This chapter actually covers chapters 23 and 24 of Invincible.

I had started dreaming about Elliot. It had been at least the past four dreams that had been there, haunting me even when I tried to escape everything that was happening to me and trying to forget the place that I was in. I wanted the memory of the cell to fade away and to seek out happy dreams but the longer that Sam and I were stuck here, the harder it was to reach that place. Also, it seemed no matter what, I couldn't completely leave behind the hard-stone floor I was lying on or the ever present, thrumming pain in my leg. I heard Sam shifting around and I was relieved she was awake. It was always more comforting when she was awake.

I heard her sigh and I decided to call her name.

"Yes?" she asked and I was glad she didn't sound particularly annoyed with me. A little annoyed, maybe, but it didn't seem to be at me.

"Water, please," I requested. She was keeping the food and water on her side and I could barely walk. The pain in my leg seemed to get worse every time that I so much as thought about it and so I was doing anything and everything to keep my mind way off it.

"Sure," Sam said.

Was it a little bad of me to enjoy that she was taking care of me? I knew better, I really did, but the finer things in life – like, you know, not shitting in a hole – were denied to me. If I wanted to be a little deluded and pretend like she'd do things for me. Even if it was just throwing a bottle at me across our dingy cell. I heard the crinkle of the plastic and wondered if she'd actually aim for my head or just roll it gently across to me. Usually it was the latter, but I'd never be surprised if it was ever the former.

"Fenton," Sam said, and I resisted the urge to tell her to call me 'Danny'. After all the time we'd spent together, we should really be on a first name basis. I heard her footsteps echo on the stone floor. "We really need to talk about something and we need to do it now."

I pried my eyes open. She sounded serious. It must be serious. "What?"

"I … There's something wrong with the water we have," she revealed.

Shit. He was poisoning us. I struggled to get my arms under me. I wanted to sit up and pay attention. "Wrong?"

"Well …" Sam started and I didn't like the hesitation in her voice. "I think so."

"Why do you think so?" I demanded. Had Elliot been here when I was asleep? It was always when he seemed to show up, even though I hated the thought of her seeing him when I was dead to the world. "Have we been drinking bad water or something?"

I hadn't felt like it but what did I know?

"No, it's just the one bottle." She crinkled the plastic she was holding in her hands.

"I'm confused." What else is new? Jazz would have childishly teased me. "How do you know this?"

"Elliot told me, when he originally dropped off the food. He said for each of us to drink half and then something would happen."

But that had seemed so long ago, now. She was keeping secrets from me? It was hypocritical for me to be butt-hurt about it but, admittedly, I was.

"Something like death?" The thought didn't scare me. It might be nice to actually cross over. Really cross over. Like Ember had done. Like I knew Jazz and Tucker would have. They had lived too much with me to actually entertain the idea of living in the Ghost Zone and entertaining that half-life. I wondered if I could cross over, being a halfa, or if I would get stuck like in the Ghost Zone, stuck between, never fully part of one world or another. Would it matter to me? No. It shouldn't.

"I don't know. I don't think it would make sense …" Sam hesitated but I could tell what she was thinking. Vlad made no sense. We didn't know what he wanted.

"Can I see it?" I asked, looking at the bottle in her hands. It looked like water but if there was something wrong with it, Sam shouldn't be the one to find out what.

Sam passed me the bottle, talking about what it looked like and all that but I didn't care. I opened the top of it and chugged about half of it. Sam shrieked but I calmly but the top back on it and put it on the stone floor beside me. Sam's pale face was locked in a mask of shock but she should be used to me pulling stupid shit by now.

"Now, see what happens to me and then make your own decision."

"I … what!?" Sam exclaimed. "What happens if this kills you? What –"

But I felt fuzzy and dizzy and I didn't hear anything else.

(-.-)

I felt like someone had stuffed cotton into every part of me. Every single part. I wanted if a part of being dead was just having constant dry-mouth. I picked my head up, feeling like a weighed a million pounds and as I tried to open my eyes, the strangest sound reached my ears. Crying. Someone was crying.

"Sam?" I blurted. "Sam?"

She appeared in front of me, out of her dingy party dress and then I really looked around. Bed. I was on a bed. The cotton in my mouth had been the corner of a real actual pillow. We had blankets and there were two white stalls ahead and I hardly dared to hope that Sam really had just washed her hair.

"Why are you crying? Is everything okay?"

Dumb fucking question, I thought, and from the brief twist of her face, I knew she thought so too.

"I just …" Sam hiccoughed. "I want out of here. I can't stay in here anymore! I miss my mother, my father, and I miss being able to fucking eat when I'm hungry and I miss being clean and I feel so selfish missing these things, but I do!"

"It's not selfish," I said, knowing it was true and knowing those were the words she needed to hear. "You're so strong. It's okay. It's okay to miss those things; I miss them as well. We'll be okay. We'll get out of here. We're going to fight him and get out of here. You'll see your mother and father soon. It'll happen."

Sam collapsed on the edge of the mattress, hiding her face in her hands. She started crying again, so loudly and terribly that my entire heart hurt. I edged across the blankets, moving slowly, trying to make sure that my body still moved like my body and that I didn't hurt anything. I sat down next to her but I didn't know what to do. Did I put a hand on her shoulder? Did I touch her? She didn't like me doing that and so I kept my hands in my lap.

"This is hard. I know that it's hard. I –" I was no good at this shit but I had to fill the silence. "I wish I had the right words to say right now, but I don't. I really fucking don't. I know it's my fault we're in here and I wish I knew how to fix it. But, I will try harder to fix it. It's going to work out here, okay. Just remember what I told you: you're going to get out of here."

"Shut up," Sam ordered. "I just … I want to be alone."

Like we were ever fully alone. "Is that a shower?"

It would give us an excuse for privacy.

"Mhm," Sam managed. "You have new clothes by the side of it. I put them there."

"I … I'll go do that."

I edged off the bed, wondering how I would get my pants off with my ankle restraints. As soon as I stood, though, I realized they were gone and had been replaced by worse. There was a large, chafing metal thing around my waist but the worst part of it was the metal collar clamped around my neck. I was like a dog. Probably worse than a dog. Vlad would treat a pet better than this. I tried not to pull a face or tug at it or anything as I inched my way to the shower, feeling weighted down. I wondered if it really was that heavy or if I had just become that weak.

I turned on the shower and watched the water cascade to the bottom of the white porcelain floor. I didn't know what to do with it and I hated that I was so stumped. Water. Shower. It was all so foreign to me. I peeked out at Sam one last time but she had hidden herself away. I shouldn't bother her. I shouldn't push. She'd kill me. That, I was sure of.

I struggled out of my filthy clothes and stepped into the water. Immediately, black swirled around my feet. I watched the dirty water cascade over the open wound in my leg and immediately, I twitched it out of the flow of the shower. That was asking for a fucking infection. I reached for soap and shampoos and didn't even think about wasting them because I just wanted to be clean. I wanted to be clean and warm. The steam swirled around me and I felt dizzy. I leant against the shower wall and then I slid down to the floor. Things would be better if I just … sat. Sat and leant my head back and maybe closed my eyes for just a moment.

(-.-)

"Fenton! Wake up!"

I was being shaken by cold little hands.

"Five more minutes," I bitched, hoping Jazz would back off for at least two seconds.

"Now!"

Not Jazz's voice. Definitely not Jazz's voice. I peeked an eye open, cold settling into my body. "Sam?"

"Get dressed. Quickly," Sam ordered and her cheeks went bright red.

"Is something going on?" Vlad? Elliot? I wondered, trying to get my legs back under me. Not that I could do anything about either of them.

"No!" Sam exclaimed and then she swiftly left me alone.

Because I was totally naked. I wished I could tease her. It wasn't anything that she hadn't seen before but I knew it wasn't the time or the place. I wished for a time and place where we could laugh together again but it would never be in Vlad's basement. I wanted to hear her laugh, though. Things had always seemed better when Sam was laughing.

I yanked on the new clothes and I felt strangely warm. Warm and better and I didn't want to attribute that to Vlad and his gift of clothing at all.

"Are you decent?" Sam called.

I bit my lip and then decided to try. "Never, but I'm not naked."

I tried to laugh first, letting out the smallest of sounds and then Sam actually did let out a laugh. I was so relieved. It made my heart skip a beat. It made me smile almost a little too wide. It was better than sitting back down on the bed and sinking into the soft mattress. Sam turned around to face me and then sat on another side of the bed.

"So, did I pass out?" I asked, hoping she said no and that she'd smacked my head into the wall. I didn't want to be so run down that I was just passing out in the shower.

Sam was less than helpful. "No idea. I fell asleep."

"Oh." So, for all I knew, Elliot had crept into the cell and knocked me out for shits and giggles. I was stewing about that, trying to take a catalogue of myself and figure out of anything new hurt, even though it was hard to tell with the constant pain, when Sam blurted, "How did you get your pants on?"

"How did I … Wait, what?" My gaze snapped up to her and Sam's whole face had gone bright red.

"I mean, um," Sam stuttered. "Didn't you have an ankle shackle on?"

My first thought was oh, so you didn't look at me naked. It shouldn't have been as disappointing as I was. I had to let go.

"They took it off." I showed her my empty legs and then lifted my shirt, showing off the ugly metal band, and then I pointed out my metal collar.

Sam winced when she saw my neck. "That's got to hurt."

"Not really." It could be worse. Vlad could have put spikes on the inside of the collar. Mostly, it just made me heavy. As if it made it better, I added, "And there's still a lot of slack on the chains. I just can't go anywhere with them without hurting you."

"Those probably won't be easier to get off."

As if we could anyway. Sam would have to get out of her restraints before I could even touch mine. "No, probably not." I rubbed at my leg. "I hate to ask but my leg is really starting to bother me."

"Oh, right. I think they put the pills over by the food."

I watched Sam hop off the bed, moving easily. She didn't look like she was in pain anymore as she bent down and picked some things out of the corner and walked back to me, spilling out trail mix and water along the bed. I leant forward and picked up the pill bottle and the water.

"How's your side been feeling lately?" I asked, feeling the pills go down my throat. "I haven't heard you say anything about it."

And I was shitty for not having asked her earlier.

"It hasn't really been bothering me so it must be healing." It was sound logic to me. "I've still been trying not to stress my side, though."

"Smart," I said and a yawn escaped me. Fuck. Didn't I just wake up? "Does it look better?"

"I can't make myself look at it. It just … It would freak me out far too much."

I remembered that about her. I yawned through my words of, "Makes sense. Fuck. I feel like I've been sleeping forever. I don't want to go to sleep again."

I almost felt like a kid, whining to his mom that he didn't want to go to bed yet.

"Mmm," Sam said and I had no idea what that could mean. "So, let's talk about something. Like how we're going to escape. That seems important."

We. The longer that we were in here, the less I believed that there would be a 'we' when it came to escaping. There would be a 'her', 'she'.

"I have no idea. I'm really not smart enough to figure out something like that. I really wish I was but I'm a fucking dumbass. All that I have are powers and I can't use them! I'm nothing but a dumbass with stupid powers and … Fuck."

If I were Jazz-smart, I could have saved her. If I was quick thinking, like Tucker, I could have saved her.

"You can't think like that. You're –"

"You can't say it," I interrupted quickly. I think it would kill me to hear her trying to support me. "You really can't. You're the person who probably knows it best."

"We … Let's not talk about that," Sam finally decided.

I let my head drop. It hurt to look at her. "Sorry. I'm so fucking sorry."

I had hurt her so much. For so long.

"No, it's okay." I wondered if she meant it. "It's just that it's probably better to avoid certain things while we have to spend so much time together, right?"

She had a point. "Right."

To avoid that we had a past at all. To pretend like there was nothing else between us. That it was just a coincidence that we were both here. I didn't want to pretend that I didn't love her, like that wouldn't always be a part of me. No matter what happened, if we never spoke again, if we both went off and lived our lives, it would always be a part of me. She was the first girl that I truly loved. How could I avoid that at all?

I picked up a pillow and a blanket. At least, right now, I couldn't pretend. I pushed my legs off the edge of the mattress.

"Where are you going?"

I looked at her face but that suddenly hurt. "I think it's best I try to sleep after all. I was just going to make a spot on the floor."

Distance. She'd probably want distance. I could give her that much, at least.

"You could stay up here. Now that there's a mattress, it wouldn't be fair to make you sleep on the floor."

Fair. Sam was just good. Too good for me. Too good for everything that had happened for her.

"Thanks," I managed. "But I'll move as soon as you need me to."

"It's all right."

"Night," I said, putting my head down on the pillow.

"Night," Sam said, her voice small.

I closed my eyes, trying not to listen to her shift around, trying not to think of much of anything. That was easier said than done. All I could think of was Sam, in pain. All I could think of were my parents, without either child. All I could think of was Jazz and Tucker, and if they were happy now. If I could have one thing, it would be for them to be happy.

All of them.

So, on tumblr I'm: we are all of legend now (with dashes between every word). If you want to find my replies to anon reviews, add backslash tagged backslash anon dash replies. If you want to see anything I post about Superman or the Reflections Universe, go to my tumblr URL and add backslash tagged backslash reflections dash universe. Punctuation is spelled out due to Fanfiction's restrictions. If you're having any trouble accessing the tumblr content please send me a pm and I can format it for you in a different way.

~TLL~