May 24, 1998
Rainier University

Hannah Russell puttered around her dorm room, getting ready to leave again. With finals almost up she was ready to move back to Richie's apartment. The young witch allowed herself a decidedly gleeful smile at the prospect. She couldn't wait to have him around full time again.

During the school year, Hannah stayed in the Rainier dorms.

Richie had a tendency to take off to Paris if MacLeod needed him and she didn't like puttering around that apartment on her own, it was way too big. A single dorm room was smaller and didn't feel quite so lonely. But now that Hannah was finished school for the summer, she was free to take off to Paris with him and she fairly bounced with excitement.

Picking up her anthropology book, Hannah moved to stuff it into her backpack but lost her grip on it before she could.

Without any warning, a vision crashed into her mind and the young witch gasped in horror. The images being presented to her, sent a vicious chill through her soul.

Blair Sandburg, her friend and teacher, in his office with a blonde woman. The same woman Hannah had seen him walking around campus with several times over the previous week. At the time she'd assumed the blond to be his new girlfriend or something.

She'd assumed wrong. Way wrong.

Now, in her mind's eye, in the aching clarity of a vision, Hannah saw the blonde woman holding a gun on Blair. And the image that followed brought a sickened moan from the young witch as she grabbed at a chair to remain upright.

Blair - face down - in the rose garden's fountain. He wasn't moving.

Shaking off the disorientation that always accompanied a vision, Hannah snatched up her keys and raced out of the room.

Blair Sandburg couldn't die. Something in her was adamant about it. He could not die.

He wasn't allowed to. Not yet.

---

After a breathless run across campus, Hannah rounded the corner and was horrified to see a crowd of people next to the fountain.

A crowd that included EMTs.

Racing down to the grassy area, Hannah wove her way through the bystanders, a spell already forming in her mind.

She sincerely hoped nobody noticed or wondered what she was doing. But then, if anyone saw her lips moving they'd probably assume she was praying.

'Not a bad idea.' The young witch thought to herself. 'Not a bad idea at all.'

Her tear-filled blue eyes locked on the scene before her for a long moment. Watching as a dark haired man, Blair's best friend Detective Ellison (her mind supplied absently) had to be forcibly restrained by two tall black men, each murmuring to him. Clearly they were trying to keep him calm but failing. Which was quite understandable considering they weren't really calm themselves. How could you be calm when one of your friends lay dying before you?

Hannah pressed a clenched fist to her mouth - as if that act could hold back the tears. Not only tears for the good friend fighting for his life but tears generated by the expressions of agony mixed with horror and disbelief on the faces of the detectives standing around.

Then there was the expression on Detective Ellison's face. Hannah's heart wrenched in agony watching him. She'd never seen such pain, such utter and raw agony on one face before.

And when the EMTs shook their heads, clearly giving up...

Hannah's tears spilled over...She was losing a good friend, someone she thought of as an older brother and that was agonizing enough, but it was clearly paltry in comparison with the loss Detective Ellison was facing. Blair had alluded, on several occasions, that the older man was the brother he'd never had. It had been obvious to Hannah that the two men cared as much about the other as was humanly possible. Whether they knew it or not, theirs was a friendship rarer than the most valuable of jewels.

Stepping back slightly, Hannah knew now was the time. Blair could not be allowed to slip away.

"He is vibrance, he is life, he is one too strong to die," the spell fell from her lips with an undercurrent of urgency. As if she couldn't wait another moment. That every second counted. One look at Detective Ellison's face told her it did. "On the corporeal plain he is needed by all, I beseech now, all powers great and small, You mustn't let Blair Sandburg fall."

The spell completed, Hannah waited for it to take effect.

One moment passed, then another, and another. In seconds it became clear that nothing was going to happen.

"I don't understand it." She whispered. "It should have worked."

"Its not meant to."

Hannah spun to face Jesse, the Whitelighter in charge of her and her sister. "Why not!? I know I'm supposed to do something. Otherwise why'd I have the vision?"

The Whitelighter rested his hands on her shoulders and turned her to face the scene before them. "You aren't meant to interfere, you're meant to bear witness."

A tiny sob escaped the young witch. "Witness what? Blair Sandburg's death?"

"No." Jesse leaned down to whisper past her curls. "To the beginning of his rebirth. Now watch."

"His what?" Hannah turned to face him again but Jesse was already orbing out. His body disappearing in a swirl of blue energy.

Confused, the youngest Russell sister turned back to the painful picture before her.

She was just in time to see Jim Ellison yank away from his friends and sink down next to Blair.

Hannah's confusion tripled as Ellison placed his hands on either side of Blair's face.

She gasped as her Sight kicked in and she Saw a wolf.

Vaguely the young witch was aware of a voice yelling, "He's gone!!!" but her attention was on the scene being played out before her.

The wolf began to turn away but another voice, a deeper voice than the first one, instructed calmly. "Use the power of your animal spirit." For a split second she had a clear image of a man, some sort of Shaman by the markings he wore, but his attention was not on her. He was speaking to someone else. Ellison most likely.

Ellison clearly listened for a moment later, the vision shifted again and through her mind's eye, Hannah saw a massive black jaguar running toward the wolf who turned toward the jungle cat. Leaping into the air, they collided and merged, sending off a bright flash of light.

Startled, Hannah blinked and realized the vision was over. Obviously whatever had happened, there'd been an effect.

Moving closer again, she heard Detective Ellison speak.

"Simon, I think I hear a heartbeat."

The oddness of the statement stuck in Hannah's brain. 'How the hell did he....' She began, knowing that even kneeling next to Blair, there was no way Ellison could have heard the sound, not unless he had his ear pressed against  Blair's chest. Which he hadn't.

The thought was forgotten as a flurry of activity again surrounded the anthropologist as he came to consciousness, rolled over and spit out water.

Hannah sighed in relief. He was alive.

She ran a hand over her curls and let it rest on the back of her neck. Jesse had said she was there to bear witness to Blair's rebirth.

Rebirth to what?

Watching as Blair was loaded into the ambulance and swept from the scene, the young witch realized something very big was going down. But she had absolutely no idea what that was.

Making a mental note to talk to Emma about the things she'd Seen, Hannah turned and started back toward her dorm. "Just when you think your world can't get weirder..." She mumbled with a shake of her head. "Your Whitelighter shows up and confuses the hell out of you. Rebirth? What does that mean? Reborn to what? As what? And where the heck did those spirit animals come from? Who was the guy in the vision?"

She moaned slightly and pressed a hand to her forehead. "I think I'm getting a headache. Oh boy...I have the distinct impression life's going to get very complicated soon."

Finis

 

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