Chapter 3 - The Ghost of the Past
Trevor was whimpering, his phone dropped on the floor, forgotten. Mara had her hands over her ears, praying silently. They had wanted to watch Lily fail, wanted to play high school games in a professional hospital. Now, they were facing real, unadulterated monsters.
One of the mercenaries stopped at the nurse's station. He grabbed Trevor by the hair, forcing him to his knees. The man’s face was covered by a ballistic mask, but his voice was chillingly clear through the thin walls.
"Where is Caleb Ror?" the mercenary demanded.
"R-Room 12!" Trevor sobbed instantly, pointing a shaking finger down the hall. "He’s in Room 12! Please, don't shoot! Take the nurse, take anyone, just let me go!"
Inside the room, Caleb looked at Lily, his jaw clenched. He reached for a heavy metal IV pole, preparing to use it as a makeshift weapon. He was a Navy SEAL; he would die fighting, even if he was outnumbered and outgunned.
But Lily placed a hand on his chest, stopping him.
"You're still recovering," she signed. "If you rip that needle out, your lung will collapse again. Stay behind the door. When I give the signal, you take the second one."
Caleb stared at her, his blue eyes wide. You're going out there?
Lily didn't answer. She reached into her scrub top and pulled out her stethoscope, wrapping the thick rubber tubing tightly around her right hand. She took off her watch, exposing the thin, pale scar on her wrist—the mark of the Sparrow.
She opened the door of Room 12 just an inch and stepped out into the dim red light of the hallway.
"Hey!" Lily called out, her voice loud, clear, and perfectly timid. She raised her hands in the air, acting terrified. "Please! Don't hurt them! I'm just a nurse!"
The mercenary holding Trevor turned, his masked face fixing on Lily. He smiled under his mask. A lone nurse in bright blue scrubs. An easy target.
"Check the room," the lead mercenary ordered his partner, pointing toward Lily.
The second mercenary advanced on Lily, his weapon lowered slightly, confident that a terrified woman posed no threat. He grabbed her by the shoulder, intending to shove her out of the way to clear the room.
That was his final mistake.
The moment his hand touched her shoulder, Lily’s timid demeanor vanished. She dropped low, slipping under his arm. With lightning speed, she whipped the stethoscope tubing around his neck, crossing her arms and executing a flawless, high-leverage chokehold.
The mercenary gasped, his weapon firing blindly into the ceiling—pfft, pfft—as he tried to break her grip. But Lily was like iron. She used his own body weight against him, driving her knee hard into the back of his thigh. He buckled. She twisted, slamming his head violently against the concrete doorframe of Room 12.
The mercenary went limp, knocking out cold. Before he even hit the floor, Lily snatched the suppressed submachine gun from his hands and disarmed his tactical vest, pulling out a flashbang grenade.
The lead mercenary at the nurse's station stared in absolute disbelief. The "too soft" rookie nurse had just taken down a highly trained operator in less than four seconds.
"What the hell?!" the lead mercenary roared, raising his weapon toward Lily.
"Caleb, down!" Lily yelled.
She pulled the pin on the flashbang and hurled it down the hallway.
May you like
A blinding white flash and a deafening CRACK exploded in the confined space. Trevor and Mara screamed, covering their eyes. The lead mercenary stumbled backward, temporarily blinded and disoriented, firing wildly into the walls.
Lily didn't waste a heartbeat. She sprinted down the smoky, red-lit hallway, her scrubs fluttering behind her like a cape of defiance.
