With his hands still tied in front of his body, Mike walked down the long corridor, noting the odor of formaldehyde growing stronger with each step he took.
Next to him, Chong couldn't hide a gleeful smile as he escorted his prisoner, exchanging glances with the guard walking behind Mike every so often, as if to see if the man shared the same joy.
As they'd expected, the manic doctor had stopped by to administer more sedatives, explaining that he had put a few feelers out to the old contacts to see if there was any need for organs of Steve's blood type to repay the old debt, and thus was considering surgery on the young Inspector later in the night.
In the meantime, he would take Mike for a stroll, share some thoughts, and pass the time until word got back to him.
With a somber nod, he'd bid farewell to Gifford as he walked out of that room, hoping and praying that her adjustment had worked and that Steve would start coming back around, allowing them a better chance at escaping the precarious situation.
The fact that Chong hadn't noticed any difference when injecting the sedative had given him hope for a good outcome.
And so he followed the crazy doctor, using every chance possible to get valuable intelligence about their location, any potential escape routes, as well as the exact amount of people in the way of a successful escape.
So far, Mike didn't have a whole lot to show for.
Noticing his eyes drifting back and forth between the barren walls before ending up on the man behind him, pushing them along, Chong smiled, his steps slowing down somewhat.
"As you can see, Lieutenant, I have…upgraded my personnel. I call them my Adams. Adam 1 through 3 run my errands in town while Adam 4 stays here with me for…added protection. I made sure all of them look alike to confuse you."
"That's their names? Adam?"
"That is correct. I could have chosen something different but wanted to keep it simple. A man of your conviction should appreciate the name."
With a broad smile showing off his yellow teeth, Chong stopped in his tracks and put a hand on Mike's shoulder.
"There it is again, Lieutenant. You are too worried about individualism. Nobody cares about names. Names are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. What we should all worry about is unity. And accomplishments. Striving for a better and healthier tomorrow to save this country."
"Is that your latest slogan to justify murder?", Mike countered, shrugging his shoulder just enough to get rid of the doctor's hand.
"I feel like this is some sort of déjà vu…that we discussed the matter already.", Chong countered curtly and began to walk again, "And just like I told you last time, some sacrifices are worth for the good of all, whether you want to admit I am right or not. It's nature at its best. Survival of the fittest, death to the weakest link in the chain."
They entered a brightly lit laboratory through a large double door, four empty autopsy tables along with several overhead OR lights greeting them on the other side.
The sight itself was a haunting one, but something else caught his eye right away, sending a shudder down his spine.
Near the back corner, several large tanks divided up in smaller segments held human body parts submerged in formaldehyde. From his distance, he could make out several sets of arms and legs, even a torso missing all its limbs and head.
It took all his willpower to keep his mind focused on the situation at hand, trying to comprehend what his eyes were seeing but all his senses refused to acknowledge.
"We've been here for a couple of months now, setting the stage for a bigger operation this side of the state.", Chong explained as if they were touring a manufacturing facility, "Even though I initially fled to the east coast, something always pulled me back here."
"Guilt, perhaps?"
Mike's snarky comment was rewarded with a hearty chuckle from the doctor, and a viscous shove from the man behind him, causing him to land chest down on one of the stainless steel tables, immediately taking in the strong scent of disinfectants.
"So, what is this?", he asked before being pulled back to his feet, "Your private torture chamber?"
"The power of sedation makes the need for torture unnecessary. As a matter of fact, it would be an undesirable outcome of my research. Torture causes stress which in turn can have adverse effects on the human body. It is my goal to perform the best surgery possible to reattach limbs, a condition that leaves little room for errors and addressing other problems."
Growing nauseous at the sight of countless human body parts floating in various tanks around them, including an upper arm with a fully reattached lower arm, discernible only by the countless stitches at the connection site, Mike swallowed hard, even his experienced mind incapable of processing the magnitude of murders that had taken place to harvest the assortment around him.
"So our guesses were right.", he said and pointed his chin at a tank containing a human torso with a reattached right arm that had shriveled and turned black, " You haven't been able to complete the procedure yet. You're still doing research because you know it's near-impossible to achieve with the current knowledge of medicine. But that doesn't stop you from taking bribes from desperate people hoping for a chance at a new life. In the meantime, you pick people off the streets, kill them and use their bodies for your research."
"Your doubting nature has always been very entertaining, Lieutenant.", Chong countered, his cheery voice slowly but surely turning into a growl, "But you are mistaken. I have been able to reattach certain limbs before, toes and fingers even, so long that they came from the same person. The trick lies in ensuring that the attached limb functions properly, and if harvested off another human being, doesn't get rejected. Those two factors alone have warranted extensive research on my end and we are very close to attempting another procedure in hopes of finalizing the process and begin to treat my…long list of clients eagerly awaiting results."
Mike had to bite the inside of his lip, knowing from past experience that arguing with a man who lacked any sort of morals was a waste of time, and in this case, a dangerous game if Chong decided to turn on him.
Instead, he glanced around the room, noticing several cabinets and shelving units neatly stacked with surgical supplies, bottles containing different colored fluid as well as brightly illustrated maps of various regions of the human body.
A science lab gone mad, by any definition.
"You asked how many we processed. To be honest with you, I lost count." Chong continued undisturbed, "Some were not in good enough…condition to be used for my research. Others were prime specimen and I was able to harvest multiple limbs off them. So I lost track after a while."
"Why dump the legs north of the Bay?"
"Why not?", Chong countered with a smile, "Why dig a hole each time a new body has been used up? Bring cadaver dogs right to our front door? We have a large freezer in the backroom where we store any refuse and once it is full, one of my Adam's disposes of the…evidence far away from this lab. It was only an…unfortunate event that the currents happened to bring the legs ashore as close to our base as they did. It must have been one of those odd storms rolling in. Then again, the rest of the body parts did disappear in the ocean as planned."
As they walked past another tank containing three severed arms in various degrees of decomposition, Mike's eyes fell on an instrument tray not too far away. Amongst the assortment of tweezers, shears and bone saws were scalpels of various lengths, all of them an attractive addition to his escape kit.
"Why are you telling me all this?", Mike asked and slowly inched his way toward the tray, the doctor and his goon following along.
"Why not?", Chong countered with a wily smile, "Every man deserves to know the truth before he dies."
It was then that Mike decided to take action.