Disclaimer: Characters not mine... They just do strange things in my head.
The room became a flurry of activity in a short time. Guys he worked with filtered to the door to speak to Bill, making Mark's agitation come to the fore, though he still couldn't move very much. A few of them even came in the room, but nobody stooped down to talk to Mark or bring comfort to him. At this point, he was just another casualty of the road, to be left behind when he could no longer keep up.
Mark blinked when the EMTs clomped in to the room in their heavy, rubber soled boots. "Well, well, big, ain't he?" The first man into the room said to no one in particular. The walkie-talkie on his belt crackled with information and static, and he wore latex gloves. "No wonder dispatch warned us." The gloves were powder blue, but to Mark as the EMT knelt down, the gloves became long, ashen gray, clawed hands. Mark knew full well it was the drugs that were making him see this, but he still couldn't help his reaction. Despite having lain still for hours, he exploded away from those demonic looking hands, which for all he knew, could have been the icy hands of Death or something worse.
"Oh fuck!" The EMT shouted. Mark was on his feet and at his most intimidating in seconds. He didn't say a word or make a sound, which was the creepiest thing about it. The EMT knew that most others would be raving by now. He looked to the rotund man who seemed to be the one that had found the big guy in this state. "Got any suggestions to help control your coked out friend?" He asked.
Bill shrugged his shoulders mildly. "It's never been this bad before. I assume all you can try to do is see if he'll get some downers into him."
"Great" The EMT muttered, and then looked back to Mark. "Hey, big fucker, you want some fun Valium? It'll put ya right. I got it if you want it." Mark just glared at the man who was shorter then him, but almost as wide. Mark was breathing heavy, and blinking, but otherwise not moving. He noticed the other EMT go to a bag he'd carried in with him. "Big fucker, look at me, not him." Said the first man. His name tag read: REGGIE, and he was in the middle of taking a quick glance around the room. He was long hardened to his job and the situations that it put him in. A strung out cokehead was nothing new to him. His eyes darted over to the bed. He saw the spilled bottle of pills there.
"Reds, eh? Wow. Good thing you had those in your stash. It probably saved your worthless life last night... I hate smart cokeheads, I really do. Honestly, you should fucking know better. Now, you can take the Valium my partner here is digging up for you, calm down, and come with us. Or, you can stay here and keep up your self-destructive cycle until your fucking heart explodes. It's your choice." Reggie said. For a long while, nobody in the room moved.
The other EMT finally stood up, with a bottle of pills from the gear bag in his hand. Mark's eyes rested on him again, wondering what threatening shape this man's hands would take on. Reggie immediately saw that he was loosing the big guy's attention. "You're a wrestler, right?" Reggie asked. "You've gotta be making good money, why waste it on this?"
Mark's eyes went back to him, and he glared daggers at this man. "You think life in the circus is easy?" He asked. Mark's voice was a harsh rasp, and he couldn't be sure if he'd formed coherent words or not. Everyone looked at him with such surprise that he'd spoken, that he knew he must have made understandable words come from his mouth. He'd jabbed as effectively as he could have with his now only trembling hands at the moment. He'd made an impact that people would remember. "At least you get to go home at the end of the day. At least you have a home." Mark rasped, and then his body started to wobble as if his knees were being cut out from underneath him. The last of his strength and energy was gone, and he was going to collapse.
He sank to his knees first, the last of his reflexes saving him somewhat by using his arm to prop himself up against the bed. The EMTs immediately jumped into action. The big one, Reggie, was in front of him, and the smaller younger man was behind him. "Can you still understand me big fucker?" Reggie asked him. Mark nodded weakly. "You gonna puke?" Mark nodded again. "Okay Joey, you get in front of the big fucker here. I am not dealing with coke fiend puke today... Especially from a guy this big. It's gonna be a lot."
"Here" Said Bill. He was holding the room's waste paper basket. Joey changed positions with Reggie without voicing any complaint, his mind to his work. He held his hands against Mark's shoulders, effectively keeping him an arm's length between them. Bill set the garbage can down in that space.
"Hope that's big enough. Depending on if he's eaten, he could become a Linda Blair stereotype." Reggie warned. He was right too. Mark's head lolled forward, and he heaved more into that garbage pail then he thought possible. Then again, he had had a lot of booze in his system as well last night. Reggie was behind Mark, his arms around the lower part of his chest, keeping him upright. "Hey! Whoever's not necessary, get the fuck outta here! This ain't a show!" Reggie barked. Mark saw blurry forms start to head towards the door from the corner of his eye.
"S'all a show" Mark slurred and heaved again, this time bringing up a stream of green bile. "Not real. Jus' a show." He rasped, and pitched to one side, about to fall over.
"Oh no no no, big fucker. You ain't passing out on me now! You did not live this long to die with one sock on and a severe case of halitosis, did you? I mean, you're stupid for having got yourself into this situation, but you'd be a fucking idiot and a quitter to give up now." Reggie said, his voice booming. Mark figured he would have made a great drill instructor if he'd taken the military route. Mark listened to that voice, and found himself believing what he'd been told... And Mark was no quitter. His not being a quitter is what had led to this situation. Mark stiffened his spine and forced himself to stay upright, aided by the edge of the bed.
"Well look, big fucker's got a brain in that head of his still." Reggie declared. "Now, we're gonna get you some Valium, okay? Your heart's still going a mile a minute and you're walking towards a heart attack." Mark managed to nod his head in agreement. "We're also gonna try and put a big dose of acetaminophen in you. You're burning up."
Mark managed to hold himself up while they poured pills and water down his throat, not opting for injections because they figured that he'd survived this long already, he could live through the time it took for them to absorb into his bloodstream. As often as possible, he looked over to Bill. Seeing Mark's will to survive this had softened the other man's expression somewhat. Perhaps Bill could even believe this was all an honest mistake... Yeah, right. Bill more then anybody else knew how Mark pushed everything, most of all the limits of his own body. "You hit what you head for." Bill had warned him cryptically not too long ago after yet another night of Mark's carousing.
Only now did Mark fully understand those words. He'd found his limit all right, and now he could do little more then suck air into his lungs. Reggie continued to hold him up while Joey stepped outside the room and brought in the rolling stretcher, which was impossible with the crowd in the room when they'd arrived. "Now big fucker, you gonna get violent when we strap you down?" Reggie asked.
"No" Mark whispered, trying his very best not to look at either of their gloves. They still made the hands underneath them look very alien to Mark. As an aside, he found his voice had much improved with the water they'd washed the pills down with. It wasn't much of an improvement, but he at least recognized it as his own again. "Sleep... Want sleep." He murmured.
"I'll bet you do." Reggie said. "How long you been awake now?"
"Don't remember." Mark answered. The EMTs hoisted Mark up on to the stretcher with relative ease for Mark's size, and Mark stayed good and quiet while they secured him to it. Joey started asking him questions, and Mark muttered back answers. He told him his birth date, his blood type, details about his insurance, next of kin, and exactly what drugs he'd been taking. But his eyes held on Reggie and Bill.
"We're gonna take him back to the hospital and pump him up with fluids and vitamins... the docs there can recommend rehab programs, especially for someone with money like him. Most addicts just get tossed back out on the street when they're through the danger zone. I assume you'll be coming with us?"
"I'll have to arrange a few things. He chose to do this at an inconvenient time." Bill said, thinking of the shows and the upcoming pay-per-view. He sighed deeply, and looked over at Mark. "He always does this. He always pushes himself." Bill said in a rare, emotional moment.
"Well, once we get him full of the things his body needs, maybe he can push himself back into a healthy lifestyle." Reggie offered. Mark closed his eyes then. He didn't want to face rehab. He just wanted to go home and sleep... That is, if he had a home. If they pulled him from shows, he literally had no place to go. Fuck Florida. Too humid there anyways.
"Hey big fucker! You're not goin' to sleep on me yet! I think you'll make it, but the doc's still gotta put you in the clear and make sure you're not gonna have a heart attack." Reggie barked. Mark's eyes snapped open. "See, you can't be that dumb. You know when it's important to listen..." Reggie turned back to Bill. "Anyways Mr. Moodie, I'm bringing him to Mercy. You'll be able to track him down there."
"Okay, what should I do with those, with all of it?" Bill pointed to the remains of Mark's stash strewn on the bed.
"Flush 'em, toss 'em, hell bring the reds with you for when you need to relax. Just don't let HIM have 'em." Reggie said. "All right Joey, let's move out. Seeing as I've taken a liking to the big fucker here, mostly because I figure he's done puking, you wheel and I'll heal."
They brought Mark out via the loading dock, for the sake of not upsetting the other guests. Two days ago, Mark had strutted in the front doors like he owned the place. Now he was being asked to leave by the back door... and he'd earned it.
It had been Bill who'd convinced him to get the jacked up insurance coverage, and when Mark got to the hospital, he was glad of it. Because of his risk of heart attack, and it being a Monday morning, he was wheeled on through the doors of the waiting room and hooked up to a heart monitor, among other things. He was also strapped down to a bed, which disturbed him, but the Valium had kicked in, and he couldn't do much of anything about it.
Reggie, in his oddly placed affection for his charge, had stayed with Mark while he waited to see the doctor, talking to him and keeping him awake. In a quiet moment, Mark managed to weakly test the restraints. "Jus' like the beast I've become." He said darkly, not caring if Reggie heard him or not.
"You didn't hurt anybody while fucked up, did ya?" Reggie asked.
"Fed a few expensive hookers a lot of drugs." Mark confessed.
"Well, that ain't shit. I deal with a lot of hookers, and you were probably making their life a little easier to handle."
"Ya know, for someone who hates cokeheads, you seem quite the advocate of recreational drug use." Mark's eyes rolled back. If he had wanted to sleep before, he needed to sleep now. Reggie laughing out loud kept him conscious though.
"I said I hated smart cokeheads. You should know better. Besides, I can't fault anybody for wanting to get rid of their pain. Most paramedics are alcoholics in our off time. We work such fucked up hours that we have to drink ourselves to sleep."
"Mmm... Sleep." Mark murmured.
"Not yet big fucker." Reggie ordered and Mark's eyes snapped open again. A smallish man in a white coat stood in the door way, and was flanked by two far larger men. "What have you got for me, Reggie?" The small man asked.
"Cocaine overdose. Have administered Valium to slow heart rate and acetaminophen to bring down his fever. Name is Mark Calaway, now know as 'big fucker', 28ish years old, blood type is..." Reggie then rattled off all Mark's medical stats. "...And he's insured out the ass, so you can't just turn him out on the street. Ain't that right, big fucker?" Reggie asked.
"Worth ev'ry penny to listen to you fer the last hour an' a half." Mark mumbled with his eyes half-closed.
"Yeah, very funny. Well Mark, you're in good hands now. See ya around." Reggie said. Mark watched him go through his still unfocused eyes. He wanted to say something, but the doctor and the two orderlies were immediately in his face, checking him for eye dilation, and all the other preliminary evaluations. The lights in his eyes, and all the hands in his space were getting him agitated again. The doctor spoke to him in an even tone, trying to sooth him, but Mark couldn't focus on him like he did the brash Reggie. A temporary regimen of anti-psychotic drugs and nutritional supplements were arranged as Mark was showing signs of malnutrition, and Mark was wheeled into a private room and finally allowed to sleep.