"Mac?" Jack called out as he came through the door. "I'm feelin' Chinese … you down?"

When Mac didn't immediately answer, Jack craned his neck to see if Mac was racked out on the couch. Nope. And he wasn't in the bathroom because the door was open. Maybe he'd felt worse than he'd let on that morning and gone to crash in Jack's room, the bed being much more comfortable than the sofa.

Not there either.

Jack looked around, starting to feel a twinge of real worry. He'd felt the need to hassle the kid just a little about taking it easy, more to discourage a real stubborn bonehead move like jaunting out for a less than leisurely half marathon than because he thought Mac still needed to even be home from work. But now he was pre-annoyed with his young friend, assuming that a stubborn bonehead run was exactly what he was going to find out happened this afternoon to explain Mac's absence.

Then Jack saw his desk, and the open file cabinet beneath it. "Oh, no, Mac, please tell me you didn't …"

Jack crossed the room in a few long strides. The note with the warehouse address Timmons had given him was sitting right on top of scattered photographs from the file he'd been building. The picture of a sleeping, or more accurately unconscious in a military issue hospital bed, just barely nineteen-year-old Mac with a bruised and swollen face was right beneath the address.

God. Damn. It. Jack had been going to check out the warehouse when he got back from Peru, but circumstances had intervened. He should have known if Mac saw that cabinet he'd never be able to resist …

That little shit.

Jack opened another drawer that it never would have occurred to Mac to look in, because he already knew what he'd find there, and dropped ammo and another backup piece in his pockets. He didn't even bother to lock the door on his way out, simply letting it slam shut behind him and he jogged down the outside stairs to the parking lot, swearing under his breath and getting out his phone.

He didn't even greet the voice on the other end, just snapped. "I've got a problem," as he started his car and roared out of the parking lot, headed southwest, mentally cursing traffic in several languages. "Yes, it's about Mac," he snapped like it should have been obvious, easing more pressure on the accelerator and ignoring the honking of horns and the squealing of brakes, his brain in full-blown single-minded overwatch mode.

0-0-0

Mac edged around the back of the warehouse, grateful there were no windows where he'd actually gotten dropped off. He was sure he'd recognized the man who'd been entering when he'd had the cab drive around.

Older, deeply tanned, heavier, and bearded, Tallahassee didn't look much like Woody Harrelson anymore, but damned if his particular husky drawl as he called out to someone in one of the trucks that had pulled up only moments after the cab had pulled away didn't practically make Mac's hair stand on end. It was as like a voice out of an open grave.

Part of him had remained convinced that Tallahassee was still alive, and the photo Jack had shown him a while back more or less confirmed it. But another part of Mac's brain, the part that still occasionally woke sure he could smell his mother's perfume, the part that started halting letters to his father from time to time, that bit of him had hoped he was wrong, hoped that photo was someone who just resembled someone Mac had thought was a friend. Accepting that someone he'd served with was a traitor was a tough pill to swallow. Much worse than accepting his death, honestly.

But that voice was unmistakable. Mac dropped into a crouch, preparing to edge around the side of the building to see if he could get a look inside. He felt the cell phone in his pocket vibrate. He squeezed his eyes shut for a second. He didn't even have to look to know who it was. But he took out his phone anyway. Yeah, that's who it was. Shit.

"Jack, I'm sorry … let me explain a minute before … I know I should've …" Mac stammered quietly, almost whispering.

"Button it, Carl's Junior. You listen and you listen good. I am on my way over to that warehouse and you are under no circumstances to snoop around, skulk, just go have a look, or any of the other crap you always say when what you mean is stick your neck out for no goddamned good reason," Jack hissed.

"Jack, something's going on, there's multiple trucks, all different labels that look like retail delivery trucks, and O'Neill is here for sure."

He heard Jack swear away from the mouth piece and then say something, but he couldn't make out what. Clearly Jack was either talking to himself or there was someone with him. "Jack?" Mac asked, honestly a little unsure of what to do next.

"Mac, whatever you do, don't you dare go in there, kid. Those guys are dangerous as Hell."

"Why didn't you tell me you knew they were here?" Mac didn't mean to, not after he'd broken into the filing cabinet, but he sounded like he felt a little betrayed.

Jack was starting to understand some of Mac's emotionally self-protective tendencies. Mac almost seemed to expect things to be hidden from him. Maybe Jack should have said more, sooner, he thought.

"I didn't, kid, I promise you, if I'd known, I'da checked it out. I just got the message there might be something worth looking at right before I left for Peru."

Mac's back rested against the building for a minute. "I'm sorry Jack," he breathed, the weight of not trusting Jack heavy on his shoulders.

"You're damn well gonna be if somebody spots you and it's really who you think it is," Jack growled. "Get back in your car and just casually drive away from there. Okay?"

"I took a cab. The Jeep is still at work," Mac replied, realizing how bad an idea this was, sort of all of a sudden.

"You lay low until I get there then, you hear?"

There was silence for a moment. Then Jack heard the phone scrape against pavement followed by the muffled sound of Mac's voice saying, "Alright, it's on the ground."

That was followed by another voice and even muffled the accent was all too familiar barking, "What're you doing here?"

And then a sharp crunching pop and a sound almost like feedback as the phone was crushed.

Jack floored the accelerator around the last bend to the parking lot for the group of warehouses. "You get that?" he asked the speakerphone next to him and he slid into a parking space in a move so close to a Tokyo drift he was even more furious with Mac for missing.

Patricia Thornton replied, "We're in-bound."