It wasn't until after an hour had passed that a nurse dressed in teal  scrubs approached Brian and Kevin in the waiting room. Both looked at the woman with weary eyes.

"They have Mr. Carter stablized for now. Would you like to go this his room?" the nurse asked.

Brian quickly stood up along with Kevin; a mixture of anxiety and dread filled their hearts. "So can we both go in at the same time?" Kevin questioned.

The nurse gave Kevin a tight smile. "Well, typically we would only allow one person in the patient's ICU room at a time but I think that is a silly rule and no one seems to follow it. You can both go in but be advised you may be asked to leave."

Both men nodded their heads to assert their cooperation with the nurse. Wordlessly, they followed the young nurse down the hall past brightly lit patient rooms. Kevin kept his focused to the woman leading them to the room; Brian stole a sideways glance into one room, instantly regretting what he saw.

'Nicky won't be like that.' he mentally shuddered.

Finally, the nurse crossed the doorway into the ICU room where Nick was.

"You can pull chairs up to the side of his bed." Seeing the look on Brian's face she quickly added, "I know that the amount equipment and IV bags are probably overwhelming, but this is standard protocol for most ICU patients."

Instead of entering further into the room the two men simply stood in the doorway, unsure of what to do while the nurse busied herself with adjusting one of the IV machines. Kevin's face paled as he looked at his baby brother.

As she was starting to turn around to leave the room the nurse started to say, "My name is Jen..." She stopped in midsentence when she saw Kevin's ghostly white complexion. Quickly, she grabbed a hard plastic chair and took Kevin's arm, resting a hand on his elbow without missing a beat. "Sit down hun...."

This jerked Brian out of his stupor. "Kev are you alright?"

Dragging his palm across his face in a defeated gesture, Kevin sighed; he immediately felt embarrassed. "Ah....um, yeah I'm fine."

Brian looked at him with uncertainty, "You're as white as a sheet, are you gonna fa---"

"I said I'm fine!" he sharply hissed.

Because of the sudden display of temper it was the nurse that suddenly felt embarrassed. She cleared her throat to regain her composure. "Well as I starting to tell you, my name is Jenny. Let me know if you need anything." She tossed a look over to Brian as she passed him on her way out of the room. "Anything." she added with a whisper as she kept walking out the door.

Kevin gingerly laid a hand ontop of Nick's bruised hand that was laying beside his body. "Why didn't you just stay back at the house?" he choked out with a sob.

Brian laid a comforting hand ontop of his cousin's shoulder, tears pooling in his eyes as he looked down at Nick's scraped face.

"You said you had all of this under control, God why did't I tell you to stay put..."

"Kev, stop blaming yourself," Brian soothed. "You had no idea this would---"

"Don't!" the older man snapped. "Don't you dare make excuses and tell me this wasn't my fault! he continued harshly. "I'm supposed to be responsible for Nicky---"

"Yeah, maybe that was back when he was fourteen!" Brian countered, echoing his cousin's tone.

Instead of countering Brian's words, Kevin simply shook his head in a defeated gesture.

"God Bri, I'm sorry I snapped at you; this is...is just all so surreal," the older man quietly studdered.

Glancing down at Nick's swollen face, Brian lightly squeezed Kevin's shoulder. His throat constricted as he swallowed the lump that was in his throat.

"Do you think one of us should call Nick's family?"

Kevin's head snapped up. "God no!....I mean, we should wait until we know more, besides the weather isn't really that good for anyone to be out. I'm glad you came up, but I'm also not happy you came."

Brian tried to reason with his cousin. "But don't you think that's being unfair to his parents?"

"Normal parents I would say yes but we're talking Nick's family. Do you really want them here causing more problems?"

"I guess you're right."

Leaning forward, Kevin lightly stroked Nick's face with the back of his fingers in a fatherly gesture. "Hopefully he wakes up soon so we know more of what has happened to him....."