revivalproject | Fortunate Son - Creedance Clearwater Revival

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Fortunate Son - Creedance Clearwater Revival

WHO: Billy Hargrove; Open
WHERE: Fountain
WHAT: Showing up in this city beats being dead
WHEN: May 8th
WARNINGS: S3 finale spoilers for Stranger Things?

This doesn't feel anything like Starcourt's floor. The glossy and tiled smoothness of it against his back is missing. It's rough and jagged, like Billy's laying on a gravel road. Or maybe it feels like that as blood seeps out from his sides. It stains up into his white tank top, into the waistband of his jeans. There's faint lines lining his arms and temples where he had been controlled.

Then he feels the pull. Towards a glowing orb and it hurts - fuck does it hurt like hell - to move, but he manages to touch it. And immediately goes down with a yell, brain trying to process all of that and still reeling from being back in the driver's seat of his head again.

Onto his back he goes, blue eyes at the sky again. There's a lot of blood lost from the two wounds, and Billy realizes that's probably why he feels weak. He's not supposed to feel like this, he's Billy Hargrove. King of Hawkins, pretty boy and playboy.

God he's killed so many people in the span of a month, even though it wasn't his fault.

He coughs and finds the strength to wipe away the wetness. Saliva, good, it wasn't blood. He knew coughing up blood was a bad sign at least. He heard about it from-

No, don't think about her right now.

Billy lays there, turning his head to look around. Was there anyone around? He needs to call for help. And he does, a choked out "...help," that has an edge to it because he's not going to be heard as weak as long as he can help it.

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"You clearly had to be talking about yourself, genius," she said as she freed her hands to wipe them on her coat and pull out her comm. "Because you aren't suggesting to the doctor that might be operating on you if this doesn't go well to drink. The last thing you would need is a slip of a scalpel."

As soon as she has her comm out her fingers are flying through a text.

"I'm not holding both of our weights up in a shitty location with high heels."

Billy wants to punch her so bad. Just curl his hand into a fist and-- He jerks at both pain and a memory from a long time ago. One that had been unearthed recently before being brought here. While his face remains furious, he doesn't move to act on his thoughts. The intrusive thoughts don't win this time.

Billy knows he's not going to be like his dad and stuff like this is going to test that.

"Well maybe you should get some sensible shoes. And I wasn't suggesting you drink and operate at the same time. I'm not an idiot. I meant for headaches after you're done carving people." Well maybe you should've used your words then, Billy...

"I have them and use them. But I wasn't expecting a mouthy kid to show up bleeding out today,"
She grumbles under her breath. He's worse than most already.

How could she have ever thought Tony was bad? This punk was worse.

"I normally don't waste pain killers on myself. But after you it'll be tempting."

Instead she might go investigate that bar.

Maybe it's good that he doesn't catch what she grumbles about, focusing instead on holding the bandages against his wounds. The two on the side are the worst, and he hisses when he puts too much against it. "Wasn't expecting some hot-tempered broad, so I guess we're both even."

He almost moves like he's going to get up, then decides against it and lays down. Billy debates on something, then decides against that too as he waits for the hired help to come to her aid. "How far is the hospital anyways? Maybe I can fucking walk."

Billy can't, but it beats just laying here, waiting for her patience to give out on him.

"Too far for-"

Tae stops when a large, heavily muscled and tattooed man with long hair arrived.

"This doesn't look like luggage, Doc," Gladio noted as he moves to kneel by Billy.

"He's plenty of baggage in one package, clearly," she answered. "Try not to jostle him too much."

Gladio nodded. "Obviously. Wish I had one of those potions from Eorzea to help stabilize him. Anyway, hi kid, I'm Gladio, I'll be your ambulance. Bear with me."

"Says the bitch mad about blood I can't control," comes the retort under his breath. Billy doesn't even care if she or this big guy hear it. She's already... promised? not to kill him. At least his life feels like its being spared out of spite.

The glare goes from Tae to Gladio. It's then he realizes that he doesn't not the doctor woman's name (nor at this point is he really caring). But he supposes a name is important.

"Billy. Billy Hargrove." The sooner they get this ambulance ride over with, the better. Hell, the sooner he's back in shape, the better.

"Hargrove," the doctor echoes, sounding less than settled on the shape of the name. All these English names are just frustrating at times. So many damn sounds she's not skilled at making.

Gladio, for what it was worth, just nodded to the boy in his arms.

"How about we rush, Doc? He seems... well, like he got savaged by something."

Of course she just speeds up as best she can in her heels.

Edited 2023-05-24 22:52 (UTC)

"Har," he sounds out, though of course he's condescending about it. "grove." Then he's being picked up and he bites his inner cheek to keep from being verbal about that. It hurts but there's nothing Billy can do about it at the moment.

"At least someone can fucking rush," he grumbles. Almost loudly. Billy isn't exactly known for masking himself or anything. "Savaged is an understatement, because I'm dead when I get home." All of it's bitten out, trying not to move too much while Gladio moves and Tae keeps up.

"Don't do that," Gladio grumbles at the kid. Not right to make fun of someone's accent."

But Gladio doesn't touch the other stuff. He knows plenty of people who are dead back home. That's just part of the territory. And his attention is on getting him into the hospital.

Once inside Tae was quickly behind them, moving a lot more easily over smooth floors as she directs Gladio around to where they need to get.

Billy flashes a pained glare up at Gladio. "Fuck you, I was sounding it out to help." Nevermind the tone he had used like Tae was stupid or something. And it something to keep his mind off of the pain, though there was plenty of nice things he could talk about but doesn't.

He doesn't like the hospital lights above him. There's a full scowl and he turns his head to bury it away into Gladio. Stalking the halls for a girl, halls that looked sterile with flickering lights--

There's a groan of pain and yes, focus on that. On the pain that the creature gave him. The doctor that was giving him hell and the broad man with muscles Billy dreamed of giving him a ride to the nearest bed or wherever.

In good news, there are probably a few people who would be jealous over Billy getting to bury his face in Gladio's pecks. And since only one person has gotten so before Billy, victory?

Gladio carries the young man into a room he is directed to by Tae and lays him out onto a bed before stepping back. Tae's already at Billy's side, pulling on latex gloves.

"The shirt has to go. I'm sorry. We'll have someone replicate you a new one later."

Then she's producing scissors to cut it off. Sorry, no more time for nice doctor.

Maybe a victory. He'll think about it later when he's not in so much pain.

The bed feels scratchy, but it's also soft and the best thing he's laid on in hours. Maybe days. He's focused on that, that he doesn't notice her cutting off the shirt. It wasn't like there was much of a shirt left to save anyways, the tank top tattered from the one-sided fight at the mall.

"...'S fine, just don't make my shit worse." Muscle flutter in an attempt to get away from the cool metal of the scissors, with Billy gritting his teeth through it. "Fuck."

"You can't get worse," she mumbles to herself as she tears the shirt open. Then she's rattling off instructions to Gladio to hold things in place while she moves around to get supplies. Soon she's got out new tools and cursing to herself.

"Need some verbal consent, kid. Going to do a transfusion for you. If you have an extremely rare blood type this could be bad. Without it, we've got trouble. Gladio?"

"O-Neg," he says.

"Clean your arm," she directs him, and the big man moves to get an alcohol pad. Yeah, he's clearly been kidnapped as an assistant.

"Do you consent to treatment?"

"It's called dying and I'm pretty fucking sure that's worse." One day he'd stop arguing with the person trying to save him. That's not going to be today. Or probably tomorrow. Try a month or so from now.

Billy doesn't realize how pale he's gotten since Tae found him, how much blood's been lost since then and now. Shit. But she said she wasn't going to let him die right? Right? Even if he's acting like a pathetic piece of shit, right? Billy mutters off his normal blood type and tries to get comfortable. Eyes watch the ambulance - Gladio - go to do as Tae asks, then looks to her.

"...I consent." Because if he doesn't, Billy knows what's going to happen.

One day she'll yell at him for arguing with the person trying to save him because that's stupidly distracting.

"Good boy," she says as she starts preparing a line for him and Gladio. Once she's got blood going, she'll get to the rest.

"I can't sedate you. I'm going to give you something to put in your mouth. Bit down when it hurts."

When, not if. She grabs a cloth and folds it up, offering it to his mouth.

Edited 2023-06-07 01:25 (UTC)

At least now he seems to be willing to cooperate without barking like an angry dog. Billy grunts with the transfusion, but doesn't say anything. All he can really do is just try to get comfortable because he has no idea how long he's going to be stuck in this bed.

The blue eyes watch her red ones and he nods. No sedatives. He could handle that. Despite that tough guy thinking, he accepts the cloth and takes it between white teeth and tries to relax. And he doesn't, but he tried.

For what it's worth, when she starts, he doesn't scream immediately. But the pain grows and he feels like he's going to hurt his mouth with how hard he's biting into the cloth. It gets soaked with his saliva and at one point he does start squirming, but he doesn't make any motion to tell her to stop.

At least the transfusion itself doesn't hurt. That's just something he could fail to notice with enough time. As for the rest of it. Once the blood is flowing and Gladio is sitting down, and she's got a bag of IV fluids as well... Well this is the painful part. This is the part with the hands involved in exposed areas and trying to stitch things up to prevent all that fresh, clean, new blood from going right back out.

"I know," she says, her voice a low, soft thing as she works, "I know it hurts. I'm sorry. I'm going as fast and careful as I can. Once we've got you all patched up I'm going to personally get you a big meal from the diner. And maybe some alcohol for pain numbing. Does that sound good?"

Poor kid, he's in a real state of things.

Billy tries his best to stay still, but he can't help when his body tries to squirm away from her working hands at points. His own are balled into tight fists with white knuckles and he finally has to squeeze his eyes shut as the cloth muffles his scream. It hurts, it really does, she's right.

Her offer of alcohol and food almost go past him, but Billy manages one, two curt nods.

Somehow his teeth grit harder and tears get squeezed out. Tae said she wouldn't let him die, she practically promised. If he could just get past this part, it would be fine.

It takes a while. A while through which Gladio seems tense and Tae seems focused. She keeps up her litany of trying to soothe the kid. And, at long last, she starts to slow down. It's less 'rush to save his life' and more 'thorough to finish'.

Soon she's stitching him up, though it doesn't seem like she's pleased with that.

"Would that I could get you some skin grafts. I'll have to ask Billy to come in when he can and heal this over a bit faster, for your sake."

But this had been a life or death emergency.

Time is a thing, but Billy can't keep track of it. All he knows is pain and the work that Tae's doing with Gladio sitting next to him. He can hear the doctor still trying to soothe him, even if it's not working. It's just too painful. And he's tense, which probably isn't helping things.

When she seems to relax, Billy does as well. His breath comes out ragged, with his face covered in sweat and grime, and his jawline having an added layer of saliva that the cloth couldn't soak up. Said cloth gets spat out to land on his collarbone area and he feels dazed.

"...y'done yet? Fuck." A pause and he takes another shuddering breath. "...hurts."

"Yeah," she says as she sets the final stitch. She looks tired too, but that doesn't mean she can stop. "I need to hook you up to some stuff, get you food and other things."

Damn but the kid had been in a bad state.

"Mind if I ask just what happened to you? You aren't exactly the first with... strange scars here."

He wonders how much longer this needs to go on, but he doesn't have the strength to look at what she's doing.

"...Really aren't going to let me die." It's the softest his voice has been since they met. Finally Billy looks towards her, curls framing his sweaty face. There's the...barest scowl on his face, but he's too tired to actually go through with it.

What happened to him? Right. "...Mind flayer." Billy thinks of the sauna, of Max's face peering down at him. "...tried to save them. It wasn't my fault." He reaches to grab her wrist in a weak grip that's supposed to be tight. "It wasn't my fault-"

"Of course not," she says with a roll of her eyes. Don't even get that wrong. Idiot kid.

"What's a Mind flayer?" she asks as she starts to wrap bandages over the damaged areas. But yeah, she's going to let the kid grab her wrist. "Whatever you did at home isn't here, kid."

Billy thought maybe she'd make an exception with how terrible he had been at the start. A glance to the big man next to his bed, then back to her. He doesn't mention how he thought she'd go back on that in case that gives her the idea.

'It's not my fault, Max-'
'What's not your fault, Billy?'

That grip stays on Tae's wrist, a tremor to it. "It...took my brain. I couldn't control what... I was doing. It's not my fault." He takes in some trembling breaths. Trembling that matches his hand. How had he described it to Max? "...He's a shadow. A giant shadow. In my head. I couldn't get him out until it was too late."

"Definitely doesn't sound like the Mindflayers back home," Gladio mumbled to himself as Tae looked at the kid.

"I'm sorry," she says at last to Hargrove. He's an ass but he is still a patient and he had clearly been scared. "I don't think there are any here. You're safe for now. If you need I can ask someone to watch out for you. But first I have to get my ambulance unhooked. Can't bleed him dry for you."

And the mutt here was slowly stabilizing.

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