Author's note: Okay, after the first chapter totally fit the title, there won't be mutch hitchhing anymore, and not much DL in this chapter either, sorry... there'll be more in the next chapters, I promise.
Thanks for the comments so far, keep reviewing ;)

... and I'm still looking for a beta reader...

"So, what's your plan?" Lindsay whispered over to Danny. She also had a gun with her.

"I'm thinking we wait here for them to come out, when they walk past us we just stop them from behind and cuff them up. Since we can't call any backup teams yet it's just you and me, Becky. Please be careful", he whispered back.

"I'm always careful! Just because I am a woman and I work out here in the small towns doesn't mean I never had to handle a situation like this. Do you seriously…"

"Hush, they're coming!"

Danny and Lindsay hid to the right and the left of the front doors of the store, making as little sound as they could. Both were concentrating on the doors, waiting for them to be opened. What they didn't take into consideration though was the possibility of a third member of that criminal group. They had completely ignored the car at the parking lot next to the gas station, the car which was now empty.

"Don't move!"

Lindsay felt the cold steel of a gun on her temple, she immediately froze. Danny looked over and saw that a tall, dark man was holding Lindsay and pointing a gun to her head.

"Put your guns down!" The man yelled at them. They slowly did as they were told, and right after they had disarmed themselves the two accomplices of their hostage-taker came out of the store.

"Get back in, before that clerk calls the police!"

Too late! Lindsay and Danny were relieved when they saw the clerk inside on the phone.

The three criminals dragged Lindsay and Danny into the store.

"Tom, get back out and take their guns, we might gonna need them!" The third, unmasked guy seemed to be the mind of this whole operation, he gave all the orders. One of the robbers ran outside and picked the guns up while the other one was pointing his at the clerk again.

"I, I … I just called the police", the clerk stuttered nervously, "they're gonna be here any minute, you should just… just give up…" He almost cried, and couldn't take his eyes off the gun pointed at his face.

"Gus, can we take off these masks now? This thing is suffocating me! The police is getting us anyways, they have our car outside, they'll just run the license plate and…"

"Alright, alright, Terry. Take them off, I'm not wearing mine anyway." Gus, the head of this company, was still holding Lindsay, but pointing his gun at Danny now, while Tom was outside getting the additional guns.

Terry was the first one to take his mask off. Lindsay was surprised about how young he looked, she figured he was about 14 years old. The other one, Tom, didn't look much older, probably 16 years old. Gus was of course the oldest one, that also explained why the two boys were obeying him. She estimated him to be around 25, maybe even a bit younger. She wondered what made these kids throw away their lives like this. Her curiousity forced her to ask, but then her good sense stepped in and she decided not to throw her life away like this, out of curiousity. Afterall, she was still in the hands of Gus, the guy with the gun and command over two other gun-holders. All three of them didn't seem too pleased about the fact that the police was on its way.

"This is bad. This is really, really bad." Tom walked around in the shop nervously, holding Lindsay's and Danny's guns in both hands and talking to himself. The bags with the stuff the kids wanted to steal had been placed next to the garbage can, they didn't seem important anymore. Danny caught a glimpse of what was in the bags: a few candy bars, bottles (alcohol?), magazines, and some other, not very robbery-worthy looking stuff from this tiny store.

"Sit down over there." Gus was talking to Danny. With his gun he pointed to the front side of the counter. He also pushed Lindsay to that place and forced her to sit next to Danny, while Terry brought the clerk around the counter to accompany them.

Danny couldn't help but ask, "You ran into all this trouble just for a few bucks and some beer?"

Gus got really angry now, "Shut up! You have no idea! And no-one's talking to you anyway, you don't speak unless you're asked! … I need to think…"

From outside they heard the police coming, blue lights were blinking throught the store windows. This obviously wasn't part of their plan.

TBC