All units BOLO: 2017 White Toyota 4Dr, occupied 2x, last seen northbound on Holly Street. The driver is a nude white female wanted for the attempted capital murder of a police officer. Be advised she may be armed and is considered to be dangerous. Approach with caution.
The doctor came into my room and told me I was lucky. The blade had missed all of my vital organs but I still needed over 200 stitches to sew me up. He planned to keep me for a couple of days for observation. I was laid flat and turned on my right side in a manner that allowed me a view outside. From what I could tell, I must be on the 3rd or 4th floor of the hospital overlooking the back parking lot. In the distance, I could see almost see the location where this had happened. There were still police cars and a crime scene van there. I started to close my eyes when I heard someone cough from behind me.
It hurt to move so the best I could do was cut my eyes in their direction to see who was there. “Hey Rich!, how you feeling man?”, asked my shift Sergeant, Cain Marshall. I feigned a smile and replied, “She almost got me, Cain.” He stood up and walked over and put his hand on my shoulder. Cain was maybe twenty years my senior. He stood there for a moment and was about to say something when the door opened and in bounced one of the prettiest nurses either of us had ever seen. She had red hair, blue eyes, and a smile that would soften the heart of the devil himself. She was carrying medication and had a tablet tucked under her arm. She walked right up to Cain and leaned in and kissed him on the cheek, then said, “How’s our patient doing, Dad?” Cain smiled at his daughter, Ailison, and told her he seemed okay to him and believed he was malingering just so he could spend more time with her. Ailison’s smile quickly turned to a grimace and she replied, “And what’s wrong with that?” She leaned over and kissed Rich on the forehead and handed him the tablet. It was his Kindle Reader and she figured it would give him something to do while he was on the mend. Then she handed him his water and ordered him to take his medication. Ailison said she would check back in on Rich in a few, but they were short-staffed and she had other patients waiting on her.
As soon as she left, Rich asked Cain if he could get his radio too. Although he was supposed to be resting, he still wanted to monitor what was going on in the world, especially if this woman who tried to kill him, popped up on the radar again. Cain told him he would see what he could do, but for now, the orders were for him to rest. There would be investigators and people from public affairs who would want to speak with him as soon as he was able. Rich let out an audible groan and Cain laughed before leaving and closed the door behind him. Rich closed his eyes and drifted off into a morphine-induced sleep.
Rich awakened with a jerk. He had been dreaming. Rather he had been re-living the traffic stop. What did he miss? What could he have done to prevent getting stabbed? Who was this bitch and why did she try and kill him? He opened his eyes and saw the twinkling of the city lights outside. It was dark. He had no idea what time it was but based on street traffic and how dark the sky was, he figured it must be after 11 p. m. He tried moving but even the slightest shift in body weight created a pain that he couldn’t describe. He felt as if he had been cut in half. Two hundred stitches? Didn’t the Doc say two hundred stitches, Rich thought to himself? That’s got to be a helluva of a wound. He found the bed controls and tried adjusting the bed so he could sit up a little more. Big mistake, but he pushed through. He figured if he moved just a little at a time and then rested, eventually he could get the bed where he wanted it. While playing with the controls, he noticed his Kindle Reader on the bedside table, along with his dinner tray. He wasn’t hungry but he did want the Kindle, so he pushed the tray aside and that’s when he saw his police radio. Cain must have dropped it off when he was asleep. Great! Now he wouldn’t go bonkers while laid up in here. All of a sudden his appetite returned a little too, so he removed the cover to see chicken broth, pudding, and jello.
The above is an excerpt from the second scene of Gabriel’s Sword. Aside from seeing how this reads, I wanted to share the beginning of a new technique I’m trying in this novella, the multi-perspective narrator. That’s a fancy way of saying instead of using dialogue to identify conversations between characters, I’m experimenting with shifting the narrator’s voice to each character as that character takes over prominence in a scene. I will still use dialogue where it makes sense, but if this technique goes according to plan, the shift in narrator should make for a cleaner, quicker, more enjoyable read. Let me know your thoughts, please.
