Chapter 6 - Shadows on the Third Floor
“Down!” Daniel roared.
He grabbed Emma from the chair and threw himself into PICU 314 just as a hail of suppressed rounds shredded the drywall of the corridor with a sound like tearing canvas. Plaster exploded into chalky clouds. The observation window of the neighboring room shattered into thousands of safety-glass pebbles.
Lin was already on the deck, drawing her Glock 19. She returned fire through the doorway—two sharp, deafening cracks that echoed violently in the enclosed ward. One of the men in gray grunted, stumbling back into the hallway wall, clutching his shoulder.
“They’re here for the kids!” Daniel yelled, kicking the heavy wooden door shut and throwing the manual deadbolt. “They aren't trying to kidnap them. They’re sterilizing the scene!”
“Mercer’s clearing his liabilities!” Lin fired another round through the door’s vision panel, keeping the shooters pinned at the corner. “He knows the toxicology won't wash! If the girls die of 'complications from an unidentified assault,' he buries the evidence with them!”
In the corner of the room, Olivia’s monitors began to scream as the power fluctuation disrupted the main line, switching the life-support machines to internal battery power.
Emma was huddled under the small plastic sink, her hands over her ears, her eyes squeezed shut, rocking back and forth. “Not the gray men. Not the gray men.”
“Emma, look at me!” Daniel knelt beside her, his service pistol held high, barrel toward the ceiling. “Look at me, Em!”
She opened her eyes, streaming with tears.
“I promised you nobody was going to take you to the gray house. Do you remember?”
She gave a tiny, desperate nod.
“I don't break my promises,” Daniel said fiercely. He reached into his pocket, pulled out the gold shield pinned to his leather badge holder, and pressed it into her small hand. “Hold onto this. It’s magic. It means every honest cop in this city is standing between you and the door. You understand?”
She clenched the cold metal in both hands, nodding again.
*THUD.*
A heavy breaching ram slammed against the door lock. The wood around the frame splintered.
“Lin! Cover the bed!” Daniel commanded.
Daniel moved to the hinge side of the door, flattened himself against the wall.
*THUD.*
The deadbolt gave way with a screech of shearing screws. The door flew inward.
A tactical barrel poked through the gap, scanning toward the hospital bed where Olivia lay intubated.
Daniel didn't wait. He stepped forward, grabbed the hot barrel of the weapon with his left hand, forcing it upward toward the ceiling just as the shooter squeezed the trigger. A three-round burst ripped into the acoustic ceiling tiles, raining fiberglass and dust down upon them.
With his right hand, Daniel drove the heel of his service weapon directly into the shooter’s throat.
The man gagged, dropping his weapon. Daniel grabbed the assailant’s tactical vest, spun him around, and drove him backward through the open doorway, slamming him into the second gunman who was raising his rifle in the hallway.
Both men crashed to the floor in a tangle of limbs. Daniel stepped out, kicked the rifle down the corridor, and brought his weapon down on the second man's temple with enough force to crack bone. The man went limp.
The first shooter, gasping for breath, scrambled backward, his hand reaching for a backup knife on his thigh.
Daniel planted his boot firmly onto the man’s wrist, pinning it to the floor until the steel blade clattered away. Daniel dropped his knee onto the man’s sternum, pressing the barrel of his Glock between the man's eyes.
“Who sent you?” Daniel demanded, his chest heaving, his eyes burning with fury.
The man spat blood onto Daniel’s cuff. He smiled a ragged, ugly smile. “You’re already dead, patrolman. Look out the window.”
Daniel kept his gun pressed to the man’s skull while glancing through the cracked window at the end of the hall.
Down on the street below, three black SUVs had blocked both entrances to the emergency bay. Men in dark raincoats were systematically cutting the power feeds to the external surveillance towers.
County General was completely cut off.
And from the elevator bay behind Daniel, the chime sounded.
The digital floor indicator over the elevator doors lit up: *Floor 3.*
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The doors began to slide open.
***
