Chapter One: Open Road
One Week Earlier
Some folks, MacGyver reflected, had all the luck…the rotten kind. At the moment, it seemed his friend Hank was one of them.
MacGyver was seeing him out after a visit of several days, and they emerged on the outdoor landing of MacGyver's apartment just in time to see a truck back straight into Hank's car.
Hank gave a strangled cry, flinging out a hand as if he somehow thought he could stop the truck in its path before the inevitable crash.
MacGyver winced, cringing at the sound of twisting metal, and squinted in a vain attempt to see the license number as the truck peeled away as if the driver hadn't even noticed what he'd done.
"Hey! That's my car you just hit!" Hank shouted, dashing down the stairs two at a time.
"Look at it," he growled, kicking a tire savagely as MacGyver joined him beside the damaged vehicle.
"Sorry," MacGyver offered.
Hank sighed, turning and leaning against the vehicle. "You're more of a mechanic than I am, Mac. I know it doesn't look pretty, but if it'll still run…"
MacGyver grimaced, the size of the dent giving him strong doubts. "Pop the hood."
The twisted lip of the hood took some prying with a makeshift crowbar before it opened, and MacGyver shook his head when he saw the damage. "No good, Hank."
"All right…how long'll it take you to fix?"
MacGyver glanced at him from under the hood, one eyebrow half raised as he fingered a ruptured hose. There was such a thing, he reflected, as making too good a reputation for yourself. "I could maybe patch together a temporary fix, if you just needed to go a few miles. But I wouldn't trust it lastin' a hundred miles, and it's pretty remote out there; last thing ya want is to break down in the middle of nowhere."
Hank kicked the tire again. "I've got meetings tomorrow, Mac; I can't miss those."
"Tell ya what; take the jeep down," MacGyver offered, pulling his keys from his pocket and working one of them loose from the ring. "I'll have the Range Rover fixed, and drive it down to ya in a week or so when it's ready."
Relief showed on Hank's face. "Thanks, Mac; I owe you one."
MacGyver grinned, tossing the key to him so that it spun through the air. "What's one more favor between friends?"
oOo
So it was that a week later MacGyver was driving lazily, leaning back and steering with one hand as he reflected on the peacefulness of the empty, open road.
Then he sat up, at once completely alert as he spotted something out of place in the scene. A little girl was stumbling along the side of the road; even as he watched she tripped and fell, and lay without getting up.
MacGyver quickly pulled to the side of the road, then jumped out and ran to the girl without bothering to shut the car door. "Are you all right, honey?" he asked, crouching beside her with a hand on her shoulder. She was crying, he realized now, and sensed she was simply too tired and discouraged to get up.
"Come here, baby," he crooned softly, lifting her into his arms.
"Let me go!" she screamed, fighting against him with a wild, hysterical fear.
"I won't hurt you, sweetheart," MacGyver assured her, holding her firmly despite her desperate struggles to free herself. He rocked gently as he waited until she tired herself out and went limp in his arms. Only then did the soft flow of his words begin to get through to her. "…all right, baby, you're safe now. Mac's got you; I won't let anything hurt you. Shh, baby; it's all right…"
In an instant of realization, she recognized that the arms around her were protective, not restraining, and that this man was a friend. Flinging her arms around his neck and clinging to him now, she burst into renewed tears on his shoulder.
"Shh; it's all right." He pulled his fingers through her short dark hair, stroking and petting it as if she were a puppy. "What happened, baby?"
"I — lost — my teddy!" she gulped.
"I'll get it back; I promise I'll get your teddy back for you. Shh, baby; everything's going to be all right."
Gradually she calmed, until at last she lay quiet, her tearstained cheek on MacGyver's shoulder. Pulling his handkerchief out of his back pocket, he mopped her face, then held it for her to blow her nose. "That's better. Want to tell me your name, sweetheart?"
"L-Lucie," she sniffled, wiping her eyes with the back of her fist.
"Please to meet you, Lucie. I'm MacGyver, but we're going to be friends, so you can call me Mac."
A tiny smile quivered at Lucie's mouth. "'Kay, Mr Mac."
MacGyver grinned. "That's right, baby. Now, how about you tell me what you and teddy were doing out here by yourselves before he got lost?"
"We were shopping with Mama, an' a man grabbed us and put us in a car, and when he stopped he made the other girls get out, but he didn't see me an' teddy, so I climbed the hill to the road, but I dropped my te-eddy!" She ended in a wail, and MacGyver bounced her gently.
"Shh; you're done crying, remember? So, there are other girls who are still with the bad man?"
She nodded against his shoulder. "An' my teddy."
"I won't forget your teddy," he promised. "How about you, sweetheart; did you hurt yourself, or did the man hurt you?"
"I scrapeted my knee."
MacGyver shifted her on his arm so he could get a good look at her. She was covered in dirt and scratched and bruised, but the skinned knee did seem to be her worst injury. "Wonder if Hank has anything in the Rover to clean ya up."
He knew there was no first aid kit between the seats where he kept it in his jeep, but a search revealed one tucked in the spare tire well. Perching Lucie on the hood of the car, he set about doctoring her up. *
"I know it stings, baby," he murmured as she whimpered at the feel of the antiseptic. "Almost done."
He put an adhesive bandage over her knee, deciding the rest of her scratches were too minor to need more than cleaning. "That's a brave girl. Now, think ya can show me where you climbed up?"
"I…guess so," Lucie said doubtfully.
"Then let's go find that bear."
Next chapter coming next week!
* Illustration for this scene can be found at www . deviantart . com [slash] femalechauvinist [slash] art [slash] Owies-863855166
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