Day 2: 03:30
Mai
Mai was completely exhausted. Emotionally, physically, and mentally exhausted. Getting kidnapped, beaten, mentally traumatized with the potential of death at any moment, and no matter how hard she wanted to fall asleep and wish it was all just a dream, she was harshly woken up with either a slap or kick. She had stopped crying finally. She cried out as much as she could earlier. Her body just couldn't produce the energy to sob. Her face was numb, if she had tears flowing, she didn't know it.
'Naru...' she thought absentmindedly, 'Naru...Naru...' Being apart from him was agonizing. She was terrified for herself and Naru's sake. 'What is going to happen to him? Does he not even care about my well-being? Only for his ego? Sorry that my life hangs in the balance of the egotistical Oliver Davis!'
She was starting to lose it now. Her train of thought went from possible to delusional within a second. Mai really needed a break. She needed him back. She needed...sleep. Before she knew it, she felt herself become heavy and she felt her eyes close.
-o-
After what seemed like a long blink in Mai's opinion, she opened her eyes to a dark astral plane. She got up and started looking around. It was eerily silent. There was nothing around her. Just empty space. And yet? It was calming, to say the least. Here she could be at peace. She didn't have to fight her body's wishes to sleep.
Sleep...
Yes...
All she wanted to do was lie down...
Close her eyes...
And not wake up...
…
"Mai!" a static voice in the distance called to her. That was annoying. She scrunched her face. It sounded as if a voice synthesizer was thrown into a blender and then started screaming her name. Didn't it know how much she just needed to sleep?!
To just...
Stop...?
"Mai" the static was even louder than the voice now. As if it was trying to drown that concerned, and terrified person. Who was calling to her anyway?
"Mai please open your eyes!" It was a male voice. Who else would be here? Besides...
"Gene?" she croaked out. It felt like a weight was pushing on her throat preventing her from talking. It was painful. But she willed herself to open her eyes. Were her eyes even open? She reached her hands up to her face. Yeah, her eyes were definitely open, but she would have been fooled otherwise with how dark it was around her. It felt empty, cold, and...dead.
"Mai please, I'm begging here. Open. Your. Eyes!" It sounded closer now. It was definitely Gene.
With every ounce of strength she had left in her she screamed as loud as she could, "GENE!"
Then she was consumed by white.
She thought she was now completely blinded by a light when a shadow overcame her vision. She felt her body, light as a feather, being pulled into an embrace. Soft fabric caressed her face.
"Oh thank god," the breathy whisper of Gene sounded next to her ear.
She fell lax in his embrace and they both sunk to the ground of the astral plane. He held onto her like she was going to drift away at any moment. And she felt like it too. She didn't even have the energy to lift her arms to return the embrace. She just let him hold her. An embrace filled with emotion, but all of which just felt...familial. Like an older brother holding his little sister after an ordeal.
"What happened there Gene?" she eventually asked when she felt her throat clear up.
He paused in his gentle rocking. When had he started rocking? He pulled back a bit to look at her in the face. He scrunched his face as if lost in thought of what to say. Finally, he sighed, "Your spirit, your soul, was nearly lost. When...someone's spirit has started giving up the world of the living...they'll begin to drift away to a section of this realm where they cannot return. Even if in the living world, their body has died, their spirit can live on here. But if they wish to give up the world of the living, they pass on. They cannot return if they do. That's where you were about to traverse had I not stopped you in time."
Mai looked at him with an incredulous glare, "How do you even know about this stuff?"
He smiled and almost chuckled. "I'm a dead spirit medium who can't leave this place. I've come to know quite a bit about this place."
"Don't get smart with me Eugene Davis," she said, starting to get some of her energy back being with him. "But, what does that mean? That I almost died? That I lost my grip on reality or something?"
"Yes."
"Oh."
"Oh? You almost die, and all you can say is 'oh?'" he shot back.
"Well, what does one say to that?!"
"A thank you for saving your spirit would be a good start," he said smirking.
"Oh my god, you're as bad as your brother," she said smiling. She can start moving her fingers again. "So when can I leave this place and go back to the living world?"
"When your spirit has recovered. It's heavily damaged. Just like an injury on your body, it needs time to heal."
"Is there a way to speed up the process? I have to get back to Naru! I have to-"
"Why are you so keen on dying Mai?"
That struck a nerve. A nerve she didn't know she had. Ever since the death of her parents, leaving her alone in the world, she had felt particularly empty inside. It all changed when she met Naru. She finally had someone to connect with. She had to protect him, and if that meant dying along the way...
"I'm not-"
"Don't lie to me, Mai. If you go back now, you'll be nothing more than a spirit living in a hollow shell. Your body and spirit need rest," Gene ordered. She could tell he wasn't going to budge.
"Alright. Fine. How long?" she asked.
"24 hours in the living world. That's the best I can offer. You should be here longer, but time unfortunately is not a luxury we have right now. In the meantime, however, it's time we begin your training."
"Training?" she asked.
He stood up and taking his hand in hers he helped her stand. "Yes," he said, "If you're going to channel Naru's PK, you're going to need all the help you can get. Are you ready to begin?"
She smiled. A great big smile he hadn't seen since before they were taken. "Yes!"
"Then let's get moving."
-o-
Day 2: 09:00
Naru
In what felt like an eternity, the van finally stopped, the engine was killed, and the side door was thrown open. Naru scrambled to his feet while the men behind him pushed. Not being able to see the level of the ground he stumbled upon hitting the pavement and caught his feet only just in time. Hands grabbed at his shirt and pushed him forward. He moved where he was led and made no resistance. The more he complied the closer he would get to Mai.
Being led down a series of hallways and rooms he tried to map out the place in his head. 'Twelve steps forward. Right turn. 32 steps forward. Stop. Clicking/unlocking(?) sound. Eight steps forward. Sidestep right.'
He heard in the background yelling in English, Japanese, and a couple of other languages he didn't immediately recognize. He logged their conversations into a recess section of his mind. Talks of plans for an auction, set up for field testing, and orders for subordinates to finish setting up testing software. It was very intricate and he'd honestly be impressed with the level of coordination from this mass of a team if he wasn't in the situation he was in.
Before long he was shoved into an area and a door slam was heard. He immediately reached up to the bag over his head and ripped it off, face contorted into a look of controlled fury. He was in an odd-looking room. It was as if a hospital overnight room had been stolen and placed inside a prison cell. There were no windows and only one door. A full-size hospital bed was seated along the back right corner, various vitals-measuring equipment dotted the adjacent side. The floor and walls were concrete which gave the room a chill in the air. The bed had a comforter and a fleece blanket bundled upon it as if someone found some blankets and chucked them onto the bed in haste.
Silence filled the air.
"I demand to see my assistant," he said in a calm but demanding tone.
The silence was his only answer.
"Hello? Is anyone out there? I demand to have Mai in here now!" He tried again.
Nothing.
He began to pace around for a minute. This was insane. Completely insane! How were they going to get out of this?! He wouldn't take this for much longer. He needed Mai in his arms, now.
He stepped towards the door and began to bang his fist incessantly on it. "Hello! I know there are people out there! You either get Mai Taniyama in here right now or so help me I-"
The door swung open and two men charged in at him. Caught off guard he didn't have time to react as they shoved him back into the room with semi-automatic weapons aimed at his chest. He stopped shouting and threw his hands up in a surrender pose. His eyes widened but did not replace his already hardened face of fury. He was determined to get answers. Not ten seconds after that, two other men brought (more dragged as Naru looked at the situation) a lifeless Mai in their arms and chucked her onto the ground. They turned and left with the other two armed men trailing behind them. The heavy steel door slammed shut and a latch was heard from the outside.
"Fuck..." he muttered as he exhaled a breath he didn't even realize until that moment that he was holding. "Mai," he fell to his knees at her side. Her hair was disheveled, her face bruised and old, and clotted blood stained her lips and forehead. Bruises and dirt covered her legs making it hard to tell what was what, as well as scratches that were shallow and some deep to match.
"Mai, wake up," he whispered pulling her head into his lap. No response. "Hey, dummy. C'mon, you seriously picked a bad time to be sleeping," he said gently shaking her. Still nothing. He started patting her cheek with his hand "Mai I'm serious right now you need to-" he stopped. Her breath was faint. Deathly faint. Her chest was barely rising. "Mai!" he shouted. He picked her up and ran to the bed.
'Oh god, oh god, I can't lose her, I can't-I can't lose her!' an emotional part of his brain started shouting.
'Shut up! We aren't going to lose her. She's still breathing, isn't she? She's still alive.' The more logical side reminded him.
'What they did to her though! They could've overdosed her or something. She's so lightweight, oh god!'
'Shut up, shut up! Focus! She's barely breathing. She needs oxygen. Look around. There's medical equipment all over this room. There has to be something here.'
The door to the room swung open and another man came through. Naru whipped his head up and clutched onto Mai tighter in fear of whoever was to come through that door next. This man...he didn't look like the usual gang of mercenaries. He was scrawny looking, tall, on the older side. Naru guessed around the late forties to early fifties based on the gray in his hair and the deepened wrinkles on his face. He wore glasses and a gray, striped, button-down shirt that was tucked into dark khaki-colored pants.
"Are you Dr. Oliver Davis?" the man asked in an incredulous tone. The man was Japanese; Naru could tell as such.
What was that supposed to mean? "Who's asking?" he replied trying to keep the fear out of his voice.
"I'm Dr. Yuuto Hiroa. I...have been sent to assist the pair of you in transport recovery and any medical assistance you might need these next two weeks," the man said.
'Transport recovery, is this guy serious? As if we are some product or something?' Naru thought bitterly. 'I guess in a sense, we are though.' A lot of thoughts were flowing through his head at that moment. Thoughts about who he really was, how he got roped into working with these illegal traders, and what kind of things they would be doing that would require medical attention. Looking down at the near-lifeless girl in his arms, however, he only had one train of thought.
"Can you help her?" he asked hesitantly. "She's already suffered enough at your colleague's hands. She's barely breathing and I don't have time to waste on people who are useless to me right now."
The man chuckled with a sound that held no humor. "My colleagues. I don't work for them, I work for myself," he said. He was holding information back from him Naru was sure. "You definitely sound like Dr. Davis. I've read your books." He started making his way over to the pair. Instinctively Naru gripped tighter onto Mai's body and held her closer. "Honestly though, for someone as smart as you you should think about the situation you are in right now. I can help her you know, but only if you let me."
"She's suffered enough. How do I know you will actually help? That you even can help?" Naru hissed through gritted teeth.
"What, you expect me to just pull my medical certificates out of my back pocket? Oh, wait...Ah yes. I can do just that." the man said with more ego in his voice than Naru had ever heard before. The man reached behind and pulled out his wallet. It was a weathered and old leather wallet, but the cards that he just pulled out looked fresh and crisp. He handed two card-sized certificates over to Naru.
Certificate of Completion
Mr. Hiroa, Yuuto
Has successfully graduated Jutendo School of Medicine with his graduating class of 1989.
University of Tokyo
recognizes
Hiroa, Yuuto, MD. FAANS
In his efforts in the field of neurological study and is to be welcomed in as a fellow member
August 1992
"I had them laminated and shrunk to card-sized. You never know when someone might need to question your credentials," Dr. Hiroa said smugly.
Naru gave the cards back and looked at him. Now he was curious how a neurosurgeon got his end mixed up with human traffickers but now was not the time to be thinking about that.
"Well you're a neurosurgeon I'll grant that, so what do you do when a patient is barely breathing?" he asked.
"Well let's take a look then shall we?" Dr. Hiroa said. Adjusting Mai to lie on the bed, Dr. Hiroa started to get into his element. He began picking up a blood pressure cuff, an o2 finger monitor, and various other vitals-taking equipment. Naru had to take a few steps back. He didn't know how to assist and knew he'd only be getting in Dr. Hiroa's way. Before long, Mai was hooked up with various wires and nodes dangling off of her. The Dr. asked for his assistance when it came to taking off parts of Mai's clothes. Blushing he did as he asked and tried not to pay too much attention to the way her delicate skin felt electrifying under his fingertips. How, if the situation wasn't so dire, he'd love to linger his fingers there longer.
Dr. Hiroa started to record things down on a notepad at a rapid pace. His eyes became glossed over in focus. Naru understood that look; no distractions or interruptions. After another 20 minutes, Dr. Hiroa put down his notepad and looked up at Naru.
"Well it's a good thing those bastar-I mean...my colleagues didn't do too much damage. She is stable. I've got her on oxygen right now to keep her breathing even and consistent. Her scrapes and cuts aren't life-threatening, but if you'd really like I can get her forehead taken care of. She's currently in very deep stasis. I'd almost say coma but her heart rate is too high for that. It looks like she just needs some time for recovery," Dr. Hiroa informed Naru as he started cleaning up his surroundings.
"A luxury we don't have," Naru said. "They're expecting us to begin training within the next 12 hours, maybe less."
"Well, I put her on a pain medication that should diminish some of the pain. It should wear off in about a few hours. In the meantime, I need to get an inventory of this equipment and ask you for some general information about Mai. I hope you know her well enough to answer."
"I know her as well as I know myself. Maybe more so." Naru answered honestly. He did a thorough background check on her and gathered up information about her medical conditions and condition shortly before hiring her.
"Then let's begin doctor," Dr. Hiroa said smiling candidly.
