"You okay, Ri?" Mac asked, sitting down on the deck next to her, putting his backpack between his feet so it wouldn't get tossed around with the pitching of the boat.
After a couple of minutes she lifted her head and gave him a weak smile. "I didn't know I'd get sea sick. Ugh."
Mac patted her shoulder and got up, extending a hand to help her to her feet. She shook her head and then regretted the movement; it seemed to make her stomach feel worse. "You'll feel a little better if you can see. Trust me."
Riley knew Mac wouldn't suggest something if he didn't genuinely think it would help so she let him haul her to her feet and then sat down next to him on the bench that ran around the entire deck. She glanced at Jack who was talking with the captain, or pilot, of whatever the hell you called the guy crazy enough to take them up the coast to get them near enough to Chechnya that a land crew could smuggle them inside its borders. Mac was rummaging in his pack and when she returned her attention to him he handed her a water bottle and a couple of pills. The idea of swallowing anything was pretty unattractive, but she took them from him and asked, "What are these?"
He made the face she thought of as earnest self-deprecation. "They're for motion sickness."
She swallowed them with a reluctant sip of water. "Do you get seasick?"
He grinned. "Not usually. I have though. It's awful. One time I was hurt pretty badly and couldn't move around on ship. My guts felt like a lava lamp. You don't want to start a mission feeling like that." She nodded her head in agreement. "Besides, always be prepared, right?"
Mac could see he was doing a decent job of distracting Riley from her misery since she smirked at him. "I thought you got kicked out of the Scouts."
He flushed at the memory of having to admit his expulsion to his grandfather, but laughed lightly anyway. "Doesn't mean their motto isn't solid."
They chatted for a while, occasionally raising eyebrows at Jack pacing the deck and yelling at someone on the sat phone from time to time. Finally Riley commented, "Jeez, the old man seems wound for sound on this one."
Mac looked away from Riley, across the deck at Jack for a minute, then his face got the expression that she thought of as circling the outer planets. "That's probably my fault."
She put a hand on his arm. "Mac, you always think everything is your fault. Jack's just … Jack."
He forced himself to make eye contact with her. This was important, and maybe if he could get through saying it to Riley, he could make himself have the conversation with Jack. "No … I took his head off the other day. Just for giving a damn about me. And he … He gave me a pass like he always does." Mac sighed. "It's just … I didn't have much of a childhood, you know? My mom got sick when I was really young. My dad didn't really want to deal with it. Then, in different ways I lost them both. And my grandfather, he was a good man, but … He wasn't really up to parenting a twelve year old whose primary pastime was blowing stuff up in the garage. I just grew up young I guess." Riley nodded her encouragement. Mac must be feeling really guilty about yelling at Jack if he was opening up like this and she didn't want to say anything that might stop him from unloading. "I guess when Jack goes all DEFCON Dad … it reminds me of what I missed."
Riley felt a tightness in her chest. She took Mac's hand. "I know what you mean. I was sitting on the deck trying not to puke and thinking how weird it is to be out in the middle of the Caspian Sea and it made me think of one time when I was younger and I was really sick." Mac squeezed her hand. "My mom couldn't get off work and Jack stayed home with me. He read me all seven books in the Chronicles of Narnia … Prince Caspian was my favorite. That was the first time in my life I ever really knew what it was like to have a dad." She paused for just a minute. "No matter what our lives looked like back then, we're not missing anything now."
Mac leaned toward her and bumped his shoulder against hers, an expression of total understanding. He said quietly, the joking tone of his voice just shy of believable, "Knock it off, Ri. You're gonna make me start bawling like a kid." She chuckled anyway, not about to call him out for the vulnerable too-shiny look his eyes had at the moment. His eyes searched her face for a moment. "So, you feeling any better?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm good I think. Thanks."
Mac gave her a reassuring smile and then got up and strode across the pitching deck, not like someone who'd ever been seasick, but rather like a creature native to it. Riley had noticed Mac could do that in just about any situation, adapt and act like he belonged there. She thought that, while it was a useful ability, it must be exhausting, especially since he didn't seem to know how to turn it off. He and Jack started talking seriously, and pulled in the couple of other operatives on the boat who Matty had now assigned to their team, insisting that they were not going to keep going into the field with no support like the Musketeers. It was then that Riley realized land was in sight.