The paramedics were amazed to even find a pulse.  It was weak, but it was there.  So instead of taking a trip to the morgue, as they’d assumed upon taking the call, the ambulance headed to the hospital.

The doctors were unable to surgically remove the bullet lodged in her brain due to the excessive swelling and the risk of death.  They wanted to wait until the swelling subsided, although the team of neurosurgeons all knew in their hearts that the poor young woman with the bullet in her brain and lying in the hospital bed would probably never wake up, whether or not they removed the bullet.  And even if she did, she’d never be the same person her friends knew and loved.

Shane’s friends kept a constant vigil by her bedside, trying to never give up hope.  Day after day, they sat beside her and cried, prayed, read to her, and had conversations with her, all of them hoping against hope that one day Shane would wake up and be the same woman she was before.  And while her friends sat by her side, and Shane’s body lay inactive in the hospital bed, her brain remained active.  To the outside world, Shane McCutcheon was as good as dead, however, her brain was very much alive.

At first, she was not aware of her condition.  She just knew something wasn’t right, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it.  Shane knew what had happened by the third day of her coma, which was the same day she began to hear the voice.

It wasn’t like in the movies, where people die and there is a great flash of white light from the heavens and they step into the beam to be transported to the great thereafter.  There was a sudden sense of peace, and calmness, and it was then Shane knew she was about to die.  She gave into the relaxation of it all, and the thoughts of everything else faded away as she became fully prepared to give up the fight and accept her fate.  Shane was ready to accept death.

Not yet, said the voice.

Shane was startled out of her state, and the serenity was gone as quickly as it had come.