Wilmette After Dark...the real deal!
Title : Wilmette After Dark (3/10)
Summary : We begin with a flashback to when Patrick finds out about Pete becoming a vampire, but as we arrive at the fight in the present, someone's trying to break the rules...
Author : Crispy the Centaur
Rating : PG13. Only one major swear word.
Author's Notes : Originally, this was going to be all flashback, but I put in that one paragraph to tie everything together. Meh.
Previous Chapters: Prologue, Chapter I, Chapter II
"Alright guys, that's the last of the gear," Korean Tom Cruise announced. With Joe's assistance, he lifted the final amp into the back of the trailer and shut the door. Another gig successfully wrapped up, both band and crew began piling into the seats of their touring van. The last to enter, Patrick turned back to see Pete and Hemingway making their way down the sidewalk. Motioning for the others to wait, the singer hopped from the vehicle to catch up with his band-mate.
"Pete! You're not heading back with us?"
The bassist shrugged his shoulders, then looked down the vast, dimly-lit street. "Gonna take some time to think, y'know? The ol' 'Writer's Block' has me all dried up at the moment. Maybe a walk will clear my head."
Patrick nodded in understanding, then knelt to speak to Hemingway, gently ruffling his headfur as he did. "And you make sure Petey's safe, little fella. Make sure the big, mean, Ja Rule and his crew don't come take him away again!"
Giving a slight chuckle at his friend's speech, Pete turned and began walking away, his voice echoing across the building walls as the shadows blotted him out from view.
"You just try to get some rest, 'Trick! Ol' Petey will be okay tonight!"
Although Patrick followed the instructions of getting a good night's sleep, the sound of a ringing telephone roused him around 2:38 that night. The cobwebs of slumber still clouding his mind, he stumbled from his bed, tripped over the bedside dresser, and made fast friends with the dormitory floor.
"Hey, this isn't so bad." Patrick muttered as he sprawled out among laundry-bound clothes and rock magazines, too tired to continue his journey to the telephone. Before another thought passed, a set of feet blocked his vision, and the ringing stopped with a perky "H'lo?"
Joe stood with his back to Patrick, phone in one hand, and a Nintendo DS in the other. Patrick lifted himself from the floor and propped himself onto his elbows. "Leave it to Joe's late-night video game quests to
keep him awake enough to take a phone call." He mumbled to himself before listening closely to the conversation.
It was a female voice on the other end, quite possibly a secretary or receptionist. "I'm sorry for calling at this hour, sir." She began, "But I'm looking for one of the following. Would you happen to be one Joseph Trohman, Andrew Hurley, or Patrick Stumph?"
"First one. You're talkin' to Joe."
"I see, Mr. Trohman." the woman continued, her voice sounding more concerned. "This is the Skokie Valley Hospital calling. Mr. Peter Wentz had the three of you listed as his emergency contacts."
Almost as if by magic, Patrick hoisted himself from the floor so that he was almost breathing down Joe's neck. "Joe! Do they know what's wrong with Pete?"
With a shrug, Joe repeated Patrick's question to the receptionist. There was a moment's silence and a whispered conference, then she replied, "The paramedics weren't exactly sure how it was caused, but he suffered a dangerous amount of blood loss through a wound in his neck. They're trying to give him a transfusion in the ICU right now."
Plucking the phone from Joe's grasp, Patrick shakily gasped into the mouthpiece. "We're on our way!" Slamming down the phone with a shudder, he yanked Joe off-balance as he dashed staggeringly for the door.
2:53 am. Patrick looked pleadingly at the display on his watch as he stepped through the sliding double-doors of the hospital's entrance - praying that the twelve minutes that had elapsed since the phone call hadn't been twelve too many. Joe picked up his pace, passing Patrick and headed straight to the reception desk. He had a short conversation with the nurse on duty, then he motioned toward the waiting room seats with one arm and placed the other around Patrick's shoulder. "She said that we'd best sit and wait. There should be somebody who'll be out soon."
Patrick said nothing, allowing himself to be led toward the seats. However, before the two could get off their feet, the doors to the ICU banged open. A lone doctor, a rather grizzled woman with sharp features, walked out and pointed to Joe and Patrick.
"You two, are you the emergency contacts of Peter Wentz?" The years of the woman made her voice hollow and emotionless - almost impossible to tell if she was bringing good news or bad. Slightly startled by her stern-sounding tone, the duo could only nod. Though the doctor spoke cold, unsympathetic sobriety, her next words were enough to shake Patrick down to his very core.
"Well, I'll have you know Peter is dead."
There was an echo the last words of her sentence in Patrick's head. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words could form from his trembling tongue. Even the consoling arm that Joe had wrapped around him felt like a crushing weight. Nevertheless, the doctor continued speaking. "We found him almost an hour ago near the downtown core. We're expecting foul play, as the amount of blood lost through such a small laceration hardly seems like an accident. You may go to see him, but make it quick - we'll be turning the body over to the Forensics Team for investigation soon." With that, she turned on her heel and made her way down the opposite hall.
Letting out a sigh, Joe placed a hand beneath Patrick's arm, helping him into a standing position. Gently helping to support his rattled friend, he tried his best to keep a calm head as the two made their way down the Intensive Care hall.
The hospital room smelled strangely clean and looked almost blindingly-white for such a place of death. At first, Patrick only kept his eyes to the floor, unable to bring himself to look at the still body of his friend. However, this caused him to stumble against one of the young intern-nurses that was cleaning up. With a yelp, Patrick stumbled back against Joe, but still kept his eyes averted.
"I'm...I'm so sorry." The nurse shook her head slowly, looking imploringly to the two. "I told them to keep trying, but they said it was no use anymore."
"No, it's fine. It's not your fault." Patrick felt a lump in his throat begin to build, aided by the guilt he felt for letting Pete set off on his own. He glanced to the girl's nametag in an attempt to distract himself. "I'm sure Pete would have appreciated you trying, Nurse Wilde."
"Please, just call me Morgan. I am...well, I guess 'was' now, a big fan of your band. I'm...just so sorry."
With a shudder, Patrick placed a hand on Morgan's shoulder and finally turned his eyes to the hospital bed. One of Pete's arms hung over the side, paler than the room's walls, dark and collapsed veins standing out against the skin. There were still traces of blood on the sheet near his throat, though the intern had cleaned up the skin, and the tiny puncture-wounds on his neck were completely stitched up. Patrick's eyes followed the wires on Pete's chest to the bedside monitor. Though the sound on it had been turned off, the screen still showed one straight, continuous, line. The lump in Patrick's throat seemed to grow tenfold as he gazed at the face of his fallen bandmate - there was no "peacefully asleep" expression like many stories give to the faces of the dead. Eyes shut so tightly that it was almost impossible to tell where each eyelid began or ended, blackened lips, tensed jaw - it was a face of a painful death.
"Dr. Withers always says that I shouldn't dwell on this, that people die here all the time," Morgan broke the silence. "But it just hurt so much to see someone you admire so much let go..." She began to trail off, then moved to the door. "I'm sorry, I'll leave you alone with him."
As soon as the nurse left, the tiny thread that held together Patrick's emotions finally broke. With a gasp, he flung his arms around Joe, burying his face in the crook of the guitarist's neck, fingers digging into the fabric of his jacket, fighting with all his strength to keep the tears from spilling out. Joe gently rubbed at his friend's back, gazing hopelessly at Pete's still form - only the sound of medical personnel pacing the halls formed a mournful ambiance. Still clutching Patrick tightly, Joe let his eyes hover about the room. The curtains nearby billowed haphazardly against the breeze of the dark outside as the moonlight cast a glow onto the sleek, blanched walls. As he flicked his gaze over to his friend's gurney, he was snapped back to reality as he saw Pete's frame begin to stir beneath the sheets. Bewildered, he rubbed his eyes with his other hand, Patrick still clinging to him in a tight hug, just to be sure that what he saw was real, and his sharp inhale compelled Patrick to look over. The next scene was the strangest sight of all: Pete, sitting up in bed, rubbing at his eyes as if he just woke up - though the heart monitor he was connected to still showed a flatline. Though Patrick had always considered himself an atheist, the next words out of his mouth could make one guess otherwise.
"Jesus. Fucking. Christ!" The exclamation seemed to linger through the unit in a distant echo.
Pete recoiled, fingers to his temples, the way one would react during a hangover. "Mmmrhh...Keep it down, will ya? I think my skull's about to burst out of my head."
Hands forward, as if approaching a dangerous animal, Patrick crept toward the bed, voice down. "Pete, just hold still. I really can't explain what's going on..."
Letting his hands drop onto his lap, Pete feebly craned his neck as Patrick placed his fingers on either side, pushing down hard in an attempt to find a pulse. For a breif moment, he almost thought he felt one, but it was simply the thrumming of blood in his own fingertips.
"This...this is impossible." Patrick furrowed his brow and placed the back of his hand against his bandmate's left cheek - it was cold to the touch. Pete opened his mouth to say something, and that split second before he could speak, Patrick found the reason for the missing vital signs. With his other hand, he hooked his fingers over Pete's lower jaw and peered at the top row of teeth. The next sight caused Patrick to jump back in shock against Joe, eyes wide, hands shaking.
"Pete? No...No, those are just make-believe..." He shivered, backing up further, prompting Joe to do the same.
Confused, Pete ran his tongue over his teeth, flinching as he felt the sharp point of a tooth that was never there before. Following the motion to the opposite side, he felt a second one. "Well, this is...strange...I..." He paused, looking at the IV blood bag next to him. "Joe, 'Trick. You may want to leave the room now."
"Are you going to drink from the IV?" Joe cut in.
There was a long silence, then Pete nodded vigorously.
"So it's true," Joe folded his arms and shook his head. "Vampires exist AND they're feeding on emo bass-players?"
A long silence followed, both his bandmates staring blankly at him, the way one would to a horribly amateur comedian. With a light yelp and hands to his temples again, Pete cleared the awkwardness.
"Son of a...I just remembered! It...It was William, he attacked me! I remember feeling teeth in my neck..."
"Beckett?" Patrick cocked his head to the side. "William died months ago, remember? He had that bad fever..."
For his answer, Pete pointed to the straight line on the monitor. "Being dead doesn't seem to make a difference, 'Trick."
Patrick gave a nod in understanding. Before he could speak, however, Morgan's footsteps, followed by her voice, called to them from the hall.
"Is everything all right in there, guys? I thought I heard another voice..."
Patrick snapped back into reality, pulling the cord of the IV away from Pete's mouth, pushing him back slightly and plucking one of the electrodes from his chest. Pointing to Joe, he tried to keep his voice quiet,
"Play along with me, here. Don't mention vampires, and I'll try to get us all out of this place. Pete, best not say anything, in fact, keep your mouth closed. Those fangs can be seen from a mile away." Slipping the electrode beneath his shirt and attaching the wire about a handspace below his clavicle, Patrick waited until the monitor picked up his heartbeat, then leaned forward and put on a mock expression of surprise as Morgan poked her head through the door.
"Did the Forensics Team come in already? It seems pretty early for...for...for the love of all things unexplainable!" The intern-nurse lost all sense of professionalism as her eyes flickered between the conscious Pete and the rhythmic spikes on the heart monitor. Clamping a hand over her mouth to stifle her previous shout, she gave a nervous, confused laugh. "You guys weren't fiddling around with the defibrillator, were you?"
"Nope. Even if I wanted to, I'm not sure where it is." Patrick declared in a nonchalant fashion.
"I don't even think I can spell that!" Joe cut in as Pete nodded and shrugged.
Morgan took another look at the monitor, then removed a small flashlight from her pocket. Tilting Pete's chin and gently pulling up on his eyelids with her thumb, she shone the light into each of his eyes. "Pupils still seem a little dilated, but eyes look pretty clear. No sign of clouding or glassiness. Here Pete, follow my finger." The nurse waved her finger back and forth, up and down, side to side, as the bassist followed every motion with precision. "Seems pretty focused. And he just resuscitated while I was gone?"
"That's how it happened." Patrick continued his story, occasionally looking to Joe and Pete as they both nodded, "We were just sitting here, when I thought I saw his chest rise a bit. I don't really know much about CPR, so Joe and I tried compressing his chest. Next thing we know, there's a teensy little spike on the monitor." It was a blatant lie, but Patrick hoped that his best innocent expression - his "poker face" could help get them out, as quick as he could. Taking in a deep breath, he moved his left arm inward to better hide the wire on his chest - the monitor was almost a makeshift lie detector, but he pressed on. "So we just kept at it until he came around. Wouldn't forgive myself if we just stood there and let our bassist fade away again, right?" Patrick gave a wink and threw his arm around Pete, who nodded again. Morgan said nothing. Her jaw was wide open in amazement, almost still unable to process the fact that the patient was still alive. Regaining her composure, the nurse folded her arms and tried to make her voice sound more . "Right. Right, they important thing is that he's alive again. Just wait here, I have some paperwork for you guys to fill out. Canceling of death certificate, hospital discharge form..." her voice trailed off as she took off down the hall.
With a sigh of relief, Patrick disconnected the electrode of the heart monitor from his chest and helped Pete to remove the wires and IV from his torso and arms. "All that's left is trying to explain this to Andy, what with all the blood drinking."
"That's right! I don't think I can stay alive without it. Besides, that blood bag there is still temp--"
"Pete! Control yourself." Patrick pushed the IV out of arm's reach. "Let's just get the hell out of here."
-*-
Painfully remembering the last time Patrick trusted Pete to go off on his own, he watched the first shooting star of the night streak across his view from the car window. The streetlights seemed to grow dimmer and the road looked dustier as Joe drove toward the place of the fight. Another star fell, this time the light in the sky reflecting off the hood of the car. Gnawing on his lip, Patrick reached over and flicked off the headlights, then pointed in the direction of one of the building's fire exits.
"Guys, pull in here, we can hide in this alley." He instructed, eliciting a pair of quizzical looks from his bandmates. "The fight must be on the other side of this place. I thought I saw a Dandy going up those steps..."
"White fedora? I think I see him too." Andy cut in, leaning between the seats. "What's he carrying, though? Looks like some sort of old gun case..."
Yet another meteor from the shower illuminated the sky, shining a second of light on the Dandy and what he was holding.Patrick shrieked, throwing the car door open. "It's Ryan Ross! And he IS carrying a gun case!"
Summary : We begin with a flashback to when Patrick finds out about Pete becoming a vampire, but as we arrive at the fight in the present, someone's trying to break the rules...
Author : Crispy the Centaur
Rating : PG13. Only one major swear word.
Author's Notes : Originally, this was going to be all flashback, but I put in that one paragraph to tie everything together. Meh.
Previous Chapters: Prologue, Chapter I, Chapter II
"Alright guys, that's the last of the gear," Korean Tom Cruise announced. With Joe's assistance, he lifted the final amp into the back of the trailer and shut the door. Another gig successfully wrapped up, both band and crew began piling into the seats of their touring van. The last to enter, Patrick turned back to see Pete and Hemingway making their way down the sidewalk. Motioning for the others to wait, the singer hopped from the vehicle to catch up with his band-mate.
"Pete! You're not heading back with us?"
The bassist shrugged his shoulders, then looked down the vast, dimly-lit street. "Gonna take some time to think, y'know? The ol' 'Writer's Block' has me all dried up at the moment. Maybe a walk will clear my head."
Patrick nodded in understanding, then knelt to speak to Hemingway, gently ruffling his headfur as he did. "And you make sure Petey's safe, little fella. Make sure the big, mean, Ja Rule and his crew don't come take him away again!"
Giving a slight chuckle at his friend's speech, Pete turned and began walking away, his voice echoing across the building walls as the shadows blotted him out from view.
"You just try to get some rest, 'Trick! Ol' Petey will be okay tonight!"
Although Patrick followed the instructions of getting a good night's sleep, the sound of a ringing telephone roused him around 2:38 that night. The cobwebs of slumber still clouding his mind, he stumbled from his bed, tripped over the bedside dresser, and made fast friends with the dormitory floor.
"Hey, this isn't so bad." Patrick muttered as he sprawled out among laundry-bound clothes and rock magazines, too tired to continue his journey to the telephone. Before another thought passed, a set of feet blocked his vision, and the ringing stopped with a perky "H'lo?"
Joe stood with his back to Patrick, phone in one hand, and a Nintendo DS in the other. Patrick lifted himself from the floor and propped himself onto his elbows. "Leave it to Joe's late-night video game quests to
keep him awake enough to take a phone call." He mumbled to himself before listening closely to the conversation.
It was a female voice on the other end, quite possibly a secretary or receptionist. "I'm sorry for calling at this hour, sir." She began, "But I'm looking for one of the following. Would you happen to be one Joseph Trohman, Andrew Hurley, or Patrick Stumph?"
"First one. You're talkin' to Joe."
"I see, Mr. Trohman." the woman continued, her voice sounding more concerned. "This is the Skokie Valley Hospital calling. Mr. Peter Wentz had the three of you listed as his emergency contacts."
Almost as if by magic, Patrick hoisted himself from the floor so that he was almost breathing down Joe's neck. "Joe! Do they know what's wrong with Pete?"
With a shrug, Joe repeated Patrick's question to the receptionist. There was a moment's silence and a whispered conference, then she replied, "The paramedics weren't exactly sure how it was caused, but he suffered a dangerous amount of blood loss through a wound in his neck. They're trying to give him a transfusion in the ICU right now."
Plucking the phone from Joe's grasp, Patrick shakily gasped into the mouthpiece. "We're on our way!" Slamming down the phone with a shudder, he yanked Joe off-balance as he dashed staggeringly for the door.
2:53 am. Patrick looked pleadingly at the display on his watch as he stepped through the sliding double-doors of the hospital's entrance - praying that the twelve minutes that had elapsed since the phone call hadn't been twelve too many. Joe picked up his pace, passing Patrick and headed straight to the reception desk. He had a short conversation with the nurse on duty, then he motioned toward the waiting room seats with one arm and placed the other around Patrick's shoulder. "She said that we'd best sit and wait. There should be somebody who'll be out soon."
Patrick said nothing, allowing himself to be led toward the seats. However, before the two could get off their feet, the doors to the ICU banged open. A lone doctor, a rather grizzled woman with sharp features, walked out and pointed to Joe and Patrick.
"You two, are you the emergency contacts of Peter Wentz?" The years of the woman made her voice hollow and emotionless - almost impossible to tell if she was bringing good news or bad. Slightly startled by her stern-sounding tone, the duo could only nod. Though the doctor spoke cold, unsympathetic sobriety, her next words were enough to shake Patrick down to his very core.
"Well, I'll have you know Peter is dead."
There was an echo the last words of her sentence in Patrick's head. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words could form from his trembling tongue. Even the consoling arm that Joe had wrapped around him felt like a crushing weight. Nevertheless, the doctor continued speaking. "We found him almost an hour ago near the downtown core. We're expecting foul play, as the amount of blood lost through such a small laceration hardly seems like an accident. You may go to see him, but make it quick - we'll be turning the body over to the Forensics Team for investigation soon." With that, she turned on her heel and made her way down the opposite hall.
Letting out a sigh, Joe placed a hand beneath Patrick's arm, helping him into a standing position. Gently helping to support his rattled friend, he tried his best to keep a calm head as the two made their way down the Intensive Care hall.
The hospital room smelled strangely clean and looked almost blindingly-white for such a place of death. At first, Patrick only kept his eyes to the floor, unable to bring himself to look at the still body of his friend. However, this caused him to stumble against one of the young intern-nurses that was cleaning up. With a yelp, Patrick stumbled back against Joe, but still kept his eyes averted.
"I'm...I'm so sorry." The nurse shook her head slowly, looking imploringly to the two. "I told them to keep trying, but they said it was no use anymore."
"No, it's fine. It's not your fault." Patrick felt a lump in his throat begin to build, aided by the guilt he felt for letting Pete set off on his own. He glanced to the girl's nametag in an attempt to distract himself. "I'm sure Pete would have appreciated you trying, Nurse Wilde."
"Please, just call me Morgan. I am...well, I guess 'was' now, a big fan of your band. I'm...just so sorry."
With a shudder, Patrick placed a hand on Morgan's shoulder and finally turned his eyes to the hospital bed. One of Pete's arms hung over the side, paler than the room's walls, dark and collapsed veins standing out against the skin. There were still traces of blood on the sheet near his throat, though the intern had cleaned up the skin, and the tiny puncture-wounds on his neck were completely stitched up. Patrick's eyes followed the wires on Pete's chest to the bedside monitor. Though the sound on it had been turned off, the screen still showed one straight, continuous, line. The lump in Patrick's throat seemed to grow tenfold as he gazed at the face of his fallen bandmate - there was no "peacefully asleep" expression like many stories give to the faces of the dead. Eyes shut so tightly that it was almost impossible to tell where each eyelid began or ended, blackened lips, tensed jaw - it was a face of a painful death.
"Dr. Withers always says that I shouldn't dwell on this, that people die here all the time," Morgan broke the silence. "But it just hurt so much to see someone you admire so much let go..." She began to trail off, then moved to the door. "I'm sorry, I'll leave you alone with him."
As soon as the nurse left, the tiny thread that held together Patrick's emotions finally broke. With a gasp, he flung his arms around Joe, burying his face in the crook of the guitarist's neck, fingers digging into the fabric of his jacket, fighting with all his strength to keep the tears from spilling out. Joe gently rubbed at his friend's back, gazing hopelessly at Pete's still form - only the sound of medical personnel pacing the halls formed a mournful ambiance. Still clutching Patrick tightly, Joe let his eyes hover about the room. The curtains nearby billowed haphazardly against the breeze of the dark outside as the moonlight cast a glow onto the sleek, blanched walls. As he flicked his gaze over to his friend's gurney, he was snapped back to reality as he saw Pete's frame begin to stir beneath the sheets. Bewildered, he rubbed his eyes with his other hand, Patrick still clinging to him in a tight hug, just to be sure that what he saw was real, and his sharp inhale compelled Patrick to look over. The next scene was the strangest sight of all: Pete, sitting up in bed, rubbing at his eyes as if he just woke up - though the heart monitor he was connected to still showed a flatline. Though Patrick had always considered himself an atheist, the next words out of his mouth could make one guess otherwise.
"Jesus. Fucking. Christ!" The exclamation seemed to linger through the unit in a distant echo.
Pete recoiled, fingers to his temples, the way one would react during a hangover. "Mmmrhh...Keep it down, will ya? I think my skull's about to burst out of my head."
Hands forward, as if approaching a dangerous animal, Patrick crept toward the bed, voice down. "Pete, just hold still. I really can't explain what's going on..."
Letting his hands drop onto his lap, Pete feebly craned his neck as Patrick placed his fingers on either side, pushing down hard in an attempt to find a pulse. For a breif moment, he almost thought he felt one, but it was simply the thrumming of blood in his own fingertips.
"This...this is impossible." Patrick furrowed his brow and placed the back of his hand against his bandmate's left cheek - it was cold to the touch. Pete opened his mouth to say something, and that split second before he could speak, Patrick found the reason for the missing vital signs. With his other hand, he hooked his fingers over Pete's lower jaw and peered at the top row of teeth. The next sight caused Patrick to jump back in shock against Joe, eyes wide, hands shaking.
"Pete? No...No, those are just make-believe..." He shivered, backing up further, prompting Joe to do the same.
Confused, Pete ran his tongue over his teeth, flinching as he felt the sharp point of a tooth that was never there before. Following the motion to the opposite side, he felt a second one. "Well, this is...strange...I..." He paused, looking at the IV blood bag next to him. "Joe, 'Trick. You may want to leave the room now."
"Are you going to drink from the IV?" Joe cut in.
There was a long silence, then Pete nodded vigorously.
"So it's true," Joe folded his arms and shook his head. "Vampires exist AND they're feeding on emo bass-players?"
A long silence followed, both his bandmates staring blankly at him, the way one would to a horribly amateur comedian. With a light yelp and hands to his temples again, Pete cleared the awkwardness.
"Son of a...I just remembered! It...It was William, he attacked me! I remember feeling teeth in my neck..."
"Beckett?" Patrick cocked his head to the side. "William died months ago, remember? He had that bad fever..."
For his answer, Pete pointed to the straight line on the monitor. "Being dead doesn't seem to make a difference, 'Trick."
Patrick gave a nod in understanding. Before he could speak, however, Morgan's footsteps, followed by her voice, called to them from the hall.
"Is everything all right in there, guys? I thought I heard another voice..."
Patrick snapped back into reality, pulling the cord of the IV away from Pete's mouth, pushing him back slightly and plucking one of the electrodes from his chest. Pointing to Joe, he tried to keep his voice quiet,
"Play along with me, here. Don't mention vampires, and I'll try to get us all out of this place. Pete, best not say anything, in fact, keep your mouth closed. Those fangs can be seen from a mile away." Slipping the electrode beneath his shirt and attaching the wire about a handspace below his clavicle, Patrick waited until the monitor picked up his heartbeat, then leaned forward and put on a mock expression of surprise as Morgan poked her head through the door.
"Did the Forensics Team come in already? It seems pretty early for...for...for the love of all things unexplainable!" The intern-nurse lost all sense of professionalism as her eyes flickered between the conscious Pete and the rhythmic spikes on the heart monitor. Clamping a hand over her mouth to stifle her previous shout, she gave a nervous, confused laugh. "You guys weren't fiddling around with the defibrillator, were you?"
"Nope. Even if I wanted to, I'm not sure where it is." Patrick declared in a nonchalant fashion.
"I don't even think I can spell that!" Joe cut in as Pete nodded and shrugged.
Morgan took another look at the monitor, then removed a small flashlight from her pocket. Tilting Pete's chin and gently pulling up on his eyelids with her thumb, she shone the light into each of his eyes. "Pupils still seem a little dilated, but eyes look pretty clear. No sign of clouding or glassiness. Here Pete, follow my finger." The nurse waved her finger back and forth, up and down, side to side, as the bassist followed every motion with precision. "Seems pretty focused. And he just resuscitated while I was gone?"
"That's how it happened." Patrick continued his story, occasionally looking to Joe and Pete as they both nodded, "We were just sitting here, when I thought I saw his chest rise a bit. I don't really know much about CPR, so Joe and I tried compressing his chest. Next thing we know, there's a teensy little spike on the monitor." It was a blatant lie, but Patrick hoped that his best innocent expression - his "poker face" could help get them out, as quick as he could. Taking in a deep breath, he moved his left arm inward to better hide the wire on his chest - the monitor was almost a makeshift lie detector, but he pressed on. "So we just kept at it until he came around. Wouldn't forgive myself if we just stood there and let our bassist fade away again, right?" Patrick gave a wink and threw his arm around Pete, who nodded again. Morgan said nothing. Her jaw was wide open in amazement, almost still unable to process the fact that the patient was still alive. Regaining her composure, the nurse folded her arms and tried to make her voice sound more . "Right. Right, they important thing is that he's alive again. Just wait here, I have some paperwork for you guys to fill out. Canceling of death certificate, hospital discharge form..." her voice trailed off as she took off down the hall.
With a sigh of relief, Patrick disconnected the electrode of the heart monitor from his chest and helped Pete to remove the wires and IV from his torso and arms. "All that's left is trying to explain this to Andy, what with all the blood drinking."
"That's right! I don't think I can stay alive without it. Besides, that blood bag there is still temp--"
"Pete! Control yourself." Patrick pushed the IV out of arm's reach. "Let's just get the hell out of here."
-*-
Painfully remembering the last time Patrick trusted Pete to go off on his own, he watched the first shooting star of the night streak across his view from the car window. The streetlights seemed to grow dimmer and the road looked dustier as Joe drove toward the place of the fight. Another star fell, this time the light in the sky reflecting off the hood of the car. Gnawing on his lip, Patrick reached over and flicked off the headlights, then pointed in the direction of one of the building's fire exits.
"Guys, pull in here, we can hide in this alley." He instructed, eliciting a pair of quizzical looks from his bandmates. "The fight must be on the other side of this place. I thought I saw a Dandy going up those steps..."
"White fedora? I think I see him too." Andy cut in, leaning between the seats. "What's he carrying, though? Looks like some sort of old gun case..."
Yet another meteor from the shower illuminated the sky, shining a second of light on the Dandy and what he was holding.Patrick shrieked, throwing the car door open. "It's Ryan Ross! And he IS carrying a gun case!"