Through The Ups & Downs
Couple; Harrison X Briana
Rating; Mature
Disclaimer: I do not own HTTYD or any songs I might use! In addition, from this point in the story and in future chapters, I do not own the character Ella (Eira) Solveig. She belongs to a good friend, ShadowSpirit020.
49) Wait It Out
The area was as silent as a graveyard and everyone stood in disbelief at what transpired moments ago. All of Berkville saw it; Harrison raced in on Toothless and defeated Red Death, then took this Dominic character by himself after double-crossing him. Harrison had been willing to give up his freedom to save the residents of his hometown, and then Harrison fought Dominic. The battle waged for nearly thirty minutes, just hand-to-hand combat, and then it was halted with both men keeping a gun on the other one. For a brief moment, everyone was sure that Harrison had Dominic cornered. However, that changed when Dominic grabbed a grenade and yanked the pin out; if that wasn't bad enough, Dominic shot Harrison twice in the left leg. One hit the upper thigh, and the other one struck Harrison's shin, Harrison hit the ground hard and in pain. Harrison told everyone to get out of range, yet, they never saw him make an escape when the explosion occurred.
The force of the grenade going off had everyone on the ground to cover them from any debris. When the initial blast was over, there was nothing but thick smoke clouding the area and no one could see Dominic or Harrison's figure through. For a fact, they all knew Dominic was dead, they saw Harrison shoot him and land right next to the grenade when it went off. However, they didn't know if Harrison far enough away to survive the explosion. Briana was in tears, scared to death that her husband was dead. Toothless roared out, and no response came from the other side. Toothless growled lowly as he motioned to Hookfang and Wildfire to do something. Both dragons lifted into the air and gave a powerful beat of their wings to blow the smoke away.
"Soldiers! Spread out and search for Haddock! NOW!" Aaron demanded. There was no time to waist, Harrison had been shot twice before the explosion and if he was alive by some grace of God, then he wouldn't be much longer. In a heartbeat Trevor, Syrus, Dexter, Olivia, Andy, Skye, and Chelsea rushed down to help search for Harrison with Glenn and Aaron in tow too.
"I need to help them!" Briana whimpered.
"No, dear. You need to stay up here with the boys and comfort them," Mia instructed her daughter, Viviana tried to help as well. After fifteen minutes, Dexter and Syrus waved their hands to signal that they found something.
"Found the Dominic guy!" Syrus yelled.
"Definitely dead. Harrison shot him in the back of the head," Dexter confirmed. "Harrison wasn't far from Dominic when the shot happened. He's gotta be around here," he whispered. Another ten minutes passed as Toothless jumped down and started sniffing around the debris before he moved some of it out of the way and there laid Harrison's still figure, severely wounded too.
"Toothless found him!" Trevor announced. Briana held her breath, so did hers and Harrison's family, their friends also. "Alright, careful now," he eased down and checked Harrison for signs of life and was relieved to feel a pulse. "I got one, but its weak and he definitely unconscious. I can't survey how bad the damage is, I'm afraid to move him,"
"No need. Emergency services are on their way, he'll go straight to the hospital and hopefully, we'll know more after that," Aaron informed. Harrison looked to be in bad shape, there were minor injuries that they could see right away. Split lip, cuts, bruising starting. What worried them was the two gunshots to the left leg and anything else they could not see right now.
"I-Is he going to be okay?" Chelsea asked softly.
"I don't know, he's barely clinging to life," Glenn mentioned while doing his best to hold pressure on Harrison's leg. After what seemed like forever, an ambulance pulled up and three paramedics rushed over as the soldiers stepped back to let them work.
"Unconscious, lost a lot of blood, weak pulse. We don't have much time," said one of them as Harrison was carefully lifted onto the stretcher, "Careful of his leg," the man warned. Soon, Harrison was in the back of ambulance and it was gone about five minutes later.
"What happened?" Spencer demanded quickly.
"They're taking him to Berkville Memorial, we'll know more there after Harrison gets out of surgery; and that's if he survives. I can't lie to you, Mr. Haddock. Harrison might not make it, we don't know anything until we get there so I suggest we don't waste time," Aaron informed. Sadly, no one could argue. Harrison was alive, and by Odin, they hoped it stayed that way. The two families and friends quickly dispersed and reached their mode of transport to go to the hospital.
[Hospital; Three & A Half Hours Later]
The Haddocks, Graysons, and friends were all at the hospital in the waiting area, most of which were nervously pacing around for some kind of update. Spencer just arrived after leaving his second in command in charge as he had his son to worry about. Aaron already called into HQ and reported what happened; he was given strict instructions to let them know about Harrison's condition when the doctor let them know. The nurses station confirmed that Harrison arrived ten minutes before they did and that Harrison was taken right into surgery but they knew nothing else as they also had not been updated since then. Viviana was crying quietly as Nate tried to comfort her, Spencer was pacing with Glenn and Aaron. Briana was being soothed by anyone who wanted to attempt to calm down the worried wife. All of them had been there for three and a half hours, the friends took breaks on doing coffee and snack runs. Finally, the doctor emerged from the Emergency Room as all eyes fell on him.
Of course, they were oddly surprised to find out that the doctor was someone they knew. Emmett Eretson. "Dr. Eretson? What are you doing here?" Nate asked first.
"Well, Berkville is my hometown. I saw when Harrison was brought in and I took the lead on his surgery," Emmett said softly.
"How is he?!" Briana demanded quickly and rushing forward.
"Alive and very lucky to be with all I saw," Emmett said as he motioned with his hands for everyone to sit down, reluctantly, they did so. "Harrison sustained multiple injuries; the worst was to his left leg as I understand he was shot twice,"
"Yes, that's correct. Will he recover?" Aaron inquired.
"If I might be allowed to finish?" Emmett asked while placing his hands in his pockets as Aaron nodded and stepped back. "Thank you. Now. I apologize for the long wait on an update, but there was a lot to be done to save his life. As you know, Harrison was gravely injured in the explosion. He suffered multiple small injuries to his person, mainly the face; it's really just some cuts, burns, and bruising. In addition, there was internal bleeding and severe injuries to his leg. The chest and abdominal injuries were straightforward to deal with, Harrison has two broken ribs on the right and a cracked one on the left along with his right wrist being sprained. I assume this was from the impact after the blast, but the leg injury was far worse,"
"How worse are we talking?" Glenn tried. Emmett gave them a sympathetic look now as they got nervous.
"There was extensive damage to the nerves and blood vessels within the lower leg and extensive loss of skin and muscle. The left lower leg bones were severely broken. We undertook surgery but despite the best efforts of trauma and vascular surgeons, we were unable to restore blood supply to the lower leg meaning there was no prospect of the leg healing. The tissue was already dying and had we done nothing, Harrison would have developed gangrene and died. Therefore, the only option we had was to amputate. I'm sorry, but we had to remove his leg from below the knee to save his life," Emmett informed as they all gasped. Briana instantly began to cry again, hiding her face into Skye's shoulder.
"Where…is he now?" Nate forced out.
"Harrison is very sick, and in the intensive care unit, remaining in an induced coma. His condition is critical but stable. I'll take you to see him, but much like with when Nate was in isolation, there cannot be too many people in the room at once. I'm setting the limit at four," Emmett told them calmly.
"What happens when you take him out of the induced coma?" Viviana asked.
"Well, we have to wait for him to wake up; it usually doesn't take long. After that, I'm sure he'll need some time to come around and be aware of things. By that point, we'll explain to him his injuries, the recovery time," Emmett listed off.
"Will he walk again?" Briana wondered, finally calming down a bit.
"Of course, Mrs. Haddock. Harrison can start basic leg exercises as soon as he's able to move without much pain. As I said, he has the sprained wrist, the two broken and one cracked ribs. It will take some time and I would also like to warn you that the physical recovery is not the only one to consider," Emmett began.
"Meaning?" Regina asked.
"Dr. Eretson is referring to the trauma of the accident affecting Harrison. You have to figure that he took on a large dragon, then fought Dominic, the blast; all of that is going to take some time to process, then he'll have to cope with losing his leg. Unfortunately, the doctor or even us can't say how it will go until he wakes up. Some soldiers are fine after things like this, and others are not," Aaron informed.
"Precisely. Harrison not only has to face the two or three months of recovery, but also the physical therapy. Within that, Harrison will also need to cope with the mental and emotional side of things. As it stands now, Harrison, I assume will be discharged from the military, that will be something else he has to wrap his head around. Patients like this, well, they don't all handle it as nice as we'd hope for. I'm certain that Aaron and Glenn here will advise to keep an eye on him after he leaves the hospital. However, as they said, we don't know anything until he wakes up and learns about what has happened," Emmett said gently.
"After he wakes up from this, he'll undergo a psychiatric evaluation, and then he will likely be honorably and medically discharged from the military. Even after that, we'll probably still keep an eye on him for a while," Glenn stated. It was hard to take in, knowing that Harrison risked his life for them and lost his leg doing it. Right now, all most of them wanted to do was see Harrison but would have to keep the visits short. Emmett said they would likely let Harrison off the induced coma in a few days; they wanted to give his body time to rest and restart. All any of them knew is that Harrison was going to need their love and support to get through this, and all of them were willing to give it.
[Four Days Later]
Emmett took Harrison off the induced this morning and said that Harrison should be awake by dinnertime at the latest. However, here it was 7:30 pm and Harrison was still out. The family expressed their concerns to Emmett and he decided to have some tests run to see what the problem might be, an hour passed before Harrison was returned to his ICU room and hooked back up to things as Emmett faced the family and friends to deliver the grim news about Harrison.
"Well, Dr. Eretson. Why hasn't he woken up yet?" Briana asked.
"I'm afraid that he's in a coma," Emmett said.
"Well, yeah. You guys induced him into one," TJ stated slowly. Emmett shook his head now.
"And we removed that this morning, Harrison should be awake by now and he isn't. After running some scans and tests, we've determined that he's just in a coma and we unfortunately don't know when he could wake up. It could be tomorrow, or a week from now, maybe even a few months. In situations like these, we just don't know. A bit of good news though, he isn't in a vegetative or persistent coma, he does respond, slightly, to a bit of touch. Otherwise, he remains unresponsive. All we can do for now is just watch him and pray he wakes up soon," Emmett informed sadly before turning away and going to see about other patients on the floor. The group couldn't believe it, all that time waiting for Harrison be off the medically induced coma and now he was in one or had been. Briana was a mess, all of them were. Harrison risked his life and had to deal with all these changes. As Emmett said though, all they could do now was wait it out.
~A/N: Big thanks to harrypanther for the assist with all the medical stuff!