Blood Harvest

by Michael Weinberger

  “Can you reach me down here?” Her voice was in gasps and heavy swallows as she raised her hips even higher to further display herself to the assumed man.

  Placing the palm of his left hand on her right cheek the man gently, yet firmly, pressed and turned Lei’s head to the left while walking around to her right.

  “Hmmm,” She thought. “This might be a slight complication.”

  The act was a surprise but a maximum turn-on for Lei who’d always liked a bit of the “top and bottom” play in her personal time. The man’s left hand firmly, but non-aggressively held her head away from him while his right hand continued its exploration of her body, slowly caressing her breasts and working its way down…

  Down…down…down…

  Then the leather-gloved fingers parted through her very small, well-groomed patch of pubic hair. For her part Lei began to push up into the right hand while moaning slightly louder than previously.

  Lei felt the tip of his little finger graze against that most sensitive part of her and the whole experience became very real. Recognizing that she was getting too far lost in the moment, she gently tried to turn her head back for a look at the man who, for the time being, thought he was in control of her. Her efforts were resisted with a minimal increase in pressure on her cheek, countering her attempt to turn her head.

  The hand rotated and all four fingers moved down and covered her sex, pressing gently while rotating softly over the whole area.

  “Damn,” Lei couldn’t help but think “this guy has got a clue.”

  She could feel her moisture making the leather slick, increasing her pleasure with each slight circulation.

  Effortlessly, a finger slipped deep inside her. She gasped loudly as her body reacted with exquisite submission to the penetration. Lei gyrated and undulated her hips around the finger, squeezing the finger all the while with muscles well-trained for this optimum pleasure giving purpose.

  “Take off the gloves,” she cooed between breaths. “Don’t you want to feel me? Feel me on the inside?”

  The hand had gone slack as she worked her body around it, opening and closing her thighs in a type of primitive intimacy.

  “Feel my warmth and wetness? Feel my body grip onto yours?” she moaned.

  The left hand eased the pressure on her cheek and the right hand slipped from inside her.

  She turned her head slowly to face the man, but just as her eyes found his he threw his leg over her body, placing himself into a mounted position. The movement pinned her with each of his legs on either side of her hips and his feet interlocking around her inner thighs. His left hand held her face under her chin and when Dr. Whelan brought up his right hand it held a small but wicked looking knife. He moved it within centimeters of her right eye.

  “You think I don’t know you bitch?” The doctor said with unrestrained lusty anger. “Oh, I do want to penetrate you. Oh yes, I do. But not with just any part of me. Oh no no.”

  Fear overwhelmed her as she recognized, not the man, but the type of man now straddling her body. She acknowledged she’d made a horrible mistake. This type of man took his pleasure in a very different way. This type of man was to be avoided at all costs. His pleasure was not merely the inflicting of pain; it was in the kill, the rush from stealing life and the power derived from the act. The type so many sexual predators emulated.

  The doctor seemed lost in some brutal lust until instantly the entire scene turned from a seduction with Lei in control to a kind of sadistic torture in the hands of a knife-wielding madman.

  “No one I have ever met can sharpen a blade to the extent I can. See?”

  The doctor ran the flat of the blade across her cheek. It didn’t cut the tender flesh of her face but Lei could tell from the way the razor itched to grip her skin the blade was indeed exceptionally sharp.

  Dr. Whelan traced a path down Lei’s face, across her throat and over one breast, stopping briefly at her nipple. Lei panicked knowing the mere flick of a wrist could effortlessly and cleanly amputate it. Instead the blade continued down her chest to her belly; she felt the coolness of the blade travel to the inside of her navel and stop.

  “I have found the best place to work the knife while prolonging life is within the abdomen. As long as you don’t perforate the intestines the bleeding is minimal and death can take days upon days. Unfortunately, I don’t have that kind of time with you, but I do have a few hours to kill.”

  The doctor chuckled at his little joke then grew serious.

  “Shall we begin?”

  The knife was indeed sharp; Lei felt the cold steel as its tip sank unimpeded into the flesh of her stomach.

  Chapter 38

  It took longer than an hour, but when Chris rejoined the group he had everything they needed pertaining to Pharmanetics: printouts of blueprints for the building submitted to the city, security systems filed with the police and fire departments in cases of emergency, even the specs for the phone, electricity, plumbing and sewer systems. All were laid out neatly on a large conference table in the executive offices where the crew had been waiting.

  “My God,” Steve exclaimed viewing the sheer mass of detailed information before him. “You couldn’t have come into all of this information via the normal channels.”

  “I didn’t,” Chris said nonchalantly. “In fact I’m sure I violated an enormous amount of privacy and communications laws in the process of acquiring it.”

  Steve looked at Chris, unsure if his friend had been kidding him. The idea of deliberately breaking the law to do…well…anything, didn’t initially sit well with Steve. He was still a cop after all. Then again, here he was about to storm into a major corporate building with potentially lethal force without going through the proper channels making the entire event a highly irregular and illegal action.

  “You know what?” Steve said.

  “What?”

  “I just don’t want to know. Spare me the details from now on.”

  Chris considered it a moment, then said “I think that would be best.”

  Alpha was scanning the plans as Chris and Steve talked, shaking his head in apparent disbelief.

  “This information is incredible! How could you have achieved this when all of my resources could not?”

  Steve spoke up before Chris could reply in an attempt to spare himself the dissertation Chris would provide on the subject.

  “Chris has always been a relatively well accomplished hacker.”

  “Relatively well accomplished?” Chris said as if greatly offended. “I’m one of the best! If it weren’t for my desire to be a legitimate member of the common good I would be living in the Bahamas draining corporate slush funds and living like Hugh Hefner.”

  Chris shook his head, “Three girlfriends…at his age, unbelievable!”

  Stunned, Alpha looked at Chris, “And I thought you were an idiot.”

  Chris looked slightly chastened, “Well, its okay. I thought you were an albino.”

  Alpha cocked his head, confused, “But…I am an albino.”

  Nodding Chris replied, “Well, there you go,” and immediately turned his attention away from Alpha and began reading through the security installations from the blueprints he had acquired.

  Alpha looked to Steve for enlightenment but Steve only shrugged his shoulders and went back to work at the table.

  They worked diligently to find out as much as they could about the massive skyscraper. A plan began to come into focus.

  “Okay,” Steve started, “it appears the first and second floors are information desks and offices which are open to the public. The third through ninth floors are research and processing labs while the tenth through thirteenth floors have been opened up into one large production warehouse.”

  “It’s a big, open, empty space. Why do you say this is where Pharmanetics produces their products?” Alpha asked.

  “See all the high voltage electrical running directly to this area and nowhere else in the building? That tells me t
hey have equipment on this level requiring beefed up power beyond that of simple research machinery.”

  “Actually, some of the machinery used in the Pharmanetics’ research labs can use and generate a great deal of power. An electron microscope for example, would practically need its own power plant,” Chris explained.

  “Wouldn’t the machines which produce the drugs be extra heavy as well?” Alpha asked.

  “Yes they would and I believe they are,” Steve answered. “You’ll notice on the blueprints each floor, three through nine, has added reinforcement, albeit minimal, but still run on normal electrical circuits. I believe the base products for the drugs are made in the labs on these levels then sent to the upper floors for assembly.”

  Each man silently studied the schematics as they considered Steve’s theory.

  “I think you’re right Steve,” Chris interjected. “Look how the third through ninth floors all have special safety features and minimal security. Sprinklers and foam fire protection, special ventilation, and unique drainage all standard for a working laboratory. Now look at the open area on the tenth through thirteenth floors that have minimal safety and higher than normal security. Given your theory this particular set-up makes sense. The creation of the basic products within the pharmaceutical world is no secret, but the combination of chemicals and the ratios which make the drugs effective are highly guarded. Not to mention the finished products themselves need to be protected until shipped to the suppliers.”

  “How does this help us?” Alpha asked impatiently.

  Steve recognized the irritation in his voice. As far back as he could remember Alpha was about action as opposed to planning.

  “Bear with me for a second Alpha. We can see that the rest of the floors, fourteen through eighty are either showroom floors or straight office space with the top floor being for the exclusive use of our good Mr. Daniels. The floors below ground appear to be the usual boiler room and other utility areas for the building.”

  “Is this normal for a company to use their buildings to not only house their corporate people but also house their production facility?” Chris asked. “I would think the costs of warehousing and research could be more efficient at lower real estate rates.”

  “True, unless you want to keep you’re activities extremely private and monitor the tightest security standards, which is far more difficult to do in multiple areas.”

  “Again I ask you, how does this help us find our people?” Alpha demanded with a little more volume than before.

  “The high security Alpha.”

  Alpha looked at Steve realizing the answer was forthcoming.

  “What if…and this is pure speculation now, but what if instead of major production equipment putting drugs together in combination, the area has been converted.”

  “Converted?” Alpha said. “Converted to what?”

  “We’ve already determined that our blood supply was what Pharmanetics wanted for its ability to make a human body an adverse environment for viruses and bacteria.”

  “Yes,” Alpha agreed.

  “How long does the effect last?” Steve asked Alpha.

  “Like you and yours, I would think that the benefits of the drug would alter your blood chemistry permanently,” Chris responded.

  “Then I would ask you, where’s the money in a permanent cure?”

  Steve let the question hang for a short period of time then continued.

  “If a person received a cure derived from the blood of our people for a common cold and was never going to get another cold for the rest of their lives, how does Pharmanetics continue to make money?”

  “So…you think they are converting the permanent curative aspect of the blood to something more temporary?”

  “As Chris Rock used to say in his stand-up routine ‘There’s no money in a cure’; I think they have reversed the process. They acquire the blood supply in the heightened security room and transport it to the other floors for refinement into a more profitable product.”

  “But the sheer mass of people who would be on that floor would require constant maintenance, food supplies, bathroom facilities, and etcetera.”

  “This brings us full circle to what happened to those people at The Inferno and Glitter Gulch. A new technology which keeps a person in a coma-like stasis without the harmful side effects of chemicals would mean a body could produce more products over time before…”

  Steve stopped himself from saying what he was going to say and altered his words before he continued, “Before the person is no longer able to produce additional product.”

  Alpha stared wide-eyed at Steve as he heard his finishing words.

  “I will see the building burned to the ground and render the fat of all of those involved as the fuel for the fire.” The look in Alpha’s eyes made it clear he meant every word. This was not an idle threat.

  Trying to ignore the frightening revelation, Chris said, “So we can assume our LAPD brethren are there as well?”

  “It’s our best guess, but it is still only a guess.”

  “So,” Alpha asked while still studying the documents on the table, “how do you intend to get in the building and remove all of those people without having any idea how to bring them out of the state they are in?”

  “I don’t plan on bringing them out.”

  Alpha looked up from the documents on the table sharply and faced Steve.

  “I only intend on exposing Pharmanetics for who and what they are, then we’ll let those far more brilliant than we figure out how to help the prisoners.”

  “That would mean exposing our people to the whole world!”

  “Hoo-boy…” Chris whistled.

  With a calm Steve hadn’t expressed since this entire escapade had begun, he said, “I know.”

  “You know? That’s it?!?” Alpha was yelling again.

  “Yes, I know and I’m sorry for that, but I see no other way to accomplish this.”

  “That is completely unacceptable!!!”

  “If you have another plan for how to remove over three thousand comatose people from a building in secret, then now would be a good time to share.”

  Alpha balled his fists and for a moment appeared as though he might strike Steve. Then his head dropped and his hands went to his face and rubbed his forehead.

  “It’s all coming apart and, you’re right, it is too big for me to stop it from happening.”

  A nervous moment passed before Alpha spoke again.

  “I need you all to promise me something.” Alpha spoke so quietly Steve had to strain to hear him. “I need you to promise me that when this news breaks you will use whatever influence you have to help keep these parasites and vultures of humanity away from my children.”

  Steve looked at Alpha, understanding the weight of what was being asked.

  “I know it may seem an impossible task. All I am asking is that you try. Try your best, please.”

  “I promise,” Steve nodded.

  Alpha’s eyes were red and moist as he gripped Steve’s hand in both of his.

  “Thank you.”

  Chapter 39

  “Doctor?” The voice cut through the silence as clearly as if it had been amplified through a speaker system. Unfortunately, the person it was directed toward was so lost in the slice he had made in Lei’s abdomen he never heard a sound.

  With the care and precision of a master craftsman, Dr. Whelan glided the impeccably sharp blade further toward Lei’s right hip. She was pinned in near immobility, quaking in small tremors as the knife passed through her skin as easily as a hot knife through soft butter.

  “DOCTOR!!!” Kunnert’s voice was an explosion of sound and command. Dr. Whelan’s head snapped up upon hearing Kunnert that time.

  “What…are…you…DOING?!?”

  The doctor was visibly shaken, as if waking up from a dream, looking from Kunnert, to what he had done to Lei, and back to Kunnert in a confused manner.

  “I…She…” He was comp
letely lost for words.

  Kunnert studied the situation before he spoke again.

  “She’s mine. Put the knife down and get off of her.” Kunnert’s voice was calm and there was even a twinge of understanding and compassion mixed in with the command and unspoken threat.

  The doctor hopped off Lei immediately, walked over and stood next to Kunnert who studied him. Kunnert made a small gesture with his head; the doctor nodded and left the room.

  Kunnert walked over to Lei and observed the incision the doctor had made. It ran three inches horizontally from her navel toward her right hip, splaying her open in surgical exactness. There wasn’t much blood, but what blood was present was pooling in the open wound, gently flowing over the side and down her body with every rise of her chest for a breath of air.

  “Lie still.” Kunnert spoke to Lei in soft tones that sounded remotely like compassion. “I will get something to clean and stitch the wound.”

  Slowly Kunnert turned his back to Lei and walked over to a wall cabinet, removing a small white box that appeared to be a first aid kit. Pulling a standing tray behind him, Kunnert walked back over to Lei and began removing items from the first aid kit, placing them gently on the tray. Among the items Lei could see were three rolls of sterile gauze pads still in their packaging, forceps, a long curved suturing needle and a tube of what she believed to be antibiotic paste. Kunnert removed other things but she couldn’t make out what those things might be.

  “I must apologize for my associate. He lacks some of the more social graces and has particular tastes which can be somewhat disturbing.”

  Lei didn’t respond, the pain in her abdomen had finally registered and she strained with her bonds in order to alter her position and cover her wound.

  “He is also quite skilled in the use of that blade of his. He sliced through your skin and the minor amount of subcutaneous fat you have, but he didn’t penetrate deep enough to sever the muscles of your abdomen.”