This is part one of two or three. Not certain exactly. Also not certain when I’ll get the next bits typed up, I’ve had a crazy month, and it kept me from even getting this much down until now. But I know where it’s going, and I know how this part will end, so it’s just a matter of needing some time without chaos to get it written.

---

---

The new guy was sprawled on the sofa in the lounge. Track marks all over, whipcord lean, ragged and looking like he was on the nod. Hellion jerked his head towards my office, so I followed.

I sat in my chair, and he plopped into the one opposite, “Where the hell did you find him Max?”

“Manhattan.”

“In a dumpster?”

I snorted, “He’s not as trashed as he looks. I mean, he sort of is. But he’s what we need. He’s what Eternus needs, to be more specific.”

“We can all use help. The guy is a junkie though. And from the looks of things has every disease known to man. Herpes for sure, that line of cold sores is pretty bad.”

“Yeah, well, that’s his thing. He’s a healer. Just an empathic one. He heals by absorbing what’s wrong. Then he dumps it onto a target as needed. But he has trouble justifying dumping some things, so they linger until he finds somewhere, something that’s acceptable to him. He’s been through hell.”

“Can he really help? Is what’s wrong with Don an illness?”

“That’s what we’re going to find out. He’s on his way up.”

“I asked him if he knew what was wrong last night. He couldn’t answer. Kept stuttering and shaking. Evelyn was wrecked, just crying non stop. Me and Mandy had to take her home, she couldn’t take seeing him like that.”

“He hasn’t really been right since that thing with Finale. He said he thinks it has something to do with some kind of time echo or feedback. At least, that’s what I think he said. He was shaking too damn hard to be sure. I think it gets worse every time he loops back, and it’s terrifying to think that he’s looping that much, and coming back in increments of days or even hours from our perspective. I couldn’t get him to say if we’ve called The Doctor in before, if this was something new enough to matter.”

“He wouldn’t say?”

“Couldn’t.”

“Fuck.”

“My thoughts exactly. I’ve been trying to find reliable psychics and time manipulators, but they’re rare to begin with, and the ones I have tracked down nope out on me as soon as I get close.”

“What the fuck? Have they said why?”

“One lady did. No idea if the reason is the same for all of them, but she said my soul was screaming so loud it was like razors in her mind. Then she passed out.”

“Jesus fucking christ, Max. What the fuck is that? Your soul is screaming?!”

“No clue, man, no clue. But it ain’t good.”

“Fuck. Is my soul screaming?”

“I’m not a psychic.”

“It was a horror filled rhetorical.”

“Oh. I suspect we know the answer though. Shame your name isn’t because of supernatural stuff. Maybe that would help.”

“I do know a guy. Used to be an enemy of sorts, back when I was working solo in Atlanta. Controls spirits and shit. Used to summon demons and devils to throw at me. No idea if they were really supernatural, or if he’s just got a weird power, he plays mysterious. But he claims to be a master sorcerer at least. I can call him, see if he’ll come up here.”

“Do that. Even if he can’t help with this, never hurts to keep connections. We could use someone that’s good with the woowoo crap.”

“I’ll go call him.”

---

Mike hadn’t been gone five minutes when I heard Delmont yell for help. I ran back into the lounge to see him carrying Don in from the stairwell. Don was having a seizure.

“Doctor! Wake the fuck up!”

He woke and snapped into motion, “I’m not a fucking doctor. Lay him down, big guy, then go into the other room, both of you.”

“I’m not leaving him!”

“Look, General, my shit gets twitchy and goes off sometimes. You don’t want to be close if it does. Unless you fucking enjoy tertiary syphilis?”

Delmont gagged and ran. I retreated with more dignity. And stayed in the doorway. The Doctor knelt beside the couch he had just abandoned and laid his hands on the sides of Don’s head. That’s when the screaming started. Him and Don both. I couldn’t see anything happening; whatever he does isn’t flashy.

They both screamed for about five minutes. Enough time for everyone to show up armed for bear, powers at the ready. Then they both passed out. I moved to check on them. Pulses slightly elevated, but dropping. Breathing fine. The seizure Don was in had stopped, but the new guy was twitching a good bit. I waved the team in and got both of them moved into beds down the hall, hooked up the monitoring gear and waited and called you.

"I told you The Doctor could pull off miracles. Back before he got addicted the first time, his patients had absurdly high recovery rates. He was an oncology nurse. People on death’s door going into remission entirely, when they shouldn’t have lasted another week. When he’d do ED shifts, it was even more obvious, if you knew what to look for.

But he was sucking all of it up. It can’t kill him. But he was building up the symptoms and started stealing opiates to cope. I lost track of him after he got fired. He’s never told me what happened, but somewhere between then and the next summer, he figured out what was going on, started taking on some local gangs. They’d end up in my hospital, wracked with withdrawals, cancer of the everything, advanced Alzheimer’s, all kinds of hell. And they’d say there was this junkie that did it to them."

“That’s great and all, but it doesn’t help me figure out what to do now?”

“I’m telling you that because I don’t either. After I reconnected with Kerry, he didn’t really explain much. But other than needing a nap after he does a ton of using his power, he’s never had any kind of reaction like this that I’ve seen. All I can do is monitor them and provide supportive care. If they haven’t come to in another hour or so, we’ll have to get them to a hospital and keep them going until they do wake up. If they do.”

“I can get supplies, equipment.”

“I’d want an EEG for sure.”

“Let me make a call. The DoD can make things happen fast.”

---

“Well?”

“This is not normal.”

“How bad is it, John?”

“I’m not sure. I’m not even sure it is bad. But it isn’t normal.”

“Am I going to have to beg here?”

“Sorry. Sorry. Look at both of them and see if you can see what I’m seeing.”

“They look the same. Bunch of squiggly lines. You’re the one that went to medical school, not me.”

“They do look the same. Exactly the same, except in one section. And they’re both abnormal overall. These squiggles? Nobody has matching ones. They’ll be similar enough, sure, but these are perfectly synced other than the prefrontal cortex. But even there, there’s a high degree of similarity beyond what it should be. But weirder is that there’s wave forms that shouldn’t be present at the same time.”

“What does that mean?”

“It looks like they’re awake and asleep. Alpha, beta, and delta waves going at the same time. But there’s parts, here and here, that are what you see when someone blinks. But they aren’t blinking. Their eyes aren’t moving at all.”

“John, come on man, get to the point!”

“Fuck you Max, that is the point! You always have been an impatient little asshole.”

“This isn’t the time for sibling squabbles. I’m sorry I care about my friend and the guy I asked to help him. Now could you please give me something I can work with here?”

“Sorry. Truth is I’m not sure what the hell is going on. I’m not a neurologist, Max. Can I show these to one?”

“Yeah, I think so. I know Don is covered under our charter, and Kerry should be covered under exigent circumstances. I’ll take the heat if he tries to sue.”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“Best I can do. Can’t you tell me anything? If this isn’t something medical, I need to be moving to find someone with the right power or skill set. They’re my responsibility.”

“It fucking looks like their brains are connected. That they’re connected and communicating. They’re awake and asleep, showing signs of the kind of activity you get while talking to someone. I don’t know how their powers work. I’m an orthopedic surgeon Max, this is out of scope for me. I think it’s out of scope for anyone.”

“You find a neurologist then. I’ll try and find someone that… Shit. I don’t even know what we’ll need. Mind readers?”

“Your guess is better than mine.”