Warning for this chapter: a lot of bad language and overall bad vibes. I hope you guys don't mind this content and will still like it as much as the earlier chapters. Feel free to let me know how you feel about it!

Also special thanks to Razell (again!) for your review! Glad you're interested in Jay's backstory. :)

*Curt's viewpoint*

I could feel drips of things on my skin – my face mostly – sharp and cold where my jaw lay exposed in the air, and sort of thicker, warmer, where it was pressed on the ground.

What ground? Gritty, icy, besides that I wasn't sure. Outside or inside? Couldn't tell; would be dark either way. I let my lips grow slack and groaned. I was groaning? Why? Ah, I noticed: something was wrong with my lungs. Deep somewhere in there I was screaming at my half-dead brain to feel something. Pain? Sure, why not, because I'd been feeling pain all this time, hadn't I? Ever since the world ended, yeah.

Ice liquid dripped on my teeth, and I squeezed my eyes further shut.

Later, I was moved around, sleeves pulled down to make my wrists cold as sticky thread bound them tight, like a plaster cast. Aching feelings bloomed all over my scalp and my eyes blinked open, open, until I realized what a dizzy mess my sight'd become. The whole world was fuzzy and flickery like static on a T.V. screen. It killed my head even more just to keep my eyes open. They shut.

What'd happened?

I got around to answering myself once my skull stopped hurting so much. I was bound; someone wanted to keep me in place. My lungs didn't feel quite right, or my head. My head….

I waited, waited for a very long time. For now my brain didn't want to keep up with heavy thinking. As my mind went slack, I dreamed. In my dreams, the world hadn't ended just yet. I was back in the park, with Jay. Jay….

His jacket was blue, like feathers deep in the forest, and he sat with me on the lodge steps as we stared into the green. The forest was so deep. Somewhere, past it all, lived people that I was supposed to know. Not anymore. Jay was the only one left. By now he was the only one I knew.

"You're glad that college'l wait for one more year, aren't you Jay?" I asked.

He grinned at me. That was all I needed, all I needed to understand him. My boy was staying by my side, choosing walks in the wilderness and Rachel Carson over business and exams. He really was just like me. My perfect son….

Sure – I thought, still lost as I stared into darkening woods – we're both a little sick now, in different ways, I guessed, but we'd stick together through anything. Jay'd never leave me, not like my wife, not like…who was that boy whose name I couldn't quite remember anymore? I supposed it didn't matter. Jay was the one that mattered.

We'd stick together through anything. Even when I started waking up, that's what I thought: anything. Anything for my son.

Then the noise began.

"You there yet?"

I groaned. The voice was too loud, even for my old ears, ears that'd stomached .308 caliber gunshots. There was a grating echo around me, I realized. My eyes finally blinked open for good.

The walls were close but not quite cramped, made of tile patched with steel. An old nook in a factory, it looked like, or maybe a hospital. I was on the floor, staring up at a half-fallen ceiling, lined with stalagtites. My hands were bound behind me with thick layers of duct tape. My legs were the same, only thicker. Low on my ankle, just past the tape, was a handcuff. The other loop was locked around an exposed piece of rebar in the wall beside me.

"Where the fuck…."

I stopped when the voice began laughing, all wheezy and thick like it came from rotten lungs. "You're there, alright," I heard.

I shook my head and blinked to clear up my sight. When I turned my head right, I saw the source of the voice, a bald, chunky guy with a brown jacket and camouflage pants, clutching a handgun.

"You," I looked down at myself and saw bandages under my open jacket, tanned with dirt and dust. "Why'd you fucker's not kill me, huh?"

"Oh, you didn't figure that out yet?" Another greasy laugh. "You must not be very smart, Mr. Sniper. Hey Roy!" He called, looking at a rusted door on the wall. "Come in here, your friend's awake."

"Don't fuck around with me," I growled. "Tell me what the hell I'm doin' here."

"Ah, shut up," the guy with camo pants answered as the door jarred and swung open.

The first thing I saw poking out from behind the door was a single wooden crutch, homemade, by the looks of it. Then in swung the body, one leg bound in a sad little sling of torn cloth. I looked up to see a familiar face: scarred, ugly. It was the truck driver I'd thrown off the roof.

"Sniper bitch," Roy spat, angry and low in his throat. "You called a fucking horde on our asses last night, and when that wasn't enough you sicced your damn pet Hunter on my wingman. You slimy weasel fuck. He was gonna vouch for my promotion today!"

"So this is 'bout revenge," I said. "You patched me up just to skin me alive, or somethin'?"

"Oh, I wish it was," Roy answered. "But not yet. Our boss, Mr. Keller, wants to know where you came from, you see. If there's a safehouse in that neighborhood of yours, he's gonna take it."

"There ain't no safe house." I said. Holy hell, I was lying already. I had no plan to deal with these men, I realized, as the words spilled out. This could very easily get me in trouble. Not that trouble was anything new.

"No safe house?" Roy repeated, shifting his hold on the crutch. "I'm no fucking retard. A lone survivor like you just isn't gonna make it outside a safe house."

"I wasn't alone."

"Oh yes that's right," Roy inclined his head. "The pet Hunter. You call that thing company, don't you, you sad little fuck? Funny story, about that Hunter of yours…."

My whole mind went red. I jerked, panicked, praying to anything that this 'story' wasn't going somewhere bad.

"What?" I asked, as the man in camo pants laughed some more. "What happened?"

"Well, while you were out, we caught ourselves a little visitor just outside the perimeter."

"What did you do to my son?" I yelled.

"He's just downstairs," Roy said. "Sedated. Probably awake by now, but he won't be movin' around much." He nudged the camo man, squinting. "Norman here's good at makin' chemical cocktails that really keep 'em down."

I didn't hear much of his babbling. I was staring at the floor, fixed on black and brown spots of rust and calcium and mold. In my mind, I was screaming. Jay was in the last place I wanted him. With these devils calling the shots, he could be dead already. I had to break free somehow, rip them apart first chance I got.

"Listen, bitch," Roy said, limping a step forward. "If I had my way, your little pet would be chopped into pig slop, you hear me? But Mr. Keller's got a plan, you see. He's givin' you sad fucks a chance. Tell us where your fuckin' safe house is, and then Norman here won't have to do something bad."

"Why 'm I supposed to believe that?" I asked, cringing as I fought back the choking pressure in my throat, the hot wax of panic dripping down my brain. "You ain't honest people. First time I saw a couple of your men, they tried t' kill me for my supplies. Jay," I gave up on composure as my voice cracked, "Jay, he's the only one on this cold, bitter earth that hasn't tried t' kill me! He's everythin' t' me! Everythin', an' I know he, he loves me back! His smile, when he hears me speak t' him, his smile's like the sky!"

I stopped. I knew I was delirious, that the thought of losing Jay to these monsters was making me even crazier than before. Exhausted, I squeezed my eyes shut.

"You fuckin' lunatic," I heard Roy say. "Y'know, if you hadn't made me so fuckin' furious, I might actually feel sorry for you. Funny thing."

"So," Norman said. "You ready to tell us where you've hid those supplies?"

I bared my teeth as my head leaned on the ground.

"No," I said, through gritted jaws. "You'll only hurt him anyway."

"Pfft, you're a poor sport," Norman laughed. Roy only narrowed his eyes.

"I'll let Mr. Keller know that the sad fuck won't talk," he said. "Maybe now he'll heed my advice on this whole fuckin' shitshow."

"You do that," Norman said, as he turned towards another door. "I'm gonna check on the Hunter boy. Who knows," he laughed again, loud and grating as ever. "Maybe he'll be the one to talk!"

"Don't touch 'im! Don't!" I yelled as he left. There was no purpose to doing this, that I knew, but I couldn't stop myself. My brain was falling to pieces.

As they left, bolting the doors shut with keys, I laid down my head and prayed.

Hi again, Unfolded here! So eventually I'll have a link to the pics from comic con, but for now I just wanted to focus on writing new chapters. The con was really fun by the way! I hope some of my readers might have also gotten to be there. It wasn't a huge one, so probably not, but it was a good one.

By the way, on the topic of the story, just be prepared for some more "unhappy" times. Things aren't about to turn around for Curt and Jay, but hang in there and hopefully you'll like how the story ends!