Blind Eye by Jan Coffey

won’t need the help of some stranger like him.”
    â€œA stranger who’s been giving us all kinds of references,” she reminded him.
    â€œStill, why can’t we wait until Monday?”
    â€œI learned long ago to jump at the chances we are given in life. Waiting is just about all we do around here. Patients are brought to this wing and this is where they stay…waiting until the end,” she said quietly. “Look at her. She’s been waiting for six years. Why don’t you tell her we’re not going to do anything about what she’s given us until Monday? You tell her to wait.”
    Sid looked at JD. She seemed to be having a nightmare. A slight frown on her forehead deepened and her body jumped. Her eyes immediately opened. She looked at him.
    Aside from some nurse’s kindheartedness, JD had had no one to sit beside her, hold her hand, fight for the treatments she should get. Sid didn’t know where this sudden awareness in him of a patient’s needs was coming from. But he understood what Jennifer was fighting for.
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œOkay, what?” she asked.
    â€œOkay, do what you need to do. Take her picture. E-mail it to this Mark Shaw.”
    She stood on the other side of bed and stared at him for a long moment. Then she smiled.
    â€œDon’t worry,” she said finally. “You can bring a barricade and a tent and set yourself up in the front lobby.”
    â€œYou mean, set my tent up next to yours,” Sid responded.
    â€œExactly.” She headed for the door. “I’ll be right back with the digital camera.”

20
    Nuclear Fusion Test Facility
    A t first glance, the facility handbook offered a lot less than Marion had hoped for. She was looking for a reference to the emergency exit, but could find nothing listed in the index. Great handbook. She double-checked the facility identification. Every page was labeled with NMURL, New Mexico Underground Research Lab. The publication seemed to be put together in a pretty haphazard manner. A lot of information was missing.
    She thumbed through the index. There was no mention of an auxiliary power source that she could find, either.
    The schematic of the laboratory layout at least offered something, she thought, looking closely at the page as she held the penlight that she’d retrieved from the floor of her quarters. Operating information regarding ventilation, power, water and sanitation were also covered in depth.
    Studying the layout diagram for the entire facility, Marion couldn’t even see the generator she’d found in the room off the kitchen. She didn’t know whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. Maybe there were pages missing. Maybe there was another power source.
    She put the penlight down on the open book and pressed her fingers to her eyes. Her head still had a dull ache, and her eyes were so tired.
    â€œToughen up,” she chided herself. “No time for that.”
    Returning to the facility diagram, she decided her first stop had to be the maintenance closet. She needed a much more powerful source of light than what she was operating with. During the past few weeks down here, she’d poked her head into that room a number of times for cleaning supplies. She remembered seeing a box of oversize flashlights. She hoped the batteries were still good.
    There were other things she knew she had to see to immediately after that. Checking out the walk-in freezer in the kitchen for space was part of one grim task. The temperature in the facility seemed to have remained constant, but it would only be a matter of time before the bodies of her coworkers began to decompose. Marion wondered if she was strong enough, mentally and physically, to drag them to the freezer.
    Whether anyone was coming after her…ever…was something she didn’t want to think about.
    The pounding in her head was coming back. She moved down the hall, trying to ignore the