by Kiel Nichols
Kristano explained everything. The entire time, Gideon stood and looked at the monitors. Asia didn’t interrupt. He didn’t ask clarifying questions.
“I’m guessing,” Kristano concluded, “that some of your patients this week have had remarkable recoveries.”
Asia nodded numbly, still looking out the window.
“You did that. You healed them. You have come into your gift.”
When Asia made his decision, he turned back to the group. “The first thing we’re going to need to do is to explain this away.” He gestured to the computer. “I wasn’t the only one in the room when this was discussed. Even the technicians were buzzing about it.”
“I’ll take care of that,” Kristano said. “What about Raina?”
“We’ll have to start by figuring out what’s normal for her. We have no baseline to compare this to. We also have to figure out how to keep running tests on her so that we can determine the problem.” Asia took a sheet of file paper from the basket hanging behind the computer and began to make a list.
“If he has the ability to heal, why can’t he just go heal Raina?” Gideon asked Kristano.
Asia looked at Gideon in shock then just turned to the door and walked out.
He didn’t look to see if they were following, which of course they were.
When he reached Raina’s side, he put his hand over her head and another on her stomach.
“I’m not sure what I’m doing here. I’ve never tried to heal anyone. Everyone who got better seemed like an accident.” He closed his eyes.
“Did you remember thinking anything in particular when you were with them?” Kristano asked, trying to guide Asia.
“I just wished for them to get better. In one case, there was excessive bleeding in the brain, and I just thought that the patient really needed the bleeding to stop.”
“Why don’t you think about Raina waking up?” Eric suggested.
Asia closed his eyes and concentrated. After several frustrating minutes, he opened his eyes and looked at the monitor. There were more squiggles on the paper, but no change on the bed. “That’s odd,” he said. “According to the graph, she’s awake, but as you can see, she’s clearly not.”
He stroked her hair back. “Raina, can you wake up for us now?” he asked quietly.
She didn’t move.
“I was able to make the baby stronger. He should be fine.”
Gideon jerked. “He?”
Asia rubbed his hand over his face. “Yes. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to let the cat out of the bag.”
“No, it’s fine.” Gideon was on Raina’s other side and bent down to softly kiss her lips. He rubbed his face lightly over hers. “I love you, Raina. Honey, you need to come back to me. We need to talk about the baby we made.”
When she didn’t respond in any way, Gideon sat and just held her hand. It was obvious he was barely holding himself together. “I know we didn’t expect to have a baby, but isn’t it wonderful? We’re so lucky. You need to come back to me so that we can celebrate.” A single tear streaked his face.
“I’m so sorry,” Asia said. “Maybe she’s not healing because I don’t know what’s wrong with her.”
“I know you did your best,” Eric said. “Gideon, why don’t you go home and clean up? I can stay with Raina until you get back.”
Gideon nodded. Then he said to Raina, “Sweetheart, I’m going to go back to your house to shower and change. I’m not leaving you for good. Wake up, and I’ll come right back, OK?”
* * * *
Raina knew that something had happened. For one thing, she could see. She just wished she could remember what. Nothing hurt. She wandered around in the pretty little garden she used to have in the backyard when her parents were alive and just whiled away the day. She looked down at the picnic blanket under the tree and decided that she would just lie down and watch the breeze rustle the leaves above her head.
She had just gotten settled when she heard a voice.
“I love you, Raina. Honey, you need to come back to me. We need to talk about the baby we made.”
She knew that voice. It was Gideon. He said they made a baby. Raina looked down and saw her belly, swollen with child. She felt it move.
“I know we didn’t expect to have a baby, but isn’t it wonderful? We’re so lucky. You need to come back to me so that we can celebrate,” Gideon’s voice persisted.
Raina looked down at her belly again, and it was flat. She knew the baby was still in there, though. He was healthy and strong.
“Sweetheart, I’m going to go back to your house to shower and change. I’m not leaving you for good. Wake up, and I’ll come right back, OK?”
The garden around her started to fade until her backyard began to look like it had since her parents’ death. It wasn’t sad. It just wasn’t blooming as beautifully. It was also getting a little cool.
Raina walked toward the house. She wandered the rooms, but she didn’t know how long she was wandering. It was like time didn’t exist.
Gideon was home. She ran down the stairs to greet him. She tried to swing her arms around him, but she couldn’t. He trudged upstairs, rubbing his eyes. He stripped off clothes, stiff with dried blood, and climbed into the shower. As soon as he was in under the spray, he started to cry.
Raina hurt so badly watching Gideon cry in the shower. She wanted to comfort him, but she couldn’t.
Am I dead?
She looked around for some kind of hint. There was no white light to walk into, no one else hanging around the house. It was almost like she was out of phase with the world.
Gideon, baby. Talk to me. I’m right here.
“I wish you were here, Raina. I miss you. Please be OK.” Drawing in long breaths, Gideon finished his shower and rubbed his body with the fluffy towel that was on the rack next to the shower.
Gideon! I’m right here.
Gideon turned his head quickly to look behind him.
Yes, you heard me. Try a little harder.
“I’m imagining things now,” Gideon muttered as he headed out into the bedroom.
Gideon! Don’t be an ass. You’re not imagining me, I’m here.
“Raina? Are you there?” Gideon looked around the room.
I’m here! I love you. What’s going on?
“Oh, my God.” Gideon ran to the phone and dialed the hospital. “Please don’t be dead, please.”
I don’t think I am. I don’t feel dead.
“You’ve never been dead before, how could you tell?” Gideon asked the operator for the nurse’s station. When he asked for status, he was told there was no change. He let out a long breath.
“If I’m not imagining this, tell me something I don’t know.”
It took a minute for her to think of something he wouldn’t know. I have days of the week underwear. You’ve never seen them because they’re silly. Look in my top right drawer.
Gideon did as she asked, and there were seven panties, each with a day of the week on them.
“Raina, please listen to me. If you can control this, you can wake up. You’re in a coma. Please wake up.”
I can’t. I don’t know how.
“Kristano!” Gideon yelled at the top of his lungs.
Kristano appeared abruptly. He carried a sword when he materialized. When he realized there was no battle, the sword disappeared. “What’s going on?”
“I can hear Raina. She’s talking to me.”
“Did you call the hospital? Has she woken up?” Kristano asked.
“She’s still in a coma, but I swear I can hear her. Raina, say something to Kristano.”
Raina tried to comply. Kristano. Can you hear me?
Kristano didn’t say anything.
Kristano!
Gideon’s head jerked. “You don’t have to shout.”
“Did she say something? I thought I heard my name, but it’s not clear,” Kristano asked.
“She yelled your name pretty loudly.”
“
I didn’t really hear anything.” Kristano took Gideon’s arm and led him to a chair. “Are you sure you’re not just hearing her because you want her to be OK?”
“I’m sure. Raina, can you travel away from me?”
Yes.
“Follow Kristano into the next room and tell me what he’s doing.” Gideon gestured for Kristano to leave the room.
In the bathroom, Kristano stood in front of the mirror and stuck his tongue out at himself.
Raina laughed. Tell him he shouldn’t make faces at himself in the mirror. His face might freeze like that.
“Raina said that your face is going to freeze like that,” Gideon said. “Stop making faces.”
Kristano came out of the bathroom. “OK, I’m convinced. Raina? Do you know what’s happening? Your body is in a coma at the hospital. You were shot. We need you to wake up.”
“She said she doesn’t know how,” Gideon informed Kristano of the conversation he’d had with her earlier.
“Can you travel away from the house?”
I don’t know what’s going on, or if I can go someplace else. Want me to try?
Kristano shook his head. “I heard that. Say something else.”
Do you want me to try to go somewhere? Raina felt silly annunciating the words like that.
“Yes, I’m going to pop back over to my house, follow me.” Kristano dematerialized.
She wasn’t sure how to do it, and if she succeeded, she didn’t know if she could tell Gideon she had. She stopped, closed her eyes, and thought about Kristano’s living room. She couldn’t picture the room, but she knew the approximate location of it. When she opened her eyes, she was standing in his kitchen. Kristano was leaning against the counter.
I did it. She looked at the room she was in. Sort of.
“Why only ‘sort of’?” Kristano asked.
Because I’m in your kitchen, not the living room where I tried to project myself.
“Maybe you showed up here because you can only go to a person, not a place.”
That makes sense.
“Why don’t you try to find Eric? I won’t tell you where he is.” Kristano suggested.
Great idea. Raina concentrated on Eric. When she opened her eyes, she was in her hospital room looking down at herself in the bed. Eric was sitting by her bedside, holding her hand.
Eric, she tried to call his name, but he never even stirred. She tried again, until eventually, he could hear her.
She thought about Gideon and found herself back in her living room with Gideon and Kristano in the room, waiting.
* * * *
“I don’t understand what’s happening,” Gideon said, pacing the living room floor. He noted the change from rug to floor back to rug again.
“I don’t either. I’m not sure why she can talk to us, but she can’t wake up.” Kristano sat negligently, his massive upper body blocking the entire back of the chair. “Did you find her really hard to hear at first?”
Gideon ran a shaky hand over his bald head. “Yeah, I did. I thought she had died, and it was her ghost trying to communicate.”
Gideon’s cell phone rang. Seeing Eric’s name, he flipped the top. “I think I hear Raina trying to talk to me.” Eric started speaking without so much as a hello. “I can barely hear her, but as long as I hold her hand, she talks to me.”
“Actually,” Gideon said, “you might be able to hear her even without holding her hand. It’s tough to hear her at first, but she gets louder as you go.”
“Holy shit.”
“Yep. I think we should have a summit meeting. Can you get here soon? Also, tell Raina to come back. I don’t know if she can hear me from that distance right now.”
“Sure thing. Do you want me to bring Asia there or should he stay and monitor Raina?”
“See if he can come, too. Thanks, Eric.” Gideon flipped his phone shut. “They’re coming.”
Chapter 17
Within a half hour, everyone was assembled in Raina’s living room again. The only difference was that it was impossible to see Raina.
“Let’s toss some theories around. How do we get Raina to wake up?” Gideon asked.
“She could try trying to lie in her body. That’s always worked in the movies,” Eric suggested, only half joking.
Maybe this is part of the prophecy. I can see right now. It felt so natural that I didn’t notice it at first, but maybe it’s meant to be this way.
Gideon hadn’t realized that she could see. “But you can’t work on the prophecy if you can’t even hold the paper. Besides, you need to wake up.”
“Is she talking to you all now?” Asia asked. He was the only one who couldn’t hear her at all, perhaps because they never really met. There was no connection there.
“Yes, she is,” Kristano said. “There was nothing in the prophecy that indicated an out of body experience.”
Eric snapped his fingers. “That’s it. We need to look into astral projection. Maybe she’s accidentally projected and can’t figure out how to get back.”
“I know we’re meeting here because it’s private, but I’d like to get back to Raina’s”—Asia hesitated—“body, I guess you’d say. I want to see if I can figure something out on the medical front.”
“Let’s head back and continue this discussion there,” Gideon suggested. He didn’t feel comfortable being this far from Raina, either.
* * * *
Bryce was still pissed. He sat at Billy’s and had a beer while he thought about how his brother had betrayed him. The yeasty taste of the beer just didn’t seem strong enough, so he ordered a shot of tequila to go with it. The burn of the liquor left a fiery trail to his stomach, and he gave a little cough. A moment later he ordered another.
When Gina arrived a little while later to meet Steve, she found Bryce hunched over his fourth shot of tequila. He wasn’t piss-faced drunk yet, but he was working on it.
“What’s going on, Bryce?” Gina asked, trying to affect a casual tone.
Bryce tossed the shot back without a shudder and lined it up with the other empty shot glasses. The bartender had tried to take them away, but Bryce wouldn’t let him.
“Not much,” Bryce answered with a sarcastic laugh. “Did you know that Raina got shot?”
“Oh my God,” Gina sat down and ordered a beer. When Bryce indicated to the bartender that he wanted another shot, Gina shook her head sharply. She knew that Harry’d suddenly get busy and “forget” about Bryce’s shot. “Did she die?”
“No,” Bryce answered. “I called the hospital just before I got here. She still hasn’t woken up, but she and the baby are holding their own.”
“What?” Gina sat up a little straighter. “Did you say baby? Raina’s pregnant. Is the father that Kris guy that you were talking about?”
“No.” Bryce turned his bleary, angry eyes on Gina. “No, it’s Gideon. You know, my brother.”
“Oh, that’s why you’re trying to get toasted.” Gina started to rub Bryce’s back in a friendly, soothing way.
It felt so good that Bryce leaned toward her. Gina’s hand moved up until she was massaging his neck. He tilted his head forward and groaned. The scent of her perfume drifted toward him.
“Why don’t I call Steve and cancel then help you get home? I don’t like the idea of you stumbling home drunk.”
The tequila that he’d drunk had given him a nice buzz. He wasn’t so drunk that he couldn’t think, but he knew even one more would push him over the edge. “Hey, Harry, cancel that shot, OK.”
Harry looked up from the beer he was pulling and nodded. “Will do, Bryce.” He winked at Gina.
Bryce pulled Gina into a hug. “You’re a good friend, Gina.” He had forgotten how soft she was. He buried his face in her hair.
Gina trembled a bit then pulled away. “OK, let’s get you home.”
Bryce was able to get up and walk on his own, but Gina kept her arm around him. Even though he didn’t need to, he leaned on her for help. The soft, warm body soo
thed him more than the tequila had. He thought about the possibility of getting her naked and slaking his frustration. He knew it wouldn’t really be fair to her, but at the moment, he wasn’t capable of letting that sway him.
They made it out into the fresh air, and Bryce took a deep breath. The liquor swirled in him, making him feel a little dizzy.
“I’ll call Steve,” she said, letting go of him. “Can you stand?”
“Of course,” Bryce said, swaying only slightly.
Gina unclipped her cell and speed-dialed Steve.
Bryce watched the purple of twilight warm her skin to a rose and thought of how pretty she was. Not sensually beautiful like Raina, but sweet and wholesome looking—like the girl next door.
Without warning, hands grabbed Bryce from behind. He tried to turn and fight, but they had him in an unbreakable hold and were pulling him toward a van. “Hey!”
“Shut up,” a voice said roughly before Bryce was kidney-punched. The force of it made him feel like he was going to retch.
Gina noticed that Bryce was being pulled toward a van and tried to follow.
Suddenly terrified for her, Bryce shouted, “No! Call Gide—” Before he could get his brother’s name out, he was punched again in the stomach. This time he gagged.
He was pulled into a van, still gagging.
“If you throw up, I’m going to make you eat it,” the guy holding him said.
Bryce let out a long breath and hoped that Gina would let Gideon know what happened. He didn’t know why he was being kidnapped, but he had a bad feeling it had something to do with Raina.
He wished he had listened to his brother.
* * * *
Asia was able to move Raina into a private room. Unlike the ICU suite, there was no limit on the number of visitors in the room, and there were no cameras.
Gideon didn’t ask how it was possible for the doctor to pull that off since she was still in a coma.
