But he’d met Rhonda Jenkins. She was blind and because of that, he felt safe with her. Besides, he liked talking to her because most everyone else he talked to in Comstock was ignorant about medical issues.
She’d wanted know how he became interested in studying Alzheimer’s. He’d been honest with her, only because the information would soon be of little value to her. He’d told her he’d gotten into Zelint’s AZ-1166 study late in the final stages of the investigation, but it had still been a wonderful opportunity to have the time and equipment to delve into his personal scientific research.
But Rhonda Jenkins is merely a test subject, no more, no less. No different than a chimpanzee, or a rhesus monkey. I couldn’t let her humanity in any way influence my mission to search out critical answers. Some things are much more important than being fuzzy and warm.
Question upon question continued to plague him. They never stopped.
Could a decaying brain heal itself, or at least regain function with the right catalyst? What made cells already damaged by Alzheimer’s regenerate in neural tissue?
What in AZ-1166 allowed an Alzheimer’s subject’s depleted neuron forest to take up increased function again? Regain normalcy?
Was it a different pathway of regeneration? Fewer neurons, with greater or increased cell-to-cell transmission power?
Super neurons?
He thought about that possibility a lot. He always liked the sound of it.
But neurons were only one part of the equation. He knew the only real cure for Alzheimer’s would be at the cellular level. That was the part of the puzzle that kept eluding and fascinating him.
There were times even he wondered why he preferred to be so detached and clinical. He’d come to accept that he simply wasn’t a herd animal like most of his human counterparts … and that in itself defied reason.
He came from an average family and he’d loved his parents and his brother. But somehow he never bonded with any of the men or women who passed through his life. He felt little need for companionship. He lived inside his intellect.
Ethan looked around the lab. Just being there made him feel at home. He yanked open the bottom desk drawer and pulled out a brand new flash drive. He shoved it into a slot in his PC, next to the one already there. He would finally download everything onto that extra drive, then sleep a whole lot better. He hit the download key and waited for it to finish, and then pulled out the extra drive, and stared at it for a moment before placing it back into his bottom desk drawer.
Life would be so much easier if he could have a tech assistant. Having to do everything himself was starting to wear him down.
Maybe I could train Pete or Rocky?
I really must be tired to even consider trusting anyone in this facility, especially them.
There were way too many people involved already. After having given it much thought, he still wasn’t sure how his relationship with any of the existing personnel would end.
But he knew he’d have to think about it and finish it sooner rather than later. The study was at an end and shutting down. All that remained was the FDA approval. Then Zelint could launch the marketing program.
Final dispensation for the personnel would have to be determined very soon.
* * * *
Gina unlocked the unit’s narcotic box and pulled out Meperidine. She filled a syringe with the narcotic, matched it with Derek Kopek’s med card, and set it on a tray, ready to be injected. Hopefully, this would take away his discomfort.
Discomfort?
Yeah, sure!
This med isn’t going to bring Derek anywhere near comfortable. Saying that to him is almost laughable. He, of all people, would know better, especially after a lifetime of working in pharmaceuticals.
The poor can barely breathe, so his oral pain meds along with jabbing him with a needle and pumping him with the smallest dose of happy juice is not going to do it for him. He’s going to keep on suffering because there is no real relief for him.
Is there a single word for suffering? I don’t think so. I don’t know how to describe the crushing, grinding sensation that can turn someone into a frenzied, mindless creature.
And all I have to offer him are empty words.
Rocky held out the phone for her. “A call for you.”
“Put it on hold, please.” She shoved the unit’s supply of narcotics back into the lock box, put the keys in her pocket, and then picked up the phone.
Rocky looked up as she answered, made no attempt to hide the fact he would be listening to her conversation. She walked away as far as the cord would take her, but although she didn’t want him listening in, she also needed to keep her eyes on the man to make sure he stayed away from the narcotic-filled syringe sitting on the tray.
“This is Gina Mazzio.”
“Hi, doll. Can you talk?”
“Not really.”
“Just listen, then. It looks like we can stop wondering which patient was in the basement last night. Rhonda Jenkins is gone.”
Gina turned to a patient pushing a walker with shuffling steps. The woman went up to Rocky. “My dresser drawer won’t open, Rocky.” She gave him a big smile. “Will you come fix it for me?”
Gina could tell it was the last thing Rocky wanted to do, but he had no choice but to go with the woman.
“Are you sure it was Rhonda Jenkins?”
“Are you missing anyone on your unit?”
“No … we have the same census as yesterday.” Her heart sank. She’d wanted to be mistaken about the whole basement affair. Hoped there was no patient involved.
“Then she has to be the one.”
“Isn’t she the blind woman you told me about?”
“Yeah.” Harry’s voice was throaty. “I questioned Pete, but he played dumb. He gave me one of his infuriating business-as-usual shrugs. The thing is, her chart has already been deleted from the files for the unit’s current census; I can’t even bring her up on the computer.”
“That was pretty fast,” Gina said. “What about her room? Are her belongings gone?”
“Not one sign that anyone ever lived there. I went through everything to make sure there wasn’t something that I could follow up on. Not only that, someone new is scheduled to arrive this afternoon.”
Gina paused to think. “There must be some kind of master file that gives the names of everyone in the study, at least everyone who flows through this facility. We need to look for it.”
“Yeah! It’s probably in the same place as the exit interviews that were a part of the consent package. I still can’t locate that section either.”
“That’s where they talk about any symptoms they’ve had while on AZ-1166?”
“That’s it. Somehow we’ve got to get our hands on all that information. And the only place it could be is with Ethan Dayton.”
There was a beat before Gina answered, “Oh.”
Chapter 22
What has happened to Rhonda Jenkins?
The name kept running through Gina’s mind. She tried to remember what else, if anything, she might have heard in the basement corridor the night before. Everything had turned into such a blur. She needed time to think about it, time to disentangle her fears from what she’d actually heard.
The rest of the morning Rocky kept close to her until he finally disappeared for his lunch break. Gina sat down at the desk and mentally walked through everything from the time she left their apartment, to the repositioning of the security cameras so she wouldn’t be seen, to the moment she got cat-clawed.
Yes! There was a scream … just as the cat’s claw ripped into me. I’m sure of it. Was that Rhonda Jenkins down there screaming?
She remembered hearing Pete and Rocky walking in her direction, talking in their usual macho lingo, and that’s when Ethan called out to them. It was definitely Ethan.
She reached for the phone to talk to Harry again, but Rocky strutted into the station, back from his lunch break.
“Your turn, nurse.
”
That low-life really knew how to get her Bronx up. She wanted to wipe that smug smile from his face, kick him a good one smack between the legs. Instead, she acted as though she was unconcerned about him and walked off the unit.
Out the door, she checked her watch. The jerk had taken forty minutes for lunch instead of the allotted thirty. Once inside the elevator, she took her ID card off her neck and slid it into the basement slot under the blank square on the board. When the door snapped open—her stomach clenched and she jumped back.
Under her breath, “Cut it out! Don’t be such a wuss.”
She poked her head out into the dimly lit basement corridor and listened.
Nothing.
Stepping out, she began to walk to the right, following the path she’d taken the night before.
Not afraid … not afraid.
Shaking, she forced one foot in front of the other until she came to a huge outcrop of rock. She wondered if this was a portion of one of the above ground boulders she’d seen.
It was very quiet. No sign of the cat that had caused her so much grief the night before. Right now she was sorry it wasn’t here—at least it would have been company.
The farther she went, the dimmer the lights became. Shadows turned from gray to black. She searched for some place to hide if she had to, but there was nothing—only the dimly-lit corridor with its granite walls. Everything felt smaller and tighter.
She squinted at her watch. Couldn’t really make out the exact time, yet she felt she’d been gone about ten minutes.
And then, the pathway abruptly ended. Gina was smack up against another huge outcrop of rock that blocked her way.
Now she really felt trapped. She took short and painful breaths as claustrophobia became a rope that yanked at her neck.
“No!”
Her heart was beating wildly. The world was closing in … closing up.
She needed to get away, to return to the elevator. She spun around and pressed her back against the cold, massive boulder … a rock stabbed into her shoulders. Everything seemed smaller, tighter. She stared back into the corridor; the near-darkness became a moving wall edging its way toward her.
She clenched her eyelids shut until her scalp was tingling.
Oh God, if you get me through this I promise to be a better person. I promise, I promise…
Buzzzzz.
The sound was loud. It sliced through her panic like a scalpel
What?
She jumped away from the boulder.
Buzzzz.
The noise was coming from the rock.
Her fingers roamed across the section she’d just pressed against. What she thought was a rock stabbing into her was really an oversize metal button-switch.
She lightly touched the button. Nothing happened … only the buzz.
She leaned hard on the button with the heel of her hand. A click, then a section of stone snapped out and away.
How about that?
She stepped into the continuing corridor, walking as if on broken glass. The silence was so profound; she jumped when the rock entrance suddenly clunked shut behind her.
The dimly-lit corridor finally ended at an unlit doorway. She stepped through and felt for a light switch, found one, and covered her eyes against the sudden blinding light.
The strong smell of formaldehyde was like a smack in the face. And there was something else, something metallic. She could almost taste it.
Blood!
As her eyes adjusted, she saw large glass containers sitting on shelves lining the entire room. Each container was filled with clear fluid … and floating specimens. She stepped closer, put her hand on one of the heavy glass jars and peered at the contents. It looked like …
“Oh, my God!” Her hand pulled back like it had a life of its own; her voice startled her. She glanced at the containers on the right and left.
“Human brains!”
The nearest cerebrum looked like firm jelly—almost within the norm. She moved slowly along the length of the shelf, looking at other dissected brain specimens. In many, the cortex was shriveled. and the ventricles had separated, leaving huge empty spaces in between.
Diseased brains.
Her neck started to tingle; her mouth turned so dry she could barely swallow.
Each and every fluid-filled container in the room held either a whole brain or some part of brain tissue.
And then she was shivering so hard her teeth were chattering.
They're staring back at me … watching me.
She’d seen practically every horrible procedure you could imagine. But looking at those floating brains was making her light-headed.
She turned away and studied the room. In the center was a large stainless steel table—it was set up as though it was in a morgue’s autopsy room.
Why is there a residue of blood encircling the drain and a burgundy splatter on the scale?
Close to the table were several trays of instruments, and an array of bloody medical saws. The only thing missing in the room was … a body.
Where is the body that blood came from? Was it Rhonda Jenkins in here with Ethan? It must have been her that I heard screaming.
As she turned to leave, she saw a small desk; the bottom drawer was cracked open. She had to pull the drawer open, look inside.
There was a notebook, laptop computer, and a loose flash drive. She yanked out the notebook and flipped through the pages. It was all about planned cerebral experiments.
Yuck!
She quickly tossed the notebook back in the drawer, and grabbed the flash drive, shoving the small storage device into her pocket. She left the drawer cracked open, just as she’d first found it.
A glance at her watch told her she had ten minutes left to her break. She had to get out of there now.
Buzzz.
Oh, shit!
Someone was coming in.
Her senses were firing at top speed—she could hear every sound, could smell her own terror-filled sweat, and could feel a cold draft on her legs.
The air was coming from under one of the shelves behind her. She bent down, saw a three-foot-high door under the lowest specimen shelf.
Was it a closet? Could she fit in there?
She dropped to her knees, pulled at the handle, crawled into the darkness, and reached behind her to shut herself in.
* * * *
Ethan walked into the lab.
Why are the lights on? Did I leave them on last night? Must have.
He stared at the stainless steel table with the remaining tell-tale traces of blood.
God, what a mess! Rhonda Jenkins half awake, looking at me with those empty eyes.
When he’d told Pete and Rocky to lay her on the table, she’d screamed his name—Ethan! Ethan! Is that you? Help me! These men are going to kill me.
He told himself that she was only an AZ-1166 statistic. That was her real value. The drug should have turned her Alzheimer’s remission into a legitimate positive statistic, but because of her side effects, along with too many others like her, she was here at Comstock. They wouldn’t let people like her, and all the rest of them who had gone through Comstock, ruin everything for him … for Zelint.
He looked around the room at all his specimens. He was certain each one held a key, an answer. He just hadn’t found it yet.
Bottom line—he’d needed Rhonda’s brain. That’s all. It wasn’t personal. Her particular side effects to AZ-1166 had to be studied.
But this time it bothered him.
Ethan had given her the IV med to put her out, but she was still awake when he cut her scalp. Her screams were unbearable; they didn’t stop until he was ready with the cranial saw.
He walked to the desk, opened the bottom drawer, and started to pull out his laptop, then he changed his mind and kicked the drawer shut again.
He looked carefully around the lab one last time. Everything seemed in order, except that bloody mess.
Pete will have to clean i
t up.
He nodded, turned off the light, and left.
* * * *
Gina saw the spill-over light from the cracks around the small door disappear. She was in total darkness, wedged into the opening. Her neck was crimped, her legs were cramped, and she wanted to scream. She forced herself to wait until she thought it had been five minutes, then she pushed at the door with her feet. It wouldn’t budge.
No!
This was her worst nightmare—she was buried alive.
She took a deep breath, made a fist, and reached back, driving it into the door.
It still wouldn’t open.
Chapter 23
Harry couldn’t remember ever being this agitated on a job. The uncertainty of Rhonda Jenkins’s fate left him feeling puzzled and off-balance. He was accustomed to arriving at a new job loaded with confidence, backed up with a healthy inventory of know-how. But this place was not like any other facility he’d ever worked at—it was totally understaffed and patient care was more custodial than anything else. For some reason, human storage kept popping into his head. It wasn’t an image he liked.
His nurses’ agency usually provided better pickings.
He couldn’t stop thinking about Rhonda. Her sudden disappearance tapped into his insecurities.
Was she really the one Gina heard screaming in the basement?
He and Pete had just now finished handing out lunch trays when the orderly, hands on his hips, mouth spread into a wide smile, said, “So what made you become a girly nurse?”
Some kind of electricity spiked through Harry. Without a word, he reached out and grabbed a fistful of hair and yanked the jerk’s head back, exposing his neck; his other hand was poised to chop into his throat. The sleazy smile melted.
Harry couldn’t explain why he attacked the guy. Throughout his career he’d been thrown every possible kind of sly, mean-spirited remark about being a male registered nurse. After he decided he couldn’t afford medical school and took up nursing, even his parents gave him a bad time about it. Most of the insults seemed like senseless slams against not only him, but against an honorable profession.
Bone Pit: A Chilling Medical Suspense Thriller (The Gina Mazzio Series Book 3) Page 13