Dead Man's Eye Read online

  Dead Man's Eye

  Shaun Jeffrey

  Blighted by an eye disease, Joanna Raines undergoes a corneal transplant operation to stop her going blind. The procedure is successful, but in the weeks that follow she begins to see dark coronas surrounding certain people. By turns fearful that something has gone wrong and worried that she’s going crazy, Joanna searches for an answer to the phenomena.

  What she finds will change her life forever. The transplant has opened a door in her mind, and the strange coronas are not legacies of the operation but proof that a legion of demons plans to invade the earth!

  Now the only thing that stands between the demonic horde and their plot to take over the world is Joanna, a young woman with the power to see them for what they really are.

  Seeing is believing.

  The demons are real.

  Joanna just has to convince everyone else before it’s too late.

  Shaun Jeffrey

  DEAD MAN’S EYE

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank Jim Mcleod, Rhonda Wilson and Mark West for taking the time to read my work and for offering their comments. Garry Charles and Daniel Russell for their support. Brenda and Darren, because they are always there for me. And finally Deb and Callum, my number one fans.

  CHAPTER 1

  Joanna Raines looked at the world through a dead man’s eye.

  Things were still a little blurry, which was why she felt sure her transplant was being rejected – why else would it feel scratchy and appear red? She shuddered at the thought of a world in darkness if the graft failed, especially now that she could see things a little clearer. The checklist she’d been handed after the operation mentioned various symptoms to watch out for, two of which she had, which was why she’d made the appointment with the doctor.

  The musical notes of the tannoy interrupted her thoughts and she listened to the disembodied voice announcing that the train would be twenty minutes late. She peered at her watch, squinting to combat the double vision so she could make out the position of the hands. Prepared for such an event, she had decided to catch the earlier train. Her hospital appointment wasn’t for another hour and a half, so she still had plenty of time to get there.

  A chill wind blew through the Victorian station, carrying with it the pungent scent of cleaning fluid that tickled her nose and made her eyes water. Further along the platform, she saw a yellow triangular board, the figure on which she guessed indicated cleaning in progress. She resisted rubbing at her replaced cornea, wary of dislodging it or upsetting the stitches, which although virtually invisible, made her feel a little like Frankenstein’s monster.

  Joanna stared up at the lichen coated glass roof overhead. Wan light seeped through, making her feel like she was underneath a pond. Through her new cornea, she saw blurred beams of light arcing down, like biblical rays; through her uncorrected eye, it felt like trying to stare through a dusty curtain, a common symptom of Fuchs’ corneal dystrophy.

  At the sound of approaching footsteps, Joanna looked up, squinting. Despite her blurred vision, she could see a large man wearing a red vest top, and as he drew close, Joanna ducked her head, letting her black hair veil her features.

  “Damn trains! Always late when you need to be somewhere at a certain time,” the man said as he sat beside her.

  Despite the pressure behind her eyeball caused by leaning forwards, Joanna didn’t look up. “It shouldn’t be long,” she said, the words coming out barely more than a whisper, intensifying her insecurity.

  “An optimist. I guess you don’t travel by train very often, otherwise you’d be with us pessimists.”

  She gazed at her feet, all four of them. Concentrated on trying to correct the view, closing one eye at a time, but it didn’t help, and the replaced cornea actually stung and she started to feel a little giddy and sick.

  “You like a stick of gum?” the man asked.

  “No thanks.”

  “I know, it’s god-awful muck, especially this low sugar shit. If I wasn’t in a bodybuilding competition this afternoon, I’d be eating chocolate. God, I miss chocolate. You don’t realise how much until you can’t eat it. The things we do for our dreams eh.”

  Joanna nodded. She knew all about dreams. Had followed hers through college and university where she gained a BA (Hons) in photography before setting up as a freelance photographer, specialising in portraits; then her eyesight started to fail, and the dream faded along with her vision.

  “Sorry for rambling,” the man said, “it’s just this fuckin- pardon my French - train, where is it? We’ll probably get some bloody lame excuse about leaves on the line next.”

  Joanna heard the man tapping his foot on the ground and drumming his hands on his thighs. She could almost feel the impatience oozing out of him.

  Feeling a little dizzy, she folded her arms across her chest and closed her eyes to rest her sight, but the irritation from her replaced cornea caused tears to form. The darkness behind her lids increased her fears about going blind. She couldn’t imagine a world of perpetual darkness.

  Someone walked past, pulling something that rattled across the stone floor. She heard a couple of children arguing and an irate mother berating them. She also heard traffic outside and the beat of wings as a bird, probably a pigeon, flew through the station. Then she detected the sound of heavy machinery droning in the distance like a mechanical bee. The whistle of the wind blowing along the platform. And above it all, the man at her side beating out his impatient rhythm like a war beat.

  She never realised before how much extraneous noise the ears picked up that the consciousness ignored.

  A voice over the tannoy interrupted her thoughts and the announcer mumbled out an almost incoherent apology for the lateness of the train, and that there was a change, and it would now be arriving at platform two at any minute.

  “Typical,” the man beside her said as he stood and hurried away.

  Joanna opened her eyes, the tears obscuring her sight even more. She blinked rapidly, aggravating the stinging sensation that felt as though she had a lash stuck on her eyeball. Despite wanting to rub it, she closed her eye and pressed the palm of her hand against the lid to soothe the pain.

  She looked up at the sound of the approaching train, the engine’s single headlight like a Cyclopean eye. Through her Fuchs’ eye, she saw the light as a bright ball with needle-like rays radiating out. Through the transplant, she saw at least three bright lights.

  When she looked with both eyes, the effect combined to create a distorted image.

  Joanna gathered her belongings and made to stand when she heard a shout and what sounded like a hollow drum roll. She looked across the platform and saw a flurry of movement on the stairs leading down to platform two. People jumped aside, and she squinted to combat her distorted vision, recognising what appeared to be a suitcase tumbling down the steps.

  The waiting passengers scattered out of the way of the falling luggage, knocking into each other in their haste.

  A woman with a halo of blonde hair stepped aside, crashing into the man beside her. He grimaced and reared back, inadvertently knocking into an old woman who dropped her drink. The plastic beverage container exploded like a grenade, splattering hot liquid over the legs of a teenage girl wearing a miniskirt. She squealed and flailed her arms in the air, punching the young man next to her in the nose, and causing him to step into the path of the bodybuilder that had been sitting next to Joanna.

  Unable to tear her gaze away, Joanna watched in horror as the man stumbled and then fell over the edge onto the tracks. Someone screamed. The engine driver blew his horn, the hellish sound almost deafening in the confines of the station. Although it wasn’t going fast, the train wheels squealed against the rails. The man
tried to roll out of the way, but he didn’t move fast enough. With sickening precision, the front wheel rolled across his arm.

  The train stopped, and a strange silence descended.

  Blood gushed from the stump where the man’s arm had been.

  Joanna froze, unable to believe what she had just seen. Bile rose in her throat and she fought not to be sick.

  She caught sight of movement beside the man and turned her head. Saw what looked like a strange shadow, a black ethereal mass that surged towards the fallen figure and flowed into his body through the ragged stump of the missing limb.

  Thinking she’d imagined it, that she was seeing anomalous floaters, Joanna blinked, aggravating the irritating pain from her cornea. She narrowed her eyes, straining to make sense of what she had just seen.

  A second later the man moved, his legs twitching. Then he sat up and grabbed the severed limb. Despite the distance, Joanna thought the sliced end looked like a cut of meat marbled with fat and muscle. But strangest of all was that although the man’s arm had been severed, he had what appeared to be a black limb protruding from the shoulder.

  The man started to stand, and a strange black shadow surrounded him like a dark phosphorous corona. The nimbus was so black, it looked like an absolute absence of light, as though the man had been carved out of his surroundings.

  Joanna covered her face with her hands. Either her eyes were playing tricks on her, or she was going mad…

  She shuddered. Maybe there was something even worse than a world of darkness.

  CHAPTER 2

  “So Miss Raines, what’s the problem?”

  Joanna stared at the doctor and exhaled slowly. Where should she start? With the fear of her transplant being rejected? Or with the fear that she might be going mad? Neither option seemed appealing, but weighing them together, she plumped for the former.

  “I’m worried about the transplant. My eye feels scratchy, and when I blink, it hurts.”

  “Okay, let me have a look.” He leaned forwards and scrutinised her eye. “Look up,” he said. “Now look down.” After a moment, he nodded. “The end of one of the stitches is sticking up, and when you blink, it’s causing it to rub. I can soon fix that.”

  Joanna watched as he donned a pair of gloves and sterilised a pair of scissors. Although her eyesight wasn’t clear and she now doubted what she had seen, she couldn’t get the image of the one-armed man out of her head, blood gushing from the stump of his arm.

  Then there was the blackness that infiltrated his body. The more she thought about it, the more she realised how ridiculous it was. What she had seen must have been a shadow, that’s all.

  “Alright, Miss Raines, just lean back,” the doctor said as he stood over her and held her eyelid open with his fingers.

  Joanna watched as the scissors headed towards her eyeball, growing more blurred the closer they came. She cringed. One slip and he would pierce her eye like a grape.

  The need to blink became almost overpowering and she felt tears rolling down her cheek. She felt a slight irritation, then heard the scissors snick together and the doctor drew back.

  “There you go, that should be better. Just try not to move your eye around a lot.”

  Joanna prepared herself, and then blinked. The scratchy feeling had gone and she blinked another couple of times, savouring in the relief.

  “How’s that?” the doctor asked.

  “Feels fine.”

  “Now is there anything else I can help you with? You’re looking very pale.”

  Realising the doctor was waiting for her to reply, she shook her head. “No, everything’s fine.”

  “Good. The epithelium on the surface of the eye is growing back well. Just remember to keep using the eye drops.”

  After thanking the doctor, Joanna walked out of the room and into the corridor of Temple Hospital. Paintings of trees, fields and mountains adorned the clinical white walls like windows, belying the fact they were in the heart of the city.

  Patients, staff and visitors bustled around Joanna, causing her to pause for a moment to allow her eyes to rest as she tried to focus her gaze.

  “Hey Jo, what you doing here?”

  Joanna looked up and saw her boyfriend, Stephen Cook.

  “I had an appointment with the doctor.”

  “You didn’t tell me. I’d have driven you in if you’d said.”

  “It was a last minute thing.”

  Stephen frowned. “Why, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. My eye was a little itchy, that’s all. The doc’s sorted it now.” Stephen nodded, tongue poking from the corner of his mouth, something he

  always did when he was concerned or nervous. He looked at her with his chocolate brown eyes, dark hair neatly combed to make him look presentable at his reception desk in the A & E department.

  “Are you sure you’re alright? You don’t look very well,” he said.

  Joanna nodded, then shook her head and sighed. “There was an accident at the train station earlier. A man fell on the track and a train cut his arm off.”

  “You mean Lincoln Parker. Yes, I processed him not long ago.”

  “I saw him fall on the track.” She took a breath, inhaling the sterile aroma of the hospital. “It was awful. There was so much blood.”

  “Jesus Jo, I didn’t know. Do you want to sit down?”

  “No, I’m fine. It was just… it was awful.”

  “I can imagine. Well, I can’t actually.” He stepped forwards and put an arm around her shoulder, squeezed tightly and kissed her on the cheek before stepping back, looking awkward.

  Missing the warmth of his touch, Joanna held her arms out and he stepped into them and gave her a hug, their fledgling relationship still in the uncomfortable stage as they tested boundaries.

  After a moment, they separated, and an embarrassing silence ensued until Joanna said, “That man that lost his arm… Is he going to be ok?”

  “I guess so. I mean he’s strong. Did you see the size of him?”

  “He said he was a bodybuilder.”

  “You spoke to him?”

  “He sat next to me on the platform.”

  “Well I’ll tell you what, when they wheeled him in, you wouldn’t believe he’d just had his arm severed. Bloke was as chipper as someone who’d just won the lottery.”

  Joanna frowned. “So he was conscious.”

  “Yeah. Shock affects people in different ways. I think I would have passed out.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “In the operating room. They’re trying to save his arm but they had a hell of a job getting it off him as he wouldn’t let go of it!”

  Joanna wondered whether she should tell Stephen what she had seen, but then thought better of it.

  She remembered the first time they met in the hospital café after she accidentally spilt a cup of tea over him. Luckily, the tea hadn’t been too hot and they started talking, hit it off, and had now been going out with each other for a month, and she didn’t want him to think she was crazy.

  Stephen looked at his watch. “I’ve got to get back to work. What are you going to do now?”

  “As I’m in town, I thought I might do a bit of shopping.”

  “Well take it easy and don’t overdo it. You know you’re supposed to rest your eyes.”

  “Ok Doctor Cook.” She smiled.

  “Well I wouldn’t like to think that you couldn’t see me in all my glory.”

  “Hmm, there’s nothing like blowing your own trumpet.”

  “Well if you won’t blow it for me, I have to do it myself.”

  “So you’re a contortionist too!”

  Stephen blushed. “I was talking metaphorically.”

  Joanna liked the way Stephen got embarrassed so easily; the colour bleeding into his cheeks made him look cute. “So you mean you can’t blow it yourself.”

  “If only.”

  “Then I guess I’d better loosen my lips.”

  “If I didn’t know
better, I’d think you were trying to seduce me.”

  “You wish.”

  “We could always work on it.” He winked then looked at his watch again. “I’ve really got to go now. If you’re still around later, I get off at five.”

  “And what, you want me to watch?”

  Stephen went a deeper shade of red. “I meant get off work.”

  “Sure you did.” Joanna grinned. “I’ll see how I feel later on.” She kissed him quickly on the lips and then walked away, chuckling.

  Walking around the shops tired Joanna more than she thought and by the time she arrived back at the hospital to meet Stephen, her eyes were stinging. The eye drops helped relieve some of the pain, but the thought of returning to the train station made her feel a little queasy, which is why she waited for Stephen to give her a lift home in his car.

  She walked through the automatic doors in the A & E department and despite the distance and her blurred vision, she recognised Stephen sitting behind the desk by his light pink shirt, which he said made him look welcoming and approachable, but which she thought looked a little effeminate. At a distance, and with her distorted vision, he resembled a blancmange.

  Hoping he noticed, she waved and saw him wave back. Then she went to sit in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs in the waiting area where people sat snuffling and complaining about the length of time they’d already waited to be seen.

  After a moment, the blancmange came out from behind the security screen and walked towards her until it gained clarity.

  “You ready?” Joanna asked.

  “You’ll have to give me another fifteen minutes as I’m running late,” Stephen said. “How are the eyes?”

  “They’d be better if I didn’t have to look at that pink shirt.”

  “I could always wear my Hawaiian one instead.”

  “What, and let me think I was on an acid trip. No, I think you should stick with the pink.”

  “Are you talking rude again?”