Chapter 32: Congratulations on Your Coma (Part II)

Hospitals gave Elaine a sense of barely sedated hyperactivity. As environments they acted on a casual organization that required the motion of numerous individuals at all times, a business that blurred through the halls producing a constant din that never mixed enough to become white-noise. Footsteps melted with the cocktail buzz of conversation, the snuffling and beeping of machinery, the rattle of passing carts, and the hollow echo of ringing telephones from the nurse’s station. It would be a strange blessing, she mused, that anyone could sleep in all the punctuated noise—even in the coma ward.

Even Frog’s voice didn’t seem as distracting as the amalgam of the hospital’s sounds and she happened to be on the phone talking to one of her dozen boyfriends. Elaine’s brain didn’t focus so much on her words as process the conversation in a side band while she worked, a sort of peripheral listening; she had a more important task at hand, but knowing when it would be okay to call Frog over later that night (after her rendezvous) would be a good thing to know.

Elaine worked in quick spurts, inputting flurries of commands into the Enoch in her hands. Six times in the last hour she updated the program, sideloaded it into Emily’s old iPhone, and watched the results of the coding. Chance’s connection to much of the outside world had been broken when Zane cut the broadcast device built next to Roger’s room with the Faraday cage and it’s rune wards—but at this range the Cathedral glass on the iPhone still reacted to the emanations of his psyche. Covering all her bases, however, Elaine also currently had Zane reconstructing another Faraday rune-cage around the coma ward.

After her final test, Elaine set the Enoch to do a diagnostic of the iPhone and while that ran a pair of shadows occluded the fluorescent hospital lights.

“I’ll call you back,” Frog said to her phone and closed it. “Emily. Tom. I’m afraid Elaine is a little busy right now. Should you even be out of bed?”

“You’re Frog, aren’t you?” Tom asked. They shook hands. “I can see all the things that you’ve been doing for Chance and Emily has told me most of the background. I’ve heard that Elaine’s quick action may have saved my life. Even if she tried not to take credit, I just felt the need to thank everyone…you personally.”

Elaine pressed the Enoch closed and terminated the connection with the iPhone abruptly—the other phone fell into an idle state as she scooped it up.

“You’re welcome,” she said.

Emily momentarily glanced back to room her comatose brother lay within. Standing next to Tom in the bright lights she looked almost vulnerable, as if she could allow a bit of her guard to drop in his presence. Elaine sympathized silently, with Frog and Zane by her side she always felt more comfortable confronting strange circumstances. Whatever the approach, the status of her newfound brother, his connection to her out-of-control campaign, and all the ramifications that brought certainly merited the label of “strange.”

“I apologize,” Emily said. “I should not have threatened you after all you’ve done for me. I did pay you to discover the person behind my fears and you did find him. I am too used to my political opponents digging up dirt and using it against me and you struck a nerve. Digging is what private investigators do, after all.” She patted Tom’s arm and nodded. “At least I still have one brother I can talk to, and I’m not going to ignore Chance any longer. Even if he is in a coma.”

“You can still talk to Chance,” Elaine said. She held up the iPhone she’d just programmed and shook it lightly.

“I don’t understand,” Emily said. “He’s still in a vegetative coma… We just had his physicians look him over again on the off chance… Isn’t that my old phone?”

Elaine nodded. “The Cathedral glass on this phone is still active. I’ve spent the past few hours while Zane’s worked trying to reestablish the connection we lost when we cut him off. I can’t get anything like the resolution I had earlier, but if you can settle for texting.”

Tom took the offered iPhone and looked at the screen, then back towards the room.

Don’t worry, Emily, the screen read. I’m still here to cheer you on.

“Is that really him?” asked Tom, he handed the phone to Emily.