This was the third time that Seth had woken up that night. He was coming down off the morphine more and more each hour and it was starting to get on his last nerve. The ache in his ribs was becoming more annoying as he struggled to find a comfortable position to get back to sleep in, but as the hours wore on it seemed like the idea was sinking further and further into wishful thinking territory.

At least his wings didn't hurt as badly anymore. They were healing, but it felt like it was taking forever. He'd gotten so used to flying around everyday –even made it a point to practice almost as often as he went to the gym- that it felt really odd to be immobilized like this. Not to mention the disuse of his legs.

That had been a hard pill to swallow.

When the nurses had explained to him what had happened to him after the wreck, he'd nearly fallen into a panic attack. Of course, they told him it was only temporary paralysis and that he should be able to move his legs within a month's time frame. It would take that long because of the time required for his spine to mend the bruise, but it still scared him to death.

What if the doctors were wrong? What if he never regained the use of his legs again?

Seth turned on his side, favoring his ribs, and tried to keep his eyes closed. Maybe if he didn't open them, he would eventually fall asleep. He sighed, wondering if Dean and Roman had made it to Tampa yet. Honestly, he had no idea where the next show would be after Tampa; he was pretty behind on the schedule. It wasn't like he'd been told; he wasn't going to be there anyway.

He heard footsteps outside of his room, soft pattering footsteps that Seth disregarded as one of the nurses in scrubs moving up and down the hall. Shifting in his blankets, he sighed and screwed his eyes closed even tighter, trying to will sleep to come to him out of thin air. The footsteps have stopped outside his door, and suddenly the room is dimly illuminated by the bright light seeping in from the hall. It darkens again just as quickly, and Seth is still oblivious to the nurse's presence as she crosses the room and stands behind Seth's back.

Seth still isn't quite sure if Finn's weird ass powers will continue to prevent everyone from remembering that he has wings, but so far the nurses and orderlies have either not noticed that they are there or treated them as if they were the most normal thing in the world, inspecting the adhesive bandages but never bothering them. He guesses that's what the nurse is doing now and just goes with it.

There's silence for a long moment, and then the sound of clicking machinery, and even from behind his closed eyelids, he can see the bright light of a camera flash.

Seth's eyes fly wide open and he nearly sends himself crashing back down against the bed when he sits up too quickly. The tall shape looming at the foot of his bed is definitely not a nurse. Unfortunately, he knows exactly who this is, and once he gets over his initial shock, a ferocity that isn't entirely Seth's fills his veins. He growls like some rabid animal, his heart pumping double-time from fear or shock or anger –he wasn't quite sure which- and his veins pumped with adrenaline. He recognized this feeling and had no doubt that his eyes sheened gold.

Why couldn't Finn have stuck around long enough to get this guy too?

He propelled himself off the bed with a strength and speed he didn't know he possessed in his current state, lunging at the man in the baseball cap with a war-like cry. Seth tackled the man to the ground, ignoring his surprised shriek, and cocked his fist back. His knuckles spattered with blood, bruising from just the one punch to the man's nose.

"Who the fuck are you and why do you keep following me?" Seth snarled, readying for another blow. The man who he recognized from the arena that night opened and closed his mouth like a fish, eyes wide in the dark. "Gold," he stammered out, glasses knocked askew and blood coming in rivulets from his nose.

Seth glared down at him, fist still cocked back, looking at a loss as to what to do next. The decision he makes is risky and on the fly and probably really stupid, but he reaches down and roots through the man's pockets. He finds a phone and a wallet inside, and snarls at the man, "Jacket. Off. Now."

His voice isn't his own right now. He hardly recognizes the dangerous low tones, but they appear to be working in his favor so he brushes them off as a scare factor.

Interesting.

The man sheds his jacket and holds it out with a shaking arm. Seth snatches it up, wrestles the man's camera from around his neck and, with one last glare, escapes through the door. The door locks from the inside for privacy, so Seth makes sure to lock it before he closes it shut behind him and makes his way down the hall, hoping none of the orderlies were close by.

As he walks, he keeps a brisk pace to avoid drawing too much attention and shrugs the stolen jacket on over his own shoulders, thankful that his stalker was tall and a size bigger than Seth was normal to so that the jacket was comfortable over his wings. He shoves the wallet and phone into either of the pockets in the jacket and hangs the camera around his neck by its strap. He hangs back from rounding a corner, finding a nurse exiting one of the rooms with a tray of pills in hand.

Sensing an idea, Seth waits until her back is turned and she begins walking down the hall, and then silently pads towards the room. He manages to catch the door before it closes and locks –otherwise he would've needed a key card to open it again- and slips inside. There are cabinets full of pills in boxes and jars, assorted medical equipment and silver trays like the one the nurse had been carrying.

Seth knows what his painkillers are called; he's had enough in his lifetime to be able to know the names. He roots through the cabinets until he finds them and unscrews the top. He shoves his hand inside and collects a handful of the little white capsules, stuffs them into his pockets and replaces the jar. Briefly, he questions why he's doing this. Is he really about to illegally break out of a hospital? He's already punched a guy in the nose and stolen his stuff, not to mention his pockets are currently filled with pain medication that he was never allotted. Why are you running?

The camera thumps heavily against his chest as he moves, almost like a reminder. Oh. Right. Because the person who could rat him out and expose him to the public was following him. He needed to get out of Cincinnati. If he could get off the grid, then the man couldn't follow him. He had said that he had been following the show on the road, and that was how he'd been finding Seth all this time. Seth peeked out through the door, making sure the coast was clear, before heading down the hallway in the same direction the previous nurse had gone. The elevators were the opposite direction, but if the orderlies found out that he'd escaped, that would be the first place that they would look. It was easy to access, especially for someone who was supposed to be wounded and in pain.

Stairs it was.

Seth found the stairwell with no problem and hurried down them as quickly as he could. By the time he'd made it to the ground floor level, he was breathing hard, his ribs protesting annoyingly as his lungs pressed against them trying to gulp in precious air. Now the hard part was getting out through the hospital entrance while still in his gown that clearly marked him as a patient. He walked as quietly as he could from the stairwell, closing the door softly behind him. This late at night, there weren't that many people in the lobby; one or two stragglers at best, and a drowsy looking nurse manning the front desk.

Thankfully, as Seth neared the desk, the nurse leaned down to fiddle with something in her pocket and then returned her focus to what Seth guessed was her phone. From there, Seth used her distraction and slipped towards the front doors. One of the two stragglers looked up at him as he hurried by, but did nothing to stop him.

Once the doors slid open, Seth made a break for it. He ran through the night air, his hospital gown flapping like tails behind him, the ground cool against his feet now that the sun was not there to warm it.

So he was out now.

First things first, he would have to get rid of the giveaway outfit. Finding a Wal-Mart that was still open was easy, and using the money he found in the stalker's wallet, he managed to snag a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, some underwear, and a nondescript baseball cap. He stuffed the rest of the underwear and his gown and shirts into a backpack –a pretty good idea on his part to buy some of those packs of t-shirts and underwear- and simply ripped the tags off of a pair of cheap looking flip-flops. After paying with cash, Seth left the wallet behind and pocketed the rest of the paper money, since there was no use in using the credit or debit cards if he didn't have ID or a pin number to work with. He left the wallet with the customer service desk, saying that someone had dropped it in somewhere in the store, and legged it out of the store.

Fuck, this was so surreal. It felt like something out of a movie; stealing people's wallets and having to disappear in such a fugitive-like fashion. Actually, this was probably what Dean did on a daily basis. He'd tried to teach Seth once, but Seth had brushed him off -"I don't wan't you to teach me how to be a menace to society"-but now, he was kind of glad that he had remembered at least something from that lesson.

From there, Seth had no idea where he would go. He just knew that he needed to get out of Cincinnati. He pulled out the phone and dialed a number he knew would pick up. Heaven knew why he was calling this number, he had no idea what he would say once they picked up, but as the ringer began on the other line, he waited with baited breath for the familiar voice.

Seth knew they'd picked up. He could hear them breathing.

But for a while, neither of them said anything, shock evident for both of them.

"Hello?"

Seth waited for a response, and smiled when he was answered with a nervous-sounding, "He…hello?"

"It's me," Seth said, knowing Dean would recognize who he was talking to from his voice alone. Sure enough, he replied, "I know. What's-"

"I'm gonna be gone for a while, okay?" Seth blurted out. He himself didn't really know why he said that. Where exactly was he going?

"Gone?" came Dean's startled reply. "Gone where? Where are you right now?"

"I'm outside the hospital," Seth lied. "I ran."

He can practically hear Dean's jaw dropping. "You what?"

"Look, I'll see you later okay? I'm gonna miss the bus if I don't go now, and I don't know how much battery this thing has," says Seth, unaware of what his brain has cooked up for him. He murmurs a quick goodbye and hangs up, shoving the phone back into his pocket and really wishing that he had though to grab a USB charger from the Wal-Mart. Too late for that, he guessed. He was going to miss the bus if he stayed here any longer, and he needed the rest of the phone's battery to search the web for his next destination.

He needed to find out where Ring of Honor was being held this week; that would be his best bet.

Don't you remember, Seth? You're temporarily paralyzed; what are you doing up? Expect little one or three shots later on, I think? If you want to play a game, pick your fighter for Battleground: Seth or Brock. All the users and guests who pick right, will get the next chapter dedicated to them. Just something fun. :)

-AC