A/N: Finally, another chapter. Things are moving a little more slowly than I planned, but they are moving. R/R, enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own The A-Team, etc.

Face was almost disappointed at how easy it was to get into the Indy VA. Granted, he was wearing brown contacts, glasses, and carried some entirely convincing identification that indicated he was "Jared Lawson, Psych Advocate," but he was a federal fugitive, for crying out loud. He'd half expected to see his wanted poster on the wall somewhere, alongside Hannibal and Bosco's, maybe. This was barely a challenge. Clever fake ID, total confidence in the B.S. he was currently peddling, the right smile at the right time to the right ridiculously attractive nurse…too easy. He'd have Murdock out of here in no time flat. They'd be on their way to a brand new hopefully-lucrative mission in twenty minutes or less.

Then again, there did seem to be a little bit of a tense vibe amongst the staff. Well maybe not tense, more like…despondent, like working conditions weren't so great at present-if their expressions and body language were any indication. Another nurse summoned the one that had just pointed Murdock out to him before regretfully departing to fulfill her nursely duties. Ah well, c'est la vie.

Face crossed the room to where Murdock was obviously feigning sleep in an arm chair. It was a common tactic, especially when the pilot wasn't sure of his visitors. Face sat down on the unused footstool in front of the chair. "Hey Sleeping Beauty, it's me. Wakey, wakey." he said conspiratorially, when Murdock didn't drop the rouse right away. "And can I just say that Nurse Adams is unbelievably hot?" He jabbed Murdock lightly in one shoulder. "You been holdin' out on me, or what?"

Murdock still didn't so much as twitch. Face snorted. "Come on, man. You want me to dump this water on your head or what?" Said cup of water sat on the end table next to a chair. Face reached for it, but the pilot didn't try to stop him. His grin turned slightly bewildered. Maybe the man was really napping. "Murdock?" Face lifted one of the pilot's arms and let it fall to the arm of the chair again.

No reaction. Then Face noticed the rough, red marks around Murdock's wrist, a tell-tale sign of the repeated, resisted use of restraints. Any traces of a smile quickly bled away from his expression, and his heart rate kicked up a notch. "What the hell? Murdock? Hey, Murdock." He pushed the pilot's other sleeve up and found a similar aggravation on the other wrist. Why the hell was he being restrained enough to leave marks like that? "Murdock!" He gave the man's shoulders a gentle shake.

Face glanced over his shoulder, wondering if his voice had gotten too loud. The nurses seemed to be absorbed in something else at the moment, fortunately. When he turned back, he finally found himself meeting a pair of familiar but dazed looking eyes. Murdock flinched and recoiled slightly, out-of-it and not so familiar with Face's currently-brown eyes. It took him a moment to realize who he was looking at.

"Face-why are your eyes like that?"

"Murdock, Christ, what is going on? You were sleeping like the dead! And what is this?" he held the pilot's arm up again, indicating the marks on the wrist.

Murdock looked shaky, like he was trying to decide whether or not he was really awake. He reached for the cup of water with a clumsy motion that knocked it onto the floor and completely gave up trying to recover it. Pressing the heel of one hand into the bridge of his nose, he answered. "They switched my meds. It's bad. I mean, it's really, really bad, Face…"

Face steepled his fingers against his mouth for a moment, more than a little alarmed at the condition his friend was in. "Okay…okay. Here's what we're going to do. I'm gonna go over-"

Murdock's head jerked up. "You're gonna go?" He had latched down so hard on the word that Face flinched, startled at the man's frantic reaction.

"Just over to the nurse's station, Murdock. Now I want you to stay here and try and relax, all right? I promise I am going to take care of this. You hear me?"

"I hear you," Murdock answered, sounding like a robot. A robot that didn't quite believe what he was hearing.

"Here, hold this for me," Face spoke as he got to his feet, handing Murdock his keys as a means of mental security. "Can't go anywhere without those, right?" The pilot slowly grasped the keys, staring wide-eyed as the conman turned to walk away. Face waited until his back faced his friend to take a slow, deep breath. He needed to get some answers from the staff and call Hannibal. Murdock needed to get out of here, badly, and his condition made his extraction a hell of a lot more complicated than expected.

"Excuse me," Face addressed the second nurse, as the one he'd made eyes at earlier was nowhere to be seen. "Do you have a moment to answer a few questions?"

The nurse looked up from her computer and regarded him critically, sizing him up. Her badge read "Shayla Jefferson."

"And you are…?"

Face flashed the counterfeit ID. "Jared Lawson. I represent Mr. Murdock on behalf of the VA's Psych Advocates program."

The nurse seemed to pause, glancing out in the direction Face knew Murdock was sitting, and then back again. "You…represent him?" She pulled her hands away from the keyboard, finally committing to the conversation. "In what capacity? Did you sign in on the visitor log?" Still skeptical.

"Psych advocates are commissioned by request as a means of ensuring the rights and dignity of those we represent."

Face could almost hear Hannibal ribbing him about the line of B.S. he'd just managed to sling out to this latest mark…Wow, that's a lot of syllables for you, Face, maybe you should sit down and recover your strength...Meanwhile, the nurse was biting her bottom lip. She wanted to tell him something, that much was obvious. He decided to push the envelope a bit more.

"And yes, I signed in with Nurse Adams. I'm here because we received an anonymous tip recently that Murdock's treatment has become…shall we say, substandard." He watched the color rise to her cheeks and hoped he hadn't taken the con a step too far.

"His treatment hasn't been-" she started off hotly, then quieted herself, eyes darting as though she was worried someone might hear. "It hasn't been substandard so much as railroaded," the nurse emphasized.

"Railroaded?" Face prompted. Almost there…

She looked around once more, and finally spilled it. "A man came here earlier this week. Government type, real piece of work. He gave us a form signed by some big-wig psychiatrist saying that we had to change Mr. Murdock's treatment regiment. New drugs, new procedures…and they're all wrong." She looked genuinely distressed and pissed off about the situation, and her eyes had wandered toward Murdock again. Her expression was slowly deep-freezing Face's insides.

"I didn't make that anonymous call, Mr. Lawson," she went on, "but I should have. The way it's changed him, in so little amount of time-it's awful. He doesn't talk to the other residents anymore, barely talks to the staff. We caught him trying to pull the security shields off the windows two or three times until we were instructed to start restraining him at night. Yesterday he actually tried it in the middle of the day, in his sleep. He woke up in the middle of it and promptly had a ten-minute panic attack. He gave an orderly a black eye when they tried to restrain him at bedtime that night."

Face swallowed, his mind rebelling against mental images of Murdock's plight. All this had been happening without any of the team knowing it. The three of them had been making plans for the next mission…playing cards, and ordering pizza, and watching T.V. while Murdock slowly went completely insane in this place.

"If I'd known about your organization," the nurse was saying, "I would have called. I've talked to everybody from my immediate supervisor to the director of the hospital, and no one seems to be able to overturn this order. Murdock's psychiatrist has been wrangling legal roadblocks for days now. If there's anything you can do…"

"Can I take a look at the order?" Face shook himself back into form, happy that his voice still sounded vaguely authoritative.

"I'm not sure that's-"

"Please, Nurse Jefferson. I'm not asking you to present me with his records, just the order this G man gave to you. Did you happen to get his name? Seriously, this could go a long way toward giving Mr. Murdock the help he needs." His pleading was almost too genuine. When a con got too close to the truth, it could dissolve in a heartbeat.

She sighed. "I could lose my job for this," she told him in a serious tone, even as she dipped into a filing cabinet drawer. "His name was Ericks. But it was strange because Mr. Murdock seemed to know him." Her fingers deftly trolled across a row of folders.

"What?" This threw Face a bit.

"Yeah, and Murdock called the man something else. A nickname or first name maybe? Can't remember…Letich? Something like that. Here's the file."

Face took it on autopilot, still hanging on her words. "You don't mean Lynch, do you?"

"Lynch, yes, that's it. Do you know who he is?"

Damn.

"Mr. Lawson?"

Double damn.

Coming soon...Investigation, deception, extraction. You'll see Hannibal and B.A. pretty soon, too!