Author: cheekymice.
Beta: brandywine421. Thanks once again to Brandy. waves and thanks again to everyone who offered to beta. mwah
Disclaimer: I don't own The OC, Ryan or Benjamin McKenzie.
Story: As requested Hero! In peril Ryan! Yeay! All in the title really. Set post finale.
Notes: For 'Missy' and m3kane who have been nudging me somewhat...and a big thanks to every single one of you who commented. I loves ya. :)
Heist
Chapter 8
Everyone stood still as the medics worked. Even the SWAT guys watched intently. It must have been hard for them to think that they'd been so close to ending the situation without further casualties. Thinking if they'd acted that bit sooner then maybe, just maybe they wouldn't be watching someone barely into adulthood fight for life.
Breathe.
Please breathe.
No one said the words out loud but you could hear them clearly being collectively said by everyone.
"Don't do this to us kid…come on." The medic who was pumping his chest muttered under his breath.
Sandy could feel his nails bite into the palms of his hands.
He shut his eyes and continued to pray.
"What is going on? Please tell me." Kirsten asked the young police liaison officer as he led her down the corridor. She'd been politely asked to leave the hastily commandeered room across the street from the bank and follow the cop; no one was telling her why.
"Please… what's happened?"
"I'm not sure. All I know is that someone will meet us shortly." The man said as he walked but he way he wouldn't meet her eye Kirsten knew he was lying.
Kirsten felt herself go light-headed and a cold chill ran up her spine. She knew instantly that something had happened to Ryan, she didn't know how she knew, she just knew. If truth be told she'd a premonition that something bad was going to happen when as she looked back into his eyes when she left the bank. She'd learnt that Ryan's eyes were the window to his mind and they'd had that flat defiance in them that told her he wasn't going to step back from the situation he found himself in.
A careworn looking plain clothed detective stepped forward to meet them as they neared the bank; he nodded to the beat cop that stood by the cordon to let her pass.
"What is it?" She asked.
"I'm sorry. I don't know how to tell you but…"
Kirsten didn't let him finish, she ran past the ambulance and into the bank. She saw that someone had thrown blankets over the bodies of the fallen undercover cop and gunman but she slowed when she saw a new body on the floor. Her heart moved to her throat. The detective caught up with her and took her elbow to steer her away. One of the medics moved and she saw who was lying there. She swung around and looked at the cop, baffled as to what was going on but relief coursed through her veins as she saw it was the body of the other gunmen.
The relief she'd felt quickly vanished as the cop spoke softly to her, his eyes full of compassion. Kirsten noticed that he didn't remove his arm. It was a good thing because she suspected it was the only thing holding her up.
They said that the scans showed Ryan's brain waves were good and he was responding to external stimuli, that he was breathing on his own now. So if he was doing so great why wasn't he waking up? Seth got up and walked over to the vending machine. He pressed for a coffee and got a cup of weak instant, after the first sip he checked that there was no one watching before he flung the cup hard at the opposite wall. He watched the brown watery liquid drip down the magnolia surface with no great satisfaction. Seth was angry that he wasn't allowed in the ICU with his parents. He was pretty much pissed at the world right now and if the truth were told, he was also scared, so fucking scared for himself and for Ryan.
And to add to that his parents were ignoring him at the moment, they told him to go and calm down and come back when he could behave like an adult. Seth cringed at his earlier words but he'd only voiced what his parents were scared to.
"So what you are saying is that although Ryan's showing that he's not completely brain dead…you can't tell us if he's going to end up a vegetable?"
His mom had flinched at his words and his dad had looked like he was going to lose it but Seth couldn't help it. He wanted to know what they were dealing with and the doctor had bandied medical terminology like they should know what he was talking about… MRI, EKG'S, EEG'S …what the fuck was Hypoxic encephalopathy and cerebral hemispheres? Progress in Seth's book was Ryan sat up in bed ogling the nurses and getting annoyed at his parents as they hovered over him. Progress was not telling them that the fact that Ryan was now breathing on his own was a good thing. That wasn't progress… that was normal, that shouldn't be a hard thing to do… that is what people did every day.
So as Seth heard it, if the lack of oxygen to the brain was limited to a very brief period of time, coma should be reversible with varying levels of return to function, depending on the extent of injury because as Ryan had been smacked around the head a few times as well they had that to contend with. Seth wanted to shout at the doctor that 'they' didn't have to contend with this….Ryan did. Frustration at the way the doctor was speaking of Ryan like he wasn't a person had made his blood boil.
Seth didn't want to hear that only time would tell as to what damage might have occurred in Ryan's oxygen-starved brain. He didn't want to know about the mild case scenario that had Ryan suffering from inattentiveness, poor judgment, seizures and motor in-coordination. By the time Doctor 'I don't give a shit about Ryan' went on to the worse case scenario… complete state of unawareness and unresponsiveness….Seth wanted to punch his smug face.
So he'd snapped and said what everyone was skirting around. Was Ryan going to ever be able to function again? His parents had looked at him as if that by mentioning it he was somehow cursing Ryan to that fate but Seth had to know because the possibility scared the shit out of him. Ryan was intelligent and strong; he was impervious to everything life had thrown at him and to end up. …like that… was unthinkable.
Doctor Smug had replied calmly and patronizingly that they really couldn't tell what damage might have occurred as there was no way of telling just how long Ryan hadn't been breathing. Only time would tell. But he was making 'progress.'
Great…fucking great, big woop-dee-doo.
So he was stuck in a corridor that smelt of pine disinfectant wondering what the hell was going on and trying to figure out how things had gone so wrong these past few months.
Ryan could hear everything going on around him, the electrical buzz of an overhead light, a machine that beeped every two seconds, the clatter of things being moved near his head. He could hear voices, strange voices both male and female saying his name over and over. And voices he recognized and they sounded like something had upset them. Sandy kept saying that things would be different and Kirsten repeated over and over that he needed to wake up.
Wake up?
He didn't understand.
He was awake… he just couldn't seem to open his eyes or move but for some reason that didn't worry him. He just listened to what the voices had to say to him. This was a better place to be. He felt safe here.
TBC.