Gray, paper-thin skin lay over protruding bones. Without words, he pleaded.
He wouldn't live much longer, but every second brought him immeasurable agony.
At Gaby's other side, a hairless woman jerked and flailed in futile rage. With each movement, a monstrous sac on her midsection recoiled with a life of its own.
Turning a slow circle. Gaby saw more of the same—until her gaze landed on the pile in the corner.
Decomposing bodies, overrun with maggots.
Failed experiments.
Patients whose usefulness had run out.
Knowing she'd allowed this to happen, angry tears burned Gaby's eyes. She wanted to kill the doctor now, this instant.
But as she breathed in the stench of decay and desperation, absorbed the misery in the frantic auras, their anguish became her own. The insurmountable burden bowed her shoulders and wrenched her heart.
She needed to kill them. All of them.
But for the first time, God made sure she saw things clearly… even through her blurring tears. They were all evil, and all human—capable of great suffering.
Gaby sensed the doctor moving toward her, along with other bodies. She recognized the danger, felt the encompassing evil.
Ready to fulfill her duty, she poised herself—and a gunshot rang out. The misfired bullet hit the wall, sending out a spray of splintered wood and plaster dust.
Shaken from her discipline, Gaby spun around and there stood Morty, shoulders back, chin up, arms straight out with the gun gripped tightly.
He took aim again and Gaby glanced behind her to see the doctor advancing, her lip curled in rage, her eyes hot with hatred. In her blood-soaked hand, she hefted a long surgical blade as lethal as Gaby's own knife.
The room echoed with the blast of another resounding shot. The doctor's body jerked at the bullet's impact, then crumpled to the ground, felled by a gunshot wound to the side of the face. No longer recognizable, Dr. Chiles now resembled the monster Gaby had anticipated.
Morty crept up beside her. 'Oh God, Gaby. She's dead, isn't she?'
'Looks like.' In the gray ugliness of the room, a blue glow floated around Mort. On the outermost reaches of the aura, the blue was quiet and calm, but closest to Morty, nearest to his heart, it shone rich and deep, indicative of a man who'd found his work in life.
Gaby couldn't quite credit Mort's transformation.
'Oh God,' he said again. Trembling, he lowered his hands and gazed around the room in horror. 'I'm sorry, Gaby.'
'For shooting her? Don't be.' Gaby had no regrets there. But now for the rest of them…
'No, I meant…' He swallowed hard. 'Luther's not far behind me. Right before I came in here, I heard him in the woods. He's not alone.'
Gaby tried to order her thoughts, but it wasn't easy. She had to contend with her ability and duty, and her own human emotions.
'He must have followed me,' Mort rushed to say, 'and there's no way he didn't hear those shots. He'll be in here any second.'
'Which is why I avoid guns.' Drawing in stale, odorous air, she forced herself to think. Luther's proximity no doubt had much to do with her altered state. His singular effect on her threw off her balance, robbed her of a much-needed edge.
She honestly didn't know if that was good or bad.
Either way, it was all too much, too discrepant from the bizarre reality to which she'd grown accustomed. Her stomach revolted and she clapped a hand over her mouth to keep from puking.
Mort's voice tottered with fear, further bewildering her. 'Gaby!' Looking beyond her, he stumbled back.
She followed his line of vision and saw two of the poor creatures, armed with crude weaponry probably used by the doctor to inflict her experiments, now descending on them. Rubber tubing trailed from one stooped soul, while remnants of torture discolored the other.
They both had the same bulbous fingertips and toothless, slathering mouths she'd seen before.
The doctor must have cut them loose before she attacked.
Vociferating in excitement and panic, they lumbered forward, starting a frenzy with the others who didn't understand. The noise grew deafening.
Disheartening.
In that moment, Gaby made up her mind. They all needed to die. Thanks to the doctor, they were barely human anymore. Their black souls, now disoriented with sickness, frightened by chaos, and maddened from pain, made them dangerous—especially to Morty. Besides, anything other than death would only cause them more cruelty.
Grabbing up the surgical tool from the doctor's limp hand, Gaby handed it to Mort. 'Cut them all free.'
'But… !'
'Do it, Mort. But be careful. Stay out of reach.' The order had barely left her mouth before the first monstrosity fell against her, awkwardly stabbing. Gaby sidestepped, turned, and sliced cleanly across the throat, cutting the carotid artery. She shoved the pitiable creature aside.
The other reached out, and Gaby sank her knife into its heart, twisted, and dragged it out again. The body dropped hard to the ground.
One by one, she dispatched the tormented souls.
Without God's intervention.
Without His purer vision.
She saw them all for what they were, and though she had a paladin's power, she acted out of her own conscience, not divine instruction.
One of the more weakened patients offered no more than garbled pleas—for a cessation of suffering.
Gaby made his death quick and painless by cutting off life support. She severed IV tubes and disconnected an oxygen tank.
'Luther will be here soon.' She sensed it. But by the time he and his fellow officers ordered medical care, the bodies would be at peace.
'Go,' Morty whispered to her, his voice barely audible over the now blaring sirens. 'Find a back way out. If Luther catches you here…'
'He'll arrest me,' Gaby finished for him. She had always understood that. 'What about you?'
From a distance, Luther shouted, 'Gaby! Where are you?'
'Go,' Morty begged. He waved the gun at her. 'There's a door at the back of the room. Go through there. Find a way out. I'll stall him.'
Still she hesitated, unable to make the decision—unable to abandon him.
Morty hauled her close and gave her one bumbling kiss, startling her senseless. His aura burned bright with determination. 'You're important to the world, Gaby. You have a purpose. You have to be free to do what you can.' His crooked smile wavered. 'And finally, I think I found my purpose. For once, I get to be the hero. Now
'Gaby!' Luther's voice echoed down the corridor. The beam of a bright flashlight hit the walls.
He was only a few yards away.
Gaby turned and fled. On her way across the room, she spotted a fresh corpse, unmarred with disease. Given the bright, suggestive clothing, it had to be the prostitute Rose.
Poor Bliss.
Gaby found the door and went through it with no idea where it led. She trusted God to see her safely outside. As the door shut behind her, impenetrable darkness closed in.
She crawled forward, feeling her way…
And that's when she heard the doctor speak. 'You let her do this.'
Gaby's heart dropped. Dr. Chiles wasn't dead!
Luther shouted, 'No,
'I can't.'
