Chapter 45: As Time Goes By

Michael’s ribs hurt from his beatings. They weren’t broken, at least he didn’t think they were, but the pain from them slowed him down a little as he gathered up Phillip’s rifle and vest. There were some pain pills in the one pocket and he downed them with a sip of water from a utility sink nearby. He may or may not live long enough for them to work, but they couldn’t hurt.
His weapons were checked and made ready, and he asked himself for the last time what he was fighting for. Was it Jamie? Was it Tanya? Was it himself? He had to have a finish line to cross or he would fall short.
He closed his eyes and relaxed, deciding that he should let his heart decide what his life would be worth- what the people would completely fail to see as they wrote his elegy. It came to him with a surprising lack of effort. It made sense and was worth fighting for, and would drive him unto the end. Failure was not acceptable, and with Jamie causing havoc on her own, he had a chance of bringing it off.

There was silence in the halls as Janet stepped silently through them, carefully checking the doorways as she approached them and wishing that at least one of the enemy would show themselves and put up a fight. Her blood was boiling and her heart was racing. It had started the moment she had woken up and had become progressively harder and faster, and regardless of the agency’s design specs for it, it had to be wearing out from pumping so hard for so long. Her spirit was rapidly burning away at both the physical and meta-physical ends. 
“Heavenly Father... Please give me the strength and the time I need.”
The words had just come out in a whispered voice, as if they were from the deepest part of her soul. In some way they comforted her, and they brought forth more words from inside her that gave her strength. They were lyrics and rhythms she had known long ago, had sung in the coffee shops, and had presented to others in such a beautiful form that one could not help but take them to heart.
The words cooled her blood a little, perhaps just enough to keep her alive, and she started to hum the music and sing the words softly to herself as her ears and eye scanned everything around her.
“Help me, teach me, change me Lord,
Arm me with your shield and sword.
Bless me with Your Word of Truth,
Unto me Your Living Proof.”
She heard a rifle trigger start to move and spun out of the doorway she was in front of, wincing as the pounding of the automatic fire temporarily deafened her. The muzzle followed her out of the doorway and she was ready for it, forcing the rifle towards the ceiling and driving the butt of her rifle into the man’s face with her elbow.  He was off balance and she spun, letting go of the barrel and drawing her Springfield from the horizontal holster on the back of her belt. Even her left hand was working well tonight and her finger brushed the safety off a hair before the trigger broke and sent the scum into the afterlife. It had been so fast, less than a few seconds between life and death, and she hadn’t even started breathing hard.
Her ears were still ringing so she did not hear the footsteps behind her as she relieved the corpse of its weapons. There was a change in the air around her and she dove to the side, rolling as her attacker fired his pistol at her, missing, but only just. Her eye locked onto the hatred in the face of the man called Robbie. He was bleeding profusely from his carelessly bandaged arm and his left hand shook with the stress the wound put on his body, making Jamie realize that her luck had not yet run out.
His gun was empty now. The stress and the hatred made him stare at her across the sights, motionless but for his heavy breathing. Janet stood, tucking her pistol away and stepping closer, putting her chest against the smoking muzzle of the AMT Javelina, impressed that the man could control the ten-millimeter with just his single hand.
“I know those eyes... They were on the other side of the sub-machine gun that shot me.”
She pushed closer and Robbie started to back-pedal, stopping against the wall, the gun jabbing him painfully in the chest and feeling overpowered by the fear induced within him at the way the girl was staring at him.
“I’m still alive. You failed to kill me, but you took my eye.” A wicked smile formed as she listened to the voice inside her. “ ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot’. And given the other things you’ve done to me, I think it’s only fair.” 
Her arm swung and drove her knife though his eye socket and into his brain. It was a mercifully quick death given his crimes against her, but she did not have the time to make them feel what she and so many others had. There were more out there, waiting for her.
A quick swipe cleaned the knife on Robbie’s shirt before it went back in its sheath. The hunt wasn’t close to being over. Not by a long shot.

Michael heard commands from the end of the hall, a leader mustering the troops in order to overwhelm Jamie. It hurt like hell with his bruised bones, but Michael crept silently along in a crouch with one eye locked on his front sight and the other watching for any sign of movement. 
A head leaned out of a doorway further down and he snapped off a shot, crisp and clean as a springtime mountain river, or so his mind waxed poetically in that instant. The body fell to the floor in the doorway and a few breaths later another one peered out, nearly receiving a similar fate. The target ducked back, just in time, and then started spraying around the corner with an MP5 on full-auto. 
Michael ducked into an open door to wait out the fusillade, his mind beginning to wander even as his body kept tabs on everything of its own accord. He could feel it- the same as he had in Prague four years earlier. 
Death was all around him. It had filled the building like an evil, toxic gas, yet somehow he felt warmed by it, perhaps even aroused instinctually, right down to his primordial roots. It calmed him in a way that was so dissimilar from his usual worries in a firefight. He felt untouchable.
On continued reflection, somewhere in the second thirty-round magazine being sprayed down the hallway, he started to wonder whether the pills had been laced by their previous owner for some reason.
“Two... One... Jam.” 
He spun around the corner like his gut told him to, rushing as hard as he could towards the sub-machine gun that had, in fact, jammed just when Fate had told him it would. The gun had been pulled back into the door to be cleared and Michael heard the bolt clack shut and readied himself, diving past the open door and turning, firing rapidly as the gunman came into view and catching him with several rounds to the chest. 
Michael’s short flight ended on the other side of the doorway, smacking hard on the floor and rolling into a crouched position. He was facing the last of the enemy, the leader of their squad, who had moved fast in order to take advantage of what he thought would be an easy mark. Their eyes met across the other’s gun sights for an instant; fractions of a second that Michael could almost count, so fast his mind was working. He never hesitated in firing, though, and the man went down from the headshot, a forty-caliber ticket to the next existence.
It had been several surreal moments, and as he stepped into the room to check the bodies and gather a few more weapons, he started to react to the physical results of such stress. The intense watering that suddenly started in his mouth was only a second’s worth of warning before the heaving of his stomach, upset at the physical demand and nervousness that his mind had set aside. 
As he prayed over a convenient office trash can, he remembered that moment in Prague just before he entered the final room, when his body had done the same thing. He had reflected later, in the hospital, that it had been his instincts telling him that the next step would be the one that mattered, and would be the riskiest. Death was likely, and like a fool he had ignored the warning and kept going.
Spitting the last of the taste from his mouth, he understood what a crock that line of thinking had been. Instincts were fine and all, but they weren’t prophecy. His body was only reacting to stimuli, nothing more, and while he had the power to push past it, there were limits to everything. Even his body would fail, just like in Prague, if pushed hard enough.
Michael chose his pick of the weapons carefully, steeling himself for the struggle to come and knowing that if he had any hope of survival, he had to fight as hard as Jamie. He had to make it a race to see who got to Amherst first. It was the only way to meet his full potential.
He slipped the sling of the MP5 over his head, his wounded shoulder protesting but less loudly than before, thanks to the medicine. He was down to twenty rounds for his Smith, fifteen of which he consolidated into one magazine, leaving the other five for backup, should he need them. Chances were pretty good that he would, and soon. A single grenade was there as well, and Michael hesitated in picking it up at first, but it went onto his belt anyway in spite of the recent experiences with them still fresh in his mind. This was no time to be giving in to fear.
The hall was still quiet, but somewhere in the building he could hear rifle fire. Jamie was on the loose and wreaking havoc for all she was worth, drawing everyone towards her. Amherst would be around somewhere. He had no place to back down to.
Michael steeled himself and stepped into the hallway.

Janet paused behind a large machine in a shop room, switching her magazine and quickly thumbing the rounds from a nearly empty one into a half-full one. She could hear footsteps on the stairs at the far end of the long hallway she had just passed through- a group of pursuers that had been attracted by the bullet-filled deaths of three of their comrades. They might think they were hunting her but they were still on the defensive, being led by her into whatever trap she decided to spring.
Her housekeeping was complete and she closed her eye, breathing as deep as she could to settle her nerves, and listening carefully to the sounds of the men. Her body was beginning to lose steam and the pause was necessary to catch her breath, but the bloodlust was fading. She had to find Amherst soon or she would be too weak to fight.
Two guards stepped into the room and split up, clearing it from each side as they advanced in the near-darkness. The light from the hall made the shadows deeper and more sinister, or maybe it was their target. Regardless, the halting, cautious steps gave Janet plenty of time to plan her moves, and she waited until the man nearest her was mere feet away. 
The guards both swung to the left to face the clatter of the magazine Jamie had tossed there, opening them up to her attack. She spun around the machine and lunged at the man, her hand lining up the glowing Tritium sights on her Walther and squeezing off two rounds into the man’s head at point-blank range. Her right arm extended and triggered a long burst from her rifle at the other one, the flash lighting up the room in a strobe effect that only ended when the man had fallen to the floor dead. 
There was more movement at the end of the hall and the beam of a tactical light captured her in the open. The rounds that followed it narrowly missed their target as she dove into the room and rolled, tossing a grenade into the hallway before scrambling to her feet again and lunging through the other door from the room. The grenade detonated, shaking the walls and floor, and bits of shrapnel bounced around the machine room she had just been in. With any luck, that had slowed the men down some. 
Janet did not wait to catch her breath again. She started working her way through the rooms and halls, heading towards the place her instincts were telling her Amherst was hiding.

The grenade sent a message though the entirety of the building: That the game of death had been taken to a new level. Everyone inside now knew what was really at stake.
Michael was glad for that. The few inside the building who were determined to live were going to be shaken, a precious bit of advantage against them. He could only hope that they wouldn’t put up as much of a fight as the others he had run into.
He entered a larger room that was surrounded on the edges with catwalks and stairs, and a large open area in the middle that stretched several floors. A chain hoist was in the middle well alongside the cable hoist for a machine. Michael stepped to the railing and peered at the bottom that was three floors down. 
His right eye caught movement in its periphery and he spun away from it, lunging to the side and gasping as the machete’s edge caught him on the shoulder instead of the throat as was intended. Michael quickly recovered and shifted his stance to meet the physical threat with the frame of his rifle, deflecting the blade into the strap. The razor-sharp edge slipped through it and it came free, whipping around as the enemy kicked Michael in the stomach and knocked him backwards against the stairway’s rail. 
The blade swung again, sparking against the steel railing as Michael shifted away and barely avoided the strike. His mind wasn’t able to react quickly enough to the attacks and his body started to react instinctively, lunging forward towards the attacker, swinging the rifle at the end of the sling ahead of him to deflect the next slice of the blade. 
The rifle nearly caught the enemy on the head, but quick reflexes saved him as he leaned backwards and felt the muzzle of the gun brush his nose as it passed. He back-pedaled, trying to recover his balance as Michael closed in to grab his shirt with his right hand, and launched a palm-strike with his left, the blow hitting quickly and at the same time as the discarded rifle hit the floor.
Michael’s momentum carried them both to the railing of the center well, slamming into it and sending a metallic rattle through the room. A knee to the groin took the remaining fight from his enemy and Michael lifted him up and over the rail, and then watched in a detached way as the man fell to the bottom and landed in a heap.
A searing pain hit him and he felt his chest, finding a small D-handled knife stuck in his side, apparently an unnoticed strike as he had lifted the man in his adrenaline-induced fury. It was getting tougher to catch his breath, the number of gasps rising at an alarming rate and signaling a serious injury, perhaps a lung hit.
“Ah! Shit!”
Another spike of pain swept through him as he had drawn his pistol, causing him to hunch slightly over and take carefully metered steps towards the stairway leading upwards. Leaving the knife in was the best way to slow his bleeding, but each step only worked it around in his side and caused more injury and pain. He had to stop and take care of it if he was going to move any further.
A crate was convenient for a rest and sitting down helped Michael gather the strength and courage to yank the knife out, suppressing a yell of pain as the barbed edges tore more flesh on their way out. His right hand was shaking uncontrollably from the pain and took several flexes to settle down enough to stuff a bandage into the wound and tape it. It would slow the bleeding but not stop it internally. Untreated, death was certain, but he only needed enough time to finish his task.
“It’s useless, you know.”
Michael snapped around to face the man who spoke, his mind automatically taking note of the rifle in his hands. He had snuck up on Michael while he had been focusing on controlling the pain and had, for some reason, decided to hold his fire this long.
“Yeah. But if I’m going to die here, I’m going to fight unto the end.” His left hand gripped the Smith, but he had to focus a little harder to make sure his point-shot was going to go where he wanted. 
“I prefer the sport of shooting armed men to the unarmed.” The rifle lifted, taking aim at his head. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“That’s very generous.” Michael had little hope of actually winning this one. He had to turn nearly all of the way around to even bring his weapon to bear, seconds too long to avoid the head shot from the rifle. Moving off the axis would help, but at that range it was only a minor correction from the rifle to kill him. 
He turned his face away, determining to spin to his left and rapid fire the pistol from a retention position, making for the most error in shot placement but removing the time needed to extend his arm for an aim. It was just going to be a hope and prayer type of move. He took a few breaths and steeled himself, his opponent being sporting enough to ignore the tensing of Michael’s body and wait until he actually moved.
An object streaked past the level they were on in the central well, from top to bottom, and Michael felt two bullets whiz past him to strike the man, the body thumping to the concrete floor, dead before he hit. It had been so fast, an impossible shot.
He stood and made his way to the well, looking down in time to catch a glimpse of Jamie loosening the chain from her legs and drop to the floor. She casually glanced up to check on him but never gave a second look as she darted out of sight towards the opposite stairway, her boots pounding on the steps as she sprinted up them as fast as she could safely manage. Michael caught a glimpse of her technique and was proud that she was using everything he had taught her, even in the torn up and carefree condition she was operating in. She really was pulling all of the stops to get Amherst in her sights, using everything she knew and trained for.
The rifle was ready to go on a full magazine and was now Michael’s last chance. Getting to Amherst was now the goal. He couldn’t possibly beat Jamie to him in his current condition, but he could be there to make sure she got her chance at revenge.

Janet shrugged off the exhilaration from her make-shift bungee jump to save Michael and poured her strength into her legs, making up for the time she had just lost doing what she had said she would not. Amherst had gone up to the top level and was now waiting for her- his smirk at her from a floor above had stated his expectation. They would have it out, if only she would face him.
Michael was also making his way up, she saw from the other end of the room, but he was slowed by his injuries and probably would be lucky to make it to the top level at all. She knew he was trying, but could not count on his help.
No, this was hers and hers alone. 
The top level came into view and her caution slowed her, aiming carefully while scanning around her with all her still-working senses. The top step was a little loose, she noticed, but it didn’t matter and was only a distraction to be discarded in her information processing. The real target was there somewhere, and she found him as she mounted the last step, curious about his relaxed manner in the face of someone intending to annihilate him. 
“I’ve been waiting, little girl.” He lit a cigar and puffed pensively, even as the revolver in his hand was aimed at her with his arm across his chest.
“Believe me, so have I. I’ve been waiting for a long time to see you again.”
He blinked in curiosity rather than surprise. “Oh?”
Janet smiled wickedly, a gleam in her eye at having finally come face to face with her nemesis and knowing that he would be dead at her hands, even if it destroyed herself in the process.
“Oh yes. You and I have unfinished business.”
Amherst smiled a little, perhaps feeling satisfaction at his importance to her. “It’s nice to be wanted.”
Janet stepped to the side, moving to make his shot harder in a manner that would not be obviously so directed. His eyes never left hers and she had to figure that he was trying to read her as Michael always did and was having trouble.
“Oh, you’re wanted all right.”
“Forgive me for the lack of courtesy, but I seem to have forgotten your name.”
“My name is Janet... Janet Wells.”
The butcher smiled again after a moment’s recollection, his memory serving him well once jogged. “Ah yes... Janet. Your face is different now, but I can see you behind it. I still remember that night and the shrill cries of your friends as I cut them.”
The measured goad had its effect, Janet’s face turning beet red in spite of her condition. Amherst adjusted his position to keep his gun ready for her, making sure he gave her no clear advantage that she could exploit.
“I’m surprised an animal like you bothered to memorize it.”
“It’s hard to forget making a masterpiece. You were a star.”
Janet realized her position and settled her hot temper, refusing to give him another advantage over her. “I’m in a different line of work now. I’m just a courier today.”
“Hm?”
His confused look was met with another smile from the woman, the game switching sides with her words. 
“I have a message for you. ‘You are wicked in my eyes, and now My wrath shall descend upon you. May your sins be your fate and lead you unto your eternal damnation. So sayeth the Lord’.” 
Janet lunged off her spot and swing the rifle up, triggering off a volley as Amherst also moved to avoid, the bullets peppering the crate next to him and sending splinters into the air around him. His gun came up and the cannon-like report boomed through the building. 
Janet felt the bullet pass very near her head as it ripped through the steel wall she had ducked behind. The power of the 460 S&W Magnum cartridge was intimidating, and even through her earplugs it was deafening. The sound pounded her head like a sledge and it took a full second for her to recover when Amherst stopped to reload, swinging the assault rifle around the wall and emptying the magazine into the area before moving again to avoid the deadly return fire.
“You can’t win, little girl!” Amherst’s yell came after the first return shot, his voice showing the strain he had in trying to hear himself amid the din. “I fucked your friends! I fucked you! I fucked that blonde bitch! And I fucked your agency! You were powerless to stop any of it!”
Janet hid behind a crate and hoped that he hadn’t seen her move there. The wood was no help to her as cover, and she needed time to recover her depleted strength. Her breaths were ragged with her exertion, the pain in her chest searing even over the drugs, and a stifled cough into her fist showed traces of blood. The voice inside her spoke of diminished time, a warning about the impending end that she could not afford to meet before her mission was finished.
“I’m going to kill you again, you little cunt! And I’ll go on killing others, just to see them bleed!”
Her eyes shut tight and focused past the pain, willing it to the back of her mind’s concerns.
“SHOW YOURSELF!”
Janet spun around the crate, drawing her Springfield and leveling the sights onto Amherst’s head, the post steady in the rear notch as if it was frozen there in her grip.
Amherst had her pegged, his sights already on her, and she watched the cylinder click into place as the hammer began to fall. She had a brief sight of the gun firing before the bullet slammed into her Springfield, shearing the slide from the frame and sending into her forehead, dazing her even as she spun to take the hit and try to recover. It took every ounce of control she had left to draw her Walther with her right hand and bring it up, firing rapidly through her splotchy vision at the doubled image of Amherst. A round struck home and he moved, spoiling his aim on her and resulting with a three-hundred grain projectile through her left lung, the shock of the impact knocking her flat on her back.
Silence reclaimed the space for a short time as the pair slowly came to their senses. Amherst was bleeding from a shot to his lower abdomen, Janet from a through-and-through in her chest. Somehow, both managed to get to their feet, though Janet coughed hard, the blood and pink froth splattering on the floor.
“Now...” His gun came up again, though decidedly less assured. “Now you die.”
Janet’s arm wouldn’t move. The gun was still being held tight, but something was preventing the actuators from moving it into firing position. She looked at Amherst, determined to face him better than she had before: defiant and determined until the last.
A short burst of rifle fire sounded and Amherst jerked to his left, spun, and fired a shot at Michael who had finally made it to the top of the stairs. Michael was knocked backwards down the stairs from the bullet he took, too exhausted and injured to even try dodging.
“No!” Janet’s heart screamed, even as the word came out as a whimper. Her knees buckled and she went down, her loss of control reminding her of where her heart needed to focus- on the task at hand.
Ian Amherst started laughing, his cackle broken only by a bloody cough. He rolled over and glared at her, and then brought the gun back to aim at her, despite lying on the ground.
“I’ll finish you, bitch!”
Jamie rolled over and struggled to her knees, and then shakily to her feet. She wasn’t going to die like a dog again! Not to mention that she had to finish the man before her life ended, and that meant getting to him.
“Yea...”
The gun fired and Janet’s body went numb, the bullet lodging in her spine after passing through her liver. It was only the fact that her body had mechanical compensators that allowed her to continue staggering towards her target. 
“Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.”
The gun sounded again and she fell, only ten feet away, with her hip smashed by the impact of the round. Her body felt nothing but a burning surge of energy, her arms more than strong enough to pull her closer to him.
“For thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” 
The last shot of the revolver fired, tearing into her chest at an angle and running down along it, missing her heart but opening up the cavity on it’s way through. It exploded out her back in a bloody spray but did not faze her in the least, as her eyes were looking beyond herself now.
Amherst could not move away, as Christiansen’s burst had impacted his spine and made his legs useless. His own body was failing him as the pain and shock began to take hold. He was frozen in place as Janet grabbed his shirt and pulled herself to within inches of his face, the blood from her lips dripping on his face as she looked at him with curiosity. It was as if she was not entirely sure that what she was looking at was real.
“Are you afraid, Ian Amherst? Do you feel like there’s no possible hope for you?” 
His eyes told her. The eyes are the windows to the soul, as Michael liked to say, and she could see this man’s soul. It was a scummy, pathetic, and fearful thing now.
“You’re going to die.” Her voice came in whispers, as if telling a secret. “Your life will end in pain and suffering. The last thing you will see is my face, gazing down at you.” 
She reached back and drew her knife, resting the point against the man’s throat, the angle sure to not just cut it but drive deep enough to hit the brain if she so desired.
“If you beg, I will kill you quickly. Beg me like the dog you are, or I’ll make the pain last as long as I can.”
Amherst knew fear now, she could see. The words she had chosen were the same he had spoken to her on that dark, God-forsaken night in Paris. They were words she had never really forgotten, even as a cyborg named Jamie, and they were the justice she had longed to unleash upon him from the moment she had gained new life.
Whatever his soldier credentials, he had long since lost them when his heart had changed. The coward within him spoke up, fearing the eyes of the creature before him.
“P-Please.... Please end it quick.”
Whether he realized it or not, he had used her own words as his response, so it was only fitting to finalize this flashback to memory lane by ending it the same way.
Janet Wells leaned down and whispered in his ear. 
“No.”
The knife slipped into his throat and no farther, his screams cut off by the blade’s broadside blocking them. Instead, a whistling gurgle seeped from around it and the blood sprayed slightly as she held the blade in place and started into his eyes. 
The last memory of Ian Amherst was of the girl staring down at him with a sadistic smile, the same smile he had given her.
Janet sagged to the floor and managed to roll over to look at the huge skylight, the night having claimed the last vestiges of the light that had marked her last day on this earth. She had missed it.
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.”

Michael dragged himself to his feet with his good arm, his other entirely useless from the bullet-smashed shoulder, though he could only feel a portion of the pain. Either the shock or the damage had blocked the feeling from it and it was only a considerable niussance as he struggled up the stairs once again.
A thumping sound blasted the building and a detached (and less hard-working) portion of his brain told him it was the agency helicopters arriving. Somehow, he knew they would not be in time.
Jamie was there, leaning over Amherst as he shuddered his last moments of life, and once she was sure he was dead, fell over and was still. 
“Jamie...”
Michael stumbled forward as best he could, eventually falling next to her as his strength gave out. She was still breathing, and it was the last bit of time he had left.
He brushed the hair from her face, a touch that brought a smile to her bloody lips
“Jamie... Jamie, I love you.”
“I love you too, Michael.
“I’m sorry I never told you.”
“Mm...” Her eye opened a little and looked at him. “I never doubted it, because I love you too.”
Somehow he managed to pull her to him, his face against hers and a gentle kiss on her cheek. His body was failing fast from shock.
“Reach in my pocket if you can.”
It was slow, but she managed to get her hand into his pocket and felt something there. She pulled it out but could not move any further.
“What is it?”
“Our toll for the ferryman.” The River Styx was wide. They were going together and tradition said they would need a guide. “Death and taxes are eternal.”
“Is that what that was.” She now understood why he had placed the coin on the body of that Carabinieri woman.
“It can’t hurt, huh?”
They were both silent after that. Somewhere in the building the agency was looking for them, but the only sounds he could hear were of their breathing, both growing weaker and more ragged as time went on. It was taking it’s time and he hated waiting in silence, but neither had any more to say. 
“Mama?”
Jamie’s voice broke the silence, but just barely with as weak as it was.
“Jamie?”
“I can see them, Michael. My mom and dad, Angie and Carol... it’s a party for me. I want you to meet them.”
“You go on ahead, Jamie... I won’t be long behind.”
He sensed, rather than felt, her body relax. She was still, and the blurring of his vision told him he was not long behind her, as he had said.
It was a funny thing, he had to admit: It was her birthday today.
“Happy birthday, Jamie.”

He must have blacked out for a short time because the next thing he knew, he was looking at a young girl, smiling cheerfully as she stepped to Ian Amherst and plucked his soul out, scattering it to the winds with a gentle blow from her lips. She leaned over and brushed a hand over Jamie, pausing for a moment in confusion as the soul came out and split briefly into two before merging once again. This one went into the flower basket she held. Her hand reached for Michael, and he had never known such comforting warmth in his life.