Thirsty



  Thirsty

  By Jason P. Crawford

  Thirsty

  Copyright: Jason P. Crawford

  Published: 09 Dec 2014

  Publisher: Epitome Press

  The right of Jason P. Crawford to be identified as author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the publisher. You must not circulate this book in any format.

  Thirsty

  “Goodnight, Suzie.” I watched my fiancée’s long black hair disappear behind her apartment door, the dingy overhead light flickering, casting my shadow along the wall. Still savoring the lingering taste of our last kiss, I turned away from the door.

  Light lanced into my pupils, burning holes into the back of my brain. I recoiled, wincing away and clamping my lids shut again.

  “What the hell?” The transition was so jarring that it took a second to process. I was on my back, in bed. “What happened? Where am I?” I reached up to knock the light away from my face.

  The movement stopped about three inches off the mattress.

  “What…?” I turned away from the light, pulling my arm as I did so. The blur resolved into the curve of my flesh, the bones of my hand. My eyes traced the blue of my vein upward to my wrist.

  I was chained to the frame.

  A quick glance told me that the other wrist, and both ankles, were in the same situation. My heart sped up, and every time my eyes came forward, I had to close or avert them to keep from being blinded again.

  “Hello?” How did I get here? I was just at Suzie’s. I dug into my memory, but couldn’t bring up anything that would explain what was going on.

  The electricity hummed in the glare, and I could hear the building creak. I squinted, trying to see past the light in front of me, but it was useless.

  “Is anyone there? This isn’t funny!” Panic had begun to creep into my voice, but I took a few deep breaths to slow my breathing. Freaking out isn’t going to do any good. You’ve got to keep calm.

  I managed that for about thirty seconds.

  “Goddamn it!” Then I shouted, rattling the metal bedframe with the cuffs as I shook my hands and my feet. “This has gone far enough! Let me out!”

  “In good time, Mr. Foster. Soon enough.”

  My muscles all tensed at once, locking in place. I couldn’t move anything except my eyes, but the light was so bright that they watered. Next to the lamp, so blurry I couldn’t be sure of anything, I thought I saw someone in a white coat, like a lab coat. His face was behind the lightbulb, but I could make out my wallet in his hands as he flipped through it. His fingers were pale, long, undecorated.

  “Clint Foster. 27 year old student at the University of California, Long Beach. Banks with Chase. Engaged to a lovely brunette named Suzanne, who calls you ‘sweetheart.’” He opened the billfold. “Doesn’t like to carry cash.”

  “Dude, what the hell?” My voice broke, but I cleared my throat and pushed on. “Look, just take the wallet. It’s fine. I can’t even tell who you are, and if you let me go –“

  “Sssshhhh…” His voice resonated in my skull, and it was like I had just taken a sedative—I could feel the tension leaving my body, taking all the nervousness with it.

  I was calm.

  “Now, isn’t that better?” The man sounded like a concerned parent or teacher, but there was something about the rhythm of his voice that was…old. Out of place. “It wouldn’t do to have you alkalinizing your blood or putting undue stress on your cardiorespiratory system.” He refolded the wallet and laid it down on the bedside table nearby.

  “Humans are amazing creatures, really, don’t you think?” He reached down, pushing up the short sleeve on my left arm and strapping a blood-pressure cuff to it. The bag filled with air, pinching off my blood flow as he spoke. “Sentient, sapient, yet slaves to animal desires. The only real species on the planet with the freedom to overcome the lizard brain, you have decided to submerge your intellect in favor of ignorance because it’s easier.” He sighed. “There is so little motive for true discovery anymore!”

  I tried to move my lips, to talk, but they wouldn’t obey my brain.

  “Oh, my apologies.” He read the dial on the cuff, jotted down a few notes, then undid the Velcro with a tearing sound. “You may speak.”

  It was like someone untied my tongue. “Wh…who are you? Where am I? What’s going on?”

  “All the usual questions.” Another sigh. “I hope that, after we’ve had some time to talk, you’ll come to ask better ones.” He stood, more of his body hiding behind the bright searchlight in front of me. “For now, answering those questions would simply introduce experimental bias, and I can’t have that. Not if I’m going to be able to publish my results.”

  Is he some kind of mad scientist or something? “Are you…are you doing some sort of experiment on me? Why am I tied up?”

  “That’s enough.” His voice was still the compassionate father’s, but my jaw clipped shut and wouldn’t open again. “I forget how annoying the incessant queries of a child could be. Necessary, of course, for the learning process, but annoying.” He brought out a syringe and grasped hold of my arm again.

  “This shouldn’t cause you any significant discomfort. I’ve had many years of practice.” In a quick, smooth motion, he drove the needle into my vein. The pinprick of pain was overwhelmed by the terror that rushed through my body—but my muscles remained relaxed, unresponsive as he extracted a sample of my blood.

  “Excellent.” He brought the tube, filled to the brim with dark red fluid, up toward his face. I heard a deep inhalation. “This will do perfectly as a baseline sample.” He left my field of vision and his footsteps receded.

  I blinked; sweat was pouring off of my forehead into my eyes. I tried to call for help, to ask for a towel or a washcloth, but I couldn’t.

  A door opened, then shut. It sounded like a refrigerator. My eyes rolled away from the light in front of me, looking up at the ceiling. It was pure white, with a single vent in my field of vision.

  “I’ll have those analyses done by tomorrow night.” The voice moved around the room, its speaker still hidden. I could hear glass and metal moving, shifting on countertops and in cabinets. “I think that you’ll be an excellent subject, Mr. Foster. Strong willed and athletic. You have much potential.”

  This must be what quadriplegics feel like. Pure fear was in my veins, sweating from my pores, but I still couldn’t move or speak…or scream for help. My heart was pounding, thudding against the walls of my ribcage.

  Am I going to have a heart attack? The walls of my mouth were dry, and my tongue felt like sandpaper with each inhalation. The footsteps gained in strength, until my captor stood above the bed again. He laid a hand on my chest.

  “I am going to leave you now. I understand that you will try to escape, but you must realize that it is pointless. You are miles from where anyone can hear you or find you, and even if you breach these walls, you would be lost, with no bearings or anywhere to go before I found you again.” He withdrew his hand. “Is there anything that you need? You may speak.”

  “I need something to drink.” My lips formed the words, but there was little strength behind them.

  “Ah. Of course. Forgive me.” Footsteps again, then the running of a faucet. “I don’t expect that you’ll mind tap water at this point, will you, Mr. Foster?”

  I shook my head. Ice clinked into the glass, and the man’s pale hand brought it down toward my lips. I could feel the temperature drop around the lip o
f the cup as it approached my mouth.

  Water poured in, cool, clear…and a little salty. I sighed in relief.

  “Is that better?” The cup withdrew, and I swallowed the last bit of liquid in my mouth before nodding. “Excellent. I suggest that you rest well, then. I shall see you when the initial tests are complete.”

  “Wait!”

  He paused, his shoulders moving, turning back my way. “Yes, Mr. Foster?”

  “Why me?” I strained, trying to get a better look at him, but the spotlight defeated my efforts. “Why did you take me?”

  He said nothing for a few seconds, and I could hear my heartbeat in my ears.

  “Good day, Mr. Foster.”

  “Hold on!” I heard a door open, squealing on its hinges. “Wait a second!”

  It clicked shut. I was alone again. I fought back the terror that threatened to paralyze my brain.

  I had to act.

  “Okay.” I flexed my muscles, tensing each one in turn. The paralysis had worn off, leaving me in command of my body again. “I think that it’s high time I got the hell out of here.”

  I wiggled my hands inside the bonds, testing them, looking for any weaknesses. These are tight, but I think I can get out of them. I strained, trying to squeeze my right hand so that it could pass through the cuffs, but my only reward was pain as the metal dug into my flesh. I bit my lip to keep from screaming as the blood begin to flow, sticky and wet, over my palm.

  “Come on, you son of a bitch!” I dug deep, steeling