They listened again to Justin yell and JC had managed to pick out what he said. He wasted no time in telling the others. He bolted toward the front door. Joey and Chris gave each other knowing looks and took off after JC. They reached Justin and couldn’t believe their eyes. Lance was home! JC moved to kneel beside Justin.

"Is he going to be ok?" Justin asked looking at JC with teary eyes. JC looked Lance over. He could see multiple bruises, but nothing else so he began to run his fingers gently down Lance’s body. He felt the break in Lance’s broken arm and continued his examination.

"Yeah, I think so. His left arm is broken and he has several fractured ribs. We don’t need to take him to the hospital though. I have everything I need here to fix him up. Joey, help me lift Lance up and take him into the living room. Taking him upstairs would jostle his body too much and we don’t want that." JC explained. Joey nodded and took the opposite end that JC wasn’t at. They lifted Lance up very gently and carried him into the living room and put him on the couch without Lance waking up at all.

"Alright. I’ll be right back. I’m going to get what I need. You guys keep an eye on him and let me know if anything happens." JC instructed as he headed for the basement where his equipment was. He gathered everything he needed as fast as he could and managed to carry it all back.

"Did anything happen?" JC asked and they all shook their heads while moving out of the way so JC could do what he needed. JC first put Lance’s left arm in a cast then moved onto bandaging his torso. "I think that about does it. One thing’s for sure. He’ll have one hell of a headache when he wakes up."

"What do you think happened to him?" Joey spoke up; as he looked Lance’s bruised, beaten, pale body over. JC shook his head.

"I’m not sure. All I know is that he’s home now and we’re gonna take great care of him until he feels up to par." The guys all nodded in agreement.

After a long silence filled the room it was broken with Chris saying, "We should go to bed. I think we’ll be able to sleep better now that Lance is home. We haven’t really gotten any sleep."

Justin and Joey agreed with Chris but JC didn’t. "I think I’m going to stay up just incase Lance needs anything."

"JC, I really think you should get some sleep. You’ve gotten the least sleep out of all of us. Besides, Lance will be sleeping."

"I know. I just want to be here incase he needs someone." JC explained looking Chris hard in the eyes. Chris just sighed and gave in. He knew there was no changing his mind when he got that look.

"Ok. See you in the morning." The guys left after saying good night. Once they had left JC pulled a chair closer the couch and sat down in it. He couldn’t believe this was happening. He suddenly felt anger surge through his body. He was mad that something like this happened to Lance and he couldn’t do anything to prevent it. Then there was movement that came from the couch, which caught JC’s attention. He watched as Lance struggled to overcome unconsciousness before he finally opened his eyes. After Lance opened his eyes, JC took a brief look at the clock. It read 2: 39 a.m.

JC’s attention was drawn back to Lance when he tried to sit up. JC immediately pushed him back down and Lance winced in pain. "Yeah. It would be a good idea if you don’t move. You have a couple fractured ribs. Do you need anything?"

"Wa…water." Lance managed to rasp out. JC nodded. "I’ll be back with your water." He returned a couple minutes later and handed Lance the glass of water. Lance drank half of the glass before JC pulled the glass away from him.

"Don’t want you to get sick." JC explained and Lance nodded. JC sat there and watched Lance for a few minutes. He noticed that his eyelids were starting to droop. "Go ahead and go to sleep. You’re home now and nothing else is going to happen. I’ll be right here when you wake up." Lance fell asleep soon after hearing this and JC went back to thinking. It bugged him that he didn’t know what happened with Lance. He wanted to find out but didn’t want to press Lance when he first woke up.

Then JC began to reminisce about everything before this whole mess started beginning with Lance seeing a murder. Eventually JC fell asleep and letting all of the problems lay at rest for now.

Chris was the first one up that morning. Joey soon followed but Justin remained sleeping. Neither Joey nor Chris had the heart to wake him up since he got just a little more sleep than JC did. This situation had affected Justin a lot because he always looked up to Lance, as well as the rest of the guys, as older brothers and it scared him what had happened to Lance. Chris and Joey moved downstairs into the living room to find a scene that surprised them.

They saw JC sleeping in one of the kitchen chairs and his arm laid on top of Lance’s to show that he was there. Chris and Joey thought Lance was asleep but was surprised when he greeted them.

"Hey. How are you feeling?" Joey asked.

"Better. I feel like I’ve been hit by a train but better. I’m just glad to be home. I missed you guys."

"We missed you too." Joey and Chris wanted to hug Lance but didn’t want to wake up JC so they decided against it. "I’d hug you right now but I don’t want to wake Sleepy up." Joey explained.

"Who said I’m sleeping?" Came a tired reply from JC. He looked up at Joey with a small smile. JC got up to stretch while Chris and Joey hugged Lance. Each of them held onto each other longer than they’ve ever done before. Chris finally broke the embrace and surveyed JC. He concluded that he didn’t get that much sleep because he looked worse than he did before, if that was possible.

"What time did you go to bed?" Chris asked.

JC yawned before answering. "Lance woke up around 2:30 and I went to bed a little after 4:30. What time is it now?" Joey looked at his watch.

"It’s six in the morning. Man, you hardly got any sleep at all. Aren’t you tired?" JC just shrugged. Just then the phone rang.

"I’ll get it." JC said picking up the cordless that sat on the TV. "Hello?"

"Yes this is him."

"Uh huh. Really? That’s great! So it’s all over now? Great. Thanks so much for your help. Uh huh. Bye." JC hung up the phone and looked at the guys.

"Who was that?" Chris asked.

"That was Detective Bartley. He said they caught the people who kidnapped Lance last night. They were robbing a convenience store since they hadn’t got the money from us. He says it’s over. Both of them get life in jail because they’ve had a long crime history." JC explained. Everyone was quiet, letting what he said sink in.

"You mean it’s finally over? He can’t hurt any more?" Lance whispered looking into JC’s blue eyes that we filled with concern and brotherly love.

"Yes, it’s over. He can’t hurt another soul as long as he lives." JC replied looking back into Lance’s eyes that were still filled with pain but there was also relief. Just then Chris and Joey started jumping for joy and slapping high fives with everyone. Justin came into the room in the middle of this, rubbing his eyes.

"What’s going on?" The others filled him in on what they had found out on the telephone and Justin started celebrating with them. Eventually everyone’s energy died off and they were sitting around the living room relaxing.

JC decided to bring up what he had been thinking about for a while. "It’s great to have you back home, Lance. I just want to know one thing. How did you get here? It’s obvious that you didn’t come by car because of the mud and how banged up you were."

Lance sighed deeply and closed his eyes while he told the tale, reliving it. "After I got off the phone with you, they took me into this car. The guy had told me how I wasn’t going to see you guys again because this was all just a scam and that he might drop me off when they got to Mexico. I figured if I stayed with them then I would get killed. So I jumped out of the car and rolled down the hill. My left arm hit against something hard and I could feel the bone break. I made sure I was actually alive before pushing myself toward your house. All I could think about was getting home and here I am."

The guys all moved closer toward Lance. "Well we’re glad that you’re ok and made it here. We were so afraid of what happened to you. We were really worried. JC was a real mess." Justin said.

"What do you mean was? He still is a mess." Joey joked half-heartedly because it was kind of true. He could still see the worry in JC’s eyes. JC didn’t rise to defend himself. He was too tired to even think of a good comeback.

"JC? JC? Hello? Is anybody home?" Chris asked waving a hand in front of JC’s face. JC snapped from his trance where his mind had just gone blank. Once Chris knew he had JC’s attention he said, "Are you ok, JC?"

"Yeah I’m fine. Why?"

"Why?" Justin asked incredulously. "Because you were so far gone and you had this blank look on your face."

"I’m just tired, J." JC replied.

"Well then go to bed." Joey said.

"I don’t know…" JC was trying to protest. Chris gave him a hard look and then looked at Lance and saw that he looked just as tired as JC. This gave him an idea.

"No way. You’re not getting out of this. You haven’t slept or eaten ever since Lance left. So you’re going to eat some breakfast with Lance and then both of you are going to bed." Chris explained leaving no room for argument. JC stopped trying to protest seeing that it was useless. Instead, he got out of the chair and helped Lance off the couch. JC made Lance use him to support his weight and took them into the kitchen where they both sat down next to each other. The other three made a quick breakfast for JC and Lance. Both of them ate mostly in silence with a few words said here and there.

They had finished and Joey and Justin escorted them upstairs to their room. They both lay down in their beds. Once Joey and Justin left, JC rolled over on his side, facing Lance. Lance remembered that he wanted to ask JC something.

"JC?"

"Hm?" JC responded looking at Lance.

"Is it true what Chris said? You haven’t been eating or sleeping since I had been kidnapped?"

"Yeah. I was too worried about you to sleep and I was too busy thinking to remember that I needed to eat. The guys bought pizza and I ate a piece of that but that was it. I just couldn’t stand to eat not knowing if you were being fed or not. This was driving all of us crazy. I just handled it the wrong way."

"I can’t believe you did that. You’re always the strong one. I never would have thought that you would reach a breaking point."

"Yeah me either. I’m glad this is over."

"Me too, JC. Me too." That being said, both of them fell into a dreamless sleep; the first one for Lance in months. This was a definite sign that Lance was going to be ok. Chris came up later to check up on the two of them. They were both sleeping peacefully. Chris knew that there were still some obstacles that Lance would face like getting over what happened to him but he knew that everyone and everything would get back to normal. There was no doubt in his mind about this. He knew though that these two would help each other to the end. Chris stole one more look at JC and Lance before tiptoeing out the door.

A/N:  Well, that's the end. I hope everyone enjoyed it. It's not the best story I've written, but I'm fond of it. I hope you are too. Anyway, I want to thank everyone for reviewing. Hopefully next weekend I'll have a new story up for you guys to read.