Sometimes Truth Hurts More Than Ignorance
Chapter 1: Awaken to the Land of Light
He awoke with a start. Suddenly, with all his sense screaming for attention, his burning itching left arm, the chill of the room, his inability to move anything but his toes and fingers, and most of all, his inability to see a single thing combined with a drug induced haze, Jason was sent into an overwhelming fit. Nothing made sense. As he frantically struggled in an attempt to free himself from his bonds he screamed in frustration. While it was normally in his nature to take things calmly, it was too much at once to handle sanely.
Hands were soon at his shoulders, trying to keep him still. With blind incomprehension Jason fought back harder, assured that he must be coming close to breaking his bonds for such a reaction from the unknown presence. Caught up in his mind's battle, rushing through possible scenarios, he almost didn't hear the other yelling voices, or sense the lips beside his ear, speaking quiet comforts in a familiar tone; But a softly reassuring hand wiping the tears from his face and stroking his cheek somewhat sensually brought Jason back to near calmness with a shiver running down his spine. It was something he could connect to a memory, even if nothing else yet made the slightest bit of sense.
Finally somewhat calm enough to feel appropriate rage towards his unknown captor her tried to turn his head towards where his friend and lover was and demanded in a steely voice, "Where are we Tommy? Who has us and WHY IN HELL DON'T WE HAVE ANY LIGHT?"
The nurses currently in the room saw Tommy crumple with a defeated sigh. Closing his own eyes in an attempt to escape the harsh lights of the hospital himself, he continued to stroke Jason's cheek as he collected himself. "Jason," Tommy started softly in a strained attempt to keep his voice under control, "you need to calm down. You're safe. I'm here Jase and I'll take good care of you. Nobody has us hostage, there are no captors, you're ok, it's all ok," he repeated reassuringly.
With tears still streaking down his face, in the still blurry confusion, he attempted to calm down his own voice, feeling Tommy's presence and reassurance somewhat strengthening him. "But Tommy, why can't I move, and why won't you turn on the damn lights?" Feeling Tommy's hesitation and after a moment of silence, he began to panic slightly again.
Tommy was, quite frankly, in a state of confusion. He had been over this much with the frantic young man before. In fact, it was partially at Jason's insistence that he was brought here. The doctor had mentioned nothing of possible memory lapses. Keeping the confusion out of his voice and noticing Jason's tension at the hesitation, Tommy said, "It's ok Jase. You need to clear your mind and concentrate. You're in a hospital. You were...," Tommy's voice faltered again, "... attacked. You can't move because you're strapped to your bed..." Again faltering, Tommy shook his head in uncertainty. His countenance posing millions of questions to the silent nurses. "Jason," Tommy said somewhat exasperated, "is there anything that you do remember?"
The nurses took this as their cue to leave. This was obviously going to become an emotional conversation that they felt they had no place listening to. The act relieved Tommy as he could now speak without worry of revealing hidden identities.
Clutching tightly to Tommy's hand, the young man's brow knitted in concentration as he tried to fight past the haziness. The drip probably didn't help.
"I don't know," Jason murmured in controlled frustration. "There's flashes of color. It doesn't make any sense. Pain, lots of pain," Jason grimaced as the phantom pain came back and took over while he was trying to recapture the fighting memory, "and..." This time it was Jason's voice that faltered. His face registered an epiphany, and a conflict of emotions.
"What is it Jase?" asked Tommy, lovingly giving the hand in his a reassuring squeeze.
Even though Jason didn't have his memories of the particular incident, there was one thing that made him realize exactly what had happened, if not the details themselves. It was an image of a leering face which triggered a realization which he desperately did not yet want to share with Tommy. It was too close. Too personal. Then another realization hit him; if he couldn't remember what had happened, maybe he'd already told Tommy.
"What do you know about what happened, Tom?"
Keeping his voice low, so as not to be overheard, he recounted to Jason what he knew. "About a month ago, we were attacked by the putty patrol and Goldar. Nothing unusual about it save there were more putties than we were used to... are you sure you don't remember this Jase?" Tommy asked with acute concern on his face, which was lost on the young man.
Jason shook his head, or tried to as much as the head restraint would allow. It was the truth, and Jason was actually shocked about the time. It was disconcerting to know of such a large memory lapse.
"Ok, well, we fought them as usual, and, as usual, Goldar singled you out for a fight. I really don't understand what that ape has against you," Tommy expressed with deep seated annoyance. Jason smiled sadly. There was something that Jason wasn't telling Tommy, and he knew it and would find out what it was. 'But now's not the time,' thought Tommy. "We were overwhelmed, but most importantly, you were caught in a position, by a combination of the putty patrol and Goldar, that disabled your ability to fight. You were incapacitated and before we could call Alpha to teleport you out, you were stripped of your communicator and morpher and taken in a flash by Goldar. The putties likewise disappeared and we were at a loss." Tommy began slightly sobbing at the memory of his boyfriend's disappearance, and Jason was shaking.
In a moment of decisiveness, he reached over and unlatched the straps that bound Jason, leaned over and gave him a careful hug so as not to further ail Jason's slow healing wounds. Momentarily startled, Jason cautiously returned the hug, but he still wanted to know what else that his Tom could tell him, because there had to be more; his blindness had not yet been explained. Yes, Jason had given into the idea that he was blind when Tommy failed to give any other satisfactory reply.
"Tom?"
"Yeah?"
"I need to hear the rest."
With a hurtful sigh, he separated from Jason in resignation. "Ok. There's not all that much more I know of. I mean, we searched in vain for you for two weeks, even covertly going to the Dark Dimension to try to find you. Without a power source or a communicator to lock onto, even Billy was at an impasse for ideas. It was Zack who finally figured it out, and went after you. I wanted to go Jase, I desperately wanted to go, but the others just wouldn't let me. I guess it was for the best in the end. I mean, they rightly thought that I was too close emotionally to you and no one was sure how I would react to going back, 'cause we found you in Zed's throne room itself."
On the edge of bursting into tears, Tommy fought to carry on, "Oh god, Jase. I couldn't stomach it... it... what you looked like when Zack brought you back." At this point Tommy couldn't stand it anymore and let out violently sharp but silent sobs. "Jase, I was so scared for you. We weren't sure you'd live. I, we, had you healing in the Power Chamber, but there's only so much you could heal there. After a week we realized, and you agreed, that you needed a real doctor, so we brought you here."
Jason found that Tommy's extreme display of emotions was incredibly disconcerting. He knew that for Tommy to display his emotions so strong, that his own condition must've been tragic. Briefly wondering if Tommy had ever left his side in the last two weeks, he remembered the straps.
"And why was I strapped down Tom? I still haven't figured that out yet. I'm not a danger to anyone am I?"
"Just yourself. Damn it Jason, you may not remember consciously but there's no doubt that the memories are there, and they're bad. The nightmares you had were so violent that you physically tried to fight them, and every night you were re-opening wounds and creating new ones. He damn near killed you again Jase, and it was your own fucking mind that was going to be the messenger." Tommy's raw emotions were wearing away at Jason's own emotional barriers. He was really choked at his concern.
Although he didn't tell Tommy this, the nightmares were nothing new and the idea of being near death was old news as well. In this case, what Tommy didn't know wouldn't hurt him and Jason wasn't yet willing to share. Jason spent a second giving much thankful credit to the drugs that he always took for a dreamless night before sleeping with Tommy. Because of them, Tommy wouldn't have to know. That he was callous to the emotional stress of pain didn't mean that it hurt any less or that he could deal with Tommy's knowing. Life with Tom had been too good and too much of an awesome distraction from reality to let that get in the way.
"And one last question Tom, I promise," Jason said softly, carefully snaking his arm around where he knew Tommy's waist to be. "Why can't I see?"
Tommy sighed again, but this time it was a mixture of loving contentment at being near a conscious Jason again and from the exhausting toll that this conversation had taken upon him. "Don't worry love," Tommy said, leaning forward to give Jason's lips a light kiss, "it's only temporary. Doc Schugart says its from the trauma and the drugs that they're giving you. He says that at the amazing rate you're healing, you should start regaining vision anytime now." At that Jason smiled, knowing that he had his powers to thank for that.
Without warning, Jason felt his consciousness slipping from him quickly and slightly panicked before drowsiness calmed him. Tommy squeezed his hand in understanding as Jason continued to fall. Before he lost consciousness completely, he mustered up all his strength to lean up and whisper in Tommy's ear, "I love you Tom." Then he was gone, not even able to stay awake long enough to hear Tommy's own return whisper professing his love.
Alone again, Tommy sighed and set about strapping Jason back in, knowing that this time the nightmares were likely to be worse as the memories were closer to the surface.