“Thanks, guys. I owe you lunch,” I said.
“No problem, doc. Just doing our job,” Stash said.
“You should come out to happy hour,” Stanislaw said. “If your wife will let you.” The guards laughed, grunting and elbowing each other.
“She will. One of these days,” I said. “Hey—what’s that?”
Three police cars careened into the parking lot. The reporters fluttered away like seagulls fleeing a group of children. A van pulled up behind the cars; the words “Crime Scene Unit” were written on the side in squared red letters. The cops exited the cars, and among the uniforms, I immediately recognized Lanza as he gestured at the lingering blonde reporter, yelled at her, then pointed toward the ultrahighway. The journalist scurried off on her stiletto heels. As the group strode to the hospital door, Lanza bumped shoulders with O’Keefe, who toppled into some bushes on the side of the walkway, dropping his case and his hat and keys. Lanza seemed not to notice. The six policemen awkwardly cycled, one by one, through the revolving entryway. Lanza led the way straight up to me. We nodded formally at each other.
“Doctor,” he said, holding out his hand.
“Detective,” I said, shaking hands with him first and then with each of the cops in turn. I turned again to Lanza. “To what do I owe this honor? I figured you’d still be busy with the crime scene over at the stadium.”
“Nah, the feds are taking care of that one now, since whoever it was used an illegal German assault rifle,” Lanza said. “And anyway, someone anonymously called us with a tip that the people who died overnight didn’t die accidentally.”
I stopped. I nodded over my shoulder.
“I’ve been wondering that myself. Follow me. I’ll show you to the ICU.”
I swiped my Atman, and we waited for the elevator. I looked at Lanza.
“Who’s this anonymous tipster?” I said, blinking at them.
“Honestly,” said the grayheaded cop whose uniform said he was a captain, “whoever it was sounded like an absolute nutjob. Somebody with a scratchy throat, using a voice scrambler. But Lanza mentioned you had called with your concern about one of the deaths at the hospital here a few nights ago. So we decided to come take a look.”
“Protocol,” Lanza said, nodding.
A thunder of footsteps echoed in the distance—growing quicker, louder, harder, closer. From the central corridor burst Rothenberg and McDermott, the trauma surgeons. They ran as fast as they could, donuts in their mouths, bellies bouncing, lidless coffees slopping onto the floor. They rushed toward the emergency room.
“Hey guys,” I called out. “What’s happening?”
Rothenberg spun around, pulled the donut out of his mouth, and banged backwards through the swinging door.
“The last of the patients is coding,” he yelled.
“The celebrity?” I called out.
I got no response. The doctors disappeared. I trotted toward the door, too. The cops were at my heels as I pushed through them. The patient was at the far side of the circular room, and the two surgeons were swinging on their gowns, calling out commands. Three nurses and four specialists were grouped around the gurney like chess pieces, as the machines beeped and rattled, then flatlined. I got a glimpse through the crowd and saw that the patient was none other than Joe Steelman. He had lasted longer than I had expected. The cops and I watched as the doctors used electricity, blood transfusions, tubes, and spongy cloths to try and bring the celebrity back to life. At one point, everything slowed, grew quiet. The sudden silence seemed to bode well. But then the patient started convulsing. Rothenberg pinned him down and barked for McDermott to crack open the ribcage and to try and work directly on the sputtering heart. But he stopped midsentence; the seizure had stopped. Rothenberg brought his ear close to the patient’s head. The surgeon tensed, listening intently. Two seconds later, the electrocardiogram droned. The two surgeons stepped away as the nurses brought in the paddles and tried to shock the cardiac muscle back into a rhythm. I stepped back, aware the final reckoning for Joseph Harry Dugash had come, right at the peak of his hard-earned fame.
“Detective,” I said to Lanza, who was staring at the face of the fresh corpse. “I can show you the rooms. Most of the other bodies are up there.”
“Uh-huh,” Lanza said, not blinking, unable to tear his gaze away. “You know…I’ve never seen anyone die in the hospital before. It’s so…clean.”
“A bit cleaner than a desert battlefield, I’d guess. But you get the same sloppy result down in a six-foot hole, ultimately.”
Lanza nodded, saying nothing more.
The surgeons came out from a curtain, pulling off their gloves with snaps of latex, tossing them in the trash by the wall, then pulling their masks down. Rothenberg stopped in front of me and glared.
“You know someone named Meruda?” he asked.
“Never heard of them. Is that a Latino name?” I said.
“No idea. That’s what the patient just said,” the surgeon said, shaking his head, the mask dangling at his collar. “I’ve never seen anything like it before. The guy was dead to rights, no pulse, then his eyes open and he says one word: ‘Meruda.’ It was barely a whisper, I had to lean in just to hear it.”
The surgeon wiped at his hairy hands and arms with a chemical towel.
“That never happens. I’ve never seen someone die, come back just to say something, then code again.”
“Strange,” I said. “You have any idea what happened to all these patients?”
“No idea, Joe,” Rothenberg said, pulling him a step away from the cops, toward the nursing station in the unit. He looked in both directions, leaned in close to me. His voice dropped to a whisper. “It’s too weird to be a coincidence—all those people. But I have no idea what happened overnight. We would have found poison right away, or at least traces of something. The O.N.K. would have found anything in the diagnostic codes. Wouldn’t it?”
“No idea, Stuart,” I said. “But there is one person who keeps showing up right before patients die, according to the terminals.”
“Who?”
“Shiro Ishii.”
“Shiro Ishii? Excuse me?”
“A Japanese doctor supposedly on our staff. Or rather, somebody masquerading as a Japanese doctor on our staff,” I said. “Maybe it’s the angel of death, I don’t know. I’m just glad the cops showed up, just in case we’re overlooking something.”
“Cops are never a good idea,” Rothenberg whispered, his eyes darting both directions. He tossed another chemical rag in the trash. “But I’ve never heard of any Dr. Ishii. Just help them where you can and keep the hospital out of it as much as possible. Namaste, Joe.”
The trauma surgeon bowed quickly and stepped away. I walked back to the cops, who were huddled close together. Lanza stared at the corpse of Joe Steelman, as if trying to will him back to life. I patted my friend on the shoulder.
“The man was a visionary,” Lanza said, shaking his head, staring at the celebrity corpse. “I don’t know if the U.S. will even medal in hot-dog eating at the Olympics without him. And no one else has the courage to bite poisonous snakes—at least no one still alive.”
“This way, officers,” I said, ignoring him. I tilted my head toward the elevators. “I’ll show you the rest.”
“Lead the way, doctor,” said the grayheaded captain, motioning for them to continue on.
We entered the elevator in silence. Inside, I swiped my Atman. On the third floor, we exited and the cops’ bootsteps echoed down the hallway as we neared the line of shrouded bodies along the wall. I lifted the first sheet for them to see; it was the face of a teenaged girl, her eyes open, a tinge of blood smeared along her lips. The youngest of the cops tapped into the device on his wrist. Lanza moved to the next sheet, lifted it, and discovered an elderly man whose mouth hung open, gray and cavernous. Lanza took a small flashlight from his breast pocket, stuck it in the fatty folds of the man’s chins, and shut the jaw. But when he removed it, the mouth dr
opped open again, jiggling the neck’s rolls. I walked over and whisked back another sheet. This one was a middle-aged man, wearing a bloodstained rainbow beanie. The other four cops fanned out and investigated all the bodies: children, parents, grandparents, an infant curled like a bloodless little bean on a gurney near the end of the line.
The captain took one glance at the tiny body and covered it again.
“Doc, may I ask what we’re looking for?” the captain asked, approaching me.
“We don’t know. The O.N.K. says these people just died from natural causes,” I said, scratching my chin. “But that makes no sense—it’s like they all died of old age in one night. They were stable and recovering after we patched them up. Most weren’t even hurt that badly.”
“Alright,” the captain said. “We’ll play this by the book. I’ll download the records, take them to headquarters. Doc, you keep playing detective here and let us know what you find.”
“Absolutely,” I said, pointing at the wall terminal. “Take whatever you need.”
The captain went to the wall, opened the glass cabinet with a special Bureau-issued law enforcement key, and punched in his personal code on the screen. He slid out his own special-issue portable drive and plugged it into the terminal. The machine blipped. The captain’s brow furrowed. He pulled out the drive, blew on it, scratched at it, then reinserted it. The machine beeped again. He pulled out and tried again, and then again. Each time it was rejected.
“Damnit. Thing’s never had a problem before,” the captain said.
These cops wouldn’t be able to do anything without my guidance. I cleared my throat.
“There have been some strange glitches in the computer system,” I said. “Like in Room 371.”
I pulled the label from my pocket.
“What’s that?” Lanza said, grabbing it out of my hand.
“I found it in Room 371. I’m not sure what’s going on, but I heard there may be a record of some person checking into at least two rooms the same night the patients died in them. And I’ve found those little labels in both rooms the morning after.”
“I haven’t seen loose paper in years,” said Lanza.
With a snort, the captain gave up on the machine. We walked down the hall. At 371, I swiped my Atman and ushered them all inside. Antiseptic air stung our eyes and noses. The cops fanned out along the walls, scouring every corner of the room. The young one with the thin moustache inexplicably dropped to the ground and felt around under the bed, then jumped up and inspected the toilet, sticking his head most of the way in to scrutinize underneath the rim. He was a very excitable sleuth. Lanza and I exchanged a glance and put our hands to our mouths to stifle our laughs. The captain went to the terminal, plugged his drive in and scanned the records for anything unusual. Lanza and I stayed close to the doorway as the team scoured the scene.
“What the hell do you think’s going on?” Lanza whispered.
“I told you, I have no idea,” I whispered. “Ever since the massacres during the Purge, hospital security’s been as tight here as it used to be at the old commercial airports. Technically it’s impossible someone could access a patient room without leaving any trace—especially a stranger no one would recognize in the hallway in the middle of the night.”
“That’s what I thought,” Lanza said, shaking his head.
After a few minutes, the captain snarled in frustration at the medical terminal. He slapped the side of the monitor with his big meaty hand, rattling it. The other cops snickered. The captain removed the flash drive and pointed them out the door. But he was the last to leave.
“It’s bizarre,” the captain said. “I’ve been called out on at least a thousand hospital deaths, and I’ve never seen a glitch like this.”
“Same here,” I said.
“One more thing,” the captain said, stopping mid-stride out the door, jabbing a finger at my sternum. “You really have no idea who that guy is, with the strange name you mentioned? These terminals are nearly impossible to hack into, according to our computer guys.”
The captain gave me that skeptical cop stare, that unshakeable scowl. I gave him a blank look, slackening my face into the dumbest expression I could muster.
“I’ve heard how hard it would be to access Bureau information at one of these terminals,” I lied. “No one’s heard of Shiro Ishii here. But I’ll poke around, let you know what I find.”
We shook hands, that hardboiled captain and the helpful doctor. I walked the officers out of the hospital in silence. Lanza and I nodded at one another.
“Doctor.”
“Detective.”
Then the cops went out the door, got in their cars, and pulled away with a flash of lights, a whoop of sirens. As they pulled off into the distance, I cracked an energy stick and snorted it.
Right after the cop cars vanished, two figures emerged from the edge of the parking lot and walked toward the door. One was small, moving slow and measured. The other one was younger and faster, had a hat pulled low over his eyes. As they passed the benches in front of the hospital I recognized George MacGruder, my death-defying patient. After a moment I realized the one in the hat was O’Keefe. They drew even at the door, and MacGruder slowed—but O’Keefe just jumped into the revolving door, the blinking implant in his wrist pointed forward.
“Hey, Doc, I wanted to check—”
I squeezed my temples in frustration. This guy would never leave, he would never stop.
But Stash and Stanislaw appeared out of nowhere. They jammed into the whirling compartment, grabbed the reporter by his arms and dragged him out and toward the parking lot, heels dragging along the pavement. MacGruder shuffled through the door, grinning impishly.
“Who was that guy?” MacGruder asked, scratching his gray pate. “He kept asking me such incredibly stupid questions.”
“A reporter,” I said, watching as the two guards dragged him off behind a row of parked cars, beyond the view of the security cameras. MacGruder shook his head.
“Joe, that ain’t a reporter. When I was a kid, reporters could take down presidents. Now they can’t even tell you who robbed the convenience store last week.”
We strolled to the elevators.
“So remind me—why are you here today?” I said.
“You said to come in if there was anything seriously wrong with me,” MacGruder said.
“What’s wrong?”
“Heartburn,” the patient said.
“George. That’s not what I meant by ‘Seriously Wrong.’”
“But you also said heartburn could be a sign of the ulcers returning. And we both know how the last one almost got me.”
We stepped into the elevator, I pushed the button for the third floor. The second floor blipped by. We stared at each other like cardsharks over a poker table. A half-smile was etched deep in MacGruder’s wrinkles. I shook my head, but I couldn’t keep from smiling, too. The man was relentless, and he was the best patient a doctor could hope for, at least most of the time. I sighed.
“I know you wouldn’t come into the hospital unless it was really necessary, because you already know your inpatient allotment of days is almost up…” I said, eyebrows raised, nodding my head slowly.
MacGruder nodded eagerly.
“…so I’ll put in that I requested an emergent check-up overnight for an irregular heartbeat, and we’ll keep you under observation,” I continued. “Even though we did the full battery of tests a few days ago, we should still be able to get you one more run through the O.N.K. If the Bureau will allow it—and if it will set your mind at ease.”
“It sure will, Doc,” MacGruder said. “These are the things my Jody used to treat with chicken soup, maybe a spoonful of cough medicine. But ever since she passed, the same small remedies don’t work. I’ve wondered if maybe she used some special ingredients.”
He shook his head, his lips crinkling. I patted him on the back.
“I think,” I said, “that special ingredient was love. Or may
be a little whiskey. That’s what my mom gave me when I was a kid.”
MacGruder got checked in and prepped for the night. I put him in a room on the third floor next to my office, one of the rooms where one of the massacre victims had died the night before. The tubes and sensors and machines were wheeled around MacGruder like a high-tech, beeping banquet. The wall monitors showed steady vitals blipping along. He settled again into the hospital, smiling, gently trying to seduce the prettiest nurses. I watched from afar. I knew the man was probably just lonely and admitting him would open myself up to an official reprimand. But regulations be damned. Patients needed care of all kinds, even if the Bureau wouldn’t ever officially recognize it. Especially if the Bureau wouldn’t.
As if on cue, my Atman blipped, notifying me of several missed calls. Old Man Wetherspoon had left one page marked urgent—something he’d never done before. I rushed back to the nearest terminal, signed in, and called Wetherspoon’s office. There was no answer. So I descended the stairs to the basement, and knocked on the Old Man’s door. There was a rustle, a croaked series of grunts, and even though I had my ear to the door, I couldn’t make out exactly what his gravelly voice was saying.
I twisted the knob and pushed. But something blocked it. I shoved hard once, then twice. It went a few inches, but stuck fast.
“Neal, it’s Joe.”
“I know it’s you,” said the Old Man’s voice, clearer, on the other side. “But you can’t come in. Not now.”
“Why not?”
The Old Man’s one bloodshot eye, a film coating it, appeared in the opening.
“Just shut up and listen. You won’t be able to find any of the patient records. I know this. Don’t ask how I know. But get that patient out of here, or something might happen to him too.”
“What patient?”
“The old lecherous bastard. Your friend. The one who has nothing wrong with him, who just wants to hit on the nurses.”
“What’s going on? Why would I keep a needy patient out of the hospital?”
“That fogey’s not needy—he’s horny. Just get him out of here. And forget we even had this conversation. These people don’t take kindly to people who know too much. And find the girl. Esmeralda Foyle.”
Project 137 Page 10