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Dr Gordon had always had his own office while he was at this hospital. Before and after Jigsaw. The blood on his hands were different in both scenes. Sometimes it was of a patient he had no interest of need for and sometimes it was helping to wipe off the blood from another doctor.
And sometimes the blood was of a man he couldn't save.
He remembered crawling through those tunnels, not able to even save himself, how would he save Adam? Adam, Adam, Adam. Sometimes, he swear that he saw his ghost in the mirror. When it would fog up, his silhouette would loom behind him, not moving, just staring. Hollow eyes, maggots rotting spoke to him with no words, only sadness.
Why couldn't you save me? It whispered. Save me, Lawrence, save me. Save me. Save me.
He woke up in a sweat, words echoing though his head. Words that couldn't escape, echoing in their chamber to be released. They couldn't leave until he did what had to be done. That would happen to be the thing he's already failed at. Nobody cared about Adam Stanheight except for him. He left Adam Stanheight to die in a run-down, rotten bathroom and nobody knew. Nobody cared that Adam Stanheight died because no one was looking for him. No one cared. It's what Lawrence thought until. Until the tow kid showed up at Adam's door, wondering if their 'Uncle Adam could come out and teach them photography pretty please.' Well, two of them were there that day but it mostly Jessica that requested it.
After her trap, she walked into his office, having already figured out exactly who had been behind it. She called it 'a hunch'. He invited in with open arms, taking her on as his apprentice.
But she was always on his radar.
A radar that beeped endlessly. He had recognised her ragged little demeanour anywhere. She stood at 5'3 at 15 years old, only a bit older than Diana was at the time. He had seen her at the hospital sometimes, sporting bruises and cuts that always came with a too well thought-out explanation behind it. Never with a parent though. She was always alone. But someone had marked her. Marked her like hell. Took medicine that wasn't for her and sold it. Her brother was a spoiled boy who didn't do anything despite his sister's need for money. And so Hoffman marked them.
Gordon hated setting up their trap. Adam's voice nibbled away at his ears like a rat on most days but today it was overbearingly loud. He was screaming at him, scolding him for not going against Hoffman in one way or another.
"If they survive, I'll have a reason to monitor and look after them." He convinced the nagging voice in his head.
"Oh yeah, sure Lawrence!" Adam had yelled. "What the fuck is going to happen if they fucking die?! Then what?! You going to kill all three of us?"
Adam tended to float in the air, leaning on an imaginary wall, legs crossed. But today, he stood straight. Straighter with arms wide open and mouth moving animatedly.
"They will be fine." Gordon's voiced quivered as he pulled chains over gears.
"If it was that Amanda chick, I wouldn't mind." Adam put his hands out like he was surrendering. "But Hoffman?"
"You're as bad as Allison."
"You calling me your wife, Larry?" The spectre joked, lighting a cigarette. "They're better off than me. Speaking of which, where's little D?"
Gordon grunted as a response. Adam never appeared in the light. Only in the dark dingy underground of of Jigsaw's tunnels and stupid little game rooms. It was hard to ever make out his face, features blurring with each passing day. He joked that soon he'd become a Picasso but 'one of the real fucked-up ones'. It was really, really weird how someone could make an impression on you and yet you could not remember their face. He'd only known Adam for a few hours but he acted like those hours weren't embedded into his mind.
He breathed in and turned around. Adam wasn't there anymore. He didn't have the comfort of the only man who understood him after his rebirth. Was it worth being reborn if Adam wasn't by his side? He felt newly awakened when Adam was by his side. Adam was the first man both times: in the bathroom and at his rebirth. Even as he flitted in and out of consciousness, he could see his spirit standing above him, cocking his head and shaking it.
"Little Lawrence Gordon." He'd mutter.
No one knew he was down here. Only John and Jill, but now one half was dead. And Hoffman was in charge now. Hoffman wanted the two of them. Daniel still followed the rules but had struck out on his own after Amanda's death. So really, he was Amanda's disciple and not John's. But it didn't matter. Hoffman could have Aiden for all Lawrence cared; as long as he had Jessica all under his surveillance. Their trap was fairly easy. He'd made it so.
Jessica and Aiden were separated by a wall, a poison pumped into their systems. Jessica had no access to the antidote, making it so that she would die within the next 15 minutes. Aiden had the antidote, activated by a lever on his side of the wall. Either, he could follow his instincts and save the antidote all for himself, causing his sister to die on the other side as he watched (an allegory for how he had watched her struggle all those years with no support from their parents) or he could provide her with some of the antidote. She would be allowed the antidote if her brother decided it(this time, an allegory for how it felt to suffer without medicine). Were Aiden to give her it, she would heal but both of them would go on with disabilities throughout life.
As he set them into the game, he realised just how much they truly looked like Adam. Aiden had his features, everything curved and slightly down-tilted on his face. Meanwhile there was Jessica, the indignant sloppiness of her looking like she'd come out of a shithole.
"They were more my kids then they were my sister's. They came over a lot. All the time in fact." He was back.
"You're not mad at me?" Lawrence turned around.
"You know that Hoffman guy is a real pain in my dick and balls? He's an asshole, for sure." Adam snorted. "I'd rather you kill these guys then he does."
Adam had a hopeless charm to him. He was dirty and grungy and his face was melting off by the second but Gordon didn't mind. Adam was the panic to his calm, the careless to his meticulous. He was grinning the whole time Gordon was setting up the trap.
"You ever find me annoying, Larry?"
"All the time."
"Even now?"
"Yes, even now."
"Then why do you keep me around?"
"It's not like I have a-" He turned to face Adam indignantly but now Adam stood there as a dehydrated body, not how he usually appeared. He looked like how he would appear had Lawrence been to the bathroom. All shrivelled up and horrid looking, no hair, no eyes, clothes baggier than he was when he was alive.
This was his worse nightmare. His only companion leaving him as a withered corpse. No, no, Adam had to stay. Lawrence Gordon couldn't atone for his guilt by saving Adam so he had to be a constant reminder of how he failed. Failed to do his trap and failed to have a good outcome. Maybe he did actually complete his trap and now...he had killed Adam Stanheight. He completed his trap. He followed all the rules except stay within the deadline and what did he get?
A ghost that haunted him and a wife and daughter who barely cared about him anymore. But he could help Adam again. Make sure this trap was winnable. Be the opposite of Amanda, make sure they got out alive. The easy way out. He stared at the unconscious body of Jessica Stanheight, looking at the needle in his hands. He took a new syringe and injected only a bit of the antidote into her veins. Enough to keep her alive after an hour. If medical couldn't reach her by then, at least he had tried. But he needed to do this. He needed it for Adam. To see Adam again.
Whether it'd be his ghost or his essence, he needed Adam again.
Jessica trudged into his office again, now 23. She threw stacks of photos, all listed in alphabetical order. He sifted through it, giving her a look.
"There's not as many in here, Jessica."
She shrugged. "Sorry, some of the roll went to Matthews."
She seemed awfully nonchalant, now having adopted her uncle's paleness and matted brown hair.
"It's alright." He assured her. "Just don't be in league with Nelson."
"I think Nelson gets it better."
"I'm sorry?" He stood up now. He had dragged this girl out of her own personal hell and here she was complaining that he didn't get it. "Nelson left for a decade after his game."
"But he was the original Disciple, he gets it better!" She shouted back.
"Then you can leave!"
"I will. And you're not getting any help from me, unless my brother allows it." She stomped off defiantly, still raging.
"Oh Lawrence," An old friend's voice echoed from the corner, blue plaid shirt over his shoulders, a cigarette in hand. "You've lost two daughters and two Stanheights. Maybe you're just a problem."