CHAPTER 6

It felt like they had been in the air days instead of hours by the time they had traveled that many miles and crossed through so many time zones, but they were finally here, wherever here was. She was hardly out of the helicopter and String already had his sleeping bag out, not that he appeared to be planning on using it, and was going over the plans for attack first thing in the morning.

"Need any help?" Caitlin asked, cheer a little forced into her voice. At the moment a long, warm bath and at least twelve hours of uninterrupted sleep sounded pretty good; instead she was going to get to sleep in shifts in an unwelcoming jungle half way around the would from home with no running water at all other than a murky stream that was more mud than water.

He had better be glad we love him so much, because I sure wouldn't do this for just anyone!

"I just about have it," he finally answered after a long pause. "That is, unless you have the highly sought after secret to staying cool out here or keeping the mosquitoes away."

Ah, so he was here at least somewhat in mind and not just in body.

"I'm afraid I can't be of much help in that area," she admitted. "What about unpacking or getting ready for tomorrow though?"

"I don't have much that needs to be unpacked since we're leaving before dawn, just thought I'd review the plans and make sure we have everything."

"And if we don't, do you want me to walk down the road a ways and buy whatever you need from the friendly neighborhood munitions dealer?"

"If only it were that easy. I'd just prefer to make any changes to the plan tonight rather than have a problem tomorrow."

"Makes sense. Alright then, I'll see if I can help Dom or Lexa then," she said, turning to leave, "Oh, and String…"

"Yeah?"

"Don't forget to get some sleep; you look like you could use it."

Sleep, they all needed it especially tonight,he thought, him probably the most at the moment, yet he was the least likely to get any. How could he when he was so close? When by tomorrow afternoon, he might be able to actually hug Saint John and talk to him, something he had only been able to dream of for the last seventeen years? Sleep? Yeah, he would try to, but it was already a lost battle, he knew, no matter how tired he was.

"I'm worried about him," Dom's voice broke through Lexa's evaluation of the younger man.

"At the moment it'd be a lot more profitable to worry about yourself. He is probably better prepared for whatever dangers we will meet out here than any of us."

"But he hasn't slept to amount to much in days, and if he doesn't find Saint John…. Every time he seems to get more distant for a while. Eventually he climbs out of his self-imposed solitude and rejoins the land of the living, but I'm afraid that just once he won't."

"I know about some of the things he's grabbed at, no matter how slight the possibility and how disappointed he was when he didn't find his brother, but does he really believe Saint John is out there somewhere just waiting to be picked up? I mean come on, it's not going to happen, surely he knows that as well as you or I do."

"I just know I'm not sure even I can put him back together again if gets like he was. Say, weren't you the one that gave him all this information? Why bother if you don't even believe Saint John is alive yourself?"

"I did give him the information, along with plenty of warnings; I needed a ride and he was about the only was I was going to get one. He doesn't like me though, and there was no way he was going to take me anywhere without feeling he owed it to me."

"You mean you're just using him so that you can get a ride wherever you want. Don't you ever stop to think about anyone else but yourself? About the pain you're causing him?" Dominic demanded, anger beginning to rise in his voice.

"He'll get over it. It's real information, he was the one who swears he saw his brother in the picture, not me. And it's not like I'm getting out of this as easily as you make it sound like I am either. I volunteered my help in return for a ride, that it all."

"But you don't know how he was…"

"I know he was an emotional wreck but refused to show it, determined it was his fault he got picked up and Saint John didn't, and he would do anything to get him out. What more is there to know?"

"That was later, much later," Dominic countered. "Before he worked for the FIRM, right after the war he spent about a day curled up on his brother's bunk crying; then he went up to the cabin and locked himself out of the rest of the world. He didn't routinely do anything other than hide out alone at the cabin for weeks at a time for nearly a year. To this day I still don't know what he did up there; he had a few healing injuries to recover from but nothing that serious, I do have a hunch he might have followed a couple leads that somehow managed to find him, but other than that… I went up there as often as I could, sometimes bringing groceries, others just to visit, but there were a couple time he had locked the door and risking getting shot as I busted through the window would have been the only to get in. Thankfully he finally snapped out of it and started coming up to the hangar on a more regular basis, but even now there are still times…"

"Sorry if I cause more trouble than I'm worth, that really wasn't the intention. I just figured I had something he wanted and he had something I did, we could make a clean deal and hopefully only have to see each other a minimal amount of times. I knew he was sensitive about this kind of thing but never to that extent. Even for him that seems a bit over the top though. Like it or not, his brother has been missing in action seventeen years and the likelihood of him ever coming back is beyond slim."