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Our Paranormal Chernobyl "Dr. Williams, Dr. Williams to Room 342," a woman’s voice said over the loudspeaker. It had been a very busy morning and this was the last thing that Harold Williams needed. Normally it was the nighttime that got crazy but this morning was an exception. "Fucking MRI, German piece of junk!" he muttered under his breath. Nothing had gone his way that morning. All of this metahuman business had the entire hospital in knots. The morgue was filling up with grotesque corpses—a human porcupine, an insect man, a dragon, on and on—and nobody knew if the city was under attack from a supervillain or a new plague. And then someone had the balls to leave a message with the floor nurse that the Siemens people had called to let the them know that their MAGNETOM Sonata was about one session away from complete failure—something about a remote diagnostic picking up system board trouble. He had called and asked Wes what the hell was going on. Wes had no idea what the he was talking about and said that he would call their support rep to find out. That was almost a half hour ago. He still hadn’t heard a word back from anyone. Wes was the best tech in the hospital, and it was unlike him to have not responded. "Dr. Williams, Miss Lorenzo was supposed to get her MRI twenty minutes ago," Nurse Harris said to him as he passed her. "I’m on it, nurse. Just tell her to hold on and we will be right with her as soon as we can… you know the routine!" he said in a harsh tone. "Dr. Williams, Dr. Williams, reception please," the load speaker pronounced. "You’ve got to be kidding," he said shaking his head. Reception? he thought. Who in the hell is here to see me? And at RECEPTION? "Call down to 342 and tell them I’m going to be a few minutes," he said to Nurse Harris. Five minutes later he arrived at the main reception desk. "Dr. Williams," he said as he approached. "Who’s here to see me?" "Yes, Doctor, your lunch is here," a young man said to him. The teenager was dressed in jeans and a blue nylon windbreaker with "Sezchuan Chef" on the front. He was holding a large white bag that had gone translucent in places from the steam. "Lunch? I didn’t order any lunch," Williams said, shaking his head. "Well look here, Doc," the young man said, stepping forward with the bag. "This is gonna be the fifth false order today for you guys. Somebody had better pay for this stuff or I’m not coming back again." "I don’t have time for this. Just take it away. I don’t want it and I’m not going to pay for it," the doctor said. "Fine," the young man snarled. "I’ll be sure to let everyone who calls us know that it was your fault that we cut off your service." Doctor Williams thought about it for a moment. "Okay, okay, okay. You win. Give me the freak’n food." "That’ll be $37.40," he said, handing the bag over. "Good lord, this is enough to feed an army," the doctor said. He carried the food with him through the hospital, up to the third floor, and ten minutes later he was in front of room 342. For some reason, there were two cases of toilet paper stacked beside the door. More importantly, the "Danger: Do not enter" sign was posted on the door. The sign was only supposed to be posted when the MRI was running at full power. The MAGNETOM Sonata was Siemens high-end system designed for research as well clinical uses, so it had more power than a standard MRI. It was against policy to run it at this level during the day. "Jeeeesuuus!" he said as he opened the door and marched in. Stranger waited for a moment when the coast was clear. People were going in and out the service doors. It would be impossible for him to get in. He was tired of hiding behind the dumpsters and needed a diversion to facilitate his entry. He felt something brush his foot. He looked down and saw a large rat waddling over his boot. "Hey, you live around here. Is there any other way into the—" He stopped whispering mid sentence. There was something about this rat. Perhaps it was the way its un-groomed whiskers seemed to just hang, or the odd curl of its tail. Something inside told him that this rat could not be trusted. "Yeah… sorry about that. I thought you were someone else. I… look this is embarrassing for me too. I mean nothing personal old boy, I just don’t like the cut of your jib. That didn’t come out right… I mean… sorry. Let’s just forget the whole thing." He quietly turned away. When he looked up he had made up his mind on what to do. There was truck parked near the loading ramp that was marked with biohazard symbols. He crept over to it, and as there was no one inside, he quickly put his hand through the driver’s side window and jammed the horn into the steering wheel column. As the truck’s powerful horn began blaring he grabbed a back corner of the hood and crushed it into the body of the vehicle. He ran back for cover and waited for people to start coming out. Before too long a crowd of service workers had gathered near the truck and were trying to figure out what to do. When he felt that there was enough confusion, he walked up the ramp and into the building. The loading area was empty, with all of the staff outside watching the proceedings with the truck. He went through a small office to the door at the other side, and peeked into the hallway. He was on the first basement level, where the morgue and maintenance offices were located. Across the corridor and a few yards away was a door marked "Supplies." A trio of blue-clad kitchen workers passed by him. He waited, and when the hallway was clear, he moved to the closet door. It was locked, but he twisted hard and it came open. He slipped inside and closed the door after him. "What do we have here?" Stranger said to himself as he looked around the little store room. It was filled with basic hospital supplies: gauze, pine cleaner, gowns, surgical masks. Then it struck him that the rat by the dumpster was just a victim of circumstance. Stranger’s harsh words had not been necessary. This was, after all, the rat’s home and neighborhood, and the last thing that Stranger needed was another street tough gunning for him. He’d have to be careful when he came back here. Stranger grabbed a heavy-duty trash bag from the counter and proceeded to pour some of the pine cleaner into it. He then removed his clothes and placed them in the bag and shook the bag for a few moments. He took the trash bag over to the slop sink in the corner of the room and dumped out his clothing. He filled the sink with hot water and squeezed the clothing under the water for a few minutes. He then took the clothes out and rung them out over the sink until they were only damp. He then grabbed a bar of soap and gave himself a quick scrub. After toweling off he picked up a laundry bag in the corner and emptied its contents on the floor. The bag held an assortment of work garments, most of them one-piece jumpers, and all of them in need of a washing. He quickly put on one of the jumpers, a painter’s cap, and a surgical mask. He pulled the cap low over his head and lifted the collar of the jumper. He grabbed a few items from the counter and started tossing them into the laundry bag—a big squeeze container of Talcum power, a container of Borax, several bars of soap, and a towel. He stopped for second and looked slowly around the room. He thought of the chain of events that had brought him to this point. He would never be able to rest with so many people looking for him. His concern began to mount when he thought of being chased by Q-Ball. He would be helpless against the big floating ball in the open, especially if that bug lady was there to back up Q-ball. "Don’t think about that now," he said to himself. "You’ll deal with it when the time comes." He then picked up the receiver of the wall-mounted phone, hit 9 for an outside line, and dialed information. "Yes, could you connect me with Cook Country General please?" He waited for the hospital receptionist to answer, then said, "Yes, I would like to leave a message for the chief attending physician in charge of the MRI system. This is Hans Uderschmitt calling on behalf of Siemens. I must inform you that your MRI system in on the verge of a complete malfunction." "Yes that is correct. We remotely detected it this morning. You must be sure that no one uses it until our service technician arrives. He will be there in a half hour. Please have the doctor and your head technician standing by. Good day Madame." He hung up and dialed 0. "Yes, could you please tell me who is in charge of the MRI system today? I see. Thank you." One phone call later, Stranger emerged from the closet. He was carrying two medium cases of toilet paper in his arms in front of him, the laundry bag dangling from one wrist. Only his eyes and hat showed above the cases. He walked down the hall, heading toward the stairs. Less crowded than the elevator. As he approached the morgue, he was surprised to see an armed policeman standing outside. Then the morgue doors opened and four people filed out, looking like a tour group. A man in a suit with hospital ID pinned to the collar led the group toward Stranger. "If there’s anything else I can show you…" he said to the young man next to him. "No, you’ve been more than kind." The kid was eighteen, maybe nineteen, dressed in an expensive looking black suit and a red tie. An ancient geezer in gray suit followed them, trailed by a woman in a boring navy skirt and jacket. "We’ll be going now." Stranger had seen these people before. They’d been on the roof of the Art Institute, right before the naked giant showed up, and Crossfire had been aiming an arrow at them. Stranger stepped aside, and the group passed him without taking notice. He had an urge to follow them, just to see what they were up to, but there were two pellets under his skin that the police detective said might be poison. And they might be tracking devices. He wouldn’t be safe until he got them out. Or disabled them. Just before he reached the morgue doors, Stranger shifted the toilet roll cases to his right arm, putting them between his head and the cop, and almost ran into a doctor. The old guy had come around the corner without watching where he was going. He bounced into the laundry bag, gave Stranger a distracted "Sorry," then hustled down the hall the way that the tour group had gone. Doctors. Usually they didn’t even say sorry. Halfway up the stairs, Stranger realized that he’d seen that MD before. Except he hadn’t been wearing a white coat and a stethoscope. He’d been talking to Crossfire outside the institute, and the archer had tried to get him to take Stranger out for lunch. No wonder, Stranger thought. People were always trying to get him to talk to doctors. As Dr. Williams entered the room a hand grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and pushed him into the wall. The bag of food was yanked from his hand. "What the hell is going on here!" the doctor shouted. "You had better be quiet, chief," Stranger said. "Do what I ask and everyone will be OK." Dr. Williams could see Wes sitting in a chair and it appeared that its metal arms had somehow been folded around his waist. "Do what he says, Doc. This jerk is a mess," Wes said in a shaky voice. "What do you want?" the Doctor asked. "I need you to do an MRI on me. At full power," Stranger said, turning the Doctor around to face him. "Are you crazy? That’s a very serious procedure. You could get hur—" The Doctor stopped in mid sentence. Stranger had removed his surgical mask and was looking right at him. "Please do it. Now!" A few minutes later the Stranger was getting ready to get into the MRI. He’d crushed the phone, then torn a thick strip of metal from the table and had wedged it between the door and the jamb. As Wes started the machine, Dr. Williams pulled out his cell phone and began dialing. "Shit," he exclaimed. Nothing on the phone but static. The magnetic field of the MRI was interfering with it. Stranger had undergone many MRIs before. Most in this very room, so he was familiar with the process. He’d tried to sneak a nail in once when he was a kid, just to see what would happen, and the entire system went crazy. It was that past experience that had given him the idea. The detective had said something about metal pellets. He was hoping that the MRI would screw up whatever they were meant to do. As the machine started up he could feel a tingling in his arm and upper back. "Hey man," Wes said from the control panel. "Do you have any metal on you or what? I’m getting some interference." "Just ignore it," Stranger said. "Is everything okay, Wes?" Dr. Williams asked. "Look, Doc," he said, pointing to the screen. "This guy has something in him. They’re small but they’re metal." "I’m stopping this," Dr. Williams said. "NO!" Stranger screamed in a tone harsh enough to give both men pause. "Let’s just let it run, Doc," Wes said in a shaky voice. The tingling in his back and arm had changed to prickles and then to burning pins. Stranger could feel the sweat pouring off his naked body and on to the platform. Yesterday he would have been screaming at the top of his lungs, but the events of the past day had given him a new strength. We wondered if there was some way for him to pack the entire MRI up and take it with him. I wonder how Q-Ball would like a round of this, he thought to himself. Q-Ball. The sewer rat, the first rat he’d talked to today, was right—Stranger had to stay hidden and pick his moment. He didn’t have anything that could hurt that armored form. The rat had mentioned using a harpoon, but had been very vague about where to get one. It was difficult to take the suggestion seriously since he’d never used a harpoon before and wasn’t sure that he could be effective with it. But the rat did seem to know what he was talking about. He felt the pain subsiding. As he stepped out of the machine he could hear someone knocking on the door. "Just break it down if you have to," the Doctor was yelling. Stranger picked up the laundry bag and ran over to the door. He could see the hinges starting to buckle under the strain of the men outside. He leaned against the door with his back and held it steady against the men’s violent rushes. He quickly began putting on his semi damp but clean outfit. "Give me two printouts of the scan," he said to Wes. The technician clicked icons on the screen, and moments later two color printouts of his arm and back rolled out of the printer next to the PC. "Now delete everything you just did," Stranger said. "It’s all on back-up," the doctor said. "We couldn’t delete if we wanted to." "Delete it now or I’ll delete the whole machine," Stranger said. "I told you that we couldn’t—" The Doc was interrupted by Wes. "Done," the tech said. The men had stopped banging on the door and now he could hear and feel one thud after another hitting the door. It wouldn’t be long until the axe would get through the door. Stranger had everything on now but his mask. He began wolfing down the Chinese food that the Doctor had brought up. "You know, you owe me money for that," the doctor said nervously. Stranger just looked up at him and kept eating. He could feel the axe head hitting his back now. The men outside must have had no clue what this tough substance was that they were hitting, because they kept swinging. Stranger took a big gulp from the soda the doctor had brought up with him and then threw the food and styrofoam cup in a corner. After wiping his mouth he put his mask back on. "Why are you doing this?" the doctor asked. "We could have helped you. You didn’t have to do all of this." "And you think I’m crazy," Stranger said. "Man the only time any of you sons of bitches ever helped me was—" Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a large metal orb heading south. "Q-Ball," he said, smiling under his mask. In the distance he could see the round form gliding gracefully across the Chicago sky. He could hear the sewer rat’s cryptic words ringing in his ears and almost feel the salty sea spray. In an instant Stranger grabbed his laundry and began running full speed towards the window. "Aye, I’ll have me that gold doubloon, captain," he said, laughing. "Away the boats, ’cause thar she blows!" He smashed through the window, and was gone. |