“I’m sure I have no idea,” answered the ambulance dryly.
I glanced back down at the ambulance’s map display. I was nearly on top of the coordinates Moti had given me. Sylvia. Looking forward, I saw that we were heading straight for a nice mountaintop villa. Below it were slopes of cultivated grapevines. At first, it looked like my wife had booked a much nicer resort for her and Joel2 than the one we’d stayed at on our honeymoon. Then I remembered that she had been forcibly taken to this place, most likely by the Gehinnomites.
At the entrance to the winery, I took my foot off the gas pedal. The blip on the map display blinked, and the ambulance told me, “We have reached your destination.”
Just off the road were the remains of a gatehouse. It looked like it had been stepped on by a giant foot, or maybe a people-mover. About a quarter mile up the mountain was a three-story mansion, the only place I’d seen in the last ten minutes that could be housing Sylvia. I got out of the vehicle, wondering whether it was a good or bad thing that no welcoming committee came to greet me. Was it possible that nobody was watching the entrance?
Guess I’m about to find out. Sylvia is in there. Hero time.
“Don’t go anywhere,” I instructed the ambulance.
“May I ask, when will I get the results of my assessment?”
“Soon,” I said. “So long as you stay put and shut up.”
As I exited the ambulance, three unfortunate truths unveiled themselves to me:
I was about to enter a terrorist compound by myself.
I was utterly unarmed.
I had no idea what to do if I ran into the other me.
Wait: Can two of me even exist in the same space? I thought. If we touch, will the world end? I guess, technically, only one of me needs to make it.
“Actually, one more thing,” I said. “Do you have any weapons on board?”
“Is this another test? I thought you wanted me to stay put and shut up.”
“I do. After you answer this question.”
“No.”
“You mean, no weapons?”
“Yes.”
“What do you do in the event of, I don’t know, a violent patient?”
“Summon the police.”
Good thinking. Unfortunately, I’m an international criminal with no identity. I slid open the door connecting the front cabin to the rear and looked inside. Bandages, sheets, Band-Aids, and lotions—Moti probably could have MacGyver’d something with all this stuff, but I sure couldn’t. All I needed was something sharp, like a scalpel, but no luck. I next tried looking for warning labels, indicators of things that could inflict damage on people. Nothing. There was a gurney on board, but when I tried to take off one of its legs to use as a club, I only succeeded in pinching my fingers. I was getting frustrated and flustered. Also, I was scared that at any given point, one of my wife’s captors or an angry vintner might spot the trespassing ambulance on his property.
I had nearly resigned myself to grabbing a stick off the ground when I saw it: a tiny little warning label with a lightning bolt on it. Electric shock! I opened the metal box. It contained … a lightning gun! I would strap it on, kill all the Gehinnomites, and save my wife. The end.
I wish.
The box contained a portable defibrillator. Well, beggars can’t be choosers. I took the defibrillator out of the container and pulled one of its two metallic paddles from the battery pack.
“Hey, ambulance, how many zaps can each of these defibrillator pads handle before having to be recharged?” I asked.
The answer came back, “Three, each. You don’t need both to complete the circuit; each pad is a self-contained defibrillator.”
I grabbed a bandage roll and wrapped it around the paddle in my left hand, fashioning a crude, electrified boxing glove. I’d have to make physical contact to use it, and also risk shocking myself in the process. I thought about putting the other paddle in my back pocket as backup in case I used all three charges, but knowing me, I’d accidentally sit on it and shock myself out of commission.
I examined my handiwork. One man with a defibrillating hand versus an army of Gehinnomites. Do this, and I might get my life back. Don’t, and I’ll just die. No. I refuse to give Moti the satisfaction. Despite my feigned confidence, I felt stomach acid rising up my esophagus, and my chest felt frozen. Great. A panic attack. I breathed in and out, but spending more time in the back of a stolen ambulance was not going to fix that. Fuck it, here goes.
The first step of my plan was reconnaissance. I started by creeping up toward the villa, crouching low to stay behind the grapevines. I’m not an expert at these things, but I had played plenty of stealth-combat video games. Staying out of sight was always the prudent thing to do. I reached the entrance and took a quick peek inside. Several parked cars, a large RV, and a completely destroyed golf cart. No guards. Off to the side was a wooden sign pointing to La Jardín. I allowed myself another glance and, seeing no movement inside or outside, ran through the parking area until I reached the garden and hid behind a leafy wet bush. After several long moments of listening and shaking off bugs, I was convinced that no one had seen me. I walked down into the garden, trying to see any kind of activity in the house. As a result, I nearly tripped over something wrapped in a blue drape.
My clumsy misstep caused the drape to unroll slightly, revealing—ugh!—the corpse of a man whose neck had been violently broken. My stomach churned. I felt the sick coming up, but held it down. My teeth clenched involuntarily. Relax, dead people can’t hurt you. I squeamishly re-covered the poor guy’s face, wiping my hands on my white lab coat afterward. There was a branch nearby swarming with fire ants, which I kicked over to hold the drape down.
I looked up a stone stairway, hearing a repetitive metallic clicking coming from the villa. Some kind of security system? Stealing up the steps a bit, I saw the sound was merely from the latch of the rear patio door, swaying back and forth against its anchor. Why’s the door open? Is this what walking into a trap feels like?
I tiptoed up to the door, my defibrillator paddle held out in front of me like a shield. Having it probably did more to boost my confidence than provide any actual protection. As I reached the top, I could see the cloud forest below on three sides. If I wasn’t about to barf from terror, it would have been a beautiful view.