Shadows of Dreams

"He was a good man with a good heart." Kim said softly, glancing out over the people who gathered at the funeral. "He always had a way of making everything a little brighter, even by only being there. His mood was always happy, disposition cheery, and during the darkest moments of my life, he always seemed to be able to make me smile."

Kim took a pause in her speech to control her wavering voice. As she did so, she looked to her friends.  Billy's face flooded without pride, tears falling freely down his cheeks. To his left, Jason and Adam sat together. To Jason's right side Kat sat, crying quietly into her upturned palms, her bone deep, racking sobs echoing even to Kim.

And finally, Kim's eyes drifted to the cherry wood coffin in front of her, hundreds of flowers covering embroidered linen made of darkened roses. And again, Kim paused, swallowing down the lump in her throat that threatened to choke her. Her lover lay under those flowers, his eternal sleep had already begun.

"We loved him. I love him. We loved him even when we hated him. A man, who had barely begun to live, but what he gave to us all we'll never forget. He gave us love, life, humor, and strength.

"Rest in peace, Tommy Oliver."

~Four Days Prior~

All was silent in the hospital room; white washed walls reflecting nothing but the horror of death, the stench of pain. It was raining--drizzling really--the wind pushed rain drops against the pain of glass, the curtains were half drawn, giving only a small view of the moistened Angel Grove. The ICU was characteristically quiet, Kim realized as she glanced out the window leading to the hallway. Cade Oliver was seated right outside the room, on the floor, his scrubs still painted with the blood of his younger cousin. The last surgery had gone badly and now all that was left was waiting. Waiting for him to live, waiting for him to die. 

He lay under the blankets and sheets, his body prone and slim in the shadows. He was wearing a hospital gown, the middle of his chest, from breast bone to navel, covered in bandages that soaked with blood almost every ten minutes, tubes in his arms feeding him the blood he needed to survive. He was breathing rapidly through a tube down his throat, the steady whoosh the only sound besides the beeping in the room. His skin had almost a transparent look from loss of blood and his eyelids had a purplish tint. His eyes looked dark in his white face, two bruises, and his lips pale.

Kim watched him, as she had been for several days, and her heart crippled little by little...his appearance, right now, was forever burned in her memory. He had suffered...had been suffering, for many weeks and in some ways Kim hoped his pain would end soon.  She even prayed for, not because she wanted him to die, more like she wanted his pain and suffering to end.  She loves him so much that seeing him this way was killing her bit by bit.

 As she watched the machine inflate and deflate his lungs she wept. It seemed like she hadn't stopped weeping, a continuous flood falling down her face. She didn't even know how her body managed to make the tears as they left her, she had cried so much. She held Tommy's cool hand between her two smaller ones, linking her fingers through his.

It wasn't supposed to be like this...he was supposed to grow old with them.  She and he were supposed to get married, have kids and start a family of their own. He wasn't supposed to die at the tender age of twenty one. He wasn't supposed to die from this disease; after all of their battles as power rangers he had managed to come out alive.   Everything that they had been through together, and now this dreaded disease was taking their hopes and dreams away from them.

So deep in her pain was she that she didn't hear Cade come into the room until he set a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"How's he doing?" He asked softly.

Mildly startled, Kim looked up at the handsome man, so alike Tommy that it was heartbreaking. His shoulders were broad, face chiseled. And above the woman melting mouth were the eyes that were an Oliver virtue. Dark brown, shaded, so sad and puppy dog like. His expression was of a deep sadness, so open she could tell without having to even look at him. But she did anyway, looking up, offering him an encouraging look.

"Ok," She responded softly.

With a look at her, Cade went over to the left side of the bed and sat down. He carefully moved a hand over his cousin's waxen face, checking both pupils by carefully opening his eyes. Murmuring softly to himself, he unclipped the tube from his younger cousin's throat, unhooking it from the breathing mechanism and as carefully as he could, opened the latch so that he could see if Tommy was breathing independently. The boy didn't move but after a second or two took a gurgled breath on his own, and an expression of sadness held the older mans face.

I didn't want him to feel pain...God, oh God, please help me, his mind screamed, his heart thudded, but his face didn't show.

Motioning to his nurse, Sarah, at the door, Cade stood shakily and unclipped several tubes, getting a careful hold on the contraption down his throat as Sarah stood nearby to help. With a gentleness and grace that looked almost liquid, he removed the tube from his cousin's throat, careful not to hurt him at any time. Tommy made a choked sound as his lungs started to work on their own again, taking in breaths.

And to Kim's shock, he opened his eyes.

Taking in deep, quiet breaths, he gazed at her, soft sighs echoing from his chest in deep pain. His glazed eyes went from Cade to Kim, his brows creased in confusion. He stopped and thought a moment, a look of understanding crossing his expression, remembering what had happened to him and what was still happening. He made a small sound between sorrow and pain and swallowed softly, his eyes meeting Kim's.

"Hey."

"Hey there," she responded, sending him an encouraging smile although her entire soul was crumbling down into her toes.

"I'm dying, huh?" He asked softly but firmly, gazing at her.

Tears once again falling down her cheeks, Kim tried to speak through the thick lump growing in her throat and found she couldn't. Not because it was physically impossible at that moment, but because she'd never lied to him. And never would. She said nothing to his question, but as she watched, his face took on an expression of the same understanding it had held before.

"Can..."

"Can what?" Cade asked softly, his doctor face in place. It was only there so he wouldn't die, so his chest wouldn't cave in.

"Let me go, Cade. Please? I want to..." he stopped, sucking in a breath before gathering the strength to speak. "I want to go. To the place." he whispered, his gaze shifting to Kim's.

Understanding dawned in her eyes and she nodded softly, the promise from so many months ago so fresh in her memory that it was like it had been yesterday. "Bring me here? So I can know I was loved too?"

She looked at Cade, explaining to him without needing words.

It was time to go home.

The sun was setting as they got to the shore, thick golden light moving over the crystalline ocean. Sea gulls crowed in the sky and the tide crashing on the shore was all that could be heard. The air was crisp, cool, wonderfully clean, the scent of the day still held in the soft, sun kissed sand.

Cade carried his younger cousin in his arms onto that sand, until Kim stopped him with a hand to his arm, motioning without needing to that they'd gotten to the spot. She slid down to the ground and gently, Cade laid his cousin partially onto her lap, letting his legs and feet rest in the sand as he tucked a second blanket around his thin form.

Without having to be told he understood this was a time for Kim and him and tenderly kissed his cousin's cheek, chin trembling. He tucked the blanket over Tommy's blood soaked hospital smock, the dark red a startling contrast to his pale skin, and stroked his face gently, whispering in a mildly choked voice, "I love you, squirt."

Standing, letting the silence, but for the ocean, take him in, Cade took one last look at his cousin and moves away. To wait, to hope for a salvation that would never come. For the first time in his entire life, as he walked away from the man he cared more about then himself, Cade bowed his head and prayed.

Breathing in deeply, Tommy watched Cade's back for awhile before moving his eyes to the horizon, watching as the sun set and the water lapping close to him, beautiful. For the first time in months, since this hell had set into his life, he felt bliss, peace, joy, and a deep happiness. "Kim?" he murmured, looking up at her with glassed eyes.

"Hmm?" She asked softly, the ocean tickling her toes.

"I know I'm not going to make it but I want you to know that everything. Is going to be ok."

Gazing down at him, Kim stroked his hair softly from his face and whispered, "How could I ever be ok without you?"

"Well... I guess you'll have to find a way." Tommy's eyes began to close and he shook it away. Swallowing and looking up at her, he murmured, "You got to be strong.  Take care of yourself, and take care of the group."

"Yes, always," Kim nodded quickly, chest so tight she could barely get the words out.

"You have to give...my stuff..."

"Stuff?"

"Yea...my...give my Hawaiian shirts to Zack."

"Zack?" Kim giggled softly, gazing at him in love, her heart so crumbled she could barely comprehend how it still beat.

Grinning slightly, Tommy nodded and trembled, curling deeper into the blankets and her arms. "Yea...give...oh, disks, on my desk. My computer desk. One...one, its...give it to Billy...he'll understand."

His will. "Ok, ok, handsome, shh...its ok...close your eyes, and sleep."

"No, I don't want to sleep..." he whispered almost franticly, shaking his head, his glazed eyes tinged with fear. I'm so scared, Kim...I don't want to die...please help me...I don't want to...I want to have kids...I want to have a family...I want to marry you, I don't want to die..."

Her tears falling again, Kim gave him a tender smile, chin trembling so hard she was sure her face was going to break, and cupped his cheek, cradling him to her tightly. "Shh, it'll be..."

"P-please...please don't say..." His voice cracked and his face lost some of its vitality, blinking softly at her as his own tears trickled down his cheeks. "I'm so scared...I'm so young...ca..."

"Shh," Kim said thickly, stroking his cheek softly and bringing his face as close to hers as she could, the lump in her throat so hard she didn't know where she found the voice to speak. "Shh...Everything's ok...you're so wonderful...so many people love you, so many who care about you..." She gazed down at him and nodded, smiling through her tears, stroking his cheek. "I love you, Tommy, I love you so much that it hurts, and I'll always love you."

His face began to loose the small amount of color he'd kept and his eyes started to haze in and out as they gazed into hers, his voice soft as he spoke.   "I love you beautiful, always will, always have."

His lips turned up into a small smile and his eyes lost their soul. His heart ended its struggle, a breath entering into his lungs for the last time. With a strangled sound, Kim watched as he died, her lips meeting his as his last breath left his body. He lay silent in her arms, looking up into the sky with eyes that would never befall the beauty of the world, and a sob that was more a scream left her throat, her arms pulling him so that his face was pressed into her neck, her own in his shoulder. She rocked him, crying so hard she couldn't move, for a time unknown.

Finally, when she looked into his face again, she lightly kissed his lips once more, and moved her fingers down over his eyes, closing them for eternity.

"Sleep well, darling knight."