MacGyver was the first person through the door, and he stopped when he spotted Bozer and Thornton in the kitchen holding champagne glasses and bottles of the bubbly. He felt Jack nudge him forward, so he could get in the door, along with Riley. So Mac stepped all the way into the kitchen, eyes locked on Thornton. "How did you beat us here?" They had left her at the Foundation not an hour ago.

"I took off while you three hit the showers," Thornton replied,gliding forward to hand Mac a glass of champagne.

"Where's mine?" Jack queried, as he slid around Mac. He smiled when Bozer handed one over. "Niiice."

Riley was right behind him, moving to Bozer to get a glass of her own. "I see we made it just in time for New Years." A glance at the clock on the wall showed they had about 40 seconds to spare.

Bozer nodded then herded the group outside. "To the fire pit, folks. I have a surprise in store. Well, sort of."

Once everyone was standing around the fire pit, Bozer pulled out his phone and tapped the screen. A count down rang out and he gestured for everyone to join in.

So as a group they counted down "eight...seven...six...five...four...three...two...one. HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

"To 2017. May it be the best year ever with family and friends!" Bozer toasted, raising his glass.

"To 2017!" everyone echoed, raising their glasses as well. Then they all took a sip as Bozer tapped his phone screen again and fireworks shot up from below the balcony, streaking into the sky and bursting into sparkles of color.

Jack was impressed. "When did you get fireworks?"

Bozer shrugged, then pointed to MacGyver. "To be fair, Mac set it up before you guys took off on this last mission. Where did you guys go this time?"

"Yokohama, Japan," Riley replied. "And may we never go back." She drained her glass and held it out for more.

"That sounds ominous. Why? What happened?" Bozer couldn't hide his curiosity as he refilled Riley's glass. It was then that he noticed the ace bandaged wrapped around her wrist and hand. "Whoa...you're hurt!" The very thought of which bothered him greatly.

Riley waved off his concern. "I'm just a little bruised, but it was worth it. Speaking of which..." Riley moved over to Mac and gave him a big hug. "I don't think I ever thanked you. So...thank you, from the bottom of my heart."

MacGyver felt himself blushing a bit as he hugged her back. Or, at least he tried to hug her back. Lifting his arms hurt and he could not stop the exhale of a tiny grunt. "I'm fine," he stated, when Riley jumped back, looking horrified.

"Okay, what's going on here?" Bozer demanded, unsure of who he should be worried about more. "What the hell happened to you two?"

"Kind of a long story there," Jack interjected. He waved to the chairs on the deck. "We should probably all get comfortable first."

Bozer was quick to plop himself down on the seating around the fire pit. He waited, impatiently, while Jack and Thornton took the chairs, Riley sat beside him and Mac remained standing. "Sit," Bozer told him, so they'd get to the story faster.

MacGyver shook his head. "I need to stretch my legs. It was a long plane ride." He gestured to Jack. "You love to tell stories, so why don't you tell Bozer what happened?"

"I'll start," Jack allowed, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. He grinned at Bozer. "Riley and Mac will have to tell you the back half, I wasn't with them for that. Not till the end."

"Just start talking already," Bozer ordered. He was pretty sure he was going to die with anticipation at this point.

So Jack took pity on him. "Long story short, since I know you're just bursting with curiosity..." he paused to laugh at the glare Bozer directed at him. "Sorry. Anyway, so we got the hard drive we were sent to get, but we were in this high rise and the bad guys chased us onto the roof. We're talking twenty stories up. So I take position to hold them off while Mac and Riley climb down the ladder that was secured to the side of the building. This is a seriously high-tech Hi-rise and the ladder is built in as a security measure in case of emergencies. So, I'm shooting at the bad guys, taking them out one by one, while the kids make good their escape because Riley has the hard drive in her back pack."

Riley couldn't keep quiet. "The kids?" she echoed. "Seriously? Not that we aren't kids in comparison to you, but really, Jack?"

"I just call em as I see em," Jack drawled, taunting her right back. He then waved at her to continue. "You might as well pick up on the story here, since you're the one who almost fell off the building."

"WHAT?" Bozer screeched, jumping to his feet and staring at Riley. "You fell off the building?"

Riley stood up and grabbed him by the arm, making him sit again. "Almost fell off the building, obviously, since I'm right here and in one piece."

Bozer realized she had a point, so he made himself relax and breathe. "Okay...okay...so what happened, exactly?"

"Well...Mac and I started down the ladder. He went first just in case we met up with any more bad guys on the way down." Riley grabbed one of the bottles of champagne and took a swig straight out of it. She was alive and well, but remembering what had almost happened was freaking her out a little bit. Wiping her mouth with the back of one hand, Riley continued. "But what happened instead is that my foot slipped and I lost my grip, and the next thing I knew I was falling." Riley paused to take a shaky breath, exhaling it slowly to calm her nerves. "For a moment there, I thought for sure I was going to die. Next thing I know I'm jerking to a stop. I don't know how he did it, but Mac caught the shoulder strap on my back pack."

"Dumb luck," MacGyver muttered, as he moved to sit beside her. He winced as he lifted one arm to rub a hand down her back. Riley was trembling and Mac knew that it was finally hitting her, and hitting hard, how close she had come to falling to her death. He remembered the first time he'd had that very experience. Jack had been the one to save him then.

Riley turned into Mac, wrapping her arms around his waist and clinging to him as tears slid down her face. She felt stupid, but in this moment she couldn't stop them to save her life. Luckily, the moment didn't last long, and Jack picked up the story for her while she finished dealing with her melt down.

Jack made sure he had Bozer's attention, before continuing. He knew Riley needed a moment and that MacGyver was the best one to help her through it, given how it had been the two of them involved. "So, anyway...I took out all the bad guys and I reach the side of the ledge and look down just as Mac is swinging Riley back onto the ladder. They continued on down so I swung over and made my own way down. We reached the bottom and made out way to the pick up point and...boom...here we are. Mission accomplished."

"Oh my God!" Bozer felt gobsmacked. He looked at Mac and Riley, relieved to see that she was looking composed and sassy once again. "So, Mac...how did you get hurt?"

"I'm not really hurt, just sore," MacGyver replied, then explained. "Even though Riley is light, when you catch someone who's falling it's a dead weight. It pulled on my shoulders...no big deal."

Riley grinned at Mac. "I have to say, I'm glad you're stronger than you look."

Mac frowned at her. "I'm not sure if that's a compliment or an insult," he confessed.

"If it were Jack, it would totally be an insult," Riley replied, laughing. "But in your case it is a most sincere compliment." She meant it with every fiber of her being.

"Well, in that case, thank you." Mac felt himself flushing a bit at the compliment, so he focused on turning the attention off of himself by turning to Bozer, who was still looking shell-shocked. "You okay, Boze?"

Grabbing the Champagne bottle from where Riley had set it, Bozer took a long swig before replying. "I don't know. I mean...how do you guys do what you do? Riley almost died tonight." The reality of it all was beginning to hit him, the way it had Riley a moment ago.

She patted him on the arm. "We just do it. Not that I've been doing it for anywhere near as long as the others, but it didn't take me long to realize you don't think about it. You just do it."

Jack decided it was time to change the subject to something more positive. He grabbed his glass and raised it for a toast. Here's to doing it again, doing it better and, most of all, doing it together in 2017." He smiled as everyone raised their glasses or a bottle and came together to clink them all around before taking a drink.

"And here's to good friends and good times," MacGyver stated.

"And to family!" Thornton added.

Bozer wasn't about to be left out. "To all the above."

They clanked and drank again.

It was then that Riley realized, "Hey, the fireworks are still going off."

"I had them programmed on a timer," MacGyver explained. "The big finale is coming up." He moved to the balcony and the others gathered around him. They all lifted their eyes to the sky as shooting streaks of sparkling color exploded into the sky, bursting one after another before dripping down in glittering sparks that faded gently away.

"Good show, Mac," Jack complimented his friend on the awe-inspiring spectacle before them.

Bozer clapped MacGyver on the shoulder. "My brother knows how to get it done." That said, now that the show was over, he turned to Riley. "I made snacks, want to help me get them out."

Riley was all for it. "I'm starving, lead the way." But as she followed Bozer inside she noticed something. "There's a spider on your back."

"What? Where?" Bozer danced around and shook himself. He hated spiders. "Get it off! Get it off!"

"I'm not touching it," Riley countered, shuddering. "I hate spiders."

Bozer was closest to Jack. "Get it off me!" he pleaded.

Jack backed away. "Sorry, I hate those creepy things. I'll shoot it off if you want, but I'm not touching it."

Before Bozer could respond to that particular offer, Thornton was beside him. She grabbed his arm to hold him still and scooped the spider off with her free hand. "He's off now," she stated.

"I think you scared him more than he scared you, Boze," MacGyver commented, as he joined Thornton and studied the spider resting in her palm.

"Not a chance!" Bozer hissed. He shuddered and brushed at his clothes, certain he could still feel it crawling over him. Not that he'd actually felt it at all. "Kill it!" he ordered Thornton. "Mac always sets them free, which means they just come back to haunt me all the time."

Thornton smirked. "He's harmless."

MacGyver was grinning. "It's a Daddy long-legs, Boze. They're harmless." He bent his head closer to study it. "I think it's a marbled one. You hardly ever see those."

"And I don't ever want to see it again." Bozer did a full body shudder. "Please get rid of it. Preferably permanently."

"Let's go get those snacks," Riley said, taking Bozer by the hand and leading him into the house.

Which allowed Thornton to set the spider free down the side of the balcony.

Fifteen minutes later they were all sitting on the deck with full plates and watching a movie on the wall, using the projector system Mac had created so that Bozer could watch his films as if on a big screen. They had all let Riley pick the movie and she had chosen Independence Day.

Jack and MacGyver were sitting side by side, munching on Bozer's sausage puffs and shrimp balls, in between sips of beer.

"I think 2017 is going to be a good year," Jack stated, out of the blue.

Mac couldn't have agreed more. He looked around him, realizing just how lucky he was. He had a beautiful home and great friends to share it with. For his New Year's resolution, MacGyver vowed to make it a point to take the time to appreciate it more often.

Not wanting to disturb the others, who looked engrossed in the movie. Including Thornton. MacGyver leaned in to Jack, to whisper, "This is how we do it."

Jack's response was to hold out his fist. Fist bumping back, MacGyver relaxed into his chair feeling more content than he could remember feeling in a long time.

2017 was going to be a great year.

THE END