Sister Katherine Saves the Day
Those who had chosen Sister Katherine for her role as Sister. Katherine had chosen well. Divining in this devout Sister the strength of character and purpose they were searching for, she had been recruited from a Convent in Ireland. She was a woman religious, but hers was not a nun's life of contemplation entirely enclosed in the cloister of a monastery, but serving the church in a multitude of apostolates.
Her faith was in no way diluted by working in the outside world; she voluntarily entered a consecrated life and professed three vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty, in consecration to God forever. This was her vocation; she had found true happiness and had only pity for those who skimmed through life as if it were a pleasure cruise to be enjoyed while they could. Both nuns and sisters are Brides of Christ, and Sister Katherine was as utterly devout in her faith as those who had chosen a life of hiddenness, sacrifice, and prayer in the cloister.
Yet such was the calibre of the men who approached her, and their powers of persuasion, that Sister Katherine was prised away from the convent in Ireland where she had lived for almost thirty years. With humility and absolute sincerity, she accepted her appointment as a guardian of the son of Ann Marie.
Now was the moment where everything that had gone before would go to waste if she did not save David, and she did not know whether she could do it...
She had to stop the bleeding from the artery in his leg and, desperately trying to remember her training from her early days in a nursing order, she pushed both of her thumbs into the wound, holding the flow to an extent but failing to stop it seeping away at the sides. There was no first aid kit in the flat she knew, but that would be useless anyway; she had to get help.
I must open the safe to get the phone and press the emergency button, but I can't leave David.
Holding just one thumb over the wound, which was very ineffective in staunching the flow, she reached with her other hand for the waist cord of her apron and pulled it away. The blood was everywhere now, but she remained icily calm; all her energy and thought were directed towards saving David. She was going to try to apply a tourniquet to his leg, using the cord to stop the blood loss temporarily while she ran upstairs to phone for help.
Keeping one thumb on the wound, she tried to secure the cord one-handed, but it was impossible; she was going to have to take both her thumbs off the artery. Knowing she had to keep the blood loss to a minimum, she carefully rehearsed the stages of the procedure in her mind before she started so she could complete it as quickly as possible.
'God forgive me, David.'
She took her thumb away, and at once a fountain of blood spurted up in her face. Ignoring it, she rapidly wound the cord around his leg, formed a slip knot above the severed artery and pulled it as tight as she dared. She had effectively reduced the rate of blood loss but was alarmed to see that David's breathing had become very shallow and intermittent. Checking his airway for obstruction, she turned his head more comfortably to one side, but his breathing did not improve. She knew she was going to have to get help. This would mean leaving David on his own, but there was no alternative. Before she left, she checked the tightness of the improvised tourniquet, remembering how dangerous an inexpertly applied tourniquet can be.
'Hold on, David, hold on.'
She ran from the room, leaving the flat door jammed open, and raced up the stairs to her flat. Fumbling with her key at the door, she stumbled into the bathroom, scrabbling at the wall until she found the panel. Quickly placing her thumb on the sensor pad, she pressed hard, but to her horror, nothing happened. She pushed frantically again, leaving a bloody imprint that seeped down the tiles, and it was then she realised that the blood that was obscuring her thumbprint, preventing it from being recognised by the system.
Almost falling, she reached over to the sink and turned on a tap, thrusting her hand under the flow of water to wash away the blood. With a towel, she hastily rubbed her thumb dry and, with the dry part of the towel, cleaned the place on the panel. Quickly, she tried again, and this time the safe door swung smoothly open to reveal the phone. Unplugging it from the charger, she pressed the emergency button in the centre and heard a rapid electronic sequence of clicks and then the voice of the priest.
'State briefly the nature of the emergency if you can, then return to guard the child. That is your first duty. Help is on the way.'
The message ended, and she heard a further tone. She spoke quickly but calmly and professionally, even though her hands were shaking:
'It's David, he is in a sort of trance and has suddenly started to bleed from wounds to his neck and shoulders. Cause unknown. Arterial bleeding from a leg wound is critical. Tourniquet applied, but major blood loss. Life-threatening condition. He is very weak. Shallow breathing, bad colour, appears to be severely malnourished and dehydrated. Emergency. Come quick.'
She put the phone back in the safe and, slamming the panel shut, raced back down the stairs to David. The tourniquet seemed to be holding, and she eased it a little, but the neck and shoulder wounds were still oozing dark blood. As she ripped his shirt away to assess the damage, David suddenly convulsed and went completely still.
He had stopped breathing.
As gently as she could, Sister Katherine pulled David down onto the carpeted floor and, hitching up her skirt, she straddled his lower body, placing the heel of her left hand in the centre of his chest and covering it with her right hand began to pump down rhythmically, counting the compressions.
After thirty, she stopped and gently tipped back David's head; lifting his chin with two fingers and pinching his nostrils shut, she sealed her mouth over his and blew in firmly, checking back to see that his chest was rising. It was, and she gave another breath before resuming the chest compressions.
Sister Katherine continued with the cycle of compressions and rescue breaths, losing all track of time as she pushed herself on and on. Her body was wracked with fatigue, but she never faltered, sweat running down her face like rose water, mixed with the blood that now swamped them both.
She stopped giving the breaths now, being physically unable to continue, but continued her rhythmic pressing of his chest like someone possessed, her frail body swaying from side to side as she slipped into semi-consciousness. A haze was coming down before her eyes, and she knew she could not continue for much longer, but she had to, she had to...
'O.K., Sister, come away, we have him now.'
Sister Katherine thought she was hallucinating.
'Where is that voice coming from? Go away. I must save him, God save him, God save him.'
Strong hands gripped her shoulders and firmly but gently pulled her off David. She opened her eyes in surprise and saw two other men opening boxes beside David, taking out bandages and instruments, and saw a third take out a hypodermic syringe, drawing fluid from a glass phial.
Sister Katherine became very agitated and shouted out loud, 'Stop! Stop! Who are you?'
She struggled in the arms of her captor and twisted up her head to look him in the face. He looked back at her.
'Quiet, Sister, we will save him....'
'Who are you?'
'Friends'
She was screaming now and hysterical, 'Leave him, leave him. Help!'
The man holding her put his face close to hers and spoke softly into her ear, and at once she became calm. He signalled to the medic setting up a drip, who quickly prepared a syringe and injected Sister Katherine in her upper arm. The strong sedative took immediate effect, and she slowly relaxed in his arms and smiled at his face.
She felt secure at last; the crisis was over, and she could surrender control to the protectors. She had been pushed to the very limits of physical and mental endurance, and now, in a drug-induced euphoria, she momentarily regressed from a strong, resilient, and courageous 78-year-old woman into the novitiate eager to impress those in spiritual authority, her wise elders. Grabbing the arm of her now silent companion, she said, 'I didn't forget you know, I never forgot.'
As she drifted into a drugged sleep, finally free from the heavy burden of responsibility, she silently mouthed the words that had been whispered into her ear, the password she had memorised for the first time nearly thirty years ago.
'Quis ut Deus.'
Sister Katherine had done her duty.
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Part Two
'Somebody else is working on this patient at the same time!'
The doctor stepped back from the operating table in astonishment and was quickly joined by the other medical staff in the theatre; they watched enthralled as the wounds on their would-be patient were remotely cleaned and sutured by an invisible surgeon. The procedures were carried out impossibly fast, and it required total concentration by the observers to keep up.
As soon as the treatment was completed, the wounds began to heal, and a wave of healthy pink skin rippled down the patient's torso like a fresh coat of paint. The ugly arterial wound on his leg became a thin, jagged line that was swept away on the healing tide, and the wasted musculature of the patient filled out with healthy tissue. The redundant doctors were confounded by what they had just witnessed and were unable to make any sort of rational comment.
David had arrived by private ambulance only an hour ago, and after an initial examination, had been prepped for surgery and brought straight to the theatre of this modern hospital facility. The doctors were fully prepared to meet any medical contingency, but the possibility of him being hijacked from their care had not been considered.
James, the senior doctor, was the first to find his voice.
'There is nothing left for us to do; ring for the nurse, John, if you would,' he said calmly.
John, the second medic, went to the wall phone and spoke briefly. Within a minute, the nurse appeared.
'Put the patient in a side ward, nurse,' James said. 'Keep him under constant observation and notify me immediately when he regains consciousness.'
'Yes, sir.'
The nurse wheeled the trolley out of the room and into a bright and airy single bay, skilfully transferring his patient onto the bed. Once satisfied that his patient was comfortable, he spoke softly into the telephone at the bedside and informed the nursing station of his location.
After making an entry in the patient log at the foot of the bed, the nurse then turned to the television monitor, which showed in split-screen the view in both directions down the corridor outside, and checked the standby battery, which was programmed to trip in if the mains supply was interrupted. Releasing the positioning lock, he swivelled the set round on its base so that he would be able to see the screen head-on from the chair by the side of the bed.
Daylight from the armour-plated window in the far wall opposite was shining directly on the screen, and reaching up, he carefully adjusted the set until the image was sharp and clear.
Picking up a checklist, he systematically verified the furniture and fittings in the room, methodically ticking off the relevant boxes.
All checks completed, the nurse settled into the chair by the bed to start his vigil, shifting in his seat and pushing his shoulder holster into a more comfortable position. Through the window, he could see the half-acre lawn outside. Rolled as flat as a cricket pitch and devoid of any possible cover, the area was constantly monitored by CCTV cameras. The nurse looked down on the sleeping face of his patient. Highly trained, he would remain constantly alert to any change in his condition.
In the main control room, an operative made an entry in his log and fractionally adjusted the contrast on his monitor. David was the only patient requiring constant surveillance, and he yawned slightly, but his eyes never left the screen.
It was going to be a long shift.
The treatment suite in the clinic descended into silence as it went into lockdown mode. In the administrative wing, the two doctors who had attended to David knocked on the door of the director's office and went inside. The director got up from his seat and, welcoming his visitors by name, indicated they should sit in the two chairs arranged in front of his desk.
The doctors looked tense and impatient to get straight down to business; both politely refused the offer of coffee.
The director was in his fifties but looked very fit, wearing an expensive grey suit underneath the hospital gown he had hastily donned when first called to the treatment room. In the flurry of activity afterwards, he had completely forgotten to take it off, and he now removed it, draping the gown over the back of his chair. Sleek and well-groomed, he could have passed for the chairman of a successful company, but the white scar that ran down to his jawline spoilt the effect.
'I would never have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes,' he said in perfect English that carried only the slightest inflexion. His accent was impossible to place, but it seemed that English was not his native language of birth.
Completely at ease, he unhurriedly adjusted his tie and straightened the front of his jacket.
'Whoever is responsible for the procedure we have just witnessed is not of this world,' he said calmly.
James said, 'I agree,' and without adding any further comment turned to his junior colleague.
'Can you give us your report, please, John?'
John, reading from his notes, spoke carefully and concisely.
'On the evidence of what we have seen and an initial examination of the patient post-operative, we can confirm that David is physically well but comatose. His body is functioning efficiently, albeit at a reduced, much slower metabolic rate than normal.'
He hesitated slightly before continuing.
'Something like we might expect to see in hibernation, but in this case, his mind seems to be operating independently. Brain scans reveal the high levels of activity indicative of a conscious waking state, but apart from the areas of the brain responsible for basic motor functions, none of the activity has any correlation with his life here.
We have no explanation for this other than the theory that David is simultaneously existing elsewhere. We believe that his mind has separated from his body, and he is consciously interacting with another world. It is not known if his mind requires a biological base to function; it may be able to exist in an immaterial form, but we speculate that, based on the evidence of the care taken to ensure it remains alive, he intends to return to his physical body at some time.
We have an element of control over his physical body here, but his conscious self is in a place beyond our reach. His mind could be functioning in another dimension, an alternative world, or even in cyberspace; we have no way of knowing. If he exists in a spatial dimension, he may be inhabiting an alien body as an avatar or in an exact simulacrum of his human self.
We do not have much to go on other than the bruising and contusions, but the wounding to his femoral artery in particular is situated in the exact position appropriate to a human body. These injuries were severe, and he was lucky the Sister found him in time and was able to administer the first aid that saved his life.
If David is injured again in the other dimension, we surmise his body here will exactly mirror the same wounds. Should he die alone and untreated in the other place, he will be beyond our help: we cannot resuscitate a corpse. Whilst he is in our care, we will provide access to all appropriate life support systems, but we will not attempt to revive him prematurely. That would truly be a step into the unknown and is an unacceptable risk for us to take. Only should a situation arise that gives us no other choice, would we be prepared to attempt a resuscitation.'
John paused to let the implications of his statement sink in.
"The conclusions we have so far stated are made in good faith, based on the limited evidence we have. The following observations are mostly guesswork but consistent with what we know of David's unique constitution and his determination to survive.
We believe that David has travelled between two quite different worlds.
From the evidence of the initial malnourished and dehydrated state in which he was found, it seems that it was difficult or even impossible for him to eat and drink normally in the initial environment. That would account for his poor condition even before his wounding whilst under the care of the Sister. That the Sister saved his life, both in this world and the other, is undeniable, and we recommend she be commended for her prompt action.
The extensive bruising on his back suggests that he fell from a height. The severing of the femoral artery also seems to have been the result of the fall, and the stone splinters in the wound suggest he landed on an irregular rocky surface.
His two physical bodies are separated, but what happens to one instantly happens to the other, regardless of the distance that separates them. It is similar, in effect at least, to a phenomenon at the subatomic level known to physicists as quantum entanglement. What we have to consider is that wherever he is now must appear to David as the real world, and his life here, if he can remember it, is possibly akin to a dream. However, if he had control of the initial transition, if it was planned, in other words, he may have ring-fenced memories of his life here to preserve the content. That is as far as I am prepared to go; any further speculation becomes more and more contrived and quite useless.
All we can say with certainty is that we have every reason to believe that David is safe and well, but we have no exact knowledge of his current circumstances. At the end of his journey, he will make his own decision as to his future path, but we have fulfilled our sworn duty to ensure he is free to make the choice.