Chapter 61

Waiting for the others to arrive felt like an eternity to Quatre. Paul and Trowa had tied up Carter so he couldn't get away and started searching the small cabin while they waited. Carter whined and yelled threats until Paul stuffed his mouth with a dirty sock he'd found in the house. Cathy waited with Quatre, taking turns putting pressure on Kiri's eye. It looked like the bleeding had slowed a little, but it was hard to be certain.

"Are you sure they can find this place?" Cathy asked. "Maybe we should just put Kiri in the car and drive into town."

Quatre shook his head. "I don't think that's a good idea. They'll be here any minute and it'll be easier and safer to move Kiri with the proper equipment. And a helicopter will be much smoother than driving so she won't get bounced around. I don't want to accidentally hurt her worse."

Cathy sighed. "I know. But it feels like it's taking too long."

Quatre nodded. He checked his watch. It had been ten minutes. He didn't dare tell Cathy that Heero had thought it would take twenty.

"Do you hear that?" Cathy asked.

Quatre strained his ears. "It sounds like a helicopter."

Cathy perked up. "Could it be your friends?"

"I hope so."

It didn't take long for the helicopter to land and Heero was jumping out of it before it had properly touched down. Wufei followed suit, carrying a first aid kit. Heero went to Trowa and Johnson to help them with Carter, leaving Wufei to handle the girl's injuries.

"What happened?" Wufei asked as he knelt next to Quatre to assess the damage to the girl.

"She took a knife to the face," Quatre told him. "She got knocked off the porch and landed hard. She lost consciousness and I didn't dare move her."

Wufei nodded as he carefully checked the girl's neck and spine and opened her uninjured eye with his fingers. "We need to get her to Sally. DUO! Bring the stretcher over here!" he called as he waved to the braided pilot who was on his way over with the stretcher. Wufei set about putting a neck brace on Kiri as a precaution

When Duo arrived with the stretcher, Wufei instructed them on how to move the girl. "Okay, Duo. You and I are going to carry her to the helicopter. Quatre, keep pressure on her eye. Catherine, come with us, you'll need to be checked out as well."

Cathy nodded and silently followed the men to the helicopter. It didn't take long for them to secure the stretcher.

Heero hurried over. "Duo, take them back. I'll go back in the car with Trowa and Paul."

"Uh…isn't that other guy injured, too? Shouldn't we take him?"

Heero's eyes flashed with anger. "He deserves the bumpiest ride on the worst road we can find. You get the girl back to Sally. We'll be along later."

Duo blinked in surprise. Heero wasn't usually so vindictive. It wasn't part of his training. "Uh…okay. I'll see you there then."

He climbed into the pilot's seat and called back, "Is everyone ready?"

Wufei gave him the affirmative and Duo took off.

"Is she going to be okay?" Cathy asked once they were airborne.

Wufei looked at her and then back at the girl before answering. "She'll live but I don't know how extensive the damage to her eye is. We'll have to wait and see. That's all I can promise."

"Oh." Cathy fell silent and watched as Quatre and Wufei tended to Kiri. She hated that Kiri was in this position and Cathy blamed herself for Kiri being in it. If she hadn't been so stupid as to get a ride from someone she didn't know! He was with the circus so she should have been able to trust him. It made her angry that the circus, her home, had been violated that way. She hoped Trowa wasn't gentle with Carter. The man deserved to be tortured for what he'd done to Kiri. And considering how reluctant Kiri had been to do what Carter had wanted her to do, Cathy was certain he'd done worse to her in the past. It made her sick to think about.

A soft whimper from Kiri caught Cathy's attention.

"Shhh…" Quatre soothed. "It's okay, Kiri, you're safe."

Kiri didn't seem to hear him. She whimpered again and started twitching in her sleep.

Quatre looked at Wufei. "I think she's having another nightmare. We'll need to strap her in before it gets worse."

"You can't do that!" Cathy snapped. "Tying her down will just freak her out. Didn't you see what Carter tried to make her do? I'm sure he's done worse to her and I wouldn't put it past him to have tied her up at some point. That would just be cruel."

Wufei sighed. They'd all had to deal with Cathy at one point or another and while she was Trowa's sister, the rest of them just couldn't seem to get along with her very well. "Catherine, we know that it may seem cruel to tie her down but her nightmares are quite violent. We don't want to hurt her worse than she already is and if she thrashes about that is entirely too much of a possibility. I promise that we'll do our best to keep her calm but I don't dare give her a tranquilizer. Strapping her in is our best bet."

Cathy shut up after that. She knew that her brother's friends wouldn't intentionally hurt Kiri but she had come to see Kiri as her responsibility. And after this morning's demonstration of what she'd been put through before Trowa found her, Cathy didn't want anything that could potentially upset Kiri to even be an option.

Kiri started to thrash about as predicted and Wufei started tightening the straps. He hated the idea of tying her down as much as Cathy did but at least this time they had proper straps and didn't have to resort to handcuffs.

"Kiri, it's okay, you're safe," Quatre murmured softly to the girl. "Calm down. We've got you. Nobody will hurt you. You're not in trouble. Just rest."

The girl seemed to calm down a bit, which mildly surprised Wufei. He recalled the ferocity of her nightmares during her previous hospital stay and had been ready for a full blown fight to keep her under control, especially since the incident from this morning seemed to have something to do with her past.

"Why do you call her that?" Wufei asked Quatre.

"Huh? Oh, you mean 'Kiri'. Well, that's the name she gave us to call her," Quatre explained. "Someone at the circus gave her the name and she liked it so we've been using it since she won't tell us her real name."

Wufei nodded. "I think Sally will be glad to have something to call her."

"Hey guys? We'll be landing soon," Duo yelled back. "Get ready to drop altitude."

"Cathy, make sure your straps are secure," Wufei ordered. "You don't want to slide around during a landing, especially with Duo piloting."

Cathy nodded and double-checked her straps.

Duo had heard Wufei's jibe and made an extra effort to put the bird down softly. He didn't want to hurt Kiri by landing hard anyway, but Wufei's comment made him mad enough that he wanted to go out of his way to prove the Shenlong pilot wrong.

"That wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be," Cathy said as they touched down.

Wufei nodded but didn't bother speaking to her. He was busy trying to coordinate getting Kiri off the helicopter while still keeping pressure on her eye.

"Duo, you and I will carry the stretcher, Quatre, keep pressure on her eye. Cathy just follow us; we'll get you sorted once the girl is taken care of."

Cathy was about to complain about Wufei's terse order but she held her tongue when she noticed the concerned looks on all three men's faces. She felt ashamed that she had always been so quick to accuse them of being heartless because of what had happened to Trowa during the wars. Perhaps she had been wrong.

"Does Sally know we were bringing her in?" Quatre asked as they headed for the hospital door.

"I think Heero called her," Duo told him. "But I know I didn't do it. It might be a surprise."

"Some surprise," Wufei grumbled. "Quit jabbering. We can talk once she's been seen to."

Heero had, indeed, alerted Sally to the arrival of the helicopter and she had a room ready.

"Catherine, I'd like you to wait in here while we tend to Kiri's eye. I'll look at you as soon as she's stable. You boys can wait outside," Sally told them after Quatre gave her a quick rundown of Kiri's injuries.

Sally and her nurses worked quickly to assess the girl's injuries but Sally had to call in a specialist to perform the emergency surgery on Kiri's eye. She just didn't feel like she had enough experience to do it correctly and Sally wanted to give Kiri every chance to come out of this incident as unscathed as possible. Once the surgeon was done and the nurses had cleaned up, Sally excused them and did a quick examination of Cathy's cut. It was shallow and had already stopped bleeding so she applied an antibiotic as a precaution and bandaged it.

Once that was taken care of Sally asked Catherine to fill her in on Kiri's progress at the circus in more detail.

"She's been doing so well, Sally. But I'm afraid this may have undone everything," Cathy told her sadly. "She was happy. She loved to help with the horses. Paul even said that she had agreed to learn to ride even though I'm pretty sure she's afraid of heights. She's very eager to please and hasn't been nearly as jumpy."

"What about the nightmares?"

"As far as I could tell they were tapering off. She still has them, but they aren't as bad or as often as when she first arrived. I really thought she was going to start talking soon." Cathy sighed. "Now that might never happen. She was so completely terrified of Carter that she shut down. It was awful. She wouldn't…no, couldn't do anything but cry after she saw him. It took hours for her to calm down, Sally. I've never seen anything like it. I feel so bad for her. There was nothing we could do because we didn't know what had upset her."

"That wasn't your fault," Sally told her kindly. "There was nothing you could have done to prevent it. I won't make you tell me what happened with Carter as I'm sure Colonel Une will want a statement from you and I'll hear it then."

"Thank you, Sally," Cathy said quietly. She looked over at Kiri, who was still unconscious. Her eye was heavily bandaged and she was hooked up to different machines that were monitoring her vitals.

"Cathy, I want you to report to Trowa. He'll tell you when Colonel Une wants to see you. Until then I suggest you rest. Kiri will be fine. Her vitals are good and sleep will help her to heal. You need to take care of yourself. I'll take care of Kiri."

Cathy nodded and left the room. Trowa hadn't arrived yet so she picked a chair in the waiting room and dropped her head into her hands. It didn't matter what Sally said. Cathy blamed herself for what had happened to Kiri. If only she'd been able to stop Carter before he could use her that way. If only she hadn't gotten a ride from him. If only Kiri had been able to tell them about Carter. If only Cathy had earned Kiri's trust enough for her to talk.

"Please don't blame yourself," Quatre's soft voice interrupted Cathy's pity party and she looked up to see him holding a cup of coffee out to her. "I wasn't sure how you liked it, so I brought some sugar and creamers for you."

Cathy took the cup. "Thank you," she whispered.

They sat in silence. Cathy was still lost in her thoughts and Quatre wasn't sure that he dared to intrude on her any further. They were currently enjoying a very fragile truce that the slightest provocation could crumble. Wufei and Duo joined them after a few minutes, each with their own drink. Wufei had tea while Duo was sipping from a bottle of soda.

It wasn't long before Trowa and Heero came through the emergency room doors pulling a struggling Carter between them. The only reason he wasn't yelling obscenities at his captors was because he still had the sock stuffed in his mouth. Paul followed a moment later after parking the car.

Sally came out to assess the situation. "Hello, Agents. What have we here?"

"Caucasian male, late twenties, injury to groin sustained during an altercation involving a 19-year-old female," Heero told her.

Sally raised an eyebrow. "Is this the man that hurt Kiri's eye?"

Trowa nodded.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" Sally asked, removing the gag.

"That bitch broke my dick!" Carter yelled. "She'll pay for UMPH!"

Sally had shoved the gag back in his mouth. "That's quite enough of that young man. Bring him along. We'll see if there's anything we can do about his sensitive bits after I wash that filthy mouth out with soap. Perhaps that will help clean up your attitude."

Duo had nearly snorted soda out of his nose at Carter's outburst and was trying to compose himself. Wufei offered to help Heero take Carter to the examination room so that Trowa could tend to Catherine. Paul was a little torn between helping with the prisoner and checking on Cathy but decided that he needed to keep his mind on business at the moment. There would be time to make sure Cathy was okay once Carter was in a cell.

Trowa was glad to leave Carter to the others. He walked quickly over to Cathy and immediately enveloped her in his warm embrace.

"Cathy, are you okay?" he asked her softly.

Cathy nodded and wrapped her arms around her younger brother. "I'm so worried about Kiri."

"Sally will do everything she can for her," Trowa assured her. "Kiri's a lot tougher than she looks. She'll pull through."

"Have we received orders from Colonel Une yet?" Quatre asked Trowa.

Trowa shook his head. "Heero said he would apprise the Colonel of the situation as soon as he is done here and he'll let us know what she needs from us."

Quatre nodded. "I guess that means that we guard Kiri and Carter until further notice."

Trowa nodded.

"Yeah, well you still owe me a story," Duo said as he lightly elbowed Quatre's arm. "Heero said you thought I'd enjoy it."

Quatre cleared his throat. "Yes, well, since we'll have to tell Colonel Une what happened in full detail anyway, perhaps it would be better to wait?"

"Awww," Duo whined. "I flew extra fast because I was promised a story."

Quatre chuckled at his friend. "All right. Why don't we go get something to eat and I'll give you the highlights."

"Deal!"

Quatre turned to Trowa and Cathy. "Would you two like to join us?"

Cathy shook her head. "I'm really tired. I'd rather not."

Trowa nodded his agreement. "I think Cathy and I will go to my place for a while. Alert me if I'm needed."

"Your loss," Duo told them cheerfully. "Have a nice nap."

Trowa grinned and rolled his eyes at his friend's antics. Cathy only rolled her eyes. She wasn't nearly as amused. She was tired and worried about Kiri.

"Will Kiri be safe here? Should I just tell Sally that I'll stay with her?" Cathy asked Trowa.

Trowa shook his head. "Johnson is going to stay to guard her today. We both need sleep, Cathy. I'll bring you back after we've had a chance to rest. Besides, I'm sure that Kiri will sleep today as well. She was completely worn out even before we confronted Carter."

Cathy knew it was pointless to argue with him so she sighed and nodded. "Sally will call us if she wakes up, won't she?"

Trowa looked at Duo and Quatre. "Can you ask Sally to call me if Kiri wakes up? I don't think she'll wake up before we come back but…just in case?"

Quatre nodded. "Of course. You two go home. You look like you could sleep on the floor and not notice how hard it is."

Cathy yawned. "I could do that…"

Trowa chuckled and led his sister out to the car. He was just as worried about Kiri but he knew she was in good hands. He needed to keep himself ready in case any of Carter's superiors caught wind of his arrest. He was certain they wouldn't let it go unpunished.

Colonel Une wasn't expecting the knock on her office door. She was also not expecting to see Heero Yuy with Paul Johnson in tow.

"Okay, what happened?" she asked once the door was shut.

"There was an incident at the circus," Paul started.

"Don't tell me you blew your cover!"

"No! I mean…I don't think I did, Colonel," Paul told her quickly.

"The incident in question involved the girl that we extracted from the hospital," Heero explained. "We've been hiding her at the circus with Agent Barton's sister, Catherine."

Colonel Une nodded. "Yes, I remember. Continue."

Paul took over. "The girl has been recovering quite well, Colonel. She adopted the name Kiri and has been very enthusiastic about assisting with various chores. However, the Circus Manager hired a new hostler to assist with training some new horses. He said the young man came with a letter of recommendation from Trowa. It turned out that the letter was a forgery and he was one of Perdu's men."

Colonel Une's gut froze but she kept her composure. "And how did the girl…Kiri respond?"

Paul cleared his throat. "I'm afraid that I don't have a complete answer for you. You'll have to check with Cathy or Trowa for that. What I can tell you is that the morning after his arrival, I found one of the circus' horses injured in her stall. When I confronted Trowa about it, he said he hadn't recommended anyone to the Manager and Cathy had gone missing. She called and told us that Carter, that's the name of Perdu's man, had kidnapped her and would trade her for Kiri. Kiri insisted that we trade her to save Cathy from what she'd been through and since we didn't have any other options, we decided to go with it and try for an opening to rescue both women."

"Go on," Colonel Une prodded when it seemed like Paul didn't want to continue. "What happened next?"

"We…uh…we arrived at the specified location, which was a cabin in the middle of nowhere."

"Yes, Quatre called me about the cabin. He didn't give me any details about why he was there, just that he had a possible lead on another of Decart's locations. I'll have to speak to him about that."

"In Quatre's defense, Colonel, there was a lot going on at the time. You see, once we got there Carter, um, he decided he was going to make an example of Kiri. He insisted that she…uh…" Paul cleared his throat again, unsure of how to make his report less crude. "He…he said that Kiri had been trained to perform certain tasks and he wanted her to give us a demonstration."

"Agent Johnson, I understand that the situation is delicate but I need details. Please give them," Une told him, trying not to sound exasperated. She could tell that Paul had been affected by the situation. Paul was also one of her less corrupted agents. He wasn't naïve or a prude; he just didn't have a tendency to be offensive if he could help it. Colonel Une actually respected him for his ability to keep things upper class. However, some situations required the blunt truth. And the blunt truth was often crass.

"Yes, Ma'am." Paul cleared his throat. "Carter insisted that he would injure Catherine unless Kiri gave him a…a…hand job," he mumbled.

"A what? I didn't catch that."

"A hand job," Paul said a little louder. "Though I think he might have wanted a blow job as well but Kiri didn't give him the chance to force her to do that. She…well, she's a smart kid, Colonel. She got him worked up just enough to get his guard down and then she broke his…parts."

Heero's smirk confirmed Paul's story.

"Anything else to add, Agent Yuy?" Colonel Une asked dryly. She hadn't missed his smirk.

"The man is an ass. He got what he deserved. The entire drive back he would have called her every name in the book if Barton hadn't shoved a dirty sock in his mouth. Sally washed his mouth out with soap when she got her hands on him. She confirmed the damage and then prescribed a very mild pain killer. It's so mild that I think aspirin would be more effective. But then, we don't want to risk letting him have anything he could overdose on and then die before he is held accountable," Heero told her.

"How is Kiri holding up?" Une asked. "Has she given us her official statement?"

"That may take a while yet," Paul said. "You see, during the time that Carter was using Kiri, he was holding Cathy hostage at knife point. When Kiri twisted her wrist, Carter backhanded her and the knife cut her eye. Sally had to bring in a specialist and she's still not sure how much of the damage will be permanent. And we're not sure when Kiri will wake up. She's been unconscious since Carter backhanded her."

Colonel Une swore.

"Sally said she would recover. She just isn't sure when exactly we'll be able to get a statement from her," Heero said. "Trowa seems to think that having Carter in custody will do one of two things. Either it will make Kiri retreat beyond where we can reach her or else it will help her to feel safe enough to start talking to us."

"Let's hope it the latter," Une said. "I think it would be wise to have a debriefing of this incident tomorrow morning with everyone who was involved. Have Agent Barton bring his sister in so we can speak to her as well."

"Who should stay to guard the girl?" Heero asked. "You know Decart won't let Carter's arrest go unpunished."

"I will assign someone," Colonel Une said. "I need you all here for this so we're all on the same page."

Heero nodded. "Just make sure that there is absolutely no chance that the agent will betray the girl. She's been through enough."

"You don't need to worry about that, Yuy. I will see to it personally."