Blindsided

Kelly Severide had had a headache most of the day, it had started early in the morning, and at the time it was little more than just annoying, and he'd tried to ignore it at first. In a couple hours, slightly annoying had upgraded to a dull throbbing. He'd taken Excedrin and thought that would be the end of that, but it never went away, it never even eased up, instead as morning turned to noon and then afternoon it went from a dull throb to a sharp throb, it was largely based in the back of his skull but at varying times it would jump around to a stabbing pain around his eye socket to moving clear across his scalp. He took more pills when enough time had passed, but the day went by and his headache still wasn't getting any better, so the next time he took another dose a couple hours sooner than the instructions said to. He didn't care, he just wanted the pain to stop, but it wasn't.

By night, he found himself staggering around his apartment, not sure what to do. His head felt like it was going to explode, and part of the feeling had coursed down to his stomach, it pulsated with every noise, every word, every sound, it pulsed when he looked at the lights. Both his head and his stomach pulsated in a sickening harmony, and altered, for a bit they throbbed in time with one another, then his head would throb, then his stomach would pulsate. This was worse than any hangover he'd ever had. The pain was so bad he could hardly even keep his eyes open, and he felt them burn with an onset of tears that were being wrenched out of him from the excruciating pain. That only made him even more nauseous, and he ran to the bathroom just in time to be violently ill.

Casey had just put his key in the door and entered the apartment, having been gone most of the day, first on a construction job, then he stopped at a pizzeria for dinner, and picked up some groceries on the way home.

"Kelly?" he called out, knowing that the Squad lieutenant had to be there because his car was outside and the lights were on.

He heard the sound of Kelly throwing up in the bathroom and dropped the bags on the floor and went to see what was wrong.

"Kelly?" he said as he made his way into the bathroom.

He found Kelly leaning back against the tub, all strength appeared to be gone from his body, his eyes could barely even open as he weakly moaned, "Help me, I'm dying."

Casey smiled sympathetically as he ran a washrag under the faucet, and knelt down beside his friend and wiped Kelly's mouth and told him, "You're not dying, Kelly, you have a migraine."

The other man moaned under his breath as he squeezed his eyes shut and could just barely shake his head as he replied, "This can' be a migraine..."

Casey smiled a little more amusingly as he asked his friend, "You never had a migraine, did you?"

The only response he got was a pained whimper. Casey lightly patted Kelly on the shoulder and told him, "Come on, let's get you up."

"I' been takin' pills all day," Kelly weakly murmured as Casey helped him to his feet, "they didn' do any good."

Casey nodded understandingly and told him, "Come on, let's get you to bed, you'll feel better in the morning."

"I won't make it till then," Kelly said in a pained whisper.

Casey smiled assuredly and placed both hands on Kelly's shoulders as he led him out of the bathroom, "Come on, everything's going to be fine."


Casey left the lights off in Kelly's bedroom as he helped Severide get changed and into bed, only the street lights shining in the window provided any illumination so he wasn't blindly stumbling around in the dark. He disappeared for a moment and returned with a bottle of water, Kelly pursed his lips together and turned his head to the side.

"Come on, Kelly, you need to drink this."

"Mm-mm," he weakly tried to shake his head.

"You won't get better if you don't," Casey told him as he unscrewed the lid, "just drink it slowly."

It took a lot of coaxing, but Kelly finally took the bottle and one sip at a time, drank about half of it.

"Good," Casey said as he took the bottle from him, "that'll help. Now just take it easy and go to sleep."

Kelly laid back and moaned at the contact of the pillows touching the back of his head. Even that felt like his skull was about to split wide open. He turned on his side facing towards the window.

"Do you want me to stay with you tonight?" Casey asked earnestly.

Kelly was in too much pain to move or even try to make any sounds indicating either way. He closed his eyes and waited for sleep to take him, waited for something to make the pain stop.


Kelly woke up in the dark, everything was still and quiet, and he tried to remember what had happened. He looked at the clock and saw it was 5:24 in the morning. How long had he been asleep? He felt a little stiff and sore, so more than just a few hours, how long? He remembered his headache, and he remembered going to bed around...9? 10?, the night before. He lay still for a minute and waited to see if anything happened, then slowly he moved, his head wasn't throbbing with every inch he turned. He let out a sigh of relief. Then he fell back asleep.

When he woke up again it was getting light in the room, he craned his neck to see the clock and the red numbers now said it was almost 7 A.M. He heard footsteps and turned and saw Casey appear in the doorway.

"How're you feeling?" he asked.

"Better," Kelly answered as he sat up.

"Glad to hear it," Casey said as he entered the room.

"Thank you."

Kelly looked at his friend and finally asked the question that had been on his mind off and on during the night. "How did you know?"

Casey didn't answer immediately, but he told Kelly, "When I saw you on the bathroom floor, you looked just like I've felt several times."

"You get migraines a lot, don't you?" Kelly asked.

"More than I'd like, they're a bitch, but they always go away, it's just actually getting to that point," Casey explained. "But for someone who doesn't regularly get them, and doesn't know what to expect, they can be very overwhelming."

"True that," Kelly quietly grunted. "Thanks, buddy."

"That's what I'm here for," Casey replied.