### Chapter Thirty: The First Spark
The hospital room was a cocoon of beeps and murmurs, the stimulator's faint buzz a new thread in the tapestry of sounds Syan had grown used to. He drifted in and out of sleep that first night, the anesthesia's fog lifting slowly, leaving behind a dull ache where the implant sat. Lila stayed close, her chair pulled tight against his bed, her soft breathing a steady anchor when the nurses' footsteps faded.
Morning brought Dr. Chen, his brisk energy cutting through the haze. "Day one," he said, adjusting a monitor Syan couldn't see. "We're upping the pulse—small jolt, see what responds. Ready?"
"Yeah," Syan said, his voice rough but firm. Lila's hand tightened on his, a silent cheer.
The doctor tapped something—a remote, maybe—and a faint tingle rippled through Syan's upper back, sharp and strange, like a static shock under his skin. He tensed, waiting, and then it came—a twitch, small but real, in his right arm. Not a lift, not yet, but a flicker of movement he hadn't forced.
"There," Dr. Chen said, satisfaction in his tone. "Nerves are waking. We'll build on that."
Lila's gasp was louder than the machines. "You moved! Syan, you moved!"
"Barely," he said, but a grin tugged at him, matching the spark in her voice.
"Barely's a start," she shot back, fierce and bright. "Dragon's got sparks now."
His parents lingered by the door, their relief quieter but palpable. "That's good, right?" his mother asked, her voice tentative.
"Very," Dr. Chen said, packing up. "Slow road, but he's on it. We'll discharge tomorrow if he's stable—home recovery, daily checks."
The day stretched with small tests—nurses moving his arms, noting twitches, the stimulator's pulse a constant hum. Syan felt it all, the flickers growing steadier, his shoulders shifting slightly under his own will. It wasn't power, not yet, but it was proof—his body answering back, inch by inch.
Lila read to him that afternoon, her pirate tale weaving through the sterile air, her voice lifting with every pause to check his face. "You're smiling," she said once, accusing but delighted.
"Hard not to," he replied, the ache in his back fading under the weight of her joy.
His father stepped closer then, gruff but warm. "You're tougher than I ever was," he said, a crack in his usual stoicism. "Keep it up."
His mother nodded, her hand brushing his arm—light, hesitant, but there. "We'll get you home," she said. "Make it easy as we can."
That night, alone with Lila's soft snores beside him, Syan flexed his fingers, feeling the faint twitch respond. The first spark had ignited—not a blaze, but a glow, steady and growing. He'd crossed the threshold, and now, with his family holding the line, the road ahead shimmered with a light he hadn't dared chase before.
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Let me know if you'd like Chapter 31 or any tweaks here! The recovery's begun—want to keep exploring it?