Page 36 of Twisted Fate

“Will, watch out!” Logan cried as he felt his grip slip completely, the crowbar pulling right out of his hands.

Will darted backward, knocking right into Logan as he did so. Logan felt time slow to an impossible crawl as he teetered backward, reached for the guard rail that surrounded the huge machine, but missed it. The world narrowed down to little more than the ceiling of his factory as he fell over the guard rails, the shouting voices of his employees a mumble of sound that made no sense. He knew what was coming next - impact - but he didn’t think about that in the milliseconds before he hit the concrete floor, he thought of Keily and their girls.

Pain exploded in his left leg, his left hip, along his right shoulder, and finally in his head. He felt the bones splinter in his leg and was certain he heard the loudest sound he’d ever heard as his skull cracked when his head bounced on the floor. That’s when the world went instantly black for Logan.

* * *

“Start an IV drip…you got his leg stabilized? Right, let’s move him.” Logan heard female voices from somewhere in the darkness he now inhabited. He perceived movement but had no idea where he was going or how he was getting there.

“Keily…” He mumbled, reaching for her, but she wasn’t there.

The world went dark and silent again.

“What’s wrong with him, why won’t he wake up?” He heard Keily’s voice demand, and he wondered who she was talking about and why she sounded so panicked and angry.

The world faded away again.

“We’ve repaired the damage to his leg.” He heard someone say but he couldn’t ask whose leg was damaged or why they were telling him about the guy’s leg. It wasn’t any of his business, but he couldn’t move his lips or make his throat work.

What was going on? Why couldn’t he speak? Or move?

The darkness tugged at him again, invited him to escape this strange place and he accepted, for now.

Time passed slowly, too quickly, in uncountable seconds for Logan. There were moments of near awareness when he caught snippets of sentences, a flash of sunlight, the smell of food, but he could not seem to pull himself out of the darkness. Was this what Keily felt after her surgery, something she’d tried to explain to him a few times? He felt as if he was drowning in the darkness, trapped there and unable to escape. He clawed at the darkness, looking for a foothold, for a way to tear himself free or climb out of this black hell, but nothing happened. He remained alone, without the woman he…loved.

The thought, all thoughts, floated away and he knew nothing for a while.

A streak of sunlight seared the crack in his eyelids before it disappeared. Too bright, too painful. Go back to the dark.

At other times there was pain, but it only lasted for a few moments before it flowed away into a black river that blended into the world he now inhabited. Logan floated there, suspended in nothing, his thoughts coming to life every now and then, bringing him back to something like reality, if reality was a black echoing cave.

He had no concept of time, had no idea how long he’d been in that strange world, but he knew he wanted to escape it. He wanted to be at home with his girls, with Keily. His family. The only real thing that mattered to him.

Maybe he’d lost his chance, maybe this was really Hell and he’d never escape, he worried, on the occasions when he could think of anything at all. What if this was it? What if he’d…died?

This couldn’t be it, though. Life had been so cruel to him until he stopped waiting for the world to be nice to him and took his fate into his own hands. He’d made something for himself and when the chance came to have far more than he’d ever hoped to have, he’d taken it. Hadn’t he?

18

Keily

She rushed to the hospital within minutes of Avery coming in to check on her. There’d been a sound, something like a wounded animal in the last mortal throes of a very painful death, a sound Keily hadn’t understood came from her, until Avery rushed in to help. Logan was in the hospital, he’d fallen off one of the machines, a 15-foot drop. He had a head injury.

Keily didn’t know how bad the injury was but her brain produced a million horrifying images as she raced to the hospital he’d been taken to. As a stop light held her up, seeming to take much longer than it normally did, Keily imagined him dying without her there for his last moments, without having ever heard her say that she loved him. Had she missed her chance?

Rosa and Violet both called her as she drove but Keily didn’t answer. She was barely aware that she was driving now, in too much of a panic to be completely aware but still understanding that even the hands-free distraction might be too much for her to deal with at the moment. She had to get to the hospital, had to know what was wrong, had to know if Logan was still…alive.

Tears streamed unchecked down her face, and she was totally unaware of the way sobs tore from her throat. All she cared about was following the road to the hospital and once she was there, finding a spot to park. She could just leave the car at the emergency room entrance, but she knew it would get towed, and it wasn’t really a nice thing to do.

She scoffed out a smile through the watery mess of her face. A year ago, she’d have parked there anyway. Logan had changed her entirely, even down to that little nicety. Would he be there to see how she changed in the future? To see how their girls changed and grew over the years?

He had to be.

The words became a mantra as she walked into the emergency department and asked to know where Logan was. She explained that she was Logan’s girlfriend, that she had three baby girls at home that wanted to have their daddy back, and the woman at the reception area gave in and finally told Keily where he was.

When she made it back to the private room where Logan was being cared for Keily looked around, expecting to see rushing medical staff, but there was nothing. Keily hesitated in the door, looking around in confusion. Was this the wrong room?

“Can I help you?” A male nurse walked by and stopped when he saw Keily was in a bit of a predicament.