Chapter 5 - THE HOSPITAL IN DARKNESS
Emergency lights turned the corridor red.
Daniel moved to Emma’s door.
A nurse shouted that the generators would restore full power within seconds.
They did not.
The neonatal monitors switched to battery backup.
Security radios filled with static.
Daniel’s rescue instincts took over.
“Lock this room.”
The nurse hesitated.
“Do it.”
Daniel looked through the narrow window.
A man in hospital scrubs moved quickly toward the neonatal unit.
His face was covered by a surgical mask.
But Daniel recognized the walk.
The dark figure on the ridge had favored his right leg after stepping back from the edge.
This man did too.
“Michael.”
Daniel opened the door and ran.
Michael reached the neonatal unit first.
He used a stolen badge to enter.
Inside, alarms pulsed from incubators. Nurses worked by emergency lights.
Michael moved toward Emma’s baby.
Daniel struck him before he reached the incubator.
They crashed against a medication cart.
Michael swung a metal tray. It caught Daniel above the eyebrow.
Daniel staggered, then drove his shoulder into Michael’s chest.
“You should have stayed on the mountain,” Michael hissed.
“You should have made sure she was dead?”
Michael reached for a syringe from the cart.
Daniel caught his wrist.
For a moment, the two men struggled beside the incubator while Emma’s daughter slept inches away.
A nurse screamed for security.
Michael kicked Daniel’s injured hand.
The syringe fell.
He ran through the rear exit.
Daniel pursued him into a stairwell.
At the ground floor, Michael fired through the emergency door.
The bullet struck the wall beside Daniel’s head.
Park officers returned fire.
Michael escaped through a loading dock where an ambulance had been stolen minutes earlier.
Power returned.
The entire attack lasted less than four minutes.
But it changed the investigation.
Michael had entered a hospital, interfered with critical care, and attempted to reach the newborn.
Federal agents joined the search.
Rachel stood beside Emma’s bed after the security lockdown ended.
“He thinks the drive is connected to the baby.”
Emma shook her head.
“No. He thinks I gave it to Daniel.”
Daniel sat nearby while a nurse bandaged his forehead.
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Then where is it?”
Emma looked at him carefully.
“The helicopter.”
Daniel frowned.
During the rescue, Emma had been wearing a thin chain beneath her coat. The secure drive was inside a waterproof medical pendant attached to it.
When Daniel clipped the harness around her, the chain broke.
The pendant fell into the folds of his rescue bag.
Emma saw it happen.
Michael did not.
Daniel called the airfield.
The helicopter had been grounded after the storm and remained inside the rescue hangar.
But when officers arrived, the hangar door was open.
Daniel’s rescue bag was gone.
Security footage showed a man in a county maintenance jacket entering during the hospital blackout.
Michael had planned both attacks.
He now possessed the drive.
Rachel’s face tightened.
“If he destroys it, we still have Emma’s testimony.”
“It is not enough,” Emma said. “The files include internal emails, trial deaths, illegal adoptions, and the names of doctors who signed false records.”
“Did you make a copy?”
“No. I was afraid the network was monitored.”
Daniel looked at her.
“Michael will not destroy it immediately.”
“Why?”
“Because he needs to know what is on it.”
Rachel agreed.
“The drive is encrypted. Emma, how long to break it?”
“With the hardware Vale Biotech uses? Maybe six hours.”
Daniel checked the clock.
Michael had taken the bag forty minutes earlier.
They had less than five hours before the only evidence connecting Project Haven, Emma’s identity, and the Novaris deaths could disappear.
Then Emma remembered something.
“The drive has a dead-man transmitter.”
Rachel leaned closer.
“What does that mean?”
“If someone enters the wrong password three times, it sends its location to a secure email.”
Daniel’s phone rang.
An unknown number.
He answered.
A distorted voice spoke.
“Commander Hayes, if you want your daughter and granddaughter to survive the night, come to Vale Mountain Lodge alone.”
The call ended.
Emma heard every word.
“He knows,” she whispered.
Daniel stood.
Rachel blocked the door.
“You cannot go alone.”
Daniel looked at Emma.
For thirty-one years, he had followed rules while the Vale family stayed ahead through fear, money, and corruption.
This time, he would not let them choose the ending.
May you like
“I am not going alone,” he said.
“I am bringing the truth with me.”
