Day Twenty Two

"This, my friend, is the room in which you will be spending your time working."

Beck, with his hands cuffed behind his back and the butt of a man's gun balancing on his spine, pushing him forth and through a large archway door, stumbled into a rather blinding white room and was immediately hit with a sense of cold, fresh air so different from the grimy air within the cells beneath the ground, in which he and Cat had been held the night before. He had stayed in his confinement for the remainder of the day beforehand whilst they sent his once redheaded friend off to work god knows where, alone and in silence and attempting to read what the words had said on the crack lidded coffin in his companions cell adjacent to his. It had felt like a thousand hours before she had finally come back, shoved inside her reformatory, red in the cheeks and clothes ripped and sullen with dirt and blood – he didn't dare to question her as she cried herself to sleep; he was rather afraid of the answer that he would get from her, though he was sure of what it was.

He glanced sideways at his captor, who he had later learned was named Vincent McCormick, with a slightly furrowed brow. The room at which he was brought too and told he was going to work in, resembled that of private room within a hospital, with a comfortable bed smack in the middle and a machine he was by no means familiar with standing still and silent beside it, IV hooks and chords hanging all about it. It was as if he was being brought into a room full of strangers and being told to tell someone everything he knew about them, which in reality, would be absolutely nothing at all – if that, considerably, made any sense whatsoever. To him it had, but maybe not to anybody else who wasn't quite in the same position as he.

"And what am I supposed to be fixing here?" He asked slowly, thick dark brows furrowed and his eyes reducing to small slits as he glared at the shorter, stockier male who was smiling broadly and kindly beside him. The scene and situation didn't exactly seem to fit his persona, and Beck had made sure that he kept his guard up because of it. It was, if not eerie, completely idiosyncratic and try as he might, he didn't quite understand it.

"You see this machine here? Hooked with the wires?" Vincent asked as he hobbled over, picking up one of the chords gently with nimble fingers. Beck nodded in turn, facial expression remaining passive. "Well, they aren't functioning properly, and someone dear to me needs it in order to survive. You are to fix it, and make sure she will get the fluids she needs, through these chords." He said, glassy dark gray eyes wide and fixated upon him and him alone, as if the other man behind him, holding Beck by the biceps with a vice, iron grip as if he was going to escape, was not in the room at all, and was simply a mere an obscurity in the doorway.

"If your friend needs it so much, where is she now?" He questioned skeptically, and if possible, dark irises narrowed down even further at the outlandish man before him. "Will you let me and my friend free once I fix it?"

"Now if I told you, Beckett,"

"Beck."

"Beck, would you reconstruct it as well as I wish you too? I'd think not, no matter the answer, which is therefore a reason at which you will not receive one. Do you understand?"

"I guess so" He shrugged, and the simple movement alone caused the burly man beside him to toughen and tighten his grip upon his arm, enough to leave a crimson hand print upon chiseled, olive skin. He didn't give the other man the satisfaction of a wince or a cringe, but had simply stared at Vincent as he fell into place beside him, wide eyes glaring into his own, glassy and as round as the spectacles upon his sunken cheeks.

"Perfect. Remember, we'll be watching – don't do anything stupid." And with that, leaving Beck in a contemplating trance, Vincent and his constant 'sidekick' pushed him further into the room before exiting themselves, leaving him cuffed by his wrists behind his back and with no vital information, no tools, just…nothing. Try as he might, he could not bring himself to comprehend what his task at hand was to do; sure, he had gotten down the basics (fix the machine, save the lady…then…?), but, the reasons at which why they had been making such a fuss about it, why keeping someone alive was important, was foreign and unexplained to him and he was nothing but confused, left in a mindless sea of obsidian.

He hobbled over to the flat and still machine aimlessly, constantly glancing about the nooks and crannies of the room in which he was forced into for any signs that they were actually watching him – like hidden cameras, or something like that. The technology they had on this island, hell, this entire lot they had, was absolutely astonishing. How long, exactly, had they been here to create such a thing? Why did they? Questions, questions, questions…would be a lot easier if they just told me, he thought as he knelt down beside the inanimate and unresponsive widget, a tad unsteadily as he was unable to straighten out his arms. The albino contraption, that appeared far too complicated for his limitedly extensive mechanic knowledge, was decorated with buttons and metal of all sorts and he had automatically estimated that it had been turned around so he could get a look at it through the back way, as if they believed he was going to try something to ruin it, or harm the "vital" object in any way.

"I kind of need my hands! Hello?" Beck shouted at no one, chin tilted toward the ceiling as he yelled and thrashed at his arms, skin pressing into the tight restraints around his wrists and causing a distinct, burning sensation to flood over him. It was uncomfortable and his arms and shoulders were beginning to ache at the angle in which they were coerced in. Yet, as he had suspected, after minutes of waiting not one person had made their presence known to aid him. Either that or they had just figured that keeping his hands held behind his back the entire time would prevent him from doing anything. Personally, like he had often thought about Jade, he thought they were being just a bit too paranoid.

Jade…

Albeit it had only been a day since he had last seen her face, though it certainly felt like a hundred of months, he missed his overly possessive, Gothic girlfriend in which he took so much pride in. To be able to see her face, to know that she was alright and well and not in a situation like Cat and he were, would mean a lot more to Beck than he would tell anybody who had asked him. He loved her, yes, that there was absolutely no denying (he would, though he would prefer not to leave her alone in the world, take a bullet for her, or anything that would put her in the slightest bit of harm's way), but he wasn't as open with his feelings; he preferred to keep himself collected. After all, he was Mr. Calm and Collected Beckett James Oliver.

More than anything, he had hoped severely that she was alright and that Brent, as having the role of her step brother, was able to take care of her when he was away and for however long he was. He imagined the duo to be completely confused, possibly even as bewildered as he was (and most definitely Cat as well) as to where they had gone and what had happened, and he cherished the thought that she didn't think he abandoned her with the once-redhead girl, when in reality, that was most likely not the case. How was she to guess what had happened, when they hadn't even known there was an entire…civilization…if that's what you could call it, out there, just waiting for Beck to come in reach so he could fix a stupid appliance he quite honestly, knew not a single thing about.

Right here and right now though, he wanted her with him and in his arms, especially since he had no idea how this mess had even turned out to be and he was confused and she was his rock, just like he was hers. No one was wrong when they said that perhaps Jade had needed him.

But no one ever guessed that maybe, just maybe, Beck had needed her too.

Two years ago, March 8; 2008

Los Angeles California.

"I…I'm really sorry, Beck. I mean that."

He and Jade were reclined upon the leather comforter within the RV his father had just recently gifted him for when he was older, he fifteen and she fourteen, the very best of friends (though she had often commented that she didn't like to think of them as best friends, and just acquaintances because she thought his stalker-ish crush on her was creepy and weird but hung out with him anyway, something he never really understood) shoulders bumping against each other as his father drove the two from the Hospital. Jade had agreed to come along with him when he found out the news since he was with her at the time he was informed of what had happened, and he couldn't have been more thankful. He may have been young, but he knew he had a reason why he liked her so much. Behind that cold, sarcastic demeanor she always put off, she really did seem to care.

But now, with his elbows resting upon his knees and his handsome face bowed toward cupped hands, tears threatening to spill over – but he resisted them, because he refused to cry in front of a girl – his outlandish crush upon the gothic thirteen year old girl who had just apologized for something that was not even her fault, something he knew that she would never, under any circumstance, do to any other, was for once, not his main focus. The atrocity, something that would alter his life possibly forever, was the only think present in his mind, and he couldn't bring himself to speak.

"Are you going to say anything? Because I'm trying to be nice here…" Jade commented after continuous moments of silence, and from the corner of his eyes he saw her glaring at him with narrowed eyes, black fingernails pressing to her pale, pale cheeks. Her bag was hanging loosely off of her shoulder, slouched awkwardly against the couch over the fact that she had sat down beside him, the blinding yellow cap of something contrasting greatly against the ebony fabric.

"Just…I…" Beck paused and buried his face into his hands, struggling to find the words to describe what he was feeling, something genuinely difficult to do. "I just don't know how this could happen. Cancer, Jade. Cancer. This is going to change everything."

"Your mom is a strong woman, Beck. She'll make it through it, okay?" She said, hesitantly placing her hand upon his shoulder as if she was attempting to comfort him. Before he was able to speak again, to deny her statement that not everything will be alright and being her, she should know that already (something he wasn't really thinking about saying; it was upon impulse only), she reached down to her bag to grasp that yellow cap, pulling out an equally bright bottle and shoving it into his arms with a smirk. "Lemonade, your favorite, right?"

Beck hadn't bothered to respond, but rather grabbed her face between his hands and pressed his lips hungrily to hers – because the simple fact that Jadelyn West was being supportive and nice to him, considering his feelings for once, rather than mean, meant too much for him to put in words, even if that did sound sappy and girly.

When she kissed him back, he forgot everything.

He could have sworn he was the happiest fifteen year old boy alive.

"So, we work out here all day and we don't even get any water?" Beck asked Cat as he drew near, dumping the barrel of rocks into a pile next to her as she dropped the seeds into the soil and mended at the growing plants. He had been moved from the room he was previously in and forced out to endeavor with the other workers in the fields, or rather, the plantation his tiny friend had told him about. The men put him to servitude straight away, taking the metal clasps from around his wrists and shoving the handles of a wheel barrow into his hands – his only order, "pile up them rocks, break 'em and move 'em." At first it had seemed chaste enough, all things considered he was quite the strong boy and he figured he would be able to handle it fairly well, however, when the heat and the lack of water supply teamed up together and beat down upon him like solid baseball bats, he found his energy slowly disintegrating away.

"Beck, shh. We're going to get in trouble!" She whispered back at him, not looking up from her work but slightly turning her head to the side as if to expose her swollen and split lip to him. He furrowed his brow at her, eyes traveling to the men surrounding the perimeter of the fields, anger coursing through his veins. The simple fact that they laid a hand on her, someone whom he considered strongly to be a younger sister, was enough to make him lose his temper - just like if someone had hurt Jade in any way, though he was sure his anger would be twice more severe if that were to ever happen.

"They did that to you? They hurt you and you didn't tell me?" He growled.

"It's not the only time, Beck." Her voice noticeably cracked.

"Ca-"

"Oy, handsome! Shut your trap over there and get back to work!" A guard yelled from somewhere behind him. Beck ignored him, keeping his shoulder squared as he glared down at Cat as she worked.

"You're going to just give into them? Come on -" Suddenly, a fist flew from nowhere, iron knuckles smashing against the side of his face, squarely in the jaw. He toppled backwards in surprise, his hand automatically jerking up to his face as he regained his balance, glancing over at the person at which had punched him. Anger, something not foreign to him recently, spread through him like a raging, furious wildfire, boiling in his veins and popping to the surface. Without much of a second though, as if acting upon a foreign, new impulse, Mr. Calm and Collected Beckett James Oliver, flung a clenched hand out to strike the other male just beneath his nose – and, as they say, all hell broke loose.

He hadn't really known why he had done so, but striking the other man's face had felt like it was the proper thing to do. Beck wasn't thinking when he had done it but he didn't regret it, even as the two brawled together on the landscape, throwing punches and kicks at each other. It was only when another brute, and then another, had become suddenly involved in their physical controversy that he did begin to regret it; he was unable to beat them all off whilst protecting his face and other important vitals (which were undoubtedly being pummeled) and though he hated to seem weak, he did his best.

"No! Please, leave him alone!" He heard Cat scream from somewhere around him, her voice sounding far away and distant compared to his heart pounding within his ears and the fists and feet connecting with his body. She suddenly yelped – and Beck had it.

Upon using his skills in Stage Fighting class back at Hollywood Arts, he grabbed the closest man by his collar and shoved him with all of his might away, but not without a severe socking in the face before he had done so. His arms were hauled behind him and he was pushed face first into the dirt by the other man, who was ten times stronger than he it seemed, and the punches and kicks thrown at him had abruptly stopped. He felt the blood trickling from his face and he could taste it along his tongue, creating a bitter, copper relish upon his taste buds. Spitting it at the dirt beneath him, his heart still thumping wildly in his ears as if it had duplicated and ripped from his chest to sit right beside them, he, one eye swollen, glared at the man standing over him, a gun pointed at his forehead.

"If you're going to kill me, do it." Beck challenged, unsure of his words but testing the other man's patience and temper. As if he had heard his hopes for the best, the man with the shaggy blonde hair pulled the gun from his face and gestured to the guards surrounding him and holding him firm against the grit – his lungs were constricting uncontrollably from the pressure.

"Can't kill ya, bosses orders. You got yourself lucky this time, Oliver." The blond said, gruff voice menacing. "Take him back to the cells, do what you wish. Just don't kill 'im."

Beck was one lucky and unlucky, guy, now wasn't he?

…Beck's a confused little, wild boy - who just got jumped o.o - isn't he? Anyways, since I stayed home from school again 'cause of my fever, I decided to type this up with my little motivation music (instrumental stuff really helps, by the way. Just sayin') and reading over some of your lovely reviews (: So I hope you guys like this one as much as the others, even though the ending was well…blah.

I have some bad news. Kind of bad news in my case, not really in yours.

I'm stuck at a crossroads for the ending and the next few chapters, even though I already wrote them. I was making some tweaks to them when I finished this one and well…now I'm not so sure about the ultimate decision I made. SO. Basically anything's possible now.

And I'd also like to thank my reviewers, who seriously make my day: kikudog6, ohsnapitzratzie, Jeremy Shane, Titanlvr4evr, Lily Jess, SongBird341, ImRightHere13 and all the others! I love you guys! s2

With that being said.

You know what to do (:

Preview:

"You're schizophrenic, you're insane.Of course you're going to see things that aren't real." The boy said with a sinister smirk that rivaled Jade's; it was eerily similar, just like the resemblance she had toward she and her older brother, but she had thought nothing more of it.

"I'm not schizophrenic!" Cat nearly shouted, the tone of voice she had used sounding as if she was trying to convince herself more than she was trying to perceive him – and, she decided, she wasn't denying that either. Was she?

"Well, than that just leaves insane. That tends to happen when people see and talk to people who aren't real."

Then, just like that, he was gone.