I'm sorry, but I feel like I should give myself a freaking award for how fast my brain works. I just now sent my partner the last chapter then thought of this, though this won't be posted nearly as fast. Oh well, you guys are taking what I give you.

Read on, lovelies.

October 18th 2013

Chase's Pov

The house was quiet. Only, not really. Adam and Leo were upstairs, playing their umpteenth round of some new superhero game. I was invited to play and usually would have accepted, but I needed some thinking space.

But I didn't want to stay away from everyone either. That was why I found myself sitting next to Bree's still form still attached to many never-ending wires on the table, while I just held her hand. What more was there to do when she was hardly even there? Davenport said she could be, depending on how deep and what kind of limbo her state of mind was in, but I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure about anything anymore.

"You really need to wake up." I continued to hold her hand as I talked to her, not bothering to go into extreme detail over the events happening in advance. But if there was a chance she could hear me, Bree deserved to know there was suspect to why she was like this. But I was doubtful.

Although, I wasn't sad—not really. Being sad about something like this was a waste of time. Sooner or later, Bree would wake up, no matter what someone said. Though, I doubted it would be as soon as I would've liked. Who was going to help with Christine when my "love counselor" (as she had resorted to calling herself over the last four or five months) was stuck in a limbo of some unknown nature.

The entire world, that I once thought had been ahead of me, was now completely upside down.

Davenport cancelled the last two training sessions but assured that the next one was definite. Maybe it was best that way, I couldn't handle seeing Christine so soon after our most recent…deadlock, I guess. It wasn't really a fight—a fight was something full of yelling and screaming and anger. Our words were just defeated and hurt. Nothing like a fight.

And what was worse was that it meant two of my closest girl friends were out of the picture; what advice could my comatose sister offer me, and how well would my girlfriend act around me when we're falling apart at the hands of some cocky athlete trying to make a move on her?

I sighed, running my free hand through my hair and giving hers a squeeze (more for my comfort than hers) before dropping her hand and getting up from my seat.

Davenport had taken away most of the monitors hooked to the lines running up and down, in and out of Bree's body, but left some, like the heart monitor. Why he had one just lying around when there was a perfectly fine, updated one on his cyber net, I would never know.

I tapped away at his computer, looking at the files and charts he'd created when she fell ill. They hadn't changed since the last time he looked at them—a little over a half hour ago.

The ratings could almost be considered eccentric from how they jumped up and down all over the graph. Apparently her levels of moment were more improved at night, for reasons unknown. Over the last couple of days her twitching and tiny jumps had gotten more recent and noticeable. That was a type of improvement we had to cling to.

"Hey, Chase," Davenport said, walking into the room. I knew he was trying to hide it, but his tone was guarded. Everyone was like that around me lately. I couldn't blame them either; I'd probably act the same way if thrown into the same situation. "How're you doing?"

"Exhausted," I replied. I still looked at the screen, clicking on the chart dating back to a week ago. The lines that graphed her progress were stubs then, and they weren't much taller now. The realization deflated and crushed any hope of a decent day that I had. "Nothing's changed, except she moved a couple times this morning before I left for school. Talking doesn't help much." And makes me feel even worse, I added on silently, keeping it to myself.

"Well, usually comatose patients don't show any signs of movements until weeks put under—sometimes even months. The fact that she is showing progressing signs earlier is likely to her chip interfering with her strength and health levels. Or she could just be one of the lucky ones." Davenport looked to Bree breathing tiny, slow breaths at a time and then to the chart. "Let's just hope luck remains on our side for the time being."

I leaned back in my chair in front of his computer. I liked to believe it was a little bit of both—it was lucky that her chip was pulling her through this more quickly. But the thing I didn't like was him referring to her as a patient. She was Bree, trying to recover in the place where'd we had grown up together. That didn't make her a patient, only holding a remote similarity to one.

"There's one thing I don't understand, though," I admitted slowly. I thought to the question I'd been pondering since I saw the stress levels that had involved Tina in some way. "What other enemy did you have except Allan Grant?"

Davenport seemed reluctant to answer. "Being a successful scientist with everything can be tricky," he explained, "especially when there's more than one scientist besides you with a load of money. Jealousy and envy can turn people into ugly things, especially when they have an advanced, human level of intelligent with crazy, possible ideas. It's hard to tell who will do anything in their rage of jealousy, plus the fact their strangers."

"Or when their revenge is enough to turn their jealousy into something so bad you can't recognize it at all," I muttered quietly, swinging my chair to look at Bree.

Had my sister fallen to the hands of one raging jealous stranger that envied Davenport's success?

October 19th 2013

No One's Pov

Christine had two hours to get ready for her hangout-slash-mini play practice with Callan. She was ready in ten minutes. Seven, even. It wasn't that hard. To help ease her troubled thoughts on the whole whatever with Chase (because fight totally wasn't it), she pretended that Callan was someone like Janelle or Leo and she was just going out with him to get something from a place as plain as a drugstore. So, she slapped on a red tank top, some black skinny jeans and matching combat boots, and threw on her leather jacket. And just for kicks, she stuck some chap stick in her pocket and made her hair into a messy bun. Because after all, it totally wasn't like this was Chase. It was Callan, what she wore around him didn't matter.

To blow time she spent it texting Rachel.

Is she doing any better?

Not much. Adam says there's been a bunch of twitching.

Almost like an afterthought, Rachel shot another text her way.

Chase won't leave her side. He's starting to worry people.

Christine's shoulders slumped. That was not what she wanted to hear. But she could understand where he was coming from. He was the most intelligent being in the world and couldn't wake up his sister; that had to be harder to deal with than she could imagine.

And she had begun to worry about how this would all affect his mysterious mood swings that had already been far past irregular before.

The alarm Christine had set on her phone went off. She hurried up from her seat and called out a good-bye to Rem, promising to make it home by dinner. Rem made some offhanded sounding comment about not worrying about it. Christine was only able to hear that as she slipped out the door.

The walk to Callan's house was peaceful, which helped ease her thoughts a little more. She pushed away the boyfriend/arch enemy/best friend/ life or death/play drama for now, instead focusing on the watching the sky and seeing the black arches of birds as they flew across the powdery blue day sky. It was abnormally quiet for a usual Saturday afternoon, but many people must've had the weekend off.

The Eastwood residence was a fancy one. It was semi-Victorian with a modern touch and a few personal splashes like the Halloween flags whipping outside in the fall California breeze. It had to be at least two stories with a basement and small, triangle attics like in the movies Christine figured, walking up the stoned pathway. A cold chill tickled the skin of her spine; the entire thing felt like a beginning to one of those horrible PG-13 horror movies no one found scary.

Christine shook off her nerves and reasoned with herself she was just nervous about meeting his parents for the first time since she's known him—assuming they were home anyhow. She rang the doorbell and patiently waited, taking in how pretty their wrap around porch was with a tiny tint of envy. It truly was a beautiful house.

A petite blonde lady, shorter than Callan, answered the door. She wore a cashmere sweater and a lovely string of black diamond around her neck and wrists. Christine resisted the urge to raise an eyebrow. She never understood why people enjoyed flaunting their wealth when meeting new people.

The woman reached and vigorously shook her hand. "Ah, you must be Christine. Come in, come in." Christine could barely choke out a greeting in return as she practically fell into the house. Wow, the lady had a strong grip.

"I'm Callan's mom, but you can call me Mrs. Eastwood. Our maid Ana can and will take care of any and all your needs for your visit. Would you like some tea or maybe a lemon square?"

Christine hated lemon squares. "No, I'm quite alright. Thank you though," she added a bit hastily at the end, not wanting to come off rude and make the situation anymore awkward and one-sided than it already was coming off to be. Where was Callan?'

"Mom, I'm sure the last thing Christine wants is you pestering her with your horrible lemon squares." Wow, that boy always had the ability for uncanny timing, didn't he?

Callan himself took the stairs two at a time, sliding into the foyer with an annoyed look planted on his face, directed to his mother. "I can handle it from here mother."

"Nice meeting you!" Christine called to Mrs. Eastwood's retreating figure once she began to leave the room, muttering about how the manners had slipped the current male population of the generation.

Well, Christine thought, better her mad at her son than at her, who hadn't even been there for five minutes.

"So, should we get started?" She turned and smiled, digging into her messenger bag to dig out her handy script.

Callan beamed at her, holding his arms out in a mocking bow. "Right this way, Milady." He led her in the direction of the den. It, fitting with the rest of the house, was beautiful and cozy with antique figures of glass animals, leather bound books, and delicate china glaze vases holding matching plum colored flowers.

Why couldn't all houses be this stuck in time? In her opinion, it would make some places much prettier.

But other places are perfect the way they are, and you know it, a tiny little voice teased in the back of her head, her mind instantly jumping to Bree in that gorgeous, technology depending house. How one of her best friends laid there while Christine wasted her time with a cute (in a certain light) athlete who seemed intensely focused on her knees.

"You okay? Need anything—glass of water, maybe?" Callan seemed to notice her dazed look as her eyes glazed over. She felt guilty for being a rude guest, but she couldn't help but think of how badly she didn't want to be there, even with the pretty plum flowers and swirly dark Persian rugs. But a glass of water actually sounded great. Sipping on it would give her something to focus on.

"Actually, that sounds great. Thank you." Besides, a glass of water was much more appetizing than lemon squares.

Christine watched as Callan got up from the couch as maneuvered his way to the kitchen, and claimed her own seat. For a brief moment she considered texting Chase—just to check up on him—but no, bugging him would only irritate him more, and that would lead to nothing good.

"Here you go." The brunette jumped, but quickly recovered, smiling in thanks as she took the glass from Callan's outstretched fingers. It must've been lemon water, or flavored berry of some kind, she mused, watching the slight white lucid swirls twirl around with the water. Christine took a tentative sip. The aftertaste wasn't as bad (or good, really) as she had thought, but it wasn't quite typical flavored water either.

As the two began their scenes, respectively starting in different points of the room for clarity and character, Christine smiled and managed through her lines, taking whenever Callan looked down to his script to wince at the sudden, erratic throb that hit between her eyes like a mallet.

How the sudden the pounding started, she had not a single clue.

Christine took the chance one a five minute break to down her water, hoping it would help clear her head. The aftertaste was still just as bad as the first time, but she shrugged it off and flipped through her script.

"Hey, Chris, you feeling okay?" The brunette looked up quickly, regretting it once the thump thump thump got worse. "You're looking a little clammy."

Was she? The last thing she felt was hot—if anything, she couldn't be any more cold.

"I'm fine," Christine tried to wave away his efforts of helping her take a (slow) seat on the couch. "I just need a little break."

The last thing she heard was Callan hurrying away to get her another cold glass of water and an aspirin before she fell unconscious.

Callan grinned manically as he entered the room, half a glass of water in hand; he knew she wouldn't need it anyway. Not after the affects took place.

Wow, Tina wasn't kidding when she said the side effects were fast working ones.

Okay, so a part of him did feel bad for having to drug a girl to like him, but this was what was best. He really only kept everyone's best interest in mind—he got a little privacy with a hot girl, her boyfriend never finds out, and everyone remained in their diluted happy fairytale. It was the perfect, on the spot plan, really.

"Oh, Christine," he said aloud, mostly to himself as the girl groaned and shifted in her spot on the couch. "What a mess you've stumbled into, isn't it?"

Easily, he lifted her partly conscious body and shoved it against the wall, he had no regrets for his actions as he set them in motion.

He smashed his lips against her.

"Kids!" Mrs. Eastwood called out, keys jangling as she walked closer to the door. Callan uttered a colorful curse under his breath as he responded back, "Yeah, Mom?'

"I'm leaving for an appoinment. Ana's coming with me to drive me back. Will you be all right on your own?"

"Yeah, perfectly fine!"

"Chiao, then. I'll be back in an hour or two."

Callan waited to hear the door slam close and the engine start up and fade down the street before turning to the loopy girl staring cross-eyed into the distance over his shoulder.

Yes, it was pathetic for a popular athlete like himself to be resorted to hooking up with a drugged corpse, but he was Callan Eastwood, and Eastwoods always got what they wanted.

Even if other people didn't know it.

By the time Callan was finished with his dirty deeds, he could hardly handle putting back together the picture everyone thought was there.

Christine was...difficult, to say it in a brief light. Once she got past her random bursts of contast giggles and near puking acccidents, she was the easiest girl ever. She was loud and drunken and hazy and had no clue what bumped and grinded and moaned against her.

It was pretty pathetic that he was doing her when she wouldn't remember, but beggers couldn't be choosers.

Callan was able to haul Christine into the back seat of his car, her clothes crooked and hair mused a little. But, if not looked into with a careful eye, she could pass as any other tired teen that had stayed up late and fallen asleep.

That was his exact story. When Allan Grant answered the door to the sight of his daughter in the arms of a boy who was not her boyfriend, he got a little skeptical about his reasons of being with her.

"Don't worry, Mr. Grant." Callan threw the man his best charming smile. "We were busy with rehearsing our lines and Chris just fell asleep. Where do you want to have her sleep?"

Allan directed him reluctantly up to his daughter's room, opening the door himself and setting the sleeping girl on top of her sheets. Callan merrily waved and called for the mn to have a nice evening as he pulled his car out of the driveway.

Sometimes, things were just too easy.

It was almost laughable.

October 21st 2013

Chase's Pov

Bree opened her eyes.

Once. And stared straight into mine.

I broke down the moment they closed again, the moment of recovery slipping away faster than I could run after it. Bree had been so close. I could remember the emotion, the feeling, that had looked right through me for that one second. All the pain and weakness and suffering and fragile behavior in her was thrown at me, making me lasp into a continous fit of sobs.

Davenport and the others tried to cheers up with the positives that I'd already acknoweleged. "The fact that she had even opened her eyes for a second is a miracle," he'd said. "If it happens again, more signs of the leaving illness and decreasing stress and fear rates could bring many more uplifting signs of normal activity."

But I couldn't let my train of thought focus on that, not when I cried over my sister's bod in hopes somthing idiotic and magical would happen.

Because I was stupid enough to believe in something like that happening.

Play practice dragged on as bitterly as it always had been nowadays. Today Alissa had the understudies practice with who their partners in most scenes would be. Tina and Callan dragged themselves off into a corner to begin furious whispering and hand gestures. christine met me near the center of the stage.

"I heard Bree's been making progress," she approached cautiously, acting weary as if I would strike out. "That's good, isn't it?"

"Not enough progress," I muttered sourly in dismay. Why couldn't anyone see—even my own girlfriend, the love of my life—see that not every good sign was really good, only false.

Christine dropped the subject from there. We focused on the beginning and end mostly, agreeing that the middle was too overworked (except for the kissing scene, which we did a few times.) The fight-slash-whatever the hell you want to refer to it as was dropped, treaded carefully around to help make up for some of the already there awkward tension.

Near the end of pratice was hell. Plain and simple.

"Hey, Hottie." Tina smirked at me, clearly watching Christine out of the corner of her eye like I wouldn't notice. Or maybe she wanted me to notice. I didn't know anymore. "Maybe we could meet up again this weekend?"

I narrowed my eyes at her dangerously. Her games were not catching my amusement. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Tina rolled eyes, running a hand over my chest like we shared a secret that threatened to burst through the seams at any moment. In sheer disgust, I smacked her fake nails away from me and took several steps away. Like that did anything. "Oh, come on Chase," she purred, batting herself at me. "Don't pretend like you didn't enjoy it."

"Get lost, Diva bitch, this is not your business." Christine was behind me. She'd heard everything like I thought she would. And of course took it the wrong way, resluting in what would be another hidious blow up. So much for a romantic year.

"What the hell is she talking about?" my girlfriend snapped as soon as Barbie Walters trotted away in her neck breaking heels. "Did you really have to prove a point when I hung out with Callan this weekend?"

The stage had been quiet, straining to listen in on the break out while still trying to appear normal. They were horrible at it. Somewhere to my right I heard a gasp—probably Gemma or Damon, watching the scene unfold.

"Prove a point?" I raised my voice without meaning to, but I couldn't help. What point did I have to prove when I was a damned mess? "My entire weekend resolved around Bree and her only. She is practically on her deathbed and you think that I would just throw a night away with some whore? I can't say the same for you."

Christine's nostrils started to flare. "Callan and I were practicing—"

"So that's what people call it these days? Practicing? Yeah, real classy, Chris."

She let out a mean growl to go along with her stony look. "At least I'm not using some poor, sick girl as an excuse for sneaking around with a slut!"

That tore it. All the self-restraint that had meekly held me together broke and suddenly I was nothing.

"Really? Really, Chris, you want to go there with me? Do you know how many hours I spent pouring over every damn medical book my family owns to see what happened to my sister? Do you know how many times I cried myself to sleep and you weren't there to tell me everything would be fine even when we both knew it wouldn't be? I've waited around so many damn times for you to help me with this and what do you do? You only visit Bree once or twice and go goofing off with some jerk of an athlete while I'm left a mess, stuck in hell." I stepped closer, daring her challenge a single word I said. "Because really, I don't think you do."

Christine glared at me long and hard, a scowl set my way that I deflected.

"Call me when you're not such a freaking bastard anymore."

Then she walked away.

Sorry that I couldn't go into deep detail on what Callan did to Christine, but I'm on a writing limit, people and this story is staying T rated.