Chapter Twenty-Two: To Believe The Impossible

(War – Poets of the Fall)

Voight rushed into the hospital with Olinsky and Roman at his heels. They'd been closely following the ambulance carrying Burgess and Atwater with Jasmine driving just behind them. As soon as the small group entered the hospital, Jasmine explained how she was going to "deal with the vest."

"Defused or not," she had said. "It's still a bomb and it really shouldn't be in a hospital. I'm going to collect it and take it somewhere that it can be safely and fully dismantled. I'll deal with the vest, and then I'll be out of your hair."

Olinsky nodded to his old friend. "We really appreciate what you've done for us."

She laughed. "Didn't done much," she pointed out. "Just call me when you know how your guys are doing? Okay?"

Olinsky smiled. "Of course."

With that, Jasmine said her goodbyes and headed off to collect the, now diffused, bomb vest. Roman had already made his way over to the front desk, asking the receptionist questions. Voight and Olinsky approached the street cop.

"Halstead," the cop repeated. "H-A-L-S-T-E-A-D."

The receptionist typed away at her keyboard for a couple moments before looking up at the three men. "It looks like he's still in surgery. You can wait just down that hall to your left."

Voight and Olinsky turned to head over, but Roman stayed put. "And a Kevin Atwater. A-T-W-A-T-E-R."

Olinsky paused, turning back to the younger cop, but Voight just kept making his way towards where he was certain Erin would be. "You going to go comfort your partner?"

Roman shrugged as the receptionist typed away. "It's the least I can do."

Olinsky nodded. "I'll send Ruzek over to join you two and give you an update on Halstead. Do me a favour, Roman."

Roman raised a curious eyebrow, urging the detective to continue.

"Um," the receptionist interrupted. "Mr. Atwater just came in. He's being prepped for surgery down the hall to your right. Your two friends are undergoing very different procedures with very different risks."

"We're aware, thank you," Olinsky said, trying his best to not sound rude. However, it wasn't the easiest task, as it had been a really long day and he was beyond exhausted.

"What'd you want me to do again?" Roman asked.

Olinsky paused for a moment to remember. "Oh. I was just going to say to give Burgess and Ruzek some time alone. Come let us know how Atwater's doing if you know anything...or just go get a coffee."

Roman laughed. "I wasn't planning on hanging around."

Olinsky nodded and headed off down the left hall to find Voight.

Voight arrived in the small waiting room to see Antonio and Ruzek. The younger detective was leaning back, his head pressed against the wall behind him as he stared at the far corner of the roof. Antonio, on the other hand, was hunched over, his head in his hands.

"Where's Erin?"

Ruzek didn't react. Neither did Antonio.

"Where's Erin?" Voight repeated, this time much more angrily.

"She's in the washroom," Gabby announced, entering the room with a tray holding three cups of coffee. She then sat down between Ruzek and her brother. One at a time, she handed each their cup, each accepted the cup expressionlessly and wordlessly.

Voight raised an eyebrow, causing the firefighter to sigh. "She completely lost it after they took off the vest. Antonio and Ruzek had to drag her out of the OR kicking and screaming."

Voight had turned to go check on Erin when the woman spoke up again. "She really does love him. You know that right?"

Voight nodded solemnly. "Yeah," he whispered so quietly he wasn't sure if Gabby could even hear him. "Yeah, I know."

The sergeant made his way to the washroom and (after knocking a few times with no response) let himself in. He saw Erin standing at a sink, washing her hands over and over. Her eyes were red from crying, but the tears had stopped falling. It was as though, she had run out of tears to cry.

"Erin?" he called softly. "How're you holding up?"

"Fine," she muttered, focusing on washing her hands. "I just have to-"

Voight cut her off as he turned off the faucet and grabbed her hands. "There's nothing on your hands Erin. They're clean. You're clean."

She shook her head. "No," she whispered hopelessly. "I can't get it off. They're covered in blood- in his blood. In Jay's blood...and I...I can't get it off."

He held her hands up to her face. "Erin Lindsay," he stated. "Look at your hands."

She looked away. "I can't. I can't," she whispered.

"Erin," he repeated, more sternly.

Slowly, Erin looked at her hands.

"There's no blood Erin. Jay's still alive. You didn't kill him. You didn't do this to him," he assured her as he let go of her hands.

Erin staggered back from the mirror, running her hands through her hair. "No, no," she whispered as she tucked herself into a ball, knees pulled up to her chest. "It's because of me, because I didn't have his back. I was right there Hank. I was right there when they took him. I was just sitting there, up against the wall. I watched as they fought, as he took Jay, but...but I couldn't do anything. All I could do was watch. I failed him. His blood is on my hands."

Voight shook his head sadly. "Erin, no," he corrected her, taking a seat beside her. "None of this is on you. It's on Valerie, and Dante and Ripper, but it's not on you." He paused , turning towards his daughter. "Erin look at my hands. Are they bloody?"

She shook he head. "Just mine."

"Erin, if my hands are clean, then so are yours." He paused for a moment, gathering the strength to continue. "Valerie's motives, she covered them in so many lies, it's hard to tell what they really were, but anyway you break this down...They shot you, they took Jay because of me. Because of what I did, or what I didn't do, to Hansen Kane."

Erin looked at her father-figure. "Hank. It's not your fault."

"I just told you the same thing and yet you don't believe me either. The only thing that's going to make us feel better is when Jay gets better, and Erin, he will."

"How can you know?"

Voight laughed. "Because you got shot. Now, as much as I may hate it, I have to allow you two to see each other and work in my unit. I can't break my own rules. I've seen the way he looks at you Erin. I'd have to be blind to miss it...and if I've learnt anything from this case it's that the feelings aren't unrequited. There's no way he's going to die. Not when he finally has a chance to be with you."

Erin smiled sadly. "I want to believe that Hank. I want to believe that so badly, but I can't. There are some injuries you can't beat with willpower. And...I can't lose him...I can't..." she trailed off a wave off sobs screamed through her entire body.

Voight wrapped his arms around her and held her close as she sobbed uncontrollably. "Everything's going to work out Erin. You'll see."

"I...I just want to see him again," she managed through her sobs. "I just want...I want...I want this to be over..."

"I know Erin," he whispered. "I know."

Dr. Rays approached Ruzek, Olinsky and the two Dawsons. Antonio shot to his feet immediately, asking questions left and right. Ruzek also stood up, but was able to get in any questions due to Antonio's barrage of words. Olinsky just sat silently, unmoving.

"Antonio!" Gabby barked. Her brother shut up, causing her to lower her voice to a much gentler tone. "How is he?" she asked, putting a comforting hand on her brother's shoulder.

Rays sighed. "I'd be lying if I said I fixed him up," the surgeon confessed. Upon seeing the terrified looks everyone gave, he blurted out the next sentence quickly. "He's alive," he assured them. "He's still in bad shape though."

"How bad?" Antonio asked in a voice so thin, it was as though he was being strangled.

"We were able to reset the fracture on his femur. His leg should heal fine...provided he survives at all. He lost a lot of blood, plus he was bleeding internally, in his chest. It was a small laceration, but it was left unattended for a very long time. We were able to repair the source of the bleeding, but the damage was done. I just don't know if he's got enough strength left in him to heal."

"He's strong," Antonio snapped ferociously.

"I'm not saying he's not strong. He experienced extreme amounts of trauma over the last little while. He's malnourished, probably didn't get much sleep and he experienced multiple severe beating, not to mention the crash. His body is, simply put, worn out. I'd like to tell you that as long as your friend is strong, he'll pull through, but I don't know if that's going to be enough."

Antonio staggered back, collapsing into his chair. He stared at the floor in horror. Ruzek froze, except for his head with swayed side to side slowly as he shook it in disbelief. Even Gabby looked stunned. Olinsky just sighed sadly.

"So he's going to die?" She managed in a voice barely above a whisper.

"Well, we've put him into a medical coma," Rays explained. "Hopefully, this will allow him the chance to heal, but we mainly did it because of his head."

"No," Antonio mumbled under his breath. "Don't tell me he's got brain damage."

Rays sighed. "Right now, we're thinking he's got a severe concussion. Brain damage is certainly a possibility, but we don't think that it's a huge risk right now. He was without oxygen for a few minutes correct?" Ruzek nodded. "It's possible that the oxygen deprivation combined with the concussion could lead to serious problems, but we won't know for sure until he wakes up." He paused for a moment. "And I need to stress that he may not."

Gabby briefly put her hands over her nose and mouth before running them up her face and through her hair, letting out a deep breath as he did so. "What do think though? Brain damage wise, if he lives-"

"He will," Antonio spat, but in reality, he hardly believed it himself.

Gabby sighed. "When he wakes up," she resumed. "What do you think we'll be looking at in terms of brain damage?"

Rays thought for a moment. "Again, I can't be for sure and I don't even know if he will wake up, but if I had to give you my best guess..." he paused again, or just a couple moments. "I say we'd be looking at some basic, short term memory loss. Some the complex systems might be slightly impaired. We're talking some trouble moving certain body parts, maybe difficulty with remembering longer words, but I doubt it will go past memory loss."

The three let out small sighs of relief before the doctor spoke up again. "The real concern is whether or not he'll wake up at all. We're going to keep him in the coma for a few days, then we'll take him off the treatment and...and it'll be a waiting game for him to open his eyes."

Gabby nodded. "Thank you doctor."

Rays smiled slightly. "If you'd like, he could have some visitors, no more than two at a time of course and only for a few minutes, but if you'd like to send his girlfriend in-"

"His girlfriend?" Ruzek asked, confused.

"I'm sorry...his partner," the doctor corrected himself. "The girl who was hold the detonator. I assumed they were together by her reaction."

Ruzek chuckled faintly, "Well, they are very close."

"Oh," Rays said, dragging out the 'o' sound for emphasis. He smiled lightly. "I will do everything I can to keep your friend alive, but as I said, there may not be much we can do." The group nodded and Rays walked away to attend to other patients.

Olinsky, who had been sitting silently throughout the conversation, finally spoke up. "I'll go get Erin and Voight, fill them in. Ruzek, you should go talk to Burgess and Roman. Let them know how Jay is...and if there's any news on Atwater-"

"I'll send Roman back with the information."

"Hey Al," Antonio butted in. "If you don't mind I'd like to go with you to fill in Erin. I'd like to go see Jay with her."

Olinsky paused for a moment, trying to read his fellow detective's motive. Antonio had brought Jay into the unit and although he'd tried to hide it, Olinsky could tell that the younger's detective's disappearance had hit Antonio harder than most of the unit. Not to mention how distraught he had been after finding Jay only to lose him again so quickly.

Olinsky nodded in agreement, winning the tiniest smile of appreciation from Antonio.

"I'm going to call the firehouse." The three detectives turned to Gabby. "We're all family," she explained before pulling out her phone.

Antonio smiled, the words ringing through his head, hitting him hard. We're all family.

"So they know nothing?" Roman repeated.

Burgess shrugged hopelessly. "He's still in surgery. But...In the ambulance...He couldn't move his arm. He could barely even feel it." She ran her hands down the sides of her face. "We saved the day. Aren't we supposed to get a happy ending right about now?"

Roman sighed. "You'd think, but knowing our luck..." he trailed off. "At least he's alive."

"And Halstead?"

Roman opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off by Ruzek making his not-so-grand entrance. The detective looked completely crushed and demoralized.

"He's alive," Ruzek muttered. "At least he's alive right?"

Roman went to defend himself, but then abruptly thought against it. He rose up from his seat next to his partner and excused himself.

"I'm going to go tell Voight and the others that Atwater's still in surgery. I'll be back in bit. You guys want coffee or something?"

Ruzek shook his head, while Burgess smiled weakly, but also shook her head. Roman nodded and made his way off down the hall.

"How's your partner?" Ruzek asked, taking up Roman's seat beside his girlfriend.

She sniffed back a wave of tears and let out a jagged breath. "Still in surgery. How's Halstead?"

Ruzek shrugged. "They put him in a medical coma. The doctor...he's not optimistic."

Burgess put her hand on his knee. "Just got to have faith right? You've all beaten the odds in Intelligence before. This is no different."

"This is plenty different," Ruzek admitted. "This is...this is right on death's door...and all we can do is wait. I hate feeling so useless."

Burgess nodded. "You know why I want to be in Intelligence?"

Ruzek shrugged. "Because we deal with higher stakes?"

"In a sense. It's just...sometimes, as a regular cop, you feel like there's more that you should be doing. It feels like you're not doing enough. Sure you catch a shop lifter here and a speeder there, but...sometimes you just want to- to do something bigger, something better."

She moved her hand from his knee to his hand and held it tightly. "But that's not the point. What I do...it's just another part of the job. I'm the first on the scene, and sometimes that's all I am...and the rest is you- is Intelligence. We're all parts of one machine. Uniforms shouldn't be solving murder cases anymore than Intelligence should be pulling someone over for a simple speeding ticket. It can make us feel useless, because it's not our part of the job. I can feel useless because I'm not catching the killer, but someone is. Intelligence is. The killer is still getting caught."

She squeezed his hand just a little tighter. "And we may feel useless right now, because we're not helping them, but someone is. Someone who's good at their job. Someone who knows what they're doing. I know it sucks. I want to help too, but this isn't our part. It's still getting done...just not by us."

Ruzek turned to his girlfriend. Gently, he leaned forward and placed a soft kiss on her lips. It didn't last very long, but when they pulled away they felt just the tiniest bit better.

"It's still getting done," Ruzek whispered, trying to assure himself. "Kim...tell me they're going to be okay."

She shook her head softly. "And here I thought it was your turn to comfort me."

He smiled at her comment. "Fine then," he whispered, leaning in for another kiss. "It's going to be okay."

Erin and Antonio walked into Jay's hospital room. Erin had been informed of how delicate his situation was, but still, she was unprepared for the sight in front of her eyes. Her partner somehow looked worse than he had in the OR. Perhaps it was all the tubes and the machines, but they'd have those in the OR too.

She decided it was the calmness. It was the waiting. She could almost taste it in the air that surrounded her. In the OR, everyone had been rushing around, everyone had been trying to help, but now it was just waiting. And waiting, was not a shade that looked good on Jay Halstead.

"Why is it the closer we are to him, the farther we feel?" Erin asked sadly. "We finally got him back. He's right here, but he's...he's almost gone."

Antonio gently gripped her hand. "It's almost over Erin. In a few days they are going to take him out of the coma and he's going to wake up. He's going to be right there, right there in that bed until he wakes up. He's here Erin...and I know how far away he feels, but I can promise you that he is right there. He's not going anywhere. He's right there."

Erin let out a jagged breath, as she slowly approached his side. She put her hand on his arm, just to feel that he was real. That he was there. She put her second hand down on his arm and leaned over him. For a moment she hovered over him, just taking him his presence. Then, she placed a gentle kiss on his forehead, holding it, just long enough to assure herself that he was still with her. She would have placed the kiss on his lips, if not for the large tube that was placed down his throat. After she leaned back, standing up straight, she turned to Antonio who was standing behind her.

He was crying, silent tears running down his face. She looked at him sadly before wrapping her arms around him. He returned the embrace.

She felt foolish, as though, for an unforgivable time, she had forgotten that she wasn't the only one who missed her partner. She wasn't the only one who would die just to get him back safely. She held her friend tightly as she reminded herself that she wasn't the only one whose close friend was dying just a few feet away. She wasn't the only one waiting.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered to him. "I'm so sorry."

Tada! Another Chapter, Another week. I'm quite happy with this chapter. (btw, don't worry there will be Erin and Antonio- and everyone else- talking to unconscious Jay. I just ran out of words in this chapter). I really hoped you liked it. Please let me know what you thought and what you'd like to see next. I tried to put in a Burzek scene as requested by zvforever. I hope it was okay...I still suck at writing romance, but hey! I tried. As always...I still know nothing about medicine either, so if I screwed up horribly...oops, I guess?

I just wanted to add how much I thrilled with the constant support. The amount of reviews, favourites and follows just blows me away every week. Please keep the love coming. I will be trying to get chapter 23 out to you all early, so maybe Wed or Thurs (not sure). We'll see how that works out. Aside from that though, updates will stay on Sunday.

As always, hope you enjoyed. See you next-...time? See you next time? Yeah, let's go with that. Next Sunday doesn't really work in this case.

Next Chapter:

Chapter Twenty-Three: She's Pulling Me Through