Psychic Visions 08-Now You See Her... (19 page)

T
ia stopped beside
the little boy and casually draped her arm along the back of the chair. “Hi, are you here alone?”

Jeremy’s eyes grew wide and he nodded his head. “He’s coming back, he said.”

“Oh good.” She watched him shift slightly closer to his bunny. “What’s your pet’s name?”

“Dozer,” he said gleefully, giving him a big hug, continuing to chatter. “He’s mine, my dad gave him to me.”

“He’s cool.” She smiled. “Sounds like you have a great dad.”

“He’s awesome,” Jeremy shouted. “He’s the best.”

She laughed. “Are you ready to go see him? He’s outside.”

Jeremy looked outside, craning his neck to see his father. “Really? How come he’s not in here?”

“He’s talking on the phone and it’s too noisy inside.”

“Cool.” Then his lower lip trembled. He lowered his voice and said, “The man said I have to stay here.”

“And the man said I could take you outside.”

Jeremy brightened and held up his arms.

Her heart aching, she wrapped her arms around him, bunny and all. She stood up and blended into the interior. Choosing the closest exit, she walked carefully forward, determined to get this little boy out safely.

Holding her energy tight to her chest, she made it to the door in record time.

Outside she could feel her body tremble with the effort.

You’re doing great,
Stefan said calmly inside her head.
Take a left and head for the truck. Dean has gone after the kidnapper.

I think he’s ditched us,
she whispered, trying to preserve her strength.

Maybe, but maybe he didn’t ditch Hunter.

She crept forward trying to avoid any scenario that would involve the boy seeing his father attack a man or be attacked. He’d been through enough already. Only her strength wasn’t holding.

Slowing and scared, she knew she still had a distance to go, and her heart pounding, she knew she was in danger of not making it.

Something is wrong,
she whispered.
I don’t know what or why.

Wrong how? With you? With Jeremy? With the area around you?
Stefan snapped, looking for answers.

With me,
she cried.
Where are you? I don’t feel so good.
She started to run. To Stefan. To Dean. To anyone who could take care of Jeremy.

Fast.

I’m falling,
she cried out.

I’ve got you,
Stefan said, strong arms grabbing her.
Drop the shield.

Instantly her senses reasserted themselves. She looked around, trying hard to stay on her feet. Stefan held her and Jeremy.

Jeremy took one look at who held them and cried, “Stefan.”

“Hey, Jeremy, nice to see you again. How are you feeling?”

“Awesome sauce,” he cried and reached out to grab Stefan and hugged him hard.

Dean came running.

“Hey, Jeremy.”

“Daddy.”

Then everything went woozy and Tia sagged hard against Stefan.

Can’t make it.

And she succumbed to the darkness.

*

Dean caught his
son as he launched himself from Stefan into his arms. He shuddered, his arms closing tightly around the tiny body. Tears burned his eyes. God it had been close. Too close. He didn’t know what was going on, but if there was ever motivation needed to hunt this asshole down, the kidnapper had given him the perfect one. Put his family in danger, would he? It was not going to happen twice.

He’d kill the bastard before he got a second chance.

“Dozer doesn’t like french fries,” Jeremy announced. “But I bet she would.”

“Who’s she?” he asked, having trouble following his son’s train of thought.

“The nice lady who carried me out here.”

Dean smiled. “You know something, I bet she does. Maybe we should invite her to have some with us.”

Jeremy grinned. “We’re going to have to wait until she wakes up from her nap first,” he announced with his typical aplomb.

Dean spun around looking for Tia and found he was alone, except for the gang of cops heading his way. “Did you see her fall asleep?”

“Yes, she looked so tired, she just closed her eyes and fell, but Stefan caught her.” Jeremy laughed. “That’s how I’m going to go to sleep from now on.” He giggled. “And you can catch me and carry me to bed.”

Dean grinned. “I’d love to – once. After you give me lots of warning. Otherwise, I might not catch you.”

“Ha. Stefan caught her,” Jeremy complained. “And she didn’t warn him.”

“Sure she did,” Dean said, looking around the parking lot for Stefan and the sleeping Tia. He hoped they were in the truck. “You just didn’t hear her.” Motioning to his buddies, Dean casually carried Jeremy over to his vehicle. He should probably have his son checked over by the medical professionals to make sure the kidnapper didn’t do anything to him, but given his alert, happy disposition all he’d have to contend with was an overdose of french fries in his small tummy.

At the truck he saw Stefan standing on the far side. He was talking on the phone.

“No, it’s not a normal sleep. She’s out.”

Dean raced over, Jeremy bouncing in his arms. “How is she?” he asked in a low voice as he set Jeremy in the front of his truck.

“Out cold,” Stefan muttered.

Damn it. He peered into the back seat. She was stretched out on the seat, her knees hanging off the end. They’d have to shift her upward to be able to close the door. Her skin had a waxy pallor. He reached down and grabbed her hand. “She’s really cold,” he said in surprise. Jeremy popped up on his feet, a blanket in his hand. “For the lady.”

Dean gave his son a warm hug. God he’d never get enough of those chubby arms around his neck and said, “Thanks, Jeremy.”

He took the tiny blanket and spread it over Tia’s chest. He glanced at Stefan and mouthed, “What’s wrong?”

Stefan shrugged. “No idea. Why don’t you grab her hand and see if there is an improvement.”

Dean searched his features. “Okay.” He reached down and picked up Tia’s hand. The coolness of her skin was concerning. As was the laxness. He understood unconsciousness but in this case it was as if there was a lack of substance to her.

How that could be, he didn’t know. It was concerning. Holding her hand in his, he watched her features, hoping for a change.

“She’s here, right?”

“She’s here,” Stefan murmured. “But she said her energy was failing before she went down. As if too weak to do what she was doing. I caught her just before she collapsed.”

“Did she do anything different than any other time?” Dean asked. “Use any different energy. I know that sounds crazy, but…”

“Nothing is crazy in this business,” Stefan said. He glanced over at Jeremy and smiled…and froze. “Shit,” he said under his breath.

Dean glanced from Stefan to Jeremy and back again. “No shits allowed, tell me what’s wrong and it damn well better not involve Jeremy.”

Keeping his voice low, Stefan said, “Let me see the stuffed animal.”

Dean looked over at Dozer. He looked as normal and ratty as ever. He’d tried several times to separate Jeremy from the animal but he hadn’t succeeded. “What about it?”

“I’m thinking there is something…off with it.”

“Off? Off how?” Dean reached over and picked up Dozer as an unconcerned Jeremy played with the coins in the pocket on the dash. He gave the stuffy a quick search over but there wasn’t any tears or repairs to it that he could see. In fact, he looked normal.

He held it up to Stefan. “Looks fine.” He glanced over at Stefan only to see an odd look come over his friend’s face. “What is it?”

“It’s got a negative energy on it. It will damage anyone’s energy over time, but in this case, with Tia. It’s doing its damage now.”

“How?” Confused and worried, Dean looked at the stuffy and back at the comatose woman. “Surely this thing can’t be doing that kind of damage.”

“I can feel it from here,” Stefan said. “Now that I know it’s energized that way, I can protect myself for a little bit at least.”

“And Tia?” Dean said. “Jeremy loves this thing.”

“Which makes it a great weapon,” Stefan murmured, staring at the stuffed animal like it was a viper about to strike. “Oh…”

At the change in his voice, panic reached out and pinched his stomach. Dean said, “Oh, what?”

“The energy is changing. It’s balancing back out again.”

Dean snorted. “None of this made any sense to begin with, but now it really isn’t making any sense. How could it do that?”

“You. You’re doing it. You’re saving Dozer for Jeremy.”

*

Stefan could feel
the energy pulsing, searching as the changes that Dean had unknowingly made weakened. Waves of weak wrongness drifted in his direction. He deliberately pulled his own energy in tighter, snug up against his body.

This energy had a foreign atmosphere to it. Something damaged. Yet also seeking to heal. He frowned at the undulating waves drifting from the bunny. They weren’t strong. They weren’t specific. They were…pathetic.

Wondering, he pulsed a little healing energy into the center of the waves. Instantly his energy was absorbed. And the other energy strengthened. But was it strengthening in a good way or was he adding good energy to be converted to bad? He hadn’t added enough to see. He pulsed a little more. The energy flared then settled slightly.

Interesting. He pulsed more into the center of the bunny. What could take energy and turn it to something bad? Energy was energy. If this was a switch from positive to negative then an actual breakdown of the energy molecules must have happened.

Therefore, positive energy once applied should shift the balance back again.

Did he know how to do that? And even if he didn’t, all nature seeks balance, all nature seeks to heal. So in theory if he gave it positive energy, then it should rebalance and re-heal itself.

But it was a gamble. He didn’t know what caused this so if he didn’t have enough of what it was looking for, he could be making the scenario worse.

That was fear talking. Closing his eyes he tracked the energy back to the bunny and found an odd metal ball shoved deep inside. He carefully wrapped the ball in energy, gifting it with strong healing vibes and love. Always love. Fear was the absence of love and in that situation all negativity thrived. Fill the void with love and all turned to glorious positivity.

A hard lesson to learn.

He carefully imbued his wrapping with joyous love of all things. Then slowly unwrapped the ball.

It pulsed in a normal manner.

The energy had reversed.

So Dean’s overwhelming relief and love for his boy had affected the ball, just not enough to heal it fully.

But it still needed to come out. Using his senses, he tracked the slight trail the ball had made as it was shoved deep inside the bunny. It was tiny, like shot from a shotgun. Unnoticeable in most scenarios. Certainly for most people, unnoticeable in this situation.

He opened his eyes and reached for the bunny.

And damn it if it didn’t send out a shock wave.

“Shit,” he murmured, shaking his fingers. “That stung.”

“What did?” Dean asked, frowning at him. “I can’t feel anything.”

Stefan opened his vision to include Dean’s energy, and sure enough, he’d been surrounding the bunny in bright positive energy so it wouldn’t hurt Tia. He likely hadn’t known and now that the ball was fine, he hadn’t turned down his output.

“Shut down the energy a little, will you please,” Stefan asked as he watched the frown on his friends face and the automatic lowering of the power he’d used to keep Tia safe. Very interesting.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Dean said, staring at the bunny. “I’m not doing anything.”

“Yes you are, or were rather, as you’ve corrected it now.” Stefan laughed. “Take them home and look after them.” He turned toward his car. “I’ll follow.”