The guard hit the buzzer. The tall man entered the hospital office: white walls, desk and metal detector. He didn’t wear his leather pants, as Hela had asked. No, this man who faced the metal detector, now wore a baseball cap and corduroys. Somebody’s uncle. A brother. A neighbor. Familiarity’s mascot.
The guard sat behind the desk, hardly looking up from her food as the glass door shut behind the man. She scooped out the insides of her taco with a plastic fork, as if performing some sort of taxidermy, then shoveled the gut-heap of beef and cheese into her mouth.
“Excuse me, sir.” Hela’s master said.
“Sir!?” The guard clamped her hands where her hips should have been. Hela’s master discovered the guard had breasts.
“Pardon me.” He said and curled his lips into a smile, which had never ceased to juice a pair of female panties. “I am here to visit a friend of mine.”
“What unit?” the guard asked, softened by the creamy tenor of his voice.
“D North.”
“Mnh.” The guard flicked a fragment of lettuce from her sparse, red mustache and rose to her feet. “You’ll need to fill out some papers, but first, step through here.”
She positioned herself on the other side of the metal detector. Her squinty brown eyes darting into Hela’s master’s watery, blue ones. Only this plastic rectangle, this hermaphroditic creature in a poo-brown uniform separated Master from Hela. And he would allow no obstructions.
Fluidly, with no words, his hand rose to the guard’s stubble-dotted neck. He closed his thumb and forefingers on her trachea, pressed down firmly, feeling the muscles pump for air beneath his digits, watching the guard’s eyes bulge, then flutter shut.
She fell gently, almost gracefully, onto the dusty tile floor and landed on her side. “Not dead, just fainted.” Hela’s master thought as he stepped around the metal detector.
“’Scuse me, sir?” a guard asked in the hall. “Where you tryin’ to get to?”
“D North.” Hela’s master replied.
“Oh, down there.” The guard pointed over his shoulder, down the blank, white hall with his thumb. “This place is like a maze n’nt it?”
“Yep.”
“Tha’way, all the crazies can’t escape. Heh heh.”
“Wouldn’t want that.” Hela’s master said and started to walk again. Something cold knocked his leg from the inside of his biker boot with each step.
The guard continued down the hall in the opposite direction, toward the office. Both their footsteps clicked and echoed in the empty hallway like a leaky faucet.
Master knew he had about 2 minutes.
“Hela, you have a visitor.”
“Me?”
“Yeah, you Snow White. It’s your prince here to wake you up.” Nurse Jean led Hela down the yellow hallway, into the eating area where her master was seated at one of the sticky, round tables. Something bright and alive to mock the dull, worn walls. Hela shrieked and ran toward him, leapt and landed on his lap, nearly knocking him from the chair.
“No touching!” Nurse Jean yelled and rubbed her baggy eyes.
“You heard her.” Hela’s master said sternly.
“But..but..” Hela began. Her master winked. Hela smiled and nodded, knowing this was not the time to misbehave. Nurse Jean waddled out of earshot.
“Hello little sister.” Master crooned.
“Is that what you told them?” Hela slid into a seat across the table from her Master.
“I couldn’t exactly tell them the truth…”
“Yeah. So what’s with the funny get-up? Where’s the gun and the leather pants?” Hela giggled.
Master lowered his tone, “In my boot. And I thought it would be too conspicuous.”
Hela’s face wiped blank, her eyes steamed up like greenhouse windows, her nipples puckered with waves of thrill. “Which one?”
“Tiger stripes.”
Hela pictured her master’s tiger-striped desert eagle .50 wedged beneath the shiny buckle of his boot. “Goodie! That’s my favorite one!”
“Now get to the door and get ready to run.”
