Fic: Jabberwocky, Part 28b/?, Red Cortina, by Sytaxia

[sytaxia]

“Boss!  Boss!  DI Tyler!  Oh, please, shite, come on, please, Boss…  Boss!”  Sam’s eyes flew open, his breath rattling in his chest and scraping harshly against his throat, and he found himself gasping, laying on the bed in Chris’ mother’s room, Chris’ shocked face inches from his as he shook Sam’s shoulders.

“Gene?”  Sam gasped out, and Chris shook his head, his hands still firmly grasping Sam’s upper arms and his face frozen in a horrified expression.  Sam stared around the room, his eyes wide and frightened, and then finally registered that it was not Gene that he had heard, but Chris, calling him out of his nightmare.  He closed his eyes and leaned back, then felt pain lance through his ribs and shot upwards again, bolting into a sitting position and gasping raggedly for breath.  He felt Chris’ hands on his upper back and just below his throat, drawing him upwards, and air started to flow through him more easily.  He took a few long breaths, and then opened his eyes again and looked at Chris.  “I’m okay.”

Chris shook his head, “I thought you were having a fit or sommat.  You kept lashing about and screamin’ an’ all.”  He pulled his hands away from Sam, and then handed him a glass of water, which Sam drank down quickly, his throat pumping with the motion.

“I’m all right.  It was just a dream,” Sam said, shaking his head and trying to clear it, hoping that he hadn’t scared Chris too much with whatever had happened.  His throat felt raw and he swallowed more water against the sensation.  “I was screaming?”

“Like it were the end of the world.  You sure you’re all right?  I can ring the Gov, have him send that doc down again,” Chris’ voice was quiet as he took the empty glass from Sam and placed it back on the bedside table.  “Blimey, I thought you were gonna hurt yourself there, Boss.”

“I’m fine,” Sam said, trying to lean back and finding that doing so caused his head to collide with the headboard, and bright flashes of light shot in front of his eyes as pain ratcheted through his skull.  He reached up, wincing as he did so, and felt something wet in his hair.  “What…”

“You were hittin’ your head against the bed, the way you were rollin’ about.  I thought you might split your skull open,” Chris said, and he reached forward and inspected the side of Sam’s head.  “Bloody hell, Boss, you did…  Your head’s bleedin’ all over…”

“Probably just a little cut, Chris.  I’m fine,” Sam said, feeling a dull throb developing where his head had collided with the headboard.  “Do you have a mirror in here anywhere?”  Chris nodded at this, and then moved away, going over to the bureau at the far end of the room and pulling off a large, square hand mirror, which he offered to Sam.

Sam held the mirror up with one shaking hand, and then gently probed at the back of his head with the other, his fingers coming away stained with blood.  “It’s not so bad,” he said softly, and Chris nodded at this, and took the mirror back from Sam, silently returning it to the exact spot that he’d retrieved it from.  “Can you help me to the loo?” Sam asked, and Chris nodded again, still standing at the side of the bed, and Sam realized, with some gratitude, that Chris was waiting to find out exactly how much help Sam would need.

Sam slowly climbed to his feet, glad to find that his knees were wobbling considerably less than they had the day before, and managed to stand on his own.  Walking, however, resulted in a wave of dizziness making its way quickly down from his head to his feet, and he fell forward, giving a small yelp of pain as he reached out an arm to catch himself on the bed.  Chris moved forward and grabbed Sam’s arm, pulling it up and around his shoulders, and then Sam nodded at him, and the two of them made their way to the bathroom, Sam panting as if he were running, hard, instead of slowly walking, but managing to make it to the doorway without putting too much of his weight on Chris.

When they finally reached the room, Sam sat down on the closed toilet lid, and Chris dampened a cloth and then moved forward, slowly, as if he were unsure of his actions, and then reached forward to touch the cloth to the cut on Sam’s head.  Sam winced at this, and Chris drew his hand back quickly.  “I, er, is…”  Chris stammered, and Sam shook his head and held out his hand, taking the cloth and wiping the blood from his hands before holding it up to the back of his head, pressing into the gash there.  Chris stared at the floor, and then the ceiling, not sure of what to do, and then moved forward and placed his hand on Sam’s shoulder.  “I should look it over.  Make sure it don’t look like it needs stitches or sommat.”

Sam nodded, and Chris leaned down, grimacing at the thick line of deep, blackish red that was traced amongst Sam’s hair, and he gingerly touched it with one finger, then pulled the hair away from it, feeling Sam shudder as he did so.  He squinted at it, and then pulled away, moving to wash the blood from his own hands at the sink as he did so.  “Don’t look too bad, Boss.  Already stopped bleedin’ out, like.  Don’t think we need to ring the doc for it, not ‘less you want to.”

Sam shook his head, “No, it’s fine.  I’m fine, Chris.  Really.”  He dabbed at the cut a few more times, and then handed the cloth back to Chris, who rinsed it out at the sink and laid it over the edge of the bath.  Sam regarded him for a moment, and then felt his face color a bit, “Chris.  Could you…”  Sam inclined his head towards the door, and Chris gave him a confused look, before finally registering that Sam was asking for some privacy.

“Oh!  Right…  Let me know if you need ought,” Chris quickly moved out of the room, and Sam stared at the door for a moment after he’d left, and then took a deep breath and stood.  It took him several minutes to manage to relieve himself, flush, and wash his hands, but he found that he was able to do so on his own, and then he moved towards the door, trying to widen his steps and firm his strides, and finding that doing so only set him off balance and made his legs weaken again.

“Chris?”  Sam opened the door and called out, and then looked around the hallway; Chris was nowhere to be seen.  Sam knit his brows together, trying to determine where Chris could have gone, and drawing a blank as he did so, not sure whether he should look for Chris, or try to make his way back to the bed.  The thought of lying down again, with nothing to do except fall asleep and wait for the nightmares to return, was enough to make him decide upon the former, and he slowly made his way down the hall, dragging one hand against the wall for support as he did so.  He peered inside of the last room that he found, and saw that it was nearly empty, except for two camp beds, a suitcase, and an ashtray that was already overflowing.  Sam raised an eyebrow as he realized that this was the room that Gene was staying in, and then he moved to the next room, and found that it was an absolute shambles, with dirty clothing and odds and ends of every sort scattered around the floor, and an unmade bed.  Chris’ room, Sam guessed, allowing himself a small, amused smile at the untidiness of the room.

Sam crept down the hallway, still panting and leaning on the wall, but finding that walking seemed to have gotten easier than it had been the day before, and he looked back into the room that he had been staying in.  There were items laid out under a thick sheet of dust on the dressing table, a carpet of dust disturbed only where Chris had taken the mirror from the bureau, and the night tables were mostly empty, except for the empty water glass, the mixing bowl that Sam had thankfully not needed to utilize a second time, and the book that Chris had brought up the previous day.  Sam took a moment to examine the cover, and realized just which book Chris had brought him with a wide smile: “The Examination and Typing of Bloodstains.”  Sam turned the book over in his hands, and realized that the Crombie book he’d mentioned all those months ago at the mill wouldn’t even be printed for another five years; the book in his hands, less than two years old and by Culliford, was the current height of blood pattern analysis.  Sam wondered, vaguely, when Chris had purchased it, and flipped idly through it, finding odd notes scattered here and there, including a doodle of a distinctive blood spray on a wall, which was labeled, “What’ll look like when Guv kills boss: decepitetoin.”  Sam realized that he was looking at the blood pattern indicative of decapitation, and felt a grin split his face when he saw the caption.  Despite the fact that the word “decapitation” was spelt out several times on the page, Chris had still managed to misspell the word in his own writing.  Sam did a small double take when he noticed that, and then a small, knowing smile split his features.

There were still no sounds from downstairs, and Sam suddenly felt his grin fade away as he realized that Chris was not only nowhere to be seen, but he was nowhere to be heard, as well.  A cold, thick feeling of fear wrapped itself around his innards, and he set the book down quietly, and then slowly moved back to the doorway, making his way as quietly as he could out of the room.  The voice of the killer echoed back to him from his dream, and he realized that there was, in all actuality, a very good chance of him being found, despite all of Gene’s reassurances.  The image of Chris laying in a pool of his own blood somewhere downstairs suddenly hit Sam’s mind with the force of a freight train, and he swallowed hard, trying to keep himself from shaking as he made his way towards the staircase.

The house was old, and the steps were slightly narrow and higher than the ones that Sam was used to, making the small flight of stairs seem like an incredible obstacle before him as he made his way towards the edge, letting his hands slide off of the wall and grasping at the top of the banister.  He looked down and saw the doorway, and then took a deep breath and lowered his right foot onto the first step, still clutching tightly to the banister with both hands as he dragged his left foot down to meet it.  Sam felt his insides coil into a tight spring as sweat beaded along his face, neck, and chest, his ribs straining and shooting pain through his body as he continued to lurch down the staircase, and then he stopped, his heart freezing inside of him as he heard what was obviously a shout of pain, in Chris’ voice, coming from the kitchen.

Sam’s eyes widened at the sound, and he tried to urge himself more quickly down the stairs; if they had been found, then the killer was only after him, and might leave Chris alive if he handed himself over…  Sam heard another muffled scream, and this time there was no mistaking the pain in Chris’ voice as it carried down the hallway and towards the stairs.  Sam thrust his right foot down again, and then tried to take a full step with his left, instead of lowering it to the same step that he’d rested his right foot on.  His palms were sweating just as madly as the rest of him, and his hands slid along the banister, causing his grip to falter, and he felt himself sliding down, face forward, after his left foot, scrambling madly to grab the rails under the banister as he did so, and managing to lean back far enough that he crashed to the stairs sideways, instead of forward, his right leg twisting painfully under him and his ribs and back filled with a thick, hot pain as his body slammed against the rails, his forehead colliding with them as his bottom slammed down on the steps.

Sam was gasping again, his breath coming in thin, ragged hitches as he heard the sounds leave off and silence fill the house, and then there was a muffled thumping, as if someone were running…  Sam closed his eyes and waited to hear that voice again, waiting to feel those hands against his flesh…  He felt tears well in his eyes, and his entire body started to shake in fear and anticipation, and then there was a pressure on his arm.  Sam jerked backwards away from the touch and came as close to shouting as his lungs would allow, and then wrenched his eyes open, finding himself once again staring at Chris’ face.

“Bloody hell!  What’re you doin,’ Boss?  Shite, the Gov’s gonna kill me…”  Chris reached forward and grabbed at Sam’s underarms, trying to pull him to his feet, and Sam felt his legs wobble and falter under him, and then fell back down onto his rear, sending Chris tumbling back against the stairs and onto his own backside.  “Boss?”  Chris’ voice was trembling, and Sam realized that he was still wide-eyed and shaking, and that he really hadn’t reacted to Chris’ presence at all since he’d jumped away from his touch.

“I heard…  I heard…”  Sam was gasping and twisting his head around frantically on his neck, looking from the front door to the hallway that led to the kitchen to Chris, trying to understand what was happening.  He had been so sure that the killer was in the house, had practically smelt him…

“Boss, why didn’ you just call out if you needed sommat?”  Chris was standing again, and reaching down towards Sam, trying to pull him up once again.  “Boss?”  Sam realized that Chris was not only all right, he was trying to speak to him, and he shook his head, trying to clear away the thick cobwebs of fear and dread that seemed to be filling his skull.

“I heard you shout,” Sam said, softly, and Chris’ face fell even further.

“I just burned meself, is all,” Chris said, holding out his hand, and Sam noticed that there were two long welts on it, one on the back of his hand, and one on the back of his wrist.  “I were tryin’ to heat up that soup what Annie made for you, and, well, I’m not the best hand in the kitchen, so…”  Sam stared at Chris’ hand, and realized that the two shouts he heard must have been the result of the two burns on Chris’ hand.  He shook his head, feeling heat rising in his cheeks as he realized how foolish he’d been, and still unable to shake off the horrible feeling of dread that seemed to suffuse throughout his entire body.

“Bloody hell, Boss, why didn’t you just call out?” Chris was holding out his hands this time, instead of grabbing for Sam, and Sam reached up and took them, clamping his mouth shut against the urge to scream as his ribs seemed to shift inside of him, as if they were made of blades instead of bone.  His right leg, too, protested in pain as Sam straightened it out and tried to put his weight on it, and he realized with a hot stab of anger that he’d somehow managed to not only land himself firmly on his own arse, he’d also managed to wrench his knee, adding injury to insult.  Or injury to injuries, he thought with a frustrated roll of his eyes.

It took quite a bit of effort on both of their parts, but they somehow managed to get Sam back onto his feet, and then down the last few steps to the bottom of the stairs.  Sam was leaning much more heavily on Chris as they made their way to the kitchen, past what Sam recognized as a sitting room and a dining room, and another door that Sam decided must be a cupboard, positioned under the stairs.  Eventually, Sam found himself in Chris’ kitchen, and he noticed that there was a mess of spilled liquid, chicken, and vegetables on the floor, and his eyes followed a trail up the side of the stove to a large pot, which was over-boiling with hisses and spurts as liquid continued to trail over its side and onto the top of the cooker, where it landed with a hiss and sizzle, dripping down to the puddle on the floor.

“Oh, buggeration,” Chris muttered as he helped Sam to sit down at the table, and then stared into his face, trying to ascertain exactly what sort of a state Sam was in, before he ran towards the stove and grabbed a long dishtowel, using it to protect his hands as he grabbed at the pot, not bothering to turn off the gas to the burner first…  Sam felt his fear gently subside into an odd mixture of humor and horror and Chris dragged the end of the dishtowel through the flames of the stove, and then set the pot down on the counter top and shouted as he realized that the towel was on fire, throwing it to the floor and stamping at it, muttering a string of gibberish and curses until it was out.  He then turned off the gas to the stove and regarded the pot dubiously, and then turned a sheepish grin to Sam.  “Er…  I think your tea’s ready, Boss…”

Sam’s face split into a disbelieving grin as he saw this, and he rested his elbow on the table and his face in his hand for a moment, and then started to laugh, the motion sending more spears of pain through him.  Within seconds, Sam was shaking with silent laughter, hugging his ribs and wincing at the same time, and Chris simply stood there, a slightly guilty, slightly shamed expression on his face.  “Chris,” Sam finally said, straightening up in the chair, “Sit down.”  He motioned towards the other chair, and then wrapped his arms back around his chest again, his laughter dying down in the wake of the pain that was flaring up in his ribs and back, coupled with the new throbs in his head and his knee.

“Sorry, Boss,” Chris said, quietly, and then reached into his pocket and withdrew a packet of cigarettes, lighting one and then reaching for the ashtray, and then letting his eyes go wide again.  “Bugger!  The Gov said we’re not to smoke around yeh,” he said, and Sam shook his head, another amused grin spreading over his face.

“I don’t mind,” he said, still gasping slightly after his little adventure on the stairs, and after the laughter.  “Really, go on,” he said, and Chris gave him a nod and took another drag.  The two of them sat in silence for a few moments, both staring at the floor, and then Sam looked over at Chris, his breathing finally even and steady, “I’m sorry.”

Chris shook his head, “It’s not your fault I’m rubbish in the kitchen, is it?”

“I meant for coming down the stairs like that,” Sam said, and Chris gave him a mildly accusatory look, and then looked down at the burning end of his fag before taking another long drag.

“I shouldn’t have left you like that, Boss,” Chris said, quietly, and Sam shook his head.

“It would appear that you were trying to do me a favor, Chris,” Sam said, and Chris gave him another skeptical look.  “I just…  I thought he might’ve…  I thought he might’ve found the place.”  Sam looked at the floor, suddenly feeling as guilty and shamed as Chris looked, and then he looked back up at Chris, to find that he was giving him a questioning look.

“There’s no way that he could, is there, Boss?  I mean, ‘s not like the Gov’s taken out an advert or nought,” Chris said, and Sam shook his head.

“We ought to be ready for anything, Chris,” Sam said, and Chris nodded at this.  “Are you…  Are you armed?” Sam asked, and Chris nodded again, watching Sam’s eyes widen as he did so.

“Gov had me take me gun,” Chris said, and then added, “It’s in me room, upstairs.”

Sam shook his head, “You should keep it with you, at all times.  Just to be safe.”  He considered this for a moment, and then leaned his head towards the kitchen door and the hallway to the stairs, “Granted, it’s probably a good thing you didn’t have it on, as we’d likely have just shot ourselves accidentally on the stairs…”

Chris gave a short chuckle at this, and then nodded at Sam, “All right.  I’ll have it about me, all times, if you want.  I can go get it now, if you want.  Or when we go back…  Hell, can you…”  Chris voice trailed off, and Sam felt his face start to color again as he realized that Chris was right; there was no way that he was going to be able to get up the stairs on his own.  The way that he currently felt, he realized, he’d be lucky just to get back to the foot of the staircase, even with Chris’ help.  He shook his head and gave an annoyed little laugh at this, rubbing his hand over his face as he did so.

“We might want to hold off on that, just for a bit,” Sam said, and Chris nodded, then looked over at the mess on the floor and stove, and then looked over at Sam, still looking slightly ashamed.

“I’ll just, er, clean this mess up then, shall I?” Chris asked, and Sam nodded, leaning forward slightly on the table.

Several minutes passed as Chris cleaned up the floor and the stove, and then set about wiping down the pot and the counter, before finding a large spoon and ladling a bowlful of the soup out for Sam.  When he looked up, Sam was slumped down with his head on his arms, asleep at the table, and Chris felt a guilty feeling in his chest when he realized that it was his fault that Sam had come downstairs in the first place.  He grabbed a spoon, and then moved over towards Sam, setting the bowl and spoon in front of him and nudging his shoulder slightly.  “Boss?”

Sam opened his eyes and blinked, then looked up at Chris, and took a moment to register that he’d fallen asleep at the table.  He noticed that the kitchen was cleaned up, and wondered how long it had taken Chris to do that, and how long he’d been asleep.  Chris gestured towards the bowl on the table, and Sam nodded at him, and straightened up, pulling the bowl closer to him, and then noticing the small bag from the chemist’s that was sitting on the table, next to Chris’ ashtray.  “What time is it?”

“Er, fourish…  Four oh seven,” Chris said, giving a lopsided grin to Sam, and Sam shook his head.

“I’m been asleep for nearly eight hours?  Why didn’t you wake me?”

Chris gave Sam a small, injured look, and then shrugged, “You need your rest, Boss.  I came back up with the case files after everyone had left, and you were asleep then, so I figured I let you have a lie in, ‘til you started screamin.’”  Chris gestured towards a thick pile of folders and papers that were sitting on the kitchen chair next to Sam’s as he said this, and Sam shook his head again.

“Don’t let me do that tomorrow.  We’ve got a lot to go over,” Sam said, and then pulled the two small bottles out of the bag and squinted at the labels.  Prescription labels, he learned, were even harder on the eyes in 1973 than they were in 2006.  “And I’m supposed to be taking these at eight in the morning, two in the afternoon, and eight at night.”  He twisted off the cap, glad that at least that little trial was spared him due to the time period, and slid one of the antibiotics pills onto the table, followed by one of the painkillers.  He looked up at Chris, “Could you get me a glass of water?”  And then he returned the bottles to their bag and started in on the soup, finding that although it had managed to cool down to nearly room temperature, and that there were bits of condensed and pot-burned liquid swimming in it, it still seemed like the greatest thing on earth.  He made a mental note to get the recipe from Annie, and then started to guess at the ingredients as Chris plopped down with a glass of water and lit another fag.

“The Gov should be coming in around six, and Annie was supposed to be here at two, to take over and let me go hunt for the factory with Ray and Glen,” Chris stated flatly, trying to make conversation, and Sam nearly choked on the mouthful of soup that he’d just taken.

“She what?  Annie’s not come for her shift?”  Sam’s eyes grew wide and slightly panicked, and Chris gave him a confused look.

“I figure she just got tied up in her checkin’ records at hospital, is all…  Boss?”  Chris noticed a soft clacking noise, and realized that Sam’s spoon was knocking against the rim of the bowl, his hand shaking, along with the rest of his body.

“Chris, go get that gun.  Now.  Don’t ever take it off.  And then call the station,” Sam’s voice was a shivering whisper, “Now,” he said, much more firmly, and Chris nodded, leaving his still burning cigarette in the ashtray and nearly sprinting for the stairs.

Sam slowly climbed to his feet, leaning heavily on the table and feeling his ribs and back strain as he put his weight on his arms, and knowing that his aching knee and trembling legs would prevent him from standing without the aid of the table.  He slowly made his way to the edge, and then tried taking a step away from the table, both of his legs threatening to buckle as he did so, until he found his way to the hall edge of the room, where he leaned heavily against the wall and pulled the handset of the wall-mounted phone down, slowly turning the dial with his finger until he’d gotten the station’s number in.  He heard Chris thundering down the stairs as Phyllis answered.

“Manchester Police,” came her voice, ornery as always, and Sam allowed himself a small smile at the sound.

“Phyllis.  It’s Sam Tyler,” he said, noticing that he was slightly out of breath, and there was silence for a moment on the other end of the line.

“Boss?  That really you?” she eventually responded, and Sam felt himself nodding, despite speaking to her over the phone.  “It’s good to hear your poncey little voice, you silly bugger, we’ve all been going spare worrying about you,” Phyllis started in, but Sam cut her off.

“No time, Phyllis.  Is Annie there?” Sam asked, and he heard inaudible, muted voices, and then a rustling of papers.

“She’s not checked in all day, Boss.  DC Chester said that she were at hospital, going over records,” Phyllis responded, and Sam felt his heart begin to beat so rapidly that he felt it would burst inside of him.

“I need you to put me through to the Gov.  Immediately.  He’s there, isn’t he?” Sam asked, wondering if he’d be able to reach Gene, or even Annie herself, if he tried calling hospital reception.  His entire body seemed to have transformed itself into a Christmas cracker about to be pulled, and he tried not to envision two small hands in a little red dress yanking at the ends of one as he waited for Phyllis’ response.

“He’s just in, Boss.  Putting you through now,” Sam exhaled slowly as she said this, and then heard the clicking sound of switchboard connections come over the line, followed by the sound of the phone ringing.

“Pick up, pick up, Gene, pick up the bloody phone,” Sam felt himself muttering, and then he heard the familiar and decidedly angry sound of Gene’s voice over the line.

“Hunt.”  Gene stated his name sharply, and Sam took a long breath before responding.

“Gov,” he started, and then he could practically see Gene’s fists forming at his sides as the answer came over the line.

“There’s no phone in Skelton’s ruddy guest room, Tyler.  Only phone in that house is downstairs.”

“Very astute observation,” Sam said crossly, and then immediately began speaking again, before Gene got the chance to scream at him, “Annie hasn’t called by yet.  Phyllis said she’s not checked in at the station.  Tell me you sent her somewhere else.”

There was a long pause, and then Gene’s voice came back over the line, a white hot whisper that Sam had barely ever heard before, and that he knew meant that Gene was out for blood, “She wasn’t at hospital.  She left while I was still there, said that she was going over to Skelton’s to take her watch with you.”

“Fuck…”  Sam heard the word as if it were said by someone else, and barely registered the shouts that Gene was making from the other side of the line, ordering Ray, Glen, and two other DC’s to get to the hospital and find Annie.  “Gov?  Gene?”  Sam shook his head to try and collect his thoughts, which were tumbling rapidly into each other like a 2006 motorway pile-up accident, crashing and slamming and sending him reeling against the wall.  “Gene.  We have to find her.”

“I’ve got Ray, Fletcher, Chester and Durham on it,” Gene said, “I’m coming over there now.  If the bastard’s got Annie, he can get your location out of her,” Gene said, and Sam felt his blood turn cold.

“Gov, this isn’t the time to worry about me, you gave Chris a gun.  If he’s got Annie…”  Sam couldn’t bear to finish the sentence.

“If he’s got our Annie, he’s going to pay for it in his own damned blood, drop by drop.  And he could be on his way to you, right now.  I’m not having three of my finest missing in one day,” Gene shouted over the phone, and Sam found himself bracing for a fist, even though Gene was blocks and blocks away from him.

“Then get your arse over here, Gov, and we’ll find her together,” Sam said, finding an odd, unnatural strength suddenly filling him, his legs seeming to wobble less as he straightened, pulling away from the wall.  There was no response except for the dial tone to answer him, and he set the phone back on its cradle.

“Chris, go get my jacket,” Sam said, and Chris started to move for the stairs, and then stopped and made for a small closet next to the door to the sitting room, and Sam followed him with his eyes, wondering what he was doing, and then seeing Chris emerge with his leather jacket.

“Ray an’ I nicked it out of evidence, and Cartwright brought it up from the station before she went up to see you this morning,” Chris said, and Sam took the jacket from him, wincing as he pulled it over his shoulders, and feeling the familiar thick patch on the inside pocket, where he knew his badge and warrant card, along with his wallet, were stowed.  He marveled at the idea that they’d not been taken, along with the jacket, when it had lain on the pavement the night after he was taken, and managed to pull it on and pull his collar on top of the collar of the jacket, grimacing at the fact that even the jacket was too large for him now.

“Removing criminal evidence is an offense, Chris,” Sam said, softly, and then he looked back up at Chris, meeting him in the eyes, “Thank you.”  Chris smiled softly and nodded, although his grin didn’t even come close to his eyes, and Sam knew that he wasn’t the only one assuming the worst.  “The Gov’s coming down here; we’re going to stick together on this one.  He’s sent Ray, Glen, Jeff and Carl down to the hospital to check there, it’s where she was last seen.”

“Where are we gonna check, then, Boss?”  Chris was moving towards the same space closet from which he’d retrieved Sam’s jacket and pulled out his own coat, shrugging it on and staring at nothing, his mind trying to digest everything that had been fed into it in the past five minutes.

Sam shook his head as he made the short walk to the base of the stairs, and then sat down on the third step from the bottom, rubbing at his eyes.  “Factories.  We’ll look over the list that Ray and Glen were making; if the Gov doesn’t have it, we’ll go down to the station for it, and then we’ll try to come up with our own ideas and start the search with the most likely locations.  Keep in radio contact with the others, and once they finish searching around the hospital, they’ll join us - we can split up and search more locations that way.  We’ll cover as much ground as possible, not stop until we find her, or run out of locations, and then we go back to compiling the list.  There has to be something that’ll help point us to the right location, some, some…”  Sam’s voice trailed off as his lungs rebelled against him again, and he bent down, coughing hard into the side of his fist, trying to fight against the movement and keep still, until he felt Chris’ hands on his back and chest again, drawing him up.

“You can’t go, Boss,” Chris said, softly, and then he sat down next to Sam, who glared at him angrily, panting rapidly as he tried to get his breathing under control again.

“Chris.  Annie’s missing.  We have to find her,” he gasped it out, and Chris gave him a dark, worried look, shaking his head but not arguing the point any further.  The two of them sat in silence for several minutes, both staring at the floor without seeing it, their minds turning over the events that had just transpired, Chris’ wondering how they were ever going to find Annie, and Sam’s jumping through mental image after mental image of Annie, Annie pinned up against the wall like a dead insect, Annie being half crushed and hung like an ornament, trying to scream but finding that she could only scream blood and not sound, Annie being torn down and thrown to the floor, being ravaged like an animal, bitten and slammed and ripped…  Sam found that he had started shaking again, violent tremors making their way through his body, and he wrapped his arms around himself to try and stop it, and then noticed that Chris was staring at him again, the dark, worried look never having left his face.

“Boss?  You’re shivering fit to rip in two,” Chris’ brows knit together as he took this in.  “I…  Are you sure you can…”

“He can’t have Annie.  He can’t have taken her.  It just…  No…”  Sam felt tears start to form in his eyes and scrubbed at them madly, finding that his body was still quaking and fighting against the motion, trying to hold himself still and finding that it was impossible; every spare second brought another horrifying image of Annie being tortured to his mind, and every new image caused the shaking to start over anew.  Sam was still rubbing his eyes roughly when the door opened, and he felt his breath catch again as he realized that the figure on the other side of the door was just as likely to be the killer as it was to be Gene.

Time seemed to slow as the door knob slowly turned, and then a thin shaft of cold, grey light and a gust of autumn wind slid through the crack between door and jamb, and Sam felt Chris tense next to him as the door finally opened, revealing Gene standing there, flinging it the rest of the way and storming in, and then slamming it shut behind him.  “What the bloody - Tyler, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“We’re going to look for Annie.  Factories.  Start with the most likely candidates that Ray and Glen haven’t already covered, and then continue down the list.  After the others check at and around the hospital, they’ll join us, we can split up and cover more ground that way, search through more of the factories…”  Sam was still shaking and gasping slightly as he said this, and Gene shook his head.

“You’re not going anywhere.  We’re keeping you safe, here.  The others will look for our Annie, and if they don’t find her, they’ll come by here, and we’ll try to work out a plan that’s not so much needle in a haystack, and you can sit in on that, be right up your soddin’ alley, but you’re not going out.  You’re going back upstairs.”

“Like hell I am!  Gov, if he has Annie, he…”  Sam tried to clamber to his feet as quickly as he could, clutching at the staircase’s banister for support and nearly pitching forward, a wave of vertigo hitting him as he stood.  Gene rushed forward and Chris stood next to him, and the two of them grabbed him as he started to fall.

“Christ, Tyler, just look at you,” Gene practically growled it as he shoved Chris away and then picked Sam up, grunting as he straightened his back and starting up the stairs again.

“Gov, we have to find Annie…”  Sam tried to struggle in Gene’s arms, and found that the movement only caused his ribs and back to ache more.  They slowly made their way up the stairs, Gene going slightly red in the face as he carried Sam up the stairs and Sam continuing to try to squirm out of his grasp.  Eventually, they reached the room at the top of the stairs, and Gene pushed through the door and set Sam down on the bed, nearly dropping him there as he did so.  “He can’t have taken Annie.  He can’t.  We have to find her.  Gov, what..  Gov, no!  Gene!”

Sam continued to argue and try to move away, as Gene reached into his trouser pocked and withdrew a set of handcuffs, and wrapped one end around Sam’s right wrist, and the other around the lower rails of the bed’s headboard, trapped by the large, carved piece of wood above that.  “If this is the only way to keep your looney arse in bed, then so be it!  Now you listen to me: we’ve got an officer missing and a psychotic nutter out for your blood, and the last thing that we need is you toddling about tryin’ to bloody kill yourself!  We’ll find her.  And we’ll keep you safe.  But you’re not moving your sorry arse from that spot; and I’ve got no damned time to argue with you!  Now are you going to keep fighting me, or are you going to stay here and stop prancing about until you keel over and fucking cark it?”

“If you…  Gene, you can’t do this!  Gov!  Gene!  Don’t!”  Gene was walking towards the door, his strides long and purposeful, and a deep, dark burning look in his eyes telling Sam that he’d finally been pushed past the point of madly beating on anything and anyone in sight, and into the realm of cold, pent up fury and purposeful rage that, a dark, angry force driving him along a single course of action with no time or place for any other thoughts; even the man of brute force was pushed back into the recesses of Gene’s mind, replaced by a single course of action, a single drive pushing the rest of him away.  Sam wondered, briefly, if Gene had been like that when he was missing, and then he watched the door slam shut, and turned a shocked face back and forth from his handcuffed wrist to the door, feeling panic rising up in him and pulling madly at the wooden post that the cuffs were attached to, twisting at it to try and loosen the post.

There was a loud sound from downstairs, a crash and a clatter, and Sam wondered if Gene had calmed down enough to subside back into his normal “break things first and then work on the case” mode, or if he was hearing something else…  There were shouts, and Sam couldn’t make out any of the voices, until he heard Gene’s raise to a loud cry of “fuck!” a word which even Gene hardly ever used, and then there was another crash…  Sam felt his breath stop and his blood turn to ice as he heard more shouting and shuffling downstairs, and he waited for the sound of gunfire, pulling his legs up and drawing himself into a fetal position, and then tightening it until he was practically curled into a ball, huddled against the back of the bed and shaking, his head in his hands, waiting for the killer to come for him.

He’d been too fast for Gene and Chris, somehow, and now they were all in for the same as him.  Sam briefly saw a flash of all of them, Annie, Gene, Chris, Ray and Glen, all stripped naked and pinned up, five mirror images with their arms outstretched like crucifixes, blood pouring from thousands of wounds between all of them, and then Sam felt the hands on him, heard the killer’s laugh, heard the growling, hissing sounds of the woods, and he tried to curl up upon himself more tightly, waiting for the worst to come, trembling madly as his mind raced through a thousand nightmares, a thousand images of his friends, a dark, glaring forest of hideously mangled bodies, each of them a mass of blood and bruises and bites, each of them torn and ripped and pinned to the walls, shrieking and screaming in a thick, wet language of blood, just as he had, and just as he would again…

Sam ignored the pain that it caused as he curled up more tightly, waiting for the worst to happen.

All comments, criticism, and mutations of the bunny are highly encouraged and very much appreciated.  Feedback is my drug of choice, and you never know what an offhand comment might inspire, the way this fic has mutated...