52.03 A Prayer to Camacho

[shoeless.db]

The scent of burning flesh burrowed into his nose as its accompanying smoke stung at his eyes. Despite expecting both, General Manager Shoeless slammed shut the door he had opened. Months had gone by since he'd last been down here, below centerfield at the Basilica, almost an entire season of mediocre Mad Popes baseball. His team sat four and half games out of first with 22 games to play with only a four game lead for the last wild card spot in the Pacific. Christ, it's already into September, Shoeless thought. This has to be done.

He braced himself and opened the door again. Dull LED screens of countless machines flashed readings and calculations. Wires and tubes extended like tentacles from every direction, hungrily grasping at a naked man, likely a low minor leaguer in need of adjusting, lying prone on a wheeled gurney in the center of the room. Next to it, on a stool and wearing soft blue scrubs, sat the green-eyed woman.

"You are late," she said, not looking up as she sutured an incision just below the man's navel. Extending from the incision in every direction -- up to his chest, around his midsection, and down across his exposed genitals -- weaved bolts of scorched tissue, like a tattoo of blackened roots. "Precious time wasted."

"I was held up," he lied. "I'm here now."

The green-eyed woman tossed the scissors and suturing needle she was using onto a metal pan and walked to a door to the back of the room. She tapped on the glass. Within seconds, two assistants rushed into the room. They unhooked, pulled and snapped free the tubes and wires from the man on the gurney, leaving only a single tube from the man's hand connected to a bag of clear IV liquid. The assistants nodded to one another before one unlocked the wheels to the gurney, and they pushed the man from the room.

Within moments, they returned with another gurney and positioned it in the center of the machines. The green-eyed woman motioned for them to leave with a flippant hand motion, and both shot for the door they had come, one glancing with a curious eye at Shoeless as they walked from the room.

"Disrobe and lay down" the green-eyed woman said. "We must hurry."

"Not even dinner or a drink first? Rude."

She shot him a look causing a shiver to lightning down his spine. He quickly removed his clothes and, tentatively, laid on the cool plastic of the gurney.

"You're certain this will work?" He asked as she pinned wires to all parts of his body. She did not answer him. She worked feverishly and, at last, raised a clear mask over his nose and mouth. She turned and flipped a switch. A metallic gas pushed through the mask, and Shoeless stared into the fluorescent glow of the ceiling light.

Camacho, help us, he thought, feeling himself lose consciousness. Only your divine grace and power will get us to the playoffs.

[Jwalk100]

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[bschr682]

Haha

[Dington]

A Shoeless sighting!

[CTBrewCrew]

Schwing!