Shorter than the last one, but then it was rather long, so I guess it all evens out. More coming tomorrow with any luck, but it's going to be a busy day for me tomorrow, so I'm not sure.
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Tess felt herself shaking with both revulsion and nearly uncontrollable anger. Not at the man lying on her bed, but at the men who had ordered and carried this out. They had done a piss pour job of anything. Ok, so they left this until the last minute and then had to rush through it. That's no excuse for this . . . this . . . butchery. They didn't even complete the procedure! She had to swallow to keep from gagging.
In that single instant, she wished she had pumped both Barillo's and Ajedrez's bodies full of lead. They deserved it for having thought of this. And Guevera, well, he was a dead man if someone else hadn't already taken care of that. The man wasn't a doctor, he was a little kid who enjoyed pulling the wings off flies and the legs off spiders. If he were still alive then she was going to track him down and teach him the error of his ways. For this and for every other "procedure" he had ever inflicted upon another living being. It would be a long and painful lesson.
In that moment she was supremely glad that she had given her patient the nearly hallucinogenic narcotic that was keeping his pain at bay. Even with the drug, correcting this mess was going to cause enough pain to make him lose consciousness. At least his body wouldn't go into immediate shock from the blood loss. Yes, he'd be nearly unconscious for the next few days maybe, but he should stay alive. And perhaps the greatest pain would pass by then.
"Señor? Señor?" She rested a gloved hand on the side of his face, trying to be certain that he was paying attention to what she needed to say. Not that she could be certain. "Señor, I'm going to have to do quite a bit of . . . of housekeeping. I'm afraid that Guevera left a bit of a mess behind when he was done. This is going to hurt, but I'll be as careful as I can. If it gets to be too much, we can take a break. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
"The bastard did a number on me?" The words sounded as if they were making their way out his mouth through a haze of pain and befuddlement, but at least they were semi-lucid.
"Yeah, he did a number on you. But I'm going to do my best to keep that number as low as I can. I'm going to start now. Okay?" She was his jaw clench. "Okay then," she whispered. Then she picked up a small roll of gauze and started soaking up as much of the blood as she could.
Sands was beginning to wonder if he had really lost his eyes. He could have sworn that he kept seeing flashes of color. Somewhere his mind was telling him that this was caused by misfired neurons in his brain, but he wasn't paying too much attention to that. Instead, most of his focus was set on keeping himself from screaming. He wouldn't have minded letting out a bellow or two if he could have been sure that it would have sounded manly. But no, he was certain that if he let himself scream then it was going to come out as the girliest scream ever uttered by masculine lips, and that after that he would start begging for the pain to stop, for his tormentor to stop. He last real link with reality was the handle of a gun in his hand, and the quiet, nearly incomprehensible murmurs of the woman tending him.
No matter how gentle she was being, though, it wasn't enough. It seemed as if the air itself was keeping the fiery agony blazing in his eye sockets. On and on it went, never letting up, never growing bad enough for his mind to simply shut down and let him escape.
He had no idea how long this lasted before one particularly deep touch set off an explosion of light in his mind. His entire body stiffened, his spine arching off the bed. He managed to contain his screams deep in his throat, but he still heard them in all their clarity. A muffled voice cut through the pain and the light, "Shh. I'll stop. I'm sorry, I'm sorry . . ."
There was a light blinding him. He looked around the small darkened room. "Sorry baby, but your plan was too small. . . ." That bitch Ajedrez was still alive. She was sitting on the edge of a nearby table, smirking at him. Some part of him cried out that he had already killed her, but he must have been mistaken. Not a problem, he'd kill her now.
"Die bitch," he hissed. Her expression didn't change. Not even when he pulled the trigger and heard faint screams. Before he could shoot again, blackness rushed up to claim him. The last thing he heard was a weak moan. He sincerely hoped that he had killed her.
Tess was being as careful as she could, but she knew that each touch, each wisp of wind stirred by her movements was just increasing the man's agony. Why had she even agreed to give him more of the drug? Surely it would have been kinder to them both, but especially for him, if he had been able to pass out. But no. She had respected the wishes of a man near crazed with pain, and now she was regretting it.
What's a few more regrets? Isn't that what led me to bring him here in the first place? Regrets and guilt over situations I can't change or influence, yet feel responsible for anyway?
But if you don't try to make payment for the cartel's acts, who will? Tess hated that voice, the one that spurred her to right all the wrongs made by one family. A family she had never even truly been a part of. But you do listen, and you listen because you're afraid that without some sort of penance, the blood of your father will rise in your veins and you'll find that you're just as capable as he of doing things like this.
Stop. I have other things to worry about right now.
This was a familiar argument to Tess. One she repeated with herself nearly every day. It didn't always run along those lines, but always on parallel ones. It was enough to drive her mad, or it would be if she weren't already.
Yes the schizophrenia. Always there waiting to drag you down. It wasn't as bad as that. True, she had been diagnosed with the disease, but she had had one, one, episode since then. It was extremely mild, and with regular medication it didn't hinder her life at all. Provide interesting voices to argue with? Yes. But she was always able to tell that they were generated by her own mind.
She was so focused on keeping her touch light and her mind clear, that she didn't notice when the hand holding the pistol shifted to rest against her side. The first indication of trouble that she had was her patient's spine nearly bowing his body off the bed, and a muffled scream of pain. She responded instantly by pulling her hands back and saying in a very apologetic and near desperate voice, "Shh. I'll stop. I'm sorry, I'm sorry." It was then that she felt the barrel of her revolver dig into her side, and heard Sands say, "Die bitch."
The next thing she knew, her side was on fire, the sound of a gunshot was ringing in her ears, and the scent of gunpowder was filling her nose. She stumbled back from the bed, a moan low in her throat. Damnit that hurt! Flippin' A! Tess pressed a hand to her side, and brought it to her face. It was red. "Great, more blood to clean up." Having made that complaint she collapsed in a nearby chair.
