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Despite everything, it was actually the IV that sent Gordon over the edge.
The bruises he could deal with, though he still hated to see Alan’s skin turned to a patchwork of purples and blacks. Hell, he was even arguably fine with the metal frame that incased Alan’s leg complete with nasty looking pins sticking into his shattered bones even if that image will forever be seared into Gordon's mind every time he closed his eyes.
Gordon could deal with all that because it was all temporary.
The bruises will fade, the cuts and scrapes will become lost in all of Alan’s other scars and even his leg will heal to the point where he would be able to run and jump and do all the Alan stuff that Alan likes to do. Even the IV is only temporary and Doctor Story had promised that it will be removed as soon as Alan didn’t need it anymore and yet it sickened Gordon to see it.
Alan was alive and that was what was important and Gordon knew that. He knew he should be grateful that Alan had only sustained the injuries he had when it could have so easily been much worse. Alan was alive and yet here Gordon was, staring at the tubing that snaked up Alan’s arm while barely keeping himself conscious as his lungs screamed for oxygen and his brain screamed to rip the IV out.
Gordon’s arm burned and even when he dug his nails into it, the feeling did not ease. He knew that the IV was attached to Alan and not himself and yet as he watched the fluid pump through the tubes, Gordon swore he could feel it enter his bloodstream.
A small part of him realised that he was overreacting, he had worked very hard in therapy to be able to recognise what fears and reactions were normal and which are fuelled by his past traumatic injury. But while logically Gordon knew that his PTSD was affecting him, he was too busy stuck there in that hospital bed surrounded by whirling machines and hushed conversations and the unending agony that the meds simply did not touch to be able to calm himself down.
Trying to ground himself, Gordon dug his nails in harder but he could still feel the medicine course through his veins. While the Doctors claimed that it was medicine, Gordon knew that it was instead poison that was tearing him apart from the inside. Gordon clawed at the needle that he could feel piercing his skin but it simply would not budge even as he drew blood.
Gordon could feel everything.
There was fire running through his veins, there was metal digging into his body, his bones, his very soul. Every whisper was a shout and every shout a faint memory that had lost all meaning. The lights were too bright and too dim all at once and whenever he closed his eyes he could still see his own blood mixing with the water, he could still see where his body ended and the hydrofoil begin.
He knew they were only memories and that this time it was Alan that was hurt and not him and yet Gordon could still feel everything.
The white walls were closing in on him, the whirling machines counting down the fleeting moments that felt like eternity, the moments before his body will finally give up and shut down.
Gordon’s head was spinning. The body on the bed wasn’t his own, he knew it wasn’t his own, and yet it was like he was staring at himself lying there covered in bruises and monitors and tubes and when Gordon remembered that it was Alan who was lying in that bed the guilt tore at him even deeper than the memories did.
That was his little brother who was lying there unconscious and yet here Gordon was, feeling like he was going to be sick just because he saw one stupid IV.
Alan was sleeping, not unconscious. Sleeping. He was alive, he was safe, he was just sleeping and soon enough he was going to wake up and he will chase away all the bad memories from Gordon’s mind because that’s just how amazing Alan was. But the idea of depending on Alan like that when Alan was the one who needed the special attention right now just made Gordon feel even worse.
What kind of older brother was he, expecting Alan to talk him down from an episode while Alan had a shattered leg and a myriad of new scars to add to his collection.
Gordon twisted, curling his legs up onto the chair and wrapping his arms around them. There was a flash of pain with the movement but Gordon pushed it away, knowing it wasn’t real. None of this was real. The burning in his veins, the shudders that washed over him as adrenaline rushed through his system trying to keep him alive, none of it was real.
The accident had been years ago and while Gordon knew that, that terrible feeling was still there and when Gordon closed his eyes he could see it all happening again and again and again.
He needed to ground himself, he could not afford to spin out of awareness here, not when Alan needed him.
Gordon locked eyes on Alan, confirming that he was still breathing deeply and evenly and confirming that the damn IV was still there. Gordon’s hands twitched as his veins burned anew. He could not touch it, he could not bare the thought of hurting Alan any more than he was already hurting. Alan was already in a hospital bed because of Gordon, he refused to cause him more pain just for his own reassurance that the memories were just memories.
But what if it was for Alan’s sake too? Doctor Storey claimed that the IV was to help him but maybe it wasn’t, maybe something had gone wrong and Alan was in fact unconscious because of whatever mysterious fluid was pumping through that IV? Taking it out would be what was best for Alan and Gordon had only ever wanted the best for Alan.
Gordon knew that she was shaking but he could not stop it, not when such familiar white walls surrounded him, not when that whirling machines echoed in his mind, and especially not when the same tubing that had snaked up his arm up to the hanging bag from the pole by the side of his bed all those years ago was now attached to Alan’s arm.
The Doctors here claimed to want to help him, claimed that he was safe now but they could be lying. Those same Doctors had claimed that the medication will help ease the pain but it never did so why should Gordon trust his baby brother to their care?
The IV wasn’t just some saline or blood, who knew what they were drugging Alan with. Truely, it was Gordon’s responsibility to do something about it because only he knew the truth, only he knew that they were poisoning with Alan with ocean knows what.
Gordon launched himself forward and gripped onto the cannula connected to Alan’s arm.
“Don’t!”
He whipped around, pulling the IV out as he went.
The sharp scream behind him that made Gordon’s whole body jolt but his eyes were locked on the figure in the doorway. His head spun, blinking back blurs he hadn’t realised were there and as his legs shook, Gordon dimly wondered why everything felt so wrong.
“The hell were you thinking?” Scott barked.
Gordon blinked, slowly, and twisted back around to the bed.
Alan gave off another chocked sob as he clutched his arm, blood streaming through his fingers and staining the white fabric beneath him. All at once Gordon realised that he was still holding the IV but he now dropped it, stumbling away from the bed. Away from the guilt, away from his crying brother, away from the terrible thing he had just done.
Scott had already taken his place by the bed, holding pressure onto Alan’s bleeding arm. Alan whimpered, squeezing his eyes shut and Gordon felt sick all over again.
“I…” Gordon tried. “He…”
“Go get help.” Scott snapped.
“Ri… Right.”
Of course he should go get help. Alan was bleeding, not because of his injuries but because of what he had just done.
Gordon did not remember sitting down.
In fact, he did not remember leaving behind the white walls and whirling machines and yet here he sat with his back pressed against a tree and his hands fidgeting with the grass beneath him. The sun was warm even in the shade and when the wind blew through his hair, Gordon felt himself take in a deep breath.
“You’re back?”
Gordon did not know why he was not at all shocked that John was sitting beside him even though the last time Gordon remembered seeing him was on the video feed during the last rescue. The rescue that had ended with Alan having a shattered leg and a stupid IV in his arm.
John set aside the book he was reading, giving Gordon his full attention. John did not meet his eye, he was rarely able to handle direct eye contact for a long time but Gordon was used to that and if anything he didn’t really want anyone meeting his eye right now.
“I guess…” Gordon mumbled.
“Do you want to talk about it?” John asked.
“No.”
If it were Virgil here he may have pushed a little further and if it was instead Scott then maybe he would have started the yelling right about now. But this wasn’t Scott or Virgil this was John and what John did best was listen.
“It’s stupid.” Gordon said. “I know I should just be glad that Alan’s going to be okay and I know I’m a shit brother.”
“But?”
“But it burns.”
Gordon pressed a hand against the crook of his elbow, hissing when it touched the raw skin. He hated that he could still feel the tubing but he hated even more that he had made Alan’s hospitalisation all about him.
John blinked, slowly, giving Gordon all the time he needed to process exactly what was happening and Gordon both hated him and loved him for it. It would be so much easier if John just slapped him and told him to get over himself or maybe yell at him for hurting Alan or do anything at all but sit there and listen to what Gordon had to say.
“I know it’s not real and I know it’s connected to all this deferred pain shit but I’m just sick and tired of this whole fucking thing. It’s been years but I’m still broken and now Alan’s hurt because of it and I never wanted to hurt Alan but I keep doing it because I’m so fucked up.”
“Gordon,” John said carefully. “You actually helped him.”
Gordon scoffed, twisting away. He really wasn’t in the mood for false reassurances, not when he had made Alan scream like that.
“The medicine that they were using should have been too strong for Alan to feel that much pain when you ripped out the IV. By Alan reacting like that, they worked out that the medicine wasn’t actually doing anything.”
“But…” Gordon breathed. “He was sleeping easily.”
“No,” John grimaced. “No he wasn’t. Alan was drifting in and out of consciousness because of the pain he was in and we would have never known if it weren’t for you. They put him on a different medication that’s working now and he’s actually resting and it’s only because you pulled out that IV. It will still take time for him to recover fully but now he can do so with as little discomfort as possible.”
Gordon considered John’s words carefully. If it was Virgil he would be giving Gordon false assurances that everything was fine and if it were Scott then maybe he would claim all responsibility for not having realised that something was actually wrong. But this wasn’t Scott or Virgil, this was John.
John was kind, yes, but first and foremost he was honest.
“He was in pain.” Gordon said.
“Yes.” John said. “But now it’s being managed. Thanks to you.”
“I want to see him.”
“Like I said, Alan’s resting right now but-“
“I need to see him.” Gordon said more firmly. “I need to make sure I didn’t hurt him.”
“Gordon, he still has an IV and all the rest. Are you sure you’re ready to go back there?”
“He’s my Brother,” Gordon said. “I have to be with him.”
When Gordon tried to stand his legs shook and refused to hold his weight. He was more exhausted than he had realised, no doubt from the adrenaline that had long since drained from his body. Without comment or complaint, John hooked Gordon’s arm around his neck and helped him stand slowly, waiting several moments before letting Gordon take a step forward.
They walked through the hospital garden like that and even when Gordon felt a little more steady, John stayed close by just in case he needed it.
There was no sensation of burning in Gordon’s arm now. It was stinging a little, there was no doubt about that, his nails having drawn thin lines in some places and outright drawing blood in others, but it was not burning. There was no tubing that snaked through his body, no medicine that coursed through his veins.
Gordon was safe and healthy and he was going to put aside his past if it meant helping Alan get through the present because that is what brothers do.