Emily stumbled back into the waiting room to a barrage of unintelligible questions.

"He's fine," was the only answer she could mumble as she collapsed into the nearest chair. She felt like she could sleep for more than 20 minutes for the first time in days.

"Fine? You mean it's out, right?"

"What? No. That's next, the medicine has to numb him first."

"YOU LEFT HIM IN PAIN?"

Emily blinked her eyes to meet Garcia's furious, tearful, mascara-streaked face.

"It's okay, Garcia. He got some local anesthetic, I think Dr. Baker gave him more than was required."

"Oh, I like Dr. Baker."

"You would, he'd fit right in with the circus clowns."

"So, if he's numb why isn't it OUT?"

"Patience, young one. It's local anesthetic, probably Lidocaine, not enough for him to tolerate the removal. That'll happen once the Happy Juice starts working its magic...sorry, wonders, not magic. No magic."

"Happy Juice?" Hotch eyed her with concern. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, like I said, Dr. Baker belongs in the circus. Any news on those blood tests?"

"No on the tox screen and STD panels. The good news is that they didn't find any other drugs at the cabin and the analysis came back positive for LSD and Dilaudid, so narcotic pain killers are off the table since we still don't know how much he was given, but he's finally getting I.V. antibiotics..."

"Why didn't she do that as soon as he got here?! Couldn't they see that dirty knife? That thing must be covered in tiny creepy crawlers. Ugh. Incompetent jerks!"

"Baby Girl, no insulting the doctors. She made the right call going to radiology first. Penicillin is a Beta Lactum antibiotic, if she had given him that, he'd probably be dead even without the knife."

"Oh."

"Right, 'Oh'. He's in good hands."

"So what IS he getting?"

"Erth-something."

"Erythromycin," Hotch finished. "It's a different class of antibiotics, different method of infection fighting, but just as effective. Relax."

"Should we call Gideon?"

"No, let him call us. I'm not initiating a call until that THING is out."

"Didn't he want to know what we know?"

"Well then maybe next time he'll stay."

"Next time? How often does this kind of thing happen. What are you people not telling me?"

Dr. Cheng barely refrained from putting her head in her hands. She loved being an E.R. doctor but there were some cases that tried even the most experienced: such as Dr. Spencer Reid. Never in her 15 years had she come across a patient with such headache inducing injuries and complications. Head trauma, can't do an MRI, so few answers from colleagues, knife in the back with no chance of general anesthesia, unknown drug usage. Usually family knew what the patient had access to, or the timeline of an injury and with the kidnapper dead, only the patient had her answers. Her patient who couldn't say more than two words at a time without excruciating pain.

"Okay, Nurse Stewart, run down the abnormal labs with me. Hemoglobin?"

"10.9."

Damn. Agent Hotcher hadn't mentioned anemia. It was likely he didn't even know. Dr. Reid probably took his OTC iron pills and hadn't mentioned it because it was so easy to control, but with blood loss and no pills for three days the number had started to fall again.

"Platelets borderline at 155."

Double damn. "Someone stop the ibuprofen." She would restart the medication once the platelet level went up. It was possible that his count was normally borderline which would usually still be safe. Or it meant he could have a serious infection or pre-existing condition lowering it, maybe even an un-diagnosed one. Great, more complications... The good news was he didn't have a fever so infection wasn't likely. The reference range went up to almost 400 with a low of 150. The most likely scenario, though, was the drugs again. If it was the drugs cutting the platelet level in half then once they were cleared from his system it would be safe to give him the ibuprofen again. Any more blood thinning and they'd be in dangerous territory. Good thing the ibuprofen was only hooked up for a few minutes. Looked like they would have to stick with heat and ice for inflammation treatment for the next several hours.

"How about glucose?"

"Um, 71.

Triple damn.

"Creatinine/ BUN.."

"Don't need those or the liver enzymes right now."

She knew he was dehydrated and on drugs. Those could be fixed later, but the others...Shit.

"Okay, what's his blood type?"

"AB positive."

Finally, some good news. Universal Recipient.

"Someone get me glucose tabs and one, no two bags of blood and start a transfusion immediately." They couldn't start yet. The wound wasn't bleeding very much but this kid couldn't afford to loose much at all. He wasn't coughing up blood which meant that the knife, while dangerously close to the lungs, hadn't punctured one or torn the Aorta...yet. 71 was still considered normal for sugar, anything below 65 and he was liable to have a hypo attack of convulsions. Thankfully a seizure was unlikely as long as his number stayed above 50 but blood loss would not help with that. Then of course there were the platelets.

A nurse placed the glucose tablet under his tongue so it could dissolve without needing to be swallowed while another hung a bag of blood on the I.V. stand.

"Get another I.V. in his other arm."

That'll wake him up. They didn't need two lines right now, but they would soon. The sound of snores had been reassuring at first, at least he wasn't unconscious, but she did need him awake to monitor his neurological condition and snoring meant restricted airways which meant breathing difficulties and involuntary movement. Never mind the damage that could be done during the throes of a nightmare. Then there was the shivers from the cold, but the best way to avoid head trauma complications was to get any inflammation down. Also, the cold would slow down his blood flow, making any bleeding more manageable. It was just a matter of risk management, if putting up with involuntary shivers meant avoiding a full on seizure and hemorrhaging, then it was worth it.

"Hold him steady!"

A strangled cry reverberated round the room.

Spencer Reid was first aware of the sharp prick to his hand, followed by the overwhelming feeling of being trapped in a freezer, except freezers didn't hurt. What ever happened to the promise of blissful numbness? Oh, right. His arms weren't numb. He couldn't look up, but noticed the lack of a familiar calming voice.

"Emily?"

"Emily had to leave."

Leave? But..

"You're okay. We're going to start fixing you up in a minute. We just need an extra I.V. line for a blood transfusion."

Blood transfusion? He didn't think he'd been bleeding that badly. What the hell had happened to him? And why did he need to ask such a basic question.

Okay, Dr. Cheng took a deep breath. Blood bags, glucose tablets, no snoring. Pulse ox...she glanced at his wrist monitor...96. Rather low with an oxygen mask but better than the 91 it had been at his admission.

"Okay, Dr. Reid if you feel anything painful on your back let me know. I need you to stay awake, okay." Sometimes Dr. Baker was almost too good.

Damn sadistic bastards. What had the nice Dr. said? Oh, yes, time for sleep and bed time. He longed for sleep, the drug high and hallucinations hadn't helped with sleep at all. If anything, his body felt more sluggish after a hallucination as if the drugs had dropped a twenty-pound weight in his gut.

"Okay Dr. Reid, I need you to answer some questions."

Reid was hoping for more star wars quizzes. He was more than a little annoyed when she asked, "When did you get that head wound?"

Really? He was surrounded by strange nurses, having God only knew what done to his numbed up back and she was asking about his head?!

"Dr. Reid?"

"Three days."

"Three days ago? How did it happen?"

"Shovel."

"You were hit in the head with a shovel?"

"Yes." Reid squeezed his eyes shut as Hankel's voice echoed in his head. 'Shoot him, you weakling! He's a satan!' You're okay, Reid told himself. You're in the hospital. Stop, stop thinking...but he couldn't stop thinking about it. Why were they doing this? Why couldn't they just leave him alone?

Dr. Cheng noticed the change in his breathing and the return of the sobs. She put down the scalpel, eyeing her very small incision with dissatisfaction. This was not going to work.

He hadn't even flinched when she made the incision, so the sobbing had to be nightmare recollection, not pain. She needed him calm. Following her predecessor's example, which had obviously worked wonders, she started singing. She wasn't like Dr. Baker, she couldn't keep up a lively discussion and focus on her work but singing? As a member of the church choir she found singing to be calming. She didn't know what his faith was, but she trusted the calming tone alone would ease his anxiety. She could keep herself to one question in between songs. That ought to give her answers and give him some peace.

"My chains are gone, I've been set free..."

"It's been three hours!" Penelope Garcia growled at no one in particular. The rest of the team was half asleep, haphazardly slumped over the chairs, their eyes refusing to close even if their brains had shut down. But she couldn't sleep, not even for 5 minutes. Every time she closed her eyes she saw his bloody hospital blanket and heard his sobs. "My poor babies. I'm never coming out to the field again." She thought her crime scene photos were bad enough...but this. Having a victim in her care...one of her babies being the victim? It was too much to handle.

"Garcia, trying to sleep over here!" Emily moaned, amazed at the tech's energy level. Was she the only one who had slept in the last three days?

"How can you possibly -?"

"Spencer Reid!" a familiar voice called out from the waiting room doorway.

"Here!" came a bunch of voices with varying amounts of energy, no one comparing to Garcia who bolted out of her chair and made a beeline for Dr. Cheng. "How is he?"

"Just fine."

"Fine. Vague, so vague. What does fine mean? Does fine mean out? Please tell me it's out." Garcia decided she loved seeing stressed out doctors smiling. That couldn't be a bad thing.

"It's out. He made it."

"Oh my God!" Suddenly a hundred pound weight fell off her shoulders and she could breathe again. She hadn't even known she was holding her breath. "For reals, it's really out? Can I see him? I need to see him...like now."

"Unfortunately no. My nurses have him in radiology..."

"Again? Didn't he already go there?"

"For the xray, but we couldn't get MRI tests with that knife. So we're back tracking. But I did get a picture for you." She took out her cell phone and gave it to Garcia.

Garcia had been expecting a picture of Reid, lying on the hospital bed on his back, but what she got was... "Ugh...what is...that is..." It was blood and icky stuff is what it was. Black and bloody and...not pretty.

"Those," Dr. Cheng pointed to the black spots against white flesh and blood, "are staples in his back."

"Staples in Reid's back? I wanted to see this because...?"

"Staples, no knife."

"No knife. Staples. No knife." Suddenly black and icky was pretty. "So he's okay. We can take him home tomorrow...or today. Wait, what time is it?"

"I'm going to need to keep him a few days for observation. I took a wound culture to check for infection and I'll need to check out that head injury. But for now, I suggest you all go get some sleep now."

"Sleep, you mean leave him?"

Dr. Cheng nodded. "He's out of immediate danger. I suspect the cardiac arrest was from the drugs which should be flushed out of his system in a few days and not the head wound. If it hasn't caused any problems in the last three days, then I expect the MRI to be clean but I need to know for sure. He's going to need help in the next few days as he goes through narcotics withdrawal. I'm going to put him on some nausea medicine and non-narcotic pain killers to at least take the edge off. He's going to be in pain and misery, but not danger."

"Can I just go back to his room and wait and sleep there? I don't want him walking up alone."

"You may, but he'll probably sleep most of the day. And now, Agent Hotchner." Dr. Cheng indicated to a wheelchair that was brought over with a hospital gown. "Sit"

"I'm fine."

"I understand your concern for Dr. Reid's far more severe injury but you were still shot!"

"In my bulletproof vest." Hotch's glare promised pain to anyone who had told.

"The very reason I did not force the issue sooner. You need a minimum of a chest xray. Who knows, we might even see Dr. Reid down there."

Hotch sat down in the wheelchair, knowing that fighting with the doctors was a loosing battle. If this was the quickest way to check on his agent's condition then so be it. He turned to his team. "Go back to the house. Get some sleep."

"I can't, Boss Man. That place has bad karma. Please don't make me go back there."

"Okay, Garcia can stay. Everyone else, go back to the house, your go-bags are there anyway. I'll meet you there tomorrow and then we'll get hotel rooms until Reid is ready to leave." There was no way, he was staying more than a day. "And someone call Strauss to tell her the good news. I promise to call you all as soon as he's awake."

A/N. I am not a doctor. I have a little bit of medical training. I emphasis the little part. I have done my best to make this as realistic as possible, but I am no expert so no using this information for real-life. You do that, it's at your own risk.

Amazing Grace was written by John Newton and the added verses of 'My Chains are Gone' were written by Chris Tomlin.

We've got one...maybe two chapters left if I stretch it out.