AN: It lives! Updates will continue to be slow, but I promise I haven't abandoned the story!
/Memo
Protective Marking: Confidential
Clearance: Security Check
To: Jack Simon, Junior Agent in the Field
From: Decade. Chief of London operations, Secret Intelligence Service, Counter-terrorism Section.
Date: June 26, 1998
Subject: Instructions
The suspect, viz. Ms. Coleman, is to remain under 24h surveillance until such time as her recovery, whereupon we will proceed with criminal charges. A formal review of your handling of this case will be scheduled following her debriefing./
Once again, Brigid opened her eyes to find herself lying in a hospital bed. The fluorescent lights above her did nothing to help her pounding head. Her entire body ached, but her head was definitely the worst; she started to raise a hand to press to her throbbing temple, only to feel a sharp tug on her wrist. She glanced over to the side of the bed - in addition to an i.v. line, her arm was cuffed to the bed rail.
A polite cough sounded on her other side. Brigid turned her head to see Jack Simon sitting in a chair beside her, looking stern. There were dark circles under his eyes; idly she wondered how long he had been there.
"What is this for?" she asked, her voice raw and hoarse.
Simon crossed one leg over the other and carefully smoothed down the crease in his pressed white trousers before answering. "I should think that would be self-explanatory. You are under arrest."
"For what? I held up my end of the deal."
The corners of his mouth turned down slightly. "Your end of the deal was to ensure that the bomb didn't go off. Fifty-eight people were killed, and even more injured."
Brigid would have shrugged if she hadn't been so exhausted. "The detonation was unavoidable. But that doesn't change the fact that I did what you asked and led you straight to Dillon."
A strange look crossed Simon's face - pity, perhaps, or grief - and he pursed his lips. "I'm sorry to have to inform you, but you suffered a rather severe concussion, and you probably don't recall…"
She waited; eventually he cleared his throat and continued, "Something set off an explosion in your flat while you were outside. We're still investigating the cause, but…no one survived. The remains of at least three people have been found; though as of yet we haven't been able to positively identify them, we are reasonably sure that Fitzgerald and Drury must have been there." He started to reach out as if to pat her hand, but cut the movement off. "I am sorry for your loss."
"Oh, that - I remember." Then a new thought occurred to her. "That won't be a problem, will it? I know you can't convict Dillon if he's dead, but now you don't even have to worry about a trial. He's out of your hair and I still get my amnesty."
Simon stared hard at her. "Are you…confirming that Fitzgerald was in the flat?" he asked slowly, as if Brigid hadn't been speaking perfectly plain English.
"Yes. Dillon, James, Eddie, and Kelly. They were arguing and kicked up a mess of gunpowder. Eddie fired his revolver and set the whole thing off."
"Who's Kel - wait." Simon's brow wrinkled. "You were outside at the time, so how do you know exactly what happened?"
"I was inside." Her stomach rumbled; she vaguely remembered eating an apple earlier, but she had no idea how long ago that had been. She ran her eyes over the buttons on the panel beside her bed.
"Inside? Then how did you get out before the fire?"
"I walked." There was a big red button that said call nurse. Brigid pressed it.
"You walked," Simon said flatly. "Faster than an explosion." Then he sighed and reached into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a small black package and offered it to her. "You'll have to hide this from the nurses, but I imagine you'll be needing it."
Brigid glanced at it - a pack of cigarettes. She recognized it as the brand that she had used to smoke, but made no move to take it. "Why?"
"There's no shame in needing a crutch to get through difficult times. Just do use them sparingly, and not while I'm in the vicinity."
"Keep them. Those things are terrible for your health." God only knew how much damage she'd already done to her lungs. She remembered constantly craving a cigarette, and somewhere in the back of her mind her body was telling that yes, it really could use one; but it was easy to ignore. Her wellness was more important.
Simon waited a long moment, eyes narrowed suspiciously. Then he shook his head and replaced the pack in his pocket. "You've been through a serious trauma; maybe it's best if we continue this conversation when you've had a chance to rest and process everything."
Brigid looked up sharply, then immediately regretted it as pain shot through her neck. "You're not leaving until we get this settled." She jiggled the handcuffs. "We had a deal; I did everything that MI-6 asked."
"I'm afraid my superiors don't see it that way. You -" Simon cut off abruptly when the door opened to admit an older man in crisp blue scrubs.
"Mrs. Drury," the man said somberly, coming over to lift a chart from the foot of her bed. "It's good to see you awake at last. I'm Dr. Ramon; I've been treating you since you were admitted two days ago. How are you feeling?"
"Hungry."
The doctor gave her a placating smile. "Let me take a look at you, then we can see about dinner. Sir," he said, turning to Simon, "would you mind stepping out of the room while I examine my patient?"
"SIS is going to request her medical files anyway," Simon said, looking uncomfortable. "It would be simplest if I were to stay and hear her condition firsthand."
"I am more than willing to comply with government, but the wellbeing of my patient is my primary charge. For modesty's sake -"
"I don't care," Brigid interrupted, impatient at the delay. "He can stay."
The doctor gave her a concerned look, then glanced at Simon. The other man sighed, and politely turned his back to gaze blankly at the opposite wall.
The examination was long, and thorough. In addition to her vital signs, Dr. Ramon checked and explained each of Brigid's cuts and contusions - as if she hadn't been able to feel them all herself. There were some tender, light burns on her chest and stomach. Her back and head were especially bruised; apparently the force of the explosion had flung her against Simon's car when it had screeched to a halt in front of the pub. She thought she saw his shoulders stiffen when the doctor explained the cause.
"You hit your head pretty hard," the doctor said, "and there was some mild swelling. The scans mostly look good, but I'm going to call our neurologist, Dr. Cajal, to run a complete neurological exam later today. Just to be sure that there isn't something we missed. For now, I'll ask you some basic questions. Can you tell me your name?"
Brigid hesitated for a moment, then went with the name that was on her ID; that was what the hospital would have. "Brigid Drury."
"Good. And what year were you born?"
"Nineteen sixty-four."
The doctor flipped a page on her chart. "Okay. Now, what can you remember about your accident?"
Her head was throbbing again, but Brigid answered anyway; complying had the best chance of getting him to leave and bring her food. "Dillon, James, and Eddie were arguing in my flat. There was gunpowder on the floor and in the air, and when Eddie fired his revolver it caught fire. I walked downstairs and out the garden gate; Simon's car was coming up the street. Then the kegs in the bar must have caught, because there was another explosion. That's all I remember."
Dr. Ramon frowned at her. "I suppose that partially explains the handcuffs," with a glance a Simon. "I'm sorry, I don't have any information about anyone else involved in a fire. I can call -"
"Don't bother," Simon said, turning back to face them. "Everyone else was killed."
"Oh. Oh, I'm so sorry…"
Brigid was aware of Simon's intense scrutiny, but she didn't understand it. "If you're done with your questions, I'd like to eat now."
"Doctor," Simon interrupted, "could shock produce a change in someone's emotional affect? Or a head injury, perhaps?"
The other man nodded slowly. "It's not unheard of for trauma to have such an effect. The CT scan didn't pick up anything abnormal, but the pressure from the swelling could have caused some damage that can't be seen on a simple scan."
"Are you saying there's something wrong with my brain?" Brigid asked. "My head aches, but otherwise I feel normal."
"No, nothing like that," Ramon said. "Dr. Cajal will give you a thorough examination and answer all of your questions. I'll give her a ring as soon as we're done here."
"Aren't we done?"
The doctor hesitated, but only for a moment. "Not quite. There was a discrepancy with the charts that we received from your physician at Charing Cross that I wanted to ask you about."
She wasn't at Charing Cross? That was the hospital closest to the pub. Not knowing whether her location was important or not, Brigid filed the information away to examine later. "What discrepancy?"
Dr. Ramon glanced at Simon again. When he made no sign of willingness to leave the room, the doctor sighed and removed a photograph from his folder. "According to your obstetrician, you're currently twelve weeks pregnant; this is the ultrasound photo that was taken when you were admitted to the emergency room after your collapse three days ago."
The photograph looked familiar. "That's right," she said. She'd make sure that they took care of the issue before her discharge. Maybe this hospital would be less reluctant than Charing Cross.
"You can see here that the fetus has fully formed limbs as well as facial features - typical for twelve weeks."
The doctor paused, as if waiting for Brigid to say something. When she didn't, he pulled out another photograph. "This one was taken yesterday. In this one, the fetus - well, it technically isn't a fetus. Not yet, anyway. Undeveloped eyes and ears, limb buds rather than actual arms and legs…I consulted with the OB/GYN department, and they all agree that this is an ultrasound of a seven- to eight-week-old embryo."
"And?" Brigid asked, confused.
"Wait, you're saying that this second picture is also of Mrs. Drury's child?" Simon said with a puzzled frown.
Dr. Ramon nodded. "I thought it must have been a mix-up at first, but Charing Cross is sure that they sent over the correct files - and Mrs. Drury just confirmed it. But there's no doubt that this photo is also correct."
"Could it be a difference in equipment?"
"There might be minor differences, of course, but nothing this marked. It's as if the fetus has…de-aged, somehow."
"What does that mean?" Simon asked.
"I don't know. I've never seen anything like this before. No one has, that I'm aware of."
De-aged, Brigid pondered, wondering if that was anything she needed to be concerned about or not. Then she abruptly remembered exactly how she had walked out of the flat in the midst of an explosion.
"Hm," she said.
Both men turned to her, as if just then realizing that she was still present. "Do you have any insight to offer, Mrs. Drury?" Simon asked, with a special emphasis on her false name.
"When Eddie fired the gun, I did something to freeze time," she said. "I was able to walk out of the flat and through the pub to the garden. Everything outside was frozen too; I was the only thing that was moving. But all the time I felt as if something was slipping away, like I was losing something. I wonder if that's what I was losing - time."
Simon was staring at her as if she'd just admitted to walking on the moon. "You…froze time," he said at last. "How."
"I don't know. I just did it."
"Have you done this before?"
"No."
"Do you think you could it again?"
"Mr. Simon!" the doctor protested. "In the interest of my patient, who has just been through a serious physical and emotional trauma, I have to insist that you save your questions for a later date. Encouraging delusions is not conducive to -"
Brigid wasn't listening to what the doctor was saying. She was pondering Simon's question. Could she do it again? She tried to recall the exact moment in the pub, that feeling of impending death and her desperation to stay alive. She closed her eyes, reaching for that faint, indescribable spark of power.
When she opened her eyes again, the fluorescent lights were softer, muted - and both men were frozen in the exact attitudes in which they had been in when she'd closed her eyes. The doctor was seated in a chair at her side, gesturing towards her, while Simon stood next to the bed rail, gazing down at her with his arms crossed. Silence hung heavy in the frigid air. Just as before, she could sense something slipping away from her, like grains of sand running through the neck of an hourglass.
Cautiously, Brigid lifted her free hand. As before, movement was difficult; but she remembered how she'd adjusted previously and tried again. All she had to do was mentally push outward from herself, just a small amount, and the air around her arm warmed and allowed her hand to raise. Interesting; but at the moment, not very helpful. She was still cuffed to the bed, and she had no tools with which to spring the lock.
Unless…Simon most likely had the keys on him. Brigid gingerly pushed herself into an upright position and reached towards his pants' pocket, the one nearest to her. The linen of his trousers was solid and unmovable; like she'd done with the air, Brigid pushed out, hoping to free the material enough for her to reach inside and find the keys. It worked. The pocket opened beneath her fingers, and -
"What?" Simon jerked away suddenly as Brigid's hand closed around a small metal key.
Hm. Had she accidentally set time moving again? No - Dr. Ramon was still stiff as a statue, and the minute hand of the clock on the wall hadn't budged. She must have simply expanded her bubble too far and included him. Interesting.
"What are you - how?" Simon was gazing around the room in open wonder.
Brigid turned the key in the lock and the cuffs sprang open. "Yes," she said. "I can do it again."
That time-slipping-away feeling was growing stronger, like an itch beneath her skin that couldn't be ignored. Restarting the clock was even easier this time, now that she'd already done it once. Light and sound poured back into the world in a single instant, just as Simon lunged for her wrist, clamping his hand down on the cuffs.
"These stay on for the time being, I think," he said, snapping the cuffs closed again and wrenching the key from her fingers. Brigid tried to keep her grip on it, but her body was just too exhausted.
" - healing." Dr. Ramon looked between the two of them. He blinked and rubbed his temple briefly. "I'll ask a nurse to bring up a tray; but I must advise bed rest for the rest of the day. Mr. Simon, please do your best not to antagonize my patient or I shall evict you; government can take up the issue later. Mrs. Drury, do try to cooperate, and get some sleep tonight. Dr. Cajal will be along soon."
The doctor stood to leave the room, but Simon called him back. "And for yourself, doctor - no discussions with colleagues outside of this room, especially any that pertain to Mrs. Drury's, ah, current delusions. Her case has been upgraded to Top Secret."
"I know this dance Mr. Simon, don't worry," Dr. Ramon said, and shut the door behind him.
Simon turned back to Brigid, arms folded. "Do as the doctor advises and get some rest," he told her. "As for the disposition of your future…I need to consult with my principle. That neat little trick of yours is going to generate quite a lot of interest in SIS."
Brigid closed her eyes, her head pounding. "As long as I get my amnesty, I don't care."