"Nice to have you back," the guard said, as Ross put Big Daddy and his brothers into their new cell; this one having no windows that he could grab a hold of, and break out. "Enjoy your new home. It'll be yours for the next twenty years."
"Marcus, I am so sorry about this," Ross said, as Big Daddy sat down, and wiped away his tears.
"Hey, you three are in luck," another guard called from the hallway. "Right in time for breakfast."
"Come on," Barry said, patting him on the shoulder. "We should probably eat something. Keep our reputations afloat."
Wiping his face, Marcus shuffled behind his brothers instead of walking in front of them, and instead of getting a meal, he just sat down at their usual table because the smell of the food alone was enough to make him sick to his stomach.
"Hey Marcus," said Bruce a crocodile who was in there for assault. "How's your boy?"
"Don't ask him that," snapped Winston, a tiger who was in there for armed robbery, as he thumped Bruce on the back of the head
"How'd you know I broke out to see my son?" he asked, looking over at them.
"Some new guy was bragging that he shot a teenage gorilla last night just a minute ago," Winston said, as Barry and Bob came over. "And you said that you had a teenage son, so I could only assume. The guy sounded pretty full of himself."
"Who told you this?" Barry said, as three bears appeared behind him, and pushed him out of the seat.
"Hey!" Bob snapped.
"You're sitting at our table," one of them said, a thick Russian accent in his voice.
"This is not your table," Big Daddy said. "Only the toughest inmates can sit here, not newbies like you and your buddies. So either apologize to my brother, and beat it; or I'm beating your ass."
"Should we do something?" Bruce asked with a mouthful of food, as he and Winston watched the confrontation from a different table.
"Of course not you moron. No one gets between Big Daddy and his prey, that's suicide," Winston said, wiping the side of his mouth with his paw.
"You honestly think we would be afraid of you?" one of the bears scoffed. "Please. You and your brothers don't know what we're capable of. Just last night, I shot a gorilla just like you three. Kid had it coming too, punching Yakov in the face the way he did."
"Really?" Bob asked. "Don't you think that maybe this kid has a family that will miss him."
"Who would care?" the bear growled, getting in his face. "And what are you going to do about it?"
Standing up from the table, Big Daddy stuck his thumb and forefinger into his mouth, and whistled sharply enough to make the entire cafeteria go silent so they could look at him.
"Everybody clear out!" he roared, making everyone scramble to leave; leaving him, his brothers, and the three bears alone. The bears realizing the severity of the situation, as he stepped closer to them
"Let me make something clear," he said to Roscoe, the bear that asked the question, grabbing him by the front of his jumpsuit with one hand, and balling his free hand up into a fist. "I care if that boy lives. Because he, was my son...So know I feel absolutely no regrets, when I do this."
Seeing Big Daddy deliver a solid punch to the bear's jaw that left the brown haired mammal hunched over the table holding it, Winston winced, and looked over at Walter, another guard, who was standing there with a bag of peanuts.
"Aren't you going to do something to stop this?" he asked, taking an nut from the bag while he watched the brawl continue.
"Not without back up," he said, as Winston popped the peanut into his mouth. "Last time he got into a fight with an inmate he couldn't stare down, it took both his brothers, me, and five more guards to get him off the guy."
"So you're just going to let him do this?"
"Just until the boss man stops ripping Ross a new asshole for not bringing them in earlier," he said, eating a nut, as a crash sounded from the cafeteria that was so loud, everyone winced.
"That had to have hurt," Bruce said.
~Meanwhile~
"Excuse me," Rosita said to the nurse, as she adjusted her purse on her shoulder. "I'm looking for-"
"Fourth floor, room 402, second door on the right hand side on the west wing, and good luck getting in; Dr. Mane had to throw out everyone who was in there earlier, and locked the door," the jaguar said, her eyes not leaving the computer screen, as she typed something into the keyboard.
"Thanks..." she said slowly, going up to what she hoped was the right room, and trying to open the door, only to find it locked.
"Excuse me," she said, stopping a lion as he walked over. "Dr...Wolfe, is there anyway you can get this door unlocked? My friend's in there, and I would like to see him."
"What?" Dr. Wolfe asked, trying the knob, and groaning in frustration. "And mom says me picking locks is a bad thing."
Watching Dr. Wolfe pick the lock with his claws, Rosita opened the door, and went in; seeing Johnny just starting to wake up.
"Hey," she said softly, as he moved to sit up; wincing sharply at the pain in his side. "Oh, don't sit up so fast."
"Here," the doctor said, using the remote that was next to Johnny's bed to raise up the bed so he wasn't straining himself. "How're you feeling?"
"Very drugged, and sore," Johnny slurred, as the doctor shined a light into his eyes. "Where's my dad?"
"He was here a few hours ago," Dr. Wolfe said, looking kind of confused.
"The nurse at the front desk said another doctor threw out everyone that was in here," Rosita said, seeing Dr. Wolfe's expression go from confused to annoyed.
"You must be talking about Dr. Mane," he said, checking Johnny's heartbeat with his stethoscope before wrapping it behind his neck again, and reaching for Johnny's breathing mask. "Johnny, I'm going to remove your breathing mask for a minute to see if you can breathe without it."
"Okay," he said.
Helping him take off the breathing mask, Johnny sat up a little bit straighter so he could press the stethoscope to his back, and flinched slightly because it was cold.
"Sorry, I know it's cold," he said. "Now, take a slow, deep breath."
Inhaling slowly, Johnny winced when the air entered his lungs, and exhaled; repeating the same thing when Dr. Wolfe moved his stethoscope to check his other lung.
"Well, your lungs are working just fine," he said, putting his stethoscope back around his neck, and checking Johnny's lymph nodes. "But given the damage done by both the bullet and the knife, it may take a while for it not to hurt when you breathe. So just take it slow."
"Okay," he said, laying back to relax, and closing his eyes; his mind giving him a flashback to what had happened the night before where Mike jumped in front of the gun, making him sit back up and open them again to look around the room. "Where's Mike? Is he okay?"
"He's fine," Rosita said. "I talked to him while you were still in surgery. He's a little shaken up, but he's alive."
"Thank goodness," Johnny breathed, relaxing into the bed again. "He jumped in front of the gun when I got shot. I was afraid he was dead."
"I can assure you he's fine," she said, pulling her phone out of her purse. "Do you want to talk to him?"
"Yeah," he said, sitting up, and letting her call Mike; putting her phone on speaker so they could both hear him.
~Meanwhile~
Jewel woke up slowly to the sound of Mike's phone going off on his nightstand, making her elbow him in the hip.
"Answer your phone Mike," she yawned, rolling over to go back to sleep, as Mike sat up, and yawned.
"What do you want Rosita?" he asked, holding back another yawn.
"Just wanted to see how you were doing," a familiar cockney accent spoke, making Mike let out a sigh of relief before he fell back onto his bed.
"You have no idea, how badly you scared me back there kid," he said, crying happy tears now that he knew Johnny was going to be fine. "Welcome back."
A/N: I was going to put more into the fight with Big Daddy and those bears, but what I had planned would have gotten me reported, so I'll leave the rest of what happened to the bears to your imaginations. But don't worry, they got their asses handed to them.