The Dark Knight/The Sarah Connor Chronicles
'Tales from the Mad House'
By Miranda Sparks
Her veins burned like fire. She wanted to tear them out of her body but something was holding her down to the bed. Clasped by her hands and feet Sarah Connor could only throw her weight around impotently as she tried to force her way to freedom, but the buckles would not break.
The cold cement ceiling waved like the ocean and stopped short every time it threatened to crash down on her. On either side the walls would shrink and expand with her movements: too far one way or the other and she would be crushed. Her body was like water that could trickle away if she only willed it, but those goddamn straps held her in place.
"Let me out of here!" she screamed. Was it just her or did the bed tighten its grip with every pull? Beads of sweat boiled and steamed as they ran down her clammy skin, down the tight, anxious flesh of a woman who'd spent every day preparing for the end.
What fresh layer of hell had she found herself in, and where was John? They'd taken him away, locked him away, away where it's not safe... "Away where it's not safe..."
Again she fought the straps, certain in her madness that her strength could shatter the buckles: then she would be free, then she could pull the fire out of her body and hold the ceiling at bay. She would pry open the door with her fingernails until they bled and run into the night to find John...
She would hold him, hide him, keep him safe, and prepare.
It was only a matter of time before her name flooded into the right sources and they would come for her. The authorities had taken her in and soon all of her enemies would know...
Suddenly there came a voice from the wall itself. "Word of advice, watch your breathing. You gotta lotta dangerous chemicals running through your system, you don't wanna lose control."
"Who said that!?" she screeched. "Who said that!? I'll fucking kill you, you freak! I'll fucking kill you!"
"Fine, give yourself a heart attack. If that's what you really want, then hey, be my guest." The unseen figure huffed, smacked his lips loudly and became silent. It was clear that his input was not required nor was it appreciated. That was fine: he didn't have to speak if he didn't want to.
Sarah reveled in the silence, but that was only one demon she'd chased away. The walls, the ceiling and the bed were still against her: a monster in the sheets was going to rise up and swallow her whole. She could hear its inhuman growl beneath her.
"Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up," she chanted, louder and louder each time. "Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up!"
"I didn't say anything," the unseen voice stated innocently, though the haunting tone was anything but. Whoever this man was he was guilty as sin and profoundly enjoyed being that way.
"Shut up!" Sarah cried. "Don't talk to me! Shut up!"
He laughed viciously. "Well who else is gonna look after you, huh? There's nobody else around! It's just you and me and the demons in the wall, and you know what? They're hungry..."
"Shut up."
"They're hungry and they'll get you when you least expect it."
She was losing her mind. Drawing on all of her strength Sarah resolved to focus and did so as she stared at the door. It was only a few feet away, but it was also a mile: it didn't matter, she could still draw on every ounce of strength and break the straps. The goal was in sight and she wasn't going to let it go, no matter the cost and definitely not while John was still out there, needing her.
Her mind flung itself outside of time and outside of space to when she'd finally freed herself. One step, two step, she was nearly at the door when it came flying open. She stopped, and there on the other side was death itself: it had come for her and was wearing her face and her clothes.
The rifle in its hand exploded into her abdomen, leaving her life blood to drain painfully from her. Though it wasn't the pain she feared, or death, but rather a world where her son, the world's greatest hope, would have to fend for himself.
There was still so much he needed to learn and so little time...
All the while the strange voice sang cruelly and joyously. "They're gonna gonna get you, they're gonna gonna get you, they're gonna gonna get you, they're gonna gonna get you."
Screams fought to escape Sarah's lips between her hungry gasps. The demons, the terminators or the maniac next door weren't going to get the better of her. She would endure and overcome, just like John will when judgment day wipes billions of lives from the face of the earth.
"They're not going to get me," she hissed. "You're not going to get me."
"Well I'm not gonna get you," the voice said as though it were still trying to be her friend. He laughed a free, mad cackle dripping with sickness. "Hee-hee, hoo-hoo, ha-ha, a-ha, a-ha."
"Who are you?"
Focus on the voice, she thought. If he was her enemy, her only true enemy, then she could use him to slow herself, to recompose and break herself free. This madman who saw fit to break her spirit as though it were a game would only make her stronger.
"Who am I? Who are you?" he asked indignantly.
"Don't turn this on me," she seethed. "Answer the damn question."
Sarah listened closely to him. It was coming from the right, from there: in the corner rested a tiny little hole from out of which his voice would echo. It rippled like fire with every word from a dragon's tongue. "You got a real mouth on you. I gotta say, I like that in a lady."
"Still didn't answer my question," she panted.
"You know I would, but you wouldn't believe me even if I told you."
Every ounce of hatred in her body poured into that hole, all to keep her madness at bay. On the other side sat a monster, the kind she'd always fought to protect John from, the kind of death merchant that put SkyNet together.
Sarah hissed. "Try me."
"Listen, don't do this to yourself," he pleaded, "don't... make me out to be the bad guy here. I'm just trying to help you out of this place, see? This place is hell. Do you really think that either of us wants to be in this place... alone?"
If she could have she'd have slapped herself back to her senses. Damn the fucking braces to hell! Still she had to fight not to scream and focused on the voice: that unseen voice which belonged to the devil himself.
"You know this isn't my first visit to Arkham. Nobody recognizes me though," he mused. "It's a haunted house of horror that drives men, well... batty. Sane people walk in here one day and they walk out, crazy as the rest of them. That's because they don't understand, but I do."
"So you're the king of the crazies."
"Yeah," the lunatic drawled flatly in sick satisfaction. "You know you need a guy who's super-sane to come in here and whip everybody into shape. I'm the best thing that's ever happened to this place."
"You don't say," Sarah hissed. Still she fought the clasps. She hated the voice so much, but not enough to break her bounds: that only meant she'd have to learn to hate him more.
"Did you know that 'Arkham' literally means 'prophet of doom'? That's a hell of a reputation to live up to."
"Uh-huh."
The inmate smacked his lips in muted frustration. "You don't believe me, do you? Even in the face of absolute despair here you are thinking 'there's gotta be a way.' Well, what if there's not?"
Sarah gasped desperately and continued to hate the voice. "There's always a way."
"You mean there's always been a way so far." The voice giggled viciously and scuffled in his corner. Sarah stared at the hole and began to feel her hand slipping through her bonds. "Listen to me blather on and on: I was going to tell you a story."
"What are you waiting for?"
"For you to listen."
She could only laugh as she felt her wrist slicked with sweat begin to make way through the restraint. If she could only dislocate her thumb she would be free. Her heart was still racing a mile a minute while her blood was boiling her alive. "I'm... I'm listening."
"You see I was once like you," he began. "I was a fighter, not that it was in my nature back then. I used to... pet kittens and kiss babies instead of wanting to strangle the little suckers like I do now, but fate had other plans for me."
"There is no fate," Sarah murmured: there is no fate but what we make for ourselves.
"That's exactly what I thought, and then... and then..." He paused for effect. "The bombs fell. The world ended. Those of us who survived were drafted. There were no pacifists, not while we faced absolute extinction..."
Sarah rejoiced as her thumb clicked out painfully and her hand came free. That was one small victory out of the way, now there came the escape. She had to stop and breathe to keep her heart from running away from her. The burning in her veins wouldn't stop. What had the doctors given her?
"Extinction?" she asked the voice. "Against what?"
"No."
Painfully her thumb clicked back into place. She had to keep from making any noise lest her unseen companion alert the guard. "No? What do you mean 'no'?"
"I mean I'm not going to tell you. You'd never, ever believe me."
Sarah pulled open her other straps and stepped off the bed gently. "Why? Scared I'm going to think you're crazy or something?"
"Machines," the voice said readily, chilling Sarah Connor to the very bone. "Machines everywhere. Bombs flying, people dying, Gotham City was turned into a killing field. Of course there's no proof of this because it hasn't... happened... yet."
Diving towards the hole Sarah tried to peek through but there was only darkness on the other side. It didn't seem possible, that here of all places she would run into another soldier from the future.
"You read my file," she accused.
"What file?" the voice defied indignantly. "I'm just another inmate here, just like you. I don't even know who you are, lady!"
"Then how do you know...?"
"Because I was there," he whispered harshly: no jokes, no teasing, just brutal truth. Silence hung ominously between the two.
"What happened then?"
"Then they took me in," he said. "You see, machines don't know how to laugh or how to cry. These things confuse them so they came here to Arkham Asylum and one by one they took us apart, just to see how we tick."
"I'm so sorry," she gasped.
The deep voice giggled deliriously. "They... heh... they gave me these scars. Ha ha... smile and the world smiles with you! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!"
To be continued...