He won’t survive, this one. Not in the shape he’s in. She knew that from the moment she laid eyes on the patient. The Doc knew it too, that much was certain. But regardless, he didn’t stop trying. They had to do their duty. From time to time, even the most hopeless cases have been known to survive.
She took the gauze, stretching it over the man’s gaping stomach and pressed as firmly as she could at the sides. What the hell, let’s give it a shot. The muscles around the shredded abdomen contracted slowly, despite the anesthesia. Reflexes. Whatever it was that happened to him was horrible, alright.
With the precision and infallibility of a well-oiled machine, the Doc proceeded to work his way on his end. Despite her not being weak of stomach, she averted her eyes. Some blood and gore is bearable. However, witnessing the rending of flesh and bone while surrounded by similarly mutilated bodies was another thing altogether. Best not look at it until I must. The man’s muscles kept slowly contorting while he was being cut, moving under her fingers ever so slightly. It appears that he is not completely oblivious to the agony we are putting him through. Then, out of the blue, she noticed something. The man was fit. Not just fit, it was apparent that his body was comparable to that of a triathlete, at the very least; the kind of body that only the most capable and devoted sportsmen and special forces members walked around in. Was this some sort of military op gone wrong? I’ll have to remember to ask the Doc where these guys were even found.
“Goddamn it!” Doc Addams suddenly exclaimed, some of the patient’s blood having splashed in his face, right over the glasses. The wound he had been working on started gushing crimson. “He had a couple of torn arteries pressed inside! Someone, anyone! Come here and wipe my glasses!”
Within less than a second he could see again, but by that time the man’s slight contractions had stopped entirely. The Doc didn’t need to be told. He could tell just from looking that this was now a fresh corpse.
“The internal injuries were too severe,” he said after a couple of contemplative seconds. “The rest of them, they’ve been so badly mangled you could see it right away. We couldn’t tell the damage this one here had suffered without opening him up.” He removed his gloves slowly, as if he aimed to purposely give his words some additional weight. “Which was simply not an option, given how much blood he’d lost on the way here.” He put his gloves next to the deceased as he made his conclusion. “This man was as dead as the rest of them, we just didn’t know it.”
He always takes it personally when a critical intervention fails, even after all this time. Claudia didn’t blame him. She was the same, although she never did any actual surgery herself, being a nurse. Still, assisting in an exhausting procedure that doesn’t result in a life being saved was just about the worst feeling in the world.
“Doctor Addams, sir,” she broke the silence after giving him some five seconds to gather his thoughts. “Who were those men? Where were they found? Were these animal attacks, all of them?”
What the hell is going on? she wanted to ask, but opted not to. It’s not like he would know. He just fixes people.
“I am not all that certain, Nurse Chance.” He removed his glassed, this time wiping them personally. “And I’m not sure that I want to know. In fact, I’ll be glad if I never have to see something like this again.” Lost in thought, he turned his stare toward the large pair of doors, the only barrier between them and the angry mob of sick (and not so sick) people outside. “But enough about that. All of you, take these to the morgue and notify the relevant authorities.” But just as they were about to start moving the bodies, he interrupted them with, “I’ll need two volunteers. You will remain here to work the door and assist me with these, shall we say, less critical cases.”
Claudia didn’t hesitate once before she raised her hand. Helping people was why she was there, after all.
A week later
Exhausted, though the night was just beginning, Claudia Chance relished the opportunity to rest in the staff room. Granted, she had to join two chairs together so as to place her ample buttocks comfortably, but no one was around to complain.
There’s so much work to be done…
Times had never been harder. Something was going on in the city, and it kept getting worse. Even if everyone ignored the rapidly rising frequency of assaults and more violent crimes, it was more than evident that something new was going down.
Like that new wave of animal attacks…
The mere thought of what had happened last week was enough to cause an unpleasant sensation on the back of her neck. Those men and the way they were just butchered like that; just thinking about it sent shivers down her spine.
No one deserves to die like that.
In the meantime, she had made some inquiries about the whole thing. The results were strange, to say the least. While some of the deceased men did have military backgrounds, most of them did not. Furthermore, none of them had been employed in any combat agency at the time of their deaths.
At least not officially, that is.
The possibility of the entire thing being some sort of failed secret operation was indeed there, but what could it have possibly been? An escaped animal would demand the attention of animal control, not a military organization or whatever it was that those men were.
Alternatives do come to mind, but they’re all drawn straight out of bad movies, of course. She smiled for a little bit, amused by the absurdity of what she had actually allowed herself to consider. An escaped experiment. A maniac with claw-like weapons. A werewolf. The thoughts kept piling up, each more ridiculous than the last. For a while she amused herself like that, almost completely losing track of the time. By the time she snapped out of it, another ambulance was arriving at the hospital.
“Nurses Anders, Chance and Harrison, report to the emergency room for intake!” The operator’s voice echoed from the speaker in the room’s upper corner.
Time to make a difference. For the millionth time.
Now in a somewhat better mood, Claudia rose from her table, placing the other chair back in its place before she exited the room. As always, the hallway was packed. Luckily, most of the people there knew exactly who she was. It took less than a second for them to move to the sides, forming a passage that was wide enough to let even her sizeable frame through.
Who knows, this might go easier than expected. Claudia traversed the neon-lit hallway with heavy yet quick steps. But her positive disposition quickly got shot to smithereens by the sight in front of her. Coming up the hallway, members of the ambulance staff raced toward her at top speed, their hands firmly planted on the bloody gurneys that rolled in front of them. Oh, God, not this again…
The commanding voice of Doc Addams cut through the air the way it always did. “We’ve got a total of six victims, all bleeding profusely! Clear the path! These men are beyond critical!”
Let’s try and use the opening I’ve made getting here, then. Without a word, Claudia turned around, sighing in relief when she saw that she still had a clear field of vision to the end of the corridor.
“Alright, you’ve heard the doctor! Make way for your fellow patients!” Then, having noticed just how unpleasant she sounded, Claudia added a finishing touch to her act: “Please.”
With all the speed of a crawling baby, the patients in triage cleared as wide a path as was possible. No one made a major fuss this time, and those who had anything to say now mercifully kept their mouths shut.
Ah, the perks of having trusting and regular customers. Claudia felt proud as she made her way toward the area that led to the operating rooms. Behind her, the others followed suit. The Doc was on the phone, busy requesting the aid of all available surgeons as soon as possible.
“This is neither a joke nor a drill!” he bellowed into the phone’s mic. “The animal attack from last time; it’s happened again! If you want us to learn anything about that you better get here yesterday!”
The path to the large pair of doors appeared much longer
than it actually was, but, eventually, they passed through without incident.
“Thank God that went without a hitch,” a female nurse commented while she barred the door.
Good thinking. That was smooth back there, but who knows what might happen if they get jumpy again. But she didn’t share the other nurse’s enthusiasm. Who knows what splendid sights, sounds and whatnot await tonight.
“Alright, all of you, spread out! I want at least a pair of nurses on every one of these men until and after the surgeons arrive! I want you to continuously check their pulses, breathing, and sew up any minor lacerations. We need to keep as much blood in their bodies as we possibly can. If you find a laceration longer than an inch and a half, press down on it and wait for me or another doctor! Go!”
Like drones in a well-maintained hive, the nurses went about their work. The sounds of wheels turning, sheets rolling and instruments clicking soon filled the room, treating the three surgeons who arrived moments later to the sight of a perfectly functioning ER ward. Claudia herself was just about to lend her assistance to Doc Addams when bad news started popping up all around.
“Mine is gone!” a male nurse exclaimed, barely able to keep his eyes opened due to the copious amounts of sweat that dripped down from his forehead. “I need a doctor to confirm and call it!”
“Me too!” Another one, this time a female, soon let her voice be heard. “These men’s injuries, they are even worse than they look!”
And they look absolutely horrid.
“Claudia, focus!” The Doc invited her to return her gaze to the wrapped figure that lay in front of them. The hospital sheet was completely red, and covered absolutely every part of the patient, including his face.
Oh well, let’s see the newly recast Two-Face.
Claudia steeled herself as she grabbed the sheet, expecting to witness a sight straight out of her worst nightmares. She always hated injuries to the face. Her own beautiful face was a treasure in its own right, and she couldn’t imagine what disfigurement might be like. With a forceful motion she pulled the cover clean off the patient, revealing something no one in the room expected: a perfectly intact—albeit blood-covered—attractive male. His body caught her attention first, but it was his face that gave her the biggest surprise: it was the man she had talked to when they’ve brought in the previous batch of D.O.A.s.
What in the—? It’s that strange, hot guy!
Caught completely off guard, Claudia had absolutely no idea what to think. She had even less of a concrete opinion when she (and the doctor as well, judging from his flabbergasted expression) realized that the man had no external injuries whatsoever. But he was covered in coagulated blood, which made it easy to mistake him for someone with actual injuries.
Encrusted layers of dark crimson lay embedded in every exquisite canyon between the man’s immaculately sculpted muscles. If it were not so grotesque it might even have even been hot, in a bizarre sort of way. Without thinking, she ran her hand across his abs, slowly feeling her way toward the middle of his chest. He was breathing evenly, and his heart was beating the way a healthy heart should.
He’s… completely alright. The fact disturbed her to no end. Everyone else had been slashed, ruptured and torn beyond recognition, but here was this man, apparently in perfect health.
And his health is not all that’s perfect about him.
Although she hated herself for thinking that way in a situation like this, Claudia simply couldn’t resist. There was something about the man, apparent even though he was unconscious. It was too primal to categorize, but she could feel it none the less.
“Care to remove your hand so that I can check the rhythm of his breathing myself, Claudia?” the Doc finally said, preventing her from making an even bigger fool of herself.
“Oh, yeah, sure,” Claudia replied as she drew her arm back to her curvaceous side. As she did so, she could feel the hot waves of redness as they slowly expanded over her cheeks.
Completely ignoring her change of color, Doc Addams proceeded to feel around the man’s solar plexus. “This is... this is surprisingly good. Great, actually.” He carefully traced his fingers across the patient’s body. “There are no external signs of injury at all,” he concluded as he stepped away from the surgical table. “What is the situation on your end?” the Doc asked calmly, but in such a way that everyone in the room clearly heard and understood.
“Zero survivors!” one of the doctors responded, more annoyed than saddened.
“They were torn up in such a way that saving them was absolutely impossible, yet the thing didn’t finish them off. Instead, they’ve been left to die in pain!” another one added. “The agony they must have endured before death; I can’t even imagine it!”
But… why would an animal do something like that? Still surprised by the healthy patient near her, Claudia found herself staring blankly into space while the doctors’ words sank in. Suddenly, some of the crazier ideas from earlier didn’t seem all that impossible.
“That… that’s the same thing that happened the last time,” Doc Addams responded thoughtfully. “I assume that you all know just how likely that is with animal attacks, right? Twice in a row, especially.”
“Somewhere between nothing and zero,” a female doctor responded, deadpan.
“Exactly, my dear colleague,” Doc Addams answered as he moved around the room. “But how would you rate our odds of finding a survivor among these people?” He paused for a moment, timing his interruption to just when the other doctor was about to speak. He allowed a thin little smile to grace the edges of his lips. “Because I’ve got one here, and he is as healthy as you or me.” “Well, maybe not as me,” he finished, now smiling a bit more overtly.
At first, his colleagues merely stared at the Doc and the man who lay on the gurney behind him in disbelief. Then, having noticed the slow movements of the patient’s chest, all three of them rushed toward the table. Caught up in their professional and personal curiosities, they almost pushed the older doctor to the side.
The following night
I couldn’t sleep a wink.
Thoughts raced through Claudia’s head as she stuffed her ample backside into the tight white skirt of her nurse’s uniform. Who the hell was that man last night? She zipped the skirt up hurriedly, eager to get on to the next part. Why in the world was that man unharmed? With careful movements (so as not to rip it) she put her hands through the sleeves of her white blouse. They said that he woke up. She zipped the top completely, barely managing to get it to cover her spilling cleavage. But they also say that he can’t remember anything. Finally, she took her white hat and perched it on her head, completing the outfit. As she made her way out of the dressing room, Claudia took a moment to observe herself in the mirror.
Not bad at all. She commented on the display she made. Her curvy, voluptuous figure had been shaped by the tight clothes into something straight out of a fetish magazine. Her overwhelmingly large chest and hips practically competed for attention, but what really stole the show was her face. Normally very pretty in an unassuming way, with the assistance of a thin layer of make-up expertly applied, her visage became simply astonishing. All it took was a light amount of eye-shadow and a bit of red lipstick, and she became a shining image of exaggerated femininity.
Let’s see if this will refresh his memory, she thought as she exited the room, looking forward to her impending talk with the handsome new patient.
As she walked down the corridor, it was apparent that everyone noticed her appearance. Heads turned and people stared as she made her way toward the room that she’d been told contained the blond man. They said they’ve identified him as Dillon Myers, a small business owner. Hardly a dangerous profession. The only trait he shared with the other, deceased men was a well-honed physique. Beyond that, the similarities ended.
“Excuse me, madam, but I think you’ve got the wrong room.” Lost within her own internal monologue, Claudia almost failed to notice the pair of policemen wh
o stood watch on each side of the door until she was right on top of them. “I heard they throw wicked parties on the floor above, though. You should give it a shot there, I think,” the guard finished, all while eyeing Claudia’s body from head to toe. The other one said nothing, although he stared just as much, if not more.
Why are guards in front of—? Ah, I get it, he’s probably a suspect! Despite the ridiculousness of the idea (given Dillon’s lack of teeth and claws capable of tearing all those men apart), Claudia knew better than to antagonize the policemen while they did their duty. As far as I know, they may well consider the idea as ridiculous as I do.
“I am here to check out the patient,” she replied, showing them her best smile.
“Hasn’t he already been checked out?” The policeman responded, gazing at everything other than her lips. “A Doctor Grayson came by about half an hour ago, said everything was in perfect order.”
“Yes. Yes, he was. This one is personal, you see. As a matter of fact, I was the nurse who found him last night, and it would really mean a lot to me if you would just let me see him.”
The cops exchanged looks, then turned back toward her, clearly expecting her to say something more.
“They were all dead, you see,” Claudia continued, now having chosen the card she would play. “Every single victim of the animal attacks had died. Except him. With that and the ever-increasing influx of new patients, hospital morale is low. My morale is low. Seeing a survivor would really help, you know?” She finished her story with a wink, standing in such a way that it appeared as if it was dedicated to both of them.
“Well, now,” the guard said, smiling. “I don’t see a reason why we should deny a pretty girl like you a little dose of morale.” The other man didn’t speak, but smiled anyway. “Go in, pretty lady. Just make sure to be careful, just in case he actually did do it.” The guard couldn’t help but laugh as he spoke.
And they say that policemen are stupid.
Pleased that her plan had worked, Claudia passed by the cops and opened the door slowly, as if she were unpacking a present. Then, in a single mincing motion, she stepped in and shut the door behind her, mentally preparing for another glimpse of the Adonis she’d seen last night.
Arranged Marriage To The Rogue (Victorian Romance) Page 50