Disclaimer: See initial chapter

A/N: I've been sitting on this chapter for a long time, debating whether or not it was 'good enough' to post. The medical aspects are not central, and I hope that what I have written is in no way offensive to anyone. Please forgive me my errors, and the super long delay in posting. Thank you; I hope people are still interested in reading (it's been so long).

Chibs paces the length of the exam room. It's tight, blocked off from the rest of the E.R. by little more than a flimsy curtain. It's not a substantial enough barrier.

Sound carries through curtains, voices. People.

Strangers will hear, and Chibs' throat goes dry, his stomach falls, like it does when he takes a hill at breakneck speeds and free falls for several seconds, except the feeling lasts.

He doesn't have time to do something to protect Juice's privacy, or deny the nurse's words. No time to set things to rights. No time to get his voice back under his command, or to wrap his mind around what he's heard.

It's gibberish.

Untrue.

It didn't happen.

Not to Juice.

Not in the only way that it could possibly have happened.

There was little that Chibs wouldn't put past Clay. The man was self-serving, and paid little heed to his conscience - if he had one anymore - but this...this didn't make sense.

Didn't add up in the way that blackmail, or beating or preying on the younger man's emotions - his desire to belong, to feel loved and accepted - to get what he wanted, did.

Brothers didn't rape brothers.

Maybe they gave each other the occasional blow or hand job, but it wasn't like this.

Wasn't brutal, animalistic.

Didn't leave a brother broken and concussed, talking nonsense that couldn't be attributed to drugs.

"We've got to strap him down; keep him from hurting himself," one of the nurses says. Her voice is strained and Chibs comes to himself as though waking from a long sleep - brain fuzzy, ears buzzing, blood pumping too quickly for his heart to keep up.

He moves on legs that feel like rubber, closes the distance between himself and Juice in a few long strides, grips the panicking man's face between his hands and forces Juice to look him in the eye.

Juice's eyes are wide, and this close, Chibs can see the confirmation of why he'd brought Juice to the ER in the first place - uneven, unresponsive pupils; one so wide that it completely drowns out the brown and encroaches on the white; the other, small as a pinprick, the brown of iris a small, thin circle.

Chibs would've patched Juice up on his own, at the clubhouse, had Juice been in his right mind, and not babbling shit about holes, and mice that liked to watch while he sat on a couch with his mother's boyfriends, and spiders that were digging around in his brain, filling him up with cobwebs.

Truth was, it kind of scared him, far more than Juice's uneven pupils, which betrayed a concussion. Far more than finding out that Juice had tried to off himself. And far more than finding the boy, lying in a darkened room, beaten, and knowing that it was Clay who'd done it to him, but not being able to do a damn thing to prove it.

Had he not discovered Juice's bedsheets stained with blood, Chibs might've attempted to talk some sense into the younger man, but Chibs had no idea where some of that blood had come from . There was too much on the bedsheets for the head wound - though head wounds did tend to bleed a lot - to account for on its own.

The cuts on the younger man's face had looked superficial, but the darkly bruised lump, just shy of Juice's temple had been worrisome, as had his initial unresponsiveness when Chibs had tried to rouse him, only to have the boy ramble unintelligible nonsense once he'd woken. It still made Chibs' blood run cold when he remembered the odd, childlike pitch to Juice's voice as he pleaded with the mouse to help him.

Chibs didn't know where all the blood had been coming from, at the time, and, now that he does know, he wishes he didn't. He's almost afraid to touch Juice, now that he knows that the younger man was raped. It's a dirty, ugly word, and Chibs wonders what the mouse, and the spider have to do with it.

Rape was something that happened to women, not full grown men who were capable of defending themselves, and fighting back. Rape was a cowardly act, and, if it did happen to a man, it wasn't talked about, because men always had a choice.

They were strong, powerful enough to fight back. Rape didn't happen to men like them. It happened to the weak, and, though Juice was young, and sometimes stupid, Chibs didn't consider him to be overly weak - not physically.

The nurse's words tumbled around in his head like clothes in a dryer. Loose. Wet. Wrinkled. Nonsense that made him feel angry and sick to his stomach.

Angry at Juice, for letting himself get raped in the first place, and leaving Chibs to do the cleaning up afterward. Angry at Clay, because, though Chibs didn't want to think that his leader had done something so low, there wasn't another option, not unless there'd been someone else at the clubhouse last night, lurking in the shadows. Angry at himself for not being there to stop it. Angry at the nurse for not letting it go.

"Juice, calm the fuck down," Chibs orders, trying to get Juice's eyes to lock on his.

He ignores the shocked gasp of the on call nurse, the one who'd suggested that they strap Juice down to conduct the examination. He doubts that immobilizing someone who's been traumatized is a good thing.

"Don't...the mouse won't say a word," Juice's voice is pleading, promising something that Chibs doesn't understand, and he grips Chibs' arms hard enough to bruise.

"I've got him," Chibs says, and he lets out a breath when the other nurse returns, sends the one who'd suggested tethering Juice's wrists to the exam table out.

"I'm sorry about that, she's new," she says. "She doesn't know all of the ropes yet."

Chibs just wants this to be over, doesn't want apologies, doesn't want to be present, isn't sure that it's legal for him to be there, but he'll be damned if they're gonna send him out, not after what almost happened.

"Does he have to do this?" Chibs asks.

"Anyone who is of age and a sound mind can refuse to be examined, but given your friend's altered state of mind -"

"The decision's being taken away from him," Chibs finishes. "And I'm not in a position to refuse for him."

"I'm afraid not," the nurse says. "We'll make it as quick and painless as possible, and make sure the rest of his injuries are taken care of. If you'd like to wait outside of the exam room..."

Chibs tries to gauge Juice's frame of mind, tries to get the younger man to focus, but Juice's gaze wanders, remains skittish. "Juice, do you want this?" Chibs has to give Juice a chance to think for himself.

Juice looks at him for a split second, but there's no recognition, nothing to prove that Juice is able to make sound, medical decisions.

"The spider knows," Juice whispers in a frantic voice, shudders, digs his fingers painfully into Chibs' forearms.