Chapter 6 - We barricaded ourselves inside the isolation room.I pushed a metal cabinet against the door.
Sarah shut the blinds.
Evan hid beneath a bed.
Jax stood beside me, completely still.
Then came footsteps.
Slow.
Measured.
Three steps.
Pause.
Three steps.
Pause.
Someone knew exactly where we were.
“Officer?”
The voice came through the door.
Dr. Voss.
“Let's not make this difficult.”
I drew my weapon.
“Open the door.”
He laughed.
“You already know that's not how this works.”
“Where are the children?”
“Safe.”
“Where?”
“Closer than you think.”
I looked at Evan.
The boy's face had gone blank.
Voss continued.
“You have been given a remarkable amount of information tonight.”
“More than you intended?”
“No.”
The answer surprised me.
“I intended all of it.”
Jax growled.
“Why?”
“Because I needed you to believe you were chasing me.”
A pause.
“You're not.”
I stared at the door.
“What are you saying?”
“You've been chasing the wrong monster for nine years.”
My mind raced.
Nine years.
Exactly how long I had worked with Jax.
Why mention that?
Voss said:
“Ask your dog what he remembers.”
The door suddenly opened.
Nobody stood outside.
Just an empty corridor.
Jax moved forward.
He sniffed.
Then looked at me.
He wanted out.
I stepped into the corridor.
A small projector clicked on.
A video appeared on the wall.
Nine years earlier.
A much younger Jax.
A training facility.
I recognized the location.
My first K9 assignment.
But something was wrong.
In the footage, Jax was standing beside another handler.
Not me.
The other handler looked familiar.
I stared.
Sarah whispered:
“Who is that?”
I couldn't answer.
The man turned toward the camera.
His face was unmistakable.
Dr. Elias Voss.
Not in a lab coat.
In a police uniform.
My breathing stopped.
The video continued.
Voss was younger.
He stood beside Jax, speaking to another officer.
Then a timestamp appeared:
MARCH 14, 2017
Nine years earlier.
I stepped closer.
The footage showed Jax being transferred.
The receiving officer was me.
I remembered that day.
Or thought I did.
But the video showed something I had never been told.
Jax had been taken from Voss after an operation went wrong.
The operation involved missing children.
The children had been recovered.
One had died.
The report had been sealed.
I remembered none of it.
The video cut.
A second scene appeared.
Voss entered a room carrying a file.
He placed it on a table.
The file label:
PROJECT JAX
My skin prickled.
Jax stared at the screen.
Then suddenly he barked.
Not at Voss.
At one particular image.
A photograph.
A little girl.
Maybe six years old.
Standing beside a red door.
I recognized the stuffed dinosaur in her hands.
It was green.
Just like Evan's.
The image changed.
The girl's name appeared.
MAYA COLLINS.
Evan suddenly screamed.
“That's my sister!”
I turned.
“What?”
“She was here.”
“When?”
“Before me.”
“Where is she?”
He started crying for the first time.
“Dr. Voss said she was the first one.”
Sarah knelt beside him.
“The first what?”
Evan looked at me.
“The first child Jax saved.”
The corridor went silent.
Then the speaker above us clicked on.
Voss whispered:
“And now we're going to find out whether he'll save you too.”
A door at the end of the hallway opened.
Beyond it was a staircase leading down.
May you like
Three levels.
Exactly as Evan had said.
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