Nick kept flailing, but the pad was back on his mouth and nose, and all his senses started to shatter into little pieces like a broken mosaic. He couldn’t make sense of what he saw and heard and felt, and all he could smell was a sickly scent like a cheap perfume badly imitating the scent of flowers.

In another few seconds, he was unconscious.

Nicholas Sayre returned to his senses very slowly. It was like waking up drunk after a party, his mind still clouded and a hangover building in his head and stomach. It was dark, and he was disoriented. He tried to move and for a frightened instant thought he was paralyzed. Then he felt restraints at his wrists and thighs and ankles and a hard surface under his head and back. He was tied to a table, or perhaps a hard bench.

“Ah, the mind wakes,” said a voice in the darkness. Nick thought for a second, his clouded mind slowly processing the sound. He knew that voice. Dorrance.

“Would you like to see what is happening?” asked Dorrance. Nick heard him take a few steps, heard the click of a rotary electric switch. Harsh light came with the click, so bright that Nick had to screw his eyes shut, tears instantly welling up in the corners.

“Look, Mr. Sayre. Look at your most useful work.”

Nick slowly opened his eyes. At first all he could see was a naked, very bright electric globe swinging directly above his head. Blinking to clear the tears, he looked to one side. Dorrance was there, leaning against a concrete wall. He smiled and pointed to the other side, his hand held close against his chest, fist clenched, index finger extended.

Nick rolled his head and then recoiled, straining against the ropes that bound his ankles, thighs, and wrists to a steel operating table with raised rails.

The creature from the case was right next to him. No longer in the case, but stretched out on an adjacent table ten inches lower than Nick’s. It was not tied up. There was a red rubber tube running from one of Nick’s wrists to a metal stand next to the creature’s head. The tube ended an inch above the monster’s slightly open mouth. Blood was dripping from the tube, small dark blobs falling in between its jet black teeth.

Nick’s blood.

Nick struggled furiously for another second, panic building in every muscle. The ropes did not give at all, and the tube was not dislodged. Then, his strength exhausted, he stopped.

“You need not be concerned, Mr. Nicholas Sayre,” said Dorrance. He moved around to look at the creature, gently tapping Nick’s slippered feet as he passed. “I am taking only a pint. This will all just be a nightmare in the morning, half remembered, with a dozen men swearing to your conspicuous consumption of brandy.”

As he spoke, the light above him suddenly flared into white-hot brilliance. Then, with a bang, the bulb exploded into powder and the room went dark. Nick blinked, the afterimage of the filament burning a white line across the room. But even with that, he could see another light. Two violet sparks that were faint at first but became brighter and more intense.