Traveller Probo

Middlemore Hospital’s Emergency Department was, as usual, full of patients, each of whom considered their cases worthy of their presence, even though some staff had their doubts.

As one of the red-clad charge nurses, Lucy Roundthwaite was used to the hustle and bustle when dealing with human injury, suffering, and hypochondria. Thankfully not as manic as the hospital services dramatised on television, the busy department still serviced the needs of about a third of a million patients each year, making theirs one of the busiest in Australasia.

“Well, just when you think you’re getting bored, it seems something was happening on the streets of our fair city’s southern suburbs,” smiled Patrick, who assisted in admissions.

Lucy snorted. “Surprised hon? I think it’s been quiet of late,” she replied as she went about her work. How could anything be a surprise? Place high populations of racially diverse Pacific Islanders and Maoris together in the country’s most impoverished living conditions, there would always be violence. “So,” she asked. “What is it? Gangs, drunks, or domestic?”

“Dunno love. One of the ambo’s just heard that the police were bringing in a murderer,” grinned Patrick, his carefully plucked eyebrows arched.

“Well, that’ll make the evening a little more exciting than usual,” she replied with a rare chuckle.

Patrick giggled. “I’ll say. The paramedics say they’re also bringing in a man who was injured by the murderer,” he added.

Lucy grumbled, “As long as the police have this under control. It looks like it’ll be a busy night.”

A triage nurse was busy with a little girl with the blue lips and panicked expression of a chronic asthma sufferer. Another nurse led a high-priority patient to the screened care area. He was a giant of a Tongan who had experienced chest pains and was expected to be admitted to critical care. The Tongan nurse had chatted at length with his sizable family who hovered, concerned and anxious. A number of other patients, including a small boy with a head split from falling off a skateboard and a home handyman with a nail-gun nail through his thumb, waited patiently with accompanying family members.

It wasn’t long before the expected paramedics burst into the corridor next to the busy waiting area, professionally brisk as they wheeled a hospital gurney upon which reclined an Asian man wearing military fatigues. The paramedics told Lucy he had a fractured humerus, confirmed by the sling he wore. His face was ghastly pale in the fluorescent light and, after a quiet discussion with one of the triage nurses, the paramedics pushed their patient through the swinging doors to a vacant treatment partition. The nurse had a look of shock, her hand to her mouth in surprise. These nurses had seen it all and it took a lot to shock them, so when the nurse hurried over to provide the patient details, Lucy was eager to know more.

“Lucy, we have to get a secure treatment room ready. The police are bringing in a murderer and they’ll need a gurney as he’s sedated,” the young nurse, Ella, muttered quickly. Having worked in Emergency for the past year, Ella was a real darling and quite the wag, though now was not the time for levity. Her urgency made Patrick gasp, his hand to his mouth dramatically but Lucy only grumbled, “Well they should’ve let me know first.” She paged an orderly to prepare the secure room, little more than a private treatment space with a lockable door. Because the police were in charge, there were clear procedures for the treatment of patients under arrest. The police would then either take the patient to the watch-house or they would be formally admitted and kept under armed police guard.

“How exciting!” gushed Patrick.

Ella gasped, “I know!” as she smiled broadly and moved to help another patient.

It was only minutes later when an orderly, accompanied by two police officers, wheeled a gurney upon which a large Maori man lay. He was unconscious and naked but for his PiuPiu, the traditional reed skirt. Facing away from her, his meaty hands were purple as they were bound behind his back with a black plastic tie. The soles of his massive feet looked like he had never worn shoes in his life.

Patrick muttered, “Oh Lordy-Lord! What the hell is he wearing?”

Lucy shrugged. “Who knows? Typical Saturday night it seems, eh?” to which Patrick nodded in wide-eyed agreement.

“Why is it that we’re the final destination for many of the city’s nut-cases,” he exclaimed. “Eventually they get hurt, then we and the poor police have to sort out their stupid shit.”

Lucy nodded as she shuffled forms to a filing cabinet, “Well, at least it wasn’t a car accident with kids.”

Patrick filed his nails as he awaited the patient’s details to complete the admission. The Tongan nurse, Felila, gave Patrick a raised eyebrow look with a silent ‘wow’ and Lucy shook her head in mild disapproval. With too much demanding their attention, and having seen almost every form of stupidity mankind was able to inflict upon itself, Lucy didn’t let their new patient overly concern her and went back to her busy evening.

***

Sergeant Vinny Manning strode next to the gurney pushed by a burly Tongan orderly. He hadn’t been into the Emergency Department for some months, not since he had been training young constable Selwyn Eastwood here, so he hadn’t seen the nurse Ella before. She looked like she was fairly new and he couldn’t help but smile to himself. Young Selwyn fancied himself as a bit of a ladies’ man at times and, though losing his lunch over the severed head had been perfectly understandable, the fact he was still covered with vomit while this little babe was about wouldn’t sit well with him at all. Selwyn had barely recovered, his face still pasty-green while the front of his jacket was stained and odorous.

Not that Vinny had come through unscathed. The man on the gurney was covered with blood and, according to Dr Chow, had been responsible for some rather nasty activity in the Traveller project on Mount Mangere. He didn’t want to think too much about what was smudged on his uniform right now but accepted it was all part of the job. Besides, they were well into overtime. Nancy, his wife, would understand. She had told him not to be late as she was preparing a roast, his favourite. That would have to wait. After what he had seen this afternoon, a lamb roast was the last thing on his mind.

Vinny knew what the Transporter project was of course. With the rest of the country, he had been captivated with the idea of sending a local research team back 1000 years in time, though he still had difficulty getting his head around how they could even do that, or why they would want to. With a Maori grandfather, or Papa as he was known by his sizeable tribe of descendants, maybe the past shouldn’t be disturbed at all. Papa was a loving, gentle, deeply spiritual man but his grandmother described him as having a wild nature when he got his blood up.

The past had to stay in the past. Why disturb it? But now the past; the deep, dark, secretive past, was here on the gurney and smelling of blood and God only knew what else. The Maori warrior was like no one Vinny had ever seen and, to be honest, scared him a little. People today were far removed from the terrors of the past and were safely cocooned in their warm, comfortable lives. He looked at the big man, smelled his smells and saw his rough tattoos. This man was dangerous. To bring the past to the present might not be the smartest thing to do.

He looked to Selwyn and gave an encouraging smile. The young man looked like he was pulling himself together and was embarrassed by his initial reaction. “Don’t worry Sel,” smiled Vinny, “I lost it when I saw my first floater. Not being prepared does it every time.”

Selwyn looked across and nodded, “Thanks Sarge. That was some heavy shit for sure.” His pale face flushed and he gave a shaky smile, though the smell of vomit and blood on his uniform was obviously not helpful. Vinny smirked as Selwyn cast a quick glance at the pretty nurse. They arrived at the secure treatment room to be met by a young doctor with the aloof, superior air some doctors like to have with cops. While Vinny described how their charge came to be in their care, the doctor nodded seriously and paused to look incredulously when advised that this was a man apparently from a thousand years in the past.

“Are you telling me that this man came through the Transporter?” he asked.

Vinny shrugged, “Apparently so!”

“I thought they had all sorts of safeguards against such things happening!” the doctor exclaimed as he stared at Vinny disapprovingly.

Vinny shrugged again, immediately taking a dislike to the man. “Apparently not!” he replied.

The doctor was immediately critical. “My God, we haven’t got any procedures in place for us or for him. He might be carrying an infectious disease we could all catch or, more likely, we have diseases the poor fellow could contract.” As he leaned across the unconscious man with a stethoscope, he wrinkled his nose at the smell. He then examined the prisoner’s purpling hands with some concern. “When will you fellows ever learn? This man has acrocyanosis. We’ll have to remove these ties or he risks having permanent damage.” He huffed in disapproval, “If you must, can you use normal hand-cuffs?”

Vinny cast a quick look to Selwyn and their eyes met briefly before he responded, “Sorry Doc, you’ll have to speak English to us poor, ignorant cops.”

“His hands, the constrictive nature of your ties have restricted blood flow,” he explained curtly. “It’s indicated by the swelling and purpling colour.”

“Well doctor,” Vinny replied, “the patient’s wrists are too big for our cuffs. We couldn’t get them on him. We didn’t want to take any chances as this fellow is a murderer and these are most effective. Let me tell you, you don’t want him getting loose and running about the place.”

The doctor nodded dismissively, not listening. “Let’s remove these anyway. He’s sedated, so we’ll see about keeping the medication up and making his bonds unnecessary. If he is who you say, his metabolism will most likely be sensitive to the drugs and he’ll probably be out for hours.”

Vinny wasn’t happy but simply bowed his head as the doctor continued his examination. “Ella, I’d like to get some blood samples, can you sort that for me?” he asked briskly, “say, four samples, as we’ll run some tests. Also, for the moment, can I suggest we all wear masks when around him? It might not help much but...” and he shrugged his bony shoulders. Slipping on a mask, he handed one to each of the policemen and to Ella. As they slipped them on, he took surgical scissors from a tray and with some effort snipped the plastic ties that kept the big man’s hands bound. “Hmm, see?” he murmured, “Even when he’s unconscious, the ties have cut into his wrists,” and he gave another disapproving shake of his head.

“Well these are standard issue and we had to use something,” added Vinny defensively. “Apparently he had something to do with a severed head the paramedics have just brought in.”

“Really? Where is it?” the doctor asked in genuine interest and then corrected himself. “Do you know who it was?”

Vinny nodded as he continued, “It’s with Dr Chang, who arrived in the other ambulance. The paras’ should have it. We don’t know much but we heard it was one of our SAS boys who was guarding Dr Chang. He’s the Professor who’s been brought in with a broken arm. We understand most of the blood over this fellow is not even his own. We don’t want to have to fight this guy, because he won’t take any prisoners.”

The doctor moved to the door. “Okay, let’s get these samples and fix his head wound and then we can hand him back to you. If he’s that dangerous, we should get him out of here as soon as possible.” He then turned to briefly instruct Ella about setting up an IV drip so they could administer more drugs to keep their patient sedated. With a last glance at the big man on the gurney, without even giving any further acknowledgement to the presence of the two policemen, he marched off.

As Ella collected the blood samples, Vinny and Selwyn waited outside. “Hey Sarge, can I get cleaned up a bit?” asked Selwyn as he gestured to the front of his uniform. Vinny gave his consent with a jerk of his head and the young constable dashed off to nearby rest-rooms. Vinny shook his head, knowing how the proximity of the pretty little nurse added to Selwyn’s motivation to clean off his peas and carrots. He felt better knowing a couple of armed-response officers were on their way, just in case their guest aroused himself and decided to make trouble. According to good doctor, that would be unlikely. The drugs would keep their guest unconscious for some hours as yet. Vinny glanced through the door’s narrow window to view their guest as he lay motionless on his side.

Nope, this guy wasn’t going anywhere. The armed response troops might be a good insurance policy but for now he could relax. Like all New Zealand Police officers, he and Selwyn didn’t carry firearms while on standard patrol. From the boot of their patrol car they had retrieved the Glock pistol that Vinnie now wore. Selwyn had taken the Taser but the addition of some armed troops was appropriate, given the situation. Though they had an AR15 assault rifle still in the car, there was no way they could drag that into a crowded, public hospital. He was certain that the one pistol, pepper spray, batons and Taser would be enough if the big man became lucid enough to make trouble.

Vinny sniffed, removed his mask and grabbed a chair. He was close enough to the door to see that no-one went in or out. It was locked, so there should be no trouble from their guest.

It looked like it would be a long night. They would need to claim a meal allowance and grab a bite to eat later. Despite the inconvenience, the overtime was welcome.