by Lincoln Cole
She spun and swept her leg, tripping him to the ground, and then put her boot on his throat.
“I said I wouldn’t ask you again.”
Mikael struggled, and Frieda dug her heel.
“You’re not going to touch her, are you?”
He shook his head and tapped at the boot, struggling for air. Frieda held her foot there for an extra second and then pulled it away.
Mikael laid on the ground for a moment, sucking in air, and then climbed shakily to his feet. He stumbled a little bit, red faced and wary, and rubbed at his throat.
“What did she do to him?” he asked, quieter this time. “Why is he on the ground like this? What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me, Frieda. What is she?”
“She’s only a girl. She didn’t do anything,” Frieda replied, standing protectively in front of Abigail. “You have your target. Gather Curtis up. Go.”
“Tell me what she is, and I will go. I must report this to the Vatican.”
“No. I already told you. She is just a girl.”
“I need to take her—”
“I told you to go,” Frieda said, her voice taking on a tone Abigail had never heard before. A chill shot down her young spine and she took a half step back from Frieda. “Don’t make me say it again.”
Mikael hesitated for a second longer, then he picked Curtis up. Curtis was still crying and completely out of his mind as he was slung unceremoniously over Mikael’s shoulder.
“The church will hear of this.”
Mikael walked away. He headed out of the alleyway, glanced back one last time, and then disappeared around the corner.
“Get in,” Frieda said.
They climbed quickly into the car and she tore off down the road, heading away from the apartment complex toward the freeway.
She drove quickly, as though running from something, and she didn’t speak at all. Abigail thought to say something, but she was hesitant now. Frieda had sounded furious, but more than that she was scary.
Abigail had never thought of Frieda as dangerous before. She was always so calm and laid back. This was a side of her she’d never seen before.
She didn’t like it.
They headed for the interstate and going northeast. They kept traveling in silence, and gradually the weight of the silence built up until Abigail couldn’t take it anymore.
Finally, Abigail said, “I…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that—”
“You did nothing wrong,” Frieda interrupted, staring straight ahead.
“Are you mad at me?”
“No, of course not. Why would I be mad?”
Abigail frowned, staring out the window. They drove in silence for another few minutes before Abigail fell asleep. Frieda didn’t say anything else, and Abigail was too afraid to speak again. She knew she’d messed up, she just didn’t know how to make it right.
Frieda woke her up later at a fast food restaurant. The sun out now and Frieda looked exhausted. She still spoke very little to Abigail, and wouldn’t make eye contact.
“We left our stuff.”
“I already sent a friend back to retrieve it. I didn’t want to be there in case…”
She didn’t finish the statement. Abigail waited for her to continue, but Frieda just returned to her meal and looked away.
“In case what? Do you think Mikael was going to tell on me?”
“No,” Frieda said. “I think he was going to tell on me.”
“What do you mean?”
Frieda hesitated. “Nothing. Never mind. Finish your breakfast. We need to get back on the road and head to Ohio.”
“To see Arthur?”
“Yeah,” she said. “To see Arthur.”
Frieda sat like the weight of the entire world was on her shoulders, and she was lost in her thoughts. Abigail watched her for a moment and then realized that she had been wrong: Frieda wasn’t angry.
She was scared.
Chapter 13
Debra Walker sat in the waiting room of the hospital emergency room with a wrinkled and worn magazine opened on her lap. Her foot was tapping impatiently on the hard linoleum floor and her hands kept clenching.
She was staring at an article about a new beauty mask that would revolutionize her life but none of the words were sinking in. She’d been reading the same advertisement for the last half hour.
Her eyes kept wandering over to the emergency room double doors where they had wheeled her husband through a short while ago. He had complained of chest pain while they were back at home eating dinner, collapsed onto the floor, and now they were here. Debra had never been as scared in her entire life as those ten minutes spent waiting for an ambulance to arrive.
The nurse said that Frank had already been taken to some other department of the hospital to get a chest scan, which was why they kept her out in the waiting room instead of the emergency area. He still had to get one test or another to figure out what the actual problem was so they could fix it.
Probably another heart attack, she knew, and if it was then it would be his second one in the last three years. The first hadn’t been much at all, just an ache and new daily medicine he had to take, but this time it was different. This time…
It wasn’t good, that’s all she knew. He hadn’t been taking the medicine like he was supposed to and she kept telling him that he needed to be more consistent. He was stubborn and forgetful, and now they were both paying the price. She understood that this time he might not make it through to the other side.
The nurse was supposed to come get her and bring her back to his emergency room once Frank’s tests were over with, but so far no one had come out to speak with her. It was past nine at night and the entire hospital was quiet. She didn’t know if that was normal, but it was a sleepy little town and she assumed the lack of patients was because it was so cold outside.
Still, if they weren’t busy, why was it taking so long?
The more time passed by the more certain she became that something was really wrong with her husband. It was a creeping fear in the back of her mind. That was why no one had come out to see her, the little voice of fear told her. No one wanted to be the one to deliver the bad news that she wouldn’t see her husband again.
Her fingers clutched at the magazine and she could feel them shivering. It was cold in the waiting room, but not that cold. She forced herself to relax and set the magazine on the table next to her.
Maybe they were just slow in getting the results back. Or maybe they had forgotten to come and tell her what they had found. No news was good news, right? That’s what they always said. Maybe everything was fine and she was just being paranoid.
Debra hadn’t called her son or her daughters yet. They would rush over as soon as she told them, of course, but the thought of making those calls paralyzed her with fear. As soon as she told them what had happened it would all become real.
She knew she needed to call them, though.
There was a sudden crashing sound from the other side of the door to the emergency room, and Debra jumped a little in her seat. It sounded like a bunch of metal pans had dumped to the floor and bounced around.
She dropped the magazine, heart racing, and stood up from her seat. There were no other sounds. Slowly, she made her way over to the entry doors to the emergency bay to look through the square little windows in the center of each door.
The entire emergency department appeared empty: even this late at night while they weren’t busy she should have seen employees and doctors moving around, right?
Debra was suddenly aware of how alone she was in the waiting room, and how disturbing the hospital felt without any activity. The receptionist had said she would be right back, hadn’t she?
How long ago was that?
Must have been at least thirty minutes.
Debra blinked as though suddenly coming awake from a dream. She had been so absorbed in her prayers and worries about Frank she’d completely l
ost track of time. Had it really been that long since anyone was out here?
She hadn’t even noticed the receptionist leave, too wrapped up in her own thoughts. It wasn’t normal for them to leave that post for more than a couple of minutes at a time to use the bathroom, was it?
The lights flickered.
She glanced up just as the antiseptic overhead lights steadied back to a normal glow, frowning. Sit down and relax, part of her brain told her, but another voice warned her that something was very wrong. The place shouldn’t be this empty or quiet, and what were the odds of a hospital losing power long enough to cause the lights to flicker?
After a short internal debate, that second voice won out. Something was wrong, and that meant Frank might not be getting the help he needed. She needed to check it out and make sure her husband was okay.
She set her hand against the cold double bay doors that led back into the emergency department and took a steadying breath. There wasn’t a lock, but there was a sign warning that only authorized personnel were allowed through.
She hesitated for another few seconds, listening at the doorway for any sounds of movement. She had to check it out to make sure that everything was okay with her husband and that he was getting the help he needed. Never mind that every fiber in her being was screaming for her to turn and run away.
Right?
Slowly, Debra pushed the double doors open. Somewhere further in the emergency department a machine was steadily beeping. She heard a rasping breathing sound from ahead and to the right, but nothing else. No footsteps, no people talking, nothing. The hair stood up on the back of her neck.
She tiptoed down the hallway, footsteps echoing around her, and turned the first corner. The first thing she saw down this hallway was a middle-aged man lying on the floor about ten feet ahead of her, covered in blood. She took a sharp step back, covering her mouth with her hand. He was still alive with what looked to be a deep knife wound on the side of his neck.
More blood was also spilling from his chest, and it seemed like he might have been stabbed. The man groaned, and when he saw her he stuck a bloody hand out toward her, desperately trying to reach her. There was a terrified look in his eyes that cut to her very core, a primal fear at his inability to draw breath as his blood was pumped out of his body.
No one was helping him. Someone should have been helping him, right? Where was the staff? Where were the doctors and nurses? What had happened back here to cause this man to start bleeding?
It felt like she had stepped into The Twilight Zone, but this was real. It should have been a dream, but she knew in her heart that it wasn’t. This was happening; this man was really dying.
It looked as though the dying man had stumbled out of one of the nearby curtained rooms and fallen onto a cart of bedpans. He had finally collapsed to the floor, leaving a trail of blood along the way. Scattered metal pans lay all around him, many covered in his pooling blood.
Run, part of her said.
Help him, the other objected.
She felt a tear slip down her cheek as confused emotions ripped around in her body. Her chest ached and she felt her body lock up: helplessness, fear, confusion, and more paralyzed her in place.
Seconds ticked past.
“Hello?” she called out, taking a tentative step down the hallway toward the dying man. Her voice echoed back to her. “Is anyone there?”
The department split from here further off to her right down another hallway, and there were more curtained bays along both sides. It was a fifteen bed emergency department. Right now all of the curtains were pulled closed and silent.
“Hello?” she called out again, her voice echoing uncomfortably back to her. “Anybody, please!”
No answer.
She made it over to the dying man and knelt in front of him. He stared at her, eyes begging her to help him.
“Pressure,” she muttered. “Put pressure on his neck.”
She found a white towel, bunched it up, and pressed it down on the man’s neck. He struggled, and she pushed his hands away, replacing them with the towel.
Another tear slipped down her cheek. He made gasping noises, barely conscious, and she forced the cloth down harder. Even with it soaking up the blood, however, some of it seeped through and got onto her hands.
She let out a sob, doing her best to ignore the thick red liquid as it coated her fingers and rings. It smelled horribly and she felt her stomach twisting in discomfort. This has to be a dream, she told herself, trying to convince her mind it was true. She had fallen asleep back in the lobby and this was her imagination dealing with Frank’s heart attack. It couldn’t be real.
She had experienced people dying in her life — both parents, a sibling, and too many more to count — but never like this. This was visceral and horrible, inescapable in a way that none of the others had been. The man on the floor was terrified as his life ebbed away, and he kept trying to talk to her even as she held the towel against his neck.
“Shh,” she sobbed gently, rubbing his forehead with her free hand. Her fingers left trails of blood across his skin. “Don’t speak.”
He gasped and blinked, unable to focus his eyes.
“Help! Someone please help!”
The man kept gurgling and gasping, doing his best to form words. He met her eyes and grabbed her hand, leaning up.
“Stay with me. Just stay with me,” she gasped. “Someone will be here soon.”
The pressure wasn’t working, and she could feel him dying underneath her.
What the hell was going on? This was a hospital, but no staff members were in the emergency room to save this man’s life? Her husband was somewhere deeper in this building and something was terribly wrong.
If this was happening here, what must be happening to him?
The dying man’s eyes slipped closed and he took another rasping breath. Debra couldn’t believe that this was happening and knew she wasn’t going to be able to save him. The hospital lights flickered around her and she let out a sob.
“Please. Please, stay with me.”
The grip on her hand loosened as his life ebbed away. He was about to die, she realized, and more tears streamed down her cheeks.
“Someone please!” she screamed at the empty emergency room around her. “This man needs help! Please! I don’t know what to do!”
His eyes suddenly shot open, and his grip on her hand tightened almost enough to hurt. She jerked back, but he didn’t let go.
He leaned his head up the tiniest bit from the floor, looked her squarely in the eyes, and mumbled something to her.
Then, his eyes slipped closed and his head fell back to the floor. The blood stopped pumping out of his neck.
She knelt there for what felt like forever in shock and confusion. He was no longer dying, she knew: he was dead.
That wasn’t all, though. He had spoken to her, and the word floated in her thoughts just out of reach, difficult to focus on. It took her a second to realize what it was the man had whispered to her with his final breath.
Run.
She never got the chance.
“We can actually still use him,” a voice said behind her cut in suddenly.
Debra let out a little scream and stumbled to the side, sliding her knee into the man’s blood and almost falling. Her dress and arms were covered in his blood and felt sticky on her skin.
The voice sounded like it had come from a kid. Debra climbed to her feet and spun, letting go of the blood-soaked towel and backing further down the emergency room hallway.
A teenage boy stood there behind her, blocking her path. He had brown hair and dirt-stained clothes on. Mud caked his clothing and his shoelaces were frayed and worn.
“Even if he dies,” the boy said nonchalantly, “he can still serve as a vessel. There will be limitations, of course, as it isn’t ideal to use a corpse. Still, he can be of use to us. It was unfortunate for me that he tried to run … but, without that, I never would have found you.”
>
His eyes were flat and empty, completely and utterly devoid of emotion. He stared at Debra, studied her, and she felt a chill creep down her spine. Something about the dismissive way he viewed her made her feel cold.
“Who … who are you?”
“Pardon me, where are my manners? My name is Jeremy Caldwell. Who are you?”
She took a hesitant step backwards. “Debra,” she said, barely managing to get the word out. “Where … where is everyone else? Where are the doctors and nurses?”
“Here and there,” he offered, waving his hand. “Some of them made fine vessels. Others … not so much, but that was to be expected. This one thought he could escape and nearly made it to the exit. Can you imagine what would have happened if he made it outside?”
“What is going on?”
Jeremy stepped closer. “There weren’t actually as many people in the hospital as I expected or would have liked. I planned to come later in the day so there wouldn’t be too many people to contend with, but I think I might have misjudged and arrived too late in the day. It doesn’t really matter, though, because having a little bit extra on hand doesn’t hurt and I can always summon more.”
“What?”
He smiled, another step closer. “Lucky for me, we didn’t even know you were out there. I think, though, that you will work out perfectly. Definitely better than using his corpse as a vessel.”
“You’re scaring me? What’s going on?”
“Oh, am I now? Am I scaring you?”
He took another menacing step forward.
“Stay back.”
Suddenly, she felt an intense urge to collapse to her knees. She almost did, too, before she fought the urge and backed away. She felt her knees wavering as the intrusive idea of kneeling kept vying for control. Something about the suggestion felt wrong, like it wasn’t her idea at all. It was foreign.
“A tough one?” he asked. “I like that. I enjoy a good challenge once in a while.”
Debra felt her mind begin to get fuzzy and it became hard to focus. Something was very, very wrong and suddenly her thoughts weren’t her own. She had no idea what was happening, but she knew she couldn’t stay here with this creepy boy for another second.