#impukse

It was sudden. An overwhelming sense of dread and anxiety all washing over him all at once. He hadn’t been doing anything in particular to warrant them; he’d just been lazing around in his room, his back on the floor, and his legs up and hanging on the edge of his bed. You know; normal Bart Allen stuff.

Then out of nowhere his heart rate picked — more than normal even. Sure. The resting heart rate of a speedster was equivalent to that of a hummingbird. But this… This was too much.

Bart toppled off the bed, collapsing on the floor as his lungs started straining in his chest, pressing unevenly against his ribcage. His stomach was queasy. It churned and sloshed, even though he wasn’t moving. The taste of the big, home cooked meal the Garrick’s had made last night suddenly wasn’t so good as it threatened to come back up.

Flashes of memories he just wished he could forget — of ash and smoke, of bareness and bleakness, of fear, loneliness, and never ending paranoia — passed through his mind every time he blinked. Sure, he’d long since left that desolate future behind him. However, that fact wasn’t able to stop all of the anxiety it carried over into his new life. It didn’t stop him from worrying over the lives of his family and friends, or keep the constant fear that he would suddenly wake up and find that inhibitor collar around his neck and dirty jumpsuit on his body at bay. Instead, those trepidations emerged almost randomly, coming to the surface and leaving him in the form of painful anxiety attacks and night terrors.

So here he was; collapsed on the floor, trying, and failing, to force that nauseating wave of negative emotions away. He just didn’t know how. He never knew how. No matter how many times this happened, he was always in the same situation, and how could this be any different? As sobs quickly turned into rapid, shallow breaths — so shallow that he was starting to feel light headed — Bart just knew that this was going to be one of the worse fits.

It hurt. It hurt so much. He clutched at his throat, scratching, hoping that it would keep himself from hyperventilating. It failed. As much as he wanted to stop, Bart wouldn’t. He started heaving, as tears streamed down his face and smearing against the carpeted floor beneath him. His entire body wanted to curl into a ball.

He needed— He wanted— He couldn’t be alone right now. Why was he alone?

Somehow, honestly, he wasn’t completely sure, but me managed to crawl across the floor. Phone. He needed his phone. Where was it? Bart couldn’t see, his eyes blurring over as tears and gunk clouded his vision. But he couldn’t find it.

Bart couldn’t find his phone. He couldn’t see. So he did the only thing he knew he could he; he started running. He started running even though he could barely breath. He started running even though his legs felt like jelly. Thankfully, there was one place he could get himself on muscle memory alone, but it was hard. If he could, Bart would have been breaking through the sound barrier so he could get to his destination in a matter of seconds. That’s what he wanted to do. But in this sheer panic he was feeling, Bart just couldn’t trust his own legs. That in itself made everything so much worse.

Running was normally the best method Bart had of clearing his head. Today, running was his only escape plan.

He felt his shoulder crash into something solid, the sudden contact made him cry out, before topping over onto the ground. He rolled on what he remembered should be hardwood, but now that Bart was finally here, everything seemed to just get worse.

He was on his hands and knees, his breath heaving in his lungs as he choked on air. For a brief second, he thought that he might have heard a voice, but every sound was just so muffled it didn’t make sense.

Something made contact with his back, and suddenly, everything just went black.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Bart blinked his eyes open only to stare at a blank, baby blue wall. His walls were forest green…. This wasn’t his room. He tried to push himself up — noting that he was somehow in a bed — but found that there was a weight around his torso, pinning him in place. An exhausted hand whipped at his face, before he forced himself to turn and see where the weight was coming from.

“Feel better, cariño?” The voice was heavy in Bart’s ear and so reassuringly familiar.

“Jaime…” Bart’s voice felt like gravel in his throat. It was at this time that he started to process how his legs felt like lead, despite knowing he couldn’t have possibly run that fast. His neck hurt, and for no more than a nanosecond he wondered if someone had choked him in his sleep, before he recalled doing something quite similar to himself not that long ago. God he was sore. The speedster heaved himself over, turning and wiggling as best as he could, feeling the grasp of a hand on his side helping him out so that the two teens were facing one another. “How long have I been out?”

“About an hour.” Jaime stroked comforting circled along Bart’s spine, trying to encourage the guy to relax. “We were pretty worried about you. More mother almost screamed when she saw you passed out on the floor.”

“Sorry.” He let out a deep breath and felt the stiffness in his shoulders release.

“You ok there?”