Hour of Darkness
Kelly Severide stood in the cemetery facing his father's grave. The large granite tombstone marking the spot seemed to tower over him even though it wasn't possible. It had been hard to get through the service, but it had been a beautiful service. He'd spent the days and hours up to the funeral agonizing over how it was going to go, as they'd walked out of the church, he'd felt some sense of relief, but now that it was all finally over, some of the same feelings of uncertainty and the walls closing in on him seemed to return at full force.
How did they get here? How had it come to this? Benny wasn't supposed to be dead. His dad shouldn't be dead. He'd been fine the last time Kelly saw him. Then that call. And it was already over before he'd even gotten to the hospital. How the hell did it happen?
Standing there in the solitude of the dark graveyard, everyone else gone home hours ago, Kelly started replaying in his mind the last conversation he'd had with Benny. His dad had come through for Boden and for everyone at 51, but it had come too late for Kelly to thank him, to apologize for the way he'd talked to him, too late to say anything.
He stood by the grave and ran his hand over the smooth top of the stone, strangely enough he actually felt close to Benny in that moment.
"I'm sorry, Dad."
It was barely even a whisper, his voice was almost completely gone.
The words finally out that he'd been holding onto since he arrived at the hospital, Kelly felt his body shaking and felt the tears running down his face. If he had known it would be the last time he'd ever see Benny, he would've done things differently.
"I'm sorry, Dad," he repeated louder, feeling the tremors in his body grow. His knees felt weak, he felt like the ground had just fallen out from under him.
"I'm sorry, Dad...I'm sorry, Dad."
"Kelly, Kelly, wake up!"
Kelly felt light shining against his eyelids, he opened his eyes quickly, too quickly to actually see anything other than the blinding light over him. His face felt wet, his throat felt sore, and tired. He blinked his eyes a few times to adjust to the light, and when he saw who was talking to him, he screamed.
"Kelly, calm down," Benny told his son, "it's okay, you're gonna be alright."
Kelly's eyes roamed around the room and he realized he was at Chicago Med. What was going on? He tried to get up, but his body wouldn't cooperate.
Benny towered over his son and gripped him by the shoulders as he told him, "Just take it easy, Kelly, you're gonna be fine."
"Pop?" Kelly couldn't believe what he was seeing. "Is it really you? You're not dead?"
"Dead?" Benny laughed in surprise. "Certainly not. You on the other hand gave everybody one hell of a scare."
"Wha?" Kelly's brain couldn't focus.
"It's alright, Kelly, the docs already said it's going to take a few days for you to recover from the vent."
"The what?" Kelly asked. Then he realized he knew that raw feeling in his throat, it had happened to him before when he'd been hospitalized.
Kelly rubbed his eyes and wiped the tears from his face as it was slowly starting to occur to him that it must have been a drug induced nightmare.
"I was on a ventilator? What for? What...what happened? Why am I here? Where is everyone?" the words came out weakly, and every single one hurt, but the pain couldn't trump Severide's need to know the truth.
"Don't get excited," Benny told him as he sat on the edge of the bed and looked down at his son. "They're all out in the waiting room, they've been in to see you already. You've been going in and out of consciousness since they took you off the vent this morning. Kelly, you were in an accident, but the docs said you'll make a full recovery."
"Acciden'? What kind of accident?"
"You don't need to worry about that now," Benny told him.
Kelly tiredly blinked his eyes and thought to ask, "Pop, what're you doing here?"
Benny looked mildly surprised.
"They called me."
Kelly shook his head. "You're no' my emergency contact."
"I know that."
"Then who...Boden?"
"It doesn't matter, Kelly, I'm here, you're going to be alright, that's what matters."
"Why'd you come?" Kelly asked as he felt his eyes fall shut again.
There was a paused silence.
"Just rest, Kelly, you'll be fine," Benny told him, and watched as his son was suddenly out cold again.
"Kelly doesn't know?" Casey asked the other firefighters who were gathered in the hall, watching the fight taking place in the enclosed room through the glass door.
"I don't think he's been conscious enough to take it all in yet," Tony answered.
All the guys from Truck and Squad stood around and watched as Boden and Grissom stood in the empty hospital room and yelled at each other, though none of the sound came through the closed door, but based on the two men's movements and gestures towards each other, it was a safe bet that the conversation was not doing well.
"How long do you think they can keep it up?" Cruz asked.
"Long enough," Otis turned and saw the retired smoke eater coming down the hall, "Benny, how's Kelly?"
"He'll be fine, have they come out yet?" Benny pointed to the two men screaming behind the glass.
"Nope," Casey shook his head.
Benny nodded and said only, "I'm going in."
"This ought to get interesting," Herrmann commented to Mouch, who merely nodded in response.
Benny slid the door open, his sudden presence ending the argument long enough that nobody heard anything before the door closed, and once it did, the fight started again, this time with three firefighters yelling at each other, though now it looked like Boden and Benny were tag teaming on Grissom and really letting him have it.
"I thought Severide's dad and Grissom were old pals," Cruz mentioned.
"Send an incompetent moron in to 51 to replace the chief and almost gets his kid killed, friendship only goes so far," Herrmann guessed.
"Who's going to tell Severide what happened with Gorsch?" Otis asked. He turned to their captain, who merely shook his head in response.
"Think he's up to any visitors yet?" Tony asked.
"Yeah, but who wants to miss the fight of the century?" Capp gestured to the three men in the next room who all looked about ready to take each other's heads off.
"I wish we could hear what they're saying," Otis commented.
"Oh somehow I doubt that," Cruz replied watching the tempers visibly flare through the glass.
"Besides, I think we all got a rough idea what they're saying to each other," Herrmann added.
"Still, Severide shouldn't be alone," Otis turned away from the melee and faced the captain. "Casey?"
Matt stood with his feet planted shoulder length apart, his arms tightly crossed to his chest, and just shook his head and walked off.
"This whole thing is a mess," Otis said as he turned back to watch the fight.
"At least Severide's gonna be okay, that has to count for something," Herrmann said, and the gravity of his words were equally felt by everyone else in the hallway.
Otis heard somebody heading their way and saw Casey doubling back with a strange look on his face.
"What is it, Casey?" he asked. Then he got his answer when he saw who was following Matt.
Everybody turned at the sight of Sergeant Hank Voight from the 21st District.
"How's Severide doing?" he asked.
"They took him off the vent this morning but he's still pretty out of it," Herrmann answered. "What're you doing here?"
"We found out something," he said, and then seemed to notice the fight going on across the hall. He jabbed a finger in the general direction of the three firefighters having at it and asked, "How long they been like that?"
"Chief and Grissom been going at each other's throats for 20 minutes, Severide's dad just jumped in with them," Herrmann answered.
"Well now it's gonna be a foursome," Voight said as he pushed his way past the firefighters, slid the door open, stepped in, and joined in the heated conversation.
"What do you think that's about?" Cruz asked as they watched as Voight got in the middle of all of them, and first seemed to address everybody in general, then Boden specifically, then turned and based on his hand movements, started laying into Grissom about something, who looked like he could've been knocked over with a feather and scrambled to hold his own with the Intelligence sergeant.
"I don't know, but I think things are gonna get worse," Otis said.
"Is that even possible?" Mouch asked.
"Unfortunately I think so."
Kelly slept through the night, though he was the only one. Benny sat watch in the hospital room and every so often someone else would make the rounds just to make sure nothing had developed. Every time Benny looked out the door, he could see Matt Casey pacing around the hall outside, but he wouldn't come in. He hadn't been able to bring himself to enter Severide's room since he'd been brought to the hospital. Instead he took it upon himself to be the messenger, to make the rounds and get updates from the doctors and come back with the news. Benny knew it was just an excuse to avoid standing still for too long and having to actually think about what was happening.
"Benny."
The former firefighter turned at the voice. "Sergeant Voight, I thought you were done here, after you ripped Grissom a new one."
"I understand you two are friends."
"Well...after this week I'm definitely reconsidering," Benny said as he sat in the chair next to Kelly.
"How's he doing?" Voight moved over towards the bed.
"Been out of it for a few hours...he still doesn't know what happened. I've been delivering bad news to people for 40 years...I'm not sure how I'm gonna tell him," the elder Severide admitted. "It's still wait and see right now."
"What'd the docs say?" Voight asked as he looked down at the firefighter who was a mess of bruises and gashes and burns, and completely unaware of all of it.
"Said he should make a full recovery...figure it's going to take him about a month to full recover from the vent, by then the worst of the rest should be done as well." Benny looked at Voight and told him, "I knew what we were dealing with every day on the job, and as dangerous as I knew it was, I wanted him to be just like me. I was thrilled when he said he wanted to join CFD..." Benny's voice dropped a couple notches as he added, not proudly, "I knew that this could happen..." he shrugged, "you just don't think about it much, it's a job we gotta do, gotta take that risk...actually seeing it...and it's my son...that's one of the worst things I've ever witnessed. They didn't know the first couple days if he'd get off the vent, if there was brain damage...all because of Grissom, my old friend," he sneered the last words. He turned in the chair towards Voight and asked him, "Anything going to happen with him?"
"Far as we can tell, what happened is Jerry Gorsch's mess...Grissom's only accountable for putting him in your house to begin with, but I don't think he knew what was going to happen."
Benny grunted, "Guess that's something." He stood up and paced over towards the door, and saw Casey coming down the hall and practically zombie walked over towards the room. The Truck captain looked at him through the glass door and grimly shook his head, his eyes wide with revelation. Benny felt a rock forming in his stomach at this confirmation. He merely nodded in understanding and watched as the blonde man turned and walked off.
"I guess it's all moot now anyway," Benny told the cop.
Voight gazed down at Severide and asked the father, "When he's lucid, you want me to tell him what happened?"
Benny shook his head. "No...I'll do it...I owe him that much."
"I know this is a difficult time for everybody at 51," Voight said. "If there's anything I or anyone in my unit can do..."
Benny nodded. "I appreciate it, Sergeant Voight, but I don't think there's anything that...anyone can do."