Note: The light in the mine is based on a story related in the book The Telltale Lilac Bush and Other West Virginia Ghost Tales by Ruth Ann Musick, which is outdated but still cool. It kinda doesn't fit with the rest of the story, or the tone of the show overall, but I couldn't resist adding it, given that WV is a rather ghost-ridden state, folklore-wise - and it nicely filled in a minor plot hole.

The tattoo joke comes courtesy of JAG, where it's sometimes mentioned that Mac has a tattoo, although she refuses to say where it is or what it looks like.

The mine was still pitch-black, although Josh's eyes had adjusted enough to make out some lighter shapes amidst all the ink, such as Ethan's unconscious body at his feet. In the light of his watch lay the remains of his and Kat's lunch: wrappers from two energy bars - one apiece - and half a bottle of water. They had more food, of course, but they weren't wasting it yet. N-Tek ran its agents through survival training. Right now their best chance lay in waiting for a rescue.

Or so Josh kept telling himself. But Berto hadn't contacted them yet, and it was causing him no end of worry. That wasn't like their manager or their friend, to not try to find out what was going on. Josh had come to the conclusion that Berto was either insanely busy, had been badly injured, or couldn't get a signal through the mountain rock. The first conclusion was the most likely, but the last was the one that worried him the most.

He and Kat had made a brief survey of their surroundings, which had netted the discovery of a plunging mine shaft that neither flashlight nor Max's IR could fully penetrate, and also a narrow, claustrophobic passageway that only led farther away from their chance at rescue. A few hours into the ordeal Josh's enhanced hearing had picked up a noise on the other side of the collapsed rocks, but since nothing had come of it, he'd finally given it up as wishful thinking. He had wishful thinking to spare.

His watch said it was 3:18 PM. It was the longest day of his life, and it wasn't over yet.

Ethan was still out cold. Josh would've worried, except Ethan's breathing was steady. He'd taken the other athlete's pulse a few times and found it to be normal. That didn't preclude a coma, but he trusted Kat to know how to lay someone out without causing permanent damage.

"I hate this," Kat said, making conversation because they were both bored to the point of tears. They'd done the stupid questions routine (what's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? what's your favorite color at one hundred and fifty meters underwater?), argued about what skateboarding on the moon would be like (on the off chance they might actually get to do that someday), had even played the lamest game of "I Spy" ever ("I spy something... black.") and now they were back to plain old complaining. "Being stuck here. Everything is covered with water."

"It's a good thing we have on wetsuits, then." Josh shifted, slouching more. She was right, though; sitting for several hours in slimy mine water was disgusting, and uncomfortable in the life jacket and helmet he still didn't feel comfortable in removing. "You've never been in a cave before, have you?"

"I have, but I was on a speed plan at the time." There were scritching noises. If he squinted, he could see her pushing off from the damp wall and walking aimlessly around the mine tunnel - not going too far, he hoped. "In Afghanistan, a few weeks before our little introductory mission in the Amazon. Some convoy had been hijacked, and they thought that maybe some nuclear material had been stolen and hidden in one of those stupid caves, and they asked N-Tek if they could maybe send someone in to find out, and lucky me, I was in the region. So off I went."

He vaguely remembered hearing about that. Juggling college and espionage and two social lives had kept him pretty busy in those days - not a lot of time to hang out by the water cooler and collect gossip. And Kat hadn't been on his list of people to keep tabs on, mostly because they'd never met. Back then she had been a vague collection of horror stories. "What happened?"

"Well, it ended with some big explosions. No nukes, though."

"That's always a plus." The conversation lapsed into silence once again. After a minute or so of her continued wanderings and his continued stationary boredom, he said, "So."

"So?"

"You have a tattoo."

Even without seeing, he knew she was rolling her eyes. "I was in a gang, Josh. They kind of encourage it."

Her misspent youth was always a touchy subject, but she sounded like she was in a fairly good mood about it today, surprisingly, and that, combined with his intense desire to bug her, prompted him to continue. "What's it look like?"

"None of your business."

"Okay..." He evaluated his chances and switched to a new tack. "Where is it?"

"Here."

There was movement, but she was too far away to be truly illuminated by the watch, and by the time he switched over to infrared, he knew he'dve missed it. So he didn't try. Instead, he told her, "I can't see that."

A snicker was the only response.

He shook his head in resignation but half-grinned despite himself. There were moments when he still wished his dad had never assigned Kat as his partner, but there were more times when he was glad of it. It was always fun to have someone to match wits and skills with, even if she sometimes got the better of him. Sometimes he got the better of her. It all balanced out.

Any further conversation on the tattoo subject was forestalled by a low groan from Ethan's direction. Josh flicked on his flashlight and didn't bother to avoid shining it in the other athlete's face. "Welcome back to the land of the living, Raptor."

"My head," came the pained response.

Josh coughed. "Yeah... uh... you got hit by a rock."

Ethan glanced from Josh to Kat with undisguised suspicion. "Which one of you was holding it?"

"Uh..." Josh started, wondering how he could get out of this one without telling the truth, because Kat was his partner and you just didn't rat on your partners. Especially when you were glad they'd done something. He glanced at Kat, who was leaning against the far wall again and not looking as though she intended to say anything either. "What makes you think one of us would hit you?"

"Because the last thing I remember is you yellin' at me for something I didn't do," Ethan said with open hostility, climbing to his feet. "That means it was her, wasn't it?"

"What is that?" Kat said suddenly, coming to attention and staring down the mine with an intent expression.

"What's what?" Josh asked, at the same time Ethan muttered something about bad attempts at distraction.

She was frowning intently. "That light. What is it?"

Josh looked, didn't see anything, squinted and got into the infrared, didn't see anything, and switched back to say, "I don't see any light, Kat."

"It's right there," she said, with an impatient gesture in the alleged light's direction. "No, wait, now it's moving."

"Someone's been in the dark for too long," Ethan said, jerking his head in her direction, then added a muffled, "Ow."

"You're imagining things," Josh told her, although agreeing with Ethan rankled.

"I'm not imagining this. I'll prove it." And with that, she started walking briskly down the mine tunnel towards the clastrophobic passageway.

"Kat, don't wander off," he said, exasperated and more than a little concerned for her mental state. Being in the dark was driving him a little crazy, and he privately considered himself to be more stable than she was. She gave no indication that she'd heard him; her boots left the far, watery edges of the flashlight's beam and he lost visual contact with her altogether. "Kat!"

Ethan rubbed the back of his head. "Maybe you should knock her unconscious."

"Maybe I will." Josh glared in the direction Kat had gone, thinking dark thoughts about stubborn partners, and sighed. "Come on. We can't let her go off by herself."

He started walking and, after a moment, Ethan followed too, saying, "Yeah, you seem to have a real problem with that. Loser."

All of the anger and dislike that Josh had managed to submerge came right back up. Ethan was calling him a loser? Without looking back, he said, "Remind me later to beat you up, okay? Right now I want to make sure we don't get even more lost."

Ethan made an incredulous noise. "You can't take me."

Josh looked over his shoulder with wry amusement. "Trust me, I can."

Ethan shook his head and Josh turned back around - only to stop in surprise.

Kat was standing squarely in the flashlight's ray, hands on hips, one foot tapping, scowling against the light. "Hey, boys. I'll get out the measuring tape after we're safe. Let's move it."

Josh and Ethan exchanged a gesture pointing out the obvious foolishness of women - they agreed on that, at least - and, lacking any real alternative, walked on.

And kept walking for what felt like two seconds short of eternity, but what Josh's watch swore was less than thirty minutes. However long it was time-wise, the trip took them ever-deeper into the mountain's core. The mine tunnels had been constructed to follow the coal seam, not to be linear, and the path that they took courtesy of Kat's invisible light wound and twisted until Josh had no idea where they were in relation to where they'd started. That worried him.

At the same time, he wasn't sufficiently convinced that they should stop and turn back. Staying put would've been the best option, but now that they were mobile, the hope of a way out - however doubtful - was just tempting enough when weighed against the likelihood of getting desperately, as opposed to slightly, lost trying to find their way back to the entrance.

While he debated with himself, the minutes ticked by. It was finally simply easier to follow Kat, trust that she wasn't completely bonkers, and take comfort in the fact that he'd survived far worse situations. He wasn't going to die wandering lost in a mine in West Virginia with Ethan Raptor. No way. Not Max Steel.

"You could at least turn your flashlight on," Josh told her.

She called back, "I can see just fine."

He made a face that, in the darkness, no one would notice. She could see just fine because he still had his flashlight on and was shining it at her feet, but it was going to run out of juice soon. Then they'd see who needed a flashlight.

"You can't see anything," Ethan said, daring her to correct him. "You don't even know where we're going. You're just crazy."

"I am not crazy. And I'm telling you, I know where we're going," she insisted.

"Oh, SURE you do." Ethan's dogged scorn was justified, but annoying all the same. Having to keep tabs on the other athlete was wearing on Josh's nerves faster than worrying about finding his way back, or worrying about his teammate's sanity.

"You know," Josh said, "just once I want to go somewhere and have absolutely nothing happen."

"A normal vacation would be boring," Kat said, adding for Ethan's benefit, "Watch out - the ground slopes up here."

Josh had gone over his last few vacations in his mind as they'd been wandering through the mine, and he had to disagree with her. A normal vacation would be perfect. He hadn't had a single one since he'd become Max, which, come to think of it, had ruined his first college summer vacation. There'd been Spring Break in Baja with Laura - and pirates; a trip to Hawaii with Berto - and L'Etranger; an ocean cruise with other athletes - and Psycho; and now the most ill-fated mountain trip since the Donner Expedition.

Kat moved ahead while Ethan and Josh navigated the sudden incline. Ethan, grumbling to Josh, said, "Man, why don't we just leave her?"

"Because she's my teammate." He barely stopped himself from saying "partner". Partner was a spy word. Or a relationship word. Neither would give Ethan the impression Josh wanted to give.

"She's gonna get us both killed," Ethan said anyway, apparently forgetting that she would get herself killed too.

"You're one to talk," Josh told him, glaring at him over his shoulder, and then, because Ethan did have a point, took a few quick, long strides that brought him even with Kat. She was staring straight ahead, walking without looking down at the uneven floor of the mine.

"Kat," he said, finally grabbing her around the arm and forcing her to quit walking. "This has to stop."

She made a noise of annoyance and tried to yank her arm away, but Josh wasn't letting go anytime soon and the effort didn't net her much. For all her athleticism, he had a good four inches and nearly eighty pounds on her, and that was without the nanoprobes to back him up.

"It has to stop," he repeated.

"And what? What are we going to do? Follow the yellow brick road back to the entrance?" She shook his hand off defiantly and turned on her heel. "And if you touch me again, you're going down."

"Kat, I'm just saying-" he started, but cut himself off abruptly. "Nobody move!"

For a second, both of the other athletes froze. In that second, Josh heard clearly the sound he'd barely picked up: Trip's voice yelling for Ethan.

Ethan, oblivious to the fact that they were this close to getting out, said disdainfully, "So now you're doing it too. Freaks."

"Someone's down here," Josh said. "I heard them calling."

Without further ado, he pushed past Kat and ran down the tunnel, using his ears to figure out which branching corridor he should take. It was an old trick, following distant noise, and he had less trouble with it than he did with getting Kat to agree with him. She was following him - he could hear that too - and so was Ethan. It looked like they were all going to end this nightmare intact. Miracle of miracles.

The tunnel narrowed abruptly, then took a sharp left turn. Josh rounded the corner and barely avoided running straight into Trip.

The other athlete jumped back, surprised, and promptly broke into a relieved grin. "Whoa! Hey, Josh, whoa, am I glad to see you. For a sec I thought you were like a ghost or something. Where's Kat and Ethan?"

Josh turned around and shouted, "It's Trip!"

Kat and Ethan came into view a moment later. Both looked relieved, but not as relieved as Trip, who grabbed Ethan around the shoulders. "Ethan, man, thank goodness. Carlie was gonna kill me if I came back alone."

Ethan pulled back, waving his teammate away and reinforcing Josh's opinion of him as a grade-A jerk, with a muttered, entirely fake, "Yeah, good to see you too."

Kat moved on to more important matters. "Trip, how'd you get down here?"

Trip pointed over his shoulder. "There's a collapsed section back there. It's like a big hole, but you can climb down and back out. I found it by accident." He looked around and gave a half-laugh as they started down the tunnel. As promised, a collapsed section was not too far away, and sunlight filtered down over a slump of rocks and mud. Josh turned off his flashlight.

"I've been walking around down here for an hour or something," Trip added, "trying to find you guys. It's starting to creep me out."

Josh picked up that explanation and jumped on it. "Well, that explains it," he said to Kat. "You just saw the light from his flashlight."

Nevermind that it didn't explain why he, with his nanoprobe-enhanced senses, had seen nothing at all.

"The light I saw was blue," Kat said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Flashlights are yellow."

"Ours are blue," Ethan cut in, scowling. "Turn it on and show them, Trip."

"Dude, I can't. I banged my flashlight against some rocks when I was climbing down. It's busted." Trip jiggled the flashlight emphatically. The light bulb, as advertised, failed to produce even a flicker.

Kat looked at each of them in turn, clearly unsettled despite her insistence that it hadn't been a flashlight in the first place. "So... what did I see?"

Trip gazed blankly back. Ethan was glancing around like he expected a monster to drop in at any moment. Josh wasn't looking, but he felt the hair on the back of his neck rise. "Maybe we should ask Berto to find out why this mine was abandoned."

She shook her head. "I'm kind of thinking, I don't want to know."

"I'm with you," Ethan said, pushing past all of them to the fallen rocks. He started scrambling up the incline with more speed than grace. "I'm getting out of here before something else happens."

Trip shrugged and tried to give Kat a hand up onto the collapsed rocks, which she ignored in favor of hauling her own self up.

"It's a wasted effort," Josh told him in a low voice, in a tone that plainly said, "Stay away from my sister." The only reaction he got was a resigned sigh. Then Trip climbed out with a few easy jumps, leaving Josh momentarily alone in the mine. Aboveground, Ethan and Kat were arguing about which was the fastest way to head down the mountain to where the kayaks were beached. Knowing Ethan, he and Trip would take off without looking back, leaving Team Steel to hike the three hours or so to the nearest phone, if Josh was remembering the maps right. The fun never stopped, it seemed.

Josh got a solid footing in the debris - as solid as muddy slate fragments could be, which wasn't very - and was just about to climb out himself when an ice-cold wind gusted down the mine tunnel with surprising force. Startled, he looked over his shoulder and caught the faintest flicker of blue light disappearing around a turn.

He wasn't sure, but he thought the light looked like a hand. A human hand. Waving good-bye.

Josh stared for a moment longer, then blinked and shook his head clear, saying, "I have got to get out of this mine," to no one in particular. Certainly not to a ghost hand.

And then he got the heck out of there.