A/N: Hello! Thanks for your reviews on the chapters, I'm glad you're liking the story so far :) As I said last chapter, I'm really enjoying playing around with timelines in a different way than I normally do. It's new for me, as well as writing in past tense (so if you catch me writing in present, no u didn't...).

We're really starting to get into the heart of it here. I hope you enjoy!

Before Extraction – Three Years

Henry sighed as he scooted the knot up his tie and close to his throat, almost choking himself from not paying attention. He'd been too busy staring off into the picture frame his mother had freshly hung on the dining room wall.

Graduation hadn't seemed that long ago until he looked at this picture and realized how much time had gone by in these two months. That twenty-two-year-old boy being commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in front of his family and his classmates seemed so bright-eyed and ready to tackle the world. The reflection staring back at him in the glass of that frame did not seem so bright-eyed and ready to tackle the world, however.

He stepped backwards and bumped his heel into the duffle bag on the floor, already forgetting he'd set it down there to fix his tie. The house was quiet this morning, and he was almost glad for it—he couldn't miss the noise if there wasn't any to miss. Shane and Erin were away for the weekend, both going on trips with friends for the Fourth of July, and Maureen had come over to say goodbye to him last night with his nephew in tow. It was a quick one, but he was surprised she'd even come at all.

His mom had been behind him cooking a breakfast that she insisted on, even though he argued he really wasn't hungry at all. The appetite he could've had this morning had withered away after the fight with his dad last night. He was nervous enough leaving for basic before the fight, but by the time Patrick McCord had called him Johnny Combat, Henry's blood had boiled too much to even think about food this morning.

His dad had never quite understood why Henry joined the Marines, and he's not sure he ever really even tried to understand it, either. It wasn't only to piss him off and to get money for college, but also because he felt like he had a duty to serve his country. He'd tried to explain that to Patrick ever since he joined the ROTC at UVA, but every time he tried to talk to him, Patrick simply wouldn't listen.

Last night, though, Patrick struck a new chord with him when he said, "You think running off to war is going to make you a man?" His breath had smelled like beer, but Henry didn't take a step back. He never could when it came to his old man. He always stood and fought him even when he got in trouble for it. "It's just going to turn you into another cog in their machine, Johnny Combat."

Henry's fists were clenched by the first sentence, and then by the second, he was ready to throw a punch. Patrick had always been opinionated, to say the least, but there was something about the way he sounded so disgusted with Henry that cut deeper than any argument they had before. And that's why Henry's fists stayed by his side, the only reason.

"I'm not running off," he shot back, "I've spent four years working toward this—training for this. Training hard for this." He heard a siren in the distance as Patrick towered over him on the back porch, standing in front of the step where Henry was trying to get back into the house. "It's not about being a man. It's about serving something bigger than myself."

He felt his hands shaking next to his legs, coursing with adrenaline, surely, as he added: "Something you'll never understand because you're too busy holding on to your bitterness like it's a damn lifeline."

The way his words tumbled out of his mouth heated his cheeks up, made his heart race. He tried to push past Patrick, but his dad stood his ground and made Henry stumble backwards down onto the step, and he caught himself right before he was about to fall. He looked up at Patrick and gritted his teeth, and finally he moved to the side after he'd given Henry a stare-down, "Just don't come crawling back to me when you figure out it's not what you thought it'd be. Matter of fact, just don't come crawling back here at all."

The words stung Henry's heart first, then his eyes—he supposed those were tears pricking at them, actually. He walked past him and into the house, almost running his mother over. He hadn't seen her standing just inside the door, leaning against the doorframe and listening to the entire scene.

Had he not wanted him to come back to this house? To Pittsburgh? To the States? To make it out alive? The thoughts swirled around in Henry's head all night, keeping him up much too late and giving him even more of a restless "sleep."

He was still staring at the graduation photo when a plate clanking down on the table startled him out of his thoughts, and he looked down to see his mother's hand pushing it across toward him. "Here you go," she said.

The corner of his lip pulled upward when he saw the whipped cream smiley face on his pancakes, just like she used to do whenever he and Maureen were little, then again whenever Shane and Erin were little.

"I know you're all grown up now," she said, sitting down on the other side of the table from him and giving her best smile, "But I still wanted to make your favorite."

He tried to smile, too, and he pulled the chair out slowly. "Thanks, Mom," he answered, sitting down and fingering the fork reluctantly. The face was already starting to melt down the side of the pancake, and he couldn't help but notice it looked like this face was now crying. He swallowed hard and dug into the pancake quickly with the fork to try to erase the image from his head, though it will always be seared in now.

He didn't dare glance up at his mother—he knew he wouldn't be able to keep it together when he saw her watching him eat. He'd been away at college for four years, sure, but this was nothing compared to that—even he knew that in his young adult mind. Because not long after basic will come his first tour of duty, the reason he joined up, and then she'll really be worried.

But he slipped up when she cleared her throat, looking up at her while he forced himself to swallow a bite, "I still remember the first time you told me you were thinking about joining the Marines," she breathed, "You were so sure, even back then. And I knew—" her voice cracked and she looked down at the table to regain herself, breathing in sharply, "I knew that one day, I'd be sitting here watching you pack up and leave."

Henry held a piece of pancake in his mouth until it was soggy, and he just stared down at the plate because he knew he wouldn't be able to look at his mother now. "It's what I've wanted for a long time," he whispered, trying to keep his voice as distant as he could.

"I know," she whispered back, and he was sure he could hear her smile, "You've always had a sense of duty—you would pick up the trash in the park when you were just a tot because you said someone had to do it." His eyes darted at her to see that she was looking down, staring into the table right in front of her, "I just wish it didn't have to take you so far away," she breathed.

He noted the tears in her eyes before dropping his eyes back down to the pancake that had three bites taken from it.

"Your dad…" she continued, and his eyes darted back up again, "He just…doesn't know the right thing to say all the time," she said.

He almost rolled his eyes. That's an understatement, he thought. "He knew what he was saying," Henry said, the irritation coming through more than he wanted it to—he wasn't irritated with Helen, he was irritated with Patrick. He was trying hard to keep that in his mind as he wanted to push the plate away and stand up, going ahead and leaving.

"He's just scared, Henry," she said, and he felt her eyes land on him, but he froze looking at the pancake and what was once the eye, now drooped over in a runny stream, "Scared for you, scared of losing you. You're still his son, and you always will be."

He swallowed hard and pushed the plate away quietly, wiping his mouth with the napkin she'd brought over for him and setting it down on the table.

"Henry…" she breathed, and he looked up at her as he was getting up from the table, the chair screeching backwards.

"I'm not doing this to spite him," he said, though he's unsure where it came from. She hadn't even said anything about that. Maybe, somewhere deep down, he really was doing this to spite him. No, he argued with himself, I have a duty to this country, and I want to fight for it.

"I know," she said, her eyes becoming more worried, "I just want to hear you say you'll be careful, okay? Please promise me that."

He nodded, "I will."

"Say it," she demanded.

He looked at her more intensely, his heart throbbing underneath his jaw, "I will be careful," he said begrudgingly, knowing that it wasn't the case—he was going to do whatever they asked of him whenever they asked it. Careful wasn't what being a Marine was about.

She looked down as she picked at her fingernails, "And I want you to promise to come back to me, Henry James McCord." She said, and he saw her fingers shaking as she settled them down on the table to make herself stop picking at the sides. "No matter what, come back home."

"I'm not welcome here anymore," he mumbled, reminding himself of his dad's words last night.

"Nonsense," she breathed, the tears overflowing now onto her cheek. He looked away as she shook her head, "This is my house too, Henry, and he can't dictate something he didn't even mean in the first place."

He walked his plate to the sink and laid it next to it, the pancake still laying on top. "I better get going," he said softly, "I don't want to be late."

She stood up from her chair and walked over to him, "Promise me, Henry," she demanded again. "Promise me that you'll come back."

"I can't promise—"

"Henry," her voice was sharp and rigid and could, he thought, cut into a block of ice in one swoop.

He nodded finally, just barely, "I promise," he whispered, though it felt fake to even pretend to promise such a thing.

He knew as well as she did that he could easily not make it back—not necessarily from basic training, but from the places he'd be shipped to after that.

He hugged her tightly and she kissed his cheek, and they said their goodbyes and their "I love yous" and she told him to call any chance he got. She'd asked him one more time if he wanted her to drive him, that it was a long walk to the bus station, but he said no.

When he left through the front door, walking down the sidewalk toward the bus station, he felt the tears pricking into his eyes again after he was a few hundred feet away from their stoop.

Post-Extraction – Twenty Minutes

Something woke him—he's not sure if it was the pain in his ribs or the one in his head, or the loud noise whirring around him, but he's staring at the ceiling of what he believes is still the helicopter. "Where the hell…" he murmured, his eyes fluttering.

"McCord," he heard a woman barking somewhere near him, "Stay down."

"No chance of me getting up," he replied, but really it just came out as "no chanz uh…"

She grabbed his forearm and turned his arm over, and he realized she was taking his pulse. The stethoscope was in her ears as she listened, and he felt like he was going to be sick. He turned to his side and tried to miss her, but he noticed he might have gotten her shoes. She didn't even say anything if he did, though.

"Still losing blood," she said to someone that Henry couldn't see.

Blood? I'm losing blood?

He frowned and looked at her face, recognizing her now as Sarah Jordan, their medic on duty. He tried to get his voice to work, but apparently, he'd given it all away already with his one attempt at speaking. He looked around with just his eyes, trying to move his head, and he panicked when he felt something around his jaw and chin. Neck brace, he realized.

He swallowed thick and reached up, grimacing from the pain shooting underneath his arm and down his left side, and tried to pull on the brace.

"Stop, McCord," she demanded, "You need this until we can get you x-rayed to make sure there's nothing damaged more than just the broken ribs."

He swallowed again and tasted the blood, and then it all came flooding back to him—the extraction.

The boy.

The boy he shot.

The boy whose dead body he left on the floor as he carried the woman from the closet out of there.

The fall with her on top of him.

Her.

"The package…" he murmured, trying to get Sarah to look at him again as she had her back turned and was doing something at the end of his bed. He couldn't quite tell what she was doing, but she seemed focused, "The pack…" he tried to mutter out.

But Sarah was not paying attention. She'd continued moving around as though she didn't hear him at all, and then he wondered if he'd even spoken at all. Had he just thought he was talking? Is his mind playing tricks on him?

"The package," he forced, this time his voice came out jagged but loud enough he knew he was talking for sure, and she turned to look at him with something in her hand—a vial, maybe. "Where's the package?" He's not sure he was making any sense, but she was focusing intently on him.

"Focus on staying still, McCord." She demanded, "She's right here."

Henry twisted slightly, trying to get a better look at where Sarah had vaguely pointed. And then he saw a body on a stretcher near his feet, her feet facing his. His ribs were burning from the twisting, and Sarah was funneling something into the IV he was just realizing he had poked into his hand, and he felt sick all over again. He couldn't get a good look at the package's face, but a flash of her image came to his mind and he remembered how bad off she had been. Even in the darkness of that closet, he could tell she was bad—her eye wouldn't even open all the way and then she'd just passed out on him.

Her body was unnervingly still on that stretcher, he could tell that much. He could just barely see her hair—blood was all matted in it, and he still couldn't make out what color it was. He couldn't see her face, exactly, but he could see her neck underneath her chin—it had bruising all around her jaw and around her throat. His eyes moved to her body, and he watched her chest just barely rising and falling.

He questioned his senses for a moment, briefly wondering how well he was able to see. Was she breathing more, and he just couldn't tell? But then he suddenly recognized the slow beeping to be her heartrate and not his—his heart was pounding in his ribs where he, apparently, had broken them. He knew exactly how fast his heart was going because there was a painful throb about halfway down his ribcage, and it was much faster than that beep.

He groaned when the helicopter lurched, his body moving in a way that it simply shouldn't have. He felt dizzy again and threw up on the floor before moving back to where he was supposed to have been the entire time.

"I told you to focus on staying still, McCord," Sarah chided, and he felt demoralized enough that he took her orders this time.

She walked into his view again and he looked at her with just his eyes, focusing on staying still just like she'd told him. She looked much scarier up close where she was again, anyway. "She's critical," Sarah said, her face becoming even more grim.

She must've saw me looking at that woman.

"Whoever had her didn't just rough her up," she continued, looking away from Henry and toward the woman as she swallowed thick, "Internal bleeding and maybe a punctured lung—I'm doing my best, but we've got to get her back to base ASAP."

Immediately, as if by magic, he felt the throbbing start to subside, start to slow. It was still painful, however.

The way the helicopter was maneuvering, Henry assumed they must be landing soon. He looked up at the ceiling and felt the tears pricking his eyes—a sudden rush of them almost startled him. Sarah looked down, "It's the morphine," she breathed, "Don't look so worried."

He sniffled, trying to make himself believe that it was actually the morphine that he couldn't even tell was in his body—it was still on fire.

He pretended it wasn't the way seeing that woman made him feel. He pretended he wasn't upset about killing an enemy combatant who tried to kill him, looking into his eyes and blasting through his head. He pretended it wasn't just a boy who he'd killed. All of it—just pretend.

He shut his eyes as he felt the helicopter landing, and the subsequent thud that made him groan.

He wanted to help that woman. He wanted to know that she was going to be okay after he'd gotten her out. He wanted to do more than just save her body, but instead he wanted to save her life. She might die right here in front of him, or next to him if they put them together in the infirmary, and he didn't even know her name.

He found himself hoping that they would put them together in the infirmary. He wanted to keep an eye on her, and then he amused himself with that thought—he can barely keep from vomiting every few minutes, how would he begin to keep an eye on someone? But somewhere in his chest he ached, not just his ribs—this woman's life was in his hands, and he may not have saved her in time.

And besides, she saved his life—saved all their lives. He had been about to cut the yellow wire and then the red. Had she not told him the order, they would've been blown up a half an hour ago.

Henry heard the sound of medical equipment clattering again, and Sarah disappeared from his sight once more. He craned his eyes down as far as he could to try and see what was going on, "You're not dying on me!" She was yelling, and he could see her then doing compressions on the woman. His own ribs ached again in protest.

He moved to sit up, but he groaned in pain, his oxygen mask filling up with fog. "McCord!" Sarah yelled from over there, and he grimaced from the shame of moving and being caught. "You did your job. Now let me do mine!" The desperation in Sarah's voice startled him—she's normally so cool, so collected.

He swallowed hard and felt his stretcher being moved, and he panicked to try to get a look at the woman—he couldn't see her anymore, the way they had him turned, and then he was off he helicopter and being toted into the infirmary. Yet, the other stretcher remained in the helicopter as he felt his body burning again, his eyes growing heavier. It's the morphine, he heard Sarah's voice say, and then his eyes shut.

Post-Extraction – Three Hours

His eyes felt like they have weights strung to them as he tried to open them, but he was immediately blinded by a light shining down in his face. He winced, noting immediately that the neck brace was off, and he closed his eyes again.

"Easy sir," he heard someone say, and he batted his eyes to look around the room and finally lay them on a nurse. He was carrying a clipboard in one hand and an empty IV bag in the other. "You've been out for a while—you just had surgery to—" the man stopped, looking down at his clipboard, "You had a hemothorax."

"A what?" Henry asked.

Before the other man could answer, he saw Major Grayson walking into his room. "McCord," he boomed, "Glad to see you're with us."

"Sir," Henry murmured, laying his head back down into the pillow. He closed his eyes tightly, the throbbing in his head overwhelming all his senses, and he wished for some peace and quiet desperately.

"Can you give us the room?" He heard Grayson saying. He peeked his eye open to watch the other man leave, and Grayson shut the door behind him and came over and sat on the chair against the wall. "Listen, McCord, you had some bleeding in your chest they had to fix. Broken ribs. A nasty concussion." He explained it like it was a grocery list, and the carelessness wasn't lost on Henry. "You'll be on the ground for a while, and really, in recovery for a while."

Henry barely nodded, almost saying "good" but stopping himself. He'd needed time to process all the shit that just happened.

Before he could even catch his breath from Grayson listing all those items out, he continued on with clasped hands, "Lacey's gone," he said nonchalantly, still as though he were reading something.

Henry looked at him too fast and felt dizzy, and then he squinted and patted around on the bed when he remembered there was probably a remote of some sort. He finally found it blindly, fumbling with it for a few moments before turning the lights off. Once his job was done, he goes back to Lacey. "You don't mean that." Henry murmured.

Grayson looked up at him, "You think I'm joking about a guy gone, McCord?" He barked, shaking his head, "Lacey's gone. We had to leave him."

"You what?" Henry demanded, his head coming up again from the pillow. He felt so dizzy, so sick, but he couldn't take his eyes off Grayson this time. "You did what?"

"We had to," Grayson explained—or didn't explain, rather. He just said it simply, as though there was no explanation.

Henry fell back into his pillow and stared up at the ceiling, thinking again of Jason Lacey, a loving husband and father of two—three, technically—kids back Stateside. His heart felt like it was breaking as he thought of the picture he'd showed Henry a few weeks back of him and his family. "This is my last tour," he'd said, "My wife's definitely happy I'll be home for this baby—I missed the first year of both my boys."

He took a deep, shaky breath and found himself cringing from the pain in his side, remembering, suddenly, that he did just have surgery. He shut his eyes again and squeezed them tight, his fingers wrapped tightly around the sheets underneath him. "And the woman?" He asked.

"What woman?"

Henry looked over at him, "The target. The extraction."

"Oh," Grayson said, his eyes darting away from Henry. "She's in critical condition, but she's out of surgery and…well, let's just say she didn't get as lucky as you did."

Henry shut his eyes again and turned his head away from Grayson, refusing to let his major see him cry, even if he was heavily medicated.

"Listen, McCord," Grayson said, "I know you don't fully understand the bigger picture here, but we did what we had to do with Lacey. Two guys got held up and—"

"I can't right now." Henry finally mumbled, breaking all protocol. But in all honesty, so was Grayson by sitting here in this room moments after Henry had woken up from surgery. "I need a minute."

Grayson stared at him, and for a moment, Henry thought he was going to tell him to get out of bed and do pushups. And for once, Henry wouldn't, and he'd consider even saying "no." Something he never would've considered otherwise. But finally, the major got up from his chair and walked toward the door without another word.

When he heard the door shut, he wondered how Grayson could live with himself, leaving a member of the group behind. As a captain, Henry couldn't imagine leaving one of his platoon members behind. His head started throbbing again, and just as he'd shut his eyes to try to get it to stop, he heard the door open again. He looked up to see Sarah Jordan again.

"McCord," she said softly, her voice tired and dragging.

He nodded, "Jordan," he whispered, his voice unable to really make it out of his throat at all. "How is she?"

Jordan swallowed thick, looking around as if she were going to get in trouble—she could get in trouble. The woman wasn't Marine Corps, she was CIA, and Sarah would probably be breaking layers of protocol, too.

But she sat down and cried into her hands, instead, startling Henry. He'd only ever seen her calm exterior, that tough one that never seemed to crack no matter how many times she'd seen a finger blown off or a leg amputated. She looked so small, and it scared him how she shook as she sobbed into her palms, muffling her voice. "She's alive," Sarah finally got out, and Henry had been so startled by the entire situation he hadn't even considered that the woman could've been dead based on Sarah's reaction. "We've been in surgery this whole time—but she's alive."

Henry sighed and laid his head back down in the pillow, saying a quiet prayer then and thanking God for keeping her alive. "Is she going to make it?"

Sarah looked up pitifully, her face all red and wet as she clasped her hands together and shrugged one shoulder. Her eyes batted again as the waterworks started and she pursed her lips to try to keep it all together. "I don't know," she whimpered, and Henry wished he could comfort her in some way, but he couldn't move. He wasn't even sure he could comfort her if he could move. He was too exhausted.

He was too worried, too, about the woman.

"Do you know her name?" He asked Sarah suddenly after a few moments of quiet.

Sarah sniffled, "Elizabeth," she said, wiping at her nose, "I'm probably not supposed to tell you that—I'm probably not even supposed to know that. The director of the CIA called for an update—Conrad Dalton—" Henry cringed when he heard that name. He was the one that sent them into this in the first place, and he must have been the one who sent that woman—Elizabeth—into this, too. "And he asked personally for an update. He accidentally let her name slip though—he backtracked with her spy name."

"Oh," Henry mumbled. It was all he could get out, all he could form.

So they sat in silence for a long while after that; Sarah sobbing into her hands, Henry staring up at the ceiling with images of the woman and all the blood in her hair. Elizabeth. He kept saying her name over and over in his head so he wouldn't forget it. Elizabeth.

Take me instead, God, and not Elizabeth, he found himself thinking before he felt awfully sleepy once more. The new bag of pain medicine was kicking in, doing its job, and he was asleep in no time.