Quagmire's Gate

by Allan E Petersen

  She was not impressed. Whelan held up his hand in a halting fashion and Joseph clearly understood its intention was to shut-up. Obviously, he had been shown that jester many times before. Whelan continued,

  “So he said nothing to you about what is going on in the lab next door or in your mind revealed what might have been the cause of his injury?”

  He was subjected to a rather uncomfortable glare from her that immediately made him feel awkward. Finally, and with great relief on his part, she blurted out,

  “Why don’t you just tell me how he died?”

  She was not finished. Like a dagger quickly pulled from a secreted sheath, her finger shot out to stab at him.

  “And the hell with secrets here! What happened to poor Hatcher?”

  Joseph and Whelan exchanged furtive glances. Doctor Nelson was holding his breath. Lynda was getting impatient. Finally, a slight nod between the security officers was detected and Whelan said,

  “This will of course be off the record. We do not know why or how he died. An hour after he left your office his whole hand was gone.”

  She gasped and Whelan continued.

  “And, within an hour after that his whole arm was gone. Three hours later he was dead.”

  “What do you mean his arm was gone? Where is it?”

  It was not the reply she was expecting.

  “We don’t know.”

  It was such a slow reply that she naturally thought she was again misunderstood. Rephrasing the question, she asked,

  “No, I mean where is the arm now? Who has it?”

  A shaking head and solemn reply followed.

  “Like I said, we don’t know what happened to his arm.”

  ”Oh, I see. It simply got up and walked away did it.”

  Doctor Nelson giggled.

  As Joseph walked over to Lynda’s shredder and inserted the file, Whelan continued,

  “Although both of you are under contract and have signed affidavits attesting to secrecy you are both low security levels. However, because this incident is also somewhat of a medical mystery perhaps I’ll divulge some information generally reserved for someone above your clearance.”

  Suddenly Joseph looked like he had seen a ghost. He was horrified that secrets were going to be revealed. Whelan ignored the silent objection and suggested,

  “We will just get them to sign a higher lever later.”

  Joseph settled down but it was clear he was not happy to elevate their security status without proper authority.

  After a cough and a brief inner searching for the right words, he continued.

  “They are not working on lasers in there. The hole in his hand had nothing to do with ----.”

  She could not stop herself. However, it was not as if she tried. It actually blurted out rather easily.

  “Can we just get back to the question of where his arm is? I am a trauma expert. I can tell a lot from degraded tissue.”

  It was a slow confession.

  “Like I said before, we don’t know where his arm is.”

  She was getting frustrated. After all, it was a very simple question. Even a very stupid Kangaroo would understand it. Perhaps to help him appreciate her intention she decided to give him options. She asked,

  “Somebody iced it and took it away and you don’t know what happened to it, is that it?”

  Frustration forced him to shake his head in a rather exaggerated fashion.

  “No, that’s not it. It’s not that simple.”

  “Okay then. Did I miss something or what? Did he or did he not die minus his arm?”

  “Yes he did.”

  “But the arm is missing?”

  “That is correct.”

  Whelan was now getting frustrated. With both arms pumping up and down he blurted out,

  “Look. Nobody knows where his damn arm went. It disappeared. Will you just let that go for now and try your frigging best to listen. Just for once can you shut up for a minute? ”

  His finger shot toward Lynda and with an extra emphasis he blurted out,

  “Yes, it simply disappeared and yes, I mean really actually disappeared into thin air.”

  Joseph Mann shut his eyes. He could not believe such a high security issue had been blurted out. It was way over her security status.

  Joseph must have decided that as long as they had gone this far they might as well be demoted together. Stepping forward he straightened his already perfect tie and attempted to explain.

  “You see, they found him in the men’s lavatory inside the lab. He was in one of the stalls ranting and raving something about his hand. Some of the other scientists attested that they thought he was screaming something about it disappearing, vanishing into thin air. When they finally got the stall door open there was no doubt his hand was missing. All they saw was a nice neat cauterized slice of meat and bone where the hand was supposed to be.”

  She blurted out the word,

  “Cauterized?”

  When noticing Lynda perk alert on the word ‘cauterized’ Whelan asked,

  “This means something to you?”

  Slowly she said,

  “When he came to see me, the hole in his hand was cauterized. I thought it was strange but then again I had no idea what he was working on over there. I just naturally assumed it was done by a laser. That is all I could think of that might do something like that. Now you are saying it was not a laser. Naturally my professional interest is now peaked.”

  “Yes,” said Whelan. “Not to mention our security interest.”

  “And mine.” Added Joseph. After a long cold stare at his partner Whelan turned to Lynda and continued.

  “Because of the intensity of his screaming and to prevent further harm to himself he was heavily sedated.”

  Again, she cut him off.

  “Who administered that? Only Doctor Nelson and I are qualified for those procedures.”

  Sheepishly Doctor Nelson stepped forward. It was clear that he thought he was defending himself. He meekly said,

  “Well you see it happened just after you left yesterday.”

  She recalled Whelan speeding toward the silo yesterday in what she thought was a runaway cart and almost hitting her. Nelson continued,

  “I was clearly qualified to administer a sedative. However, because I was not authorized to go in the laboratory I told them to restrain him and bring him in here. He was out of control raving something about a hole in his hand that was by this time missing. His heart rate was dangerously high, through the roof actually. The morphine did little to calm him. I doubled the dosage and he settled enough to be transported.”

  She snapped,

  “Transported?

  Doctor Nelson said,

  “They took him somewhere. I have no idea where.”

  He turned to look at the two security officers and added,

  “They don’t even know.”

  For a reason unknown to her, Doctor Nelson started to tremble visibly. Anxiety entered his speech and she thought he was going to start crying. He said,

  “I covered him with a blanket and prepared another needle just in case. Naturally, I know that cauterization numbs the nerve cells. According to human physiology, he should not be in pain at all. I was beginning to wonder if he was out of control with the pain or the psychosomatics of it all. After all, his hand was missing. To tell you the truth, he was not the only frightened one here you know.”

  Lynda understood his excitement. Both led such a tedious existence down here that when something as traumatic as this reared its ugly head it would naturally register as destressing. She wondered how she would have reacted in similar circumstances. She turned her attention back to Doctor Nelson, who continued,

  “It seemed like everything was under control. However, just then the door opened and in came some General named Irsthill. Well, at that exact time my poor patient started screaming out of control again. ‘My arm, my arm.’ It was very frightening I must say.”

  Becau
se poor Doctor Nelson was starting to lose control, shaking and obviously hyperventilating, Whelan continued relating the event.

  “Yes, just as General Irsthill entered the room he started screaming again only this time with more intense hysteria. I yelled at the Doctor to get another dosage into his arm. Because a dosage had already been prepared, the Doc was ready to administer it. The General threw the blanket off him and that’s when all hell broke loose.”

  Doctor Nelson had regained some semblance of composure and cut in.

  “Just as I was ready to administer the dosage something worse happened to the poor man. The General yelled out a rude sexual explicative very demeaning to me. Poor Hatcher was struggling and madly fighting the restraints. I almost dropped my syringe. There was no arm to insert the needle into. Not only was his hand missing but now his whole arm was gone.”

  She turned to the table and looked at the ruffled sheet. It was still white, not soaked in blood as it surely should have been if what they said was true. Thinking the arm might still be on the metal table she hesitantly lifted a corner of the sheet. Perhaps she thought that in his hysteria he somehow simply missed it. It was not there.

  Slowly Lynda turned toward the security men. They were empty eyed and expressionless. There was no doubt that despite the improbability of what she had heard, it was true. It actually happened. In response to her question of what happened next, Whelan said,

  “The General then phoned and authorized an air lift over to Fort Lincoln. They have better facilities to handle such an emergency over there.”

  What she blurted out was ill thought out. If asked about it later she would admit that she should not have said it at all. However, it was too late. She said,

  “You mean taken away so it could be kept quiet.”

  Whelan produced a tolerant nod and barely managed to restrain his own nature to rudely strike back at her. He quickly regained composure and said,

  “Yes, perhaps. However there are better places for the poor man to be than secured in an infirmary ill equipped to handle such an emergency don’t you think?”

  His reply was her hard stone stare.

  As all stood silent and pondering different thoughts, a tinge of guilt entered Lynda. She realized she was feeling envious that something had finally happened but it was off her shift. She wondered if she should not remind them that she was the first to respond to the emergency. Suddenly very loud inner voice yelled at her, ‘a man had died for crying out loud’. She saw that the traumatized Doctor Nelson was not strong enough to keep going with his report. Forced to repeat the trauma had drained him emotionally. She recognized his anxiety and fetched him a cup of tea. Helping him sit down she compassionately said,

  “Just slow down and tell me what happened as best you can.”

  Obviously, the soothing tea was a good idea. After a few slow sips, he seemed to gather strength from the comfort. Sappy eyes looked up at her and he whispered,

  “The whole arm really did disappear you know.”

  With a tinge of sarcasm, still not believing the impossibility of it all she blurted out,

  “Into thin air right.”

  She was surprised at the conviction of his reply. He nodded and whispered,

  “Yes, into thin air.”

  This was neither acceptable nor logical to her pragmatic mind. As his pitiable fawn eyes remain transfixed to hers, she was slowly shaking her head. For the sake of his sanity he reaffirmed,

  “I lifted the blanket and it was gone.”

  Both security officers nodded in agreement of the improbable story.

  His shaky voice confirmed.

  “I know I injected ample CC’s of morphine into it just minutes before. I know that and I know what I saw.”

  Lynda turned to the two security men and gave them such a look that Whelan was compelled shrug his shoulders. Not Joseph though. He remained stoic, simply pinching his lips together trying to convince himself that he was having nothing to do with this blatant breach of security. Suddenly poor Doctor Nelson burst into tears and snapped,

  “And don’t bother telling me how far underground we are. I already know that. I already know we are closer to hell then heaven. But unless that vulgar General or whoever he was put that whole arm in his pocket it really did disappear right from under our noses.”

  Lynda understood how traumatic this was to the poor unstable man. Both security men must be assuming that he had lost his mind as well as his composure. Her compassion came to the forefront. She was compelled to lean forward and hug his shivering body. Instinctively she patted his back and he accepted the sympathy, took a deep breath and forced his composure to return.

  What was there to do but fill out reports? Thus under the vigilant eyes of Joseph Mann and Whelan Christianson both doctors accessed their monitors and began pounding the keyboard. Whelan noticed that although Lynda was adept at typing, her fingers flying over them in a blur, Doctor Nelson was almost as fast using just one finger on each hand.

  As both Doctors entered their medical reports into the computers, the security officers turned their backs on them. There was no need to look over their shoulder and see what each was typing. Both held a cell phone and read the report as fast as she typed. Lynda’s first clue that they were monitoring her report was when Whelan turned to her and blurted out,

  “Just a minute Doctor. You have just reported that it was not a bug bit and that you suspect he already knew what it was. Did he tell you what he was doing in the lab?”

  She slowly turned to look at him. It was then she saw both over by the cabinet each holding a cell phone. Although she does not consider herself to be the greatest Doctor in the world, she does not like to have her reports questioned, especially by non-medical people.

  In a tone designed to convey her annoyance she hissed,

  “If you had bothered to read the initial report you’d have seen that I reported he was too afraid to tell me. That fear might have been a contributing factor to his death. I also believe that I told you in person not too long ago that I do not know what is going on over there. If this causes you consternation or anxiety, then by all means tell me and I’ll be glad to administer a suppository to ease your mind.”

  If it was Whelan’s intention to intimidate her by abruptly walking toward her, it most certainly worked. In a bold move of defiance, she jumped to her feet ready to face the attack head on. Instinctively she wanted to reach for the hypodermic and defensively take a full lunge at him. However, he stopped short, just a few feet from her nose. In a manner demanding attention and compliance he explained,

  “You must understand Doctor Gray that not only did you sign contracts to get this job, so did I. If there was a security leak over in the lab through this infirmary then it is my job to stop it here, before it reaches the surface. From this point forward, please do not interfere with our work. Continuing to do so is an infraction of your contract. Do I make myself clear Doctor?”

  Before she could utter a reply or even get her stunned head to nod compliance, Joseph stepped forward and cited,

  “Page 24 through page 27 starting with paragraphs 3.”

  Her eyes never left Whelan. That was how she happened to see him slowly turn to his partner and again throw a darted squint at him. Joseph Mann slowly backed down. There was no doubt in her mind that Joseph was prepared to and capable of citing verbatim all the pages of her contract. There was a lesson to be learned. Do not question or demean their position for they obviously take it more seriously than she does. In self-defense she muttered,

  “I’ll only say this once more. I do not know what is going on in there. Hatcher was too afraid to tell me.”

  Joseph brushed past Whelan and interjected,

  “Did you question him on the general principles of the project?”

  Imagined knives dripping in blood hurled toward his thick skull. Great restraint managed to sneer,

  “I believe I already answered that question.”

  Joseph wa
s persistent in his effort to break her down.

  “No you didn’t Doctor. I find it hard to believe that you did not ask him what caused the hole.”