Hospital.
That's all he could register when his eyes opened, seeing white. A white ceiling, a white aproned nurse, white sheets, white curtain.
The nurse had asked him a question.
His consciousness blurred, his voice thick, slow, slurred.
He slipped back into dreams.
Soft sheets…black hair…red dress…candlelight…jasmine…
Michelle.
He breathed, and the breath was deep and slow. He was back in bed, next to her- lying in her arms, where he was meant to be. Everything was alright.
And then he coughed, and couldn't stop.
The nurse drew back the curtain again. A sting went into his arm.
Blackness overtook him.
He couldn't recall how long he lay there.
Time blurred.
Day and night merged together.
He spent the time in a delirious haze, neither fully sleeping nor waking.
And when he dreamt, if he was really dreaming, the dreams seemed real.
He sat with his mother, in the two-room house, by the fireplace, both of them rubbing their hands together. He was freezing, and she beckoned him onto her lap. He crawled there, into her embrace, and she murmured stories into his ear, about Ivan Tsarevitch and the Grey Wolf, and the sound of her voice made him sleepy and no longer cold.
He played with Nika in the concrete alley with a chewed up tennis ball. They had found it by the fence one day. A dog had decided it did not want it. He would throw the ball, and her face lit up with joy, her long brown hair whipping back as she ran after it.
And there was Michelle.
Laughing as she held his hand. Walking the cobblestoned streets of Paris.
Her body under his. Her skin soft. Her brown eyes looking at him with love.
And then Gretkov's voice.
The shot of a gun. Her body lying dead on the floor.
He would awake terribly in moments like these, like a fish out of water. Gasping, his body covered in sweat, his entire being in panic.
And then the nurses would come, and it would be blackness again.
The dreams again.
Sometimes he imagined a ghost through the curtain, but he could not be sure. He was too weak to fend for himself, and if it were not for the thought of her, he would not give a fuck. He would lie back without fighting, close his eyes and pray for the first time since he was a child that the afterlife was better than the life he'd lived. He'd welcome death with open arms.
He had to survive.
God knows what would happen to her if he didn't.
He awoke fully conscious.
Everything seemed strange.
He tried to move.
Then he shut his eyes.
The pain.
His head felt cracked open.
He touched his skull to find it shaved, except for patches. He felt it over, wincing as he did so.
He opened his eyes again.
It was bright. The curtain around him was drawn. A breeze blew in beside him from the window. No one was around.
There was a noise outside the window- it was slight, but it made him stiffen automatically.
"Ah- finally."
Kirill tried to move his neck around. He only managed a small turn.
There was a short man standing by the side of his bed. He was dressed neatly in white. He carried a clipboard and a pen.
Kirill tried to sit up. He couldn't.
"You remember the accident?" the man said over his spectacles.
"Da," he rasped out.
The man, who was a doctor, nodded. "Very good, then."
He scribbled on his board.
"How long have I been here?" Kirill asked.
The man kept scribbling.
"How long?" he persisted.
The man looked up from his notes. "Six months."
Six months!
"At first we were afraid you would not wake," the doctor said, staring at him intensely. "You suffered a severe concussion. Kept falling in and out of consciousness. Mostly out. But you found the will to come back, it seems."
Kirill stared.
The little man paused. "You punctured a lung. Cracked half your ribs."
No wonder he couldn't sit up.
"Very fortunately, your spinal cord seems intact," he said as he bobbed his head from side to side. "But I will have to take more x rays."
"I have to get out of here now," he insisted.
The doctor laughed. "I am afraid, young man, that you are not going anywhere for a little while."
The doctor was right.
Kirill found he could barely move. His legs had no strength.
His arms were no better.
He couldn't even feed himself.
This was normal, the doctor told him. His body had shut down for a while. It had to relearn how to do things.
Like hell, he thought, scowling, as he attempted to lift the spoon to his lips. It spilt onto his lap.
He gave up and let the nurse do it.
There was a woman who came in periodically for his psychological assessment.
He hated her.
She was large and dumpy, with short dark brown hair. She perspired like crazy, even in the cold. He had a feeling she was interested in him, in a very non-professional/client way.
She would sit by him much too closely. Lean forward with a concerned look in her eye. The smell of her armpits would fill his nostrils during these unfortunate sessions.
And she would ask him questions very slowly. Incessant questions.
Did he have trouble remembering things.
Could he tell her about the accident.
Did he feel distressed talking about it.
Did he feel any anxiety.
Did he feel suicidal.
He would sit there with what he hoped was a permanent frown on his face, and answer in as curt a manner as possible.
No, he was fine.
He was absolutely fine.
No, he did not want to talk about the accident.
Was he sure? The woman would ask eagerly. It would be good to talk about it. He had to talk about it, to begin the healing process.
One day he lost his temper. His strength had recovered slightly by then, in his arms anyway.
He threw his food tray at her head.
They cuffed him to the bed after that.
One morning he awoke to find his bed surrounded by people.
They were all wearing suits.
A blond woman stood before him. Her hair was immaculately coiffed. Her lips were pursed.
"Do you know who I am?" she said.
His voice was rough from disuse, and the English came slowly to his tongue. "CIA. Most likely."
"Correct. I'm Pamela Landy, task chief officer."
The blond lady assessed the Russian. He wasn't much to look at, and she'd been disappointed when she first laid eyes on him. But then again, for someone who had been in a near fatal crash, it was a miracle he had come out alive.
"Why did you do it, Agent Ivanovich?"
He did not look at her. "You know why. It was my job."
"Not Bourne. That's easy to figure out. Why go after the tourist. Why risk your life?"
He looked at the white bedspread. "You know nothing about me."
"Apparently she meant something to you."
Pause.
"Yuri Gretkov has been arrested."
Kirill gave a small bark of laughter, which faded back into a cough that never seemed to end.
Pamela Landy frowned, a line appearing on her perfectly made up face. "I do not see what you find so amusing, Agent Ivanovich."
"That won't stop him," he rasped out.
"You mean getting the girl?"
When he did not speak, she continued.
"CIA wants you incarcerated for crimes against the state once you recover."
Again, silence.
"You have my word she will be safe. We are willing to- make generous allowances in your sentencing. Provided you do something for us."
"What is that?"
"Find Jason Bourne. Bring him in to us."
"How do I know she's not dead already?"
"We've been watching her, Kirill."
Kirill finally looked up into her eyes. They were frank eyes.
"How do I know that," he said uneasily.
She looked to the man next to her, a big man with a cone shaped head and dark hair.
The big man nodded.
He stooped to pick up the briefcase he had on the floor. He took out a slim laptop and set it on the bed. He typed in a few things.
A window came up on the screen.
Kirill let out a little sound.
It was her.
She was walking out of a train station. She looked like she was in a hurry. She stopped by a sushi store. He could hear her ordering a few rolls. Her voice was exactly like he remembered. Cool. Polished. Elegant. Her voice.
"We will continue to watch her if you cooperate."
He could not tear his eyes away. The big man pressed a few buttons. The screen went black. Kirill reluctantly tore his eyes away to look levelly at the blond woman. He blinked a few times, and took his time to respond.
"You are offering me amnesty in exchange for a cage."
"That's one way of looking at it."
She came over closer, to the side of his bed, and sat down.
"I'm offering protection. For her. For you. Don't you want that?"
He looked at her sceptically. "I failed to kill him. Twice. What makes you think I am a good candidate for the job?"
"I have faith in you."
Kirill's eyes startled slightly, and then narrowed. "Why do you people want him so badly? He is one man. One agent."
"He's where everything starts and ends. I can't fit all the pieces in the puzzle together without him."
Kirill regarded her a moment, then looked down.
"I will- think upon your proposition."
"Don't think too long."
She got up suddenly. She motioned to the others. They began shuffling away.
"And Kirill?"
Kirill put his head up slowly.
"It's a pretty good cage from where you're sitting."