Chapter Text
It had been a normal day when Mac had first met him.
And okay, maybe ‘met’ was a bit of a stretch. It was the first time Mac had seen the man, but he hadn’t exactly met him yet. And, actually, maybe ‘normal’ was a bit of a stretch, too. It was normal for Mac, maybe, but it probably wasn’t a normal day for anybody else. Most people wouldn’t consider sneaking across the border as a normal thing to do. Most people wouldn’t consider trying to topple a terrorist plot a normal day. Most people wouldn’t consider trying to break into the headquarters of said terrorist group, with just a bobby pin, a penny, and a Swiss army knife, normal. Most people wouldn’t consider almost getting caught by the same terrorists to be just your normal, average day. And most people definitely wouldn’t consider getting shot at to be normal.
But it was Mac’s normal. It just came with the territory of his job, was all. He was used to it. Even before he had started working at DXS, he had been used to it. Being in the army sort of got you used to the sound of gunshots going off behind you, in a weird way. But he wasn’t working for the army anymore. He wasn’t disarming bombs anymore, or at least not as often. He wasn’t working with a full platoon anymore. Instead, it was just him and Jack and Nikki, following Patricia’s orders and saving the day. It was probably even more dangerous than just disarming bombs, Mac thought. He certainly got shot at more. And had to jump out of a lot more windows.
And Mac wouldn’t change it for the world. Even if it was dangerous. Even if his normal was a lot different than most people’s. He liked helping people. It was why he had joined the army in the first place, and it was why he had joined DXS. He lived to help people. It was what he did. It was practically what he was made to do, with how his brain worked. He was uniquely suited to helping people, so that was what he did. He took his big brain, his fast working brain, his brain that loved puzzles and adrenaline and he used it to help people. He solved problems that nobody else could, faster than anybody else could. He was doing more good than he would have as a physicist or a chemist or even a doctor.
It just meant that he got shot at more than most people did, was all. He was used to it by now, anyway.
He was getting shot at now. Turned out that most terrorists really hated having all of their information stolen right out from under their noses. And when terrorists hated something, they tended to shoot first and torture later. So, Mac was getting shot at. And because Mac didn’t exactly fancy getting shot anywhere, he was running. He was running and he was planning. But he was mostly running. Running and thinking and running and trying to get enough air into his lungs so he could actually breathe. Breathe and think and run and think and plan and get himself out of here. Mostly, Mac just needed to find a way to get himself out of here.
Nikki was back in their van, a few minutes away from the terrorist base, covered by weeds and dead trees and dilapidated buildings. She was safe, far away and monitoring their progress on her computer. Jack was somewhere on the first floor, trying to buy Mac enough time as he got everything out of the safe. Mac could hear Jack’s grunts and breathing and barely audible curses through his earbud. And Mac had managed to get everything out of the safe, just for the record. He had just also managed to create a bit of a commotion, was all. Maybe a bit more than a bit of a commotion. A lot of a commotion, maybe.
Still, Nikki was safe, as far away as she possibly could be, and Jack was downstairs, close to the door and ready to bolt at a moment’s notice. They were fine. All that mattered was that they were fine. And well, Mac supposed that getting himself out of here mattered too. But what was important was that they would be fine, no matter what, and he only had to worry about getting himself out of this mess. He just had to get himself off the second floor, filled with goons and guns, a completely blocked stairwell and a surprising lack of hiding places. But as long as Mac could get himself out of here, then he would be fine. He was fine.
Nikki’s voice crackled to life in his ears. “How are you holding up, boys?”
Jack grunted. “Doing fine,” he said. “Can only hold ‘em off for a few minutes longer, hoss. You gonna get yourself outta here, Mac?”
“I’m working on it,” Mac said, as loudly as he dared. He had managed to lose the goons with guns for a few seconds, but he wasn’t sure how much more time he had. “I- I think I have a plan. Maybe. Half a plan.”
“Let us know if there’s anything we can do,” Nikki said, typing just barely audible through her microphone. “And then we can get the hell out of here.”
Getting the hell out of here sounded nice, Mac thought. Going back home, to LA and to his grandfather’s house and to Bozer. Getting to curl up on the couch with pizza and a movie and Nikki and Jack and Boze. Getting to relax and breathe and not worry about anything at all. Getting to do nothing but rot in the couch, talking about crappy rom coms and yelling at the tv and laughing so loudly that the neighbours could probably hear him. Getting to sleep in his own bed, and sometimes in Nikki’s bed. Getting to close his eyes and rest and know that nobody was going to hurt him. Yeah, Mac thought, he wanted nothing more than to save the day and get the hell out of here.
But to do that, Mac actually had to get out of here, first. It was easier said than done. But this was what Mac did. He got himself out of impossible situations. He solved problems that had no answers. He bent the rules and he bent reality and he made sure that everybody lived. It was what he did. It was what he was made to do. It was what he lived to do. And in order to keep doing that, he had to actually make it out of here. He had to actually complete the mission, if he wanted to do another one. If he wanted to help more people, he needed to help himself now. And he needed to transport the documents with him, too. It would be pointless to steal them if they wound up still in the hands of the terrorists’, next to Mac’s dead body. So yeah, he definitely needed to get out of here.
He just needed to figure out how to actually do that. Mac considered what he had to actually work with. He still had his Swiss army knife and the bobby pin, but the penny was lost somewhere else. Damn. He had the papers that held the plans, obviously, but he couldn’t really use them for anything without risking losing or damaging them, and then the whole mission would have been for nothing. But there was an old tarp on the floor around him, dirtied and scuffed and ripped but looking strong enough, along with a couple of old screws and a rusted pipe. The stairway was blocked, he was sure of that, and there were goons everywhere. He could hear them still searching. But, he had noticed some windows as he had been running. They had thick glass panes in them, but-
Yeah, Mac thought. He could work with that.
Mac didn’t have a lot of time, though. He could hear boots becoming louder and louder and louder around him, as somebody got closer and closer. But he still had some time. A little bit of time. Just enough time, hopefully. He took off his own belt, and his flannel. He cinched the belt around him diagonally, like an off brand bandolier, and slid the documents under it, and tightened the belt until they were completely secure. He couldn’t risk losing them, or dropping them, or anything. They were the priority here. He threw on his flannel over top, doing it up until the documents were completely obscured. It looked a bit awkward, but it was still better than before. And the documents were safe. That was the important bit. But he still had to get them out.
The footsteps were getting louder.
Mac took his Swiss army knife out of his pocket. He was actually using the knife part, instead of the bottle opener or the screw or any of the other handy attachments, which was a bit of a rarity for Mac. But he wasn’t using the knife to hurt anybody. Instead, he cut the tarp, making the pieces as long as he could, not caring about how messy his cuts were. This wasn’t an art project, it was life or death. And man, Mac really wanted to live. He wanted to get out of here and actually get these plans away from these people and survive and- and he wanted to watch crappy movies with his friends and sleep in his own bed for once and just be home. But to do that, he had to actually get out of this damn building.
The footsteps were so loud Mac could feel them.
Mac started tying the pieces of tarp together, making sure that each knot was as strong as possible. He only needed it to be 30ft long, thereabouts, and tarps were weirdly long, so Mac had some wiggle room. Which was good, because tarps did not want to be knotted together, apparently. Turns out that they weren’t rope, actually. But Mac made do, because that was what he did. He made do with what he had. He always made do with what he had. He tied as many pieces together as he could, making a long chain of tarp, before looping it over and over again, so that he could actually carry the rope.
There was a loud bang.
Mac started running. He ran as fast as he could, carrying the tarp in one hand, and the rusted pipe in the other. He knew where he was going, even though he had only spent a few minutes in this place. He had a good sense of space like that, which was good, because this place was designed like a maze. That was probably the point, actually, because terrorists weren’t fans of letting people escape. But still, Mac was going to hold a grudge against them anyway. Why did they have to make these damn things so confusing? It was unfair, Mac thought. Not that he had a lot of time to think as he ran.
There was somebody following him. Mac would have noticed even if he didn’t hear the pounding boots or the spray of gunfire behind him, just out of reach. He could just feel the eyes on him, getting under his skin. It was a strange sort of feeling, having somebody stare at you like that. But Mac didn’t have time to worry about that. He had to worry about the fact that he was, you know, being shot at. Even if he was sort of used to it, by now, that didn’t mean he appreciated it. It wasn’t like he got shot at recreationally or anything. He wasn’t a big fan of getting shot at, thank you very much.
He was a big fan of getting out alive, though, so he focused on running as fast as he could. He couldn’t afford to stop, or think, or look back to see who was chasing him. It was only one person, he was pretty sure, which was a good thing at the very least. If there were more people, he probably would have been hit by a bullet by now. Probably more than one, actually. Probability was fickle in that way. But he didn’t have to worry about probability or imaginary gunmen or anything else. He just had to keep outrunning this one guy, and making sure that nobody else was after him. He just had to get to the window and get out of here. He just had to-
Mac made it to the window.
He smashed it out with the pipe, trying to clear out as much glass as possible. It was a bit of a small window, but it was good enough. This was Mac’s only idea, anyway, so he kind of had to hope that it was good enough. Otherwise, he was totally screwed. He tied down the tarp to a pipe next to the window, and prayed that it would stay. And then, as fast as he could, he pulled himself out of the window and outside of the building. He held onto the tarp for dear life, as he climbed down his makeshift rope. He just had to make it to the ground, now. He was so close. God, he was so close.
Mac could see who was chasing him, now that he was climbing down the rope as fast as physically possible.
It wasn’t your average terrorist, that was for sure. There was something off about the man that Mac was looking up at, and he couldn’t put his finger on it. It wasn’t just that the man wasn’t wearing even a smidge of camo, instead, dressed purely in black, even though his lack of conformity was jarring. It wasn’t just that his skin was too pale for him to have been living in the desert for months, or that his long, black jacket was too thick for the weather. It wasn’t just the fact that he didn’t shoot at Mac, even though he was sure that the man could get him as he climbed down from the rope if he tried hard enough, even if the angle was a bit awkward. There was definitely something else that was off about the man.
It was his smile, Mac realised, with a start. The man was smiling at him. He was watching him, still watching him, with a smile. A smile that was too wide and too bright, even in the most normal of circumstances. But the circumstances weren’t normal, and the smile was even more out of place with a gun in his hands. A gun that was trained on Mac, even with the awkward angle, but wasn’t shooting at him. He still wasn’t shooting at Mac, even with the gun trained on him. Mac couldn’t make any sense of the man, or his smile, or why he wasn’t shooting at him.
It was strange. It was all so strange. The man didn’t look like a terrorist. The man didn’t act like a terrorist. The man didn’t react like a terrorist. He could have been a hired gun, or something, but that still didn’t explain why he wasn’t shooting at Mac. It would have been easier if he was at least shooting at Mac. It would have been easier if Mac knew anything about who the man was, or why he riled Mac up so much, or why that smile spooked him so much. But he had no answers. He barely had any ideas. He had no clues and no variables and no way to figure it out. All he had was the gaze of the man in the window, getting smaller and smaller as Mac climbed down. Smaller and fuzzier and blurrier and-
And then Mac’s feet touched the ground, and he was sprinting again.
That was Mac for you. Always moving. Always running. Always thinking about the future, never having time to focus on the past. He just had to keep moving. He was like a shark, in that way. Or the fish in Finding Nemo. Just keep swimming. Just keep running. Just keep moving. That was all Mac was meant to do. That was all Mac could do. Keep on moving. Move from one problem to another. Move from one danger to another. He couldn’t afford to pause, especially not on a mission. But even when Mac wasn’t working, it was hard to wind down. Jack was always telling Mac that he needed to slow down for once. That he needed to stop thinking so much, but Mac had never been very good at that, not even as a kid.
Right. Jack. Mac should probably make sure that he’s okay. God, Mac needed to know that he was okay.
“I’m out,” Mac called through his earbud. “Please tell me you’re out.”
“Almost there, hoss,” Jack answered. “It’s easy as pie for me. I ain’t the one who was stuck on the second floor.”
“Well I’m out,” Mac said, panting. All that running was starting to catch up to him. “Nikki?”
“I’m bringing the van around,” Nikki confirmed. “Get out of there, Jack.”
“Out,” Jack said, after a few seconds.
Mac saw Jack, barreling through the doors and out into the open. It was a relief to see him, and it was even more of relief when Jack crashed into him, pulling him into a tight hug. It was like home, the feeling of Jack’s arms squeezed tight around Mac, pulling him close and tight and- It made Mac feel secure, more than anything. Jack’s arms meant safety. Jack’s arms meant protection. Jack’s arms meant home. Jack’s arms meant everything was over, and Mac could actually rest.
There was a flurry of distant gunshots. Okay, maybe it wasn’t time to rest just yet.
Mac forced his way out of Jack’s hug. “More hugs once we actually stop getting shot at?”
Jack pouted dramatically. “Fine,” he said, finally letting go fully. “I guess that’s the smart move.”
Mac broke out into a run, Jack just behind him. He didn’t say anything, just soaked in the fact that he and Jack were both okay, and that Nikki was on her way. Just soaked in the feeling that everything was fine. Just soaked in the burning feeling of the air in his lungs as he ran, the security that he felt of Jack running behind him. He didn’t like the missions when he and Jack had to be separated. They always worked better when they were right beside each other, Jack making sure that Mac had cover and Mac making sure that Jack could get out. It was how they worked best, right beside each other. And it felt right to have him back. It felt better than right.
“Glad you made it out, hoss,” Jack called, breaking the silence.
Mac smiled, panting as he ran. “I always make it out, Jack.”
“One of these days you’re not gonna be so lucky,” Jack said, shaking his head. “But for now, I’ll take it.”
Mac laughed, which was probably inappropriate while they were still running, but still. He could do what he wanted, he had gotten the plans and gotten out alive. “I’m just glad you got out.”
Jack huffed. “You had the hard part, hoss.”
That was when Nikki’s van turned the corner, screeching to a halt in front of them in a blur of dust and gravel and exhaust.
“Get in, boys!” Nikki hollered.
Mac grinned as he pulled open the door to the van, helping Jack in.
He sat down in one of the seats, and let Jack and Nikki’s bickering wash over him like a warm blanket. He let it wash over him like a safety net. And yet, even with his team around him, Mac still felt on edge. Mac’s thoughts still drifted to the man in the window. The man with the odd smile. The man who looked so out of place. He didn’t know why the man had been there. He didn’t know who the man worked for. But he knew that there was something off about him. He knew that there was something wrong. He knew that there was- he knew that there was nothing he could change by overthinking it.
Mac took a deep breath, trying to ignore his thoughts of the man in all black. The man who had been chasing him.
It wasn’t as though he would ever meet him again, anyway. Mac wasn’t that unlucky.
At least, that was what Mac had thought.