Nineteen

A/N: …*blinks*… well…*coughs into hand*…for those of you who noticed and are extremely confused, I did accidentally change Cammy's cousin's name from Rebecca to Bridgett…whoops. I guess that's what I get for waiting several months between each update.

Yeah…so I wish that there was a good excuse for waiting so long to update this story like: huge amounts of school work, or my computer stopped working, or even writer's block, but unfortunately none of those things are the case, so please just take this chapter as an apology and enjoy it. The epilogue will follow soon (unless my computer does die, because it really does seem to like to do that).

Waking up was a slow and painful process. Shawn was regaining consciousness by degrees and each minute was a new experience in pain. Luckily though, the sharp pain that was running throughout his whole body, dulled to an aching thrum, when he was finally awake. Groaning, Shawn opened his eyes and found himself staring down at Cammy's dirty, blonde hair.

Shawn was laying on his side. When he had lost consciousness, Cammy, who miraculously had remained unharmed, had crawled under his right arm and had laid against his chest. Where, she fell asleep.

Shawn would have loved nothing more, than to continue to lay on the ground and not move for the next year, but from the lighting in the forest, the sun was either setting or rising. Which meant that he had been out for a while, and Cammy's uncle had, had ample time to close the distance between them.

Groaning a little, Shawn lifted his arm and rubbed his hand up and down Cammy's shoulder.

"Hey," he whispered, "it's time to wake up."

"I don't wanna," Cammy whined, burying her face into Shawn's shirt.

"Come on Cammy," Shawn said, continuing to rub her arm, "we have to keep moving. We don't want to be stuck here in the dark."

Since the sky was growing darker, Shawn was pretty sure that it wasn't morning.

Apparently, the thought of being in a dark forest was enough to get Cammy moving. Reluctantly, she pulled away from Shawn and sat beside him.

Now it was Shawn's turn to sit up. Cautiously, he started to push himself up, but was panicked when he realized that he couldn't. Before he could show any of his worry though, he realized that he couldn't push himself up, because he had been trying to use the arm that Cammy had been laying on, and it had fallen asleep.

Not even bothering to smother a sigh of relief, Shawn tried sitting up again. He was almost upright, when Cammy came over and helped straighten him out.

"You, are awesome," Shawn told her, giving her a smile, despite his headache and slight bought of dizziness.

Cammy smiled back, and then waited patiently for Shawn to gather his strength.

Once he was ready, with Cammy's help and the support of the large tree trunk that he had slammed into, Shawn was able to stand up. After another minute spent of keeping himself balanced and waiting for the dizziness to pass, Shawn and Cammy were able to start their way back down the mountain.

Progress was slow. Shawn was walking with a slight limp, his ribs ached and he had to stop every, what seemed like five minutes, to lean up against a tree and catch his breath. At this rate they'd never get off the mountain. If there had been any possible way for Shawn to send Cammy on ahead, then he would have. Unfortunately though, her uncle was still out there, so it would not be safe.

During one of the many stops that the two took, Cammy had asked Shawn if he were mad at her. At first, Shawn was confused as to why she had asked him this, but when she elaborated, he understood. She had noticed the crease in his brow, and the downward curve of his lips, and thought that it was because his bike now lay in pieces, further up the mountain and she blamed herself for that.

Shawn told her that he wasn't mad at her and that he didn't blame her for anything. Then instead of telling her that he was a little confused and in quite a bit of pain (why risk worrying her or making her blame herself even further?) he told her that he was just tired, and was thinking a little too hard.

Yeah right. If only that was it. Shawn was really concerned that he couldn't sense anyone. By now the mountain should have been crawling with cops, but he couldn't sense anyone. He had been counting on the atmospheric changes of others, to lead him and Cammy back to the trail, so that they at least knew where they were. Now, however, it appeared that they were on their own.

"Give me Bridgette back."

Uh-oh.

Shawn barely had time to register the uncle's sudden presence, when the deranged man swung a long thick branch at Shawn, and it connected with his head with a loud crack.

GusGusGusGusGusGusGusGusGusGusGus

Where in the world could Shawn be? When Gus had gotten off the phone with his best friend, he had sped over to the police station and relayed all that Shawn had told him. All, that is, except where the cabin was. Not caring about how much trouble he might get into, Gus had used that as leverage to go with the police. He would ride with Lassiter and Juliet and tell them where to go, as they led the rest of the officers. Since Shawn had been stupid and had ran off on his own, no one had given too much of an argument.

By now though, Gus was a nervous wreck and almost wished that he hadn't come. He wasn't cut out for this kind of stress. He had spent hours driving up and down the different mountain trails with McNabb, in hopes of seeing Shawn, but they couldn't find hide nor hair of him. Or the uncle. Which was even worse, once they found evidence of the uncle and Cammy, in the cabin. If it wasn't for the uncle's abandoned truck, halfway down the mountain, they would have thought that they were too late, and that the uncle had already taken off with Cammy.

Gus was currently standing off to the side of the narrow mountain road, next to Lassiter and Juliet, as they waited for McNabb to turn his car around so that everyone could leave. It was getting dark, and they wouldn't be able to form a search party until morning. This sat well with no one.

"What was Spencer thinking?" Lassiter growled through clenched teeth. He was standing a bit further away from Gus and Juliet, his body tense and arms folded tightly across his chest.

No one answered Lassiter's question, not that he expected them too. What good would that answer do now anyways? Why did Spencer always have to go off and do the stupid thing? What good was his big heart, if it got him killed?

Gus looked over at Lassiter from the corner of his eyes. He could hear the older man's teeth grinding together, and if he ground any harder, his teeth were going to crack.

"We'll get search and rescue out here first thing in the morning. It'll be okay," Juliet said, trying to assuage her own worries, more than anyone else's. Not even trying to be discreet anymore, she looked down at her cell phone again, wishing that bars would magically appear.

"Well there's nothing more we can do here toni—" Lassiter abruptly stopped talking as a scream cut through the evening air.

Lassiter and Juliet's eyes met for a second, before they ran off the road and towards the sound of the screams. It was close. Extremely close.

Gus tried to follow Lassiter and Juliet, but another officer stopped him, as two other's ran after the detectives.

Lassiter and Juliet ran, throwing branches aside and trampling any foliage that came in their way. Just as the screams seemed unable to grow any closer, they burst through some tall bushes and found themselves staring at a scene that would live in their nightmares for the rest of their lives.

Kneeling on the ground, not very far from the two detectives, was Cammy. Tears were streaming down her face, along with a few trickles of blood, that fell from her nose. She was still screaming as she watched her uncle bring the large branch down on Shawn's motionless body, once again. He hadn't moved since the first blow from the uncle, who looked completely deranged, with his fly-away hair that was full of leaves and twigs.

Not even hesitating, Lassiter drew his gun, cocked it, and commanded the uncle to freeze. He was a drop of sanity away from putting a bullet through the uncle himself.

Surprised by the sudden appearance of the officers, John stopped mid-swing and stared dumbly at Lassiter.

Juliet and the other officers, by now, had also pulled out their guns and had them trained on the kidnapper. Juliet's eyes flicked from the man, down to Shawn, and then back. She couldn't see Shawn's face, but she could see the bruises forming on the bare arms of her favorite psychic. Her eyes hardened. All she needed was one halfway decent excuse and she could put that disgusting creature out of it's misery.

"You're under arrest," Lassiter said, his voice cool as steel, "put the branch down."

For a moment, it almost appeared as if the man hadn't heard him, but then John Glendale, for the first time since his little girl died, came to his senses and, stilling holding onto the branch, dropped down to his knees and wept.

A/N: So all we have is an epilogue (which has already been typed up so there's no need to worry) left, and then this story's done. Please don't forget to review, they really do make you want to update sooner…and yes, maybe that was a threat. ;D