~ Once again bright light came from the darkness as Ion slowly opened his eyes, his breathing was raspy as he could hear the soft beep of a heart monitor near by as it was in tune with his own pulse. His chest started aching as he looked down to see a large scar freshly closed with staples, Ion winced at the sight and cursed under his breath. "Dam it really was surgery, I was hoping that was just a bad dream" he thought as he realized he was still fully nude, the blanket that was over him was pulled down below his waist as Ion saw the catheter coming out of his sheath, was probably put in not too long ago as he was slowly relieving himself, he had not been out of surgery too long. Feeling weak, Ion could notice every now and then a somewhat strong shock jolting him on his heart as he noticed the pacemaker dangling on the side of his chest, it's wires shoved through a small opening in his neck, "I am a mess" he thought to himself. "Ah so you are awake" a voice filled Ion's ears as he turned his head to see Oliver standing beside him, "you are lucky to be alive, you gave us quite a scare" Oliver continued. "What happened?" Ion asked slowly as Oliver took a seat beside him, "well you had a fairly bad cardiac episode, your mitral valve ruptured causing a backlog of blood to fill your heart which caused cardiac arrest, we had to get you into surgery as quick as possible to get you on bypass so we could restore blood flow and fix your heart" Oliver answered, "frankly the survival rate for this is quite low, you mush have one good guardian angle to still be here" he continued. "Flint, what did you have to do this time?" Ion thought to himself as he heard Oliver's words, "but there is something I wish to speak to you about" Oliver continued as he placed a hand on Ion's chest. "Your heart has deteriorated quite a bit over the last little bit, while this fix should last quite a while, the same could have been said when I first replaced your mitral valve a couple of years ago, it should not have ruptured like this" Oliver started saying, "your heart walls are weakening faster then they should from the effects of the rheumatic fever in your youth, while you may not need it right away, I think you should consider the possibility of a transplant" he continued as Ion looked a bit down. "I know it would not be ideal, but you should at least talk to our transplant team and get an opinion from them, at least get on the list just in case you really do need it sooner then latter" Oliver said, "I guess I don't have much of a choice, I don't want to black out like this again because of my weakening heart" Ion replied slowly, "good" Oliver said back, "I will make sure the team sees you after you are out of intensive care, but for now, there is someone who has been waiting for you to wake up, I will go get him and you can spend the rest of the intensive care visiting hours with your hubby" Oliver continued with a smile as he left the area, Ion sighed as a new weight was on his mind, "Flint, you can probably tone it down a bit, I don't need to look like I am dying to keep the ruse up" Ion thought as he closed his eyes as he would soon have Zephyr with him to talk things out..... ~
