AN: Thank you for all of your wonderful words of encouragement! I got an amazing response to the first chapter, and I hope you guys love this one just as much. I hope you enjoy, and please leave a review!
When Mac awoke, it was to a dull throbbing in his nose.
His nose? What?
Mac brought his hand up to see if it was broken, and it didn't appear to be. It wasn't swollen, or bruised, or anything like that, but it had a deep throb, a throb strong enough to pull him from unconsciousness. Was it because of what that man had injected him with? He could remember what happened, and knew that Jack would probably be there soon to get him out of this, just like he always did, so Mac wasn't too concerned.
He finally opened his eyes and had a look at his surroundings. He was in a large cell, with bars that looked just too close together for him to slip through. Outside the cell was what looked like a minimal laboratory. If only Mac could get his hands on the chemicals that were likely in those cabinets, he could get out. But why was he in a cell in a lab? Did they plan to study the effects of the serum while he was in that cell? What even was that serum?
Mac's eyes widened when he noticed what else was in the cell with him. Bodies. Lots of bodies. And even with his throbbing nose, Mac could still tell that they stank to high heaven.
There were five bodies in that cell with him, all in various stages of decay. Most of them were too far gone to tell whether they were men or women, but the freshest one was a woman who had probably been a few years older than Mac. Other than that, Mac couldn't tell, and he wasn't about to get close enough to look. That would be the last resort. All of the bodies were wearing the same thin gray shirt and shorts, and nothing else. Mac glanced down at himself, and saw that he was wearing the same thing. He felt the material. It seemed to be standard clinic issue. Peering over at the bodies, he couldn't see any obvious signs of what killed those people.
Slowly, Mac stood up and walked to the front of the cell. He tested the strength of the bars, and sighed when they were just as strong as he suspected they would be. Running his hands along some of the bars, Mac checked for any weaknesses he could exploit, and wasn't surprised to find none. Much to his displeasure, it seemed like it was probably time to take a closer look at the bodies, as much as he didn't want to. With a sigh and a shake of his head, Mac took a few hesitant steps closer to the decomposing corpses, only to stop a few feet away when a stab of pain in his nose nearly took him to his knees.
The throbbing increased tenfold, and Mac had to reach out for the wall to steady himself. He tried to tell himself just to breathe through it, like Jack would say, but all he could think of was how much it hurt and how much he wanted Jack to be there, because Jack always made it better. Mac bit his lip to keep himself from screaming and let himself fall to his knees. It hurt so bad and he just wanted it to stop. Was he dying? Was this what killed those people? In the back of his mind, Mac knew you couldn't actually die from pain, but in the moment, it certainly seemed like that was what was going to happen.
Mac had had his nose broken several times in combat and on missions over the years, but it had never felt like this, he had never experienced pain like this, not even on the countless times he'd been tortured. Nothing had ever felt like this. Mac felt that maybe he was screaming, but he didn't know for sure. He didn't know anything but the pain.
Then, as suddenly as it had started, it was gone. The pain was completely gone. Not even a dull ache remained. Mac felt completely fine. He reached up to feel his nose again, and it felt the same as it had before, with no noticeable swelling or anything like that. Mac quickly wiped away remnants of his tears from the pain, then straightened back up to check the corpses for anything useful like he had planned.
He crouched down next to the fresh one, but was hesitant to touch it. He knew he needed to, but it felt disrespectful to touch this dead woman who had likely been through enough already without someone moving around her corpse.
That's when he noticed. The stench of the bodies was gone. Mac couldn't smell a single thing.
Jack looked at his watch, then glanced back at the compound. He sighed. Mac was taking too long. There was no way that Jack was going to go all the way to exfil without his partner, so he'd found a good spot to hide while he waited for Mac to get out. Because of the direction Mac would need to head in order to get to exfil, it would impossible for Jack to miss him. He hadn't seen him yet, which could only mean that Mac was still in the compound.
With another sigh, Jack readied himself to sneak back in. He hadn't been able to get comms back up with Riley, so he would be going in blind. But it wasn't as if he would ever just leave Mac in there, so going in blind would have to work. At this point, Mac had likely been captured, which meant he was probably being kept somewhere relatively secure. That eliminated some areas of the facility. Jack was a fully trained covert operative, and he had the utmost confidence in himself that he could find Mac, break him out, and get them both to exfil. Getting to exfil on time might be a challenge - okay, more like impossible at this point, it couldn't be done - but at least they could get to the spot, then hopefully Mac could make a radio out of pine needles and sap and get them help.
Slowly, Jack crept back down to the compound from his hiding place in the forest, and forced his way inside. Mac would've picked the lock, but Jack didn't mind just breaking off the lock altogether. Sticking close to the walls, Jack moved through the hallways and into the basement of the facility. If he were an illegal chemical weapons manufacturer, that's where he would keep his prisoners. Hopefully Mac would be in a good enough condition to get out with only minor assistance. Jack hated the thought of his kid being severely injured, especially when they had several miles of forest to hike through after their escape.
"You can't be here!" a voice shouted from behind Jack. He slowly turned around to see who he was dealing with. "This is a restricted area." The man walked closer to Jack, and looked like he was about to draw his gun. Good. Jack could use a new gun. Hopefully the man had a lot of ammunition too.
"Sorry man, could you help me out for a second?" Jack asked, doing his best to look as innocent and non-threatening as possible. Luckily, the man took the bait, and stepped closer, his hand still on his gun. The moment he was close enough, Jack grabbed the man's arm and spun him around, grabbing the man's gun the process. Once he had the gun, he stepped away from the man, and kept his aim at the man steady. The man raised his hands in surrender, his eyes wide.
"Now you listen to me," Jack growled. "Are you listening?" The man quickly nodded. "Alright, good. Now here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna lead me to where you keep your prisoners, and your gonna let the blond kid go. He's my partner, and I want him back. If you do anything I don't want you to, I won't hesitate to kill you, understood?" Once again, the man quickly nodded, eyes still wide. "Good, now start walking. Keep your hands up."
The man nodded again, then quickly turned around and started walking, keeping his hands up like Jack had asked him to. Jack memorized all the twists and turns they were taking, committing them to memory so that they wouldn't need this man to help them get out once Jack found Mac.
After a few minutes, the man stopped in front of a set of double doors, and hesitantly looked back at Jack.
"If this is where he is, then open the doors, or I'll be opening your skull," Jack threatened.
"Only the scientists are supposed to go in there," the man said. He appeared to be genuinely scared, but of Jack or the room, Jack wasn't sure.
"Does it look like I care?" Jack asked. He motioned with the gun towards the doors, and the man shakily pushed them open and walked inside. The man crossed himself once he crossed the threshold, then immediately turned to face the doors, refusing to look at the interior of what appeared to be a lab of some sort. On the counter right next to the door was a very familiar looking red knife. Jack quickly pocketed it. He really didn't want Mac to lose it again.
"Jack!" a voice cried out. It was Mac.
Jack briefly took his eyes off the man in front of him to look at his kid. He looked like he was okay, but he was in a cell with several dead bodies, and looked to be looking them over. That must have been why the man didn't want to go in.
"Hey, buddy!" Jack called back. "Your rescue's here. Now you," he said, turning back towards the man who had led him there. "You're gonna let him out, or die. It's your choice," Jack said, as if he truly didn't care which option the man picked.
Trembling, the man walked past the lab tables and towards the cell, keeping his gaze anywhere but on the bodies. He put in the code on the keypad, and the door of the cell came sliding open. Mac quickly stepped out, and Jack pistol whipped the man who had opened the door, then shoved the man's unconscious body into the cell, quickly closing it behind him.
"Are you okay?" he turned to ask Mac the moment the cell door was once again closed. "I noticed you've had a wardrobe change." Jack forced a smile to cover up how worried he'd actually been.
"Umm, yeah, I think I'm okay," Mac replied, looking genuinely unsure if he was okay or not.
"What's wrong?" Jack asked, his concern immediately skyrocketing. "What did those bastards do to you?"
"I don't know, let's just get out and maybe take me to a hospital, I don't know yet," Mac rushed out, stepping past Jack and towards the doors.
"Now wait just a minute, kid," Jack said, quickly grabbing a light hold of Mac's arm to stop him. "What are you talking about?" Mac hated hospitals. He would never suggest that he go to one unless something was life-threateningly wrong, and sometimes not even then. But he looked physically fine.
"I promise I'll tell you everything, but we really should get out of here first. I think time is of the essence." Mac pulled out of Jack's grip and slowly pushed the doors open, checking for guards. Jack followed him, then quickly took the lead, next to Mac, but just slightly ahead of him. If anyone asked, that was because he had memorized the way back, but really, it was because if he was in front of his kid, he could more easily protect him.
"It stinks in there anyway," Jack muttered.
"That's the problem," he just barely heard Mac mumble. Jack nearly stopped in his tracks.
"What?" he asked. "You've got to explain what's goin' on, kid." He put his arm out to stop Mac just before they rounded a corner. Jack peered around it to make sure it was safe, then motioned for them to keep going.
"I couldn't smell them, Jack, I couldn't smell anything," Mac replied, keeping step with Jack.
"You're lucky. It smelled worse than me after eating Bozer's bean curry." He wasn't exactly seeing the problem. Mac was lucky if he couldn't smell something that terrible, but Jack didn't remember the kid having a cold or something, and he didn't sound sick.
"No, Jack, I can't smell anything, anything at all. I can't smell," Mac said, lightly grabbing onto Jack's sleeve as they walked down the hallway. That's when Jack knew something really was wrong. The kid sounded seriously scared, and he'd reached for Jack for comfort. Something really was wrong.
Just as Jack was about to respond, an alarm started blaring. "Time to start running," Mac muttered, gripping Jack's sleeve more as the two started to run down the hallway, but let go after a moment.
They could hear voices shouting, and they weren't shouting like Jack did whenever the Cowboys scored a touchdown. Jack was sure to keep his gun at the ready, and fired off a shot when they entered the stairwell and were greeted by guards. He and Mac made quick work of the rest - Jack mentally reminded himself to mention that he was proud of how much Mac's close combat fighting skills had improved over the years - then dashed up the stairs, and out the emergency exit.
"This way to exfil," he said, taking a quick breath before beginning to run towards the trees, Mac right next to him. Maybe they should've taken the time to steal a pair of shoes for Mac's bare feet, but it was a little late now.
Jack could still hear shouting, but he and Mac had reached the treeline. Glancing back at the kid, he could see him grimacing whenever he stepped on something painful.
"Alright, kid, let's find a place to hide," he said, quickly stopping Mac.
"We can't stop or we'll miss exfil," Mac said breathlessly. He tried to start running again, but was stopped by Jack grabbing onto his arm.
"Exfil's already long gone, bud," Jack admitted. "Right now our goal is just to hide where they can't find you, and your feet aren't really gonna let you run very far in this forest before you slice them open. You know it's smarter to hide and make yourself a pair of shoes out of something."
Mac sighed, but nodded. They ran up to a large tree with low hanging branches, and Jack began to climb. This was really gonna suck for Mac, not just because of his bare feet on the bark, but his fear of heights would be a problem too. Still, Jack would rather have a scared Mac at the top of a tall tree than a dead or captured Mac at the bottom.
"Come on, bud," Jack said, a few branches above Mac. "I know it sucks but you can do this."
"Yeah," Mac said, a little breathlessly. "Yeah, yeah, I'm okay." He sounded anything but okay. "My feet feel fine." His voice was full of pain. "And this isn't even that high up." They were a good thirty feet off the ground at that point.
"Okay," Jack said, putting a hand out to stop Mac. "This should be good. I doubt they'll look up at all, and if they do, they shouldn't see us."
Mac kept climbing, just high enough to that he was on the same branch as Jack. He wrapped one arm tightly around the trunk, and gripped Jack's arm with the other. Less than a minute later, guards were swarming the forest floor below them. As Jack had suspected, they didn't look up.
"Find them!" came a shout from below. "They can't have gotten far. You can kill the man if you wish, but I need the boy alive!"
Jack glanced over at Mac. The kid had his eyes squeezed shut, and he was shaking. He looked scared, and it also looked like he was in pain, but the kid had such a high pain tolerance that Jack knew his feet couldn't be what was causing it, cut up by the tree or not. He wanted to ask Mac what was wrong, but he didn't want any chances of being heard by the people below them, who were taking their sweet time. They had to be completely sure that they weren't anywhere around before making their way back down the tree anyway.
Jack reached up onto his arm and covered Mac's hand with his own, just to remind the kid that he was there, that he wasn't alone, and settled into the long wait.