Sitting in the world's most obvious creeper van, Bradley Roswell, professional poor life choice maker, was panicking. He'd never really asked for a life of crime.

It had just kind of happened.

Well, he supposed, in retrospect, the multiple robberies of high-security laboratories hadn't just happened. Those he had planned and executed with the utmost precision. But when every legal, nonviolent channel to get certain precursor chemicals had failed him (and, he would add, he'd definitely tried everything possible that fit in those categories), he'd had to do what he'd had to do. And what he'd had to do had reasonably ticked some law enforcement professionals off.

But since getting out of prison, he was a changed man with a steady job (albeit not one anywhere near a lab) and was working on the family thing just as soon as he could get up the money to move him and his girl to a nice neighborhood. Three days ago, things were really looking up.

And then Murdoc had come knocking. Metaphorically, at least, with an invitation to visiting hours. Which, again in retrospect, he'd made the conscious choice to travel the nearly 80 mile round trip to attend.

And then a day later come up with a poison.

And inject it into a federal agent.

Which, admittedly, was a felony even if the man didn't die.

And now, watching a hospital laboratory van pull away from the Phoenix Foundation deliveries entrance, he realised he was still screwed either way, because even though the poison (a specially modified hydroxycoumarin) probably wouldn't show up in routine testing or a drug screen, its effects, and thus a pretty glaring way to treat it, very well could.

So the poor agent's life would be saved.

And Murdoc would find someone else to kill the both of them.

Even if he gave it up now and turned himself in, his death was, he reasoned, more likely than not. Protective custody, at least where Murdoc was concerned, didn't mean much.

Unless MacGyver died without a connection to him, in which case he was scott free. He took a deep breath and pleaded with himself not to make another stupid choice, and then slammed the van into a U-turn anyway.

1530: 23 hours post poisoning. HR 90/NSR, SPO2 100%, RR 21

You know how everyone laughs at CSI-type shows for how fast the forensics get done? Well, in the case of mass spectroscopy, the actual process of running the machine only takes about 20 minutes. The real issue is getting everything set up beforehand. You have to make the sample perfect or the machine itself won't like it. That means, usually, figuring out how big the molecules of the sample are, and separating the really big ones out for a separate sample. Once that's done, and the machine runs, you have to analyse the results too. The reading comes out as a graph of peaks and valleys. You have to match that graph up with another graph that has the compound you're looking for on it. Which is fine if you know what you're looking for. If you don't, that part takes hours.

Mac's timer went off for the second time that hour. He silenced it, then glared at the mostly empty water bottle sitting next to him. He'd gone through all the normal ones- the cyanides, the antiarrhythmic drugs, the opioids. He was pretty sure he'd already be dead if it were any of them, but it was sort of a comfort to see those tests come back negative.

He was sitting in one of the Phoenix Foundation labs, staring at a computer screen, trying desperately to keep his mind on the work. He was finding himself limited to the poisons he could think of, if only he could have access to a pharmacist or toxicologist. There had to be someone in this building who had some specialty in that. The cover of being a think tank meant the place actually had to churn out science occasionally, and there were dedicated scientists working to that end.

The nausea was still there, and while he was thirsty, he was thirsty in the way one was when they had a cold. Just in the background, while the idea of actually eating or drinking seemed too uncomfortable to actually complete. He forced himself to drain the rest of the bottle, then got up to refill it.

He'd barely gotten off the stool when the room spun and he had to catch himself against the table. It stopped quickly, fortunately, but he stood still with his forearm resting against the surface of the work bench until all the dizziness had dissipated and his vision cleared. He could feel sweat had broken out on his face at some point during the ordeal.

No one had seen him nearly fall. He'd requested the lab to himself, but the episode was still unsettling. He made sure he was alright and shakily stood up straight. It was almost time to check in with Gayle anyway and he admitted that he needed a nap if he was going to get any quality work done. Maybe Riley would be willing to take a shift comparing spectroscopy charts or looking for someone who knew more than he did about poisons while he rested in employee health. He hated the idea of sleeping when he had so little useful time left to figure this out, but he was edging towards miserable.

And, hey, maybe it was all in vain and the hospital lab had actually figured it out already.

The walk down to employee health was less fun than the wanted to admit. He knocked on the door to Gayle's office and she looked up, immediately concerned.

"You're early." She said, raising an eyebrow as if looking for an explanation.

"There's just no pleasing you, is there, Gayle?" He said.

"You going to a hospital would please me a lot."

"You might get your wish sooner than later." Mac said warily.

"What happened?" Gayle's tone of voice switched quickly from teasing to business. She pushed the chair out for him and kicked the trash can toward it. "Sit before you tell me. You look like you're gonna fall over."

"Almost did." Mac admitted, lowering himself into the offered chair.

"And?"

"I didn't." He said it very matter of factly. In any other context, Gayle would have assumed the vagueness in those words was fishing for some level of sympathy. She didn't play the 'oh poor baby' game and it made her irrationally angry when people tried fishing for i. But this was MacGyver. He got a pass unless he tried to milk it.

"You're gonna need to be a little more specific."

"I got up and got really dizzy for a second. I got better, I made it the rest of the way here with no issue, but I still feel like crap. I was hoping to take a nap before I went back upstairs to keep working." Gayle frowned as she wrapped the blood pressure cuff around Mac's arm.

"You throw up at all?" She asked. Mac shook his head.

"I've felt like it a few times."

"Are you drinking water?"

"Trying to." Mac said. "I couldn't eat anything." She looked at the remains of some sweat on his forehead. He was paler now than he had been. Still alert, no overt problems with orientation. Again, if he had just been the average patient, she wouldn't think much of it.

But he wasn't, and she had to.

"That should be okay, but I have to cover my bases. I'm going to start taking blood sugars too, just in case whatever it is is tanking that."

15:54, Temp 98.8, BP 112/85, HR 96, SPO2 99%, RR 20, BG 89

Gayle looked at the vitals, and looked Mac up and down one more time. Mac looked at the screen on the dynamap. "Everything okay?" He asked.

"Technically everything is within normal limits." She explained hesitantly, unsure of how to describe how the changes within the last 6 hours made her slightly wary without going into a lot of pathophysiology she hadn't had since nursing school. "Your heart rate and respiratory rate are edging up there, though, and that's been a trend this whole time. If they get any higher, I have to recommend you go to the hospital." Mac nodded.

And, another thing. The lab called about an hour ago and said the blood work never got to the hospital. I made a few calls and it seems like the driver who was driving the blood over was in an accident."

"How bad?" Mac asked, feeling instantly guilty.

"Well, Mac, bad enough they weren't able to deliver the blood."

What she hadn't told MacGyver was that it likely wasn't an accident. She still had some contacts in EMS who liked to gossip, and a couple who owed her favors. By one such contact, the driver of the van that had all but T-boned the hospital's specially outfitted lab minivan hadn't stuck around at the scene, and not only was he not there for questioning, all blood and tissue samples in the vehicle had come up missing.

She'd re-drawn Mac's blood, and repackaged it as he picked the last cot in the row to nap on. She was glad he was staying here. The high-ish heart rate didn't mean much on its own besides being weird for someone of Mac's fitness level. That could be stress or discomfort or too much caffeine. Combined with the paleness, sweat and the dip in his systolic blood pressure, though, it made her uncomfortable in an utterly fundamental way.

She queued up the only monitor currently transmitting on her screen and called medical direction to report her most recent assessment. The second MacGyver's resting heart rate hit 100, she was calling an ambulance.