Noah? John staggered as a wave of dizziness washed over him upon hearing the name. A sea of faces and things, strange and yet familiar flickered in front of his eyes, a man, determined, resolute, someone running, a.... Suddenly a low moan broke through the vision he was caught in. He shook his head as he forced his attention back to Catherine again. He could figure out what in the world was going on later. She obviously needed help. That name just felt so right though.
"Noah?" Catherine whispered, a slight smile on her lips at the sight of the young marshal they had lost so tragically. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew it couldn't be good for her to be seeing a dead man but at the moment, she didn't really care. "You.... you look good, Noah. Do you know how much we've missed you?"
"I've.... I've missed you too," he said gently, suddenly realizing he was sincere, as he reached out, taking Catherine's hand in his, feeling the pulse in her wrist. Weak, rapid, definitely not good. He quickly ran his eyes over her. There was blood on the side of her head but it looked like that had stopped on its own and wasn't enough to be much of a problem. Something else had to be going on. "Catherine, can you tell me if you're hurting somewhere?"
"We loved you so much, Noah," Catherine continued, seemingly oblivious to the question. "Sam thought of you as a son. Did you know that? I thought he would die when we lost you."
Sam.... More images came swirling around him at the sound of the name and he had to struggle to for a moment to regain control. He managed to grab one bit before forcing the images away again. Sam was US Marshal Sam Gerard. His.... boss...?
"Noah, I'm so glad if someone had to come for me it was you," Catherine whispered. "Noah, I can't go with you though. I can't.... If Sam loses someone else.... it will kill him. I can't do that to him."
"It's okay. Just try to tell me if anything hurts, okay?" he said softly but he hoped firmly enough to get her to listen. He gently felt her head and neck, relieved that the only obvious problem he found was the cut on the side of her head. He hesitated for a minute before reaching out and unfastening the buttons of her blouse, moving the silky fabric aside slightly so he could check for possible damage. "Cath?" Her eyes had slipped shut again and he had to call loudly to rouse her. "I'm just going to check and try to figure out what you hurt, okay? You tell me if I touch anything that hurts you."
He let out a slight sigh of relief when a careful check of her chest didn't seem to find any problems. He knew from experience chest injuries weren't good. When he moved to her abdomen though, he knew he had found the problem. He could see a large, dark bruise and the second he touched the area, she moaned in pain and tried to roll away.
"No, don't move! It's okay. Just stay still!" Abdominal muscles rigid, bruising.... She had to have injured something in there pretty seriously. He quickly fastened her blouse back up and then reached up again, gently feeling her forehead before shrugging off his light windbreaker and tucking it over her. He doubted that would be enough though and glanced around looking for something else before his eyes fell on the papers he had fallen on. He jumped up and rushed to the pile, coming back a moment later with his hands full.
"Cath, just going to put these here to keep you from getting cold, okay?" he said as he crumpled the papers one by one, tucking them under his jacket and over Catherine's legs. He reached out again and gently patted her hand as soon as he had covered her the best he could. "You just lie still, okay? I'm going to see what I can do about getting us out of here."