“I can’t do X-rays,” she said. “We need a tech.”
I motioned at her to pick up the phone. “So call a tech.”
Peter took a step back and then another. “The elevator. I can jam it.”
“Wait till the tech gets here,” I said.
The nurse picked up the phone, her hand trembling so hard she could barely lift it. I watched her dial through and pressed the button to put the call on speaker phone. She swallowed hard.
“Easy,” I leaned over to see her name, “Lacey. Easy. We won’t hurt anyone, but we need the X-rays. Nice and simple.”
She nodded jerkily, and the phone clicked through. She stuttered through her request for an X-ray tech to come down to the subbasement, but the guy on the other end didn’t seem bothered. A few minutes later, he strode out of the elevator.
Older than I thought he’d be, the tech had the appearance of a grumpy old man who probably yelled at people to get off his lawn on weekends, and seemed irritated he’d been called to run a machine no one else could run. “Lacey, what kind of emergency is this anyway?”
Peter stepped in behind him and the sound of tearing metal ripped through the air. The tech turned and looked at Peter as the Magelore held out a handful of wires. “Consider it permanently parked.”
“Block the stairs,” I said as I turned toward the tech, touching his chest with the tip of Dinah’s muzzle. “Name?”
He looked down at the gun and then back up at me, his eyes narrowing. “Carlos.”
“Well, Carlos, today is your lucky day. You get to run three full body X-rays faster than you ever have before. Just for shits and giggles.”
I moved him with a flick of Dinah, and for his age, he stepped fast. Perhaps it was the gun.
Worry that someone was listening to my thoughts, my words, itched at the back of my neck like an errant bug intent on burrowing under my skin, but I shook it off. “Cowboy, you first. Pete, watch the nurse at the front.”
Pete gave me a nod and stayed out of the room.
“He needs to be naked,” Carlos said as he set up the machine. “It’ll go faster that way.”
I stood between the two men as Cowboy stripped down to his boxers.
“Leave those,” Carlos said, not an ounce of fear in him. Interesting. Very interesting.
I stood behind the screen, watching as X-ray after X-ray was taken. Five in all. Carlos was efficient, I’d give him that.
“You aren’t afraid of us,” I said as he started to pull the images up on his computer.
Carlos glanced at me. “You are abnormals, yes?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
He blinked a few times, then wiped his face. “My daughter went missing six months ago. She moved like you, like a predator always on the hunt. Except the people she hunted were those who preyed on the weak, and she worked with the police. She would not just leave the way the police say she did.”
The images flickered to life and he tapped the screen. “What are you looking for?”
“A small tracking device. More than one, likely,” I said.
Carlos found the first one. “There. In the back of his left knee. A strange place.”
“Hard to get out,” I said. “It’s inside the joint.”
The other one was not so easy to pinpoint. “There, is that one in the soft tissue behind his right ear?” I touched the screen and the image magnified with one touch.
“Yes, that one could be removed easily.” Carlos nodded. “You all have them?”
“No idea,” I said.
I stripped off my clothes as Cowboy stepped into the room with Carlos. I handed Dinah to Cowboy. “Don’t shoot Carlos. He’s got a daughter like us.”
Cowboy grunted and I made my way out to the padded table and lay down. Carlos moved around me, setting up the X-ray and the machine whirred to life. Click, click, click.
“Pictures are done,” Carlos called out.
I sat up and went to the smaller room, scooped Dinah from Cowboy, and made my way back to the receptionist desk as I pulled my clothing back on. Peter sat at the desk, the nurse sprawled in his arms, blood running down her neck.
“Really? I said watch her, not eat her.”
He grunted and rolled his eyes to me, eyes that widened as they took in my semi-bare-ass state. “You or her. Haven’t eaten in a long time. Not properly. I’ll be honest, you taste like honey.”
“You hear that noise?”
“Hmm. Someone is banging on the door.” He bent his head over her neck and she let out a long moan.
“Dude, this is not the time!” Dinah snapped.
“Don’t kill her,” I said as I strode by the desk toward the stairwell. The frosted glass in the door showed movement beyond it.
“X-ray machine, now!” I growled at Peter. “Or I leave you behind.”
“Fuck,” he growled, but he set the nurse on the floor and ran to the back room. I moved around the desk and did a quick search. The light blinked rapidly on the phone and I scooped up the receiver.
“Hello?”
“Lacey, what the hell is going on down there?”
“Well, we seem to have a stuck door and a stuck elevator. But we’re all good. No patients down here, just me and Carlos.” Lacey and Carlos, sitting in a tree . . .
“Jesus, we couldn’t get through, we thought . . . there was a breakout at Clearview Rehabilitation Center, and they said three of the inmates were headed this general direction. It’s all over the emergency alert channels on everyone’s phones even so it’s a doozy.”
I sat in the chair, kept my voice smooth. “Oh, well, we’re good. Just fix the elevator. I don’t fancy doing stairs for the rest of my shift. I’m not as young as I used to be, you know.”
The guy on the other end of the phone barked a laugh and hung up, but not before I heard him say, “They’re all good. Just the usual shit with the maintenance on this place.”
I’d
