Foster, Justine, and Saunders were met at the hospital’s receiving doors by a couple of somber looking deputies. After the obligatory introductions, the three of them were quickly escorted inside and onto the familiar freight elevator for their trip to the 3rd floor ICU.

  Inside the creaky conveyance once again, Foster began to reminisce about their previous visit. “It’s too bad we’re not going to get to see the blue pipes again.”

  “Yeah,” Justine conjured up the image of Freddy's reddening face as the memory of Foster's very mean trick suddenly reared to life in her memory. She chuckled lightly. “But this time we’re here to see a living person Foster, not a dead one.”

  “We should be.” Saunders mashed on the already lit 3rd floor button again. “Nine people murdered in cold blood… you should never have put Agent Rushing’s life in danger like that. We should have breached that bank in force and subdued him with a hail of gunfire.” Saunders looked at the two men standing beside them and grimaced. “At the very least, she should have had a real gun.”

  “First of all, I didn’t make that decision. Your boss did. Second,” Foster continued with a slight grin. “Even with the limitation, she didn’t mind all that much.”

  “She never does. Agent Rushing never seems to mind throwing herself headlong into danger.”

  “Oh Jeff,” she smiled coyly as she punched her partner solidly in the arm. “I can’t believe you were worried about me. Besides,” her smiled disappeared in an instant. “You know the perp was the only one in any real danger.”

  “Really,” it was Foster’s turn to chuckle. “How are your ribs again?”

  “Better than your deductive skills.”

  “Ouch,” Foster said as he leaned up against the wall of the elevator. Why was she bringing up his most recent hairstyle failure right now? “Keep talking and I’ll take back my little toy.”

  “Try it, Foster,” Her scowl shifted to a playful smile. “You just try it.”

  “Focus, people. Enough with the banter.” Frustrated by their lack of professionalism, Saunders folded his arms across his chest and began to envision his upcoming retirement ceremony. The director of the FBI, having just finished a rather rousing speech on duty and honor, thanked Jeff personally for over twenty-five years of impeccable service to the bureau. All his friends wished him well. They were happy. He was happy.

  One more year, he told himself. One more year.

  Then, with a loud thud, the ancient elevator screeched to a halt.

  “We’re here.” One of the deputies motioned for them to exit.

  As they stepped onto the third floor, their escorts directed the trio to the right and down a strangely busy hallway. Halfway down the corridor, Foster noticed a group of nurses standing in what looked like a prayer circle. As they drew near, a nurse with red hair reached out and clasped hands with one of the deputies — a symbolic gesture which seemed to lift her spirits.

  But when their hands parted, the young woman burst into tears. Saunders slowed down their pace even though he didn’t know what to say. Out of courtesy, the deputy tried to explain what had happened.

  “Sorry sir, this town’s never seen a disaster like this before.”

  Justine and Saunders lowered their heads as a sign of condolence to the crying woman. But Foster just stared straight ahead. Crying wouldn’t solve this problem, he thought to himself, only answers would.

  Further down the hallway, Sheriff Meadows emerged from a room with a tall, lean, Asian doctor in tow. Seeing this, Foster grabbed Justine by the arm. “Let’s go,” he said as he guided her and Saunders to his preferred destination. “Let’s really find out why this town is suffering so much.”

  “Agents… Mr. Evers,” Meadows shook their hands in turn, but it was with an obvious lack of effort. The last few hours had drained him of most of his strength and the prospect of more sleepless nights to come was incredibly depressing. “This is Dr. Pan.”

  Everyone took turns shaking the doctor’s hand before he continued. “And he wants to be present while you question the prisoner.”

  “Sheriff… Doctor,” Saunders waved a dismissive hand at the man’s request. “I’m afraid that won’t be possible. There are certain sensitive issues which might come up during the interview, and I’m afraid that you don’t have the necessary clearance to be part of it.”

  “Agent… what was your name again?” Dr. Pan asked impatiently.

  “Saunders,” he seethed at the haughty doctor. There was no time for this dog and pony show. Not now. They were on a deadline. “My name is Jeffrey Saunders.”

  “Well… Jeffrey. My patient is in that room, and I am responsible for his welfare. Right now, my patient is suffering from multiple broken bones in his chest cavity, a punctured lung, and a piece of broken sternum perforated his heart. Any sudden movement could damage the precise work I did putting that man back together. He cannot be agitated in any way.”

  “Slightly,” Hoover covertly corrected the doctor’s misstatement. “His heart was only slightly perforated.”

  “We’ll be gentle, Doctor.” Saunders said as he tried to ease around the man. But Dr. Pan moved in front of the door to stop him. Without really thinking, Justine reached for her Slinger to clear a path, but Saunders raised a hand to stop her.

  “I know you will.” The physician sneered at their rudeness. “Because I’ll be in there to make sure you are.”

  Without waiting for anyone’s permission, Dr. Pan pushed the door open and hurried inside the room. Exasperated, Saunders turned to the Sheriff for some understanding. “He is aware of how many people this guy just murdered, isn’t he?”

  Jeffrey Meadows could only force out a weak smile as he said, “Do no harm…”

  “You’ve got to be shitting me.” He looked at the others. “Let’s go.”

  As they followed Dr. Pan inside, Justine felt a slight twinge of disappointment seeing the stranger with the obsession for breathing lying in a semi-conscience state on a hospital bed. His right arm was handcuffed to the bed rail, while lifesaving wires were attached to various parts of his body.

  She leaned in close to Foster and whispered, “You should have unlocked level 10 for me.”

  “Behave,” Foster couldn’t help but grin before turning his attention back to the overly concerned doctor. “Is he drugged? I need him lucid.”

  “Mr. Evers,” Dr. Pan took a second to adjust the IV drip. “I’ve been dialing back on the morphine all morning in preparation for this little meeting. Give him just a couple more minutes to come around.”

  The next ten minutes were tense as everyone in the room waited for the stranger to awaken. Dr. Pan fiddled with the equipment a few more times. But this never resulted in him gaining consciousness for more than a couple of seconds at a time.

  “Why don’t you just cut him off completely?” Foster finally said in a huff. “I don’t have time to wait for him to wake up naturally.”

  “I don’t know where you’re from, Mr. Evers.” The doctor stood up a little straighter. “But in this hospital, that action would be considered cruel. Without morphine, the prisoner would surely suffer immense amounts of pain.”

  “How compassionate of you,” Saunders said as he and Foster both shared an uncaring look. They didn’t care if this monster suffered one bit. But they weren’t ready to go full bad cop yet.

  On the other hand, Justine was keenly aware of their imposed deadline and what happened when people failed to act. In a move reminiscent of Patton, she walked up to the bed and slapped the prisoner across the face before anyone had a chance to stop her.

  “Agent Rushing, stop that!” Pan raised his hand in protest. In response to his impotent threat, she struck the stranger again, only this time harder. A low moan escaped the man’s bruised lips, but he still didn’t awaken. “What do you think you are doing?”

  In response, Justine stared the doctor right in the eye without a hint of a smile. “I’m speeding up his recovery.”

  To be fair, she actually wanted to take out Foster’s plasma gun, set the damn thing to ten and cash this guy’s karma check once and for all. But that didn’t seem like the right thing to say right now. Plus, if she did that, Foster wouldn’t get his answers.

  “Agent Rushing,” Saunders, who had grown accustomed to Justine’s unorthodox attitude over the last six months, decided to stand back and allow this moment to play out. Foster meanwhile eschewed a different approach. “Do you think that beating the man unconscious is a good way to get him to wake up?”

  In response, Justine prepared to slap him again. “It’s more humane than what I really want to do to him.”

  “If you don’t stop,” Dr. Pan was one second away from alerting the Sheriff when the stranger suddenly came around.

  “Breathing,” the stranger panted. “Will this incessant breathing ever end?”

  Without thinking, a delighted Foster moved in closer to the stranger’s bed only to have Saunders put an arm out to make sure he didn’t get too close. “Easy there, cowboy.”

  “You’re right,” Foster said, acknowledging his foolishness, then took a conservative step backward to regroup. Then, he continued, “I don’t know where to begin. Is there anything you would like to say?”

  “Eight years and that’s the best you’ve got?” Justine really wanted to slap the guy again. “I thought time was the main ingredient in preparation.”

  “It is… and no, that’s not the best I have,” he felt foolish for asking such an obvious question in his first salvo. But then like most things in Foster’s life, it was either idle or full speed ahead. “Why did you murder all those people in the bank?”

  “Murder…” The stranger’s words were slow to form, and his expression was ambivalent. “What is murder?”

  “Murder…?” Justine suddenly felt like she had been slapped in the face by this son of a bitch. “Murder is when you kill nine people in cold blood. Murder is what you did to those innocent people in the bank. Murder is when you decide you have the power over whether a person lives or dies!”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “Murder…” The stranger stared blankly into Justine’s eyes like a child learning to read for the first time. As he looked back to Foster, there was no malice in his face, only indifference. “You mean the breathing I stopped? Yes… murder.”

  “Why do you keep saying breathing? Everybody breathes, asshole.” Justine turned to Foster for an answer to this man’s incessant nonsensical ravings. But he seemed more concerned that his interrogation was getting hijacked. She shrugged off his pitiful glances with an excuse.

  “That’s what he kept saying in the bank.” She took a couple of exaggerated breaths. “Breathe, breathe. It’s all the guy would say while he was beating those people to death!”

  Foster watched the man, whose breathing before being awoken was calm and steady, now seemingly fight tooth and nail for every lung full of air. “Doctor…” He stammered quizzically. “Pan, is it?”

  “Yes,” he said, scowling at Justine.

  “Do you have any idea why he’s doing that?” Foster pointed to the man’s heaving chest. “Is there some condition where consciousness brings about shortness of breath?”

  “Excuse me, Mr. Evers?” The doctor didn’t even look in the young scientist’s direction. “What does my patient sleeping habits have anything to do with this… freak show?”

  “Humor me, doc.” Foster once again regarded the struggling prisoner. “Call it scientific curiosity if you like.”

  “There are various conditions such as congestive heart failure, COPD, asthma, or a panic attack which might induce irregular breathing. Though, I don’t see how any of that is relevant to him being conscious.”

  “But you performed his initial work up. Were any of those conditions present?”

  “No.” The stunned physician glanced at the banks of machines attached to his patient before answering Foster’s question. “Besides the damage Agent Rushing has inflicted on him. He’s in surprisingly good health.”

  “Surprisingly?” he asked. “That’s interesting.”

  “What are you thinking?” Justine withdrew from the bed just enough to draw even with Foster. “That he has a condition brought on by the,” she lowered her voice to a whisper. The next two words signified a leap of faith he didn’t think her possible of, “the signal.”

  “Maybe,” he said, pointing to his earpiece. “Hoover, I want you to run a comparison of this asshole’s medical records with any conditions that might warrant a breathing problem. Throw in any other strange ailments while you’re at it, anything outside the box.”

  “Do you know this guy went to medical school in Thailand? Thailand.” The A.I. was practically beside himself with joy. “Not that Thailand doesn’t have some good medical schools, but he went to the one that only lasts a year and a half. A year and a half! Is that stethoscope he’s wearing made from red plastic? Please tell me. I’ve got to know.”

  “Hoover,” Foster, who knew how to internalize his best friend’s running commentary, kept silent at the ill-timed stab at slightly xenophobic humor. Even so, the idea of Dr. Pan’s medical equipment coming from a child’s Playskool set was kind of funny. “Just run the comparison.”

  Justine, on the other hand, was not as adept at keeping a straight face in the middle of a joke. Everyone in the room just stared at her when she almost doubled over in laughter. Quickly, she moved to obfuscate Hoover’s barb.

  “What?” She defiantly asked their disapproving faces. “I just remembered a joke from Deep Space Nine. You know? It’s the safest way.”

  Saunders grimaced as his partner tried fruitlessly to work the room for understanding.

  “She’s funny.” Hoover recognized the reference from one of his many message boards and the meaning behind it. “But I’m afraid that nothing in his initial workup suggests he should be having any troubles breathing. Any troubles at all really. Well… other than the fact Agent Rushing practically caved in his chest with that weapon you gave her. That will come back to bite us.”

  “Maybe it’s all in his head?” she said innocently, ignoring Hoover’s dire prediction.

  “What?” Saunders regarded her statement as a parent would if their child pointed at water and declared it wet. “Of course it’s in his head, Justine. He’s insane.”

  “Maybe not.” Foster snapped his fingers loudly, but the stranger’s eyes remained unblinkingly fixed on him. “What planet do you come from?”

  “What kind of question is that?” Dr. Pan moved closer to the patient, trying to shield him from any more of Justine’s personalized wake-up calls. “First you come in here and slap my patient around like he’s a terrorist. Then, you call him insane. Now you’re asking him what planet he’s from. What kind of FBI agents are you?”

  “We’re the kind on a deadline,” Justine puffed up a little bit making the already edgy doctor flinch. Startled, Pan forgot just how close he was to the patient’s bed. The stranger did not. He seized upon the moment of anxiety to grab him.

  “My God!” Pan screamed while being dragged up onto the bed by an unrelentingly powerful arm.

  Completely in control, the stranger spun the doctor around, lifting him off the floor and into a position where he could get a better grip on his throat. Once his arm was securely around the doctor’s neck, the stranger began to squeeze mercilessly.

  “You see!” Justine already had the Slinger leveled on the stranger’s head before anyone in the room could react to what had happened. “Never give a killer an opportunity!”

  Moving almost as quickly, Foster pushed her tense arm upward and beyond a clear shot.

  “Hold on a second!” He screamed as blind anger welled up in her brown eyes. “I know what you want to do, but I need him alive for just a little while longer.”

  “Foster,” Justine slowly swiveled her head around to meet Foster’s imploring gaze. The next sentence out of her mouth was eerily deliberate and calm. “You have no idea what I want to do to him right now.”

  Before that phrase could be dissected for content, the stranger pleaded behind Pan’s reddening face. “I want to stop breathing… please.” His eyes darted around the room, searching for someone to end his pain. “Breathe, breathe, breathe… I want it to end!”

  “I can accommodate you.” Justine snarled, trying to maneuver around Foster’s attempts to block her. When the doctor’s body shifted off to the side, a perfect opening presented itself. “I have a shot, Foster!”

  “Hold on! Why?” Foster stood firm before hazarding a small step toward the two men on the hospital bed. “Why do you want to stop breathing?”

  “Unnatural,” he closed his eyes and took another laborious breath. It was almost like watching a toddle try and fail repeatedly to walk. “This is not a way to live.”

  “You mean you don’t normally breathe.”

  The stranger’s grip on the doctor’s throat loosened a fraction of an inch as his sharp eyes continued to dart back and forth. As if searching for the right thing to say, the stranger wordlessly tried to respond. Then, something danced on the tip of his unsure tongue before he brushed it away. This scene repeated itself two more times before he finally answered.

  “This planet has too much atmosphere. I miss my home.”

  “I don’t believe it.” Saunders slapped a hand to his forehead. What the fuck was happening? Was Foster contagious? “This guy’s crazier than I thought.”

  The stranger’s grip relaxed even more. Only this time, it loosened enough for the doctor to let out a gurgled scream for help. In response to his plea, the doors to the room burst open under a wave of Elmira police uniforms. Saunders recognized one of the deputies almost immediately as his tour guide, Joseph Howlam.

  “What the Christ’s sake is going on here!” Meadows screamed.

  Without being ordered, the deputies sprang into action, piling on the stranger and with no concern for the patient, wrenched the doctor free from his manic clutches. Pan’s first words upon being liberated were, “Don’t hurt him!”

  But the deputies had too much pent-up anger to oblige the doctor’s request.

  Howlam expertly grabbed the stranger’s wrist and bent it back like a twig, almost breaking it in two. The other deputy, the one who touched the nurse’s hand earlier, pressed angrily down on the stranger’s wounds until his prey cried out in pain and went limp. Seizing the opening, Sheriff Meadows rushed forward and placed a second pair of handcuffs on the prisoner.

  “Ok guys,” with the threat secured, he motioned for his deputies to step back.

  At first, none of them moved an inch. Their eyes remained fixed on the monster in their midst. Eventually though, they began to back away. Even the deputy with fresh blood on his fingers, blood that came from gouging them into the prisoner’s wounds complied with his boss’s request. Soon, the only person still disobeying the Sheriff’s orders was Joseph.

  “Joseph,” Meadows inched around the bed far enough to catch his deputy’s eye. “I said, let him go. That’s an order.”

  Deputy Howlam only slightly eased off the pressure. “Statute 71 Sheriff, no prisoner thought to be involved in a capital offense shall be left alone without an armed guard.”

  “You’re right, Joseph.” He quickly scanned the space then pointed to the far corner of the room. “Feel free to plant your ass over there if it will make you feel better. But you will let him go, right now!”

  Unsure of what to do next, Joseph seemed to hesitate. There seemed to be something about this prisoner that had him more agitated than usual, something that fought against his typically controlled anger. But like all of Meadows’ orders, they were eventually followed without question.

  “Of course, Sheriff.” reluctantly, he released the prisoner’s arm. “Orders are orders.”

  With both of his deputies under control, Meadows watched in contented silence as the prisoner came around. Writhing around in pain, the stranger tried to free himself from his bondages all the while screaming, “Breathing, stop the breathing!”

  Dr. Pan scrambled to his feet and dialed the morphine drip back up to full blast. “He’ll be out in a minute.”

  “No!” Foster screamed. In an instant, the magic 8-ball was out of his satchel. He shot the haggard doctor an admonishing look before waving the device over the stranger’s still twisting and turning body. “I need a clean scan without any drugs in his system.”

  “Agent Saunders,” Sheriff Meadows wiped his brow with a handkerchief he always kept in his shirt pocket. He had seen enough. “Can I have a word with you outside?”

  Saunders looked disapprovingly at Justine and then Foster before begrudgingly joining his counterpart in the hallway. Foster ignored their interaction and continued to scan the stranger’s body for as long as he moved.

  Disappointed in the outcome, Justine pocketed her gun and joined her frantic new partner.

  “What was that all about? Why would you ask him what planet he’s from? I thought all that stuff last night about aliens was a joke. Foster, asking him that question sounds a little…”

  “Crazy,” Hoover finished her sentence. “But that’s what everyone says, Agent Rushing. But why be like everyone else? Embrace the crazy.”

  “It’s just a hunch,” Foster lowered the PDS to his side while trying to decide how best to proceed. “And I’m… this is not crazy.”

  “Foster,” she wanted to say sorry, but now didn’t seem like the right time.

  However, it was the right time for Dr. Pan to go on a rant.

  “I’ll have your badges for this!” he shouted, rubbing his injured neck like an ambulance chaser was hot on his trail. “I will sue the government for endangerment and PTSD. I’ll sue you both back to the stone age!”

  “Sure, you will, Doc.” Foster smiled malevolently. “And when you get up there to testify, I want you to say a little prayer that no one from the Justice Department becomes aware of those fake documents you used to secure your work visa in this country. You could also pray to whatever deity you hold close to your heart that no one ever finds out about how your brother is involved in human trafficking.”

  “What?” In an instant, his attitude changed from ‘I gotcha’ to ‘oh shit’. Then, with hollow eyes, he stared unblinkingly at Foster with a look of pure terror plastered across his face. “How do you know those things?”

  He touched his earpiece again even though only Justine got the underlying meaning.

  “We are the government, Dr. Pan. And we know everything you do or have ever done wrong. We even know you’ve been cheating on your wife with a very unattractive woman.”

  “Excuse me,” Out of instinct and pent-up anger, the doctor rushed to his previously secret mistresses’ defense without thinking clearly. “Ramona’s not that ugly.”

  Foster’s mouth curled up into that same sly grin he had while teasing Freddy. “Really… I suppose that would be your subjective view. Maybe we should see if your wife has a more objective one?”

  Dr. Pan made a small sound, very close to a hiccup. His instincts screamed for him to bolt from the room in a flat out run. But one look from Foster told him that staying put would be the wiser option. “When you operated on him, did you notice anything strange… anything out of the ordinary?”

  “No,” he mumbled. “The patient was normal.”

  Foster shook the 8-ball one more time and concentrated his scans on the stranger’s head. “Do you have enough?”

  “Yes,” Hoover replied. “Though I don’t know what you’re hoping to find.”

  “Just run it against every file they have on record in this hospital.” He saw the doctor, frozen where he stood, unable to move. For a split second, he pitied the man. But only for a second. “You know. I’m not a doctor myself, Dr. Pan. But I’ve always expected more honesty from a person in your profession. Maybe one day I might get it.”

  He thought about letting out some old demons but decided against it. Instead, he simply said. “You can go now, Dr. Pan. Go check up on someone who didn’t just kill nine people in cold blood.”

  The terrified physician didn’t need to be told twice. Without a word, he was halfway down the hall before Foster had time to put away his toy.

  “Wasn’t that a little harsh?” she asked.

  “I don’t think so.” He responded.

  “Neither do I.” Hoover laughed. “But if you want, I could send his wife a dozen roses and the text messages between him and his mistress. You know… to make up for the trouble we caused.”

  “Can you do that?” Foster asked.

  “I can even include some very spicy CCTV footage from last night.”

  “No!" Justine cut through their scheming. "Both of you behave.”

  "Fine," Foster relented, thinking that Hoover's suggestions might be crueler to the wife than the doctor. "Still, you might want to send the flowers anyway. Also, let someone in state know about the human trafficking."

  "Actually," Justine interjected, "the FBI has jurisdiction over those cases."

  "Then the FBI it is. Please take care of that, Hoover."

  "Too late," Hoover said with a malevolent tone in his voice. "I ratted his ass as soon as we arrived at the hospital."

  “Now that’s more like it, boys. Use that devious superpower for good.” With that out of the way, Justine placed her hand on the stranger’s chest. “He’s breathing normally again. What does that mean?”

  “It means, Agent Rushing. That we’ll be seeing those blue pipes again after all.”