Chapter 33
It was approaching early evening when the final plan was complete for how the rescue mission was going to take place. The team was all prepared to leave early the following morning to put this plan into action.
"Right all of you go home, and be back at base at 0400 hours prepared to go." Joe said.
When Steve got home he explained everything to the kids. Leaving out details about what the mission and where Cath was being held. He spared nearly all of the details just telling them they were going to get them. Evie showed the most concern about everything she was told. She knew how missions went and she knew the risks involved for her dad. She knew that Chelsea and Jay probably would be as worried about her dad if he wasn't going to rescue their mother.
"I need to go and pack but Mary will be staying with you while I am away. Chin and Malia said if you need anything give them a ring." Steve said.
Steve went upstairs leaving all of the kids downstairs waiting for Mary to finish cooking. They were pretty much leaving on the same types of food, with Mary's cooking being very limited. Evie made her excuses before following her dad upstairs. When she reached her dad and Catherine's room she just stood in the doorway. Watching her dad getting all of his Navy gear ready, laying it flat on the bed ready to be packed. Looking at all of the medals on his formal jacket she felt proud of what her father had achieved, yet she would never want to know what he had to do to be awarded these medals. All of the time her dad was in the Navy she had to try and pretend he was somewhere else. She knew how dangerous her dad's job could be and she knew thinking about it would make her worry and make her think that every time he went away it would be the last time she would see her dad.
"You can come in you know." Steve said looking up from his bag and seeing Evie standing there. "Are you okay?" He asked when Evie walked into the bed and took a seat in the chair in the corner.
"Yeah." Evie replied.
"Are you sure?" Steve asked knowing his daughter well enough to know that she was worried about him going away again.
"You're going away again." Evie said.
"I know. Sweetheart I promise that everything will be okay. I just have to go and get Catherine back and then we can be a proper family. I need you to stay here and not to worry. Everything will be okay." Steve said, squatting down in front of Evie.
"Are you sure?" Evie asked.
"I promise." Steve said brushing some lose stands of hair out of her face.
"Okay." Evie said.
The next morning...
Steve woke up early ready to start the mission. He was trying to prepare himself for his first mission in a while. He had done his reserve training but it was different between training and actually completing the mission.
As he made his way downstairs he was surprised to see someone sitting in the living room.
"What are you doing up?" Steve asked as he moved closer and spotted it was Jay.
"I don't know I just couldn't sleep." Jay replied.
"I have to go know but you need to remember that I am going to bring your mom home. No matter what I will bring her home." Steve said.
"Thank you." Jay said.
"I will call you when I can." Steve said getting up and leaving Jay sitting on the sofa by himself.
After awhile, Evie came downstairs, walking straight past Jay into the kitchen. Jay got up to go into the kitchen to follow. This was about to become as hard for Evie as it was for him and Chelsea. Steve chose to go on a mission to rescue his mother. Although he didn't know if his mom was safe Evie wouldn't know if Steve was safe until he called or came home.
"Did my dad leave?" Evie asked when she spotted Jay following her.
"Yeah he left about half an hour ago." Jay said, he waited for about a minute to see if Evie would reply. "Your dad is going to be okay." Jay added.
"Yeah, it's just the first time that I have been here while he has been sent away. I thought that it wouldn't make a difference me living with him when he went away, but it makes it worse knowing how long he is going t be away for."
"I know, but I promise he will be okay and he will be home soon. If he thought that he would get hurt he never would have gone. I have spoke to Steve and he is good at what he does." Jay said.
"I know. Do you want something to eat?" Evie asked, trying to take her mind of everything.
"Can you cook?" Jay asked.
"I can make cereal." Evie replied, never really having been given the chance to cook properly before.
"How about I show you how to make a big breakfast." Jay said, thinking about too many mornings spent with his Nan showing him and Chelsea how to cook a very large breakfast.
"Okay."
"Well we need, eggs, bacon, sausage, bread, tomatoes and beans." Jay said, starting to collect everything out of the cupboards.
About an hour later both Mary and Chelsea had come downstairs to see Evie and Jay working side by side making breakfast. After they both got kicked out of the kitchen to leave them to cook they had ended up sitting in the dining room, laying the table and just sitting in silence.
"You're not like your brother at all." Chelsea said deciding to break the silence.
"You're not the first person to say that. Me and my brother went through a period of not talking. He went to the Naval academy I was moved to the mainland. He left and made something with his life, and because I didn't have him around I thought I didn't need him. After my mother's death I guess that we both handled it differently." Mary answered.
"Yeah. At times I don't know what I would do without my brother. Don't tell him I told you that." Chelsea said.
"I know, growing up with Steve we were close, then when we went to different part of the mainland I thought I didn't need him in my life. But I guess that I was wrong and that my life would be different. He got structure in his life and order and I guess I got the opposite and my life turned out like this." Mary had never said that out loud before.
"You didn't turn out so bad." Chelsea said. Yes Mary didn't have a stable job, or husband or kids, but she was a lovely person, she cared for her family and what more could people ask for.
"Thanks." Mary said.
A couple of minutes later Jay and Evie brought the food in and joined Chelsea and Mary at the table. While eating breakfast they made small talk, but none of them could forget that Steve was on his way to hopefully bring Cath home.
Meanwhile...
"Miss Rollins." A voice said that awoke Cath from the sleep she was in. "Normally this isn't my style, but maybe this way your boyfriend will give me answers." The voice continued.
Catherine looked up to see a figure walking in. She looked over to the corner and couldn't see the other body lying on the floor anymore. She really hoped that they have moved them to another room, but part of her knew they were probably dead through the lack of movement, which made her worry that maybe she was next. She had made many mistakes with her kids and with Steve and this was going to be the chance to put everything right.
"The kids were going to be first, but I am not that much of monster. If I don't find out what I want this time, the kids are going to be next." The voice continued.
"What's this about?" Catherine asked. She would tell him anything she needed to know, because they would not get to the kids. She knew that Steve would do anything he could for her, but when Evie, Jay and Chelsea came into the mix he would do everything to protect them.
"Shelburne." The voice said.
And that was the moment that Catherine realised that it was Wo Fat talking to her now and that this was serious and he would do everything in his power to make sure he found out about Shelburne.
"Steve never tells me anything about this. He always keeps this stuff to himself." Catherine tried to plea. That was mostly the truth, but she had seen some of his work he brought home and had heard about certain things through the Navy of when he was looking for information.
"I don't believe that you know nothing." Wo Fat said. "I am going for my lunch, you have until I have finished to think of everything you know about this, and it better be enough." He said walking out of the room.
Meanwhile...
Steve arrived at base to see the other SEALS are prepared to leave. Steve had very limited knowledge as to what was happening in this mission. He would be told everything as it happened. He understood why Joe was doing it, to stop him from doing something stupid, but he felt like he was being sidelined that he was just going to be sitting on the helicopter while the rest of them went to rescue Cath.
"Here's what's going to happen. Me and Freddie are going to lead two teams. One team going in through the back while the rest of us making an assault through the front. There are only them two exists. We need to go in fast and hard to make sure that there is no chance for them to react. Steve, Wilcox's you're with me and Jacks, Peters you are with Freddie. All other details we will go over on the plane to the landing. Be ready to leave in 30 minutes." Sam explained.
As the plane was approaching the landing location the team had gone over every exact detail that they needed. Steve had been briefed as to what he was meant to be doing. He would be an active part of the team however, he would be under strict command of Sam and that he was part of this mission as a SEAL not as an overly emotional boyfriend trying to get his girlfriend home.
The team all sat together with no one saying around. They were either trying to prepare themselves for the mission, but the rest just didn't know what to say. They didn't want to say anything to Steve. Yes, he was already worrying but they didn't want to tell him that everything was going to be okay because they knew the chances were minimal of them finding Catherine alive.
Meanwhile...
Catherine knew that Wo Fat would stop at nothing to find out about Shelburne. She had two options, she could come clean and tell him everything she knew, but she knew that he wouldn't stop until he got his revenge of Steve and kill her and possibly go after the kids, but she also knew by not telling him she would be killed and he would still carry on going after Steve and the kids to find out what Steve knew. Either way they would lose. Steve had to find her, she knew he would probably be looking but he needed to find her soon because she would have to tell him everything she knew because that was her best chance.
"Are you ready to tell me what you know?" The voice reappeared in the doorway.
"I can tell you what he has told me, but you know Steve and you know he wouldn't bring me into anything." Catherine replied.
"Well tell me what you do know and I will tell you if it is another." Wo Fat replied.
"All I know is that he knows Joe is hiding something, he sent something off to friends in the Navy about a video, he refused to go through me. He knows that it is something in Japan and he thinks whoever it is knows him because they are already one step ahead of him. That's all I know." Catherine said, hoping that it was enough to stop Wo Fat doing anything else.
"Well you see I know nearly all of that what else can you tell me." He said walking over towards Catherine and hitting her a couple of times.
Catherine screamed out in pain. She took a couple of minutes to compose herself. "That's everything, he keeps it all to himself." Catherine said trying to plead with him.
He hit her a couple more times listening to her scream in pain. "I am not normally a patient man but I am going to give you one more hour to think of anything else." Wo Fat said, hitting her once more before leaving the room.
Catherine lay there, this pain was worse than she had ever felt. She knew that she needed to get out fast because there was only so much more of this pain she could take. She knew that she had told Wo Fat pretty much everything she knew but she needed to think back to the last couple of years to everything that Steve had said, every favour that he had asked trying to think of anything he could tell her , but if she didn't think of something fast the chances of her making it out of that room were very small.
Back home...
The kids were all sitting in the living room. Jordon, Shannon and George had been over to see Chelsea and Jay. It had been a short visit per request of Jay. He had told them that he appreciated them coming over but they needed family time and there was nothing they could do. The real reason was he didn't want them asking every little detail about what had happened, because neither he nor Chelsea orEvie needed to relive what they knew, but also some of the stuff they weren't allowed to tell due the high security of it.
Each one them was sat waiting for the phone to ring or someone to come to the door to tell them Cath had been found and both her and Steve were coming home, both well. They knew that it was too early and the mission probably hadn't started but they needed to find out. It was killing nearly everyone inside not knowing. Time wasn't going by, and they needed to find out.
Meanwhile...
The team got off the plane collecting everything that they would need to carry out this mission.
"Right we need to be ready to move in 2 hours. We are going to make the assault when it starts going dark." Sam said. "Right now we have time to prepare and everything and rest up before we move."
"How are you feeling?" Freddie asked. Freddie and Steve had been friends almost since they both started at the academy. He knew Steve like a brother and knew no matter how well Steve was hiding it, he was upset and angry.
"I just want her back. I just need to focus on that and then I can start thinking about how I feel." Steve replied. For the last couple of days he had to spend most of the time thinking about the kids because if he didn't he knew he would break down.
"Okay, we are going to find her, and we are going to bring her back for you and for the kids." Freddie said, he knew that the chances were quite high that Cath might not be alive, he knew that if she survived the ambush and they took her she might could be dead unless they needed her for something else and in that case she would be serious injured. Then they only had to get her out of where she was without her getting injured and make it back to Hawaii and then she would be safe.
"Everyone keeps telling me that and I am trying to listen to them but, we both know I have done this for a long time and the chances of her being alright are not very high." Steve said, admitting to what he knew was probably true. The more time he spent not focusing on something the more he thought about what had happened to Cath.
"Just have trust in us. You also know that everyone on this team is experienced enough to be able to get Cath back safely. You know that Cath is strong and you need to focus on how good this team is." Freddie said hoping that he was helping. Him and Steve had know each other for so long they knew when each other was lying and when they were hiding something and he knew that this probably was not working.
"I do have trust in you, it just Wo Fat that I can't trust." Steve said.
"He needs her for something just remember that." Freddie said.
Meanwhile...
"Have you thought of something else." Wo Fat said.
"Only one more thing that I can really think off. It relates back to the death of Steve's mom, he said it's not an accident, he said that it's where everything started. The accident report was taken and he sent off something to the DOD but they never gave it back, it was from a meeting in the Governors office. That's all I can remember at the moment." Cath explained. It was the most basic of information but it's all that she could remember hoping that it would by her more time.
"Did he ever get this something back?" Wo Fat asked.
"I don't think so, I think he and Joe fell out over it, Joe sent it off apparently but as far as I am aware Steve not received whatever it was back. I don't even think Joe sent it off, something to do with protecting Steve, but he might have after Steve found out." Catherine explained. The truth was she had only heard about it when Steve asked her to check to see what was happening with and at that point they hadn't received anything.
"That is all for now, I am sure I will be back later to get some more information." Wo Fat said walking out of the room.
The pain that Catherine was experiencing was getting worse. She knew that if she had any chance of making it out of the room alive a team needed to rescue her fast. Any idea she had of trying to escape herself would not work now, when she was first taken she had planned her escape, but after the beatings that she had taken she was in no state to walk let alone make an escape.
As she lay on the floor she did her best to think of her kids, to think of all the things they did together, any happy times they had together. There wasn't many but she had to think of the good things in her life. She knew that if she didn't make it out of the room alive she wanted to die thinking of all the positive things she had in her life. All the good things that she had done.
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