The Disbanded: Divided We Stand-Chapter 43
By MyNameIsCAL
---Max's POV---
They discharged Fang from the hospital a few days later. Mike and Eli had arrived yesterday. Mom's house was packed with people. They insisted on going to a hotel, but Mom made room for them.
Fang was glad to get out of the hospital, but his mental state of mind was starting to lower again. He seemed distracted. Reluctantly, Fang had been prescribed medication for stress. Basically, it wouldn't let his blood pressure get too high, preventing another heart attack. Sometimes I thought Fang got frustrated that he needed doctors and medication to fix him.
"Is there anything you need before we go home?" I asked Fang.
He shook his head. "Going home actually sounds good."
---Iggy's POV---
It was late, but Fang was still awake, watching TV in the family room when I came down to prepare food for breakfast like I did every night.
"Shouldn't you be sleeping?" I asked.
Max was with him too, but she was asleep. "Yeah, I should be, according to the doctor."
I took a seat next to him.
"Did I ever tell you what really happened in Chicago?" Fang asked, his voice hoarse.
"I suppose not," I replied.
Fang let out a deep breath. "I suffer from depression, Ig. I sorta just lost it after I got out of the hospital there."
Why was he telling me this?
"And I just get so tired of this. Being in pain and living on the verge of death," he continued. "They can't fix my mind and they can't fix my leg or lung. I'll be like this forever and sometimes I get to the point where I can't take it anymore. If it weren't for finding Max and you, I wouldn't be alive anymore."
"Don't say that." But I knew Fang was telling the truth. That explained his moods and why there was something off about him ever since we reunited.
"Even now I'm just afraid I'm going to do something stupid or I get stressed out that something's going to happen to me and Max will get stuck without me again. Iggy, just promise you won't let me do anything stupid." He sounded like he was crying. "And if anything happens to me, look after her."
"Nothing's going to happen to you."
"Just promise me that you'll do that if something does."
"Alright, I promise."
---Max's POV---
I had fallen asleep, listening to Fang's heart beat. It was only a little faster than normal, but I promised myself I wouldn't worry too much, for his sake. When I worried, he would only get more worried about me. That wouldn't be good for his health.
We were barely adults and he had already had a heart attack. I think that was one of the reasons he had become so depressed lately. It made him feel older than he was. Then again, mentally we were older beyond the years we had been breathing. Pain was a weakness to him, or at least sometimes it was. It really brought him down when in the end, it didn't affect the way we equated him to as a person.
"Max, wake up, breakfast." Fang shook me awake.
He still had his arm around me. I guess we had both fallen asleep on the couch.
Helping Fang of the couch, I handed him his crutch and we entered the kitchen. Mom had put out a folding table and some folding chairs. Even then the kitchen was still packed with people. Chuck and Barry were already seated. Cal was carrying on a conversation. Ted was getting the drinks out of the fridge. Fang took the seat closest to where we were standing.
"Morning," Cal said. "How's it going, Fang?"
Fang shrugged. "Alright, I guess."
I watched him take out his medication and set out what he needed to take. There was the pain killer, his depression meds, and his new blood pressure meds. Ted placed a glass of water next to Fang's plate.
"Thanks," Fang muttered.
---Nudge's POV---
Wherever we are now, they put me and Angel in separate rooms. We can only communicate through Angel's mind reading powers now. Even with Angel, I felt lonelier every day. They only fed us once a day. It wasn't enough. The last time I had seen Angel, she was nothing but a toothpick.
When I wasn't conversing with Angel in my head, I was thinking about Iggy. I wondered what had happened to him. Sometimes I would wonder about the others, like if Fang lived or not. He must have. I knew that Max had picked to save him over us, and by now, I could accept that without anger. After all, it was three to two and we knew she had to save the bigger group.
And if I wasn't thinking, I was sleeping. I got tired so fast that sleeping wasn't hard. Angel didn't like to sleep though. She was afraid of being separated. Sometimes when we were both sleeping, we would wake up in cages somewhere else. Other times, we would find ourselves apart. The time without each other was the hardest. Angel said that they were going to start experimenting on us again. It meant running and going through the cruel tests they set up for us.
One of these days the exhaustion was going to kill us.
