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of the dark
hallway, something heavy connected with his forehead. He crumpled
like a bag of bricks and the world went black.

    ***

    W hen Geoffrey awoke, his head was pounding even harder than
before. His throat was so dry it practically begged him to find a
drop of water. He reached up to rub the throbbing knot on his
forehead, but his arms wouldn’t budge. He lifted his heavy eyes and
took in his surroundings. The same dank, musty smell as before.
Sunlight tried in vain to reach through the room’s only window, but
it was covered in layers of newspaper. In fact, as Geoffrey scanned
the room, there were newspapers covering every wall of the room.
Every single inch of wall space covered in black and white print.
One particular headline on the wall above him grabbed his
attention. Circled in red was the bold, black title:

    “ THE SURGEON STRIKES
AGAIN”

    Geoffrey tried again to lift his arms but
they wouldn’t budge. He lifted his head and was horrified to find
all four limbs had been tied down; restraining him tightly to the
hospital bed in which he laid.

    “Comfortable, Mr. Winters?” asked a soft
voice. Geoffrey turned his head to find the old man standing behind
his head, with two younger men standing next to him. He wore blue
surgical scrubs and latex gloves. He was staring down at objects on
a metal tray and picked one of them up. Geoffrey’s heart skipped a
beat – the old man had grabbed a small scalpel.

    “You know, I was a young hot shot like you
once,” said the old man while he closely inspected the scalpel.
“Best young surgeon in the city. But I caught a bad case of myopia.
Not as bad as yours, mind you, but bad enough that I lost sight of
who I was. Oh, I thought I was God for a period of time.”

    He chuckled to himself, his eyes distant in
memory. “But the good Lord sent me a wake-up call – brought me back
down to reality you might say. Bess and I got pregnant with our
first child - a baby boy we named Chuckie. All was right with the
world. But Chuckie was born with a defective heart, a condition he
could not overcome.”

    A single tear streamed from the old man’s
eyes, and he wiped it away with the sleeve of his scrubs as he
rounded the bed to Geoffrey’s side.

    “Let’s just say I tried to take things into
my own hands – I was God after all. Well, the medical community
frowns upon its doctors taking things into their own hands, and my
license was revoked. After that, things were never the same for me.
I could never find a replacement for the thrill of surgery - the
power that comes with holding another man’s life in one’s hands.
Oh, we’ve eked out a meager living and I’ve raised a happy,
wonderful family. For that, I am grateful. But there’s nothing
quite like surgery.”

    He nodded to one of the men, who dabbed a
reddish-yellow liquid over Geoffrey’s abdomen.

    “Like I mentioned last night in the bar, my
grandson needs a new kidney. I’ve extracted the kidneys of nine men
now, and I’ve not yet found just the right one,” he said, pointing
to the wall with his nose.

    Geoffrey looked at the wall in the direction
the old man had pointed. He found a headline that seemed to shout
its message:

    “THE SURGEON SLAYS HIS
NINTH VICTIM : BODY
FOUND IN FIELD .”

    The realization of what was about to happen
came over Geoffrey like a great tidal wave. It crushed him with
such terrifying power that all he could think to do was to scream.
He unleashed a primal, gut-wrenching shriek that no one outside of
that house of horrors would ever hear. The old man’s deeply
wrinkled brow furled in aggravation. He reached his latex-gloved
hands into his pocket and retrieved a wrinkled ten-dollar bill. He
held it, stretched tightly, in front of Geoffrey’s face.

    He smiled politely and, for the first time
since they’d been in the bar, the old man’s kind, timid personality
returned.

    “Thank you so much for the tip, Mr. Winters.
I promise I’ll put it to good use.”

    He