(AN: sorry this chapter suuucks I hate it but its sooo hot here I'm melting and I didn't want everyone waiting too long on that cliffhanger so I hope you like this at least a little bit
also I know Nikki would be more involved but shes annoying as shit so whatever lol)
Jack was blown backwards with the force of the blast, landing on his back on the pavement, leaving him winded and reeling.
He barely even noticed the pain in his shoulder, as debris flew his way, a piece of something stabbing into his arm. But how could he care about anything else? Mac was in there.
He could think of nothing else, blinking in panic as he peered through the dust to try and see if Mac had made it clear. But all he could see was rubble and flames.
"No, no Mac. Come on, kid. Don't be dead, don't leave me like this."
His hands fumbled for his phone, pulling it from his pocket and pressing speed dial, as he picked himself up from the ground. It was harder than it should have been, to pull in air, due to the rough fall, and it was only getting worse as he tried to fight back his emotions.
Thorton picked up, sounding more panicked than Jack had ever heard her. "Jack! Nikki and I are watching from the satellite. Did that building just blow up? Where are you and MacGyver?"
Jack couldn't take his eyes off the wreckage, his growing, overwhelming panic, making it hard to formulate an answer to either of her questions.
"He's...They hurt him, and he couldn't walk so...Patty he's...he's in there."
She was silent for just a moment, and Jack could hear her quiet, shocked breaths, before there was a scrambling rustle on the phone, and Nikki's wavering voice.
"Is he…?" He knew what she was asking, but he refused to think the answer could be anything close to yes.
"I tried to get to him. I thought I had enough time, but he...I have to find him."
Nikki's breath hitched, as she started to cry, and Patricia was back on. "I'll send a team in. Jack you shouldn't touch anything till they get there, you could cause more damage."
Jack's voice was stronger as he made his way to the mess of the warehouse. "I have to get him out."
Patricia sounded more determined now, but Jack was hardly listening. "We're coming, Jack. We'll be there soon. We'll get him."
Jack didn't notice when she hung up, or when he dropped his phone to the ground in his haste to get to his partner, all he could think about was the way Mac had looked at him when the bomb blew.
He had known he wouldn't be making it out, and all he had wanted was for Jack to get back and be safe. But that wasn't Jacks job, that didn't matter to him. All that mattered, was that Mac got out of every mission safe; that was Jack's job, and he'd failed.
He knew he had to be careful about what he moved, in case the whole jenga pile came tumbling down onto Mac. He could potentially make things much worse, if he moved the wrong thing. But he couldn't leave his boy in that smoldering mess, he couldn't just sit, and wait, and do nothing.
Blood dripped down Jacks arm, pain tugging at it every time he moved, but it was the last thing he was thinking about, as he tried to find what was left of the doorway Mac had been standing in when it came down.
"I'm coming, Mac. I'll find you. It'll be okay." The last word came as a sob, and he raised a dirty hand to his face to clear his eyes.
It didn't take long for Thorton and Nikki to get there with the rescue team; running out of their cars towards the wreck, to find Jack shouting for his partner. He didn't seem to notice them as they approached, and Patricia had to to touch his shoulder, in order for him to turn.
What she saw made her take a step back, in shock, although she shouldn't have been surprised, given that the agent before her had survived an explosion.
His eyes were bloodshot and damp, face streaked with dirt, as blood continued to soak into his shirt from the glass sticking out of his shoulder.
His voice was rough, and thick with emotion. "We have to find him. I can't...I can't find him."
Patricia nodded, hands reaching out to pull him from the mess. "We will, but you need to be checked over."
Jack shook his head, eyebrows coming down over furious eyes. "No! I'm not leaving him!"
She knew there was no point arguing; Jack wouldn't abandon his partner, even at gunpoint, and her order as Director would mean nothing to him. She let him go, with a sigh and started to help him dig.
Jack grew more panicked as time went on, but finally, he saw those familiar curled fingers beneath wood, and debris.
"I found him! Mac, I got you. Hang on, I'll get you out."
Rescue workers ran forward, to meet him where he was crouching, gripping those fingers tight. "Don't touch anything! Let us handle it."
Jack wouldn't have listened, except the faster he let them through, the faster he got Mac back. He squeezed those fingers tight, whispering to the kid, before Thorton's hands met his shoulders, pulling him gently back.
"You'll be okay, please be okay."
He stumbled back, feeling weak, and shaky, and watched the rescue workers pile in and start their work.
Watching them work, and not be able to move forward and help, made Jack itch, hands jerking forward every time another piece of MacGyver was revealed.
His arm was uncovered, dusty and scratched; and Jacks hands curled into fists to stop him reaching out. His shoulders came next, then his back, and hips, legs, blood pooling around where he lay, but Jack couldn't see his face; he needed to see his face.
"Jack, stop." Patricia tried to pull him back, to get him to sit down, as Nikki cried quietly behind him, but he couldn't.
Mac's blond hair glinted in the sun, most of it soaked through with red, from the wound on his forehead made worse by the collapse. There was too much blood; through his hair, down his neck, on his thigh from the stab wound. But that wasn't what the EMT's were muttering about.
Hands pressed gauze and bandages to stop the bleeding, but their worried looks were focussed elsewhere.
Jack stepped closer, ignoring Patty's insistent pleas for him to stop, and listened instead, to what was being said about his partner.
"We're going to need to stabilize this, before we move him; but we need to move fast, his vitals are dropping."
"I'm not getting any response to pain. I'm putting his GCS at an eight."
Another one sighed, fingers pressing high on Mac's spine. "I can feel a break here, I'm gonna need a vacuum stretcher."
Jack didn't understand all the numbers and acronyms that they started rattling of, but he knew that it was bad. Mac was having trouble breathing, and his blood pressure was too low; they suspected internal bleeding somewhere in his chest, and there was a break someplace in the kids spine.
His legs felt as if they were about to give out, and he wobbled where he stood. Nikki came to his side, taking his hand. "He'll be okay. Right? He's always okay."
Jack would have been inclined to agree, because their job was dangerous and messy, and they'd gotten out of some tough spots together. But it had never been this bad.
Jack knew he needed to be strong, to put on a brave face, but he lost any semblance of calm once he saw Mac's face.
Finally, he could see his kid, but it wasn't what he had wanted to see. Mac's eyes were closed, face ashen and blood stained, with dirt and dust streaked over his skin. Scratches marred his cheek and lip, and his lips were slightly parted and...blue.
EMT's started shouting about a collapsed lung, panicked voiced declaring that Mac had stopped breathing. Jack's vision started to blur, as they rolled Mac over onto his back, covering his face with a mask, as they tried to get his remaining lung to work. His shirt was torn open, a needle stuck into his chest, to relieve the pressure, before they cursed and started CPR.
It wasn't working. They were losing him.
Nikki's hand tightened on Jack's but Jack didn't squeeze back. He couldn't feel his hands anymore, or any part of him, that wasn't his thumping, racing heart.
He watched them hold Mac's head, and place things in his mouth to force him to breathe, and repeated his mantra in his head.
"Just survive, Mac. Don't die, that's all I ask. Don't die."
Nikki screamed, sobbing, just as the EMT's declared that Mac's heart had stopped, and Jack couldn't take anymore. He blacked out to the whine of the defibrillator.
…..
Lights. Voices. Hands. Something in his shoulder hurt. What the hell was going on? Where was he? Where was...
"Mac!" Jack erupted into awareness, thoughts already jumping to his partner, and he tried to sit up before his eyes were even open.
Hands found his chest, and pushed him back down, as he blinked up at the faces in front of him. "Jack, stop. You'll rip your stitches."
Nikki's red, tear-stained face, hovered over him as she tried to get him to calm down. Jack took a second to look around, noting that they appeared to be in a hospital, before brushing her hands away.
"Where is he? Why aren't you with him? He shouldn't be alone!" Thorton was watching him tiredly, from her spot in the corner of the room, clothing ruffled; and Jack didn't know why they wouldn't be with Mac unless he was…
The heart monitor he was attached to, began beeping errqatically, displeased with Jacks jumping heart rate, because the last time Jack had seen his little blonde genius, was when he was flatlining.
Nikki thumped her hand, impatiently on Jacks chest, making it ache just a little, as she tried to get him to focus on her, and end his spiral.
"He's alive, Jack! When they took him in, he was alive."
Her last words didn't make him feel much better, and he frowned at her, as he tried to steady his breaths. She sighed, and sat back in her chair next to his bed.
"He's still in surgery."
Jack slumped back to the bed, as he watched her face. His voice was rough, and he felt the slight blur of pain meds that he was no doubt being given through his IV.
"His heart stopped."
Nikki looked down at her hands as she spoke, face crumpling through her wobbly words.
"They had to shock him, like four times, and I couldn't look away. Jack, he...it looked like they were working on a corpse." She sucked in a breath, and wiped at her eyes, raising her chin to stare at the wall in front of her. And he could tell, she was trying to shut away her emotions and just relay the facts.
"They brought him back, but he wasn't breathing on his own. He's been in surgery for a couple of hours now. We've been with you since then. You had glass in your shoulder, so they took it out and sewed you back up. You have a minor concussion too, and some heavy bruising to your ribs and back, but you'll be fine."
Jack couldn't care less about his own condition. He attempted to swing his legs over the side of the bed once more, determined to get to his partner.
"I want to check in with the doctors, get some answers about how he's doing."
Thorton came forward this time, wary and quiet. "Jack, they'll tell us when they have news. For now, stay still. We don't need you making your injuries worse, on top of everything else."
Her eyes were sympathetic, something that jack hadn't seen before. "I'm worried about him too. But we just have to wait."
That, unfortunately, was not something Jack was good at, but he recognised her exhaustion and Nikki's precarious hold on her emotions.
He sank into his mattress with a bitten back sigh, and gently slipped his hand into Nikki's. "It'll be okay."
…..
It took far too long to hear anything, but when the doctor finally came to Jacks room, the three agents were so eager for news, they all stood at once. The doctor raised a hand, stopping their rush of questions before they began.
"He made it through surgery, but he's in serious condition. We've just settled him into the ICU and he's likely going to stay there for some time. He sustained a lot of damage during the building collapse, and it's going to be a long, hard road to recovery. But I do believe he will get there."
Nikki sighed in relief, but Jack had more questions. "I heard the medics talking, when they dug him out. His spine? Is it-?"
The doctors face grew somber, as he averted his gaze for a moment. When he brought his eyes back to Jacks, there was an apology there. "The initial assessment showed damage, and now that we've done some tests, and I've been able to look at the scans…" he hesitated. Jack hated when medical professionals hesitated.
"He's broken his neck."
The room was silent, afraid of what it might mean. Jack hated the words, and spat out his own, though he didn't know if he wanted his question answered.
"Is there… is the damage permanent?"
Nikki didn't look like she was listening anymore, face pale and drawn. Jack squeezed her hand in comfort.
"For now, it looks like he was lucky, and his spinal cord is intact. However we will need to be careful and be prepared for anything. He's not out of the woods yet."
Jack clenched his teeth at the phrasing. Mac was anything but lucky, but he knew the man was right. Mac could have died. But he hadn't, he just had to focus on that.
"You can see him when you're ready, but keep it calm in there. He isn't conscious just yet but hearing your voices can help him come back."
Thorton looked a shade pale herself, but shook the doctors hand. "Thank you."
…..
Technically, Jack shouldn't have been out of bed, but Mac shouldn't have been fighting for his life in some private hospital in freaking Egypt, so Jack didn't really care.
Nikki went first, while Jack impatiently waited for the nurse to detangle him from his iv and monitors. And he knew that it may be a while till Nikki was ready to let go of him. He didn't want to wait, but he couldn't deny her, her time with him.
When he finally got to go see him, he realised he may not be ready to. It had been hard enough to see Mac under the rubble, but now, to see him being kept alive with machines, taped up and sewed up and unresponsive? He didn't know if he could stomach that.
But of course he couldn't abandon him either, Mac needed to know he was there.
Thorton pushed the door open for him, so that he wouldn't have to use his bad arm, and he stumbled a bit as he caught sight of Mac in the bed.
The first thing he saw was the brace, around his partners neck, looking as if it were choking him or keeping him trapped. It made Jack feel claustrophobic, in a way he'd seldom felt before now. Then the breathing tube, trailing from his mouth, breathing for him and keeping him alive until his body healed enough to do it on its own.
He looked awful, even with the blood and dirt washed away, he looked as if he were gone already leaving nothing but an empty body.
Jack couldn't look at his face for long. It was too painful to see those eyes closed, because he couldn't help but wonder if they would ever open again.
So, instead, he focused on the little parts of Mac that looked the same as they always did. His hair hanging over his forehead, long enough that he was always flicking it out of his way.
Jack took a seat in the chair beside the bed, and carefully raised a hand to brush that hair back.
"Hey kid. I'm here now. I got you."
His hands were the same too, although they were hardly ever still, they were the same graceful, fingers that he'd watched a million times. They were always building things or taking things apart. Even now, they had the tiniest bit of grease and dirt under the nails, that Mac could never scrub free, and probably never wanted to.
Jack knew that Mac secretly loved the smell of grease, and oil from his motorbike, because it brought with it all the memories he had of his grandad and his father.
Jack took one of those hands, being careful of the wires and needles taped to it, and just focused on those fingers, on the wide, strong palm.
"I need you to wake up soon, okay? We're all here waiting, and you know how much I hate mission reports. Don't make me do it on my own, cause I can't remember half the stuff you did to fix that bomb." He let out a small, breathy laugh, already missing Mac's science lectures and the way he would scold Jack for skimming on details during reports.
"Come back, okay? Don't leave me alone here."
Jack knew that wishes came with birthday candles and shooting stars but all he had was a fiery explosion and he figured that counted as a giant candle of sorts. Weather it counted or not, he knew what he was wishing for, and he'd do anything to make it come true.
(AN: ill try to get the next chapter up soon thanks for all the wonderful comments and kudos it makes me so happy to see you enjoying it. also let me know if you have anything in particular you want to see in the next chapter)