A/N - Trigger warning, torture references. I am re-imagining some of the origin story I wrote last spring and summer to fit with this more in cannon story line. You may see familiar elements if you followed those as we move along through this one.

This time when Mac started to return to consciousness, he fought it.

He didn't want to wake up there, didn't want to open his eyes and see O'Neill or one of his goons grinning at him with sinister enjoyment for what they were about to do. And he definitely didn't want any more of what they'd been putting him through.

He could hear movement in the room and he processed from the red he could see behind his closed lids that there was light coming in the basement windows above the chair he knew he was still tied to. He had passed out when one of the cousins had gone to work on his shoulder with a corkscrew and had apparently stayed out all night.

He groaned quietly as his brain informed him it was done letting him rest and that no matter how unpleasant whatever was in front of him was, he was going to have to face it. He sighed. He really, really didn't want to.

Without opening his eyes, he spat grit from his mouth, grimacing at the flat chalky taste of the Afghani moon dust mixed with the coppery tang of his blood. He kept expecting a bullet in the back of the head but so far that hadn't even been threatened.

You're still alive, Gus. Which means you've still got a chance. Show 'em what you're made of, bud.

He counted in his head, thinking he was maybe an unreliable historian at this point, but he was pretty sure he'd been here for about a week. Well, not here; moving from camp to camp with O'Neill and his men. They were high in the mountains now. He sighed again, but it was almost a sob this time. He clenched his jaw, trying to get on top of the feeling.

As the cobwebby blanket of sleep and minor concussion started to loosen their grip on his brain, he had the momentary hopeful thought that maybe he could pretend to give these guys a little something and get a break from the torment, buy himself a little time for Jack and DXS to mount a rescue. Assuming any of them were still alive, that was.

Whoever was in the room jostled his chair a little.

He had the sick, sinking certainty that if no one had found him by now, they weren't going to.

He peeled his eyes open, steeling himself for whatever the new day held.

He was surprised to find a mutantly tall guy who would have probably been able to go toe to toe with the Hulk if he wasn't so thin a stiff breeze would blow him away. The guy had sharp, pleasant Nordic features combined with fine strawberry blond hair and a scraggly beard. He was standing in front of Mac with a canteen. He was deeply tan, prematurely wrinkled from the elements, and dirty, dressed in nondescript stained linen pants and a tunic.

Mac processed the bright green eyes and rasped, "Zwickey?"

The man blinked a few times, like he didn't understand what Mac said. Mac tried again, "Big Z?"

This time the green eyes flickered with recognition, of the nickname at least. "You don't have a lot of time. Have a drink."

The voice was tentative, but his hands were steady as he raised the canteen to Mac's dry lips.

The bite of chlorine and iodine marred the taste of the water, water that was at least body temperature anyway, but Mac was grateful for it. He was so parched his tongue felt too big for his mouth.

They'd been doling out just enough water to keep him alive. He couldn't remember the last time they'd let him up from the chair to use the dark fetid latrine behind the house. He also couldn't remember when he'd last needed it. Around noon yesterday, he thought blearily.

If this was how they treated prisoners, he wondered how in the blue hell Zwickey was still alive. And why.

"I tried to get them to keep looking for you," Mac whispered.

He hadn't intended to speak again at all, but something in him needed Z to know he hadn't been forgotten. Zwickey looked like someone had slapped him for a second but then he patted Mac's shoulder gently, full recognition dawning on his face. "I wouldn't have expected anything less, Hollywood."

Voices approached from the stairs then. Zwickey hurried to set aside the canteen and stand off to the side, looking at the ground.

"Well, cockadoodledoo, there, Hollywood," O'Neill said lazily as he sauntered into the room, flanked by two guys who could give Zwickey a run for his money size-wise, and they were a hell of a lot better fed and conditioned. His eyes scanned Mac's face for signs of weakness.

Something in Mac that hadn't grown up, that probably never would, asserted itself then. He let his aching face split into a smartassed grin. He felt his lip start to bleed almost immediately. "Good morning to you, too. Any chance you brought some coffee? The room service in this place sucks."

He almost shivered visibly at the low, threatening chuckle that brought out of his captor. He stopped himself from trembling, but it took everything he had.

O'Neill nodded at the other men. One of them dragged an old washtub and bucket out of the corner and the other shouted something up the stairs, then grabbed Zwickey by the elbow and herded him out of the room.

"Well, I didn't bring coffee. But I think we can arrange for you to wet your whistle again today."

Mac stared up at him defiantly. But when the familiar face of the dark eyed kid O'Neill called son entered lugging the first bucket of dirty water, Mac's resolve disappeared like smoke in a stiff breeze, and he started shaking.

O'Neill gripped his face and forced eye contact, sensing that they were getting close. "Unless you'd rather chat over that coffee you mentioned instead."

Mac swallowed, his mouth and throat so dry it was like trying to get gravel down. "On second thought I think I should cut back on caffeine."

The sound of the water pouring out into the tub made him flinch, but he didn't break eye contact.

"You sure, kid? The missus makes damn fine coffee. And that water there is of somewhat questionable provenance."

Mac closed his eyes, suddenly too tired for even another word of defiant banter. "Go to Hell."

"Sure. Why don't you warm up the place for me then."

He kicked the chair over and Mac crashed against the ground. He heard O'Neill (whose real name he still didn't know) call for his brother-in-law, Zahir.

This was going to be bad. Zahir was the worst of them.

He hoped he'd lose consciousness faster this time.

He didn't know how much more he could take.

0-0-0

Jack sat at the makeshift table alone, drinking depressingly familiar shitty mess tent coffee.

He appreciated the assist the small outpost had offered their team under the auspices of the CIA through Miles, but his appreciation didn't improve the quality of the grub.

He'd choked down an MRE around sunrise before going out with one of the patrols. He thought it was one of their "western omelettes" which was enough to put down an elephant, but he'd drowned it in enough Tabasco that it had only tasted about half as bad as Jack felt.

At least he knew the kid was still alive. But that wasn't much, not after the video of him that Vis had pulled out of an encrypted message. O'Neill answered to somebody. And he was making sure that somebody knew the mission in LA hadn't been a total wash.

Unfortunately, that was about all they had for new intel. They couldn't pin down a location. And there were so many little pockets of extremists here in the mountains that trying to find just one was, to borrow one of Mac's analogies, like throwing darts in the dark.

In fact, if Jack was honest, the intel was worse than the food. Four raids so far, and nothing.

Well, not nothing. The team Jack had been going out with had actually busted up two active cells and a bomb assembly operation outside a small village not too far away. But no Mac. And no sign of Mac but that godawful thirty second video clip.

Thornton had headed back to LA yesterday. She'd tried ordering him to do the same. "We have another mission. They'll notify us when they have something, Jack," she'd said gently.

She'd stiffened at the cold look in his normally warm brown eyes.

After a minute, she'd added, "While we stay here trying to find him, other threats are going unaddressed. The boss wants me to remind you that MacGyver isn't one of our agents, and while Oversight is comfortable diverting some resources and maintaining Mac's official status as an asset to prioritize this search and rescue he ... they …"

Jack interrupted, "You can remind the boss that I don't hafta work for you. I'm not leavin' without Mac. The kid comes home with me."

He didn't add that if that was in a box that didn't much matter at this point. Angus MacGyver was not going to spend a second more in this shithole than he had to, dead or alive. Then, after Thornton had left, the video had come in and, as bad as it was, Jack felt almost weak with relief.

He'd ignored offers of mid-day food, and been stewing over the map in front of him for a while now. Three known locations left and none of them showed any activity on the last clean satellite pass. He was sure with such an indomitable spirit Mac was still holding up, that he knew friends were looking and would by God find him if it was the last thing they did. He wanted to believe Mac hadn't yet given up hope. As for Jack, he was damned close. Not to giving up, never that. But hope was getting harder and harder to reach out and grab as the hours slipped past.

Elliot brushed into the tent then on purposely loud combat boot-clad feet, dressed to blend in at this outpost like the next-level operative Jack was now certain he was, dropping his bag on the table in front of Jack and giving him a grin that gave Jack a tiny fistful of the hope he desperately needed.

"Gear up, Old Man. Vis found something."

0-0-0

He was still thirsty.

The shame of how greedily he'd drank the bottle of water Zahir has let him have when he finally said he'd cooperate with O'Neill was still burning in his cheeks. It didn't matter that he'd agreed only after they'd shot Zwickey, once in the leg and then in the hand. It didn't matter that Mac had spent more countless hours unable to catch a real breath. Every time he thought of himself saying, "Stop! Okay, I'll do the work. Just stop," his face heated anew.

Well, it was that or the fever. He knew he was dehydrated, and the sticky runny crust on a number of his scrapes and that nasty puncture wound from the corkscrew, signaled an infection. Forget the wet rattle that had started in his chest after the third encounter with that tub and bucket.

But he'd eaten, been allowed almost a pint of water before they took it away. That should have given him some hope, but it hadn't.

O'Neill had said something to Zahir when they hauled him up off the floor, and Mac had caught the phrase, "last ten days paid off," and that was all it had taken to destroy the last shred of hope he had that Jack or anyone else was coming for him. He couldn't wind up like Zwickey, who he knew was now wounded and being dragged off to another camp. He had to do something.

He shifted a few components along the work table. Ravi, O'Neill's son, all of maybe eleven, shifted the weapon on his lap and gave Mac a bored look. You knew they no longer considered you any kind of a threat when they left a child to watch you, especially one who left the safety on his weapon and who dozed on the crate he was perched on from time to time.

If no one was coming, he'd do what he could; what he needed to do.

Mac carefully slipped some wires into the waistband of his pants when Ravi glanced out the window. Tonight or tomorrow night at the latest, Mac was going to get out of this hell hole.

Or die trying.