Martin Vance shifted in his chair, turning his head briefly to eye some of the other patients in Trinity Medical Center’s psychiatric unit. He glanced again at the metal sprinkler head projecting from a small hole in the ceiling directly above him. He didn’t like the looks of it. No, sir, Scooby-Doo-in-a-half-shoe – he didn’t like the looks of it at all. This was a real amateur job, of course. He could tell that right from the start. Could see the actual flip-floppin’ microphone up there – see it plain as day. He knew what they were doing, too. He’d been through it all before. When you knew the sort of things that he knew, when you had connections right out of Liberia and the Far East on a mainline receiver into your geranium cranium at 538 bits per second – well then, everyone had their ear to the grand ol’ wall, Paul. Not that it mattered. Not in the least. If they thought he was just gonna spill his guts for a little Geodon, a little Haldol truth serum in the form of one big hummer of a syringe … well, they had no idea who they were actually dealing with, did they? He’d seen this type of action before – in a thousand other disease-infested rat pits far worse than this mojo dime-bag. And he hadn’t talked then. Hadn’t told them a damn thing.
‘Mr Vance?’
Tight as a clam, he was – never get the pearl!
‘Martin?’
He glanced over at the woman sitting across from him. Ms Queen Mojo Dime-Bag, herself. Little Miss Harley-Davidson on the Seroquel Express.
‘Martin, I see that you’ve been looking at the overhead sprinkler quite a bit during our session today. Does it bother you?’
He said nothing. It was best to just keep your mouth shut during the interrogations. He’d learned that much. Learned it the hard way. Let ’em play out their own string until they hung themselves with it, for all he cared.
He checked the corners of the room for traps, but didn’t see any. That was the worst kind, anyway – the ones you couldn’t see until it was too late. You step into one of those zombies and you’ll be cleanin’ up your own body shrapnel till next Easter.
‘Would you prefer to sit somewhere else, Martin?’
Stupid sling-blade witch doctor talkin’ at him again. Which doctor? Witch doctor. Ha! That was a good one. Funny but it ain’t, as people like to say. Chief Interrogator Numero Uno. She’d been on his case since they’d dragged him in here yesterday afternoon. Black as night in the heart of darkness, that one. She’d cut him down to pieces in a second if she had any idea the sort of technical intel he was carryin’ around in his long-term memory. Enough to topple the balance of power, that was for sure.
‘Yeah, any electric chair will do, right, doc?’ he said. Let her chew that over for a while.
‘I assure you that you’re in a safe place,’ she replied. ‘Nothing in this room is designed to hurt you.’
He scoffed at the remark. Check the traps, baby. Check the traps.
‘You don’t believe me?’
‘It’s not what it’s designed to do – it’s what it can do. Isn’t that what they teach you in that military boot camp of yours? What if Mother Goose never came home? That’s the thick of it. Funny but it ain’t.’ He glanced up at the microphone above him. It was capturin’ every flip-floppin’ word. Man, he had to be more careful with what he said. He couldn’t chance a slip-up. They’d be all over him. ‘You get those sektars off my back and maybe we can talk.’
‘You’ve used that word before: sektars. I’m not familiar with that term.’
‘Well, you should get familiar with it, tipsy-top. You and the goon squad, both.’
‘Can you explain what it means?’
‘Not if I wanna stay alive in this rat pit. Place is crawlin’ with ’em. Flip-floppin’ sektar parade last night. Couldn’t sleep a wink if I wanted to.’
‘We can talk about strategies to improve your sleep, or I can ask the nurse to give you something in the evening to help you rest at night.’
‘I’ll bet you could. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’
‘I’d like for you to feel better, yes. I think that the medications will help. Maybe we could start with just one.’
‘And I’ll be up to eight H-bombs by the end of the week, with my brains oozin’ outta my ears. No thanks, Dr Frankenstein.’ He checked the corners again – thought he saw one. Just a glint of metal razor that was gone by the time the eyes focused completely.
‘I respect your concerns, Martin. But I really am here to help you. Many of the thoughts you’re having are symptoms of a disease called bipolar disorder with psychotic features. The medications I’m recommending are designed to help improve those symptoms. That’s the goal.’
‘Yeah? Well, you can kiss the bird with those word turds, you psychological nerd. This meeting’s over!’ Martin Vance leapt up from his chair, which toppled backward, striking the floor with a reverberating bang. Dr Subina Edusei was on her feet almost as quickly, positioning her own chair between herself and the patient. Two of the psychiatric unit’s techs exited the nurses’ station in a hurry and were three-quarters of the way across the room before Subina held up her hand for them to stand by a moment.
‘Settle down, Martin. This is a safe place for you.’
Martin frowned. ‘No-no-no-no-no-no-no.’
‘I’d like you to walk over to the other side of the room now. We can talk more later if you want.’
‘I don’t want none of your magic beans,’ he advised her, shoving his fallen chair with his foot and storming off toward the far wall. The few patients who’d briefly turned their heads to watch the standoff quickly lost interest as Subina left the common area through the locked doors leading to the nurses’ station.
‘You okay?’ Tania Renkin – one of her favorite nurses – asked, meeting her at the door.
‘I’m fine,’ Subina said. She sat down at the desk and began entering a note in the chart. ‘Martin’s a little riled up this morning.’
‘You want him to receive anything else?’ Tania asked. ‘He got ten milligrams of Zyprexa IM early this morning. I don’t think it’s touched him.’
‘See if you can get him to take a Zydis ODT.’
‘If he refuses?’
Subina shrugged. ‘Show him the needle, and tell him that’s his next option. See if that changes his mind about taking the oral medication.’
‘It often does,’ Tania agreed. She looked out through the thick glass partition into the common area. Martin was pacing at the far end of the room, muttering to himself. ‘Martin doesn’t scare me. I’ve taken care of him before.’
‘So have I,’ Subina replied. ‘About four months ago, in fact.’
‘When he’s taking his medication, he’s actually quite pleasant.’
‘Yeah. He’d definitely pass the bus stop test.’
Tania smiled. ‘The bus stop test; if you encounter a person at a bus stop and don’t think to yourself, Hey, this guy’s crazy …’
‘… then they pass,’ Subina finished.
‘It’s amazing how many mentally ill people can pass the bus stop test. I wonder,’ she mused, ‘out of all the people we come in contact with in our daily lives, what percentage do you think are psychologically unstable?’
‘If you knew the answer to that question,’ Subina said, returning the patient’s file to the rack, ‘you’d probably never leave your house.’
‘Right.’ The two of them watched Martin as he continued to pace the room. ‘By the way’ – Tania pointed a thumb toward the security monitor behind them – ‘have you had a chance to see the guy in Seclusion Room Two yet?’
‘I looked in on him this morning when I got here. What’s his story?’
‘Don’t know.’ Tania shook her head. ‘He presented to the ER last night, ranting and raving, covered in scratches, obviously psychotic, unable to provide any useful information. The ER doc gave him five of Haldol and two of Ativan, and he got medicated with Geodon and Vistaril before we brought him over.’
‘How did he respond?’
‘Not well. It still took four security guards to get him into that room. He almost bit one of them.’
Subina studied the monitor. The man inside the seclusion room looked like a human wrecking ball: probably six foot four and pushing 250 pounds, most of it muscle. He’d removed his hospital clothing, revealing a crisscross of superficial scratches that covered the dark black skin of much of his torso and extremities. As she watched, he walked to the padded door and punched it hard. The muffled sound of the impact reached their ears a moment later.
‘Do we have a name?’
‘Not yet. He’s not someone we’ve seen here before.’
‘Well, he’s going to need more medication – but right now I think the safest course of action is to just let him be.’ Subina opened the door to the hallway leading back to her office. ‘I need to make a phone call before rounds. I’ll see you in the conference room in a few minutes.’
‘Okay,’ Tania replied as she entered her ID number into the automated medication delivery unit in the corner. ‘Let’s see if Martin will take his Zydis. We’ve got to get him looking good. In a couple of days, he might have a bus to catch.’