Axial Rotation, a macgyver fanfic

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1 rotation of the Earth on it's axis. 1 day.

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1 rotation of the Earth around the Sun. 1 Year.

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How many rotations had Riley sat through, been oblivious to, run in the opposite direction to.

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So here she sat in the hyperbaric chamber room silently. Spinning her favourite ring around her thumb reflexively.

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How many rotations had Jack lived through?

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How many rotations did she have left?

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Three months had passed since their treatments in these chambers. 92 rotations.

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Things stayed the same.

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Things changed.

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The Phoenix had gone from strength to strength on going freelance.

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Bozer's grief had finally caught up with him. But he was coping as best as he could. Moving on.

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Mac and Desi had broken up.

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Riley's world felt... Different.

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There she was. Sitting. Not moving. A photo sitting next to her. Faces' laughing at a joke long told and forgotten. Her eyes were trained on the chamber in which Mac had-

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The chamber in which he'd almost failed to see another rotation of the Earth on it's axis. In the aftermath Riley had been knocked flat off hers. The final barrier to admitting how she felt tumbling away as she watched the life vanish from him. Love.

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Her foolish foolish heart had fallen for her best friend. So much for locking her feelings away. Pushing them into that box. Though she'd long known that she'd been lying to everyone and herself in trying to just get them to go away. Emotions aren't a science, you couldn't ever control them. This much was true. No matter how hard Riley had tried to fight this fact. It seemed to be a constant. Much like the speed of light. It was fact. So here she sat at 3am in the morning. Pulling an all nighter on a possible lead on Desi's presumed dead fiance.

Her mind spinning out of control trying to solve the problem of finding him, or a trace of him to follow. Riley had gone wandering to clear her spiralling thoughts. Code and if when scenarios playing through uncontrolled. The Phoenix was soothingly silent at this time of night. A balm washing over her overexcited and stressed senses. The building was not empty. The night shift was almost as busy as the day. Operations starting and finishing. Experiments ongoing. But it felt calmer, people moved more delicately. As though protecting the veil of piece that fell as the sky darkened outside. Unfortunately it was only helping Riley's frazzled mind a little. So she sat in this room. The room where she'd sworn her world had stopped spinning. Frozen in the high pitched wail of the flat line. Spinning the ring Mac had given her for her birthday years ago.

The Phoenix therapist, Johnston had advised her to walk with her feelings. The trauma of the nanobots, the hijacking coupled with loosing Jack and Leanna with almost loosing Mac. She was veering directly into PTSD. Sessions had been taking place twice a week. Trying to find ways to cope with her anxiety, sleeplessness and hypervigilance. Bozer had accidentally startled her a month after the chamber and she'd put him into a headlock. He'd been a good sport about it. But Riley had felt waves of panic and guilt sweep over her and she'd been out on leave for the rest of the week. Her actions hadn't caused any physical harm but her mind felt cracked. She could feels eyes on her everywhere she went. Little gaps that were trying to grow into chasms. The images of her assaulting Mac had been flashing in her dreams with scary regularity. If was in one of her sessions where she'd realised that those images had brought her back to Elwoods drunken abuse of her mother. Something she'd sworn to herself she'd never become. Never go through herself. Never happen to anyone she loved. The promise she'd never shared with a single person had been broken.

Rationally she knew that she'd never actually hit Mac in her own right mind. But the images wouldn't leave her. The memories of the bruised and torn knuckles disappearing by inches on her skin. The marks on Mac. Flashes of the video proof. The traumas were culminating. The dam had to break eventually she supposed. Johnston was an older woman, white hair always set in a beautifully aranged braids. Wide discerning eyes that stopped Riley from hiding from her own truths. The moment she'd related her attack on Mac with her father's abusive history, Johnston had to walk her back of the proverbial ledge. Dr Johnston was a safe harbour in a hurricane. Riley had never been great at therapy, the experiences in the supermax not lending her to engaging in it. Johnston had changed all that. Having that impartial voice listen and guide her through her increasing traumas and struggles was helping her find her way back to her standard axial motion.

'Next time you feel the world spin out of control. Just find something to bring you back. You do not need to get back to normal in those moments. Find a moment of stability. Once you get to a single step in the right direction, the next steps will be that bit easier.' Johnstons words had echoed in her mind as she sat on her hyperbaric bed. Riley took some deep breaths, eyes sliding shut slowly. Her fingers still spun the ring on her thumb. The spinning mechanism of the interlocking rings in time with her breathing.

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The cotton beneath her was cool, giving way to her warmth. The air faintly alive with the hum of electricity. Centring herself carefully as she'd been learning in therapy. Her hair heavy on her back. The rings secure on her fingers. The well worn silver slipping around her thumb as she flicked it with her forefinger. Her feet dangling off the ground. The rise and fall of her shoulders as she took her breaths. The warmth of the flannel shirt she wore. Soft jeans hugging her legs. Fuzzy socks Bozer had made her during the quarentine on her feet. No shoes. The world seemed new and brighter as she opened her eyes again. Stable steps. She slipped off the bed silently and padded over to Mac's chamber. Trying to recognise all the feelings that swirled around.

Panic.

Grief.

Joy.

Love.

Pain.

Sadness.

Hope.

Love.

The glass was cool as she placed her hands on it. Echoing her previous self begging Mac to come back to her. Love. He'd wound himself into her life. His kindness and sweetness helping to erode her many walls built over the years of only trusting herself. His brillance showing possibilites she'd thought were beyond her. His absolute trust in her giving her hope of building a better place. He'd given her hope, trust, family, safety and love. His eyes seeking her out first as he sat up. Finding her in a crowded room. Trying to cheer her up after Billy. Sharing their grief over Jack. They had loved each other for a long time. But then she'd fallen head over heels. Two years of dealing with the weight of the feelings and examining them had led her to one conclusion: there had been no other path for her. One way or the other she would have fallen in love with him. Sooner or later. He was just too good. Too on her level. They shared so much. More than she'd experienced with anyone else.

The pain of their father's leaving them. Having to grow up far too fast. Being strong for those around them. Sacrificing themselves for family no matter the cost. The isolation that came with being smarter than most people. His path had been much more heroic than hers. Riley had made peace with her darker history. There was no sense in punishing herself endlessly. At least she'd try to be kinder to herself with her many mistakes. The Brink giving her a means of saving the future Rileys of the world. Mac's shoulders were heavy with his perceived failures. Thornton. Nikki. Pena. His father. Gwen. Charlie. Jack. They each tried to help each other with the burdens of their pasts. Mac unlike the others didn't dismiss her past. He'd even been honest saying that he'd had his reservations after her second hack into the NSA. But they'd built something out of all that. A partnership that had withstood the end of the world and a global pandemic. And so much more besides.

Then he was gone.

The one thing that could rip them asunder. Her heart had broken. It was that moment she'd finally understood. A year telling herself that she'd get over these feelings. Constantly minimising them, never actually classifying it was. That box of hers. Love. Not the love of friendship, not the love of platonic partners or siblings. The love that inspired songs and poems, heartbreak and changed the world over and over again. The sort of love that she'd always dismissed as who could ever love that deeply? Riley laughed sadly as she stepped back from the chamber, back to her own one. Wasn't life funny.

The photo that still sat on her bed was aged with time and love. Marks of light exposure and many moments of being taken out and carefully tucked away evident. A letter had arrived with it enclosed a few months after Jack's funeral. His sister had found it in his gear and knew where it should go. Riley had phoned her immediately trying to send it back. Rebecca a true Dalton would hear none of it. The photo wasn't hers to keep. The photo belonged to Jack's little girl and so help her god if Riley tried sending it back she'd be getting her ass kicked. They laughed together. A long conversation of love and pain, the best type of pain one that betrayed the depth of their bonds.

Riley had no recollection of when the photograph was taken. Jack's messy scrawl did not include a date. Simply captioned "My kid and wolfpack". It was them. At Macs', a fire lighting up their laughing faces. Her. Jack. Mac and Boze. Bozer clearly telling some story involving Jack judging their postures and gestures Mac had his arm thrown around her shoulders and they were in pieces with mirth. Her mind conjured images of Jack carefully unfolding this photo during his op, dropping a kiss to the air and imaging them altogther again. A imagining never to be. Her boys. The pain was duller in her chest now. A slow ache, healing from the sharp ragged wound of a year ago. She'd taken to carrying this token as a reminder of what she had and what she had lost. Jack had given her a second chance. He'd saved not just her life but her soul. Bringing her to DXS, the Phoenix. Bozer. Mac. Carefully, slowly she followed the well worn paths in the image as she folded it up. Riley's eyes closed once more as she pressed the folded square to her lips and tucked it away.

'Hey.'

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Mac stepped down towards her, eyes flicking from her to both chambers and back again. Her fingers danced back to the ring. The dim lights in the room causing him to glow faintly. As though he was nothing more than an apparition conjured by her tired brain.

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'Hey.' Her voice seemed to echo in her ears endlessly. They sat down on her bed side by side, staring at his chamber. Riley wasn't sure what to do or say. Hell she'd didn't know where to look. It certainly seemed like he was equally lost for words.

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'Wasn't expecting to see anyone down here.' Mac's voice was deeper than usual. It was as though she could hear the weight of what had happened in this room in it. Her hand entwined with his without conscious thought. His thumb now flicking the ring.

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His hand felt as it always did in hers. Strong, gentle warm and made her feel safe. His calloused fingers drawing her in close. It felt like such an intimate gesture. She'd held the hands of quite a few people but they'd never been like this. Not so close or meaningful. Each of them relied on their hands so entirely for their jobs, their passions. When the nanobots had compromised Mac's clever hands... no one else seemed to quite understand the pain. Yes, he thought that they only cared about him for what he could do with those hands. Constantly undermining that they loved him for the kind soul he was. Riley thought she'd understood. Holding his unmoving hands had been unsettling. It wasn't Mac. Even when he was asleep his hands moved. Fiddling with paperclips. Building things. Playing the ukele. His hands were rarely still. The energy of his mind spilling to his fingertips. The only time where them being still felt okay; felt right was when they were interlocked with hers. His hands were how he engaged with the world around him. Made it his own.

'I wasn't expecting to come down here.' She replied eventually. 'I was working and I couldn't think straight and just ended up here.' Her voice betrayed her days of little sleep and fractured mindset. His hand tightened on hers. Ring spinning faster.

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'I haven't been down here since that day.' The words tumbled out unbidden. 'I didn't want to ever come back in here. I wanted this room gone. Deleted. I-' Her voice caught in a quiet gasp. Tears threatening to fall. Then Mac was all around her. Pulled into the most desperate hug. Mac was deceptively strong. Something about the Boy Scout persona made everyone forget that he was a formidably trained man. He'd pulled her into him so fast so quick that she was barely able to process it. The warmth of him surrounded her and she felt like the cracks were healing. Just a bit. Enough to make finding her equilbrium just that bit easier. Not as scary. That she wasn't alone in the dark. His hands dug into her back as though trying to bring her even closer. Her own hands clutched at him as fiercely. In a moment of weakness she let a couple of fingers drift to his hair. A temptation she'd rarely allowed herself. They sway together in the embrace. His face was buried in her shoulder. He was here. Alive. The steady thrum of his heartbeat that had been stilled for those horrifying moments beating in time with her own.

The hand not burrowing into his hair had made its way to his chest as though to make absolutely sure it was still beating. Confirmation that this wasn't a delusion her mind had made up to protect her from the insurmountable pain of loosing him.

'I heard you.'

Her heart fluttered and stilled for just a second.

'I heard you.'

Mac untucked his head from her shoulder and rested his forehead against her temple. He kept repeating it. Like a mantra. A mantra that saved his soul. One that could bring him back from the dark.

Don't leave me. Not like this.

Her eyes looked to the chamber opposite them. The memories playing in slow motion. Her pleading to Mac. Hoping he could hear her.

Don't leave me. Not like this.

'I heard you and you saved me.'

They spun in tandem.

Her and Mac.

Spin.