CHAPTER 12

"I take it you two have met before."

"Yeah, you could say that."

"And he knew Saint John."

"Hopefully he just knows of him. But after me, if he has ever gotten a hold of him, knowing we're brothers…" he cringed at just the thought.

"Care to explain for the really confused?" Caitlin requested.

"Back in `Nam my helo got shot up pretty bad and I went down over enemy lines. Quan Van Dao took me in and I became his favorite prisoner to pick on for the next two months. If I so much as breathed I deserved to be punished for it. Also, he developed a habit of taking out his anger on certain people and got great pleasure out of destroying and turning families against each other whenever he got the chance."

"So since he didn't like you, you're afraid he'll take it out on Saint John," she surmised.

"I'm not afraid he would, I know he would. And I didn't make anybody's stay any easier with my 'useless antics and futile escape attempts,' of course it was one of those useless attempts that got me out, but he doesn't take kindly to his prisoners escaping and something tells me years haven't done much to soften him."

"Hawke," a burly, muscular Russian accomplice addressed. "The boss says you're coming with us."

"You'd have to kill me first."

"Watch your mouth."

"I'd rather die here than go back to Vietnam any day."

"That could be arranged if necessary ," he ground out irritably, grabbing the slighter man's arms and pinning them behind them behind his back as he easily shook off Dom and Caitlin and forced Hawke down the hallway, "but he specifically said alive."

\A/

Nhu nodded in understanding. "Okay, I think I understand." She drew in a deep breath. "So what can I do to help?"

"Right now Hawke, Dominic, and Caitlin, the ones you left your baby with, are going after the leader of the group that was after you and Tommy. As soon as they catch them, we will take them into custody and you should be able to safely leave. Until them, the best thing you can do is sit tight and be string. Did you ever actually get a look at any of them?"

"I did."

"Good, then you can identify the man when they are brought in."

"And they won't be able to come after us anymore, right?"

"Right. With your testimony and the evidence we've recently gathered against him, I don't think he will be getting out of jail for a very long time, if ever."

\A/

"Hawke, what is it that makes you believe you could beat me, capture me, when you failed so miserably before?"

"I didn't lose last time. I still got away."

"And received how many beatings before you succeeded? At what cost? And you still never did really win. Nor will you this time."

"What do I have to lose for trying?"

"You were young and naïve at twenty, Hawke, but this is just stupidity. You have nothing to gain by escaping, our paths will cross again, I guarantee it. And by trying to get away you have everything to lose. Unfortunately for him, your brother had to learn that the hard way."

"Leave him out of this."

"Fine, I'm just trying to warn you though so you don't make the same mistakes he did. If you had stuck around just a while longer you might have seen him; it was only perhaps a month after you disappeared that I got the pleasure of meeting him. He was wounded pretty badly though, evidently wasn't able to get picked up by a certain medivac helicopter, and I'm afraid he didn't last too long. You know how easy it is to get something infected around here… He was only there for a week or two and had a raging fever most of the time, only getting worse. Finally he couldn't deal with the pain anymore and could only come up with one solution."

"No."

"He killed himself."

"Liar! He wouldn't do that, not to Dom. Not to me…"

"Suicide, I believe you Americans call it."

"Saint John couldn't, he just couldn't. I'm his brother I know him."

"And I saw it. You can't deny the facts, Hawke."

Sinj - dead…. No he couldn't be, he just couldn't.

"I don't believe you." Quan had lied to him before, why would this be any different? Maybe because it was some damned convincing, it matched with the few facts he did know, it fit. All except for the final happy reunion he had been expecting and awaiting for so long. "He isn't dead."

"And you know this how? I've seen him more recently than you - what sixteen years ago? Even if he were still alive, after so many years in captivity you probably wouldn't even be able to recognize him. How are you expecting to find him?"

"I know people."

"So do I. Stop kidding yourself. He's dead, has been for years. Why do you find it so hard to believe? Surely you know of others doing similar things. In fact, I could see you doing the same thing by the time this is over. I know I probably would - letting down a friend, losing a brother, not being able to do anything about your friends starving to death back in the United States, while you're back in your 'favorite country.'"

"You…."

That was why he was brought along on the trip he realized. He and his knowledge could be worth quite a price in Vietnam, and if not for that, Quan would enjoy torturing him over his brother's death. If he was dead, he reminded himself, he didn't know that Saint John was dead. And he was planning to let Dom and Cait starve to death in the prison cell he had left him in. And he couldn't do a thing about it, unless he got away, again.

Leaned against the solid bamboo railing, blood ran down in rivulets across his bruised cheek and he didn't dare touch those tender ribs; it was a punishment that he had kind of expected, definitely no surprise, but it was still serving its purpose. What would he give to regain his freedom? How many times would he go through this because of his vain attempts to get away? It seemed it didn't matter what he did, he was stuck here.

He couldn't live like this though, being confined to a tiny cell with a handful of people going through the same hell - taunting, teasing, beating, whatever it took - they would get the information out of you or eventually kill you trying. He knew some of the people who hadn't come out alive, and those who wished they hadn't because of the torment they'd been through.

He had been here… how long had he been here? And already he was driving himself crazy. He was going to get out of here or die trying; he had to