Wrapping up Untethered.
Not Beta'd
Goren's Hospital room
The light was bright blinding his eyes and sending a searing pain in his head. He couldn't remember where he was. All he could see was the blinding white light. All he felt were the soreness in his arms and legs from where restraints pdug and tore through his skin leaving deep bruises and scrapes.
It had to be heaven. Suddenly, he was hot and thirsty as fear started to bubble up from inside him. His cracked lips begged for the tiniest bit of moisture. He couldn't even muster the smallest bit of saliva to soothe the irritation. There was redness around the rim of his dry lips. He panicked and almost took out his IV. The attendees tried to calm him and adjusted his IV. He fought them and they held him down. He felt restrained and screamed, "No no no. Too long." He tries to get a grip on time and ground himself. "10-9-8-7-6- 6 -7-6-5-4-3-2…" his eyes darted left and right and he tried to will his head up but they kept pushing him back down. "I'm a cop. Let me go."
"Mr. Goren we are just trying to get the IV still so you can be hydrated. Do you know where you are?"
"Heaven. ...pills I'll take them just let me go?"
"Heaven?"
The attendees and doctor talk among themselves.
"What history do we have for him?"
"He's a transfer out of Tates."
"He may have a mental condition but either way we can't treat him if he keeps fighting us."
"Maybe he's breaking into delusions? Could be psychosis or a schizophrenia delusion."
"He is severely dehydrated. The dehydration could be worsening his condition. Okay. Let's administer a mild sedative to calm him down so he won't detach his IV and we'll access fully after he's got some fluids in. If he continues to fight us then, we may need to restrain him." The doctor continued while gesturing with his forefinger, "You see these marks, they're from previous restraints. I'd really like to keep that as a last resort if we can to give him a chance to recover. Also if we need to restrain him, I think it's best to do that pharmaceutically rather than actual bindings." He gave Goren a last look over. "Who's his medical proxy?"
"It says Alexandra Eames."
"Contact the medical proxy. See if she has any insights that will help us treat him."
Eames had left him at the hospital to get some rest, shower, and some food. She was on her way back when she received a phone call from the hospital. "Yeah, I'm Alexandra Eames. I'm already on my way. Please do not restrain him. I'll make sure he doesn't fight you. He was tortured and denied food and drink for a least 3 days maybe more. He doesn't really have a great idea of timeline in his state and the COs are not cooperating."
She pulled up to the hospital where they were keeping Goren. She was nervous and touching her face. The hospital was eerily quiet during the day not filled with the chaotic chatter and scurrying about that had been last night. She stayed a couple minutes in her car to mentally prepare herself for dealing with what awaited her. The doctors gave her a little idea of what she was to see and she filled in the blanks from what she saw that evening they admitted him. It seemed like he was regressing a bit and possibly suffering from nightmares. She rubbed her face and fixed her hair letting out a big breath. She exited the car and began walking to the hospital entrance.
She stood outside of Goren's room and was greeted by the attendees. "We need your help to get him to calm down. In light of his recent torture and the restraints, we want to avoid restraints physically and chemically as much as possible. We did give him a sedative earlier to help him rest and get some fluids in him."
"No more sedatives. He needs to be lucid."
"Okay we will write in his chart that he is to be given no more sedatives but that also depends on his cooperation."
"I understand. He will cooperate. Can I see him now?"
"Yes. He may be a little groggy. That's because of the sedative."
"Well if you need anything else you know where to find me." She flashed a quick smile and walked into the room. Inside, there were several machines beeping and monitoring his heart rate and blood pressure. He had an IV hooked up to his right arm. He was dressed in a white and blue hospital gown that was just a bit small on his large frame. He had a little more color to his face than when she last saw him but he was still a bit pale and his eyes were glassed over and had dark circles underneath.
"Bobby." She saw him shifting a bit in his hospital bed that was much too small to fit him straight on. His legs were curled up to his stomach to make himself fit. He looked small and vulnerable but his dehydration aged him considerably. Goren the contradiction, always. If she wasn't so scared and concerned for him she might have laughed at the thought but instead she settled calmly by his side trying to gather his attention.
"Alex. I'll save you. She won't hurt you."
She teared up a little. She saw a bit of fear in Bobby as he tried to reach out and grasp her arm. He winced at the pain of the Iv pulling at dry and itchy skin. Even in this state, he was trying to protect her. "Bobby, I'm here. I'm safe. You are safe but you're in a hospital, do you remember?"
"It's Jo!"
"Is he hallucinating?" An attendee inquired as he shined a small flashlight in his eyes. Goren tried to close his already exhausted eyes to shield him from the blinding pain that accompanied it.
"No. He's just tired." Eames ran her hand softly through his hair to comfort and soothe him. He leaned in to the touch feeling more relaxed than he's been in days. "He's had his sleep deprived for many days and I think the hospital is triggering memories of when I was hospitalized. It was the last major hospitalization." She grabbed his hand. "We got her." She caressed his hand with hers.
"I'm sorry," Bobby averted his eyes feeling confused and ashamed of his disorientation. Oh Bobby look at you.
"Hey Bobby. The doctors need to check you and you have an IV in your arm. Do you feel that. I need you to leave that in and let the doctors do their job. They aren't going to hurt you okay."
"Okay, Alex."
"You can examine him."
"It looks like the IV is helping but you still are very dehydrated so we want to get you back to normal levels. We also need you to be able to urinate before we release you." The doctor examined his arms and legs.
"You'll probably have some muscle or bone weakness due to being restrained for a long period of time. So if you do have to use the bathroom please call a nurse to assist you or we will have to put in a catheter."
He softly replied, "Uh no. I don't want…"
Eames smiled gently in his direction. "Figured you'd might have some objections to that."
The Doctor continued, "There's still a lot of bruising." Goren winced. "Do these hurt when I touch them? We can give you something for the pain and put some ointment to help speed the healing." He let go of his arm and then his leg making note of the patterns of bruising as they appeared deep, purple-blue, and rorschach-like in appearance. "Your blood pressure is still quite high. Let's see if you can get that down on your own before we have to treat you for it. We need you to try to rest and relax. Let the IV and meds do their jobs, okay?"
The doctor turned and Eames walked with him to the door. "His pain medication. Can we make sure no opioids? Nothing too strong?"
"We'll give him motrin for the pain."
"Thank you. Do you need me to sign anything?" She signed the consent to treatment forms and returned to Goren's side sitting in a chair by his bed as he had once done for her.
