Chapter 24: Altered States of Reality.
The ambulance appears behind Fernando's house in a flash of light where no one in the café would be able to see it. Jeanette walks up to Fernando and Gadget and looks him over quickly, as if to get it over with as soon as possible. But in the act of checking him, she finds blood dripping from where he stood.
"Fernando?", Jeanette calls to him.
"What do you want?", he snaps at her.
"You been shot, haven't you?", she asks
"Does it matter?", he snaps at her again.
"If you been hurt, you need to see a doctor.", she tries to explain.
He walks up to her and reaches to her keyboard and types on it. A bright light flashes a few feet away from them with Dr. Aiesha standing there.
"What is going on?", Dr. Aiesha asks both angered and shocked.
"I need emergency medical treatment, now.", Fernando explains to her.
"What happened that you wont go to the emergency room.", Dr. Aiesha asks.
"I got shot.", Fernando started to explain but is interrupted.
"In Italy.", Jeanette throws in.
Dr. Aiesha looks at her as if she was crazy but then realizes that this is her father, the Time Traveler, so anything would be possible. He takes her by the arm and hauls her to the door, "I need surgery... now."
Jeanette and Gadget follow them into the house, though Fernando says a command to teleport him and his doctor daughter to the medical facility in the house. With them gone, Jeanette and Gadget continue to the living room where Jeanette takes a seat in one of the single chairs.
"Where did they go?", Gadget asks as she looks aound.
"Probably to the medical room in the basement.", Jeanette answers.
"So they are going to take a while?", Gadget asks.
"They might...", Jeanette answers, pausing for a second, "What do you have in mind?"
"Lets go to his time travel room and redo the mission, but a half hour early.", Gadget answers.
"Cant do that.", Jeanette tells her.
"Why not?", Gadget asks.
"If you do, that will create two you in Italy when there should be one. That cant happen, and if it does, one of you will be annihilated. Which one remains to be seen, but it will not work. You will forget why you are there and wont do the mission if you were to repeat it.", Jeanette explains.
"Is this absolute?", Gadget asks.
"According to Einstein it is.", Jeanette answers.
"Then its time theory was put to the test.", Gadget tells her.
"Don't.", Jeanette replies sternly.
"Why not?", Gadget asks in a miffed tone.
"In your rescue when you and Urth Quake had that adventure that went bad, there was an incident involving one of the CDRR Ambulances. Something happened and there were two of the same ambulance appearing one after the other and parked nose to nose inches part. They were the same vehicle, with the same equipment inside. The only difference was the supplies – the one I came in on was a full truck, the other was half empty from a major rescue it did before it got there. Then an energy bubble enveloped them and then there was one again, but this one was filled with supplies from both ambulances. Strange on seeing it happen, but that is what happened. And that was an inanimate object. I cant even speculate on what would happen if it were to happen to a living, breathing person. I doubt you would survive the ordeal.", Jeanette tries to push the point for her not to even think of doing it.
Gadget gives her a mean look.
"I'm not happy with this mission failing. But if Fernando got shot, what makes you think it will not happen to either of us if we tried again. I doubt we would survive if we went into the house with him.", Jeanette tells her, driving the point home with, "I'm willing to do my all to save a friend, but if it means dying for that person, I would not. You seen that Fernando almost did."
Gadget thinks, turning to look at her a couple of times before deciding on what to say.
"Alright. It cant happen now. But when an opportunity opens where we can save them again, I wont hesitate to act.", Gadget says out loud but to herself.
"There might never be such an opportunity.", Jeanette tells her.
Gadget takes a few steps to walk away towards the hallway to leave the house, but Jeanette calls her, "Gadget?" Gadget turns around to face her from the hallway. Jeanette finishes her statement as she points to one of the tables in the room, "Your gun, put it on the table and leave it behind."
"Oh.", Gadget says as she returns to the room, taking out her gun and puts it on the table as told to do so.
"Where are you going?", Jeanette asks.
"Home.", Gadget answers.
"Not like that you're not.", Jeanette tells her.
"What do you mean?", Gadget asks.
"You came in here in a t-shirt and shorts, not in an Italian Emergency Medical Technician's Uniform.", Jeanette answers her.
"Well, Uhm...", Gadget started to say.
"We'll wait for Fernando and Dr. Aiesha to return so we can change into what we had on.", Jeanette explains, "So have a seat while we wait."
Gadget sits down though is not happy with the options. Its another 20 minutes before Fernando returns with his doctor daughter, his arm in a sling.
"Finally.", Jeanette comments to herself.
"Its not my fault this idiot got himself shot.", Dr. Aiesha tells her.
"Hey!', Fernando tries to interject but is cut off by Jeanette.
"We'll be downstairs in the showers and put these uniforms in the lab for your disposal.", Jeanette tells him before getting up, "Come on Gadget."
Father and daughter watch them go to the basement door before it closes behind them.
"Well, what happened?", Dr. Aiesha asks of her father.
"It's a failed mission. That is all I'm going to say because the ramifications of it exploding into something bigger is just too much to tell you or anyone else.", Fernando answers his little but yet grown up girl.
"I'll leave it alone for now. But if you got shot, that means others have died.", Dr. Aiesha points out.
"Like I said, leave it alone.", he tells her.
"Lets hope your two friends also leave it alone.", she tells him.
"They will.", he says, if to himself.
"One more thing, daddy...", she asks.
"Its always daddy when you want something. Now what is it.", he tells her.
"So it is. Well... Next secret mission you have, tell me so I don't end up being pulled out of one medical emergency to take care of yours.", she tells him, "I have to go to the hospital and take care of a few patients."
"Yeah. I'm sure you got some half ton slob who's foot fungus and toe jam you need to clean up.", he tells her.
"Believe in what you want to believe, father. But I do have a job to do.", Dr. Aiesha tells him.
"OK. And thank you. Computer, Send Dr. Aiesha to her hospital office.", he says. she was gone in a flash of light. Fernando lets out a sigh and looks at his bandaged arm in the sling. "Two weeks, yeah right."
As he thinks for another half minute, Jeanette and Gadget come out of the basement in their shorts and t-shirts. He looks at them as they look at him.
"You want something?", Jeanette asks him.
"This does not leave from the three of us.", Fernando tells her and Gadget.
"It wont come out of me.", Jeanette tells him.
"Make sure you do. I don't want to bring Juanita and her class of flunkies in black to mind wipe the entire café.", Fernando warns her, mostly Gadget.
"You wouldn't dare.", Jeanette tells him.
"Don't do anything that might incur that from happening.", he tells her, then looks over Gadget, "That goes double for you."
"What did I do?", Gadget complains like a little girl.
"Nothing. Yet. And that's the problem. This mission is to remain secret, no matter what happens next.", he tells her.
"I'll do my best.", Gadget bows her head to look at the floor.
"I need you to do better than your best, because look at what my best did to me as it was not good enough.", Fernando tells him,
"We get the point.", Jeanette complains, then takes Gadget by her wrist, "Lets go."
She takes Gadget to the hallway and out the house. Then them gone, Fernando takes off his shirt and t-shirt slowly and gingerly until they were off, exposing the rib bandages that goes around his body. He takes a few steps to the sofa where he sits down for a moment. The day was still young and full of promise, but as far as he was concerned it was over.
Though he did not want too, he ends up sleeping a few hours into the afternoon. It was the sound of metal grinding on metal that wakes him up. And the house was coming from inside the house.
He goes to his room and takes his gun and mind wiper from his desk, and takes them to the source of the noise: the basement.
It would not have mattered if he came with a marching parade band playing loudly, as the noise of was incredibly loud. He finds Gadget kneeled down in the basement still in her shorts and t-shirt with an electric automotive grinder, trying to cut away at the door. Being made from a special combination of Space Iron-14, Carbon-14, Titanium and Carbide, it was not going to open any time soon.
No word was going to get her attention, so Fernando pulls out his gun and carefully aims it at the grinder against the door. A slow squeeze of the trigger releases a bullet to fly across the room at near Mach 1 speeds. Hitting the grinder knocks it out of her hand. She freezes in place and slowly turns around to where the shot came from. Fernando looks at her as she sees him several feet away from her.
"What are you doing?", he asks her, then changes his mind, "No. How did you get in here, and what are you doing?"
"Uhm... I left something personal in there?", Gadget tries to play it off.
"You need to get out of this place. Now.", Fernando tells her.
"I'm sorry", she says to him as she got up on her feet, then starts to shimmy her shorts part way down her waist, "Maybe I can make it up to you?"
"How about no, never and get out of my house.", he tells her sternly.
"I can make it worth your while.", Gadget hints at him, lightly smacking her rear end that faces him.
"Yeah right. Unless you got Morphine for the pain or magic to heal me with, I would advise you to get out.", he tells her.
"But don't you want some nice tight blonde maus booty?", Gadget tries to taunt him seductively.
"Not today, tonight, or any other time. Now leave or else.", Fernando warns her.
"Or else what?", Gadget asks in challenge.
"Computer, teleport subject- Gadget Hackwrench ten feet above the deep end of the lake near the Acorn Café.", he says. He could only get a microsecond glimpse of Gadget's eyes opening wide in disbelief and bewilderment before a flash of light takes her away to the projected coordinates. Fernando can almost believe that he can hear her scream before she hits the water in free fall.
He goes back to the living room. As he goes back to the spot on the sofa he was on, he thinks about methods of rapidly healing his wounds. At the same time at the Waldorf Astoria, Juanita has been monitoring the mission since he has waken up. She knows what he's been through, his wounds and his mindset. But she needs to now deal with Tammy, extending her stay by another 24 to 48 hours.
All this activity makes Fernando realize he was hungry. He walks to the kitchen and makes himself a multi-meat and cheese sandwich on a Kaiser Roll. A little mayonnaise and mustard completes his creation. Taking some Pineapple – Orange juice, he puts his meal on a plate and onto the service island. He stands on the kitchen side and eats his tiny meal.
She floats about as a small ball of light around the tree that makes his house and home. Unlike any physical being would have trouble getting in, but being a non-corporal being of energy and thought patterns, she makes her way through the window by the door and goes down the hall to where the living room was. There she materializes into a physical self that everyone knows as Tinkerbell. Fernando is aware of her being there but continues with his small meal. She takes her steps deliberately towards the island counter area of the kitchen and takes a seat to sit on. She leans over the counter towards him.
"What ever is going on in that head of yours, you did not fail through your own actions.", Tinkerbell tells him.
"Hello Tink.", he tells her, "Why are you here, to try to cheer me up?"
"I know you all too well and seen you through this before. So yes, I am. So first...", she tells him before taking out her wand and pointing it at him. A bolt of living energy flows from it to him, healing his injuries and dissipating away his physical pains in just a couple of seconds.
"You should not have done that.", he tells her.
"Why not? This world needs you in 100 percent condition. Anything less and you will not be able to save it or anyone on it.", Tinkerbell tells him.
"It feels like cheating.", Fernando tries to explain.
"Cheating is what that blonde mousie it trying to do.", she tells him.
"I will deal with Gadget.", he says.
"Then do so.", she continues to tell him.
"When its time. Now it not the time.", he explains.
"When will it be? When she is standing beside herself and all laws of this physical world goes crazy?", she demands.
"I said I will deal with it in its own time.", he tells her.
"Then you know what she is up to?", she asks.
"She wants to go back in time and rescue Tammy's mother and sister.", he answers her, "But doing so will create paradoxes and problems with the Space/Time Continuum, which is the reason why I have to stop her. But it has to be done at a point in time of the event's choosing, not mine."
"If I was in my world I would be able to see that.", she replies.
"Well, you're here, and for me no doubt.", he tells her.
"You don't have to be mean about it.", Tinkerbell explains.
"I don't mean to be mean. I'm hurt and tired, and if you don't know, the mission was a failure.", he says.
"I knew that it was going to fail, but at least you are alive.", she tries to explain, "And that is the most important part."
"I failed and Tammy's family is dead. And she wants to start a relationship with me while I keep that a secret from her. That is too much to handle.", Fernando explains.
"First, what happened to you? What is wrong with your arm?", Tinkerbell asks.
"I was shot in the bicep and the bullet went through onto the side if my chest. Plus I was hit in the back a few times. My bullet proof vest protected my body but I do have cracked ribs on top of the arm muscle injury.", he explains.
"Then come on out here.", she tells him.
"I'm having my lunch.", he hefts up the sandwich to show her.
"Slices of dead pork meat, essence of curdled milk solids, and baked fermented wheat pulp...", she dissects the sandwich mentally.
"Your forgot the vinegar sludge of soaked and crushed mustard seeds and spices. Either way its good.", he adds.
"Finish your ham sandwich and come over here so I can put a healing spell to fix you up.", she tells him.
"If you don't mind, I'll pass. Every time you heal me, I end up waking up in my bed tired and you still sleeping like an exhausted lover.", he explains.
"That's because I fill you up so much energy, that you become an insatiable lover...", she explains, then sees that he was not happy with those spoken words. "I was just kidding. In truth, the healing spell exhausts your energy reserves and you pass out into sleep. Then I carry you to your bed and spend the day with you so no harm comes to you."
"And how many hours had pasted? I don't remember those times.", he asks and says.
"Depends on your wounds and how much energy is used.", she answers. Looking him over, she deduces a time frame to work with on his injuries, "24 hours. Maybe more."
"Then let me finish my lunch. Then I have to secure the house.", he explains.
"Alright.", she replies.
Fernando goes to the phone on the kitchen wall and makes a call.
"Hello, Juanita?", he says, "Good. I know you been monitoring me, so I need another 48 hours added to Tammy's hold over. I'll be fine. Don't tell her anything. Thank you." He hangs up the phone and continues with his lunch.
He takes his time though he had eaten half of it before she came in.
"Making sure that the red-squirrel does not know what is going on?", Tinkerbell asks.
"Tammy can never know what has happened.", Fernando answers.
"Besides the obvious, why?", she asks.
"Put yourself in her shoes...", he started to say.
"I don think they would fit.", she interrupts him.
"Tink...", he call to her in frustration.
"Well, they wont fit.", she continues.
"Its an expression for – put yourself in her situations.", he explains, then continues, "If she found out that I was there when her family was killed..."
"If in knowing all the details, that they were killed while you tried to save them, knowing that you tried to save them and got hurt yourself, I would not fault you at all.", she explains.
"That's not the way most people think.", he adds, "First she would ask why was she not involved, then she would ask why wasn't anyone else involved, and finally question my own decisions and actions."
"In knowing the facts, she would believe that you did your best.", she says.
"I don't think I did my best.", he tells her.
"You found her mother in the kitchen, and when her sister cried out when being attacked upstairs, she ran for her and got killed in the stairs trying to go save her. That is not your fault.", she explains.
"And how would you know that?", he asks.
"Juanita is not the only one who can monitor you.", she answers.
"And you women wonder why I have not had a total intimate encounter of the fairer gender in such a long time.", he says to himself.
"Now, mister. You're not supposed to do that unless you are married.", Tinkerbell tells him.
"Is, was, I am entitled as a man...", Fernando begins but is interrupted.
"All men say that since the day they get a little erection at some pre-teenaged year.", Tinkerbell says, holding back her giggles. Fernando looks at her with such anger that she worries about her existence in this universe.
She tries to make it up to him in words, "Its not how it sounds, Fernando. Every male out there all say the same thing once they get into some form of sexual maturity, that they are 'entitled.' But that's not the case, not with you. Yes, you were married, and it did not end on a happy note but you two were happy together. I know that. And I know that you would do the same for the next female who is worthy to say 'I do' with you. I would if I could because I know you can. You are not entitled because you are a man. You're entitled because of the things you can do for her."
He still looks at her angry.
"I'm sorry.", she finally adds. He was still angry with her, or at least what she said. She continues, "If I could make it up to you, I would."
He picks up the remains of his sandwich and puts it into the trash compactor within his sink and runs the other for a while as he puts the dish and glass into the sink afterwards.
He starts to walk out of the kitchen, "I'll forgive you when I'm in a better frame of mind."
"So...", she beings to say.
He continues walking through the living room, she gets up out of her seat and follows him to his bedroom. There he begins to take off his clothes to just his briefs. She enters the room as he bends over and lifts a leg to take off his pants. The pants, like everything taken off before it, gets thrown to the table in the middle of the room. He turns to face Tinkerbell.
"You still want to do this? Do it now before I change my mind.", as he takes a pair of scissors from the night stand. He cuts the soft cast from the side that his daughter put on hours ago until it falls off him and onto the floor.
"You sure about this?", she asks.
"You got the healing spell. Just do it.", he tells her.
"Alright...", she says with a sigh. She raises her wand, waving it around in a circle at Fernando's direction. When she stops waving, a massive amount of bio energy is released from the wand and surrounds Fernando in a glowing cocoon of energy. Once the last of the bio energy flies out of the wand, the cocoon of energy shrinks about him until it all disappears into his skin and fur. The light fades and the room returns to darkness.
Though he has enough energy flowing through his body to win several world wars on his own, he crawls into bed and under the blankets to use it as it is needed in healing his injuries.
Nothing is said between them, Tinkerbell gets on to his bed with him and holds him. She can feel him tremble through the layers of blankets between them, the energy taking on every injury and infection, curing him of his pains and illnesses though doing so had raised his body temperature in fever.