A/N: This originally started out to be the next chapter in my Sideways Series but it doesn't fit into the category of a drabble and has potential to be much more.

PS, I do believe this first chapter is one of my angsty yet!

Blackout

Daylight was just peeking through the thick foliage in the Barataria Wildlife Preserve, spotlighting the overturned 2016 Ford F-150 extended cab. The front end was completely crushed creating a terrifying scene of twisted metal and broken glass, while a white string of steam pressed onward up into the morning sky.

Chris LaSalle was wedged in tightly by the steering wheel and the driver's seat making him feel as if the entire front end of his truck was sitting directly on his chest. For whatever reason, the airbag had not deployed. It also didn't help that he was technically upside down and that all of the blood in his body had rushed to his already aching head.

He didn't remember the crash. He didn't even remember driving the truck last night. His last concious thought had been settling in on the couch with a beer and some wings from Chubby's to catch the final game in March Madness.

Damn, he must have hit his head pretty hard to have lost an entire night of events which evidently had included crashing the new truck. Everything seemed distorted as if he was waking up from a heavily drug induced sleep.

What in the hell had happened to the automatic emergency response system? Wasn't it supposed to send a signal upon impact? Groping around, he managed to find the release button to his seatbelt. As the seatbelt released, he should have felt gravity pulling him towards the roof of the cab. No such luck. That might have something to do with the fact that his body was literally entangled with parts of twisted metal and glass. He dreaded to think about what would happen when all of the pain hit. That point when his body and brain finally realized that something was broken or severed.

Shifting his gaze, he noticed Brody in the passenger seat, her head titled sickly against the cracked window. There was a large laceration near her hairline causing blood to run down the side of her pretty face. From what he could tell her airbag had failed too.

He wanted to call out to her but his warped sense of consciousness wouldn't let him. He felt like he was in the middle of one of those dreams where you knew that you needed to wake up but couldn't because you were helplessly trapped within the nightmare.

Briefly, he thought about trying to crawl through the small opening that used to be the driver's side window, but even through blurred vision he could see that it wasn't a viable option. He and this beautiful new truck of his had become one in the worst way possible.

Grimacing, he managed to move his right hand just enough so that it was touching Brody's. It felt cold, like the countless number of dead bodies he seen over the years and that terrified him. She was so flaccid and still. If only he could manage to wake her up. Then together they might have a chance of getting out this, whatever this was-alive.

He hoped against all odds that this really was some sort of weird dream caused by his excitement over the new truck and that the sweet but at times overly reserved woman next to him was really at home safe in her own bed or in the shower getting ready for a day at the office.

Closing his eyes he forced his head against the back of the seat. The way he saw it, he had two options; one wake up and save his own ass or pray to God that Pride would be able to utilize the GPS tracking device in this now gnarled forty-thousand dollar vehicle and get them the hell out of here. Where ever hell was.

Glancing back at Brody, he realized he was more worried about her than himself. The way her head was hanging and all the blood that was oozing out her her scalp couldn't be a good sign.

What if he had done something to cause this accident and she was already dead? If that were the case then he might as well die alongside her too.

And then her finger twitched ever so slightly brushing against his hand.

Dwayne Pride stood with his arms crossed over chest as two different sets of trauma team members worked feverishly on his agents. Normally, Pride wasn't an arm crosser but he needed to do something. Every muscle in his body was starting to quiver.

Victims of a horrific car accident, both of his agents were near death. What if he lost one of them worst yet what if he lost both of them? He couldn't see much through the closed curtains, but he could hear. The ER attendings were fighting to try to stabilize both of them.

Pride's head kept turning from the left to the right and back again as if he watching a fast paced tennis match. Orders were being spouted so quickly that it was hard to tell what was being done and who was getting what.

Then he heard it, the sickening continuous alarm sound of the heart monitor. One of his agents was coding; a flat line on a computer screen, chest compressions followed by the sound of the AED. Pride heard the flopping sound of a body being shocked rising and falling back to the table followed by the words: again.

A calming hand ran down to the middle of his back as Loretta stepped up to his flank.

"Which one is it?" he asked.

"Christopher," Loretta placed her hands behind her lacing her fingers together. A skilled physician, Loretta could make more of what was happening than her longtime friend. Despite her faith, in the resilience of both agents she had the sickening feeling that this time it wasn't going to end well. Her gut told her they had been out in the wilderness too long without medical attention for both of them to just bounce back.

At first, it had looked like Chris was faring a little bit better than Brody but now…

Like Pride, she was literally holding her breath praying that she would hear the words normal sinus rhythm.

Then a shout came from the other side. This one's not breathing! We're going to have to tube her!

Brody wasn't breathing on her own and headed for an all systems crash.

Now it was if LaSalle and Brody were in some sort of competition or maybe it was some unspoken bond between them that said, if one didn't make it, the other would refuse to go on. Pride couldn't be certain. All he knew was that he was praying that neither of them gave up.