Darkness Rising
A Once Upon a Time in Mexico story by Merrie
Disclaimer: If wishes were horses I'd sell mine and buy SJ.
Summary: Sands and Jeffrey, after having a good long homicidal run have finally been caught. So what happens next? And how the hell does a wanted psychopath wind up in the CIA anyway?
Characters: Jeffrey, Sands, Roland Rivers, Emily Brisbane, Susannah Cartwright, Dr. Claire Harrington
Author's Note: Wow, this chapter got…long. I had planned a lot in this chapter but it sort of mutated on its own. That's normal, right?
Rating: R for extreme violence, graphic imagery, sexual situations and language.
Chapter Nineteen: …But It's Not Me Part II
You lock the door and throw away the key, there's someone in my head, but it's not me.
-Brain Damage by Pink Floyd.
"Have you found a mechanic yet? Time is of the essence. Time is ticking away. Time is not on our side," Jeffrey murmured as he and Sands moved stealthily through the halls of the hospital. Or, it would have been stealthily if Jeffrey could shut up for more than two minutes. "Not my fault, can't seem to help it. Chatter, chatter away. Saying everything, meaning nothing," Jeffrey murmured as if he had sensed Sands' irritation and impatience. Perhaps he had.
"How long are these fucking drugs supposed to last anyway?" Sands muttered to himself as he doubled over a little and leaned against the wall, trying to calm his racing heart and quickened breath as pain continued to lance through his abdomen. "They should have at least given me a few days to heal before presenting an opportunity to escape. That was rude of them." He then suddenly realised that he was the one making all the noise now and shut his mouth with a click of his teeth and a mental curse.
Jeffrey let out a short giggle at Sands' forgetfulness which only made Sands scowl. "Wasn't you, wasn't I, nine-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie," Jeffrey said solemnly.
"Right. Sure," Sands said with an annoyed frown and a shake of his head. "Just go back to being quiet. Do you think you can do that?"
"As the grave. As a church mouse. I'll be golden," Jeffrey said with a quick nod. Sands just sighed in response and together they made their way through the hallways of the hospital, desperately trying to find a bit of sanctuary where they could find a doctor and get their wounds tended to. And maybe get the hell out of this fucking place. That certainly would have been appreciated as well.
WWW
"Just who does that bitch think she is?" Roland muttered as he glared at Dr. Harrington's retreating form. He had just been informed that he was to take Sands alive. No exceptions. What the fuck kind authority does she have to tell me what to do? Unfortunately, she had a lot. Despite the fact that Sands had killed an employee of the CIA within the US, the CIA didn't really have jurisdiction to intervene. While the local law enforcement agencies knew this and had every right to send Roland and his team packing, they had done nothing in sympathy for their lost coworker. Dr. Harrington wasn't so understanding. She was threatening to call his superiors in Langley and get him pulled off the case if he did not bring her precious patient back to her safe and sound. What she didn't seem to understand was that it was a 'kill-or-be-killed' situation concerning Sands, and always had been. He had already killed 3 people for fuck's sake!
"Don't let her get under your skin. She's as crazy as the rest of the whackos in here," the security chief and Roland's unofficial partner for the search, a man by the name of Silber muttered under his breath.
"Of that, I have no doubt," Roland murmured in return before sharing an amused look with Silber. "How can you stand to work for her every day?"
"I just tell myself that I don't; that I work for the hospital instead," Silber said with a shrug. "And even though you probably don't believe me, there are worse people than her working at this hospital."
"You're right. I don't believe you," Roland said with a shake of his head before looking over to what Silber had picked up. "Is that a map of the hospital?"
Silber nodded and handed it over Roland. "It's the best one I could find. I guess no one ever thought to make a very accurate one in case it was needed in a manhunt, huh?" he asked with a bit of a wry laugh.
"And we're sure Sands is still in the hospital?" Roland asked as he scanned over the map.
"I've got men posted on every exit out of the building. He ain't going no where," Silber said definitively.
Roland nodded, his attention still focused on the map in his hands. "Good, good. I'm going to get you, you bastard, you've no where left to run," he murmured as his eyes scanned the map, envisioning Sands in this place or that. The man was on the run, injured, and supposedly drugged to the fucking gills. Yeah right. If he was the drugged up he wouldn't be leading us on a merry chase, now would he? That stupid bitch doctor. He glanced over at Silber and saw the man watching his every move. "I don't suppose you have a suggestion of where to start looking?" he asked the security chief causally.
"It's easier to get in to the older parts of the hospital, the part your suspect was contained in, than it is to get out. Trust me. If you want my opinion, focus your attention in those areas."
Roland pursed his lips and looked over the sections Silber had referred to. "It's hell of a lot of area to cover," he muttered to himself. He then held out a hand for Silber's radio and raised it to his mouth. "Officer Brisbane, please respond, over."
"What is it, Rivers? I've got an escaped prisoner to catch you know. I don't have time for girl talk," Emily's voice came through the radio and assaulted his ears. "Over," she added as a bit of mocking afterthought.
Roland just rolled his eyes. Emily was one of the brightest officers he knew but her twisted sense of humor left something to be desired at times. This was one of those times. "Take as many of Officer Silbers' men—" for the security chief was a member of the DC Police Department as well and warranted the title in recognition of that fact "—and concentrate your search on the newer areas of the hospital. Check any unused areas he could be possibly hiding out in. But don't limit yourself to them. He'll kill his way through a crowd if he has to. We've seen that. Over."
"Are you sure? Was there anything else you wanted to tell me? How to talk like a proper young lady, perhaps? I bet you'd like that," Emily teased. "Over and out, Rivers," she said before he could respond, and the radio went quiet.
"Chicks, huh?" Silber murmured sympathetically having overheard Roland and Emily's conversation. It was likely anyone with a radio-every one of Silber's staff-had as well. Roland cursed.
"You have no idea," Roland muttered in response, taking a minute to bring his temper under control before bringing the radio back to his lips. "Officer Cartwright? Please respond, over."
"This is Officer Cartwright, over," Susannah's voice came through the radio a few moments later.
"You'll be searching the older parts of the hospital with me. Come to the security command center and we'll coordinate our search together. Over."
"Understood. Over and out."
WWW
"Just do what you're good at and we won't kill you." Sands' attempted reassurance to the trembling nurse he had found to redress and re-stitch his weeping chest wound did not seem to have much of an affect. Jeffrey's sudden ramblings—
"Not supposed to kill before dinner. Bad form. No pudding for you." –didn't seem to be helping matters either.
"Just ignore him," Sands said with an offhand wave of the scalpel, not noticing that the nurse had flinched again. "I'm afraid he's partaken of a bit too much of your hospital's fine drug supply. Wouldn't you agree, Jeffrey?"
"Sizzle, sizzle," Jeffrey murmured in response.
"There you have it," Sands said dryly. "Are you about finished?" he looked down his bare chest to where the nurse's hands busily worked. "Because that fucking hurts, you know."
The trembling nurse gave out a little squeak and a moan as if he had just told her that he was going to eviscerate her with a rusty butter knife.
"Need shots after that. Lockjaw is definitely not recommended," Jeffrey murmured, snatching Sands' thought out of the air and responding to it with little effort. "Time. I'm discomforted."
"Seems like the vote's unanimous," Sands muttered. "Ok, it's time to go whether you're done or not. And if you try to tell me it's not healthy for me to be running around with a healing gun shot wound to the stomach, I'll fucking slit your throat. Savvy?"
The nurse did the most prudent thing for all concerned, now that it was time to be leaving, and fainted.
"Rude. Very rude," Jeffrey muttered, sitting up a little with a wince to look down at the nurse's crumpled body. "Go."
WWW
"I sincerely doubt he's going to be in there, but hey whatever floats your boat, buddy," Emily murmured under her breath as the security guard she was partnered with made a thorough search of the woman's rest room. "Pervert," she muttered, checking her watch as she waited for the idiot to finish gawking at the tampon dispenser. They were getting no where. People were beginning to doubt that Sands was still in the hospital now; it had been so long since anyone had seen a trace of him. Emily was getting frustrated, it was true, but not so much that she lost her common sense. There was no way that Sands could have left the hospital without someone seeing. The entire place was on alert and he wasn't exactly able to blend. Not with his pointed features and the shoulder-length hair. He was a man made to be noticed and somebody would. They just had to be patient.
"He's not in there, ma'am," the guard dutifully informed her after searching every stall twice. Emily was just thankful they were all vacant; although seeing some pissed off doctor or nurse go after the guard for the uncalled for embarrassment might have held amusement for at least a little while.
"What a shock, Emerson," Emily murmured under her breath. When he predictably asked what she had said, she just shook her head and smiled a little. "Good job. Let's keep looking, ok?" Damn Roland for making me search this fucking part of the hospital. He's not here. He never was. She sighed and kept looking for Sands regardless.
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Dr. Harrington scowled as she listened to the radio she had taken from the security desk. These people couldn't find their own shadows. How am I supposed to believe that they'll find my patient? Dr. Harrington knew that Sands had to be found and found quickly. It was essential for the furthering of his treatment. He has to realise that his place is here or else he will try this again and that simply will not do. He needs a stable environment in which to live otherwise he will never heal. He will never learn to trust me. And without that trust there can be no healing. It's circular. Dr. Harrington knew Sands was a killer, she had seen the results of his work first hand with the nurse and the two guards he had killed in escaping his room, but she knew that at his core he was just a confused young man. It was that confusion which led him to kill, and if she could calm his mind his body would follow.
"Doctor? Are you alright?" a voice interrupted her thoughts.
Dr. Harrington looked up to see a well-meaning intern staring down at her fixedly. "I'm fine," she said evenly.
"I'm scared too. Can you imagine? A real life serial killer on the loose in our hospital? Some days it simply doesn't pay to get out of bed. But they'll surely catch him. They're the police," the intern said with complete conviction, nodding her head quickly so that her shoulder-length red hair made pendulum-like motions past her ears.
"If this group is the model for all police officers in the country then we are all doomed," Dr. Harrington murmured, still listening to the idiots chatter back and forth on the radio. She was tempted to push down the talk button herself and give them all a few fast lessons in common sense; something each of them seemed to be sorely lacking. "Even they will have to catch him eventually. There's no where left for him to run. He's to stay here."
"Who is? The killer? He's going to stay here? Oh Dr. Harrington, I don't know how I feel about that. What if he escapes again? How will I be able to work here knowing that he could get out and kill us all?"
"Then quit," Dr. Harrington said succinctly. "Because he's going to remain here until he's successfully rehabilitated. No matter how long it takes."
"Do you really think one of the other doctors here might help him? Make him normal?" the intern asked curiously.
Dr. Harrington turned her head away and rolled her eyes. "No, you mindless twat, I don't think one of the other doctors might be able to help him. I know I amgoing to help him."
The intern moved to the side a little to get a good glimpse of Dr. Harrington's face as she said this vow, and immediately took a step back at the icy resolution in the doctor's face, unequivocally deciding to begin looking for a new line of work as soon as possible. All doctors are definitely insane.
WWW
"You're inane, crazy as a jaybird, escaped loony, out of the booby hatch, and into the world talking to yourself and to me and me and to you."
"Jeffrey please, for the love of god, just shut up for a few minutes and let me think. What happened to the 'silence was golden' mood you were in earlier? Practice that again."
"Turned my fingers green. Fool's gold. It didn't glitter," Jeffrey murmured with a mournful shake of his head.
"Oh yeah? What about 'silence speaks louder than words?' Why don't you try that one on for size for a little while?"
"Do you think it would really fit? It seems too small."
Sands rolled his still fixed and dilated eyes at that. "You won't know if you don't try, now will you? And if at first you don't succeed…" Jeffrey nodded, seeming to get the picture.
"Not alone," Jeffrey whispered a few minutes later. "We're no longer one…or two…" He frowned at this, seemingly confused at his own statement.
Sands forcibly clicked his jaw shut so Jeffrey wouldn't have the chance to continue rambling his clearly jumbled thoughts and listened. Sure enough, he could hear what sounded like a pair of shoes clicking down the hall to his left. He backed himself against the corner, tightened his grip on the scalpel he held, and waited, listening hard.
"This is bullshit, ma'am. Pardon my French. Are we even sure this guy's still in the hospital? For all we know he's jumped out of a window and is wrecking havoc on the innocent citizens. We need more men. With scent hounds. We need to evacuate this damn place. Then, maybe, we'll find him if he's still here," a man's voice complained, leaving Sands to smirk. If only he knew just how close he was. The complaining man's companion-Sands could still hear two distinct sets of footsteps-declined to answer.
'Watch out for the other. They know to listen. Not ramble on. He'll be cake. The other will be pie,' Jeffrey whispered within Sands' mind, seeming to understand the need for silence. That was something at least. He still seemed to be speaking in a mishmash of metaphors, quotes and idioms, but Sands was beginning to understand the gist at least, and the knowledge that Jeffrey wouldn't be like this forever reassured him. Not to mention that he was sublimely thankful for the fact that while Jeffrey was lost in a drug altered landscape, his own vision was clear.
The footsteps grew closer, and Sands tightened the grip on the scalpel until his knuckles turned white from the strain. Jeffrey was still being physically silent, but within Sands' head he was chanting and rhyming about a need to kill that could not be denied. Sands had never really thought about his killing as a need, but now that he had, he could see that Jeffrey was right. It wasn't just that he liked to kill; it was that he needed to. He could feel that need now like a ball of vipers deep within his guts, hissing and biting to be unleashed. Even if Sands had wanted to stop; wanted to be normal again, he feared it was no longer an option. The need was great and would not be denied.
"You've been chasing this guy longer than I have. Where do you think he would go?" the man asked again, and Sands strained to listen, both wanting to know the answer to the question and the identity of the man's companion. He reasoned that it had to be one of Roland's…coworkers, but he didn't know which one.
"I think he'll stay close." Ah, Susannah. He wasn't entirely sure how he felt about that. About her. Jeffrey on the other hand, wanted her dead. Or sex with her. He seemed to be conflicted between the two. "He's had plenty of opportunity to flee the country. The only place he's gone is Baltimore. No, he'll stay on the East Coast. Or he would if he was going to get away. He's not."
"Correct," he companion said firmly. Sands fought down Jeffrey's urge to snort at their arrogance.
"Do not become overconfident, Stark. We haven't caught him yet. Sands is extremely clever, and strongly motivated to ensure his own rival. We're only his pursuers."
Stark, or whatever his name was, didn't seem to like that answer. "Kill. Need. Need. Kill. Death is art. Beauty. Quick, fast, slow, fun. Blood dripping, dripping, dripping. Screams like symphonies. Power to kill. Power to save. Never save. Always kill. All must. Death. Inevitable." Sands halted Jeffrey's whispered rambling with an upraised hand. Now was definitely not the time.
"Did you hear that?" Susannah asked suddenly, and Sands froze and silently cursed his rambling second personality. He then shrugged. It didn't really matter if they heard him. They were both dead.
"Yeah. Whispering," Stark answered, beginning to lead with his gun down the corridor as Susannah had been doing all along. "You think it's him?"
Susannah didn't answer, only tightened her own grip on her weapon, calming her breathing so that he aim would be true. She had no doubt in her mind that Sands knew that they were here and lay in wait for them. She didn't know if he was armed, but it was safer to count on the fact that he was.
"All or none. Must get both. One is lonely. Both wish us harm. No harm will come. Can't. Must be free. This is not the way the world ends. No bang, all whimper. I will not let it!"
Sands ignored Jeffrey's now loud ranting because it truly didn't matter anymore. Nothing did. He either made his move against them now, or stayed here until they found him and killed him. Somehow he knew that his capture would no longer be an option in these circumstances. His prey would be fighting for its life as surely as he. He made his strike.
Stark fell with a hand on the thrown scalpel that had lodged itself in his throat, gurgling for breath as he and his weapon fell to the floor. Sands' luck wasn't as good with Susannah however. A bolt of searing white hot pain raced through his chest, and he suddenly found it difficult to breathe. That didn't stop him though. The rage at being wounded by someone so….insignificant as her sent him into a pain and anger filled frenzy that had him barreling towards her regardless of the risks of running full tilt towards a loaded gun. He didn't care. He was beyond caring. He only wanted, no needed to make her pay for what she had done.
Susannah hadn't seen Stark go down. There hadn't been any time. If he still lived she would get him help later. If Sands still lived there would be no help for either of them. So she shot. The bullet hadn't been the killing shot she had been hoping for-she had missed his heart by mere inches but enough so that he still charged-but she had certainly done some significant damage. Blood wasn't quite spilling from Sands' lips from the bullet in his left lung yet, but it was only a matter of time. She had to make that time or she would die. They all would.
Her breath left her body like Sands' surely was when he tackled her to the ground, but somehow she had managed to hold onto her gun. She didn't care how she had done it, only that she needed to get it pointed towards him long enough to blow his fucking head off.
"Bitch! Fucking whore! Must love because this fucking hurts!" Jeffrey yelled and pinned Susannah's wrist to the floor almost effortlessly. "We need time. Time wounds. Time heals." He coughed then, and Susannah grimaced as droplets of blood saliva dripped onto her face. "Walls closing in. Hard to breathe. Your fault. Kill only the kill."
"You don't want to kill me, Sands. Jeffrey," Susannah gasped, trying not to let out a cry as she could feel the bones of her wrist grinding under their weight.
"Yes, I do," he hissed immediately but then frowned. "Why wouldn't I?" he rasped, his breathing beginning to sound a little ragged, but his grip and weight on her not fading as his breath was.
"Because you need my help. You're in no shape to move on your own. If you kill me, you'll be left here to die alone. No one will come to help you." If Susannah was as desperate as anyone in her current situation had every right to be, it didn't show in her voice.
"What makes you think we can trust you?" he asked after hesitating just long enough that Susannah thought she was about to leave this life.
"You don't have a choice," she said firmly, keeping her gaze locked on his.
"Fuck you. You know by saying that, I just want to kill you and search out my own choices, don't you?"
"I know. Come on, Sands. You're a reasonable man. Look at the logic in this. You must see that you need help. I shot you in the chest; in the lung to be accurate, and without medical attention soon you'll drown in your own blood. It doesn't sound like a nice way to die to me. But hey, I'm not you."
"Let go of the gun and maybe I'll think about it," he rasped.
"I keep the gun and you keep the bullets or I don't help you and you die."
"Fine," he hissed. He didn't need a gun to kill her. She had gotten too far under his skin for him to use something as blunt and impersonal as a gun. No, her death required knives or hands. Something up close where he could hear her take her last breath. She kept a hold of the gun but pressed the clip release so that it slid out onto the floor. He reached up and pulled the slide back, sending the bullet in chamber across the hall. He gathered up the bullets and kept them in hand, moving off of her as quickly as he could manage with a bullet lodged in his chest-he hadn't felt it exit through his back. Damn bitch. Why did she have to shoot him? Why couldn't she just lie down and die like she was supposed to? He grumbled these thoughts within his mind as he yanked the scalpel out of the dead cop's neck and brandished it in her direction, but didn't move towards her. The fact that she could just run occurred to him, and he scowled. He didn't like this. He didn't like not being in control of the situation. But as he felt a wetness creeping deep down in his throat, he knew he had no other choice.
"You've seen how good I can throw this thing," he held up the scalpel. "Try to run, and you'll encounter it first hand."
Susannah nodded as she rose to her feet. What the hell am I doing? I'm surviving, that's what. She argued within her own mind as she looked over to Sands who now stood a little crookedly, as if he'd rather lie down than stand as he silently threatened her. "You need medical attention. If you don't stop the bleeding and seal up that wound at the very least…you'll be in trouble," she said as gently as she could, both trying to make her point clear and trying not anger him into killing her. Though she now noticed a faint trembling in his hand as it gripped the bloody scalpel that he had used to kill Stark, she had no doubt that he could still throw it with accuracy. For now. "Come on."
Sands either didn't trust the hand she offered or was trying to be a stubborn man about accepting a woman's help because he didn't take what she offered and instead tried to get up on his own. He paid for this arrogance by coughing up a small pile of bloody she didn't want to know what onto the floor. Even though she had had to shoot him at the time or be killed herself, seeing what she had done to him firsthand afterwards sent a shot of guilt through her body. She wasn't a monster or a sociopath. She didn't like killing people. Not even those who deserved it. "Are you going to accept my help now or do you want to leave me here? One of us doesn't have a lot of time to fuck around, Sands."
"Time. Shorter of breath and one day closer to death," Jeffrey moaned. "Sands of the hourglass slipping through broken and bloodied fingers." Jeffrey didn't laugh at the pun he had made. It wasn't funny. Nothing was anymore. "All fall silent in the halls of the dead."
"Yeah, sure," Susannah agreed without comment, taking Sands' right arm and pulling it up so that it lay around her neck with him leaning heavily against her, the scalpel having been transferred to his left hand and still pointed at her even as he was seemingly at her mercy for the moment.
"Why are you doing this?" he gasped out through bloodied teeth. "Rather be dead than institutionalized. Death is peace. I won't go back."
"I know," Susannah said softly. She had always suspected that Sands would do everything in his power not to end up locked up in some hospital like this one. She had even told Roland that he'd probably be happier on death row than charged as the criminally insane. Susannah didn't think she really blamed him on the count. "Don't talk. You'll just make things worse."
"Don't care. Rather be dead than caught." He had been about to ask her to kill him rather than take him back to those who would chain him, but his survival instinct reared its ugly head fast and hard and roared at him to stop his fucking whingeing and get ahold of himself. He wasn't a fucking pussy. He was better than this. He would survive this. He would get away from them and laugh about it later. Those stupid bumbling cops who couldn't catch a fucking tan if they were on the surface of the sun. He would show them all.
"Being caught has nothing to do with talking but fine, whatever. You want to talk, you go right ahead. Ramble to your black heart's content. Just if you really want to live through this, it might be a good idea to listen to what I'm trying to tell you."
Sands scowled but then Jeffrey moaned in their shared pain and they both came to the decision that it was best to listen to her for the time being. Anything to make the pain go away. Anything.
WWW
"Agent Cartwright come in please, over," Roland said through his radio. He and Silber had been searching the hospital from top to bottom for the last fifteen minutes and so far nothing. Not even a trace of Sands. Had he been wrong? Had Sands somehow managed to make his way to the newer parts of the hospital? And if so, how the fuck was he managing to evade all of their teams? From what Roland had seen of the hospital grounds as he had searched it, there were very few empty places in which to hide out. The building was practically bursting from all the activity contained within. There were doctors, patients, family members, security, anyone and everyone lining the halls he had passed. Fewer since the alert that a serial killer was loose on the grounds went out, but a lot of innocent bystanders getting in his way all the same. "Agent Cartwright this is Agent Rivers, please respond, over."
"Maybe she turned it off? She might have wanted radio silence if she thought she were getting close to finding Sands," Silber offered upon seeing Roland's brow furrow as he was unable to reach his coworker.
"Maybe," Roland murmured, chewing on his bottom lip in thought for a moment before bringing the radio back up to his lips. "Agent Brisbane come in, over."
"Yes, darling?" Emily drawled over the radio a moment longer. "What is it?"
Roland refused to acknowledge her jibe, cutting straight to the point. "I can't raise Susannah. Have you heard from her recently?"
"No, not a word. Why? Do you think she is in trouble? She was with an Officer Stark. If you can't reach her radio, try his," Emily suggested, not sounding worried, not yet.
Roland turned to Officer Silber who nodded and used his own radio to attempt to contact his man. After a few tries, he looked up at Roland with a perplexed look just shy of worry. "His radio is on, but he's not answering. You don't think—"
"If he's got her, then we don't have time to think," Roland interrupted. "Emily, did you hear that? Meet me at the entrance to the new wing of the hospital. We're going to go and find Susannah."
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"I don't care how you have to do it. Fix it now," Sands ordered the surgeon he had grabbed with Susannah's help. He didn't bother to stop and think of why she was helping him anymore. His only thought was that his breath was getting shorter and shorter with each passing minute.
"You need immediate surgery. This isn't something that can be fixed in here, or just by me working or you willing it so. You have a bullet lodged in your lung. If we don't remove it soon, you'll die," the doctor informed him slowly, trying to make this madman understand.
"Doctor heal thyself," Jeffrey threatened. Sands interpreted for him after wiping a trickle of blood from his lips off using the back of his hand.
"If you don't help me, you die. Simple as that."
"You'd die as well," the doctor tried to reason with him, looking to Susannah to give support that wasn't in her to give. You couldn't reason with the irrational. You would surely drive yourself insane by simply trying.
"Just do your best, doctor." Susannah gave him a look that said it was safer just to do what Sands said than try to argue with him. Surely the doctor must know by now of the people Sands had killed in his escape and by association just how dangerous he was. Don't be a fool. Just do as he says. He won't be able to go very far for much longer. When he falls I'll take my moment and then we'll all be safe and he'll be dead. She willed the doctor to hear and understand her silently thought message.
"Fine," the doctor agreed grudgingly, being left with no alternatives. It was either impromptu surgery on an escaped psychopath or death by the same said psychopath. He wasn't a stupid or suicidal man. Impromptu surgery it was.
WWW
Both doctor and patient survived the spur-of-the-moment surgery with more flying blood than colors, but survival was survival. The doctor hadn't been able to remove the bullet after a good deal of hesitant trying-without the anesthetic Sands had refused digging through a conscious patient's chest was a trying experience indeed-but had stitched it in at Sands' threatened insistence no matter how much the doctor tried to argue for Sands' health.
"Why do you care whether I live or die? I'd kill you with no such deliberation as you're taking with me," Sands said with a frown and a hissed intake of breath as the doctor finished the sutures.
"Because it's my job," the doctor answered, not taking his eyes off of his work. "Place too much stress and tension on these sutures and they won't hold. I've already told you that you need proper medical attention, but you're still not listening to me, are you?"
"Listening doc. Do you want a carrot or a stick?" Jeffrey asked suddenly as Sands buttoned up the white lab coat he had borrowed to cover the blood stained and tattered hospital gown he had been running around in.
"How long are these fucking drugs supposed to last? Do you know how annoying it is having a drugged up person in your head while you remain sober?" Sands asked with irritation.
"Can't say as I do," the doctor said with a moment's hesitation. "What were you given?"
"It was blue," Jeffrey offered with a helpful smile. "Blue like the clouds. Only not. Or maybe it was red. Like blood. Blood is pretty but hard to get out of clothes." He nodded somberly.
"I don't know," Sands said with a sigh. "I wasn't here. He was."
"You really are two separate people sharing one body?" the doctor asked curiously. He had been listening to the two slightly different voices speak back and forth to each other and to him and the CIA agent, but he still had to ask. He wasn't sure he believed it.
"True. Honest. Bored now," Jeffrey said with a frown as if he were disappointed in the doctor for asking.
The surgeon shook his head at that, making a face as if that only served to confuse him even more. It was likely that that was the case. "What are you going to do with me?" he asked, taking off his bloodied gloves and dumping them in a trashcan against the wall. It pained him not to put it in a biohazard can as he was trained, but they were in a conference room or some such and he didn't have the option. Come to think of it, he didn't think he had ever been in this particular room before, and he was a member of the senior staff.
"He's going to let you go. Aren't you, Sands?" Susannah spoke for him, giving Sands a pointed look as he raised himself slowly up off of the table.
"You're a ballsy bitch. I like you," Jeffrey said with a leer in her direction.
Sands ignored Jeffrey's comment and answered Susannah's. "You're testing my fucking patience, Agent Cartwright, but fine. Your precious doctor will live for now. I don't kill those who are of use to me. At least, not at first."
"How comforting," the doctor muttered under his breath. Sands shot him a cold look just daring him to say something further; to try his patience, but the doctor remained wisely silent.
Susannah was just about to suggest to Sands that he tie the doctor up and leave him in here when Sands took his own initiative and grabbed the conference telephone off of the table and used it to knock the helpful doctor out cold. "Come on, hostage. I've got places to be."
"And people to kill," Jeffrey added with a manic grin.
"That too," Sands agreed. "Let's get the fuck out of here. I've always disliked hospitals, but I've never had an urge to firebomb one to the ground like I do with this one before."
"Tygers burn brightly," Jeffrey added his opinion to that matter. "This place should have stripes. Does it have stripes?"
Sands just decided it was easier not to attempt to answer that one.
WWW
"Come on, people! This hospital's not that fucking big!" Roland shouted in frustration as they were still searching for both Sands and Susannah now and having found trace of neither.
"Calm down, Rivers. You'll give yourself an aneurism or something. Well, I suppose this would be the right place for it. Nevermind, you go right ahead. Knock yourself out," Emily muttered, frustration beginning to wear on her too and send her back to her old patterns of irritability with Roland. She didn't care right now. She only wanted to find Sus and knock her friend upside the head for worrying her.
"What is your problem, Brisbane? If you can't handle this case anymore why don't you just leave and save us all a lot of grief?" Roland asked as he turned towards her and leveled her with an icy glare.
Emerson and Silber shared a knowing look and decided to walk on ahead and let their two partners duke it out or fuck each others brains out as it sounded that neither of them were completely sure which one they wanted.
The two combatants warred on, neither of them noticing that they were now alone in an empty hall. "Fuck you, Rivers. I'm handling this case a hell of a lot better than you are!"
"Oh yeah? How so?" Roland taunted with a sneer. "What have you done that's so great, oh mighty Agent Brisbane? Huh? Jack shit, that's what. I'm your superior. I should have had you thrown off of this case a long time ago."
"You may be the leading officer on this case but you've never been my superior, Roland. Never. You're not even my inferior. You're nothing to me."
"That's not what you were saying a few days—" Roland was cut off by a sharp slap across the cheek. His head jerked to the right under the momentum of the blow and he unintentionally bit down hard on the inside of his cheek, drawing blood. "Real nice, Brisbane," he muttered, spitting out a wad of bloody saliva to the ground and glaring up at her. "Striking a fellow officer now. I'll be sure to add that to me report…" he trailed off with a frown as he saw her face.
Instead of the fiery anger he had expected from her, he saw something else. Before he could figure out what that something else was, they were kissing. Hard, rough, passionate kisses that stole his breath away and gave it back to him again in turn. His fingers made their way to the back of her head and tangled themselves in her hair, bringing her even closer as their kiss grew heated and much deeper. It was a definite one-of-a-kind soul kiss, each of them drawing everything and anything they could out of the other person.
Hands moved under shirts and down waistbands; their present situation and the search for Sands and Susannah lost in the moment their lips had joined. It didn't exist anymore. There was only heat and flesh and desire. They probably would have taken things far further than was prudent in a public hospital corridor, but they were interrupted by cries of their names by their partners. They broke apart as if pulled, matching looks of mingled horror and lust on their faces, and moved even further apart before running to see what had happened while they had been having an impromptu and entirely improper make-out session.
"It's Stark sir; ma'am. He's dead," Emerson announced as Roland and Emily turned a corner and followed the calling voices. They came upon a dead body in the middle of the hall dressed in a security uniform. His neck was a mess of blood and torn flesh.
"He was with Susannah," Roland announced softly, clenching his fists in rage and desperately not looking at Emily. "Sands did this. That mother-fucking bastard did this!"
"She either ran or he's taken her," Silber said stoically. He pulled out his radio and called one of his men still at the security desk to send for the morgue. "Someone has to stay with the body until the police and pathologist arrive. I'll do it. Take Emerson with you and find the son of a bitch who did this and your missing agent. I pray she's still alive."
"If she isn't, then Sands isn't either," Roland vowed coldly. No one argued that and the two agents and security officer continued their search through the halls of dead.
TBC
A/N: Well golly. I really didn't expect this chapter to get that long. It took on a mind of its own, I swear. Hmm, as did my characters…. Anyway, I hope you liked it! Please review and tell me what you thought! Thankee-sai.
Special thanks to all of my reviewers! You guys are the best!!