Brains checked on Alan. His vital signs were returning to normal and color was coming back to his face. He decreased the saline solution IV drip rate before heading back to Bed 2, where Kyrano laid as still as a statue. "I wish I knew where you were right now," he whispered, reaching out to smooth a stray lock of hair away from the older man's forehead. Then a thought occurred to him.
He went to the other end of the large room and wheeled a machine back over with him to Kyrano. He pulled the bed away from the wall and lowered the bar then pushed the machine so it was flush with the bed. He pressed a button and a circular tube extended. Brains slid Kyrano's head into it as it came to a stop. He then turned on the monitor and pressed another button. The machine began to whir, a red laser light moving from the top of Kyrano's head down over his face to his neck then back.
Slowly an image of Kyrano's brain began to appear on the monitor. What the color CT scan showed Brains was alarming. The entire frontal lobe was an angry red...a color it shouldn't be. Then, as the scan continued, the right portion began to change slightly, morphing from red into a darker color...more purplish.
"Oh, no!" Brains cried. He rushed to a nearby mini-refrigerator and pulled out a small vial of clear liquid. Racing to a nearby cabinet, he grabbed a syringe, removed it from its protective packaging and poked it into the top of the vial. Slowly he drew out half the amount of the liquid then returned to Kyrano's bedside. The CT image continued to change, the darkened red area looking more and more as though it were turning purple.
"Shit!" he cursed, removing the plastic cover from the needle and tossing it to the floor. He checked the scan one more time and then positioned the needle at Kyrano's right temple, just at the edge of his eye socket.
"Thunderbird 5 to Brains."
"Not now, John!"
Brains pressed the plunger down into the body of the syringe, emptying the liquid directly into Kyrano's brain. He then withdrew the needle and went back to the monitor. The next pass over the right frontal lobe showed the purple color fading and returning to red. "Oh, thank God!" Brains breathed, his shoulders sagging. "Jesus Christ."
"Brains, what the hell?"
"Sorry, uh, John. I was in the middle of...Kyrano started having a stroke."
"He what? Is he okay?"
"Yes, I-I think he'll be fine. I a-administered a dose of heparin. It looks like the clot has broken up."
"Well, I was gonna ask if he'd regained consciousness, but my guess now is the answer to that would be no."
"That's, uh, correct," Brains replied as he continued to watch the CT image refresh. "But John, the electrical impulses from his frontal lobe...it's off the scale! I've never seen such a-astronomical activity in the brain. Ever!"
"What's it mean, Brains?"
"I-I can't be sure. It's almost as though...like he's on overload."
"On that other plane?"
Brains moved slightly to the right and stared down at Kyrano's prone form. "That's the o-only thing that makes sense a-at this point, John. I know it sounds crazy, but-"
"No, it doesn't sound crazy. Not really. I talked to Dad. He said something like this happened once before, that Kyrano was trying to contact a soul and got rejected, and that it left him unconscious for twelve hours."
"When did that happen?"
"I don't know, he didn't say too much more about it. You think he's found Tin-Tin?"
"I wish I knew. I wish there was some way I-I could get inside his head and find out."
"How's Alan?"
Brains turned to look at the life signs monitor above Bed 1. "Back to normal. He hasn't come to yet, but a-all vitals are good."
"That's great. Good work on Kyrano, Brains."
"Uh, thanks, John. I-I take it Virgil and Scott's search for Tin-Tin hasn't, uh, produced any results."
"I haven't heard anything from the Mole. I'll give them a call now. Dad and Gordon should hit the island in about three hours."
"O-Okay. Let me know i-if Scott and Virgil find anything."
"I will. Thunderbird 5 out."
Brains leaned back against the wall, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. "For God's sake, Kyrano," he said quietly, "don't ever do that to me again."
"Thunderbird 5 calling the Mole."
"Mole here."
"Scott, anything on Tin-Tin yet?"
"No, John." Scott proceeded to explain what he and Virgil had found in the cavern at the end of the new tunnel as well as brief him on what they were now doing to continue their search.
In return, John relayed the conversation he'd had with Gordon and their father. He told his brothers what Jeff had said about Kyrano trying to contact their mother.
"When was this?" Virgil asked.
"I don't know, Virg. Dad didn't say exactly when it happened, and he wouldn't give us anything more than what I've told you. I'm surprised he said as much as he did about the whole thing."
"Me, too," Scott replied as he and Virgil frowned at one another. "Virg, you'd better tell John about the rose quartz...about what Kyrano told you."
Virgil nodded and told John about the quartz's healing properties as he remembered from his talk with Kyrano. When he finished, John said, "You know, guys, we're really outside the scope of our knowledge here."
"I know," Scott replied. "We need Kyrano for this."
"But Dad said last time it happened he was out for twelve hours."
"Virg, we don't have twelve hours! We have to find Tin-Tin!"
"Maybe Brains should try to wake him up," John offered. "Although I don't know that that's such a good idea at this point."
"Why not?" Scott asked.
"I just spoke with him. He said Kyrano nearly had a stroke. He was able to stop it and dissolve the clot just in time."
"For Chrissakes, this just keeps getting worse!" Scott yelled, slamming his fist down on the console in front of him. "There has to be something more we can do than burrow around down here in futility!"
Virgil turned to look at him. "You don't think she's down here. Do you?"
"I don't know what to think, Virg! You can't tell me the Mole's scanners have functioned perfectly ever since Brains brought them on line seven years ago and all of a sudden aren't working! If the Mole says Tin-Tin isn't down here, I say we believe it." Off Virgil's puzzled look, Scott continued, "I'm just sick of sitting here doing nothing but hoping to find someone that's not down here."
"So you do believe Brains and Kyrano," John said.
Scott looked Virgil right in the eyes as he replied, "I guess maybe I do."
That admission from their older brother startled both John and Virgil. They'd never known Scott to acquiesce to the supernatural explanation when other, more tangible theories existed.
"Then let's get back to the house," Virgil said, throwing the Mole into reverse. "Maybe we can help Brains bring Kyrano around. At the very least, we'll be up there when Dad and Gordon arrive."
Scott averted his gaze and just nodded in silent agreement.
"Okay, guys. I'll let Brains know you're on your way. And I'll inform Dad that you're breaking off the search."
"We're not breaking off the search," Scott said, his voice barely audible. "We're just going to start looking somewhere else."
Virgil's mouth quirked into a half-smile. "I never thought I'd see the day, Scott."
Scott half-chuckled, half-snorted. "Desperate times call for desperate measures, Virg. Now get this baby back to Base on the double."
"Yes, Sir!"
John couldn't help but smile as he said, "Thunderbird 5 out."
"Whaddya mean they're breaking off the search?" Jeff roared. Seated next to him, Gordon cringed, suddenly wishing he were anywhere but sitting this close to his angry father.
"They're not really breaking it off, Dad, they're just...they're going to look for her in a...different way." John told him about his conversation with Scott and Virgil, and how they'd decided to turn to Kyrano for help in locating Tin-Tin. He reiterated that the Mole's scanners hadn't shown anyone in any of the tunnels, and told them about the gigantic rose quartz his brothers had found in the newly discovered cavern.
Now it was Jeff who was being forced to think along lines he'd refused to let himself think along ever since that incident with Kyrano trying to contact Lucille. "And Scott agreed to this course of action."
"Actually, it was his idea, Dad."
"Well, Scott's my field commander. If he says this is the right thing to do then it's the right thing to do."
Gordon looked over at his father. He'd always known Jeff trusted his oldest brother...hell, he trusted all of them. But never before had he realized how implicitly he respected Scott's judgment. Within the space of a couple of hours, Gordon had found out more about his father's mind and heart than he had in all his previous twenty-nine years.
"Keep us informed, John. If Kyrano wakes up, I want to be patched through to the island immediately."
"F.A.B., Father. Thunderbird 5 out."
The shackles of your earthly confines fall away, revealing a place long dreamt of by those who have forgotten its very existence. The fabric of the universe has never wavered, it has never left you. You have left it. Until now. You are returning. Like children returning home after millions of years on the run. Man thought he knew a better way, and set off alone to find it, to forge his own path. To create his own reality. To sever his connection with that from which he came.
But now you are coming back. One by one. You are the children of those who fought to free themselves from your creators, from the one true consciousness which bore your very soul. But now...you want to go home. You want to live again, live as you were meant to live, unburdened by man-made cares and concerns, by that misery which you have of our own free will created. You have lost the language of your ancestors. You have lost the ability to express the infinite beauty and wonder of that from which you came.
See it. See it again now. See it and understand, Kyrano.
Within his mind, Kyrano cried out against the images flashing around him, against the anguish of all the Earth-bound souls had lost, against the knowledge that man himself had severed such an exquisite connection to the collective soul from which he came.
You see now the importance of the cornerstones, for without their power, there is no hope for those who dwell upon Earth. No hope of returning home, of returning to us. No hope of regaining that which has fled the planet's consciousness. The rose quartz must be restored. It must, or all will be lost!
Brains started as Kyrano moaned. He leapt to his feet and crossed the ward, coming to stand next to Bed 2. Just then his watch communicator beeped.
"Thunderbird 5 to Brains."
"Here, John."
"How's Kyrano?"
"Not sure." Brains went around to the CT monitor and was surprised to find the red area in the frontal lobe fading rapidly. It paled to an almost pink color then morphed into dark yellow and finally into bright yellow. "I don't believe it."
"What?"
"Kyrano's brain activity...i-it's returned to normal! Just now!"
"Does that mean whatever was happening to him is over?"
"I don't know. Just a moment ago he moaned, but he hasn't displayed any other signs of waking."
"Hey, Brains?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you realize you didn't stammer once just now?"
Brains blinked. "I-I didn't?"
"No. You didn't."
Suddenly shy and nervous, Brains replied, "Well, I-I don't know why, uh, John."
"Never mind, don't think about it. Listen, Scott and Virgil are heading back to the house. I've spoken to Dad, too. They all seem to be in agreement that you guys need to get Kyrano back with us. We think it's the only way we're gonna find Tin- Tin."
"Really? A-And Mr. Tracy a-agreed?"
"Yeah, surprisingly enough, he did."
"Moreover, Scott agreed?"
John chuckled. "No one was more surprised by that than me, Brains, but yes. In fact, it was his idea."
"I'll be damned. Well, I-I'll start trying to rouse him. How long until Tracy One a-arrives?"
"One hour, fifty-three minutes."
"F.A.B. Brains out."
A wry smile upon his face, Brains contemplated the man lying on the bed before him. "Well, Kyrano, it looks like you're going to make converts of the Tracys after all. Of all of us."
