34) I Don't Like Walking Around This Old and Empty House
"Wait, we're going to do what?" Carolyn stared at Mal as if he'd lost his mind.
"We're gonna pull a hospital job," Kaylee said cheerfully. "Simon you explain, you do it best."
Simon chuckled, "Considering I spent quite some time in a hospital almost exactly like the ones on Ariel I have a unique understanding of the layout and how to get in and out of the facility without undue attention from the authorities."
"At least this time the coffins will be empty," Mal smiled.
"Wǒ yěshì zuìle," Carolyn wasn't sure her eyes could get any larger. She slanted a glance at Riddick to see his lips curved in an amused smirk.
"Part of the job last time was sneaking in for a scan," Simon's tone was unworried. "We don't need to do that this time around so we can eliminate some of the potential problems."
"Inara's got her appointment at St. Lucy's this year, so we'll be pulling the job at the Med Center of Raphael," Mal explained.
"There won't be a lot that's changed," Simon explained to her kindly. "Raphael's has its own dedicated security force. But the Feds don't generally move out of their sub-station unless an alarm goes off."
"Which it won't, right," Riddick inquired dryly.
"No." Simon shook his head and brought up a schematic. "All the doorways, floors, points of entry, have sensors for patient ident scans. Since you'll be bringing in a couple of DOAs there won't be any idents to scan."
"But we won't be scanned," Carolyn frowned thoughtfully. "The sensors scan the patient idents but not the staff?"
"They do," Mal nodded. "Last time we slipped a few bills into the right hands and got us some false idents and uniforms. That ain't even the hard part."
"The med vault should be in the same place," Simon assured Mal as the rest of them looked on.
"What's the hard part," She frowned.
"We gotta find a busted-up ambulance an' fix it up," Kaylee shrugged. "Only official vehicles allowed in."
"We can't just steal one," Riddick suggested. "Seems faster."
"Faster yes," Simon nodded, cool as Carolyn had ever seen him. "But if an ambulance goes missing…"
"That's a red flag that somethin's goin' on ain't kosher," Zoë finished for him.
"We went through this last time, shouldn't be hard to find an ambulance," Mal shrugged. "Fixin' it up weren't too hard either. Not for Kaylee."
"All of this is the easy part," River smiled. "Creative forgery and we have working aliases. Work on the cortex and they will pass a rudimentary scan or one that is considerably more than rudimentary."
"The hard part comes later," Simon half smiled. "Since Rick is quite memorable and it is also doubtful that anyone from a mining colony would be a paramedic on a Core planet he is obviously out of the running. Zoë can't go." He looked at Kaylee.
Kaylee shook her head, "I'm gonna have my hands full, and Rick's too, findin' an' then fixin' up the ambulance."
"She will be required to fly the ambulance," River was already working on her portable cortex.
"Jack is too young, and I'm unsuitable for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is I'm not quite as believable as a paramedic," Simon looked at Carolyn. "That leaves you and Mal as our thieves."
"Uh," Carolyn had no idea what she was supposed to say to that.
"This is the hard part," Mal muttered. "Doc just tell me we ain't gotta learn that medical jargon. They didn't even ask us last time."
"And if we're not prepared this time, they undoubtedly will. You know the kind of luck you, we, have," Simon retorted. "So yes, you 'gotta learn that medical jargon'."
Mal groaned while Zoë simply patted him on the shoulder in silent (if slightly mocking) commiseration.
The lines were…problematic, as River might say.
"Cardiac stimulators and pulmonary infusers," Carolyn repeated quietly. "Applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a response from either patient."
"Cardiac infusers and pulmonary stimulators," River corrected her quietly.
"Pupils were fixed and di-di-," Mal snuck a look at his notes. "Dilated."
And on and on and on they went. Carolyn didn't know what they were talking about which made it more difficult, not less, to memorize her lines.
River grabbed an encyclopedia and began to show them what each thing meant, "Pupils, fixed and dilated means unresponsive, DOA. No reaction to light…" She went through all the medical procedures and by the time she was done, they'd gotten the lines down right.
Carolyn still wasn't easy about this job. They were in the Core, which she hadn't been in a long time, not this deep. Persephone had been the farthest into White Sun she'd been in years.
And then there was the fact that they'd be in a hospital. "I hate hospitals," Carolyn muttered, drawing the attention of River and Mal. Riddick and Jack were working with Kaylee on the ambulance while Zoë was doing the 'creative forgery' on the badges.
"Not her favorite place either," River agreed. "Would switch places but it would be…unwise."
"River does badly in hospitals," Mal agreed, halting his repetitive mutter of his lines. "She can barely stand the infirmary in an emergency."
Carolyn nodded, "Not arguin' that." She concentrated on her lines for a moment, "Just…walkin' through 'em always feels like I'm walking around an old house, all echoes because it's so empty and I'm not supposed to be there."
"Ghosts," River nodded. "Always something…the walls speak."
Funny, Carolyn kind of knew what she meant. "Yeah," She sighed. Her mother had died in a hospital. Her father, when he was discharged from the hospital had gone straight to his current residence for therapy. She didn't know anyone who'd come out of a hospital better off than when they went in.
The hospital was just as warm and welcoming a sight as Carolyn recalled, which was to say, not at all. At three in the morning Raphael's was a bright white building with forebodingly dark windows and light shining from the grounds onto the walls. River set them down in the med evac area and Carolyn took a deep breath. The long walkway to the hospital doors traversed an empty expanse of space due to the drive to a lower parking area below.
"Reminds me of a fortress where the Marquis de Sade would be right at home," She muttered as she and Mal carefully maneuvered the body caskets on their gurneys out of the ambulance and towards the entrance, dark mirrored glass doors that couldn't look less friendly if they were trying.
"Carolyn do not make me laugh," Mal remonstrated in a voice that suggested a chuckle could escape at any moment.
"Sorry sir," She fixed a grim look on her face. "Don't smile Mal. This is a hospital. People don't smile until they're upright and leaving. And sometimes not even then."
"Got it," Mal sobered. Maybe he remembered what she'd told him about her parents. Or maybe he just didn't want to get thrown in jail. That could be awkward. (Understatement, Riddick must be rubbing off on her.)
But she had to give it to Mal, he had nerve. Pushed through the automatic doors and right up to a scarecrow skinny fellow in scrubs. Even his hair looked like straw on top of his head, a surgeon's cap on top of it, "What've you got?" His voice might could get more bored with the situation, but it would be difficult. He practically radiated ennui.
"Coupla DOAs," Mal offered. "When we got there—"
"I'm sure you did everything you could," The bored voice droned though he did look up and give them a half smile of what might have been encouragement. "Take them down to the morgue." He glanced at Mal and Carolyn's badges, "New on this shift?"
"Yes sir," Carolyn gave him a slightly nervous smile.
"Well, a couple more hours and you can get some rest," Blue eyes met hers and the small half smile spread his lips a bit more, exhaustion on his face. Not bored then. Just so damn tired he didn't have the energy to express interest.
"Yes sir," She nodded. "You too sir."
"Buddha be merciful yes," He nodded at Mal. "Go on down. If I don't see you on your way out take care. There've been rumors of rioting in the black out zones. We don't want to lose anyone."
"Yes sir," Mal actually sounded respectful. "You too sir." The doctor waved them on through to the main portion of the hospital and Carolyn gave him her own tired smile as she passed.
The elevator, large enough for them to enter with the caskets opened at the end of the hall and as they approached several doctors and nurses (Carolyn guessed, she couldn't actually read the badges from this distance) exited it. Mal fumbled with the gurney for a moment, angling it as if trying to make the elevator and bumped one of the white coated men.
"Beg your pardon sir," He apologized backing off as quickly as he could.
"Oh for—" The balding man took a deep (hopefully calming) breath and visibly controlled himself. "Just be careful please."
"Yes sir," Mal nodded promptly. "Sorry sir."
One of the nurses with him gave both the doctor and Mal an approving look and Carolyn guessed that no matter what the doctor thought the nurses were the ones in charge. "Hold the elevator," She called back, and the last nurse out paused and held the doors open.
"Folks are a lot nicer here than they were last time," Mal muttered under his breath as the doors closed. He produced the badge of the doctor he'd bumped, and Carolyn grinned appreciatively, "Last time ours didn't work, to get in the med vault. Luckily we had a doctor handy."
"You'll have to tell me about it sometime that isn't now," Carolyn composed her face into its sober lines as the doors opened again.
"Hmm…" Mal nodded and began wheeling his gurney down an empty hall. Carolyn guessed that this area wasn't well traveled. Four turns and a long hallway of various doors later they arrived at the room Simon had marked for them, "Five oh eight." Mal tried his badge and sighed when it didn't work. The doctor's badge did however, and they quickly hustled into the med vault.
"Let's get everything we can and then some," Mal suggested as he began to ruthlessly loot the shelves.
Carolyn nodded, doing the same, "Didn't Simon mention the lenses we need might be here?"
"Yeah, he said to look for a box marked Ocular-Crystallenz-Post-Meridian conversion," The Captain wasn't wasting any time. "We'll keep an eye out."
"Got 'em," Carolyn smirked and pulled the entire box off the shelf along with everything else she could reach. For good measure she snatched anything else that looked like it was for eyes, something marked tapetum and everything that was on the shelf next to it. From what Simon had said what they didn't use they could always sell. And it wasn't like they were paying for the stuff.
Between she and Mal they'd stuffed the contents of every shelf and cabinet into the caskets and with a little creative shifting managed to get them closed up again. The rattling made her nervous though and she jerked open a few more wall lockers, smiling when she found rolls upon rolls of gauze and bandages. "Padding," She suggested and Mal nodded.
"Can't hurt," He began to fill in the empty spaces with the rolls and finally the casket topped gurneys moved without clinking. "Good," He took a breath. "I'll check the hall, let's be ready to move."
Somehow the way out was even more nerve-wracking than making their way in. And once they were past the hospital exit Carolyn took a long slow breath. Walking steadily but not hurriedly was the key. When they loaded the supposedly empty caskets into the ambulance River turned to look at them and Mal nodded.
"You got rid of the badge," Carolyn asked, and he nodded again.
"Dropped it in the elevator, got no doubt with all the on and off it'll be overlooked for a while and found sooner or later," He shut the door behind them. "All right Little Albatross, let's head on home."
"Lì shí," River lifted them off the ground as smoothly as she'd set them down and headed away from the hospital. Dawn was just beginning to show over the horizon when she flew the ambulance into Serenity's cargo bay. Jack waited by the controls and the moment they were in Carolyn saw the bay doors shut behind them.
"I'd say that was a satisfying day's work," Mal smiled.
Author's Note: So another hospital job! They might not have much of an opportunity for those since Inara's leaving and their ability to dock in the Core would dwindle considerably. Though they might be able to do one on Persephone or Pelorum.
Chinese Translations:
Wǒ yěshì zuìle ((Internet slang) I can't even... / Are you kidding me! / OMG!),"
Lì shí (right away / quickly / immediately)
