Hi! It's going to be forever until the next new episode, so I thought I'd entertain myself by posting a story. I actually wrote quite this some time ago and never got around to finishing, but it's mostly done now so I should be able to get it up fairly quickly. (Best laid plans, anyway.) It takes place sometime in season 4, maybe? Pre-Miggy. Mostly just an excuse for some hurt/comfort. I hope you enjoy! -abby

"Thomas?" Juliet's head pounded thunderously. Her entire body was stiff and sore, and moving was a herculean effort. She slowly rolled onto her back with a groan. After several long minutes she managed to push away from the chilly concrete floor and arrange uncooperative limbs into a seated position. "Thomas?" She pressed the heel of one hand against her right eye, which throbbed so viciously she feared it might pop out of its socket at any moment. Bloody hell, Juliet thought miserably. "Thomas? Are you here?"

She wasn't even sure why she called out for her partner. Instinct, maybe. Because she didn't remember anything. And there was not even a glimmer of light, so she certainly couldn't see him. The room was black as pitch. Darker than dark. She felt her eyes open wider, searching automatically for illumination that didn't exist.

I've gone blind. The thought wormed its way abruptly into Juliet's mind and suddenly she was awash in wave of hysteria. Maybe it's not the room at all. She quickly tamped down the thought - and the panic - until she had more information. Stop. You're fine. It's just dark.

With a deep, centering breath, Juliet summoned all of her discipline and training and forced herself to simply focus on the important questions: where was she, and was she alone?

She had no real reason to believe that anyone was with her. There was nothing besides suffocating blackness. Nothing other than a soft, strained noise she couldn't quite identify and the vague notion that she'd been with Thomas before everything went blank. He's got to be here.

Or, she admitted to herself, maybe it's just hope. Unfounded, desperate hope that she wasn't completely alone in the isolating darkness.

She gave in to the desperation and tried again. "Thomas?"

If it hadn't been so quiet Higgins would never have heard. "Higgy?" The voice was thin and trembled with pain but was still unmistakably him, and relief flooded her body.

"Thomas? Where are you?" She wasn't feeling anywhere near steady enough to stand so Juliet took to her hands and knees, inhaling sharply as aching muscles protested the movement. "Can you see me?"

"No…'s too dark," he murmured, and her stomach unclenched the tiniest bit.

"It is dark," Higgins soothed. "Tell me where you are."

"Here," Thomas coughed a little. "Over…here." He coughed again then inhaled on a wheeze. Juliet crawled forward carefully, following the sound that she now recognized as labored breathing. After a moment her hand bumped against something soft and Thomas grunted in response.

"Hi," Juliet said softly. "Here you are." She sat down and gently skimmed his arms and chest, blindly searching for injuries, for anything that would explain the frailty of his voice and why he was struggling for breath. Bones on the left side of his chest gave way under her fingertips and Thomas cried out weakly. It was punctuated by another painful-sounding cough, and Juliet's heart skipped a beat.

"I'm sorry," Higgins apologized, concern for her partner forming a tight ball in her own chest. "You've got some badly broken ribs. Try not to move." She slid a hand up to caress the side of his face and felt him nod. "What happened?" she asked. "Were we in a car accident?" The last thing she could recall was being in the Ferrari.

"Yeah," he whispered. "Huge…pickup. Came…out of nowhere." He dragged in a shallow breath. "Woke…here. You 'kay?"

"I must have hit my head," Juliet replied. "I'm a little dizzy and don't remember much, but mostly fine. What about you? Anything other than the ribs?" The query was delivered in a tone that made it clear she was expecting an honest answer.

"I'll be…okay," Thomas deflected.

"Thomas," she said firmly. She caught the deliberate phrasing and knew that meant he was more seriously injured than he was trying to let on. "How bad?"

"Head hurts. And I…uh." He hesitated, and Juliet's chest tightened at the quiet fear threading through his words. "I…can't f-feel my legs."

The quivering ball of anxiety in Juliet's belly exploded into full-blown terror at Magnum's admission. "Oh, god. Okay. It's okay. You're okay," Higgins fought to keep her voice from shaking, and she stroked his cheek gently with her thumb. "Shhh," she soothed. "Just stay still. We're going to get out of here and you're going to be fine."

"Yeah," Thomas whispered.

"Let's think about this. Let's think. We were in an accident." Juliet forced aside her fear for her partner and instead tried to focus on finding a solution to the most immediate problem - that they were trapped, with no idea where or why. "Do you remember anything after that? Any idea who brought us here?"

He made a soft noise which she took as a no.

"Maybe we still have our phones," she murmured. She searched her pockets and more cautiously Magnum's, taking care not to jostle him. She then patted down the floor in all directions and was disappointed, but not surprised, when she did not find their phones or anything else.

Pull it together, Juliet. She took a deep breath and found her partner's hand in the darkness, giving it a gentle squeeze. "I'm going to explore a bit. Maybe I can find a light switch or figure out where we are. You just hang in there and don't move, okay?"

He wordlessly tightened his fingers around hers. With a final pat to his chilly hand she managed to stand and start the tedious process of shuffling her way across the floor. She kept her arms extended in front of her body, searching for the wall.

It didn't take long to find it. Their prison was small. No bigger than eight feet square, if that. Slowly, methodically, Higgins worked her way around the perimeter of the tiny room. She probed along what felt like cinder block walls, carefully patting her way down to the floor and up as high as she could reach, searching for a light switch, a door, anything at all.

Juliet wanted to scream in frustration when she found absolutely nothing beyond the outline of a corrugated metal garage-style door. Thorough exploration confirmed that the door was solidly secured from the outside.

She closed her eyes, rested her pounding head against the wall and forced herself to take another deep, even breath. It did little to calm her nerves.

After a moment she shuffled back over to her partner and settled down at his side by feel. "Anything?" he rasped. His voice was impossibly weak, weaker even than it had been ten minutes prior. Juliet didn't want to think about what that might mean.

"Nothing," she sighed, locating his hand and wrapping her fingers around his. They were cold, so cold, and Juliet felt despair seep into her thoughts. He's badly injured and in shock. And he's going to die if I can't find a way to get out of here, she thought helplessly.

"Don't…worry." Magnum's rough whisper broke into her thoughts. "They'll…find us."

"What?"

"Rick and TC. And…Gordie," he elaborated. "They'll find us."

Juliet knew that he was right. And she also knew their only option was to wait and hope that it happened in time.