“High,” he said slowly, finding some spit.

“Hello, yourself.”

“No. Stone. .” He took a breath, wheezed, “Grog. .”

“Yep, we gave you something. We’re about to give you some more of the good stuff.”

“Hi,” he said.

“Right. Stoned, huh?” she said.

“No. Hel. . lo. You’re. . pret. . pretty.” His eyes probed around on the front of her blue tunic and focused on the laminated picture ID alligator-clipped to her pocket, and he read the printed title: Amy Skoda CRNA. “You’re pret. . ty, Amy,” he said.

“Thank you, and you’re lucky to be alive.”

He blinked at the blue shapes circling around him. “Where?”

“It’s all right now. You’re in a hospital.”

He nodded and the beep speeded up and he caught a panic flash of jagged black sky coming down, and frigid gray water rising up in ranks of whitecaps. He swallowed and muttered, “Storm.”

Amy nodded. “Mister, you’ve had quite an adventure.”

“Others?”

But she disappeared and the question hung unanswered. He waited and waited as it all slowed and went dim. Then the blue shapes above him startled and retreated. He heard shouts.

“Heads up, gang! We got another one!”

“C’mon, they need help.”

The blue commotion surged away.

Then someone.

A hand appeared and held up a syringe. This syringe was thicker, a dull gray plastic, not skinny like the other. It moved up and out of sight.

“There you go,” a voice said-a different voice. “It should be better now.”

Jesus God. No. Ow. Not better. They’d jacked him back into the storm. Black waves flooded from his arm, into his chest, drowning him on the inside. His lungs. .