Category : Stories

Sub Category : Adventure

Chapter Five: Welcome to The Industry, Kid

A few hours later...

Maraellus sat in his hotel room, flashing lights from the neon sign of the bar just across the parking lot gave shadows of people walking about. The eastern side was a paradise and safe haven from the busy life: an easier life for one if they wanted to keep a low profile in the regions close to town but still wanted their own privacy. In a tired daze from what had happened just a few hours prior, he finally receiced the breather that he deserved from escaping the clutches of his attackers. Men in suits, usually it was a bad sign. And he may know just whom sent them after him.

But he dared not sleep just yet lest he be caught off-guard and taken in by Dr. Calico. Again. The flashbacks had slowed down and become more docile, giving him a few moments to differentiate his reality from what had happened not so long ago. 

Marsellus had remembered waking up in a sterile white room that was blank and barren save for the restraining table that he laid upon. Leather straps kept him contained and without any relent. He was trapped within this machination and it would not even allow him to move a muscle. He felt his pulse spike as he heard the taps of footsteps from outside of the room, silence so deafening one could hear a pin drop to the immaculate white tiled floor below should they have one. 

Finally the door opened and admitted the same hulking brute of a doctor now in a much more intimidating black tuxedo attire whom left the door open even after entering, only to rush at Marsellus with a full-blown sprint. The surprising speed the behemoth of a man ran at Mars made him suck in a breath, realizing he could very well be murdered by this man at any second. He closed his eyes for a moment and simply tried to breathe, hoping he could perhaps survive by a prayer. 

"CARLISLE! NO!" The voice echoed from the doorway, causing the mastadon to skid to a halt just a few inches from Marsellus' entrapped form. The smoldering glare he aimed at the frightened boy spoke volumes in his 'I-Could-Kill-You-If-It-Wasn't-For-That-Man' sort of presence. Almost as if his loyalty for whomever stopped him could override his urge to apparently rip Marsellus apart. 





Carlisle stepped aside to let Marsellus see a much shorter, and far older man gaze at Marsellus. The receding salt and pepper hair atop his head was slicked back a bit to give him just a little more age behind his eerily dark brown eyes underneath his glasses. The white lab coat he adorned showed he had to be some sort of doctor, and Marsellus felt the need to find out an answer to the question that burned at him. "I take it you are actually Dr. Calico, r-right?" 

The doctor nodded and smiled, and it did nothing to ease Marsellus' nerves as he felt his heart thumping in his chest. A synchopation that was far too fast for his taste to think straight, he struggled against his restraints once more in some faint hope he would be free but could never happen in a million years it felt. Finally The Doctor broke the awkwardness of the moment:

"I apologize for the restraints, Mr. Gustov. You had my companion here floating in the doctor's office when he tested you-"

This gave Marsellus pause as he pinned a glare at Calico. "Your so-called 'companion' knocked me out just as I got out of sight of people!" He turned to look at the intimidating Carlisle, who only glowered at him which caused Marsellus to flinch a bit and soften his expression. 

"Mr. Gustov," Dr. Calico said as a screen came down from an opening in the ceiling, "You passed out right in front of him and he actually caught you. I would guess it was from a series of strenuous brainwave activities that you had been going through in the last week or so, if I am correct." 

The monitor showed static before giving crystal clear footage, most likely from one of the overhead security cameras in the hospital, of Carlisle and Marsellus as they met. Marsellus was seen falling to the floor only for Carlisle to catch him by the back of his shirt and set him down on an examination table. The brute was then seen putting an ear to his chest through his shirt before making way out of the room. The screen shut off after that and retreated to the ceiling once more as Dr. Calico continued. 

"Carlisle said he hardly felt a heartbeat at the time, so he went to get a defibrilator. But when he came back, he saw your chest moving and you had come back to. So he brought you here for testing." 

The revelation floored Marsellus, his face losing color as the implications hit him like a wrecking ball. "So you're telling me that I died for a minute or two??" The doctor confirmed the question with a nod and paced about Marsellus. "And after he came back in, he literally left the ground for a few moments. Floating in the air for approximately one foot. Give or take a few inches, so he says." 

Reaching behind Marsellus to retrieve a clipboard, Dr. Calico pulled a pen from his coat pocket and tapped it against the metal clip when he came back into view, lifting a few pages to look at the writing qith a quizzical brow. "It says here that you had been experiencing odd events over the course of a week or two before the event. Rather extreme events too, at that. Voices which could suggest schizophrenia, sensitivity to light and sound, incessant migraines, and events of uncanny psychological telepathy." Calico let the pages fall once more upon the board and turned to look at Marsellus with a confused expression. "Say, can you tell what I am thinking now?"

Marsellus had zoned out after half of the symptoms had been said, looking around frantically as the voices began to whisper again. He could never tell what they were saying, but as the doctor asked the question, he felt the urge to shake his head no. Disappointment dotted The Doctor's brow at the response before he put the pen to paper and checked a box. 

"Well, guess it is time for inteoductions: I am Dr. Reevus Calico. Neurology Specialist, and I will be your doctor this evening." Carlisle set himself against the wall to the right, about 20 feet from the two of them with his arms crossed, almost looking as if this were a show for him to watch. 

Marsellus felt this was not going to be a pretty exam, it would seem. Something was telling him that everything about this encounter still felt terribly wrong, and he couldn't shake the feeling. And just as he was about to speak out on it, his instincts kicked in even more when the lights in the room went from a blinding white to a deep, dark red to silhouette Dr. Calico's expression of surprise even deeper. Sirens began to blare and both of the free men began to look around the room. For the first time since Marsellus had met the man, Carlisle had spoken, his voice a deep bass tone that one would expect a large, almost olympian-like man such as he to have: "Sounds like we got company, Doctor."

The Doctor nodded in agreement as he looked around the room still, almost as if they were not alone. And then, as if it were a scene out of a scifi comic, Carlisle was sent through the wall behind him. An almost echoing roar could be heard for a second that grew more and more faint. Dr. Calico was quite alarmed by this and made his way closer to Marsellus, almost putting his back to the restraining table before he fell to the ground inconscious. 'What the hell is happening?' Marsellus thought to himself before looking around. Finally all he could see was the black of the shadowy figure standing right in front of him, and the glowing purple eyes that were set beneath the hood, pinned on him...