Harvest (43 page)

"You bastards!" yelled Abby, flailing at them. "You bastards/' The man behind her tried to seize her arms. She twisted around and swung at his face, her fist connecting in a satisfying thud. She spied a flash of movement. It was Yakov, darting away and vanishing around the corner. Now the man she'd shoved was on his feet again, coming at her from the other direction. Together the two men trapped her between them and lifted her from the floor. She didn't stop fighting and thrashing as they carried her through the doorway into the white room.

"You've got to control her!" said Tarasoft.

"The boy--'

"Forget the boy! He can't go anywhere. Get her up on the table!"

"She won't hold still!"

"Bastards? Abby screamed, kicking one leg free.

She heard Tarasoff fumbling in cabinets. Then he snapped, "Give me her arm! I need to get at her arm!"

Tarasoft approached, syringe in hand. Abby cried out as the needle plunged in. She twisted, but couldn't break free. She twisted again, and this time her limbs barely responded. She was having trouble seeing now. Her eyelids wouldn't stay open. Her voice came out barely a sigh. She tried to scream, but could not even draw the next breath.

What is wrong with me? Why can't I move?

"Get her in the next room!" said Tarasoft. "We have to intubate now or we're going to lose her."

The men carried her into the adjoining room and slid her onto a table. Lights came on overhead, searingly bright. Though fully awake, fully aware, she could not move a muscle. But she could feel everything. The straps tightening around her wrists and ankles. The pressure of Tarasoff's hand on her forehead, tipping her head back. The cold steel blade of the laryngoscope sliding into her throat. Her shriek of horror echoed only in her head; no sound came out. She felt the plastic ET tube snaking down her throat, gagging, suffocating her as it moved past her vocal cords and into her trachea. She could not turn away, could not even fight for air. The tube was taped to her face and connected to an ambubag. Tarasoft squeezed the bag and Abby's chest rose and fell in three quick, lifesaving breaths. Now he took off the ambubag and connected the ET tube to a ventilator. The machine took over, pumping air into her lungs at regular intervals.

"Now go get the boy!" snapped Tarasoft. "No, not both of you. I need someone to assist."

One of the men left. The other stepped closer to the table. "Fasten that chest strap," saidTarasoff. "The succinylchotine will wear off in another minute or two. We can't have her thrashing around while I start the IV."

Succinylcholine. This is how Aaron died. Unable to struggle. Unable to breathe.

Already the drug's effect was starting to fade. She could feel her chest muscles begin to spasm against the insult of that tube. And she could raise her eyelids now, could see the face of the man standing above her. He was cutting away her clothes, his gaze flickering with interest as he bared her breasts, then her abdomen.

Tarasoft started the IV in her arm. As he straightened, he saw that Abby's eyes were fully open now, and staring at him. He read the question in her gaze.

"A healthy liver," he said, 'is not something we can take for granted. There's a gentleman in Connecticut who's been waiting over a year for a donor."Tarasoffreached for a second IV bag and he hung it on the pole. Then he looked at her. "He was delighted to hear we've finally found a match."

All that blood they drew from me in the ER, she thought. They used it for tissue typing.

He continued with his tasks. Connecting the second bag to the line. Drawing medications into syringes. She could only look at him mutely as the ventilator pumped air into her lungs. Her muscle function was beginning to return. Already she could wiggle her fingers, could shrug her shoulders. A drop of perspiration slid down her temple. She was sweating with the effort to move. To regain control of her body. A clock on the wall read eleven-fifteen.

Tarasoft had finished laying out the tray of syringes. He heard the sound of the door open and shut again, and he turned. "The boy's loose," he said. "They're still hunting him down. So we'll take the liver first."

Footsteps approached the table. Another face came into view and stared down at Abby.

So many times before she had looked across the operating table at that face. So many times before, she had seen those eyes smiling at her above a surgical mask. They were not smiling now.

No, she sobbed, but the only sound that came out was the soft rush of air through the ET tube. No...

It was Mark.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Gregor knew that the only way out of the ship's aft section was through the blue door, and it was locked. The boy must have gone up the spiral staircase.

Gregor peered up at the steps, but he saw only curving shadows. He began to climb, the flimsy staircase ringing with his weight. His arm still throbbed where the boy had bitten him. The little bastard. This one had caused trouble from the start.

He reached the next level and stepped off the staircase, onto thick carpet. He was now in the living quarters of the surgeon and the surgeon's assistant. To the aft were two private cabins with a shared head and a shower. At the forward end was a well-appointed saloon. The only way out of this section was back down the staircase. The boy was trapped.

Gregor headed aft first.

The first cabin he came to was the dead surgeon's. It stank of tobacco. He flicked on the light and saw an unmade bed, a locker with the door hanging open, a desk with an overflowing ashtray. He crossed to the locker. Inside he found clothes reeking of smoke, an empty vodka bottle, and a secret stash of pornographic magazines. No boy.

Gregor next searched the surgical assistant's cabin. It was far more orderly, the bed made, the clothes in the locker neatly pressed. No boy in here either.

He glanced in the head, then started towards the saloon. Before he reached it, he heard the noise. It was a muffled whine.

He entered the saloon and turned on the lights. Quickly his gaze swept the room, taking in the couch, the dining table and chairs and the television set with its stack of videotapes. Where was the boy? He circled the room, then stopped, staring at the forward wall.

The dumbwaiter.

He ran to it and pried open the doors. All he saw were cables. He slapped the Up button, and the cable began to move, groaning as it lifted its burden. Gregor leaned forward, ready to snatch hold of the boy.

Instead he found himself staring at the empty dumbwaiter. The boy had already escaped into the galley.

Gregor headed back down the staircase. This was not a catastrophe. The galley was already secured. Gregor had started padlocking it every night, after discovering that the crew was sneaking food out of the pantry. The boy was still trapped. Gregor pushed through the blue door and started across the walkway.

"I'm sorry, Abby," said Mark. "I never thought it would go this far."

Please, she thought. Please don't do this...

"If there was any other way..." He shook his head. "You pushed it too hard. And then I couldn't stop you. I couldn't control you."

A tear slid from her eye and trickled into her hair. Just for an instant, she saw a flash of pain in his face. He turned away.

"It's time to gown up," said Tarasoft. "Will you do the honours?" He held out a syringe to Mark. "Pentobarb. We want to be humane about this, after all."

Mark hesitated. Then he took the syringe and turned to the IV pole. He uncapped the needle and poked it into the injection port. Again he hesitated. He looked at Abby.

I loved you, she thought. I loved you so much.

He pushed the plunger.

The lights began to dim. She saw his face waver, then fade into a deepening pool of grey.

I loved you.

I loved you...

The galley door was locked.

Yakov tugged again and again at the knob, but the door would not budge. What now?The dumbwaiter again? He scurried back to it and pressed the button. Nothing happened.

Frantically he glanced around the galley, considering all the possible hiding places. The pantry. The cupboards. The walk-in refrigerator. All of them offered only temporary concealment. Eventually the men would look in all those places. Eventually they would find him.

He would have to make it difficult for them.

He looked up at the lights. There were three bare bulbs shining overhead. He ran to the cupboard and plucked out a heavy ceramic coffee cup. He threw it at the nearest light.

The bulb shattered and went dark.

He fished out more cups. Three throws, and the second bulb shattered.

He was about to aim at the last bulb when his gaze suddenly fell on the cook's radio. It was set in its usual place on top of the cupboard. His gaze followed the radio's extension cord as it trailed down to the countertop, where the toaster sat.

Yakov glanced at the stove and spotted an empty soup pot. He dragged the pot off the burner and carried it to the sink. He turned on the faucet.

A radio was playing at full volume.

Gregor pushed open the galley door and stepped inside. Music blasted away in the darkness. Drums and electric guitars. He felt for the wall switch and flicked it on. No lights. He tried it a few more times, but nothing happened. He took a step forward and his leather sole crunched on glass.

"The little bastard's smashed out the lights. He's going to try and slip by me in the dark.

Gregor pushed the door shut. By the light of a match, he inserted his key in the lock and turned the deadbolt. No escape now. The match went out.

He turned to the darkness. "Come on, boy!" he yelled. "Nothing's going to happen to you!"

He heard only the radio blaring away, drowning out any other noise. He moved towards the sound, then paused to light another match. The radio was sitting on the countertop, right in front of him. As he switched off the music, he noticed the meat cleaver lying on the countertop. Beside it lay scraps of what looked like brown rubber.

So he's got his hands on the cook's knives, has he?

The match flickered out.

Gregor took out his gun and called out: "Boy?" Only then did he notice that his feet were wet. He lit a third match and looked down.

He was standing in a pool of water. Already it had soaked into his leather shoes, certainly ruining them. Where was the water coming from? In the wavering light of the flame, he scanned the area around his feet and saw that the water had spread halfway across the floor. Then he saw the extension cord, the end sliced off, one coil glistening at the edge of the pool. In bewilderment he scanned the length of the cord as it snaked across the floor and looped upwards, to a chair.

Just before his match flickered out, the last image that Gregor registered was the faint gleam of blond hair, and the figure of the boy, his arm stretched towards the wall socket.

The end of the cord was dangling from his hand.

Tarasoft held out the scalpel. "You make the first incision," he said, and saw the look of dismay in the other man's eyes. You have no choice, Hodell, he thought. You're the one who tried to recruit her into the fold. You're the one who made the mistake. Now you have to correct it.

Hodell took the scalpel. They had not even begun to operate, and already sweat had broken out on his forehead. He paused, the blade poised over the exposed abdomen. They both knew this was a test - perhaps the ultimate one.

Go ahead. Archer did his part by taking care of Mary Allen. Just as Zwick did with Aaron Levi. Now it's your turn. Prove you're still part of the team, still one of us. Cut open the woman you once made love to.

Do it.

Mark shifted the scalpel in his hand, as though trying to get a better grip. Then he took a breath and pressed the blade to the skin.

Do it.

Mark sliced. A long, curving incision. The skin parted and a line of blood welled up and dribbled onto the surgical drapes.

Tarasoffrelaxed. Hodell was not going to be a problem after all. He had, in fact, passed the point of no return years ago, as a surgical fellow. A night of heavy drinking, a few snorts of cocaine. The next morning, a strange bed, and a pretty nursing student strangled to death on the pillow beside him. And Hodell with no memory of what had really happened. It was all very persuasive.

And there'd been the money, to cement the recruitment.

The carrot and the stick. It worked almost every time. It had worked with Archer and Zwick and Mohandas. And with Aaron Levi too - for a while. Theirs had been a closed society, meticulous about guarding their secrets. And their profits. No one else at Bayside, not ColinWettig, not even Jeremiah Parr, could even begin to guess how much money had changed hands. It was enough money to buy the very best doctors, the very best team - a team Tarasoff had created. The Russians merely supplied the parts and, when necessary, the brute force. In the OR, it was the team that performed the miracles.

Money alone had not been enough to keep Aaron Levi in their fold. But Hodell was still theirs. He was proving it now with every slice of his scalpel.

Tarasoft assisted, positioning retractors, clamping bleeders. It was a pleasure to work with such young and healthy tissue. The woman was in excellent condition. She had a minimum of subcutaneous fat and her abdominal muscles were flat and tight -so tight that their assistant, standing at the head of the table, had to infuse more succinylcholine to relax them for easier retraction.

The scalpel blade penetrated the muscle layer. They were in the abdominal cavity now. Tarasoft widened the retractors. Beneath a thin veil of peritoneal tissue glistened the liver and loops of small intestine. All of it healthy, so healthy! The human organism was a beautiful sight to behold.

The lights flickered and almost went off altogether.

"What's going on?" said Hodell.

They both looked up at the lamps. The lights brightened again to full intensity.

"Just a glitch," said Tarasoft. "I can still hear the generator."

"This is not an optimal setup. A rocking ship. The power going oft--'

"It's a temporary arrangement. Until we find a replacement for the Amity building." He nodded at the surgical site. "Proceed."