5.1
( coping. )
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iris
With the first wave of responders, Emily and JJ are the first at the scene.
Iris is dozing in and out of consciousness, but when she feels cold hands along her forehead, pushing the clammy hairs out of her face and away from the fine sheen of sweat along her skin, she manages to flicker her eyes open.
It's a paramedic sat above her, on her right, and then JJ is sat on the other side of her. She smiles and nods reassuringly, grasping Iris' hand.
Dizzy and hyper-aware of the slowing of her own heartbeat, she lifts her head against the touch of the paramedic, peering down at the two nurses by her left leg. "She's lost a lot of blood!" one of them shouts, barely heard over the sirens, and the words slur together but not because of them — it's Iris. Everything she sees, everything she hears, is smudging together into one big blur.
"Morgan," she breathes, the paramedic by her head pulling an oxygen mask over her head with a band that's elastic but still feels too tight.
JJ squeezes her hand. "It's okay. It's okay, Remy. He's just over there. You're gonna be okay."
And with that, her mind slips away into the heavy curtains of blackness lurking on the edges of her brain.
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"Is she gonna be okay?"
It's Spencer's voice that shocks her into some kind of awareness.
Iris had been dozing, half conscious and half asleep, for quite a few minutes, but as she rocks up a ramp on the unsteady, squeaking wheels of a gurney and enters the cool air
-conditioned hallways of the hospital, she opens her eyes fully at the sound of her friend's voice.
Her head rolls across to the side, blinking dazedly at the shrinking figure of Emily Prentiss. She's leaving her side for the first time since arriving at the bomb site, instead running toward a shocked Spencer, his skin pale and eyes wide as they lock onto Iris.
"Hey!" he shouts. "Hey, hey, let me through — she's my friend!"
Iris wants to tell him it's okay. Wants to tell him she's fine, she's not in any pain.
But instead, her vision closes up like a pinhole and loses focus, and she falls away from reality once more.
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"Hey," a soothing voice greets. "Welcome back."
Her eyes flutter open and blink a few times, clearing her vision so she can focus on the bright white light hovering straight about her. She has to squint against it, like she's at the dentist, but it's a struggle to do even that; each and every limb feels like jelly and her head feels airy, as if she's wrapped up in a dizzying lightness.
"Am I dead?" she breathes.
"No," a voice laughs out softly. "But you are on a lot of drugs."
Yeah, it sure feels like it. Her blood feels like liquid gold, heavy and thick in her veins, making every movement feel heavy and wobbly at the same time. Like that scene in Harry Potter where he loses the bones in his arm, she thinks idly.
Iris winces, tilting her head to the side, and blinks again until her vision clears and focuses like a camera. Her mind tries to work, tries to figure out where she is and what's going on and what happened before she fell asleep, but it's almost as if it's turned to sludge.
But she does recognise the person sat beside her: Emily.
She's smiling tentatively, leaning on the edge of Iris' mattress, picking idly at a loose thread in the cotton sheets. There's a window behind her head, sunlight streaming through, making the edge of her black hair fuzzy. Or maybe that's just Iris and the haze of her deep sleep that's still clinging to her brain.
"What's going on?" Iris asks.
"You're in hospital," Emily says, smile fading. "Are you okay? Are you in a lot pain?"
"My brain feels like a slushie."
"No difference there, then," Emily jokes, but it's half-hearted. Suddenly, she swallows harshly, throat bobbing and eyes wincing; her face grows abruptly somber, more serious, making Iris' heart pick up speed. Or, rather, it would pick up speed, if the drugs in her veins allowed it. "Do you remember what happened to you before you came here?"
A forgotten memory, an instinct, makes Iris flinch, her eyes closing.
Images flood her mind: first it's Spencer shouting her name, then back to the paramedic above her, and then back to Morgan telling her not to look down, then back to the bomb-blast and Garcia's phone call and the stolen ambulance.
She tilts her face away from Emily, writhing back into the pillows, as her eyes sting with oncoming tears. "Shit," she curses, because, yeah, shit. There's no other word in the English language to convey how she feels, other than that one.
"I'm sorry," Emily says, and the sadness, the defeat, in her voice shows she means it with every fibre of her being. She exhales, standing. "Spencer called your mom. She's on her way from Maine now."
Iris nods, but she's pretty sure even the presence of her mom couldn't reassure now.
Emily shuffles a little closer, squeezing Iris' wrist again. "Why didn't you come to me?" she murmurs. "You and Morgan... Why didn't you--" She cuts herself off, inhaling sharply, and mumbles something to herself. Iris barely manages to catch the words, So new.
"What, come to you so you can be the one who gets blown up?" Iris asks, but when Emily looks at her with big, dark eyes and her face set in such an expression of earnest, Iris suddenly knows that she's exactly right: that's exactly what Emily would prefer. Iris before herself, apparently.
Iris scoffs a laugh and turns her eyes to the ceiling. "Don't be ridiculous."
Emily says nothing for a while, her hand staying on Iris' arm, where the identification band from the hospital is tied loosely. As tired as she is, and as cold as the hand is, Iris appreciates the comfort that Emilys company brings.
"Get some rest, okay?" she murmurs eventually. "You really need it. The team's staying in town for a couple more days while you're here, so I'll see you later." Giving her a final smile, Emily slips out of the room, closing the door behind her with a soft click.
Completely alone, in this new level of complete silence, Iris can hear the steady, relentless beeping of her heart on the monitor to her left, can hear the ruffle of the bedsheets with each slightest movement. Can hear her own heartbeat, just like back at the bomb-site.
How the hell is she still alive?
Breathing deeply, she stares at the ceiling, telling herself, In through your nose, out through your mouth, as she tries to hold panic at bay. How could this happen? To her?
But she needs to see, has to confirm it for herself — even though she knows it's only going to hurt. But some mistakes have to be made, even if you know they're only going to be mistakes — she's learnt that much from How I Met Your Mother.
So she musters up every scrap of the remnants of her courage, and then lifts her head and, with arms that weigh themselves down, pulls aside the cotton sheets.
She's wearing a hospital gown, but the material is thin and papery and semi-translucent, allowing her to see through it. There's her hip, and her left thigh, and her left knee, and then, half way down her shin, her leg just... Ends. Where her left ankle and foot used to be, there's only a bandaged stump.
Yeah, she thinks. Shit.
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It's a long, gruelling process: many a night is spent crying and waking up in a nightmare about losing both legs, not just one; it's worse than the hardship she experienced in high school, the struggle of losing her father, and the physical difficulties the FBI training program put her through, all combined.
The nurses who take care of her, feed her and check her hourly and sometimes stay for a chat when it's been a couple of hours since someone came to visit her, say she's doing well. She's always been ambitious and hard-working — but who knew it could apply to this, too? Could apply to this slow process of healing — both mentally and physically.
Morgan comes to visit her regularly, and she tells him just as regularly not to blame himself. Comically, Garcia cries more than Iris has when she sees her for the first time. Hotch, Emily, JJ and Rossi all visit together, bringing a couple of magazines and some much-appreciated chocolate with them (Iris is learning the hard way that hospital food is terrible. Forget losing her leg — she's about to lose some weight, too, with the state of these appetite-diminishing meals).
Some nights, in the first week in hospital, Spencer stays with her so her mom can get a good night's sleep and relax for a while.
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spencer
"The thing about killing . . . Is you never know if you can do it, until you do it."
"And your point is?"
At her question, Spencer looks across at Iris through the harsh light of the hospital room, trying to understand what she's saying with the look in her eye, but he doesn't know if it's the light or her or his exhaustion, but for some inexplicable reason he can't read her as well as he usually can.
His voice had been soft so he didn't make her jump. But Iris' voice is a little amused and sarcastic. But it's forced, that much he's certain of.
His words had been spoken as Iris popped another grape into her mouth while she read a book he'd given her, looking rather content for someone he knew was suffering greatly.
Iris was always an optimist, he knew that, but seeing her acting so happy when she wasn't, frustrated him. He wanted to scream at her to show emotion, that it was okay to sob and get angry and punch her pillows.
That's probably why he's so gentle with her — he wants her to like him, to trust him with the darker parts of her sunshine personality. Because he knows it's there. He knows there's a dark part of her that she doesn't show anyone, and has yet to show him.
Their eye contact doesn't waver for several more seconds, before he looks down at the tiled floor and admits, "I know you've wanted this job for years, but it's okay if . . . I don't know. If this makes you resign."
Iris smiles sadly with a lone nod. He thinks, in a surge of panic, that she's actually going to quit. After only a few weeks on the job. "But I'm not going to," she says suddenly. "I'm not a quitter."
Spencer clears his throat, hesitating as he rubs his hands together, leaning on his knees in the plastic chair.
"Usually," he continues, "my intellect is a shield which protects me from my emotions, but more than often that shield is under repair." Iris looks at him, and her stare is fairly distracting and anxiety-inducing, so he can't look at her as he continues speaking. "The people who work this job, no matter how smart they are, no matter how young or old, are damned by their profound knowledge of others. Me included."
He pauses, takes a deep breath. Wind from the open window ruffles through his hair.
"The other week, in the café, when you asked what's been going on with me for the past few years . . . I couldn't tell you the whole truth," he says, quietly, his voice already wavering.
God, he's not even talking about it yet, but his heart's already pounding, and he knows he's in a hospital room but at the same time he's back there again, and it feels so impossibly real.
He's not anxious about telling her, not like he used to be back in LA, when any personal question was off limits. It's what this job does, he supposes: it forces people together, forces people to trust each other. And he does — he does trust her, beyond all rationality. Iris Remington has a hold on his heart that he knows he can't break, even if he wants to, and no matter how quickly it has come, the intimacy and trust between them is whole and unbreakable.
So he tells her.
"Around, uh, two years ago, I was . . . I was kidnapped. Well, I say kidnapped, but it was more, I don't know, held hostage, spur-of-the-moment abduction situation, you know?" He's rambling. Squeezing his eyes shut, and forcing his now clenched fists to flatten out along the stone barrier, he takes a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm down. "Anyway. It was the worst twenty-four hours of my life. I was forced to dig my own grave, and as a person who is terrified by the inherent absence of light, and is also terribly claustrophobic, I was living through one of my worst nightmares." Another deep breath as he controls his heartbeat. "But I got through it. They found me, and I lived. Ha, obviously."
Shifting against her pillows, Iris doesn't speak for a long moment. It stretches into an eternity, and Spencer drowns in the silence, both wanting her to say something and dreading her reaction.
"What's your point, Spencer?" she asks, very softly, after a minute or so. Her eyes are soft and sympathetic, but confused, too.
"That that's okay," he says, instantly, looking across at her. Her eyes immediately soften again. "I want you to know that it's okay if this job kicks your ass, because it happens to the best of us. And that . . . " He thinks over his words for a couple of seconds. "That I know you thought this job was gonna be, I don't know, like you were in the Avengers, or something. And, clearly, it's not like that at all. But that's okay."
She doesn't pause before saying with a strangled voice, like her throat is almost too dry to speak, "I killed someone, Spence." Her eyes water. "And I lost my freaking leg."
"You also saved the lives of a hundred other people." He hesitates. "Including me. And the others." He glances behind them, at the closed door behind which Emily and Hotch wait to visit and, a floor above, the rest of their team sit with Iris' mother, having lunch, before his eyes land back on her. "You're incredible."
She scoffs, shifting in her bed with a wince. It's been a few weeks since the bomb blast and she's looking a lot better than she had done initially, a lot less like the living embodiment of death. But, still, the pain she bears is visible. "I'm not incredible. I did something . . . Horrible."
"Deep down, all of us are capable of doing unspeakable things. Why, that's up to the individual," he says. "But what you did, Iris, no matter how horrible you deem it, it was the right thing to do."
"He was a kid."
"I know. I'm sorry."
She rolls her eyes, but it isn't with amusement or annoyance. It's only a sad gesture; she's lifting her stare to the sky to try to fight off tears. "I hate that. Why do people say sorry when it's not even their fault?"
"Because an apology deserves to be said," he answers, "even if it's not from the right person."
Her eyes glossy, her lips curve into a sad smile that could make flowers grow in the darkest, coldest winter. Spencer's heart cracks wide open and he looks down again.
"But I don't want you to feel like you're not supposed to talk about it, either, you know?" he continues, staring out at the view and feeling cold wind nip at his skin. "Because, trust me, not talking about it is the worst thing you can do to yourself. For a couple of months after the . . . The incident, I . . . I struggled. Really struggled. He'd, uh, given me dilauded to knock me out, and I had to try and keep clean. I occasionally still get cravings now." He pushes a hand through his hair. "But the worst thing, was staying silent. I thought it was one of those things that, you know, if I didn't talk about it, I'd just forget. But I remember it like it was yesterday. Even now."
Gnawing at his lower lip, he has to look down to hide the fact that his eyes are watering.
"This job has torn a chunk out of all of us," he finishes, so quiet it's lower than a whisper. "We all have our battle scars. You just gotta . . . "
"Get a prosthetic limb and handle it."
He raises his eyes, thinking she's angry with him, but she's smiling tiredly at him instead. Her face is warm and lights up the room in a way much better than the sterile glow of the bulbs above his head. It takes a soar of college for him to be able to hold her gaze. Her brown eyes look almost black in the light, and they're so deep and so endless that Spencer can't help but find it unnerving.
She's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.
"Thank you, Spencer," she whispers, very quietly, almost invisibly.
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iris
Her mom stays with her through it all. Back in Virginia, she (and the cat) practically live in Iris' flat for two weeks while Iris remains in hospital after the surgery, and afterward, when Iris gets out and is placed in her wheelchair, she stays for the extra two months it takes to get her prosthetic leg made and fitted and working.
Emily is her most regular visitor, slipping into the lead just ahead of Spencer. Her mom and Emily get on like a house on fire, bonding essentially over their shared love of cats and Days of Our Lives.
She asks Hotch if this will cause her to lose her job, but thankfully he tells her it probably won't, and he'll handle Strauss if she asks any questions (Iris dreads to think of his temper if that does happen). There'll be several months not in the field, but after that, she's safe to return to work, as long as her prosthetist knows to mould her a leg fit for strenuous activity.
That is, of course, if she can actually use her fucking leg.
Unfortunately, getting back on her feet — quite literally — is practically impossible, considering she doesn't have feet anymore. She has... Foot.
"Okay, push against me," her prosthetist says, crouched on a rolling stool in front of where Iris sits, hands wrapped around her new leg.
She's been home from hospital for two months now, mostly immobile but getting damn good in her wheelchair; she's not been to work for a while, making occasional visits to the office but never actually going on a case. It's a lonely life, even with her mom there.
Iris does as asked, raising the stump of her left leg, which ends just below her knee allowing it to bend a little, and placing it into the carbon-fibre socket that's propped against her nurse's leg. She pushes, feeling it hit the cushioned plastic at the very bottom.
Her nurse, a pretty brunette woman named Nurse Jenkins, smiles brightly and pats her knee. "Does that hurt?"
She peers down. The socket is fit just for her, with the edge gripping around the edge of her knee and the rest of the plastic tight around her shin. "No, that's fine," she says, feeling her mom's hand on her shoulder, squeezing.
"Okay, good." She begins to roll up the leg sleeve, which is made of tight elastic and clings at Iris' skin. "Keep pushing against me; we want this to be tight and secure."
Pulling up the long, elastic leg sleeve, her hands roam up Iris' bare thighs, covered only by shorts, and the touch is invasive and she has to remind herself that this is her goddamn doctor, and has seen her leg more times than Iris has seen her own reflection.
"This may look difficult, but within a few weeks, when it comes to putting this on, you'll be able to do it easy-peasy. Until then, you might need a little help." She glances at Iris' mom, who nods. She looks back at Iris, snapping the elastic into place. "Taking it off can be a little harder. It's kind of like taking off a sports bra after being at the gym. But, again, you should be capable of doing it independently within a couple of weeks."
"What about walking? How long will that take?"
"It depends," her nurse says, smile fading an inch. "Some people are quick learners. But even with this, it's always a work in progress. After a couple of meetings, you should be able to walk alone, without the help of the bars, but I recommend crutches for at least a month, and no strenuous activity for several." Iris frowns; no chasing unsubs at work, no cycling, no swimming. God, this is so . . . Shit. "But, process can always be made. And you, Iris, are a very determined lady, and I'm sure you'll be back to business in only a few months."
Iris sure hopes so. She didn't come as far as she has to let this loss get in her way.
Just like Nurse Jenkins said, it takes a few weeks and a few appointments for her to get into the swing of things. It feels strange to finally experience balance again after so long, which is hard to get used to, forget the actual walking. Each visit, Nurse Jenkins forces her to place a game of bump and kick, which makes her swing her leg back to bump her butt, and then kick forward as if to send a football soaring into the net. It hurts at first after so long not moving her leg, and God she's terrified she's going to hurt herself, but soon she's swinging her leg back and forth with ease.
"Okay," Nurse Jenkins says, toward the end of her fourth visit. "Try it without the bar."
Iris looks up sharply, smile dropping. There's a long window behind the woman's head, making her edges fuzzy with afternoon sunlight, and forcing Iris to squint. "What?" she breathes.
The woman nods, smiling. "You heard me, Iris. Go ahead. Try and walk the full length without the bar," she says. "You can let your hands hover above, if you want. Just remember what I've taught you."
Iris hesitates, then follows the instructions, moving to the end of the path formed by the two rails. Taking a deep breath, she lifts her hands off the comforting, warm metal of the two bars, before she takes a shaky step forward, feeling the soft cushion of her heel touch the floor and then the roll down to her toe. Surprisingly easy.
She steps with her right, and then goes to her left again, the step strikingly slow compared to that of her right.
But she's getting faster.
Within seconds, and without placing her hands down, she reaches the path and looks up to her Nurse and her mom with a bright grin of victory.
After that, progress comes quickly.
Soon, she's walking steadily without the bars, and by her sixth visit she's introduced to her crutches: her new best friends for the following months.
The Remington family have always struggled financially, and Mariah Remington can't afford to own a home she isn't living in, so merely three months after Iris' surgery, she is left alone in Virginia again. Well, not completely alone — Spencer helps her get to her hospital appointments for helping her walk, and Morgan gives her lifts to work and Garcia takes her home.
The first month back at work is spent in Garcia's office helping from Quantico (and eating far too much junk food for someone who's not going to be able to burn it off for a long time), but she's a quick learner, and soon she's able to walk pretty well on her fake leg, and she's back in the field (but not chasing unsubs — that might take a while) and back at the gym, trying to burn off her new set of stomach rolls.
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Yes, Iris did lose her leg. Obviously, from this chapter. It was lowkey fun seeing all of you freak out last chapter, but don't worry, it's not gonna change much! Iris is gonna carry on being a badass and working at the BAU, it's just gonna take several chapters for her to heal from this.
And, of course, it's also good to have diversity with characters with disabilities, and I've never written a physical disability I don't think only mental illnesses, so I thought it was about time.
Also, a fuck yes for Iris and her never-ending strength!!
Btw, this may seem short, but all of this is over a period of five-six months, and Iris is nowhere near done healing from this, so yeah. I'm trying to be accurate to what it would be like to lose a limb, but it's difficult when I know so little and have to write so much. Sorry if things seem short and rushed, just know that usually these things take a long time, and I'm trying my best to show that.