"Who's sitting with her?" Tommy asked as Billy walked into his office, several hours later, with test results in his hands. None of the results made sense to him and he hoped that Tommy could shed some sort of light on things. While Tommy was not a medical professional, his years of laboratory work and genome synthesizing gave him a leg up on the average person looking at something like this.
"Aisha. Although she keeps calling her 'Mrs. Campbell'," Billy said as Tommy let out a sigh. That was not what he had wanted to hear from Billy. "There's nothing in the MRI that indicates a new injury or any swelling that we wouldn't expect after a surgery like this. We know she's always struggled coming out of anesthesia in the past- so my best theory is that because of the previous TBI it is taking her much longer to come out of that this time. The reason we didn't see it after her last surgery was because she was in a coma for so long."
"Please tell me you sent Ollie home," Tommy said and Billy nodded. The relief flooded him that their son was not having to pretend to be him any longer. "Did you figure out what time line she thinks she's in?"
"In her mind, she's pregnant with Ollie and must have recently sent you that fucking letter. She was terrified when I mentioned that your mom was coming to get Ollie," Billy said and Tommy shook his head. That would explain a lot about her overall reaction to Ollie as well- even if she thought that he was him, she had told him how scared she had been at that time. How scared she was of what might happen to her and their child if it ever got out that Tommy Oliver had a child. As much as he hated to admit it, he knew that Lord Zedd or Mondo would have gone straight after Ollie to get to him if they had known. "I was thinking…maybe we lock the room off and you morph."
"Excuse me?" Tommy interjected and Billy let out a sigh. Tommy, physically, had changed a lot since he was seventeen, but one thing that he did have in common with his teenage self was that he had access to the White Ranger powers. It was the version of him that she had fallen in love with and had broken and it was one of the few things they could do to give Tommy some level of connection with his wife. "That is a horrible idea."
"Normally? Yes. But it may be worth exploring. It wouldn't be the first time that your powers have let the two of you reach each other," Billy said as he placed the results in front of Tommy. "I know you've spotted things in her scans before that I haven't. I pulled some of the baseline scans we did years ago when the two of you were called back in after Landon was born. If you want to take a look before you try to go back in there…"
"Refresh my human anatomy…right side of the brain controls memory, attention, reasoning, and problem solving?" Tommy checked and Billy nodded. "I should have killed Hayley."
"It's still on the table," Billy muttered and Tommy gave him a look that clearly said he had not expected that from him. "None of us are going to talk you out of that, if it's the option you want to go with. Your kids, your wife- everyone is at risk and while this is a solution, it does have its risks."
"I'm going to take a few hours to look at this and then I'm willing to try morphing in front of her if Aisha is still 'Mrs. Campbell'," Tommy said and Billy walked out of his office to go check on his other patients.
Tommy spread the scans out in front of him and pulled his reading glasses out of his pocket. They had started these scans years ago when Billy suspected that their prolonged ranger activity might be having effects on their brains and other parts of their body. It had already shown some differences, but none of them really knew what it meant and there weren't enough people to study if he was honest about it. However, it did show that all of their children were different than children at roughly the same age, but were tracking as similar to each other.
The older scans were familiar and he marked items that they had known about for years. Kimberly had had more brain injuries than the rest of them, mostly thanks to her gymnastics career and the propensity for monsters to toss her around during battle. Even though she was more than capable of taking out monsters, it was why they really tried to limit her interactions with them now. They both agreed that it wasn't worth risking the damage it might do, but the damage had come for her anyway.
He looked at the three most recent scans from before her injury, immediately after the first surgery, and today. His heart sank as he looked at the post injury scan, there was so much damage. So much that explained why things were taking so long to return to close to normal. Admittedly, his goal was no longer 'old Kimberly'. His goal now was just a healthy Kimberly, whatever that looked like. He looked at the one from today and saw how much she had healed, but there were still some parts, where the injuries had just been too deep to heal. There was slight swelling, but it was nothing compared to last time.
He rubbed his eyes as he tried to see a difference, as he tried to see what would cause this change. He knew the rough location of the hippocampus, but everything looked fine and if Billy's trained eyes had said it was fine- he believed that there was nothing to find. He believed that this was a fluke that could not be explained, except that her brain just may not have been able to take another surgery right now. That maybe they should have given her longer to heal before attempting this, but every evaluation that had been done indicated that this should have had a minimal risk. Something in the evaluations was either missed or Kim was just an edge case.
"Hey Tommy, how you holding up?" Trini asked as she slipped into the office and sat down across from him. Billy had quietly alerted all of them that something had gone wrong and then Jason had called and told her to not expect him for supper. It was too much of a coincidence after the S.O.S. that Billy had sent out and she had given her kids money for pizza and headed straight for the hospital. When Billy had finally given her a bit of a back brief, she knew that going to Tommy was the right answer. Kimberly had someone with her and was blissfully unaware of what was going on, Tommy needed comfort.
"Not good and I don't see that they missed anything on these scans," Tommy muttered as he pushed the scans away and leaned back on the couch, staring at the ceiling. He could guess why Trini was here, but he didn't know if he wanted to talk with her. "She thinks Ollie is me and I cut my hair. She thinks she's pregnant with Ollie and that I hate her because she just sent me that letter. Hayley may not have killed her, but if this…if this doesn't improve..she's stolen her from me either way."
"She'll always come back to you. She always has," Trini whispered and Tommy just shook his head. He wanted to believe that. He wanted to believe that this was just a hiccup in her recovery and that in a couple of days she would be mortified that she had flirted with her own son while thinking that he was him, but the pit in his stomach said otherwise. The pit in his stomach said that this might take months to overcome. "Talk to me, Tommy."
"I just…I feel like this time is different," Tommy said as he brushed his hands against his pants, trying to remove the sweat and calm himself. "Losing her a second time…"
"You haven't lost her. Why would you even think…" Trini trailed off as Tommy locked eyes with her and she saw it. She saw all the pain that he had been pushing back and hiding. She saw all the stress that he had on himself to keep his family going and care for his wife and do all the jobs that he had on his plate. She saw the raw fear that he would do everything in his power to get her to remember and she would turn away from him again. "So what if she's forgotten the last 18 years. You know one thing that I've seen happen over and over with the two of you?"
"What's that?"
Trini moved over next to him and grabbed his hands and he looked up at her again. She needed to see some sort of hope in Tommy's eyes, but that wasn't there. The thing that she did see was determination and that would have to do for now.
"You fall in love with each other over and over again. So if all else fails, you'll do that," Trini stated as he gave her a shaky nod and she then opened her arms to him and he collapsed against her. Tommy was the strongest of them, but they all knew exactly what that strength was propped up on.
"Kim- can you close your eyes for me?" Billy asked and Kim looked up at him for a moment before squeezing her eyes shut. She heard the door open and close and as she listened to the footsteps, she recognized them. She recognized him. Fear jolted through her, but it was quickly pushed away by the desperation she felt for Tommy to just hold her again. The desperation she felt for him to be here and make it all better. "Keep those eyes closed for me- we want to test something. You good to go?"
"Yeah," Tommy whispered as he rolled his morpher in his hands and glanced behind him as Billy blocked all of the windows from line of sight. "It's morphin' time- tigerzord."
Kim's eyes shot open and she saw Tommy standing in front of her. She put her hands protectively over her abdomen as he walked closer to her and then sat down in one of the chairs next to the hospital bed. She relaxed as he leaned back in the chair and gave her all the space that she was asking for. How had they actually gotten him to come here? To come all the way to Miami?
"Where…where did you come from? I thought you left with your mom," Kim said as Tommy let out a long sigh and he hid his helmeted face behind his hands. "Tommy- I know it's you."
"Yeah, but…what should I tell her?" Tommy asked as he looked over at Billy and Billy just shrugged. He wasn't really sure what they should do at this point. "Dr. Cranston."
"The literature is vague on what to do. I've got a consult request in with a psychiatrist to confirm this diagnosis, they would have a better idea of what is appropriate to discuss," Billy said and Tommy ground his teeth together. Could he pretend to be 17 again for her? He wasn't even sure he remembered what he was like at 17 all that well, other than he had been hurt. He was so very hurt at that point in his life. "Kimberly, do you feel safe?"
"Now that he's here, yes," Kim said as Billy nodded and he looked between the two of them. From everything they knew about the timeline, it made no sense that she would feel safe with him. "What? What is it?"
"I want him to de-morph, but he isn't going to look like the Tommy you are expecting and I don't want to scare you with that," Billy said as Kim took a good look at Tommy. He had filled out in the few months since she had seen him last, the suit bulging in places it never had before. Was it realistic that that could have happened in only a few months? "Do you think you can deal with that?"
"What are you looking at?" Kim asked as Aisha scrolled through her phone and she then slowly put it down. "What is that?"
"Cell phone," Tommy explained and she shook her head. Cell phones were bricks that none of them could afford. "Fuck it. Kim, it's 2014 and a lot has changed since the last things you remember."
"Way to ease her into it," Aisha said as Tommy glared at her and she was glad that he was still clad in his ranger gear. It was almost a death wish to challenge Tommy like this right now.
"How else are you going to explain a cell phone that lets you keep up with things on the internet? The internet that we knew at age 17 was barely functional at best and cell phones were the size of a brick," Tommy spat back and he tried to compose himself. Getting angry at their friends wasn't going to help them and it sure as shit wasn't going to help her trust him. "Ish…I…"
"I know," Aisha said as Tommy just nodded and then let out another long sigh. "How about we start easy- would you like to see yourself in a mirror?"
"Ummm…sure," Kim said as Aisha pulled up her phone and then placed it in front of her, making sure the self-facing camera was on. She held it in front of Kimberly and watched as the shock passed through her. She reached up to the gauze and then leaned in to study her face. There were scars she didn't recognize, wrinkles that she had never seen before. She quickly looked down at her hands and saw a bridal set on her left hand. She jerked her head back up to Tommy and felt herself suddenly go woozy. "You…you're not lying."
"No, Beautiful," Tommy whispered as he reached his gloved hand out for hers and held it in his. "I keep hoping that you'll wake up and this just be the anesthesia, but you're on wake up number seven and you still think you're in 1996."
"Did you marry me?" Kim blurted out and Tommy watched as Aisha silently removed herself from Kim's line of sight. Billy had already melted into the background, observing, but trying to give Tommy some pretense of privacy. They suspected that once Kim started asking questions, things were going to get personal very quickly. "Even after I…after I told you that…"
"I did, eventually. Although I think our parents would have killed us if we had one more kid without getting married," Tommy joked and she gave him a confused look. She didn't know that she had four children and that their family and friends had basically given up hope on them ever getting married. Life had happened and for the longest, it just wasn't something that they prioritized. "Is it easier for you with me like this? In this?"
"I know that you're Tommy when I see you like this, but I also heard you walk in and I knew that was you too. I know your voice, I'd know it anywhere…I just don't know if I'm ready…if I can face…" Kim started as the tears welled up and he gently cupped her face. "I'm not pregnant?"
"God I hope not, that would be baby number five and failed vasectomy number two," Tommy said as her eyes widened and she gripped his hand. "You've given me four beautiful babies."
"Did…the Tommy from earlier…" Kim trailed off as she stared at him and she reached over for his helmet. While she was not sure if she wanted to see him, she needed to confirm if who she was talking to was who she thought it was. Now that she was putting some of the pieces together, she had to check. She had to be sure. She, clumsily, unclipped the helmet and he tilted his head back and then forward to make it easier for her to pull off. She saw the familiar brown hair and felt her heartbeat quicken, maybe this was all some terrible joke. As she fully removed the helmet, she placed it in her lap and he slowly looked up at her. She couldn't say that she recognized him from building a life with him, but when she squinted- she could see that this might be what Tommy had become and as she looked for Mrs. Campbell and Dr. Cranston- she realized the same thing for Aisha and Billy. They had aged, just like she had, but that didn't bring her comfort. How was she going to get back the last 18 years?
AN: With this latest cluster from this weekend- I wanted to remind all of you that my stories are also available under the same penname on AO3. I plan to publish on both sites until it is no longer feasible to publish here, however, this latest incident does not make me hopeful that this will continue to be semi-stable for much longer.