Skullcrack City (27 page)

It’s difficult to explain the sensation of waking up from death. I’d been nowhere else—no heavenly lights or infernal torments washed over me. To my knowledge, or in retrospect, my perception, I hadn’t known I’d been at all.

There were two observers during that time who could tell you my body was there in all manner of distress—heart rate soaring or disappearing, brain waves fluctuating like wild or flat-lining, lungs processing air via respirator, skin puckering against an army of sutures. But until the moment I opened my eyes there in Dr. Tikoshi’s lab, as far as I’m concerned, I was fucking dead.

It was so nice.

And then, of course, I woke up.

“Can you hear me?”

I could. Dara looked ragged and sleepless. The puffy perimeters of her eyes told me she’d been crying. I tried to answer her, but the word “Yes” came out of my mouth as, “Yub.”

Wait, why ‘yub?’ Why wasn’t my mouth working properly?

I wanted to reach up and touch my face, but found I couldn’t move my hands.

Jesus. Was I restrained again? Was anyone checking to see if I’d broken the world record for waking up in restraints?

Dara read my eyes. “You can’t move them yet? I’m sorry.” She put her hand on mine and I felt the sensation. She lifted my hand to her face and sighed. This was hard for her. She looked so worried. I tried to brush against her skin with the back of my finger. Nothing. “Dr. T. said there’s going to be a reintegration period, because of all the damage and the new input. He’s going to guide you through it, like he did with Buddy. Supposedly this kind of thing used to take years, like a toddler’s brain developing, but Dr. T. says he’s developed something that will give the connecting and healing processes a boost.”

No. I couldn’t be the newest sacrificial lamb laid out for Dr. T.’s experimentation. I tried to voice my dissent.

“Nuh. Da. Mebbe die.”/
No. Dara. Let me die.

“I can’t. I’m sorry.”

“Cah do dis.”/
You can’t do this.

Something started to beep behind me. I tried to roll from my side, to see what it was, but I couldn’t.

Dara lifted her gun and pointed it at someone behind me. “Fix it, motherfucker.”

“Relax, dear.” It was Dr. Tikoshi, his creepy non-accent slightly altered by broken-nose snuffle sounds. “Everyone needs to relax. Doyle’s dura mater is still very swollen. Any more pressure between the dura and the titanium plate and we’ll lose him. This is a delicate time. I’ll take care of it.”

Dr. Tikoshi walked around the bed and brought up a syringe to my IV insertion point.

What was he putting in me? What had he done?

“As I said—you need to relax. This is a mixture to reduce swelling. A little mannitol, a little neurontin. A pinch of steroids. Something for the pain, of course. And the most subtle hint of perphenadol.”

“Nuh. Nuh.”/
No! No!

“Have you heard the voices yet?”

What voices?

The beeping behind me subsided. Dara kept her gun on Dr. T., but her hands were shaking. My vision swirled.

Dara looked at me. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t let you go.”

“We have to move soon. Dr. T. says that Akatsuki is three states away, dealing with some issues with Delta MedWorks. Now, I don’t know what the hell that means. I guess I don’t even care, right now. But I don’t want to find out he’s lying and have one of those skullcrackers come in here and tear us apart. I don’t know if I even believe Dr. T. when he says he only made two of those goddamn things.”

I focused on my mouth as much as I could, on shaping my lips and making the right sounds. “One he…called…No…zo…mi. Dead?”

“Oh, you’re doing great. That’s so good.”

“It’s…dead?”

She hesitated, then said, “Yes. You put six rounds through him, and one lucky shot of mine hit him in the face right after he…”

Dara was holding something back. She looked across my body, making eye contact with that bastard surgeon.

“Dr. T. and I have talked about it. You’ve only got a couple of days until you should be able to get out of bed, and you don’t need any more stress than you’ve already got. High blood pressure could throw you into a coma, or worse. Just worry about healing, right now, okay?”

“Dara?”

She put her hand over her mouth to stifle a cry. “I can’t. I know this is my fault. All I can do is hope that you’ll forgive me.”

She rose from her chair, and stepped out of my view. I tried to rotate again and there was a cold water shock and I could feel something pressing against the back of my head and after that I lay very, very still.

I woke in a hotel room, alone. The drapes were pulled across the windows. There were bright white spots where mirrors and art had been pulled from the wall. My head throbbed all over, and a smaller spike of pain resonated near the base of my neck. Something cold and flat was pressing against my back. I managed to lift my left arm off of my body, but the weight of the hotel bed sheets pressed it back down.

we could burn it watch the fire hungry
What?
they say I’m getting better but mom and dad they won’t look me in the eye this is how you get to the next level and join the council keep grinding bitches and
Who’s in the room?
money they gasp when the knife goes in that’s what makes it real fish fresh fish polish each weapon each night naked rotate oil
I’m sleeping. I must be sleeping. This is the drugs talking.
I wanted to believe in an afterlife better than this man this place is too small
It’ll stop soon.
this is what I get for helping my friends Jesus what is that thing what is that thing
It’ll stop soon.
we played him for sure yeah you want more Hex here you go Crooked D you fucking herb the medication burns I couldn’t control it
Am I awake?
once the flames started I peed all over myself and I smelled like smoke for days the man is sad again he’s always sad my world is too small
Oh, shit. I’m in the hotel room. I’m awake.
I wonder if all the Vakhtang have jaws like that this is my Right of Refusal and my girlfriend thinks it’s funny that I drew on this thing but you have to stand out am I right
I can’t think straight. Are these my thoughts?
primary target one S.P. Doyle thought to be in possession of both bank assets and sensitive information
It’ll stop soon.
my sister brought me flowers like that makes up for sleeping with my husband maybe I never would have started smoking if she never would have been
It’ll stop soon.
such a bitch but that’s life no hey now that’s death the hospital lights should turn back on any minute of Christ I’m scared I’m so alone I’m so alone
It’ll stop soon. Please.
oh my head I’d hoped Dara would fuck me after I made her that eye but you can never tell which way the wind blows oh great and now she’s going to bed with that sad skinny motherfucker oh hungry slide through space smells like smoke again
Please. Stop.

“Only one more move, I promise. I know this is hard on you. Dr. T. said your integration is showing real signs of progress. We had to leave for a minute to get more perphenadol from a friend of Huey’s, so I hope that’s helping. You were screaming when we got back.”

“The voices. I couldn’t stop the voices.”

“Are they there now?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

Dr. T. jumped in. “The perphenadol seems to be highly effective for suppression.”

“Oh, doc, you have no idea,” said Dara. And she winked at me because she wanted us to share something, or she wanted me to remember the way we had been, and how she had saved me, but her face was still sad, and I was terrified that the voices would come back. She tried to distract me.

“Once you’re up and around you can help me with this fucking guy. I’m barely sleeping, even when I’ve got him cuffed to that chair.”

“I don’t care. Why am I hearing those voices?”

Dr. T. said, “It’s part of the integration. Nozomi told me they were overwhelming at first, but the perphenadol seemed to help, and he was practicing meditation at night as a form of therapeutic absorption to block them out.” I tried to picture that massive beast sitting in lotus position, doing circular breathing with brains on its breath. “Akatsuki has been trying something else, creating memory hallways to identify and separate each of the voices.”

“And that’s working for it?”

“Not ‘it,’ him. He’s a male. And yes, I believe so. But Akatsuki is a later version of the…what’s the parlance they’re using in the media? Skullbuster?”

“Skullcracker.”

“Yes, skullcracker. Isn’t that delightful? I mean, it’s reductive, and there’s so much more to these beings, but it’s got a nice sound to it.”

“It sounds like a fucking nightmare, doc. But you’re a crazy asshole, so you don’t get that.”

“Temper temper. Watch your blood pressure.”

He was right. I could feel my veins distending. The sense of compression at the back of my head was phenomenal. I had to focus on keeping things at low tide.

“You said he compartmentalized each of the voices, but what I’m hearing is a mad rush. They’re thoughts that aren’t my own. They’re private kinds of things, but they’re in my voice, I think.”

“The longer you hear them, the more distinct they should become. You don’t recognize any of them?”

“That’s enough, doc. Doyle’s had a long day. Maybe it’s time he had a little bedtime cocktail.”

Dara bent over and kissed my cheek and said, “Goodnight.” Then she grabbed a syringe from the hotel end table, stuck it into my I.V. tap, and pushed the plunger down.

The new lab was much smaller than the one Dr. Tikoshi had kept hidden in the slums of 45
^th
. This thing was closer to a dentist’s office. One surgical area, a few sterilizers and packed cabinets. The central light buzzed and crackled, and there were dead flies in the ballast cover. The view from the window showed me seagulls, industrial blight, and not much else. It was definitely a D-list, emergencies-only kind of set-up.

In hindsight, I’m grateful we were by the hydraulic noisescape of the ports, so far outside the city. Anywhere else, and people probably would have heard all the screaming.

When I woke, Dara and Dr. T. had helped me to sit up for the first time in days. In a normal context I would have found the dizziness and head pain shockingly oppressive, but after enduring the high pressure terminal nothing vertigo of the realm and the actual sensation of something biting into the back of my head, this was kind of a walk in the park.

“Can I see a mirror?”

Dr. T. and Dara exchanged a look.

Dr. T. said, “I would suggest that you first let me tend to your needs, and beyond that I believe a discussion of your new condition is in order before you.”

“Fuck my needs. Fuck your discussions. Tell me what the hell…”

Dr. T. pulled a syringe from his chest pocket and jammed it into my thigh.

“Jesus.”

“Remain calm. The promethazine will help you through this.”

I did feel better. His injection washed through me and I almost fell back on the bed. I wondered why I didn’t feel air rushing across the open back of my hospital gown.

“Steady. Please look at my light for a moment. Okay. Pupillary reflex is finally functional. That’s good.”

“That’s how you figured us out, huh?”

“What’s that?”

“The night we met you. You did that little trick with your hand, and all of a sudden you’re pointing a gun at us.”

“Oh, yes. I had my suspicions before then, but once she displayed monocular impairment and you didn’t, I knew that she was the one-eyed woman and you were Mr. Doyle.”

“You know, doc, you’ve got a hell of a brain on you. Doesn’t mean you’re not a piece of shit. I definitely wouldn’t say
that
. I’d probably say you’re a speedy-handed, weird-voiced, waxy-skinned fuckwad witch doctor, for sure. But a smart one.”

I liked promethazine. I was feeling good. Almost happy, despite it all.