1013 local time rilla Normal rilla 1 0 2001-11-07T05:50:00Z 2001-11-07T05:50:00Z 4 2192 12498 home 104 24 15348 9.2720

1013 local time

undisclosed location

Someone was trying to pry open her skull with a crowbar.  At least it felt as if they were.  Wherever she was, it was blessedly dark, hot but dark.  The temptation to let herself slip back into the oblivion of an unconscious dreamless sleep was nearly overpowering and she very nearly gave into temptation until the voices, hushed and exotic, reached her ears.  They were close, these voices, and Mac struggled to lift her eyelids.

At first she couldn't make out anything.  The room was swathed in thick, sweltering, superheated darkness.  But as her eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom she was able to distinguish shapes that resembled furniture and a single heavily shuttered window.  Blinking repeatedly to clear her blurred vision, she slowly turned her head, stifling a cry at the sharp pain that permeated all other sensations.  Sighing over her sorry condition, she closed her eyes again and let the darkness reclaim her.

"Altair!"  The whispered name echoed deafeningly in the quiet building.  "Altair!"

A woman softly padded across the hard packed earthen floor, a basket of linens balanced on her hip, her face lowered and listlessly watching the dust motes dance around her stocking clad feet.  Her face was hidden behind a black veil, only her eyes visible.  Hearing her name called she looked up and located the origin.  She shook her head at the beckoning woman, trying to dissuade her conversation.  It didn't work and the woman followed her across the room and out the door.

"Altair, wait, it's important."

"No time, Suleima.  I've got to finish this… and you'd better stop it with the English before he returns."  She pinned Suleima with a warning look, the dark irises of her doe-eyes darkening until they were indistinguishable from the pupils, a testament to the strength of her concern.  A moment later she turned and continued on her errand.

"Altair!" Suleima called out to no avail.  "Stormy!"

The retreating woman froze in her tracks, swaying with the abruptness of her sudden halt.  A shudder coursed through her, causing her shoulders to tremble and her thoughts to swirl with an intensity she had thought had been lost to her long ago.  The wind tugged at her veil and a pale hand snaked up to automatically catch the material before it could fly high enough to expose her face.  Slowly turning around to face her Arabian friend she whispered, "How did you…"

The locket Mac had slipped into her hand dangled from her fingers.  "Because I have a message for Colonel Stormy Caldwell of the US Marines.  I never knew your name, Altair.  When you came here so many years ago you wouldn't speak.  Did I ever tell you why I called you Altair?"

"No," her voice was so soft that Suleima almost didn't hear it above the sounds of daily life in the complex.  She accepted the piece of jewelry and pried open the locket to reveal a lock of Andrew's hair.

"Altair is Arabic, it means `a bird'.  You were so forlorn and depressed when I first saw you that you reminded me of a nightingale I once saw when I was a child.  It had been captured in the wild and placed in a cage," Suleima spoke soothingly, remembering the woman she had first seen in a filthy ragged military uniform, silent and proud regardless of her ill treatment.  "That bird never sang again, it just sat in the cage and withered away until it died."

"How did you find out my name?" Slowly, she turned around, her white knuckled hands clutching desperately at the basket she held.

"Your message got through, Altair.  Your friend has come." Suleima watched Altair's eyes closely trying to detect the woman's emotions.

"I don't…"  Confusion warred with pure unadulterated joy as Altair tried to form a coherent thought.

"I have a message to give you," Suleima continued, " and some bad news as well."  Suleima took a deep breath, trying to calm the wild fluttering of her heart. "This friend, she said to tell you that `Coyote has the last laugh, always'."

Altair's eyes crinkled and she suppressed a sudden chuckle. "Co-yo-te," she murmured, pronouncing the name the same way her great-grandmother had when she used to gather all the children around her rocking chair to hear the tales of Co-yo-te the Trickster.  She knew who had come, who would come even when she was though to be long dead. "Mac."

"But, Altair, this friend of yours, she was found out.  I do not know how or by whom, but it was discovered that she was here to take you back."  Suleima stared into Altair's eyes.  "She was taken last night, Altair."

"But how?  Surely she didn't leave the camp at night, how could she have been taken?  Mac's not exactly what you'd call easy pickin's."  Altair's concern was evident in her harsh whisper.  "Where is she?  Where are they keeping her?"

This was the question that Suleima wished she could avoid answering, Riyadh's level of confidence had risen to such a degree that he felt Altair was no longer a threat, that she would remain where he put her and accept any treatment he felt obliged to dole out.  By abducting her friend and holding her within his complex, he was waving a red flag before Altair's eyes.  She wouldn't remain the simpering concubine and allow him to hurt her American friend.  She had already been pushed too far; her control was already close to breaking.  "She's here, Altair, she's here."

1547 local time

Jordan-Saudi border

US Marine military encampment

"Get me the Admiral," Harm shouted into the device, slamming a fist down on the tabletop for good measure, a sign of the futility he felt.  He could just make out the sounds of the JAG HQ over the line, sounds that were a world and a lifetime away from where he stood in the scant shade cast by tents in the desert, worried about the whereabouts of his best friend and unaccustomed to the feelings of helplessness it created in his chest.

"Chegwidden."

"Admiral" he acknowledged.  "We've got a problem, Sir."

AJ rubbed a hand across his face at the revelation.  "What kind of problem, Commander?"  How could they have already found trouble when they'd only been in Jordan for little over a day?

"I've lost Mac, Sir."

"You lost her?  What were the two of you doing that you could loose her; playing hide and seek with terrorists?" the Admiral's voice boomed loud and clear over the line and Harm pulled the receiver away from his ear in response.  "I suggest you locate the colonel as soon as possible, Commander.  She's the best partner you've had yet and I'd hate to see you have to break in another one."

"Aye-aye, Sir."

AJ hung up the phone and summoned Tiner to his office.  "Get me Webb, Mr. Tiner.  And tell him to get over here pronto."

At the camp, Harm turned away from the communications chief to stare across the sand in the direction of the compound where Mac's friend was reportedly being held.  Mac hadn't deserted camp the previous night of her own accord; she wouldn't have abandoned her disguise just to traipse across the desert for a quick visit.  Someone had to have lured her out or slipped in and taken her from the inside.  Since her firearm was missing, Harm's best guess was that she'd been taken unaware, stolen away during the night at some point when she had left their tent.  He just couldn't figure out how.

1709 local time

Arabian desert

residence compound

"You've got to help me, Suleima."  Stormy's eyes shone bright with fear and panic.  "Just keep Riyadh occupied for a little while. Please, he never need know that your intentions were to help me." So much unspoken expression filled her too-dark eyes, things she would never speak of, memories she would never forget, and she clutched Suleima's hands in a death grip, her knuckles white from the exertion.  She couldn't let Riyadh get his hands on Mac, no matter the consequences.

"Altair…"

"I'll do it with or without your assistance, Suleima.  And you're right to not want to help, it could prove dangerous.  I don't want you to get hurt.  Please, forget I asked…" Stormy sputtered, second-guessing her own better judgment and not waiting to hear Suleima's response.  She dropped her tight hold on her friend's hands and had fled the darkened courtyard before Suleima could form a single thought.

She stood staring after the woman she had been inexplicably drawn to when she'd mysteriously appeared so many years before.  Dropping her gaze to the ground, she thought of her own family, the one she left behind to join the household of Riyadh.  If one of her sisters were in trouble she would want someone to help them, to protect them if possible, and she had failed to do so much as lift a finger against Riyadh on Altair's behalf.  How could she deny Altair that same charity now when she so desperately needed it?  How could she turn her back on her yet again?

"Altair, wait…" She started to follow her friend when she heard the familiar tones of her husband's voice coming from the entry.  Altair had asked her to keep Riyadh preoccupied.  Turning on her heel, she raced across the sandy courtyard, stirring up the dust and dirt with her hurried steps.  If she was going to catch him before he decided to deal with their new American `guest', she was going to have to move quickly.

Stormy rushed through the buildings that made up the residential complex.  Every nook and cranny of the area had been burned into her brain over the years and it wasn't long before she found the tightly latched storage shed.  It was similar to the one she was often locked in over night; by some stroke of luck her presence had been ignored that evening, probably due to the arrival of a second American in their midst. Brushing aside the worrisome memories that assailed her, she struggled to lift the board that lay across the door to bar unauthorized movement.  She pushed open the door and slipped inside.

Mac was immediately aware of the intruder's presence.  She had been laying on the ground, fully awake at last and attempting to assimilate an escape plan of some sort when she heard someone enter her prison.  The bright light that streamed in through the open door blinded her temporarily.  As if the headache from her concussion hadn't been severe enough…

The flashlight slipped from her grasp, shattering on the ground with bone-shattering resonance.  The sudden dusky-dim interior brought Stormy to a stand still and she dropped to her knees, frantically dragging her hands across the floor in search of the captive Marine.  When her hand made contact with Mac's foot she let out the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.  As soon as she made contact with Mac's foot, it was jerked back out of her reach, accompanied by a gasp of pain.

 Mac's distressed response helped Stormy find her voice, "Hey, Co-yo-te, I thought you were supposed to rescue me, not the other way around."  The barest of seconds passed before Stormy hurled herself into Mac's surprised arms.  All pain forgotten, at least temporarily, Mac returned the embrace with desperate need.  For a long moment the two women remained motionless and silent.

"We've got to get moving, quickly."  Stormy was the first to break the embrace, trailing her hands up Mac's arms and to her face, trying to assess any damage her friend may have incurred.  She shuddered when her fingers brushed against Mac's temple; it was coated in dried blood and dusted with sand.  "Can you walk?"

"As long as you're alive I think I can do almost anything. I'm so sorry, Gypsy Crow.  I never even knew…"

"It doesn't matter," Stormy's voice was whisper light.  "But we really do need to get moving.  I have a friend who may or may not be keeping Riyadh busy for a little while.  Regardless, we need to get as far from here as we can."  Stormy rose and helped Mac do the same, supporting more of the other woman's weight when Mac let out a stifled gasp.

Feeling Stormy's grip tighten, Mac hurried to reassure her, "It's not me, Gyps, I'm okay.  I'm a marine, right?  It's you…"

Cutting off her friend before she could go any further, Stormy started to move toward the door.  "I'm a marine too, remember?  There will be plenty of time to talk later, Mac, plenty of time."  She practically drug Mac through the door, propping her up against the external wall while she replaced the latch.  "Come on, Marine, suck it up," she murmured once the beam was back in place.

Mac watched her, wondering to whom her whispered words were directed.  She could easily have been speaking to herself rather than Mac.  Observing her friend's clothing, Mac glanced down at her own obviously non-Arabian mode of dress.  "Gyps, I'm not really dressed…"

"I've got it covered," came the whispered reply, followed by a folded bundle of dark fabric.  Mac worked as quickly as she could to slip the clothing on over what she already wore, tugging the veil firmly in place.  She glanced at her friend to find her anxiously waiting.

A conveniently loose section of the rear perimeter fence allowed them to slip away from the complex and out into the arid landscape that surrounded them on all sides.  Stumbling along through the sand, they continued to put as much distance between themselves and the complex as was possible given their varying physical conditions.  Pulling Mac over yet another pile of shifting sand, Stormy lost her grip on Mac's arms and tumbled down the slope headfirst.

"Gyps? Gypsy Crow?"  Mac craned her neck trying to locate her companion.  "Stormy!"

"Keep it down, will ya," Gypsy Crow's voice hissed back to her.  "Do you want Ali Baba and all his Arabian Knights to find us out here?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Nothing, just a private joke that's been keeping me sane these last few years."

"How about giving me some warning next time you decide to go down the easy way," Mac's mock sternness was ruined by the laughter that followed her remark.

"Yeah, well you're more than welcome to join me, or you can wait until I make it back up there to help get your lazy six in gear.  But either way you're gonna have to wait until I can get some of this sand out of my mouth," Gypsy Crow sputtered.

"Suck it up, Marine."

"That's the problem, Mac."

1450 Romeo

JAG headquarters

Admiral Chegwidden's office

"Webb!"

"There are still a few avenues of recourse left.  Admiral, I realize you're upset since this is Mac, but my hands are tied. Relations are strained right now, the Middle East isn't exactly the prime location for a weekend holiday."

AJ rose from his chair and leaned on his desk with clenched fists.  Not known for being a man of great patience, he considered how many bones he would have to break before Webb abandoned his play at immobility and helped get the two JAG lawyers back to the States. "I want my people back, Webb."

"Yelling won't assure Mac's safety, AJ.  I'm worried about her too, but she's a marine, right?  Maybe she'll be able to get out on her own."  Clayton Webb refused to look away from the fuming ex-SEAL, he was damned if the man would intimidate him.  Past broken noses aside, he'd survived worse than an angry Judge Advocate General.  He just didn't know if he could survive something happening to Mac.