Morning Star
Chapter 17
When Syd woke she was in the hospital, once again surrounded by machines, with a variety of monitors and tubes attached to her body. Her first thought was one of relief that her ordeal was over. But seconds later she was overwhelmed by the memory of Gage being shot. She remembered Jimmy and Alex coming to the old Psych Hospital, she remembered telling Trivette where she had last seen Gage but after that nothing.
A young nurse came into the room at the moment and looked at Syd with delight.
"Ranger Cooke! You're awake! This is wonderful news; your friends have been so worried. I'll just go tell them and the doctor, they will all want to see you." Turning, before Syd could even speak to her, the nurse was out the door.
Within minutes Alex, Erica, Trivette and Walker were surrounding her. They each looked pretty tired, especially Alex, but Walker's wounds were beginning to heal. Both his eyes were open and the bruises around them had dulled to a yellowish-green colour.
"How long have I been sleeping?" were Syd's first words to her friends, as she painfully noticed the absence of her best friend from the small family of well-wishers.
"Three and a half-days, Sydney." Came the reply from Alex, who stroked Syd's hair from her face, as she looked to her husband and friends for help in talking to Sydney.
"You really gave us quite a scare!" Erica stepped forward, gingerly giving Syd a hug. Trivette and Walker nodded.
Syd picked up on their evasiveness immediately, and though she was terrified to hear the reply, she plunged forward and asked anyways.
"Gage?" she looked at her friends, their faces a study in concern. "Is he...?"
The silence in her room was deafening. Walker finally spoke up. "We don't know Sydney. We don't know where Gage is."
"What do you mean?" Syd sat up clumsily. "How can you not know where he is?"
"I went Sydney." Trivette finally spoke. "I went into the woods where you said Gage was but I couldn't find him. We've searched the entire property, buildings and grounds, and he has not turned up."
"He can't just be missing!" Syd exclaimed. "He was shot, he was bleeding, and he needed help. There is no way he could have gotten out of there himself. He ..."
Syd began to panic as the reality of the situation hit home. She started to have trouble breathing and her blood pressure began to rise. Immediately nurses were in her room, followed by her doctor.
"You'll have to leave." An older nurse held the door and motioned for the Rangers and their wives to leave.
"We haven't given up; there are still search teams out looking." Trivette said as he left the room.
"I'm sorry Sydney. I know how much Gage means to you." Alex added.
'No you don't.' thought Sydney sullenly as the nurses and doctor poked and prodded at her. 'I don't think even Gage really knows how much he means to me.'
"When can I get out of here?" Syd asked her medical team. "I need to find my partner."
The doctor looked at her and meeting her gaze, answered bluntly. "You have just come out of a coma; standard practice is to remain the hospital a minimum of two more days. But Ranger Cooke, your leg has been badly injured. Even when you are released, you are looking at several months of intensive therapy to rebuild the damaged tissues. You are very lucky that you did not lose the use of your leg, when you were brought in we had very slim hopes that you'd ever walk again."
Syd let the doctors words sink in. This just wasn't fair, this couldn't be happening. Almost lost the use of her leg? Two more days in the hospital? Gage, still out there, alone and suffering. Was he even still out there? What if a wild animal had smelt the blood and .... Sydney remembered how she had felt when she saw Gage after he had been attacked by the bear. The thought of something like that happening to him again broke her heart. Gage was so strong, so solid; he had overcome so much difficulty in his life already. She needed him to stay that way, she counted on his strength far more than she had ever realized.
Syd melted back into the pillows as the medication she had been injected with to calm her breathing and lower her blood pressure began to take effect. And, with her body unwilling to do her heart's bidding, Syd fell into a restless sleep plagued by dreams of Gage and a life without him.
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"We have to do something Walker." Trivette said to his partner after they had left the room. "Now."
"Did you see the look in her eyes?" Erica noted to Alex, who nodded grimly in reply.
"She loves him" Alex and Walker stated at the same time.
The foursome shared a look and smiled despite the gravity of the situation. Walker was the first to break the silence.
"Now that we know Syd is awake, I feel better going down to the office and talking to the ground crews. How about you Trivette?"
"Definitely." The Rangers kissed their wives, who decided to stay at the hospital a bit longer and make sure Syd was comfortable, and headed to Ranger Headquarters.
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When Gage woke up he was disoriented and confused. He was in a small, dark adobe building. He could hear whispering voices but they were not speaking in English. They were speaking in Spanish? Where was he? Mexico? He tried to sit up but severe pain in his right shoulder and arm coursed through his body and he let out a roar, collapsing again onto the bed.
His call brought his caregivers running. A older man and woman, in their sixties, rushed to his side and began speaking to him. Cursing inwardly Gage wished he could remember some of his high school Spanish, but truth be told he hadn't paid much attention in Spanish class. He'd only taken the course because some of the most beautiful girls in his school had been taking it. Of course, none of them were as beautiful as Syd.
Syd! Oh God, where was she? Suddenly recalling some of the events that had led to his current situation he tried to sit up again, calling her name.
"Syd? Sydney! Where is she?" he looked enticingly at the woman who shook her head at him as she placed a cool cloth on his forehead.
"Sydney Cooke. Mujer." He tried again haltingly, some basic Spanish words coming back to him. "Mi socio. Texas Guardabosques. Adonde?"
"No senor. No mujer aqui." The man replied.
Not here. Gage's heart sank. What had happened to her? Those shots had come out of nowhere, he had pushed her into the bushes and then....he remembered feeling the burning of hot metal as the bullet sliced into his shoulder and then he was falling. He could remember hearing Syd calling his name, crying out for him, but he couldn't answer. And then her cries faded away. The next thing he could remember, he had woken up here. Where was here?
"Donde esta aqui?"
"Mexico." The man replied again.
"Como?" Gage replied, wondering how he ended up in Mexico when the last place he had been was outside of Dallas, at the abandoned Psych Hospital.
"El Rio – mi barco." Ahh...the river and the man's boat. The river that ran through the hospital property must flow to Mexico.
"Cuando?" When?
"Tres dia senor." Three days! He slumped back down. Syd could be dead. He was in Mexico, severely injured and in no shape to move let alone rescue Syd, and it had been three days since they had been attacked. He remembered finding her in that cell, collapsed on the floor, battered and bruised. He thought about holding her frail body in his arms as he carried her away to safety and she accused him of letting them take her. He remembered waking up in her arms as she tried to bring down his fever by smoothing a cool cloth on his forehead. And he remembered the look in her eyes as she finally told him that she loved him.
He didn't want to live without her, Gage realized. If Sydney was dead he just wanted to curl up and die himself. He had failed her, he had promised to protect her, he had tried to bring her back to safety but once again he had let them take her. As tears began to slide down his cheeks, Gage gratefully slipped back into unconsciousness as the worried Mexican couple examined his bandages and continued to soothe his slight fever with damp rags.
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At the headquarters for Company B, Walker and Trivette were disheartened to learn that no progress had been made in the search for their missing comrade. After talking to the ground crew leaders, who had expanded their search well beyond the perimeter of the Psych Hospital, Walker sat down quietly at his desk while Trivette stood and looked out the window.
"Walker". Trivette finally broke the silence. "Its not that I don't trust the guys out in the field, but wouldn't it be best if we went back out ourselves and looked?"
Walker nodded slowly, still lost in his thoughts.
"I mean, I just can't sit around here and doing nothing." He continued. "No matter what we discover, we have to find him. For the Rangers, for his sister. For Sydney."
"He is still alive." Walker spoke at last, shaking his head as if to clear a vision.
"Cherokee instincts?" Trivette asked, a smile spreading across his face. Walker's instincts had never once been wrong, and while Jimmy had once dismissed his partner's hunches as pure luck he had come to believe in the close connection that Walker seemed to have with the spiritual world.
Nodding, Walker stood. "He's safe, at least for now. Let's go home and get some rest tonight, we'll head back to the hospital grounds at first light."
Feeling renewed and energized by Walker's plan, Trivette grabbed his hat and headed out the door. He called Erica on his cell phone to tell her the 'news' and headed home.
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At the hospital Alex and Erica had returned to Sydney's room. When she had awoken again, she seemed despondent and morose. She didn't want to talk about what had happened or how she was feeling. She just wanted to be left alone. If Gage was gone...well, then life was just not worth fighting for. Why had she wasted all that time? She should have told him ages ago that she loved him. She had let fear of the unknown hold her back from taking the plunge with Gage, and now she may have lost her chance forever. Karmic justice, she thought to herself.
The women left the hospital shortly after Erica received the phone call from her husband. She had shared the promising news with Alex, who also trusted her husband's instincts implicitly, but together they had agreed to not divulge it to Sydney. It was a tough call, they knew that Sydney needed some optimism but they didn't want to give her false hopes.
They did tell her that in the morning the two Rangers would be heading out to look for Gage themselves, and this did seem to cheer the younger Ranger up somewhat. Walker and Trivette were the best, Syd knew that. If anyone could find Gage, it would be them. But what would they find?
Angry that she couldn't go out there and look for him herself Syd suddenly flung her water cup across the room. Water sprayed everywhere and the cup satisfactorily cracked into two pieces, but the victory was hollow. Alone in her hospital room, Syd cried herself to sleep.
Chapter 17
When Syd woke she was in the hospital, once again surrounded by machines, with a variety of monitors and tubes attached to her body. Her first thought was one of relief that her ordeal was over. But seconds later she was overwhelmed by the memory of Gage being shot. She remembered Jimmy and Alex coming to the old Psych Hospital, she remembered telling Trivette where she had last seen Gage but after that nothing.
A young nurse came into the room at the moment and looked at Syd with delight.
"Ranger Cooke! You're awake! This is wonderful news; your friends have been so worried. I'll just go tell them and the doctor, they will all want to see you." Turning, before Syd could even speak to her, the nurse was out the door.
Within minutes Alex, Erica, Trivette and Walker were surrounding her. They each looked pretty tired, especially Alex, but Walker's wounds were beginning to heal. Both his eyes were open and the bruises around them had dulled to a yellowish-green colour.
"How long have I been sleeping?" were Syd's first words to her friends, as she painfully noticed the absence of her best friend from the small family of well-wishers.
"Three and a half-days, Sydney." Came the reply from Alex, who stroked Syd's hair from her face, as she looked to her husband and friends for help in talking to Sydney.
"You really gave us quite a scare!" Erica stepped forward, gingerly giving Syd a hug. Trivette and Walker nodded.
Syd picked up on their evasiveness immediately, and though she was terrified to hear the reply, she plunged forward and asked anyways.
"Gage?" she looked at her friends, their faces a study in concern. "Is he...?"
The silence in her room was deafening. Walker finally spoke up. "We don't know Sydney. We don't know where Gage is."
"What do you mean?" Syd sat up clumsily. "How can you not know where he is?"
"I went Sydney." Trivette finally spoke. "I went into the woods where you said Gage was but I couldn't find him. We've searched the entire property, buildings and grounds, and he has not turned up."
"He can't just be missing!" Syd exclaimed. "He was shot, he was bleeding, and he needed help. There is no way he could have gotten out of there himself. He ..."
Syd began to panic as the reality of the situation hit home. She started to have trouble breathing and her blood pressure began to rise. Immediately nurses were in her room, followed by her doctor.
"You'll have to leave." An older nurse held the door and motioned for the Rangers and their wives to leave.
"We haven't given up; there are still search teams out looking." Trivette said as he left the room.
"I'm sorry Sydney. I know how much Gage means to you." Alex added.
'No you don't.' thought Sydney sullenly as the nurses and doctor poked and prodded at her. 'I don't think even Gage really knows how much he means to me.'
"When can I get out of here?" Syd asked her medical team. "I need to find my partner."
The doctor looked at her and meeting her gaze, answered bluntly. "You have just come out of a coma; standard practice is to remain the hospital a minimum of two more days. But Ranger Cooke, your leg has been badly injured. Even when you are released, you are looking at several months of intensive therapy to rebuild the damaged tissues. You are very lucky that you did not lose the use of your leg, when you were brought in we had very slim hopes that you'd ever walk again."
Syd let the doctors words sink in. This just wasn't fair, this couldn't be happening. Almost lost the use of her leg? Two more days in the hospital? Gage, still out there, alone and suffering. Was he even still out there? What if a wild animal had smelt the blood and .... Sydney remembered how she had felt when she saw Gage after he had been attacked by the bear. The thought of something like that happening to him again broke her heart. Gage was so strong, so solid; he had overcome so much difficulty in his life already. She needed him to stay that way, she counted on his strength far more than she had ever realized.
Syd melted back into the pillows as the medication she had been injected with to calm her breathing and lower her blood pressure began to take effect. And, with her body unwilling to do her heart's bidding, Syd fell into a restless sleep plagued by dreams of Gage and a life without him.
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"We have to do something Walker." Trivette said to his partner after they had left the room. "Now."
"Did you see the look in her eyes?" Erica noted to Alex, who nodded grimly in reply.
"She loves him" Alex and Walker stated at the same time.
The foursome shared a look and smiled despite the gravity of the situation. Walker was the first to break the silence.
"Now that we know Syd is awake, I feel better going down to the office and talking to the ground crews. How about you Trivette?"
"Definitely." The Rangers kissed their wives, who decided to stay at the hospital a bit longer and make sure Syd was comfortable, and headed to Ranger Headquarters.
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When Gage woke up he was disoriented and confused. He was in a small, dark adobe building. He could hear whispering voices but they were not speaking in English. They were speaking in Spanish? Where was he? Mexico? He tried to sit up but severe pain in his right shoulder and arm coursed through his body and he let out a roar, collapsing again onto the bed.
His call brought his caregivers running. A older man and woman, in their sixties, rushed to his side and began speaking to him. Cursing inwardly Gage wished he could remember some of his high school Spanish, but truth be told he hadn't paid much attention in Spanish class. He'd only taken the course because some of the most beautiful girls in his school had been taking it. Of course, none of them were as beautiful as Syd.
Syd! Oh God, where was she? Suddenly recalling some of the events that had led to his current situation he tried to sit up again, calling her name.
"Syd? Sydney! Where is she?" he looked enticingly at the woman who shook her head at him as she placed a cool cloth on his forehead.
"Sydney Cooke. Mujer." He tried again haltingly, some basic Spanish words coming back to him. "Mi socio. Texas Guardabosques. Adonde?"
"No senor. No mujer aqui." The man replied.
Not here. Gage's heart sank. What had happened to her? Those shots had come out of nowhere, he had pushed her into the bushes and then....he remembered feeling the burning of hot metal as the bullet sliced into his shoulder and then he was falling. He could remember hearing Syd calling his name, crying out for him, but he couldn't answer. And then her cries faded away. The next thing he could remember, he had woken up here. Where was here?
"Donde esta aqui?"
"Mexico." The man replied again.
"Como?" Gage replied, wondering how he ended up in Mexico when the last place he had been was outside of Dallas, at the abandoned Psych Hospital.
"El Rio – mi barco." Ahh...the river and the man's boat. The river that ran through the hospital property must flow to Mexico.
"Cuando?" When?
"Tres dia senor." Three days! He slumped back down. Syd could be dead. He was in Mexico, severely injured and in no shape to move let alone rescue Syd, and it had been three days since they had been attacked. He remembered finding her in that cell, collapsed on the floor, battered and bruised. He thought about holding her frail body in his arms as he carried her away to safety and she accused him of letting them take her. He remembered waking up in her arms as she tried to bring down his fever by smoothing a cool cloth on his forehead. And he remembered the look in her eyes as she finally told him that she loved him.
He didn't want to live without her, Gage realized. If Sydney was dead he just wanted to curl up and die himself. He had failed her, he had promised to protect her, he had tried to bring her back to safety but once again he had let them take her. As tears began to slide down his cheeks, Gage gratefully slipped back into unconsciousness as the worried Mexican couple examined his bandages and continued to soothe his slight fever with damp rags.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----
At the headquarters for Company B, Walker and Trivette were disheartened to learn that no progress had been made in the search for their missing comrade. After talking to the ground crew leaders, who had expanded their search well beyond the perimeter of the Psych Hospital, Walker sat down quietly at his desk while Trivette stood and looked out the window.
"Walker". Trivette finally broke the silence. "Its not that I don't trust the guys out in the field, but wouldn't it be best if we went back out ourselves and looked?"
Walker nodded slowly, still lost in his thoughts.
"I mean, I just can't sit around here and doing nothing." He continued. "No matter what we discover, we have to find him. For the Rangers, for his sister. For Sydney."
"He is still alive." Walker spoke at last, shaking his head as if to clear a vision.
"Cherokee instincts?" Trivette asked, a smile spreading across his face. Walker's instincts had never once been wrong, and while Jimmy had once dismissed his partner's hunches as pure luck he had come to believe in the close connection that Walker seemed to have with the spiritual world.
Nodding, Walker stood. "He's safe, at least for now. Let's go home and get some rest tonight, we'll head back to the hospital grounds at first light."
Feeling renewed and energized by Walker's plan, Trivette grabbed his hat and headed out the door. He called Erica on his cell phone to tell her the 'news' and headed home.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----
At the hospital Alex and Erica had returned to Sydney's room. When she had awoken again, she seemed despondent and morose. She didn't want to talk about what had happened or how she was feeling. She just wanted to be left alone. If Gage was gone...well, then life was just not worth fighting for. Why had she wasted all that time? She should have told him ages ago that she loved him. She had let fear of the unknown hold her back from taking the plunge with Gage, and now she may have lost her chance forever. Karmic justice, she thought to herself.
The women left the hospital shortly after Erica received the phone call from her husband. She had shared the promising news with Alex, who also trusted her husband's instincts implicitly, but together they had agreed to not divulge it to Sydney. It was a tough call, they knew that Sydney needed some optimism but they didn't want to give her false hopes.
They did tell her that in the morning the two Rangers would be heading out to look for Gage themselves, and this did seem to cheer the younger Ranger up somewhat. Walker and Trivette were the best, Syd knew that. If anyone could find Gage, it would be them. But what would they find?
Angry that she couldn't go out there and look for him herself Syd suddenly flung her water cup across the room. Water sprayed everywhere and the cup satisfactorily cracked into two pieces, but the victory was hollow. Alone in her hospital room, Syd cried herself to sleep.