right as if yanked. She waggled her head, her face twisted by tics, and when the fit passed, she stood with her feet spread apart, fists clenched at her sides, her brows lowered in a glare. "So help me, I'l kil you, Wax."
Marisa launched herself at him, seizing his throat. Strangulation starbursts blurred his vision, and he stabbed the gun's needle blindly into her torso and pul ed the trigger. Only when her hands fel away from his neck and she col apsed to the floor did he look down to see that he'd pierced the thin cloth of her hospital gown, injecting her right over the heart.
Harold, he thought, rasping to restore his breath. Wax hadn't counted on the poison working so quickly,
although he'd heard that procaine in sufficient
quantities could cause cardiac arrest. He couldn't risk having the patients he'd kil ed inhabit the other subjects; he'd have to work faster.
Hurrying back to the doctor's bag, Wax transferred al the remaining poison vials to the deep pockets of his white coat. He paused only long enough between rooms to put a new dose in his gun. Each victim added bites, bruises, or bleeding scratches to his wounds, yet he kept on. He saw Edvard Munch's pitiful, haunted creature in each skul -like countenance, and he was determined to silence once and for al the scream they heard.
The last one, a skinny black man named Ezra, survived long enough to pursue Wax into the corridor. The
doctor stumbled and crawled across the hal ,
hyperventilating as the dying man threatened to topple on him. When Ezra slumped halfway through the door instead, Bartholomew Wax sprang up and reloaded his gun, swapping the vials as if changing the clip in an automatic weapon. Then he cast a sheepish glance to his right.
The corporal from the front desk stood only a couple of yards away, her .45 pistol drawn and aimed at his head. She wasn't smiling.
A tal , stocky man in a navy-blue suit stood beside her. Silver threads filigreed his dark hair and thick black eyebrows, and the furrows in his face gave him a
fatherly beneficence.
He tipped his head in greeting. "Dr. Wax."
"Mr. Pancrit." The title was a deliberate slight. Wax knew that Carl Pancrit was a doctor, too, in the
technical if not the ethical sense. "I didn't expect to see you here at this hour."
"Obviously not," his col eague observed, nodding toward the man sprawled in the doorway. "But I've been expecting you. For some time now, I've suspected that your heart isn't quite in this project." Wax tightened his finger on the vaccine gun's trigger.
"Take a look around you, Carl. The experiment is a failure."
"Not if it prompts further research. Yet you haven't submitted a new proposal in months, and that makes me think you're holding out on us. You wouldn't do that, would you, Barty?"
Pancrit advanced, arms spread as if to embrace him in a paternal hug, but Wax swung the gun toward him. "I'm done, Carl."
The corporal cocked her pistol.
Pancrit raised his hands to placate both of them.
"Please! Let's be sensible about this." He motioned for the soldier to lower her weapon, then gave Wax a
sympathetic look. "I can't blame you for putting the poor devils out of their misery. I would have done the same thing myself--"
"I'm sure you would have." Wax kept the vaccine gun level with Pancrit's chest.
"--but you stil owe us for those pictures of yours. We went to a lot of trouble to get them for you. Do you want us to send 'em right back where they came from?" Wax gave a wan smile. "That won't be necessary." He drove the needle of his gun into his own carotid artery and pul ed the trigger.
As he crumpled to the floor, the corporal rushed
forward, brandishing her pistol in case Wax was
playing some kind of trick.
He wasn't.
Carl Pancrit sighed as he watched Bartholomew Wax twitch in his death throes. "Don't think you can get away from me that easily," he muttered.
2
A Slave to the Masters
NATALIE LINDSTROM COULD NOT HELP
FEELING A STAB OF ENVY WHEN she arrived
Marisa launched herself at him, seizing his throat. Strangulation starbursts blurred his vision, and he stabbed the gun's needle blindly into her torso and pul ed the trigger. Only when her hands fel away from his neck and she col apsed to the floor did he look down to see that he'd pierced the thin cloth of her hospital gown, injecting her right over the heart.
Harold, he thought, rasping to restore his breath. Wax hadn't counted on the poison working so quickly,
although he'd heard that procaine in sufficient
quantities could cause cardiac arrest. He couldn't risk having the patients he'd kil ed inhabit the other subjects; he'd have to work faster.
Hurrying back to the doctor's bag, Wax transferred al the remaining poison vials to the deep pockets of his white coat. He paused only long enough between rooms to put a new dose in his gun. Each victim added bites, bruises, or bleeding scratches to his wounds, yet he kept on. He saw Edvard Munch's pitiful, haunted creature in each skul -like countenance, and he was determined to silence once and for al the scream they heard.
The last one, a skinny black man named Ezra, survived long enough to pursue Wax into the corridor. The
doctor stumbled and crawled across the hal ,
hyperventilating as the dying man threatened to topple on him. When Ezra slumped halfway through the door instead, Bartholomew Wax sprang up and reloaded his gun, swapping the vials as if changing the clip in an automatic weapon. Then he cast a sheepish glance to his right.
The corporal from the front desk stood only a couple of yards away, her .45 pistol drawn and aimed at his head. She wasn't smiling.
A tal , stocky man in a navy-blue suit stood beside her. Silver threads filigreed his dark hair and thick black eyebrows, and the furrows in his face gave him a
fatherly beneficence.
He tipped his head in greeting. "Dr. Wax."
"Mr. Pancrit." The title was a deliberate slight. Wax knew that Carl Pancrit was a doctor, too, in the
technical if not the ethical sense. "I didn't expect to see you here at this hour."
"Obviously not," his col eague observed, nodding toward the man sprawled in the doorway. "But I've been expecting you. For some time now, I've suspected that your heart isn't quite in this project." Wax tightened his finger on the vaccine gun's trigger.
"Take a look around you, Carl. The experiment is a failure."
"Not if it prompts further research. Yet you haven't submitted a new proposal in months, and that makes me think you're holding out on us. You wouldn't do that, would you, Barty?"
Pancrit advanced, arms spread as if to embrace him in a paternal hug, but Wax swung the gun toward him. "I'm done, Carl."
The corporal cocked her pistol.
Pancrit raised his hands to placate both of them.
"Please! Let's be sensible about this." He motioned for the soldier to lower her weapon, then gave Wax a
sympathetic look. "I can't blame you for putting the poor devils out of their misery. I would have done the same thing myself--"
"I'm sure you would have." Wax kept the vaccine gun level with Pancrit's chest.
"--but you stil owe us for those pictures of yours. We went to a lot of trouble to get them for you. Do you want us to send 'em right back where they came from?" Wax gave a wan smile. "That won't be necessary." He drove the needle of his gun into his own carotid artery and pul ed the trigger.
As he crumpled to the floor, the corporal rushed
forward, brandishing her pistol in case Wax was
playing some kind of trick.
He wasn't.
Carl Pancrit sighed as he watched Bartholomew Wax twitch in his death throes. "Don't think you can get away from me that easily," he muttered.
2
A Slave to the Masters
NATALIE LINDSTROM COULD NOT HELP
FEELING A STAB OF ENVY WHEN she arrived
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