Rescue
CHAPTER 10
Report from the Swarm
It was well past the time that TAS92ZB's pod should have been disseminated, but the signals indicated that the mainframe was so occupied by its current problems that discharge was not likely to take place in the foreseeable future. In any case, there wasn't any time to process signals concerning the probability of it because the Mainframe was working at near capacity to acquire the resources to propagate.
The possibility of another propagation had long been considered unlikely, so the pursuit required every available segment to work at its highest capacity in the hope that the carrier they were a part of would succeed. Right now, TAS92ZB was receiving some signals from outside that were confusing. Apparently, the resource the carrier was trying to control was damaged, but the damage was like nothing any of the segments had ever encountered.
Knowing that its task was critical, TAS92ZB sent an inquiry to the memory archive stored in the antenna chains of the nucleotides. The response made the problem perfectly clear. The resource the carrier needed had been damaged and was incapable of making decisions for itself. The swarm's carrier must make decisions for it.
------------------------------------
Nurse Hastings had outdone herself when she prepared Courtney's medical file that was to accompany her, but she'd made a mistake. She had forgotten about the hell Courtney would raise when anyone attempted to examine or question her without George being there. The deputy accompanying her was told to drive slowly as she'd be safer in transit. As a result, George arrived only 40 minutes after she did and while they were still arguing about admitting her.
Entering the hospital through the emergency room, George noted a Lincoln County Deputy he didn't recognize by the door. Carefully, he held his left arm behind him to hide it from the deputy. Deciding to remain anonymous, he walked past the curtained beds and the admitting desk where the EMT was still arguing about Courtney's admission.
Acting as if he had a destination, George continued from emergency through a high atrium filled with waiting patients to the main entry. There weren't any guards, so George retraced his steps. As he approached, he noticed a gap in the curtain through which he could see a girl strapped to a gurney.
Instead of approaching the bed that he was certain held Courtney, he approached and entered the adjacent stall. Carefully, his retracted the curtain between the beds and put his finger to his lips to keep Courtney from talking. He quickly undid the straps holding her, handed her a bag containing one of her dresses and some shoes and whispered that she should get dressed quickly.
George turned his back and was surprised when she tapped his shoulder almost as quickly as he was turned away. She had slipped the dress over her head and slid her feet into the shoes in seconds. Taking her hand, George led her through adjoining curtains to the end of the row and then the two of them walked confidently through the atrium and out the main entrance.
The only distraction was a fleeting thought that caught George's attention as they exited into the bright autumn sunshine. "I wonder if holding her hand creates some kind of magic. It seems as if, together, we could do anything." For Courtney, passing through the hospital's entry with her hand in George's was like entering another World. With a whimper, the war between her past and future evaporated. She simply opened her heart, allowing every expectation that she'd ever accumulated to float away and be replaced with unconditional love.
While Courtney's troubles were ending, George was sure his were just beginning. The last time he'd been responsible for the happiness of another person was a decade past. Although he'd planned it, wanted it and been utterly consumed by the pursuit of it, actually winning the emotional commitment of a young innocent girl scared him witless. The only thing holding him together was the unfinished remnants of his goal. He had to get her away.
Leading her to his small pickup, he directed her to the driver's side and had her slide under the wheel. Quickly, he exited the city and turned south on the freeway. With success and freedom so close, he could now plan for the future.
With a reassuring tone, he asked his girl, "How does it feel to be free?"
With the brightest, most radiant smile of commitment he'd yet seen, she answered, "I don't want to be free! George, I belong to you. You saved me, so my life is yours. If you really want me to be happy, there's only one way. Let me stay with you and please, don't leave me." She finished with tears in hers eyes but with an even brighter smile.
With a shake of his head, George's war ended. "Courtney, I promised I'd do everything I could to make you happy. I'll keep you beside me as long as you want to be here. I promise I'll never willingly leave you. But you have to think of the future. I'm 60 years old and that means that the rest of my life is almost certain to be shorter. I don't want you to worry, but you have to be ready for whatever the future holds, a future that is almost certain to be one without me. The life that we do have, that we are facing will be hard but with your help, we can both be happy. But I want you to be happy even after I'm gone."
"Now, one of the problems we have right now is that we don't have much money left. I had to spend a lot more than I'd planned to get you out of jail, so we need to be in Las Vegas tomorrow morning so we can replace what I spent. If we drive straight through, we can get there before dark or we could stop on the way for a meal. What do you think we should do?"
Courtney needed security. In a desperate attempt to communicate her need, she asked, "Do you remember when you asked me to really listen? You wanted me to do more than hear, you wanted me to listen and understand. There were things you knew that I didn't. Do you remember that I did what you asked and I believed what you told me?" Her questions were asked with a level of sincerity that George had never heard before. They reached something inside of him, twisting the strings of his heart until they resonated.
"I remember," he answered in matching tones.
"I promised you that I would do whatever you asked of me and I will. But please, let me to talk to you in the same way. There are some things about me, some of them I have only been aware of for a few hours and they are things that you should know. Will you let me talk, and really listen?"
"Yes, Courtney, I promise I'll listen." George pledged to the tune of virtuoso emotional violins.
"The first time you touched my hand, you turned my world around. I remember my parents loving me when I was little, but then they changed. Before you, it'd been years since anyone had touched me the way you did. I can't describe to you how, but I can feel the difference in your each and every touch. It's as real to me as the warmth of sunshine. And when I lose contact with you, it's like a shadow that blocks the sun."
"What I'm trying to say is that you can give me the happiness you promised with the simple act of touching. More than that, you give me a feeling of love and security that words can't describe, that satisfies more than the deepest desires of hunger, thirst or breathing, and you do it with your touch."
"I don't understand why or how, and I don't want to. I believe that you're worried that the weird doctor changed me to feel this way, that you might try to change me back. I want you to know that I've never had the tiniest taste of the happiness your touch gives me and I don't want it to go away. I don't want to be changed back, even if you think that what he did was bad."
"To keep you and the happiness you fill me with, I'll give up everything. I was taught in school that the way to be happy is to be a good person, marry a good boy and have some good children. But when you touch me, everything I learned changes to a lie. My whole life, I've watched parents divorce; their children abandoned. Even in the best families, love can fade and slip away."
"So I promised myself that to keep what only you can give me, I'll give myself to you, heart and soul. If you want to end my life, it's yours to end. If you want to use my body, it's yours to use. If you want to give me pain, I'll suffer it happily. If you need my hands, they're yours to command."
"Now you asked me what I wanted, to drive or eat, and I want to answer you with the deepest desires of my heart. I want whatever you want, I want what you decide. I have no desire beyond pleasing you. If we eat, my purpose will be to keep my body beautiful for you. My hunger is less important than pleasing you."
"If you ask me to want something for myself, it feels deep inside me as if you're pushing me away, as if you're withdrawing from me. I've watched your face when I pleaded with you not to leave me and I've seen your confusion, so I hope you can understand that when you ask what I want for myself, what I hear you saying is that you want to go away."
"Please tell me you understand. If you do really want to leave me, I'll understand and I'll give you what you want because I know the only way I can keep you is to give myself to you unconditionally. Even though leaving would break my heart, I can only be happy if you are happy. The only thing I'll ever ask of you is, Please don't leave me?"