Chapter 10

A few years past and Ashley and Steven Shelby got married.  Steven Goodykoontz graduated and attended Indianapolis University and began working at the Indianapolis Zoo to pay for it.  Ashley and Steven Goodykoontz’s relationship stopped after he moved.  He thought about her often and really missed being her friend.  However, they did call once in a while and when they did, they updated themselves. 

Steven arrived at the zoo after hours to clean up the live fish tanks.  He was a maintenance worker and his job required him to swim inside of tanks and clean out garbage and algae from the tanks.  He also had to fish out the dead fish.  Most of his days were uneventful, however today was different.  There were two boys who liked to pick on him.  They did not mean to be hurtful; they just liked to play pranks on people.  However one thing about today is that they went way too far. 

Steven put on his wet suit and not knowing, the two boys had put metal staples inside of it because today he was scheduled to clean out the electric eel tank.  He walked into the dressing room and spread dish soap all over his body and slid the suit on.  He walked out onto the ramp over the tank.  He put on his goggles and his snorkel.  He jumped in and began to clean out the tank. Very soon afterwards he began to feel jolts of electricity.  He played it off as nothing and kept working.  The two boys peered into the tank and noticed that Steven was feeling the pain and they were laughing.  However, once the eels became more aggressive, the jolts of electricity became worse.  At that time, Steven tried to get out of the tank, however with every jolt he convulsed.  With one big convulsion, he caught the back of his wet suit on a piece of coral and ripped his suit and cut himself.   The eels smelled the blood and went into a frenzy.

Suddenly, the laughter of the boys stopped and it turned to freight.  They ran to the nearest phone and called 911.  However, the damage was done.  Steven was being eaten alive and the eels began to slime around Steven and their jolts became excruciating.  He wiggled around a little bit and he suddenly went into shock and passed out.  The two boys, riddle with fear and anxiety suited up and jumped into the murky slimy water and brought Steven out into the open.  They performed CPR and were able to revive him.  He came too, however just as soon as he came to, he passed out again.  They laid him out ont dry ground and waited for the ambulance to arrive.

Once the ambulance arrived, the paramedics strapped him into the gurney and threw him into the back. 

“Will he be okay?” asked one of the boys.

“Uncertain,” replied the paramedic.  “He certainly is in bad shape.”

The two boys looked at each other worried.  They shook their heads as they watched the ambulance speed off towards the hospital.

***

At the hospital, the paramedics wheeled Steven in and they rushed him into the operating room.  Steve was barely conscience and was whimpering as he was gasping for air.  One of the doctors put an air pump to his mouth to help him breathe, however the damage to his lungs were tremendous.  Scars were all over his face and body and he was still bleeding, despite being bandaged up. 

The doctors wheeled him into the OR and they rolled him onto another gurney and put him to sleep with a sedative and they proceeded to operate on him.  They put a tube down his throat and began to suck out the water and slime from his lungs.  Then they turned him over and washed out his wounds on his arm and his back. However, his arm was badly torn up, so they had to amputate it.  They sewed up his back and bandaged it up. 

Next was his face.  His left eye was beyond repair and it ran the risk of getting badly infected.  Instead of trying to repair it, they took it out.  There were massive amounts of scars on his face from the eels slashing him getting banged around on the coral.  Some slime seeped into the wounds it made it very difficult to clean out and sew back up.  They used some water and sprayed out his wounds and they rubbed alcohol on inside of it to clean it.  Then they proceeded to sew it up. 

Despite these efforts to keep Steven alive, they were still losing him.  It seems that he also suffered a massive heart attack in the struggle and the lack of oxygen had hurt his brain.  His breathing was erratic and his heart rate was through the roof.  The doctors raced to pump some blood thinners into him, however it was too late.  Steven died right there on the operating table.

All the doctors watched in horror and in melancholy as the heart monitor flat-lined.  The doctors put away their instruments and unplugged Steven from the feeding tubes and the monitors.  They put a sheet over him and slowly wheeled him into the morgue.