Page 60 of Resilience

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Sam came to awareness with a groan. Every single part of his body hurt in some way—but his neck and shoulder were the mainstage of his pain festival. He needed more of the good drugs.

He opened his eyes to a soft-focus view of formless white. The first time he’d opened his eyes in this place, he’d thought he’d died, and this was the light people talked about going into. But it had turned out to be the ceiling of a hospital—the ceiling of the intensive care ward at this hospital, which was in Nevada somewhere.

He’d almost died, apparently. Catastrophic hemorrhage, he remembered somebody saying. Couldn’t remember who, but probably a doctor.

Something was different. The room was quieter.

He blinked his eyes, trying to clear his vision. When he could finally look around, he saw he was in a different room altogether, one with four solid walls rather than three walls of glass. Fewer machines in here—though he was still connected to several.

And Fitz stood at the foot of his bed, looking rumpled and exhausted. But he was smiling a little.

“Hey, prospect. How you feeling?”

Sam tried to clear his throat. It hurt a lot, but he got it done. “They moved me out of the ICU? That’s good, yeah?”

“It’s good. They got the infection under control, and after a couple more bags of blood you’ll be full up.” Fitz put his hand on a lump of covers that was Sam’s foot; Sam noticed heavy traces of blood in his knuckles and around his nail beds. “You’re gonna be okay, kiddo. I thought we were gonna lose you when you were bleeding out on the ground, but you’re gonna be okay. Some impressive scars, but chicks digs scars.”

As wakefulness took hold, Sam remembered more. “Uncle Gun? Is he okay?” Gun had fallen on him at the compound. He’d been shot trying to save him. Not trying—doing it. His uncle had saved his life.

Fitz’s stunted smile disappeared entirely. “He’s bad. Still unconscious. They’re calling it a coma. And the bullets severed his spine completely. He won’t walk again.”

“What?” Sam couldn’t get his head around that news. “No way. He’s a fighter. He’ll wake up, and he’ll get back on his feet.”

“Sam. No, he won’t. He’s paralyzed from the waist down. We’re just trying to get him to wake up now.”

“But he can’t ride without his legs.”

“That’s a worry for later, kiddo.” Fitz looked over at the bank of machines, then he came to the side of the bed and set his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Don’t stress about Gun, okay? He’s in good hands. There’s nothing you can do, and making yourself sick worrying about him doesn’t help anybody.”

“He got shot coming for me.”

“I know. That doesn’t make it your fault. We all got each other’s back. Right? You’re the reason we knew we were getting hit. If not for your sharp eyes, those fuckers would’ve got away clean with our shit. They almost did anyway. But we got ‘em all, and we got our shit back, and that’s because of you.”

Another memory freshened. “Jordan. I think it was Jordan.”

Fitz nodded. “It was. And you got him, too—but he was still kicking long enough to press him for details. You did good, Sam. Gun’s not on you. Every hurt we took, it’s on Jordan and it’s on the piece of shit who flipped him.”

“Do you know who?”

“We got a good idea, but don’t poke around there yet. Above your pay grade for now.”

One of the worst things about being a prospect: having to do some deeply upsetting and obviously illegal shit and not having any clear understanding of why. But Sam had been in it long enough by now to know there was no point in trying to get answers, so he asked another important question.

“Who else got hurt? On our side, I mean.”

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