Twenty-Five
"It is me," Steve concluded miserably. He sat with Oscar in his room at Rudy's complex, waiting (once again) for word on Jaime's condition.
"I don't think so," Oscar countered.
"How can you say that?" Steve argued. "She took one look at me – and she hit the floor."
"Maybe. But how many times did she look at you on the flight down, or during the mission or even on the rescue chopper?"
"That's...true," Steve allowed. "Still, what other explanation is there? Practically every time Jaime has collapsed, I've been the one with her – and when I wasn't, they were talking about me!"
"Let's see what the doctors have to say," Oscar suggested.
And so they waited, boss with agent and friend with friend...for a very long time...
* * *
"We still don't have an answer for you," Rudy admitted, very early the next morning. He and Michael had been running tests and treating Jaime throughout the night – and they were no closer to the source of her problem.
"Not what I was needing to hear right now, Doc," Steve said. "But we have to be realistic; if I stay away from Jaime, the attacks will stop. It's that simple, right?"
"Even if you are the trigger," Rudy explained, "and I'm not certain that you are, not having you here could be even more harmful to Jaime."
"Not following that logic," Steve told him. (Oscar seemed equally confused.)
"What you've been talking with her about may help alleviate the problem. And if you weren't here, Jaime's imagination would probably be trying to fill in the gaps on its own...with what could be disastrous results. So let's talk this through again and see what we can come up with." Rudy looked at Oscar and then back at Steve. "Jaime showed no signs of pain or illness before she actually collapsed this time?"
"She was fine," Steve affirmed. "In fact, she was better than fine; she handled herself like a seasoned agent on that assignment. No way she could have done that well if she was in pain."
"Alright. And on the chopper afterward? Because I'm thinking fatigue and the build-up of adrenaline may have played a role..."
"I can tell you that she was fine then, too," Oscar put in. "In fact, I asked her how she was feeling – if she'd been hurt or if she was in any pain. She was exhausted, yes, but she was jubilant when she found out how well things had turned out – and she most definitely was not ill."
"Okay," Rudy pondered, "that gets us a little closer. So this all came on suddenly, at the substation, correct?" Oscar and Steve nodded. "What happened right before she collapsed?"
"I sat down next to her," Steve told him.
"And right before that?"
Steve frowned. "I got a drink from Oscar...once I got out of the shower."
The lightbulb flashed on in Rudy's mind so suddenly that it was impossible to miss. "Steve!" he said urgently, "Did you wash your hair?"
"Well, yeah...there was a little blood in it, and -"
"That's it!" the doctor proclaimed, leaping to his feet.
Oscar and Steve eyed him like he might have been working a little too long without any sleep. "You're saying the trigger is...shampoo?" Steve asked.
"Of course not!" Rudy was almost dancing as the realization blazed through him. "We showed Jaime a photo of Jim and Helen's old ranch – the one where Jaime lived after her parents died – and it happened to have been taken on a rainy day." Still, Oscar and Steve stared at him. (Didn't they get it?) "She was able to tell Michael that she'd had a dream before waking up and having an attack...and she'd dreamed of running in the rain!"
"Water?" Oscar theorized.
"No," Rudy said patiently. "Don't you see? Steve...with wet hair...Jaime running in the rain..."
Finally, Steve understood. "She's remembering...the night she died."
Rudy nodded. "Exactly. That has to be it! But not remembering it; more like flashing on it as her mind tries to prevent her from remembering. It's simply too painful a physical memory and too frightening – so while her conscious mind is striving to see it, her subconscious is shutting her down. Protecting her, so to speak."
All three men nodded; suddenly, it all made sense.
* * *
"I told you I'm not seeing a shrink!" Jaime insisted the next afternoon, after she'd been given a day and a half to rest.
"This isn't a shrink – I mean a psychiatrist," Michael told her gently. "Connie Warrant is a psychologist who specializes in hypnotherapy, and -"
"Same difference! She wants to poke around in my brain! Well, forget it!" Jaime crossed her arms and her jaw jutted out and set that way, daring Michael to try and change her mind.
Instead, Rudy stepped in. "Honey, I'm sorry but this is not optional this time. We believe we know what's been causing your pain -"
"Great! What is it?" Jaime asked, still defiant.
"Right now, it's buried in your subconscious," Rudy hedged, "and it appears that trying to bring it forward by simply reminding you – or even telling you flat out – will induce another attack. And since every attack is a little worse than the last one..."
"The hypnotherapist could hopefully bring it out – where we can deal with it – with a lot less danger to you," Michael concluded. "Of course, Rudy and I will both be here to monitor you the entire time." He smiled gently at her. "Like Rudy said, this is not optional anymore. Your health and your safety are at risk, and this is how we need to treat it."
Jaime sighed. "Fine. Bring on the damn shrink." While her voice sounded angry and defiant, her eyes gave away the truth of how very frightened she was.
* * *
"So you think she'll resist the hypnosis?" Connie Warrant queried Jaime's doctors.
"She hasn't been through our resistance training yet," Oscar interjected.
"But she's very scared of this process," Michael told her.
"And very stubborn," Steve added. (Her strong will had been one of the reasons he'd fallen in love with her.)
"Then I would suggest sodium pentothal to smooth the way – and also calm her nerves," Connie told them. "However, once I have her fully under, you'll want to remove the drip. Provided the memory doesn't prove too physically or psychologically dangerous, we'll want Jaime to be able to retain it when she wakes up, so we can begin to deal with it."
Steve had an idea – and a question. "If you can bring this memory out with hypnosis, what about the rest of the memories she's lost? Can you restore all of them the same way?"
"Unfortunately, no," Connie explained. "This memory was not truly lost. It's been hidden deep in Jaime's mind since her reawakening, causing her debilitating pain while her conscious and subconscious minds are at war, pushing the memory back and forth. It is possible, though, that releasing this memory may allow some of her lost memories to return more freely...but since we are dealing with brain damage caused by oxygen deprivation...it may not."
Steve thought about this for a moment. "The most important thing right now is to make sure she's safe – and free from that pain."
Rudy nodded. "You and Oscar can wait here; we'll come and let you know as soon as it's over."
* * *
"Alright, Jaime," Connie Warrant began, "I'm going to take you back in time now...and I want you to remember that anything you might see, you are only viewing, only observing. None of it is happening to you now, none of the pain, none of the fear – you are only an observer. Do you understand?"
"Yes..." Jaime murmured, completely under. Her body was relaxed, her eyes closed. Rudy removed the pentothal drip and left her solely under the therapist's influence.
"We're going back in time now...back to when you were lying in this very bed, hovering between this world and the next one, with your body in a coma. Go back there with me now...picture it and observe it..."
"Yes..." Jaime whispered.
"Good. Now I want to take you a little further back in time. Remember that you are only observing; none of this is happening to you now. Just observing. It is very dark outside...and it's raining. You are running in that rain...but you are running blind..."
Jaime began to thrash restlessly in the bed. "You are only observing," Connie reminded her again, "none of this can hurt – or even affect – you now."
Jaime's struggle grew more violent and her doctors moved quickly to each side of her bed, raising the guard rails and watching her closely. Her soft moans suddenly turned into a piercing, terror-filled scream:
NO!
* * * * *