Chapter Fifty-Nine
Declan
Recovering from having my brain fried, I’m introduced to a man I swear I’ve never seen before.
"This is Dr. Campos, Declan,” a random orderly in powder blue scrubs says in a condescending tone while escorting me to the front desk. “He’s going to be taking care of you from now on."
"Happy Birthday, Declan," this Dr. Campos, a man I don’t recognize, says with an attempted friendly smile. "Do you remember me?"
Getting an instinctive pit in my stomach, I shake my head violently.
"That’s right,” a nearby nurse chimes in. “Declan’s twenty-eight today. How exciting." If only she knew.
"That’s okay," the doctor continues. "I’m going to take you away from this place. Would you like that?"
"No thanks," I reply with the truth. I don’t want to go anywhere with this stranger, though I don’t want to stay here either. I churn the wheels of my chair, hurriedly rolling away.
"Now, now, Declan," Dr. Campos says, leaning over to whisper in my ear, "I need you to be patient and contain yourself until we get to the van." He flashes a smile at the hospital staff and a handful of schizophrenics watching to pass the time. Then he pushes me carefully down the hall.
As the elevator starts its descent, the doctor's tone changes in an instant.
"What in the hell were you thinking?" he snaps, glaring at me with fury.
"Why are you yelling at me?" I ask, naive and scared. "What did I do? Where are we going? Who are you?"
"This is no time for games, Declan." He claps back. "You nearly got yourself killed. Do you realize how lucky you are to be alive?"
"What?" I mumble, not having the slightest idea what he’s talking about.
"Are you seriously trying to tell me you don’t know what’s happened to you?" he demands, wondering what the medical staff did to me.
The elevator reaches the bottom floor, and Dr. Campos pushes me across the lobby and through the automatic doors into the loading area, where a large white van waits for us.
"How’s he doing?" a greasy haired man asks from the driver’s seat.
"He’s not," the doctor replies sharply. "I don’t know what they did to him, but he’s completely out of it." With me buckled and ready to go, Dr. Campos slides the side door shut and yells to the driver, "Let’s go!"
“Where are you taking me?” I cry out in fear.
“Declan,” the doctor says, snapping his fingers in my face. “You have nothing to be afraid of here.”
He tells me that when he learned I was committed to a psych ward, he rushed to the courts to get an order to have me placed in his custody. But I can’t fathom any reality in the narrative he provides.
“Miss Paxon gave you my vehicle,” he rambles on. “So, I had to hire a service to pick you up. This nice gentleman is here to take us home.”
The chauffeur argues with the doctor about the sudden change in destination, explaining it’s going to cost him another fee.
“We must make it to the facility before it’s too late,” the doctor says with urgency, extending a wad of cash to the driver. “We need to make haste.”
The childish bickering gives me the sense the spindly man behind the wheel isn’t a randomly hired servant, but someone the doctor has worked with before.
"Where are we going, guys?" I ask, trying to change the subject.
"I told you, Declan,” the doctor snaps at me, “we’re going home."
"We sure do live a long way away,” I remark, staring out the windshield at a never-ending stretch of dirt. “How much further until we get to your house?"
"What’s wrong with him?” The unknown man glares at the doctor with a look of concern.
Seeking answers, Dr. Campos flips through pages of a green folder. A medical file from the looks.
"Shit!” the doctor shouts. “They fried him. Those idiots. It says here the patient was acting in a hostile and belligerent manner. Refused to cooperate. Kept yelling about a dead woman. And Dr. Rajib, the fucking moron, zapped his brain."
"What do you mean they—" I begin my question, when, all at once, the van rolls to a slow stop. All the lights on the dash turn off, and the world outside disappears in blackness. The driver turns the key, but it’s no use.
I have no time to process what’s happening before the van is sent sailing, its back end curling up and over the front as it flips through the air.
It slams back to the ground, rolling savagely.
Glass shatters, scattering across the desert.
In the chaos, Dr. Campos is ejected through the void where the windshield once was, crashing down to the earth where rocks and shards of glass tear apart his bare arms and face.
Suspended by my seatbelt, my arms and legs dangle as the van rocks back and forth in place.
“Aaaahhh!” the driver screams from outside, and it sounds like he’s being sawn in half. His wails fall silent a moment later, as a sea of red soaks into the dirt beyond the glassless hole through which I can see.
Dazed by the accident, I use my left hand to feel for the buckle, desperately hoping to free myself from the wreckage.
Before I can break myself loose, the door is abruptly ripped from the side of the van and sent soaring across the open field.
Standing in the shadow is a massive, cloaked figure, its eyes burning with flaming red bloodshot intensity.
It snarls through a mouth full of rusty razor blades for teeth.
The second we lock eyes, the world turns ice cold.
Whether from the shock of seeing its face or the blood rushing to my head, my consciousness begins to fade in a flash.
"Ha, ha, ha." I hear only its demented laugh as my limp body is taken.