archimedes |b. allen|

error 404: sam not found

error 404: sam not found

Everything slowly starts to fade back in. My eyelashes flutter against my cheeks as my eyes peel themselves open. Fear overwhelms my senses for a fraction of a second, forgetting where I was, why this looked so familiar but so foreign at the same time. The room I'm in is dimly lit, the curtains in front of the glass sliding doors are pulled, but I swear I can see the outline of two people standing in front of the doors. There's someone talking beside me, but not to me. Their voice is just fuzz—a hum above the regulatory beeps of something above my head.

I'm in the hospital.

I got the shit beat out of me.

Morgue.

Maude.

Fuck.

As my hearing starts to sing in, I pick out that it's Maude's voice at my bedside. "Yeah no, they did the chest tube bedside, they sedated her. They ruled out spinal cord injury and any mandibular fractures. She's just dealing with this pneumo and a small fracture in her clavicle. They think it'll heal back up just fine though... No, she's uh, she's still out. But she's reactive to stimuli, she's there... No, no, no, you don't need to come. Everything's under control, like I said, it was just a little fender bender. She'll be out of here in a few days... No, you know she'd be upset if you drove all the way here when you knew she was fine... Okay, okay, Nic. Yeah, I'll call you with any updates. Okay, bye."

There's a streak of silence, beating over the top of me as I try to flutter my eyes open again. Maude jumps from her seat as I do, hand enveloping mine as she stands over me. My vision is blurred, but I can still make out the form of her. I try to smile, but my bruised jaw stings in pain as my lips move, causing me to clear my throat so I don't yelp.

"Don't—don't move. You're really banged up... And—and don't talk either. One of your vocal cords got damaged, they're gonna get you a botox injection to fix it, but you need to rest your voice for now, so you don't make it worse ya know..."

Her voice is so somber, so mellow, so soft. I've never heard this outspoken girl so timid. It's like I'm some wild animal that she's treading around, so as to not provoke it.

"They, uh, they had to place a chest tube. It's fixing the pneumo, but you're gonna have to be in here another day at least. I think they were talking about pulling it tomorrow... And um, no one—" her voice starts to shake, quivering uncontrollably, and I already know where she's going, "—no one's seen you without the mask on, and we—we kept the suit on as much as we could. I made sure—I made sure no one saw..."

All I can do is blink my eyes, swallow down the gargantuan lump forming in my throat. My eyes water at her words, and I firmly grasp her hand in mine, letting her know I heard her and hopefully how thankful I am.

"Sam," she starts to choke on her words. "Sam, why didn't you tell me? I thought—I was so... Sam, I wish you told me."

My lips part as I suck in a shaky breath, lips moving to speak, but her shaking head stops me.

"No, no, please don't talk. You'll make it worse. I'm sorry, I'm not mad, I just—I wish I could've been there for you," her other hand reaches up, gently holding my hand in both of her. "Sam, you're my best friend. I just wish you would've told me you were out there every night putting your life on the line... And I kinda wish you told me about the Flash, you know how much I loved him."

She lets out a giggle, breaking from the serious conversation we were having (if you could even call it a conversation, I wasn't allowed to talk). I feel a laugh bubbling up from my chest, and as it passes through my throat, I feel the pain she'd been warning me about. I wonder when I'd gotten my larynx damaged during the fight with Morgue and her shadow creatures. But that whole event was a blur for me, and I think I was lucky I barely remembered half of it.