So sorry for taking so long! Huge thanks to Gwyn and Brownwyn for your lovely reviews, sorry I couldn't send an official reply.

Chapter 4

When Stell didn't respond, I panicked. Patted her cheek, called her name more forcefully. Best I got was her eyes half open for a moment. So I squeezed her hand tightly.

'Hang in there, Stell, OK? Hang in there. We ain't going to lose you yet. Not for a long time.' I hung onto her hand, willing her to open her eyes again while I continued. 'You still got stuff to do, including buying me a whole heap of pretzels and taking Mac to another Jets game.'

Still got nothing, so I tried another line. 'Know what, forget about the pretzels, I'm going to get serious here: you and Mac. I don't know exactly what's going on between you two, but I know something is and that's great. Two of you deserve to be happy with each other.'

Her eyes flickered open, head turned towards me so I carried on, speaking real hurriedly 'cause I knew the ambulance was going to be with us any second. 'Listen, Stell, please, this is important: you two, you and Mac, whatever's going on with you, I know you got a whole lot of stuff still to do together …' I was losing her again and I could hear the bus pulling to a stop. One last chance to get through to her. I gripped her fingers almost tripping over my words as I tried to get them all out of my mouth. 'Mac ain't going to make it without you, Stell. You know that. Rest of us aren't going to do too well either. So don't you go leaving us, you hear me, Stella Bonasera? You got to hang in there.'

But her eyes closed again and I was moved out of the way by the paramedics. Don't know how much Stell had heard or taken in. Guess at least I'd said it to her, which had to count for something, right?

Trouble was, it started me thinking about all the things I'd never got to say to Jess, never would get to say.

So many things.

Only thing that eased my regrets was knowing that we had said some of the important stuff.

Not enough, though. Not enough.

Had to tear myself away from those thoughts, they were taking me down dark paths. Stella needed me, I had to stay focused. But the expression on the paramedics' faces while they assessed Stell made even more hope desert me. And the blood… Christ, so much blood. All over Stell, the sidewalk, my hands… I stared at my hands, at the blood on them. Triggered the memory of being by my desk less than an hour ago, after the coffee had spilled, seeing that vision of blood.

Realised I was shaking as I scrubbed my hands on the bloodstained shirt that was still in my hands. Couldn't get all of it off, but at that point I was past caring. And anyway, the paramedics were already getting ready to move Stell.

At least they were quick about getting Stell into the ambulance. There was no question about me going with her. Wasn't leaving her on her own. Sudden unwelcome thought came as I got in that if… that if the worst happened, at least she'd have someone she knew with her. I knew she hadn't died in the ambulance in the dream, but as reality hadn't followed the dream exactly, I was taking nothing for granted

And looking at her – unconscious, still bleeding out, EMS grim-faced – I felt even more of my confidence disappearing. Wasn't much left of it by now. Seemed like the only chance left was getting Stell to the hospital as fast as possible.

Didn't take long for another blow to fall. Hadn't been taking much notice of where we were, but it suddenly struck me that it was taking a hell of a long time to reach Presbyterian.

Asked the guys if there was a problem getting there.

'Nope, 'cause we ain't going to Presby,' driver replied.

I blinked. 'You're kidding me.'

'No, sir. Got a code black at Presby 'cause of the Rockefeller incident. They telling us to go to Mount Sinai. Your friend's likely going to be seen faster there.'

I tried arguing, it did no good. So I argued some more. In the end they told me to shut the hell up or they'd toss me out the back doors. I shut up.

Just like in the dream, we were going to Mount Sinai and that was that. Yet again it seemed like events were fated to happen. What that meant for Stell's chances of survival, I didn't know. I really didn't know. Best Icould do at this point was make sure EMS knew which streets to use to avoid the worst of the traffic, while trying to keep out the way while they gave updates to the hospital and tried to stabilise Stella. I probably pissed them off no end, but whatever.

'Hang in there, Stell, please. Just hang in there.' Willed her to open her eyes, or something, anything to give me a bit more hope. But there was nothing. Only tiny bit of reassurance I had was that she was breathing and still had a steady heart rate. For the moment.

Despite the short cuts, it still felt like hours until we reached the hospital. Stell had been out of it for most of the journey. At least EMS had been able to finally control the bleeding, although they hadn't been able to stop it. I held back while they lifted Stell out of the ambulance then followed behind as close as I could. Tried not to look back at the blood on the floor of the bus and the blood-soaked swabs that'd been tossed aside.

Soon as we got inside the ER, there was a team of medics waiting to meet us. Briefly as possible, keeping an eye on Stell, I flashed my badge at the nurses' station, told them who I was – co-worker and friend - and that Detective Mac Taylor was Stell's next of kin.

Fast as I could, I scrawled down Mac's name and number, and got that horrible sinking feeling again. There'd still been no message from Mac, and the vision of him arriving too late reared up in my mind again.

I shuddered, and hurried away from the nurses' station to get back to Stell.

They were already moving her towards a treatment room as EMS handed her over.

'…stab wound to the lower thorax. Severe blood loss. Blood pressure dropping, currently 80 over 60. Briefly responsive, unconscious for the last ten minutes.'

I butted in, telling them that it was a piece of broken glass that had stabbed her, and that it had happened approximately 30 minutes ago...

'Thank you, sir. We'll take it from here.'

I continued as if I'd not been interrupted. 'And you need to know that she's in danger of going into cardiac arrest at any moment so you need to get a crash team here now.'

With the memory of the future I had, I was dead certain about that.

Should have expected it, but it was still a shock when, rather than doing what I said, they told me to move out of the way.

I wasn't giving up that easily and followed them into the treatment room, squeezing in before they could stop me.

'I ain't messing around: she's going to go into cardiac arrest. You have to understand.' I grabbed the doc's arm, trying to get her attention.

She pulled her arm from my grasp. Didn't even look at me as she said, 'Get this man out of here. We need to take the patient down to the OR soon as she's stable enough.'

Someone else took a hold of my shoulder. 'Sir, you need to leave now.'

'Not without you listening to me,' I'd raised my voice. Tension in the room had risen, too. 'You don't understand, she's…'

The hold on my shoulder tightened.

'Sir, you have to understand that she's our patient and the doctor makes the decisions regarding her treatment.'

'So she's your patient, but you can still take some advice, right?' I glanced desperately at Stell as they fixed her up to another monitor, hooked a bag of blood onto a stand next to the bed and cut through her blazer to attach an IV line. 'This is going to sound crazy, but I know what's going to happen, I know, OK? If you take her down to the OR and she arrests on the way there, she's not going to make it.'

'And you got your psychic medical degree from which school?' The guy holding my shoulder snarked. 'Get out of here before we got to have you removed.'

Felt a white hot anger rising up in me as I shook him off and got in his face. 'Listen, buddy, all I'm asking is that you prevent her going into cardiac arrest and dying!'

Guy wasn't budging. 'You're the one putting your friend's life in danger by standing here arguing and distracting us. I'm giving you one more chance to leave quietly before I call security.'

What did I do? Keep arguing and get thrown out, leaving Stella to her fate; or concede, leave the room and leave Stella to her fate that way. There had to be another option, surely?

I glanced around, saw a security guard eyeballing me. I was running out of time.

'All right, let's get her down to the OR,' the doc ordered. Someone else pushed me out of the way as they started to get ready to move Stell. What else could I do? I had to stop them. So I grabbed the gurney, yelled again that they had to listen to me. Carried on yelling even as the security guard hauled me out of there.

They were going to take Stell out of reach. I struggled with the guy holding my arms. It was a no go. I wasn't strong enough.

Then the anger in me fought back.

Stell didn't deserve none of this. It was wrong. I knew, knew that Death was waiting. And I knew with equal certainty that I was going to make that bastard wait a hell of a lot longer for Stell.

I had one last chance.

I let the guard move me away, just enough so that he'd think I wasn't going to do nothing more. In the treatment room, something was holding them up, they were struggling with an IV line. Exactly the delay I needed. Soon as the guard relaxed his hold, I took my chance.

'Hey! I need help here! I need a crash cart in treatment room three, now! Patient in cardiac arrest!'

I hollered so loud, every head in the place turned towards me. For a second, everyone froze. Then they moved. Kicked off a whole lot of activity, people shouting, running towards Stell…

That exact moment, Mac burst through the entrance; looked around wildly and saw it all. I saw him stop dead at the sight of Stell's bloodied, lifeless-looking body lying on the gurney, surrounded by medics. He flinched, visibly. His usual poker face failed and his emotions were exposed – disbelief, horror and sheer terror.

'Stella…'

He started running towards her. Breaking free from the security guard, I reached Mac just in time to haul him out of the way of the crash team.

'Stella!'

'Mac, stay back, OK?' I grabbed his arms, hoping like hell this was going to work, that I'd made the right call.

Seemed like I had, as the very next moment, among all the confusion, an alarm blared from the monitors attached to Stell. The line on the monitor had gone haywire. The fact I'd been expecting it didn't make it any less horrible.

'No!' Frantic, Mac lunged towards her. 'Stella!' The way he shouted her name… Damn. The desperation in his voice would haunt me for a long time.

I had to heave him against the wall, trying to get him to calm down.

'You interfering ain't going to help her, Mac!'

Nothing else I could do then except keep a hold of Mac and watch as the crash team got to work, hoping desperately it wasn't too late. Beside me, Mac was silent, couldn't even hear him breathing. The muscles in his jaw were rigid and his fists were clenched. Was easy to tell from the tension in him that he was ready to break away from me any chance he got to reach Stella. So I kept him pinned against the wall. Tried to ignore the hideous sound of the alarm and the whine of the defibrillator, while I willed Stella to survive.

Mac's eyes stayed fixed on Stella.

Face set, the doc again called, 'clear!'

It wasn't working. They were losing her. The image in front of me began to blur and for a moment I swear there were two images, almost laid over the top of each other: one stronger, the other weakening; one in which Stella had already lost her fight for life, the other still uncertain. The last tiny bit of hope I had gave a kind of dying gasp, and burst out of my mouth in a yell.

'Dammit, Stella, this is an injustice! You have to fight this, come on, fight!

Couldn't say any more. Had nothing left. Again, the doc called 'clear', but this time I could see the look she gave the others. She wasn't going to continue much longer.

'Stella, please, stay with me.' Mac's voice cracked on the last word, got lost in the noise around us.

I closed my eyes, felt my head slump forward onto my chest.

Almost missed it when the doc shouted, 'We got a pulse.'

Pretty sure my own heart skipped several beats.

Mac inhaled sharply.

I found my voice again, found my hope reviving. 'Come on, Stella, come on. You can do this, keep fighting.'

She did.

Gradually, that jerky line on the monitor steadied and the sound became a regular series of bleeps – one of the sweetest sounds I'd heard in a long time.

Catching my breath, and keeping a hold of Mac, I locked eyes briefly with the doc. She held my gaze for a moment, before looking down again at Stell.

We didn't have long to wait before they were moving Stell out of there and to the OR. Mac snatched the opportunity and grasped Stell's hand, holding on and hurrying alongside the gurney.

'I'm here, Stella. I'm not going anywhere. I'll be waiting for you…'

When Stell's fingers slipped out of his and he could go no further with her, Mac looked like a man who'd almost lost his hold on life. It was that moment, right then, that I understood exactly how much Stella meant to him. It was more than simply Jets games and coffee together; way more. Stella was his life. That realisation sobered me even further. I took a hold of Mac's shoulder and told him that Stell would be okay, that she was tough, she was a fighter… Only hoped to God she was tough enough. There was still one hell of a battle ahead of her. Without thinking about it, I found myself saying to Mac words I'd said before, in a different reality.

'This is Stella. You know damn straight she doesn't give up. She'll pull through, Mac.'

He looked at me with hollow eyes. 'She has to.'

Sighing heavily, I nodded.

I took hold of Mac's arm and steered him to the nearest waiting area. Got him into a chair but was too drained to even look for one myself. Simply slid down the nearest wall and stayed there.

Dragging my hands down my face, it hit me that we were still a long way from escaping this nightmare. And, unlike the last few hours, I had no idea what was going to happen. As bad as the constant déjà vu had been, this was worse.

There was nothing I could do except wait.

Huge apologies for the wait for this chapter, and the previous cliffhanger... Please let me know what you think, even if you want to shout at me :P Lily x