Harvest

now like twin bats out of hell.

She sped up.

So did the other car. Suddenly it swooped left into the next lane. It pulled up beside her until they were almost neck in neck.

She glanced sideways. Saw the other car's window roll down. Glimpsed the silhouette of a man in the right passenger seat.

In panic, she floored the accelerator.

Too late she spotted the car stalled ahead of her. She slammed on the brakes. Her car spun and caromed off the concrete barrier. Suddenly the world tilted sideways. Then everything was tumbling over and over. She saw darkness and light. Darkness, light.

Darkness.

'… Repeat, this is Mobile Unit forty-one. Our ETA is three minutes. Copy?'

'Copy, forty-one. How're the vitals?'

'Systolic holding at ninety-five. Pulse one ten. We've got normal saline going in one peripheral line. Hey, looks like she's starting to move.'

'Keep her immobilized.'

'We've got her in a collar and a spinal board.'

'OK. We're ready and waiting for you.'

'See you in a minute, Bayside…'

And pain. Short, sharp explosions of it in her head.

She tried to scream, but no sound came out. She tried to turn away from that piercing light, but her neck seemed trapped in a choke-hold. She thought if she could just escape that light and burrow back into darkness, the pain would go away. With all her strength she twisted, straining to break free of the paralysis that had seized her limbs.

'Abby. Abby, hold still!' a voice commanded. 'I have to look in your eyes.'

She twisted the other way, felt restraints chafing her wrists, her ankles. And she realized that it was not paralysis that prevented her movement. She was tied down, all four limbs strapped to the gurney.

'Abby, it's Dr. Wettig. Look at me. Look at the light. Come on, open your eyes. Open.'

She opened her eyes, forced herself to keep them open, even though the beam of his penlight felt like a blade piercing straight through her skull.

'Follow the light. Come on. That's good, Abby. OK, both pupils are reactive. EOM's are normal?The penlight, mercifully, shut off. 'I still want that CT.'

Abby could make out shapes now. She could see the shadow of Dr. Wettig's head against the diffuse brightness of the overhead lights. There were other heads moving around on the periphery of her vision, and a white privacy curtain billowing like a cloud off in the distance. Pain pricked her left arm; she gave a jerk.

'Easy, Abby.' It was a woman's voice, soft, soothing. 'I have to draw some blood. Hold very still. I have a lot of tubes to collect.' Now a third voice: 'Dr. Wettig, X-ray's ready for her.'

'In a minute,' said Wettig. 'I want a bigger bore IV in. Sixteen gauge. Come on, people.'

Abby felt another stab, this time in her right arm. The pain drove straight through her confusion and brought her mind into startling focus. She knew exactly where she was. She couldn't recall how she'd arrived, but she knew this was Bayside Emergency Room, and that something terrible must have happened.

'Mark,' she said, and tried to sit up. 'Where's Mark?'

'Don't move! We'll lose this IV!'

A hand closed over her elbow, pinning her arm to the gurney. The grasp was too firm to be gentle. They were all hurting her, stabbing her with their needles, holding her down like some captive animal.

'Mark!' she cried.

'Abby, listen to me.' It was Wettig again, his voice low and impatient. 'We're trying to reach Mark. I'm sure he'll be here soon. Right now, you have to cooperate or we can't help you. Do you understand? Abby, do you understand?'

She stared up at his face and she went very still. So many times before, as a resident, she had felt intimidated by his flat blue eyes. Now, strapped down and helpless under that gaze, she felt more than intimidated. She felt truly, deeply, frightened. She glanced around the room, seeking a friendly face, but everyone was too busy attending to IV's and blood tubes and vital signs.

She heard the curtain whisk open, felt a lurch as the gurney began to move. Now the ceiling was rushing past in a flashing succession of lights, and she knew they were taking her deeper into the hospital. Into the heart of the enemy. She didn't even try to struggle; the restraints were impossible to fight. Think, she thought. I have to think.

They turned the corner, into X-ray. Now another face, a man's, appeared over her gurney. The CT technician. Friend or enemy? She couldn't tell any more. They moved her onto the table and buckled straps across her chest and hips.

'Hold very still,' the tech commanded, 'or we'll have to do this all over again.'

As the scanner slid over her head, she felt a sudden rush of claustrophobia. She remembered how other patients had described CT scans: like having your head jammed into a pencil sharpener. Abby closed her eyes. Machinery clicked and whirred around her head. She tried to think, to remember the accident.

She remembered getting into her car. Driving onto the Turnpike. Then her memory tape had a gap. Retrograde amnesia; the accident itself was a complete blank. But the events leading up to it were slowly coming back into focus.

By the time the scan was completed, she'd managed to piece together enough memory fragments to understand what she had to do next. If she wanted to stay alive.

She was quietly cooperative as the CT technician transferred her back onto the gurney — so cooperative, in fact, that he left off the wrist restraints and buckled on only the chest strap. Then he wheeled her into the X-ray anteroom.

'The ER's coming to get you,' he said. 'If you need me, just call. I'm right in the next room.'

Through the open doorway she could hear him talking on the telephone. Yeah, this is CT. We're all done here. Dr. Blaise is looking over the scan now. You want to come get her?

Abby reached up and quietly unbuckled the chest strap. As she sat up, she felt the room begin to whirl. She pressed her hands to her temples and everything seemed to settle back into focus. The IV.

She ripped the tape off her arm, wincing at the sting, and pulled out the catheter. Saline dribbled out of the tubing, onto the floor. She ignored the saline, concentrating instead on stopping the flow of blood from her vein. A sixteen-gauge puncture is a big hole. Though she taped over it tightly, it continued to ooze. She couldn't worry about that now. They were coming to get her.

She climbed off the gurney, her bare feet landing in a pool of saline. In the next room, the tech was cleaning up the CT table. She could hear the rattle of tissue paper, the clang of a trash can.

She took a lab coat off the door hook and pulled it on over her hospital gown. Just that effort seemed to drain her. She was struggling to think, to see through a white haze of pain as she moved to the door. Her legs felt sluggish, as though she were wading through quicksand. She pushed into the hallway.

It was empty.

Still slogging through quicksand, she moved up the corridor, reaching out every so often to steady herself against the wall. She turned a corner. At the far end of the hallway was an emergency

HARVEST

exit. She struggled towards it, thinking: If I can just reach that door, I'll be safe.

Somewhere behind her, from what seemed like a great distance, she heard voices. The sound of hurrying footsteps.

She lunged against the emergency exit bar and pushed out, into the night. Alarm bells started ringing. At once she began to run, fleeing in panic into the darkness. She stumbled off the kerb into the parking lot. Broken glass and gravel cut into her bare feet. She had no plan of escape, no destination in mind; she knew only that she had to get away from Bayside.

There were voices behind her. A shout.

Glancing back, she saw three security guards run out the ER entrance.