Chapter 20 - The Pursuit Through Norfolk
The thick, stinging white fog rolled across the linoleum, blinding the incoming contractors as they breached the front doors through the shattered glass. Their tactical flashlights cut through the chemical haze like pale yellow swords, illuminating swirling clouds of vapor but failing to find a target.
"Down the hall! Go!" Ethan yelled, keeping one arm around my waist while his other hand held his Sig steady, firing two rapid suppression rounds into the ceiling tiles near the front entrance to keep the advancing operators pinned behind the door frame.
Ghost led the charge, his paws finding immediate traction on the slick floor as we sprinted past the examination rooms toward the heavy steel-reinforced door of the surgical prep area.
"They're bypassing the lobby! They're hitting the exterior alley!" I shouted, hearing the heavy thud of combat boots hitting the concrete outside the side windows of the kennel block.
"They brought a perimeter team to cover the alley," Ethan said, slamming the heavy steel prep room door shut behind us and throwing the thick deadbolt into place just as a burst of automatic gunfire chewed through the wooden doorframe inches from his shoulder.
The prep room was small, windowless, and smelled faintly of surgical soap and autoclave steam.
"There's no back exit here except the roof hatch!" Ethan said, spinning around to check the ceiling access panel we had used weeks ago during the first attack.
"We're not going to the roof," I said, moving swiftly toward the large stainless-steel hydro-therapy tub used for bathing large dogs. "When I renovated this building, the contractors didn't just install standard plumbing. The hydro-tub drains into a secondary industrial grease trap that connects directly to the old municipal steam-tunnel network beneath Norfolk."
Ethan stared at me, a grim, appreciative smile breaking through the tension on his face. "You put a secret escape route into a veterinary clinic?"
"When you spend years running from black-ops syndicates, Lieutenant, you don't trust local zoning laws," I snapped, grabbing the heavy wrench from the maintenance hook on the wall and leaning over the hydro-tub.
With three furious turns of the wrench, I unbolted the heavy brass drainage grate at the bottom of the tub, tossing it aside with a loud metallic clatter. Below the drain sat a wide, dark drop-shaft lined with corrugated iron piping, wide enough for a man to crawl through—or a seventy-pound Belgian Malinois.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
The heavy steel door behind us groaned as the contractors outside slammed a tactical sledgehammer against the lock, sending shockwaves through the reinforced concrete walls. The hinges were holding, but they wouldn't last another thirty seconds against hydraulic breaching tools.
"Ghost, down!" Ethan commanded, pointing toward the open drainage shaft.
The Malinois didn't hesitate. He dropped his head and slid smoothly into the dark iron pipe without a sound.
"You next, Madison," Ethan said, his hand resting firmly on my shoulder, pushing me toward the opening.
"Not without you," I said, shaking my head fiercely.
May you like
"I'm right behind you. Go!" Ethan ordered, his voice brooking zero argument.
I dropped into the shaft just as the heavy steel prep room door gave way with an ear-splitting screech, crashing inward as the black-clad contractors poured into the room.
