********************

~~~~~~~~~~~

Blair Sandburg closed the computer file and flipped up the imaging headset as he thought about the author of those haunting words. His great-grandfather Blair, the man he'd been named after, had been murdered along with his wife shortly after he'd written those words, less than a month after their child, a son, had been born. A vengeful and wealthy student named Brad Ventriss had apparently hired killers and sent them after the conscientious, and by all reports, popular young professor. Ventriss had also been suspected of another murder, but he'd fled the country and disappeared.

Margaret had been the last of her line, so Grandmother Naomi had raised the couple's young son, James, aka Jamie or when Nana was feeling particularly whimsical, Jimmy-Joe. It was part of the family folklore that she could never get over raising a child who'd been named after a cop. But she did her best, carting him along around the world as her fancy took her, just as she'd done with his father before him. Jamie had grown up with a love for the rich and varied cultures of the world, with the 'mysteries' as Nana had called them. Like his father, he'd sought to understand…and to share what he learned with others.

And, like his father, Jamie kept hoping to one day find a Sentinel. Finding a Sentinel seemed to have become a kind of family quest, passed along from one generation to another, along with Blair Sandburg's journals and academic papers.

A few years before he was killed in the Great Yellowstone Eruption of 2035, archaeologist James fathered Margaret-Naomi Sandburg. Marni took after her beloved and ancient Nana Sandburg and got pregnant at 17. Naomi lived long enough to look at the infant boy and whisper, her voice muted with a kind of awe as her eyes glistened with tears, "It's Blair, my Blair!"

And Blair did have to admit it. He looked exactly like the holos of his great-grandfather. Exactly, right down to the long, curly hair and the earring. It hadn't been intentional. Most of the family photos, the few that there'd been, given the family had strongly developed gypsy inclinations and tendencies to travel light, had been lost in the fiery cataclysm that had been visited on the earth long before he'd been born. So he'd had no idea of how his ancestor had looked. But he'd recently come across some old pictures of students and faculty when they'd excavated the Rainier university archives that had been stored in a building just inside the flow zone.

It had given him a strange feeling, to see himself in the old files, faded by time but made fresh again through the modern holographic restoration techniques. But after the initial shock, he'd shrugged, figuring that while the field of genetic memory was only in the infancy of its research, the early findings showed that we are born far more than we are made by social circumstance, however 'politically incorrect' those findings were. The research had been triggered by the inexplicable but undeniable similarities between identical twins who had been raised apart from birth. Common enough preferences, like favourite colours or clothing styles, and really odd correlations, like marrying spouses with the same names on the same dates, or naming their children the same, children also born on the same days, had come to light, time and time again…more than coincidence, the occurrence of such alignments were now statistically predictable. So, he accepted in an academic kind of way that he was a throwback of sorts, his great-grandfather reincarnate. From all he'd learned of the man, Blair figured he could have done worse than end up being like him.

Unlike his grandfather and mother before him, who had been archaeologists, Blair had taken up anthropology, like his great-grandfather. His specialty was the late 20th century. It was why he was working on the excavation of the long buried site of the city of Cascade. The old city was mostly evacuated in '35 when the surrounding volcanic mountains had once again become so violently active. Before the cataclysm was over, two-thirds of the city had been buried under lava and the rest severely damaged by earthquake and fire. But there were any number of underground structures that had survived the onslaught of ash and molten stones, earthquake and fire. In some respects, Cascade was a kind of modern Pompeii or Akrotiri.

One such structure was the sub-basement of Ellison Enterprises, the building that had once been owned by William and Steven Ellison, Jim Ellison's family.

His namesake's Jim Ellison! The Sentinel.

Blair got up to put the disk of the old journal away in his desk, locking it into a fireproof box with the other disks and holos, as well as the original journals and papers written by his long dead ancestor. He couldn't explain the sense of anticipation he had, but attributed it to the fact that he was working on a site that had a connection to his great-grandfather's Sentinel. But the anticipation bubbled constantly lately, growing and combining with something that felt like urgency and almost unbearable excitement. It made no sense. It just was.

As for those dreams he'd been having for as long as he could remember, the dreams of being in a jungle somewhere, of a wolf and jaguar…and of being with another man, someone taller and older…well, he figured the old journals were at the root of the dreams as well. Oh, he knew well enough who the other guy in the dream was. There'd been holos made of the Sentinel, from newspaper clippings of the era, and the pictures the original Blair Sandburg had kept with his journals.

Blair talked with Jim Ellison in his dreams. He didn't find that particularly surprising, either, as Jim Ellison had been the primary hero of his imagination for as long as he could remember, thanks to his mother who had told him tales of the original Blair Sandburg and his Sentinel from before he could read.

Once he could read for himself, he'd poured over the notes and articles, and the holos of Jim; and since being in school, he'd sought out anything he could find on the old cultures, searching for examples of sentinels. And he'd kept a watch for any new information or research that would even hint that another sentinel had been found. He attributed the animals in his dream jungle to his more general research of the old cultures. They'd believed in spirit guides, so Blair figured his mind was populating his sleep with archetypes of that long distant time.

But, so far at least, as far as sentinels themselves were concerned, he'd found nothing more than what his family documents contained, except for another Burton document that had come to light five years ago…and for which he'd sold virtually all he had at the time to acquire. Though it concerned the role and responsibilities of the village shaman more than sentinels, he'd thought it worth the investment, pouring over it and finding interesting information about how a shaman was identified and trained. It was all this, the intrigue and mystery of Blair Sandburg's Sentinel, the possibilities that such another might yet exist somewhere, that had led him to anthropology rather than archaeology as a post-graduate specialty.

Sighing, Blair went out onto the balcony, shivering a little against the chill of the night air. He looked out on his city and up into the starry sky, clear for once and not laden with the perpetual clouds. On nights like this, after having once more delved into his great-grandfather's journals, he felt such an ache, a loss that he couldn't explain. Lonely somehow. Like something or someone was missing, someone vital. Sometimes, like tonight, the ache was so bad that his eyes burned and his breath was tight, as if the ache filled him up, leaving no room for air.

Swallowing, wishing he understood why he felt like he did, he shrugged and went back inside to retire for the night. He'd told Connie he'd be at the dig early to delve into those old computer records she'd dug up, to see if there was anything there that would give them a better sense of what might be found in the vast reaches of the building's sub-basements.

********************

In the old repository of computer disks, Blair found some interesting information about William Ellison's investment in medical research. Smiling to himself, Blair reflected that the old man had apparently been trying to beat the grim reaper. Ellison, Sr. had poured a lot of money into a project that proposed to take someone on the point of death and put them into a state of suspended animation. Fascinating. Ahead of its time really, the technology at the end of the last century being rudimentary and risky at best. Not like the processes available in the world now, where for a price, a body could be held in stasis for eternity.

Sandburg curled his lip at that thought, shuddering as he considered the wretched existence of a soul trapped in a netherworld between life and death, not really alive nor dead, but caught with a body that probably should have been let go, to follow its natural path back to merge with the earth. God, how lonely, how excruciatingly lonely, would such an existence be. Sighing, he shook his head. Those who froze their bodies didn't necessarily share the same beliefs about souls and eternity as he held…if they did, they wouldn't be so afraid to die.

His thoughts were interrupted by the excited shout of the lead archaeologist who was working on the actual dig, while Blair sorted through the detritus of the humans who had occupied this building.

"Blair! We've uncovered something unusual in here," Connie shouted. "You might want to come and take a look."

Blair left his lunch on the dusty surface of the old desk he'd been using as an improvised workstation. 'Rabbit food', Connie called it, teasing him about evidently only ever eating 'green' food, an accusation that was wildly inaccurate, he protested routinely, as most vegetables, fruits and carbs weren't green.

"What have you got?" he asked as he crawled into the recently excavated chamber.

The workers had uncovered a massive steel tube, about seven feet long with a four-foot diameter, buried against the solid rock wall. There was an old-fashioned keyboard built into one side, and an odd little toggle at the bottom, or what he supposed was the bottom given the orientation of the keyboard. The shiny surface was muted by years of dust and grime, but otherwise the assembly looked intact and a line still connected it to the perpetual power source they'd found housed in the building's basement. It had been the heat signature from that power source that had shown up on the satellite photos and had led Blair into talking Connie into applying to work on this site as a joint project, in case something…what he had no idea, but something worth finding…was there.

"Maybe the old man had himself frozen after all," he mused softly as he examined the huge receptacle.

"You think you know what it is?" Connie asked, her expression thoughtful. She had an idea as well, but she'd only seen the things in antique books of old and fairly esoteric technology.

"Yeah," he nodded, looking back toward her. "I think it's an old cryochamber. Maybe we should call in a support crew from the U. They might want to open it under controlled conditions…just in case."

"Oh, come on," she replied without bothering to mute her sarcasm. "No one's ever been revived from any of these things when they've been found. Their brains are mush."

"True," Blair allowed with a shrug. "But all the units I've heard of were damaged, mostly by interruptions in the electricity needed to keep them functioning properly. Old William Ellison had a specially designed perpetual atomic generator installed in this building and now I understand why. But you know that…it was the generator's heat signature that led us to this location and helped determine where to begin the dig. I'll give him his due…the old guy was really ahead of his time. That technology was only introduced toward the end of the century and was really just becoming relatively common, for personal use anyway, around the '20s and it cost a king's ransom. But the fact is, there is a possibility the person inside could be revived. I think we should give the guy a chance, don't you?"

Biting her lip, she nodded. It would cause a bit of a delay, but if Sandburg was right, and he had an instinct for these things, for all that he was still only a grad student, it might well be worth the few days of downtime. Pressing the comlink on her wrist, she called in the new, and potentially exciting, find.

********************

They'd had to enlarge the entry into the dig, and use special hoists to haul the metal sarcophagus from the sub-basement, first taking care to ensure its connection with its power source remained stable. While that was going on, the U had set up a special stasis lab to receive the body that they were expecting to extract from the cylinder, and to try to revive. Scientific speculation about a successful revival ranged from highly sceptical, even derisive, to the curious and finally to those like Blair, the very excited and hopeful. Finally, as the researcher both attributed with the find, as he'd recommended the retrieval and restoration operation, and as a local expert on the era, Blair found himself present for the opening and transfer of the body, should they find anything that looked like it could be restored inside.

As his research, of necessity, included a certain expertise with the computer processes and languages of the era, Blair was given the task of figuring out the archaic keyboard and likely access codes. He'd been thinking about it since the first time he'd looked at it, and figured that it probably wasn't all that complicated. The technicians of the day wouldn't have wanted the opening of the cylinder to be an unsolvable mystery. Pretty sure that it had to be a mix of fairly accessible information shortened to alpha and numeric codes, and further speculating that this was William, or perhaps Steven, Blair had already researched the family history of names and birth dates and had the data on his personal palmlink.

He'd also ruminated about what the access command would be. 'Open Sesame' seemed too whimsical, though it appealed to his sense of humour. Simply 'open' seemed dangerous. The curious might open the cryochamber without any possible way of then caring for the person inside. Finally, Blair determined that the access code would likely refer to the intent, the purpose of opening the modern sarcophagus. 'Revive' seemed the simplest, clearest command to reflect the most desirable intended action.

When the senior scientist, Laura Woodhouse, gave him the go-ahead, Blair pushed a few of the cracked buttons, starting with William Ellison's initials and birth date, added the command to 'revive', and then hit enter. Nothing. Undeterred, he entered the same information for Steven. Still nothing. Frowning, aware that the others in the lab were watching him restlessly, Blair thought about the problem. Maybe it was still William, but in a fit of wanting to remember and honour his first born, had chosen Jim's data as the code. Tapping on his palmlink, he pulled up that information. Taking a breath and mentally crossing his fingers, Blair typed in 'JJE:19/10/59:REVIVE'.

A low humming emanated from the tube, and Blair's eyes brightened with pleased anticipation…well, actually, his eyes sparkled with excitement as he held his breath. There was an audible 'click' as the toggle shifted, and then a grating of metal against metal as the face of the tube began to lift. Swallowing, he stood away from where he'd been kneeling by the keyboard, and pushed his hair behind his ears as he pulled off his glasses to hook them into the front of his shirt.

The tube cracked open, emitting a fog as the chilled air inside met the warmth of the lab, and a segment lifted up and away, eerily like the opening of a coffin's lid. As the fog began to dissipate, Blair was the first to glimpse the tall, muscular, nude man inside the vessel that had been laid lengthwise on the floor. Others gasped as well as the lid opened further, amazed by the perfection of their find. There were no burn marks from the cold controlled temperature in which the body had been stored. But nor did the apparition appear real…more like a slightly bluish-white marble statue of an eternal warrior, frozen and still for all time.

The man from the holos. The man in the jungle of his dreams. Trembling with the realization of exactly whom he was seeing, his throat suddenly tight, his heart thundering in his chest, Blair found his vision blurring with unexpected tears…of relief. That's what it felt like. A huge, overwhelming wave of relief.

Crazy. He knew it was crazy to feel that so sharply. How could he be relieved to find someone he'd thought dead and buried more than almost eighty years before?

The sound of his voice, as low as it had been, broke the spell of wonder that had fallen over the technicians and scientists. In moments, they had carefully transferred the stiff, frozen body from the antique cylinder into the transparent stasis chamber in the centre of the lab. The body was immersed in barely liquid, clear gelatine made of various chemicals to safeguard the tissues while warming occurred. But during the transfer, the injuries that had caused the death, or near death, of their subject became evident. His back and left side were badly burned and there was evidence of surgical intervention in the sutured but unhealed wounds in his back and the occipital lobe of his head.

Ellison's body had no sooner been safely transferred when the scientists and technicians went to work, gathering reams of output from the scanners built into the stasis chamber.

"Well, it's no wonder they considered him as good as dead," one of the scientists reflected as he read the readouts detailing the physical damage left by the bomb explosion seventy-eight years in the past. "We'll need to get a surgical team on this if there is any hope whatsoever of successfully reviving him. Despite the evident traumatic damage, though, there is amazing cellular integrity…no evidence of decomposition either externally or internally. We just might have the makings of a modern day miracle here."

Turning to Blair, the scientist, Josh Enright, observed, "You seemed to actually recognize him when the sarcophagus was opened. Care to explain that?"

Blair nodded, his gaze still transfixed on Ellison's body, scarcely able to believe what he was seeing. "Yeah, my great-grandfather knew this man and wrote about his death. I've seen pictures of him in old newspaper files. He was something of a hero…Cop of the Year and all that. He died as a result of injuries received during a bomb explosion…but he saved more than forty other lives, including my great-grandfather's. My grandfather was named after him and I guess I wouldn't even be here, alive I mean, if not for him. According to my ancestor's journals, they buried him with full honours…no one knew he'd been cryogenated."

Finally tearing his eyes away from Ellison, Blair looked at Josh as he said, "In an odd way, I feel like I know this guy. I'm probably the only person alive who has any idea who he was, but my great-grandfather wrote about him extensively in his journals. I'd like to be involved in his revival and post-resuscitation recovery. I think I could help him adjust. I'd like to try anyway…kind of like paying off an old debt. Besides, what better source could I have for my diss on the late twentieth century?"

"Makes sense to me," Josh nodded thoughtfully, wondering about the astonishing odds against anyone alive today, let alone a member of the revival team, actually knowing the man who had been found. Shrugging, he decided that that was what luck was. Beating the odds. And if Sandburg had a clue who this guy was, then luck would appear to be working in the favour of the team. Not to mention, the man in the stasis tank. "If he does ever wake up, the man is going to be very disoriented and having someone around who knows at least something about the time in which he lived and who he was could make all the difference to his sanity."

Blair blew out a silent breath of relief at Josh's words. He knew he'd been pushing to have such personal involvement with Jim Ellison, once, if, he was successfully revived. As a grad student, he was a long way down the food chain for a project like this.

But…he did feel as if he knew the man. He'd read Ellison's whole history in his great-grandfather's journals, or at least as much as his namesake had been able to find out. The first Blair Sandburg had been obsessed with this man.

And Blair had read his great-grandfather's even more secret journal, the one handed down, literally from one hand to the next, through the family. The one that contained all he'd learned in the brief time about Jim Ellison's sensory abilities and sensitivities. Combined with his published papers, it gave Blair a place to begin in helping this guy cope in this new world…well, new for James Joseph Ellison, anyway.

Swallowing, Blair again turned his fascinated gaze to the man in the stasis chamber and he reflected on the words he'd read in the old journal, just a few short days ago.

And Blair thought, with a slight shiver, of his great-grandfather's persistent sense that his Sentinel wasn't dead, but lost. How freaky was that?

And how weird was it, Blair wondered, that after four generations of belief in their existence, he'd been the one to find a sentinel. And not just any sentinel…THE Sentinel.

His great-grandfather's Sentinel.

********************

The team from the University's Teaching and Research Hospital was ecstatic; there was no other word for their reaction at being called in to assist on a project that would make them all famous. Not to mention, further the worthy causes of science, technology and medicine.

The new invention of biotechnical nanites had reached the stage where the university researchers were ready to go ahead with experimentation on human subjects. But though permission to proceed with the tests had been received, there were still serious political concerns about their effectiveness in handling massive trauma. Would they, in fact, heal the injured or illness damaged tissues, or create a mutation of sorts? Would they stop when the necessary repairs were complete and disintegrate as they were purported to be designed to do, or would they run rampant, infesting the body and then jump from one host to another, like some kind of modern day plague?

The fears were ignorant and uninformed nonsense according to the researchers, but fears weren't rational. Quite simply, the nanites were dormant until they were introduced to the system they were to interface with. Once in contact with the system's cells, they absorbed the DNA coding, self-programming and self-replicating from that point. After that, they could have impact only on the system that matched that genetic code, so even if they could be transmitted from one subject to another, they would not function in a different body. Period. But there was a need for a dramatic demonstration on a human subject. And what better than a man who was as good as dead, who would die without the intervention of such state of the art, technically assisted, medical intervention?

When Blair first heard of the plan to use the nanites on Ellison, he was worried. Very worried. For one thing, what if they didn't work the way they were supposed to? Would Jim suffer for that for the rest of his life? And how would they work on someone with enhanced senses, a condition that only Blair knew about and was very reluctant to share. And that worried him, too. Should he be more forthcoming? Would it make a difference to Ellison's recovery? Or should he respect the secret, as his great-grandfather had done, because Ellison hadn't wanted anyone to know about his capabilities?

But then he thought of the suffering Ellison would experience if the nanites weren't used. Oh sure, medical and surgical techniques had come a long way in the past seventy-eight years, and Jim's survival could still be theoretically possible using modern microsurgery and skin graft growth in labs for the replacement of the burned tissue. But the grafts still took time to grow, and meanwhile Jim would have long been resuscitated and suffering from the burns. With his senses, that suffering would be beyond imagining and the shock of that hideous pain alone might cause an already weakened, traumatized body to expire. And even before the grafting was attempted, the urgently required microsurgery, while theoretically possible, would just be another invasive onslaught against a body that was already fragile, presuming that they could resuscitate him at all. Jim would have to contend with the pain and disorientation of that recovery while coming to grips with the fact that no one he knew was alive today. That he was completely alone.

Though he was uncertain of his decision, Blair came to the conclusion that Ellison's sensory uniqueness was not his secret to share. And, he had to agree with the decision that the use of the nanites would be the most potentially merciful treatment option, the one with the highest possible quotient of success, the least invasive in traditional terms and the option that would lead to the fastest recovery.

In the end, there really wasn't a lot of choice. The trauma suffered by Ellison in the explosion had been extensive…well it had virtually killed him. Added to the additional complexities and potential complications of reviving a man who'd been frozen for the better part of a century, it was determined that if the injuries were not addressed before Ellison was resuscitated, then he'd not likely survive anyway.

It took four days to 'thaw him out' as it were. Once his body had been restored to normal temperature, he was hooked up to machines that artificially oxygenated and circulated his blood, leaving the stimulation of his heart until the nanites had done their work. Damage to his coronary tissues, from what appeared to have been a lacerating injury, was part of what had to be repaired. The nanites were introduced to his system…and those researchers who were so inclined, prayed that the subatomic wonders of technical science would work.

While the technical and medical processes were underway during the day, Blair buried himself in his great-grandfather's research and journals to make sure he was as prepared as he could be to help Ellison when he woke up. It was a self-imposed crash course on all that the first Blair had discovered or surmised about sentinel characteristics, all of his observations and speculations. Sandburg paid particular attention to the jargon his ancestor had used to describe how he'd worked with Ellison, and what had worked. Blair wanted to use words that Jim would easily recognize when he woke up. When he wasn't working on the journals, Sandburg was busy getting ready for Jim's awakening, simple everyday things like acquiring a modest wardrobe for the man who had arrived in this place and time with nothing but his soul. Or cleaning up his place with the hope that Jim, who had no place to stay, would agree to stay with him, at least for a while.

But every evening, and long into each night, Blair found himself drawn back to the stasis lab, to stand beside Jim Ellison…and talk to him. He didn't know if it would do any good, if the man could hear him at any level, but Sandburg reasoned it wasn't unlike someone in a coma, now that the blood was being artificially oxygenated and was flowing again. If Jim had even the dimmest awareness of what was happening to him, Blair didn't want him to feel alone. Sandburg also hoped that it might help Ellison grow used to the sound of his voice, as something familiar, as he had no idea whether his voice, like his appearance, echoed with the cadences and tones of his great-grandfather.

It was amazing to watch the progress of the sub-atomic-sized nanites. Burned skin disappeared and in its place healthy tissue appeared, resilient, whole. The scanners showed the same success was underway with the healing of the internal tissues, organs and bones. Jim no longer resembled an alabaster statue. His skin was a natural colour now, carrying the slightly bronzed look of someone who spent time outdoors. Muscle tissue seemed healthy and well developed.

Even the trace of old scars and wounds disappeared.

Ellison's body would be perfect, better than it had been before he'd been virtually killed by the explosion, when he awoke.

It only took three days for the damaged tissue to be repaired and all evidence of the nanites to disappear from tissue samples taken from Ellison's body and blood.

A week in total since the cryochamber had been found, seven days of building expectation and excitement in the minds and hearts of the team working toward the restoration of this body to life.

Secrecy had cloaked the entire project, and miraculously, nothing had yet been leaked to the media. But speculation had begun within the team from the first day about the impact this extraordinary news would have…provided they did, successfully, resuscitate Ellison. Nothing like this had ever been done before. The closest example, as one tekkie facetiously pointed out, was Jesus calling Lazarus out of his burial cave.

Blair listened to the speculations, heard the avid excitement, and quickly found himself growing angry. No one here seemed to grasp that Jim was a human being, not some inanimate, insensate, research 'project'. This was a man who lay helpless under their hands, who when he woke would be confused, terribly confused, by what had happened to him. He might well be afraid to find himself suddenly in a different place, a different world from the one he'd left. A world where no one, not one single person from his previous life was still alive. From what he'd grasped of the man's character from his great-grandfather's notes, Blair believed that Ellison would despise being an object of worldwide study and speculation, would hate the glare of the media's merciless spotlight.

Wondering what to do to protect Ellison from becoming a public display, Blair found himself researching medical and privacy laws and cases, looking for parallels and precedents…and found he didn't have to look far. Basic rights to privacy were sacrosanct and clearly set forth in the statutes. As was the patient's right to privacy about any and all medical conditions that did not infringe upon the health and safety of others. Provided there was no evidence or history of convulsive disorders that would prohibit obtaining personal transportation licensing, whatever happened to him here, as a result of the restoration, even the extraordinary breakthrough of the nanite recovery of his tissues and resuscitation, could not be published without his express permission.

When, in conversations with others on the team, Blair detected a certain reluctance to honour those rights on the part of some of the research and restoration team members, he got in touch with a buddy who'd just passed the bar. With his help, Blair had the necessary legal papers quickly drawn up to protect Jim's rights, to hold all information confidential until Ellison could make his own decisions about what would be released, so long as he was alive. With his buddy's support, Sandburg met with a superior court justice, who just happened to be his buddy's aunt. Sandburg argued his right to be Ellison's 'next of kin' for legal purposes, based upon the knowledge of Jim's history that he'd meticulously extracted from his great-grandfather's journals and the newspaper records of the day. He also obtained 'Power of Attorney' rights to make decisions on Jim's behalf pending Ellison's return to consciousness. The fact that his grandfather had been named for Jim, and that Blair's own middle name was James in honour of the man, didn't hurt in establishing the legitimacy of his involvement. The simple fact was, Blair was the closest thing Jim had to family.

The session had been held 'in camera', to ensure Ellison's continued privacy. The Justice, thinking the whole matter essentially irrelevant, not for a moment believing that Ellison would ever actually be revived, granted Blair's requested status. However, the Justice was not completely insensitive to the fact that this could be considered precedent setting, given the modern practice of using the much more effective stasis techniques. Someday, in a century or two, someone might actually care about the ruling. Until then, so far as she was concerned, it could remain buried in the record.

With a bemused smile and a shrug, she signed the necessary documents, and Blair was on his way…a very happy grad student, armed with the weapons he needed to safeguard a man he'd oddly already begun to think of as his friend. He felt the strongest need to protect Jim Ellison, most especially now when Jim was unable to protect himself.

********************

Though he'd had the documents for a couple of days, Blair only took several copies of the documents with him to the lab the day that resuscitation was to be attempted. Up until then, he'd hesitated to table them, in case his presence was determined to be 'intrusive' to the medical procedures to be implemented. No way did he want to be barred from the lab as an interfering meddler, or perceived as hostile to the interests of the team and the university…until Jim actually revived, any and all of the rights could be contested as invalid. Up until that point, while Jim wasn't actually a corpse, he wasn't really alive, either. Sandburg couldn't afford to be caught up in endless legal wrangles and debates, so he planned a quick and bloodless coup.

Arriving early that day, Blair entered the lab a good hour before the revival procedure was scheduled to begin. Going directly to the scientist in charge of the project, he pulled out the sheaf of legal papers as he explained quietly, but not apologetically, "Dr. Woodhouse, I hope this won't seriously inconvenience you, as we're striving for the same result, the successful revival of James Ellison, but I must now inform you that I have the legal authority for his security and well-being, at least until he wakes up and can take responsibility for himself."

Woodhouse, a tall, angular forty-something woman gazed at him over the tops of her reading glasses, one brow quirked as her cool grey eyes flicked from the papers in his hand to his steady, earnest gaze. "What, exactly, does that mean, Sandburg?" she asked dryly.

"It means that nothing can be released about his treatment and resuscitation without either his or my express permission, as those details concern his legal rights to privacy. I'm sorry, but that will inhibit the publication of research findings that would reveal his identity. Also, it means that I have the final say in how he is treated," Blair continued, speaking clearly but rapidly, obviously a bit nervous but steadfast. "For example, the lights in here are too bright and the room is too cool for his comfort. Currently, he's lying there naked, like a slab of meat, and I think he would object to that. So, I'd like a sheet to cover him when we take him out of the stasis tank…and I've brought the sheets with me. I've chosen and prepared them to ensure his skin, which is bound to be sensitive, will not be unduly irritated. Finally, the lab is crowded with people who are doing little more than 'sight-seeing' and I want access limited only to essential personnel. He's not an object of curiousity. He's a man who has been traumatized and who will have enough to cope with once he wakes without having strangers gawking at him."

"I see," Woodhouse replied neutrally, unsure whether to be irritated at the command the grad student was taking of what she liked to think of as her project, impressed that the kid had kept focused on the fact that they were dealing with a human being as opposed to an inanimate object of scientific interest, or amusement at his marginally aggressive but evidently anxious demeanor. Sandburg was no fool…he had to know that if she took this wrong, she could make a world of trouble for him in the university milieu. "Anything else?"

Taking a breath, Blair softened his tone, to explain to her why he was doing this. "Dr. Woodhouse, I honestly don't mean any disrespect. But…this man was a good friend to my great-grandfather. In a way, I really am the only family he has…the only person here who really cares about him as a person, a unique and special individual who is teetering on the brink between life and death." Looking over toward Jim who was still immersed in the gelatinous solution, he continued, "I know from my ancestor's writings about him that Jim has a lot of sensitivities, allergies. So I'll want to screen whatever medication he's given. I'd also like to have him moved as soon as possible after he regains consciousness to a more normal environment, a room in the hospital instead of this lab, someplace with windows so that he doesn't feel all closed in, wondering where he is. This is going to be so hard for him, you know? He probably doesn't even know he was cryogenated…he won't have any idea about what's happening to him and he might not be very happy about the fact they didn't just let him die."

Turning back to Woodhouse, he sighed, "I just want to help him…that's all."

Woodhouse looked from Blair to Ellison and back again, her lips pursed thoughtfully. Finally, nodding, she reached for the papers in his hand and leafed through them. Looking back up into his intense gaze, she said with an even tone, "All the documents seem to be in order, and your requests are more than reasonable. I'm sure Mr. Ellison will be grateful to you for seeing to his interests when, if, he wakes up."

"He's going to wake up," Blair replied, inserting a note of confidence into his voice, though his mouth was dry and his throat tight with anxiety and barely suppressed excitement.

Woodhouse smiled gently then, as she studied the earnest young man standing before her. His long, curly hair hung loose around a face that was very pale, giving the lie to his confident tone. And his eyes were wide, filled with such a mix of hope and fear that she was startled by their intensity. "I hope you're right, Blair," she said quietly. "But don't get your hopes too high. This has never been successfully achieved before."

"I know," he replied, looking away for a moment. But then his shoulders straightened and his chin came up as he turned back to her and said, "Jim Ellison, from all I know about him, is a fighter. We just have to help him, get him started…he'll make it back."

"Well, on that note, I think we should begin," she said, turning to initiate the business of resuscitation. In accordance with Blair's wishes, she directed non-essential personnel out of the lab, had the lights muted and the room temperature adjusted.

Jim was carefully lifted from the stasis tank and placed upon a gurney. His body was bathed to remove the last of sticky glop in which he'd been immersed. While the bath was underway, Blair substituted the sheets he'd brought with him, a fine soft cotton weave that he'd washed with non-allergic, odourless soap and fabric softeners, for those on the hospital bed that had just been rolled into the lab.

Jim was transferred onto the bed and was intubated, and connected to a respirator that was then turned on to inflate his lungs and begin the normal, physical process of breathing. Electrodes were attached to his chest and limbs to monitor his vital signs. When the heart monitor was turned on, Blair winced at the high-pitched, penetrating and annoying shriek of noise. Moving to the technician, he had the auditory function of the machine disabled. Electrical implants were placed subcutaneously in Jim's chest, over his heart, while another technician checked his intravenous connections, one for the whole blood that he was being given to enrich his hemoglobin count, the other a nutrient mix of glucose, saline and essential elements.

Once the technicians had finished, a sheet was draped over Jim's waist and legs, and Blair moved to stand beside the bed, and grasped Jim's hand. The room was swiftly cleared of all but the medical personnel required to effect the resuscitation procedure, which was little more than the flick of a switch to energize the electrical implants, with the standby capacity to inject adrenaline into Ellison's heart, should that prove to be necessary. Of the rest of the research team, only Blair and Laura Woodhouse remained.

"Are you ready, Sandburg?" Woodhouse asked, unable to completely erase the quake of her own excitement from her voice.

Blair took a deep breath, swallowed the massive lump in his throat and was surprised to find that he had to blink away unexpected tears as he focused his attention on Jim. He lifted a hand to gently stroke Jim's wide brow, while he continued to tightly hold Jim's hand as he murmured quietly, "Okay, Jim, this is it, man. It's time to come back. We're just going to shock your heart into action. The respirator is doing all the work for you, so you just have to lie back and relax. It's time, Jim…it's time."

"Dr. Lin, you may proceed," Woodhouse directed.

Dr. Lin said to Blair, "You'll have to let go of his hand while the current is flowing. Ready…" and as Blair lifted his hands away so that he had no physical contact with the bed or Jim, Lin hit enter on the precoded command for electrical stimulation of the cardiac nexus.

Jim's body arced as the convulsive spasm rocked his system, and then collapsed to lie still once more when the current ended.

Blair's eyes jumped to the monitor and his heart clenched when he saw it was still flat-lining. His gaze darted to Lin, who seemed relatively unperturbed that the first effort had not succeeded. Murmuring a new command into the voice activated computerized system, he again stated, "Clear…" and hit the enter key.

Again Jim's body arced under the onslaught of energy bursting into his heart and triggering sympathetic reactions throughout his system. The charge ended and Ellison's body lost all animation, except for the artificially generated movement caused by the tide of air that was pushed into and pulled out of his lungs by the respirator.

Blair felt a sense of panic sweep over him. It wasn't working. Jim wasn't responding.

Trembling, he held up a hand toward Lin as he moved in to again touch Jim, gripping his arm tightly as he laid a hand against Jim's cheek. "Please, man…don't do this. Don't give up, not now. You've come so far, Jim…you can make it. Please…you have to try. Follow my voice, Jim…follow it back…"

Even as he spoke, Lin had moved to plunge the epinephrine solution directly into the cardiac muscle.

Standing back, Blair nodded to Lin who prepared the computer coding for the final attempt. But this time, Blair didn't stand silently. This time, he kept talking, kept calling out to Ellison to respond, to come back…to live.

The electrical pulse was cut off. The body collapsed into stillness. The monitor continued to record the monotonous and heartbreaking flat line.

The cursor on the heart monitor began to move, first in a wobbling reflection of arrhythmia, but it self-corrected, until the steady, peaked waves of a living heart flowed across the screen. Startled, indeed shocked by the turn of events, Woodhouse touched Sandburg's shoulder and pointed to the display, which Blair in his despair hadn't noticed.

Sandburg looked up and saw the signature of life. For a moment, he just stared at it, frozen, at first too emotionally moved to do more than gaze with a kind of rapture. Then his lips trembled and a sob broke from his throat as he closed his eyes and gave thanks for this miracle to the powers that listen. Sniffing, taking a quick swipe at his eyes to clear them, he leaned over Ellison to stroke the warm, smooth brow while he gazed with a full heart upon the relaxed, unconscious face of his Sentinel. All the while his other hand gripped Jim's, holding on for dear life.

Lin and Woodhouse were grinning broadly, exchanging congratulations on this latest successful, if surprising, stage of the resuscitation process, though they were both mystified as to why the response to the electrical stimulation had been delayed. Lin joked that perhaps the young man had a 'healer's touch'. Both the senior scientists laughed at that, neither believing in such a thing. They both knew it wasn't over yet, and wouldn't be, until Ellison regained consci