A/N: Woof. The warm and fuzzies after the cold and painfuls.

That's all I have to say.

Hope you enjoy!

tw: violence/torture

Elizabeth | Before Extraction – 40 Hours

After the men had hauled her off the floor and dragged her through the labyrinth of the hotel halls, they blindfolded and gagged her and loaded her into a vehicle. She had no idea where she was, but she counted the turns they made each time she swayed. Right turn, right turn, left…right. Even if she had been able to see, she wasn't sure how well she could've seen—everything seemed so blurry from being tased. She hadn't felt pain like that in years.

When they came to a stop, the men grabbed her arms, squeezing their fingers unnecessarily tight into her skin—her hands were zip tied, what did they think she was going to do? Her feet hit the ground and she winced in pain, almost crying out through the gag, but she stopped herself. Her ankle started throbbing immediately, and she hadn't even realized how badly it had been hurting the whole ride here—wherever "here" was.

"You should have stayed at the party," she heard a voice say, and she tried to make out who it was—it didn't sound like Hariri. "But I suppose it's fitting that the little mouse ran right into the trap."

With those words, she wanted to fight—she wanted to die fighting. She knew if she'd tried to fight she would certainly die, but something inside her told her it was okay. She'd go out that way and be fine with it. Inside her head, there was this terrible tension aside from the headache. A tension that caused herself to feel pulled two ways: stand and fight and die, or go along with what they do and say and hope that the CIA will pull her out.

Her chest heaved as they pushed her forward suddenly, and she tripped over something and heard a metal clank, realizing she was on a ramp.

The plane ride was long and dreary. She wasn't sure how long she was on there, but it was long enough that she almost fell asleep even with all the adrenaline coursing through her. They had her tied in the back somewhere, she could tell because they'd walked a long way until they shoved her down. The entire ride, though, she cursed herself for letting her cover be blown. She'd known she was in too deep, but she didn't know that until it was too late.

The thought kept tossing in her mind as they bumped along of just how her cover was blown, though. She couldn't figure it out.

When they got out again, it was another car ride, and she didn't even try to count the turns that time—she had no idea where she was, and the CIA would just have to find her without her helping this time.

In a short time, they had ripped the blindfold off along with a chunk of her hair and thrown her down into a cinderblock room. Immediately, her knee ached, crying out with its own silent pain as it hit the hard ground. She positioned herself to be seated and leaned against the wall, getting a good look at the men—Hariri and two of the men who were in the hotel with him. Behind them was a boy—he couldn't have been more than fourteen—and she swallowed hard when she saw he had a rifle.

"We'll skip the part where you pretend you don't know what I want, Dr. Morgan," Hariri said, stepping closer toward her and squatting down, his hands relaxed over his knees. The way he said "Dr. Morgan" made him sound like he was taunting her, and judging by the look on his face, he was. She resisted the urge to kick him. "Tell me who sent you, and I'll consider letting you leave here in one piece."

Elizabeth stared at him for a few moments, taking some shaky breaths though she tried to look defiant. "You think I'm just going to hand you a signed confession?" She knew as soon as she said it that she shouldn't have, and the blow to her cheek told her she really shouldn't have. Hariri stood up briskly after hitting her, smiling slowly down on her.

"I think you'll be begging to talk soon enough," he murmured, and he looked back at the two men behind him, the boy staying back, and Elizabeth felt a kick to her left side first, and then someone pushed her head back into the wall. She felt the blood run down the back of her neck, but she refused to cry.

She refused to let them get the pleasure of hearing her whimper.

The punches rained down on her torso over and over, and she got glimpses of Hariri just standing over them, watching with a little smile.

One punch hit her just under the eye, somewhere above her cheekbone, and her head hit the wall again and she just had to stay there, staring at the ceiling for moments and wishing she were dead.

Her head was spinning enough that she had to close her eyes, and she regretted closing them at all because she just wanted to keep them closed forever. The pounding in her head was making her feel sick, and she would've heaved had it not been for the pain radiating through her entire body. Then she overheard one of the men: "'ayn almulsaq?"

They were speaking Arabic—wouldn't they know she can speak it, too, if her cover had really been blown? One man was asking about the sticker, and her heart pounded faster and harder because they knew—they knew she'd planted a sticker. Is that how my cover got—

Before she could finish that thought, she felt another blow to her side and missed the rest of their conversation. She was being dragged again, this time by her hair without letting her get to her feet, and she was thrown into what looked like a closet. Before she blacked out momentarily, she saw a glimpse of what looked like a bomb.

Hariri must have seen her notice it because he looked over his shoulder and then back at her, crossing his arms. "The timer will be set if you do not tell us what we want to know," he said, "And then you will blow up for your country. Is that what you want?"

She didn't answer, but mostly because she couldn't—she'd tried to speak, tried to get anything out, but her voice was completely gone. She just looked at him instead, and he kicked her in the shin so hard that she bent sideways, falling down the wall and landing awkwardly with her hands tied behind her back.

As she laid there, he looked down at her, and she saw the boy again standing behind him with the rifle. Shoot him, she begged in her mind, just take him out…you can't look at this and think this is righteous.

But she knew better—she knew the way the Al-Hariri family raised their children, and she'd recognized him before as one of Fadi's sons.

"Still silent?" Hariri asked.

She looked up at him and felt the tears start to prick at her eyes—something she didn't want to do, but she was so angry and frustrated and in so much pain that she couldn't think straight.

When he pulled a blade from his jacket, she let out a whimper, and he clearly smiled at her. "I do enjoy this part of the job every once in a while," he murmured, smirking at her as he squatted over her again, pointing the blade just underneath her jaw. She extended her neck as far as she could, closing her eyes and feeling the tip of the blade on her skin. "I'll ask you again," he breathed, his other hand coming up and wrapping around her neck, "Who sent you?"

When she didn't answer right away, his fingers began squeezing, and squeezing, and she finally cried out so loudly that his first instinct was to let go of her throat. He looked at her and his jaw tightened, the blade still poking into her neck, "I'll let you think about it," he mumbled, his patience clearly having snapped as he stood up and brushed shoulders with the boy.

The boy shut the closet door on Elizabeth, and she was left in complete darkness for what she thought was hours until Hariri came back, delivered the similar regimen she'd gotten as her welcome here, and then left her once more. She refused to speak—she couldn't let her country down like that.

Each time he'd leave, when she had the wherewithal, she'd claw at the door, at the inside of the closet—she'd try anything she could to get out of there. The last time he left, though, she heard a beep—she knew the bomb had been set.

Hurry up, Langley, she thought as she laid against the back wall again, closing her eyes.

Elizabeth | Post-extraction – 60 Hours

To say her eyelids felt heavy didn't even begin to describe it—they felt impossible to open, and her right eye was impossible to open. It stayed shut while the other one was met with bright, blinding lights that made her flinch and turn her head away, met with more pain when she moved so suddenly. Her chest felt like it had been run over by a truck, her neck so stiff that she wasn't even sure it was her own or if it was just a replacement one. She shut her eye again and let the lid shield her from the lights, staying like that for moments as she briefly replayed the events that happened in her mind.

She tried opening her eyes again, met with the same bright lights and the same impossibility of her right eye. Panicking, she moved her hand from where it was lying on her stomach and felt her cheek carefully, her fingertips just barely brushing because she was so scared she'd find out she had no eye. But when she felt her eye underneath the swelling, she breathed out, looking over to her IV pole. She had no idea what was in there, but she assumed it was good stuff.

It didn't take her long to realize how hard the bed was, how scratchy the sheets felt against her legs and her arms. She felt a chill come over her, and she tugged at the blanket a bit until it covered her arms. The faint smell of antiseptic told her she was in some sort of medical facility.

Her throat was so dry suddenly, and she looked around for any sign of a water. There were no cups by her bed, but there was a chair. It was empty, though she noticed the indentation left behind.

The ache in her chest took her attention away from the chair, and she groaned as she moved her head back to a neutral position, squeezing her eyes shut as she felt like there were little explosions going off in her chest.

Explosions.

The memory flooded back to her—her brief moments with the memories didn't last long earlier. The bomb hadn't gone off, apparently, since she was still alive. How did the bomb not go off? I saw it ticking. Her hands squeezed the edge of her blanket and then suddenly released when she heard faint voices, pulling all her attention away from her memory.

She jumped when she heard the door click, her toes curling up when she saw it opening. But then she saw a woman with her hair slicked back in a bun—bright red hair that Elizabeth swore shined in those terribly bright hospital lights.

"You're awake," the woman said, putting her clipboard down after rushing into her room. The clipboard hit Elizabeth's foot, and she groaned in pain. The woman looked at her nervously, "What's the matter?"

"It hurts," Elizabeth mumbled, her throat so sore and scratchy.

She was trying to bend her knee as the woman was messing with the IV bag.

"It hurts," she repeated.

"I know, I'm trying to get some more pain medicine in—"

"No," Elizabeth croaked, "The clipboard. My foot."

The woman stopped fumbling with her IV and looked down at where she'd laid her clipboard, mumbling something that sounded like an expletive as she moved quickly to take it off her foot. When she did that, Elizabeth's suspicions were confirmed: she was on a Marine base. Had to be.

"Where's it hurting?" The woman was asking her, and Elizabeth eyed her suspiciously.

"It's burning all over my foot—all over my leg." She said, her voice sounding low. She was trying to get her foot out from underneath the blankets, but she felt like she'd been cocooned in them and grew even more frustrated. The woman reached down and helped her, lifting the blanket and gasping.

"Shit," she breathed.

That can't be good, Elizabeth thought to herself as she watched the woman go over to the phone on the wall and mumble something about needing the x-ray room for room two. Elizabeth assumed she was room two, and that she would be getting an x-ray. From the way her ankle was burning, though, she was pretty sure she could give this woman a diagnosis: it's broken. It felt just like her other one did whenever she was a freshman in high school playing soccer—her one and only year on the high school soccer team.

Elizabeth startled again when she saw a man walking into her room, his feet shuffling against the floor as his IV cart rolled along in front of him. "She's awake?" He said.

The woman looked over at him, "McCord," she barked, "Get out of here—not right now."

"Is she okay?" He asked, his voice sounding…desperate? Elizabeth wasn't sure why he'd sounded like that, or what caused him to, or who the hell he was. She squinted as he stood at the foot of her bed with a cup in his other hand.

"Is that water?" She asked.

He looked down at it and nodded, "I—yeah."

"Can I—"

"I'll get you some water," the woman was saying as she was clicking the wheels on Elizabeth's bed.

But this man was already shuffling up to the head of her bed and carefully putting the cup up to her lips, and she felt her eyes going wide. Her lips were so dry, her mouth so cottony that she made herself stay still, though, and wait for him to tip the cup up so she could get a glorious sip. She closed her eyes when the cool water touched her tongue, and she gulped so big that it hurt her throat and chest all the way down. She swore she could feel the water touch her stomach.

As she tugged her head away to let him know she was finished—her throat was hurting too badly for much more—she got a better look at him. "You're…" she murmured, remembering him vaguely. He had stood right there, actually, and helped her breathe. Or was that all a dream? She couldn't remember. It didn't seem real that she'd been lying here before without any recollection, but he seemed very real.

"I'm Henry McCord," he said, not waiting for her to re-say her words. "I'm a captain in the Marines," he added.

She swallowed hard and winced when she felt her throat contract, her toes burning all over again from the pain radiating in her foot. If she was so doped up, how was she still in this much pain? She glanced over at the woman who was now frozen, just watching this man—this Henry—and watching her, too. She felt like she was a zoo exhibit, suddenly.

"How do I know you?" Elizabeth got out, squinting at his face.

He studied her eye for a moment and then suddenly moved to grab something above her head, and it startled her enough that she flinched and brought her arm up to cover her face.

"Oh my God," Henry's words tumbled out of his mouth, the regret pouring out of his voice. "I'm so sorry—I was just trying to reach for this," he said, pushing a button on what Elizabeth noticed was a remote, and then the lights turned out. She sighed and let her arm go back down carefully, her good eye watching him. She was glad he'd turned the lights off, but how did he know to do that? How did he know she needed them out?

He looked down at her and swallowed hard, and she noticed him gripping onto her bedrail and gripping onto his IV pole—he seemed nervous, like he was lying about something. The uneasiness in Elizabeth's stomach reappeared.

"I was the one who extracted you," he said softly, his eyes not watching hers anymore—they were down somewhere on her body. She followed his gaze to find him looking at her hand that was still clutched onto the blanket—she hadn't realized. She loosened her grip, and he looked back into her eyes, "And I was here when you woke up the first time—I helped you breathe."

Elizabeth felt the weight in her chest again and furrowed her brow, "Breathe…" she mumbled, trying to remember. She looked over at the woman who was still staring at the two of them.

"You were on a ventilator," she said, and finally she started working on Elizabeth's IV bag again, taking it off the pole and hooking it to her bed swiftly. "And McCord was in your room when—"

"Why was he in my room?" Elizabeth asked.

The woman looked at Henry, and he looked back at her. Elizabeth felt the tension thicken in the air, and her eye darted between the two of them—one on her left, one on her right.

"And who are you?" Elizabeth asked the woman, not giving either of them a real chance at answering her first question since they clearly weren't going to anyway. They'd just stared at each other and ignored it entirely.

"I'm sorry," she breathed, shifting her gaze back to Elizabeth, "I'm Dr. Sarah Jordan, I'm a medic with the U.S. Marine Corps."

Elizabeth felt her body relax a little before she looked at Henry, and something about the way he was watching her made her relax even more. He'd just made her feel uneasy seconds before, she wondered if he were lying, but now just looking at him made her muscles feel softer. She brushed her fingers along the hem of the blanket, her eye dropping down to look at the scratchy material.

"Jordan saved your life for sure," Henry murmured, and Elizabeth looked up at him suddenly. She must've had a questioning look on her face because he continued talking. "I was…I was…" he wasn't saying anything other than those two words over and over, and Elizabeth wanted to tell him to spit it out. But instead, this woman, Jordan, she did it for her.

"Spit it out, McCord," she said.

He glanced at her with a little flicker of frustration in his eye—something Elizabeth immediately clocked as a look she'd give Will. "I'm working on it," he spat.

"Not fast enough," Jordan replied, "We've gotta get her to x-ray."

"What?" Henry looked down at her, and Jordan was pointing to her ankle that was poking out. The last Elizabeth had seen of it, it was black and blue.

"You were saying?" Elizabeth piped up, interrupting the banter and looking at Henry still.

He dropped his eyes back down to hers, "I was afraid you were dead…or that you'd died when I got you out," he finally admitted.

Elizabeth stared at him for a few moments and felt the weight of his own emotions pushing down on her. As she studied him, she was hit with another memory.

"How did you know my name?" She asked, remembering that he used it when she was first waking up, when he was trying to help her breathe. She remembered that specifically because it had brought her back down to earth, brought her to reality where she was, indeed, Elizabeth Adams and not Eleanor Morgan.

It was Eleanor Morgan who was beat. It was Eleanor Morgan who was tortured for her country's secrets. It was Eleanor Morgan who was left in a closet with a ticking bomb just outside the door.

It was Elizabeth Adams, however, who never said a word about her country, her mission, and who told Henry how to diffuse that bomb. It all flooded back to her like a tidal wave, and she felt like she was drowning. Separating herself from Eleanor Morgan was the only way she could even begin to parse this all out in her head—the only way she could begin to deal with the trauma, both physically and mentally.

He was reaching for her hand again, and she jumped and pulled it away. She caught his eyes, and they looked sympathetic, like he was just a kid trying to help. But he was no kid, and she wasn't sure he was really trying to help.

But then again, the warmth from his fingers made her inch her own fingers back toward him, and he was watching them closely. He looked up into her eyes and she swallowed hard, grimacing from the sandpaper feeling in her throat, and she blinked at him a few times and kept moving her fingers toward his. She hadn't realized how cold her fingers were until his warm ones were wrapping them up.

"We really need to get you to x-ray," Sarah said, ripping Elizabeth from his warmth suddenly as she moved the bed. She'd only had moments of that warmth, yet her body felt like it was ripped of something integral when Sarah moved her.

"You're bringing her back here, right?" She heard Henry ask, though she could not see him anymore. He was above her head somewhere, and with all the pain and stiffness, she didn't dare move to see him.

She didn't need to, anyway. His brown eyes, that short brown hair with the little reddish tint, the way his eyes looked like all he wanted to do was hold her—it was all seared into her memory already. Yet, she found herself still wanting to look regardless of whether she had him memorized or not.

"Yes, McCord, but you need to be—"

"I'll be right here," Henry answered, his voice firm and defiant, even. He was a captain, she supposed, so he must have had some sort of right to be a bit defiant. Maybe a grunt couldn't have gotten away with that, or maybe it was just because they clearly had some sort of friendship going on.

Elizabeth heard the whole exchange between Henry and Sarah, but she still was caught up on her unanswered question as Sarah rolled her to x-ray: how did he know my name?