We're Havin' a Heat Wave
By: Amy D & Suisan
For Numb3rCrunching
This story came about as inspiration from K8T. I hope all of you like it.
First, the disclaimer and then the thanks.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of characters in this story. They are the property of Scot Free Productions, Cheyrl Heutton and Nick Fallacci. Please don't sue me, I'm poor. The character of Dr. Elaine was created by and belongs to Suisan.
Rating: Mature. There be some "adult language" contained within the story.
Thanks: Many thanks to the following people. K8T for giving me the idea in the first place. Suisan for kicking my butt in getting it finished and helping greatly with the medical stuff. Antoinette and Beth for Beta Reading and Ely, also for beta reading.
Any comments, compliments, job offers, feel free to post here or PM me.
And now, I present to you...
We're Havin' a Heat Wave
A Numb3rs Story
By AmyD and Suisan
Chapter One
"DON!"
Colby was running before Don hit the ground, even if he wasn't aware of leaving the golf cart until he was already in motion. He cursed the fact that in spite of a burst of speed he poured into his legs, he wouldn't be able to catch Don before the senior agent hit the ground.
To Colby, it looked like Don was falling in slow motion, gracefully pitching over in the middle of the 14th fairway of the Angeles National Golf Course. He dropped to his knees next to Don and held his breath as he checked for a pulse. He started breathing again when he found it.
What the…? Colby thought, checking Don over. It only took a couple of moments to diagnosis the problem. Heat stroke. Don's pulse was pounding, his skin was flushed, and on the hottest day on record, he wasn't sweating a drop. That was a great, big problem. The human body cooled off by sweating. If Don wasn't sweating, he was overheating and that could be fatal.
How in the Hell did I miss this? Colby thought. We had plenty of water; we haven't been out in the sun too much. He looked back at the cart, then down at Don. Hell, I've toted heavier guys in Afghanistan. He draped one of Don's arms around his shoulders and climbed, slowly, to his feet.
"You need some help?" A male voice made Colby look up and almost fall over in shock. Climbing out of a golf cart was the reason he and Don were on the golf course in the first place. Steven Cooley, L.A.'s newest robber baron and a Tiger Woods wannabe.
He went to Don's other side, helping get Don back to the golf cart.
"He'll do better lying down." Colby said, Cooley nodded and the two men stretched Don out on the golf cart's seats.
"Daniel!" Cooley called over his shoulder. "Bring me a couple of bottles of water and some golf towels. Need a phone?" He asked Colby.
"No, I got one." Colby said, pulling his cell phone from his pocket, letting his thumb do the walking as he dialed 911
Cooley took his hat off and was fanning Don. "The club'll let an ambulance on the course, just tell him what hole we're on."
Colby nodded.
"Man, heat stroke is the worst." Cooley said.
Daniel, a twenty-something, appeared with bottles of water and towels in hand. After hanging up, Colby grabbed a bottle of water and a towel. Soaking the towel in the water, he lifted Don's head just enough to wrap the wet cloth around the older man's neck, then dumped the rest of the water on Don's wrists.
Don started and moaned as the water began to bring him around. "Wha…? What's happen'…" Don's voice slurred at the end of his question, another classic heat stroke symptom.
"Hey, man, what's your name?" Cooley asked Don.
"Eppes, Don Eppes"
Cooley nodded. "My name is Steven." Cooley looked over and up at his training partner, "Daniel, go get some more water."
Daniel nodded and loped back to the other golf cart.
Cooley took a moment to wipe the sweat from his face and said "I think I've got enough water for an army."
Colby nodded but said nothing, a gnawing fear starting up in the pit of his stomach. If anything happened to Don because of this case, he'd never be able to live with himself. How could I explain it to Charlie, let alone Alan?
When Daniel returned with some more bottles of water, he took the towel from around Don's neck, rewetted it and tucked it back in place. Cooley took another damp towel and used it to fan Don. Colby checked Don's pulse again, it was still pounding. Another tendril of fear snaked its way into the Colby's stomach but he pushed it aside.
Don is not dying out on a golf course! Not from freakin' heat stroke!
"Don't beat yourself up over this," Cooley said. "It happens even to seasoned pros. You're so eager to get out on the course that you forget." He opened another bottle of water and handed it to Colby. "Think he'll be able to drink this?"
"We can try." Colby replied. "Don? Come on, open your eyes and look at me."
"Don, we need you to drink some water," Cooley said.
Don's eyelids flickered open at the unfamiliar voice. "What…?" He looked up at Colby, confusion all over his face. "What's…what's…."
Colby handed the water bottle back to Cooley. "I'll hold him up, you get him to drink."
Cooley nodded. After a couple of tries, he actually got Don to swallow some of the water.
"Water's cold…." Don mumbled.
"That's a good thing," Colby told him. "You want the water cold. Drink some more."
The water wasn't cold, and both men knew it. It was lukewarm but to Don, in his overheated state, it would be like swallowing ice.
A course marshal showed up just then. He hopped from his cart and headed to the men, water in both hands. "Ambulance is almost here." he said. "I heard it coming up on my way out. Another marshal'll show them out here."
"Thanks," Colby replied.
"C'mon Don, a couple more sips." Cooley tilted the bottle up to pour the last of the water into Don's mouth.
Don swallowed and coughed and gasped for air.
In the distance, a siren could be heard.
"Hang on, boss," Colby mumbled. "It'll be okay. Just relax."
The ambulance roared up in a cloud of dust and noise, another course marshal hopping down from the cab. One of the medics took care of Don while the other one radioed stats and vitals to whatever hospital was closest. It wasn't until they were getting Don loaded up on a gurney and readied for transport that Colby was able to catch the paramedic and let him know, without Cooley hearing him, that Don was a FBI Agent. The medic nodded in understanding, secured the gurney in the back of the ambulance, closed the bay doors and pounded on the wall to let the driver know to go. A spray of fine dust and one flying, misplaced pinecone heralded the departure of the ambulance, and Granger looked down at his watch. Arrival to departure had covered seven minutes, but it had seemed far longer.
Colby looked after the disappearing vehicle and opened his cell phone to make another call.
"Megan? It's Colby. We've got a great big problem."
He wasn't sure what was going on, but he knew that being flat on his back with the sensation of moving at a fast pace couldn't be good. Just as he realized he couldn't see anything, a pinch and a prick on the back of his left hand made Don blink his eyes open. There was a huge blurry, blue colored form leaning over him, and beyond that blur was more blur, but white in color. The sound of a siren roared through the air, making his ears hurt.
"Hey!" Don tried to say, but the word didn't want to leave past his teeth.
"Mister Eppes, it's all right. You're in an ambulance on the way to Pacifica hospital. I'm Tommy, your paramedic, and what you just felt on your hand was me establishing an IV." Tommy, if that's who the man really was, patted him on the arm and turned away to grab a clear bag of some sort of fluid and gave it a squeeze.
"Whoa!" The pressure on the bag seemed to correlate with a sudden cold sensation running through his left arm.
"It's all right, Mister Eppes, that's just the saline hitting your bloodstream. You're severely dehydrated and we've got to get that taken care of, along with getting your temp lowered, that's why it feels so cold to you."
"'Gent Eppes." He was tired of hearing 'Mister Eppes' - that was his father's name, not his.
"Right, that's what Agent Granger told me. Guess you are starting to feel a little better, Agent Eppes." The blur known as Tommy reached up and stuck something into Don's ear. "Right, temp starting to drop, but not too fast. Karla! How much further to Pacifica?"
A disembodied voice drifted over the sound of the wailing siren. "ETA, 2 minutes."
Don watched as the Tommy blur leaned over to an awful orange colored cabinet on the wall and pulled something out that had a tail and seemed to be attached to the odd colored box. "Medic 248, Pacifica." The medic spoke into the hand holding the … whatever it was he'd grabbed.
"248, Pacifica, go ahead." A different voice from the first came through the siren soaked air.
"Pacifica, we're 2 out with a 36-year-old Caucasian male, apparent heat exhaustion victim. Pulse steady at 78, B/P at 120/80 and an aural temp reading of 104.2. Skin is dry and pale…" Don tuned out the medic's voice and tried to ignore the sudden fluttering sensation in his chest as well as the electronic beeping noise that seemed to be increasing in tempo. "Pacifica, change of status. The patient just started to throw arrhythmias…." Don welcomed the darkness that was slowly creeping back in on the edge of his vision.