The Jigsaw Man (20 page)

head would explode like an overripe tomato being

struck with a sledgehammer.

Perfect.

"Stop, you fool," Dr. Marshall shouted once it be¬

came obvious what my plans were. "Grab him, Drake.

Hurry!"

Drake came after me, but I knew I had the angle on

him. He knew it, too, but kept coming anyway. W i t h a

yell of pure triumph, I launched myself into the air,

easily shattering the lead-framed stained glass window

and was ready to fly free as a bird into the bright blue

yonder. Fly for a second or two, at least.

Wasn't gonna happen.

I hit the glass hard, breaking through it easily enough,

but my flight to freedom only lasted for another three

inches. That was when I hit face-first into the wire mesh

window screen bolted to the outside brickwork. It was

heavy-gauge mesh probably installed on these expen¬

sive windows to protect them and it stopped my forward

progress pronto, my nose painfully reduced to a red

pulpy mess upon impact, the rest of my face and body a

patchwork of cuts and puncture wounds from all the

exploding glass. So much for my great escape.

Bounced back into the tower room, I landed with a

heavy thump at Drake's feet, where he found the sight

of my bloodied face and body tremendously amusing.

He was laughing so hard, in fact, that Dr. Marshall was

the one who came over and held me down so I wouldn't

try r u n n i n g away again.

"Get the needle," Dr. Marshall said to Drake.

"What's the hurry? Why don't we let him have a run

at the other window? I'd love to watch that again."

"Just get the needle, we've wasted enough time with

this loser. I'm late for surgery."

"All right, it was j u s t a thought," Drake said, still de¬

lighted by my suffering.

I watched him walk over to a rolltop desk and remove

a large hypodermic needle from one of the drawers. He

filled it with a clear yellow fluid—probably the same

stuff he'd drugged me with down in the cellar—then

walked over and handed the needle to his boss.

Part of me knew I should be flailing about, scream¬

ing like a banshee, and desperately trying to get away,

but I j u s t didn't have it in me. I was battered, bruised,

and bleeding, and every inch of my body hurt like hell.

Worse still, the impact with the metal screen had r e -

opened my right shoulder wound, and with the amount

of blood I was leaking all over the floor, I was getting

light-headed, feeling n u m b , stunned, and more than a

little lethargic.

I'm sure I would have passed out on my own if they'd

given me another thirty seconds, but Dr* Marshall wasn't

taking any chances. He viciously plunged the hypoder¬

mic needle into my thigh, but I don't remember feeling

any pain. I never even screamed. Within seconds, every¬

thing went black.

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y

Speaking from the experience of someone who has

drank several hundred gallons of cheap, often home¬

made booze, then eventually progressing to stolen

Sterno, I knew what it was like to wake up with a head¬

ache. I was an authority on them, actually. I've had

more hangovers than I care to remember, but none of

those self-induced headaches hurt half as bad as the

way I felt when I finally woke up and slowly stirred back

to life.

My head was pounding, driving a six-inch spike of

agony through my brain with every blood-pulsing beat

of my heart. I didn't dare open my eyes. Heaven forbid.

Instead, I lay perfectly still, j u s t concentrated on tak¬

ing short, shallow breaths, and tried to ride out the

storm.

Must have been a hell of a party last night. Blue J and I

must have really—

Then, t h r o u g h all the pain and the hazy memories

filtering out of my drug-saturated brain, I remem¬

bered where I was and what had happened to me up

in the castle's tower r o o m . I tried to fight it, deny my

m e m o r i e s , because accepting the t r u t h would lead

me in a direction I simply wasn't ready to go. No

way.

Maybe Puckman brewed up another batch of that awful

Screech, and I drank so much I don't—

I gave up halfway through my pitiful attempt at avoid¬

ing reality. W h a t was the point? I knew perfectly well

where I was and why I had such a bad headache. All the

lies and wishful t h i n k i n g in the world weren't going to

help my situation or make me feel any better. Why

bother?

Because the truth scaredme too much, that's why.

Obviously the reason I had a headache was because

I'd been whacked out on drugs. W h y had I been drugged?

Because Drake was taking me to the operating room

for surgery. Why was I headed to surgery? Because Dr.

Marshall said—

He said he needed my legs.

Oh God, please. Not that. Not my legs.

Not my fucking legs.'

My thoughts seemed to freeze up. I wouldn't allow—

couldn't allow—myself to keep t h i n k i n g about this. I

wanted to die, right then and there. Die, before I found

out if anything had happened to me.

I opened my eyes.

Then I started screaming.

I didn't have proof yet that my legs were gone—I

hadn't looked down or anything—but I didn't need to.

Lying six feet away from m e , strapped in his own bed

and looking straight at me was Lucas, the older man

who'd begged me to end his suffering in the blood bank

room. He was shaking his head and looking at me with

a sad expression on his face.

"Welcome to Hell," Lucas whispered, then turned

his face away from me.

This can't be happening.

But it was. There was only one reason I'd be lying next

to Lucas. Dr. Marshall had made good on his threat to

take my legs from m e , and even worse, he'd decided to

put me up in his special room on the fourth floor. He'd

carved me up, and turned me into one of his Bleeders.

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - O N E

I must have passed out again, because it was nighttime

when next I opened my eyes, the Bleeders' room deathly

quiet and in darkness. The only light came from the

window, the moonlight filtering in through a foot-wide

gap left in the heavy curtains. It was still too dark for

me to see much of anything, which was a little unnerv¬

ing, but at least my headache was a lot better.

I tried to sit up a few inches, trying to peer through

the gloom to get a look around, and that was when I

learned I was strapped to the mattress. So I didn't fall

out of bed, I suppose. With no arms or legs, it was prob¬

ably a good idea, but it pissed me off. I started twisting

and turning, trying to get myself free. I thrashed and

pulled and lashed my body around in a senseless fit of

pure adrenaline-fueled anger. Truth be told, my rage

didn't really have anything to do with the straps, they

were j u s t the last straw after I'd been so violated body

and soul lately. Eventually, exhaustion and pain calmed

me down, and I lay panting for air in the dark with tears

running down both cheeks.

"You okay, Mike?" a voice said on my right.

It was a familiar voice, but I couldn't quite place it. It

didn't sound like Lucas, but that's who'd been beside

me earlier, hadn't it? I turned my head and could make

out a big lump on the bed next to m e , but that was

about it.

"Who's there?" I asked. "That you, Lucas?"

"No. Lucas is in the bed on y o u r left. It's Red Beard,

M i k e , remember m e ? "

"Course I do. H o w you doing?"

Stupid question, but it was out of my mouth before I

thought about it.

"Same as y o u " Red said, "Cut down to n o t h i n g by

that filthy bastard surgeon, and wishing I was dead."

I looked around the room again, trying to see how

many other beds were filled.

"I can hardly see, Red, are Bill Smith and W h e e l s

here too?

"Nope. Just us. Wheels was for a while but he died in

his sleep. I think they took too much blood out of him.

Lucky bugger. Haven't a clue what happened to Bill

Smith, though. Never saw him again."

"Maybe Bill made a run for it and got out of here. I

tried that myself."

"Me too," Red Beard said. "That's how I ended up in

here. Piss Dr. Marshall off and this is where he sticks

you, I think. Oh, and don't worry about y o u r vision.

Your eyes will get better accustomed to seeing in the

dark once you've been here a while longer. You've only

been here for about three weeks. Give it,some time."

Three weeks?

"What are you talking about?" I asked. "This is my

first day, isn't it?"

Red laughed at that. "No, 'fraid not, my friend. They

brought you in at least two weeks ago, but I think it was

closer to three. They keep the new arrivals pretty

drugged, to keep the pain down and let y o u r wounds

heal without you moving around. You were probably in

a recovery room for a few days too."

Son of a bitch,

I guess that explained the killer headache—they'd

had me out like a light for weeks. It dawned on me then

that I had no idea what the date was, or how long I'd

been here at the castle. I didn't even know what m o n t h

it was.

"What's the date, Red? Any idea?"

"Does it matter?" he asked. "None of that makes a dfference anymore, so forget about it. Around here there

are only two days of the week you need to worry about.

Bad days, when they drain our blood, and good days,

when they leave us the fuck alone. That's it, good or bad.

N o t h i n g else matters."

We lay in silence for a long time, and I felt myself

starting to nod off again. I was sleepy but I had to ask.

"Hey, Red?"

"Yeah?" he answered, sounding tired as well.

"What day is tomorrow? "

I heard him take a deep breath; then in a soft whisper

said, "Bad. Get some sleep."

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - T W O

Apparently I slept in. I woke up at the crack of dawn,

the sunlight j u s t starting to chase the darkness away,

but everyone in the room whose mind was still intact

was already wide-awake and starting to get nervous.

The nurses and the orderlies would be coming through

the door soon.

"It can't be that bad, can it?" I turned to ask Red

Beard, but it was old Lucas, on my left, who answered.

"You ever donated blood before?" Lucas asked.

"Sure," I said. "Lots of times. It was never that big of

a deal."

"Yeah, I agree with ya. W h e r e did they take it from?"

"What?"

"The blood. W h e r e did they take it out of y o u ? "

"Oh, my arm."

"Right. W h i c h arm do you want them to take it out

of today? Oh, that's right, you don't have
anyfrtggin'

arms, j u s t like the rest of us, ya damn fool. They'll be

takin' it out of your head, for Christ's sake. Ever had a

big needle jabbed into your head, Mike?"

Lucas was obviously hot u n d e r the collar, but I wasn't

sure if he was genuinely mad at me for not killing him

when I'd had the chance, or if he was j u s t on edge,

nervous about what was about to happen. Probably a

bit of both, so I bit my tongue and didn't say anything

back.

"Relax, Lucas," Red Beard j u m p e d to my defense.

"He's new, it's not his fault he doesn't know what's hap¬

pening."

"I know," Lucas sighed. "It was j u s t such a stupid

question, and I feel like crap today. I j u s t want it all to

end, Red. I can't take much more of this, I really can't."

"I know, Lucas," Red commiserated. "We all want it

to end."

I felt a bit like a spectator at a tennis match, turning

to my left, then right, as my roommates talked back

and forth. W h e n they lapsed into silence for a moment,

I j u m p e d into their conversation.

"First of all, Lucas, I'm really sorry I didn't finish the

j o b , back when you wanted my help. You don't need to

forgive m e , but understand something. I wanted to

help, I tried to help, but I fucked up. I got scared and

ran to save my own ass. N o t that it did me much

good."

"Ah shit, Mike," Lucas said. "I don't hold it against

ya. I'd have done the same. It's j u s t this awful place. It

drives ya crazy. They torture us again and again, and

there's nothin' we can do about it. Wears a man down

after a while. Wears him until he snaps. Remember

Charlie, the guy who started screaming and brought

the guards r u n n i n g that night?"

"Yeah, I remember," I said, t h i n k i n g about how I

couldn't get him to quiet down and shut up.

"Well, he finally snapped. His body's still over there,

third bed on the right, but his mind has shut down and

gone bye-bye. God, how I envy him!"

"Don't say that, Lucas. You gotta keep fighting. We're

not dead yet."