Disclaimers: I don't own Max Steel and, unless those nice people at Foundation Imaging give me the rights to it, I never will!

Umm. . .this chap's gonna get kinda gory, but I'll tell u when that'll happen so u can skip it if u want, k?

Chapter 4:

"I'm going out, see you later!" Melissa called out, bag on her back, rollerblades on and a hand on the front door.

"I wouldn't be so confident." Berto told her. "Smith wants you at N-Tek ASAP."

"You're joking?! This is my first day off in weeks! Besides, I was going to get something special for my mom." Melissa finished in a whisper so that only Berto could hear her. "It's her birthday tomorrow."

Berto relented. "Fine, I'll tell Smith that I couldn't contact you. Keep your bio-link off, anyway."

"Thanks, Berto!" Melissa said, relieved.

"You owe me big time." Berto replied, before realizing that he was talking to no one. "Max, we've got a situation. We need you and Rachel in the TSO, now!" Berto commanded, opening the link to Max.

"What's wrong?" Josh replied, almost as forcefully.

"We've lost radio contact with a few of out agents in Africa. You'll be briefed as soon as you arrive." Berto told him, closing the link.

"Melissa is going to be so annoyed now." Josh remarked after informing Rachel of what was happening. "She's always wanted to go to Africa for as long as I can remember."

*****

"What's the 4-1-1, bro?" Max asked as soon as the doors to the TSO opened.

"A couple of our agents were sent on a recon mission a week ago. So far, we have had no contact from them at all. All we need you to do is to locate them."

"But?" Rachel interrupted.

"There have been some reports of a terrorist organization being set up in the same city as the agents went missing in. Be careful." Berto added, more of an after-thought than anything else.

*****

Slamming his fist against the wall in pure rage, he was all but oblivious to the pain it cause and the blood now trickling down his hand and onto his civilian clothes. The wall had shaken at the impact, but that was all. They weren't dumb enough to capture him and then allow him to escape so easily.

Sighing in exasperation, he leaned against the wall and slid down it, ending up sitting on the floor hugging his knees to his chest.

Ignoring his injuries, he rested his chin on his knees, thinking. How had this mission gone so wrong? He played the image over and over again in his mind until he wasn't sure where he was; in the cell or in the middle of the fight.

~Flashback~

It was supposed to be the easiest mission that they'd ever gone on. It was, until it went horribly wrong.

An alarm screeched all around them, not knowing where the noise was coming from as another explosion rocked the base. Chunks of debris were falling everywhere, the structural integrity of the building falling.

"Max, you need to get out of there now otherwise the building will collapse with you inside!" Berto warned over the bio-link.

"Where's Rachel?" Max asked, panicking just slightly.

"She's outside, waiting for you." Berto lied, knowing that Max wouldn't move an inch if he thought that his partner was in danger.

"Ok, I'm on my way out." Max replied, not believing his friend at all. Following Berto's instructions, he was gradually making his way out when. . .

~End flashback~

Max looked up from his position to see that the guards were standing outside his cell, and he stood up, wincing slightly, but doing his best to avoid showing any emotion.

As per usual, the cell door opened, and a DREDD guard walked in.

'Interrogation, more like torture.' Max thought bitterly to himself, but refrained from saying anything that he was thinking at the moment. Nodding, Max followed the guard out of the door and down the hallway. Resistance, as they say, was futile, and also pointless. He wouldn't even get twenty meters before he was caught.

The doors slid open, revealing a huge, open space, or at least that's what it looked like at first. Glancing around, Max saw Rachel standing in the corner, as always, and gave her a brief smile of reassurance.

"I'm going to ask once again: I know you are a part of N-Tek, and I know that, being a senior agent, you will know what I am talking about, so answer my questions and your partner," Rachel flinched, "Will not suffer any more than necessary." A man said in Russian, walking into the room.

"No, don't tell him anything." Max mouthed at Rachel, and she nodded in response.

"Now, where is this super-human agent that has been causing me and my lieutenant so much trouble over the past five years?" He asked menacingly, but Rachel's eyes flickered over to where Max was standing.

"No," he mouthed once again. 'This guy was the head of one of the strongest terrorist organizations in the world, and wouldn't have second doubts about killing me either way.' Max thought to himself, as he waited for Rachel's answer.

"I don't know what you are talking about. The person who was infused with the probes died soon afterwards." Rachel replied in perfect Russian, glancing sadly at Max, who was waiting for what he knew was now going to happen.

(A/N: OK, this is where it's gonna start getting gory, so look away now if u hate this kinda stuff! Btw, I don't have anything against people from Russia; it was just the first country that came into my head!)

The Russian man shook his head, almost remorsefully, as he uttered the next few words.

"Hang him from the ceiling." He barked at the guards, who obliged. Two of them grabbed Max by the elbow, leading him towards the centre of the room, right next to a pair of shackles suspended from the ceiling. Hoisting his up, they cuffed his wrists so that he was now left hanging from the ceiling.

Rachel tried to close her eyes as she heard the familiar crackle of a shock stick to avoid watching, but she couldn't. They had tapped her eyelids open so she couldn't do anything except watch.

As the shock stick was jabbed into his side, next to a half-opened would, Max bit down on his tongue to avoid screaming out in pain.

'Don't think about it!' He ordered himself, trying to ignore the pain that was now coursing through his body. 'We'll get out of here. I know we will.' He thought, but not convincingly. The whole base was comm.-secured, so there was no chance of anyone from N-Tek coming to their rescue any time soon.

"Stop." The Russian commanded; a one word order. "I'll ask you again; where is the super-human agent?" He said, more viciously. Once again, Rachel said nothing about Max.

"I already told you; he's dead."

"Fine then, I'll accept that the man died, but what about the young girl that was there the same night? I know *she's* still alive so you can't feed me the same type of lies." He walked around to the table that was situated in the room, and picked up a ten or twelve inch knife.

"I would be a shame," he said, twisting the knife in his hands, "if she were to have a little. . .*accident*." He said pointedly, and, for perhaps the first time, Max's head shot up at the mention of his sister.

"How old was she, thirteen, fourteen? That would only make her a teenager, even after five years, and I highly doubt that you would want her death on you conscious."

"You would never find her, not in a million years. You don't even know her name." Max said defiantly, a look of pure rage in his face, and suddenly realized his mistake as his shirt was taken off once again, and the knife plunged into his stomach. Dark red blood ran from the freshly-opened wound, and started to drip onto the floor.

"Tsk, tsk. It seems that I still have to teach him his manners sometimes." The Russian commented calmly, yanking the blade out once again and ignoring Max's scream of pain.

"Take them back, and leave the woman with him for a short time. He might be able to persuade her to see some sense." The Russian said, switching to Swahili so that neither Rachel nor Max would understand him. The guards nodded, and forced their prisoners back to their cell.

(OK, the gory parts over, for now *gives an evil grin.* This is what I can cum up with if needs be!)

*****

"Max, why do you have to be so stubborn?" Rachel asked rhetorically, kneeling down beside him and pressing her hand to the wound to try and stem the flow of blood.

"I am not going to let them hurt my little sister." He replied firmly, gritting his teeth. "I'm not worried about all of this, if he knew I was the agent he was looking for, he'd kill me anyway. I don't have a choice; death by torture, or death by execution."

"I think it's slowing." Rachel said in a vain attempt to change the subject from where it was inevitably heading.

"Don't worry, I'll live." He tried to reassure her, standing up, using the wall for support. "At least he didn't go for the whole 'suspend me from my feet for a few hours' this time. I'm starting to get sick of looking at the world upside down." Max added, trying to lighten the mood, but all he got was a weak, forced smile from Rachel.

"We *are* going to make it." He said forcefully, crouching down beside her and putting an arm around her shoulders. "I mean, come on, how long do you recon they'll be able to keep Jen away?"

"This is stupid." Rachel said, tracing the outline of the wound with her right hand. "He knows who we are; I can tell." Both their heads jerked up at the sound of the cell door scraping open, and Rachel stood up, sighing dejectedly, after kissing Max on the lips.

*****

"Jen, would you stop pacing already? You're starting to make me feel nauseous." Berto said, watching her from the corner of his eye.

"Gee, sorry, *Berto*," she said sarcastically, pausing for a second. "I didn't realize how much you were concentrating on me and not finding my brother!"

"Will you give me a chance?! He's been missing for less than twenty-four hours; it's hardly a situation that calls for panic."

"Oh, sure! And when will you decide that it's time to panic? When we're too late to save them?" She practically spat at him. Berto sighed and turned his attention back to the monitors lining the room. She was majorly pissed, and nothing he could do would change that.

"I think I've got a location on Max!" Berto said after a few minutes, and Jen rushed over to scan the data that the screen was showing.

"Cape town, South Africa." She muttered half to herself. "I'm going." She said, turning around, ready to walk out of the room before Berto stopped her.

"You're not going without some kind of back-up!" He said forcefully, and regretted it instantly.

"Oh, and where *am* I going to find back-up? In case you haven't noticed, N-Tek has been destroyed!"

"Right here." Berto replied, seeing the look of shock on Jen's face. "I'm not letting two of my oldest friends die." Tilting her head, Jen grinned the same smile her brother had.

"So, what are we waiting for?" She asked rhetorically, walking out of the room.

*****

"Is this the place?" Jen asked suspiciously, glancing at the building. Berto just shot her a look.

"Jeez, OK!" She said, admitting defeat. "So, what's the plan?"

"We rush in, rescue Max and Rachel, and in the process destroy the whole building."

"So, the Max Steel way then?" Jen asked; a cocky grin on her face. "It shouldn't be that hard! Lets go!"

*****

Entering the building, Jen heard a rush of static, and glanced briefly at Berto.

"It's comm.-secured, which means that we have to be careful." Jen nodded, and gave him a thumbs-up sign before starting to creep down one of the hallways.

*****

Distracted by the sudden invasion of the building, most of the guards were caught unaware before they had even realized what was happening.

"Max, Rachel?" Jen hissed, glancing around at the cells lining this particular hallway, and her heart skipped a few beats as she recognized a certain blond female further down the hall.

"Rachel!" Jen called out, and Rachel turned to look at her in a mixture of fear and surprise. "Rachel, where's Max?" She asked her, waiting for Rachel to say that her brother was fine. Instead, she said nothing.

"Rachel, come on, where is he?" Jess said, more softly than before. Unable to say anything, Rachel just nodded her head in the direction of the cell.

Opening the door, Jess looked in . . .  and then backed out again, hand covering her mouth, eyes wide in shock. Walking forwards, she knelt down in front of him and felt for a pulse. There wasn't one.

"He's dead, isn't he?" Jess asked rhetorically, not bearing to look at Rachel. Her brother was dead.

APRIL FOOL'S DAY!

A/N: Cum on, did ya really think that I was gonna kill Max off? Did ya? *Jumps to avoid a gun being fired* Hey! No fair, I wasn't ready!

Ya see? This is the kinda stuff I rite if I feel like it! Hope I didn't scare too many of ya!