Doc Mortis (9 page)

Chapter Thirteen
A COMMON ENEMY

T
HUD.

The tip of the blades embedded deep into the tabletop beside Mr Mumbles's head. Only then did he close his eyes, and, for a moment, I thought he looked disappointed. When he opened them again, they were devoid of all emotion, just as they'd been a few moments before.

‘I want you to know, I don't forgive you,' I said quietly. ‘I can't ever forgive you. But... but I don't blame you, either. What they did to you... I didn't know any of this would happen. I didn't know.'

I took hold of the scissors again, holding them the way they were designed to be held this time. I brought them shakily to his mouth. ‘Keep still,' I told him, even though he wasn't the one having problems holding steady.

I hooked the tips of the blades round the first stitch, where it passed over the front of his mouth. I was about to snip, when I remembered what happened last time his stitches came undone. ‘Wait, nothing bad's going to happen if I do this, is it?' I asked. ‘You're not going to puke more water on me or anything?'

He mumbled something low and short. It could've been ‘no', but it could just as easily have been ‘yes'.

‘Good enough,' I shrugged. Chewing nervously on my bottom lip, I steadied my hand and began to cut.

Eight careful snips, and his mouth relaxed. It didn't open, but at least that was now his choice. I turned my attention to the straps on his wrists. They were leather, with large brass buckles – almost impossible to break out from, but easy enough to undo.

Five seconds later, his left hand was free. A second after that, it was wrapped round my throat, his thick fingers almost meeting at the back of my neck.

I didn't pull away. He didn't squeeze. We just looked at each other. For a long time, we just looked.

‘I
hate
you,' he spat. His voice was gravel at the bottom of a deep, dark pit, though less slurred than the last time I'd heard him speak.

‘Snap,' I replied, still not fighting him.

His eyes flared. ‘Don't tempt me.'

He ran his tongue over his lips, either tasting the blood or assessing the damage, I couldn't tell which. Then, with a grunt, he pulled his hand away and began to unbuckle the rest of his restraints.

In no time he was free. He swung down from the table beside me and I was immediately cast into shadow. He loomed over me, glaring down, hot breath swirling through his flared nostrils. I looked up into his eyes, unflinching. I was so afraid I thought I might wet myself, but I was damned if I was going to show it.

‘He's even less dead now!' announced I.C., arriving back and breaking the stand-off. He gave Mr Mumbles a friendly wave. ‘Hi, not-dead-guy. You're
huge
!'

‘How
are
you still alive?' I asked.

He gave a grunt. ‘Kill us over there, we come back here.'

‘And if you get killed over here?'

‘We stay dead.' He scowled, and I was reminded of his expression in the photograph I'd found earlier. The photograph of all three of us together, somewhere else.

‘Have you ever seen this guy before, I.C.?' I asked.

I.C. nodded his head.

‘You have? When?'

‘Just a minute ago, remember? I beeped his nose.
Honk!
' He giggled at Mr Mumbles. ‘You have a big nose, mister.'

‘I meant before that. Not a minute ago, some other time. Have you ever seen him before today?'

‘Nope.'

I turned to Mr Mumbles. He had found his clothes somewhere and had already slipped his grubby shirt over his scarred torso. His overcoat swished around his knees as he pulled it on.

‘What about you? You ever meet this kid before?'

Mumbles narrowed his eyes. ‘You think he'd be alive if I had?'

‘You'd have to catch me first, big nose!'

‘Cut it out, I.C.,' I warned, all too aware of the danger Mr Mumbles still potentially posed. I dug a hand into the front pocket of my jeans and pulled out the wallet. Flipping it open, I thumbed through the three photographs inside. ‘So, if neither of you have met the other, how do you explain—?'

I didn't get a chance to finish the question. Before I'd pulled out the correct photo, a light came on at the far end of the room. I whipped round to see three figures watching us from behind a large window. Two of them stood behind the third, towering a metre or more above him.

‘Well, well, well,' said Doc, his unidentifiable accent crackling from a speaker somewhere within the operating theatre. ‘This is cosy, yes?'

Mr Mumbles's reaction was instantaneous. He roared and ran at the glass, his coat flowing out behind him. He'd covered three metres when Doc raised a small device, about the length of a pen, but four or five times thicker. He clicked a small button on the end of it and Mr Mumbles made it no further.

His roar became a howl as he dropped to the floor, his back arching, his muscles standing in knots. I heard a crackle of electrical current and smelled smoke in the air.

Click
.

Doc pressed the button again and Mr Mumbles fell silent. His broad chest heaved, his breath laboured and rattling. His eyes were open, but rolling back in his head. A string of drool hung down over his chin, mixing with the blood that was already there.

‘Now,' Doc said, tucking the device into the breast pocket of his white coat. ‘Where were we?'

‘That's him. That's the bad man,' I.C. whispered. He was behind me again, peeking out at Doc and his two porter henchmen. Though he was barely touching me, I could feel his whole body shaking.

‘I warned you, didn't I?' Doc asked. His voice was light and he wagged a finger playfully, as if he were telling off a mischievous two-year-old. ‘I told you I would be very upset if you escaped, and what is it you do?' His face darkened. All playfulness vanished. ‘You escaped. Naughty boy. Naughty, naughty Three-Nine-Six-Two.'

Down on the floor, Mr Mumbles groaned, obviously still in pain. I was surprised to find I didn't enjoy seeing him like that.

‘Perhaps it is my fault. Perhaps I did not spend enough time with you. Getting to know you. Letting you get to know me. Perhaps you did not take me seriously. Perhaps I did not give you enough reason to.'

He reached down to the console in front of him. He must've pressed some button or flicked a switch, because a moment later a door next to the window slid open. ‘Now, I will give you reason,' Doc said. ‘I will show you why it is important that you take me seriously. Come.'

I looked down at Mr Mumbles. More groans, but no other movement. Pity. Even if he did hate me, it was obvious we had a common enemy. I could've done with the extra muscle.

‘Oh, do not worry about Patient Forty-Four,' said Doc, beckoning us forward with a wave of his hand. ‘He will be... taken care of. As always.'

Behind me, I.C. yelped with fright. A porter stood at his back. Its long arms were out at its sides, its button eyes – black ones, this time – gazing directly ahead. Stepping forward, it ushered us towards the far end of the room, and towards the door that led through to Doc.

‘I am about to show you something. Something very special.'

Doc had led I.C. and me along several corridors, a porter on each side of us, and one bringing up the rear. Now we stood outside a wide set of double doors. They were shiny and clean, freshly painted in a warm shade of orange. Their pristine sheen was in stark contrast to the filth and decay of the rest of the hospital.

Above the door a sign had been nailed clumsily in place. It was made from a rectangle of dull grey metal, with two words stencilled on in black paint:

I only half noticed this sign, though. I was more interested in the rusted one fixed lower down on the wall, beside the door. It identified the next room as Ward 10.

A tingle of excitement crept over me. If I remembered the map correctly, Ward 10 was beside a door that led to a corridor that joined two parts of the hospital together. The next building over contained Wards 11, 12 and, most importantly, Ward 13.

Ward 13, where the cure was waiting for me. Ward 13, where I'd be able to get home.

I glanced over to my left and immediately spotted the door. It was a plain wooden one, with no markings on it. I felt as if it should've looked more important, somehow. More special. Freedom waited behind that door. All I had to do was get to it.

Doc coughed impatiently and I gave him my attention, for now. He was standing with his back to the double doors, his hands clasped behind his back, his glasses perched right on the very end of his nose.

‘As I was saying...' He gestured to the door behind him. ‘You are about to see something spectacular. No one has ever seen within this room and lived to tell the tale.' He looked at us both in turn. ‘You shall not be an exception.'

I.C. shivered. His hand slipped into mine and gripped it tightly. His skin felt cold to the touch.

‘Within the Gallery you will see many things, many wonderful, incredible things,' Doc told us. He was becoming breathless with excitement now, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and back again. ‘Things which would never have been, which
could
never have been, without my... talents.'

He smiled wistfully, and gazed down at the floor, as if recalling some fond memory. I looked across to the door on the left, but he spoke again before I could even think about making my move.

‘Who knows? Perhaps if you are lucky, one of you may end up in the Gallery too.' He leaned over and ruffled I.C.'s hair. ‘You'd like that, I think, wouldn't you? You'd like that very much.'

For once, I.C. didn't say anything. He just stood there in silence and tightened his grip on my hand until I could feel the blood pumping through his fingers.

‘Now, if you'll follow me, you will see some of the highlights of my life's work. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.'

He clapped his hands twice. The sound was startlingly loud in the otherwise silent hospital. Somewhere close by – back along one of the corridors we'd just come through, I thought – I heard the rattle of metal and a frenzied chorus of
hungry, hungry, hungry
. With everything going on inside, I'd forgotten about the things outside. Still, they didn't seem important now. A distant danger, at worst.

With a mechanical
whirr
, the orange doors juddered open. The room beyond was dark as pitch, but as Doc took a pace forward, dozens of soft lights began to glow, as if someone was slowly turning up a dimmer switch.

The lights weren't mounted on the ceiling. They stood in rows running the length of the entire ward – two rows, each with twenty or more lights, spaced two or three metres apart. Dark shapes moved at the centre of each light, shapes I couldn't even begin to identify.

As the lights grew in intensity, I recognised where they were coming from – inside glass and metal tubes, like the ones I'd stumbled on earlier. These ones were illuminated, no doubt to give a clearer view of the horrors that were trapped inside. They were not, as far as I could tell, filled with the same orange fluid as the others.

The porters nudged us into the room. A speaker mounted on the wall just inside the doorway spat angry static for a few moments, before a soft, mellow tune began to play. It was a jarringly gentle little ditty, played on the xylophone or something, and completely at odds with the increasingly frenzied movements of the shapes in the tubes.

‘Now then, my darling children,' said Doc, running his stubby fingers through his wiry white hair, ‘let us take a look at what's in the Gallery.'

Chapter Fourteen
THE GALLERY

I
.C. had let go of my hand and was now clutching my arm instead. He was sobbing silently, silvery tears meandering slowly down his pale cheeks.

‘Don't look,' I told him. He hesitated, but then obeyed, turning his gaze away from the wretched creature thrashing around in the glass tube in front of us.

‘Oh, no,' said Doc, stepping up behind us. He snagged a handful of I.C.'s hair and yanked the boy's head back up, forcing him to look. ‘I insist.'

It was a child, that thing in the tube. At least, I assumed so. It had the proportions of a child – one somewhere between I.C.'s age and mine – if not the appearance.

It took me almost a full minute to figure out what Doc had done to him, or her – it was impossible to say which. Doc stood by, waiting for me to comment on his handiwork. His “masterpiece”, as he'd called it. But then, that's what he'd called all six of the monstrosities he'd shown us so far.

I looked down at the exposed ribs, the bones yellow and sickly-looking. They curved outwards from the chest bone, like the frame of a half-finished boat. A red, fleshy blob pulsed in the centre of the ribcage, attached to the rest of the body by countless veins and arteries. On each side of the heart, two purple lungs slowly inflated and deflated. In, out, in, out.

‘You've...'

‘Yes?'

‘They're...'

‘
Yes?
'

‘Inside out,' I grimaced. ‘You... you turned them inside out.'

And he had. Most of the kid's skeleton could be seen, overlaying the exposed sinew and muscle of its body. The other organs were on display too. The kidneys. The liver. The little funny-shaped one at the side that doesn't do anything. All of them.

Its brain sat atop its skull like a sloppy pink hat. It would almost have been funny, if it wasn't so horrific and terrifying.

Doc clapped his hands together happily. ‘Inside out! Well done! You are being rather good at this, yes?' The more excitable he became, the stronger his accent got. It was still impossible to place, but I'd figured out why. It wasn't a real accent at all, it was a child's attempt at an accent. Doc, like everyone else here, had been created by the imagination of a kid in the real world. I wondered how long he'd been here for, to become as warped and twisted as he had.

‘Come, come. We have much to see,' he said, skipping on to the next tube and beckoning for us to follow. The porters hovered round us, shepherding us after their master.

‘So, let me get this straight,' I began. Doc had stopped before another of the glass tubes. I didn't look into it, but faced him instead. ‘You're the one making this place the way it is? All the things roaming around out there, you're the one turning them into... whatever they are?'

‘Oh my goodness, no,' Doc said, pushing his glasses higher up the bridge of his nose. ‘The Darkest Corners itself does much of the work. It remakes them. Changes them. I merely lend a helping hand now and then.

‘I have worked on just a few thousand patients.' He pointed towards the closest wall. ‘Out there, there are millions of them.
Billions
. All being altered a little bit every day. Here in my hospital I simply, how you say, hurry things along a little.'

‘And you keep them all here?' I asked. I was stalling for time now, trying to delay the moment he'd force me to turn round and “admire” another tormented soul. ‘You keep them here to look at.'

‘Not all, no. Not all. Some I set free.' He rubbed his hands together and giggled below his breath. ‘It... amuses me to think of them out there. In the wild. All alone. Poor frightened rabbits.'

His glasses had slipped along his nose again. He peered over them at I.C., who was half hidden behind my back.

‘Like you, little one, frightened little bunny.' He reached out to stroke I.C.'s face. I caught his hand by the wrist and held it. The porters bristled.

‘Don't touch him,' I warned. ‘He's just a kid.'

A creepy, sickening smile spread across Doc's face, exposing almost every one of his yellow teeth. ‘But those are my favourite patients of all,' he oozed. He took his arm back with a single sharp tug. ‘And I shall do more than touch him. I have great plans for this boy. Perhaps something like this?'

He motioned towards the tube. Reluctantly, I turned and looked. Something – no, I corrected myself. Some
one
sat on the floor of the tube, knees up to their chest, arms wrapped round their shins, hugging them tight.

The person in the tube was mostly normal. Mostly. Normal legs, normal arms, normal body. But the head...

The head.

‘You're sick,' I said quietly.

‘Yes,' leered Doc. He ran his hand down the glass front of the tube, caressing it. ‘I know.'

He turned his gaze back to I.C., who was staring at the person behind the glass, as if in a trance. ‘Perhaps I will do the same to you, yes? Perhaps I will do to you what I did to her.'

I.C. shook his head furiously. Inside the tube, the girl raised her eyes to meet mine. Except they weren't her eyes. It wasn't even her head. It was a dog's head.

The maniac had given her a dog's head.

‘No. No, quite right,' Doc agreed, smiling down at I.C. He stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘Not original. Something special for you two, I think.' He looked me right in the eye. ‘Something special for something special, yes?'

He leaned closer to I.C., placed the back of his hand by his mouth, and whispered as if imparting some great secret. ‘He's real, you know? A real boy, here in the Darkest Corners.'

I.C.'s smooth brow furrowed. ‘I'm a real boy.'

Doc dropped his hand, adjusted his glasses, then broke into a laugh so sharp and sudden it made both I.C. and me jump. ‘
Real
,' he guffawed. ‘That's a good one.'

‘Shut up,' I hissed.

‘A very funny joke, I think—'

‘
Shut up!
'

Doc caught my expression and his eyebrows arched in surprise. ‘You mean...? Oh, how wonderful! He does not know, does he?'

‘Know what? What don't I know? Why does everyone keep saying that?'

‘My, oh my, this is going to be more fun than I dared dream,' Doc continued. He rubbed his hands together so vigorously I thought his skin might rub away. ‘Come, I must show you the rest of the Gallery, and then –' madness flashed behind his eyes ‘– we shall prep for surgery.'

The Gallery did not get any less disturbing. Quite the opposite.

We'd seen a boy with insects crawling beneath his skin. We'd seen twins stitched together, back to back. I'd lost count of all the others, their bodies deformed, or charred, or – in one case – turned into something resembling brown Plasticine. Their unique, individual horrors blended in my mind until I couldn't even remember the details. Maybe that was no bad thing.

After the Plasticine man the music stopped and we were ushered back towards the door. The tour, it seemed, was over.

We were back in the operating theatre where we'd been captured. Mr Mumbles was gone, but drag marks through the garbage showed he'd been taken out through the door next to the light switches. It had been closed again afterwards. Despite myself, I wondered what was happening to him.

Doc stood by a sink, running his hands under a flow of murky brown water that spat from the end of a corroded tap. He hummed to himself as he scrubbed up. “The Teddy Bears' Picnic” again. The three porters stood round I.C. and me, still caging us in with their freakish bodies.

‘Hygiene,' he announced, not looking round. ‘So important. Wouldn't want any of my patients catching infection.'

He turned round and wiped his hands across the filthy, blood-soaked apron he had pulled over his front. ‘Not by accident, anyway. Although, my porter tells me he has already smelled infection within you. A most interesting and unusual infection,' he continued, looking at me. ‘But we will leave you with this, I think.'

I saw an opportunity. ‘What's the matter? Can't you cure it? I thought you were a doctor.'

‘Ha!' he cried, without mirth. ‘To cure you would be simplicity itself. I have medicines which could cure you in an instant. One quick stab with the needle, and
poof
. Infection gone. No more.' He sniffed, shoving his glasses higher on his nose with a little more force than usual. ‘But I choose not to. I think this infection works to my benefit, yes?'

He knew. He knew what was keeping me here. But he'd also told me what I needed to know. Some of it, at least. The cure Joseph had told me about had to be injected. Now all I had to do was figure out what it was I needed to inject. But first, I had to get to Ward 13.

‘All clean,' Doc sang, holding up his hands. ‘Now, who's first?' He pointed a finger in my direction, then tick-tocked slowly between me and I.C., muttering below his breath.

‘If you... go down... to the woods... today...' His finger moved between us on each pause. ‘You'd better... not go... alone...'

‘What's he going to do to us?' I.C. whimpered. He was attached to me like a limpet, arms wrapped round one of mine, fingers clutching at my jumper.

‘Nothing,' I lied, then, ‘I don't know. Just be ready, OK?'

‘For what?'

‘Anything. Just be ready.'

‘...bear... that ever... there was...'

‘What,
anything
? Like... monkeys?'

‘No, not monkeys,' I sighed. Then I remembered that nothing could be ruled out in this place, and added, ‘
Probably
not monkeys.'

I looked to the door Doc had led us through earlier. I'd been careful to memorise the route from the Gallery back to here. Retracing our steps would be easy. Not that I wanted to revisit the Gallery, of course, but the door that led through to the section housing Ward 13 was right beside it. It was thirty metres from here to that door, maybe less. Thirty metres with porters hunting us down. The one in the air duct had been quick, but how fast could they move standing up? I realised with a shudder that I had absolutely no idea.

As if reading my mind, the porter directly behind us took a step to its right, adding another barrier between us and the door. Its black button eyes gazed vaguely in my direction, its pig-like snout twitching as it sniffed the air. I feared for a second that it had somehow smelled my thoughts, but quickly dismissed the idea as ridiculous. If anything, it may have smelled some adrenaline surge, or other chemical change in my body, as I'd considered making a run for it. Either way, it was now on its guard.

‘...the day... the teddy bears... have their... pic... nic.'

The finger stopped on I.C. and Doc gave a curt, but satisfied, nod. ‘You first,' he said, matter-of-fact, and I.C. screamed as all three of the porters pounced.