A/N: Sorry for not updating in a while! Please review!

July 6th

The spooky, night air surrounding the woods seemed to seep in through the van's windows where the five of them were sitting, listening to Carson's cluttered mutters. Casey was scared of what Carson knew more than anything. Whatever it was, it was bad, worse than she had initially thought.

"Shit, we shouldn't have come here," Carson said, glaring at Dale and the two other girls, obviously avoiding Casey's eyes. For a moment the redhead wanted to scream, to demand that they keep driving until they found somewhere where they could call the police and report the disappearances and the spikes on the road.

"Carson, what the fuck is going on?," Bonnie demanded, sounding slightly angry with him. Casey stared at Carson hoping he would explain what was really going on. If he didn't tell them in the next few seconds, she knew she would probably lose what little bit of a sane mind she had left.

"It's-I can't, holy crap this is bad. This is really, really bad," Carson moaned, banging his head lightly on the steering wheel.

"Just tell us what it is and then it can be over," Dale said comfortingly. Casey recognized his attempts to pry information out of the distraught high school student that seemed as if he was about to have a panic attack if he already wasn't. She prayed that Dale would get him to open up, knowing that what Carson knew would probably not help them at all, but once they all knew they could get on their way back to the nearest town where they could find help.

Carson still looked scared and reluctant, but his eyes seemed to soften in the slightest, like he was giving up the fight against his fear. "My uncle, h-he lived up here for a while, but he disappeared a few months ago. The police found his car at that place, Sal's diner. They did this whole investigation thing and they couldn't find the guy who owned the diner, so they did a two week search in the woods. A few of the searchers went missing, so they stopped because they thought it was some sort of wild animal," Carson took a deep shuddering breath and let out a strangled sob. "The house was given to us. I thought it would be nice to come up here and chill out you know? I didn't think there was someone killing people up here. I'm so sorry."

Casey's eyes widened when she realized what it meant. Olivia and Elliot were still in the woods where searchers had disappeared. Nick and Alex were waiting at the diner where Carson's uncle's car had ben found. There was danger lurking around every corner here, as if the spikes weren't bad enough. This wasn't the paradise Casey had expected, or anyone expected for that matter.

A ringing interrupted her thoughts, a siren. The sound had never sounded so good to Casey's ears. It took only a moment for the five of them to make eye contact with one and other before all the doors were thrown open and all of them proceeded in jumping out into the middle of the road, waving their arms frantically like Casey had been with them.

The ambulance speeding quickly down the pitch black road screeched to a dead stop in front of them, the horn honking loudly, as if they were some kind of crazy, drunken kids that were screwing with them. Of course, it probably looked that way to the driver.

"Hey!," an angry voice called out. It took only a moment for Casey to notice the police car located behind the ambulance where a balding man had just stepped out of, looking particularly annoyed. Although normally she would've been scared out of her mind at the pissed off way the man was waving his arms about, shouting explicits, Casey had never been so happy to see a police officer in her life.

Whenever she had been around them when she was younger, they would constantly question her about everything, things she'd already been over with them. They were too persistent for her, too official. But her best friend wanted to be one, so she normally kept her mouth zipped instead of bitching about it.

"Please help us, please!," Casey screamed, limping as quickly she could over to the man. "Please t-there are people trying t-to kill us!" She couldn't muster another complete thought, for she broke down in hysterical tears, clinging onto the officers upper arm for support as her legs turned to jelly. Her world was spinning in circles, her mind was becoming clouded over with images of Fin's body in the car. Everyone else was missing, gone, possibly dead. She could be the last one left. God might've left her to be alone again, like he had with her parents.

Everything went black as her eyes slipped shut.

The morning mountain air was chilly against Olivia's skin. Even when she was curled up tightly in a ball, she couldn't stop the violent shivers that rocketed through her body every minute, though she knew she couldn't blame it entirely on the weather. Olivia figured that she had collapsed two hours after Elliot and Samson had been taken, kidnapped. She had no idea what the fuck she was going to do. All she could think about was the bones she had found in the forest and how she knew fully well that it could be Elliot in a few hours.

Tears streamed down her tired face as she fought off sleep. She unsuccessfully attempted to drag herself to her feet, but resulted in her collapsing onto the uncomfortable ground once more.

The sun filtered gently through the trees and splayed across Olivia's dirt covered, grimy face. God, she felt absolutely disgusting. She couldn't believe she had been in the woods for three days with no food or a place to wash up. Her hair was greasy and matted with small twigs and her skin looked a shade darker from having slept on the forest floor. And she wasfucking thirsty now!

This was exactly like a horror movie, something Olivia would know all about. Though she despised the woods, horror movies were her specialty. She enjoyed yelling at the stupid victims, curled up when she should be studying. They were thrilling, fun, like roller coasters. Now, though, she didn't think she would be able to watch any more of them without breaking down into tears of what it felt like to be so completely helpless, not knowing where the people closest to you were, not knowing when the horrible things were going to end….not knowing anything in general.

Olivia had to do something, though. If not for her than for Elliot and everyone else. What that something could be, she didn't know. She wouldn't get very far walking, especially when she was barely able to keep her eyes open already, but she had to do something, anything. For what Olivia assumed to be the last time, she pushed herself to her feet, shaking incredibly hard, and started walking in the direction she hoped would bring her to safety.

"How's he doing?," A deep male voice sounded in Fin's head.

"He's going in and out of consciousness," a pretty female voice said. "He has a pretty bad concussion too and broke a few ribs and his foot, but I would say he's pretty damn lucky. Kid, barely had a pulse for a while but we got him back to health. He must've been laying there for a few days because he's malnourished pretty badly. Lucky you found him when you did, or else he would've been dead."

"Good thing he got out of the car or else he would have surely suffocated from the combined heat and girl those kids picked up, she's still unconscious right?"

"Yeah, why?"

"I think she was the one who dragged him out of the car. He was probably passed out on impact. I'm pretty positive she also performed CPR on him because nearly all of his upper ribs are broken where the procedure is performed. I would really like to shake her hand for doing that. Without her, this kid probably would be dead. Did you get her name by any chance?"

"I believe it's Casey, at least that's what those kids told us." Fin's eyes opened in the slightest at the mention of Casey's name, the world around him blurry. The lights were dimmed and he could barely make out the three people standing in front of him. He recognized the two men as the detectives that had rescued him. "Look, whatever she told them got all of them pretty hysterical. I still can't get a straight thought out of any of them without one of them breaking down," the taller, lankier one said.

"Casey?," Fin croaked out.

"Hey, kid," the balding detective said kindly, walking over closer to him. "How're you feeling?" It took Fin a moment to answer as that was a very hard question to answer. To describe it accurately would be to say he felt like he had been hit by a million pound truck, gone sky diving without a parachute, and then set on fire, but he wasn't going to say that.

"Okay," he grumbled. A hint of a smile played at the detective's lips as if he knew exactly what Fin wanted to say.

"I don't know if you remember, but I'm Detective Cragen and this is Detective Munch," he ushered over to the other detective who waved. Fin snorted and nodded.

"I remember, but what happened? I mean why was I out there? What happened to Casey?" A million questions were bouncing around Fin's head, but he couldn't talk fast enough for them to ask them all. The detective sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed.

"Fin, you were in a car accident." Well no fucking shit. "Your friend, Casey, managed somehow to get out. She must've thought you were dead, but know that she did try to revive you…." As Detective Cragen began telling them about what happened, Fin became more and more confused. From what Detective Cragen had heard from the kids, Casey had been in some sort of danger. What kind of danger was the mystery.

Fin didn't know how extremely clueless he was at the time.

Elliot felt something tight and heavy binding his wrists and ankles together, chains. It dug painfully into his skin, undoubtedly leaving various, deep cuts. His back felt like it was literally on fire from being forced into the uncomfortable position he was in. All in all, he hadn't felt this sore and beaten in a long while. He was pretty certain lack of food, water, and a comfortable bed was due to that. The overwhelming earthy smell and freezing floor made him feel even worse, claustrophobic.

It took all of his might to yank open his eyes from the sleep that was liable to set in any moment, although the awful pain was hard to sleep through because it had been the thing that had woken him up. At first everything around him was spinning and he could barely make out which part of the room was the floor and which part was the ceiling. His head felt like someone smashed bricks against and when he felt a small trail of warm liquid streaming down his neck, he realized it was a scary probability.

"Hello?," Elliot muttered into the darkness, hoping that he would get an answer, any answer. He was afraid, of course, of the person who had taken him away from Olivia, but he needed some sort of reassurance that he wasn't going insane and thinking up this whole, entire thing. A few beats passed, but nothing was heard except Elliot's accelerated breathing. After muttering a few curses to himself, El began to wiggle and squirm around, attempting to break free from the chains that he knew would hold him captive. He worked out nearly everyday, lifting weights, yet he still didn't have the strength to break free from the rough, metal links.

"God help me," Elliot whimpered to himself, mustering faith somewhere in his heart that someone would find him. What he wanted more than anything though was for Olivia to get out of there safely. If he was killed by these fucking freaks so be it, as long as she was safe.

In the pitch blackness, Elliot suddenly heard a subtle creaking. It sounded like it was coming above him, as if someone was walking over where he was sitting, as if he was underground. He thought he knew what it felt like to be completely in distress because of a closed space he was wrong. His already pounding head began spinning around in fast circles and before he could stop himself he emptied the sparse contents of his stomach, mostly water, on the cold, concrete floor next to him. Fuck, he needed to get out of there. He couldn't breathe,. It felt like his lungs were on fire. He was falling through an empty space and he couldn't get his bearings.

Just when he was certain he was going to die, a door above swung open, pretty, morning light bathing over Elliot's shaking body. Gratefulness swarmed around in his brain, but that was before he saw the disgusting woman standing above him. Her eyes were a sickly yellow that seemed to glow and her skin didn't even look human. For a moment, Elliot thought that he had stepped right into a childhood nightmare, even more so when she began descending down a rickety staircase.

Before he could stop himself, Elliot let out a strangled cry and began desperately trying to move himself backwards. Although he had been knocked out immediately last night after someone had poured that burning liquid down his throat, he knew that this woman had done it. The one glimpse he got of the mystery person last night were the eyes that seemed to glow in the dark.

"Hello dearie," the woman croaked. She sounded surprisingly young for the awful way she looked, but that was the last thing on Elliot's mind. He was more focused on wiggling back and forth, trying harder than ever to free himself from the chains that bound him so tightly. Though he tried to hold back the screams of terror that threatened to erupt from his throat, he couldn't fully. The woman just laughed evilly.

"Don't think that I'm in the mood for a struggle boy, after that little stunt your friends pulled," she hissed through her yellow, rotten teeth. "I can assure you, they won't make it very far, not with our men out there hunting them. When they get back here, you'll be able to say your last words." She let out a scary, loud cackle that shook Elliot down to his bones.

As abruptly as she began laughing, she stopped and before Elliot could even let out a breath, she was advancing quickly towards him with something sharp in hand. He clenched his eyes shut, refusing to beg her to not slice him up, though he probably would prefer that she didn't. But he didn't feel a stinging pain of a blade penetrating his skin, in fact he felt nothing at all. He heard, however, a small metallic click. Hesitantly, he opened one eye to look at his hands. It surprised him greatly to see that they were free and no longer in chains, though his feet were. In any other dangerous situation, Elliot would have violently started swinging his arms around, punching the woman in the face, but this wasn't another situation. Who knew what these people were capable of? Cannibalism was one of them and Elliot didn't want to become their latest meal.

"Eat this," the woman spat, slamming a plastic plate of a mysterious food in front of him. It didn't actually look like food at all. It was dark and looked squishy and Elliot was not in the mood to try new food choices. "I'll be back," she growled and then she was gone. It left Elliot to be doomed in the blackness.

Alex, Greg, and Nick sat in the overgrown greens, swatting away the early morning mosquitos. They were exhausted after arriving at the edge of the trail after 3 hours and then following it for roughly three more miles before stopping for a break.

"I promise the town is coming up soon," Greg panted. "I used to stop there all the time when I drove to the airport to go on business trip. It's like the only reasonable town for miles." Alex sighed and leaned her head back against the tree.

"I'm so tired of this," she muttered sleepily. "Jesus fucking christ, I really just want a beer." Greg and Nick chuckled at her humor. Nick always admired Alex's humor. She seemed serious when she said most of these things, but it usually resulted in everyone cracking up.

"Think of it this way, Al, you're probably burning so many calories," Nick said with a grin.

"Why, Nick, do I need to?," she asked, her eyes seeming to burn holes into his. His smile faltered and he seemed to shrink back slightly. "Honey, I'm kidding," Alex said laughing, punching his arm playfully. Greg looked at the both of them.

"You guys seem more like siblings than anything," Greg announced. Alex and Nick exchanged smiles because it was undoubtedly true. They were best friends, they loved each other like a brother and sister would, they shared secret information that they kept buried deep in their hearts. When Greg and Nick had still been in that cellar before picking the lock with a paper clip Greg had had in his pocket, they had talked about Alex,. They had talked about Nick loving her like a sister, and about how he wasn't about to give up the fight against Sal and the others because they were hurting her.

"I know. He's my best friend and I'm so lucky to have him," Alex smiled at him and leaned her head against his shoulder. "Without him, I would be dead."

Nick stroked her pretty blonde hair back, as bad as it looked right then. "Don't say that, Alex. Please don't," he begged sadly, not wanting to think about what would have happened if he actually hadn't been there.

"Nick, they're probably all laying dead somewhere. I'm so sorry that we got into this, but I don't know what else we can do." He began to feel her body shudder as sobs ran through her body. Nick knew exactly what she meant. He didn't know what to do either, about any of this. Olivia and Elliot were probably dead since they had both ran in after Sal. It sent a fresh wave of tears to Nick's own eyes, but her hurriedly brushed them away. Fin and Casey might never even come back. Hopefully they hadn't and they were lounging somewhere that was thousands of miles away from here. But he knew that it was his own wishful thinking, not a plausible explanation.

"Guys," Greg interrupted, "we have to keep walking or we're never going to get there." They all knew it was true, but it took more effort then necessary for Nick to lay a tender kiss on Alex's forehead and for the both of them to pull themselves off the ground.

They continued on their way walking, Greg basically the only one talking, telling them about his life from his start in California to his desire to move up here, a place seemingly so peaceful and wonderful.

Alex was really thankful for Greg's consistent talking. It filled the awkward silence that would have been. He actually even seemed happy telling them about his past, as though he had wanted to get it all out for a while. It was really nice though to hear someone talk, someone that had also been through hell. It was definitely a wonder how he was talking so normally, yet Alex had a feeling that he was good at concealing his feelings, somewhat like Olivia. She shook her head. Just a normal thought of Olivia, not being dead upset her. She didn't want to get her hopes up and think she would ever see her best friend again. Everywhere in her heart, she did have hope. But she continued to deny the hope she had because if she admitted she had it, it would hurt so much more when she found out she would never see Liv again.