The Fallen - Ch.001 [In Bad Shape]

The Fallen

Chapter I - In Bad Shape

Reann walked through the wooden doors and up to the desk in the middle of the hallway. A portly-looking woman was on the phone, chatting away to one of her friends no doubt, while sitting behind the desk typing out some memo. Reann walked up to her and gave her most pleasant smile, although she was disgusted by the way the woman kept her appearance. She, on the other hand, held up a ‘please wait’ finger to Reann, thinking that the discussion on whether or not that celebrity in the newspaper actually did whatever he did was far more fascinating than whatever Reann had journeyed 30 miles to this place for.

Not in the mood for waiting, Reann decided to take an immediate left down the hallway to find someone more helpful. Coming to a set of stairs, she decided to climb them to look if the place was actually occupied by any other than the ‘desk potato’ at the entrance. Just her luck, a man was walking past in a lab coat with a clipboard in his hand. She cleared her throat, at which the man stopped and turned to notice her, his face brightening as a gazed at her and he walked up to her with his hand outstretched.

“You must be Reann. I trust that our secretary was more than hospitable?”

“Yes, I am Reann. And how did you know about that woman?”

“She is slightly racist and not exactly a jolly person, although we keep her as she does her job relatively well. The fact is that not many people would enjoy working in a place like this.”

“Fair enough. I trust that he’s ready to receive visitors?” Reann did a slight flutter of her eyelids as she mentioned this, causing the man’s eyes to widen slightly and force him to cough slightly.

“Yes, he is ready. If you would just walk with me to his room?”

As Reann walked down the hallway, the doctor, Earl, talked about the man she was about to visit. Apparently since his revival he has become extremely aggressive, so they have had to keep him constricted and he also isn’t entirely lucid, sometimes having no idea who or where he is. Great, thought Reann, just the thing I needed: a maniac.

They had arrived at his room, more like a cell with the steel door and safety glass window, and Earl was about to open the door when he stopped.

“One last thing; if he’s awake, which he probably is, don’t try to get to close or hostile. He almost ripped the face off one of our staff last week when he started asking questions about why he was there. What I mean to say is that even though his hands and feet are tied, he can still bite.”

Earl threw a switch at the left of the door and swung the door open slowly. Reann stepped inside to an austere room, bare except for a single mattress. On that mattress lay the man she had come here for; heavily bandaged and lying on his side, facing away from her. She looked back at Earl with a questioning look. He just shrugged his shoulders.

“He was in that state when he arrived. We have had to change the bandages a few times and give him some blood packs, as he started to bleed heavily if he was moved the wrong way. I haven’t seen him myself yet but some of the other staff tell me that it’s a miracle he’s still alive...”

There was a rattling noise behind her which caused Earl to take a step back, his eyes wide in shock. Reann slowly turned around to see the man standing in front of her, not two inches from her face. He was wearing a bandage around his head which covered his right eye and forehead. He didn’t move though, he just stared at her as if waiting for her to say something. Reann managed a barely audible ‘Hello, I’m Reann’.

He just squinted slightly, possibly giving a sign of anger. She repeated herself, slightly louder, and asked him who he was. He turned around and walked up to the padded wall, reaching up and ripping one of the buttons off.

“Sergeant Tykor Wulfen. Serial Number 71984623”

He then placed the button in his mouth but didn’t swallow. Instead, he walked back to Reann as far as his chains would let him and spat the button at Earl, hitting him in the eye. Earl put his hand over his eye and muttered something about him being needed somewhere else before rushing off. Tykor just smiled and went back to his bed, trying to find a good position to sit down. Once he had, he looked up at Reann waiting for her to speak. When Reann couldn’t think of anything to say, Tykor asked her something.

“So what do you want? Here to determine whether or not I’m insane? Or are you just here to admire the sight of a broken and beaten man?”

“My employers want to know if you would accept a proposition of theirs.”

“You honestly expect… that I would accept some idiotic proposition…”

Tykor stood up again and walked towards Reann, making her buckle slightly in fear.

“… when I am tied up and haven’t had a decent meal for… for… what date is it today?”

“What?… Oh it’s Thursday, the 23rd of June 2005.”
“¡Puta de mierda! I’ve been in this shithole for at least a month, fucking pendejos…”

Tykor shook his head slightly and put his hand up to his face, feeling his bandages before slumping it back down again.

“Anyway, I want a decent meal before any such ‘talks’ and a nice cigar, some whiskey, a shave, some new clothes,…”

“Shouldn’t you take it easy? You are still in pretty bad shape, even though it’s been a month…”

“Lady, I have a PhD in Medicine and I’m also a fully qualified Surgeon. I think I know what I can and can’t do. And also, I’ll provide the cigars as I know a guy who has just what I need.”

“But…”

“You get me out of this shithole and then you can start asking questions. Until then, you’ll get nothing from me.”

Reann exited the room and walked down the hall, before bumping into Earl again. When he asked what she thought about him, she replied that he seemed sane enough and would sign the release forms. Earl argued that he was clearly insane and stated that he couldn’t be moved without authority from a government official anyway. He quickly changed his mind when she presented her CIA ID badge and he walked her to the head office.

Earl offered Reann some coffee but she politely declined, stating that she didn’t mix business with pleasure. As he was searching for the release forms, Reann had a look around his office. There was a large notice board made of cork on one of the walls, which had numerous documents and images.

Tykor’s profile was on the wall, along with some images of him before and after his arrival at this place. The before image of him was pleasant, showing him with a group of soldiers with him at the front, enjoying himself and having a laugh. Reann smiled to herself, somehow happy at the sight of him being happy.

The after image was slightly sickening. It showed Tykor in what looked like an operation room. His torso was covered with round bruises and entry wounds, as well as some scratches. His face was bloody, his right eye partially hanging out of its socket and in some places his bones were showing.

“An awful sight, isn’t it?” Earl had noticed her staring at the pictures “We’re not sure what happened to him or even who did this to him. Every time we try to ask him, he gets aggressive and tries to attack us. The government isn’t much help either, because as far as they are concerned, or should I say the computers, Tykor doesn’t even exist except in one place where his military number checks out. But even that wouldn’t give any specific details. Ah! Here they are.”

Earl had found the release forms in his ridiculous filing cabinet and had placed it on his desk; he sat down and started to fill in all the information necessary. Reann gave him her ID badge number and a little bribe of $500 to make sure he’d keep his mouth shut, although she called it a ‘reward for good citizenship’. Earl of course accepted it, quickly pocketing it in case anyone should walk in. He pushed the form towards Reann asking her for her signature, which she gave and signified that Tykor currently belonged to the government but for the moment he was hers.

Reann had taken Tykor back to her apartment; after having stopped at the hospital to pick up some surgical equipment, an expensive clothes store to buy a good suit (the government was paying, not her), a small market to buy an electric razor and good whiskey, a butchers to pick up some meat for dinner and a cigar store.

As soon as they had arrived, Tykor asked where the bathroom was and started to strip off. Reann blushed slightly and pointed him to her bathroom which he headed towards, still covered in bandages. When he had disappeared from view, Reann started to prepare dinner when she heard him calling for her to bring the surgical kit and the cigars.

“If you don’t like the sight of blood, I would suggest you get back to whatever you were doing. Otherwise, you could help me with the mirror as I need to correct a few things those idiota surgeons did to me.”

With the kit opened, Tykor took out a small bottle of morphine and a needle. He explained that he was going to have to cut away parts of his flesh since some of it had began to fester due to poor suturing, and that he needs to inject the morphine straight into the area affected to get rid of most of the pain. The cigar, which contains hashish, was to be taken afterwards to help dull the pain. The areas were he was about to operate on were slightly green and were indeed just parts of his flesh sown together to look as if it had been burned shut. Since Reann was a desk jockey, she decided to give him her biggest mirror and not stick around for the show.

The meat Reann had bought was Reticulated Python, which Tykor had spotted and said that it was ‘good eating’ if it was grilled or barbequed. She got out some rice, fresh vegetables and good spices to go with the snake. Once she had gotten the food on the go, she decided to take a quick peek at how Tykor was faring.

The once circular messes of rotting flesh had been replaced with neat, straight sutured lines on his torso. Most of his bandages had been thrown in the sink, covered in blood, as well as some foul smelling bits of flesh. He was now looking at his head wounds, fingering them to see if they were okay with a cigar in his mouth. There was a vertical scar running down his right eye area, the eye itself badly damaged and bloodshot. Tykor looked at Reann, with a look of pain and his face very pale compared to its regular tanned hue.

“I stole a blood pack from the hospital with my blood type. Could you be a doll and hook me up with one before I faint?”

Reann took one of the blood packs and attached surgical tubing to its base, while Tykor inserted the other end into his right arm and then took the pack with his left, holding it high. She just noticed that he was left-handed, when she remembered he almost never used his right. She also noticed that the palm of his right hand had some burn marks, before she remembered dinner and decided to return to the kitchen.

Once some colour had returned to his face, Tykor got up and started to clean around the sink. He then took a shower, shaved himself a Ronin beard, put on some new bandages and then tried on his new suit, liking the feel immensely of the fabric against his skin. He walked out of the bathroom feeling refreshed and carefree, thanks to the hashish. Reann noticed that he looked quite handsome and normal, if it weren’t for the fact that he was wearing a make-shift eye-patch out of bandages.

Tykor ate slowly, sometimes fumbling with his cutlery as his hands had trouble gripping them. Reann ate in silence, with the radio spouting out the news, and watched Tykor with curiosity. She noted that he was right; the Python did taste good grilled, almost good enough to be eaten on its own. Once he had finished with his dinner, Reann decided that now was the time to start asking questions.

“Now can I start asking you questions?”

“Claro cariño, I’m not going to stop you.”

“What part of the military do you operate in?”

“I was a Sergeant of the Special Forces, Shadow Corps Division. Officially I don’t even exist and thanks to a mission that was fucked up, I no longer belong to them. My whole team was wiped out, but I don’t remember how I survived or who rescued me.”

“The burn marks on your hand?”

“Oh yeah, we were given some new equipment to test out on the field. I was given a prototype XM8 that was made out of plastic to keep it light. After I had emptied a couple of magazines, the fucking grip started to melt. Won’t be using that again anytime soon.”

“Well, I have an offer for you from the government: they will keep you in the military under the condition that you accept to be part in one of their military experiments in Nevada.”

“Are you talking about Area 51?”

“I’m not sure; I’ve only been told that it’s in Nevada. To be honest, I’m not even sure why they sent me to ask you…”

“Can I have a few days to think about it? I’ll need a place to stay and I don’t have any money…”

“Don’t even think about trying anything funny…”

“Bella, I’m low on blood, energy and haven’t done any exercise for over a month. I couldn’t even if I wanted to, sorry to disappoint you.”

Reann had agreed to let him stay for a few weeks, since she had two other ‘clients’ to visit and could get her job done while Tykor was recovering. During her absence he started doing his exercises again, starting off with running for a few days and then doing push and press-ups. Within ten days he had gained back a pound of muscle, and had taken on a much healthier hue than his previous pale demeanour.

His eating habits had returned to normal, now able to finish a full meal with room left over. He cleaned the rest of his wounds up especially that of his eye which he managed to stop from swelling due to an infection, and although he couldn’t see very well out of it, it was a definite improvement over half-blindness.

He had also found one of Reann’s pistols, hiding away in one of her closets. He spent his time taking the pistol apart and cleaning it, whilst listening to the radio for any important news he might have missed. Apparently during one of the sniper competitions the favourite to win was caught with drugs, and upon investigation at his home the police had found enough cocaine to sentence him to a maximum security prison.