As it turned out, according to the yellow pages, there were twenty-two Allison Sharpes in the New York area. Robin and the others spent the next three days tracking down every last one of them, a task which took longer than they might have hoped due to the fact that Robin had to see each one in person to know whether or not they were the girl she'd seen Barney talking to at the bar.

Finally, they managed to eliminate all of the women in question but one, who had not been home any of the various times they'd stopped by her apartment. Marshall and Lily both had to be at work, so Ted accompanied Robin on her fourth visit to the home of the final Allison Sharpe.

Robin cursed under her breath in frustration when once again, there was no answer.

"This has to be the right one," she muttered. "We've eliminated all the others."

"Assuming the girl even lives in the New York area," Ted reminded her with gentle, cautious warning. "Even if it is her… this is still kind of a long shot, isn't it? I mean… it's possible this girl didn't even see anything."

"Well, if she didn't then one of our best friends has disappeared off the face of the earth and we have no other way to find him…" Robin's tone was terse and stubborn, leaving no doubt as to her determination not to give up. "… so we'd better hope she did."

She knocked again, but no one answered.

Ted didn't dare to speak as they made their way back to the rental car he'd acquired for the search – much more convenient than repeatedly paying for cabs all day for three days straight.

Once they were in the car, Robin leaned forward, resting her head on the dashboard for a moment. Ted extended a tentative hand to rest on her back, just below her shoulder, rubbing gently in a slow, soothing circle.

"We'll find him, Robin," he assured her, though he was not at all sure it was true. "He'll be fine, I promise."

"You can't know that," she mumbled, her words barely distinguishable from behind her folded arms. "There's no way for you to know whether or not he's even…"

Her words trailed off as her cell phone began to ring, and Robin took it from her purse with a weary sigh. Suddenly, her eyes went wide with amazement and disbelief, and she looked up at Ted with stricken eyes.

"Who is it?" he asked her with urgent impatience.

Her voice was an awed whisper, incredulous and almost suspicious as she gave him the startling answer.

"It's… it's Barney!"

************************

Barney lay on his side on his small strip of carpet, his entire body trembling with the combined effect of cold, hunger, exhaustion, terror, and pure blinding agony. The last three days had passed in a haze of unending torment, as Allison and Ryan had stretched the borders of their sadistic imaginations to devise a limitless list of vicious, torturous "games" to play with their helpless captive.

Barney's entire body was covered in cuts and bruises, coated in a filthy film of blood, sweat, and other bodily fluids that he didn't want to think about too clearly. His feet and hands had both been severely burned, more than once, as had various patches of sensitive skin on the rest of his body. He was fairly certain Ryan had managed to break several of his ribs, as well as his left leg, with the brutal blows delivered by his fists and feet.

They had given him only a few sips of water since they'd taken him, and nothing to eat. Barney felt dizzy and light-headed, his thoughts muddled and confusing as he tried in vain to come up with some way out of this living nightmare – until he stopped trying. By this point, Barney had all but accepted the fact that he was going to exist here in this state of agony until they got tired of their cruel games… and then, he was going to die.

As Allison had promised – they had broken him.

He had begged and cried and screamed with agony, overwhelmed with his own humiliation at giving them what they wanted – his own utter and complete abasement – but unable to fight the sheer survival instinct that pushed him to do anything, no matter how degrading, that might help him survive another moment.

He didn't want to think about some of those things he had done.

He shuddered, fighting off a sense of nausea as he tried to focus on his surroundings instead.

He had been left alone for the past hour.

Ryan had gone outside and Barney had heard the car's engine start up nearly an hour ago. Allison had lain down on the sofa just beyond him, its high back obscuring her from his view; but he could hear the soft sounds of her snoring and knew that she was asleep.

They said they'd kill me when they got tired of this… and they've left me alone for an hour now. When he gets back… they're going to kill me…

After all he'd been through, Barney was surprised that he still feared death – but he did.

Once again, his traumatized mind began searching for some means of escape. His disjointed thoughts somehow made their winding way to his cell phone, where he had seen it the night before, tossed aside on a pile of his clothing and other belongings in the corner of the bedroom.

His mind's defense mechanisms quickly blocked any thoughts of exactly what had taken place in that bedroom, and he struggled to focus on the phone.

She's asleep. If there's still any battery left… if I could get to the phone…

They had tied and untied and retied him so many times in the past few days that he'd lost count. Fortunately at this point, they knew that he was far too weak and injured to get past the front door, so they hadn't bothered to do more than to tie his wrists together in front of him. Barney pulled himself forward weakly on his elbows, trying to drag himself the twenty feet or so to the bedroom door.

He immediately froze, biting back a cry of anguish at the searing pain that seemed to radiate from his battered ribcage and his damaged leg, throughout the rest of his body. He nearly blacked out from the pain alone, but managed to stay conscious, struggling to keep silence while catching his breath and steeling himself for the next attempt.

It hurt so bad – but he had no other choice.

It was a long and agonizing process, made more terrifying by the knowledge that at any moment, Allison might wake up or Ryan might return, and Barney would face more suffering as a consequence for his failed attempt.

But it's almost over anyway… they're done with me, and they're going to kill me… I have to try…

Barney was infinitely grateful that the bedroom door was open. He crawled slowly through the doorway and toward the pile of clothes in the corner. His suit was crumpled in a heap with his shirt and underclothes, but otherwise undamaged. It seemed surreal, given the state of his body, to see the clothes he had worn the night he was taken.

It seemed like several lifetimes ago – almost as if he'd never really existed before the horror of this place… only dreamed it.

It was real… wasn't it?

Desperately Barney snatched up his IPhone in trembling hands, fumbling with his raw, burned fingers to turn it on, cringing when the quiet greeting chime echoed in the stillness of the not-quite-empty house. He looked over his shoulder with dread, waiting for Allison to appear in the doorway – but she did not. Relief overwhelmed him as he returned his attention to his prize, surprised and grateful to see that it still had half the battery remaining. He held his breath as he pressed speed dial one to call Robin's cell phone.

**************************

Robin held her breath as she pressed the call receive button and put her phone to her ear.

"Hello?" She barely breathed out the word. "Barney?"

Only silence met her words for a long, awful moment, before Robin heard a sharp, shallow gasp on the other end of the line, the first indication that there was actually someone there.

"Barney? Is that you?"

"R-robin…" Her name was little more than a ragged, broken sob on the other line, and Robin's heart clenched at the sound. "I… I need…"

"Barney, where are you? What's happened?" she asked, struggling to keep her voice calm. Something raw and jagged and shattered in his tone struck an instinctive chord deep within her, and she knew on some primal level, too deep to really tell how she knew, that something unspeakably horrible had happened to him. "Talk to me, sweetie, I need to know how to help you…"

"I've been… a-abducted…" His voice sounded weak and breathless, as if he was badly injured and in a lot of pain. "I… they're… holding me prisoner in this… this cabin…"

"Do you know where you are?"

Barney was silent for a long moment before finally responding with a despairing sob. "No… I-I'm sorry…"

"No, no, Barney, it's okay," she tried to reassure him, tears springing to her eyes at the broken sound of his voice, and the very thought that he was apologizing to her – as if it was his fault that he'd been kidnapped, and had no idea where he'd been taken. "Listen… do you know who they are? What they want?"

"A-allison… Sharpe…"

"They want her?"

"No… she… she t-took… she…"

Realization dawned on Robin as he stumbled over his words, and her eyes went wide with understanding. "Wait… she did this? She's the one who kidnapped you?" Robin had thought that Allison might know what happened; she'd never really considered that the girl might be responsible for Barney's disappearance.

"Yeah…" Barney's voice sounded slurred and listless when he spoke again, as if his very meager store of energy was about to give out. "She… she wants to… she's… h-hurt me…"

"Barney, have you seen your surroundings at all? Do you have any idea where you are?"

"Woods," Barney tried, his voice barely audible now. "M-middle of nowhere. Don't… don't know…"

"Okay… okay, hang on, Barney, we're gonna help you, okay? We're gonna call the police, and we're gonna come find you… okay?"

"Well, isn't this interesting. Just what do you think you're doing, baby?"

Robin's chest seized up with a cold feeling of terror when she suddenly heard a cruel, menacing female voice near to the phone, slightly muffled but still clear enough to understand. The sheer panic in Barney's trembling whimper made her mouth go dry, her heart pounding with dread.

"I'm sorry… no, I'm s-sorry, please…"

"Not good enough."

The woman's voice was hard and dangerous, and Robin heard a thumping sound, followed by a cry of pain and terror.

"Barney? Barney!" Robin cried out in helpless fear. "We're coming, okay? We're coming!"

She couldn't be sure if he'd heard her or not, because the line was dead by the time she finished speaking. She stared at the phone for a stunned moment of horrified shock before looking up at Ted, blind determination in her eyes. She got out of the car, taking her purse as she stalked purposefully back up toward the door.

"Robin?" Ted followed her, clearly uncertain as to what she was doing. He'd only caught her side of the conversation, and didn't yet know what she did. "Where is he? What'd he say? Robin?"

Ted's eyes widened when Robin took her pistol from her purse. He obviously hadn't had any idea she'd even been carrying it.

Robin didn't really care what he thought at the moment.

As she took aim at the lock on the front door of Allison's apartment, Ted stepped back, hands raised in a halting gesture.

"Robin, no… what are you…? We can't just break in…"

"She has Barney, and she's hurting him. We have to find out where she's taken him, and we don't have time to wait around for the cops to show up…"

"We won't have long to wait if someone hears the…" Ted's voice trailed off as Robin pulled the trigger and he flinched… but there was only a soft ping as opposed to the loud blast he'd anticipated. "… shot…"

Despite the situation, Robin spared him a wry half-smile as she stepped through the door with a shrug.

"Silencers are cool."

***********************

Barney flinched violently, his shaking hands dropping the phone to the floor, as Allison swiftly closed the distance between them. She kicked the phone away from his hand across the floor – kicking his damaged fingers in the process – and knocked it against the wall behind him, where it shattered into a dozen pieces. Unmoved by the strangled cry of pain that left Barney's lips, she reached down and grasped his hair, twisting viciously as she dragged him across the room and out into the living area. Once there, she allowed him to fall to the floor on his face, his bound hands folded beneath him as he struggled through the agony that consumed his abused body to pull himself up to his knees.

"You have really screwed up this time, Barney," Allison declared, her voice trembling with fury as she kicked him in the stomach, knocking him back down onto his face on the floor. "You little idiot!" She kicked him again, and he coughed hard, gasping for breath.

"Please," he whispered, shaking his head. "I'm sorry… I'm sorry…"

She grabbed his hair again and yanked his head up, dragging him to the side of the sofa and yanking his head back over the arm of it to expose his throat. Barney flinched when he heard the sound of her switchblade opening, closing his eyes, his breath quickening with panic when he felt the cold, smooth steel against his throat. Her voice was frighteningly close to his ear and he jumped slightly when she spoke again, low and menacing and sickeningly intimate.

"Too late, baby," she informed him. "Guess what?" There was cruel amusement in her voice, and he opened his eyes to meet hers with dread, his heart sinking at her final smiling words. "I'm bored now."