Fic: Burning, green cortina, dak
Title: Burning
Author: dak
Word Count: 1892
Rating: Green Cortina
Warnings: mild swearing and Sam thumping
Spoilers: 2.03, 2.06
Summary: AU for 2.06
A/N: I've always thought that power cut in 2.06 was a little too convenient. I've been wanting to write this fic for ages and in a desperate attempt to chase away some aggravating writer's block, I decided to finally force myself to write it. Please enjoy!
There was nothing he could. Every time he pulled at the ropes it only seemed to make them tighter and the iron was only getting hotter. It wasn’t painful at first, an almost gentle warming sensation seeping into his chest. A gentle sensation that grew worse with each passing second. Warmer and warmer until he finally felt it, the reddening of his skin.
Warmer and warmer until the plastic buttons of his shirt began melting through his vest, into his skin.
Warmer and warmer until he could feel the metal burning hot against him, searing his flesh, boiling his blood.
His mind was frantic, racing, filled no longer with sentences, with logic, but fleeting thoughts.
Mum. Home. Pain. Year? Maya. Pain. Home? Gene. Home. Pain. Pain. Pain.
So much pain. There was only one way to stop it. Only one way and that was to slip into sweet, blessed unconsciousness.
*
He was going to ream the little tosser. He and Sam had been working well together lately, until this Paki mess came along. Something about this case had sent Tyler trotting off towards the funny farm again and It had something to do with that woman. What was it with Tyler and a pretty face? Didn’t his mum love him enough as a child?
“This is the address that Roy bird gave us, Guv,” Ray pointed and Gene pulled the Cortina up to the curb with an abrupt stop.
“Torches. Looked like there was power cut ‘bout ten minutes ago,” the Guv ordered as he reached into the glove box and chucked a pair of torches at Ray and Chris.
In all fairness, though Gene was loathe to admit it, he himself may not have been thinking completely straight through this whole, bloody ordeal. Any drugs case always brought back unresolved memories of Stu and this had been no different. Gene always acted harder, always took the extra step into the muddy side of right versus wrong when it came to drugs on his patch. He’d just never had Sam there to call him on it before. Damn the man.
Gene led the charge inside the building, expecting to find that dolt Ravi, expecting to find nothing, expecting to find Tyler eating crumpets and sipping tea with the Queen, expecting anything except what he found.
It was the smell. The smell was the first sign that something was very, very wrong. He’d smelt that before, most recently when Ray had been lying unconscious next to a, literally, flaming car. Burnt flesh. Burning flesh. Gene hoped it was Ravi. He somehow knew it wasn’t.
“Jesus,” he nearly dropped his torch as he sprinted to his waning deputy’s side. The iron was cooling but still warm. Gene couldn’t look at his face but the lad’s whole body was shaking. Violent shudders. He wasn’t sweating either, not anymore, but he was hot. Damn hot. His normally pale skin bright red and burning.
“Sam? Sam, can you hear me?” Gene already knew the answer, he just didn’t want to admit it. Ray appeared on the other side and immediately began undoing the knots that were keeping the warm metal close to Tyler’s chest.
“Don’t!” Gene barked and held up his hand, stopping him. “Unplug it but don’t move it.” Ray looked closer and Gene watched his Sergeant’s eyes light up in realization. The iron was stuck to Sam’s flesh, burned into it through his thin, blue shirt. If they tried to move it, they would be taking half his skin with it. “DS Carling, radio for an ambulance. Think we better let the professionals deal with this one.”
Ray shook his head vigorously, obviously sickened at the sight. “Right, Guv.” He unplugged the cord then ran out of the room, dragging Chris with him.
Gene finally forced his eyes to move from the injury and up to Tyler’s face. He wasn’t unconscious, not quite, but his brain clearly wasn’t in Kansas anymore as Gene noticed his eyes fluttering beneath the lids, his head sluggishly rolling from side to side. With as much care as he could muster, Gene peeled the tape from his DI’s mouth.
“Sam?” Gene tried to stir him again but received only a whimper in response. “You in there, Tyler?” Sam didn’t try to speak but vomited and began to choke as the viscous liquid quickly dripped back down his throat.
“Shit,” Gene cursed and turned Tyler’s head to the right. He grabbed a hanky from his pocket and tried to wipe away what he could. His Inspector was not going to die choking on his own sick. “We’re gettin’ you out of here, Sammy. Just wait a mo, alright?” He assured him as Tyler continued to convulse on the dingy carpet, and held tightly onto his shoulder, desperate to keep him anchored, somehow, to the real world.
*
Hot. Pain. Hot. Burn. Hot.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Get ice packs. Beep. Beep. Beep. We need to cool him. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Stop it. Please. Stop. No more. Please.
...“Amublance...Tyler...”
Beep. Beep. Malignant hyperthermia. Beep. Beep. Impossible. Beep. Beep.
“...keep breathin’ Sam...”
Hurts. God. Hurts. Shit. Too much.
Beep. From the suxomenthonium chloride. Beep. Hang on Sam.
“Hang on, Sammy.”
Please no. Don’t. Please.
Please.
*
It was a few hours until he was able to see Sam again. They’d been able to save Cartwright, catch the bad guys, and prevent another murder, thanks to Skelton no less, but in order for all that to have had happened, Gene had to abandon his DI at the hospital. Now he was forced to wait with concealed anxiousness until Sam was pronounced ready for visitors. Or dead. Visitors would have been slightly more preferable.
“DCI Hunt?”
Gene’s head snapped up, annoyed that it had taken so long, probably fifteen minutes, for one of Sam’s doctors to speak to him.
“Is he dead?” Might as well find out the truth sooner rather than later.
“No, sir. Not yet. Mr. Tyler--”
“Detective Inspector,” Gene corrected him.
“Detective Inspector Tyler, suffered a severe third degree burn to his chest.”
“No shite, Sherlock. Probably had summit to do with the bloody hot iron strapped to ‘im.” Gene ran a hand through his hair in frustration.
The doctor wisely chose to ignore the outburst and continued with his report. “We were able to remove the, well, weapon without causing too much further damage. His shirt was able to protect him somewhat from the metal coming in direct contact with his skin. As with any burn this serious we’re most concerned with infection.”
“That all?” Gene knew it wasn’t and waited impatiently for the rest.
“No.”
Gene Hunt was always right.
“Due to the heat of the iron and its position over DI Tyler’s heart, it caused his blood to heat significantly, resulting in hyperthermia. Heat stroke. His core body temperature was at forty-two degrees when he was brought in.”
“Forty-two? Metric bullshit,” Gene muttered. “What’s that in real numbers?”
“It’s approximately one-hundred and seven degrees Fahrenheit.” The doctor performed a quick calculation on his chart. “One-hundred and seven point six, to be exact. At forty-one...one hundred and six degrees, brain death begins. We’ve been able to cool him to one hundred and one degrees but he still has not regained consciousness and we have yet to determine if there will be any lasting brain damage. If you’d like to see him...”
Gene didn’t even wait for the doctor to finish before storming down the hall, pretending he knew where he was going. Luckily the doctor was able to catch up in time and led him in the right direction.
*
Numb. Nowhere. Nothing. Numb.
“I’m going to stop coming to see you, Sam. I’m sorry.”
Numb. Nothing. Nowhere. Numb.
“Wake up, yeh lazy bastard. For chrissakes.”
Pain. Searing. Harsh. Pain.
*
“Anytime you’d like to wake up, Tyler, that’d be good for me,” Gene repeated for the fiftieth time that week as he scrunched his large frame into the familiar hospital chair, nothing but a newspaper, a flask, and an unconscious body for company. The nurses had just changed the bandages on the boy’s damaged chest and Gene relaxed as he knew they wouldn’t be disturbed and that he wouldn’t have to see the charred flesh.
“Me hand’s gettin’ a cramp, fillin’ out all the forms you normally do. Had to start drinkin’ with me left ‘cause of you.”
Sam’s labored breathing was the only response. At least he was breathing on his own. That had to be a good sign, didn’t it? Gene opened the paper to the sport section and began regaling the unconscious man with tales of the great Dennis Law, subconsciously hoping to rouse the United fan into a fury. Sam’s muscles tensed and twitched but his eyes remained firmly closed.
Gene grabbed his flask, took a drink, and kept talking.
*
Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain.
“Mr. Tyler?”
Light. Light in his eyes. Light.
“Sam?”
Chest burning. Chest hurting.
“Sam, you’re in hospital.”
Breathing. Breathing hard. Breathing hurt.
“Sam, can you tell me what year it is?”
The question. The ultimate question.
“Sam?”
Laughter. His own. It hurt.
*
The phone clattered to the floor and a breathless Chris appeared in Gene’s office doorway a split second later. “Guv! Hospital just rang. ‘E’s awake. The Boss’s awake.”
Gene was out the door before the sentence was finished.
*
Sam felt a cool breeze as the curtain was flung back fiercely.
“Took your own, sweet time, didn’t yeh?”
“Guv?”
It was a question. It shouldn’t have been. Gene took a hesitant step forward, slowly peeling off his driving gloves and placing them in his pockets as he spoke. “Yeah. ‘S me, Sam.”
“Guv.”
“That’s right.” Gene stood next to the bed looking down at the glazed eyes of his Inspector.
“Hi,” Sam smiled. “They gave me morphine,” he sighed.
Gene rolled his eyes. “Doped you up to the gills, have they?”
“Yeah. Can’t feel much,” he let his eyelids drift shut. “Chest feels odd, though. Tight.”
“But it doesn’t hurt?”
“I think I like morphine,” Sam grinned.
“Well don’t get too used to it, Tyler. Don’t need you makin’ a habit out of it.”
“Nooo. Drugs are bad,” Sam shifted uncomfortably in the bed, wincing a touch as his bandaged chest moved. “You...you get the dealers?”
“As if there was any doubt.”
“There was,” Sam admitted.
“Snarky bastard. Weren’t that Paki, though.”
“Ravi? Good. Sooo...I was right?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Oh.” Sam seemed despondent.
“Maybe a bit.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“Like the morphine?”
“They told me your brain weren’t fried.”
“ ‘S not,” Sam scowled.
“Yeah? Then what year is it?”
Sam thought long and hard before answering. “The year it’s supposed to be.”
Gene nodded, satisfied, and pulled up a chair, making himself comfortable. “Good enough for me.”
“Gene?”
“Yeah, Sammy?”
“It hurts a little.”
“Girl.” Gene checked to make sure no one was looking, then held Sam’s head up and helped him take a nip from the flask. Sam coughed weakly, but quietly, and quickly settled himself. “There. That’ll put some hairs on your chest.”
“I’d settle for skin,” Sam mumbled as sleep threatened to steal him away again and Gene couldn’t argue with that. Instead, he pat Sam on the arm, releasing the fears he hadn’t noticed he’d been keeping.
Author: dak
Word Count: 1892
Rating: Green Cortina
Warnings: mild swearing and Sam thumping
Spoilers: 2.03, 2.06
Summary: AU for 2.06
A/N: I've always thought that power cut in 2.06 was a little too convenient. I've been wanting to write this fic for ages and in a desperate attempt to chase away some aggravating writer's block, I decided to finally force myself to write it. Please enjoy!
There was nothing he could. Every time he pulled at the ropes it only seemed to make them tighter and the iron was only getting hotter. It wasn’t painful at first, an almost gentle warming sensation seeping into his chest. A gentle sensation that grew worse with each passing second. Warmer and warmer until he finally felt it, the reddening of his skin.
Warmer and warmer until the plastic buttons of his shirt began melting through his vest, into his skin.
Warmer and warmer until he could feel the metal burning hot against him, searing his flesh, boiling his blood.
His mind was frantic, racing, filled no longer with sentences, with logic, but fleeting thoughts.
Mum. Home. Pain. Year? Maya. Pain. Home? Gene. Home. Pain. Pain. Pain.
So much pain. There was only one way to stop it. Only one way and that was to slip into sweet, blessed unconsciousness.
*
He was going to ream the little tosser. He and Sam had been working well together lately, until this Paki mess came along. Something about this case had sent Tyler trotting off towards the funny farm again and It had something to do with that woman. What was it with Tyler and a pretty face? Didn’t his mum love him enough as a child?
“This is the address that Roy bird gave us, Guv,” Ray pointed and Gene pulled the Cortina up to the curb with an abrupt stop.
“Torches. Looked like there was power cut ‘bout ten minutes ago,” the Guv ordered as he reached into the glove box and chucked a pair of torches at Ray and Chris.
In all fairness, though Gene was loathe to admit it, he himself may not have been thinking completely straight through this whole, bloody ordeal. Any drugs case always brought back unresolved memories of Stu and this had been no different. Gene always acted harder, always took the extra step into the muddy side of right versus wrong when it came to drugs on his patch. He’d just never had Sam there to call him on it before. Damn the man.
Gene led the charge inside the building, expecting to find that dolt Ravi, expecting to find nothing, expecting to find Tyler eating crumpets and sipping tea with the Queen, expecting anything except what he found.
It was the smell. The smell was the first sign that something was very, very wrong. He’d smelt that before, most recently when Ray had been lying unconscious next to a, literally, flaming car. Burnt flesh. Burning flesh. Gene hoped it was Ravi. He somehow knew it wasn’t.
“Jesus,” he nearly dropped his torch as he sprinted to his waning deputy’s side. The iron was cooling but still warm. Gene couldn’t look at his face but the lad’s whole body was shaking. Violent shudders. He wasn’t sweating either, not anymore, but he was hot. Damn hot. His normally pale skin bright red and burning.
“Sam? Sam, can you hear me?” Gene already knew the answer, he just didn’t want to admit it. Ray appeared on the other side and immediately began undoing the knots that were keeping the warm metal close to Tyler’s chest.
“Don’t!” Gene barked and held up his hand, stopping him. “Unplug it but don’t move it.” Ray looked closer and Gene watched his Sergeant’s eyes light up in realization. The iron was stuck to Sam’s flesh, burned into it through his thin, blue shirt. If they tried to move it, they would be taking half his skin with it. “DS Carling, radio for an ambulance. Think we better let the professionals deal with this one.”
Ray shook his head vigorously, obviously sickened at the sight. “Right, Guv.” He unplugged the cord then ran out of the room, dragging Chris with him.
Gene finally forced his eyes to move from the injury and up to Tyler’s face. He wasn’t unconscious, not quite, but his brain clearly wasn’t in Kansas anymore as Gene noticed his eyes fluttering beneath the lids, his head sluggishly rolling from side to side. With as much care as he could muster, Gene peeled the tape from his DI’s mouth.
“Sam?” Gene tried to stir him again but received only a whimper in response. “You in there, Tyler?” Sam didn’t try to speak but vomited and began to choke as the viscous liquid quickly dripped back down his throat.
“Shit,” Gene cursed and turned Tyler’s head to the right. He grabbed a hanky from his pocket and tried to wipe away what he could. His Inspector was not going to die choking on his own sick. “We’re gettin’ you out of here, Sammy. Just wait a mo, alright?” He assured him as Tyler continued to convulse on the dingy carpet, and held tightly onto his shoulder, desperate to keep him anchored, somehow, to the real world.
*
Hot. Pain. Hot. Burn. Hot.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Get ice packs. Beep. Beep. Beep. We need to cool him. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Stop it. Please. Stop. No more. Please.
...“Amublance...Tyler...”
Beep. Beep. Malignant hyperthermia. Beep. Beep. Impossible. Beep. Beep.
“...keep breathin’ Sam...”
Hurts. God. Hurts. Shit. Too much.
Beep. From the suxomenthonium chloride. Beep. Hang on Sam.
“Hang on, Sammy.”
Please no. Don’t. Please.
Please.
*
It was a few hours until he was able to see Sam again. They’d been able to save Cartwright, catch the bad guys, and prevent another murder, thanks to Skelton no less, but in order for all that to have had happened, Gene had to abandon his DI at the hospital. Now he was forced to wait with concealed anxiousness until Sam was pronounced ready for visitors. Or dead. Visitors would have been slightly more preferable.
“DCI Hunt?”
Gene’s head snapped up, annoyed that it had taken so long, probably fifteen minutes, for one of Sam’s doctors to speak to him.
“Is he dead?” Might as well find out the truth sooner rather than later.
“No, sir. Not yet. Mr. Tyler--”
“Detective Inspector,” Gene corrected him.
“Detective Inspector Tyler, suffered a severe third degree burn to his chest.”
“No shite, Sherlock. Probably had summit to do with the bloody hot iron strapped to ‘im.” Gene ran a hand through his hair in frustration.
The doctor wisely chose to ignore the outburst and continued with his report. “We were able to remove the, well, weapon without causing too much further damage. His shirt was able to protect him somewhat from the metal coming in direct contact with his skin. As with any burn this serious we’re most concerned with infection.”
“That all?” Gene knew it wasn’t and waited impatiently for the rest.
“No.”
Gene Hunt was always right.
“Due to the heat of the iron and its position over DI Tyler’s heart, it caused his blood to heat significantly, resulting in hyperthermia. Heat stroke. His core body temperature was at forty-two degrees when he was brought in.”
“Forty-two? Metric bullshit,” Gene muttered. “What’s that in real numbers?”
“It’s approximately one-hundred and seven degrees Fahrenheit.” The doctor performed a quick calculation on his chart. “One-hundred and seven point six, to be exact. At forty-one...one hundred and six degrees, brain death begins. We’ve been able to cool him to one hundred and one degrees but he still has not regained consciousness and we have yet to determine if there will be any lasting brain damage. If you’d like to see him...”
Gene didn’t even wait for the doctor to finish before storming down the hall, pretending he knew where he was going. Luckily the doctor was able to catch up in time and led him in the right direction.
*
Numb. Nowhere. Nothing. Numb.
“I’m going to stop coming to see you, Sam. I’m sorry.”
Numb. Nothing. Nowhere. Numb.
“Wake up, yeh lazy bastard. For chrissakes.”
Pain. Searing. Harsh. Pain.
*
“Anytime you’d like to wake up, Tyler, that’d be good for me,” Gene repeated for the fiftieth time that week as he scrunched his large frame into the familiar hospital chair, nothing but a newspaper, a flask, and an unconscious body for company. The nurses had just changed the bandages on the boy’s damaged chest and Gene relaxed as he knew they wouldn’t be disturbed and that he wouldn’t have to see the charred flesh.
“Me hand’s gettin’ a cramp, fillin’ out all the forms you normally do. Had to start drinkin’ with me left ‘cause of you.”
Sam’s labored breathing was the only response. At least he was breathing on his own. That had to be a good sign, didn’t it? Gene opened the paper to the sport section and began regaling the unconscious man with tales of the great Dennis Law, subconsciously hoping to rouse the United fan into a fury. Sam’s muscles tensed and twitched but his eyes remained firmly closed.
Gene grabbed his flask, took a drink, and kept talking.
*
Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain.
“Mr. Tyler?”
Light. Light in his eyes. Light.
“Sam?”
Chest burning. Chest hurting.
“Sam, you’re in hospital.”
Breathing. Breathing hard. Breathing hurt.
“Sam, can you tell me what year it is?”
The question. The ultimate question.
“Sam?”
Laughter. His own. It hurt.
*
The phone clattered to the floor and a breathless Chris appeared in Gene’s office doorway a split second later. “Guv! Hospital just rang. ‘E’s awake. The Boss’s awake.”
Gene was out the door before the sentence was finished.
*
Sam felt a cool breeze as the curtain was flung back fiercely.
“Took your own, sweet time, didn’t yeh?”
“Guv?”
It was a question. It shouldn’t have been. Gene took a hesitant step forward, slowly peeling off his driving gloves and placing them in his pockets as he spoke. “Yeah. ‘S me, Sam.”
“Guv.”
“That’s right.” Gene stood next to the bed looking down at the glazed eyes of his Inspector.
“Hi,” Sam smiled. “They gave me morphine,” he sighed.
Gene rolled his eyes. “Doped you up to the gills, have they?”
“Yeah. Can’t feel much,” he let his eyelids drift shut. “Chest feels odd, though. Tight.”
“But it doesn’t hurt?”
“I think I like morphine,” Sam grinned.
“Well don’t get too used to it, Tyler. Don’t need you makin’ a habit out of it.”
“Nooo. Drugs are bad,” Sam shifted uncomfortably in the bed, wincing a touch as his bandaged chest moved. “You...you get the dealers?”
“As if there was any doubt.”
“There was,” Sam admitted.
“Snarky bastard. Weren’t that Paki, though.”
“Ravi? Good. Sooo...I was right?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Oh.” Sam seemed despondent.
“Maybe a bit.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“Like the morphine?”
“They told me your brain weren’t fried.”
“ ‘S not,” Sam scowled.
“Yeah? Then what year is it?”
Sam thought long and hard before answering. “The year it’s supposed to be.”
Gene nodded, satisfied, and pulled up a chair, making himself comfortable. “Good enough for me.”
“Gene?”
“Yeah, Sammy?”
“It hurts a little.”
“Girl.” Gene checked to make sure no one was looking, then held Sam’s head up and helped him take a nip from the flask. Sam coughed weakly, but quietly, and quickly settled himself. “There. That’ll put some hairs on your chest.”
“I’d settle for skin,” Sam mumbled as sleep threatened to steal him away again and Gene couldn’t argue with that. Instead, he pat Sam on the arm, releasing the fears he hadn’t noticed he’d been keeping.