Dr. Kelly Brackett stood up and leaned on his desk. He put all his weight on his hands. He knew that was the only thing that would keep them from shaking with rage. Perhaps it would even keep him from strangling the paramedic.
"All right!", he blasted, staring the young man square in the eye. "Let's have it. I know you know what an expensive piece of equipment this is." He nodded at the mangled remains of the bio-phone on his desk. "I want to know what happened to it and I want the truth! 'You won't believe it' isn't going to cut it with me!"
Johnny swallowed hard. he knew there was no getting out of this one. He took a deep breath. "An elephant sat on it," he admitted in a barely audible tone. He prepared for the explosion he was bound to be at ground zero for.
Brackett paused for a second and looked up at Johnny, his face going a delightful shade of red. "Did you just say elephant? ELEPHANT??" he yelled at the top of his voice. Johnny squirmed around, wincing.
"Uh...yeah I said that," he replied timidly.
Brackett sat down slowly. He stared at Johnny for a minute and then spoke, barely controlling his temper.
"Well why don't you tell me about it, Gage? And it better be good!"
Johnny took a deep breath and began. There had been a freeway stack up involving a huge truck and two cars. It looked as if the truck had braked too hard to avoid the first car that had suddenly cut it off and had rammed it from behind. The driver in the car behind the truck ran right up the rear of the truck, wedging itself under the running board.
As the station had arrived the truck driver and the occupants of the first car were in the middle of a nice little stoush. Captain Stanley ordered Mike, Marco and Chet to go break it up before someone really got hurt. He got a hold of Roy and Johnny and told them to check out the person in the second car.
The three firemen managed to break up the fight and calm the group down somewhat. The truck driver was yelling about Daisy being hurt.
"Who's Daisy?" Chet asked, looking around for an injured woman. He couldn't work out what the truck driver was on about.
"Daisy! She's in the back of the truck! This dimwit cut me off! I tell ya if she's hurt I'm gonna rip your head off!" he shouted, raising his fist at the other driver.
"Go on and try it, buddy. I'll put ya in hospital but good!" the man responded nastily. Mike stepped between the two of them and told them to cool it. Captain Stanley jogged over to see what the hell all the fuss was about.
"Looks like we have another passenger in the back, Cap," Marco said.
The Captain shook his head. "You should know better than to let someone ride in the back of a truck like this," he said to the truck driver. "Just wait here and we will check it out."
While this was going on, Roy and Johnny had reached the other car and were in the process of opening the driver's side door with a prybar. The man inside was groaning, rubbing his face with his hands and doing more damage from the glass imbedded in his cheeks.
"Mister, don't rub your face. You'll only make it worse. Just settle down and we'll have you out in a jiffy," Johnny said reassuringly.
"All right, but it's stinging real bad. Hurry, please..." the man responded weakly.
With a final push the door opened with ease. Roy leaned in and began checking the driver out. He told Johnny to get the bio-phone and equipment and set it up. Captain Stanley poked his head around the rear of the truck to see how they were doing.
"Won't be much longer, Cap," Roy said. "He's only suffering a few cuts on his face."
"Good! Could have been worse I guess. Say, we got another victim in the rear of the truck. Need your help as soon as you're finished up here."
The Captain barked for Marco to check for any gas leaks and for Chet to give him a hand opening the back of the truck. Johnny dropped the equipment at the driver's door and placed the bio-phone on the hood of the car. He opened it up as Chet jumped on the hood and undid the big metal latches on the truck.
The truck driver came around to watch the firemen. He was wringing his hands nervously. "Now be gentle. Poor Daisy is probably really shook up. She isn't gonna take too kindly to you being rough with her."
"Don't worry, she's in good hands. How's it going, Kelly?" the Cap asked.
Chet grunted as he wrestled with the last latch. He could hear Daisy moving around near the door. Next thing there was a huge bang as the doors flew open, knocking Chet off the hood of the car and into the Captain's arms.
"What the...???" the Captain exclaimed, his jaw almost hitting the ground.
Roy had gotten the victim out of the car and almost let him slip from his grasp as he stared up at the rear end of the biggest elephant he had ever seen. Johnny was too busy relaying information to the hospital to notice the silence that had decended around him.
"Daisy! Are you okay, old girl?" the truck driver said, glad to see his passenger no worse for wear.
The animal was moving backwards slowly, looking behind it as it began to step down. Its rear leg hit the hood of the car with a loud thump. Everyone, except for Johnny, moved back a little.
"Uh, Johnny, you might want to move, pal," the Captain said nervously as he watched the animal bring its other foot down. Johnny looked up in surprise. He jumped back hurriedly as the animal moved back again, its huge feet leaving craters in the hood of the car.
"My God! What the hell?" Johnny spluttered. As they watched dumbstruck, the elephant wriggled its massive behind at them saucily and promptly sat down on the car, almost flattening the bio-phone.
"The radio!" Roy shouted, dismayed. The truck driver walked over to the giant and placed a hand on her side, rubbing her hide and talking to her like a little baby.
"Oh, how are we gonna explain THIS?!?" Johnny moaned, feeling queasy as his stomach somersaulted.
"What do you mean WE? You left it there!" Roy said defensively. He could imagine the amount of crap that was going to hit the fan over this. Bio-phones were expensive and Brackett could be a real bear when it came to lost or damaged equipment. He had bawled out squad 8 for breaking two brand new unused BiCarb syringes in a row just this week. He was going to have a fit when he saw the remains of the radio.
"Cap?" Johnny said desperately.
"Don't look at me, pal. I can't get you out of this one, I'm afraid," the Captain said sadly.
Chet was trying hard not to laugh out loud. His guffawing was getting to Johnny who turned on him, giving him a look that would have killed him on the spot. Mike and Marco wisely decided to stay out of it but could see the funny side. They pulled Chet away over to the engine out of harm's way.
"And that's the whole story, plain and simple, Doc. I swear on a stack of bibles that it's all true!" Johnny finished.
Brackett hadn't interrupted him once. He just sat there with a scowl on his face. "So you are telling me that it was unavoidable, huh?" Brackett asked. "Why didn't you just grab the radio before you got out of the way?"
Johnny bit at the inside of his lip nervously. He hesitated before replying.
"She sat down so fast I would have lost my head for sure! You do understand, don't ya, Doc?" he pleaded.
"Maybe you needed to have your brains addled. It might have knocked some sense into you," Brackett paused for a moment before continuing. "Okay, I guess I will have to accept your explanation. But this doesn't mean you are off the hook by a long shot. If you so much as scratch the new bio-phone I will skin you alive, Gage. You have been warned!"
Johnny felt his entire body sag with relief. He nodded, his head bobbing up and down like a jack-in-the box, smiling weakly.
"You got it, Doc. That baby will be treated like gold! Not a scratch, a dent, a paint scrape, a..."
"Okay! Okay! Enough said already! Now get out of here so I can get some work done," Brackett exclaimed irritably.
Johnny backed out of the room at light speed and closed the door behind him gently.
Brackett reached over and poked at the mangled radio. He grinned, then chuckled to himself. He could not wait to see what Gage would get up to next.
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