They both tensed at the realization that they'd stopped moving. "Jack, listen to me. I admire your fighting spirit, but don't provoke them," Chris whispered into Jack's shoulder urgently. "If you piss them off, there's not much you can do to protect yourself, and that's a nightmare waiting to happen."

"You want me to be docile about this?" The sheer indignation was more than enough to indicate how much he planned to follow that advice.

"Pretty much, yeah."

The light that flooded in was blinding enough to force him to screw his eyes shut, but on a more pleasant note, it let fresh air in, too. Compared to the hot, stuffy air that they had been breathing, it was incredible.

"Oh, so you are alive back there. You made me worry for a second, with how you randomly stopped your bitching." Purple grinned down at them. Well, at Jack.

"Fuck you," Jack spat back. So much for not provoking them.

Purple laughed. "Oh, that's precious. All right, Princess, get out here. I'll let you stretch your legs for a little bit, give you some fresh air. How does that sound?"

He pulled Jack out of the trunk, who kicked and swore and was overall the exact opposite of cooperative, but he just laughed at it. Depending on Purple's personality, that could be either good or very bad, and Chris dearly hoped that they didn't find out which one the hard way.

Nobody came for him, but they left the trunk open and he was able to stretch a little thanks to the added space. He listened, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Those kids were relentless. I thought they were going to kill us for a second back there."

"Hey, management's already sent out another team to get the third one, don't worry," Rhino answered. "Those two with him might be good, but we'll get him."

"You didn't see it. I'm pretty sure that they had to sell their souls to get that strong," she said. "They're going to have a helluva time taking him in."

Sounds like Team Dungeon was in the clear for the time being, then. Chris breathed a sigh of relief and let this head drop.

"Well, look at you sitting pretty."

His heart jumped into his throat and he looked up. Lucky leered at him in a way that made him try to shrink farther into the trunk. "You know," he drawled and pulled Orion out of his pocket, "I used to know somebody with a bey just like this. Blond hair, too, and about your age by now. Can't say that it'd be good for him if we ever ran into each other again, though." He smiled. "I think he'd agree. Wouldn't you, Chris?"

"Well," he said, surprised at how little his voice shook, "it's too late to change it now."

"Yeah, I guess it is. I'm glad."

He barely managed to catch the whimper before it came out.

Lucky seemed to somehow be able to sense it and chuckled. "It's a real pleasant surprise, finding you here. But this is the problem: if I kill you, I don't get paid. Do you see how that could be inconvenient?"

He nodded.

"But if I were to kill you anyways-" he reached down and traced a finger over his ribs- "I think I'd start here. Of course, that's assuming I don't keep you alive for a good, long time. More of a long-term investment, if you will. I've never done that before. It might be fun. But then I still wouldn't be getting paid." He sighed. "It's all very frustrating. What's Dr. Ziggurat want with you, anyways? Did you run from a job?"

"No." He shook his head. "I don't know what he wants with me."

Lucky yanked him halfway out of the trunk in an instant, bringing them almost nose-to-nose. "Don't you dare lie to me, Chris," he said, voice dangerously low.

"I'm not." It came out more as a plea than an argument.

Lucky practically threw him onto the ground. With no way to catch his fall, he landed painfully hard.

"Chris!" Jack cried. He looked up to see him standing a few yards away, fighting against Purple. It looked like they were in a camp of sorts, just a few vehicles settled at the end of a dirt road in the middle of a thick forest. "Leave him alone, you asshat!"

"Sorry, honey, but that's not happening." Lucky yanked him to his feet.

"Oh, come on. You're going to upset him," Purple complained.

"Then I'll go out of sight and deal with him." He shoved Chris hard towards a small trail. He barely managed to keep his balance.

"If you kill him, you don't get paid!" He heard Purple call behind them as he was forced down the trail.

…

Jack watched Chris get dragged away, realization finally kicking in. "Wait, no! What do you mean 'if you kill him'?" What the hell are you going to do to him, you bastard? Leave him alone!" He pulled harder against the hands holding him back. "Let me go!"

"Oh, hush. I doubt Lucky'll actually kill him."

"Oh, because torturing him is so much better," he snarled. "Get over there and stop him!"

"Sorry, Princess, but that's not happening and there's nothing you can do about it."

If that sentence had been a physical blow, it would have knocked him clean off of his feet. As it was, it made him still, fiery rage cooling down enough for reality to start kicking in.

"Oh, that hit a nerve, didn't it?" He laughed. "This is nice, not having you trying to squirm everywhere."

Tears started slipping out of Jack's eyes. "Please," he whispered. "Don't let him hurt Chris."

"Oh, we're going to try begging now?" The response was more annoyed than anything. "If you try that one more time, I'll take a page out of Murphy's book and tape your mouth shut."

The rest of them were still milling about as if nothing was happening. Hell, one was starting to grill something behind a truck as of they were having a backwoods tailgating party. He tried to hold back a sob. "I'll do anything you want, I swear. Just don't hurt Chris," he begged. "He doesn't deserve it."

"A lot of people get what they don't deserve. But that is an interesting proposition you just made." He pushed Jack flat onto his back against the hood of a nearby car and grinned down at him. "'Anything' has a lot of possibilities, you know."

Someone wolf whistled. Jack flinched when he leaned over him. "I might think about listening to you if you're good. What do you say, Princess?" He purred. "How important is that little blonde to you? You can say no, if you'd rather just let Lucky have his way."

"Lewis!" Jack recognized the voice as the one that had battled with Chris before things went to hell. "Our client wants him undamaged."

Lewis rolled his eyes. "Who said anything about damage? I'm not gonna leave any marks."

"I'm not going to stand here and let you molest the merchandise. Get off of him."

Lewis' face darkened, and for a terrifying moment Jack thought he wouldn't listen. But he straightened and pulled Jack back upright. "It's not molestation if he agrees to it."

"Coercion doesn't count. Now get away from him."

"But," Jack stammered, "Chris-"

"Will be fine," he cut him off. "If you quiet down and stop trying to fight with everything that moves, we'll go get him."

"Aw, come on, Ray. You're no fun."

He stared at him for a moment. "You mean that?" He asked cautiously.

"Mmhm. But if you break your word on it, I'll let Lucky have as much fun as he wants and make you watch. Understand?"

Chris started to scream and any doubts he had about just how simple that seemed went out the window.

It was an agonizing wait while Lewis (thank god that he hadn't been left with Lewis) went to look for Chris. But the screams finally stopped, and it wasn't long after until the three of them came back.

Chris didn't look too bad at first glance. Scared senseless and obviously trying not to cry, sure, but no broken bones, bloody face, or obviously lacking limbs, plus he was walking. Jack thought about calling out to him, but decided against it. He hadn't know how quiet they wanted him to be. It wasn't until Lewis led Chris closer that he noticed the long, bloody slit up the entire seam of his shirt. Lewis lifted it up.

Chris' skin was gone.

Well, some of it, anyways. It was a long, terrible rectangle, with one strip on the side closer to his back shorter than the rest, like it had been cut off halfway through. Which, considering the circumstances, it probably had been.

"Stace, grab the med kit," Lewis said, not sounding happy about it. "You just had to make an open wound for us to worry about," he snapped at Lucky.

"Trust me, that's nothing compared to what it'd look like if you'd have let me finish."

"Move over. I'll take care of it," Stace, a long, thin woman told him before promptly pushing him out of the way. She started to put some sort of cream on it. The pained noise that came from Chris in response made dark spots dart across his vision.

…

Chris' heart sank the moment he saw Jack sitting quietly on the ground, barely acknowledging him beyond looking at him with huge, teary eyes. He couldn't see any sign of physical injury, but the implication was there. Nobody had cared when Lucky had dragged him off, but they magically changed their mind? No. Not when he came back to find Jack looking so terrifyingly close to broken. Something had happened in the meantime, and he couldn't help but worry about what. None of the ideas that he could come up with were good.

Who he assumed to be Stace came with the requested medical kit and immediately started to treat his side. Her bedside manner was terrible. The harshness that she used to slather cream over it, combined with the way it stung, was enough to make him hiss.

He almost missed the small, weak noise that Jack made in response. "Jack? What's wrong?" He asked, voice strained as he tried to ignore the way that she was relentlessly adding more of the stuff. It was far more bearable than what he had been going through a few minutes ago. He could do this.

Jack didn't answer. He blinked, eyes distant.

"Oh sh- SOMEBODY CATCH HIM!" Stace bellowed.

Purple scrambled over, but not fast enough. Jack went limp and collapsed into a heap, Purple skidding to a halt next to him.

"I swear, if he hit his head," she muttered and got up. "Nice try, but back up. You've done enough to him already; you don't need to be the first one he sees-"

Too late. Chris couldn't see Jack's face, but he heard the soft, confused sound that Jack made as he stirred. Purple smiled down at him in a way that made Chris' stomach twist. "Hey, Princess."

The terrified yelp that Jack let out was little reassurance. He furiously backpedaled a few feet away before freezing in his tracks.

Stace shooed Purple away and fussed over him for a bit before declaring that he didn't have a concussion and telling Rhino put him back in the trunk, which Jack was unnervingly cooperative about. Then she was back to him. She taped a bandage over his side before turning her attention to his arm, muttering multiple things about infection and idiocy as she painfully messed with it for what felt like forever.

Eventually, he was back in the trunk, too, their positions switched this time. Jack buried his face between his shoulder blades the moment the trunk was closed. "Are you okay?" he asked softly.

"It's nothing fatal."

"That's not what I mean."

He sighed. "I know. Just… be really careful around Lucky, okay?"

"I figured," he let out a broken laugh. "I'll do my best, as long as you try to stay away from Lewis."

"Which one's that? The purple-haired one?"

"Yeah."

Chris made a mental note to memorize Lewis' face so that he could hunt him down if they ever got out of this.

…

*deep breath* WELL OKAY THAT'S FINALLY DONE IT FEELS LIKE I'VE BEEN TYPING FOR FOREVER! *checks word count* Oh, that's probably why. Eh, a little extra length to a chapter never hurt anybody except me while I try to edit.

I have midterms soon, so am update might come really soon (the irresponsible route) or not for a while (the good student or burnout route). We'll see what happens.

Thanks for reading, y'all are lovely, and have a nice day.