A happy New Year to you all!!!!
Chapter 5
Starsky came around from the effects of the chloroform slowly, his head aching both from the drug and from the blow it received when it smashed into the pathway in the cemetery. The headache was accompanied by a dry throat and a sickly, empty feeling in the pit of his stomach and he longed for a glass of cool water to revive him and take away his discomfort, but had the feeling that such kindnesses may be in short supply.
The brunet groaned into the dark and opened his eyes. Or at least he thought he'd opened his eyes, but there seemed to be no difference between having his eyes open and closed. Whichever way, he could see nothing but cloying, velvety blackness so thick he felt he could cut it with a knife. Was he blindfolded? He tried to touch his face but realised belatedly that his arms wouldn't move. They seemed to be secured above his head, and his ankles were similarly immobilised. He was laying flat on his back and beneath him he felt some sort of cover over a set of thin metal rods. He panicked and started to pull at his bonds, feeling the pull on the ropes around his wrists as the fibres started to abrade his skin. He shouted out into the darkness but the place he was in muffled his shout, the air having a deadening quality to it.
The cop stopped struggling for a moment, the breath whistling in his throat as he stared into the pitch black, trying to make out forms, shapes, anything which would give him a reference point to help him establish where he was. The air around him was dry and cool, bordering on cold and had a strange, unpleasant smell which he couldn't quite place. It was almost like earth – the sort of smell when you dug down into the dry dirt and found it damp a few inches down. As though he was below ground.
That thought sent his pulse racing again and he tried to calm himself, feeling around with his fingers to find out what he was bound to. They hit cold metal bars and he ran his fingers along them to the limits of his bonds before trying to move his feet too. He seemed to still have his shoes on, and his jeans, but his sweatshirt had been opened at the front, exposing his chest to the cool air and he shivered now, partly from the cold and partly from fear. Without being able to see, he had the desperate and horrific idea that maybe he'd been buried somewhere. Buried alive! Oh my God! His worst nightmare come true.
Starsky had always had a fear of the dark. Not the sort that made him want to leave the lights on when he went to sleep. Or the sort that made him shy to go into a dark building. But it was a fear nonetheless and one of his childhood nightmares had been to wake up and never be able to see again. This was his nightmare, re-enacted in all it's terrifying glory and it set up a sheen of sweat to cover his body as he tried to calm the beating of his heart. Again he pulled at his bonds, the lucid part of his brain telling him it was pointless while the other, animal part willing to do anything in order to escape.
'HELP' he yelled.
The sound appeared muffled in the stuffy silence, but he continued anyway, desperate to make someone, anyone, hear that he was there, alive and waiting to be rescued.
'Hey, can anyone hear me? Help. Lemme out. HELP' he yelled into the darkness and paused for a moment to try to gauge whether anyone had heard him or not. He heard nothing, then, at the very periphery of his hearing there was a tiny scratching sound, like nails on stone. He stopped breathing, the better to hear the noise, trying to decipher it's meaning. And then the realisation hit. The one thing he hated more than the dark. Rats! He strangled a sob, his heart hammering in his chest and yelled pitifully into the darkness
'NOOOOO. Motherfuckers! HEEEEEEEELP'.
The sound of the tiny paws caused him to pull again against his bonds, feeling the rope pull and chafe at his skin until both wrists felt raw and uncomfortable.
'HUTCH!…… ANYBODY!' Nothing. But at least the shouts seemed to keep the rodents at bay. Thankful for small mercies, Starsky kept up his shouting at intervals until his voice was raw and rasping and the pains in his head pounded him into submission. He lay still, cramps now starting to pull at the muscles of his shoulders from being confined in one position for so long. How long had it been? How long had he been here, since he'd been drugged and overpowered. And why?
Well the why was easy enough. His captor had issues. That was the correct psychological term for the madman. Issues that centred around Starsky. Without the psycho, techno babble. He wanted Starsky dead, and the way things seemed to be playing out, the brunet realised that very soon he'd get his wish.
The air felt stuffy to him now, thick, as though he could cut it with a knife and breathing seemed difficult although whether from panic, or because of lack of oxygen, he wasn't sure.
Starsky lay still for a moment trying to send out mental thought waves to his partner. Come get me Blondie. Hutch? Find me huh? I'm scared.
The brunet's breathing sounded loudly in his ears and he realised he was hyperventilating. He made a conscious effort to calm himself. It wouldn't do to die of hypoxia before he died of anything else, he thought, grimly.
Ok think. He was at the cemetery. Mickey had called him and he saw Mickey right? Yeah, that was right. He saw the weasely little snitch right before he got jumped. Surely someone must find his car. A huge candy apple red "parade float" as his partner called it, was difficult to hide and difficult to disguise. Maybe he just needed to wait for someone to call in an abandoned car. And Hutch would start to look for him as soon as he was found missing from his apartment.
That thought calmed him a little. The thought of the big blond searching for him gave him a measure of comfort. Hutch wouldn't give up. Hutch would find him even if others couldn't. But would he find him in time?
Subdued by this sobering thought, Starsky lay back, wincing as the back of his head met the hard unforgiving mattress. His head felt lumpy and swollen and he knew he'd gone down with a blow. He was bruised and maybe even concussed.
Suddenly his ears heard something else. Not the patter of the tiny rat claws on the stonework this time. It sounded like a key being inserted into a lock. Maybe he wasn't buried alive at all! The thought gave Starsky renewed vigour and he yelled again.
'In here. I'm in here. HELP' he stopped and listened. The small noises had stopped and the brunet was just about to shout again when he saw a sliver of light illuminating the darkness about 15' away. He looked up and blinked, forcing his head up from the bed so that, in the meagre light he could see his surroundings. He had only a moment to register the stone effigies around him, the dirt floor and the bed to which he was tied before the light was extinguished as the familiar figure closed the door to the crypt behind him. Starsky shivered in the cool breeze from the opened door and tried to remain calm as the man walked towards him.
'Its no use shouting. There's no-one around. This part of the cemetery was full up years ago. Not many visitors down this end now. If they do find you, it'll be too late' the soft voice sounded as the man lit a candle and placed it onto one of the stone shelves.
'You'll never get away with this' Starsky growled, anger now forcing his fear to the background.
'But I have got away with it. More than once. Its amazing what a crazy ticket does for you. They can never disprove that I'm crazy'.
'Tell that to the two cops ya killed'.
There was a soft snicker. 'Or maybe to that girl of yours. How long did she live? Just long enough for you to have a little hope that the doctors had made a mistake'.
'Shuddup!' Starsky yelled. 'Just shuddup Prudholm. Don't ever talk about Terri again, ya hear' Starsky yelled yanking at the ropes binding his wrists to the bed. He so wanted to grind his fists into the madman's face. And he so wished he'd done it all those years ago, when he'd had him in the warehouse. When he and Hutch had gone in on the back of the bike and taken down Crazy George and his two henchmen.
Starsky vividly remembered kneeling over the older man, fist drawn back to deliver a crippling blow, and Prudholm's face leering back up at his. 'Ya can't touch me…..I'm crazy' he'd said. And the Judge had agreed and sentenced the criminal to life in Cabrillo State. So why wasn't Prudholm still behind maximum security at the mental hospital?
The brunet stopped struggling. 'What're ya gonna do now?' he asked quietly.
'I'm gonna make you suffer'.
'For what?'
'You know what for' Prudholm ground out, slaming his fist into the mattress beside Starsky's head. The brunet didn't flinch, instead locking eyes with the madman and waging a silent war of wills.
'Gary died in jail. He died coz he was a junkie. It wasn't anything t'do with me' Starsky said slowly, as if explaining something complicated to a young child.
'He wouldn't have been in jail if you hadn't have taken him'.
'Prudholm, just…..just let me up huh? We can talk this through. I can get ya help'
'Help?' Prudholm giggled. 'Help? It ain't me that's gonna need the help boy. I'm not the one tied to the bed'. The older man looked away and muttered to himself. Starsky strained to here the mad ravings. Gary's not himself...gotta calm him down...get him something t'make it easier. Garys...no, not Gary...freakin' cop. Not Gary it's Starsky...Starsky. Yeah but Gary needs ya...Gary...NO STARSKY...
The brunet realised that whatever had caused PRudholm to be released, he was far from sane. He tried to be reasonable, making his voice low and quiet, 'Prudholm…..George. Listen to me. Lemme go now and I can talk to the Judge for ya. Get ya some better accommodation maybe. Somewhere nice'.
'Nowhere's nice in there. Nowhere's nice without Gary. An' you killed him. You killed my son, my boy. You deserve to suffer like I've suffered' the man said, his voice cracking and on the verge of collapse.
'And ya think I haven't?' Starsky said softly. 'Ya think I don't think of Terri every single day? Ya think I didn't think about killing myself coz she was gone? She was innocent. She'd done nothing 'cept be my lady, but that was enough for you wasn't it? Enough for you to want to get to me through her. Well now ya got me. So what're ya gonna do? Shoot me? Fine. Go ahead. I'm good 'n' ready. But Hutch'll come after ya. An' if not Hutch, there'll be others. You'll never get away with it Prudholm. An' an insanity plea won't cut it this time'.
'Shoot you? No, that's way too quick for you, cop. I've got something much more special for you. How long d'ya think it takes to starve to death? One week? Two? Think again. With just enough water, I can keep you alive for months, slowly wastin' away till there aint nothing left of ya but skin an' bone, hurtin' so much you'll plead with me to end it'.
'You're fuckin' crazy' Starsky spat out at him. 'You're beyond crazy!'
Prudholm grinned at him as he slowly walked back to the shelf to the candle. He picked it up, the yellow, flickering light sending the shadows dancing across his face, the eyes abnormally bright as he imagined the curly haired cop's final hours.
'Where're ya goin'?' Starsky asked him, not wanting to be left in the dark again. Even Prudholm's mad rantings were preferable to being left in the pitch dark again.
'I'm gonna be goin' now. I may be back tomorrow. Maybe the next day. Who knows? But I'll check on you now and again. Wouldn't want you to die too soon, would I?'
'No, Prudholm wait. Ya gonna untie me?' Starsky yelled at the man's retreating back. 'George wait'. He started to pull at his bonds again, the thoughts of being alone with the rats in the dark more than he could bear. 'Gary wouldn't have wanted this'.
Prudholm crossed the small stone room in three strides and backhanded the bound cop across his face. Starsky's head flew sideways and ricocheted off the thin mattress.
'Don't you ever say my son's name again' the madman ground out before walking calmly away. He put his hand on the door and pushed, letting in the soft morning light and making Starsky squint at the unaccustomed light. Extinguishing the candle, Prudholm backed out of the room and closed the door behind him, leaving the panicked cop tied and alone, staring into the darkness and wondering what the hell was going on. And more to the point, how he was going to get out of it.
