Welcome to the Jungle, Sweetheart

Can you pick me up?

Slash was sleeping pretty heavily when he heard the house phone ring. He heard some of the other guys grumble in their rooms, but most of them were heavier sleepers than he was, and all of them were too lazy to get up and get it. 

Slash rose to his feet and left his room. He bumped into Michelle in the hallway, the only other person who would answer it, and he told her he's got it and she went back to her room with a yawn. Slash picked up the phone sleepily, "Hello?" he asked with a yawn. 

Then Slash heard the last voice he expected to hear. One that he could recognize even now when it was just a weak croak. 

"...Slash... Can you pick me up..." 

He was not anticipating that. Axl got into trouble a lot, but he couldn't remember anything coming to be drastic enough where he had to call to get help. Axl was always too prideful for that. "Axl? Where are you?" 

Axl's voice paused for a minute as if he wasn't sure where he was. "Uh... On the corner between Grainger and Washington I think.." he replied unsurely, and Slash heard his voice trail off at the end. 

Slash wanted to ask what the hell happened, but he thought that with Axl, he probably shouldn't, even though he was actually really scared for him. 

He went to say 'Okay,' but then he heard the phone drop and he figured that was Axl's lazy way of hanging up, leaving it off the hook. 

So Slash threw on some clothes and a jacket, and he brought an extra set of clothing for Axl, figuring he'd probably be cold in what he set off with that evening. He went to hop in the car but it appeared that fucking Duff took it so he could ride off with a girl. So, as stealthily as he could, Slash sneaked back inside the house and grabbed Izzy's motorcycle keys, and rode off on his Harley, setting off for the corner on Grainger and Washington. 

He wasn't even quite sure where that was but he figured if he just drove down one and looked for a red on the corner of a block he'd find him. He drove down Grainger slowly, looking on both sides of the street for a Washington sign. When he found it, he saw the phonebooth he figured Axl called him in. 

But no Axl. 

So he parked the motorcycle near the curb, and figured that he may as well continue on foot, he couldn't have gotten far, right? Ugh, it's like looking for a lost puppy. Unless they want to come back to you, they're either not gonna be found or they're dead. He approached the trail of red blood, his heart began to race. He followed it all the way to the phonebooth, and when he found a crumbled, bleeding Axl on the floor, his heart stopped.

"HOLY FUCK AXL!" Slash blew the door open and picked up Axl out of the phonebooth and laid him out on the edge of the sidewalk near the bike. He didn't groan or lift his head or anything. That was not reassuring. 

He quickly checked his pulse in both his wrist and his throat, and he felt a wave of relief rush through his body and lift a million pounds off his shoulders when his heart was still beating. 

Slash was horrified to see what state he was in. He was pale as a ghost, had no shirt, half of his pant leg was completely missing, his remaining clothes were shredded, there was blood all over his boots and his leg. And he was covered in long, deep cuts all over his chest and his forearms, a few smaller ones on his legs, and holy fuck was his right leg ever mangled-looking. He couldn't even see very much of the actual wound on his leg, the way he was laying hid most of it. But that was a lot of blood. 

Almost up and down his entire calf was red, and more continued to trickle onto the pavement. And what is that on his neck? It looks like a bruise. Slash brushed some of his red hair off his neck, Hahaha holy shit Axl's got a hickey!