren't much looser. But Mac had been in the room while she dressed often enough to know just how many weapons it was possible for her to conceal.

When he came up empty handed, he stood. He knew his first question should be about the virus. What found its way out of his mouth instead was, "Was everything a lie?"

She looked him directly in the eye and her voice trembled with emotion when she answered, "Not us."

It was so raw, so genuine, he wanted to believe her. It was worse than if she'd admitted it was all a lie though. Because she'd looked him in the face countless times and told him how dedicated she was to their job, to their country, to helping people.

"Then why?" She answered with the barest shake of her head. "I thought you died trying

to do something good."

He barely heard her reply. He shifted back to agent mode, because if he kept just being Mac, her betrayal was going to break him down. He'd deal with it later. Alone.

The only thing that mattered right now was getting that virus back.

His eyes narrowed. "It's not here, is it?" She didn't answer, tried to keep her face neutral. But he knew her too well. "Guys, stop looking."

Jack and Riley both paused in their search and looked at him for guidance. He sighed. Nothing was ever easy. Why was nothing ever easy? He spun her around and pulled cuffs out of his pocket, he clicked them into place, caught between being glad to have her in custody and wanting to scream at both his personal sense of betrayal and the danger he knew was now loose in the world, headed who knew where.

"She already sold it."

Jack drew his weapon again, almost on reflex at the news. He leveled it right at Nikki's head. "You sure."

He sighed again and gave a slight shake of his head. It wasn't denial, it was pure frustration. "Yeah, I am." He put a hand on Nikki's shoulder and pushed her toward the door. "Let's loop Thornton in and get DHS to pick Nikki up."

Jack came around behind Nikki, gun still drawn. "Yeah, it's been a minute since the locals got to nab a terrorist. Bet they'll be all kinds of happy to see her. Mac walked out ahead of them, not looking left or right, other than to wave Riley outside with him.

Nikki stopped moving, and narrowed her eyes at Jack. "You're not going to find it," she sneered.

"Your ex might be interested in asking nicely, Nik, but I'm not. And those DHS folks won't be either. You're a terrorist. You don't have any of those fancy rights like an honest to goodness citizen anymore." Not anywhere near as gentle as his partner, Jack gave her a hard shove toward the exit.

By the time they got outside, local law enforcement was already on the scene, having been called in by Thornton when they'd finished interrogating Kendrick. They'd hauled him out of the back of their "borrowed" van already. Jack handed Nikki off to a pair of the locals in time to catch Thornton sounding absolutely furious.

"So, Nikki's alive. Benjamin Chen is in the wind and we don't know when or where he's gonna unleash that virus."

Mac looked thoroughly guilty, as though it was entirely his fault. Jack plastered on kind of a smirk and prepared to take some of the heat off his partner. "I know it looks bad…"

"Bad?!" she practically shouted. "Jack, bad is when you accidentally run over your neighbor's dog. This is a damn catastrophe of biblical proportions."

Mac's face had smoothed, but it was with thought, or more accurately with memory. He said, an almost dreamy voice. "It's here. The target's San Francisco."

Mac jogged over to catch up with Nikki before she could be carted away. Jack and Riley were right on his heels. "Chen's planning on releasing the virus here, isn't he?" he demanded.

She squared her shoulders and answered crisply, "You're wrong. It's Tokyo."

Mac shook his head. He suddenly understood why Jack occasionally just lost his shit and punched a wall. Right now he kind of wanted to do the same thing. "Oh, you're lying."

Riley and Jack both looked confused. Mac felt compelled to explain. He also thought it might tip Nikki over toward just admitting what she'd done. He glanced at Jack and Riley. "Eliza A. Pittsinger. I saw it on Kendrick's phone, but I didn't realize it until now." He shifted his eye contact back to Nikki. "Pittsinger wrote a poem in 1907 on the anniversary of the San Francisco earthquake. Over 3,000 people died in the fires."

Her jaw firmed. She squared up with him in a way that would have looked aggressive if she wasn't handcuffed. "Sometimes a purge is necessary to fix what's broken."

Mac snapped. "Don't pretend this was about ideology. You did this for a payday!" He couldn't think of any reason to betray his country, but money was the worst one someone else could have.

She shook her head, her expression a combination of determined and desperate for him to understand why she would have betrayed him. "Mac, did you ever ask yourself why our government wants that weapon? What are they planning on doing with it?"

That was the tone she always used when she was trying to talk Mac into doing something he didn't think was a good idea or really didn't want to do. It had gotten him into trouble more than once when he capitulated to it. Honestly, they'd gone in the way they had in Cairo because Nikki had pushed for it, while she stayed safely in the van, supposedly jamming signals. Which now that Jack thought about it, she definitely hadn't been doing because the call from Bozer had come at the worst possible moment and distracted them both. Well, it distracted Mac. Jack had to admit, he'd kind of been screwing around before everything went to hell. He'd mostly been doing it because he'd been pissed that Mac sided with Nikki about where to go next on that mission. He could see the wheels of those old habits wanting to turn. Mac was the smartest guy he'd ever known. Like it was a superpower how smart Mac was. But Nikki Carpenter was the kid's kryptonite. He butted in, hoping to grind those wheels to a halt. "We're running out of time here, Mac."

Nikki's eyes shot daggers at Jack before returning to MacGyver's. "Even if you find it, the people I work for will stop at nothing to get it back."

Jack couldn't resist poking her just a little. "We'll see about that, won't we?"

Her defiant expression, the almost smug way she looked at him, jolted Mac back into action. "No more games. Where's Chen?"

"You should leave."

There it was.

The indication that she still cared for him.

He hated the way the idea warmed him. And he also recognized it for what it was. Pure manipulation. Yeah, well, two can play at that game. Only he wasn't willing to stoop to using the relationship he'd thought they had to do it. He forced a confident, half amused smirk on to his face.

"Well, that's not gonna happen." He was satisfied at her sharp intake of breath. "I'm not going anywhere and neither are you." He wondered what he looked like to her at the moment because she dropped back a step. He let his smile spread. "So, Chen will release the virus here, then we'll both die." She recoiled visibly this time and swallowed hard. He heard it. He advanced on her, got close enough to make himself uncomfortable, but successfully kept it off his face. "So what's it gonna be?"

There was a long silence. Nikki seemed to think she could wait him out. She looked at the two men who'd been leading her toward their car.

Mac shook his head and waved off the other agents. "You guys should get out of here. Evacuation efforts are probably going to be all hands on deck. And the prisoner isn't going anywhere."

They nodded and started toward their car without another word. They got as far as opening their doors. When Nikki half shouted, "Stop! Chen is heading for the heart of the city. There's a military truck. It's disguised as National Guard. He should be hitting the highway right about now."

Mac sighed his relief, he turned to direct Riley to get Thorton back on the computer. "Already on it," she said crisply before he could open his mouth.

He raised his eyebrows at Jack and mouthed, "She's really good," thinking she was busy with her laptop and wouldn't notice.

"Yes, I am," she agreed, spinning the laptop and revealing Thornton's face glaring out at them expectantly.

Jac chuckled, he couldn't help it. Riley might absolutely hate him right now, but he could only think it was a good thing to bring together two of the smartest people he'd ever know on this job. He was also hoping he could maybe extend it beyond that. He owed the kid that much. He felt like their history might have had something to do with how she wound up in the clink. "She really is."

"Who really is what?" Thornton demanded.

Mac pretended she hadn't asked. "We have a line on Chen."

He proceeded to fill her in.

"So, get after him."

"Patty, he's got a pretty good head start. We're gonna need a chopper or somethin'."

"Director Thornton and you're at an airfield. Commandeer one!"

"Oh, right!"

He and Mac took off at a run, leaving Riley to coordinate support with Thornton.