Thomas Hoover - Life blood

"Are you really awake?" I loved this poor, beat-up man. More than anything, I just wanted to hold him.

"I'm not… but I'd damned well better be." He tried unsteadily, to straighten up. "Morgy, before he put me away, that Ramos bastard was talking about me, and you, in the past tense. Like we'd already been 'disappeared.' He didn't know I speak Spanish. What the hell's going on?"

I wasn't sure how to tell him. But I was getting that super energy God gives you when you realize life is no longer a game. We had to get focused.

"Baby, where's your passport?" I asked.

He looked around then pointed to his battered camera bag in the corner.

"It's in there. Or was. Central America. Never leave home without it." He grimaced then lightly pushed me away and stood by himself. "Jesus, do you know what they're doing? You were right all along. They're selling kids in the States. That Ramos prick is running the operation, not to mention Alex Goddard's slice of the action. And somebody at the American embassy here is handling all the paperwork, so they can grease everything through the INS. But I still don't understand how it is we're-"

"Honey, I know exactly what's happening." I'd long since figured out that Alex Goddard and Colonel Ramos were working hand in glove. But I still couldn't bring myself to tell him how he and I were going to be used. It was just too sick. "Listen, not long from now I think I'm supposed to be taken down there to the village for some kind of rite, as part of this whole disgusting operation, and then after that he's going to use… You don't want to hear. We've-"

"You know, Ramos and a bunch of G-2 thugs are here to take away a batch of little kids," he rambled on, not seeming to hear anything I was saying. He was off in his own world, trying to sort out things in his head. "But what I can't figure is, how can they just take children from here and nobody tries to stop them? Are these indigena so terrified-?"

"Listen, please." Now my hallucinations were returning in spite of all I could do, trails of light that glimmered off all the objects in the room, and I didn't know how much longer I'd be coherent. I'd have to talk fast. "We've got to get Sarah before daylight. She's down in the village. I tried to get her out of there yesterday, but-"

"Is she okay?" He stared at me and his eyes cleared for a moment. "I mean, is she able to-?"

"No, she's not okay. She's hallucinating worse than ever. I'm sure he's giving her more drugs. Really heavy stuff."

"So how-?"

"Hopefully, we're going right this minute. There's a river. But if that doesn't work out, there's something I can do to buy us a month's time. Alex Goddard's got a laboratory here, just down the hall, in back of his office. It's the evil center of this place. So if I can get in there and dump all his petri dishes, his in-vitro culture mediums… Baby, it's all so disgusting. But I'm going to take care of it."

I was starting to have real trouble just stringing words together into sentences. My hallucinations were still growing, the loud whispers of light, but I did manage to tell him how I thought we could get Sarah and elude the Army, if we did it before sunup, though my plan probably came out pretty jumbled. Yet I felt that if we did it together, we could take care of each other…

Then, with my remaining strength, I launched into action.

"Let me check the hall. I just want to shut down his lab. Call it… call it insurance. Five minutes, and then we'll be out of here."

It also would be a kind of justice, to even the score for what he'd done to Sarah and to me.

I leaned Steve back against the wall, then walked slowly across the tile floor to the door and tested it. Surprise, surprise, it was locked. I again tried the knob, an old one, then again, but it wouldn't budge, just wiggled slightly. He'd locked us in.

Now what?

Then I remembered the time Steve and I were in a similar situation. When we got locked in my room at the Oloffson in Port-au-Prince, he'd just taken his Swiss Army knife and unscrewed the knob, then clicked it open. He'd made it look like a piece of cake, but he had a way of doing that.

He was barely conscious, so this time I'd have to do it myself. I glanced around at his bag.

"Is your Swiss still in there?"

"I think…" His mind seemed to be wandering. Then he gave a weak thumbs-up.

I went over and zipped it open. Be there, I prayed. We really could use a break.

I rummaged through telephoto lenses and film canisters and underwear. Then I found it, zipped inside a water-repellent baggie and stuck in a side pouch.

I snapped it open and went to work, him watching me, his head nodding as he struggled to stay conscious.

The main difference between this time and Haiti was, here I didn't know what was on the other side and I was having hallucinations of multicolored snakes.

"You're doing great," he said finally, seeming to come a bit more alive.

And I was. Out with the screws, off with the knob, in with the small blade, and click. Maybe we just think men's mechanical skills are genetically hard-wired. Maybe it's all a secret plot to elicit awe.

I closed the knife and shoved it back into his bag, then turned to him.

"Honey, I'm just going to be a second. While I'm gone, practice walking."

"Be careful, please." He gave a cautionary wave. "They don't want us leaving here alive."

"Just get ready." I quietly pulled back the door and peered out into the dark hallway. It was empty, abandoned, no snakes, with only a light breeze flowing through.

When I stepped out, the fresh air hit my face and I had a moment of intensity that made me realize what I really wanted to do, first and foremost, was see Tz'ac Tzotz one last time. A last farewell to one of Sarah's children. Stupid, yes, a private folly of the heart, but I had to do it.

I was halfway down the hall, experiencing flashes of color before my eyes, when I heard a voice.

"They're all praying for you. It's almost time."

I turned back, startled, barely able to see. Finally I made out Marcelina, in her white shift. We were standing a few feet from the stairs, where I wanted to go, and I was tripping, my reality almost gone. I think she knew that, because she reached out to help me stand.

"Marcelina, where's Sarah?" I grasped her hand, which helped me to keep my balance. "Is she still down there in that… place?"

"She's been so looking forward to the ceremony. She wants them to bring her-"

"You don't know where she is?" I realized nothing was going to go the way I'd hoped it would.

"They all love her. They're taking good care of her."

"Well, I love her too. And I have to get her. Now." I was whispering to her, trying to save my strength. "Marcelina, promise me you'll stop all this. It's so horrible. So sad."

"It's our life," she whispered back, then turned her face away.

I didn't know what else to say, and I was terrified Alex Goddard might materialize, so without another word, I pulled away and started up the steps.

When I reached the top of the stairs, the hallway was lighted by the string of bulbs along the floor, and I made my way as fast as I could to my room at the end. I pulled my passport out of my bag, along with a charge card, slipped them both into my pants pocket, and headed back down the hall.

When I got to the door of the room where Tz'ac Tzotz and his mother were, I gave it a gentle push and peered in, but the glow from the lamp above the bed showed it and the crib were both empty…

No! They must have already taken the children. Next they'd be coming for me. I realized I'd been a fool not to head straight for the lab. I should have just gone-

The room went completely dark, together with the hallway, a pitch-black that felt like a liquid washing over me. The main power, somewhere, had abruptly died, or been deliberately shut off.