Critical by Robin Cook

night?”
    â€œHe did, and I told him the only missing-person report filed overnight was for a woman.”
    Jack thanked the sergeant and managed to catch up to Vinnie, who’d summoned the back elevator. Downstairs, Jack found Lou in the locker room, already suited up in a Tyvek coverall, which had replaced the far more bulky protective moon suits except for known exceptionally infectious cases.
    As Jack quickly changed into scrubs, Lou couldn’t help but notice the swelling and discoloration of Jack’s injured knee.
    â€œThat doesn’t look so good,” Lou commented. “Are you sure you should be doing these posts?”
    â€œActually, it’s gotten better,” Jack said. “I just have to baby it until Thursday, when it’s scheduled to be repaired. That’s what the crutches are for. I could do without them, but using them is a constant reminder.”
    â€œYou’re having it operated on so soon?” Lou questioned. “My ex-brother-in-law had an ACL tear, and he had to wait six months before having it fixed.”
    â€œThe sooner I have it, the better, as far as I am concerned,” Jack said as he climbed into a Tyvek coverall. “The quicker I get back to my bike and, hopefully, my b-ball, the saner I’ll be. The competition and the physical exercise keep my demons at bay.”
    â€œNow that you remarried, are you still tormented by what happened to your family?”
    Jack stopped and stared at Lou as if he couldn’t believe Lou had asked such a question. “I’m always going to be tormented. It’s just a matter of degree.” Jack had lost his wife of ten years and two daughters, aged ten and eleven, to a commuter plane crash fifteen years earlier.
    â€œWhat does Laurie think of you having surgery so soon?”
    Jack’s lower jaw slowly dropped open. “What is this?” he questioned with obvious irritation. “Is this some kind of conspiracy? Has Laurie been talking to you about this behind my back?”
    â€œHey!” Lou voiced, raising his hands as if to fend off an attack. “Calm down! Don’t be so paranoid! I’m just asking, trying to be a friend.”
    Jack went back to finishing his suiting up. “I’m sorry to jump on you. It’s just that Laurie has been on my case to postpone my surgery since it was scheduled. I’m a little touchy about it because I want the damn thing fixed.”
    â€œUnderstood,” Lou said.
    With hoods in place and tiny, battery-powered fans recirculating the air through high-efficiency particulate air, or HEPA, filters, the two men entered the windowless autopsy room, which had not been upgraded for almost fifty years. The eight stainless-steel autopsy tables bore witness to the approximately five hundred thousand bodies that had been painstakingly disassembled to reveal their forensic secrets. Over each table hung an old-fashioned spring-loaded scale and a microphone for dictation. Along one wall were Formica countertops and soapstone sinks for washing out intestines, and along another wall were floor-to-ceiling glass-enclosed instrument cabinets, the contents of which looked like something that should have been in a house of horrors. Next to them were backlit x-ray view boxes. The whole scene was awash in a stark blue-white light coming from banks of ceiling-mounted fluorescent fixtures. The illumination appeared to suck the color out of everything in the room, especially the ghostly pale corpse on the nearest table.
    While Vinnie continued the preparations by getting out instruments, specimen bottles, preservatives, labels, syringes, and evidence custody tags, Jack and Lou went to the view box to look at the whole-body X-rays that Vinnie had put up. One was anterior-posterior; the other was lateral.
    After checking the accession number, Jack gazed at the films. Then he said, “I think you are right.”
    â€œRight about what?” Lou