[MacsChick]

Okay, as promised, here's part three!

Here's just another note to this part--in one of my previous MacGyver/Jack O'Neill stories, both of them were tortured by Ba'al (if you follow SG-1, you'll know who that is). You might be able to follow this part a little bit better if you have that information. Also, in my MacGyver/Jack O'Neill fics, they're not only related--they're descendents of the Ancients.

Anyway, on with the story!

Invincible Part Three
Rated: PG

It was still early dawn when MacGyver and Jack O’Neill reached their destination—the cemetery where Murdoc had last lured MacGyver into his latest dangerous proposition. The morning mist and the faint light of the rising sun gave the usually eerie, sober gravestones a peaceful appearance, whitewashing them of the years of grime and erosion from the harsh elements, casting them in a soft glow. Jack quietly pulled his rented car up as closely as he could to the ornate wrought iron gates guarding the sanctuary of the dead and parked, shutting off the engine.

“Still closed,” Jack said, looking up at the gates. “It looks like we’ll have to hop the gates, or you can use some of your clever break-in techniques.” He grinned and winked at MacGyver.

“It doesn’t make sense,” MacGyver said. “Murdoc is a master of hiding. He knows I’ve been here before. He wouldn’t return here. Setting fire to my house boat was his way of saying, ‘come and get me,’ his way of re-starting the game between us. He wouldn’t make it this easy to find him. It’s too obvious.”

“I never said he was here,” Jack said, “but it’s important that we come here so I can show you something. I think it’ll help us with our next step.”

They stepped out of the car and approached the gates. MacGyver examined the lock and realized that it would be easy to pick with his knife.

“Well?” Jack asked, watching him.

“I can open it,” MacGyver said.

“That’s good. I wasn’t looking forward to leaping over that thing. My knees are killing me.”

MacGyver pulled out his knife and began to work on the lock. It gave easily.

“Well, the security here sucks,” Jack said.

MacGyver put his knife away and gently pushed the gates open. He looked ahead of him and saw a clear path leading to the large mausoleum that looked so familiar.

“The last time I was here, Murdoc was hiding beneath that tomb,” he said, pointing straight ahead. He looked at Jack. “There’s a hidden room, buried underneath it.”

“Let’s go.”

They walked up the pathway, the thick, moist morning air clinging to their clothes. Both of them glanced around periodically to make sure that no one was watching them. Once they reached the mausoleum and entered it, MacGyver stopped short of the paneling on the floor in geometric shapes. The coffin was no longer on the stone platform, but he knew there could still be some mechanism that tripped it open.

“There’s a trap door here,” he said to Jack. “Be careful.”

“That’s the way in to the underground room, isn’t it?” Jack asked.

“Yeah,” MacGyver said. He looked around for any other possible entrances, but he didn’t see anything. “I guess I’ll have to trip it somehow so we can get down there.”

“Wait,” Jack said, grabbing MacGyver’s arm. “Here’s what I wanted to show you.”

MacGyver looked to where Jack was pointing. Carved in the stone above the bier, he clearly saw the name. It took him a few moments of staring at it to make sure he wasn’t seeing things. He couldn’t believe what he was looking at, completely stunned.

“Murdock,” he said. He turned to look at Jack. “I…I don’t remember seeing that there the last time I was here.”

“Quite a coincidence, isn’t it?” Jack asked, arching his scarred eyebrow.

“Well, I assume that’s all it is. I mean, the name’s not even spelled the same.”

Jack shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “Why don’t you go ahead and set off the trap door. We’ll see what else we find.”

MacGyver nodded, looking around for something to open the trap door. He wasn’t particularly crazy about crashing through the floor again. Even though he knew to be prepared for it this time, he still didn’t want the jarring feeling of falling and coming to an abrupt stop. Besides that, he didn’t know what was waiting below the doors this time.

“The trap door seems to activate after weight has been placed on it for a certain amount of time,” he said, remembering how he fell through after standing above the door for a few minutes. He looked around and saw a large slab of granite that was being carved into a new headstone. It hadn’t been finished or placed yet, and MacGyver went to pick it up. It was slightly heavy. “Jack, c’mere and help me lift this,” he said.

Jack helped him pick up the slab, and they carried it over to the tomb.
“What’s the purpose behind this?” He asked MacGyver.

“Do you want to volunteer to stand on this thing until it opens?” MacGyver asked, smiling at him.

“Uh, no, not really.”

MacGyver pushed on the slab until it was directly over the trap door. “The weight of this headstone should be enough to trigger the trap door to open,” he said. “All we have to do is wait a few minutes.”

MacGyver stood and watched with Jack. Nothing happened. He frowned at it, puzzled.

“You were saying, Mac?” Jack asked.

Suddenly, the floor gave way, sending the slab of granite toppling below ground. MacGyver and Jack moved away, making sure they wouldn’t be taken with it. When the slab landed, they thought they heard what sounded like a piano being crushed, several keys producing a mangled, dying note upon impact. The trap doors remained open, seemingly overburdened with the heavy weight of the slab. They were beginning to creak on bent hinges, slowly closing again.

“What the hell?” Jack asked, watching the doors with fascination.

“Come on, Jack, let’s get down there before they close!” MacGyver said.

He slid his body between the slowly narrowing hole in the floor, carefully dangling from the doors and looking down to see what was below him. The granite slab had crushed a grand piano. The cage that Murdoc had set up to catch MacGyver after the trap doors swallowed him was gone, replaced by the piano. It and the slab weren’t too far away from his feet, so he lowered himself down onto it and then stepped down to the floor.

“Okay Jack, come on down here!” He shouted up to Jack, whose face he could see peering down through the crack in the doors.

“There’s room for a safe landing, I hope,” Jack said.

“Yeah, don’t worry. It’s not that far.”

MacGyver watched as Jack slipped through the closing doors. He saw the smashed piano and the granite slab below him, and he also used them to step down to the floor. He looked up and saw the trap doors seal shut, enclosing them in dim light and stale air. Jack looked at the piano, impressed by its destruction. Twisted wires and keys spread out, revealing the guts of the instrument.

“Oops,” he said. “Looks like somebody’s gonna need a new hobby.”

MacGyver looked around the underground room. Everything else had stayed the same. The only thing that had changed was the placement of the piano. The sweeping mahogany staircase, the antique furniture, and the old lanterns were still there. He lit several of them, bringing more light into the dismal abode. Cobwebs and dust clouded the corners, but the furniture still looked clean and well-maintained, almost as if Murdoc had been living there. He shuddered, thinking the place was indeed a perfect fit for a man into the deadly arts.

“Cozy,” Jack said, smirking. He waved away a cobweb that was near his face.

“The last time I was here,” MacGyver said, “I did a favor for Murdoc.”

“You did a favor for a Goa’uld?” Jack asked in disgust.

“I didn’t know he was a Goa’uld at the time. He wanted me to help his sister who, as far as I can tell, is innocent—and fully human.”

“Yeah, I get it. That’s a tough call.” Jack walked down the stairway.

“So Jack, what are we doing back here?” MacGyver asked, watching as his cousin appeared to be searching for something, his gun drawn as a precaution.

“Daniel thinks that there’s something here that will help us,” Jack said, still searching. “Some clue or something.” He stopped when he reached the far corner of the room. It was hidden beneath the area above that housed the piano, and it was in a darker part of the room. He turned on his flashlight and saw a long object covered in a cloth. Instinctively, he knew what it was. Before he unveiled it, he needed his cousin. “Mac, I think you’d better come down here,” he said, staring at the cloaked object.

MacGyver walked down the ornate stairway. “Did you find something, Jack?” He asked. He also stopped when he saw the covered object, staring at it.

“Oh yeah,” Jack said. “Take a look.” He gave MacGyver the flashlight and he pulled back the cloth, revealing what both of them dreaded it was.

“A sarcophagus,” MacGyver whispered.

Both of them stared at it, remembering in horror how its regenerative powers were used to restore them to health, only for each of them to be repeatedly tortured separately by Ba’al. MacGyver began to see how it connected to Murdoc, and why he never died. Murdoc was found of underground spaces like this one. He lurked in caves and catacombs, and seemed to have a strong obsession with death.

“That’s why he never dies,” MacGyver said out loud, still staring at the Goa’uld device. “He has a sarcophagus.”

“That, and having a Goa’uld symbiote doesn’t hurt, either,” Jack said.

“What if he’s inside?”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out, isn’t there?”

Jack opened the sarcophagus, his weapon aimed at it, prepared for any unpleasant surprises. They watched as the gold, wing-like lid split open, revealing the white, glowing core inside. Both of them released a sigh in relief.

“It’s empty,” MacGyver said.

Jack glared at the sarcophagus and clenched his teeth, remembering with anger their abuse inside the machine. “We’ve gotta destroy this thing,” he said, as if thinking out loud.

“What?” MacGyver asked.

“If we destroy it, Murdoc might finally be able to die.”

“I’m afraid that will have to wait,” someone said behind them.

The distinctive British accent made it clear who it was. Both of them turned and saw Murdoc standing there.

To be continued…

[trtlsoup]

*cue dastardly madman music*



GOOD chapter!

[MacGyverGod]

MacGyver, Jack and Murdoc in one story. Beautiful. Their interactions are great.

[Pseodonym]

Du Du Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun