#76: Toilet Stall

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Chad was nose to nose with a dragon.

The Dragon said “Hi there. My you look tasty. Er...I mean. Don’t be alarmed. Congratulations. You are the first.”

It vanished...

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(later)

“Well hello there big boy!” a feminine voice spoke in his ear “wakey wakey…time to rise and shine. If you don’t your bladder is going to pop.”

Yeah…there was that.

Chad definitely felt the urge. An INTENSE urge. He opened his eyes and found himself laying, flat on his back, on a table. He raised his head and looked around. It seemed to be a medical facility of some sort. He was naked and cold. He sat up, swung around and fell off the table.

....and hit the floor hard. That hurt. The damn floor was damn cold. He just lay there on the cold tiles for a minute ...breathing. His chest hurt.

He heard someone coming. That couldn’t be good. He made his way quick as he could into the next room which turned out to be the restroom. Quick as a scalded cat he entered a toilet stall and swung himself upon to a toilet seat...the stall door closed the door behind him.

Since he was here and naked...he relieved himself. That helped but he still didn’t feel very good. In fact he felt worse and worse. He reached back with one hand, flushed the toilet then swung to the floor and worshiped the porcelain goddess.

He puked. “Ralph...Ralph...Ralph...”

Dry heaves.

“You ok in there?” a voice said. Who ever he had heard earlier had followed him into the restroom. He heard a flush.

Chad heard the sound of running water. Someone was washing their hands. He mumbled “Yeah...I’m ok. Just nauseous”

“I understand. I was like that after watching my first autopsy. I puked for hours. You’ll be ok. You won’t die...you’ll just wish you could.” the voice said.

The sound of an air dryer motor as the man dried his hands then he said again. “I’m closing up. Someone screwed up on the paperwork again. Cadaver services was supposed to have delivered a corpse for dissection first thing this morning. I was supposed to prep it. It’s not here. I can’t find it. Too bad. The students will just have to wait. I have a hot date tonight so I’m not hanging around here to look. When you get through puking let your self out.”

Chad heard the sound of footsteps retreating...a door closed.

Dissection?

“Feel better?” a voice in his head asked.

“Not really.” he replied.

“Wait for it…” she teased “ Coming in Three.”

“Who…what? Say! Who are you?” he exclaimed

“….and what am I doing in your head!” she finished. “ Very, very good. You are precocious. I knew you would be.”

“Yeah? Well what are you doing in my head and what am I doing naked, in a toilet stall?” he replied.

“Trying to stay alive.” she said.

“Oh? Ok. That works. Since you seem to know what’s going on why don’t you tell me the next move.” he said.

“Wait for the lights to go out, then leave.” she said. “You can see in the dark...now.”

“I can?” he asked “ that would have been handy in the rock-pile he thought. "How come I can do that?”

“Shhhh” she said. “ you don’t actually have to say anything out loud. I can hear your thoughts.”

“This just keeps getting weirder and weirder. You know what? My butt is cold...not to mention other parts. You reckon we can do something about that?” he asked.

“Men...always thinking about the little head instead of the big head” She teased. “Certainly. Just relax...relaaaaaaax.”

“Damn I’m hungry all of a sudden. “ He said for no apparent reason.

“Yup..I’m converting all your spare fat, sugar, starches and wastes into Structural Smoke Motes. Too bad I didn’t think of that earlier while you still had a full load.” She quipped.

“Ok...the blood nanites have grown enough Smoke I think. Let’s see what happens.” she finally said.

Chad felt himself lifted off of the cold floor. He seemed to be floating a few inches above the tiles. That was better. He felt warmer too.

“Ok..one problem solved. StructuralSmoke has you up off that cold floor. Now let’s see. Ok..there. We’re in a graphene bubble. Hang on...this is tricky....got it...” she sighed...

“Got what?” he asked.

“Light manipulation.” she replied “Did you ever see predator? Graphene can do it for real”

“You mean where the guy was supposed to have been able to fire a mini-gun off hand? ...that’s just ignorant. Yeah...I saw it...oooooooh.” he sputtered to a stop.

“Invisible huh?” he asked.

“Pretty much.” she replied. “Especially in low light conditions. Your black skin color helps a LOT.”

“I’m hungry” he said

“You said that” she replied. “Hang on...I’m working on it...There...how about a snicker’s bar? You won’t be so grouchy after you eat one.”

“Huh? Well I’ll be damn. Thanks” a train of large spiders were carrying several candy bars under the toilet stall door. He grabbed one. Damn if it wasn’t a snicker bar, and ate it in two bites.

“Aren’t you supposed to take the wrapper off first?” she asked.

“Oh...yeah.” he said. “I’ll do that next time. I was HONGRY!”

“No matter” she said “the plastic works just as well. In fact that’s a good idea we need the carbon. Keep eating it. It’ll save time. The spiders are cleaning out the break room vending machines. All that sugar will certainly help. Eat everything they bring you.”

That was easy enough to do. He did that. Funny thing. No matter how much he ate it didn’t seem to help. He was still as hungry as he had been.

“Ok. Hold out your hands. Cup them as if you’re holding water.” she said

“Huh? Well ok.” He did as he was told.

Fog formed in his cupped hands. It was very faint to begin with but it got thicker and thicker. When it looked like grey water something moved inside it. He almost dropped it.

“Don’t drop it” she said “If you do we’ll have to start over. I’m almost done”

Slowly the murky, dense grey fog coalesced into ......a dragon the size of a small bat.

“Dragons’ rule” it squeaked. “High Five!”

The little Dragon sat in his hands and looked at Thad. “Hadn’t we better get out of here? It won’t be too many hours before the early shift arrives.“

“Good plan. What have you got in mind?” Chad said. For some reason speaking to an avatar seemed perfectly reasonable. Odd that.

“I’ll scout the way. You can see through my eyes. Follow me..”...the dragon told him.

Sure enough he could. Thad's’ vision abruptly changed. Suddenly he had a window or a screen at about chin level. Whatever the dragon looked at he saw in the screen. He was looking right at himself. He look pretty bad.

“Yuk” he said, referring to himself.

“Yup” she agreed. “Pretty nasty. The sugar-charge from those candy bars won’t last very long. You need to un-ass the area ASAP. You need some real food.”

“Lead on McDuff” he said.

“Actually my name is Akatsuki” she said. “ and the correct quote is “lay on, Macduff, And Damn’d be him that first cries, “Hold, enough.”

“Oooooh” he replied “testy, testy.. Go!”

“Color me gone.” she said. The little dragon was off like a streak. It too had Chameleon abilities. It blended in with the back ground perfectly. If there had been anyone around this early in the morning to see no one COULD have seen her. She darted to and fro in front of him. He followed at a gallop as best he could.

Shortly she rounded a corner and stopped.

“Lockers” she said “Perhaps I can find you some clothes.”

She hovered in the middle of the locker room and stretched out her tail. The last third of it dissolved into...gnats. The gnats flew to each of the lockers and slipped through the cracks. Once inside they examined the contents.

“Found one” she said . A gnat had found just the right thing. It contained what he needed. He took out the clothing and dressed.

The surveillance gnats had returned to Akatsuki and coalesced back into her tail. It was now full length but it had a sharp tip. She used the tip to write on the inside of the locker door.

For reimbursement for
the clothing I took call
xxx-xxx-xxxx

“What about the candy bars?” he asked.

“I left a note there too.” she replied

“Who’s number?” he asked

“I’ll ‘splain later” she said.

“You got lot’s of ’splaining to do Lucy” he replied.

He was dressed. The little dragon resumed flight. In less time than one would think they were on the roof.

“Now what?” he asked. My it was a long ways down.

“You jump.” she told him.

“I do WHAT?” he replied.

“Don’t get all huffy. “ she said “It’ll be ok. I need to find you the right thing to jump ON to. We need to hurry though. It’s getting light.”

“Onto? You mean like that laundry truck?” he said. An open truck was loading up with laundry from the hospital. The workers were tossing the bags full of dirty clothing into the open topped truck bed.

“The very thing.” she said “Get ready”.

“Ready how? That’s a hundred yards away, and fifty feet down. Even for a paratrooper that’s a bit much. I ought to know....I wuz one.” he told her.

“Oh ye of little faith.” she chided “ momma fix. Now jump. They’re pulling out.”

He jumped.

“Now what?” he asked the dragon flying near him. The ground was coming up really fast.

“Wings” she said. And sure enough wide dragon style wings deployed from his back with a “whoooomph!”... more of a kite really....or a parachute.

“We don’t have enough StructuralSmoke for real wings but these should do for now. All you have to do is glide.” she said “I’ll handle it..”

With that she dive bombed the laundry truck. He was right behind her willing or not. They made it. Before the laundry truck got up to speed he was laying among the bags of laundry in the back of the truck.

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The Next Episode is
#77: New Development
The Previous Episode was
#75: Library
the First episode was
#1 : Prologue

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