The wind shifted in the clearing around him and Fowler looked up to see two parakeets flying to higher branches against the darkening sky. Their cries had a mocking quality, like the teasing voices of children engrossed in some playground power play. Gritting his teeth so hard that they scraped together, Fowler unclipped the holster on his belt and pulled out his sidearm. Using his left arm to support his shooting hand, he pointed the gun at one of the parakeets as it preened itself wantonly like a knocking shop window prostitute. The painted bird disgusted him with its colors and its cries, perched there so high above him. He wanted to blow it out of existence. In a shower of blood and explosion of feathers, the act would announce that he, Chief of Security Fowler, was in charge on this island.
No hippie hacker was going to get the better of him—how could she even think she’d get away with whatever damn fool plan she’d hatched? And the British girl? She had only been on the island a short while. She was either very naïve or she’d brought some of this bullshit rebellion to the island with her. He suspected the latter was the truth of it, even now she was eroding his order like a poisonous wave lapping against the very fabric of the island. The black kid was in on it too. He was sure of that. His men had been very thorough and there was no other explanation—his own guy, his own fucking guy, had snuck into the house with them. He recalled the satisfying crunch the kid’s walkie-talkie had made when Fowler had smashed it beneath his boot, grinding it into the dirt where they’d found it round back. Fowler made a solemn vow to himself—he’d grind the turncoat’s skull into the ground just the same as soon as his men popped the lid on their metal hideout.
Then, raised voices and movement in the trees separated Fowler from his angry reverie and he turned to see his men approaching with the cutting gear. Alerted by the noisy activity, the parakeets flapped from their branches, chattering excitedly. Slowly, the Chief lowered his weapon and pointed it at the ground. No blood and feathers today. For now, anyhow.
“You took your sweet fucking time. Put your goddamn backs into it!” Fowler yelled, “Set it up over there by the main door. Bitches inside can pay for the damage.”
His men were sweat drenched and flushed from their efforts, their tanks all but empty as they struggled on the last few meters to the house.
Now we can get this party started, thought Fowler as he finally, reluctantly, returned his pistol to its holster. His mouth craved coffee and his ass needed to be in the pile cushion atop the swivel chair in the warm confines of The Snug. But right now, his men needed supervision—even now, one of them had stopped work and was staring open- mouthed at the treeline.
“I said get it set up! What the fuck is wrong with you…” Fowler began, but then he saw several more pairs of wide eyes locked on the horizon behind him. The Chief followed their gaze and saw what they saw. Streaks of light, rotating like great searchlights across the clouds in the glooming sky. Unbelievable. Someone had activated the goddamn lighthouse. Fucker would be seen for miles around, another nail in the coffin of his regime, another flagrant disregard for the rules.
“Get back to work, all of you!” he hollered, “I want that shitbox open by the time I get back!” Then, selecting three men at random he barked, “You, you and you. Come with me. Keep up!”
As he marched off in the direction of the lights, Fowler pulled out his gun. He made a new vow to himself not to holster it again until he’d restored order to this godforsaken rock.
Stratum granulosum
The condition of the boy infuriated him. It was a far from perfect specimen. No matter, this one would enrich the stockpot ahead of the main ingredient. He took the lad’s body from the hook where it hung limp and heavy beneath the cold, unkind beams of the work lights, lifted it onto his shoulder and laid it down on the gurney.
Taking a fresh scalpel from the bench, he made the primary incision from the tip of the acromion down, being careful to use the belly of the knife not the tip. His wrist remembered the act from countless times before and gave its signature twist around the umbilicus as he sliced. He wiped the scalpel on his apron and put it aside, picking up the heaviest of his cartilage knives. Time to begin reflecting the tissues. A world of interest on the inside, so much more than the drab outer layers, slave to the tyranny of facial expression and superficial physique. He sawed with the knife, using its weight to help him pull the flesh back from the bone all the way up to and over the boy’s chest. He wiped the knife and reverted to the scalpel. Now it was time to work on the abdomen, taking great care to slice layer by layer so as not to perforate the bowel. The silver kiss of the blade caused new lips to open expectantly in the boy’s belly, which puckered open wetly like a flower. The peritoneum incised, he fingered the orifice, making a V-shape to raise the abdominal wall. Just as thousands of others had before, the organs fell away from the outer surface, crouching back as though they knew they mustn’t be cut. He paused, taking in the saltwater bile stench of the lad’s innards, then opened the abdomen fully. He grabbed the heaviest cartilage knife once more and got to work on the chest, cutting through the sternoclavicular joints then sawing at the costal cartilages. The boy was in good shape, supple and young, easy work. Older cadavers could result in calcified costal cartilages, rigid structures like tombstones an epitaph to the specimen’s age. Cutting and prizing against the posterior surface of the sternum, he lifted away the large elongated pyramid of flesh and bone and placed it in a dish on the workbench. Adjusting the lamp, he peered into the deeper mystery of the chest cavity. He used the huge knife again, cutting close to the spine and then used his free hand as a scoop, dipping it into the thoracic cavity. Stringy adhesions stretched and snapped as he lifted the thoracic organs from out of their gory hole. He piled them up on the boy’s neck then stepped back and admired his handiwork. He had usurped the superficial. He was looking at the boy’s true face.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Time for dessert.”
“There’s dessert?” Marla’s face lit up as her sweet tooth kicked in at the mere mention of something sweet. Yes, the smell and the taste of something sweet would put paid to the bitter aftertaste of that horrible cellar.
Afters, that’s what her adoptive parents had called dessert, or her favorite pudding—both terms betraying their Northern backgrounds. As she listened to Jessie clanking around out of sight in the larder, Marla imagined bowls brimming with apple pie with cream and custard, plate loads of fruitcake, immense trays buckling beneath the weight of crackers and cheeses. The sound of clinking glasses jolted her from her reverie and she stared dumbstruck as Jessie proudly deposited the big bottle of ouzo on the table in front of her.
“Jessie, no way…”
“Dessert,” came the characteristically wicked reply. “You pour.”