. . .It's what's inside that counts. That's what Robins always said, scalpel in one gloved hand, coffee in the other. It's what's inside that counts. And they bleed. We all do, we can only keep it up for so long even if the spirit is undying. I couldn't fight any longer. The waiting drained me. I only panicked, fantasizing about my escape, and eventually blanked out, staring at the door. Now I stare at my reflection. The painting of a sorrow.

I didn't know what to be more afraid of - the things set free or the man splayed out on the tiles - but now it's nearly over. Now I'm only afraid that I'm going to Hell, and that I'm going the way that they all did. I can watch the end. This might be more of an escape, too, than an end, because it was unbearable, breathing and waiting, listening to them get closer - almost thinking I'd won. But they were bound to find me. They know this place. It doesn't look like much from the street but that doesn't matter because it's what's inside that counts; my entire life I've spent in this place, or thinking about it. We all felt the same way. Except of course for Walter. Our founder. I fell by the cages in the third room - our eyes met in silence - and I saw myself reflected. Now I'm the last. I want to shut my eyes but every time I do he is there. What can I do but accept what is coming to me?

I wasn't surprised - if any of them were to find me first it would be Alger. He could culture compassion and use it as a weapon. He appealed to the most ignorant, altruistic nature; the so-called injustices served against him represented to you whatever injustices were once served against yourself, and we became responsible for every scrap of suffering in the world. I'm not a cruel man. You thought that I was. You thought that I was, because you listened to the bleeding hearts out the front and in the papers, screaming morals that they didn't understand. You thought that these products were just as human as yourself and that they did not deserve to live as factories, because you didn't grow them and you didn't feel their covetous eyes follow you through the days. You thought that though they looked different, so did everbody else, and it's what's inside that counts, because you didn't know better. Differences! They are different on the inside, too, I said, and kept saying until Robins told me to shut my mouth and take a look at this. You study them, you develop that voyeuristic bond, and you think that you know them when all they see is pain. So many beautiful patterns! Alger described them the best - Alger knew where to look. I had nowhere to run. I couldn't fight any longer. When I woke up, everything was grey, but it's clear now. I know where I am. I can't move freely but I can watch my warped reflection on the steel roof above the operating table. A face without a heart. I can see the red in my eyes, it must be the colour of exhausted fear or perhaps I'm above my defeated body, floating up to watch what happens. The long line of mistakes we made, the things we wasted and the money that bound us together are what made it go so quickly, back then, and now I listen for anything to distract me from this empty time. How is it that my whole life was shorter than a second spent roles reversed on a metal slab?

Alger sighs as if it is his duty. He looks down at me, scalpel in one gloved hand, coffee in the other. In sleepless nights and waking nightmares I've always known that it would end this way, but with each bright day came delusion, promising salvation with cures created by the sick and flawed, and so, blindly, we went ahead. We never stopped. The spirit is undying. It's what's inside that counts. 1