A/N: Sorry for the missed week, the research for the medical stuff ended up taking a lot more time and energy than I was expecting.


The warm hand on Gus' shoulder continued to ground him as the nurse in a blue shirt bustled around, taking his blood pressure, his temperature, and his pulse. She asked questions as she unclipped a monitor from his finger and typed on the computer, and he felt himself detaching from the experience as he answered mechanically, speaking as little as he could with his broken voice but still making sure he was quick, clear, and thorough.

"Here's a hospital gown, ties go in the back, here's a bag for your clothes." The nurse handed over the bundle of items in her hands and continued, "The doctor will be in shortly, do you need any assistance getting changed? If you'd rather, we could cut off-"

Gus shook his head frantically. He didn't care that it was only scissors; they were still metal and sharp, and the nurse was definitely not Shawn.

The nurse nodded briskly, and Gus watched her leave the room before taking a breath and gently shrugging away Henry's hand. Henry pulled back and glanced between Gus and the door as his fishing line pushed and pulled in indecision.

"Do you want me to-" Henry started to ask.

"No," Gus answered immediately. "Just... turn around?"

Henry nodded and turned, his head tilting slightly as he studied the desk and cabinets in the corner of the room. The red tint to his puzzle pieces slowly faded as they began to click together.

Gus smiled slightly at the similarities between Shawn and Henry before looking down at the hospital-green gown on his lap and deciding what was the least painful way to change his clothes. It was easier to ignore all of the thoughts and memories lurking at the edges of his mind as he focused on his task. He put his bracelet down carefully and grabbed the back of his shirt collar, pulling it over his head and wincing as the cloth rubbed against the cut on his face. He tried to move his bad arm as little as possible as he eased his other arm free and slid the sleeve over his new bandage. He tossed the red and yellow stained shirt on the ground without a second thought before pulling the gown on.

The sleeves kept trying to slip down his shoulders, but he ignored them as he took a breath and worked one-handed to take the rest of the prisoner clothes off. His leg burned when he was forced to move it, and he bit his lip to stay quiet so he wouldn't worry Henry. A strange mix of satisfaction and vulnerability ran through him as he dropped the clothes off the side of the bed to join the shirt.

Gus took several breaths to make sure his voice wouldn't shake before saying, "You can turn around now."

Henry turned back around, and Gus self-consciously pulled the sleeves of the gown higher onto his shoulders. Henry scanned him over quickly before nodding towards the gown. "Want me to help with the ties?"

Gus hesitated before nodding and sitting forward, giving Henry access to his back. Henry reached out before pausing, his thoughts flaring red again. Gus frowned, wondering what had caused the reaction, and he focused on the pulling fishing line: Anger, a dark band of bruising and raw skin wrapping around the back of a neck, large bruises spreading across the shoulders and back, one dark circular bruise right over the spine, a foot kicking a person while they were already on the ground. Guilt.

Gus tried to remember when he'd been kicked as Henry started doing up the ties of the gown, and he was so distracted, he didn't realize Henry was at the top tie until the gown's collar moved slightly towards his throat. He jolted and waited for the collar to tighten, but Henry was already moving away, and the gown wasn't slipping off of his shoulders anymore.

Gus took a few breaths to calm his racing heart as he shook his head at himself; the hospital gown was almost comically loose around his neck; it couldn't be further from a collar if it tried.

Henry watched him for a moment before reaching to take the clear plastic bag the nurse has left and walking around the bed towards the discarded clothes. Gus found his voice again to say, "Don't bother, just pitch them."

He didn't care if he had to leave the hospital in the nude, there was no way in hell he was going to put that uniform back on.

Henry nodded without any argument and quickly bagged the dirty clothes before tossing them further back into the room, out of the way and out of sight. He moved back to Gus' side and lifted his hand slightly with a questioning look. Gus nodded and was able to relax further as Henry's grounding touch returned to his shoulder with a gentle squeeze.

He looked around as they waited and his gaze caught on his bandaged arms; the duct tape on the left seemed to stand out, looking crude and gross next to the sterile cleanliness of the room, the bed, and the gown. His eyes slid over to the bulkier bandage on his other arm and he chewed his lip, realizing Henry was going to find out what was underneath if he stayed in the room. He didn't want Henry to find out like that.

He needed to be the one to tell Henry.

He tried to focus on the searing in his arms instead of the words coming out of his mouth as he said, "Um… You should know. My arm, it's not… it's not just cuts."

"Yeah, I kinda figured that out myself," Henry said gently.

Gus nodded and forced himself to keep going. "It's, uh… He-" the words wouldn't form, and a thought rose up to rescue him as he tried to push through the block; how would Shawn say it?

He tried again, "Do you remember when Shawn and I were twelve and you walked in on us watching the second chainsaw massacre movie?"

"Yeah…" Henry answered hesitantly. "I grounded Shawn for a week after that."

"I don't think I slept for a week after that," Gus remembered with a small smile. He looked back at his bandage and his face fell. "Um, in the movie, remember when Leatherface had that electric carving knife…?"

He felt the moment Henry understood as two puzzle pieces clicked together and a black wave spread from the realization. The fishing line pulled tight, and an image was unintentionally broadcasted: Dahmer strapped to a medical table as a machine slowly pulled his hair up, tearing his scalp free; blood running across his face, skin pulling and stretching, white bone peeking through the mess…

Gus barely suppressed his gag and grabbed his bracelet, slamming his strengthened shield between him and the vivid imagination. He quickly asked the first thing he could think of to distract Henry. "How's Shawn doing?"

Henry's thoughts stuttered as he noticed Gus' distress, and he took a deep breath, the black fading into the background as he answered, "He just got out of X-ray. Juliet says they're waiting to hear back but are assuming surgery."

Gus nodded, having expected as much, and Henry hesitated before saying, "Gus, I'm-"

He was interrupted by a knock on the door and someone calling through asking if they were ready for the doctor to come in. Henry squeezed his shoulder and quietly said, "Thank you, for telling me."

Gus tried to smile at him before nodding towards the door with a questioning look. Henry nodded in understanding and called out for him, "Yeah, he's ready."

The doctor let himself in, and Gus tried to distract himself from the white coat by focusing on the stethoscope hanging from his neck, his bald head, and the taste of steak coming from his thoughts.

The doctor started speaking before he even looked up from the folder in his hands. "Hello, Mr. Guster, I see that you've had quite a busy few days. I'm Doctor Hunt, let's get you taken care of."

Gus tensed slightly at the doctor's blunt tone and had to keep himself from flinching when Hunt sat at the desk and started to ask brisk questions about his injuries, his pain levels, and his breathing.

The doctor eventually looked away from the computer and stood up, taking his stethoscope off as he stepped forward. Gus cringed back without thinking, leaning into Henry's hand, and Hunt paused with the scope partially lifted to his ears. "I just need to double check your breathing and listen to your chest. This is a bit cold, but it won't hurt."

Gus nodded and forced himself to stay still as he was instructed to take deep breaths while the doctor listened to his chest and back. His third breath triggered another coughing fit and Hunt stood up straight, waiting for him to be done before asking, "Have you inhaled anything in the last day or two?"

Gus nodded, and, at the doctor's expectant look, remembered the 'thorough' part of the rule. He swallowed and said, "Some water and puke. The coughing's been worse since the second."

Hunt nodded at the answer and absently reached out to feel Gus' throat. Gus scrambled back and the doctor froze before slowly lowering his arm. "Sorry, muscle memory…"

Gus' heart was pounding and he tried to track the words that followed while also fighting the phantom collar that was trying to tighten around his throat. He was only able to pick up "CT scan","very lucky", and "no major injuries" through his haze of panic.

A warm hand covered his and helped pull him back to the room as the doctor stopped talking; Gus could feel them waiting on him, and he looked down at Henry's hand while muttering a quiet, "Sorry."

Hunt's thoughts stayed even without any traces of impatience or annoyance as he answered. "Mental trauma is common in situations like yours, no need to apologize for an injury. A psychiatrist can be scheduled to meet with you later, if you'd like. Not everyone wants them, but they are available."

Gus nodded in understanding, even as he knew he couldn't take the risk of being seen as a psychotic patient who saw and heard things that weren't there. He thought about what it would be like, to be constantly surrounded by voids and twisting thoughts, and he couldn't stop the shudder that ran through him.

"Like I said, it's your choice," Hunt said with a shrug. "I'm not worried about your lungs, we'll keep an eye on it while you're here, but antibiotics should get it cleared up. I'm going to need to look at your injuries, but I can put on a treated bandage after to help with the pain."

Gus took as deep of a breath as he dared and closed his eyes as he whispered, "Ok."

He flinched slightly at the added flare of pain as his bad arm was moved and the pressure from the bandage lessened. Hunt's hands were surprisingly gentle as he peeled away the duct tape, and Gus choked back a whine as the skin pulled at the edge of his wound.

"Yeah, that looks pretty painful," Hunt said, in an almost conversational tone. "Believe it or not, though, it's not actually the worst I've seen this month. You said this was done by a knife?"

Gus nodded, keeping his eyes clenched shut. He didn't want to see it; there were parts of his body that he just wasn't supposed to see, and he intended to keep it that way. Henry's thoughts glowed red, but they stayed as grounding as his touch as the doctor laid down a new, cool bandage and taped it down.

"Alright, it's safe to look. That should start to feel better in a few minutes; let's talk options."

Gus peeked with one eye to double check that his arm was covered again before opening both eyes fully to look at the doctor warily. Hunt's lips twitched slightly, as though he was trying to smile encouragingly before he explained, "The EMT on site was able to retrieve the detached skin and preserve it. It's risky, but due to the surgical nature of its removal, and the short duration it's been detached, I think we can use it as a graft instead of having to harvest fresh skin."

Gus stared at him and thought about the strip of skin being waved in front of him, and how it had been in Dahmer's pocket for almost an hour -how it had belonged to Dahmer for almost an hour- and he almost refused to take it back. But he also knew how skin grafts worked. He knew how they would cut off several layers of skin from somewhere else on his body, how a knife would be slicing into him again, how he would have yet another wound to heal from.

He knew he was shaking hard enough for Henry to feel, but he clenched his hand around his necklace and kept himself in the present as he nodded his head jerkily and answered, "Y-yeah... I want to try that."

"Alright. In that case, I'm going to go talk to the nurses and get things started; the sooner we can get it done, the more likely the detached skin will still be viable. Someone will be in in a few minutes to talk you through what's going to happen." Hunt walked back to the desk and retrieved his folder. "You'll be sedated for the surgery, and hopefully we'll also be able to take care of your other injuries before you wake up. Do you have any questions for me?"

"No," Gus answered as he eyed up the doctor's hand already resting on the door handle. He remembered his last wake up in a hospital, the panic of choking and suffocating on a tube, and quickly changed his mind, "Will I wake up on a ventilator again?"

Hunt paused with the door partially open and gave the question a moment of thought before replying in a matter-of-fact tone, "Hopefully not, but with your injured throat and lungs, I can't guarantee anything."

Gus sighed and nodded as the door closed again. He tried to remind himself that he'd be asleep while everything happened, that he wouldn't feel a thing, and that he'd probably wake up on pain medication. At the reminder, he looked back down at his bad arm and carefully flexed his fingers, noticing that the constant hot pain had already faded slightly. He tried to focus on that relief, instead of on knives, and skin, and being completely helpless.

"Hey, you're safe, alright? It's going to be ok."

Gus hoped Henry was right. He glanced at his arm again and asked, "You wanna know what sucks?"

"What?"

"Shawn was just bragging less than a week ago that I'd never had surgery…" Gus said with a faint smirk.

He could practically hear Henry's eye roll before his reply. "Of course he did. You two…" Henry sighed the sigh of a parent who was far too used to his son getting into trouble. Gus couldn't argue with the sentiment, so he just sat back and focused on the fire slowly ebbing away in his arm as he waited for the next hurdle.


"Alright, I think we're all ready to go," a blonde nurse informed him, her cheerful voice contrasting strangely with the rolling thunder of her thoughts. She checked his IV line before reaching for a needle sitting on a tray nearby, and Gus clenched his hand around his bracelet as he watched her inject the medicine into the tube leading to his arm. The nurses had agreed to let him keep Shawn's necklace until he was asleep, and Henry had agreed to keep it safe until he woke up.

Henry squeezed his shoulder in silent support as the nurse smiled and said, "Do you think you can count down slowly from ten for me?"

Gus nodded. "Ten."

What if his mind was too different now, and the drugs didn't work?

"Nine."

What if they did work, would he be able to keep his thoughts separate from everyone else's when he woke up?

"Eight."

He didn't want to lose himself again.

"Seven."

He didn't feel any different, shouldn't he be feeling tired now?

"Six."

He hoped Shawn was ok.

"Five."

He really wasn't feeling anything. He should tell the nurses-


Fire surrounded Gus, heat washing over his skin as flames scurried up the walls and spread across the ceiling. Tongues of flame flickered under his skin, burning wherever they touched, leaving black trails that cracked and leaked molten blood. He tried to keep himself quiet as the searing pain spread through him, smoke twisting and wrapping around him, choking him as hot flames wrapped around his throat.

The flames turned solid, holding him tethered in place as Dahmer walked past, cradling a dripping brain in his hands. He didn't know whose it was, and that scared him more than the sharp tools that appeared in Dahmer's hand. Dahmer grinned and started to cut into the brain, and Gus felt the same knife cutting his arm, each slice bringing another wave of agony.

But he wasn't the one screaming.

Metal surrounded Gus, glowing hot, and the air waved and shimmered with heat as the trunk buckled and warped around him. He ignored the smell of burning flesh and the pain in his hands and arm as he pounded on the lid, desperate to get out. Shawn needed him, Shawn was hurting, Shawn was burning. It was all his fault. He had to save him before it was too late. He fought until his hands were blackened husks and the metal buckle of his collar was melted to the floor. The screams outside stopped. And Gus' screams began.

The metal cooled, the screams faded, and the air was filled with the sounds of beeps and clicks and hums. Gus knelt on the ground and tried to say something, to beg for it all to stop, but duct tape covered his mouth, forcing him to just watch silently as a hand descended towards him. His muscles were locked in place, unseen chains and cuffs and rope and tape keeping him from moving even an inch as Dahmer grinned right in front of his face, petting his head.

"You are such a good boy. Knowing your place, listening to the rules, being a lesson. I am going to take you apart, piece by piece, and put you back together until I know exactly how you tick. You don't get to be free, you don't get to die, you just get to be with me. You're mine."

Gus strained to move as more hands appeared, running over his head, resting on the back of his neck, grabbing his collar, cupping his cheek, running over his throat. Pulling his shoulder, hitting his leg, squeezing his arm. They glided and scratched and choked and pulled and tore, and pieces of him dripping with blood came apart at their searing touch.

"Here, hopefully this'll let you rest a bit easier…"

A voice blew into the garage, bringing with it the smell of the ocean and a cool rush through his arm that chased away the flames. A blanket of darkness wrapped around him, and he relaxed into the silence.

He woke up, feeling safe and warm and not wanting to move. He cracked an eye open before immediately slamming it closed again. It was bright, too bright. He smelled the ocean breeze and wondered when he'd fallen asleep on the beach, why the waves were beeping, and why the sand was soft under him like a bed. It was wrong for people to be hurt so badly, but at least he knew where he needed to be to help.

He wondered who was hurt and where he was supposed to help when a fishing line pulled under his fingers, and he realized he must have decided to go fishing. Fishing didn't really seem like something he'd do, but he wasn't really sure what he'd normally do. He thought there was a reason that should bother him, but he didn't know why.

"It looks like he's trying to wake up." A gentle woman's voice spoke up on the shore, her voice almost lost among the other sounds he could hear. Barking dogs, ringing bells, beeping machines, the rasp of stone against stone. The fishing line pulled again, and he was surprised the fish were biting with so many noises that would normally chase them away.

He wondered why his boat smelled like burnt sage as he relaxed in a small bubble of safety. It was strange, he didn't think he was supposed to be safe. It was his fault after all; he hadn't found the house fast enough, they didn't have to be this hurt, they shouldn't be this hurt. He should have been better.

The line tugged again, and he wondered at the strange thoughts trying to pull him away from the calm sea as dusk turned to night and darkness returned.


Puzzle pieces clicked together, and he vaguely wondered what picture they were making as he struggled to open his heavy eyelids. He remembered something about a beach and a boat, and he thought there were other things he didn't want to remember from before that. Bugs buzzed around the back of his neck, and he wondered why he couldn't move to brush them away; cold water rushed over his shoulders when he realized how close the bugs felt to a knife against his skin.

He was just starting to worry that he wasn't safe after all when he heard a small sound. It was important, he knew it was. He listened harder and heard squeaking and rustling cloth and quiet voices.

"He did great, everything's looking good so far."

Those weren't the right sounds, though he thought they were good sounds. He cracked his eyes open and saw blurry shapes standing around a bed before he heard the sound again. He let his eyes fall closed and tracked it carefully, pushing everything else away so he could focus only on the sound of balls ponging slowly and quietly on the wall next to him

He relaxed, knowing the sound meant he was safe and he could rest.

Gus slept.


Juliet shifted in her chair again, trying to get more comfortable. She'd known Shawn would be in surgery for hours, but she'd refused to leave the hospital. It seemed wrong, leaving them alone again, even if she knew they were safe now.

It also felt wrong to be complaining about the uncomfortable chairs, even just to herself, when she knew the boys had been stuck in even worse chairs for over a day without being able to move. She wondered how long she would be comparing her complaints with the boys' ordeal and realized it was probably going to be for a while. She sighed and shifted again.

One of the downsides of sitting and waiting with nothing to do, besides the numb butt, was that it gave her too much time to think. She kept running through each of the crime scenes in her head, imagining what it would have been like to live through what she'd only seen the aftermaths of. She thought about how Shawn and Gus had acted after they'd been rescued, she thought about how many injuries they both had, she thought about what it had felt like to kill the mad man who'd caused all of that harm.

Her fingers twitched as she mentally took her gun apart and reassembled it again, trying to calm the blood rushing in her ears and the twisting in her stomach. She didn't regret pulling the trigger, rather the opposite, and that was bothering her more than she'd cared to admit.

When Yin had been killed, she'd expected a rush of relief, or at least a sense of closure from the whole mess finally being finished. But all she'd felt was numb and a niggling feeling that she was still being watched. That it wasn't actually finished. Now, she'd killed someone for the first time. And the feeling was finally gone.

"Family of Shawn Spencer?"

Juliet shook herself out of her thoughts as she quickly stood up and walked towards the waiting nurse. It wasn't time to let herself process everything yet, she needed to be there for Shawn and Gus now.

"I'm his girlfriend, his father's with his friend-"

"I know, honey," the nurse reassured her with a friendly smile. "We've got them in the same room. Let me take you to him."

"Thank you," Juliet replied with a rush of relief as she followed the nurse. She'd been worried about how the boys were going to handle not being able to see each other; them being in the same room was better news than she could have imagined.

They went through several hallways, up an elevator, and through even more halls before the nurse finally stopped at a closed door. "They're both still sleeping off the anesthesia, someone will be in shortly to check on them," the nurse informed her with a nod before walking off.

Juliet let out a quick breath before opening the door and letting herself into the quiet room. Her eyes immediately landed on the two beds and their occupants, taking in the bandages on Gus' arms and face, the wires and tubes running from both of them, and the bright green cast on Shawn's leg. She smiled slightly at the last one, remembering how Shawn had wheedled the nurses into letting him have 'the awesomest cast ever'.

"Do I want to know how my adult son ended up with a kid's colored cast?" Henry asked softly from across the room.

Juliet shook her head and walked over to sit on the chair already set up next to him before answering, "It involved a lot of puppy dog eyes and shameless flirting."

Henry snorted with a smirk and Gus stirred slightly, turning his head to stare at them blearily with unfocused eyes before closing them again with a murmured, "She's not on the tower 'nymore, goin' fish'n for bubbles."

"He's been doing that a lot," Henry said, answering her questioning look. "He wakes up for a second, says some weird stuff, then goes back to sleep. Apparently he's got fishing on his mind."

"I didn't think he liked to fish," Juliet said, looking at Gus curiously.

Henry smirked and shook his head. "Oh, he doesn't. I'm pretty sure he hates it even more than Shawn."

"That is saying something," Juliet said, matching his smirk. She'd heard plenty of rants against Henry's favorite pastime over the years.

Henry's smile grew softer as he looked Shawn over before asking, "How was he doing? For real, not the glossed over stuff you texted."

Juliet thought for a long moment, making sure she had the right words before she answered. "He was scared and didn't want to show it, the only times he stopped talking was when he was thinking about… you know, and pretty much every story he was telling people involved both him and Gus."

Henry sighed and nodded towards Gus. "He kept flashing back there too. But he was fighting it."

"They're both fighters," Juliet said with a small, proud smile.

Henry nodded in agreement. "That they are."

They were silent for a moment before Juliet added, quieter, "I'm glad they'll be able to fight it together."

"Yeah. Me too."


A/N: I researched the crap out of injuries and recovery, but there's only so far google can take me. And I wasn't brave enough to ask anyone outside of the fanfiction subreddit, lol. I went deep diving into scientific papers to try to understand the criteria for if/when removed skin could be reattached, but due to the fact that most people with these injuries have their skin crushed/tore/pulled off, there wasn't any good answer. I based my final answer on the fact that some degloved injuries were able to be reattached, and most likely they would have been detached for about as long as the skin in this story. Word of warning, do NOT research this stuff if you don't want to see some REALLY graphic (and fascinating) pictures…