Tertiary Effects Series | Book 3 | Bite of Frost

by Allen, William

  Since the injury was to his right hand, we refrained from shaking and just exchanged nods instead. I could tell Dan was hurting, but too stubborn to kick up a fuss.

  “Nice to meet you,” I replied almost mechanically, and I turned my attention back to Kelli.

  “Kelli, now is not a good time,” I hissed under my breath. “Ya’ll should go home.”

  “But what if there’s nerve damage?” Kelli replied, confusion and worry writ across her pleasant features.

  “Better than lead poisoning?”

  “You think there’s going to be trouble? I’ve got my pistol in my purse this time,” Kelli volunteered that tidbit as she lifted a purse large enough to qualify as a diaper bag in my mind.

  “Yes,” I hissed, looking around with a probing sweep of the room, “but keep it to yourself. My gut is telling me the NG boys they got stationed here are in on it, and their boss is holed up in the security office.”

  “Well, just lock his ass in there,” Kelli huffed.

  “That’s the plan, but he has access to all the video feeds from the hospital. Fortunately, there’s no audio, but he can see everything we are doing and coordinate his buddies coming in from outside.”

  “Shoot,” Kelli muttered, then she looked over at her husband. “What you want to do, honey?”

  “I can still shoot leftie,” Dan admitted with a grimace. “If I can get some Tylenol Three or something like that.”

  I nodded, patting Dan on the shoulder. “I’ll see what I can do. Once this kicks off, I need all of you folks to fall back to the staff lounge, just through those doors and to the right. You’ll see the double doors. We’ve designated that as a shelter, and I’ve got our boys setting up to guard the entry.”

  Wandering over to one of the unoccupied desks, I unslung my pack and removed a small tin from one of the side pockets, thumbed the container open, and shook out a pair of generic ibuprofen and dropped them in a paper cup. It wasn’t Tylenol Three, but they should take the edge off. Then I filled one of the plastic mugs with water from the cooler and carried my offering over to Dan. He chugged the water gratefully after popping the tablets into his mouth. He gave me a murmured ‘thank you’ but Kelli rewarded me with a hug, instead. As she pulled me close, she whispered, “Anybody else we need to watch?”

  “The two ladies in the blue smocks, I think,” I replied. “Nothing concrete, but I think they are plants for the gang. Just keep an eye on them.”

  “Thanks. I’ll let Dan know.”

  “Just watch yourselves,” I admonished, and Kelli gave me one of her impish grins that reminded me of the girl I used to know.

  With that, I moved back to the intake desk, then walked around to find Wade already back, and huddled up in a tense discussion with Dorothy. I waited until the hissed whispers finished, then grabbed Wade.

  “Done?”

  “Yeah. You were right. Dead zone in the cameras.”

  “I need you to fall back with the staff when this goes down. I’m depending on you to cover the door, Wade.”

  “But I can…”

  “Wade, if this goes the way we think it will, you’ll be between Dorothy and the raiders who will likely be looking for hostages,” I reasoned, giving my friend the best incentive I could think of to guard the door into the staff lounge. “Look, this won’t be your first rodeo dealing with bad odds,” I reminded him, “and we need a deputy to lead the civilian volunteers when the shooting starts.”

  “But you’re going to be out here,” he protested.

  “And Sally will have my back,” I shot back. “We trained for this, Wade, and I’m sad to admit, I’m pretty good at doing this job. But you need to tell Dorothy and Marta to keep their pistols handy, and to watch those new housekeepers.”

  The plan we’d cooked up with Sheriff Stringer went pretty much that route already, with just a few tweaks. I’d asked Sally to buddy up with the other newcomer, Kit, so she could be ready if he turned his coat. I hated to put her in that position, but she was simply too good for me to risk asking one of the other deputies. If Kit Cammack stepped out of line, then Sally would end him. Period.

  Wade grumbled, and then went back over to explain the plan to his wife. I knew I could rely on her and Marta to watch Betty and Connie, the two new ladies on the housekeeping staff.

  The three Jasper County deputies had their own orders and I wasn’t in any position to argue with their stated plan to guard both the ER and the concrete and steel reinforced room that housed the hospital’s pharmacy, but I thought their chances against a determined attacking force were very poor. Especially if the National Guard troops joined in on the other side. God, this was shaping up to be a real mess, I thought as I scrubbed at my face in frustration.

  “Bryan, the gate guards just radioed in,” the young LVN manning the radio announced. “They just checked in an ambulance. Got a local coming in with a gunshot wound. ETA thirty seconds.”

  That was my cue, I realized. Time to fish or cut bait.

  I lifted my phone, hitting the send button on the text I’d already drafted. The recipient was Pete Standly, and shortly I was going to find out if I was right or not. If I was wrong, I would be very embarrassed and likely dismissed from my reserve position by Sheriff Bastrop. If I was right, well, even if everything went according to plan, a lot of people were going to die in the next few minutes. And that wasn’t even counting what I’d asked Wade to do for me.

  Two seconds later, the lights went out all over the hospital, plunging the emergency room into darkness before the backup lights flicked on, bathing the large open room in a ghastly red light along the interior walls. Well, that takes care of the cameras. The power leading to the security room was now cut, thanks to Pete, and restoring the connection would take longer than this shindig was likely to last.

  “Okay folks, that means it is time for all of you to make your way to the back of the emergency room in an orderly fashion,” I bellowed, my voice raised over the general hubbub of multiple panicked conversations and exclamations. “Follow Deputy Husband as he leads you to the designated shelter. That means everybody, people. If you are sitting here waiting to see a doctor, well, that’s where the doctors and nurses are going, so get moving.”

  Working with the other escort volunteers, including the newcomer Kit, we got everyone headed in the right direction even as several of the medical staff emerged from the now-darkened exam rooms behind the intake desk and started to the staff lounge and the shelter we’d rigged up in there. After another five seconds, the regular lights clicked back on, and the exodus momentarily slowed. I gave another yell, and the mass of people continued filing out of the exposed emergency room and down the hall to the lounge.

  Sally, as I had asked, stuck to Kit like glue, and gently escorted him away from the other civilians as I saw the three deputies standing at the doorway leading back into the unused portion of the hospital, and then turning towards the hallway leading to the pharmacy room.

  “Come on in, boys,” I called out to them. “We may need your help with this first.”

  Grumbling, the three men stood like statues with their rifles hanging from their slings. They appeared unsure about which way to jump, and I hoped they figured things out if this was more than a run-of-the-mill gunshot victim being hustled in for treatment.

  I heard the approaching siren of the ambulance as it cycled once, then went silent, and I wondered if that was supposed to be some sort of a signal. I shouldered my M4, and looked over at the three deputies. Sally stood to the side, flanking Kit.

  “Ya’ll might want to get ready, deputies.”

  Butterflies were busy breeding in my stomach as questions kept circling my mind. Did I completely misread the situation? Was I ready for a long rest in a nice, padded room? Is it really paranoia if they are out to get you?

  I got my answer when I heard Sally shout, “Put it down!”

  The ensuing crack of a pistol shot in an enclosed space made me start to turn, but then I heard Sa
lly’s voice over the earpiece as she reported, “Target neutralized.”

  That answered one question, I thought as I decided to take a knee to reduce my profile. Standing to meet a charge went out of style about the time the Civil War ended, I decided as I shouldered my carbine again and peering into the sights just as the glassed double doors of the ER entry popped open on the tracks, and armed men started hustling in out of the cold.

  The familiar camouflaged pattern registered briefly in the back of my mind as I started squeezing the trigger, rapidly fanning my shots from right to left. They appeared to wear the same body armor as before, so I focused on shots to the lower extremities.

  After what seemed like an extremely long time, but was probably only a single heartbeat, other shooters around me repeated the pattern but starting on the other side. The flat crack of 5.56 rounds splitting the air filled the air as we pumped rounds into the armed intruders without a thought spared for mercy.

  I counted six men down, and from the moaning and thrashing, two of them somehow appeared to have temporarily survived the onslaught. Amazing how the human body is so resilient, I mused as I promptly delivered two more shots to silence the wounded.

  “Stand down,” One of the other deputies shouted, and I did, taking the time to swap out my half-spent magazine as I rose to my feet. God, that got the old adrenaline pumping, even if the intruders failed to get off a single aimed shot in my direction.

  “What the hell was that, Sergeant Hardin?” I heard one of the deputies call out to me from behind, but I ignored him as I crept across the blood-slicked floor and approached the still open door. I stayed low, bent at the waist but with my head up as I scanned first the inside of the parked ambulance, then the near side. Both the driver’s side and passenger side doors gaped open, as did the rear gate, but there was nobody visible.

  Dropping on my belly, I peered under the bottom of the ambulance for more hostiles, but I saw no one preparing to ambush me on the far side. Duck walking forward, I took a quick peek inside the cab. No driver, and no attendant present, so the real driver and paramedic were most likely dead in a ditch somewhere, and the clock was still ticking.

  “Looks clear,” I announced, then I risked a glance back to see one of the deputies pointing his pistol at Sally, covering her as another approached her with handcuffs ready. Hamlin and Paulson, I realized.

  Taking in the sight, I raised my rifle and aimed at a point midway between the two men as I calmly asked, “What the actual hell do you two idiots think you’re doing?”

  “She shot Mr. Cammack. She will be detained and questioned, as you should be as well. There are rules in place for use-of-force, and you both violated them. Please lower your weapon.”

  The speaker, Hamlin, sounded almost like he was reading from a training manual, but his eyes told a different story. He might have been a good deputy, devoted to protecting the public and all that jazz, but now he was in shock over what had just happened. Forget mounting a last stand to defend the pharmacy. In this state, Deputy Hamlin couldn’t be relied on to guard the kiosk at Sunglass Hut at the mall.

  “What happened, Sally?”

  “Like you said, I was watching Cammack, and as soon as everybody else was looking at the door, he drew down on Deputy Aranda, there. That’s when I fired my weapon.”

  I looked over at the only deputy who wasn’t currently participating in our little drama. He looked more than a little upset.

  “She’s right, Dean. We were all target fixated on the doors, and I looked up just in time to see that little bastard had me dead in his sights.” Deputy Aranda hissed under his breath, then brought his own AR up and centered it on Deputy Hamlin’s head. They were all wearing body armor, and I could tell the stocky deputy wasn’t messing around, as his next words oozed anger. “She hadn’t pulled the trigger, I’d likely be dead at that range. Makes me wonder why he was aiming at me, and not you.”

  Caught in the middle, Deputy Paulson took a step back and made a show of stowing his cuffs. Then he held up his own hands. This was going in a direction his training had failed to cover.

  “Look, we can straighten all this out, now that the threat has been neutralized.”

  I had to laugh, and all eyes swiveled to me.

  “Dude, this is so far from over,” I growled, then lowered my M4 to low ready. “This was the distraction. And by the way, if these guys got past Williams and Ridgeway all kitted up like that, then those NG boys are either in on it, or dead. That look like a paramedic and driver bringing in an injured citizen? Either way, we are supposed to have a string of eighteen wheelers, off schedule, pulling up to the back loading dock any minute now. Any of you guys have eyes on that convoy?”

  As if on cue, I heard the bark of an energetic explosion deeper from deeper into the hospital complex.

  “What was that?” Deputy Hamlin demanded.

  “Somebody blowing the rollup door at the dock, I imagine,” I replied, letting the lie roll off my lips without a hint of embarrassment. “My guess is they’re making a charge for the pharmacy, but hey, what the heck do I know?”

  Before anyone else had a chance to add their own comments, I heard a weak cry from behind the intake desk.

  “Hey, a little help here.”

  I was closest, but my rapidly developing sense of self-preservation meant I took the extra second, laying flat on the floor before risking a peek around the corner. I found Larry, the civilian volunteer, staring back at me. He was clutching a bloody patch on the outer edge of his upper thigh, about four inches from his hip.

  “What are you doing?” Larry managed to ask through a whimper of pain.

  “Making it harder for somebody to shoot me in the face when I sneak a peek,” I replied, waving with my off hand as I kept the Springfield loose in my right. I wasn’t exactly pointing at Larry, but I was keeping my options open.

  Larry shrugged painfully.

  “Guess that makes sense,” he allowed. “You think you can get me some help?”

  “Depends,” I replied with a neutral tone. “If you can explain what you’re doing out here while you should have been back with Brandon and the rest, you know, guarding.”

  I thumbed the Press To Talk, or PTT, button on my radio so Sally, and more importantly, Wade, would hear what he had to say.

  “I was just coming back to find Kit when I saw those guys come piling through the door, and then the shooting started. I tried to lean out to get a shot when I felt like my leg caught on fire. I looked back and saw I was bleeding. I think you can figure the rest.”

  I nodded, and I heard Wade in my earpiece.

  “He did head back your way,” my neighbor confirmed. “Said he didn’t want to let Kit out of his sight. Didn’t trust him, he said.”

  “Well, he’s got a GSW on the upper thigh. I’ll get him loaded on a gurney and headed you way,” I explained to Wade. Studying the layout of the emergency room as a whole, I realized we had a problem even as I hustled over with Sally to grab that gurney.

  The ER was set up with an entryway leading into this wing of the hospital with the typical wide-access doors, and the intake desk was a long, waist high table on caster wheels that broke up what was in essence an extended, dead-end corridor composed of the curtained treatment bays on the left side and the four exam rooms on the right. This was the actual ‘emergency’ part of the room, branching off to the left. To the right, we had another wide passageway that led to the suite of still-maintained operating rooms, then deeper into the now-disused sections of the hospital. The door to the staff lounge was just three doors further down past the split to the corridor, on the left. The staff lounge was carved out of space left between that curve to the left for the ER and led further back on that side of the building. Then, the operating theatres and accompanying recovery rooms took up most of the corridor on the right side. Pat had pointed this out during our earlier walkthrough, but I didn’t grasp the full implications until that moment.

  This main corridor exten
ded further back into the bulk of the hospital, running past the cafeteria before taking a hard right, then leading to the security room before and then the pharmacy. Access to the pharmacy was, by design, easier from the back side of the hospital than through the front, and with the dispensing half-door sealed up tight, the invaders would need to hold all of the corridor down to the ninety degree turn to insure they had enough time and safety to set charges or bring in a burner to breach the bank vault style door.

  Or, as I was realizing in horror, since they needed to push shooters far enough down the corridor to protect their efforts to raid the pharmacy, that would give them a clear shot at anyone outside the door to the staff lounge. That would also allow them to extract their man, or men, from the security room.

  We got lucky that Pete had been willing to listen to me about Corporal Cansler having most likely switched teams, as Pete was the only person still working in the whole hospital who had the knowledge of how to cut the circuits carrying the video feeds. He was also the one who suggested switching off the power as a distraction when he shut down the video. That was sneaky, and I was just glad the older man was on our side.

  Up until this point, I’d been toying with the idea of leaving the pharmacy to the raiders to penetrate and focusing all our efforts on protecting the staff and patients, but now I realized we were in a race to see who could seize that corner of the corridor and hold off the other side. If we held it, we could pick off their men as they tried to penetrate the pharmacy door, and if they held it, then a few shooters could suppress our guards with covering fire long enough for an assault element to get into the lounge for hostages. What would come next would be a footrace.

  We’d bought ourselves a little time with the booby trap I’d asked Wade to set up in the corridor just inside the rolling door at the loading bay. I wish I could claim superior tactical skill, but let’s face it, when there’s only one route the raiders could take through the back of the building, I wasn’t exactly channeling Sun Tsu. And it was originally Pat’s idea anyway. Just one of Mike’s hand grenades, a little bit of fishing line, and a 5 gallon sealed metal jug full of gasoline, styrofoam pellets, and a double handful of ten penny nails just to see if they did anything. The tank was only three quarters full, as we wanted the gasoline to out-gas a bit. I only hoped we didn’t end up burning down the hospital, but that was a risk I was willing to take to protect our people inside.