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"I must have slept all night," he thought to himself as he opened his eyes. For once he was alone in his hospital room and was secretly happy for the peace and quiet; he couldn't take any more of the questioning looks that his visitors had been giving him. He raised a hand to his throat and winced as he touched the bruised flesh on his neck, he was pleased to find that it hurt slightly less to swallow than it had yesterday.
Reaching for the control he awkwardly raised the head of the bed instantly regretting it as the room span wildly. He was glad that the nurses had been thoughtful enough to leave a kidney dish on the bed tray; he reached for it and vomited the pitiful amount of food he had managed to eat yesterday. Stomach emptied he leaned back in the bed and moaned pitifully, God he hated being ill. He hoped that by lying still the room would stop tilting on its axis and give his stomach a chance to settle, combined with the fact that his aching head was pounding in rhythm with his heartbeat he felt miserable.
As he lay with his eyes closed he tried to piece together his memories and combine them with the vivid dream he had last night, as with the last one he knew that it wasn't a figment of his imagination but a sliver of his forgotten past. "Think, man," he commanded himself as he tried to place the memories in order. The only logical explanation seemed to be that the beating and his meeting with the FBI agent were related; he wished he could remember more. He still had no idea why Andy hated him or exactly what he had done to anger the Malucci family to the point of trying to kill him. He promised himself he would talk to his partner today and thrash out whatever differences they must have had, if he ever came back to visit him that was.
Eric and Calleigh met in the waiting area of the hospital, "Hey, how you doing?" Calleigh asked as she gave Eric a small hug.
He pulled back and regarded her with tired eyes, "I've been better. I've been trying to convince this Sipowicz guy to come back and hear H out."
"Any luck?"
He shrugged his shoulders as he sat down, "Not yet, he keeps growling at me to leave him alone. Thought it best to give him some space for a while."
Calleigh understood what he meant, the man's gruff demeanour reminded her a little of Frank. "The nurses say he slept through the night, no bad dreams," she said, changing the subject. "You wanna go in or should I?"
He gave her a sad smile before answering, "You go, he doesn't even seem to know I'm here half the time," he couldn't keep the disappointment from his voice. He had grown so used to having H by his side that it hurt almost physically to have his brother-in-law treat him as if he were a stranger.
She could see the pain her friend was in, "It won't be this way forever," she tried to reassure him. "He's had a few bits and pieces come back already, we have to hope that he'll get better."
"What if he doesn't?" his eyes were full of despair, he wasn't sure he could live with the fact that Horatio might not ever be the same person.
"We have to be strong for him, Eric. He needs us."
He nodded his head sadly, before climbing wearily from the chair and walking towards the exit, passing a middle-aged man dressed in a smart black suit. So caught up in his misery he paid the stranger no attention as he shoved his hands in his pockets and trudged off.
Calleigh took a few moments to herself, gathering her thoughts before she visited Horatio again. Taking several deep breaths she walked over to his room, knocked on the door and let herself in. She wasn't surprised to find him lying back with his eyes closed; thankfully the swelling around his eyes was decreasing with each day that passed. She wrinkled her nose as she walked closer to the bed; glancing at the tray she found the soiled kidney dish that was causing the offensive odour. She carefully picked it up and took it to the bathroom, flushing the chain afterwards. As she walked back into the main room she could see that the noise had woken Horatio.
He grimaced as he gradually opened his eyes, "Calleigh, you came back."
She walked over to him and placed a hand on his arm, "How are you feeling today?".
"Like crap." he answered honestly, causing Calleigh to frown.
Taking her hand away from his arm and placing it on his forehead she looked at him in concern as she felt the heat radiating from his skin. "You feel hot, let me go and find a nurse."
He was about to tell her not to worry when another wave of nausea hit him, he grabbed blindly for the bowl and emptied what little left there was in his stomach. He closed his eyes and lay back again, hearing nothing but the deafening ringing noise in his ears. He figured she was heading for the door but couldn't be sure as the room began to swing at alarming angles. Time seemed to lose meaning as a feeling of complete misery overtook him, he forced his eyes open again as he heard the sound of the door being opened. Calleigh came back into the room with a doctor following closely behind.
"The doctor's going to check you out, ok?" she told him as she stood by the doorway, giving the doctor room to work. He tried to nod his head and would have screamed at the pain it caused had he not been already been biting on his lip.
"Follow the light with your eyes," the doctor commanded. He tried as best he could to follow the instructions but found that the light caused agony to lance through his skull. Minutes later the doctor walked to the end of the bed and wrote his findings on the chart before calling for a nurse to enter the room. He turned to Calleigh, "You're friend looks like he's picked up an infection." The shock was evident on Calleigh's face, "It's not uncommon with his kind of head injury, we'll put him on a high dose of antibiotics and hope that does the trick."
"Will he be ok?" she had to know the answer.
The doctor shrugged in response, "I would hope so, and it looks like we've caught it in the early stages. He'll probably be quite unwell for a few days but we'll keep him constantly monitored and hope he pulls through with no problems." He turned back to the nurse and instructed her to add something to Horatio's IV.
After the medical staff left the room Calleigh sat back down in the chair beside the bed, her eyes drifting over every part of her friend's body. She could see the red patches on his face and chest as the infection took hold and coursed through his system. She wished she could take his pain away; she took his hand and was comforted when he squeezed it tightly in response. She stroked his head and tried to soothe him, "Just try to sleep, it'll all be over soon."
He opened his eyes to look at her, the room was still spinning wildly around him but he found himself able to focus a little with her in front of him. Even though he didn't really know her that well he felt strangely safe with her, he forced himself to try to relax and let the medication to its work. He was doing a good job until he saw the black-clad figure standing in the doorway; the monitors registered his rise in blood pressure as he recognised the man as being the same person in his dream last night.
Calleigh noticed his distress, "What's wrong?" she asked worriedly as she gripped his hand tighter.
His gaze fell back on her, "He's here." His voice shook slightly as his eyes widened.
She looked round but the man Horatio had seen was no longer there, "There's no one there," she told him, figuring the fever was causing him to hallucinate.
"No, he was there. I saw him." He was insistent, he growled under his breath frustrated that Calleigh didn't understand. "I remember him, he was in my dream."
"There's no one there, just lie back and try to rest."
If her words were meant to soothe him they had the opposite effect, he tried to sit up in the bed and pointed towards the door, breathing heavily. "I know him, you have to stop him. I need to speak to him."
Having been alerted by the increasing beeping of the monitors a doctor and nurse came in to the room. "You need to calm down, sir," the doctor told him as he nodded at the nurse.
Horatio took no notice as he tried to sit forwards again, "You have to listen to me, I know him!"
Taking a syringe from the nurse the doctor administered a light sedative before turning his head to speak to Calleigh, "We had no choice I'm afraid. It's only a light sedative, he needs to remain calm."
She nodded, tears brimming in her eyes. "Can I stay with him?".
"I don't see why not, he'll likely drift in and out for the next few hours. It'll probably be beneficial to have someone with him that he knows at the times when he's lucid."
She couldn't help the tears that escaped from her eyes as she sat back down, the doctor and nurse left the room and shut the door quietly behind them. Her gaze fell upon Horatio; he was lying with his eyes open and was starting at the ceiling. Upon closer inspection she could see his eyes were glassy and unfocussed, his mouth was moving and she strained to hear what he was saying. Moving her head closer to his face she made out one word, 'Collins'.
She watched him closely as his eyes slid shut, he mumbled incoherently as his fever climbed. She lost track of time as she sat and watched him twitch and grimace as he battled unseen enemies in his mind. Suddenly her phone beeped and brought her back to reality, pulling it out of her pocket she opened it and read the message:
"You and the Cuban have no idea what you're getting involved in. You should have left well alone, Blondie. I'm not the only one who's watching you".