A/N: I have another chapter up for all you shanks! I only got one review on my last few chapters so if you're still reading please leave a review! Thanks for reading!

And a special shout out to softball007 for reviewing on each chapter! Love ya!

In all honesty, I hadn't a single thing to do with the brilliant planning of our grand rescue attempt. I was absolute klunk when it came to things like that and both Minho and Newt were well aware. It was my suspicion that they dragged me along simply to watch my facial expressions as they constructed their grand scheme. It was rather impressive really, and I couldn't seem to stop myself from showing it. It didn't help that the pair could read me like and open book.

But they, forgot, I could read them just as well.

I'm thinking I may have a hand in inspiring them a bit, as if they simply want to show off and my presence provides them with a sense of competition that they wouldn't have otherwise. Despite evidence to the contrary, both Newt and Minho are fiercely competitive, if not particularly vicious. So, really, it was interesting to be a part of their proceedings, and it also provided the group with a sense of familiarity, Newt, Minho, and I were what was left of the Keepers and our little planning session seemed to remind them of the Gatherings. It… calmed them, somehow. That and the knowledge that, Tommy was close by, and, for the moment, alive.

Anyways, as the boys and Jorge were planning I set to work bandaging up the other boys' cuts, burns, and bruises. Not everybody had escaped our run-in with the Cranks unscathed, though we had armed ourselves since, either with weapons gained in that fight or the ones that were stashed with the food cache.

Essentially, the plan was this: A good-sized portion of us would force our way in through the front, waltzing right on in through the front door, and while they had the attention of the crazies within, the rest would sneak in through the back.

Newt and Minho had some fancy shmancy well-thought out plan, but in as simple terms as they could put it, that was it.

We'd then send a force of four or five to check the upstairs while Minho and checked the lower-level. Newt and who-ever else would watch our virally-infected friends, weapons drawn and at the ready.

Hopefully, we'd find Tommy and Brenda, and once we did, we'd be on our way out of this God-forsaken piece of no-so-civilized civilization.

"You two look comfy," Minho smirked.

A second later I climbed down the poor excuse or a staircase after him, grimacing at the image of the pair. Tommy was tied to a chair, his wrists and angles bound as he stared at us in surprise, gaping. "What… how…" he stammered, eyes wide and genuinely surprised.

Minho smiled, eyes sparkling in the darkness, "We'd just found you. Did you think we were gonna let these bunch of shuck-faces do anything to you? You owe me. Big-time."

"What do you mean you'd just found us?" he questioned, eyebrows furrowed. I hadn't realized it, but I'd missed the shank. A lot.

"Jorge's been leading us through the city- avoiding Cranks, finding food," Minho told him, moving to cut his bindings. I went to do the same for Brenda. She was in much the same predicament, her limbs bound, stuck to the chair, and dirty. She, however also had duct tape over her mouth.

Minho went on to explain, "Yesterday morning, we kind of spread out, spying here and there. Frypan was peaking around the corner into that alley up there just as those three shanks pulled a gun on you. He came back, we got mad, started planning out our ambush. Most of those shucks were wasted or asleep."

By that time I had cut through Brenda's bonds, her eyes not leaving Minho and Tommy for a moment. She ripped the duct tape off herself with little more than a flinch and then got up, pushing herself up out of her chair and past me without a word as she started, hesitated and then continued towards Tommy. She stopped a few feet away from his chair.

Thomas stood, immediately getting that dizzy look in his eye and swaying. Raising a hand to his head he sat back down in the chair. "Oh, man. Anybody got some aspirin?"

Minho and I laughed. He'd be okay.

But Brenda hadn't stopped by the chair, she'd continued down towards the stairs where she stood with more weight on one foot than the other and her arms crossed over her chest. Her face was blank, expressionless, but her body language revealed she was indeed angry about something.

"Brenda?" Thomas asked, his voice slightly higher than usual and strangely sheepish. "You okay?"

She nodded, but didn't meet his eyes, didn't even look at him. "I'm fine." She said shortly, her words clipped and with and edge to them. "Let's go. I wanna see Jorge." Yet there was no emotion behind her words.

Thomas groaned, seemingly at his headache but I had my suspicions that it was directed more towards whatever he had done to offset Brenda's liking of him.

"Come on, dude." Minho told him, offering hand to help him back up on his feet. "Headache or no headache, we need to go. No telling how long we can keep the shuck prisoners up there quiet and still."

"Prisoners?" Thomas questioned with a quirk of his eyebrows. He looked to me for answers.

"If that's what you wanna call them," I shrugged, "We can't risk letting them go until we get out, we've got a dozen guys holding more than twenty, and they aren't too happy- might start thinking they can take us. Once they get rid of their hangovers, that is."

Thomas nodded, standing up again, but much slower this time. He squeezed his eyes shut for time before sucking in a breath and opening them, taking a step and steadying himself. "I'll be fine."

Minho smiled, clapping him on the shoulder, "Such a man. Come on."

I flashed the pair a smile as I headed for the stairs, the both of them falling into step behind me. At the top of the stairs I motioned for Brenda to go down before me. She didn't move her feet and inch, simply shook her head, still with that blank expression. Shrugging, I headed down a few steps, looking back to see Minho give Tommy a look before rolling his eyes and heading down after me.

"Girls are mental," He muttered, gently pushing me forward.

"Are not," I weakly in response only to have him laugh at me. But he was smiling, and somehow I knew he didn't think me completely insane… a best, I suppose I was cracked, not completely right in the head, but not bad. I don't think any of us were. There wasn't a way in hell you could go through what we had and not have a least a small sense of insomnia and paranoia and a few other things…

But maybe that was okay.

I hadn't realized how bad it smelled the first time I was in this room, but now that I was coming back the smell of sweat and vomit was overwhelming and thoroughly disgusting.

Bodies still littered the floor, some were sleeping, which they weren't earlier, some were huddled together and shivering. Some even looked dead. Jorge, Newt, and Aris were right where we'd left them, standing guard with their knives drawn, slowly turning in circles.

Thomas's eyes lit up upon seeing the boys, his spine straightening and lips curving into a smile. "What happened to you guys! Where have you been?"

"Hey," Frypan shouted, being the first to catch sight of Thomas, "Its Thomas! As ugly and alive as ever!"

Newt was the next to notice and come up to us with a smile, clapping Tommy gently on the shoulder, "Glad you're not bloody dead, Tommy. I'm really, really, glad."

"You too," Thomas replied with a sincere smile and a small nod, "Has everyone made it so far? Where'd you guys go? How'd you get here?"

Ever the inquisitive one, our Tommy-boy. I smiled, laughing slightly and taking the initiative to answer his question. "There's still eleven of us… Plus Jorge and Brenda over there," I said motioning to where the two stood beside the door, though their attention was on us.

"Any sign of Barkley and the rest of them? Were they the ones who set off the explosion?" Thomas asked, his questions coming faster than I could answer.

So, Jorge did instead, moving from where he was by the door, though he was still holding that nasty looking sword which at one point ahd been resting on the shoulders of some seriously screwed up crank with a long ponytail and a crooked grin that quite frankly creeped the hell outta me. "Haven't seen 'em since." He said, "We got away pretty quickly, and they're too scared to come deeper into the city."

Thomas nodded, but whispered to Minho to come closer. Once he and Newt were close beside us, he leaned in and spoke. "The guy with really short blonde hair. Seemed like the leader. What happened to him?"

Minho shrugged, looking between Newt and I for an answer.

I shrugged, not having the faintest idea.

Newt didn't seem to know either. "Must've got out," he said, "A handful did –we couldn't stop all of them."

"Why?" Minho asked Thomas, "You worried about him?"

Thomas looked around nervously, his voice lowering as he spoke again. "He had a gun. He's the only one I've seen with something worse than a knife. And he wasn't very nice."

"Who gives a klunk?" Minho replied in his usual fashion. "We'll be out of this stupid city in an hour. And we should go. Now."

"Good that," I agreed, looking up at the grins that adorned the boy's faces in response to my somewhat breathy response.

"Okay," Thomas said. "I want to get out of here before he comes back."

"Listen up!" Minho called out as he stepped away from us, the crowd separating before him. I smiled, it was just so natural for him, so casual. He was a born leader. Strong. Firm. Smart. Confident. He lead without really having to try. It was almost effortless and the boys respected him. He was familiar, they knew what he was capable of, what he had done. They knew him and they trusted him. They trusted him in a way they could never trust Jorge. So it had only been a matter of time until Jorge realized this and let Minho take the reins he'd been waiting for oh-so-patiently. "We're leaving now." Minho went on to say, addressing the pile of half-crazed infected cranks we'd cornered. "Don't follow us, you'll be fine. Follow us, and you'll be dead. Pretty easy choice, don't ya think?"

Newt and Minho ushered me out the door ahead of the others, while they stood by the door with Jorge, watching the Cranks as a precaution.

The alley the building opened up into was wider than you'd expect and so fit our group pretty easily. And then all I heard was Minho shouting, "Hey, Thomas! Dude, wake up! We're leaving!"

Pretty soon we were all gathered, weapons held down at our sides or tucked into pants pockets. Minho then took it upon himself to explain what we would be doing next, which was relatively simple, we were making a break for the city's edge. We were only about a mile away and we weren't so worried about battling off Cranks, we'd done fairly well against them so far.

"Hey!"