Cookie Cutter Man (19 page)

You’re running out of time!

Daniel fell across the room and collapsed onto the couch.
Taking the weight off his ankle felt like heaven, but it looked like hell. His
black sock was red and dripping, and there was a trail of splattered blood on
the carpet leading in from the front door.

Where the fuck is all this blood coming from?

A thin stream of it ran out of his sneaker and onto the
floor when he pulled the shoe off his mangled foot. There, like the tip of a
strange new finger, a bone stuck out of his ankle.

The sirens woke Daniel up again. How long had he been out?
He turned around on his knees and looked out the window. Three stories below,
life on the street went on as it always did.

You’re running out of time!

“Stop saying that!” Daniel’s knee crunched the remote
control, bringing the television to life.

The field reporter on the screen said this: “An attempt has
been made on the life of computer genius and inventor Maxwell O’Brien. As you
see behind me, there is absolute chaos in the front of the O’Brien estate where
this shocking tragedy took place.”

Behind her was the monolithic home Daniel had left what
seemed like years ago. Cops were everywhere, and an ambulance was parked out
front.

“Paramedics are on their way down—” the reporter looked off
camera at someone and nodded, then turned around. “Here they are now, I’m told
Maxwell O’Brien will be taken to Mother Mary’s Grace Hospital for emergency medical
care.”

They’re going to get you.

“Police have said this young man, Daniel Rimms, is wanted
for questioning about the crime.”

Daniel watched his face fill the screen, replacing the
bullet-riddled lump on the stretcher. It felt like he was seeing it through
someone else’s eyes. Outside, the sirens were getting closer.

The voices grew louder, a choir in his head singing verses
of doom.

He stuck his fist in his mouth to stop a scream, teeth
drawing blood from the back of his hand –

You are OUT of time!

— a citywide manhunt is now in progress —

You are OUT of time!
a symphony of suffering, 10,000
harbingers babbling

— new breed of American terrorist — his head hurt —
You
are OUT of time!
— it hurts so bad oh God — these criminals must be stopped
—

Daniel’s head cleared all at once when he drew his gun and
shot the television.

The screen caved in before the tubes inside exploded,
spraying him with small chunks of glass and a strange ozone stink. The panic
was gone. The voices were gone. The pain in his head was gone. There was
nothing left but the cold new hole in his center, a hole that was always hungry
but could never be filled. He still had a chance to get away.

The police were closer, but they weren’t here yet. He had to
get out.

I can’t believe I even came here —

Daniel closed that part of his mind off, the regret and
hindsight would kill him if he let it, and they had to be controlled. He hopped
on his good foot into the bedroom, pulled his sock drawer out of the dresser
and let it crash to the floor. Taped to the back of the dresser was an
envelope, the first thing he had unpacked. It was full of money, and he was
going to need as much as he could get to go underground. Of course, he could
still count on help from Jared and the others, but that would be later. He was
the only one that could get him out of the situation he was in right now. He
took a quick confirming peek at the cash ($3500) and he stuffed it in his
pocket. Daniel sat on the bed and opened the cylinder on his back-up piece-four rounds.

If only I had my case ... wonder what even happened to it?

He adapted to its absence. There was a chance it was still
in his car, but it might as well be in fucking Kosovo for now. Four rounds were
enough. It would have to be.

Outside the sirens were louder. It sounded like every cop in
the city was just up the street.

Then there was a knock on the door.

Daniel froze, not in panic, but to hear. It came again, a
little louder this time, and he limped out into the hall. He stood and stared
at the door. The sirens were deafening now, they filled the world and
threatened to collapse it. The knocking became a pounding.

With a flick of his wrist Daniel closed the cylinder, and
thumbed back the hammer, leaning against the wall for support.

The knocking continued, and he could hear the sirens; the
police were out front and in his head.

“Daniel, open the door!” the voice on the other side
demanded. His mouth went dry as he watched the round brass jiggle back and
forth a little as the cop tried the knob. It wouldn’t be long before they
kicked it down.

“Are you home?” the cop asked and the pounding started
again. “We need to talk.”

Daniel closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and when he
opened them he was ready to kill again.

“I’m coming in, Daniel, I still have my key.” The door
began to open.

In walked a man of medium height and weight, his black hair
cut slightly out of style. He wore a plain black suit and held a government
issue .45.

Daniel
saw
this.

No matter how many sleepless nights would follow, he would
never convince himself of anything different. He saw his own reflection staring
back at him from the G-man’s mirrored shades and then he pulled the trigger,
twice, three times, four.

One between the eyes, one in the stomach, one in the heart,
one in the right lung. Daniel crossed the cop with a hollow-point blessing and
wondered why the pig had a key as Echo’s body was blown back from the impact of
the bullets, slamming against the wall to the right of the door. Her cobalt
eyes were wide open, her arms spread-eagled to the sides.

She slid slowly down the wall with questions on her lips.
Her beautiful body smeared the blood on the wall as she collapsed, lifeless,
making a crimson crucifix on the plaster backdrop of this strange new stage.
There was no crown of thorns on the top, instead a cloud of brains that began
draining toward the floor as if trying to crawl back home.

“Echo?” The gun fell from Daniel’s hand as he realized what
he’d done. The sirens were gone; the cold feeling in his soul was gone. The
only thing left was the only thing he’d ever loved.

“Echo! Baby?” he pleaded, hating himself for it and at the
same time knowing that it would revive her. Of course it would! People don’t
kill what they love, do they? Not unless

I’ve lost my mind

And if not for that, he would never have hurt her for the
world.

When the police finally arrived, they found an empty shell
of a young man sitting next to the dead body of a girl that had once been
beautiful. The young man was crying, knees drawn up tight against his chest.
He was rocking back and forth, holding an empty revolver to his head, pulling
the trigger over and over.

Click. Click. Click.

PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE

PATIENT ID: 6655321 Daniel Theodore Rimms

SYMPTOMS: Extreme paranoia, distrust, hatred for authority,
memory gaps, mental lag, depression, violent and sudden mood swings, antisocial
behavior, delusions. Patient suffers from sporadic and extreme hallucinations,
often coupled with migraine-like headaches. Patient has admitted experimental or
habitual use of all following narcotics: marijuana, opium, peyote, hashish,
LSD, hallucinogenic mushrooms, methamphetamine, cocaine, Lithium, Morphine,
Novril, Darvocet, Percocet, Percodan, Vicodin, Valium, and Thorazine.

DIAGNOSIS: Patient is a violent, delusionary schizophrenic.
Multiple personalities evident. Level-Four security floor recommended.

COMMENTS: I have not seen a case as interesting and complex
as this in quite some time. The patient was found criminally insane and unable
to stand trial after a failed assassination attempt on a world-renowned
scientist. Patient has constructed a parallel world that he occupies when he
gets bored with reality, fleeing to it at different times both willfully and on
a subconscious, almost involuntary level. Patient is extremely intelligent and
imaginative, also very deeply involved with his fantasy and hallucinations.
Therapy is difficult. Patient is uncooperative at best. Refuses to speak if
being recorded. His will be a long and hard road to recovery, which I hypothesize
is unlikely but possible. Allow me to once again stress that the patient is
EXTREMELY VIOLENT and susceptible to unpredictable mood swings. He rotates
between two or three key personalities, other than what I’ve determined to be
his own. Level-Four security is highly advised at least on a preliminary basis.

Dr. Alma Pazcowski, M.D.

*****

Daniel sat on the bench in the courtyard, watching. The
guards were a little lax today, due to the unseasonably beautiful weather and
because he’d been good for over a month. He didn’t say anything to anyone any
more. How could he cause problems now? Not a single outburst in almost 40 days.

He looked out the corner of his eyes at Crevvers, the
orderly. Crevvers was the worst. But that would probably change if a guy wasn’t
drugged up or being physically restrained.

Daniel tossed another small chunk of stale bread onto the
green lawn about a foot closer to him than the last. The pigeon cooed stupidly
and looked at him with its shutter-click eyes. A little closer...

They wouldn’t be expecting this, not after last time, after
the crocodile tears he’d conjured up.

Daniel lunged off the bench and caught the bird with both
hands. The little filth-bag squirmed and squawked; orderlies were closing in,
and he didn’t have much time to end its transmission for good. He bit the head
off the pigeon, spit the bloody chunk in Crevvers’s face and punched his
fingertips through thin flesh and hollow bone.

The orderlies managed to pin him down only after he had
opened the chest cavity like a bleeding, feathered cabinet; exposing wires and
circuitry only his eyes dared to see.

It was quite a while before they let Daniel near the birds
again.

*****

Dr. Alma Pazcowski sat at home in his private study, looking
over the file. The first week in the hospital the patient nearly beat an
orderly to death with one of his crutches (he’d sustained a compound fracture
jumping out a second-story window during his crime).

Daniel Rimms had tried to kill himself twice, once by eating
rat poison, which had been bad. The second time was during lunch, which had
been worse. Right there in line, waiting to get his tray slopped with
vitamin-heavy gruel, the patient picked up a fork and started stabbing himself
in the throat. Luckily the utensils were plastic and a guard had been present,
but the kid managed to stab himself a couple good ones on either side of his
windpipe. A quarter of an inch in either direction and he would have punctured
his larynx. The scars were visible but surprisingly small; the wounds had healed
nicely.

Twice the young man had mangled a bird. During their last
session Dr. Pazcowski had finally managed to get the reason out of the patient.
The doctor shivered the tiniest bit when he thought of the patient screaming “
It’s
a camera! A camera
!”

Daniel had shouted himself hoarse before they could sedate
him.

In his thirty-some years in the field of abnormal and
criminal psychology, Dr. Pazcowski had never come across a mind so concisely
split and unaware of its factions. The patient had three very distinct
personalities; the most common was “Jared”. There was also “Ebin”; the third
was “Rob”. The names would change depending on the situation the patient was
describing. All three personalities assured Dr. Pazcowski again and again that
a fourth personality, named “Simon”, was dead, murdered during some covert
government operation. The doctor smiled a sad smile and shook his head to think
of it.

Mr. Rimms still insisted the man he’d tried to kill was
cloning robots, or some damned thing. Utter nonsense. He was also sure the girl
he had been living with over the last three years or so was dead, that he had
in fact murdered her. The girl, Echo Allen was her name, had tried to visit the
patient for the second time about three weeks ago, and was due back in the
morning. Upon seeing the girl, the patient was sent into a psychotic rage
followed by nearly four days of catatonic silence and suicidal depression, symptoms
identical to those exhibited after her first visit. Dr. Pazcowski had spoken to
the girl, and she obviously cared very deeply for the patient, which could be a
key factor in the rehabilitation. Her presence refuted his entire fantasy, and
Dr. Pazcowski was willing to bet it would be the girl that would make or break
him.

She was a soft-spoken young woman, very attractive, with
vibrant green eyes.

Dr. Pazcowski rubbed his forehead and closed the file until
tomorrow.

Why do you bother? He asked himself. He didn’t really think
there was a chance of this young man ever being a productive or even
stable
member of society again, did he? Not really, no. But the young woman had
inspired him, for he truly believed there was nothing she wanted more than for
this strange patient of his to grow well again.

Most of all, it took the routine out of his day. He’d never
been asked to have the therapy room swept for bugs before a session until he
shared that room with Daniel Rimms. Dr. Pazcowski shut the desk lamp off and
went to bed. He had another session with the patient tomorrow, and he would
need his rest.

*****

Daniel sat rigid in the chair, like a sweating statue. He
stared at the doctor across a short expanse of carpet.

“Now, tell me, Daniel, do you remember where we left off
last session?”

“Yes, doctor.”

“Where?” Dr. Pazcowski coaxed, after his well-placed pause
yielded no positive results.