by Lyle Howard
41
The old man had been right. After the old Chrysler warmed up, she drove as smooth as a brand new car. It was only a 15 minute ride to Jackson Medical Center from Chase’s home, along a circuitous route Gabe knew would avoid the major traffic thoroughfares. As he drove past landmarks he had seen countless times before, they all seemed different to him. Perhaps because, for the first time, he was really noticing them. He felt like a stranger in a familiar land, appreciating everything around him, soaking it all in, committing it all to memory so he wouldn’t forget what it was like to have been alive here. The Cuban cafeterias with their Latin music blaring so loud, you could tap your feet to the frantic rhythms nearly a block away. Street vendors selling everything from bags of limes and lemons to charred mystery meat on wooden skewers … it all smelled so wonderful. Overhead, the city’s Metrorail train system glided by, transporting its faceless passengers to the concrete and glass spires of downtown Miami. In the distance, the bright lights of the city, glittering like a million chandeliers with their colors only limited to one’s imagination, gave this routine night its carnival-like atmosphere. Gabe didn’t realize it, but he was grinning uncontrollably, awestruck by its majestic beauty, like a newborn child.
One of the largest publicly funded hospitals and teaching facilities in the entire United States, Jackson Medical Center’s reputation for quality care and its elite staff are unparalleled in every field of medicine. With campuses and satellite centers spread out over the whole city, its primary facility is a complex of towers and buildings that house both hospital patients as well as medical offices, situated on the western side of downtown Miami. It was an office on the fourth floor of the main 10-story building that Gabe was interested in.
As he guided the old Chrysler into one of the hospital’s covered garages, Gabe tore a stub from the automated ticket dispenser and began hunting for a parking spot. On the third level, he finally found a vacancy. Pulling into the space, he made a mental note of the color and level number he was parked on. When he shut down the engine, the car back-fired twice and sizzled for a full 30 seconds before falling silent.
Gabe climbed out of the car and the brisk wind seemed to intensify, chilling Gabe to his very core. The swirling breeze howled through the structure, making a sad, lamentable sound that made Gabe want to pick up his pace. Walking as quickly as he could, he continually clenched and unclenched his fists to keep the circulation and feeling in his fingers going. Even under the harsh glare of the florescent lights, Gabe could see that the skin under his fingernails was turning blue. He needed his medication … and soon.
There was no entrance into the hospital from this level, so Gabe had to take the elevator up one floor. The warmth of the enclosed lift was a welcome respite, giving Gabe brief chance to thaw his bones. The doors opened and he stepped past two women, probably a mother and her daughter, who had obviously been crying. Gabe remained silent, but tried to look understanding as he used his arm to block the door from closing before the mourners had made it inside. God, how he hated hospitals.
The acridly antiseptic smell of the hospital accosted Gabe’s nostrils the instant he pushed through the glass doors. A staccato chime was tolling over the speaker system, and like the ultra-high pitched frequency of a dog whistle, it appeared that only the hospital’s staff cocked their heads to heed it. Gabe never remembered being aware of it during his stay; he was sure it was always there, calling someone to go somewhere, but he’d never really paid attention to it … until now.
A large digital clock hanging over the nurses’ station read 8:35. Gabe tried to avoid eye contact with the two nurses manning the desk as he pressed the “down button” on the elevator. He could feel one of them staring at him, and he instinctively kept his back turned to her and jabbed at the button, hoping, but knowing, it would do nothing to increase the speed of the lift’s descent.
“Are you alright, sir?” came a gentle voice from behind.
Gabe did his best to ignore her.
“Sir … are you feeling alright?”
“Hmmm?” muttered Gabe naively. “Were you talking to me?”
The nurse, a young blond with that “extra perky” smile and deep blue eyes came around from behind the desk. “Yes, sir. You look peaked. Are you okay?”
Gabe gouged at the lit elevator button hard enough to almost splinter his fingernail. “Just a bit under the weather tonight. That’s why I’m here. Came to see my doctor.”
The nurse moved around to Gabe’s left, but he turned away not wanting her to get a good look at him. “May I ask your doctor’s name?” she asked suspiciously.
Why the hell is taking this elevator so long?
“Sanborn,” Gabe said, his nose nearly pressed against the cold silver doors.
This answer seemed to appease the nurse. “Ah, Dr. Sanborn. His office is on the fourth floor … one floor down.”
Gabe growled between clenched teeth. “Yes, I know.”
A bell chimed and the doors hissed open, but not soon enough for Gabe. Thankfully the lift was empty, or he would have trampled any passengers as he rushed inside.
“Have a good evening,” the nurse called out as the doors slid closed. “And feel better.”
It wasn’t like Gabe to snap like that. His nerves were frayed, and his entire body was trembling like he was a junkie going through the symptoms of withdrawal. As the lift came to a stop, Gabe touched his palms to his face and realized they were like two slabs of ice. Stepping out of the elevator, he cupped his hands around his mouth and blew into his fists to warm them. It’s like the Arctic Circle in this place.
There was no nurses’ station on this floor, just offices and what appeared to be storage and examination rooms. Hanging on the wall across the hallway was a directory. Gabe quickly scanned the listing and found Sanborn, Kenneth … 422. There would be no need for skulking around here; with the exception of a two man janitorial crew shampooing the carpeting, Gabe couldn’t see anyone else. When he had anonymously phoned the hospital earlier in the evening, he had been told that Sanborn would be in his office until 9:00 P.M. Gabe just prayed a medical emergency hadn’t changed all that.
This floor was so disorienting. Like spokes on a wheel, darkened corridors spread out from a central hub. With the drone of the shampooing machine rumbling through his head, Gabe identified the correct hallway.
A few landscaping plants would do a lot for this place, Gabe thought as he padded down the sterile passageway. “416 … 418 … 420,” he counted under his breath.
A sliver of light illuminated the pale green carpet beneath the door to room 422. Gabe put his ear up to the door and listened, but heard nothing. He took hold of the door knob and twisted … it was unlocked. Knocking as he entered, Gabe found himself in an empty outer office. A single desk lamp illuminated a small work station. Three walls were adorned with the same nondescript artwork found in most receptionists’ cubicles, while the fourth wall, which separated this room from Sanborn’s office, was manufactured out of frosted glass. All Gabe could make out behind it were a few vague shapes and some distorted shadows. He thought it was a very unsettling effect for a doctor’s office. As he stepped further into the receptionist’s quarters, there was a picture on the desk, a family portrait, none of which was of Kenneth Sanborn.
From the main office came a shuffling of papers and the creak of a chair.
“Dr. Sanborn?” Gabe called out.
A voice responded from behind the glass wall. “Yes, who’s there? It’s after office hours.”
Gabe poked his head around the doorway and found Sanborn sitting at his desk, opening his mail with a fancy pewter letter opener. This office was dark as well, except for a lamp on the doctor’s desk which illuminated a small framed photograph of Sanborn and his wife. “Someone forget to pay the electric bill in this place?” Gabe asked.
Sanborn still hadn’t looked up from his mail as he exhaled a weary sigh. He assumed he was just talking to one of the cleaning crew. “T
his is the only chance for peace and quiet I get after a day full of surgeries and I cherish the solitude and subdued lighting. If you’ll come back in about 15 minutes, my garbage will be ready. I’m just going through the last of my mail.”
“I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else, Doc.”
Sanborn looked up and squinted into the darkness. Gabe’s face was shrouded in shadow. The doctor reached across his desk and bent the neck of the desk lamp to shine its focus on the visitor.
Gabe covered his eyes from the glare of the beam. “Remember me, Doc?”
The letter opener dropped out of the doctor’s hand. Pale astonishment fell upon Sanborn’s face, and his entire body began to tremble uncontrollably. “This … this is impossible,” he stammered. “You … you’re supposed to be dead!”
“Dead?” Gabe countered. “Hey, I’m sorry to disappoint you, Doc, but wasn’t it you that told me I still had six months to live?”
Sanborn seemed confused and began looking around the room like he was searching for another exit. His finger waggled at Gabe nervously as his breathing began to come in gasps. “The yacht blew up! I saw it on the television! I saw it with my own two eyes! You were supposed to have been killed in the blast!”
Gabe entire body went rigid. What was going on here? How did Sanborn know about his involvement with Mystique? It was impossible … he couldn’t have known. There was nothing on the news tying him to the explosion. Gabe’s mind was calculating and shifting events and ideas around like slats on a Chinese puzzle box. Somewhere, all of this fit. Of course! Bock would need a connection in the medical profession to help him procure terminal recruits. Who better than someone who deals with them on a daily basis?
Gabe’s only purpose here tonight had been to acquire more medication, and suddenly he found himself staring into the frightened eyes of someone who knew way too much. The pills could wait. Gabe needed to play out this hand. He stepped further into the office. “I think we need to talk, Doc.”
Out of the corner of his eye, the doctor found where the pewter letter opener had landed on his desk, and subtly covered the blade with his right hand. Sweat beaded up on his forehead and his fingers raised to fiddle with his collar as if it were five sizes too small. “I have nothing to say to you,” he said as he eased his high-backed chair away from the desk. “Now you’d better leave before I call hospital security.”
Gabe held up his hands innocently. “Sure Doc. Don’t get your stethoscope in a knot. I’ll leave…” He turned to the door, but, instead of retreating, Gabe closed the door and clicked the lock shut. “…when hell freezes over.”
“What … are you doing?” Sanborn quavered.
“Take a good look at me, Doc,” Gabe said as he walked closer into the spotlight from the desk lamp. “Do I look like a guy who’s in the mood to screw around? I want some answers, and I want them now!”
Sanborn reached for the phone, but Gabe was surprisingly quick as he yanked the receiver out of the doctor’s hand and ripped the cord out of the wall. “Sorry, Doc. Security’s not coming.”
Sanborn pulled his hand back ever so slowly, keeping the letter opener secreted beneath it. “I don’t know what you want from me. I just did whatever they told me to do.”
Gabe put both hands on Sanborn’s desk and leaned across it menacingly. He was at the end of his physical strength, but this new disclosure seemed to pump a little gas into his tank. How deep did this conspiracy run? How is it that August Bock could have manipulated every event, every nuance of his life? Gabe would have to start thinking on a different plane … believing that everyone was now under Bock’s influence. Who could he trust? August Bock was a more than just a madman—he was a deadly virus that infected everything and left no one unsusceptible. “You know I’ve got nothing to lose, Doc, so don’t play games with me. How long have you been working with August Bock?”
Sanborn tried to put up on an intrepid facade, but his voice couldn’t mask his desperation. “I don’t know who that is, or what you’re talking about.”
Gabe leaned back and took a long dramatic pause. Years of breaking alibis across an interrogation table had made him a master in the subtle techniques of intimidation. Slowly, he began to walk around the desk, tapping his fingers across its surface as he closed in on his cowering prey. “Ehhh,” he said, imitating the sound of a buzzer. “Wrong answer, Doc. Strike one.” Gabe grabbed a stapler off Sanborn’s desk and sent it flying across the room into one of those amorphous pieces of artwork. The glass in the frame shattered into a thousand fragments. “Two more strikes and you’re out,” he snarled. “You want to try again? Tell me about your association with August Bock.”
Sanborn had pressed himself so far back into his chair, there surely had to be two rows of button impressions on his spine. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he faltered.
“Ehhh,” Gabe buzzed again. “Strike two.” He picked up a trash can by his feet and heaved it through the opaque glass wall separating Sanborn’s office from the receptionist’s. The subsequent crash was loud … too loud. Unless the cleaning crew was deaf, they must have heard it. Gabe would have to pick up the tempo. He grabbed Sanborn by his red paisley tie and jerked him out of his chair. They stood eye to eye, doctor to patient, conspirator to victim. “I’m through dancing with you, Doc,” Gabe hissed. “Now it’s time to fess up. Was August Bock using you to recruit terminal patients like me? Tell me the truth, or I swear I’ll knock your nose so far down your throat, you’ll have to breathe through your ears.”
“Not like you,” Sanborn stuttered.
Gabe didn’t understand. “What does that mean, not like me?”
With the speed of a striking snake, the letter opener came out … arching upward at Gabe’s abdomen. Gabe pivoted to his right as the blade ran up the front of his shirt and glanced off the bottom of his chin. Blood oozed from the inch-long gash along his jaw line, but his adrenaline was pumping far too fast for him to feel the sting of the exposed wound. With lightning reflexes of his own, Gabe caught Sanborn’s wrist before the blade could make another pass. The doctor was out of his chair, forcing Gabe back onto his desk, the tip of the letter opener pointing directly between Gabe’s eyes.
Gabe was on the defensive. Bent awkwardly backward and losing more precious energy-giving blood every second, his options were few.
Sanborn was grinning like a jackal, his face flushed beet-red, his eyes filled with frenzied fanaticism. “Maybe this time,” he grunted, “you’ll stay dead!”
Gabe had both arms locked straight out above him, the blade poised at their apex like the sword of Damocles. He had no leverage—only the waning strength of depleted muscles … but his head was hitting something. He tilted his head back and caught a glimpse of the desk lamp … he had to go for it … it was now or never.
Gabe’s right hand came off Sanborn’s wrist, and, in what seemed like slow motion, the blade started its downward sweep. Gabe had the lamp by its neck and swung it outward, catching Sanborn square on the side of his head with the heavy chrome base. The letter opener never hit its mark as the doctor screamed in pain and stumbled backward, tripping over his chair in the process. The cord from the lamp snapped out of the wall and the office was filled only with what meager light managed to filter in through the broken window to the outer office.
Gabe could hear Sanborn crawling to get away, but until his pupils fully adjusted to the darkness, the doctor may as well have been invisible. Gabe held his breath and listened. Sanborn was prone on his stomach, wriggling toward the office door like a miner crawling through a tunnel. Light glinted off the letter opener Sanborn was still clutching in his hand, and it caught Gabe’s attention. Throwing all thoughts of self-preservation to the wind, Gabe dove for the fleeing doctor and grabbed him around the waist. Together the pair continued their struggle with the blade. Rolling back and forth across the floor, the two men fought. Just a few short weeks ago, Gabe would have had no problem drubbing a weaker adversary, but with all
of his vitality robbed by his illness, even fending off someone as uncoordinated as Sanborn was proving to be more than a handful for him.
Gabe could feel the letter opener between them, pressing against his stomach. Sanborn was on top of him, forcing the blade downward with all of his strength. Gabe was gasping for every breath, his fists locked around Sanborn’s, the veins on his forearms protruding like drinking straws, not letting the makeshift weapon get any closer.
“You have to die,” Sanborn strained. “You can’t even begin to understand what you’re up against.” He was straddling Gabe on the floor, but the standoff was taking its toll on a set of arms that was more used to performing delicate surgeries than hand-to-hand combat. He needed more leverage. Flexing his knees, he rose up, enabling him to apply more of his bodyweight behind the blade. This was also his fatal mistake.
Gabe felt the weight lift off his body, and, with crushing power, brought his right knee up into Sanborn’s now vulnerable groin area. No one, with the possible exception of a pregnant woman in her 30th hour of labor, could commiserate with the sheer torture a man feels when he’s had his crackers crumbled. Sanborn’s eyes rolled back into their sockets as he face contorted in pain. In a decisive, swift movement, Gabe pulled down on the doctor’s hands, guiding the letter opener into Sanborn’s own stomach. The rounded blade tore through the fabric of his lab coat and clothing, and buried itself to the hilt in the soft tissue above his abdomen. Blood gushed from the puncture as Gabe yanked his hands free.
Kenneth Sanborn reared back and howled like a dying sea serpent. The horrifying expression on his face was a mixture of disbelief and agony. His fingers clutched for the handle of the letter opener, but barely half an inch of it was left protruding from his stomach. His entire body began to shudder as his life drained out in an ever spreading crimson stain on the front of his white coat. “Maybe … maybe it’s better this way,” he sputtered as he began to cough up blood. “I deserve this … for what I’ve put you through.”