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Howie awoke to the feeling of someone injecting liquid into his IV, a burning sensation coursing through his veins. He looked to the side and seen that Dr. McNorton was the culprit for the pain.

“Ahh, Mr. Dorough, how are you feeling?”

Howie yawned, rubbing his hand over his face. “Fine… what was that you just put into me?”

“Morphine,” he replied, discarding the syringe. “For the pain, you don’t remember, do you?”

He shook his head, “No… remember what?”

“Well, Brian had fallen unconscious, and you, had sacrificed yourself and took a dive to break his fall. That instant it happened, your body seemed to be in shock, actually becoming numb to the pain your body was really protesting. As soon as we got you two back into your room, you felt the immerse pain and fell unconscious, kind of like a delayed reaction. Your body is in no condition to be doing anything beyond the extreme, both you and Brian.”

Howie turned to look away, he didn’t remember falling unconscious. “Is Brian alright?”

Dr. McNorton nodded, “Yeah, he’s just getting his required rest. I have some good news, and some bad news…”

Howie’s heart rate quickened, which caused the machine hooked up to him to blare in alarm. “Calm down Mr. Dorough,” Dr. McNorton urged, resetting the machine so it would stop the screeching sound. “If you keep this up, I won’t be able to release any information to you until I know your capable of withstanding it.”

“Sorry,” he softly apologized. “Just getting a little to excited…”

“Excited or worried?” he had asked him. Both, he thought to himself. “well, the good news is that Mr. Alexander James McLean is conscious.” Howie’s eyes widened. “The bad news is… he doesn’t remember anything, and we aren’t too sure if he remembers anyone.” Howie’s heart sank. “That’s where you come in. You see, when Alex became conscious, he had, what we would like to call an outburst episode.”

“An outburst episode?” Howie had repeated.

He simply nodded, “Yes… a part of Alex’s brain was damaged, and we aren’t sure if it had damaged his short term memory, or his long term memory.”

“What’s the difference?”

Dr. McNorton sighed, “If he damaged his long term memory, he will not remember anything that had happened in the past, which means, he won’t remember who you all are, his career, everything is basically wiped clean off his slate. If his short term memory is damaged, he’ll remember everything in the past, but he won’t be able to turn his short term memory into long term memory. So, for example, he seen me today when he became conscious, but as soon as he falls asleep tonight and wakes up tomorrow, he won’t even remember what happened yesterday, and everything would be new to him, including him meeting me again. But then again, I could be wrong about both. Maybe the concussion to his head only affected him in a way where he forgot about the bus crash incident. He’ll remember stepping onto that bus, but everything else from that point will be nothing.”

Howie sat there in shock, letting the new information sink in. “So… your taking me over to him to see if he remembers us?”

Dr. McNorton nodded, “That is, if your up to it…”

Howie fell silent for a while, thinking it over. There was no question that he wanted to see AJ, but what made him think was if he was ready to see his best friend in such a state, what if he didn’t remember who they were? He turned towards Brian, “Hey Rok…”

But Dr. McNorton stopped him, “I don’t think that’s a good ideal. You see, I’m guessing when he saw Nick yesterday, it was in a way, traumatizing for him, being that Nick could have been a reminder of the crash. People receive things differently, and people cope with things in different ways. You seem to show no complications in coping with the incident, but Brian, on the other hand, is struggling with handling what had happened to you all. Certain things from now till god knows when can become a painful reminder of the crash to him, and I don’t mean to sound pessimistic, but you will all have your little episodes somewhere down the road, it’s just that, it’s wearing Brian down more than I had thought.”

Howie had nodded and just stared at Brian, watching his chest rise and fall. Part of him felt bad for leaving Brian here, because they both agreed that they would go in and see Kevin and AJ once they became conscious, but the other part of him knew that Dr. McNorton was right, Brian needed all the rest he could get, and he just wasn’t ready to face certain things like Howie was.