His eyes swung ahead as his grassy slide continued, catching another problem in his path—the foot-wide base of a tree. He tried to duck his head but couldn’t get his hands up in time to protect himself. The top of his skull smashed into the stout trunk and everything went black.
38
Lucas opened his eyes to find he was lying on his back with a mask covering his nose and mouth. His neck ached and his head was throbbing. It felt like a herd of elephants were taking tap dance lessons inside. Floating speckles of blobs danced across his vision, making it difficult to focus. All he could see was a blurry image of a redheaded female and three retina-burning overhead lights. Plus, there was the rank smell of week-old BO in the air, but he wasn’t sure if it was his stench, or hers.
The woman holding onto his wrist spoke in a soft, comforting voice. “Stay calm and everything will be fine. My name is Sarah. I’m a paramedic. You’re on the way to the hospital.”
“Hospital?” he said in a slow, muffled voice, powering through his sticky lips. His mouth felt like someone had dumped a box of cotton swabs into it.
“There was an accident. But you’re safe now. Can you tell me your name?”
“Lucas,” he answered, blinking rapidly to get a better look at the women taking his pulse.
“Hi, Lucas. Nice to meet you. Do you remember how you received the cut on your scalp?”
“Not really,” he said, wanting to bring his hand up to feel the top of his head, but his arms wouldn’t move. They were strapped to the gurney he was lying on. He started to panic, yanking his arms to test the restraints.
She put her hands on his, squeezing and pressing lightly. “Lie still, now. We don’t want you pulling the IV out of your arm.”
“Why am I tied down?”
“For your own safety. There were issues when I first began triage on you.”
“Was I seizing?”
“No, it was more restlessness than anything else. You were speaking nonsense and wouldn’t let me get a good look at you.”
“What was I saying?”
“Something about a Krellian invasion, anchor points, and time travel. I’ve been doing this a long time and I’ve heard some strange things over the years, but I have to say, never anything like that. So right now, I need you to remain still. Can you do that for me?”
Her voice had a calming effect, so did her touch. He nodded, though the pressure inside his skull was still there. “My head—it hurts.”
“You may have a concussion. I need you to breathe normally and lie still while I gather the rest of your vitals and address that cut.”
His memory still wasn’t working, but his vision was clearing a bit. He could see that Sarah was a slender woman in her thirties with a dash of freckles across her nose. Rather plain-looking but she had kind, aqua-blue eyes and a gentle way about her. Lucas knew he could trust her, and he really didn’t have a choice. He looked at his left arm and saw the IV line. She must have pulled the sleeve of his shirt up, and then did the same with the Smart Skin Suit to expose the vein.
Sarah made eye contact and gave him a thin smile. It reminded him of how his mother used to smile when she was sitting on the edge of his bed, feeding him chicken soup when he was sick.
“I put you on fluids. Nothing to be concerned about. You’re one of the lucky ones.”
“Lucky?” he asked in a shaky voice. “What happened to me?”
“There was a city bus collision and tanker explosion. I’m guessing you were knocked unconscious by the shockwave. We found you next to a fancy church with stained glass windows across the front. St. Michaels, I think. Do you remember any of this?”
As soon as he heard the words tanker explosion, the memories came flooding in. A charge of adrenaline rose up in his body, fueling his thoughts and his words. “My brother! Where is he?”
“Brother?” she asked in a concerned tone.
“His name is Drew. Is he okay?”
“I’m sorry, Lucas, we didn’t find anyone else with you. Could he have run off?”
“No, he was on the bus with his mom when the dump truck smashed into it. What happened to him? Is he alive?”
“I wish I could tell you more, but I wasn’t involved in the bus extrication. I did hear there was one survivor—a small child who was airlifted to the burn center. But other than that, I really don’t know much else.”
A powerful knot formed in his gut and his chest felt like someone had dropped a safe on it. His heart and his mind started to race, flashing a hundred thoughts all at once. Tears began to flow. “Oh my God. Drew. This is all my fault. What have I done?”
“Lucas, this wasn’t your fault. Car accidents happen. People get hurt. You couldn’t have done anything to stop it. Rest now. Save your energy. We need to focus on . . .”
He stopped listening to Sarah even though her words continued to land on his eardrums. She worked on his scalp while he turned all his thoughts to Drew. All he could think about was a helpless child lying in the flaming wreckage of the twisted bus. His mind conjured a vision of Drew lying next to his dead mother and the rest of the bus fatalities. If Drew was the lone survivor who’d been airlifted to the burn center, then he surely was in critical condition and fighting for his life. If he survived the next few hours, he’d be disfigured for life. There’d be the endless skin grafts. The scars. All the pain. But what about his legs and that gifted mind of his? What kind of life would he have now?
The image of his beautiful foster brother’s face faded from his memory and was replaced by a fresh pile of guilt. The universe was at it again—watching him—tormenting him with vicious intent aimed at those he loved. Each time he tried to fix the past, the problems escalated. Lucas had traveled back in time and changed the past all right, but his actions weren’t helping anyone. His plan to stop Drew’s mom from driving home didn’t accomplish anything. Not a damned thing. She still died, and now everything else was worse.
Deep down, he knew the lone survivor was Drew. It had to be. Otherwise, the future he came from would be gone forever and he’d have nothing to return to. If that was the case, then he might as well take a gun, stick it in his mouth, and pull the trigger. Boom. End of story. Fuck history and fuck the future. He’d already wrecked it all, so who the hell cared anymore? He didn’t know how much more he could take.
“Arrrrrrrg!” he screamed into the mask, sending every ounce of energy he had into his vocal cords and out through his lips. He yanked his arms up and down in the restraints, screaming again and again, trying to free the pain and the guilt from his soul.
Sarah slid away with her hands up and a frightened look on her face.
Lucas let out one final scream and held it until he ran out of breath. When he was done, he felt better, though the look on Sarah’s face told him she was petrified.
“Did I hurt you?” she asked.
“No,” he said, pumping more air into his lungs. “I just needed to let that out. A guy can only take so much.”
“You need to remain calm. I can’t help you unless you do.”
He felt awful for scaring her. She was only doing her job and trying to help him. “I know. I’m sorry. I lost my head for a moment. It won’t happen again.”
He took a minute to let his private pity party fizzle on its own. It did. He needed to get a grip. Millions of people were counting on him to make this right and he wasn’t a quitter. It was time to stop acting like one.
A wave of logic took over his brain, sifting through the available options. There weren’t many left. In fact, there was only one: Anchor Point Alpha—the last remaining anchor point preprogrammed into Fuji’s Incursion System. Lucas figured the suit and glasses were running dangerously low on power by now. If he was right, he’d only get one more crack at this anyway. So Anchor Point Alpha it was. His last, best hope to undo all that he’d done.
To get there, he’d need Fuji’s help—assuming the monk was still waiting for him in the future. With baby Drew’s accident and all the o
ther changes along the way, it was possible he wasn’t. However, both Fuji and he were wearing Smart Skin Suits, and the incursion technology was designed to protect them from the changes to the timeline.
He did have faith in Fuji and his science, though some of it was difficult to grasp at times, making Lucas wonder if any of it would hold true. In the end, his faith didn’t matter. There was only one option left and he had to try. Otherwise, all of history would fail, and so would the timeline reversion.
If Lucas was going to travel to Anchor Point Alpha, it wouldn’t happen if he was stuck in some hospital, getting probed and prodded by a bunch of doctors. He couldn’t take the chance he’d get sedated or locked away in a nut house. Nor could he risk damage to the Smart Skin Suit or the Google Glasses stuffed in his pocket next to Lauren’s car keys.
His eyes turned to Sarah. “I need you to stop the ambulance and let me out.”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”
“Seriously, I need you to release me.”
She shook her head and pinched her lips. “You need medical attention. The hospital’s only a few minutes away, so right now, I need you to lay back and let me do my job. It’s what’s best for you. Especially after your little tirade a minute ago.”
“I said I was sorry, and it won’t happen again. Just needed to vent. Can you please pull over and let me out?”
“You need to be examined by a doctor. Probably more than one at this point.”
“Sarah, I appreciate your help, but you have a patient who’s refusing treatment. Aren’t you supposed to abide by his wishes?”
“Yes, but we can’t just drop you off in the middle of nowhere.”
“Which hospital are we going to?”
“University Medical.”
“Perfect! That’s right by my apartment. Trust me, I’ll be fine. I’m feeling much better now, and I don’t want any more treatment. Please, just pull over and let me out. I’ll walk home from here.”
She paused but didn’t say anything.
“I know you have a job to do, but you’re just wasting your time, and your driver’s. As soon as we get to the hospital, I’m going to refuse treatment and walk away. Wouldn’t you rather turn this transport around and go back to the accident and treat someone who actually wants help? I’m sure there are plenty of people who are hurt a lot worse than me.”
“I see your point.”
“Then I beg you. Stop and let me out.”
“I think you’re making a serious mistake.”
“I’ll be fine. I really will. This isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve been hurt much worse than this. A little bump on the head is nothing. It’ll take a lot more than that to keep me down for long.”
“Will you at least let me finish treating the gash on your scalp?”
“Sure. Then I’m out of here. Deal?”
She hesitated, then spoke. “Assuming the survivor is your brother, you might want to stick around until I can find out where they took him for treatment. But they probably won’t let you see him until he’s stable. Might be a day or two, so you’ll need to prepare yourself and be patient.”
Sarah was right. His heart screamed at him to go check on Drew, but his logic told him otherwise. “If it’s him, the last thing I want is to see him like that. I’ll never get that vision out of my head. That’s not how I want to re—” he stopped in midsentence.
“How you want to what?”
Lucas tried to find words, but couldn’t come up with an ending for the sentence that would work. He decided to punt instead.
“Well, um, never mind. Let’s just say that I have other, more pressing matters to attend to. Please, just patch me up so I can get the hell out of here. Okay?”
She nodded. “I’m still going to check on the survivor for you. Whether you wait around or not, that’s up to you.”
“Fine,” Lucas said, not having the energy to battle her anymore. He was completely spent, still needing to find out what happened to Drew and where they’d taken the lone survivor. Since the paramedic was offering, he decided to take her up on the help. Then he’d make his way back to Lauren’s car and continue the mission.
39
The next morning after falling asleep in Lauren’s car by mistake, Lucas made his way to the Critical Burn Unit on the first floor of the University of Arizona Medical Center in Tucson, looking for information on baby Drew. The paramedic had followed through and was able to locate the hospital where the first responders took the lone survivor of the bus crash.
He needed to see his foster brother—it was the sole thought on his mind, and the only reason he decided to remain in this time period. He wasn’t sure how he was going to talk his way past the nurses’ station, but he had to try. If nothing else, he’d force his way through them if that’s what it took. Nothing was going to stop him. Not today. Not now.
His logic had been correct the night before—seeing a burned and disfigured Drew was the last thing he wanted permanently etched into his memory. But his logic wasn’t calling the shots, it was his heart. It desperately needed answers, and the list of questions was growing by the minute:
Was Drew the lone survivor?
How bad were Drew’s injuries?
Were his legs crushed like before, or were burns the only new injuries?
If Drew was dead, would Fuji still be there waiting for him in the future?
How much power remained in the Smart Skin Suit and Goggle Glasses?
Would he be able to make contact with Fuji?
If he could travel back in time again, would his last attempt at a complete timeline reversion work, or would he continue to make everything worse?
One question at a time, he scolded himself as he approached a trio of women working the twenty-foot-wide CBU desk. Focus, dickhead. Start with Drew. Then take it from there.
“Can I help you?” the portly brunette nurse in the middle asked. Her hair was hanging limp and wrapped down across her left shoulder, as if a humidifier had taken all the life out of it. Her nose was holding up a pair of smudged reading glasses.
Lucas checked for a nametag or ID. He found neither.
“I’m here to see my brother.”
“Name, please.”
“Drew Ramsay.”
The weary-eyed nurse punched at the keys on the ancient computer terminal sitting in front of her. It was the size of a commercial microwave oven, taking up half of the free space on her desk.
Lucas leaned over the counter, catching a glimpse of the flickering 1980s green screen display as it filled with fresh lines of text.
She looked at him. “I’m sorry, but I don’t have a listing for a patient by that name. Could he have been admitted somewhere else?”
“I was told by a paramedic he was taken here,” Lucas answered, suddenly realizing his mistake. “Wait—try Drew Falconio. He might have been admitted under his mother’s maiden name.”
“His mother?”
Lucas knew he goofed. He should have said our mother instead. “We’re stepbrothers.”
The nurse locked eyes on the display again, pawing at its keys. She looked up a few seconds later. “I’m sorry. No Drew Falconio, either. Maybe he was taken to the county burn unit?”
“I don’t think so. I was told he was airlifted here last night from the bus accident on Tucson Boulevard.”
The skinny blonde nurse on the left rolled to the middle of the CBU desk in her four-wheeled office chair. Her wrinkled hands came up to cover her saggy cheeks as she whispered in the ear of her colleague. Their secret conversation lasted a few seconds, then the blonde rolled back to her station.
“We do have a small child who was brought in last night, though he’s listed as Baby Doe,” the brunette said.
“That must be him! Can I see him?”
“Are you family?”
“Yes. I told you before. I’m his brother—stepbrother.”
“Name please?”
“Lucas Ramsay. Is Drew okay? I need to see h
im.”
The nurse pointed at the bandage covering the cut on Lucas’ scalp. “Were you in the accident, too?”
Lucas was getting annoyed by all the questions. “No, but I saw the whole thing happen from down the street. The explosion sent me into a tree. Can I see my brother or what?”
She leaned forward and scanned his stolen attire. Her eyes spent the most time looking at his feet and then the bungee cord belt. She must have been curious about the paint splotches and the rest of his mismatched ensemble. A second later, she sat back in her chair, folding her arms across her chest. The expression on her face changed from helpful to suspicious.
“Can I see some ID?” she asked in a serious voice.
“Hell, no. I’m not showing you my ID. What is this? The Spanish Inquisition? Look, I just need to see him for a second. I have to know if he’s okay.”
“Not without proper ID.”
Lucas pinched his eyebrows and stuck out his jaw, wanting to send a strong message to her. “Do you ask every family member to show ID, or just me?”
“It depends.”
“Jesus, lady. That’s my brother back there and he’s probably fighting for his life. Why would I make up something like this?”
“Until we can identify Baby Doe, I’m afraid I can’t let anyone past this station.”
“His mother was just killed! Have some compassion, for Christ’s sake! I’m all that’s left of the family. How the hell do you expect to identify a baby unless the family does it for you?”
“Sir, I need you to calm down.”
“I am calm, but this is insane. Your logic doesn’t make any sense. I am family and I demand to see my brother!”
“Sir, shift change is in a few minutes. When my supervisor gets here, we’ll try and sort this out.” She pointed at a waiting area across the hall. “Why don’t you have a seat over there?”
Reversion (The Narrows of Time Series Book 3) Page 32