Road to Recovery [R for Cussing] [Open]

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

Sam sat on his bed in the medbay with a pad of paper resting on a tray and a pen gripped in his hand. He didn't know where she had found it, but Dr. Grey had given them to him--along with a set of cards with a series of shapes drawn on them--and told Sam to trace the shapes onto the paper. It was an effort to rebuild his hand-eye coordination, just one of the many of the things, along with his memory and balance, that had been damaged when the bullet entered his brain.

His brow was knitted together as he focused on the image of the black triangle on the card that was visible through the paper. He pressed the tip of the pen against the paper and carefully forced his hand to move a long the lines of the triangle. Almost instantly, his hand shook with slight tremors, pushing the pen off course, which forced him to correct. This, in turn, would often result in an over-correction which sent the pen drifting off in the opposite direction and thus creating a wavy line with 'mountains' and 'valleys' instead of one that was crisp, clean and straight.

He felt like a toddler, again, trying to color within the lines.

"God DAMN it!" he cursed when his hand jerked, sending the pen off in a perpendicular direction to the one he wanted it to go. "I can't do this!"

Comments

[cabbage-butt.livejournal.com]

"Yes," says Brainy calmly, puttering around and working on fixing up more of the Med Bay that was damaged during all the fighting. "You can."

[prettycoolguy]

"Can't do what?"

Have a Spartan. The Chief hears the outburst and comes over to see what's wrong. He doesn't know Sam too well, he wasn't on the ship for very long before the Yeerk attack and the headshot.

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"No, I can't," Sam insists holding up the pad of paper he'd been drawing on and flipping through the pages that contained his 'tracings.' "Look at this. I can't even trace a damn square!"

[cabbage-butt.livejournal.com]

"Your brain is still fixing damaged connections. Repetitive actions will help it do that. Keep trying and eventually you'll be able to regain some functionality."

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"Yeah. Easy for you to say," Sam grumbled, dropping the pad back down on the tray and flipping to a clean page. "You're not the one stuck in bed tracing trapezoids while every one else on the ship is out there actually doing something."

[prettycoolguy]

The Chief had to go through rehabilitation once, after the augmentation surgery. This strikes a chord with him. Repetitive, embarrassing exercises are something he knows all too well.

"Do you want to be able to do more than just trace trapezoids?" he asks Sam seriously. He means to go somewhere with this. Sometimes you need less rational, more bat to the gut.

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

Sam sighed. He already knew where this was going. He got a 174 on his LSAT's, he knew a loaded, leading question when he saw it. "Look, I already know what you're going to say. Baby-steps. I know, I get it. It's just...I used to be able to do this and now I can't...and it's just frustrating."

[prettycoolguy]

"Don't think you know what I'm going to tell you." Chief's firm, but not exactly unkind about it. "Though you were close," he admits. "Think about why you're here. You're alive, and you can function. You can heal, and that's more than you'd have if you were just a little bit less lucky."

"You're not doing something you used to be able to do. Forget that. You're earning it for the first time. And your body is going to fight you every inch of the way back."

[cabbage-butt.livejournal.com]

"When I was an infant," says Brainiac 5, "I had an intellect very similar to what it is now. I knew what walking was. I could speak in full sentences. I determined my own proofs to the mathmatical theorem known on Earth as Fermat's Last Theorem when I was two month of age. I knew the mechanisms responsible for walking, but was unable to get my body to function in the manner necessary to achieve my first steps until after a considerable number of attempts. It was immensely frustrating, knowing how to do what I wanted, but not knowing how to do what I wanted."

There's a light kzzack of some sort of electrical probe he's messing with.

"Think of it as simply knowing of writing." He goes on, "And be grateful you're alive to be frustrated."

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

Sam shakes his head. He doesn't know whose bedside manner sucks more, Chielf's, Brainy's, Dean's or that guy Sawyer's--whose been bunking two beds down. And lucky for Sam, he gets to see three of them on a regular basis.

"Yeah, I know I'm lucky, and I am grateful. Believe me, I am," he replied. "Jesus, what's it take to get a 'Damn, that sucks' out of you guys?"

Shaking his head, he starts to scrawl his name at the top of the page. It's not awful, just not what his signature normally looked like. This was gonna get old real fast.

"So how's everybody else?" he asked, referring to the other crew members that had been lucky enough to have Yeerks in their brains. He needed to distract his mind from this damn triangle or he was going to start going crazy.

[cabbage-butt.livejournal.com]

"We actually seem to be making some progress, now that everyone is free of their infestations. We've decided on command structure, there are now security patrols so we aren't surprised by any on-ship threats, and a team has been selected to make progress on our escape."

[prettycoolguy]

"Yes it sucks," the Chief says, though it's evident he doesn't say "sucks" much just by the slightly awkward use of the word. "Just don't expect much in the way of sympathy out of me yet. I had to go through that once, and this is cake compared to when you first start walking again. Just... trust me on that."

"That pretty much covers it," he nods to Brainy about the changes. "Cybil named me second in command, Lyta and Nathan are both third. The infested all seem to be doing alright, bad memories all around but I think everybody's getting over it fine.

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

Sam nodded as Brainy and Chief explained in more detail the newest developments on the ship and he felt--though he knew he shouldn't--a strong sense of uselessness wash over him. All this stuff was going on, they were finally organizing, looking for ways to get back home, and preparing for what might come at them next, and he couldn't be a part of it. He was stuck in the medbay to recover, left out of the loop except for what information he could glean out of the few people who actually came into medbay now that things had calmed down again.

He continued nodding, his hand drawing to a halt midway through the second line of the triangle as his eyes drifted around the room, eventually landing on Brainy. With Jean's help, Sam had already begun to get most of his memories organized. There were still time when things were still blurry and chaotic but, for the most part, he seemed to have a handle on them. And what Sam remembered, disturbed. He, honestly, wondered if it was the same for the rest of them. But since none of them--save for Brainy--came into the medbay, he never had chance to ask.

"That's good," Sam finally spoke, "That they're getting over it, that is. I know a lot of us did some pretty fucked up shit. Shit we would've stopped if we could've." Gee, Sam, to whom and what could you be referring?

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

Dean comes in a bit later, having relaxed with his medicine of choice in the sensoriums. He's still carrying the bottle, but it's empty by now, and he's only a little buzzed, just enough to be in a decently good mood. Talking with Chaucer helped, and he made up with Jo (sort of), and met some new pale kid. A lot better than having to deal with werewolves and Sawyer.

Dean sets the bottle down on his way in, and then, as usual, pulls up a chair next to Sam's bed. He flashes his little brother a grin, and gets comfy.

"Everything alright, Sammy?"

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"Yeah," Sam nods. Though, by the defeat in his tone, things clearly aren't going all that well for him. He's still trying to trace the shapes without straying from the thick black line, but can't seem to keep his hand from jerking and creating wavy lines instead of nice crisp ones.

Then, he sniffed as Dean sat down next to him and glanced up at the bottle. "Have you been drinking?"

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

Dean's grin fades a little as he watches Sam try to trace the lines. He's quiet for a moment, almost uncharacteristically, but it's obvious he's not going to say anything. Obviously the recovery is going to be awkward as hell.

Then Sam sniffs, and Dean raises an eyebrow. "You secretly part bloodhound or something? I mean, I know you got the puppy look and everything, but that's going a bit far, man."

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"Dude, you smell like you bathed in it," Sam retorted. "Anyone standing up wind in a hurricane would be able to smell you."

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

"Now you're just exaggerating," Dean says carelessly, rolling his eyes. "What are you, my mother?"

... Wow, did he really just say that?

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, that's exactly who I am," Sam said. He's not bothered by Dean's careless remark. "Because I've been the one glued to your bedside for the last few days, right?"

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

Silence, because Dean isn't sober enough to reply to that. Instead, he scowls and mumbles, "At least I can draw a straight line."

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

First he's shocked. That stung. Big time. Looking back down at his awful attempts to draw a trapezoid, a triangle, a square, and a pentagon, Sam flipped the pad of paper shut and tossed it to the end of the bed.

"You're an asshole."

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

And oops, Dean's realized what he's said. When Sam calls him an asshole, Dean nearly flinches, and straightens, looking at Sam. After a minute of awkward silence:

"Look, I didn't mean that, alright?" Dean says, looking guilty.

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

Sam, unfortunately, is not buying it. He's been working his ass off trying to get something that at least resembled a straight line. And his faith in himself was already weak, even after Chief and Brainy--as poor as their bedside manners were--had convinced him that he would eventually get it.

"Just leave, Dean."

[pie-bitches.livejournal.com]

Crap, Dean is panicking internally. No matter what he does, he can't seem to get through the day without pissing Sam off, or making him feel like crap, and Dean doesn't want that. That's half of why he's drinking, but shh, don't tell anybody.

But instead of just leaving, Dean has to make it worse. He stands up, and tries to explain himself.

"Look, Sammy, I swear I didn't mean that. I don't--" Dean doesn't really have an excuse, so he rambles, and the buzz helps. "Listen, I'm trying, man. I am, okay? I know I'm a douchebag, trust me, you're not the only one who's told me that on this ship... thing."

Dean stops, and sighs, running a hand through his hair. He's crap at apologizing. And being a big brother.

[thenameissam.livejournal.com]

"Yeah. Sure. Whatever," Sam said, shrugging off both Dean's insult and his apology. Yeah, right, he's going to be carrying that around for a while. Especially the insult.