Hysteria Page 7

The court recorder sits in the corner typing.

  “This hearing will come to order,” Judge Dickinson says and closes the door on armed court officers waiting outside. “In the case of Fantasy Fifteen verses McKenzie Chase the court will hear for the Plaintiff.”

  Through the door, McKenzie hears shouting. The door opens. Mylo falls through onto the floor.

  “What is the meaning of this?” Dickinson says.

  “I represent McKenzie,” Mylo says, tucking in the tail of a lime green shirt into red jogger pants and straightening a pink tie with piano keys. A suit jacket that McKenzie recognizes as one he outgrew at least two years ago and clearly three sizes too small for Mylo.

  “Is this correct?” Dickinson says to McKenzie.

  McKenzie shrugs.

  Mylo glares at him. “Saved your as once already, buddy,” he whispers. “Payback time.”

  McKenzie nods.

  “Let the court record defendant’s response as yes,” Dickinson says.

  “Simona Scarrow, for the plaintiff your honor,” a pin stripe suited woman says and holds up a document. “Exhibit A, showing a court order granting custody of a minor by the state of New York. Said minor is defendant, one McKenzie Chase age fifteen.”

  “Accepted,” the Judge says.

  “I don’t accept it,” McKenzie says. “Not even buried Mom and Dad yet.”

  “I granted custody for the state,” Judge Dickinson says. “Everything is in order.”

  “The plaintiff further petitions the state of New York,” Scarrow says handing an affidavit to Dickinson. “Grant the plaintiff access to its intellectual property, known herein as FFX.”

  “Nature of property?” Dickinson says browsing the affidavit.

  “A Nano-technology cell re-sequencing formula,” Scarrow says.

  Dickinson removes his spectacles and rubs the bridge of his nose. “And the defendant is currently in possession of FFX?”

  “Correct, your honor,” Scarrow says.

  “Source code?” McKenzie whispers to Angel as he stares at his hands trying to see it underneath his skin.

  She nods.

  “Plaintiff further asserts immediate remedy by retrieval of property,” Scarrow says.

  “Retrieval?” McKenzie says. “What does that mean?”

  “Yes, exactly what does that mean?” Dickinson says.

  “His blood, your honor,” Damien says. “I want his blood.”

  Scarrow scowls at Damien.

  “No further interruptions will be tolerated in my court,” Dickinson says.

  Damien blows a gum bubble.

  “Your honor, plaintiff asserts his right to remove hindrances and penalties on his commercial survival to the estimated loss of income of one Trillion US dollars.”

  Dickinson looks up from his affidavit. “Did you say-”

  “One Trillion, yes,” Scarrow says smiling at Damien. “For this year alone.”

  McKenzie feels his throat tighten. “Ten percent.”

  “What was that?” Dickinson says.

  “He offered ten percent,” McKenzie points at Damien.

  “Are you saying you wish to settle, young man?” Dickinson says.

  McKenzie looks at Angel.

  She slowly, almost imperceptibly shakes her head.

  Mylo punches McKenzie and hisses, “Man that buys us the playboy mansion with all the honeys thrown in.”

  “I’ll mention that to Jenny shall I?” McKenzie says.

  Mylo flushes.

  “How much blood?” McKenzie says.

  “The plaintiff proposes filtering the entirety of defendant’s blood,” Scarrow says. “Returning the blood cleansed of its property.”

  “For a date set when?” Dickinson says.

  “Immediately, your honor,” Scarrow says.

  “So ordered,” Dickinson says.

  “Wait,” McKenzie tries to sit up. “Is it painful?”

  “Very,” Damien says.

  “Has it even been tested?” McKenzie shouts.

  “Court adjourned,” Dickinson says. “Good luck young man.”

  Chapter Twenty One: Blood Code

  “Sign here,” Scarrow says holding out a document to McKenzie as a nurse inserts a tube in each arm and a technical team sets up various machines.

  McKenzie hesitates. He looks up at Angel. “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Think you’ll live long enough to spend your blood money?” she says.

  McKenzie feels his stomach back flip. His Mom’s dead eyes seem to stare at him from wherever he looks. He throws the pen across the room.

  “For Jenny’s sake don’t make waves,” Mylo says. “Take the money and run.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Scarrow says and places another pen in his grasp.

  “You’ve done this before right?” McKenzie says to the nurse.

  The nurse ignores him.

  Damien and his team stand behind monitors.

  McKenzie signs and passes the signed copies of the settlement over to Mylo.

  Scarrow takes her signed copy from Mylo.

  “File it fast, boys,” she says. “And spend it faster.”

  “Man what a day,” Mylo says and punches the air. “Oh, Jen asked me to tell you funeral’s at eleven.”

  “So soon?”

  Mylo punches a wall “It’s in shares. Not worth more than a few thousand,” Mylo says. “But I thought-”

  “Cash?” Scarrow says with it seems an exaggerated look of pity.

  “You screwed us,” Mylo says. “Where’s that judge.”

  “Trust me,” Scarrow says. “Those shares will be worth billions to you when Fantasy Fifteen launches.”

  “Just what is this Fantasy Fifteen?” Angel says.

  “And you are?” Scarrow says as if she’s stepping in something nasty.

  “With me,” McKenzie says studying Scarrow’s expression. “Answer her.”

  “We’re ready to begin,” Damien says.

  Scarrow seems to hesitate.

  “You don’t know,” McKenzie says. “Do you?”

  Scarrow flushes, looks away and joins Damien. “Charming doing business with you, Chase.”

  “They even keep secrets from each other,” McKenzie says as the lights dim and the window blinds are sealed to allow the large monitor screen to be easily viewed.

  “Three, two, one,” Damien says. “Begin.”

  McKenzie watches his blood slowly spiral up the arm tube as the intense itching in his legs moves up his body and into his arms.

  On the big screen above him, McKenzie watches his blood.

  “See,” Damien says pointing at the screen. “Zoom, please.”

  A blue hazy glow to McKenzie’s blood seems to evaporate. In its place tiny spider like creatures. Millions of them.

  “We’re detecting back flow,” a technician says. “Levels increasing.”

  “That’s good, right?” McKenzie shouts.

  The tech shakes his head.

  “Increase outflow,” Damien says.

  The tech crew pushes a bank of faders higher. LEDs flicker from orange to red.

  McKenzie feels his arms begin to shake. Small blue sparks appear across his fingers.

  “Resisting filters,” the tech says.

  “I said increase outflow,” Damien shouts.

  “We’re exceeding safety limits,” the tech says.

  McKenzie feels his body begin to spasm. As if something inside him his clinging to his organs, refusing to leave his body.

  “Max it,” Damien shouts.

  The tech glances over to McKenzie. Shakes his head.

  Damien pushes the tech across the room and slams the faders all the way.

  Under his skin, McKenzie feels the creatures resisting the pull of the blood flow. Digging sharp pinchers into his organs, his heart, his kidneys, his lungs and even into his bones. A million desperate claws clinging to him. Biting jaws holding on to him for their survival. He can feel them behind his eyes. Inside his brain. S
warming together. Millions as one entity.

  The screen zooms out showing his entire body bathed in a blue glow.

  The energy building up in him seems to create a flood of sweat bursting out from every pore of his skin. The intense energy from the friction of movement. It’s as if he’s in nuclear meltdown. His entire body glowing blue with hundreds of tiny lightning bolts.

  On the screen McKenzie watches the creatures move back against the blood flow. Pushing his blood like a wall of water. A tsunami. Sweeping the tidal wave and all oxygen away from McKenzie’s heart.

  His heart pumping so fast he knows it’s going to explode.

  “You’re killing him,” Angel shouts.

  Chapter Twenty Two: Fade to Black

  Angel pushes Damien away from the bank of faders. She slams the faders down to zero.

  “He’s going into cardiac arrest,” a nurse says. And slaps an oxygen mask of McKenzie’s face.

  He tries to slap it away. Brushes the nurse’s arm. Lightning sparks from his fingers snap at the nurse.

  She screams as she is thrown across the room as if by an invisible force.

  McKenzie can hear a dozen heartbeats around the room. His vision seems to penetrate under their skin. The thundering drum sounds of beating hearts and the vision of their swirling blood seems to flood into his brain and wash over his senses. As if he can taste what’s digesting in their stomachs.

  Angel punches at McKenzie’s chest at a rate of a hundred times a minute.

  Lightning snapping at her fists like a rabid dog and still, she is able to resist and punch at his heart.

  “We need to stop the blood leaving his body,” Angel shouts and pulls at the tubes in McKenzie’s arms.

  “No,” Mylo says and whips her hands away. “He’ll bleed out on the floor.”

  “We have VT heart rhythm,” a doctor shouts. “Defibrillator.”

  McKenzie feels a heart valve quiver as if the creatures are collapsing his heart.

  “Rhythm converging to V-fib,” someone shouts. “Get that Defib online now.”

  “Quarter charge,” McKenzie hears someone else shout.

  “Give it to me,” Angel shouts and McKenzie feels his body arc. Almost breaking his back as a defibrillator shock passes into his heart.

  “It’s not working,” someone shouts.

  McKenzie stares up into Angel’s eyes. He can hear her heart beat and he feels his heart rhythm matching hers. Like two beating drums in unison. He grabs her fists. The lightning from his hands dancing around hers.

  “Use it,” he says.

  She nods and punches his chest with McKenzie’s own fists.

  McKenzie feels the lightning enter his chest and burst into his heart.

  Angel places her lips to his ears and whispers, “Escape.”

  For McKenzie, everything fades to black.

  Chapter Twenty Three: Breakout

  McKenzie sinks into a darkness punctuated by lightning flashes across his eyes. The echo of a single word bounces around his solitary world. This prison world of infinitely dark and impossibly high walls trapping him within himself.

  Escape.

  Escape.

  ESCAPE.

  It follows him wherever he steps. Leers out at him from dark shadows. Torments him from mists like ghosts pressing in on him. Echoes in the sexiest voice he’s ever heard.

  Escape

  Escape

  ESCAPE.

  He feels his fingers claw at the dark walls. Ripping into them. Hauling his mind up towards freedom. Higher and higher. His toes bleeding as his nails dig and push up. Higher and higher.

  His head swims. Looking down he sees the shadows move. Morph into his Mom and Dad.

  “Don’t leave us, Kenzie,” Charlie Chase shouts.

  “You killed us,” Brad Chase says. “You owe us. Don’t leave me here with her.”

  His parents claw at his heels. Try to drag him down.

  McKenzie kicks out. Feels his feet connect with his Dad’s jaw. Snapping his head backwards. Charlie and Brad fall. Howling as they spiral away into a swirling abyss.

  “I’m sorry,” McKenzie yells and climbs. Higher and higher. His vision blurring with tears.

  He feels his eyes snap open. His vision clearer than ever. The hospital ceiling above seems to bear down on him.

  “I’m alive,” he hears himself say. He wiggles his toes. No blood on them. He stifles a laugh. “Alive.”

  He struggles to raise his head. Realizing his chest, arms and legs are strapped down to the bed.

  Escape. Escape. Escape.

  He feels the lightning zip across his hands as they clench into fists. He flexes his arms and the restraints snap and fling themselves against the wall.

  A male nurse pushes down on him as another raises a syringe to his arm.

  McKenzie twists, punches out at them. Sending them flying backwards across the room. It’s as if he doesn’t need to instruct his body. It knows what to so. Even before his mind knows it. As if his body can make the calculations before his mind knows there is a problem, an obstacle to assess.

  The door swings open.

  A cop pulls his gun and aims at McKenzie.

  Escape. Escape. Escape.

  McKenzie searches for an exit. Looks to the window. Feels his knees flex and bend. He looks down at his leg casts. Twitching as if controlled by this intense desire for freedom. The casts buckle and crumble. It’s as if he’s not in control. As if, his body’s desire rules over his actions. He feels himself roll across the bed without even willing himself to do so. In a split second, he is onto the floor. Aware of his actions and yet possessed by their desire.

  One foot hits the cold lino and he feels his knees bend, ready to spring across the room.

  A bullet flies across McKenzie’s legs. He feels his legs twitch, as he twists out of the bullet’s path.

  “No,” Damien shouts, “he must be kept alive.”

  McKenzie feels his legs compress like a coil of a spring action gun. His legs release with an explosive force. He hits the window and feels the glass shatter under the force of his fists. He tumbles out of the window and into the sky. Into freedom. Embraced by its joy. Every fiber of his body screams out with lust for the intense feeling. The feeling of awakening. Into a body more alive than he could ever dream of. And as he looks down at the moving cars in the street five floors below. To certain death. He feels himself smile.

  Chapter Twenty Four: Maximum Impact

  McKenzie knows he’s heading for maximum impact with the yellow taxicab roof. It will kill him in less than two seconds time. But his body twists and turns like a cat falling from height, determined to land safely. His feet prepare for the high impact. He even gets a sense of needing to roll across the roof in as shallow a dive angle as possible. His arms fling out at the rushing air as if he’s a bird with wings catching the up draft.

  Somehow, he’s going to hit the red, white and blue stripe awning over the hospital lobby. He plummets into the taunt cloth like an albatross with an ancient mariner’s arrow through its heart. Ensnared by a tall ship’s sail. He feels himself flung out across the morning rush hour traffic.

  His shoulder smashes into the sign on a cab roof. He registers the pain but it’s like a distant memory. His brain busy with a billion instant calculations intent on survival. He rolls across the cab roof. Drops into the fast lane.

  Already the distance and proximity of each blaring car horn is processed and his body rolls to where he assumes safety is offered. He automatically without thinking flattens out as a bus hitting its brakes passes directly over his head. He’s alive. He allows himself a moment to laugh.

  He rolls out from under the bus. This seems to disappoint a group of school kids with their smart phones filming him with expectations of capturing a bloody and battered corpse to pass around boring lessons. Instead, they get a zombie. A boy enslaved by a body that cannot die. Do they see this? Do they see him burning up inside the hurricane of fire swirling around his ey
es?

  Bus passengers with their gawping faces pressing up against the glass, fall back in their seats with surprise. It’s as if McKenzie is a predator leaving the zoo cage forever. Free and ready to hunt.

  Why are the kids laughing?

  Then McKenzie feels the first strong breeze of Fall whistling and lifting up his hospital apron. Biting into his bare butt.

  He vaguely assesses the shouting bus driver jumping down from his bus. But McKenzie cannot stop. He must run. His legs demand it. Run for freedom.

  Chapter Twenty Five: Barefoot At The Funeral

  McKenzie, bare foot and near frozen in his hospital apron, finds himself at the gates of a graveyard. A fine cool rain seems to douse, calm the sparks of lightning across his fingers.

  An old clock chimes eleven. A hollow sound that makes McKenzie shiver.

  Press photographers huddle inside the gates as if to ambush passers-by. They stare at McKenzie.

  Flashguns go off in his face.

  He tries to ignore them as his feet feel compelled onward. He follows a long winding row of cars leading up to a funeral.

  “He’s their runaway nutter son,” a reporter says and chases after McKenzie. A TV reporter thrusts a microphone at McKenzie. “Aren’t you the kid who-”

  McKenzie knocks the reporter backwards over the hood of a limo and walks on.

  Jenny and Mylo hold hands in a small group as two coffins lower into the fresh dug earth.

  Somehow, he can’t figure it out how, but he’s at Mom and Dad’s funeral. He looks at his feet. Dirty and blood soaked. Must have been running for hours. He tries to feel something. Maybe it’s the cold but he feels numb to the sight of his parents disappearing into the earth.

  “Nice suit, Chase.”

  McKenzie turns to face Damien.

  “As of today you’re a rich man,” Damien says. “You can even afford something that covers your bare as.”

  McKenzie feels his hands clench into fists.

  Jenny turns to face Damien. Flashes a look of disgust.

  He doesn’t know what to say. Maybe apologize but for what? It seems the whole world is out to blame him for living. “Jenny, I-” McKenzie says.