AN: I just wanted to say thanks for the really nice comments that I got on the last part. That really made me smile. The story is starting to come to an end, but that being said there are probably about 6 more chapters to go at least. :-)
"Who is presenting?" Izzie asked looking up from the patient chart and at the three interns who'd been assigned to work with her for the week. It was a routine question, she always asked but she didn't usually need the answer, she usually knew what was going to be said. She didn't this time, she didn't know who the woman was, she didn't know where she'd come from.
"Blaire Vokes," one of the interns began. "Twenty six weeks pregnant, sustained serious chest and leg trauma in an MVA twenty four weeks ago. She was placed in a drug induced coma for eight weeks and now is in an induced minimally conscious state. She was transferred here last night from the ICU, for closer monitoring of the pregnancy."
"Okay," Izzie nodded, staring down at the chart, she had no idea if what they'd said was right, she couldn't read the words in front of her, her vision was starting to go blurry, it was being punctuated by flashes of bright light and an incessant pounding inside her head. "Arh!" A half moan half scream slipped from her mouth and she raised her hands to her head. She dropped the chart and cried out again just as her patient started to moan.
"It's okay Bell," she heard the husband say, "I'm right here." For the briefest of moments she thought it was Alex talking to her and then she passed out.
-8-8-8-8-8-
"Iz, Izzie," She heard someone say as they wrapped a hand around her shoulder and gently shook her. She opened her eyes and blinked, she couldn't work out who was sitting beside her, who the voice belonged to, all she could see was past them, there was a figure standing behind them and it looked like Alex.
"Alex," She letting his name slip off her tongue and she tried to sit up. The movement hurt, her whole body ached and her head started spinning. She closed her eyes and lay back down.
"Dr. Stevens don't move too much." She heard the voice say again, a woman's voice. She opened her eyes again and this time she could see the person beside her, it was Addison.
"What happened?" she asked not sitting up this time, she lay on her back but she didn't look at her she kept looking past her and into the space Alex had been in.
"You fainted." Addison told her before asking, "Have you been looking after yourself?"
"I thought so." She really did think she'd been looking after herself, until today she had been feeling really good, she'd been eating well, putting on weight, and sleeping, she'd probably been sleeping a bit too much, her dreams about Alex were becoming more vivid, sometimes she didn't want to pull herself out of bed but she always did. "I don't know what happened. Is my baby okay?"
"You're baby is fine," Addison smiled at her. "How do you feel?"
She tried to push herself up again but stopped when she'd raised herself only a few inches. "My body aches," She said feeling a strange pain run through her. "Are you sure he's okay?"
"You're baby? He's fine." Addison smiled at her. "I'm going to leave you to lay down for a bit, page me if you need something."
"Thanks," She watched Addison walk out the room and she closed her eyes again. She wasn't sure what was wrong with her, she felt strange and she wasn't sure why. She started concentrating on her breathing, she took long deep breaths, and as she was breathing out she felt someone move in the room, she heard someone's footsteps, then felt a hand brush across her face and a tingly feeling ran through her body. "Who's there?" She asked and her eyes flew open. There was no one there though, she was alone. She closed her eyes again and she felt the tingle run through her body again. "Alex," this time she kept her eyes closed, she didn't open them. "Alex are you there?" Logic told her it wasn't him but she couldn't shake the feelings running through her body. She kept her eyes closed and she inhaled deeply, she could smell him, his scent was sitting in the air. "Alex," She let his name roll off her tongue and she just lay there too afraid to move, scared that if she did she might lose him, and soon she drifted off to sleep.
-8-8-8-8-8-
Her dream wasn't pleasant though for the longest time everything was just black and then she seemed to wake up screaming. Everything stopped being black and started being bright white, so bright she couldn't see anything but she could hear things, there were things moving around her and then she felt them grab hold of her. These things which she wasn't quite sure were people, they looked like white blobs grabbed hold of her. They wrapped their hands around her arms, around her legs and they started pulling.
It hurt, she felt like she was being tortured, she tried to pull away, she wanted to pull away but she had no control over her body, she couldn't move. She just lay there as these things pulled at her; all she could do was breath, and then somewhere through all of it she could hear Alex. His voice pushed through telling her it was okay, that she was okay. She wasn't okay though, nothing about it was okay and she wanted to scream that but she couldn't.
Eventually the torture stopped and the blackness returned, she didn't normally like the blackness but it was better than the pain, not even Alex's voice trying to clam her had made that bearable. When she finally woke up it was hours later, there were footsteps moving around the room and when she opened her eyes she saw Meredith sitting in a chair watching her.
"Hi," she smiled as she slowly rolled onto her side. The dizziness and the aches still hadn't gone but they weren't as bad, she could tolerate them. "How long have you been sitting there?"
"Not that long." Meredith stood up and walked over to the bed. "I heard you'd fainted, I wanted to make sure you were alright."
"Oh," She pushed herself up in the bed and lent against the wall. "I think I'm okay. I don't know what happened, I was fine and then I wasn't." She didn't want to tell Meredith about everything, about the strange feeling she had right before she passed out, or about the dreams she'd just had, she didn't want to listen to her try and explain it, she got enough of that from her counselor.
"Are you feeling okay now?"
"Yeah," She ran a hand through her hair and slid forward to the edge of the bed. "I can't believe I fainted in front of a patient, I feel so stupid."
"Your patient is in a coma, I don't think she noticed." Meredith smiled at her.
"It's not a coma," She was remembering what the interns had said, the moan her patient had emitted in the seconds before she collapsed. "She knows what's going, and her husband was there." She rested her head in her hands and started shaking it, she hated that she'd done that, that it has happened to her.
"Iz it's okay." She felt Meredith reach over and take her hand. "These things happen."
"But they're not supposed to." She stood up and lent against the wall. She waited for the lightheaded feeling to pass and then she walked to the door. "I need to check on my patient."
She walked down the corridor towards her patient's room but she stopped short of actually going inside. She could see through the window what was going on, the husband was leaning over the woman and gently massaging the side of her head. She couldn't tell if the woman was awake or not, if her eyes were open but it didn't really matter, she didn't want to disturb them. As she stared at them a tear ran down her cheek, there was something painfully beautiful about what she was seeing.
"Iz," She heard Meredith's voice come up beside her and then she felt her hand rest against her shoulder. "Dr. Montgomery asked me to take you home when you woke up. She wants you to take the rest of the day off."
"Oh, okay." It didn't really surprise her that she was being sent home, she was always getting sent home when it looked like she might not be coping. "I have to get my things from my locker." She said and she slowly pulled herself away from the scene, there was no point arguing, if this was anything like last time her patients had already been reassigned and there would be nothing for her to do if she stayed.