"Left? Are you sure it's a left?"

Sabrina craned her neck forward over the steering wheel, squinting her eyes in the vain hope of making out anything other than darkness in the distance.

In her passenger seat, Maxwell did an admirable job of holding in an exasperated sigh.

"I'm sure." He answered in a low monotone. It was a phrase he'd been uttering all night and after being roused out of bed by a frantic phone call and given the upsetting news that Kelly and Jill were in trouble, having his judgment questioned every five minutes was starting to irritate him.

Sabrina didn't see a problem with it, however. She raised her brow suspiciously. "I don't see anything to the left."

That was it.

Maxwell rolled his blue eyes to the sky. "You don't see anything to the right either. Or behind you, or hardly in front of you. It's night, Sabrina." He answered back evenly. He paused for a beat and in the chilly silence that followed, realized he'd been overly sarcastic. He immediately regretted his words. It wasn't like him to snap at people, especially his friends. But knowing that Kelly and Jill might be hurt and being forced to wait another couple of hours to find out if they were alright was doing things to his head. He wanted to yell, he wanted rip the countryside apart, he wanted to punch the face in of whoever was putting them in danger. But as crazy as the uncertainty made him, he knew Sabrina had to be suffering too. She was snippy, jittery, and anxious. Her driving was erratic and recklessly fast and the only reason he hadn't taken over the wheel because she hadn't given him the chance. Not that his driving would be any better off in his state. He forced an easy grin on his face and turned to her, hoping to soften the blow.

"You said I was the navigator, remember? I'm the one that comes here all the time? I remember you telling me that. You said you would trust me."

Sabrina shot him a weary look. "Okay." She relented, rubbing her temple in agitation. "You're right, you're right. I know, you're right. I just want to find them."

"Me too."

With a temporary cease fire quieting it's passengers, the orange pinto slowed slightly and made a left hand turn onto another seemingly endless stretch of country highway.

Maxwell leaned forward and studied the patches of road illuminated by headlights for a moment before pointing at something out the window. To Sabrina's frustration, she couldn't see what.

"Okay, over there is a little fishing pond," He began quickly. "You couldn't even see it if it was day, there's too much brush around it. Start slowing down. You'll see a dirt road. Follow that and it'll lead you to CA 170. Turn right and that'll take you all the way to Bridge Grove."

Sabrina frowned. It wasn't usual that she had to depend entirely on someone else and the helplessness and loss of control was maddening. Never had she felt so useless.

And fishing pond? What fishing pond?

"Are you s-" She started.

Maxwell's blank stare stopped her.

"Fishing pond. Slow down. Right at CA 170." Sabrina repeated pleasantly. She obediently slowed and eased the Pinto onto the bumpy dirt road. "Hey now, that wasn't so bad. See? I'm getting better already."

Immediately, Maxwell came up with a variety of responses to that statement but before he could decide on which one to use, the mobile phone he'd been unwittingly resting his elbow on began to buzz. He jerked his arm away in surprise, having forgotten about its existence. Who the hell had a phone in their car?!

But Sabrina looked like she'd been expecting the call. She snatched it up and jammed it between her head and shoulder, making the car swerve uncomfortably to the right.

"Charlie?" She blurted out by way of greeting. Her eyes went blank as she listened to what the voice was saying on the other line.

Maxwell could only imagine what. From the little he'd heard Kelly speak about her boss, he gathered that Charlie was a very powerful man. He stayed quiet, watching the road because Sabrina hardly was and listened to her side of the conversation.

"Okay-" He heard Sabrina say quickly into the phone. Charlie was telling her something. She repeated herself a few times before letting out a loud hiss and rubbing her face in her hands.

"Charlie's people found their car." She whispered quickly. "Thirty minutes out of Bridge Grove. Wrecked to hell. Doesn't look good."

Maxwell felt his stomach roll but said nothing.

"Oh, it's just Max."

At the mention of his name, Maxwell perked up. "What?"

"Bennett."

"Huh?"

Sabrina was about to snap at the poor man, but realized he'd thought she was speaking to him. Instead she patted his elbow and pointed to the phone. "He's Kelly's… friend. He said he knows the area pretty w-" She shot him a guilty look and then turned away. "Um, Max Bennett. No, it's Maxwell. Maxwell Bennett. L.A., yeah."

Maxwell felt his face grow hot. Despite all that was going on, he was being checked out by his friend's boss? He couldn't help feeling a bit insulted.

"Uh huh, yeah." Sabrina went on. "What's your middle name?"

When Maxwell didn't answer, Sabrina nudged him to let him know that this time her question for was him. "Middle name."

Maxwell sighed. "Clarence."

"Clarence." Sabrina relayed into the phone before grinning at him. "Clarence?" She mouthed.

"My grandfather's name." Maxwell muttered back defensively. "It's a family name. He was a war hero. Shut up."

Sabrina ignored him. "Thanks, Charlie." A pause. "Yeah, we're going as fast as we can." Another pause. "We're about two hours out of L.A., so it'll be a couple more hours. Not sure exactly where. Two hours north of L.A., maybe a few hours south of San Francisco, somewhere in there, I'll be damned if I know, no one thought to put up any road si-"

She paused so suddenly that Maxwell turned to see what had happened. He was taken aback by the alarmed look on Sabrina's face. "Charlie, I have to go!" She said before slamming down the phone and snatching it up again.

"Ugh, how could I be so goddamned stupid! Max, dial this number!"

"What?! Why, what happened?" He asked nervously. "Are they okay?"

"Just do it!" Sabrina ordered. She shouted out a San Francisco number and Maxwell quickly punched the buttons for her.

"What's going on!" He asked again, his voice so full of fear and urgency that it snapped Sabrina back to reality.

She stared at him for a moment as the phone rang on the other line, seeing him in a new light. He was a nice guy, patient and caring, with a good head on his shoulders, usually easy going and open to anything. But right now, with his blonde hair that he hadn't bothered combing sticking up messily and his eyes wide and full of fear, he looked like a scared little boy. Rightly so, since she'd dragged him out of bed in the middle of the night, telling him only the vaguest of details, and making him drive halfway up the state. And he'd done it without question.

He'd do anything for Kelly without question. The poor guy was hopelessly in love with her, any fool but Kelly herself could see it.

"I'm sorry, Max." Sabrina said quickly. "Nothing's wrong, I just remembered Kris lives much closer to Bridge Grove. She can get to them alot sooner than we can."

Maxwell calmed down and then looked puzzled. "Wait, Kris? Jill's little sister?"

Sabrina couldn't answer. At that moment, a sleepy voice answered on the line.

"Hi, It's Sabrina." She said quickly. There was a brief pause. "Can you put Kris on please? It's an emergency."

Kelly fortunately had enough thought left to not allow the elevator to reach the second floor. She pulled the emergency stop button and swayed to the side when the machine came to a grinding halt. The lights flickered for a brief moment, then everything became still.

"Goddammit," Jill crudely broke the silence. She rolled hip to hip before forcing herself to sit up. Both hands gingerly covered her mouth and nose, but the pain kept her from pressing down. She was scared to touch her skin, fearing what she might find on her fingertips. "A fucking elevator. Half of the place isn't complete but they have a perfect-" Jill grimaced, falling down to her elbow. Her friend was at her side in a split second.

"Slow down there, Jill. We're okay right now." Kelly moved her hand to draw the hair away from Jill's face, but missed by inches. Realizing her mistake, she instantly drew back and looked perplexed by her own action. She was hoping Jill hadn't noticed, but by the way her friend was looking at her, it wasn't possible that she had.

"Hey," Jill whispered, touching Kelly's hand. "Your head, how is it? Because you don't-"

The worried brunette shook off Jill's concern and forced on a smile. "I'm just dizzy from running. I'll be fine, promise." She hoped the confident tone would ease her friend's unconvinced stare. "More importantly, what about you?"

Jill tried to put a smile on her face but she felt too tired to move even the muscles in her cheeks. Pain thumped in her face, almost unbearably so. "I'm okay, I'm..." Jill attempted to push herself up and felt Kelly's hands on both of her arms. But couldn't bring herself to stand anymore. "Yup, doing good."

Kelly helped Jill slide against the elevator wall, where she settled into a slumped form. "You're just tired from all that running. We'll wait for Bri here and everything will work out."

It was the sight of the always realistic Kelly looking at her with eyes full of hopeful optimism and wanting her to do the same, that made Jill faintly smile. "It will." She lied, feeling her throat fill with something hot. "You're strong-" Jill heaved over, catching herself with both hands. Kelly grabbed her waist with one hand and tried to gather up as much hair as she could to pull it behind Jill's head.

Vomit spewed to the floor in violent retches, enough to the point that Jill pushed Kelly away. She knew what it was. She could taste it. It was what they had injected into her blood stream. That... chemical. It burned like acid, but tasted metallic in her mouth.

Her eyes gazed down at the mess on the floor and witnessed droplets of blood mixing in with the yellow substance beneath her.

Kelly wanted to ask questions, but found herself unable to speak.

Hair slipped over Jill's eyes when she turned her head to look at the other detective. Panting, Jill decided it was a perfect time to smirk. "Seems I've caught your morning sickness."

"Jill..."

In those few seconds, Jill could only think of how Kelly would survive without her. She could feel the thin thread of life she was holding on to begin to break away. Who was going to pay for Kris' college tuition? Who was going to teach Kelly's baby how to bat its eyelashes and get their way?

Who was going to protect Kelly, keep her alive, keep her baby safe?

There was so much more she had to do.

Her eyes blurred in despair as she looked at Kelly one last time, choking on a sob as her body went numb, and her vision went black.