Gamma's Energy Attracts

Part 28

Please Note: I had to adjust Tabitha's age in Chapter 3 to reflect the age gap of 12 years, making her younger when her sister was declared "Dead" Sorry, Dear Readers!

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Caly’s POV

I head back into Tabi’s room and Doc tells me without looking up, “We are starting to push, Caly! Grab a leg.”

Sure enough, Ryan has one of Tabi’s legs over his forearm so he can press it into her shoulder as far as it will go. She is weakly holding up the other leg. That certainly doesn’t look comfy, but I do remember contorting like a pretzel trying to have my own pups. I move into position. Tabi is crying and her words mumbled under the gas mask.

“What is she saying?”

“It’s all my fault!” she wails out loudly. 

“Pretty sure it takes two to do the horizontal tango. Usually, us females tend to blame our Mate’s for getting us in this predicament,” I’m trying to do a little distraction humour here.

‘You’re not nearly as funny as I am.’ Athena chimes in, but I ignore her for now.

“No. It’s my fault, I prayed to the Goddess for my family to be here.” 

Poor Tabi, I know her family has been a mess since she was kidnapped three years ago. Her Mom became agoraphobic, literally refusing to leave the Packhouse after she was taken, not even outside for a run in her wolf form. Her mental state was so terrible that when Tabi contacted her to say she was alright, her Mom refused to believe it was her. Ryan ended up taking his new Mate all the way out west to visit. Now the Mother leaves the Packhouse, but only with her husband and never crosses the territory lines. Tabi knew her Mom and Dad wouldn’t be able to come up for the birth of their first grand-pup. 

They don’t know it yet,  but I asked Cyril to fly them home whenever they are ready. I know I told Stav to buy a van, it’s winter and who wants to drive all the way to Nevada in the winter with a new baby? It would take days!

“Sweetie, your Mom is just in a bad place. She lost one child, and then you were taken from her.” I try to appease our little Mama.

“I know. I know about Mom. I saw her ghost!”

Ghost? I think it’s time to dial back the concentration of the gas, I mind-link my thoughts to Doc. ‘Do you think she’s delirious?’

‘They do call it laughing gas for a reason. People often say odd things or giggle inappropriately.’

“You don’t believe me!” Tabi shouts, breaking me out of my mind-link. “I saw her in the hall!”

“Who did you see? Your Mom, she’s fine as far as I know. Did you want me to call your parents for you?” I have no problem waking them up if it makes Tabi calm down. Wait, it’s a three-hour time difference, so that would only be shortly after nine for them.  Yep, let’s do that, “Did you bring your phone,” I ask Ryan.

“Not Mom, my Sister! She was so skinny, a wraith! You have to believe me, Luna!”

My Goddess! It couldn’t be, could it?

“No, no, Baby. Those were prisoners Shane brought in to get medical treatment,” he tries to placate her, but she’s having none of it.

“I know what saw, Ryan!” In her anger, she struggles to try getting out of her Mate’s grip, but she’s too weak from pushing and too round in the belly to right herself. 

‘Practically a pregnant turtle,’ Athena chortles. She can be so rude at times.

‘I’m just going to check on the she-wolves next door. Keep her focused on the baby!’ I mind-link Ryan as I back away from the bed. I don’t want her to know what I’m doing just yet. I spend time closing the door as quietly as possible then rush next door.

I open the door without knocking, but everyone turns at the sound of the door anyway. Terri seems to be grilling the one girl about all the places she’s been while Colin dutifully takes notes. The rest of this interrogation is going to have to wait.

“All-Mother!” The older female squeals at the sight of me.

Terri’s face is stricken with anger, “You were supposed to let us figure out if their story was legit before showing yourself!”

“Clearly she recognized me. I don’t have time for this!” I snap at Terri, which is so unlike me. “What is your name?” I feel badly for commanding her, but I need the absolute truth and I need it now.

She doesn’t hesitate to answer, “Lina.”

“Full name!”

“Paulina Green, Al-all-Mother.” She bows her head to me and bares her neck.

“No f*ckin’ way!” Terri whispers, making the connection. 

“Did you have any siblings?” I continue to press.

“Yes, I have a Sister. Her name is Tabitha, they thought she might be a Foreseer as well, when I left she was still really young and not very good yet. There are 12 and half years between us.”

I move towards her and she looks a bit frightened as I extended my claws. I hold her ankle down so she can’t move as I use all my strength to break the chain. She looks at me confused as I help her sit up and swing her legs over the edge of the bed. I grab her IV pole. “We need to go next door, there is something you need to see. Terri, grab her other arm.”

“The other girl is still out. Shane, you stand guard, everyone else get back to bed.”

In the hallway, I call for Karen who is sitting at the desk writing some notes. “I need you to go in there and tell Ryan to move out here for a minute so you can take Tabi’s vitals.” I have to mind-link him my plan, any Mate worth their salt wouldn’t leave his she-wolf at a time like this, but he has to decide our next step.

Ryan comes flying out of the room ready to fight, but he can’t very well fight his Luna, can he? “Caly!” he says desperately before he looks over Lina, whom Terri is holding up.

“She looks just like…” He looks through the tiny glass window at his Mate, then back at the stranger.

“Who are you?” She asks Ryan, but no one answers her.

“She says her name is Paulina Green, Tabitha’s ‘Ghost’. I had to use my command, I don’t have any other way to prove it. We will abide by whatever you decide to do,” I tell him.

“Tabi says Paulina got a tattoo at sixteen, a tabby cat because her family always called her Tabi-cat as a kid. Her parents hit the roof when they found out.”

“Can you untie my gown?” She says softly to no one in particular. As soon as I release the tie at the back of her neck, the cloth slides down over her bony shoulder. I turn her so Ryan can see the striped kitten design. There are deep scars running through it, but it is undeniably a tabby cat.

“s**t, how are we going to explain this to her? I thought she was f*cked up from the drugs!” Ryan says as he starts to panic.

“Maybe take a photo of the tattoo, let’s see what she has to say.” Ryan unlocks his phone and hands it to me, his hands are shaking. I snap the photo and tie up the gown before she takes a shaky step towards the door.

“Why is she in the hospital?” She looks through the tiny window, her eyes widening at the sight of the large bump. “Is it a baby? My baby sister is having a baby?”

“You’ve been gone a long time, Tabi is 22 and Mated to Ryan,” I say gently. It’s too much for her to process all at once. “Let Ryan and I try to talk to her first.” She doesn’t respond so Ryan and I head back into the room.

“Where the hell were you!” Tabi screeches at us. We deserve that, she probably felt we had abandoned her.

“Tabi, I promise you it was very important and I pulled Ryan away to verify something. I am truly sorry.” She’s going to need to lean on Ryan in the coming days, I don’t want her p*ssed at him, so I shoulder all the blame.

“Now? Are you kidding me?” she huffs out in between panting.

“Luna, I agree with our patient, this pup is crowning. Now is the time to focus on pushing. Help hold her legs.” Doc’s cheery bedside manner slips for a minute, I’ve made her cross with me, too. Terri, Ryan, Tabi, now Doc? I’m batting a thousand today.

Focus. I need to focus. I gather my energy and step towards Tabi, hiking her leg up.

“Here comes a big one!!” Doc says, and I wonder to myself if she thinks announcing like that is encouraging? I personally hated it, but Tabi is her one person…

“I know that. I. Am. The. One. PUSHING! ARRGGhhhh!” Tabi leans forward to push with all her might, and I slip my hand onto her bare back, under the open part of the hospital gown. I feel the energy slip into her. She flops onto her back panting and I remove my hand.

‘She needs more from you,’ Athena is quick to say. I’m not being given any energy, but Athena has always known where I need to be.

“Breathe with me,” I catch my breath too and focus on gathering more energy for the next push. Tabi looks up at me and nods, the whole while Ryan is whispering sweet nothings into her ears

“One more,” Doc says encouragingly. I take a peek. Sure enough, Doc is working to grip a tiny shoulder. Doc gives me a worried look.

I once again hold Tabi up by placing my hand on her back.

‘Stop throttling your energy! Pup is stuck,’ Athena warns suddenly, plucking her claws into my brain as though she was making a soft spot to lay her body down.

‘I didn’t realize I was,’ I tell her honestly. I am so focused on Athena relaxing, I feel the energy moving frighteningly fast out of me and into Tabi. Her entire body contracts into the smallest ball possible for a preggo, every muscle taut as she makes the big push.

“We have a girl!!!” Doc squeals. She sticks a baby aspirator in the babe’s mouth and sucks out some guck and the piercing cry is beautiful music. “Dad, come cut the cord.” Ryan’s face is absolutely overjoyed. I knew he was secretly hoping for a Princess to spoil.

The nurse moves to wipe her with a clean blanket before rushing her over to the scales to take her measurements and such. “Weight is 7 pounds 8 ounces, height 19.5 inches, APGAR is 8.”

“What’s APGAR?” Ryan asks as the nurse passes him his pup for the first time, and he rushes over to lay the pup on Tabi's chest so they can both look at her with adoration.

“It’s an assessment of her health, 8 out of 10 is a good start in life,” I reassure him. I swing my body around to see the baby, but the fast movement makes me feel woozy and I grab the bed rail so I don’t tip over. Doc M immediately wheels her stool over to me and pushes me down onto it. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” I am positive Doc doesn’t believe me. I try a distraction, today is about the new Mama. “Do you have a name picked out?” I ask our happy couple.

“We each had a girl’s name picked out, Ryan and I liked ‘Heather’ and I was thinking about ‘Leena’ after my sister.” Ryan’s face goes a bit pale.

 “How is Mama feeling?” I ask gently.

“Pretty good considering,” she tells me as Ryan takes some more photos.

‘Pretty good, considering she got at least two days' worth of your energy to help deliver that pup.’ Athena quips up.

‘You’re the one who said don’t hold back!’ I remind her. Silly wolf.

‘I’m just sayin’ !’ Athena snarks back.

“We have something to show you, it’s important.”

“Oooohkkaaay,” she draws out hesitantly.

“Do you recognize this?” I look over at Ryan, he takes out his phone and holds it up to her face.

“Oh my Goddess, where did you get that? That was my Sister’s!!”

“I know, it turns out your ‘ghost’ wasn’t a ghost.” I wait while she looks at me confused.

“You’re telling me she’s alive? She was a skeleton, she was being carried. What happened to my Sister?”

‘Oh s**t, warm up the energy again.’ Athena says she covers her snout with her paws, pretending she’s not looking at Tabi’s horrified face.

“We don’t know just yet. We brought her to the hospital to get treatment, but Terri and I will get to the bottom of it.” 

“Ryan, take the baby!” She passes off the little blanket burrito and sits up. Then she starts pulling on the IV line.

“Tabi, NO!” I didn’t mean for it to come out like a command but it stopped Tabi with her hands in mid-air. The baby immediately starts fussing. I look apologetically at the new parents, “Sorry! Tabi you need to rest, do you want me to bring her in here?”

“Hell yes, I want to see if it’s her!”  

“Okay, take a deep breath. She came from some bad circumstances, and you are both not in the best shape. So let’s just take a deep breath now.” She nods enthusiastically and takes a loud breath. I mind-link Terri to bring Lina in.

“Tabitha?”

“Paulina?” Every emotion imaginable crosses Tabi’s face before she begins trembling. I move with Lina to the bed and suddenly we have two females loudly crying and clutching at each other.

“My baby Sister is all grown up with a baby of her own.” Lina is sadly sobbing, but she’s so dehydrated she can’t even produce tears.

“You’ve been gone since I was in first grade. They told us you and your Mate were dead a few months later. We thought you were dead all this time.”

“There wasn’t a Mate, Tabi. Rocco was a story that Elder Giles concocted so you wouldn’t worry about me, because I would be travelling. I didn’t know, I didn’t know I was gonna be…”

“Be what? Be what, Lina? Why would you listen to Giles, he was a disgusting, vile man?! You were scared of him. Why would you work for him? Why did you ever leave with him?” Tabi lays bare all her hurting heart.

“I did it for you! Giles said he needed to see if other gifted she-wolves were in danger. I did work for the Council for a few months and I was okay with it for a while. Then he started pushing me to look into the future of some of his friends. I found out he was taking money, and I was seeing any of it.  He said it went into an account for my future. I knew he was lying.  I wanted out, I wanted to go home. He told me if I wouldn’t do it, he would start training you, but you were gonna half to move into Council Headquarters. I foresaw him doing it, I couldn’t let it happen. Mom and Dad were already freaked out because they didn’t want me to leave, I couldn’t let them take you. After I called home, I tried looking into your future for as far ahead as I could. I pushed myself until I passed out. I saw you as a teenager, still living with Mom and Dad so I thought I did the right thing,” She whispered sadly, lost in her own memories. 

She was quiet for a moment as I held my breath in lamentable anticipation. I just had a feeling in my gut we were going to find out what happened to so many of those missing women. 

‘It’s not your gut, that’s just your nervous stomach and low energy. That ‘knowing’ is called ‘instincts’ and that’s all me, Babe.

I chose to not dignify my wolf with an answer.

“I didn’t know he planned to sell me. I went to bed one night, I was fast asleep and I felt a prick on my neck. I woke up in a shipping container in a basement, not knowing how long I was out for or where I was. Everyone spoke Spanish, one of the wolves translated for me. I was locked into a little room, but it had all the essentials of a bedroom and bathroom. I was told I could clean up and rest for the night, I started work the next day.”

“Lina, that’s enough for now. There will be time for this later. Today is not a sad day. We found life twice today and reunited family. Enjoy your time with your family, then get some rest.” I get up from my seat and offer it to her. I mouth, “Stay with her,” to Theressa. 

“Thank you All-Mother. You don’t know how much this means to me!”

“Actually, I can feel it,” I give her a warm smile.

Ryan asks if she wants to hold the baby. “A little girl! So precious,” Lina says softly, the tiny pink hat and mittens give the gender away. “She looks like you did the day Mom brought you home. Have you guys picked out a name?”

“Ryan and I agreed on one name, Heather, but I still wanted to name her Leena after you.”

“I’m honoured, but I wouldn’t want her to be commemorating my sad life. I’m home now, she’s going to get to know her Auntie. This little girl pup deserves her own name and her own destiny. I think Heather sounds beautiful.”

Shane was stationed outside the door of the second room. I tell him I’m going straight to bed and not to worry.

I trudge up the stairs, feeling exhausted. I come home to find Stav and Rose in the kitchen. Rose is assembling sandwiches.

“Rose, it’s 1 am, what are you still doing here?”

“Feeding the Incredible Sulk,” she juts her chin out at my Mate. She’s made a half dozen sandwiches, I hope she’s not planning on feeding them all to him. “Seems he can’t sleep, he’s missing his Luna.” Then she adds, “So I’s stayed up to await the good news; do we have a new pup in the Packhouse?”

“We do, a baby girl, named Heather. Heather’s Aunt showed up just in time for the delivery.” Rose’s butter knife clatters onto the counter as she stops to look at me in shock. I nod my head.

“Well, Heaven’s to Betsy!” She works quickly to slam a plate in front of Stav and wrap the rest in plastic wrap.

“Can I have another?”

“No! You don’t be needin’ it, breakfast be in a few hours. These are going to the hospital wing.” I snicker at Rose as she gathers up sandwiches in a tea towel and rushes out the door.

“So you missed me, huh?” I wiggle my eyebrows at my Mate and he devours that sandwich in seconds before lifting me up and taking me to bed.