"I know this place," Hannibal said as the team and Decker got out of their cars beside a huge and dilapidated building. "Old power station. Been closed since the sixties."

They had parked outside an open entrance big enough to drive a truck into. The shapes of old machinery loomed out of the shadows in the cavernous space beyond the entranceway.

"Murdock, I want you to stay here and guard the cars."

"Hannibal, I feel okay."

"I know, but we're miles from civilisation. If Amy is hurt, or if any of us get hurt, then these cars might mean the difference between life and death. I'm not risking leaving them out here unguarded."

Murdock still didn't look happy, but nodded. Hannibal turned to the rest of his team, including the temporary tag-along.

"I know it's tough, but we need this guy alive. That might be the only sure way to clear Face and those other men."

"Agreed," Decker said. "Non lethal force unless absolutely necessary."

Hannibal didn't like Decker's tone, his words sounded too much like an order, but they had no time to argue about it.

"This place is huge," Face said. "How the hell do we cover it?"

"We'll split up." Hannibal started handing around flashlights. "It may be huge, but I'll bet he's working out of the control room. That's what we have to find."

"Split up?" BA frowned and glanced at the battered Murdock. "This guy ain't no pushover."

"Two teams of two?" Decker suggested, looking at Hannibal, who nodded.

Face scowled. "Oh let me guess whose team I get to be on."

+-+-+

Amy shivered lying on the cot. He'd just torn the battery pack of the wire out and though he'd not attempted to touch her beyond retrieving that, the feel of his hands against her flesh had terrified her.

Cut off now from passing any message to the team she felt more alone than before. The guys were coming, but until they got to her, she only had herself to rely on. Her captor said he didn't intend to kill her, but he also seemed too crazy for her to rely on his words. His intentions could change in a second.

Right now, he was bending over his workbench and she could hear little clicking sounds. She'd heard them before, in her time with the team. The sound of bullets clicking one by one into an ammunition clip.

"Hey," Amy called, stretching up. "I thought you wanted to apologise to Face, talk to him. You need a gun for that?"

He looked over his shoulder at her.

"Just to keep him from killing me as soon as he sees me."

"He wouldn't do that. He's not a killer."

"Of course he's a killer, Amy. That's what he's trained to be, that's what we were all trained to be."

"You were in the army too? In the war?"

"Yes."

"You know..." she needed to keep him talking, let the guys get close, closer than he's ready for. But it frightened her; terrified she'd say something wrong, something to make him angry. "You know it's all over, don't you?"

"Of course." His voice sounded resigned, rather tired. He turned back to continue loading the clip.

"Then talk to me. I'm a reporter, I can tell your story. You know that, well people won't approve of what you've done, but some of them will understand what you feel, about those men, about how wrong everything is."

He looked at her again, frowning. "You want to tell my story?"

"I'm a reporter."

"You're part of the A-Team."

"I'm a reporter first."

"I find that hard to believe."

You're not the only one.

"Don't you want to make sure at least one reporter has the truth?"

"I don't know..." He shook his head. "No. I never wanted that. None of that crap."

"You mean publicity?"

"I just wanted... Not to exist." He wandered slowly across to her. "I didn't want the cops to even suspect I could exist. They had their killers. I was... never there."

"Until Face."

"Yes." He looked at the floor, shame in his expression for the first time. "Yes."

"So why did you stay after that? You could have run, left LA, gone anywhere."

"Oh no." He shook his head. "No, I have to make it right with Peck. It's a matter of honour."

He came towards her and she shrank away as he knelt down by the cot, but mustered the courage to speak again.

"Can I ask you one more thing? Since it's over, like you say, and after this you'll be..." What? In jail? Dead? "You won't be doing this any more; can I ask you your name?" When he looked at her face, she smiled weakly. "Hey, reporters, we always want to be the first one to know."

He shrugged. Just a small shrug, as if he didn't care any more.

"Nathan Saunders. Sergeant. Do you want my serial number too, Miss Allen?"

+-+-+

"Hannibal," BA said, as they moved quietly along a wide aisle between banks of machines. "What we gonna do 'bout Decker once we got Amy?"

"We'll get away from him, BA, don't worry."

"I know that. But he knows about her now. Knows for sure I mean. And about Murdock."

"Then we all go, BA. We stick together."

BA didn't answer for a moment, until Hannibal looked back at him.

"Don't like the idea of taking Amy on the lam with us, Colonel. Ain't fair. She didn't do nothing' wrong."

"I don't think Decker sees it that way." Hannibal shrugged. "Can we talk about it later, BA? We'll figure something --"

He stopped and looked down at his foot as he felt a difference in the surface he'd put it on, saw a small metal plate, a trailing wire and heard a distinct click.

"Oh hell."

Several small bangs sounded rapidly ahead of them, explosive bolts giving way and the floor they stood on vanished under their feet. It dropped away, and they slid and scrabbled, trying to keep their feet, and failing. They slid down a trap door, until it slapped back against the side of the pit and BA and Hannibal crashed down to the bottom.

"I'm getting real tired of falling down tonight," BA growled.

The trap wasn't meant to kill. Hannibal realised that as they landed on the floor of the pit to find it covered in old mattresses and gym crash mats. Still the impact was enough to make him dizzy he stayed lying down for a moment, looking around.

At least fifteen feet deep and the sides of the pit offered no handholds to climb out. Scars on the concrete sides of the pit suggested to Hannibal that a piece of machinery had been embedded in here once. Perhaps it had been sold when the place closed. Now the pit it left behind had become a booby trap, which told Hannibal something important.

"This guy's been using this place for a long time," he said, as BA helped him to his feet. "Long enough to prepare the place for invasion."

"Maybe Face and Decker already ran into a trap too."

"Maybe. We'll find out, when we get out of here." He looked up. Far too high, even for one of them to climb up on the other's shoulders. Only one way out of this. He raised his radio.

"Murdock, come in." Hannibal smiled when BA moaned.

If there was one thing BA hated, it was being rescued by Murdock.

+-+-+

Face and Decker had ventured deep inside the power station, searching for the control centre. They were about to turn into a long wide passageway, but Face put a hand on Decker's arm before he turned the corner.

"Wait. I think I hear something." He'd heard and seen something several times now, barely more than a footfall and a shadow ahead of them. Either this place had ghosts, or someone was leading them. No. Luring them.

Decker stood back and let Face peek round the bend, for no more than a second, but enough to see what he needed to see.

"He's there. Stood right in the open, but he's got Amy at gunpoint." Face didn't dare attempt a shot at him. Even a headshot could cause a spasm of his trigger finger, killing Amy. Another plan, he needed another plan. Looking up at the high walls, Face saw a catwalk running along high above the passageway. A stairway up to it lay about thirty yards back the way they came.

"Decker, you want to see if you can get behind him, along that catwalk?"

Decker looked up at it, followed it with his eyes and nodded. The moonlight, from windows high in the walls gave enough light up there that he wouldn't need his flashlight.

"Okay. What do you plan to do?"

"The way he's standing there, I think he's waiting to talk to someone. If I keep him talking while you get past him -- better take your shoes off, by the way."

"Right." Decker nodded. "And then?"

"You sneak up on him while he's distracted. Or if he hears you, he's going to point that gun at you and not Amy. And when he does, if I'm close enough, I'll disarm him."

"If you're not close enough?"

"Then I'll shoot him. In the leg," he added when Decker raised his eyebrows.

"Right." Decker turned to go.

"Decker," Face said, quietly, making him turn back. "Good luck."

"You too."

Face watched him go, waited while Decker stopped to remove his shoes then started to climb the stairs to the catwalk. Time to go. He poked his head round the corner again, and lingered a bit this time. Long enough to be seen.

About fifty yards away a man stood, holding a pistol on Amy who sat on the ground beside him. Taking a longer look this time Face saw that she was gagged, the sight of that made his head throb and his guts tighten into a ball of needles.

The two were in a pool of dim light from an old bulb high above them. More bulbs made evenly spaced circles of light along the floor.

As Face ducked his head back, he heard a man's voice.

"Peck? That's you, Peck, I know it's you. Show yourself."

Nothing I'd like better. He waited a moment, glancing up to see the dim figure of Decker on the catwalk. Decker stood still, and Face guessed he would wait for Face to move, to focus the killer's attention, so he wouldn't notice Decker creeping along high above.

Can I trust Decker? In this, rescuing Amy, yeah, no question. On the other hand, if this works, I'll have to watch myself, because for sure after this Decker goes back to being, well, Decker.

Long enough. Face stepped into the open, his pistol pointed out in front of him, started to walk slowly.

"Let Amy go!"

"Peck?"

"Yeah, it's me. Let Amy go now or I'll kill you."

"I need to talk, Peck, that's all. I don't want to hurt her."

Face frowned. The man sounded sincere, almost pleading. Despite his assurance that he didn't want to hurt Amy he still held the gun to her head. Face had to force himself not to look at her, needing to keep his eyes on the killer, watching for the slightest sign he might be about to pull the trigger.

And looking at his face brought the memories back. The white jacketed waiter he'd barely spoken to, too intent on Celia to notice him. Now the face came back to him, as he remembered letting him into the room, letting him open the bottle, and tipping him. My god, tipping the man who would later come back into the room and murder Celia. Face swallowed, trying to lose the sick taste in his mouth.

"What do you want?" Face called, from fifty yards away now. Must keep him talking, keep his eyes and ears on me, and give Decker the chance to flank him, get behind him.

"I just want to talk, Peck. I know it's all over, but I need to talk to you."

"Damn right it's all over. Amy? You okay?" He spared a quick glance at her, assessing. She nodded. Now he was closer Face could see a shackle around one of her ankles, a chain leading to a metal loop sticking out of the floor. Her hands were bound behind her.

"Who the hell are you anyway? What do you want?"

"Sergeant Nathan Saunders, Lieutenant. I need to tell you that I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" Seemed a little late for that.

"You're not the kind of man I wanted to punish. You're not one of those... those liars and phoneys."

"What? Don't you know who the hell you're talking to? I'm the biggest liar and phoney there is!"

"No!" Saunders shouted, and Face saw him flush. The gun he had pointed at Amy came up briefly to point at Face, who now stood around ten yards from him. "That's close enough!" Face stopped as the gun went back to point at Amy. "You're not like them! You're better!"

"I'm worse." Face didn't yell it. "At least their achievements were real. They were rich, they did have power. I just lied about it."

"Real?" Saunders shook his head. "You're real. We're real. What you did, we did, in the war. What we went through in those camps. What they make into entertainment, to slander us --"

"Stop saying 'us'." Quiet again, quieter than before. Saunders didn't seem to hear it.

"That's real, you're a war hero!"

"According to some, I'm a war criminal."

"According to who?"

A crash to Face's right made all three of them spin around. A section of catwalk had given way, swinging downwards, and Decker came sliding, tumbling down it, and landed hard on the ground, on his face. He lay still. The rigged catwalk section swung back and forth, the end of it six feet over Decker's head.