Melinda woke her patient every couple of hours, making sure he was okay and sympathizing with the injured man. Each time she woke him he’d ask where he was, and what happened, and she knew the head injury was making him dizzy. She smiled as she remembered the proud man arguing over using the urinal or making the short trip to the washroom. She’d finally acquiesced and let him try it with an orderly’s help. He managed four steps when his legs gave out and would’ve fallen if not for the other man’s quick reflexes. Between her and the orderly they put him back to bed and he begrudgingly admitted she was right.
Melinda walked into the room with Stacey Midland just before she was to go off shift and they examined the patient while he slept. The doctor was worried about the continued confusion, but knew it was too early to tell if there was permanent damage.
“Keep the IV going and the morphine for pain. If his stomach is still bothering him give him Zofran IV.”
“Yes, Doctor,” Melinda said.
“Dr. James should be in to see him later this morning, but if Chris wakes up and needs to talk to her before then just call her office.”
“I’ll note it on his chart,” Melinda told her as they left the sleeping man alone once more.
It was several hours later when Chris slowly fought his way through the thick layer of confusion and became aware of his surroundings once more. Unlike the other times he woke up, his memories were clear. Sadness hit him as he remembered the onset of the flashback. The gelatinous blobs were everywhere he looked, yet he understood they were not real. They were a result of his mind sending him back into the nightmares he had when Maguire held him in the chamber and forced the drugged water down his throat. Most of the hallucinations were buried deep in his subconscious, but some of them returned and when they did he was sent into a new world. One that terrified him, because he had no way of knowing what would happen next.
The injured man turned onto his left side as nausea and pain slammed into him. The memories alone were bad enough, but to know that this could happen again was something he didn’t want to face. He grabbed for the nearby basin and spit out the acidic bile that burned its way up in his throat.
“God...” he hissed as each new memory showed like a movie behind his closed lids, reminding him how helpless he was when the flashbacks happened. He held the palms of both hands against his head, groaning as his body trembled under the thin blankets. With each flash of the movie, the pain intensified until he cried out, an agonizing wail for help that fell on an empty room. His body shook and he released his head long enough to pull the blanket tighter around himself, hoping to alleviate the chill seeping into his bones. He had no idea how long he lay awake, fighting off the fatigue that came with the pain.
Vin Tanner pushed open the door and quietly walked inside, his eyes going to the form curled under the blanket. He knew instantly something was wrong and he rushed to the bed. He didn’t want to startle the trembling man, and gently placed his hand on his shoulder, feeling the body jump at the light touch.
“Chris?”
The shivering man heard the voice and felt the touch, but didn’t acknowledge it. He lay on his side, his eyes closed, his hands fisted in the blankets, His knees drawn up to his waist. His head still felt ready to explode, and he wondered if it would ever stop.
“Hey, Cowboy, wanna tell me what’s wrong?” the tracker asked softly, a lump in his throat as he watched his friend trying to control his fears.
“I can’t...”
“Sure you can, Chris,” Tanner looked towards the door at the soft knock and was pleased to see Susan James enter. “Hi, Doc,” he said softly.
“Hello, Vin,” she said as she walked the short distance to the bed. “Hello, Chris.”
Larabee hated anyone seeing him as he was at that moment and he kept his eyes closed.
“Go away!” he told them both.
“What’s wrong, Chris?” the doctor asked.
“Come on, Cowboy, talk to me,” the tracker said when the blond remained quiet except for the soft moan that issued once in a while.
“Chris, do you need something for pain?” James asked, concerned that her patient was slipping into a deeper depression than he’d been in while in Washoe. She held the chart in her hands with the report from Dr. Lee Carlyle. The psychiatrist noted that her patient suffered a mild case of PTSD, if anyone could suffer from a mild case. She knew more about Chris Larabee than the doctors in Washoe and right now she knew he was trying to hide his pain from his friends. Trying to keep them from seeing just how much he was suffering. Oh, he was trembling and seemed frightened right now, but she knew better. He wasn’t frightened, at least not of anything physical. The fear ran deeper than that and she knew he remembered the events that put him back in the hospital.
“Chris, I know you feel like you want to be left alone, but it will help to talk about what happened to you,” the psychiatrist explained.
“Didn’t help before,” the blond told her, still not looking at the two people in the room with him.
“Chris, never known you to be a coward,” the tracker said, knowing how the blond felt about the word.
Larabee turned on the bed and sent a heated gaze towards his friend. His chest heaved as he drew air into his lungs and faced the two people he knew would not leave him alone.
“I’m not a coward, Vin, but...” he stopped as tears filled his eyes.
“But you remember what happened, don’t you?” the long haired man asked, his hand once more resting on his best friend’s shoulder.
Larabee couldn’t talk past the raging nausea and pain, but he knew Tanner could read the truth in the worried blue depths. He closed his eyes and tried to turn away, but the strong hand on his arm refused to let him. He knew this man would lend him the strength he needed to get through it all. He opened his eyes and took a deep breath as the blue orbs never wavered form his own green ones. This was it, he knew he couldn’t hide behind his fears, and needed to tell them how he felt. His throat was suddenly dryer than the Black Rock Desert, his tongue felt swollen in his mouth and his breathing grew raspy.
“Easy, Cowboy, just relax and look at me,” the sharpshooter soothed, his hand massaging circles on the trembling man’s shoulders. “That’s it, now let’s just take this one step at a time. Doc James is here and you don’t have to do this alone. Okay?”
“...okay...gimme...sec...”
“Take as much time as you need, Chris,” James said as she filled up a glass from the pitcher of ice water on the table. She put a lid on it and placed a straw through the hole before holding it out to her patient.
Larabee lifted a trembling hand and took the glass. He sipped from the straw and forced a small, weak smile to his face as he placed it back on the table.
“Wh...where do I start?” he asked softly, a slight tremor in his voice as he looked at the two people.
“Wherever you feel like, Chris. I’ve got all the time in the world,” the psychiatrist assured him. She smiled as the younger man pulled up a chair for her. “Thank you, Vin.”
“Welcome,” he said and looked at his friend. “You want me to stay?”
Larabee’s answer was a simple nod and he sighed as Tanner pulled up another chair. The room was silent, the seconds dragging into minutes, until Chris picked up the water once more. He knew the doctor and the tracker were watching, waiting for him to speak. He finished the glass of water and placed it back on the table. He knew he couldn’t put it off any longer and he began speaking, his voice weak to his own ears.
“I remember Vin coming into my office and asking if I wanted to go out for coffee. They were all going, but I kept seeing the files on my desk and I wanted to get rid of them. Told Vin to bring me back one...”
“A jumbo,” the tracker said softly.
“Yeah, figured I’d be there all night and would need something to keep me on track. Wish the hell I’d gone with you boys...maybe none of this would have happened.”
“Should’ve made you come...”
Larabee laughed as he met the tracker’s sorrow filled gaze. His own eyebrows arched and he shook his head at the guilt he saw there.
“You really think you could’ve made me come with you, Vin? You’re not to blame for what happened on the roof, none of us are. I’m a grown man and I knew what I was doing, so wipe that look off your face or I’m not going any further.”
Tanner knew Larabee was right, but he couldn’t help feeling things might’ve been different if he’d tried to convince the blond to go.
“Vin, Chris is right. There is nothing to feel guilty about. You are not your...”
“Brother’s keeper,” Larabee finished,his voice filled with emotions as he watched the shaggy head nod.
“Thanks,” the sharpshooter said softly.
“What happened after the others left, Chris?” James asked.
Chris lowered his eyes and took a deep breath before resuming his tale. “I started working on the files, but kept seeing something out of the corner of my eye. At first I didn’t know what it was, and when I’d look there was nothing there. Everything started to feel weird...”
“Weird, how?” James asked when her patient grew quiet once more.
“I don’t know...just felt like nothing was real and yet it was. I knew what I was seeing wasn’t there, but it scared the crap out of me. I started throwing things at it and ran like a sc...scared...kid,” the blond explained, reaching for the glass of water once more.
James and Tanner remained silent, knowing Larabee had to do it at his own pace. They watched as he replaced the cup, his hand trembling as he placed it back in the circle of moisture on the table.
“There were more of the damn things in the outer office...looked like a fucking party of spiders...Jesus, I hate those things. They blocked the elevator and I ran to the s...stairs...H...he was there, Vin...That son of a bitch was there and I knew he couldn’t be.” The green eyes stared straight at the blue ones, neither man speaking for a few seconds.
“Who?”
Chris looked into his best friend’s eyes and knew what he was about to say would probably add to Tanner’s guilt, but he had to get the story out. He knew he had to talk about everything and the fact that the man who tortured him before was part of the new nightmare could not be forgotten. Taking a deep breath he clenched his fists and looked away.
“Whelan...” The reaction was instantaneous as the young tracker’s eyes dropped and his breathing intensified.
“Fuck!” he swore, standing up and pacing the room. His hands fisting and un-fisting as the tension grew in the lean body.
“Bastard’s still haunting you...”
“No, Vin, he’s not!” Larabee exclaimed. “I knew he was dead and I screamed the fact at him. There’s no way he could’ve hurt you...me ...or anyone else.”
“That’s right, Chris, he couldn’t,” James agreed.
Chris watched the tracker as he continued to pace and waited until he finally sat down. The blond knew the body was far from calm as the hands continued to clench and unclench at the sharpshooter’s sides.
“Are you okay, Vin?” the patient asked.
“Y...yeah, I’m fine,” the soft voice drawled. “Go on, Chris.”
The blond nodded and looked down at his own hands. “I knew what was happening couldn’t be real! That it was all part of whatever was happening in my head, but I ran anyway. Before I knew what was happening I was on the roof and I swear I felt like I could fly!” He looked up at the two people in the room with him as tears glistened in his eyes.
“I don’t remember walking to the edge of the roof, but I remember looking down and thinking I could make this trip...all I needed to do was spread my arms and let go...just step out and fly....free...”
James shook her head as Tanner started to speak. She wanted to let Larabee tell it at his own pace, without feeling as if he was being forced to do so. It was important that he talk it out, knowing that they were there for support if needed.
“Jesus, it was like my brain was split in two parts. One side knew this couldn’t happen, the other insisting that it could...I was there...staring down...wanting so much for it to be true...and I couldn’t fight it any more...but I heard your voice,” he said meeting the trackers gaze once again. “Heard you tell me you’d go with me...knew you were there to help and...and I was turning to get down...but I tripped, Vin...it wasn’t that I was jumping!” Tears were flowing freely now as he tried to make them believe him. “I really wasn’t. I mean I knew you wouldn’t let me jump, Vin, even if I thought I was Superman or anyone like that who could fly...I remember thinking the boys are back and I need that coffee...and...and turning to see all of you...and my foot catching in that edge...and I thought...I don’t want to do this...but all of a sudden it seemed like I had no choice. The last thing I remember was thinking I must’ve hit the ground head first because I was sure it exploded!”
“You hit your head on the edge when you fell,” the tracker explained.
“Then why am I here and not in the morgue? How did you stop me from falling?” the blond asked seriously.
“We caught you...”
“We? Meaning you?”
“I caught you, but it took us all to pull you back over the ledge...Thought you were gone, Chris...”
“I thought so too, but you know what?”
“What?”
“Somehow I knew you guys would find a way. Just like I knew you’d find me in that damn chamber. Even when Maguire forced the drugged water on me and the fucking hallucinations began...the spiders, the other things...”
“What other things, Chris?” James asked, knowing it was important for him to talk it all through.
Larabee met her eyes and knew she could see there was more to the story. He reached for the glass again and sipped at the cold water. He looked at the clock and realized nearly an hour had passed since he began talking and the pounding in his skull was growing worse.
“You have to finish it, Cowboy,” the tracker rasped.
“I know...it’s just hard to talk about,” the blond told them and took another deep breath. “I saw all kinds of things I knew couldn’t be there...snakes...big fucking insects...people I k...killed...my Dad and Mom the day I had to identify them,” his voice broke with emotions as he remembered the animated bloodied, twisted bodies of his parents coming towards him, cursing him for not being there for them.
“Knew it wasn’t real, but it sure felt like it...I remember thinking anything is better than this and next thing I knew I was standing over six bodies w...with a blood stained knife in my hands. It felt like my hand belonged to someone else and it kept stabbing and stabbing,...and blood was splattering the walls...and running down the blade...I couldn’t see very much because it was in my eyes and the smell was nauseating a...and I knew what I was d...doing...but I couldn’t stop.”
Chris released the pain of the memories in one choking gasp, his stomach churning once more as daggers stabbed at his skull. His hands clasped his head and he vomited the contents of his stomach, until nothing remained. His body shook and he lay back against the bed. He didn’t hear the nurse come in and inject medication into his IV, but he soon felt a lessening of the agony and the nausea and drifted towards sleep.
“Well?” Tanner asked as James closed the file in her lap.
“He’s talked about what happened, Vin, and that’s good. We knew about Maguire and what he did to Chris, but we didn’t know how the drugs affected him or what they did to him. He talked about the hallucinations and hopefully that’ll also help him. What he’s gonna need now is support and that’s where all of you are gonna come in. He’s gonna need to know that although this could happen again he can’t live his life in fear. He has to be able to function as he always has...with that confidence that he can do whatever he did before this. There’s no way of knowing whether he’ll have more flashbacks. LSD is unpredictable and they can occur for years after the actual use of the drug.”
“Jesus Christ!” Tanner swore as he paced the room once more.
“Vin, that’s not gonna help him. He needs you to be strong for him, not losing it because of your anger.”
“How the hell do I help him live with the fact that this could happen again?” the tracker asked angrily.
“By doing what you always do...Support him...be there for him...but don’t try to coddle him, because that’ll just make matters worse. The one thing I’ve learned about Chris is that he’s an independent man and likes to do things on his own. If he thought you and the others were trying to put him in a...”
“Glass bottle...
“He’d run as far away from here as he could. Not out of fear of you guys, but out of a fear of losing who he is. My advice is that once Stacey releases him you try and put your lives back the way they were. Again there will be changes, but for the most part, pick up where you left off and go from there.”
“You mean go back to the ghost town...to Four Corners?”
“It might help all of you deal with it.”
Tanner stood beside the bed and looked down at the now sleeping man. Memories of the last month or so were still vivid and he wondered if going back to the place it all started really was such a good idea. Would it help Chris if they went back, or would it be too hard for him.
“I don’t know, Doc.”
“Why don’t you talk about it with the others and see if it’s something you want to do. It doesn’t have to be right away. Actually I’d rather you wait a month or so, just to make sure he’s up to the trip, but I really think it will do all of you a world of good.”
“I’ll talk to the guys and see what they say,” Tanner told her.
“Make sure you include Chris in those talks. He needs to know that you trust him to make decisions like this.”
“Hell, Doc, I’d trust Chris Larabee with my life! We all would!” the tracker said forcefully.
The psychiatrist smiled at the younger man as she looked from one man to the other. “I know, Vin, and he feels the same way about you guys. That’s what makes the seven of you so unique. I don’t think I’ve ever seen seven men respect and care for each other the way all of you do. It doesn’t happen very often, especially with a group of men as diverse as your group. It’s something I’m glad I’ve been able to witness.”
“Thanks, Doc, these guys are family, especially...”
“Chris.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sure he feels the same way. I’ve got a few other patients to check on, but I’ll let his nurse know where I am if he needs to talk.”
“Okay, thanks, Doc.”
“Nothing to thank me for, Vin. Chris did all the work today,” the psychiatrist assured him as she walked to the door.
“Doc.”
“Yes, Vin.”
“When will he be released?”
“That’s up to Stacey, Vin.”
“What about you...does he need to see you or take any medications again?”
“No...I don’t think so. He’s talked through what happened. I’m leaving him my number and a recommendation that he come talk to me if he starts feeling down again, but otherwise I think he’s got all the support he needs.”
“Thanks, Doc.”
“You’re welcome. Try not to worry to much, especially in front of Chris. If he sees any doubts from you guys it’s going to effect his own performance. Be positive, but let him talk if he needs too.”
“We will.”
“You know my door is always open if any of you need to talk, Vin, and I don’t mean only as a doctor. I’ve known all of you for quite some time now, and I think you know you can trust me.”
“We do, Doc,” the tracker told her, sitting in the chair by Larabee’s bed once more.
“Good,” she said with a smile. “I’ll see you later.”
Vin nodded as the door closed before looking at his friend once more. He knew that Anne Sheridan would be arriving in approximately two weeks and he hoped things worked out between her and Chris. The man deserved some happiness for a change. He watched as Larabee turned onto his side, but didn’t wake up. He stayed beside his friend, knowing the others were back at work and would check in with him later in the day. His mind slowly wondered back over his conversation with the psychiatrist, and he began to think the idea really did have merit. Maybe it was time to face what happened there and put it all in the past where it belonged. All he had to do was convince his friends the idea held merit. For now, he would sit and watch over the sleeping blond.
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