Okay, so I know that all of you probably hate me, but just hear me out…I'm enrolled in college now and lemme tell you, it's not exactly all fun and games, especially for a lowly biology major like me. I've had no time to write this, because I've been writing papers, and when I've had breaks, I'm not going to lie, I slept and relaxed. I've been receiving everyone's reviews, follows and favorites, and I've read them all. Thank you all so much for your continued support, even though I don't deserve it. I'm still ridiculously busy, but I figured that I needed to write something to show my appreciation and to let you all know that I'm not dead. So here we are…chapter eleven! I hope that it makes up for a little bit of the wait that I've put you through.

Chapter Eleven: Never get Kidnapped

~Clary~

Everyone had been sitting in a companionable silence for over an hour as Will drove the truck farther and farther away from the hotel safe-haven. Tessa was riding shotgun, and Will was instructing her on how to properly multitask. She was reading a map, giving directions and scolding him when he was stupid, which was a bonus, like a pro. Clary was in the backseat, wedged in between Jace, who was sitting behind his cousin, and Jonathan, who was behind Tessa.

Clary had stopped noticing the stragglers within the first hour of the walk; they just blurred by now, going unnoticed in her boredom. She yawned and leaned over so that her head was resting against Jon's bicep. Without another word, she closed her eyes, fully intent on taking a nice nap.

Of course, that was when Will slammed on the breaks and turned. Clary's eyes snapped open as she jolted forward. Before she could get whiplash, however, she had two strong arms wrapped around her, pushing her back into her seat. Both Jace and Jon had thought to reach out and catch her. She gave both of them a grateful smile, before turning to see what Will could have possibly stopped for.

They were on a small side road now, moving slowly through the wooded area. Clary could feel the apprehension in the car and couldn't help but share in the unease. This place didn't look safe with dense trees on either side of the dilapidated road. Anything could be moving through that wilderness, watching them and waiting for them to stop so that it could pounce.

Clary shook off her apprehension. She was being silly. It just looked creepy. There was nothing out there. Zombies would have already shown their faces, because they didn't have a brain to tell them to hide and wait for their food.

"Well, Tess," Will said with a small sigh as they came to a break in the trees. "You weren't wrong."

There was a small gas station nestled in gap in the forest, but Clary could see where nature was trying to take the land back. Small trees were growing everywhere, the pavement was cracked, and sapling and weeds were sprouting through the gaps.

"You guys want to stop here?" Jon asked incredulously.

"Why not?" Jace asked. He was looking through the windshield as they turned into the tattered parking lot. "This is what we have to work with now. All of the welcoming and friendly stores have already been raided and are now overrun with stragglers. These ones never get touched, because people always assume that they're deathtraps.

"Did you ever think that it was for good reason?" Clary questioned.

Jace smirked down at her and said, "Yeah. Don't worry, though, if you get into trouble, Red, I'll protect you."

"Last time I checked," Will quipped from up front, "it was you that needed protecting."

Jace turned to cast an annoyed glace at the front. "Yeah," he said, "well your—"

"Shut up," Tessa said impatiently. She turned and looked in between Jace and Will with a small frown. "This is serious. We all need to be careful."

"You heard the woman, Jacie," Will said smartly. "We need to be serious."

Clary could already tell that the cousins being serious was impossible. She wasn't expecting miracles. Will turned off the engine and opened his door. Jace, Jon and Tessa followed his example and they all jumped out at nearly the same time. Clary, of course, had to awkwardly follow afterward. She sighed in relief as her feet finally hit the ground. It had been cramped sitting in between two buff guys.

"Okay," Will said. "Jon and Jace, go to the back and see if there's any stragglers that I don't know about. Clary, stay out front and next to the gas pumps, be ready to fill up the fuel cans. Tess. Come with me; we're going inside to see what we can find.

Everyone nodded and Clary watched them walk off to do their different duties. Clary felt a bit of resentment due to the fact that they were keeping her back, away from the danger, because she was the youngest. She figured that throwing a temper tantrum would just confirm for them that she wasn't ready to go out on raids, so she dealt with it. She would suck it up and so what she was told until they felt better about sending her out. She rolled her eyes. Being the youngest was so fun.

She sighed as she jumped up on to the back of the truck, standing on the tailgate. She leaned down and grabbed two of the cans and jumped back down with them. She walked over to the nearest gas pump and sat them down. She walked back over to the truck to grab a couple more when she heard the sound of Jon and Jace fighting in the still air.

She bit on her lower lip uncertainly. Part of her wanted to go and help them, but then another part of her knew that she had a job to do. If she wanted to be trusted to go out on more raids, she would have to trust her friends to be able to take care of themselves. She inhaled deeply as she gave herself a mental pep-talk. She put her hands on the tailgate of the truck, prepared to push herself back on it, when she heard a stick snapping and trees rustling. She froze and turned toward the noise.

She had sworn it had come from the section of forest closest to the truck. She rolled her eyes and shook her head. It was just her paranoia messing with her; she would be fine. She tensed up again and vaulted herself back into the bed of the truck.

Snap!

She froze and turned to look back at where she had originally heard the noise. There was no way that she had hallucinated twice. She turned around and grabbed two more gas cans. She knew that there was someone, or something out there. Whatever it was, Clary didn't want it to know that she knew about it in case it was hostile.

"You're good!" Will called from inside of the station, sounding a little out of breath. He'd probably had a few stragglers to take care of before he was able to attend to the gas.

Clary didn't say anything in return. She just grabbed the nozzle and turned to the gas container. She hummed lightly to herself, trying to keep calm despite the fact that her nerves were on end. "Well, well, well, Clarissa," a cold voice said. "You've gotten big, haven't you?"

Clary stiffened up, unable to believe what she was hearing. "What the hell?" she muttered to herself as she slowly turned around to get a good look at who had been watching her from the forest.

~Jace~

Jace and Jon walked away from the others cheerfully. Jon even grinned his way as they turned the corner and headed to the back of the store. The older man's cheerful demeanor abruptly changed when they were out of sight of the others. It wasn't as though he was angry; he looked more annoyed than anything else. He sighed as he looked over at Jace and shook his head.

"We need to talk, Jace," Jon said.

Jace didn't like his tone. "What's there to talk about, Jon?" he questioned.

"What do you think?" Jon inquired. "I'm Clary's older brother. I have certain duties that I must attend to, regardless of how much I don't want to."

"What duties?" Jace asked. "If you're going to try to kick my—"

"Don't be ridiculous," Jon said. "As the older brother, it is my duty to threaten to kick your ass unless I deem you completely unworthy; if that was the case, I would kick your ass immediately and leave you for the incoming stragglers."

And there were incoming zombies. There was only a handful of them, and they were a good twenty feet off, but it didn't mean that they weren't supposed to be eliminating a threat. "Have I ever told you that you choose the worst time to do your duties?" Jace asked him, as he pulled out his knives from their sheathes and got ready to charge the incoming target.

"I'm aware," Jon replied as he pulled out his own blade. "It doesn't matter, though, as long as I get the point across." They both started walking toward the undead, and when Jon got to the first one, he dodged out of the way of a clumsy swinging hand and said, "Clary seems to like you a lot, God only knows why, but she does."

Jace didn't say anything as he kicked the rotting leg of one of the corpses and felt the weakened bone snap. The zombie fell to the ground and Jace slammed one of his knives into the undead's head and yanked it back out. The body, an old lady, fell to the ground.

"I thought that I would point out," Jon said as Jace decapitated a teenage zombie, "that if you're able to find someone that is able to look past your narcissism, you should probably keep them."

Jace rolled his eyes as he outmaneuvered another zombie and spun around bringing his foot high enough into the air to kick the man in his temple. It crumpled to the ground. "Can you please just get to the damned point?" Jace snapped impatiently, as he got to the next zombie. It had its hands out, desperate to get a hold of him, but Jace grabbed it by the neck and rammed his knife into the corpses forehead.

"Yeah," Jon said. "If you ever hurt her, I'll kill you."

Jace sighed and turned to look at him. "Now was that so hard to get out?" he demanded.

"I had an entire speech in my head planned," Jonathan grumbled. "The least that you could have done was let me get finished with it."

Jace smirked at him and said, "Sorry, Jonny, we don't have time for that." He adopted a more serious look on his face as he turned to fully face Clary's brother. "I like her, man. I really do. I have no intention of letting anyone, let alone me, hurt her as long as I'm around."

"Good," Jon said. "I just got my sister back, and I want her to stay around for as long as possible." He was silent for a moment before a small grin spread across his face. "Don't tell her I said that, though. She'll never let me forget it if you do."

"Noted," Jace said with a grin.

"We probably need to start searching…" Jon trailed off as Tessa's shout rang through the air.

"What the hell's going on?" she practically shrieked. "Clary!"

Jace blinked, unsure of what to do. He felt dread pooling around in the pit of his stomach. Without another word, the two of them dashed back to the front, Jonathan keeping pace with him without a problem.

"What's wrong with Clary?" Jace demanded before he had even cleared the side of the station.

When he got to the front, he saw the strangest sight ever. Will had Tessa tangled in his arms, restraining her as she tried to run toward the edge of the parking lot, toward the forest.

"Help me," Will snapped, not answering Jace's question. "Tessa, you have to calm down, or there's nothing that we can do!"

Tessa didn't seem to be listening to him. She squirmed harder, shrieking at him to let her go as she fought. Jace and Jon both ran toward them and Jonathan paused beside Jon, trying to restrain Tessa. Jace, on the other hand, looked around the lot.

"Where's Clary?" Jace demanded quietly. He turned around to look at the pair that had been at the front with her.

When neither of them answered, Jace asked again, yelling this time. "Where the hell is Clary?" he roared.

"He just came," Will said faintly. "He came and took her. I don't know who, or what…." That was when Tessa stopped fighting and broke down. She turned around and pounced on Will, wrapping her arms around his neck as she started sobbing into his chest.

Will looked over her sobbing form and Jace questioningly as he embraced her uncertainly. Jace probably would have found this entertaining any other time. "Who took my sister?" Jonathan asked.

"He looked a lot like you," Will said. "Same blond hair and same build. He was out of my sight before I could get a better look at him, but—"

"What way did he go?" Jon cut him off.

Will pointed in the direction that Tessa had been trying to dive into moments before. Jace didn't wait for approval, or for permission. He turned around and dashed into the forest. He heard his cousin cursing at him to stop and to get back, but he didn't pay them any attention. He owed Clary his life, and he would be damned if he was going to wait around to make a plan to save her while she was getting farther and farther away. She deserved better than that from him.

~Tessa~

Nothing prepared her for the gut wrenching pain that losing Clary brought on her. Sure, losing Jonathan both times had hurt so badly that she couldn't breathe, but this was different. She had been taking care of and looking after Clary so much over the past three years, that it felt more like she was losing a daughter.

Will had been the closest person when she had finally lost her composure. She hadn't intended on freaking out and sobbing all over him like an idiot, but she hadn't been able to hold it in any longer. Will hugged her tightly, not letting her go, like she had been afraid that he would. "We're going to get her back," he assured her quietly. "Go after Jace. Make sure that he doesn't get himself killed. Get your sister back from that prick."

She heard the sound of rushing footsteps a moment later, and then Will started rubbing her back. It was so soothing that she felt herself calming slightly. "It's okay, Tessa," Will murmured to her. "Clary's in good hands. They'll get her back."

Tessa nodded shakily and Will pulled back from her just enough to see her face. He smiled at her weakly as he brought one of his hands up from her waist and brushed his thumb over her cheek. "We're going to get her back." He leaned forward and pressed his lips against her forehead gently, in a soothing gesture. Tessa closed her eyes, allowing herself to take comfort from the contact.

He pulled back again and quietly asked, "Who was it that you saw?" Will asked. "Who took her?"

Tessa remembered looking out of the broken window frame and seeing Jonathan's clone standing next to Clary, a handgun pointed directly at her chest. She inhaled shakily and exhaled slowly. "My dad," she whispered.

Fair warning with all of this…I'm very rusty. It's been a while since I've written anything for TMI, so I hope that I didn't screw this up too badly. I hope that you liked it and I'm hopefully going to start the next chapter soon. I know that I left off Will's POV, but I wanted to go ahead and put this out before I go to sleep, so I won't forget to do it later. Will's POV will be extra-long in the next chapter. It's good to be baaaack!