Pain slipped through the edges of Zac's consciousness. His wrists burned and his back ached from strain. His breath rattled in his chest, wet and heavy. Breathing hurt in a way that could only mean one of his ribs was cracked, putting pressure on his lungs.

Zac, like all elves, did not “sleep” in the same fashion as a human. Humans spent roughly eight hours out of twenty four completely unconscious, with their subconscious minds flashing imagery at them while their bodies repaired and regenerated the damages of the day. For elves, the process was a dreamless, floating trance. Unless, of course, the elf in question was exhausted beyond their body's capacity to function, or unless some jack ass had decided to dump drugs into their coffee! In which case, yes, elves dreamed. Usually nightmares in Zac's case.

Therefore, when Zac awoke to screaming pain and the equally painful realization that someone he had trusted had betrayed, kidnapped, and hurt him he almost let himself slip back into darkness, in the hopes that he would wake a second time to find it had all been a nightmare.

The pain wouldn't let him slip back under, though. It was too sharp and immediate.

He pried one eye open, but it didn't help. He was in utter darkness. He had a limited form of something like infrared vision, but that showed only a flat surface. Probably a wall. Not informative. He was inside, and interior places tended to have walls.

He assessed himself and his situation. He was dangling by his wrists, his feet just slightly brushed the ground if he strained and stretched. This movement also informed him that he was barefoot, and tucking his chin down to his chest he realized he'd lost his shirt somewhere, too. He shivered; not because the room was chilly, which it was, but because he didn't think he wanted to know why his captors had seen fit to partially strip him and hang him up like a pinata at a child's party.

Although it hurt like fire, he moved his hands and arms as much as his bindings would allow. It wasn't much. Someone had been thorough, binding his wrists to either side of a metal pipe, using steel chains. He wasn't breaking out of this. Steel burned elvin flesh at contact; not quite like acid or fire but still painfully. Left bound like this long enough Zac might lose the use of his hands. Left too long, the damage might be permanent.

Why? What had Zac possibly done, to arouse Alex's suspicion? What had exposed him? Why was he doing this?

He never hurt anyone! Not… not in Alex's lifetime, anyway. He’d hidden himself away for decades, emerging from his shelter only to pursue scholarship and seek the young ones for companionship. Sure, he was a warrior but he hadn’t drawn a blade in ages! Never had need to. Swung some punches, maybe, but only to defend the young and the naive. Surely no one could take exception to that!

Yet… here he was. Bound by iron in the darkness.

What were they going to do to him? Who were they?

Metal scraped against metal behind him. Zac twisted, but couldn't move enough to see. He heard footsteps, heavy breathing, rustling cloth. Several humans, presumably, entered the room. He breathed in, smelled sweat, fear, shampoo, and Alex's preferred brand of aftershave. There was a click, and a bulb somewhere behind Zac flickered to life.

He started talking before any of them could start asking questions. He needed to get some control of the whole mess, even if it was just the illusion of control. He hoped to startle them slightly; humans relied on sight, they might think he was unaware of their presence. Or still unconscious.

“Well, you got me. One trussed up... elf...” he trailed off, waiting. There were no gasps or sounds of confusion. They knew what he was. At least they knew what species he was. If they really knew what he was, they'd have used a lot more chains.

“Can't say I'm much of a prize,” Zac continued, “but I'm game. What is it you hope to accomplish here?”

“We ask the questions here, freak!” Alex shouted.

“So, ask.”

Someone stepped directly behind him. He felt the bite of steel against his spine and yelped; two tiny points of metal pressed against the small of his back. There was a click, and his back exploded in agony. His muscles seized violently. His jaw snapped closed with a teeth rattling clatter, choking back the scream he hadn't even realized he was trying to make.

It went on for ever, or for maybe half a minute, he wasn't really able to count. Then the device was pulled away from his back, leaving a burning point of pain where it had touched him and echoes of lightning throughout his body.

“How'd you like that, freak?” Alex asked.

Zac tried to turn his head enough to see his treacherous friend, but he lacked the muscle control.

Alex moved around in front of him, flanked by two strangers. One was a boy about the age of the students at the university, maybe nineteen or twenty. He looked vaguely familiar, with sandy blonde hair and a scattering of freckles across his nose. Probably Zac had seen him around campus. The other man was a massive example of humanity. His eyes were level with Zac's, even with Zac dangling several inches above the ground. He was bald, and his muscles had muscles. His brown shirt strained at his chest and biceps. There was an icon on the shirt, a letter H wrapped around a stylized I. That didn't mean much to Zac but he memorized the design hoping he could find out who these people were and what they wanted.

The big one gripped Zac by the hair, jerked his head to the side.

“Tell us what we want to know, and we might not have to get rough,” he growled.

“You haven't,” Zac winced as his hair was yanked, “haven't asked me anything!”

“What did you do with Taylor Page?” the young one demanded.

Zac blinked. “Taylor who?” He had a pretty good idea, actually. It had to be the child he'd taken back to the boy's dorm last night. But what did they want with a random young human? He wasn't about to hand over someone else to these madmen.

“The boy you kidnapped! Last freaking night!” Alex slapped him hard. Probably hurt Alex's hand more than Zac's face, though.

“I didn't kidnap anyone,” Zac said.

“I know you did! You got him drunk, separated him from his friends, and lured him away! I have witnesses!” the boy yelled.

Zac shrugged. “I never got any boy drunk, last night at least.” There'd been a few too young soldiers, time and again, who needed to forget and needed to be kept safe while they did. But that was generations ago.

“Liar!”

Zac glared. “I've never lied to you, Alexander Ferrell. Never once.”

Alex jerked back at the use of his name, glaring.

“Don't think your elf tricks will work on me, freak!” Alex yelled.

“Wha-” Zac's baffled question was interrupted by the press of metal against his back, and once again lightning tore through his body. He flailed, unable even to try to move away from the pain. Unable even to scream as his throat locked up.

Finally it ended. Someone, he didn't bother to see who, slapped him. Okay. No using full names. They must believe the old fairy tales, about names giving power. They kind of did but not like Alex thought.

“Where is the boy?” Alex demanded “What did you do to him?”

“Nothing,” Zac said. “I did literally nothing to him. I did not give an underage human child alcohol, I did not lure him anywhere.” He paused. Blinked. “I did take him back to his dorm? Is that what this is about? Is the boy missing? I left him in the lobby of his dorm, I'm sure of it. I buzzed the Resident Assistant to come find him.”

Alex, strangely enough, looked to the boy. Who shrugged.

“I got a buzz, yeah, but coulda been from anyone. And the lobby was empty except for Taylor, and he was gone by the morning.”

“You are Taylor's resident assistant?” Zac asked.

“I don't gotta answer you,” the boy said with a sneer to cover the still very present fear in his voice.

“Okay, no you don't,” Zac panted, “but you could maybe make sure he's really missing, not, I don't know, in class?”

“Thought you didn't know who I was talking about,” Alex pointed out.

“I never knew the kid's name,” Zac admitted.

“So, what, you just walked him home out of the goodness of your heart?” Alex mocked.

Zac watched as the boy walked around him, and heard a heavy door open but not close. Hopefully he was going to make the call, not just flee the room.

“Yeah,” Zac said. “Why not? Party was getting rough, didn't wanna see a kid hurt. You'd do the same thing.”

He thought Alex was the kind of guy to keep a kid out of trouble, anyway. Maybe he was wrong. The boy out in the hall could barely be twenty, if that. Fear made him seem even younger. If Alex thought Zac so very dangerous, why did he allow the boy to participate in this farce?

“Holy crap,” the boy's voice echoed through the still open door, “Freak told the truth. Taylor's in class!”

There was a moment of stunned silence. Zac was, partly, glad his good deed hadn't gotten an inebriated child hurt and also glad this seemed to be nearly over. Surely with the proof he wasn't a kidnapper they would let him go. He'd have to promise not to go to the authorities, but really what were the odds of him ever doing such a thing? He had much more to lose than they did by public exposure. Sometimes it sucked having to hide what he was. Still. Couldn't expose his entire species over one violent misunderstanding.

“So the freak did a good deed. Don't change what it is,” said one of the men who was still out of sight behind him.

“And what am I?” Zac asked.

“That's what we're going to find out,” Alex declared ominously. “Keep cooperating, maybe we won't have to hurt you too much.”

Zac's head fell to his chest. This wasn't over after all.

Damn.