The Ransom (Part 15)

By Jenny Taylor

"Hungry are we?" The villain asked in amusement. "Well unfortunately for you, Virgil Tracy…You'll have to wait for your next meal after your…operations are complete." He smiled while the helpless Tracy frowned at his captor's response to his grumbling stomach.

"Operations? What operations?" Virgil asked worryingly.

"The ones that you'll be receiving as part of your father's discarded project that I've obtained."

"What? What do you mean?" Virgil asked quietly. The Hood stayed silent as he prefers to let his victim to work out the answer. After a few minutes thinking, Virgil spoke nervously in fear. "Are you trying to say that my dad's discarded project involves installing artificial implants into me?"

"I knew that you would figure it out…eventually." The villain smiled as his bound and blind victim shudders in fear. Silence again falls into the medical room as Virgil tries again to fit the pieces of the mental, complex and terrifying puzzle.

What? No! It can't be! He wouldn't do that to us! He couldn't, could he? Oh God, dad why? Why did you dream up a plan that involves installing implants into us? Why did you do it? He pauses for a while as he tries to calm himself down by taking slow deep breaths before resuming the mental puzzle and thinking about it logically.

O.K.…The Hood said that dad's plan was made in the early stages of International Rescue…which he then decides against it and reject it…to prevent it from going beyond the planning stages of design and removed it from the plans involving International Rescue...

The plan that dad started and never finished, involves implants to be installed into us…Perhaps…to enhance us and possibly…aid us…in saving others from disasters. (Sigh) I guess…in a way, that I'm glad that dad has decided that this plan was a bad idea and rejected it, but…I wished that he destroyed them, to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands and being used against humanity.

And now…our biggest and dangerous arch-nemesis, The Hood, has his evil hands on my dad's rejected project. And he's going to…experiment dad's project on me. But…the question is…did dad try to destroy the project and somehow…only mine survived? Or…did he just…store it…waiting to be destroyed and, for some reason…forgot to destroy it, which meant that the plans for all five of us survived?

(Sigh)So…The Hood plans to use and adjust dad's project…to be used on me. So when the Hood means a new…career, for me, probably means that, with my new (gulp) implants, I'll end up as The Hood's bionic or cyborg controlled servant. God, I hope not! I don't want to be hisservant, cyborg or not! But…from the way things are going right now… (Sigh) I don't have any choice.

Virgil sags back into his restrained medical bed, frowning with sadness and worry, knowing that he may never see his beloved family again. But that leaves one question, which the villain had only partially answered, how is the evil mastermind going to fake his death, in front of his family?

Alan arrived and approached the small group with the collapsible stretcher and a defibrillator that Dr. Anderson required. He hands over the defibrillator to his intermediate older brother Gordon, who received it awkwardly due to the fact that he's wearing Virgil's 'Jaws of Life' which didn't fit him properly.

"O.K Alan, we'll need place the stretcher behind Joe's back so we can slide him onto it once he's free." Jaycee informed the young astronaut, before turning to her younger patient. "Joe, I'll need to remove your mask so we can move you onto the stretcher easier. So…do you still feel pain?"

"A little bit Rescue Girl." He replied, feeling a bit tired, which didn't go unnoticed by the sharp-eyed doctor.

"Joe, I need you to stay awake, because when we move you, it will get more painful. So…on the pain scale of 0 to 10…where do you believe on the scale is your pain now?"

"About 2, Rescue Girl." Jaycee nodded and then reaches for her bag.

"Joe, I'll need to give you some more pain killing medicine to reduce your pain to zero, so we can move you as painless as possible. O.K?" Joe nodded as Jaycee retrieved the bottle of morphine which she used previously, stuck a 10ml needle into it, withdrew the liquid to about half of the needle and then injects the medicine into him via the IV catheter.

Scott winced as Jaycee injects Joe with morphine, which didn't go unnoticed.

"Scared of needles are you Scott?" She asked curiously at the Field Commander.

"Err…scared no, I'm just not a big fan of them." He replied, trying to hide his fear of the pointy syringes. Jaycee isn't convinced and gave him the look that tells him so. Scott quickly changes the subject. "How long will it take for the pain killer to work before we can start moving him?"

Jaycee thought for a moment before replying. "It'll take about a couple of minutes. So…he'll be ready to be moved once we get the stretcher behind his back, normally we would have him extracted lying flat, but… given the fact that we're in about 12 inches in water so that option is out the window."

"So it means that we'll have to extract him in a sitting position?" The eldest brother asked, to which the doctor nodded in response.

"So, if you could lift Joe just enough so we can place most of the stretcher underneath him please?" Scott nodded and shifted slightly so that Alan can place the stretcher just behind Joe.

"Joe?" The boy looked up at the doctor. "International Rescue and I are going to lift up slightly so we can place the stretcher underneath you, so you can sit on it and to remove you as quickly and carefully as we can. You might feel some pain when we move you, if it gets too painful, Joe, tell us to stop and we'll stop. O.K.?"

The boy nodded in response as Scott and Alan shifted into positions and Jaycee retrieves the defibrillator from Gordon so that he can position and prepare himself in order to lift the debris off the young patient for the extraction.