Sawed: Chapter 01
Chikorita-Trainer1
T
Disclaimer: I don't own Saw or anything else I might shamelessly reference or rip off.

Author's Note: So, I know I'm like twenty years late to the party, but I'm a Saw fan now. Watched it all the way through for the first time this year, immediately became a Chainshipper (because duh), and a few weeks after watching and re-watching the first one, I stupidly binged the next 6 all in one night. Yeah, turns out you can't do that in your 30's like you could when you were a teenager. At least not that AND still be able to go to work the next day. I watched them because I wanted to educate myself in the franchise, but man did it hurt knowing Adam definitely DID DIE. Goddamn, he was so adorable. So yeah, here's MY take on if they survived, ended up in the hospital, and fell in love. It's been done, I've read them all, and now I'm a part of it. Enjoy.

Oh, and the title just refers to the fact that this happens post-Saw. Like, it's just the past tense of the word Saw. I couldn't think of a good title.

He was out. He didn't know how, he didn't know why, but he was out. Adam Faulkner could vaguely feel his body being lifted, carried, set on something soft and rattled forward. He figured he must be on a gurney or a stretcher or something, but every five seconds or so he would fade into unconsciousness. He could hear muffled voices from either side of his head, spouting medical terms and police jargon.

I'm dying, he thought. They're going to declare me dead any second, and pull the sheet over my head any—OW! What the-?! he thought suddenly as something sharp was jabbed into the crook of his elbow.

Oh, an IV. Well, they're trying to save my life, I guess.

Feeling safe for the time being, Adam allowed himself to relax. He was in professional medical hands. He could trust these people, these voices, these sensations. He would live.

"Larry? Can you hear me? Honey?" came a soft voice.

"Daddy, please wake up," cried a younger voice.

Lawrence Gordon tried to process the voices around him, but so far, they sounded like they were underwater. Or he was. He couldn't decipher the sensations he was feeling, until one thought snapped him into consciousness.

"ADAM!" he suddenly shrieked.

"Dr. Gordon, please lie back," a doctor instructed, gently pressing Lawrence's chest, forcing him back down on the bed.

"Save Adam! Please!" he cried, thrashing weakly.

"Shh! Shh! Dr. Gordon, it's alright—" said the doctor.

"He's still in there! Help him!"

"He's alright! He's fine! It's OK!" said the doctor, dabbing Lawrence's face with a cool cloth. "You hear me? They got him out. He's here, he's at THIS hospital, he's fine."

Lawrence's breathing slowed as he processed the information. It was only then that he remembered whom he had originally been so worried about.

"Alli? Diana?" he called out weakly.

"We're here, honey," said Allison. Lawrence, still trying to catch his breath, turned his head to the left and saw his wife and daughter, their eyes still red, their cheeks still wet.

"Oh, God," he sobbed, bringing his hand to cover his mouth. He reached out with his other hand and drew his family near. "Are you alright?"

"We're fine, honey," Allison said softly, leaning down to hug her husband. Diana squeezed in and reached up to hug her father.

"The police said the bad man is dead," she said.

"Zep. Yes. He's…he's been…killed…" Lawrence panted, remembering how Adam had viciously beaten and bludgeoned him to save Lawrence.

After the doctor checked Lawrence's vitals, made sure his IV was hooked up, and all the other obligatory medical things, Lawrence was left alone with his family.

"Larry, we need to talk."

Lights. Lights making the inside of his eyelids glow red to his vision. Why are lights on when he was sleeping? Was he supposed to be awake or what?

Eyelids fluttering open, Adam took a breath. He saw white, he smelled disinfectant. He was in the hospital.

Oh, my god, he thought. I'm alive.

It was over. That horrifying ideal of being chained up in that dank, disgusting industrial bathroom was over. He wiggled his feet to make sure neither was still shackled. His previously fettered ankle was a little sore, but free nonetheless. He turned his head from side to side, but there was no one in the room with him. He tried to push himself up by the palms of his hands, but only his left one was mobile. His right arm was in a sling, and felt a little numb.

"You're just wounded…wounded in the shoulder," a voice echoed in his head.

LAWRENCE! he suddenly thought with horror. The man who had shared his trauma, his fear, his terror, had sawed his own foot off and then dragged himself across the floor, grabbed and loaded a gun, and shot Adam in the shoulder.

Oh, God, I killed a guy, Adam thought dreadfully. I mean, it was in self-defense, and in defense of someone else. But still…

Then he fumbled around with his left hand and groped for his call button, and pressed it. He needed answers. But he also knew it would probably be a while before anyone came in. Hospitals were busy places, and his condition clearly wasn't critical.

Twenty minutes passed before a nurse came in.

"Mr…Faulkner?" she asked, checking her clipboard.

"Adam," he answered, surprised at how hoarse his voice was. "But yeah."

"How are you feeling?" asked the nurse.

"Very fucking confused," he rasped. "How did I get here?"

"I'm not privy to the details, I just know you were brought in to the emergency room with another man, a doctor here—"

"Lawrence Gordon," Adam finished.

"Yes."

"He sawed off his foot," said Adam.

"Yes," said the nurse. "It was horrible."

"I know, I was there," Adam sighed. "Is he alive?"

"Yes. He's just a few rooms down, actually," said the nurse. Adam's face lit up, though he hoped he could hide it.

"You have a mild bullet wound in your right shoulder. The bullet was removed, and you've been stabilized. Just don't move it for a few days, and you'll make a full recovery."

"Mm," Adam uttered in acknowledgement. For the first time, noticing he was in a hospital gown, he asked "Where are my clothes?" Not fully understanding why he would want his blood-soaked rags back.

"The EMTs had to cut you out of your shirt and pants," said the nurse.

"Oh, so they're gone?"

"Yeah."

Adam sighed and leaned back onto his pillow. The nurse just walked back around his bed, adjusting his IV drip, making notes of his vitals, and doing other boilerplate nurse things.

"Where's the…thing that makes the bed go up?" Adam asked, not used to reaching for things with his left hand.

"It's right here," said the nurse, showing him the panel of buttons on his bed's control panel. She pressed one, and the head of his bed was slowly raised to an angle. "How's that?"

"That's fine, thanks," Adam grunted.

"I'm going to bring you some water with a straw, is that OK?"

"Yeah, yeah, thanks."

Adam didn't know how long he'd been asleep, but by the time he woke, it was dark outside his windows, a cup with some water and a straw had been set on a table beside him, and he was shivering with cold. He tried to lift his blanket up around his shoulders, but with only one movable arm, he could only tuck it around his right shoulder.

His shivering only reminded him of Lawrence, shivering from terror and blood loss, gently touching the side of his face, pleading with him to believe that they were going to be alright.

Lawrence! he suddenly thought, unable to keep still. Looking to his left arm, he saw the IV tube still pumping hydration and he assumed antibiotics into his system, and he felt as shackled to his bed as he did to the pipe in the bathroom. Refusing to stay put, but unable to use his right arm for anything, he creatively reached over and bit the IV tube with his mouth and yanked the needle out of his arm. Thankfully, he didn't end up hemorrhaging from the site of injection, so he peeled his covers off, set his bare feet on the cold hospital tiles, and limped out of his room, determined to find Lawrence's.

Which direction? he asked himself. But being an observer, a voyeur, as Jigsaw had dubbed him, Adam knew how to look around his environment and spot things out-of-the-ordinary. Looking down the hall, he saw a few police officers outside a particular room, and determined that to be Lawrence's. He also saw a blonde woman and a little girl sitting in chairs facing the officers.

"Is Lawrence-?" Adam began before he was cut off by an officer.

"Sorry, kid. Only family members at this time," said one of them.

"We'll also need to question you about what happened, if you're up to it," said another.

"Just go back to your room, Adam," said Allison. She didn't seem angry, just tired. Adam knew now why he and Lawrence had been put in separate rooms to recover—the police needed to take both their statements and cross-reference them. It made legal sense, but oh, how he wanted to be with Lawrence.

Adam nodded and slowly turned away, slinking back down the hall towards his room. He couldn't help but overhear the officers say softly to Allison

"Sorry to hear about the separation," and he knew that Allison was leaving Lawrence. Just a few hours ago, Adam would have turned up his nose at such a fate, believing Lawrence to be totally deserving of desertion, but everything had changed. He had watched the man mutilate himself for his wife and child, and now it was all for nothing?

He got back to his room, but couldn't make it to the bed. He put his good arm out to touch the mattress, and then sank to his knees on the floor. Guilt, exhaustion, and for some reason, the familiar hollowness in his chest that could only be heartbreak overwhelmed the young photographer.

But he wasn't alone for long. He heard footsteps follow him and looked up, and saw Allison in his doorway. He looked into her face briefly, and then down again.

"He cut off his own foot just save you," he said pleadingly, as if stating this obvious fact would get Allison to reconsider.

"Adam, Lawrence and I were hitting the skids anyway," she said. Adam looked up at her again, this time with an expression almost of judgement. Was their marriage really not worth saving, even after such an ordeal? "I know what he did must seem heroic, but," Allison explained while kneeling down to Adam's level. "I'll let you in on a little secret about women, Adam; we're not actually wooed by acts of violence. Especially self-inflicted ones."

Adam wanted to chuckle darkly, but he was just too sad.

"Cutting off his foot isn't going to fix all our problems," said Allison. "You're probably too young to understand, but one big, dramatic gesture can't reverse everything that's already gone wrong in a relationship."

Adam said nothing, so Allison continued.

"There hasn't been any passion between us for years," she admitted. Adam just blinked. "He's been like a zombie, or a robot. Just walking through life not feeling anything. In fact, the only passion I've seen him have in the last ten years, for anything, was you, when he woke up."

Adam lifted his gaze up to Allison at that.

"His first thought, when he woke up in that bed, was of you. Not of me, not of our daughter, you."

"Probably 'cause I was the last person he'd seen," Adam suggested.

"Because he feels for you," Allison said. "For whatever reason, he burns with emotion for you, not me."

"Because it just happened," Adam pleaded, trying to downplay Allison's implications. "You didn't see him in that room, screaming, melting down, all because he thought you and Diana were dead or dying."

"Our marriage is dead and dying," said Allison. "But he still has you. He needs you."

Adam swallowed, squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head.

"All this happened because of me," he said, almost to himself. "And they won't even let me see him."

Allison had seen with her own eyes how much Lawrence had wanted Adam to be OK when he woke up. She could see how deeply Adam felt about his actions and their experience together.

"Come here," she said softly, taking Adam's free hand and leading him to stand up. They walked back down the hall to Lawrence's room, which was being guarded by the two police officers. Diana was sitting in a chair beside them.

Allison had Adam's hand in her own, and she said to the officers

"I know it's technically not allowed," she began. "I know he's not family, but this man spent over six hours in that hellhole with Lawrence, he was there when he sawed off his foot, and he saved his life from Zep. That may not make him family but it makes him something."

The officers looked at each other for a second, understanding what Allison was trying to say.

"Make it quick," one of them said, and they stepped aside. Adam entered.

The room was dark, save for a small light above the bed. Adam looked over at Lawrence. His head was down, his hands at his sides, the lower half of his leg bandaged—it appeared that the surgeons had reattached his foot, but Adam wasn't so naïve to think it was all going to work out. Like with the drummer from Def Leppard, there was no guarantee that a reattached limb would stay reattached.

Being barefoot, he made virtually no sound as he approached the doctor, so when he got close enough to sit down on the bed and Lawrence still didn't notice him, Adam had to reach out and lift Lawrence's chin up to look at him.

"Adam?" Lawrence almost gasped. Adam put his left hand to the side of Lawrence's face, though still couldn't meet his eyes.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered as he leaned down, awkwardly hugging Lawrence with his one good arm around the doctor's waist and pressing his face into Lawrence's chest.

"For what—this?" Lawrence gestured to his leg. "I've dealt with worse amputees than this. …can't think of any right now, but..."

"It would have been better if you'd just shot and killed me to begin with; none of this would have happened," said Adam. Though he knew that statement didn't really make any sense. Lawrence would still have had to saw his foot off to crawl across the floor to reach the gun in the first place. But Adam's guilt, not his common sense, was guiding his speech.

"Adam, look at me," said Lawrence. Adam hesitantly lifted his eyes, which were threatening to spill over with tears that were balanced precariously on his lower lids, to meet the doctor's. "I'd rather lose this foot to gangrene," he paused. "than walk through the rest of my life without you."

Lawrence grasped both sides of Adam's head and leaned his forehead against his like he had done in the bathroom when they both thought they were going to die, gently running his fingers through Adam's hair, his nose touching Adam's, their faces so close, Adam's left hand on the doctor's cheek.

The two horror victims stayed like that for a few minutes, just caressing each other's faces and hair, sighing and silently crying.

"Mr. Faulkner?" came a stern voice of one of the police officers. Adam sniffed, knowing that he'd get in trouble if he didn't return to his own room, but still unable to pry himself from Lawrence's arms.

"I can't leave you," he breathed.

"You never will," said Lawrence.

It took Adam a minute to fully comprehend what Lawrence meant by that, but as he breathed deep the scent of the older man, absorbed the warmth of his touch, and allowed his heart to open up to the sentiment, he understood.

Their experience in that room had bonded them forever. They would henceforth share an almost cosmic emotional connection. The metal chains and shackles had been traded in for a psychological tether that would stretch across space and time, and would never be broken. They were a part of each other now.

"I'll always be with you," said Lawrence. Adam almost scoffed. What was this—Final Destination?

Adam closed his eyes, wishing for all the world to shut out the environment around the two of them— Allison and the cops, the hospital equipment, their injuries and trauma—and just stay in their embrace. He sniffed, and Lawrence lifted his head just slightly above the younger man, and gently but firmly pressed his lips to the top of Adam's head.

That was OK, right? Between two grown men? Frodo did it to Sam at the end of Return of the King. Billy Hayes did it to Max in Midnight Express. It wasn't weird. After such a traumatic experience, couldn't a man kiss another man on the head?

Adam withdrew from Lawrence's room and quietly shut the door. Allison was by his side in an instant, and put her arm around his hunched-over shoulders.

"I'll take you back," she whispered. Adam kept his head down, his face buried in his left hand, letting Allison guide him back to his room and into his bed. A nurse was already waiting in the room, and she put the IV back in his arm.

"You can't go ripping this thing out, OK?" she said sternly.

"Sorry," said Adam, allowing himself to be stuck.

The nurse left the room and Allison came to Adam's bedside and put her hand on his injured shoulder.

Adam thought that Allison, if he ever met her face-to-face, would be pissed at him for what he had done and what had happened. What else would you feel towards a creepy spy who took pictures of your unfaithful husband and had gotten him into trouble this deep?

But Allison was strangely compassionate towards the voyeur. She, too, had gone through a traumatic experience, and it had clarified things for her as well. She now knew things that she didn't before—such as what a marriage could withstand, and what it couldn't. What ignited Lawrence's passions, and what didn't. What she knew was that Lawrence and Adam needed each other.

She leaned down and whispered in Adam's ear

"Take care of him, OK?"

Adam lifted his good arm up to Allison's shoulder and clutched her close as he nodded.

"I will."

END OF CHAPTER 01
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