The powerful cars roared. Trek Sanders was in the lead, his motorcycle, Plato, roaring under him as he popped a wheelie to gain more speed. Team Knight Rider was chasing a truck that a group of terrorists (now in FLAG custody) had been controlling by remote control to crash into the White House and explode on contact. Though they had been able to change the truck's course, the team hadn't been able to disarm the bomb from the remote site. T.K.R would need to go to the source and disarm the bomb from inside the now runaway truck.

Trek pulled up beside the eighteen wheeler, getting ready to jump on to it. No problem, with a lot of coaching from Jenny, he'd done this a couple of times. Trek ducked quickly as one of the truck's automated guns shot at him. With a yelp, the young man leapt onto the back bumper of the moving vehicle. "Made it." Trek sighed. He pushed some of his light brown hair away from his eyes, nearly loosing his grip on the fast moving truck. Fortunately, quick reflexes enabled him to retain his grip. Trek avoided looking down for all he was worth and then some. After working the back door open, Trek moved slowly but surely towards the front of the truck where the bomb was located. He found it quickly enough. It wasn't overly complicated and he had it disabled in twenty six seconds, definitely not a new record for him. Maybe he was coming down with something . . .

"Kyle! The bomb's-" Those were the only words Trek managed to get out before he felt something explode somewhere dangerously close to him. He was aware of someone shouting into his ear-piece, then the sound of something cracking before darkness overtook him.

**

Jenny Stevens gasped in horror as the truck Trek was in rolled over several sickening times. By the time it's gruesome journey had ended, the truck was torn to shreds.

"Trek! It's Kyle, answer me, dammit!" Kyle yelled frantically into his com link. The only sound he got was static. The former CIA agent hoped it was just damage to the unit.

"Is he all right?" Domino, Jenny's car asked, sounded worried.

Trek was a sweetheart and she would hate it if anything happened to him.

"Trek!" Kyle cried again.

Still no response, not even static was coming over the transmitter. The rest of the team, consisting of Duke, Jenny, and Erica began running towards the truck. Up close, the damage looked even worse. Duke noticed some nasty burn marks on the trailer as he and Kyle pried open what was left of the door to get to Trek. The kid barely stood out against the dark confines of the truck thanks to his blue T.K.R uniform. He was conscious, but his face was screwed up with pain. It was then that Jenny noticed the heavy piece of equipment across his legs.

"It's not pressing on me with it's full weight." he gasped out. "If it was, I wouldn't have legs to feel pain with."

Kyle was slightly relieved as he and the rest of the team struggled to move the equipment off Trek's legs. It was no use, the equipment was welded into the wall of the truck.

"Are you hurt?" Jenny asked. Even with some light seeping through, the truck's interior was very dark and she could hardly see him.

"I think my head's bleeding. Other than that I'm just a bit thirsty. Did anyone bring a water cooler?" The quip comforted the team as Duke hooked a cable from Attack Beast onto the equipment. At Duke's signal, the Artificially Intelligent truck slid the metal off Trek's legs. Jenny heard him trying not to gasp and knew the process must have hurt like hell.

"I don't think anything's broken, just give me a minute to make sure." Trek said as Duke helped him up gingerly.

Trek's prediction was right, he could walk on his own. The only time he swayed was when he stepped out into the light. Erica cringed, there was a line of blood on the right side of Trek's face courtesy of an half inch gash in his temple. Trek wiped away the blood with his sleeve. Duke saw the cut wasn't very deep and wouldn't need any stitches. By the time they had returned to their respective cars, it had stopped bleeding entirely.

"That was pleasant, what's next? Snipers? A stalker, maybe?" Kyle shared a relieved smile with Jenny.

**

The following morning Jenny sat in the briefing room, awaiting Erica and Trek.

"Where are those two?" Kyle demanded.

"Think they sneaked off to someplace romantic?" Attack Beast joked.

Erica walked into the room in time to hear the comment. The ex-thief snorted; "Oh please. Are you serious or are you trying to spice up what little social life you have?"

Beast was preparing to retort when Trek walked in looking like he'd gone forty rounds with Death. The young millionaire held up his hands, "I know, I know, I'd probably scare little children right now, but no sleep will do that to you."

"You could break a mirror." Erica added her two cents.

Trek sighed; "I did . . I dropped it." He explained quickly, sitting down in hopes of drawing less attention to himself.

Naturally Kyle was concerned; but right now there was more pressing business:

"Yesterday a missile hit the truck damaging the equipment in it before we got a chance to examine it." Trek muttered under his breath that the equipment wasn't the only thing that got damaged. Kyle shook his head but let the comment slide. "Our orders for today are to salvage the wreckage and have the lab examine it."

"When do we leave?" Jenny asked

Kyle glanced at his watch, "In about ten minutes."

"If I might interject?" Dante's voice sounded, "but how can you complete your mission when a fifth of your team is asleep?"

Kyle frowned as he heard Jenny's good natured sigh and turned around to see Trek asleep in his chair. Erica noticed how much younger Trek looked when he was asleep.

"Who's gonna to wake him up?" Duke whispered.

Kyle shook his head, smiling "let him sleep. He deserves it."

The team crept out of the room silently leaving only Erica behind. After being certain no one was watching, Erica brushed some of Trek's hair away from his eyes with a quick smile.

**

It was sometime before Trek awoke with a painfully sharp gasp. He looked around the room, noticing the lack of other people.

"Did I miss something?" Trek wondered aloud. Shrugging, he stood up and stretched.

"Plato?" He called out.

"Boldly going where no one has gone before." Trek laughed as he remembered the All Night Star Trek Fest they had watched two nights ago. Wow, it seemed like it had been a week.

Trek tapped his watch; "Kyle, what's up?" He ignored Duke's comment about Sleeping Beauty and told Kyle he'd be there in a half hour.

"Take it easy, Trek. I don't want a repeat of yesterday." Kyle advised him.

"You and me both, Boss." Trek assured him as he signed off.

**

Trek was just beginning to think that his luck may be changing when he walked into the hangar. Everyone was hauling huge pieces of machinery around and, it seemed to Trek, making an unnecessary amount of noise.

"What's going on?" Trek demanded, his headache aggravated by all the racket. He wished he had taken that third Aspirin.

"We're setting up a new monitoring satellite!" someone yelled, reminding Trek of the project that he'd helped to design.

"Look out!" Someone cried from behind Trek.

Luke, a powerful young engineer, was carrying a large beam into the hanger. He didn't notice Trek was standing right behind him.

As he turned to determine the cause of the warning, the beam hit Trek on the side of the head and he noiselessly collapsed in a heap. Luke apparently didn't see Trek on the ground as he walked off with the beam.

Moments later, Gill, TKR's chief mechanic entered the hanger, looking for Trek. It was then that he found the fallen T.K.R member. "Uh, Trek?" He questioned, knowing that there'd be trouble if Trek was really hurt. Trek's eyes were closed andhe wasn't moving. Until finally he groaned and tried to sit up.

"Ow." Trek sat up with a grunt and managed to climb to his feet.

"Maybe you should see the doctor," Gill suggested.

"I'm fine," Trek lied, "I was just leaving anyway. Hopefully with as few head injuries as possible." He left before Gill could say anything more.

**

Fortunately, the ride to the crash sight was uneventful. "Hey, guys." Trek called out. "Miss me?"

Jenny grinned at him; "How are you feeling?" She asked. She didn't remember that bruise forming yesterday. She supposed she could have missed it.

Trek shrugged, "Never better, I guess." If you don't count one hell of a headache, he added silently.

"What the hell . . .?" Kyle whispered in surprise. The team crowded around him. Kyle was holding a scanning device in his hand and he was examining a hunk of metal.

"What is it?" Trek asked, now into the conversation.

"The missile's signature matches one from Sky 1."

**

"Another traitor!" Erica exclaimed. "FLAG should really do a background check on these people!" Kyle just looked at her and rolled his eyes. He was not in the mood for this, especially with FLAG breathing down his neck.

Trek sat down heavily in his chair. He leaned his head against the back and closed his eyes. Kyle and Erica were still arguing.

"Are you all right, Trek?" Jenny asked suddenly. The kid hadn't moved in a few minutes.

"'No one is impressed.'" Trek said slowly, eyes closed.

"What are you blathering about?" Attack Beast demanded.

"It's part of a song I like. I used to say it to my friends when they got into fights . . . after I threw cold water on them." Jenny couldn't help but grin at the malicious smile on Trek's face.

The young millionaire stood up then sat back down again. "My kingdom for another Aspirin." he muttered. Duke looked at him in concern. Trek did seem a bit pale.

"You sure you're all right, Trek?" Duke asked.

Trek nodded. "Yeah, it's just a headache, I'm fine. Can we trace where the missile came from?"

Kyle shook his head. "Whoever did this tampered with the missile so that we can't trace the missile back to the person who shot it. But FLAG has more sophisticated scanning equipment, so I've sent them a piece of the missile to them. We should have results by tomorrow."

Jenny nodded, "There's no way to trace it from here?"

Kyle shook his head, he knew they hated not being able to do anything as much as he did; "The best we can hope for is for someone to slip up and say something. So for now all we can do is keep our eyes and ears open. Dismissed."

**

Trek's head was killing him. He hadn't felt the need to let the others know just how bad his headache really was. It was all he could do to not fall asleep during Kyle and Erica's spat. He was headed to the garage to make sure Plato hadn't been damaged during the trouble. He had done a cursory test yesterday, but tonight he wanted to be more thorough just in case he had missed something, but that didn't seem likely.

The garage was empty, but it seemed unusually bright to him.

Trek thought he heard Attack Beast say something to him, but he couldn't make it out. He grabbed a scanner and moved towards Plato. He opened his mouth to say something but the words didn't come. What did come was a gasp as white hot pain exploded behind his eyes. Trek stumbled back, one hand clutching his head. The scanner lay forgotten on the floor.

"Are you all right, Trek?" Dante's voice seemed to come from very far away.

All Trek managed to do was groan, unconscious before he hit the ground.

**

"Erica!" Kat's voice rang annoyingly in her mind. "Erica!"

This time Erica moaned, "What is it, Kat? It's two in the morning."

"Trek's unconscious! He came into the garage and then he just . . . just collapsed! You have to help him!"

Erica was already pulling on her robe, "Does anyone else know?" the former thief demanded.

"Jenny, Duke and Kyle are on their way! Oh, I'm so worried!"

**

By the time Kyle got to the garage the rest of the team was there. The cars, especially Domino and Plato, were worried. He held the door open for the doctor who was right behind him.

"We're over here!" Jenny called out.

Kyle didn't like what he saw. Trek was dangerously pale and his breathing seemed slow. The doctor pushed passed Kyle and leaned close to Trek. He ran several cursory tests.

"We need to move him to the lab." He said after a moment. As though on cue, the stretcher arrived and Trek was carefully loaded onto it.

**

"You could just say post concussion syndrome, you ER reject!"

Trek's voice could be heard down the hallway. Kyle smiled, he sounded all right. As they got into the lab the team could hear Trek arguing with the ship's doctor . . . as usual.

"It's a lack of imagination like yours that makes this job so mundane." The doctor turned and plastered a smile to his face as Duke cleared his throat.

"Hi, Guys." Trek smiled, "I was just leaving. . ."

"Sit down!" Kyle's voice had been sharper than he'd intended. He regretted his words as Trek winced and put a hand to his head.

The doctor turned to Kyle. "Mr. Sanders suffered a blow to the head yesterday . . ." Trek cleared his throat and turned his head away.

"The explosion was two days ago." Kyle's face wore a puzzled frown.

"You don't know the whole story, here it is. There have been two blows, both of which were suffered within the same forty eight hours."

The doctor related the story that Gill had told him about the accident in the garage.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Jenny asked softly, now understanding where that bruise had come from.

"It wasn't that bad," Trek's defense sounded lame even to him.

The doctor cleared his throat. "I was just on my way to express my concerns . . ." he began.

"Tattle Tale." Trek muttered.

The doctor looked at him sharply. Trek gave him the sweetest grin he could muster, coupled with a whipped puppy dog look. The medical practitioner rolled his eyes. Jenny almost smiled, but stopped herself when she saw the 'I'm not impressed' look on Kyle's face. It was the doctor's turn to clear his throat.

"My prescription for is for him to remain as inactive as possible."

"Bed rest." Trek supplied. "That's a good idea. I'll leave right now." He ducked out the way of Duke's hand and moved quickly down the hallway to his quarters.

**

Trek knew Kyle was going to raise holy hell tomorrow, but he was confident he could deal with it after he got some sleep . . . and more Aspirin. Trek laughed as the thought of opening his own Aspirin Junkies Anonymous building occurred to him. Judging by the amount of the stuff he'd been taking recently, it was starting to sound like a good idea.

The hallway leading to his room was empty. A lot of people were out on vacation and the rest were just sleeping. Trek was grateful for the silence. He'd heard far too little of it lately. Then he got the feeling he was being watched.

Quicker than an eye blink, Luke, the engineer had his muscled arm around Trek's throat. The T.K.R member started to struggle until Luke put a gun to Trek's spine.

"Now take off that fancy watch and walk. Try anything cute and you're dead." Trek complied, wincing as he deliberately raked his hand across an open air vent panel, drawing blood. The engineer was so happy at finally having his revenge that he didn't notice the action, or the fact that the watch was broken and wouldn't have done Trek a damned bit of good anyway. Luke shoved him forward. Trek could only hope he didn't notice the trail of blood behind them.

**

Kyle was just going to check up on Trek when he noticed the kid's watch laying on the ground. Trek tended to be absent-minded, but this was just plain careless. The team leader bent down to pick up the device . . .

Then he saw the blood.

Kyle tapped his own watch.

"Duke, Erica, Jenny, I think we have a problem."

**

"So it was you who shot the missile, wasn't it?" Trek tried to keep Luke talking. That's what you were supposed to do in hostage situations, right? Only Trek had never had experience in being the hostage. Now that it had happened, Trek decided it wasn't at the top of his list of things to do, but he was alive. The only flaw with his plan was that Trek was forced to listen to Luke's insane ranting and constant gloating.

"Yup." Luke grinned proudly. "I fired it from my own bike, right outside of the cars' sensors. It would have had worked if you hadn't lived. Then there was that second shot, with the pipe. I thought that would at least put you out of commission so I could poison you. But I underestimated you both times. I won't make that mistake again, Trek. Count on it." Luke shoved him forward. Trek squeezed his bleeding finger again. He hoped Kyle and the others got the clue and wished Luke would shut up, not necessarily in that order.

Really, it isn't very much to ask. I'm not hard to please.

Trek thought. What a time for the corridors to be empty! "What have you got against me, anyway?" Trek asked after a moment.

The magic words.

Luke started seething, "I should have been on T.K.R!" he growled. "I'm faster, stronger and smarter than you! I was just about to be asked to join when you volunteered. I was stuck as being a damn engineer. For all this time I've watched and learned all your habits. I waited for just the right time to outsmart you." Luke gloated.

Trek wanted to compare I.Qs, but he changed his mind as Luke tightened his grip on his throat. Trek gasped soundlessly as black spots appeared in front of his eyes. Just as he was starting to loose consciousness, Luke loosened his grip.

"Satisfying as killing you outright would be, I need you for my plan."

"Lucky me." Trek muttered, blinking back tears. The younger man knew that because he was loosing blood, Luke's strangling would weaken him further and much faster. By the time help got to him, he might not be of much use. At that moment, the beginnings of a plan inserted it's way into Trek's mind.

"So, what is your plan? I want to know what goes on in the mind of someone smarter than me." The hostage was barely able to avoid spitting out the bad taste in his mouth.

"I'm going to grab one of your fancy bikes and ride."

Flattery was working, but Trek couldn't help the sarcastic note in his voice as he said, "And you'll drive off into the sunset? That's not much of a plan, Luke. Even if you kill me, FLAG will hunt you down and . . ." Luke cut off Trek's air supply again.

This time, Trek sank to his knees before Luke relaxed his grip.

The engineer yanked him to his feet viciously.

"Have I mentioned I'm a millionaire?" Trek muttered, grunting as Luke shoved him forward again. "Why am I not surprised?" Trek griped, "That line never works . . ."

**

Duke and the others had no trouble following Trek's trail. "For a trail this visible, the wound must've been pretty deep." Jenny commented. Her military experience told her immediately that Trek would need some stitches. Hopefully they would get to him soon before Trek lost too much blood.

"They're headed for the garage." Kyle announced. "Duke, Erica, you cut them off at the back. Jenny, you're with me." Duke and Erica nodded, splitting from the other two.

"Who do you think grabbed him?" Jenny asked. Kyle shook his head grimly. "I don't know, but they're going to pay."

**

Trek was forced to calm down the cars. Even though Beast barely tolerated him, Trek knew the big truck wanted to rip through Luke's spleen with some of the big, nasty guns he had. In a weird way it was flattering. "I'm fine, Dom." He assured a concerned Domino. "I'm sure the others are on their way."

"Don't be so sure about that." Luke sneered. "I disabled the ship's sensors. Wasn't even that hard."

"They can still see." Trek grinned weakly, raising his bloody hand slightly. "They'll know exactly where to find me, and to a lesser extent, you."

Trek was already beginning to feel lightheaded, from the blood loss but he was determined to stay conscious for a little while longer.

"You dirty bastard!" Luke screamed, pushing his gun deeper into Trek's back. "I'm going to kill you!"

"You're going to do that anyway." Trek replied coolly. "Now, there will be witnesses." Luke opened to mouth to reply when another voice rang through the air.

"Just put the gun down, Luke." Duke, who was standing near Erica said. "No one's going to do anything drastic, if you don't," he said evenly. Duke hoped his hostage situations training wouldn't fail him.

Luke giggled insanely. "If you don't call blowing this punk's head off his shoulders 'drastic' we'll get along fine."

Luke shifted Trek as Kyle and Jenny walked in.

"Just put the gun down." Kyle said.

Luke smiled; "Okay." He dropped the gun and kicked it obediently towards Erica. "I guess I'll just have to break his neck, so much more personalized don't you think?"

"Do you want me to take him out, Duke?" Beast asked, his gravelly voice eager.

Jenny looked at the big truck. "Trek could get hurt." She pointed out.

The black truck relented. "All right. Whatever you say, Jenny."

"Enough chatting!" Luke yelled, twisting Trek around so quickly it nearly yanked the younger man off his feet. "Land the plane right-!"

Without warning, Trek's eyes rolled back into his head and he crumpled to the ground, leaving a stunned Luke wide open. One of Attack Beast's darts put Luke out of action for a few hours.

Trek stood up and dusted himself off, which was quite awkward with only one good hand. Erica moved to brace him and noticed the bruises already starting to form on his throat. She didn't have to guess where they had come from. She had never been more tempted to kick someone while they were down. The ferocity of her emotions startled the former thief as Kyle put a hand on Trek's shoulder.

"Nice work, Trek." the Team leader grinned. "I thought you really were unconscious."

Trek shrugged modestly; "That was the plan."

Dante also commended Trek on the soundness of both his strategies.

Trek examined his still bleeding finger. "Damn it. That's deeper than I thought." He'd forgotten about the pain during the ordeal but now it, and the lightheadedness had returned with a vengeance. He resisted the urge to fall onto his face.

"We should get you over to the doctor's right away." Erica grinned at the expression on Trek's face.

"Can't I just be the hostage again?" The young man inquired.

"Now." Kyle's tone indicated that there would be no argument.

"Dammit, Jim I'm a doctor not an engineer!" Plato exclaimed.

Trek grinned at the bike as Duke gently shoved him out of the room.

**

Four stitches, a good night's sleep and three Aspirins later, Trek was fully recovered, even the bruises around his neck didn't hurt anymore.

"Hey guys." Trek grinned, looking a hundred percent better, "What's going on?"

Kyle looked up. "We just learned that a group of Russians is planning on bombing Fort Knox." He said grimly.

"Damn, after all that time in the doc's office, I come back to a typical day." Trek groaned.

The End