AN: This chapter is shorter than I'd like, but I never want to force a chapter to be longer when it has a logical ending point. It's also not as exciting as other chapters, but these ones are necessary too. Enjoy :)

Audrey laid awake, staring at the ceiling, just as she had every night since her sons had gone missing. She tried to sleep, but never managed to get more than a few hours at the most. Walter was much the same, though both pretended that they didn't realize the other was awake. Every time she did fall asleep, Audrey would dream of either the various horrors her sons could be experiencing, or the phone ringing, and finally learning the truth. In the good dreams, the truth was that her sons truly had fallen down a rabbit hole into Wonderland as Megan had jokingly suggested, and returned without a scratch on them. In the worst dreams, the truth was that her boys had been found naked in the desert, raped, and murdered. The dreams had become so frequent that when the phone rang next to her, she didn't even pick it up, and Walter had to come around the bed to her side and answer it himself.

"Hello?" Walter answered, his voice alert despite it being nearly four o'clock in the morning. Audrey sat up and focused on her husband. She watched as his jaw dropped and eyes went wide, and an overwhelmed smile slowly spread across his face.

"Yes, we'll be there right away, thank you so much," he said, then hung up the phone. "Yes!" he shouted, picking up Audrey and pulling her into a bone crushing hug.

"Walter, what is it?" she asked, although she cautiously hoped it was what she thought it was.

"They found them, they found the boys," Walter answered. He set her down and immediately ran into their ensuite bathroom, grabbing a change of clothes on his way. "That was Detective Villarreal. The boys are at Mercy Hospital, they're both alive and should make full recoveries. He'll fill us in on the details when we get there."

Audrey didn't even know what to say. She felt tears of joy building behind her eyes.

"What's going on?" Audrey turned to see Megan opening the door, clearly having been awoken by Walter's shouting. "Did someone find them?"

"Yes," Audrey tearfully replied. "Go get dressed, we're going to meet them at the hospital."

Not ten minutes later, Audrey, Walter, and Megan had piled into the car and were on their way. Audrey's heart was racing. Yes, the boys had been found, and Walter said that Detective Villarreal had said that they were expected to make full recoveries, but that still didn't answer what exactly had happened to them. He hadn't even said whether or not the San Diego Snatcher had been involved after all, as Channel 7 was reporting.

Audrey was out of the car before Walter had even shifted to park. Her husband and daughter were right on her heels, and the three of them quickly made their way into the hospital. Just upon walking in, there were more deputies around than Audrey would've expected to see. At the front desk, there was a young Hispanic man with a gun and badge on this belt, probably in his late twenties.

"Mr. and Mrs. Nichols," he greeted them. "I'm Detective Diego Villarreal." He reached out a hand towards Walter to shake, but was ignored.

"Where are my sons?" Walter asked in lieu of any sort of greeting. Under normal circumstances, Audrey would've scolded him for being so rude, but these weren't normal circumstances. She wasn't exactly in the mood for pleasantries either, even though the detective was just being polite.

"Let's talk," he said, motioning towards a quieter corner. The three of them followed him, but none of them took a seat.

"What's going on?" Audrey asked. "When can we see the boys?"

"I just want to know they're okay so I can go back to sleep," Megan added. Part of Audrey wanted to smack her for the comment, but at least one of them was capable of handling the situation without too much of a personality change.

"Are you sure you want your daughter to hear?" Villarreal asked them.

"She can handle it, now tell us what's going on," Audrey rushed out in response. Megan was oddly mature for her age, in some ways. Audrey was sure that no matter what the detective was about to tell them, Megan could in fact handle it, and probably handle it better than either she or Walter could.

"Drake and Josh are both going to be okay, physically," he assured them. "Josh is currently in surgery to repair his shoulder. He was stabbed, but the doctors have already assured me that they expect him to regain full use of his arm within three months, provided he follows their recommendations on physical therapy. Josh also has a dislocated thumb, but that should also heal well. He's severely dehydrated too. They both are, but Josh is going to be just fine." He stopped.

"What about Drake?" Audrey forced herself to ask when he didn't immediately continue, despite the ache in her chest at the thought of what Josh had endured. Villarreal sighed.

"Drake will also heal physically, and should do so even quicker than Josh. He has a lot of nasty cuts and bruises, but those should all heal within a week or two." He stopped again, glancing at Megan with a grimace before continuing. "Unlike Josh, Drake was raped."

Audrey whimpered and covered her mouth with her hand. Walter put his arm around her and took a deep breath. Megan frowned, and looked away, arms wrapped around herself.

"They haven't yet performed a rape kit, since he's a minor and has been combative. They've been keeping him sedated for his own safety. Everything else is for their doctors to discuss with you." Villarreal offered them an apologetic smile, but could clearly tell that there was nothing he could say that could make this better.

"Combative? What do you mean combative?" Audrey quickly asked.

"He's just scared," Villarreal assured them. "He's been panicked without Josh right next to him, and could hurt himself or someone else on accident, which is why they've sedated him for the time being."

Audrey closed her eyes and nodded. She hated it, but it made sense. Ever since Josh had become the center of Drake's life, her son had reached for his stepbrother every time he was scared. It was a far cry from the way he used to completely shut down on himself in private like he used to. In public, Drake held that same bravado and cocky smile that he'd had all his life, but at least in private, now, he allowed himself to break down a bit more with Josh. After going through something so horrific, so much worse than even what had happened when they'd been kidnapped in Hollywood not even six months earlier, it made perfect sense that Drake would be reaching out for Josh even more, and even panic when Josh wasn't there.

"What happened?" Walter asked, his voice breaking. Audrey could practically hear the tears in her husband's eyes. "How did you find them?"

"We didn't," Villarreal admitted. "We got a call from an elderly couple that two boys showed up on their doorstep covered in blood, one nearly naked. Deputies got there as soon as they could, and Josh explained that they had been kidnapped off the side of the road and held in a basement for a few days, during which time Drake was raped, Josh was stabbed, and they managed to escape. I think the rest should be for them to tell you."

Walter nodded, squeezing Audrey's shoulder.

"Can we see them?" she asked.

"I can take you to their room," the detective responded. "It'll be up to their doctors whether or not you can go in and see Drake, but I can at least take you to his room. Josh should be out of surgery soon as well."

Detective Villarreal beckoned them to follow him, so they did without a second thought. Megan kept her arms wrapped around herself, but Audrey wrapped an arm around her daughter's shoulders.

"I'm sure they're gonna be okay," Audrey forced out, trying to be strong for her.

"They better be," Megan muttered in reply.

The boys' room was at the very end of the pediatric wing. It was immediately apparent which room was theirs because of the two deputies standing guard outside of it.

"There's something else you should know," Villarreal said. He stopped a few rooms away from the boys'. "They were in fact kidnapped by the San Diego Snatcher. However, it wasn't just one. There were two men doing this. One of them is dead, we found his body right where Josh told us it would be. The other man is gone, and we haven't been able to track him down yet. We don't have any reason to believe that he's going to come after either one of them, but still, just as a precaution, we're gonna be leaving deputies with your sons for a while."

"What, to protect them from getting kidnapped and raped again?" Walter asked through gritted teeth.

"Walter, stop, just stop," Audrey said. She couldn't handle all of this. She couldn't handle any of this. It was all too much. She looked up at the ceiling in an effort to stave off her tears.

"Can I just see my brother? Please?" Megan asked, showing more emotion than she had the whole night.

"I'll ask his doctor," Villarreal said. He gave them a tight smile and walked away.

Audrey looked back down the hallway towards her sons' room. She recognized one of the deputies standing guard.

"Deputy Villarreal?" Audrey walked closer and saw that it was the same deputy who had initially taken her missing persons report. The deputy looked over at her and gave her a tired smile.

"Mrs. Parker-Nichols, good morning," she greeted. "And please, call me Rosa. Things can get a little confusing when my brother is around."

"That's your brother?" Audrey asked, gesturing back towards the detective. Rosa nodded.

"Yep. Diego is three years older than me."

"What are you doing here at four-thirty in the morning? I thought you worked day shift."

"I do, but I volunteered for this as soon as Diego told me," Rosa explained. "Diego and I share an apartment, and he was the detective on call for this case tonight. When he got the call, he told me immediately, so I volunteered. I'm not leaving your son until they make me."

Audrey smiled for the first time since getting the call.

"I appreciate that," she replied. "Megan, this is Rosa. Walter and I met her Sunday morning. She'll be keeping watch over the boys."

Megan offered her a tight smile and shook her hand.

"This is my partner, Deputy McClain," Rosa introduced.

"Good to meet you," he said, shaking all of their hands. He was about Rosa's age, but white and with blue eyes. He looked quite similar to Josh. Audrey physically felt her heart ache. She looked at the door, but she couldn't see through the small window in it.

"Hopefully, you can see him soon," Rosa offered.

Only a moment later, Diego Villarreal returned, an older man in a white coat right behind him.

"I'm Dr. Carlyle. I'll be your sons' primary doctor while they recover here," the doctor introduced. "You can go sit with Drake, but he should be asleep for another few hours. As I'm sure Detective Villarreal has made you aware, we did have to sedate him. According to EMTs, he panicked when he was separated from his brother in the ambulance, enough so that he passed out. When he regained consciousness, he again panicked, and was at risk of unintentionally hurting himself or hospital staff, so he had to be sedated. It is because of that that we haven't run the rape kit yet or treated his other minor injuries. We're hoping that he'll calm down enough when you're with him. If not, we'll need your consent to treat him whilst sedated."

"Okay," Audrey replied around a sigh and a nod. "We'll see how he's doing when he wakes up and go from there. Can we see him now?"

"Of course, but there is one more thing." The doctor looked between them before continuing. "Both of your sons will need to have some tests done to determine if they've contracted any illnesses from the men who did this to them. Both of them were exposed to their blood through open wounds, and we can't be too careful."

Audrey forced tears back and nodded. She hadn't even thought of that possibility, but of course it was true. She wasn't sure how Josh had been exposed, but for Drake, the answer was obvious. She doubted that the monster who touched him had used a condom.

"Can we just see our son now?" Walter asked, his voice betrayed by tears.

Dr. Carlyle opened the door and gestured for them to go inside.

Audrey was in first, quickly followed by her husband and daughter. It was dark in the room, with only the light of a lamp to illuminate it. There were two beds in the room, with a curtain like in a shower to separate them if need be. The bed closer to the door was empty, and the other held her little boy. The faint light of the lamp was all that lit up Drake's unconscious face. The moment she saw him, Audrey wasn't sure what she felt. Her heart ached and soared at the same time. She quickly fell into the chair at his bedside as tears clouded her vision.

"Oh, honey," she said, gently taking his lax hand into hers. He looked paler than normal, and even in the faint light she could see tear tracks on his face and dark circles under his eyes. She couldn't see any injuries aside from just a bit of gauze wrapped around the wrist that was exposed over the blankets. Audrey reached up and ran her fingers through Drake's bangs, brushing them back from his face. "I'm so sorry this happened to you, sweetie, but I'm gonna be here for you. I'm not gonna let him ever touch you again, I swear," she whispered to her son.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Walter and Megan sitting next to each other on the small couch, in a rare embrace - well, Walter had his arm around Megan's shoulders, and Megan was leaning into him, and that was the closest to an embrace that they ever got.

"Is he gonna be okay?" Megan cautiously asked. Audrey wasn't sure if she had ever heard her daughter voice concern like that over Drake before, aside from when Megan learned the truth about her father.

"Of course he is," Walter answered. He smiled, but the tears in eyes told a different story. "We're gonna take care of him, and Josh too. They're both gonna be fine. It's probably gonna take some time, but I'm sure they'll bounce back eventually, you'll see."

Megan smiled like she didn't really believe him, but said nothing. She made eye contact with Audrey. Neither said a word, and simply shared in their concern with a look. Uncharacteristically, Megan leaned further into Walter and made herself comfortable, and closed her eyes. Maybe Megan wasn't handling this quite as nonchalantly as it had first seemed.

Audrey looked back at her son. At least asleep, he seemed peaceful, and hopefully, he wasn't in any pain.

"It's gonna be okay, sweetie," she said. Audrey lifted Drake's hand to her lips, placing a gentle kiss on his knuckles. "I'm here now."

"Rosa, can I talk to you for a second?" Diego asked her as the Parker-Nichols family entered their son's hospital room. She glanced over at McClain, and, at his nod, vacated her post to go speak with her brother.

"Yeah, what is it?" she asked, crossing her arms over her chest and angling herself so that she could clearly see the door to Drake's room. She didn't expect James to come after him or Josh, but she couldn't be too careful, not after she'd already allowed such horrible things to happen to those boys.

"Are we gonna talk about this?"

"What is there for us to talk about?" Rosa shot back. "We screwed up. The San Diego Snatcher was our own fucking cousin and his boyfriend and we didn't even know. We had them in our apartment, eating our food at our table, maybe an hour before they went off and raped a child, and we did nothing! And now our cousin is dead. So what do you want to talk about?" Diego flinched at her cursing, and Rosa knew she wasn't being fair. It was just as much her own fault as it was Diego's, and she was sure that Diego was just trying to make sure that she was okay, but how could she be?

"We couldn't have known-."

"We should've known," Rosa interrupted. "I knew something was off about James, but instead of trying to actually figure out what was off about him, I took another shot instead. I knew Miguel was lying, but I let it go. It all makes so much sense now." Rosa barked out a sardonic laugh and shook her head. "Why they were asking so many questions about the case, why they were saying such disgusting things about those kids, even why Miguel left the Church in the first place and pressed us to get together. It's all so obvious, and we didn't see it. One boy got stabbed, another was raped, and it's our fault for not stopping it. It's bad enough that we didn't see to stop the six other men from getting their throats slit, but we could've actually stopped these things from happening to these children, and we failed them."

Diego sighed.

"Good to know you've still got your head on straight about this," he said. Rosa offered him a sarcastic smile and a shrug in return. "Well it's not our fault. Yeah, of course everything seems super obvious in hindsight, that's why they say hindsight is twenty-twenty, but even if we had suspected them at the time, we wouldn't have had anything on them. Even everything from last night is only circumstantial in hindsight too. So even if we'd known, we still wouldn't have had anything to bring them in on. We still wouldn't have been able to stop what happened. We couldn't have stopped the kids from getting hurt, and we couldn't-," Diego broke off for a moment, his voice breaking as tears shined in his eyes for just a moment before he blinked them away in a rare show of emotion. "We couldn't have saved Miguel either. It's probably been too late for Miguel for years."

Rosa focused her gaze completely on the door to Drake's room instead of responding to her brother. Deep down, she knew he was right, but she was too hurt and angry to say so right now - hurt because her own flesh and blood cousin had been capable of such evil, and angry for the same. Later, she would allow herself to grieve her cousin, or rather, grieve her childhood friend that her cousin had been so many years earlier, but not now. Later, she would allow herself to just be angry at James for doing this, instead of at herself for not seeing it, but not now. Later, she would see it all clearly and rationally, but not now.

"I just want to make sure that you're okay," Diego continued. "You've been working on this case just as much as I have, and I know this has been a really rough morning for both of us."

Rosa let out a small scoff and nodded. That was certainly an understatement. Diego had woken her up at three o'clock that morning - only a few hours after they'd both gone to sleep - to tell her that he'd received a call from a sergeant that the boys had been found. It was just dumb luck that Diego had been the on-call detective for that case that night, and Diego had wisely known that Rosa would want to be woken. Her shock had quickly turned to anger, and at anger it had stayed. She hadn't saved those boys from what James had done to them, so all she could do was try to save them now. Rosa knew she couldn't actually stay at Drake's door until James was caught, but she could certainly try.

"I'll be fine," she finally said. "I just want to protect them in any way that I can now. You don't have to worry. My head is on straight enough to do my job and look out for those boys. And I've got McClain with me too. I'll be fine," she insisted. "We can talk more later. I know you've got a lot you can be doing before you take the boys' statements when they wake up."

"Are you sure?" Diego asked. To his credit, he did look genuinely concerned about her.

"I'm going back to my post," she quietly said. Rosa offered Diego a small, sad smile, then walked back over to McClain, on the opposite side of Drake's door.

"You okay?" he asked her, ducking his head to catch her gaze. She gave him the same smile she gave her brother.

"No," she replied, choosing to be honest for once. "We'll talk about it later."

She would certainly have to talk to a lot of people about it later. It wasn't as if it wasn't going to come up that Miguel was the cousin of one of the detectives on the San Diego Snatcher case. In fact, Diego himself was probably going to have to talk to his sergeant about it later that day. They would both be telling the brass everything they knew about James in an effort to find him, and everything they'd known about Miguel for the FBI agents coming in to create a profile. The more they knew about Miguel, the more they could figure out about James.

So yes, she would definitely be talking about it later. Later, but not now.