Disclaimer: See part 1 -- nothing's changed

With thanks to Gamine and Nessa for patiently picking out the nits. Also thanks to Kahva just because.

Please offer feedback, it tells me how I'm doing

And you guys thought the last one was evil...

~*~

Peterson balanced on his good leg as best he could, but the way he was chained up meant that was a nearly impossible challenge. He wished Eric had opted to break something else. Something slightly less important. Not like he had too much choice. He snorted softly. His internal clock told him that it was probably somewhere around six o'clock in the evening.

He wasn't sure what Eric was going to have come up with, but whatever it was, it had to start soon.

Unless Eric's decided he's going to leave me here to rot...which is probably about what I deserve.

Light, and suspiciously feminine footsteps approached the holding cell. A moment later and the elegant form of Hana slipped into the room, moving swiftly and surely from shadow to shadow.

"Time to go," she whispered as she reached him.

"I hope you've got a lock pick on you," Peterson answered softly, "otherwise I'm not going anywhere."

Hana chuckled dryly. "I have something better." With a slight rattle, she produced a set of keys. "I lifted them from the 'help' this morning."

"Sneaky," Peterson approved as he felt her free his left ankle. "What's Eric doing?"

"Going after Soong," Hana answered, her voice muffled by the fact that she was bending to release his right ankle. "How bad's your knee?"

"Shot," he admitted. "He's gone after Soong? On his own?"

Hana straightened and unlocked his left wrist. "It's personal." She paused, meeting his gaze. "Something to do with Kosovo."

Peterson hadn't thought it was possible to feel any worse about an operation. He now realised he was wrong. Oh shit.

Hana, meantime, finished releasing him. "C'mon. Kick yourself later -- we've gotta get outta here."

"Quite to the contrary, my dear," stated a new voice. "You are not going to be going...anywhere."

~*~

Silently, Eric crept through the lab complex. The whole complex was obviously into their night time routine, to judge by the dimmed lighting and the complete lack of staff. That suited him perfectly. He bypassed the door into the cell gallery. What he needed was a way into the cells themselves. A little further on, he found a likely looking door. Let's see what's behind door number one. He listened for a second and judged there was no-one immediately behind it. Quietly, he pushed it open a fraction -- enough for him to get a sense of what lay beyond without alerting anyone who was in the room or...on the stairs.

Eric smiled faintly to himself as he slipped into the stairwell. The bare concrete stairs led only one way: Down. This had to be the way into the cells. It very clearly wasn't somewhere Soong went -- otherwise it would have been painted, and probably tiled. This was somewhere the minions went. The underlings. The lab rats. Eric's faint smile thinned into a grimace as he descended the stairs. Lab rats no more.

At the bottom of the stairs, which descended two flights -- a distance Eric guessed probably took him to the floor level of the cells or thereabouts -- he found another door. Again, he listened before easing it open a crack. Another hallway -- this one a virtual negative of the one at the top of the stairs. Grimy, unpainted walls, bare cement floor...

He stepped out into the hallway and was faced with a 'nurse's' station, unmanned -- after all, who cared about the prisoners; it wasn't as if they could escape -- and unsecured. He could see the electronic lock controls blinking on the switch panel behind the desk.

Eric nodded to himself. Let's find door number two... There was a sheet of paper on the desk with cell assignments written on it -- and mercifully enough -- written in English. He scanned the list, twice before he finally spotted the name 'Borgh' scrawled in classic doctor chicken scratch. Cell five b. OK...five b... Eric turned to the switch panel and released the lock on five b, then jogged along the hallway in the direction of the faint 'click' of the lock releasing.

There was a risk there was someone up on the catwalk as he opened the cell door, but that was a risk he was going to have to take. Time was running out. He stepped into the cell and found himself being pounced on by 'George'. They both crashed to the ground, 'George' obviously intending to make a break for it.

There was a moment as their eyes met.

"What the...?!" 'George' began, the fight leaving him completely.

"Long story," Eric answered.

'George' blinked a couple of times as he rolled off Eric, allowing him to sit up. "You're...you're that guy -- from the other day." A frown crossed 'George's' face. "Wait...aren't you supposed to be Chinese or something?"

"Or something," Eric agreed.

"What the hell's going on?"

"Mr Kim's going out of business," Eric answered.

A knowing look crossed 'George's' face. "You're working for Frank Peterson."

"And your name isn't George Borgh," Eric retorted, getting to his feet. "There'll be time for proper explanations later. Provided we can get out of here before the air strike comes down." He offered 'George' a hand up. "You in?"

"If you're Peterson's, I'm in," 'George' answered, nodding. "What do you need me to do?"

~*~

Kimberly shifted, uncomfortably. The baby didn't seem to want to settle down at all this evening. The thought crossed her mind that there was something wrong -- that the stress of the last five and a half days had harmed the baby somehow -- but it didn't feel wrong. Just feels like he's decided to practice half a dozen katas, she mused wryly. Honey, please settle down...

She cuddled the pillow closer.

This really was going to be a long night.

~*~

Eric was still semi-convinced 'George' was liable to slug him a good one when he got a suitable opportunity, but for the time being, they had a truce. 'George' was freeing the other prisoners and was going to do his best to get them out of the compound, which left Eric free to track down Soong.

Quietly, he padded down dim and oddly empty hallways searching for Soong. Each room he checked was empty; most of them were bedrooms, so that wasn't too surprising. And yet, the longer he went without seeing another human being, though, made Eric nervous. Something wasn't right.

He glanced at his watch. Fifteen minutes before Taylor was due to show up.

Where the hell was everyone?

Up ahead, Eric saw the bright lights of a well lit room. Automatically flattening himself against a wall, he inched towards the open doorway. Voices floated out of the room.

"I must admit," said one that Eric identified as belonging to Soong, "I was impressed with your little charade, my dear. And Mr Myers is quite the actor -- he was almost believable."

Eric froze. Fuck.

"But," Soong was continuing, "there was just one fly in the ointment, at least as far as your plans were concerned."

"He's got a very unforgettable face," stated a new voice, one that Eric half thought he ought to recognise. "Particularly when he's shoving it where it's not wanted."

"That's enough, Dr Mendez," said Soong warningly.

Oh shit. Eric closed his eyes. I should have known. Javier Mendez. Ex-employee of Biolab. Michael Zaskin's predecessor. A man Mr Collins had sacked for incompetence...at Eric's say so.

~*~

There was the Soong compound, Taylor noted. Just coming up. TAC squawked and the computer reported that something had 'painted' her with a targeting radar. Oh why am I not surprised this isn't gonna be a straight forward shoot'n'loot? All the same, a smile crept across her face. Ah well -- shoot'n'loots are boring...

A warning went off, indicating target lock had been achieved.

All right -- you wanna play? Let's play...

~*~

Eric inched closer to the room, wondering how the hell he was gonna be able to do anything about this. He was betting that also in the room was, at the least, Hana. Probably Peterson too. Soong had at least got Mendez with him. Probably the two 'help' as well. OK, let's cut down what I don't know...He reached the doorway.

Flattening himself even tighter to the wall, Eric looked into the room. All that was immediately visible was a small section of the room to the right of the door. That was completely empty of people -- fortunately. In fact, all it contained was a large, wooden sideboard. If this was the movies, Eric mused, there'd be a mirror over that thing. No such luck. What his view of the room did tell him was that the occupants of the room were on the other side of the room.

Did he risk moving across the doorway to get a better look?

"I am a little surprised," Soong was saying, "that he hasn't yet joined this little party. I thought he was nothing if not intelligent."

"Perhaps he's too intelligent to fall for this," Hana snapped, firmly confirming to Eric she was present.

Peterson has to be here too, unless Soong's already killed him. Eric found he was oddly upset by that thought. Dismissing it as irrelevant for the time being, he wondered what the best plan of attack was. Sometimes, he finally decided, full frontal is about the only way to go...and I do have one thing on my side. Reaching round, Eric drew the gun. He'd just have to make sure it counted for something while he still had surprise on his side too.

~*~

Taylor kicked in Airwolf's turbo jets and the helicopter roared out of range of the ground weaponry. Chew on that. She could practically hear the crew on the ground doing a collective 'what the hell'. She smiled and looped back round, accelerating towards the speed of sound right back at the weapons emplacement.

The warning of radar lock blatted again.

Taylor smiled and squeezed the trigger, firing off a HARM missile straight back down the radar signal, then pulled back on the collective, pulling Airwolf up in a steep climb, even as the missile exploded.

Oh yeah. Definitely something to chew on.

~*~

Eric heard the whine/growl, just before he heard the concussive blast of a missile exploding. A moment later and some of the windows in the building rattled. Blast was over a mile away, then, he guessed.

From the room, he heard Mendez yelp, "What the fuck was that?"

Eric knew a cue when he heard one. "That would be the signal that time's up." Moving fast, he entered the room, levelling the gun in the direction of Mendez' voice. He fired once, hitting the doctor in the right shoulder -- not as accurate as he'd have liked but certainly debilitating enough to take Mendez out of the game for now. That one shot bought him the time to look around the rest of the room and see who else was there.

It was a sitting room. Soong was seated on an easy chair, the two 'help' standing guard either side of him. Hana was on a two seat sofa, just to Mendez's right. Don't think about how close you came to hitting her... Peterson was sprawled on the floor, probably unconscious. No sign of Chung-Hee.

"Quite the avenging angel, Mr Myers," Soong applauded, even as Eric brought his gun in to aim at Soong's head. "But surely you're not going to just shoot me?"

"Evil Overlord rules," Eric retorted, firing. "Shooting is not too good for my enemies." That shot was dead on target, hitting Soong between the eyes. The Korean slumped back in his seat, just a neat red hole in his forehead the only giveaway that he was emphatically dead. "And Christ knows there's nothing about you worth hanging on to."

The two 'help' exchanged looks.

"What the fuck are you two waiting for?!" Mendez screamed, clutching his shoulder. "Kill that bastard!"

"Better still," Eric answered, firing off another two rounds, "don't." The two rounds were hastily aimed. Neither shot was on target, and both served to just enrage the two thugs.

One of them pulled a revolver out and took aim.

"Oh this was not a good idea..." Eric dived as a bullet ripped through where his head had been seconds before. He rolled to his feet and fired again, hitting the one with the gun in his gun hand. That took care of that little problem, but both thugs were still on their feet and breathing, and one -- the one who hadn't pulled the gun -- was getting closer to him. Eric fired again, this time centre-mass, going for something that would put the thug down in a hurry. The shot was on target, but the thug just grinned.

Oh fuck! Kevlar. Well shit.

And then the thug was on him.

~*~

Taylor brought Airwolf round for a second pass, though she wasn't expecting that radar source to still be in operation -- and it wasn't -- though she could pick up the IR signal from the burning wreckage. That'll put a crimp in your style.

Throttling back, she came round to pull a proper scan of Soong's compound, looking for any more 'surprises' -- and found some. Another two AC emplacements, nearer the house, that had definitely not been there when they'd done the recon. Damn someone's gotten paranoid in the last two days. One of the emplacements attempted a radar lock.

Stupid bastard. Taylor fired another HARM. Another emplacement went up with a whumpf. The other AC emplacement showed a sudden and rapid depowering. Smart guy. Too bad for him I'm not dumb enough to leave him operational. As she came back round on a third pass of the compound, she fired a bullpup at the location Airwolf's computer had logged the third emplacement. The third emplacement exploded.

~*~

Tossing the pistol aside as useless if the two thugs were wearing Kevlar -- and from the grins, they both were -- Eric dived forwards, neatly avoiding the lunge of the closer thug.

"All right boys -- you wanna dance?"

There was a moment when nothing happened, then Hana screamed, "Eric get down!"

Used to obeying commands of that sort without argument, Eric dropped to the ground just as a huge explosion rocked the house, closely followed by a second. The glass in the wide, patio-style doors blew inwards. Holy shit...As the tinkle of glass died away, Eric rolled to his feet, wincing as some of the shards dug into them, hoping he was reacting faster than the thugs. Thug number one -- the one who'd already been shot in the hand -- wasn't moving, though Eric knew it was too much to hope for that the Korean had taken a piece of glass somewhere vital. Thug number two was just getting to his feet.

Eric launched himself at the thug, driving the shorter man back to the ground. Time to make your size count -- for once! Wrapping his arms around the shorter man's neck, he applied pressure and started to choke him out. The thug fought back, but Eric had all the leverage advantage. The struggles got progressively weaker until Eric felt the man's body go lax in unconsciousness. Then with a twist, Eric broke his neck. One down...

~*~

Bringing Airwolf round in a wide sweep of the compound, Taylor looked for targets that she could hit safely. The main building was a nice, fat target, but that was almost certainly where Eric was.

Another warning tone sounded, indicating that a missile had been launched from the ground. Heat seeker SAM. That was easily dealt with. Even as she put Airwolf through a complex pattern of evasive manoeuvres, she brought up a sunburst and fired it.

The bright magnesium flare lit up the rapidly darkening sky like day and the heat seeking missile homed in on it, just as it was supposed to. As Taylor pulled up, the missile exploded at the flare.

Now does one of you dumb sons of bitches wanna try your luck again?

~*~

Another explosion, airborne this time from the sound of it, echoed through the night as Eric turned his attention to the remaining thug, who still hadn't moved. Cautiously, he moved over to the thug, well aware of the possibility the Korean was playing possum.

Not cautiously enough as a hand snaked out, grabbed an ankle and pulled. Eric found himself falling. As he landed, the thug was onto him, throwing wild punches. Most of them were so wild as to miss altogether, but a couple landed sending pain through Eric's jaw. This is really not what I had planned for my Monday night...Mustering a burst of energy, he surged up, throwing the thug off. Before the other man could recover, Eric had grabbed him in another sleeper hold.

"Say good night."

The thug fought the hold -- possibly more so than his colleague, probably guessing what was going to happen next -- but grimly Eric clung on. He couldn't afford to do anything else. When the body finally went limp, he completed the job and broke the man's neck.

Then he turned his attention to Martinez, who was clutching his shoulder and looking pale. In large measure because Hana had produced a gun and was holding it against his temple.

"You were right," she said. "They didn't find it."

Eric smiled faintly. "How's Peterson?"

"Got a headache to rival the last time some bastard hit me over the head with a baseball bat," Peterson replied himself with a groan.

"That happen often, then?" Eric asked.

"More often than I'd like."

Eric shook his head and climbed to his feet. "C'mon -- I'm thinking Ejector Earhardt is itching to put a missile through this place."

"I'll just bet she loves that you know about that one," Peterson retorted.

"If you'd done all your homework on that one," Eric retorted, retrieving his gun, "you'd know I was somewhat involved in it."

"I don't wanna know," said Hana.

But if she had anything else to say, it was drowned out well and truly by the sounds of the big attack helicopter landing. That probably meant things were over. Taylor climbed out of the chopper, obviously looking fairly pleased with herself.

Eric watched her move across the grass. The sense that something still wasn't entirely right was still with him. Which meant either his intuition was doing overtime -- or...

He started forwards, yelling, "Taylor, down!" But the warning was just fractionally too late. Chung-Hee had appeared wraithlike from the bushes and had grabbed the blonde by the throat.

"Don't come any closer!" he yelled. "Or I might just have to...kill her."

TO BE CONTINUED...