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lovemesomerafael · 5 years ago

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Cinderella of Chicago Chapter 4 Part 2 The House

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Part 1 Read it on AO3

Mrs. Forscher, you need to let Brian out of that room.” Meg decided to try reasoning with the hideous old woman. “This is a serious crime you’re committing here, and it’s only a matter of time before Brian’s roommates miss him and send help. They know where we went.”

“Oh, I don’t think so, Meg dear. Remember, my address isn’t in the Craigslist ad. And remember, too, even with my address and directions, you two had a terrible time finding my house.” The woman’s voice was thin and cracked, and her attempt at a kind smile looked more like a threat, given the horrible state of her teeth.

“How could you possibly know that?” Meg shouted, becoming more frustrated by the moment.

“Is it important? I just seem to know things. Now, shall we get this blood drawn so we can begin our work? I’d like to get a baseline level.”

“A baseline level of what?”

“Of the potion Brian is testing for me.”

“What!” Brian shrieked. “I’m not going to take any drug. Forget it!”

“But you’ve already taken it, Brian, my dear. In your tea.”

Both Brian and Meg let out horrified gasps.

“You drugged me?” He cried. “What did you give me?”

“Why, that’s the best part,” the hag answered calmly and proudly. “It’s my own formula. It will make me young and beautiful again. It’s finally ready. I’m about to be free from this grotesque form!” Her eyes glowed maniacally.

“That’s… That’s so many kinds of wrong… You can’t test a drug on a prisoner in your house! You can’t test a drug on a human without a metric crapton of informed consent! And… And… Brian is already young and beautiful!” Meg was pacing and waving her arms in her agitation. “How would you even be able to tell if it’s working?”

“That’s not exactly how it works, dearie. The boy is given the lebkuchen and we wait for it to achieve the right level in his blood.”

“What’s libkoo- whatever you said?”

“Lebkuchen. It’s what I’ve named my potion.”

“Well, how, exactly, does the potion make you young and beautiful if he’s the one who took it?”

“Is it important? That’s just how it works. Now, if you’re done proving to yourself that you don’t have a choice, shall we begin?”

Brian’s voice was low, almost a growl. ”If the drug is in my blood, how does it get into you?”

The huge, ugly woman sighed. “You won’t like it.”

“I already fucking hate all of this, lady! What are you planning to do?” He shouted.

“My boy, I’m afraid I’ll have to have a transfusion of your blood once it’s achieved the right level of the potion.”

“Oh, hell no!” Meg shrieked. “No. If you think I’m going to help you with any of this…”

“Oh, I know you will, dear Meg. But you’ll be all right. Once the project is finished, you can go on your way.”

“I can go on my way? What about Brian?”

“Well… I suppose I could let you take him with you. He’ll be heavy, of course, but you can probably manage.”

“Listen to me, Mrs. Forscher-“

“Granny, please.”

“Mrs. Forscher, I demand that you explain what you mean by that. Why won’t Brian be able to walk out of here? Just how much blood do you need for this project of yours?”

“Why, all of it, of course.” The evil old hag’s creaky, cracked voice was perfectly nonchalant as she announced her intention to kill Brian.

Brian had to sit down. He held his head and groaned. “This can’t be happening.”

Meg had heard enough. With a wordless cry, she ran down the hall, through the parlor, past the front door and began to search for a kitchen. She was going to have to take her chances with a knife, or whatever other weapons she could find. This insane old crone was planning to murder Brian!

The kitchen was as spotless as the rest of the house. As the old woman had said, there were knives there, and Meg chose the largest one she could find. She found a rolling pin as she frantically searched the drawers, and took that with her, as well, as she tore back through the house to the hallway where Brian was imprisoned.

Meg held the knife up, ready to stab down into the horrible hag’s chest. “Don’t make me do this. I don’t want to hurt you. But I won’t let you hurt Brian, and I certainly won’t let you kill him.”

“I understand, my dear,” the old woman wheezed calmly. “Do what you must.”

Meg took a deep breath and screamed as she brought the knife down as hard as she could into the woman’s chest. Except it didn’t go in. It was as though Meg was stabbing stone. The knife made a bit of a hole in the ratty sweater she wore, and a tiny tear in the shapeless dress beneath, but simply stopped there. Again, trying to hurt the woman had hurt Meg’s arm, but the woman did not react at all.

“What the hell are you?”

“I am as you see me, Meg dear. Now, I’m afraid I really must insist that we get the first blood draw done.”

The woman who called herself Granny held out the small metal tray to Meg. “Shall we?”

Meg was so shaken by what had happened that she simply dropped the knife to the floor and took the tray from her. “I won’t hurt Brian,” she whispered weakly.

“Of course not, dearie. It’s just a simple blood draw.”

Brian, still sitting on the floor behind the grate, his head in his hands, asked, “What if we refuse? What if we just won’t do it?”

“That would prolong your stay, of course, but eventually you will help me with my project. It’s why you’re here, dear.”

“Why would we help you, especially if it means you’re going to kill me?” Incredulous, Brian rattled the grate in his frustration.

“You must eat, of course. And drink.”

“And you’ll just put more of this shit in my food or drink, right?”

“Of course, dear boy.” The harridan’s thin, cracked voice only made the hellish things she said more terrifying.

Brian looked down again, clutching handfuls of his hair.

“Don’t even think about it, Brian. We’ll figure something out. I’m not helping this bitch kill you. It’s not happening.”

“Just… for now… maybe we should go along.”

“No!”

“Meg, it’s not like I haven’t had blood drawn before. It’s no big deal. There’s not a chance in hell we’re doing any fatal transfusions, but let’s just go along for now. C’mon.”

He held his arm out through the grate. For a long time, Meg just stood, holding the little metal tray, but didn’t move.

“Just do it, Meg. It’s OK,” he said tenderly.

They looked into one another’s eyes as she knelt in front of him, setting the tray on the floor. “I’m not going to hurt you,” Meg said shakily.

“I know. We’ll figure it out.” Brian tried to smile reassuringly as Meg expertly tied the rubber tourniquet around his forearm.

“At least you have great veins,” she sighed.

“You say that to all the guys.”

It took Meg less than a minute to fill the small vial on the tray with Brian’s blood. She put the small bandage on where she’d punctured his skin and kissed it. As she did, a tear fell from her eye onto his arm.

“Don’t cry, sweetie. We’ll be OK. Promise.” Brian smiled as best he could and squeezed Meg’s hand.

“We will.” It was a vow.

Meg stood and handed the tray, with the now-full vial, to the crone and snarled, “Now what?”

“Now we take this to the laboratory. Follow me.”

The woman shuffled down the hall and Meg followed, sending a backward look to Brian just before going into the parlor. He blew her a kiss, but his eyes were troubled.

The laboratory was, naturally, in the cellar of the dark, creepy house. The worn, splintered stairs emitted a chorus of squeaks and pops as the old woman and Meg descended, and after the dim gloom of the house, Meg was stunned to see that the cellar was brightly lit with fluorescent fixtures hung from the ceiling. There was a long, L-shaped counter with shelves underneath, and modern electronic equipment for doing all sorts of blood analysis lined the surface. Where had she gotten all this? What did she do down here? Beside a centrifuge was an assortment of beakers, flasks, and other glassware, with frames for supporting it over one of the several Bunsen burners. The laboratory was clearly the source of the slight chemical smell in the house. This was insane.

As strange and surprising as its presence was, the laboratory equipment wasn’t the most troubling item in the cellar. That was the medical exam table, complete with several sets of leather straps, just beyond the counter full of equipment. Meg felt a wave of nausea. The table was as clean as everything else in the creepy house, but there were a few nicks in the shiny black padding, and more than one deep crease in the leather straps - clear marks of having been used.

Meg tried to listen as the woman showed her how to use the centrifuge, and then to prepare the plasma for analysis. There was a small, odd-looking machine that appeared to have been taken apart and re-assembled slightly differently than originally intended, or perhaps made by combining two or more other machines. Once a small amount of the plasma was placed in a tube and inserted in the machine, it was a simple matter of pushing a button and waiting until a number appeared in green LED on the readout panel.

“Hmmm. Forty-three,” Granny said, seemingly to herself. “Interesting.”

“What’s that mean?”

“It’s simply a baseline. Now we wait. We’ll re-check in one hour. Would you like some more tea?”

“You gotta be kidding.”

“No, dear. I enjoy tea. I think I’ll have a cup. You’re welcome to explore down here if you like, or go sit with Brian. Whatever you’d like. I’ll be in the parlor.” The old woman smiled her ugly smile and turned, making her way slowly back up the stairs.

Meg looked over the counter and on all of the shelves, into a metal cabinet against a wall, and in every drawer of a short storage unit next to the cabinet. There was an abundance of blood-drawing equipment: needles of various sizes, vials, alcohol wipes, rubber tourniquets, tubing, and collection bags like those used in blood banks. Meg shivered with disgust. But she also got an idea. Grateful that she was wearing a sweatshirt, she hastily zipped it halfway and stuffed some vials and other items inside.

Brian paced the room, looking out the oddly thick windows and trying to think of a way out of this. His cell phone had no reception anywhere in the room, no matter what he tried. He heard the soft click of china in the parlor, but no voices. He knew Granny was in there, because he’d heard her heavy tread and the grunts of effort she made as she sat. He wondered what Meg was doing.

The evil hag grinned horribly as Meg entered the parlor. “Have you decided to have some tea with me, Meg dear?”

“No, thank you, Granny,” Meg said, sitting on the overstuffed couch again. “But I did want to talk to you. To ask you to please reconsider. This is not right. Brian is young, and he’s a firefighter. He helps people, Granny. He’s a good man. And he has a family who loves him. Please don’t hurt him. Please.”

“That’s very sweet of you. It’s nice that he has such a good friend to care for him.”

“Will you please reconsider?”

“I’m afraid not, dearie. Scone?”

Meg sighed and fought the tears of fear and frustration that threatened. “No, thank you. I think I’d like to go sit with Brian. May I go into the room with him?”

“I’m sorry. But you can talk just fine through the bars.” Her creaky voice sounded as though she was speaking of nothing more than using regular plates rather than the good china. “Go see him. That’ll be nice for him.” Again the hideous smile.

Meg stood carefully, holding her arms close to her body, then left the parlor. She found Brian carefully examining the grate keeping him captive in the room. “Anything?”

“These bars are solid. Who the hell installs something like this?” He angrily shook the grate.

“She may have done it herself. She’s got a full-on lab in the cellar. At this point, I wouldn’t put anything past her. Who is she? What is she?”

“No idea,” Brian shrugged, sitting on the floor on the other side of the grate from Meg had settled.

She looked back toward the parlor and, seeing and hearing no sign of Granny, quickly unzipped her sweatshirt and shoved the blood draw supplies through the grate. “Quick, hide these somewhere, but somewhere close,” she whispered.

Brian took the supplies and tucked them behind the open door, where they were out of sight but handy.

“What are we gonna do?” He whispered.

Meg had kept one set of equipment, and positioned the items so that they were hidden unless the old woman stood right next to her. “Give me your arm. I need to draw another vial. I have a plan.”

Brian stuck his arm through the grate without hesitation, and Meg drew a vial of blood as quickly as she could, stuffing it into a pocket of her sweatshirt.

“OK, get rid of this stuff,” she said, pushing the used items through the grate. Brian stuffed them behind a row of books in the nearby bookshelf.

For the next hour, Brian and Meg sat on the floor together, quietly talking. Meg whispered her plan to him, and when Granny didn’t appear right away, they drew another vial of his blood before the hour was up. Brian hid the vial with the rest of their secret supplies behind the door. For the rest of the time, they tried to keep each other’s spirits up as best they could, making feeble jokes and talking about pleasant things. With a confidence they didn’t really feel, they made a date to go to the next Adler After Dark event at the planetarium. They didn’t even care what the program would be; they knew it was always their kind of event and they’d have fun no matter what, because they’d be together.

“And afterwards,” Meg said, squeezing Brian’s hand, “we can go to my apartment and have RumChata and make out.”

“I’d like that,” he replied, giving her the best smolder he could under the circumstances. “And maybe if I let you win at BattleGround Jupiter, I’ll get lucky with the ruler of Jupiter and all its moons.”

“I think that’s a distinct probability,” Meg told him, looking into his eyes.

“That does it. We’re getting out of here.”

At exactly the one-hour mark, the crone shuffled into the hall, making a short trip into the other room to retrieve the little metal tray before bringing it, complete with fresh supplies, to Meg. She stood, saying nothing, as Meg drew another vial of blood from Brian. Again Meg kissed the bandage when she was done, feeling terrible about being any part of this horror. Brian gave her an encouraging grin and actually found the courage to wink. “It’s OK, sweetie.”

Meg smiled sadly and stood up. “Should I put this in that room?” She asked, holding up the little tray.

“Oh, thank you, dearie. That would be lovely.”

Meg put the tray on a small dresser in the room that was covered with boxes of supplies, including a container for used needles, into which she dropped the needle. Then she re-entered the hall, blood vial in hand, to follow the hideous old woman back down into the cellar. Behind the hag, she pocketed the fresh blood and replaced it in her hand with one of the vials she’d secretly drawn earlier.

“Forty-four?” The hag frowned grotesquely as the machine in the lab lit up with the result of this sample. “That’s not good.”

“It isn’t? What’s wrong?”

“I was hoping the level would be at least sixty by now. At this rate… I don’t know. We’ll have to see.”

“Granny, this potion, is it dangerous? I mean, will it hurt Brian?”

“Oh, no dear. Of course, it’s all a bit academic, really, since I’ll have to sacrifice him in order to get the full transfusion. But the potion wouldn’t hurt him. Make him age a bit more slowly, be handsomer, I suppose. But it wouldn’t harm him. It’s unfortunate, really.”

“Yes. Unfortunate.” If Meg hadn’t known it would be useless, she would have whacked the miserable old witch with the biggest flask on the counter.

It was full dark now. There were old-fashioned lamps with glass shades on many tables throughout the house but, even with them lit, the house was still gloomy and spooky. Brian and Meg continued to sit together on either side of the grate. Granny had said that the next blood draw was two hours from the last one, so Meg and Brian had time to draw another two secret vials of blood for Brian to hide in the room where he was being kept.

Each vial was small, so the total amount of blood she’d drawn from Brian was much smaller than would be taken, for example, when a person donates a unit of blood, but Meg was concerned about the vile old woman seeing too many puncture marks on Brian’s arms. Fortunately, he was wearing a long-sleeved flannel shirt. Since the hag allowed her to explore the laboratory all she wanted, Meg had drawn a vial of her own blood, no easy task, and tried it in the machine, thinking that might be a way to fool the crone into thinking her potion hadn’t worked. But the ugly old woman’s adjusting and fiddling with buttons and dials on the machine when she first showed it to Meg must have been to calibrate it somehow to Brian’s blood. When Meg put her own in it, the screen showed an error message. So much for that idea.

Three more times through the night, the hideous hag made Meg draw Brian’s blood, and Meg went through the same steps to substitute an earlier vial for the fresh one. The crone was becoming very concerned and agitated.

“It’s not working as well as I’d hoped. The level just isn’t rising as I planned. This is very disappointing.”

“Maybe Brian’s just not a good… subject, or whatever. Maybe you should let us go and you can try again.”

“No, I won’t be able to do that,” she said in a wheezy tone of regret, but didn’t explain why. Meg didn’t bother to ask. It had been a longshot, anyway.

The hag tried to get Brian to lie on the daybed in his prison and sleep, and offered Meg a bedroom upstairs, but both refused. “We’re staying together,” Brian said with finality.

The old woman shrugged and went back down the hall, apparently to her own bed, reappearing at intervals for new blood samples. Meg and Brian leaned against one another, the grate between them, holding hands and giving each other what comfort they could through the seemingly endless night. Neither slept, although they may have dozed from time to time.

The next morning, the horrible old woman made Meg draw another blood sample. Meg again switched the fresh one for an older vial. They could keep the ruse up indefinitely, because Meg would give Brian the fresh sample whenever she could return to him after testing. It would give them more time, but eventually the drug, whatever it was, would reach the blood level the evil hag wanted. Meg soon learned that wasn’t how it was going to go.

When Meg tested the morning’s sample, the crone scowled in frustration at the low result, but said, “Well, it can’t be helped. The time is up. It will have to be enough.”

“Wait, what? I thought you needed a certain blood level!”

“Yes, dear, I would have liked a much better result. But there is a window of effectiveness for the lebkuchen, you see, and it’s about to close. It’s time.”

“NO!” Meg cried, grabbing the woman’s arms. “Please! You can’t hurt Brian! I won’t let you!”

“I know, dearie, this is all terribly upsetting,” the old harridan creakily said, patting Meg with a gnarled hand. “Now. Let me show you how these straps work. Brian is a nice boy, but we can’t expect him to help with this part of the project, now, can we?”

Meg began to cry. “I won’t help you kill him. I won’t.”

“Of course not, Meg dear. You’ll just help me with the straps and then you can go.”

“No! I won’t! This is where it ends, you witch! You can’t do it without me, and I won’t help.”

“I would prefer not to do it without you, it’s true. And Brian would prefer that. I will if I must. That would be unfortunate, however.” Her thin, wavery voice actually sounded almost sad.

“What do you mean, Brian would prefer it? He’d prefer not to die, lady.”

“Of course he would. But if he must, he’d prefer to do it gently, rather than taking a more difficult route.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Meg was crying and shrieking in her anguish.

“I am very strong for my age, as you know. So I can help Brian down to the laboratory and onto the table, but you see, dearie, I can’t both keep him there and attach the straps if he’s fighting me.”

“Well, that sucks for you, but I’m sure the hell not going to help you murder him!”

“So if I must do it all myself, Brian will need to be unable to fight me.”

Suddenly, Meg understood the threat. “So you’re saying… you’ll kill him first and then drain all his blood?”

“I’m afraid that’s my only alternative. Which would be much more difficult for him than to simply fall asleep during the transfusion.”

“Pass out from blood loss, you mean, and then die!”

“Yes, dear. Which is much nicer for him than the alternative.”

“Which is?”

“Is it important? Just know that what I would have to do would be… unpleasant for him.”

In that moment, Meg knew what she must do. She couldn’t stop the tears that flowed down her cheeks, or the occasional sob of terror. But she tried to calm herself as best she could. “All right, tell me about the fucking straps, you evil bitch!”

Meg struggled and fumbled with the many straps on the exam table. Try as she might, she kept repeating that she could not figure out how to work them.

“Well, it doesn’t work the same when there’s nothing inside! These work with pressure. I can’t…” She purposely inserted the end of the strap incorrectly into the buckle again.

It took quite a while, but eventually Meg was able to wear through the terrible old hag’s infuriating, oily patience. The old crone began to be short with Meg, showing her for what seemed like the hundredth time how to fasten the straps. Meg continued to do it wrong, and to express confusion about how they worked.

This was not in the plan. First the potion didn’t work as it should have, which meant that the result was not going to be what she’d hoped and she would probably have to concoct the potion all over again, and then find a new boy and girl to help her. It was all very vexing. And now this girl was proving completely useless at fastening the restraints.

“I can’t understand it – I can’t do it – without something inside!” Meg wailed. “It just doesn’t make sense to me! I don’t see how the limb would go in…”

Finally, the terrible old harridan reached her limit with Meg’s incompetence. Her wheezy, creaky voice rose to a thin howl as she snapped, “Oh, you stupid, stupid girl! Here! I will lie on the table and I will tell you how to do each step as you go. Now, help me up.”

Meg, still crying, did the best she could to assist the very large woman to awkwardly, with much grunting and groaning, climb onto the exam table and lie down. Then, the ugly witch talked Meg through fastening each restraint, one by one. She was happy to see that the ridiculous girl was finally catching on. With careful instruction, strap by strap, she was at last seeing Meg begin to understand as she worked the buckles. With a sigh, the horrible old woman talked Meg through the last restraint.

And realized, too late, that she’d been tricked.

Meg tore the chain from around the crone’s neck, palmed the key, and ran up the stairs, having no idea whether the old woman would remain strapped down. She threw the cellar door closed, having seen earlier that it was made of thick, shiny metal, with a wide bolt on the outside. Meg assumed it was meant to imprison the witch’s victims in the cellar when necessary. She hoped it would imprison the witch, at least long enough for her and Brian to escape.

She slammed the bolt home and rushed through the dim rooms of the house to the hallway, and used the key to unlock the grate, freeing Brian.

“I hope the key opens the front doors,” Brian cried as they ran pell-mell down the hall, through the parlor, and to the door.

They key worked. Brian and Meg ran as fast as they could to his car, locking the doors as soon as they were inside. As Brian sped down the driveway, Meg looked back at the house to see the hideous old woman emerge through the front doors, shaking a fist in the air and screaming in rage.

Fear and desperation drove them to try everything they could to find their way out of the neighborhood. They didn’t know whether, at any moment, the horrible woman would come careening around a corner in the vintage Batmobile to recapture them.

“I’m trying Siri,” Meg announced, taking Brian’s phone from the dash. “Maybe we’ll catch a break.”

They did. For whatever reason, Siri guided them, straight and true, out of the lush neighborhood of estates and mansions and back to the real world. Their first stop was District 21 headquarters, where they reported what happened to a room full of wildly skeptical detectives. Sergeant Voight laughed out loud. The detectives looked their disbelief at one another. But Sergeant Platt, who had escorted them up to the bullpen and then stayed to hear the incredible story, wasn’t so sure.

“Hank, I don’t think they’re making it up.”

“We’re not!” Brian cried, holding up his phone with the Craigslist ad on the screen. “I showed you the texts. You see the needle marks.”

“All right, all right,” Voight said, holding up a hand. “We’ll check it out.”

“Don’t go alone. Take the whole team. And big guns. This woman… she’s unbelievably strong, and she’s… there’s… I wonder if bullets will even work on her,” Meg said, addressing this last comment to Brian.

“Come on, Otis, that’s-“

Brian cut Adam Ruzek off. “You weren’t there. You’ll believe us when you see her.”

Having filled out at least a hundred forms and given formal statements, Brian and Meg headed home. The witch was the Intelligence Unit’s problem now. They were both exhausted. When they reached Brian’s car, they decided to prioritize the plan they’d made when they were imprisoned in the witch’s creepy house. Although they hadn’t yet gone on their planetarium date, they would go to Meg’s apartment, have RumChata and make out.

Brian had offered to let Meg win at BattleGround Jupiter, but she was having none of it. “We’ll play for real. And this time, we’ll up the stakes even more than last time.”

“What’s better than kissing the ruler of Jupiter and all its moons?” Brian raised an eyebrow, with a very intrigued grin.

“I’m glad you asked, young Paduan,” Meg laughed. “Getting lucky. Getting lucky with the ruler of Jupiter and all its moons.”

#chicago fire #brian otis zvonecek #Brian Zvonecek #Otis #yuri sardarov

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