| Chapter 2 Sometime in the middle of the night the buses reached their destination, and all the guys traded their beds on the bus for beds in a hotel. They were all pretty tired from the trip, and there was nothing on the itinerary until that afternoon so they all decided to sleep in. It was about 11:30 in the morning and Brian had been awake for a while staring at the ceiling and listening to his stomach growling. He decided that he would order brunch and start getting ready for the day. He called room service and ordered, then jumped in the shower real quick before his food got there. As he got out of the shower he remembered that when he arrived there was no letter waiting for him. This brought some ease to his tension, maybe it was going to stop now. There was a knock at the door, "Room Service", the guy yelled. Brian opened the door and let the man push the cart inside, he tipped him and closed the door after him. Brian pored himself some coffee and grabbed a piece of toast. The local paper had come along with the food, so he started skimming the page to see if there was anything interesting going on. He had drank about half his coffee and eaten his toast when he found it. There in the middle of the paper in an envelope was the letter. Brian's heart was in his throat, and he was feeling really nauseous as he opened it. There were only two words in the letter, they read "Got You". At first Brian just sat there, not knowing what to make of this. Then it hit him; the food, there's something in the food!! He was increasingly feeling sick, and now he was dizzy. Brian reached for the phone, lost his equilibrium and fell to the floor. God, please don't let me pass out. Brian knew that Mark was just in the next room, so he yelled out. "Mark! Mark!" Mark was putting his shoes on when he heard a loud thump come from the direction of Brian's room. He stood up and was on his way to the door when he heard Brian call his name. He rushed out the door and over to Brian's. As he entered Brian's room at first he didn't see him, then he saw Brian on the floor. "Brian, what's wrong!" Mark said as he made his way to him. Brian was almost to the point of passing out, "Hospital" was all he could say, then he was out. Mark immediately called for an ambulance, then he picked Brian up and laid him on the bed. Mark began looking around Brian's room, trying to figure out what could have caused this. He saw the letter on the floor, picked it up and read it. Mark was unsure what it meant, then he saw the food cart. Now he was pretty sure Brian had been poisoned by something in the food. Mark walked out into the hall and yelled for Kevin. Kevin was a few rooms down the hall, and was just waking up when he heard someone yelling his name. He got up and walked to his door and stuck his head out. "What?" Kevin said rather annoyed that Mark would just yell down the hall, instead of coming to his door. "Kevin, its Brian, get down here!" Mark yelled. As Kevin ran down the hall toward Brian's room he could hear the sirens of an approaching ambulance. He reached Brian's room to find Brian laying lifeless on the bed. "What happened?" Kevin asked as he made his way to the side of the bed Brian was on. "I think he was poisoned," Mark said " I found this on the floor next to the food cart." Mark handed Kevin the letter. Kevin glanced at the letter and handed it back to Mark as he bent down to check on Brian. He was breathing, barley, and he was whiter than the sheets on the bed. "Where the hell are those paramedics?" Kevin said just as they walked through the door. Kevin moved out of the way as they began to work on Brian. Mark informed them that he may have been poisoned by something in his food. One of the paramedics took out some sample cups, walked over to the food cart and began filling each cup with a sample of the food and coffee. "We'll have the lab analysis this so we know what we're dealing with." he said. As they loaded Brian on the stretcher and got ready to take him down to the ambulance, Kevin ran over to Howie's room and banged on the door. Howie, looking like he just got up, opened the door. "Kev, what's going on?" "Howie, we're taking Brian to the hospital, wake up the others and meet us there OK." Kevin said. "What happened?" Howie asked completely in shock. "There's no time I'll fill ya in at the hospital" Kevin said as he ran down the hall to his room. He put on the first thing he saw, grabbed his shoes and his cell, and was out the door. ~~~~~~~~~~ Howie, A.J., and Nick made there way down the corridor of the hospital in the direction of Brian's room. It had taken them a while to get A.J. up, so when they arrived Brian had already been moved from the emergency room. As they rounded the corner they could see Kevin standing in the hall. "Kev, how is he?" Nick asked. Kevin turned to face the guys, and they could tell by the look on his face it wasn't good. "Umm, I'm waiting on the doctor to come up" Kevin said with great emotion in his voice. He was on the verge of crying. "They've got him hooked up to every machine imaginable." Howie walked over to Kevin and put his hand on his shoulder for support. A.J. and Nick looked through the window into Brian's room. They could see Brian laying motionless in the bed with all kinds of tubes and wires everywhere. Nick quickly turned away from the awful sight of his friend hooked up to so many machines. "Damn," was all A.J. could say. "Kevin, what happened?" Nick asked, tears rolling down his face. "We think he was poisoned; he had ordered room service, half the food was eaten, and there was another letter, that's all I know." "What'd the letter say?" asked A.J. "It just said �got you." Kevin said. As the guys stood there in shock, the doctor rounded the corner of the hall. "Mr. Richardson?" he asked. Kevin turned to face the doctor, "Kevin" he said. "Kevin, would you like to talk in private?" the doctor asked. "No, we are all family, please go ahead." "OK" the doctor said, "lets all sit down." He gestured to a small waiting area, and the guys walked over and took a seat. "The lab has analyzed the food that was brought in, and it does contain a high concentration of poison. The problem is that it is a combination of poisons, which makes treating Brian very difficult. The antidote for one poison will increase the effects of the others." All of the guys were stunned. "What can you do?" Kevin asked. "I have consulted with a few of my colleagues, and the consensus is to NOT treat him." the doctor said. "Are you saying that your not going to do anything to help him?" Nick asked, obviously angered by what he had just heard. "No, I'm not saying that, I'm saying that we aren't going to treat him for the poisons in his system; but we are going to treat his symptoms. I think that is the only thing we can do at this point. If we treated him for the poisons, I believe that would harm him more than it would help him. We will keep him closely monitored, but its mostly going to be up to Brian now. He has a hard fight ahead of him." Kevin stood up and offered his hand to the doctor, "Thank you doctor." "I've instructed the nurses to set up a more private room for you to stay in, and if you have any questions just ask one of the nurses to beep me." the doctor said as he took Kevin's hand. "All right, thank you again." Kevin said. As the doctor walked down the hall, Howie turned to the guys, "Kev, have you called Leighanne or Jackie yet?" "No, I'm going to do that now" Kevin said with some hesitation in his voice. This was going to be a difficult phone call. Nick stood up, wiping the tears from his face, "I'll go sit with Brian for a while." "OK Nick, one of us will come relieve you in a little while." Howie said. As Nick walked toward Brian's room, A.J. and Howie decided to go see if they could help the nurses set up the room the doctor talked about. That left Kevin alone to make his phone calls. Kevin closed his eyes and prayed that God would help him as he called Brian's family. He reached for his cell, and dialed the number. "Hello" Leighanne said. "Hello, Leighanne, its Kevin. Something's happened to Brian......." Chapter 3 |