Ghost of a Chance

Alex left Leroy in the lobby of the hospital with Billy Tasker eagerly taking notes on his story of kidnapping and tunneling into the museum’s vault. Leslie and Hannah were on their way in, but he’d promised to go see Iggy first thing and his hand was really starting to hurt.

“There you are,” Iggy’s voice assaulted him when he reached the surgery floor.

Alex turned to find the doctor bearing down on him.

“What took you so long?”

“Sorry,” Alex said. “I stumbled on a break in the ghost case.” He held up his hand so that Iggy could examine it. “How’s Danny?”

“It’s not good,” Iggy said. “I got here in time to use the rune but the fool doctor in charge tried to stop me. I had to get rather insistent.”

Alex smiled at that. He’d seen Iggy upset a few times and the man was a force of nature.

“He’s sleeping now,” Iggy continued. “The doctors will keep him sedated until the nerves in his arms have time to regrow. Shouldn’t take more than a few days.”

Alex sighed, and his hand started to tremble from pure stress relief; he’d been under a tremendous load the last few days, and with Danny out of the woods, daylight was beginning to glimmer.

“Danny would have been much worse if it weren’t for you,” Iggy was saying as he peeled the bandage off Alex’s hand. “That was quick thinking, getting him down like that.”

“Wish I’d been faster,” Alex said.

“How many bullets hit you?”

“Besides this one,” Alex said, trying to wiggle his fingers and wincing at the pain it caused. “I counted four.”

“Danny’s lucky,” Iggy said. “Four more bullets and he’d have lost too much blood before he ever got here. The surgeon who pulled the other three out of him said it was touch and go for a few minutes.”

Alex just nodded with a mixture of pain and relief.

“Come with me,” Iggy said, leading Alex into a small examination room.

Under the bright lights, Iggy studied Alex’s wound. The hole where the bullet had hit him was still leaking blood, but he couldn’t see daylight through it, so that was something.

“Does this hurt?” Iggy asked, raising Alex’s ring finger.

Purple dots swam in Alex’s vision and he bit his tongue to keep from screaming.

“Figures,” Iggy said, shaking his head. “The shot messed up some of the little bones in your hand. I can fix that, but it will take a few weeks. A major restoration rune could have handled it, but you took too long getting here.” He seemed a bit miffed about that. “Fortunately for you, bones can be regenerated.”

Iggy produced a piece of chalk and drew a door for his vault on the wall. A few moments later, he had it open and was leading Alex through. He spent the next ten minutes painfully injecting Alex’s hand with all manner of syringes that all seemed to have square needles and be filled with acidic liquid. While he worked, Alex told Iggy about the events at the museum.

“Did you get a look at Jimmy Cortez’ rune book?” Iggy asked.

Alex shook his head.

“The cops took all that stuff,” he said. “But Callahan told me I could see it on Monday at the Central Office.”

Iggy pulled out his green-backed rune book and tore a standard regeneration rune from inside. Sticking it to the wet blood on the back of Alex’s hand, he reached for his lighter and his face fell.

“Damn,” he said. “I left it on my nightstand.”

Alex chuckled and pulled the silver lighter out of his own pocket.

“This came in real handy tonight,” he said, passing it over.

Iggy carefully lit the rune paper, leaving a pulsating blue rune behind, hovering in the air for a moment. It vanished suddenly in a shower of blue sparks that settled down on the back of Alex’s hand. As he watched, the ragged tear began to shrink as the skin knitted itself back together. After a minute, the only sign of the wound was the blood on his skin and the ache in his hand.

“Drink this,” Iggy said, shoving a vial of sickly green liquid into Alex’s good hand.

Alex drank and handed it back. Surprisingly, it wasn’t too bad.

“That’ll keep it from getting infected,” Iggy said. He took out some narrow strips of thin wood and broke them into short lengths.

“So, was Barton happy?” Iggy asked as he began to wrap Alex’s hand, using the splints to keep the palm from moving.

“Yes,” Alex said, his voice a bit sarcastic. “His motor was fine.”

“You don’t sound happy.”

“The thieves didn’t break through the wall until after midnight,” Alex said. “That means I lost our bet and he doesn’t owe me anything.”

Iggy raised an eyebrow.

“He said that?”

Alex nodded.

“Said if he made an exception, everyone he did business with would think he could be played.”

“Sorcerers,” Iggy declared, shaking his head.

Alex agreed.

“Now don’t try to use that hand for at least a week,” Iggy said. He’d wrapped Alex’s palm tightly using the wood splints to keep his fingers from moving, then looped a cloth sling over Alex’s head.

“Thanks, doc,” Alex said as Iggy went to the sink to wash up. He picked up the lighter, intending to return it to his pocket, but it slipped from Alex’s fingers and clattered to the floor. Alex just sat there, staring at it.