Dortmund Hibernate

by C. J. Sutton

  Magnus slumped against the door, tired.

  “What the hell am I supposed to do?”

  A helpless plea.

  “I dunno, you’re the one with the key. Just watch out for those guards. Oh, let the good times roll. This is therapeutic.”

  Interrogation

  The reason a human lashes out is due to that competitive nature pulsating through every muscle. We do not take a loss well, Magnus. Nor should we.

  As Magnus left the room of Jasper James, he heard footsteps approaching from the front of the Asylum. A cold sweat strangled his body. He walked, hesitant, towards the social room, hoping he could hide the key and the knife in someone else’s locker before detection.

  “Mag,” said the familiar voice, from behind.

  He continued to walk, unsure how far Walter was behind him. If he could just get in there first, in hope of Brian being somewhere else…

  A hand squeezed his shoulder. Hard.

  “Where you off to?” asked Walter, turning the doctor on the spot. “Brian’s outside answering questions; you’re next.”

  “Very well,” he replied, remaining calm. “I just saw Simmonds, I need a coffee before I face the boredom of cop talk. Fucking cops.”

  Walter was sceptical, looking back to Simmonds’ door suspiciously.

  “Understandable, I’ll join.”

  They walked in unison, past the screams of Astrid Ellen in her cell, and the pounding of head against glass in Brutus’ enclosure. Magnus needed to break the silence to remain in control…for it slipped, a defrosting ice block hovering above the sink.

  “So, what do the cops know?”

  Walter hesitated.

  “Man dead, lacerations to the back of the head.”

  “Do they know who it was?” he said, as genuine as possible.

  “They do,” replied Walter, and Magnus knew he was waiting for the light of the social room to reveal the deceased, wanting to analyse the expression. Psychology 101. They entered to find Shirley placing her belongings in the locker.

  “It was your taxi driver,” said Walter, as though telling Magnus his dog had run away, “sorry to hear.”

  Magnus believed this moment would define their relationship. Shirley’s ears pricked up on the delivery of the news, and it was clear she already knew who was murdered and understood Walter’s approach.

  “Poor bastard,” said Magnus, running a hand through his hair, four eyes staring at him nervously. If they’d known he had a knife sheathed in his pants, or a key to unleash nine levels of hell…

  “Yeah, doesn’t really happen around here, with all the crazy locked up. What’s the point, offing a taxi driver?”

  He wasn’t just a driver and you know it, thought Magnus, before remembering that it was this kind of action that would lead all fingers pointing to him.

  “Where were you last night?” asked Walter, arms always at the ready.

  Magnus didn’t want to stall, but it came naturally…and toxic bubbled.

  “Wait a minute…they think it was me? You think it was me,” said Magnus, appalled, “I’m here to cure the murderers, not become one, Walter.”

  “Now I didn’t say—”

  “You didn’t need to…I’m a doctor…”

  The most awkward silence of Magnus’ life, and likely Shirley’s and Walter’s, sat in the corner of the room with legs crossed blowing smoke rings from a cigar. Shirley proceeded to make a coffee, setting up three cups to accommodate her company; anything to turn her back on the men in the social room. A preference of women, indeed.

  “Mag, they’re going to question you. One of the officers saw you physically handling the driver in the pub, the other saw you dismissing him in the zoo. I’m asking for your safety, not their benefit. Where were you?”

  Imagery from last night replayed like an old tape in black and white, sound removed, Lee’s face of pleasure hovering above as the room dissolved into static.

  “In my room,” he said, not wanting the confession of his time with a prostitute.

  “You’ll have to do better than that, I’d say.”

  Shirley handed Magnus the cup, its heat on his palm welcome.

  “I don’t have to do shit. I didn’t kill the man, and any accusations will be met with the end of their careers.”

  The door swung wide open, a gunshot to runners. Magnus dropped his coffee, the ceramic cup smashing into a million pieces on the hard floor, the brown liquid oozing into the cracks like a burst dam cascading through dank valleys. Brian stared, wide eyed, at the doctor and issued him outside with a nod of his head, sweat covering his brow.

  “They want you out there,” he said to Magnus, nervous. Magnus turned to clean up his mess, but Walter placed a hand on his shoulder, softer this time.

  “I’ve got it,” was the only response.

  Magnus shrugged, winced apologetically at Shirley and left the social room. The door soon slammed shut behind him. The long, dark hall of Dortmund Asylum reminded Magnus of what the poor kid must have seen had he regained consciousness in Annie the anaconda’s mouth; an abyss caused by Simmonds. The footsteps became a rhythmic dance that kept the eerie laughs at bay…but soon enough the heavy door halted the metronome. Magnus heaved, rain pattering against metal, and saw two armed police officers leaning against their vehicle, smoking and staring at the Asylum.

  “You must be Dr. Paul,” said the closest officer, sunglasses and a poorly trimmed beard on a pale face. His arms and stomach were thick tree trunks, but his legs hadn’t joined the family as yet, pins on an alley waiting to be bowled. He tossed away his cigarette and pulled out his notepad, while the other cop, smaller in size with double the attitude and slightly concealed by a blue hat, approached cautiously.

  “Yes,” said Magnus, shaking hands with the duo, “I heard there was a death in the town. I hope the exits have been sealed during the investigation?”

  Starting on the front foot took the police by surprise, a quick glance between the team telling Magnus one clue; this doctor, with no prior convictions and in his first week catering to the needs of Dortmund, was the prime and only suspect.

  “All the right precautions have been taken, but we have a few questions. He was your taxi driver, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were his only client?”

  “I doubt that, I’m sure he had others. What would a driver do all day while I’m here, working?”

  Another glance between parties; had they been any more obvious, their guns would have been pointing at Magnus’ face. And that thought reminded him of Jasper, disarming one in a state of exaggerated vulnerability.

  “We’ve spoken to most people in town, and nobody knew who he was, save for a few girls he drove home on Saturday night for a large tip. He arrived here one day before yourself, doctor. One concludes that his purpose was to bring you up and back, or wherever you like. Did the pair of you ever take a trip outside town?”

  “No,” said Magnus, abruptly, “we weren’t friends, our dealings were strictly business.”

  “Annoy you, did he?” asked the hat-wearer; must be the Bad Cop.

  “Yeah, at times, but no more than you’re both annoying me right now. I have a job to do, gentlemen. I’m here to cure the sickness in nine murderers, rapists, whatever you want to call them. I am their doctor; becoming one of them would make my profession null, don’t you think? I know you’re here to accuse me. But to tell you the truth, I was with someone last night, and I didn’t leave my hotel until ten minutes before my shift; the driver didn’t turn up, so I hiked up this hill. And I was late. I’m never late.”

  Bad Cop adjusted his hat.

  “With Lee, were you?” he said, spitting out a phlegm wad.

  Magnus didn’t have to answer; his expression gave them fact.

  “Sorry to disturb you, doctor,” said Good Cop, jotting another note into his pad before tucking it in his back pocket and withdrawing his keys to the car. “We’ll talk to Lee and let you know if we req
uire any further information. Is there anything else you’d like to tell us, before we go?”

  “There is,” said Magnus, brushing a strand of Astrid’s hair off the front of his shirt. “Don’t bring the squad car up here; if a person was to escape, you’d never see it again.”

  The Button

  Have you heard the African proverb, Magnus? If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a closed room with a mosquito

  It’s time to do some investigating of my own.

  “I saw your snake” said Magnus, watching Claude Slippery Simmonds gnawing on a piece of meat in the middle of his cell. “She’s locked up, just like you, in a zoo no more than three kilometres from this very spot.”

  After the interrogation, Walter had been waiting at the entrance of the Asylum, likely having listened to the entire affair. The look of assessment was more for his time with Lee than the potential of him killing the taxi driver. Admitting he spent a night with a prostitute was harder than confessing a murder, had the latter been truth. Doctors have a professional aura, and once that aura is pierced, so is seriousness. To achieve his goals, they needed to see him as an upstanding citizen. Magnus hoped this news wouldn’t filter through to his employers…or to other guards, especially Carter. Had Carter used Lee?

  “I know she’s there, doc.”

  “Of course you do Claude, because of the information you receive, yes?”

  Claude shrugged to agree, much too focused on his meal, which Magnus now saw was a rat fresh from a kill, tail dangling like a strand of spaghetti. Blood smeared his mouth, covering teeth, a complete dinner with a side of red.

  “They don’t treat her well, Claude. Kids laugh, zookeepers starve her, men throw stones. It’s not an attraction, it’s a circus.”

  I need to know how they get their information. I need to know which one of these nine killed the damn taxi driver. I need to keep my sanity to pass my mission.

  Claude picked up the rat’s newly dead head and tossed it at Magnus, hitting him in the forehead. Restraint sizzled away like the fat off meat on the grill, soaring through the gaps in the door.

  “You’re just angry because we got your driver.”

  “We…who is we?”

  “Us, the insane. The people you can’t save, no matter how hard you push. Trying to save us is like trying to keep this rat alive…it’s already dead.”

  Magnus wiped the blood off his forehead, no longer disgusted by the scene, just the approach.

  “I have a key, I can let you see your Annie,” said Magnus, showing Claude what weighed in his hand.

  “I know you have it, how else would we have got to your driver.”

  “Fuck!” screamed the doctor, stomping on the rat’s head to see brain ooze out onto his shoe. “I’m supposed to be here to save you, and you’re all fucking with me. Why? Do you want to be killed?”

  “It is kill,” said Claude, shaking the rat carcass before his face like a ticking clock, “or be killed. Them boys I captured knew that. Annie knows that. Walter knows and Carter knows. The cops, they know. Why is it so hard for you to understand? Questions won’t get answers here. I know the day I walk free from this place is closer than ever. And I’m going to stroll right down to that zoo and bust out my beloved. That’s why I don’t shake, that’s why your taunts mean nothing. You said to your colleagues that I expect Annie to come up here and set me free, but an anaconda can’t do that. I can, though, and when I do, you’ll see what crazy really means.”

  How can he know I said that?

  Teeth ripped away furry flesh, eyes rolling back in delight, the taste more fulfilling than a searing roast with all the trimmings. Hopelessness grew into the limbs of Magnus Paul, Claude no longer caring for the company outside his cell holding a master key. It won’t just be the cops and guards who’ll lay blame on his shoulders, he knew. Small towns talk. Will those at the bar turn their heads? Will he be served beer with a steady hand? Will Lee be impacted by the news? He had to see her…soon.

  “Doc,” said Claude, for the fifth time.

  “Yeah?” he responded, trying to mask the deflated state inside his head.

  “Do you know why I was caught?”

  “Because you couldn’t control the sickness; it catches up with everyone, you can’t hide from yourself.”

  “No. No, no, no, no, no. Where’d you get your papers? The reason I was caught is because I could control my sickness, I have complete control over my mind, and my lifestyle became too public. It wasn’t a crime to have a nice car named after my favourite breed of cat. It wasn’t a crime to know everything a man could possibly know about animals. No. The kids pushed the emergency button when they tried to boost my ride. I’d never killed men before that night. They made me realise how much I hate humanity. If those brothers had entered my home, stabbed me in the throat and then stole the Jag, fair play. But while I live and breathe, while it’s parked in my garage? Fuck that. We all have that point, doc. That emergency button. Some are hidden so far within that they never get pressed. But once they do, there’s no going back. I can see it,” he said, standing, pointing, hair a bush, “that yours is about to be pressed, and it’s going to be sicker than anything in this cell, or the cell across from me. Grab the popcorn kids; Doctor Magnus Paul is about to make it double figures in Dortmund Asylum.”

  Finding the Teat

  Magnus, we look at difference unfavourably. Too fast, you’re dangerous. Too slow, you’re a fool. Why is our own pace the ideal barometer?

  Slippery Simmonds had been the last patient before Magnus Paul finished his shift. The doctor didn’t know what day it was, aware only that beer was needed and a room full of sane people were a desired backdrop to stop his mind from obsessing over a dead taxi driver. The pub had little more than fifteen inhabitants chewing complementary nuts and engaging in low talk, town gossip, their eyes darting to the dishevelled doctor in a crumpled white shirt and jeans caked in mud from the descent; better get used to the hike. There was no Lee, swaying hips to the beat of a band. No Walter hunched over the bar engaging in a conversation that made Magnus feel as though he had a friend in this grim haven. And no taxi driver in a far-off corner assessing his every decision…but a shadow lingered where he once sat – a being not seen but felt; a man cloaked in invisibility not letting Magnus forget about the death and all that would follow because of the way it occurred. Beneath a slanted painting of a goat grazing in thick grass, Magnus noticed a familiar head staring into the bottom of a whiskey glass. To go over and converse was better than the company of ghouls, the unpredictability of whispers.

  “Thought you were sick,” said Magnus, as the aged head bolted upwards.

  “Shhh,” he said, loud and drunk, “don’t tell anyone.”

  Carter had deep bags under his eyes, purple blotches infecting the rest of his cracked face. His grey hair didn’t care for conformity, his hands hidden under the table, likely under his rear to avoid their shakes.

  “Did you hear about the murder?” said Magnus, fishing.

  “Sure, your taxi driver, smashed in the skull and drowned, they say?”

  News travels faster than the western wind. But in Carter’s eyes Magnus didn’t see blame or suspicion. In Carter’s eyes, Magnus saw…nothing.

  “So they say.”

  Magnus felt pity for the ageing guard, his true self wallowing in the scent of smoked bourbon, no love for the job present.

  “You…okay?” he asked, unable to deter from his general position in life.

  “Okay?” slurred Carter. “If only you knew how okay I was, it’d make you run out of this pub. I’m too okay, and that is an issue.”

  Spittle took flight with every word, a shower on the forecast if Magnus was to remain on the table.

  “Very well,” he said, standing up, but a hand suddenly shot out from under the table and grabbed Magnus by the pants pocket, dragging him back down. Quick hands around here.

  “Don’t let a man drink alone.”

/>   Magnus hesitated, but remained, sipping at his pint of liquid gold while trying to think of conversation. He knew little of Carter’s past, and cared even less, but silence has a way of revealing the worth of a hand, even to the holder.

  “Have you been in Dortmund all your life?” asked Magnus, to which Carter spat.

  “No, got dragged into this shithole, didn’t I. Fucking stupid, but I showed them, huh?”

  “Ah…yeah, you did. Any children?”

  In a flash Carter seemed to sober up, the alcohol evaporating out of his pores to seek another poor soul. More people were entering the pub now, with darkness controlling the skies and there being little else to do in the land of the hidden.

  “I hate children. You?” he said, mockingly. “Tight ass wife in the city, nestling your little birdies while you make them a fortune?”

  “No kids, no wife,” he replied, quickly.

  “Well, no kids, no wife, no life. Why are you here? The money can’t be better than a city job, even at Dortmund.”

  “I do it for my siblings,” said Magnus. “I lost my sister to addiction, and my brother to a sickness. When we were young, we were best friends. Their sickness grew with age and surroundings. There has to be something in that, you know?”

  Carter stood up, whistled loudly, pointed to himself and then Magnus, and held up two fingers. The bartender moved as if on a timer, tapping his foot as the pint glass filled before grabbing a top-shelf bourbon and pouring a double shot. He dashed over, almost knocking a pair of tradesmen as he set the glasses on the wooden table.

  “To age and surroundings,” he said as they clinked glasses. Carter’s hands weren’t shaking, but they were pink as though left out in the sun too long.

  “Who do you think ended the cabbie?”

  Magnus noted not an ounce of interrogation, so he spoke freely.

  “I wish I knew that answer. Now I have to cart my ass up that hill every day, and be looked at as though I’m a murderer because nobody else used his services.”