The Serophim Breach (The Serophim Breach Series) (12 page)

Dr. Lau left Brandon under the close supervision of the resident and a nurse, and headed for the fifth floor. A quiet voice in her head told her she had missed something.
Obviously,
she retorted. But everything had pointed to shock, even the circumstances of his injury. This thought did nothing to quell the wave of self-doubt that followed close at her heels.

She rounded the corner into the lab and found Thad Kroner bent over a sample, his bald spot prominently displayed. At thirty-eight, he had a round baby face and a body to match. The nurses often giggled to themselves about his ever-present sweat rings and the strange things he packed himself for lunch. But Dr. Lau had never worked with a better lab technician. As she entered, he glanced up and grinned absentmindedly, continuing to work on the biopsy that lay before him.

“Thad, I need you to run some tests for me. Immediately, okay? Blood and tissue, please. He’s exhibiting signs of shock and suffering from physical trauma resulting from an assault. No change in his condition when we administered oxygen or an IV drip,” she said, walking past him and deeper into the lab.

“Okay,” he said without looking up from his work. “You have it?”

She took a small sample of the blood and placed it on a microscope lens before returning to set the vials down next to his elbow.

“Now, please,” she prodded.

Wisps of medical school came back to her as she fitted the lens and adjusted the light on the scope; she remembered lab exercises, dissections, charts, and lectures. None of them were very clear or particularly applicable, but she felt compelled to look at the sample herself. Brandon, or at least his family, was a special case. Still, she had spent so much time over the last few years running on autopilot, she wasn’t entirely confident in her diagnostic skills outside of the usual physical injuries that came limping in to the ER and her clinic.

Peering into the microscope, she called out a little louder, “I’m serious, Kroner. Now.”

His stool scraped the floor, and she pursed her lips, satisfied. Then she frowned. On the slide, Brandon’s blood looked . . . strange. The cells should have been moving slightly, she knew; the red would only jostle around the tiniest bit, and the white would be a little more active. But Brandon’s sample seemed to pulse, like the cells were responding in coordination to some kind of stimulus or current. Almost like blood moved in veins, with a beating heart propelling the motion. And there were no white cells in the sample.

“Double-time, Thad,” she said, then hopped off her stool.

“Yep,” he called from the back of the lab.

She paced near the door for a few minutes, trying hard to remember something from medical school that would help her categorize what she had just seen.

“Hey, Doc,” came Thad’s voice.

“Yeah?”

“Is the patient on any meds? Any drug use?”

“None reported. Why?”

“I’m running a tox screen, and already it’s popping up red. And then there’s—” Thad went quiet.

“What?” she asked anxiously.

“Uhhh . . .”

Dr. Lau gritted her teeth. Despite being one of her best lab techs, Thad tended to get engrossed quickly in results and forget anyone else was waiting for them. Rather than call out for answers from her current position, she headed for the back of the lab.

She found him sitting at a powerful microscope, fiddling with the lens. His brow was furrowed.

“What is it?” she repeated.

“Well, uh . . . it can’t be right, I don’t think,” he stammered. It was unlike Thad to be embarrassed about speculation. He was known for calling lab results before the computers did, and he was right more often than not. Dr. Lau took another step forward to remind him to keep talking.

“Well, there’s something in his bloodstream we don’t want there. That’s obvious. I just can’t figure out . . .” He stopped again.

“Kroner, just tell me what you see. We have to start somewhere,” she growled, exasperated.

“Something is moving in his blood. I mean, moving the blood cells. And from the looks of the tox screen, I think it’s inorganic,” he finished.

“Inorganic,” she repeated.

“Yeah, but not like a drug or something. I mean, something’s moving it, but I can’t see anything that shouldn’t be there. This sample should not be behaving this way. Whatever is in his bloodstream, it looks like it’s . . . in charge. That’s the best way I can put it right now,” he said. He looked at her for a moment, waiting for a response or a challenge, and then turned back to the microscope.

There was no way to know how long it would take Kai or the police to get to her. Sarah remained huddled against the back of her closet, listening hard, watching the dim light from her bedroom window slant more and more sharply under the door. There had been no noise in the house for what felt like hours until a floorboard creaked in Paul’s room behind her just before her cell phone died. She had frozen, terrified, listening for another sound, certain the jogger was still in the house that was once again completely silent. The muscles in her stomach contracted as she thought about what lay at the bottom of the stairs. Lani’s voice, the scream for help, echoed in her head. She covered her eyes and worked hard not to let out a sob.

The silence was finally broken by the grinding of gravel against wheels. Someone was pulling into the driveway. She let out a shaky breath as a substitute for the scream she felt in her whole body and moved carefully onto her hands and knees. Sliding herself along the carpet, she silently begged the house not to creak as she crawled toward the door and edged it open. Her breathing sounded noisy to her ears; she was on the edge of hyperventilating, sucking quick breaths through her nose in an effort to hold back the cries.

She poked her head out of the closet. The room was almost dark now, with the sun setting out over the ocean, and the sharp lines and defining details receded into terrifying shadows. Staring straight ahead, she waited for motion. Outside, the gravel crunched louder now, and she heard the light squeak of brakes. Desperate for her brother, she crawled out from behind the closet door and toward her bedroom window, where she raised herself up enough to look out. A big white pickup that did not belong to Kai sat in the driveway.

A male voice said something she could not hear clearly and she nearly collapsed into tears. Mike emerged from the driver’s side and walked around to the back of the truck, where he began unloading crates onto the gravel. With the window shut, he might not hear her call for him, and anyone in the house certainly would. But she couldn’t bring herself to wait alone any longer, and so she dropped back onto her hands and knees and crawled for the bedroom door.

The hallway outside her room was empty when she peeked out. She stretched out onto her stomach and pulled herself toward the stairs, moving as carefully as she could. The bottom floor came into view; she saw a heavy pool of liquid and the top of Lani’s head, unmoving. Silently, she let the tears fall and her body heave with the sobs she could not let out. There was still no sign of the jogger, so she pressed herself against the wall and crept down the stairs, keeping her eyes off the floor.

She stopped at the bottom step and peeped her head out to check the hall to the front door. Lani’s body remained in her peripheral vision, a mound on the floor. The front of Mike’s truck was visible through the window next to the front door, and she could see Heather sitting in the front seat, her head bowed over and her face lit by the light of her phone. Sarah wanted to scream for them, but she was still inside the house and far from their help if the jogger were in the kitchen or the den.

From her current position, she could only see the front left side of the room where she had been sitting for most of the day, watching MTV. She realized that to get out to rescue, she would have to go past the room, without knowing what waited there. Outside, Mike slammed the truck bed closed, and Sarah knew she had to move.

She stepped slowly out into the hallway, her back pressed against the wall. Sidestepping so she could keep an eye on the kitchen, she placed her feet gingerly on the floor around the object that covered most of it. She was more than five steps from the door and fully exposed when he came into view.

The jogger’s shirt had been yellow. A grisly bib of dark blood had turned most of it brown. He was kneeling in the middle of the den, his head tilted back, mouth hanging open. She was frozen in place, even as she realized that his eyes were open, glaring up and forward. His throat made a sickening gurgle as he breathed, his chest expanding and contracting in an off-kilter rhythm. But he didn’t move. He looked like someone in a trance.

Mike’s door slammed shut, and the truck engine fired up. Sarah saw the jogger’s left hand twitch violently just as she moved to take another quiet step forward. She set her foot in blood and slipped, falling forward. All at once, she lost control. The hysterical screams came ripping out of her chest as she scrambled toward the door, crying for Kai, for Mike, to wait, to stop, to help.

She reached the doorway and slipped again, the soles of her shoes now slick with her friend’s blood. Every inch of her body tensed for the impact of the jogger, and the pain.

“Mike! Mike!” she cried frantically, flinging the door open and stumbling out onto the porch.

She saw him lean over his steering wheel and squint in her direction. The driveway was washed in red light as he put on his brakes. Pushing herself up, she ran for his truck, scrambling down the stairs to the driveway. Mike parked the truck and got out just as Sarah reached Heather’s door and yanked desperately at the handle. Heather’s eyes were wide as she opened the door.

“Sarah, what’s wrong?”

Still waiting for the collision, the attack, the tearing, and the screaming, Sarah climbed over Heather into the truck cab, crying uncontrollably.

“We have to go; we have to get help!” she screamed.

“Kiddo, what happened?” Mike asked, his eyes on the open door.

“Lani—she’s dead, she’s inside, and he killed her!”

Just then, a horrible wail rolled out of the gaping front door, echoed by Sarah’s in the truck. Heather’s body tensed, and Mike’s eyes widened as the sound died out, leaving only a sense of terror hanging in the air.

“He’s still in there! Let’s
go
!” Sarah begged.

Before Mike could answer, the jogger appeared at the doorway, his features contorted in rage. He let out a bloodcurdling shriek and beat his own fists against his face and head. Mike stepped out from behind his door, a look of horror and fury coming over his face.

“Please, Mike!” Sarah shouted.

Next to her, Heather locked the door and pushed herself away from the window, terrified. She took her eyes off the jogger for a second and called out, “Dad!”

Mike seemed not to hear. He stepped forward into the driveway just as the jogger leaped out from the doorway and rushed at the truck. The headlights illuminated his condition as he charged, but he was moving too fast for Mike to respond to the grisly sight of blood covering the man’s face and shirt. The jogger was on him in seconds, raking splintered fingernails across Mike’s face and neck and snagging a hand on his shirt collar, the attacker’s momentum throwing them both to the ground. Mike landed hard on his hands and knees, his shirt collar ripping away as the jogger slid past the truck in the loose dirt and gravel. Almost immediately he was clawing at the ground and Mike’s legs as he scrambled like an animal to regain his footing. Heather screamed for her father as he stumbled back against the front edge of the truck, dazed.

“Get up!” Sarah yelled.

He turned to look at her and blinked slowly, bewilderment plain on his face. An angry welt was already swelling under his lip, and thin red lines ran across his cheek and neck where he had been scratched. Only a few feet away, the crazed man was scrambling forward, his eyes locked on Mike, who sat in shock on the ground. Sarah felt her mind clamp down over any instinct but survival, and she slid over into the driver’s seat and started the truck. The roar of the engine made Mike flinch, and then he jumped up to his feet.

“Wait!” Heather cried, wrapping her arms around Sarah and pulling her away from the wheel. Her father’s eyes had finally cleared; he yanked the driver’s side door open and leaped into the truck, shoving Sarah aside and pulling the door closed behind him. On the driveway before them, the jogger threw himself at the hood of the truck, mouth open and bellowing, as Mike slammed it into reverse and backed down the driveway at full speed. The crazed man grasped at the windshield once before he bounced off the hood and crashed to the ground. He rolled to his feet almost instantly, sprinting after them and grasping at the air until the tires kicked up too much dust and he became only a shadow disappearing into the dusk.

~

The last glow of the sun was fading behind the clouds as Jones sped down the highway. Paul sat quietly in the passenger seat, his hands wrapped around his phone and wedged between his knees. Sarah had not answered his calls, and he was repeatedly getting a busy signal from 911. They were having trouble getting anything on the radio, and the few local stations they picked up were playing languid ukulele tunes or oldies. The disparity between the music and their mood was dizzying.

“Right here,” Paul said.

Jones answered quickly, “I know.” He took the corner hard, swinging into the driveway and fishtailing on the dust and gravel.

Paul leaned forward trying to get a look at the house as they approached. Every window upstairs was dark, but the ones downstairs were tinged slightly by the faint yellow light from the motion sensors on out back. Rolling to a stop near the front, they saw the open front door like a puncture wound in the house. Paul jumped out of the truck.

“Sarah?” he called, loping up toward the door. There was no answer. Jones turned the truck off as Paul took two long steps into the house and skidded to a halt. A strange choking sound caught in his throat as he stuck a hand out to steady himself. On the floor of the hallway lay Lani’s body, her limbs thrust out at wild angles, stagnant pools of blood displaying footprints, slip marks, the spatterings of struggle. Her eyes were open, glassy, and unseeing.