Z26

Karai

They rush her straight into surgery. I admit I'm relieved when they find a pulse, part of me thought I'd wheeled in a sister with no life in her to save. I sit in the waiting room watching other families gather together, a leader of each lot periodically going to the counter to check in, get a status update. I feel a sense of helplessness, tethered to loneliness. How badly our family wants to be in here right now, and can't. The sense of weariness that creeps into each of us from time to time settles over me, like a sheet of ice bound to my flesh and I want to shrug it off. Every now and then I glance at the clock, watching the hours slip by, knowing Raph's perched on a rooftop nearby and won't leave until he knows something, and each brother will take a shift with him. The weather forecast pops up and I see the storms coming, knowing they won't change his position, wherever it is that he's posted up, and I hurt for him. If this was Leo…

"Miss Hamato, is it?"

I start, tearing my unfocused gaze from the news reel, numbly glancing up at the doctor in scrubs standing over me. They're remarkably clean, hospital green scrubs, and I wonder if he didn't change them before coming out to speak to me.

"Just tell me she'll live." I hear myself say, while my muscles draw tense and my heart clenches, bracing for the verdict.

"I'm Dr. Jennings, and she will, but," he makes a face, looks confused, "her heart is on the opposite side of her chest from the uh- horn that was imbedded in her sternum. It's rare for the heart to be as far off to one side as hers, but it happens. It saved her life actually. How did you say this happened?"

"She got in a fight with a bull." I shrug, feeling a strange sense of foreboding, even though what he's telling me seems like good news. "Is there, something wrong doctor?"

"The head wound, that's what I'm concerned about. She shows brain activity now, but we'll have to wait and see."

My stomach turns, "See what?"

"If she remembers who she is." He puts a placating hand on my shoulder and I want to swipe it away, to scream and yell at him about all that our family has endured, about the kids she has that need their mother. But I don't, I need this man to answer questions.

"Is she awake yet?"

Dr. Jennings shakes his head, "No, it may be a while. It's just wait and see for now. She's been in recovery for the past hour, we're admitting her. A nurse will be out shortly when they move her to a room. I'm very sorry."

He's very sorry. I have to tell Raph there's a chance Zoe may not remember who she is? In this family that's a disaster. I rub my hands over my face, pull out my phone, change my mind then change it again. Okay, I'll tell everyone she's going to live but there may be complications and I'll get back to them as soon as I find out what those are. Then when she wakes up, once I know, I'll deal with what to do next. Besides I need to talk to April and check on Midori, and I want to know how Noah is doing. Yes, that's what I'm going to do.

XXX

I keep opening the blinds to let the light in, but the damn nurse keeps coming through and shutting them whenever I leave to get something to eat. It's been a week, and she still hasn't woken.

There's been a lot going on within our family, shifting and adjusting to manage our newfound situation. When I told April the whole truth, she insisted I tell everyone so we could prepare, and it was difficult, but the right thing to do. April sent her cousins home, packed up the kids and Splinter and brought everyone to the lair. Then she located an apartment for three of us girls, and the boys went to work setting it up. Exodus volunteered to live at the lair and play Mommy to the male children. It was Donnie and Leo who pulled together the plan.

Raph was busy trying to explain to Anton, on his level, that his Mommy had an accident and was in the hospital trying to get better. At the same time he was trying to juggle five kids and cope with his own loss. He and Zoe haven't been apart this long without at least a conversation, since they met. She's always been his counter, his balance, and he's lost without her. This Raphael is worse than angry, bitter Raph, or brooding over the troubles in my life Raph; this Raph, pines, staring off into space, swings and misses, goes through the fatherly motions, but his mind, his heart, they're with the woman hanging on by an invisible thread in the bed next to me.

"While familiar surroundings would better help her remember who she is, we can't be separated and the house and lair are just too far apart; we can't just shock her with us outright. There's no telling how much of her life she will remember and how she'll react. Andrea is our best bet at helping her remember the kids, and hopefully, us. We'll set up an apartment and you, April, and Zoe will stay there with Midori, Andrea and Rachel. The rest of us will stay at the lair and take it one day at a time."

April interrupts my thoughts as she steps in the small square room, holding a carrier containing three steaming cups of coffee. I'm surprised when Exodus pops her head in after her. She scarcely leaves Noah, she's so enamored with the now vibrant baby.

April smiles, as only she can but the circles under her eyes give her away. "Morning Karai, why's it so dark in here?" She sets the coffee on a side table and crosses the room to open the blinds, "Zoe loves the light, it's good for her. Besides come night fall…"

"I know. Damn nurse, she keeps closing them." I pry a cup from the holder, go to hand it to X and see her standing over Zoe, soaking in the mess before her. There's wires everywhere, monitoring her brain activity, a tube draining fluid off the wound sight, iv fluids, a heart monitor, and who knows what else. All of those wires seem to make her look even smaller than what she is, and that's pretty tiny to begin with. Damn Mighty Mouse of a woman, I know why Raph loves her, all spitfire and fight. There's a pang in my chest, it tears him up to see her like this. There are stitches along her hair, and they'd shaved around the injury on the side of her head. She'll be able to cover it with the long hair they've been kind enough to leave, but it will be a while before it grows out. The gash itself is seven inches long, although not wide, unfortunately deep. I don't know what it was she hit it on, something when Teppo was swinging her around like a ragdoll most likely. She's bruised and scraped up everywhere but that won't bother her. She jacked up her ankle again for the tenth time since I've known her, this time though they've done surgery to repair it, so there's a big fat cast that will surely piss her off. Exodus reaches out a fair skinned hand and strokes Zoe's hair then kisses her forehead and I feel the coffee cup slip from my parting fingers when Zoe moans.