LV48

by Matt Doyle

  The inner wall is devoid of doors for the first third of its length, which means all I have to do is check on that side for signs of alternative entry points. There’s nothing obvious. The outer wall is mostly given over to private rooms and a couple of consultation rooms, all of which are also locked. Being thorough, I not only test the doors but look in through any windows I come by. Right now, I’m finding nothing but desks, and empty spaces where beds were until we disrupted everything.

  Once I clear the area enclosing the open-plan area, doors start to appear on the inner wall again. The first is locked, but the second is open. I expected that. This, we were told, leads to the floor’s operating theatres, and doesn’t have a lock. Inside is a longer hallway spanning the entire length of the inner section. There are four operating theatres in total, and our instructions are to check two on this side, then the other two when we reach the other side of the square hallway. Both the ones I go into are near identical and may as well have been ripped from TV shows. The medical implements are locked up in drawers, which doesn’t help if we’re right about Doctor Sanderson, and everything is ridiculously but necessarily sterile. The main thing is there are no additional entry points. I spot a basket of what I’m guessing is dirty laundry close to what will be the last theatre I check on the other side, and decide to leave it there for that run.

  Further up the main hallway, I find a locked janitor’s closet, and a few more locked consultation rooms, then hit the left turn to the hallway that leads to the northwest side of the floor. By this time, it’s all feeling a bit rinse and repeat. The only difference up here is a few windows face out towards the other parts of the building you can reach via the hub. Below us is a picturesque courtyard. Most of the windows are solid without any means of opening them, and the ones that do open are too small to fit a person through. The exceptions to these rules are the ones at each end of the hallway and directly in the middle.

  The inner wall contains four alternative entrances to the operating theatre area. In this case, they lead to observation areas, one for each theatre. These are nothing more than small rooms with large platforms at the back that give you a clear view of the adjoining theatre via the large windows built into the walls. Pauline Welch’s room is in the northwest corner, and I give a quick look-in as I pass. Corporal Devereaux seems happy enough with his card game, and I don’t stick around too long, though I do use the small bin in the room for my now empty cup of gross. Locked doors are my friend all the way up until the door to the operating theatre hallway. I enter, just as I did last time, and am unsurprised to find both rooms are fine.

  In the hallway, there’s a metal opening in between the centre theatres. This, as I recall, leads down to the laundry room. The laundry basket to its right sits next to the door to the last theatre I came to when I checked from the other side… Was that always there? If it was up by this door, I’d have seen the laundry chute. Guess I must have misjudged it… I blame the lighting.

  I walk over to the basket and open it up. There are a couple of sets of scrubs at the bottom, but nothing else. On my way back up the hallway, I stop to skim-read the message board fixed to the wall opposite the laundry chute. It’s an old-style thing containing handwritten notes about rota shifts. In a way, I’m glad it’s not a modern touch screen installation. If the staff are as overworked as they claim, they may as well spend the budget on useful things like medical equipment rather than hi-tech message walls. As it is, there’s nothing worth noting on the various pieces of paper.

  I enter the outer hallway once again and continue my rounds. Locked doors remain my constant companion until I finally reach the door to the open-plan area. This time, when I nudge the door open, I walk in.

  I can tell straight away that I may as well have not bothered. I’ve not had to stay in the New Hopeland Hospital before, nor have I had to visit anyone in a ward like this. The whole thing is laid out as I expected, with spaces set aside for beds. But rather than the metal framework and pull-apart blinds you see on vintage TV shows, this is a mix of spaces with no divides, and those with hard-looking cubicle structures identical to the ones you find in a lot of offices. Sure, you can pull something across the front for complete privacy, but rather than a curtain, it’s a reinforced series of plastic plates. In total, I count thirty bed areas along the wall that adjoins the waiting area, and twenty-eight on the wall closest to the operating theatre hallway. Here, the beds are divided in the middle by another manual note board.

  The side walls have a few more cubicles, and the middle of the room is taken up by yet more bed zones, and a couple of desks I’m assuming are set aside for staff. There are no obvious points of entry other than the two doors at either end. It’s all very dull, dark and empty. At least it looks different to the rooms I’ve seen already.

  I walk back out the door I came in through and head back to the desk where Hoove is sitting. “Catch anything on the security cameras?” I ask.

  Hoove shakes his head and looks up from the screen. “Just you walking around and Donal starting his rounds with Nurse Bridges. I hear you two are well acquainted already.”

  I smile. “We spoke earlier.”

  “The way she tells it, it was a bit more than that.”

  “She gave me some attitude, and I gave some back. Nothing too serious.”

  Hoove laughs, and relaxes back into the chair, crossing his arms behind his head. “To be honest, I’m more worried about Donal with her. She was real happy to have him escorting her.”

  “I thought she might be,” I reply, moving around to watch the monitors for a minute.

  “Even suited up like he is, it’s the accent apparently. It gets worse. The cheesy bastard told her the name Anabelle suits her. See if you can guess why.”

  I shrug. “Not a clue.”

  “Because she’s a doll and he wants to possess her.”

  I turn to look at Hoove and, after a few seconds studying him, realise he’s serious. I crack first, but soon enough, we’re both laughing our asses off.

  Finally, Hoove brings us back to reality by asking, “So, did you find anything?”

  “No,” I reply, forcing the laughter back down again. “There are a couple of potential entry points, the windows at the back and maybe the laundry chute between the operating theatres, but we knew about them already. Everything else seems fine. The doors that should be locked are, and the ones that shouldn’t be aren’t. For now at least, we’re fine.”

  “Well, let’s see how long that lasts.”

  I glance down at the monitor and see a shot of just outside the room we have Pauline Welch in. Though we don’t have a clear view of the inside of the room, the angle does allow us to see the edge of the table Corporal Devereaux is presumably still playing cards on. I spot his feet underneath that, crossing and uncrossing as he stretches.

  And something is still gnawing at me.

  I narrow my eyes. “He was quick…”

  “Who was?”

  “Doctor Sanderson. When he checked in on Pauline Welch, he was quick.”

  Hoove pours some soup from his Thermos into the lid, gives it a quick blow, then takes a mouthful. “Of course he was. He’s not likely to try anything while we’re escorting him.”

  “No, but that’s the thing. He…”

  Hoove raises a hand to silence me, and I follow his gaze to Donal O’Brien and Nurse Bridges as they return from their tour of our guests. “Everything okay?” Hoove asks.

  “Seems to be,” Donal replies. He looks down to Nurse Bridges and asks, “Anything you noticed?”

  “Nope. Most of them are resting soundly. One or two are awake and worried, but that’s to be expected.”

  “Okay, good,” Hoove says.

  “Well, I better get back downstairs,” Anabelle says with a yawn. “Long night ahead and all that.”

  Hoove waves her on, and we all watch silently as she makes her way down the hallway to the hub. Once she’s gone, Donal turns to us and asks, “So, what’s goin
g on then? Ya shut up pretty quickly when you saw us coming.”

  “I was just saying that Doctor Sanderson didn’t try anything while he did his rounds.”

  “And like I said,” Hoove replies, “he wouldn’t. Not while we were with him.”

  “Exactly. And when have we not been with him?”

  Both Hoove and Donal go quiet, and when Donal does respond, his voice is low and slow. “Pretty much all the rest of the time.”

  “That’s what I’ve been missing. What we’ve all been missing. If he wants Pauline Welch’s blood, he’ll have already taken it. Tonight, that won’t be his aim.”

  “We’ve put a fucking death sentence on her head,” Hoove growls. “Okay, let’s mix things up a bit. We’ll have two people on the desk at all times and stagger the patrols with the escort runs rather than mix them. And we’ll have two people in with Welch at all times.”

  “So who goes now?” I ask.

  “I’ll do it,” the Captain replies, getting to his feet and downing his soup like most people down beers. “In the meantime, one of you wake Hanson and send her on her patrol. When the next one turns up…” He picks up a piece of paper and reads down the names, then continues, “Doctor Thorndike it says here. When they turn up, hold off on the tour until Hanson’s back. We’ll wait for Caz to finish her tour, then switch me and Devereaux for Hanson and O’Brien.”

  “Got it,” Donal replies, and Hoove starts off on a jog towards the left-hand hall at the back of the room. Donal stretches his arm and flexes the claws on his Tech Shift gear, then says, “I’ll go wake Sleeping Beauty.”

  I’m about to suggest I should do it, but Donal’s obviously been waiting for a moment like this, because he clears the room at speed. With little else I can do, I just sit back and wait for the shocked scream from the room we were supposed to be using as a rest area.

  MY PATROL COMES a little under an hour later. Unlike his two counterparts for the evening, Doctor Thorndike is a kindly old man who is probably a few years past retirement age. Despite his advanced age, he moves quickly and efficiently through the halls and carries out his checks with the minimum of fuss. As a result, we reach Pauline Welch’s room very quickly.

  “Captain Hoover?” he asks, offering a hand to New Hopeland’s ultimate moustache wielder. The Captain nods and accepts the greeting. Thorndike turns to Corporal Devereaux then and adds, “And you are Corporal Devereaux, I understand?”

  “Sure am,” Devereaux replies.

  Thorndike nods and starts checking over the heart monitor. “It is good to see that the police do not have our problems with attracting younger staff. I do believe our youngest staff member is in their late forties.”

  “No way is Nurse Bridges in her forties,” I comment.

  “Nurse Bridges?” Thorndike stops mid-thought and frowns. “This is unusual.”

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “This isn’t one of the regular heart monitors. It’s an older model than we normally use now. Unless…I suppose we could have set this up in case anything happened. It’s certainly more disposable. Though I really should have been told… Unreliable little things, though. Would anyone object if I checked the finger connector?”

  “Go right ahead,” Hoove says, his face taking on a suddenly very serious expression.

  Thorndike reaches down and takes Welch’s hand. He pauses, frowns again, and removes the finger connector.

  Beep…beep…beep.

  We all watch the monitor screen, waiting for it to stop displaying a heartbeat.

  Beep…beep…beep.

  “Her hand is cold,” Thorndike comments. “And her breathing…”

  “Looks fine to me,” Devereaux says. “Steady rise and fall of the chest.”

  Thorndike shakes his head. “Most people breathe with their abdomen when they rest. Not all, mind you, but still.”

  “Check her,” Hoove says.

  Doctor Thorndike slowly peels the bedding down and one thing starts to become clear. When he rolls down the top of Pauline Welch’s hospital gown, it’s confirmed. Strapped to her torso is a small machine simulating the rise and fall of her chest. Doctor Thorndike brings his fingers to the woman’s neck and, after a few seconds, shakes his head. “She’s dead.”

  “How long?” Hoove asks.

  “That is hard to say. Her body is at room temperature already, though.” He raises the fingers he used to check the pulse, revealing a smear of foundation. “Cosmetics. She’s not stiff, which means she’s been dead more than thirty-six hours. If someone has been taking steps to hide discoloration…that shouldn’t happen earlier than the second day. She arrived yesterday, or possibly the evening before as I recall.”

  “Unconscious too,” I say. “Any chance she was dead already?”

  “No, someone would have noticed. She had a procedure, though. Someone must have checked in on her during and after that…”

  All at once, all the lights on the floor cut.

  Chapter Eight

  “DOCTOR THORNDIKE,” HOOVE says, his voice low. “I want you to head to the nearest locked room. Get inside and lock the door.”

  “The doors only lock from the outside,” he replies.

  “I’ll go with him,” Devereaux says. “I can slide the key back under the door after it locks. That should eliminate anyone taking it from us. Assuming we’re the targets, that should stop anyone trying to go for the Doc.”

  “Do it,” Hoove orders. “Go without your torch if you can. I want a test on how hard it’s gonna be to get around without being spotted.”

  Doctor Thorndike and Corporal Devereaux make their way into the hallway, and a little over a minute later, Devereaux returns on his own, his shape barely visible. “Sorry,” he says. “He wanted to go to the staff area rather than a patient room.”

  “How’s it looking out there?” Hoove asks.

  “Too dark. Working without the torches will be difficult.”

  “Good job the HK45s won’t be affected.” Hoove places a hand on my shoulder—which I will claim did not make me jump or squeak—and adds, “It’s unlikely our vampire knows we know about Welch yet. That means he may still be heading this way. Given Welch’s heart monitor is still functioning, it’s likely just the lights that have been cut, so the cameras should still be on. I want you to get to the front desk and rendezvous with Hanson and O’Brien. Try to figure out where Sanderson or whoever else this may be is and see if you can corral him.”

  I nod, even though no one can see me, and say, “Okay. Keep your headphones off as long as possible, though. We can call out if we need to.”

  “Sucks not to have radio contact,” Devereaux says.

  “Too bloody true,” Hoove agrees and gives me a pat on the back. “Get going. Let’s try to finish this quickly.”

  I walk out in silence, and turn right, placing my hand on the wall to feel my way down in the dark. No sense in drawing attention to myself unintentionally. As I make my way down the hallway, I listen intently to my surroundings. Nothing. Yet. My hand finds the corner, and I become grateful I left my arm outstretched a little, or my face would have found it too. Moving quicker, I clear the last section of the hallway and spot the light of the monitor behind the desk, the screen illuminating Hanson and O’Brien’s face a little as they watch.

  I walk over quickly, thankful we’d had the foresight to move the chairs against the walls. I make my way behind the desk and join the huddle. “Anything?”

  “Other than you walking down the hallway?” Hanson asks. “Nada. How’s our unconscious bait?”

  “Dead. For a couple of days apparently,” I reply, keeping my voice low. Hanson and Donal glance at each other and I continue, “Which means it’ll likely be me who Sanderson heads for. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like to find him sooner rather than later.”

  Hanson nods and taps a key on a holo-keyboard, and the view changes to a shot facing another corridor. The night vision isn’t great, but it’s enough to see if anything moves. Hanso
n lingers for a few seconds, then clicks to another shot, this time of the windows at the far end of the building. Next comes the windows further along, then another hallway, and another. When she clicks again, we get a shot of the main desk, the three of us sitting behind it. Something catches my eye out in the room, but it’s gone before I can see what it is.

  Was that a light?

  “Hanson, can you click back to the shot of us again. I thought I saw something in the room, but I couldn’t catch it.”

  “Hold on,” Donal says and twitches a finger. He looks around, then says, “Nothing on my infrared.”

  “There was definitely something,” I state.

  Hanson shrugs. “Well, let’s have a look.” She clicks back to the shot of our room. Nothing on the camera other than us.

  I sigh. “I’m gonna do something. Tell me what you see on screen.”

  I get up and walk forward, my eyes focused on a small green light. When I get as close to it as I can, I lift one finger towards it.

  Hanson snorts out a laugh. “Nice.”

  “Move the camera on,” I say, and within seconds, the light is gone.

  “The cameras aren’t on non-stop, only when they’re on screen,” I say, walking back to the desk.

  “Makes no difference to us,” Donal replies. “We’d only be able to see what’s on screen anyway.”

  “Actually, this is bad,” Hanson says. “At least if we’re right about Sanderson.”