THE MAN WHO KILLED HIS BROTHER, CHAPTER 14

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kastenessen
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THE MAN WHO KILLED HIS BROTHER, CHAPTER 14

Post by kastenessen »

Chapter 13 ended with the realisation that Alathea had been found but was in a coma at the hospital. Chapter 14 begins with Brew and Ginny hurrying there. It takes some time and Brew is almost in pieces when they arrive at University Hospital. There they meet Lona. Brew sees that she is cut off from everything, she is in terrible pain. She still hasn't seen Alathea but has heard from the doctor that she's an addict. Brew is trying to calm her down by saying that it isn't her fault, she was forced to do it, but that is Lona also aware of.

It turns out it is Lieutenant Acton who has called her and told what has happened, how she was found out on Canyon Road.
For a minute, I had an impulse to grab the Olds and head for Canyon Road-out toward the mountains east of the city, where only the richest of the rich live- and start banging doors until I found wherever it was Alathea'd come from. It was a crazy idea....
"For a minute". Sometimes SRD's humor is so...pitch-black...

Then they wait together, they wait for a very long time until a doctor finally shows up...her condition is stable and soon they can see her but still in a coma and the doctor don't know when or if she will rise out of it. Depends on how much her brain has been hurt. Seems like Alathea's case is rather unusual, her mind fighting the body as hard as it can and then a backlash...

Ginny and Lona leaves for the elevator but Brew lingers and asks the doctor some questions after he explains who he is. Among them an utterly cruel and blunt one:
"Is she a virgin?
He grimaced. Disgusted at me-or at the question. Or at the answer. "Not by a long shot."
I was so surprised at Brew's insensitivity when I read this. Brew was upset of course, and in chocked, but still...but it is also effective, storytelling-wise. In all the commotion going on at this moment, comes this question, it really gets to you...

Brew catches up with Ginny and Lona. They take the elevator to the eight floor and find the room where Alathea is. At her door they meet another doctor entering; dr Stevens, a freckled man with red hair...He tells them to wait and enters. After three minutes he leaves and Brew get bad vibes from him...

They see Alathea looking like death herself. Lona starts to cry and so does Brew.
I shamble dover to the window, trying to control myself. For a couple of bad minutes, I couldn't seem to do it. But slowly my anger came back, and my eyes started to clear. I hit my knuckles on the windowsill until I could see straight again. Then I looked around.
Brew is in an emotional turmoil, changes from sorrow to anger, becoming more analytical again. A hard moment for him, seeing his niece close to death like this...Then Stretto enters and starts babbling, this gets Brew going, asking Stretto how many people knew Alathea was where she was...Then Ted enters, wanting to discuss something with Brew, almost accusing them for missing the point, that the children were kidnapped, not for the sake of drugs but for the sake of prostitution. They were kidnapped by a pimp. Then Ted gives Brew a description of a man who lines the girls up...Seems like old Ted has been digging up something really worthwhile...Red hair, freckles, called Sevin Rinlassen...

Brew paralyses, he realises it is Dr Stevens that came with a bag but left without...Time stands still, seconds feels like eons, while Ginny comes up with Dr Stevens black bag. It is filled with dynamite and it is ticking...Lona faints, but Ginny takes hold of the situation, tells Ted to go the nurses station, tell the cops and the hospital the situation, tells Stretto to take Lona, tells Brew to open the window!...is she going to throw the bomb outside with people out there?...it's a good action-sequence here...then tells him to leave with Alathea, he starts to do that but is meetin Stretto and Ted and tell them to take her. He goes back to Ginny, she is holding the bomb outside the window, protecting herself with the wall...a nurse comes for an old lady in the room...Ginny refuses to let go of the bomb or leave it to Brew, but he still can persuade her to use her left arm, then the bomb goes off...
Her left hand was gone. What remained of her forearm was just mangled meat. But her heart was still beating. Blood pumped out of her stump on to the floor. It looked like all the blood in the world.
This was some chapter! Fantastic action-sequence to end it with...but I have always wondered if it was the right thing to do, to keep the bag out the window the way Ginny did, was there really no other way? I don't know what I would have done though, maybe just put it on the windowsill, but we're talking about seconds here, I don't know...Great chapter!!! WOW!

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Post by Dragonlily »

kastenessen wrote:This was some chapter! Fantastic action-sequence to end it with...but I have always wondered if it was the right thing to do, to keep the bag out the window the way Ginny did, was there really no other way? I don't know what I would have done though, maybe just put it on the windowsill, but we're talking about seconds here,
Do you think they could have tied a sheet around the handle of the bag of dynamite, and dangled the bag on the sheet a little ways below the window?

Yes, this is really a high-tension sequence. Everything is happening so fast. It's enough to knock everything else out of your head.
"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." -- Roger Penrose
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Post by Ryzel »

I do not really know if I could have come up with a better alternative.
"Und wenn sie mich suchen, ich halte mich in der Nähe des Wahnsinns auf." Bernd das Brot
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Post by Dragonlily »

You’ve done such a good job with these chapters, Kasten, that I have to give them the responses they deserve. Time out from other authors: SRD gets my undivided attention.

I have one of those spasms of admiration over the way SRD gets us out of Ginny’s office and down the elevator. Brew’s tension is expressed in the quick, uneven chop-chop of short phrases and sentences, as he tries to race to the hospital for Alathea, but he can only wait, while the elevator moves, wait, while Ginny drives.
SRD wrote:The sun shone cheerfully, the traffic took its own sweet time, and the man who designed the sequencing of the stop-lights was a maniac – and there was nothing anyone could do about any of it.
Brew’s description of the hospital includes his impression that the hospital looks more comforting at night. :) SRD follows this shortly with his description of Lona:
It was as clear as daylight that we’d failed her.
I think these are neat touches, continuing the theme of Brew as night-dweller. But more important is the pain this family is in. Lona and Brew are both near falling apart. Probably the only reason Brew doesn’t is because he thinks maybe he can help Lona in some way.
When from somewhere she found the strength or maybe the generosity to say, “Thank you for coming,” I almost groaned out loud.
”I’m all right.” If she’d been any more all right, she would’ve been hysterical.
They keep waiting, and SRD keeps building up the tension. The doctor’s report isn’t any help, because he doesn’t know if Alathea is going to end up fine or in a permanent coma. Alathea fought harder against the drug than most people do, so she is more damaged than she would have otherwise been.

Here we get to this Dr. Stevens that Kasten told us about. The one that gave Brew a bad feeling. But the treatment equipment hooked to Alathea gives Brew a bad feeling, too, and so do all the nice people in the nice recreation area outside the window, and so does Mr. Paul Candidate Stretto, so we forget about Dr. Stevens. It isn’t until Ted gets there that we finally get the point of Brew’s unease. Ted describes the pimp who has been renting out the little girls, and it fits “Dr. Stevens”.

(This name made me wonder if SRD might have been complaining about “prostituting” his name by being forced to publish under “Stephens,” but he probably named the character before choosing his pen name.

(While digressing about names, I might as well mention that SRD changed the name of his red-haired murderer from Sevin Rinlassen in the first issue, to Sven Last in the revised issue. Kasten, I can see you’re using your old paperback again. :) )

Brew admires Ginny for the way she keeps her head to minimize the damage when the bomb goes off, but he is just as good. They work as an automatic team. Then the bomb goes off.
All of a sudden the air was full of dust and sunshine and silence.
Brew is deafened but he can still see Ginny say his name as he works to save her life. SRD doesn’t say anything about Brew’s feelings – he doesn’t have to. I feel what Brew does.
"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." -- Roger Penrose
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Post by kastenessen »

Joy wrote:You’ve done such a good job with these chapters, Kasten, that I have to give them the responses they deserve. Time out from other authors: SRD gets my undivided attention.
Well thank you! :)...and:
(While digressing about names, I might as well mention that SRD changed the name of his red-haired murderer from sevin Rinlassen in the first issue, to Sven Last in the revised issue. Kasten, I can see you're using your old paperback again. :) )
Nooo! S**t! You got me there Joy! :) I should've checked you know, but it's much easier to write with the paperback in front of you than the hardback, or worse, the omnibus... :) ...but still, it's interesting don't you think? He has changed the names, and I think I know why...think of it, Sevin Rinlassen, Treddus Hangst, those are names that...are out of this world really...

Joy wrote:
Brew's description of the hospital includes his impression that the hospital looks comforting at night. :)
I agree with you, these are neat touches. It all fits smoothly together; night architechture, timeflow, with Brew and his waiting that you mentioned later in your post for instance, timeflow; something I have been delving into a couple of times. It is charachterisation from a point of view which i cannot put into words but it has a meaning, that I am certain of...

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Post by Dragonlily »

kastenessen wrote:Sevin Rinlassen, Treddus Hangst, those are names that...are out of this world really...
And here I was thinking they were Scandinavian! :P
"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." -- Roger Penrose
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kastenessen
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Post by kastenessen »

Joy wrote:
kastenessen wrote:Sevin Rinlassen, Treddus Hangst, those are names that...are out of this world really...
And here I was thinking they were Scandinavian! :P
No, but Sven Last is! Or could be... :)


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