The next morning, Morgan awoke first and ventured to the kitchen to make Reid some breakfast. When at last the young agent stumbled into the kitchen, Morgan handed him a bowl of oatmeal.
"Here, see if you can eat this."
Reid looked at it with disinterest.
"Come on, your guts are all messed up from this. If you can keep this down, I'll make you something good for lunch."
Reid agreed and managed to eat a few spoonfuls of the gooey substance. With continued prompting from Morgan, he managed to eat about half of it before pushing it back across the table with a firm, "I'm good."
"Alright, I guess that will do for now."
"What..uh…what's everybody up to today?" Reid asked, "Are we going back in to work?"
Morgan paused, surprised that Reid would be thinking of going back already.
"We don't have an active case right now. I think everyone is having a paperwork day. Why? You're not thinking of going in, are you?"
Reid shrugged, "I kinda want to see everybody."
"Well, they want to see you too," Morgan chuckled, "JJ and Garica are blowing up my phone asking about you."
Reid smiled, comforted to know the team was thinking of him.
"Alright, you win, tough guy," Morgan sighed at last, "Let's change those bandages and we'll go in for a few hours."
Reid got up from the kitchen stool and started to hobble to the bathroom.
"Let me help," Morgan jumped up.
"I got it," Reid insisted, "I can walk…ish."
"I think I've got an old pair of crutches at the office," Morgan offered as Reid hobbled his way into the bathroom, "At least promise me you'll use them. The doctor said to stay off that foot for a few days."
"Is…is it broken?" Reid paused to look back at him, realizing he had such dim memories of the hospital that he hadn't received any actual information, "What…did they do to me?"
"It's not broken- by some miracle, just dislocated. They said you'll have to get that cast off in a couple weeks."
"What else did they do?"
"Mostly just cleaned you up and pumped you full of fluids and antibiotics. A lot of those wounds were pretty infected."
Reid nodded. While he had sustained some pretty large wounds from being knocked over in his chair and dragged across the ground, he hadn't really thought much about them until now.
"I got some stuff you have to put on all the open wounds when you change the bandages," Morgan explained, tossing him a bottle of cream from the hospitals pharmacy, "I uh..noticed when they gave you the IV that those weren't the only track marks. Do you want to talk about it?"
"Um.." Reid fumbled uncomfortably, knowing that the vials of dilaudid he had stolen from Tobias were still tucked away in his go-bag where he had hidden then before arriving at the hospital, "Tobias..he..uh, injected me with…something."
"Dilaudid,"Morgan nodded, "Probably cut with some kind of psychedelic. We found out from his journals and his sponsor that he had a pretty serious drug problem. Probably contributed to the psychotic fracture. You know, since people with a family history of psychotic disorders should definitely avoid street drugs."
He looked pointedly at Reid at that last sentence. Reid instinctively ran his hands over his arms, which was unnecessary since he was still wearing Morgans hoodie. He wasn't sure if Morgan had found the vials in his bag, but doubted it since he had hidden them pretty carefully.
"Of course," Reid agreed, figuring that Morgan was probably just speculating. Between the dilaudid he'd been given by Tobais the day before and the intense painkillers and sedatives he was given given at the hospital, he had not yet begun to experience withdrawals, but feared that might be coming.
"You think you're going to go through withdrawals?" Morgan asked, seemingly reading his mind.
"I don't know," Reid admitted, "He injected me from a homemade concoction of street drugs that were mixed up by a man in active psychosis. Without knowing the precise dosage and makeup of the drugs there's no way to calculate if I've developed a physiological dependence. It would also depend on metabolism and a variety of other factors, I just don't have enough data to determine…what?"
He paused when he noticed Morgan trying to hide a chuckle.
"Now you're starting to sound like the old Reid," Morgan laughed.
This made Reid feel much better and he felt a tension in his muscles release that he hadn't even been aware of. He picked up the cream and headed into the bathroom.
"You sure you don't want help?" Morgan called after him.
"I'm sure."
Minutes later, Morgan heard a loud crash and Reid yelled, "Morgan, I need help!"
Morgan opened the bathroom door to find Reid laying sideways in the bathtub shirtless, the shower curtain having fallen down on him.
"What'd you do?"
"I fell," Reid explained.
"Yeah, no shit, Sherlock…it just…how?"
"I miscalculated the difficulty of putting cream on your own back while standing on one foot, ok? The physics of that are…"
"I got it," Morgan cut him off, bending down to pull him up and sit him on the edge of the tub.
He pulled off the rest of Reid's bandages and was once again taken aback by the sheer number of cuts, bruises and open wounds. Most of them were superficial but a few of them on his back and shoulders looked a little more serious, likely from where the chair had hit his shoulders when he fell.
The younger man winced as Morgan gently rubbed the cream on his wounds.
"Does it hurt?" He asked gently.
"Not really, just…the idea of it…. I'm gross."
"Nah," Morgan tousled his hair, "I grew up in the hood in Chicago, man. I had friends who gave each other stitches, pulled teeth, you name it. This is nothing."
Morgan skillfully applied the cream and covered the wounds with fresh bandages.
"See, that wasn't so bad, was it? I'm going to set a timer, we have to do this again in four hours."
"Thanks, Morgan," Reid smiled gratefully.
"No problem, Kid. Now, go get dressed."
The two changed out of their pajamas and into comfortable clothes before making their way out to Morgans car. Morgan held a hand out for Reid to steady himself as he made his way down the stairs.
"Did I walk up here last night?" Reid asked, realizing he had no memory of the trip into his apartment.
"I wouldn't call it, walking, exactly," Morgan teased, "It was more like me dragging you."
Reid's face fell with self-consciousness and Morgan quickly recovered, "I'm kidding. You're tiny, it was nothing.
While Reid suspected that was not the truth, he nodded and felt a new surge of gratitude for his friend who had taken such good care of him.
When the two arrived at the BAU Reid was instantly engulfed in hugs from Prentiss, Garcia and Penelope.
"Oh, my Baby Boy, you're back!" Garcia squealed, "I was so worried about you!"
"I'm fine, Garcia."
"Spence," JJ hugged him tightly, "I'm so sorry. Next time, we don't split up!"
"It's not your fault," Reid hugged her back, "I'm just glad to be back."
Even Hotch looked relieved, and although Reid suspected he might be told to go home, Hotch just patted him on the shoulder and said, "Reid, how are you?"
"I'm ok," He smiled, "It's good to see you."
The team spent the rest of the morning accomplishing very little paperwork, but spent a lot of quality time with Reid, who was quickly becoming more like himself. True to his word, Morgan dug up an old pair of crutches for him and he was thrilled to be able to get around a little better by himself. They ordered a nice lunch, which Reid was actually able to eat and the others filled him in on everything that learned about Tobias, most of which Reid had already figured out while being held captive.
When the alarm on Morgans phone went off, he and Reid exchanged a look and walked off together towards the bathroom. The rest of the team stared with curiosity.
"What do you think that's about?" JJ asked.
"Probably changing his bandages," Gideon waved it off.
Each member of the team instantly noticed the lack of protest form Reid, who would have normally insisted on doing everything by himself. Morgan noted this as well, as Reid let him change the bandages on his back without protest, and thought maybe the positive changes he had talked about the previous night were indeed beginning to unfold. Maybe the silver lining in this whole ordeal would be that Reid would be a little less reticent to let his friends help him. He knew there would be a lot more turmoil for Reid to overcome, but was feeling a little more confident that Reid would be okay in the end.
