Matt was starting to realize he was just beginning to wake up. He felt very strange, and uncomfortable. He felt like he was sick, or hungover, or something in between, he wasn't sure. It hurt to open his eyes, his body was stiff and sore in various places, he winced and softly moaned every time he moved. The sun was up, it was morning, if he had to guess, later than he usually slept, and he was sprawled out over the middle of the bed. He clumsily got to his feet and padded over to the door, opened it, stepped out into the hall, and suddenly found himself wondering just what the hell had gone on last night.

The guys from 51 were scattered across the living room, sleeping on the furniture and a couple on the floor with blankets and pillows. Casey tried to remember what they were doing there, but it wasn't coming back to him. He tiptoed over to Kelly's room, hoping Severide could shed some light on this, but when he got there, he felt even more confused than before.

Kelly was asleep in bed, looking dead to the world, and Boden was sitting in a chair by the bed asleep, with his head tilted clear back that it looked like the chair might tip over at a moment's notice.

Casey tried to think. Now things were starting to come back to him, but only bits and pieces, and what he could remember was all fuzzy, like a dream.

He remembered Boden had told him a couple days earlier to hang in there, and not to lose faith. And he guessed Boden's solution was to round up everybody Kelly had specifically been trying to avoid since the hospital, and bring them to the apartment to see him instead. That way Kelly couldn't avoid them, he had to see them, he had to hear what they had to say. Casey remembered the knock at the door, neither of them was expecting anybody, so when he opened the door and saw 10 firefighters out in the hall, he was overwhelmed to say the least. He'd seen the mild look of panic on Kelly's face at seeing everyone, but there was no way out of it.

Casey vaguely remembered a sensation of inching his way back from everyone and wanting to disappear from the situation altogether. On one hand he felt like he needed to be there for Kelly, but at the same time he knew his best friend was in a multitude of perfectly capable hands. Like it or not, this was what Kelly needed, to be around his firehouse family, to know that what happened to him hadn't changed the way they saw him or thought of him, to know he wasn't alone in all this. He heard the others talking to Kelly, but nothing really seemed to register with him what they were saying. It wasn't important, they were here for Kelly, he was the one who needed to hear what they had to say. Leave it to Otis to find him though, however much time had passed, in the kitchen where he was sitting with his whole upper body slumped over the table.

"How're you doing, Lieutenant?" he asked cautiously.

Casey forced himself to sit up and without looking at Otis he told the man, "This feels like the worst night of my life." Everything that had been going on the past couple weeks piled on him and he dropped his face against the tabletop again and broke down sobbing.

He heard the scrape of a chair's legs against the linoleum floor, heard Otis sit down next to him, felt the younger man's hand on his back as he tried to be reassuring, "It's gonna be alright, Casey, we're all here, for both of you."

That was the last conscious memory Matt had of what had gone on in that apartment last night.

He quietly backed out of Kelly's room and turned around and tried to figure out what to do. Did he wake anybody up? Should he? Or should he just go back to his own room and pretend to sleep until everyone else was up and around? He didn't know and it made him feel very self conscious as he tried simultaneously to tiptoe over everybody on the floor and not step on any parts of the floor that creaked and wake everybody up.

The apartment was awkwardly silent once everybody left, and it was just the two lieutenants again. Casey had tried avoiding Kelly for a while but finally went into the living room and faced the dark haired man, who stood behind the couch with his hands pressed against the top to support him.

"So..." Casey tried to think what to say, and honestly didn't know, "how're you doing?"

Kelly looked at him for a few seconds before shrugging and letting out a small groan. "I really don't know...I feel weird."

Casey merely nodded, not sure how to respond.

Kelly added, "I feel like something's missing...but, whatever it is...it doesn't feel like that's a bad thing, if that makes any sense."

Matt had trouble daring to hope. He'd done more praying in the last few days than he remembered doing the whole time his mom was awaiting trial. He'd gone back to Orlovsky yesterday, hoping there might be something to 'strength in numbers' and the two men prayed together for what felt like an eternity. Casey knew he should've been honest with the chaplain about what was going on, but he couldn't bring himself to tell the man about Kelly's incident the day before anymore than he could Boden. But hearing this, Casey felt a small sensation of relief...maybe his prayers had actually been answered, maybe what Kelly had lost was the sensation Rooker had taken his soul from him. Maybe this was a win for them, and maybe there'd be more, he hoped.

All the same, Matt felt a need to clear the air about something, and he told Kelly, "I had no idea they were coming here last night."

Kelly nodded, "I know. It's okay...I guess I needed it..." he looked down towards his feet and sighed, "God...it feels like I've been gone from 51 for forever."

"You'll be back soon, Kelly."

He nodded, "I know...but that means seeing a therapist."

Casey nodded sympathetically, "I know you don't want to."

"No, I don't," Kelly said point blank. He looked Casey dead in the eyes and added hesitantly, "but I know I have to."

"Would it help if I come with you?" Casey offered.

"Uh...I don't think so...I don't know...this...it's going to be hard enough to tell anybody about...and you've already been through the worst of it here...maybe this way I can take the burden off you some."

Casey slowly nodded, "I understand."

There was a look on Kelly's face that indicated a combination of pain and hesitance as he said, "But there is something that, uh, I guess I should tell you about...maybe once you know, you won't think I'm such a basket case."

Casey felt a mild shock, "I don't think that, Kelly."

"It's okay, I would if I had to see the way I've been acting," Kelly gestured to the couch.

Matt sat down beside him, dreading what might be coming. What came out though, wasn't anything he could begin to imagine.

Kelly told him about the nightmare he had in the hospital while he was on the ventilator, where Casey was the one who had been raped, and Kelly had tried to help him, and all it had gotten him was yelled at, beaten up, and nearly killed more than once, and finally about him drinking the bleach and winding up on life support. Now things were starting to make sense, why he'd found Kelly in the bathroom screaming when the bleach fell out of the cupboard. Knowing this made Casey feel like he was going to be sick, but he stayed there and listened to the whole thing as Kelly very painfully explained how the nightmare was almost, almost worse than what he'd actually gone through, and it was at the forefront of his mind every time he felt like he was going to explode and lay into Casey when the stress and the memories and trauma all got to be too much, that was the one thing for sure keeping him from going off the rails, that he didn't want his nightmare to become a parallel reality.

Casey managed to listen to all this and take it all in with a stone faced expression, no readable emotions. Even his voice seemed deadpan when he finally asked Kelly, "I'm going to hug you, is that alright?"

Kelly looked at him, his eyes shining with tears starting to well up and merely said, tiredly and desperately, "Please..."

Casey carefully put his arms around Kelly and pulled him against him, he felt Kelly's heart beating in his chest, felt every breath he took in and out, felt a slight tremor running through his body as he tried not to fall apart on Matt now.

"Why didn't you tell me about this sooner?" Casey quietly asked.

"I didn't know how, without you thinking I'd lost my mind," Kelly said.

"It sounds like..." Casey spoke quietly and slowly, not wanting to upset Kelly anymore than he already was, "like your brain thought reversing our positions would help protect you against the trauma...for a while anyway, if you thought I was going through it instead of you."

Kelly shook his head, "I don't know...all I know is I wanted to die when I thought it was you...and I also wanted to die when I remembered it was me."

"And now?" Casey asked cautiously.

Kelly pulled back from the embrace and looked at him, "I know it wouldn't solve anything...maybe nothing will ever solve it...but I'm not going to let that bastard win...he's dead, that's half the battle over...I gotta figure out where to go from here to finish it."

"You know I'll help you any way I can," Casey said.

Kelly nodded, "I know...thanks, buddy."

Casey sighed tiredly but managed a small smile, "That's what I'm here for."

A/N: I am so sorry for being absent so long on this and most of my other stories. I'm hoping to get back to work on them and updating soon.