Shade and Diesel hid themselves among the various cars in the parkling lot. They were scouting out the target for the latest request. Across from them, there was a white building with a symbol featuring a two-headed caduceus on a cross. No, they weren't in a high-tech fantasy world, but in front of a typical hospital in a small urban district.
The workday was soon going to end, but hiding out in a parking lot was the natural thing to do, since they wouldn't be out of place among other vehicles.
Still, there was virtually nothing to do but to wait for their target to come out.
Target: Michael Bradley
Occupation: Internal Doctor
- Malpractice
- Negligence of duties
- Under the counter schemes
"Hmm…sounds like the stereotypical crooked doctor who just doesn't care about anything but money."
It was hackneyed story. A guy making his way through medical school, probably doing it because someone decided to push him into it, for the purpose of making a hefty paycheck. Though it was probably easy to say that they were in their profession for greed, there was certainly a significant amount of effort required to maintain and hold onto their jobs. Long nights taking care of critical patients, the worry of misdiagnosis, the stress of being unable to save those in front of you – these things piled up and made it easy to make a slipup. And those slipups could lead to some rather toxic grudges by certain patients.
In this case, it seemed like the request came from someone who had suffered for a very long time, due to being given a trial medicine for their symptoms. The medicine had an adverse effect on their body, rendering them much sicker than would've otherwise.
The request was passed on to Diesel and Shade, the latter who seemed uncharacteristically enthusiastic about it.
Speaking of which, currently, Shade was in the next row, apparently asleep from waiting for so long.
"Hey Shade! It's almost time!"
"Huh! What! Where! Is it time? Is it time for the carnage?"
"Calm down, Shade. I know you have something against doctors in the past, but we should check to see if he's really what the client says he is."
Apparently, Shade died in the past due to a host of complicated medical failures. Seemingly, every doctor had something to say about her condition, which led to the prescription of different medicines. At some point, the different medications conflicted, resulting in a shutdown of her body and her standing before Kami-sama.
"What do you wish to do in your next life? Since yours tragically ended so early," he asked of her.
"I want to travel around and kick the ass of anyone who dares to cause trouble like they have caused me!" That was Shade's natural response after months of suffering in which none of the doctors seemed able to relieve. Furthermore, she had a desire to travel due to being too weak to walk any farther than within her own home during her sickness.
As a result, Kami-sama asked if she wanted to be a truck that took revenge for those that were wronged, which she happily agreed. Though, aside from bringing vengeance to those with evil intent, Shade didn't have the urge to do much else. Also, she tended to be a bit wild when that happened, so Kami-sama had decided to give her the requests where the target would need to reincarnate into a new body anyways.
The one time she had been sent to service her target into the next world 'as is', Kami-sama was left with re-assembling his body that had virtually become a smear scattered across many destroyed rooms caused in her rampage.
Kami-sama's powers were limited after all. It took him some time to move the entire destruction area to an enclosed space. And another few weeks to decipher and reassemble the pieces of his body back together. Especially, since the man had happened to be in the kitchen, Kami-sama had a hard time sorting out his brains and organs over the leftover meatloaf surprise that he had been holding mid-impact.
If he had made a mistake, then the poor guy would've been reincarnated with attributes of a pigcow, given the mixture of meats that provided the DNA. It was better just to let her handle the requests that needed no finesse.
As such, Diesel and Shade's current request only needed the mind of a doctor to send off to the next world, one that was teemingly full of undead. Apparently, a villain who sewed together zombies was needed. Just thinking about being forced to live in a place filled with the scent of rotten flesh was nauseating to Diesel. It made him wonder how Hell could be worse.
"Wait, here he comes! Get ready!"
Shade moved to a parking space where she had a clear shot down the path when he stopped in front of his car.
"Okay, can I do it now?! I want to go back to sleep."
Diesel scooted in front of Shade, keeping her from jumping the gun. "Wait, who's that approaching him?"
Sure enough, a shady character, in the typical dress of trying to be discreet but utterly failing, approached the doctor.
"Dr. Bradley, how do you do?" The man tipped his hat to him.
"What do you want? I already tried those samples that you provided. Case closed." Dr. Bradley looked unpleased to see him.
"So, what if they cause diarrhea? Then, you give them xxxx for that."
"And then yyyy for that, which causes massive nausea, and then zzzz, which causes inflammation – It's a long freaking daisy chain of drugs that you're having us force on patients!"
"So what? That just guarantees that your practice will have a steady flow of patients. A win/win situation that just takes a bit of time to solve."
"I don't care what the higher ups say. I'm done with this! Get out of my face. I'm leaving. End of discussion."
As the doctor got in the car, things seemed to be quite different than what was initially reported. It looked like the doctor had just been misled, and now, reflected on his actions. The shady hat guy seemed more suspicious in the meantime. Diesel eyed Shade as she revved up her engine suddenly.
"Woah! What are you doing?! We can't off that guy! He's not a suitable target to send. They need a doctor! A doctor!"
"Tch, then what are we supposed to do? I don't want to let him off the hook either."
"Hmm…good question." Diesel pondered for a moment before an idea hit him.
"Hey Kami-sama, can I ask you a question?" He radioed out.
Moments later, Kami-sama's voice could be heard. "Yes?"
"Can we request for help from someone in the divine realm? I have an idea. You may not like it though."
Kami-sama stroked his beard nervously on the other end as he listened to Diesel's request.
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The next day.
Shade was wondering why they were returning to the hospital rather than trailing the mystery guy that was pushing strange medicine onto doctors.
"You'll see. I requested for some 'backup'."
Rolling right up to the wall next to the emergency operating rooms, the two of them peeked inside with their ability.
Strangely, the man from yesterday was inside, strapped to a table.
"This is not funny! Who did this to me and why?! I'll have the director fire you immediately! You won't get away from this!" The man futilely resisted as he tried to wiggle out of his restraints.
Diesel pulled up his information on the request.
Target: Orville Stuart
Occupation: Hospital Director
- Coordination of Medical Malpractice
- Defiance of duties for monetary gain
- Taking bribes from pharmaceutical companies outside normal channels
Once a different target had been defined, Kami-sama could lock onto the person and dig up their current actions. By tracing the mystery man, he had found the paper trail leading to the mastermind.
"Well, that looks like a more solid case for fixing the main issue. And with good timing too. Look, there he is right now. Go have him bond a little closer with that Porsche of his."
"Will do. Woo-hoo!" Shade sped off, and in under 10 seconds, the sound of a horrible crash echoed in the parking lot. Hopefully, the Director would be reincarnated without a nose. Otherwise, Diesel would feel sorry for him, but just in the slightest bit.
Turning back to the operating room, a different request was being fulfilled.
In front of the mystery man, three geese had climbed on top of the surgery table. One had a scalpel in its beak. Another had a syringe. The last one just had a medical mask over its beak as it stared straight into the face of the man, who no longer had any sense of what was going on. But he knew, it wasn't going to be pleasant.
"HONK HONK HONK HONK!"
Diesel turned away at that moment because he never did like sharp things. He didn't need to see what was going to happen.
Slowly, he scooted away from the room as the sounds of painful screaming echoed from within. There would be no one to save him as the staff had been conveniently occupied elsewhere, compliments of Kami-sama's influence.
Shade and Diesel got their karma. And the geese got some for themselves. That was a win/win for the both of them.