"I'm guessing Lina went after the easy one first." Mindi pulled up a chair and sat directly in front of Howie. "It's much easier to convince someone out of their fears and beliefs than to deal with your problem."
"I uh, think he's pretty scared too." A.J. volunteered.
"No he's not," she contradicted. "It's a symptom. Howie's one of a very few people who's allergic to psychic energy."
"I'm *what*?"
"Allergic. Nick probably discovered it on the bus. Remember Alex sang you awake?"
"We all remember that." Kevin drawled. "I wouldn't call it 'singing' exactly.."
"Nick should have been able to wake you himself. Because your mind shied away from psychic contact, he needed that outside help... both to wake you up and distract you while he got you out."
"Someone thanked me for taking his mind off things so they could get him asleep. Same thing?"
"Uh huh," she nodded. "What Howie feels as fear or squeamishness about telepathy, telekinesis and that sort of thing, is actually a defensive mechanism his brain has set up to keep him away from something that's unhealthy for him."
"So if he's allergic..." A.J. pondered this, "...how are we going to get him to help pull Nick out?"
"That's the sixty-four thousand dollar question."
Howie paled. "You need me to wake Nicky?"
"All four of you," she turned to look at Kevin. "Which is part of why Lina went apeshit on you. If she couldn't change your mind, there wasn't much point in working on Howie."
"Yelling at me was gonna change my mind?" he raised an eyebrow.
"Well no," Mindi shrugged, "but look at it from her position. Her partner is lying unconscious in a hospital bed and for once she can't help him. You can and you didn't want to. I've seen your temper, Kev. What would you do if things were reversed?"
A.J. grinned. "Take a swing at her."
"Okay okay. So... Howie?"
"Depends how bad it is. Considering he's spent so much time around Nick for so long, I don't think it's fatal. But you've been around a lot of psychic activity for two days... how are you feeling, besides scared?"
"Confused. Still not really sure what to believe."
"All right. Brian's bought us some time, so here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to walk out of here and take a cab back to the hotel. Could at least one of you stay here and keep Howie company?"
"I'll do it. You probably need to talk to Kristin." A.J volunteered.
"Yeah, I do." Kevin shook his head. "Since when do you remember that kind of thing? I thought that was my job?"
"Someone had to step in, bro."
"Whatever. Kevin and I can split a cab. Just... try to be as normal as possible for a few hours. Keep Howie away from the ICU, leave the room if you need to talk to me or any other psychic."
"Clean out my system?" Howie asked in a sceptical tone."Pretend things are normal?"
"You're catching on. Call home or something. Play a board game. I'll check in later and see how things are. See ya." With that she got up and left. Kevin looked from Howie, to the door and back again. Finally he shrugged, waved and followed her out.
"How does she just turn it off like that?" Howie wondered. "How does she expect me to just forget about it all?"
"'Cause you have to. So, what do you want to do? Wheelchair races? Play lose-the-bodyguard? Go toss things out the window for the fans?"
"Bone..." his friend just shook his head.