It was such a disorienting place. The lights were too bright, and yet the halls were too dim. There was a sterile smell in the air that burnt his nostrils, a quiet atmosphere that made anxiety rise in him like a bull moments from charging. They'd stuck a needle in his arm, they'd told him he was safe, they'd told him he was going to be okay.
He knew they were lying.
Nicolas' eyes flitted about the hospital room. He'd been left alone at that point, with only the IV drip and the slow beeping of the heart monitor to keep him company. And they weren't very good company.
"You're sick," they'd told him, "you've been drugged. We need a blood sample."
Oh, how he hated it. How he hated all the needles and the scalpels and the medicine that was thrust on him. Hate, hate, hate. He hated it!
He was going to escape while he could, while the shackles were gone.
The heart monitor screamed when he ripped the electrodes off his chest, and his arm ached when he haphazardly yanked the IV tube away from its port, but he didn't care. He just needed to get away.
Nicolas stumbled for the door, supporting himself on the hospital walls on his journey down the hall. His ripped up hero's outfit was gone, replaced by a loose fitting white gown that was made of a scratchy fabric he didn't like.
"Sir? You need to get back to your room," a woman's voice called, and soon a hand landed on his shoulder.
His heart leapt into his throat. He didn't waste any time in pulling away from her and running, albeit clumsily, away. She shouted after him, but he was far too fast.
He dodged into an elevator after a decidedly confused man in a white coat exited it, slamming the button to close the doors over and over again before turning his attention to the numbers.
He couldn't tell what the numbers were.
They were too jumbled - each time he was certain he'd found 1, it turned into 7. 5 morphed into 2, 6 became 9 — all the while, dread collected at the pit of his stomach. He didn't want to be stuck there. He couldn't be stuck there.
He pressed the bottom leftmost button, huddling in the corner of the elevator and praying he would be safely brought to the bottom floor. He wanted to go home.
But what was home?
He lived in a small, dirty apartment - the checks the government wrote him for his heroics didn't offer much - and he dreaded it each time he returned there.
Now, Jackalope had a home. His house was nice, and quaint, and well decorated and despite all the wrongdoing Jackalope did, it was homely. It wasn't fair.
He'd devoted all his time and energy to the protection of people, and what did it get him? A small, dirty apartment and countless articles speculating what scandals he may be a part of. It wasn't fair.
The elevator opened with a slow creak, a testament to its age, and there to meet him was a blue uniformed man. "Nick, I need you to come with me."
It was Midnight, waiting to drag him back to the men in white coats. He wouldn't allow it.
Nicolas slowly stood, supporting himself on the wall before bolting past Midnight and running very clumsily for the automatic doors.
"Nick, you're dru — oh, fuck it."
He could hear the electrical snap of the taser before he could feel it, but even then it failed to bring him down, as much as it hurt. The skin on his back exploded into a thick plate of grey, boney material, and that plate absorbed the brunt of the shock. He must've gotten his dispar back.
"Nick, stop! We're trying to help you!" Midnight screamed, the lights overhead flickering.
But Nicolas knew he couldn't be trusted. Sure, he'd taken Victor away from his ear, and Nicolas was very great full for that, but he'd also led him to more people in white coats shoving more needles into him. He had to get away.
Nicolas made it through the doors and found himself barefoot on the slick asphalt of the parking lot. The moon warbled in a thin sheen of water beneath his feet, and rain carefully pattered over the city. It was cold. He was cold. But he couldn't go back.
Nicolas continued to run, some semblance of stability returning to him after a while. He ran and ran and ran, until his legs ached, until the bottoms of his feet were scratched and sore, until each cut stung with the late rain washing into them. Then he found a bus stop, and he slunk into the back of the bus with a plethora of people staring at him. His dispar bubbled just below the surface, almost - but not quite - ready to burst over his entirety.
He was given a wide berth, likely by people fearing he was insane, and allowed to sit just next to the exit doors. He waited for one stop, then two, and on the third, he stepped out into a quieter side of town where the landscape was covered with little suburban homes instead of looming skyscrapers.
He knew this place. It was where Jackalope lived.
Nicolas stopped, the gentle patter having morphed into a steady beating of rain, and stared out at the neighborhood before him. He could vaguely tell that the house across the street, with the yellow police tape around it, was Jackalopes', but he couldn't remember what happened there. He was with Jackalope, trying to figure out what they'd done with Syrus, but then it was fuzzy. Nicolas began to cross the street, his feet still stinging from the wounds they'd suffered, and made his way into the yard.
The door was off its hinges, and after tearing the yellow caution tape away, he was able to slink in rather easily. The house had a certain chill about it, as if something terrible had happened there, but Nicolas could hardly think of that. All he could think of was the blind man's cane laying on the ground before him. He stooped to pick it up, became immediately dizzy, and promptly fainted on the entryway floor.
