The mountains were beautiful, but Denver was not; not anymore, at least. The buildings were mostly intact, but windows were smashed, appearing as gaping wounds in the high-rises. The roads were deserted with no sign of life like there’d been in Des Moines. Either the population had been completely decimated, or it had succumbed to the resulting violence directly after the Plague made its rounds.

Miles shivered as he looked out the window at what had become a ghost town. They were doing okay for supplies, but Stephen had wanted to pass through the city itself to see if there was some kind of bartering system or market in place to continue stocking up. Miles wished that they’d bypassed it altogether, just like all the empty suburbs they’d seen from the freeway.

Glancing back at Stephen in the driver’s seat, Miles said, “I really don’t like this.”

Stephen nodded and agreed, “We’ll get back on the highway as soon as we can.”

The first bullet shattered Miles’ window. Glass slices across the back of his neck and he cried out in pain at the fire now lodged into his left thigh.

“Get down!” Stephen shouted.

The Rover jumped forward in a burst of speed as Miles slid to the floor while stripping off his shirt. He tied it tight around his thigh to stop the bleeding and nearly passed out from the pain. Gunfire echoed strangely in his ears, coming fast and continuous. He heard McGee shout from the back seat and the resulting gun shots directly behind him sounded like explosions, they were so loud.

And then the world spun as the Rover slammed into something and rolled twice before coming to a standstill. Miles’ vision grayed out, but he didn’t lose consciousness even when he fell from beneath the dash to the roof, which was now on the ground. Pain radiated throughout his body, but all he could think about was Stephen, who hung unconscious from his seatbelt.

Forcing himself to move, Miles crawled to his lover, pulling out the pocketknife that Jethro had made him carry since they’d become involved. Not bothering with the buckle, he simply cut through the belt. He cushioned Stephen’s fall with his own body and then laid him out straight, feeling swiftly for possible injuries and, thankfully, finding none other than the head wound.

Looking into the back, he found Tim coming around, gun still gripped firmly in hand, but Eva and Jimmy were out cold. There was shouting outside and more gunfire, which made him flinch. Keeping the panic at bay by concentrating on the immediate, Miles climbed into the back to assess Eva. He cut her down as well and then found that she’d either badly sprained or broken her wrist while trying to cushion herself from the rolling vehicle.

Jimmy had also not had his seatbelt on, although why Miles didn’t know. He lay sprawled on the roof, groaning as he came to. “Miles?”

“Stay put, Jimmy,” Miles ordered quietly. “I don’t know what might be going on out there.”

“You’re hurt, let me help you,” Jimmy countered, pushing upright.

Miles sat heavily at the offer and nodded, watching as Jimmy checked Tim over. The concussion was easy to spot in the dazed expression. The ex-agent struggled upright, not hampered by a seatbelt, which he must have taken off to get better aim. Jimmy helped him sit and held up a finger, asking, “How many fingers?”

Tim blinked a couple of times, clearly trying to focus, and then answered, “One. Stephen and Eva?”

“Out cold,” Miles reported.

Tim checked his weapon and announced, “I’m out. Stay here.”

Not that Miles was going anywhere with his leg still bleeding sluggishly, but he nodded anyhow, as did Jimmy. Tim crawled into the back and started searching for ammunition. Miles’ heart jumped when he spotted unfamiliar boots coming towards them. “Tim! Someone’s coming!”

“You in there! Come out now!”

Miles swallowed against a dry throat and called back, “We have people injured in here. I was shot, I can’t come out.”

“Come out, or I’ll assume you have weapons and shoot you from here.”

Looking over at Tim, Miles whispered, “Protect the others. Maybe I can see what’s going on.”

“Miles, don’t!” Tim exclaimed in a harsh whisper.

Jimmy nodded in frantic agreement, his broken glasses adding to his air of desperation.

But Miles ignored them and pulled himself through the window, dragging his leg. He almost passed out again as the movement sent fire dancing through his leg and ribs. Panting shallowly, Miles stopped and sat up, leaning on the wreckage of the Rover. He looked up to find two soldiers striding towards him in Military Alliance uniform. His heart sank so fast and so hard that he thought he might vomit.

They’d almost made it…they’d been so damn close to escaping…

Looking around, though, he saw that the vans weren’t there. The others had gotten free, which sent a rush of hope through him. Offering a wry grin, Miles greeted, “So. You come here often?”

“Are you badly hurt, Dr. McCabe?” the first soldier questioned.

Miles recognized his insignia and answered, “Still bleeding from my thigh wound, Lieutenant, but I’ll live. Well, assuming you aren’t here to execute me.”

The Lieutenant, a big, broad man with dark hair and eyes shook his head. “I’m not. My mission is to retrieve you and Dr. Connor, along with an Abby Sciuto and former agent McGee.”

And kill everyone else, Miles realized, feeling nauseas again. Out loud, he said, “Dr. Connor was driving. He suffered a blow to the head and is unconscious. I’m not sure, but he might have internal injuries. Are there more of you? Is there a doctor, maybe?”

“Who else is in there?” the second demanded, ignoring Miles’ questions. His voice was the one who’d threatened to shoot them.

“No one,” Miles answered. “We were the supply vehicle. It was just Stephen and I.”

The two soldiers exchanged a look and Miles knew that they somehow knew he was lying. Their rifles came up as they moved closer and all he could do was close his eyes and pray. Two gunshots echoed viciously and Miles flinched, hugging himself and unable to look.

He flinched again when hands gripped his shoulders, but then Tim said, “Miles, Miles, it’s okay, we’re okay now.”

Shocked, Miles’ eyes opened and he looked over to find both soldiers dead, single bullet holes in their heads, blood rapidly staining the pavement.

“Come on, we can’t stay in the open like this,” Tim urged. “We have to get them out of the Rover to shelter.”

Jimmy squirmed out of the Rover and joined them. He saw the dead soldiers and promptly turned aside to throw up.

Though he sympathized, Miles held onto his tenuous control and asked Tim, “What if there are more?”

Tim shook his head and pointed out, “I’d be dead if there were. There was a truck that went after the vans, but there’s no one else here. Can you walk?”

Miles thought about it and then nodded. “But I can’t carry anyone.”

“Miles? Where are you? Miles!” Stephen called from inside.

Relief hit Miles hard and he couldn’t stop his voice from shaking as he answered, “Out here with Tim and Jimmy!”

Stephen pulled himself out of the front window and immediately crawled to Miles, pulling him in for a hard, tight embrace. Miles shook violently in his embrace, letting the panic wash over him, mixing with the joy that Stephen was all right. He’d never been so grateful to hold the other man in his life.

A good half-minute later, Stephen sat back and said, “Let me look at you. What are your injuries, can you tell?”

“I think I broke some ribs and you can see the gunshot. The bleeding’s mostly stopped, though,” Miles reported.

Tim interrupted with, “We have to get out of the open, Stephen. You can examine him later.”

Nodding, Stephen squeezed Miles’ shoulder and then asked, “Where’s Eva?”

“Unconscious still, I think,” Miles answered. “She’s inside.”

“Okay. McGee, I’ll get her out while you and Jimmy help Miles to his feet,” Stephen ordered.

Bracing himself when the other guys crouched down and put an arm around his waist from each side didn’t really help. Pure agony lanced through him as they hauled him upright. When he could see through the haze, he gasped, “I might have been a little optimistic earlier when I said I could walk.”

Tim chuckled and said, “I figured.”

Stephen came out with Eva then, the petite woman now awake and aware, thankfully, if shaky on her feet and cradling her right arm. He helped her stand and then scanned the area before pointing to the nearest building. “We’ll get Eva and Miles settled in there and then come back for more weapons.”

Tim nodded and they started walking. Miles leaned heavily on both men, barely able to make himself drag his leg the short distance necessary. Stephen pushed in the partially broken wooden door and kept an eye out as they went inside. It must have been an office building, because there was a lobby complete with plastic, semi-fashionable chairs. Or, what had probably been fashionable thirty years ago.

Miles groaned when they sat him in the nearest one, panting and shaking in reaction and, he vaguely suspected, shock.

“Jimmy, come with me. McGee, keep watch.”

“On it, Boss.”

If Jimmy answered, Miles didn’t hear him. The roaring in his ears drowned out just about everything.

“Miles? Come on honey, stay with me,” Eva urged, taking his hand.

Snapping back to awareness, Miles focused on her bruised and worried face, managing a brief smile as he said, “Natalie’s never going to let Stephen hear the end of crashing the Rover.”

Eva smiled in return and agreed, “Definitely not. And now we know who the better driver is.”

“How’s your wrist?” Miles asked.

She admitted, “It hurts, but we’re just going to concentrate on you for a while, okay? Forget about us.”

Stephen echoed, “We’re going to get you all stitched up and then you can go back to worrying about the rest of us.”

Miles shook his head and told him, “It didn’t go through. You’re going to have to dig for it.”

Cursing under his breath, Stephen said, “Then we’re going to knock you out.”

“You can’t. What if we have to move again?” Miles countered.

Stephen looked torn for a few seconds before that all-too-familiar poker mask fell into place. “You’re right. McGee, find him something to bite down on. We don’t want to give away our position if anyone’s listening. Jimmy, get him on the floor. I’m not operating on a plastic chair.”

Miles sighed and muttered, “I knew they should’ve just put me there in the first place.”

He held onto Jimmy’s shoulders as the other man swung him carefully from the chair to the floor. Gritting his teeth against the surge of pain throbbing in his leg, Miles didn’t protest when Jimmy lowered him the rest of the way to the floor. He stared up at the cracked ceiling and caught his breath until Tim arrived with a damp piece of wood. Not that he would’ve noticed dirt in his condition, but it was a thoughtful gesture.

Eva sat beside him again and offered her hand, but Miles shook his head. “You’re going to need it. I don’t want to hurt you accidentally.”

“Miles, shut up and take my hand,” Eva ordered acerbically.

A grin surfaced briefly and he took her hand.

Stephen leaned over him and asked, “Ready?”

Miles shook his head. “No.”

“Good,” Stephen replied, winking.

Shaking his head, Miles used his free hand to put the wood between his teeth and then met the other man’s eyes, nodding once.

He felt his shirt pulled free and then scissors cut through his pant leg and thought, Okay. So far, so good. Not too bad.

That lasted only as long as it took Stephen to use a scalpel to start digging for the bullet. He screamed around the wood in his mouth and then blessedly passed out.

* * * *

Stephen ruthlessly ignored Miles’ scream of pain and then mentally breathed a sigh of relief that his lover had passed out. He moved swiftly, cutting through muscle and tissue to get to the bullet lodged deep, right next to the bone. That it hadn’t struck and shattered the femur was a miracle. He pulled out the bullet and threw it aside, ordering, “Swab it.”

Jimmy reached in with clamps holding a sponge while Stephen traded the scalpel for pre-threaded needles, glad that Jimmy had thought to do so. He really was becoming quite adept at emergency surgery, which was turning out to be a serious asset. After repairing the muscle and tissue as best he could, Stephen closed the wound. He doused it liberally with antiseptic and peeled off the bloody gloves as Jimmy wrapped a bandage tightly in place.

Stephen wiped his forehead and realized that he was shaking now that the surgery was over. Taking a deep breath and slowly releasing it, he looked at Miles’ face, which was slack and showed no signs that he was coming around. Relieved, hoping he stayed unconscious for at least a half hour or more, Stephen started cleaning the multitude of cuts on Miles’ face only to discover there was still glass in some of them.

He picked up tweezers and a magnifying glass from the medkit and started to carefully find and remove all the glass. It seemed to take forever, but finally he was done and could start stitching up the worst of the gashes. There were only two big ones, thankfully, and one was partially hidden by Miles’ hair. He wouldn’t be scarred nearly as badly as Tony, likely having only faint lines in the end.

The other cuts got butterfly band-aids and then he turned to Eva and said, “Your turn.”

“Oh, I’m good,” Eva protested. “I can wait.”

Squeezing her shoulder, Stephen said, “You really can’t. You don’t want it to heal wrong and need to be re-broken down the line.”

She paled further at that and replied faintly, “No, I guess not.”

“I grabbed a splint while we were out there,” Jimmy announced.

Stephen held out a hand and, looking determined yet still scared, Eva gave him her injured arm. He carefully felt the bones and their placement, ignoring her gasps of pain as he ascertained that it wasn’t actually broken, just badly sprained. The swelling would go down with ice, so he ordered Jimmy, “Get one of the gelpacks from the…”

“They’re back!” McGee exclaimed suddenly. “Both the vans are back!”

Stephen immediately ordered, “Stay put, McGee! It could be a trap!”

From the young man’s embarrassed expression, he hadn’t thought of that and did as he was told. Moving from Eva’s side to McGee’s, Stephen peered out the front door, which was only open a crack, and waited until the vans parked and he saw Jethro get out of one of them, armed with a rifle. Relieved, he clapped McGee on the back and called out, “We’re in here, Gibbs!”

Jethro unerringly locked onto his voice even before Stephen and McGee pushed the heavy door open to step outside. Jethro jogged over to them and gripped Stephen’s shoulder, steel gray eyes searching his face as he demanded, “Miles, Eva, and Jimmy?”

“All fine. Well, Miles was shot in the leg and Eva has a badly sprained wrist, but otherwise fine,” Stephen amended. “Tony?”

Snorting in amusement, Jethro answered, “Slept through the whole damn thing, thank God. He’d just had a couple of pain pills and a sedative when we left camp this morning.”

“Timmy!” Abby shouted.

Stephen looked over to see McGee catch the tall woman in his arms and hold tight. He smiled at their reunion and then asked Jethro, “Casualties?”

“Sounds like you got the worst of it. Everyone else is okay,” Jethro answered.

Stephen wanted to check on Tony and it looked like Jethro wanted to check on Miles from the way his eyes kept straying to the building. He laughed briefly and said, “You go see Miles, I’ll go see Tony, and we’ll meet back here after.”

Jethro quirked a grin at him before nodding and heading inside.

Stephen strode across the street to where the vans had parked, making time to say hello to everyone else first, even though he wanted nothing more than to see for his own eyes that Tony was okay. Finally, he was able to climb into the slightly dented, but otherwise unscathed vehicle and climb into the back where Tony lay snoring and oblivious to the world.

Sitting on the floor beside him, Stephen took Tony’s hand and let himself rest for a few minutes, closing his eyes against the throbbing headache demanding that he pay attention. He likely had a minor concussion, but didn’t really care. All his people were alive, if not completely in one piece and that was all that mattered.

“Stephen? Are you okay?”

He looked over at Natalie’s soft question and answered, “Minor concussion, but otherwise all right.”

“Let me be the judge of that,” she replied, moving closer and kneeling beside him. She checked his pulse and then his eyes. “Headache? Dizziness?”

“Yes and no.”

“Nausea?”

“No, thank God.”

She smiled and said, “Yep. Looks like a bump on the head, all right.”

Stephen snorted. “Couldn’t tell.”

“Too bad we can’t blame your bad mood on it,” she teased.

“Gee, thanks, Nat,” Stephen replied.

Frank stuck his head in the van and asked, “Everything okay in here?”

Stephen met his friend’s worried gaze and offered a reassuring, “I’m fine, Frank. Just taking a couple of minutes. What happened to the truck following you guys?”

Frank explained, “When Gerald said he was a good shot, the boy was being modest. I’d say he’s at least as good as Gibbs. And with both of them in the rear van, they took out the soldiers on our tail.”

It was hard to reconcile easy-going Gerald with that, but it seemed the man had hidden depths.

“No one’s going to report back on our position,” Frank continued.

Stephen sighed and said, “They won’t have to. Once they don’t report in, the Alliance will know our last location.”

Frank grimace as he demanded, “How they hell did they get here so fast?”

Suddenly wondering the same thing, Stephen said slowly, “I bet they flew. And if they’re all dead…”

“The plane should still be here!” Frank finished, excited.

Natalie protested, “Don’t tell me you know how to fly a plane!”

Frank grinned and answered, “Okay. I won’t tell you that I know how to fly a plane.”

Chuckling, Stephen moved passed Natalie and told her, “We’re going scavenging. We’ll be back in a half-hour, tops. Oh, and Eva has a sprained wrist that should be wrapped.”

She slapped him on the shoulder before he was out of reach and exclaimed, “You couldn’t have said that in the first place?”

He and Frank stopped on meeting up with Jethro, but Natalie continued into the building with a dirty look sent Stephen’s way.

Jethro grinned and asked, “How’d you manage to piss her off in the last seven minutes?”

“Not important,” Stephen replied. “What is important is there’s a plane sitting somewhere around here.”

Immediately going on the alert, Jethro commented, “And one of you can fly it?”

Frank nodded confirmation. “If it’s got wings, I can figure it out.”

“The real question is, will it have enough fuel to get us all to Vegas,” Stephen cautioned.

That sobered their excitement a little, but Jethro observed, “Only one way to find out. McGee! Gerald! Ziva! Kate!”

They answered the bellowed summons in short order, everyone scrambling to get there as fast as possible.

“Ziva and McGee. You head east. You’re looking for an airplane,” Jethro barked. “Kate and Gerald go west. Make sure you’re armed and be back in thirty minutes. Move!”

They left immediately in their assigned pairings and in the direction ordered.

Stephen grinned in appreciation. “Now if only my people were that well behaved.”

Frank snorted. “Yeah, right.”

Jethro grinned back at him and said, “You and Frank should go south and I’ll head north.”

“Alone?” Stephen asked.

Nodding, Jethro answered, “I can move faster on my own. You’re injured and should stay behind, but I’ll let you go out.”

Stephen glared at him. “Let me? You’ll let me go out?”

Jethro smirked before heading north.

“You know…” Frank started.

Stephen interrupted, “Finish that, and you’re a dead man.”

Frank chortled to himself as he started south.

Glaring at his best friend’s back, Stephen followed.

* * * *

Miles groaned as Ducky and Natalie helped him from the building to the van he’d be sharing with Tony. At least he could stretch out somewhere comfortable and it even had the benefit of him being able to keep an eye on his lover. Trouble always seemed to find Tony.

Natalie climbed in the van and Miles sat on the doorway, leaning backwards and scooting backwards with her help as Ducky supported his leg. Gritting his teeth, Miles managed to slide all the way into the back, pausing often to catch his breath. He had to let Natalie swivel his leg around so he was facing the right direction.

“What the hell happened to you?” Tony mumbled, rubbing his eyes.

Looking over at him, Miles retorted, “I got shot, what’s it look like?”

Alarm immediately rose on Tony’s face and he started to move towards Miles only to gasp and fall back. Holding his stomach, Tony stayed very still.

Even before Natalie swatted him on the back of the head, Miles winced and mentally kicked himself for making such a careless remark. He couldn’t really turn towards Tony, not with the massive bruise on his chest, but he did take the other’s hand and assure him, “I’ll be fine, Tony. It’s just a flesh wound.”

Tony met his gaze at last and asked, “So that’s why you can’t even move to look at me?”

“Well, I could, but my ribs are a little sore, so I’d rather not,” Miles admitted.

Natalie chimed in with, “It’s a little more than ‘just’ a flesh wound, but he will be fine. He’s certainly better off than you will be, if you don’t stop moving around!”

Tony gave her a meek look and promised, “Not moving. Staying right here.”

She made a disbelieving noise, but left them alone.

“So, what happened?” Tony asked instantly.

Miles grimaced and explained, “The Alliance was waiting for us when we hit Denver. The vans got away, although I’m not sure what happened yet, but Stephen flipped the Rover.”

“Is everyone okay?”

“Eva’s got a sprained wrist and the others have varying degrees of concussions, but yeah,” Miles answered. “There were two soldiers. I thought they were going to kill Jimmy, Eva, and Tim but…Tim killed them first.”

Executed them. Shot them in the back of the head when they didn’t even know he was coming, an insidious voice whispered inside. They couldn’t even defend themselves.

“Miles?”

Shaking off the renewed panic that suddenly made his heart thud heavy in his chest, Miles cleared his throat and continued, “Stephen dug the bullet out of my leg, I passed out and next I knew, you guys had shown up.”

Tony squeezed his hand as he questioned softly, “Are you okay? And I’m not talking about your leg or ribs.”

Miles swallowed against a tight throat and silently shook his head. Ignoring the pain, he rolled onto the bed so he could press up tight against Tony, burying his face against the other man’s throat. All he could see was the blood pooling on the pavement, sinking into the cracks, and the holes in the back of those soldiers’ heads.

The soldier’s voice echoed through his head…My mission is to retrieve you and Dr. Connor, along with an Abby Sciuto and former agent McGee.

“It’s okay now,” Tony whispered, stroking a hand over Miles’ head. “You’re safe. We’re all safe.”

And even though he couldn’t seem to find any tears to shed, Miles shook violently in his lover’s arms and prayed that one day he would believe that.

* * * *

Jethro remembered a big park right in the middle of the city from back when and headed directly there at a jog. He wanted to find the plane and make sure a pilot didn’t fly off when the rest of his team didn’t return or check in. Thanks to resting in the back of the van with Tony, he felt back to full strength physically. Knowing that someone might be out there, ready and willing to destroy his family spurred him on. If anyone was going to kill more soldiers just doing their job, it would be him, not Gerald or McGee. They were too young for such horrors, even though he saw the hardness of spirit approaching in both. He would protect them as much as he could, for as long as he could.

It was a big park, all right, almost wild after so long without anyone tending it. It was because of that, that he found the plane easily, the swath cut in the tall grass simple to pick out. Not only that, but it looked like the plane had taken out some saplings on its landing.

Bringing the rifle up, he peered through the scope to search for signs that someone else was nearby. He stayed behind a large oak for five minutes while slowly scanning the area for life bigger than the rabbits hopping around, oblivious to the danger nearby. Finally determining that no one was there, that the pilots had been part of the attack, Jethro walked from the tree to the C-17 Globemaster III that waited some fifty meters away. It was a new plane, probably just off the line, replacing the C-141 Starlifter that had been in production since before the plague.

The cargo bay door was open in the back and he shouldered the rifle to take the pistol from his shoulder holster. There was absolute silence as he leaned just a little forward to look inside. The cargo held a Hummer of all things, and extra supplies, but no soldiers. Stepping inside, kept to cover as he made his way to the cockpit where he found the door open and it, too, empty.

Relaxing a hair, Jethro started looking around at what was left of the supplies and to see if he could find a mission brief. Not that he expected to be that lucky. These kind of soldiers knew their orders by heart and didn’t hesitate to execute them; literally in this case. He had no illusions that most of them wouldn’t make any kind of return trip to the Alliance.

Jethro paused when he found a backpack that did actually contain papers. Profiles on Stephen, Miles, Abby, and McGee. No one else. Not even Natalie, by all accounts a dedicated doctor in her own right, or Frank’s girls who were nothing but innocent. Sickened, he forced the nausea back and continued reading.

* * * *

Ziva nearly had a heart attack when the Hummer came barreling down the main street and no one save herself and McGee around to defend the others. But then she spotted the familiar gray head of Gibbs and breathed a shaky sigh of relief. Holstering her gun, she walked over to meet him, flashing him a grin as she asked, “Did you get a good deal?”

“The best,” he answered. “It was free. Everyone back?”

Shaking her head, Ziva answered, “Just McGee and me. We were not nearly as successful as you appear to be.”

He hopped lightly out of the Hummer and they walked towards the others as he said, “Found the plane, all right. It’ll take one of the eggheads to figure out if it’s useable, but it’s intact.”

“Could you not simply read the fuel gage?” Ziva pointed out.

Gibbs gave her an irritated look, but Stephen, Frank, Kate, and Gerald arrived from their different directions just then.

“You found it!” Kate exclaimed.

Gibbs nodded and said, “There’s extra fuel and supplies back at the plane, too. We should get them and get out of here before dark.”

Stephen agreed, “Definitely. Frank and I will go back with you. The rest of you make sure we’re ready to go the moment we’re back.”

Ziva watched the three men stride towards the massive, military vehicle and shook her head, annoyed. She knew that it wasn’t that Gibbs did not think her capable, it was more that he wanted her to stay at camp and make sure the others were safe. And even though it was somewhat of a compliment, that he trusted her to take care of Tony and Miles, it still chafed. She wanted to be in the front, making decisions and discoveries. The only man she willingly allowed to lead was Gibbs, and that only through her respect of him.

Turning to the others, she ordered, “Well? Get a groove on!”

Kate snorted. “It’s ‘get a move on.’”

Ziva waved at her and said dismissively, “That too.”

Rolling her eyes, Kate nonetheless fell into step with Abby and Gerald as they headed back towards the vans.

A grin surfaced as she thought, Then again, being the boss of Kate Todd is nothing to shake a stake at, either.

* * * *

“How bad is it?” Stephen asked, once they were in the Hummer and driving away from the temporary camp.

As if the tightness of Jethro’s jaw couldn’t tell him that.

“They only wanted you, Miles, Abby, and McGee,” Jethro reported. “Everyone else was expendable.”

“Fuckers,” Frank growled.

Stephen silently echoed the sentiment. Aloud, he prompted, “What else did you find out?”

“We’ve got another three hours before final check-in gets missed. An automatic order goes out in that case and another team gets sent here to see what happened. We have to change our route. We have to make as direct a path for Vegas as we can.”

Frank leaned forward and countered, “It’s better to keep to the main roads and make as much time as we can. We’ll drive all night and not stop unless we absolutely have to.”

Nodding, Stephen agreed, “We’ll make better time on the highways and avoid the towns and cities between here and there.”

Jethro stared straight ahead as he thought over their words. He said slowly, “We can leave a present for the secondary team that will cause enough damage that they might think twice about coming after us again.”

“How much damage are we talkin?’” Frank questioned.

Lips twisting, Jethro answered, “Not quite Hiroshima, but enough to make them wonder what the hell else we have in our arsenal.”

Startled, Stephen asked, “Do we have anything that will cause that much damage?”

“We have Abby and McGee. That should give us something to cause that much damage.”

A grim statement that Stephen didn’t want to put to the test, especially not after what McGee had just done, but they didn’t have a choice.

Frank suggested, “Let me take a look at what we have before we go involving them. I know a thing or two about explosives and what makes things go boom.”

They arrived at the giant cargo plane and Jethro parked right next to it. Stephen climbed out and walked over to it, following Jethro inside. Frank went directly to the cockpit, but was only there a few minutes before he joined them in the main area and shook his head. Disappointed, but not surprised, Stephen said, “Plan B it is. Do your thing, Frank.”

The black man half-grinned and replied, “I knew those summers making fireworks with my cousin would come in handy one day.”

Stephen and Jethro spent the time loading the food and medical supplies into the Hummer, letting Frank take care of the destruction to come. They finished before he was ready and sat on the hood of the vehicle, only thighs touching as they waited.

“You’re not telling me something,” Stephen said, apropos of nothing.

Jethro leaned back on his palms as he stared up at the sky for a long moment. “They were going to use Miles to assure your cooperation. I don’t know how they figured it out, at least in part, but they know that the two of you are lovers. The orders were to hurt Miles in any way necessary to make you return.”

Stephen felt ill. He’d known, of course, just how ruthless the Alliance was, but it hadn’t truly occurred to him that they would use Miles against him, not like that.

“Everyone else was to be executed,” Jethro continued, still staring at the sky. “Even the girls. It was right there in black and white. You never told me you were working on a cure to the Plague, Stephen. Why not?”

The change in subject threw him for a second. Stephen said, “I don’t know. It isn’t something that you just throw into conversation, I guess.”

Finally, those piercing eyes met his and Jethro leaned close, his gaze burning intensely as he snarled, “It damn well has to be when people are escaping with you! God damn it, Stephen! What were you thinking not to tell at least me?! They’re going to keep coming after you and Miles for as long as it takes to get you! You’re too fucking valuable for them not to!”

“Would you have done things differently?” Stephen demanded.

Jethro snapped, “Yes! Of course I would have done it different! Tony and I would’ve disappeared on our own first because he was in the most danger! Then, six months down the line, the rest of my team would have followed. Then you and yours could have gone off the grid and no one would have been the wiser to us being connected and we wouldn’t be weighted down with four injured adults and three terrified children!”

Glaring, Stephen retorted, “So it’s yours and mine now, is it? I thought we were in this together, Gibbs!”

“We are!” Jethro shouted, shoving him off the Hummer altogether.

Stephen landed hard, the breath driven from him, and lay there gasping for air. When Jethro’s feet appeared in his line-of sight, Stephen looked up, bracing himself on his elbows, but staying down. As enraged as the other man seemed, it was better to stay down.

With a colder expression than Stephen had ever seen, eyes like flint, Jethro stated flatly, “If you ever keep something that big from me again…”

The words stopped, but Stephen understood his meaning. They would be over, if he withheld something like that in the future. Jethro would leave and, in all likelihood, take Tony with him. It had been the two of them before the four of them, after all. Nodding, Stephen said, “I won’t.”

It seemed as though the next minute stretched into eternity, but Jethro’s hand ultimately reached down to him. Stephen sat up and took it, letting the other pull him to his feet. When Jethro let him go almost right away and stalked to the plane, Stephen let him go. Not only did they both need to cool down, but Stephen didn’t feel all that steady on his feet all of a sudden.

He made it the few steps to the Hummer, but then the throbbing in his head mixed with dizziness and Stephen found himself back on the ground. Unable to make out which direction was what, he called out weakly, “Jay! Jay, I need you!”

* * * *

Jethro went inside the plane to see what Frank had done, but also to get some space from Stephen before he really did something he would regret. Pushing Stephen from the Hummer had been a gut reaction, frustrated that the other man would keep something so vital from him. He half-heard the other man call out after him, but ignored it, knowing he needed to calm down before they talked again.

They shared so much about so many things, and it was already so hard for him to trust as much as he had with Stephen. None of his ex-wives had qualified for the kind of depth he’d gone to here; it was even difficult for him to be that open with Tony, and he certainly wasn’t with Miles, not yet at least.

To find out after the fact that Stephen hadn’t trusted him enough to tell him about working on a cure…it felt like betrayal.

You still shouldn’t have pushed him off the Hummer, his internal critic pointed out.

Grimacing at himself, he found Frank doing some kind of wiring under the control panel in the cockpit. “What are you doing, hotwiring it?”

Frank pulled himself out from underneath and explained, “I don’t want to accidentally blow up someone who’s just looking to loot the place. I want the ones who sit down and power up and try to access the computer system.”

“Good plan,” Jethro concurred.

Looking beyond him, Frank frowned and asked, “Where’s Stephen?”

“Outside.”

“Why?”

That inner voice said, Because I’m an idiot. But Jethro only said, “We need some space.”

Frank sighed. “What did he do now?”

“Nothing I’m going to talk to you about. No offense.”

“None taken. Just keep in mind that Stephen’s been king of the hill for a long time and doesn’t always think in terms of compromise or group dynamics.”

Something that he already knew, of course. Stephen’s take-charge nature was one of the things that he liked about the other man. Realizing that he could’ve been a little more on board with the compromise thing himself, Jethro said, “Excuse me,” and left Frank to keep going with whatever he was doing.

Jethro was still on the ramp when he spotted Stephen on the ground and shouted, “Frank! Get out here!”

He ran to his fallen lover, dropping to his knees to check first for a pulse and then injuries. Nothing stood out and he lightly tapped Stephen on the cheeks, but got no response.

“What happened?” Frank demanded.

Jethro shook his head. “No idea. He was fine when I left him.”

Or maybe he hadn’t been, Jethro realized, remembering Stephen’s call earlier. “Let’s get him to the Hummer and back to camp.”

Frank took Stephen’s feet while Jethro supported his upper body and they maneuvered the unconscious man into the back seat of the vehicle. Once there, though, Stephen groaned, a hand going to his head and blinking up at him. “What happened?”

“That’s what we want to know,” Jethro answered. “Are you hurt? Did you hit your head?”

Frowning, hand still holding his head, Stephen said, “I don’t…I can’t remember. I don’t even know where we are. Where’s the Rover?”

Shock rendered Jethro mute for a few seconds and he glanced to Frank.

“Must have been a more serious concussion than Natalie thought,” the black man replied to the unspoken question. “Short-term memory loss isn’t uncommon, although I don’t think there’s usually a gap between waking up the first time and having it kick in later. Not without additional injury anyhow.”

Jethro sighed. “I pushed him earlier and he fell off the Hummer.”

Scowling, Frank said, “That would probably do it.”

Resting his hand on Stephen’s chest, Jethro asked softly, “Why didn’t you tell me you were injured?”

“I don’t remember,” Stephen told him. “I should have, if it’s bad enough to cause memory loss.”

Jethro looked back at Frank and said, “How long do you think it will take you to finish?”

“Another half hour or so, why?”

“We’ll wait for you. Stephen can rest here until you’re done and then we can just pick up the others and keep going.”

Stephen spoke up, “I get a say in this.”

Jethro was surprised when Frank answered the same time he did with, “No, you don’t.” and wound up sharing a brief grin with the other man.

Glaring at them, Stephen closed his eyes and put an arm over his face, effectively ignoring them.

Frank snorted and said, “I’ll think I’ll just get back to work.”

Sitting on the floor, Jethro put a hand on Stephen’s thigh and stared at him for a long time before saying, “We were attacked by the Alliance. They found us because they sent teams out hunting for you, Miles, Abby, and McGee. These teams went to what was left of the major cities who didn’t have any kind of government. We didn’t get a chance to talk about this before I got pissed at you for not telling me you were working on a cure for the plague, but we should now, don’t you think?”

Stephen immediately understood what he was saying and looked over at him, guessing, “Someone will be waiting for us in Vegas.”

“I think so, yeah,” Jethro confirmed.

Stephen looked up at the ceiling. “We can’t cut a break.”

Jethro rubbed Stephen’s leg and said, “Looks that way.”

They sat there, but not even the tenuous physical connection as enough to keep Jethro’s thoughts from descending down a thousand dark paths. What waited at Vegas could be worse than what they’d just been through.

And Jethro had the feeling that their luck was about to go from bad, to worse.