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Tear drops on a rose
[Monday Night] "Neal Tanner?" Neal walked over to the surgeon, into his office, and sat down. "Mr. Tanner, Lt Sperry is stable right now, but he's still in critical condition and all the news is bad. I understand you're his next-of-kin?" "Yeah, guess so - he doen't have any family, we kinda do for each other, you know? What're you saying - if he's stable, doesn't that mean the worst is over?" "Not in this case - honestly, it'll be touch and go as long as he's listed in critical condition - not less than three days. He took three rifle bullets in his chest cavity and one in the head. Our main concern is first that there may be brain damage from the wound, loss of blood, and over exposure. A second concern is that he still has significant internal bleeding from one area basically inoperable because of the location of the damage. Thirdly - shock is always a factor in cases like this - a lethal factor and a real danger. Mr Tanner, If he does recover, we don't know what kind of brain damage we may be dealing with. Lt. Sperry could recover his health, but spend the rest of his life blind, or as a quadriplegic, or tramatically effected in some other way." Neal leaned back. He didn't hear anything else, the surgeon became a buzzing drone in his ears as he went on - something about the next stages of watching, waiting, treatment, hopes, concerns... [Tuesday 9am]
Dr John Grey - FBI Homicide investigation. Jennifer hesitated only an instant as she walked in and sat down. She had been working only yesterday morning when she found out about Steve. She hadn't been in today, but this meeting was vital. Washington State was being relieved of the investigation by the FBI - a little late, don't you think? Steve dead, Keith dead, Frank dead, Bill dying... Lt. Tomsen called the meeting to order - drone - she wasn't even catching the words - so many people dead, over a hundred this time, including US and Canadian police - evidence of at least two werewolves? They had one body? - She didn't even know that - who's doing the forensics? And everybody was looking at her... "I'm sorry, having a blond moment, who's examining the body?" Lt. Tenny (FBI) answered, "One of our people has the body, we have the amored werewolf suit with us. The individual has been identified as a known mercenary, but one without known ties to the US or Canada - we suspect a personal tie with the Chinese colony. His manner of death presents its own puzzle, someone remotly detonated a blasting cap inside the headpiece - but they didn't stick around to clean up their mess. The reason we asked you to come in today, is because we want you to look at the gear this guy was using and let us know if this corresponds to the damage from the other massacres. A case appeared, opened, the werewolf suit was pulled piece by piece from the case. Jennifer's trembling hands handled each piece as she examined teeth, jaw reach, handspread, saw the servos, the body armor, measured the lengths of the arms, legs, and torso. She couldn't finish. She was shaking so bad, she finally had to hold her own arms. "Gentlemen, this is it. You don't need me anymore, excuse me!", and she was gone. [Noon] Kim was redressing David's right shoulder. The bullet had passed clean through, and David only favored the arm slightly - Kim thought of him carrying her out of the cabin yesterday. She was surprised by the healing, and wondered if it was normal for a bullet wound to close up so quickly. The exit wound was worse and had not yet fully closed. She compared it the scar from some other bullet wound on his back - similar enough... "Who shot you David?" "Brian. And it was Brian that killed the boy in your car, He also killed my brother, a man you never met. I took care of it, Brian's dead now." "I thought he was your friend, he killed that little boy? Was he after ME? I thought he worked for you, I thought he was your Friend?!" "Calm down. I told you he's dead. Why do you think we're still out here? I've got to sort a few things out, and my shoulder needs to catch up with the rest of me. Are you done? Kim was just finishing the fresh dressing. David noticed she was crying. "And why was he shooting at you? Did you all go up to Canada so you could shoot each other? Are you done now? "Yes, we're done. My brother is dead, Brian's dead, our business in Canada is finished. I just need to find out about somebody and we can close up in Seattle, take that honeymoon I promised you. How'd you like to visit Mother Russia?" Kim looked down at the wolf, Hrauk, at her feet, and had a brief vision of frozen desolation. She looked back up to David and said something. She felt herself going numb again... [Wednesday 2pm] Jennifer Greene watched the rain from inside the Starbucks, watched the cars wander around in the wet parking lot, listened to the cheap jazz coffeehouse music, thinking about nothing past the flavor and feel of her latte. She didn't want to go home today. There was no reason to go home. She had that damn memorial service tommorrow morning - she really didn't want to go. Jennifer thought breifly of going in to the office, she hadn't been in at all except to attend the meeting yesterday morning. When your husband's a cop you're supposed to expect a call some day, but now... she only went into forensics to work with her husband, Dammit! why couldn't she think about something else? She picked up her phone and couldn't think of anyone to call. She started to put it up again and decided to call Neal, see how Lt Sperry was doing. "Neal Tanner" "Hi Neal, this is Jennifer - any word about Bill?" "Yeah, he's having a rough time, still hanging in though...How you doing, You all right?" "Not really, as good as could be expected? I don't know - look - hey, are you up for dinner tonight, I really don't want to sit at home, I'm kinda going stir crazy, I guess I really don't want to be alone, do you mind?" "Yeah, I'd like that, my daughter's still out so I got no reason not to, how 'bout that seafood place on the pier right at the North end of Pike's Market, let's meet early - about sixish?" "Great...Thanks, Neal. See ya around six!" Boy, that made her nervous, almost like a date - that's crazy though, Neal she could trust. He was a friend, reliable, courteous, and he wasn't another cop. She really needed to not be alone right now, and wondered what she would do for two hours. She was only nervous from too much coffee. [6:00 pm] Neal was stoney and Jennifer was crying in the hospital waiting room. Bill was gone. He'd developed some kind of blood clot that got tangled up in his heart around 5:30, by 5:35 he was a corpse. Neal had gotten there by 5:50, Jennifer was there by 6:00. "You know, a friend's sposed to be there with his family - where's his family?! What kind of - what am I sposed to do if there's no family - I mean - God - he's dead, he's gone - he's really completely gone..." Neal lost it, fell over sideways on the couch and just started crying. Jennifer crossed over, sat down beside him, leaning his head against her side and putting her arms around him. Both were crying. Nothing changed for a while. They left the hospital about a half hour later, deciding they would still get something to eat. They were close enough to downtown not to change their original plans, and the restaurant was nice. The table they shared overlooked the waterway - they could see couples outside, the ferries coming and going every 15 minutes or so, a glimse of the moon once in a while. After dinner they stayed for coffee. It was almost 10:30 when Neal walked her to her car. He hesitated, and offered a hug which turned into an enlonged embrace. She was crying again - then it was over and she was gone. Neal stopped at his car and looked back up to see her drive off - she was really hurting. He thought again of Bill, seeing him again all sickly and wired up in the hospital bed. He was worried about Kim. She was supposed to be back today or tomorrow. He felt sick - he still couldn't believe she'd gone off and married this guy that she'd only known a few days. It was late, he was tired. [Midnight] The Greyhound pulled up to the terminal doors and stopped, after a brief delay the door opened. Two teenage or college kids came off first followed by a black lady and an elderly couple, then Marcus - with his footlocker. He checked out the almost empty bus terminal and walked over to the hotel display. Tonight it would be a shuttle to the Holiday Inn, tomorrow he would talk to Rick and try to get the scope of things. The hotel shuttle would be 20 minutes. He wandered into the empty McDonalds and got a bag of 6 cheeseburgers. He was sore all over and the bus rides hadn't helped. What a FUBAR - David gone, Brian, Slim Jim & everyone else dead - dead cops, dead Chinese, then Cody pulls a no-show leaving him alone to hot foot it out of the zone with Greyhound as the best option back to civilization. Marcus wondered if Cody pulled David out...well, tomorrow he'd find Rick. He watched a couple making out for a little while, visualizing tearing them apart, smelling the blood in his mind. He picked up his footlocker and cheeseburgers and walked up to them, uncomfortably close, then past them to wait outside for the shuttle. Marcus moved into the shadows, leaned against the wall, and waited patiently as the moon slowly detatched itself from the clouds. - - - - David looked up at the same moon. Tomorrow they would sail into Puget Sound, from the top. He could reach Cody through his folks on Blake Island - they could even wait for him there. Cody would talk to Ted or Rick and pick up the pulse of things, even get in touch with Marcus when he surfaced, or maybe find him... The wolf trotted out of the cabin, toenails clicking a little strangly, David turned to his bride as she followed. "I want you to meet some people tomorrow. You know where Blake Island is? A friend of mine's parents live there - really nice people, Blake and Ira, Blake says they named the Island after him, but he does own a fairly large lot and a few slips. We'll be able to stay with them, I'm thinking a few days. We can also take a 10:30 to Seattle with lunch on the ferry - I want to meet your Dad - you don't think he'll shoot at me do you?" "He wouldn't dare" as she wrapped herself around him, "he couldn't shoot you without hitting me! Now - are you coming to bed eventually, or did you want to make love on the deck again?" The wolf watched them go in and close the door, found a spot against the cabin wall and went back to sleep.
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