Fatal Complications

by John Benedict

  The man gave Katz a questioning look. “Do what she says, Nikolai,” Katz said. So the older man was in charge here. Katz nodded and Nikolai moved over to stand beside him.

  The two men exchanged glances, and Jenna worried they might rush her. “Don’t think I won’t use this gun,” she said with as much no-nonsense bravado as she could muster. “Just ask your friend, Dr. Seidle. He made that mistake and he’s got two bullet holes in his head to show for it.” Katz looked vaguely surprised, but Nikolai appeared unfazed. Jenna wanted to keep them back on their heels, so she added, “And his brains are splattered all over the delivery room.” There, that seemed to get the message across.

  Protocol dictated that she call for backup now. Play it by the book. She pulled out her cell phone and looked down for a moment to dial it.

  Pfft.

  The noise came from across the room. What was that?

  A nasty switchblade had appeared in Nikolai’s right hand and he brandished it with glee. Shit, a weapon! The bad guys were multiplying, and her odds were worsening. She realized there was indeed something very rotten at this hospital and she was rapidly becoming outmanned. What had poor Benjamin gotten himself into? She hoped to God he was tied up in a back room somewhere. Jenna quashed these thoughts, hoping to tamp down the panic that was churning just below the surface. She resisted the urge to feel overwhelmed—or to feel anything. Emotions were not particularly useful in these situations. She refocused on her training and took several deep, calming breaths.

  The presence of the knife didn’t change her threat scene calculus. After all, the two men were five or six feet away. She still had the Glock and wasn’t afraid to use it. She was in charge here. She just needed to continue to think clearly and control the situation. In fact, the knife clarified things. These two had revealed themselves as definite bad guys, justifying the use of deadly force. “Drop the knife!” she barked at Nikolai.

  He just stood there, leering at her as he continued to make sweeping motions with the knife through the air.

  “I said, drop the fucking knife!” She fired her weapon above him as a warning. Plaster bits from the wall sprayed down on top of Kim’s ventilator. Nikolai lowered the knife and put up his other hand in a stop gesture. His smile faded, but he still didn’t drop the knife. She needed to call in badly, but first she had to control this volatile situation. Should she cuff them and then call? Or should she shoot Nikolai?

  The hospital intercom crackled loudly to life, startling her. “Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat! Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat!” Jenna took several more deep breaths and willed her pulse rate back down. She thought for a moment. Dr. Daulton? Wasn’t he the brave doctor in the DR that tackled Seidle and delivered his own wife’s baby? Talk about tough situations. Although, wasn’t his name Luke?

  Something about Nikolai’s blade drew her attention. Was that blood on it?

  Nikolai suddenly lunged at her. He moved awkwardly, with a surprised expression on his face, but with the knife still clenched in his hand. Jenna hesitated only a fraction of a second before firing her pistol twice. At this range she couldn’t miss. She heard Nikolai yelp and saw his face contort in pain and disbelief as blood spurted from his chest, but he kept coming at her.

  She quickly realized why—Katz was hunkered down behind Nikolai and was shoving him toward her like a battering ram. She sidestepped quickly, and Nikolai’s limp body tumbled past her, thudding onto the floor. Katz swiped at her neck with his free hand. She kicked him hard, landing a solid blow to his ribcage that sent him stumbling to the ground.

  She brought her gun back up and aimed it at Katz’s chest. “Don’t move!” she screamed, her heart pounding in her ears. She counted her shots—five, so far. That left her with eight rounds. Plenty.

  Katz groaned and got to his knees.

  “Move again and I’ll shoot you,” she said. He stayed put, huddled in the corner, staring at her. She slowed her breathing. Okay, one perp down. She had evened the odds and now it was one on one. Just like in the simulator. Her brain processed the distinct likelihood that Katz had actually pushed Nikolai toward her using him as a human shield. Talk about friends.

  She touched the side of her neck where it felt as if something had scratched her. Her hand came back bloody. Shit! Had Nikolai managed to slice her with his blade? She didn’t think so. She refocused on Katz and noticed he had a syringe in his hand. Was this the cause of the scrape on her neck? Things had moved so fast. She couldn’t be sure of what had happened. “Did you inject me with something?” She waved the gun at him.

  He nodded, and she thought she could detect a slight smile.

  She wanted for all the world to shoot him right here and now and just fricking end it. But she resisted the temptation for the second time that night. She was, after all, one of the good guys. “With what?” she asked, trying to keep the dread she felt out of her voice.

  “Just some mild pain medicine that I was trying to give to my patient, Mrs. Daulton—before you interrupted my care.” He smiled innocently.

  “Cut the bullshit! I know you were trying to kill her.”

  He eyed her closely, then glanced at the clock on the wall.

  Bastard! All of a sudden, Jenna didn’t feel so well. God, he’d drugged her. Was the damn gun already becoming heavy in her hand? She brought her other hand up to steady the gun. Now she felt totally overwhelmed and the panic that had been lurking nearby flooded into her. They hadn’t covered this in the training manuals. The Glock was now so heavy that she needed both hands to hold it. She still needed to call for backup, but she couldn’t even use the damn cell phone. This was not good. She tried to spread her legs into a more stable firing position, but her legs buckled beneath her and she went down hard onto her knees. Her legs felt like jelly and she wobbled miserably before they gave out completely. She fired in Katz’s direction as she fell facedown on the floor.

  Katz was on her in an instant, straddling her and holding her gun arm down. She struggled for all she was worth, trying to bring her gun into a firing position. If she could just get another shot off… But she couldn’t overcome his grip. She twisted her neck to look up at him and saw a look of pure evil in his face. Something dripped onto her face and made her blink. Was that blood dripping down onto her—his blood? She prayed to God that she had hit the prick—and that it was lethal.

  He pried the Glock out of her fingers. “You’re right,” he said, standing up. “I lied. I gave you a muscle relaxant, which explains why you’re getting so weak. In about two minutes you’ll stop breathing, and you’ll be dead in four.”

  This time she believed he was telling the truth. She knew about paralytic agents. Four minutes wasn’t a long time. She clung to the hope that she was in the intensive care unit of a hospital and that someone could still come by and save her. They had to have heard the gunshots. She began to gasp for breath.

  “So long, Special Agent Jenna. Life’s a bitch.” He found her cell phone in her pocket and smashed it on the floor. Then he turned and headed toward Mrs. Daulton.

  Jenna’s air hunger was rapidly becoming unbearable and she no longer cared about Katz or Mrs. Daulton. Please, someone help me! As the room dimmed about her, she heard the intercom come to life once again. “Red Alert! Surgical Intensive Care Unit. Red Alert! Surgical Intensive Care Unit.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 12:35 A.M.

  Rob got off the bed and began pacing about the small OB call room. He checked his watch again for the tenth time. Where was she? She should be here by now. Rob couldn’t imagine what was taking Gwen so long. She had sounded very excited on the phone and he thought she would be right up. He was surprised she had left in the first place. He dialed her number again. No answer.

  Rob thought back to their earlier phone call. It wasn’t exactly the way he had pictured the big conversation, the one where he professed his love for her and told her he was leaving Cindy. But he didn’t see that he had had much cho
ice in the matter. Her pain had cut through him and he didn’t have it in him to keep her guessing any longer. He wanted desperately to hold her in his arms, squeeze her tight and convince her everything would be all right.

  Something still bothered him about their conversation. What exactly had she seen fit to attend to in the middle of the night? He recalled that Katz’s name had come up. How the hell did Katz fit into this strange night? What was that prick up to? He didn’t have any hard evidence that Katz was involved with Seidle and that whole OB fiasco, but it would certainly come as no surprise if he was. He hoped to God Gwen wasn’t mixed up with Katz. Please Lord, keep her safe.

  It struck Rob as odd that he was still invoking God’s name. Old habits die hard, he mused. After all, hadn’t he written God off when he fell in love with Gwen? Surely, God wouldn’t be listening to him now, or leastwise not be inclined to help him. He shook his head and sighed.

  Rob peeled off his sweat- and bloodstained scrubs, tossed them in the circular hamper, and headed to the shower. He’d started the water and was just about to step into the stall when the hospital-wide intercom crackled to life. “Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat! Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat!”

  Roman Daulton? How weird was that? What the hell did that mean? Rob shook his head, then stopped abruptly. The hospital only had four floors. There was no Room 604. Very odd.

  He hopped into the shower stall, pulled the flimsy curtain closed, and stood under the weak stream. Rob was surprised how bloody his arms and chest were. He lathered up well and watched as the blood—Kim’s blood—washed off him and went swirling down the drain in red spirals. He was glad he had been here in the hospital to save Kim. Such a sweet woman. The baby was adorable, too. Strange and big things were definitely afoot this night and fate seemed to be playing all its trump cards.

  The hot water felt good rushing over his tired muscles, and he stood there for several minutes, soaking in the warmth. Although his body was exhausted, his mind was brimming with energy. He felt such a high, such exhilaration that it seemed his feet barely touched the floor. He recognized this as a symptom of being in love and smiled. He couldn’t wait to see Gwen; hopefully she would be here any minute. He tried to listen for sounds of the call room door opening. Maybe she would even sneak up on him in the shower. He imagined her pulling the shower curtain aside and smiling at him. He would pull her into the shower with her clothes still on. They would stand there in the water kissing and holding each other.

  The hospital intercom blared again, interrupting his shower fantasy. Sounded like a red alert. He strained to hear it, but couldn’t make out the details above the rush of the water. Or perhaps it was a code blue being called somewhere in the hospital. In a busy hospital, patients were fighting for their lives at all hours.

  All these thoughts about love and Gwen, God and Katz, and people dying reminded him of his recurrent nighttime plea to the universe—that either Cindy, Gwen, or he should die to put an end to his misery. Rob smiled wryly; he, of course, had no use for the gun of fate anymore. Be careful what you wish for. He had an uneasy sense about this and wondered if God was listening after all.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 12:35 A.M.

  Kim regained consciousness slowly. What was that loud noise? What was going on? Had she imagined the noise? No, her ears were still ringing. Her torpid mind was very sluggish to respond. She felt so weak—all she wanted to do was sleep. She tried to open her eyes but they refused, as if someone or something were holding her eyelids shut. She noticed a very strange sensation in her chest. It was rising rhythmically even though she was making no effort to breathe. She then became aware of the horrible, plastic breathing tube lodged in her throat, and started to gag. She must be on a ventilator. She struggled mightily to coax her memory back to life.

  She felt drugged. Wait, she had been drugged! In a flash, she remembered the whole ordeal—having contractions at home, Colby looking worried, Luke driving her frantically to the hospital, being wheeled into the C-section room—each memory linking to the next, like bridges connecting islets through a fog. Further, she recalled Dr. Katz giving her the spinal, which had put an end to those nasty contractions. After this, though, her mind drew a blank—the bridgework halted abruptly in mid-span. What had happened?

  Then a horrifying thought struck her. Oh, dear God, what about the baby? Was Abi okay? She needed to wake up, get moving and find out. She tried to wiggle her feet but they didn’t respond. Was she paralyzed? She suffered a moment of panic until she wiggled her fingers and found they moved normally. She remembered the spinal and reasoned it must be still working, explaining the numbness in her lower limbs.

  Where was Luke, though? She tried hard to clear her mind, to get it working. For some reason she thought this was important. She focused on her other senses. She listened carefully and heard the beep-beep of a monitor over her head. Must be a cardiac monitor or a pulse ox. Again, she noticed the air being pushed into her by the breathing machine. Surely this wasn’t normal—something must’ve gone wrong with the C-section. There was also a strange odor in the air that she couldn’t identify. It reminded her of the Fourth of July, but she couldn’t say why.

  Suddenly, the hospital intercom came to life. “Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat! Dr. Roman Daulton, Room 604, stat!” Kim was amazed. That’s a weird page, she thought. Very weird. Was she dreaming? A drug-induced haze? Roman Daulton? Room 604? What did that mean? She had an odd sense that the page was meant for her and that it was important. Her mind automatically set about analyzing the page, approaching it like any other problem.

  This reminded her of the Sudoku puzzle. She remembered solving it and whispering the solution to Luke before she passed out. Kill Senator Pierce. Was this page related? Was Luke somehow involved? Where was Luke, anyway? It wasn’t like him not to be here. Too many difficult questions. She felt so tired. The drug wave washed over her again and she sank into the incoming tide of drowsiness, surrendering to its power.

  As she drifted down through deeper and deeper sleep levels, the loud noise returned. Then again. She awoke for a second time with a start. Now, her ears not only rang, but hurt from the noise. Were those gunshots? Suddenly Kim identified the strange smell as spent gunpowder and this sent chills down her spine. Something was desperately wrong here. Her instincts screamed. She needed to wake up. She shook her head back and forth, ignoring the gagging tube in her throat. And, there was something about that page that was vitally important. Roman Daulton? Room 604? She didn’t know why, but she knew she needed to understand.

  A familiar voice near her interrupted her thoughts.

  “Ah, I see you’re waking up, Kim. Good.”

  Kim nodded and strained to listen. “You gave us quite a scare back there,” the voice continued soothingly. “I’ve come to help you.”

  She recognized the deep voice of Dr. Katz. She felt him lean over her and remove some tape from her eyelids. She opened her eyes and the light poured in, temporarily blinding her. Soon her vision returned, although her eyes remained out of focus. She squinted up at him. He had a strange expression on his face.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

  She felt a bit relieved. She wanted to believe him.

  Then the intercom blared again: “Red Alert! SICU! Red Alert! Surgical Intensive Care Unit!”

  Something still wasn’t right here. Kim struggled to move her head and look about the room, but her head felt very heavy and her vision rippled with dizziness when she did this. Something over in the corner of the room caught her attention, but Dr. Katz partially blocked her view. Was that a body there, in a heap on the floor? Her mind was slow to process the image. She craned her neck to get a better look, but succeeded only in triggering more waves of dizziness. And Dr. Katz seemed to shift his position to block her view.

  Alarms were going off in Kim’s head. There was definitely a body on the floor, lying in a pool of blood. Frant
ically, she fought to hurl off the effects of the damn drugs.

  “Such a worried expression, Kim. Are you in pain?” Dr. Katz patted her arm. “Not to worry, dear. I have something for you. It will take care of your pain.” He chuckled and added, “Forever.”

  Kim started to panic. Forever? She needed to focus. Room 604. Room 604. Roman Daulton. Kim’s brain, nudged by an outpouring of adrenaline, kicked into overdrive. She felt the puzzle begin to unravel before her. Swatara Regional only had four floors. There was no Room 604. Roman numerals danced before her. In a flash, she had deciphered the coded message.

  “My master has prepared a place for you,” Dr. Katz continued and his eyes lit up as he spoke. “You will meet him soon.” He turned for a moment to the supply cabinet behind him. She could hear him rummaging through the drawers. Kim seized the opportunity and acted on the message.

  Seconds later, Katz returned to hover over her. Kim saw him inject something into her IV tubing. She tried to scream, but the endotracheal tube rendered any speech impossible.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 12:45 A.M.

  Sorry, Walker. As soon as Walker left him alone, Luke dashed out of the OR and headed back to SICU. As he wound his way through the hospital corridors, the overhead intercom blared out, “Red alert! SICU! Red alert! Surgical Intensive Care Unit!” Some bad shit was going down in the SICU, like an out-of-control patient or family member. Or a crazed, gun-wielding doctor on the loose. I hope I’m not too late!

  As Luke rounded the last corner to the SICU, he was greeted by a horrifying sight. Katz was at Kim’s bedside, injecting something into her IV line. Luke sprinted toward the room, screaming, “Stop! Don’t do it!”