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When Colby wakes up, the first emotion he feels is shock. He knew that he was going to die on the boat, but instead he’s in the hospital and he has no idea how that is even possible. A quick check of his wrists shows that he’s not handcuffed, which means that the team must have been able to find some sort of evidence to prove his status at a triple agent. When he sees the figure sleeping at his bedside, he definitely knows that they found proof, as there is no way that Don would have allowed Charlie anywhere near him otherwise.
“I keep trying to get him to go home and get some sleep, but he’s stubborn,” comes a voice from the other side of his bed, that Colby knows to be Don’s before he even looks that direction. “He kept insisting that he needed to be here when you woke up, which technically he is.”
“How am I alive?” Colby asks, wincing at how rough his voice sounds.
“Carter killed Lancer before he could inject the full syringe,” Don says quietly in an attempt to avoid waking Charlie. “Your heart did stop though. Sinclair got CPR started soon enough.”
“Shit,” Colby mutters. “How did you find me in time? I know Kirkland was murdered.”
“Charlie worked his magic,” Don responds.
“What did I work my magic on?” Charlie asks sleepily as he wakes him.
“Helping us find your boyfriend in time,” Don responds. “I’ll let the two of you talk,” he adds, rising from the chair and leaving the hospital room, though it’s obvious to everyone that he’s not going very far.
“Thanks for working your magic,” Colby says once they’re alone. “I wasn’t sure if…”
“I always knew there was more to the story. I just couldn’t figure out how to prove it,” Charlie assures him. “How close did you come to dying?” he blurts out. “I know Don didn’t tell me everything.”
Colby closes his eyes as he figures out what to say, especially since he’s still processing the fact that he’s still alive. “Pretty damn close,” he finally says.
Charlie pulls his chair closer to Colby’s bedside and takes the other man’s hand interlacing, their fingers. “Stay with me when they let you out of here. You shouldn’t be alone and I think they ransacked your apartment anyway.”
“Your father going to be okay with that?” Colby asks. While he has a decent relationship with Alan Eppes, he also knows that the man's opinions are frequently at odds with those of his sons, and he doesn’t want to be the cause of a rift between father and son.
“He started with all the 1960s hippy shit on Sinclair, so it’ll be fine,” Charlie assures him. They hear voices coming from the hallway and a nurse bustles in shortly after, followed by Don, who has an apologetic look on his face, as he had been trying and failing at running interference to give Charlie and Colby time to talk.
Because he quite literally survived a lethal injection, the doctors keep Colby in the hospital for nearly two weeks out of fears of lingering effects. By the time that he’s discharged, he has regained a lot of his strength, though he still gets tired quickly when he exerts himself. He’s thankful that Don insisted on driving him to Charlie’s house, as leaning against a fellow agent for physical support is a lot less embarrassing that having Charlie or Alan fulfill that role.
Charlie insists on fussing over him, which Colby appreciates at first as it means that he is able to hide some of the still lingering effects. He can’t get tired from exerting himself if he’s not allowed to actually exert himself. However, it also gets really old really quickly, not that Colby would ever admit as such. He knows Charlie well enough to know that he thinks he should have been able to locate Colby sooner, and that all the fussing is his attempt to make up for that. Colby knows that locating him sooner wouldn’t have changed anything, as he wasn’t injected with the potassium chloride until after the FBI had them surrounded. However, letting Charlie know that he couldn’t have done anything to change what happened would mean revealing some of the more graphic details of what happened on that boat, and there’s an unspoken agreement between all involved to spare Charlie that knowledge. Therefore, Colby simply puts up with the fussing, knowing that it won’t last forever, as the semester is about to start and Charlie will be gone for stretches at a time in order to teach.
What is harder than the lingering physical effects are the psychological ones. Colby frequently has nightmares that take him back to that boat. Most nights he’s able to slip out of bed without waking Charlie, but the really bad ones - the ones where Lancer went after Charlie and Colby couldn’t do anything about it - actually wake Charlie before they wake Colby. The knowing glances that he gets from Alan in the mornings tells Colby that the man is very aware of the nightmares and he appreciates that he isn’t pressed to talk about them. It’s bad enough having to talk about them to the FBI psychologist, but it’s the only way that he’ll ever be allowed back to work.
Colby knows that the best thing for his mental health would be to take the position in DC, but he always knew that he would turn it down. Taking the position would mean leaving Charlie and that’s not something that he’s willing to do. Not when Charlie has been solidly in his corner even when there was no reason for him to be. Don comes around often enough that Colby knows there is still a space for him on the team, though David’s absence tells him that won’t be without its difficulties. He has a long road ahead of him before he’s back to the “old Colby” but he knows that with the support of Charlie, Alan, and Don, he’ll get there eventually.