Chapter 1000: Getting Closer to the Truth
Translator: Sean88888 Editor: Elkassar1
(TL: woohoo Chapter 1000)
(ED: !!!!!!!!!)
"There's no doubt that Nicholas' secret lies in his body."
Sheyan placed his hands on the table and swept his gaze across everyone's face as he said so confidently.
"Regardless of whether Nicholas is dead or alive , as long as his body is still there, we can uncover the secret from it."
Reef earnestly asked, "Do you mean the scars on his body? The marks left by surgery?"
"There's probably more than that, my friend. I feel that finding the person who operated on Nicholas is one clue, and it's the obvious clue given by the mission, but Nicholas' corpse may very well be another important clue in itself. Besides that, the stuff Nicholas had with him before he went to prison also has great research value," answered Sheyan.
"Nicholas' corpse is an important clue?" asked Mogensha in bewilderment, "How so?"
Sheyan smiled. "Corpses can speak too - when they're in the hands of certain professionals. Professionals such as forensic doctors, who have a lot of experience looking for evidence on dead bodies."
The bait which Sanzi habitually placed at the stern of the boat had surprisingly caught a tuna. There were only some simple ingredients on the boat, so Sheyan and his brother showed off their skills with a knife and treated everyone to some tuna sashimi.
With Sheyan keeping watch, everyone else relaxed and had a good rest. Eight hours of sleep pretty much restored everyone to their optimum condition. After that, Sheyan steered the boat back to Los Angeles. Although they did meet with coast patrol along the way, they were superior both in terms of boat and skill,so they managed to escape from their pursuers without any danger.
It was evident that the aftermath of their fine work in Los Angeles had yet to die down, but the tension among the citizens of Los Angeles were not as high as one would expect. The terror in Hollywood had only affected the safety of the rich. As for the prison riot, as long as the prisoners did not escaped, everything was fine.
On the contrary, the threat of invasion by a large number of cold-blooded Terminators was more worrying, because although these steel monsters did not actively hunt humans, they harbored no goodwill towards humans either. They would kill all the humans they met along the way. (Of course, if a human was too far away, a Terminator would not bother chasing the person down.)
Therefore, although there were strict inspections being performed all over the city, most of them were to catch robots. In truth, Sheyan had overestimated the consequence of his previous reckless act.
Sheyan and Sanzi had to undergo inspection when they infiltrated the prison previously, so they had had to use their real appearances, unlike the others who had altered their appearances during the operation. Now, the two of them needed to put on some simple disguises
After returning to Los Angeles, the team once again split up for the sake of efficiency.
Sheyan and Sanzi would investigate the clues regarding to the scars on Nicholas' body, while Zi and Mogensha would "invite" a forensic doctor over to dissect the body. Of course, the best way to do that was to tempt the doctor with cash. The money would make sure the client remained tight-lipped afterwards.
After some investigation, Zi and Mogensha chose a forensic doctor named Dr. Smith who had been in practice for twenty years. He was about 40 years old and was in a bad financial state. A person who had 20 years of experience in a field surely could not be that bad.
The task was done without much difficulty. Dr. Smith was easily tempted by a hundred thousand dollars to violate the loosely-enforced rules. He agreed to all the conditions, then brought over all his tools and started the examination.
The whole forensic examination process was quite gory and unpleasant, so Zi naturally did not stay to watch. She left Mogensha there to watch over Dr. Smith. Mogensha just smoked his cigar without any expression.
Compared to how smooth-sailing the operation was on Zi's side, Sheyan's side met with a rather huge problem.
They first contacted Mr. Dursley, whom they had worked with before. Apparently, the bribe given to the workshop supervisor was still in effect as he was very cooperative in answering Sheyan's questions.
Nicholas had always had some problems with his health. He had a bout of illness five years ago, which was apparently quite serious. The hospital had even issued a notice of critical illness, but after a surgery, not only did he miraculously recover, he recovered very thoroughly. Since then, Nicholas started to drink and smoke heavily.
Sheyan immediately pointed out the crux of the problem.
"Since you're his direct superior, Mr. Dursley, surely you must know what kind of illness he suffered from."
Dursley replied in a confident tone, "Of course. He has a very serious case of congenital heart disease. It's precisely because of his condition that he was transferred to our workshop's quality control department, since it's the only job that's suitable for him."
Sheyan's spidey sense tingled as soon as he heard that. Not only was severe congenital heart disease difficult to cure, but more importantly, the best time for treatment is when the patient is younger than 10 years old. Beyond this age, the increase in height will cause more burden on the heart, leading to more and more heart damage! And yet, the scars on Nicholas' body could confirm that his heart was indeed operated on.
According to Dursley, Nicholas was completely cured after the operation and started drinking, smoking and eating wantonly like a healthy man. That was nothing short of a medical miracle!
Something smelled fishy!
With some excitement, Sheyan enquired from Mr. Dursley the place where Nicholas had the operation done.
Mr. Dursley simply answered, "It was District 8 Community Hospital, and I remember it very well, because Nicholas didn't have the money to choose the hospital when his condition worsened, so the entire treatment was done in the community hospital."
And District 8 Community Hospital was exactly where Sheyan and his party members were stuck.
The quality of the hospital was comparable to the district level hospitals in China in the real world. Be it the facilities, the equipments or the personnel, they were far inferior to higher grade hospitals. What were the chances for a doctor from this kind of place to completely cure Nicholas' severe congenital heart disease?
Armed with the power of money, Sheyan had no trouble finding out the identity of the main doctor responsible for the operation, but the doctor had retired and emigrated to Canada. A bit of snooping around revealed that the doctor did not have the reputation nor the history to suggest that he was capable of performing a miracle like that. He had had 11 infringements of differing severity throughout his career - even his retirement was due to a serious medical accident. But, the doctor had a rich son, who hired the best lawyer for him. He was able to retire and move to Canada after paying a hefty amount in compensation.
All the signs showed that the secret lay in that miraculous surgery. How did the magic happen?! How did a mediocre doctor suddenly become a miracle worker, conquering the fatal illness that had baffled all the doctors around the world?
At a corridor in the hospital, Sanzi kept dialing the phone, but every call he made failed to connect. Sheyan lit a cigarette, took a deep puff, and spewed out the smoke.
He pondered carefully and said,"A heart surgery is absolutely not as simple as a circumcision operation.(ED: Wow) There must be a first assistant and a second assistant, and the third assistant as well as the anesthesiologist must be present as well. If we really can't find the doctor, there are still four others who had witnessed the operation. Maybe they wouldn't know the details, but if we can combine all four of the testimonies, we might be able to somewhat restore the scene."
Sanzi's eyes lit up when he heard that. "That's right! I'll go take care of it right away!"
Sanzi's ability in carrying out orders was as strong as always. After a busy period of time, he succeeded in getting the list of people who took part in Nicholas' surgery. The first assistant and anesthesiologist back then were still working in the community hospital right now, so Sanzi went to talk to them.
"The surgery? Oh, I remember! That surgery was messier than our general election this year! Doctor Didi made at least a dozen mistakes during the operation! And I'll tell you what, the most unfortunate person was not the guy lying on the operating table, but me! I was the one who had to correct all those mistakes!"
"Unusual incidents? I don't recall any. The only thing unusual was that the patient was really lucky not to die on the operating table. In fact, with that severe a heart defect, the pacemaker and the restoration we did wouldn't have helped much. He would live for two more years at most."
"Oh, before the operation, Dr. Didi spoke with the patient for a really long time. They had a most agreeable chat from 2pm all the way until the time the doctor got off work, but that's no big deal. Doctors are obliged to relieve the psychological depression of patients. In this respect, Dr. Didi is actually pretty outstanding. I always thought he should be a lawyer or a politician instead with his eloquence.
"...."
As Sanzi was telling Sheyan all this, the public phone next to Sheyan rang. This was the temporary mode of communication he and Zi agreed upon.
"Hello?" Sheyan waited calmly for a moment before he picked up the receiver. He could hear from the voice transmitted over that the mood of the caller must be agitated and urgent.
"Seaman, come back quickly!" The one speaking was Zi. She usually had a calm demeanor, but right now, she sounded short of breath, and there was a trace of surprise and shock in her voice!
"We discovered something amazing during the autopsy! You'd better come back and see it for yourself!"