A/N: Hiyaz once more. :) First of all, thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter and said they wanted more! It means a lot to me. :D
I'm sorry this took so long, really. I couldn't get to a computer for like two months, though, so I do have a valid excuse. :}
Y'all can thank PsychoWing for this chapter. Thankies very much, PsychoWing!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything you recognize. I'll just put it that way – otherwise this would go on for like ever. XD
Alex stirred groggily. Where was he...he couldn't remember. That would have scared him, but for the fact that thinking felt like trying to mentally swim through syrup. He fuzzily decided to take stock of what he could, and try to go from there.
He was lying on something hard and cold. A floor, he thought. Concrete, judging by the texture under his cheek. He wasn't bound, which may or may not have been a good thing. He smelled...water. Old, stagnant water. He wasn't sure what, exactly, that meant, but was positive it was nothing good. As his mind cleared, he detected the sound of breathing. He must not be alone. He forced himself to pry his eyelids apart in order to look at his surroundings.
As soon as he did, he was met with the sight of two probably-once-shiny-but-now-scuffed-and-muddy black boots. He blinked, hard. The boots were still there. He frowned, then regretted it as his head twinged in pain.
The legs above the boots shifted. A very familiar voice said, "Hey, I think he's awake."
Another, equally familiar – but slightly more welcome – voice said, "You sure?" The words had a Scottish lilt to them.
"Course I'm not," the first voice said irritably. "That's why I said I thought he was awake."
"Well, excu-use me," grumbled the Scottish voice, drawing the word out into three or four syllables.
"You're excused," grumped the first voice.
"Shut up, guys," a new voice said tiredly.
"What, is our bickering keeping you from your beauty rest?" mocked the first voice.
A pause. Then: "Now that was unnecessary." This from the first person to have spoken, who sounded distinctly sullen.
"Nah, you deserved it," came a fourth voice.
"I did not!"
A scoff. "Did so."
"Did not!"
"Did so!"
"Did-"
"Ow," Alex moaned.
The squabbling stopped cold. "Toldja he was awake," mumbled the first voice.
"Oh, shut it," said the third.
Alex sat up slowly, forcing down the nausea that rose with his head. Whatever tranquilizer they had used on him, he hoped they never did so again. He looked around his cell – a standard bleak affair, medium-sized, grey, and windowless – at the four older men sharing it. "Hey, guys," he croaked to his team with an attempt at a smile. "What'd you do to get yourself tossed in here?"
Wolf – the first person to have spoken – snorted. In typical Wolf fashion, he said, "This is the thanks we get for trying to rescue you."
Alex winced. If it was bad enough that MI6 had deigned to send a rescue team..."How long have I been here? The days tend to blur by when you can't see the sun," he explained when the men looked at him in disbelief.
"Not sure about how long you've been here, specifically," Snake – the second speaker – replied. "We think they've been moving you around."
"That would explain why they keep tranqing me," Alex commented.
Snake nodded and continued. "In any event, you've been incommunicado for almost three weeks."
Alex lay back and thunked his head against the floor – softly, so as to not aggravate his rapidly mounting headache. "Three weeks," he said quietly. Almost a month. Three weeks with Jack sitting at home, fretting, worrying, wondering if she would ever see him again.
Snake must have caught his look, because he said reassuringly, "Don't worry about it. We'll get you out."
That dragged a small chuckle out of the boy as he worked his way back into a sitting position. "Yes, and you're doing such a good job of it so far."
"You bet!" Eagle – the other one who was arguing with Wolf earlier – jumped in. He grinned. "We've got 'em surrounded from the inside."
Before Alex could retort, Fox's pained voice came from across the cell. "Will you guys shut up?" he said softly.
Alex raised an eyebrow. "What's with you?" he asked.
Fox cracked an eye open long enough to glare at him. "For your information, Cub, my head is killing me, my stomach is rebelling, and my butt is numb. So forgive me if I'm not in the best of moods." He closed his eye again.
Alex smiled ever so slightly. "Sounds like we're in the same boat."
Fox just flipped him the bird without looking.
Wolf rolled his eyes at his teammate. He scooted over toward Alex and stage-whispered, "He did that to me, too." Glancing down to hide his smile, Alex noticed that it had been Wolf's boots in front of him when he first woke.
The sound of footsteps outside interrupted the reunion. They stopped outside the door, and something metallic jingled. The door opened to admit a stocky, balding man holding a pistol. He peered nearsightedly at the prisoners, then half-turned and called to someone in the hallway, "'Ey, Frank! 'E's awake!"
"Took 'im long enough," another man – apparently Frank – complained.
"I toldja not to use that trank...tranquiloosing...I toldja not to put 'im to sleep with that stuff," the man in the doorway said. "Remember what happened last time?"
"What happened last time?" Wolf whispered to Alex.
"Shut up, Harold," Frank said, preventing the boy from responding. "Just drag 'em out 'ere. I'm done listenin' to their whinin'!"
"You mean...you're going to kill us?" Alex said, affecting the persona of a scared little boy.
"That's right!" Harold said triumphantly. "We're gonna kill you, an' it's gonna be slow an' painful."
Alex widened his eyes further. "Slow and painful? How are you going to do that?"
Harold opened his mouth to respond, then shut it. He furrowed his brow and turned to call, "Frank? How are we gonna kill 'em?"
Before Frank replied – but after his exasperated sigh – Alex stage-whispered to Eagle, "I hope you brought your insulin."
That made Harold's head whip around so fast, he winced and rubbed his neck. "What'd you say?" he asked Alex, not seeing the men's bewildered looks.
Alex tried to make his eyes wider, but only succeeded in straining his vision. Oh well, he thought. He settled for adding an extra tremor to his voice when he said, "Wh-what?"
"What'd you say about insulin?"
"O-oh. W-well, see, my friend here-" he gestured to Eagle, who adopted a blank expression- "h-he's diabetic. Y'know, he'll die slowly and in a lot of pain if he has too much sugar-" He cut himself off and mouthed a curse.
Harold grinned. He turned around and yelled, "'Ey Frank! You 'ear that?"
"'Ear what?" Frank called back.
"Th' one's diabetic!"
There was a pause, probably as Frank worked through why this was so exciting. Then he whooped and yelled, "Lock 'em back up! I gotta find us some sugar!"
Harold complied, grinning widely. He winked at Alex and said, "Thanks, kid. Maybe you'll die quickly." He shut the door.
Alex lost his scared-little-boy look and turned to face the what-just-happened looks from his teammates.
"What just happened?" Fox asked. He closed his eyes and leaned his head against the wall once more even as he gave Alex an "explain" gesture.
Alex grinned. "Oh, I was just thinking of the Wonderland incident," he said.
Slowly, everyone grinned – even Fox.
Harold returned in due time, carrying a bag of pure sugar. He grinned menacingly and said, "Time for your medicine."
Alex wondered how long it had taken him to think that up.
Harold produced a pair of handcuffs from his back pocket. He set the sugar bag down, using it to prop open the doorway, and cuffed Eagle to the bars in the tiny window in the door by one wrist. Idiot, Alex thought, not for the first time. Then Harold started spoon-feeding Eagle the raw sugar.
Two hours later...
"...And then, since we'd already slayed the Big Bad Wolf, we just walked right across the Yellow Brick Road without incident, but of course we still had to fight the dreaded Countess Carrot and her evil minions – you remember, the Potato Pelicans. So we did that, but just before we reached the summit of Candy Mountain, the Hershey Hounds came down with chocolate all around their muzzles. Can you believe it – they ate all the Twix! They had all of Candy Mountain to choose from, and they had to eliminate my favorite! Well, I couldn't let that go, now could I? So I took the Starburst Sword and, well, got violent, I'll admit – it wasn't rated G for general audiences. But they ate my favorite candy bars! Every last one! Okay, so after the violent part, I led – they'll say dragged – everyone up to the summit and lo and behold, there was that pony guy! And he was all, 'Yay, you made it, you did good,' and I was all, 'That's not good grammar,' and he was all, 'Whatevs, have some candy,' and I was like, 'OMG CANDY YAY!' and then I was all, 'Erg, I ate too much candy.' And that is the story of what happened on Candy Mountain! Now, getting down is another tale altogether, so-"
"That's it!" Harold finally cried. "I have sat here for two hours waitin' for you to die! An' you're not dead! You're – you're hyper! You're rambling about things that don't even make sense, an' I think Frank had the right idea when he left, an' I'm just leaving!" And having said that, he ran screaming from the cell.
"But wait!" Eagle called petulantly after him. "I didn't tell you how we got down, or about that time with the cookout, or about that- OOH! I haven't told you about that one time when Cub and I took Wolf's clothes and switched them with princess clothes!"
As Eagle carried on, Wolf leaned over to Alex and said, "Nice work, Cub."
Alex grinned. "See, everything can come in handy at some point."
"Yup. But you're both lucky Harold left when he did."
Alex's grin widened. "What, you don't want to be reminded of the Princess Wolf incident?"
Wolf growled, living up to his name.
Alex took that as an affirmative, and quickly – and wisely – changed the subject. "So where might we find spare keys to the cuffs?"
"I say we leave him here," Snake chimed in. "Let him talk the sugar out of his system." Alex opened his mouth to say something – he wasn't sure what – but Snake said, "It beats having to go home listening to that."
Wolf, Alex, and Fox all locked gazes. "Let's go," they chorused.
A/N: I almost feel sorry for Frank and Harold. Almost. XD
Okay, so it's three pages long – not counting the author's notes. Whatevs, have some candy.
You (the reader): Ooh, candy!
WAIT! You have to review first! Then you get candy.
You: *grumble grumble* Fine. But you better have (insert name of your favorite candy here).
I do, don't worry.
You: Good.