Chapter 10

Dean smiled at the thought that at least something in this miserable night had gone his way. Though the power was out, the ice-maker had kept itself cold enough to keep whatever ice it already had from melting. Dean reached in, grabbing a handful of small ice cubes and put them in the small towel he'd brought with him. After one more handful, Dean closed up the towel and pressed it against his face, sighing at the comfortable cooling sensation that spread over his hot, swollen skin.

Content to be by himself for a little while, Ambrose leaned up against the wall next to the ice-maker, closing his eyes as he reflected on the evening's events. He felt annoyed, as usual, with Reigns and hurt by Seth. Reigns he could handle. Seth, on the other hand, he had no defense against. Rollins was supposed to be his best friend. He was supposed to stand up for him when no one else could or would, but now, he'd turned on Ambrose too. It only takes one snappy remark, Ambrose thought bitterly to himself. He knew he'd need to build up his resolve for the next, more extreme time that he was sure Seth would lose his tempt with him. If Dean's past had taught him nothing else, it'd taught him that once someone turned on you, it only got worse after that.

Ambrose felt a hollow spot growing in his chest. Before he'd met Seth, Dean had been a depressed kid barely holding on. However, once he'd gone into the indies and met Rollins, the younger man had attached himself to Dean's hip, and he'd watched over Dean like a hawk. Only later did Dean realize that it was Rollins' protection that had afforded Ambrose enough hope, causing him to begin to crawl out of his suffocating darkness. Even today, it still blew Dean's mind that people always remarked how confident he looked in the ring and on the mic, but that was only thanks to Seth. Having Seth by his side gave Dean the confidence to do anything. If it hadn't of been for Rollins, Dean didn't know where he'd be today. This thought brought Dean's past musings to a halt, while shedding an uncertain light on his dark and looming future. Now that Seth was through with him, he wondered what was next? Would he return to the darkness that had nearly swallowed him up, a darkness that only Seth had been able to penetrate and push back?

Ambrose sighed and tried to shake his feeling of loneliness before it got too tight a hold on him. The others would be getting worried about him...if they even cared anymore. Opening his eyes, Dean was confused. He closed them again and opened them to be greeted by the same sight: darkness. He couldn't help but chuckle, when I was thinking about darkness, this isn't exactly what I meant...

Trying to make his way back to where he thought he remembered his room being, Ambrose began to hear voices. Voices threatening Seth, promising to finish the job, then move on the rest of The Shield. Just as he was beginning to wonder, with amusement, if everyone was right, and there were bodiless voices in his head, something brushed against Dean's leg, causing him to jump in fright. Colliding with a table as he stumbled away from the touch, Ambrose hissed in pain saying, "Son of a..."

"Ambrose, where are you?"

Dean perked up as he heard Roman's deep, strong voice, "I'm over here...wherever here is." Remembering the voices, he asked, "is Seth with you?"

"No, I left him in the room."

Dean wasn't sure if he should feel happy or worried, but the second sound of a slamming door caught his attention.

"Guys?" Seth asked shakily, barely holding his own against the pills and his exhaustion. Shining the beam around, he searched for his friends. His beam first found Reigns, feet from him, looking worried, but unharmed. "Dean? You still out here?" Seth called.

"Yeah, the stupid lantern must have died," Ambrose replied.

Seth shined his beam in the direction he thought Dean's voice had come from, and he suddenly began sprinting towards his friend.

"Hey, what the...?" Dean asked, startled as he saw his best friend charging headlong into him. Then he felt it, an arm that felt more like a tree trunk slamming into the back of his already dizzy head. Falling to the ground, Ambrose tried to cover himself, to protect his head from further blows. Then he heard the familiar whooshing sound of Rollins' ring gear as he vaulted over Dean, taking out his attacker with a dropkick.

A heavy thud and a crash of china emanated from the other end of the hallway where Seth had left Roman. Seth raced back to check on Reigns, flashlight miraculously still in hand. They don't call him the architect for nothing, Dean thought to himself.

Rushing towards Roman, Seth stopped dead as he saw his large friend chocked into submission, the attacker using Roman as a shield. "We can make this real easy Sethie boy. Come with me, and I let your friend go. Fight me like you did my friend over there, and I break his neck," the attacker said quietly, tightening his grip around an unconscious Roman's throat just to prove he wasn't messing around. A small groan escape from Roman, making the stranger smile.

Seth could have sworn his heart stopped beating as flashes of his dream replayed unbidden in his mind. "Okay, okay, just don't hurt him. You can take me. Just please let him go."

"Seth, don't!" Ambrose called, still on the floor fighting to stay conscious. Seth refused to look back at what he knew would be Dean's pleading expression. The same one he'd seen countless times before when standing up for his friend.

"That's better," the mystery man cooed, "now turn off the flashlight, put it on the ground and put your hands up. Do anything other than what I've just told you, and you will soon find yourself a one man faction, understand?" the man asked calmly, clearly feeling no doubts about his control of the situation.

"Yeah," Seth said as he knelt down, putting the flashlight on the floor and turning it off. Then, almost immediately it felt like a truck had slammed into Seth as he was tackled to the ground, blows raining down on him.

"Your friends thank you," said the same voice, somewhere in the darkness.

Ambrose did the only thing he could think to do in a hotel full of people, "Help! Someone help! Help!"

Suddenly, doors all around them began to open as other guests brought out their flashlights to check on the commotion. One woman walked up to Ambrose, her light finding him first. "There's a lantern over there, we need to get it on," Ambrose told her. She found her way to the lantern and turned it on just as the door to the stairs slammed shut.

Cursing under his breath, Ambrose tried to stand up, but a wave of nausea prevented it. Looking up, he saw Roman in the dim light, sprawled on the ground.

"Oh my! Is he okay?" An elderly woman asked, turning to Ambrose.

"Yeah, just too much to drink," Ambrose said, trying to play it off as his adrenaline helped to finally get his shaky legs underneath him. Dean looked between Roman's still form heaped on the ground, and the door he assumed Seth was taken through. Dean walked over to Roman and knelt beside his fallen friend.

"Are you sure you boys will be alright?" The woman asked.

"Yes ma'am, we just need to sleep off."

"But you sounded like you were being attacked or something, the way you were yelling," she said cautiously.

"Well, being drunk in the dark can be a scary thing," Dean replied patiently. He suddenly regretted that he knew the truth of his own statement. Looking concerned, but not wanting to cause a scene, the woman turned and went back to her own room. The other guests shortly thereafter followed suit.

Dean searched for Seth's discarded flashlight and grabbed it, not trusting the now illuminated lantern. Once he had that measure of security, Dean turned his full attention to Reigns. A few gentle shakes elicited a groan from the large man as he began to come to.

"Hey, Rome, that's it, wake up," Dean encouraged, remembering to keep his distance from the big man. "Roman, you with me man?" Dean asked concerned, silently noting the angry red marks around Roman's neck.

Roman simply nodded, not yet trusting his voice. He suddenly looked around, searching the dim hallway. Dean, spending enough time with his two friends that he felt they could read each other's minds sometimes, understood immediately what Reigns was looking for...or rather, who he was looking for.

"They got him Rome."

Roman's eyes grew wide. Then, they narrowed with accusations.

"Hey, don't give me that look. It was you or him. I knew you were in the hallway. Who knows which way they took Seth from the stairwell? They could have gone onto any floor and we wouldn't know," Dean said, not sure if he was trying harder to convince himself or Roman. Roman still looked skeptical.

"Look, even if I had somehow been able to go after him, standing threatens a second visit from my burger. What hope did I have of fighting off a group of guys on my own when I have to fight my burger's comeback at the same time? Not to mention I can't get the world to stop spinning for two seconds..."

Roman considered it for a minute, then answered in a gravely, strained voice, "Yeah, you're right. Then I would have lost both you."

"Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence."

"Hey, I didn't mean it in a bad way. You said yourself, you're hurt."

"Yeah, I guess," Dean said with a sigh. He looked once more at the door to the stairwell, hoping beyond hope that Seth would come through it any second with a bright, triumphant smile. He knew his hopes were only making the situation worse, but he couldn't help it. Seth was his best friend, not to mention the one with all the plans. How would he and Roman get Seth back?

Groaning, Roman began to stand. Ambrose alternated between trying to help the big Samoan up and trying to keep himself from face planting. "Alright, let's get to the room, regroup, and figure out what to do next," Roman said, offering the closest thing they had to a plan. Ambrose agreed, and he and Reigns, the oil and water of the team, leaned on one another, depending on each other for support on their way back to their room. It was a short trip, but to the two beaten men, it might as well have been miles...