This has been a story thrashed out between myself, Tsari and Nutty, and based on a prompt challenge by Just_Another_Flygirl, who challenged me with aliceinwhumperland's whump word(s) of the day: 'Are those…leeches?' What follows will now be a mini-fic of about 6 chapters, and I promise the prompt is there…somewhere!

Scott rolled his neck and stretched his arms above his head. It was turning out to be one of those days. He'd just come back from his second rescue to refuel both his 'bird and himself before heading off for his third. While waiting for the bots to finish checking One over, he was in the lounge, cramming a slice of left-over pizza. Virgil must have stopped off on his way back to refuel then got called out. Again.

Time to check on his brothers. Calling EOS, because he knew that John and Alan were out on their own mission, he asked for an update on everyone. John and Alan were on the other side of Mars, assisting the colonists after a major storm. They were just about wrapping their mission up and would probably be finishing around the time Scott started his. Virgil and Gordon were in the North Sea, where an oil rig had been damaged after being hit by a ship. They were about halfway through theirs.

He nodded. Kayo and Penny were off doing their thing, and Grandma – Grandma was right beside him suddenly, nudging his shoulder. She was helping keep an eye on communications. And the beeping of his watch showed that it was time for him to leave.

Mission number three was not going to be easy, and Virgil and Gordon would join him when they had completed theirs. It was an illegal cobalt mine in Papua New Guinea, hidden by the vast rainforest that covered most of island. Finding a place to land One would be tricky. Thankfully, by the time Scott was in the air for the short hop over EOS had found a remote village that had a temporary airport and was less than 20 miles from the rescue area.

Flying over the area, it looked like someone had decided on a whim to cut a runway out of the jungle, with the village centred around the top end. He'd need to land one then head off west on foot, the jungle was too dense for anything else. Scott mused on whether he could use his jetpack to fly over the trees to the mine but decided it would be useless due to the fuel needed. So he set out on foot, taking with him two collapsed stretchers and the first aid kit.

It was hot. Hot and sweaty. His uniform regulated the heat as best it could, but under the trees there was no fresh air. While he walked he reviewed what he knew. Cobalt mines were nasty. There were few of them left any more because they tended to be treacherous. The area would have had all the trees cut back to make it easier to move anything dug up, but the mine itself would be a simple series of holes dug straight down to the central mine, each hole only just big enough for a man to fit down. For years it had been the final resting place of children used to get into such small areas, even though such behaviour was illegal, and Scott ferverntly hoped that there would be no children here.

There was little hope for the four people said to be trapped. These kinds of mines had no supports in them and collapses were frequent and deadly. But one of them had managed to get a signal out and here he was.

Suddenly, out of the jungle loomed a temple, almost completely hidden by the trees and vines, but it must have been amazing when it was being used. The architecture was stunning, and Scott took five minutes to catch his breath and admire it. Virgil would love this. It was almost like that temple in that old kids film they used to watch – Jungle Book. It gave Scott a reason to smile as he recalled how Gordon spent the rest of the day after watching it trying to swing from furniture to furniture and not touch the ground, insistent that he was a monkey. Shaking himself from the memory, he moved on. Not far now.

Reaching the cleared area, Scott wondered if he could have set One down here, she would have fitted – just – but that may have caused a further cave-in. It did mean that they had a clear area for Two to send down the rescue platform to take the injured up, and Scott began to feel a little better about their chances. If he had needed to traipse them through the jungle he would have doubted their chances.

Sure enough, there was no-one on the surface to talk to, and there were three holes in the ground. Scott assumed that they had taken the farthest hole as some kind of rudimentary pulley system had been set up, with a strong rope descending. It was pitch black down there, so he activated a glow stick and watched it fall. Quite deep then. Time to let everyone know what was going on.

Hitting the comms button brought Grandma, EOS, John and Alan online. No one was happy about him going down the hole, but without a mole pod from Two there was little he could do about it. EOS showed them all a scan of the mine. Once Scott had reached the bottom the mine opened out into a series of large caverns, and there, clustered at the end furthest from the hole, was four life signs. Ground appeared stable, and the hole was large enough for Scott to move through. Virgil would not have fit, and even Gordon, with his wide swimmers shoulders, would have had difficulty. Grandma instructed him to keep his comm open as he went down, and Scott agreed. He hoped that Virgil would call with an update soon.

Going down the hole was an experience he would like to forget. It was still a tight fit, and his shoulders felt a little knocked about by the time he had hit the bottom. The cavern was dimly lit by the glow stick, and Scott left it there, activating more and dropping them at regular intervals.

Scott began to feel uneasy. The mine was quiet, and he expected that after a cave-in, but there was something about this place that felt wrong. It felt abandoned. He murmured his suspicions over the comms quietly, he didn't want to cause another cave-in, but he knew that four life signs needed investigating and carried on, only half listening as John instructed EOS to try to boost the scans and Virgil warned about being more cautious.

Virgil's warnings proved to be prophetic, as did Scott's gut. Passing through another tunnel into the last cavern he was confronted with the four life signs. Four men who were clearly not unconscious or injured in any way. And they were armed and surrounding him.

His family listened in horror as a short scuffle followed, and a single gunshot rang out. Their horror mounted as the men discussed caving the cavern in, but they ultimately decided just to leave Scott there. They listened to the men leaving.

With Three just about to leave Mars and Two wrapping up the oil rig disaster on the other side of the world, no-one was available to get to Scott for some time. And with Scott not answering his comm, all they could do was hope.