Free My Black Beast by Randall P. Fitzgerald

on it. Somehow
it was less comfortable than the floor. The mattress was rough and
scratchy and may as well have not been there for all the padding it
offered.
    The girl followed him over and reached out
gingerly toward his arm. She touched him lightly, almost like she
was prodding a pile of jello to see if it was set. When her hand
failed to catch fire, she moved it back and grabbed his wrist to
turn it over. For the life of him, Lowell couldn’t understand her
confusion. She was human by every visual indicator. Maybe she had
magic goo in her blood or something, but everything was in the
right spot at least.
    By now he had assumed she was a nurse of some
kind and at least that was looking like a better deal than whatever
the old gremlin had planned behind that shit-eating smirk. She
checked his arm and head, pressing until he complained. His head
was still bruised but mostly better. The features of the world
stayed put, anyway.
    She moved to bring the tiny table over to
where he was sitting and he could see now that it had bandages and
a few vials full of clear liquids. She pointed at his shirt and
then motioned over her head.
    “ I don’t…”
    She stopped sharply at the sound of his voice
and seemed to panic a bit. She thought a moment and pointed to his
shirt then lifted slightly on the middle of her robes.
    “ Oh, right, right. No gowns to
wear, though?”
    He waited for a response for some reason and
all he got was a confused, awkward smile.
    “ Right.”
    Pulling the shirt over his head was an
exercise in self-torture that he wasn’t keen on repeating. He
managed to get it off of everything except one of his arms and
that’s where he gave up, slouching and breathing heavily. All of it
hurt and he was beginning to wonder why the hell he was going along
with this. She was probably here to poison him, right? Those vials
were probably poison. Maybe they wouldn’t work, though. Maybe
they’d give him super magic powers like Marka had.
    He was leaning back on his arms, shirtless,
trying to avoid the pain in his ribs to no avail. The girl stared
at his chest intently and put a hand out to touch it. Maybe she was
intrigued by the locket? He watched her quietly, not sure if this
was part of the whole thing. Her hand landed lightly on his chest
and the softness of her cool fingers wasn’t unwelcome. When her
other hand rose to her chest in a light clutched ball, he began to
feel like this maybe wasn’t part of the checkup.
    “ This, uh… thank you
but…”
    Her eyes widened as she caught herself. Rather
than pull her hand back she pushed it forward and Lowell let out a
yelp of pain. That was when she pulled back, repeating what sounded
like apologies over and over as she shuffled over the things on her
cart.
    The push had shifted something and Lowell
clutched at his side trying to unfuck his insides. The girl’s face
straightened with determination, though Lowell wouldn’t have
noticed, and she moved his hands away. He didn’t have any strength
to protest and again the cool touch of her hand was on him. She
place a hand firmly on his side and another on the shoulder above
it. A warmth began to bubble inside around the spot. It was almost
pleasant beneath the waves of hurt. But the warmth kept growing. It
was nearly hot now. The girl was repeating the words that had
sounded like an apology as the heat began to feel like it was
cooking him inside. That was a loud crackling noise. He couldn’t
hold it anymore. He screamed but the girl didn’t move her hands. It
felt like hours but he knew it couldn’t have been more than a few
seconds. The heat began to dim and the pain followed. He could feel
her hands again now, cooler than before and just as soft. He was
exhausted and thankful and confused. Mostly thankful. The pain was
gone. The girl pulled back and turned to her tray, trying her best
not to look at him. She grabbed the bandages, wrapped them around
his chest as quickly as she could manage, and then reached