He never saw them coming.

It was around midnight when four figures emerged from a white sedan near the Clareview LRT station, faces hidden by their hoodies, the 17-year-old recalled.

His friends scattered. He was surrounded.

"From the back — someone hit me with a hammer," he said.

The teen needed surgery to repair his skull and relieve blood clots in his brain. (CBC) Once. Twice. Skull cracked open, blood pouring out.

"Then I lost consciousness."

His friends called for help. Police, they said, jotted down information, including the phone numbers of the teen's mother.

He was rushed to the University of Alberta Hospital.

Meanwhile at home, a worried Annabelle Bizimana waited up for her child. Her last name is different than her son's, who is not being named for his protection.

It wasn't until 14 hours after the attack that the hospital called, she said.

They told a disbelieving Bizimana her son needed surgery urgently, to repair his skull and relieve a blood clot in his brain.

"I couldn't say anything. I was just shocked," she said.

Police say attack was random

By the time Bizimana made it to hospital, her son was already in surgery. There were tears of relief afterwards, when he opened his eyes, just briefly.

"He just saw me and he said, 'I'm sorry, mommy' and he cried. And I said, 'You know what, now is not the time to cry.Thank God you survived.' "

She was later told her son and his friends were likely on a connecting pathway to the LRT station when the assault occurred. They had just finished a session at their small studio, making music and having some drinks.

The teen said he has "no idea" what provoked the attack and can't remember much from that night. Police said they believe it was random.

"I didn't run with everyone because I didn't understand what was going on," the teen said. "Before I knew it, I was done for."

He said his friends are scared, and so is he, "because I don't know these guys and it was just a random attack."

It's now been a month since the assault, but the trauma lives on.

The boy is back home, stitches out. The scar where his skull was stapled shut starts just above his left ear, snakes up the side of his head, curves around the back, then slices through the top like a giant question mark.

But the headaches and sleeplessness won't go away. And the teen said he can't concentrate on the schoolwork he requested.

He hopes doctors will sign off on his return to school after he undergoes rehabilitation at the Glenrose Hospital.

"I'm very worried because this is my last year and I really want to graduate with the rest of my classmates," he said.

"I might not be able to finish my semester, and it's very important that I finish it."

Other troubling questions

In the aftermath of the attack, another troubling question persists. The family says they want to know why they weren't informed immediately about what happened.

Bizimana still agonizes over those hours her son lay on a stretcher without her. "Maybe he wanted to talk, ask something, say, 'I'm in pain,' " she said.

By the time she made it to hospital, her son was in surgery. Bizimana shudders at the thought that she didn't get to see him beforehand.

"The police didn't contact me. The emergency department didn't contact me. My son was just laying there in that hospital — maybe he could die," she said.

"If my son was dead, they would come that day to my door because he's dead," she said. But being struck with a hammer, "it was like it was nothing."

During his week-long stay in hospital, Bizimana said she kept waiting to hear from police.

Finally, nine days later, she went to the police station to find out about her son's investigation. But she said it took another nine days before a sergeant visited their home.

"What if I didn't go to complain?" she said.

In a written response to CBC, police said a report was filed the day after the attack and they are investigating.

Police said they will respond to additional allegations when the investigator, who is away, returns. But they confirmed officers are expected to contact parents of a minor who is injured and taken to hospital.

Alberta Health Services said emergency room staff do all they can to contact the family of an unconscious patient. But if a patient is awake — even someone underage — consent is required.

For Bizimana, the incident leaves her thinking Canada isn't as safe as she imagined when she and her husband immigrated here 15 years ago from Burundi with their two- year-old son.

"When I moved to this country, I was like, 'Oh, finally, we are coming to a peaceful country, here I will be safe with my kids,' " she said.

Worried about his future

She worries about her son's future, the potential long-term consequences of his injuries and his current setbacks.

He can't play soccer or basketball. He misses reading and his social studies class, where he loves learning about Canada's past and aboriginal history.

He's also worried about how long it will take before he can get back to his biggest passion, making his "own beats" and writing his "own stuff" in his mini-studio at home. The self-taught "trap" musician has dreams of becoming an audio technician and interning in Los Angeles.

Still, he feels fortunate, for the "great service" at the hospital, where everybody was "nice and caring."

And that he survived.

"They just told me that I got very, very lucky, because injuries like that — you either die" or end up with a disability or brain damage, he said.

"I feel very blessed. I feel like this is sort of a lesson for me. It just shows you've got to have faith. Something like this — not a lot of people survive something like that."

Bizimana hopes police will review how the case was handled, and that someone will remember something from that night that leads to justice for her son.

"If we don't speak out, our kids will die. And those kinds of crimes will keep going on."

andrea.huncar@cbc.ca

@andreahuncar