Free The Bleeding Man by Craig Strete

and I had got blood on my straw and I did not like it. I don't like blood.
It makes my head hurt and I get angry and frightened. I stayed up in the tree all
night.
    When the new
keeper, the mean one who drank, came in the morning to change my straw he found the dead man. I
thought he was going to hit me with a stick. But he didn't hit me. He ran away and they came with
a net and dragged me out of the tree and wrapped me up in the net and no matter how much I
screamed, they wouldn't listen. I wanted to be free and they wouldn't listen.
    That's why they
put me in this cage in the big white building and why the men in the white coats are going to
kill me. They keep telling me they are going to kill me but I don't care. My fur is falling out
and they don't feed me enough and nobody pets me anymore. I don't care. I'll sleep a lot and that
will help pass the time. They don't love me anymore. I don't care. I'll sleep a lot and have good
dreams and I will be very angry when they wake me up because my dreams will be very pleasant and
I will not want to leave them.
    I will dream that
I am dead.

The Bleeding Man
    The medicine
shaker, the bone breaker. I have seen and been all these. It is nothing but trouble.
     
    I have sat on the
good side of the fire. I have cried over young women. It is nothing but trouble.
     
    Miss Dow leaned
against the observation window. Her stomach revolted and she backed away. Unable to quell the
nausea rising within her, she clamped a hand to her mouth.
    Dr. Santell gently
took her arm, led her away from the window and helped her to a couch facing away from the
observation window.
    Nausea passed;
Miss Dow smiled weakly. "You did warn me," she said.
    Dr. Santell did
not return the smile. "It takes getting used to. I'm a doctor, and immune to gore, but still I
find it unsettling. He's a biological impossibility."
    "Not even human,"
Miss Dow suggested.
    "That's what the
government sent you here to de­cide," said Dr. Santell. "Frankly, I'm glad he's no longer my
responsibility."
    "I want to look at
him again."
    Santell shrugged,
lit a syntho. Together they walked back to the observation window. He seemed amused at her
discomfort.
    Again, Miss Dow
peered through the window. This time it was easier.
    A young man, tall
and well-muscled, stood in the middle of the room. He was naked. His uncut black hair fell to the
small of his back.
    His chest was slit
with a gaping wound that bled profusely; his legs and stomach were soaked with blood.
    "Why is he
smiling? What is he staring at?" she asked, unable to take her eyes off the figure before
her.
    "I don't know,"
said Dr. Santell. "Why don't you ask him?"
    "Your sense of
humor escapes me," said Miss Dow through tightly closed lips.
    Dr. Santell
grinned and shrugged. His synthetic cigarette reached the cut-off mark and winked out. The butt
flashed briefly as he tossed it into the wall disposal.
    "Doesn't
everything?" suggested Dr. Santell, trying not to laugh at his little joke.
    Miss Dow turned
away from the window. Her look was sharp, withering. "Tell me about him," she snapped, each word
like ice. "How did he get—that way?"
    His amusement
faded. He licked his lips nervously, nodded. "He has no name, at least no official name. We call
him Joe. Sort of a nickname. We gave him that name about—"
    "Fascinating,"
interrupted Miss Dow, "but I didn't come here to be entertained by some droll little tale about
his nickname."
    "Friendly, aren't
you?" asked Santell dryly. A pity, he thought. If she knew how to smile she might have seemed
attractive.
    "The government
doesn't pay me to be friendly. It pays me to do a job." Her voice was cold, dispassionate. But
she turned to face Dr. Santell in such a way that she would not see the bleeding man. "How long
has he been like this?"
    "It's all in my
report. If you'd like to read it I could—"
    "I'd prefer a
verbal outline first. I'll read your report later; I trust that it is