The Howling III

Chapter Twelve

It was impossible for Malcolm to tell how long he rode inside the van. There were moments when he was almost awake and he could see Dr Pastory sitting close by, watching him. There were heavy curtains across the rear window, and the only illumination came from up front in the cab where the other man was driving. Malcolm did not have the strength to turn and look up there, and he soon lapsed back into unconsciousness.

He had only vague sensations of when the ride ended. First the vibration of the engine stopped; then there were the metallic sounds of doors opening and closing, and the voices of the two men. The chill of outdoor air was on his face briefly, and then it was warm again. He felt the familiar touch of sheets on his body and the slight give of a mattress under him. To his drugged brain that meant he was back in the hospital. Safe. Holly would be here soon. He slept.

When finally his brain cleared and he came fully awake, Malcolm saw at once he was not in the hospital. The bed was similar, and the room had the same kind of medicinal smell, but there was a coldness here. Not in the temperature, for the room was quite warm, but in the atmosphere. Malcolm had no idea where he was; he only knew it was a bad place.

The room was very plain. There was his narrow bed, a four-drawer bureau, a little night stand, and a straight wooden chair. The room had one door and no window. In a corner was a white enamelled sink with a mirrored cabinet above it. On one wall hung a picture of a dog on a hillock overlooking a flock of grazing sheep. The picture showed storm clouds building on the horizon.

Malcolm peeled back the covers and swung his feet out of the bed on to the floor. He was dizzy for a moment and had to shut his eyes. When he opened them he felt a little better. He looked down and saw that he was still wearing the foolish little garment they gave him at the hospital.

He stood up, and carefully walked the few steps to the door. He tried the knob. Locked. Malcolm was not surprised. He prowled around the room touching things; feeling their surfaces.

He ran some water over his hands at the sink and splashed it on his face. He looked at himself in the mirror. The young face that looked back at him was very sad. Dark half-moons shadowed the eyes.

The bureau was unfinished wood of some kind. Malcolm pulled out the drawers one by one. Three of them were empty, but the top drawer contained clothes. There was underwear, jeans, T-shirts, sweaters, socks, and tennis shoes.

"Well, hello, Malcolm. How are you feeling?"

The voice startled him so that he spun away from the bureau and almost lost his balance. Dr Pastory stood in the doorway. He had opened it without making a sound.

"I see you found the clothes. It's all right, they're for you. I hope they fit. I'm not used to buying clothes for a boy. Young man, I should say."

Malcolm shrugged.

"I thought you'd be tired of wearing that hospital gown. I don't blame you."

Pastory was trying hard to make his voice friendly, but it was still oily and cold to Malcolm. The doctor came over and took his arm to guide him back to the bed. His touch was as unpleasant as his voice. He had an antiseptic smell to him. Malcolm sat down on the bed. Pastory took the chair and hitched it over close.

"Now then, how do you feel?" he said again.

"Sick to my stomach," Malcolm told him.

"Well, that's not unusual. The drug does that sometimes. It's nothing to worry about. We'll get some food into you and you'll feel tiptop again."

"Where are we?"

"It's a little place of mine where we can get you all well again."

"I'm not sick."

"That's a matter of opinion, Malcolm. Definitely a matter of opinion."

Dr Pastory was looking at him in a strange, piercing way, but then he put on the fake oily smile again.

"Why don't you put on some of your new clothes? Are they what boys are wearing today?"

"They're okay."

"Good. You just get dressed now and I'll show you where we're going to work together."

"Work?"

"In a manner of speaking. You're an unusual young man, Malcolm. I'm going to give you a few tests — oh, nothing that will hurt or anything like that — and see if we can find out what makes you so unusual."

"I don't think I want to take tests."

Pastory's little eyes glittered. "I told you before, Malcolm, in this life it doesn't always matter what we want. Now will you get yourself dressed, or should I bring in somebody to do it for you?"

"I'll do it."

"Good. That's the spirit I like." The doctor went out. The door closed soundlessly behind him. There was a whispered click of the lock. Malcolm turned the knob just to be sure. It was locked all right.

He tried on some of the clothes from the bureau. Everything was a size or so too big, but not so much that it mattered. And it did feel good to be wearing real clothes again.

When he was dressed Malcolm sat down on the bed and waited.

In a few minutes Pastory came back in bringing a mug of some hot brown liquid. There was another man with him. The other man was big with a barrel chest and thick neck and bristly black hair. His lips were thick and set in a permanent sneer. He smelled bad. Malcolm recognized the smell from the morning he was taken from the hospital. Was it only this morning? Whatever they shot him up with had messed up his sense of time.

Pastory handed him the mug. "Drink this. It's full of vitamins and other good things."

Malcolm drank. It tasted like a heavy beef broth. Not too bad.

"Later on you can have solid food, but I think for now we'd better stick to liquids."

"How long am I going to be here?"

"That depends." He pulled the door all the way open. "Come along now."

"What are you going to do?"

Pastory dropped the fake pleasant expression he'd been wearing. "I haven't time to explain every little thing to you. Kruger, bring him along."

The big man grabbed Malcolm by the shoulder and dug his thumb into a nerve there.

"Hey!" the boy protested.

"The doctor wants you to come along." Kruger had a high singsong voice that did not fit with his size. He pulled Malcolm to his feet and propelled him out of the door.

He was taken along a short hallway and into another room, larger than the one where he had awakened. A skylight in the ceiling made it very bright. There were shelves on the walls holding all manner of bottles, vials, beakers, and jars. Some of them contained liquids or powders, but others were empty. Along one side of the room was a counter with a stainless-steel sink and a little gas burner. There was a cluster of instruments and equipment that meant nothing to Malcolm all along the counter.

In the centre of the room was a high, narrow table, padded, with tough leather straps riveted to the sides. Under the table was a complicated system of gears so it could be tilted in any direction.

"This is a laboratory," Malcolm said.

"Very good," Pastory said, as though to an apt pupil. "Would you like to jump up on the table there?"

"No."

"I think, my boy, we had better understand how things are run around here. When I make a suggestion, it is not really a suggestion. It is an order. And when I give an order, you obey. That way we will all get along much better. Now get up on that table."

Malcolm felt his face growing hot. His shoulder still hurt where Kruger had dug into the nerve. He walked to the table, turned around, and gave a little jump so he was sitting on it.

"That's the idea," Pastory said. "Now lie back, please."

"What for?"

Pastory snapped his head at the big man who was standing by eagerly. "Kruger!"

Before Malcolm knew what was happening, Kruger had pushed him down flat on his back and had buckled a strap around one of his wrists. He flailed out with his free hand.

"Cut it out!" he yelled.

Kruger drew back a massive arm and cracked the back of his hand against Malcolm's cheek. Malcolm tasted blood. His eyesight blurred for a moment and there seemed to be an edge of fire around everything. There was a strange growling sound in his ears, and Malcolm was surprised to realize it came from his own throat.

Pastory hurried over to the table. "Did you see that? Wonderful! Get the other hand strapped down, Kruger. And his feet. Quickly!"

As the doctor peered down on him Malcolm's flash of anger drained away to be replaced by a numb feeling of hopelessness.

"There, he's changing back now," Pastory said. "But did you see it, Kruger? Did you see what happened to his face?"

"It looked funny there for a minute. Like his teeth were too big for his mouth, or something."

"Or something!" Pastory repeated. He leaned very close to Malcolm, took his chin in one hand and turned his head this way and that. His breath had a minty smell.

"Are you all.right now, Malcolm?" he asked.

"I want to get up."

"In time, my boy. In time. Tell me what you felt just then, when you tried to get at Kruger."

"I–I was mad. He shouldn't have hit me."

"No, you're quite right. I'll see that it doesn't happen again."

Pastory walked back to the counter and began to write furiously in a hardbound notebook. He spoke more to himself than to the others in the room. "It appears that anger triggers the change. I wonder if other powerful emotions will have the same effect. We will have to look into that."

He returned to the table. "Open your mouth, please."

Malcolm hesitated.

"It's only a thermometer. See? All I want to do is take your temperature. Now open, please."

Reluctantly Malcolm obeyed, and the doctor slipped the

glass tube expertly under his tongue. |

"I am going to take a sample of your blood now. A very small bit, Malcolm. You'll never miss it."

The boy watched as Pastory inserted the hollow needle into a vein on the inside of his elbow and drew crimson fluid up into the cylinder.

"There now." The doctor withdrew the needle and taped a wad of cotton over the tiny hole it left. He took the thermometer out of Malcolm's mouth and examined it. "A touch above normal. Nothing to be concerned about."

"Can I get up now?" Malcolm said.

"Very soon, my boy. There is just one more shot now; one that will relax you and make you feel good. Then we'll get you up and give you something to eat."

Pastory gave him the needle in the shoulder, then backed away looking very pleased with himself. "You just relax for a minute or so, Malcolm. I want to go and check some references. If you need anything just tell Kruger here. Okay?"

Malcolm rolled his head to look at the doctor but he did not answer. A heavy feeling was spreading through his body. He did not want to do much of anything.

As soon as Pastory went out and closed the door, Kruger came over and stared down into the boy's face. The man's heavy features were twisted in open hostility.

"You better not do anything like that to me again," he said.

"Didn't do anything." It was an effort for Malcolm to get the words out.

"You know what I'm talking about. That thing you did with your face and your teeth. I don't care what the doctor says. You better behave or I'll hurt you."

The big man talked to him some more, but Malcolm floated off to a warm cosy place where the words made no sense.

After that, time had little meaning for Malcolm. He knew he was being measured and weighed, prodded and pricked, tested, retested, fed and purged. He did not care about any of it. Sometimes he would be left alone and Kruger would be there. The big man glowered at him constantly and made threats, but Malcolm had no energy to respond.

The worst part was when he was strapped to the table. Then Pastory would do things to him that he didn't like to think about. Things with little electric wires and such. Sometimes the doctor made it very cold in the laboratory, sometimes unbearably hot. He was always writing in his book, looking very excited. With the drug in him, Malcolm couldn't care.

Then Dr Pastory made a mistake with one of the shots he regularly gave Malcolm. The boy moved his arm just as the needle went in, and the drug squirted harmlessly on to his sleeve. So intent was Pastory on watching Malcolm's face that he did not see. When he went away Malcolm could feel himself growing steadily stronger and more alert.

Later that night — or maybe it was day, Malcolm could never be sure — Kruger came into his room. The boy saw him, but pretended to be asleep.

"You awake?" Kruger demanded. "Yeah, I can see you are. Come on, it's time to get you up and get you dressed." He started toward the boy.

"Don't touch me," Malcolm said. "Keep away."

"Listen, you don't tell me what to do and what not to do. Maybe you need to be reminded of who's boss around here." Kruger lumbered over to the bed, reached down and seized Malcolm's wrist.

A dull anger pushed its way into the boy's clearing mind, but he still did not have the strength to pull away.

Gripping Malcolm's wrist with one hand, Kruger pulled a cigarette lighter from his pocket with the other. He snapped on the flame and brought it slowly up under the boy's palm.

The sensation of heat quickly grew into pain. It brought back terrible memories of a night of flames and screaming and the stench of burning flesh. The flesh of his people.

In a sudden convulsive movement, Malcolm snapped his head to one side and clamped his teeth on the hairy wrist of the man who held him. The skin broke easily, and he worked his jaws from side to side, biting through the tougher muscle meat. His tongue felt the slick ropey tendons though the taste of blood.

Kruger's scream shattered around his head like breaking glass. The cigarette lighter dropped to the floor. Malcolm bit down harder, finding a wild joy in the sensation of sinking his teeth into living flesh.

"Kruger!" The shout came from Dr Pastory, who had run into the room in response to the big man's cry.

"Get him off me!" Kruger shrieked, trying to pull his arm free.

Malcolm, eyes closed in a kind of ecstasy, bit down all the harder. He felt bones grind against his teeth.

There was a short, sharp stab in the back of his neck, and Malcolm recognized it as the jab of a needle. Instantly he lost feeling in his face. His jaw muscles slackened and Kruger pulled his lacerated arm free.

"Look what that little sonofabitch did to me! Look at my arm! I'll kill the little bastard!"

"Shut up, Kruger."

Malcolm watched dully as Dr Pastory pulled his assistant away and looked at his arm.

"He took quite a chunk out of you," Pastory said.

"Damn near bit through the bone. Will it get infected or anything?"

"I'll dress it for you in a minute. What I want to know is what did you do to provoke him?"

"Nothing. I didn't do nothing."

Pastory stooped and picked something off the floor. "What's this?"

"My lighter. I–I must have dropped it."

"Don't lie to me, Kruger. Don't ever lie to me. You know all I have to do is say the word to have you put back in the bad place."

"Please don't, Doctor. I was just fooling around. I didn't mean to do anything to him."

"Get out of here. Go to the laboratory and I'll come in and take a look at that bite. It may even turn out to be helpful to me."

Cradling his injured arm, Kruger left them alone.

Pastory came over and touched Malcolm's face. The anaesthetic had left him without any feeling there, but Malcolm could see the doctor poking at the flesh and muttering to himself.

"Incredible. Absolutely incredible. Malcolm, you are going to make me a very rich and famous man. We have a lot of work to do in the next few days, but then we'll start reaping the rewards. And don't you worry, my boy, I'll take very, very good care of you."

Malcolm sank back on the narrow bed. All the anger was gone. All he felt now was an icy despair. He was ready to give up and die, except for one thing. He still held in his mouth the delicious taste of Kruger's blood.