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Chapter 3 (In Chris' perspective)

The concrete pavement where I was lying was bare and unforgiving, I was curled up in a fetal position with my muscles clenched and for the life of me I couldn't unclench my paws or move myself.

As a moment passed, I realised I was lying in some sort of puddle, I could feel my fur starting to soak it up, was it my blood or my tears? There was a figure standing over me, it was speaking but why couldn't I hear it? My heart was pounding hard as if it was going to break out and leave me. I had no memory, no movement and no choice, but to lay there and wait to be finished off or left there to rot.

As the figure picked me up I let out a whine and he gently held me over his back. This motion made my head spin in all directions and for a moment my vision hazed up. Now that I was upright I started to involuntarily and violently cough up blood, once It started it didn't stop, each cough stinging more and spraying blood further. I could open my eyes now but all I could see was what seemed to be a coyotes back. He was well built but was skinny and could easily be mistaken for a large hyena, I recognized his bright electric stripes from somewhere, I just couldn't put my paw on where.

My tiredness and exhaustion flooded me along side the rush of adrenaline, my body felt numb and I could barely feel his dark red fur shoulder under my maw. I struggled a little, squirming a bit from side to side but the pain stung like salt on a wound. Worn out, tired and badly beaten I let out a deep moan before falling asleep right on the coyotes back.

---

"Morning Chris," He left a small pause before continuing, "Haven't seen you in a long time." He spoke slowly, or was that just me? I tilted my head and observed the silhouette in front of me, "Wha-?" Sudden realisation grasped me and I realised where I knew him from.

"Max!" I shouted ecstatically. Max was the closest of what few friends I had. He had helped out in the mental unit where I was sent. Even though introductions were difficult as I was gagged and in a straightjacket, for one reason or another, we still ended up as close friends. "I finally found you!" I still spoke in my excited voice not letting haunting memories ruin my mood.

I looked around, I was on his bed lying flat with a few pillows behind my head. My runaway pack was nowhere in sight but I didn't let it bother me.

He chuckled a bit before replying, "Yes It's me, but don't get me wrong I'm quite sure I've found you." He said playfully.

I giggled at this and leaned up to embrace him but was grounded by his paw on my chest, "Don't get up, you're badly hurt"He said lying down next to me and wrapping a loving arm around my back.

"What happened last night?" I asked him recollecting little of yesterday's events.

"You were beaten pretty badly, you didn't even try to defend yourself at all." he said softly as he rubbed my belly fur, making me murr quietly.

"Wha-?who by?" I managed to spit out in between pleasurable murrs. He stroked my head gently but no matter how gentle he was I could still feel the large tumour like swellings on my skull which made me flinch in pain.

"Chris, I don't know. All I saw was a bear and another fur running off. Do you know them?" he asked stroking my back to comfort me. Sudden realisation hit me hard when I realised what had happened.

"Y-yea, I know the bear, I kinda knocked him out when I got mad" I said bashfully only now realising that he got the last laugh.

He let out a chuckle at this as he carried on "So how come you didn't fight? You had your knife" he said holding the nightmare black blade up. I got worked up about this and sobbed a bit, I couldn't manage to explain, just to point at the battered collar that I had tried to remove manually. He noticed this and gently hugged me again trying to comfort me, "I see, that explains why you were in such a sorry state when I found you"

"C-can you get it off?" I pleaded, this was the only thing tying me down from escaping. If I managed to get it off then the prospect of escape was still there, although I would need to rest here to heal up before I left.

"Sure, but I don't want you running off, at least not for now" he said plainly before hesitantly producing some bolt cutters from under the bed and cutting it off in one clean strike.

"Thank you!" I said happily rubbing the fur on my neck that had matted due to the tight collar.

"Stay in bed for now, I'll go to make you some food" He said rubbing my tummyfur before heading downstairs. I nodded and turned slowly on the bed, trying to get some more sleep. This wouldn't be that bad, I can stay here for a bit, safely, then I will find my way.

---

Chapter 4 (In Max's perspective)

I left the kit alone for a while, some rest would do him good. With all this on my head there was one thing bothering me in particular, that was Dan, Chris couldn't stay here. Whatever they wanted to do with him, they needed to do. I thought to myself about this for a longer time, Dan needed to know although Chris trusts me and I really don't want to break that. The least I could do was explain the situation to him, right?. I hesitantly picked up the phone and dialled Dan's number. After what seemed like an eternity of hearing the dialling tone I heard his impatient voice;

"Hello, what?"

Nice to see that Dan hadn't changed since last I spoke with him, I never did understand why he hated me this much. "Hey Dan, its Max. I have some good news and some bad news for you." I said trying not to sound arrogant, but after years of his hatred burdening me I couldn't help it much.

"Max, what the hell do you want?" he said ignoring what I said.

"Chris is here. He's badly hurt he wa-"

"What the hell did you do! I always knew you couldn't be trusted" he interrupted abruptly, speaking in a harsh and unforgiving voice.

"Hey! It wasn't my fault, I found him being beaten senseless because you put that damned collar on him making him unable to defend himself" I snapped back having heard enough of his crap.

"You are an idiot, you always dosomething stupid and get yourself and others hurt" he said lowering his voice slightly, he still wasn't listening to what I was saying. Same old Dan.

"That's unimportant, I would never let anyone else do something stupid and I would never put Chris in harm, Its your damned fault he ran away so don't try and pin it on me" I said flattening his defence in a slightly harsh tone.

"How is he?" he asked changing the subject after a long sigh.

I was glad he had calmed down, although hoped that he could find an ounce of reasonability. "He's safe. His wounds are healing and I was just about to grab some food for him, he should stay here until he's better then you can do whatever you like, alright?" I said confidently thinking that would work unless Chris ran away first.

Dan let out a moan of frustration and hatefully said, "Keep him there" before hanging up.

Well now I understand why Chris ran away, I would too if I were in his position. I thought as I heated up some soup and brought it back to the sleeping fox.

I gently stroked his belly to wake him up, he responded immediately by purring and murmuring.

"You have to eat something, then get some more rest, come on open up" I said softly as I held a spoon full next to his maw. He resisted a bit by turning his head away, not liking the prospect of being fed. "Come on, it will be easier and quicker if I feed you. Plus its not like I haven't done it enough times when we were in the unit" I added, chuckling at my own joke.

With a little fuss and a bit of a whine he gave in mumbling something under his breath that was barely audible. I spoon fed him the soup until it was all gone. "Any good?" I asked noting that he was still very tired, he only responded with a soft nod and lay his head back down to sleep. I gently stroked his back waiting for him to fall asleep before leaving to go eat for myself and watch some TV until the evening.

---

Chapter 5 (In Chris' perspective)

I had slept on and off for what seemed to be ages as it was now night. I was woken by the sudden opening and sharp closing of van doors. I panicked, it was probably nothing but I took no chances, I staggered up to the window to find Dan and some other people coming towards the house alongside a police car. Shit, Not again! I thought I was safe here, that I was going to be fine, what happened to change that?

_ _

I shook my head frantically trying to find my runaway bag. It wasn't here, nor was my knife, I guess I would have to go just like this then. I bolted quickly to the other room which faced the garden, there was a greenhouse just underneath the window that I could climb onto, I flung open the window and stumbled out onto the glass panes quickly. Just as I jumped down from there I met the eyes of everyone out to get me, all gathered up in the living room facing the back garden, where I was.

Max stood there hand cuffed as the officers took him away, he just looked at me, frowned and softly shook his head. I felt horribly guilty, what had he done to deserve this? Dan was screaming at the top of his lungs but I completely ignored every word, it was probably crap anyway. Luckily for me the back door that Dan was banging on and frustratedly trying to open was locked, I gently slid down the angled side of the glass house and landed softly on the ground. I looked back again to see that Max had now been taken away, Dan unfortunately was still there.

Dan seemed to have stopped shouting now and instead looked like he had reached the pleading and bargaining stage, shame I wasn't interested. Finally setting my mind on my escape route I turned and with perfect precision I jumped the fence that lead to an alley behind. I turned to run down the alley that would take me onto the main road, they would soon be out of the house and back to chasing after me. I got to the large road and looked around the corner where I was going to check it was clear, when I saw it was I carried on down the side of the road that I hoped they wouldn't follow.

I heard the screeching tires in the distance and shifted into a full out sprint on all fours, it wouldn't be long before they found me. My heart was racing as rapidly as my mind now, oblivious to my surroundings all I could think about was the look on Max's face, I also felt sorry for Dan, it wasn't his fault he just always does what he thinks is right which unfortunately is sometimes wrong, or at least can be when it applies to me.

I could see their car turning the corner I was panicking, now I was pushing my body as far as it would go. Luckily we still had some distance between us and I could see a large woodlands that I could easily disappear into. Ahead of me was a junction that looked to be clear, I continued to run at full pelt towards the woods still keeping an eye on who was giving chase. As I was looking back at how far away they were my attention was suddenly diverted to the agonising blaring horn that was coming towards me.

I had no time to get out of the way of the car and I was right in his path, pulling my arms to my face I braced myself for the impact. Having shut my eyes all I could feel was worry and myself shaking, everything went slow for a moment as I tightened up. I never felt the impact, just the feeling of turning and everything spinning around me as I did feel myself hit the ground on my side and then everything went out.