Page 23

“You’ve been talking about this crazy scheme for a week, Aaron,” Bruce whispers over the table. “Some things are better left as they are, and all our asses patiently doing our time at Fulton definitely ought to be one of those things.”

“What the hell are you scared of, Bruce?” I’m seriously sick of his ‘put your head down and become institutionalized’ bullshit. Kevin is also losing his patience, and dealing with an aggravated Kevin is a bad idea. “The plan’s finally ready. I want all of you to come with me.”

“I’ll take my chances on the inside, thank you very much!” Bruce stands up to return his breakfast tray.

Suddenly, Kevin grabs a hold of his hand. “Sit down, old-timer! Shut up and listen to what the vampire has to say... or else!”

Bruce slowly takes his seat again. “Let’s hear it, Aaron. Make it quick. You’re cutting into my drawing time.”

I smile at my three friends and take a quick look around to make sure no one is eavesdropping on us.

Satisfied that we’re ignored, I focus on my little pack of escapees and start going through the plan.

Everyone has their role; everyone has a function to fulfill before, during, and after.

I play to each man’s strengths and abilities while taking into consideration their various weaknesses.

Every step is timed for precision. When I finish, Bruce sits back and smiles.

We sit in silence for a few minutes. It’s a lot for anyone to process, with plenty to be done over the next two days in preparation. Still, what I’ve already managed to put in place gives us a nice head start.

“A helicopter?” Richard can’t believe I haven’t used any vampire voodoo magic mind-control spell on Cassandra to convince her to bring a helicopter for the escape.

She volunteered the service, agreeing I should be free from Fulton Institution ahead of the legally recommended schedule. It just so happens that I decide my friends deserve the same shot.

“Yeah, dude,” I confirm. “But remember, it’s like I said.

If any of you don’t want to do it, I’m not here to twist anyone’s arm.

At the end of the day, it’s your life. If you don’t want to spend it running from the law, I can respect that.

But for me, I’d rather be free and on the run than cooped up in a cage for years to come. ”

“Hey, I’m with you, man,” Kevin says. “I don’t want to spend another waking moment in this place. I would kill any motherfucker who would try to bring me back here.”

I wince internally at Kevin’s comment, though he’ll come in useful if things go south. Seeing Bruce’s and Richard’s broad grins spreading across their faces makes up for it.

“You know I’m in, dude. There’s a whole forest out there. No way can they find me, once you set me loose,” Richard says.

“I never thought I’d say this in my lifetime, but I’m tired of doing nothing, man.

I don’t care if this is the last thing I ever do while I live and breathe, it’s worth the chance of freedom,” Bruce says, to my great relief.

His artistic skills will be crucial for the big distraction to buy us enough time to escape to the yard and board the helicopter.

“My only thing is navigating the forest out there. You have a plan for where you are gonna land that bird? You can let Richard off in Fort Leonard Wood all you want to; I ain’t going in there. ”

“What’s wrong with the forest?” Richard asks warily.

“Bruce has this idea that there’s a ‘thing’ getting people out there,” I reply sarcastically.

“It’s no joke. Just ask Don what happened to his dad outside the Fulton gates five years ago.”

“What happened?” Kevin seems genuinely curious.

“Something tore Clive Killian to shreds and dragged what was left of his body up into a thirty-foot poplar tree,” I reply, when Bruce refuses to discuss it. “I’ve done my research.”

The others look to Bruce for confirmation, to which he nods.

“That was one of the contributing factors to why I escalated this escape plan. It seems our hospital director and Don are members of a secret society that deals heavily in the occult. Don’s dear old dad was a member too.

I suspect Clive was some sort of hunter and was going after someone or something that Redfield tries to keep contained here, but it escaped and killed Clive when he tried to recapture it. ”

“What the hell are you talking about, Aaron?” Kevin eyes me disgustedly. “I mean, it’s all well and good that you think you’re a vampire and Richard here thinks he’s a werewolf.”

“I do not think I’m a werewolf. I tell these people I believe they exist, but never that I’m one of them! I’ve seen them… vampires, too.”

“Shut up, Richard!” Kevin snaps.

“Hey, now. Come on, guys. We’re not going to be going at each other’s throats. We’re together in this, and no one at this table is your enemy... they are.” I point over my shoulder in the guards’ general direction.

“Well, just listen to this ‘old-timer’ for a minute,” says Bruce.

“You think it’s a coincidence that almost every case that comes in here seems to be somehow connected to something of that nature?

Aaron identifies with vampires; Richard saw werewolves and vampires in a turf war in the Anaheim Hills.

They’re all the way from California; what kind of jurisdiction does a Missouri mental institution have over them?

Neither of their cases are federal, and this isn’t a federal institution.

Strings are pulled to gather them all here.

Kevin, you’re from Georgia; what the hell are you doing here?

I’m the only local boy in this wing, as far as I know. ”

“Well, if Redfield is collecting rare cases, what’s that have to do with us?” Kevin asks. “We’re average joes, right, Bruce?”

“Not exactly. When I was put in here, people thought I was predicting the future in my drawings,” he replies.

“Maybe I do. I don’t know… I was working the fair circuit, drawing portraits and caricatures and stuff.

A couple times, I sat down to do a picture and I drew the person in an unfamiliar place or landscape.

Townsfolk said the images I drew come true.

” He looks down at his broken hands. “As for you, Kevin, are you familiar with Frankenstein’s monster?

How about the Incredible Hulk? Your rage gives you superhuman strength.

What sinister organization wouldn’t want that at their disposal? ”

“When you put it that way, it makes sense there could be more going on here than meets the eye,” Kevin concedes.

“That’s all I want you to be aware of, all of you,” Bruce says. “The whole picture is never easy to plainly see; sometimes, you need to look beneath the surface in order to see the whole story.”

“Fair enough,” I say, trying to steer the conversation back to the matter at hand.

“When we leave here in the chopper, we’ll be headed deep into a forest reserve southeast of here.

As long as they don’t have air support and we move fast enough to lose anybody on the ground, they’ll never catch us.

Cassandra makes some excellent arrangements. ”