Missing Scenes, "Horn of Plenty"
by Sammie

DISCLAIMER: Not mine. "Airwolf" belongs to Belisarius Productions and CBS and USA and Universal.

RATING: T

SUMMARY: Missing scenes from "Horn of Plenty" - Caitlin and Hawke's POVs.

A/N: While brainwashing isn't new to "Airwolf," "HoP" was certainly different from the earlier, subtler attempts to brainwash String (Charles and Diana splitting up!) and Archangel. Angelica is underwhelming, imho, but isn't a cookie-cutter villain (Hickland's comment that would bring Angelica into the show if the show had lasted confuses me .), and I loved Hawke's recovery scene.

Best part: Caitlin was the key to the episode! The suggestion about her flying Airwolf, taking down the guard, fighting String, her role in Hawke's recovery. I was a little puzzled by her clear hostility towards Angelica, because she's watched tons of women hit on Hawke and hasn't reacted so viscerally before (e.g. Holly, Lia).

She looks over the set of needles. There's so many.

"You have to mix certain vials together before you inject," Michael is explaining. "Unfortunately, they need to be kept separate until four hours before injection." He points at the next set. "These are for if you screw up."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Dom retorts.

"It's still a prototype," Michael warns. "Hawke will be our second human subject and the first unmonitored one."

"Second?" Dom asks, frowning.

Caitlin stares at Michael, who looks back at them unflinchingly. "You," she murmurs, understanding dawning. "When we got you out of East Germany."

"They used it immediately after I attempted to kill the Committee. It's been tweaked since then."

Tweaked. But still with an outrageous potential for death.

She closes the vial case and looks out the window of the limousine.

She gasps, trying not to flinch as she watches Dom go down after being shot. Hawke starts walking towards the Lady, and she quickly dives into the empty missile compartment and slams the door shut.

She waits in silence as the doors to Airwolf open, and somebody besides just Hawke also gets in. She carefully turns over the small, zippered pouch holding the serum, listening for their conversation.

The original plan was for Dom to drop off Airwolf, and he and Hawke would leave in whatever vehicle (land or air) they could. The minute they took off, she'd get Airwolf into the air and give them cover going home.

It was assumed that Horn would take Airwolf and attempt to keep Hawke or force Hawke to fly Airwolf under duress. Either way, Cait was to take out anybody else, inject Hawke with the serum (if needed) and fly to pick up Santini.

Of course, nobody expected that Hawke would shoot Dom.

She listens to the conversation between Airwolf's main pilot and the man Horn has accompanying him. It seems pretty clear that Hawke is not flying under duress. She cracks the door open a peek; she doesn't have a very good view, but she can't see that anybody is holding a gun to him.

They land, and the soldier in the plane gets out first as Hawke shuts down the Lady by himself. All right. String's cooperating with Horn for sure.

She sighs. Time for another plan.

She clicks the button on, giving Airwolf enough lights to attract just one person over. She waits for him, lying across the seat in the dark so he can't see her through the windshield. A sharp kick to the sternum sends him down; she strips him and ties him up, then shoves him into the missile chamber and closes and blocks the door, leaving just enough air to breathe.

As she struggles to change into the guard's uniform in Airwolf's tiny cabin, she ponders (rather incongruously) the question of how Hawke even manages to change in here in such record time. She tucks her hair under the cap and pulls it down low, then turns off Airwolf and starts to get out.

A guard shouts at her. "Everything OK?"

She tosses him a thumbs up, then shoulders her gun and disappears into the building. The hallways all look alike, and she tries to give herself mental bread crumbs so she can find her way back out, but soon she is lost. She decides to focus on finding Hawke and Dom instead and starts following the non-guards, men and women in lab coats or pushing food trays - and sure enough, they lead her where she needs to go.

She sees the blonde from three days ago, right outside String's room. She knew that woman was up to no good.

She slips softly into his room, the door snicking shut quietly behind her. She stands a little uncertainly, not sure where he is.

He comes around the corner, staring at her through narrowed eyes. "Hawke," she calls gently.

He doesn't stop his advance; he doesn't seem to recognize her. She calls his name again; "Spy!" he screams at her and nearly catches her when he jumps. She lands a hard kick to his sternum, wincing as her friend goes reeling onto the floor. He recovers more quickly than she anticipated and grabs her, slamming her against the wall. She sees stars for a moment, and everything blinks black for a second, and she can feel herself sliding down the wall. He starts to peel her off of the wall, turning her to land a solid punch.

Her head's still throbbing, but she manages a half turn and slams the needle into his chest. He groans in pain and seems to black out, slumping into the wall and pinning her under him.

She carefully guides his fall, trying to adjust her own position so she doesn't hurt either of them. He collapses on top of her, a dead weight.

She carefully rolls him over, and to her horror, he begins convulsing.

He hears the door snick shut, and there's somebody standing in his room with the normal green uniform of Horn's men.

There's something familiar about her face. The eyes - there's something - why does she seem so familiar? She calls his name, and her voice sparks a distant memory.

Logically, he doesn't know anybody here except John and his daughter Angelica. If he recognizes her, then perhaps she was checking up on him, trying to sabotage whatever it was - "Spy!" he screams, launching himself at her.

She gets a well-aimed kick in, and he goes reeling into his beside table. Man, Horn's guards are well-trained. She reaches for him - why is she doing that? - but he grabs her and slams her against the wall.

There's a soft cry, and the body slides down the wall bonelessly. He reaches for his opponent, and for a moment something flashes in his mind; she feels familiar, too. For a split second he hesitates, and then his logic kicks back in, and he pulls her around to give her a stunning blow.

A second later he feels the jab of a needle under his ribcage and he groans in pain, then blacks out.

She's emotionally exhausted, and for once she feels the fight drain out of her.

One third results in death, Michael had said, and she was the one who injected him. In one day she had thought she lost Dom and now she's lost String, and the latter by her own hand.

She'd joked once about getting a chance to fly Airwolf if the Lady's two main pilots were unable to: "What counts as something happening to you or String?" She'd meant it as a joke; she really had. Be careful what you wish for.

She loves Airwolf. In a unit with two men, she and the Lady have a special kinship. But even Airwolf isn't worth this.

Too exhausted to move, she just lays her head on String's chest, tears falling down her face.

His blackout ends, and he feels like he's waking from a long, disturbing dream. There's a weight on he chest.

He raises his head, and the weight on his chest lifts quickly. "Hawke? Hawke." He knows that voice.

He instinctively reaches a hand for her face, brushing some of her hair out of the way, cupping her face gently. "Cait?"

"Yeah." Her voice stills as she swallows back tears.

He props himself up, trying to figure out where he is. He looks around, his mind slowly registering his surroundings. The expression of her face is completely inscrutable. He thinks he sees relief on Caitlin's face, but his mind feels foggy; he tries to swallow. He still can't remember -

"You all right?" she asks softly.

He looks to the door, then suddenly back at her, his panic rising. "Huh."

"What?"

Everything comes rushing back. Angelica, Horn, the brainwashing room, the - "I - " He panics, grabbing for her desperately. "I killed Dom?" Distantly he can hear her contradicting him, but it's all he can register right now: "I killed Dom?"

"No! no." She soothes him, gripping his shoulders, looking at him pleadingly. "He's in a cell here. Your gun was filled with tranquilizers."

He's not processing.

"He's all right. I've seen him," she assures him.

He can't process it. He sees Dom falling, and that's all he sees in his mind's eye, and somewhere he is screaming, and he can't tell if it's in his mind or if he's doing it or if it's Dom when he shot him and -

"I've seen him," she whispers.

Her soft whisper inexplicably manages to break through to him, and he tightens his grip on her, turning back to look at her. Amidst the whirl of his thoughts, he can hear her whisper in his mind again, and he latches on. Cait wouldn't lie. Cait wouldn't lie. Cait wouldn't lie.

He can feel his heartrate slowing back to normal. Cait wouldn't lie.

She is in business mode. "Hawke. Who is this guy, Horn?"

He blinks, trying to follow her lead. Horn. Horn. Right. "...couple years ago. He, uh." He mumbles, trying to figure out what he wants to say. "High rises didn't get built, oil wells didn't get drilled. Government contracts didn't get done, and I don't know." Come on. He knows more than this. He feels like he's back in 'Nam, wading through a swamp thick with mud and feeling woozy and trying to keep from getting sunstroke.

"Government - " Cait. Focus on Cait's voice. "- had him up for grand jury indictment," she remembers. "Right. He disappeared."

He's nodding, trying to make sense of what he's saying.

"What does he want with you?" she asks.

"An Airwolf mission."

It suddenly clicks for him, and he turns to look at her right away. She came with Airwolf for him. Dom came to deliver the Lady for him; she must have been on board and sneaked in. She's clever - oh, she's clever.

His mind keeps bouncing around like a ball in a pinball machine. It notes that her mascara's running a little. That, and she's beautiful.

His gaze drops to her mouth, and he leans in instinctively, pulling her ever so slightly towards him.

Even in his grogginess, he feels a slight resistance. He knows when a woman's not on the same page as he is. And Caitlin's currently in another book entirely.

He pulls back, trying to focus on the direction she'd taken him in - Horn. Business first. She's right. This is not the time or place. "I gotta find away to get us all out of this."

He looks up at her, and he can't seem to look away. She nods, and he can almost hear the cogs turning her mind. She's the most beautiful thing he thinks he's seen in this long nightmare; she came for him. She came for him.

Now she's back under his protection. (A tiny voice that sounds suspiciously like Cait adds indignantly that she can take care of herself, thank you very much, and she'll bite anybody who says otherwise. He doesn't care to delve into the reasons why Cait has her own voice in his head.) "I gotta find a way to get us all out of this," he murmurs.

"We will."

They hear somebody at the door, and Cait quickly grabs her cap and slides it over her head, stuffing her hair underneath it and lowering her head.

The door opens, and the guard comes in. "Something wrong?"

"Fell," he replies shortly from where he's half sitting on the floor. "Hit my head. He beat you here." He jerks a thumb back at Cait.

"Want a doctor?"

"I'm fine."

The guard nods, and then - thank God - he barks at Caitlin, "Stay to make sure he doesn't have a concussion or something. Horn'll have our heads if something goes wrong."

She nods.

The door opens, then closes. He turns back to Cait and moves to take her cap off before stopping himself. She needs her cover.

"Come on. Let's get you up." She helps to pull him to his feet, and he leans heavily on her.

She drops him into the a chair at the far end of the room, away from the window in the door, and kneels in front of him. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I got hit by a semi," he mutters. He drops his hand to her shoulder and feels her wince slightly underneath his hand. "Cait?"

"Nothing. I'm fine."

He narrows his eyes, trying to work through the fog of his memories.

He slammed her into the wall.

A wave of nausea comes over him, and he feels like he's going to throw up. He vaguely remembers her body suddenly going soft under his as she slid down the wall. "I hurt you," he murmurs, dread rising in his chest. "I slammed you into the - Cait," he gasps, reaching for her.

She just shakes her head. "You weren't yourself," she soothes. "It's OK. Besides." She gestures to his shirt, where there is a faint footprint, made by the dust and dirt on Caitlin's boot. "I think I need to apologize too," she smiles sheepishly. "And I wasn't under the influence of anything." She winces. "Although I don't know if 'sorry' is enough."

He gives a small laugh. "That was some kick," he mutters. He's had worse, but it was well-placed and had enough power to send him flying.

"You don't hurt?" she murmurs, concentrating on brushing some specks from her bootprint off his shirt.

He shakes his head, watching her, and his hand instinctively comes up to trace along her cheek. She came for him. She didn't leave him behind.

Her eyes flicker up, and then she snaps back into business mode. "OK. What do we do now?"

"Um." He pauses. "I'll keep up the brainwashed charade." What a stupid comment. Of course he will; duh. He tries to think up a better plan, but he feels like his brain is still off in lala land.

"When's your mission?" she asks briskly.

"Tomorrow morning, six a.m."

Cait nods. "OK. That's good. The nurses said Dom would need some more time to recover. You go out, as scheduled. Fly the Lady out, then circle back. Blow the back door for me. I'll grab Dom and we'll meet you out at the far side. I'll bring you details later; I got to scope out this place."

He nods, letting her guide him this time. He normally comes up with the plans, and he never stopped to think that, well, she's perfectly capable of it herself. He feels a desperate relief at that; he feels like a large burden has been lifted from his shoulders.

"I gotta go. I can't stay much longer," Caitlin whispers.

He nods. "Where are you going to stay the night? Don't stay in the barracks."

She shakes her head. "I have to take care of something first."

He reaches for her. "Let me help."

She pauses, pursing her lips, and then a small, enigmatic smile crosses her face. "I think you can."

He tells Horn that he needs to make sure Airwolf flies all right the next morning; he wants to take her for a test flight.

They stand outside the cave Airwolf's in; the night sky is black but dotted with tiny points of light. Horn asks him if he's all right . Apparently, Hawke thinks, he's picked up some acting skills from watching the actors on the sets he's been on. He lies convincingly.

Cait has placed herself strategically in the shadows near Airwolf, and Horn, unaware of her identify, gives her the directions to follow him into Airwolf. She climbs into the copilot side with her huge gun, and he lifts off with Airwolf. It's a shame, he thinks. If Dom weren't still out and unconscious, he'd blast his way through the compound and bust Dom out now and they'd all go home.

They zoom out, and Cait signals. They agreed - hand signals only, in case Horn's got listening devices in the Lady.

He loses a tail.

He circles around, then lands. Cait pulls the guard out and lays him peacefully down on the grass and undoes his ankle cuffs. She doesn't take off the blindfold, but she carefully tucks a blanket around the guard.

He managed to fake long enough to get another sleeping pill from the doctors, which he didn't injest like he normally was convinced to do. They fed it to the guard Cait had locked in the missile compartment; hopefully that'll keep him happily unconscious until morning - until after they're long gone.

It still amuses him that Cait locked him there.

He can't help but smile as she carefully leaves the guard behind, covering him with some branches, too. He suspects that, while the branches make nice camouflage, she might still be afraid he'll catch cold. As she comes back onto the plane, he looks over at her, his lips twitching.

She gives him a look. 'What?' she mouths.

'Blanket?' he mouths back.

'I don't want him to freeze!' she insists.

Back at Horn's compound, he manages to convince Horn to let Caitlin "protect" Airwolf that night. He feels safer knowing that if and when she sleeps (she says she's got a lot to do tonight), she'll be sleeping in the aerial battleship, rather than in the barracks with the rest of Horn's men. In addition, she can escape if she needs to.

He tries not to flinch when Angelica comes again, and he gives her as sweet a smile as he can muster, and lets her kiss him.

She's beautiful, and she genuinely seems to have fallen for him, and he can even forgive her for what she's done, but any feelings he might have had for her are gone.

This woman drugged him, used him. She let him shoot his closest friend, and she let him think that he was dead.

Angelica let him get brainwashed and shoot Dom.

It takes all his willpower not to recoil when she touches him. She drugged him so much that he shot Dom - the man who raised him, who taught him to fly.

He's tired, but he's almost afraid to close his eyes. Sleep comes in fits. In his dreams, he sees Dom greeting him, asking after him; he sees Dom falling.

In his dreams, he also sees Cait, her face with dried tears. She would never. She would never do what Angelica would have done; she can't even do what Marella and Michael's agents did all the time. She would never drug him and let him shoot Dom. She would never let him do something that would've wounded him like that.

"I've seen him." Her voice is soft and gentle and reassuring, and for an instant he thinks she's there; her voice is soft but audible. "I've seen him."

With that, he falls into a short but peaceful sleep before he's roused at 5 a.m.

He can't quite understand her hatred of Angelica Horn. Given, he doesn't like Angelica any more than she does, but still.

His guilt over shooting Dom is not likely to fade soon, no matter how many times the man assures him that they're well and good.

He leans against a post on his front porch, looking out to the lake. Just then, he feels her warm hand resting between his shoulderblades. "Hey," she greets with her smile, and he finds himself comparing her to Angelica for the millionth time that day. "I can see the smoke coming out of your ears."

He smiles back at her.

"You all right?" she asks gently.

"Yeah."

She pauses, then covers his hand with hers. "Dom doesn't blame you, you know. He knows you weren't in your right mind."

"He wasn't the only one I hurt," he mutters.

"Oh, me?" she looks genuinely surprised and dismisses it with a wave of her hand. "You barely touched me."

He fingers the bruise that's showing up on her collarbone, and she pulls her sweater to cover it.

"Besides," she jokes. "I kicked you square in the chest, and I was in my right mind. You don't blame me for that, do you?"

He gives a short laugh, then shakes his head. "No."

"Well, then," she offers brightly. He just smiles at her. She turns so that she's facing forward again, staring at the lake. Her expression dims. "Besides," she says sourly. "Somebody drugged you."

"She didn't actually do it herself," he murmured.

"She helped," his coworker snaps.

"I was drugged, Cait. She didn't force me to do anything."

Caitlin turns to him sharply. "If I were drugged so that some man could take advantage of me - like that sheriff in Pope County - would that count any less as a crime because I wasn't aware what was happenin'?"

"No," he answers immediately.

"That's right," she snaps.

"Cait, it's different."

"Why?" Her twang is more audible when she's upset. "'Cause I'm a woman and you're not?" she snaps. She turns back so that she's looking at the lake, not at him. After a moment she turns to him, and her eyes are filled with tears. He stares at her, astonished. "I'm sorry," she says softly, and her voice shakes just a tiny bit. "You saved me from that sheriff twice and I couldn't reach you in time."

He reaches for her hand and squeezes it tightly in his.

He lies in his bed that night, unable to rest. He's exhausted, but his mind's too full to sleep.

Angelica's words and all they shared - did, he corrects himself - weigh on his mind. Not share. He isn't sure what to think.

He hates being lied to. He hates it. But he could even excuse being lied to for his own benefit, as much as he dislikes it and would never do it himself.

But Angelica didn't lie to him for his own benefit; she did it for hers.

He knows Horn's daughter is conflicted, caught between her own feelings for him and her loyalty to her father. He can understand being caught between a rock and a hard place, he can, but something just doesn't sit right, and he doesn't just mean Horn.

He throws his covers off and starts to head downstairs for a cup of water.

He stands at the top of the stairs, his eyes adjusting to the darkness in the cabin. Dom and Cait were still at his home very late, so they're crashing at his place tonight. They'd partitioned part of the loft off and put Dom on a cot upstairs; he was sleeping a lot, as he was still working off the effects of the drug. He'd tried to get Cait to take his room and he'd take the couch, but she refused; she wasn't the one drugged in any way. She'd be fine downstairs, she said.

She's not even sleeping on the couch; she's sitting on the floor, resting her back against a large couch pillow, a book in her lap; her head is tilted back, her mouth slightly open. One hand rests on Tet. She's asleep.

He can't help a small smile and starts down the stairs quietly; she doesn't wake. He carefully scoops her up, and she gives a start. "String?"

"Yeah."

"'Need somethin'?" Her drawl is thicker in her sleep, he notes. "Need somethin' for me to get?"

She's exhausted; she's not making complete sense. "No. I can get it."

It doesn't register. "'S't Dom? Need something - "

He lays her on the couch, pulling the quilt tightly around her. She sighs contendly, adjusting herself and pulling herself deeper under the quilt. "If - you 'n Dom need ev'ryfi - somefin'. 'S in the fridge."

He tries not to laugh. He doubts she will remember anything about this conversation the next morning. "Go to sleep, Cait," he says quietly.

She worms her way deeper under the quilt and is out like a light.

He goes to pour himself a cup of water; Michael's doctor told him to stay hydrated as his body worked to expel the last bits of the drugs used on him - both Horn's and the antidote. Thinking over what Cait said, out of curiosity, he goes to the fridge and opens the door. He's not expecting to find anything.

He sees a huge container of chopped vegetables, ready to eat, and a large bowl of fruit salad, and there seems to be individually-wrapped packages of food that could be tossed straight into a pan to saute for a meal. He doesn't remember Cait doing any of this, but he had gone to bed early. She must think that he's going to forget to eat or something in the next few days.

He gets his glass of water and starts to head up the stairs again as he looks down at her. She sighs softly, her brow smooth and quiet.

He steps closer to her, as if drawn like a moth to a flame. The moonlight coming in plays softly on her features. The sleep of the innocent, he thinks; not the innocent of a child who knows nothing of the world, but the sleep of the innocent who has a clear conscience.

She has never made a play for him; she has never stood in his way except when she felt it was for his benefit. Her affection is like Dom's - supportive but freeing.

Freeing.

Everything clicks into place for him. He stares at her, as if seeing her fresh. Angelica had days to let him go, if she truly loved him. She could have let him go and never gone through with the kidnapping; she could have set him free before he was brainwashed. She could have let him go after all that. She hadn't. All she wanted was for him to forgive her her deception so that he could love her. She had no intention of letting him go, and she hadn't. He'd made it out of Horn's grasp with no thanks to her.

He'll bet that Angelica knows it. Knows that he would leave in a heartbeat if he knew everything, and that's why she clung so hard.

Caitlin's breath is soft, deep, and regular; she's fast asleep. He can risk standing here a little longer and just watch, without her waking.

She risked her life to free him. She risked losing him permanently to free him; Michael had mentioned that in one third of cases death occurred. It explained her tears; apparently he had narrowly escaped being one of that third by providence alone. She had not come to help him in order to oblige him to her, not any more than he had saved her in Pope County in order to oblige her to him.

In her half-awake, half-asleep moments just minutes ago, Caitlin asked about him and Dom and what they needed. In Angelica's most conscious moments, she started every sentence with how SHE wanted him and how SHE cared about him. She hadn't asked about him and his feelings, except to know whether he could forgive her. The stark contrast jars him.

Caitlin gives a small sigh, then turns slightly so that she's facing away from the back of the couch. A lock of hair falls over her face.

He pulls closer to her, gently brushing the hair out of her face. She doesn't wake; he begins to wonder how much rest she ever actually got. She had spent the night scoping out the building to find which doors he should blow out and laid out an escape plan for her and Dom, and he hadn't questioned her about it. He is beginning to think, however, that the ease with which she designed the plan speaks more of having examined every option and eliminated the bad ones than a simple, on-the-spot idea. If that's true, that means she'd been tromping the grounds for hours, awake the entire night. No wonder she's exhausted.

He traces her cheek, his fingertips brushing over her skin softly. He cups her cheek very, very lightly so as not to wake her, his thumb gently brushing over the skin, an unconscious smile as he looks at all the freckles dotting her face.

He isn't sure how long he's there before he stands up to go back to bed.

end