MACGYVER'S RESIDENCE
LA
'…It looks great, but not quite as great as last year…'
On Mac's laptop screen, over Skype, Cage smiled a teasing little smile at Mac, Jack, Bozer and Riley, as they showed her the freshly-decorated house, adorned with rusty sheriff stars and (fake) cow skulls and cacti and even a large (fake) stuffed vulture.
(This year's Halloween theme had been declared to be 'Wild West ghosts with a touch of steampunk' by Bozer.)
(Of course, they had to show Cage, given how passionate she was about Halloween.)
(And they were doing this because they'd enjoyed last year – which had been her idea – so much.)
(And they did miss her, even if they kept in touch, thanks to the wonders of modern technology.)
(Cage was fully recovered now, but had chosen to stay in Australia, close to her sister.)
(Almost-dying did tend to change one's priorities.)
(She was working for the Australian military now, in what she claimed was a far more boring job than her previous work with the SASR's 4th Squadron.)
(None of them believed her – though not from what showed on her face or in her voice; Cage was Cage, after all - but she'd never tell them otherwise.)
Bozer put up his hands.
'Hey, we're not trying to beat the Queen of Halloween…but we did a pretty awesome job! Am I right, people?'
Riley and Mac both glanced at Bozer, fond smiles on their faces as they shook their heads, then nodded in agreement as they turned back to Cage on the screen.
Meanwhile, Jack crossed his arms stubbornly.
'Still reckon we should've done what me and my cousin George did and borrowed a-'
'No, Jack.'
'Grave robbery is a crime.'
'And you work for the government.'
Cage raised an amused eyebrow.
'Jack is never going to change.'
They could hear the affection in her voice, as well as a touch of sadness, though it was hard to tell, her being her.
The man in question grinned.
'Nope.'
He popped the p, almost obnoxiously, while Mac smirked mischievously.
'He's old and set in his ways.'
Jack looked up, affronted, at his partner, while Bozer grinned and reached out and bumped his fist to Mac's, as if to say, good one, bro, while Riley, too, smirked, eyes sparkling with mischief.
The Texan turned to the Australian woman on the screen, almost-pouting.
'Come on, Cage, back me up here!'
She was older than Mac, Riley and Bozer by a handful of years, and she was more serious than them, so perhaps she'd help him out…
Cage just smiled one of her enigmatic little smiles, a hint of mischief appearing in her eyes.
Jack sighed internally.
He was on his own.
The young 'uns really had no respect for their elders, did they?
The small group of children approached the front door of the heavily-decorated house with some level of trepidation and an awful lot of excitement.
(There'd been a really, really awesome haunted house here last year, and they were looking forward to seeing what had been cooked up this year.)
The door was opened by a dark-haired young woman, her hair swept up into a messy bun, wearing trousers, a loose-ish white shirt, a vest and a cowboy hat and boots. She also had a gun holster with an ornate pistol in it on her hip, and she looked sad and resigned when she greeted them.
'Welcome to town, kids. I hope you're brave, 'cause there's something really wrong here…' Wide-eyed, the kids stepped into the house, and the woman pointed down the hallway. 'Best go that way.'
The hallway was eerily quiet, and shadowed. One of the girls jumped a little when, she swore, one of the cacti moved, but it seemed to be a false alarm.
Then, suddenly, a woman who looked as if she'd been drained of all colour, wearing an extremely fancy dress and bonnet, burst out of a doorway and into their path.
She bore a rather eerie resemblance to the woman who'd greeted them at the door.
She looked down at them over her fan, something very, very sad in her eyes.
'Have you seen my husband?' She took a step closer, as the kids took a step away from the ghostly woman. 'Have you seen him? Have you?'
She kept stepping closer to them, and the kids kept stepping back, being herded into another room by her, before, eventually, turning and running into that other room.
It was pitch-black, except for the sounds of clanking, of metal-on-metal.
There was also muttering, in a male voice, the volume so low it was hard to discern.
'…Just another four hundred, just four hundred more…five hundred eagles, $5000, then I can marry her, her daddy promised…'
Suddenly, there was a flash of flame in the corner, illuminating a young man, face gaunt, just as ghostly as the woman in the fancy dress, wearing a leather apron and toiling over an anvil, a huge pile of horseshoes and spurs and door hinges and the like beside him.
He looked up at the children, as if he were only just noticing that they were there.
'Got an order for me?'
Shaking their heads, backing away slowly, the kids hurried into the next room, which was full of shelves packed with glass bottles containing strangely-coloured liquids, some glowing. In the middle of the room, there was a man wearing trousers and chaps and a loose shirt, as well as a cowboy hat, a gun holster strapped to each leg, lying on a table. He was also very, very still, and there was a young woman with long hair in a neat braid, in a simple shirt and skirt with an apron over the top, bent over the table, apparently trying to stitch a wound on the man's chest back together.
Both of them looked just as grey and faded and ghostly as the blacksmith and the fancy lady they'd passed.
The doctor (or nurse) working on the man smiled at long last, and patted his shoulder gently.
'There you go, Mr Dalton. All better now.'
The children glanced at one another.
He didn't look better at all.
He looked dead.
Still, he got up and tipped his cowboy hat at the young woman.
'Much obliged, Miss Taylor. Hope your father changes his mind soon.'
She nodded, a sad little smile on her face, and Mr Dalton stood up properly, walking towards the kids.
There seemed to be a large hole in his chest.
The kids backed away much faster, running into the last room, which appeared to be a saloon, complete with slightly-dusty tables, cobwebs, and several cow skulls on the walls.
There was a man tending the bar, looking just as ghostly as everyone else, except the woman who'd opened the door.
He finished cleaning the glass in his hand with a rag, and put it down and grinned at the kids.
'Looks like y'all could do with a drink.' He reached under the bar and brought up a tray, containing glasses of what seemed to be sarsaparilla…with eyeballs floating in it in lieu of ice-cubes. 'Try some, it's delicious!'
The kids backed away, stammering out refusals, only to hear a voice behind them.
'Boo.'
They screamed, jumped and turned, to find a very short woman wearing a cowboy hat behind them, an utterly terrifying look on her face.
They screamed again, as the ghostly saloon owner came ever-closer, holding out his tray of eyeball-sarsaparilla...
'Try some, it's delicious….'
'That was so awesome!'
'Best haunted house ever!'
Mac-the-ghostly-blacksmith, carrying a large bag of candy, grinned at the kids clustered in the front entryway around Bozer, Riley and Beth, who were handing out candy from bowls shaped like cow skulls.
He headed over to Beth first, since her candy bowl looked the closest to being empty. She was crouched down, talking to a little boy wearing all-black, an eye-patch, a red headband, and a bright-red scarf around his waist, with a toy parrot on his shoulder and carrying a katana.
'I really like your costume, miss!'
Beth smiled as she dropped a few pieces of candy into the boy's plastic pumpkin bucket.
'Thank you! I really like your costume too! You're a pirate-ninja, right?'
The little boy positively beamed at her, nodding enthusiastically, before bouncing off to the door where his mother waited. Beth watched him and his friends leave with something soft and gentle in her eyes. Mac glanced over at her, silent for a moment, before opening the bag of candy and holding it up.
'Refill?'
She glanced up at him, still smiling and looking happy and at ease, and held up the bowl for him to pour the candy into.
(That made him very happy; she'd been hesitant – yet again – when he'd invited her over for Halloween.)
(But, this time, she'd accepted the invitation without any external encouragement, after he'd reassured her that Jill was invited too – she'd wound up declining as she'd gotten another Halloween invitation; the Edwards team liked to put on a haunted house at Nick and Rowena's every year too – and that she wasn't imposing in the slightest, she wasn't being invited out of obligation or anything like that, they just wanted her there. He just wanted her there.)
As they headed back inside after a stint handing out candy in the garage, gunslinger Jack and society lady Diane exchanged a knowing, affectionate look as they watched the tableau in the entryway.
Beth was chatting animatedly to a little girl dressed in a doctor's outfit complete with a real stethoscope, showing her how to use it on an obliging Mac.
(Apparently, it took the combined power of an attractive, fiercely stubborn woman that he was starting to really, really like and an adorable little girl to turn him into a good patient.)
Bozer and Riley were taking advantage of the brief lull between groups in order for the former to help the latter snap a couple of cool pictures of her in costume (her character's backstory – Bozer had written full ones for each of them – involved her being a Wild-West bounty hunter who'd stumbled upon a very strange, scary little town) to send to Billy.
Beth finished her demonstration, and both she and Mac grinned at the little girl and her father, Beth grabbing a few pieces of candy from the nearest bowl and dropping it into the little girl's 'first aid kit'. The little girl waved at her as she and her dad left, until she rounded the bend in the path and was no longer in sight of the front door. Beth waved back, a bright, soft smile on her face.
Jack did not miss the glance that his partner gave the young doctor. Neither did Diane.
He reached out and wove his fingers through Diane's, as Riley smiled at her phone, eyes soft and loving, doubtlessly reading a message from Billy.
'Grandkids on the horizon, eh?'
Diane slapped him lightly on the arm, though her eyes were less reproving than he might have expected.
'Don't count your chickens before they hatch, Jack Wyatt Dalton.'
Jack just gave a little smile in return.
It was really, really, really early days yet, but he had a gut feeling, and you had to trust the gut.
One day, he was going to be Grandpa Jack.
He just knew it.
In the kitchen, making up another batch of the eyeball-sarsaparilla (the eyeballs were really lychees stuffed with fruit preserves and a blueberry), Matty, wearing a cowboy hat but nothing else in terms of a costume, smiled as she watched Riley smile fondly at her mom and Jack holding hands, Beth and Bozer take a silly selfie together, and Mac excitedly check his security system (slightly re-purposed for the night) as they waited for the next group of haunted house 'victims' to come up the driveway.
She knew first-hand the sacrifices that their work required.
She knew how isolating it was, how hard it was to maintain relationships with those outside the business.
She was very glad that they'd found a family.
They were very lucky.
She was very lucky.
PHOENIX FOUNDATION HEADQUARTERS
SOMEWHERE IN LA
'…The top-secret plans for a highly classified and heavily compartmentalized DoD project were stolen eighteen hours ago.' The day after Halloween, Matty turned away from the big screen in the war room to face Mac, Jack, Bozer and Riley. 'At least, that's what the DoD thinks.' That got her an array of raised eyebrows, and Mac reached down and grabbed a paperclip from the bowl. It began to take the shape of a question mark. 'Luckily, there's only one suspect.' She tapped the screen and a generic silhouette of a man's head, with a question mark over it, appeared. 'Meet Suspect 237, master thief, who has stolen everything from a Monet to classified government secrets. Unfortunately, no one has ever photographed him or gotten a physical description.'
'I'm getting some serious déjà vu here, Matty. And not the good kind!'
Mac's expression grew wry, as he gave a little nod of his head in Jack's direction.
Jack has a point.
Last time we had an encounter with someone known only by a casefile number, he tried to kill my best friend, my partner, Riley and our boss.
And me, of course.
And the fall-out was pretty spectacular.
Me and Boze had a fight about something other than who ate the last of the Cheerios or me turning his laundry pink by mistake for the first time in years.
I said some things to Nikki about her family that I'm not proud of.
Cindy got me banned from the dating site we met on for ghosting her. I'm not proud of that either, but as I said…fall-out. And I was holed up in the Latvian embassy; couldn't exactly text her back.
And Murdoc's still trying to hurt me and everyone I care about.
Yeah, that was not a good couple of days.
Matty put her hands on her hips, and leaned closer to Jack.
'Well, put on your big-boy pants and stop jumping at shadows, Dalton!'
(They were all fluent enough in Matty's unique language now to know that that was her way of reassuring Jack.)
(It was weird, but it was very her.)
Matty removed her hands from her hips and tapped the screen again, bringing up photo of a USB stick that looked, frankly, completely ordinary.
'There's a tracking device embedded. It's physically impossible to remove without destroying the data itself…' A look crossed Mac's face, briefly, but there long enough for them all to see. He was taking that as a challenge, wanted to try and test himself and see if he could do it, just for the sake of it. Matty made a mental note to arrange for Mac to put the DoD's tech to the test. (She was very fond of him, after all…and she did love to keep the DoD on their toes.) '…and it was supposed to be un-hackable.' Mac, Jack, Bozer and Riley exchanged a glance. Apparently, Suspect 237 had managed to get in and disable it anyway. 'DoD can't get back in to reactivate it.'
Matty looked pointedly over at Riley, who couldn't help herself and gave a little grin with a touch of a smirk.
She, too, loved a challenge.
Jack reached out and put an arm around her shoulders, a very proud-papa smile on his face.
'But they ain't got a Riles.'
SEVEN HOURS (AND A POT OF COFFEE) LATER
Riley's computer, newly-modified by her, with Mac's assistance (no-one touched her rig without her express permission – even Mac knew better than to try and make any changes or cannibalize its parts), chimed, as she drained the last of the pot of coffee that Bozer had made.
Jack, who was sprawled out in one of the war room's armchairs, dozing, sat up suddenly, comically.
'Got him, Ri?'
The hacker gave a smile that was both grim and satisfied, even a little proud, and nodded. She turned her laptop around, so that Jack, Mac, Bozer and Matty could all see the screen.
There was a slightly-grainy CCTV photo of a thirty-something Asian man on the screen.
'Based on the data from the DoD's tracker and cross-referencing it with all available CCTV, traffic cam, ATM cam and social media footage, that's Suspect 237.' Riley changed the window on her screen, to a map of LA with a red dot, moving relatively slowly, on it. 'And he's right here in town.'
FIFTY FOUR MINUTES LATER
'Seriously, brother, we gotta have a serious talk about your driving!'
Jack, buckled in securely, nonetheless grabbed hold of the nearest available thing, which happened to be Bozer's shoulder.
(He, Bozer and Riley were all jammed into the back seat of a car that Mac had 'borrowed'. Suspect 237 – they still hadn't worked out his real name – had made them for more-or-less what they really were as soon as they'd gotten within thirty feet of him, necessitating this crazy car chase.)
Mac himself was driving, and had just pulled a particularly sharp U-turn, as Riley frantically typed on her laptop to make things easier for them and harder for 237 by hacking the traffic cams and keeping an eye on the man himself, who was in another 'borrowed' vehicle.
'Nearest left, Mac…'
He took that quite literally, slammed on the brakes, and reversed ten feet so he could turn left down the street they'd just passed.
Bozer gave an undignified and unmanly yelp, right into Jack's ear, causing the older man to make a loud noise of protest.
'Mac, bro, I love you, but I refuse to believe that Frankie and Smitty were this bad!'
Mac's explanation for his somewhat questionable driving was that he'd been taught by MIT students and had hardly driven until he'd wound up in Afghanistan.
(Driving through the desert, sometimes evading enemy fire and always keeping an eye out for IEDs, was really a whole other kettle of fish to driving down the street.)
Mac slammed on the brakes again, leading to more cursing from the back seat, reversed, and made a very sharp turn, just in time to see 237's car crash hard, head-on, into a red truck.
A very familiar red truck.
The thief reversed slightly, but didn't get far, as Mac pulled their car into his potential escape path. Then, the four Phoenix agents exchanged a glance, Jack looking pointedly at Riley, who just gave a little shake of her head.
She hadn't known they were in town.
She hadn't known he was in town.
Jack, Mac and Riley all reached out to open the nearest door, as Mama Colton, Billy, Jessie and Frank, all armed, got out of their very battered truck.
'Oh, you have got to be kidding me!'
Jack cursed as he opened one of the car's front doors, as Mama opened the other.
237 was not in his stolen car.
Instead, there was a hole (a very small hole, considering, but cat burglary was one of his known skills) in the floor of the car, just above a manhole. The hole appeared to have been cut using some kind of blowtorch.
(Or a laser torch like the one Mac had made in Finland, but Jack thought that less likely. He was pretty sure not many people could go all Luke Skywalker with an old DVD player and a normal torch; his partner was special. In more ways than one.)
Across the front passenger seat and the driver's seat, Mama shot him a look that put Matty to shame.
'You just cost us $3 million.' Jack's brow furrowed in confusion, as Mama continued. 'He skipped bail as nine different aliases, my Frank noticed it was the same guy.'
Jessie crossed her arms.
'He's the biggest mark Colton Bail Bonds has ever had…'
Mama glanced over at her daughter, nodding, then glanced back at Jack, who didn't look happy himself, and Mac, who seemed to be rather fascinated with the hole in the floor of the car.
(That, Mama was sure, wasn't faked. MacGyver was a great young man, but he was real weird.)
'…And y'all just let him get away.'
'Excuse me! We were just about to catch him, weren't we, brother? You guys got in the way!'
Mac, rather awkwardly, but very earnestly, raised his hands, one palm facing Mama and Jessie, the other his partner.
'Clearly, we all have the same aim: catching 237. Arguing amongst ourselves just gives him more time to get away, and we did make a very good team last time; strategically speaking, it's more efficient if we collaborate…'
Meanwhile, Bozer and Frank, off to one side (there wasn't really enough room for more than four people to crowd around 237's car), stood in somewhat awkward silence.
Bozer couldn't stand awkward silences, so he broke it.
'So, uh, do you like Star Wars? And I don't mean, like, necessarily, in the whole celebrate-May-the-4th way, though 'course it's cool if you're into that, 'cause it's seriously awesome, an old buddy of mine from my burger-flipping days, Luis, used to hold these awesome May the 4th parties…'
Frank just raised an eyebrow.
As Mama and Jack argued while Jessie watched with her arms crossed, Mac mediated his heart out, and Frank and Bozer had a conversation about Star Wars, of all things, Riley strode over to her boyfriend, crossing her arms.
They were silent for a second, something a little tense, a little awkward, simmering between them, before Riley spoke.
'Just passing through?'
Billy gave a small smile, looking as sheepish, as apologetic, as he ever did.
'I was hoping to pay you a surprise visit if we were still on the West Coast once we got our man…'
After a beat, Riley just gave a little nod in understanding, then smiled up at him, simply happy to see her boyfriend, and hopeful that they could steal at least a few hours or maybe even a couple of days together, later, after they caught 237. Billy smiled back at her, just as happy to see her, something in his eyes suggesting that he was already making plans for later. For after.
(She got it.)
(She really, really did.)
(She and Billy had to keep their work very separate from their relationship, couldn't talk much about it, since she was a covert government operative and he was a bounty hunter who occasionally skirted the edges of the law.)
(It sucked, but they made it work.)
ANONYMOUS MOTEL
SOMEWHERE IN LA
'I got him in Santa Monica, eight minutes ago.'
'And I've got him heading down the I5, right now.'
Mac, Jack, Bozer, Riley, Mama, Billy and Jessie all stared at Frank and Riley, who were both working on their laptops in the motel room.
(Matty and Mama had come to the same deal, the same contract, as they had the last time, so the Coltons were now temporarily 'contractors' for the Phoenix Foundation.)
They all knew that 237 still had the USB on him; Riley had tracked it through the sewers and now, apparently, down the I5. But, somehow, Frank also had 237 in Santa Monica, based on all available camera footage.
It was Mama Colton who spoke.
'I'm not doubting y'all…' She knew her son and Riley were two of the best in the business, if not the best. '…but how can he be in two places at once?'
Both hackers gave helpless shrugs. Jack opened his mouth, as if to say something, but was quelled by Mac shooting him a look.
(None of Jack's suggestions for being in two places at once would be scientifically plausible.)
Instead, the blonde spoke.
'The logical thing to do is divide and conquer; Frank, Riley, Bozer, keep digging…'
Jack turned his head and grinned at Billy.
'Me and Billy-Boy call dibs on Santa Monica!'
Riley shot him a look. Jack ignored her, and she rolled her eyes and mouthed sorry at her boyfriend, who just grinned, as if to say, no need to worry, lady.
Mama watched with a look of amusement and an arched eyebrow.
'So that leaves me and Jessie and Baby Einstein to head down the I5.'
Mac groaned.
Apparently, a promise of payment wasn't the only thing Mama Colton had gotten from Matty.
Riley grinned in amusement, Jack chortled and Bozer nearly-giggled.
Mac rolled his eyes, the gesture not short of affection.
What else is family for?
SANTA MONICA PIER
In slightly-awkward, slightly-tense silence, Jack and Billy strode down Santa Monica pier, deftly evading tourists as they kept their eyes peeled for 237.
They doubted (strongly doubted) he'd still be here, but maybe he'd left a clue or two behind.
As they walked past a group of particularly rowdy tourists, Jack broke the silence.
'I like you, Billy. You're a good guy, and your Mama would've raised you to be a gentleman.' Jack paused, stopped in his walking, and looked Billy Colton square in the eye. 'But you break her heart, even just a tiny bit, and I'll break you. Capiche?'
Billy, to his credit, looked Jack right back in the eye.
'You really don't do subtle, do you? Riley said you'd barrel right into me, but that was a whole other level.' His expression grew very serious. 'And capiche. Breaking her heart is the last thing I wanna do. Riley's an amazing woman.' He paused. 'And she can look after herself.' A fond, truly smitten smile grew on his face. 'If I break her heart, she'll ruin my life with a couple of keystrokes.' He paused again, glancing back at Jack. 'But I'm glad she's got you helping watch her back.'
Jack, too, smiled, and held a hand out for Billy to shake, before the two of them got back to work.
Riley had found a good one.
ANONYMOUS MOTEL
SOMEWHERE IN LA
Jack and Billy found nothing.
Frank, Riley and Bozer hadn't gotten anywhere either.
But Mac, Mama and Jessie had something.
Or, rather, three somethings.
Jessie held up an extremely-unusual-looking Halloween monster mask.
(Part of the reason why it looked so odd was that it was about two-thirds burned.)
(Mac had had a chance to extend the little trick he and Alex had pulled off a week and a half ago, by using it to put out a still-burning car.)
'Pretty sure this isn't stocked at your standard dollar store or costume shop.'
Mama Colton tossed a plastic evidence bag containing a bloodied knife onto the coffee table.
It was clearly not a prop. They all hoped the blood was animal, and not human.
She raised an eyebrow, letting it speak for itself, as Mac held up the third item, the top half of a grocery store receipt.
He was met with several raised eyebrows, and he just shrugged.
'Even bad guys need to do grocery runs.'
HIGH-END COSTUME SHOP
LA
Jack and Riley pulled up down the block from the costume shop that she and Bozer had traced the partially-destroyed Halloween mask to. They got out of the car, and started walking towards the shop.
They'd barely taken three steps when Riley turned to Jack, crossing her arms.
'You threatened him.'
It wasn't a question.
Jack looked her dead in the eye, knowing better than to play dumb.
'We had a good chat.' She raised an eyebrow. 'Uh, yeah, I did.' Riley stared at him for a long beat. She looked halfway between wanting to yell at him, because she was a grown woman and could look after herself and she did not need Jack to protect her…and wanting to hug him, because he cared enough, more than enough, to protect her, look out for her. Shovel talk her boyfriend for her, like a good father. She compromised by shooting him a look, then shaking her head affectionately. 'I know you can look after yourself, Ri. Promise.' He had trouble, sometimes, with that, had to remind himself. It was hard, sometimes, to look at Riley and not be reminded of that brilliant, closed-off, fiercely, stubbornly, independent twelve-year-old, who'd refused to eat the dinner he'd cooked her and insisted on making her own, even though, at that age, she'd been a worse cook than him, and had cut herself on a tin can and locked herself in the bathroom to deal with it herself, rather than letting him help. 'I can ruin those pretty-boy looks for a couple of months, but you can ruin his life, and burn far fewer calories doin' it. Just…I want you to know, I'd do it for you anyway.'
She stared at him for another long moment, then reached out and hugged him tightly.
Smiling over her shoulder, Jack returned the hug just as tightly.
A GROCERY STORE
(HEY, MAC'S RIGHT)
(BAD GUYS HAVE TO EAT TOO)
LA
Mama, Frank and Jessie strode into the grocery store, eyes peeled, though they appeared to everyone around them to just be stopping by for a grocery run.
Subtly, Mama gestured with her head towards one of the security cameras, then towards the manager's office. Frank nodded and started winding his way towards said office, while Mama and Jessie headed over to one of the counters to cause a scene.
ANONYMOUS MOTEL
SOMEWHERE IN LA
As Mac carefully swabbed some of the blood off the knife with a Q-tip and placed it into a mixture of stuff that he'd obtained from the convenience store and the pharmacy down the block, Bozer, leaning against the wall, turned to Billy, who was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking for all the world casual and relaxed.
(They were both kinda superfluous, since whatever Mac was doing – he was now squinting at his makeshift test-tube of unknown fluid and blood and muttering under his breath, before dropping in a crushed tablet of some kind – they didn't understand it.)
Bozer crossed his arms and put on his most threatening expression, channelling Liam Neeson.
'If you break Riley's heart…I know kung-fu. Well, sorta. And not exactly kung-fu.' Bozer paused, making sure his expression was suitably menacing. 'You break her heart and…I will look for you, I will find you and I will kill you.' He paused and made a very Bozer face. 'Well, not kill. Just…injure badly? But not so badly that you can't be patched up?'
Billy repressed the urge to laugh; as silly as his words were, Bozer was completely serious about hurting him if he hurt Riley. Even if Billy knew that Bozer knew that he was completely out of his depth.
(Billy could take him in a fight, perhaps not with complete ease, since Bozer did do lots of combat training with the Phoenix, but Billy had had a near-lifetime of training from his Mama, and Bozer was, until reasonably ecently, as civilian as one could get.)
The bounty hunter looked up at the other man, expression serious.
'It's the last thing on my mind, promise.' He smiled. 'Makes me real glad she's got so many people looking out for her.'
Bozer smiled too.
Riley was awesome and amazing, and she deserved just as awesome and amazing.
Billy did seem to fit the brief.
'Hey, Boze, can you go grab these things from the vending machine downstairs?'
Mac held out a list. The first time on it was Coca-Cola. Bozer, by now used to Mac's crazy ideas, ability to make strange things out of strange combinations of normal things, and general weirdness, hardly raised an eyebrow, and just headed downstairs to buy his BFF an awful lot of soda.
Billy, who was peeking out the window from behind the curtains, closed the curtains again and turned to Mac, who had returned to doing whatever tests he was doing on the blood from the knife (he had a little bit dissolved in some kind of liquid in one of those little containers used for storing makeup samples and was slowly adding drops of some kind of other liquid using an eyedropper), an eyebrow raised.
'You gonna give me a shovel talk too, MacGyver?'
Mac finished his test, made a little huh sound, and then looked up at Billy, a wry and slightly amused expression on his face.
'Nope, I think you've had enough of them…' His expression shifted to something more serious. '…and Riley is more than capable of looking after herself. If she thinks you deserve it, she'll have your fingerprints linked to every open homicide investigation in the country and all of your accounts frozen and your credit history destroyed. I don't know what I'd be able to do to help…' He truly didn't. He could almost-certainly come up with a dozen options if it came to it (hopefully it would not), but he had no ideas now. He looked the other man dead in the eye. '…but if she wants it, she's got my help.'
Billy nodded just as seriously, before he smiled and gave a little chuckle, shaking his head in amusement.
'She's more than worth it, but seriously…two dads, a mama almost as scary as mine, and two brothers? It'd be enough to send most guys running for the hills!'
Mac, too, chuckled, then pointed at Billy.
'Oh, wait until our boss has her chat with you…'
A HAUNTED HOUSE
(A VERY SCARY-LOOKING HAUNTED HOUSE)
(ACTUALLY SCARY, NOT FUN-SCARY)
(TRUST ME, THERE'S A DIFFERENCE)
LA
Jack and Riley pulled up at the house, which they'd located based on a vehicle description from a clerk at the costume shop, and some hacking of the DMV and LA's traffic cameras.
Jack had barely put the handbrake on when two other vehicles pulled up, one of which was the Coltons' very battered and very distinctive truck, the other a car that'd been parked in the lot of the motel they'd been based in, which'd been presumably 'borrowed'.
Jack glanced at the young hacker, and grinned, spreading his arms wide.
'All leads lead to the haunted house, eh, Ri?' He paused. 'You get it, right? You know, all roads lead to Rome…'
Riley rolled her eyes with very exasperated affection.
Jack's puns were terrible.
The Coltons, Jack, Mac, Bozer and Riley, the first five with their weapons drawn, carefully entered the haunted house, to find themselves in an entryway with three corridors, one to the left, one to the right, and one straight ahead.
They all paused in the entryway and exchanged a glance. Jack shook his head vigorously, waving his hands as well.
'Oh, no, we ain't doing that. We ain't!' He jabbed his finger at Mac. 'You haven't forgotten Bermuda, have you?' He pointed at himself. 'Handsome jock. Always dies first! Always!'
Mac made a very long-suffering noise. Bozer and Riley snickered, Billy grinned in amusement, and Frank and Jessie exchanged a disbelieving look, while Mama Colton gave a snort.
'A, you're not that handsome, Jack, B, you are, obviously, still alive, and C…it's the most efficient way to search the place.'
Billy, standing next to Riley, gestured towards the right corridor with a grin-smirk on his face.
'Ladies first.'
She shook her head with a very fond little smile, and the two of them headed right. Jack seemed to be internally debating whether he should protest that or not, so Mac grabbed him by the arm and tugged him down the left corridor, Bozer following without a discussion. Mama Colton, Jessie and Frank took the corridor that led straight ahead, Mama in the lead, her shotgun at the ready.
'All I'm saying is, it's Dia de los Muertos, the spirit world and our world are real close, man, and we got a baddie who can be in two places at once!' Jack gesticulated as he, Mac and Bozer walked through the haunted house, all on high alert. 'What if he ain't one of us, and I don't mean not one of us like I think you're sometimes actually a native of Alpha Centuri Prime, brother...' Jack pointed at Mac, who rolled his eyes. He'd heard Jack's argument that he was actually an alien stranded on Earth sixteen times, but he was definitely 100% Homo sapiens sapiens. '…but not one of us as in he was, but then…' Jack drew a finger across his throat. 'And then, since this…' He gestured to their surroundings. '…is his work…'
Suddenly, Mac flung out an arm, stopping Jack and Bozer in their tracks. He stared for a long, long moment at the carpeted hallway in front of them, before crouching down, then lying down on his stomach and slowly commando-crawling forward slightly. Mac felt along the carpet for a while, before finding what he was apparently looking for, pulling out his Swiss Army knife, and digging it into a patch of carpet…and prising open a trapdoor.
A trapdoor big enough for any one of them to fall through.
Jack, Mac and Bozer all exchanged a glance, then Jack gestured towards the revealed trap.
'If I fell down that, I'd fall forever through a bottomless pit of doom where no-one could hear me scream, wouldn't I?'
As Jack continued to rant and rave about the horrors of falling forever (which, Mac had to agree, would be awful – he wasn't really scared of heights, exactly; like all people scared of heights, he was really afraid of falling), Bozer turned to his BFF and stage-whispered.
'This is what you had to put with in Bermuda, wasn't it, bro?'
Mac just nodded.
'Yeah, for hours. And with him complaining he was hungry, too.' At Bozer's raised brow, Mac continued with a half-shrug of his shoulders. 'I wouldn't let him eat the canned corn.'
Bozer clapped a hand on Mac's shoulder in sympathy.
They all loved Jack to bits, but his complaining drove them all crazy.
(Even if it helped Mac think.)
'Oh, no you don't!'
Jessie grabbed her Taser from her belt, and jammed it firmly into the suit of armour that was attempting to skewer her with its sword. The electricity arced across the metal, frying the electronics that powered it, causing it to drop to the floor at her feet with several loud clanks.
Meanwhile, Mama Colton expertly fired a round through the eye hole in a second suit of armour (this one wielding an axe), clearly damaging something vital, because that suit of armour face-planted on its own weapon.
Frank had his arms wrapped around the third suit of armour (which had a Morningstar in its right hand), hanging onto its back and evading said Morningstar as he sliced through some exposed wires. After cutting the third wire, the suit of armour froze completely, and he gave it a firm kick, causing it to topple over.
Mac kicked over the table in the middle of the room, and he, Jack and Bozer dove behind it, narrowly avoiding the arrows that were being shot at them by, of all things, an arrow-shooting machine that seemed to be straight out of Lord of the Rings, if not for the fact that it surely had to be powered by electricity, since there were no orcs or trolls around to turn a wheel or something like that.
The blonde risked sticking his head out so he could get a better look at the machine, almost literally missing being hit by an arrow by a hair's breadth when he ducked back behind cover.
He turned to his partner, gestured at Jack's gun.
'Aim for the giant copper cog at the bottom left.'
Jack nodded seriously, stuck his head above the table briefly to get a good look, then returned to cover, waited for the arrow to go whistling over their heads, and then ducked back out to fire back at the machine.
He hit that giant copper cog dead-centre, and the machine made a spluttering noise, before exploding, showering them all in dust and ash and filling the room with a rather unpleasant smell.
Jack and Bozer, with ash in their hair, turned balefully to Mac.
'Did you know that was gonna happen, brother?'
Mac just gave a rather sheepish little smirk, shaking some ash out of his own hair.
'Uh…I crudely estimated the probability at 40%?'
'Riley!'
The hacker felt herself being tackled to the ground by a familiar weight, and not even half a second later, a wickedly sharp-looking blade went wooshing over her and Billy, passing through just where her neck would have been half a second ago.
After another second, Billy pushed himself up onto his elbows, staying down just in case, as both of them breathed hard, adrenaline still coursing through their systems.
Riley, still catching her breath, reached up and put a hand on his cheek for a moment, desperately wanting to kiss her boyfriend for saving her life, but realizing that this was absolutely not the time.
They couldn't afford to get distracted in the middle of a deadly haunted house.
Instead, she smiled at him, straightening his hat playfully.
'Nice save.'
Billy just grinned back at her, before getting up and holding out a hand to help her heave herself to her feet.
They held hands for a moment longer, watching the hallway before them for any more signs of traps, before glancing at one another, nodding, letting go and walking down the hall.
A few minutes later, Riley tugged Billy close to her, pressed him right up against her, her back pressed to the wall in turn, just as the seemingly-innocuous little table at the end of the hall belched a fireball right at them.
He stared at her for a moment, then at the fireball-spewing table, then right back at her, shaking his head fondly with a smile, before reaching up to tuck a lock of her hair that'd come loose from her ponytail behind her ear.
'You do hate owing anyone, lady.'
Mama Colton, Jessie and Frank paced around the room that they'd finally found themselves in. It was, apparently, a dead end.
The only entries and exits were the corridor that they'd come out of, and a door that clearly led outside, which was sealed shut.
(They'd tried and failed – several times – to open it.)
Frank, who was on his phone, looked up at Mama and shook his head silently.
Whoever (presumably Suspect 237) had constructed this literal house of horrors, which was obviously a trap of some sort, had set up state-of-the-art signal jamming.
Jessie kicked the door leading to the outside in frustration, earning her a look of reproach from her mother, who spoke after a moment.
'We get stuck, we look for a new angle. I didn't raise y'all to give up.'
They heard a noise above them, and instantly, all three Coltons had their guns pointed at the ceiling…in which a hole opened.
A second later, Billy dropped through the hole, followed by Riley.
Two seconds later, a very old-looking oil painting peeled away from the far wall, opening like a door, to reveal Mac, Jack and Bozer.
Everyone stared at the three of them.
Mac just shrugged. Jack held his hands up and out, raising his shoulders, as if to say, don't ask me. Bozer looked very sage, knowing.
'Told you, man, this is Scooby Doo gone dark!'
Five minutes later, Riley and Frank were trying to get around the signal jamming, while Mac, with assistance from Bozer, Jessie and Billy, was trying to open the door, but not having much success. Jack and Mama Colton were a little ways up the hallway on the floor above, after having gone through the trapdoor which Riley and Billy had come through, looking out a window that they were fairly certain looked out over the door that Mac was trying to open.
They saw movement on the edge of the yard.
A moment later, nine men, all clothed in black, all of the same build and height, and all with dark hair (though some appeared to have dyed it that colour, rather than being naturally black-haired), and all carrying nasty-looking semi-automatics, slipped through a loose board in the fence.
All nine were apparently practically cat-burglars, given the tiny space they contorted themselves through.
Jack and Mama exchanged a glance.
They had not seen that coming.
'So that's why he could be in two places at once.'
'And skip bail nine times in nine states within six months.'
'And, you know, steal all that stuff without getting caught…' Jack made a face. 'Mac's never gonna let me live this down, Mama!'
Like everyone else, Mac loved being right.
He especially loved being right when it meant that Jack was proven wrong.
(Jack just took heart in the fact that at least Mac was nowhere near as bad as his dad. That guy took intellectual superiority to a whole other level. Even if he was, objectively, intellectually superior to anyone Jack had ever met, save the younger MacGyver.)
Mama Colton just arched a brow at him, as if saying, you're on your own, before sticking her head down the trapdoor and calling out to her kids and the younger Phoenix agents.
'Long story short, 237's really nine different fellas and they're all pissed off and armed and outside that door.'
Mac immediately stopped trying to open it, spat out the piece of chewing gum he was chewing, and jammed it into the lock, as Billy and Frank grabbed the large armoire in the corner and started moving it towards the door.
Mama, followed by Jack, dropped back into the room, as Mac's thinking-face changed to his I-have-an-idea face and he pointed to the corner.
'Boze, grab me that sword. Riley, can you grab those fake cobwebs?' He whirled around, eyes scanning the room for what he had at his disposal, and his eyes landed on Mama Colton. 'Mama, I'm going to have to borrow your scarf…'
He whirled around again and darted over to the other side of the room to grab a Jack-O'-Lantern, as Mama began unwinding her scarf, having witnessed, first-hand, what Mac could do.
He'd saved her and her children and their businesses (both the diner and Colton Bail Bonds) a couple of years ago, in exactly the state he was in now, so she was going to listen, even as Jack leaned over and stage-whispered in her ear.
'You're not gonna get that scarf back…'
Frank, meanwhile, continuing to blockade the door by moving furniture with his brother, glanced over at the blonde.
'Exactly what is our plan?'
Mac, who was stuffing the huge pile of fake cobwebs into the Jack-O'-Lantern as he supervised Bozer and Riley knotting Mama's scarf around the sword in a certain way, looked up, a little smirk on his face that he didn't seem able to help.
'We're going to give them a taste of their own medicine.' His expression softened a tiny bit. 'My grandpa always said, turn the weapon they're trying to use on you against them.'
He nodded in satisfaction as Riley showed him the finished sword-and-scarf thing, and gestured for her to pass it to Billy so that he could hang it over the door, directing the bounty hunter to tie the loose end of the scarf around the doorknob in a certain way, before gesturing to the passageway behind the painting.
As they all ran through the passageway, with Mac in the lead, Bozer called out to his BFF.
'Bro, your grandfather was talking about Donnie Sandoz, not nine baddies with AK-47s!'
It occurred to Bozer, though, as he spoke, given the relatively recent revelations about Mac's family (specifically his dad, and the fact that Harry Jackson – and Ellen MacGyver – had known the truth all along), maybe Harry Jackson really had been trying to advise his grandson how to deal with heavily-armed bad guys…
'Jack, pull the cord down as you pass it, and someone kick down the trapdoor to our left…'
Mac checked on the Jack-O'-Lantern containing the fake cobwebs and various other bits and bobs that he'd picked up along the way laying in the still-smouldering fire in the fireplace in a room that he and Jack and Bozer had been briefly trapped in, on its side so that its contents did not fall out.
Jack, who along with the others, was converting the remnants of several other traps, including the one that'd trapped the trio earlier, into a brand-new trap according to the blueprints in Mac's head, looked rather sceptically at the slightly-burning pumpkin.
(Sure, he'd witnessed literally thousands of Mac's 'miracles', but this was a weird one. A really weird one.)
'You sure that Jack-O'-Lantern's oven-safe, brother?'
Mac prodded the pumpkin with the poker, turning it slightly so that he could see what was happening to its contents, then using the poker to stir the sludgy, foul-smelling mixture congealing on the inside of the pumpkin.
'This, Jack, is the original pumpkin pie. Well, sort-of. Early American settlers used milk, honey and spices instead of cobwebs-in-a-can. And eating this would probably kill you.'
Mama Colton raised an eyebrow, staring at the not-a-pumpkin-pie as if it were sacrilegious.
'Angus MacGyver, if we get out of here in one piece, I'm making you a proper pumpkin pie.' She looked rather like she'd slap his hand with a wooden spoon if she had one. 'Calling that thing of yours a pumpkin pie...'
She shook her head, and behind her mama's back, Jessie just grinned at Mac, who shrugged sheepishly.
He wasn't going to complain about getting some of Mama's pie.
Nine sets of footsteps neared them.
The repurposed traps had slowed the 237s, but hadn't stopped them.
(One – or nine – did not become the best thief in the entire USA without being really, really good at getting out of a sticky situation. Or twenty.)
Hurriedly, the Coltons, Riley, Bozer, Jack and Mac climbed into the little alcove hidden behind another oil painting.
(It had previously held the machinery needed for a particularly complicated trap, half of which had been repurposed into another trap for the 237s in the doorway, the other half of which had been shoved into the wardrobe in the corner.)
Mac, holding the pumpkin with the goop lining the sides, and Jack, holding his gun at the ready, were closest to the painting-door, the blonde holding the it ever-so-slightly ajar, listening very carefully.
The footsteps grew closer.
And closer.
And closer.
Then, there was a click.
'What the-'
Mac quickly turned to his partner.
'Aim for the nose.' He tossed the pumpkin into the room full of master thieves occupied with their final trap as Jack fired off a single bullet with deadly accuracy, straight through the Jack-O'-Lantern's nose, before pulling the painting shut firmly. 'Hold your breath!'
Mac covered his mouth and nose with his arm, as everyone else did the same. They heard a bang, slightly muffled by the painting, and after counting to ten in his head, Mac opened the painting-door again.
The room was full of acrid-smelling smoke.
There was exploded pumpkin on the walls.
There were also nine, spluttering, coughing, teary-eyed master thieves lying on the floor.
The Coltons and the Phoenix agents exchanged a glance, before each of them got to work cuffing the nearest thief.
'Y'all so much trouble, Mama's gonna have to see if she can get a bonus for picking up nine of you…'
PHOENIX FOUNDATION HEADQUARTERS
SOMEWHERE IN LA
'…Come on, Mama! Please? With a cherry on top?'
His mouth full of Mama's delicious pumpkin pie, Jack begged the bounty hunter for the recipe. Riley, leaning on Billy's shoulder as they sat side-by-side on the war room couch, swallowed her own mouthful of pie because she was civilised (unlike a certain someone) before speaking.
'You can't even bake, Jack.'
The less said about Jack's pie-baking attempts, the better.
'Yeah, but Boze can, and he owes me for saving his life! Wookie life debt, you know!'
Bozer looked incredulous, putting down his own fork.
'Excuse me, what Wookie life debt?'
Jessie and Frank shot their brother a teasing look (they were going to tease him mercilessly later about whether he really wanted to become a member of this crazy family), while Mac and Matty exchanged a fondly exasperated glance over their slices of pie.
They happened to be facing the right way to see Beth approach the door, looking very doctor-y and fiercely determined. Mac assumed that she wanted to speak to Matty, thinking that their debrief would be over by now (which it was), since they'd all stopped by the infirmary to make sure that his makeshift tear gas hadn't caused any of them any harm earlier.
She noticed that they were otherwise occupied as she reached the door (they'd frosted all the glass except for the door), and turned around to leave, looking a little awkward, and Matty just smiled knowingly at the blonde agent standing beside her.
'The Docs want an MRI machine.' Those were very expensive, though Mac felt that it would definitely be very useful, and the investment would probably save the Phoenix in the long run, given the cost of an individual MRI scan at a discreet private hospital. 'I'm much more easily persuaded while eating delicious pie…'
Matty could definitely be subtle when she wanted to be.
The whole saga with his dad being Oversight proved that.
But often, Matty was a bigger fan of the sledgehammer approach.
And she definitely was when it came to this sort of thing.
Mac shook his head with very exasperated affection (his family seemed to think that there was no such thing as a private life), but got up anyway and stuck his head out of the war room, calling out to the young doctor.
'Would you like some pie, Beth?' He held up his plate of half-eaten pumpkin pie. 'Mama Colton's pumpkin pie is even better than Bozer's, and that is really saying something.'
Beth smiled, bright and wide and childlike.
'Well, I can never say no to pumpkin pie…'
He grinned and took a step back into the war room, then opened the door a little wider for her. Matty, meanwhile, had cut Beth a slice of pie, and simply handed it to her. The young doctor took it eagerly, and enthusiastically took a bite, which made her face light up even more.
(By that point, Mac had thought it was impossible for her to look any brighter.)
(He was proven wrong, empirically.)
(It was adorably ridiculous.)
(And ridiculously adorable.)
'We've done the cost-benefit analyses, and we had Accounting check it over; assuming that the current number of Phoenix agents and the rate at which they require MRIs remains steady, we break even in 4.78 years…'
'…Oh, come on, Mama, have pity on a fella!'
'You put cardamom in this, didn't you?'
'Lady, I love you and your family, but they are several kinds of crazy…'
'So is yours…but I'll love you anyway.'
Mac smiled and took another bite of pie.
AN: Oh, come on, after Season 2's Halloween episode, I had to do a Halloween ep! I had so much fun writing this, especially the opening! Did you guys like my 'casting' of the gang for Halloween? (To be honest, I think the show's casting of the team as zombie-Wizard-of-Oz characters was better, but the wild-west-ghosts-with-a-touch-of-steampunk just hit me and would not let go…) What'd you think of this ep's guest stars? Or Jack and Bozer's shovel talks? And Mac's not-a-shovel-talk? Do you think I managed to keep everyone in-character and sounding like themselves? (I had a bit of difficulty writing the Coltons, even though they've appeared twice now, I've found it hard to get their characters and voices down pat…) I think I've taken the whole master-thief-is-actually-several-people plot point from somewhere, but for the life of me, I can't remember where…anyway, point is, I don't think I can take credit for that.
I'm giving you guys a hint right now – this ep lays the groundwork for the first major, multi-ep story arc for this season…any guesses as to what that groundwork is? Or precisely what might happen in this arc?
There is no Detours episode tag for this ep, but here's the press release for the next episode (which I hope to have up in 2 weeks):
3.09, Twigs to Snowshoes. Mac, Jack and Riley find themselves in northern Canada. Far northern Canada. In November. In bear territory. Meanwhile, a father-son fishing trip and its aftermath causes Mac to wonder if he and his dad are making any progress.
Will Jack finally get to fight a bear? Tune in next time to find out!