Chapter Fifty Three: Different Circumstances
Dr. Bosch and his team entered the med lab like paramedics dispensing a trauma victim. They pushed the gurney to the empty space where Hiro's bed used to be while one medic broke off to retrieve another set of portable monitors. While he did that, the other attached the saline bag to a stand before moving out of the way for the doctor to examine his patient in greater detail. He also injected a colorless serum into the access port of the catheter when the doctor wasn't looking.
Kally still looked like her entire body was straining, her teeth clenched as her muscles continued to stay taut. This surely couldn't be good for her, Dr. Bosch decided. But without a general idea of what was going on or what had caused it, he wasn't sure he should prescribe any kind of muscle relaxers. So he ordered morphine to see if that might at least lessen the effects. He couldn't move far though because she still held his arm in a vice-like grip.
When the one medic who'd hung the saline suggested trying to loosen her hold on him, Dr. Bosch shook his head. He had a feeling it wouldn't be quite that simple and didn't want to risk breaking her fingers, or anyone else's for that matter. He'd just have to bear with it and hope she didn't break anything in his arm. Bruises he could live with.
Now that the monitors were hooked up, he could tell that Kally's heart and blood pressure were still through the roof. That was decidedly not a good thing, not by any medical standards he knew. And, from all indications, the morphine had yet to do anything to relieve her pain. From start to current, this had been going on for a good five to ten minutes. It had taken them some time to get back to the med lab after all.
But just as Dr. Bosch was about to order meds to counter the symptoms before him, they stopped. Everything stopped. Including Kally's heart, her entire body going limp. The doctor stared in shock for about two seconds before he realized his arm was now free and all the monitors were sounding the alarm for the complete opposite reason. "Crash cart!" he yelled as he brushed wires out of his way so he could begin CPR, just in case the other medics didn't respond fast enough.
The doctor drove his fist into Kally's sternum like a hammer, right above the heart cavity. The jolt seemed to send a shock wave through her and she gasped, eyes flashing open as her back arched with the sudden intake of air. She fell back to the gurney with another jolt of energy, now breathing hard from the oxygen mask still over her nose and mouth.
The heart monitor registered the restarting of her heart, indicating that her pulse now beat within the normal range, albeit with more intensity than was probably necessary. By this time, the medic who'd gone after the cart returned, holding the paddles out, but he was waved off as Kally's vitals evened out.
"Can you hear me?" Dr. Bosch asked his patient, noting that her eyes were still wide open, like she couldn't believe what she was seeing. "Are you in any pain?" Her eyes, he noted, had dilated until they were almost black.
Kally turned her head slowly to look up at the doctor. There was something funny going on with her vision. Or maybe it was just that it seemed so much more different than what she was used to. "What did you do to me?" she asked, feeling a little short of breath. She blinked and her vision returned to normal. More than a little confused, she shook her head to try and clear her thoughts.
Dr. Bosch couldn't help but look puzzled. "I'm not sure I understand," he admitted. "I didn't do anything to you."
She raised the hand with the IV line and made a funny little grimace at it. "Ugh. Was that really necessary? You know I hate needles." She looked up again, not at the doctor but past him. "I still don't know what you did."
Realizing Kally was possibly not talking to him, Dr. Bosch turned to see if anyone was behind him. There wasn't. Were hallucinations a residual of what she'd just gone through? It was possible. "I don't know what happened," he told her, still not sure if she was listening to him. "But I want to run some tests to try and find out."
Professor Othin seemed to shimmer behind the doctor and Kally wasn't sure if he was really there at first, or if she was imagining things. Well, if it was a figment of her imagination, then so be it. At least she had the potential of learning something interesting, so she asked again, only thinking the questions instead of saying them out loud. Her mouth decided it didn't want to work at the moment anyway.
Othin smiled at her, an almost grim yet pleased smile. "I did what seemed best given the circumstances," he answered her first question. "I applied a rune to awaken your Valkyrie blood. The process, of course, is not an easy one. Those who are chosen to ride in this elite group have faced many challenges in their mortal life. And to become one, that part of them which is mortal must change. Since you are only half Valkyrie by birth, it was necessary to pull that part of you from its dormant state. Even now, it is still solidifying inside you."
Even though Dr. Bosch and his team were working all around her, she didn't seem to pay them any heed, even when they took samples of her blood or rechecked her vitals over or injected contrast dye into her bloodstream. What about my abilities before? I saw the video from Stark Tower. Wasn't that my Valkyrie heritage coming out?
"In a way," Othin replied, seeming to move without moving as the medical team transported her to the room with the MRI machine. He was always the same distance away from her, no matter where they moved her physical body. "Your Valkyrie self knew you were in danger and tried to activate. It helped that you had been in a state of peril recent to this event. However, it was not a complete activation, possibly owing to the drugs introduced to your system. But there are some specific gifts as well that your mother passed on to you before she died. One of those gifts is the runes you dream about at night."
Kally barely felt them mover her onto the slab of the scanning equipment, her muscles still refusing to move after the intense pain she'd felt earlier. But I don't feel like anything's activated. To be honest, I feel more like I'm made of jelly. I doubt that's how a Valkyrie is supposed to feel.
Othin laughed. "Of course it's not. But you are still mortal for all of your mixed heritage. Your mortal body needs to rest after the amount of energy you expounded. But do not fear, you will be back to a more normal state in no time. And even more, you will be ready to do battle, for you will need to be ready. I know there is someone in the shadows who is helping you, though I cannot see his face. Only trust him so far as you feel it is right."
Kally thought her professor looked almost sad by that last statement. Should she tell him who it was? But a part of her prohibited it, though she wasn't sure why. "I don't understand."
The look on his face quickly passed and the slab she was on slid into the round cylinder of the MRI machine. "No, but you will. Your friend, Hiro was it? He is not physically able to aid in your escape, though he has other abilities that even he may not be aware of yet. It may be up to you to break the both of you free from this enemy. You must be ready. But remember this: should you find yourself up against this Ms. Kendrick again, your Valkyrie blood may not be enough to defeat her. Do not take on any battles beyond what you feel capable of winning."
I won't, she promised, the pressure of the hard surface underneath her coming more to the foreground than it had been before. It was that sensation that told her whatever out of body event she was experiencing was about to end. And even though she'd heard everything Dr. Bosch and the others had said during the whole exchange, it was almost as if from a distance. Would it be a bad thing to let them continue on with their tests? Wasn't this whole scenario to prevent them from moving onto whatever phase of their DNA testing they'd intended?
Whatever the answer to that question was, she couldn't stop what was going on any more than she could make her body obey her mental commands. Professor Othin was right. Whatever transformation she'd gone through had taken a lot out of her and it would probably take a while for everything to get back to normal.
When she looked up again, and towards where the end of the open tube sat, Professor Othin was gone. All she saw was the far window where Dr. Bosch and another medic did... something. She had no idea what it was, other than it probably had something to do with the scan they were performing on her now. Well, it was what it was. And it wasn't like the whole ordeal hadn't worn her out, because it had. She let her eyes refocus on the curved surface above her, her eyes growing heavy. A minute or two later, she was blissfully unconscious.
Fred paced his assigned bedroom. It was a little after seven in the morning. And even though they'd all gotten to bed late, he'd had a hard time sleeping. There was just a lot to mull over. The fact that they'd exposed their biggest secret to several Avengers about being the Big Hero 6 was mind blowingly awesome and kind of a downer at the same time. He'd really hoped to confess his involvement to Tony under totally different circumstances.
But that hadn't been the only thing to put a wrench in their plans. Now Hiro's aunt was at Stark Tower, which meant they'd have to be extra careful about what they told the Avengers the rest of what they wanted and needed to know about how they worked and why Hiro had PTSD. The Black Widow had stressed the importance of knowing as they prepared to formulate a rescue plan. It might make any extraction easier if they knew what might trigger an episode, with the hope of avoiding any such triggers as much as possible. Things wouldn't have been quite so complicated with Hiro's aunt not in the picture, but apparently the universe wanted to make things complicated.
The mascot clutched at his shoulder. It didn't hurt as much as it had the night before, but the area was still a bit tender. That and it itched, which – he knew from experience – was a sign that it was healing, so long as it didn't turn into a burning itch. After all the antibiotics they'd pumped into him the night before, he doubted it would get infected any time soon, if at all.
"So, what does this mean exactly?" he hazarded, pausing to watch GoGo who sat on the edge of his bed. He watched her blow a gum bubble before sucking it back in, her expression unreadable, one knee drawn up to her chin. "I know this definitely complicates things, and we may have to come to a hard decision. Can we keep our involvement as super heroes a secret from Aunt Cass or will we be forced to show her our hand?"
Wasabi closed his eyes, both hands threatening to rip his hair out on either side. He didn't do lack of sleep well, especially not when topped off with potential death and other complications. Hiro's aunt showing up definitely counted as a complication. "I have absolutely no idea! But I just gotta point out that we all knew this might be a possibility one day. I just hoped it would take a lot longer." He forced his hands down to his sides, clenching his hands into fists instead as he let out a sigh.
Chances were good that once Cass found out about their extra-curricular activities, she would force Hiro to stop. And if they didn't have their leader, the whole team would rapidly fall apart. Despite the fact that Wasabi had been rather hesitant about the whole thing, he'd gotten used to it and didn't really want to see it end. They'd have to figure something out eventually. After all, it might be difficult to keep things together once everyone started graduating, but he'd hoped to not have to worry about this kind of thing until much, much later.
"It just very well may come to that," GoGo inserted. "It's not like we can keep it a secret forever. And Hiro is still technically a minor. If anyone knew about his involvement, he'd be more than forced out of the picture."
Honey pressed her fingers nervously together. She'd taken up a perch on the edge of Wasabi's bed, facing out into the room. It was safer to stay close to Wasabi, in case he had a panic attack. She was pretty good at talking him down from them if necessary. "I don't think I'm prepared for that just yet," she admitted.
GoGo rolled her eyes. "I don't think any of us are prepared for that just yet either, so we'll just have to be extra careful when it comes to talking around her. Because there is no way we're sitting this out."
"What she said," Fred agreed, his expression serious. "I don't care if my shoulder's still hurt when the time comes. I'm going out there with everyone, guns blazing and everything."
Wasabi seemed to jerk as he kept himself from standing bolt upright. "How can you say that?! We don't even know what we're up against! I mean, come on! This is Hydra! If it took almost destroying a major city to defeat them the first time, in our century, what do you think it's going to take to take a whole facility by storm and rescue two captives? It's practically impossible!" He threw his hands up in the air with his last words.
"We've got to keep it together," Honey worried. "If we don't, we won't be of any use to anyone. And it's not like we haven't had our share of experience. How many people can say they've been up against exoskeletons? Or have gone up against alien species? I'm willing to give it my all. Are you?"
Fred gave an almost wry smile. "Well, technically speaking, we didn't really go up against space aliens. They just sort of got stuck in the middle of everything. And I don't count Picard and his people as aliens, even if Worf was a Klingon or whatever. But I take your point. We're not inexperienced, just differently experienced."
GoGo nodded. "He makes a good point."
But before anyone else could comment, the door opened and Baymax waddled into the room. "I believe Sam has something she needs to share with everyone," he announced.
His words brought everyone crowding around the robot, all trying to talk over each other in an attempt to try and get out whatever it was Sam had uncovered. But, after a minute of this, GoGo finally decided this was the wrong way to go about it and silenced them. "Baymax, is this something the others should know about too?"
The robot blinked once. "I believe so. It is in regards to the location of Hiro, Kally, and their captors."
"I will inform the others," JARVIS spoke up. "I am sure they would appreciate it if you would head up to the penthouse level now."
Honey and GoGo exchanged glances at this announcement, but it made sense. Only a little over an hour had passed since Honey came back down. And even if the others had tried to go back to bed, someone would be awake upstairs. "I think we'd better get going. If JARVIS really has told them there's news, it would be easier for us to meet them there than to wait for them to come get us."
Wasabi looked like he might protest a bit. But then he seemed to come to his senses. "Good point," he admitted. He stood and walked over to the door. "Might as well get this over with." He paused. "And you're sure Hiro's aunt went to bed? I really don't want to have to explain to her right now how we allowed her nephew to talk us into creating a super hero team."
"As sure as I can be," Honey replied. She'd seen Natasha lead Aunt Cass into the room in question, looking pretty done in. "Let's just hope she can actually sleep and doesn't have insomnia."
Fred nodded. "I actually have an idea to help with that," he stated. "JARVIS, think you could give us a warning if she's headed our way? I mean we'll have to tell her eventually, but right now, with all that's going on, it might not be such a good thing, if you know what I mean."
"I would like to add my belief that it would be detrimental to her mental health to have this information revealed at this time," Baymax chipped in. "I believe it would be wise to keep this knowledge from her until a more appropriate time."
They all waited in breathless silence to see if the AI would agree. And then the answer came in the affirmative. After that, they all seemed to breathe just a bit easier as they headed out into the hall and towards the elevators. Regardless of what information Sam and Baymax had, it would bring them one step closer to saving both Hiro and Kally.
