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A/N: Thank you all for the reviews. Thanks to Betherdy Babe for beta.

In the Cellblock

Once Zandar left, Rick kicked the cell door several times. He hoped to loosen it, but he really did it to unleash some of the pent up fury he had. I've never lost it before, but I've never had an innocent civilian in danger before my eyes without any way to help her. Her identity and the fact that she captivated him the moment their eyes met only added to his concern and anger.

"Master Gunny, who's Abernathy?" Rock asked as Clutch got in a few well-placed kicks to the wall that was shared with Rick's cell.

Sergeant Stone stopped kicking and shook the door. "Excellent. The hinges are exposed," he said looking at the rusty screws near the bottom. "Now I just need some metal."

"Took all my knives and even my belt buckle, Master Gunny," Blast-off said as he sat against the wall once more. "I've got nothing."

"Me neither," Rock said from behind him.

"Clutch? Got anything hidden?" Rick asked. If I could just get something to loosen those screws, I can knock the door out enough to get through.

"Nope," Clutch said looking dejected. "Looks like we're not gonna be able to save her. Too bad. She's really pretty and seems tougher than she looks."

A wave of intense jealousy swept through Rick at the Marine's comments. He didn't want his buddies or anyone else noticing how pretty she was or the strength in her eyes when facing those COBRA bastards alone. "Do you think you could keep your mind on us getting out of here? Besides, she is one hundred percent hands-off to you."

"Really? So, who's Abernathy? Someone important?" Clutch asked with raised eyebrows.

"General Hawk."

"Holy shit!" Clutch said with eyes widening. "The General has a daughter?"

"She doesn't know he's still alive." Rick thought of what the young woman will go through upon finding out her father, whom she thought was dead for over fifteen years, is alive.

Rick had been in the General's office a couple years ago and Hawk got an email that he took right away. The Marine got up to leave, but Hawk motioned for him to stay. As the General's grin broadened, Rick desperately wanted to escape because it was obviously something private that he had no business knowing about.

"Sorry, Sergeant," Hawk said smiling. "Just got a message about my daughter…"

The General then told the young man about being a POW, the loss of his family, everything. Rick never knew why, but after that Hawk sought him out to confide in. Growing up without a positive male figure around, Rick always wondered what a real father would be like. General Hawk would be a great father. Too bad war took him away from his family.

"Unbelievable? If COBRA found out Hawk has a daughter, no wonder they got our real identities to catch us," Clutch said.

"So, we gotta get out of here. That's Hawk's daughter out there. We owe it to him and her to protect her," Rick said looking at all of his men.

"Hey, Clutch, don't you wear steel-toed shoes?" Blast-off said from the floor of his cell.

"Yeah, so?"

"I asked if anyone had any metal around here," Rick said shaking his head. Clutch was a good Marine but sometimes not the most creative.

"I need my shoes," he whined.

"You said the guard had the same size, so steal his once we're out. Now give me a boot," Rick said putting his hand through the bars into Clutch's cell.

"Oh, this sucks," the driver said as he sat down to pull off his boots.

In the Pit

"Ah, General Hawk, so good of you to take my call. Allow me to introduce myself, I'm Zandar," a tall man with bright red hair, who stood on the hologram grid in the middle of the briefing room, said as he bowed. A black trench coat was brushed aside to show a long knife in a scabbard.

Hawk glanced quickly at the team assembled around him and heard Misha's thick accent immediately in his earpiece. "Zandar is zhe younger brother of Zartan and has a twin sister Zarana. Ze is not smartest one in zha family."

The General tried not to laugh too loudly. Even if he's an idiot, he obviously captured my men, so I better take him seriously. "We haven't seen or heard from your brother in six months. I really hope we killed him and you're calling to say you're in charge."

"No, my brother's not dead. He's quite alive and safe. He has earned a great reward from the Commander," Zandar said with a bit of envy in his voice.

"I need to tell you that our official policy is that we do not negotiate for release of our people. We rescue them and destroy everyone in our path. If you have any of my men, I suggest you let them go and maybe give us some information on your brother…" Hawk said and paused, staring at the man who suddenly looked off at a sound. "If I'm boring you, perhaps you'd like to call back later?"

"No! I said don't hurt… Idiots!" Zandar suddenly disappeared off the hologram platform and Hawk looked at Breaker and the other technicians in the room with raised eyebrows.

Please tell me we can trace this, he mentally screamed at his people who were scurrying about.

Zandar suddenly reappeared on the platform, but had one arm stretched outside the field. "It would appear our time to talk has been shortened, General Hawk, or should I say General Abernathy?"

Hawk felt his stomach drop. There's no way he could easily find out my identity. "I don't know who you're talking about."

"Oh, I think you do. As a matter of fact, I'm going to prove you are Clayton Abernathy the Third, the disowned son of wealthy millionaire or maybe billionaires by now," Zandar said with an evil smile.

Hawk noticed the Joes tensing in the room. If my identity was compromised, what would happen to them, their families? No! If they found me, they could find…

Kate! In answer to the mental question and the fear that suddenly gripped his heart, Zandar pulled a young woman into the hologram with him. She had long blond hair, which fell around her face, and a red mark on her cheek. Her eyes stared in a blank fashion at the man who was leering at her.

Fear unlike any he had ever known in his life hit him. His daughter was a hostage to get to him. Nothing in his years of military service could help him deal with this. To add insult, the transmission went dead.

"Get it back!" he shouted at Misha, Breaker, Duke and everyone in the room. God, please don't let them hurt her anymore.

"Sir? Was that really your daughter?" Duke asked.

"Somebody tell me they traced the fucking message!" he screamed again as he walked toward the control panel. Rage, pure and unchecked, flowed through the General. All that was done to protect her, to let her live her life secure that her world was safe, had been destroyed. Someone betrayed him. Betrayed the Joes. There was no doubt this bastard had Stone, Rock-n-Roll, Clutch and Blast-off as well.

In Zandar's control room

Kate backed up in shock as her father appeared in the room. It was an older version of the man whose picture was on her bedside table with her mother on their wedding day. It was a face she memorized to keep the monsters away at night and the face she hoped to see again when her life was over. How can he be alive? What is he doing here? Uncle Larry said my father was a real American hero, like John Wayne or Clint Eastwood portrayed in the movies she loved. He couldn't be alive and never come to find me.

The young woman bumped into something as the man, who looked like her father, spoke to Zandar. As his voice awoke the lonely little girl inside her, she stumbled back into a table, knocking it into a server rack. Tools, screwdrivers, wrenches and hammers fell onto the floor as the table collided with the rack. The voice of the man who told her stories over the phone was now telling Zandar he did not negotiate.

Falling to the floor like she was in a dream, the young woman's eyes never left the larger than life-sized hologram in the center of the room. Landing on some of the tools, she was roughly backhanded for making so much noise by the closest Neo-Viper.

A fresh taste of blood filled her mouth as her head snapped back. She was in such a daze from the emotional trauma of seeing a dead man in front of her that she did not respond. Zandar was instantly there to pull her up from the assorted tools she sat on and back on her feet while he yelled at the man who hit her.

She could feel the pain from the slap on her left cheek and the sting to her lip. As Zandar pulled her close to the ghost on the platform, her conscious mind still refused to believe the impossible. My father died a heroic death. He saved his men and was honored as a hero. Did those soldiers lie to me? Did they know? Why wouldn't he come for me? Does he even know mother is dead?

A thousand questions flooded through her mind as the blue eyes of her father looked at her from several inches away. Turning her head fully toward the hologram, it suddenly disappeared. I knew it was a dream. Why I'm in so much pain from a dream, I'll never know? Must have really hit my head in the car accident. I bet I'm in a coma. Look, that ugly black dog that caused the accident is even sitting in the corridor waiting for me.

Zandar dragged Kate back into the hall as lights flickered in the computer room. The table that Kate hit into the computers apparently caused several of them to crash and control of the systems was fluctuating.

"Damn. Son-of-a… You little bitch. Stop acting like you don't know what's going on," Zandar gripped her shoulders, shaking her hard. "I'm going to make you pay if you've screwed up this set-up."

Zandar dragged her roughly by her right arm down the corridor toward the cellblock; Kate suddenly realized she was holding a screwdriver and shoved it in her pocket.

TBC

A/N: I really appreciate all the feedback and the favorites and alerts people are signing up for. It keeps me going with the story.