Dramatic Music
Meanwhile in New Atlantis Cassidy, Natalia and Alexandra are still standing around talking and suddenly as they are about to leave the alarm on the bio-system that controls and keeps watch over Drake is triggered. It gives out a voice command that his body’s brain wave patterns are no longer stable, they have gone into irregular patterns and a second warning says that the Golum’s heart is beginning to heat up. They all rush over to the control console and both Alexandra and Natalia try to re-set the system but no matter how many times they try the system will not re-set. Natalia goes to a second console and tries to bring it on line. Natalia screams back to Alexandra and Cassidy that the system is showing the same thing and will not allow her to re-set it. Alexandra, looking at the console, is more worried about the bio-readout on the Golum’s heart as the system is continually saying that the heart is reaching a critical condition. Cassidy turns around in disbelief at what is happening, she is panicking and says, “Do something, help him!!” Natalia, “We’re trying to, we are doing everything we can think of but it’s just not working.” But what they don’t realise is that Josie has reached out with her mind once again and connected with Drake’s.
Cassidy, after hearing Natalia still saying that they are trying as hard as they can, goes up to the maturation tank, drawing out one of her twenty-four inch fighting daggers she spins it in her hand and thrusts it into the opening of the tank and tries to prise the door open on the tank. Alexandra, seeing this screams at Cassidy, “STOP! If you do that, if you open it that way, you could cause him irreversible harm". Cassidy reluctantly stops and puts her dagger away.
All of a sudden Drake’s eyes open up and begin to glow as he is trying to say “Save her!” but none of them can understand. Re-routing the brainwave bio-sensor they are able to hear his thoughts and all they continually hear from his mind are the words, “You must save her!” They all look at each other and one of them says what they are all thinking, “Save who??” Their attention is drawn back to the bio-sensor console it is now showing that the Golum’s heart is at an absolutely critical level. Alexandra says, “If we don’t get it under control the heart will crack all the way through and we will lose him.” Cassidy, on hearing this, looks directly at Natalia and Natalia seeing the look on Cassidy’s face knows exactly what she wants. Natalia says, “No, no way! You can’t use that, it could kill you both.” Alexandra asks, “Use what?” Natalia answers, “Cassidy wants to use the amplification stone in order to break the connection between Drake and whoever has reached out to his mind.” Alexandra says, “Natalia is right, it could kill you both.” Cassidy states, “I don’t care, he’s my best friend, I don’t want to lose him, he has always been there for me and for us. If you’re not going to help I’ll do it on my own.” Alexandra, looking at the sensors again, says, “You had better make up your minds fast if you are going to do something.”
Cassidy, looking at Natalia again says, “Am I going to have to do this on my own or are you going to help me?” Natalia finally agrees to help on one condition, that Cassidy is to wear the bio-sensor so they can keep track of her vital signs. “The moment they reach a dangerous level I’m pulling the plug, no ifs, ands or buts about it.” Cassidy says, “Fine, let’s just do this!” As Alexandra is fitting Cassidy with the bio-sensors, one on her temple, one on her neck and one on her chest, Natalia, not wanting to waste any more time, kneels down, places her hand on the stone floor, her eyes are closed for a minute then they open, glowing and she says, “Awake and rise!” At that very moment the floor turns from being solid stone to a liquid form and out of that liquid rises a Golum. The Golum stands in front of them with the Power Amplification Stone which is made from solid Amethyst and a small amount of quartz crystal surrounding it to help regulate the amount of energy passing through it. Natalia instructs the Golum on how to place the Amplification Stone according to Cassidy’s wishes.
As this is happening suddenly Josie finds herself in a dimly lit maze. Along both sides of the walls are many different doors. Hoping to find her way out Josie begins to try each door with no success. She continues on throughout the maze not realising that she is in somebody else’s mind. She finds another door in front of her but this time it is different to the others she has seen. As she opens it and steps through she suddenly finds herself falling then comes to an abrupt stop. Picking herself up Josie finds herself back in the very hospital she was in when she was younger and very sick. No matter how many doors she goes through, or floors she goes to, it seems like she is just going around in circles.
By this time Cassidy is prepared to begin to try to separate Drake’s mind from whoever is linked to him. Cassidy and the others believing that the harm which is being caused to Drake must be from one of the elementals ie; witch who serves Tansin. The crystal is now hovering in front of the maturation tank, Cassidy places one hand on the crystal and one hand on the tank and as she does this she summonses only one quarter of the power she possesses and can draw on and begins to channel it through the crystal. As she does so her eyes light up and her hair stands out from her head and goes an ice blue and white colour.
At that moment there is a massive clap of thunder which reverberates through the halls of New Atlantis which causes everyone to stop doing whatever they are doing. Throughout New Atlantis everyone knows what this sound means that something forbidden is being done and they all wonder who and why.
Still in the room Cassidy has just begun to enter Drakes mind but after only a few seconds she is pushed out. Both Natalia and Alexandra see that something is not quite right. Natalia asks, “What happened?” Cassidy replies, “Just after I entered his mind he pushed me back out.” Natalia asks, “Has he ever done that before?” Cassidy answers, “No, that has never happened, this is making me more worried.” Alexandra says, “I don’t want to interrupt but you had better try again, his vital signs are getting worse.” Cassidy begins again only to be pushed out for a second time. This time she realises that it is not Drake who is pushing her out, she exclaims, “You bitch!!” Both Natalia and Alexandra ask, “What do you mean ‘You bitch?’” Cassidy says, “The person who has linked with his mind is the one keeping me out and she is the strongest person I have ever come across.” Getting frustrated and pissed off Cassidy decides to do something even more foolish, she takes out of her hip pouch a ruby-like bracelet. Before either of the others can stop her she quickly snaps it closed around the amplification crystal.
With that, both the crystal and Cassidy begin to rise towards the ceiling in the centre of the room. As this happens, the now modified crystal projects a light beam towards Drake. Cassidy places both of her hands on the crystal, turning herself into mist, she is then drawn through the crystal and along the beam into Drake’s mind. Alexandra asks, “What the hell just happened then Natalia?” Natalia goes on to explain that she has just entered Drake’s mind physically but by doing this she could become trapped in there forever or worse she could cease to even exist.
Cassidy has just appeared in the very same labyrinth part of Drake’s mind as Josie first did. Unlike Josie Cassidy is able to open a few of the doors into Drake’s mind. As she opens each door she sees a path to each past memory. Until she reaches a door that she finds already opened, stepping through she finds herself in a place that is made up of both Josie’s and Drake’s mind. Sensing the other person that has invaded Drake’s mind Cassidy takes on a more primitive and more dangerous form of what her people were when they first gained their powers. To most people her kind looked like the grim reaper made of mist.
Black Dawn by Adrian von Ziegler
Josie who is still trying to find a way out suddenly feels an intense chill in the air and her skin begins to crawl and the hairs on the back of her neck stand up as she gets a terrifying feeling that she is no longer alone. At that very moment she hears a wailing scream that causes her to freeze in terror. The longer she stays there the colder it becomes and the closer the wailing seems to get. Nervously she turns and looks over her right shoulder where she catches a glimpse of this terrifying creature coming towards her. At the same time all the lights behind the creature begin to go out and as Josie turns to run through the nearest door it slams shut in her face. Frantically she tries to open the door. A few seconds after that she can hear and see all the doors slamming shut. Turning around to see where the creature is Josie suddenly has to drop to the floor as the creature goes flying past with it’s claws out, barely missing her. In fact it tears through part of the clothing on her shoulder as she drops to the ground. As the creature goes flying past it lets out another horrible scream showing it’s disappointment at missing her.
From Cassidy’s point of view she could not tell that it was actually her friend Josie, all she saw was a faceless creature in her path. Cassidy, in her mist form turns around and tries again. Josie, seeing this, quickly ducks out of the way again. Getting to her feet she begins to run down the corridor trying different doors on and off on the way, but no matter how much she struggles to open them they just won’t budge. She crosses the hallway and tries the doors on the other side and while she is busy trying one door, not paying attention to the creature, she realises by seeing the reflection in the window that it is too close for comfort. Josie jumps out of the way and spins around just as the creature drags it’s claws through the door. She sees that the creature has it’s claws stuck in the door and is pulling trying to get it’s hand out.
Josie decides to kick the door open with all her force, this causes her to fall back on her arse. Josie hasn’t realised by now that the creature has freed itself and has become even faster than before. It is so fast that she only has time to push herself away from the door with her legs. However, she is not quick enough as the demon strikes the floor but also catches her leg and tears the lower leg open. Josie screams in pain as the flesh is torn from her leg. Back in Josie’s apartment, where her body is still lying on the floor, the wound appears on her leg there as well and bleeds profusely.
Back in New Atlantis Natalia is becoming worried as she knows that Cassidy cannot spend any more than an hour in her current form in someone else’s mind. She asks two things of Alexandra, firstly how critical is the Golum’s heart and how close is it to cracking all the way through. Secondly she asks how much time has passed since Cassidy entered Drake’s mind. Alexandra replies, “His heart is only moments away from cracking all the way through.” She also tells Natalia that Cassidy has already been in Drake’s mind for 45 minutes. Both Natalia and Alexandra think to themselves the very same thing, “Please hurry Cassidy, you haven’t got much time.”
As they are thinking this back in Drake’s mind Josie is struggling to get back up on her feet, she is pulling herself up on a gurney. She rips a piece of cloth from a sheet and tries to wrap it around her bleeding leg. Holding the bandage in place she limps along the corridor and with her other hand she holds onto the wall. She hears the screech of the creature again and sees it barrelling down the hallway with it’s claws out in front of it. Realising that the elevators are across from her Josie decides to make a break for it to see if the elevator will take her to another floor that may look the same but hopefully will not contain the demon. She takes a deep breath and just goes for it but her feet keep sliding in her own blood making it difficult for her to cross the short distance to the elevators.
She just manages to get across as the demon goes past and again it takes a swipe at her, but for a second time it just misses her ripping the back of her clothing again. Josie leans against the wall and grips her leg with both hands because she is in so much pain. She peers around the corner trying to see where the creature has gone but it seems to have disappeared. She drags herself over to the elevator, leaning against the elevator doors Josie lets out a really deep sigh of relief believing that the creature is no longer after her. She hears a whispering voice calling out to her and it continually says. “This way Josephine, this way!” As she decides to follow it she suddenly hears the ‘ding’ of the elevator arriving at her floor. Terrified and shaking, Josie slowly turns around and watches the elevator doors open but to her amazement and relief it seems that there is nothing in the elevator. Foolishly she puts her head in to the elevator to have a look around and suddenly the creature appears face to face with her. Screaming Josie tries to back away from it but it flies at her grasping it’s claws into her shoulders and slamming her back against the wall on the other side of the corridor.
Josie, still screaming, begs for it to let her go. The creature raises it’s head and all she sees are it’s glowing red eyes and Josie watches as it slowly opens it’s mouth and shows it’s teeth even more. As the demon is about to rip open her neck with it’s teeth a huge lightning bolt hits it throwing it down the corridor. Josie again hears the voice, this time it is telling her to run for her life. Josie, now seriously injured from the last attack tries to run but only manages to stagger down the corridor. After only getting a few feet Josie leans against the wall and begins to slide towards the floor leaving a massive trail of blood across the wall. Hearing that the creature has freed itself Josie pulls herself up off the floor and begins to head down the corridor again.
Back in New Atlantis Natalia sees a crack appear in the Amplification Stone and she knows if the stone cracks and breaks apart it will be destroyed, along with it, the ruby bracelet. Natalia thinks to herself, “That’s one of the worst things that can happen to her it could actually obliterate her. The absolute worst thing that could happen is that she could get trapped in his mind where she would have to continually relive all the horrifying and sad things which he has experienced, which would include watching her parents be murdered over and over again by Kyah and this would then leave Cassidy trapped forever in darkness in Drake’s mind.
As Josie is running down the corridor she is getting weaker and weaker from the loss of blood. She arrives at a corner and after leaning against the wall for another few seconds in order to catch her breath she continues on. About a quarter of the way down the corridor she realises that there are no more doors except for one. She hears a sound like rushing, whistling wind and knows that the creature is not far behind her. As she gets just a few metres from the door she realises that the lights in front of her are beginning to go out and as she looks behind she sees that those lights are also going out one by one. As she turns back from seeing the lights going out behind her and how close the hideous creature is she gets the feeling she has just gone from the frying pan into the fire as she can now see another one of these creatures in front of her. She manages to get out of the way and cringes against the door as it goes flying past her and begins to attack the one that has harmed her. For several minutes she desperately tries to open the door. She hears the first of the creatures let out a loud banshee like screech and she watches as it raises it’s hand and brings it’s claws down and slices through the second one. As this happens the second creature seems to dissipate and looks like someone has swirled their hand through smoke. Josie gets even more frantic and tries to open the door even harder. The first creature hovers in mid-air and watches as the last wisps of smoke disappear.
Josie continues to struggle to open the door and glancing up she realises that the creature has now turned it’s attention back to her. Still holding on to the door handle with one hand she now begins to kick and hit the door as she screams for someone to let her in. Cassidy, meanwhile, still bewildered cannot understand why Drake took the same form as her in order to defend one of Tansin’s kind. Shaking her head she decides to end this now. On her bony hands she makes the nails grow to full length and charges at Josie. Josie swings around from pounding on the door, places her hands and arms in front of her face to protect herself as she sees the claws coming down towards her. Just as the claws make contact with her arms the door suddenly swings open and from out of the blackness comes a pair of hands which grab Josie around the waist and wrench her back into the darkness and the door slams closed in Cassidy’s face. Cassidy starts attacking the door and no matter how many times she claws at it the door continually heals itself. What Cassidy doesn’t know is this door protects Drake’s subconscious mind and no-one, including Cassidy, has ever been past this point.
Josie, terrified and trembling, can see nothing but darkness then after a few seconds she hears a sound of a jingling chain against what sounds like glass. Nervously, she stretches out her hand towards the sound but something cold and covered in cobwebs touches it, she screams loudly and draws her hand back as quickly as possible. After a few seconds she regains her composure and with a little more courage for the second time she stretches her hand out into the darkness, carefully feeling around for a few seconds her fingers make contact with the chain.
Carefully she pulls the chain down and suddenly, with a click, the darkness is lit up by a bright light-bulb and Josie finds herself within a room filled with cobwebs but Josie has no idea that this is the beginning to Drake’s subconscious mind. The only eerie sound she can hear is a constant clawing at the door that is behind her. Suddenly she notices that there are massive cracks appearing in all of the walls and at the same time the light-bulb begins to glow brighter and brighter for a reason that Josie has not yet noticed. As the light gets brighter her wounds begin to heal but Josie has not noticed, she is more concerned with the cracks in the walls which seem to be getting larger and larger. As they do so the room begins to warp as they look as though they are being torn apart. At that very moment the light goes so bright that it is blinding. Suddenly the light-bulb explodes, Josie puts her arm up to shield her eyes and along with the light-bulb the really badly warped walls explode as well and turn into a spinning mass of debris. As she is watching she realises that it is getting closer and closer to her and she closes her eyes waiting for what she believes to be the inevitable end.
Martyrium by Adrian von Ziegler
While Josie is standing there with her eyes closed she hears a loud whooshing sound and then suddenly everything goes dead quiet again. Afraid to open her eyes Josie has the unusual feeling of floating in mid-air. She decides to slowly open her eyes and finds herself sitting on a swing in a park. She looks around and finds herself in a park across from the hospital she was in when she was younger.
She touches her shoulders and in amazement she sees that the wounds are completely healed and then she bends down to unwrap her leg and finds that this wound has also healed.
Before she can do anything else she hears her name being called in a way she has not heard in years. As she stands up, turns around and walks toward the voice to see who it is calling her she suddenly sees herself reflected in the face of the mobile phone which is laying on the ground in front of her. She finds herself transformed into looking as she did many years ago. She is wearing a pair of black jeans, a singlet, a pair of orange sneakers and finds her hair has gone back to being pitch black, long and pulled back into a pony-tail with just a few wisps hanging down around the side of her face.
Out loud she asks the question, “What’s going on?” and feeling just a little afraid. Again she hears the voice calling her name, “Josephine, Josephine!!” She turns around again and as she does so she bumps into a person who is standing right in front of her. At first she does not recognise him. He then asks, “Josephine, are you alright?” She says, “No, I don’t know what is going on!” Drake puts his hand out to take hers and leads her back to the swings. As they sit down on the swings it suddenly hits her who this person is. There was only one person she knew who called her by her full name and this was a person she knew only as Adams. Suddenly all her fears and apprehensions disappear for when she was with this person she felt nothing but safe. Back in the real world Josie’s convulsions begin to slow to the point of almost stopping.
Josie says, “A few seconds ago I was in the middle of a nightmare. How did you find me in the darkness?” Drake replies, “Because I heard you screaming in the dark and I remembered the promise I made to you, that I would always be there to look out for you when you needed me. I pulled you from that nightmare into a world where you felt safe.” As he is speaking he extends his hand and points to the surroundings Josie is now in. As Josie looks she sees that it is the Warp Tour music concert that was held across from the hospital when she was sick. She had watched the concert from her hospital room window and only after begging the doctors did they allow Josie to have a few hours to herself outside of the hospital and in this time she went across to the concert and watched it through the fence. This is how she remembers that she first met Drake.
Meanwhile, Cassidy is still clawing at the door as hard as she can. Alexandra and Natalia are listening to Cassidy being frustrated that she cannot pass this point. Natalia goes on to ask Cassidy, “What’s happening?” “He shut me out when he saved that monster!” Alexandra asks, “What else did you do?” “Nothing, why?” Alexandra answers, “Because suddenly his vital signs are returning to a normal and stable rhythm. The heart has cooled enough so I can inject a stabiliser into the crack. This is only a temporary fix though.”
Drake and Josie go on talking and Drake says to Josie, “Do you feel more comfortable now?” Josie answers, “Yes, I’m much more comfortable now, can I stay here with you forever?” Before Drake can answer her question the world he has created for her to feel safe suddenly begins to warp, go blurry and distorts. Drake stands up quickly from the swing, grabbing Josie by the hand and pulling her to her feet he tells her that she has to go. Josie refuses, repeating, “I want to stay here with you forever.” “No, Josephine, you have to leave NOW!” This makes Josie jump and feel a little wary and afraid of Drake. Still grasping Josie’s hand Drake starts to run across the park towards the hospital doors. As they do so Drake looks behind and realises Cassidy has broken through the barrier between his conscious and sub-conscious minds and he realises that this is why the world he has created has started to warp.
While this is happening Alexandra is just finishing up injecting the mixture into his stone-heart. As she turns to place the syringe on the table behind her she notices that the crystal is glowing even more intensely and that there are pulses of light. As she stands staring at it she sees more cracks appearing in the amplification stone which is made of amethyst and also within the ruby bracelet that was placed there earlier. Extremely worried, Alexandra turns to Natalia and tells her that the crystal is about to crack all the way through. Natalia, seeing this, orders the Golum to remove the bracelet which will break the connection between Cassidy’s ability to stay in Drake’s mind physically and force her out. As the Golum obeys the command and tries to disconnect the bracelet from the stone there is a massive discharge of energy and as the energy passes through the Golum it tears it apart.
Drake & Josie reach the doors of the hospital, the electronic doors just begin to open when Cassidy, in her primeval form, grabs Drake so hard that she leaves claw marks in his shoulder. She shoves him out of the way in order to get to what she still thinks is one of Tansin’s followers. She gets her claws around Josie’s neck, digs them in to the flesh and lifts her up in the air and as she does so she is beginning to pull on Josie’s neck in order to tear her apart. Drake gets to his feet screams at Cassidy, “STOP!!” Cassidy now looks at him and as she does so Drake turns around and Cassidy sees all the different forms, demons, lichens, vampires etc which Drake is and in an instant they all blur and merge into one being of such hatred and rage, a being that no-one has seen in eons.
Drake with his oversize teeth bared, claws appearing from his outstretched hand, and his eyes which are normally pitch black turning a very bright red indicates that he is now seriously pissed off. Before Cassidy can react Drake brings his clawed hand up through the bottom of her rib cage. Because Cassidy is more mist than solid she thinks she is safe until she realises that something is seriously wrong as she reverts back to her physical human form, Drake curls his hand inside of Cassidy and brings his claws out through the front of her ribs which causes her to drop Josie to the ground. Drake screams at her again, “YOU SHOULDN’T BE HERE, GET OUT OF MY MIND!!” Immediately after that Drake turns and hurls Cassidy from his conscious and his sub-conscious minds.
Imaginary by Evanescence
Cassidy desperately tries to stop herself from being ejected from his mind, she grips the sides, digging her hands in to what appears to her to be an open door. Her body is being pulled out and distorted by the ruby crystal and the amplification stone but she refuses to let go. Suddenly she realises that she no longer has any more time in Drake’s mind as the edges of the door become like molten wax and as she tries to hold on her fingers just drag through the sides of the door. A strong force suddenly pulls her completely away and as it does so Cassidy screams, “NO-O-O-O-O-O!!!!” and it echoes loudly.
As this is happening the light-beam from the ruby bracelet begins to switch on and off as if it is running out of power. Natalia and Alexandra look at each other as they both think the same thing, that Cassidy is actually past her time limit and they say in unison, “Come on Cassidy, you have to get out of there, you have no time left!” Then they see the light-beam go from flickering to being a solid beam of light to a crackling ball of light which is travelling back down the light-beam to it’s source. It passes through the ruby bracelet and the bracelet breaks into four pieces and they fall off, hitting the floor and shattering. Alexandra seeing this says, “Well, that can’t be good?” At that very moment the amplification stone almost stops glowing except for a small flicker of light inside of it. Natalia, who is worried about Cassidy as she has not re-materialised, walks towards the crystal. Suddenly a wall of stone appears in front of her, it is the Golum in one of it’s many forms. As Natalia tries to go around it the wall grows higher and longer towering over her, Alexandra and the maturation tank that holds Drake.
At the moment it reaches the roof and the walls at the sides of the room you can hear a high pitched ultra-sonic sound as the crystal explodes blowing Cassidy out and across the room. There is a loud thump as Cassidy slams up against the wall at the end of the room. She then slides down the wall slamming into the floor. Just after this happens Natalia and Alexandra scream out to Cassidy to look out as shards of the crystal are heading in her direction. Barely able to move, she pulls the bio-mesh cloak up over her to protect herself. As she does this the shards of crystal strike the bio-mesh and penetrate but barely missing her body they leave slice marks across her face, neck and shoulder. Natalia is terrified as she had to watch the crystal shards pass straight through the bio-mesh and she has no idea how badly injured Cassidy may be from these pieces.
Back in his mind Drake, after dealing harshly with Cassidy, turns back to see Josie lying on the ground just in front of the automatic sliding doors. As Drake walks towards Josie to help her up from the ground he stretches out his hands and realises that they are covered in blood. Shocked by this he takes a step back and as he does so he catches sight of his reflection in the glass of the sliding doors. Horrified by what he sees he quickly turns away from Josie as she regains consciousness. As Josie gets to her feet she asks if he is alright. Aggressively he tells Josie that she must leave now. Josie asks why she must leave and also why he won’t look at her. Josie begins to approach Drake with her hand outstretched to place it on his shoulder but Drake pulls away from her, closes his hands into fists, puts his head down and thinks to himself, “I’m not a monster!!” By this time Josie is now standing in front of him and she puts her hand under his chin and raises his head so he is looking at her. Josie asks. “What are you afraid of?” Drake, thinking that he’s still this horrible monster, turns away from Josie yet again. Josie, refusing to let this go again stands in front of him and asks, “WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF?”
At that very moment Drake sees that his hands are back to normal which means the rest of him must also be the same. He walks Josie to the sliding doors once more and before she steps through Drake places his hands on either side of her face and kisses her gently on the forehead. As Josie walks through the doors and begins to return to her own mind she calls out to Drake, “Am I dreaming?” Drake answers, “Yes!”
By this time the Golum has almost reverted back to it’s human form and no longer creating the barrier to protect them. Natalia races over to Cassidy’s side, she carefully pulls aside the bio-mesh cloak and seeing how badly cut Cassidy is across the face, neck and shoulder she calls out to Alexandra to bring the medical kit to her. Alexandra runs to the medical cabinet, opens the doors and instead of being able to immediately see the kit she starts rummaging through the contents of the cabinet. Finally she finds it on the bottom shelf right at the back. Grabbing it as fast as she can she runs to where Natalia is kneeling down next to Cassidy. Alexandra opens the kit, takes out a syringe and a vial which she places in to the syringe and locks it into place. She then injects Cassidy in the neck, closest to her wounds. Natalia has collected the hand held healing device out of the medical kit and places it over the wounds and activates it. They both see that the wounds are healing quite fast but Natalia notices blood coming out from under the cloak in Cassidy’s chest area. She tells Alexandra about the blood coming out from under the cloak. Natalia carefully pulls the cloak back to reveal the massive wound that Drake has inflicted on Cassidy.
Crawl by Superchick
After finishing with the other wounds Alexandra proceeds in trying to heal the massive holes in Cassidy’s chest. No matter how many times Alexandra uses the healing device the wound will not heal any more than a few millimetres around the openings of the wounds. Alexandra gives her more injections but even that does not help Cassidy’s condition. Alexandra looks up at Natalia and with that one look Natalia races over to the console, hits an intercom emergency button and she gets someone from the main medical control centre saying to her, “How can we help you?” Natalia yells to them that they need immediate assistance and the person, seeing where their position is, replies that a team is on the way. A few seconds later the medical team arrives.
Natalia watches as the medical team assist Dr Alexandra in trying to save Cassidy’s life. One of the medical team goes over to the console, presses several buttons which makes an operating table slide out of the wall and lock into place. Alexandra and the medical team try to raise Cassidy from the ground as carefully as possible but no matter how many times they do this she screams in agony even though she has now been dosed up with a high amount of pain-killer. After hearing Cassidy scream Alexandra goes to give her an even stronger dose. As she does so Natalia grabs her by the wrist and says, “Don’t, couldn’t that kill her?” Alexandra replies, “It could but I’m willing to take that risk in order to get her on to the operating table.” Natalia reluctantly lets go of her arm, puts her head down and thinks to herself, “This is not good.”
After the injection Cassidy passes out which gives them the opportunity to move her quickly. Just as they place her on the operating table she suddenly wakes up and begins to scream again in agony. One of the medical team notices that a partly broken rib is sticking into Cassidy’s heart and alerts Alexandra to this problem. While this is happening no-one notices what is happening with Drake.
Subconsciously realising what he has done Drake’s hands open up and begin to lift up towards the front of the tank and as he touches the tank and pushes the front clear part, which is made out of crystal, begins to take the shape of his hand and arm. A few seconds later he manages to come in contact with the Golum which is just finishing re-forming into it’s human state. The Golum’s eyes begin to glow bright white as it begins to walk towards where the medical team, Alexandra and Natalia are.
The Golum reaches the team working on Cassidy and it deliberately bumps into them pushing some of them out of the way. They look up, and one of them says, “What the hell…….” But before they can do anything the Golum begins to push the others out of the way as well and as it does so it begins to form a fighting blade which extends about one foot out of it’s hand. Natalia gets in front of the Golum and putting her hand up and at the same time commands it to, “Stop!!” The Golum comes to a dead stop and Natalia watches as the blade begins to retract. Natalia turns around looking at the others and they all breathe a sigh of relief. But suddenly the Golum pushes Natalia to the floor and proceeds to do the same with everyone else. Natalia tries to command it to stop once again but it does not obey and she, along with the rest, watch as the Golum raises it’s fist, shoots the blade out to full length and plunges it straight into Cassidy’s chest striking her heart.
Cassidy feeling some of the most excruciating pain she has ever felt, screams in agony so loudly that it is heard throughout New Atlantis. This sound causes great concern to such a point that the guards who patrol New Atlantis think that they are under attack and begin to transform and head towards the medical centre. As they do so an image of The Elder suddenly appears overhead and he explains that they are not under attack and that everything is fine and then instructs the guards to go back to their normal routines. The image of The Elder then fades away.
By this time Cassidy’s heart has stopped and worried about this Alexandra tries to approach her and as she does so the Golum creates big spikes which come out of the walls and floor around that area to prevent any of them getting close to Cassidy. As they can do nothing more than watch, one of the female medical team spots what seems to be blood travelling through the veins of the Golum’s arm. She alerts the others to what she is seeing.
Those who were knocked off their feet get up again and they watch as the blood flow goes up towards the wrist then travels along the blade and into Cassidy’s heart. Just after it has entered her heart a strange aura appears and her heart begins to beat once again. The Golum retracts the blade and as it does this it retracts the spikes from the walls and floor. Cassidy takes a deep breath as there is a blinding flash of light and everyone in the room covers their eyes because it is so blindingly bright.
After the light has dissipated they see that Cassidy is now sitting up on the edge of the operating table and to their amazement and great joy they see that the wound in her chest has healed. Alexandra gets out a hand held machine and scans the wound to see if there is any residual damage but finds that it is perfectly healed apart from a little scarring. Natalia walks over and asks how she feels. Cassidy answers, “I’m fine, just a little sore.” Natalia asks, “What happened, why did the Golum attack you in that way?” Cassidy goes on to explain to all of them that Drake passed some of his unique blood to the Golum in order to save her life.
Alexandra recommends that Cassidy takes it easy for the rest of the night and to remain on the operating table so that they can monitor her in case there are any complications. Cassidy says, “No, I’m fine.....!” and tries to stand up. Her legs buckle under her and Natalia comes to her aid and helps her back up on to the table and says, “You’re not going anywhere I’m afraid.”
Back at the College Detective Jade who is just getting in the back of the van, does not realise what she has done to cause Josie to go into having a seizure. One of the other Detectives in the van says, “Don’t you think that was a little harsh?” Jade answers, “No!” The other officer says sarcastically, “Well, do you think you hit a nerve?” Detective Jade just smiles and laughs.
In the apartment Josie is still laying on the floor but her seizure has completely stopped. As Josie opens her eyes they flash from her natural green eyes to the dark purple that signifies some of her dormant vampire genes have been awakened. Her eyes then return to normal, she closes her eyes and passes out again.
Vampire Diaries End Theme
Detective Jade tells the other officers that she is returning to the station, she then leaves. Twenty minutes later Detective Jade arrives at the St. Kilda Rd Police complex. After parking her car and walking up the front stairs Jade notices a black limo parked just shy of the station. Whilst she is still looking at the limo and not where she is going she bumps into Kristen and Professor Harris as they are coming out of the station. Kristen says nastily, “Watch where you’re walking!” as she pushes past Detective Jade. Jade says, “Excuse me!!” but she gets no response as Kristen and Professor Harris walk over to the limo and get in. Another police officer who is coming down the stairs says, “Are you alright?” Jade replies, “Yes, I’m fine” but thinks out loud, “What a bitch!!” Jade continues on into the station, but inside the limo Professor Harris comes face to face with Tansin, his worst nightmare.
Professor Harris gulps and says, “Tansin, I didn’t know you were already back? Let me explain.” Tansin holds her hand up as if to say, “I don’t want to hear your excuses.” He keeps trying to speak but this is seriously beginning to annoy her and to get her point across she reaches over and grasps his neck with her hand squeezing it tightly and says, “SHUT UP!!”. Kristen says, “I told you she was going to be mad!!” By this time Tansin has started to tear strips off Professor Harris, “What the hell do you think you were doing getting in to a physical argument with Josie? You were sent there to keep an eye on her, in case we had to use her to force her father to keep searching for the tomb. If it comes to it we will also use her to force her father to open the tomb. Now you’ve brought all this attention on to us that we don’t need at this time! If you ever do this again I won’t hesitate to kill you. Let me demonstrate!!” As she says this she pulls her hand back from his neck, he watches as her nails begin to grow about an inch and then she stabs her nails into his stomach. A few seconds later he begins to spasm and his skin starts to tear as if it is really, really tight then suddenly his flesh goes back to normal. Tansin says, “Make sure you remember this, now get out of my sight.”
Screams Of Insanity - Original Composition - Scary Music
Professor Harris can’t get out of the limo fast enough. Kristen now hops over to the other side of the seat where Professor Harris was just sitting and tells the driver to take them to the College.
Back in New Atlantis Jake Gamaleil, the Captain of The Reaper has just returned from Japan, from the island of Shikoku with another shipload of seriously injured acolytes. Jake is standing on the deck and there to meet him is Natalia. She yells out to him that there was an accident involving Cassidy. Hearing this Jake Gamaleil ignores what his first mate is telling him, he walks over to the side of the ship, grabbing some of the rigging he swings himself out with one arm holding on then he lets his grip loosen so that he slides down the rigging and lands on the dock next to Natalia. He asks how bad the accident was,“Pretty bad.” They both head off back to see Cassidy. For the rest of the night Natalia stays with Cassidy and Jake stays there until his ship has been fitted with more supplies and is ready to leave once again. While Jake is standing next to Cassidy he places his hand on her brow and says, “Get well soon, we need you in this coming battle.”
The limo carrying Tansin and Kristen has arrived at the College. They proceed to Josie’s apartment and manage to slip past the two Golum’s because they are being cleaned by some of the janitors from the College. Kristen enters the main door to the apartments first, followed by Tansin. They reach Josie’s apartment after a few seconds. Kristen begins to knock on the door and as she does so she asks another student who is passing by whether she has seen Josie today. The student says, “No-one has seen Josie since her first two classes this morning. That’s all I know.”
As Kristen looks at Tansin she notices that Tansin’s necklace that carries a jewelled spider begins to move. Tansin feeling this places her hand next to the necklace and the spider crawls slowly down on to her hand. She lifts her hand up in front of her and as she looks at the spider, it looks at her and raises it’s two large front legs and moves them up and down slowly. Tansin speaks to the spider, “What is it my pet, do you sense something?” She puts her hand up against the door and the spider climbs off her hand and begins to crawl down the door. As the spider nears the bottom of the door it sucks it’s body in flat as it crawls under. On the other side of the door it retakes it’s natural shape and sits there for a few moments.
Back outside Josie’s apartment Tansin’s eyes begin to glow as does the spider’s. At the same time the spider begins to grow in size reaching the diameter of a dinner plate. It begins to slowly creep across the floor and after a while Tansin, seeing through the spider’s eyes notices a pair of legs. She commands the spider telepathically to continue forward. The spider begins to move again. By now it is sitting at the end of the couch and near Josie’s legs. The spider continues to creep towards Josie, then it stops, wiggles it’s front legs in the air again then just as it reaches Josie’s legs she moves slightly and the spider rears back as if to strike but instead slowly creeps up onto her leg. It then begins to move up her lower leg towards her thigh it shows Tansin that there is a large amount of blood on the carpet. Tansin is puzzled by this as there doesn’t appear to be any wounds on Josie’s legs. As the spider continues to crawl up the torso and reaches her ribs area Josie moves again and rolls over on to her back with her arm sliding down and almost squashing the spider on to the floor. The spider manages to come up between her arm and chest and ends up sitting on Josie’s chest. Tansin, stretches her hand out and as she does so the spider stretches it’s legs out and puts them on Josie’s face near her mouth. Tansin shakes her hand back and forth and the spider does the same on Josie’s face as they try to wake her up. After five minutes of constantly shaking her and getting no response Tansin places her hand against the door and a glowing light appears around her hand, at the same time the bottom half of her hair starts to blow around and turns an ice white blue colour. In her mind she says, “Unlock and open!” and as she does so the various locks on the inside of the door begin to turn and unlock themselves, even the chain on the door slides itself across and drops down. The door handle turns and the door swings open.
Tansin and Kristen enter Josie’s apartment. Kristen walks over and kneels down near Josie, checking her pulse finds that it is slow and thready. Kristen tells Tansin that Josie is extremely ill and does she think it might be a good idea for them to call an ambulance to save Josie’s life. Strangely, Tansin agrees that it would be a good idea. Turning towards the door, Tansin calls to the bodyguard that is with them. He comes in to the room and as he does so Tansin instructs him to call for medical assistance for “this human”. As the bodyguard is doing this Tansin walks over to where Josie is, leans down, takes hold of the spider still on Josie’s chest and as she picks it up it begins to shrink back to the pendant size. As she puts it back onto her décolletage it attaches to the necklace and retakes its original form of the jewelled spider.
The bodyguard, who is standing just inside the door, says that medical assistance is on it’s way and will be here shortly. The bodyguard then goes on to ask, “Why are you saving this worthless human?” Tansin replies, “As I told Aziel I believe there is something special about her that may be we can use to our advantage.” The bodyguard replies, “And if she turns out to be nothing more than the worthless human she appears to be….?” Tansin looks down at Josie lying there defenceless on the floor and states, “If she is nothing more than human then I will take great pleasure in sucking the very life from her myself.” Tansin then instructs the bodyguard to go and wait for the ambulance outside.
Kristen looks up at Tansin and says, “What about all this blood?” Tansin says, “What about it?” Kristen indicates, “If the medical personnel finds all this blood and no wounds on Josie then they will become suspicious and that could be bad for all of us – don’t you think?” Tansin turns around, puts her hand out and it lights up and as it does so the blood begins to evaporate. But before she can finish the energy being emanated from her hand and in her eyes starts to dissipate. Kristen notices this and says, “You haven’t been feeding enough have you?” This question annoys Tansin and she says, “I’ll show you how much power I’ve got!” She turns, puts out her hand and a huge ball of light appears and the blood vaporises and at the same time scorches the carpet. As she is doing so both she and Kristen can hear the ambulance officers coming towards the door. Kristen tells her, “You must leave before you are seen by these humans.” With this she becomes transparent and then disappears.
The bodyguard yells to the ambulance officers “They’re in here!” At the door, the ambulance officers see Kristen kneeling next to Josie and ask her how long she has been unconscious. She answers, “I don’t know, we’ve only been here for a few minutes.” The ambos begin working on her and after checking her pulse and finding it slow and thready one officer says to the other, “We need to put a central line in so we can get some fluids into her straight away.”
While the ambulance officers are working on Josie and preparing to move her to the hospital in New Atlantis Jake Gamaliel has set sail again after saying goodbye to Cassidy, Natalia and Alexandra.
Monster by Paramore
As Natalia goes to get a cup of coffee she bumps into Alexandra who is just returning with two coffees in her hands, she says, “You read my mind, I was just going to get one myself.” Alexandra hands one of the coffees to Natalia and at the same time they hear Cassidy say, “I hope you brought one for me.” Alexandra answers, “Of course, this one is for you because I’ve already fed. Coffee this early in the morning makes me a little jumpy.” Alexandra goes on to ask Cassidy how she is feeling. As she hands her the cup of coffee and checks the wound that was in her chest. Natalia asks, “Do you remember anything?” “No, not a thing” notices the scarring across the lower half of her chest. As she sees the scarring, Cassidy has a sudden flashback and says, “Now I remember! Drake tried to kill me but I don’t think it was on purpose, but other than that I can’t really remember anything else.”
Alexandra finishes checking Cassidy’s wound and says, “It’s healed really well but I’m afraid you’ll be left with some scarring.” Cassidy says, “I’ll just have to learn to live with it.” As she sits up, looking at Natalia she asks, “What time is it?” Natalia answers, “It’s 1am.” Cassidy says, “Damn, is it that late?” “What do you mean ‘it’s that late’?” Cassidy says, “If it’s 1am here it must be about 10.30am in the morning in Melbourne, Australia.” Natalia gasps, “That’s right, we promised to meet Josie today at the Club at 10.30. With everything that’s been happening the last few days I forgot. Do you think she would still be there?” Alexandra says, “I can always check for you while you get changed, you can use my quarters.”
Cassidy says, “I’ll only be a few minutes, do you mind if I borrow some of your clothes?” Alexandra answers, “Of course not, there should be something in there that will fit you.” Natalia also accompanies Cassidy to Alexandra’s because she also decides to change out of the skirt she’s in. After about 30 minutes Alexandra decides to see what is taking the others so long so she goes to her apartment. Just as she is entering Cassidy and Natalia are coming out of the apartment. Cassidy is holding her uniform and cloak on one arm. Natalia had changed into a black pair of leather pants along with a white cotton shirt and a red fitted jacket. As for Cassidy she is wearing a pair of blue denim jeans with a black one shouldered T-shirt. Alexandra comments jokingly about the clothing, “Why don’t they ever look that good on me?” Natalia asks Alexandra, after looking at Cassidy, “What are your plans for the rest of the week?” After shutting the door to where Drake is, Alexandra answers, “I’m going to take a much needed rest and sleep for the next several days.” They all laugh.
As Cassidy and Natalia leave Alexandra calls out to Natalia, “Remind Cassidy to take it easy for the next few days since she is just recovering from the wounds that were inflicted on her. As Cassidy and Natalia reach the nearest teleportation gate Alexandra is just hopping in to bed and thinking to herself, “Whew, about time!” A few moments later Cassidy and Natalia arrive in the office of the nightclub “The Graveyard”. After they exit the office Cassidy goes over to the bar to ask staff members if they have seen Josie today. As she is doing this Natalia says, “I will go downstairs to see if anyone down there has seen her.”
Five minutes later Natalia returns and says, “No-one downstairs or on the door has seen her.” Cassidy answers, “The same up here no-one has seen her upstairs either.” Cassidy then asks Natalia, “What do you think we should do, should we wait here or should we go to Josie’s apartment?” Natalia answers, “Maybe it would be a good idea to wait here for a short while in case Josie is on her way. It would be a shame if we left now to go to her apartment and we missed her.”
Back at Josie’s apartment the ambulance officers have finished stabilising her and are now putting her into the ambulance to transport her to the Royal Melbourne Hospital.
Five minutes later the ambulance arrives at the Emergency Department of the hospital and the doctors and nurses start working on Josie immediately. Without a medical history on the patient it is difficult for the doctors to know exactly what is wrong with Josie. As they are still examining her she starts to go into another seizure and as she does so she knocks her bag out of one of the nurses hands. As the doctors are about to inject her with a generic seizure medication the nurse who is picking up the contents of Josie’s bag notices a card marked “In Case of Emergency”. The nurse pulls the card out to have a look at it and screams to the doctor, “STOP! Don’t give her that medication!” The doctors stop and one says, “Why??”
The nurse quickly hands the card to the doctor and he reads what is on it which is the name of the neurosurgeon to contact in case of emergency and it also details what is wrong with her. As Josie comes out of a second seizure the head of the emergency department tries to locate Dr Talbot. He speaks to Dr Talbot’s secretary and she tells him that the doctor is not in his surgery at the moment and she asks would he like to leave a message. The Head of ER explains what he is ringing about, that he has a patient called Josie Solomon in the ER and she had a medical card which said in the case of an emergency to call Dr Talbot. On hearing this the secretary tells him that she will get in touch with Dr Talbot immediately. The head of the ER says, “Thank you very much I look forward to hearing from him as soon as possible.”
The head of ER returns to Josie and he tells the staff who are working on Josie that he is waiting for Dr Talbot, the neurosurgeon whose name was on Josie’s card, to contact him. He asks them to monitor the patient until Dr Talbot arrives.
Several hours later both Cassidy and Natalia become concerned that Josie has not yet arrived at the nightclub. Cassidy stands up and grabs her bag, Natalia asks, “What are you doing?” Cassidy replies, “If Josie was coming, I think she would have been here way before now. I’m going to see where she is.” Natalia suggests, “Wouldn’t it be easier just to call her to see if she is at her apartment and while you are doing this I will call Keira and the guys to see if they’ve heard from Josie today.”
Cassidy is in the process of ringing Josie’s apartment and it rings right out so she tries again. Natalia is now talking to Keira and asks her if Josie has rung today. Keira says, “Not as far as I know but I’ve been pretty busy with my duties today.” Before Natalia can ask Keira to see if the guys have heard from Josie she is already on the intercom to them asking that question of Dara, Gitan and Newar. A few moments later two of the guys appear and after a short while so does Newar who has just been out for a run in his lichen form. As Keira hands the phone to Gitan, Newar retakes his human form. Gitan goes on to say that he and Dara have not heard from Josie today, he turns and looks at Newar who, shaking his head, says, “Neither have I!”
Natalia lets them know that Josie did not show up at the club at 10.30am and it has now been several hours since they have been waiting for her. Newar asks, “What can we do to help?” Natalia says, “If you hear from her please just let us know.” After Natalia has finished talking to the guys she turns back to Cassidy and by the look on her face she realises that she hasn’t got through to her yet. Natalia asks Cassidy, “Do you want me to try her mobile?” Cassidy nods her head yes. Natalia then tries Josie’s mobile number.
At the hospital, while the nurse is putting Josie’s belongings and clothing in a bag to put under the gurney she hears a mobile phone ringing. The nurse opens the bag and rummages around until she finds the phone and then answers it.
When Natalia hears someone answer the phone she immediately thinks it’s Josie and says, “Josie, where have you been, we’ve been waiting for you at the club all day?’ Cassidy, hearing Natalia talking to someone on the mobile phone hangs up the phone she’s on and stands there waiting to find out where Josie has been.
The nurse answers, “Josie Solomon’s phone, Nurse Richards speaking.” Natalia, “What! Who!” Nurse Richards says, “This is Alex Richards and I’m a nurse at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. I’m speaking to you on a patient’s phone.” Natalia gasps and asks, “Is Josie alright?” Nurse Richards explains that unless she is speaking to a family member she can’t give out any details. Natalia, desperately wanting to find out why Josie is at the hospital lies and says, “I am family, I’m her sister.” The nurse then explains to Natalia that Josie was brought in earlier from the college apartments after being found unconscious by a young lady called Kristen. Nurse Richards also explains that after Josie was brought in she had a seizure and the doctors are waiting for Josie’s neurosurgeon to arrive. After hearing this Natalia tells the nurse they will be there as quickly as possible.
After hanging up the phone Natalia turns back towards Cassidy with a shocked look on her face. Cassidy asks, “Why do we have to go to the Royal Melbourne Hospital, what’s happened to Josie?” Natalia, knowing that she has to lie, quickly comes up with another explanation compared to what the nurse told her. Natalia explains that early this morning Josie was found unconscious in her apartment and then she was taken to the hospital. Cassidy asks, “Do they have any idea what happened to her?” Natalia says, “No, they are still trying to find that out.” Cassidy asks, “Why did you say that you were Josie’s sister?” “The nurse could only give out information to family members, so that’s why I pretended to be her sister.”
The Other Side by Sirenia
Natalia and Cassidy quickly grab their handbags and as they go to head downstairs Cassidy begins to ask the person behind the bar if she can borrow his car, but before she can get the words out fully, he throws her the keys and says, “Take my car!” Cassidy catches the keys, says a quick thank you and then she and Natalia run down the stairs.
Back at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Josie’s neurosurgeon, Dr Talbot, has arrived and whilst he is examining Josie he is also talking to the head of ER about her condition. Dr Talbot then instructs the staff that Josie is to have an MRI scan and blood tests as soon as possible. He also instructs them that she is to be moved to the Intensive Care ward.
Cassidy and Natalia are just getting into the BMW and Natalia starts the car. Cassidy says, “Oh God, I hope she’s okay!” Natalia agrees with her. As they are entering the underground car park at the hospital Josie is just being put into the MRI scanner. The radiologist, with Dr Talbot standing next to her, starts the brain scan.
Cassidy & Natalia arrive at the Intensive Care unit and are told that Josie is at Radiology on the 1st Floor 1B Building, having an MRI scan. Whilst they are being told this Dr Talbot and the radiologist have now started a careful examination of the scans and the radiologist points out to Dr Talbot that the tumour is bleeding which would be the reason for the seizure. When the scan is almost finished Josie regains consciousness, she is disoriented and trying to speak. Dr Talbot notices that she is having difficulty speaking. Dr Talbot reassures her and tells her that she is having a scan.
The radiologist spots the tumour and then notices that it seems to be branching out and acting differently to an Oligoastrocytoma. Dr Talbot agrees, “Yes, that’s why Dr Grey had such trouble with it, he’s tried surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Nothing seemed to be working until Josie’s mother took her somewhere and a week later, when they did another MRI they couldn’t find a trace of the brain tumour, it was as though it had never been there. Whatever was done to save Josie’s life obviously didn’t quite work and there must have been a minute amount of the tumour left that the MRI couldn’t detect. Now the poor girl has to go through it all over again but this time with the real prospect of not surviving???”
The doctor says to take Josie back to the Intensive Care ward and keep an eye on her until he finishes examining the new scans against the old scans. Nurse Richards along with an orderly takes Josie back to her room in the ICU. After settling her in the room Nurse Richards comes back out to the desk and is told that Josie’s sisters are there to see her. She goes to the waiting room and speaks to Cassidy and Natalia. Cassidy asks, “How is Josie doing?” The nurse replies, “She is doing well but she’s gone back to sleep.” Natalia asks a little forcefully, “Can we see her?” Nurse Richards replies, “You can come in and sit with her for a while, until Dr Talbot returns from radiology.”
Back in the Radiology Department Dr Talbot is about halfway through comparing the old with the new scans. He notices that the tumour has grown about another 20% and along with the radiologist he notices that the tumour has spread out tentacles from itself into other parts of her brain. While they are examining the scans a nurse from pathology enters the room holding the preliminary blood test results. The nurse says to the doctor, “I thought you would want to see this as soon as possible.” Dr Talbot takes the results from her and begins to flick through them. He gets to a page where it shows that the medication which was given to Josie to shrink the brain tumour hasn’t been working for weeks. He says, “This is bullshit!” He hands the results back to the nurse and says, “Take these back to pathology and test them again and when you have done that re-test them again. I want to make sure that there is no mistake about these results.” When he finishes looking at the scans he leaves and goes to talk to Josie.
When Dr Talbot reaches Josie’s room he is told by Nurse Richards that some of Josie’s family members are sitting in the room with her. Just as he enters the room Josie begins to wake up. Cassidy says, “You’re finally awake, how do you feel?” Josie tries to talk but can’t get the words out properly and the harder she tries the worse the speech impediment becomes. Cassidy & Natalia are now standing beside the bed, trying to calm her down. Dr Talbot walks in to the room and trying to allay Josie’s fears telling her that her speech should be better within the next couple of days once the intra-cranial bleeding is absorbed by the body. He apologises to Cassidy and Natalia and says, “I’m sorry that I didn’t introduce myself first, I’m Dr Talbot.”
Dr Talbot looks at Josie and says, “Unfortunately Josie, I have some bad news….”, he hesitates when he sees the look on Josie’s face which indicates to him that she doesn’t want the others in the room to hear what he has to say. He turns to Natalia and Cassidy, “I’m sorry ladies you will have to leave because what I have to say is confidential between Dr and patient.” Natalia suggests that she and Cassidy could go and get some other clothes for Josie from her apartment. Josie, with difficulty, tells them what she will need and where to find them in the apartment.
After the girls leave Dr Talbot explains to Josie in great detail what has happened with her brain tumour. He says, “These are only the preliminary results but it appears that the medication that you are taking to keep the tumour at a smaller size has not been working for several weeks. I know this is bad news but Pathology is re-checking the results and hopefully these results are wrong.”
Josie, who is sitting in the bed, turns her head to look out the window. While she has her head turned she asks the doctor, “If the results are correct, how long do I have?” Dr Talbot replies, “Ahhhmm, perhaps 12-13 months if you take it easy!” The doctor asks, “Is there anyone else you would like me to inform?” “No, I’ll do that.” Dr Talbot asks, “Is there anything else I can get you?” Josie replies, “No thank you, I’d really just like to be on my own.”
Several hours later Cassidy and Natalia returned to the hospital with the clothes from Josie’s apartment. They asked the nurse at the desk if they could take the clothing in to Josie but the nurse tells them that Josie doesn’t want to see anyone at this time. Just before Cassidy and Natalia leave they ask if it would be alright to come back and visit her during visiting hours tomorrow. The nurse tells them that would be fine if Josie is up to seeing anyone.
While Cassidy & Natalia are driving home neither of them say a single word to each other about what is wrong with Josie. Just after they arrive home they bump into Dara and Keira who are waiting in the lounge-room for Gitan and Newar, who are downstairs looking at the new swords that were made and sent by Dalroy. Gitan decides to bring them upstairs to show Dara and Keira. As they come upstairs and into the lounge-room Newar asks, “So, have you heard from Josie?” Dara says, “Yeah, have you heard from her?” Cassidy answers, “Yes, we’ve heard from her. Excuse me I’ve got something to do.” She leaves and goes upstairs to her room which then leaves Natalia in the awkward position of having to explain to the others that they found out why Josie didn’t show up to the nightclub. It was because she was being admitted to the Royal Melbourne Hospital as she had been found unconscious in her apartment this morning.
All the guys, including Keira, have an absolutely shocked look on their faces. Newar asks, “How the hell did she end up unconscious, were there any witnesses?” Natalia says, “As far as they know there were no witnesses.” Before she can say anything else Dara says, “I bet you it was some of Kyah’s people who did this to Josie.” Keira, “If it was Kyah’s people wouldn’t they have just killed her?” They all look at each other, thinking the same thing, that that would be true they wouldn’t leave anyone alive or leave the body where it could be discovered.
Lifeclock by Adrian von Ziegler
Cassidy, now at her bedroom door, enters her room. She walks over to a cabinet, opens it up, she quickly starts looking through the books, crystals, potions to find something that will help Josie’s body absorb the damage more quickly and heal faster. After searching for several minutes and not being able to find what she wants, in frustration she sweeps everything off the shelves with her arm. A few seconds later she hears a knock at her door, she turns to see Keira standing in the doorway. Keira asks, “Are you alright milady?” Cassidy is standing with her hands on the bottom shelf of the cabinet and replies, “No, I’m not alright, I can’t seem to find the herbs that I had in here that helps with healing.” Keira reminds Cassidy that she used those herbs several months ago. Cassidy lets out a sigh and Keira asks, “Would you like me to go to New Atlantis and bring some back?” Cassidy answers, “Yes. Is there something that you wanted to ask or tell me?” Keira asks, “Do you want me to pass the word around that Josie is performing at the nightclub this weekend?” Cassidy says, “You can pass the word but after seeing how sick Josie was today I don’t think she will be able to perform. But tell people just in case.” Keira says, “I will leave for New Atlantis now and be back shortly with the herbs.”
Just as Keira is leaving Cassidy sits down in her meditation spot. She sits with her eyes closed for a few seconds and whilst she is doing this her hair begins to lifts and blows like there is a breeze. As this happens the colour of her hair starts to change to her true hair colour which is ice blue and white. As she opens her eyes, they are glowing white and with the power of an elementals mind she begins to lift a dozen large crystal balls from the table. This is how she meditates in order to calm herself down.
Keira now enters the lounge-room to collect her bag and the work diary. Gitan asks, “What was all that noise upstairs?” Keira answers, “Cassidy is just in a foul mood because she could not find the herbs she was looking for and she just swept everything off the shelves with her hands. I’m going to NewAtlantis now to get the herbs for Cassidy and when I return I’ll be heading straight to the nightclub.”
For most of the night Josie lays there and simply stares out the window into space. Even when the nurses do their rounds and come in to check on her she doesn’t even acknowledge that they are there. About 4am she finally falls asleep.
By the time Keira returns everyone is asleep except for Gitan. After going and placing the herbs, that Cassidy needed, in the kitchen Keira says goodnight to Gitan and decides to get some sleep and go to the club later on in the day. An hour later Gitan decides to go down to his bedroom/crypt to also get some sleep. He climbs into his coffin, slowly pulls the lid shut as he can sense now that the sun is just rising.
Later on in the day Cassidy is in her room preparing the potion with the herbs that Keira brought back from New Atlantis, knowing this will take her most of the day. Keira is just leaving for the nightclub and as she is leaving she sees Dara, Newar and Natalia entering the study with their training gear on and carrying their various weapons. Natalia is carrying two war hammers, Newar is carrying gauntlets that have four large retractable blades built into them. Dara is carrying a double handed broad-sword. They see Keira and wave to her as they pass the door.
Dara, Newar and Natalia have reached the training room of New Atlantis and Dara asks, “Are we training against each other, are we training just with the Golums or are we having a mixture of both?”
Newar, without saying a single word, decides that he’ll start it off without any warning by activating both blades in both of the gauntlets. He takes a swing at Natalia first, doing a double strike at her. With his third strike, Natalia sees it coming and brings both of her war hammers down blocking his attack. Seeing this Dara jumps through the air with the double handed broadsword above his head and he strikes down as though he is going to slice Newar in half. As Dara comes right down, lands and strikes at him, Newar, without even looking feels the breeze of the blade he brings his left arm up catching the double handed broadsword’s blade in between the claws of the gauntlet. As he does this he twists the gauntlet and locks the broadsword so that it can’t be moved. He brings his arm down which pins the sword preventing it from being lifted and whilst doing this he kicks Dara across the room which causes Dara to let go of the hilt. Natalia brings her war hammers up and away from Newar’s right arm and as she does so she unlocks the single blade into two on each of the war hammers. Now she spins herself which causes her arms to come up and the war hammers become like the spinning blade of a circular saw.
Newar is unable to do anything more than just raise his arms and use the gauntlets as shields. Newar yells out, “NOW!” and all of a sudden two of the Golum’s attack Natalia. Both the Golum’s swing at her with their blades fully in battle mode. Natalia does a somersault in mid air to get out of the way of the Golum’s. As Natalia lands she does a cartwheel and brings one of the war hammers up and splitting one of the Golum’s straight up the middle. In her head she thinks that this will give her a little bit of breathing space but the Golum she split in half now becomes two. Seeing the predicament that Natalia has got herself into Dara tries to reach his sword but is stopped by Newar several times. Dara, thinking, “Well, since Newar gave us no warning when he first attacked, he should love the irony in this.” With that he leans forward and flexes the muscles in his back and at that very moment two massive vampire bat-like wings shoot out of his back and he brings them down with such force the pressure of air that is built up is enough to send Newar tumbling through the air. Because Newar has been pushed so hard he slams into the two Golum’s knocking them over as if they were nothing more than bowling pins.
.....To Be Continued.....
.....To Be Continued.....
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