Andrew Neiderman: Deficiency

Only one thing came to mind as a solution. She ripped the marine bag from Curt's hands and opened it to pull out the serrated fisherman's knife. He laughed when she held it up for him to see.

"What do you think you're going to do with that?" he asked. "You can't stop me with that."

"I'm going to keep you from getting what you need, then," she said and brought the blade to her neck where she would cut quickly into her carotid artery. Death would be quick. "You know the human body," she said. "You know what happens once I do this."

"You won't," he said.

"Why not? You're going to kill me anyway, aren't you? That's what will happen. The only difference is, from how you are degenerating, I can be assured you will die too."

He shook his head and looked at Curt with a certain new desperate interest in his eyes.

"You won't do that, but just in case, Curt will precede me to the Afterlife."

"Or I'll go for you now and you'll shoot me," Curt threatened, not sure where Terri was heading with all this. He took a step forward.

Finally, the look of confidence left his face. He was getting redder, breaking out in what looked like hives. He pulled at his neck collar, the sweat now dripping off his cheeks. He glanced at the dead Will Dennis and then back at them.

"Let Curt go," she said, "and I'll drop the knife. Once he's out that door and in our vehicle, I'll give you the knife."

"No," Curt said.

"Do it," she ordered, pressing the knife against her skin enough to cause some bleeding.

"Terri!" Curt cried. He didn't know what to do first, get that knife out of her hand or lunge for the killer.

"Maybe we'll just kill him first," he said, seeing their devotion to each other. "If you don't do what I tell you to do, I'll shoot him right now."

"Do that and I'll definitely have no reason to live," she said with such firmness, the smile left his face again. "You had better decide really soon," she added.

"Time is not on your side. You're hyperventilating. You'll probably go into cardiac arrest any moment and I won't be giving you any CPR. That's for sure." He tilted his head as if he were listening to another voice again.

"Okay," he said smiling and nodding slowly. "You," he told Curt, "get out. Drive away."

"I won't do it," Curt said, more to Terri than to him.

"You've got to, Curt. He'll kill us both for sure." He studied her a moment. This wasn't just a sacrifice. She had some plan in mind. He had to trust her. Her eyes were pleading for it. He debated with himself. If he left and she failed, he would feel terrible, but if he stayed, what would he accomplish? Only their certain deaths.

"Okay," he said. He looked at the clone. "If she does die," he said, "I'll be coming for you."

"Or we'll be coming for you," he countered, the smile still there. Curt glanced at Terri again. She nodded and mouthed, "I love you." He turned and walked to the door. There, he hesitated, looked back, and then walked out.

"When he starts the engine," she said quickly.

They stood facing each other and waited. The automobile was started. She lowered her hand and he rushed at her, seizing her wrist and twisting it until she released the knife. He held onto her and looked into her face. She thought his eyes were two balls of ice.

"To the bedroom," he said. "Lead the way." He released her wrist and she walked ahead of him. When they reached the bedroom, he closed the door behind them and locked it.

"Now," he said, "you will truly fulfill your oath and benefit your patient. You diagnosed us. Now, let's cure us."

"This isn't going to help you," she said. "It will be only temporary. Look at what's been happening to you. You need to replenish your nutrients more and more frequently. It's only a matter of time before it doesn't work at all and you'll die a horrible death. Go back to the laboratory."

Stall him, she thought. His onslaught of wet beriberi was coming faster and faster. The symptoms were clicking off in her mind. The vein pulse in his neck was rising. He was having more trouble breathing. The resistance between the arteries and veins dropped further and further, his blood flowing round his body more rapidly. His heart was struggling to maintain this higher output.

"I can give you this shot to tide you over and then you can..."

"Get undressed," he screamed. "Now!"

She backed away. He won't shoot me, she thought. He knows that would mean his own death as well. She shook her head.

"You're not living up to the deal. You're cheating."

"If you listen to me

He roared with rage and somehow gathered the strength to literally leap at her, his feet leaving the ground, his hands landing on her neck. He threw her down on the bed with such force that he nearly knocked the breath out of her. Why wasn't he weaker?

She struggled, trying to keep his hands from tearing at her clothing and then, he brought his mouth to hers and pressed down with such determination and desperation, she was caught with surprise. She felt her own eyes bulging as if he was blowing air into her skull and pushing them out of their sockets. Then his tongue latched to hers and struggle as she would, she could not free it. She began to gag. Her arms weakened. He pushed them to the side as if they were broken and began to undo her jeans.

She jerked her torso in a vain effort to toss him off. His hands were on her naked buttocks. She felt her eyes going back in her head. This wasn't a rape as much as a ravishing, she thought. She was blacking out. Her final act of resistance was an attempt to clench her teeth. He put his finger into her mouth, beside his own tongue, and easily forced it open.

Moments later, she went unconscious.

Meanwhile, Curt drove as far as he thought would convince that creature he was fleeing for his life. He pulled over just after the end of the driveway and doubled back to the lake house. He knew he wasn't nearly a 100 percent recuperated yet from his minor concussion. This tension and terror, the effort to get back quickly, already had taken quite a toll on his physical stamina. He was breathing hard and his head was pounding.

He realized it would make no sense to just go bursting through the front door. He couldn't directly confront a man with a gun, especially a man who had no hesitation about using it. He went around the side of the house instead, and, staying close to the building, looked through the window into the living room. He saw Will Dennis's body, collapsed in the chair, but no one else. Then he moved around the corner of the house and came along the back to the window of the bedroom he and Terri were using. Slowly, he brought himself up to look in. At first he didn't see anything. Then he saw her, her clothes torn off her body, her arm dangling over the edge of the bed. Her hand moved with some weak effort to reach something.

The slam of the front door froze him. He listened until he heard the sound of Will Dennis's car engine being started. After a moment he went around the other side of the building and came out front just as the car started away. Without any pause, he rushed the entrance of the house and charged through the living room. When he entered the bedroom, he found Terri had fallen to the floor.

"Terri!" he screamed and rushed to her. He held her in his arms. She was gasping, her eyes bulging, her skin looking like a fire had been started inside her and was climbing up toward her brain. She gagged, grunted, and swung her head to the right. He followed her gaze and saw her doctor's bag. Quickly he lowered her to the floor and seized the bag, opening it.

"What?" he cried.

She closed her eyes with the effort to speak.

"B," she said and he scoured the bag, pulling out medicine bottles until he saw the one labeled B-complex. He unwrapped a syringe and inserted the needle. As he filled it, he looked at her and she nodded. He kept filling it until there was no more room and then he injected it into her arm.