"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 go."
"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, Mort. Drop the gun. Now."
"I can't."
The doctor laughed.
And a final shot rang out.
Unable to bear it, Gaby turned back, frantically retracing her steps. If Luther wanted to apprehend her, she'd somehow talk him out of it. Or she'd find a way to evade him.
But she had to know if Morty was safe. He'd come to help her because he cared; she couldn't just abandon him.
Reaching the door she'd gone through, she opened it a mere crack and saw Luther bent over a supine body.
Morty.
He wasn't moving.
A scream crawled up her throat, but before Gaby could get the sound out, several things seemed to happen at once.
She saw the doctor drag herself upright against a rickety table, her mouth twisted in wicked delight. She held Mort's gun.
Luther pushed to his feet and faced her.
The badly wounded doctor stumbled, and a kerosene lantern crashed into one of the oxygen tanks.
An explosion rocked the building, shooting flames everywhere.
The door blasted shut on Gaby. She tried, but it wouldn't budge an inch. Something must have collapsed against it, blocking it. She listened hard, but all she heard was the snap and crackle of hungry flames devouring the carnage.
"No!" Gaby pounded her fists on the door, but it didn't matter. No one acknowledged her calls, and the door didn't dislodge. Smoke seeped into her darkened room, bringing with it the caustic scent of burning wood, cloth, and… flesh.
Gaby tried kicking the door with her feet, but the smoke grew thicker, burning her eyes and throat, reminding her that despite being a freak, she was still all too human. She finally had to move away.
Heart pounding hard, silent prayers running amok, Gaby crawled and crawled until she found a hole in an outer wall that led to the swamp.
She stumbled out, fell onto to her back in the prickly weeds, and gulped in great gasping breaths. When she could breathe again, she faced the destruction. The flames didn't seem to spread, but with how that room had exploded… could anyone make it out of there alive?
Gaby didn't realize she was crying until the sirens began winding down and she heard her own sobs. The weakness so enraged her that she shook a fist at God.
"This is why I can't be friends with people? This is it? Is this my fucking lesson?"
Her raw voice competed with the sounds of chaos, echoing in hollow dismay over the surface of the swamp, emphasizing the futility in all that she did, all that she'd dared to do.
More emergency personnel arrived. Police, firefighters, EMTs. More voices. Enough lights to brighten the woods and send eerie, dancing shadows everywhere.
Drawn to concealment against her will, Gaby got to her feet and moved out of the open, choosing a position behind a copse of trees where she could watch the busy swarm of police and medics, and still escape if anyone spotted her.
The hot tears continued to fall unheeded down her cheeks as she hunkered down, praying to see Luther or Mort in one of the bright emergency beams trained on the building. So much pain filled her that she wanted to curse and wail. She wanted to scream out her anger.