Last 100% little!Christophe– I just wanted to get this segment over with. Plus, it's fun to update more frequently.

Enjoy!

Christophe wakes up in a cocoon of sheet and blankets. He glances down at his hands. Pink and normal again. He wriggles them, to test it out.

He doesn't hurt anymore. That's all he knows. He doesn't hurt anymore and it's warm. He should inspects his surroundings . . . he should plan an escape . . .

He still can't bring himself to care. He closes his eyes and goes back to sleep.

XXX

"Tophe!"

Voice. It's female.

Whatever.

He rolls over, sheets twisting around his body.

"Chris-toph-phe! Wake up!" A small hand grabs his shoulder.

He jerks into a sitting position, whipping his head around. His muscles groan, but his hands still curl as he goes into defensive mode.

Maria on one side of the bed. Chase crawling up next to him. Gregory hovering by his bedside table.

He closes his eyes and falls back against his pillow.

"Christophe! You all right? You better be alright, moron! Oh, god, your face!" He hears Maria sniffle down her tears. "Oh, dios, Christophe, don't just tune us out now."

He opens his eyes obligingly.

"What are you zree doing 'ere?" he mutters, his voice thick. The words still sluggishly fall out of his mouth. He can barely move the right side of his face.

"Coming to get you out, you moron!" she snaps. "You were gone for ten days, you know! We came and visited you yesterday, but they made us go back to our fucking lessons, so Gregory came up with his plan last night and we're going to bust out!"

He stares at the three of them, half-reeling.

"I was gone for ten days? But I was only in ze Fridge for six."

"You were in the Fridge for six days?" Chase lets out a little whimper. He crawls up next to Christophe on the bed. He's the only one who's still smaller than him (Gregory and Maria have both been cycling through series of growth spurts over the last few months). "Oh, Christophe." He half-hugs Christophe around the shoulder.

"You've been healing, we think." Maria clenches her fists out in front of her. "We saw them drag you out of the Fridge – you looked like hell – they made us leave, but made sure we got a good look first – wanted to scare us I think – fucking bastards."

"The angels healed your frostbite," Chase tells him. He hops off the bed but stays close enough to Christophe to brush his fingers over Christophe's shoulder. He hugs Maria around the waist at the same time. He's a physical contact whore.

Christophe glances down at his fingers and nods.

For the first time he surveys the room around him. A single bed. White walls, the pebbly texture barely visible in the gloom of the night. About the size of a bedroom. No other furniture. There's an IV next to him.

"We took it out of you," Maria explains when she sees his raised eyebrows.

"Why?"

"Because we're getting out of here," she hisses.

The words make his stomach clench, so instead he focuses on his questions. "'Ow are you 'ere? Ze hospital is on ze ground floor, and ze do not let us out of ze student dorms after nine o clock-"

"We snuck out."

It's the first time Gregory has spoken since Christophe woke up. His voice is flat and harsh.

"You broke zeir rules?" Christophe leans forward to glare at him. "Zey are going to fucking murder you!"

"I don't think you've been listening." Gregory doesn't look down at him. "We've said repeatedly that we're going to break out. Tonight. We are going to give them plenty of reasons to want to kill us."

"Break out?"

For a few seconds the only sounds are the steady hum of the a/c and their pounding hearts.

"But . . . ze guards."

"Negotiated with."

"You negotiated wiz ze guards?" Christophe stares at him in disbelief. He glances at Maria and Chase, who are avoiding his gaze, then back at Gregory. "What did you do?"

"Nothing I won't do again if it means we can get out of here."

"But . . . you said years until we escape. You said we 'ave to become stron-gairre." His accent slips on the last word.

"We are strong enough. If not, then we have to be tonight. We have to leave, Christophe. What happened to you . . . I do not want it to happen again."

"Why?"

He knows Gregory has been building a plan together, analyzing the building structure, planning their blending into the real world, how they'll cover their tracks. He also know Gregory has not finished the plan yet, that he will always follow the plan.

Gregory doesn't respond. Chase sits on the bed next to him and curls his arms around Christophe's waist.

"Why?" he demands, fists clenching the sheets.

"Maria," Gregory jerks his head. "Give him your mirror."

Shakily, Maria tugs her mother's eyeshadow container (a momento she never lets go of) and hands it to him. He opens it and stares into the mirror.

The right side of his face is completely coated in scars, twisted and marred. The features are melted beyond recognition. He touches his right eye. In the gloom, he hasn't even noticed he can't see out of it.

"Oh," he says.

He can't look any more. He snaps the mirror closed and hands it back to Maria, who tucks it into her jeans pocket.

"Just because I 'ave started to look a leettle gross does not mean we need to start risking your lives-"

"I let him drag you away!" Gregory yells.

Christophe looks up at him in surprise.

"You were shouting at the them and Maria and Chase tried to fight them off and he just dragged you away! And I did nothing! I just stood there and planned and plotted and did nothing!"

"And if I wait and make the perfect plan this time, then I will never carry it out, because I will be too afraid. We have to do it now, Christophe. I'll loose my nerve if we don't, and then we'll never escape. They hurt you so bad. I never want them to hurt any of you again." He grits his teeth and hides behind his blond wave of bangs. "We have to escape now. While we still can."

They all stare at him.

"I am not letting my emotions rule me." He rubs his eyes and avoids their looks. "I am just thinking logically. Right now is the best time-"

Christophe grabs his hand and drags him down onto the bed. He reaches up, brushes the hair out of Gregory's eyes, and forces him to look at him.

"I understand," he says, and kisses him, because at this moment, it's perfect.

Gregory stumbles back, eyes wide. Maria crows. Chase giggles. Christophe's cheeks burn.

"Um, um, um-"

He's never seen Gregory flustered before. It's undeniably adorable. Adorable. He's never applied the adjective to the English bastard before, either. What is he, a girl?

"Right." Christophe swings his legs out of the bed, stumbling from the effort. He holds onto Maria for support. The door is closed. "Let's escape zis place, zen?"

XXX

"What about ze guards?"

"Like I said, I negotiated with them."

They speak in hushed whispers and cower behind the corner, glancing at waiting room. Into the waiting room, out the double doors, into the sunlight, over the gate – It'll be perfect, beautiful. And then they'll be free.

"Negotiated, like-" Christophe clenches his fists. "Like you negotiated to get me ze cigarettes?"

Gregory nods, his jaw tight. "But much more required."

Christophe glances at Maria and Chase. "Why would you let 'im do zat?" he snaps, as quietly as possible, because there's a dozing receptionist at the front desk.

"They helped me, Christophe."

"What? What ze fuck? You fucking assholes! 'Ow could you 'ore yourselves out just so I –"

"We already told you," Gregory growls, keeping his voice down. "Now shut up before you give us away and render everything we've done pointless."

Christophe closes his mouth, still fuming, his stomach still churning. He can't argue with them, not right here, not right now. Not ever, he realizes. They did what they did because they care about him.

He presses his forehead against the wall.

"Cameras?" he whispers.

"Hernandez turned them off. At least, he said he did. If he didn't-" Gregory cracks his knuckles.

Hernandez is one of the regular guards. He's also one of the medium-sized population of pedophiles the Yardale school hired for the sole purpose of tormenting the kids.

"Zere are supposed to four guards," Christophe murmurs. The number of guards is part of Gregory's plan, just something else to take into consideration.

"We found out the schedule. Two of them we . . . negotiated with last night, one of them we managed to slip a sleeping serum, and one of them we found a baseball bat for." Gregory looks at him sharply.

He's right, there's no turning back.

"We have to get past the receptionist." Maria glances up at Gregory. "What was the plan again?"

Gregory sighs. "Simple distraction technique. Make some noise in the opposite direction, hope she goes to investigate. If not, we'll have to move on to more advanced techniques." He pulls his shoe off his foot and lobs it past the receptionist.

It lands in the mouth of the far hallway with a thump. The receptionist yawns, glances at the shoe, and frowns. She clambers out from behind her desk and stumbles over to the shoe. Bends over. Glances down, muttering, "Why-"

Gregory darts forward and slams a rock down on her head. She crumples, hits the floor. Maria and Chase rush forward to help him, and the three children drag her limp form behind her desk again.

Christophe stares. "What . . . " he whispers.

"Picked this up this morning." Gregory hefts it, smiling, smirking humorlessly. "Let's go."

They head out into the gravel walkway. The stones crunch under their feet as they move, so Gregory, Maria and Chase take off their shoes (Christophe, while he was changed into the black uniform while he slept, didn't receive a pair of shoes and so moves quietly).

The fence towers in front of them. Barbed wire at the top, brick twenty feet high. Video cameras rotate slowly.

"Fucking Hernandez," Maria mutters. "What a fucking liar."

They huddle behind bushes, staring at the video camera covering the section of wall they've selected to climb.

"The ones inside have to be turned off," Gregory says with certainty. "Otherwise, they would have already tracked us down."

"Is zere anywhere not covered?" Christophe asks, even though he already knows the answer. Gregory has been running through escape options every day for the past few months.

Gregory shakes his head. "No." He chews his lip and examines the wall. After a minute, he says, "Alright. The fastest route will be to clamber up that tree next to the wall, and then somehow jump the ten feet . . . " he hesitates. "Chase will go first, followed by Maria, then me, then Christophe-" He stops and turns to Christophe, opening his mouth to ask the question.

"I'm fine," he snaps. "Ze already 'ealed me up and pumped me full of zeir nutrients so I am not starving to deazth anymore. I will go last."

Gregory nods. "Christophe last. We'll start climbing ten seconds apart. It should take approximately a minute and a half to climb the tree, and twenty seconds to get across the wall. I didn't plan for Hernandez to forget to turn off the outside cameras. I didn't plan for this."

His eyes start to widen. He sucks in too much air, ragged fingernails digging into the ground.

Christophe grabs his shoulder and forces him to look at him. "I will fix this," he promises.

He turns and runs back towards the Yardale school, keeping behind bushes to avoid the cameras.

He snaps open the shed lock with a rock. He holds his breath for a second, praying slight clang! doesn't wake anyone. Nothing happens, so he pries open the shed door and steps inside. Dust fills his mouth and he coughs and coughs, bending over on his hands and knees.

When the coughing fit leaves him, he scrambles up and searches through the shed until he finds a length of rope. Still hacking slightly, he runs back to the others, panting for air.

"Perfect!" Maria snatches it from him and hugs the rope against her chest. When the others stare at her, she snaps, "What?"

"Someone 'as a rope fetish," Christophe mutters.

"Yeah," Chase says, his voice light even though his eyes are huge from fear and he hugs himself constantly. "Want us to tie you up, Maria?"

"Shut up you guys!" She shoves the rope back at Christophe, who starts to uncoil it.

"Maria's right, it's perfect." Gregory takes the end of the rope from Gregory. His panic has died down. "I will take thirty seconds to secure this rope to the branch. Then Chase will grab it and we will throw him over the gate. His weight will drag it down. Find something to secure it to."

"You're gonna throw me?" Chase squeaks. "Why me?"

"You're ze smallest, moron," Christophe snaps.

"But he's the fattest!" Maria teases. "Throw me instead, it seems like fun!"

"Follow the plan," Gregory says. "This is the plan. Let's follow it."

Christophe watches as Gregory, Chase, and Maria dissolve into a squabble. It's so strange how things went back to normal almost immediately, as if he never-

But the fact is, he still remembers the wet spurt of blood when his knife slashed the first vein in Emma's neck. The right side of his face is still scarred into deformation (he catches the other kids sneaking glances at it every few seconds). He still knows exactly what Maria, Gregory, and Chase had to suck to even get them this opportunity.

It's so easy to forget, though. Easy to forget and just run for freedom.

They scamper up the tree in dead silence, their trained bodies moving with practiced ease. Christophe knots his end of the rope around the tree while Gregory ties his end around Chase.

"They can see us," Maria whispers, nodding towards a video camera a dozen feet away, which is now focused on them, probably a motion sensor.

"I estimate two minutes for someone to notice it, two minutes for them to summon forces and arrive here." Gregory helps Chase to his feet; all four of them balance precariously on the thick branch.

"Christophe, help me." The two larger boys pick Chase up and stagger over to the end of the branch. Even with their abnormal strength (influenced by them being 'low heavenfilth?' Christophe wonders) they still grunt under Chase's weight.

"One, two, three." Gregory hisses, and they toss the smaller as hard as they can.

Chase's arm scrapes the barbed wire on the top of the fence, but he tumbles over it and the rope on their side tenses. They hear a thump on the other side.

"You all right?" Gregory calls.

"Yeah . . . landed on my hurt arm . . . gimme a sec, I'm tying it to a bush . . . "

Christophe hears noises, shouts inside the school. He turns to Gregory, mouth open without anything to say.

"Okay, go!" Chase yells.

Maria clambers across the rope first. She ends up getting her arm stuck in barbed wire, shrieks, but disappears over the side next.

Gregory gives Christophe one last look and starts to climb hand-over-hand over the rope after her. He disappears and hits the ground with the same groan in pain as Chase.

"Stop!"

Christophe turns. Guards hurdle towards him, their guns raised, two hundred feet away.

"We won't hesitate to shoot!"

As if to emphasize, a shot cracks out and bark flies off the nearest tree. Christophe gapes at it for half a second. They're really fucking serious!

But he swallows down his fear and shouts back:

"Fuck you, assholes!"

He flips them off and slides one hand over the rope, ignoring the burn. He drags himself over the rope. A shot nicks his cheek, and he cries up but keeps climbing.

He ends up dragging himself right through the barbed wire. Adrenaline sears away his pain. He lands on the ground. The fall disorients him, and with his face in the dirt, all he can do is let his hands scrabble out for a purchase, for anything. Someone drags him up and hugs him. He opens his eyes and sees locks of blond hair, even though he doesn't need it to discern identity. He'd know Gregory's scent –of soap and blood and cotton – anywhere.

"Thank fucking god you're alright," Gregory mutters, dragging Christophe closer to him until their chests press together. "I thought they'd shot you."

"I am all fine, moron," Christophe murmurs back, and lets himself relax into Gregory's arms.

"Lovebirds? Save the making out for later." Maria forces them apart. "They've got soldiers on the other side – I can hear 'em – and it'll take, like, two minutes or less until they open the gate."

They snap back to reality. In front of them is the highway, which is surrounded by fields of waving grass.

"Let's go!" Christophe grabs Gregory's hands and drags him into the fields. The other two follow. Their bare feet are full of stickers and burrs in seconds. The grass scratches at their arms and legs and faces, but it's tall enough to cover the children. The perfect hide out. And in the darkness, no one can see the grass moving, anyway.

Laughter bubbles out from Christophe. He honestly cannot remember the last time he laughed because he found something funny, or because he was happy. Certainly not since they came to Yardale.

With Gregory's hand in his and his three best friends/family in the world running beside him, he couldn't be more at peace.

The freedom lasts for eleven days.

xxx

Review? (grins hopefully)

-liz out