Rock and A Hard Place: Chapter 6
Author's Notes: Another chapter of the Saga is here again as Scott and the girls continue their investigation into the strange happenings at Death Valley. More action is to come as the story continues...please keep reading and reviewing!
Annie's mood hadn't improved by the time she and Roxy made it back to Boulder Hill to report their findings. The pain shooting up her leg was becoming nearly intolerable, and Roxy had frayed her nerves down to her very last one with comments about how she had managed to blow their cover. She couldn't imagine how the hell Rax had managed to discover her so quickly, but she could guess that it was probably related to his single-minded obsession with Vanessa. Brad had told her on a few occasions how much she resembled her mother, but was it so much that it showed through in simple movement? As though it isn't bad enough I have to watch out for that bitch, now I have to keep an eye on an obsessive sex-crazed bastard who thinks I'd be a good replacement for her. Life just gets better and better.
Annie parked Phoenix in the garage and removed her mask, for once thankful that Roxy had beaten her here. Chameleon was already parked in the bay, and there was no sign of Roxy. Hopefully she'd already gone up to the conference room to debrief, although the thought of Roxy coloring the debriefing of their recon mission with her version of events scared Annie a little. Then again, she knew Scott well enough to know that he wouldn't take Roxy's story as the full truth anyway. Sighing raggedly, she ignored the pain throbbing in her left leg and began the trudge up to Boulder Hill's debriefing room, stopping momentarily when Buddy called out to her.
"Annie, is that dried blood on Phoenix's seat?"
"Yes, it is," she replied flatly and nonchalantly as she kept walking.
Buddy caught up to her quickly, immediately noticing the limp, as well as the disarrayed makeup and disguise. "What happened? You okay?"
"Sly Rax happened, and no, I'm not okay." Annie wanted desperately to keep up the tough act, but in the face of Buddy's brotherly concern, she exploded in a wealth of frustration and hurt. "He buried a stiletto in my leg, it hurts like hell, I had to listen to Roxy berate me the whole way back, and now I just want to get through this debriefing so I can get cleaned up and crawl into a hole somewhere and cry."
Buddy could see how pale Annie's face looked, especially framed by the red of her hair. "Look, go hit the shower, and I'll go let Scott know you're back and have him send Jess down to look at that leg. I think your debriefing can wait."
"Wait, before you go..." Annie painfully managed to remove her boots and retrieve the piece of ore she'd gotten from the mine. She handed it to Buddy with a short explanation. "This is what VENOM was after. It's some sort of super-metal ore that they're mining. I didn't get any specifics, but I'm sure a chemical analysis will turn up something."
"Good job, Red, looks like all my training paid off," Buddy said with a proud grin.
"Sort of. I could have done without Rax's added bonus, but thanks Buddy." Annie weakly smiled back as she limped away toward the locker room.
Buddy reached the conference room doors just in time to hear Scott's clearly annoyed and angry voice from the other side.
"What part of 'working together' did I fail to make clear to you, Roxy?"
"Sheesh Scott, your precious girlfriend was only a few minutes behind me. She should be here any minute, so just chill out and relax, would ya?" came Roxy's clipped reply.
"No, I will not 'just chill out and relax'." Even from the other side of the door, Buddy could hear the dangerously calm tone in Scott's voice. "I don't care if Annie was only two paces behind you, when you work together you leave together, you arrive together, and you debrief together. No matter how much you don't like it."
"You wouldn't be acting this way if our roles were reversed," Roxy accused him angrily.
That comment made Buddy wince. Damnit Roxy, that was exactly the wrong thing to say! When are you gonna learn to keep your mouth shut!
"As a matter of fact I would be..." Scott began, but his lecture was cut short as Buddy opened the conference room door.
"Excuse the interruption, Scott," Buddy said, in reply to the sharp look the new MASK leader shot him. "Thought you might like to know Annie just made it back with a present for you." He slid the piece of silver ore across the table as he added, "It's some kind of super metal VENOM's mining. Rax gave her a stiletto in the leg for her trouble, so she's in the locker room now getting cleaned up."
Scott's eyes met his briefly before turning a dark look Roxy's way. "You neglected to mention that. Now not only did you leave her behind, you left her behind AND injured."
"She didn't say anything...I didn't know she was hurt!" Roxy defended herself weakly.
Scott took a deep breath and let it out very slowly. In the meantime, no one spoke...the conference room was filled with silence. Buddy saw Jess sitting in her normal position, being unusually quiet, and he could almost see the thought process going on in Scott's head.
Scott knew he had two options: he could waste his time lecturing Roxy about the finer points of teamwork, or he could quickly finish and get to the more serious issue of Annie's injuries. He quickly chose the latter option.
Before he could even ask, Jess stood up to leave. "I'll go see how bad Annie's leg is. That is if she lets me anywhere near her."
Scott shot Jess a sympathetic smile. "I'll be down to give you a hand in a minute." When Jess nodded and left, he turned his attention back to Roxanne. "Is this all you found?" he asked, indicating the piece of metal ore, "or is there something else you aren't telling me?"
"That's it, unless you want to hear how your precious second in command blew this little recon mission out of the water," Roxanne teased maliciously.
"What I want to hear is the sound of you leaving to get some sleep," Scott snapped back, ignoring the bait, "because as soon as we find out what this rock truly is, we're going back to Death Valley. Good night, Roxy," he added in dismissal.
"Yeah, sure, ignore the truth," Roxy commented as she walked out the door, flashing Buddy a smile on the way out.
He smiled back. "Good job out there."
"Yeah, well, at least someone appreciates me," she tossed out as the door closed.
Scott resisted the urge to start ripping his hair out by the roots, instead focusing on the piece of ore in front of him. He picked it up and started idly tossing it up and down before handing it back to Buddy. "Can you get a chemical analysis started on that, and let me know as soon as you have the results?"
"You got it, chief," Buddy replied as they exited the conference room together. He shot a concerned glance Scott's way as he added. "I think you might want me to call Julio while we're waiting, 'cause with the amount of pain Annie looked like she was in, I don't think Jess is gonna get anywhere near her."
"Better call Brad too," Scott suggested. "He'll want to know what happened, and I may need to recall him."
"You're the boss," Buddy smirked as he disappeared back into the garage.
About ten minutes later, Annie was cradled in Scott's arms, silent tears falling down her cheeks as he carried her through the hallways of Matt's mansion. Jess had spent five of those minutes trying to coax her off the locker room floor, giving up as soon as Scott appeared in the doorway. He immediately sent Jess home to get some sleep, along with the promise of a recall sometime soon. After Jess left, he casually walked over and gently scooped Annie off the floor, not giving her a chance to anticipate the onrush of pain. She yelped once before she settled down and buried her head in the crook of his neck.
He pushed open the door to the mansion's lounge, carefully depositing Annie on her right side atop one of the open lounges. She immediately curled her legs at the knee, and Scott had to admonish her softly. "Straighten your leg, Annie."
"It HURTS!" she wailed as another batch of tears flowed down her cheeks, but she reluctantly did as he asked.
Scott positioned himself so Annie's head was cradled in his lap, and he stroked her hair as he replied, "I know, honey. Julio will be here soon, so just try and relax." Silence reigned for a few more minutes as Scott continued to stroke Annie's hair comfortingly. When he sensed that some of the tension had left her body, he asked quietly, "Feel like talking about what happened?"
"Rax happened," Annie mumbled.
Scott could tell it was sheer force of will keeping her from passing out from pain and blood loss, so he kept her talking as much as she could. "So I heard. How did you get close enough for him to get such a good shot at you?"
"I had to do an emergency makeover," Annie explained dazedly, "in order to see exactly what they were mining. Chatted with one of the migratory workers they hired who helped me get a sample of the metal they wanted. I was almost out of there before he showed up." She snorted, livening up a bit as she finished her explanation. "He threw me into their watering hole to blow the disguise, then shot me when I ran away from him. I just had to go and inherit enough of Vanessa's characteristics that the bastard knew me on sight. And if that's not bad enough, he freakin' hit on me by calling me her look-alike..."
"What?" Scott forced his voice to remain steady, and resisted the urge to tear out of Boulder Hill in Thunderhawk and hunt down Sly Rax himself.
"I got him back by stabbing him with his own dart," Annie said proudly through a pain filled haze, ignoring Scott's reaction.
The conversation was interrupted by Julio's arrival. When he saw Annie and Scott on the lounge, he wasted no time in setting up his supplies. He sat down on the other end of the couch and very gently began cleaning the leg wound as he commented casually, "It's been a long time since I've seen you, Annie. You're either very lucky, or your Ranger friends do a very good job fixing you up."
"Both," Annie managed to squeak out in reply before she fainted with one last shudder of pain.
Scott continued to gently cradle Annie's head in his lap as Julio worked. Within a few minutes, he had Annie's injury clean and bandaged. Her eyes were just starting to flutter open when Julio gathered his supplies and inclined his head toward the door, motioning for Scott to follow. Scott placed a pillow under Annie's head as he got up, kissing her forehead as he instructed, "Lie still, sweetheart, I'll be right back."
"Well?" Scott asked the doctor as they stepped outside the lounge.
"Annie's just suffering some minor shock from pain and blood loss, Scott," Julio relayed with some relief. "The dart hit a major blood vessel that made her cut look worse than it really was. It's really just a deep scratch that will heal just fine in about a day or so. She should be back on duty by tomorrow."
"Should be? Are you sure?" Normally Scott wouldn't question the doctor's orders, but he needed an excuse to keep Annie out of the line of fire for a while, at least until he could figure out exactly what Sly Rax's intentions were. If he could use a medical reason, all the better.
"I sense you're not," Julio said with a small amount of irritation.
"I just think she needs to stay off of it for a few days," Scott insisted, "just to make sure it heals properly and thoroughly. Otherwise, I know that if I send her back out in the field, she'll have it tore up again before too long." He knew he was laying it on rather thick, but it was the only way to convince Julio he was right. To diffuse the situation a little, he smirked over at the doctor. "You'd agree if you've ever seen that girl handle a motorcycle."
"I have." Julio couldn't hide his own knowing smile. "And I suppose if you feel that strongly about it, you can tell her I said to stay off of it. I left a couple of painkillers inside; she probably won't need them after tonight. They are rather strong, so they'll probably double as a sedative as lightweight as Annie is. Call me if you have any other problems."
"I will," he promised, shaking Julio's hand in goodbye. "And thanks."
"You're welcome, Scott, I'm positive I'm leaving her in good hands."
He smiled and waved Julio off as he walked back into the lounge. Annie picked her head up slightly from the couch to regard him before lying back down. He poured a glass of water from the pitcher on the end table and brought it over to her, along with the painkillers. "How's the leg feel now?"
"A Little better, but it still hurts like hell," Annie replied, pushing herself upright as Scott offered her the water glass and tablets. "Painkillers?"
Scott nodded and sat down beside her. "They're pretty strong apparently, so Julio said that for you, they'd probably double as a sleep aid. That's probably not a bad idea at the moment."
She eyed them dubiously as though considering something. "How soon are we heading back out?"
"I am heading back out as soon as Buddy gets the results of the chemical analysis on that ore you brought back. YOU," Scott stressed pointedly, "are off duty for the next two days until that leg heals."
The glare Annie gave him could have melted butter as she recalled her earlier explanation of events. "This better be solely because of my leg injury, and not because of some misplaced and overprotective sense of chivalry. Besides, Rax was probably just trying to play mind games with me." It worked too.
"You're still the world's most horrible liar, Annie, I can tell you don't believe that. All the more reason for you to lie low for the next few days."
Scott calmly matched her stare as she continued to glare at him. "Scott..." she tried again futilely.
"No."
Seeing that he wasn't going to budge on the issue or comment further, Annie downed the painkillers in one huge gulp of water. "I hate you," she declared half-angry as she waited for the tablets to take effect.
"You hate the fact that I'm right," Scott corrected with his most charming smile, pulling her in close for a hug.
"I hate that AND you."
"I love you." He batted his eyes at her and tried to look mournful.
"I still hate you." But the goodnight kiss she gave him as he cuddled her to sleep told him otherwise.
It was silent for a moment as Annie began to drift off to sleep. "Be careful out there, Scott," she whispered.
"I will, honey." He remarked before leaving one final kiss on her forehead.
Scott left the lounge leaving the door open just a crack in case she requested anything. He turned around to notice his father and Julio were discussing in the hallway about Annie's injury.
"Well, did you put her to sleep?" Matt asked with a proud smile on his face. He always knew there was an unbreakable bond between Annie and Scott. The two lovebirds reminded him of those memorable days of his youth.Scott still blushed slightly, "Yeah, but she'll still be angry when she wakes up."
"So what exactly happen out there?" Matt crossed his arms. Even though Matt handed his command down to his son, he was still a top ranking PNA official who supervised the MASK division and most PNA political affairs.
"Well..." Scott was about to explain the overview of the mission, but halted as he saw Roxanne coming down the stair in her leather jacket. "Where are you going?"
Roxanne rolled her eyes in distaste, "What you planning to play the role of my surrogate father now?"
"I ordered you to get some rest. We'll no doubly be leaving first thing in the morning. Last thing I need is you going out, partying, and coming back intoxicated."
"Who said I was going to come back intoxicated? In fact," She put an innocent smile on her face, "I plan to meet my drug dealer at the strip joint I work, to get the high this job isn't giving me."
"That isn't funny," Matt said with seriousness in his tone. Roxanne always had a knack for lying, but that was next to his worst nightmare of her returning to VENOM.
Roxanne gave Matt a quick kiss on the check, "I'm sorry daddy. You guys are being so stereotypical about my nights off, just can't help but play a little with your minds." She sighed and turned to Scott, "Is she alright?"
"Yes...but she's off duty for the next few days."
Roxanne couldn't help a mental cry of 'Yes', but did a poor attempt to hinder her excitement. "Oh that's a shame. Anyways I have some stuff I have to do back at my apartment. You know like feeding my cat, paying my bills, doing laundry that sort of stuff. I'll be back bright and early, and I promise to set my alarm clock this time."
Scott just stared at her already knowing her babbling meant trouble.
"I take it that's an ok," She remarked as she headed for the door. "See you guys later." As soon as she stepped outside, she pulled out her cell phone. She glanced at the phone realizing the same number was trying to reach her the past 5 hours. It rang again and she answered it on way towards her sports car. "Yeah what is it?"
"Where the hell have you been? I've been trying to reach you for hours!" The man shouted over the phone.
"I was working alright. I can't talk here, you know where to meet me at." Without waiting for a reply, she put her phone away and drove her car speedily down the Trakker driveway.