Sorry for my complete uselessness and lack of activity, but life caught up with me for a surprising amount of time, so writing, much to my annoyance, took bottom priority.

I would like to once again thank everyone who reviewed and faved, but I am afraid I can't mention you all this time because I lost the piece of paper I wrote all the names down on. I am useless, really I am.

So just to convince everyone I'm not dead, here's Chapter Six.

West waited for the moment of strategic benefit; namely when the gunshots stopped; and kicked the thin metal plate away from the narrow shaft she was sitting on and dropped to the floor, landing in a roll to stop herself from breaking an ankle. Unfortunately, she'd misjudged the distance, and she ended up falling a little further than she'd anticipated, before beginning the roll feeling slightly surprised. The result wasn't anything serious; just a slight ache in one shoulder and the decision that gravity was not on her side that day. Her eyes immediately found Jess and Becker and she sprung off the floor towards them none too soon. She felt the breeze created by the speeding bullet centimetres away from her face. She settled into a crouch next to Jess and began firing at the men already emerging from the elevators, promising herself a good complain at the laws of physics later on in the day. Bullets hit the ADD, making her jump and fix her full attention on the fighting. She wasn't sure which had come as more of a shock, the glass explosion or the scream Jess gave out. Someone further inside the Hub slid across the floor to take position behind a different table, and in doing so gave West a good enough view of his face. What she saw made every sense and function in her body cease to respond to brain signals, time seemed to temporarily stop, and it was a wonder she even continued breathing. The man she was looking at couldn't be, shouldn't be, but clearly was, her brother Jack. It did not make sense in her head. Jack was dead. There was no questioning that, she'd spent months knowing and being unable to do anything about it. Yet here he was, in the ARC, as usual somewhere he wasn't supposed to be and right in the middle of trouble. He was in front of her, clear as day, which lead her to one inescapable conclusion: he had lied to her.

"Sargent West!" The loud, commanding bark from Captain Becker brought her crashing down with a thud and she cursed internally. This was a life-and-death situation! She couldn't start reminiscing; it was going to get someone killed. "Get Jess out of here, now!" He barely spared her a glance but kept his eyes on the fight in front of him. West nodded once anyway and got to her feet. She fired two shots through the computer system and found Jess.

"As soon as there's a pause, run for the shaft," she whispered, "I'll go up first and pull you up after me, got it?" and without waiting for a reply, she counted down in her head. In the sudden and disconcerting silence that followed, West made her move. "Go!" She darted out from behind the computer system and a bullet whizzed past her head in seconds. The owner dropped to the ground almost instantly, a victim of Becker's deadly accuracy. She pulled a stool up to the hole she had made in the ceiling not ten minutes previously, and in one swift movement was lying on the floor of the ventilation shaft. She turned to reach down to Jess, who was having much more difficulty climbing onto the seat thanks to her heels.

"Loose the shoes Jess!" West shouted down. Jess complied, managed to stand straight on the stool, and reached up to West's waiting hands. West pulled her up, hand over hand until she had a good enough reach and could wrap her arms around Jess' shoulders and scramble backwards, pulling Jess with her. While the field co-ordinator lay out of breath on the floor of the foot-high shaft, West checked her ammunition.

"We're not just going to leave them there, are we?" Jess' question made West look up, into eyes that were nearly spilling tears and willing her to do something, anything, that would help the man down below them. West was convinced she only meant one of them, but she didn't say anything on the subject.

"What would you like me to do, give you a pistol and drop back down there? No. Becker ordered me to get you out, so I will. If they're still deep in it by then, I'll think about going back in, but we need backup."

"There's got to be something we can do," Jess muttered. West just snorted.

"Come on before someone shoots the roof by accident." she shuffled along on her front until they came to a junction. There was a somewhat awkward silence.

"You don't know where you're going, do you?" Jess asked sweetly. West didn't respond, merely shifted out of the way so that Jess could take the lead. She crawled past with a slight chuckle, a gesture West didn't deign worthy of acknowledgement. They crawled for half an hour in complete silence except for the sound of their hands and knees hitting the metal beneath them, a time that was lost to West. She tried to deny the facts in front of her, tried to convince herself that it had all been a mistake, she'd been sent the wrong letter... She would have settled for anything rather than admit the possibility that her brother had been lying to her. She and Jack had a stronger connection than that. They would do anything to protect each other, and would, by Jack's own words, always support one another. West didn't understand why he would do something like that; make her think he was dead. What possibly could he need to do that for? She refused to believe it.

And yet... There was one undeniable fact that kept presenting itself to the front of her mind. If Jack had wanted her to know he was alive, he would have told her. He would have sent an email, or at the very least replied to the desperate text messages she had sent him in some vain attempt to prove his COs wrong. At last it sunk in. He had lied to her. He had let her believe he was dead, and there was no way in Hell she was going to let him slip away again without finding out why.

Jess continued to lead her on through the maze of metal duct tunnels, and with alarm West realised she had been daydreaming instead of mapping the route they'd taken in her head. It didn't matter, however; they reached the loading bay unchallenged. Once there, however, they faced a problem.

"There's at least ten of them," Jess reported, peering into a grate, "All armed, and there's a white van that I can't see into. There may be more in there."

West said nothing, merely pulled her pistol once again out of its holster on her hip and carefully clicked open the ventilation hatch.

"Wait, what are you... You're not going down there!"

"Shh! Stay here, don't make any noise, and don't, whatever you do, try and help."

"They'll shoot you on the spot, West, and you know it."

"No they won't. They don't want me dead." Before Jess could utter another protest, West dropped in a similar fashion as before onto the concrete of the loading bay.

She was greeted by silence. It was amusing, actually, the shocked expressions on their faces as she stood there in front of them, just one against a dozen. They all knew who she was; they just hadn't expected her sudden arrival. Slowly, they raised their rifles; big, brutal things with the probable capability to fill her with bullets in no more than a few seconds, were the holders so inclined. In under ten seconds, West was surrounded by soldiers. The illusion was slightly damaged by the varying looks of conviction on their faces.

"Hold your fire!" one ordered, stepping forward out of the circle. He wasn't armed, but instead of a gun carried an air of instant and unquestionable authority. He was also at least three inches taller than the rest of them. West thought she might have seen him before.

"Teresa Ortega, I am under instructions to bring you before the Leader Ortega for questioning and recruitment. Failure to..."

"Let me stop you right there," West announced, raising a hand. "First of all, that's not my name. Secondly, you and I both know that I am not going to come with you willingly, so let's just get that one out of the way. And thirdly, why are you even here?"

"We are under instruction to bring you in for questioning..."

"...And recruitment, yeah, I got that. What I meant was why not just launch a stealth mission to my flat or something? This whole thing is just a little out of character."

"Mission tactics may not be disclosed. You will come with me."

"Will I now? And how are you going to enforce that? You can't shoot me."

The commander's expression had gone from superior to put-out during the course of the conversation, and by this point he looked like he was about to have a heart attack. One single blood vessel on his forehead was pulsing in a very unattractive manner, and the only reason West didn't burst out laughing was her attempt to retain some kind of professionalism.

"I may not be able to shoot you," he said quietly, "But there are no limitations on how much I can hurt you."

Unfortunately for him, the backswing on his punch was far too wide, and West saw it coming long before he had even committed to it. Instead of sending her sprawling across the floor as he had no doubt intended, the Commander found himself with his arm twisted around his back, being used as a shield by West, whose hold on him was far too strong for him to break. She also had a pistol held securely to his forehead.

"Jess!" she barked towards the ceiling. The field coordinator landed somewhat awkwardly on the concrete a moment later, and almost froze in shock at the sight before her.

"No one follows us out," West ordered, "Or he dies." The soldiers reluctantly made a hole in their circle and watched as Jess, West and their commander made a slow advance to the exit. Just as they reached the rear door of the loading bay, a bullet ricocheted off the wall two feet above them, sending a small drizzle of concrete down after it and causing Jess to scream. West let out a hollow laugh and released the commander, sending one foot into the small of his back that sent him staggering to the ground. West pulled Jess out the door and closed it with an unnecessary slam, before locking it with her wrist key.

"What the hell was that?"

"I'll explain everything in a minute. Just get behind the car," West led Jess over to a small blue hatchback and opened the passenger door, reached into the glove box and returned to the Loading Bay. She disengaged the lock in the same movement as pulling the pin on the stun grenade in her hand, and in seconds she was back with Jess behind her car. Instinctively, Jess' hands went over her ears, but it was an unnecessary precaution. A muffled 'boom' followed, and West straightened up.

"That ought to do it," she muttered to herself. "Jess, I need you to call backup while I sort some things out... Jess?"

The petite woman stood up slowly, visibly shaking and trying to control herself. West felt a little sorry for her. It was unlikely she had ever done something like that before.

"You promised me answers. I am not doing anything until you give me them."

West let out a deep breath and leaned against her car, pulling a stick of mint chewing gum out of one of the many pockets her cargo trousers contained. She chewed thoughtfully for a moment before looking Jess straight in the eye.

"I'll tell you," she said, "But you have to swear you will tell no one what I am about to say, not even Lester." Jess gave a small, determined nod. "You might want to sit down then," West decided, "This is going to take a while."

A sickening dread accompanied the hollow click that indicated to Becker his pistol was empty. Thankfully Jack managed to hit the Spanish soldier he had been aiming at, and that stopped the latest handful of them for the time being. Just for fun, he hunted in every one of his pockets for another magazine, but he already knew he wasn't going to find one. Their luck, if that was what he was calling it, had finally run out.

"Jack, what've you got left? I'm out."

"Half a mag. We're going to have to get out of here pretty soon in that case." Becker immediately knew there was something wrong; there was pain in Jack's voice that he was trying to supress. He darted out of his cover position, catching a glimpse of the pile of corpses slowly building up in front of the elevators. There were dozens of them. Becker didn't keep his gaze on them for long.

"What happened?" he asked, reaching Jack.

"Shot in the arm. It's not a major issue, it went straight through. Just hurts like Hell. How can we get out of here?"

"There are the vents," Becker only needed one look at Jack's arm to decide that wasn't an option. "Or the lift."

"Where does that corridor go?" Jack shifted his weight on the floor, simultaneously jogging his arm and sucking air in through his teeth.

"The rest of this floor is all research labs and the menagerie, nothing useful. The only way down or up is that elevator."

"What drunken idiot designed this place?"

"One who didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition," Becker answered sarcastically.

"Dude that wasn't the Inquisition, that was the bloody Armada," If Jack had noticed Becker's deliberate joke he didn't respond to it. Instead he looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "That was Teresa, wasn't it?"

"Yes it was," Becker responded distantly. He was trying to figure out a way down to the armoury without getting shot, but his options were thinning out rapidly.

"She saw me, didn't she?"

"I think so, yeah."

"Well that's just...Fantastic," he eventually decided on the word to use, although Becker was disinclined to agree with him. "What do you propose we do?"

"My immediate suggestion would be to head down to the armoury and fight our way out from there, but that would involve using the lift, and I am not fond of what's waiting for us on the other end."

"Although we don't actually know which floor they were on," Jack pointed out.

"No, but if it was me, I'd have every floor covered by now."

"True. Vents?"

"You wouldn't last ten minutes with that arm."

"Will you stop being right all the time? So what do we do with next to no ammo and very little anything else?"

"Well we can raid them for ammunition, for a start," Becker suggested, as much as he disliked the idea.

"Now why didn't I think of that?" Jack stood up, scanned the pile of bodies in front of them, and made a noise.

"I agree. Can we hurry up and do this?"

They both quickly and methodically found pistols, ammunition, and anything else that they thought might come in useful. They worked in silence, and tried as hard as possible not to think about what they were doing. Jack came across a man, lying in a corner, still alive, with a fatal gunshot wound that simply hadn't killed him yet. He raised his pistol.

"Lo Siento," he muttered, and shot the man through the head. "Let's get out of here." Becker nodded, even though Jack wasn't even looking at him, and punched the call button on the lift doors.

"What did that mean?" he asked.

"I'm sorry," Jack translated. "Didn't they teach you foreign languages at school?"

"The only class I failed."

"That is officially impressive."

"Do you ever shut up?" Becker inquired, somewhat sarcastically.

"I tried once," Jack said sadly. "Never really got over it."

"Unbelievable," Becker muttered.

The doors opened with their usual soft ping that suddenly seemed extremely loud, and Becker was almost shocked to find a completely empty carriage before them. He had, deep in his subconscious, been expecting the Spanish to have left them a surprise gift before leaving, but thankfully they hadn't. Jack had been thinking the same thing.

"Okay. Where are they?"

"Maybe they realised they're no match for us and left," Becker said, not even convincing himself.

"Yeah... No. They've had a change of tactics."

"Either that or we've killed them all."

"Isn't that a lovely thought," Jack said cheerily. Becker tried to work out if he was being serious or not, and deciding he would rather he wasn't.

"Are we going in or aren't we?" he asked, realising they were both still standing outside the lift.

"Well, here goes nothing," Jack said, just as cheerily as before, and took one giant and exaggerated step into the elevator.

So thanks for reading, and please leave a review as many of you lovely people so often do