Pulling The Dragon's Tail Read Online Free Page B

reality
descended upon him, he realized his plight: stuck in a psychiatric
hospital! How could his simple, straightforward request three days
ago in Dr. Campbell Devereaux’s counseling office—he just wanted to
tell her the truth about her grandfather—how could it lead to
this?
    He recalled Devereaux’s look of chagrin. The
chagrin had turned to doubt. Then, as he shared about the longevity
experiment of her grandfather, Mitchell Hilliard—as succinctly as
he had endlessly rehearsed it— fear enveloped her face. When he
mentioned his true age...an alarm…then handcuffs…a
struggle…then…
    A large presence loomed over him. “Mr.
Kristopher. Tsk. Tsk. Are you going to do this to me every morning?
You’ve been setting off the nursing station alarms with your
nightmares. And then they have to send in the expert to calm you
down. Just relax.” A strong, rough hand gripped his shoulder.
“Reviewing too many Neuro Shock videos, I bet. Or maybe you’ve been
hanging out with Dr. Devastate too long. Devereaux never lets anyone escape from Neuro Shock Therapy. So it’s best you just
accept it.” This booming raspy bass voice belonged to Keagan
Maddox, the most experienced psychiatric technician at the Ellis
Clinic.
    No reassuring demeanor came from Keagan; only
sternly barked, blunt reality. His prominent reddish mustache
twitched expectantly like a cat’s tail. With his powerful hand he
grabbed Nate’s forearm and pinned it against the bed. Deftly,
Keagan reached into his white coat breast pocket and extracted a
small syringe. “More anti-anxiety transdermal for my faavooorite
patient. Getting you all ready for The
Machine.”
     
    * * * * * *
     
    Several hours later, with the medication’s
effects waning, Nate woke up. Panic threatened to engulf him again,
like a boat being tossed to and fro in a storm. Sweat stained his
light blue hospital gown. Heart pounding, he stood up to catch the
breath being squeezed out of him.
    He grabbed an octagonal-shaped puzzle from the
bedside table. A temptation to vent his frustration by throwing it
at the wall crossed his mind. “I’ll never solve it!” he muttered.
The ingenious creation would have exploded into a thousand pieces,
shattering with it all his hopes.
    Pacing around the tiny room, he tried to gather
up the strength to continue. The small three foot square window
permitted a view of the Hudson River from ten stories up. Looking
from the most extreme angle he could just make out the Statue of
Liberty to the south. From there his thoughts soared out over the
Atlantic Ocean, back to the sanctuary he had emerged from just a
week earlier. “Oh, how I wish I’d never left,” he moaned. But now
that harbor of safety seemed a million miles away. Then his
thoughts turned to Wakely. Still keenly feeling her death, he
fought back a wave of tears.
    The forced separation from Dugan was another
sharp psychological blow; one more absurd twist since his arrival
back in the North American Union. With the persuasive power of
psychobiologist Campbell Devereaux and reinforced by the artificial
intelligence known as CLUES, he was diagnosed with psychosis with
delusions of grandeur. Now only one hour separated him from late
twenty-first century medicine’s most effective way to treat mental
illness: the Neuro Shock machine.
    The polite, bemused smiles of the staff had
reinforced the subtle message that he was crazy. Dr. Devereaux had
been more to the point. “Mr. Kristopher. Nobody believes that
you’re ninety-one years old. You have no wrinkles and very quick
reflexes. You’re thirty-five and not a day older. Neuro Shock is
the treatment of choice. It will end this unproductive and
useless delusion, and you’ll be able to get on with the rest of
your life.” She forced a half-smile through gritted teeth before
turning on her heels and walking away. Her Cheshire cat expression
still haunted him.
    Angrily, he muttered, “Keagan was right; she is
Dr. Devastate. Why is it so