WHO: Michael Westen and Elsa of Arendelle. WHEN: Slightly backdated to Tuesday, 9/01/2150. WHERE: From medical to Michael’s apartment. WHAT: Recovering from the battle. STATUS: In progress! WARNINGS: TBI (traumatic brain injury) & other physical injuries, discussion of war & its aftermath, etc. Probably some evidence of acute stress reaction will pop up too since they’re both likely traumatized by the war.
Michael was no stranger to a hospital bed. His body provided plenty of evidence in the form of pale scars, crackling joints, knotted muscles -- but aside from feeling sore when it rained and needing a good massage every now and then, he’d been lucky. His injuries had always been temporary; minor, really. Even life-threatening bullet wounds healed up quickly once he sought proper treatment. It was the one good thing he’d inherited from his father: a strong, healthy body that could bounce back from just about anything.
But he wasn’t immortal. He wasn’t a god or a mutant or a superhero. He was a normal human, and his body had a breaking point. Literally. His left leg had broken in two places, and he’d twisted both his wrist and his shoulder somehow. He couldn’t recall the circumstances. One moment he was fighting by Elsa’s side, a gun in one hand and a dagger in the other, and then his memory went blank. When he woke up, it was the next day, and his weapons had been replaced by IV lines and vital sign monitors.
Turned out his brain had a breaking point, too. How many times had he gotten a concussion -- from a fight or an explosion or a car accident -- and just walked it off? How many times, during those nine months in the DR last year, had he gone to a dimly lit bar to get the crap beaten out of him for sport, then celebrated his survival by drinking until he passed out? How arrogant had he been to think that he could march into a werewolf war, after a year and a half of retirement, and he’d be fine afterward?
The doctors had offered a thorough explanation of his injuries and treatment, but Michael was left with only a fuzzy recollection. Something about draining the swelling in his brain? He understood what it boiled down to: traumatic brain injury. Even if they’d had access to sophisticated imaging equipment, it was difficult to predict how much damage would be sustained. There were too many factors for an accurate prognosis. He’d seen the effects of TBI on friends -- some of whom were back in fighting shape within weeks, some whose careers and lives came crumbling down in the aftermath.
It was terrifying, the idea of losing the mental sharpness he’d relied on for so long. It was a fear he’d hoped he wouldn’t have to face for years, until the threat of dementia started looming over him in old age. Not now, not when his son was still a child, not when his relationship with Elsa was still so new, not when he needed his survival skills more than ever in this world.
But there were small blessings: he’d finally been released from medical (after multiple requests & a fair amount of begging on his part) with a shiny new cast, crutches, and instructions to return regularly for rehabilitation. His head was still pounding and he felt like throwing up every time he moved, but he needed to get back to a normal setting. The hospital frightened Charlie, and Elsa had to choose between caring for him alone or worrying by Michael’s bedside, neither of which was a fate he wanted for her.
A kind but clearly overworked nurse wheeled him down to his room early in the afternoon, while Charlie was still in daycare, so that Michael could have some time to settle back in. Easing himself out of the wheelchair, he balanced his weight between his one good foot and the crutches, waiting for the wave of dizziness to subside. Then he gave Elsa a reassuring smile as he hobbled forward a few steps.
“See? I’m fine on these things. I’ll be chasing Charlie again in no time.” His words came out a bit more haltingly than he would have liked, but he didn’t have to search for them as much as he had yesterday. That was encouraging, right?
Elsa still wasn’t certain how she had remained unscathed when the battle had ended. She’d fallen once, hard enough that she had bruised her tailbone, but apart from that and other, various, and mild bumps, bruises, and scrapes, was fine. Instead it was Michael she worried for. He’d taken a nasty fall and hit his head, after which he hadn’t gotten up. One moment he had been firing his gun and the next he was down, and Elsa had felt her world fall away for a moment.
In the next instant, someone had been there. He’d looked Michael over and then assured her that he would get him to triage. Elsa had helped, and when the doctors had sent Michael on to medical, she’d watched reluctantly. Then she turned back to the fight and continued on. Her first hours afterwards had been spent getting an update on Michael’s condition, making sure that Charlie was taken care of for the rest of the night and the next day, and then Elsa had spent as much time as she could at Michael’s side. She’d slept, and showered, and taken a few hours to assure Charlie that his dad was okay, but it wasn’t until Michael had woken and Dr. Crusher had given him a cautiously positive prognosis had she returned to her quarters to sleep for hours.
She was in Michael’s quarters when he returned to the apartment he shared with both Dr. Crusher and Dr. Gates, and she smiled reluctantly at his very mild joke. “I would prefer that you sit down. Better yet, laying down. On your bed.”
She gestured at it, and the nurse hovered, waiting to assist Michael into bed. He said, “Gonna have to take it easy for a few days, you know? Head wounds take time.”
The nurse gave a reassuring smile after he’d settled Michael in, and folded up the wheelchair. “I’m doing rounds in the residences over the next few weeks. Let me know if you need anything.”
Elsa nodded, and when he had left, came over to sit on the edge of the bed. “How do you really feel?”
Michael rolled his eyes, but he knew better than to show any other signs of protest. The nurse was just trying to do his job, after all. He could appreciate that. It wasn’t the nurse’s fault he hated being laid up when there was work to be done.
So he did as he was told and took a seat on the bed, lifting his damaged leg painfully with both hands. With a tight smile and a small nod, he thanked the nurse for his assistance. Then, once he and Elsa were alone in the room, Michael let out a heavy sigh, his eyes falling shut for a moment as he scrubbed a hand over his face.
“I feel like I got run over by a semi.” He wanted to reassure her, but he didn’t have the energy. Thank god I’m retired, he thought. Keeping up the facade of being fine, just for a minute or two in front of the nurse, had been exhausting. That sort of thing had always come so naturally to him, but right now it was like trying to float in the ocean with an anchor strapped to his chest.
Michael reached a hand out to Elsa, craving the comfort of her touch. In a way, he was lucky. He could’ve been here alone. Even if he’d had Fiona around -- he suspected his recovery would’ve been a little more difficult with her. He’d loved that about her, the way she’d always challenged him; it had made him a better person. But in this moment it would have been overwhelming.
Elsa slid her hand into his, holding it for a moment before leaning forward to brush a stray lock of hair out of the way of his eyes. “I don’t know what a semi is, but I’m going to assume that it’s very big.”
She herself had been more worried than she’d let on for the entirety of Michael’s stay in medical, and Dr. Crusher’s explanations of what had happened inside Michael’s brain weren’t difficult to understand, but they were frightening in many ways. That they had no real way of knowing the extent of the damage done to him -- and that piled on top of damage that had already been done previously -- concerned Elsa. But panicking when the bad things happened had never been her style of rule in Arendelle, and it wouldn’t be how she handled crises here, either.
“Do you need anything? Something to eat or drink? I’ve already decided to bring my work here during the day, when I can, to sit with you and keep you company,” Elsa told him, tucking one leg up under her so that she was more secure on the bed.
“You don’t have to do that, El," Michael protested weakly, even though he already knew she wouldn’t hear of it. She’d say she was doing it because she wanted to, and she’d mean it -- of course she would -- but he still couldn’t help feeling like he was a burden on her.
It was a worry he’d had for a while now: that he was tying her down too quickly, that their relationship had saddled her with a life she might not have been ready for. It was why he’d waited for her to suggest that they move in together, even though it would have been practical to do so months ago. It was why he always made sure to ask if she could watch Charlie, instead of just assuming she'd be willing. He wanted all of this to be at her pace, not his. She'd made so many sacrifices in her life already; she deserved that much.
And now Michael needed her more than ever, and he hated himself for it.