Rape
Kelly Severide had spent most of his day off-shift at the courthouse sitting around in a gallery waiting to be called for jury duty. He'd tried to get out of it, he'd filled out on the questionnaire sent to him in the mail why he wouldn't be able to sit on a jury given his work, but he'd still been informed he had to show up. He was one of what seemed to be a couple hundred people who showed up for the same trial, and he had to wait around as one by one, people were called to the front, 12 in the box and 6 more on folding chairs in front of the box. The two lawyers stated their sides of the case and went through a discussion about if anybody was related to or acquainted with the defendant or either of the attorneys, several were. Then there was a show of hands for any questions that applied to any potential jurors, and stopping to talk with the ones who had raised their hands. A recess was taken, and of the first 18 picked, most were excused, then the process started again, 18 more called to the front, the original questions were rehashed and some new ones were added as well. At that rate, Kelly was sure they'd never even get to him, he almost fell asleep several times during the process. They broke for lunch, and at 1 o' clock they resumed, and finally Severide's name was called and he found himself on one of the folding chairs. By now the gallery was largely empty, so many people had been excused for various reasons, and he hoped it meant they'd be getting out of there soon. Like all the others he'd been asked if he had any health problems that would make it difficult for him to sit for long periods of time, any problems hearing, any reason why he wouldn't be able to sit on a week long trial. He'd never been so relieved to tell anybody what it was he did for a living and exactly how much of his time it took each week.
By the time he was excused with a handful of other people, court was just about to adjourn for the day anyway, it was late in the afternoon and it was already getting dark. The cold night air coming in was a welcome relief after the stuffy air of the courtroom.
It was only once Kelly got to his car that he remembered to take his phone out of his pocket and turn it on. That had been a big thing for everybody going into the courtroom, nobody was allowed to have their phones on, of course. Of course, during the brief recesses everybody else had turned theirs on and were texting or talking to somebody until they were called back in, except him.
As soon as his phone came on he saw several missed calls by the guys from 51. What was going on? Most were just hangups when they couldn't get him, but there were a couple voicemails, one from Mouch, one from Boden. He listened to the chief's message first. It was brief, and grim.
"Kelly, you need to get to Chicago Med as soon as you get this message, Casey's in the hospital, somebody attacked him."
Kelly felt like his stomach dropped out of his body entirely. He was aware that for a minute he just stood in the parking lot with his jaw dropped and his eyes wide as he tried to process this. The call was two hours ago, what had happened since then?
He got in his car and rushed to the hospital, he debated calling for a heads up on Casey's condition but decided he didn't need to get into a wreck trying to get there faster if the news was bad. It didn't matter much, he was at Med in 15 minutes, he was sure he'd gone through several red lights in the process but he honestly had no memory of even being on the road. He ran in and immediately he noticed the waiting room was fairly empty of firefighters.
"What's going on?" he demanded to know as he marched over to Herrmann and Mouch, the only two still there.
"Casey's been moved to a room, the chief and the others are in with him now," Herrmann answered, a grim expression on his face.
"What happened?" Kelly asked.
"Uhhh," Mouch said in a tone that suggested he knew more than he was willing to let on and trying to buy time, "We're not really sure, he was about unconscious when they found him."
"They-who?" Kelly asked, "Who found him, where?"
"Somebody found his truck half a block from an alley with the door open...they found Casey in the alley by a bunch of garbage bags," Herrmann answered hesitantly.
"When?"
"About three hours ago," Mouch answered, "You're his emergency contact, when the hospital couldn't get you, they called Boden, and he called us."
"I was in court all day," Kelly groaned, he realized he hadn't bothered to look through all the missed calls, he would've definitely noticed a call from the hospital. "What did the docs say?"
"That...Casey's going to be recovering for a while," Herrmann said, "And it'll probably be a few days before he can go home. He got lucky that nothing was broken, but that's about the size of it."
"What does that even mean?" Kelly asked. "What...why aren't you guys in with the others?"
"Halstead suggested everybody go in in shifts or it might overwhelm Casey," Mouch told him, "Chief said if you showed up to head right in."
"Where's his room?" Kelly asked.
Herrmann told him and Kelly took off. On the way he saw Otis and Cruz coming back from Casey's room and both men looked horrified.
"Where've you been?" Otis asked.
"Never mind that, what's going on with Casey?" Kelly asked.
"He's awake, that's about the size of it," Cruz answered. "He looks pretty bad, Severide."
"He's been asking for you," Otis added.
"Thanks," Kelly took off running without any further questions.
He turned the corner and through the glass doors he saw Boden's back blocking the view of Casey in the hospital bed. He slid the door open and entered, "Casey?"
Boden turned and looked at Kelly, and Kelly saw Casey, and he was horrified.
Casey's face had been beaten black and blue, his left eye was a sickening shade of purplish red and just about swollen shut from somebody punching him, he had stitches over his right eye, large purple bruises went up and down his arms, his sheet had just slightly been pushed to the side and Kelly's eyes widened at the sight of the bruises on his thighs. Only then did it click in his head just what had happened.
Boden's voice on the message played in his head again. He'd just said that Casey had been attacked. All Cruz had said was he looked pretty bad. Mouch said nobody really knew what had happened because he'd been unconscious when somebody found him. Found, oh God.
Casey looked at him through the eye that could still open, and he weakly croaked out, "Kelly..."
Severide just stood there for several seconds, unable to move, unable to think. All he was aware of was a sensation coursing through his body, a sudden sensation of heat, of pins and needles stabbing every nerve in his body, and an uncontrollable urge to extricate himself from the situation.
"Kelly?"
He wasn't even able to talk. Severide felt his whole body surging with a sudden need to get out of there. He was only faintly aware of his feet moving, before he turned and ran out of the hospital room.
"Kelly!" Casey momentarily forgot about the pain he was in and tried to get up, but his injuries won out and with a defeated cry he fell back against the hospital bed. Boden was at his side in a second, trying to get the lieutenant to calm down.
"Kelly!" Casey screamed at the top of his lungs.
"He'll be back," Boden assured the younger man.
Casey's body went limp against the mattress as the fight left him.
"He hates me," he said in a small, broken voice.
"No," Boden shook his head.
"He's disgusted with me," Casey said, "because I didn't stop it."
"No, he's not," Boden assured the blonde man. "He's in shock, Matt."
Suddenly Casey sniped, "What gives him the right to be in shock?" As soon as he'd said it, he groaned and looked down at his knees, "Sorry..."
"It's okay, Matt," Boden lightly squeezed Casey's hand to let the fireman know he wasn't alone. "Give Kelly some time, he'll be back."
Casey groaned and shook his head, "He won't be back."
"Yes he will."
Casey shook his head and mumbled "No" like a mantra, each one slightly louder than the one before, then out of nowhere he shot up in the bed again and Boden had to restrain him as Matt screamed and sobbed, "Kelly! Kelly! I want Kelly!" His outburst was enough to trigger the monitors he was hooked up to, all of which started going off, and the doctor came running in to find out what had happened.
Severide's mind was reeling as he ran through the corridors, he only paused for a few seconds when he saw a cop at the front desk collecting a bag and his heart dropped to his stomach as he realized a rape kit must've been done on Casey, and that was it. Images he couldn't deal with entered his mind and he resumed running for the exit. He was faintly aware of somebody calling his name but he didn't stop or look to see who it was, he ran out the doors of the hospital and got about 10 feet into the parking lot before he felt something knock him down.
He hit the pavement hard and realized somebody was on top of him, he struggled against whoever it was and turned over, and suddenly stopped and his eyes bulged when he saw it was Otis and Cruz.
"Where the hell are you going, Severide?" Otis demanded to know as they got off him and everybody stood up.
"I can't do this," Kelly was heaving every breath like he'd just run a marathon, "I can't go back in there."
Even as the words came out of his mouth, Severide could hardly believe he was saying them and he knew it wasn't making any sense, it wasn't making any sense to him either but right now he had an overwhelming sensation in his whole body to put as much distance between himself and Casey as possible, just why that was he didn't know.
Cruz grabbed his arm and tried to shake some sense into him as he yelled in the lieutenant's face, "You better pull yourself together, Severide, and get your ass back in there, Casey needs you."
"He's been screaming for you for the past half hour," Otis added.
"Who did this to him?" Kelly demanded to know.
"We don't know," Otis shook his head, "The cops are canvassing the area where he was found to see if anybody saw or heard anything."
"I can't go back there," Kelly said, "I can't see him."
"Why not?" Cruz asked firmly.
Kelly hated himself for saying it, but he really didn't think he could go back and face Casey. He felt something in him that the only word he could think to describe it was fear. A fear he didn't think he'd ever known before in his life, in any fire, any building collapse, that all paled to what he was feeling right now, he couldn't explain it, and he hated himself for it, he hated even more that he could admit to this, if only to himself.
When the weight of what happened to Casey fully hit him, Kelly had felt two things simultaneously, he wanted to find whoever was responsible and kill them with his bare hands...and he wanted to throw himself down beside the hospital bed, hold his battered best friend in his arms and promise Casey it would be alright. That was when his brain short-circuited and he was hit with a massive feeling of fight or flight, and he chose flight, because he was scared to death what might happen if he actually acted on that instinct.
In just a split-second, images, sounds, raced through his head, if he even touched Casey he could picture the Truck lieutenant flashing back to his attack and lashing out and flailing about trying to escape from Kelly, only further injuring himself in the process. That scared the hell out of him more than anything and the only solution he could think of was to remove himself from the situation before he did something they both regretted.
"I don't know what I'll do," he confessed to the two men. "I'm scared I'm gonna hurt him."
Otis and Cruz came down a notch at that, but they didn't let up.
"You need to get over that, Kelly," Otis told him, "He needs you."
"What if..." Kelly was at a loss how to explain, "What if I make it worse?"
Cruz was determined as he told the Squad lieutenant, "The only way you can do that is if you don't get back in there right now."