Shadows | A Forever Fan-Fiction - Sequel to Lights

Chapter Fourteen: Reconciliation

After a while, I left Sigurd and Rayes to argue. I dragged myself into an on-call room and closed my eyes, leaning against the door. Thoughts swirled around in my mind, broken, distorted, displaced.

There really was nothing I could do. I was completely helpless in this situation. Would death remove my mother's tumour? But then how could that be explained? If I came up with some kind of solution that didn't make medical sense, then it would look very strange indeed. And the only other person I could really consult about this issue was Dr. Morgan.

After a silent, internal battle between pride and wanting to keep my mother's secret, I took out my pager and punched in a message. Minutes passed without any response. Finally, there was a knock on the door, before it hesitantly swung open.

"Why did you page me?" Dr. Morgan queried with forced politeness.

"I needed a consult for a woman with a brain tumour," I stated.

"I'm in cardio. Perhaps you would have better insight if you asked someone such as Rayes?" he suggested.

"Not if she's immortal," I sighed.

He glanced at me quizzically. "What are you talking about?"

"Are we playing this game now? How many immortal ladies do we know? I'm talking about my mother."

"She has a tumour?" he demanded, suddenly interested.

"Yeah," I said. I flicked on one of the light-boards in the back of the room and hung up the scans. "It's beautiful, but..."

"When was her last death?"

"Maybe like a decade ago or something. Yeah, a decade, after..." I broke off, not wanting to revisit the topic of Adam and my mother.

"I can't help you."

"Please!" I cringed at the obvious desperation in my voice. I carefully sat down at one of the desks in the room and looked up at him.

"When I say that I can't help you, I mean that I can't help you. I don't know how. I need to conduct more research."

I crossed my arms and glanced at the floor. After a long while I rose. "Thank you for your time."

"Jo qand I are meeting up, later," he said as I was leaving. I turned in the doorframe to look at him. "I'm trying to fix things."

I nodded. "Good for you."

"I mean it, Lights." We stared at each other in an uncomfortable silence, waiting for something, anything, to break the silence. Suddenly, both of our pagers burst out into the air, buzzing furiously.

"Nine-one-one," I muttered. "The CT room. Crap." I sprinted away before Dr. Morgan could speak again, panic flaring and stabbing through me like electricity. As I skidded into the CT room, there was bright, startling flash of light accompanied by a rush of wind. When I stepped inside nervously, the room was empty aside from a nurse and an intern, both looking very confused and scared.

"We don't know what happened-" the intern began terrifiedly as Dr. Morgan arrived, his mouth slightly agape.

"Perhaps it was a miracle," I replied dryly. "Whatever you just saw, forget that you saw it. It's unimportant."

"What-?" he started to ask, but he seemed to realise within moments what was going on.

"But the patient was-" the nurse stuttered.

"Yes, I know," I sighed. "But it's really rather a long story." I started down the hallway, breaking into a sprint and cramming myself into an already-packed elevator. I quickly darted out into the lobby, where Dr. Morgan was running breathlessly down the stairs. He followed me as I raced out into the cool morning air, desperately trying to hail a cab. Finally, one actually pulled over.

"I'll pay you triple if you get us to the Hudson in the next twenty minutes," I told the cabbie as Dr. Morgan and I clambered into the back of the cab. The cabbie nodded mutely, seeming completely unsurprised, and made a beeline down the road. I fidgeted in the back of the cab silently, nervously.

"We'll find her," Dr. Morgan assured me.

"Yes," I replied tetchily. "We have to."

"Not to raise the panic level, but what if this was planned?" Dr. Morgan suggested.

"Let's think about that later," I muttered.

Fifteen minutes later, the cab slammed to a halt by the decaying remains of a dock on the edge of a small park. I tossed a wad of cash, and probably most of my salary for the past two months, at the cabbie and leapt out of the cab in a frenzy. There was no-one in sight.

"This is where you said you usually return?" I demanded.

"Yes," he said uncertainly. "It is."

"Is it the same? Oh god we don't know!" I cried. I stared into the waters, kneeling at the edge of the dock. "What if she can't swim? What if she's forgotten how to swim?"

"She's probably fine," Dr. Morgan soothed. "It's going to be okay."

We scrounged around the docks, around the park, desperation scrawled thickly on our faces. There was no-one that looked even slightly out of place, not to mention anyone who looked like my mother. I became frustrated, and plopped down on a bench, crossing my arms. After a short while, Dr. Morgan stopped looking and sat down next to me.

"She's gone," I moaned quietly. "She could be anywhere. Do you know how long the Hudson is? Do you know how big New York is?"

"I'm quite aware," he sighed. "She might have been arrested."

"Oh, fan-frickin-tastic," I raged. "This day is just getting better and better."

"You could call Jo," Dr. Morgan suggested.

"Yeah," I muttered. "I could, but it's a bit tricky to explain."

"Then do so," he sighed, rising and trotting away to resume looking, even though I had an awful feeling that it was incredibly futile. I picked up my phone listlessly and dialled her number.

"Hello-"

"Hey, Jo, do you know if-"

"-this is the voicemail of Detective Jo Martinez. Please leave a message after the-" A shrill, shrieking beep shot through my ears. I sighed almost savagely, frustration hammering into my head fiercely.

"Jo-" I began.

"Lights!" Dr. Morgan called from the dock. "Lights, I think I've found something over here!"

"Nevermind," I muttered into the phone before hanging up. I stood up and strode over, sure that he was making mountains out of molehills. However, I suddenly remembered all of Jo's stories about the 'good old days' with Dr. Morgan, and my doubt faded a little.

"I found this," he muttered, lifting a slightly creased envelope into the air. I took it gingerly and after a moment of slight indecision, tore it open. Out fell a handful of Polaroids and a folded slip of yellowed paper. I collected the Polaroids, flicking through them with renewed anger. There were pictures of people - people I knew, people I used to know. People who had died that I knew. I tucked the Polaroids into the envelope again and began reading the note, turning over the thick, rough paper in my hands as I unfolded it.

You may not be immortal, but your mother has the rest of eternity to feel pain.
-Adam

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