Becoming (Core Series Book 1) Page 7

  “What now?” Jason asked, looking at William.

  “Olivia will send someone out to inventory your office, and then we’ll be back so you can confirm if anything is missing. For now...I see the nurse coming. You just rest, and we’ll talk later this afternoon,” he said. He stood up and took Susan’s hand in his own. They stood together at the foot of the bed.

  For a moment, Jason envied Mathews—for his beautiful wife, for his confidence in himself and his command of every situation.

  “I hope that you feel better soon, I will inform the team you will be in later this week. Core will be disappointed, but she will get over it” Susan said.

  The nurse entered the room then. It was the pretty, comforting one who had been there when he opened his eyes. Jason nodded in confirmation as his thoughts drifted back to the mysterious hooded figure.

  “If you remember anything else, please keep remembering it.” William chuckled. Susan punched him lightly on the shoulder.

  “Don’t joke about it, William,” she scolded playfully.

  “Ah! It’s fine, Susan. I am sure you will give him good grief on my behalf.”

  Jason smiled at their affection. He wondered if he would ever know someone so well.

  The nurse scribbled on his chart and took a syringe out of her pocket. Her deodorant filled the room.

  “Talk to you soon,” he called as Susan and William left the room, hand in hand like newlyweds.

  “Playful couple,” the nurse commented. Jason noticed her name tag. “Nurse Becky Peterson,” it read. She stood next to the bed on his left, injecting the clear fluid into his drip.

  He felt the cold as the fluid entered his veins. Moments later, the soothing effect of the sedative washed over him. His headache began to disappear into the background. Tiredness washed over him as waves wash onto the shore; his breathing became slower, his eyelid blinked heavily, and then closed.

  “Yeah...they make a great couple,” he managed to slur before sleep captured him. All his worries and cares just faded away. Thoughts of a mysterious, alluring, blue eyed girl slowly entered his dreams. His heart rate went up slightly and breathing got laboured and then settled as a smile spread across his face….

  Nurse Becky smiled and pushed the button to lower the bed flat. She tucked the sheets around him and left the room.

  Escape

  Jason opened his eyes to grey daylight illuminating the room; a persistent beeping noise blared from his mobile phone. The air smelled of disinfectant. He was still drowsy from the sedative—he felt like a weight was slowly pressing his lungs into his spine.

  He opened his good eye and peered at the day, licking dry lips. Outside, rain was falling in a steady cascade. He wondered how long he had been asleep this time.

  The television was on—muted—although the picture was blurry. After shaking his head and rubbing his eyes, he could finally make out a fuzzy picture of Core’s island. With arms waving, the hooded figure of Core jumped up and down on the television screen, trying desperately to get his attention. He quickly found the remote control and increased the volume. The beeping noise ceased.

  “Jason!” Core yelled. “You have to get out now! They are coming for you. I can’t hear or see you, but I know you can hear me! They are in the building already—get your ass out of bed!”

  “What?” Jason mumbled. Adrenaline surged through his veins, slowly bringing him to alertness.

  “I can guide you out, answer your mobile!” Core shouted with a sharp edge to her voice. His phone rang, a muffled sound. It was in the drawer next to the bed.

  “Hello?”

  “Jason, get out of there please! Clothes on now!” Core screamed into the phone, her voice commanding and pleading all at once.

  “Okay! Okay!” Reality flowed in stronger as he peeled the monitor cables from his arms and fumbled for his clothes, which were in the drawer where his phone had been. The drip in his arm was painful to pull out, but he bit his lip and suffered through.

  “How did they find me?” he asked.

  “I don’t know! Just follow my direction,” she said.

  The picture on his phone changed to a map of the floor he was on. A big yellow arrow pointed down the hall to his left. Jason finished tying his shoelaces and jumped out of the bed.

  “Agh!” His legs collapsed under him and he fell to the floor. Jason groaned as he struggled to stand. His legs scrabbled uselessly beneath him.

  “Get out! Get out!” she screamed in his ear. He used the bed as a crutch, got to his feet, and wobbled slowly to the door.

  “Move when I tell you to move, and do not stop! Plug in your headset—you will need both hands free.” He obeyed without hesitation, although his hands shook as he plugged in the headset. Then he hit the key-lock and dropped the phone into his pocket. “I activated a heart attack alarm in the adjacent room,” Core’s voice flowed into his ear. “Wait for the nurses to run past. There is a stairwell that leads to the basement at the end of the hall.”

  Alarms sounded from the room to his right. Moments later, several nurses ran past Jason’s door. “Go, go now!” Core urged him forward. “Be quick, they are already coming up the elevator.” Jason opened the door and glanced to his right. The elevators glared at him from the end of the hallway, and an ominous anxiety rose from deep inside his stomach. With one hand, he grabbed his name plate from the door. Then he started to run as fast as he could past the nurses’ station.

  Nurse Becky emerged from a side door and gaped at him as he ran toward her, struggling to stay upright. “Mister Bancroft, you must get back to your bed now!” she said loudly, the pitch in her voice rising as he came near.

  He was already starting to breathe hard from the strain. “I must get out of here,” he said between breaths, propping himself with one arm against the wall. “They are coming for me.... Core, which way!” he said. Nurse Becky looked down the hall, her face crinkled in a frown.

  “One door down on your left,” Core said in his ear. The elevator bell sounded ominously behind him, announcing the arrival of death. “Now! Go, go!” Core shouted, her voice high and sharp. Jason’s panic gave his heart a squeeze. He leapt into action, and in two strides was at the door. “Mister Bancroft!” Nurse Becky cried. She grabbed onto one of his arms.

  The door was heavy, but he managed to get it open just as the men stepped out of the elevator. Jason ducked into the stairwell with Nurse Becky hanging onto his arm, trying to pull him back. He only hoped that the men had missed his escape, in all the confusion.

  “Jason, move! You have four floors to cover, and they are going to find your empty room in about thirty seconds.”

  The adrenaline flowed through his veins, quickly clearing the effects of the sedative. Jason took two strong strides toward the stairs before he felt a tug on his arm.

  “Mister Bancroft! If you don’t return to your room immediately, I will have to call security!” Nurse Becky yelled, her face red with anger.

  “Please do, Nurse Becky! There are dangerous men in the hospital. Also, contact Lieutenant Mathews. Tell them...tell them...that the men who attacked me are here,” he said firmly, and used both arms to push her away. She shook her head in desperation and terror, and then ran to call security.

  “They found your room,” Core said, showing him the feed from his room’s security cameras. The men trashed the room, looking for any possessions or clues to where he might have gone. Jason began to step lightly down the stairs, glancing at his phone as he kept the other hand gripped tight on the stair rail. She switched to the hallway camera when they left. Two of them turned towards the elevator and the other one towards the stairwell. “No doubt they will search room to room.”

  Jason began to take the stairs two at a time, marvelling at how quickly he had recovered. “What is the plan? By now Becky has called security....”

  “The guards are mobilizing! One is coming up the stairs—take the next door,” she said smoothly; the tone of her voice calmed him slightly. He o
pened the door and walked through just as the sound of footsteps on stairs began to echo around him.

  The hall was empty, apart from a few gurneys and food trolleys that stood next to the wall. Jason started running towards the door at the end of the hall.

  “Stop! There is a guard outside the door.”

  Jason stopped and stood stock still.

  “Turn right into the laundry. You can ride the chute down to the basement.”

  At that moment, a guard opened the door at the end of the hall. “Hey you!” he shouted when he saw Jason. “Stop right there!” He approached with slow, smooth steps, as though Jason was a wild animal, and would scare easily.

  Jason looked back at the stairwell door, breathing hard in exasperation, expecting the other guard to appear at any moment. “I can’t do that!” he cried desperately. “The men who attacked me are up there!” He wiped sweat from his forehead, breathing hard with panic.

  Core whispered the instructions in his ear. “Take the door to your left, which opens to a ward. It adjoins two other wards—to its right and left. Take the door on the right...hopefully the guard will go left. Go!”

  Jason ducked into the door, shrugging his shoulders at the guard, who started running toward him.

  He ran to the connecting door, almost falling over a bed in his rush. He closed it just before the guard entered the room behind him.

  “The laundry chute across the hall!” Core urged him on. He dodged through the hall. From the corner of his eye he saw the patients in their rooms, oblivious. Most were sleeping.

  The guard opened the door behind Jason and entered the ward as Jason reached the door to the hall. “Quickly—the two from your room are almost there. Cross now or it’s over!” Her voice was alive with anguish, and the intensity of her emotion gave him a boost of energy. He opened the door and ran across the hallway, dashing into the laundry room as the hallway door burst open. He was just in time to see two of the black-garbed men run into the hall. They had their guns out.

  “Second floor ward E!” one said in a haunting voice, firing as he ran toward the laundry door. A cloud of black mist formed around the men and, moments later, two snarling wolves appeared from the mist.

  The sight of their sharp, glistening teeth, their lolling tongues, flashed in Jason’s mind as he scrambled into the laundry chute and dropped.

  Cold rose in his chest, and his mind felt numb as he fell through the dark, narrow chute. I hope there is something soft to land on... he thought. He bounced off the side of the chute one—twice—on his way down, and his banged elbows and shoulders screamed at him. The chute then made a forty-five degree turn, nearly knocked his wind from his lungs. Jason tried to gasp but could not—he thought his head might decide to explode—every heart beat sent black spots scurrying across his vision.

  Moments later, the walls of the chute disappeared, and Jason was falling through air. Then he crashed into thick, densely-packed sheets. The smell of dirty sheets gagged him as he stared up at the rising sides of the laundry trolley.

  “Son of a bitch!” he shouted, holding his head. “That hurt like hell. Agh, my head! Are you still there? Core?” he asked. He squinted and plunged his hand in the laundry pile for the earpiece, which had popped out on impact. He found it only a couple of panic-filled seconds later.

  “Jason! Are you there...? Jason?” Core asked in a wheezy voice. What if there was no laundry trolley? What if he is bleeding on the floor? Anguish built inside her mind and terrible scenarios rushed through her, each one worse than the last. “Jason!” she screamed in agony.

  “I’m here...I’m here, what now?” He breathed a sigh of relief and pulled at the end of one of the sheets. The words “Brisbane Royal Hospital” were embroidered on the edges.

  “Get moving, they will be following you down the chute any second!”

  He climbed out of the trolley and grabbed a white overcoat that lay on a table. Then, he pushed the trolley out from under the chute. That will give them a bit of a surprise, he thought and smiled broadly. He swung the overcoat onto his shoulders on as he left the collection area.

  The laundry room was filled with row upon row of silver washing machines. All were currently in operation.

  He felt some of the panic subside “I have an idea. I am at the Brisbane Royal Hospital, right? There is a train station right across the street. Where is the nearest exit?” He peeked out of the laundry room door.

  The hall was empty. An emergency exit was down the hall to his right; further down were the doors that lead into the main entrance to the hospital

  “Should I use the main entrance or the emergency exit?” He slipped out of the laundry area and ran close to the wall, looking back and forth for any sign of approaching men. A blood-curdling howl erupted from the laundry room as the wolves’ soft bellies found the hard concrete floor. He snickered like a girl.

  “The emergency exit is better; it leads to a side alley that will take you across the street to the subway,” she said.

  Jason grabbed the nearest fire extinguisher and struck the emergency exit door with the bottom of the extinguisher. The glass lock on the door handle broke free with a loud bang, spewing glass in all directions. The door swung open. He flipped the extinguisher over, grabbing it by the bottom, and swung it with all his might, hitting the valve against the floor. The extinguisher went ballistic. It flew out of his hands, spewing clouds of white dust in its path. It ricocheted off the walls in all directions. In no time, the entire hallway was completely engulfed in a white cloud of smoke.

  “Awesome!” Core shouted as Jason dove out into the alley. His mouth tasted like dirt, from the extinguisher, but there were worse things.... The side alley had a couple of garbage bins standing next to the wall, and the street was filled with puddles. It was still raining hard—the pelting rain quickly drenched Jason and immediately washed away any residue from the extinguisher.

  He ran to the main street. The clouds overhead were deep purple, and there was no sign of letting up. This much rain in such a short period was going to cause havoc in the city.

  “You’ve made it. Get to the subway please,” she pleaded, her voice hoarse with emotion. He glanced behind him down the alley, which was still empty.

  “This was close,” she whispered. She felt herself relax at his safety, felt the anguish resolve. The gloom she had sketched for a future alone, without Jason, subsided. She wondered how she would live if something happened to him, and he not even knowing how she felt.... He could disappear without ever knowing her.... The thought made her cringe.

  Jason crossed over. The cool, busy subway station was a welcome relief. “Take the south bound train, but don’t go home—that is the first place they will look for you.”

  “Where should I go? I don’t have friends in this city.” Jason looked around the busy building and pushed past some students who stood in a cluster near the ticket line.

  “A new train station has just opened in Richland. Go there, take bus four-sixty to Browns Plains. Come to the facility—you will be safe here.” Her voice had returned almost to normal—it had a note of relief in it, which washed like fresh clean water over his soul.

  “Good idea.... And, Core?”

  “Yes Jason?” Her voice was taut, expectant.

  “Thank you for saving my life,” he said softly.

  “You are welcome.... But don’t thank me yet, it’s not over!” she replied in jovial tones. Jason smiled.

  He walked to the ticket booth and waited in line. There were hundreds of people in the station. He blended in with the crowd, as many had white overcoats on—most of the hospital staff would use this station. He smiled and tried to keep his head down as he looked from side to side.

  A mother and her two young children stood in the queue ahead of him. The children were talking loudly, and the woman tried to shush them under her breath. They would be quiet only a moment before they started fidgeting and playing with one another again.

  “How did you
know about them?” he asked Core, once he felt that the knot in his stomach had completely disappeared.

  “I monitored all hospital and parking lot cameras, and watched for anyone that matched the description you gave the police. They just appeared in the parking lot—one moment the frame was empty, and the next they were walking towards the entrance.” Her voice sounded puzzled.

  “What do you mean they just appeared?” he asked as softly as he could. He tried to look as normal as possible while scanning for any sign of the men. The queue got shorter.

  “I ran facial recognition on anyone in camera frame. The camera was configured for thirty frames per second. They appeared in the aspect of one frame, and they came out of nowhere. It’s not like they walked around a corner or got out of a car—if they had, I would have seen it.”

  “Well, I guess that is not as crazy as my wolf-attack story,” Jason conceded. “William must think I am loony....” The counter to his right opened. “Hold on,” he said. To the older woman behind the counter, he said, “A ticket to Richland station, please?”

  “That’ll be six-eighty, mate,” she said. He handed her a ten dollar note, and accepted the change and ticket. “Thank you, ma’am,” Jason said. He smiled at her and slipped his ticket in the pocket of the overcoat he had taken as he turned away and walked towards the stairs. “Okay, I got the ticket,” he said to Core as he watched his surroundings.

  Music played from speakers overhead as hundreds of people went about their daily business, oblivious to his flight.

  “Great! Now make your way down to the platforms...I hope that this is now over,” she replied. Her voice sounded relaxed.

  Jason walked down the stairs to the platform, where he sat down as far away from the entrance as possible. “There are a lot of people here, I should be able to blend in without a problem,” he said. All around him were hordes of people: talking on mobile phones, sitting and watching the other end of the tunnel, walking up and down the platform waiting for the train.... The wind was cool and had a faint smell of diesel and axle grease. The acrid scent activated the headache that had been pounding behind his temples ever since he struck the side of the laundry chute.