Time for another update! I've seen a little big of traffic with this story, which is wonderful to see, and I'd absolutely adore it if you guys would leave me a little review when you finished taking a look at this chapter. I'm still fleshing it out to keep it going for a bit, but having reviews always helps with the writing process because I know there's a desire to read the story. Thanks everyone!

Chapter Two

It was the longest and most awkward car ride that Barney Ross had ever endured in his life. Aside from the occasional mention of which turn she should take, there were no other words that were exchanged between the two of them. For his part, he was unsure of what there was for him to say. There was a risk of saying the wrong thing and scaring her off while she still had access to the vehicle and therefore the ability to disappear without a trace once more. Even though he was currently sitting in the passenger seat beside her Barney knew that it wouldn't take much for her to bolt. The tension in her hands was completely noticeable as she held the wheel with an iron grip, refusing to so much as look in his direction even under the pretense of needing to check her mirror.

He had decided not to direct her back to the bar. There were too many people around who didn't know what the situation was and would surely want to poke their noses into the fact that Barney Ross was suddenly walking around with a good looking girl who was clearly too young for him. Instead he took them back toward the hangar that had now become headquarters for the Expendables team, the place he had adopted as his "home" of sorts when he wasn't on a mission.

Fifteen minutes later the hanger was in sight and he could feel some of his own tension slip away. Finally there was something he felt comfortable with just on the horizon. But his anxiety rose again when he noticed the gleam of the bikes that were already parked inside, a sure sign that at least part of the team had returned to the hanger to wait. As he felt the car slow to a stop and the engine cut out, the Italian couldn't help but pray that Christmas might be the only one inside. He vaguely remembered having Lee over his shoulder when Mickey had delivered the package under her false identity in the bar, and he highly doubted that he had left everything sitting on the top of the bar for the world to see.

But that was just Christmas.

"This is it?"

He couldn't tell whether she was slightly disappointed or whether she was amused with the fact that he had taken her back to an airport hangar. It was nearly impossible for him to tell with the way she stood beside the car and glanced around her, eyes shielded by a pair of dark sunglasses that she had thrown on almost as soon as he had climbed into the passenger seat.

"Yeah, this is it," he said with a bit of a shrug. "I know it's not much-"

"I'm sure it does the job."

She was trying to keep herself completely neutral, he didn't need to be a genius to see that. Everything about her right now was sitting in a limbo that would frustrate him to no end as he struggled to guess what her true emotions were about the situation. Though her stance seemed to be almost uncaring of their change in scenery, his gut told him that she was already uncomfortable with where she was. It was a foreign place to her eyes, an area of the world that she had no knowledge of and therefore no control over. Despite her promise to remain for the following twenty-four hours just to get through all of the paperwork that was waiting for him to look at Barney knew all too well what the soft press in her lips meant. He'd seen it several times in the past…

"Come on."

His words were not pressuring, but as he crossed around the front of the car and moved to gently place a hand against the small of her back she started moving toward the hangar door as if to completely avoid his touch. Part of him was a little hurt by the abrupt dismissal of her body language, but he knew better than to argue at this point. Thus far he had been rather lucky with getting her to agree to come along with him. He didn't want to push his luck. Yet at the same time Barney knew that he was running short in the remaining time for silence. Whether she liked it or not they would soon have to discuss the issue that lay between them and hash out the volatile emotions he knew were lurking beneath the surface. Though whether they made it through that conversation or not would remain to be seen.

The doors were not firmly closed as they had been when he had left, so pushing them aside with his uninjured hand was relatively easy for the older man as he gestured for the girl to proceed ahead of him into the space. After a moment of slight hesitation she did just that, looking around at the various pieces of equipment that were carefully placed in their cases and the large plane that took up most of the space within the hangar. There were only two bikes in there right now, but Barney immediately knew who they belonged to.

"Hey, Barney! Everything all-"

Doc stopped as he appeared around the back end of the plane and took in the sight of the two figures before him, his head cocking slightly to the side as he become focused solely on the womanly outline that continued to make her way forward. From behind him appeared Christmas, and he too simply stared at her until she was only ten feet away. There she stopped, seeming to regard the both of them with uncertainty in her eyes.

"Miss Mikayla." A grin spread across Doc's face as he laughed, dropping his arms until he could take her smaller hands in both of his larger ones and press them against his lips. "Sweetheart you look like the spitting image of your mother."

For the first time since he had seen her, Barney saw Mickey smile a little, the tension in her shoulders vanishing. "It's good to see you again, Doc."

"It's been fifteen years since we last saw you," Christmas chimed in, standing behind Doc with his arms folded tightly over his chest as he looked the young woman up and down with a frown upon his face. "What happened to that little girl who insisted on running around barefoot in her dresses?"

"She grew up."

Barney couldn't help but feel just a little jealous when he saw how easily she moved across the distance and wrapped her arms around Lee's chest as he hugged her close for a moment. A glance was shared between himself and Doc before he gave a sharp shake of his head and Doc nodded in silent understanding. When at last Mikayla pulled herself away from the embrace she didn't turn around and look back at Barney, but rather split her attention between Doc and Lee, who both regarded her with a warmth in their eyes that was almost uncharacteristic of the both of them. Despite all of the hardships that they had endured over the years, no matter how many bloody battles they had fought and friends they had lost, there still seemed to be a lot of compassion in their faces when they looked at the brunette before them, as if reminiscing of the days that now lay behind them.

"We were really sorry to hear about Blanca," Lee told her as he lightly placed a hand atop her shoulder.

"She was a beauty," Doc agreed, adding his sympathy.

With not much else she could say on the matter, Mickey simply smiled. "Thank you."

When the silence fell between them, Mikayla found herself standing a little awkwardly between the three larger men in the room and dropped her eyes to the ground in an effort to do something else with herself in the meantime. For a moment her mind mulled around with an idea of how to escape the situation in a dignified manner. There were a great number of questions that she could ask if she wanted to, though she had no desire to stand there and wait for the answers to come. Asking them would only remind her of the time that had been lost and the rather unpleasant situation that had brought them all together in the same room for the first time in almost twenty years.

But the approaching roar of motorcycle engines gave the girl the room that she needed to avoid such a tense moment. Turning her head, the brunette watched as a number of differently shaped bikes made their way into the hangar and veered off to the side where the other two had been parked, though the SUV that followed along behind them came a little deeper into the enclosure before it too turned off to the side and cut the engine. One by one each of the passengers disembarked from their own mode of transportation until Mikayla had a chance to look at them all clearly. The odd one she recognized from photos that had been around the house, while others were complete strangers that she had never before heard of. And to her amazement, many of them were not the experienced guns that she had expected to see, but rather a group of younger hires who couldn't have been much older than she was now.

Dark eyes scanned each of them to see if perhaps she would recognize a face within their midst, but there seemed only to be one that looked even remotely familiar to her. And at first, she wasn't sure that she was looking at the right person at all. His hulking frame certainly set him apart from the others, as did the blonde locks of hair that sat atop his head. But he carried himself differently now, and the scars that he bore on his face were more in number than they had been in previous years. Still, as she watched him slam the door of the SUV and turn to look at the gathering of people that had formed within the walls of the hangar, she knew that he recognized her as well despite the years that had passed since they were last in each other's company. The instant she saw the grin, she knew.

"Hasn't Barney gotten you killed yet?" she asked him.

"Nah," Gunner said, brushing the comment aside with a grin. "Someone in this outfit has to be known for their good looks, and it sure as hell ain't him."

His deep laughter started to roll as he held his arms as wide as they would go and proceeded to wrap them around her smaller frame, hugging her close to his chest as he shifted his weight back and forth between his legs in a rocking motion. And for a moment, just a moment, she allowed herself to be lost in the past, where better times and memories lingered deep within the deep recesses of her mind. Even with the years that she had spent burying them as best as she could they were still as vivid as the day they had actually occurred.

Gunner pressed his cheek against the top of her head. "It's good to see you again, kid."

"I'm not a kid anymore," she reminded him as she pulled back and rewarded him with her small smile. "But it's good to see you too, Gunner."

"Who's the babe?"

Though the question was asked rather quietly to the person standing next to him, it didn't escape Mikayla's notice. She drew back from Gunner almost immediately and sharply turned her head to look at the offending male who had addressed her in such a manner, eyes narrowed dangerously. Each step that she took in his direction was accented with the sharp click of her heel against the concrete floor of the hangar, slow and deliberate as she crossed in front of Gunner until she stood at the front of the group with her eyes locked on the offender.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" she asked.

His own eyes seemed to narrow in response. "I think you heard me."

"Oh, I did. I was just giving you a chance to reconsider your choice of word."

"Not likely to happen."

"Then I suppose you're going to be sadly disappointed with the answer."

"Hey, knock it off!"

Their exchange was cut short by Barney's sharp order, though neither of them immediately turned to look back at him. They were far too busy with their staring contest to be concerned with him, especially since neither Mikayla not the idiot in front of her seemed too keen on taking a direct order from someone else. But the boy was doing well in his attempt to size her up, despite the fact that her choice in clothing alone was enough for him to dismiss her as a low scale threat if anything. Still, he'd be foolish not to take notice of the body that lay beneath the pencil skirt and blouse, which he found to be rather alluring.

It was only when Barney crossed the room and step between the pair that they finally gave it up, but Smilee could see almost right away that this situation was unlike any other that he had shared with Barney Ross before. This time there was another type of look in his eye, one that John Smilee had never seen since he started working for the older man, and it caught him a little off guard.

"I said, knock it off," Barney repeated in his darker tone.

It was a warning, and the others seemed to realize it too. Before Smilee knew what was going on, Luna had placed a hand on his shoulder to draw him back and Galgo was chattering in his ear about needing to take a step back. Doc and Christmas swept in rather quickly to remove the girl from the situation and lead her to the office that had been set up at the back. Thorn and Mars were already removing themselves from the situation by walking around the outside of the group, and they were followed rather quickly by Toll Road and Caesar, neither of whom were anxious to stay and see how things played out.

He stayed for only a moment longer before he let it go and turned away to busy himself with the cargo in the back of the SUV that still needed to be unpacked and tended to. And as Barney watched Smilee go, he felt Luna's watchful eyes on him before she too went off in the other direction. The only one who remained beside him was Gunner, who glanced between the two departing groups and shook his head a little.

"If I didn't know any better-"

"It's fine," Barney interrupted briskly.

Again, Gunner shook his head. "If that's your definition of 'fine' then I'd hate to see what happens when things get bad."

Barney looked at him for a moment before he turned away without a word and followed the path previously taken by Doc and Christmas. The tension in his jaw was evidence of his anger, and Gunner knew better than to question the motivation behind it at this current moment in time. There were but four of them in the room who had any idea of what was happening, and that was how it was going to stay until Barney said otherwise. But as he watched Barney storm off toward the office at the back of the hangar, Gunner felt that terrible jolt in the pit of his stomach that only showed itself when there was bad news on the horizon. There was no way for him to warn Smilee of his folly without sharing information that wasn't his to share, but Gunner knew that the wise-ass kid needed to be smacked before he was allowed within Barney's sight again.

Though he had to admit, watching Mikayla stand up next to him like that had been rather amusing for the Swedish giant. If he hadn't known any better, he might have thought that she would have kicked the kid's ass if given the chance. And that thought alone was enough to make him smirk in amusement.

"You'll have to forgive, Smilee," Lee said in his quiet tone, glancing briefly over his shoulder before he placed a hand against the small of her back. "The only woman he gets to see on a daily basis is the one who would kick his ass in a heartbeat."

"It's not every day we get a pretty young thing like you walking around," Doc agreed, attempting to make her smile a little.

But Mikayla was not overly amused, and only part of her anger was still sitting back with the boy who had decided to address her in such a rude fashion. "I've been dealing with his type for years," she told them both bitterly. "He's just lucky that Barney stepped in when he did."

Doc looked over her head and toward Lee, who seemed to be thinking along the same lines when he silently nodded his head in agreement. Neither man was a complete fool, though they were both aware that asking too many questions at this point might prove to be dangerous. They didn't know how Barney had managed to convince the young woman to accompany him back to the hangar, but they knew for certain that the conversation to come was going to be like walking on eggshells. A lot of things had been left unsaid over the last several years. And a lot of things had come to create negative feelings that would not leave without a fight.

Lee pushed aside the door of the office with his hand and flanked the opposite side of the door not taken by Doc as the pair stepped out of the way to let Mickey head inside. It wasn't really much to look at, the inside of the office. Barney had never been the kind of guy to deal with technology, and so the only thing involving wires was the telephone that sat in the one corner of the desk. Otherwise there was paperwork all over the surface of the desk; tactical plans, weapon lists and statements given to them for the work that they did.

She crossed the room in only a few steps, looking around to see if there was some sort of secret that the room might eventually reveal to their eyes. But there was nothing in there…save for the single item that caught her attention on the desk, immediately taking the brunette over to it with faster steps than before.

"I'm sorry about that, Mick," Barney started as he stepped into the office between his friends. "He-"

If ever there was a time when Barney wished he could freeze time and stop something from happening, now was certainly the time. Instead of looking down at the package of paperwork that the boys had kindly placed on the desk after his rather abrupt disappearance at the bar, Mikayla had taken something else into her hand, something that instantly made Barney's insides go cold. The way she looked at the picture…the sadness and hurt that lay behind her eyes…he didn't have to be a genius to know what was going through her mind now. It was all plainly written on her face, an agonizing look that went no further than her eyes…but didn't really need to.

"Mickey-"

"You got him killed, didn't you?"

Barney's eyes closed as he inhaled slowly and tried to steady himself against the blow of the question. The younger recruits didn't know, but his old team had learned to let the past sit behind them and never questioned the fact that Billy's picture was still sitting in the corner of the cork board on the wall as a constant reminder of what they had to lose in this line of work. He didn't even really think about it anymore, for the picture had come to feel like such a normal thing to him. But now he regretted his decision entirely, especially when his mind registered the venom in Mikayla's words.

"I did."

All at once the tension had returned to her body and she began to tremble as she slowly turned herself to face him and lifted her eyes away from the wallet-sized photograph in her hands. He had never seen such anger before, such a burning passion that completely overtook her form. If it were possible, he didn't doubt that she would have burst into flames right then and there. In one sharp movement she had slammed her hand against the top of the desk and left the picture there, face down so that neither of them would have to look at the smiling youth on the other side.

"It's bad enough that you put your own life on the line every day," she muttered darkly, taking a slow step toward him to punctuate her words. "And Lee's and Doc's and Gunner's….but those other members of your team? They don't have any idea of what they're getting into when they get involved with you. They don't know just how tough this life is."

He said nothing as he watched her advance, his tongue unwilling to move in order to rebuke anything that she threw in his face with all of the unspoken hatred she possessed - all of the hatred he knew he deserved.

"That's why you take them so young," Mikayla continued until she was standing right in front of the aging Italian and glaring heavily up at him. "Because then you're stopping their lives before they even began. And then you can feel good about the fact that you're only ruining one life and not anyone else who might be attached to them at the same time." She paused, looking him up and down for a moment. "You're even more pathetic than I imagined."

As the initial shock of her words was absorbed into his body, Mikayla left him no time to question her or even begin to argue back before she stormed past him, through the open door of the office and back down the concrete floor toward her car. He could hear her footsteps retreating, growing further and further away with every step that she took, but Barney didn't immediately respond because his mind was so wrapped up in the things that she had said, analyzing the truth behind it all. After a moment though, he realized that he was losing his opportunity, and turned sharply on his heel to chase her down.

But he was too late. By the time he was halfway across the room she had already put the car in gear and backed her way out of the hangar so quickly that black marks were left behind from her tires. He cursed to himself and placed both hands on either side of his head, grumbling and swearing about how stupid he had been. What the hell had made him think that he might actually be able to reason with her? What a damn fool he had been. His head turned to look at the open door through which Mickey had disappeared, exhaling sharply as he felt a hand connect with his shoulder.

"I wanna punch something right now."

Lee shook his head. "You've already busted up your good hand."

"Then I'll bust up the other one too," Barney told him stiffly.

Doc slowly made his way to Barney's other side, his eyes also staring at the door that had provided the escape route. "Hey man, you didn't have a chance, okay? You didn't do anything wrong."

"Yeah…right…"

Pulling away from the both of them he clenched his non-dominant hand into a fist and stormed back to the office, passing Gunner who just watched him go until he heard the forceful slam of the door to signal Barney's exit. He watched the door for only a moment long before he walked toward Lee and Doc, a questioning look on his face. But he wasn't stupid…he knew how it had gone.

"That good, huh?"

Doc rolled his eyes a little and scoffed. "World War Two went better than that."

"You think she'll come back?" Gunner asked them.

But Lee just shook his head. "I don't think so," he confessed. "I think that ship sailed a long time ago."

Silence fell between them as they each took their turn looking between the open hangar and the closed office door then slowly filtered away to carry on with their individual tasks. That looked to be the end of it, though they knew that their encounter with Mikayla would haunt Barney for a while before he finally managed to put it behind him. If he ever could, that is. And given the look on his face when he had pulled away from them, there was a chance that he would never truly be able to put this incident behind him.