Autistic Spencer Reid

Chapter 10

"Spence, are you okay? Does anything hurt?" JJ asked, he could hear the concern in his voice but his mind was too foggy to process what she had just said. 

What does she want me to say? What happened?

His brain fog is heavy when he returns to consciousness after he passes out, he knows this, but it's still really frustrating when it happens.

Spencer tries to question JJ but instead just lets out a mumble. His vision is returning to normal but the lights are so bright that he's just squinting anyway. His hearing is coming back, but it's too loud to hear anything of value. Waking up to this environment is never good, Spencer knows he'll quickly get overstimulated here. 

He tries to make his limbs respond to his thoughts, trying to get away from the light and noise. His limbs feel heavy and there's a tiredness deep in his bones, seeping through his muscles and settling in his head, everything feels absolutely exhausting.

He can feel his fingers twitching, not necessarily intentionally, but that's still a good sign. 

But he can also feel pressure on his right index finger, he has a good idea about what it is and why it's there. But he still doesn't want it on him.

If the doctors and nurses had explained what they were trying to do with him earlier and asked if they were okay to touch him then he may have been able to tolerate it better. 

He could hear someone talking near him, a feminine voice, but also stern and slightly aged.

"You said PoTS right? I'm a cardiologist, I diagnose that. We can test for it upstairs, we have a tilt table. Room 206 when you're ready," The doctor had walked away, her feet padding away into the distance.

Had Spencer heard that right? He hadn't even mentioned it to his own doctor, yet he'd practically been fast-tracked into getting a diagnosis, or at least some form of testing. It usually takes at least 2 years for PoTS to be diagnosed because of the lack of understanding and misdiagnoses, how was this so fast?

"Spencer, we're going to take you to room 206 okay? They have a tilt table test there and it'll be quieter, is that okay?" Rossi had asked him a question but all Spencer could so was slightly nod his head and even that was a struggle.

He knew he'd have to get off the floor now, but that takes so much energy that he honestly didn't have. He could possibly help get himself off the floor, but he definitely couldn't do it himself, and he'd end up feeling ill as soon as he stood up which didn't fill him with enthusiasm.

He could feel who he assumed was Rossi, JJ and a nurse holding various body parts to help pull him up. He helped as much as he could, but ultimately it was them who had practically lifted him up.

When he finally stood up, as he had expected, his heart rate went up, his head started pounding and he felt like he was going to faint. The weakness came on pretty suddenly but luckily someone had thought to put a wheelchair behind him, so he slumped into that.

He could hear a persistent and incessant beeping that just seemed to be increasing by the second.

"Turn that off, please, turn it off," Spencer mumbled. He was finding it hard to keep his head up steady but he tried his best to cover his ears.

He was prevented from doing this by a thick cord that seemed to be attached to the end of his finger, he'd forgotten about that. The oximeter was fitted tightly to his finger and was signalling a machine to beep to his heart beat, which was very fast.

"170, that's very high. I think you might be right about the PoTS. I'll wheel him up, follow behind," A nurse had shown the distress on her face but Spencer really couldn't care less at this point, he just wanted to go to sleep. He'd slept ten hours the night before, yet he was constantly plagued with fatigue, these episodes making it even worse.

"Yeh, lead the way," JJ smiled at the nurse and put her hands in her back pockets, following after Spencer who was holding his head up with his hands, and the nurse who was pushing him. She was happy that her being pushy had led to the doctors and nurses actually doing something to help.

"I'll message Hotch and let him know we're going to be here a while longer. We've caught the unsub now so it's just paperwork and packing up." Rossi pulled out his phone and sent a quick text to Hotch.

Rossi: Spencer is having some tests done, we'll be a while longer.

Hotch: Okay, we'll pack up and let the jet know. Do you think you'll be out of there by tonight?

Rossi: Probably, I'll keep you updated.

Rossi put his phone away and followed after JJ who was holding the lift open for him.

"How are you feeling Spencer?" Rossi looked over at him, he looked a bit queasy.

"Honestly? Like shit" Spencer managed to get out. He wanted to give them a reassuring smile or laugh at the poor joke he'd made, but he just couldn't muster up the energy to mask right now. He knew the team is okay with him being himself now, but that didn't mean he automatically unmasked around them, it was ingrained in his mind, survival skills.

They reached room 206 and made their way into it, helping Spencer onto the table and standing to the side so he could be strapped against the table. Spencer knew they mainly did this to patients who were at risk of fainting, him clearly being one of them.

"Spencer, I'm going to stick this needle in your arm, it supplies IV fluids if you faint and we can take blood during the test and examine that later to make sure we're not missing anything."

Spencer had come around a bit more now, he was lying back down which helped. He winced away from the needle when it was stuck into him, but he knew that the test would be a hell of a lot worse than the needle prick.

"Okay, let's get this started then," the older feminine voice from earlier had walked into the room towards him.

Spencer gulped and briefly closed his eyes, hoping that this would show what was going on with him, but also hoping that it wasn't so bad that he passed out again. There seemed to be a very small margin for both of those things to occur simultaneously.

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Let me know if you enjoyed this part and I'm open to any suggestions!