Chapter 7 - Darkness in the Center
The complete darkness that swallowed the 911 center was suffocating. For three long seconds, the only sound was the heavy breathing of six dispatchers and the high-pitched whine of dying computer monitors.
Then, the emergency back-up battery strobes kicked on, bathing the room in an eerie, pulsing amber glow.
"Ethan?" Janet’s voice trembled from across the room. "What just happened to the secondary generator?"
Ethan didn't answer. He reached under his desk, his hand closing around the cool metal handle of the department-issued heavy tactical flashlight stored in his drawer. He unclipped it, clicked the beam on, and swept the white light across the room.
"Everyone stay at your stations," Ethan said, his voice deadly quiet. "Do not move."
Through his headset, which was still running on an internal battery loop connected to his personal radio unit, Cordero’s frantic voice broke through the static.
"Ethan! Ethan, do you copy?! Vance is target—"
The radio line cracked with violent static and died. A local signal jammer had just been activated within fifty feet of the building.
*Clang.*
The sound echoed from the heavy steel access stairwell at the far end of the dispatch floor—the stairwell that led directly to the roof and the backup generator vault.
"Janet, get everyone behind the central server room partition," Ethan ordered calmly, pulling a heavy steel pry bar out of the emergency kit mounted near his desk. "Lock the glass doors from the inside."
"Ethan, you don't have a weapon!" Janet whispered, terror visible in her eyes.
"I have the facility manual and I know this layout," Ethan said smoothly. "Go. Now."
The dispatchers scrambled quietly behind the soundproof, reinforced glass partition of the central server room, sliding the door shut. Ethan stood alone in the amber-lit main floor, holding his heavy flashlight in his left hand and the steel pry bar in his right.
The stairwell door slowly creaked open.
A tall figure stepped into the light of the amber strobes. Rainwater dripped off his dark oilskin jacket onto the linoleum floor. In his right hand, Marcus Vance held a silenced automatic pistol. In his left, he held a heavy tactical knife. His face was smeared with dirt and rain, but his eyes were wide, bright, and completely insane.
"Hello, Ethan," Vance said, his voice dripping with terrifying warmth. "I thought it was time we met face-to-face."
Ethan didn't back down. He stood his ground in the center aisle, keeping his flashlight beam aimed directly at Vance's chest, avoiding his eyes so as not to blind his own peripheral vision.
"You’re trapped, Vance," Ethan said, his voice echoing in the large, quiet room. "The perimeter gate locks automatically when primary power fails. You can't leave this building."
"I don't want to leave yet," Vance smiled, taking a slow, deliberate step forward. His boots squeaked on the wet floor. "You see, Ethan, you’ve been a real pain in my ass all night. You and that little girl. You sitting in your comfy chair with your little headset, playing god with radio signals. I wanted to see what kind of man sits behind the curtain."
"A man who’s going to make sure you never leave this building," Ethan replied coldly.
Vance chuckled, raising the silenced pistol. "You're brave. Dumb, but brave. Where is she?"
"Who?"
"Don't play games with me!" Vance barked, his smile instantly turning into a snarl. "The Jenkins family isn't at the safe house! Kane radioed me before he got flushed! You moved them! Where did you put them?!"
Ethan realized with a sudden jolt of insight: Vance didn't know the safe house assault had failed to secure Mia. Kane hadn't told him the cellar was intact. Vance thought Ethan had rerouted the family to a secondary location mid-crisis.
Ethan used the delusion to his advantage.
"I routed them to a secure federal staging facility twenty minutes ago," Ethan lied smoothly, keeping his tone perfectly flat. "They’re ten miles outside the county by now, surrounded by a dozen armed marshals."
Vance’s jaw tightened. A vein throbbed on his temple. "You’re lying."
"Check your scanner," Ethan said calmly. "Oh, wait. You jammed the frequencies. You’re completely blind, Marcus."
May you like
Vance’s eyes darted around the dark room, a flicker of doubt finally crossing his hardened face. That single second of hesitation was all Ethan needed.
Ethan slammed his hand onto the main facility fire suppression manual override toggle on the pillar next to him.
