WHAT REALLY HAPPENED

by ardavenport

- - - Part 2

The call was for a man down. In the office.

Roy and Johnny had just sat down to dinner with the rest of Station Fifty-One's men, but they had to leave. Captain Stanley said that they would keep some of the lasagna warm in the oven.

There was no one there to meet them at the modest one-story building. Only one dark blue car in the otherwise empty lot in front.

No one answered their knock or their calls. The Venetian blinds were pulled down over the front window, so they couldn't see inside. Johnny ran around to look in back. Almost immediately he called for a pry bar. Roy grabbed it from the upper compartment of the squad and ran around to the back with the drug box and the biophone.

"I can see him on the floor. He's not moving."

Roy peeked in the high window while Johnny pried the door open. He could just see a man's body behind a table and an overturned chair. He wore a white jacket, his arms clutching his chest. But he wasn't moving.

The door yielded and Johnny threw it open.

The smell was terrible. Excrement, urine, vomit. The man's arms and legs were contorted, his mouth open. His eyes wide. He clutched a torn yellow page in one hand. His skin was pale and bluish. Dead. No pulse.

Johnny went to check the front room while Roy knelt by the body. There was water and broken glass on the floor and a metal counter and sinks along the wall. Johnny came back.

"There's a woman on the floor in there by a phone. It's the exact same thing."

Roy turned back to the body again. What. . . . ? He took the paper out of the man's hand. It was torn from a yellow legal pad and there was one word scrawled in ball point pen in huge letters. He didn't know what it meant, but it looked like this man's last word.

"Roy."

He looked up at his partner. Johnny had grabbed the back of a chair pushed against the small table.

"Something's wrong." Suddenly breathing fast, he bent down and grabbed the biophone. "We gotta get outta here. Get the drug box."

Roy stared. Everything looked fuzzy around the edges.

"Roy! Get the drug box. We have to get out of here now!" Johnny's tone went harsh and demanding. Roy grasped the handle of the black box and Johnny impatiently pulled him up by the arm. Keeping a firm grip on his upper arm, Johnny hustled him out through the door and then closed it.

Roy felt it when they got outside, out of the smell. It was a warm, pleasant day, but suddenly he felt out of breath, his chest tight.

Something was wrong.

They came around the front of the building and sat down by the squad, their backs to the wall. Roy showed the paper to Johnny. Everything was blurry but the letters were large and it was still light outside. Johnny opened the biophone.

"Rampart, this is Squad Fifty-One. How do you read?" He sniffed and wiped his face on his bare arm.

Doctor Brackett's voice answered.

"This is Rampart. I read you loud and clear, Fifty-One."

"Rampart. We have two victims. Both deceased. Both appeared to have died with convulsions and loss of control of bodily functions." Johnny breathed loudly as he spoke. Roy's nose ran and he wiped it and his mouth and swallowed.

"We are both now experiencing shortness of breath, blurry vision and excessive discharge from the nose and mouth." Johnny sniffed and wiped his face again. He looked at his partner and Roy nodded.

"How long ago did this happen, Fifty-One?"

"About a minute ago." Johnny took another breath and sniffed again. Roy handed him the yellow paper. "Rampart, one of the victims was holding a piece of paper in his hand. He appears to have written the word 'sarin' on it. We think it was meant for anyone who found him."

"Fifty-One, repeat that."

Johnny squinted at the paper. "Rampart, that's sarin. S A R I N." He wiped his nose again.

"Fifty-One, two milligrams atropine. Both of you. Right now!" Brackett's voice shouted out from the receiver.

Roy opened the drug box. His hand froze over the open trays. Atropine, atropine, atropine. His fingers quickly counted down to the correct slot. He grabbed the vial and two syringe packets. Squinting and blinking, he could just make out the larger 'A' on the label. They always kept everything in its particular slot, but he had to be sure. He tore the packets open.

"I sure hope you got the right one." Johnny leaned his head back against the wall, his arm over his forehead.

"Yeah, I got it." He pulled the syringe plunger back.

"Fifty-One, this is Rampart; don't waste time trying to find a vein. Use an intramuscular injection."

Johnny dropped his arm. "Oh, he's got to be kidding. Did you hear that?"

"Yeah." Brackett was really shouting. Roy checked the syringe one more time. "There's no point in waiting." He grabbed a meaty part of Johnny's upper thigh and jabbed the shot home.

"OW!!" He stiffened, his back straight, almost pushing up off the pavement. "Ow! Ya-you could've WARNED me!"

Roy pulled the needle straight out and put it back in the box. He picked up the next prepared syringe and the vial of atropine. "Well, you can have your shot at me next." He squinted and blinked at the dosage, flicked his finger against the syringe. He handed it to Johnny.

"Aaaaaah!" It really hurt. He could feel it squirting into his flesh, below his hip where Johnny grabbed him. Then he yanked the needle out and Roy rubbed the place on his pants where the needle had gone in.

"Rampart, this is Squad Fifty-One. Two milligrams atropine. Both of us."

"Ten-four, Fifty-One."

Putting the syringe back in the box, Johnny leaned back against the wall. "Y'know Roy, he didn't ask us for vital signs. You think that means he knows what 'sarin' is?"

"I sure hope so. And I sure wish I didn't have to." How long did it take for the atropine to work? How long did they have? He still felt like he wasn't getting enough air. He just couldn't get in a deep breath. The sun was going down. The sky was starting to get dark.

They sat next to each other, panting, their backs against the wall of the small building, the squad, big and red, still parked right in front of them. Leaning against the wall, Roy pushed himself up to his feet.

"I'm going to get the oxygen out of the squad." He stumbled forward and crashed against the hood.

"Roy!"

Clutching his arm tightly over his stomach, Roy looked up at his partner, who wasn't standing up that straight either. "I'm sure glad we didn't have dinner before we came." He clinched his teeth, fighting back the convulsion and nausea. The victim in the back . . . . vomiting and loss of bodily functions. Roy hoped that the atropine would stop that.

"It's okay, it's okay. I'll get it. I'll get it." Johnny's hand patted his shoulder before he turned and leaning on the side of the squad, went to the side compartments. He took out the portable oxygen and put it on the ground; then he got out the tank. His nausea marginally under control, Roy went to help, pushing himself forward on the hood, then the side mirror, then the side.

"I got it, I got it." But Johnny didn't and they locked arms, Roy with the portable, Johnny dragging the tank on its wheels. Brackett's voice called out from the biophone.

"Squad Fifty-One, this is Rampart."

Leaning on each other, they unsteadily went back to the wall.

"Squad Fifty-One. Respond."

Johnny let go of the tank and slid down to the ground. Roy eased himself down with the portable unit in front of him.

"Johnny! Roy! Talk to me!"

Johnny picked up the receiver. "Rampart, this is Squad Fifty-One." He wiped his face again. "We were, uh, getting the oxygen out of the squad."

"Oh. All right. Good idea." Sitting right next to his partner so their shoulders touched, Roy was close enough to hear the tiny voice coming out of the receiver. He attached the masks to the tubes. "This is very important Fifty-One; is there anyone else in your area?"

"Negative Rampart. The building where the victims are located is isolated. The parking lot next to it is empty, except for one vehicle which is probably the victim's."

Roy could hear a siren in the distance. He handed Johnny an oxygen mask and turned on the valve for the one he had and put the mask to his face.

"All right. We've notified the fire department and the health department of your situation. We're sending help. The police should be by anytime to cordon off your area. Whatever you do, don't let anyone come near you unless they're wearing gloves and a mask. And tell the officers where the victims are so they can rope it off. Can you manage to give us some vital signs?"

"Ten-four, Rampart." Johnny grabbed Roy's wrist. "You first this time." Roy nodded. His vital signs were all up. But was that the sarin, the atropine, or just old fashioned fear? Johnny handed him the stethoscope and BP cuff as he read off the readings to Brackett. Roy got the same results, BP, respiration, pulse rate, all up. They were both nauseous. And when he shined his pen light in Johnny's eyes he saw a lot of dark brown iris and the pupils constricted to small dots. They didn't react at all to the light, but his partner blinked and flinched from it. He repeated his own vital signs to Brackett.

Johnny took several breaths but then put the mask down and picked up the biophone receiver again.

"Rampart?"

"We're here, Fifty-One."

"Can you tell us what sarin is?"

Johnny let the receiver slide down to his shoulder and took another breath from the mask. Roy didn't hear an answer coming from it. Johnny picked it up, holding it out slightly, so Roy could hear.

"Rampart?"

"Ten-four Fifty-One. Sarin is nerve gas. It was developed by the Germans for World War II. It's an odorless, colorless fluid and it can be inhaled as vapor or absorbed through the skin."

The receiver slipped down to Johnny's shoulder again. He wiped his forehead with his arm. "Oh, man . . . . ."

"Fifty-One? Johnny?"

"Ten-four, Rampart."

Roy breathed in the oxygen. Was the nausea better or worse? He could feel his heart pounding. Was it the fear or the sarin? He reached up to the pens in his front pocket. Should he write a note to Joanne? How much could he say to his wife on that little pad of paper he had?

The sirens were almost there. They could both see the flashing lights down the street, racing to them.

The sun was down. It was getting dark.

- - - End Part 2