Apocrypha Sequence: Deviance

by Shane Jiraiya Cummings

  The man's hand moved with precision as he leaned closer to the girl. Blaine couldn't see what the man was doing to her but it caused his hairs stand on end and his stomach to knot. Blaine clenched his fists as another anguished scream rocked the hallway.

  There was no doubt now. He was answering this girl's cries.

  The man in the coat stepped back to admire his handiwork, offering Blaine a full view of the debauchery.

  The girl was spread-eagled, bound at the wrists and ankles by the cruel wire, holding her in an 'X' shape. She sagged against her restraints, sobbing uncontrollably with her head bowed. Bedraggled dark hair, falling past her shoulders, shrouded her face. Her hospital gown was ripped open at the front and covered in blood. A poorly stitched wound on her throat was crusted with dried blood, and dark crimson lines marked her breasts and stomach. Fresh blood stained her torso a foul red and dripped onto the floor, where it was captured by plastic sheeting. The plastic covered the floor and much of the walls.

  She looked up at her tormentor with pathetic, pleading eyes. Blaine's blood burned when he caught sight of her face, her terrified face. Christ, she was barely eighteen. Too young to die at the hands of this sick bastard.

  She shook her head as her torturer advanced again. He could see clearly what he held in his hand. A blood-stained scalpel. Her mouth moved, but if she said something, it was forever lost to Blaine's deadened ears. In his mounting rage, Blaine doubted the cruel bastard with the scalpel heard it, either.

  He searched for a weapon, anything he could use to take the guy down. The corridor was sadly lacking.

  Turning back to the door, he saw the man waving the scalpel in the hapless girl's face. She shuddered and sobbed. He also caught sight of the tormentor's face. He wore a surgeon's mask but the eyes gave him away. It was that prick of a doctor: Radisich.

  His fury raging, Blaine no longer cared about a weapon. Rational thought was overwhelmed by raw adrenalin.

  He slammed his shoulder into the double doors with explosive force and hurled his bulk into the examination room. Dr. Radisich turned in surprise, dumbfounded by the white blur of motion that charged toward him.

  The collision was sickening. The doctor collapsed like a sack as Blaine crash-tackled him into the concrete wall. A nearby metal trolley, carrying pristine metal tools and kidney-shaped bowls, rattled from the impact.

  Blaine didn't hear the clatter of the scalpel hitting the floor, the crumple of the plastic sheeting, or the snap of Radisich's ribs. The pair went down hard, the doctor bearing the brunt.

  For long moments, nothing moved in Examination Room Four.

  Blaine rose to his feet and dusted off his hospital-issue pyjamas, trying to remove the taint of the loathsome creature passing himself off as a man.

  He stared at the crumpled doctor, splayed unconscious in a mess on the floor, silently grateful for his years of football training. Unable to contain his disgust, he spat on Radisich before turning to the girl.

  #

  Mr Blaine, what led you down there in the first place? flashed up on the laptop screen.

  Blaine pondered the detective's question carefully, reviewing everything that had happened that night. Getting the nurses to call for help, then actually believe him, took some doing. He had commandeered a notepad from the nearest nurse's station and frantically scribbled his messages.

  Seeing the tortured girl's cuts soon convinced them. It was harder to convince the medical staff that Dr. Radisich was the culprit, but it didn't matter too much, either. He'd been safely jammed into a storage cupboard, still unconscious and bound with the same wire used on the girl, until the police arrived.

  I heard the girl's screams, Blaine typed on the screen, immediately below the question. He decided shouting at the detective was probably not a good idea.

  The detective, probably a few years younger than him, stared him long and hard in the face. His eyes wavered between Blaine's and the bandages wrapped around his ears. He soon left him with the laptop while he discussed something with another detective.

  They returned together a few moments later. The other detective, approaching his fifties, read the transcript and also shot Blaine a hard look.

  He turned the laptop around and typed something. Turning it back to Blaine, it read:

  That is impossible, Mr Blaine. The girl's vocal cords had been removed.

  * * *

  The Cutting Room

  Hic locus est ubi mors gaudet succurrere vitae.

  The plaque gleamed, caught on the cusp of shadows and fluorescent light. Burnished copper letters. Stark Roman font.

  "This is the place where death delights to help the living." Parrish's recital of the phrase was now ritual as he donned the second pair of latex gloves. They snapped into place with a satisfying echo that hung in the air. Smells of rubber and disinfectants clung to the place, thinly masking the stench of decay.

  The plaque had been there for as long as he could remember, even before the tenure of crazy old Doc Kaufmann, who once famously ate a cadaver's eyeball, and perversely, taught him everything he knew about forensic pathology.

  "Doctor Parrish?" The diener said, throwing his concentration into turmoil.

  "What is it, err... Greg, wasn't it?"

  "Gary, sir. The body's been prepped."

  "I can see that." He spared a glance while adjusting his gloves.

  A young woman lay naked upon the slab. Her breasts were thrust out, courtesy of the body block jammed between her shoulder blades. The lines of her ribs and the hollow of her chest lay exposed under the intensity of the low-slung bar lamp.

  He stopped fiddling with his gloves as he stood mesmerised, tracing with his eyes the waves of her raven hair as they ate the light and shimmered with the glut. His gaze lingered on the curve of her breasts, coquettishly angled by her position on the slab. Noting the fullness of her nipples—hard, dark lumps contrasting to her pallid skin—he silently thanked the powers-that-be for his good fortune. An attractive woman, even a dead one, was better than the grisly parade that usually passed through his life and his morgue.

  "The bread knife's not here," Gary said, "do you want me to go get one?"

  "That won't be necessary." His eyes swept the room a final time before settling on the leather case placed by the door. His leather case.

  Gary was all rangy limbs and awkward angles as he hovered by the corpse. The low bar lamp brought his apron and the folds of his scrub suit into sharp focus, obscuring his face in the feathery darkness beyond. He looked more like a butcher's clumsy apprentice than a morgue diener.

  Dr. Parrish shook his head as he took possession of the case. "Greg, shouldn't you be doing something?"

  "Umm ... oh, right. And it's Gary, sir." He paused a moment longer before shuffling off to fetch the tape recorder.

  As he laid the case upon the aluminium trolley next to the corpse, Parrish heard the assistant mutter something from the far corner of the room. It was a smallish room lined with metal, which amplified every sound.

  Brushing aside his irritation, he withdrew his personal serrated bread knife—a surgical version of the household knife, ideal for slicing organs—and placed it on the trolley next to the electric Stryker saw and the scissor-like enterotome. After storing his leather case at the foot of the trolley, he surveyed his tools, waiting for the assistant to return.

  He picked up the scalpel, checking to see if it was fitted with a #22 blade. The mavericks in Emergency sometimes raided the morgue supplies for their own ends, especially the larger sized scalpel blades. Satisfied, he replaced it, and moved to caress the Hagedorn needle when the diener returned with the recorder.

  "Put it down." Parrish noted the diener's awkwardness.

  Gary flinched, placing the recorder on the scales which dangled above the end of the autopsy table. The scales bobbed up and down, the needle settling to 272 grams.

  "Not there." Parrish sighed from behind his surgical mask.

  Snatching the tape recorder up
with child-like indignity, Gary then leaned across the exposed corpse and dropped it onto the trolley with a clatter. He couldn't resist stealing a glance at the breasts as he pulled back and straightened.

  "Idiot," Parrish muttered, more concerned by the tape recorder dropping onto his knife than the lecherous behaviour of his assistant.

  "Tell me, diener—it was Greg wasn't it—do you know what we do now?"

  "Gary, doctor."

  "Well?"

  "We ... umm ... make the first incision?"

  "No, diener, we don't."

  Gary flushed. His hovering hands, drawn up like effeminate claws, spoke volumes of his inexperience.

  "We confirm the identity," Parrish said after the silence wasn't filled. "Get the paperwork while I inspect the tag."

  He watched the diener shuffle off to the filing cabinet before moving to the woman's feet. He prided himself on efficiency and precise movements, navigating around the table without raising a sound. He stooped by the corpse's big toe and read the name on the tag quietly to himself.

  "What was the subject's name?"

  Gary startled at the sudden question, almost dropping the clipboard. "Umm ... Natasha."

  "Umm Natasha who, diener?" Parrish was tired of having his time wasted by this fool.

  "Natasha Kohl, Doctor. From out of town. Lived in Berlin, Germany."

  "What were you doing here, all that way from home?" Parrish asked of the corpse. "Now, diener, we've established this is the correct body. How do we proceed?"

  "The first incision?"

  "No ..."

  Again, the diener paused awkwardly beside the autopsy table, clutching the clipboard across his chest like a shield.

  "Try, the external examination," Parrish instructed.

  Gary nodded.

  "I take it you've not performed many autopsies before, then, diener?" Parrish emphasised the assistant's title. "Stop cradling that clipboard, get over here, and activate the tape recorder."

  Gary scurried to comply, uncertain of where to offload the clipboard.

  "Wait," said Parrish. "On second thought, read me the cause of death."

  Gary froze mid-step, then returned to studying the file.

  "Umm ... says Cause of death: Unknown."

  "What? Incompetent fools. Any injuries listed?"

  "Nope."

  "Are there any notes, then?" Parrish waved his hand for emphasis.

  "Says Rigor has not set in at time of admission."

  "When was that? This morning?"

  "Umm ... hang on." Gary scanned the file with darting eyes.

  "Out of the way, fool!" Parrish nudged the assistant away and commandeered the clipboard. Gary half retreated, half stumbled against the wall.

  Propping his lanky frame on the handle of a body storage vault, he shot the doctor a glare laced with indignation and shock. Parrish was too absorbed in the file to take notice.

  "This is ridiculous," Parrish fumed. "Not a skerrick of information to be found. I'm examining blind."

  He tossed the clipboard at the open filing cabinet. It smacked off the side of the cabinet and clattered to the ground as Parrish circled around the body and resumed position next to his tools.

  Gary scampered over to retrieve the fallen clipboard while Parrish commenced the external examination.

  "Do you know what diener means, Greg?" Parrish's eyes never left the corpse.

  "Gary," said the diener, shaking his head as he shunted the cabinet door closed. The metallic echo reverberated through the room.

  "It's German," Parrish dropped back into measured tones. "Those Germans are an industrious people. A good sense of order. They were the first to perform autopsies, you know." He bent low, hovering his face bare inches above the woman's chest. "Diener means servant, Greg. Do you like the sound of that?" His eyes sparkled as he looked up from his inspection and met the diener's sullen glare.

  Parrish flicked on the tape recorder as he drew himself to full height. "Stratton Memorial Hospital, autopsy in morgue examination room two," he said aloud. "Subject's name is Natasha Kohl. Female Caucasian. Approximately thirty years of age. Estimated cause of death: unknown. Dr. Hamilton Parrish MD is prosector." He paused, glancing at Gary again. "What's your surname?"

  "Timms."

  "And the diener." Parrish spat the word at Gary. "Is Greg Timms."

  "Gary." The assistant muttered.

  "Time is two-thirty-nine pm, and I have commenced the external examination."

  Parrish moved around to her feet once more. He placed his hands on the aluminium slab either side of her legs and began his task. His gaze soon drifted upward, taking in her calves and thighs.

  He swivelled first to the left, then to the right, following the table's moulded blood groove up the expanse of her legs. With her torso pushed out by the body block and the table angled downward to facilitate blood flow, he had a prime view of her curves and the sparse hair of her pubic region. He savoured the sight, knowing tomorrow would bring a decomposing drunk or a messy railway suicide.

  "Subject appears to bear no obvious signs of trauma," he spoke into the recorder. "Her skin is very white. Unusually so."

  Gary had crept closer, floating behind Doctor Parrish.

  "I'm examining her legs for injuries or needle marks." Parrish started at the toes, wedging them apart while holding the foot closer to the light. It was true. No rigor mortis. Her limbs were still supple, even after lying in the morgue for hours. Her state prevented a guess as to the time of death. The case grew more intriguing by the moment.

  He worked his way upward, inspecting knees and thighs for signs of the unusual. He paused at her crotch, sifting through her pubic hair. He pried her legs apart like an easy hooker, and spread her labia wide.

  "Unusual," he said into the air, keeping a calm voice despite an accelerating heart. "If I didn't know better, I'd say her body is exhibiting signs atypical of a corpse. As if she only died this very moment. There is ..." He coughed, cleared his throat. "A surprising amount of vaginal fluid."

  Parrish shifted position, allowing the legs to droop and splay even further apart. Standing by the woman's torso, he checked for a pulse.

  Nothing.

  "Diener," he said. "Fetch a thermometer. I'll need you to take a measurement."

  Gary sauntered off to do as bidden.

  "Quickly!" Parrish called after him.

  Gary returned a moment later with the thermometer in hand. He wavered as he stared at the body, his indecision clear.

  "In the rectum, man!" said Parrish, leaning across her face to feel for breath.

  Gary eased the glass device into the orifice. Expectancy was clear on his face. Even Parrish looked down with anticipation. Instead, nothing. Heartbeats later, Gary removed the thermometer and arranged the woman's legs in a more modest pose.

  "What's the reading?"

  "Umm ... a few degrees above room temperature," Gary cocked his head, "isn't that what you expected?"

  Parrish didn't answer. Instead he was fixated on something near her breast. "Get me a magnifying glass."

  Gary dutifully complied. Within moments, the magnifying glass was in the doctor's hand.

  "Come here," the doctor motioned. "What do you see?"

  Gary leaned forward, awkward in close proximity to Parrish, and stared through the magnifying glass.

  "Well?"

  Gary pulled his gaze from the glass and focussed instead on the woman's chest and abdomen.

  Dr. Parrish traced a line with his finger from underneath her breast down to below her abdomen. "There! It looks like a scar. A faint one, but definitely a scar." He began to trace the line back toward her other breast but pulled back, whirling to face Gary.

  "Tell me about the initial incision," Parrish demanded.

  Gary stepped back, flinching from the doctor's fervour. "Umm ... it's a deep cut, down to the bone. It's a 'Y' shape, starting from the front of the shoulders and goes down to the ..."

  "Go on."

&n
bsp; Gary stared harder at the corpse, at the near-invisible scar. The line Parrish just traced. "Down to the abdomen."

  "Someone's been at her before me."

  Gary nodded but shrank back. Confusion was rife in his eyes.

  "I don't like this one bit. We have to cut her open." Parrish moved with purpose, repositioning himself next to the trolley. "Normally, the diener makes the first incision, but I think I'll spare you that honour today."

  Gary stood in the shadows.

  The woman's chest lay exposed, propped up, and at the mercy of Parrish's scalpel.

  "I am commencing the initial incision," Parrish declared to the recorder.

  He stabbed the scalpel into the right shoulder, furtively at first, but was soon slicing along the scar in a barely controlled rush. Parrish used hungry sawing cuts to part skin and flesh. Trickles of blood and other fluids seeped from the monstrous incision, spilling down the woman's torso and onto the table.

  A tiny moan escaped into the room, almost unheard, as the scalpel sliced through the woman's stomach tissue.

  Parrish's response was sluggish as he shook himself from the task. "What was that?"

  "What?"

  Parrish gaped at the corpse. "Did you hear a noise? Like a sigh?"

  The woman's face was locked in a death mask as before. Her closed eyes were lost to the world, her mouth open in the tiniest of pouts. All identical to when Parrish first entered the room.

  "I'm continuing the incision," he said to the recorder, as he plunged the scalpel deep into her stomach, picking up the weeping thread of the cut. He was approaching the lowest end of the incision but proceeded with caution, having lost his earlier vigour.

  Gary. A voice called to the diener. A feminine voice. Foreign. Stop him! He's not doing it right.

  Gary looked about the room in alarm but saw nothing—no one other than the doctor and the corpse. Parrish's tentative scalpel was nearing the abdomen and the pubic area.

  Diener! Dr. Parrish looked up from his bloody handiwork to stare Gary in the eye. He lowered his mask, exposing a demented grin. His voice, the screech of a harpy. Punch me in the face!