Tinga´s Ghost by Shannon Hearn

All character of Dark Angel are owned by Cameron-Eglee Productions and Twentieth century Fox. 

Rated "R" for mild nudity. 

***

Part 1, My life so far...

***

            I was Born X5'359, but that was an entire lifetime ago.  That was before her ghost started to show up.  First I thought that this image of my late sister Tinga was just my imagination.  But it wasn't she was real.

            It was several weeks after the fire and the order that command was compromised that I started to feel like the world of order I had been born into had completely fallen apart.  My breeding partner was gone, but something told me that an image of who I was, Brin was starting to eak through the layers of Re-indoctrination that my superiors had dumped into my head.  Little did I know that there was a being trying to make sure that the little almond eyed girl she knew from her youth would find her way home.

            I was asleep one night, I don't know when, but I felt like I was choking on something.  Then I reached over to see a white skinned Polynesian woman, wearing nothing but a tube top and a medical wrap around her waist hovering over my bed.  The pain in her eyes was such that I attempted to believe that is was some guilt driven dream of me handing her over to Renfro to be reversed engineered.  But that was until I felt the cold shiver run right through me and into my stomach.  This being was very real as frothy liquid started to pour out of her mouth. 

            That is about the time I rolled like crazy in the bed to grab a nearby lamp to pierce the thing before me.  But the tubes hanging from its body lashed out at me and knocked the lamp from my powerful grip. 

            "Why" The spirit said as its drowned features and gurgly voice moved through me.  "Why Little sister, Why???" 

            At that moment I screamed as it touched my face and entered my mind.  "Brin.  It's me Tinga.  I am here to speak to you."  Then there was darkness. 

***

            I awoke several hours later drenching wet.  I just shook as before me was a Blood dripped picture of the Blue Lady lay before me.  The blood drops formed several words. 

            "Brin find Case"

            For almost an hour I just looked at those words set before me.  Who was Case?  I did not want to know.  Whatever was affecting me must have been at that location, because after I gotten clean and dressed, I left that location and ran until I felt safe.  That was about a month ago. 

            For the past several weeks I have been working at this job as a waitress at this diner.  Keeping my barcode hidden hasn't been too much of a problem for me with flesh-toned makeup, but I still remember that night.  That was until this off blond good-looking guy entered the place with a Doberman.  Something in my head screamed familiarity, but I couldn't place him.  And given the way I was feeling recently.  I was getting very hot inside.  I was going into heat and the guy was hitting on me.  I did not want to start out a relationship like this but it was a better chance for me to kill two birds with one stone. 

            "Hi there stranger, what ya's name."  I said in my best North Virginian accent attempting to through in some Mi Long accent in there. 

            "Hi, Um my name is Christian."  The guy said to me and I was almost drooling there in front of him. 

            "Um, my name is Nikki."  I said trying my best to keep my hormones in check.  In one hour my shift would be over, if I could last that long then I was home free. 

            "Hey how about meeting me in an hour, okay."  I said to him.  Within the next hour we were at his hotel room making out like rabbits on viagra.  I could feel the sweat down my body as I disconnected from myself.  I could feel the rhythm of my body moving with his as time became meaningless.  It was after I had lost track of time is when I went to sleep.  That was when Tinga's ghost returned to me and I was scared. 

***

            I was standing on a precipice of a well-forested mountain naked.  The cold wind was biting at my skin and I saw Tinga once again standing before me.  Instead of the haunting being that I had encountered from before, she was transformed into something the Ordinaries would call Angelic.  Since the days of my youth praying to the Blue Lady named Mary, I had not seen a being that would draw me into her life the same way that She did.  Tinga had been transformed into a servant of the Blue Lady; I just stood there scared.  I feared that I would be struck down where I stood.  But, Tinga just walked over to me and with her silken gown took me by my shoulders and sat down with me.  It wasn't until I felt the white shawl she had on being wrapped around me that I started to calm down. With a sisterly look that she always gave me when we were children she said, "Brin, Little Sister.  I'll protect you." 

            Those words tore at my soul as if I was terrified to even move.  Was she going to send me to the Dark Pitt?  I didn't know, but I just sat there as she started to talk with me.  I just held on to he shawl holding tighter around me to fend off not so much the cold of the weather around me but I knew that there was something that was going to be happening to me and I was afraid. 

            "Brin," Tinga said to me as she put her hand on my shoulder. "I need you to find my son Case."  I recoiled back fearing it was some act of vengeance she was going to place upon me. 

            "Brin, I am not wanting you to fear me.  I just want you to find my son Case.  I know that your soul is in there."  She said as I was getting more scared.

            "Tinga, what if I don't want to find your son.  What if I have other goal in my life." At that moment Tinga said something to me that I would never forget. 

            "Brin, It will be the only way that I will be able to leave you alone.  As long as my child feels that I abandoned him, than I cannot rest.  The sooner that I can tell him that I have died, I can pass onto the other side."  Tinga's request was a simple one:  To have closure in this life.

            "So you need me, to give your child closure." 

            "Yes.  But there is a catch, I cannot complete this quest alone in that there are souls that must be unified so that I can pass on."

            "These souls, Am I one of them Tinga?"  I said as I attempted to bring about an answer. 

            "Brin, the people that will bring you to the end of this quest you will meet."  Then Tinga paused for a moment and said something.  "Say Hi to Zane for Me, Okay."  Before I was able to communicate my questioning I woke up.  Staring at Zane's barcode. 

            Christian, the guy that I had sleep with, tuned out to be my Manticore Sibling Zane. 

            At that moment I swore that after this quest, I was going to make sure that Tinga stayed in the afterlife where she belonged. 

Next:

Part 2, The morning after