A/N: In response to some of the reviews, of course that wasn't the end :)

When the body reaches a certain level of pain, you react in one of two ways: fight or flight.

Save yourself, save yourself, save yourself. This is the message your brain pumps out when it chooses to fight. It works so hard not to cast you adrift, not to let go, not to lose. It's the adrenaline; it stops the body from giving up; it saves your life.

But when it chooses flight, when your body decides it's had enough, it's going to throw in the towel, it's finished. Done. Your body succumbs, your blood stops flowing, your heart stops beating. You're free from pain. You drift.

Lucy had always understood this response. She understood pain. She thrived on adrenaline. That rush, it made her come alive. So she sure as hell was going to go down without a fight.

In waves of derealization, between time lapses, with blurry vision, she could tell she was alive. When she looked up it was hazy gray. She closed her eyes. When she looked up again there was someone hovering over her, someone she didn't recognize. They forced open her eyes and shined light into them. She felt the pain of the glare and gasped.

She bolted upright and choked for air and the man hovering over her pushed her back down. She was suddenly enveloped in an excruciating pain that was the most intense she had ever felt. Her right shoulder was screaming with heat. Her body began to shake the longer she was conscious and aware and aching.

"Calm down!" said the man. "I know it hurts but we need you to calm down!"

She couldn't speak even if she wanted to. The burning sensation that was taking over her body had numbed her mind. For however long the pain lasted, she wasn't herself. Her mind was in pieces, scattered in a frantic search to get a grip on the reality of what had just happened.

There was busied movement, chaotic movement going on around her, and constant poking and needling at the gunshot wound. She screamed, inside and out. They kept touching the wound and dabbing away her blood and fishing around inside her body, deeper and deeper. Nothing was sacred. She was oozing with vulnerability. She couldn't hide from this or think herself away even if she wanted to.

There were voices echoing around her that she could hear, touchstones.

"Patient's name?"

"Lucy Sullivan."

"About how old does she look?"

"I'd say sixteen, maybe seventeen."

"Height?"

"Approximately fight feet, two inches."

"Weight?"

"Between one-ten and one-twenty."

"She's a criminal, no?"

"The police were chasing her."

"I see."

"How's the wound looking?"

She screamed again and squeezed her eyes shut. They were digging into her with their instruments and knives and fingers, so unapologetic. Why didn't they let up? Why were they making it worse? She lurched and tried to curl up in safety but they held her body upward, wide and stretched out. They strapped her legs to either side of the bed and did the same with her arms. She was trapped entirely and they were still scraping away at the inside of her. Then two hands touched down to her head and her hair. She opened her eyes and saw a woman, middle-aged and teary, trying to coax her out of it.

"Are we almost done?" she asked.

"Give me one more minute."

She felt a long, rounded instrument press into her shoulder…two pressing fingers…another a fast prick…and then…

"Got it."

The bullet dropped loudly into a pan. Her shoulder felt cool in its absence. But the pain, oh the pain. It didn't get worse but it didn't subside. Her body stopped shaking but it could only concentrate now on the throbbing pulse of her exposed muscles and bones and tendons.

"Morphine. Get the kit. We'll close it on up."

"Yes, doctor."

The woman's gentle hands left her and she floated away for a brief moment. The man to her right stood up and leaned over her body to speak to her. He held either side of her face and his fingers were red with her own blood.

"Lucy, can you hear me? Nod if you can hear me."

She nodded.

"We're taking care of you, alright?"

The woman handed a syringe and a glass bottle of liquid over her body.

"You'll feel another twinge of pain but it'll go away. You might be knocked out for a little while, okay? Nod if you can hear me."

She nodded.

"You're not going anywhere."

The woman returned her hands to Lucy's head and she felt the tiny pinch of pain, and as if it were the final straw, she felt a cool sedation enter the pulsating wound and it spread through her blood to her arm and her neck and her legs and her chest…And she was finally calm once more.

Time skipped intervals. It cheated reality. It throttled her deep into her own subconscious and when she was ready to return again, when it was time for her to come back, it did so gently.

"Miss Sullivan?"

Lucy felt warmth as more sounds settled in.

"Miss Sullivan?"

Echoing into clarity, she opened her eyes. She stared upwards at a light and a profoundly white ceiling. She felt more warmth on her arm and then – Ouch! – immense pain in her right shoulder.

"Can you hear me?"

Her eyes traveled slowly. A white outfitted woman was at her bedside. She was middle-aged, with soft eyes and light hair, and Lucy recognized her face at once as the one who stood hopeful and sympathetic during the worst of her care. Her hand was on her left arm – that was the warm feeling she felt. But then she felt something else on her left arm; it was cool and smooth. She tried lifting her hand but she couldn't do it. She looked down: her wrist was handcuffed to the sidebar of the bed.

"The morphine's staring to wear off," said the nurse, and suddenly her voice wasn't so gentle and angelic. "You'll feel groggy for a while."

Groggy was correct; she still felt half-asleep, entirely too sedated. "There's been a mistake…" she started. Her voice was weak and quiet, something she did not recognize.

"No mistake," said the nurse curtly. She stood at the side of her bed and bent over slightly to speak, and her voice was very loud and direct as if she were scolding her. "You were shot in the shoulder this afternoon on Tenth St. and were brought in by the police. The doctor took the bullet out and you've been out ever since. These—" she gave the handcuffs a rough shake, "—are to keep you from leaving until we can release you into police custody."

Lucy's heart was pounding. Her mouth had dropped open as the nurse spoke coldly to her. There was no sympathy left whatsoever in her eyes. The nurse picked up a clipboard next to her bed and began scribbling away furiously; Lucy could hear her dot the i's with vigor. When she looked around she felt claustrophobic: her bed was surrounded by only a foot of space on either side and was sectioned off by cream-colored curtains that swung back and forth whenever someone walked by. There was a light hanging over her bed and when she twisted her wrist around the glare caught on the shiny metal of the cuffs. Her bottom lip began to tremble. At the foot of the bed the curtain opened and a young girl her age stood in a student nurse's uniform. She gave Lucy a sympathetic smile but promptly righted herself when the older nurse looked her way.

"Aspirin tablets are on the table." The woman put the clipboard into the girl's hands. As she breezed through the curtain she spun around and said to Lucy with profound anger, "You're one lucky child – at least your wound was quick!"

It struck Lucy almost as badly as the bullet had. She was referencing the severe beating Michael Banks had received in Brooklyn; according to her, Lucy was, without a doubt, one of two culprits. Lucy bit down on her lip but it shook anyway and soon her cheeks were drenched in tears. She made to bring her hands to her face but was unable to – her right arm was in excruciating pain and the other was attached to the bed. The constraints coupled with her drowsiness made her weeping even worse.

"Here…" The young nurse fished out a hanky and dabbed at Lucy's cheeks. "I'm Nurse Turner. I'll be helping to take care of you, I guess. As long as we have you."

"You know," sniffled Lucy, "I didn't do it…It's all a huge mistake!"

Nurse Turner scanned over Lucy's petite body frame and slight muscles and also took a look at her spotless, non-bloodied knuckles. "I believe you."

Lucy whimpered. "Do you?"

Nurse Turner nodded. "I lived on the streets for some time, too."

Lucy sobbed hard. She hadn't cried this badly since she was a child. She felt embarrassed that it was in front of a complete stranger, yet the circumstances of her situation (the handcuffs, the injury, the hospital bed) did not let her hide anything.

"I know Spot," said Nurse Turner suddenly.

Lucy stopped moving.

Shaking her head, Nurse Turner continued. "I can't believe he dragged you into this. That boy is awful. I lived in Brooklyn when I was on the streets and we're about the same age. I've only met him a few times but I've heard so many things about him that I…" she paused to contemplate. "I'm just sorry you got involved with whatever shit he pulls. He's a monster."

With her jaw dropped, Lucy ran through the possible directions in which she could steer this conversation. She sniffled once more and took a deep breath. "I can't say I don't—"

"You don't deserve it," she interrupted. "Don't say that."

"Look, if you knew me and my history…I'm not sayin' I should've been hurt this bad and I'm sure as hell innocent and all…It's not his…" So many things were zipping through her mind that she could hardly think a clear thought. She imagined what Michael Banks looked like now; she thought of the way Spot treated her that night, and nearly every night preceding it; she remembered Spot as weak and vulnerable as she had seen anyone thereafter. She felt her eyes mist again.

"You should try and sleep some more," said Nurse Turner. "They're going to discharge you as soon as they can since really you should be in police custody right now."

Lucy's head fell to her pillow with a thud. Her teeth chattered from her quivering lip.

"I'm sorry," added the nurse empathetically. "I didn't mean to be so blunt. I'm just used to it and all…"

"Tell me something," said Lucy. "How'd you end up here if you lived on the streets?"

Nurse Turner sighed and contained a small smile. In a quiet voice she said, "I met a boy. A good boy. His family had money. Not a lot, but enough."

Lucy nodded and lay her head back down. Immediately David popped into her head.

"I'll check on you in a few hours." Nurse Turner turned and breezed through the curtains into the aisle of the hospital.

The large, wide room was full of emergent patients, and the sounds of pain and misery echoed from the high ceilings and back into the small space that Lucy inhabited. She could hear Nurse Turner a few beds over from hers, speaking with the head nurse and the doctor. She could hear the person in the bed to her left writhing in quiet agony and her imagination, in its sensitive and dreary state, haunted her. She shuddered to think what injuries brought them here.

Then the looming thought of what would happen when she actually started to recover weighed heavy on her. She was to stay until her wound was healed enough so that she could be carted off to jail. The company there, she knew, wasn't going to be as enjoyable as the hospital. She was still a wanted criminal; her reputation, however twisted and worthless, was tarnished irrevocably. She – Jack Kelly's little sister – had so much more to add to her persona. First it was her illicit relationship with Spot, and now, it was a crime she was suspected of committing because of him. How many more hits was she willing to take? This last one nearly finished her. If ever there were a more clear-cut, God-sent reason that she should stay away from him, this was it.

And yet despite this – all of this – she felt her heart pull and tug every time she carried the thought of Spot across her mind. It wasn't a nervous excitement like the way the two of them would sneak around together, but a deep, troubling anxiety. Her last trace of memory had him pulling a gun from his pocket aimed towards the police. Had they shot him as well? Was he still alive? And what about Banks, was he still alive as well? And if he was, would he ever correct the mistake he so erroneously made by pointing the finger at Lucy as well as Spot?

Lucy gave in and let her tears roll hard and free. Little wet tracks lined the creases of her eyes, down her cheek bones and into her hair. The sound of her soft sobs didn't embarrass her anymore, knowing pain engulfed the entire room. She acknowledged the feeling – this very truthful, deep-seeded ache – and eventually, she succumbed to it.