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Her eyes flew open as if the entire building had shaken, even though after a few seconds of looking around told her that nothing had moved at all. She was wide awake in those few seconds, listening intently for movement in the dark room. Then, as carefully as she could muster, she reached for her watch, pressing the tiny button on its side to light the face. Three twenty-one a.m. She sat up from her own palette on the floor, a makeshift bed in the far corner where she could keep watch. Blue light from a gravid full moon poured in from the tall windows, passing through voile curtains with the ease of water to illuminate the prostrate man on the bed and she saw why she might have come so quickly out of her own cycle. Cort was twitching in his sleep, moaning in despair, hands, fingers clutching to grasp some indefinable object. His brows were furrowed in pain. It suddenly dawned on her: she hadn't administered the most basic of pain relief! She had been so happy to get him splinted and in a place of peace, she forgot the pain relief!

Crawling to her nearby satchel, she pulled out a tiny syringe and small vial, along with a folded little wipe that filled the air with an alcoholic scent. She pierced the foil cap of the bottle with the new needle and drew down small droplets of medicine into the opaque tube. Then, she wiped down a small spot in his arm and slipped the needle into a small vein, hoping she could do so without waking him. In a matter of seconds, the medicine worked its magic and the troublesome wrinkles in his forehead smoothed away.

Tiny beeps startled her out of a reverie that had her staring at Cort for what seemed very long minutes.

Damn! Her watch!

Panicked, she swept it up from the folds of her skirt, de-programmed its alarm, and tossed it into her satchel, along with the alcohol wipe. Watching to see if Cort had somehow been brought out of slumber by these tiny noises and movements, Rachel locked the used needle in a sturdy leather case and found a cap for the used vial. No sense wasting what little there was, she thought.

With one last glance at a Cort, who now showed signs of being a snorer, she settled back into her palette, about as far from sleep as she was from home. Another couple of hours and she could slip out of the room to start the next phase of her mission.

There had been the smallest prick of added pain and he twisted in the fog, thinking more bullets were hurtling past. His efforts to avoid them faded as a stream of darkness took him, sweeping him away in its black waters.

He floated, almost peacefully, for some time way beneath the surface, his hair streaming about his face like thin strands of sea kelp. The fire was gone...for now...it was gone, so he leaned back into the flow, letting it take him where it willed. Opening his lips, he breathed it in, feeling its coolness wrap around his beating pulse. Hours passed and still he floated, nothingness, blessed nothingness, piling atop itself beyond the reach of pain, of memory. Even loss was...lost.

Now that she had come this far with the first part of her mission, Rachel began to go over plans for the coming day. Cort would probably sleep a good long while yet, if she could keep him comfortable and undisturbed for the next eight hours at least. She was going to have to change his bandages again later.

Soup; she was going to have to get some food to him. Rachel hoped Katie would help her out some more, because she had landed from the warp just in time to ride to the outskirts of Redemption, just in time to see the explosions and Herod fall. She had not had time to fully collect for all contingencies.

She had hid in the brush as Ellen rode by, now a grim shell of a woman faced with living without the juice of revenge to keep her alive. How empty is her world going to be now? Rachel wondered. Would hate to have to wake up the next morning and realize that your purpose that day is NOT to face down the man who shattered your world.

The pity Ellen elicited in her was not a compassionate one; it seemed to Rachel there would be more waste than before now that she had given Herod what he had been dishing out. Cort had been wise to drop whatever vengeance he might have had, even though he might have had a thousand better reasons than Ellen.

Rachel rested her head on her knees, letting the flow of her thoughts ramble in her mind. There were a thousand ways to take out the soul of a human, a thousand ways to defeat them. That Ellen had hung it on on the method by which she had killed her father was a poor choice in Rachel's eyes. And Cort had suffered for it. Cort, who had only wanted to reject the devastation.

She sighed as she watched the midnight blue sky outside the window turn a deep purple in preparation for the rising sun. Rachel came from an age of hostile takeovers and subversive politics, the late 20th century, where offers that could not be refused were par for the course. In Rachel's world, Herod would either be a Ken Lay or the devasted employee of one. And it was into that world that she ultimately meant to take Cort; not because of any sense of protection or desire to "evolve" him. She had a mission to accomplish for men who trusted her, believed in her talent for technology and blending into a community. Terry, Bud...how did she get involved with them...?

The object of the mission replayed with ever increasing fuzziness in her consciousness...

Cort obliged her, giving her all the time she needed, though it was, of course, completely unwitting on his part. He floated onward, down his dark river, making no effort to stop its flow. It was, indeed, all there was, right now, in his world. Just him...and the nothingness that encased him.

Some hours later, he found he was floating upwards through layers in the river, each one a lighter shade of grey than the one below. "No," he moaned again. He didn't want to break the surface. He would not break the surface. Holding himself perfectly still, he willed himself back into the darker deeps, back where it was quiet and still, back where the empty void absorbed his pain and the long fingers of his memory could not reach his soul.

She found the saloon keeper in the kitchen a few hours later, puttering away with a bit more bounce to his step. Rachel had drifted out of sleep this time to find early sunlight pouring in, heating up the room with a promise of higher temperatures. Had it really been twenty four hours? Yesterday had passed with unease all around as she hunted down Cort's clothes, handed them to the laundress, tracked down a hiding place for her things, taking a cursory survey of what was left of Redemption. Privacy was now a premium as those left without lodging doubled up in the houses remaining. She hadn't even bothered to find out what was going on at Herod's place - she imagined that much of what had not been blown to smithereens or burned away was already sequestered among the populace. Which was just as well. God knew they had been the subject of many pilferings themselves.

The whores of the bordello looked haggard but unfazed. The farmers were jubilant. The towns people were various shades of shock, anger, relief, and ambition - ambition in making sure they filled whatever voids Herod and his men left behind.

Note to self - find out what happened to his henchmen.

Scattered snatches of conversations clued her in that not everyone was grateful to be free of Herod's reign.

Now she carried a tray up the stairwell of hot soup and some bread. She had no idea how long Cort had been without food or water, so soup was the easiest thing she could think of to get him back on track.

Balancing the tray on a side table near the table, she carefully turned the wobbly doorknob and tried to carry in the tray as silently as one could with heavy skirts, an irritating corset and unweildy dishes. She straightened to congratulate herself on a (relatively) smooth transaction after setting the tray down on the bureau and closing the door, when she heard movement and a voice behind her.

Cort was leaning on one elbow, watching her from the bed. It took all his strength to lift himself even that much and he shook somewhat with the effort of it. His mind was still fighting its way through the last cobwebs that encased it, slowing it down, making it hard to concentrate, harder still to get his eyes to focus clearly. He'd been aware of the swish of green skirting that came through the door. It was the green that had pulled him to the surface of his dark waters...green that didn't belong there in the murky grey-blackness. He felt drawn toward it and before even completely waking, had forced himself up on his elbow not to lose sight of the color.

It was blurry and wavered a bit within his gaze, so he blinked several times. His hair had fallen forward, though, blocking his vision. He tried to lift his free hand, pushing at his hair, but the motion sent streaks of pain shooting through his fingers. He cried out briefly with the shock of it, falling heavily back onto his pillow.

"You're awake!" she exclaimed; only her voice came out more as a squeak than an intonation of surprise. Cort was sprawled across the bed, passing his brutalized hand over his face in a weak attempt to brush the hair out of his eyes, and grunting slightly from the pain of movement.

Abandoning the tray, she rushed to the side of the bed to do it for him, noting that the pain medicine had worn off. How was she going to help him this time?

Taking his forearms she placed his trembling hands on his chest, pressing lightly to communicate that he needed to be still. He still appeared groggy, disoriented, but she talked with a good volume so that he could be sure to hear her.

"I've brought some soup. You need to eat if you want your strength back," she said, trying to meet his gaze as he lay blinking up at her.

"The children," he gasped hoarsely. "Don't hurt the children!" He pushed with his forearms against her hands, not strong enough, though, to release them. Turning the side of his face into the deep pillow, he moaned, "No, don't! Don't...burn...it!"

Dismay broke out as tears in her eyes as she witnessed his delusion, heard the fear and sorrow in his voice. She let go of his arms - her touch only seemed to cause more agitation - and sat back to watch his expression replay the horror of watching the mission burn. For a several moments, she felt it as much as he: total betrayal, utter evil devastation, all his efforts to amend his life razed to the ground. Innocents taken down once again. And for what? So he could assuage Herod's own warped sense of guilt and outrage. Cort had rejected him, rejected the evil. And he was going to pay.

Blinking her eyes rapidly to clear her vision and to regain some sense of logic, she let this development sink in. He was not recovering as quickly as she thought he would...had counted that he would. A pale sheen of sweat shone on his face, signs of a burning fever, a paleness around his eyes and mouth despite the deep tan. For a moment she was tempted to forgo stringent instruction to keep all anachronistic instruments out of play and use the little thermometer she had packed. But then she knew: beyond a poultice and elixir, the times in which he lived held nothing more than relief of symptoms. A thermometer would only confirm in scientific milibars what she already knew : Cort was in trouble.

He needed rest; he needed liquid.

Those two thoughts kept rolling around in her mind; liquid to feed the fever, keep the body's ability to fight it. The local doctor had disappeared, seemingly overcome by the events, by the triumph of watching Ellen get her due. And her bosses had said to do what she could on her own. The less contact, the easier it was to break away.

Shaking with unexpected anger, Rachel found her satchel once more, administered more pain medicine, and returned with a wet washcloth to wipe his face and neck. Grime, blood, gunpowder soot, sweat, all took time to bathe away, and even though he began to look more human, despite the gash in his forehead, he still looked gray with trouble and defeat.

She was going to have to ask the saloon keeper for even more leniency, more time in the room, she realized; more actual assistance. Rachel grimaced at the thought of having to give Cort the badly-needed sponge bath. It would be so much better if he were able to do that himself. She and Horace had just plopped Cort on the bed, taking off his boots, removing the gun-belt, suspenders, shirt, until he lay under thin sheets, shivering and protesting fire alternately.

Getting food into a fevered patient, that was another thing entirely. How does one feed a delirious person?

Cort lay quiet once more in several minutes as the pain reliever allowed him to relax and convinced his brain that he need not fight off whatever he thought was attacking him. She would have to see if there was a way to get him to at least swallow water...ice chips? Was there such a thing out here in the middle of the Arizona desert, where the latest newfangled contraption was the latest pistol, the silliest parlor toy?

Lost in thought, it was a while that she sat at his side on the bed, watching shadows flit over his face, dreams pass beneath eyelids, mouth move in wordless argument. Somehow, she felt this was a needed moment. Cort needed to know he was not alone.

The dreams and drugs seemed to shift somewhat in his system and he fell back into an uneasy ramble against perfidy, betrayal, horror, pain, Rachel placed her hands on his arms again. We'll get you through this she told him silently. We'll get you where you belong.

If she had dared to speak the next thought out loud, she would have added : home, with me...

On some level he knew someone was with him, sitting close. There was an awareness of...presence, bringing with it the only sense of comfort, the only anchoring in his rearranged world. Slowly, unseen, his fingers moved across the sheet, seeking that presence, needing some contact that would keep him from following his river and being emptied into the sea. Part of him wanted the sea, wanted to be lost forever in its depths, never having to...think...again, never having to feel. Yet at his basic, inner core, he rejected that. There had to be more...for him...than just that. And...so...his fingers moved. Only that. Nothing else. It was all he could do, the only effort he was capable of making, not to let his soul go out with the tide. It seemed to take a while to move them, and he did it blindly, eyes closed. At last, though, he felt a smooth softness and curled his hand atop it. A long, soft sigh escaped his lips. He was... anchored.

She had become so lost in thought, so caught up in her own troubles, that the slight movement of his hands on his chest startled her. The furrowed brow resolved several expressions of searching; it seemed he was making an effort to gain some semblance of consciousness. One of his hands, the unbroken one, moved as if he were gingerly testing the air for any sign of outward life.

On an impulse, she slipped one of her own hands underneath the fingers. At her touch, Cort took a breath and sighed, a fragile expression of peace finally settling in his aquiline features, the lines of his mouth softening. His fingers rested upon hers in the most delicate grasp. Deeply touched, Rachel risked the slightest squeeze in return. Her white hand looked so small and pale beneath his; protected, wonderfully fitted.

"That's it, Cort," she murmured, smiling broadly despite the fact that he wouldn't see her. "Rest easy. Everything's going to be okay."

Filtered through many layers, he heard her voice, and like a small child, believed them. With his hand in hers, he knew he would not wash out to sea, would not be lost, not even to himself. It was enough. For now, it was enough. He lay quietly upon the cloud tops once more, the blue sky resting lightly upon him, the softest of coverings.

“Mmmmmmmm," he murmured, the first sound of peace he'd made in days.

When it seemed there had been a change in his sleep, Rachel had to talk herself into pulling her hand away, resisting an urge to lay down beside him, unwilling to break any healing contact. But when she did, the fine spidery thread that was their connection held, and she could see by his expression that he moved into deeper sleep. Good.

She returned to the tray to inspect the (now cold) soup and the freshly washed clothing on the chair.

The cleric's vest was pressed, though a bit threadbare, and the overcoat showed signs of skillful patching, all the red dust and dirt of the Arizona desert sloughed away. She had to really look at the coat to see the patchwork, too, careful stitches that hid the fact that the priest had been dragged and kicked along the way. Beneath those items shone a crisp white cotton shirt which had to have been brand new. In fact, she was certain of it, for there were some conventions about the sewing and seams that were fancier than what they had removed. Rachel felt a surge of gratitude for the kindness, grateful that she wasn't the only one thinking of Cort. Brushing her fingers over it one last time, she walked to the window to see the position of the sun and watch the people below. The sounds of hammers could be heard, and the rumble of carts. Her own stomach growled, reminding her that even nurses have to survive, and she wondered if Cort would sleep long enough for her to eat the soup and return with a fresh hot bowl.

He slept, deeply, dreamlessly, for some while, then, awaking, remained still, eyes closed, listening to the sounds of reconstruction coming in through the window. He had no idea why so much hammering and sawing would be going on. Had something happened? The mission! Was the mission being rebuilt? His eyes flew open, scanning the room. He'd never been in this place before. Where was it? Why was he here? He needed to get up, go to the window, check on the mission!

Then he frowned. There was nothing anywhere near the mission that would have a room like this. He pushed with his hands on the bed to get to a sitting position, a sharp, startled cry of pain escaping from him when he put weight on his broken fingers. He fell heavily back against the pillow, holding his bandaged hand in front of his face. What? Then sudden memory flooded back just as the door opened.

The man in the door way shuffled in, pushing aside the doorway with an elbow because his hands carried a large deep pot of steaming liquid, his forearms draped with towels. He was half-way across the room when he realized Cort was sitting up slightly, watching him with wary grogginess, blinking mightily against a sun that now peered into the room as it began its descent to the other side of the world.

"Excuse me, Preacher, just getting you some bath water. I was going to have one of the midwives in to take care of you, but I see you are probably fit to do it yourself."

With the combination of sunlight in his eyes and the sharp pain in his hand, it took Cort a few seconds to realize that it was Horace, the barkeep, who was talking to him.

He shook his head, trying to clear it. Had he dreamed her? He'd thought..somehow... almost for sure...there had been a woman near. He remembered...green. His head heavy, he let it rest on the pillow, turning a bit sideways to look at the man. Not really interested at present in the process of bathing, he summoned up politeness from deep inside, and said, "Thank you. I'll see about it in a few minutes. Just leave it over there."

Horace set the water down and moved to leave, pausing with his hand on the knob. "You and Ellen," he said, his voice not much more than a whisper, so used had he become to hiding what he felt, "we're...we're...all of us...grateful." He ducked his head a bit. "Just wanted you to know." Then he was gone.

Cort lay on the bed, studying the dust motes in the sunbeam that flooded goldenly through the window. Ellen. She had thrown him her father's badge and said, "The law has come back to town."

His brow knit and his jaw worked as he recalled that final sight of her riding out of the burning town, leaving him standing there, his thumb pad rubbing the badge.

Had she thought to set his future for him by that? Did she think, really, that was what he...wanted? That, simply, he would take the badge and everything would be set on some even keel in his life?

And where was she, herself, going now that her whole life's aim had been fulfilled? He couldn't recall when he'd met an emptier soul.

Then he closed his eyes, scrinching his lids down tightly, pressing his lips into a thin, white line. A tear welled under his long lashes, threated to track down his cheek, but somehow made its way back within and spread across his eye. Slowly his left hand moved to his neckline, running with just a suggestion of a tremble along the length of where his white collar would have been.