Close Encounters Of The Stapler Kind

By Wanda Hargrove

Johnny was preparing to go into another one of his tirades about why the Phantom needed to be barred from Station 51. Roy sighed as he saw the younger, dark haired man take in a breath with his mouth open. Before Johnny could utter a sound the tones sounded. “Squad 51... Woman Down… 1234 Commerce Crossings, 1-2-3-4 Commerce Crossings…. Time Out 12:23.”

Roy reached out and grabbed the microphone from the side of the podium as he wrote down the address. “Squad 51... KMG-365.” Replacing the mike he hopped into the driver’s side of the squad while handing Johnny the note. Upon exiting the station, both paramedics were all business they knew that a woman down could mean almost anything from a head injury to a broken ankle.

Pulling up in front of the building both men hopped out of the vehicle, they were met by a security guard. As they began to remove their equipment, the guard shook his head. “I don’t think you’ll need all that.”

“Why not?” Roy asked curiously.

“Well, and I only called because the supervisor asked me too. The woman in question is disaster prone. I mean things like this always happen to her. Don’t ask me why but they do,” the guard commented as he began to lead the men inside the building.

They were led from one department of large machinery with papers flowing through the machines at high rates of speed; then to another department with machines that were opening envelopes and the women at them processing them quickly. They came upon the woman in question who was still lying on the floor. The victim was laughing at a comment made by one of her co-workers and seemed to be in good shape.

Roy bent down next to her, as Johnny opened the bio-phone getting it setup to make the call to Rampart. “What’s your name?” Roy asked the woman on the ground.

“I’m Mary, and really I feel fine. I’m just going to die of embarrassment,” she smiled.

“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that,” as Roy pulled out his pen flashlight and flashed the light into her eyes checking her pupil reactions which were equal and reactive. Pulling out the bp cuff he wrapped the cuff around her arm and pumped it up. Her blood pressure was normal, and pulse was normal. Moving his body back onto his heels, Roy asked, “Did you black out?”

“Oh no,” Mary replied as she rose and righted her chair so she could sit in it. Roy rose and Johnny repacked the biophone back up, as she continued her story. “What happened is this stapler is defective,” she held up the offending piece of office supply. Opening it up again she replaced the missing row of staples. “Every time I use the darn thing, it jams up after the third use. Then when I open it to find out what’s wrong it shoots the whole row of staples out at me. This time I lost my balance and fell out of the chair,” she giggled as her face blushed.

Johnny, whose curiosity got the better of him, picked up the stapler. Cracking it open a tiny bit nothing happened, but as soon as he opened it up all the way, it shot the staples out, which bounced harmlessly off his chest. But the reaction was priceless. Johnny jumped and stepped backwards. Tripping over the drug box, he fell, landing squarely on his behind with an oomph.

Roy began to chuckle, and Mary, feeling vindicated, said, “See.”

“Yes, I see ma’am,” he replied as he pulled out a MICU form for her to sign. Gathering his wayward partner and their equipment they headed outside to the squad. Roy’s chuckling grew louder as Johnny replied, “Go ahead and laugh, but she was right that stapler is defective.”

Regaining enough of his composure, “Only you could have a close encounter with a stapler.”

Johnny blushed again and pleaded, “Don’t let Chet get wind of this, I’ll never be able to live it down.”

“Oh, I think I can let this one stay here. Besides, he’s still having fun over your experience on the skateboard,” Roy guffawed.

“Humph,” Johnny folded his arms across his chest. “I know, and that’s why the phantom has got to go,” Johnny began in his tirade again, as the squad pulled away from the building, heading back to the station.

Roy’s chuckling at the stapler incident grew to full fledged laughter, as he thought to himself that only Johnny could have a close encounter of the stapler kind.

The End