Chapter 23

A/N: You guys are the best. Seriously though. Apologies for the atrocious writing. I'm honestly ashamed of this chapter.

Dan hovers uselessly as they carefully lay her out across the backseats of the car, ignores the curious looks of the two lawyers that recently joined them. He thinks that Blair may have said that their names were Nate and Chuck, but he can't be sure, and he's not quite sure which one is which. Not that he cares terribly much. His attention has tunneled in on Serena and her currently wax-work features; he's blind to anything other than her. If he had the choice, he would take her home and nurse her better himself. But he doesn't have a choice, these are extreme circumstances. The only thing he can do is trust these three strangers with her life.

He climbs in the back so that her head rests in his lap, lolling at his movements limply. Her long legs are a little cramped in the small space of the car and he winces at the angle they'd had to stretch her wounded left leg. The doctor Serena had called, Blair, had assured him that it was simply a sprained ankle and superficial wounds. That her ribs were bruised, not cracked. That she had a mild concussion, nothing large.

This information, he thinks, is supposed to help calm him. But it doesn't. Nothing can stop the whoosh whoosh whoosh of his heart in his ears. It hasn't gone away for a long time. He doesn't see it ever going away. Not until she comes back to him; healthy, safe and strong. Even when she opens her eyes again this very day, she won't be the same. She will be weak- Physically. And that will hurt her. And, of course, that will do nothing but hurt him down to the very core of himself, where he finds that she is wrapped around him tightly.

"Hold that drip up high, Humphrey." Blair warns as she climbs into the drivers seat. One of the lawyers, Chuck, climbs in beside her.

"What are..." He clears his throat, and directs his attention to the lawyer. "Why are you coming with us?"

Chuck gives him a strange look, as though it should be obvious. "Serena's hurt."

He smiles at the man's loyalty despite hus runaway thoughts. "Yeah. Sorry. Stupid of me to ask, I guess."

And then, because all falls silent in the car as Blair drives, he adds. "I just- I don't really know you. She's not really ever spoken of you. I'm just trying to figure out your motives here, man, no offense."

Blair gives a click of her tongue. "Oh, I am so having words with her when she's not knocked out from drugs. Not mentioning me?" Blair simply raises her eyebrows and lets out a little huff before falling silent.

"She didn't..." Chuck's eyebrows knit together as he turns to face Dan in the back seat. "How long have you known Serena, Humphrey?"

Oh. So now he's calling him 'Humphrey' too. He raises his eyebrows at it.

Then he lets out a ridiculous laugh. "Oh, man, only the shortest time. Probably like eight or nine days now. I don't know. I wasn't counting."

Chuck and Blair are both silent at his answer, and he watches Blair's reaction in the rear view mirror since she seems like the most rational out of the two. Or, at least, the friendliest. He's been getting nothing but bad vibes off this lawyer ever since he had first seen him and the other one rushing through the woods. Though he supposes that Chuck knew Serena back before all of this; he's bound to be protective. She was a part of the law firm. And Dan's a stranger to him.

Dan's trying to fill the blanks though. He still doesn't truly know how she became this. He knows it started around the time she was kicked out off the firm. He doesn't know these people, these apparent friends of her, know what it is she does for a living now. Their weird arrangement.

"So, you've known her for nine days, and suddenly she's ending up like this?" The man gestures to Serena's unconscious body, his whole body suddenly tense and on the attack.

Oh. Woah. Okay- That was not- No. He's got this wrong.

But before he can explain, Blair lays a hand on Chuck's arm. "Chuck," she says softly, "we haven't seen her in five years. She's changed a lot, but her trust issues haven't." Blair's eyes lift to meet Dan's. They're almost smiling. "If Serena trusts him, then so can we."

Chuck keeps Dan's gaze for a few moments, the tension between them palpable. Dan gulps but holds his grounds. He will not let them take him away from Serena, and he will not let them take Serena away from him.

Finally, Chuck sighs and lets the moment go. There's still that slight stiffness to his body, as though he's ready to launch himself at Dan at any given moment, but Dan pretends not to notice it. It's actually pretty sweet that he's so willing to protect Serena that way. Or rather it would be if it didn't threaten Dan's ability to stay beside Serena at every moment throughout this whole ordeal. Then again, it's admirable that this loyalty and protectiveness of Serena is still there after five years of her being out of their lives. (Was that her choice or theirs?)

"Uh...So, where did the other lawyer go?" Dan asks nervously.

"Nate went back to the law firm to cover for us. Our boss is pretty hard on rules, especially since Serena..." Chuck falters for a moment, "Well, ever since she disappeared, I guess."

"Disappeared?" Dan chokes around the word.

"How much has she told you about her past, Humphrey?" Blair asks quietly, talking a left turn.

"Just that...About her Dad. Being murdered. And that she was shot." He glances down at Serena and runs a hand through her hair. "I made her stop telling me. I mean, I wanted to know, but it was hurting her so much to relive it..."

He tries to ignore the memories of her sobbing, clutching to him desperately, ghosts in her eyes. Weak. Exposed. Flawed.

"Oh." Blair sighs. "You've got a lot to learn about our Serena van der Woodsen."

Her body feels lighter now. Like she's floating through air and the clouds are carrying her, wrapped around her providing her with this supernatural warmth that she feels settle comfortable in her heart for the first time. It doesn't hurt to open her eyes. The light around her doesn't blind her, though she does feel a bit slower in her movements than she normally is. Groggy. Like all of her paranoid senses have been cut off. Part of her revels in it, in the blissful peace that it provides. The more rational part of her panics. How will she ever protect Dan like this?

The first thing she takes in is that she is no longer in the forest. In fact, she's fairly certain she's laying on a bed. The pillow feels soft beneath her head. The duvet doesn't scratch beneath her fingers.

"Serena?"

She tilts her head slowly, movements all too groggy, and finds Dan sat beside her looking freshly shaven and all clean. No blood. Just a few bruises. "Dan." She rasps. "You okay?"

Dan laughs lightly, eyes sparkling as his hand reaches out to take hers. "Yeah, Serena. I'm okay now." He presses a kiss to her knuckles.

He stares at her so intently, like he's trying to tell her something, or like he's trying to figure something out; possibly like he's finally found something worth seeing. Her sleepy smile and recovering body is all it takes to make him like that, really? Perhaps it's relief. It's probably relief.

"Dan. The staring's still creepy." She croaks out, and he giggles. So macho.

"Yeah. Not sorry."

She hears a click and turns her head to the noise. Or rather lets her head flop to the side. Her neck feels so weak. So weak. So peaceful. Damn. Can she feel this peaceful all the time?

"Blair." She greets the woman with a scowl. "You drugged me."

Blair shrugs, reaching the side of Serena's bed. "I knew you wouldn't follow our plan."

If she had the energy, she'd roll her eyes. "I'm gonna kick your ass."

Blair snorts. "Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it."

Dan's grip on her hand is too pained for a moment, and she glances over at him, notices the grief-stricken expression haunting the lines of his weary face. Knows he's thinking back on all the violence he's been exposed to this past, what, week? And it's all her fault. All her fault for ever being so selfish as to take him with her. So selfish as to not take his life in the first place. Easily. Quickly. Before he had the chance to fall in love with her and make it all harder for her to leave him alone.

"So." Blair interrupts their moment without raised eyebrows, which surprises Serena. "Most of your wounds are superficial. That gash on your leg's gonna need to be kept bandaged for quite some time and you really should wear a knee brace. That'll help you with your sprained ankle, too." Blair sighs. "Your rib's are bruised but not cracked, as far as I can tell. I think you've slept off your concussion. However, I can't rule out any internal damage unless you let me take you to a hospital-"

"No. No hospital." She insists again.

"Serena." Dan warns.

Her words clog in her throat. How can she possibly explain to them that the problem isn't the hospital itself- she created many fake ID's and fake medical records, passports and birth certificates many years ago- but being away from Dan? She may be hurt, she may be too drugged to move, but it'll ease her mind to be by him. There's no way she will leave him alone. Not with this inevitable danger headed right for him. Especially not since this all seems to be orientated around her Dad's Case. Not while she's still in the dark as to why anyone would want to kill him in the first place.

"No, Dan." She says tiredly, meeting his eyes and hoping he understands.

He doesn't argue, but he doesn't look happy with it either.

Serena turns back to Blair, searching her eyes. Pleading. The woman doesn't say a word, and Serena can't read her so well anymore. Unaware of how she truly feels about this.

So instead she swiftly changes topic. "Anything else I've missed?"

Blair bites her bottom lip. "Nate and Chuck have your knife."

She splutters instantly, sending a shooting pain down her left leg. Grits her teeth against it and hisses instead. "Are you kidding me?"

"Well, they're helping the police with the investigation, so they needed to-"

"They're going to arrest me?"

Blair stares at Serena like she's just grown another head. "What planet are you living on, S? No, they've headed off to destroy it."

"Destroy-? Blair, no! It's a murder investigation. They can't- I can't let them be corrupt- Not for me. Never for me."

"It wouldn't be the first time." Blair mutters darkly.

Serena's heart falls into the pit of her stomach. Slouches back into her pillow and resists the temptation to curl herself into a ball, to hide herself away from all the pain that life brings. No. She is not a little girl.

But that- That's one of the reasons why she left. Because it was always in their eyes. The ghost of her Dad, their boss. Haunting her. Them. Every single one of them. And she had just thought that if she had kept them out of what she was going to do, then they would lose their ghosts. That they would stop blaming her just that little bit less.

Serena lifts her eyes to Blair's and, blindly, she hopes to see her best friends clear eyes.

She finds their ghosts blazing there, relentless. Painful. Reaching out for her and pulling her too far into the past- too far- so far that she just wants to stop.

Dan's hand squeezes and pulls her back to the present. Back to life.

She has never loved him more.