This chapter contains dark things like violence, torture, and harsh language. Skip this chapter if you need to!

(Sodapop's POV)

I slowly returned to consciousness, and when I did, I immediately groaned in pain.

"Soda? Jesus, you're alive."

I opened my eyes and turned my head towards the voice. After my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw a familiar figured sitting on the ground next to me and leaning his back against a wall. "Steve? What happened?"

"After you performed your heroic act and saved Harrison, you got shot," Steve said dryly. "I tried to get you back to camp, but I got a few bullets in my leg."

I remembered Steve and me hitting the ground, but that didn't explain how we ended up in a cold, dark room. "Why aren't we dead?"

He scoffed. "Well you tried your best, but before they could kill us, they decided to take us prisoner instead."

I struggled to sit up next to him. It was challenging, not only because of my injuries, but the metal shackles that were attached to my ankles and wrists made it difficult to move. Once I was sitting next to Steve, I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the cool wall. The cold eased some of the throbbing in my skull. "Why did they take us prisoner?"

"A few reasons, none of them good," he said. "They said they're gonna try to get a prisoner exchange. In the meantime, they're gonna see how much information they can get out of us."

I opened my eyes, and my gaze landed on Steve's right leg. "Shit, Steve. Are you okay?" His leg was extended in front of him. A thick fabric was wrapped around his knee, and a thinner bandage was wrapped around his lower leg. Both pieces of fabric were stained with his blood.

"Considerin' neither of us are dead, I'm great." Steve joked. "If I'm being honest, I don't think I can walk more than a few feet with this bullet in my knee. They took the one out of my calf though."

That confused me. "What do you mean they took it out? Why would they do that?" All of this information coming at me at once was overwhelming. "What all have I missed?"

"You've been out cold for a day or two, I'm not really sure what day it is anymore. I was pretty sure you were still breathing, but I didn't know… I didn't know if you'd wake up." Steve's voice grew quiet and he sighed. I could only guess how rough it would've been for him to think there was a chance I could be lying dead next to him. A shiver went down my spine, and after regaining his composure, Steve continued. "Like I said, they wanna get information from us. They need us alive to do that." Then he gave me a distressed look. "They cleaned both of us up as much as they could so we'd stay alive. They took more shrapnel outta you and cleaned up some of your wounds. They didn't take the bullet out of your shoulder, though. I guess they figured if they wrapped it up good enough, it would at least stop the bleeding. Same with my knee."

I nodded. Everything he said made sense, even though it didn't necessarily mean it was good news for us. "So you got all of that just by listening to them talk?"

Steve shrugged. "Pretty much. I don't think they know I can understand them yet."

I scoffed and shook my head. "Damn Steve, you never stop surprising me." I rested my head against the wall again and closed my eyes. "I'm sorry, Steve. This is my fault."

"No, Soda. You did want you felt like you had to. You saved Harrison. That kid owes you his life." I felt Steve place a hand on my good shoulder, his shackles making noise as he moved.

"Too bad that means we'll never see Tulsa again," I muttered sadly. I wasn't even sure if Harrison survived, so there was no way to know if my efforts were even worth it. I felt tears streaming down my face. I always hated being so emotional, but Steve was the only one that could see me cry, and given the circumstances, I figured it was understandable to shed a few tears.

"There's still a chance we make it out of here, Soda. We're greasers… these guys got nothin' on us." Steve gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze. "I made a promise to Darry, and I intend to keep it."

I didn't mention that his promise to Darry was that he wasn't returning home without me… he wouldn't be breaking his promise if he didn't return either.


We passed the time by talking about what we thought our family and friends were doing in Tulsa, or what the guys in our unit were doing wherever they were. Things sometimes took a dark turn when we tried to guess who was still alive and who wasn't. Steve tried teaching me Vietnamese, but I didn't learn as easily or as quickly as he did, so I only learned a couple words and phrases.

We were questioned by our captors several times a day, and unfortunately for me, they didn't speak a lot of English, so when I couldn't answer their questions, I was punished. Even if I understood their questions, I wouldn't have answered anyway, so all I could do was take the punishments they sent my way. Steve understood all of their questions, but he was punished when he refused to answer too.

They used several different methods to try to get us to talk: waterboarding, beatings, whippings, burning our skin from their cigarettes or any metal objects they could find to put into a flame, and other creative forms of interrogation. During the interrogations, I tried to focus my mind on other things, and usually that meant I thought about my life back in Tulsa, and my thoughts were contorted by what was happening at the time. When water was being poured over my face, I thought about how Ponyboy felt when the Socs almost drowned him in the fountain. When they marked my skin with more burns, I wondered if that's what it felt like when Dally, Johnny, and Pony were saving those kids in the church. The distractions usually worked, but the pain and trauma lasted well beyond the torture itself. Whenever I was aching or sore, I thought about how Darry felt when he came home from work every day. Trying to be as strong as Darry helped me toughen up a little, but I still felt weak and vulnerable.

Between interrogations, we were given minimal food and water, and once in a while we were given first aid supplies. We tried to keep our injuries clean, especially our agonizing gunshot wounds, but neither of us were medics, and the damp dungeon-like room they kept us in wasn't exactly a clean environment. After a while, it started to smell too.

Neither of us slept well. We would be woken up at any time of the day to be questioned, but even in the hours of rest we were allowed, we couldn't stay asleep. I would frequently wake up from nightmares, usually shouting or trembling, and Steve was always there for me, helping me calm down. I knew he was struggling too, but he never made it obvious. Instead, I noticed he would be twitching or mumbling in his sleep for a few seconds before he'd wake up, eyes wide and looking like he was ready for a fight. I was pretty sure he avoided sleeping at all costs, probably to stop reliving whatever it was he saw in his sleep, but he never mentioned anything, and I didn't want to bug him about it.

Our captors had a particular grudge against Steve. Not only did his uniform give away his status as my commanding officer, but once he started yelling out some words and phrases in Vietnamese, our captors were furious and took their fury out on him. There were times that when I was being interrogated, Steve would shout something, and the focus would move onto him. I knew he was protecting me, but I only wished that he would look after himself sometimes too. I would shout and try to get our captors' attention when they were beating Steve, but they mostly ignored me and my pathetic attempts.

It was impossible to tell time, but I had guessed it had been a couple weeks since we had captured when I started to see a change in Steve. He started talking less, sleeping more, and he seemed like he was getting sick. A couple days later, he was really warm and shaky.

Finally, I had to bring it up to him. "Steve, you ain't looking too good. What's goin' on?"

He was lying on the ground, shaking, and apparently trying to sleep. He shook his head. "'m fine, Soda."

"No you're not," I said. "Steve, tell me."

"What do ya expect? It's not like we're relaxin' in paradise," he spat. Then he looked at me, and his demeanor changed a little. "Just a little sick is all. And my leg's really smartin'," Steve murmured.

I nodded. My shoulder had been aching all the time from the bullet still stuck in it, but for the most part, I could keep myself from moving it too much. It was only really bad when our captors would press their knives into it, opening up the wound again, or when they would yank my arm around. Steve's knee was constantly being moved, especially when our captors would drag him across the floor, so I could only imagine the damage and pain the bullet was causing.

"You're not lookin' good either," Steve muttered.

I rolled my eyes, but I didn't say anything. Then I decided to change the subject. "I never thanked you for saving my life."

He looked confused. "Thanked me? Soda, I told you… ain't no way I was gonna leave you behind." Then he chuckled a bit. "And this ain't exactly where I hoped we'd end up."

"Still… thanks Steve," I said. "I owe you my life."

Steve struggled to sit next to me. When he did, I could see in his eyes how tired he was. "You don't owe me anything. I owe you and your family so much more. Let's just call it even."

I nodded. "Deal." We stayed silent for a minute or two before I spoke again. "We've always had each other's back… now we gotta stay strong for each other too. Deal?"

A moment passed, but he weakly replied. "Deal."


I guessed a few more days had passed when things took a turn.

Steve and I were both getting weaker, and after a particularly rough interrogation session, we barely could stay in a sitting position, even with the wall's support. Steve's hair was still dripping from the water that was poured over his face. The grunts and gasps I heard coming from Steve while they waterboarded him made me want to scream, pull out my hair, and kill every one of those assholes that were torturing my best friend. I thought I had gotten used to their torture techniques, because when I was being questioned again, I hardly felt it when they were burning my skin, but when they started punching me in my already-bruised ribs, I couldn't help but wheeze and shed tears as I tried to get air into my lungs. I knew Steve was shouting something at them, but I couldn't understand what he was saying over the pounding in my ears.

Eventually, our captors were done with us and left us alone. As we sat against the wall, I was still struggling to breathe.

"You okay, Soda?" Steve asked.

"'m fine," I replied between wheezes. "You?"

Before Steve could reply, we heard shouting and gunshots in the distance. Knowing that our captors wouldn't be shooting their own men, it could only mean one thing: our guys were nearby. "Steve, this is it. They're here!" Until that moment, I didn't think there was a chance that we'd get out of our prison, but we finally had a glimmer of hope. "What are they saying?"

Steve was silent as he listened to the shouting. "Something about the Americans. They're surprised."

Suddenly, the door to our room burst open, and light flooded the room. I tried to cover my eyes, but I couldn't lift my arms anymore, so I just turned my head and closed my eyes.

"Randle? Curtis?" I knew that voice. I slowly opened my eyes, and when they adjusted, I saw Butch standing in the doorway. He was lowering his gun so it was no longer pointed at us.

Then Henry appeared behind him. "Golly, I didn't think we'd ever see you two again."


Steve and I were immediately transported to a military field hospital. Everyone that we encountered seemed excited to see us, and some were obviously surprised that we were alive. I can't blame them, I'm surprised too. We received encouraging words, and a couple high-ranking officers assured us that we would be discharged from the army once we were all fixed up. We would never have to go back into the jungle.

As soon as we arrived to the hospital, Steve went into surgery and the doctors put me in a wheelchair while they looked me over. I couldn't gather a lot of information about Steve and his condition because I was busy being questioned by the nurses and doctors, and those that would answer my questions kept saying it was too soon to tell. All I found out was the doctors were concerned about his leg, and someone said something about an infection. It all sounded serious, and everyone looked worried about Steve's condition.

After the doctors looked me over, they decided I also needed surgery. "Before that happens, I need to ask for a favor," I said to the nurse that was setting up my IV. She was a very pretty blonde woman with amazing blue eyes.

"Of course. What do you need?" Her voice was soft and sweet.

"Steve Randle and I need to share a room." She looked confused, so I felt like I had to explain. "Trust me, he'll give you all hell if he doesn't know where I am when he wakes up. He has a bit of a temper." I don't know why, but I didn't feel like I could tell anyone that I needed to be near him too. I needed to look after him, just like he had done with me. We were held prisoner together, and I'd be dammed if I let our own people split us up after we were rescued.

"I can arrange that," the nurse said with a smile. Then she gently gripped my arm. "This isn't the first time I've worked with P.O.W.s… I understand."

The way she said it told me she knew exactly what I was going through. I was relieved. "Thank you, nurse…" I realized I didn't know her name.

"Laura."

"Thank you nurse Laura," I said with a smile. "Can I ask you for one more favor, Laura?"

She nodded. "What else do you need?"

"Before I go into surgery, can I use the phone? I need to make a call."