Part 36

It was like a bad dream, noise and urgency and a big dose of confusion thrown in. It took Harper another minute or so to register reality, and even then he only partially accepted it. People were around him, there was tightness around his arms and chest, but his head suddenly fell forward not longer secured. Harper then tried to focus, and he heard a familiar voice through the mess of uncertainty, but then he heard noise, loud abrupt noise and somewhere deep within his conscious he registered gun fire, but his natural instincts to take cover were immediately hindered, though his head had become free, he was still secured firmly to the tree.

There was then something else that he registered. There was now tightness around his neck, a cold tightness. He was barely breathing, but he felt the restrictive hard metal pressing against his neck. His head swam, as the gun fire continued, but he was alone now and the familiar presence had long gone or maybe was far away to begin with, nothing was making any sense and he soon gave up to the slumber of unconsciousness.

Dylan pushed Buz to move faster as they tracked the noise of gun fire. The wood surrounded them now, and the trees were just dark shadows as they navigated as quickly as they could through the natural terrain, hindered by the unrelenting rain. The gunfire was now so close they could see small flashes of explosions, and they quickly took cover. Scanning the area, Rhade spotted the retreat of the other faction that had separated, and Buz's men seemed to now be pursuing them through the woods.

"Harper!" Beka then spoke, surprising them all, and without care she rushed forward, closely followed by Zal.

Dylan instructed Rhade to bring Buz and they moved with caution after Beka. It took only a few moments for Beka to reach the tree in the clearing, and immediately she paled on seeing the sight before her.

"We have to free him," Zal immediately worked on the ropes that secured Harper to the tree, and was quickly joined by Beka, as they frantically tried to free their friend.

Rhade kept a tight hold on Buz, as Dylan could only look on; his own hands useless in trying to help free Harper. There was now an unsettling silence, and even the rain seemed to die down, as they all saw how unresponsive Harper was to their actions, a nervousness hung in the air as they finally found some give in the rope until only his hands remained bound around the trunk.

"Give me that rope," Rhade asked when they managed to remove the long length of rope from around Harper, before working to release his hands. Rhade took the rope from a silent Zal and immediately set to work, securing Buz in a similar fashion to another tree, and once he was done they were gently lowering the unconscious form of Harper to the ground. Beka rapidly removed the cloth covering Harper's eyes and mouth, and then grabbed his wrist.

"He's not breathing, there's no pulse," Beka noted with emotion, as she tried to find a pulse in the engineer's wrist.

Rhade attempted to put his hand to Harper's neck, and shot an angered glance at Buz. "You put the collar on him?" he sneered with disbelief.

"Not my doing," Buz offered calmly, as he looked on.

"I can't find a pulse here either," Rhade stressed, but his tone suggested it was the inability to access Harper's neck easily due to the collar being the cause.

"He's nearly blue, look at his lips, and he's so cold," Beka spoke with fear lacing her words, and soon found Zal by her side, and without word he just put his arms around her and she didn't object, seeking the small comfort it afforded.

Rhade glanced at Dylan as he appeared to be in a trance. "Dylan! Help me here," Rhade snapped, and the captain quickly fell to his knees, and checked Harper's wrist for any sign of a pulse. Dylan could only slowly shake his head, so Rhade moved the human onto his back and opened the remains of Harper's shirt. His skin was pure white where the ropes had dug in, and the rest of his skin had a nasty blue tint to it, as Rhade placed the flat of his hand against Harper's chest. No words were spoken, just silence as the Nietzschean calmly brought his hand away.

"He's still alive," Rhade simply spoke.

"What?" Beka checked with a hint of anger, suggesting that Rhade was messing with her feelings. "Look at him, he's not breathing, he has no pulse, he's freaking blue!" Beka raged and turned to Buz with nothing but intense anger in her eyes. "You did this to him!" she sneered, as Zal continued to hold her close.

"We'll deal with him later," Dylan spoke towards Beka, as Zal's hand rested on her arm to encourage her to focus on what Rhade was now doing.

Beka turned and saw the Nietzschean was now breathing deep breaths into the human, and she could only watch as her long time friend's chest rose with each of Rhade's breaths.

"Shouldn't you be doing heart massage too?" Beka asked quietly, now calmer as she started to believe the impossible but still feeling so helpless and confused.

"His heart is beating," Rhade stated between breaths.

"But he has no pulse!" Beka reminded them sharply, and moved down to Harper's side as if to begin the procedure as she placed her hands on Harper's chest.

"Beka, he does, it's just very feint, and if you do that you could kill him," Dylan warned with more focus, putting his arm across her to stop her, and Zal then moved her away again. "He has a pulse, but he's cold from exposure to this weather, his body has slowed down, that's all, he not dead, and wasn't dead," he assured her, as he concentrated on what Rhade was doing. "Rhade is working to increase his core temperature, its standard medical practice," Dylan informed her, as Rhade stopped and stared at the human.

"He's breathing again, his lungs are taking in air on their own accord," Rhade then announced and he immediately gathered Harper up in his arms with care. "We have to get him out of this rain, and back to shelter."

"The rain is stopping," Dylan noted, as he walked alongside Beka, with Zal flanking her other side. "We'll leave Buz here to get a dose of his own medicine, and let his followers find him, we have more important business."

"Wait, shouldn't we try to warm Harper up first, do something? We can't just keep him so cold like this!" Beka frantically fussed.

"Rhade knows what he's doing, and so do I, military training teaches you a lot," Dylan simply assured her as Rhade concentrated on ensuring Harper was not being put at risk by the movement, as Dylan gestured to Zal to stay with Beka.

"So why did Rhade save Harper, if captain fantastic knew what to do?" Beka snapped, not appreciating the fact she didn't know how to help her friend, and she caught the cold stunned stare that Dylan threw her, and she looked away. "I mean, I don't know, let's just get Harper back," she stammered.

"I wanted to help," Dylan simply said, and he looked at his weakened hands.

"Ignore me, I'm not saying anything right, right now," Beka offered and her body language told Dylan not to back off, knowing they had other concerns to deal with.

Rhade began to move at a more hurried pace, keeping close contact to Harper as he could to share some warmth, as they moved back through the woods and towards the stone city of Edenia.

Things were now calm, and the rain had long stopped leaving behind a freshness and silence that blanketed the whole city. It was early morning, but the sun was yet to rise and the dark skies remained.

"How did you know he wasn't dead?" Beka spoke up in the near darkness of the room, lit only by a single candle, and she looked towards Rhade who watched intently for the moment over the still form of Harper.

Rhade took a deep breath before answering, the past hour had been a flurry of trying to get Harper dry and then stable, and his breathing constant. This had been the first chance for reflection, and the brief silence had allowed them both to realise how close they had come to losing one of their own, and that they still could. Both Dylan and Zal had left them to try and find more blankets, knowing Harper was still in a critical situation, and in desperate need for proper medical care that wasn't available. After storm, there was now a chilling wind flowing through the city that was being felt by all, and especially Harper.

"His skin warmed up against my hand, and it reacted slightly to my touch, enough for me to know. A dead body wouldn't have," Rhade offered quietly, his eyes focused on monitoring the human.

"Oh," Beka returned, her eyes also fixed on the almost mummified Harper, wrapped in all the available blankets they had had in the house, but it wasn't nearly enough. "He doesn't look good," she then spoke without emotion. "He looks so young and helpless, so different," she added with fear.

"I know," Rhade agreed and then looked at Beka. "Least he has some colour again; he's lost the blue," Rhade considered. "But he's still not breathing normally, and he's still cold."

"We have to get rid of that collar," Beka then stressed.

"It's not our main concern right now," Rhade countered. "We have to help him get warm, and get all his systems working how they should be."

"Maybe we could, you know, rub his hands or something?" Beka suggested, moving closer.

"No!" Rhade snapped, and then realised his tone in Beka's frightened expression, knowing she just wanted to help her friend. "Sorry, but no," he then spoke calmer. "His hands, his feet, the blood is cold and if we encourage circulation from these place and that blood reaches his heart, the cold could kill him."

"Warming the inner core thing, ok, I get it," Beka offered tiredly, knowing she was out of her depth regarding her understanding of Harper's condition. "That's why you keep breathing into his lungs, right?" She offered with a slight smile.

"Right, helping to warm him from the inside, and not because I like it," Rhade smirked, remembering Zal making light of Rhade's reasoning for keep giving Harper the kiss of life.

Beka found a smirk. "Zal's growing on me, slowly."

"I'm getting use to him hanging around," Rhade admitted. "I don't trust him completely, but at times tonight he has been of benefit," Rhade agreed with distraction, as he checked Harper's eyes with a frown.

"He just held me, and it," Beka hesitated. "It helped, it was nice," she finished.

"We need to get Harper warm, both of us," Rhade then looked at Beka again.

"I know, you keep saying," Beka smiled, and then clocked what Rhade was now suggesting, as he began moving aside the blankets that covered the human.

"Both of us?" Beka checked.

"I'll make contact with his neck, it has to be skin to skin, you can have his chest, particularly the ribs," Rhade stated with authority.

"Skin to skin, and I get his chest?" Beka showed her uncertainty.

"We maybe can change that so you get the neck?" Rhade offered awkwardly.

"Good plan," Beka agreed. "I don't want to give Seamus a heart attack the minute he wakes up, seeing me, skin to skin, chest to chest," Beka suggested.

"Yeah, he'll be totally calm waking up with a Nietzschean chest to chest," Rhade countered and Beka paused, realising his words.

"Maybe I should take the chest," Beka considered.

"Beka, with respect, Harper really doesn't have the time for us to fight over who gets to hug him where," Rhade then spoke with seriousness.

Beka took a deep breath and found herself briefly remembering how Harper had said he was ok with being naked in her presence now, but she still had problems with it, only now it was to save his life. "Ok, original plan," Beka spoke with an air of control, and she moved to lie down as Rhade gently moved Harper onto his side. "I have him," Beka then confirmed as Rhade took up his position, lying behind the smaller human.

"He'll freak whatever happens when he does eventually wake up, considering he freaked out about me giving him a simple massage," Rhade remarked, as he removed his shirt and made contact with the back of Harper's neck with his chest, his head resting above Harpers.

"You best avert your eyes soldier or you'll be the next one who's life is in danger," Beka warned, seeing Rhade had a very strategic position, being a taller man than Harper, as she hid under a blanket and skilfully removed her top and immediately moved close to Harper.

"Gentle at first, gradual warmth, not sudden," Rhade warned.

"I'm scared, Rhade," Beka admitted allowing her fears to be heard in her voice, as she moved Harper's head so it rested against her shoulder.

"He'll be ok," Rhade comforted, and their close proximity allowed for whispered words now.

"Harper is all I have," she continued.

"You're not alone, Beka, you have all of us," Rhade whispered back.

"He's all I have of what I used to be, he's the one constant," Beka explained. "Rev left me, Trance changed, I don't even recognise her as the purple pixie I first knew," she offered with a sigh.

"Purple?" Rhade questioned, and Beka looked into his eyes, and he saw the tears threatening. "That's right, I remember something about that," he quickly remarked and then put an arm around Harper that was able to hold Beka too. "Don't worry, what can be done is being done," Rhade stressed.

"We shouldn't even be on this god forsaken planet, this was Dylan's idealistic idiotism that led us here," Beka seethed now.

"Don't transfer blame," Rhade warned.

"We have to get away from this place! We can't keep going on like this!" Beka quietly fumed now.

"Beka, he's warming up," Rhade then spoke, to break her out of her rant. "He also seems to be breathing a lot better now, and unassisted," he smiled.

There was suddenly the noise of people arriving, and both Beka and Rhade glanced over to the door.

"We have," Dylan stopped to take in the scene. "Blankets," he finished, and then frowned seeing Harper sandwiched between Beka and Rhade.

"Body heat," Rhade offered.

"I know the procedure," Dylan agreed, and quickly distracted himself by adding the additional blankets to Harper's form before turning back to Zal, who remained speechless and immobile just staring at the threesome. "Zal?" Dylan prompted.

"Huh?" Zal offered with distraction.

"Blankets, Harper needs them, remember?" Dylan encouraged, and finally Zal snapped out of it and placed the blankets he had held over Harper, Beka and Rhade.

"Is this something we can help with?" Zal then asked with a grin, the suggestion all too clear, finding his voice again.

"We have enough body heat, thanks," Rhade grinned knowingly.

"How's he doing?" Dylan asked.

"Better, colours coming back, his breathing is getting stronger, and his temperature appears to be slowly rising, which is good," Rhade explained.

"His feet are still cold," Beka complained.

"Don't make contact with any other part of his body," Rhade spoke with concern.

"I'm not, I just accidentally brushed them and they felt like ice, I don't want to touch them too soon again," Beka returned.

"Seems like you have it all in hand," Dylan seemed pleased, until he became aware of someone else in the house, he gestured to Zal to move with him and the others to stay with Harper.

"Excuse me?"

Dylan paused on hearing the voice, and glanced at Beka seeing her immediate reaction.

"Send that freak away, Dylan," Beka warned in a low voice. "She's the crazy old bag that used Harper like some medical experiment," she added, recognising the old lady's voice coming from the next room.

"It's Killah here, I have something, I hear the young man is poorly again," she continued and Dylan intercepted her at the door, before she could move inside to see for herself.

"Please leave," Dylan instructed.

"You shouldn't have come here, Killah," Zal warned, stepping past Dylan and moving Killah away.

"I have this, it will help; he does have severe hypothermia, right?" Killah checked trying to give Zal a small bag, looking at the Edenian's clueless expression before turning to Dylan. "Right?"

"We think so, and we're doing all we can to help him," Dylan stressed. "So please leave."

"This contains what he needs to bring up his core heat," Killah explained with care, producing a small canister and then a face mask. "Make sure he inhales as much of this as he can, the results will be immediate, this is proven stuff," Killah explained and gave the equipment to Dylan, before the captain could object, and then she turned and left, but before leaving she turned once more to Zal and Dylan. "I told Harper I would help him, so make sure he inhales that."

Dylan looked at the canister and mask in his hands, and then to Zal. "Can we trust her?"

"She works with Buz," Zal shrugged.

"Buz doesn't want Harper dead, right?" Dylan considered and looked at the equipment again, torn as to what to do.

"Not as far as I know, and if he did, Harper would be dead already," Zal offered.

"Who says he isn't? It could just be a matter of time," Dylan frowned.

"Then what have you got to lose?" Zal suggested, and gestured to what Killah had given Dylan.

"Beka won't agree to this," Dylan then took a deep breath. "But this isn't her life we're talking about."

"Harper needs something, and well, we have nothing else to give him," Zal reasoned and Dylan had to agree.

Both men moved back into the room where Rhade and Beka still embraced Harper. Dylan stopped and showed the equipment to Rhade, and Beka.

"Inhalation treatment? That is what I think it is, right?" Rhade seemed to brighten immediately.

"Did she give you that?" Beka checked, not sharing Rhade's enthusiasm.

"Beka," Dylan began but Zal moved forward.

"Beka, I know Killah is a mad old cow, but answer me this, when she put that chip into Harper's back did he get sick from that procedure, did the wound get infected?" Zal asked.

"No," Beka offered and seemed confused.

"No, he didn't, which suggests that maybe, just maybe, the old bad might know what she's doing it's just the company she keeps that unsettles us," Zal stated convincingly. "I know she's mad, and she's called Killah, which is unfortunate for someone interested in medicine, but we have to take this chance because you're special little guy isn't winning this fight just yet," he gestured to Harper, who remained unconscious in Beka's arms.

"Zal's right," Rhade simply said, as Dylan moved down to them and put the equipment next to the bundle of blankets that covered Harper.

"Ok," Beka agreed reluctantly, and immediately Rhade moved and gently placed Harper back onto his back, as Beka took a blanket and wrapped it around herself.

Rhade was quick to set up the gear and soon had the mask placed over Harper's nose and mouth, and he activated the canister that began filling the mask with a substance.

"What is that stuff?" Beka asked.

"If it's what I think it is, and I have no reason to doubt it is, it's a kind of heat medicine that Harper inhales," Rhade offered with care. "The vapour has warming qualities that will go straight to his core and effectively warm the vital organs up and in turn should warm the rest of him up as well," Rhade explained. "We often carried similar items in field packs."

"I swear, this has gone too far, next time I see Buz his head is mine, he won't know what's hit him," Beka seethed as she retrieved her top. "I've seen Harper through a hell of a lot of scrapes but never this bad, this complicated and this sick," she continued. "Hell, even the Magog knew when to stop!"

Dylan took a moment before responding. "Those eggs nearly killed him too, Beka."

"I know!" Beka snapped and then composed herself, as Zal sat next to her and took her hand into his, a simple gesture that seemed to have the right response. "But the Magog played fair, and tried to kill us all, they didn't just single one of us out and played this sick game of cat and mouse, I can't take this anymore," she stressed. "Buz, this other faction, Kenan, no more, no more taking the Harper, no more," Beka said with gritted determination. "They either take all of us, or none of us!"

"Agreed," Rhade supported with determination. "We stay together; we have to start fighting back and if it kills us, better all of us than just one."

Dylan slowly began nodding his head. "Sounds like a plan."

"I'm in," Zal offered brightly, and saw the stares he received. "What? I'm in, remember? You guys are the best thing that's ever happened to me, I'm not letting go," he smirked.

"He's inhaled it all," Rhade then observed, as he removed the mask from Harper and quickly wrapped the human up in blankets to preserve the heat that was now contained within Harper's body. "Let's hope its enough, and in time."

They all settled down around Harper, keeping an eye on him, with a new togetherness and determination. As the night skies outside became lighter, and the sun slowly began to rise, bringing fresh light into the room with a brand new day.

TBC