A/N Since I'm shortly leaving on vacation, the next chapter of Fugitives will not be posted until the Monday after Thanksgiving - my apologies for the delay!

Chapter 19

Awareness beckoned, teasing him with fragmented sounds and the mercifully fleeting touch of cruel hands, then the voices receded, removing the urgency of his awakening. He lay in a feverish nether-world of uncomfortable semi-consciousness until an injudicious move launched a domino effect of painful spasms that jolted through his body, jerking him brutally awake, then nearly catapulting him back into the darkness. He lay on his side, retching miserably and, although the empty state of his stomach precluded that from being a productive activity, even dry heaves were painful to abused ribs.

With gently exploring fingers, he found a new knot on his temple where a gun butt had been applied to ensure he was in no state to protest his relocation - a gratuitous act in his opinion since he had been well on his way to falling gracefully unconscious without assistance. He cracked an eye cautiously, waiting for the room to steady sufficiently to appreciate his new surroundings, but the dim light, from what seemed to be a free-floating bulb over his head, was entirely too bright for the current state of his constitution, and he shut it again hastily to concentrate on subduing his rebellious stomach.

Keeping as still as possible to inhibit the internal undulations that continued to threaten his equilibrium, he attempted another visual exploration of the scenery, assuring himself as best he could that his tribulations were going unobserved. Although the room was empty, the red eye of a video camera mounted high on the wall opposite shattered the illusion of privacy and made him suspect that the space had been used before to house reluctant guests.

Unwilling to provide any more inadvertent entertainment to electronic observers, he gritted his teeth to prevent verbal or involuntary abdominal outbursts as he dragged himself painstakingly to lean against a wall perpendicular to the camera, feeling slightly less vulnerable in that position. Once the room had finished its resulting gyrations, he again attempted to take stock of his environment. It was clearly underground, a veritable dungeon, one small and dusty rack of bottles announcing its original function as a wine-cellar.

The room was musty, cool and far from clean, and once Steve's eyes could track sufficiently to spot the tiny droppings, he realised it was almost certainly inhabited by rats, an exceedingly unpleasant prospect in his vulnerable state. The only other item of interest was a tall flight of wooden stairs leading up to a door, yet even if a kind kidnapper had inadvertently left it unlocked, Steve knew he was incapable of exploring the opportunity to escape at that time. The wall against which he was leaning was more than just a convenient prop, it was the only thing keeping him sitting upright.

He had a vague recollection of reading an article that claimed you could only feel one source of pain at a time, but whoever wrote that was a liar or inexperienced, since all his injuries were clamouring for attention simultaneously.

He didn't bother checking under the blood-soaked bandage covering his thigh or lifting his shirt to inspect the damage there, and a few, controlled breaths reassured him that his ribs were bruised not broken. But he could scarcely avoid looking at his right forearm, an extremely unpleasant sight, he decided. He pondered the wisdom of pulling out some of the more accessible splinters, balancing the probability of blood-poisoning against that of blood loss, but decided that, even as a way to wile away the time, that occupation lacked appeal.

His father would know the best treatment under the circumstances, but the one bright spot in the whole scenario was that Mark was safe and undoubtedly working for his return, though such an outcome carried with it the inevitable accompaniment of facing the music for his actions on the rooftop. He'd probably be grounded for life.

He idly wondered how Masters had fared against his father's wrath, but such fascinating musings were interrupted by the grating of a key in the lock and the door at the top of the stairs creaking open.

Instead of watching the triumphal procession down the stairs, he leant his head back against the wall and tried to gather his scattered thoughts. It occurred to him that it might be a mistake to reveal how much he knew about Canin and his organisation. Ignorance made him and his father less of a threat, but he couldn't think of a plausible stance to take. His demeanor would be just as unfriendly if he believed Canin was still working as a cop and he didn't want to break his cover. Just thinking about the layers of subterfuge in the encounter exacerbated his headache, and he settled for bland disinterest as, with an effort, he forced his eyes up to meet Canin's.

Obviously deciding that Steve was no threat in his present condition, and maybe not wanting any revelations Steve had to be made public, Canin had dispensed with bodyguards and ventured down alone. Steve glanced towards the camera but, at this angle, he couldn't see if it was recording.

"Canin," he acknowledged coldly. "Do you mind telling me what the hell is going on?"

"A smart cop like you, Sloan, and you haven't figured it out yet." Canin looked smug but kept a cautious distance from his prisoner.

"Enlighten me," Steve replied dryly, too tired for these games.

"This is all mine now," Canin gestured expansively.

Steve looked round the dingy cellar, deliberately misunderstanding. "Well, congratulations," he said sarcastically.

"The Ganza family controls all organised crime in Southern California, and I control the Ganza family," Canin elaborated.

"You're a cop, Canin, one of the good guys, remember?" Steve suddenly felt like Luke Skywalker trying to turn Darth Vadar away from the Dark side of the Force.

"Yeah, I risked my neck on a daily basis for the ingratitude of the general population and a measly salary of seventy-five thousand a year. Now, I control billions."

"That's what this is about?" Steve asked incredulously. "Money? You killed your fellow officers for money?"

Canin seemed more amused than stung by the contempt in Steve's tone. "We don't all have a rich father and live at the beach. I grew up on these streets with nothing. I made myself what I am."

"A murderer? A traitor? You took an oath." All the passion and commitment Steve felt for the police force was contained in those few words, but Canin dismissed them casually.

"Don't be such a boy scout, Sloan."

Steve wished he had a dollar for every time he'd heard that unoriginal line. "At least I can look at myself in the mirror every morning," he returned scathingly. "You've become everything a cop despises: a money-grubbing, treacherous parasite."

This time he touched a nerve. The pale eyes opposite him blazed with fury and, for a moment, Steve braced himself in expectation of a blow. He almost hoped for that outcome, for if Canin ventured close enough to hit him, he had every intention of tackling the rogue cop, bum leg or not. Canin would be a very useful hostage, and Steve was longing to get his hands on him.

Up to that point, he had entertained reservations as to Canin's guilt, perhaps wanting to give a fellow cop the benefit of the doubt, but now, for the first time, he was faced with inescapable proof of the depth of Canin's perfidy, and it was dawning on him that, not only was the man so smugly confronting him responsible for the death of his colleagues and their horrific experiences on the run, but he also had ordered Mark's execution. The heat of anger seared through his blood, and he would have loved nothing more than to vent his feelings by pounding on the man responsible.

To his regret, Canin stayed out of range, respecting Steve's training and physical abilities.

Canin eyed him speculatively. "You know, you and your father have caused me a lot of trouble and expense."

"I'm so sorry," Steve replied with polite insincerity.

"Moreover, you have something that belongs to me, and I want it back."

Steve cocked an eyebrow, the only movement that didn't cost more energy than he had. "I don't think I have anything, your men have already searched me."

"If you don't have it, your father does." Canin didn't miss the powerful wave of tension that radiated from Steve at the mention of Mark, though the injured man made no verbal response.

"Did you know he's under arrest?" Canin goaded.

Steve attempted to conceal his dismay at this news, unsure what could have led to that. Had Masters betrayed them after all or was this some misguided attempt to protect his father?

Canin crouched down just out of reach. "Where's the notebook?" A threat was implicit in his soft tones.

This time Steve's reaction was immediate. "Go to hell!"

Canin smiled. "I can send you there first. The men guarding your father are in my pay." He bent forward confidingly. "I can have him taken out any time I want."

At that threat to Mark, the fury that had been bubbling perilously close to the surface, like lava flowing under a thin crust, burst forth in a molten explosion of rage.

He launched himself bodily at his tormentor with all the strength he could muster in his good leg. Canin, taken off guard, stumbled as he tried to get to his feet and back away simultaneously, and Steve was on him, his momentum boring Canin into the ground hard. The struggle should have been one-sided, for Steve's injuries were too severe for him to stand a chance against a fit, well-trained opponent, but the crescendo of rage swelling inside coupled with the satisfaction of finally meting out revenge for all the dangers and indignities he and his father had suffered, drowned out the pain and overrode the ensuing weakness.

The first well-placed blow of his fist had dazed Canin, and now Steve's superior weight held him down as he focused all his anger and fear for his father into the power of his arm throttling the dirty cop underneath him. Unable to escape the inexorable choking hand, Canin had the presence of mind to grab Steve's injured arm, squeezing it cruelly.

Black spots swam dizzily before Steve's eyes, and his vision seemed to be caught in a roaring tornado which narrowed his line of sight down to the congested face in front of him. He focused his considerable will-power on maintaining his grasp, much as he had done on the roof earlier, but the maelstrom of his senses blinded him to the arrival of Canin's reinforcements, alerted by the video feed from the camera. A blow to the head completed Steve's descent into semi-consciousness, and they were able to drag him off their boss, tossing him into a limp heap across the room.

Humiliated by the need for rescue, Canin planted a vicious foot in Steve's side, but, deprived of a satisfactory response, he soon desisted. "You're lucky I still need you alive," he growled hoarsely, massaging his bruised throat.

Steve's earlier consolation that at least Mark was safe had evaporated. He hoped Canin's boast was merely an empty threat but, even in his dazed state, realised that the most likely explanation was that the Chief was using his father as bait, with or without Mark's consent.

Laboriously, he retraced his earlier movements, though this time he dragged himself under the CCTV, hoping that would place him under its field of vision, needing that privacy.

He was left unmolested for several hours, except for the provision of a jug of water for which he was eminently grateful. He was shivering with the beginnings of a fever and presumed that infection was setting into both his leg and forearm. The constant throb of agony from his many wounds was exhausting, and he was light-headed from repeated blows and the loss of blood.

He longed to sleep, but every time he closed his eyes, his concussed and feverish mind relived the desperate minutes where he'd held onto his father with failing strength and he'd jerk awake, disoriented, grasping desperately for the reassurance of Mark's wrist under his fingers.

Exhaustion only added to the turmoil in his mind as it flittered incoherently from nightmare to memory, and his body twitched as his muscles reacted instinctively to the mental images of running, falling and fighting.

At times, in an effort to pull himself back from the twilight world of confusion, he recited his name, badge number and address, using the concrete facts of his identity to displace his disorientation. Time seemed to have no meaning without external means to separate pain-filled minutes from hours, and full consciousness was too slippery to grasp.

In the brief periods of greater lucidity that punctuated the more general confusion, he drank thirstily from the water jug. Once, as he reached out, he found a fly struggling in the lukewarm liquid and watched as its frantic struggles faded to intermittent movements before, with a certain amount of fellow feeling for its imprisonment, he offered it a finger as a life preserver.

When the door opened next, a rush of adrenaline helped him rally, and he glared stonily, if a little blurrily, at Canin as he descended the stairs. This time, the cop-turned-mobster was taking no chances, and two of his men seized Steve's arms, pulling them behind him and jerking him to his feet.

Already strained muscles in his back and arms protested the position of restraint, and he could feel fresh blood trickle down his stomach from the wound on his ribs, but the defiance in his expression did not dim.

Canin didn't look as smug now, merely dangerous, and the sight of him prompted the memory of the casual violence the man had dispensed in Ian Trainer's office. The bruises he had inflicted on Canin's throat brought a brief smile to Steve's face, but it quickly disappeared at the mobster's words.

"I think it's time we invited your father to this party."

The automatic tensing of his muscles that the suggestion precipitated reminded Steve of how tightly he was restrained. He gave a short laugh with no humour behind it. "You can beat me to a pulp and I wouldn't do anything to endanger my father."

Canin's smile was unpleasantly triumphant as he pulled a small object out of his pocket - the cell phone Jesse had given him. "Then it's lucky for both of us that I have this."

"He's under arrest, remember." Steve tried to make the words sound casual. "They probably took his away from him."

"They didn't."

Canin's grin was so hateful that Steve longed to remove it by the simple expedient of a fist through his teeth. But that pleasure was denied him. He remembered Canin's boast that his men had been in charge of Mark's arrest.

Jesse had preprogrammed his and Mark's number into the cell-phone's memory, and Steve could do nothing but watch in dismay as Canin accessed the numbers, then listen in impotent fury to Canin's side of the conversation, knowing his father well enough to fill in every word of his response.

It was obvious Mark was asking to speak to him, and Steve's pulse raced at the opportunity, the throbbing echoing painfully in his arm, ribs and leg. There had to be something useful he could say in the brief moment, maybe something only his father would understand. But his addled brain refused to cooperate, and he could think of nothing useful. He had no idea where he was, and Mark already knew that Canin had him.

Canin gave him the obligatory caution not to say anything stupid, and he was given an admonishing shake that left him dizzy.

"Dad?" He was appalled at the weakness in his own voice, but the next word was summoned up from the very depth of his soul, a warning, command and plea all rolled into one desperate word. "Don't!"

He was braced for the retribution he knew would come, but the blow to his already injured ribs left him too breathless to even cry out, for which he was grateful. He sagged momentarily between the two behemoths holding him, but then forced himself upright as he saw Canin preparing to leave.

"Canin!" The low, almost choking, words brought the mobster's attention reluctantly back to his ex-colleague. "If you hurt my father, I'll kill you."

It should have been absurd, an empty threat from a desperate man, but the passion in the voice carried conviction, and a shiver of fear ran down Canin's back as he remembered what this man had achieved before, barely off his death-bed, for his father's sake. They'd all had their agendas at that time, but Steve's was the only one clearly stated and pursued with a single-minded intensity that bordered on obsession. His first priority had been clearing his father and getting him out of jail, and he'd badgered and cajoled and pushed himself and everybody up to and including the Chief of Police, until he'd succeeded.

Canin had already been embarrassed by this cop once in front of his men, and he couldn't afford to show more weakness, so he shrugged off the vow, gesturing to his men to drop Steve and follow him out. As a last sadistic gesture, he flicked off the light, leaving Steve in molasses-thick blackness.

The dark of his prison seemed like a tangible force, pressing coldly on his chest and clogging his lungs with the stench of death. A rustle from a corner reminded him of the other occupants of the cellar.

He knew he was getting sicker, the fever radiating off his skin in waves, his face flushed. The agony in his ribs was a fire consuming him, and the throbbing in his head told him he was suffering from a concussion. He tried to slow his breathing, taking quick shallow breaths, trying to control the pain.

'Dad.' Steve's awareness diminished one breath at a time until only that word remained. If anyone could outwit Canin and his whole organisation it was his father. Steve had immense faith in his father's abilities to do everything from planning a successful, multi-million-dollar robbery to catching the most elusive criminal - given time. He wanted to trust that Mark had everything under control, but he also knew that his father would come for him, plan or not, willingly launching himself with no sense of self-preservation if he knew his son needed him.

Steve could no longer sit passively while his father marched into danger. The lack of illumination gave him a chance to move unobserved, and enabled him to prepare a surprise for the next visitor. Climbing the stairs in his condition was the equivalent of ascending Everest unassisted, but stubborn determination and fear for Mark overrode his sense of the impossible. Each movement, no matter how small, sent a stab of coruscating pain through his injuries, and his dizziness increased exponentially, but the slats of the wooden stairs provided secure handholds that prevented him toppling back down as he inched his way like a blind, wounded snake up the stairs.

He tried to decide which hurt worse, his arm, leg or head, and let the effort of deciding distract him from the pain in his side until a groping hand informed him that he'd succeeded in reaching the top of the stairs. Remembering that the door opened inwards, he installed himself against the wall on the other side, wrapping his good arm around the railing to anchor his exhausted body. He dropped his aching head limply back against the wall, quelling his rebellious stomach. He was sure that they would come for him when Mark arrived, and he had to remain alert to utilise every speck of advantage his position of surprise might bring. Meanwhile, in the musty basement, made colder by the fever raging within, Steve waited.