Hi everyone!

I couldn't fool any of you, you all figured out what was going to happen (grin) I have had the premise for this story for a few months. I wanted to finish 'Chain Gang' and take a little break before proceeding with it.

Kreek – (big hugs!)

The information about lightning and electrical injuries and the treatment of such injuries is as correct as I could make them. However – this is a work of fiction, I will take artistic license to suit the story when necessary. Please do NOT use the information in this story for medical information. Seek proper medical attention for all lightning and electrical injuries.

Lightning –Chapter #2

The tall thin doctor entered the waiting room and Starsky was in his face instantly.

"How is he? How bad is it? Will he be okay? Why was he acting so strangely?"

"Excuse me? Whatever happened to manners?" The doctor placed his hands on his hips and stared at the distraught detective until Starsky stepped back, one step. "All right, come with me and we will speak in a more private setting. It is not this hospital's policy to discus patient information in a public setting"

Starsky looked around the waiting room at the seven other people there, including Huggy and Dobey "Oh, right" Dobey and Huggy nodded at him, accepting that he would be the first to know the extent of Hutch's injuries. This was standard operating procedure with them.

"My name is Doctor Steven Goldberg, I am the head ER doctor" He stopped and looked at the detective.

"Detective Sergeant David Starsky" When the doctor turned and walked away, Starsky stuck his tongue out at the doctor as he followed behind. Childish, yes, but it helped to lighten his mood slightly.

Doctor Goldberg continued down the hall to one of the consultation rooms, arrogant enough to believe, correctly in this case, that he would be followed to the room. "First off, are you family?"

"No, he's my partner, his parents are in Minnesota but he has a legal advance directive in case of injury or illness, just as he has mine – Now, tell me what's goin' on with my partner?"

They entered the room and the doctor closed the door "Good, we will need a copy of that directive for our records if we don't already have a copy on file. Before we go any further, I have a few questions to ask. First, tell me exactly what you saw"

Starsky's brow furrowed in consternation "What does that have to do with anything?"

"I must know all of the mechanisms of injury to fully comprehend the direction for further medical assessment and treatment. Besides, lightning injuries are fairly rare and one must never pass up the opportunity to increase the knowledge base of information in such cases. Please proceed with your narrative"

Starsky started at the doctor for a long minute. He didn't want Hutch to be a case study; he just wanted his friend to be okay. This doctor obviously was full of himself and in love with trying to intimidate people with his large vocabulary. His vocabulary was probably the biggest thing the man had on him. Starsky chuckled to himself; he'd have to tell Hutch that one.

Starsky took a deep breath and began "We were on a bust, one of the perps sicced his dog on me, Hutch jumped for the dog and caught it in mid air. That's when the lightning hit him; they arched in pain and fell to the ground. Hutch wasn't breathing at first, so I did a chin lift, head tilt. I think his tongue was blocking his airway. Anyway, he started breathing on his own. I hollered for help and about five minutes later, the ambulance arrived. He didn't regain conscious at all during that time"

The doctor scribbled some notes on his pad and looked up when the narrative stopped "Uh huh, hmm, thank you, that answers some questions I had. As you know, he was hit by lightning or probably closer to the truth was that the lightning "flashed" over him. The 'arching in pain' was most likely not pain induced, but muscle contractions induced by the electricity."

Starsky nodded, that made some sense and relieved some of his anxiety over Hutch having been in any pain at the time.

"The flow of lightning current might flow internally, but it generally does so for an amazingly brief period of time and while it can cause short-circuiting of the body's electrical systems – the nerves, brain, heart and the like- it rarely causes any significant tissue damage or burns. Therefore, myoglobiuric renal failure and burns play only a small part of the over all injury pattern from lightning strike. While it is true that some lightning victims have literally been knocked out of their shoes and have sustained significant bodily damage, this does not appear to be the case in this incident. At this juncture there are no external signs of trauma and no discernible damage to his clothing. But sometimes the damage takes a few days to show up. He will need to stay in hospital for at least three days until we are sure of the extent of his injuries"

Starsky's head spun with the information overload "I want to go see him now" Starsky informed the doctor. He wanted to assure himself that Hutch was okay.

"He is sleeping now. He was very agitated as you know and we had to sedate him as well as restrain him-"

"What! Why?" He moved closer to the arrogant doctor, anger furrowing his brow.

The doctor looked down his long nose at the detective "As I said just a moment ago, he was agitated, that means he was-"

"I know what agitated means, I am currently agitated!" Starsky snapped, cutting him off "And I'm getting very close to moving beyond agitation"

"I can see that. Mr. Hutchinson was exhibiting some odd behaviors. It is not uncommon for a victim of lightning or electrical shocks to exhibit altered states of consciousness, amnesia, confusion and disorientation. Subsequently, the patient will often show normalization of mental sequelae or status that may range from distractibility and headaches to psychiatric disorder and right up to dementia"

Starsky felt his jaw drop and felt the blood drain from his face "Dementia? Psychiatric disorder?"

"We won't know the full extent of his injuries, physical or mental for a few days, hence the hospital stay. We will have to adopt a wait-and-see attitude and treat all symptoms as they present themselves"

"Doc, what did you mean by saying the lightning 'flashed' over him?" Starsky struggled with his growing need to see Hutch and the needed to pay attention to what the doctor was saying. The need to see Hutch, as usual, was winning that little war. But he focused as best he could on the doctor, knowing it was important.

"Lightning, unlike man-made electrical current is of extraordinaryily high amperage and voltage but it is of extremely brief duration. Your partner was not in contact with the ground so there isn't –as yet- any proof that the bolt passed through him, hence it most likely 'flashed' over him, meaning it probably did not pass through him. It left his clothing and shoes intact. With the lack of external damage, it is difficult to determine how much or how little damage was done." The doctor reiterated.

"It was raining, hard, wouldn't that have grounded him?" Starsky paced the length of the small room, trying to keep his waning patience with the irritating doctor.

"Not necessarily, raindrops, no matter how hard they are falling, are still separated by particles of air, which is a poor conductor of electricity. Say your friend was being sprayed with a steady stream of water, or standing in a puddle or even dry ground, then yes, he would have gotten a bigger shock. How far from Mr. Hutchinson were you when the lightning occurred?"

"I don't know! I didn't take the time to measure it! The next time it happens, I will have a tape measure handy and take all kinds of measurements while allowing my partner to die while I do so, just to satisfy you! I'd really like to know what the hell that has to do with anything anyway?!" He paused his pacing long enough to stare angrily at the E.R. doc.

"I was attempting to point out that you were lucky. You were on the WET ground and were soaking WET at the time – it could very well have been you instead of your partner. You were really lucky, that's all I was trying to say" There, Goldberg thought to himself, that ought to make the man feel better.

"You call that lucky? I wish ta hell it HAD been me! I'm goin' to see my partner now" His limited patience at an end, Starsky stomped out the door, slamming it hard behind him as he went in search of his partner.

Doctor Goldberg shook his head. Sometimes, he just didn't understand some people.

----

Hutch slowly regained consciousness. He had thought that he had heard Starsky earlier and had been puzzled when his friend had grabbed him by his leg and dragged him like a bag of trash to the curb. Even though he was some distance away, he could hear Starsky talking to him. He tried to answer, to move, but his body refused to respond to him. He had blacked out again as the sound of the ambulance had nearly shattered his eardrums. As consciousness fled he wondered 'when had they increased the decibels on those things?' The sirens were now loud enough to wake the dead. The madding volume of sound chased him to oblivion.

Rain dripping on his head woke him next 'Starsky? Help, help me…I don't feel good at all' Hutch listened for his friend as he tried to control the mad pitch and roll of his stomach. His nose seemed to have gotten more sensitive, or maybe it was simply because he was feeling quite ill right now, but somehow the garbage in the alley seemed to have gotten even smellier and he was able to discern several different stenches

Ugh, his stomach turned and he vomited. He was so weak he was barely able to move his head away from the gross puddle he had created. 'Starsky?' he rolled slowly to his chest and tried to place his forehead against the concrete of the alley to steady himself for the attempt to sit up, but his nose kept getting in the way. He let his head drop back to the ground.

'Starsky? Where are you buddy? What happened? Hello? Help! Someone, anyone? I n-need help' His stomach turned again and he heaved up some bile. His stomach tried for more but it was empty now, it just couldn't seem to get the message though. After several more attempts, his stomach finally gave up trying to regurgitate food that had long since passed through his digestive tract.

Hutch's head ached fiercely, but he gritted his teeth together and forced himself to try to get up again. Something must have happened to Starsky. He would never have left other wise. Had the bad guys kidnapped him? How could that be though? The whole area had been surrounded for the bust this morning… no, that wasn't it. He had heard Starsky talking to him. He had heard an ambulance and… and other police officers…

He quit thinking about that. He needed a plan, so he would get to his feet and get out of this alley and get to a phone. There. That was a nice plan. If he could just get past the 'get to my feet part'

He got his arms under himself and pushed up into a sitting position and held that pose with his eyes tightly closed, as the world spun madly around him. His stomach lurched yet again. He waited a bit then slowly opened his eyes. The alley and its contents had gone gray. Well, not completely gray, the colors were muted, but he could pick out some yellows and blues but mostly everything else was varying shades of gray.

He sat still for what felt like a long time. He brain refused to process anything too quickly. After a bit he tried standing up, but his legs felt funny. He slowly tried again and after a few tries, decided that he would just have to crawl out of the alley on his hands and knees. Undignified to be sure, but what the hell, if it got him out of that damn stinking alley, it would be worth it.

It felt like every bone and joint in his body was made of rubber and every bit of that rubber hurt. But he forced himself to crawl down the alley. He had to get to a phone and call for help. This part of Bay City was not known for its kindness to cops. Hell, this part of town wasn't known for kindness, period.

Knowing that the longer he stayed here, the greater the odds were that any one of the unpleasant locals could come upon him and rob and beat him (if he was lucky) or rob him and kill him (if he was not), he forced himself to continue his trek out of the alley. It felt like the trip of a thousand miles instead of one of several yards. The end of the alley seemed to keep moving away from him, but finally after what felt like hours, he made it to the sidewalk.

He leaned against the wall of one of the buildings that made up the alley and looked for a phone booth. It then occurred to him that in this part of town, people damaged phone booths for kicks. Maybe there would be a store or market that was open… Hutch looked up one side of the street and then the other trying to decide on which way to go. He didn't have the energy to go far.

He must have blacked out again for when he opened his eyes, the sun was high in the sky. Surly they must be looking for him by now. Starsky would be frantic. Why hadn't anyone come looking in the damn alley? How fricking hard would that be? Even the greenest of rookies would know to do that. He tamped down his anger. He would have his explanation when he got back to his precinct. Heads would roll. Much like his head felt like it was doing now.

Hutch went through the arduous task of sitting up once more. His mouth was bone dry. He licked his lips. His tongue felt really weird, like it had grown by several inches. He shook the feeling off and pushed himself to his hands and knees. One hand in front of the other, move one hand, move one knee, take a deep breath and repeat. His knees should be hurting by now, but then it was so hard to separate one pain from another. He heard the sounds of people and moved in that direction. Someone would help him. He made himself believe that.

He staggered as he moved and he kept himself going by repeating 'Get to the people. Get help. Wring Starsky's neck for leaving me alone in that alley. Get to the people. Someone will call an ambulance for me'

Finally he made it to where he had heard the voices. He had been staring at sidewalk so long now it hurt to try to look up. He hoped it was a store and not some criminal types selling dope out of some building. He listened for a bit and heard the sound of a cash register being rung up. He could smell bread and other baked goods and coffee, a bakery! Yes! He crawled through the door. Some helpful baker would be calling an ambulance for him; help would soon be on its way! Water! I really could use some water right now.

"Hey! Get the hell outta here!"

Hutch looked up, instead of concerned looks from the baker and patrons; he saw only anger and fear. 'Help me!' His legs collapsed. He pushed himself up on his arms. 'I need some help, please!'

"I said GET OUT OF HERE!" The baker flapped the front of hisaprin at him.

Hutch tried again 'I'm a police officer, I'm hurt, I need an ambulance' his voice sounded like a long whine, but dammit he needed help 'PLEASE! I need help'

"I said get out of HERE!" The baker grabbed a broom and headed towards him, swinging the broom wildly.

'Wait! Don't hit me! I said I'm a police officer, I need help!'

The broom connected with his shoulder, he let out a yelp. The baker swung the broom again, and hit him again. "OUT! GET OUT OF HERE!"

Hutch stared at the angry baker 'what the hell is wrong with you?! I told you, I'm a police officer and I need HELP! Call an ambulance for me, PLEASE!'

"He's mad!"

"Look out!"

"He looks like his gonna attack!"

"Listen to those growls!"

Hutch looked around at the different people. What the hell was wrong with them? Mad? Hell yeah, he was mad, who wouldn't be with that kind of treatment? But attack? He must have crawled into a madhouse masquerading as a bakery.

"He's foaming at the mouth! I think he's rabbit!" A large woman in a polkadot muumuu shrieked, edging her way back from him and holding her purse up to her quivering chins like he was going to steal it.

'That's RABID, woman! Not RABBIT!' He snapped at her.

"He almost BIT me! Did you see that? I feel faint" With that, the woman dramatically slumped against the counter. Other patrons rushed over to aid the woman.

Hutch rolled his eyes 'Bite you? Oh good GOD woman, really, this is going too far! I would rather bite one of Starsky's burritos!' Hutch began to back out of the bakery. The people in there were crazy. 'The large woman slumps and everybody rushes to her side, but they can't take the time to call me an ambulance?' He shook his head in disbelief.

The baker swung his broom at him again, hitting him once more in the shoulder.

'OUCH! THAT HURT! I hope you know that you are assaulting an officer of the law, you could get jail time for this!' Hutch had had enough. He turned and crawled out the door and the baker swatted him on the butt as he departed 'OUCH! I'm LEAVING already! Sheesh!'

"And STAY OUT! Martha! Call the cops! Tell them that there's a dangerous-"

'Cops! Yeah, you just call the cops!' That's all Hutch needed to hear, 'I'll wait until the cops arrive and THEY will call an ambulance for me, OR better yet, they will just take me to the hospital!' He moved as quickly as he could to get away from the mad baker and his equally mad patrons.

His head was buzzing with pain and weakness was dragging at his limbs, making them feel as it he had lead weights attached to each of them. He found a large cardboard box between two buildings and crawled in to wait for the Calvary, in the form of police officers, to arrive. He rested his head on his arms and though he tried to keep them open, his eyes drifted shut of their own accord.

TBC