The warm, sticky flow of life is all over him. Of course it hurts—no one could take a fall like that without some sort of pain. (It's in my eyes, red, magnificent scarlet—must keep eyes open to keep the illusion alive.) He feels hands. He sees faces. But it's all sort of blurred together. They lift him to the gurney (how am I still conscious?) and take him off.
The wheels clatter against the paving. It jostles. The blood drips further down his face (into my eyes, into my mouth, and why does it taste so good?) and the voices around him are muffled, the light darkening in his still-open eyes (shock—that's it, I'm going into shock). There's different air now, the parts of his face not covered by the blood registering slight temperature change (sense of touch—heightened. All other senses dulled.) He's inside. But then crimson blackness took him.
Screaming. There's screaming—I'm screaming. I'm nine, I shouldn't be screaming! Mother rushes over, ashen-faced, and nearly passes out at the sight of ivory poking out through deep red and flesh. My head's all fuzzy. Blood loss? Shock? Concussion? Hard to be sure. It's interesting, though, the way the bone managed to pierce my leg. Mother sends Mycroft inside to dial the hospital. She's crying.
They're transferring him from the gurney to the bed. Still no clear voices. (This is Bart's. Bart's isn't right.) He feels strange, disconnected, not quite his old high, but close to it. (Floating away…)
"Why were you on the roof in the first place?"
"I was exploring."
"I told you not to go up there!"
"No, you didn't. You told Mycroft not to go up there. Never said anything about me." Mother's disappointed. She's sad and nervous. I feel strange. I'm a cloud. I think it's the medicine.
The blood's gone crusty in spots. (Magma. Cooling and hardening.) It feels odd as he manages to move slightly. Molly's standing over him, worrying as usual, but for once, he doesn't mind it because he knows she's here to help. (Stuck. Can't move.) He's in pain, he can barely register what's happening, can barely feel the cold metal on his back, but he manages to move his mouth into a single word.
"Molly."
Molly jumps. (Why? She knew.) "Sorry," she apologises. "I've never had them talk back before. The bodies, I mean."
He moans. It's the best he can manage. He can tell that she's reset his shoulder. (How long was I out? Not too long; dried blood still present.) Molly takes a sponge and starts wiping his face gently. "Sorry about the water—the warm isn't working." He inhales sharply at the cold water on his hypersensitive skin. "Sorry," Molly says again. (Always apologising…)
The cold plaster hurts on my leg. I think they know that already, but I tell them anyway. I have to try not to walk for weeks. It may as well be years. There's no fun sitting around all the time. Then they show me how to walk on crutches. It hurts my underarms. A lot. Can't I just walk regularly, even though it hurts a bit?
It's dark and musty and smells of plastic when he opens his eyes again. He recognizes the environment (Body bag.) from an experiment he'd done one afternoon. It crinkles. He's in a moving vehicle (Engine whirr. Shock fading, blood loss still requiring recuperation.) which stops before too much longer. He hears a wheelchair and he's dragged into it, still in the bag, still in pain, still unable to move without making it worse. The chair goes up a ramp and into a lift. (Block of flats. Molly's residence.) The sensation the lift makes as it goes up sends his head spinning, the strange sensation of falling up taking control.
"Do you not remember what happened the last time you were on a roof, dear brother?"
"Mycroft, I'm fifteen, I'm not nine."
"Hardly my point."
My foot slips. I'm tumbling down the slope of the roof, grabbing at anything I can to try to keep from falling again. I tump over the edge but manage to grab the eave—it hurts as the metal slices into my fingers, deep into the flesh. They never make this comfortable.
And then, predictably, the eave itself swings loose. It's not meant for holding up even the thinnest of teenage boys, and it soon collapses. Fortunately, I don't break any bones this time as the speed is lessened by the effort of wrenching loose the other, quite pathetic, bolts. But my hands are covered in blood.
"What did I tell you?"
"Shut up."
He's in a bed, the pillows smelling of women's shampoo. (Molly's bed.) He feels much better, still not at his best, shoulder aching, light-headed, and exhausted, but undoubtedly alive, and he permits himself to smile. (I've won the Game.)