Title: Bottoms Up
Genre: Gen
Characters: Don, Liz, David, Colby
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: General for the series
Warnings: Violence. Alcohol.
Word count: 1700
Challenge: lj comm hurt_don no. 13, July 2010: what-alcohol, where-party
Disclaimer: I own nothing and am not being paid. Fair use and just for fun, I swear!
A/N: There's not been much hurt Don fic around lately, so in lieu of having my ridiculously long fic finished, I decided to try to write something for this prompt. Thank you to munchkinofdoom for the beta and zubeneschamali for the beta and title suggestion. Any remaining mistakes are my own.

Summary: Chasing a suspect into his boss' party normally wouldn't be a problem. But when his boss doesn't like federal agents either, Don and Liz find out that interrupting his party isn't a very good idea.

They were in an extremely bad situation. Liz looked around the room again, hoping for some indication of how she and Don could get out of this mess. They'd been chasing Karloff, but they hadn't expected that his boss would be holding a party, of all things, nearby. When Karloff had run into it and started shouting, "Feds!" and eight weapons had been aimed their way they'd been totally unprepared and had no choice but to give up their weapons and cells. Their cells had even been turned off, taking away the chance that the GPS could be used to find them.

"What's your names?"

Miller was circling them slowly, studying them carefully, a shark about ready to bite.

"Agents Eppes and Warner," Don replied for them both, standing stiffly and trying to act like he wasn't freaking out the way Liz knew he was. The way she was.

"Which one are you?" Miller asked Liz, pausing briefly in front of her.

She took a second before answering, the only rebellion she really could have. "Warner."

"So that makes you Eppes," Miller said unnecessarily, moving again to stop in front of Don. "Well, Eppes, come. Come and have a drink with me."

Say what? Liz was not expecting that.

Don gave Liz a look that seemed to say 'it's okay' and she saw, briefly, a flicker of confusion, before he followed Miller over to the bar. Miller's men forced her forward, closer to the bar, presumably so she could have a good view of whatever was going to happen.

The bartender poured two shots, placing one in front of Don and the other in front of Miller. Miller picked his glass up and downed it quickly, gesturing 'bottoms up' when Don didn't follow. After the gesture, Don reluctantly raised the glass to his lips and drank.

"Not quick enough." Miller nodded in her direction and the men standing either side of her grabbed her arms. She automatically started struggling, trying to free herself from their grip. Then another man stepped forward and punched her hard in the gut. Liz doubled over, the pain exploding and radiating out from the impact, the men holding her arms the only thing keeping her standing. She heard Don cry out once before falling silent. The men dropped her arms and when the pain had died down some she slowly straightened, one arm wrapped protectively around her stomach, needing to see what was happening to Don.

He was grimly drinking another shot, the total number of glasses in front of him already up to three, compared to Miller's one. He put that glass down and another shot was placed in front of him. There was no point to Miller's game, and maybe that was the point. It was a whim, make the Fed drink against his will. When is he going to stop? A chill ran down her spine as she suddenly realised that maybe Miller wouldn't stop. Her mind suddenly made a connection: there had been a few 'accidental' alcohol related deaths amongst Miller's crew and two of his rivals had died from choking on their own vomit after consuming large amounts of alcohol. Maybe the deaths weren't so accidental after all. Alcohol poisoning. If Don drank too much in too short a period of time... It was a strange way of killing somebody, but it did allow the possibility of covering up a murder. But not in this case. An FBI agent deciding in the middle of chasing a suspect to get hammered? Definitely did not make any sense. And she was a witness, if she lived that long.

So in this case, it was for fun. Miller gestured in her direction, Don apparently having paused too long again, and she copped another blow to the stomach. This time it took her to the floor and it was longer before she was able to think past the pain. Her attacker's hand felt like a block of concrete being dropped onto her stomach.

There was a smile on Miller's face as Don drank another shot, her view of the number of glasses now obstructed. She had no idea of how many shots he'd been forced to drink. Don was starting to sweat and look unsteady on his feet and she wasn't surprised when, a few seconds after he'd put the glass back down, knocking it against the other glasses, he hurled.

It earned her a kick to the back and she couldn't help the cry of pain.

"No, do-don' hurt her."

She was kicked again, this time from the front and it knocked the wind out of her. She curled herself up into as small a ball as she could, trying to protect as much of her body as possible.

"You don't want her hurt, you know what you have to do."

No, Don, don't. When she looked up, she saw that Don had picked up the next shot, managing to spill surprisingly little, and was downing it. His eyes closed and his throat worked as he tried to keep the shot in his stomach. Another two, this time Miller allowing some time in between them, and Don's balance was gone. He collapsed to the floor, and Miller crouched down beside him another glass in his hand. Don shook his head from side to side, murmuring what she thought was 'no' a few times, when Miller held the rim of the glass up to Don's lips.

"Leave him alone," Liz called out, angry and scared. "Damnit, leave him alone!"

Miller ignored her and stopped the movement of Don's head by grabbing him by the back of the hair. Don tried to fight it, his coordination totally screwed, but another man grabbed his hands, easily stopping him. Then Miller placed the glass against Don's lips, tipping it to force him to drink. Some of it went down, but the rest just wet the shirt Don was wearing. One of Miller's men handed him two shots, one after another, and he forced Don to drink again.

Don had stopped moving. Oh, God. He was unconscious. Miller waved away the next shot, releasing Don's head and standing back up.

"It's your turn, Agent Warner."

She knew that there was no point in struggling when the two men picked her up from the floor and forced her to the bar, even though she was terrified. She managed to get a glimpse of her watch and felt a glimmer of hope. It had been forty minutes since they'd last called in their position. Colby and David should be nearby, and with no response to phone calls and their phones being off, they'd be searching for their team-mates. There was a chance of Don and her being rescued, but she didn't know whether Don would survive that long. He was lying slumped back against the bar, almost completely on the floor, and if he threw up again, he'd choke.

Obediently, Liz drank the first shot when it was put down in front of her, grimacing at the taste.

"FBI, drop your weapons!"

"LAPD, drop your weapons!"

The yells came from multiple voices from two different directions. Liz was holding the second shot and she threw it in Miller's eyes before grabbing a bottle from behind the bar and hitting him on the side of the head with it. It shattered and he went down. Liz held the jagged remains of the bottle out in front of her as a weapon, ready to defend herself, but Miller's men, after a very short fight, had dropped their weapons. Two of their number had fallen but it looked like all the agents and officers were fine.

Liz dropped the bottle, breathing hard, the adrenaline rush having temporarily deadened the pain of her injuries. They were safe, now. She rushed the few feet to Don's side and checked his pulse and breathing. His skin was clammy and cold but he was breathing.

David appeared and she backed off to let him help Don, knowing that he was in better condition to do so.

"Alcohol poisoning," she explained, watching him check Don's airway and listen for his breathing before rolling him into a recovery position.

"Liz, are you okay?" Colby asked from beside her.

The adrenaline was starting to abate and her back and stomach were starting to hurt a lot. She grimaced. "They hit and kicked me in the back and stomach. They used that as a threat to force Don to drink the shots. And when Don was pretty much unconscious, when he couldn't drink any more, Miller held him by the hair and forced it into his mouth." She gave Miller, who'd been handcuffed and was starting to come around, a contemptuous glare.

"How long until the ambulance?" David asked.

"Five minutes," Colby replied, guiding her down to the floor to lean against the bar.

Liz let her eyes shut, just trying to breathe through the pain.

A knock on the open door of Don's hospital room, and then Liz walked in. He was awake and alone.

"Hey, Liz," Don said, sounding ridiculously cheerful for someone who'd had a huge number of shots poured down his throat and had to have his stomach pumped. Let alone someone whose breathing had dipped into dangerous territory while they'd been waiting for the ambulance and had to be given mouth to mouth.

She shook her head at him with a disbelieving smile. The amazing Don Eppes, ladies and gentlemen. He always bounces back.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, deciding not to sit down. Leaning back against a seat hurt.

Don shrugged. "Okay. Don't think I'll be drinking for quite a while, though. You?"

"Just bruises," she said. Deep bruising, but only bruises, nonetheless. She'd been lucky and no vital organs had been damaged. "We were lucky, Don. If the others hadn't turned up then, you could have died and Miller would have forced me to drink until I was in the same situation."

"Yeah, I know," Don said soberly.

Silence fell.

"So I've heard that there's a new bar opening in my neighbourhood..."

Liz rolled her eyes. Yep, he always bounced back.

-FIN-