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ToTL: Dark Reflections: Smoldering Decay
 
#13
Smoldering Decay:
[A Hero Sandwich Production]
Memories (pt 5)

----------

I didn't have to wait for more than a few minutes before Tim returned, a bundle of clothing under his arm. He paused for a moment when he saw me sitting on the bed in the modified lab coat.

"Here." He said while handing me the bundle of cloth. "The teams repairing the hospital pulled these out of your locker." He hesitated again before adding. "I'll just wait outside."

I looked at the clothing in my hands for a minute before it clicked. These were my clothes, the ones I had worn to work a week ago. I had given them up for lost. Apparently someone on the repair crew had gone the extra mile and salvaged the contents of the staffs lockers. It wasn't something I had expected. But then again, the other hospitals that had been attacked were just piles of rubble now. Skyway hospital was the first one still standing after an impact, even if it was a bit crooked.

After a self conscious glance at the camera in the ceiling corner, I stood up and turned my back to it. There was no sense in changing in the bathroom, that had a camera as well and it was significantly closer. The lab coat joined the clothing on the bed, and the hospital scrubs made a pile on the floor. I ignored the beeping of the equipment as room went from 'safe' to 'hazardous'. Putting on actual clothing felt strange after a week of wearing nothing but the paperweight scrubs. The denim and heavy cotton felt more like putting on armor than clothing, but I was willing to let that mental contortion slide by for the time being. I'd take all the help I could get, even if it was only in my head.

Tossing on the lab coat over the jeans and sweater felt a little bulky, but I ignored the minor discomfort in favor of worrying about who was waiting to see me. The happy feelings of freedom I had been so centered on a minute ago were doused by apprehension. Going into meetings without a clue had never ended well for me. And this meeting was with someone who had a lot of influence. The only thing that kept me walking towards the door was the knowledge that people with a lot influence rarely liked to wait.

I knocked on the door and, after a beep from the other side, it opened. The lighting in the hallways was brighter than my room and I had to squint for a few seconds before my eyes adjusted.

"Here," Tim said as he held out a pair of sunglasses for me. "I figured you could use these." His voice sounded strange without the distortion of the hazmat suit.

"Thanks." I said as I slid them on. The sunglasses reduced the details I could make out further. But, more importantly, they made is possible to see without squinting.

"Come on, this way to the waiting room."

I mumbled an affirmative and made sure to focus on him as he lead the way. To my blurry vision he was just one more head of dark hair in hospital scrubs, easily lost in the crowd. It didn't take all that long to reach the waiting room. Tim stopped beside a man in military dress. I couldn't make out his exact rank, but with everything that I assume he made happen, 'Important' seemed to fit the bill.

"Ahh, Miss Quinn. It's good to finally meet you." He said as we shook hands. "I'm officer Michaels. I was hoping we would have a chance to talk about your future."

"I'd be happy to, sir. But I'm lost as to why this is happening." I said, hoping that I could finally get some answers to all the strangeness that was going on.

"Certainly, but the details should be discussed someplace a little more private." He turned to Tim and dismissed him with a brief handshake and a "Thank you Mr Davis."

I followed Michaeles as he left the waiting room and made a beeline for a rather large black suv. "Shouldn't I check out?" I asked as someone, also in military dress, got out to open the car door for us.

"Don't worry about that, that paperwork can be taken care of later." Michaels said as climbed inside and scooted over to the far seat. I took the implicit invitation and got in as well. When the car door closed with a solid thunk I tried not to think about frying pans and fires.

"Miss Quinn, you present us with a unique opportunity. As you know hospital staff would normally be fast tracked for recovery. But due to the unique circumstances surrounding your accident we didn't know what to expect, and by the time we did, well it was obvious that the hospital was no longer an appropriate fit." He pulled a folder out of the briefcase at his feet and passed it to me. "I'm hoping that we can provide a better use of your talents."

I opened the folder with more than a little trepidation. I knew that my talents, if you could call the unconscious emission of dangerous levels of radiation such a thing, would be a barrier to getting back to work. But had hoped that with time I could control it. Michaels talked as if all of this was a forgone conclusion. I took of the sunglasses, and opened the folder to find surprisingly legible (read: large) font. The first few pages where both comforting and worrying at the same time: A patient summary and in depth analysis of my abilities, as well as few theories about their practical application. Comforting because I could understand them, and worrying because they were far more detailed than anything I saw at the hospital.

When I got over my shock and flipped past the first few pages, I ran into something even more confusing, page after page of hospital surveys. They were by no means comprehensive but they all listed possible patient loads as well as technical sophistication. And throughout it all was a liberal sprinkling of abbreviations and acronyms that made no sense to me.

"I don't get it." I finally said. "you want me to do hospital surveys? High stress environments full of already sick people is just about the worst place for me. And you already seem to know this." I emphasized my last point by tapping on my patient summary at the front.

Michaels had answers for my concerns. "We are willing to provide equipment and training to help deal with your abilities. You current attire is just one possibility. Any residual radiation will be mitigated by limiting the amount of time you would spend on site. You are one of the few people with the necessary training to evaluate these locations, and who is unable to contribute locally. We would prefer to get you back on your previous job, but unfortunately that isn't an option."

His arguments sounded logical, but something was off. "I doubt that recruiting me to evaluate hospitals would warrant the amount of weight you have thrown around to get me in this car. And the fact that you would have had to access my, supposedly confidential, patent records to create this patent survey hasn't escaped my notice either."

The smile that Michaels had worn from the beginning went away, instead replaced with a much more serious expression. "Miss Quinn, allow me to be frank. We are losing this war. You yourself came very close to being a casualty. They are destroying our hospitals faster than we can rebuild them. We need trained people to help us evaluate alternate locations for patent care. You will receive more than fair compensation for your services. Any details beyond that will have to wait until after you have agreed to help us." Having said that, he pulled out another form from his briefcase and laid it on top of the folder in my lap.

This was something I wasn't all that surprised to see. Non-disclosure agreements were not unheard of as part of hospital life in paragon city. Every time a hero comes up with some new technology that they want to test (usually on themselves), and they are smart enough to realize that it may have an adverse reaction to their well being, they will make arrangements to have medical personal on site. An NDA is usually involved in these cases, as they have to tell us enough about the device that we can help them if something goes wrong. Those NDAs don't threaten treason for failure to comply with them though.

I read it, and understood enough of it to be sure that it just put limitations on what I could talk about to whom. The exact details of what and whom were buried in legalese. But I trusted that those would be made clear to me if I signed it. Part of me wanted to scrawl my name on the dotted line, just to figure out what all this was about; part of me resented the rather obvious manipulation tactics they where using. But in the end my choices boiled down to staying in the hospital and waiting months or even years to figure out what was going on, or sign my name and find out. After a few minutes of thinking it over I scrawled my signature at the bottom. I knew there would be strings attached to the carrot they were waving in front of me. But it was a mighty fine carrot.

I handed the form back to Michaels. After a brief glance at it his smile came back. "Glad to have you on board." As the car pulled away from the curb Michaels placed a few more files on the seat between us. "As you may have guessed these are not normal hospitals we want you to evaluate. We have been working in conjunction with Portal Corp to find alternate wolds where we can use hospitals for longer term patient care. We can't afford the time it would take to start negotiations with all of the possible candidates. We need someone to evaluate the candidate worlds and report back on which ones would be the most capable of helping us. I hope that someone is you."

I was stuck speechless by the audacity of the plan. I picked up one of the folders and leafed through it without seeing the contents, stalling for time while I tried to come up with a response that wasn't laughing or crying. After a minute I remembered some of the stories I heard through the grapevine. "we aren't talking about the praetorian mess or that shadow shard place right?"

Michaels was quick to quell my fears. "Oh no, the places you'll be visiting are nowhere close to those hotspots. You will be surveying much lower risk locations. Your job won't be without some risk, but nothing more than what you faced before the ritki started kamikaze-ing into hospitals." He leaned over a bit to look at the page I had open in front of me. "Beta Tau 3-48, a close analog of our own dimension, relatively speaking. Something happened in the past between Hamidon and Nemesis leaving both greatly diminished. Their largest worry seems to be with a stronger version of the Clockwork King." Michaels paused for a moment to give me a reassuring smile. "But don't worry about that, you just need to be concerned with how many patients they can help us with, and how quickly those heroes can recover while they are there."

It didn't take much longer for me to decide to sign up for the program. If I wasn't able to help people in hospitals here, I would at least be able to get them the best help that I could elsewhere. There were more papers to sign, with mind numbing legalese and scary repercussions, but it seemed like a good deal. At least I understood why they went through so much effort to get me out of the hospital. I spent the remaining time of the car ride combing over my patient profile, trying to figure out what I could do to control my abilities.

My ruminations were interrupted as the car came to a stop and the door was opened by the driver. I had been so absorbed by my reading I had missed our arrival. We were in a small underground parking structure. More black vehicles with tinted windows filled the spaces around us. I followed behind Michaels as he badged us through several doors and into an elevator. Inside the elevator there were no buttons, which suggested that there was only one destination, or it was tied somehow to the badge that called it. The doors opened to a much more hectic scene than I expected, technicians and military personal bustled through the corridors, intent on their own destinations or conversations. Michaels didn't waste any time, setting off at a brisk pace; I followed, feeling slightly out of place among the throng of people who obviously knew where they were going.

I won't bore you with the details of next few hours, suffice to say that there were tests, papers to sign, more tests, and more papers to sign. By the end of it all I was feeling rather worn out, and was happy to follow my driver cum guide to my temporary onsite housing. Michaels had disappeared sometime between the second set of testing and form signing. After making sure that my newly issued badge opened my door, my guide, whose name I have long since forgotten, informed me that wandering the halls wasn't recommended and that someone would fetch me in the morning.

I mumbled something vaguely affirmative in nature and shuffled into my room. The first thing that caught my eye was the shingling on the walls. Heavy grey plastic bags about two foot square and half an inch thick were bolted on all four walls, stenciling across the surface identified them as lead. Even the back of the door didn't escape treatment, though they had to overlap a bit in the center to fit two rows. Either then floor and ceiling were thick enough that they didn't have to worry about additional shielding or there was only one floor to this place. The only vertical surface to escape the treatment was another door. This one lead to an en-suite bathroom, which was shingled as well. Someone had been thoughtful enough to hang a small mirror above the sink, as the original fixture had been covered or removed by the lead shielding. The small shower had been made just a little bit smaller, and I wondered briefly about the possibility of leaks, but in the end it wasn't my problem. I used the facilities, shrugged out of my clothing, and curled up on the rather stiff cot.

*****

The next two weeks passed in a rush of training. Training on how to safely use the portals, training on how to reduce my emissions, training on how not to stand out in a crowd. The last one came as a bit of a surprise. Apparently not all of the worlds I would be investigating were on the best of terms with us, and I would have to avoid drawing attention to myself as I made my evaluations. During that time there was an attempt on the Galaxy city hospital, apparently it was also turned into a glancing blow. I never found out exactly how bad the damage was, just that the hospital was still standing. The only improvement in the routine was when they moved me into more permanent quarters. The new room didn't have slabs of lead bolted to the walls, I figured they were in the walls instead. When I moved in the walls had a fresh coat of grey paint, and the door had a much more solid feel to it.

My first evaluation was almost anti-climatic, though I will admit to getting a small thrill my first time through the portal. I forget the exact name of the place, just that they had never seen a resurgence in their war with the rikti. The local contact greeted me as I emerged from the portal and led me on a informative, if slightly boring, tour of several hospitals. I observed things, I took notes, I asked a few questions, and I came home. After that first successful run through they had me doing one or two a day, starting with the worlds that knew we were coming. Those made up a rather short list and soon I was visiting the worlds where I wasn't welcomed with open arms, or at all.

That was exciting for a while, but it slowly became simply stressful. I was dropped off in an out of the way alley or dark corner of a park. I would make my way to the nearest hospital and find a seat in the waiting room. Put a slightly worried or tired look on your face and you blend in with the rest of the crowd. Watch the people as they come in, and see how long it takes for the minor cases to come back out. Look at the heroes as they exit from the deeper in the hospital, if they have any limps or bandages still attached. If that wasn't enough, walk around like you know where your going. A purposeful walk and the right attire will get you surprisingly far.

*****

I had thought that if things went sideways it would be while I'm on the other side of the portal. I was wrong, but not by much.

I was prepping to visit one of the not-on-the-best-of-terms dimensions. The chatter of the portal technicians as they dialed in the portal settings a familiar murmur in the background. My review of the map was interrupted by the alarms blaring. In my crash corse introduction they had never covered what to do in if the base alarms go off, so I looked to the technicians for a clue. They were both huddled behind the control panel looking fearfully down the hallway. I shot a quick look down the hallway as well and noticed what they were so afraid of: Rikti. Their glowing portal hung in the air as more continued to come out. I realized, after a glance around the room, that the technicians had the only cover available. So I scampered over to join them, hoping that we wouldn't be seen and the troops that always seemed to plentiful around the base would be able to save us.

"Any clue how much longer it's going to take?" I asked in a whisper.

"You want us to start up that portal now?" The tech nearest me hissed back.

"Well, yeah, better stuck in a dimension that we have good, or at least non-hostile, relations with than captured by them." I answered with a nod of my head toward the hallway.

The pair of them looked at me for a second, then glanced down the hallway before nodding at each other. "Right, no guarantee, but at least we won't be captured."

"Good enough for me." I said as I moved to act as a lookout.

It was a tense few minutes listening for approaching rikti and making the occasional glance around the corner. Thankfully they all seemed to focus their attention at the other end of the hallway where there were sporadic sounds of gunfire. Their inattention did not last once the portal opened up though. The guards closest to us turned and drew their rifles at the noise from the portal.

"They're coming!" I hissed over my shoulder at the pair.

"Need more time!" was the only response I got aside from rapid clatter of keys.

I sucked in a breath between my teeth and concentrated on the one skill I had been able to cultivate in my weeks of training. Sticking my head around the corner I focused my will against the breathing mask of the closer of the two guards. After a second the collection of plastic and metal started to smoke and the guard got a lung full of rather noxious fumes. The other guard, rather than try and help his compatriot sighted along his rifle. I didn't wait for him to pull the trigger. The rifle pulse took a smoking chunk out of the corner and I winced as hot metal fragments bounced off the back of my neck. I psyched myself up for a few seconds and glanced back around the corner. This time the rifle came back up almost immediately. But the adrenaline must have helped, because his respirator started to smoke as well before he could pull the trigger.

My momentary elation sunk like a lead weight when I saw three more rikti round the hallway's far corner and run towards us. "No more time!" I shouted as I got up and to beat feet for the portal. At this point not caring all that much where it went, as long as it was away from here.

Two steps from the portal I heard one of the technicians yell "Wait! It's not sta-", but it was too late and my momentum carried me through.

I hit uneven ground on the other side and barely managed to avoid face planting on the metal grating that was the floor. After an awkward stumble I looked over my shoulder at the portal, just in time to see it disappear. It didn't take a genius to figure out what the tech had been trying to say. And it didn't look like they were going to be joining me any time soon.

Looking around the room I was now stuck in revealed damaged machinery and pieces of armor embossed with the crey logo. Great, I managed to land in a crey facility that had recently seen an outbreak of violence. If this place was anything like home that meant one of two things. Either the hero corps was going to send one of their forensics teams down here to bag and tag everything; a relatively good thing in my estimation. Or crey was going to send their own clean up crew; a not so good thing. It all depended on what happened and who got out.

Given my previous luck I wasn't going to bet on the hero corps showing up, so I set out in an effort to find an exit. Hopefully before someone unfriendly found me.

An hour and a half later I had a much better appreciation for whomever had decided to shut this place down. Every room I looked in was either littered with broken equipment, broken crey powersuits, or spent brass. I saw plenty of half assembled portal technology, so I had a good idea what the crey were doing here. And perhaps, if my training about portal tech had been worth anything, a good guess as too why I ended up here.

The sight of a larger heavier door set in a little alcove raised my hopes. I knew I was on the highest sublevel from the elevators, and this door was different from anything else I had seen. So with a slight spring in my step I hurried over and pressed the button next to it.

The glowing red sky and floating islands of the shadow shard started back at me through the door way.

"Well crap."

----------

Finally done!
I'm sure those of you participated in the task force that spawned the idea for Dark!mirror-verse heroes know exactly where she is. But for those of you who don't know Dr. Quaterfield's task force centers around crey who have been experimenting with portal tech in the shadow shard. Its fun, you should try it out some time.

I'm also not sure if/when I will write the next bit of Decay-fic. So it's safe to assume that the hero corps, or more accurately the portal corps, show up to do a final bag and tag of the base and find her there. Cue much paperwork and a trip to atlas park.
-Terry
-----
"so listen up boy, or pornography starring your mother will be the second worst thing to happen to you today"
TF2: Spy
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[No subject] - by Bob Schroeck - 07-09-2008, 01:50 PM
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