"You went and broke the wrong heart, baby, and drove me redneck crazy," —Redneck Crazy, Tyler Farr

"You no-good son of a bitch!" Runo screamed, raining down blows on Dan's shocked figure. No one else moved, apparently so shocked by her reaction that they were stunned into speechlessness. "What the hell is wrong with you? You leave me behind again and again, never call, never text, never write, never visit and then you decide to contact me out of the blue with a letter saying that you want to break up!" Even though the maelstrom of abuse he was receiving, Dan physically felt the chill of Mylene's glare on his back. "As if our relationship status wasn't already crystal clear!"

"I wasn't gonna send that letter!" was all Dan could say. He backed away and held up his hands in submission.

"Likely story!" she shot back. "Drago said you were going to send it the morning you disappeared! Only, since you vanished into thin air, the police were left to find it instead! And since they are actually courteous, they waited until I got there to open it!"

Dan had grown more and more pale as her tirade continued, and by the last sentence, all of the blood had drained out of his face. His cheeks were ashen. He was only beginning to understand just how much trouble he was in.

"What the hell were you thinking?" she snarled, a trace of her heartbreak leaking through her voice. "We're best friends with a kid who owns a private jet! All it would have taken was one question and you could have come and visited! You could have reconfigured an access point to let you out in Wardington! Heck, you could have gotten a job and bought a plane ticket yourself! It's not like your parents would object; you practically gallivant to other worlds every other weekend! Or maybe it is every weekend! How would I know? You never call me to tell me what's going on in your life! And you at least get two phone calls a month from me!"

Dan's eyes flicked to Hydron and the others for help, but they were staying out of it. Sid and Volt were staring at him, eyes wide, while Hydron just sighed and pressed his hand against his face. Lync just gaped at him, and Dan's sense of panic grew.

"Runo, please, just give me a second—"

"No, Dan Kuso!" she snarled.

"But, Runo, just listen to—"

"Shut UP," she shrieked, jerking forward with the force of her exclamation, and Dan's mouth closed with an audible click. "Dan Kuso, I have been to hell and back in the past three weeks. I lost my best friend because of you!" He could see her eyes were filling up with tears that she was struggling to keep back. Her cheeks flushed.

"I-I'm sorry," was all Dan could think to say. He was clearly at a loss for words. It was all he could do just to meet her eyes, and yet, at the same time, it was impossible to look away. Even though they were filled with the most anger and rage than he'd ever seen in his life, they were her eyes, and, for some reason, he never wanted to stop gazing at them.

Her glare softened a bit at this admission, her eyes narrowing in confusion, and he finally had the courage (or cowardice) to rip his eyes from hers. "I really messed up, Runo," he mumbled softly. "I never meant to do that to you. I never meant for any of you to get involved," he looked around at the group assembled around them guiltily before focusing on the blue-haired girl again, "but especially not you, Runo." She seemed to realize then that they had an audience, but brushed it off easily in her anger.

"Yeah, well, I am involved," she seethed. "I was involved from the very beginning. From the day we met on that damn baseball field, I was involved in your life! So why did you shut me out? You just cut me out of the picture, like I never mattered to you! Like I was just…just…ARGH!" She fell silent, unable to continue her sentence. Dan closed his eyes in shame.

She didn't speak for a moment, and one of the onlookers used the opportunity to cough and catch Dan's attention. Dan looked up slowly, his face red, while observing Runo continue to glare at something out of the corner of his eye. It was Sid who had coughed, and he actually looked embarrassed for once.

"Uh, I know this isn't a good time, but if you could worry about your relationship status after we get out of here, I think we'd all be appreciative," he growled. Runo shot him a glare that almost rivaled that of Mylene, but she complied without saying a word. That reaction in and of itself left Dan speechless. She bent down and helped Joe to his feet, causing him to blink rapidly to fight off more dizziness. Dan, left with no other choice, helped Lync to retrieve his shirt and pulled him to his feet as well.

"You good?" he asked quietly, taking in the newly healed skin and faded lightning marks on Lync's chest before he pulled his shirt over his head.

"Y-yeah," Lync nodded uncomfortably. "I feel better than I have in the past few weeks, actually..." He brushed off his shirt, causing a few flakes of charred synthetic fibers to flutter to the ground like snow. Dan glanced over his shoulder at Runo, who was standing near Joe as he leaned against a few crates, dutifully ignoring him.

He was almost surprised by how much her cold shoulder hurt.

The Ventus brawler guessed what his eyes were focused on and shot him an embarrassed but sympathetic look. Dan sighed. He ran a hand through his hair as he looked to Hydron.

"Did you get that map, then?" he questioned, hollowly.

"Yeah," the former prince replied, holding up a Vestal-type communicator. He tapped the center buttons a few times until the image he wanted appeared. Dan could tell it was the map of the maze from the reverse image he could see from his position a few feet away. He didn't have to look over Hydron's shoulder to know that it was huge. He couldn't even see the individual paths. Clearly, that wasn't what Hydron had been expecting. His eyes widened in disbelief at the sight of it.

"Oh geez," he muttered. "Lync, can I see that map of yours?" Lync came to his side eagerly and held up his paper beside the holographic map, eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Dan noticed an excited glint in his eyes as he took in the image on the communicator, and he smirked in anticipation as he glanced between the two.

"Why don't you let me figure it out?" Lync suggested, holding out his hand. Hydron sighed and forked over the communicator.

"Better you than me," he muttered, turning around. He stared in Dan's direction, presumably to give him an encouraging word regarding his relationship status, but the glare Mylene sent him would have been enough to make a Secret Service officer stop in his tracks. They both saw it, and when Hydron sent him an apologetic glance, Dan just smiled in understanding. No one in their right mind would risk Mylene's wrath, and Hydron was no exception.

So Dan simply settled for leaning against the wall of crates, staring miserably at Runo's turned head like a kicked puppy. Although, he supposed he deserved it. He realized with a bit of terror that she probably would have acted like this regardless of whether or not he wrote that letter. After all, everything that she had said was true. It was with a sinking stomach that he digested her accusations. They were all true.

But what did she mean that she had lost her best friend because of him?

Runo reached under her cape and pulled out an object about the size of a ring box, only clear with metal stripes running down the sides. She stared at it for a moment, looking disgusted with herself, before she pulled it open. She tipped it onto it's side and a white ball fell out—a white ball that Dan recognized.

Tigrerra? he thought, eyes wide. He walked over to Runo, stopping a safe distance away, but stared at Tigrerra in distress. No sooner had he thought of her name did she pop eagerly out of her ball, shaking each one of her individual appendages as if they were stiff.

"What happened…?" she asked groggily. Runo hiccoughed.

"Oh, Tigrerra," she choked out. She pressed Tigrerra against her cheek. "I am so sorry! I didn't know what I was doing; I am so, so sorry!"

"Runo…" Tigrerra murmured. She seemed to come to her senses after a moment of Runo's sniffing, and then her voice took on the consoling tone of a mother. "Oh Runo…it's alright…"

"Runo," came a masculine voice, revealing itself to be Splight when he popped out on her shoulder. "Please, do not be upset. I should have been stronger; strong enough to break free of that witch's claws."

"Both of you, knock it off! It's my fault," Runo insisted, a tear falling down her cheek. "If only I hadn't let her hold me…"

"You didn't let her hold you," Splight replied insistently. Runo hiccoughed. "You broke out of her clutches not once, but twice on your own."

"You did what?" Sid exclaimed, drawing everyone's gazes. Even Lync looked up from his map-deciphering at the intensity of his voice. Runo stared at him in alarm, taking in his startled face. "You broke out of her hypnosis twice? By yourself?"

"Yes, she did," Splight confirmed. Sid just gazed at her in amazement. Runo glanced around in seeming confusion when her eyes landed on Dan, who had a similar expression on his face. She bristled.

"What?" she snapped at him. Her cheeks reddened, and Dan flinched.

"No, it's just…that shouldn't be possible," he stammered, engulfed in his surprise. Runo took it the wrong way and snapped, insulted.

"Why?" she snarled. "Because I should be weak? Because I should always need saving?"

"What?" Dan exclaimed, utterly confused. "Runo, no, that's not what I'm saying at all!"

"Kazarina's hypnosis is extremely potent," Sid interrupted, much to Dan's relief, but he stared at Runo throughout the explanation with a hurt expression. She simply turned her attention to Sid and ignored him. "It is almost impossible to break out of it on your own when she really wants to hold on to you. Which I'm assuming she did."

"Kazarina hypnotized Jake," Dan added cautiously, watching Runo with a wary eye. She glanced at him with guarded curiosity. "And the hypnosis she used on him was different from what she used on the kids they kidnapped from Interspace. Losing battles didn't snap him out of it, and he didn't act like a mindless drone. He had personality, but it was like he was a completely different person."

"That sounds right," Sid growled. "That's what a true Hypnosis Master can do. Completely suppress your will and then rewrite a whole new one over it."

"Hypnosis Master?" Hydron asked.

"Yeah, what's that?" Dan seconded.

"It's a Gundalian with an unusually powerful ability to hypnotize," Sid groused. It seemed as though the position of explanation giver was irritating him. "Usually, they've spent a long time in a special school to perfect the skill and when they graduate they get the title. But Kazarina is just that skilled; she doesn't need a piece of paper to tell her she's a master. Her skills speak for themselves."

He looked to Runo with an expression just short of a glare. "That's why we're surprised. It's impossible to break out of her hypnosis at the drop of a hat."

"Got it!" Lync cried out triumphantly just as Runo opened her mouth to challenge the Pyrus brawler. Everyone immediately turned their attention to him as he rose to his feet, tapping the communicator screen. "We're here." A red dot appeared somewhere near the beginning fourth of the maze. "The end is over here." Another red dot appeared, this one on the other side. Mylene walked over to him and peered over his shoulder to get a closer look. "You see these blue paths?" he asked, glancing at her and pointing to several blue lines that traversed the image. Dan realized as he stepped closer that those were paths, and that the black lines were the walls of crates. Mylene nodded. "Those are multiple solutions to the maze."

"They were considerate, I see," she commented savagely. Lync squirmed a bit, clearly wary of making the wrong comment in reply, but she just waved him off. "Can you get us to the exit?"

"Y-yes," he stammered in reply, glancing at the map before heading to the nearest pathway. "But the other guys have the same map. We're gonna have to be careful."

"I can help with that," came an unexpected voice from above. The group gasped and Dan actually jumped, his eyes widening. The sound of shoes touching down behind him made him whirl around, and a huge smile broke out on his face.

"Shun!" he exclaimed ecstatically. The ninja smiled, his eyes brighter than Dan had ever seen them.

"It's good to see you, Dan," he replied, sounding more than just relieved. Dan crossed the distance between them in a second and the two embraced in the manner than boys do, a tight hug with a sharp clap on the back. Dan winced at that, but didn't complain. The whip lashes might have healed externally, but clearly, not everything was completely repaired. When they separated, Shun stepped back and looked Dan over properly, taking in faded bruises and scars that hadn't been there the last time he'd seen him. His amber eyes lingered on Dan's red ones. The slightly haunted look, however faded from the presence of friends, was not missed, and the ninja's eyes narrowed.

"Where did you come from?" Joe asked from the side, drawing Shun's gaze. He wasn't fazed and apparently expected his presence.

"Mira, Keith, Alice and I got here a few hours ago," he explained. "We were studying the Death Bomb to see if we could find Mylene and Shadow." He looked over Dan's shoulder at said Aquos and Darkus brawlers, both of whom had finally managed to mask their surprise at his appearance. However, at this explanation, their mouths dropped again, and Mylene looked outright stupefied.

"Spectra?" she breathed. "Spectra's here?"

"The brawlers have been looking for us?" Lync exclaimed in utter shock. Dan glanced at the others behind him, taking in their stunned expressions. Runo was the only one that didn't seem surprised by this information; she was watching Shun with a look of relief on her face. "Shouldn't you have been a little preoccupied with looking for Dan?"

"We ran out of leads a while ago," Shun explained. He was eyeing the group with obvious distrust, but a grudging respect as well. He answered curtly, in a voice that was as devoid of respect as a tundra is devoid of warmth. "The only thing we had to go on was a Gundalian guy that started leading Chaos Bakugan into Bakugan Interspace." Dan and Runo gasped, both horrified for different reasons.

Suddenly, green and black lightning filling the air, sending everyone diving for the floor. Dan, Shun and Runo landed in a startled heap, but Dan reacted quickly. Once the crackling died down, he sat up immediately, a reaction Shun mimicked a second later. Airzel was propped up on one knee, hand out where lightning had shot, but his figure was distorted and his face frozen in shock. Dan blinked in confusion; it was as if the air between them had been replaced by a glass partition, a glass tinged with a myriad of colors.

Then the glass began to flicker, and Dan realized what it was. His eyes flicked to Joe, who had his face scrunched up and his arms pressed against his chest in concentration. A slight, almost unnoticeable glow had surrounded him. He was fighting to keep the shield up, but Dan could tell he was almost out of energy.

"Joe!" he shouted, "I need you to hold it for one minute! Can you do that?" He got a grunt and a hysterical nod in reply, and the shield flickered back to life. Shun was staring, quite obviously flabbergasted, but Dan ignored him. "Lync!" he cried next, attracting the startled teen's attention. "You said any of these paths can lead to the exit?"

"Yeah, but—"

"We're splitting up!" Dan lowered his voice to a loud whisper, just loud enough for those close to him to hear. Lync's eyes widened in horror, and he opened his mouth to protest, but Dan silenced him. "Lync, you take Joe and the others and get out with the map. Shun and I'll get out another way!"

"What are you, nuts?" Mylene hissed angrily from where she was getting to her feet. "You don't have a map!" As if on command, Shun snatched the communicator from Lync's hand, stared at it intently for a few seconds, and then handed it back to the bristling teen. He gave Dan a nod; he had memorized the way out.

"I have Shun; we'll be fine," Dan hissed back. "They'll come after me and you guys will get out safe!"

"Dan—" Hydron started, but Dan cut him off.

"There's no time to argue about this!" he snapped, getting to his feet beside Shun. "Runo, go with Mylene and the others!"

"Oh, hell no!" she snarled. "I'm going with you!"

"Runo—" Dan growled, but it was then that Joe let out a strangled shout of pain, and the shield fizzled out loudly. Dan swore, grabbed Runo's hand, and shot down the nearest path. He briefly witnessed from the corner of his eye that Hydron snatched Joe's hand and yanked him to his feet before the crates obscured his view, forcing him to trust the others to follow his directions. That was when he realized Shun had disappeared. "Shun!" he shouted, searching from side to side wildly in fear for his best friend.

"Up here!" Shun responded, drawing Dan's gaze upward. Shun was running along the top of the crates, apparently surveying the area from the air. Dan allowed a bit of tension to slip from his shoulders, and when Shun told him to make a right, he did so without question. He had the aerial view. He knew Shun was the one in the know right now.

"Take the second path!" Shun called from above, and Dan did as he was told, yanking Runo with him. Her hand was tight around his own, holding on with terror and, perhaps, trust. Although Dan guessed that if she did trust him, it was only because of their current situation.

Suddenly, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and Dan dove for the ground, dragging Runo with him. The hall exploded with green lightning and Runo screamed, revealing Airzel was hot on their tail. As soon as it died down, Dan yanked her to her feet, startled to hear the telltale sound of something hitting flesh, followed by a loud grunt of pain.

The pair whirled around and some of Runo's hair whipped Dan in the face, but the sharp stings of pain were ignored as they stared, taking in Shun as he landed gracefully in a crouch several feet away from the man he had just kicked in the face. The ninja rose to his feet quickly and turned to face the two of them, eyes wide with urgency. "Come on," he urged, dashing down the hallway at a pace that was at least humanly possible to match. Dan and Runo followed without question as he lead them through the paths, occasionally separating from them to run along the tops of the crates and get a better look around. They left Airzel behind, rubbing at his badly bruised jaw and obviously nursing a growing grudge against Dan.

The Pyrus brawler dreaded the idea of being caught. The first few weeks had been bad, sure, but he knew he was in for it if they managed to get their hands on him again. Forget escaping and running around the facility; laying a hand on Kazarina was nothing short of signing his own death warrant. She would make his life hell if they caught him. She'd probably spend days just torturing him inside his own head—and then she'd break out the electrocautery again.

Dan shook off the morbid thought. He was getting out of here. Shun was here now, and so were Alice, Mira and Keith! There was no way he wasn't getting out of here!

Runo was breathing heavily behind him, and Dan was also starting to feel the effects of the prolonged physical activity. It had been weeks since he'd done something like this, he realized. His abilities had definitely diminished since then, and his weakness alarmed him. Thankfully, Shun chose that moment to drop down from his position above, for the first time not hitting the ground running.

"I think we've got a decent head start," he said breathily. It was the closest Dan had ever seen him come to panting. He fixed his gaze on Dan. "You okay?"

"Fine," Dan replied between pants, letting go of Runo's hand to rest his hands on his knees. She pushed her bangs out of her face as her chest rose and fell visibly. Her cheeks were flushed, revealing several white patches that marked scars invisible otherwise. Shun didn't miss it, nor did he gloss over Dan's recently healed wounds. His eyes lingered on the bandage on his arm, a detail Dan missed as he caught his breath.

"What happened to your arm?" Shun asked. Dan straightened up and glanced from his friend to his arm before biting his lip.

"Kazarina," he settled for after a moment of debating what to tell him. Shun's eyes narrowed and Dan grimaced at him. He knew that expression.

"How bad?"

"Pretty bad," Dan summarized, recalling the intense throes that robbed him of sleep and the hours he had spent rubbing at the burns with a towel in an attempt to relieve some of the unbearable itching. All that wound up doing was intensifying his pain, however, and made the whole ordeal even worse.

"How are you doing, Runo?" Shun asked next, turning his attention to her. Runo looked at him, and Dan noticed immediately how his eyes flicked to hers, seeking confirmation that she had, indeed, broken out of Kazarina's clutches. His shoulders sagged with relief when he realized it was her normal forest green eyes looking back at him, featuring with a similar expression.

"I'm alright," she said strongly, obviously still tense. However, she didn't appear as shaken as she had been earlier. Dan realized as he watched her that her stoic demeanor had returned, the one he had seen in the old days. In a way, it was comforting, but also upsetting. The Gundalians were forcing her back onto a path she had left behind, and it was changing her.

Suddenly, Dan recalled what Shun had shared earlier.

"They're attacking Bakugan Interspace?" he demanded, enraged. Runo grimaced.

"Yeah," she confirmed. Dan turned to her in surprise, but she wouldn't meet his gaze. "They're sending in waves of Chaos Bakugan to wreak havoc."

"Why?" Shun and Dan asked at the same time. Runo grimaced.

"They said something about gathering Chaos Energy…"

"Chaos Energy?" Dan repeated. The words felt familiar—eerily familiar. He tested them on his tongue again. "Chaos Energy…"

"What is it?" Shun questioned.

"It just…sounds familiar," he muttered, rubbing his chin. "Where have I heard that before?"

Suddenly, Shun stiffened and his head snapped to the side. Dan and Runo both tensed beside him, nervous. The ninja's eyes narrowed.

"Stay here," he said before leaping onto the top of the wall of crates. Dan opened his mouth to call after him, but Shun chose that precise moment to look back down at him and raise a warning finger to his lips. Dan closed his maw in silence and clenched his fists nervously. He didn't notice that Runo drew close to him in her anxiety, as both eyes were flicked back and forth between Shun crouching above them and the end of the hall he was watching.

Suddenly, the sound of running footsteps reached their ears, and, though Shun appeared as stoic as a snow leopard, both Dan and Runo flinched. However, the sound was muffled, and it took a moment for Dan to realize that whoever was running was running on the other side of the partition upon which Shun was perched. Looking up at him, Dan watched as Shun's head swiveled to track the runner, until the footsteps faded. The ninja remained above for a moment longer—perhaps waiting for whoever it was to round a corner—before he jumped down to rejoin the pair below.

"That was Gil," he shared. "He's heading back toward Airzel. My guess is that they're gonna team up and head after us."

"That's bad," Dan said, for lack of other words. "How far are we from the exit?"

"We're about halfway there," Shun said. "We've gotta move."

"Okay," Dan replied.

"Sounds good," Runo echoed, and they broke into a run—all striving for freedom.

Er….8 pages and 4275 words later, aaaand we're still in the maze. I guess I knew it would take a few chapters but ohmygoshtheywouldnotshutUP.

Don't kill me!

Review!