by Coral Walker
For a while Kevin didn’t speak, his brows knitted as if the thought troubled him. When he sighed audibly and patted Peter on the upper arm to acknowledge him, Peter knew he was giving up.
“I appreciate it,” he said. “It isn’t easy to inflict suffering on a young lad. But before you agree to it, I want you to be crystal clear about the procedure.” He walked over to the wall where a diagram of the human anatomy was hung.
“In the human body, there are many locations that if stimulated cause severe pain. The emotional distress inflicted by the pain is the main element that stimulates the healing dust from Brianna. Heart, lungs, liver, stomach, … all these organs are important, and any miscalculation could mean death, which, of course, we shall try to prevent. We are targeting the part of the body that is the least dangerous but causes the maximum pain. The appendix turns out to be the perfect spot — it has no known function so we can remove it at the end of the procedure, and we all know how painful appendicitis is. What we’ll do here is cut it open and deliberately infect it — there are millions of ways of doing it. We’ll give you an anaesthetic to start with, but after it wears off you will be on your own, I’m afraid. There won’t be any painkillers or medical care until after the operation is completed.”
He paused and looked at Peter. “So, do you still want do it?”
Peter smiled vaguely, feeling a touch of bitterness in his throat.
There was a moment’s hesitation in Kevin’s face, but he looked quickly away from him and shifted his attention to the operating table that Jack was lying on.
“I’ve been trying not to think of Jack as an ordinary boy, Peter. He is part of the game, and we must carry out the plan without brooding on morality or guilt.”
“Well, as a friend,” he turned back to Peter and continued, “I have to warn you. Whatever you do, don’t try to save the boy. His life is in Lord Shusha’s hands, not yours or mine.”
“He’s right, Dr Pentland. Don’t rush into this. You can’t save the boy,” Nina mumbled.
Peter grinned and patted her gently on the back as he walked past her.
“So you are sure you still want to do it?” Kevin’s voice asked again behind him.
In a blue hospital gown, Jack lay peacefully in a deeply sedated sleep, no longer blue-skinned as he had been the last time he had seen him. He checked his pulse and then the wound on his neck. Except for three small, insignificant red spots, he could hardly believe that, just a couple of days ago, he had been dying from a bokwa’s bite.
On his way in, he had noticed a stretcher trolley parked just outside the room. He went to get it, rolled it in and placed it alongside Jack.
“Gave me a hand?” he asked, glancing up at Kevin.
“Of course.” Kevin, still standing by the diagram, moved forward.
Together they lifted Jack up and laid him flat on the trolley. Two orderlies were already waiting by the door.
“Take him back,” Kevin said as the orderlies took over the trolley.
“The same basement room?” they asked.
“Yes, the same room.”
Peter frowned at what he had heard. It was where they had kept Brianna as a punishment. A basement room was normally used for storage and only on rare occasions for detention. On this tiny base, far away from home, now and then, someone might blow a fuse and, in the worst case, need to be locked up. But whatever the case it wasn’t supposed to be for people.
“This is for you, Peter.” Kevin handed him a blue hospital gown that he had just taken out of a cupboard.
There was an awkward exchange of glances as Peter took it.
“We’ll leave you to get changed,” Kevin said.
“I need to pack my luggage, Peter. So it’s a farewell from me,” said Nina in an odd voice.
Together, Kevin and Nina walked out and closed the door behind them.
In exactly five minutes, Kevin returned with Johnson, a part-time anaesthesiologist. Most staff in this complex were trained in multiple areas. Johnson was also a skilled nurse and an electrician.
“Hi, Dr Pentland,” he greeted him, at the same time putting on his gloves.
“Hi, Johnson,” he glanced at him and managed a smile.
“Do you know you have a heart murmur?” Kevin asked, looking at the heart monitor they had just set up.
“I have had it for as long as I can remember. It’s never caused any problems.”
He felt the gown being lifted, and cold, gloved hands touched the lower right side of his stomach. A circle was marked where the appendix was supposed to be.
“You’re going to have a sleep, Dr Pentland.” Johnson was flashing his young smile at him, and the next instant a gas mask was placed over his face.
+++
When Peter woke up some time later, the effect of the anaesthetic was gone without a trace. He was alone, fully awake, and the pain in his lower stomach was intermittent but severe.
He lifted his right hand to feel the wound and was stunned by how hot and wet it was — they had left the wound open.
For a while, he was overwhelmed by the profound irony of being both the butcher and the meat on the chopping board and felt an irresistible urge to laugh. His muscles were all primed for it, and he battled to suppress it. In no time, every sense and every nerve cell were writhing with pain so intense that he could do nothing but succumb to a long, high-pitched scream.
He shivered uncontrollably afterwards, staring blankly at the ceiling.
He was developing a fever — it was all going to plan.
There seemed to be a figure floating into the room like a shadow.
Finally, he focused on someone.
“Wa…water p…please,” he pleaded.
A straw was placed between his lips. He sucked it greedily, cherishing the momentary cooling of his burning throat. Then he fluttered his eyes and, for the first time, glanced aside to see his benefactor.
In his mind he was thinking of Nina, but she was busy packing her stuff, or perhaps the sweet-faced girl Sarah, a newcomer with a sympathetic heart. When he caught sight of the blue-faced young Baran woman with large round orange eyes staring at him, he was startled.
Instantly, he was no longer the obedient patient, but Dr Peter Pentland.
He moved to sit up, at least that was what he attempted, but found himself helplessly bound to the bed as if glued to it. He was much weaker than he thought he was, and the price for trying was high. For a minute or two, he was beside himself with pain, cursing and sputtering every word that came into his mind for the blue-skinned woman to go away.
The young woman got up swiftly and took a few steps back. Still holding the glass in her hands, she stared at him, eyes opened wide, almost in the shape of a full circle.
“I thought Jack was here,” she said in a ringing tone that lingered in his ears.
The mention of Jack’s name brought a small degree of sense back to him. He glanced back, struggling to get his mind focused.
“He’s I … in the b … b … basement.”
She blinked and, the next moment, was gone. A large man with thick shoulders, who must have been standing by the door so quietly that he hadn’t noticed him, went after her, his back stooping to fit through the door.
Putu, Lord Shusha’s giant. He had never seen any other man of such a size. And the young woman, the one who was mourning the death of Jack. Could it be her?
He pondered in his feverish mind without making sense of it before slipping beneath the dark, treacherous currents of unconsciousness.
13
Nina Caplin
The door burst open, and in stepped a tall woman in dark-framed glasses. In her hand was a small purple suitcase, which she put down by the wall.
She came straight to the trolley and looked down at him. “I am Dr Nina Caplin,” she said, head slightly nodding as she greeted him. Her face then spread into a nervous yet broad smile that flashed her white teeth.
For a moment, Jack was wide-eyed staring at th
e woman. “People with white teeth like that like to have wide smiles to show them off,” his Mum had once commented after a lengthy shopping trip. This woman certainly belonged to that category.
“I am taking you with me,” she snapped, and her face turned solemn, almost stony, as if bracing herself for dissent. In a crisp and forceful manner, she started to unbuckle him.
“Where to?” Jack asked, sitting half up as he watched her undoing the last buckle that held his ankle. A feeling of embarrassment came over him — he was wearing nothing but a loose blue gown.
She said nothing. On top of a pile of boxes stacked in a corner she located his shirt and trousers and threw them to him.
“Put them on,” she said.
Catching the clothes, Jack got up and slid off the trolley. It was a little too soon, his legs wobbled unexpectedly underneath his weight like an old man’s, and he teetered a step back to lean against the trolley for momentary support.
A few yards across the room, the tall woman stood with her back to him and her arms crossed.
Pivoting on one leg at a time, he started scrambling into his trousers.
“I am taking you back to Earth,” said the woman in a flat tone.
He fell backwards and hit the trolley behind him, which creaked loudly under his sudden impact.
The woman’s head turned sideways, and she said something that he didn’t catch. For a while his mind was blank, but when he recovered himself he asked.
“When?”
“Now. The shuttle is taking off shortly.”
“What about them?”
“Them?”
“My family.”
She turned sharply to face him, looking stern and determined, but there was a touch of artifice to her look.
“Of course, them,” she muttered, blinking. “I assume they are fine … and … and they … they will join you eventually back home.”
A brilliant smile flashed momentarily across her face, as if to reflect the bright prospect of being reunited with his family back home. Then the solemn look was resumed and she turned away from him.
“We are in quite a rush — I’m sure you understand,” she said.
Quickly Jack stripped off the blue gown and put on the shirt.
+++
Soon he found himself walking towards the door, the woman’s hand tight on his arm. At the door, they halted as she cautiously checked the corridor.
The corridor was dimly lit and jumbled with untidily piled boxes.
Head still fuzzy from the sedatives, he let himself be towed along. The tall woman was in a hurry, her head twitching nervously from side to side, as if she were afraid of being seen. He felt a twinge of pity for her and tried to make his footsteps as careful as hers, but something inside him was growing heavy and unsettling.
“Doc … tor, I … I … hope … you understand, I … I am not going anywhere without … them,” he intoned in a hushed voice, feeling the gnawing bitterness in his own words.
Something riveted her all of a sudden to the spot. She stared at the corner where the corridor made a right turn and gestured for him to keep quiet.
It took Jack a moment to figure out she wasn’t reacting to what he had said. Someone was coming their way. He stood, straining his ears, but picked up nothing except the buzzing of a faulty light from the ceiling behind them. Then he caught sight of the shadows stretching out across the floor and creeping up the wall opposite, before shrinking again. The next instant, the owners of the shadows appeared. One of them was so tall and broad that the corridor was immediately transformed into a crammed mousehole.
“Jack!” a young woman’s voice came from behind the giant.
His heart missed a beat. He recognised the voice before her smooth blue-skinned face emerged from the shadows.
Cici!
“Where are you taking him?” Cici cried, staring at the tall woman next to him.
“It’s none of your business.” The hand that was holding him trembled as she answered.
“Of course, it is. He’s mine!” Cici exclaimed, and the giant advanced towards them.
“Yours? You silly blue-faced cow. How ridiculous that you should claim a person to be yours. You stop there. I said stop —”
The giant was approaching fast. His enormous, muscular body blocked their path, and his thickset arms waved a yard away from their heads.
“Freeze. Or I’ll shoot!” Nina Caplin gave a sharp cry, dropping her purple suitcase to the ground with a loud thump.
All eyes fell on Nina’s hand, a silver tranquillizer gun gleamed coldly between her fingers.
The man snorted and proceeded all the same. One moment he moved with a swiftness unexpected for a man of his size, and the next, he tumbled and slumped towards Jack.
Hastily stepping aside, Jack watched in awe as the giant crashed to the ground by his feet. Two red darts, one next to the other, stuck out from his neck.
Standing behind the prostrate giant, Cici looked suddenly dainty and frail. She glanced at the gun that was now pointing at her and then at Jack, her eyes seeking his.
He met them, and, for a moment, their gazes locked. He felt strangely mesmerised. They were the same pair of eyes that had gazed at Ornardo so many times, each with such affection that his heart was always filled with wonder.
“Jack?” she called, “has Ornardo really gone?”
Slowly he nodded and watched with pity as the colour drained from her face.
“Tell me, Jack, what happened?” she said in a small voice and started trembling.
“I … I don’t know. It was all a blur. One minute you were having the cake and the next minute you …”
“Tell me …”
Inhaling deeply, he resumed, “… you turned into a blue bokwa …”
Shutting her eyes, she breathed heavily. “So it’s all true. I killed him. I killed him …”
“I have a feeling he wanted it that way …” Jack heard himself saying. Damn, what was he doing? He was supposed to hate this woman who had enslaved him and nearly killed him and Brianna. But he felt the pain, her pain, and his heart throbbed with it.
She opened her eyes. They were shimmering with tears.
“I … it was only a feeling,” he stuttered, fumbling in his mind for clarity, “… after I saw you turn into … the … the bokwa, I … I wanted him to run away from you. I screamed and screamed, but he ignored me. I couldn’t move, be … because he had disabled me. He could if he wanted to; he was the master of the body at that time. All I could do was watch … watch him being attacked … I felt his mind, grey and dull, but determined, very determined, as if he knew what was going to happen — he was going to be killed, and he was ready for it …”
“Why?”
Jack shuddered at the harrowing sound of Cici’s voice and glanced at her. How pitiful she looked — leaning against the wall. She could barely stand.
“He chose to, Cici, don’t you see? He wanted to stay there, to be with Lizi, to be with his family. It was his home.”
Remembering suddenly, he rummaged in his pocket and fished out the yellow band with the Arnartarna flower.
“Perhaps you should have this back.” He held out the flower and said apologetically, “I’m sorry, it’s a bit squashed.”
She raised her head. Her eyes sparkled as her glance fell on the yellow flower, and a faint smile appeared on her tear-furrowed face. Propped against the wall, she wobbled towards him.
From the corner of his eyes, he caught the sight of Nina’s hand, holding the silver gun.
“No!” he cried.
The dart flew past him.
He thrust forward, meaning to stop the dart, but it was too late. Cici stumbled forward, collapsing. He caught her in his arms, and her cold face dropped onto his chest. Gasping, he watched teardrops escaping from her shut eyes and threading their way down to her chin.
“Why did you shoot her?” he howled in utter disbelief, turning sharply towards Nina.
“I had to. Sh
e was attacking you,” the tall woman said in a calm tone. Walking over, she took Cici from his arms and laid her down neatly next to Putu.
“She wasn’t. She came for this,” he yelled, waving the yellow band in front of her.
“Ha, you believe that. Why on earth would she want some trash like that? It’s not even a real flower.” After that, she snatched the band from him and threw it on the ground. “She’s only a beast, don’t have any pity for her.”
“No, she is not.”
“That was what you said. You saw her turning into a bokwa, didn’t you? She almost killed you. I happen to know that that night Dr Pentland was called to the castle. If it weren’t for him, you would be dead by now.”
“She didn’t know what she was doing.”
“Humph, you’re silly to believe that. If only you knew what her father is doing with Brianna and Bo …”
Suddenly she stopped, and her brow creased a little. Something had slipped from her lips that she hadn’t intended.
But Jack was alarmed. “What’s that? What’s Lord Shusha doing with Brianna and Bo?” he demanded.
+++
As soon as the words about Brianna and Bo slipped out, the boy in front of her was no longer shattered and bewildered. He was staring at her like she was a beast he must fight.
What had she got herself into? She should be taking some last photos and doing her final selection of souvenirs. Instead, she was waving a silver tranquillizer gun about and shooting people.
“Come on, Jack. Don’t make me do something I might regret. We’re running out of time,” she pleaded and leaned forward to grasp him by the arm.
He slipped from her hands.
“I’m not going with you unless you tell me what has happened to Brianna and Bo! Where are they?” he was snarling at her, waving his hands.
For a moment, she was silent, staring at him from behind her thick glasses in disbelief. Finally, she articulated word by word. “You will go with me no matter what. I’ll shoot you if necessary.”
