Chapter 11

Mouth opened in an oval of incredulous disbelief, Roy could only watch as the cab seemed to fill with oily, black streamers of smoke that quickly thickened. They wound sinuously through the confined area, blurring and then sharpening into focus with a tantalizing, mesmerizing rhythm that left him momentarily rooted in place. As he stared transfixed, the smoke seemed to be solidifying into something solid. Two long tentacles slithered out of the mass and wound about Gage like a python immobilizing its prey.

When the tentacles began transforming into sausage like appendages that resembled fingers, five on each long arm, the blonde paramedic snapped his mouth closed and sprang into action. Blowing his breath out in a ragged exhale, he slapped his palm against the glass of the window as his other hand moved to the door handle; the button refused to give under his pressing thumb. He yanked at the handle, refusing to believe that the door had locked itself.

"What the devil?" Hank Stanley was beside him now and Roy was unable to put his thoughts into coherent words. He tore his gaze from the terrifying yet hypnotizing spectacle before him and glanced at his captain, who was standing about two feet away from him and gazing at him in obvious annoyance. Could the sharp eyed man not see what was occurring inside the tight confinement of the cab? Even now, as he whipped his head back towards the truck he swore he could feel the vehicle vibrating from the tornado that seemed to be swirling within.

"Johnny's down," he finally managed to croak out, even though he could no longer see his partner through the undulating, shaping twirls of smoke and had no idea if he was even in there.

"Try the key…." came the calm reply, and DeSoto mentally added on "you twit" to the captain's words. He fumbled the key out of his pocket and somehow managed to slide it into the lock and turn it despite his clumsiness. This time the button on the handle yielded and the door moved outward with agonizing slowness, but only about a quarter of an inch. The maelstrom within seemed to be sucking all of the air from the cab, effectively preventing him from pulling it open.

Roy grunted, both hands now gripping the handle and tugging with a ferocity he didn't realize he possessed. There was a sudden whoosh and even as his brain registered the noise for what it was the door was released from its vacuum. He hit the ground, on his rump, with a hard thud. He stared upwards, unbelieving, as the twisting, swirling smoke edged ominously out of the cab and enveloped him in its complete blackness, obscuring his vision and blanketing the rest of his senses.

His hands went up to his neck as the thick mass coiled around it and tightened; snaking tendrils wound about him like a scarf but they were definitely not intent on enhancing his wardrobe. The same serpent like form that had suffocated John in its death grip was now intent on claiming another soul. He slapped in panic; his hands touched nothing but his own skin.

Gasping for breath, DeSoto forced himself to relax. He deliberately dropped his clawing hands and took as deep a breath as he could. The results were immediate. The loop loosened and seemed to shift shape, splintering into several pieces that seductively stroked his face. Roy resisted the urge to throw up his arms once again and brush away the tickling tendrils; instead he resolutely stared straight ahead as he pushed off the ground and struggled to his feet. A hand clapping down on his shoulder jolted him into a wide eyed panic; he realized it was Captain Stanley only as he spun around and raised his fists in a defensive move.

The thick eyebrows of his leader rose upwards in a questioning arc. DeSoto slumped in relief and glanced warily about; only the hazy pollution tainted air of the county appeared around him. The dark, threatening mass had vanished as quickly as it had appeared. He sucked in a shuddering gulp of air and then whirled about to poke his head into the cab. The empty expanse of beige seat met his searching look but the opened passenger door gave him a measure of hope that his partner had somehow bolted to safety.

The firm hand of his captain came down on his shoulder again, tugging him backward. "He's over there by the backhoe…..when this is done you're going to have a lot of explaining to do."

"Yes Sir," Roy gulped out, unable to believe that Hank had seen nothing of what had happened. He tipped his head to check and saw that John was indeed over by the mound of dirt to the side of the new grave, busy cinching on his safety belt.

He handed off the trauma box and biophone, grabbed the splint box, and followed Stanley across the dew touched grass to the rectangular shaped hole in the ground. Johnny was now in the deep pit, crouched by the young man's legs, while Marco was kneeling in the tight space by the victim's head. Roy set down the box next to the backhoe, carefully stepping over the two lines secured to the heavy piece of machinery. Chet and the man who had waved them down were engrossed in a conversation and he listened while constantly sweeping the area for signs of that thing, that apparition…or whatever it had been.

"Kid's first day on the job, and what's he go and do? You think he can listen to directions? Everybody knows they're only six foot deep, but that idiot goes and scoops out the blasted thing almost double that, and then goes and falls right in it. I'm telling ya, it's hard to find good help nowadays, especially ones that can count and measure, and aren't hopped up on drugs. You know what I'm saying?"

The worker continued on his tirade, only pausing long enough to turn his head and spit out a stream of dark tobacco. Kelly leaped back, but not quick enough, and sidled sideways, trying to scrape off his soiled boot. Roy felt a bit of his anxiety sliding away and allowed a tiny smile as the captain stepped up and guided the older man away from all of them, trying to solicit some information but having a hard time breaking through the string of complaints. As the paramedic peered down into the deep abyss, out of the corner of his eye he caught the furtive motion of Chet slinking out of sight and wondered what that was about.

"We need the basket, and a traction splint down here!" Gage shouted.

Kelly suddenly reappeared, shooting a funny look in DeSoto's direction as he shot past. Within ten minutes the new but probably now jobless employee was on his way to the hospital with a broken leg. Since he had refused any pain relief or IVs, the paramedics had been released from the follow up and were packing up their equipment. The two linemen were standing nearby, coiling up the ropes and carrying on a whispered conversation. Roy knew it had everything to do with Gage and the strange happenings; Marco had given him a very fast but condensed version of what had transpired at the Gantry Funeral Home as they had followed the stokes carrying paramedic and Kelly across the grass.

As Roy shelved the orange box, he flicked his gaze towards Johnny, again, observing his movements and trying to calculate his state of mind. He had appeared perfectly normal during the rescue and the treatment of their victim. If anything, he had seemed extremely focused, almost as if he was making an extra effort to stay on track.

"What gives? You're giving me a complex, looking at me that way!" Johnny demanded, glaring in irritation at his partner as he slammed the two compartment doors closed; Roy jerked his hand out of the way within a second of losing it.

He guiltily dropped his head and bit his lip, trying to decide how to word his questions without sounding like a complete idiot. He rested a hand on the side of the squad and swung around to face his partner, determined to get to the bottom of the whole business. The scuff of feet on gravel drew his notice and he half turned to watch the approach of both Chet and Marco.

"Say, Roy….." Marco asked, glancing nervously at Gage, who had assumed a defensive stance; he had his arms crossed and his back up against the truck. Roy really didn't blame him since the last time the two friends had banded together they had tried to force an exorcism on him.

"What was the sister's name, you know, the one that haunted, errr, interrupted the séance the other night on your run?" Chet asked, either oblivious to or not correctly interpreting the narrowed eyes, clenched jaw, and intense anger radiating off the younger paramedic. He looked like he was ready to launch himself off the truck and take out both linemen in one move.

"Uh, Alice, I believe, but I don't know the last name," DeSoto replied, trying to take in all the strange body postures and expressions that were being displayed by the 51's firemen.

"Well, there's a new grave over there one row over from where that kid fell in; the name on the little card is Alice Baylor and her date of death is last month. Don't you think that's a little too much of a coincidence?" Chet questioned breathlessly, his voice raising as he spoke and his hands waving. He snatched the neatly coiled rope before it fell out of his grasp and impatiently looped it over his arm while moving a few steps closer.

Marco let out a warning hiss and jerked his head in the direction of the freshly dug hole. "Look out, I think we're all going to be into mucho trouble; the Cap is bearing down on us and I think that's steam coming out of his ears…."

All the heads turned simultaneously to observe the business like striding gait of Captain Stanley, who had apparently finished up with the loquacious worker and the sheriff's deputy; he was now heading their way. As Lopez had warned, the look on his face didn't portend a pleasurable discussion.

"Don't you," Stanley began, throwing each man a glance that held the promise of further retribution, "gentlemen have somewhere that you really need to be?"

A chorus of affirmative replies met his question, coiled ropes were promptly stored, and the men dispersed to their respective vehicles. As he climbed into the squad, Roy hesitated as their captain muttered something as he stalked by. To the very edgy medic, it sounded something like "I wonder where that rain cloud disappeared to?"

Running a hand over his face, Roy slid the rest of the way in. He started up the truck and pulled out onto the graveled drive, following the circle that wound around the back of the cemetery. The road eventually led back to the main gates and Roy purposely turned left when they exited out onto the main road; he had no desire to drive by that funeral home even though it meant a several mile detour.

He chanced a fast look at Johnny, who was staring straight ahead through the dusty windshield, tapping his fingers on his right hand in an aimless, nervous rhythm on the track of his opened window; his left hand was gingerly pulling the fabric of his shirts away from his stomach. Probably sore from the belt, Roy mused and sympathized, having felt that discomfort many times.

He rolled down his own window, not liking the faint tinge of sulfur, smoke, or whatever it was that was lingering in the small space. When he rolled to a stop at a red light, he stuck his head out and looked up at the sky. Not a cloud in sight, only diesel plumes of smoke wafting upwards from the ancient, rumbling truck in front of them. So maybe Captain Stanley had seen some of that thing escaping from the inside of the cab…..

When he glanced back over at his friend, Johnny was pulling his green pen from his pocket. A yellow wrapped stick of gum fell out; Gage stared at it for a moment before holding it up with two fingers.

"Where did this come from?" He asked, puzzled.

"Uh, maybe from Miss Gantry? She offered me a stick of it while we were waiting for you outside of the mortuary."

"Oh," John replied, clearly not remembering how it had ended up in his pocket. He stared at it a moment, shrugged, peeled the wrapper and foil off, and popped it into his mouth. Busy chewing, he grabbed a call slip from the visor and wrote something on it.

"Johnny?" DeSoto asked, making the turn onto Alameda Street.

"Yeah?" The younger man answered in distraction; he stopped his chewing and started looking for something. He slapped at his pockets, ran his hand across the seat, and then started searching the floor.

"What are you looking for?"

"What did I do with the call slip for that last run?" Gage asked, straightening back up and pulling down the sun visor once again. "The one for the cemetery, all I got here is the one for the funeral place."

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about," Roy admitted. "You didn't write anything down for the last one, you didn't put your helmet on, and you completely ignored the dispatcher when the call came through." He almost added "and you totally ignored me too" but decided by the reaction rolling across his partner's face that it might be just a little too much information at the moment.

"I did what? Or didn't do…now wait just a cotton picking minute!" Johnny's voice rose as his shock and disbelief escalated into anger. "What do you mean I didn't…..oh man….."

He swallowed hard several times as he thought it over, anger disappearing as quickly as it came. He snapped the visor back up and slumped back into his seat. "You know Roy, come to think of it, I don't even remember leaving that creepy funeral parlor with those stone angel things guarding the doors."

Roy made the left turn onto 223rd Street and nodded his head in understanding. "What's the last thing you do remember?"

Johnny rubbed his jaw in thought, and half turned on the seat to face his partner. "Well, before I was standing by that backhoe hooking on my belt, I was checking out what the guys were doing in that, uh, casket room, you know the one where they had them all on display? I fell over Lopez, got up, and picked up my tools that fell out of my pouch and of course Kelly was giving me grief about something. It's kinda vague after that, although my shoulders are sore so I'm pretty sure I somehow slammed up against the back wall in there. That's the last thing…" he trailed off and shifted back against the seat with a frown. "Weird, there was some smoke in that room…you don't think that, that Alice, she…..ah hell!"

There was silence for a moment as DeSoto backed the squad into their station bay next to the already parked engine, turned off the ignition, and pulled the keys out. The two men looked at each other.

"What's going on, Roy? Do you believe in ghosts now?" John's voice was harsh, thrumming low and tight with emotion, as he got out, slammed his door, and stalked around the front of their truck. "Or do you think that the Alice chick inhabits my body? The guys seem to think that I'm possessed, maybe they're right!"

DeSoto closed his door and resisted throwing his hands up in a gesture of defeat, or perhaps weary resignation. He really didn't believe in ghosts, didn't buy into the whole idea of the supernatural, aliens, or anything like that couldn't be logically explained. But yet, he had seen with his own eyes that threatening yet mesmerizing form of smoke that had seemed human in both shape and actions. He had observed Johnny's odd behavior; plus there was the fact that Marco had witnessed almost the same things, just in a different setting. How did one rationalize two people viewing the same unworldly creature, spirit, or whatever that blob of gas and vapor was?

"I think," he began, before he was interrupted by the arrival of the rest of the men. He clamped his lips together as they ambled to different areas along the side of the engine; having apparently finished their cups of coffee in the kitchen, they were about to begin some routine maintenance. An uneasy quiet drifted through the bay.

Gage shot him a look of desperation before trudging away in the direction of the locker room. Roy broke the silence by slapping the squad with a hand, the only way he felt he could express his own frustration at the moment. Even though both Lopez and Kelly were staring at him with questioning looks, there was no way he was going to continue this discussion with the linemen because Captain Stanley had paused to speak to Stoker. He was already in enough trouble with their leader without him overhearing a rambling, crazy discourse on one of their own. The two men seemed to be in complete agreement as they busied themselves with their appointed tasks and nonchalantly discussed plans for supper.

Several long minutes later John rejoined them in the garage and their captain disappeared back into the kitchen. Chet began a long winded tale of a trip to the bowling alley and how the young lady in the lane next to him had thrown two gutter balls in a row – in his lane. While he elaborated on her motives, the engine crew checked and cleaned their equipment; DeSoto inventoried the drug box and Johnny tested the oxygen from the squad. Because of the proximity of Hank Stanley, who had the fine hearing of a bat, the lineman's story was met with amused and disbelieving smirks but no comments about the boasting.

The captain reappeared shortly thereafter, inquiring as to how close they were to finishing. His plans for a street and hydrant drill in the Hyland Parks development in five minutes were thwarted when the klaxons sounded. He moved over to the mic to acknowledge the call and Johnny and Roy got into the cab. They settled their helmets on their heads; Stanley handed the slip of paper through the window to DeSoto who promptly passed it to his partner.

John studied the address, his lips tightening and eyes narrowing. "You recognize this address?"

"Clinton Street wasn't it?" Roy asked, pulling cautiously into the street and then accelerating.

"Not just Clinton Street, 1012 Clinton Steet….as in the home of the TEAL family," he replied emphatically, stressing the name and shoving the call slip with a disgusted motion up onto the sun visor.

"Ahhh…" Roy replied, the memory of that "thing" in the squad washing over him. He involuntarily touched a hand to his neck, shuddering at the evil that had seemed to flood off of the unexplainable, smoke appearing apparition. The only good thing about the home they were heading towards was the strong possibility that Alice had returned there - which would be a reprieve for the man next to him; unfortunately it also meant a bad situation for Mr. Teal if they were calling for assistance….

~TBC~