Dead on Arrival

Dead on Arrival

An Urban Legend from the Strength of Old

By Mark VanTassel

Shamrock winced, then suppressed his heebie-jeebies. ‘Doctor, heal thyself,’ was a common phrase. Performing quality assurance on his own autopsy was something else entirely.

The door to the morgue clicked. Shamrock flipped his flashlight off and waited for a few seconds; the image of the incision burned into his vision. He slipped away from the slab, trying to move quietly. From the far side of the room, he could see the doorway. Weak light came through the small panes in the double doors. Anyone entering the morgue would have been back lit and easily seen. He was alone. Shamrock forced himself to relax and moved back to the slab.

I’m going to give myself a heart attack, he thought. He checked his pulse for the thousandth time. Or not.

The door clicked again, and his ears popped. It’s the biohazard air filters. Still, he stared across the morgue until he felt safe again.

He needed the proper instruments, but they were in the next room. When he tried to get them, the strange strength that kept him going faded. He didn’t have proper instruments. He had been lucky to find a good multi-tool in the top drawer of the records desk. The desk just sat in the corner of the meat locker. It had a worn chair and an old workstation. Its only real purpose was to provide a convenient way for the morgue staff to check bodies in and out of the locker. Otherwise, the nearest workstation was in another department.

Shamrock worried about moving around. His torso ached from the traditional Y-incision, and his throat had been cut post-mortem. He could tell from the way blood had collected and the scalpel had cut through it. Someone had removed something, likely a bullet. With so much tissue damage, if he fell he would not be able to get up again.

Where would the bullet have gone? Normally it would be in a crime lab, but this was the deep locker. Procedures had to be bent in favor of secrecy. The bullet might still be here.

Shamrock walked, careful to keep his weight slightly forward. Falling backward would be the worst case scenario.

His locker in the morgue wall read, ‘121-MRSA.1.’ The locker below read, ‘121-MRSA.2.’ Same case. He pulled that locker open and found his clothing, the contents of his pockets, his organs--bagged, labeled, and boxed--and the bullet. Or arrowhead?

It was shaped like a bullet, but the base had a socket sized for a shaft. There were no rifling marks. It was silver, very old--tarnished almost black--but the bright etched runes looked new. Which didn’t establish their age, but it might matter later.

Strange and stranger. This was a lab for cutting-edge, greater-than-legal research. What was an old artifact doing here? Particularly as his murder weapon. If it had any magic, it was certainly in the wrong department. If he’d had any say in it, it would never have been allowed down here.

The line from the intro to his favorite detective show was, ‘What did they do that they didn’t have to do?’ Why kill him with this weapon? Mundane weapons would attract less attention. Although down here they might attract exactly the same lack of attention.

Shamrock walked toward the doorway, careful not to push too close to whatever effect it was that weakened him. To his shock, he reached the opening without so much as a twinge.

The only thing that had changed was the artifact--be it bullet or arrowhead.

He returned to the open locker and laid the piece of silver on the drawer. This time he edged toward the doorway with greater care.

“What the hell is that thing?” he wondered, lips moving soundlessly.

His strength was fading, just as before.

Artifact back in his possession, Shamrock eased into the hall.

* * *

Arthur downed the last of the whiskey and opened a new bottle. His bow and the broken arrow shaft sat in the corner, between his desk and the wall.

He needed out.

The only way out is on a slab.

Werewolves. He had never liked them. Learning that they sometimes drifted from the pages of fiction, into the world, was horrifying. Lisa--Dr. Gambert--had a guaranteed weapon. He pulled one of the artifacts from his pocket. It threaded onto standard shafts, and something between the silver material and the runic writing simply cancelled a were-creature’s life force.

He’d nearly missed Shamrock. He drained his whiskey and poured another. His fingers couldn’t get the cork back into the bottle. Stupid bottle.

His watch vibrated, and he pressed a button. One of his trail cams showed him the doorway of the morgue.

“Fuck me.”

Shamrock looked out, tilting his head to see one way, then the other. He had surgical tape wrapped around his neck to conceal the wound.

He fumbled an arrowhead into his hand.

“Guaranteed, my ass.”

Adrenaline warred with alcohol as he fumbled his quiver onto his belt and retrieved his bow. He counted. Nine arrows left. On the one hand, he hadn’t missed a shot recently. On the other hand, he was drunk. Nine would be plenty.

* * *

Shamrock stopped at a janitor’s closet that had been left ajar. He pulled a janitorial uniform from the dirty clothes hamper and stepped into it. His suppressed sense of smell might be working in his favor right now. Of course, if he stunk and didn’t know it, he might draw extra attention.

No. The uniform was an upgrade. His other option was running around undead and naked.

Moving felt strange. He’d had a shot to numb his elbow for stitches, and while he wasn’t numb, that was the closest feeling he could compare to his current state.

He passed a janitor bobbing to the music in his headphones.

“Hey, George,” the guy said without looking up.

Shamrock felt his chest inflate. In a half-panic he offered the guy a knuckle bump. Air leaked out through the stitches in his Y-incision as he walked away.

He paused to pick up a gum wrapper, and an arrow flashed over him and embedded in the wall at the end of the hall. Shamrock turned toward the threat.

“Get down, get the fuck down,” Arthur screamed. The janitor between them froze, and Shamrock ran.

Arthur killed me? Why? We’re buddies.

The next arrow banked off the ceiling, then dropped. Shamrock flinched at the noise and took a glancing hit to his shoulder. The arrow slapped the wall sideways and fell to the floor.

He dropped, slid the last few feet to the corner, then scrabbled around it to safety.

“Freeze,” a strange voice yelled.

Shamrock reversed course and ran back across the hallway intersection. A third arrow just missed him and slammed into the wall, where he snapped the shaft as he tried to escape.

A series of shots went off behind him, and his head pitched forward. He fell, breaking his nose, and threw himself back to his feet, skidding around the next corner.

He had a headache now. His hand found a hole in the back of his head, and a bulge in his forehead.

How could he still be thinking? He’d just taken a hit to the brain.

Problem for another time, Shamrock. Gotta prioritize.

“Get out,” Arthur yelled.

“Yes, sir,” the strange voice said. “I’ll lock you in.”

“Roger that.”

Shamrock took an instant to think, then continued down his new hallway. The overhead lights turned red and began flashing. A chime sounded, and he recognized the facility’s ‘active shooter’ warning. Fabulous.

His timing couldn’t have been much better. He slipped into the server room as someone disappeared down the hall away from him. Shamrock pulled the door closed, then ran into the server racks. Arthur would risk a bowshot in here.

* * *

Arthur’s phone beeped three times. He hit the answer button on his headset.

“Sir, I’ve got a werewolf loose, but it’s doing weird shit.”

“Define weird.”

“It ran from me. One of the guards just shot it in the head, and it didn’t even pause, it just got back up and ran some more. Our specialty solution isn’t working. I hit him in the throat, and the arrow lodged initially. He was dead. I watched them weigh his heart.”

“How intelligent is he?”

“Still thinking, not sure how deeply. He stole a uniform and tried to camouflage himself.”

“Has he attacked anyone?”

“Not yet.”

“Are you up to this? I can smell alcohol through the phone.”

“I’m fit for duty, sir. I’ve hit him once, and nearly hit him two other times. Got tangled up with a janitor, or I’d have him already.”

“Bring him down, Arthur. He cannot leave the premises.”

“Yes, sir.”

The connection closed. Arthur switched to record. If he failed, he wanted his successor to benefit from his experience.

* * *

Shamrock considered what he needed next. Was his condition transmissible? If so, he needed to turn himself in and request captivity over death. If he couldn’t pass it to others, he could try for genuine escape.

He shook his head, and the bullet shifted. He tried to sigh in relief as his headache faded, but was reminded of his other problems.

Information was scarce. Could he go on this way for some time? Would he decay over the next few days? Should he live in a refrigerator to prolong his undeath?

I’ll just paralyze myself with What Ifs. I can’t trust the company, so the answer is to escape, then attempt research.

The facility was water-cooled. There was a water lock on the drain system, used for interior inspection of the pipes. The question was, would his hips fit inside?

His head slammed into the server case beside him, and when he tried to pull away he found himself trapped. His hand came up and found an arrow through his face. It must have knocked out a few of his teeth. He tried to move his tongue. It was impaled.

A second arrow slammed into his back, different this time. It paused, then forced itself deeper. Arthur was stabbing him with it.

It probably wouldn’t kill him. He was already dead. So…

Shamrock relaxed. His limp body sagged, and only an arm thrown around his neck kept him from falling.

“Gotcha,” Arthur said in his ear.

Light flooded him, and he twitched. Inconvenient when you’re trying to play dead. Something writhed inside his chest, and he took a breath.

“What in God’s name are you?” Arthur asked.

A knife plunged into Shamrock’s back, six or seven brutal stabs, delivered as fast as Arthur could move.

Shamrock stood, lifting Arthur, who refused to release his headlock.

He reached up and grabbed Arthur's hand, forcing the headlock open. Arthur was a fighter and committed fully to knife combat. He cut into Shamrock’s guts, stabbing repeatedly. Shamrock did the only thing he could, he grabbed the blade, feeling the metal bite into his hand. Then, an inch at a time, he pulled the knife out of Arthur’s hands.

Arthur tackled him, and he went down under the larger man. He tried to stab, but his hand was trapped, and Arthur was stronger.

It shocked him when Arthur sagged, and he rolled both of them over. The knife had gone into Arthur’s liver.

“Stay with me,” Shamrock said, but no sound came out.

“Sorry,” Arthur breathed, and his body stopped.

Shamrock closed Arthur’s eyes.

Something clicked. He hadn’t been terrified. At no point had he lost function. He was calm. Clinical. Right now he wanted to cry over the loss of his friend, but couldn’t summon the emotion.

He patted Arthur’s chest and stood. The deep cuts on his hands were closing. He reached around and felt at his back. The arrow had snapped off, which meant the arrowhead was embedded.

Shamrock found the drain for the cooling system. His hips would barely fit. A pipe wrench helped him break his collar bones, which allowed him to stuff his shoulders into the pipe.

* * *

Chun sat in a surveillance van, watching Pine Ridge Research. A gout of water shot from a pipe on the facility’s east side, including a roughly human-shaped object.

“Nothing on thermal. Who puts a body into a drain like that?”

The body began to swim, slowly, clumsily making progress toward the shore. Chun looked at the thermal imaging again. Then he picked up his phone and dialed Annabeth.

“I’ve got a corpse moving around here. Want to introduce ourselves?”

“Of course. Be there in twenty.”