Chapter 2 - Lockdown Protocol
The sound of Marcus Vance's voice over the internal PA system caused Emma to press her forehead against my arm, her chest heaving as she held back sobbed breaths. Olivia lay beside her on the linoleum floor, her respiration becoming increasingly shallow and irregular.
"Hold on," I whispered to the girls. I reached under the desk, pulled out the heavy tactical flashlight, and unclipped my service radio. I keyed the mic. "Dispatch, this is Unit 4-12, requesting immediate tactical backup and EMS to Precinct 7. We are under an unauthorized facility lockdown, suspect is outside the main entrance."
Static answered. A steady, rhythmic pulse of interference drowned out the channel—a tactical frequency jammer, likely powered by the same mobile unit Vance was holding outside. He had severed our external communications before initiating the physical seal.
I looked down at the terminal screen. The pharmacy database record for code 884-Delta was still partially visible beneath the system crash window.
PATIENT: VANCE, MARCUS
COMPOUND: NEURO-STABILIZATION AGENT / FORMULA 9B (EXPERIMENTAL)
RESTRICTION LEVEL: CLASS-1 CONTROLLED / DEFENSE CONTRACTOR SPECIFICATION
This wasn't an off-the-shelf prescription or a stolen narcotic. It was an experimental compound tied to a defense contractor. I remembered reading a precinct memo six months ago regarding Aethelgard Bio-Tech, a biomedical research facility operating out of the industrial park three miles south of town. They had secured municipal security contracts to update county emergency response networks—including our station's security grid.
Marcus Vance hadn't just guessed how to lock us in. He was one of the engineers who designed the system.
I grabbed the emergency medical kit from the cabinet behind the desk and knelt beside Olivia. Her pulse was thready, hovering around one hundred and forty beats per minute. Sweat slicked her forehead, and her abdomen was rigid to the touch.
"Emma," I said, unzipping the medical kit and pulling out a stethoscope and penlight. "When your daddy gave her the medicine, did he use water? Did she drink anything else?"
"No," Emma whispered. "He used the blue tube. He put it right in her mouth. She cried and said it tasted hot, like fire. Then he tried to do me, but I ran into the hallway."
"Did he have more than one tube?"
"He had a whole box of them," she said, nodding frantically. "In his gray bag. He said we needed it because the bad men were coming to take his work."
A heavy thud rattled the ceiling above us.
I snapped the flashlight toward the upper wall. The maintenance access hatch in the ceiling of the records room, located just off the main lobby, was vibrating. Marcus Vance wasn't staying outside. He knew the building's infrastructure. He knew that the roof access ladder led directly down into the HVAC plenum, bypassing the exterior locked doors entirely.
"Stay down behind the counter," I instructed Emma. "If you hear loud noises, cover your ears and stay flat on the floor. Do not move unless I tell you to."
May you like
I unholstered my sidearm, thumbed off the safety, and moved silently along the wall toward the hall leading to the records room.
The air in the station felt heavy, turning cold as the HVAC system shut down. The only sound was the steady drip-drip-drip of water falling from my rain-soaked uniform onto the floor, and the faint, terrible sound of Olivia struggling to draw breath in the dark.
