Davey heard another switch being flipped, louder this time, and suddenly the inside of the room’s enclosed cubicle became visible. Davey saw a man sitting in a chair, a big man, almost as big as Josh. He couldn’t make out all his features clearly but he did pick out an object he held in his hand.
The black box with the awful red button!
Davey shivered just looking at it, his groin tingling in fearful anticipation. Then he noticed the wires running from the box were indeed the ones spliced into the cubicle from his groin. His balls tingled again.
Who was this man? Why was he holding the black box?
“Davey,” the bald doctor began, “the man in the compartment cannot hear or see you. It’s soundproof and the window is made of one-way glass. He thinks it’s a standard mirror. He’s oblivious to whatever goes on in this room. Do you understand?”
Davey nodded. He noticed the colonel enter his field of vision again and move directly toward the compartment. He pressed a button and spoke into what looked like an intercom attached to its front.
“Can you hear me?”
“Yes.” The man inside had been told only he was going to participate in an experiment to judge the levels of human endurance to pain and tolerance of both the victim and the controller. He had been told his was the controller’s role and the black box in his hand seemed to confirm this. He didn’t give it much thought really, having done a number of strange things for COBRA in the past always at a fair price.
“Turn the knob located near the top to the third position and hold your thumb over the red button.” Chilgers’ eyes sought out Davey’s. “Prepare to press it on my signal.”
“No!” Davey screamed but the word came out muffled.
“Kill the man in the booth, Davey,” the bald doctor instructed. “Kill him with your power before he has a chance to hurt you.”
“I … can’t. You’re making him! It’s you who want to hurt me! …”
“Press it,” Chilgers said into the intercom.
Davey’s head lurched back as far as it could, straining his muscles. His buttocks tried to lift off his chair, stretching the straps. He felt a spasm in his bladder and the terrible warmth of urine trickled down his leg again.
“Turn the knob to the fourth position,” Chilgers told the man in the booth.
“No!” Davey tried to scream again but this time no sound emerged at all.
“Use your power,” the doctor was telling him, “it’s the only thing that can save you from the pain. Aim it at the man in the booth. It’s him that’s hurting you. It’s his thumb on the button.”
Davey bit his lip, thought of aiming The Chill at the colonel but knew it would get him nothing but more pain.
“Slight vibration in energy levels.”
“Alpha waves just popped up. Readings normal again.”
“Vitals on the rise.”
Chilgers found Davey’s eyes again. “Get ready to press,” he said into the intercom.
“Energy levels in state of flux.”
“Alpha waves approaching the red.”
“Energy concentration ratio at eighty-three, eighty-four, eighty-five …”
“Vitals climbing, climbing …”
“Press it,” said Chilgers.
This time Davey’s buttocks succeeded in leaving the chair, yanking the leather restraining his body with them and tearing his breath away with a horrible kick. His groin was in a vise that somebody was tightening. He tried to breathe but all he felt was a racked set of misplaced muscles. There was another brief jolt, like an aftershock, and Davey felt his bowels go loose on him and was barely able to control their contents. The bald doctor leaned over and dabbed a towel to his mouth, wiping away the saliva and dribbling blood. He spit some more out and the doctor wiped that away too. His breath came back, but he couldn’t get enough to satisfy his starved lungs, so the room darkened briefly and something fluttered inside his ears.
“Turn the knob to the fifth position,” he heard Chilgers say into the intercom.
“Stop!” Davey pleaded to the doctor, seeing only half of him. “Help me, please! …”
“I can’t help you, Davey,” Teke said. “Only you can help yourself. Use the power. Stop that man from hurting you.”
“Get ready to press on my signal,” Chilgers went on.
“He wants to hurt you, Davey,” the bald doctor was telling him. “The black box has another seven levels to go and each is much worse than the one before. He’ll go all the way if you let him. Stop him, Davey. Stop him!”
Davey’s eyes bulged. The Chill rose in him.
“Energy levels passing seven.”
“Alpha waves reading all in the red.”
“Vitals rising dangerously fast.”
“Press on my signal,” Chilgers repeated into the intercom.
“Energy concentration ratio at ninety … ninety-one … ninety-two, ninety—”
“Energy levels at seven-point-five …”
“—three … ninety-five … ninety-seven …”
Teke faced the man behind a separate console in the room’s front. “What have you got on brain scan?”
“Significant activity and it’s increasing.”
Inside the booth, the man had begun to shake. Every muscle and joint in his body was affected. His tongue vibrated in and out of his mouth. His eyes bulged wide, locked unblinking.
“Energy levels just passing eight….”
“Energy concentration ratio 100… 101 … 102 …”
Blood frothed at the corners of the man’s mouth, began to seep from his ears. His feet pounded the floor and then kicked hopelessly before him. His hands clawed the air, like a drowning man’s struggling for the surface of the sea. His features went beyond scarlet to purple, his blood seeming to boil.
Davey Phelps stared straight ahead, feeling and hearing nothing, intent on his target. His eyes held a calm, yet intense, glare.
“Energy levels approaching nine …”
“ECR at 105… 106… 107 …”
Chilgers moved his finger from the intercom. “Press it,” was all he said.
Davey Phelps’s eyes jumped.
The black box in the booth ruptured, seeming to explode. The glass of the compartment’s window cracked but didn’t shatter, saving the lab’s occupants from seeing what happened next.
The man’s insides broke apart, lifting him to his feet in a twisted, shriveled way. His flesh contracted, withdrew. Ribs poked at the surface, then jammed their way through skin and clothes as his entire body fought to turn itself inside out. His head exploded and a stream of blood erupted from the top of his skull, painting the remnants of the window and filling the cracks with spent flesh. What was left of the body hung on its feet still writhing for several seconds before tumbling forward to the floor in a misshapen heap.
“Oh my God,” muttered Teke.
Chilgers backed away and, much to his own surprise, covered his eyes.
Davey Phelps felt the pain coming and tried to shut his eyes to it. But it racked him anyway. He felt as if somebody were sticking needles into the backs of his eyeballs, only worse because the pain was everywhere and he couldn’t even raise his hands for futile comfort. His toes twitched, fingers spasmed.
Teke loosened his assistant’s hold on the plastic tube and the emergency dose of the sedative rushed into the boy’s veins.
The pain had become too much. Davey felt his breath going and his life following after. It was over; he knew that, accepted it, welcomed it. Anything to be rid of the pain. Then he felt calm and sure, suddenly relaxed. Breathing easily and drifting away toward oblivion.