Dead or Alive: Makes No Difference-Ch. 1

The tune of Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust” thrilled from Caitlyn Walsh’s nightstand, drawing her from a peaceful sleep. She groaned as she reached her hand over to get it.1

“What, Milo?” she answered, her voice harsh and groggy. She’d known it was him right away since the ring tone that had gone off was her personalized ring tone for him.2

“Room 327, Section D.” he said in a firm voice. This information woke her up slightly more and she sat up in her bed.3

“What happened?” she asked immediately.4

“Just get down here.” And with that the connection was lost. She groaned as she got out of bed and reached over and grabbed the jeans that were lying on the chair in her room. With her jeans and Case University shirt on she quickly gave her naturally red and brown hair a brush and threw it up in a ponytail before grabbing her purse and keys. At 4:35 in the morning she was out of her apartment and on her way to the teaching hospital. She only hoped Milo had a good reason for waking her up so early, because if he didn’t, she and the others in the group were going to have a fresh cadaver to work with.5

At 4:50 she had reached the hospital and was making her way to the room and section Milo had stated on the phone. It was in an abandoned part of the hospital, so no one ever came into it; except for a select group of individuals, two of whom were her and Milo Vermodi.6

“Ok, I’m here, what is it?” she asked, her voice filled with annoyance as she walked into the room and spotted Milo.7

“That.” He said, pointing to a corner of the room. Caitlyn looked in the direction he was pointing and saw a sheet that was gradually growing red, covering something. Without a thought she walked over to it and lifted the sheet. She was shocked by what she saw. Skeletal remains sat in a pool of blood, all muscles, organs and skin gone.8

“What happened?” she asked as she turned to face Milo.9

“That’s what we’re trying to figure out.” He said, staying where he was, standing by the door.10

“ ‘We’re’? Who else is here?” she questioned. She’d thought it was just her and Milo.11

“Jess and Luke. Jess had come in and found it. She called Luke and I. When I saw what it was I called you, figured we all needed to be here.” He told her. Jessica Monter and Luke Darth were the other two individuals in their little group.12

“Where are they now?” she asked him.13

“Down in the hospital’s café. Jess was a little freaked out.” She nodded at the information given to her.14

“Alright, so what are we going to do about this?” she asked, getting back to the situation at hand.15

“We can always dispose of it.” He suggested.16

“Shouldn’t we figure out who it is first?” she asked, walking over to him.17

“I think it’s Mr. Parson, we were going to use his liver.” Milo said, looking slightly over her shoulder.18

“And how do you know that it’s Mr. Parson? Are you some sort of psychic or something?”19

“No, I’m just observant. On the table there’s a tag, his tag, it’s bloodied. Maybe if you’d been paying attention…”20

“Hey, you call me at 4 in the morning and then show me that, I don’t think the first thing I’m gonna be doing is looking for a tag, I’m gonna be wondering who the heck would do something like that.” She shot back at him.21

“Don’t forget that we need to be on are toes at all times, paying attention to every little detail if we want to get where we want. It doesn’t matter the time of day.” He told her firmly.22

“Right, and you’re always on your toes. Mr. I do everything right. Just because you situated yourself as the leader of this little group, doesn’t mean you’re perfect.” She replied angrily. They glared at each other for a minute before they heard someone clearing their throat. When they turned to see who it was they saw Jess and Luke standing in the doorway.23

“We interrupting something?” Luke questioned, looking at the two of them.24

“No, you’re fine, Luke.” Milo replied after giving Caitlyn one last glare.25

“Good, was worried we’d have two more bodies.” He said with a joking smile.26

“Hey, Jess, you alright?” Caitlyn asked as she walked over to her friend, ignoring Luke’s comment.27

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just didn’t expect to see that when I came here.” She said, eying the corner where the remains still laid.28

“Why were you here?” Caitlyn asked curiously.29

“Doctor Charlt wanted me to stay late and I got off at three. I decided to come down here to maybe get a look at Mr. Parson, make sure he was still ready for what were going to be doing. That’s when I saw the remains in the blood.” She swallowed hard at the memory.30

“Did you notice anything else?” Milo questioned. She shook her head no.31

“Guys, maybe we should call the cops, I mean there might be some killer out there who’s threatening us or something.” Jess said. Milo looked her firmly in the eye when she said this.32

“And tell them what exactly? That somebody cut up the body that we were cutting up? And then what? We’ve got two months left in our residency here, we can’t blow it now. No, we deal with this ourselves. You all got that?” he said tightly. 33

“Hey, ease up. It’s not her fault she stumbled on this thing. Like you would’ve been so calmed, cooled and collected if you were the first one to stumble on this. Just ease up, we won’t call the police, but calm down.” Caitlyn told him harshly.34

“I’m just saying. We can’t have anyone bailing on what we’re doin’ now, not when we’re so close.”35

“Fine, no cops, we take care of the remains. You and Luke take ‘em and burn ‘em.” She told him.36

“Fine.” Within twenty minutes him and Luke were out of there, leaving Caitlyn and Jess by themselves.37

“Who do you think did this?” Jess questioned as they started to scrub the blood off the floor.38

“I don’t know, Jess, whoever it was is a sick bastard though.” She said, anger in her voice. The remains had been the last thing she’d expected to find. She’d thought someone had figured out what they were doing and had confronted Milo about it, but no, this was far worse. Someone had found out where they were, that was for sure, but they were making their presence known in their own personal, sick way. Caitlyn wanted to know who it was.39