Not According To Plan (Preath Fanfiction) (Co-written by @uswntloves1723)

8: The Daily Grind

Tobin's POV
Time: At some point in "Day 2"

Allie and Kelley stare with blank faces, and I'm sure I look the same.

"OK ladies!" Maxine appears next to Enzo, motioning to us sober ones. "Up for work."

"What the fuck did you do to them?" Kelley shouts. In a matter of moments, Megan and Ash have toppled over each other like French fries, completely out of it. We reach to unbind them, but Maxine kicks the gate.

"Let. Them. Sleep." Her coloured lips form a sneer, and the whip hangs out her belt. All of us see it.

We shut our mouths, but I'm seething, jaw clenched beyond my front teeth so much it almost hurts. Once again, Maxine and Enzo blindfold Allie, Kelley and me, leaving the other two behind. They take us down the long hallway, cement hard beneath my feet. I'm in the middle, Enzo's ring piercing my tricep. Still, it's a lot better to be pushed than dragged.

When we finally stop, the blindfolds are tugged from our heads. In front of us is a long work table laden with wooden sticks and thin pieces of metal.

"You're going to be making stakes and knives," Maxine orders with a shove.

"Um, for what, exactly?" Allie asks.

"Zat, I cannot tell you."

"Of course not," I mumble. I'm not even sure I want to know. What I do want to know is why these criminals have the confidence to put weapons into our hands. But I just know they're going to get busted. With Megan and Ash in here, the authorities must be looking everywhere for us now. As much as I hate to say it, we're worth money, and money matters. This can't last much longer.

Enzo pulls us apart, pushing Allie far to my left and Kelley to my right.

Maxine stands before us. "Each of you has one butterknife. If you do anything stupid, it will not be pretty," she says, like we even have the energy to do anything stupid.

"Seems like menial work," Kelley smirks. "Will we be getting a paycheck, or...?"

Maxine rubs her brow. "Mon Dieu, do you ever shut up?"

"We're soccer players, Miss," I say, making sure the focus isn't on Kelley alone. "It's part of our job description to talk a lot."

"And loudly," Allie adds.

"Not here it isn't!" Enzo finally uses his voice. "Eyes down at your hands."

I've never made a stake before, so I'm careful not to make a mistake. They must think we're vampires or something. I just hope these weapons aren't going to be used against us in any way. I'm scared-but not for me. Yes, they hurt Allie and me badly, but with just one night's sleep, I can already feel the bruise on my eye changing colour. We're soccer players. We can take pain. What terrifies me most is the worry this mess has caused. How Chris must be feeling. My mom, my dad, my sweet nephew if he knows...

As much as I hate to say it, what Enzo said is right. I must focus on the task at hand, which is frankly much less grueling than soccer practice. I can't work without music, so while Maxine opens a frozen dinner in the corner, I quietly hum "Swervin'". Tapping my feet on the echoey floor, I pray the song will chill me out a little. Kelley recognizes my slow version of the beat.

"Uh, yeah," she sings. "On da track, run that shit back."

Allie joins in. "We got Harry on the track, Swervin'," she raps along.

The unity I feel takes away all my inhibitions. "How you look so perfect on your worst days?" I sing out loud and terribly. The falsehood of that statement cracks us all up.

"Be quiet," Enzo chides.

"The acoustics are great in here," I say, looking at him. As soon as our eyes meet, the moment before he gut-punched me comes flooding back. Like I caught a glimpse of something innocent inside him, something on the brink of pouring out that he's constantly trying to swallow down. But I maintain my tone. "Are you really telling us we can't even sing?"

His eyes dart toward Maxine, who glares as harshly at him as she did us. "Yes," he says as sternly as I believe he can muster.

The moment of hope evaporates in the ceiling, and all because of me. How I wish I could just tell Chris that I'm okay, that we're all okay. I try to imagine that she's next to me: that the concrete is clean turf, that the buzzing lights are field lights, that the stains on the ceiling are clouds in the open roof of a stadium. But like meditation, this vision doesn't last for long, as wood shavings hit my feet and bring me back to reality.

I look over at Allie, who's grown progressively quieter since they first dropped her in my cube. "Psst, Harry," I whisper.

She jolts her head in my direction, eyebrows raised. I give her a thumbs up, asking if she's okay.

She nods without thinking about it, so I know she really isn't. Of course, none of us are okay. The emotions have been up and down this entire time. If Megan and Ash are just delirious from whatever pill they gave Allie and possibly me, they'll snap out of it soon enough. I just have to have my head on straight when the others are down, and trust they'll do the same for me. Keep my head in the game, for them.

"When do we get to eat again, your majesty?" Kelley asks after a few minutes. She's always hungry.

Then again, so am I. "Yeah, same question," I say.

Maxine shrugs, finishing her Michelina's fettuccine alfredo, which I can smell from here. "Not up to me. I'm not the majesty."

"But you're his message girl or something, aren't you? His sidekick? His daughter?" Kelley laughs. "Or perhaps his slut?"

"I care nothing for him!" Maxine slams her fork into the tray, then points her finger at Kelley. "You know nothing you say."

Kelley flinches, then regains her stance. "Okay, jeez. But for the record, you don't have to care about someone to be their bitch."

Maxine's nostrils flare, and a flush of fear prickles my neck, but to my surprise, her finger falls and she says nothing more.

After a while longer, I'm finally done with my stake. Using my body to hide what I'm doing, I carve a little 'T' into the bottom of the handle, big enough to be visible but not quite noticeable. I don't do this because I'm proud of my creation-the whole thing sickens me-but because whenever the real police find us, especially if anything happens, I want there to be clues.

I nod my head for Kelley's attention and show her. Allie watching as well, I point to the bottom of the stake, and use my fingers to hint "small." They follow my lead and carve their own letters.

Seeing that we're done, Maxine points at a circular saw in the corner adjacent to her and instructs us to grind down the blades and attach handles. She then leaves with her empty cardboard container.

"What do they want with all these weapons?" Kelley whispers. "There's only five of us."

"We don't know that," I say. "We didn't even know you were here until this morning."

"Maybe they're preparing in case the police come," says Allie.

"But if there's only three of them, what good will that do?"

"Three that we know of," Kelley says, using my former logic. "And five of us that we know of. But it doesn't make sense that they'd let us outnumber them."

In the reflection of the metal machinery, I catch something moving through the back door window. "No," I start. "No, no, no!"

Knife in hand, I lunge for the doorway as I see Megan and Ash being transported through the hall in potato sacks, the exact same way Allie and I were before they beat on us. I have no control over my body or my tongue. "No, don't hurt them!" I scream as I smash the window. "Let them go! Don't-"

But Enzo's stationed too close, and before I can even attempt to get the door down, he covers my fist and my mouth and restrains me.

I guess I can't keep my head on straight after all.

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A/N: Sorry for the hiatus guys! Thank you for reading, and please stay tuned for the next chapter, which will be Christen's <3