Disclaimer: Well, seeing as it's not even been 24 hours since I last updated, I don't think that much has changed…
A/N: 72 Reviews!! Thanks a ton to everyone who reviewed!! By the way, someone should write this down as a record for me! Three consecutive days in a row I have updated!! It's a new record!! All right, on with the story!!
4:00-5:00AM
4:00 Stephanie tried to keep her tears from falling any more. She tried to get herself under control because she knew that Chris would be laughing at her right now and telling her to suck it up if he could see her.
But the pain that she was feeling right now…
It was almost too much for her.
She felt an arm wrap around her, and she leaned closer to Shawn, knowing that he must be feeling along the same emotional line that she was. Her face felt hot, and she still felt like shit from giving birth not all that long ago. Now she was feeling like she wanted to puke her guts out. She didn't even know if she would still be sitting up the way she was if it wasn't for Shawn's arm holding her there.
She thought about that for a second.
Shawn's hands were tied together.
How the hell could he wrap an arm around her?
Stephanie slowly raised her head from his shoulder, and looked at him, only to find that he was staring quite peculiarly at something over the top of her head. She turned in that direction, to see that it was Batista's arm that was wrapped around her-not Shawn's. Stephanie's tears had ceased for the moment, and she thought that she had seen something in his eyes when she looked at him. He removed his arm from her shoulders. She wiped at her eyes, and turned back to Shawn, shaking the thought off.
There's no way that she could've seen concern in Batista's eyes…
Was there?
He had been so cruel to Chris earlier…
"Was it…was it painful for him?" she asked. Shawn swallowed, and looked back down at her.
"I don't think so, it looked almost instant. The bullet looked like it hit him near the start of his neck." Shawn said. Stephanie stared at him for a second, her forehead wrinkling.
"The neck?" she asked. Shawn nodded.
"Yeah, it was pretty close to the start of his neck, might've just missed his ear." Shawn said. Stephanie was no longer really listening. Something was ringing in her ears.
"I got shot in the back of the neck, what else would you expect?" Chris was saying in her head. "Shot in the back of the neck," kept echoing in her head. Right after that, something else came back to her.
"Shawn is still with them." Chris' voice was saying in her mind.
"Shot in the back of the neck…Shawn is still with them…" Stephanie met Shawn's eyes again.
"What time did this happen?" she asked him, her voice still sounding terrible from her crying. Shawn looked up at Batista.
"What time was Chris killed?" he asked him. Batista glanced at his watch, and shrugged.
"I'd say around midnight." He said indifferently. Stephanie fought back a smile.
Chris wasn't dead at all.
He'd called her at 12:30 to tell her he'd been shot in the neck, but was okay and was going after Shawn. She had told him not to at first, but finally relented.
Then she had been kidnapped.
Apparently, Chris had thought this out pretty well, because he'd fooled both Shawn and the remainder of Evolution, and also scared the shit out of his wife. Thankfully, she and Chris thought alike most of the time. She kept, what she hoped, looked like a grieving widow look on her face as Randy and Ric entered the room. Randy let a smile creep up across his face.
4:22 "Well, if it isn't Sleeping Beauty?" Randy asked, walking over to her. "Big Dave, would you please make sure that Shawn stays in his designated seat?" Dave stood up and pulled Shawn to his feet. Randy stepped closer to Stephanie, and made her stand up.
"I'm going to assume that Shawn has told you about the…unfortunate events that have befallen your husband." He said. Stephanie glared at him.
"Yeah, well, you know what happens when you assume. You make an ass of you and me." She said smartly.
"You have picked up on your husband's sarcastic manner." Randy commented. Stephanie shrugged, while still glaring at him. It was getting harder for her to try and keep quiet about Chris actually being alive with each passing second.
"I guess we both picked up a little from each other." She said. Randy nodded.
"That is true. Because he was begging like the bitch that he is for me not to kill him." Randy sneered. Stephanie raised her arm to slap that smart-ass look off of his face, but he caught it in mid-air, and wrapped his other arm around her, forcing her closer to him. Stephanie tried to back away from him, suddenly wishing that she had more on than that stupid hospital gown on. She had a bad feeling about that look in his eyes.
"I think it's safe to say whose bitch you are now." Randy whispered.
"You leave her the fuck alone, Orton!" Shawn yelled. Stephanie winced when she heard the sound of skin against skin, knowing that Shawn had either been punched or slapped, one of the two.
"Why? It's not like I have to worry about her husband coming after me or anything." He sneered again.
"I wouldn't be placing any money on that one, Randy." Stephanie thought.
"Orton." Flair said. Randy turned to look at him. Flair shook his head at him. Randy seemed to ponder this for a moment, and finally released his hold on her.
"I wouldn't want to run the risk of catching anything from you, anyways. I've heard the rumors about you. I heard that you actually slept with Bitchoff when he was still around." Randy said. Stephanie kept the stony look on her face. She hated it when people brought that up. That had caused a problem between her and Chris for a while as well, simply because she had slept with the enemy.
"Don't believe everything you hear about me," She said, and sat back down, closing the back of her hospital gown before doing so. Randy nodded, and walked over to Flair. He also motioned for Batista to come over with them. They walked to the far wall and began to talk in low voices. Stephanie turned to look at Shawn. His right eye was starting to turn a nice purple-blue color. She debated filling him in about Chris, but figured it was too risky.
It would just have to wait.
4:43 Chris and Jack were sitting in the SUV, staring at the warehouse, where Shawn and Stephanie were being held. Chris sighed and cocked his gun. Jack sat there silently, watching the building in the darkness, since they had turned off the headlights again before approaching the building.
"How should we do this?" Chris asked, staring at the aluminum side of the building. Jack flicked his lighter and lit a cigarette. He inhaled, rolled down the window slightly, and then exhaled the fumes.
"I think that our smartest move right now is to barge in there with guns blazing." He said, turning to look at Chris. Chris slowly nodded his head.
"That's what I was thinking too, but how are we going to really surprise them? Walking through the door won't provide much surprise." He said. Jack took another puff of his cigarette.
"Agreed." He said. There was a silence. Jack handed the cigarette to Chris, who reluctantly took it and took a puff. He wasn't a natural smoker, but he took the occasional puff when he felt like he wanted one, which was rarely ever. He thought that after this he might be craving one a little more often from all of the stress this day had given him.
"What if we send something else in first, and then go in behind it, shooting at them like that?" Chris suggested.
"You'd have to be as accurate as you could be, we don't have much ammo." Jack said. "How many did you say there were?"
"Four," he said.
"And then there's the question of what to send in before us." Jack said. "What did you have in mind?" Chris stared out the windshield and thought for a moment. He slowly began to look at what he was sitting in. He turned to Jack.
4:51 The remaining men of Evolution walked back over towards Shawn and Stephanie.
"When is the boss man supposed to be here?" Ric asked. Randy shrugged.
"He'll be here when he gets here." He said. Right as he finished that, his cell phone began to ring. Batista stood by Shawn again.
"Orton." He said.
"Randy? This is Jack…Bauer…we spoke on the phone earlier?" Jack said.
"Yes, I believe that you are supposed to be getting a helicopter for me." Randy said. Stephanie looked at Shawn with panic on her face.
How would Chris find them if they were taking a helicopter?
"I realize that, and I have to tell you some bad news. The only chopper available to come would have to come at 6 o'clock, instead of 7." Jack said. Randy sighed.
"Fine, we'll be ready by then anyways." Randy said.
"Good." Jack said, and got ready to hang up.
"Tell me Jack," Randy said. "How is it that such a wonderfully trained man loses the person that he is supposed to be protecting?"
"Shit happens." Jack said, and hung up. Randy chuckled to himself and hung up his phone as well.
Right as a black SUV came barreling through the wall behind him.
Batista yanked Shawn up out of his chair and shoved him in the direction of Stephanie. Randy jumped to his right, over by Flair, to avoid being hit by the vehicle. Randy grabbed his gun and looked all around him to see who was driving the vehicle, but he couldn't see.
"Flair!! Where the fuck did that thing come from?!" he yelled.
"I don't know!!" Flair yelled back. Batista grabbed Stephanie and Shawn, and crouched down behind a crate, forcing them to do so as well.
"Why are you helping us?" Shawn demanded. Batista turned to look at him.
"Who said I was helping?" he asked, as the SUV finally made it to the other side of the building and crashed through the far wall and into the deep water below.
4:59 Jack and Chris were crouching behind a crate right next to the first wall that the SUV had broken through. Jack cocked his gun and looked at Chris.
No more words were needed.
The shit was about to hit the fan.
5:00
A/N2: Thanks again to everyone who bothered to review last chapter! I hope you extend the same courtesy to this one!! (If you're lucky, you might get to read the end of this story by tomorrow!) It all depends on you…and my ability to stay focused… Well, until next time…
