Chapter 25 and Epilog

Chapter 25

It was just over an hour later when Peter finished negotiations with the Army. He found his friends in an office, cuddled together in one of the portable, inflatable nests that sentinel troops take with them on missions. He could see right away that Blair was glowing and he could scent that both sentinels had taken comfort from their guide. He spoke softly to Jim, as he was head of his pack, and asked permission to enter the nest.

“Do we have authorization to go onto the Army Base?” Spike asked, as Peter settled himself in the nest.

“If you agree to the conditions,” Peter said.

“What conditions?” Spike growled.

“General Henry Gideon is a Medal of Honor winner. He lost his guide three months ago while on a mission. The Army doesn’t want to lose him. They recognize his need for healing, a new guide and psychiatric counseling, but feel that he was vulnerable due to his grief and deliberately mislead. He was not acting out of any selfish drive to steal another sentinel’s guide. We have permission to go onto the base only if you and Jim agree not to exercise your rights under sentinel law, as it applies to General Gideon.”

“I’ll only agree to that if he agrees to give up Xander without a fight,” Spike said.

“I have a plan,” Peter said. “The four of us will go to Xander together, Jim and I will remove the General. He will be transferred, immediately, to a secure sentinel facility in Boston Massachusetts. He will receive healing and will not be released until he bonds with a new guide.” Peter took a deep breath. “It’s a good deal, Spike, I had to press hard for the agreement that he remain in hospital lock-up until he bonds. In addition, a Sentinel Prime will have access to the General for questioning. The Army may want to sweep this whole thing under the rug but the Sentinel Guild won’t allow it. Someone in the government recruited the General for this mission and the SG wants to know who that person is. That’s where the real culprit lies.”

“And if the General puts up a fight?” Jim asked.

“You and Spike have to give your word. I don’t. I want the General to live so he can be questioned. The Army knows that. So I’ll give you my word. If the only way to get to Guide Xander Harris is to kill General Gideon, I will kill him myself.”

“In that case you have my word,” Spike said.

“And mine,” Jim said.

Peter looked at his watch. “The chopper will be here in about five minutes. I’ll be bringing my guide and some of my troops on the chopper with us just in case they are needed, but there is no plan for them to be involved with extracting the General from Xander’s room. We will meet with a Sentinel Dr. Rupert Giles when we get to the base. He’s been treating Xander and is one of the best guide doctors in the country. I’ll meet you in back of the building in five minutes.”


The flight to the Army base had been terribly long, from Spike’s point of view, and now being forced to meet with Dr. Giles, when Xander was in the building, was nearly intolerable. If it weren’t for the bond with Blair he doubted he would be able to control himself.

“I need to get to Xander,” Spike said, interrupting the conversation.

“Were you able to follow anything we have said?” Dr. Giles asked.

Spike stood up and growled at the doctor.

Dr. Giles looked startled for a moment and then he understood. “Oh, I apologize Sentinel. I simply meant that all your focus is at getting to your guide. It’s understandable, under these circumstances, that you may…”

“Apology accepted,” Spike interrupted. “Let’s go,” he said to Blair.

Blair and Spike entered an office two doors down and waited.

Dr. Giles called General Gideon. “General Gideon,” he said. “I have the results of Guide Xander’s blood tests, please come to my office so that we can discuss them.”

“We can discuss them on the phone,” the General said.

“No, General, we can’t,” the doctor said. “Even though Xander is in a coma he can still hear our conversation. I will not take the chance of any negative impact on my patient. Please come to my office, Guide Nurse Calendar will remain in the room. I assure you that she will notify me immediately if there is any change in Xander’s condition.”

“How long is this going to take, doctor?” the General asked.

“I don’t anticipate a conversation longer then fifteen minutes, General.”

“Fine, I will be right down.” The General hung up the phone and walked to the elevator. He was worried about what Dr. Giles had found, if the doctor felt discussing it in Xander’s room could have a negative impact then it couldn’t be good.

Jim and Peter moved to a back corner of the doctor’s office where they would not be in the General’s line of sight when he entered. Nurse Calendar had helped the General dial down all his senses in an effort to keep from zoning out and to help lessen his drive to attempt a bond with Xander. When he entered the doctor’s office, he was not smiling. The doctor invited him to sit down and it wasn’t until he saw movement out of the corner of his eye, as Jim took up a guard position at the door, that he noticed anyone else in the room. All his senses immediately went to full alert and he glared at the doctor.

“I told you my mission was classified, doctor. I’ll have you court-martialed for this.”

“Thank you doctor,” Peter said. “You may leave now.” Dr. Giles got up from his desk. Jim moved aside to let him leave the office and then closed the door and took up the guard position again.

The General glared at the two men and a low growl rumbled from his chest.

“I am Sentinel Prime Peter Wall,” Peter said, ignoring the growl and its implied challenge. “We need to talk General.” Peter walked around the doctor’s desk and sat down. “Please, General, sit.”

“I don’t have time for this,” the General said, “I need to get back to my guide.”

“General!” Peter’s voice held a tone of command that made the General turn around.
“Sit down.”

“I don’t take orders from you,” The General said, and turned back toward the door.

“I have new orders for you, from the Army, General. They order you to stand down!”

The General turned once again and watched as the Sentinel Prime pulled an official looking packet of orders from his dispatch pouch. The General walked over and grabbed the orders from Peter Wall’s hand. He read them and then looked up at Peter. “Where did you get these?” he asked.

“I’ve been in touch with the Army, General. You’ve been lied to. The sentinel guarding the door is Sentinel Detective James Ellison of the Cascade Police. He is Sentinel Liaison Officer, Pack Leader and second bond to Guide Xander Harris.”

The Generals eyes got big and then he flopped into the nearby chair as thoughts raced through his head. Guide Harris had already bonded with a new sentinel, he couldn’t have him, Xander wasn’t his, could never be his. He had unknowingly kidnapped another sentinel’s guide. No, that wasn’t true. He had known Xander was a bonded guide. He had knowingly kidnapped and put a guide in danger. In a moment of clarity, the ramifications of his act hit him hard. His thoughts continued to swirl in a cyclone of horror and guilt for what he had done and Sentinel General Henry Gideon zoned out.

As soon as General Gideon passed, by Spike and Blair left the office they were hiding in. Unwilling to wait for the elevator, Spike headed for the stairs. Blair tried to keep up, but Spike’s preternatural speed was too much for Blair and he fell behind. As soon as Spike got to the room he began to strip. He ordered the nurse out and then ignored her, as all his focus went to Xander. He climbed into the bed and took his guide, his love, his soul mate into his arms. “Xan, I’m here, Pet. Sorry it took so long. Come back to me, Xan, please. You have to come back to me.”

Blair came into the room as Spike continued calling to Xander. He undressed as he spoke quietly to the nurse and she stared at the strange sentinel with yellow eyes. “It’s okay,” Blair said. “That’s Xander’s Bond Mate and I’m a healer guide. I’m going to take off my pants now so unless you are into voyeurism you should leave.”

The nurse left the room as Blair’s pants hit the floor. Then he climbed into the bed, pressed his naked body against Xander’s back and wrapped his arms around his pack mates. He searched carefully for himself in Xander’s mind. He knew he had to avoid laying down any new pathways. What he found shocked him. The overdose of memory eraser had wiped out almost everything since Xander’s bonding with Jim. What were left were only fragments, disjointed words, absent of feeling. Xander couldn’t find his way back because there were no clear pathways back. Blair knew new pathways had to be built and with Xander’s condition it would be a long, slow healing, if they could heal him at all.

When Jim arrived in the room, Blair got out of the bed to tell him what he had found in Xander’s mind.

“He remembers the cross bonding?” Jim asked.

“Yes, after that things start to fade. By the time he gets kidnapped most everything is gone.”

“Can we get him back Blair? I don’t want to loose him, the only thing worse would be loosing you.”

“I think we can but it has to be done very slowly and gently.”

“How slowly?” Jim asked.

“Twenty-four hours to bring him out of the coma and then he’ll need weeks of healing after that to get him out of danger of a brain cascade.”

“Can I help? The doctor said only healers he had before the overdose and his bonded sentinel. If he remembers me…I want to help.”

“Yes,” Blair said. “We can switch off. I need to keep my strength up, so while I rest you can be with him.”


Twenty-four hours later Xander came out of his coma.

“What happened?” Xander asked, when he woke up and found Spike and Blair pressed against him in the same bed.

“What’s the last thing you remember?” Spike asked.

“We were all in the bullpen and then I was in a room with just the guides and then I was strapped down and Ethan Rayne hit me. But that can’t be right. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“You were kidnapped,” Spike said, “and given an overdose of a memory erasing drug.”

Just then Jim came into the room carrying a tray full of food. “Xanman,” he said with a big smile on his face, “You’re awake.”

“Yeah, big guy. A little the worse for wear, but awake. I’m starving. Is any of that for me?”

“Sure, Pet,” Spike said, as he took a plate from Jim.

Jim put the tray on the bedside table. “I’ll go arrange for transport home,” he said, and left the room.

“Transport home?” Xander asked, “Aren’t we in the guide hospital?”

“We’ll tell you all about it on the way home,” Spike said. “Right now you need to get some food in your stomach.” He offered Xander a forkful of mashed potato.

“You know you’re overwhelming me,” Xander said, as he reached for the fork.

A blue-eyed Spike smiled at his guide and pulled the fork away before Xander could get a hold of it. “Nice try guide,” he said, and then offered the food to him again. “Now eat.”

Blaire chuckled and got out of bed. ‘Things are back to normal,’ he thought, as he got dressed.


The healer Guides at the army base tried to bring General Gideon out of his zone, but he just kept slipping deeper in. The same day that Xander came out of his coma, the Sentinel Prime made a decision to send the General on to the Sentinel Hospital in Boston, as they had planned to do. The General was strapped onto a gurney and secured on an Army transport plane. Three and a half hours into the flight a stealth fighter was sent out from a secret base in the mid-west. Without warning an anti-aircraft missile was fired at the plane carrying the General, everyone on board was killed instantly as the plane exploded into a giant fireball. The burning debris fell into Lake Huron leaving dark gray streams of smoke to mar the cloudless blue summer sky. Families boating on the lake called the Coast Guard to report a possible plane accident.

The End.

Epilog:

That evening Spike sat on the sofa watching the news, while Xander lay curled up asleep, his head resting in the crook of Spike’s neck. Xander’s even breath brushed along Spike’s naked chest, giving him comfort as he watched the TV, turned low, so as not to disturbed his love’s rest.

It was a news report of a meteor shower over the great lakes, which stabbed at his psyche. A family, boating on Lake Huron, had sold their video of the event to the network. Spike watched with sentinel sight as fire fell through the sky, not round balls of a meteor shower, but angular shapes. He saw a wing, a fuselage and other pieces too small to recognize. And he knew.

Spike whispered to Jim who sat near by watching the same news report. “Call the hospital in Boston. Find out if the General arrived. That was no meteor shower.”

When Jim returned to the living room his eyes were filled with pain as he looked at Spike. “Boston said that the General never got there, he was sent to Bethesda instead. Bethesda said the General was never scheduled to be transferred there.”

Blair looked at the two sentinels; he had been in the kitchen when Jim made the calls. “Don’t tell Xander, not yet,” he whispered. “He needs to do some more healing before he deals with this.”

The two sentinels nodded their agreement.


AN: Runaway Guide 2 - The Healing is now being posted to this sight.

I want to give a big thank you to a fellow writer, Neichan, who’s support and help in polishing this fic have made this a better story, and me, a better writer.

I also want to thank Kerensa, for agreeing to beta this fic and for doing a timely and wonderful job.

And a big thank you to all the readers, for giving this story a chance and sticking with it until the end.

Hugs and Blessings,