Chapter 18

Sol sat anxiously, and quietly, in Room two with the rest of his gang. He'd been in situations like this many times before; where his gang had been attacked and someone had been injured bad enough to need a hospital bed, but there was something about this that didn't sit with him well. When Sol had stopped that man initially going near Lex after they'd left the truck, he'd made a promise with himself that he'd look after her. Seeing the fear in her eyes when she bashed into him in the truck, he knew she wasn't someone who was used to the madness of a criminal life. She continued to surprise him though; saying witty comments that made him smile, sticking up for the gang and saving them from punishment in the prison, diffusing situations that would have otherwise been bad for one - or all - of them. She made her mark with the team, but also more importantly with Solomon both in his head and in his heart. He knew he could trust her and she'd proven herself time and again, especially recently, that she really cared about all of them. Sadly though, her dedication to the team had ended up with her in the hospital, alarms blaring as Sol heard a myriad of heavy footsteps run into the room beside them.

"Shit." Raj breathed out, his head wrapped up with bandages holding the gauze across his newly stitched head injury. "That sounds really bad." The team stayed silent, trying desperately to hear anything going on in the room to gauge how bad it was. Sol wrung his hands as he could hear the shouts through the closed doors.

"This is serious, Sol. We need to make sure none of us go anywhere without protection." Ty said quickly, panicked that one of his friends could end up in as bad of a state as Lex. Sol's gaze shot over to him, and then to Raj.

"Funnily enough, I thought we had already established that. It was Raj's hot head that got us into this mess." Sol was finally vocalising the anger and frustration at what had occurred today. Raj rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"You told me to go and take a walk." Raj reminded him, desperate not to take the blame for Lex's condition. Sol's head shot towards the rest of the team sitting there, looking at each one individually as if studying them while he spoke.

"After Toby got attacked, we had information that we needed to take advantage of. Lex managed to not only save Toby, but also to overhear that a woman had planned for this to happen. I told everyone to be alert, to walk in groups because anyone in this prison could have been bought out to attack us. And then all of you let Raj go by himself. Lex - the one who Raj had just called out as not being honest - was the one who went after him, ran back to us to get more help and then leapt into a fight with eight... EIGHT... people by herself." His voice was raising with each sentence, causing the others to sit back as far as they could in their chairs. "If this is a lesson to be learnt, fucking learn it quickly. All of us have a target on our backs, none of us are safe and none of us will be spared. The attacks have already ramped up, sooner or later one of us will end up seriously injured or dead if we don't stay alert and help each other..." his tone was back being quiet, laced with a morbid fear that made everyone's hairs on the back of their neck stand on end. "We already lost one valuable member of the team, God Bless Gio, I am not going to lose anyone else." The pep talk had helped Sol, but terrified everyone else. There was a short silence before Raj spoke up.

"It was a lapse in my judgment to think Lex wasn't here for us. I am really sorry about that." Raj hung his head low as he took in the gravity of that moment. Yes, he was hesitant about letting someone new into the team. Yes, he was suspicious that she was a woman. Most women only appeared when they wanted to get into Sol's pants, or to get protection from someone they'd annoyed initially. No one had ever appeared out of nowhere and been good for them, and Raj felt like that needed to be aired out before everyone just welcomed Lex with open arms. It had, instead however, caused everyone to get hurt. Had he not said that, he'd never have had to go for a walk to calm himself down. He wouldn't have gone out alone. He wouldn't have been jumped on by eight people. Lex wouldn't have come after him, called for backup and taken hits for him, Eddy wouldn't have been injured, and Ty, Sol and Toby wouldn't need to be hiding in here silently with me whilst they tried to save her. He could tell it hit Sol the hardest. He never really opened himself up to let people in, the only people he ever trusted were in this room with him. And Gio. Once Gio was gone, Sol seemed to harden himself even more; gone were the days the guys would all sit together and drink beer, talking about their lives and their past. He never joined in anymore. It was as if he was distancing himself from everyone emotionally, just to stop the hurt happening again.
Yet here he was, hands clasped in his lap, staring out at the door just waiting for some news from Dr Forrester. The alarms finally died down and the room fell even more silent than it had been all this time. Every person waited with bated breath, hoping the silence was a good thing rather than a bad thing. The memories of Gio were fresh in everyone's mind, the situations so similar back then. Sol shot to his feet and began pacing and muttering to himself. Under his breath, Raj just about made out that he was running through who could have been responsible for this, trying to piece together the mastermind before anyone else ended up buried in the ground.

"Sol, it'll be okay." Toby put his hand on Sol's shoulder. It caused him to stop still.

"She'd better be." He snarled before he continued pacing. They heard all the footsteps leave the room, this time a lot slower and quieter than when they were called in. The door finally closed, and the handle to their door rattled as it was opened. Every one of them stared, unblinking, as the door swung open and Dr Forrester slowly walked in, his head hung low. Holding their breath collectively , they waited for his update.

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