So sorry for the long wait with this chapter, everyone! Life got a little carried away for a while and the muse to continue writing just wasn't there. But I'm back now and hoping that perhaps I'll be able to get some more writing done before Christmas time! Please leave me a review and let me know what you think!

Chapter Thirteen

Despite her upbringing, Mikayla had never been the religious type. She had gone to church and said her prayers to appease her mother when she was a little girl, but as she had grown older and become a little bitter toward the different aspects of her life she had left religion behind her. What was the point in kneeling for confession to ask for forgiveness when you were out there taking lives on an almost daily basis? The fewer people that knew about her chosen lifestyle the better. Even her mother hadn't been privy to all of the details when Mickey had channeled her anger and frustration into her physical training. She could barely remember how she had even come to get involved with that life, but the money had been too good to pass up when things had started to get really tight.

But the chapel was the perfect place for her to hide at this time, loath as she was to admit it. The hospital staff were unable to legally remove her from this room, but would always be able to locate her in the instant that something changed with Barney. And here she would be free of the constant stares and worried glances that the others seemed to wear when she was in their presence. Lee hadn't been thrilled when she had told him where she was going. The growl in his throat had been evidence of that. Yet he knew as well as she did that as soon as she entered that room he had absolutely no way of removing her without it being against her will and he wasn't prepared to deal with the hell that would erupt if he had tried.

Yet another trick she had learned from Barney, he had grumbled.

Mickey had taken a seat somewhere in the middle of the room, having collapsed into a pew with a groan of discomfort as soon as Lee had departed. He hadn't been pleased with the idea of leaving her alone for even the briefest moment of time, and she knew that it wouldn't be long before someone appeared to sit with her. Lee had been rather firm on the fact that she would not be sitting there by herself all night. Apparently Barney would have a fit that she was in there at all instead of worrying about her own health.

The young woman closed her eyes and tilted her head forward a little, letting her forehead rest against her clasped hands with a soft sigh. When was the last time that she had slept? She couldn't really remember. She couldn't even tell how many hours had passed since Barney had been thrown back into their cell and she had first tried to stop his wounds from bleeding. But the minutes had ticked on by regardless and now she was beginning to feel the weight of them upon her shoulders.

Even in her state of exhaustion however, the brunette's mind was still mulling over the possible ways that Church might have been able to find her and connect her to Barney. Was there some kind of paperwork trail that he had used? No, that didn't make any sense. She had seen her birth certificate and there was no father listed, presumably a way of keeping them safe when Barney went back to his chosen lifestyle and left them both behind. Mickey was still a little bitter about that. It was one of the things that had been burning in her mind when she had finally gotten fed up with him and demanded that he just leave. She had been only sixteen years old then. He had promised that he would be there to see her graduate from high school early…and he hadn't come. She remembered looking out into the crowd for her mother when she had crossed the stage to receive her diploma and spotted her somewhere off to the side. She'd been alone, even though she tried to show her pride through her bright smile.

But it had never truly been enough for her. She had wanted so badly for Barney to be there that she had placed all of her faith in his word. And when he had let her down, Mickey had turned her heart against anyone else for fear of being hurt like that again.

"Mind if I join you?"

Dark eyes shot upward in surprise. The older gentleman who approached her was someone she wasn't immediately familiar with, well dressed in a suit and with hair more grey than anything else. His tone of voice was fairly gruff even though he wore a bit of a smile in the corner of his lip, one hand resting on the back of the pew as the other gestured to the bench on which she sat. Mickey slipped back a little and looked around her in case someone else was nearby, but she saw no one.

"Don't worry," he said as he lifted his hand in a calming gesture. "I'm not here to hurt you. I'm a friend of Barney's."

Mickey raised a brow. "You'll have to forgive me if I don't immediately trust that the old man had too many friends."

Chuckling gently in amusement, the older man shifted into the pew regardless and placed himself beside her, sitting sideways so that his attention rested not on the altar ahead of them but on her. His hands quietly folded in his lap as he leaned in toward her, immediately causing the young woman to pull back a little in distrust. But the more that she found herself looking at him the more Mickey couldn't help feeling that she had actually seen this man before. Her brow furrowed into a small frown as she considered all of the possible places he might have appeared. And then she relaxed a little, the memory surfacing.

"You were flying the plane," she murmured lightly.

The old man nodded slowly. "I'm Operations Officer Drummer."

Mikayla raised a brow in question. "You work for the CIA and yet you're lending a hand on these suicide missions? Either you're getting bored or you're just as crazy as the old man is."

Drummer seemed to take her sarcasm in his stride, chuckling lightly at her comment as he gave his head a bit of a shake. "Not too far off," he responded. "He's certainly made my life interesting over the last couple of months."

With a bit of a grimace, Mikayla settled back against the hard wooden pew and folded her arms lightly over her chest in a protective manner, eyeing Drummer carefully. "Look, since I'm pretty sure that you're not here for a social call, let's just cut to the chase. What do you want from me?"

The laughter seemed to fade away almost instantly as the professional agent look over. Drummer shifted only slightly so that he could better address her head on, the intensity of his gaze growing with each passing second. In ordinary circumstances she knew that she wouldn't have flinched in such a situation. Most of the men who approached her wore the same lecherous grin, each seeking one thing and one thing only when they decided that they were going to slide into the empty seat beside her. She'd grown accustomed to handling them. But the steady look that Drummer seemed to eye her with was something completely new for Mickey. Then again, sitting inside a chapel was something that was pretty new to her as well.

"I need to know everything you can tell me about Church," he started slowly, dropping his voice into a low growl once more. "What he was planning, what he wanted…everything."

But the brunette just shook her head, breathing a soft sigh. "You're about to be really disappointed with my answer," she warned him. "He didn't seem to have any other motive for what he was doing aside from wanting Barney to come after me. He didn't torture me, he didn't have me beaten when I didn't give him information. I was just the bait."

Her eyes took note of the twitch in his jaw as Drummer resisted the urge to say something…probably to curse, she thought. That's likely what she would want to be doing in his position. But since her knowledge of Church and his previous position within the agency was minimal at best she could only guess at the thoughts that were running rampant through the older man's head. He didn't look pleased, that much was certain. Though it seemed that he was reluctant to share his displeasure with her, for he spoke not a word that might request her to re-evaluate her statement and think again about what she might have seen. Did he actually believe her, or was he taking pity on the fact that he thought Church had put her through hell and back in a few different ways?

If it was the latter of the two, it didn't sit well with Mickey.

"What are you thinking?" she asked him.

Drummer didn't hesitate to lift his eyes and make direct contact with her. "I think that as soon as he realizes Barney wasn't in that building he's going to come back for him."

It was only because she remembered where she was that she didn't curse out loud, biting down on her lower lip instead as the anger began to bubble in the pit of her stomach once more. Loathe as she was to admit it Drummer was probably right. If Church was that hell bent on getting his revenge on Barney for whatever reason, he was bound to go back and double check the results of his scheme. And when he realized that there were no bodies to be found in the smoldering rubble he would retrace his steps and make a second attempt. It wouldn't be difficult for him to figure out where Barney was being treated either, as he seemed to know exactly how to get that video to him.

The very idea that Church might get his hands on Barney again was enough to make Mickey's blood boil.

Her teeth grit together in her anger, causing a painful twinge in her jaw that she ignored. "Can you find him again?"

Very slowly, Drummer shook his head. "I don't know if we can," he answered in a rather bitter tone. "The time that you went after him was a trap that he set you up for. I can only wonder at how many other times he intentionally let himself be seen so that we could gather what little intel we had."

Though he didn't say it outright, Drummer had admitted to the one thing that Mikayla was worried about. With the time that Church had spent working for the agency he had amassed enough skills and knowledge to know how to avoid almost all detection at all. He wouldn't be found until he wanted to be, and he was going to make damn sure to use those skills to turn everything around and get back at Barney. He'd know exactly what buttons to push, which avenues to go through in order to find out if the leader of the team had indeed been killed or not. And as soon as Church was privy to the fact that both she and Barney had survived his initial assault he would return with a vengeance. Mickey didn't doubt this in the least.

"What do you suggest?"

Again, Drummer gave his peppered head a bit of a shake. "If he were well enough to be moved to a safe house we could hide him away for a while until we had a better idea of Church's movements. As he is now, there's nothing we can do."

Mickey bit down in her lip, eyes widening a little as she attempted to come up with some sort of plan that would allow them to move Barney's battered form away from the hospital…but she knew that in his current condition he couldn't be moved anywhere. Not unless Drummer happened to know of a fully stocked medical facility that the CIA had hidden away underground.

"Then someone stays with him at all times," she murmured, lifting her dark eyes to look at the agent before her. "I don't care what you have to do to get this hospital to agree, but he is never to be left alone. One of us must be with him at all times, especially if there are people moving in and out of the room."

Drummer raised a brow. "You don't trust the nurses and doctors?"

"Would you?" Mickey countered.

The older man shook his head slowly, the one corner of his mouth curling upward. "Not for an instant."

The two shared a look for a moment before Drummer slowly picked himself up off of the pew and stepped into the aisle again, buttoning up the front of his jacket as he looked down at Mickey once more. His face became neutral and guarded once more as he cleared his throat, lifting his head a little higher.

"Your babysitter should be here shortly," he said, eyes dropping as he did up the last button. "No doubt someone will be keeping an eye on you for the next little while."

Mickey resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Don't remind me."

"Good day, Miss Valdez."

For a moment Mikayla watched him go, mentally debating whether or not to say anything further to the perfect stranger about to leave the room. But as he neared the doorway that would lead him out to the hallway she found herself twisting around a little more, biting back the ache in her body as she did to call out to him once more.

"Agent Drummer."

He paused, momentarily turning back around to look at her.

"I never did thank you," she said quietly. "For the part you played in rescuing us."

He blinked at her, seeming to be rather unaccustomed to being thanked or acknowledged in anyway. "Don't thank me until we take care of Church…"

Nodding in understanding, Mickey offered the man a bit of a smile. For an instant he seemed to return it, but he quickly let it fall away from his face and he left the room without another word. Mickey exhaled slowly as she found herself alone once more, eyes moving away from the door and back toward the altar that sat at the front of the room. She hadn't expected to make it out of that building alive. But now that she had it seemed that the danger level had jumped to a new and ridiculous level. Not just for herself but for Barney as well, the last person she had ever expected to come waltzing back into her life after such a prolonged absence.

Was there anything more that she could do? Her mind whirled madly as she tried to come up with all of the other things that could happen, all of the options that she would need to try before she was finally able to rest easy. But her mind and body were far too tired for her to think clearly and the young woman ended up rubbing her forehead when it started to ache. She couldn't think clearly right now. The lack of food, fluids and sleep were beginning to catch up to her. But she needed to keep going. She couldn't rest now, not when Barney was still so vulnerable and they didn't know how close Church really was.

"Hey…"

Her head shot up once more to see one of the younger team members standing almost in the exact same spot that Drummer had occupied only moments before, looking down at her with a soft smile. She recognized him now as the one who had first come into the room to help her before the building had exploded, the one who had gotten her onto her feet and refused to leave her behind even at the risk of his own life. He spoke to her in a gentle tone of voice that didn't startle her from her thoughts, but rather beckoned her from them until her eyes were able to focus once again.

"May I?"

Again, she found herself nodding quietly as he slid into the space beside her on the bench in a way that seemed eerily similar to the conversation she had just experienced.

Mickey blinked slowly at him. "You're Thorn, right?"

The boy nodded, his smile still in place. "I am," he told her lightly. "I hope you don't mind…but Lee's really adamant that you not be left by yourself right now."

"So basically neither you nor I have a choice in your being here," she translated.

"Yeah, pretty much."

Mickey let out a sigh, leaning heavily against the hard wooden back of the pew as she rubbed at her tired eyes. She didn't have the patience for this. She didn't have the energy. And while she knew that Lee and the others were doing this with the best of intentions it was going to become very annoying very quickly if she was constantly being shadowed by someone else. If Church thought that he was going to come after her then he was more than welcome to try. The chances of him launching any sort of assault so soon after their escape were slim, and so she knew that she at least had a small window of time in order to plan her next move before he figured things out and moved against her.

If he thought he was going to corner Barney a second time he was in for one hell of a surprise.

"Look, don't take this the wrong way," Thorn began, twisting to look at her better. "But you look awful."

Mickey raised a brow. "Is there a right way to take a comment like that?" she asked him dryly.

Thorn shook his head, lifting a hand in quiet defense. "What I mean is that you should probably try to get some sleep, and I don't think that sitting in the chapel all night is a good way of getting it."

"I'm not leaving this hospital," repeated the brunette for the millionth time that day. "And if Lee thinks that he can send some young gun like you in here to convince me otherwise-"

"Whoa!" he declared, now with both hands raised to stop her. "I'm not here to make you leave, okay? Lee's just as worried about Barney as the rest of us are. But I also know that he's worried about you. If I hadn't volunteered to come and sit with you Gunnar was going to march right back to the hospital and carry you out himself…you and I both know he could have done it too."

The frown that settled onto Mikayla's face was perhaps the darkest one that Thorn had seen in a while now, though he found that it wasn't all that unfamiliar to him. Eerily enough he had seen the same look on Barney's face at least once before, when Drummer had shown up at the hangar and he had seen Church's video. It was haunting really, to see her look so much like her old man when he was only just beginning to know him. Already he could see the beginnings of what made the two so alike. So he supposed the real question was just how much of the old man she saw in herself. Was this desire to keep him safe out of the love that a daughter bears her father? Or was it more guilt based?

Knowing better than to ask such questions now when he was little more than a stranger, Thorn simply put them out of mind for the time being. It wasn't any of his business, and he highly doubted it would ever be. But in the off chance that there was an opportunity for him to figure things out and make the picture just a little clearer…well, who was he to turn down such a chance?

"Look, why don't you just relax?" he asked her gently. "I'm right here…I promise I won't try anything funny. But you really do need to rest otherwise you're going to crash."

Mickey seemed to watch him with a closely guarded expression for a few moments before she shifted against the bench. Her body language betrayed how uncomfortable she was now, but it seemed that she was considering his offer. He had put his life on the line for her, she reasoned to herself. When word had come that the building was rigged to blow he hadn't abandoned her as she had instructed him to, but rather scooped her up into his arms and run the risk of being slowed down by her added weight. That had to say something about his character. Or perhaps his fear of the others, she thought with an inward smirk.

"Alright," she said slowly. "But only for a few minutes. I'd prefer you to be hovering outside of Barney's room…though I don't suppose I could convince you to go. Just-"

Here she paused, regarding him again. But Thorn was quick to jump on her pause and give her a reassuring nod in silent understanding. He didn't need her to tell him outright what it was that she wanted. He understood. And it seemed that Mickey was rather grateful for not having to explain herself, a soft sigh falling from her lips as her shoulders slumped a little.

With a wave of his hand, Thorn opened his arms a little. "Come here. I'm slightly more comfortable than the bench, and I promise," he added when she narrowed her eyes at him. "That I will keep my hands to myself."

Though she hesitated for a moment longer, Mickey allowed herself to slowly slide toward him on the bench, shifting her body so that she could lay across the hard wooden surface with her lower half. Her upper body pressed lightly into Thorn's chest as she lowered herself down, feeling her shoulder come into contact with the one side of his body. His arms gently wound around her for support, but he kept his word and was mindful of where his hands were placed so as not to make her anymore uncomfortable. As she settled in and adjusted herself minimally for comfort she found that the battle to keep her eyes open became too great to continue. Within a few minutes they had closed and Mickey drifted off to sleep, carefully watched by one who didn't intend to wake her after only a few moments.

That promise, at least, he intended to break.