by Dale Mayer
He slipped closer to the big metal drawers on the one side with computerized door locks. The morgue was more advanced than many. Anything that dignified those in death made it easier on everyone. He shifted along the wall, searching for anything that would make sense of this. He strengthened his barriers against the energy vibrating at a level he’d prefer not to access. It helped dim the noise somewhat. He wasn’t sure why the energy was so extreme today. Two men entered the room. He eased his barrier slightly to hear their conversation.
“Man, what a night. Talk about gang wars. What have we got – seven dead and three more upstairs? The ones out on the street are rioting even worse now.”
That explained it. Young anger, anger of the righteous, vigilant anger, and the anger of losing in that war were all clearly flying around him. A gang fight had sent many members from both sides to lie in a relative calm side-by-side in the morgue. There would be no more fighting in here. At least not against each other. Hopefully. He shifted his focus and took a moment to separate the energy, and realized a half dozen screamed louder than normal. If these young men had fought this loud and this strong while on the streets, they’d probably done a fair bit of damage to innocent bystanders as well.
He shook his head. Talk about bad karma. When would humanity learn? One paid for every misdeed – if not here and now, then later. And he’d met enough of those people to know that fact for sure. No one ever took heed because payback could take decades.
He shifted back again, drifted around the two men who were shuffling carts full of bodies. Some into drawers, some lined up to go to autopsy, and some needing paperwork. He wondered at the human capacity to deal with death every day. Did it affect these men? Or did they see it as a necessary service that they could do for mankind? He’d likely never know.
As he turned to drift toward the autopsy room, he caught a tiny thread of… something. Something odd. Something off. Again.
He followed the faint thread of energy out to the autopsy room, to where a man lay nude on the table, a big Y incision on his chest, his ribs open, while someone in a gown muttered over him.
Stefan couldn’t hear him clearly, but there was something wrong. He slid down to the far end and tried to see the name on the chart. Owen Dugar.
“Poor bugger. You didn’t know what had happened, did you?” the doctor said. “Looks like your heart just cooked itself. Beyond weird. Well, let’s take a closer look.”
As Stefan lifted his gaze to study the heart in the man’s hand, he realized he’d never seen anything like it. The heart looked like a hunk of oozing, burnt meat. How the hell had that happened?
The doctor stared.
Stefan stared.
That was when he realized something else. Even though dead, there were foreign energies on this man’s heart.
He studied the dead man’s open chest. There were scars on the man’s belly, but with the chest open he couldn’t see if there were other scars to indicate earlier surgery, like bypass surgery. Although Dr. Maddy would likely be able to get the information for him, he didn’t want to wait. He continued to listen, hoping for more.
“Even with everything they’d done to you, you still didn’t make it,” the doctor said to his dead patient. “I’ve never seen anything like this one. I’m going to speak with your cardiologist. See what he might have done different with you, and if he had any idea what might have caused this.”
With that he placed the heart on a scale to weigh the blackened mass.
Armed with that information, Stefan closed his eyes and retraced his pathway home. All he could think about was how long a surgical team’s energy would stay in a body after surgery.
Thankfully he had someone he could ask.
*
“You know, I don’t think I have a conclusive answer for that,” Maddy said thoughtfully. “There are too many variables, such as the level of caring in the surgeon, if there were any type of complications that would require multiple people to step up, or if the patient died and had to be brought back. Depending on what the surgery was there could be any number of other people involved in the process.”
Maddy shifted in the straight back desk chair, wishing she were back in her own comfy office rather than in Dr. Jorgenson’s office and rubbed the back of her neck slowly to ease the tension.
As for Stefan’s current question she added, “Give me a day or so and I’ll see what I can find out with my own patients. Several have other surgical issues. I can check and see.” As she thought about it she had to wonder. “You know, one of the first things I do is clean out the energy, release the blockages, and work on any of the system’s imbalances. I don’t care who or what or why the problem exists, I just go and clean them out.”
“Meaning?” Stefan’s tired voice slipped through the phone. “Meaning you don’t have anyone on your floor with a recent or old surgery that you haven’t cleaned out yet?”
“Exactly. But…” she let her voice trail off as she thought about it. “There will be many of them at the children’s ward.”
“Right.” Stefan’s voice perked up. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“If it was anyone but Celina involved you’d have been all over this,” she said warmly. “There’s nothing like a personal involvement to throw your thinking off.”
“Ha, my thinking has been off for months,” he growled.
She smiled, remembering the concert they’d all gone to where they had seen Celina for the first time. “Actually about a month. As long as you help from a distance and give her some space…”
“She’s got big trouble riding her back. She gets a day or two and that’s it.”
Maddy couldn’t help herself. She laughed. “But you have to let some things happen as they were meant to. The road to heaven and all that…”
“Hell,” he said in disgust. “At the moment there isn’t a road going anywhere but into the nearest sewer.” And he hung up.
*
“Eric?” Lilliana Moore walked over to her eight-year-old son and bent down to him. He lay curled into a tight ball on the hospital bed. His face was scrunched in pain with beads of sweat rolling down his forehead.
“Honey, can you tell me what’s wrong?”
He shook his head and tugged the covers higher.
She settled on the side of the hospital bed and reached out a hand to gently stroke his shoulder. “It’s the leg again, isn’t it?”
He still wouldn’t speak. She frowned, thought about it, then understood. “No, not the leg – the new bone piece, right?”
His head barely moved, yet it was enough. He’d started protesting about the cadaver bone implant as soon as he’d woken up from surgery. She didn’t know who had told him that bone had come from a dead body, but because of the wild imagination and fearful mind of an eight-year-old it was the worst thing anyone could do. She’d like to wring that person’s neck. Eric hadn’t been the same since he’d woken up. He said odd things, hated to be alone, and now had a horrific fear about the boogeyman – even worse, he had a morbid obsession with death.
And he wanted that damn bone out. Something that wasn’t likely to happen – especially given that the surgeons were delighted with the results of their handiwork.
She didn’t know how to help her son. He needed to talk to a counselor, but she was hesitant to bring another stranger into her son’s world. She wished there was someone here who could help.
She didn’t even know who to ask.
Chapter 10
Given the traffic in Portland on a Saturday afternoon, it was nothing short of a miracle that Celina made it on time. Breathless, she made her way to the specialist’s office, her walking stick a reassuring tapping tool as she strode down the hallway. Third doorway on the left. She dragged her stick along the wall until it hit the first door, then the second, and then a third. Standing outside for a moment, she tried to control her ragged breathing. This was too important. She needed this visit. Needed to find out if there truly was
something else wrong with her eyes or…
See, now I’m going to be interested in finding that out too. She shuddered as the same insidious, poisonous voice crept through her mind.
Go away, she snapped. This has nothing to do with you.
Ha. We’ll see about that.
She mentally took that gargoyle image that she always saw in her mind and poured cement on top of him. It always worked – for a moment or two. Then he somehow managed to break through and return. Often though, he became really angry that he couldn’t control her and would take off, looking for new ways to torment her.
She waited a moment longer to make sure she was alone, then reached for the doorknob and walked inside.
“There you are.” The woman’s voice on the left was quietly relieved. “I’m so happy you made it.”
Celina laughed. “I almost didn’t. That downtown traffic is deadly at this time.”
“I know,” the woman commiserated. “Let’s hope it will be worth it. We aren’t used to working weekends, but we’ve had patients in and out all day and they’ve been saying variations of the same thing.”
Celina smiled politely. She stood in the middle of the room, not quite sure what she was supposed to do.
“I’ll take you right into the examining room and let Dr. Jorgensen know you are here.”
Relieved, Celina let herself be led to an examining room. There were sounds in the other room of an animated conversation going on. She smiled, loving the sound of the woman’s voice. And she’d never heard her eye doctor sound quite so alive before. The door opened to tinkling laughter that was so infectious Celina couldn’t help but smile.
“Here she is.” Dr. Jorgensen moved into the room in his usual short, hoppy movements. He was a small man and clipped his shoes on the tile floor as he walked. It made it easier to keep track of his whereabouts as he moved around her.
Celina smiled. “Good afternoon. I’m so sorry for missing my appointment. I completely forgot about it.”
“Not to worry. You made it and that’s what counts.”
He shifted to face someone who stood in the doorway.
Celina opened her eyes, and damn if she didn’t see something greeny gold in the doorway. Interesting. Either one of her ghosts had decided to come and visit her here – which would be odd but not unheard of – or this specialist had something odd going on so Celina could actually see her. She saw ghosts in colors and energy forms all the time but not people. And that would be incredibly unusual as well. But it gave her hope.
She nodded acknowledgement to the now silent woman standing still at the entrance. “You are the specialist Dr. Jorgenson wanted me to meet?” she asked.
“I’m Dr. Maddy.” The woman glided into the room gently, carefully, as if feeling her way. Celina tilted her head, her eyes open as she watched bright yellow and green colors stream and twist with the woman’s movements. She’d never seen anything like it. With or without her sight.
“Hello, Dr. Maddy. Thank you for seeing me.”
Dr. Maddy said, “Hi, Celina. Dr. Jorgensen has told me so much about you.”
She could hear the smile in Dr. Maddy’s voice making her respond in kind. “That’s probably not a good thing.” Celina shrugged. “He can’t figure out why I can’t see.”
“I’ve seen your medical records and the surgical reports. According to what I’ve read the surgery to reduce the pressure on your optic nerve and reattach the optic nerve in your left eye was a complete success.”
“How can it be a success if I can’t see?” Celina countered.
“That’s why I’d like to take a look.” Dr. Maddy approached. “May I?”
Celina nodded. “Go ahead.”
For the next half hour Celina went through every eye test she’d already had done many times over. She waited in silence while the two doctors carried out minimal conversation. Then Dr. Maddy stepped around Dr. Jorgensen to stand in front of her. “May I explore your head?”
Dr. Jorgensen took that moment to step out of the room.
Curiously Celina nodded. “Of course.”
What followed was a systematic search of her head as Dr. Maddy’s long fingers glided and stroked from front to back, from side to side. At one point she said, “Interesting.” But she didn’t elaborate.
Celina had no idea what her skull shape might have to do with anything, but she was willing to be checked over for anything.
After it seemed Dr. Maddy had done everything she could do, Celina asked, “Well, did you find anything?”
“Maybe, but I need to perform a couple more checks. I’m going to leave you here for a few moments.” And she left. The door shut, leaving Celina alone. She wanted to get up and move around but something stopped her. She didn’t feel like she was being watched, but neither did she feel like she was quite alone.
As she sat there, a strange lassitude filled her limbs. A warmth like she’d never experienced before crawled up her legs. She’d have cried out in shock but it felt good – so good she didn’t want it to stop. She whimpered in delight as the heat reached the aching muscles from last night. She probably should have mentioned the accident to the doctor, but he would likely have tut-tutted her to death and not been able to help anyway.
The heat continued to climb up her hips and spine. Celina leaned back and moaned lightly as her body let the stress drain from her neck and shoulders. Heat spread to all corners of her body, making her almost writhe with joy. Peacefulness filled her as she shifted into the heat, to the places that were missed. It continued to climb higher and higher, easing into her neck and whistling through her veins.
She shivered, then shuddered. That felt so good. She had never felt anything like it. She wanted it to last – forever, if possible.
Then it shifted into her skull and heat flashed and danced through her brain. She reached up a hand to her forehead to see if the warmth she was feeling inside was emanating outside. But it wasn’t. Her forehead was cool. So was her neck. Bizarre. Yet there was no fear attached. There was a sense of joy. Release. Peace. Lord, it felt wonderful. She didn’t know if Dr. Maddy was responsible or not. She hoped so, because she’d do a lot for a repeat session.
And then the heat hit her eyes.
She groaned. The warmth turned hot and achy inside her skull. What had been a comforting heat now sent flares of spitting shocks into her skull. She slammed her hands up against her head and she cried out.
Instantly the pain stopped.
The heat stopped.
And the flares inside her head stopped.
The comforting warmth washed over her, sweeping her body gently in long, soothing strokes from the top of her head down. She shuddered as her body eased back again in relief as she realized the pain was not coming back. She didn’t know what had happened, but it had been brutal. So fast and so deep, with such cutting pain. She hadn’t had time to do anything but react.
She’d gone from being in a euphoric daze to being in agony.
Slowly the panic eased back. And peace was again filling her insides. If nothing else she was starting to feel better. She opened her eyes, willing them to see something. At least a little bit. Enough that she could get around to do what needed to be done.
Just not enough…
Not enough for me to see? Is that it?
She stilled, the benefit of the smooth healing instantly evaporating. “What do you want?” she hissed out loud, hating that he could understand when she spoke to him in her mind or out loud.
I want to see. Let me see.
“No.”
You’re here now. Fix it. Let me see.
She slammed her eyes shut and swore softly under her breath.
Her nasty visitor laughed, that same horrible sound that gave her nightmares and woke her up in a cold sweat.
No. I will never let you see.
*
Maddy sat cross-legged in Dr. Jorgensen’s office. A ripple of aftershock still wracked down her own spine, even as she gently s
troked Celina’s spine back to peacefulness again. Shaken but quickly regaining her sense of balance, Maddy left anchors in place for further work. And there was further work required. But not the same type of healing work she was used to.
All the energy issues she saw came from different emotional issues or physical causes. That she hadn’t come up against one like this before didn’t mean much – especially given the millions of different scenarios that people came up with to hide. Nothing was protected more than one’s deepest, darkest secrets. And she had no way to know at this point what Celina might be hiding or was indeed trying to protect.
Taking a deep breath, she slowly eased out of her meditative state and pulled her energy back into her body. She opened her eyes and stared at the plain, simple office, her thoughts churning. She needed to come up with something to say to Celina, and then she needed to connect to Stefan… and fast.
*
Stefan sat outside on his deck, a pot of healing tea at his side. The late afternoon sun had slipped lower behind the trees, setting up a kaleidoscope of rays peeking through the branches. He loved this time of day.
Stefan.
He smiled. Hello, beautiful. What’s up?
I just did a session on your Celina.
At the concern in her voice the smile fell away. What’s wrong with her? He couldn’t keep the alarm from his voice.
That’s the thing. I couldn’t get to the correct region of her eyes to find out. I came up against some major walls that immediately attacked me.
Attacked you? he asked incredulously. Why?
I have no idea. And no, before you ask, I’ve never seen it before. She took a deep shaky breath. It was a little unnerving.
Sounds like it, he muttered. Are you all right?
Yes. She rushed to reassure him. I’m fine. I’m not sure what to say about Celina.
Is she healthy in every other way?
Yes, in remarkably good physical health. Not in energetic health. She’s stressed and bleeding an incredible amount of energy to her injured friends, keeping her ghost communications functioning, and the anger, guilt…she’s feeding that with energy she doesn’t have to spare.