The Obligatory Egos Swap AU - Jacksepticeye Egos

Sweet Dreams, Dear Hero

TW: mugging, guns, hospital visit.

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The cry for help had been faint in the night, almost imagined, but Chase knew he'd heard it and immediately drew himself closer through means of side streets and alleys and even a couple of backyards.

He knew he wasn't welcomed here in small-town Ontario, Canada, but it was temporary, the first place he chose once he got his passport so he could leave America, and sure he wasn't surprised when the first reaction to him arriving on the scene of a mugging as the resident hero was to begin getting yelled at, but what he hadn't expected was the gun the mugger had pulled on him, long forgetting the backpack he'd stolen and dropping it on the ground so he could put all of his focus on Chase.

The person he'd been mugging ran away without their bag once they'd seen the gun, leaving just Chase and his opponent, one of which was holding a weapon and might have had more on him, and one who didn't care for that stuff. It was only Chase's guess what the mugger planned to do with the gun in his hand.

"So. You're the big, bad hero everyone is talking about. Not very big, are ya?" He had a strong accent of which Chase couldn't recall, but it didn't seem like he was from around here either; something they had in common. "Well? What are you going to do?"

Chase leaned down and picked up the backpack, watching the man with curious eyes. "Huh? I'm going to return the backpack you tried to steal. What kind of idiot are you, anyway, to just drop it like that."

The mugger narrowed his eyes in response, cocking his gun. "The backpack isn't what I'm here for, kid. I'm here for you."

As Chase straightened back up, a pair of arms wrapped around his middle, holding his arms at his sides and making him drop the bag once more. He kicked backwards but the perpetrator's legs were too spread to reach, and yet he still couldn't touch the ground. "It's funny how you think that works. You won't get away with this!"

"You are less than loved around here, no? No one will save you, and you can't save yourself."

Chase screamed out suddenly, hoping to get some attention or scare the guy into dropping him, but no lights turned on in the little roundabout they were standing in, nor did it seem to sway the men at all.

Quickly, the man holding Chase flipped him onto his shoulder so he would be easier to carry and they started to walk away, the man not even caring while the kid screamed and hit his back.



Chase sat quietly in the back of the rusty blue pick-up truck, in a cage that was meant for a large dog. It didn't seem very kind for a human, let alone a pet, and he almost hoped it was just that he wasn't the first person they'd kidnapped so he didn't have to feel bad for any dogs, too.

There was a tarp tied down over the entire trunk so he was in darkness from the inside and hidden from the outside and he was beginning to feel insanely claustrophobic until the truck suddenly came to a stop.

The truck shook as the two men slammed their doors and he heard footsteps coming closer. "Still alive in there?"

Chase kept his mouth shut, waiting for the moment they let him out so he could go nuts. Instead, they undid the tarp and manned the entire cage out of the trunk, both carrying it without any sort of struggle. Chase looked around, finding only open field surrounding them every way he could see. There weren't even any big farmhouses that he could escape to, and he was beginning to feel hopeless.

The cage was set down a good distance from the truck and opened. "Get out, you little shit." One of them kicked the cage, rattling Chase's very being. He obeyed, looking around once more to find anything he could make a run toward before he was violently kicked in the back of the knees and forced to the ground.

"So, you try to be all tough with the bad guys but then you get captured on the first try. You're either really new or really stupid."

"Who said this was my first time being captured?" Chase spat back.

The men laughed. "Okay, so stupid it is. Well, there won't be another, kid. You need to know when to just stay away."

He pulled the gun out again just as Chase flipped himself over so it was aimed right at his face. He screamed and tried to scoot away but a foot digging into his back made him stop.

"I won't stop for anybody, dude! My own parents kicked me out because of it! Get over yourself if you think you have any way of stopping me without killing me."

His kidnapper tilted his head, fiddling with the gun in his hand. "Parents? How old even are you?"

Chase figured he knew better than to tell a stranger his age, but one who had a gun to his face probably had a right to the truth. "19. I haven't talked to them since I turned 18."

"Hm, sad. Hold him down, would you? I'd like to get a nice, clean shot."

Chase struggled against the man trying to restrain him from behind and managed to free one of his arms to elbow the man in the crotch, but he did nothing but grunt and hold tighter.

As Chase closed his eyes in wait for the trigger to pull, he heard something else in the distance. Sirens. And the guys about to kill him seemed to hear it too if their curses were anything to go off of. Chase opened his eyes one last time, the hope of being saved flooding his mind and soul, but the last thing he saw was the anger on the mugger's face as he slammed his finger back to take his life.



Everything was quiet but things were slowly starting to piece themselves together around him. The faint beeping of a vitals monitor in one ear, the scent of antibacterial cleaner, and the bright light that shone overhead all made up the scene of a hospital room.

He could feel bandages wrapped tightly around his head and as he strained to open his eyes, only one was able to do so, the other closed down with a patch covering it. Chase struggled to remember what had happened to bring him here, and then he didn't want to.

His heart rate picked up, making the monitor sound louder and faster. Why could he only hear it in one ear? That was getting frustrating.

Voices appeared in the hallway, vaguely on the side of his good ear, and made him turn to it with great effort. A woman in a white coat smiled at her clipboard, then at him a second later. "Oh, hello... Chase?"

Chase tried to nod as if confirming his name, but it only hurt his head. He tried to move his hand to stop the room from spinning, but realised it was tied down with a handcuff, same with the other one.

She noticed what he was looking at. "They're for your protection; we know you did nothing wrong, but the police seem to have the wrong idea." The nurse seemed nice and if Chase was feeling better he would even think she was pretty. "So, we can't discharge you until you've gone through a bit of therapy for your head wound and we make sure everything is really okay. So far all we know is that you've lost the vision in your right eye and some hearing in your right ear. You're lucky to have turned your head."

Did he turn his head? Was that why the gunshot was so loud it had made his ears ring? He could have sworn he'd lived to see the paramedics finally find him, but there wasn't much memory after that.

"The shot didn't hit anything that could cause permanent body or brain damage. You're lucky," she repeated, possibly giving him a blushing look? He couldn't tell with only one working eye.

So, he was half blind and half deaf. Oh boy, if only he'd listened to his parents... was there even a way to make light out of this? He was in a foreign country without any family with some of his first major trauma to work through. Maybe it was time to figure out if this was really what he wanted to do with his life.