For Zack Thomson, living in the Nicholls Ward isn't so bad. After his parents died, he developed strange and severe allergies, and the mental institution was the only place where he could be properly looked after. As strange as it was, it was home. He could watch as much television as he wanted; his best friend Charlie visited him often enough; and Nurse Ophelia--the prettiest no-nonsense nurse ever--sometimes took him bowling. Of course, that didn't mean he had it easy. His allergies restricted his diet to strawberry smoothies, and being the only kid at the hospital could get lonely. But it never once crossed Zack's mind to leave...until the night someone crashed through the front doors and told him to run. Now he's on a race for answers--about his past, his parents, and his strange sickness--even as every step takes him closer to the darkest of truths.
For Zack Thomson, living in the Nicholls Ward isn't so bad. After his parents died, he developed strange and severe allergies, and the mental institution was the only place where he could be properly looked after. As strange as it was, it was home. He could watch as much television as he wanted; his best friend Charlie visited him often enough; and Nurse Ophelia--the prettiest no-nonsense nurse ever--sometimes took him bowling. Of course, that didn't mean he had it easy. His allergies restricted his diet to strawberry smoothies, and being the only kid at the hospital could get lonely. But it never once crossed Zack's mind to leave...until the night someone crashed through the front doors and told him to run. Now he's on a race for answers--about his past, his parents, and his strange sickness--even as every step takes him closer to the darkest of truths.
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Overview
For Zack Thomson, living in the Nicholls Ward isn't so bad. After his parents died, he developed strange and severe allergies, and the mental institution was the only place where he could be properly looked after. As strange as it was, it was home. He could watch as much television as he wanted; his best friend Charlie visited him often enough; and Nurse Ophelia--the prettiest no-nonsense nurse ever--sometimes took him bowling. Of course, that didn't mean he had it easy. His allergies restricted his diet to strawberry smoothies, and being the only kid at the hospital could get lonely. But it never once crossed Zack's mind to leave...until the night someone crashed through the front doors and told him to run. Now he's on a race for answers--about his past, his parents, and his strange sickness--even as every step takes him closer to the darkest of truths.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781429929240 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Press |
| Publication date: | 05/21/2025 |
| Series: | Night Runner Series , #1 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 272 |
| File size: | 280 KB |
| Age Range: | 13 - 17 Years |
About the Author
Max Turner is the author of the young adult vampire novel End of Days. He is a high school science teacher and lives in Ottawa with his wife and children.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
The Visitor
My name is Daniel Zachariah Thomson. Everyone calls me Zack. I live in the Nicholls Ward of the Peterborough Civic Hospital, and this is the story of how I died, twice.
I know what you're thinking: The Nicholls Ward — isn't that the loony bin? The nuthouse? Where they put people who torture squirrels or think they're Julius Caesar? That explains it. Only a loo-loo would think he could die two times and still be around to talk about it. Well, the truth is a funny thing. It can be its clumsy self and it doesn't matter what anyone believes. I guess it's like way back in the Middle Ages when everyone and his dog thought the world was flat. That you could sail too far from home and your ship would drop right off into space. The whole planet was wrong on that one, and it didn't change the truth one pinch. My story is sort of like that. Read it and see for yourself. I'm not crazy. I'm here for different reasons.
The other people on the ward aren't all crazy, either. My neighbours all have mental disorders, that's true, but these are never as bad as you might think. Certainly not like the villains in Hollywood movies who turn their victims into wax dummies or serve them up for dinner. Most of the patients in the Nicholls Ward are older people. They need help just to eat. I don't expect to see them appearing in a horror movie anytime soon. They're all pretty harmless.
But I'm different. I stay up all night, for one thing. That's when my whole life happens — when the others have all taken their happy pills and are snoozing away. I do ordinary stuff, like read, or lift weights. And I run every night, usually outside, but I love movies, so if there's a good one on TV, I'll hop on the treadmill instead and watch it in the fitness room. I love video games, too. There's a big-screen TV in the common room. It takes up half a wall. When you wire up a game, the characters are almost as big as you are.
On good nights, my friend Charlie comes to visit. He's my major contact with the outside world, and because of this, and the fact that my schedule is a bit off, the hospital staff usually let him stay after visiting hours have ended, so long as the two of us aren't making too much trouble. Chaos is one of Charlie's specialties. I'm sure he could have a room of his own here. He'd fit right in.
* * *
Life in a mental ward is pretty routine. Meals, naps, TV time, medication and lights out — it all takes place according to a carefully crafted schedule. It helps keep everyone stable. I have a little more leeway than the others because I'm the only one awake after ten o'clock, but even my nights follow a regular pattern. You can't exactly set a clock by it, but it never changes very much, either — dinner, free time, exercise, breakfast, reading, sleeping. But all this changed the night a strange old man crashed his motorcycle through the front doors of the lobby and destroyed our big-screen television.
I was in the fitness room when it happened. It was about three in the morning. One of my all-time favourites, Terminator, had just ended, but my eyes were still glued to the small television hanging from the ceiling. A woman with hair so perfect it must have been made of plastic was telling me all about the wonders of Miracle Glow hair care products. The way she carried on, this stuff was our ticket to world peace. While she yammered away, interviewing other people whose lives were now fairy tales thanks to Miracle Glow, I pounded the treadmill. My shoes were practically melting. It was a night like any other. Until I heard a noise like an asteroid hitting the building. I felt it, too. A tremor that came right up through the floor. A second crash quickly followed, and the wail of a police siren.
In a flash I was out in the hall, past the reception counter and into the lobby. The whole time I was thinking, He's really done it this time. Charlie, that is. But when I saw the devastation, I knew right away it had to be somebody else. Not even Charlie could have managed this. The lobby was a total disaster. There was glass everywhere. The outside doors were blown right off their hinges.
The common room was even worse. The ping-pong table was tipped over and furniture was scattered all over. Actually, this was partly my fault. Well, our fault, Charlie's and mine. As soon as everyone had gone to bed we'd set it up that way so we could have a ping-pong fight. Charlie had wanted to celebrate the end of the school year, and so we'd spent a good hour pelting one another with ping-pong balls. Forts of overturned furniture were still set up all around the room. And we'd forgotten to put the ping-pong table back. I could see tire marks on the floor where the driver had swerved to miss it. The black streaks led straight to the wall where the TV used to hang. It was on the floor now in about a million pieces. I could tell right away that no amount of Krazy Glue was going to bring it back from the dead.
Right in the middle of the floor was the driver. He looked about seventy, with long black hair streaked with white and grey. It stuck out in all directions, as if he'd just been attacked by a tornado. He was on his hands and knees. His long overcoat looked too tight, and his mismatched gloves had the fingers cut out of them. Not the best for crawling across broken bits of TV. Sitting against the wall where the television used to be was his motorcycle, though I'm guessing it wasn't actually his since it said "Peterborough Police" on it. The siren was still wailing and the red and blue lights were flashing all over the white walls.
The old man looked up at me with milky blue eyes. He seemed dazed. Like he was trying to bring me into focus but couldn't quite manage it. He looked like a homeless person, or an undercover police officer dressed like a homeless person, in which case, his costume was perfect. On the ground in front of him was an old top hat smushed flat as a pancake, and it looked as though there were about ten layers of clothing sandwiched underneath his coat. That explained why he wasn't in pieces like the television. The padding must have saved him.
I glanced over my shoulder at the reception counter, where Nurse Ophelia, Nurse Roberta and the other overnight staff normally hung out. You could usually spot at least one security guard. Someone had to be there in case the police showed up with a new patient, which often happened just after the bars closed. No one was in sight now.
I made my way over to the old man as quickly as I could. I was worried he might try to get up and fall back into the sea of glass. Down the hall just ahead of me, a door opened and someone stuck his head out. It was Jacob, my red-haired neighbour. I waved for him to come over and give me a hand. He started up the corridor, then turned around. He did this a couple of times, turning back and then turning away again. His hands were over his ears and he was muttering something to himself, so I just let him pace in front of his room and turned my attention back to the old man. His head was shaking back and forth like he was dizzy, and he was mumbling to himself too, so I put my ear closer to his mouth.
"Hurry ... hurry up ..." he was saying. I couldn't tell if he was talking to me or to himself. I asked him if he was okay, but he didn't answer. He just shook his head one more time and grunted. Then he took hold of my arm. His grip was strong, which surprised me. I wondered for a second if his fingers were going to punch right through my scrubs. As he stood up, bits of glass fell from his overcoat. I noticed a small cut on his forehead and another across the bridge of his nose. Blood dribbled down his face and into the stubble on his chin, which was grey and black and white, just like his hair. He looked pretty gory, but I couldn't help myself. I just kept staring, I guess because I felt sorry for him. All the Miracle Glow in the world wasn't going to turn his life into a fairy tale. He smelled like the inside of a wine barrel. And, cuts or no cuts, unless he had a good explanation for all the remodelling he'd just done, when Nurse Roberta showed up, he was in for it.
The old man shook his head a few more times, then he looked me over again. It was like he was waking up or something. His eyes came into focus. He stared at my face for a second, then sort of nodded. A smile spread up one cheek. It made his eyes go wrinkly. He clenched his fists, leaned back and turned his head to the ceiling like he owed the man upstairs a miracle-sized favour.
"Thank heavens, boy!" he said. "Finally ... I've found you."
CHAPTER 2Breakout
The old man put a hand on my shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze. Then he glanced down the hall at Jacob, who was still rocking back and forth with his hands over his ears. A door opened beside him, then another farther down. A pair of curious heads poked their way into the corridor. I recognized the Chicago Man and Sad Stephen. With all the noise coming from the siren, we were going to have a lot of company before long.
As soon as the visitor saw the others, he shoved me towards the motorcycle. Now, I was only fifteen years old, but I was tall for my age, and strong, too. Still, I had trouble staying on my feet when he pushed me away. He had a lot of oomph in those arms. By the time I had my balance, he was right beside me again. His head was swivelling every which way. I couldn't imagine what he was looking for. Behind him, through the window, I could see the parking lot was empty. Hardly surprising. Most people wouldn't choose to visit a mental ward at three in the morning.
"Well, what are you waiting for, boy, the Apocalypse?" he said. "You're going to be worm food if you don't get a move on." He looked at me with his eyebrows high on his forehead and a weird expression on his face, like I was supposed to jump on the motorcycle and ride it to freedom or something.
"He's coming," he continued. "He could be here any second." The man put a hand on my shoulder and pushed me gently towards the motorcycle again. He looked back over his shoulder at the parking lot. I got the feeling Darth Vader was about to waltz in and lightsabre us both in half.
When he noticed I wasn't moving, his nostrils flared and an expression of annoyance came over his face. He reached down, grabbed the handlebars of the police cycle and picked it up himself. That was when he noticed the front forks were all mangled.
"Damn piece of garbage!" he shouted. "No wonder the police can't catch anybody." Then he tossed the bike aside as if it deserved a special place in the junkyard for letting us down. It smashed into the wall, and the fierce roar of the siren turned into something that sounded more like the mewing of a dying cat. "We're going to have to run for it," he said.
The wine smell on his breath was so strong I started to gag. He didn't give me time to recover. Instead, he just grabbed my scrubs near the collar and started to sprint. And just like that, I was practically airborne. And I had no control whatsoever over where I was going. The guy must have been bionic or something.
He hauled me through the lobby and out the gaping hole that had once been the main entrance. Our feet made crunching noises on the broken glass. I tried to work his hand free from my shirt, but it was as if he'd tied his fingers into knots. I couldn't budge them.
Then a bunch of things happened, all at the same time. I heard Nurse Ophelia shouting my name. She was somewhere behind me. About six police cruisers pulled into the parking lot. Two security guards ran into the reception area on our left and started chasing us. And someone shouted, "DON'T MOVE!"
Well, maybe the old man was deaf. Maybe he was so used to hearing strange voices that he'd learned to ignore them. Or maybe he didn't understand English all that well and thought "DON'T MOVE!" meant slip it into overdrive, because that's what he did. And he was fast. Even hauling me alongside him, I bet he would have beaten half the Canadian Olympic team. We almost made it off the lot, but just as we were approaching the street, I heard a sound like a firecracker. The old man slowed a bit. Then a whole bunch of firecrackers went off, and he let go of me, stumbled and fell.
I couldn't keep my balance, so I fell down beside him. I scraped an elbow on the asphalt, and my hands hit something warm, wet and sticky. Then I rolled up onto my knees. The old man was lying right beside me. Blood was pooling underneath him. It was all over my hands and clothes. And it was all over him.
He'd been shot. Many times.
I felt the old man's hand digging into my arm again. He was struggling to speak.
"Run ..." he said. Then he coughed several times. "Don't let the cops get you. He's coming. Run!"
CHAPTER 3The Second Coming
As the blood spread across the asphalt, the old man's eyes went glassy and the strain on his face seemed to go away. A slow smile spread up one side of his mouth.
I didn't know what to do. Smile or no smile, this man was dying. And there was blood everywhere. I started to get dizzy. My eyes spun in quick circles, like they couldn't focus all of a sudden. Everything went red. My teeth started grinding. I was so confused and agitated that all I could do was put my hands against the sides of my head and groan. To be scared or sad would have made more sense, but all I could think was that this was wasteful. I should have been able to do something.
An instant later, police officers were everywhere. Hands took hold of my arms, helped me up and pulled me away. I didn't resist. I just turned my head so I could get one last look. The old man's milky eyes were glazed over. His breathing had stopped. His smile looked wooden now. Frozen on a dead face. Then, just before someone stepped in the way, his head tipped sideways in my direction. One of his eyes twitched and closed. It made him look as if he was winking at me.
I don't remember if I said anything as the police took me inside. I kept trying to look over my shoulder to see what was happening, but a group of officers had formed a ring around him faster than you could say shoot, and the two escorting me didn't slow down until I was back inside the lobby.
Nurse Ophelia was waiting there.
"Oh, no ..." she said when she saw me. I was still covered in the old man's blood.
"It's not mine," I said.
Nurse Ophelia stepped behind the nurse's station and came back a second later with a handful of tiny square packages. She started ripping them open. I noticed her hands were shaking.
"We'd better get that off," she said.
Inside the packages were folded wipes that smelled like medicine. She gave one to me and started wiping at my face. She was a bit more clumsy than normal. Or maybe it was just that I was still dizzy. All this commotion was probably making everyone a little jumpy.
I was just getting down to the business of cleaning my hands when I heard a loud screech. It was the kind of noise a car makes when it stops too quickly — tires skidding on asphalt.
I looked up. A train of police cruisers was pulling out of the lot, and right in the middle of them was an ambulance. It had stopped suddenly, halfway onto the road. It tilted a bit to one side, then the back doors flew open and someone jumped out. It was the crazy old man! He looked around, then his eyes settled on me and he started sprinting back to the ward. A police car was in the way, but he didn't even break stride. He actually stepped right on top of the hood, cleared the roof in a single leap, then jumped off the rear bumper. The police in the lobby reached for their guns, but the old man obviously didn't care a pinch.
Then he saw Nurse Ophelia and stopped dead.
I couldn't blame the man for staring. Nurse Ophelia was probably the most beautiful woman on the face of the earth. When we were window shopping last Christmas, she caused three accidents just walking from Brock Street to Simcoe. Unless you were blind, she pretty much stopped you in your tracks.
Well, the old man looked at her and his face calmed, but then his brow wrinkled up again, as though he'd just remembered he was supposed to be annoyed. He pointed a finger at her. "Get him out of here," he said. Then he turned to go, and I don't know if it was because of all the police lights or what, but for just an instant, his watery blue eyes glowed red, just like a person in a photograph when the flash doesn't work right. I'm not even certain it really happened, because he sprinted off so fast that no one even had time to take aim and fire.
I looked at Nurse Ophelia and the officers nearby. Some still had their guns out. They looked stunned. I don't think if Santa Claus had flown down in a flying saucer you would have seen more mouths hanging open. One woman started talking into a radio that was clipped to her shoulder.
"Yeah, I think so. The same guy ..." The way her voice sounded, it was like she didn't believe herself. I didn't hear the rest because Nurse Ophelia quickly took hold of my hand and started pulling me down the hall.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Night Runner"
by .
Copyright © 2008 Steven Maxwell Turner.
Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
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