by Stevie Barry
That might not stop her trying, though. Her hospital bed was going in his damned living-room -- he wasn't going to make the mistake of leaving her on her own again. It would be a while yet before she'd spend any significant amount of time conscious. The scarring would be horrendous, but with proper physical therapy she should eventually regain full use of the limb.
For some reason, Lorna looked smaller while unconscious. She was a little bundle of contrariness when awake, the force of her personality giving her a slight illusion of height. Now, stitched and bandaged, she looked vulnerable in a way Von Ratched didn't like. Vulnerability was wrong on her -- and he found it odd that he should think so, since she was unquestionably easier to deal with like this.
Now he summoned a nurse, ordering her to give Lorna a sponge bath and wash her hair. Once again he had an odd notion of letting her keep her physical dignity -- even more odd this time around, since he'd just spent three hours operating on the woman. Still, it only seemed right to leave that detail to someone else.
Dawn was streaking the sky when he went out to survey the destruction again. It looked even worse in the daylight, and he was going to have a long, long headache of a day ahead of him. They needed fresh supplies, aircraft, personnel, and enough material to rebuild the hangar. While he could more than afford it, there was no knowing how much time they'd have before winter boxed them in.
And that was quite apart from what the inmates would do, when they found out about this -- and they'd know the details, sooner or later. Best tell them the escapees were dead, or he'd never be done dealing with copycats. Really, Lorna ought to be punished for this, but she'd been shot twice and all her friends were gone. Nothing Von Ratched could do would be worse than that. It might be wise to put her on suicide watch for a while.
He sighed, heading for his office. He had work to do.
----
Once Katje was through panicking, she settled down to business. She had no training beyond basic first aid, but she wasn't very squeamish, so she helped Gerald as best she could.
Ratiri had been shot in the thigh, and the bullet was still in there. There was nothing to do for now but keep pressure on it, and try to keep him warm enough to avoid going into shock. She'd wrapped her bathrobe around him, and now she was shivering so hard she thought her bones would break apart. Her tears had dried on her face, and her cheeks felt cold and tight. Her nose wouldn't stop running, and her eyes still stung from the smoke and grit. If she hadn't had Ratiri to take care of, she might have fallen apart entirely.
She looked at Gerald, who had sacrificed his doctor's coat to Ratiri, and looked as cold as she felt. In the dim light of the cabin his face was grey, streaked with soot and dried sweat, but he was as professional as he could be, given the circumstances. Ratiri was only half-conscious, whimpering like a wounded animal -- he'd hit his head when he fell, and half-dried blood crusted the left side of his face. He was going to be a holy terror when he came to and found they didn't have Lorna.
But Katje couldn't think about Lorna, or she'd lose it herself. If Lorna hadn't died on that tarmac, nothing good would await her -- but there was no way she would have stayed behind unless she was mortally wounded. This entire thing had been her idea; she'd get out or she'd die trying. And she hadn't gotten out.
Katje hoped Lorna was dead, because God knew what Von Ratched would do to her if she survived. After all the damage she'd done, he'd probably torture her to death, and the thought made Katje ill. She didn't want to know just how creative he could get in that area, but her imagination was unfortunately vivid.
So she sat and shivered, and wondered if any of them would ever be whole again.
----
Lorna wasn't sure when she properly woke. She spent far too long in fuzzy half-dreams, her mind filled with fire and death. If she was dead, this was surely hell.
But eventually she did wake, and found herself staring at an off-white ceiling. There was an IV in her right arm, and she was pumped full of so many drugs she felt like she was floating. What was she doing here? Where was here?
Memory hit her like a tire-iron to the head. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Not only was she still alive, she was still in the bloody Institute. The Institute she'd half destroyed.
She tried to sit up, and pain lanced through her right shoulder. That's right, she'd been shot -- there would be no running this time. Maybe she could hang herself on her IV line before Von Ratched could come back and murder her.
"Don't try to get up."
Lorna twitched. There was an orderly seated in a chair against the far wall, behind a portable desk strewn with paperwork. A woman, tall and big-boned in a vaguely pretty way, her dark hair pulled back in a sleek ponytail.
"Do me a favor," Lorna croaked. Her throat was so dry she could barely form words. "Kill me before that fucker comes back." Her words were so slurred and her accent so heavy that odds were good the woman wouldn't understand her at all.
"Can't. Doctor said you've got to recover."
Why? she wondered. She'd be pretty easy to torture as she was. Why waste resources getting her back to health first?
"I have to say, that's a lot of damage you did." Was it just her, or did the woman sound a little impressed?
"Only thing I'm any good at." And lately, it seemed like that was true. Lorna Donovan, destruction personified. Soon to be the very late Lorna Donovan, but growing exhaustion dulled her fear. At least the others would survive, since she'd left Von Ratched nothing to pursue them with. She'd got them out of hell, and that knowledge was the only comfort she had.
Consciousness wandered away again, and when it returned, the orderly was gone. Unfortunately, in her place sat Von Ratched.
Lorna tensed, but she was too weak and too drugged to break anything with her telekinesis. None of her vague nightmares could compare with the sight of that man, who sat so still he could have been a statue. He sat with his hands laced together, watching her with an intensity that managed to unnerve her even in her fuzzy state.
"I underestimated you, Lorna," he said. "Something I will take care to never do again. If it comforts you at all, your compatriots did indeed escape."
Why was he telling her that? Why would he give her any reassurance at all?
"You, however," he continued, "are going nowhere. Ever. I don't care if I have to keep you drugged until the end of time -- you will not leave this Institute."
Though his voice remained perfectly even, there was a threat and a promise in it that made her shudder. "Surprised you didn't kill me," she managed.
He arched an eyebrow. "I am not going to hurt you, Lorna. I do not break my own things."
"Piss off," she muttered, on pure reflex. The connotations of that were something she just couldn't deal with yet. She felt sick enough already. If he thought he could hit her with a case of Stockholm Syndrome, she'd jump out a window before he had a chance to get started.
Von Ratched shook his head. "So very stubborn," he sighed. "You could be so much more than you are, if you stopped being too pigheaded to learn. No matter. I will teach you."
Bullshit, she thought, her eyes tracking him as he left the room. Good. She needed some time alone -- time to think, insofar as she could through all the drugs. With these wounds she'd be stuck here a month at least, but it was never too early to start planning.
Unfortunately, he returned a moment later, carrying a hairbrush.
"No," Lorna said flatly. "You really want me to settle in here, you stop doing that."
"Hush, you foolish woman. Until your shoulder heals, you will not be able to do this yourself. Just be glad I have assigned a nurse to help you deal with everything else."
Oh, ick. She hadn't even thought of that, but she was profoundly grateful she could retain at least a little dignity. She stayed still and scowled as he worked on her hair, this time seriously considering chopping it all off as soon as she got a chance. Hell, maybe she'd even shave her head.
"Why do I repulse you so much, Lorna?
" he asked, drawing the brush along the crown of her head.
"'Cause you're you," she retorted, still slurring. "I know what you are, Doctor. Why does it bother you that I do? Are you vain or something?"
Von Ratched laughed, almost silently. "Were you anyone else, it would not bother me. As it is you, however, we will have to work on that."
Yeah, right. She stayed resolutely silent after that, hoping he'd get bored and go torment someone else, but no such luck. Surely he had other stuff he should be doing, right? After she'd destroyed so much, he ought to be busy nonstop working out how to fix it all. Just how long had she been unconscious?
"There," he said, after what seemed like an eternity and a half. "When you are capable of staying awake for any length of time, I will bring you something to read. Meanwhile there is a button beside your bed. It will summon a nurse if you require anything."
All I need is you in a coffin, Lorna thought, refusing to reply. Preferably in bits.
Von Ratched shook his head again and left her, but she couldn't go back to sleep right away. How the hell was she to get out of this? Staying here longer than necessary simply wasn't to be thought of.
Sitting up was a struggle, but she had to look at her leg. It was splinted and wrapped in bandages, and she wondered how bad the damage was -- how long it would be before she could walk. Her right hand explored the wound at her shoulder, but it too was too heavily bandaged to properly investigate. Damn.
She lay back down again as carefully as she could, already exhausted again. The others escaped, she reminded herself. Von Ratched couldn't hurt them anymore. It was the only good thought she had to hold onto.
----
Von Ratched was indeed very busy, but he had to take time to see Lorna. Knowing her, she'd try to crawl away and reopen her shoulder. It was going to be hell when she managed to stay conscious for more than fifteen minutes at a time, but that could be dealt with when it happened.
For once in his life, he had no plan at all. Plans were pointless when dealing with her, so he didn't bother. Now that she was cut off from all her friends, he had a chance to make her believe he wasn't a total monster -- the problem was that he was a complete bastard, and she knew it.
But it would be at least a week before she was consistently awake enough to do much of anything. Meanwhile he'd spent a full day on his satellite phone, seated in his office with a succession of gin and tonics. The speed with which everything had to be done made the cost enormous, all the more so because none of his suppliers were legal.
The new hangar would be a bare-bones construction, since he just wanted something put together before the snow flew. It had to be big enough to hold their supplies and a few aircraft, but it didn't have to be fancy. Few of his mercenaries had actually died, though plenty would be in traction for a while.
The inmates were confined to their rooms for now, and wouldn't be released until he could devote proper attention to dealing with them. At least if they were separated, they wouldn't gossip. Grieggs was in charge of them, since she was one of the few of his staff he trusted to be able to deal with it all.
And yet, even with the stress, he was in a remarkably good mood. Lorna had inadvertently taken care of the Ratiri problem for him, and if the man was far enough away, she wouldn’t be able to talk to him. Even Von Ratched's telepathic range only stretched a few miles, though he was working on that. He didn't want to admit that his escapees had run so far and so fast that he couldn't locate them telepathically. That was weakness, and the underlings had seen him physically wounded too often already. He preferred them thinking he was something more than human.
He signed off on the last of his paperwork, and went to tour the inmates' wing. It was blessedly quiet here, and a few scared faces peered at him through the small windows in the cell doors. They certainly thought him inhuman, and that pleased him. He was something more than they, and they should damn well know it.
Von Ratched would be the first to admit he was a very arrogant man, but he had the power to back up that arrogance. Until he'd met Lorna and Duncan, very few things had ever escaped his control: his world was ordered exactly as he liked it. And now, with Duncan gone, it could be again. Lorna would be problematic for a long while yet, but if she was the only troublesome element in his life, he would count himself fortunate.
The cafeteria gleamed as it never had when it was used, and the Activities Hall was immaculate. He'd keep the inmates penned for at least another week, until they'd be so stir-crazy they'd behave like angels if it meant they could leave their rooms.
Meanwhile, there was still Wrigley to deal with. The boy was back to being heavily sedated, and he couldn't be kept in isolation indefinitely. When things had settled down, Von Ratched would repeat that experiment on a few other inmates, to see if the results were typical. It would be good to get back to proper work.
He gathered some things from the kitchen and went back to his own apartment to cook. Lorna should at least try to eat something, if he could keep her awake long enough to do it. She'd need books soon, and perhaps he could give her a television, though there was no way he would let her watch the news. She could have movies, though, once he figured out what she'd like. If she grew too bored she'd try to get up no matter what he said, and she really did need to stay off her leg. In another week he'd give her crutches, so she could at least go to the bathroom on her own, and it would need a cast eventually. The bone was fractured, but he couldn't put a cast on it until the flesh and muscle had healed.
She was asleep again when he got home, her duty-nurse reading a paperback book. "Has she woken at all?"
The woman put aside her book. "Not fully. She started muttering in some language I didn't understand, but she didn't respond when I questioned her."
He knew the nurse was vastly curious as to why Lorna was in his apartment rather than an actual hospital room, but like all his staff, she would never ask. Doubtless they would speculate among themselves, but let them. They knew better than to question him. "It's a start, I suppose. You are dismissed for this evening."
She nodded, and left with a distinct air of relief. Von Ratched knew it unnerved the nurses and orderlies to be in his private space, but it couldn't be helped, and they would never pry into his things. It meant they were in for a certain level of boredom, but that couldn't be helped, either.
He looked at Lorna, who was definitely unconscious now. It was somewhat odd that he'd started finding her beautiful, but he did. Her past life had marked her, yes, but it gave her a certain allure she would not have had if she'd looked like DaVries. He could see the woman she might have been, had her life been different. She was a great deal more intelligent than she let on, and he wondered what she would have made of herself, if she'd had a proper education. Perhaps he could see to it she got one now. She had so much potential, and he would see she made use of it.
He went to his kitchen to make dinner -- steak for himself, soup for her. She'd be on a diet of clear liquids for some time yet, but Von Ratched was a very good cook, and he could make chicken soup a little more interesting. His kitchen was spacious enough for him to properly work in, bigger than one man probably needed, with black granite counters and a gas stove worthy of a chef. Very rarely did he feed anyone but himself, but he had expensive taste, and his tools had to be worthy of it.
He made her some tea as well, sweet ginger to soothe her stomach, and mixed himself a White Russian, though he'd been drinking on and off all day. Using morphine was a bad idea with Lorna here, so he'd settle for the poor man's substitute. Once she'd recovered he'd have to be careful with that, too, since the last thing he needed was her to plunge back into raging alcoholism.
The shelves with all his notebooks would have to move, too, probably to another, more private office. He didn't trust Lorna to respect his privacy -- he wouldn't, were he in her shoes -- so everything that wasn't locked in his desk had to go. This was not a living arrangement he'd made on a whim; he'd figured out how to Lorna-proof his
apartment some time ago. He'd acclimate her, and then….
Then what? a snide little part of his mind asked. You can't keep her locked in your apartment indefinitely. She would go mad. And she’d take you with her.
He knew that. Of course he knew that. The goal was to make her want to stay, and he was arrogant enough to think he could do it.
With a shake of his head, Von Ratched took the soup into Lorna's room. She was half awake now, but she snapped to full, wary consciousness as soon as she saw him.
"I am not going to poison you," he said, forestalling her protest as he picked up her breakfast-tray one-handed. "You must eat, if you are ever to recover enough to get out of this bed."
She didn't fight when he set the tray down, and the smell of the soup was enough to make her pick up the spoon. Those green eyes were still wary, though, still regarded him as very much the enemy. There was a fine pattern of scratches on her left cheek that hadn't healed yet, and a rather spectacular bruise over her right eye. Her chin was scraped, and she'd split her upper lip against her teeth -- it looked like she'd lost a bar fight. He wondered how many she'd been in, throughout her life.
"I didn't know you could cook," she said at last.
"There is a great deal you do not know about me, Lorna."
"I just bet," she muttered acidly.
"Sooner or later you will stop being so hostile."
"Doubt it," she said, slurping her soup. "Been this way my whole life. Don't you go thinking I'll change on your account."
"You did for Ratiri," he pointed out.
"You, mate, are not Ratiri," she snorted. "You're like…the anti-Ratiri. I know what you are."
He sat in the spare chair, crossing his arms. "And what do you think I am?"
She blinked, genuinely surprised. "You're a bloody monster," she said, in the tone of one stating the very obvious. "You're a controlling, arrogant gobshite who doesn't give a damn about anything you don't find useful. You think anyone who isn't you is thicker'n a yard'v lard, and you don't care that everyone hates you for it, 'cause we're apparently a lesser species." Drugged though she was, her glare was knife-sharp.
