"I can see you, Robin," he said. "You know that. Right? I'm not blind, and I'm certainly not dumb." He pointed his gun at her, again. "If you think you can move faster than a bullet from my gun, then by all means, keep heading for the direction of the door. I can personally guarantee that you won't make it. Just so you know."
Robin let out a strangled whimper, but she stopped moving. Her entire body trembled as she looked up at the weapon pointed at her head. Tears welled up in her eyes for what felt like the millionth time that day.
"Do you understand me?" Officer Fitzpatrick asked. "I need you to reassure me that you understand the gravity of the situation."
She nodded her head almost imperceptibly.
"I want to hear your voice, Robin," he said. If I ask you a question, nodding your head isn't the answer I'm looking for. Do you understand?"
She began nodding her head again, but then she stopped. "Yes," she whispered. "I understand." Her voice was meek.
"Good girl. See. I knew you were smarter than you looked. Thank you for proving me right." He resisted the urge to pat her on the head like a dog.
"You're welcome," she whispered. She averted her eyes.
"That's better. I speak. You speak. I speak. You speak. That's what people do. That's what adults do. It's called holding a conversation, and it can actually be quite pleasurable when it's done correctly. Wouldn't you agree?"
"Yes- yes," she replied.
"This is great. I like this. It's like having a ventriloquist's dummy without all the hard work." He followed her gaze to the gun at the end of his arm. "Are you looking at this?" Officer Fitzpatrick asked, waving it around dramatically. "Impressive. Isn't it?"
"Yes," Robin said. "Yes."
"Thank you for the compliment. I bet you'd love to hold it. Wouldn't you? Well, I really wish that I could accommodate you, but it really isn't appropriate for me to allow you to hold my gun." He scratched himself under the chin with the muzzle of the gun. "Then again, I don't really give a fuck about what's appropriate."
He turned his attention back to Sandra. "That goes double for you, Sandra. I've already had it with Robin for now. If I ask you a question, you answer me using your words. You understand?"
"I understand," Sandra said, echoing his question.
"Maybe later," he said. "Now isn't really a good time. Tell me. Are you right-handed or are you left-handed? Never mind. It doesn't really matter anyhow. We all know which arm has to go. It's not like you have a choice."
"No," Sandra screamed. "Don't you touch me. Don't you dare touch me, or I'll make you sorry that you did."
Officer Fitzpatrick grabbed her by the good arm and dragged her to the center of the room. "One of these things ought to work. Don't you think?"
He looked down into the trays of surgical instruments that lay beside the twice-deceased body of the patient on the operating table. Selecting one, he held it up so that the light glinted off it.
"I think this is called a scalpel, but I'm not a real doctor. What do you think, Sandra? Scalpel? Is that what this is called?" He didn't release his iron grip on her arm.
She nodded.
"Don't forget our agreement, Sandra. Use your words, but please use your indoor voice. You make my trigger finger very, very nervous when you scream."
"Scalpel," she said. Her breath came in heaving gasps as she hyperventilated. "It's a scalpel."
"Very good. Do you think this came from the clean pile or the dirty pile." He turned it from side to side and squinted at it under the brightness of the overhead lights. "Looks clean to me. What do you think, Sandra?"
"Clean," she said. "Your hands aren't clean, and the room is contaminated now, but it came from the tray of clean instruments."
"Very good. You know. I think I'd make a good doctor. What about you? Don't you think I'd make a good doctor?" He twisted her arm as he asked the question.
"Yes. Yes, of course. You would have been a very good doctor." Her eyes were big and wild. She glanced at the tray of surgical instruments.
The cop caught her looking at the scalpels, clamps and various other tools that he couldn't identify.
"I hope you're not getting any ideas," he said. "I can stab you through the carotid artery in less time than it would take to get my gun back out of the holster, or I can shoot you through the eye in less time than it would take you to get close enough to those surgical instruments to mount some sort of attack on me."
"I wasn't looking at anything," she said. "Please let me go. You'll never see me again. I'll leave the hospital. I'll leave town. I'll leave the state. I don't care. I'll just leave. Just please, please, please just let me go."
"You sound ridiculous right now." He shook her by the arm. "I hope you realize that. Why can't you just see that I'm trying to help you?" He sighed heavily. "Women. Can't live with them. Can't cut their fucking arm off without a song and dance routine."
Robin was on her hands and knees. Her hair hung down over her face, and she was crying. She walked one hand forward and followed it with her knee. Then she repeated the movement backwards so that she was back to the starting point.
"It's cute the way you think I can't see you, Robin. You can take as many steps forward as you like as long as you take the same number of steps backward, but so help me God, if I see you getting one inch closer to that door, you're fucked."
She crumpled onto the floor and rolled into a ball.
"There. That's better. Be a good girl and just stay in the fetal position crying until I figure out what to do with you next." He turned his attention back to Sandra, who had stopped fighting to get out of his grip.
"Bone saw," he said. "We're going to need one. I don't think this thing is going to cut through bone." He gestured with the scalpel. "Do you?"
Sandra didn't answer.
Officer Fitzpatrick shook his head. "I can't believe we're back to this," he said. "Do you remember the conversation we all had like five minutes ago?"
Sandra nodded.
"Again. A-fucking-gain." He held the scalpel up high above his head and drove it down into her forearm.
When he pulled the scalpel out of her arm, a stream of black goo exploded into the air like it was under pressure. The viscous substance was as thick and dark as dirty motor oil.
The cop tried to dodge the stream of ichor, but it struck him dead center on the forehead and rolled downward into his eyes before he had a chance to wipe it off. "You disgusting bitch," he shouted. "Look what you did."
He raised the scalpel again, bringing it down into her left eye and twisting it until there was nothing left but a mangled mess.
Sandra screamed throughout the entire process. Black pus drained from her eye socket and streamed down the front of her scrubs.
"I just wanted to help you," Officer Fitzpatrick said. "Just wanted to fucking help you. Now look what you made me do." He pulled the scalpel out of her eye and drove it into her chest.
Sandra made a gurgling noise from deep inside her punctured lung. Her hands clutched at the handle of the scalpel that protruded from her chest.
Suddenly, a clanging sound filled the room, and the cop slumped to the floor. He was unconscious.
Robin stood over his body, holding a stainless steel tray. "I did it," she said. "I knocked him out. Let's get out of here, Sandra. Sandra? Sandra?" She stared at the one-eyed monster that had been a nurse just minutes earlier and emitted a shriek.
Sandra finally managed to wrap one of her hands around the handle of the scalpel that was embedded in her chest. She pulled upward and outward, effectively removing the surgical tool from her flesh while making the wound much larger in the process.
She didn't seem to notice.
Dark blood gushed from the open wound, splattering onto the floor where it puddled. The substance stained her scrubs black and coated her shoes.
She tossed the scalpel, and it landed with the clattering sound of metal on tile.
Robin moved backwards quickly. Her eyes were open wide, and
she was panting heavily. Every few seconds, she let out a whimper.
"Stay away. Keep away. Stay away." She made her way to the other side of the room and didn't stop until her back was against the wall. "No. No. No. No. Oh, no, no."
Sandra took a few unsteady steps toward the place where Robin stood and clutched the wall behind her.
From his spot on the floor, Officer Fitzpatrick let out a moan. He twitched and opened his eyes. "What the fuck," he said. "What the actual fuck." He looked up and saw Sandra advancing on Robin, leaving black tracks on the floor with every step.
Robin's eyes met his. "Help me," she said. "Please. Help me."
He looked at the floor and spotted the surgical steel tray lying near him. "Did you hit me in the head with a fucking tray?" he asked.
"No. Yes. No," Robin wailed. "Do something. Shoot her with your gun."
Officer Fitzpatrick rose to his feet. "Shoot her with my gun? Shoot her with my gun? You smash a stainless steel tray over my head, and you want me to shoot her with my gun?"
He moved closer to Sandra, whose back was still turned to him as she advanced on Robin. "Lucky for you, I have a bone to pick with this bitch first." He reached out and grabbed a fistful of her hair, effectively halting her forward progress.
With one hand tangled in her hair and the other on his gun, he dragged her backward through the spilled sludge that currently passed for her blood until he reached the operating table in the center of the room.
She snapped and snarled at him as he selected another scalpel from the array of surgical tools. It didn't matter to him whether it was clean or dirty. "What's the difference?" he asked aloud. "What's she going to get an infection?" He laughed.
The cop couldn't grab hold of Sandra's oozing arm while still holding onto her hair with one hand and the scalpel in the other. He turned to Robin, who had slumped to the floor with her back still against the wall. "I don't suppose you could hold her arm for me," he said.
She shook her head.
"That's what I thought," he said. "Women are worthless."
He pushed Sandra, or what used to be Sandra, to the floor, face down in a puddle of her own ooze. Then he raised his boot and stomped it down on her blackened arm over and over again while the bone crunched and splintered.
He knelt on her back and wrapped one hand around her wrist. Using his other hand, he sliced and diced his way through torn skin and mangled flesh until he had removed her arm below the bicep.
"I told you that arm had to come off," he said. "Could have saved us both a lot of time and effort if you'd just cooperated."
The sound of Robin's whimpers distracted him from his task. He leveled the scalpel at her.
"You look like you're healthy now," he said. "But I'll just bet you dollars to donuts that you'll be begging me to relieve you of some infected body part before the day is through. You're not quick and clever enough to avoid being bitten. Mark my words."
Beneath him, Sandra grunted, groaned and tried to break free, but the weight of the cop kneeling on her back kept her from making any progress toward escape. "What do you think, Princess?"
Sandra renewed her efforts to get away, but she was no match for his strength.
"Baby, you're stronger than you look, but I'm even stronger than that. I don't know what made you doubt it for a second. That's the problem with women today. Always gotta test, test, test. Test the waters. Test the friendships. Test my patience."
He grabbed her opposite wrist and stretched out her arm. "Here goes nothing," he said. "What are you going to do about it?"
Chapter Thirteen
Father Matthew arose from his seat and pushed it away from the table.
"I think we both know what we have to do, Audrey. The people at the hospital need us. That woman and her children probably walked into a nightmare, and there's no one there to help them. I feel responsible. Audrey, I need to do something. We need to do something."
Audrey pushed aside the pad of paper and dropped the pen on the table. She smiled, baring her teeth, and she nodded her head.
"It's settled then. Let's go." He looked around and patted his empty pockets. "What did I do with my keys?"
Audrey shrugged stiffly.
"Never mind, I found them. We'll take my car." He led Audrey to the door. "Wait here." He went back to retrieve the keys to the ambulance. "Just in case," he said.
Audrey stood quietly waiting while he returned to the kitchen to fetch a pair of butcher knives. He handed one to her, and she clutched it awkwardly in stiff fingers.
"Just in case," he repeated. "Let's go. We'll exit through the front of the church."
She nodded and bared her teeth.
They made their way from the rectory to the basement of the church itself without any surprises. Father Matthew stayed alert, watching and listening for anyone or anything that might be hiding in the shadows, but there was nothing.
By the time they reached the top of the stairs that led to the front of the church, the priest was covered in sweat, and he felt feverish. He reached out and touched Audrey's arm; she was cold as death.
"Wait. Before we open that door, I just want you to know, no matter what happens, God loves you. God really, really loves you." He squeezed her ice cold arm. "Do you understand?"
Audrey nodded almost imperceptibly.
"Follow me." He opened the door slowly and pushed it open. Holding his breath, he poked his head through the doorway and looked around. "I think it's safe. Come on."
Audrey dutifully followed him into the church. The butcher knife was still clutched loosely in one hand. She held both arms at her sides as she moved.
They walked down the center aisle, making slow and steady movements that would have been at home in a funeral march. Father Matthew swiveled his head from side to side, looking up and down each and every scuffed wooden pew as they passed it.
Audrey never turned her head.
The priest nearly had his hand on the bolt and was just about to slide it out of place so they could leave the church when he heard a thump. He turned around to see Audrey with her hands around the neck of someone who used to be someone and now was no one. No one.
She was eating his face.
The faceless man screamed. His mouth opened wide. "Help," he said. It was the last word to escape the place where his lips once were before Audrey bit off his tongue.
"Audrey! No!" The priest dropped his butcher knife. "He's not one of them. He- he was speaking. He's not . . . dead." He remained rooted in place as he watched Audrey tear out the man's throat with her teeth and fingernails.
She tore into his belly next, grabbing slick handfuls of organs and bringing them to her lips while the man still twitched beneath her, his hands clutching at nothing. Her borrowed clothes became soaked in crimson blood that streaked her face and matted her hair.
Father Matthew waited for her to finish, unable to look away. He watched her eat until she was satisfied.
When she was sated, she stood and walked to the heavy wooden door and slid the bolt open. With a single nod to the speechless priest, she walked into the light of day.
He followed her.
The knives they'd brought from the priest's kitchen lay abandoned on the bloodstained wooden floors of the church. He closed the door on the church and the blood and the forgotten butcher knives and the dead man lying on the dirty floor, and he swallowed hard.
"My car is right over here. It's the Camaro." The priest looked at the car that had brought him so much joy and guilt. "It's not like the one I had in high school that I told you about. This one has an automatic transmission."
He looked at his bloodstained companion and felt another wave of guilt crash over him. Was there something that he could have done to prevent the man's death back at the church, or was his dedication to Audrey clouding his judgment? He decided that the answer was both.
They crossed the parking lot to the place where his car was parked, and he sighed with relief. The car appeared to be undam
aged and unoccupied. Considering recent events, he hadn't been sure if that would be the case.
He pushed the button on his key fob to unlock the Camaro, which emitted a satisfying chirp. "It's unlocked," he said. "You can get inside."
Audrey shook her head.
"What's wrong?" He cursed himself for not bringing the pen and paper with them. "Don't you want to get in the car?"
She shook her head again.
When Father Matthew took a step closer to the driver's side door of the vehicle, she pounced on him. With more strength than he knew she possessed, she pushed him backward several feet.
She shook her head, and then she held out one hand with palm facing him.
Stop.
"What's wrong? We have to get in the car, Audrey."
She pointed at the car, and then she lowered her hand several inches.
The priest followed the direction she was pointing with his eyes and saw something moving in the low space between the undercarriage of the car and the ground. "Oh, no," he said. "Not again." Then he heard whimpering.
"Please," said a woman's voice from beneath the car. "Please. Don't hurt me."
Father Matthew dropped to one knee and peered beneath the car. "No one's going to hurt you," he said. "Come out from under there. I'll keep you safe." He couldn't see past the shadows to the person who lay there.
"Where's Peter?" The voice was unsteady.
"Peter?" Father Matthew asked.
"He went into the church to see if he could find help, and he never came back outside." A small tear-streaked face popped out from near one rear tire. "He told me to wait here until he came back, but he never came back." The woman sniffled. "Why didn't he come back?"
"When did he go inside?" Father Matthew asked her.
"Right before you and that woman got here." She glared in Audrey's direction. "Why is she covered in blood?"
The priest thought about the man who lay dead inside, the man whose blood was currently drying on Audrey's clothes and skin, the man whose flesh sat partially consumed inside Audrey's stomach.
"I haven't seen him," he said.
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