We parked the cars in a small clearing directly southwest of the prison. It was a near silent affair as we all hopped out of the vehicles and checked over our gear one last time. The air was somber, everyone preparing for what was sure to be a difficult mission. I knew that we were also preparing for not everyone to make it out alive. The dominance and prowess of Scorpion's grasp was undeniable and the moment they realized that we were breaking in, they would be after us with their guns blazing. I just hoped that we avoided as many casualties as possible and that none of my friends were among them.

I was in the process of rechecking my gear on last time, ensuring that I had enough clips of ammunition and that my bullet-proof vest was secured correctly before making sure that my communications unit was working and on the same frequency as everyone else's.

Max was standing beside me, doing the exact same thing. He kept glancing at me out the corner of his eye though he seemed to be trying to make sure that I didn't notice.

Eventually, I sighed. "What is it?"

"Are you in love with him?"

My head whipped towards him. I sputtered out, "What?"

"Daniel. Are you in love with him?" Max raised an eyebrow looking mildly curious.

"You were inside," I hissed. "How did you hear—?"

"I was standing near the window. You're avoiding the question."

"Does it matter what the answer is?"

Max shrugged and re-holstered his gun. He started to make sure that his comms. unit was working. "Not really. I was just curious as to what you were going to do about the situation."

I dropped my voice so that he was the only one who could hear me. Everyone else was at least fifteen feet away but I didn't want to risk being overhead, especially by Daniel's parents. "Nothing, okay? I'm not going to do anything bout it."

Max didn't say anything but I could all-but hear the judgement in his gaze.

"Daniel deserves better than me, all right? That's the issue. I'm not the kind of person he should want to be with. It's not safe. He'll always have a target on his back if he's with me and you can't live a full life if you're always checking over your shoulder. I can't do that to him. Even if I did love him."

"So you do. Love him, I mean."

"I didn't say that." My eyes snapped to his.

Daniel's blue eyes were as clear as crystal. I could practically see the wheels turning in his head as he started to formulate a carefully measured response. "I would do anything for Lia," he said at last. "I would follow her anywhere she had to go. I'd watch her back so she wouldn't need to. I'd even take a bullet for her if I had to. Do you know why?"

"Because you love her. But Max, it's different than that. The two of you are trained operatives. You know how to take care of yourselves. It's not like that with Daniel."

"That's not the reason. Yes, I love Lia. Even though everyone always tries to tell me that the two of us are too young to really know what love is...I know I love her. But it's not the reason that I would follow her to the ends of the earth or take a bullet for her.

"I would do it because she makes me feel safe. She is my home. When we're apart...I feel incomplete because I'm not where I'm supposed to be. Even when the two of us were just friends before we started dating, I had the same feeling. Lia is my home. And even though we all face uncertain futures, I know that I will always be able to come home."

Max sighed and leaned against the side of the car we were standing next to. "You and I have always been very similar, Melanie. We both had to give up our families to join this life. We both had to figure out where we belonged and had to fight every minute to get there. But the one thing that makes the two of us very different is that you don't know when it's time to stop fighting.

"I think it's a defence mechanism. At least it was for me. As long as I was fighting, putting up walls that I refused to let fall, I was safe. No one could be hurt because of me, everyone I cared about would be safe from the life I'd chosen to live. And then I realized that I didn't know why I was running away from everything that might be good for me. So I stopped running and fighting and I found home."

He wasn't looking at me anymore. He was staring across the clearing to where Lia was standing with the members of her strike team.

"What are you saying?" I asked Max.

He didn't even glance at me. "I think it's time for you to stop running, Mel. I think it's time you found your home too. Even if its dangerous. Even if it doesn't make sense. Even if it's not Daniel. You need to find where you feel safe. Where you know you that you can always return to. Home."

Max took off walking towards Lia without another word, leaving me staring after him. She looked up as he approached, her whole face lighting up. I turned away, letting them have their goodbye moment.

Hopefully, it wouldn't be the forever sort of goodbye.

Ten minutes later, we were moving. All of us walked together for awhile but then teams three and four diverged from one and two, heading in the direction which would allow them access to blocks A and E respectfully. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to access cell block G in the time span we'd allotted ourselves for this mission. It was located directly in the heart of Scorpion's compound.

We'd gotten lucky that Jack Briar wasn't placed in that block. It would have made the mission exceedingly more difficult as we would have needed to be more discrete to gain entry into the building, instead of just muscling our way in as we were planning on doing.

Lia and Max walked as close to each other as they were able while still managing to keep to our respective teams. I could see their dark figures in front of me, an arms length all that was separating them. They didn't talk, none of us did, but their silent movements were communication enough.

I couldn't imagine bringing someone I loved into a situation like this. It was hard enough bringing my friends. If anyone died on this mission, it would be their blood on my hands. It was true that this problem wasn't entirely my own, most of the blame didn't even fall on me, but Jack Briar was my father and he was the one we were going to save and so it would fall to me.

In the dark, hiking up the side of a mountain where the air was getting increasingly more brisk, I had time to consider Max's words in the clearing. It was true that I hadn't really had a home in a long time. Even Oaks wasn't my home. It was the building I called home, the setting I could always return to in order to find comfort, but it wasn't my home.

Home was with the people I loved. My parents, my brother, they were home. Even after I'd left to forge a new life for myself, they were still home. But now Wes was in danger and my parents were dead and I didn't know what had happened to my home. I didn't know if it was still the place, the people, I remembered or if it had changed.

And if the latter was true, was Max right? Was Daniel the home I was searching for? Or if not Daniel, someone like him? Someone I loved and someone who loved me back. Was that my home?

I didn't know.

I wanted to know.

But how to let someone in after a lifetime of running. That was the hard part. I'd left Daniel behind on purpose, intent on starting over. Intent on leaving the feelings I had for him in the Oregon as I started my new life abroad. And I had. Hadn't I?

Or maybe I'd just buried them so deeply that I thought they were gone. I'd always heard that you never forget your first love and I never really had loved anyone since Daniel. Even my relationship with Patrick, who had been my first real boyfriend, had been unable to hold a flame to the love I had for Daniel in our friendship.

So, perhaps, I'd never had the chance to even get over him. Maybe that was the problem. I'd never really gotten the chance to love him and so I'd never had a chance to go through the heartbreak and the pain that would allow me to fully move on from him. Maybe that was what I needed to do now.

The tree line cleared suddenly, exposing a break in the forest. At the front of the group, Mariano held his fist up, a silent communication for all of us to stop.

"Alpha and Beta teams," Tasha's voice sounded off in my ear through the communications device. "You are now in position for entry. Your target to set the explosive is due north. Please hold for further instruction."

As Jack Briar's extraction team, Max, Mariano and I were the Alpha team. Lia and the two MI6 agents she was working with were the Beta team. Teams three and four, which contained Daniel's parents, had been labeled Gamma and Delta respectively.

"This is mission control. We have successfully hacked into the Scorpion mainframe database. We will have complete control of their security system in t-minus five...four...three...two...one."

There was nothing where we were to suggest that they had been successful save for the relieved breath that Tasha exhaled into the microphone.

"Alpha one you are able to set the explosive now. Do not detonate, repeat do not detonate."

"Affirmative, mission control. Alpha one setting the explosive now," Mariano said. He was team leader for us and, as such, had garnered the title of alpha one. Max was alpha two and I was alpha three.

The five of us hung back as Mariano crept a hundred yards forward to where there was a small crevice in the rocky deposition of the mountain. While it was completely invisible to us, our intel told us that, just on the other side of the rock was cell block B. We all watched silently as Mariano placed the explosive and began to walk back to us. When he was once more hidden in the folds of the forest, crouched at the front of our pack, we all breathed a collective sigh of relief.

While our team and the Beta team were entering through the same entry point, the Gamma and Delta teams both had their own individual points of entry. With our bomb set, we could have ploughed our way through now but in order to cause the ultimate panic and diversion, we were waiting for the other teams to be in position.

The Gamma team would detonate their explosive first, hopefully causing the majority of Scorpion personnel to rush off to the far end of the compound at which point we would blow our bomb and go in search of my father.

"This is delta one, we are in position and the explosive has been placed. Waiting on confirmation to detonate, mission control."

Control was Tasha and that MI6 agent whose name I hadn't learned. They would be working together to make sure that this mission was as successful as it could be.

"Message received, delta team. Waiting on Gamma."

"Gamma team is in position, control. Gamma one is we are placing the explosive now."

"Affirmative."

A pause of static where we all waited tensely. Max glanced at me. Lia squeezed my knee with her hand.

"Gamma one here, the explosive has been set. Waiting on permission to detonate."

"Gamma one detonation is a go. Repeat, detonation is a go."

No sooner had the words left her mouth than did the bomb go off. In our position, on the Eastern side of the mountain, we were unable to see the Gamma and Delta teams on the Southern and Northern sides of the mountain. We couldn't see the spark from the explosion, there was absolutely no indication where we were that there was something amiss.

There was a slight rumble in the air, something so inconsequential it could have easily been the sound of rolling thunder preluding a storm.

And then, all at once, there was the sound of a siren in my ear.

"This is the Gamma team. We have entered cell block A. Repeat, we are inside of cell block A. Beginning extraction tactics now."

"Affirmative Gamma. Delta team, you are able to detonate in t-minus five...four...three...two...one."

Another resounding boom. This time, I recognized the voice that came onto the radio. It was the voice of Daniel's father, Malcolm Ortiz.

"This is Delta; detonation was a success. We are now entering block E."

"Confirmed, delta. You are clear for entry."

As Tasha spoke to the delta team, I could hear the other MI6 agent speaking in low tones to the gamma team. I did my best to block out the other teams. While it was essential for all of us to have communication with each other in the event of an unforeseen event arising, it was also extremely distracting.

"Alpha, beta, you are a go for entry, in t-minus ten...nine...eight...seven...six..." The sound of gun fire coming from the comms., someone yelling for someone else to get down. "...three...two...one."

And our bomb went off.

It wasn't like the other two which had been softer, mere echoes of the real explosion. This one was real and it was a hundred yards from me. I felt my ears start to ring and had to turn my head away from the explosion in order to avoid looking at the bright flash of light as the concoction of C-4 blew away at the rocky mountain.

"Alpha and beta teams are in position. We are entering block B now."

The six of us moved at half-runs towards the hole that we'd blown into the mountain side. Mariano entered first, followed by Max and myself and then Lia and the other members of her team. Mariano took point as we moved as a group into foreign enemy territory.

It was dark inside of the mountain, much darker than I expected. While I knew it was a top-secret prison hideaway, I expected that Scorpion would have added their own technology to the place, making it more easily inhabitable.

The opposite was true. It was dark and dank and smelled musty. I could hear people banging on cell doors and yelling somewhere near us but the sounds were muffled and my ears were still ringing from the bomb going off.

"Alpha team, you are going to continue straight down this corridor. Do not engage with any prisoners. Your target is Jack Briar alone. Beta team, you need to turn left here. Your first target is fifty yards down."

"Affirmative, control. Alpha team moving forward."

Max and Lia took one last long glance at each other before our teams separated. We wouldn't see each other again, if everything went as it was supposed to, until we were back at where the cars had been left in the clearing. Then, our team continued straight as Lia's deviated to the left and we continued on.

Our path, as predicted, was clear. Tasha led us through a convoluted pathway that allowed us to avoid two different sets of Scorpion personnel as they ran towards where the first explosions had gone off.

She had complete access into their database, meaning that she was able to see what was happening on their security cameras and control what alarms were going off. It wouldn't be long before Scorpion was able to kick her out of the system which meant that we had to act fast before they figured out where we were.

"Beta team you have a row of prison cells on your left. There is a key-panel on the side of the wall. Please enter digits four-seven-three-three-two-nine."

"Affirmative, mission control."

Gasps and cheerful exclamations filled our ears as the first round of MI6 and CIA prisoners were released.

"Delta team, your first objective is in thirty-seven yards. Please continue forward."

"Gamma team—"

I tuned out the chatter completely, forcing myself to rely on my senses. I focused on the the things that I could control. My feet pounding against the solid ground, the gun in my cold hands, my labored breathing.

As per the MI6 agent's instructions, we turned left. What none of us anticipated; however, was to come across a group of Scorpion agents moving at a dead sprint towards the explosions.

Pure instinct took over, so fast that I couldn't even remember moving. I fired once, twice, and two of the four agents fell to the ground, dead. The other two followed a moment later as Max and Mariano lowered their weapons to their sides.

"Nice reflexes, kid," Mariano said to me under his breath.

"Thanks."

We kept moving. We made it through another few minutes of creeping around and came to a stop in front of a heavy metal door with a passcode lock.

"Mission control we need some assistance here. We're at the door separating block B and block D."

"Affirmative, Alpha team. Please enter nine-six-two-seven-eight-seven."

Mariano entered the digits and the door slid upwards, disappearing into the ceiling. "Let's keep going."

We did. It was hard walking through block D. We'd been instructed not to release any prisoners in this block unless we had time on our way out. We were trying to keep our presence in this part of the compound to a minimum. If we sent out a hoard of prisoners from this block too early, they could inadvertently alert the entire prison to the fact that we were here to rescue Jack Briar. It would be safer for all of us to release them on our way out but it was still difficult hearing them bang against doors, begging to be released, and knowing that we had to keep moving.

Block D was relatively devoid of guards. We had to take down two, leaving them dead in the middle of the floor, but managed to make it through relatively undetected.

This was the hardest part of doing this work in the real world. At school, during training, even though we'd been trained to kill and could execute it flawlessly, they never said how hard it was to take a life. I knew that better than anyone else. Until the night of the attack at the school, I'd been the only upperclassmen in history to have killed someone while still in training.

It wasn't an accomplishment to be proud of and I'd carried the weight of my actions on my shoulders since I'd killed that woman in Spain. Nothing could prepare you for the agony of killing. Even if it was for the betterment of the public, it still chipped away a piece of you, some long forgotten part you forgot was even there until you felt the hole in your chest where it used to be.

We finally hit the door to block F, the cell block where my father was being kept.

"Mission control we need to gain entry into block F. Repeat, we need the code that will gain us entry into block F."

"Affirmative Alpha team. Input one-one-seven-three-eight-four."

"Confirmed."

The door slid open.

A gunshot sounded.

Mariano fell to the floor.

The man that shot him was dead not two seconds later and my gun lowered the moment the threat had been subdued.

Max crouched down next to Mariano and my mind flashed back to Paris when Max worked on Brent Grimes as I watched, helpless and unable to do anything.

"How bad?" I asked.

Mariano groaned. Blood was welling around the side of his abdomen. At least he was alive. The bullet had entered him from the side slightly, just missing his bullet-proof vest and lodging in his body.

"He'll live if we get him medical help soon." Max looked up at me, pausing for a half-second in his work of trying to stop the bleeding, pale pink lips pressed into a thin line. We both knew that help was a long way away, especially if the both of us were expected to move forward towards my father.

"Mission control this is alpha team. Alpha one is injured. How far away is medical help?"

"We have a team by helicopter on standby. They're located ten minutes away from the clearing where you left the vehicles."

"Affirmative," I said. "Call them in."

Max and I