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"Kevin! Adam! Go go go! We got this…"
The gun fight had ended and the perps were either dead or being put in cuffs when Voight sent them on their way. They didn't need to be told twice. It felt like forever ago since Jay had called for backup, but in reality it had been less than 10 minutes…but even that was too long. Jay was already injured…
"Jay!"
Kevin reached him first, his speed driven by fear and anger. He was angry they hadn't been able to back Jay up as soon as he called for it. Angry the assholes hadn't given up, that a kid got shot and another one was briefly a hostage. Angry that in the chaos of the bust, they weren't able to lock it down quicker, leaving Jay out there alone with no help in sight.
"Jay!"
He didn't hesitate in taking Spencer out. The bounce of Jay's body when Spencer's last two punches landed crushed his heart and spiked his rage. Jay looked dead and if not, he had to be close to it. He didn't remember aiming, didn't remember pulling the trigger, it just happened with no thought.
Jay probably saved his own life with that. Even though Kevin provided the bullet center mass, Jay provided the extra training that helped him pull it off.
He screamed into his radio, "Jay's down. Call an ambo…"
That was as far as he got before he stumbled and landed on his hands and knees sending his radio skittered away. He was still five or so feet from Jay, so he crawled, scrambled, the rest of the way there.
The closer he got to Jay, seeing his blood streaked face from the old and new lacerations and being unable to tell if he was breathing because of his vest, the more certain he was that Spencer had beat him to death.
There were tears running down his face he wasn't aware of, and sadness and guilt where warring for dominance in his heart. He knelt on Jay's right side, one hand laying reverently on top of his head while the other trembled its way to Jay's carotid artery hoping to find a pulse. When he felt it, he dropped his head in relief and gasped for breath around a sob, not sure how long he had been denying himself air.
Adam was still a half a block away when he heard Kev's desperate plea, "Dispatch 5021 Ida, roll an ambo to my location. Officer down.."
Kevin's body language had him skidding to a stop before he reached them. Jay was…he looked like a broken doll that had been tossed away, limbs all splayed and askew. His left arm was flung toward Spencer while his right arm lay beside him. His left leg was stretched out with the heel of his right boot almost touching the calf of it. He was…he looked dead…
The tears on Kevin's face and shake of his shoulders seemed to confirm it and an overwhelming agony filled him. They didn't get there in time.
"Kev?"
He didn't realize he'd asked the question out loud, then wasn't sure Kevin heard him it was choked out so quietly.
"Kev…he…"
Looking up at his best friend with tear filled eyes, he choked out the unbelievable truth, "He's alive…he's alive."
A relief so profound it was almost debilitating, washed through Adam as he fumbled for his radio and called dispatch.
"What's the status on that ambo…officer down! Blunt force trauma, possible internal injuries…"
He didn't know if there were internal injuries. He wasn't a fucking doctor, but Christ given what he could see of Jay's belly where his shirt had ridden up…
"Oh man…"
Dropping to his knees, he gently put his hand on the darkening bruises and could feel the heat and rigidity.
"5021 Ida to dispatch, internal bleeding confirmed."
"Copy 5021. Ambulance three minutes out."
While Kevin started pulling the velcro on Jay's vest and begging him to wake up, he turned his attention to the asshole.
The last thing he wanted to do was follow protocol. It was pointless given the splotch of blood center mass, but he crouched down beside Spencer and did it anyway. It gave him a second to ride out the overload of adrenaline twitching through his system and get his shit together so he could help take care of Jay.
Once he had the confirmation the asshole was dead, he twisted back to Jay's side, going from a crouch to his knees. His intention was to help Kev get Jay's vest off, but then he saw the cuffs.
"Jesus Jay…Jesus…Jesus fucking Christ…"
Digging keys out of his pocket, he unlocked the cuff from Jay's bloody wrist and gently brought his arm down to his side.
"Dammit!"
He yanked off his flannel leaving himself in just a t-shirt and put pressure on Jay's bloody wrist and the GSW to his bicep from a few days ago. It was bleeding more now than when it happened. He stared at Kevin then shook his head in disbelief, "He cuffed himself to the asshole."
His eyes flicked from Spencer to Adam then back to Jay's face, "Spencer's luck ran out going against Jay."
Pulling open the last of the velcro on Jay's vest, Kevin removed the front panel, set it aside and watched the rise and fall of Jay's chest for a moment then checked his pulse again.
He met his best friend's terrified eyes across Jay's broken body and nodded, "Still strong…not as though…"
Adam rubbed his knuckles over Jay's sternum but got no response, "Come on man…" then put his hand on Jay's cheek and smeared a stream blood from his brow that was about to flow into his eye, "Jay, come on bro…wake up…"
X
It had been five minutes since Kevin ran to Jay screaming into his radio for an ambulance and four minutes of prayers or forever later, that the ambulance rolled up and two paramedics they knew by sight but not name took over.
Watching them work on Jay was another level of awful.
They wanted Jay to react to anything; the frustration of being manhandled or the collar that would make him anxious or the needles that would scare him. They wanted Jay's usual m.o.; internal panic at the sight of a needle disguised as outward calm that those who knew him, could see right through…those who knew him…but he was a living version of a dead guy, they got nothing.
The medics got to a point where they had Jay ready for transport and he and Kev helped roll Jay onto the backboard and load him onto the gurney. Still no reaction…'Come on Jay, come on…'
Kevin volunteered to go in the ambo and would call Will on the way. There was an unspoken, painful conversation between the two partners. If Jay did wake up, it would be better for Jay to see Kevin's face. Waking up and seeing the face of the guy who had been a colossal prick to him all week was the last thing Jay needed.
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That night
Bed at a 45° angle, a loose fitting hospital gown, blanket to his waist. Arms at his sides, an IV, head tilted slightly to the right, a nasal cannula.
That was the canvas.
The painting was a grade three concussion, flakes of dried blood, swelling and black bruises. It was a broken nose and split lips, blood tinged bandages on future scars to his brow, cheek and under his eye. It was smaller cuts, scrapes to the forehead and jaw, all uncovered but shiny with antibiotic.
It was gauze wrapped knuckles on his right hand stained pink, knuckles of his left black and blue. It was a bandage on his left bicep, an 'older' injury made new.
It was internal bleeding from a lacerated kidney. It was drainage tubing hidden under a sterile pad.
It was desperation.
It was give your life if needed and if the worst came to pass, it was a handcuff and doing what could be done to make sure Spencer didn't get away.
Gathered around his bedside, they were the frame. Swimming in too many emotions to decipher; and strangled by the ugly facts. What they were looking at were Jay's physical injuries from the case.
Spencer almost killed him because they screwed up. His physical injuries weren't the worst of it though. The true trauma was hidden underneath - the emotional injuries perpetrated by them…injuries they couldn't even try to put on Spencer.
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Later that night
Trudy stood at the door to the waiting room and could practically smell the worry and guilt permeating the room. Worry was okay, guilt was not…not about this.
"Hey!"
The words weren't there but the tone used screamed it and they all snapped their heads up at the command.
"Listen up because I'm not going to repeat it…" she gave them all a hard look, "I know what you're all thinking and you're wrong. Jay being in that bed is not your fault."
Adam opened his mouth to disagree but she put a halt to it.
"Last I checked Ruzek, listening involved keeping your trap shut."
He closed his mouth and like the others disagreed with their sergeant in silence.
"Jay getting hurt was on Anderson when he tackled him down those steps. Jay continued to work while injured but he's not at fault either, he didn't do anything wrong. Anyone of us would have tried to push through it and thank God Jay was able to."
"But…"
This time she silenced him with a scalding glance.
"Jay got Spencer, his CI's had the information we needed. He worked them like only Jay Halstead could. He had an idea and pulled the thread. He got us to where we could take the asshole down.
"But all of this…" she twirls her finger in the air, "… the reason he's here, isn't on us. This is all Spencer…
"Look guys, we all treated Jay like crap. We didn't believe there was a kid and our idiocy hurt him, bad, but it didn't stop him and…AND…"
Hailey put her hand on Adam's knee, "Adam…"
They were all feeling guilty but Adam was the most vocal outside of Voight, and it was hard for him to shut it down and just listen.
"Jay took the only actions he could to find the little boy; he broadened the perimeter and ran a search. Believing Jay or not, it would have been the only action any of us could've taken, run the search and move on with the next step until and if, there was something actionable when the results came in.
She could see they still didn't quite believe her, didn't want to believe her and rolled her eyes in frustration, "Ignoring the truth is another slam on Jay. He worked through the pain despite what we did. Inside or outside the bullpen, benched, suspended even fired, Jay would work this case and you all know it, so to believe you're at fault for him getting hurt is taking away what he did, what he sacrificed to get Spencer. We've taken enough. Don't take that too."
She throws her hands up in the air, "Dear Lord, just take a damn second, take the emotions out of it and be cops in an elite unit and reason it out. The 'only thing' we did by not believing Jay, was hurt the heart of a man we love."
Hopelessness setting in, Kim ran her hands through her hair, "I'm not sure we'll come back from it, that we'll get a chance to make it up to him."
Her effort to get these idiots to release the unwarranted guilt they felt about Jay getting hurt made her realize it was more than likely a defense mechanism. It was hard to face what they did and easier to take on the blame for what Spencer did and the tone of Kim's statement just confirmed it.
Adam mumbled, 'We don't deserve it but Jay will give us a chance.'
"What?"
He violently ran his hand over his face and self loathing dripped from every word, "I said, whether we deserve it, or not, Jay will give us a chance."
He looked at Kim, then around the room, "You all know it. You know he'll give us a chance even though we don't deserve it and you know why? Because he's not a fucking asshole. Because he's a better person than us. I already felt the fucking forgiveness radiating off him before we went in for the bust.
"He's going to fucking excuse us and chalk it up to the stress of the case. You know he will. You know that's who he is, which just makes everything worse, BECAUSE WE FUCKING KNOW WHO HE IS!"
He charged out of the room with a 'Jesus fucking christ' and a punch to the wall.
The silence in his wake was wrapped in barbed wire.
Hailey sat with her head in her hands trying not to cry. She believed everything Trudy said, everything Adam yelled but it was Kevin that released the dam when he said exactly what she was thinking:
"Adam's right. We don't deserve it but Jay will give us a chance to fix it…I hate that I can easily see the part of Jay that would pardon us but pushed aside, ignored, whatever you want to call it, the person, the detective he is when he went in that day."
He shook his head, mourning the loss of the man he thought he was, "We took our own anger, our own disappointment out on Jay in a way that would hurt him the most. Did we set out to purposefully stick it to him, no, but for whatever reason that's what we did…we didn't trust him and I know I'll have to live with that the rest of my life because even with Jay's forgiveness, I'll never be able to forgive myself."
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Three days later
Trying to get comfortable at least physically, he shifted his hips and the pain in his back spiked beyond the pain in his head, beyond the meds they were pumping into him. He closed his eyes to it, breathed through it and waited for it to pass, waited for the meds to take over again.
He didn't really try to engage in the quiet conversations going on around him. He still didn't know what to think. He really got the shaft on this case but was willing to put it all behind him and chalk it up to the stress, which was the truth.
They'd all done stupid things in the name of catching whatever asshole they were chasing. It was just that he was the recipient of that stupidity this time not the criminal, though given how Voight treated him, he felt like one at times.
He couldn't deal with it now. The case had been taking it out of him for weeks, out of all of them, but this last week put him in a place he didn't know how to navigate. He needed to bury it for now. Everything was too big; too much pain, too many emotions, too much fear about his future.
His future…even with the blur of drugs and all encompassing pain he clocked the absence of Voight. He had no desire to see him but his absence hurt. It sent a loud and clear message…he was out of Intelligence, hell maybe the CPD.
He needed to focus on his physical recovery right now. It wasn't as daunting.
Every time he came to, there was always someone from the unit with him. A few times it was the whole team, sans Voight. They weren't apologizing or asking to talk about everything but he knew if he brought it up they would be more than happy to go there…he just couldn't do it.
His voice was quiet, sleepy, and tinged with pain, and even before he said what he wanted to say, they knew they were blowing it with their hovering.
Being hopped up on pain meds that weren't quite doing the trick, loosened his tongue a bit, "I don't…can we talk about it later guys? Everything sucks and…it's too much right now, all of it."
The guilt Adam felt was immense and even though he wanted to resolve the issue, start to resolve the issue, he needed to do one fucking thing right by Jay and follow his lead when it came to the shit they all threw at him.
He hated that, to Jay, their presence was about them wanting to fix it, maybe wanting forgiveness as soon as possible. That wasn't why they were there. It didn't even dawn on them to try and fix it yet.
They wanted to help Jay in whatever way they could, they loved him and cared about him. He was their friend, their brother and they were worried about him, but they all fucked up big time and did a shit job of showing it.
So it made a sickening kind of sense that Jay would only think they were there for that reason…they sure as hell weren't showing him they cared this last week.
His anger at himself skyrocketed. If Al was here he would have smacked him up along side the head and tell him he was an idiot. Deserved and true. If Al was here none of this would have even happened. He would have set them all straight the second they stepped foot in the bullpen.
Then his anger turned to sadness. There were times when he felt Al's loss more profoundly than others. This was one of those times. Jay was also a voice of reason. He wasn't as quiet and smooth as Al, but it was there. Halstead's words and tone were a virtual smack in the head…but they did the trick…he cared about them and would protect them in any way he could, words or actions. Jay always had their back and this time, they didn't have his.
"Whatever you need Jay. We'll leave the ball in your court and even if you don't want to pick it up, we understand."
Believing Adam's words, he nodded, but still wanted nothing more than for them to leave. The pain meds he was getting weren't working, something was wrong and…
A scream dampened by a clenched jaw caught them all off guard as Jay arched off the bed then curled to his side. Hand flailing trying to reach his back, he pulled out his IV dripping blood anywhere his hand travelled.
Adam tore out of the room followed by Kim yelling for help while Kevin slammed his hand onto the call button. Hailey tried to sooth him with calm words, running her hand through his hair while trying to grab his flailing arm and failing miserably. Jay was desperate to reach his back, but his other injuries were making it impossible.
Pillow askew, he pushed his face into the bed and screamed until it abruptly stopped and his body went lax.
Ethan and Will ran in, Kim and Adam hot on his heels, "What happened?"
"We don't know. We were talking when all of a sudden he screamed and tried to grab his back. He passed out just before you came in the room."
Ethan, already suspecting what was happening, put a hand to Jay's lower back while unlocking a wheel simultaneously, "Goddamnit…he's bleeding again."
Will had come to the same conclusion as soon as he ran into the room and saw his little brother curled on his side, bruised face lax in his unconsciousness.
"Rupture?"
""More than likely…I'll page Fuentes."
Ethan and Will whisked Jay from the room without a word to the group, relegating them to flies on the wall as they heard the exchange between the two doctors.
X
Not really knowing where to go, they all lingered outside Jay's room and that's where Will found them ten minutes later.
"His kidney ruptured. They're going to try to save it, but priority is doing whatever they need to do to get the bleeding under control.
"I'm going to observe, but I'll keep you guys updated."
Before they could say anything or ask freaked out questions, he was off and running for the stairs, leaving the fumes of his anxiety to join their own.
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Four hours later, the group jumped out of their seats when Ethan walked into the waiting room. They were all cops, they could read the truth on his face. Jay was alive, but it was bad.
"He's alive, but he's not out of the woods. His kidney ruptured and we weren't able to save it…"
"Is…can he be okay, with one kidney?"
"You can live a full life with one kidney Adam but that isn't the issue at this point.
"Jay had massive internal bleeding and we weren't able to get his volume up fast enough and lost him on the table. The shock to the system left him unstable and we lost him again in the PACU.
"He's there now and Will's staying with him. We'll move Jay to the ICU when his vitals stabilize for the trip up."
They were shocked and devastated for Will. They knew he was observing the surgery and couldn't imagine what it would have been like to witness his brother dying not once but twice and being powerless to help.
X
It was taking so long they were afraid something had happened, but an hour and a half into their growing worry, Dr. Choi was there to walk them up to Jay's room. It wasn't lost on them, they wished it was, but it wasn't lost on them that it took that long to get Jay stable enough to move.
Ethan was only going to let them stay for a minute which pissed them off but when they got a look at Jay, they changed their tune…staying for only a minute would fine by them.
With glassy eyes, Platt had marched right over to Jay's bed and put a hand on his shoulder. She let out a sad sigh and a quiet, 'oh Chuckles,' then blinking her tears away, addressed Will.
He was sitting there staring into Jay's battered face and holding his hand in both of his. He looked lost. The doctor in him, ready to spring into action if needed, warring with the big brother scared shitless for his little brother. She wanted to help but didn't know how.
She have him a weak smile, "You need anything Will? Can I get you anything, food, clothes from home, coffee?"
He hadn't heard anyone enter, so he was a bit startled someone was talking to him. Briefly lifting his eyes away from his little brother, he found himself looking at Jay's desk sergeant. He'd only ever seen her with scowlish sarcasm painted on her face, so to see the softness in her eyes right now brought him to tears and choked up his voice, "Ah, no…I'm good. Thanks though Trudy…thanks."
Platt was brave, not them. They were all frozen at the door. Jay was draped in a spider web of wires. The dark bruising on what they could see of his face appeared darker against his pale skin. What they couldn't see, they assumed was the same but it was hidden behind the tubing of the vent and the strap holding it in place.
They weren't told he was on a vent and seeing it now drove home how close they came to losing him.
Ethan read their fear and tried but failed to alleviate it, "If his vitals continue to hold steady and he doesn't develop a fever, we're hopeful we'll be able to get him off the vent in the morning."
They probably should've had some questions but remained silent.Right now they wanted to keep their heads in the sand and pretend everything would be okay, that Jay would be okay. They needed to forget that Jay had almost been taken from them twice after they'd thrown him away. Maybe tomorrow they would ask questions but not right now…they were all too engulfed in fear and lacking in courage to face the answers.
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A/N
Did you know (no, no they don't Floopdeedoopdee! Stupid question just spit it out!) Hey guess what!? (Better? OMG! On with it!) Originally his injuries were going to be standard beat down owies and a gunshot wound to the thigh. Look at what Barbara did! Look at it! She is such a freakin devil…I might need to hide her mean jeans and get her something else to protect our boy. Tan, polyester mom pants or something similar might do the trick. Poor Jay.
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I will try my best to get the final chapter out by the 15th. I am sicker than a dog.
Thanks for all the comments, kudos and reviews, they make my day!
Stay safe peeps! Big smooch!