Chapter 9 - The Cold Slab
I didn't turn off my headlights. I drove the Subaru straight up the concrete ramp of the loading dock, slamming the front bumper directly into the side of the Sprinter van.
The impact rocked the van on its axles, knocking one of the tactical guards off his feet.
The second guard instantly drew a suppressed sidearm from his hip, but I didn't give him the angle. I kicked my door open, lunged low with the heavy steel cryo-flask swung like a sledgehammer, and cracked it across his kneecap.
The guard went down with a muffled grunt, his gun skittering across the oil-stained concrete.
The first guard scrambled to his feet, pulling a taser from his vest, but I charged him, driving my helmeted shoulder into his gut and slamming his head back against the van’s steel pillar until he went limp.
Chest heaving, I spun around to the gurney.
The blue vinyl bag was zipped tight. A laminated toe tag flapped in the night breeze: DOE, JANE - MARINA DOCK 4.
With trembling hands, I grabbed the heavy plastic zipper and yanked it down.
The face staring up at me under the amber lights was cold, gray, and undeniably my mother.
The wrinkles around her eyes, the small birthmark on her left cheek, the silver hair she refused to dye—it was Evelyn. The real Evelyn.
"I'm sorry, Mom," I whispered.
I grabbed her stiff, ice-cold right hand, pulled her thumb out from the curled fist, and pressed it hard against the glass scanner of the cryo-flask.
A high-pitched tone beeped twice.
The scanner light flashed green.
The heavy pneumatic seal of the thermos hiss-vented a plume of freezing vapor, and the locking ring rotated open.
Inside, resting in foam cutouts, were two identical auto-injectors.
One was labeled with a green band: ANTIDOTE - ACTIVE.
The other was labeled with a red band: CARRIER - REVERSE.
Beside the injectors was a laminated index card handwritten in my mother’s unmistakable, sharp penmanship:
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MARK: IF YOU ARE READING THIS, ONE OF US HAS TO CHOOSE WHO DIES FIRST. THE BOY, OR YOUR SISTER.
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